The Diversity of Grice

--- by JLS
----- for the GC

--- BEING ABLE TO RELAX at my swimming-pool library, I'm going to check some of the books and photocopies it is furbished with, and provide the relevant Grice references. I have this old book by L. J. Cohen, whom I have quoted often vis a vis his "secondary-bibliography" gem: "Grice on the logical particles of natural language" (A 'gem of Gricean secondary bibliography is an essay, however critical, that features 'Grice' in the title). In his much earlier "The Diversity of Meaning", Cohen's indexers cared to have Grice cited on p. 155. I open the page, and it's ch. vi, "Meaning and the a priori", and it's section 20 -- Cohen is a very systematic philosopher -- or was-- he died some years ago. The section 20 should interest R. B. Jones, and it's called, 'Are all a priori truths analytic?" and cares to quote from the classic by Grice/Strawson.

Cohen is, typically, critical -- He was sharing with Grice the varsity of Oxford, though. Cohen writes:

It is essential to bear in mind
taht the whole problem collapses if
the analytic-synthetic distinction is not
defined independently of the a priori-empirical
one. The thesis tdhat all a priori truths are
analytic cannot articulate the way in which
a priori truths are validated, if your definition
of analyticit presupposes a concept of a priori
truth; and the question will be begged against
opponents fo the thesis if the analytic-synthetic
distdinction is not distinguished even in sense,
let alone in actual working, from the a priori-
empirical one. It is not easy to see what is gained
by a defence of the other (e.g. H. P. Grice and
P. F. Strawson, In defence of a dogma, p. 142) ...)
and thus excludes all communication and
controversy between Kantian and logical
positivists

The gist then:

Cohen is citing Grice/Strawson along with Bennett 1959.:

"It is not easy [but yet not impossible]
to see what is gained
[hey, the thing was a tribute to a visiting
professor -- why do we have to be so materialistic
that everything has to have a gain?]
by a defense of these two dichotomies that
confounds a defence of one with a defence of the
other"

Here he refers to p. 142, explicitly of the G/S paper now repr. in Grice WoW. So one would have to check what page 142 becomes in the reprint.

It's not clear that G/S confound things. It seems clear that they are only defending the analytic/synthetic. That Grice WAS interested in the a priori is however obvious from archival material unburied by Chapman. She notes that Grice did think of including in the Valedictory Essay of 1987 (written one year before his death) an examination of "Nothing can be green and red all over" -- as "synthetic a priori". And indeed Chapman reports of Grice's asking his children's playmates about that very sentence. But in the essay with Strawson he seems indeed to be focusing (or they seem to be focusing) on the analytic thing only.

The proposal by Grice and Strawson is a modest one. In terms of conversational moves: an analytically false move has to be followed by "I don't see what you can mean by that!". The response to a synthetically FALSE move has to be, "I can't believe you!"

Their examples:

A: My neighbour's three-year old son understands Russell's theory of types.
B: I can't believe you! (Cfr. Alice, in the new Johnny Depp thing, "I believe at least three impossible things a day. Keeps my mind healthy and wise").

----

A: My neighbour's three-year old son is an ADULT.
B: I can't possibly see what stupidity you may mean by that!

-- Etc.

Cohen finishes the reference off with a cultivated mention of the "Kantians" and the 'logical positivists'. But surely you cannot criticise the Kant Lecturer for 1977(Stanford -- i.e. Grice) with not knowing his Kant! Cant Kant.

--- Etc.