Grice’s
Dictionary
H.
P. Grice, St. John’s Oxford
Compiled
by Grice’s Playgroup, The Bodleian
“a” Grice knew that his problem with Strawson was the Square of
Opposition. So he is well aware of the question about Barbara and Celarent.
abderites: Grice was something of a logical atomist, so he used to
refer to himself as a neo-Abderite. The reference being to Democritus and
Leucippus, from Abdera.
abdicatum: Apuleius makes an analogy that Grice (and the Grecians
before) finds interesting. It is the ‘propositio dedicative’ apophatike’/’propositio
abdicativa’ kataphatike distinction. The ‘abdicatum’ would be the ‘negatum.’ The
‘dedicatum’ would be the ‘affirmatum.’ Apuleius’s terms make the correlation
evident and Grice preferred it to that of ‘affirmatum’ and ‘negatum,’ – “where
the correlation is not that obvious.” So there is the abdicatum, the negatum,
and the negation. ‘Negatum’ and ‘affirmatum’ are actually used when translating
Husserl from the vernacular! For Husserl, Negation negation a noetic modification of
a positing, noematic cancellation every ‘negatum’
an Object posited as existing, reiterated negation; a ‘negatum’ not a
determination produced by reflection; non-being equivalent to being validly
negated. Grice’s interest in ‘not’ as a
unary functor is central. Grice was ablet to tutor Strawson in philosophy in
that famous term. In his “Introduction to logical theory,” Strawson alleges to
show that some logical
‘laws,’ taken together, show that any truth-functional sentence or formula in
which the main constant is “~ “ is the contradictory of the sentence or formula
which results from omitting that sign.” Strawson goes on to say: “A standard
and primary use of “not” in a sentence is to assert the contradictory of the
statement which would be made by the use, in the same context, of the same
sentence without “not.” Of course we must not suppose that the insertion of
“not” anywhere in any sentence always has this effect. “Some bulls are not
dangerous” is not the contradictory of “Some bulls are dangerous.” This is why
the identification of “~” with “it is not the case that” is to be preferred to
its identification with “not” simpliciter. This identification, then, involves
only those minimum departures from the logic of ordinary language which must
always result from the formal logician's activity of codifying rules with the
help of verbal patterns : viz., (i) the adoption of a rigid rule when ordinary
language permits variations and deviations from the standard use (cf. rules “
~(p Λ ~p)”
and “ ~~p ≡ p” and the discussions in
1-8, and 2-9); (ii) that stretching of the sense of ‘exemplify’ which allows,
us, e.g., to regard ‘Tom is not mad’ as well as ‘Not all bulls are dangerous’
as 'exemplifications’ of not-p.’”
Strawson goes on: “So we shall call ‘~’ the negation sign, and read ‘~’as
‘not.’ One might be tempted to suppose that declaring formulae “ ~(p Λ ~p)” and “p v ~p”
laws of the system was the same as saying that, as regards this system, a
statement cannot be both true and false and must be either true or false. But
it is not. The rules that “ ~(p Λ ~p)” and “p v ~p”
are analytic are not rules about ‘true’ and ‘false;’ they are rules about ‘~.;
They say that, given that a statement has one of the two truth-values, then it
is logically impossible for both that statement and the corresponding statement
of the form ‘ ~p’ to be true, and for
both that statement and the corresponding statement of the form ‘~p’ to be
false.” A bit of palæo-Griceian history is
in order. Sheffer, defines ‘not’ and negation in terms of incompatibility in ‘A
set of five independent postulates for Boolean algebras, with application to
logical constants,’ Trans. American Mathematical Society. Grice does refers to
‘the strokes.’ His use of the plural is interesting as a nod to Peirce’s minute
logic in his ‘Boolian [sic] algebra with one constant.’ There is indeed
Peirce’s stroke, or ampheck (↓), Sheffer’s stroke (|, /, ↑), and and Quine’s
stroke (†, strictly Quine’s dagger). Some philosophers prefer to refer to
Peirces Stroke as Peirce’s arrow, or strictly stressed double-edged sword. His
editors disambiguate his ampheck, distinguishing between the dyadic
functor or connective equivalent to Sheffer’s stroke and ‘nor.’ While
Whitehead, Russell, and Witters love Sheffer’s stroke, Hilbert does not: ‘‘p/p’
ist dann gleichbedeutend mit ‘X̄.’ Grice explores primitiveness. It is
possible, to some extent, to qualify this or that device in terms of
primitiveness. As regards ‘not,’ if a communication-system did not contain a
unitary negative device, there would be many things that communicators can now
communicate that they would be then unable to communicate. He has two
important caveats. That would be the case unless, first, the
communication-system contained some very artificial-seeming connective like one
or other of the strokes, and, second, communicators put themselves to a good
deal of trouble, as Plato does in ‘The Sophist’ with ‘diaphoron,’ that Wiggins
symbolises with ‘Δ,’ to find, more or less case by case, complicated forms
of expression, not necessarily featuring a connective, but involving such
expressions as ‘other than’or ‘incompatible with.’ Grice further refers to
Aristotle’s ‘apophasis’ in De Int.17a25. Grice, always lured by the
potentiality of a joint philosophical endeavour, treasures his collaboration
with Strawson that is followed by one with Austin on Cat. and De Int. So what
does Aristotle say in De Int.? Surely Aristotle could have started by referring
to Plato’s Parmenides, aptly analysed by Wiggins. Since Aristotle is more of a
don than a poet, he has to give ‘not’ a name: ‘ἀπόφασις ἐστιν ἀπόφανσίς τινος
ἀπό τινος,’a predication of one thing away from another,
i.e. negation of it. This is Grice’s reflection, in a
verificationist vein, of two types of this or that negative utterance. His
immediate trigger is Ryle’s contribution on a symposium on Bradley’s idea of an
internal relation, where Grice appeals to Peirce’s incompatibility. ‘The
proposition ‘This is red’ is imcompatible with the proposition, ‘This is not coloured.’
While he uses a souly verb or predicate for one of them, Grice will go back to
the primacy of ‘potching’ at a later stage. A P potches that the obble is not
fang, but feng. It is convenient to introduce this or that soul-state, ψ,
sensing that …, or perceiving that … Grice works mainly with two scenarios,
both involved with the first-person singular pronoun ‘I’ with which he is
obsessed. Grice’s first scenario concerns a proposition that implies another
proposition featuring ‘someone, viz. I,’ the first-person singular pronoun as
subject, a sensory modal verb, and an object, the proposition, it is not the
case that ‘the α is φ1.’ The denotatum of the
first-person pronoun perceives that a thing displays this or the visual
sense-datum of a colour, and the corresponding sensory modal predicate. Via a
reductive (but not reductionist) analysis, we get that, by uttering ‘It is not
the case that I see that the pillar box is blue,’ the utterer U means, i. e.
m-intends his addressee A to believe, U he sees that the pillar box is red. U’s
source, reason, ground, knowledge, or belief, upon which he bases his uttering
his utterance is U’s *indirect* mediated actual experience, belief, or
knowledge, linked to a sense-datum φ2 (red) other than φ1
(blue). Grice’s second scenario concerns a proposition explicitly featuring the
first-person singular pronoun, an introspection, involving an auditory
sense-datum of a noise. Via reductive (but not reductionist) analysis, we get
that, by uttering ‘It is not the case that I hear that the bell tolls in Gb,’ U
means that he lacks the experience of hearing that the bell tolls simpliciter.
U’s source, reason, ground, knowledge, or belief, upon which he bases his
uttering his utterance is the *direct* unmediated felt absence, or absentia, or
privatio or privation, or apophasis, verified by introspection, of the
co-relative ψ, which Grice links to the absence of the experience, belief,
or knowledge, of the sense-datum, the apophasis of the experience, which is
thereby negated. In either case, Grice’s analysans do not feature ‘not.’ Grice
turns back to the topic in seminars later at Oxford in connection with
Strawson’s cursory treatment of ‘not’ in “Logical Theory.”‘Not’ (and ~.) is the
first pair, qua unary satisfactory-value-functor (unlike this or that dyadic
co-ordinate, and, or, or the dyadic sub-ordinate if) in Grice’s list of this or
that vernacular counterpart attached to this or that formal device. Cf. ‘Smith
has not ceased from eating iron,’ in ‘Causal theory.’ In the fourth James
lecture, Grice explores a role for negation along the lines of Wilson’s
Statement and Inference.’ Grice’s ‘Vacuous Names’ contains Gentzen-type
syntactic inference rules for both ‘not’’s introduction (+, ~) and the
elimination (-, ~) and the correlative value assignation. Note that there are
correlative rules for Peirce’s arrow. Grice’s motivation is to qualify ‘not’
with a subscript scope-indicating device on ~ for a tricky case like ‘The
climber of Mt. Everest on hands and knees is not to atttend the party in his
honour.’ The logical form becomes qualified: ‘~2(Marmaduke Bloggs is
coming)1’, or ‘~2(Pegasus flies)1.’ generic
formula is ~2p1, which indicates that p is introduced
prior to ~. In the earlier James lectures he used the square bracket device.
The generic formula being ‘~[p],’ where [p] reads that p is assigned
common-ground status. Cancelling the implicata may be trickier. ‘It is not the
case that I hear that the bell tolls because it is under reparation.’ ‘That is
not blue; it’s an optical illusion.’ Cf. Grice on ‘It is an illusion. What is
it?’ Cf. The king of France is not bald because there is no king of France. In
Presupposition, the fourth Urbana lecture, Grice uses square brackets for the
subscript scope indicating device. ‘Do not arrest [the intruder]!,’ the device
meant to assign common-ground status. In ‘Method” Grice plays with the
internalisation of a pre-theoretical concept of not within the scope of ‘ψ.’
In the Kant lectures on “Aspects,” Grice explores ‘not’ within the scope of this
or that mode operator, as in the buletic utterance, ‘Do not arrest the
intruder!’ Is that internal narrow scope, ‘!~p,’ or external wide scope, ‘~!p’?
Grice also touches on this or that mixed-mode utterance, and in connection with
the minor problem of presupposition within the scope of an operator other than
the indicative-mode operator. ‘Smith has not ceased from eating iron, because
Smith does not exist ‒ cf. Hamlet sees that his father is on the rampants, but
the sight is not reciprocated ‒ Macbeth sees that Banquo is near him, but his
vision is not reciprocated. Grice is having in mind Hare’s defense of a
non-doxastic utterance. In his commentary in PGRICE, Grice expands on this
metaphysical construction routine of Humeian projection with the pre-intuitive
concept of ‘not,’ specifying the
different stages the intuitive concept undergoes until it becomes
fully rationally recostructed, as something like a Fregeian sense. In the
centerpiece lecture of the William James set, Grice explores Wilson’s Statement
and inference to assign a métier to ‘not,’ and succeeds in finding one. The
conversational métier of ‘not’ is explained in terms of the conversational
implicatum. By uttering ‘Smith has not been to prison yet,’ U implies that some
utterer has, somewhere, sometime, expressed an opinion to the contrary. This is
connected by Grice with the ability a rational creature has to possess to
survive. The creature has to be able, as Sheffer notes, to deny this or that.
Grices notable case is the negation of a conjunction. So it may well be that
the most rational role for ‘not’ is not primary in that it is realised once
less primitive operators are introduced. Is there a strict conceptual
distinction, as Grice suggests, between negation and privation? If privation involves
or presupposes negation, one might appeal to something like Modified Occam’s
Razor (M. O. R.), do not multiply negations beyond necessity. In his choice of
examples, Grice seems to be implicating negation for an empirically verifiable,
observational utterance, such as U does not see that the pillar box is blue not
because U does not exist, but on the basis of U’s experiencing, knowing,
believing and indeed seeing that the pillar box is red. This is a negation,
proper, or simpliciter (even if it involves a sense-datum phi2 incompatible
with sense-datum phi1. Privation, on the other hand, would be involved in
an utterance arrived via introspection, such as U does not hear that the bell
is ringing on the basis of his knowing that he is aware of the absence,
simpliciter, of an experience to that effect. Aristotle, or some later
Aristotelian, may have made the same distinction, within apophasis between
negation or negatio and privation or privatio. Or not. Of course, Grice is
ultimately looking for the rationale behind the conversational implicatum in
terms of a principle of conversational helpfulness underlying his picture of
conversation as rational co-operation. To use his Pological jargon in Method,
in Pirotese and Griceish There is the P1, who potches that the obble
is not fang, but feng. P1 utters p explicitly conveying that p.
P2 alternatively feels like negating that. By uttering ~p, P2 explicitly
conveys that ~p. P1 volunteers to P2, ~p, explicitly
conveying that ~p. Not raining! Or No bull. You are safe. Surely a rational
creature should be capable to deny this or that, as Grice puts it in Indicative
conditionals. Interestingly, Grice does not consider, as Gazdar does, under
Palmer), he other possible unitary functors (three in a standard binary assignation
of values) – just negation, which reverses the satisfactory-value of the radix
or neustic. In terms of systematics, thus, it is convenient to regard
Grices view on negation and privation as his outlook on the operators as this
or that procedure by the utterer that endows him with this or that basic
expressive, operative power. In this case, the expressive power is specifically
related to his proficiency with not. The proficiency is co-related with this or
that device in general, whose vernacular expression will bear a formal
counterpart. Many of Grices comments addressed to this more general topic of
this or that satisfactoriness-preserving operator apply to not, and thus raise
the question about the explicitum or explicatum of not. A Griceian should not
be confused. The fact that Grice does not explicitly mention not or negation
when exploring the concept of a generic formal device does not mean that what
he says about formal device may not be particularised to apply to not or
negation. His big concession is that Whitehead and Russell (and Peano before
them) are right about the explicitum or explicatum of not being ~, even if
Grice follows Hilbert and Ackermann in dismissing Peirces arrow for pragmatic
reasons. This is what Grice calls the identity thesis to oppose to Strawsons
divergence thesis between not and ~. More formally, by uttering Not-p, U
explicitly conveys that ~p. Any divergence is explained via the implicatum. A
not utterance is horribly uninformative, and not each of them is of philosophical
interest. Grice joked with Bradley and Searles The man in the next table is not
lighting the cigarette with a twenty-dollar bill, the denotatum of the Subjects
being a Texas oilman in his country club. The odd implicatum is usually to the
effect that someone thought otherwise. In terms of Cook Wilson, the role of not
has more to do with the expressive power of a rational creature to deny a
molecular or composite utterance such as p and q Grice comments that in the
case of or, the not may be addressed, conversationally, to the utterability of
the disjunction. His example involves the logical form Not (p or q). It is not
the case that Wilson or Heath will be prime minister. Theres always hope for
Nabarro or Thorpe. The utterer is, at the level of the implicatum,
not now contradicting what his co-conversationalist has utterered. The utterer
is certainly not denying that Wilson will be Prime Minister. It is, rather,
that the utterer U wishes not to assert or state, say, what his co-conversant
has asserted, but, instead, to substitute a different statement or claim which
the utterer U regards as preferable under the circumstances. Grice calls this
substitutive disagreement. This was a long-standing interest of Grices: an
earlier manuscript reads Wilson or MacMillan will be prime minister. Let
us take a closer look at the way Grice initially rephrases his two scenarios
involving not as attached to an auditory and a visual sense datum. I do not
hear that the bell is ringing is rationally justified by the absence or
absentia of the experience of hearing it. I do not see that the pillar box is
blue is rationally justified by U’s sensing that the pillar box is red. The
latter depends on Kant’s concept of the synthetic a priori with which Grice
tests with his childrens playmates. Can a sweater be red and green all over? No
stripes allowed! Can a pillar box be blue and red all over? Cf. Ryles’ssymposium
on negation with Mabbott, for the Aristotelian Society, a source for Grices
reflexion. Ryle later discussing Bradleys internal relations, reflects that
that the proposition, ‘This pillar box is only red’ is incompatible with ‘This
pillar box is only blue.’ As bearing this or that conversational implicata,
Grices two scenarios can be re-phrased, unhelpfully, as I am unhearing a noise
and That is unred. The apparently unhelpful point bears however some
importance. It shows that negation and not are not co-extensive. The variants
also demonstrate that the implicatum, qua conversational, rather than
conventional, is non-detachable. Not is hardly primtive pure Anglo-Saxon. It is
the rather convoluted abbreviation of ne-aught. Its ne that counts as the
proper, pure, amorphous Anglo-Saxon negation, as in a member of parliament (if
not a horse) uttering nay. Grices view of conversation as rational
co-operation, as displayed in this or that conversational implicatum
necessitates that the implicatum is never attached to this or that expression.
Here the favoured, but not exclusive expression, is not, since Strawson uses
it. But the vernacular provides a wealth of expressive ways to be negative!
Grice possibly chose negation not because, as with this or that nihilistic
philosopher, such as Schopenhauer, or indeed Parmenides, he finds the concept a
key one. But one may well say that this is the Schopenhauerian or the
Parmenidesian in Griceian. Grice is approaching not in linguistic, empiricist,
or conceptual key. He is applying the new Oxonian methodology: the reductive
analysis alla Russell in terms of logical construction. Grices implies priority
is with by uttering x, by which U explicitly conveys that ~p, U implicitly
conveys that q. The essay thus elaborates on this implicated q. For the record,
nihilism was coined by philosopher Jacobi, while the more primitive
negatio and privatio is each a time-honoured item in the philosophical lexicon,
with which mediaeval this or that speculative grammarian is especially obsessed.
Negatio translates the ‘apophasis’ of Aristotle, and has a pretty pedigreed
history. The philosophical lexicon has nĕgātĭo, f. negare, which L and S,
unhelpfully, render as a denying, denial, negation, Cicero, Sull. 13, 39:
negatio inficiatioque facti, id. Part. 29, 102. L and S go on to add that
negatio is predicated of to the expression that denies, a negative. Grice would
say that L and S should realise that its the utterer who denies. The source L
and S give is ADogm. Plat. 3, p. 32, 38. As for Grices other
word, there is “prīvātĭo,” f. privare, which again unhelpfully, L and
S render as a taking away, privation of a thing. doloris, Cic. Fin.
1, 11, 37, and 38, or pain-free, as Grice might prefer, cf.
zero-tolerance. L and S also cite: 2, 9, 28: culpæ, Gell. 2, 6,
10. The negatio-privatio distinction is attested in Grecian, indeed the
distinction requires its own entry. For it is Boethius who first renders
Aristotle’s ‘hexis’ into ‘habitus’ and Aristotle’s steresis’ into ‘privatio.’
So the the Grecians were never just happy with “ἀπόφασις (A)” and they had to
keep multiplying negations beyond necessity. The noun is from “ἀπόφημι.” Now L
and S unhepfully render the noun as as denial, negation, adding “oκατάφασις,” for
which they cites from The Sophista by Plato (263e), to give then the
definition “ἀπόφασις ἐστιν ἀπόφανσίς τινος ἀπό τινος,” a
predication of one thing away from another,
i.e. negation of it, for which they provide the source that Grice is
relying. on: Arist. Int.17a25, cf. APo. 72a14; ἀπόφασις τινός,
negation, exclusion of a thing, Pl. Cra. 426d; δύο ἀ. μίαν κατάφασιν
ἀποτελοῦσι Luc. Gall.11. If he was not the first to explore
philosophically negation, Grice may be regarded as a philosopher who most
explored negation as occurring in a that-clause followed by a propositional
complexus that contains ~, and as applied to a personal agent, in a lower branch
of philosophical psychology. It is also the basis for his linguistic botany. He
seems to be trying to help other philosopher not to fall in the trap of
thinking that not has a special sense. The utterer means that ~p. In what ways
is that to be interpreted? Grice confessed to never been impressed by
Ayer. The crudities and dogmatisms seemed too pervasive. Is Grice being an
empiricist and a verificationist? Let us go back to This is not red and I am
not hearing a noise. Grices suggestion is that the incompatible fact
offering a solution to this problem is the fact that the utterer of Someone,
viz. I, does not hear that the bell tolls is indicating (and informing) that U
merely entertains the positive (affirmative) proposition, Someone, viz. I,
hears that the bell tolls, without having an attitude of certainty towards
it. More generally, Grice is proposing, like Bradley and indeed Bosanquet, who
Grice otherwise regards as a minor philosopher, a more basic Subjects-predicate
utterance. The α is not β. The utterer states I do not know
that α is β if and only if every present mental or souly
process, of mine, has some characteristic incompatible with the knowledge
that α is β. One may propose a doxastic weaker version, replacing
the dogmatic Oxonian know with believe. Grices view of compatibility is an
application of the Sheffer stroke that Grice will later use in accounts of
not. ~p iff p|p or ~p ≡df p|p. But
then, as Grice points out, Sheffer is hardly Griceian. If Pirotese did not
contain a unitary negative device, there would be many things that a P should
be able to express that the P should be unable to express unless Pirotese
contained some very artificially-looking dyadic functor like one or other of
the strokes, or the P put himself to a good deal of trouble to find, more or
less case by case, complicated forms of expression, as Platos Parmenides does,
involving such expressions as other than, or incompatible with. V. Wiggins on
Platos Parmenides in a Griceian key. Such a complicate form of expression would
infringe the principle of conversational helpfulness, notably in its
desideratum of conversational clarity, or conversational perspicuity [sic],
where the sic is Grices seeing that unsensitive Oxonians sometimes mistake
perspicuity for the allegedly, cognate perspicacity (L. perspicacitas, like
perspicuitas, from perspicere). Grice finds the unitary brevity of not-p
attractive. Then theres the pretty Griceian idea of the pregnant proposition.
Im not hearing a nose is pregnant, as Occam has it, with I am hearing a
noise. A scholastic and mediæval philosopher loves to be figurative.
Grices main proposal may be seen as drawing on this or that
verificationist assumption by Ayer, who actually has a later essay on not
falsely connecting it with falsity. Grices proposed better analysis would
please Ayer, had Grice been brought on the right side of the tracks, since it
can be Subjectsed to a process of verification, on the understanding
that either perception through the senses (It is red) or introspection
(Every present mental or souly process of mine ) is each an empirical
phenomenon. But there are subtleties to be drawn. At Oxford, Grices view on
negation will influence philosophers like Wiggins, and in a negative way,
Cohen, who raises the Griceian topic of the occurrence of negation in embedded
clauses, found by Grice to be crucial for the rational genitorial justification
of not as a refutation of the composite p and q), and motivating Walker with a
reply (itself countered by Cohen ‒ Can the conversationalist hypothesis
be defended?). So problems are not absent, as they should not! Grice re-read
Peirces definition or reductive analysis of not and enjoyed it! Peirce
discovers the logical connective Grice calls the Sheffer Stroke, as well as the
related connective nor (also called Joint Denial, and quite appropriately
Peirces Arrow, with other Namess in use being Quines Arrow or Quines Dagger and
today usually symbolized by “/”). The relevant manuscript, numbered MS 378 in a
subsequent edition and titled A Boolian [sic] Algebra with One Constant, MS
378, was actually destined for discarding and was salvaged for posterity A
fragmentary text by Peirce also shows familiarity with the remarkable
meta-logical characteristics that make a single function functionally complete,
and this is also the case with Peirces unfinished Minute Logic: these texts are
published posthumously. Peirce designates the two truth functions, nand and
nor, by using the symbol “” which he called ampheck, coining this
neologism from the Grecian ἀμφήκης, of equal length in both directions. Peirces
editors disambiguate the use of symbols by assigning “” to the
connective we call Sheffers troke while preserving the
symbol / for nor. In MS 378, A Boolian Algebra with
One Constant, by Peirce, tagged “to be discarded” at the Department of
Philosophy at Harvard, Peirce reduces the number of logical operators to one
constant. Peirce states that his notation uses the minimum number of different
signs and shows for the first time the possibility of writing both universal
and particular propositions with but one copula. Peirce’s notation is later
termed Sheffers stroke, and is also well-known as the nand operation, in
Peirce’s terms the operation by which two propositions written in a pair are
considered to be both denied. In the same manuscript, Peirce also discovers
what is the expressive completeness of ‘nor,’ indeed today rightly recognized
as the Peirce arrow. Like Sheffer, of Cornell, independently does later
(only to be dismissed by Hilbert and Ackermann), Peirce understands that these
two connectives can be used to reduce all mathematically definable connectives
(also called primitives and constants) of propositional logic. This means that
all definable connectives of propositional logic can be defined by using only
Sheffers stroke or nor as the single connective. No other connective (or
associated function) that takes one or two variables as inputs has this
property. Standard, two-valued propositional logic has no unary functions that
have the remarkable property of functional completeness. At first blush,
availability of this option ensures that economy of resources can be
obtained—at least in terms of how many functions or connectives are to be
included as undefined. Unfortunately, as Grice, following Hilbert and Ackermann
realise, there is a trade-off between this philosophical semantic gain in
economy of symbolic resources and the pragmatically unwieldy length and rather
counterintuitive, to use Grices phrase, appearance of the formulas that use only
the one connective. It is characteristic of his logical genius, however,
and emblematic of his rather under-appreciated, surely not by Grice,
contributions to the development of semiotics that Peirce grasps the
significance of functional completeness and figure out what truth functions —
up to arity 2 — are functionally complete for two-valued propositional logic,
never mind helping the philosopher to provide a reductive analysis of negation
that Grice is looking for. Strictly, this is the property of weak functional
completeness, given that we disregard whether constants or zero-ary functions
like 1 or 0 can be defined. Peirce subscribes to a semeiotic view, popular in
the Old World with Ogden and Welby, and later Grice, according to which
the fundamental nature and proper tasks of the formal study of communication
are defined by the rules set down for the construction and manipulation of
symbolic resources. A proliferation of symbols for the various connectives that
are admitted into the signature of a logical system suffers from a serious
defect on this view. The symbolic grammar fails to match or represent the
logical fact of interdefinability of the connectives, and reductive analysis of
all to one. Peirce is willing sometimes to accept constructing a formal
signature for two-valued propositional logic by using the two-members set of
connectives, which is minimally functionally complete. This means that these
two connectives — or, if we are to stick to an approach that emphasizes the
notational character of logical analysis, these two symbols —are adequate
expressively. Every mathematically definable connective of the logic can be
defined by using only these two. And the set is minimally functionally complete
in that neither of these connectives can be defined by the other (so, as we
say, they are both independent relative to each other.) The
symbol can be viewed as representing a constant truth function
(either unary or binary) that returns the truth value 0 for any input or
inputs. Or it can be regarded as a constant, which means that it is a zero=ary
(zero-input) function, a degenerate function, which refers to the truth value
0. Although not using, as Grice does, Peanos terminology, Peirce takes the
second option. This set has cardinality 2 (it has exactly 2 members) but it is
not the best we can do. Peirces discovery of what we have called the Sheffer
functions or strokes (anachronistically and unfairly to Peirce, as Grice notes,
but bowing to convention) shows that we can have a set of cardinality 1 (a
one-member set or a so-called singleton) that is minimally functionally
complete with respect to the definable connectives of two-valued propositional
logic. Thus, either one of the following sets can do. The sets are functionally
complete and, because they have only one member each, we say that the
connectives themselves have the property of functional completeness. / is the
symbol of Sheffers stroke or nand and /is the symbol of the Peirce Arrow
or nor. Grice stipulates as such, even though he does not introduce his grammar
formally. It is important to show ow these functions can define other
functions. Algebraically approached, this is a matter of functional
composition In case one wonders why the satisfaction with defining the
connectives of the set that comprises the symbols for negation, inclusive
disjunction, and conjunction, Namesly , there is an explanation. There is
an easy, although informal, way to show that this set is functionally complete.
It is not minimally functionally complete because nor and nand are
inter-definable. But it is functionally complete. Thus, showing that one can
define these functions suffices for achieving functional completeness.
Definability should be thought as logical equivalence. One connective can be
defined by means of others if and only if the formulae in the definition (what
is defined and what is doing the defining) are logically equivalent. Presuppose
the truth-tabular definitions of the connectives. Grice enjoyed that.
Meanwhile, at Corpus, Grice is involved in serious philosophical studies under
the tutelage of Hardie. While his philosophical socialising is limited, having
been born on the wrong side of the tracks, first at Corpus, and then at
Merton, and ending at St. Johns, Grice fails to attend the seminal meetings at
All Souls held on Thursday evenings by the play group of the seven (Austin,
Ayer, Berlin, Hampshire, MacDermott, MacNabb, and Woozley). Three of them will
join Grice in the new play group after the war: Austin, Hampshire, and Woozley.
But at St. Johns Grice tutors Strawson, and learns all about the linguistic
botany methodology on his return from the navy. Indeed, his being appointed
Strawson as his tutee starts a life-long friendship and collaboration. There
are separate entries for the connectives: conjunction, disjunction, and
conditional. Refs.: Allusions to negation are scattered, notably in Essay 4 in
WoW, but also in “Method in philosophical psychology,” and “Prejudices and
predilections” (repr. in “Conception”), and under semantics and syntax. There
are specific essays of different dates, in s. V, in two separate folders, in
BANC.
absolutum: the absolutum is one, unlike Grice’s absoluta, or absolutes.
Trust Grice to pluralise Bradley’s absolute. While it is practical to restore
the root of ‘axis’ for Grice’s value (validum, optimum), it is not easy to find
a grecianism for the absolutum absolute. Lewis and Short have “absolvere,”
which they render as
‘to loosen from, to make loose, set free, detach, untie (usu. trop., the fig. being
derived from fetters, qs. a vinculis solvere, like “vinculis exsolvere,” Plaut.
Truc. 3, 4, 10). So that makes sense. Lewis and Short also have “absolutum,” which they render as“absolute, unrestricted,
unconditional,” – as in Cicero: “hoc mihi videor videre, esse quasdam cum
adjunctione necessitudines, quasdam simplices et absolutas” (Inv. 2, 57, 170). Grice
repatedly uses the plural ‘abosolutes,’ and occasionally the singular. Obviously,
Grice has in mind the absolute-relative distinction, not wanting to be seen as
relativist, unless it is a constructionist relativist. Grice refers to Bradley in ‘Prolegomena,’ and has an essay
on the ‘absolutes.’ It is all back to when German philosopher F. Schiller, of
Corpus, publishes “Mind!” Its frontispiece is a portrait of the absolute, “very
much like the Bellman’s completely blank map in The hunting of the snark.” The
absolutum is the sum of all being, an emblem of idealism. Idealism dominates
Oxford for part of Grice’s career. The realist mission, headed by Wilson, is to
clean up philosophy’s act Bradley’s Appearance and reality, mirrors the point of
the snark. Bradley uses the example of a lump of sugar. It all begins to
crumble, In Oxonian parlance, the absolute is a boo-jum, you see. Bradley is clear
here, to irritate Ayer: the absolutum is, put simply, a higher unity, pure
spirit. “It can never and it enters into, but is itself incapable of, evolution
and progress.” Especially at Corpus, tutees are aware of Hartmann’s absolutum.
Barnes thinks he can destroy with his emotivism. Hartmann, otherwise a
naturalist, is claims that this or that value exists, not in the realm (Reich)
of nature, but as an ideal essence of a thing, but in a realm which is not
less, but more real than nature. For Hartmann, if a value exists, it is not
relative, but absolute, objective, and rational, and so is a value judgment. Like
Grice, for Hartmann, the relativity dissolves upon conceiving and constructing
a value as an absolutum, not a relativum. The essence of a thing need not
reduce to a contingence. To conceive the essence of a table is to conceive what
the métier of a table. Like Hartmann, Grice is very ‘systematik’ axiologist, and
uses ‘relative’ variously. Already in the Oxford Philosophical Society, Grice
conceives of an utterer’s meaning and his communicatum is notoriously relative.
It is an act of communication relative to an agent. For Grice, there is hardly
a realm of un-constructed reality, so his construction of value as an absolutum
comes as no surprise. Grice is especially irritated by Julie Andrews in Noël
Coward’s “Relative values” and this Oxonian cavalier attitude he perceives in Barnes
and Hare, a pinko simplistic attitude against any absolute. Unlike
Hartmann, Grice adopts not so much a neo-Kantian as an Ariskantian tenet. The
ratiocinative part of the soul of a personal being is designated the proper
judge in the power structure of the soul. Whatever is relative to this
particular creature successfully attains, ipso facto, absolute value. Refs.: For
a good overview of emotivism in Oxford v. Urmson’s The emotive theory of
ethics. Grice, “Values, morals, absolutes, and the metaphysical,” The H. P.
Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), c 9-f. 24, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, University of California, Berkeley.
abstractum: The usual phrase in Grice is ‘abstract’ as adjective
and applied to ‘entity’ as anything troublesome to nominalism. At Oxford, Grice
belongs to the class for members whose class have no members. If class C and
class C have the same members, they are the
same. A class xx is a set just in case there is a class yy such that x∈yx∈y. A class which is not a set is an
improper, not a proper class, or a well-ordered one, as Burali-Forti puts it in
‘Sulle classi ben ordinate.’ Grice reads
Cantor's essay and finds an antinomy on the third page. He mmediately writes his
uncle “I am reading Cantor and find an antinomy.” The antinomy is obvious and
concerns the class of all classes that are not members of themselves. This
obviously leads to a pragmatic contradiction, to echo Moore, since this class must
be and not be a member of itself and not a member of itself. Grice had access
to the Correspondence of Zermelo and re-wrote the antinomy.Which leads Grice to
Austin. For Austin thinks he can lead a class, and that Saturday morning is a
good time for a class of members whose classes have no members, almost an
insult. Grice is hardly attached to canonicals, not even first-order predicate logic
with identity and class theory. Grice sees extensionalism asa a position imbued
with the spirit of nominalism yet dear to the philosopher particularly
impressed by the power of class theory. But Grice is having in mind the concretum-abstractum
distinction, and as an Aristotelian, he wants to defend a category as an
abstractum or universalium. Lewis and Short have ‘concrescere,’ rendered as ‘to
grow together; hence with the prevailing idea of uniting, and generally of soft
or liquid substances which thicken; to harden, condense, curdle, stiffen,
congeal, etc. (very freq., and class. in prose and poetry).’ For ‘abstractum,’
they have ‘abstrăhere, which they render as ‘to draw away from a place or
person, to drag or pull away.’ The ability to see a horse (hippos) without
seeing horseness (hippotes), as Plato remarks, is a matter of stupidity. Yet,
perhaps bue to the commentary by his editors, Grice feels defensive about
proposition. Expanding on an essay on the propositional complexum,’ the idea is
that if we construct a complexum step by step, in class-theoretical terms, one
may not committed to an ‘abstract entity.’ But how unabstract is class theory?
Grice hardly attaches to the canonicals of first-order predicate calculus with
identity together with class theory. An item i is a universalium and 'abstractum' iff
i fails to occupy a region in space and time. This raises a few
questions. It is conceivable that an items that is standardly regarded as
an 'abstractum' may nonetheless occupy a volumes of space and time. The school
of latter-day nominalism is for ever criticised at Oxford, and Grice is no
exception. The topic of the abstractum was already present in Grice’s previous
generation, as in the essay by Ryle on the systematically misleading
expression, and the category reprinted in Flew. For it to be, a particular
concretum individuum or prima substantia has to be something, which is what an
abstractum universaium provides. A universal is part of the ‘essentia’ of the
particular. Ariskants motivation for for coining “to katholou” is doxastic. Aristotle
claims that to have a ‘doxa’ requires there to be an abstract universalium, not
apart from (“para”), but holding of (“kata”) a concretum individuum. Within the
“this” (“tode”) there is an aspect of “something” (“ti.”). Aristotle uses the “hêi”
(“qua”) locution, which plays a crucial role in perceiving. Ariskant’s remark
that a particular horse is always a horse (with a species and a genus) may
strike the non-philosopher as trivial. Grice strongly denies that its
triviality is unenlightening, and he loves to quote from Plato. Liddell and
Scott have “ἱππότης,” rendered as “horse-nature, the concept of horse,”
Antisth. et Pl. ap. Simp.in Cat. 208.30,32, Sch. Arist Id.p.167F. Then there is
the ‘commensurate universal,’ the major premise is a universal proposition. Grice
provides a logical construction of such lexemes as “abstractum” and
“universalium,” and “concretum” and “individuum,” or “atomon” in terms of two
relations, “izzing” and “hazzing.” x is an individuum or atomon iff nothing
other than x izzes x. Austin is Austin, and Strawson is Strawson. Now, x is a primum
individuum, proton atomon, or prima substantia, iff x is an individuum, and
nothing hazzes x. One needs to
distinguish between a singular individuum and a particular (“to kathekaston,” particulare)
simpliciter. Short and Lewis have “partĭcŭlāris, e, adj.” which they render,
unhelpfully, as “particular,” but also as “of or concerning a part, partial,
particular.” “Propositiones aliae universales, aliae particulares, ADogm. Plat.
3, p. 35, 34: partĭcŭlārĭter is
particularly, ADogm. Plat. 3, p. 33, 32; opp. “generaliter,” Firm. Math. 1, 5
fin.; opp. “universaliter,” Aug. Retract. 1, 5 fin. Cf. Strawson,
“Particular and general,” crediting Grice twice; the second time about a fine
point of denotatum: ‘the tallest man that ever lived, lives, or will live.” To
define a ‘particular,’ you need to introduce, as Ariskant does, the idea of
predication. (∀x)(x
is an individuum)≡◻(∀y)(y izzes x)⊃(x izzes y). (∀x)(x izz a particulare(≡◻(∀y)(x
izzes predicable of y)⊃(x
izzes y Λ y izzes x). Once we have defined a ‘particular,’ we can go
and define a ‘singulare,’ a ‘tode ti,’ a ‘this what.” (∀x)(x izzes singulare)⊃(x izzes an individuum). There’s
further implicate to come. (∀x)(x izzes a particulare)⊃(x izzes an individuum)). The concern by Grice
with the abstractum as a “universalium in re” can be traced back to his reading
of Aristotle’s Categoriæ, for his Lit. Hum., and later with Austin and
Strawson. Anything but a ‘prima substantia,’ ‒ viz. essence, accident, attribute,
etc. ‒ may be said to belong in the realm of the abstractum or
universalium qua predicable. As such, an abstractum and univeralium is not a
spatio-temporal continuant. However, a category shift or
‘subjectification,’ by Grice allows a universalium as subject. The topic is
approached formally by means of the notion of order. First-order predicate
calculus ranges over this or that spatio-temporal continuant individual, in
Strawson’s use of the term. A higher-order predicate calculus ranges over this
or that abstractum, a feature, and beyond. An abstractum universalium is only referred
to in a second-order predicate calculus. This is Grice’s attempt to approach
Aristkant in pragmatic key. In his exploration of the abstractum, Grice is
challenging extensionalism, so fashionable in the New World within The School
of Latter-Day Nominalists. Grice is careful here since he is well aware that
Bennett has called him a meaning-nominalist. Refs.: For pre-play group
reflections see Ryle’s Categories and Systematically misleading expressions.
