Dummett and "Oxford philosophy": Grice's Reply

Speranza

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In "Origins of Analytic Philosophy", Dummett reprints an interview with his German translator. The nice thing about it is the 'dialogue' format. He expands on things he talks about in his other (LSE) interview, rather than the 'dialogue' with Davidson (videorecorded).

He refers to Austin at various stages. Dummett calls Austin's influence 'noxious'. We know that it is around Austin that Grice's place in "post-war Oxford philosophy" centres, so the connection is interesting. Besides the bad things Dummett has to say about "Oxford philosophy", of the type that Dummett never showed a sensibility for, there's this bit about Frege.

It was via Austin's translation of Frege that Dummett grew his interest for Frege.

Now, Grice has expanded on various aspects of what he calls the "Oxonian dialetic", and Dummett has not been a good critic of it, never having quite understood it. Dummett's tutors at Christ Church were members of Austin's playgroup -- two of them: Urmson and Flew -- (Foster wasn't).

The Frege-Austin connection is good. Students of Frege (I'm not) are realising how many of Frege's concoctions relate to neo-Griceian ones. Indeed, alla Bradbury in "Eeating people is wrong", I am tempted to refer to "the influence of Grice on Frege". The idea of 'conventional implicature' relates, in surprising ways, to Frege's views on colouring, etc. (Neale has written on this, and also Horn).

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So, we have a methodological-substantive interaction to consider here: Dummett's criticism to the methodology of "Oxford philosophy" AND the outcomes of such methodology, as they relate to outcomes of other methodologies and approaches that Dummett favours.

Dummett seems always to have been a 'continental' type, and ironically refers to the 'insularity' which he associated with Austin's Play Group. I can agree that it tended towards insularity in various ways. As Warnock recalls in "Saturday mornings", they never cared to publish their views, because they knew they were the centre of world philosophy, and they didn't need to promote what they are into.

Dummett notes the reverence and iconic status that the Play Group attained in the USA: Austin and Grice were indeed both William James lecturers. Dummett's implicature seems to be that the Americans should rather be concentrating on grander Continental names like Frege.

At one point in "Reply to Richards", Grice mentions his classical background. Like Austin, Grice had a first in classics (rather than PPE, then unexistent). This sensibility for the 'dead' languages -- Graeco-Roman, as it were -- is important, Grice notes, to understand the members of the Play Group and their sensitivity for questions of usage. Naturally, those deprived of this classical education are bound to criticise those who have it of displaying and showing off a talent which is a sign of a privilege. While Dummett had attended a public school (and a good one at that: Winchester), he apparently never seems to have displayed an interest in questions of usage (until much later when, provoked by his students'papers -- "Grammar and style, for examination candidates").

So, Dummett's connection with Austin is interesting in it being a first-hand encounter with Grice's Play Group. It was via Austin's "Methods in Modern Epistemology", the optional-paper programme for the BA at Oxford, which, Dummett tells us, had Austin translating Frege (for Blackwell). It was via tutorials with Urmson (a colleague of Grice, though slightly younger) and Flew (a tutee of Grice) that Dummett learned about philosophy (also Foster).

YET --- given Dummett's different sensibilities (his growing interest in Frege -- he ceased to show any respect for the sort of 'linguistic botany' that the Play Group practiced. Dummett's further commentaries on or against Strawson should also be considered.

By the time of the revival of truth-conditional semantics with Davidson in Oxford, this streak of anti-Oxonian analysis in Dummett had been forgotten, and Dummett could yet again show his polemic approach in yet different ways. And so on.