51 ideas
| 3811 | Entailment and validity are relations, but inference is a human activity [Searle] |
| Full Idea: We must distinguish between entailment and validity as logical relations on the one hand, and inferring as a voluntary human activity on the other. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 3822 | Theory involves accepting conclusions, and so is a special case of practical reason [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Theoretical reason is typically a matter of accepting a conclusion or hypothesis on the basis of argument or evidence, and is thus a special case of practical reason. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.VII) |
| 3806 | Rationality is built into the intentionality of the mind, and its means of expression [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Constraints of rationality are built into the structure of mind and language, specifically into the structure of intentionality and speech acts. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Int xiv) |
| 3812 | Rationality is the way we coordinate our intentionality [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The constraints of rationality ought to be thought of adverbially; they are a matter of the way in which we coordinate our intentionality. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 3809 | If complex logic requires rules, then so does basic logic [Searle] |
| Full Idea: If you think you need a rule to infer q from 'p and (if p then q)', then you would also need a rule to infer p from p. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 4568 | If 'Queen of England' does not refer if there is no queen, its meaning can't refer if there is one [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: If 'the Queen of England' is not a referring expression when there is no queen, nor can it be one when there is a queen - since the meaning of the expression is the same in either case. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §4.1) | |
| A reaction: I'm not convinced. Does this mean that since I can point with my finger at nothing, I therefore do not indicate anything when there is an object at which I am pointing. Sounds silly to me. |
| 3810 | In real reasoning semantics gives validity, not syntax [Searle] |
| Full Idea: In real-life reasoning it is the semantic content that guarantees the validity of the inference, not the syntactical rule. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 3841 | Users of 'supervenience' blur its causal and constitutive meanings [Searle] |
| Full Idea: I am no fan of the concept of supervenience. Its uncritical use is a sign of philosophical confusion, because the concept oscillates between causal supervenience and constitutive supervenience. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.9 n5) | |
| A reaction: I don't see why you shouldn't assert the supervenience of one thing on another, while saying that you are not sure whether it is causal or constitutive. The confusion seems to me to be in understandings of the causal version. |
| 4574 | If some peoples do not have categories like time or cause, they can't be essential features of rationality [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: If our most basic concepts, like time, space, substance or causality, are not shared by some peoples, it puts paid to the cherished ideal of philosophers to discover a set of concepts or categories which any rational human must employ in his thinking. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §5.2) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a place where a priori philosophy (Aristotle,Kant,Hegel) meets empirical research (Whorf). However, interpreting the research is so fraught with problems it drives you back to the a priori… |
| 15642 | If kinds depend only on what can be observed, many underlying essences might produce the same kind [Eagle] |
| Full Idea: If the kinds there are depend not on the essences of the objects but on their observed distinguishing particulars, ...then for any kind that we think there is, it is possible that there are many underlying essences which are observably indistinguishable. | |
| From: Antony Eagle (Locke on Essences and Kinds [2005], IV) | |
| A reaction: Eagle is commenting on Locke's reliance on nominal essences. This seems to be the genuine problem with jadeite and nephrite (both taken to be 'jade'), or with 'fool's gold'. This isn't an objection to Locke; it just explains the role of science. |
| 15645 | Nominal essence are the observable properties of things [Eagle] |
| Full Idea: It is clear the nominal essences really are the properties of the things which have them: they are (a subset of) the observable properties of the things. | |
| From: Antony Eagle (Locke on Essences and Kinds [2005], IV) | |
| A reaction: I think this is wrong. The surface characteristics are all that is available to us, so our classifications must be based on those, but it is on the ideas of them, not their intrinsic natures. That is empiricsm! What makes the properties 'essential'? |
| 15643 | Nominal essence mistakenly gives equal weight to all underlying properties that produce appearances [Eagle] |
| Full Idea: Nominal essence does not allow for gradations in significance for the underlying properties. Those are all essential for the object behaving as it observably does, and they must all be given equal weight when deciding what the object does. | |
| From: Antony Eagle (Locke on Essences and Kinds [2005], IV) | |
| A reaction: This is where 'scientific' essentialism comes in. If we take one object, or one kind of object, in isolation, Eagle is right. When we start to compare, and to set up controlled conditions tests, we can dig into the 'gradations' he cares about. |
| 3816 | Our beliefs are about things, not propositions (which are the content of the belief) [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The terminology of "propositional attitudes" is confused, because it suggests that a belief is an attitude towards a propositions, …but the proposition is the content, not the object, of my belief. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.2) |
