Mass terms: Some philosophical problems Ed. by Francis J. Pelletier (review)

476 LANGUAGE, VOLUME 56, NUMBER 2 (1980) M finds that Japanese attitudes are describable quite exactly in terms of the characteristics of mysticism identified by William James in The varieties of religious experience. One surprising consequence is that, although a Caucasian who speaks a little Japanese is praised extravagantly, one who speaks the language fluently is apt to be treated with feigned incomprehension, as an invader of 'sociolinguistic territorial integrity' (82). M concludes that, since 'the Japanese approach their language within a mystical framework of beliefs about its structure and operation' (91), the foreigner must exercise unusual caution with regard to Japanese linguistic behavior; in particular, both the translator and the user of translations must be highly aware of the full sociolinguistic context. [William Bright, UCLA.] Mass terms: Some philosophical problems . Ed. by Francis J. Pelletier. (Synthese language library, 6.) Dordrecht : Reidel, 1979. Pp. xiii, 303. /80.00. A professor of linguistics once said to me that philosophers cannot teach linguists anythingaboutlanguage —regrettablechauvinism. Since Aristotle, and especially during the last decade, it has been impossible for any linguist worth his salt, if he professed an interest in syntax and semantics, to ignore developments in the philosophy of language. Reidel's 'Synthese library series'provides useful handbooks for the purpose, and this volume is as good as any in the series; it will be of value to anyone interested in countability. It is a collection of nineteen papers on mass terms: all but three were originally published in philosophical journals, from 1970 on; ten of them appeared in Synthese 31 (1975). The new papers are by Sharvy, Pelletier, and Bunt (whose contribution is an extended version of his 'Formal semantics of mass terms', Papers from the 3rd Scandinavian Conference on Linguistics, ed. by F. Karlsson, 1976). There is an introductory survey of the field by Pelletier, who has also compiled a bibliography of 65 recent works on mass terms—including all the articles in this book and a number of US dissertations, but nothing from Europe (e.g. Bunt's 1976 paper is unlisted). The contents are grouped under three major topics: the linguistics of mass terms, the ontology of mass terms, and the logic of mass terms. The range stretches from the Quinean view that non-sortals are constituted of sortal parts to the antithetical notion that all sortais are instances of non-sortals, and from Parson's predicate logic to Montague's intensional logic and to Bunt's ensemble theory—which is remarkably similar to a set theory that uses the notion of an ensemble (corresponding to a mass term) in place of a set. So a wide variety of views and analytical procedures are presented in the book. There are indices of names and subjects, too rare in such collections. I noted an insignificant typo on p. 8, line 5; and Gabbay and Moravcsik's names are re-ordered in the bibliography. Any other typographical infelicities escaped me. I have two final comments, not about the book itself. By and large, the philosophy of mass terms takes for granted the traditional assignment of countability to nouns, although the evidence clearly indicates that countability is a subcategory of NP's; congratulations should go to Bunt and to Pelletier for recognizing this. Finally, I suspect the assumed primacy of count terms, by a number of eminent philosophers, to be a consequence of the obligatory marking of countability in IE languages. Had these same people spoken, say, an Oriental language in which sortais are identified optionally and then periphrastically, would they have made the same assumption? [Keith Allan, Monash University, Victoria, Australia.] The sign and its masters. By Thomas A. Sebeok. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1979. Pp. xvi, 339. $19.95. This new collection of nineteen articles, all previously published (with one exception) during the period 1976-79 (again, with one exception), constitutes further evidence of S's prodigious production in the 'field' of semiotics. In accordance with its title, the book is divided into two main parts (followed by appendices comprising three miscellaneous pieces). Part I ('The sign') consists of eight papers (two co-authored), meant to exemplify S's 'absolute conviction that semiotics begins and ends with biology...