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прагматика и медиа дискурс / Teun A van Dijk - Text and Context

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SEQUENCES OF EVENTS,

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PRAGMATICS

continuous, whereas the event of 'thunder' may be discontinuous, because there are temporal 'gaps' between the component events (during which other events may occur).

2.3

The notion of PROCESS is not easily defined, and perhaps should not be accounted for in terms of events at all. For reasons of simplicity we take processes as continuous events, occurring during a PERIOD <ti, t, +;> of time, of which intermediary events cannot be, or are not conventionally, distinguished. Raining is a typical example. In process perception and description the focus of attention is on the properties of the change itself rather than on the difference between the initial and the final state. As soon as an initial or final state of a change and some difference are indicated, as in `it started raining' or `it stopped raining', we speak of events not of processes. It follows that if we consider events during one moment (unit) of time, we observe them as processes, because we do not distinguish intermediary events. This means that we may take processes as the basic concept, and identify events that constitute discrete (parts of) processes by distinguishing initial and final states and a change between them.

2.4

Changes in possible worlds need not be minimal. Several events may occur at the same time. The same holds for processes, and for events and processes. Similarly, we may speak of ie series of distinct events following each other in time. If such a sequence is perceived or conceived of as one unit, we called it a compound event. This distinction between one compound unit and a sequence of units will be important not only for actions but also for the theory of discourse. This is one of the reasons why the term `sequence of events' will be used in a stricter sense, in order to denote a subset of the set of possible series of events. A SERIES of events may consist of events which are completely INDEPENDENT. In a sequence the events are not only linearly ordered but also related by DEPENDENCE.

The highly intricate notion involved here is that of CAUSATION. S A series of events will be called a sequence if the events are causally related. This causal relation (or operation) may have various forms. Either each event causes each next following event, or a subsequence of (causally related) events causes some following event (or again sequence of events), or some series of independent events causes one event (or sequence of events). That is, an event may have a SIMPLE CAUSE or a COMPOUND CAUSE. The event(s) caused by an event or sequence of events will be called a CONSEQUENCE. Events may have severa!, independent causes or consequences. If a consequence immediately follows the causing event, it will be called a DIRECT consequence; otherwise it is INDIRECT. We see that the notions of cause and consequence are RELATIVE: an event is a cause relative to its effected consequence(s).

These definitions imply that causation only holds between events, not between states or between events and states. This is different from the expression of `cause' in ordinary language. We say that the heat caused the

NECESSARY CONDITIONS:
taking water
POSSIBLE COURSES OF EVENTS,

SOME NOTIONS FROM THE THEORY OF ACTION

171

fire, or that the accident caused John's being in bed now. However, closer analysis shows that natural language and cognition make shortcuts over sequences of events and the initial and final states of events. Thus, the fire is caused by a change of temperature, and John's being in bed now is the FINAL STATE of a series of events (and actions) caused by the accident. Such a final state of a causal sequence of events is often called a RESULT.

In Chapter 3 we tried to give a simplified semantic analysis of causeconditional connectives. The proposal made there will have to be based on a serious analysis of causal relations between facts, of which however only a few notions can be touched upon here.

We first assumed that causation is involved in COURSES OF EVENTS, characterizing state changes, not states. If we say that some state is 'caused', we mean that an event is caused which has that state as final state, viz as a result. Similarly, I may cause' the state that a glass does not fall (viz by holding it), but again this state is rather the result of my action itself, not part of a consequence of my act. Secondly, it is assumed that courses of events are ordered in TIME, such that if A causes B (or some part A' of a A causes some part B' of B in case of non-momentaneous events), A precedes B. Thirdly, a course of events is a member of a set of of which one course will be called ACTUAL (or historical) and the others the nonactual alternatives. This kind of set-up may be represented with the trees as given in Chapter 3: from each node in the tree, defined as a particular state of a particular world, several paths lead to different subsequent nodes.

