17 ideas
| 9038 | We must distinguish what the speaker denotes by a name, from what the name denotes [Evans] |
| Full Idea: There are two related but distinguishable questions concerning proper names: what the speaker denotes (upon an occasion), and what the name denotes. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §I) | |
| A reaction: I don't think any account of language makes sense without this sort of distinction, as in my favourite example: the password is 'swordfish'. So how does language gets its own meanings, independent of what speakers intend? |
| 5824 | How can an expression be a name, if names can change their denotation? [Evans] |
| Full Idea: We need an account of what makes an expression into a name for something that will allow names to change their denotations. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §II) | |
| A reaction: Presumably an example would be 'The Prime Minister is in the building'. Evans proposes to discuss communication, rather than strict meanings and descriptions. |
| 9042 | A private intention won't give a name a denotation; the practice needs it to be made public [Evans] |
| Full Idea: Intentions alone don't bring it about that a name gets a denotation; without the intention being manifest there cannot be the common knowledge required for the practice. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §II) | |
| A reaction: Well, I might have a private name for some hated colleague which I mutter to myself whenever I see her. The way names, and language generally, becomes ossified is by joining the great impersonal sea of the language. ..waves of bones, |
| 9041 | The Causal Theory of Names is wrong, since the name 'Madagascar' actually changed denotation [Evans] |
| Full Idea: Change of denotation is decisive against the Causal Theory of Names. Changes of denotation actually occur: a hearsay report misunderstood by Marco Polo transferred the name 'Madagascar' from a portion of the mainland to the African island. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §I) | |
| A reaction: This doesn't sound decisive, as you could give an intermediate causal account of Marco Polo's mistake. I might take the famous name Winston, and baptise my son with it. And I might have done it because I thought Winston was a German dictator. |
| 12900 | How could 'S knows he has hands' not have a fixed content? [Bach] |
| Full Idea: How can it be that a sentence like 'George knows that he has hands', even with time and references fixed, does not have a fixed propositional content? | |
| From: Kent Bach (The Emperor's New 'Knows' [2005], I) | |
| A reaction: The appeal is to G.E. Moore's common sense view of immediate knowledge (Idea 6349). The reply is simply that the word 'knows' shifts its meaning, having high standards in sceptical philosophy classes, and low standards on the street. |
| 12901 | If contextualism is right, knowledge sentences are baffling out of their context [Bach] |
| Full Idea: Contextualism seems to predict that if you encounter a knowledge attribution out of context you won't be in a position to grasp which proposition the sentence expresses. | |
| From: Kent Bach (The Emperor's New 'Knows' [2005], I) | |
| A reaction: It is only the word 'knows' which is at issue in the sentence. If someone is said to 'know' about the world of the fairies, we might well be puzzled as to what proposition was being expressed. Is the word 'flat' baffling out of context? |
| 12902 | Sceptics aren't changing the meaning of 'know', but claiming knowing is tougher than we think [Bach] |
| Full Idea: When a sceptic brings up far-fetched possibilities and argues that we can't rule them out, he is not raising the standard for the word 'know'. He is showing it is tougher than we realise for a belief to qualify as normal knowledge at all. | |
| From: Kent Bach (The Emperor's New 'Knows' [2005], III) | |
| A reaction: [Bach cites Richard Feldman for this idea] I think that what happens in the contextual account is that 'true', 'belief' and 'know' retain their standard meaning, and it is 'justified' which shifts. 'I am fully justified' can have VERY different meanings! |
| 5825 | Speakers intend to refer to items that are the source of their information [Evans] |
| Full Idea: In general, a speaker intends to refer to the item that is the dominant source of his associated body of information. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §II) | |
| A reaction: This sounds like a theory of reference which fully preserves the spirit of traditional empiricism. Speakers refer to ideas which connect to the source of their underlying impressions. |
| 5823 | The intended referent of a name needs to be the cause of the speaker's information about it [Evans] |
| Full Idea: A necessary (but not sufficient) condition for x's being the intended referent of S's use of a name is that x should be the source of the causal origin of the body of information that S has associated with the name. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §I) | |
