Hunt with the Hounds, Run with the Hare

A lot of Grice has to be understood in the light of his colleague at the "Play Group", R. M. Hare.

R. M. Hare quotes H. P. Grice in a number of publications.

On p.59 of his _Freedom and Resentment_, he refers to Grice's contribution to the Aristotelian Society, vis-a-vis what we may call the "odd but true" distinction. Hare is discussing the moral dictum, 'ought implies can'. Hare writes: "it is the inconsistency or incomprehensibility or falsity of some utterance on some occasion that tells us about the logical properties of the words used -- not mere misleadingness or inappropriateness".

A second reference is on pp.25ff of his _Practical Inferences_. This corresponds to his 'Some alleged differences between imperatives and indicatives' (_Mind_, vol. 76) -- and the reference is again to the aforementioned symposium. It is interesting that a footnote on p.25 reads that Hare's essay was first read to a colloqium at Manchester -- only 4 years after Grice's own essay was read -- and yet Hare's use Grice's concoction of the 'implicature' of which Grice will make full use in 1967
for the _Logic & Conversation_ Lectures. Hare avails of Grice's notion of conversational implicature to explain away, as it were, the oddity of some
inferences involving imperatives:

Put on your parachute and jump;
Therefore, jump"

(Cf. Post the letter; therefore, post it or burn it", etc.).

On p. 81 of his _Moral Thinking_ Hare refers to Grice's 'In defense of a dogma' (in _Studies in the Way of Words_): i.e. the 'dogma of empiricism' so called by Quine of the analytic-synthetic distinction. Hare shares with the early Grice (for the latter Grice's view see 'Reply to Richards' in R. Grandy's _Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories, Ends_, pp.54 ff) some optimism re thedistinction as it applies to some 'moral' contexts involving, for example, the modal 'ought' ("One ought to do his duty").

As far as Grice quoting Hare is concerned, Grice refers to Hare as one of the members of the Play Group that would meet, upon Austin's strict invitation at various colleges in Oxford mainly throughout the fifties. Grice is replying to the critic such as Gellner or Bergman who would refer to 'Oxford analytic philosophy of ordinary language' _en bloc_: [leaving aside _Ryle's_ little own group of seniors], "within the Play Group, great diversity was visible, as one would expect of an association containing people with the ability and independence of mind of Austin, Strawson, Hampshire, Paul, Pears, Warnock, and Hare (to name a few)." ('Reply to Richards', p.50).

The next important quote of Grice is not so much to _Hare_ per se but to his _phrastic_. As early as 1952, Hare, making as he says using of the Liddell-Scott _Greek Lexicon_ 'improved' on the terminology of his 'Imperative Sentences' (_Mind_, 58) -- the descriptor-dictor distinction -- by coining the phrastic-neustic distinction ('neustic' has other uses in, for example, ecology, though). The 'phrastic' (from a Greek verb meaning 'to point out or indicate') is the common element in various utterances; the 'neustic' is the element which distinguishes them (from a Greek verb meaning 'to nod assent'). Hare will go on to refine this fine distinction in e.g. Phil. Rev. 79) with the 'tropic' (from the Greek word for 'mode' or 'mood') thus freeing the neustic from this signalling function, and the 'clistic' -- Hare's word -- from the Greek verb 'to close' -- for that
aspect of the utterance (already in Frege's vertical stroke of his
'judgement sign') which represents 'completeness'. Now, Grice refers to the
_phrastic_ at least twice. In 'Retrospective Epilogue', he writes that he
will "perhaps be in line with those philosophers who, in one way or another, have drawn a distinction between 'phrastics' and 'neustics,' philosophers, that is to say, who in representing the structure of discourse lay a special emphasis on

(a) the content of items of discourse whose
merits or demerits will lie in such features
as correspondence or lack of correspondence
with the world, and

(b) the mode or manner in which such items are
advanced, for example declaratively or
imperatively, or (perhaps one might equally
well say) firmly or tentatively.

