Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Demonstratives', 'Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake?' and 'On the Freedom of the Will'

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6 ideas

19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 10. Two-Dimensional Semantics
14894 Indexicals have a 'character' (the standing meaning), and a 'content' (truth-conditions for one context) [Kaplan, by Macià/Garcia-Carpentiro]
     Full Idea: Kaplan distinguished two different semantic features of indexical expressions: a 'character' that captures the standing meaning of the expression, and a 'content' that consists of their truth-conditional contribution in particular contexts.
     From: report of David Kaplan (Demonstratives [1989]) by Macià/Garcia-Carpentiro - Introduction to 'Two-Dimensional Semantics' 1
     A reaction: This seems so clearly right that there isn't much to dispute. You can't understand the word 'I' or 'now' if you don't understand both its general purpose, and what it is doing in a particular utterance. But will this generalise to other semantics?
14700 'Content' gives the standard modal profile, and 'character' gives rules for a context [Kaplan, by Schroeter]
     Full Idea: Kaplan sees two aspects of meaning, the 'content', reflecting a thing's modal profile, which is modelled by standard possible worlds semantics, and 'character', giving rules for different contexts. Proper names have constant character; indexicals vary.
     From: report of David Kaplan (Demonstratives [1989]) by Laura Schroeter - Two-Dimensional Semantics 1.1.1
     A reaction: This gives rise to 2-D matrices for representing meaning, and the possible worlds are used twice, for evaluating meaning and then for evaluating context of use. I've always been struck by the two-dimensional semantics of passwords.
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 1. Nature of Ethics / f. Ethical non-cognitivism
22485 Non-cognitivists give the conditions of use of moral sentences as facts about the speaker [Foot]
     Full Idea: What all these [non-cognitivist] theories try to do is to give the conditions of use of sentences such as 'It is morally objectionable to break promises', in terms of something which must be true about the speaker.
     From: Philippa Foot (Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake? [1995], p.192)
     A reaction: A wonderfully simple and accurate analysis of this view. Compare analysing 'there is a bus coming towards you' in the same way. Sounds silly, but lots of modern philosophers see things that way.
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 1. Nature of Ethics / g. Moral responsibility
21378 We clearly feel responsible for our deeds, because we are quite certain that we did them [Schopenhauer]
     Full Idea: Another fact of consciousness ...is the wholly clear and certain feeling of responsibility for what we do, of the accountability of our actions, which rests on the unshakable certainty that we ourselves are the doers of our deeds.
     From: Arthur Schopenhauer (On the Freedom of the Will [1841], p.93-4), quoted by Christopher Janaway - Schopenhauer 7 'Freedom'
     A reaction: The point is that we have this feeling even if we do not believe in free will. I am struck by the fact that responsibility is very obvious in our own case, even if it is not when we objectively consider other people. Even villains can feel guilty.
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / h. Expressivism
22486 The mistake is to think good grounds aren't enough for moral judgement, which also needs feelings [Foot]
     Full Idea: The mistake is to think that whatever 'grounds' for a moral judgement may have been given, someone may be unready, indeed unable, to make the moral judgement, because he has not got the attitude or feeling.
     From: Philippa Foot (Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake? [1995], p.192)
     A reaction: This is roughly the Frege-Geach problem for expressivism, of how we still make moral judgements about situations where we ourselves are entirely disinterested (such as ancient historical events).
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 1. Nature of Value / b. Fact and value
22487 Moral arguments are grounded in human facts [Foot]
     Full Idea: The grounding of a moral argument is ultimately in facts about human life.
     From: Philippa Foot (Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake? [1995], p.207)
     A reaction: The best slogan I can find for summarising Foot's metaethics. The facts she refers to the basic human needs. She is right, and this almost bridges the fact-value divide (as long as you give a damn about human needs).