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Single Idea 6270
[filed under theme 19. Language / F. Communication / 6. Interpreting Language / b. Indeterminate translation
]
Full Idea
What it is to be a correct translation is to be the translation that best explains the behaviour of the speaker.
Gist of Idea
The correct translation is the one that explains the speaker's behaviour
Source
Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec III)
Book Ref
Putnam,Hilary: 'Meaning and the Moral Sciences' [RKP 1981], p.41
A Reaction
This seems fairly close to Quine, but rather puzzlingly uses the word 'correct'. If our criteria of translation are purely behavioural, there is no way we can be correct after one word ('gavagai'), so at what point does it become 'correct'?
The
19 ideas
with the same theme
[full translation may be a logical impossibility]:
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6318
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The doctrine of indeterminacy of translation seems implied by the later Wittgenstein
[Wittgenstein, by Quine]
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18963
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Indeterminacy translating 'rabbit' depends on translating individuation terms
[Quine]
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1631
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You could know the complete behavioural conditions for a foreign language, and still not know their beliefs
[Quine]
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1632
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Translation of our remote past or language could be as problematic as alien languages
[Quine]
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3988
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Indeterminacy of translation also implies indeterminacy in interpreting people's mental states
[Dennett on Quine]
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6311
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The firmer the links between sentences and stimuli, the less translations can diverge
[Quine]
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6312
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We can never precisely pin down how to translate the native word 'Gavagai'
[Quine]
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6313
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Stimulus synonymy of 'Gavagai' and 'Rabbit' does not even guarantee they are coextensive
[Quine]
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6317
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Dispositions to speech behaviour, and actual speech, are never enough to fix any one translation
[Quine]
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6270
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The correct translation is the one that explains the speaker's behaviour
[Putnam]
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6283
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Language maps the world in many ways (because it maps onto other languages in many ways)
[Putnam]
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14206
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There are infinitely many interpretations of a sentence which can all seem to be 'correct'
[Putnam]
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6399
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Criteria of translation give us the identity of conceptual schemes
[Davidson]
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6179
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Should we assume translation to define truth, or the other way around?
[Blackburn on Davidson]
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3495
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Shared Background makes translation possible, though variation makes it hard
[Searle]
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3083
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Many predicates totally resist translation, so a universal underlying structure to languages is unlikely
[Harman]
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3698
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Indeterminacy of translation is actually indeterminacy of meaning and belief
[Bonjour]
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2763
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There is an indeterminacy in juggling apparent meanings against probable beliefs
[Dancy,J]
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6341
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Right translation is a mapping of languages which preserves basic patterns of usage
[Horwich]
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