ContemporaryMusic Review 9 1997OPA (OverseasPublishers Association)

1997,Vol.16, Part 4, pp. 41-50 AmsterdamB.V.Published in The Netherlands

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Fictionalism: a neglected context for

studies in musical signification

Cynthia M. Grund
Uppsala University

The aim of this essay is two fold: firstly, a paradoxical ambiguity surrounding the nature
of the sign which is under investigation in musical signification studies is identified and
discussed, and a means of resolving this ambiguity is provided. Secondly, it is suggested
that the philosophical point of view known as fictlonalism provides a natural and fruitful
framework for theorizing about issues of this nature.

KEY WORDS Metaphor, counterfactual, fictionalism, intentionality.

M y i n v o l v e m e n t w i t h studies in musical semiotics b e g a n as the result of s o m e

v a g u e , b u t persistent intuitions that a n a p p r o p r i a t e u n d e r s t a n d i n g of the
w a y in w h i c h the t r a n s f o r m a t i o n a l t h i n k i n g a n d r e a s o n i n g required for the
creation, c o m p r e h e n s i o n a n d a p p r e c i a t i o n of m e t a p h o r m i g h t 1. p r o v i d e us
with the elements for a theory as to h o w it is that w e regard music as something
w h i c h " m e a n s " s o m e t h i n g : 2. help us to better conceive the n a t u r e of this
m e a n i n g - r e l a t i o n s h i p b e t w e e n m u s i c a n d these " s o m e t h i n g s " ; a n d 3. help
us to formulate a theory accounting for the intentionalizing mechanisms w h i c h
elevate s o u n d sequences to the level of music, t h u s establishing the sonic
sequences w e s u b s e q u e n t l y h a v e c o n s i d e r e d to be m u s i c as signs of a v e r y
special sort. After all, as R a y m o n d Monelle remarks:

*Semiotics is the theory of signs, from the Greek word for sign, semeion. Since music seems
meaningful - - it is more, apparently, than its physical sounds - - many have taken it to
be a sign. Gino Stefani goes so far as to say "it does not need demonstrating" that music
is a sign (Stefani 1974, 280).
(MoneUe, 1992, p. 1)
42 Cynthia M. Grund

We will return to this comment shortly. It will be illustrative during our

discussion of (3), the topic among the three listed above which is most relevant
to the concerns addressed in this essay.
In the process of fleshing out the intuitions which I had regarding the
mechanisms which drive metaphor and their subsequent three-fold explanatory
utility for a theory of musical signification, the initial step was to formulate
an explicit semantics for metaphor in terms of counterfactuals. Here, metaphors
are recast as counterfactuals, which, in turn, are analyzed semantically in
the style of David Lewis' possible-world approach. 1The first application of
this work regarding metaphor to things musical musical was indirect; it is
suggested in what ways descriptive and evaluate statements about music which
themselves are metaphors may be accorded truth value, rather than simply
being dismissed as some sort of purely subjective, "unscientific" statements
tinged with only some sort of obscure "real world" meaning, if any at all.
The next application is more central to musical signification studies; it was
time to see whether or not this formal semantic approach which employed
counterfactuals and possible worlds might, indeed, prove to be a candidate
for a mechanism which can account for a theoretical linkage between the
manner in which metaphors "mean something" and the manner in which
music itself "means something". Anyone who has given any thought to the
matter cannot agree with the commonplace that "music is the universal
language", but at the same time, there nevertheless does seem to be some
relationship or other between music and language which is worth investigating.
Note that we are no longer tarrying at the level of statements about music,
inquiring as to whether or not what they say about the music is "true", but
we are descending to the level of the music itself. Examination of some
contemporary attempts 2 at formulating a characterization of musical work
revealed that they were too broad; the formally complex,historically grounded,
performance-means-stipulated sonic phenomena which were delineated still
permitted as instances sonic material which I argue we would not want to
callmus/c. In order to remedy this, I purpose some formal versions of a necessary
and sufficient condition for an acoustic phenomenon to be music at/for a
reference group of agents: **in order for a sequence of sounds to be music,
they must be apprehended as or as/fthey were something else, i.e. something
which itself is not a sequence of sounds 3.
Let's relate this to quote (*) at the beginning of this essay. There we read:
"Since music seems meaningful - - it is, more, apparently, than its physical
sounds m many have taken it to be a sign." This is a good example of the
subtle fashion, in which the two levels - - sonic material simpliciter vs. sonic
material which is music - - to which we refer in the preceding paragraph
may be conflated. If I may permit myself a little Peirce-terminology here, I
will set the stage for the ensuing discussion in such terms: following the
 Fictionalism 43