Given these preliminaries, various KINDS of causation may be defined. Aboye, for instance, we saw that we may have single and multiple causes, unique or exclusive and concomitants causes, etc. Similarly, a cause may be such in just one situation or in several or in all possible situations. Given our scheme of world-time and courses of events, we define a simple kind of cause in terms of SUFFICIENT CONDITION. A condition is sufficient for a subsequent event if it NECESSITATES the subsequent event. In other words, at some node 1i of the tree it is INEVITABLE that, given A occurs in <w;, ti>, B occurs at all subsequent situations (at ti+ 1 ) which can be reached from <w ;, tj>. Note that this may hold just for this particular occasion, provided that all other things remain the same (this is the well-known ceteris paribus clause in definitions of causation). That is, John may break his neck falling off his chair only on this occasion — where indeed his falling causes his breaking his neck — but not at the numerous other occasions he has or might have fallen off his chair. On those occasions the event would not have been sufficient. It follows that some event is a cause only together with a number of specific properties (or other events) of a certain world, eg the brittleness of John's bones and the reaction speed of his muscles, together with the specific properties of the event (change) itself: the exact way John fell NOW made a fractured spine physically/biologically necessary. We see that here the cause holds only in

one (at least one) subtree of the universal tree. Causing events may or may not be

172 PRAGMATICS

is a cause for a plant to grow, and it is also a (biologically) necessary condition, but breaking my neck is not necessarily a cause of my death. Thus, B has A as a necessary condition if in ANY (sub)tree we must pass an A-node in order to reach a B-node.

Different kinds of causation may depend of the FORCE of the causing event, fe on the fact whether the cause is sufficient in at least one, many, most or all possible (sub)trees of the universe. Thus, in the (sub)tree in which our actual world is developing, being shot through the head will on nearly all occasions cause death. This means that in the definition of causation we need a set of basic POSTULATES (laws, basic properties, etc) defining the actual world and the set of possible worlds compatible with it. That is, I can cause a book to change place only in those worlds where gravity is similar to that in our world(s). A causing event is more forceful than a sufficient condition in that it brings about some other event in a way more independent of cooccurring events and initial conditions. In natural conversation, then, we normally will ask for further, specífic, conditions in cases of weak causes (how did he fall off his chair?), but not with strong causes (he fell from the Empire State buildings (as a cause of his death)).

From our brief discussion of causality it follows that causation involves necessity (of consequences), viz the fact that — given the circumstances — A will lead to B whatever else may happen (independently), ie in all possible worlds which have A occurring in an immediately previous state (in this particular subtree).

We will see below that in a specific kind of courses of events, viz in (courses of) action, further intricacies, eg regarding agency, intentions, purposes and goals become relevant, but we now are in possession of some elementary notions about events, sequences of events, processes and causation, which will be necessary in an account of action.

3 Doings, acts, actions

3.1

Aboye we gave a brief intuitive characterization of action as an event brought about by a human being'. If BRINGING ABOUT has the same meaning as `causing' this characterization is already incorrect as it stands, because we have stipulated that only events (not objects or persons) may cause events. So, either 'bringing about' is not `causing', or actions are not events.

Intuitively, at least a set of actions involves events. The action of'opening a door' clearly 'contains' the event of'opening', with an initial state where the door is closed and a final state where the door is open. In the ACTION of opening a door, however, there is another event involved, viz the movement of the arm of the one who opens the door. This is an event because in an initial state the arm is in a different position from that in subsequent states. Such an event may, according to definition, cause the event of opening, viz if moving my arm, on this occasion, necessitates the opening of the door.b

BODILY EVENT,

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The event of opening may also have been caused by other events, eg by a movement of air (wind), but intuitively we do not say of the wind that it performs an action, or acts, when it causes a door to open. Actions are usually predicated only of HUMAN BEINGS (and perhaps of animals). In the example given, this action contains a movement of a part of the body causing a movement of a door, and we will say that it is the movement of the body which is `brought about' by a human being. On the other hand, we also speak of action when only a bodily event is involved without another event as a consequence, eg when I greet somebody, or when I am speaking or walking. Note that in both cases we may speak of actions only if a human being brings about an event in his OWN body. If somebody moves my arm when 1 am asleep, we do not say that I have moved my arm, or that I have acted, but somebody else has. Similarly, if somebody pushes me against a door and the door then opens, we do not simply say that I opened the door.

