From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
General semantics \Gen"er*al sem*an"tics\, noun (1933) a doctrine and philosophical approach to language and its relationship to thought and behavior, developed by Alfred Korzybski (1879-1950), which holds that the capacity to express ideas and thereby improve one's interaction with others and one's environment is enhanced by training in the more critical use of words and other symbols; -- sometimes also called {semantics}.
Note: More information can be found on the web site of the [a HREF="http:]/www.general-semantics.org/">Institute of General Semantics. [PJC]
General Semantics is the study of the relations between language, ''thought'', and behavior: between how we talk, therefore how we think, therefore how we act. --George Doris
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Semantics \Sem*an"tics\, noun sing. or pl. [Gr. shmantikos having meaning, from sh^ma a sign.]
1. the study of the meanings of words and of the sense development of words; -- formerly called {semasiology}. [PJC]
2. a doctrine and philosophical approach to language and its relationship to thought and behavior, developed by Alfred Korzybski (1879-1950), which holds that the capacity to express ideas and thereby improve one's interaction with others and one's environment is enhanced by training in the more critical use of words and other symbols; -- also called {{general semantics}}. [PJC]
3. the meanings of words as they are used to achieve an effect; especially, the multiple meanings of words or the multiplicity of words having the same meaning; -- used in referring to the confusion that can be caused (intentionally or unintentionally) by multiple meanings; as, there's no real difference, it's only a matter of semantics. [PJC]
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Semasiology \Se*ma'si*ol"o*gy\, noun [Gr. shmasi'a signification + -logy.] (Philol.) The science of meanings or sense development (of words); the explanation of the development and changes of the meanings of words; -- more commonly referred to as {semantics}. -- {Se*ma'si*o*log"ic*al}, adjective [Webster 1913 Suppl.]
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
noun
1: the study of language meaning
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
42 Moby Thesaurus words for "semantics": bowwow theory, comparative linguistics, derivation, descriptive linguistics, dialectology, dingdong theory, etymology, glossematics, glossography, glossology, glottochronology, glottology, grammar, graphemics, historical linguistics, language study, lexicography, lexicology, lexicostatistics, lexigraphy, linguistic geography, linguistic science, linguistics, mathematical linguistics, morphology, morphophonemics, onomasiology, onomastics, onomatology, paleography, philology, phonetics, phonology, psycholinguistics, semasiology, semiotic, semiotics, significs, sociolinguistics, structuralism, syntactics, transformational linguistics
From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (27 SEP 03) [foldoc]:
semantics The meaning of a string in some language, as opposed to {syntax} which describes how symbols may be combined independent of their meaning. The semantics of a programming language is a function from programs to answers. A program is a {closed term} and, in practical languages, an answer is a member of the syntactic category of values. The two main kinds are {denotational semantics} and {operational semantics}. (1995-06-21)
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