150 ideas
| 19199 | Some say metaphysics is a highly generalised empirical study of objects [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: For some people metaphysics is a general theory of objects (ontology) - a discipline which is to be developed in a purely empirical way, and which differs from other empirical disciplines in its generality. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 19) | |
| A reaction: Tarski says some people despise it, but for him such metaphysics is 'not objectionable'. I subscribe to this view, but the empirical aspect is very remote, because it's too general for detail observation or experiment. Generality is the key to philosophy. |
| 19193 | Disputes that fail to use precise scientific terminology are all meaningless [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Disputes like the vague one about 'the right conception of truth' occur in all domains where, instead of exact, scientific terminology, common language with its vagueness and ambiguity is used; and they are always meaningless, and therefore in vain. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 14) | |
| A reaction: Taski taught a large number of famous philosophers in California in the 1950s, and this approach has had a huge influence. Recently there has been a bit of a rebellion. E.g. Kit Fine doesn't think it can all be done in formal languages. |
| 3099 | Inference is never a conscious process [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Inference is never a conscious process. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 11.2) |
| 19304 | The rules of reasoning are not the rules of logic [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Rules of deduction are rules of deductive argument; they are not rules of inference or reasoning. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 1) | |
| A reaction: And I have often noticed that good philosophing reasoners and good logicians are frequently not the same people. |
| 19307 | If there is a great cost to avoiding inconsistency, we learn to reason our way around it [Harman] |
| Full Idea: We sometimes discover our views are inconsistent and do not know how to revise them in order to avoid inconsistency without great cost. The best response may be to keep the inconsistency and try to avoid inferences that exploit it. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 2) | |
| A reaction: Any decent philosopher should face this dilemma regularly. I assume non-philosophers don't compare the different compartments of their beliefs very much. Students of non-monotonic logics are trying to formalise such thinking. |
| 19309 | Logic has little relevance to reasoning, except when logical conclusions are immediate [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Although logic does not seem specially relevant to reasoning, immediate implication and immediate inconsistency do seem important for reasoning. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 2) | |
| A reaction: Ordinary thinkers can't possibly track complex logical implications, so we have obviously developed strategies for coping. I assume formal logic is contructed from the basic ingredients of the immediate and obvious implications, such as modus ponens. |
| 6950 | You can be rational with undetected or minor inconsistencies [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Rationality doesn't require consistency, because you can be rational despite undetected inconsistencies in beliefs, and it isn't always rational to respond to a discovery of inconsistency by dropping everything in favour of eliminating that inconsistency. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Rationality [1995], 1.2) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as being correct, and is (I am beginning to realise) a vital contribution made to our understanding by pragmatism. European thinking has been too keen on logic as the model of good reasoning. |
| 19306 | It is a principle of reasoning not to clutter your mind with trivialities [Harman] |
| Full Idea: I am assuming the following principle: Clutter Avoidance - in reasoning, one should not clutter one's mind with trivialities. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 2) | |
| A reaction: I like Harman's interest in the psychology of reasoning. In the world of Frege, it is taboo to talk about psychology. |
| 3077 | Reasoning might be defined in terms of its functional role, which is to produce knowledge [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Reasoning could be treated as a functionally defined process that is partly defined in terms of its role in giving a person knowledge. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 3.6) |
| 19303 | Implication just accumulates conclusions, but inference may also revise our views [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Implication is cumulative, in a way that inference may not be. In argument one accumulates conclusions; things are always added, never subtracted. Reasoned revision, however, can subtract from one's view as well as add. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 1) | |
| A reaction: This has caught Harman's attention, I think (?), because he is looking for non-monotonic reasoning (i.e. revisable reasoning) within a classical framework. If revision is responding to evidence, the logic can remain conventional. |
| 12596 | Reasoning aims at increasing explanatory coherence [Harman] |
| Full Idea: In reasoning you try among other things to increase the explanatory coherence of your view. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.2.2) | |
| A reaction: Harman is a champion of inference to the best explanation (abduction), and I agree with him. I think this idea extends to give us a view of justification as coherence, and that extends from inner individual coherence to socially extended coherence. |
| 12599 | Reason conservatively: stick to your beliefs, and prefer reasoning that preserves most of them [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Conservatism is important; you should continue to believe as you do in the absence of any special reason to doubt your view, and in reasoning you should try to minimize change in your initial opinions in attaining other goals of reasoning. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.2.6) | |
| A reaction: One of those principles like Ockham's Razor, which feels right but hard to justify. It seems the wrong principle for someone who can reason well, but has been brainwashed into a large collection of daft beliefs. Japanese soldiers still fighting WWII. |
| 6954 | A coherent conceptual scheme contains best explanations of most of your beliefs [Harman] |
| Full Idea: A set of unrelated beliefs seems less coherent than a tightly organized conceptual scheme that contains explanatory principles that make sense of most of your beliefs; this is why inference to the best explanation is an attractive pattern of inference. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Rationality [1995], 1.5.2) | |
| A reaction: I find this a very appealing proposal. The central aim of rational thought seems to me to be best explanation, and I increasingly think that most of my beliefs rest on their apparent coherence, rather than their foundations. |
| 3092 | If you believe that some of your beliefs are false, then at least one of your beliefs IS false [Harman] |
| Full Idea: If a rational man believes he has at least some other false beliefs, it follows that a rational man knows that at least one of his beliefs is false (the one believed false, or this new belief). | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 7.2) |
| 19179 | For a definition we need the words or concepts used, the rules, and the structure of the language [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: We must specify the words or concepts which we wish to use in defining the notion of truth; and we must also give the formal rules to which the definition should conform. More generally, we must describe the formal structure of the language. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 01) | |
| A reaction: This, of course, is a highly formal view of how definition should be achieved, offered in anticipation of one of the most famous definitions in logic (of truth, by Tarski). Normally we assume English and classical logic. |
| 16295 | Tarski proved that truth cannot be defined from within a given theory [Tarski, by Halbach] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's Theorem states that under fairly generally applicable conditions, the assumption that there is a definition of truth within a given theory for the language of that same theory leads to a contradiction. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Volker Halbach - Axiomatic Theories of Truth 1 | |
| A reaction: That might leave room for a definition outside the given theory. I take the main motivation for the axiomatic approach to be a desire to get a theory of truth within the given theory, where Tarski's Theorem says traditional approaches are just wrong. |
| 15342 | Tarski proved that any reasonably expressive language suffers from the liar paradox [Tarski, by Horsten] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's Theorem on the undefinability of truth says in a language sufficiently rich to talk about itself (which Gödel proved possible, via coding) the liar paradox can be carried out. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Leon Horsten - The Tarskian Turn 02.2 | |
| A reaction: The point is that truth is formally indefinable if it leads inescapably to contradiction, which the liar paradox does. This theorem is the motivation for all modern attempts to give a rigorous account of truth. |
| 19069 | 'True sentence' has no use consistent with logic and ordinary language, so definition seems hopeless [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: The possibility of a consistent use of 'true sentence' which is in harmony with the laws of logic and the spirit of everyday language seems to be very questionable, so the same doubt attaches to the possibility of constructing a correct definition. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933], §1) | |
| A reaction: This is often cited as Tarski having conclusively proved that 'true' cannot be defined from within a language, but his language here is much more circumspect. Modern critics say the claim depends entirely on classical logic. |
| 10153 | In everyday language, truth seems indefinable, inconsistent, and illogical [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: In everyday language it seems impossible to define the notion of truth or even to use this notion in a consistent manner and in agreement with the laws of logic. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (works [1936]), quoted by Feferman / Feferman - Alfred Tarski: life and logic Int III | |
