Rebutting Joseph T. Major's View of General Semantics in Heinlein's Children

JOSEPH T. MAJOR released his book Heinlein's Children in March of 2006. This book contains an updated collection of Major's essays on the so-called "juvenile" books of speculative fiction author, Robert A. Heinlein, published between the years of 1947 and 1963. In this book, Major draws certain conclusions about General Semantics, the study of language developed by Alfred Korzybski, and about Heinlein's view of philosophy based on this quotation from Space Cadet: You'll be studying the day you retire. But even these subjects are not your education; they are simply raw materials. Your real job is to learn how to think and that means you must study other subjects; epistemology, scientific methodology, semantics, structures of languages, patterns of ethics and morals, varieties of logics, motivational psychology, and so on. This school is based on the idea that a man who can think correctly will automatically behave morally or what we call "morally." (72) Immediately following this quote, Major comments: Provided, of course, that the "semantics" is the field of study of the meanings of words and not the jumble of half-digested, random readings organized by a contrived jargon and symbology unique to itself (a hallmark of apseudoscience) that was publicized under the nomenclature ("nomenclature 1948" to use a bit of that unique symbology) of "General Semantics." Heinlein was a great believer in continued study over a broad range of knowledge. In the context of this book, one might also list this vast burden of studies as another "sickener," an intellectual one as opposed to a physical one. The choice of topics touches on one of Heinlein's crotchets. In fiction and fact alike Heinlein derided the concept of studying philosophy (see Expanded Universe p. 531, for example). Yet here Matt is studying the stuffs of philosophy. It might be how you package it. (31-32) I would ask the following four questions: 1) Was Heinlein speaking of semantics" as usually defined, or of "semantics" as standing for the more specific term "General Semantics"? 2) What is General Semantics, and is it a science or a "pseudo-science" as Major claims? 3) Was Heinlein being inconsistent about studying "the stuffs of philosophy?" 4) Was Heinlein's interest in GS justified? Question #1 - Was Heinlein speaking of "semantics" or "General Semantics"? In preparing a book on the subject of Heinlein's relationship with General Semantics (Heinlein and Korzybski: Maps of General Semantics, forthcoming), I found no instances of the term "General Semantics" (hereinafter also "GS"), in any of Heinlein's work except in his 1941 WorldCon Guest of Honor speech, published in Yoji Kondo's Robert A. Heinlein: Requiem and Tributes to the Grand Master. (221) I did find numerous direct and indirect references to GS in many of his works, however: Korzybski's name appears at least three times, in "Blowups Happen" (47), "Coventry" (391), and "Gulf." (56) In "Coventry," Heinlein specifically groups Korzybski together with C.K. Ogden and "other semanticists." The number of indirect references to GS found in Heinlein's works is close to two hundred. One more example should suffice here. His first major work, For Us, the Living, which was lost and remained unpublished until recently, contains a long section which deals with the "semantic readjustment" of the protagonist Perry Nelson. (132-154) This section describes the basic concepts of General Semantics exactly. There may be no simple, yes-or-no answer to this question, as Heinlein apparently thought of GS as a part of, or complement to, traditional semantics, though Korzybski was himself more insistent on the distinctions. However, the overwhelming majority of the references clearly relate to GS rather than to the earlier semantics summarized in Ogden & Richards, The Meaning of Meaning (1922). The problem is further complicated in that what we mean by "semantics" has since changed and now includes subjects that were formerly regarded as belonging to mathematics and linguistics - none of which were then regarded as a part of philosophy. …