Explorations by other members of Grice’s playgroup are Strawson, ‘Particular
and general’ and Warnock, ‘Metaphysics in logic,’ The main work by Grice at
Oxford on the ‘abstractum’ is with Austin (f. 15) and later with Strawson (f.23).
Grice, “Aristotle’s Categoriae,” The H. P. Grice Papers, S. II, c. 6-f. 15 and
c. 6, f. 23, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley.
acceptability: Grice generalizes his desirability and credibility
functions into a single acceptability. Acceptability has obviously degrees.
Grice is thinking of ‘scales’ alla: must, optimal acceptability (for both
modalities), should (medium acceptability), and ought (defeasible
acceptability). He develops the views in The John Locke lectures, having
introduced ‘accept,’ in his BA lecture on ‘Intention and Uncertainty.’ In fact,
much as in “Causal Theory” he has an excursus on ‘Implication,’ here he has,
also in italics, an excursus on “acceptance.” It seems that a degree of analogy
between intending and believing has to be admitted; likewise the presence of a
factual commitment in the case of an expression of intention. We can now use
the term ‘acceptance’ to express a generic concept applying both to cases of
intention and to cases of belief. He who intends to do A and he who believes
that he will do A can both be said to accept (or to accept it as being the
case) that he will do A. We could now attempt to renovate the three-pronged
analysis discussed in Section I, replacing references in that analysis to being
sure or certain that one will do A by references to accepting that one will do
A. We might reasonably hope thereby to escape the objections raised in Section
I, since these objections seemingly centred on special features of the notion of
certainty which would NOT attach to the generic notion of acceptance. Hope that
the renovated analysis will enable us to meet the sceptic will not immediately
be realised, for the sceptic can still as (a) why some cases of acceptance
should be specially dispensed from the need for evidential backing, and (b) if
certain cases are exempt from evidential justification but not from
justification, what sort of justification is here required. Some progress might
be achieved by adopting a different analysis of intention in terms of
acceptance. We might suggest that ‘Grice intends to go to Harborne’ is very
roughly equivalent to the conjunction of ‘Grice accepts-1 that he will go to
Harborne’ and ‘Grice accepts-2 that his going to Harborne will result from the
effect of his acceptance-1 that he will go to Harborne. The idea is that when a
case of acceptance is also a case of belief, the accepter does NOT regard his
acceptance as contributing towards the realisation of the state of affairs the
future the existence of which he accepts; whereas when a case of acceptance is
not a case of belief but a case of intention, he does regard the acceptance as
so contributing. Such an analysis clearly enables us to deal with the sceptic
with regard to this question (a), viz. why some cases of acceptance (those
which are cases of intention) should be specially exempt from the need of
evidential backing. For if my going to Harborne is to depend causally on my
acceptance that I shall-c go, the possession of satisfactory evidence that I
shall-c go will involve possession of the information that I accept that I
shall-c go. Obviously, then, I cannot (though others can) come to accept that I
shall-c go on the basis of satisfactory evidence, for to have such evidence I
should have already to have accepted that I shall-c go. I cannot decide whether
or not to accept-1 that I shall-c go on the strength of evidence which includes
as a datum that I do accept-1 that I shall-c go. Grice grants that we are still
unable to deal with the sceptic as regards question (b), viz. what sort of
justification is available for those cases of acceptance which require
non-evidential justification even though they involve a factual commitment.
Though it is clear that, on this analysis, one must not expect the intender to
rely on evidence for his statements of what he will in fact do, we have not
provided any account of the nature of the non-evidential considerations which
may be adduced to justify such a statement, nor (a fortiori) of the reasons why
such considerations might legitimately thought to succeed in justifying such a
statement. Refs.: Grice, “Intention and uncertainty,” The British Academy, and
BANC, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library.
acceptum: Grice needs a past participle for a ‘that’-clause of
something ‘thought’. He has ‘creditum’ for what is believed, and
‘desideratum’ for what is desired. So he uses ‘acceptum’ for what is
accepted, a neutral form to cover both the desideratum and the
creditum. Short and Lewis have ‘accipio,’ f. ‘capio.’ Grice uses the
abbreviation “Acc” for this. As he puts it in the Locke lectures: "An idea I want to explore is that we represent
the sentences ‘Smith should be
recovering his health by now’ and ‘Smith should join the cricket club’ as having the following structures. First, a common
"rationality" operator 'Acc', to be heard as "it is
reasonable that", "it is acceptABLE that", "it
ought to be that", "it should be that", or in some
other similar way.Next, one or other of two mode operators, which in the case
of the first are to be written as
'⊢' and in the case
of the second are to be written as '!.’ Finally a 'radical', to be represented by
'r' or some other lower-case letter. The structure for the
second is ‘Acc + ⊢ + r. For the second, ‘Acc + ! + r,’
with each symbol falling within the scope of its predecessor. Grice is not a
psychologist, but he speaks of the ‘soul.’ He was a philosopher engaged in
philosophical psychology. The psychological theory which Grice envisages would
be deficient as a theory to explain behaviour if it did not contain provision
for interests in the ascription of psychological states otherwise than as tools
for explaining and predicting behaviour, interests e. g. on the part of one
creature to be able to ascribe these rather than those psychological states to
another creature because of a concern for the other creature. Within such a
theory it should be possible to derive strong motivations on the part of the
creatures Subjects to the theory against the abandonment of the central
concepts of the theory and so of the theory itself, motivations which the
creatures would or should regard as justified.
Indeed, only from within the framework of such a theory, I think, can
matters of evaluation, and so, of the evaluation of modes of explanation, be
raised at all. If I conjecture aright, then, the entrenched system contains the
materials needed to justify its own entrenchment; whereas no rival system
contains a basis for the justification of anything at all. We should recall that
the first rendering that Liddell and Scott give for “ψυχή” is “life;” the
tripartite division of “ψ., οἱ δὲ περὶ Πλάτωνα καὶ Ἀρχύτας καὶ οἱ λοιποὶ
Πυθαγόρειοι τὴν ψ. τριμερῆ ἀποφαίνονται, διαιροῦντες εἰς λογισμὸν καὶ θυμὸν καὶ
ἐπιθυμίαν,” Pl.R.439e sqq.; in Arist. “ἡ ψ. τούτοις ὥρισται, θρεπτικῷ,
αἰσθητικῷ, διανοητικῷ, κινήσει: πότερον δὲ τοὔτων ἕκαστόν ἐστι ψ. ἢ ψυχῆς
μόριον;” de An.413b11, cf. PA641b4; “ἡ θρεπτικὴ ψ.” Id.de An.434a22,
al.; And Aristotle also has Grice’s favourite, ‘psychic,’ ψυχικός , ή, όν,
“of the soul or life, spiritual, opp. “σωματικός, ἡδοναί” Arist.EN1117b28. The
compound “psichiologia” is first used in "Psichiologia de ratione animae
humanae," (in Bozicevic-Natalis, Vita Marci Maruli Spalatensis). A
footnote in “Method,” repr. in “Conception” dates Grice’s lectures at
Princeton. Grice is forever grateful to Carnap for having coined ‘pirot,’ or
having thought to have coined. Apparently, someone had used the expression
before him to mean some sort of exotic fish. He starts by listing this or that
a focal problem. The first problem is circularity. He refers to the
dispositional behaviouristic analysis by Ryle. The second focal problem is the
alleged analytic status of a psychological law. One problem concerns some
respect for Grice’s own privileged access to this or that state and this or
that avowal of this or that state being incorrigible. The fourth problem
concerns the law-selection. He refers to pessimism. He talks of folk-science. D
and C are is each predicate-constant in some law L in some psychological
theory θ. This or that instantiable of D or C may well be a set or a
property or neither. Grices way of Ramseyified naming: There is just one
predicate D, such that nomological generalization L introducing D via implicit
definition in theory θ obtains. Uniqueness is essential since D is
assigned to a names for a particular instantiable (One can dispense with
uniqueness by way of Ramseyified description discussed under ‘ramseyified
description.’) Grice trusts he is not overstretching Ramsey’s original
intention. He applies Ramsey-naming and Ramsey-describing to pain. He who
hollers is in pain. Or rather, He who is in pain hollers. (Sufficient but not
necessary). He rejects disjunctional physicalism on it sounding harsh, as Berkeley
puts it, to say that Smiths brains being in such and such a state is a case of,
say, judging something to be true on insufficient evidence. He criticises the
body-soul identity thesis on dismissing =s main purpose, to license predicate
transfers. Grice wasnt sure what his presidential address to the American
Philosophical Association will be about. He chose the banal (i.e. the
ordinary-language counterpart of something like a need we ascribe to a squirrel
to gobble nuts) and the bizarre: the philosophers construction of need and
other psychological, now theoretical terms. In the proceedings, Grice
creates the discipline of Pology. He cares to mention philosophers Aristotle,
Lewis, Myro, Witters, Ramsey, Ryle, and a few others. The essay became popular
when, of all people, Block, cited it as a programme in functionalism,
which it is Grices method in functionalist philosophical psychology. Introduces
Pology as a creature-construction discipline. Repr. in “Conception,” it
reached a wider audience. The essay is highly subdivided, and covers a lot of
ground. Grice starts by noting that, contra Ryle, he wants to see psychological
predicates as theoretical concepts. The kind of theory he is having in mind is
folksy. The first creature he introduces to apply his method is Toby, a
squarrel, that is a reconstructed squirrel. Grice gives some principles of
Pirotology. Maxims of rational behaviour compound to form what he calls an
immanuel, of which The Conversational Immanuel is a part. Grice concludes with
a warning against the Devil of Scientism, but acknowledges perhaps he was
giving much too credit to Myros influence on this! “Method”
in “Conception,” philosophical psychology, Pirotology. The Immanuel
section is perhaps the most important from the point of view of conversation as
rational cooperation. For he identifies three types of generality: formal,
applicational, and content-based. Also, he allows for there being different
types of imannuels. Surely one should be the conversational immanuel. Ryle
would say that one can have a manual, yet now know how to use it! And theres
also the Witters-type problem. How do we say that the conversationalist is
following the immanuel? Perhaps the statement is too strong – cf. following a
rule – and Grices problems with resultant and basic procedures, and how the
former derive from the latter! This connects with Chomsky, and in general with
Grices antipathy towards constitutive rules! In “Uncertainty,” Grice warns that
his interpretation of Prichards willing that as a state should not preclude a
physicalist analysis, but in Method it is all against physicalism. In Method, from the mundane to the recondite, he is
playful enough to say that primacy is no big deal, and that, if properly
motivated, he might give a reductive analysis of the buletic in terms of the
doxastic. But his reductive analysis of the doxastic in terms of the buletic
runs as follows: P judges that p iff P wills as follows: given any situation in
which P wills some end E and here are two non-empty classes K1 and
K2 of action types, such that: the performance by P of an
action-type belonging to K1 realises E1 just in
case p obtains, and the performance by the P of an action type belonging to of
K2 will realise E just in case p does not obtain, and here is
no third non-empty class K3 of action types such that the
performance by the P of an action type belonging to will realise E
whether p is true or p is false, in such situation, the P is to will that the P
performs some action type belonging to K1. Creature construction
allows for an account of freedom that will metaphysically justify absolute
value. Frankfurt has become famous for his second-order and
higher-order desires. Grice is exploring similar grounds in what comes out as
his “Method” (originally APA presidential address, now repr. in “Conception”).
Refs.: The obvious source is his “Method,” repr. in “Conception,” but the
keyword: “philosophical psychology” is useful in the Grice papers. There is a
specific essay on the power structure of the soul, The H. P. Grice Collection,
BANC.
animatum: anything thought.
From ‘psyche,’ anima. Grice uses the symbol of the letter psi here which he
renders as ‘animatum.’
aporia: While aware of
Baker’s and Deutsch’s treatment of the ‘aporia’ in Aristotle’s account of
‘philos,’ Grice explores ‘aporia’ in Plato in the Thrasymachus on ‘legal
justice’ prior to ‘moral justice’ in Republic. in Dialectic, question for
discussion, difficulty, puzzle, “ἀπορίᾳ σχόμενος” Pl.Prt.321c; ἀ. ἣν ἀπορεῖς
ib.324d; “ἡ ἀ. ἰσότης ἐναντίων λογισμῶν” Arist. Top.145b1, al.; “ἔχει ἀπορίαν
περί τινος” Id.Pol.1285b28; “αἱ μὲν οὖν ἀ. τοιαῦταί τινες συμβαίνουσιν”
Id.EN1146b6; “οὐδεμίαν ποιήσει ἀ.” Id.Metaph.1085a27; ἀ. λύειν, διαλύειν, Id.MM
1201b1, Metaph.1062b31; “ἀπορίᾳ ἀπορίαν λύειν” D.S.1.37.Discussion with the Sophist Thrasymachus can only lead to aporia. And the more I trust you,
the more I sink into an aporia of
sorts. —Aha! roared Thrasymachus to
everyone's surprise. There it is! Socratic aporia is back! Charge! neither Socrates' company nor
Socrates himself gives any convincing answer. So, he says, finding himself in a
real aporia, he
visits Thrasymachus as
well, and ... I argue that a combination of these means in form
that I call “provocative-aporetic” better accounts for the means that Plato
uses to exert a protreptic effect on readers. Aporia is a simultaneously
intellectual and affective experience, and the way that readers choose to
respond to aporia has a greater protreptic effect than either affective or
intellectual means alone. When Socrates says he can 'transfer' the use of
"just" to things related to the 'soul,' what kind of conversational
game is that? Grice took Socrates's manoeuvre very
seriously.Socrates relies on the tripartite theory of the soul. Plato, actually -- since Socrates is a drammatis persona! In "Philosophical Eschatology, Metaphysics, and Plato's
Republic," H. P. Grice's purpose is to carry out a provocative-aporetic reading
Book I Grice argues that it is a dispute between two ways of understanding
'just' which causes the aporia when Socrates tries to analyse
'just.' Although Socrates will not argue for the complexity and
tripartition of the soul until Bk. IV, we can at least note the contrast with
Thrasymachus' “idealize user” theory.For Socrates, agents are complex, and
justice coordinates the parts of the agent.For Thrasymachus, agents are simple
“users,” and justice is a tool for use. (2 - 3) Justice makes its possessor
happy; the function (telos, metier) argument. To make the argument that
justice is an excellence (virtus, arete) of soul (psyche) that makes its
possessor happy, Socrates relies on a method for discovering the function
(ἔργον, ergon, 352e1, cf. telos, metier, causa finalis) of any object
whatsoever. Socrates begins by differentiating between an exclusive
functions and an optimal function, so that we may discover the functions in
different types of objects, i.e., natural and artificial objects. We can say
an object performs some function (ergon) if one of the following conditions
holds.If the object is the only one that can do the work in
question, or If it is the object that does that work best.Socrates
then provides examples from different part-whole complexes to make his
point. The eye's exclusive function is to see, because no other organ is
specialized so as to perform just that function. A horse's work is to
carry riders into battle. Even though this might not be a horse's
EXCLUSIVE function, it may be its “optimal” function in that the horse is best
suited or designed by God to the task. Finally, the pruning knife is best
for tending to vines, not because it cannot cut anything else, but because it
is optimally suited for that task. Socrates' use of the pruning knife of
as an example of a thing's function resembles a return to the technē model,
since a craftsman must make the knife for a gardener to Socrates asks,
“Would you define this as the function of a horse and of anything else, as that
which someone does either through that thing alone, or best?” (...τοῦτο ἄν
θείης καὶ ἵππου καὶ ἄλλου ὁτουοῦν ἔργον, ὅ ἄν ἤ μόνῳ ἐκείνῳ ποιῇ τις ἤ ἄριστα;
352e1-2) Thrasymachus agrees to this definition of function. 91 use.But his use
of the eye — a bodily organ — should dissuade us from this view. One may
use these examples to argue that Socrates is in fact offering a new method to
investigate the nature of justice: 1) Find out what the functions of such
objects are2) determine (by observation, experiment, or even thought
experiment) cases where objects of such a kind perform their functions well and
cases where they perform them poorly; and 3) finally find out the
qualities that enable them to perform such functions well (and in the absence
of which they perform poorly), and these are their virtues.A crucial difference
between this method and technē model of justice lies in the interpretation that
each assigns to the realm of human artifacts. Polemarchus and Thrasymachus
both assume that the technē is unique as a form of knowledge for the power and
control that it offers users. In Polemarchus' case, the technē of justice,
“helping friends and harming enemies,” may be interpreted as a description of a
method for gaining political power within a traditional framework of communal
life, which assumes the oikos as the basic unit of power. Those families
that help their friends and harm their enemies thrive. Thrasymachus, on
the other hand, emphasizes the ways that technai grant users the power to
exploit nature to further their own, distinctively individual ends. Thus,
the shepherd exploits the sheep to make a livelihood for himself. Socrates'
approach differs from these by re-casting “mastery” over nature as submission
to norms that structure the natural world. For example, many factors contribute
to making This points to a distinction Socrates draws in Book X between
producers and users of artifacts. He uses the example of the blacksmith
who makes a bridle and the horseman who uses the bridle to argue that production
and use correspond to two gradations of knowledge (601c). The ultimate
purpose of the example is to provide a metaphor — using the craft analogy — for
identifying gradations of knowledge on a copy-original paradigm of the
form-participant relation. the pruning knife the optimal tool for cutting
vines: the shape of the human hand, the thickness and shape of the vines, and
the metal of the blade. Likewise, in order for horses to optimally perform
their “work,” they must be "healthy" and strong. The conditions
that bring about their "health" and strength are not up to us,
however."Control” only comes about through the recognition of natural
norms. Thus technē is a type of knowledge that coordinates structures in
nature.It is not an unlimited source of power. Socrates' inclusion of the
human soul (psyche) among those things that have a function is the more
controversial aspect of function argument.Socrates says that the functions
(erga) of the soul (psyche) are “to engage in care-taking, ruling, and
deliberation” and, later, simply that the ergon (or function) of the
soul (or psyche) is “to live” (τὸ ζῆν, "to zen," 353d6). But the
difficulty seems to be this: the functions of pruning knives, horses, and
bodily organs are determined with respect to a limited and fairly unambiguous
context that is already defined for them. But what is this context with
respect to the soul (psyche) of a human individual? One answer might be
that the social world — politics — provides the context that defines the soul's
function, just as the needs of the human organism define the context in which
the eye can perform a function. But here a challenger might reply that in
aristocracies, oligarchies, and democracies, “care-taking, ruling, and
deliberation” are utilized for different ends.In these contexts, individual
souls might have different functions, according to the “needs” that these
different regimes have. Alternatively, one might deny altogether that the
human soul has a function: the distinctive feature of human beings might be their
position “outside” of nature. Thus, even if Socrates' description of the
soul's function is accurate, it is too general to be really
informative.Socrates must offer more details for the function argument to be
convincing. Nonetheless, the idea that justice is a condition that lets
the soul perform its functions is a significant departure from the technē
model of justice, and one that will remain throughout the argument of the
Republic. […] τὸ ἐπιμελεῖσθαι καὶ ἄρχειν καὶ βουλεύεσθαι (353d3). As
far as Bk. I is concerned, “justice” functions as a place-holder for that
condition of the soul which permits the soul to perform its functions
well. What that condition is, however, remains unknown.For this reason,
Plato has Socrates concludes Bk. I by likening himself to a “glutton” (ὥσπερ οἱ
λίχνοι, 354b1), who takes another dish before “moderately enjoying the
previous” serving (πρὶν τοῦ προτέρου μετρίως ἀπολαύσαι, 354b2-3). For
Socrates wants to know what effects the optimal condition of soul brings about
before knowing what the condition itself is. Thus Bk. I concludes in
"aporia," but not in a way that betrays the dialogue's lack of
unity.The “separatist” thesis concerning Bk. I goes back to Hermann in
"Geschichte und System der Platonischen Philosophie." One can argue
on behalf of the “separatist” view as well. One can argue against the
separatist thesis, even granting some evidence in favour of the separatist
thesis. To the contrary, the "aporia" clearly foreshadows the
argument that Socrates makes about the soul in Bk. IV, viz. that the soul
(psyche) is a complex whole of parts -- an implicatum in the “justice is
stronger” argument -- and that 'just' is the condition that allows this complex
whole be integrated to an optimal degree. Thus, Bk. I does not conclude negatively,
but rather provides the resources for going beyond the "technē" model
of justice, which is the primary cause of Polemarchus's and Thrasymachus's
encounter with "aporia" in Bk. I. Throughout conversation of
"The Republic," Socrates does not really alter the argument he gives
for justice in Bk. I, but rather states the same argument in a different
way. My gratitude to P. N. Moore. Refs: Wise guys and smart
alecks in Republic 1 and 2; Proleptic composition in the Republic, or why Bk. 1
was never a separate dialogue, The Classical Quarterly; "Socrates: ironist
and moral philosopher."
Ariskant: Grice, of course, read Ariskant in the vernacular. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by Francis Haywood. William Pickering. 1838. critick of pure reason. (first English translation) Critique
of Pure Reason. Translated by J. M. D. Meiklejohn.
1855 – via Project Gutenberg.Critique
of Pure Reason. Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott. 1873.Critique of Pure Reason.
Translated by Friedrich Max Müller.
The Macmillan Company. 1881. (Introduction by Ludwig Noiré)Critique of Pure Reason.
Translated by Norman Kemp Smith.
Palgrave Macmillan. 1929. ISBN 1-4039-1194-0.
Archived from the
original on 2009-04-27.Critique
of Pure Reason. Translated by Wolfgang Schwartz.
Scientia Verlag und Antiquariat. 1982. ISBN 978-3-5110-9260-3.Critique of Pure Reason.
Translated by Werner S. Pluhar. Hackett Publishing. 1996. ISBN 978-0-87220-257-3.Critique of Pure Reason, Abridged.
Translated by Werner S. Pluhar. Hackett Publishing. 1999. ISBN 978-1-6246-6605-6.Critique
of Pure Reason. Translated and edited by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood.
Cambridge University Press. 1999. ISBN 978-0-5216-5729-7.Critique
of Pure Reason. Translated by Marcus Weigelt. Penguin Books. 2007. ISBN 978-0-1404-4747-7.
Grice’s
favourite philosopher is Ariskant. One way to approach Grice’s meta-philosophy
is by combining teleology with deontology. Eventually, Grice embraces a
hedonistic eudaimonism, if rationally approved. Grice knows how to tutor in
philosophy: he tutor on Kant as if he is tutoring on Aristotle, and vice versa.
His tutees would say, Here come [sic] Kantotle. Grice is obsessed with
Kantotle. He would teach one or the other as an ethics requirement. Back at
Oxford, the emphasis is of course Aristotle, but he is aware of some trends to
introduce Kant in the Lit.Hum. curriculum, not with much success. Strawson does
his share with the pure reason in Kant in The bounds of sense, but White professors
of moral philosophy are usually not too keen on the critique by Kant of practical
reason. Grice is fascinated that an Irishman, back in 1873, cares to translate
(“for me”) all that Kant has to say about the eudaimonism and hedonism of
Aristotle. An Oxonian philosopher is expected to be a utilitarian, as Hare is,
or a Hegelian, and that is why Grice prefers, heterodoxical as he is, to be a
Kantian rationalist instead. But Grice cannot help being Aristotelian, Hardie
having instilled the “Eth. Nich.” on him at Corpus. While he can’t read Kant in
German, Grice uses Abbott’s Irish vernacular. Note the archaic metaphysic
sic in singular. More Kant. Since Baker can read the vernacular even
less than Grice, it may be good to review the editions. It all starts when
Abbott thinks that his fellow Irishmen are unable to tackle Kant in the
vernacular. Abbott’s thing comes out in 1873: Kant’s critique of practical
reason and other works on the theory of tthics, with Grice quipping. Oddly, I
prefer his other work! Grice collaborates with Baker mainly on work on meta-ethics
seen as an offspring, alla Kant, of philosophical psychology. Akrasia or
egkrateia is one such topic. Baker contributes to PGRICE, a festschrift for
Grice, with an essay on the purity, and alleged lack thereof, of this or that
morally evaluable motive – rhetorically put: do ones motives have to
be pure? For Grice morality cashes out in self-love, self-interest, and desire.
Baker also contributes to a volume on Grice’s honour published by
Palgrave, Meaning and analysis: essays on Grice. Baker organises of a
symposium on the thought of Grice for the APA, the proceedings of which published
in The Journal of Philosophy, with Bennett as chair, contributions by Baker and
Grandy, commented by Stalnaker andWarner. Grice explores with Baker
problems of egcrateia and the reduction of duty to self-love and interest.
Refs.: The obvious keyword is “Kant,” – especially in the Series III on the
doctrines, in collaboration with Baker. There are essays on the Grundlegung,
too. The keyword for “Kantotle,” and the keywords for ‘free,’ and ‘freedom,’
and ‘practical reason,’ and ‘autonomy, are also helpful. Some of this material
in “Actions and events,” “The influence of Kant on Aristotle,” by H. P. Grice,
John Locke Scholar (failed), etc., Oxford (Advisor: J. Dempsey). The H. P.
Grice Papers, BANC.
bonum: Old Romans did not have an article, so for them it is
unum, bonum, verum, and pulchrum. They were trying to translate the very
articled Grecian things, ‘to agathon,’ ‘to alethes,’ and ‘to kallon.’ The three
references given by Liddell and Scott are good ones. τὸ ἀ., the good,
Epich.171.5, cf. Pl.R.506b, 508e, Arist.Metaph.1091a31, etc. The Grecian Grice
is able to return to the ‘article’. Grice has an early essay on ‘the good,’ and
he uses the same expression at Oxford for the Locke lectures when looking for a
‘desiderative’ equivalent to ‘the true.’ Hare had dedicated the full part of his
“Language of Morals” to ‘good,’ so Grice is well aware of the centrality of the
topic. He was irritated by what he called a performatory approach to the good,
where ‘x is good’ =df. ‘I approve of x.’ Surely that’s a conversational
implicatum. However, in his analysis of reasoning (the demonstratum – since he
uses the adverb ‘demonstrably’ as a marker of pretty much like ‘concusively,’
as applied to both credibility and desirability, we may focus on what Grice
sees as ‘bonum’ as one of the ‘absolutes,’ the absolute in the desirability
realm, as much as the ‘verum’ is the absolute in the credibility realm. Grice
has an excellent argument regarding ‘good.’ His example is ‘cabbage,’ but also
‘sentence.’ Grice’s argument is to turn the disimpicatum into an explicitum. To
know what a ‘cabbage,’ or a formula is, you need to know first what a ‘good’
cabbage is or a ‘well-formed formula,’ is. An ill-formed sentence is not deemed
by Grice a sentence. This means that we define ‘x’ as ‘optimum x.’ This is not
so strange, seeing that ‘optimum’ is actually the superlative of ‘bonum’ (via
the comparative). It does not require very
sharp eyes, but only the willingness to use the eyes one has, to see that our
speech and thought are permeated with the notion of purpose; to say what a
certain kind of thing is is only too frequently partly to say what it is for.
This feature applies to our talk and thought of, for example, ships, shoes,
sealing wax, and kings; and, possibly and perhaps most excitingly, it extends
even to cabbages.“There is a range of cases in which, so far from its
being the case that, typically, one first learns what it is to be a F and then,
at the next stage, learns what criteria distinguish a good F from a F which is
less good, or not good at all, one needs first to learn what it is to be a good
F, and then subsequently to learn what degree of approximation to being a good
F will qualify an item as a F; if the gap between some item x and good Fs is
sufficently horrendous, x is debarred from counting as a F at all, even as a
bad F.”“In the John Locke Lectures, I called a concept which exhibits this
feature as a ‘value-paradeigmatic’ concept. One example of a
value-paradeigmatic concept is the concept of reasoning; another, I now suggest,
is that of sentence. It may well be that the existence of value-oriented
concepts (¢b ¢ 2 . • • . ¢n) depends on the prior existence of pre-rational concepts ( ¢~, ¢~ . . . .
¢~), such that an item x qualifies for the application of the concept ¢ 2 if
and only if x satisfies a rationally-approved
form or version of the corresponding pre-rational concept ¢'. We have a
(primary) example of a step in reasoning only if we have a transition of a
certain rationally approved kind from
one thought or utterance to another.
bootstrap: a principle introduced by Grice in “Prejudices and
predilections; which become, the life and opinions of H. P. Grice,” to limit
the power of the meta-language. The weaker your metalanguage the easier you’ll
be able to pull yourself by your own bootstraps. He uses bootlaces in
“Metaphysics, Philosophical Eschatology, and Plato’s Republic.”
Category of conversational modality
Category of conversational quality
Category of conversational quantity
Category of conversational relation
causatum: causation figures large in Grice, notably re: the
perceptum. The agent perceives that the pillar box is red. The cause is that
the pillar box is red. Out of that, Grice constructs a whole theory of
conversation. Why would someone just report what a THING SEEMS to him when he
has no doubt that it was THE THING that caused the thing to SEEM red to him?
Applying some sort of helpfulness, it works: the addressee is obviously more
interested in what the thing IS, not what it seems. A sense-datum is not something
you can eat. An apple is. So, the assumption is that a report of what a thing
IS is more relevant than a report about what a thing SEEMS. So, Grice needs to find a rationale that
justifies, ceteris paribus, the utterance of “The thing seems phi.” Following
helpfulness, U utters “The thing seems phi” when the U is not in a position to
say what the thing IS phi. The denial, “The thing is not phi” is in the air,
and also the doubt, “The thing may not be phi.” Most without a philosophical
background who do not take Grice’s joke of echoing Kant’s categories (Kant had
12, not 4!) play with quantitas, qualitas, relatio and modus. Grice in “Causal”
uses ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ but grants he won’t ‘determine’ in what way ‘the thing
seems phi’ is ‘weaker’ than ‘the thing is phi.’ It might well be argued that
it’s STRONGER: the thing SEEEMS TO BE phi.’ In the previous “Introduction to
Logical Theory,” Strawson just refers to Grice’s idea of a ‘pragmatic rule’ to
the effect that one utter the LOGICALLY stronger proposition. Let’s revise
dates. Whereas Grice says that his confidence in the success of “Causal,” he
ventured with Strawson’s “Intro,” Strawson is citing Grice already. Admittedly,
Strawson adds, “in a different context.” But Grice seems pretty sure that “The
thing seems phi” is WEAKER than “The thing is phi.” In 1961 he is VERY CLEAR
that while what he may have said to Strawson that Strawson reported in that
footnote was in terms of LOGICAL STRENGTH (in terms of entailment, for
extensional contexts). In “Causal,” Grice is clear that he does not think
LOGICAL STRENGTH applies to intensional contexts. In later revisions, it is not
altogether clear how he deals with the ‘doubt or denial.’ He seems to have been
more interested in refuting G. A. Paul (qua follower of Witters) than anything
else. In his latest reformulation of the principle, now a conversational
category, he is not specific about phenomenalist reports.
chiliagon: referred to by Grice in “Some remarks about the
senses.’ In geometry, a chiliagon, or 1000-gon
is a polygon with 1,000 sides. Philosophers commonly refer
to chiliagons to illustrate ideas about the nature and workings of thought,
meaning, and mental representation. A
chiliagon is a regular chiliagon Polygon 1000.svg A regular chiliagon Type
Regular polygon Edges and vertices 1000 Schläfli symbol {1000}, t{500},
tt{250}, ttt{125} Coxeter diagram CDel node 1.pngCDel 10.pngCDel 0x.pngCDel
0x.pngCDel node.png CDel node 1.pngCDel 5.pngCDel 0x.pngCDel 0x.pngCDel node
1.png Symmetry group Dihedral (D1000), order 2×1000 Internal angle (degrees)
179.64° Dual polygon Self Properties Convex, cyclic, equilateral, isogonal,
isotoxal A whole regular chiliagon is not visually discernible from a
circle. The lower section is a portion of a regular chiliagon, 200 times as
large as the smaller one, with the vertices highlighted. In geometry, a
chiliagon (/ˈkɪliəɡɒn/) or 1000-gon is a polygon with 1,000 sides. Philosophers
commonly refer to chiliagons to illustrate ideas about the nature and workings
of thought, meaning, and mental representation. Contents 1 Regular
chiliagon 2 Philosophical application 3 Symmetry 4 Chiliagram 5 See also 6
References Regular chiliagon A regular chiliagon is represented by Schläfli
symbol {1,000} and can be constructed as a truncated 500-gon, t{500}, or a
twice-truncated 250-gon, tt{250}, or a thrice-truncated 125-gon,
ttt{125}. The measure of each internal angle in a regular chiliagon is
179.64°. The area of a regular chiliagon with sides of length a is given
by {\displaystyle A=250a^{2}\cot {\frac {\pi }{1000}}\simeq
79577.2\,a^{2}}A=250a^{2}\cot {\frac {\pi }{1000}}\simeq 79577.2\,a^{2}
This result differs from the area of its circumscribed circle by less than 4
parts per million. Because 1,000 = 23 × 53, the number of sides is
neither a product of distinct Fermat primes nor a power of two. Thus the
regular chiliagon is not a constructible polygon. Indeed, it is not even
constructible with the use of neusis or an angle trisector, as the number of
sides is neither a product of distinct Pierpont primes, nor a product of powers
of two and three. Philosophical application René Descartes uses the
chiliagon as an example in his Sixth Meditation to demonstrate the difference
between pure intellection and imagination. He says that, when one thinks of a
chiliagon, he "does not imagine the thousand sides or see them as if they
were present" before him – as he does when one imagines a triangle, for
example. The imagination constructs a "confused representation,"
which is no different from that which it constructs of a myriagon (a polygon
with ten thousand sides). However, he does clearly understand what a chiliagon
is, just as he understands what a triangle is, and he is able to distinguish it
from a myriagon. Therefore, the intellect is not dependent on imagination,
Descartes claims, as it is able to entertain clear and distinct ideas when
imagination is unable to. Philosopher Pierre Gassendi, a contemporary of
Descartes, was critical of this interpretation, believing that while Descartes
could imagine a chiliagon, he could not understand it: one could "perceive
that the word 'chiliagon' signifies a figure with a thousand angles [but] that
is just the meaning of the term, and it does not follow that you understand the
thousand angles of the figure any better than you imagine them."[2]
The example of a chiliagon is also referenced by other philosophers, such as
Immanuel Kant. David Hume points out that it is "impossible for the eye to
determine the angles of a chiliagon to be equal to 1996 right angles, or make
any conjecture, that approaches this proportion."[4] Gottfried Leibniz
comments on a use of the chiliagon by John Locke, noting that one can have an
idea of the polygon without having an image of it, and thus distinguishing
ideas from images. Henri Poincaré uses the chiliagon as evidence that
"intuition is not necessarily founded on the evidence of the senses"
because "we can not represent to ourselves a chiliagon, and yet we reason
by intuition on polygons in general, which include the chiliagon as a
particular case." Inspired by Descartes's
chiliagon example, Grice, R. M. Chisholm and other 20th-century philosophers
have used similar examples to make similar points. Chisholm's ‘speckled hen,’
which need not have a determinate number of speckles to be successfully
imagined, is perhaps the most famous of these. Symmetry The symmetries of
a regular chiliagon. Light blue lines show subgroups of index 2. The 4 boxed
subgraphs are positionally related by index 5 subgroups. The regular chiliagon
has Dih1000 dihedral symmetry, order 2000, represented by 1,000 lines of
reflection. Dih100 has 15 dihedral subgroups: Dih500, Dih250, Dih125, Dih200,
Dih100, Dih50, Dih25, Dih40, Dih20, Dih10, Dih5, Dih8, Dih4, Dih2, and Dih1. It
also has 16 more cyclic symmetries as subgroups: Z1000, Z500, Z250, Z125, Z200,
Z100, Z50, Z25, Z40, Z20, Z10, Z5, Z8, Z4, Z2, and Z1, with Zn representing π/n
radian rotational symmetry. John Conway labels these lower symmetries
with a letter and order of the symmetry follows the letter.[8] He gives d
(diagonal) with mirror lines through vertices, p with mirror lines through
edges (perpendicular), i with mirror lines through both vertices and edges, and
g for rotational symmetry. a1 labels no symmetry. These lower symmetries
allow degrees of freedom in defining irregular chiliagons. Only the g1000
subgroup has no degrees of freedom but can be seen as directed edges.
Chiliagram A chiliagram is a 1,000-sided star polygon. There are 199 regular
forms[9] given by Schläfli symbols of the form {1000/n}, where n is an integer
between 2 and 500 that is coprime to 1,000. There are also 300 regular star
figures in the remaining cases. For example, the regular {1000/499} star
polygon is constructed by 1000 nearly radial edges. Each star vertex has an
internal angle of 0.36 degrees.[10] {1000/499} Star polygon 1000-499.svg
Star polygon 1000-499 center.png Central area with moiré patterns See also
Myriagon Megagon Philosophy of Mind Philosophy of Language References
Meditation VI by Descartes (English translation). Sepkoski, David (2005).
"Nominalism and constructivism in seventeenth-century mathematical
philosophy". Historia Mathematica. 32: 33–59.
doi:10.1016/j.hm.2003.09.002. Immanuel Kant, "On a Discovery,"
trans. Henry Allison, in Theoretical Philosophy After 1791, ed. Henry Allison
and Peter Heath, Cambridge UP, 2002 [Akademie 8:121]. Kant does not actually
use a chiliagon as his example, instead using a 96-sided figure, but he is
responding to the same question raised by Descartes. David Hume, The
Philosophical Works of David Hume, Volume 1, Black and Tait, 1826, p. 101.
