38 ideas
6267 | A culture needs to admit that knowledge is more extensive than just 'science' [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The acknowledgement that the sphere of knowledge is wider than the sphere of 'science' seems to me to be a cultural necessity if we are to arrive at a sane and human view of ourselves or of science. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: A very nice remark, with which I intuitively agree, but then you are left with the problem of explaining how something can qualify as knowledge when it can't pass the stringent tests of science. How wide to we spread, and why? |
6272 | 'True' and 'refers' cannot be made scientically precise, but are fundamental to science [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Some non-scientific knowledge is presupposed by science; for example, I have been arguing that 'refers' and 'true' cannot be made scientifically precise; yet truth is a fundamental term in logic - a precise science. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI) | |
A reaction: We might ask whether we 'know' what 'true' and 'refers' mean, as opposed to being able to use them. If their usage doesn't count as knowledge, then we could still end up with all actual knowledge being somehow 'scientific'. |
6276 | 'The rug is green' might be warrantedly assertible even though the rug is not green [Putnam] |
Full Idea: 'The rug is green' might be warrantedly assertible even though the rug is not green. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: The word 'warranted' seems to be ambiguous in modern philosophy. See Idea 6150. There seem to be internalist and externalist versions. It seems clear to say that a belief could be well-justified and yet false. |
6266 | We need the correspondence theory of truth to understand language and science [Putnam] |
Full Idea: A correspondence theory of truth is needed to understand how language works, and how science works. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: Putnam retreated from this position to a more pragmatic one later on, but all my sympathies are with the present view, despite being repeatedly told by modern philosophers that I am wrong. See McGinn (Idea 6085) and Searle (Idea 3508). |
6277 | Correspondence between concepts and unconceptualised reality is impossible [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The great nineteenth century argument against the correspondence theory of truth was that one cannot think of truth as correspondence to facts (or 'reality') because one would need to compare concepts directly with unconceptualised reality. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: Presumably the criticism was offered by idealists, who preferred a coherence theory. The defence is to say that there is a confusion here between a concept and the contents of a concept. The contents of a concept are designed to be facts. |
6264 | In Tarski's definition, you understand 'true' if you accept the notions of the object language [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Anyone who accepts the notions of whatever object language is in question - and this can be chosen arbitrarily - can also understand 'true' as defined by Tarski for that object language. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: Thus if we say "'snow is white' is true iff snow is white", then if you 'accept the notion' that snow is white in English, you understand what 'true' means. This seems to leave you with the meaning of 'snow is white' being its truth conditions. |
6265 | Tarski has given a correct account of the formal logic of 'true', but there is more to the concept [Putnam] |
Full Idea: What Tarski has done is to give us a perfectly correct account of the formal logic of the concept 'true', but the formal logic of the concept is not all there is to the notion of truth. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Intro) | |
A reaction: I find this refreshing. A lot of modern philosophers seem to think that truth is no longer an interesting philosophical topic, because deflationary accounts have sidelined it, but I take the concept to be at the heart of metaphysics. |
6269 | Only Tarski has found a way to define 'true' [Putnam] |
Full Idea: There is only one way anyone knows how to define 'true' and that is Tarski's way. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec II.5) | |
A reaction: However, Davidson wrote a paper called 'On the Folly of Trying to Define Truth', which seems to reject even Tarski. Also bear in mind Putnam's earlier remark (Idea 6265) that there is more to truth than Tarski's definition. Just take 'true' as primitive. |
4986 | A weaker kind of reductionism than direct translation is the use of 'bridge laws' [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: If multiple realisability means that psychological terms cannot be translated into physics, one weaker kind of reductionism resorts to 'bridge laws' which link the theory to be reduced to the reducing theory. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §3.8) | |
A reaction: It seems to me that reduction is all-or-nothing, so there can't be a 'weaker' kind. If they are totally separate but linked by naturally necessary laws (e.g. low temperature and ice), they are supervenient, but not reducible to one another. |
6280 | Realism is a theory, which explains the convergence of science and the success of language [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Realism is an empirical theory; it explains the convergence of scientific theories, where earlier theories are often limiting cases of later theories (which is why theoretical terms preserve their reference); and it explains the success of language. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: I agree. Personally, I think of Plato's Theory of Forms and all religions as empirical theories. The response from anti-realists is generally to undermine confidence in the evidence which these 'empirical theories' are said to explain. |