The problem remains whether bringing about a movement of part of my body is the same as CAUSING this movement. It might be said that bringing about a certain movement of my muscles causes my arm to move in a certain way. But then the question arises how the movement of muscles is caused.

At the same time we may have the situation that 1 move (part of) my body when 1 am asleep. Although it may be said in such a case that 1 DID something, it is usually not said that I performed some action. Similarly, 1 may listen to a lecture and at the same time play with a pencil without noticing that I am doing so.

3.2

Apparently, a movement of my body alone is not a sufficient reason for calling it an action: 1 must be AWAKE and CONSCIOUS, and AWARE of what 1 am doing. Actions, thus, involve certain MENTAL componente, or at least require certain mental preconditions. These mental conditions are of a very specific sort. 1 may stumble and fall against a door, thereby causing the door to open. Although I am awake and although 1 may be conscious of what I am doing, or rather what happens (to my body and the door), we would not say that I performed the action of opening a door. One of the criteria seems to be here that I did not WANT to stumble, nor did 1 want the door to open by falling against it: 1 had no INTENTION of opening the door at all.

A number of conceptual distinctions seem relevant to this intuitive analysis. An action involves a but since a bodily event might not be brought about by myself but by somebody else or by another event, we need the concept of a DOING for a bodily event brought about by myself. Similarly, I may do something without thereby performing an action because I did not specifically want or intend to perform that doing nor did 1 want or intend the following events to happen as a cause of that doing. so, ONLY

DOINGS BROUGHT ABOUT INTENTIONALLY MAY QUALIFY AS ACTIONS.

3.3

At this point philosophical complications abound. We still have the `bringing about' problem, and additionally have such things as intentions and wants.

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The simplest solution for the first problem would be to let intentions cause doings. In that case, intentions must be events, which requires a change of state. Assuming a mind to be some object, part of my body, this mind may undergo achange of state. That is, at some point t ; it `has' no intention and at t; + 1 it `has' an intention. It is a long way, however, between such an assumed `mental event' and a bodily event. First of all, I may have the intention to move my arm, but may DECIDE not to do it. This would be impossible if intentions directly caused doings, or if doings were necessary consequences of intentions. If doings are only accidental consequences of intentions, we need other conditions in order to let intentions cause doings in at least some cases.

Secondly, I may intend to do something, but not actually do anything: if intentions are changes of my body, and if they are brought about consciously, they are themselves actions. Actions, however, were provisionally defined as requiring 'causing' intentions. It follows that if intentions are actions, viz socalled MENTAL ACTS, they would in turn require intentions, and so on, ad infinitum. So, either intentions are not actions or not al] actions need be `caused' by intentions. Thirdly, if intentions may be 'cancelled' by things like decisions, what other events should be postulated `between' intentions and doings?

3.4

Before we can discuss these problems about the mental conditions of actions, some further remarks are necessary about the observable part of actions, viz about doings and their consequences. Apparently, there are at least two types of actions, viz those which only consist of a doing (greeting, walking, waggling one's ears) and those which consist of a doing plus some event as a consequence (opening a door, smashing a window, eating an apple). In reality, however, actions are often much more complex. When I eat breakfast, build a house, govern a country, or study linguistics, these doings may be qualified as actions, but these actions are at least COMPOUND or should be considered as SEQUENCES of actions, in the sense defined aboye for events. In such compounds and sequences we must have intermediary states, to be considered as INTERMEDIARY RESULTS of the component actions, as well as a FINAL RESULT of the action(s). Characteristically, it is often this final result or consequence of a simple or composite action we `have in mind'. To wit, when I open a door, I will hardly think of, ie consciously intend, moving my arm and hand in a certain way; what I want and probably think of is getting the door open so that I may enter or may let somebody enter. In such cases we normally speak of the PURPOSE of an action. Whereas an intention has the action itself as its scope, a purpose will be taken as a mental event in which an agent represents the GOAL(S) of the action. A statement of purpose answers a Why-question about action. 1 may intend to go to Paris. The purpose of this rather complex action may differ from case to case: I may want to visit my friend Pierre, or want to attend some congress, or visit the Louvre. From this formulation it appears that purposes are also closely related to wants and should therefore be further discussed in the frarnework of mental structures.