Jonathan Francis Bennett (2001), Learning from Six Philosophers: Descartes,
Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Volume 2, Oxford University Press,
ISBN 0198250924, p. 53. Henri Poincaré (1900) "Intuition and Logic
in Mathematics" in William Bragg Ewald (ed) From Kant to Hilbert: A Source
Book in the Foundations of Mathematics, Volume 2, Oxford University Press,
2007, ISBN 0198505361, p. 1015. Roderick Chisholm, "The Problem of
the Speckled Hen", Mind 51 (1942): pp. 368–373. "These problems are
all descendants of Descartes's 'chiliagon' argument in the sixth of his
Meditations" (Joseph Heath, Following the Rules: Practical Reasoning and
Deontic Constraint, Oxford: OUP, 2008, p. 305, note 15). The Symmetries
of Things, Chapter 20 199 = 500 cases − 1 (convex) − 100 (multiples of 5)
− 250 (multiples of 2) + 50 (multiples of 2 and 5)
0.36=180(1-2/(1000/499))=180(1-998/1000)=180(2/1000)=180/500 chiliagon vte
Polygons (List) Triangles AcuteEquilateralIdealIsoscelesObtuseRight
Quadrilaterals AntiparallelogramBicentricCyclicEquidiagonalEx-tangentialHarmonicIsosceles
trapezoidKiteLambertOrthodiagonalParallelogramRectangleRight
kiteRhombusSaccheriSquareTangentialTangential trapezoidTrapezoid By number of
sides Monogon (1) Digon (2) Triangle
(3) Quadrilateral (4) Pentagon (5) Hexagon (6) Heptagon (7) Octagon (8) Nonagon
(Enneagon, 9) Decagon (10) Hendecagon (11) Dodecagon (12) Tridecagon (13) Tetradecagon
(14) Pentadecagon (15) Hexadecagon (16) Heptadecagon (17) Octadecagon (18) Enneadecagon
(19)Icosagon (20)Icosihenagon [de] (21)Icosidigon (22) Icositetragon (24) Icosihexagon
(26) Icosioctagon (28) Triacontagon (30) Triacontadigon (32) Triacontatetragon
(34) Tetracontagon (40) Tetracontadigon (42)Tetracontaoctagon (48)Pentacontagon
(50) Pentacontahenagon [de] (51) Hexacontagon (60) Hexacontatetragon (64) Heptacontagon
(70)Octacontagon (80) Enneacontagon (90) Enneacontahexagon (96) Hectogon (100) 120-gon257-gon360-gonChiliagon
(1000) Myriagon (10000) 65537-gonMegagon (1000000) 4294967295-gon [ru;
de]Apeirogon (∞) Star polygons Pentagram Hexagram Heptagram Octagram Enneagram Decagram
Hendecagram Dodecagram Classes Concave Convex Cyclic Equiangular Equilateral Isogonal
Isotoxal Pseudotriangle Regular Simple SkewStar-shaped Tangential Categories:
Polygons1000 (number)
communicatum: it is a commonplace that Grice belongs, as most
philosophers of the twentieth century, to the movement of the linguistic turn. Short
and Lewis have “commūnĭcare,” earlier “conmunicare,” f. communis, and thus
sharing the prefix with “conversare.” Now “communis” is an interesting lexeme
that Grice uses quite centrally in his idea of the ‘common ground’ – when a
feature of discourse is deemed to have been assigned ‘common-ground status.’
“Communis” features the “cum-” prefix, commūnis (comoinis); f. “con” and root “mu-,”
to bind; Sanscr. mav-; cf.: immunis, munus, moenia. The ‘communicatum’ (as used
by Tammelo in social philosophy) may
well cover what Grice would call the total ‘significatio,’ or ‘significatum.’ Grice
takes this seriously. Let us start then by examining what we mean by ‘linguistic,’
or ‘communication.’ It is curious that while most Griceians overuse
‘communicative’ as applied to ‘intention,’ Grice does not. Communicator’s
intention, at most. This is the Peirce in Grice’s soul. Meaning provides an
excellent springboard for Grice to centre his analysis on psychological or
soul-y verbs as involving the agent and the first person: smoke only
figuratively means fire, and the expression smoke only figuratively (or
metabolically) means that there is fire. It is this or that utterer (say,
Grice) who means, say, by uttering Where theres smoke theres fire, or ubi
fumus, ibi ignis, that where theres smoke theres fire. A means something
by uttering x, an utterance-token is roughly equivalent to utterer U intends
the utterance of x to produce some effect in his addressee A by means of the
recognition of this intention; and we may add that to ask what U means is to
ask for a specification of the intended effect - though, of course, it may not
always be possible to get a straight answer involving a that-clause, for
example, a belief that He does provide a
more specific example involving the that-clause at a later stage. By uttering
x, U means that-ψb-dp ≡ (Ǝφ)(Ǝf)(Ǝc) U
utters x intending x to be such that anyone who
has φ think that x has f, f is correlated in way c
with ψ-ing that p, and (Ǝφ') U intends x to be such
that anyone who has φ' think, via thinking that x has
f and that f is correlated in way c with ψ-ing that p, that U ψ-s that p, and in
view of (Ǝφ') U intending x to be such that anyone who
has φ' think, via thinking that x has f, and f is
correlated in way c with ψ-ing that
p, that U ψ-s that p, U ψ-s that p, and, for some substituends of ψb-d, U utters x intending that, should there
actually be anyone who has φ, he will, via thinking in
view of (Ǝφ') U intending x to be such that anyone who
has φ' think, via thinking that x has
f, and f is correlated in way c with ψ-ing that p, that U ψ-s that
p, U ψ-s that p himself ψ that p, and it is not the case
that, for some inference element E, U intends x to be such
that anyone who has φ both rely on E in coming to ψ, or think that U ψ-s, that p and think that (Ǝφ) U intends x to be
such that anyone who has φ come to ψ (or think that U ψ-s) that
p without relying on E. Besides St. John The Baptist, and Salome, Grice
cites few Namess in Meaning. But he makes a point about Stevenson! For
Stevenson, smoke means fire. Meaning develops out of an interest by Grice on
the philosophy of Peirce. In his essays on Peirce, Grice quotes from many other
authors, including, besides Peirce himself (!), Ogden, Richards, and Ewing, or
A. C. Virtue is not a fire-shovel Ewing, as Grice calls him, and this or that
cricketer. In the characteristic Oxonian fashion of a Lit. Hum., Grice has no
intention to submit Meaning to publication. Publishing is vulgar. Bennett,
however, guesses that Grice decides to publish it just a year after his Defence
of a dogma. Bennett’s argument is that Defence of a dogma pre-supposes some
notion of meaning. However, a different story may be told, not necessarily
contradicting Bennetts. It is Strawson who submits the essay by Grice to The
Philosophical Review (henceforth, PR) Strawson attends Grices talk on Meaning
for The Oxford Philosophical Society, and likes it. Since In defence of a dogma
was co-written with Strawson, the intention Bennett ascribes to Grice is
Strawsons. Oddly, Strawson later provides a famous alleged counter-example to
Grice on meaning in Intention and convention in speech acts, following J. O.
Urmson’s earlier attack to the sufficiency of Grices analysans -- which has
Grice dedicating a full James lecture (No. 5) to it. there is Strawsons
rat-infested house for which it is insufficient. An interesting fact,
that confused a few, is that Hart quotes from Grices Meaning in his critical
review of Holloway for The Philosophical Quarterly. Hart quotes Grice
pre-dating the publication of Meaning. Harts point is that Holloway should have
gone to Oxford! In Meaning, Grice may be seen as a practitioner of
ordinary-language philosophy: witness his explorations of the factivity (alla
know, remember, or see) or lack thereof of various uses of to mean. The second
part of the essay, for which he became philosophically especially popular,
takes up an intention-based approach to semantic notions. The only authority
Grice cites, in typical Oxonian fashion, is, via Ogden and Barnes, Stevenson,
who, from The New World (and via Yale, too!) defends an emotivist theory of
ethics, and making a few remarks on how to mean is used, with scare quotes, in
something like a causal account (Smoke means fire.). After its publication
Grices account received almost as many alleged counterexamples as
rule-utilitarianism (Harrison), but mostly outside Oxford, and in The New
World. New-World philosophers seem to have seen Grices attempt as reductionist
and as oversimplifying. At Oxford, the sort of counterexample Grice received,
before Strawson, was of the Urmson-type: refined, and subtle. I think your account
leaves bribery behind. On the other hand, in the New World ‒ in what Grice
calls the Latter-Day School of Nominalism, Quine is having troubles with
empiricism. Meaning was repr. in various collections, notably in Philosophical
Logic, ed. by Strawson. It should be remembered that it is Strawson who has the
thing typed and submitted for publication. Why Meaning should be repr. in a
collection on Philosophical Logic only Strawson knows. But Grice does say that
his account may help clarify the meaning of entails! It may be Strawsons
implicature that Parkinson should have repr. (and not merely credited) Meaning
by Grice in his series for Oxford on The theory of meaning. The preferred
quotation for Griceians is of course The Oxford Philosophical Society quote, seeing
that Grice recalled the exact year when he gave the talk for the Philosophical
Society at Oxford! It is however, the publication in The Philosophi, rather
than the quieter evening at the Oxford Philosophical Society, that occasioned a
tirade of alleged counter-examples by New-World philosophers. Granted, one or
two Oxonians ‒ Urmson and Strawson ‒ fell in! Urmson criticises the sufficiency
of Grices account, by introducing an alleged counter-example involving bribery.
Grice will consider a way out of Urmsons alleged counter-example in his fifth
Wiliam James Lecture, rightly crediting and thanking Urmson for this! Strawsons
alleged counter-example was perhaps slightly more serious, if regressive. It
also involves the sufficiency of Grices analysis. Strawsons rat-infested house
alleged counter-example started a chain which required Grice to avoid,
ultimately, any sneaky intention by way of a recursive clause to the effect
that, for utterer U to have meant that p, all meaning-constitutive intentions should
be above board. But why this obsession by Grice with mean? He is being funny.
Spots surely dont mean, only mean.They dont have a mind. Yet Grice opens with a
specific sample. Those spots mean, to the doctor, that you, dear, have measles.
Mean? Yes, dear, mean, doctors orders. Those spots mean measles. But how does
the doctor know? Cannot he be in the wrong? Not really, mean is factive, dear!
Or so Peirce thought. Grice is amazed that Peirce thought that some meaning is
factive. The hole in this piece of cloth means that a bullet went through is is
one of Peirce’s examples. Surely, as Grice notes, this is an unhappy example.
The hole in the cloth may well have caused by something else, or fabricated.
(Or the postmark means that the letter went through the post.) Yet, Grice was
having Oxonian tutees aware that Peirce was krypto-technical. Grice chose for
one of his pre-Meaning seminars on Peirce’s general theory of signs, with emphasis
on general, and the correspondence of Peirce and Welby. Peirce, rather than the
Vienna circle, becomes, in vein with Grices dissenting irreverent rationalism,
important as a source for Grices attempt to English Peirce. Grices implicature
seems to be that Peirce, rather than Ayer, cared for the subtleties of meaning
and sign, never mind a verificationist theory about them! Peirce
ultra-Latinate-cum-Greek taxonomies have Grice very nervous, though. He knew
that his students were proficient in the classics, but still. Grice thus
proposes to reduce all of Peirceian divisions and sub-divisions (one
sub-division too many) to mean. In the proceedings, he quotes from Ogden,
Richards, and Ewing. In particular, Grice was fascinated by the correspondence of
Peirce with Lady Viola Welby, as repr. by Ogden/Richards in, well, their study
on the meaning of meaning. Grice thought the science of symbolism pretentious,
but then he almost thought Lady Viola Welby slightly pretentious, too, if youve
seen her; beautiful lady. It is via Peirce that Grice explores examples such as
those spots meaning measles. Peirce’s obsession is with weathercocks almost as
Ockham was with circles on wine-barrels. Old-World Grices use of New-World
Peirce is illustrative, thus, of the Oxonian linguistic turn focused on
ordinary language. While Peirce’s background was not philosophical, Grice
thought it comical enough. He would say that Peirce is an amateur, but then he
said the same thing about Mill, whom Grice had to study by heart to get his B.
A. Lit. Hum.! Plus, as Watson commented, what is wrong with amateur? Give me an
amateur philosopher ANY day, if I have to choose from professional Hegel! In
finding Peirce krypo-technical, Grice is ensuing that his tutees, and indeed
any Oxonian philosophy student (he was university lecturer) be aware that to
mean should be more of a priority than this or that jargon by this or that (New
World?) philosopher!? Partly! Grice wanted his students to think on their own,
and draw their own conclusions! Grice cites Ewing, Ogden/Richards, and many
others. Ewing, while Oxford-educated, had ended up at Cambridge (Scruton almost
had him as his tutor) and written some points on Meaninglessness! Those spots
mean measles. Grice finds Peirce krypto-technical and proposes to English him
into an ordinary-language philosopher. Surely it is not important whether we
consider a measles spot a sign, a symbol, or an icon. One might just as well
find a doctor in London who thinks those spots symbolic. If Grice feels like
Englishing Peirce, he does not altogether fail! meaning, reprints, of
Meaning and other essays, a collection of reprints and offprints of Grices
essays. Meaning becomes a central topic of at least two strands in
Retrospective epilogue. The first strand concerns the idea of the centrality of
the utterer. What Grice there calls meaning BY (versus meaning TO), i.e. as he
also puts it, active or agents meaning. Surely he is right in defending an
agent-based account to meaning. Peirce need not, but Grice must, because he is
working with an English root, mean, that is only figurative applicable to
non-agentive items (Smoke means rain). On top, Grice wants to conclude that
only a rational creature (a person) can meanNN properly. Non-human animals may
have a correlate. This is a truly important point for Grice since he surely is
seen as promoting a NON-convention-based approach to meaning, and also
defending from the charge of circularity in the non-semantic account of
propositional attitudes. His final picture is a rationalist one. P1 G
wants to communicate about a danger to P2. This presupposes there IS
a danger (item of reality). Then P1 G believes there is a
danger, and communicates to P2 G2 that there is a danger. This
simple view of conversation as rational co-operation underlies Grices account
of meaning too, now seen as an offshoot of philosophical psychology, and indeed
biology, as he puts it. Meaning as yet another survival mechanism. While he
would never use a cognate like significance in his Oxford Philosophical Society
talk, Grice eventually starts to use such Latinate cognates at a later stage of
his development. In Meaning, Grice does not explain his goal. By sticking with
a root that the Oxford curriculum did not necessarily recognised as
philosophical (amateur Peirce did!), Grice is implicating that he is starting
an ordinary-language botanising on his own repertoire! Grice was amused by the
reliance by Ewing on very Oxonian examples contra Ayer: Surely Virtue aint a
fire-shovel is perfectly meaningful, and if fact true, if, Ill admit, somewhat
misleading and practically purposeless at Cambridge. Again, the dismissal by
Grice of natural meaning is due to the fact that natural meaning prohibits its
use in the first person and followed by a that-clause. ‘I mean-n that p’ sounds
absurd, no communication-function seems in the offing, there is no ‘sign for,’
as Woozley would have it. Grice found, with Suppes, all types of primacy
(ontological, axiological, psychological) in utterers meaning. In Retrospective
epilogue, he goes back to the topic, as he reminisces that it is his
suggestion that there are two allegedly distinguishable meaning concepts, even
if one is meta-bolical, which may be called natural meaning and non-natural
meaning. There is this or that test (notably factivity-entailment vs.
cancelation, but also scare quotes) which may be brought to bear to distinguish
one concept from the other. We may, for example, inquire whether a particular
occurrence of the predicate mean is factive or non-factive, i. e., whether for
it to be true that [so and so] means that p, it does or does not have to be the
case that it is true that p. Again, one may ask whether the use of quotation
marks to enclose the specification of what is meant would be inappropriate or
appropriate. If factivity, as in know, remember, and see, is present and
quotation marks, oratio recta, are be inappropriate, we have a case of natural
meaning. Otherwise the meaning involved is non-natural meaning. We may now ask
whether there is a single overarching idea which lies behind both members of
this dichotomy of uses to which the predicate meaning that seems to be
Subjects. If there is such a central idea it might help to indicate to us which
of the two concepts is in greater need of further analysis and elucidation and
in what direction such elucidation should proceed. Grice confesses that he has
only fairly recently come to believe that there is such an overarching idea and
that it is indeed of some service in the proposed inquiry. The idea behind both
uses of mean is that of consequence, or consequentia, as Hobbes has it. If x
means that p, something which includes p or the idea of p, is a consequence of
x. In the metabolic natural use of meaning that p, p, this or that consequence,
is this or that state of affairs. In the literal, non-metabolic, basic, non-natural
use of meaning that p, (as in Smith means that his neighbour’s three-year child
is an adult), p, this or that consequence is this or that conception or
complexus which involves some other conception. This perhaps suggests that of
the two concepts it is, as it should, non-natural meaning which is more in need
of further elucidation. It seems to be the more specialised of the pair, and it
also seems to be the less determinate. We may, e. g., ask how this or that
conception enters the picture. Or we may ask whether what enters the picture is
the conception itself or its justifiability. On these counts Grice should look
favorably on the idea that, if further analysis should be required for one of
the pair, the notion of non-natural meaning would be first in line. There are
factors which support the suitability of further analysis for the concept of
non-natural meaning. MeaningNN that p (non-natural meaning)
does not look as if it Namess an original feature of items in the world, for
two reasons which are possibly not mutually independent. One reason is that,
given suitable background conditions, meaning, can be changed by fiat. The
second reason is that the presence of meaningNN is dependent on
a framework provided by communication, if that is not too circular. Communication
is in the philosophical lexicon. Lewis and Short have “commūnĭcātĭo,” f.
communicare,"(several times in Cicero, elsewhere rare), and as they did
with negatio and they will with significatio, Short and Lewis render,
unhelpfully, as a making common, imparting, communicating. largitio et
communicatio civitatis;” “quaedam societas et communicatio utilitatum,” “consilii
communicatio, “communicatio sermonis,” criminis cum pluribus; “communicatio
nominum, i. e. the like appellation of several objects; “juris; “damni; In
rhetorics, communicatio, trading on the communis, a figure, translating Grecian
ἀνακοίνωσις, in accordance with which the utterer turns to his addressee, and,
as it were, allows him to take part in the inquiry. It seems to Grice, then, at
least reasonable and possibly even emphatically mandatory, to treat the claim
that a communication vehicle, such as this and that expression means that p, in
this transferred, metaphoric, or meta-bolic use of means that as being reductively
analysable in terms of this or that feature of this or that utterer,
communicator, or user of this or that expression. The use of meaning that as
applied to this or that expression is posterior to and explicable through the
utterer-oriented, or utterer-relativised use, i.e. involving a reference to
this or that communicator or user of this or that expression. More
specifically, one should license a metaphorical use of mean, where one allows
the claim that this or that expression means that p, provided that this or that
utterer, in this or that standard fashion, means that p, i.e. in terms of this
or that souly statee toward this or that propositional complexus this or
that utterer ntends, in a standardly fashion, to produce by his uttering this
or that utterance. That this or that expression means (in this metaphorical
use) that p is thus explicable either in terms of this or that souly state
which is standardly intended to produce in this or that addressee A by this or
that utterer of this or that expression, or in this or that souly staken up by
this or that utterer toward this or that activity or action of this or that
utterer of this or that expression. Meaning was in the air in Oxfords
linguistic turn. Everybody was talking meaning. Grice manages to quote from
Hares early “Mind” essay on the difference between imperatives and indicatives,
also Duncan-Jones on the fugitive proposition, and of course his beloved
Strawson. Grice was also concerned by the fact that in the manoeuvre of the
typical ordinary-language philosopher, there is a constant abuse of mean.
Surely Grice wants to stick with the utterers meaning as the primary use.
Expressions mean only derivatively. To do that, he chose Peirce to see if he
could clarify it with meaning that. Grice knew that the polemic was even
stronger in London, with Ogden and Lady Viola Welby. In the more academic
Oxford milieu, Grice knew that a proper examination of meaning, would lead him,
via Kneale and his researches on the history of semantics, to the topic of signification
that obsessed the modistae (and their modus significandi). For what does L and
S say about about this? This is Grice’s reply to popular Ogden. They want to
know what the meaning of meaning is? Here is the Oxononian response by Grice,
with a vengeance. Grice is not an animist nor a mentalist, even modest.
While he allows for natural phenomena to mean (smoke means fire), meaning is
best ascribed to some utterer, where this meaning is nothing but the intentions
behind his utterance. This is the fifth James lecture. Grice was careful
enough to submit it to PR, since it is a strictly philosophical development of
the views expressed in Meaning which Strawson had submitted on Grice’s behalf
to the same Review and which had had a series of responses by various
philosophers. Among these philosophers is Strawson himself in Intention and
convention in the the theory of speech acts, also in PR. Grice quotes from
very many other philosophers in this essay, including: Urmson, Stampe,
Strawson, Schiffer, and Searle. Strawson is especially relevant since
he started a series of alleged counter-examples with his infamous example of
the rat-infested house. Grice particularly treasured Stampes alleged
counter-example involving his beloved bridge! Avramides earns a D. Phil Oxon.
on that, under Strawson! This is Grices occasion to address some of the
criticisms ‒ in the form of alleged counter-examples, typically, as his
later reflections on epagoge versus diagoge note ‒ by Urmson,
Strawson, and other philosophers associated with Oxford, such as Searle,
Stampe, and Schiffer. The final analysandum is pretty complex (of the type that
he did find his analysis of I am hearing a sound complex in Personal
identity ‒ hardly an obstacle for adopting it), it became yet
another target of attack by especially New-World philosophers in the pages of
Mind, Nous, and other journals, This is officially the fifth James lecture.
Grice takes up the analysis of meaning he had presented way back at the Oxford
Philosophical Society. Motivated mainly by the attack by Urmson and by Strawson
in Intention and convention in speech acts, that offered an alleged
counter-example to the sufficiency of Grices analysis, Grice ends up
introducing so many intention that he almost trembled. He ends up seeing
meaning as a value-paradeigmatic concept, perhaps never realisable in a
sublunary way. But it is the analysis in this particular essay where he is at
his formal best. He distinguishes between protreptic and exhibitive utterances,
and also modes of correlation (iconic, conventional). He symbolises the utterer
and the addressee, and generalises over the type of psychological state,
attitude, or stance, meaning seems to range (notably indicative vs.
imperative). He formalises the reflexive intention, and more importantly, the
overtness of communication in terms of a self-referential recursive intention
that disallows any sneaky intention to be brought into the picture of
meaning-constitutive intentions. Grice thought he had dealt with Logic and
conversation enough! So he feels of revising his Meaning. After all, Strawson
had had the cheek to publish Meaning by Grice and then go on to criticize it in
Intention and convention in speech acts. So this is Grices revenge, and he
wins! He ends with the most elaborate theory of mean that an Oxonian could ever
hope for. And to provoke the informalists such as Strawson (and his disciples
at Oxford – led by Strawson) he pours existential quantifiers like the plague!
He manages to quote from Urmson, whom he loved! No word on Peirce, though, who
had originated all this! His implicature: Im not going to be reprimanted in
informal discussion about my misreading Peirce at Harvard! The concluding note
is about artificial substitutes for iconic representation, and meaning as a human
institution. Very grand. This is Grices metabolical projection of utterers
meaning to apply to anything OTHER than utterers meaning, notably a token of
the utterers expression and a TYPE of the utterers expression, wholly or in
part. Its not like he WANTS to do it, he NEEDS it to give an account of
implicatum. The phrase utterer is meant to provoke. Grice thinks that speaker
is too narrow. Surely you can mean by just uttering stuff! This is the
sixth James lecture, as published in “Foundations of Language” (henceforth,
“FL”), or “The foundations of language,” as he preferred. As it happens, it
became a popular lecture, seeing that Searle selected this from the whole set
for his Oxford reading in philosophy on the philosophy of language. It is also
the essay cited by Chomsky in his influential Locke lectures. Chomsky
takes Grice to be a behaviourist, even along Skinners lines, which provoked a
reply by Suppes, repr. in PGRICE. In The New World, the H. P. is often given in
a more simplified form. Grice wants to keep on playing. In Meaning, he had said
x means that p is surely reducible to utterer U means that p. In this lecture,
he lectures us as to how to proceed. In so doing he invents this or that
procedure: some basic, some resultant. When Chomsky reads the reprint in
Searles Philosophy of Language, he cries: Behaviourist! Skinnerian! It was
Suppes who comes to Grices defence. Surely the way Grice uses expressions like
resultant procedure are never meant in the strict behaviourist way. Suppes
concludes that it is much fairer to characterise Grice as an intentionalist.
Published in FL, ed. by Staal, Repr.in Searle, The Philosophy of Language,
Oxford, the sixth James Lecture, FL, resultant procedure, basic
procedure. Staal asked Grice to publish the sixth James lecture for a
newish periodical publication of whose editorial board he was a member. The fun
thing is Grice complied! This is Grices shaggy-dog story. He does not seem too
concerned about resultant procedures. As he will ll later say, surely I can create
Deutero-Esperanto and become its master! For Grice, the primacy is the
idiosyncratic, particularized utterer in this or that occasion. He knows a
philosopher craves for generality, so he provokes the generality-searcher with
divisions and sub-divisions of mean. But his heart does not seem to be there,
and he is just being overformalistic and technical for the sake of it. I am
glad that Putnam, of all people, told me in an aside, you are being too formal,
Grice. I stopped with symbolism since! Communication. This is Grice’s clearest
anti-animist attack by Grice. He had joins Hume in mocking causing and willing:
The decapitation of Charles I as willing Charles Is death. Language semantics
alla Tarski. Grice know sees his former self. If he was obsessed, after Ayer,
with mean, he now wants to see if his explanation of it (then based on his
pre-theoretic intuition) is theoretically advisable in terms other than dealing
with those pre-theoretical facts, i.e. how he deals with a lexeme like mean. This
is a bit like Grice: implicatum, revisited. An axiological approach to meaning.
Strictly a reprint of Grice, which should be the preferred citation. The date is
given by Grice himself, and he knew! Grice also composed some notes on Remnants
on meaning, by Schiffer. This is a bit like Grices meaning re-revisited.
Schiffer had been Strawsons tutee at Oxford as a Rhode Scholar in the
completion of his D. Phil. on Meaning, Clarendon. Eventually, Schiffer
grew sceptic, and let Grice know about it! Grice did not find Schiffers
arguments totally destructive, but saw the positive side to them. Schiffers
arguments should remind any philosopher that the issues he is dealing are
profound and bound to involve much elucidation before they are solved. This is
a bit like Grice: implicatum, revisited. Meaning revisited (an ovious nod to
Evelyn Waughs Yorkshire-set novel) is the title Grice chose for a contribution
to a symposium at Brighton organised by Smith. Meaning revisited (although
Grice has earlier drafts entitled Meaning and philosophical psychology)
comprises three sections. In the first section, Grice is concerned with the application
of his modified Occam’s razor now to the very lexeme, mean. Cf. How many senses
does sense have? Cohen: The Senses of Senses. In the second part, Grice
explores an evolutionary model of creature construction reaching a stage of
non-iconic representation. Finally, in the third section, motivated to solve
what he calls a major problem ‒ versus the minor problem concerning the
transition from the meaning by the utterer to the meaning by the
expression. Grice attempts to construct meaning as a value-paradeigmatic
notion. A version was indeed published in the proceedings of the Brighton
symposium, by Croom Helm, London. Grice has a couple of other drafts with
variants on this title: philosophical psychology and meaning, psychology and
meaning. He keeps, meaningfully, changing the order. It is not arbitrary that
the fascinating exploration by Grice is in three parts. In the first, where he
applies his Modified Occams razor to mean, he is revisiting Stevenson. Smoke
means fire and I mean love, dont need different senses of mean. Stevenson is
right when using scare quotes for smoke ‘meaning’ fire utterance. Grice is very
much aware that that, the rather obtuse terminology of senses, was exactly the
terminology he had adopted in both Meaning and the relevant James lectures (V
and VI) at Harvard! Now, its time to revisit and to echo Graves, say, goodbye
to all that! In the second part he applies Pology. While he knows his audience
is not philosophical ‒ it is not Oxford ‒ he thinks they still may get
some entertainment! We have a P feeling pain, simulating it, and finally
uttering, I am in pain. In the concluding section, Grice becomes Plato. He sees
meaning as an optimum, i.e. a value-paradeigmatic notion introducing value in
its guise of optimality. Much like Plato thought circle works in his idiolect.
Grice played with various titles, in the Grice Collection. Theres philosophical
psychology and meaning. The reason is obvious. The lecture is strictly divided
in sections, and it is only natural that Grice kept drafts of this or that section
in his collection. In WOW Grice notes that he re-visited his Meaning re-visited
at a later stage, too! And he meant it! Surely, there is no way to understand
the stages of Grice’s development of his ideas about meaning without Peirce! It
is obvious here that Grice thought that mean two figurative or metabolical
extensions of use. Smoke means fire and Smoke means smoke. The latter is a
transferred use in that impenetrability means lets change the topic if
Humpty-Dumpty m-intends that it and Alice are to change the topic. Why did
Grice feel the need to add a retrospective epilogue? He loved to say that what
the “way of words” contains is neither his first, nor his last word. So trust
him to have some intermediate words to drop. He is at his most casual in the
very last section of the epilogue. The first section is more of a very
systematic justification for any mistake the reader may identify in the offer.
The words in the epilogue are thus very guarded and qualificatory. Just one
example about our focus: conversational implicate and conversation as rational
co-operation. He goes back to Essay 2, but as he notes, this was hardly the
first word on the principle of conversational helpfulness, nor indeed the first
occasion where he actually used implicature. As regards co-operation, the
retrospective epilogue allows him to expand on a causal phrasing in Essay 2,
“purposive, indeed rational.” Seeing in retrospect how the idea of rationality
was the one that appealed philosophers most – since it provides a rationale and
justification for what is otherwise an arbitrary semantic proliferation. Grice
then distinguishes between the thesis that conversation is purposive, and the
thesis that conversation is rational. And, whats more, and in excellent
Griceian phrasing, there are two theses here, too. One thing is to see
conversation as rational, and another, to use his very phrasing, as rational
co-operation! Therefore, when one discusses the secondary literature, one
should be attentive to whether the author is referring to Grices qualifications
in the Retrospective epilogue. Grice is careful to date some items. However,
since he kept rewriting, one has to be careful. These seven folder contain the
material for the compilation. Grice takes the opportunity of the compilation by
Harvard of his WOW, representative of the mid-60s, i. e. past the heyday of
ordinary-language philosophy, to review the idea of philosophical progress in
terms of eight different strands which display, however, a consistent and
distinctive unity. Grice keeps playing with valediction, valedictory,
prospective and retrospective, and the different drafts are all kept in The
Grice Papers. The Retrospective epilogue, is divided into two sections. In the
first section, he provides input for his eight strands, which cover not just
meaning, and the assertion-implication distinction to which he alludes to in the
preface, but for more substantial philosophical issues like the philosophy of
perception, and the defense of common sense realism versus the sceptial
idealist. The concluding section tackles more directly a second theme he had
idenfitied in the preface, which is a methodological one, and his long-standing
defence of ordinary-language philosophy. The section involves a fine
distinction between the Athenian dialectic and the Oxonian dialectic, and tells
the tale about his fairy godmother, G*. As he notes, Grice had dropped a few
words in the preface explaining the ordering of essays in the compilation. He
mentions that he hesitated to follow a suggestion by Bennett that the ordering
of the essays be thematic and chronological. Rather, Grice chooses to
publish the whole set of seven James lectures, what he calls the centerpiece,
as part I. II, the explorations in semantics and metaphysics, is organised more
or less thematically, though. In the Retrospective epilogue, Grice takes up
this observation in the preface that two ideas or themes underlie his Studies:
that of meaning, and assertion vs. implication, and philosophical methodology.
The Retrospective epilogue is thus an exploration on eight strands he
identifies in his own philosophy. Grices choice of strand is careful. For
Grice, philosophy, like virtue, is entire. All the strands belong to the same
knit, and therefore display some latitudinal, and, he hopes, longitudinal
unity, the latter made evidence by his drawing on the Athenian dialectic as a
foreshadow of the Oxonian dialectic to come, in the heyday of the Oxford school
of analysis, when an interest in the serious study of ordinary language had
never been since and will never be seen again. By these two types of unity,
Grice means the obvious fact that all branches of philosophy (philosophy of
language, or semantics, philosophy of perception, philosophical psychology,
metaphysics, axiology, etc.) interact and overlap, and that a historical regard
for ones philosophical predecessors is a must, especially at Oxford. Why is
Grice obsessed with asserting? He is more interested, technically, in the
phrastic, or dictor. Grice sees a unity, indeed, equi-vocality, in the
buletic-doxastic continuum. Asserting is usually associated with the doxastic.
Since Grice is always ready to generalise his points to cover the buletic
(recall his Meaning, “theres by now no reason to stick to informative cases,”),
it is best to re-define his asserting in terms of the phrastic. This is enough
of a strong point. As Hare would agree, for emotivists like Barnes, say, an
utterance of buletic force may not have any content whatsoever. For Grice,
there is always a content, the proposition which becomes true when the action
is done and the desire is fulfilled or satisfied. Grice quotes from Bennett.
Importantly, Grice focuses on the assertion/non-assertion distinction. He
overlooks the fact that for this or that of his beloved imperative utterance,
asserting is out of the question, but explicitly conveying that p is not.
He needs a dummy to stand for a psychological or souly state, stance, or
attitude of either boule or doxa, to cover the field of the utterer
mode-neutrally conveying explicitly that his addressee A is to entertain that
p. The explicatum or explicitum sometimes does the trick, but sometimes it does
not. It is interesting to review the Names index to the volume, as well as the
Subjects index. This is a huge collection, comprising 14 folders. By contract,
Grice was engaged with Harvard, since it is the President of the College that
holds the copyrights for the James lectures. The title Grice eventually chooses
for his compilation of essays, which goes far beyond the James, although
keeping them as the centerpiece, is a tribute to Locke, who, although obsessed
with his idealist and empiricist new way of ideas, leaves room for both the
laymans and scientists realist way of things, and, more to the point, for this
or that philosophical semiotician to offer this or that study in the way of
words. Early in the linguistic turn minor revolution, the expression the new
way of words, had been used derogatorily. WOW is organised in two parts: Logic
and conversation and the somewhat pretentiously titled Explorations in
semantics and metaphysics, which offers commentary around the centerpiece. It
also includes a Preface and a very rich and inspired Retrospective epilogue.
From part I, the James lectures, only three had not been previously published.
The first unpublished lecture is Prolegomena, which really sets the scene, and
makes one wonder what the few philosophers who quote from The logic of grammar
could have made from the second James lecture taken in isolation. Grice
explores Aristotle’s “to alethes”: “For the true and the false exist with respect
to synthesis and division (peri gar synthesin kai diaireisin esti to pseudos
kai to alethes).” Aristotle insists upon the com-positional form of truth in
several texts: cf. De anima, 430b3 ff.: “in truth and falsity, there is a
certain composition (en hois de kai to pseudos kai to alethes, synthesis tis)”;
cf. also Met. 1027b19 ff.: the true and the false are with respect to (peri)
composition and decomposition (synthesis kai diaresis).” It also shows that
Grices style is meant for public delivery, rather than reading. The second
unpublished lecture is Indicative conditionals. This had been used by a few
philosophers, such as Gazdar, noting that there were many mistakes in the
typescript, for which Grice is not to be blamed. The third is on some models
for implicature. Since this Grice acknowledges is revised, a comparison with
the original handwritten version of the final James lecture retrieves a few
differences From Part II, a few essays had not been published before, but
Grice, nodding to the longitudinal unity of philosophy, is very careful and
proud to date them. Commentary on the individual essays is made under the
appropriate dates. Philosophical correspondence is quite a genre. Hare would
express in a letter to the Librarian for the Oxford Union, “Wiggins does not
want to be understood,” or in a letter to Bennett that Williams is the worse
offender of Kantianism! It was different with Grice. He did not type. And he
wrote only very occasionally! These are four folders with general
correspondence, mainly of the academic kind. At Oxford, Grice would hardly keep
a correspondence, but it was different with the New World, where academia turns
towards the bureaucracy. Grice is not precisely a good, or reliable, as The BA
puts it, correspondent. In the Oxford manner, Grice prefers a face-to-face
interaction, any day. He treasures his Saturday mornings under Austins
guidance, and he himself leads the Play Group after Austins demise, which, as Owen
reminisced, attained a kind of cult status. Oxford is different. As a tutorial
fellow in philosophy, Grice was meant to tutor his students; as a University
Lecturer he was supposed to lecture sometimes other fellowss tutees! Nothing
about this reads: publish or perish! This is just one f. containing Grices own
favourite Griceian references. To the historian of analytic philosophy, it is
of particular interest. It shows which philosophers Grice respected the most,
and which ones the least. As one might expect, even on the cold shores of
Oxford, as one of Grices tutees put it, Grice is cited by various Oxford
philosophers. Perhaps the first to cite Grice in print is his tutee Strawson,
in “Logical Theory.” Early on, Hart quotes Grice on meaning in his review in
The Philosophical Quarterly of Holloways Language and Intelligence before Meaning
had been published. Obviously, once Grice and Strawson, In defense of a dogma
and Grice, Meaning are published by The Philosophical Review, Grice is
discussed profusely. References to the implicatum start to appear in the
literature at Oxford in the mid-1960s, within the playgroup, as in Hare and
Pears. It is particularly intriguing to explore those philosophers Grice picks
up for dialogue, too, and perhaps arrange them alphabetically, from Austin to
Warnock, say. And Griceian philosophical references, Oxonian or other, as they
should, keep counting! The way to search the Grice Papers here is using
alternate keywords, notably “meaning.” “Meaning” s. II, “Utterer’s meaning and
intentions,” s. II, “Utterer’s meaning, sentence-meaning, and word meaning,” s.
II, “Meaning revisited,” s. II. – but also “Meaning and psychology,” s. V,
c.7-ff. 24-25. While Grice uses
“signification,” and lectured on Peirce’s “signs,” “Peirce’s general theory of
signs,” (s. V, c. 8-f. 29), he would avoid such pretentiously sounding
expressions. Searching under ‘semantic’ and ‘semantics’ (“Grammar and
semantics,” c. 7-f. 5; “Language semantics,” c. 7-f.20, “Basic Pirotese,
sentence semantics and syntax,” c. 8-f. 30, “Semantics of children’s language,”
c. 9-f. 10, “Sentence semantics” (c. 9-f. 11); “Sentence semantics and
propositional complexes,” c. 9-f.12, “Syntax and semantics,” c. 9-ff. 17-18) may
help, too. Folder on Schiffer (“Schiffer,” c. 9-f. 9), too.
commitment: Grice’s commitment to the 39 Articles. An
utterer is committed to those and only those entities to which the bound
variables of his utterance must be capable of referring in order that the
utterance made be true.”
common-ground status assignment:
the regulations for common-ground assignment have to do with general rational
constraints on conversation. Grice is clear in “Causal,” and as Strawson lets
us know, he was already clear in “Introduction” when talking of a ‘pragmatic
rule.’ Strawson states the rule in terms of making your conversational
contribution the logically strongest possible. If we abide by an imperative of
conversational helpfulness, enjoining the maximally giving and receiving of
information and the influencing and being influenced by others in the
institution of a decisions, the sub-imperative follows to the effect, ‘Thou
shalt NOT make a weak move compared to the stronger one that thou canst
truthfully make, and with equal or greater economy of means.’“Causal” provides a more difficult version, because it
deals with non-extensional contexts where ‘strong’ need not be interpreted as
‘logical strength’ in terms of entailment. Common ground status assignment
springs from the principle of conversational helpfulness or conversational
benevolence. What would be the benevolent point of ‘informing’ your addressee
what you KNOW your addressee already knows? It is not even CONCEPTUALLY
possible. You are not ‘informing’ him if you are aware that he knows it. So,
what Strawson later calls the principle of presumption of ignorance and the
principle of the presumption of knowledge are relevant. There is a balance
between the two. If Strawson asks Grice, “Is the king of France bald?” Grice is
entitled to assume that Strawson thinks two things Grice will perceive as
having been assigned a ‘common-ground’ status as uncontroversial topic not
worth conversing about. First, Strawson thinks that there is one king. (∃x)Fx. Second, Strawson thinks that there is at most one
king. (x)(y)((Fx.Fy)⊃ x=y).