(Grice, _Studies in the Way of Words_ p.367).

In _Aspects of Reason_, he avails (again) of the distinction. Regarding 'John should join AA' and 'John should be recovering his health by now' he mentions the 'radical' (a term which he borrows from Wittgenstein') and writes: "I am thinking of a
radical in pretty much the same kind of way as recent writers who have used
that term (or the term 'phrastic')."

There will be, indeed, further 'interface' between Hare and Grice, and I'm working on it.

[R. M. Hare who was a colleage of Grice for thirty years or so in the University of Oxford, passed away in Ewelme, Oxfordshire, on Jan. 29. 2000, Selected bibliography of R. M. Hare in the philosophy of language (Compiled
by J. L. S.):

1949. Imperative sentences. Mind 58. Repr. _Practical Inferences_.

1950. Practical reason. Thesis awarded the T. H. Green Prize in Moral
Philosophy. Oxford. Examiners: H. J. Paton and G. Ryle. Becomes Part I of
_Language of Morals_. Extract from passage on the 'ambiguity' of the Frege
'assertion' sign which he 'wrongly ommitted' in _Language of Morals_ repr.
in _Practical Inferences_ as an 'Appendix' to 'Imperative Sentences'.

1951. Review of Toulmin, _Place of Reason in Ethics_. PQ 1. A discussion of
the relevance of what Grice will later call the 'univocality' of 'reason'
in _Aspects of Reason_.

1952. The Language of Morals. Clarendon. Sections: Imperatives & logic. The
imperative "mood". Revised edition 1961. Hare distinguishes between the
imperative mode proper (as it applies to verbal conjugation), 'ought'
utterances and other utterances involving modals -- notably 'should' and
'must' --, and 'good'. Grice refers to the once fashionable theory of
holding 'x is good' = 'I commend x' in 'Prolegomena' to _Logic &
Conversation_ in _Studies_.

1955. Universalisability. PAS. Repr Essays on the moral concepts. Grice's
discussion of this in terms of what he calls the 'Immanuel' -- a part of
which may well comprise his famous 'Cooperative Principle' -- in _The
Conception of Value_. Grice here refers to "various kinds of generality
which are connected with familiar discussions of universalisability" (p.144).

1956. Review of Nowell-Smith, _Ethics_. Philosophy 31. This book by
Nowell-Smith is usually credited as incorporating some maxim of 'relevance'
prior to Grice, even in term of some kind of pragmatic implication (what
Hare would have as a 'loose sense of 'imply'') which Nowell-Smith calls
_contextual_.

1957. Are discoveries about the use of words empirical. JP 54. Repr. in
_Essays in Philosophical Method_. Hare's most explicit predicament in
philosophical methodology. Interesting to compare with Grice's own attitude
to 'conceptual' analysis in _Studies_ and elsewhere. ('Implicature' as a
_methodological_ notion for the philosopher).

1957. Geach: good & evil. _Analysis_ 13. Repr. in Essays in the moral
concepts. Further comments on 'good'. Expands on what in _Language of
Morals_ he says of functional words. Hare's functional words (his paradigm
is 'auger') compares to Grice's notion of _value-paradigmatic_ terms in
_Aspects of Reason_ ("to know what a good x is is prior to know what an x
is").

1962. Review of Singer, _Genersalisation in Ethics_. PQ 12. Hare's thesis
('universal prescriptivism') is that ought utterances entail imperatives
and conform to the Biblical golden rule ("do as you are done by"). It is
natural that he found support for his thesis in the work of Singer.

1963. Freedom & reason. Clarendon. Ref. to Grice, 'The causal theory of
perception', cited above.

1965. Critical study of Wright. PQ. Hare liked to say that he enjoyed
contributing to the issue of 'deontic' logic in an 'amateur' way -- e.g.
his TV interview with B. Magee, _Men of Ideas_. This is one such instance.