| A reaction: [1935] See Logic|Theory of Logic|Semantics of Logic for Tarski's approach to truth. |
| 19178 | Definitions of truth should not introduce a new version of the concept, but capture the old one [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: The desired definition of truth does not aim to specify the meaning of a familiar word used to denote a novel notion; on the contrary, it aims to catch hold of the actual meaning of an old notion. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 01) | |
| A reaction: Tarski refers back to Aristotle for an account of the 'old notion'. To many the definition of Tarski looks very weird, so it is important to see that he is trying to capture the original concept. |
| 19177 | A definition of truth should be materially adequate and formally correct [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: The main problem of the notion of truth is to give a satisfactory definition which is materially adequate and formally correct. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 01) | |
| A reaction: That is, I take it, that it covers all cases of being true and failing to be true, and it fits in with the logic. The logic is explicitly classical logic, and he is not aiming to give the 'nature' or natural language understanding of the concept. |
| 19186 | A rigorous definition of truth is only possible in an exactly specified language [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: The problem of the definition of truth obtains a precise meaning and can be solved in a rigorous way only for those languages whose structure has been exactly specified. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 06) | |
| A reaction: Taski has just stated how to exactly specify the structure of a language. He says definition can only be vague and approximate for natural languages. (The usual criticism of the correspondence theory is its vagueness). |
| 19194 | We may eventually need to split the word 'true' into several less ambiguous terms [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: A time may come when we find ourselves confronted with several incompatible, but equally clear and precise, conceptions of truth. It will then become necessary to abandon the ambiguous usage of the word 'true', and introduce several terms instead. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 14) | |
| A reaction: There may be a whiff of the pragmatic attitude to truth here, though that view is not necessarily pluralist. Analytic philosophy needs much more splitting of difficult terms into several more focused terms. |
| 16296 | Tarski's Theorem renders any precise version of correspondence impossible [Tarski, by Halbach] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's Theorem applies to any sufficient precise version of the correspondence theory of truth, and all the other traditional theories of truth. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Volker Halbach - Axiomatic Theories of Truth 1 | |
| A reaction: This is the key reason why modern thinkers have largely dropped talk of the correspondence theory. See Idea 16295. |
| 22304 | Truth is conceivability, or the systematic coherence of a significant whole [Joachim] |
| Full Idea: Truth is in its essence conceivability or systematic coherence. ...[p.78] It is the systematic coherence which characterises a significant whole. | |
| From: Harold Joachim (The Nature of Truth [1906], p.68), quoted by Michael Potter - The Rise of Analytic Philosophy 1879-1930 35 'coh' | |
| A reaction: We obviously need to know when a whole becomes 'significant'. Potter says mystical idealists liked this because it contributed to their teleological view of the whole of reality. Presumably its roots are in Hegel. |
| 10672 | Tarskian semantics says that a sentence is true iff it is satisfied by every sequence [Tarski, by Hossack] |
| Full Idea: Tarskian semantics says that a sentence is true iff it is satisfied by every sequence, where a sequence is a set-theoretic individual, a set of ordered pairs each with a natural number as its first element and an object from the domain for its second. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Keith Hossack - Plurals and Complexes 3 |
| 13338 | '"It is snowing" is true if and only if it is snowing' is a partial definition of the concept of truth [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Statements of the form '"it is snowing" is true if and only if it is snowing' and '"the world war will begin in 1963" is true if and only if the world war will being in 1963' can be regarded as partial definitions of the concept of truth. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Establishment of Scientific Semantics [1936], p.404) | |
| A reaction: The key word here is 'partial'. Truth is defined, presumably, when every such translation from the object language has been articulated, which is presumably impossible, given the infinity of concatenated phrases possible in a sentence. |
| 19180 | It is convenient to attach 'true' to sentences, and hence the language must be specified [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: For several reasons it appears most convenient to apply the term 'true' to sentences, and we shall follow this course. Consequently, we must always relate the notion of truth, like that of a sentence, to a specific language. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 02) | |
| A reaction: Personally I take truth to attach to propositions, since sentences are ambiguous. In Idea 17308 the one sentence expresses three different truths (in my opinion), even though a single sentence (given in the object language) specifies it. |
| 19181 | In the classical concept of truth, 'snow is white' is true if snow is white [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: If we base ourselves on the classical conception of truth, we shall say that the sentence 'snow is white' is true if snow is white, and it is false if snow is not white. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 04) | |
| A reaction: I had not realised, prior to his, how closely Tarski is sticking to Aristotle's famous formulation of truth. The point is that you can only specify 'what is' using a language. Putting 'true' in the metalanguage gives specific content to Aristotle. |
| 19196 | Scheme (T) is not a definition of truth [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: It is a mistake to regard scheme (T) as a definition of truth. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 15) | |
| A reaction: The point is, I take it, that the definition is the multitude of sentences which are generated by the schema, not the schema itself. |
| 19183 | Each interpreted T-sentence is a partial definition of truth; the whole definition is their conjunction [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: In 'X is true iff p' if we replace X by the name of a sentence and p by a particular sentence this can be considered a partial definition of truth. The whole definition has to be ...a logical conjunction of all these partial definitions. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 04) | |
| A reaction: This seems an unprecedented and odd way to define something. Define 'red' by '"This tomato is red" iff this tomato is red', etc? Define 'stone' by collecting together all the stones? The complex T-sentences are infinite in number. |
| 19182 | Use 'true' so that all T-sentences can be asserted, and the definition will then be 'adequate' [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: We wish to use the term 'true' in such a way that all the equivalences of the form (T) [i.e. X is true iff p] can be asserted, and we shall call a definition of truth 'adequate' if all these equivalences follow from it. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 04) | |
| A reaction: The interpretation of Tarski's theory is difficult. From this I'm thinking that 'true' is simply being defined as 'assertible'. This is the status of each line in a logical proof, if there is a semantic dimension to the proof (and not mere syntax). |
| 19198 | We don't give conditions for asserting 'snow is white'; just that assertion implies 'snow is white' is true [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Semantic truth implies nothing regarding the conditions under which 'snow is white' can be asserted. It implies only that, whenever we assert or reject this sentence, we must be ready to assert or reject the correlated sentence '"snow is white" is true'. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 18) | |
| A reaction: This appears to identify truth with assertibility, which is pretty much what modern pragmatists say. How do you distinguish 'genuine' assertion from rhetorical, teasing or lying assertions? Genuine assertion implies truth? Hm. |
| 15339 | Tarski gave up on the essence of truth, and asked how truth is used, or how it functions [Tarski, by Horsten] |
| Full Idea: Tarski emancipated truth theory from traditional philosophy, by no longer posing Pilate's question (what is truth? or what is the essence of truth?) but instead 'how is truth used?', 'how does truth function?' and 'how can its functioning be described?'. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Leon Horsten - The Tarskian Turn 02.2 | |
| A reaction: Horsten, later in the book, does not give up on the essence of truth, and modern theorists are trying to get back to that question by following Tarski's formal route. Modern analytic philosophy at its best, it seems to me. |
| 16302 | Tarski did not just aim at a definition; he also offered an adequacy criterion for any truth definition [Tarski, by Halbach] |
| Full Idea: Tarski did not settle for a definition of truth, taking its adequacy for granted. Rather he proposed an adequacy criterion for evaluating the adequacy of definitions of truth. The criterion is his famous Convention T. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Volker Halbach - Axiomatic Theories of Truth 3 | |
| A reaction: Convention T famously says the sentence is true if and only if a description of the sentence is equivalent to affirming the sentence. 'Snow is white' iff snow is white. |
| 19135 | Tarski enumerates cases of truth, so it can't be applied to new words or languages [Davidson on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Tarski does not tell us how to apply his concept of truth to a new case, whether the new case is a new language or a word newly added to a language. This is because enumerating cases gives no clue for the next or general case. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Donald Davidson - Truth and Predication 1 | |
| A reaction: His account has been compared to a telephone directory. We aim to understand the essence of anything, so that we can fully know it, and explain and predict how it will behave. Either truth is primitive, or I demand to know its essence. |