That the king is bald is NOT assigned common-ground status, because Grice
cannot expect that Strawson thinks that Grice KNOWS that. Grice symbolises the common-ground
status by means of subscripts. He also uses square-bracekts, so that anything
within the scope of the square brackets is immune to controversy, or as Grice
also puts it, conversationally _inert_: things we don’t talk about.
complexum:
while Grice does have an essay on the ‘complexum,’ he is mostly being jocular.
His dissection of the proposition proceds by considering ‘the a,’ and its
denotatum, or reference, and ‘is the b,’ which involves then the predication.
This is Grice’s shaggy-dog story. Once we have ‘the dog is shaggy,’ we have a
‘complexum,’ and we can say that the utterer means, by uttering ‘Fido is
shaggy,’ that the dog is hairy-coated. Simple, right? It’s the jocular in
Grice. He is joking on philosophers who look at those representative of the
linguistic turn, and ask, “So what do you have to say about reference and
predication,’ and Grice comes up with an extra-ordinary analysis of what is to
believe that the dog is hairy-coat, and communicating it. In fact, the
‘communicating’ is secondary. Once Grice has gone to metabolitical extension of
‘mean’ to apply to the expression, communication becomes secondary in that it
has to be understood in what Grice calls the ‘atenuated’ usage involving this
or that ‘readiness’ to have this or that procedure, basic or resultant, in
one’s repertoire! Bealer is one of Grices most brilliant tutees in the New
World. The Grice collection contains a full f. of correspondence with
Bealer. Bealer refers to Grice in his influential Clarendon essay on content.
Bealer is concerned with how pragmatic inference may intrude in the ascription
of a psychological, or souly, state, attitude, or stance. Bealer loves to quote
from Grice on definite descriptions in Russell and in the vernacular, the
implicature being that Russell is impenetrable! Bealers mentor is Grices close
collaborator Myro, so he knows what he is talking about. Refs.: The main
reference is in ‘Reply to Richards.’ But there is “Sentence semantics and
propositional complexes,” c. 9-f. 12, BANC.
conceptum:
Grice obviously uses Frege’s notion of a ‘concept.’ One of Grice’s metaphysical
routines is meant to produce a logical construction of a concept or generate a
new concept. Aware of the act/product distinction, Grice distinguishes between
the conceptum, or concept, and the conception, or conceptio. Grice allows that
‘not’ may be a ‘concept,’ so he is not tied to the ‘equine’ idea by Frege of
the ‘horse.’ Since an agent can fail to conceive that his neighbour’s
three-year old is an adult, Grice accepts that ‘conceives’ may take a
‘that’-clause. In ‘ordinary’ language, one does not seem to refer, say, to the
concept that e = mc2, but that may be a failure or ‘ordinary’ language. In the
canonical cat-on-the-mat, we have Grice conceiving that the cat is on the mat,
and also having at least four concepts: the concept of ‘cat,’ the concept of
‘mat,’ the concept of ‘being on,’ and the concept of the cat being on the mat.
conditionalis: strictly, propositio conditionalis: vel substitutive,
versus propositio praedicativa in Apuleius. Classical Latin condicio was confused in Late Latin with conditio "a making," from conditus, past participle of condere "to put together." The sense
evolution in Latin apparently was from "stipulation" to
"situation, mode of being."
Grice lists ‘if’ as the third binary functor in his response to Strawson. The
relations between “if” and “⊃” have already, but only in part,
been discussed. 1 The sign “⊃” is called the Material Implication
sign a name I shall consider later. Its meaning is given by the rule that any
statement of the form ‘p⊃q’ is false in the case in which the first of its
constituent statements is true and the second false, and is true in every other
case considered in the system; i. e., the falsity of the first constituent
statement or the truth of the second are, equally, sufficient conditions of the
truth of a statement of material implication ; the combination of truth in the
first with falsity in the second is the single, necessary and sufficient,
condition (1 Ch. 2, S. 7) of its falsity. The standard or primary -- the
importance of this qualifying phrase can scarcely be overemphasized. There are
uses of “if … then … ” which do not
answer to the description given here,, or to any other descriptions given in this
chapter -- use of an “if … then …” sentence,
on the other hand, we saw to be in circumstances where, not knowing whether
some statement which could be made by the use of a sentence corresponding in a
certain way to the first clause of the hypothetical is true or not, or
believing it to be false, we nevertheless consider that a step in reasoning
from that statement to a statement related in a similar way to the second
clause would be a sound or reasonable step ; the second statement also being
one of whose truth we are in doubt, or which we believe to be false. Even in
such circumstances as these we may sometimes hesitate to apply the word ‘true’
to hypothetical statements (i.e., statements which could be made by the use of
“if ... then …,” in its standard significance), preferring to call them
reasonable or well-founded ; but if we apply ‘true’ to them at all, it will be
in such circumstances as these. Now one of the sufficient conditions of the
truth of a statement of material implication may very well be fulfilled without
the conditions for the truth, or reasonableness, of the corresponding
hypothetical statement being fulfilled ; i.e., a statement of the form ‘p⊃q’ does not entail the corresponding statement of the form
“if p then q.” But if we are prepared to accept the hypothetical statement, we
must in consistency be prepared to deny the conjunction of the statement
corresponding to the first clause of the sentence used to make the hypothetical
statement with the negation of the statement corresponding to its second clause
; i.e., a statement of the form “if p then q” does entail the corresponding statement
of the form ‘p⊃q.’ The force of “corresponding” needs elucidation. Consider
the three following very ordinary specimens of hypothetical sentences. If the
Germans had invaded England in 1940, they would have won the war. If Jones were
in charge, half the staff would have been dismissed. If it rains, the match
will be cancelled. The sentences which could be used to make statements
corresponding in the required sense to the subordinate clauses can be
ascertained by considering what it is that the speaker of each hypothetical
sentence must (in general) be assumed either to be in doubt about or to believe
to be not the case. Thus, for (1) to (8), the corresponding pairs of sentences
are as follows. The Germans invaded England in 1940; they won the war. Jones is
in charge; half the staff has been dismissed. It will rain; the match will be
cancelled. Sentences which could be used to make the statements of material
implication corresponding to the hypothetical statements made by these
sentences can now be framed from these pairs of sentences as follows. The Germans
invaded England in 1940 ⊃ they won the war. Jones is in charge ⊃ half the staff has been, dismissed. It will rain ⊃ the match will be cancelled. The very fact that these
verbal modifications are necessary, in order to obtain from the clauses of the
hypothetical sentence the clauses of the corresponding material implication
sentence is itself a symptom of the radical difference between hypothetical
statements and truth-functional statements. Some detailed differences are also
evident from these examples. The falsity of a statement made by the use of ‘The
Germans invaded England in 1940’ or ‘Jones is in charge’ is a sufficient
condition of the truth of the corresponding statements made by the use of (Ml)
and (M2) ; but not, of course, of the corresponding statements made by the use
of (1) and (2). Otherwise, there would normally be no point in using sentences
like (1) and (2) at all; for these sentences would normally carry – but not
necessarily: one may use the pluperfect or the imperfect subjunctive when one
is simply working out the consequences of an hypothesis which one may be
prepared eventually to accept -- in the tense or mood of the verb, an
implication of the utterer's belief in the falsity of the statements
corresponding to the clauses of the hypothetical. It is not raining is
sufficient to verify a statement made by the use of (MS), but not a
statement made by the use of (3). Its not raining Is also sufficient to verify
a statement made by the use of “It will rain ⊃
the match will not be cancelled.” The formulae ‘p revise ⊃q’ and ‘q revise⊃
q' are consistent with one another, and the joint assertion of corresponding
statements of these forms is equivalent to the assertion of the corresponding
statement of the form * *-~p. But “If it rains, the match will be cancelled” is
inconsistent with “If it rains, the match will not be cancelled,” and their
joint assertion in the same context is self-contradictory. Suppose we call the
statement corresponding to the first clause of a sentence used to make a
hypothetical statement the antecedent of the hypothetical statement; and the
statement corresponding to the second clause, its consequent. It is sometimes
fancied that whereas the futility of identifying conditional statements with
material implications is obvious in those cases where the implication of the
falsity of the antecedent is normally carried by the mood or tense of the verb
(e.g., (I) or (2)), there is something to be said for at least a partial
identification in cases where no such implication is involved, i.e., where the
possibility of the truth of both antecedent and consequent is left open (e.g.,
(3). In cases of the first kind (‘unfulfilled’ or ‘subjunctive’ conditionals)
our attention is directed only to the last two lines of the truth-tables for *
p ⊃ q ', where the antecedent has the truth-value, falsity; and
the suggestion that ‘~p’ entails ‘if p, then q’ is felt to be obviously wrong.
But in cases of the second kind we may inspect also the first two lines, for
the possibility of the antecedent's being fulfilled is left open; and the
suggestion that ‘p . q’ entails ‘if p, then q’ is not felt to be obviously
wrong. This is an illusion, though engendered by a reality. The fulfilment of
both antecedent and consequent of a hypothetical statement does not show that
the man who made the hypothetical statement was right; for the consequent might
be fulfilled as a result of factors unconnected with, or in spite of, rather
than because of, the fulfilment of the antecedent. We should be prepared to say
that the man who made the hypothetical statement was right only if we were also
prepared to say that the fulfilment of the antecedent was, at least in part,
the explanation of the fulfilment of the consequent. The reality behind the
illusion is complex : en. 3 it is, partly, the fact that, in many cases, the
fulfilment of both antecedent and consequent may provide confirmation for the
view that the existence of states of affairs like those described by the
antecedent is a good reason for expecting states of affairs like those
described by the consequent ; and it is, partly, the fact that a man whosays,
for example, 4 If it rains, the match will be cancelled * makes a prediction
(viz.. that the match will be cancelled) under a proviso (viz., that it rains),
and that the cancellation of the match because of the rain therefore leads us
to say, not only that the reasonableness of the prediction was confirmed, but
also that the prediction itself was confirmed. Because a statement of the form
“p⊃q” does not entail the corresponding statement of the form '
if p, then q ' (in its standard employment), we shall expect to find, and have
found, a divergence between the rules for '⊃'
and the rules for ' if J (in its standard employment). Because ‘if p, then q’
does entail ‘p⊃q,’ we shall also expect to find some degree of parallelism
between the rules; for whatever is entailed by ‘p "3 q’ will be entailed
by ‘if p, then q,’ though not everything which entails ‘p⊃q’ will entail ‘if p, then q.’ Indeed, we find further
parallels than those which follow simply from the facts that ‘if p, then q’
entails ‘p⊃q’ and that entailment is transitive. To laws (19)-(23)
inclusive we find no parallels for ‘if.’ But for (15) (p⊃j).JJ⊃? (16) (P ⊃q).~qZ)~p (17) p'⊃q s ~q1)~p (18) (?⊃j).(?
⊃r) ⊃ (p⊃r) we find that, with certain reservations, 1 the following
parallel laws hold good : (1 The reservations are important. It is, e. g.,
often impossible to apply entailment-rule (iii) directly without obtaining
incorrect or absurd results. Some modification of the structure of the clauses
of the hypothetical is commonly necessary. But formal logic gives us no guide
as to which modifications are required. If we apply rule (iii) to our specimen
hypothetical sentences, without modifying at all the tenses or moods of the
individual clauses, we obtain expressions which are scarcely English. If we
preserve as nearly as possible the tense-mood structure, in the simplest way
consistent with grammatical requirements, we obtain the sentences : If the
Germans had not won the war, they would not have invaded England in
1940.) If half the staff had not been dismissed, Jones would not be in
charge. If the match is not cancelled, it will not rain. But these sentences,
so far from being logically equivalent to the originals, have in each case a
quite different sense. It is possible, at least in some such cases, to frame
sentences of more or less the appropriate pattern for which one can imagine a
use and which do stand in the required logical relationship to the original
sentences (e.g., ‘If it is not the case that half the staff has been dismissed,
then Jones can't be in charge;’ or ‘If the Germans did not win the war, it's
only because they did not invade England in 1940;’ or even (should historical
evidence become improbably scanty), ‘If the Germans did not win the war, it
can't be true that they invaded England in 1940’). These changes reflect
differences in the circumstances in which one might use these, as opposed to
the original, sentences. Thus the sentence beginning ‘If Jones were in charge
…’ would normally, though not necessarily, be used by a man who antecedently
knows that Jones is not in charge : the sentence beginning ‘If it's not the
case that half the staff has been dismissed …’ by a man who is working towards
the conclusion that Jones is not in charge. To say that the sentences are
nevertheless logically equivalent is to point to the fact that the grounds for
accepting either, would, in different circumstances, have been grounds for
accepting the soundness of the move from ‘Jones is in charge’ to ‘Half the
staff has been dismissed.’) (i) (if p,
then q; and p)^q (ii) (if p, then qt and not-g) Dnot-j? (iii) (if p, then f) ⊃ (if not-0, then not-j?) (iv) (if p, then f ; and iff, then
r) ⊃(if j>, then r) (One must remember that calling the
formulae (i)-(iv) is the same as saying that, e.g., in the case of (iii), c if
p, then q ' entails 4 if not-g, then not-j> '.) And similarly we find that,
for some steps which would be invalid for 4 if ', there are corresponding steps
that would be invalid for “⊃,” e. g. (p^q).q :. p are invalid inference-patterns,
and so are if p, then q ; and q /. p if p, then ; and not-j? /. not-f .The
formal analogy here may be described by saying that neither * p 13 q ' nor * if
j?, then q * is a simply convertible formula. We have found many laws (e.g.,
(19)-(23)) which hold for “⊃” and not for “if.” As an example of
a law which holds for “if,” but not for
“⊃,” we may give the analytic formula “ ~[(if p, then q) * (if
p, then not-g)]’. The corresponding formula 4 ~[(P 3 ?) * (j? 3 ~?}]’ is not
analytic, but (el (28)) is equivalent to the contingent formula ‘~~p.’ The
rules to the effect that formulae such as (19)-{23) are analytic are sometimes
referred to as ‘paradoxes of implication.’ This is a misnomer. If ‘⊃’ is taken as identical either with ‘entails’ or, more
widely, with ‘if ... then …’ in its
standard use, the rules are not paradoxical, but simply incorrect. If ‘⊃’ is given the meaning it has in the system of truth functions,
the rules are not paradoxical, but simple and platitudinous consequences of the
meaning given to the symbol. Throughout this section, I have spoken of a
‘primary or standard’ use of “if … then …,” or “if,” of which the main
characteristics were: that for each hypothetical statement made by this use of
“if,” there could be made just one statement which would be the antecedent of
the hypothetical and just one statement which would be its consequent; that the
hypothetical statement is acceptable (true, reasonable) if the antecedent
statement, if made or accepted, would, in the circumstances, be a good ground
or reason for accepting the consequent statement; and that the making of the
hypothetical statement carries the implication either of uncertainty about, or
of disbelief in, the fulfilment of both antecedent and consequent. (1 Not all
uses of * if ', however, exhibit all these characteristics. In particular,
there is a use which has an equal claim to rank as standard and which is
closely connected with the use described, but which does not exhibit the first
characteristic and for which the description of the remainder must consequently
be modified. I have in mind what are sometimes called 'variable' or 'general’
hypothetical : e.g., ‘lf ice is left in the sun, it melts,’ ‘If the side of a
triangle is produced, the exterior angle is equal to the sum of the two
interior and opposite angles ' ; ' If a child is very strictly disciplined in
the nursery, it will develop aggressive tendencies in adult life,’ and so on.
To a statement made by the use of a sentence such as these there corresponds no
single pair of statements which are, respectively, its antecedent and
consequent. On the other 1 There is much more than this to be said about this
way of using ‘if;’ in particular, about the meaning of the question whether the
antecedent would be a good ground or reason for accepting the consequent and
about the exact way in which this question is related to the question of
whether the hypothetical is true {acceptable, reasonable) or not hand, for
every such statement there is an indefinite number of non-general hypothetical
statements which might be called exemplifications, applications, of the
variable hypothetical; e.g., a statement made by the use of the sentence ‘If
this piece of ice is left in the sun, it will melt.’ To the subject of variable
hypothetical I may return later. 1 Two relatively uncommon uses of ‘if’ may be
illustrated respectively by the sentences ‘If he felt embarrassed, he showed no
signs of it’ and ‘If he has passed his exam, I’m a Dutchman (I'll eat my hat,
&c.)’ The sufficient and necessary condition of the truth of a statement
made by the first is that the man referred to showed no sign of embarrassment.
Consequently, such a statement cannot be treated either as a standard
hypothetical or as a material implication. Examples of the second kind are
sometimes erroneously treated as evidence that ‘if’ does, after all, behave
somewhat as ‘⊃’ behaves. The evidence for this is, presumably, the facts
(i) that there is no connexion between antecedent and consequent; (ii) that the
consequent is obviously not (or not to be) fulfilled ; (iii) that the intention
of the speaker is plainly to give emphatic expression to the conviction that
the antecedent is not fulfilled either ; and (iv) the fact that “(p ⊃ q) . ~q” entails “~p.” But this is a strange piece of
logic. For, on any possible interpretation, “if p then q” has, in respect of
(iv), the same logical powers as ‘p⊃q;’
and it is just these logical powers that we are jokingly (or fantastically)
exploiting. It is the absence of connexion referred to in (i) that makes it a
quirk, a verbal flourish, an odd use of ‘if.’ If hypothetical statements were
material implications, the statements would be not a quirkish oddity, but a
linguistic sobriety and a simple truth. Finally, we may note that ‘if’ can be employed not simply in making
statements, but in, e.g., making provisional announcements of intention (e.g.,
‘If it rains, I shall stay at home’) which, like unconditional announcements of
intention, we do not call true or false but describe in some other way. If the
man who utters the quoted sentence leaves home in spite of the rain, we do not
say that what he said was false, though we might say that he lied (never really
intended to stay in) ; or that he changed his mind. There are further uses of
‘if’ which I shall not discuss. 1 v. ch. 7, I. The safest way to read the
material implication sign is, perhaps, ‘not both … and not …’ The material
equivalence sign ‘≡’ has the meaning given by the
following definition : p q =df=⊃/'(p⊃ff).(sOj)'
and the phrase with which it is sometimes identified, viz., ‘if and only if,’
has the meaning given by the following definition: ‘p if and only if q’ =df ‘if
p then g, and if q then p.’ Consequently, the objections which hold against the
identification of ‘p⊃q” with ‘if p then q’ hold with double force against the
identification of “p≡q’ with ‘p if and only if q.’ ‘If’
is of particular interest to Grice. The interest in the ‘if’ is double in
Grice. In doxastic contexts, he needs it for his analysis of ‘intending’
against an ‘if’-based dispositional (i.e. subjective-conditional) analysis. He
is of course, later interested in how Strawson misinterpreted the ‘indicative’
conditional! It is later when he starts to focus on the ‘buletic’ mode marker,
that he wants to reach to Paton’s categorical (i.e. non-hypothetical)
imperative. And in so doing, he has to face the criticism of those Oxonian
philosophers who were sceptical about the very idea of a conditional buletic
(‘conditional command – what kind of a command is that?’. Grice would refere to
the protasis, or antecedent, as a relativiser – where we go again to the
‘absolutum’-‘relativum’ distinction. The conditional is also paramount in
Grice’s criticism of Ryle, where the keyword would rather be ‘disposition.’
Then ther eis the conditional and disposition. Grice is a philosophical
psychologist. Does that make sense? So are Austin (Other Minds), Hampshire
(Dispositions), Pears (Problems in philosophical psychology) and Urmson
(Parentheticals). They are ALL against Ryle’s silly analysis in terms of
single-track disposition" vs. "many-track disposition," and
"semi-disposition." If I hum and walk, I can either hum or walk. But
if I heed mindfully, while an IN-direct sensing may guide me to YOUR soul, a
DIRECT sensing guides me to MY soul. When Ogden consider attacks to meaning,
theres what he calls the psychological, which he ascribes to Locke Grices
attitude towards Ryle is difficult to assess. His most favourable assessment
comes from Retrospective epilogue, but then he is referring to Ryle’s fairy
godmother. Initially, he mentions Ryle as a philosopher engaged in, and
possibly dedicated to the practice of the prevailing Oxonian methodology, i.e.
ordinary-language philosophy. Initially, then, Grice enlists Ryle in
the regiment of ordinary-language philosophers. After introducing Athenian
dialectic and Oxonian dialectic, Grice traces some parallelisms, which should
not surprise. It is tempting to suppose that Oxonian dialectic reproduces some
ideas of Athenian dialectic. It would actually be surprising if there
were no parallels. Ryle was, after all, a skilled and enthusiastic student of
Grecian philosophy. Interestingly, Grice then has Ryles fairy godmother as
proposing the idea that, far from being a basis for rejecting the
analytic-synthetic distinction, opposition that there are initially two
distinct bundles of statements, bearing the labels analytic and synthetic,
lying around in the world of thought waiting to be noticed, provides us with the
key to making the analytic-synthetic distinction acceptable. The essay has
a verificationist ring to it. Recall Ayer and the verificationists trying to
hold water with concepts like fragile and the problem of counterfactual
conditionals vis-a-vis observational and theoretical concepts. Grices
essay has two parts: one on disposition as such, and the second,
the application to a type of psychological disposition, which
would be phenomenalist in a way, or verificationist, in that it derives from
introspection of, shall we say, empirical phenomena. Grice is going to
analyse, I want a sandwich. One person wrote in his manuscript, there is
something with the way Grice goes to work. Still. Grice says that I want a
sandwich (or I will that I eat a sandwich) is problematic, for analysis, in
that it seems to refer to experience that is essentially private and
unverifiable. An analysis of intending that p in terms of being disposed that p
is satisfied solves this. Smith wants a sandwich, or he wills that he eats a sandwich,
much as Toby needs nuts, if Smith opens the fridge and gets one. Smith is
disposed to act such that p is satisfied. This Grice opposes to the
‘special-episode’ analysis of intending that p. An utterance like I want a
sandwich iff by uttering the utterance, the utterer is describing this or that
private experience, this or that private sensation. This or that sensation
may take the form of a highly specific souly sate, like what Grice
calls a sandwich-wanting-feeling. But then, if he is not happy with the privacy
special-episode analysis, Grice is also dismissive of
Ryles behaviourism in The concept of mind, fresh from the press, which
would describe the utterance in terms purely of this or that observable
response, or behavioural output, provided this or that sensory input. Grice
became friendlier with functionalism after Lewis taught him how. The
problem or crunch is with the first person. Surely, Grice claims, one does not
need to wait to observe oneself heading for the fridge before one is in a position
to know that he is hungry. Grice poses a problem for the
protocol-reporter. You see or observe someone else, Smith, that Smith wants a
sandwich, or wills that he eats a sandwich. You ask for evidence. But when it
is the agent himself who wants the sandwich, or wills that he eats a
sandwich, Grice melodramatically puts it, I am not in the
audience, not even in the front row of the stalls; I am on the
stage. Genial, as you will agree. Grice then goes on to offer an
analysis of intend, his basic and target attitude, which he has just used to
analyse and rephrase Peirces mean and which does relies on this or that piece
of dispositional evidence, without divorcing itself completely from the
privileged status or access of first-person introspective knowledge. In
“Uncertainty,” Grice weakens his reductive analysis of intending that, from
neo-Stoutian, based on certainty, or assurance, to neo-Prichardian, based on
predicting. All very Oxonian: Stout was the sometime Wilde reader in mental
philosophy (a post usually held by a psychologist, rather than a philosopher ‒
Stouts favourite philosopher is psychologist James! ‒ and Prichard was
Cliftonian and the proper White chair of moral philosophy. And while in
“Uncertainty” he allows that willing that may receive a physicalist treatment,
qua state, hell later turn a functionalist, discussed under ‘soul, below, in
his “Method in philosophical psychology (from the banal to the bizarre”
(henceforth, “Method”), in the Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical
Association, repr. in “Conception.” Grice can easily relate to Hamsphires
"Thought and Action," a most influential essay in the Oxonian scene.
Rather than Ryle! And Grice actually addresses further topics on intention
drawing on Hampshire, Hart, and his joint collaboration with Pears. Refs.:
The main reference is Grice’s early essay on disposition and intention, The H.
P. Grice. Refs.: The main published source is Essay 4 in WOW, but there are
essays on ‘ifs and cans,’ so ‘if’ is a good keyword, on ‘entailment,’ and for
the connection with ‘intending,’ ‘disposition and intention,’ BANC.
conjunctum: In traditional parlance, one ‘pars orationis.’ Aulus Gellius writes; “What the Greeks call
cup.TrsTrXeYF®'^® we call conjunctum or copulatum, copulative sentence. For
example. The Stoic copulative sentence — CTU|j.7rE7rXEY(iEvov dEltofia — is
translated by “conjunctum” or “copulatum,” for example: „P. Scipio, son of
Paulus, was a consul twice and was given the honour of triumph and also
performed the function of censor and was the colleague of L. Mummius during his
censorship”. Here, Aulus Gellius made a noteworthy remark, referring to the
value of truth of the composing propositions ■ (a Stoic problem). In keeping
with the Stoics, he wrote: “If one element of the copulative sentence is false,
even if all the other elements are true, the copulative sentence is false” (“in
omni aiitem conjuncto si unum est mendacium etiamsi, caetera vera sunt, totum
esse mendacium dicitur”). In the identification of ‘and’ with ‘Λ’
there is already a considerable
distortion of the facts. ‘And’ can perform many jobs which ‘Λ’ cannot perform. It can, for instance, be used to couple
nouns (“Tom and William arrived”), or adjectives (“He was hungry and thirsty”),
or adverbs (“He walked slowly and painfully”); while ' . ' can be used only to
couple expressions which could appear as separate sentences. One might be
tempted to say that sentences in which “and” coupled words or phrases, were
short for sentences in which “and” couples clauses; e.g., that “He was hungry
and thirsty” was short for “He was hungry and he was thirsty.” But this is
simply false. We do not say, of anyone who uses sentences like “Tom and William
arrived,” that he is speaking elliptically, or using abbreviations. On the
contrary, it is one of the functions of “and,” to which there is no counterpart
In the case of “.,” to form plural subjects or compound predicates. Of course
it is true of many statements of the forms “x and y” are/* or ' x is /and g \
that they are logically equivalent to corresponding statements of the"
form * x Is /and yisf'oT^x is /and x is g \ But, first, this is a fact about
the use, in certain contexts, of “and,”
to which there corresponds no rule for the use of * . '. And, second, there are
countless contexts for which such an equivalence does not hold; e.g. “Tom and
Mary made friends” is not equivalent to “Tom made friends and Mary made
friends.” They mean, usually, quite different things. But notice that one could
say “Tom and Mary made friends; but not with one another.” The implication of
mutuality in the first phrase is not so strong but that it can be rejected
without self-contradiction; but it is strong enough to make the rejection a
slight shock, a literary effect. Nor does such an equivalence hold if we replace
“made friends” by “met yesterday,” “were conversing,” “got married,” or “were
playing chess.” Even “Tom and William arrived” does not mean the same as “Tom
arrived and William arrived;” for the first suggests “together” and the second
an order of arrival. It might be conceded that “and” has functions which “ .”
has not (e.g., may carry in certain contexts an implication of mutuality which
‘.’ does not), and yet claimed that the
rules which hold for “and,” where it is used to couple clauses, are the same as
the rules which hold for “.” Even this is not true. By law (11), " p , q '
is logically equivalent to * q . p ' ; but “They got married and had a child”
or “He set to work and found a job” are by no means logically equivalent to
“They had a child and got married” or “He found a job and set to work.” One
might try to avoid these difficulties by regarding ‘.’ as having the function,
not of ' and ', but of what it looks like, namely a full stop. We should then
have to desist from talking of statements of the forms ' p .q\ * p . J . r *
&CM and talk of sets-of-statements of these forms instead. But this
would not avoid all, though it would avoid some, of the difficulties. Even in a
passage of prose consisting of several indicative sentences, the order of the
sentences may be in general vital to the sense, and in particular, relevant (in
a way ruled out by law (II)) to the truth-conditions of a set-of-statements
made by such a passage. The fact is that, in general, in ordinary speech and
writing, clauses and sentences do not contribute to the truthconditions of
things said by the use of sentences and paragraphs in which they occur, in any
such simple way as that pictured by the truth-tables for the binary connectives
(' D ' * . ', 4 v ', 35 ') of the system, but in far more subtle, various, and
complex ways. But it is precisely the simplicity of the way in which, by the
definition of a truth-function, clauses joined by these connectives contribute
to the truth-conditions of sentences resulting from the junctions, which makes
possible the stylized, mechanical neatness of the logical system. It will not
do to reproach the logician for his divorce from linguistic realities, any more
than it will do to reproach the abstract painter for not being a representational
artist; but one may justly reproach him if he claims to be a representational
artist. An abstract painting may be, recognizably, a painting of something. And
the identification of “.” with ‘and,’ or with a full stop, is not a simple
mistake. There is a great deal of point in comparing them. The interpretation
of, and rules for, “.”define a minimal linguistic operation, which we might
call ‘simple conjunction’ and roughly describe as the joining together of two
(or more) statements in the process of asserting them both (or all). And this
is a part of what we often do with ' and ', and with the full stop. But we do
not string together at random any assertions we consider true; we bring them
together, in spoken or written sentences or paragraphs, only when there is some
further reason for the rapprochement, e.g., when they record successive
episodes in a single narrative. And that for the sake of which we conjoin may
confer upon the sentences embodying the conjunction logical features at
variance with the rules for “.” Thus we have seen that a statement of the form
“p and q” may carry an implication of temporal order incompatible with that
carried by the corresponding statement of the form “q and p.” This is not to
deny that statements corresponding to these, but of the forms ‘pΛq’ and ‘qΛp’would
be, if made, logically equivalent; for such statements would carry no
implications, and therefore no incompatible implications, of temporal order.
Nor is it to deny the point, and merit, of the comparison; the statement of the
form ‘pΛq’ means at least a part of what is
meant by the corresponding statement of the form ‘p and q.’ We might say: the form ‘p q’ is an abstraction from the
different uses of the form ‘p and q.’ Simple conjunction is a minimal element in
colloquial conjunction. We may speak of ‘. ‘ as the conjunctive sign; and read
it, for simplicity's sake, as “and” or “both … and … “I have already remarked
that the divergence between the meanings given to the truth-functional
constants and the meanings of the ordinary conjunctions with which they are
commonly identified is at a minimum in the cases of ' ~ ' and ‘.’ We have seen,
as well, that the remaining constants of the system can be defined in terms of
these two. Other interdefinitions are equally possible. But since ^’ and ‘.’ are more nearly identifiable with ‘not’ and
‘and’ than any other constant with any other English word, I prefer to
emphasize the definability of the remaining constants in terms of ‘ .’ and ‘~.’
It is useful to remember that every rule or law of the system can be expressed
in terms of negation and simple conjunction. The system might, indeed, be
called the System of Negation and Conjunction. Grice lists ‘and’ as the first
binary functor in his response to Strawson. Grice’s conversationalist
hypothesis applies to this central ‘connective.’ Interestingly, in his essay on
Aristotle, and discussing, “French poet,” Grice distinguishes between
conjunction and adjunction. “French” is adjuncted to ‘poet,’ unlike ‘fat’ in
‘fat philosopher.’ Refs.The main
published source is “Studies in the Way of Words” (henceforth, “WOW”), I
(especially Essays 1 and 4), “Presupposition and conversational implicature,”
in P. Cole, and the two sets on ‘Logic and conversation,’ in The H. P. Grice
Papers, BANC.
conversational avowal: Grice’s
favourite conversational avowal, mentioned by Grice, is a declaration of an
intention.. Grice starts using the phrase ‘conversational avowal’ after
exploring Ryle’s rather cursory exploration of them in The Concept of
Mind. This is interesting because in general Grice is an
anti-ryleist. The verb is of course ‘to avow,’ which is ultimately a
Latinate from ‘advocare.’ A processes or event of the soul is, on the official
view, supposed to be played out in a private theatre. Such an event is known directly
by the man who has them either through the faculty of introspection or the
‘phosphorescence’ of consciousness. The subject is, on this view,
incorrigible—his avowals of the state of his soul cannot be corrected by
others—and he is infallible—he cannot be wrong about which states he is
in. The official doctrine mistakenly construes an avowals or a report of
such an episode as issuing from a special sort of observation or perception of
shadowy existents. We should consider some differences between two sorts
of 'conversational' avowals: (i) I feel a tickle and (ii) I feel ill. If a man
feels a tickle, he has a tickle, and if he has a tickle, he feels it. But
if he feels ill, he may not be ill, and if he is ill, he may not feel
ill. Doubtless a man’s feeling ill is some evidence for his being ill. But
feeling a tickle is not evidence for his having a tickle, any more than
striking a blow is evidence for the occurrence of a blow. In ‘feel a tickle’
and ‘strike a blow’, ‘tickle’ and ‘blow’ are cognate accusatives to the verbs
‘feel’ and ‘strike’. The verb and its accusative are two expressions for
the same thing, as are the verbs and their accusatives in ‘I dreamt a dream’
and ‘I asked a question’. But ‘ill’ and ‘capable of climbing the tree’ are not cognate
accusatives to the verb ‘to feel.' So they are not in grammar bound to signify
feelings, as ‘tickle’ is in grammar bound to signify a feeling. Another
purely grammatical point shows the same thing. It is indifferent whether I say
‘I feel a tickle’ or ‘I have a tickle’; but ‘I have . . .’ cannot be completed
by ‘. . . ill’, (cf. ‘I have an illness’), ‘. . . capable of climbing the
tree’, (cf. I have a capability to climb that tree’) ‘. . . happy’ (cf. ‘I have
a feeling of happiness’ or ‘I have happiness in my life’) or ‘. . .
discontented’ (cf. ‘I have a feeling of strong discontent towards
behaviourism’). If we try to restore the verbal parallel by bringing in the
appropriate abstract nouns, we find a further incongruity; ‘I feel happiness’(I
feel as though I am experiencing happiness), ‘I feel illness’ (I feel as though
I do have an illness’) or ‘I feel ability to climb the tree’ (I feel that I am
endowed with the capability to climb that tree), if they mean anything, they do
not mean at all what a man means by uttering ‘I feel happy,’ or ‘I feel ill,’
or ‘I feel capable of climbing the tree’. On the other hand, besides these
differences between the different uses of ‘I feel . . .’ there are important
CONVERSATIONAL analogies as well. If a man says that he has a tickle, his
co-conversationalist does not ask for his evidence, or requires him to make
quite sure. Announcing a tickle is not proclaiming the results of an
investigation. A tickle is not something established by careful
witnessing, or something inferred from a clue, nor do we praise for his powers
of observation or reasoning a man who let us know that he feels tickles, tweaks
and flutters. Just the same is true of avowals of moods. If a man makes a
conversational contribution, such as‘I feel bored’, or ‘I feel depressed’, his
co-conversationalist does not usually ask him for his evidence, or request him
to make sure. The co-conversationalist may accuse the man of shamming to him or
to himself, but the co-conversationalist does not accuse him of having been
careless in his observations or rash in his inferences, since a
co-conversationalist would not usually think that his conversational avowal is
a report of an observation or a conclusion. He has not been a good or a
bad detective; he has not been a detective at all. Nothing would surprise us
more than to hear him say ‘I feel depressed’ in the alert and judicious tone of
voice of a detective, a microscopist, or a diagnostician, though this tone of
voice is perfectly congruous with the NON-AVOWAL past-tense ‘I WAS feeling
depressed’ or the NON-AVOWAL third-person report, ‘HE feels depressed’. If the
avowal is to do its conversational job, it must be said in a depressed tone of
voice. The conversational avowal must be blurted out to a sympathizer, not reported
to an investigator. Avowing ‘I feel depressed’ is doing one of the things, viz.
one CONVERSATIONAL thing, that depression is the mood to do. It is not a piece
of scientific premiss-providing, but a piece of ‘conversational moping.’That is
why, if the co-conversationalist is suspicious, he does not ask ‘Fact or
fiction?’, ‘True or false?’, ‘Reliable or unreliable?’, but ‘Sincere or
shammed?’ The CONVERSATIONAL avowal of moods requires not acumen, but
openness. It comes from the heart, not from the head. It is not
discovery, but voluntary non-concealment. Of course people have to learn how to
use avowal expressions appropriately and they may not learn these lessons very
well. They learn them from ordinary discussions of the moods of others and from
such more fruitful sources as novels and the theatre. They learn from the same
sources how to cheat both other people and themselves by making a sham
conversational avowal in the proper tone of voice and with the other proper
histrionic accompaniments. If we now raise the question ‘How does a man find
out what mood he is in?’ one can answer that if, as may not be the case, he
finds it out at all, he finds it out very much as we find it out. As we have
seen, he does not groan ‘I feel bored’ because he has found out that he is
bored, any more than the sleepy man yawns because he has found out that he is
sleepy. Rather, somewhat as the sleepy man finds out that he is sleepy by
finding, among other things, that he keeps on yawning, so the bored man finds
out that he is bored, if he does find this out, by finding that among other
things he glumly says to others and to himself ‘I feel bored’ and ‘How bored I
feel’. Such a blurted avowal is not merely one fairly reliable index among
others. It is the first and the best index, since being worded and voluntarily
uttered, it is meant to be heard and it is meant to be understood. It calls for
no sleuth-work.In some respects a conversational avowal of a moods, like ‘I
feel cheerful,’ more closely resemble announcements of sensations like ‘I feel
a tickle’ than they resemble utterances like ‘I feel better’ or ‘I feel capable
of climbing the tree’. Just as it would be absurd to say ‘I feel a tickle but
maybe I haven’t one’, so, in ordinary cases, it would be absurd to say ‘I feel cheerful
but maybe I am not’. But there would be no absurdity in saying ‘I FEEL better
but, to judge by the doctor’s attitude, perhaps I am WORSE’, or ‘I do FEEL as
if I am capable of climbing the tree but maybe I cannot climb it.’This
difference can be brought out in another way. Sometimes it is natural to say ‘I
feel AS IF I could eat a horse’, or ‘I feel AS IF my temperature has returned
to normal’. But, more more immediate conversational avowals, it would seldom if
ever be natural to say ‘I feel AS IF I were in the dumps’, or ‘I feel AS IF I
were bored’, any more than it would be natural to say ‘I feel AS IF I had a
pain’. Not much would be gained by discussing at length why we use ‘feel’ in
these different ways. There are hosts of other ways in which it is also used. I
can say ‘I felt a lump in the mattress’, ‘I felt cold’, ‘I felt queer’, ‘I felt
my jaw-muscles stiffen’, ‘I felt my gorge rise’, ‘I felt my chin with my
thumb’, ‘I felt in vain for the lever’, ‘I felt as if something important was
about to happen’, ‘I felt that there was a flaw somewhere in the argument’, ‘I
felt quite at home’, ‘I felt that he was angry’. A feature common to most
of these uses of ‘feel’ is that the utterer does not want further questions to
be put. They would be either unanswerable questions, or unaskable questions.