INTENTION-SUCCESSFULNESS
FULLY SUCCESSFUL

SOME NOTIONS FROM THE THEORY OF ACTION

175

Purposes of actions are crucial in the organization of our activities and interaction. It sometimes happens that we accomplish some actions, eg go into a room, but at the same time 'forget' our purpose (What was I going to do?). There are cases where intentions and purposes seem to coincide, viz in the accomplishment of those actions which are done just for their own sake. In that case the doing or its result are thernselves a satisfaction of my wants or desires, and not some further consequences of this doing.

3.5

The analysis of actions, and especially of compound actions and action sequences, requires another concept, viz that of the SUCCESSFULNESS of actions. I may have the intention of opening a door, performing a certain doing, but without the intended result(s): the action fails, because eg the door is locked. As for events, doings may cause certain consequences only if some further CONDITIONS are satisfied. An action will be called

if the final consequence or final result is identical with the purpose. Since however the occurrence of a consequence may depend on conditions or events which are beyond my control, there is also a more restricted notion of successfulness, viz that of the intended doing. If I succeed in travelling to Paris but do not meet my friend Pierre, my purpose may not have been realized, but my action of going to Paris itself at least was successful. A distinction between (or I-successfulness) and PURPOSE-SUCCESSFULNESS (P-successfulness) is therefore relevant. Thus, 1 may accomplish some doing and thereby TRY to open a door which is locked, but if the full doing of opening cannot be performed, the action fails, and is I-unsuccessful. Trying is not of itself an action, but the accomplishment of the initial doings of a (compound) action, which then did not lead to I-success (unexpectedly) or of which I-success is doubted by the agent. 7

Note that in a great number of action types the accomplishment of a doing nearly co-occurs with an event affecting an object. The doing of opening a door or painting a wall can be I-successful only if the door opens and the wall becomes white. Although strictly speaking we have two (or more) events which are (nearly) co-occurring, viz a doing and a change of the properties of some object, we may say that the object-event is an integral part of the doing. That is, doings are not only qualified and identified by the type of bodily movements but also by the types of objects and object-changes effected. It is the final state of this object-change which is the 1-RESULT of an action: the door is open, the wall is white, the car is repaired, the cigar is reduced to ashes, etc.

There are a certain number of detailed complications in the SUCCESS or FAILURE of actions. These details are not unimportant because an action which fails is not an action, and hence conditions of success are at the same time existential conditions for actions. Aboye, for example, we have defined P-success as the realization of a purposed event or state of affairs. This goal of an action may occur, however, also independently of the doing. At the same time as 1 want to open a door, the wind may blow it open. My purpose is then

176 PRAGMATICS

satisfied, but I did not open the door. It should therefore be further required that an action is fully P-successful if it also is I-successful and if the doing is the cause of the purposed events or state of affairs, and if the agent wants and knows that the doing as accomplished causes the realization of the purpose. Thus, my car may break down; I do not know anything about motors but nevertheless pulí some cábles, as a consequence of which the motor unexpectedly runs again. My doings were intended, I had the purpose that the car would run again, and this purpose is realized. Nevertheless it can hardly be said that I repairedthe car. Hence the doing must be intended AS a specific cause of a specific purposed consequence. We will say that intentions of actions are under the SCOPE of purposes of actions.

From these few examples it appears that successfulness of actions in the strict sense requires the satisfaction of various types of initial conditions. These are not only properties of the `environment' (eg of the objects affected) of the action, and not only intentions and purposes, but also KNOWLEDGE about both these initial properties of objects and environment and the CAPACITIES and ABILITIES of the agent, concepts to which we will return below.

3.6

We are now in a position to have a better understanding ofcompound actions and sequences of actions, in that conditions of success may now be given for them.