notational conventions in Monelle (1992), p. 194, in any given piece of music,

the physical sounds constitute a sign S which tias an object O - - "means
O" - - by virtue of an interpretant I. Now, I itself is a sign which has the same
object O and S and which requires an interpretant I, which, in its turn, has
the same object O as S and I, but which requires and interpretant I and so
on and so on. MoneUe provides a diagram as an aid in clarifying these
relationships (Figure 1; cf. MoneUe, 1992, p. 194):

Figure 1
The diagram commutes: S "means" O thanks to the interpretation provided
by Iv itself a sign, so actually S "means" O thanks to the interpretation provided
by 11, which itself has been interpreted by I2, which itself ... etc., etc. This is
all well and good as a schema for the theory as to what is involved in the
meaning relationship between sound sequence S and whatever object O might
be. Note, however that the sign which is under discussion is still simply the
sound sequence S, and aLLof the I1'~ 2 < i <*~ do nothing more than providing
the wherewithal to understand each I1.1, until we finally arrive at I~, which
then permits us to understand S as "meaning" O. Whether or not one thinks
that this schematizationis adequate for representing the complexities inherent
in Peirce's conception of the sign-object-interpretant relationship, it is adequate
for unmasking a paradox inherent in any semiotic system which employs a
sign-object-interpretant triangle in order to explicate the emergence of musical
signification: either the sign S which under discussion is a sequence of physical
sounds which is not "yet" music, or it is a sequence of sounds which is already
music. In the latter case, much of what is truly interesting philosophically
and semiotically about the relationships holding among sound, music and
musical signification has been passed by simply stipulating that the sign S
is already music; in the former case, some complex of sign-object interpretant
will be provided as part of whatever music is subsequently characterized as
being, but then whatever music turns out to be, it will have been characterized
44 CynthiaM. Grund

as being inherently significant, a move which certainly begs the question as

to whether or not it always is significant.
My contention is thus that this conflation of sound-sequence-as-sign and
music-as-sign is intuitively unsatisfying and, indeed, dangerous to any serious
theory of musical signification. The suggestion put forth here is that in order
to be regarded as music, a sequence of sounds already must be intentionalized,
but not in such a fashion as to "mean" something else - - the relationship
represented in the above diagram w but rather to have beeninflected or gestalted
by something else. As a result of this process we may then regard them as
being music, which, then, in its turn may be further interpreted by means
of statements, whether they be matter-of-fact ones or ones of the metaphorical
variety discussed in the above. Indeed, it may even be regarded as a sign,
the interpretation of which may well be amendable to the S-O-I 1, 1 < i < .~.
The upshot of all this is thatmusic itself is already intentionalized, the result
of an interpretative process enacted upon the sound sequences themselves.
The counterfactual found in the condition (**) provides us with a "filter"
which separates out those sound sequences which are music at a community
of reference from those which are not s. It is crucial to note that is all it does;
it does not ascribe any extra-musical meanings to the sound sequences which
make it through the filter - - theoretically, it cannot, since it is instrumental
in constituting the music to which extra-musical meanings subsequently may
be ascribed - - nor does it attribute any judgements of value. In fact, it does
not ascribe any extra-sonic meanings whatsoever. It simply serves to identify
and characterize them as music. Once identified as music, it then makes sense
to discuss intra-musical relationships involving meaning and reference, to
ponder the presence or absence of extra-musical meaning and significance,
or to discuss judgements of aesthetic value.
The fact that the counterfactual filter simply identifies and characterizes
sound sequences as music as a feature which has some clear theoretical
advantages; for starters, it is possible to draw the distinctions which were
discussed in the preceding paragraphs. The down-to-earth example which
follows, is, to be sure, anecdotal, but, nevertheless, instructive: It is taken
from a discussion which took place at the Eleventh International Congress
of Aesthetics in Nottingham, held during the late summer of 19886. After
presenting him with some of my newly hatched ideas about the counterfactual
foundations of music, Moorhead State University (Minnesota, USA) philosopher
and aesthetician Ted Gracyk told me that, for him, a heuristic for sound
sequences being music was that they caused him build buildings in his mind.
Buildings, or perhaps better, building processes thus acted as the counteffactual
filter for his separation of music from non-music. Subsequently, many of us
attended a conference event during which a concert of traditional and modern
Japanese "art" music was given by a group of Japanese musicians. For a
 Fictionalism 45

