| Lemma | conceptual system |
|---|---|
| Categoria grammaticale | N |
| Lingua | inglese |
| Sigla | Lakoff (1987) |
| Titolo | Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things |
| Sinonimi | |
| Rinvii | |
| Traduzioni | |
| Citazioni | Since we act in accord with our conceptual systems and since our actions are real, our conceptual systems have a major role in creating reality. Human beings do not function with internally consistent, monolithic conceptual systems. Each of us has many ways of making sense of experience, especially of those domains of experience that do not come with a clearly delineated preconceptual structure of their own, such as the domains of emotion and thought. There is a distinction between conceptual systems and conceptualizing capacities. The same capacities can give rise to different systems in the following ways:
First, highly structured preconceptual experiences may be different. [...]
Second, since experience does not determine conceptual systems, but only motivates them, the same experiences may provide equally good motivation for two somewhat different conceptual systems. [...]
Third, the same basic experiences and the same conceptualizing capacities may still result in a situation where one system lacks a significant concept that another system has. Differences in conceptual systems do not necessarily entail that understanding and learning are impossible. And the fact that one can learn a radically different language does not mean that it does not have a different conceptual system. Conceptual systems that are commensurable by one criterion may be incommensurable by another. [...] The question of whether conceptual systems are commensurable cannot be answered in absolute terms; it can only be answered relative to the way the question is put. Experientialism is concerned with explaining why the human conceptual system is as it is. It claims that aspects of the conceptual system are a consequence of the nature of human physical experience and the way that it is structured preconceptually by the fact that we have the bodies that we have and we interact continuously as part of a physical and social environment. Basic-level concepts and kinesthetic image schemas are products of such experience plus a general capacity to construct concepts, especially concepts that fit those of our experiences that have a preconceptual structure. There is a distinction between conceptual systems and conceptualizing capacities. The same capacities can give rise to different systems in the following ways:
First, highly structured preconceptual experiences may be different. [...]
Second, since experience does not determine conceptual systems, but only motivates them, the same experiences may provide equally good motivation for two somewhat different conceptual systems. The human conceptual system is a product of human experience, and that experience comes through the body. There is no direct connection between human language and the world as it exists outside of human experience. Human language is based on human concepts, which are in turn motivated by human experience. |