 Well, I've said it before my videos and I'll probably say it again if you don't take advantage of your parks in your area You're missing out Well, we've woken up this bright beautiful morning to talk about defining and we're going to start with different kinds of definitions Let's hit the trails so We've got three broad kinds of definitions and there are particular kinds after that And we got defining by extension Which is by pointing to the things to which? the things that are You know through which the definitions apply We've got defining by intention, which is you know the meaning Right so extensions out here, right? So an extension of trees all these trees Defining by intention is what we mean by tree right what words What further definitions do we use to describe it? right and So that's to find about extension to find about intention and then we have defining by exclusion Now strictly speaking defining by exclusion is not really defining Right because that's defining by what it's not right, so You know these are trees they are not bushes Okay, I mean that that's helpful in some way, but telling me that that is not a bush is Not the same thing is telling me what it is Because it's also not an elephant and it's not a basketball court Now So like I said strictly speaking to find it by exclusion is not a definition, but that's okay And in fact none of these ways is perfect and for defining something So if you're writing a paper, I wouldn't rely on just any one way to define any of the any of your terms I would use defining by exclusion to find it by intention and Defining by excuse me to find my extension to find it by intention and defining by exclusion use all of them Okay, and yet if you're doing a good job But you know providing definitions of all these kinds You'll have what about a 300 word definition about a page Which is you know, it's not just you know just making a fluff, right? It's real work And you know before you know it these three to five page papers really aren't that hard to fill So extension intention and exclusion, let's take a look at defining by extension So the first kind of definition we're going to look at or with definition by extension is Demonstrative definition Now this might be a good time to point out a distinction between definite item and definite a definite item is what you're defining and Definines is what's doing the defining So hello, so suppose we're defining dog Right, and if we're going to define by extension The definite will be instances of dog. I'm going to point to or you know mention the Instances of the definite So the first kinds of definitions excuse me the first kind of definition by extension is Demonstrative definition and that's just where you Point to a particular case. So I'm going to define dog Right there, that's a dog Now you have to have the definitions right in front of you Okay, and the other viewer or the person you talking to has to be able to see What you're talking about? So, you know, maybe use a picture, you know, maybe you Are standing in front of the thing like in this case we got this little dog here So this is defining but this is demonstrative definition where the definitions You know you're pointing to an instance of the definitions The next kind of defining by extension is enumerative Now enumerative is where you're, you know, demonstrative you're right in front of the thing and you're pointing to it Enumerative is where you're listing off famous cases In particular instances So let's try cities, right? If I'm giving an enumerative definition of cities I would simply start listing off famous cities New York, Atlanta, Austin, San Antonio Right, these are all enumerative cases, enumerative definitions for city And again it's really important to use kind of famous cases And, you know, one little shortcoming that we have here even with the definitions that are provided So far I've just listed American cities So if, suppose somebody actually doesn't know what city means But they know all these cities that are just listed off They might think that I'm just talking about American cities Now, you know, this isn't necessarily bad But it does show a limitation of defining by extension Even in the case where I provided the demonstrative definition of dog If somebody really doesn't know what dog is and I point to my dog and say, that's dog They might think that dog means pet Or dog means cute Or something like that, right? Now, again, it's not necessarily bad but it shows kind of a limitation for defining by extension And every kind of definitions that we're going to talk about has a limitation And again, that's not necessarily bad But it shows that none is just complete all on its own So we got a demonstrative definition and we've got a enumerative definition Let's keep going Well, the next kind of definitions by extension that we have is subclass Now subclass is kind of like enumerative Enumerative is where you list particular instances of the definitum And, you know, famous instances Well, subclass is where you list kinds, right? Or, you know, kinds within the definitum So suppose we're providing a subclass definitum of car So we could have sedan, hatchback, two-door, four-door, luxury We've got all kinds of ways where we can start providing a subclass definitum for car Suppose we're doing a subclass definitum for tree We can have oak, fir, cedar, ash All these different subclasses of tree for a definitum Like I said, it's like enumerative Enumerative you're giving particular instances Subclass is where you're giving a list of kinds within that definitum Now that wraps up our three kinds of definitions by extension Let's move on to definitions by intention So defined by extension is where you provide the definitions by pointing to cases Listing instances of the definitum Defined by intention is providing a definitum of meaning You're going to use further words and phrases as a definitum as opposed to, you know, objects or cases So maybe it's not, you know, people are going to argue about this But maybe a way to think