| 19138 | Tarski define truths by giving the extension of the predicate, rather than the meaning [Davidson on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Tarski defined the class of true sentences by giving the extension of the truth predicate, but he did not give the meaning. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Donald Davidson - Truth and Predication 1 | |
| A reaction: This is analogous to giving an account of the predicate 'red' as the set of red objects. Since I regard that as a hopeless definition of 'red', I am inclined to think the same of Tarski's account of truth. It works in the logic, but so what? |
| 4699 | Tarski made truth relative, by only defining truth within some given artificial language [Tarski, by O'Grady] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's account doesn't hold for natural languages. The general notion of truth is replaced by "true-in-L", where L is a formal language. Hence truth is relativized to each artificial language. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Paul O'Grady - Relativism Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: This is a pretty good indication that Tarski's theory is NOT a correspondence theory, even if its structure may sometimes give that impression. |
| 19324 | Tarski has to avoid stating how truths relate to states of affairs [Kirkham on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Tarski has to define truths so as not to make explicit the relation between a true sentence and an obtaining state of affairs. ...He has to list each sentence separately, and simply assign it a state of affairs. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Richard L. Kirkham - Theories of Truth: a Critical Introduction 5.8 | |
| A reaction: He has to avoid semantic concepts like 'reference', because he wants a physicalist theory, according to Kirkham. Thus the hot interest in theories of reference in the 1970s/80s. And also attempts to give a physicalist account of meaning. |
| 15410 | Truth only applies to closed formulas, but we need satisfaction of open formulas to define it [Burgess on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: In Tarski's theory of truth, although the notion of truth is applicable only to closed formulas, to define it we must define a more general notion of satisfaction applicable to open formulas. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by John P. Burgess - Philosophical Logic 1.8 | |
| A reaction: This is a helpful pointer to what is going on in the Tarski definition. It culminates in the 'satisfaction of all sequences', which presumable delivers the required closed formula. |
| 18811 | Tarski uses sentential functions; truly assigning the objects to variables is what satisfies them [Tarski, by Rumfitt] |
| Full Idea: Tarski invoked the notion of a sentential function, where components are replaced by appropriate variables. A function is then satisfied by assigning objects to variables. An assignment satisfies if the function is true of the things assigned. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Ian Rumfitt - The Boundary Stones of Thought 3.2 | |
| A reaction: [very compressed] This use of sentential functions, rather than sentences, looks like the key to Tarski's definition of truth. |
| 15365 | We can define the truth predicate using 'true of' (satisfaction) for variables and some objects [Tarski, by Horsten] |
| Full Idea: The truth predicate, says Tarski, should be defined in terms of the more primitive satisfaction relation: the relation of being 'true of'. The fundamental notion is a formula (containing the free variables) being true of a sequence of objects as values. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Leon Horsten - The Tarskian Turn 06.3 |
| 19314 | For physicalism, reduce truth to satisfaction, then define satisfaction as physical-plus-logic [Tarski, by Kirkham] |
| Full Idea: Tarski, a physicalist, reduced semantics to physical and/or logicomathematical concepts. He defined all semantic concepts, save satisfaction, in terms of truth. Then truth is defined in terms of satisfaction, and satisfaction is given non-semantically. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Richard L. Kirkham - Theories of Truth: a Critical Introduction 5.1 | |
| A reaction: The term 'logicomathematical' is intended to cover set theory. Kirkham says you can remove these restrictions from Tarski's theory, and the result is a version of the correspondence theory. |
| 19316 | Insight: don't use truth, use a property which can be compositional in complex quantified sentence [Tarski, by Kirkham] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's great insight is find another property, since open sentences are not truth. It must be had by open and genuine sentences. Clauses having it must generate it for the whole sentence. Truth can be defined for sentences by using it. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Richard L. Kirkham - Theories of Truth: a Critical Introduction 5.4 | |
| A reaction: The proposed property is 'satisfaction', which can (unlike truth) be a feature open sentences (such as 'x is green', which is satisfied by x='grass'), |
| 19175 | Tarski gave axioms for satisfaction, then derived its explicit definition, which led to defining truth [Tarski, by Davidson] |
| Full Idea: Tarski turned his axiomatic characterisation of satisfaction into an explicit definition of the satisfaction-predicate using some fancy set theoretical apparatus, and this in turn leads to the explicit definition of the truth predicate. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Donald Davidson - Truth and Predication 7 |
| 19184 | The best truth definition involves other semantic notions, like satisfaction (relating terms and objects) [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: It turns out that the simplest and most natural way of obtaining an exact definition of truth is one which involves the use of other semantic notions, e.g. the notion of satisfaction (...which expresses relations between expressions and objects). | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 05) | |
| A reaction: While the T-sentences appear to be 'minimal' and 'deflationary', it seems important to remember that 'satisfaction', which is basic to his theory, is a very robust notion. He actually mentions 'objects'. But see Idea 19185. |
| 19191 | Specify satisfaction for simple sentences, then compounds; true sentences are satisfied by all objects [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: To define satisfaction we indicate which objects satisfy the simplest sentential functions, then state the conditions for compound functions. This applies automatically to sentences (with no free variables) so a true sentence is satisfied by all objects. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 11) | |
| A reaction: I presume nothing in the domain of objects can conflict with a sentence that has been satisfied by some of them, so 'all' the objects satisfy the sentence. Tarski doesn't use the word 'domain'. Basic satisfaction seems to be stipulated. |
| 19188 | We can't use a semantically closed language, or ditch our logic, so a meta-language is needed [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: In a 'semantically closed' language all sentences which determine the adequate usage of 'true' can be asserted in the language. ...We can't change our logic, so we reject such languages. ...So must use two different languages to discuss truth. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 08-09) | |
| A reaction: This section explains why a meta-language is required. It rests entirely on the existence of the Liar paradox is a semantically closed language. |
| 19189 | The metalanguage must contain the object language, logic, and defined semantics [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Every sentence which occurs in the object language must also occur in the metalanguage, or can be translated into the metalanguage. There must also be logical terms, ...and semantic terms can only be introduced in the metalanguage by definition. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 09) | |
| A reaction: He suggest that if the languages are 'typed', the meta-languag, to be 'richer', must contain variables of a higher logica type. Does this mean second-order logic? |
| 19134 | Tarski defined truth for particular languages, but didn't define it across languages [Davidson on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Tarski defined various predicates of the form 's is true in L', each applicable to a single language, but he failed to define a predicate of the form 's is true in L' for variable 'L'. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Donald Davidson - Truth and Predication 1 | |
| A reaction: You might say that no one defines 'tree' to be just 'in English', but we might define 'multiplies' to be in Peano Arithmetic. This indicates the limited and formal nature of what Tarski was trying to achieve. |
| 16304 | Tarski didn't capture the notion of an adequate truth definition, as Convention T won't prove non-contradiction [Halbach on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Every really adequate theory of truth should also prove the law of non-contradiction. Therefore Tarski's notion of adequacy in Convention T fails to capture the intuitive notion of adequacy he is after. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Volker Halbach - Axiomatic Theories of Truth 3 | |
| A reaction: Tarski points out this weakness, in a passage quoted by Halbach. This obviously raises the question of what truth theories should prove, and this is explored by Halbach. If they start to prove arithmetic, we get nervous. Non-contradiction and x-middle? |
| 2571 | Tarski says that his semantic theory of truth is completely neutral about all metaphysics [Tarski, by Haack] |
| Full Idea: Tarski says "we may remain naďve realists or idealists, empiricists or metaphysicians… The semantic conception is completely neutral toward all these issues." | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Susan Haack - Philosophy of Logics 7.5 |
| 10821 | Physicalists should explain reference nonsemantically, rather than getting rid of it [Tarski, by Field,H] |
| Full Idea: Tarski work was to persuade physicalist that eliminating semantics was on the wrong track, and that we should explicate notions in the theory of reference nonsemantically rather than simply get rid of them. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Hartry Field - Tarski's Theory of Truth §3 |
| 10822 | A physicalist account must add primitive reference to Tarski's theory [Field,H on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: We need to add theories of primitive reference to Tarski's account if we are to establish the notion of truth as a physicalistically acceptable notion. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Hartry Field - Tarski's Theory of Truth §4 | |