That he felt it is enough to settle some debates.That he merely felt it is
enough to show that debates should not even begin. Names of moods, then, are
not the names of feelings. But to be in a particular mood is to be in the mood,
among other things, to feel certain sorts of feelings in certain sorts of
situations. To be in a lazy mood, is, among other things, to tend to have
sensations of lassitude in the limbs when jobs have to be done, to have cosy
feelings of relaxation when the deck-chair is resumed, not to have electricity
feelings when the game begins, and so forth. But we are not thinking
primarily of these feelings when we say that we feel lazy; in fact, we seldom
pay much heed to sensations of these kinds, save when they are abnormally
acute. Is a name of a mood a name
of an emotion? The only tolerable reply is that of course they are, in that
some people some of the time use ‘emotion’. But then we must add that in this
usage an emotion is not something that can be segregated from thinking,
daydreaming, voluntarily doing things, grimacing or feeling pangs and itches.
To have the emotion, in this usage, which we ordinarily refer to as ‘being
bored’, is to be in the mood to think certain sorts of thoughts, and not to
think other sorts, to yawn and not to chuckle, to converse with stilted
politeness, and not to talk with animation, to feel flaccid and not to feel
resilient. Boredom is not some unique distinguishable ingredient, scene or
feature of all that its victim is doing and undergoing. Rather it is the
temporary complexion of that totality. It is not like a gust, a sunbeam, a
shower or the temperature; it is like the morning’s weather. An unstudied
conversational utterance may embody an explicit interest phrase, or a
conversational avowal, such as ‘I want it’, ‘I hope so’, ‘That’s what I
intend’, ‘I quite dislike it’, ‘Surely I am depressed’, ‘I do wonder, too’, ‘I
guess so’ and ‘I am feeling hungry.’The surface grammar (if not logical form)
makes it tempting to misconstrue all the utterances as a description. But in
its primary employment such a conversational avowal as ‘I want it’ is not used
to convey information.‘I want it’ is used to make a request or demand. ‘I want
it’ is no more meant as a contribution to general knowledge than ‘please’. For
a co-conversationalist to respond with the tag ‘Do you?’ or worse, as Grice’s
tutee, with ‘*how* do you *know* that you want it?’ is glaringly inappropriate.
Nor, in their primary employment, are conversational avowals such as ‘I hate
it’ or ‘That’s what I I intend’ used for the purpose of telling one’s addressee
facts about the utterer; or else we should not be surprised to hear them
uttered in the cool, informative tones of voice in which one says ‘HE hates it’
and ‘That’s what he intends’. We expect a conversational avowal, on the
contrary, to be spoken in a revolted and a resolute tone of voice respectively.
It is an utterances of a man in a revolted and resolute frame of mind. A
conversational avowal is a thing said in detestation and resolution and not a
thing said in order to advance biographical knowledge about detestations and
resolutions. A man who notices the unstudied utterances of the utterer,
who may or may not be himself, is, if his interest in the utterer has the
appropriate direction, especially well situated to pass comments upon the
qualities and frames of mind of its author.‘avowal’ as a philosophical lexeme
may not invite an immediate correlate in the Graeco-Roman, ultimately Grecian,
tradition. ‘Confessio’ springs to mind, but this is not what Grice is thinking
about. He is more concerned with issues of privileged access and
incorrigibility, or corrigibility, rather, as per the alleged immediacy of a
first-person report of the form, “I feel that …” . Grice does use ‘avowal’
often especially in the early stages, when the logical scepticism about
incorrigibility comes under attack. Just to be different, Grice is interested
in the corrigibility of the avowal. The issue is of some importance in his
account of the act of communication, and how one can disimplicate what one
means. Grice loves to play with his tutee doubting as to whether he means that
p or q. Except at Oxford, the whole thing has a ridiculous ring to it. I want
you to bring me a paper by Friday. You mean the newspaper? You very well know
what I mean. But perhaps you do not. Are you sure you mean a philosophy paper
when you utter, ‘I want you to bring a paper by Friday’? As Grice notes, in
case of self-deception and egcrateia, it may well be that the utterer does not
know what he desires, if not what he intends, if anything. Freud and Foucault
run galore. The topic will interest a collaborator of Grice’s, Pears, with his
concept of ‘motivated irrationality.’ Grice likes to discuss a category
mistake. I may be categorically mistaken but I am not categorically
confused. Now when it comes to avowal-avowal, it is only natural that if he is
interested in Aristotle on ‘hedone,’ Grice would be interested in
Aristotle on ‘lupe.’ This is very philosophical, as Urmson agrees. Can one
‘fake’ pain? Why would one fake pain? Oddly, this is for Grice the origin of
language. Is pleasure just the absence of pain? Liddell and Soctt have “λύπη”
and render it as pain of body, oἡδον; also, sad plight or condition, but also
pain of mind, grief; “ά; δῆγμα δὲ λύπης οὐδὲν ἐφ᾽ ἧπαρ προσικνεῖται; τί γὰρ
καλὸν ζῆν βίοτον, ὃς λύπας φέρει; ἐρωτικὴ λ.’ λύπας προσβάλλειν;” “λ. φέρειν
τινί; oχαρά.” Oddly, Grice goes back to pain in Princeton, since it is explored
by Smart in his identity thesis. Take pain. Surely, Grice tells the
Princetonians, it sounds harsh, to echo Berkeley, to say that it is the brain
of Smith being in this or that a state which is justified by insufficient
evidence; whereas it surely sounds less harsh that it is the C-fibres that
constitute his ‘pain,’ which he can thereby fake. Grice distinguishes between a
complete unstructured utterance token – “Ouch” – versus a complete
syntactically structured erotetic utterance of the type, “Are you in pain?”. At
the Jowett, Corpus Barnes has read Ogden and says ‘Ouch’ (‘Oh’) bears an
‘emotional’ or ‘emotive’ communicatum provided there is an intention there
somewhere. Otherwise, no communicatum occurs. But if there is an intention, the
‘Oh’ can always be a fake. Grice distinguishes between a ‘fake’ and a ‘sneak.’
If U intends A to perceive ‘Oh’ as a fake, U means that he is in pain. If there
is a sneaky intention behind the utterance, which U does NOT intend his A to
recognise, there is no communicatum. Grice criticises emotivism as rushing
ahead to analyse a nuance before exploring what sort of a nuance it is. Surely
there is more to the allegedly ‘pseudo-descriptive’ ‘x is good,’ than U meaning
that U emotionally approves of x. In his ‘myth,’ Grice uses pain magisterially
as an excellent example for a privileged-access allegedly incorrigible avowal,
and stage 0 in his creature progression. By uttering ‘Oh!,’ under voluntary
control, Barnes means, iconically, that he is in pain. Pain fall under the
broader keyword: emotion, as anger does. Cf. Aristotle on the emotion in De
An., Rhet., and Eth. Nich. Knowing that at Oxford, if you are a classicist, you
are not a philosopher, Grice never explores the Stoic, say, approach to pain,
or lack thereof (“Which is good, since Walter Pater did it for me!”). Refs.:
“Can I have a pain in my tail?” The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
conversational
benevolence: The type of rationality that Grice sees in conversational is one
that sees conversation as ‘rational co-operation.’ So it is obvious that he has
to invoke some level of benevolence. When tutoring his rather egoistic tutees
he had to be careful, so he hastened to add a principle of conversational
self-love. It was different when lecturing outside a tutorial! In fact
‘benevolence’ here is best understood as ‘altruism’. So, if there is a
principle of conversational egoism, there is a correlative principle of
conversational altruism. If Grice uses ‘self-love,’ there is nothing about
‘love,’ in ‘benevolence.’ Butler may have used ‘other-love’! Even if of course
we must start with the Grecians! We must not forget that Plato and Aristotle
despised "autophilia", the complacency and self-satisfaction making
it into the opposite of "epimeleia heautou” in Plato’s Alcibiades.
Similarly, to criticize Socratic ethics as a form of egoism in opposition to a
selfless care of others is inappropriate. Neither a self-interested seeker of
wisdom nor a dangerous teacher of self-love, Socrates, as the master of
epimeleia heautou, is the hinge between the care of self and others. One has to
be careful here. A folk-etymological connection between ‘foam’ may not be
needed – when the Romans had to deal with Grecian ‘aphrodite.’ This requires
that we look for another linguistic botany for Grecian ‘self-love’ that Grice
opposes to ‘benevolentia.’ Hesiod derives Aphrodite from “ἀφρός,” ‘sea-foam,’ interpreting
the name as "risen from the foam", but most modern scholars regard
this as a spurious folk etymology. Early modern scholars of classical mythology
attempted to argue that Aphrodite's name was of Griceain or Indo-European
origin, but these efforts have now been mostly abandoned. Aphrodite's name is
generally accepted to be of non-Greek, probably Semitic, origin, but its exact
derivation cannot be determined. Scholars in the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, accepting Hesiod's "foam" etymology as genuine,
analyzed the second part of Aphrodite's name as -odítē "wanderer" or -dítē
"bright". Janda, also accepting Hesiod's etymology, has argued in
favor of the latter of these interpretations and claims the story of a birth
from the foam as an Indo-European mytheme. Similarly, an Indo-European compound
abʰor-, very" and dʰei- "to shine" have been proposed, also
referring to Eos. Other have argued that these hypotheses are unlikely since
Aphrodite's attributes are entirely different from those of both Eos and the
Vedic deity Ushas.A number of improbable non-Greek etymologies have also been
suggested. One Semitic etymology compares Aphrodite to the Assyrian ‘barīrītu,’
the name of a female demon that appears in Middle Babylonian and Late
Babylonian texts. Hammarström looks to Etruscan, comparing eprϑni
"lord", an Etruscan honorific loaned into Greek as πρύτανις.This
would make the theonym in origin an honorific, "the lady".Most
scholars reject this etymology as implausible, especially since Aphrodite
actually appears in Etruscan in the borrowed form Apru (from Greek Aphrō, clipped
form of Aphrodite). The medieval Etymologicum Magnum offers a highly contrived
etymology, deriving Aphrodite from the compound habrodíaitos (ἁβροδίαιτος),
"she who lives delicately", from habrós and díaita. The alteration
from b to ph is explained as a "familiar" characteristic of Greek
"obvious from the Macedonians". It is much easier with the Romans. Lewis and Short have ‘ămor,’ old form “ămŏs,”
“like honos, labos, colos, etc.’ obviously from ‘amare,’ and which they render
as ‘love,’ as in Grice’s “conversational self-love.” Your tutor will reprimand
you if you spend too much linguistic botany on ‘eros.’ “Go straight to
‘philos.’” But no. There are philosophical usages of ‘eros,’ especially when it
comes to the Grecian philosophers Grice is interested in: Aristotle reading
Plato, which becomes Ariskant reading Plathegel. So, Liddell and Scott have
“ἔρως” which of course is from a verb, or two: “ἕραμαι,” “ἐράω,” and which they
render as “love, mostly of the sexual passion, ““θηλυκρατὴς ἔ.,” “ἐρῶσ᾽ ἔρωτ᾽
ἔκδημον,” “ἔ. τινός love for one, S.Tr.433, “παίδων” E. Ion67, and “generally,
love of a thing, desire for it,” ““πατρῴας γῆς” “δεινὸς εὐκλείας ἔ.” “ἔχειν
ἔμφυτον ἔρωτα περί τι” Plato, Lg. 782e ; “πρὸς τοὺς λόγους” (love of law),
“ἔρωτα σχὼν τῆς Ἑλλάδος τύραννος γενέσθαι” Hdt.5.32 ; ἔ. ἔχει με c. inf.,
A.Supp.521 ; “θανόντι κείνῳ συνθανεῖν ἔρως μ᾽ ἔχει” S.Fr.953 ; “αὐτοῖς ἦν ἔρως
θρόνους ἐᾶσθαι” Id.OC367 ; ἔ. ἐμπίπτει μοι c. inf., A.Ag.341, cf. Th.6.24 ; εἰς
ἔρωτά τινος ἀφικέσθαι, ἐλθεῖν, Antiph.212.3,Anaxil.21.5 : pl., loves, amours,
“ἀλλοτρίων” Pi.N.3.30 ; “οὐχ ὅσιοι ἔ.” E.Hipp.765 (lyr.) ; “ἔρωτες ἐμᾶς πόλεως”
Ar.Av.1316 (lyr.), etc. ; of dolphins, “πρὸς παῖδας” Arist.HA631a10 :
generally, desires, S.Ant.617 (lyr.). 2. object of love or desire, “ἀπρόσικτοι
ἔρωτες” Pi.N.11.48, cf. Luc.Tim.14. 3. passionate joy, S.Aj.693 (lyr.); the god
of love, Anacr.65, Parm.13, E.Hipp.525 (lyr.), etc.“Έ. ἀνίκατε μάχαν” S.Ant.781
(lyr.) : in pl., Simon.184.3, etc. III. at Nicaea, a funeral wreath, EM379.54.
IV. name of the κλῆρος Ἀφροδίτης, Cat.Cod.Astr.1.168 ; = third κλῆρος,
Paul.Al.K.3; one of the τόποι, Vett.Val.69.16. And they’ll point to you that
the Romans had ‘amor’ AND ‘cupidus’ (which they meant as a transliteration of
epithumia). If for Kant and Grice it is the intention that matters, ill-will
counts. If Smith does not want Jones have a job, Smith has ill-will towards
Jones. This is all Kant and Grice need to call Smith a bad person. It means it
is the ill-will that causes Joness not having a job. A conceptual elucidation.
Interesting from a historical point of view seeing that Grice had introduced a
principle of conversational benevolence (i.e. conversational goodwill) pretty
early. Malevolentia was over-used by Cicero, translating the Grecian. Grice
judges that if Jones fails to get the job that benevolent Smith promised, Smith
may still be deemed, for Kant, if not Aristotle, to have given him the
job. A similar elucidation was carried by Urmson with his idea of
supererogation (heroism and sainthood). For a hero or saint, someones goodwill
but not be good enough! Which does not mean it is ill, either! Refs.: The
source is Grice’s seminar in the first set on ‘Logic and conversation.’ The H.
P. Grice Papers, BANC.
conversational category. One has to be careful here. Grice does speak of this
or that ‘conversational category.’ Seeing that he is ‘echoing,’ as he puts it,
Ariskant, we migt just as well have an entry for each of the four. These would
be the category of conversational quantity, the category of conversational
quality, the category of conversational relation, and the category of
conversational modality. Note that in this rephrasing Grice applies
‘conversational’ directly to the category. As Boethius pointed out (and Grice
loved to read Minio-Paullelo’s edition of Boethus’s commentary on the
Categories), the motivation by Aristotle to posit this or that category was
expository. A mind cannot know a multitude of things, so we have to ‘reduce’
things. It is important to note that while ‘quantitas,’ ‘qualitas’ ‘relatio’
and ‘modus’ are used by Kant, he actually augments the number of categories.
These four would be supra-categories. The sub-categories, or categories
themselves turn out to be twelve. Kant proposed 12 categories: unity,
plurality, and totality for concept of quantity; reality, negation, and
limitation, for the concept of quality; inherence and subsistence, cause and
effect, and community for the concept of relation; and
possibility-impossibility, existence-nonexistence, and necessity and
contingency. Kategorien sind nach Kant apriorisch und unmittelbar gegeben.
Sie sind Werkzeuge des Urteilens und Werkzeuge des Denkens. Als solche dienen
sie nur der Anwendung und haben keine Existenz. Sie bestehen somit nur im
menschlichen Verstand. Sie sind nicht an Erfahrung gebunden.[5] Durch ihre Unmittelbarkeit sind sie auch nicht an
Zeichen gebunden.[6] Kants erkenntnistheoretisches Ziel ist es, über
die Bedingungen der Geltungskraft von Urteilen Auskunft zu geben. Ohne diese
Auskunft können zwar vielerlei Urteile gefällt werden, sie müssen dann
allerdings als „systematische Doktrin(en)“ bezeichnet werden.[7] Kant kritisiert damit das rein analytische Denken
der Wissenschaft als falsch und stellt ihm die Notwendigkeit des
synthetisierenden Denkens gegenüber.[8] Kant begründet die Geltungskraft mit dem Transzendentalen Subjekt.[9] Das Transzendentalsubjekt ist dabei ein reiner
Reflexionsbegriff, welcher das synthetisierende Dritte darstellt (wie in
späteren Philosophien Geist (Hegel), Wille, Macht, Sprache und Wert (Marx)),
das nicht durch die Sinne wahrnehmbar ist. Kant sucht hier die Antwort auf die
Frage, wie der Mensch als vernunftbegabtes Wesen konstituiert werden kann,
nicht in der Analyse, sondern in einer Synthesis.[10]Bei Immanuel Kant, der somit als bedeutender Erneuerer der bis dahin
„vorkritischen“ Kategorienlehre gilt, finden sich zwölf „Kategorien der reinen
Vernunft“. Für Kant sind diese Kategorien Verstandesbegriffe, nicht
aber Ausdruck des tatsächlichen Seins der Dinge an sich. Damit wandelt sich die ontologische Sichtweise der Tradition in eine erkenntnistheoretische Betrachtung, weshalb Kants „kritische“
Philosophie (seit der Kritik der
reinen Vernunft) oft
auch als „Kopernikanische
Wende in der
Philosophie“ bezeichnet wird.Quantität, Qualität, Relation und Modalität sind die vier grundlegenden Urteilsfunktionen des
Verstandes, nach denen die Kategorien gebildet werden. Demnach sind z. B.
der Urteilsfunktion „Quantität“ die Kategorien bzw. Urteile „Einheit“,
„Vielheit“ und „Allheit“ untergeordnet, und der Urteilsfunktion „Relation“ die
Urteile der „Ursache“ und der „Wirkung“.Siehe
auch: Kritik der
reinen Vernunft und Transzendentale
AnalytikBereits
bei Friedrich
Adolf Trendelenburg findet
man den Hinweis auf die verbreitete Kritik, dass Kant die den Kategorien
zugrunde liegenden Urteilsformen nicht systematisch hergeleitet und damit als
notwendig begründet hat. Einer der Kritikpunkte ist dabei, dass die Kategorien
sich teilweise auf Anschauungen (Einzelheit, Realität, Dasein), teilweise auf
Abstraktionen wie Zusammenfassen, Begrenzen oder Begründen (Vielheit, Allheit,
Negation, Limitation, Möglichkeit, Notwendigkeit) beziehen.
conversational co-operation – used by Grice WOW:368 – previously, ‘rational
cooperation’ – what cooperation is not rational? He uses ‘converational
cooperation” and “supreme principle of conversational cooperation” (369). He
uses ‘supreme conversational principle” of “cooperativeness” (369), to avoid
seeing the conversational imperatives as an unorganized heap of conversational
obligations.
conversational
explicitum: Grice distinguishes between the conversational explicitum and the
conversational explicatum. Grice plays with ‘explicit’ and ‘implicit’ at
various places. He often uses ‘explicit’and ‘implicit’ adverbially: the utterer
explicitly conveys that p versus the utterer implicitly conveys that p (hints
that p, suggests that p, indicates that p, implicates that p, implies that p).
Grice regards that both dimensions form part of the total act of signification,
accepting as a neutral variant, that the utterer has signified that p.
conversational
helpfulness: helpfulness is Grice’s favourite virtue. He dedicates a set of
seven lectures to it, entitled as follows. Lecture 1, Prolegomena; Lecture 2:
Logic and Conversation; Lecture 3: Further notes on logic and conversation;
Lecture 4: Indicative conditionals; Lecture 5: Us meaning and intentions;
Lecture 6: Us meaning, sentence-meaning, and word-meaning; and Lecture 7: Some
models for implicature. I hope they dont expect me to lecture on
James! Grice admired James, but not vice versa. Grice entitled the
set as being Logic and Conversation. That is the title, also, of the second
lecture. Grice keeps those titles seeing that it was way the whole set of
lectures were frequently cited, and that the second lecture had been published
under that title in Davidson and Harman, The Logic of Grammar. The
content of each lecture is indicated below. In the first, Grice manages to
quote from Witters. In the last, he didnt! The original set
consisted of seven lectures. To wit: Prolegomena, Logic and conversation,
Further notes on logic and conversation, Indicative Conditionals, Us meaning
and intentions, Us meaning, sentence-meaning, and word meaning, and Some models
for implicature. They were pretty successful at Oxford. While the notion of an
implicatum had been introduced by Grice at Oxford, even in connection with a
principle of conversational helpfulness, he takes the occasion now to explore
the type of rationality involved. Observation of the principle of
conversational helpfulness is rational (reasonable) along the following lines:
anyone who cares about the two central goals to conversation (give/receive
information, influence/be influened) is expected to have an interest in
participating in a conversation that is only going to be profitable given that
it is conducted along the lines set by the principle of conversational helpfulness.
In Prolegomena he lists Austin, Strawson, Hare, Hart, and himself, as victims
of a disregard for the implicatum. In the third lecture he introduces his
razor, Senses are not to be muliplied beyond necessity. In Indicative
conditionals he tackles Strawson on if as not representing the horse-shoe of
Whitehead and Russell. The next two lectures on the meaning by the utterer and
intentions, and meaning by the utterer, sentence-meaning, and word-meaning
refine his earlier, more austere, account of this particularly Peirceian
phenomenon. He concludes the lectures with an exploration on the relevance of
the implicatum to philosophical psychology. Grice was well aware that many
philosophers had become enamoured with the s. and would love to give it a continuous
perusal. The set is indeed grandiose. It starts with a Prolegomena to set the
scene: He notably quotes himself in it, which helps, but also Strawson, which
sort of justifies the general title. In the second lecture, Logic and
Conversation, he expands on the principle of conversational helpfulness and the
explicitum/implicatum distinction – all very rationalist! The third lecture is
otiose in that he makes fun of Ockham: Senses are not to be multiplied beyond
necessity. The fourth lecture, on Indicative conditionals, is indeed on MOST of
the formal devices he had mentioned on Lecture II, notably the functors (rather
than the quantifiers and the iota operator, with which he deals in
Presupposition and conversational implicature, since, as he notes, they refer
to reference). This lecture is the centrepiece of the set. In the fifth
lecture, he plays with mean, and discovers that it is attached to the
implicatum or the implicitum. In the sixth lecture, he becomes a nominalist, to
use Bennetts phrase, as he deals with dog and shaggy in terms of this or that
resultant procedure. Dont ask me what they are! Finally, in “Some models for
implicature,” he attacks the charge of circularity, and refers to
nineteenth-century explorations on the idea of thought without language alla
Wundt. I dont think a set of James lectures had even been so comprehensive!
Conversational helpfulness. This is Grice at his methodological best. He was
aware that the type of philosophying he was about to criticise wass a bit
dated, but whats wrong with being old-fashioned? While this may be seen as a
development of his views on implicature at that seminal Oxford seminar, it may
also be seen as Grice popularising the views for a New-World, non-Oxonian
audience. A discussion of Oxonian philosophers of the play group of Grice,
notably Austin, Hare, Hart, and Strawson. He adds himself for good measure
(“Causal theory”). Philosophers, even at Oxford, have to be careful with the
attention that is due to general principles of discourse. Grice quotes philosophers
of an earlier generation, such as Ryle, and some interpreters or practitioners
of Oxonian analysis, such as Benjamin and Searle. He even manages to quote from
Witterss Philosophical investigations, on seeing a banana as a banana. There
are further items in the Grice collection that address Austins manoeuvre,
Austin on ifs and cans, Ifs and cans, : conditional, power. Two of
Grices favourites. He opposed Strawsons view on if. Grice thought that if was
the horseshoe of Whitehead and Russell, provided we add an implicatum to an
entailment. The can is merely dispositional, if not alla Ryle, alla Grice!
Ifs and cans, intention, disposition. Austin had brought the topic to the
fore as an exploration of free will. Pears had noted that conversational implicature
may account for the conditional perfection (if yields iff). Cf. Ayers on
Austin on if and can. Recall that for Grice the most idiomatic way to express a
disposition is with the Subjectsive mode, the if, and the can ‒ The ice can
break. Cf. the mistake: It is not the case that what you must do, you can do.
The can-may distinction is one Grice played with too. As with will and shall,
the attachment of one mode to one of the lexemes is pretty arbitrary and not
etymologically justified ‒ pace Fowler on it being a privilege of this or that
Southern Englishman as Fowler is. If he calls it Prolegomena, he is being
jocular. Philosophers Mistakes would have been too provocative. Benjamin, or
rather Broad, erred, and so did Ryle, and Ludwig Witters, and my friends,
Austin (the mater that wobbled), and in order of seniority, Hart (I heard him
defend this about carefully – stopping at every door in case a dog comes out at
breakneck speed), Hare (To say good is to approve), and Strawson (“Logical
theory”: To utter if p, q is to implicate some inferrability, To say true! is
to endorse – Analysis). If he ends with Searle, he is being jocular. He quotes
Searle from an essay in British philosophy in Lecture I, and from an essay in
Philosophy in America in Lecture V. He loved Searle, and expands on the Texas
oilmens club example! We may think of Grice as a linguistic botanizer or a
meta-linguistic botanizer: his hobby was to collect philosophers mistakes, and
he catalogued them. In Causal theory he produces his first list of seven. The
pillar box seems red to me. One cannot see a dagger as a dagger. Moore didnt
know that the objects before him were his own hands. What is actual is not also
possible. For someone to be called responsible, his action should be condemnable.
A cause must be given only of something abnormal or unusual (cf. ætiology). If
you know it, you dont believe it. In the Prolegomena, the taxonomy is more
complicated. Examples A (the use of an expression, by Austin, Benjamin, Grice,
Hart, Ryle, Wittgenstein), Examples B (Strawson on and, or, and especially if),
and Examples C (Strawson on true and Hare on good – the performative theories).
But even if his taxonomy is more complicated, he makes it more SO by giving
other examples as he goes on to discuss how to assess the philosophical
mistake. Cf. his elaboration on trying, I saw Mrs. Smith cashing a cheque,
Trying to cash a cheque, you mean. Or cf. his remarks on remember, and There is
an analogy here with a case by Wittgenstein. In summary, he wants to say. Its
the philosopher who makes his big mistake. He has detected, as Grice has it,
some conversational nuance. Now he wants to exploit it. But before rushing
ahead to exploit the conversational nuance he has detected, or identified, or
collected in his exercise of linguistic botanising, the philosopher should let
us know with clarity what type of a nuance it is. For Grice wants to know that
the nuance depends on a general principle (of goal-directed behaviour in
general, and most likely rational) governing discourse – that participants in a
conversation should be aware of, and not on some minutiæ that has been
identified by the philosopher making the mistake, unsystematically, and merely
descriptively, and taxonomically, but without ONE drop of explanatory adequacy.
The fact that he directs this to his junior Strawson is the sad thing. The rest
are all Grices seniors! The point is of philosophical interest, rather than
other. And he keeps citing philosophers, Tarski or Ramsey, in the third James
leture, to elaborate the point about true in Prolegomena. He never seems
interested in anything but an item being of philosophical interest, even if
that means HIS and MINE! On top, he is being Oxonian: Only at Oxford my
colleagues were so obsessed, as it has never been seen anywhere else, about the
nuances of conversation. Only they were all making a big mistake in having no
clue as to what the underlying theory of conversation as rational co-operation
would simplify things for them – and how! If I introduce the explicatum as a
concession, I shall hope I will be pardoned! Is Grices intention epagogic, or
diagogic in Prolegomena? Is he trying to educate Strawson, or just delighting
in proving Strawson wrong? We think the former. The fact that he quotes himself
shows that Grice is concerned with something he still sees, and for the rest of
his life will see, as a valid philosophical problem. If philosophy generated no
problems it would be dead. Refs.: The main sources are the two sets on ‘logic
and conversation.’ There are good paraphrases in other essays when he
summarises his own views, as he did at Urbana. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
conversational
imperative: In most versions that Grice provides of the ‘general expectations’
of rational discourse, he chooses the obvious imperative form. On occasion he
does use ‘imperative.’ Grice is vague as to the term of choice for this or that
‘expectation.’ According to Strawson, Grice even once used ‘conversational
rule,’ and he does use ‘conversational rule of the conversational game of
making this or that conversational move.’ Notably, he also uses ‘conversational
principle,’ and ‘conversational desideratum.’ And ‘maxim’! And ‘conversational
directive (371), and ‘conversational obligation’ (369). By ‘conversational
maxim,’ he means ‘conversational maxim.’ He uses ‘conversational sub-maxim’
very occasionally. He rather uses ‘conversational super-maxim.’ He uses
‘immanuel,’ and he uses ‘conversational immanuel.’ It is worth noting that the
choice of word influences the exegesis. Loar takes these things to be
‘empirical generalisations over functional states’! And Grice agrees that there
is a dull, empiricist way, in which these things can be seen as things people
conform to. There is a quasi-contractualist approach to: things people convene
on. And there is an Ariskantian approach: things people SHOULD abide by. Surely
Grice is not requiring that the conversationalists ARE explicitly or
consciously AWARE of these things. There is a principle of effort of economical
reason to cope with that!
conversational
implicatum: Grice loved an implicatum. And an implicature. An elaboration of
his Oxonian seminar on Logic and conversation. Theres a principle of
conversational helpfulness, which includes a desideratum of conversational
candour and a desideratum of conversational clarity, and the sub-principle of
conversational self-interest clashing with the sub-principle of conversational
benevolence. The whole point of the manoeuvre is to provide a rational basis
for a conversational implicatum, as his term of art goes. Observation of the
principle of conversational helpfulness is rational/reasonable along the
following lines: anyone who is interested in the two goals conversation is
supposed to serve ‒ give/receive information, influence/be influenced ‒ should
only care to enter a conversation that will be only profitable under the
assumption that it is conducted in accordance with the principle of
conversational helfpulness, and attending desiderata and sub-principles. Grice
takes special care in listing tests for the proof that an implicatum is
conversational in this rather technical usage: a conversational implicatum is
rationally calculable (it is the content of a psychological state, attitude or
stance that the addressee assigns to the utterer on condition that he is being
helpful), non-detachable, indeterminate, and very cancellable, thus never part
of the sense and never an entailment of this or that piece of philosophical
vocabulary, in Davidson and Harman, the logic of Grammar, also in Cole and
Morgan, repr. in a revised form in Grice, logic and conversation, the second James
lecture, : principle of conversational helpfulness, implicatum,
cancellability. While the essay was also repr. by Cole and Morgan. Grice
always cites it from the two-column reprint in The Logic of Grammar, ed. by
Davidson and Harman. Most people without a philosophical background first encounter
Grice through this essay. A philosopher usually gets first acquainted with his
In defence of a dogma, or Meaning. In Logic and Conversation, Grice
re-utilises the notion of an implicatum and the principle of conversational helpfulness
that he introduced at Oxford to a more select audience. The idea Grice is that
the observation of the principle of conversational helfpulness is rational
(reasonable) along the following lines: anyone who is concerned with the
two goals which are central to conversation (to give/receive information,
to influence/be influenced) should be interested in participating in a
conversation that is only going to be profitable on the assumption that it
is conducted along the lines of the principle of conversational
helfpulness. Grices point is methodological. He is not at all interested
in conversational exchanges as such. Unfortunately, the essay starts in
media res, and skips Grices careful list of Oxonian examples of disregard
for the key idea of what a conversant implicates by the conversational
move he makes. His concession is that there is an explicatum or explicitum
(roughly, the logical form) which is beyond pragmatic constraints. This
concession is easily explained in terms of his overarching irreverent,
conservative, dissenting rationalism. This lecture alone had been read by
a few philosophers leaving them confused. I do not know what Davidson and
Harman were thinking when they reprinted just this in The logic of grammar. I
mean: it is obviously in media res. Grice starts with the logical devices, and
never again takes the topic up. Then he explores metaphor, irony, and
hyperbole, and surely the philosopher who bought The logic of grammar must be
left puzzled. He has to wait sometime to see the thing in full completion.
Oxonian philosophers would, out of etiquette, hardly quote from unpublished
material! Cohen had to rely on memory, and thats why he got all his Grice
wrong! And so did Strawson in If and the horseshoe. Even Walker responding to
Cohen is relying on memory. Few philosophers quote from The logic of grammar.
At Oxford, everybody knew what Grice was up to. Hare was talking implicature in
Mind, and Pears was talking conversational implicature in Ifs and cans. And
Platts was dedicating a full chapter to “Causal Theory”. It seems the Oxonian
etiquette was to quote from Causal Theory. It was obvious that Grices
implication excursus had to read implicature! In a few dictionaries of
philosophy, such as Hamlyns, under implication, a reference to Grices locus
classicus Causal theory is made – Passmore quotes from Causal theory in Hundred
years of philosophy. Very few Oxonians would care to buy a volume published in
Encino. Not many Oxonian philosophers ever quoted The logic of grammar, though.
At Oxford, Grices implicata remained part of the unwritten doctrines of a few.
And philosophers would not cite a cajoled essay in the references. The
implicatum allows a display of truth-functional Grice. For
substitutional-quantificational Grice we have to wait for his treatment of the.
In Prolegomena, Grice had quoted verbatim from Strawsons infamous idea that
there is a sense of inferrability with if. While the lecture covers much more
than if (He only said if; Oh, no, he said a great deal more than that! the
title was never meant to be original. Grice in fact provides a rational
justification for the three connectives (and, or, and if) and before that, the
unary functor not. Embedding, Indicative conditionals: embedding, not and If,
Sinton on Grice on denials of indicative conditionals, not, if. Strawson
had elaborated on what he felt was a divergence between Whiteheads and Russells
horseshoe, and if. Grice thought Strawsons observations could be understood in
terms of entailment + implicatum (Robbing Peter to Pay Paul). But problems, as
first noted to Grice, by Cohen, of Oxford, remain, when it comes to the scope
of the implicatum within the operation of, say, negation. Analogous problems
arise with implicata for the other earlier dyadic functors, and and or, and
Grice looks for a single explanation of the phenomenon. The qualification
indicative is modal. Ordinary language allows for if utterances to be in modes
other than the imperative. Counter-factual, if you need to be philosophical krypto-technical,
Subjectsive is you are more of a classicist! Grice took a cavalier to the
problem: Surely it wont do to say You couldnt have done that, since you were in
Seattle, to someone who figuratively tells you hes spend the full summer
cleaning the Aegean stables. This, to philosophers, is the centerpiece of the
lectures. Grice takes good care of not, and, or, and concludes with the if of
the title. For each, he finds a métier, alla Cook Wilson in Statement and
Inference. And they all connect with rationality. So he is using material from
his Oxford seminars on the principle of conversational helpfulness. Plus Cook
Wilson makes more sense at Oxford than at Harvard! The last bit, citing Kripke
and Dummett, is meant as jocular. What is important is the teleological
approach to the operators, where a note should be made about dyadicity. In
Prolegomena, when he introduces the topic, he omits not (about which he was
almost obsessed!). He just gives an example for and (He went to bed and took
off his dirty boots), one for or (the garden becomes Oxford and the kitchen
becomes London, and the implicatum is in terms, oddly, of ignorance: My wife is
either in town or country,making fun of Town and Country), and if. His
favourite illustration for if is Cock Robin: If the Sparrow did not kill him,
the Lark did! This is because Grice is serious about the erotetic, i.e.
question/answer, format Cook Wilson gives to things, but he manages to bring
Philonian and Megarian into the picture, just to impress! Most importantly, he introduces
the square brackets! Hell use them again in Presupposition and Conversational
Implicature and turns them into subscripts in Vacuous Namess. This is central.
For he wants to impoverish the idea of the implicatum. The explicitum is
minimal, and any divergence is syntactic-cum-pragmatic import. The scope
devices are syntactic and eliminable, and as he knows: what the eye no longer
sees, the heart no longer grieves for! The modal implicatum. Since
Grice uses indicative, for the title of his third James lecture (Indicative
Conditionals) surely he implicates subjunctive ‒ i.e. that someone
might be thinking that he should give an account of indicative-cum-subjective. This
relates to an example Grice gives in Causal theory, that he does not reproduce
in Prolegomena. Grice states the philosophical mistake as follows. What is
actual is not also possible. Grice seems to be suggesting that a subjective
conditional would involve one or other of the modalities, he is not interested
in exploring. On the other hand, Mackie has noted that Grices conversationalist
hypothesis (Mackie quotes verbatim from Grices principle of conversational
helpfulness) allows for an explanation of the Subjectsive if that does not
involve Kripke-type paradoxes involving possible worlds, or other. In Causal
Theory, Grice notes that the issue with which he has been mainly concerned may
be thought rather a fine point, but it is certainly not an isolated one. There
are several philosophical theses or dicta which would he thinks need to be
examined in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently parallel to the
thesis which Grice has been discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same
general kind. An examples which occurs to me is the following. What is actual
is not also possible. I must emphasise that I am not saying that this example
is importantly similar to the thesis which I have been criticizing, only that,
for all I know, it may be. To put the matter more generally, the position
adopted by Grices objector seems to Grice to involve a type of manoeuvre which
is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing. He is
not condemning that kind of manoeuvre. He is merely suggesting that to embark
on it without due caution is to risk collision with the facts. Before we rush
ahead to exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detected, we should make
sure that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuances they are. If was also of
special interest to Grice for many other reasons. He defends a dispositional
account of intending that in terms of ifs and cans. He considers akrasia
conditionally. He explored the hypothetical-categorical distinction in the
buletic mode. He was concerned with therefore as involved with the associated
if of entailment. Refs.: “Implicatum” is introduced in Essay 2 in WoW –
but there are scattered references elsewhere. He often uses the plural
‘implicata’ too, as in “Retrospective Epilogue,” The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
An implicatum requires a complexum. Frege was the topic of the explorations by
Dummett. A tutee of Grices once brought Dummetts Frege to a tutorial and
told Grice that he intended to explore this. Have you read it? No I
havent, Grice answered. And after a pause, he went on: And I hope I will not.