1967. Some alleged differences between imperatives & indicatives. _Mind_
76. Repr. in _Practical Inferences_. Originally delivered at Manchester in
1965. Explicit ref. to 'conversational implicature' as used by Grice.
Mentioned above. The critic being Hare's student at Oxford -- who'll later
succeed him as White's Prof. of Moral Philosophy: B. A. O. Williams (in
_Analysis_, 1963, p. 32).

1969. Practical inferences. Repr. in _Practical Inferences_.

1970. Meaning & speech acts. PR 79. Repr. Practical Inferences_. Sections
include: 'neustics, tropics, & phrastics'. Cited by G. N. Leech in
_Principles of Pragmatics_, and cfr. entry for 'phrastic' in the Oxford
Encyclopaedia of Linguistics and K Allan's 'Hare's trichotomy' in the
Survey of Linguistics. Hare expands turns the trichotomy into a quartette
in 'Some particles' below and he is never dogmatic as to the _number_ of
particles to posit!

1971. _Practical Inferences_. London: Macmillan.

1971. Reply to Warnock on 'Meaning and speech acts'. In 1971. The reply
concerns mainly Hare's view on the meaning of 'x is good' vis a vis
arguments of the Gricean kind as expressed (with regard to 'good' even) in
_Logic and Conversation_ (Studies, p.9).

1971. Austin's distinctions between locutionary & illocutionary acts. In
_Practical Inferences_.

1971. Austin's use of the word 'meaning' & its cognates. In 1971. Hare is
concerned with the issue, which also concerns 'Griceans' -- how much of
'meaning' is _illocutionary_ and how much of it is _perlocutionary_?

1972. _Essays on the moral concepts_. London: Macmillan. Contents:
Wrongness and harm.

1972. _Applications of moral philosophy_. London: Macmillan.

1976. Some confussions about subjectivity. The Lindley Lecture. In J.
Bricke, Freedom and Morality. The issue concerned Grice, in e.g. _The
Conception of Value_ (ch. I: Value and Objectivity).

1978. Prediction & moral appraisal. Mid-West Studies 3.

1978. Relevance. In A Goldman, _Values and Morals_, Reidel. Some general
terms of 'relevance' as relevant to the universabilisability thesis. As he
says in his interview with B. Magee, "what is sauce for the goose is not
necessarily -- pace the Sex Discrimination Act -- sauce for the gander --
there may be _relevant_ differences (a gander can't lay eggs) -- but for
any precisely similar goose".

1979. What makes choices rational. Rev. Met. 32. Grice discusses the topic
at length in _Aspects of Reason_. E.g. on p.83 ff: the man who is invited
by his mother to visit her in Milwaukee, but his firm in Redwood City is
about to do its accounts and he is head accountant. Plus, he is then
'suddenly reminded that his wife has just had a bad car accident and is
lying in hospital in Boise, Idaho, with two broken legs and internal
injuries".

1979. Universal and past-tense prescriptions. Analysis 39. As early as his
'Imperative Sentences', Hare, defying all linguisic arguments (Hare was
especially keen on Boyd/Thorne and Ross), says that the imperative mode is
in principle applicable to all persons and tenses. Grice similarly frees
the imperative mode of any 'phrastic' restriction in _Aspects of Reason_
when he says that 'The sergeant is to muster the men at dawn' is a
"perfectly good imperative" (p.54). Hare's most explicit linguistic ref.
here is to Hindustani, where, he says (in 'Imperative Sentences') that a
form is found in that language "very like a first-person singular
imperative, which means, by courteous implication, 'Please command me
to...'".

1981. _Moral thinking: its levels, method & point_. Clarendon. Contents
include: the Archangel & the Prole, Universalisation. Prudence, morality &
supererogation. Objectivity and rationality.

1984. Supervenience. PASS 58. Repr. Essays in Ethical Theory. The term was
taken by some Griceans (e.g. A. Avramides, of Somerville, in her _Mind and
Meaning: An examination of a Gricean account of language_) to deal with the
difficult issue of the interface between the semantic and the
psychological. The term is introduced by Hare in _Language of Morals_, with
regards to 'moral properties' only.