| A reaction: This is the main point of Field's paper, and sounds very plausible to me. There is something major missing from Tarski, and at some point there needs to be a 'primitive' notion of thought and language making contact with the world, as it can't be proved. |
| 10824 | If listing equivalences is a reduction of truth, witchcraft is just a list of witch-victim pairs [Field,H on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: By similar standards of reduction to Tarski's, one might prove witchcraft compatible with physicalism, as long as witches cast only a finite number of spells. We merely list witch-and-victim pairs, with no mention of the terms of witchcraft theory. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 04) by Hartry Field - Tarski's Theory of Truth §4 |
| 16303 | Tarski made truth respectable, by proving that it could be defined [Tarski, by Halbach] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's proof of the definability of truth allowed him to establish truth as a respectable notion by his standards. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Volker Halbach - Axiomatic Theories of Truth 3 |
| 10969 | Tarski had a theory of truth, and a theory of theories of truth [Tarski, by Read] |
| Full Idea: Besides a theory of truth of his own, Tarski developed a theory of theories of truth. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Stephen Read - Thinking About Logic Ch.1 | |
| A reaction: The famous snow biconditional is the latter, and the recursive account based on satisfaction is the former. |
| 17746 | Tarski's 'truth' is a precise relation between the language and its semantics [Tarski, by Walicki] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's analysis of the concept of 'truth' ...is given a precise treatment as a particular relation between syntax (language) and semantics (the world). | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Michal Walicki - Introduction to Mathematical Logic History E.1 | |
| A reaction: My problem is that the concept of truth seems to apply to animal minds, which are capable of making right or wrong judgements, and of realising their errors. Tarski didn't make universal claims for his account. |
| 10904 | Tarskian truth neglects the atomic sentences [Mulligan/Simons/Smith on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: The Tarskian account of truth neglects the atomic sentences. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Mulligan/Simons/Smith - Truth-makers §1 | |
| A reaction: Yes! The whole Tarskian edifice is built on a foundation which it is taboo even to mention. If truth is just the assignment of 'T' and 'F', that isn't even the beginnings of a theory of 'truth'. |
| 15322 | Tarski's had the first axiomatic theory of truth that was minimally adequate [Tarski, by Horsten] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's work is the earliest axiomatic theory of truth that meets minimal adequacy conditions. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Leon Horsten - The Tarskian Turn 01.1 | |
| A reaction: This shows a way in which Tarski gave a new direction to the study of truth. Subsequent theories have been 'stronger'. |
| 16306 | Tarski defined truth, but an axiomatisation can be extracted from his inductive clauses [Tarski, by Halbach] |
| Full Idea: Tarski preferred a definition of truth, but from that an axiomatisation can be extracted. His induction clauses can be turned into axioms. Hence he opened the way to axiomatic theories of truth. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Volker Halbach - Axiomatic Theories of Truth 3 |
| 19141 | Tarski thought axiomatic truth was too contingent, and in danger of inconsistencies [Tarski, by Davidson] |
| Full Idea: Tarski preferred an explicit definition of truth to axioms. He says axioms have a rather accidental character, only a definition can guarantee the continued consistency of the system, and it keeps truth in harmony with physical science and physicalism. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (works [1936]) by Donald Davidson - Truth and Predication 2 n2 | |
| A reaction: Davidson's summary, gleaned from various sources in Tarski. A big challenge for modern axiom systems is to avoid inconsistency, which is extremely hard to do (given that set theory is not sure of having achieved it). |
| 19190 | We need an undefined term 'true' in the meta-language, specified by axioms [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: We have to include the term 'true', or some other semantic term, in the list of undefined terms of the meta-language, and to express fundamental properties of the notion of truth in a series of axioms. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 10) | |
| A reaction: It sounds as if Tarski semantic theory gives truth for the object language, but then an axiomatic theory of truth is also needed for the metalanguage. Halbch and Horsten seem to want an axiomatic theory in the object language. |
| 19197 | Truth can't be eliminated from universal claims, or from particular unspecified claims [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Truth can't be eliminated from universal statements saying all sentences of a certain type are true, or from the proof that 'all consequences of true sentences are true'. It is also needed if we can't name the sentence ('Plato's first sentence is true'). | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 16) | |
| A reaction: This points to the deflationary view of truth, if its only role is in talking about other sentences in this way. Tarski gives the standard reason for rejecting the Redundancy view. |
| 19185 | Semantics is a very modest discipline which solves no real problems [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Semantics as it is conceived in this paper is a sober and modest discipline which has no pretensions to being a universal patent-medicine for all the ills and diseases of mankind, whether imaginary or real. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 05) | |
| A reaction: Written in 1944. This remark encourages the minimal or deflationary interpretation of his theory of truth, but see the robust use of 'satisfaction' in Idea 19184. |
| 19195 | Truth tables give prior conditions for logic, but are outside the system, and not definitions [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Logical sentences are often assigned preliminary conditions under which they are true or false (often given as truth tables). However, these are outside the system of logic, and should not be regarded as definitions of the terms involved. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 15) | |
| A reaction: Hence, presumably, the connectives are primitives (with no nature or meaning), and the truth tables are axioms for their use? This opinion of Tarski's may have helped shift the preference towards natural deduction introduction and elimination rules. |
| 12595 | We have a theory of logic (implication and inconsistency), but not of inference or reasoning [Harman] |
| Full Idea: There is as yet no substantial theory of inference or reasoning. To be sure, logic is well developed; but logic is not a theory of inference or reasoning. Logic is a theory of implication and inconsistency. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.2.2) | |
| A reaction: One problem is that animals can draw inferences without the use of language, and I presume we do so all the time, so it is hard to see how to formalise such an activity. |
| 3093 | Any two states are logically linked, by being entailed by their conjunction [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Any two states of affairs are logically connected, simply because both are entailed by their conjunction. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 8.1) |
| 10152 | Set theory and logic are fairy tales, but still worth studying [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: People have asked me, 'How can you, a nominalist, do work in set theory and in logic, which are theories about things you do not believe in?' ...I believe that there is a value even in fairy tales and the study of fairy tales. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (talk [1965]), quoted by Feferman / Feferman - Alfred Tarski: life and logic | |
| A reaction: This is obviously an oversimplification. I don't think for a moment that Tarski literally believed that the study of fairy tales had as much value as the study of logic. Why do we have this particular logic, and not some other? |
| 10048 | There is no clear boundary between the logical and the non-logical [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: No objective grounds are known to me which permit us to draw a sharp boundary between the two groups of terms, the logical and the non-logical. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (works [1936]), quoted by Alan Musgrave - Logicism Revisited §3 | |
| A reaction: Musgrave is pointing out that this is bad news if you want to 'reduce' something like arithmetic to logic. 'Logic' is a vague object. |
| 3098 | Deductive logic is the only logic there is [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Deductive logic is the only logic there is. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 10.4) |
| 13337 | A language: primitive terms, then definition rules, then sentences, then axioms, and finally inference rules [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: For a language, we must enumerate the primitive terms, and the rules of definition for new terms. Then we must distinguish the sentences, and separate out the axioms from amng them, and finally add rules of inference. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Establishment of Scientific Semantics [1936], p.402) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This lays down the standard modern procedure for defining a logical language. Once all of this is in place, we then add a semantics and we are in business. Natural deduction tries to do without the axioms. |
| 18812 | Split out the logical vocabulary, make an assignment to the rest. It's logical if premises and conclusion match [Tarski, by Rumfitt] |
| Full Idea: Tarski made a division of logical and non-logical vocabulary. He then defined a model as a non-logical assignment satisfying the corresponding sentential function. Then a conclusion follows logically if every model of the premises models the conclusion. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Logical Consequence [1936]) by Ian Rumfitt - The Boundary Stones of Thought 3.2 | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This is Tarski's account of logical consequence, which follows on from his account of truth. 'Logical validity' is then 'true in every model'. Rumfitt doubts whether Tarski has given the meaning of 'logical consequence'. |