| 3833 | A belief is a commitment to truth [Searle] |
| Full Idea: A belief is a commitment to truth. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.4.III) |
| 3837 | We can't understand something as a lie if beliefs aren't commitment to truth [Searle] |
| Full Idea: If I lie and say "It is raining", my utterance is intelligible to me as a lie precisely because I understand that the utterance commits me to the truth of a proposition I do not believe to be true. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.6.II) |
| 3828 | Thinking must involve a self, not just an "it" [Searle] |
| Full Idea: We should not say "It thinks" in preference to "I think". If thinking is an active, voluntary process, there must be a self who thinks. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.IX) |
| 3831 | Reasons can either be facts in the world, or intentional states [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Both reasons and the things they are reasons for can be either facts in the world or intentional states such as beliefs, desires, and intentions. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.4.I) | |
| A reaction: One might point out that beliefs, desires and intentions are facts in the world too. Implicit dualism. One can ask, what turns a fact into a reason? |
| 3830 | In the past people had a reason not to smoke, but didn't realise it [Searle] |
| Full Idea: For a long time people had a reason not to smoke cigarettes, without knowing that they had such a reason. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: What does 'had' a reason mean here? If I wish you dead, there is a reason why you should be dead, but you don't 'have' the reason, and never will have. There's probably a reason why I should never have been born. |
| 3832 | Causes (usually events) are not the same as reasons (which are never events) [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Causes are typically events, reasons are never events. You can give a reason by stating a cause, but it does not follow that the reason and the cause are the same thing. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.4.I) | |
| A reaction: This is against Davidson. I'm with Searle here; my having a reason to do something is not the cause of my doing it. I don't, unlike Searle, believe in free will, but doing something for a reason is not just the operation of the reason. |
| 4573 | If it is claimed that language correlates with culture, we must be able to identify the two independently [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: If it is claimed that linguistic differences significantly correlate with cultural differences, it must therefore be possible to identify the linguistic differences independently from the cultural ones. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §5.1) | |
| A reaction: This is a basic objection to any extreme relativist version of the S-P hypothesis. They are part of the conspiracy to overemphasise language in philosophy, and they are wrong. |
| 4575 | A person's language doesn't prove their concepts, but how are concepts deduced apart from language? [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: It would be absurd to say the Hopi lack the concept of time because they lack tensed verbs, ..but how do we find out what a man's concepts are except in terms of his language? | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §5.2) | |
| A reaction: Presumably we should look at animals, where concepts must be inferred in order to explain behaviour. I don't see why introspection (scientifically wicked) should not also be employed to detect our own non-verbal concepts. How are new words invented? |
| 3823 | Being held responsible for past actions makes no sense without personal identity [Searle] |
| Full Idea: I am held responsible now for things that I did in the distant past. But that only makes sense if there is some entity that is both the agent of the action in the past and me now. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.VII) | |
| A reaction: A possible response, of course, is that you are held responsible for your past deeds, but you shouldn't be. The idea that you are the same as when you committed the crime is a convenient fiction for people who desire revenge. Responsibility fades. |
| 3821 | Giving reasons for action requires reference to a self [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The requirement that I state reasons that I acted on requires a reference to the self. …Only for a self can something be a reason for an action. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.VII) | |
| A reaction: Why can't we just say that this reason, given this desire and this belief, led to this action, and never mention the self? Admittedly leaving out 'I' is an odd circumlocution, but I don't find this particular argument very convincing. |
| 3824 | A 'self' must be capable of conscious reasonings about action [Searle] |
| Full Idea: In order to be a self the entity that acts as an agent must also be capable of conscious reasoning about its actions. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.VIII) | |
| A reaction: I can't accept this all-or-nothing account. A chimpanzee is some sort of 'agent', and there are bad chimpanzees you wouldn't want in your colony. Why does Searle want to cut us off in some special compound where our actions are totally different? |
| 3834 | An intentional, acting, rational being must have a self [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Selfhood in my sense comes for free once you have a conscious intentional being capable of engaging in free actions on the basis of reasons. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.5.II) | |
| A reaction: The concept of an 'action' is probably the thing that most clearly needs a self, because it implies co-ordination and purpose, and there must be some item which benefits. Personally I think you can drop 'free actions' and still have a self. |