6284 | If a tautology is immune from revision, why would that make it true? [Putnam] |
Full Idea: If we held, say, 'All unmarried men are unmarried' as absolutely immune from revision, why would this make it true? | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: A very nice question. Like most American philosophers, Putnam accepts Quine's attack on the unrevisability of analytic truths. His point here is that defenders of analytic truths are probably desperate to preserve basic truths, but it won't work. |
6273 | Knowledge depends on believing others, which must be innate, as inferences are not strong enough [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Our ability to picture how people are likely to respond may well be innate; indeed, our disposition to believe what other people tell us (which is fundamental to knowledge) could hardly be an inference, as that isn’t good enough for knowledge. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI) | |
A reaction: An interesting claim. There could be an intermediate situation, which is a hard-wired non-conscious inference. When dismantled, the 'innate' brain circuits for assessing testimony could turn out to work on logic and evidence. |
6274 | Empathy may not give knowledge, but it can give plausibility or right opinion [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Empathy with others may give less than 'Knowledge', but it gives more than mere logical or physical possibility; it gives plausibility, or (to revive Platonic terminology) it provides 'right opinion'. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec VI) | |
A reaction: See Ideas 174 and 2140 for Plato. Putnam is exploring areas of knowledge outside the limits of strict science. Behind this claim seems to lie the Principle of Charity (3971), but a gang of systematic liars (e.g. evil students) would be a problem case. |
17084 | You can't decide which explanations are good if you don't attend to the interest-relative aspects [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Explanation is an interest-relative notion …explanation has to be partly a pragmatic concept. To regard the 'pragmatics' of explanation as no part of the concept is to abdicate the job of figuring out what makes an explanation good. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], p. 41-2), quoted by David-Hillel Ruben - Explaining Explanation Ch 1 | |
A reaction: I suppose this is just obvious, depending on how far you want to take the 'interest-relative' bit. If a fool is fobbed off with a trivial explanation, there must be some non-relative criterion for assessing that. |
5001 | Maybe we should see intentionality and consciousness as a single problem, not two [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: Many philosophers today have adopted the view that we can achieve an enormous simplification by reducing the two components of the mind-body problem - intentionality and consciousness - into one; ...consciousness is no more than representations. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §8.4) | |
A reaction: One would then see subjective experience and informational content as two consequences of a single mental activity. This strikes me as the correct route to go. We do, after all, learn BY experiencing. Hence concepts are tied in with qualia. |
4993 | If a bird captures a worm, we could say its behaviour is 'about' the worm [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: When a bird pulls a worm from the ground, then swallows it piece by piece, there is a sense in which its behaviour can be said to be about the worm. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §5.4) | |
A reaction: This is preparing the ground for a possible behaviourist account of intentionality. Reply: you could say rain is about puddles, or you could say we have adopted Dennett's 'intentional stance' to birds, but it tells us nothing about their psychology. |
5000 | Behaviourism says intentionality is an external relation; language of thought says it's internal [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: The conflict over whether intentionality is a matter of behavioural relations with the rest of the world, or of the internal states of the subject, is at its most dramatic in the contrast between behaviourism and the language of thought hypothesis. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §7.10) | |
A reaction: I just don't believe any behaviourist external account of intentionality, which ducks the question of how it all works. Personally I am more drawn to maps and models than to a language of thought. I plan my actions in an imagined space-time world. |
4982 | Dualism implies some brain events with no physical cause, and others with no physical effect [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: If the mind causes brain events, then they are not caused by other brain events, and such causal gaps should be detectable by scientists; there should also be a gap of brain-events which cause no other brain events, because they are causing mind events. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §2.5) | |
A reaction: This is the double causation problem which Spinoza had spotted (Idea 4862). Expressed this way, it seems a screamingly large problem for dualism. We should be able to discover some VERY strange physical activity in the brain. |
