Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1998. Vol. 2. Eger Journal of English Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 26)

Studies - Ágnes Deli: Cognition and politeness

In my interpretation the domains of 'KNOWING', and 'NOT KNOWING' intersect to form a third domain, that of 'BELIEVING'. To believe is neither to know nor not to know; it is to make a supposition, a hypothesis. In discourse a supposition can be either confirmed as true, or denied as not true, so the speaker expressing his hypothesis either gets into the domain of 'KNOWING' or slips over into the domain of 'NOT KNOWING'. In figure a below I propose a schema of how the cognitive domains of the mind impart the three different kinds of domains: It would be oversimplification of the matter, however, to maintain that the borderlines between the domains are as distinct as shown in Figure 1, and that their arrangement can be identified in such an explicit way. The schema is meant only to imply that in the process of cognition there is a possibility of transition from one domain into another one. The usual direction of the tour is from 'NOT KNOWING' to 'KNOWING' or from 'BELIEVING' to 'KNOWING', but it can also de diverse. In the mind the process of learning or understanding is associated with movement: one can get/come to know things, come to the understanding /conclusion that..., get into the way of things, make great strides in the domain of 'KNOWING' or run into problems/difficulties in the domain of 'NOT KNOWING', and perhaps go round in circles, which does not lead anywhere, whereas one who does not want to take such 'trips' may live in a cuckoo land, i.e. be ignorant of reality. The experience of movement in the process of cognition gives ground for the metaphor: 'Cognition is a Tour'. Figure A 89