about it is defining by extension is exterior to your mind Defined by intention is defining by what's already in your mind Okay, so the first kind of defined by intention that we have is synonym And this is where you provide a definitum that is similar or as close as you can get exact in meaning as the definitum So if we're going to define a dog We might use a synonym canine or pooch or puppy Or in today's internet vernacular doggo Yeah, there's all kinds of ways to provide synonyms Suppose I want to define speed I can talk about swiftness, quick, acceleration These are all similar, although not exact in meaning And when providing a synonym for a definitum You have to make sure you use a word that's more well known than the definitum So we all pretty much know speed, right? Well, suppose somebody doesn't know the word speed And I provide the word alacrity for the definitums Well, alacrity is probably less well known than speed So that wouldn't be a good synonym Now, again, as with all these, defining with synonyms has its limitations So first of all, the definitums that you provide has to be known to the person you're talking to That would be good when you're providing that sort of definitums And also, it may not necessarily be as exact So, you know, I say alacrity Well, suppose I'm defining alacrity and I use speed Maybe it's kind of close to alacrity Speed and alacrity are close to each other, but they're not exact Now, synonyms are helpful for kind of getting in the ballpark Or trying to get somebody more or less acquainted But they're not perfect Again, none of these ways are perfect Well, that gives a synonym Let's move on to the next defining by intention Well, the next kind of defining by intention we're going to look at is etymological Etymological definitums is providing a definitums of the history of a word So words have histories They come from previous words Other languages or earlier versions of one's own language Or the language that belongs So, you know, we had mentioned speed Well, an etymological definition of speed would be that it comes from an old English word Spoan, which in turn influenced Germanic languages And then went back to influencing old English To speed or speed n I think I'm pronouncing that right And spoan means the first version of it The first word, right? Spoan means to succeed or to prosper So it's interesting that, you know, I imagine that's not what you thought You know, given what you already think speed means You know, by today's usage It's histories begins with a word that means to succeed or to prosper Now, words have histories and it can get pretty interesting You know, some of the histories of these And when you provide an etymological definition And etymological definitions You're giving at least part of that history Well, the next kind of defining by intention is lexical And this is probably the kind that you first think of when you think of a definition You're providing a definition that's in the form, grammatically You know, of the sentence And you could do this in one or two sentences You know, one is best Now with a lexical definition You need to provide two things You need to provide the genus and the deferentia The genus is the kind to which the definitum belongs Remember earlier we dealt with dog? Well, the kind to which dog belongs is mammal It's probably a little high up there Lots of mammals But hey, mammal is a good start, right? The deferentia is what distinguishes the definitum from other members of its kind Now I am not enough of a veterinarian or a zoologist or biologist So let's give the zoological definition, very precise definition of dog So let's switch examples, let's go to chair So the definitum is chair And the genus of the definitum It's not like, you know, rocking chair, desk chair, lounge chair, recliner No, that's definitums by subclass Now you're providing kinds of the definitum You want the kind to which the definitum belongs So we're not giving specific instances of the definitum We're going up an abstraction Going to more abstraction So what kind of thing is a chair? Well, it's a piece of furniture So the genus of chair is furniture The deferentia is what distinguishes that piece of furniture That definitum from other members of its kind Well, what's helpful here is to remember or to think of what other kinds Or what other things belong to that kind So you might even work in reverse here So we're working on the definitum for chair By trying to find the genus and the deferentia What we want to think about this is let's start with the kind furniture And think of the subclasses So we got chair, we got couch, we got table, we have desk We have ottoman, lamp, right? These are all pieces of furniture So we've got the definitum chair We have the genus furniture We're looking for the deferentia That's what distinguishes chair from other pieces of furniture Well, what distinguishes chair from, say, something like a table? Well, you sit on a chair Okay, good, we're on our way But there are other pieces of furniture upon what you sit What distinguishes a chair from a couch? Well, a chair is for one person to sit Good again, right? So a chair is a piece of furniture for one person to sit but we're not done yet What distinguishes a chair from a stool? Stool Well, a stool, a chair has a back and a stool does not Okay, there we go So a chair is a piece of furniture with a back for one person to sit That's the genus and the deferentia We're given a single sentence definition Single sentence definitions for chair By the way, being able to develop this skill is very useful If you can provide a single sentence definition for the terms you're talking about off the top of your head You will be very capable at explaining yourself in a moment's notice And you give the impression and hopefully not the delusion that you know what you're talking about Alright, so we've been defining the extension and defining by intention Now let's look at exclusion Again, strictly speaking, defining by exclusion is not defining It's just sometimes helpful