| 10694 | Logical consequence is when in any model in which the premises are true, the conclusion is true [Tarski, by Beall/Restall] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's 1936 definition of logical consequence is that in any model in which the premises are true, the conclusion is true too (so that no model can make the conclusion false). | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (works [1936]) by JC Beall / G Restall - Logical Consequence 3 | |
| A reaction: So the general idea is that a logical consequence is distinguished by being unstoppable. Sounds good. But then we have monotonic and non-monotonic logics, which (I'm guessing) embody different notions of consequence. |
| 10479 | Logical consequence: true premises give true conclusions under all interpretations [Tarski, by Hodges,W] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's definition of logical consequence (1936) is that in a fully interpreted formal language an argument is valid iff under any allowed interpretation of its nonlogical symbols, if the premises are true then so is the conclusion. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (works [1936]) by Wilfrid Hodges - Model Theory 3 | |
| A reaction: The idea that you can only make these claims 'under an interpretation' seems to have had a huge influence on later philosophical thinking. |
| 13344 | X follows from sentences K iff every model of K also models X [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: The sentence X follows logically from the sentences of the class K if and only if every model of the class K is also a model of the sentence X. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Logical Consequence [1936], p.417) | |
| A reaction: [see Idea 13343 for his account of a 'model'] He is offering to define logical consequence in general, but this definition fits what we now call 'semantic consequence', written |=. This it is standard practice to read |= as 'models'. |
| 3094 | You don't have to accept the conclusion of a valid argument [Harman] |
| Full Idea: We may say "From P and If-P-then-Q, infer Q" (modus ponens), but there is no rule of acceptance to say that we should accept Q. Maybe we should stop believing P or If-P-then-Q rather than believe Q. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 10.1) |
| 19192 | The truth definition proves semantic contradiction and excluded middle laws (not the logic laws) [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: With our definition of truth we can prove the laws of contradiction and excluded middle. These semantic laws should not be identified with the related logical laws, which belong to the sentential calculus, and do not involve 'true' at all. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 12) | |
| A reaction: Very illuminating. I wish modern thinkers could be so clear about this matter. The logic contains 'P or not-P'. The semantics contains 'P is either true or false'. Critics say Tarski has presupposed 'classical' logic. |
| 18759 | Identity is invariant under arbitrary permutations, so it seems to be a logical term [Tarski, by McGee] |
| Full Idea: Tarski showed that the only binary relations invariant under arbitrary permutations are the universal relation, the empty relation, identity and non-identity, thus giving us a reason to include '=' among the logical terms. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Vann McGee - Logical Consequence 6 | |
| A reaction: Tarski was looking for a criterion to distinguish logical from non-logical terms, since his account of logical validity depended on it. This idea lies behind whether a logic is or is not specified to be 'with identity' (i.e. using '='). |
| 3080 | Logical form is the part of a sentence structure which involves logical elements [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The logical form of a sentence is that part of its structure that involves logical elements. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 5.2) |
| 3081 | A theory of truth in a language must involve a theory of logical form [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Some sort of theory of logical form is involved in any theory of truth for a natural language. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 5.2) |
| 3084 | Our underlying predicates represent words in the language, not universal concepts [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The underlying truth-conditional structures of thoughts are language-dependent in the sense that underlying predicates represent words in the language rather than universal concepts common to all languages. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 6.3) |
| 12597 | I might accept P and Q as likely, but reject P-and-Q as unlikely [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Principles of implication imply there is not a purely probabilistic rule of acceptance for belief. Otherwise one might accept P and Q, without accepting their conjunction, if the conjuncts have a high probability, but the conjunction doesn't. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.2.2) | |
| A reaction: [Idea from Scott Soames] I am told that my friend A has just won a very big lottery prize, and am then told that my friend B has also won a very big lottery prize. The conjunction seems less believable; I begin to suspect a conspiracy. |
| 10823 | A name denotes an object if the object satisfies a particular sentential function [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: To say that the name x denotes a given object a is the same as to stipulate that the object a ... satisfies a sentential function of a particular type. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933], p.194) |
| 18756 | Tarski built a compositional semantics for predicate logic, from dependent satisfactions [Tarski, by McGee] |
| Full Idea: Tarski discovered how to give a compositional semantics for predicate calculus, defining truth in terms of satisfaction, and showing how satisfaction for a complicated formula depends on satisfaction of the simple subformulas. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Vann McGee - Logical Consequence 4 | |
| A reaction: The problem was that the subformulas may contain free variables, and thus not be sentences with truth values. 'Satisfaction' can handle this, where 'truth' cannot (I think). |
| 19313 | Tarksi invented the first semantics for predicate logic, using this conception of truth [Tarski, by Kirkham] |
| Full Idea: Tarski invented a formal semantics for quantified predicate logic, the logic of reasoning about mathematics. The heart of this great accomplishment is his theory of truth. It has been called semantic 'theory' of truth, but Tarski preferred 'conception'. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Richard L. Kirkham - Theories of Truth: a Critical Introduction 5.1 |
| 13335 | Semantics is the concepts of connections of language to reality, such as denotation, definition and truth [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Semantics is the totality of considerations concerning concepts which express connections between expressions of a language and objects and states of affairs referred to by these expressions. Examples are denotation, satisfaction, definition and truth. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Establishment of Scientific Semantics [1936], p.401) | |
| A reaction: Interestingly, he notes that it 'is not commonly recognised' that truth is part of semantics. Nowadays truth seems to be the central concept in most semantics. |
| 13336 | A language containing its own semantics is inconsistent - but we can use a second language [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: People have not been aware that the language about which we speak need by no means coincide with the language in which we speak. ..But the language which contains its own semantics must inevitably be inconsistent. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Establishment of Scientific Semantics [1936], p.402) | |
| A reaction: It seems that Tarski was driven to propose the metalanguage approach mainly by the Liar Paradox. |
| 13339 | A sentence is satisfied when we can assert the sentence when the variables are assigned [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Here is a partial definition of the concept of satisfaction: John and Peter satisfy the sentential function 'X and Y are brothers' if and only if John and Peter are brothers. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Establishment of Scientific Semantics [1936], p.405) | |
| A reaction: Satisfaction applies to open sentences and truth to closed sentences (with named objects). He uses the notion of total satisfaction to define truth. The example is a partial definition, not just an illustration. |
| 13340 | Satisfaction is the easiest semantical concept to define, and the others will reduce to it [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: It has been found useful in defining semantical concepts to deal first with the concept of satisfaction; both because the definition of this concept presents relatively few difficulties, and because the other semantical concepts are easily reduced to it. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Establishment of Scientific Semantics [1936], p.406) | |
| A reaction: See Idea 13339 for his explanation of satisfaction. We just say that a open sentence is 'acceptable' or 'assertible' (or even 'true') when particular values are assigned to the variables. Then sentence is then 'satisfied'. |
| 16323 | The object language/ metalanguage distinction is the basis of model theory [Tarski, by Halbach] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's distinction between object and metalanguage forms the basis of model theory. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Volker Halbach - Axiomatic Theories of Truth 11 |
| 13343 | A 'model' is a sequence of objects which satisfies a complete set of sentential functions [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: An arbitrary sequence of objects which satisfies every sentential function of the sentences L' will be called a 'model' or realization of the class L of sentences. There can also be a model of a single sentence is this way. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Logical Consequence [1936], p.417) | |
| A reaction: [L' is L with the constants replaced by variables] Tarski is the originator of model theory, which is central to modern logic. The word 'realization' is a helpful indicator of what he has in mind. A model begins to look like a possible world. |
