Comments on: The Art of Conversation

By: art of conversation

art of conversation — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:49:27 +0000

[...] Conversing and exchanging3 doesn’t have to be limited to two peoples’ talk holes opening in succession while simultaneously exercising their voice boxes. For the purpose of this essay it can encompass reading/writing: a classic, a letter, a journal or blog post, or: delivering a sermon, watching TV, feverishly bashing away at an email to a friend, adding your 140 characters worth to your twitter stream or even something as crazy as sharing thoughtful words with a loved one. “A day dreamer, forever with his head in the clouds.” - Me4 [...]

By: JamesGlover

JamesGlover — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 09:03:06 +0000

The opening lines of my favourite poem (For X by Louis MacNeice) is a sort of conversation:
“Where clerks and navvies fondle/ Beside canals their wenches/And the haunches that they handle/ In rapture or in coma”
is a kind of conversation, as is my pointing backwards in the direction I had just come in when someone asked me in NY (on my first trip) where Washington Park was, which I had just passed.
I guess the best you could say is it’s just as well I didn’t mix them up.

By: Stubborn Mule

Stubborn Mule — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 01:10:51 +0000

James Based on some of the examples in the essay, I would say that Grice was thinking more broadly than your average earth to Mars communique:

Mrs. X is an old bag.

I sought to tell my love, love that never told can be.

She is probably deceiving him this evening.

He even touches on the role of humour (perhaps not as we know it, given the peccavi example). So, while I cannot vouch for Chomsky, I don’t think that Grice would have insisted on seriousness at all times.

By: JamesGlover

JamesGlover — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 01:54:50 +0000

Before Grice, Chomsky seemed to think the only relevant study of language was in one-sided didactic statements because that it is pretty much all he does – talk at people. Grice believes conversation should be truthful, efficient and serious. I imagine his conversations are pretty much like that as well. There are many conversations which aren’t truthful: “no your bum doesn’t look big in that” being the most famous. There are also many that violate Grice’s principles but are nonetheless entertaining, like your original joke, at least the first time you hear it.

Perhaps his principles might apply to NASA communicating with Mars astronauts over limited bandwidth but the bandwidth of ordinary conversation is huge and so it has no reason, normally, to be efficient, meaningful, or even truthful.

By: OldFuzz

OldFuzz — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 00:42:25 +0000

No sale Stubborn- my answer “Yes” was quite unambiguous – how can such a simple one-word answer be ambiguous.
The problem is that the Question itself fails Manner 2!
Suggested solution – pose the questian an a Boolean “Exclusive OR”….

By: Mike Ev

Mike Ev — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 16:35:36 +0000

Thank heavens the Mule was not around 12 years ago when some hottie called liza asked me “are you married or are you single?” to which I replied…errr….”Yes”.

My marriage would have been over before it began….

By: Stubborn Mule

Stubborn Mule — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 11:09:23 +0000

Amit: you are correct. The maxims really only apply to conversations that both participants wish to pursue. In a less dramatic example, if someone you find boring or annoying starts a conversation with you, you may respond to their questions with curt, unhelpful answers (violating Quantity 1) in an effort to break the conversation off as quickly as possible without going as far as explicitly telling them to go away.

By: Amit Kumar

Amit Kumar — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 10:58:09 +0000

The maxims are good with respect to cooperativeness in conversation but in general there is no obligation to be cooperative. For example, you don’t want to be cooperative with a murderer looking out for your friend.

By: Paddy

Paddy — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 00:09:22 +0000

Reminds me of a joke Robbie once told me: Axioms A, B and C admit a conclusion Z. Axiom D contradicts Z, but admits conclusion Y.

(Needless to say that I have never won any friends with the joke).

By: Stubborn Mule

Stubborn Mule — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 23:03:18 +0000

Marco from some of the discussion and examples, it is clear that Grice includes at least some written exchanges (letter-writing in particular) in this framework. He does not, however, discuss the difference signals that are available in person that are not available in writing. The focus of his paper is on the common threads across a wide range of types of “conversation” rather than the points of difference.

Also, speaking of jokes, Grice gives the example of a British General who captured the town of Sind and cables to his superiors the message Peccavi, which is Latin for “I have sinned”.