maybe clearing up confusions or kind of getting a person in the ballpark And you know, it's defining by what the defininum is not And again, that is not actually defining Alright, because hey, look at that, that's not a computer Alright, but it doesn't tell me what it is And if you're going to take that approach, right, I had to list everything that exists Everything else that exists besides that thing in order to provide that sort of definition by exclusion But sometimes it can't be useful, it's not always useful, but it can be useful So let's take the first way we're going to define by exclusion And that's by defining by antonym Now defining by antonym is actually a lot like synonym You're providing a word that's more or less the opposite So you're providing a defininum that's more or less the opposite of the defininum This has varying degrees of precision, but it can be useful So, laggard, that's a fun word, laggard And somebody says, well, what's laggard? Well, you might start with the defininums by antonym By saying, well, it's the opposite of quick or the opposite of rapid Notice, quick and rapid are both synonyms for speed I'm kind of touched on a theme here But yeah, so laggard, it's a fun word So I was like, well, what's laggard? Well, it's the opposite of quick or it's the opposite of speed Or opposite of rapid, rapid, excuse me, not rapid, rapid So defining by antonym can be useful It has some of the same rules as defining by synonym You have to provide a word that's more familiar to the person than the defininum that you're trying to define And it can come with a varying degree of precision So rapid is not an exact definition, an exact antonym of laggard But it's close, right? It's close So in the opposite direction Another kind of peculiar thing about defining by defining by antonym Excuse me, providing a defininum by antonym is that not every word, not every thing has an antonym So we've got lots of trees around us I have no idea what the antonym of tree would be So it's going to have its limited uses, but sometimes it could be useful And in this case, yeah, laggard, real quick antonym, rapid or quick We've got one more definition by exclusion The last kind of defining by exclusion we're going to talk about is specious similar And you're probably not really familiar with this kind of definition And in fact, I couldn't find a word that means specious similar So I had to resort to the clunky phrase, specious similar So when we're talking about specious similar, I'll talk about these instances where words kind of get confused Where defininums kind of get confused with one another So one way may think about it, talk about confusions of vagueness and confusions in ambiguity But by the way, another one, vagueness and ambiguity are not the same thing So those two might actually be cases of specious similars And really the idea here is, especially if you're writing a paper You want to just set aside what you're not talking about, right? Say, okay, so the defininum that I'm dealing with here is sometimes confused with these other words, these other meanings But I'm not dealing with these So one of my favorites is evolution and improvement So sometimes we talk about a species evolving And we're talking about, or a theory evolving, or society evolving, or an individual evolving And you just need to evolve, sometimes this is a phrase What they mean is, or people use this, what they mean is improve So I'm more evolved, or that society is more evolved than ours What they mean is that society has improved Okay, that person has improved, okay, but evolution does not mean improve, right? Even the word progress, sometimes we talk about making progress, or, you know, that person has made a lot of progress To mean that that person has improved or gotten better But neither evolution nor progress mean improve, right? Evolution is just, I mean, if we're dealing with the theory of evolution, that's just an explanation for the diversity of a species But a species can go from, you know, good to bad, or, you know, somehow better to somehow worse Through the process of evolution, I mean, probably chickens came from dinosaurs, right? At some point, just because a species has evolved, it doesn't mean it's gotten better You know, in our own area, the Texas Blind Salamander, right? Well, that species evolved and adapted to its environment, but it can't see anymore And if you were to put that salamander, say, up here, it would have fewer capabilities than, you know, other lizards in this area So it's not necessarily better, right? And, you know, this is like a really bad version of Superman, right? Superman came from a tougher planet, so he evolved into a tougher being He's like, no, it doesn't work that way. That's not how evolution works It'll become stronger by being in a worse environment No, so, you know, species similars is where you're trying to distinguish definitums from each other Because we sometimes get them confused for whatever reason So yeah, species similars, it's where you're trying to, you know, differentiate between two terms That sometimes get confused with one another And again, it's not strictly speaking providing a definitums But it's trying to make sure that you're on target right from the beginning And frankly, when you're dealing with papers, right? And if you're writing out a nice explication of a term It might be helpful to start out with species similars Say, look, this is not what I'm talking about. I want to distinguish this right away, right? Okay, that might be helpful when you're writing Okay, so we've got three kinds of definitums. We've got intention, extension, and exclusion Extension is by pointing to cases or instances What's exterior to the mind? Intention is providing a definitums using meaning And then exclusion is defining, even though it's not really defining Defining by what it's not, right? And with these, what, eight kinds of definitums You can clearly, very clearly explain what you're talking about to someone else And perhaps will support me to yourself