Sunday, March 13, 2022

A Commonsense Principle and its Mechanism

Suppose someone tells you - "Give me some money". Your mind says - "If I give him money from my wallet, the money in my wallet will decrease".

This has to strike you (as a piece of commonsense) if you think of giving money from your wallet.
Now here, 'give' and 'decrease' are the related key concepts in understanding this.

Commonsense principle behind this : 
Belonging / Owning are primal to attribute. In other words, attribute is possessed by (belongs to or is owned by) the "attributee". 
E.g. - This wallet is brown. This is an attribute of the wallet. So, the colour belongs to the wallet. Why is this statement significant? Because, if something happens to the colour, there will be an effect on the 'wallet's possessing of the colour', or in other words, on the wallet. So if I give money from my wallet, there will be an effect on the money possessed by the wallet / the wallet's possessing of the money (or in other words, 'on the wallet').

How does this above principle play a role in the mechanism of the working of this "commonsense" in the visual and linguistic machinery cases?
Going by the visual machinery : When we see or visualize money in a wallet to deal with this situation, we observe with our vision, 'the wallet and the money' but there isn't a conspicuous, explicit, vision-vocabulary for the 'insideness' (/possession/belonging/ownership). It is subtle, quick and "non-material in recognition". When we set our eyes on the scene, its a direct-impact-visual-data - that there is money in the wallet. The insideness is not as explicitly or blatantly recognized by the vision machinery, as are the wallet and the money notes, just by themselves. So the 'attributee possessing or owning the attribute' remains hidden teasingly this way, which if registered would enable the striking of the implication that giving money would decrease money IN THE WALLET.
Going by the linguistic machinery : Buts that's not the case with the analogous linguistic machinery. In language, there is an explicit mention of the insideness (of the money in the wallet) either by use of the words 'is inside the' or 'is in the' or whatever. So the 'insideness' is a piece of visual (subtle) commonsense/implicitness (the "attributee possessing the attribute), but linguistic explicitness. Hence, the existence of the striking step that 'money in wallet will decrease', AFTER understanding that 'you have to give the money in the wallet', while being in a real life situation as an actor/doer when someone just briefly says/hints to you "give me some money", wherein visual commonsense (via imagination) about the insideness plays. (Read further as distinct from before). Additional point to the above 2 machineries - However if you are completely in the "linguistic domain" i.e. say, someone says to you or you read somewhere - "Suppose you give money to someone from your wallet" - the realization that the money in the wallet will decrease seems like an "equivalent" statement, and not an implication. (The commonsense is "eased" in this case).

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