Grice's Valediction

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

Grice called his reminiscence of things a "Valedictory Essay", which you must admit is one of the saddest titles ever produced by a philosopher. But he had been diagnosed with emphysema and he knew (or felt) that his end was near.

--- There are many strands in that 'valediction'. One (Five Strand) is about aspects of meaning.

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If someone utters utterance "x", do we claim that "by uttering x", X meant that p, but did not mean that q. I.e. do we 'prejudge' what U meant. Do we want to say that there is a 'centre' and to use R. B. Jones's brilliant completion of the metaphor, a 'periphery' to it?

We don't think so!

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Jones uses 'periphery' as a noun, and indeed Grice refers to 'peripheral' cases in WoW:359. How peripheral must something be NOT to be deemed 'central'. Recall that a point (even in conceptual space) has no dimension. "Be to the point" is usually stupid, as I hear it. So most things that exist ARE peripheral.

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Grice is conscious that when inquiring about the centre and the periphery we are "moving fairly large conceptual slabs" -- what Kramer would have as the hammer, and I would have as the SLEDGEhammer --. And this, "around a somewhat crudely fashioned board".

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Grice proposes a field study here:

---- He said that p.
---- He meant that p by uttering x

i. Was it 'direct', or 'indirect'?

ii. Was it straight, or 'devious'?

iii. Was it plain or rather 'convoluted'?

iv. Was it 'definite' or hopelessly 'indefinite'?

v. Etc. ("[O]ther distinguishing marks of [a] similar general character").

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"What he said (or explicitly communicated) was an INDIRECT way to get me to think about q."

"What he said a pretty DEVIOUS way to let me know he is a royalist."

"What he expressed was a most convoluted way to get to the idea that Boy Meets Girl."

"What he said lacked any degree of 'definiteness': "What is, is" (Parmenides)."

"Other".

----- It seems that a GOOD conversationalist, who appeals to the maxims to USE them and 'flout' them and EXPLOIT them (what's the good of a rule or regulation if you cannot EXPLOIT it?) is the one that goes B, rather than A in the choice of sobriquets by Grice.

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