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Full Idea
Where Kant and others had traditionally assumed that the a priori concerned beliefs 'justifiable independently of experience', Quine and others of the time came to regard it as beliefs 'unrevisable in the light of experience'.
Gist of Idea
The traditional a priori is justified without experience; post-Quine it became unrevisable by experience
Source
Georges Rey (The Analytic/Synthetic Distinction [2013], 3.7)
Book Ref
'Stanford Online Encyclopaedia of Philosophy', ed/tr. Stanford University [plato.stanford.edu], p.9
A Reaction
That throws a rather striking light on Quine's project. Of course, if the a priori is also necessary, then it has to be unrevisable. But is a bachelor necessarily an unmarried man? It is not necessary that 'bachelor' has a fixed meaning.
| 20294 | 'Married' does not 'contain' its symmetry, nor 'bigger than' its transitivity [Rey] |
| 20293 | Analytic judgements can't be explained by contradiction, since that is what is assumed [Rey] |
| 20297 | Analytic statements are undeniable (because of meaning), rather than unrevisable [Rey] |
| 20298 | The traditional a priori is justified without experience; post-Quine it became unrevisable by experience [Rey] |
| 20299 | If we claim direct insight to what is analytic, how do we know it is not sub-consciously empirical? [Rey] |
| 20300 | Externalist synonymy is there being a correct link to the same external phenomena [Rey] |
| 20301 | The meaning properties of a term are those which explain how the term is typically used [Rey] |
| 20302 | An intrinsic language faculty may fix what is meaningful (as well as grammatical) [Rey] |
| 20303 | Research throws doubts on the claimed intuitions which support analyticity [Rey] |