1986. A reductio ad absurdum of descriptivism. In Shanker. 'Descriptivism'
is Hare's favourite terms for any theory which opposes his. His own brand
of _prescriptivism_ arose against Ayer's _emotivism_ (cfr. Grice's ref. to
C. Stevenson in 'Meaning'), but emotivism can easily adopt a
_descriptivist_ format if one holds, for example that to utter an
indicative is to express a _belief_ and to utter an imperative is to
express a _desire_. Naturally enough, Grice was quite concerned with these
issues, too.

1988. Replies to Critics. In _Hare & Critics_, ed. N. Fotion.

1989. :Essays in ethical theory_. Clarendon. Contents: A reductio ad
absurdum of descriptivism. Supervenience. Relevance. Some confusions about
subjectivity.

1989. Some subatomic particles of logic. _Mind_98, vol. Repr. in
_Universal prescriptions and other essays_.

Perhaps my favourite of Hare's essay. Intended as a festchrift for his Oxford colleague J. O. Urmson, it was not printed by Stanford University Press -- they would not accept his punctuations. Refines the descriptor-dictor (neustic-cum-tropic vs phrastic) distinction vis a vis the _tropic_. Expands on various problems
including truth-conditional semantics and its interface with pragmatics

("We need to know the satisfaction- or beng-the-case-conditions of the
phrastic in order to understand the entire sentence, and one simple way of
conveying this understanding is to say what would be the _truth-conditions_
of the corresponding indicative. [...] It does not follow from this that
the complete indicative has somehow to appear inside the imperative [he is
discussing such a proposal by J. Hornsby in _Mind_]. The thought that it
does may be due to the _prejudice_ [my emphasis. JLS] that _truth_-conditions are basic to all kinds of meaning, whereas they are basic, if at all, only to the meanings of indicatives." An interesting topic here is Hare's reluctance though to say that there _is_ a corresponding notion to 'truth-condition' notion for imperatives here (e.g. ala Grice 'satisfaction-condition' in 'Retrospective Epilogue' to _Studies_).

Thus in 'Some alleged differences...' he says of Kenny's satisfaction/satisfactoriness logic (discussed at length by people like JD
Atlas, SC Levinson and M Gordon) that it 'attempts to find a value which
will play the part in imperative logic which is played by truth in
indicative logic. [...] Many [...] have been led astray by the search of
such a truth substitute. One problem is indeed pointed out by Grice
(_Aspects of Reason_, p.89):

"What do we say [about "~"] in cases like 'Let it be that my bicycle faces north', in which (at least on occasion, it seems to be that neither "!p" nor "!~p" is either satisfactory or unsatisfactory? ... Do we assign a _third_ value to "!p" (practically neuter), or do we say that we have a 'practical value' gap?" [Grice's
amusing ref. to Strawson's eccentric thesis!].

1989. Philosophy of language in ethics. In M. Dascal, Gruyter.

1989. _Essays on political morality_.

1993. _Essays in bioethics_.

1997. _Sorting out ethics_.

1999. _Objective prescriptivism & other essays_. Clarendon. Contents
include: Objective Prescriptions; Prescriptivism; Some Subatomic
Particles of Logic; Imperatives, Prescriptions, and their Logic; A New Kind
of Ethical Naturalism?; Professor Foot on Subjectivism.

[Philippa Foot
being also in part the target of attack in Grice's _Conception of Value_];
Weakness of the Will [a favourite topic with Grice, e.g. in 'The Weakness
of the Will' in B. Vermazen and M. Hintikka, _Actions and Events_, and for
which Hare's theory is usually said to provide no good solution]. ('The
phrastic and the neustic -- and the tropic and the clistic', 'Quantum
Pragmatics', and further references).

Refs:

From obit. in
http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/humanities/story/0,9850,642990,00.html
http://news.independent.co.uk/people/obituaries/story.jsp?story=118389

Cheers,

JL