Alfred Korzybski

From SCIENCE AND SANITY, 1933 by Alfred Korzybski

We must consider, briefly, the terms 'kind' and 'degree', as we shall need them later. Words, symbols., serve as forms of representation and belong to a different universe�the 'universe of discourse'�since they are not the un-speakable levels we are speaking about. They belong to a world of higher abstractions and not to the world of lower abstractions given to us by our lower nerve centres.

Common experience and scientific investigations (more refined experience) show us that the world around us is made up of absolute individuals, each different and unique, although interconnected. Under such conditions it is obviously optional what language we use. The more we use the language of diverse 'kind', the sharper our definitions must be. Psycho-logically, the emphasis is on difference. Such procedure may be a tax on our ingenuity, but by it we are closer to the structural facts of life, where, in the limit, we should have to establish a 'kind' for every individual.

In using the term 'degree', we . . .  proceed by similarities, but such a treatment implies a fundamental interconnection between different individuals of a special kind. It implies a definite kind of metaphysics or structural assumptions�as, for instance, a theory of evolution. As our 'knowledge' is the result of . . abstracting, it seems . . . to give preference to the term 'degree' first, and only when we have attained a certain order of verbal sharpness to pass to a language of 'kind', if need arises.

The study of primitive languages shows that, historically, we had a tendency for the 'kind' language, resulting in over-abundance of names and few relation-words, which makes higher analysis impossible. Science, on the other hand, has a preference for the 'degree' language, which, ultimately, leads to mathematical languages, enormous simplicity and economy of words, and so to better efficiency, more intelligence, and to the unification of science. . . .  The language of 'degree' has very important relational, quantitative, and order implications, while that of 'kind' has, in the main, qualitative implications, often, if not always, concealing relations, instead of expressing them.

pp. 254-255.

" . . . . a [non-aristotelian] system . . . should formulate general principles that all scientists in every field could follow. This was practically the case with the A-system until Francis Bacon.  "

p. 541.

The three-valued logic was created in 1920 by Jan Łukasiewicz and the many-valued logic was created in 1922 also by Jan Łukasiewicz, alone--and not in co-work with another. Some relevant data could be found in "Polish Logic" by Storrs McCall, Oxford 1967, also in many other sources.

On this matter, many inaccuracies have crept into the records. One of them was due to the Master himself, i.e., Korzybski, who in a paper of 1931 and in Science and Sanity in 1933 attributed joint authorship of the many-valued logics to Łukasiewicz and to another author — (who had at a later date disclaimed contributions himself). Every mention in Science and Sanity of Łukasiewicz (and the three-valued and many-valued logics) has an 'and Tarski' appended to it.

I believe this to have been an 'honest error', stemming from mere oversight— (perhaps from somebody's design (?) — still, no credit to K, especially that the false datum had been repeated by many other writers. In some cases there were other inaccuracies added.

The circumstances seem to have been more or less so : by 1929 a draft of Science and Sanity was largely complete. That year, Korzybski went to Warsaw-Poland and attended a congress of the mathematicians from the Slav countries. There he had first learned about the work of Łukasiewicz, also about the work of Chwistek, Lesniewski, etc.

The relevant evidence to this case was a paper (reportedly) written by Tarski, published jointly by Łukasiewicz and Tarski. This was read by Tarski, not by Łukasiewicz, at some scientific meeting (at which it seems Łukasiewicz was not present). The paper was produced jointly circa 1929, the relevant historic development treated in it dated back to work by Łukasiewicz in 1922 and 1920, this might be one likely source of confusion.

(I have seen a highly inaccurate account published in the late 1940's of the three-valued logic giving the first page of that paper as evidence of Tarski's contributions — which apparently were not the case. The version later published by Tarski himself which I have seen does not contain anything of the sort.)

What I could have gleaned from the data available suggest this approximate scenario : Korzybski, who had understood Łukasiewicz's logic very well, and who was yet none too fond of the formal logic overall, had from somebody got an incorrect datum and, on his having returned from Warsaw to the U.S.A. had simply pasted a partially inaccurate statement in the draft of Science and Sanity. The uniform error consistently recurs several (approximately five - seven ) times. It is also found in the paper of 1931 titled "Some Non-Aristotelian Data (etc).

As of 2006, it seems that the importance of the many-valued logics on any areas of life could hardly be overestimated. The applications would be properly the subject-matter of another exposition.

(WPT)

 

 

he would have only objected to the language in which the ideas of their authors were represented.