Westerner, the instruments employed as well as the sounds produced on

them were unfamiliar, to say the least. Afterwards, Gracyk reflected that, for
him, there was no questionbut that what he heard was music. The "building
transfer" unmistakably took place: whether or not he had been given any
prior information as to what he was going to hear, or whether or not he
knew that in another culture, this was, indeed, music, he could assert that
it was music for him. This, in spite of the fact that he had no idea how to
value-judge what he had heard, nor the foggiest notion of what sorts of
interpretive or extra-musical meanings were ascribed to this music in the
Japanese tradition.
As gratifying as this Gracyk example might be in light of my emerging
theor~ please note that I am not suggesting that every time we are confronted
with a new sound sequence, we are compelled to subject it to some sort of
test involving counterfactual attribution to determine whether or not it is
music. It is obvious that once we are functioning within a cultural reference
group, we may identify some sound sequences as being music and others
as not being music due to what we are taught, by recognizing similarities
between a given sound sequence and others that we have termed as "music",
by recognizing certain situations as ones in which the sound sequences
produced are usually regarded as music, etc., etc.; in short, the way we learn
to apply predicates of any sort in order to organize experience. What is being
suggested here is a 1. theory for what is "at the bottom of it all", a theory
concerned with how such sound sequences might ever become demarcated
in the first place; 2. what is conceptually and philosophically interesting about
such a demarcation; and 3. how we might be able to put together sufficiently
liberal, yet stringent criteria, for how it could interestingly be said of beings
quite unlike ourselves - - but equipped with something like ears which can
receive something like sound waves - - that they have music within their
"cultural reference group".
The questions addressed in the preceding theoretical presentation in and
of themselves are ones to which the discipline of musical semiotics is, in
general, amenable; the counterfactual/possible-worlds-semantics approach
had simply suggested itself to me as an interesting way of coming to grips
with these issues~ At the very least, the condition (**) which emerged serves
as a means of resolving the paradox of the nature of the sign in musical
signification studies, by providing a non-signifying mechanism of
intentionalization for the sound sequence before it may properly be regarded
as a musical sign.
Research which I have carried out during the past two years, however, has
convinced me that the interest of this approach to musical semioticians need
not only lie in the insights which it may provide here-and-now. Should the
methods which I have proposed be judged as having any merit whatsoever
46 CynthiaM. Grund

with regard to providing tools for furthering of our insights into the thorny
issues of musical semiotics, more insight is waiting in the wings. There are
substantive ways in which this approach dovetails with work which has been
done by some philosophers whose work falls within areas which are not
often included within the purview of music semiotics. Since their work has
been done within other areas of philosophy, such as epistemology, metaphysics,
ontology and the like, it can serve to contribute both to the idea-historic and
conceptual underpinnings of musical semiotics. Indeed, much of what they
have done may be recast and reinterpreted in terms of the methods employing
counterfactuals and intentional logic which I have been proposing. The
philosophers to w h o m I am referring are those who are regarded as advocates
of the philosophical view known asfictionalism. The name which is perhaps
most closely associated with this movement internationally is that of Hans
Vaihinger, author of Die Philosophie des Als Ob, first published in 1911. Vaihinger
had almost nothing to say about fictionalism and aesthetics, whereas Swedish
philosophers All N y m a n and Rolf Ekman, both influenced by Vaihinger, did.
Although none of these philosophers explicitly applied fictionalism to problems
of musical meaning, Nyman published a long paper in 1922 entitled "Metaphor
Och fiktion" which provides enough explicit conceptual bridge work to
establish connections between his fictionalist approach to metaphor and m y
counterfactual/intentional logic one, so that the extrapolation of a fictionalist
approach to a foundation for musical signification studies which resembles
m y suggested approach is, I feel, legitimated.
Since the stated purpose of this essay is to arouse interest among students
of musical signification for fictionalism, it is of interest to note that, although
it has been neglected in studies of musical signification, it is a sort of second-
cousin of pragmatism, the philosophical movement of which Peirce was a
leading representative, along with James. The fictionalism discussed here
was a movement spanning roughly from the end of the 19th century through
the end of World War 27. Vaihinger was philosophically active during Peirce's
lifetime and although there are important differences, his fictionalism may
in m a n y respects be regarded as an extreme form of pragmatism. Indeed,
in Konrad Marc-Wogau's Swedish dictionary of philosophy entitled Filosofisk
Uppslagsbok, this is precisely the way in which fictionalism is characterized
in the "Vaihinger" entry. Vaihinger himself says in The philosophy of "as if",
, , ,