Compound actions consists of SIMPLE ACTIONS. A simple action is defined as an I-successful doing with one intended result. In general, this doing will itself consist of several doings but, as was the case for events, there are cognitive and conventional reasons for considering some continuous doings as one doing, of which only the initial and final state are relevan[. Doings which are continuous over a period of time, and which satisfy the conditions of processes, will be called ACTIVITIES (walking, smoking). Similar remarks may be made here about events and processes. It should be said that in normal circumstances agents are in `continuous action'. They do not accomplish one action and then some time later, another action, etc, but their permanent activity is ANALYSED as a series of discrete actions and sequences of actions.

Aboye, a simple action was defined in terms of I-successfulness and the realization of one result of one doing. This result may consist in an effected change of our body together with a co-occurring change in an immediately affected object. A simple action, however, may also be defined with the additional requirement of P-success. When 1 cash a cheque at the bank, I may have performed all the necessary doings successfully, but if the bank refuses my cheque, it can hardly be said that I actually cashed the cheque. That is, the action was I-successful but not P-successful. In order to be able to distinguish between these two `dimensions' of activity, I-successful doings may be called ACTS, and those acts which require the occurrence of further consequences in

COMPLEX ACT.
ONE GLOBAL INTENTION

SOME NOTIONS FROM THE THEORY OF ACTION

177

order to be P-successful may be called ACTIONS. However, this distinction will not be made systematically in this book.

The intended results of acts may become sufficient or necessary conditions not only for following events but also for following acts. Now, a COMPOUND ACT is a sequence of acts such that the result of act a ; is a condition for the successfulness of act a ;+ 1 . Moreover, a compound act is ONE act by virtue of the fact that the 'intermediary' results (or rather their corresponding intentions) are under the scope of realized by the accomplishment of the whole compound act. Global intentions will be called PLANS. Building a house is a compound act. It consists of a sequence of acts, each of which may be carried out successfully (or fail), but they are intended as parts of the realization of a plan. A compound act is successful if its plan has been realized.

The difference between a compound act and a SEQUENCE OF ACTS is that a compound act has a clearly identifiable intended (planned) result. The development of the acts is determined by one plan (which may be changed during execution of the sequence), and the component acts are conditions for following acts. In a sequence of simple and/or compound acts there is a given purpose, but the acts may be relatively independent in the sense that even when they condition each other these relations are not planned to realize a specific result. I may take a holiday with the purpose of bettering my health, and the holiday may consist of a sequence of acts, such that at each point I may choose which act to perform, eg visit some town or go to the beach. There need not be a definite plan nor a precisely identifiable result, and the acts may be relatively independent. The sequence is unified (is not an arbitrary series of acts) under the identity of agent(s), a continuous period of time, and the execution of the various acts under one purpose. As for all purposes, such a purpose may involve a whole SET of wanted changes or states.

Finally, it is useful to introduce AUXILIARY ACTS. An auxiliary act is an act of which the result is intended as a sufficient condition for the successfulness of a (main) act. A composite act of which some act(s) are auxiliary acts, is called a Component acts of COMPOUND acts, however, may also be conditions of following acts. What, then, qualifies as a main component act, and what asan auxiliary act? Do we consider building a wall a main component act of building a house, and mixing concrete as an auxiliary act? One of the possible differences may be that building a wall is a NECESSARY component of the act of building a house, which is not the case for mixing concrete (I may use stones as foundations and have wooden walls). That is, normally speaking, I do not build a house at ah l when I do not build walls. Asan essential part of the compound act, building a wall must be represented in the plan. Characteristically, auxiliary acts may be carried out also by HELPERS. Lighting my pipe is an auxiliary act which somebody else may do for me, although I am still the one who smokes the pipe. A component act, thus, is carried out by the agent himself and is carried out

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with the intention to make the whole coinpound act successful, whereas an auxiliary act is carried out only to make one component act succeed.

These are only tentative suggestions for a distinction between composite (complex or compound) acts and act sequences, and between auxiliary acts and (necessary) component acts, and it is obvious that these distinctions require further explication.

