10 ideas
22334 | Analysis must include definitions, search for simples, concept analysis, and Kant's analysis [Glock] |
Full Idea: Under 'analysis' a minimum would include the Socratic quest for definitions, Descartes' search for simple natures, the empiricists' psychological resolution of complex ideas, and Kant's 'transcendental' analysis of our cognitive capacities. | |
From: Hans-Johann Glock (What is Analytic Philosophy? [2008], 6.1) | |
A reaction: This has always struck me, and I find the narrow focus on modern logic a very distorted idea of the larger project. The aim, I think, is to understand by taking things apart, in the spirit of figuring out how a watch works. |
7746 | We don't normally think of names as having senses (e.g. we don't give definitions of them) [Searle] |
Full Idea: If Tully=Cicero is synthetic, the names must have different senses, which seems implausible, for we don't normally think of proper names as having senses in the way that predicates do (we do not, e.g., give definitions of proper names). | |
From: John Searle (Proper Names [1958], p.89) | |
A reaction: It is probably necessary to prize apart the question of whether Tully 'has' (intrinsically) a sense, from whether we think of Tully in that way. Stacks of books have appeared about this one, since Kripke. |
7747 | How can a proper name be correlated with its object if it hasn't got a sense? [Searle] |
Full Idea: It seems that a proper name could not have a reference unless it did have a sense, for how, unless the name has a sense, is it to be correlated with the object? | |
From: John Searle (Proper Names [1958], p.91) | |
A reaction: This might (just) be the most important question ever asked in modern philosophy, since it provoked Kripke into answering it, by giving a social, causal, externalist account of how names (and hence lots of language) actually work. But Searle has a point. |
7748 | 'Aristotle' means more than just 'an object that was christened "Aristotle"' [Searle] |
Full Idea: Aristotle being identical with an object that was originally christened will not suffice, for the force of "Aristotle" is greater than the force of 'identical with an object named "Aristotle"', for not just any object named "Aristotle" will do. | |
From: John Searle (Proper Names [1958], p.93) | |
A reaction: This anticipates Kripke's proposal to base reference on baptism. I remain unsure about how rigid a designation of Aristotle could be, in a possible world where his father died young, and he became an illiterate soldier who hates philosophy. |
7749 | Reference for proper names presupposes a set of uniquely referring descriptions [Searle] |
Full Idea: To use a proper name referringly is to presuppose the truth of certain uniquely referring descriptive statements. ...Names are pegs on which to hang descriptions. | |
From: John Searle (Proper Names [1958], p.94) | |
A reaction: This 'cluster' view of Searle's has become notorious, but I think one could at least try to mount a defence. The objection to Searle is that none of the descriptions are necessary, unlike just being the named object. |
7750 | Proper names are logically connected with their characteristics, in a loose way [Searle] |
Full Idea: If asked whether or not proper names are logically connected with characteristics of the object to which they refer, the answer is 'yes, in a loose sort of way'. | |
From: John Searle (Proper Names [1958], p.96) | |
A reaction: It seems to be inviting trouble to assert that a connection is both 'logical' and 'loose'. Clearly Searle has been reading too much later Wittgenstein. This is probably the weakest point in Searle's proposal, which brought a landslide of criticism. |
22332 | German and British idealism is not about individual ideas, but the intelligibility of reality [Glock] |
Full Idea: Neither German nor British Idealism reduced reality to episodes in the minds of individuals. Instsead, they insisted that reality is intelligible only because it is a manifestation of a divine spirit or rational principle. | |
From: Hans-Johann Glock (What is Analytic Philosophy? [2008], 5.2) | |
A reaction: They standardly reject Berkeley. Such Idealism seems either to be the design argument for God's existence, or neo-Stoicism (in its claim that nature is rational). Why not just say that nature seems to be intelligible, and stop there? |
22336 | We might say that the family resemblance is just a consequence of meaning-as-use [Glock] |
Full Idea: Against Wittgenstein's family resemblance view one might evoke his own idea that the meaning of a word is its use, and that diversity of use entails diversity of meaning. | |
From: Hans-Johann Glock (What is Analytic Philosophy? [2008], 8.2) | |
A reaction: Wittgenstein might just accept the point. Diversity of concepts reflects diversity of usage. But how do you distinguish 'football is a game' from 'oy, what's your game?'. How does usage distinguish metaphorical from literal (if it does)? |
22335 | The variety of uses of 'game' may be that it has several meanings, and isn't a single concept [Glock] |
Full Idea: The proper conclusion to draw from the fact that we explain 'game' in a variety of different ways is that it is not a univocal term, but has different, albeit related, meanings. | |
From: Hans-Johann Glock (What is Analytic Philosophy? [2008], 8.2) | |
A reaction: [He cites Rundle 1990] Potter says Wittgenstein insisted that 'game' is a single concept. 'Game' certainly slides off into metaphor, as in 'are you playing games with me?'. The multivocal view would still meet family resemblance on a narrower range. |
468 | Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.] |
Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice. | |
From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where? |