p. vm:

Fictionalism does not admit the principle of Pragmatism which runs: "An idea which is
found to be useful in practice proves thereby that it is true in theory, and the fruitful is
thus always true". The principle of Fictionalism, on the other hand, or rather the outcome
of Fictionalism,is as follows:"An idea whose theoreticaltruth or incorrectness,and therewith
its falsity, is admitted, is not for that reason practically valueless and useless; for such an
 Fictionalism 47

idea, in spite of its theoretical nullity may have great practical importance. But though
Fictionalism and Pragmatism are diametrically opposed in principle, in practice they may
find much in common. They both acknowledge the value of metaphysical ideas, though
for very different reasons and with very different consequences.
(Vaihinger, 1935, p. viii)

T h e c o n t r a s t b e t w e e n t h e t w o s c h o o l s of p h i l o s o p h y is s o m e w h a t m o r e
trenchantly expressed by Nyman:

Falskt, men f6rmKnligt! vore d~irfaerfiktionsl~irans formel, under delta att pragmatismens
skulle lyda: f6rm~nligt, s~ilunda iiven sant! Detta blir friktionspunkten mellan de b/ida
befryndade filosofemen, och genom att framh/k lla den, har ocks ~ fiktionsliirans
originalitetspunkt blivit framhiivd.
( N y m a n 1927, 77.)

(False, but beneficial! would be fictionalism's formula, while pragmatism's would run:
beneficial, thus also true! That still remains the point of friction between the two related
doctrines, and by calling attention to it, the crux of fictionalism's originality is brought
out.)
(Translated b y C M G )

Let u s n o w m o v e to t h e w o r k of Vaihinger, in o r d e r to g e t a c l e a r e r n o t i o n
of just w h a t s o r t of t h i n g a fiction in the V a i h i n g e r i a n s e n s e is:

...our subject is the fictive activity of the logical function; the products of this activity - -
fictions....
By fictive activity in logical thought is to be understood the production and use of logical
methods, which with the help of accessory concepts - - where the improbability of any
corresponding objective is fairly obvious - - seek to attain the objects of thought. Instead
of remaining content with the material given, the logical function introduces these hybrid
and ambiguous thought-structures, in order with their help to attainits purpose indirectly,
if the material which it encounters resists a direct procedure. With an instinctive, almost
cunning ingenuity, the logical function succeeds in overcoming these difficulties with the
aid of its accessory structures. The special methods, the by-paths of which thought makes
use when it can no longer advance directly along the main road, are of many different
kinds, and their explanation is our problem. They often lead through thorny undergrowth,
but logical thought is not deterred thereb)6 even though it may lose something of its clearness
and purity. It is relevant also to remark here that the logical function, in its purposeful
instinctive ingenuity, cancarry this fictive activity from the most innocent and unpretentious
beginnings on through even finer and subtler developments right or to the most difficult
and complicated methods.
(Vaihinger, 1935, p. 13)

