3 ms·

Right, so you’ve demonstrated that the phenomenon exists. Now, what defines that phenomenon, exactly?

• gooseus 5y ago
  I'd say "understanding" is less one thing and more of a collection of capabilities which work together to allow understanding to "emerge". One of those capabilities would be the ability to contextual an object/statement within multiple frames of reference while also being able to compare and contrast the different instances of those contextualized objects/statements. This is what allows a child to identify a bird as any number of physical specimens of different species (chicken, goose, eagle, sparrow), while also identifying cartoon depictions that talk and simple drawings (Twitter icon) as birds as well... while also "understanding" that while the Twitter icon can be called a bird, it is not actually a real bird ("Ceci n'est pas une pipe") and it would not be expected to sing or fly like a backyard sparrow (unless it was animated, which would make still make sense to a child). I think this also what rise to our ability to "understand" jokes, puns, and other turns of phrase - "I just flew in from Boston, and boy are my arms tired!" - this dumb joke requires a number of concepts that need to be contextualized before you can "get" the absurdity of stating that a human might tire out their arms while flying... like you might think a bird would.