| 3825 | Action requires a self, even though perception doesn't [Searle] |
| Full Idea: It is a formal requirement on rational action that there must be a self who acts, in a way that it is not a formal requirement on perception that there be an agent or a self who perceives. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.IX) | |
| A reaction: I don't find this persuasive. I don't see how we can rule out a priori the possibility of a set of desires and reasons within an organism which generate an action, without any intervening 'self' to add something. Ockham's Razor. |
| 3829 | Selfs are conscious, enduring, reasonable, active, free, and responsible [Searle] |
| Full Idea: A self is conscious, persists through time, operates with reasons, carries out free actions, and is responsible. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.X) | |
| A reaction: Personally I would substitute 'makes decisions' for 'carries out free actions', but otherwise I agree, though he seems to miss a key aspect, which is that the self is in charge of the mind, and directs its focus and co-ordinates its inputs and outputs. |
| 3826 | A self must at least be capable of consciousness [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The first condition on the self is that it should be capable of consciousness. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.IX) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as a stipulative definition. It raises the question of whether it is possible that a lizard (say) is not actually conscious, but has some sort of propriotreptic awareness, and a 'central controller' for its decision-making. |
| 3827 | The self is neither an experience nor a thing experienced [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The self is not an experience, nor is it an object that is experienced. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.IX) | |
| A reaction: A nice dichotomy, that draws attention to the unique position of the self. Thanks to Descartes for focusing our attention on it. Personally I would say that the self is an object, which cannot be experienced by itself, but can be inferred by others. |
| 3820 | The bundle must also have agency in order to act, and a self to act rationally [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Agency must be added to the bundle to account for how embodied bundles engage in free actions, and selfhood must be added to account for how agents can act rationally. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.VII) | |
| A reaction: I don't buy much of this, but I am inclined to say that a will must be added to the bundle to explain why it acts consistently and coherently. It is certainly ridiculous to rest with the picture of a person as a completely unstructured bundle. |
| 3817 | Free will is most obvious when we choose between several reasons for an action [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The most dramatic manifestation of the free will gap is that when one has several reasons for performing an action, one may act on only one of them; one may select which reason one acts on. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.II) |
| 3808 | Rational decision making presupposes free will [Searle] |
| Full Idea: In order to engage in rational decision making we have to presuppose free will. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 3818 | We freely decide whether to make a reason for action effective [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Where free rational action is concerned, all effective reasons are made effective by the agent. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.3.II) |
| 4561 | Many sentences set up dispositions which are irrelevant to the meanings of the sentences [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: Many sentences set up dispositions which are irrelevant to the meanings of the sentences. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §2.3) | |
| A reaction: Yet another telling objection to behaviourism. When I look at broccoli I may have a disposition to be sick, but that isn't part of the concept of broccoli. |
| 4564 | I can meaningfully speculate that humans may have experiences currently impossible for us [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: It is not meaningless for me to postulate the potential for humans to sense in a manner which is at present unimaginable and indescribable. There is no reason to believe me, but I might be right. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §3.1) | |
| A reaction: The key counterexample to verificationist theories of meaning is wild speculations, which are clearly meaningful, though frequently far beyond any likely human experience. Logical positivists are allergic to imagination. |
| 4565 | The verification principle itself seems neither analytic nor verifiable [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: It seems that the positivists must admit that there is at least one statement which is meaningful, but which is neither verifiable nor analytic - namely, the statement of the principle of verification itself. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §3.1) | |
| A reaction: Some people think this objection is decisive, but I think any theory must be permitted a few metatheoretic assertions or axioms which are beyond discussion. Ayer thought the VP might be treated as analytic. Everyone has to start somewhere. |
| 4563 | 'How now brown cow?' is used for elocution, but this says nothing about its meaning [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: The sentence 'How now brown cow?' has its use in elocutions classes, yet this aspect of its use tells us nothing about its meaning. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §2.4) | |
| A reaction: Indeed, and also there are weird sentence of which we can assemble a meaning, but cannot think of any conceivable use ('rats swim in purple marmalade'). |
