{"id":2290,"date":"2015-06-26T10:23:19","date_gmt":"2015-06-26T14:23:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/?p=2290"},"modified":"2015-06-26T10:23:19","modified_gmt":"2015-06-26T14:23:19","slug":"plain-meaning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2015\/06\/26\/plain-meaning\/","title":{"rendered":"Plain meaning"},"content":{"rendered":"

In its reporting<\/a> on yesterday\u2019s Supreme Court ruling in King v. Burwell, Vox<\/em>\u2019s Matthew Yglesias makes the important point that Justice Scalia\u2019s dissent is based on a profound misunderstanding of how language works. Justice Scalia would have it that \u201cwords no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is \u2018established by the state.\u2019\u201d The Justice is implicitly appealing to a \u201cplain meaning\u201d view of legislation: courts should just take the plain meaning of a law and not interpret it.<\/p>\n

If only that were possible. If you think there\u2019s such a thing as acquiring the \u201cplain meaning\u201d of a text without performing any interpretive inference, you don\u2019t understand how language works. It\u2019s the same mistake that fundamentalists make when they talk about looking to the plain meaning of the Bible. (And which Bible would that be anyway? The King James Version? Translation requires the same kind of inferential process \u2013 arguably the same actual process \u2013 as extracting meaning through reading.)<\/p>\n

Yglesias describes \u201cWhat Justice Scalia\u2019s King v. Burwell dissent gets wrong about words and meaning<\/a>\u201d this way:<\/p>\n

Individual stringz of letterz r efforts to express meaningful propositions in an intelligible way. To succeed at this mission does not require the youse of any particular rite series of words and, in fact, a sntnce fll of gibberish cn B prfctly comprehensible and meaningful 2 an intelligent reader. To understand a phrse or paragraf or an entire txt rekwires the use of human understanding and contextual infrmation not just a dctionry.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The jokey orthography aside, this observation that understanding the meaning of linguistic utterances requires the application of knowledge and inference is completely uncontroversial to your average linguist. Too bad Supreme Court justices don\u2019t defer to linguists on how language works.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take a simple example, the original \u201cWinograd sentences<\/a>\u201d from back in 1973:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The city councilmen refused the demonstrators a permit because they feared violence.<\/li>\n
  2. The city councilmen refused the demonstrators a permit because they advocated violence.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    To understand these sentences, to recover their \u201cplain meaning\u201d, requires resolving to whom the pronoun \u2018they\u2019 refers. Is it the city councilmen or the demonstrators? Clearly, it is the former in sentence (1) and the latter in sentence (2). How do you know, given that the two sentences differ only in the single word alternation \u2018feared\u2019\/\u2018advocated\u2019? The recovery of this single aspect of the \u201cplain meaning\u201d of the sentence requires an understanding of how governmental organizations work, how activists pursue their goals, likely public reactions to various contingent behaviors, and the like, along with application of all that knowledge through plausible inference. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) has by my (computer-aided) count some 479 occurrences of pronouns in nominative, accusative, or possessive. Each one of these requires the identification of its antecedent, with all the reasoning that implies, to get its \u201cplain meaning\u201d.<\/p>\n