| 13341 | Using the definition of truth, we can prove theories consistent within sound logics [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Using the definition of truth we are in a position to carry out the proof of consistency for deductive theories in which only (materially) true sentences are (formally) provable. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Establishment of Scientific Semantics [1936], p.407) | |
| A reaction: This is evidently what Tarski saw as the most important first fruit of his new semantic theory of truth. |
| 8940 | Tarski avoids the Liar Paradox, because truth cannot be asserted within the object language [Tarski, by Fisher] |
| Full Idea: In Tarski's account of truth, self-reference (as found in the Liar Paradox) is prevented because the truth predicate for any given object language is never a part of that object language, and so a sentence can never predicate truth of itself. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Jennifer Fisher - On the Philosophy of Logic 03.I | |
| A reaction: Thus we solve the Liar Paradox by ruling that 'you are not allowed to say that'. Hm. The slightly odd result is that in any conversation about whether p is true, we end up using (logically speaking) two different languages simultaneously. Hm. |
| 19187 | The Liar makes us assert a false sentence, so it must be taken seriously [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: In my judgement, it would be quite wrong and dangerous from the point of view of scientific progress to depreciate the importance of nhtinomies like the Liar Paradox, and treat them as jokes. The fact is we have been compelled to assert a false sentence. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Semantic Conception of Truth [1944], 07) | |
| A reaction: This is the heartfelt cry of the perfectionist, who wants everything under control. It was the dream of the age of Frege to Hilbert, which gradually eroded after Gödel's Incompleteness proof. Short ordinary folk panic about the Liar? |
| 10157 | Tarski improved Hilbert's geometry axioms, and without set-theory [Tarski, by Feferman/Feferman] |
| Full Idea: Tarski found an elegant new axiom system for Euclidean geometry that improved Hilbert's earlier version - and he formulated it without the use of set-theoretical notions. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (works [1936]) by Feferman / Feferman - Alfred Tarski: life and logic Ch.9 |
| 10154 | Tarski's theory of truth shifted the approach away from syntax, to set theory and semantics [Feferman/Feferman on Tarski] |
| Full Idea: Tarski's theory of truth has been most influential in eventually creating a shift from the entirely syntactic way of doing things in metamathematics (promoted by Hilbert in the 1920s, in his theory of proofs), towards a set-theoretical, semantic approach. | |
| From: comment on Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Feferman / Feferman - Alfred Tarski: life and logic Int III |
| 12598 | Reality is the overlap of true complete theories [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Reality is what is invariant among true complete theories. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.2.4) | |
| A reaction: The sort of slogan that gets coined in the age of Quine. The whole manner of starting from your theories and working out to what we think reality is seems to be putting the cart before the horse. |
| 10151 | I am a deeply convinced nominalist [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: I am a nominalist. This is a very deep conviction of mine. ...I am a tortured nominalist. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (talk [1965]), quoted by Feferman / Feferman - Alfred Tarski: life and logic Int I | |
| A reaction: I too am of the nominalist persuasion, but I don't feel justified in such a strong commitment. |
| 19305 | The Gambler's Fallacy (ten blacks, so red is due) overemphasises the early part of a sequence [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The Gambler's Fallacy says if black has come up ten times in a row, red must be highly probable next time. It overlooks how the impact of an initial run of one color can become more and more insignificant as the sequence gets longer. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 1) | |
| A reaction: At what point do you decide that the roulette wheel is fixed, rather than that you have fallen for the Gambler's Fallacy? Interestingly, standard induction points to the opposite conclusion. But then you have prior knowledge of the wheel. |
| 19310 | High probability premises need not imply high probability conclusions [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Propositions that are individually highly probable can have an immediate implication that is not. The fact that one can assign a high probability to P and also to 'if P then Q' is not sufficient reason to assign high probability to Q. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 3) | |
| A reaction: He cites Kyburg's Lottery Paradox. It is probable that there is a winning ticket, and that this ticket is not it. Thus it is NOT probable that I will win. |
| 19308 | We strongly desire to believe what is true, even though logic does not require it [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Moore's Paradox: one is strongly disposed not to believe both P and that one does not believe that P, while realising that these propositions are perfectly consistent with one another. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 2) | |
| A reaction: [Where in Moore?] A very nice example of a powerful principle of reasoning which can never be captured in logic. |
| 3100 | You have to reaffirm all your beliefs when you make a logical inference [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Since inference is inference to the best total account, all your prior beliefs are relevant and your conclusion is everything you believe at the end. So, you constantly reaffirm your beliefs in inference. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 12.1) |
| 3089 | Only lack of imagination makes us think that 'cats are animals' is analytic [Harman] |
| Full Idea: That 'cats are animals' is often cited as an analytic truth. But (as Putnam points out) the inability to imagine this false is just a lack of imagination. They might turn out to be radio-controlled plastic spies from Mars. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 6.7) |
| 3088 | Analyticity is postulated because we can't imagine some things being true, but we may just lack imagination [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Analyticity is postulated to explain why we cannot imagine certain things being true. A better postulate is that we are not good at imagining things. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 6.7) |
| 3101 | Memories are not just preserved, they are constantly reinferred [Harman] |
| Full Idea: I favour the inferential view of memory over the preservation view. …One constantly reinfers old beliefs. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 12.1) | |
| A reaction: This has a grain of truth, but seems a distortion. An image of the old home floats into my mind when I am thinking about something utterly unconnected. When we search memory we may be inferring and explaining, but the same applies to searching images. |
| 3074 | People's reasons for belief are rarely conscious [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The reasons for which people believe things are rarely conscious. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 2.2) | |
| A reaction: Probably correct. The interesting bit is when they bring the beliefs into consciousness and scrutinise them rationally. Philosophers routinely overthrow their natural beliefs in this way. |
| 3097 | We don't distinguish between accepting, and accepting as evidence [Harman] |
| Full Idea: There is no distinction between what we accept as evidence and whatever else we accept. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 10.4) |
| 6369 | In negative coherence theories, beliefs are prima facie justified, and don't need initial reasons [Harman, by Pollock/Cruz] |
| Full Idea: According to Harman's negative coherence theory it is always permissible to adopt a new belief - any new belief; because beliefs are prima facie justified you do not need a reason for adopting a new belief. | |
| From: report of Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973]) by J Pollock / J Cruz - Contemporary theories of Knowledge (2nd) §3.4.1 | |
| A reaction: This must be placed alongside the fact that we don't usually choose our beliefs, but simply find ourselves believing because of the causal impact of evidence. This gives an unstated rational justification for any belief - something caused it. |
| 19311 | In revision of belief, we need to keep track of justifications for foundations, but not for coherence [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The key issue in belief revision is whether one needs to keep track of one's original justifications for beliefs. What I am calling the 'foundations' theory says yes; what I am calling the 'coherence' theory says no. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 4) | |
| A reaction: I favour coherence in all things epistemological, and this idea seems to match real life, where I am very confident of many beliefs of which I have forgotten the justification. Harman says coherentists need the justification only when they doubt a belief. |
| 19312 | Coherence is intelligible connections, especially one element explaining another [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Coherence in a view consists in connections of intelligibility among the elements of the view. Among other things these included explanatory connections, which hold when part of one's view makes it intelligible why some other part should be true. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Change in View: Principles of Reasoning [1986], 7) | |
| A reaction: Music to my ears. I call myself an 'explanatory empiricist', and embrace a coherence theory of justification. This is the framework within which philosophy should be practised. Harman is our founder, and Paul Thagard our guru. |
| 3096 | Coherence avoids scepticism, because it doesn't rely on unprovable foundations [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Scepticism is undermined once it is seen that the relevant kind of justification is not a matter of derivation from basic principles but is rather a matter of showing that a view fits in well with other things we believe. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 10.4) | |
| A reaction: I would (now) call myself a 'coherentist' about justification, and I agree with this. Coherent justification could not possibly deliver certainty, so it must be combined with fallibilism. |
| 8800 | If you would deny a truth if you know the full evidence, then knowledge has social aspects [Harman, by Sosa] |
