Hermeneutics, Physics, Autism, and Postmodernism....
So, today was the second day of my hermeneutics class. Hermeneutics is the act of determining the author's intended meaning in a Biblical text and then applying it to our current times. It can be split up into exegesis - determining the author's original intent within the context of the Scriptures, and contextualization - applying that meaning to other times and cultures. Inherent in these definitions are several important ideas:
1) There is a "meaning" to be determined.
2) That meaning is determined by the author, and has to be interpreted in the context.
3) If 1 and 2 are true, then "meaning" doesn't change (although significance might).
Now this all makes sense to me, and one would wonder why people would see it differently, but this is where post-modernism comes in. Some would say that "meaning" lies with the reader, and not with the author. We see this in the "well, that's all fine and good for you, but this is what it means to me" statements we often hear these days. It's easy to confuse interpretation and meaning. We may "interpret" a meaning differently, but that doesn't mean there are two meanings.....(lots of "means" in this rambling, sorry!). In class today we talked about "sentences" versus "utterances". A sentence by itself has no meaning, wheras an utterance (because of context) does. It's a hard concept for me to grasp, but as I understand it, a bunch of words strung together could have multiple meanings (i.e. "he hit the ball" - who hit it? With what? What kind of ball?). It is not until that sentence is used as a communication (where there is someone "uttering it" with communicative intent) that meaning occurs. This brings us to the question of where the meaning lies - does meaning come into existence with the speaker, with the words, or with the hearer? And this brings us to physics....
This reminded me of Schroedinger's Cat. In this "thought experiment" (note no animals were actually harmed in this physics experiment or this blog) the cat's state of being is "indeterminate" until perceived by an observer. So it would seem that Schroedinger would argue that meaning and truth are determined by the observer. Other quantum physicists (Heisenberg, maybe?) seem to think that complete meaning and understanding can't be obtained because the observer interferes (changes?) the existence of the thing being observed. But maybe I'm trying to hard to stretch physics into metaphysics.
Which brings me to autism. Many of the kids I see have "echolalia". Basically, they repeat things they hear, but they don't understand what they're saying and the repetitions are usually (but not always) out of context. For example, I remember a 3 year old son of a military person in Japan telling me "practice good operational security" when I greeted him with "hello". Now, I'm pretty sure he didn't know what that meant, but I did. The thing is, I was interpreting what he said based on my experiences. For all I know he might have been saying "hi", or he might have been saying "I don't like being in this doctor's office", or he might not have been trying to say anything at all. So here's the question: was there meaning in what he said? And if so, who determines that meaning - me as the listener, or him as the speaker?
Which brings me back to the Bible. Is there meaning in Scripture? And if so, who determines that meaning - me as the reader, or God as the author? What do you think?
