The Deep Berths of Language

--- To izz or not to izz, that hazz the question.

Grice's reply to Kripke's irreverential:

"See how high the seas of language can rise. And at the lowest points, too."

Speranza

Jones, in "Izz", etc., writes:

"Without as yet actually using Grice's words (though I might well put them in soon), the subject matter of Grice's work on predication in Aristotle is one of the topics under discussion at the moment on the phil-logic@philo.at mailing list. It may not be a favourite haunt of Grice club denizens (Grice doesn't often get a mention) but I thought it worth a mention."

Thanks for _that_!

--

Jones:

"In my own formal work partly inspired by the Grice/Code collaboration I combined formal models of essential and accidental predication (izzing and hazzing in Grice's terms) with the syllogistic logic. In doing so, my preliminary conclusions were that once you bring in that distinction (which seems to originate rather in Aristotle's metaphysics than his organon), then the rules of the syllogism become more complex, the usual conception of validity not being reflected fully for all kinds of predication."

Excellent points.

"Grice's interest seems to have been at least partly in multiplicity of "being", the question whether that verb has more than one sense. Izzing and Hazzing are different names to distinguish two ways in which "being" (and some other words like "having") are used, the neologism being useful because the distinction between essential and accidental predication (as this is conceived by Aristotle) is not in ordinary language consistently conveyed by distinct vocabulary."

Indeed. In other languages, it may even be inexistent. (I have not checked this. I would not be surprised if in some aboriginal -- i.e. there from the origins -- language (or 'lingo' as Kant says) there is no word for 'is': "Your letter, sir" -- the butler says. Surely it would be redundant to add, "Here IS your letter, sir".). Note that in classical Latin, 'est' is also omitted:

Tu quoque.

"You, too" -- surely "are".

---

One may wonder why the _need_ for 'is'. Recall that in Aristotelian logic,

"S est P"

but, as Aristotle argued, and Kant, too, 'is' (the copula) is "NOT" a predicate.

--- And so on.

Jones:

"Grice I believe was inclined to question that multiple senses really are involved, and the question arises by what criteria one can judge whether observed usage constitutes a single or multiple senses. On this I remain at present, much less than adequately acquainted with Grice's position, but there is one possible criterion which now occurs to me as a result of material on phil-logic."

Lovely always to have the cross-references!

Jones:

"It seems that there may be differences in Aristotle's conception of the ontological commitments implicit in affirmative propositions according to whether they involve essential or accidental predication, and hence differences in truth conditions.
The idea is that an accidental universal affirmation does entail existence, whereas an essential one does not. I am still not clear on whether this is the case, but if it were and the truth conditions do vary in such a manner, then it is hard to see how these two kinds of predication could avoid being distinguished as different senses."

--- Personally (I hate this redundancy) I'm not too sure that's the case.

We can consider Grice's ("Descartes" essay, WoW) example:

"I think; therefore I am".

---- By contraposition, this becomes Speranza's dictum:

"I am; therefore I think" (echoes of my uncle)

---

Grice's 'izz' and 'hazz' have (is?) the incovenience that it's not meant for first-person, surely the most important person (to some).

I suggest then, to reformulate:

I am; therefore, I think.

As:

Speranza IZZ; therefore Speranza HAZZ thought.

Or something.

Jones is suggesting taht to say that

"Speranza hazz thought" is _accidental_, or an accidental thing to say. Whereas to say that God (rather than Speranza) _IZZ_ would be, again in someone's parlance, _essential_ (or an essential thing to say). But I disgress.

Jones:

"Could one plausibly argue against the "multiplicity of being" if it were once established that there is a multiplicity of truth conditions?"

Yes. But perhaps we should bring Kripke in:

Kripke wrote:

'the seas of language'.

Dummett found that funny and entitled his odd collection of this and that, "The seas of language". Kripke considers things like:

Socrates is white.
Socrates has a big nose (Socrates "hazz" a big, flat, nose, in Grice's spelling).
Socrates is called "Socrates".

Of the latter, Kripke said:

"Actually sentences like 'Socrates is called "Socrates"' are very interesting and one can spend, strange as it may seem, hours talking about their analysis. I actually did, once, do that. I won't do that, however, on this occasion. (See how high the seas of language can rise. And at the lowest points, too.)"

And Kripke should possibly be quoting from Grice, unless he isn't (Determinists find, I read, counterfactual thinking a hard thing to engage in). For Grice wrote:

The source here is interesting enough and the keyword:

the 'deep berths' of language

KEYWORD: deep berths

---

Quote:

Grice, H. P. "Philosophy at Oxford 1945-1970", in The Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c. The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.

---

Grice is attempting to reconcile the Oxford 'school' of philosophy (as he never named it) with Aristotle's idea that philosophy is about the nature of things (to use the title of a book by Lord Quinton) , rather than language.

Grice proposes to adopt the _hypothesis_ that OPINION (Greek 'doxa') is generally reflected in language ("ta legomena").

But this is done with different 'levels' (Grice's word) representing differents degrees of commitment.

Some aspects of 'knowledge' receive the DEEPEST levels of embedding within (even) SYNTAX.

This aspects of knowledge then reside in what Grice describes, indeed, as the 'DEEP BERTHS' of language.

It is not possible, Grice suggests, for an utterer to use a language such as English WITHOUT BEING committed to (or anchored in) these 'deep berths' of language.

----

The DEEPEST levels are at a premium. So, it is in the interests of utterers (within population speaking Lingo L) to reserve these deepest levels (the "deep berths" of language), naturally enough, to their deepest commitments.

---

Other people MIGHT challenge this, Grice suggests, but it would DANGEROUS to do so. If we subscribe to this account, we might be tempted to argue that 'first principles' of 'knowledge' (as it were) are to be found in the deep categorial, syntactic even, structure of this or that lingo, rather than, say, in the VOCABULARY of a given language ("is" as categorial: "izz" and "hazz" as its representations).

Grice writes:

'[H]ow w talk OUGHT [emphasis Grice's -- in his
usual underlining] to reflect our most
solid, cherished and generally accepted
opinions'.

(Grice, op. cit.).

---

In this discussion of what is presented as 'uncontroversial', say, and what is, rather, available for 'denial', Grice might be described as interested in the ways in which different syntactic (as it were -- in Gentzen's sense) devices are available for conveying 'information' (or 'knowledge', if you mustn't) bring with them different 'existential' or 'ontological' commitments, if you mustn't.

And so on.

But back to Kripke:

Socrates: I am, therefore, I think (NON-SEQUITUR).

I think; therefore I am.

Socrates thinks.
Socrates is.
Socrates izz
Socrtaes is a thinking being.
Socrates, on top of that, is called (IZZ called, HAZZ called) "Socrates".

What is essential? What is not?

Kripke:

"Actually sentences like 'Socrates is called "Socrates"'
are very interesting and one can spend, strange
as it may seem, hours talking
about their analysis. I actually
did, once, do that. I won't do that,
however, on this occasion. (See
how high the seas of language can
rise. And at the lowest points,
too.)"

----

Perhaps Grice was too much of a sailor (as Kripke ain't) and went straight to the deepest berths, as perhaps he shouldn't ('have' or 'izz'). And so on.