The Thoughts Of Hobbes In The SFL Community

Russell (1961: 536):

… a doctrine repugnant to peace cannot be true.  (A singularly pragmatist view!)

The Thoughts Of Hobbes In Systemic Functional Linguistics [4]

Russell (1961: 534):

He comes next to a consideration of the passions.  'Endeavour' may be defined as a small beginning of motion; if towards something, it is desire, and if away from something it is aversion.  Love is the same as desire, and hate is the same as aversion.  We call a thing 'good' when it is an object of desire, and 'bad' when it is an object of aversion. … Will is nothing but the last appetite or aversion remaining in deliberation.  That is to say, will is not something different from desire and aversion, but merely the strongest in a case of conflict.  This is connected, obviously, with Hobbes' denial of free will.

Blogger Comments:

Through the lens of Systemic Functional Linguistics, desire and aversion are desiderative mental processes metaphorically reconstrued as things, whereas love and hate are emotive mental processes metaphorically reconstrued as things.

On the other hand, objects of desire or aversion are the phenomena of desiderative mental processes, and good and bad are emotive — not desiderative — qualities of projection (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 211).

The Thoughts Of Hobbes In Systemic Functional Linguistics [3]

Russell (1961: 533-4):

Hobbes, as might be expected, is an out-and-out nominalist.  There is, he says, nothing universal but names, and without words we could not conceive any general ideas.  Without language, there would be no truth or falsehood, for 'true' and 'false' are attributes of speech.

Blogger Comments:

In Systemic Functional Linguistics, ideas are the mental projections of language users, which may be verbally projected as locutions.  Meanings of language such as 'true' and 'false' are both construals of experience (ideational) and enactments of social relations (interpersonal).

The Thoughts Of Hobbes In Systemic Functional Linguistics [2]

Russell (1961: 533):

Sensations are caused by the pressure of objects; colours, sounds, etc., are not in the objects.  The qualities in objects that correspond to our sensations are motions.

Blogger Comments:

 Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 609):

… what is being construed by the brain is not the environment as such, but the impact of that environment on the organism and the ongoing material and semiotic exchange between the two.

On the other hand, on the SFL model, objects are construals of experience to which qualities are assigned.

The Thoughts Of Hobbes In Systemic Functional Linguistics [1]

Russell (1961: 533):

[Hobbes] proclaims at the very beginning of the book [Leviathan], his thoroughgoing materialism.

Blogger Comments:

Systemic Functional Linguistics is theorised from a broadly materialist position.  Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 608-9):

… the human brain has evolved in the construction of a functioning model of “reality”.  We prefer to conceptualise “reality construction” in terms of construing experience.  This is not so much because it avoids metaphysical issues about the ultimate nature of reality — we are prepared to acknowledge a broadly materialist position;