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Single Idea 1631

[filed under theme 19. Language / F. Communication / 6. Interpreting Language / b. Indeterminate translation ]

Full Idea

We could know the necessary and sufficient stimulatory conditions of every possible act of utterance, in a foreign language, and still not know how to determine what objects the speakers of that language believe in.

Gist of Idea

You could know the complete behavioural conditions for a foreign language, and still not know their beliefs

Source

Willard Quine (Speaking of Objects [1960], pt.III,p.11)

Book Ref

Quine,Willard: 'Ontological Relativity and Other Essays' [Columbia 1969], p.11


A Reaction

I just don't believe this, because the same scepticism then creeps into discussions of native speakers of a single language, and all communcation is blighted - which is nonsense.


The 19 ideas with the same theme [full translation may be a logical impossibility]:

The doctrine of indeterminacy of translation seems implied by the later Wittgenstein [Wittgenstein, by Quine]
Indeterminacy translating 'rabbit' depends on translating individuation terms [Quine]
You could know the complete behavioural conditions for a foreign language, and still not know their beliefs [Quine]
Translation of our remote past or language could be as problematic as alien languages [Quine]
Indeterminacy of translation also implies indeterminacy in interpreting people's mental states [Dennett on Quine]
The firmer the links between sentences and stimuli, the less translations can diverge [Quine]
We can never precisely pin down how to translate the native word 'Gavagai' [Quine]
Stimulus synonymy of 'Gavagai' and 'Rabbit' does not even guarantee they are coextensive [Quine]
Dispositions to speech behaviour, and actual speech, are never enough to fix any one translation [Quine]
The correct translation is the one that explains the speaker's behaviour [Putnam]
Language maps the world in many ways (because it maps onto other languages in many ways) [Putnam]
There are infinitely many interpretations of a sentence which can all seem to be 'correct' [Putnam]
Criteria of translation give us the identity of conceptual schemes [Davidson]
Should we assume translation to define truth, or the other way around? [Blackburn on Davidson]
Shared Background makes translation possible, though variation makes it hard [Searle]
Many predicates totally resist translation, so a universal underlying structure to languages is unlikely [Harman]
Indeterminacy of translation is actually indeterminacy of meaning and belief [Bonjour]
There is an indeterminacy in juggling apparent meanings against probable beliefs [Dancy,J]
Right translation is a mapping of languages which preserves basic patterns of usage [Horwich]