Meaning and Meaninglessness
The Connection Between Life and Language
What is meaningless?
Normally when you hear someone say that it is meaningless, they are referring to their, or perhaps someone else’s, life or experience. “Oh” they lament, “my life is meaningless” or “my work is meaningless.”
When used in this context, we are talking about something like not having a purpose or a goal for one’s life.
The question I want to ask is this: is meaninglessness in regard to one’s life related in some way to meaninglessness in language?
Here are some reflections on who they might be connected
False Meaning
Meaninglessness in language is a fascinating topic in and of itself. It is amazing that I can write the following:
He likes to drink orange flavored happiness while reclining on justice while sailing down the river of ontological identity.
While you might well try to make sense of this sentence — and in some way it is possible to make sense of it in a figurative way — this sentence is meaningless in the linguistic sense.
It is not possible to drink happiness or to sail down the river of an abstract concept.
In linguistics, such mistakes are called category mistakes. Yet, as mentioned before, my mind does not go blank upon hearing the sentence. In fact, my mind does its best to comprehend what it would be like for such a sentence to be true, that is, to convey some kind of meaning.
So here one can draw the first parallel between meaninglessness in life and language. It is possible to utter/live in a way that at first glance might seem to be meaningful, but, upon closer inspection, proves to lack meaning.
An example of this can be found in the lives of the rich and famous. Many of these people say that in chasing their wealth and fame, their life was in fact empty. They often discovered that their friends were not really their friends and everyone was just trying to get something out of them rather than having a real relationship. This forced them to find a “true meaning” or “more meaningful” life to live, one often far away from the limelight
Meaning for You but Not for Me
Another aspect of meaninglessness can be seen in the following example. Is there a difference between the following two utterances of language?
A. He drinks orange flavored happiness
B. وطورخم هو أكثر المعابر الحدودية نشاطًا في الحركة التجارية بين البلدين
(arabic is read right to left, source is in the hyperlink)
Sentence A is a meaningless sentence in a language I understand (English), while sentence B is a meaningful sentence in a language that I do not understand (Arabic).
It would seem like there is very little difference at least for me.
For me, both of these sentences fail to convey any idea, facts, or whatever about anything. Linguistically, one can say that the sentence in Arabic at least has the potential to convey something if that person happens to understand arabic. Thus the failure is on me rather than on language.
But this raises a second way that we might connect meaning in life and language. Can my life have meaning to someone else and not to me or vice versa? Just like an Arabic speaking person finds m eaning in an Arabic sentence but I do not. If language is any help, it appears that the answer is that it is possible.
But perhaps the analogy is not a good one. Since I am not the one that utters the Arabic sentence it might be better to reformulate the questions like this: Can someone’s life be seen as both meaningful and meaningless depending on the observer? Again it would seem possible.
Lets Agree about the Meaning
On a bit of a related tangent we can find a third connection we might make between meaning in life and language.
Does it require that both parties agree/intend that there is meaning or not?
If I utter the above sentence in Arabic without understanding its meaning, is it possible to convey meaning to someone who understands Arabic? An even more interesting case perhaps is if I utter a sentence in English to another English speaker, do we have to agree on the meaning for there to be one? Or is it possible that there are two valid meanings rather than favoring one?
Applying this question to life, for one’s life to have meaning does someone other than myself have to agree with that meaning? maybe it requires more than one other person to agree? If meaning in language is in some way a two way street, does the same apply for one’s life? Is meaningfulness in life a communal activity in the same way that language is?
Conclusion
The above has been more about raising possible connections and questions revolving around the use of meaning in both life and linguistic expressions than giving any kind of answer.
For what it’s worth, for now at least, my answer is that these two uses of meaning are inherently connected.
In order to have a meaningful life, one of the conditions must be that it can be expressed linguistically. But is that the only requirement?
What do you think?
Is there a connection between the two? Or is any perceived connection just a happenstance of the same word being applied to two things but not meaning the same thing in both cases? I would love to hear your thoughts.
If you want to read more about the relationship between meaning in life and language, check out this great article by Martina Wiltschko
The Meaning of Life — Five Lessons from the Study of Meaning in Language
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