    Examining the actual textual subject of controversy in the PPACA demonstrates the same issue. The phrase in question is \u201cestablished by the state\u201d. The American Heritage Dictionary provides six senses and nine subsenses for the transitive verb \u2018establish\u2019<\/a>, of which (by my lights) sense 1a is appropriate for interpreting the PPACA: \u201cTo cause (an institution, for example) to come into existence or begin operating.\u201d An alternative reading might, however, be sense 4: \u201cTo introduce and put (a law, for example) into force.\u201d The choice of which sense is appropriate requires some reasoning of course about the context in which it was used, the denotata of the subject and object of the verb for instance. If one concludes that sense 1a was intended, then the Supreme Court\u2019s decision is presumably correct, since a state\u2019s formal relegation to the federal government the role of running the exchange is an act of \u201ccausing to come into existence\u201d, although perhaps not an act of \u201cintroducing and putting into force\u201d. (Or further explication of the notions of \u201ccausing\u201d or \u201cintroducing\u201d might be necessary to decide the matter.) If the latter sense 4 were intended, then perhaps the Supreme Court was wrong in its recent decision. The important point is this: There is no possibility of deferring to the \u201cplain meaning\u201d on the issue; one must reason about the intentions of the authors to acquire even the literal meaning of the text.<\/em> This process is exactly what Chief Justice Roberts undertakes in his opinion. Justice Scalia\u2019s view, that plain meaning is somehow available without recourse to the use of knowledge and reasoning, is unfounded even in the simplest of cases.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    In its reporting on yesterday\u2019s Supreme Court ruling in King v. Burwell, Vox\u2019s Matthew Yglesias makes the important point that Justice Scalia\u2019s dissent is based on a profound misunderstanding of how language works. Justice Scalia would have it that \u201cwords no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2110,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6027,116],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-linguistics","category-policy"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5pLfN-AW","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2445,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2022\/07\/25\/moderating-principles\/","url_meta":{"origin":2290,"position":0},"title":"Moderating principles","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Monday, July 25, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Some time around April 1994, I founded the Computation and Language E-Print Archive, the first preprint repository for a subfield of computer science. It was hosted on Paul Ginsparg\u2019s arXiv platform, which at the time had been hosting only physics papers, built out from the original arXiv repository for high-energy\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "computational linguistics"","block_context":{"text":"computational linguistics","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/linguistics\/computational-linguistics\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2151,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2014\/08\/29\/switching-to-markdown-for-scholarly-article-production\/","url_meta":{"origin":2290,"position":1},"title":"Switching to Markdown for scholarly article production","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Friday, August 29, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"With few exceptions, scholars would be better off writing their papers in a lightweight markup format called Markdown, rather than using a word-processing program like Microsoft Word. This post explains why, and reveals a hidden agenda as well.1 Microsoft Word is not appropriate for scholarly article production \u2026lightweight\u2026 \u201cOld two\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "computer science"","block_context":{"text":"computer science","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/computer-science\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1481,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2012\/06\/16\/talmud-and-the-turing-test\/","url_meta":{"origin":2290,"position":2},"title":"Talmud and the Turing Test","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Saturday, June 16, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"...the Golem... Image of the statue of the Golem of Prague at the entrance to the Jewish Quarter of Prague by flickr user D_P_R. Used by permission (CC-BY 2.0). Alan Turing, the patron saint of computer science, was born 100 years ago this week (June 23). I\u2019ll be attending the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Alan Turing"","block_context":{"text":"Alan Turing","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/computer-science\/alan-turing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2298,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2015\/08\/10\/binary-search-in-the-old-testament\/","url_meta":{"origin":2290,"position":3},"title":"Binary search in the Old Testament","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Monday, August 10, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord. (NIV Proverbs 16:33) \u2026\u201cLux et Veritas\u201d\u2026 Seal of Yale University image from Wikimedia Commons. The seal of Yale University shows a book with the Hebrew \u05d0\u05d5\u05e8\u05d9\u05dd \u05d5\u05ea\u05de\u05d9\u05dd (urim v\u2019thummim), a reference to the Urim and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "computer science"","block_context":{"text":"computer science","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/computer-science\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":471,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2010\/06\/09\/a-proposal-to-simplify-the-university-of-north-texas-open-access-policy\/","url_meta":{"origin":2290,"position":4},"title":"A proposal to simplify the University of North Texas open-access policy","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Wednesday, June 9, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"\"In High Places\", statue by Gerald Balciar, University of North Texas - Denton campus, installed 1990. Image via Wikipedia. The University of North Texas is engaged in a laudable process of designing an open-access policy for their community. Draft language for their policy is now available at their site on\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "open access"","block_context":{"text":"open access","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/open-access\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/en\/thumb\/c\/c4\/UNT_Eagle_statue.jpg\/300px-UNT_Eagle_statue.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1139,"url":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/2012\/02\/25\/is-the-pot-calling-the-kettle-black\/","url_meta":{"origin":2290,"position":5},"title":"Is the pot calling the kettle black?","author":"Stuart Shieber","date":"Saturday, February 25, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"\u201c...the interpersonal processes that a student goes through...\u201d Harvard students (2008) by E>mar via flickr. Used by permission (CC by-nc-nd) Is the pot calling the kettle black? Oh sure, journal prices are going up, but so is tuition. How can universities complain about journal price hyperinflation if tuition is hyperinflating\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "libraries"","block_context":{"text":"libraries","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/category\/scholarly-communication\/libraries\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2110"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2290"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2290\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2291,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2290\/revisions\/2291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/pamphlet\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}