means of language alone.

The meaning of signs and symbols has both a logical and a psychological aspect. Logically, anything that has meaning must be capable of conveying the meaning. Psychologically, anything that has meaning must have meaning for someone, for a subject. The logical relationship between a sign and its object is a one-to-one correlation. One part of the pair, the object, is more interesting to the subject, the person involved, and the other part, the sign, is more readily available. Symbols follow a more complex logic. In addition to the object, the symbol, and the subject, there is a conception. In other words, the symbol refers not just to the concrete object but also to the abstract idea of the object. The word does not simply indicate the dinner about to arrive; it also refers to the idea of dinner in discussions, for example, of cooking. The denotation of a symbol is its relationship with the object. The connotation of a symbol is its relationship with the conception of the object. The three most common meanings of the word “meaning,” then, are signification, denotation, and connotation.

Langer based her view of the nature of symbols on the “picture theory” of language proposed by Wittgenstein in his early work. Wittgenstein proposed that propositions or statements present pictures of some part of reality. In this view, both things and relations among things are projected into language. Some of those influenced by the early Wittgenstein argued that because language is a picture of some state of things, in order to be meaningful statements either must be true by definition or must be provable as true or false. Statements that cannot be logically worked out in the manner of equations or at least proven in theory do not provide a picture of any state of affairs outside language. Therefore, mystical, metaphysical, and poetic statements are simply confused thinking or expressions of emotion that are mistaken for meaningful propositions.

Philosophy in a New Key accepts the argument that only statements with a clear, provable relationship to arrangements of objects are meaningful in language. However, it rejects the assumptions that language is the only means of expressing thought and that everything that cannot be expressed through thought is merely formless emotion. Instead, Langer maintains that language is one form of symbolism, discursive symbolism, in which objects and relationships among objects are represented. There is also, however, a nondiscursive symbolism made up of presentational forms. Feelings have definite forms that can be presented to thought through arrangements of shapes or sounds.

In her discussion of language, Langer suggests that even this primary form of discursive symbolism may have its roots in connotation, in the emotional significance that concepts hold for human beings. She points out that the speech of small children seems to arise from playing with sounds and with ideas attached to sounds and objects, rather than from practical desires to communicate needs. Expression through language enables people to bring objects, events, and actions into their minds, to hold onto things by means of their symbols.

Sacramental rituals and myth are two areas of human symbol making, areas that have often been ignored or misunderstood by philosophers who approach the mind only in terms of reason. Sacred objects are symbols that express powerful psychological reactions to fundamental experiences such as life and death. These psychological reactions often result in physical movements, such as raising one’s hands or dropping to one’s knees. When these movements become repeated gestures before the sacred objects or group, the gestures are formalized as rituals.

While ritual, according to Langer, originates from significant movements, myth originates from fantasy. The most subjective and private form of fantasy, in her view, is the dream. Folktales are somewhat less private, because they are shared and traditional stories, but they still express individual fears and desires. Myth expresses general ideas, conceptions of the state of humanity and the universe, in the form of fantasy. Langer sees mythological thinking, as an expression of general ideas, as a necessary forerunner of metaphysics. In turn, metaphysics, consisting of abstract statements about the ultimate nature of things, is the forerunner of the abstractions of science.

In the eighth chapter of Philosophy in a New Key, entitled “On Significance in Music,” Langer presents her theory of music. She rejects the two most common theories of expression in music, the self-expression theory and the semantic theory. The first holds that music is the pouring out of the emotions of the composer or performer. If this were the case, according to Langer, it would be difficult to explain the difference between a musical composition and a sigh or a scream. The semantic theory, the theory that music is a language that conveys messages, also seems inadequate to her. If music is a language, what is the meaning of each of its notes and what information does it communicate? Her own theory adopts parts of each of these others. Music does express feelings but not as an outpouring of emotion. It also has symbolic significance but not discursive significance. Instead, it is the logical expression of feelings. It formulates the inner life of human beings and presents this inner life to conscious awareness.

Langer summarizes her general view by arguing that people live in a fabric of meaning. Even facts are not realities that are automatically given but are instead intellectually formulated events. To formulate events intellectually is to conceive of them as symbols. Philosophy should therefore concern itself with symbols in order to clarify meanings. A philosophy that knows only inductive or deductive logic will overlook a vast array of symbols and find itself unable to explain much of human life.