Hardly promising, the tutee thought. Some authors, including Grice, but
alas, not Frege, have noted some similarities between Grices notion of a
conventional implicature and Freges schematic and genial rambles on colouring.
Aber Farbung, as Frege would state! Grice was more interested in the idea of a
Fregeian sense, but he felt that if he had to play with Freges aber he should!
One of Grices metaphysical construction-routines, the Humeian projection, is
aimed at the generation of concepts, in most cases the rational reconstruction
of an intuitive concept displayed in ordinary discourse. We arrive at something
like a Fregeian sense. Grice exclaimed, with an intonation of Eureka, almost.
And then he went back to Frege. Grices German was good, so he could read
Frege, in the vernacular. For fun, he read Frege to his children (Grices, not
Freges): In einem obliquen Kontext, Frege says, Grice says, kann ja z. B. die
Ersetzung eines „aber durch ein „und, die in einem direkten Kontext keinen
Unterschied des Wahrheitswerts ergibt, einen solchen Unterschied bewirken. Ill
make that easy for you, darlings: und is and, and aber is but. But surely,
Papa, aber is not cognate with but! Its not. That is Anglo-Saxon, for you. But
is strictly Anglo-Saxon short for by-out; we lost aber when we sailed the North
Sea. Grice went on: Damit wird eine Abgrenzung von Sinn und Färbung (oder
Konnotationen) eines Satzes fragwürdig. I. e. he is saying that She was poor
but she was honest only conventionally implicates that there is a contrast
between her poverty and her honesty. I guess he heard the ditty during the War?
Grice ignored that remark, and went on: Appell und Kundgabe wären ferner von
Sinn und Färbung genauer zu unterscheiden. Ich weiß so auf interessante
Bedeutungs Komponenten hin, bemüht sich aber nicht, sie genauer zu
differenzieren, da er letztlich nur betonen will, daß sie in der Sprache der
Logik keine Rolle spielen. They play a role in the lingo, that is! What do?
Stuff like but. But surely they are not rational conversational implicata!? No,
dear, just conventional tricks you can ignore on a nice summer day! Grice
however was never interested in what he dismissively labels the conventional
implicatum. He identifies it because he felt he must! Surely, the way some
Oxonian philosophers learn to use stuff like, on the one hand, and on the
other, (or how Grice learned how to use men and de in Grecian), or so, or
therefore, or but versus and, is just to allow that he would still use imply in
such cases. But surely he wants conversational to stick with rationality:
conversational maxim and converational implicatum only apply to things which
can be justified transcendentally, and not idiosyncrasies of usage! Grice
follows Church in noting that Russell misreads Frege as being guilty of
ignoring the use-mention distinction, when he doesnt. One thing that Grice
minimises is that Freges assertion sign is composite. Tha is why Baker prefers
to use the dot “.” as the doxastic correlative for the buletic sign ! which is
NOT composite. The sign „├‟ is composite. Frege explains his Urteilstrich, the
vertical component of his sign ├ as conveying assertoric force. The principal
role of the horizontal component as such is to prevent the appearance of
assertoric force belonging to a token of what does not express a thought (e.g.
the expression 22). ─p expresses a thought even if p does not.) cf. Hares four
sub-atomic particles: phrastic (dictum), neustic (dictor), tropic, and clistic.
Cf. Grice on the radix controversy: We do not want the “.” in p to become a
vanishing sign. Grices Frege, Frege, Words, and Sentences, Frege, Farbung,
aber. Frege was one of Grices obsessions. A Fregeian sense is an explicatum, or
implicitum, a concession to get his principle of conversational helpfulness
working in the generation of conversational implicata, that can only mean
progress for philosophy! Fregeian senses are not to be multiplied beyond
necessity. The employment of the routine of Humeian projection may be
expected to deliver for us, as its result, a concept – the concept(ion)
of value, say, in something like a Fregeian sense, rather than an
object. There is also a strong affinity between Freges treatment of
colouring (of the German particle aber, say) and Grices idea of a convetional
implicatum (She was poor, but she was honest,/and her parents were the
same,/till she met a city feller,/and she lost her honest Names, as the vulgar
Great War ditty went). Grice does not seem interested in providing a
philosophical exploration of conventional implicata, and there is a reason for
this. Conventional implicata are not essentially connected, as
conversational implicata are, with rationality. Conventional implicata cannot
be calculable. They have less of a philosophical interest, too, in that they
are not cancellable. Grice sees cancellability as a way to prove some
(contemporary to him, if dated) ordinary-language philosophers who analyse an
expression in terms of sense and entailment, where a cancellable conversational
implicatum is all there is (to it). He mentions Benjamin in Prolegomena,
and is very careful in noting how Benjamin misuses a Fregeian sense. In his
Causal theory, Grice lists another mistake: What is known to be the case is not
believed to be the case. Grice gives pretty few example of a conventional
implicatum: therefore, as in the utterance by Jill: Jack is an Englishman; he
is, therefore, brave. This is interesting because therefore compares to so
which Strawson, in PGRICE, claims is the asserted counterpart to if. But
Strawson is never associated with the type of linguistic botany that Grice is.
Grice also mentions the idiom, on the one hand/on the other hand, in some
detail in “Epilogue”: My aunt was a nurse in the Great War; my sister, on the
other hand, lives on a peak at Darien. Grice thinks that Frege misuses the
use-mention distinction but Russell corrects that. Grice bases this on Church.
And of course he is obsessed with the assertion sign by Frege, which Grice
thinks has one stroke tooo many. The main reference is give above for
‘complexum.’ Those without a philosophical background tend to ignore a joke by
Grice. His echoing Kant in the James is a joke, in the sense that he is using
Katns well-known to be pretty artificial quartet of ontological caegories to
apply to a totally different phenomenon: the taxonomy of the maxims! In his
earlier non-jocular attempts, he applied more philosophical concepts with a
more serious rationale. His key concept, conversation as rational co-operation,
underlies all his attempts. A pretty worked-out model is in terms then of this
central, or overarching principle of conversational helpfulness (where
conversation as cooperation need not be qualified as conversation as rational
co-operation) and being structured by two contrasting sub-principles: the
principle of conversational benevolence (which almost overlaps with the
principle of conversational helpfulness) and the slightly more jocular
principle of conversational self-love. There is something oxymoronic about
self-love being conversational, and this is what leads to replace the two subprinciples
by a principle of conversational helfpulness (as used in WoW:IV) simpliciter.
His desideratum of conversational candour is key. The clash between the
desideratum of conversational candour and the desideratum of conversational
clarity (call them supermaxims) explains why I believe that p (less clear than
p) shows the primacy of candour over clarity. The idea remains of an
overarching principle and a set of more specific guidelines. Non-Oxonian
philosophers would see Grices appeal to this or that guideline as ad hoc, but
not his tutees! Grice finds inspiration in Joseph Butler’s sermon on benevolence
and self-love, in his sermon 9, upon the love of our neighbour, preached on
advent Sunday. And if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended
in this saying, Namesly, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, Romans xiii.
9. It is commonly observed, that there is a disposition in men to complain
of the viciousness and corruption of the age in which they live, as greater
than that of former ones: which is usually followed with this further
observation, that mankind has been in that respect much the same in all times.
Now, to determine whether this last be not contradicted by the accounts of
history: thus much can scarce be doubted, that vice and folly takes different
turns, and some particular kinds of it are more open and avowed in some ages
than in others; and, I suppose, it may be spoken of as very much the
distinction of the present, to profess a contracted spirit, and greater regards
to self-interest, than appears to have been done formerly. Upon this account it
seems worth while to inquire, whether private interest is likely to be promoted
in proportion to the degree in which self-love engrosses us, and prevails over
all other principles; "or whether the contracted affection may not
possibly be so prevalent as to disappoint itself, and even contradict its own
end, private good?" Repr. in revised form as WOW, I. Grice felt
the need to go back to his explantion (cf. Fisher, Never contradict. Never
explain) of the nuances about seem and cause (“Causal theory”.). Grice uses ‘My
wife is in the kitchen or the bedroom,’ by Smith, as relying on a requirement
of discourse. But there must be more to it. Variations on a theme by Grice.
Make your contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by
the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are
engaged. Variations on a theme by Grice. I wish to represent a
certain subclass of non-conventional implicaturcs, which I shall
call conversational implicaturcs, as being essentially connected with
certain general features of discourse; so my next step is to try to say what
these features are. The following may provide a first approximation to a
general principle. Our talk exchanges do not normally consist of a succession
of disconnected remarks, and would not be rational if they did. They are
characteristically, to some degree at least, cooperative efforts; and each
participant recognizes in them, to some extent, a common purpose or set of
purposes, or at least a mutually accepted direction. This purpose or direction
may be fixed from the start (e.g., by an initial proposal of a question for
discussion), or it may evolve during the exchange; it may be fairly definite,
or it may be so indefinite as to leave very considerable latitude to the
participants, as in a casual conversation. But at each stage, some possible
conversational moves would be excluded as conversationally unsuitable. We might
then formulate a rough general principle which participants will be expected
ceteris paribus to observe, viz.: Make your conversational contribution such as
is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or
direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged. One might label this
the co-operative principle. We might then formulate a rough general principle
which participants will be expected ceteris paribus to
observe, viz.: Make your contribution such as is required, at the
stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk
exchange in which you are engaged. One might label this the Cooperative
Principle. Strictly, the principle itself is not co-operative: conversants
are. Less literary variant: Make your move such as is required by the
accepted goal of the conversation in which you are engaged. But why logic and
conversation? Logica had been part of the trivium for ages ‒ Although they
called it dialectica, then. Grice on the seven liberal arts. Moved by
Strawsons treatment of the formal devices in “Introduction to logical theory”
(henceforth, “Logical theory”), Grice targets these, in their
ordinary-discourse counterparts. Strawson indeed characterizes Grice as his
logic tutor – Strawson was following a PPE., and his approach to logic is
practical. His philosophy tutor was Mabbott. For Grice, with a M. A. Lit.
Hum. the situation is different. Grice knows that the Categoriae and De Int. of
his beloved Aristotle are part of the Logical Organon which had been so
influential in the history of philosophy. Grice attempts to reconcile
Strawsons observations with the idea that the formal devices reproduce some
sort of explicatum, or explicitum, as identified by Whitehead and Russell in
Principia Mathematica. In the proceedings, Grice has to rely on some general
features of discourse, or conversation as a rational co-operation. The
alleged divergence between the ordinary-language operators and their formal
counterparts is explained in terms of the conversational implicata, then.
I.e. the content of the psychological attitude that the addressee A has to
ascribe to the utterer U to account for any divergence between the formal
device and its alleged ordinary-language counterpart, while still assuming that
U is engaged in a co-operative transaction. The utterer and his
addressee are seen as caring for the mutual goals of conversation ‒
the exchange of information and the institution of decisions ‒ and
judging that conversation will only be profitable (and thus reasonable and rational)
if conducted under some form of principle of conversational helpfulness. The
observation of a principle of conversational helpfulness is
reasonable (rational) along the following lines: anyone who cares
about the goals that are central to conversation/communication (such as giving
and receiving information, influencing and being influenced by others) must be
expected to have an interest, given suitable circumstances, in participating in
a conversation that will be profitable ONLY on the assumption that it is
conducted in general accordance with a principle of conversational
helpfulness. In titling his seminar Logic and conversation, Grice is
thinking Strawson. After all, in the seminal “Logical theory,” that every
Oxonian student was reading, Strawson had the cheek to admit that he never
ceased to learn logic from his tutor, Grice. Yet he elaborates a totally anti
Griceian view of things. To be fair to Strawson, the only segment where he
acknwoledges Grices difference of opinion is a brief footnote, concerning the
strength or lack thereof, of this or that quantified utterance. Strawson uses
an adjective that Grice will seldom do, pragmatic. On top, Strawson attributes
the adjective to rule. For Grice, in Strawsons wording, there is this or that
pragmatic rule to the effect that one should make a stronger rather than a
weaker conversational move. Strawsons Introduction was published before Grice
aired his views for the Aristotelian Society. In this seminar then Grice takes
the opportunity to correct a few misunderstandings. Important in that it
is Grices occasion to introduce the principle of conversational helpfulness as
generating implicata under the assumption of rationality. The lecture makes it
obvious that Grices interest is methodological, and not philological. He is not
interest in conversation per se, but only as the source for his principle of
conversational helpfulness and the notion of the conversational implicatum,
which springs from the distinction between what an utterer implies and what his
expression does, a distinction apparently denied by Witters and all too
frequently ignored by Austin. Logic and conversation, an Oxford seminar,
implicatum, principle of conversational helpfulness, eywords: conversational
implicature, conversational implicatum. Conversational Implicature Grices
main invention, one which trades on the distinction between what an utterer
implies and what his expression does. A distinction apparently denied by
Witters, and all too frequently ignored by, of all people, Austin. Grice is
implicating that Austins sympathies were for the Subjectsification of
Linguistic Nature. Grice remains an obdurate individualist, and never
loses sight of the distinction that gives rise to the conversational
implicatum, which can very well be hyper-contextualised, idiosyncratic, and
perfectly particularized. His gives an Oxonian example. I can very well mean
that my tutee is to bring me a philosophical essay next week by uttering It is
raining.Grice notes that since the object of the present exercise, is to
provide a bit of theory which will explain, for a certain family of
cases, why is it that a particular implicature is present, I
would suggest that the final test of the adequacy and utility of this
model should be: can it be used to construct an explanation of the presence of
such an implicature, and is it more comprehensive and more economical than any
rival? is the no doubt pre-theoretical explanation which one would be
prompted to give of such an implicature consistent with, or better still a
favourable pointer towards the requirements involved in the model? cf.
Sidonius: Far otherwise: whoever disputes with you will find those protagonists
of heresy, the Stoics, Cynics, and Peripatetics, shattered with their own arms
and their own engines; for their heathen followers, if they resist the
doctrine and spirit of Christianity, will, under your teaching, be caught
in their own familiar entanglements, and fall headlong into their
own toils; the barbed syllogism of your arguments will hook the
glib tongues of the casuists, and it is you who will tie
up their slippery questions in categorical clews, after the
manner of a clever physician, who, when compelled by reasoned thought, prepares
antidotes for poison even from a serpent.qvin potivs experietvr qvisqve
conflixerit stoicos cynicos peripateticos hæresiarchas propriis armis propriis
qvoqve concvti machiNamesntis nam sectatores eorum Christiano dogmati ac sensvi
si repvgnaverint mox te magistro ligati vernaculis implicaturis in
retia sua præcipites implagabvntur syllogismis tuæ propositionis vncatis
volvbilem tergiversantvm lingvam inhamantibvs dum spiris categoricis lubricas
qvæstiones tv potivs innodas acrivm more medicorvm qui remedivm contra venena
cum ratio compellit et de serpente conficivnt. If he lectured on Logic and
Conversation on implicature, Grice must have thought that Strawsons area was
central. Yet, as he had done in Causal theory and as he will at Harvard, Grice
kept collecting philosophers mistakes. So its best to see Grice as a
methodologist, and as using logic and conversation as an illustration of his
favourite manoeuvre, indeed, central philosophical manoeuver that gave him a
place in the history of philosophy. Restricting this manoeuvre to just an area
minimises it. On the other hand, there has to be a balance: surely logic and
conversation is a topic of intrinsic interest, and we cannot expect all
philosophers – unless they are Griceians – to keep a broad unitarian view of
philosophy as a virtuous whole. Philosophy, like virtue, is entire.
Destructive implicature to it: Mr. Puddle is our man in æsthetics implicates
that he is not good at it. What is important to Grice is that the mistakes of
these philosophers (notably Strawson!) arise from some linguistic phenomena, or,
since we must use singular expressions this or that linguistic phenomenon. Or
as Grice puts it, it is this or that linguistic phenomenon which provides the
material for the philosopher to make his mistake! So, to solve it, his theory
of conversation as rational co-operation is posited – technically, as a way to
explain (never merely describe, which Grice found boring ‒ if English, cf.
never explain, never apologise ‒ Jacky Fisher: Never contradict. Never
explain.) these phenomena – his principle of conversational helpfulness and the
idea of a conversational implicatum. The latter is based not so much on
rationality per se, but on the implicit-explicit distinction that he constantly
plays with, since his earlier semiotic-oriented explorations of Peirce. But
back to this or that linguistic phenomenon, while he would make fun of Searle
for providing this or that linguistic phenomenon that no philosopher would ever
feel excited about, Grice himself was a bit of a master in illustrating this a
philosophical point with this or that linguistic phenomenon that would not be
necessarily connected with philosophy. Grice rarely quotes authors, but surely
the section in “Causal theory,” where he lists seven philosophical theses
(which are ripe for an implicatum treatment) would be familiar enough for anybody
to be able to drop a names to attach to each. At Harvard, almost every example
Grice gives of this or that linguistic phenomenon is UN-authored (and sometimes
he expands on his own view of them, just to amuse his audience – and show how
committed to this or that thesis he was), but some are not unauthored. And they
all belong to the linguistic turn: In his three groups of examples, Grice
quotes from Ryle (who thinks he knows about ordinary language), Witters, Austin
(he quotes him in great detail, from Pretending, Plea of excuses, and No
modification without aberration,), Strawson (in “Logical theory” and on Truth
for Analysis), Hart (as I have heard him expand on this), Grice, Searle, and
Benjamin. Grice implicates Hare on ‘good,’ etc. When we mention the
explicit/implicit distinction as source for the implicatum, we are referring to
Grices own wording in Retrospective epilogue where he mentions an utterer as
conveying in some explicit fashion this or that, as opposed to a gentler, more
(midland or southern) English, way, via implicature, or implIciture, if you
mustnt. Cf. Fowler: As a southern Englishman, Ive stopped trying teaching a
northern Englishman the distinction between ought and shall. He seems to get it
always wrong. It may be worth exploring how this connects with rationality. His
point would be that that an assumption that the rational principle of
conversational helpfulness is in order allows P-1 not just to convey in a
direct explicit fashion that p, but in an implicit fashion that q, where q is
the implicatum. The principle of conversational helpfulness as generator of
this or that implicata, to use Grices word (generate). Surely, He took off his
boots and went to bed; I wont say in which order sounds hardly in the vein of
conversational helpfulness – but provided Grice does not see it as logically
incoherent, it is still a rational (if not reasonable) thing to say. The point
may be difficult to discern, but you never know. The utterer may be conveying,
Viva Boole. Grices point about rationality is mentioned in his later
Prolegomena, on at least two occasions. Rational behaviour is the phrase he
uses (as applied first to communication and then to discourse) and in stark
opposition with a convention-based approach he rightly associates with Austin.
Grice is here less interested here as he will be on rationality, but
coooperation as such. Helpfulness as a reasonable expecation (normative?), a
mutual one between decent chaps, as he puts it. His charming decent chap is so
Oxonian. His tutee would expect no less ‒ and indeed no more! A rather obscure
exploration on the connection of semiotics and philosophical psychology. Grice
is aware that there is an allegation in the air about a possible vicious circle
in trying to define category of expression in terms of a category of
representation. He does not provide a solution to the problem which hell take
up in his Method in philosophical psychology, in his role of President of the
APA. It is the implicatum behind the lecture that matters, since Grice
will go back to it, notably in the Retrospective Epilogue. For Grice, its all
rational enough. Theres a P, in a situation, say of danger – a bull ‒. He
perceives the bull. The bulls attack causes this perception. Bull! the P1 G1
screams, and causes in P2 G2 a rearguard movement. So where is
the circularity? Some pedants would have it that Bull cannot be understood in a
belief about a bull which is about a bull. Not Grice. It is nice that he
brought back implicature, which had become obliterated in the lectures, back to
title position! But it is also noteworthy, that these are not explicitly
rationalist models for implicature. He had played with a model, and an
explanatory one at that, for implicature, in his Oxford seminar, in terms of a
principle of conversational helpfulness, a desideratum of conversational
clarity, a desideratum of conversational candour, and two sub-principles: a
principle of conversational benevolence, and a principle of conversational
self-interest! Surely Harvard could be spared of the details! Implicature.
Grice disliked a presupposition. BANC also contains a folder for Odd ends:
Urbana and non-Urbana. Grice continues with the elaboration of a formal
calculus. He originally baptised it System Q in honour of Quine. At a
later stage, Myro will re-Names it System G, in a special version, System GHP,
a highly powerful/hopefully plausible version of System G, in gratitude to
Grice. Odd Ends: Urbana and Not Urbana, Odds and ends: Urbana and not
Urbana, or not-Urbana, or Odds and ends: Urbana and non Urbana, or Oddents,
urbane and not urbane, semantics, Urbana lectures. The Urbana lectures are
on language and reality. Grice keeps revising them, as these items
show. Language and reality, The University of Illinois at Urbana, The
Urbana Lectures, Language and reference, language and reality, The Urbana
lectures, University of Illinois at Urbana, language, reference, reality. Grice
favours a transcendental approach to communication. A beliefs by a
communicator worth communicating has to be true. An order by a
communicator worth communicating has to be satisfactory. The fourth lecture is
the one Grice dates in WOW . Smith has not ceased from beating his wife,
presupposition and conversational implicature, in Radical pragmatics, ed. by R.
Cole, repr. in a revised form in Grice, WOW, II, Explorations in semantics and
metaphysics, essay, presupposition and implicature, presupposition,
conversational implicature, implicature, Strawson. Grice: The loyalty examiner
will not summon you, do not worry. The cancellation by Grice could be pretty
subtle. Well, the loyalty examiner will not be summoning you at any rate. Grice
goes back to the issue of negation and not. If, Grice notes, is is a matter of
dispute whether the government has a very undercover person who interrogates
those whose loyalty is suspect and who, if he existed, could be legitimately
referred to as the loyalty examiner; and if, further, I am known to be very
sceptical about the existence of such a person, I could perfectly well say to a
plainly loyal person, Well, the loyalty examiner will not be summoning you at
any rate, without, Grice would think, being taken to imply that such a
person exists. Further, if the utterer U is well known to disbelieve in the
existence of such a person, though others are inclined to believe in him, when
U finds a man who is apprised of Us position, but who is worried in case he is
summoned, U may try to reassure him by uttering, The loyalty examiner will not
summon you, do not worry. Then it would be clear that U uttered this because U
is sure there is no such person. The lecture was variously reprinted, but the
Urbana should remain the preferred citation. There are divergences in the
various drafts, though. The original source of this exploration was a
seminar. Grice is interested in re-conceptualising Strawsons manoeuvre
regarding presupposition as involving what Grice disregards as a metaphysical
concoction: the truth-value gap. In Grices view, based on a principle of
conversational tailoring that falls under his principle of conversational
helpfulness ‒ indeed under the desideratum of conversational clarity
(be perspicuous [sic]). The king of France is bald entails there is a king of
France; while The king of France aint bald merely implicates it. Grice
much preferred Collingwoods to Strawsons presuppositions! Grice thought, and
rightly, too, that if his notion of the conversational implicatum was to gain
Oxonian currency, it should supersede Strawsons idea of the
præ-suppositum. Strawson, in his attack to Russell, had been playing with
Quines idea of a truth-value gap. Grice shows that neither the metaphysical
concoction of a truth-value gap nor the philosophical tool of the
præ-suppositum is needed. The king of France is bald entails that there is a
king of France. It is part of what U is logically committed to by what he
explicitly conveys. By uttering, The king of France is not bald on the other
hand, U merely implicitly conveys or implicates that there is a king of France.
A perfectly adequate, or impeccable, as Grice prefers, cancellation, abiding
with the principle of conversational helpfulness is in the offing. The king of
France ain’t bald. What made you think he is? For starters, he ain’t real!
Grice credits Sluga for having pointed out to him the way to deal with the
definite descriptor or definite article or the iota quantifier the formally.
One thing Russell discovered is that the variable denoting function is to be
deduced from the variable propositional function, and is not to be taken as an
indefinable. Russell tries to do without the iota i as an indefinable, but
fails. The success by Russell later, in On denoting, is the source of all his
subsequent progress. The iota quantifier consists of an inverted iota to be
read the individuum x, as in (℩x).F(x). Grice opts for the
Whiteheadian-Russellian standard rendition, in terms of the iota operator.
Grices take on Strawson is a strong one. The king of France is bald; entails
there is a king of France, and what the utterer explicitly conveys is
doxastically unsatisfactory. The king of France aint bald does not. By uttering
The king of France aint bald U only implicates that there is a king of France,
and what he explicitly conveys is doxastically satisfactory. Grice knew he was
not exactly robbing Peter to pay Paul, or did he? It is worth placing the
lecture in context. Soon after delivering in the New World his exploration on
the implicatum, Grice has no better idea than to promote Strawsons philosophy
in the New World. Strawson will later reflect on the colder shores of the Old
World, so we know what Grice had in mind! Strawsons main claim to fame in the
New World (and at least Oxford in the Old World) was his On referring, where he
had had the cheek to say that by uttering, The king of France is not bald, the
utterer implies that there is a king of France (if not that, as Grice has it,
that what U explicitly conveys is doxastically satisfactory. Strawson later
changed that to the utterer presupposes that there is a king of France. So
Grice knows what and who he was dealing with. Grice and Strawson had
entertained Quine at Oxford, and Strawson was particularly keen on that turn of
phrase he learned from Quine, the truth-value gap. Grice, rather, found it
pretty repulsive: Tertium exclusum! So, Grice goes on to argue that by uttering
The king of France is bald, one entailment of what U explicitly conveys is
indeed There is a king of France. However, in its negative co-relate, things
change. By uttering The king of France aint bald, the utterer merely implicitly
conveys or implicates (in a pretty cancellable format) that there is a king of
France. The king of France aint bald: theres no king of France! The loyalty
examiner is like the King of France, in ways! The piece is crucial for Grices
re-introduction of the square-bracket device: [The king of France] is bald;
[The king of France] aint bald. Whatever falls within the scope of the square
brackets is to be read as having attained common-ground status and therefore,
out of the question, to use Collingwoods jargon! Grice was very familiar with
Collingwood on presupposition, meant as an attack on Ayer. Collingwoods
reflections on presuppositions being either relative or absolute may well lie
behind Grices metaphysical construction of absolute value! The earliest exploration
by Grice on this is his infamous, Smith has not ceased from beating his wife,
discussed by Ewing in Meaninglessness for Mind. Grice goes back to the example
in the excursus on implying that in Causal Theory, and it is best to revisit
this source. Note that in the reprint in WOW Grice does NOT go, one example of
presupposition, which eventually is a type of conversational implicature.
Grices antipathy to Strawsons presupposition is metaphysical: he dislikes the
idea of a satisfactory-value-gap, as he notes in the second paragraph to Logic
and conversation. And his antipathy crossed the buletic-doxastic divide! Using φ to represent a sentence in either mode,
he stipulate that ~φ is satisfactory just in case ⌈φ⌉ is unsatisfactory. A crunch,
as he puts it, becomes obvious: ~ ⊢The king of France is bald may perhaps be
treated as equivalent to ⊢~(The king of
France is bald). But what about ~!Arrest the intruder? What do we say in cases
like, perhaps, Let it be that I now put my hand on my head or Let it be that my
bicycle faces north, in which (at least on occasion) it seems to be that
neither !p nor !~p is either satisfactory or unsatisfactory? If !p is neither
satisfactory nor unsatisfactory (if that make sense, which doesnt to me), does
the philosopher assign a third buletically satisfactory value (0.5) to !p
(buletically neuter, or indifferent). Or does the philosopher say that we have
a buletically satisfactory value gap, as Strawson, following Quine, might
prefer? This may require careful consideration; but I cannot see that the
problem proves insoluble, any more than the analogous problem connected with
Strawsons doxastic presupposition is insoluble. The difficulty is not so much
to find a solution as to select the best solution from those which present
themselves. The main reference is Essay 2 in WoW, but there are scattered
references elsewhere. Refs.: The main sources are the two
sets of ‘logic and conversation,’ in BANC, but there are scattered essays on
‘implicature’ simpliciter, too -- “Presupposition
and conversational implicature,” c. 2-f. 25; and “Convesational implicature,”
c. 4-f. 9, “Happiness, discipline, and implicatures,” c. 7-f. 6;
“Presupposition and implicature,” c. 9-f. 3, The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
conversational
maxim. Grice is echoing Kant. Maximen (subjektive Grundsätze): selbstgesetzte
Handlungsregeln, die ein Wollen ausdrücken, vs. Imperative (objektive
Grundsätze): durch praktische Vernunft bestimmt; Ratschläge, moralisch
relevante Grundsätze. („das Gesetz aber ist das objektive Prinzip, gültig für
jedes vernünftige Wesen, und der Grundsatz, nach dem es handeln soll, d. i. ein
Imperativ.“) das Problem ist jedoch die Subjektivität der Maxime. When
considering Grice’s concept of a ‘conversational maxim,’ one has to be careful.
First, he hesitated as to the choice of the label. He used ‘objective’ and
‘desideratum’ before. And while few cite this, in WoW:PandCI he adds one –
leading the number of maxims to ten, what he called the ‘conversational
catalogue.’ So when exploring the maxims, it is not necessary to see their
dependence on the four functions that Kant tabulated: quantitas, qualitas,
relatio, and modus, or quantity, quality, relation, and mode (Grice follows
Meiklejohn’s translation), but in terms of their own formulation, one by one. Grice formulates
the overarching principle: “We might then formulate a rough general principle
which participants will be expected (ceteris paribus) to observe, namely: Make
your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it
occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you
are engaged. One might label this the COOPEHATIVE PIUNCIPLE.”He then goes on to
introduce the concept of a ‘conversational maxim.’“On the assumption that some
such general principle as this is acceptable, one may perhaps distinguish four
categories under one or another of which will fall certain more specific MAXIMS maxims
and submaxims, the following of which will, in general, yield results in accordance
with the Cooperative Principle.” Note that in his
comparative “more specific maxims,” he is implicating that, in terms of the
force, the principle is a MAXIM. Had he not wanted this implicature, he could
have expressed it as: “On the assumption that some such general principle as
this is acceptable, one may perhaps distinguish four categories under one or
another of which will fall certain MAXIMS.”
He is
comparing the principle with the maxims in terms of ‘specificity.’ I.e. the
principle is the ‘summun genus,’ as it were, the category is the ‘inferior
genus,’ and the maxim is the ‘species infima.’He is having in mind something
like arbor porphyriana. For why otherwise care to distinguish in the
introductory passage, between ‘maxims and submaxims.’ This use of ‘submaxim’ is
very interesting. Because it is unique. He would rather call the four maxims as
SUPRA-maxims, supermaxim, or supramaxim. And leaving ‘maxim’ for what here he
is calling the submaxim.Note that if one challenges the ‘species infima,’ one
may proceed to distinguish this or that sub-sub-maxim falling under the maxim.
Take “Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.” Since this, as he
grants, applies mainly to informative cases, one may consider that it is
actually a subsubmaxim. The submaxim would be: “Do not say that for which you
are not entitled” (alla Nowell-Smith). And then provide one subsubmaxim for the
desideratum: “Do not give an order which you are not entitled to give” or “Do
not order that for you lack adequate authority,” and the other subsubmaxim for
the creditum: “Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.”Grice: “Echoing
Kant, I call these categories Quantity, Quality, Relation, and Manner.” Or
Mode. “Manner” may be Ross’s translation of Aristotle’s ‘mode.’ Consider the
exploration of Aristotle on ‘modus’ in Categoriae. It is such a mixed bag that
surely ‘manner’ is not inappropriate!“The category of QUANTITY” – i. e. either
the conversational category of quantity, or as one might prefer, the category of
conversational quantity – “relates to the quantity of information to be
provided,”So it’s not just ANY QUANTUM, as Aristotle or Kant, or Ariskant have
it – just QUANTITY OF INFORMATION, whatever ‘information’ is, and how the
quantity of information is to be assessed. E g. Grice surely shed doubts re:
the pillar box seems red and the pillar box is red. He had till now used
‘strength,’ even ‘logical strength,’ in terms of entailment – and here, neither
the phenomenalist nor the physicalist utterance entail the other.“and under it
fall the following maxims:”That is, he goes straight to the ‘conversational
maxim.’ He will provide supermaxim for the other three conversational
categories.Why is the category of conversational quantity lacking a
supermaxim?The reason is that it would seem redundant and verbose: ‘be
appropriately informative.’ By having TWO maxims, he is playing with a weighing
in, or balance between one maxim and the other. Cf.To say the truth, all the
truth, and nothing but the truth.No more no less.One maximm states the ‘at
most,’ the other maxim states the ‘at least.’One maxim states the ‘maxi,’ the
other maxim states the ‘min.’ Together they state the ‘maximin.’First, “Make
your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of
the exchange).”It’s the contribution which is informative, not the utterer. Cf.
“Be as informative as is required.” Grice implicates that if you make your
contribution as informative as is required YOU are being as informative as is
required. But there is a category-shift here. Grice means, ‘required BY the
goal of the exchange). e.g.How are youFine thanks – the ‘and you’ depends on
whether you are willing to ‘keep the conversation going’ or your general mood.
Second, “Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.”“ (The
second maxim is disputable;”He goes on to give a different reason. But the
primary reason is that “Do not make your contribution more informative than is
required” is ENTAILED by “Make your contribution as informative as is required
(for the current purposes of the exchange)” – vide R. M. Hare on “Imperative
inferences” IN a diagram:Make your contribution as informative as is required
(for the current purposes of the exchange)Therefore, do not make your
contribution more informative than is required (by the current purposes of the
exchange).Grice gives another reason (he will give yet a further one) why the
maxim is ‘disputable.’“it might be said that to be overinformative is not a
transgression of the CP but merely a waste of time.”For both
conversationalists, who are thereby abiding by Ferraro’s law of the least
conversational effort.”“A waste of time” relates to Grice’s previous
elaborations on ‘undue effort’ and ‘unnecessary trouble.’He is proposing a
conversational maximin.When he formulates his principle of economy of rational
effort, it is a waste of ‘time and energy.’Here it is just ‘time.’ “Energy” is
a more generic concept.“However, it might be answered that such
overinformativeness may be confusing in that it is liable to raise side
issues;”Methinks the lady doth protest too much.His example, “He was in a
blacked out city.”It does not seem to relate to the pillar boxA: What color is
the pillar boxB: It seems red.Such a ‘confusion’ and ‘side issue,’ if so designed,
is part of the implicatum.“and there may also be an indirect effect, in that
the hearers (or addressee) may be misled as a result of thinking that there is
some particular POINT in the provision of the excess of information.”Cf. Peter
Winch on “H. P. Grice’s Conversational Point.”More boringly, it is part of the
utterer’s INTENTION to provide an excess of information.”This may be
counterproductive, or not.“Meet Mr. Puddle”“Meet Mr. Puddle, our man in
nineteenth-century continental philosophy.”The introducer point: to keep the
conversation going.Effect on Grice: Mr. Puddle is hopeless at
nineteenth-century continental philosophy (OR HE IS BEING UNDERDESCRIBED). One
has to think of philosophically relevant examples here, which is all that Grice
cares for. Malcolm says, “Moore knows it; because he’s seen it!” – Malcolm
implicates that Grice will not take Malcolm’s word. So Malcom needs to provide
the excess of information, and add, to his use of ‘know,’ which Malcolm claims
Moore does not know how to use, the ‘reason’ – If knowledge is justified true
belief, Malcolm is conveying explicitly that Moore knows and ONE OF THE
CONDITIONS for it. Cf.I didn’t know you were pregnant.You still do not. (Here
the cancellation is to the third clause). Grice: “However this may be, there is
perhaps a different [second] reason for doubt about the admission of this
second maxim, viz., that its effect will be secured by a later maxim, which
concems relevance.)”He could be a lecturer. His use of ‘later’ entails he knows
in advance what he is going to say. Cf. Foucault:“there is another reason to
doubt. The effect is secured by a maxim concerning relevance.”No “later” about
it!Grice:“Under the category of QUALITY falls a supermaxim” – he forgets to
add, as per obvious, “The category of quality relates to the QUALITY of
information.” In this way, there is some reference to Aristotle’s summumm
genus. PROPOSITIO DEDICATIVA, PROPOSITIO ABDICATIVA, PROPOSITIO INFINITA. Cf.
Apuleius and Boethius on QUALITAS of propositio. Dedicatio takes priority over
abdicatio. So one expects one’s co-conversationalist to say that something IS
the case. Note too, that, if he used “more specific maxims and submaxims,” he
means “more specific supermaxims and maxims” – He is following Porophyry in being
confusing! Cf. supramaxim. Grice “-'Try to make your contribution one that is
true' –“This surely requires generality – and Grice spent the next two decades
about it. He introduced the predicate ‘acceptability.’ “Try to make your contribution
one that is acceptable”“True for your statements; good for your
desiderative-mode utterances.”“and two more specific maxims:”“1. Do not say
what you believe to be false.”There is logic here. It is easy to TRY to make
your contribution one that is true.” And it is easy NOT to say what you believe
to be false. Grice is forbidding Kant to have a maxim on us: “Be truthful!”