| Full Idea: If one reads of a genuine assassination, but then fails to read the reports next day which untruthfully deny the event, one probably does not know of the event. But we must conclude that knowledge has a further 'social aspect'. | |
| From: report of Gilbert Harman (Induction [1970], §IV) by Ernest Sosa - The Raft and the Pyramid Appx | |
| A reaction: I doubt if this is enough to support an externalist account of defeasibility. Wise people don't 'know' of an event after one report. For 24 hours the Royalists thought they had won Marston Moor! You know he's dead when you see the Zapruder film. |
| 6955 | Enumerative induction is inference to the best explanation [Harman] |
| Full Idea: We might think of enumerative induction as inference to the best explanation, taking the generalization to explain its instances. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Rationality [1995], 1.5.2) | |
| A reaction: This is a helpful connection. The best explanation of these swans being white is that all swans are white; it ceased to be the best explanation when black swans turned up. In the ultimate case, a law of nature is the explanation. |
| 3095 | Induction is an attempt to increase the coherence of our explanations [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Induction is an attempt to increase the explanatory coherence of our view, making it more complete, less ad hoc, more plausible. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 10.2) |
| 6952 | Induction is 'defeasible', since additional information can invalidate it [Harman] |
| Full Idea: It is sometimes said that inductive reasoning is 'defeasible', meaning that considerations that support a given conclusion can be defeated by additional information. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Rationality [1995], 1.4.5) | |
| A reaction: True. The point is that being defeasible does not prevent such thinking from being rational. The rational part of it is to acknowledge that your conclusion is defeasible. |
| 6953 | All reasoning is inductive, and deduction only concerns implication [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Deductive logic is concerned with deductive implication, not deductive reasoning; all reasoning is inductive | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Rationality [1995], 1.4.5) | |
| A reaction: This may be an attempt to stipulate how the word 'reasoning' should be used in future. It is, though, a bold and interesting claim, given the reputation of induction (since Hume) of being a totally irrational process. |
| 17060 | Best Explanation is the core notion of epistemology [Harman, by Smart] |
| Full Idea: Gilbert Harman introduced the term 'inference to the best explanation', and argued that it is the core notion of epistemology. | |
| From: report of Gilbert Harman (The Inference to the Best Explanation [1974]) by J.J.C. Smart - Explanation - Opening Address p. 01 | |
| A reaction: Hard to assess that, but it sounds right. I'm a fan of coherence theories of justification, and also coherence theories of explanation, and there is a neat package there somewhere. |
| 12602 | There is no natural border between inner and outer [Harman] |
| Full Idea: There is no natural border between inner and outer. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.3.4) | |
| A reaction: Perhaps this is the key idea for the anti-individualist view of mind. Subjectively I would have to accept this idea, but looking objectively at another person it seems self-evident nonsense. |
| 12603 | We can only describe mental attitudes in relation to the external world [Harman] |
| Full Idea: No one has ever described a way of explaining what beliefs, desires, and other mental states are except in terms of actual or possible relations to things in the external world. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.3.4) | |
| A reaction: If I pursue my current favourite idea, that how we explain things is the driving force in what ontology we adopt, then this way of seeing the mind, and taking an externalist anti-individualist view of it seems quite attractive. |
| 8130 | Qualities of experience are just representational aspects of experience ('Representationalism') [Harman, by Burge] |
| Full Idea: Harman defended what came to be known as 'representationalism' - the view that qualitative aspects of experience are nothing other than representational aspects. | |
| From: report of Gilbert Harman (The Intrinsic Quality of Experience [1990]) by Tyler Burge - Philosophy of Mind: 1950-2000 p.459 | |
| A reaction: Functionalists like Harman have a fairly intractable problem with the qualities of experience, and this may be clutching at straws. What does 'represent' mean? How is the representation achieved? Why that particular quale? |
| 12601 | The way things look is a relational matter, not an intrinsic matter [Harman] |
| Full Idea: According to functionalism, the way things look to you is a relational characteristic of your experience, not part of its intrinsic character. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.3.3) | |
| A reaction: No, can't make sense of that. How would being in a relation determine what something is? Similar problems with the structuralist account of mathematics. If the whole family love some one cat or one dog, the only difference is intrinsic to the animal. |
| 3073 | We see ourselves in the world as a map [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Our conception of ourselves in the world is more like a map than a story. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], Pref) | |
| A reaction: Dennett offer the 'story' view of the self (Ideas 7381 and 7382). How do we arbitrate this one? A story IS a sort of map. Maps can extend over time as well over space. I think the self is real, and is a location on a map, and the hero of a story. |
| 3076 | Defining dispositions is circular [Harman] |
| Full Idea: There is no noncircular way to specify dispositions; for they are dispositions to behave given certain situations, and the situations must be include beliefs about the situation, and desires concerning it. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 3.3) | |
| A reaction: This is nowadays accepted dogmatically as the biggest objection to behaviourism, but it could be challenged. Your analysis may begin by mentioning beliefs and desires, but if you keep going they may eventually fade out of the picture. |
| 3075 | Could a cloud have a headache if its particles formed into the right pattern? [Harman] |
| Full Idea: If the right pattern of electrical discharges occurred in a cloud instead of in a brain, would that also be a headache? | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 3.2) | |
| A reaction: The standard objection to functionalism is to propose absurd implementations of a mind, but probably only a brain could produce the right electro-chemical combination. |
| 6951 | Ordinary rationality is conservative, starting from where your beliefs currently are [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Ordinary rationality is generally conservative, in the sense that you start from where you are, with your present beliefs and intentions. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Rationality [1995], 1.3) | |
| A reaction: This stands opposed to the Cartesian or philosophers' rationality, which requires that (where possible) everything be proved from scratch. Harman seems right, that the normal onus of proof is on changing beliefs, rather proving you should retain them. |
| 3086 | Are there any meanings apart from in a language? [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The theory of language-independent meanings or semantic representations is mistaken. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 6.5) | |
| A reaction: This would make him (in Dummett's terms) a 'philosopher of language' rather than a 'philosopher of thought'. Personally I disagree. Don't animals have 'meanings'? Can two sentences share a meaning? |
| 12592 | Concepts in thought have content, but not meaning, which requires communication [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Concepts and other aspects of mental representation have content but not (normally) meaning (unless they are also expressions in a language used in communication). | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.1.2) | |
| A reaction: Given his account of meaning as involving some complex 'role', he has to say this, though it seems a dubious distinction, going against the grain of a normal request to ask what some concept 'means'. What is 'democracy'? |
| 3078 | Speech acts, communication, representation and truth form a single theory [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The various theories are not in competition. The theory of truth is part of the theory of representational character, which is presupposed by the theory of communication, which in turn is contained in the more general theory of speech acts. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 4.3) | |
| A reaction: Certainly it seems that the supposed major contenders for a theory of meaning are just as much complements as they are competitors. |
| 12590 | Take meaning to be use in calculation with concepts, rather than in communication [Harman] |
| Full Idea: (Nonsolipsistic) conceptual role semantics is a version of the theory that meaning is use, where the basic use is taken to be in calculation, not in communication, and where concepts are treated as symbols in a 'language of thought'. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.1.1) | |
| A reaction: The idea seems to be to connect the highly social Wittgensteinian view of language with the reductive physicalist account of how brains generate concepts. Interesting, thought I never like meaning-as-use. |
| 12593 | The use theory attaches meanings to words, not to sentences [Harman] |
| Full Idea: A use theory of meaning has to suppose it is words and ways of putting words together that have meaning because of their uses, not sentences. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.1.3) | |
| A reaction: He says that most sentences are unique, so cannot have a standard use. Words do a particular job over and over again. How do you distinguish the quirky use of a word from its standard use? |
| 12588 | Meaning from use of thoughts, constructed from concepts, which have a role relating to reality [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Conceptual role semantics involves meanings of expressions determined by used contents of concepts and thoughts, contents constructed from concepts, concepts determined by functional role, which involves relations to things in the world. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.1) | |
| A reaction: This essay is the locus classicus for conceptual-role semantics. Any attempt to say what something IS by giving an account of its function always feels wrong to me. |
| 12589 | Some regard conceptual role semantics as an entirely internal matter [Harman] |