| 4562 | Most people know how to use the word "Amen", but they do not know what it means [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: Most people know how to use the word "Amen", but they do not know what it means. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §2.4) | |
| A reaction: Personally I find examples like this decisive against the 'use' theory of meaning. Maybe the defence is that the theory works for sentences, and individual words (like passwords) are peripheral. |
| 4571 | Reference need not be a hit-or-miss affair [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: Reference need not be a hit-or-miss affair. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §4.2) | |
| A reaction: Sounds right. If the basic scenario is picking someone out in a crowd, your listener may think they know which person you are talking about, with a high degree of probability. |
| 4566 | Any thesis about reference is also a thesis about what exists to be referred to [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: Any thesis about reference is also going to be a thesis about what there is in existence to refer to. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §4) | |
| A reaction: I see the point, but we must not put the cart before the horse. I may have an intuition that something exists, but not know how to refer to it (because of my small vocabulary). |
| 4572 | If predicates name things, that reduces every sentence to a mere list of names [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: If predicates are names of entities, then subject/predicate sentences are pairs of names, since subjects are names (or referring expressions). But a pair of names is not a sentence at all, it is a mere list. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §4.4) | |
| A reaction: If that is meant to demolish universals it is too quick. Concatenating names is not the same as listing them. A relationship is asserted. There is a (mysterious) Platonic 'partaking' between form and particular. Perhaps. |
| 4576 | An analytic truth is one which becomes a logical truth when some synonyms have been replaced [Cooper,DE] |
| Full Idea: The definition of analytic truth which has, I believe, the most chance of success is one in terms of synonymy; ..an analytic truth is one which can be transformed into a logical truth once synonyms are replaced by synonyms. | |
| From: David E. Cooper (Philosophy and the Nature of Language [1973], §7.1) | |
| A reaction: Sounds promising, though there is Quine's notorious problem of circularity in all these concepts. If synonymy is conventional, then so is analyticity. I personally feel that the circle can be broken. |
| 3814 | Preferences can result from deliberation, not just precede it [Searle] |
| Full Idea: A well-ordered set of preferences is typically the result of successful deliberation, and is not its precondition. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 3840 | We don't accept practical reasoning if the conclusion is unpalatable [Searle] |
| Full Idea: If I desire to get rid of my flu symptoms, and believe the only way to do it is death, I am committed to desiring my death. …there is no plausible logic of practical reason. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.8.II) |
| 3815 | The essence of humanity is desire-independent reasons for action [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The single greatest difference between humans and other animals as far as rationality is concerned is our ability to create, recognise and act on desire-independent reasons for action. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 3839 | Only an internal reason can actually motivate the agent to act [Searle] |
| Full Idea: Only an internal reason can actually motivate the agent to act. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.6 App) |
| 3835 | If it is true, you ought to believe it [Searle] |
| Full Idea: To say that something is true is already to say that you ought to believe it. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.5.II) | |
| A reaction: I'm sure what Einstein said is true, but I don't understand it. The truth is the thought of how things actually are, but why should I not prefer my private fantasies? I see the point, though. |
| 3836 | If this is a man, you ought to accept similar things as men [Searle] |
| Full Idea: From the fact that an object is truly described as "a man", it follows that you ought to accept relevantly similar objects as men. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.5.IV) | |
| A reaction: 'Similar' rather begs the question. Common speech distinguishes sharply between a man and a 'real man'. You only accept them as men if you see them as men, not as similar to something else. Interesting. |
| 3838 | Promises hold because I give myself a reason, not because it is an institution [Searle] |
| Full Idea: The obligation to keep a promise does not derive from the institution of promising, ..but from the fact that in promising I freely and voluntarily create a reason for myself. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.6.IV) |
| 3813 | 'Ought' implies that there is a reason to do something [Searle] |
| Full Idea: To say that someone 'ought' to do something is to imply that there is a reason for him to do it. | |
| From: John Searle (Rationality in Action [2001], Ch.1.II) |
| 15641 | Kinds are fixed by the essential properties of things - the properties that make it that kind of thing [Eagle] |
| Full Idea: The natural thought is to think that real kinds are given only by classification on the basis of essential properties: properties that make an object the kind of thing that it is. | |
| From: Antony Eagle (Locke on Essences and Kinds [2005], II) | |
| A reaction: Circularity alert! Circularity alert! Essence gives a thing its kind - and hence we can see what the kind is? Test for a trivial property! Eagle is not unaware of these issues. Does he mean 'necessary' rather than 'essential'? |