“Say the true!” “MAKE – don’t just TRY – to make your contribution one that is
true.”“I was only trying.”Cf. Moses, “Try not to kill” “Thou shalt trye not to
kylle.”Grice:“2. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.”This is
involved with truth. In “Truth and other enigmas,” Dummett claims that truth
is, er, an enigma. For some philosophers, all you can guarantee is that you
have evidence. Lacking evidence for what?The qualification, “adequate,” turns
the maxim slightly otiose. Do not say that for you lack evidence which would
make your contribution not a true one.However, Grice is thinking Gettier. And
Gettier allows that one CAN have ADEQUATE EVIDENCE, and p NOT be true.If we are
talking ‘acceptability’ it’s more ‘ground’ or ‘reason’, rather than ‘evidential
justification.’ Grice is especially obsessed with this, in his explorations on
‘intending,’ where ‘acceptance’ is deemed even in the lack of ‘evidential
justification,’ and leaving him wondering what he means by ‘non-evidential
justification.’“Under the category of RELATION I place a single maxim, viz.,
'Be relevant.'”The category comes from Aristotle, ‘pros it.’ And ‘re-‘ in
relation is cognate with ‘re-‘ in ‘relevant.’RELATION refers to ‘refer,’ Roman
‘referre.’ But in Anglo-Norman, you do have ‘relate’ qua verb. To ‘refer’ or
‘re-late,’ is to bring y back to x. As Russell well knows in his fight with
Bradley’s theory of ‘relation,’ a relation involves x and y. A relation is a two-place
predicate. What about X = xIs identity a relation, in the case of x = x?Can a
thing relate to itself?In cases where we introduce two variables. The maxim
states that one brings y back to x.“Mrs. Smith is an old windbag.”“The weather
has been delightful for this time of year, hasn’t it.”If INTENDED to mean, “You
ARE ignorant!,” then the conversationalist IS bring back “totally otiose remark
about the weather” to the previous insulting comment.To utter an utterly
irrelevant second move you have to be Andre Breton.“Though the maxim itself is
terse, its formulation conceals a number of problems that exercise me a good
deal: questions about what different kinds and focuses of relevance there may
be, how these shift in the course of a talk exchange, how to allow for the fact
that subjects of conversation are legitimately changed, and so on. I find the
treatment of such questions exceedingly difficult, and I hope to revert to them
in a later work.”He is having in mind Nowell-Smith, who had ‘be relevant’ as
the most important of the rules of conversational etiquette, or how etiquette
becomes logical. But Nowell-Smith felt overwhelmed by Grice and left for the
north, to settle in the very fashionable Kent. Grice is also having in mind
Urmson’s appositeness (Criteria of intensionality). “Why did you title your
painting “Maga’s Daughter”? She’s your wife!” – and Grice is also having in
mind P. F. Strawson and what Strawson has as the principle of relevance
vis-à-vis the principles of presumption of ignorance and knowledge.So it was in
the Oxonian air.“Finally, under the category of MODE, which I understand as
relating not (like the previous categories) to what is said [THE CONTENT, THE
EXPLICITUM, THE COMMUNICATUM, THE EXPLICATUM] but, rather, to HOW what is said
is to be said,”Grice says that ‘meaning’ is diaphanous. An utterer means that p
reduces to what an utterer means by x. This diaphanousness ‘meaning’ shares
with ‘seeing.’ “To expand on the experience of seeing is just to expand on what
is seen.’He is having the form-content distinction.If that is a distinction. This
multi-layered dialectic displays the true nature of the speculative
form/content distinction: all content is form and all form is content, not in a
uniform way, but through being always more or less relatively indifferent or
posited. The Role of the Form/Content
Distinction in Hegel's Science of ...deontologistics.files.wordpress.com ›
2012/01 › formc... PDF Feedback About Featured Snippets Web results The Form-Content Distinction in Moral
Development Researchwww.karger.com › Article › PDF The form-content distinction
is a potentially useful conceptual device for understanding certain
characteristics of moral development. In the most general sense it ... by CG
Levine - 1979 - Cited by 25 - Related articles The Form-Content Distinction in Moral
Development Research ...www.karger.com › Article › Abstract Dec 23, 2009 - The
Form-Content Distinction in Moral Development Research. Levine C.G.. Author
affiliations. University of Western Ontario, London, Ont. by CG Levine - 1979
- Cited by 25 - Related articles
Preschool children's mastery of the form/content distinction in
...www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov › pubmed Preschool children's mastery of the form/content
distinction in communicative tasks. Hedelin L(1), Hjelmquist E. Author
information: (1)Department of Psychology, ... by L Hedelin - 1998 - Cited by
10 - Related articles Form and
Content: An Introduction to Formal Logic - Digital ...digitalcommons.conncoll.edu
› cgi › viewcontentPDF terminology has to do with anything. In this context,
'material' means having to do with content. This is our old friend, the
form/content distinction again. Consider. by DD Turner - 2020 Simmel's Dialectic of Form and Content in
Recent Work in ...www.tandfonline.com › doi › full May 1, 2019 - This suggests
that for Simmel, the form/content distinction was not a dualism; instead, it
was a duality.11 Ronald L. Breiger, “The Duality of ... Are these distinctions between “form” and
“content” intentionally ...www.reddit.com › askphilosophy › comments ›
are_th... The form/content distinction also doesn't quite fit the distinction
between form and matter (say, in Aristotle), although Hegel develops the
distinction between form ... Preschool
Children's Mastery of the Form/Content Distinction ...link.springer.com ›
article Preschoolers' mastery of the form/content distinction in language and
communication, along its contingency on the characteristics of p. by L Hedelin
- 1998 - Cited by 10 - Related articles
Verbal Art: A Philosophy of Literature and Literary
Experiencebooks.google.com › books Even if form and content were in fact
inseparable in the sense indicated, that would not make the form/content
distinction unjustified. Form and matter are clearly ... Anders Pettersson -
2001 - Literary Criticism One Century
of Karl Jaspers' General Psychopathologybooks.google.com › books He then
outlines the most important implications of the form–content distinction in a
statement which is identical in the first three editions, with only minor ...
Giovanni Stanghellini, Thomas Fuchs - 2013 - Medical“I include the
supermaxim-'Be perspicuous' –” Or supramaxim. So the “more specific maxims and
submaxims” becomes the clumsier “supermaxims and maxims”Note that in under the
first category it is about making your contribution, etc. Now it is the utterer
himself who has to be ‘perspicuous,’ as it is the utterer who has to be
relevant. It’s not the weaker, “Make your contribution a perspicuous one.” Or “Make
your contribution a relevant one (to the purposes of the exchange).”Knowing
that most confound ‘perspicacity’ with ‘perspicuity,’ he added “sic,” but
forgot to pronounce it, in case it was felt as insulting. He has another ‘sic’
under the prolixity maxim.“and various maxims such as: The “such as” is a
colloquialism.Surely it was added in the ‘lecture’ format. In written, it
becomes viz. The fact that the numbers them makes for ‘such as’ rather
disimplicatable. “1. Avoid obscurity of expression.”Unless you are Heracleitus.
THEY told me, Heraclitus, they told me you were dead, /They brought me bitter news to hear and bitter
tears to shed./I wept as I remember'd how often you and I/Had tired the sun
with talking and sent him down the sky./And now that thou art lying, my dear
old Carian guest,/A handful of grey ashes, long, long ago at rest,/Still are
thy pleasant voices, thy nightingales, awake;/For Death, he taketh all away,
but them he cannot take. In a way this is entailed by “Be perspicuous,” if that
means ‘be clear,’ in obtuse English.Be clearTherefore, or what is the same
thing. Thou shalt not not be obscure.2. Avoid ambiguity.”Except as a trope, or
‘figure, (schema, figura). “Aequi-vocate, if that will please your clever
addressee.” Cf. Parker’s zeugma: “My apartment was so small, that I've barely enough room to lay a hat and a few friends“3.
Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity).”Here he added a ‘sic’ that he failed to
pronounce in case it may felt as insulting. But the idea of a self-refuting
conversational maxim is surely Griceian, in a quessertive way. Since this
concerns FORM rather than CONTENT, it is not meant to overlap with
‘informativeness.’So given that p and q are equally informative, if q is less
brief (longer – ars longa, vita brevis), utter p. This has nothing to do with
logical strength. It is just to be assessed in a SYNTACTICAL way.Vide
“Syntactics in Semiotics”“4. Be orderly.”This involves two moves in the
contribution or ‘turn.’ One cannot be ‘disorderly,’ if one just utters ‘p.’ So
this involves a molecular proposition. The ‘order’ can be of various types.
Indeed, one of Grice’s example is “Jones is between Smith and Williams” – order
of merit or size?‘Between’ is not ambiguous!There is LOGICAL order, which is
prior.But there is a more absolute use of ‘orderly.’ ‘keep your room tidy.’orderly (adj.) 1570s, "arranged in order," from
order (n.) + -ly (1). Meaning "observant of rule or discipline, not
unruly" is from 1590s. Related: Orderliness.He does not in the lecture
give a philosophical example, but later will in revisiting the Urmson example
and indeed Strawson, but mainly Urmson, “He went to bed and took off his
boots,” and indeed Ryle, “She felt frail and took arsenic.”“And one
might need others.”Regarding ‘mode,’ that is. “It is obvious that the
observance of some of these maxims is a matter of less urgency than is the
observance of others;”Not as per ‘moral’ demands, since he’ll say these are not
MORAL.“a man who has expressed himself with undue prolixity would, in general,
be open to milder comment than would a man who has said something he believes
to be false.”Except in Oscar Wilde’s circle, where they were obsessed with
commenting on prolixities! Cf. Hare against Kant, “Where is the prisoner?” “He
left [while he is hiding in the attic].”That’s why Grice has the ‘in general.’“Indeed,
it might be felt that the importance of at least the first maxim of Quality is
such that it should not be included in a scheme of the kind I am constructing;”But
since ‘should’ is weak, I will. “other maxims come into operation only on the
assumption that this maxim of Quality is satisfied.”So the keyword is
co-ordination.“While this may be correct, so far as the generation of implicatures
is concerned it seems to play a role not totally different from the other
maxims, and it will be convenient, for the present at least, to treat it as a
member of the list of maxims.”He is having weighing, and clashing in mind. And
he wants a conversationalist to honour truth over informativeness, which begs
the question that as he puts it, ‘false’ “information” is no information.In the
earlier lectures, tutoring, or as a university lecturer, he was sure that his
tutee will know that he was introducing maxims ONLY WITH THE PURPOSE, NEVER TO
MORALISE, but as GENERATORS of implicata – in philosophers’s mistakes.But this
manoeuver is only NOW disclosed. Those without a philosophical background may
not realise about this. “There are, of course, all sorts of other maxims
(aesthetic, social, or moral in character), such as 'Be polite', that are also
normally observed by participants in talk exchanges, and these may also generate
nonconventional implicatures.”He is obviously aware that Émile DurkheimWill
Know that ‘conversational’ is subsumed
under ‘social,’ if not Williamson (perhaps).
– keyword: ‘norm.’ Grice excludes ‘moral’ because while a moral maxim
makes a man ‘good,’ a conversational maxim makes a man a ‘good’
conversationalist. Not because there is a distinction in principle!“The
conversational maxims, however, and the conversational implicatures connected
with them, are specially connected (I hope) with”He had this way with
idioms.Cf. Einstein,“E =, I hope, mc2.”“the particular purposes that talk (and
so, talk exchange)”He is playing Dutch.The English lost the Anglo-Saxon for
‘talk.’ They have ‘language,’ and the Hun has ‘Sprache.’ But only the Dutch
have ‘taal.’So he is distinguishing between the TOOL and the USE of the TOOL.“is
adapted lo serve and is primlarily employed to serve.”The ‘adapted’ is
mechanistic talk. He mentions ‘evolutionarily’ elsewhere. He means ‘the
particular goal language evolved to serve, viz.’ groom.Grooming,
Gossip and the Evolution of Language is a 1996 book by the anthropologist Robin
Dunbar, in which the author argues that language evolved from social grooming.
He further suggests that a stage of this evolution was the telling of gossip,
an argument supported by the observation that language is adapted for
storytelling. The book has been criticised on the grounds that since
words are so cheap, Dunbar's "vocal grooming" would fall short in
amounting to an honest signal. Further, the book provides no compelling
story[citation needed] for how meaningless vocal grooming sounds might become
syntactical speech. Thesis Dunbar argues that gossip does for
group-living humans what manual grooming does for other primates—it allows
individuals to service their relationships and thus maintain their alliances on
the basis of the principle: if you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. Dunbar
argues that as humans began living in increasingly larger social groups, the
task of manually grooming all one's friends and acquaintances became so
time-consuming as to be unaffordable.[1] In response to this problem, Dunbar
argues that humans invented 'a cheap and ultra-efficient form of
grooming'—vocal grooming. To keep allies happy, one now needs only to 'groom'
them with low-cost vocal sounds, servicing multiple allies simultaneously while
keeping both hands free for other tasks. Vocal grooming then evolved gradually
into vocal language—initially in the form of 'gossip'.[1] Dunbar's hypothesis
seems to be supported by the fact that the structure of language shows
adaptations to the function of narration in general.[2] Criticism Critics
of Dunbar's theory point out that the very efficiency of "vocal
grooming"—the fact that words are so cheap—would have undermined its
capacity to signal honest commitment of the kind conveyed by time-consuming and
costly manual grooming.[3] A further criticism is that the theory does nothing
to explain the crucial transition from vocal grooming—the production of
pleasing but meaningless sounds—to the cognitive complexities of syntactical
speech.[citation needed] References Dunbar, R. I. M. (1996).
Grooming, gossip and the evolution of language. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN
9780571173969. OCLC 34546743. von Heiseler, Till Nikolaus (2014) Language
evolved for storytelling in a super-fast evolution. In: R. L. C. Cartmill, Eds.
Evolution of Language. London: World Scientific, pp. 114-121. https://www.academia.edu/9648129/LANGUAGE_EVOLVED_FOR_STORYTELLING_IN_A_SUPER-FAST_EVOLUTION
Power, C. 1998. Old wives' tales: the gossip hypothesis and the reliability of
cheap signals. In J. R. Hurford, M. Studdert Kennedy and C. Knight (eds), Approaches
to the Evolution of Language: Social and Cognitive Bases. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, pp. 111 29. Categories: 1996 non-fiction booksAmerican
non-fiction booksBooks by Robin DunbarEnglish-language booksEvolution of
languageHarvard University Press booksPopular science booksGrice: “I
have stated my maxims”the maxims“as if this purpose were a maximally effective
exchange of information;”“MAXIMALLY EFFECTIVE”“this specification is, of
course, too narrow,”But who cares?This is slightly sad in that he is thinking
Strawson and forgetting his (Grice’s) own controversy with G. A. Paul on the
sense-datum, for ‘the pillar box seems red’ and ‘the pillar box is red,’
involving an intensional context, are less amenable to fall under the maxims.“and
the scheme needs to be generalized to allow for such general purposes as
influencing or directing the actions of others.”He has a more obvious way
below:Giving and receving informationInfluencing and being influenced by others.He
never sees the purpose as MAXIMAL INFORMATION, but maximally effective EXCHANGE
of information – does he mean merely ‘transmission.’ It may well be.If I say,
“I rain,” I have ex-changed information.I don’t need anything in return.If so,
it makes sense that he is equating INFORMINGWith INFLUENCING or better DIRECTION your
addresse’s talk.Note that, for all he loved introspection and conversational
avowals, and self-commands, these do not count.It’s informing your addressee
about some state of affairs, and directing his action. Grice is always clear
that the ULTIMATE GOAL is the utterer’s ACTION.“As one of my avowed aims is to
see talking as a special case or variety of purposive, indeed rational,
behavior, it may be worth noting that the specific expectations or presumptions
connected with at least some of the foregoing maxims have their analogues in
the sphere of transactions that are not talk exchanges.”Transaction is a good
one.TRANS-ACTIO“I list briefly one such analog for each conversational
category.”While he uses ‘conversational category,’ he also applies it to the
second bit: ‘category of conversational quantity,’ ‘category of conversational
quality,’ ‘category of conversational relation,’ and ‘category of
conversational mode.’ But it is THIS application that justifies the
sub-specifications.They are not categories of thought or ontological or
‘expression’.His focus is on the category as conversation.His focus is on the
‘conversational category.’“1. Quantity. If you are assisting me to mend a car,
I expect your contribution to be neither more nor less than is required; if, e.
g., at a particular stage I need fourscrews, I expect you to hand me four,
rather than two or six. He always passed six, since two will drop.“Make your
contribution neither more nor less informative than is required (for the
purposes of the exchange).”This would have covered the maxi and the min.“NEITHER
MORE NOR LESS” is the formula of effectiveness, and economy, and minimization
of expenditure.“2. Quality. I expect your contributions to be genuine and not
spurious.”Here again he gives an expansion of the conversational category,
which is more general than ‘try to make your contribution one that is true,’
and the point about the ‘quality of information,’ which he did not make.Perhaps
because it would have led him to realise that ‘false’ information, i.e.
‘information’ which is not genuine and spurious, is not ‘information.’But “Make
your contribution one that is genuine and not spurious.”Be candid.Does not need
a generalization as it covers both informational and directive utterances.“If I
need sugar as an ingredient in the cake you are assisting me to make, I do not
expect you to hand me salt;”Or you won’t eat the cake.“if I need a spoon, I do
not expect a trick spoon made of rubber.”Spurious and genuine are different.In
the ‘trick spoon,’ the conversationalist is just not being SERIOUS.But surely a
maxim, “Be serious” is too serious. – Seriously!“3. Relation. I expect a
partner's contribution to be appropriate to immediate needs at each stage of
the transaction;”Odd that he would use ‘appropriate,’ which was the topic of
the “Prolegomena,” and what he was supposed to EXPLAIN, not to use in the
explanation.For each of the philosophers making a mistake are giving a judgment
of ‘appropriateness,’ conversational appropriateness. Here it is good that he
relativises the ‘appropriateness’ TO the ‘need’.Grice is not quite sticking to
the etymology of ‘relatio’ and ‘refer,’ bring y back to x. Or he is. Bring y
(your contribution) back to the need x.Odd that he thinks he’ll expand more on
relation, when he did a good bit!“if I am mixing ingredients for a cake, I do
not expect to be handed a good book, or even an oven cloth (though this might
be an appropriate contribution at a later stage).”“I just expect you to be
silent.”“4. Manner. I expect a partner to make it clear what contribution he is
making, and to execute his performance with reasonable dispatch.” For Lewis,
clarity is not enough!The ‘Execute your performance with reasonable dispatch!’
seems quite different from “Be perspicuous.”“Execute your performance with
reasonable dispatch”Is more like
“Execute your performance”And not just
STAND there!A: What time is it B just stands there“These analogies are relevant
to what I regard as a fundamental question about the principle of
conversational helpfulness and its attendant conversational maxims,”For
Boethius, it is a PRINCIPLE because it does not need an answer!“viz., what the
basis is for the assumption which we seem to make, and on which (I hope) it
will appear that a great range of implicatures depend [especially as we keep on
EXPLOITING the rather otiose maxims], that talkers will ingeneral (ceteris
paribus and in the absence of indications to the contrary) proceed in the
manner that these principles prescribe.”Grice really doesn’t care! He is into
the EXPLOITING of the maxim, as in his response to the Scots philosopher G. A.
Paul:“Paul, I surely do not mean to imply that you may end up believing that I
have a doubt about the pillar box being red: it seems red to me, as I have this
sense-datum of ‘redness’ which attaches to me as I am standing in front of the
pillar box in clear daylight.”Grice is EXPLOITING the desideratum, YET STILL
SAYING SOMETHING TRUE, so at least he is not VIOLATING the principle of
conversational helpfulness, or the category of conversational quality, or the
desideratum of conversational candour.And that is what he is concerned with. “A dull but, no doubt at a certain level, adequate
answer is that it is just a well-recognized empirical fact that *people* (not
pirots, although perhaps Oxonians, rather than from Malagasy) DO behave in
these ways;”Elinor Ochs was terrified Grice’s maxims are violated – never
exploited, she thought – in Madagascar.“they, i. e. people, or Oxonians, have
learned to do so in childhood and not lost the habit of doing so; and, indeed,
it would involve a good deal of effort to make a radical departure from the
habit. It is much easier, for example, to tell the truth than to invent lies.”Effort
again; least effort. And ease. Great Griceian guidelines!“I am, however, enough
of a rationalist to want to find a basis that underlies these facts,”OR
EXPLAIN.“undeniable though they may be;”BEIGIN OF A THEORY FOR A THEORY – not
the theory for the generation of implicate, but for the theory of conversation.He
is less interested in this than the other. “I would like to be able to think of
the standard type of conversational practice not merely as something that all or
most do IN FACT follow but as something that it is REASONABLE for us to follow,
that we SHOULD NOT abandon. For a time, I was attracted by the idea that
observance of the principle of conversational helpfulness and the conversational
maxims, in a talk exchange, could be thought of as a quasi-contractual matter,
with parallels outside the realm of discourse. If you pass by when I am
struggling with my stranded car, I no doubt have some degree of expectation
that you will offer help, but once you join me in tinkering under the hood, my
expectations become stronger and take more specific forms (in the absence of
indications that you are merely an incompetent meddler); and talk exchanges
seemed to me to exhibit, characteristically, certain features that jointly
distinguish cooperative transactions:”So how is this not
quasi-contractual? He is listing THIS OR
THAT FEATURE that jointly distinguishes a cooperative transaction – all grand
great words.But he wants to say that ‘quasi-contractual’ is NO RATIONAL!He is
playing, as a philosopher, with the very important point of what follows from
what.A1. Conversasation is purposiveA2. Conversation is rationalA3.
Conversation is cooperativeA4. There is such a thing as non-rational
cooperation (is there?)So he is aiming at the fact that the FEATURES that
jointly distinguish cooperative transactions NEED NOT BE PRESENT, and Grice
surely does not wish THAT to demolish his model. If he bases it in general
constraints of rationality, the better.“1. The participants have some common
immediate aim, like getting a car mended; their ultimate aims may, of course,
be independent and even in conflict-each may want to get the car mended in
order to drive off, leaving the other stranded. In characteristic talk
exchanges, there is a common aim even if, as in an over-the-wall chat, it is a
second-order one,”Is he being logical?“second-order predicate
calculus”“meta-language”He means higher or supervenientOr ‘operative’“, that
each party should, for the time being, identify himself with the transitory
conversational interests of the other.”By identify he means assume.YOU HAVE TO
DESIRE what your partner desires.The intersection between your desirability and
your addressee’s desirability is not NULL.And the way to do this is conditionalIF:
You perceive B has Goal G, you assume Goal G. “2. The contributions of the
participants .should be dovetailed, mutually dependent. Unless it’s one of
those seminars by Grice and J. F. Thomson!“3. There is some sort of
understanding (which may be explicit but which is often tacit)”i.e. implicated
rather than explicated – part of the implicatum, or implicitum, rather than the
explicatum or explicitum.“that, other things being equal, the transaction
should continue in appropriate style unless both parties are agreeable that it
should terminate. You do not just shove off or start doing something else.”This
is especially tricky over the phone (“He never ends!” Or in psychiatric
interviews!)Note that ‘starting doing something else’ may work. E. g. watch
your watch!“But while some such quasi-contractual basis as this may apply to
some cases, there are too many types of exchange, like quarreling and letter
writing, that it fails to fit comfortably.”TWO OPPOSITE EXAMPLES.Fighting is
arguing is competition, adversarial, epagogue, not conversation,
cooperation, friendly, collaborative
venture, and diagoge.Letter writing is usually otiose – “what, with the
tellyphone!” And letter writing is no conversation.“In any case, one feels that
the talker who is irrelevant or obscure has primarily let down not his audience
but himself.”And the talker who is mendacious has primarily let Kant down!”“So
I would like t< be able to show that observance of the principle of
conversational helfpulness and maxims is reasonal de (rational) along the
following lines”That any Aristkantian rationalist would agree to.“: that any
one who cares about the goals that are central to conversation/communication
(e.g., giving and receiving information, influencing and being influenced by
others) must be expected to have an interest, given suitable circumstances, in
participation in talk exchanges that will be profitable only on the assumption
that they are conducted in general accordance with the principle of
conversational helpfulness and the maxims.”Where the keyword is: profit,
effort, least effort, no energy, no undue effort, no unnecessary trouble. That
conversation is reasonable unless it is unreasonable. That a conversational
exchange should be rational unless it shows features of irrationality.“Whether
any such conclusion can be reached, I am uncertain;”It’s not clear what the
premises are!Plus, he means DEDUCTIVELY reached? Transcendentally reached?
Empirically reached? Philosophically reached? Conclusively reached? Etc.It
seems the conclusion need not be reached, because we never departed from the
state of the affairs that the conclusion describes.“in any case, I am fairly
sure that I cannot reach it until I am a good deal clearer about the nature of
relevance and of the circumstances in which it is required.”For perhaps “I
don’t want to imply any doubt, but that pillar box seems red.”IS irrelevant,
yet true!“It is now time to show the connection between the principle of
conversational helfpulness and the conversational maxims, on the one hand, and conversational
implicature on the other.”This is clearer in the seminars. The whole thing was
a preamble “A participant in a talk exchange may fail to fulfill a maxim in
various ways, which include the following: 1. He may quietly and unostentatiously
VIOLATE (or fail to observe) a maxim; if so, in some cases he will be liable to
mislead.”And be blamed by Kant.Mislead should not worry Grice, cf. “Misleading,
but true.”The violate (or fail to observe) shows that (1) covers two
specifications. Tom may be unaware that there was such a maxim as to ‘be brief,
avoid unnecessary prolixity, unless you need to eschew obfuscation!”This is
Grice’s anti-Ryleism. He doesn’t want to say that there is KNOWLEDGE of the
maxims. For one may know what the maxims are and fail to observe them “2. He
may OPT OUT from the operation both of the maxim and of the principle of
conversational helpfulness; he may say, indicate, or allow it to become plain
that he is unwilling to cooperate in the way the maxim requires. He may say, e.
g., I cannot say more; my lips are sealed.” Where is the criminal?I cannot say
more; my lips are sealed.I shall unseal them. What do you mean ‘cannot.’ You
don’t mean ‘may not,’ do you?I think Grice means ‘may not.’Is the universe
finite? Einstein: I cannot say more; my lips are sealed. “3. He may be faced by
a CLASH of maxims [That’s why he needs more than one – or at least two
specifications of the same maxim]: He may be unable, e. g., to fulfill the
first maxim of Quantity (Be as informative as is required) without violating
the second maxim of Quality (Have adequate evidence for what you say).” Odd
that he doesn’t think this generates implicature: He has obviously studied the
sub-perceptualities here.For usually, a phenomenalist, like Sextus, thinks that
by utteringThe pillar box seems red to me – that is all I have adequate
evidence forHe is conveying that he is unable to answer the question (“What
colour is the pillar box?”) And being as ‘informative’ as is requiredWithout
saying something for which it is not the case that he has or will ever have
adequate evidence.Cf.Student at Koenigsberg to Kant: What’s the noumenon?Kant:
My lips are sealed.It may require some research to list ALL CLASHES.Because
each clash shows some EVALUATION qua reasoning, and it may be all VERY CETERIS
PARIBUS.Cf.Where is the criminal?My lips are sealed.The utterer has NOT opted
out. He has answered, via implicature, that he is not telling. He is being
relevant. He is not telling because he doesn’t want to DISCLOSE the whereabouts
of the alleged criminal, etc. For Kant, this is not a conversation! Odd that
Grice is ‘echoing Kant,’ where Kant would hardly allow a clash with ‘Be
truthful!’“4. He may FLOUT a maxim; that is, he may BLATANTLY fail to fulfill (or
observe) it.Mock? Taunt?The magic flute. Grice’s magic flute.flout (v.) "treat with disdain or contempt"
(transitive), 1550s, intransitive sense "mock, jeer, scoff" is from
1570s; of uncertain origin; perhaps a special use of Middle English
“flowten,”"to play the flute" (compare Middle Dutch “fluyten,”
"to play the flute," also "to jeer"). Related: Flouted;
flouting.Grice: “One thing we do not know is if the flute came to England via
Holland.”“Or he may, as we may say, ‘play the flute’ with a maxim, expecting others
to be agreeable.”“Or he may, as we might say, ‘play the flute’ with the
conversational maxim, expecting others to join with some other musical
instrument – or something – occasionally the same.”“On the assumption
that the speaker is able to fulfill the maxim and to do so without violating
another maxim (because oi a clash), is not opting out, and is not, in view of
the blatancy of his performance, trying to mislead,”This is interesting. It’s
the TRYING to mislead.Grice and G. A. Paul:Grice cannot be claimed to have
TRIED to mislead, and thus deemed to have misled G. A. Paul, even if he had,
when he said, “I hardly think there is any doubt about it, but that pillar box
seems red to me.”“the hearer is faced with a minor problem:”Implicature: This
reasoning is all abductive – to the ‘best’ explanation“How can his saying what
he did say be reconciled with the supposition that he is observing the overall
principle of conversational helfpulness?”This was one of Grice’s conversations
with G. A. Paul:Paul (to Grice): This is what I do not understand, Grice. How
can your saying what you did say be reconciled with the supposition that you
are not going to mislead me?”Unfortunately, on that Saturday, Paul went to the
Irish Sea. Grice “This situation is one that characteristically”There are
others – vide clash, above – but not marked by Grice as one such situation – “gives
rise to a conversational implicature; and when a conversational implicature is
generated”Chomskyan jargon borrowed from Austin (“I don’t see why Austin
admired Chomsky so!”)“in this way, I shall say that a maxim is being
EXPLOITED.”Why not ‘flouted’? Some liked the idea of playing the flute.EXPLOIT
is figurative.Grice exploits a Griceian maxim.exploit (v.) c. 1400, espleiten, esploiten "to accomplish,
achieve, fulfill," from Old French esploitier, espleiter "carry out,
perform, accomplish," from esploit (see exploit (n.)). The sense of
"use selfishly" first recorded 1838, from a sense development in
French perhaps from use of the word with reference to mines, etc. (compare
exploitation). Related: Exploited; exploiting.exploit (n.) late 14c.,
"outcome of an action," from Old French esploit "a carrying out;
achievement, result; gain, advantage" (12c., Modern French exploit), a
very common word, used in senses of "action, deed, profit,
achievement," from Latin explicitum "a thing settled, ended, or
displayed," noun use of neuter of explicitus, past participle of explicare
"unfold, unroll, disentangle," from ex "out" (see ex-) +
plicare "to fold" (from PIE root *plek- "to plait").
Meaning "feat, achievement" is c. 1400. Sense evolution is from
"unfolding" to "bringing out" to "having
advantage" to "achievement." Related:
Exploits. exploitative (adj.) "serving for or used in
exploitation," 1882, from French exploitatif, from exploit (see exploit
(n.)). Alternative exploitive (by 1859) appears to be a native formation from
exploit + -ive.exploitation (n.) 1803, "productive working" of something,
a positive word among those who used it first, though regarded as a Gallicism,
from French exploitation, noun of action from exploiter (see exploit (v.)). Bad
sense developed 1830s-50s, in part from influence of French socialist writings
(especially Saint Simon), also perhaps influenced by use of the word in U.S.
anti-slavery writing; and exploitation was hurled in insult at activities it
once had crowned as praise. It follows from this science [conceived by
Saint Simon] that the tendency of the human race is from a state of antagonism
to that of an universal peaceful association -- from the dominating influence
of the military spirit to that of the industriel one; from what they call
l'exploitation de l'homme par l'homme to the exploitation of the globe by
industry. ["Quarterly Review," April & July 1831] Grice: “I am now
in a position to characterize the notion of conversational implicature.”Not to
provide a reductive analysis. The concept is too dear for me to torture it with
one of my metaphysical routines.”“A man who, by (in, when) saying (or making as
if to say) that p”That seems good for the analysandumGrice loves the “by (in,
when)” “(or making as if to). Note the oratio obliqua.Or ‘that’-clause. So this
is not ‘uttering’As in the analysans of ‘meaning that.’“By uttering ‘x’ U means
that p.’The “by” already involves a clause with a ‘that’-clause.So this is not
a report of a physical event.It is a report embued already with intentionality.The
utterer is not just ‘uttering’The utterer is EXPLICITLY conveying that p.We
cannot say MEANING that p.Because Grice uses “mean” as opposed to “explicitly
convey”His borderline scenarios are such,“Keep me company, dear”“If we are to
say that when he uttererd that he means that his wife was to keep him company
or not is all that will count for me to change my definition of ‘mean’ or
not.”Also irony.But here it is more complicated. A man utters, “Grice defeated
Strawson”If he means it ironically, to mean that Strawson defeated Grice, it is
not the case that the utterer MEANT the opposite. He explicitly conveyed that.Grice
considers the Kantian ‘cause and effect,’“If I am dead, I shall have no time
for reading.”He is careful here that the utterer does not explicitly conveys
that he will have no time for reading – because it’s conditioned on he being
dead.“has implicated that q,” “may be said to have conversationally implicated
that q,”So this is a specification alla arbor porphyrana of ‘By explicitly
conveying that p, U implicitly conveys that q.’Where he is adding the second-order
adverb, ‘conversationally.’By explicitly conveying that p, U has implicitly
conveyed that q in a CONVERSATIONAL FASHION” iff or if“PROVIDED THAT”“(1) he is
to be presumed to be observing the conversational maxims, or at least the principle
of conversational helfpulness;”Especially AT LEAST, because he just said that
an implicatum is ‘generated’ (Chomskyan jargon) when AT LEAST A MAXIM IS played the flute.“(2) the
supposition that he is aware that, or thinks that, q is required in order to
make his saying or making as if to say p (or doing so in THOSE terms)
consistent with this presumption;”THIS IS THE CRUCIAL CLAUSE – and the one that
not only requires ONE’S RATIONALITY, but the expectation that one’s addressee,
BEING RATIONAL, will expect the utterer to BE RATIONAL.This is the
‘rationalisation’ he refers to in “Retrospective Epilogue.”Note that ‘q’ is
obviously now the content of a state in the utterer’s soul – a desideratum or a
creditum --, at least a CREDITUM, in view of Grice’s view of everything at least
exhibitive and perhaps protreptic --“and (3) the speaker thinks (and would
expect the hearer to think that the speaker thinks) that it is within the
competence of the hearer to work out, or grasp intuitively, that the supposition
mentioned in (2) IS required.”All that jargon about mutuality is a result of
Strawson tutoring Schiffer!“Apply this to my initial example, to B's remark that
C has not yet been to prison.”What made Grice think of such a convoluted
example?He was laughing at Searle for providing non-philosophical examples, and
there he is!“In a suitable setting A might reason as follows:”“(1) B has
APPARENTLY violated – indeed he has played the flute with -- the maxim 'Be
relevant' and so may be regarded as [ALSO] having flouted one of the maxims
conjoining perspicuity,”In previous versions, under the desideratum of
conversational clarity Grice had it that the desideratum included the
expectation of this ‘relatedness’ AND that of ‘perspicuity’ (sic). In the
above, Grice is stating that if you are irrelevant (or provide an unrelated
contribution) you are not being perspicuous.But “He hasn’t been to prison” is
perspicuous enough.And so is the link to the question --.Plus, wasn’t
perspicuity only to apply to the ‘mode,’ to the ‘form,’ rather than the
content.Here it is surely the CONTENT – that it is not the case that C is a
criminal – that triggers it all.So, since there is a “not,” here this is
parallel to the example examined by Strawson in the footnote to “Logical
Theory.”The utterer is saying that it is not the case that C has been in prison
yet.The ‘yet’ makes all the difference, even if a Fregeian colouring
‘convention’!“It is not the case that C has been in prison” Is, admittedly, not
very perspicuous.“So what, neither has the utterer nor the addressee.”So there
is an equivocation here as to the utterance perhaps not being perspicuous,
while the utterer IS perspicuous.“yet I have no reason to suppose that he is
opting out from the operation of the CP;”Or playing the flute with my beloved
principle of conversational helpfulness.“(2) given the circumstances, I can
regard his irrelevance as only apparent – as when we say that a plastic flower
is not a flower, or to use Austin’s example, “That decoy duck is surely not a
duck! That trick rubber spoon is no spoon! -- if, and only if, I suppose him to
think that C is potentially dishonest;”As many are!The potentially is the
trick.Recall Aristotle: “Will I say that I am potentially dishonest?! Not me!
PLATO was! Theophrastus WILL! Or is it ‘shall’?”“(3) B knows that I am capable
of working out step (2). So B implicates that C is potentially dishonest.'”Unless
he goes on like I go with G. A. Paul, “I do not mean of course to mean that I
mean that he is potentially dishonest, because although he is, he shouldn’t, or
rather, I don’t think you are expecting me to convey explicitly that he shouln’t
or should for that matter.”“The presence of a conversational implicature must
be capable of being worked out; for even if it can in fact be intuitively
grasped, unless the intuition is replaceable by an argument, the implicature
(if present at all) will not count as a CONVERSATIONAL implicature.”This is the
Humpty Dumpty in Grice.Cf. Provide the sixteen derivational steps in Jane
Austen’s Novel remark, “I sense and sensibilia” – This is what happens
sometimes when people who are not philosophers engage with Grice!For a
philosopher, it is clear Grice is not being serious there. He is mocking an
‘ideal’-language philosopher (as Waissmann called them). Let’s revise the
word:By “counting” he means “DEEM.” He has said that “She is poor, but she is
honest,” is NOT CALCULABLE. So if an argument is not produced, this may not be
a matter of argument.Philosophers are OBSESSED, and this is Grice’s trick, with
ARGUMENT. Recall Grice on Hardie, “Unlike my father, who was rather blunt,
Hardie taught me to ARGUE for this or that reason.”His mention of “INTUITION”
is not perspicuous. He told J. M. Rountree that meaning is a matter of
INTUITION, not a theoretical concept within a theory.So it’s not like Grice
does not trust the intuition. So the point is TERMINOLOGICAL and
methodological. Terminological, in that this is a specfification of
‘conversationally,’ rather than for cases like “How rude!” (he just flouted the
maxim ‘be polite!’ but ‘be polite’ is not a CONVERSATIONAL maxim. Is Grice
implicating that nonconversational nonconventional implicate are not
calculable? We don’t think so.But he might.I think he will. Because in the case
of ‘aesthetic maxim,’ ‘moral maxim,’ and ‘social maxim’ – such as “be polite,”
– the calculation may involve such degree of gradation that you better not get
Grice started!“it will be a CONVENTIONAL implicature.”OK – So perhaps he does
allow that non-conventional non-conversational implicate ARE calculable.But he
may add:“Unless the intuition is replaceable by an argument, it will not be a
conversational implicature; it will be a conventional implicature.”Strawson:
“And what nonconventional nonconversational implicate?Grice: You are right,
Strawon. Let me modify and refine the point: “It will be a dull, boring,
undetachable, conventional implicatum – OR any of those dull implicate that
follow from (or result – I won’t use ‘generate’) one of those maxims that I
have explicitly said they were NOT conversational maxims.“For surely, there is
something very ‘contradictory-sounding’ to me saying that the implicatum is
involved with the flouting of a maxim which is NOT a conversational maxim, and
yet that the maxim is a CONVERSATIONAL implicature.”“Therefore, I restrict
calculability to CONVERSATIONAL IMPLICATURE, because it involves the
conversational maxims that contributors are expected to be reciprocal; whereas
you’ll agree that Queen Victoria does not need to be abide with ‘be polite,’ as
she frequently did not – “We are not amused, you fools! Only Gilbert and
Sullivan amuse me!””“To work out that a particular CONVERSATIONAL [never mind
nonconversational nonconventional] implicature is present, the hearer will
reply on the following data:”As opposed to ‘sense-datum.’Perhaps assumption,
alla Gettier, is better:“ (1) the conventional meaning of the words used,
together with the identity of any references that may be involved;”WoW Quite a
Bit. This is the reason why Grice entitled WoW his first book.In he hasn’t been
to ‘prison’ we are not using ‘prison’ as Witters does (“My language is my
prison”).Strawson: But is that the CONVENTIONAL meaning? Even for King Alfred?He hasn't been to prisonprison (n.) early 12c.,
from Old French prisoun "captivity, imprisonment; prison; prisoner,
captive" (11c., Modern French prison), altered (by influence of pris
"taken;" see prize (n.2)) from earlier preson, from Vulgar Latin
*presionem, from Latin prensionem (nominative prensio), shortening of
prehensionem (nominative *prehensio) "a taking," noun of action from
past participle stem of prehendere "to take" (from prae-
"before," see pre-, + -hendere, from PIE root *ghend- "to seize,
take"). "Captivity," hence by extension "a place for
captives," the MAIN modern sense.” (There are 34 other unmain ones). He
hasn't been to a place for captives yet.You mean he is one.Cf. He hasn't
been to asylum.You mean Foucault?(2) the principle of conversational
helpfulness and this and that conversational maxim;”This is more crucial seeing
that the utterer may utter something which has no conventional meaning?Cf.