| Full Idea: I call my conceptual role semantics 'non-solipsistic' to contrast it with that of authors (Field, Fodor, Loar) who think of conceptual role solipsistically as a completely internal matter. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.1) | |
| A reaction: Evidently Harman is influenced by Putnam's Twin Earth, and that meanings ain't in the head, so that the conceptual role has to be extended out into the world to get a good account. I prefer extending into the language community, rather into reality. |
| 12600 | The content of thought is relations, between mental states, things in the world, and contexts [Harman] |
| Full Idea: In (nonsolipsistic) conceptual role semantics the content of thought is not in an 'intrinsic nature', but is rather a matter of how mental states are related to each other, to things in the external world, and to things in a context understood as normal. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.3.3) | |
| A reaction: This is part of Harman's functional view of consciousness, which I find rather dubious. If things only have identity because of some place in a flow diagram, we must ask why that thing has that place in that diagram. |
| 3090 | There is only similarity in meaning, never sameness in meaning [Harman] |
| Full Idea: The only sort of sameness of meaning we know is similarity in meaning, not exact sameness of meaning. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 6.8) | |
| A reaction: The Eiffel Tower and le tour Eiffel? If you want to be difficult, you can doubt whether the word 'fast' ever has exactly the same meaning in two separate usages of the word. |
| 3082 | Ambiguity is when different underlying truth-conditional structures have the same surface form [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Ambiguity results from the possibility of transforming different underlying truth-conditional structures into the same surface form. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 5.3) | |
| A reaction: Personally I would call a 'truth-conditional structure' a 'proposition', and leave it to the philosophers to decide what a proposition is. |
| 3079 | Truth in a language is explained by how the structural elements of a sentence contribute to its truth conditions [Harman] |
| Full Idea: A theory of truth for a language shows how the truth conditions of any sentence depend on the structure of that sentence. The theory will say, for each element of structure, what its contribution is. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 5.1) | |
| A reaction: This just seems to push the problem of truth back a stage, as you need to know where the truth is to be found in the elements from which the structure is built. |
| 3085 | Sentences are different from propositions, since two sentences can express one proposition [Harman] |
| Full Idea: 'Bob and John play golf' and 'John and Bob play golf' are equivalent; but if they were to be derived from the same underlying structure, one or the other of Bob and John would have to come first; and either possibility is arbitrary. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 6.4) | |
| A reaction: If I watch Bob and John play golf, neither of them 'comes first'. A proposition about them need not involve 'coming first'. Only if you insist on formulating a sentence must you decide on that. |
| 13345 | Sentences are 'analytical' if every sequence of objects models them [Tarski] |
| Full Idea: A class of sentences can be called 'analytical' if every sequence of objects is a model of it. | |
| From: Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Logical Consequence [1936], p.418) | |
| A reaction: See Idea 13344 and Idea 13343 for the context of this assertion. |
| 3087 | The analytic/synthetic distinction is a silly division of thought into encyclopaedia and dictionary [Harman] |
| Full Idea: No purpose is served by thinking that certain principles available to a person are contained in his internal encyclopaedia - and therefore only synthetic - whereas other principles are part of his internal dictionary - and are therefore analytic. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 6.5) | |
| A reaction: If it led to two different ways to acquire knowledge, then quite a lot of purpose would be served. He speaks like a pragmatist. The question is whether some statements just are true because of some feature of meaning. Why not? |
| 12594 | If one proposition negates the other, which is the negative one? [Harman] |
| Full Idea: A relation of negation might hold between two beliefs without there being anything that determines which belief is the negative one. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.1.4) | |
| A reaction: [He attributes this thought to Brian Loar] This seems to give us a reason why we need a semantics for a logic, and not just a structure of inferences and proofs. |
| 12591 | Mastery of a language requires thinking, and not just communication [Harman] |
| Full Idea: If one cannot think in a language, one has not yet mastered it. A symbol system used only for communication, like Morse code, is not a language. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman ((Nonsolipsistic) Conceptual Role Semantics [1987], 12.1.2) | |
| A reaction: This invites the question of someone who has mastered thinking, but has no idea how to communicate. No doubt we might construct a machine with something like that ability. I think it might support Harman's claim. |
| 3083 | Many predicates totally resist translation, so a universal underlying structure to languages is unlikely [Harman] |
| Full Idea: There are many predicates of a given language that resist translation into another language, …so it is unlikely that there is a basic set of underlying structures common to all languages. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Thought [1973], 5.4) | |
| A reaction: Not convincing. 'Structures' are not the same as 'predicates'. Once a language has mapped its predicates, that blocks the intrusions of differently sliced alien predicates. No gaps. |
| 20407 | Taste is the capacity to judge an object or representation which is thought to be beautiful [Tarski, by Schellekens] |
| Full Idea: Taste is the faculty for judging an object or a kind of representation through a satisfaction or a dissatisfaction, ...where the object of such a satisfaction is called beautiful. | |
| From: report of Alfred Tarski (The Concept of Truth for Formalized Languages [1933]) by Elizabeth Schellekens - Immanuel Kant (aesthetics) 1 | |
| A reaction: We usually avoid the word 'faculty' nowadays, because it implies a specific mechanism, but 'capacity' will do. Kant is said to focus specifically on beauty, whereas modern aestheticians have a broader view of the type of subject matter. |
| 5121 | Basing ethics on flourishing makes it consequentialist, as actions are judged by contributing to it [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Basing ethics on human flourishing tends towards utilitarianism or consequentialism; actions, character traits, laws, and so on are to be assessed with reference to their contributions to human flourishing. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Human Flourishing, Ethics and Liberty [1983], 9.2.2) | |
| A reaction: This raises the question of whether only virtue can contribute to flourishing, or whether a bit of vice might be helpful. This problem presumably pushed the Stoics to say that virtue itself is the good, rather than the resulting flourishing. |
| 5122 | Maybe consequentialism is a critique of ordinary morality, rather than describing it [Harman] |
| Full Idea: Consequentialism may be put forward not as an attempt to capture intuitive folk morality but rather as a critique of ordinary tuitions. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Moral Philosophy meets social psychology [1999], 10.1) | |
| A reaction: It is certainly true that most people are concerned with why an action was performed, and (after initial anger) are prepared to forgive an unintended disaster. We have no moral objections to earthquakes, which have bad consequences. |
| 5120 | What counts as 'flourishing' must be relative to various sets of values [Harman] |
| Full Idea: If we base our ethics on human flourishing, one implication would seem to be moral relativism, since what counts as 'flourishing' seems inevitably relative to one or other set of values. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Human Flourishing, Ethics and Liberty [1983], 9.2.1) | |
| A reaction: This remark seems to make the relativist assumption that all value systems are equal. For Aristotle, flourishing is no more relative than health is. No one can assert that illness has an intrinsically high value in human life. |
| 5123 | Maybe there is no such thing as character, and the virtues and vices said to accompany it [Harman] |
| Full Idea: It may be the case that there is no such thing as character, no ordinary character traits of the sort people think there are, none of the usual moral virtues and vices. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Moral Philosophy meets social psychology [1999], 10.1) | |
| A reaction: This would be a devastating fact for virtue theory, if it were true. I don't believe it. He thinks patterns of behaviour result from circumstances, but we give accurate and detailed pictures of people's characters (esp. in novels). |
| 5124 | If a person's two acts of timidity have different explanations, they are not one character trait [Harman] |
| Full Idea: If Herbert is disposed to not speak in history class (but not other subjects), and explanation of this is different from his avoidance of roller coaster rides, then these two dispositions are not special cases of a single character trait. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Moral Philosophy meets social psychology [1999], 10.2) | |
| A reaction: A basic Harman argument for denying the existence of character (and hence of virtues). I just say that character traits are more complex than his caricature of them. If I keep imagining disaster and humiliation for myself, that is a character trait. |
| 5125 | Virtue ethics might involve judgements about the virtues of actions, rather than character [Harman] |
| Full Idea: There are variants of virtue ethics that do not require character traits in the ordinary sense. For example, moral thinking might be explicated by appeal to judgements about whether particular actions are just or courageous or whatever. | |
| From: Gilbert Harman (Moral Philosophy meets social psychology [1999], 10.7.1.1) | |
| A reaction: A very interesting proposal (from Judith Jarvis Thomson). This would flatly reject Aristotle, and one presumes that the judgement about the virtue of the action would largely be a matter of pondering cultural conventions (or, perhaps, consequences). |