A s t h e f o r e g o i n g i n d i c a t e s , V a i h i n g e r w a s n o t o n e to s h r i n k at the p r o s p e c t
of d o i n g i n t u i t i v e l y s a t i s f y i n g s p e c u l a t i v e m e t a p h y s i c s a s l o n g a s o n e w a s
aware of what one was doing. Armed with appropriate self-awareness and
t h e p r e c e d e n t s set b y V a i h i n g e r in t h e a n a l y s i s of t h e w a y s in w h i c h scientific
48 CynthiaM. Grund

and mathematical theories are grounded, one might say that we here have
embarked on a like-minded project which seeks to identify and formulate
some steps which need to be taken to constitute the musical sign which we
may then endeavor to analyze semioticaUy. The result is a theory which accounts
for the appropriate intentionahzation of sound sequences prior to a discussion
of whatever semiosis in which they m a y be theorized to take part. Indeed,
fictionalism seems to be a natural conceptual framework in which to embed
at least some important parts of the theory which has been proposed here
for the nature of the sign under investigation in musical signifidation studies.
The schema for the fictions of interest in this respect is that of "c~ - the - x,"
where c~is a s o u n d sequence and x is some element of a class T of non-sonic
objects, the "something-else" to which reference was made earlier in the essay.
The analysis of this "pre-semiotic" activity which we posit as necessary and
sufficient for the elevation of mere s o u n d to music - - so that in fact, we
ultimately come to deal with music-as-sign, rather than with mere sound-
as-sign - - m a y be usefully understood in terms of such fictions and in terms
of the Vaihingerian distinction between artifices and rules:

We make a distinction between rules and artifices of thought. In other functions also this
distinction is of value; the rules are the totality of all those technical operations in virtue
of which an activity is able to attain its object directly, even when more or less complicated.
In logic too we call such operations, and in particular those of induction, "rules of thinking".
The artifices, on the other hand, are those operations, of an almost mysterious character,
which run counter to ordinary procedure in a more or less paradoxical way. They are
methods which give an onlooker the impression of magic if he be not himself initiated or
equally skilled in the mechanism, and are able indirectly to overcome the difficulties which
the material in question opposes to the activity. Thought also has such artifices; they are
strikingly purposive expressions of the organic function of thought.
(Vaihinger, 1935, p. 11)

In conclusion, it is instructive to compare Vaihinger's comments about the

differences between artifices and rules in the above quote and the w a y in
which the role of the counterfactual filter has been contrasted with that of
the semiotic correspondences earlier in this essay. The use of the counterfactual
filter, the "something else which itself is not a sequence of sounds" it (**)
w o u l d seem to fit readily into the category of artifice in this Vaihingerian
scheme of things, whereas the kinds of correspondences sketched within a
semiotic triangle structure are natural candidates for rules. Indeed, the
contentions expressed in the first part of this essay m a y be recast in this
fashion by saying that semiotic analysis relies far too exclusively on the use
of rules in its investigation of musical signification and the inclusion of artifices
a m o n g its theoretical equipment w o u l d be of value.
 Fictionalism 49

Notes

I would like to express my thanks to Anders Engstrfm, Thomas Petersen and Jacob
Rendtorff for valuable comments on various versions of this paper which were
discussed during meetings of a research group at the Department of Philosophy
of Copenhagen University.
1. I found my ownintuitions validated in an article by Alan Tormey entitled "Metaphors
and counterfactuals~" (Tormey, 1983). I then applied and extended the procedures
employed by Lewis in his book Counterfactuals (Lewis, 1973), as well as his article
"Truth in fiction" (Lewi~ 1983), to the Tormey view, the result being a formal intentional
- - "possible-world" - - semantics for metaphors when these have been recast as.
counterfactuals of a certain kind. The results of these investigations, appeared in
"Metaphors~ counterfactuals and music" (Grund, 1988).
2. The approaches which were examined are those presented by Kurkela (1986), Levinson
(1980) and Rantala (1988 and 1991).
3. This is all presented in the paper "How philosophical characterizations of a musical
work lose sight of the 'music' and how it might be put back" (Grund, forthcoming).
4. This diagram originally appeared in Granger (1968), p. 114.
5. This condition may come in various versions which differ from one another as to
how liberally the predicates which are counterfactually attributed to the sound
sequences may be chosen. See "How philosophical characterizations of a musical
work lose sight of the music and how it might be put back" (Grund, forthcoming).
6. This example is adapted from the manuscript for Grund, 1990.
7. Before both pragmatism and the brand of fictionalism discussed in this essay, there
was Jeremy Bentham, who may be regarded as a root figure which both movements
have in common. For an examination of Bentham's theory of fictions and its interest
for studies in musical signification, see "Jeremy Bentham's theory of fictions: some
reflections on its implications for musical semiosis and ontology" (Grund,
forthcoming.)

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