4 Mental structures of action

4.1

It has been made clear aboye that a serious account of acts and actions cannot be given in purely behaviouristic terms, ie in terms of doings and their consequences alone. A number of MENTAL concepts, like consciousness, awareness, knowledge, wants, desires, intentions, purposes and decisions, have been used. Although little is known about the precise status and the mutual relations between these concepts, some brief remarks about them are necessary.

4.2

It has been shown that acts and actions may succeed only if a certain number of conditions are satisfied. These conditions may consist of properties of worlds in which the agent is acting.. Since acts involve results of changes in the body of the agent as well as changes in properties or relations of objects, the agent must KNOw about the actual state of his body and of the objects to be affected. He must know about the POSSIBLE changes of worlds, changes compatible for example with the laws of physical and biological nature, as well as about the possible consequences of doings. The agent must have a rich data base of information consisting of his KNOWLEDGE and BELIEFS. A knowledge set or EPISTEMIC SET consists of propositions which are `true', in the conventional sense of the term. That is, these propositions are 'warranted' by conventionally accepted truth criteria (perception, correct inference, information from reliable sources). Beliefs are propositions, which need not be true but which the agent thinks to be true or which he thinks to be probably true.

Knowledge and beliefs pertain to ah l kinds of facts, both particular and general, viz about properties of, and relations between objects, both actual and possible, and about particular and general relations between facts or fact concept. Knowledge and beliefs are productive in the sense that there are RULES of deductive and inductive inference which enable an agent to derive new information from old information.

4.3

Whereas knowledge and beliefs provide the data base for the agent about the world as it is, or as it could be or could become, our DESIRES and WANTS provide the actual motivation for our action, because they pertain to the structure of the world as it should be. If an agent desires or wants the state p to be realized, it is presupposed that he believes that at that moment p is not

PURPOSE OF ACTION.

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the case. One of the intuitive differences between desires and wants is that I may desire p although I know that p is not possibly realizable in a normal world, whereas from my desires I may select some of the states which I think realizable; in the laLter case it is said that I want something. I may also wantp to be the case without directly desiring p to be the case, but only because, for example, somebody else desires p. The wanting of p, then, is indirectly determined by my desire to satisfy the desires of somebody else. Similarly, I may delire p, but know that p has q as a possible consequence, but where q is undesirable. Then, if p is Iess desirable than q is undesirable I will not want p. If of two states (or events) p and q, p is more desirable than q, we say that the agent PREFERSp over q. In that case preference is directly based on desires. If it is based on our actual wants, it is more complex. Although as such I may desire p more than q, and hence prefer p over q, I may know or believe, as in the example given aboye, that p has more undesirable (te stronger and/or more numerous) consequences than q. In that case I will want q, ¡e REASONABLY prefer q over p. Note that wants and preferences need not pertain to actual state of affairs, they may also relate to other possible worlds, eg in generic preferences. I may prefer an apple to a pear even if 1 do not make an actual choice in order to eat an apple. I then prefer it for any imagined world in which 1 would make a choice.

One of the crucial concepts briefly mentioned aboye is that of REASON. We assumed that our wants and preferences based on them are RATIONAL (whereas our desires need not be). Obviously, this concept involves processes of inference in which certain desires are 'controlled' by our knowledge and beliefs about possible consequences, further conditions, desires and wants of others, and so on.

4.4

If I want or prefer a certain state or event, there are several possibilities to realize this want. 1 may wait until the state is realized by the normal course of events and by the actions of other agents, or I may act in such a way that this state is realized. In my knowledge set I have information about what types of action will most probably have the wanted state or event as a consequence. Then, if this particular act cannot reasonably be expected to have (stronger) undesired other consequences, the agent will transform his want to a

That is, a purpose is a state of mind in which I have a representation of a wanted future state of affairs or event together with the instruction that this goal must be brought about by an action (of myself). If there is more than one course of action leading to this goal, the agent must DECIDE which course to take, ¡e he must make an actual CHOICE. This decision, if it is rational, is based on a calculation of preferences and RISKS of failure of the different courses of action. A decision is OPTIMAL if it results in a course of action realizing a maximum of the desired states or events. It is obvious that in real action our decisions are not always optimal, especially not if failures can easily be corrected or if they do not have serious undesired consequences.