4991 | Behaviourism seems a good theory for intentional states, but bad for phenomenal ones [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: For many kinds of mental states, notably intentional ones such as beliefs and desires, behaviourism is appealing, ..but for sensations and experiences such as pain, it seems grossly implausible. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §5.1) | |
A reaction: The theory does indeed make a bit more sense for intentional states, but it still strikes me as nonsense that there is no more to my belief that 'Whales live in the Atlantic' than a disposition to say something. WHY do I say this something? |
4994 | Behaviourism offers a good alternative to simplistic unitary accounts of mental relationships [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: There is a temptation to think that 'aboutness', and the 'contents' of thoughts, and the relation of 'reference', are single and unitary relationships, but behaviourism offers an alternative approach. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §5.5) | |
A reaction: Personally I wouldn't touch behaviourism with a barge-pole (as it ducks the question of WHY certain behaviour occurs), but a warning against simplistic accounts of intentional states is good. I am sure there cannot be a single neat theory of refererence. |
4992 | In 'holistic' behaviourism we say a mental state is a complex of many dispositions [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: There is a non-reductive version of behaviourism ( which we can call 'global' or 'holistic') which says there is no more to having mental states than having a complex of certain kinds of behavioural dispositions. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §5.2) | |
A reaction: This is designed to meet a standard objection to behaviourism - that there is no straight correlation between what I think and how I behave. The present theory is obviously untestable, because a full 'complex' of human dispositions is never repeated. |
4990 | The inverted spectrum idea is often regarded as an objection to behaviourism [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: The inverted spectrum idea is often regarded as an objection to behaviourism. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §4.5) | |
A reaction: Thus, my behaviour at traffic lights should be identical, even if I have a lifelong inversion of red and green. A good objection. Note that physicalists can believe in inverted qualia as well a dualists, as long as the brain states are also inverted. |
4984 | All meaningful psychological statements can be translated into physics [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: All psychological statements which are meaningful, that is to say, which are in principle verifiable, are translatable into propositions which do not involve psychological concepts, but only the concepts of physics. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §3.8) | |
A reaction: This shows how eliminativist behaviourism arises out of logical positivism (by only allowing what is verifiable). The simplest objection: we can't verify the mental states of others, because they are private, but they are still the best explanation. |
4998 | Instead of representation by sentences, it can be by a distribution of connectionist strengths [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: In a connectionist system, information is represented not by sentences but by the total distribution of connection strengths. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §7.6) | |
A reaction: Neither sentences (of a language of thought) NOR connection strengths strike me as very plausible ways for a brain to represent things. It must be something to do with connections, but it must also be to do with neurons, or we get bizarre counterexamples. |
4985 | If mental states are multiply realisable, they could not be translated into physical terms [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: If psychological states are multiply realisable it is hard to see how they could possibly be translated into physical terms. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §3.8) | |
A reaction: Reductive funtionalism would do it. A writing iimplement is physical and multiply realisable. Personally I prefer the strategy of saying mental states are NOT multiply realisable. If frog brains differ from ours, they probably don't feel pain like us. |
4997 | It seems unlikely that most concepts are innate, if a theory must be understood to grasp them [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: It is widely accepted that for many concepts, if not all, grasping the concept requires grasping some theory, ...which makes difficulties for the view that concepts are not learned: for 'radical concept nativism', as Fodor calls it. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §7.3) | |
A reaction: Not a problem for traditional rationalist theories, where the whole theory can be innate along with the concept, but a big objection to modern more cautious non-holistic views (such as Fodor's). Does a bird have a concept AND theory of a nest? |
6282 | Theory of meaning presupposes theory of understanding and reference [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Theory of meaning presupposes theory of understanding and reference. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: How can you have a theory of understanding without a meaning that requires to be understood? Personally I think about the minds of small animals when pondering this, and that seems to put reference and truth at the front of the queue. |
6281 | Truth conditions can't explain understanding a sentence, because that in turn needs explanation [Putnam] |
