Theory of Meaning as a Theory of Interpretation

One way of seeing how a truth theory involves a theory of interpretation is to see what a field linguist has to do when he encounters a new language. He first formulates a theory and then tests the correctness of the theory. In forming a theory of interpretation, which is in fact an empirical theory, the field linguist has to depend upon the utterances or the prompted assents made by the native speaker in a particular situation. These utterances or prompted assents or dissents are actually an action performed by the native speaker -- an action which is determined by many factors.

1. The meaning the native speaker assigns to the sentence.
2. The belief that the native speaker entertains in the situation.
3. The desire the speaker has in the situation.

To find out a right interpretation of speech of the native speaker we have to find out the meanings that the native assigns to the uttered or assented sentences. In order to search for this we have to take the above-mentioned three factors into account. In this connection, even if we know the value of any two of the three factors as represented in the form of argument we can know the value of the third argument. Let us find out what kind of belief and desire we can assign to the native speaker on the occasion of his/her assent or dissent to an utterance of a sentence. An example will clarify how the notion of interpretation works in actual situation.

Assume 'X' as a non-Andhrite detained in a village of Andhra Pradesh, a southern state of India where no one knows any language other than Telugu. The person 'X' is staying in a house where he finds a beautiful girl who appears to be very lean and weak enters into the premise. The house owner by seeing her asks 'bagunava'? X presumes that the house owner is praising her beauty as X entertains the same belief when he meets any beautiful girl. Further, X finds that when an old person comes to the house the house owner says 'bagunava' to him. X on the basis of this incidents interprets 'bagunava' in the following way, 'bagunava' is uttered by the owner of the house is true iff someone is weak. But X is surprised when in the next morning a young man comes to that house who is very healthy and the house owner asks 'bagunava'. Then X concludes that he is in interpreting 'bagunava' as either 'beauty' or 'weak'. X could then assumes that 'bagunaua' means 'how are you?' So in this case X ought to take the native speaker to be at least as rational as he is. In this case the first and the second alternative vary from each other. So X has to find out some other common characteristics which force him to conclude that; 'Bagunava' is true iff it means how are you.