| A reaction: This is Evans's adaptation of Kripke's causal theory of names. This cries out for a counterexample. I say something about General Montgomery, having just listened to 'Monty's Double' give a talk, believing it was Montgomery? |
| 9039 | If descriptions are sufficient for reference, then I must accept a false reference if the descriptions fit [Evans] |
| Full Idea: The strong thesis (that descriptions are sufficient for reference) is outrageous. It would mean that if Mr X is wrongly introduced to me as Mr Y, then I truly say 'this is Mr Y' if X overwhelmingly satisfies descriptions of Y. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §I) | |
| A reaction: [I omit some qualifying phrases] Evans says that probably no one ever held this view. It seems right. In the case of an electron it would seem that all the descriptions could be the same, except space-time location. Same electron as yesterday? |
| 9043 | We use expressions 'deferentially', to conform to the use of other people [Evans] |
| Full Idea: Sometimes we use expressions with the overriding intention to conform to the use made of them by some other person or persons. I shall say we use the expression 'deferentially'; examples might be 'viol' or 'minuet'. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §II) | |
| A reaction: I presume Evans wasn't very musical. This label sounds useful, if you wish to connect Grice's account of meaning with Putnam's externalist account of concepts, where deference to experts is crucial. Is all linguistic usage deferential? |
| 9040 | Charity should minimize inexplicable error, rather than maximising true beliefs [Evans] |
| Full Idea: I think the Principle of Charity (maximise true beliefs) is unacceptable. The acceptable principle enjoins minimizing the attribution of inexplicable error and cannot be operated without a theory of the causation of belief for the creatures investigated. | |
| From: Gareth Evans (The Causal Theory of Names [1973], §I) | |
| A reaction: The normal principle of charity certainly seems on shaky ground if you think you have encountered a fairly normal tribe, when they in fact are in possession of the weirdest belief system on the entire planet. |
| 22445 | Morality shows murder is wrong, but not what counts as a murder [Foot] |
| Full Idea: While one can determine from the concept of morality that there is an objection to murder one cannot determine completely what will count as murder. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.7) | |
| A reaction: She then refers to abortion, but there are military and criminal problem cases, and killings by neglect or side effect. |
| 22444 | A moral system must deal with the dangers and benefits of life [Foot] |
| Full Idea: A moral system seems necessarily to be one aimed at removing particular dangers and securing certain benefits. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.6) | |
| A reaction: I thoroughly approve of this approach to morality, which anchors it in real life, rather than in ideals or principles of reason. |
| 22447 | Saying something 'just is' right or wrong creates an illusion of fact and objectivity [Foot] |
| Full Idea: When we say that something 'just is' right or wrong we want to give the impression of some kind of fact or authority standing behind our words, ...maintaining the trappings of objectivity though the substance is not there. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.9) | |
| A reaction: Foot favours the idea that such a claim must depend on reasons, and that the reasons arise out of actual living. She's right. |
| 22448 | We sometimes just use the word 'should' to impose a rule of conduct on someone [Foot] |
| Full Idea: It would be more honest to recognise that the 'should' of moral judgement is sometimes merely an instrument by which we (for our own very good reasons) try to impose a rule of conduct even on the uncaring man? | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.18) | |
| A reaction: This is a good example, I think, of the ordinary language tradition that Foot grew up in. We load a word like 'should' with a mystical power, but the situations in which it is actually used bring us back down to earth. |
| 22446 | In the case of something lacking independence, calling it a human being is a matter of choice [Foot] |
| Full Idea: In the problem of abortion there is a genuine choice as to whether or not to count as a human being, with the rights of a human being, what would become a human being but is not yet capable of independent life. | |
| From: Philippa Foot (Morality and Art [1972], p.7) | |
| A reaction: There must be some basis for the choice. We can't call a dead person a human being. Choosing to call a tiny zygote a human being seems very implausible. Pre-viability strikes me as implausible. |