Full Idea: You can't treat understanding a sentence as knowing its truth conditions, because it then becomes unintelligible what that knowledge in turn consists in. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: The implication, I take it, is circularity; how can you specify truth conditions if you don't understand sentences? Putnam here agrees with Dummett that verification must be involved. Something has to be taken as axiomatic in all this. |
6278 | We should reject the view that truth is prior to meaning [Putnam] |
Full Idea: I am suggesting that we reject the view that truth (based on the semantic theory) is prior to meaning. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: It is a nice question which of truth or meaning has logical priority. One might start by speculating about how and why animals think. A moth attracted to flame is probably working on truth without much that could be called 'meaning'. |
4999 | For behaviourists language is just a special kind of behaviour [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: Behaviourists regard the use of language as just a special kind of behaviour. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §7.9) | |
A reaction: This is not an intuitively obvious view of language. We behave, and then we talk about behaviour. Performative utterances (like promising) have an obvious behavioural aspect, as do violent threats, but not highly theoretical language (such as maths). |
6271 | How reference is specified is not what reference is [Putnam] |
Full Idea: A theory of how reference is specified isn't a theory of what reference is. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec V) | |
A reaction: A simple and important point. We may achieve reference by naming, describing, grunting or pointing, but the question is, what have we achieved when we get there? |
4995 | Behaviourists doubt whether reference is a single type of relation [Kirk,R] |
Full Idea: To most behaviourists it seems misguided to expect there to be a single relation that connects referring expressions with their referents. | |
From: Robert Kirk (Mind and Body [2003], §5.5) | |
A reaction: You don't need to be a behaviourist to feel this doubt. Think about names of real people, names of fictional people, reference to misunderstood items, or imagined items, or reference in dreams, or to mathematical objects, or negations etc. |
6268 | The claim that scientific terms are incommensurable can be blocked if scientific terms are not descriptions [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The line of reasoning of Kuhn and Feyerabend can be blocked by arguing (as I have in various places, and as Saul Kripke has) that scientific terms are not synonymous with descriptions. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec II.2) | |
A reaction: A nice clear statement of the motivation for creating the causal theory of reference. See Idea 6162. We could still go back and ask whether we could block scientific relativism by rethinking how descriptions work, instead of abandoning them. |
6279 | A private language could work with reference and beliefs, and wouldn't need meaning [Putnam] |
Full Idea: A language made up and used by a being who belonged to no community would have no need for such a concept as the 'meaning' of a term. To state the reference of each term and what the language speaker believes is to tell the whole story. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: A subtle response to Wittgenstein's claim (e.g. Ideas 4152,4158), but I am not sure what Putnam means. I would have thought that beliefs had to be embodied in propositions. They may not need 'meaning' quite as urgently as sentences, but still… |
6270 | The correct translation is the one that explains the speaker's behaviour [Putnam] |
Full Idea: What it is to be a correct translation is to be the translation that best explains the behaviour of the speaker. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Lec III) | |
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'? |
6283 | Language maps the world in many ways (because it maps onto other languages in many ways) [Putnam] |
Full Idea: We could say that the language has more than one correct way of being mapped onto the world (it must, since it has more than one way of being correctly mapped onto a language which is itself correctly mapped onto the world). | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four) | |
A reaction: This spells out nicely the significance of Quine's 'indeterminacy of translation'. Others have pointed out that the fact that language maps onto world in many ways need not be anti-realist; the world is endless, and language is limited. |
6275 | You can't say 'most speaker's beliefs are true'; in some areas this is not so, and you can't count beliefs [Putnam] |
Full Idea: The maxim that 'most of a speaker's beliefs are true' as an a priori principle governing radical translation seems to me to go too far; first, I don't know how to count beliefs; second, most people's beliefs on some topics (philosophy) are probably false. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Three) | |
A reaction: Putnam prefers a pragmatic view, where charity is applicable if behaviour is involved. Philosophy is too purely theoretical. The extent to which Charity should apply in philosophy seminars is a nice question, which all students should test in practice. |
1590 | The just man does not harm his enemies, but benefits everyone [Plato] |
Full Idea: First, Socrates, you told me justice is harming your enemies and helping your friends. But later it seemed that the just man, since everything he does is for someone's benefit, never harms anyone. | |
From: Plato (Clitophon [c.372 BCE], 410b) | |
A reaction: Socrates certainly didn't subscribe to the first view, which is the traditional consensus in Greek culture. In general Socrates agreed with the views later promoted by Jesus. |