The Play Group: P. H. Nowell-Smith

PUBLICATIONS:
1946. Freewill and moral responsibility.
Mind 57 45-61. He was 32
1954. Psychoanalysis & moral language. Rationalist Annual
Repr in P. Edwards/A Pap, eds,
A mn intro to philosophy. Macmillan.
1952. (the Nowell-Smith/Austin polemic)
cfr. Austin 1960:153-80
1954. Determinists and libertarians. Mind 63.
For free will see JL Austin, DF Pears, JR Lucas, G Ryle.
1954. Ethics (you were right, it's 1954).
with an editorial foreword by AJ Ayer.
chapters
1. theory & practice
1. the task of ethics
2. theoretical ethics
3. intuitionism
4. the analogy between ethics and science
5. the logic of adjectives.
6. the logic of sentences and arguments
2.choosing and advising
7. the purposes of practical discourse
8. reasons for choosing
9. motives.
10. egoism and hedonism
11. advice and exhoration.
12. good.
3. duty and purpose
13. right and ought
14. duty and obligation
15. duty and purpose
16. the purpose of moral rules
17. conscientiousness
18. conscience
19. freedom and responsibility I
20. freedom and responsibility II
21. postcript.
index.
he quotes G. Ryle (p.125)
HJ Paton (p.134)
There is a 1964 "note" (p.290 -- my reprint) quoting
JL Austin.
Examples:
A: I should choose that one if I were you.
B: Why.
A: Because it's more comfortable, p.77
==
A: What are you doing?
B: I am having a nice smoke.
A: Are you enjoying it? P.79
===
A: "aptness", x has a property which is apt
to arouse a certain emotion
D: descriptive
G: gerundive
(I suppose Bayne will like this, since he's written
on gerundives in the Chomsky online festschrift).
===
A: I'll have mutton.
B: Why?
A: Because I prefer mutton to beef.
B: Why? (meaning: not, 'Why do you prefer mutton to beef?'
but 'Why is your preference for mutton a reason for
choosing it?',
====
A (picking up sides): I'll have Jones.
B: why?
A: Because he's the best wicket-keeper
B: Why? (meaning, not, 'In what way is he the best
wicket-keeper?', but 'Why is his being the best
wicket keeper a reason for choosing him?'
====
A: I'll pay the butcher.
B: Why?
A: Because I owe him money
B: Why? (meaning, not, 'How did the debt arise?', but
'Why is the existence of a debt a reason for
paying him?') (pp.83-84)
===
trustworthiness: reliability (1954:82)
he calls the relevance rule the "most important" (p.82)
cancellability: withdrawal (p.86):
The "+>" clause arises "in default of an express withdrawal" (p.86)
A: What was the ordeal?
B: It was terrifying (+> I was frightened by it) but I
wasn't frightened (p.85).
1958. Choosing, deciding, doiing. Analysis. January.
1959. Causality or causation. Encyclopaedia Britannica.
cited by Barth and Krabbe, 1982.
1960. Reply to Austin. Theoria 26 2
1960. Purpose and intelligent action. PASS 34 97-112.
1962. Contextual implication and ethical theory. PAS 36 1-18.
1967. Acts and locutions. In W H Capitan/D D Merrill,
Art, mind and religion: proceedings.
Pittsburgh UP. Oberlin 6th colloquium in philosophy, 1965.
1969. ... In KT Fann, Symposium on JL Austin. RKP.

SECONDARY BIBLIO.
BERLIN I 1978:11
BRANDT, R. Ethics.
"multi-functionalism".
COHEN LJ. 1962:53.
re: instrumental view of the signalling repertoire.
"we do things by uttering x's".
HARE RM The language of morals. iv says PHN "commented on part I"
HARE RM. Review of _Ethics_. Philosophy, 31.
HARE RM 1962:75
about the innumerable/indeterminate "conversational meaning"
HARMAN G 1971:66 (originally published 1968)
Hungerland, Isabel C. Contextual implication.
Inquiry 1969 211-
cited in Caton,
HUDSON WD, Modern Moral Philosophy, p. 68, 280
says that Warnock quotes NS.
MUNDLE 1970:84-5
discusses the Nowell-Smith/Austin polemic.
ROSSI, L. Thesis
TOULMIN S E, quoted N-S, 1954:52.
WARNOCK, Dame Mary. Discusses him in, along with RM Hare.
Ethics since 1900, OUP.
She discusses notion of "logical _ODDITY".
WARNOCK GJ quotes him. 1971:31
as attending "sat. mng. mtgs"

obits of Nowell-Smith to the effect:

"I had to leave Oxford. I found Grice to be too clever and overwhelming".