Implicated vs. Incidental: Relevance Theory and The Meaning of Genesis

Peaceful Science
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John W. Hilber explains how Relevance Theory clarifies the meaning of text, by clarifying what is implicated vs. incidental to the message.

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The difference between implicated and incidental is really important because all human utterances and writings are under-determined. A lot of foundational work has to be done even to understand a phrase like, “Hooray, we won!” Who are “we”? What activity were we doing? What does it mean to win in that context? Etcetera. So we just say, “Hooray, we won!”, and expect our hearers to apply their understanding of the context we share, and to distinguish between the implicated and incidental.

This explains why learning to communicate is a never-ending, life-long experience. It’s hard! And failures happen often; we refer to them as miscommunications or misunderstandings.

It also explains why natural language processing via machine learning is so hard. It keeps me up many a night. :slight_smile:

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@Chris_Falter, I think the reason why Hilber’s point is important is that it provides a sensible limiting principle to Denis Lamoureux’s “Message Incident Principle.”

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Denis argues that all ancient “science” (though I am not sure what that is) is merely incident to the message of Scripture, not its teaching. However, we do have to consider what is implicated by their teaching too, because that is not merely incidental. I am not sure that Denis explained how he thinks through this issue. The closest I came to seeing this is here:

We can again ask the question: Was it within the cognitive limits of these ancient these women and men to know that Jesus had physically died and then physically rose from the dead? My answer is an absolute “YES!!!” It was well within the scope of cognitive competence of these ancient people to know that Jesus Christ had definitely been raised from the grave. And He lives today! Amen.
Isn’t the Resurrection Just a Relic of a Primitive Pre-Scientific Worldview? - BioLogos

Of course, we can also ask: “Was it within the cognitive limits of these ancient these women and men to” teach that we all descend from a historical Adam and Eve? It seems that, “It was well within the scope of cognitive competence of these ancient people” If that is the case, and it does not conflict with the evidence, why exactly does he say a historical Adam and Eve is incidental?

I’m not sure I know the answer to this.

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That also is very true…