Austin, “Don’t ask for the meaning of a word! Less so for the ‘conventional’
one!”What Grice needs is ‘the letter,’ so he can have the ‘spirit’ as the
implicatum. Or he needs the lines, so he can have the implicatum as a reading
‘between the lines.’If the utterance is a gesture, like showing a bandaged leg,
or a Neapolitan rude gesture, it is difficult to distinguish or to identify
what is EXPLICITLY conveyed.By showing his bandaged leg, U EXPLICITLY conveys
that he has a bandaged leg. And IMPLICITLY conveys that he cannot really play
cricket.The requirement of ‘denotatum’ is even tricker, “Swans are beautiful.”
Denotata? Quantificational? Substitutional?In any case, Grice is not being circular
in requiring that the addressee should use as an assumption or datum that U
thinks that the expression E is generally uttered by utterers when they
m-intend that p.But there are tricks here.“(3) the context, linguistic or
otherwise, of the utterance;”Cf. Grice, “Is there a general context for a
general theory of context?”“(4) other items of background knowledge;”So you
don’t get:How is C getting on at the bank? My lips are sealed Why do you care
Mind your own business. Note that “he hasn’t been to prison yet” (meaning the
tautologous ‘he is potentially dishonest’) is the sort of tricky answer to a
tricky question! In asking, the asker KNOWS that he’ll get that sort of reply knowing
the utterer as he does. “and (5) the fact (or supposed fact) that all relevant
items falling under the previous headings are available to both participants
and both participants know or assume this to be the case.”This is Schiffer
reported by Strawson.“A general pattern for the working out of a conversational
implicature might be given as follows:”Again the abductive argument that any
tutee worth of Hardie might expect 'He has said that p;”Ie explicitly conveys
that p.Note the essential oratio obliqua, or that-clause.“there is no reason to
suppose. that he is not observing the maxims, or at least the principle of
conversational helpfulness”That is, he is not a prisoner of war, or anything.“He
could not be doing this unless he thought that q;”Or rather, even if more
tautologically still, he could not be doing so REASONABLY, as Austin would
forbid, unless…’ For if the utterer is IRRATIONAL (or always playing the flute)
surely he CAN do it!“he knows (and knows that I know that he knows) that I can
see that the supposition that he thinks that q IS required;”Assumed MUTUAL
RATIONALITY, which Grice fails to have added as assumption or datum. Cf.
paraconsistent logics – “he is using ‘and’ and ‘or’ in a ‘deviant’ logical way,
to echo Quine,” – He is an intuitionist, his name is Dummett.“he has done
nothing to stop me thinking that q; he intends me to think, or is at least
willing to allow me to think, that q; and so he has implicated that q.'”The
‘or’ is delightful, for m-intention requires ‘intention,’ but the intention
figures in previous positions, so ‘willingess to allow the addressee to think’
does PERFECTLY FINE! Especially at Oxford where we are ever so subtle!
conversational
reason. Used in Retrospective, p. 369.
credibility:
Following Jeffrey and Davidson, respectively, Grice uses ‘desirability’ and
‘probability,’ but sometimes ‘credibibility,’ realizing that ‘credibility’ is
more symmetrical with ‘desirability’ than ‘probability’ is. Urmson had explored
this in “Parenthetical verbs.” Urmson co-relates, ‘certaintly’ with ‘know’ and
‘probably’ with ‘believe.’ But Urmson adds four further adverbs: “knowingly,”
“unknowingly,” “believably,” and “unbelievably.” Urmson also includes three
more: “uncredibly,” in variation with “incredibly,” and ‘credibly.” The keyword
should be ‘credibility.’
creditum:
used by Grice for the doxastic equivalent of the buletic or desideratum. A
creditum is an implicatum, as Grice defines the implicatum of the content that
an addresse has to assume the utterer BELIEVES to deem him rational. The
‘creditum’-condition is essential for Grice in his ‘exhibitive’ account to the
communication. By uttering “Smoke!”, U means that there is some if the utterer
intends that his addressee BELIEVE that he, the utterer, is in a state of soul
which has the propositional complex there is smoke. It is worth noting that
BELIEF is not needed for the immediate state of the utterer’s soul: this can
always be either a desire or a belief. But a belief is REQUIRED as the
immediate (if not ultimate) response intended by the utterer that his addressee
adapt. It is curious that given the primacy that Grice held of the desirability
over the credibility that many of his conversational maxims are formulated as
imperatives aimed at matters of belief, conditions and value of credibility,
probability and adequate evidence. In the cases where Grice emphasizes
‘information,’ which one would associate with ‘belief,’ this association may be
dropped provided the exhibitive account: you can always influence or be
influenced by others in the institution of a common decision provided you give
and receive the optimal information, or rather, provided the conversationalists
assume that they are engaged in a MAXIMAL exchange of information. That
‘information’ does not necessarily apply to ‘belief’ is obvious in how
complicated an order can get, “Get me a bottle”. “Is that all?” “No, get me a
bottle and make sure that it is of French wine, and add something to drink the
wine with, and drive careful, and give my love to Rosie.” No belief is
explicitly transmitted, yet the order seems informative enough. Grice sometimes
does use ‘informative’ in a strict context involving credibility. He divides
the mode of credibility into informational (when addressed to others) and
indicative (when addressed to self), for in a self-addressed utterance such as,
“I am being silly,” one cannot intend to inform oneself of something one
already knows!
demonstratum:
‘Rationality’ is one of those words Austin forbids to use. Grice would venture
with ‘reason,’ and better, ‘reasons’ to make it countable, and good for
botanising. Only in the New World, and when he started to get input from
non-philosophers, did Grice explore ‘rationality’ itself. Oxonians philosophers
take it for granted, and do not have to philosophise about it. Especially those
who belong to Grice’s play group of ‘ordinary-language’ philosophers! Oxonian
philosophers will quote from the Locke version! Obviously, while each of the
four lectures credits their own entry below, it may do to reflect on Grices
overall aim. Grice structures the lectures in the form of a philosophical
dialogue with his audience. The first lecture is intended to provide a bit
of linguistic botanising for reasonable, and rational. In later lectures,
Grice tackles reason qua noun. The remaining lectures are meant to explore what
he calls the Aequi-vocality thesis: must has only one Fregeian that
crosses what he calls the buletic-doxastic divide. He is especially concerned ‒
this being the Kant lectures ‒ with Kants attempt to reduce the
categorical imperative to a counsel of prudence (Ratschlag der Klugheit), where
Kants prudence is Klugheit, versus skill, as in rule of skill, and even if Kant
defines Klugheit as a skill to attain what is good for oneself ‒
itself divided into privatKlugheit and Weltklugheit. Kant re-introduces the
Aristotelian idea of eudaimonia. While a further lecture on happiness as
the pursuit of a system of ends is NOT strictly part of the either the
Kant or the Locke lectures, it relates, since eudaemonia may be
regarded as the goal involved in the relevant
imperative. “Aspects”, Clarendon, Stanford, The Kant memorial
Lectures, “Aspects,” Clarendon, Some aspects of reason, Stanford; reason,
reasoning, reasons. The lectures were also delivered as the Locke
lectures. Grice is concerned with the reduction of the categorical
imperative to the hypothetical or suppositional imperative. His main
thesis he calls the æqui-vocality thesis: must has one unique or singular
sense, that crosses the buletic-boulomaic/doxastic divide. “Aspects,”
Clarendon, Grice, “Aspects, Clarendon, Locke lecture notes: reason. On
“Aspects”. Including extensive language botany on rational, reasonable, and
indeed reason (justificatory, explanatory, and mixed). At this point,
Grice notes that linguistic botany is indispensable towards the construction of
a more systematic explanatory theory. It is an exploration of a range of
uses of reason that leads him to his Aequi-vocality thesis that must has only
one sense; also ‘Aspects of reason and reasoning,’ in Grice, “Aspects,”
Clarendon, the Locke lectures, the Kant lectures, Stanford, reason,
happiness. While Locke hardly mentions reason, his friend Burthogge does,
and profusely! It was slightly ironic that Grice had delivered these
lectures as the Rationalist Kant lectures at Stanford. He was honoured to
be invited to Oxford. Officially, to be a Locke lecture you have to be
*visiting* Oxford. While Grice was a fellow of St. Johns, he was still
most welcome to give his set of lectures on reasoning at the Sub-Faculty of
Philosophy. He quotes very many authors, including Locke! In his proemium,
Grice notes that while he was rejected the Locke scholarship back in the day,
he was extremely happy to be under Lockes ægis now! When preparing for his
second lecture, he had occasion to revise some earlier drafts dated pretty
early, on reasons, Grice, “Aspects,” Clarendon, reason,
reasons. Linguistic analysis on justificatory, explanatory and mixed uses
of reason. While Grice knows that the basic use of reason is qua verb
(reasoner reasons from premise p to conclusion c), he spends some time in
exploring reason as noun. Grice found it a bit of a roundabout way to
approach rationality. However, his distinction between justificatory and
explanatory reason is built upon his linguistic botany on the use of reason qua
noun. Explanatory reason seems more basic for Grice than justificatory
reason. Explanatory reason explains the behaviour of a rational agent. Grice
is aware of Freud and his rationalizations. An agent may invoke some
reason for his acting which is not legitimate. An agent may convince
himself that he wants to move to Bournemouth because of the weather; when in
fact, his reason to move to Bournemouth is to be closer to Cowes and join the
yacht club there. Grice loved an enthymeme. Grices enthymeme. Grice, the
implicit reasoner! As the title of the lecture implies, Grice takes the verb,
to reason, as conceptually prior. A reasoner reasons, briefly, from a premise
to a conclusion. There are types of reason: flat reason and gradual reason. He
famously reports Shropshire, another tutee with Hardie, and his proof on the
immortality of the human soul. Grice makes some remarks on akrasia as key, too.
The first lecture is then dedicated to an elucidation, and indeed attempt at a
conceptual analysis in terms of intentions and doxastic conditions reasoner R
intends that premise P yields conclusion C and believes his intention will
cause his entertaining of the conclusion from his entertaining the premise. One
example of particular interest for a study of the use of conversational reason
in Grice is that of the connection between implicatum and reasoning. Grice
entitles the sub-section of the lecture as Too good to be reasoning, which is
of course a joke. Cf. too much love will kill you, and Theres no such thing as
too much of a good thing (Shakespeare, As you like it). Grice notes: I have so
far been considering difficulties which may arise from the attempt to find, for
all cases of actual reasoning, reconstructions of sequences of utterances or
explicit thoughts which the reasoner might plausibly be supposed to think of as
conforming to some set of canonical patterns of inference. Grice then turns to
a different class of examples, with regard to which the problem is not that it
is difficult to know how to connect them with canonical patterns, but rather
that it is only too easy (or shall I say trivial) to make the connection. Like
some children (not many), some cases of reasoning are too well behaved for
their own good. Suppose someone says to Grice, and It is very interesting that
Grice gives conversational examples. Jack has arrived, Grice replies, I
conclude from that that Jack has arrived. Or he says Jack has arrived AND Jill
has *also* arrived, And Grice replies, I conclude that Jill has arrived.(via
Gentzens conjunction-elimination). Or he says, My wife is at home. And Grice
replies, I reason from that that someone (viz. your wife) is at home. Is there
not something very strange about the presence in my three replies of the verb
conclude (in example I and II) and the verb reason (in the third example)?
misleading, but doxastically fine, professor! It is true, of course, that if
instead of my first reply I had said (vii) vii. So Jack has arrived, has he?
the strangeness would have been removed. But here so serves not to indicate
that an inference is being made, but rather as part of a not that otiose way of
expressing surprise. One might just as well have said (viii). viii. Well, fancy
that! Now, having spent a sizeable part of his life exploiting it, Grice is not
unaware of the truly fine distinction between a statements being false (or
axiologically satisfactory), and its being true (or axiologically satisfactory)
but otherwise conversationally or pragmatically misleading or inappropriate or
pointless, and, on that account and by such a fine distinction, a statement, or
an utterance, or conversational move which it would be improper (in terms of
the reasonable/rational principle of conversational helfpulness) in one way or
another, to make. It is worth considering Grices reaction to his own
distinction. Entailment is in sight! But Grice does not find himself lured by
the idea of using that distinction here! Because Moores entailment, rather than
Grices implicatum is entailed. Or because explicatu, rather than implicatum is
involved. Suppose, again, that I were to break off the chapter at this point,
and switch suddenly to this argument. ix. I have two hands (here is one hand
and here is another). If had three more hands, I would have five. If I were to
have double that number I would have ten, and if four of them were removed six
would remain. So I would have four more hands than I have now. Is one happy to
describe this performance as reasoning? Depends whos one and whats happy!?
There is, however, little doubt that I have produced a canonically acceptable
chain of statements. So surely that is reasoning, if only conversationally
misleadingly called so. Or suppose that, instead of writing in my customary
free and easy style, I had framed my remarks (or at least the argumentative
portions of my remarks) as a verbal realization, so to speak, of sequences of
steps in strict conformity with the rules of a natural-deduction system of
first-order predicate logic. I give, that is to say, an updated analogue of a
medieval disputation. Implicature. Gentzen is Ockham. Would those brave souls
who continued to read be likely to think of my performance as the production of
reasoning, or would they rather think of it as a crazy formalisation of
reasoning conducted at some previous time? Depends on crazy or formalisation.
One is reminded of Grice telling Strawson, If you cannot formalise, dont say
it; Strawson: Oh, no! If I can formalise it, I shant say it! The points
suggested by this stream of rhetorical questions may be summarized as follows.
Whether the samples presented FAIL to achieve the title of reasoning, and thus
be deemed reasoning, or whether the samples achieve the title, as we may
figuratively put it, by the skin of their teeth, perhaps does not very greatly
matter. For whichever way it is, the samples seem to offend against something
(different things in different cases, Im sure) very central to our conception
of reasoning. So central that Moore would call it entailment! A mechanical
application of a ground rule of inference, or a concatenation thereof, is
reluctantly (if at all) called reasoning. Such a mechanical application may
perhaps legitimately enter into (i.e. form individual steps in) authentic
reasonings, but they are not themselves reasonings, nor is a string of them.
There is a demand that a reasoner should be, to a greater or lesser degree, the
author of his reasonings. Parroted sequences are not reasonings when parroted,
though the very same sequences might be reasoning if not parroted. Ped
sequences are another matter. Some of the examples Grice gives are deficient
because they are aimless or pointless. Reasoning is characteristically
addressed to this or that problem: a small problem, a large problem, a problem
within a problem, a clear problem, a hazy problem, a practical problem, an
intellectual problem; but a problem! A mere flow of ideas minimally qualifies
(or can be deemed) as reasoning, even if it happens to be logically
respectable. But if it is directed, or even monitored (with intervention should
it go astray, not only into fallacy or mistake, but also into such things as
conversational irrelevance or otiosity!), that is another matter! Finicky
over-elaboration of intervening steps is frowned upon, and in extreme cases
runs the risk of forfeiting the title of reasoning. In conversation, such
over-elaboration will offend against this or that conversational maxim, against
(presumably) some suitably formulated maxim conjoining informativeness. As
Grice noted with regard to ‘That pillar box seems red to me.’ That would be
baffling if the addressee fails to detect the communication-point. An utterance
is supposed to inform, and what is the above meant to inform its addressee? In
thought, it will be branded as pedantry or neurotic caution. If a distinction
between brooding and conversing is to be made! At first sight, perhaps, one
would have been inclined to say that greater rather than lesser
explicitnessness is a merit. Not that inexplicitness, or implicatum-status, as
it were ‒ is bad, but that, other things being equal, the more explicitness the
better. But now it looks as if proper explicitness (or explicatum-status) is an
Aristotelian mean, or mesotes, and it would be good some time to enquire what
determines where that mean lies. The burden of the foregoing observations seems
to me to be that the provisional account of reasoning, which has been before
us, leaves out something which is crucially important. What it leaves out is
the conception of reasoning, as I like to see conversation, as a purposive
activity, as something with goals and purposes. The account or picture leaves
out, in short, the connection of reasoning with the will! Moreover, once we
avail ourselves of the great family of additional ideas which the importation
of this conception would give us, we shall be able to deal with the quandary
which I laid before you a few minutes ago. For we could say e.g. that R reasons
(informally) from p to c just in case R thinks that p and intends that, in
thinking c, he should be thinking something which would be the conclusion of a
formally valid argument the premisses of which are a supplementation of p. This
will differ from merely thinking that there exists some formally valid
supplementation of a transition from p to c, which I felt inclined NOT to count
as (or deem) reasoning. I have some hopes that this appeal to the purposiveness
or goal-oriented character of authentic reasoning or good reasoning might be sufficient
to dispose of the quandary on which I have directed it. But I am by no means
entirely confident that this is the case, and so I offer a second possible
method of handling the quandary, one to which I shall return later when I shall
attempt to place it in a larger context. We have available to us (let us
suppose) what I might call a hard way of making inferential moves. We in fact
employ this laborious, step-by-step procedure at least when we are in
difficulties, when the course is not clear, when we have an awkward (or
philosophical) audience, and so forth. An inferential judgement, however, is a
normally desirable undertaking for us only because of its actual or hoped for
destinations, and is therefore not desirable for its own sake (a respect in which,
possibly, it may differ from an inferential capacity). Following the hard way
consumes time and energy. These are in limited supply and it would, therefore,
be desirable if occasions for employing the hard way were minimized. A
substitute for the hard way, the quick way, which is made possible by
habituation and intention, is available to us, and the capacity for it (which
is sometimes called intelligence, and is known to be variable in degree) is a
desirable quality. The possibility of making a good inferential step (there
being one to be made), together with such items as a particular inferers
reputation for inferential ability, may determine whether on a particular
occasion we suppose a particular transition to be inferential (and so to be a
case of reasoning) or not. On this account, it is not essential that there
should be a single supplementation of an informal reasoning which is supposed
to be what is overtly in the inferers mind, though quite often there may be
special reasons for supposing this to be the case. So Botvinnik is properly
credited with a case of reasoning, while Shropshire is not. Drawing from his
recollections of an earlier linguistic botany on reason. Grice distinguishes
between justificatory reason and explanatory reason. There is a special case of
mixed reason, explanatory-cum-justificatory. The lecture can be seen as the way
an exercise that Austin took as taxonomic can lead to explanatory adequacy,
too! Bennett is an excellent correspondent. He holds a very interesting philosophical
correspondence with Hare. This is just one f. with Grices correspondence with
Bennett. Oxford don, Christchurh, NZ-born Bennett, of Magdalen, B. Phil. Oxon.
Bennett has an essay on the interpretation of a formal system under Austin. It
is interesting that Bennett was led to consider the interpretation of a formal
system under Austins Play Group. Bennett attends Grices seminars. He is my
favourite philosopher. Bennett quotes Grice in his Linguistic
behaviour. In return, Grice quotes Bennett in the Preface
toWOW. Bennett has an earlier essay on rationality, which evidences that
the topic is key at Grices Oxford. Bennett has studied better than anyone the
way Locke is Griceian. A word or expression does not just stand for idea, but
for the intention of the utterer to stand for it! Grice also enjoyed construal
by Bennett of Grice as a nominalist. Bennett makes a narrow use of the epithet.
Since Grice does distinguish between an utterance-token (x) and an
utterance-type, and considers that the attribution of meaning from token to
type is metabolic, this makes Grice a nominalist. Bennett is one of the few to
follow Kantotle and make him popular on the pages of the Times Literary
Supplement, of all places. Refs.: The locus classicus is “Aspects,” Clarendon.
But there are allusions on ‘reason’ and ‘rationality, in The H. P. Grice
Papers, BANC.
desideratum:
Grice was never sure what adjective to use for the ‘desiderative.’ He liked
buletic. He liked desideratum because it has the co-relate ‘consideratum,’ for belief. He uses ‘deriderative’ and a few more! Of
course what he means is a sub-psychological modality, or rather a ‘soul.’ So he
would apply it ‘primarily’ to the soul, as Plato and Aristotle does. The
‘psyche’, or ‘anima’ is what is ‘desiderativa.’ The Grecians are pretty
confused about this (but ‘boulemaic’ and ‘buletic’ are used), and the Romans
didn’t help. Grice is concerned with a rational-desiderative, that takes a
“that”-clause (or oratio obliqua), and qua constructivist, he is also concerned
with a pre-rational desiderative (he has an essay on “Needs and Wants,” and his
detailed example in “Method” is a squarrel (sic) who needs a nut. On top, while
Grice suggest s that it goes both ways: the doxastic can be given a reductive
analaysis in terms of the buletic, and the buletic in terms of the doxastic, he
only cares to provide the former. Basically, an agent judges that p, if his
willing that p correlates to a state of affairs that satisfies his desires.
Since he does not provide a reductive analysis for Prichard’s willing-that, one
is left wondering. Grice’s position is that ‘willing that…’ attains its ‘sense’
via the specification, as a theoretical concept, in some law in the
folk-science that agents use to explain their behaviour. Grice gets subtler
when he deals with mode-markers for the desiderative: for these are either
utterer-oriented, or addressee-oriented, and they may involve a buletic
attitude itself, or a doxastic attitude. When utterer-addressed, utterer wills
that utterer wills that p. There is no closure here, and indeed, a regressus ad
infinitum is what Grice wants, since this regressus allows him to get
univeersabilisability, in terms of conceptual, formal, and applicational kinds
of generality. In this he is being Kantian, and Hareian. While Grice praises
Kantotle, Aristotle here would stay unashamedly ‘teleological,’ and giving
priority to a will that may not be universalisable, since it’s the
communitarian ‘good’ that matters. what does Grice have to say about our
conversational practice? L and S have “πρᾶξις,” from “πράσσω,” and which they
render as ‘moral action,’ oποίησις, τέχνη;” “oποιότης,” “ἤθη καὶ πάθη καὶ π.,”
“oοἱ πολιτικοὶ λόγοι;” “ἔργῳ καὶ πράξεσιν, οὐχὶ λόγοις” Id.6.3; ἐν ταῖς πράξεσι
ὄντα τε καὶ πραττόμενα, “exhibited in actual life,” action in drama, “oλόγος;
“μία π. ὅλη καὶ τελεία.” With practical Grice means buletic. Praxis involves
acting, and surely Grice presupposes acting. By uttering, i. e. by the act of
uttering, expression x, U m-intends that p. Grice occasionally refers to action
and behaviour as the thing which an ascription of a psychological state
explains. Grice prefers the idiom of soul. Theres the ratiocinative soul.
Within the ratiocinative, theres the executive soul and the merely
administrative soul. Cicero had to translate Aristotle into prudentia, every
time Aristotle talked of phronesis. Grice was aware that the terminology
by Kant can be confusing. Kant used ‘pure’ reason for reason in the doxastic
realm. The critique by Kant of practical reason is hardly symmetrical to
his critique of doxastic reason. Grice, with his æqui-vocality thesis of
must (must crosses the buletic-boulomaic/doxastic divide), Grice is being more
of a symmetricalist. The buletic, boulomaic, or volitive, is a part of the soul,
as is the doxatic or judicative. And judicative is a trick because there is
such a thing as a value judgement, or an evaluative judgement, which is hardly
doxastic. Grice plays with two co-relative operators: desirability versus
probability. Grice invokes the exhibitive/protreptic distinction he had
introduced in the fifth James lecture, now applied to psychological attitudes
themselves. This Grice’s attempt is to tackle the Kantian problem in the
Grundlegung: how to derive the categorical imperative from a counsel of
prudence. Under the assumption that the protasis is Let the agent be happy,
Grice does not find it obtuse at all to construct a universalisable imperative
out of a mere motive-based counsel of prudence. Grice has an earlier paper on
pleasure which relates. The derivation involves seven steps. Grice
proposes seven steps in the derivation. 1. It is a fundamental law of
psychology that, ceteris paribus, for any creature R, for any P and Q, if R
wills P Λ judges if P, P as a result of Q, R wills Q. 2. Place this
law within the scope of a "willing" operator: R wills for any
P Λ Q, if R wills P Λ judges that if P, P as a result of Q,
R wills Q. 3. wills turns to should. If rational, R will have to block
unsatisfactory (literally) attitudes. R should (qua rational) judge for any
P Λ Q, if it is satisfactory to will that P Λ it is
satisfactory to judge that if P, P as a result of Q, it is sastisfactory to
will that Q. 4. Marking the mode: R should (qua rational) judge for any
P Λ Q, if it is satisfactory that !P Λ that if it .P, .P
only as a result of Q, it is satisfactory that !Q. 5. via (p & q
-> r) -> (p -> (q -> r)): R should (qua rational)
judge for any P Λ Q, if it is satisfactory that if .P, .P only
because Q, i is satisfactory that, if let it be that P, let it be that Q. 6. R
should (qua rational) judge for any P Λ Q, if P, P only because p
yields if let it be that P, let it be that Q. 7. For any P Λ Q if P,
P only because Q yields if let it be that P, let it be that Q. Grice was
well aware that a philosopher, at Oxford, needs to be a philosophical
psychologist. So, wanting and needing have to be related to willing. A plant
needs water. A floor needs sweeping. So need is too broad. So is want, a
non-Anglo-Saxon root for God knows what. With willing things get closer to the
rational soul. There is willing in the animal soul. But when it comes to
rational willing, there must be, to echo Pritchard, a conjecture, some doxastic
element. You cannot will to fly, or will that the distant chair slides over the
floor toward you. So not all wants and needs are rational willings, but then
nobody said they would. Grice is interested in emotion in his power structure
of the soul. A need and a want may count as an emotion. Grice was never too
interested in needing and wanting because they do not take a that-clause. He
congratulates Urmson for having introduced him to the brilliant willing that …
by Prichard. Why is it, Grice wonders, that many ascriptions of buletic states
take to-clause, rather than a that-clause? Even mean, as ‘intend.’ In this
Grice is quite different from Austin, who avoids the that-clause. The
explanation by Austin is very obscure, like those of all grammars on the
that’-clause, the ‘that’ of ‘oratio obliqua’ is not in every way similar to the
‘that’-clause in an explicit performative formula. Here the utterer is not
reporting his own ‘oratio’ in the first person singular present indicative
active. Incidentally, of course, it is not in the least necessary that an
explicit performative verb should be followed by a ‘that’-clause. In important
classes of cases it is followed by ‘to . . .,’ or by or nothing, e. g. ‘I
apologize for…,’ ‘I salute you.’ Now many of these verbs appear to be quite
satisfactory pure performatives. Irritating though it is to have them as such,
linked with clauses that look like statements, true or false, e. g., when I say
‘I prophesy that …,’ ‘I concede that …’,
‘I postulate that …,’ the clause following normally looks just like a
statement, but the verb itself seems to be pure performatives. One
may distinguish the performative opening part, ‘I state that …,’ which makes
clear how the utterance is to be taken, that it is a statement, as distinct
from a prediction, etc.), from the bit in the that-clause which is required to
be true or false. However, there are many cases which, as language stands at
present, we are not able to split into two parts in this way, even though the
utterance seems to have a sort of explicit performative in it. Thus, ‘I liken x
to y,’ or ‘I analyse x as y.’ Here we both do the likening and assert that
there is a likeness by means of one compendious phrase of at least a
quasi-performative character. Just to spur us on our way, we may also mention
‘I know that …’, ‘I believe that …’, etc. How complicated are these examples?
We cannot assume that they are purely descriptive, which has Grice talking of
the pseudo-descriptive. Want etymologically means absence; need should be
preferred. The squarrel (squirrel) Toby needs intake of nuts, and youll soon
see gobbling them! There is not much philosophical bibliography on these two
psychological states Grice is analysing. Their logic is interesting. Smith
wants to play cricket. Smith needs to play cricket. Grice is
concerned with the propositional content attached to the want and need
predicate. Wants that sounds harsh; so does need that. Still, there
are propositional attached to the pair above. Smith plays cricket. Grice
took a very cavalier attitude to what linguists spend their lives
analysing. He thought it was surely not the job of the philosopher,
especially from a prestigious university such as Oxford, to deal with the
arbitrariness of grammatical knots attached to this or that English verb. He
rarely used English, but stuck with ordinary language. Surely, he saw
himself in the tradition of Kantotle, and so, aiming at grand philosophical
truths: not conventions of usage, even his own! 1. Squarrel Toby has a
nut, N, in front of him. 2. Toby is short on squarrel food (observed or assumed),
so, 3. Toby wills squarrel food (by postulate of Folk Pyschological
Theory θ connecting willing with intake of N). 4. Toby prehends a nut
as in front (from (1) by Postulate of Folk Psychological Theory θ, if it
is assumed that nut and in front are familiar to Toby). 5. Toby joins squarrel
food with gobbling, nut, and in front (i.e. Toby judges gobbling, on nut in
front, for squarrel food (by Postulate of Folk Psychological
Theory θ with the aid of prior observation. So, from 3, 4 and 5, 6.
Tobby gobbles; and since a nut is in front of him, gobbles the nut in front of
him. The system of values of the society to which the agent belongs forms the
external standard for judging the relative importance of the commitments by the
agent. There are three dimensions of value: universally human, cultural that
vary with societies and times; and personal that vary with individuals. Each
dimension has a standard for judging the adequacy of the relevant values. Human
values are adequate if they satisfy basic needs; cultural values are adequate
if they provide a system of values that sustains the allegiance of the
inhabitants of a society; and personal values are adequate if the conceptions
of well‐being formed out of them enable individuals to live
satisfying lives. These values conflict and our well‐being requires some way of settling their conflicts, but
there is no universal principle for settling the conflicts; it can only be done
by attending to the concrete features of particular conflicts. These features
vary with circumstances and values. Grice reads Porter.The idea of the value
chain is based on the process view of organizations, the idea of seeing a
manufacturing (or service) organization as a system, made up of subsystems each
with inputs, transformation processes and outputs. Inputs, transformation
processes, and outputs involve the acquisition and consumption of resources –
money, labour, materials, equipment, buildings, land, administration and
management. How value chain activities are carried out determines costs and affects
profits.In his choice of value system and value sub-system, Grice is defending
objectivity, since it is usually the axiological relativist who uses such a
pretentious phrasing! More than a value may co-ordinate in a system. One such
is eudæmonia (cf. system of ends). The problem for Kant is the reduction of the
categorical imperative to the hypothetical or
suppositional imperative. For Kant, a value tends towards the
Subjectsive. Grice, rather, wants to offer a metaphysical defence of objective
value. Grice called the manual of conversational maxims the Conversational
Immanuel. The keyword to search the H. P. Grice is ‘will,’ and ‘volitional,’
even ‘ill-will,’ (“Metaphysics and ill-will,” s. V, c. 7-f. 28) and
‘benevolence’ (vide below under ‘conversational benevolence”). Also
‘desirability’: “Modality, desirability, and probability,” s. V, c. 8-ff.
14-15, and the conference lecture in a different series, “Probability,
desirability, and mood operators,” s. II, c. 2-f.11). Grice makes systematic use of ‘practical’ to
contrast with the ‘alethic,’ too (“Practical reason,” s. V, c. 9-f.1), The H.
P. Grice Papers, BANC.
desideratum
of conversational candour: tThis includes the maximin. One should make the
strongest move, and on the other hand try not to mislead.Grice's Oxford "Conversation" Lectures,
1966Grice: Between Self-Love and Benevolence As
I was saying (somewhere), Grice uses "self-love", charmingly
qualified with capitals, as
"Conversational Self-Love", and, less charmingly, "Conversational Benevolence", in
lectures advertised at Oxford, as "Logic and Conversation" that he gave at Oxford in
1964 as "University Lecturer in
Philosophy". He also gave seminars on "Conversational
helpfulness." A number of the lectures by Grice include discussion of thetypes
of behaviour people in general exhibit, and thereforethe types of
expectations[cfr. owings]they might bring to a venture such as a
conversation.Grice suggests that people in general both exhibitand EXPECT a
certain degree of helpfulness
[-- alla
Rosenschein, epistemic/boulemaic:If A cognizes that B wills p, then A wills p.] "from OTHERS" [-- reciprocal vs.
reflexive, etc.] usually on the understanding that such helpfulness does NOT
get in the way of particular goals and does not involve undue effort cf. least
effort? - cfr. Hobbes on self-love. It two people, even complete strangers,are
going through a gate, the expectation isthat the FIRST ONE through will hold
thegate open, or at least leave it open, for thesecond. The expectation is such
that todo OTHERWISE without particular reasonwould be interpreted as RUDE. The
type of helpfulness exhibited andexpected in conversation is more
specificbecause of a particular, although not a unique feature of
conversation.It is a COLLABORATIVE venture betweenthe participants.There is a
SHARED aimGrice wonders. His words, Does "helpfulness in something WE ARE
DOING TOGETHER” equate to 'cooperation'?He seems to have decided that it
does. By the later lectures in the series, 'the principle of conversational
helpfulness'has been rebranded the expectation of 'cooperation.' During the
Oxford lectures, Grice develops his account of the precise nature of this
cooperation. It can be seen as governed by certain regularities, or principles,
detailing expected behaviour. The expression'maxim' to describe these
regularities appears relatively late in the lectures.Grice's INITIAL choices of
terms are 'objectives' and 'desiderata'.He was particularly fond of the latter.
He was interested in detailing the desirable forms of behaviour for the purpose
of achieving a joint goal of the conversation. Initially, Grice posits TWO such
desiderata. Those relating to candour on the one hand and clarity on the other.
The desideratum of candour contains his general PRINCIPLE of making the strongest
(MAX) possible statement and, as a LIMITING (MAX) factor on this, the
suggestion that speakers should try not to mislead. (Do not mislead). cfr.
our"We are brothers"-- but not mutual."We are married to each
other". "You _are_ a boor".----The desideratum of conversational
clarity concerns the manner of expression. [His later reference to Modus or
Mode as used by Kant as one of the four
categories] for any conversational contribution. It includes the IMPORTANT
expectations of relevance to understanding and also insists that the main
import of an utterance be clear and explicit. (“Explicate!”) These two factors
are constantly to be WEIGHED against two
FUNDAMENTAL and SOMETIMES COMPETING DEMANDS. Contributions to a conversation
are aimed towards the agreed current purposes by the PRINCIPLE of Conversational
Benevolence. The principle of CONVERSATIONAL SELF-LOVE ensures the assumption
on the part of both participants that neither will go to unnecessary trouble
[LEAST EFFORT] in framing their contribution. This has been a topic of interest
to Noh end. In "Conversational Immanuel" Grice tries different ways
of making sense -- it is very easy to do so -- of Grice's distinctions that go
over the head of some linguists I know! Reasonable versus rational for example.
A Rawlsian distinction of sorts. Rational is too weak. We need 'reasonable'.
So, what sort of reasonableness is that which results from this harmonious, we
hope, clash of self-love and benevolence? Grice tried, wittily, to extend the
purposes of conversation to involve MUTUALLY INFLUENCING EACH OTHER -- a
reciprocal. (WoW, ii). And there's a mythical reconstruction of this in his
"Meaning Revisited" which he contributed to this symposium organised
by N. Smith on Mutua knowledge. But issues remains, we hope. The concept of ‘candour’is especially basic for Grice since
it is constitutive of what it means to identify the ‘significatum.’ As he
notes, ‘false’ information is no information. This is serious, because it has
to do with the acceptum. A contribution which is not trustworthy is not deemed
a contribution. It is conceptually impossible to intend to PROVIDE information
if you are aware that you are not being trustworthy and not conveying it. As
for the degree of explicitness, as Grice puts it. Since in communication in a
certain fashion all must be public, if an idea or thesis is heavily obscured,
it can no longer be regarded as having been propounded. This gives acceptum
justification to the correlative desideratum of conversational clarity. On top,
if there is a level of obscurity, the thing is not deemed to have been a
communicatum or significatum. It is all about confidence, you know. U expects A
will find him confident. Thus we find in Short and Lewis, “confīdo,” wich they
render as “to trust confidently in something,” and also, “confide in, rely
firmly upon, to believe, be assured of,” as an enhancing of “sperare,” in
Cicero’s Att. 6, 9, 1. Trust and rationality are pre-requisites of
conversation. Urmson develops this. They phrase in Urmson is "implied
claim." Whenever U makes a conversational contribution in a standard
context, there is an implied claim to U being trustworthy and reasonable.
What do Grice and Urmson mean by an "implied claim"? It is obvious
enough, but they both love to expand. Whenever U utters an expression which can
be used to convey truth or falsehood there is an implied claim to
trustworthiness by U, unless the situation shows that this is not so. U may be
acting or reciting or incredulously echoing the remark of another, or flouting
the expectation. This, Grice and Urmson think, may need an explanation.
Suppose that U utters, in an ordinary circumstance, ‘It will rain tomorrow,’ or
‘It rained yesterday,’ or ‘It is raining.’ This act carries with it the claim
that U should be trusted and licenses A to believe that it will rain
tomorrow. By this is meant that just as it is understood that no U will
give an order unless he is entitled to give orders, so it is understood that no
U will utter a sentence of a kind which can be used to make a statement unless
U is willing to claim that that statement is true, and hence one would be
acting in a misleading manner if one uttered the sentence if he was not willing
to make that claim. Here, the predicate “implies that …,” Grice, Grant,
Moore, Nowell-Smith, and Urmson hasten to add, is being used in such a way
that, if there is a an expectation that a thing is done in Circumstance C, U
implies that C holds if he does the thing. The point is often made if not always
in the terms Grice uses, and it is, Urmson and Grice believe, in substance
uncontroversial. Grice and Urmson wish to make the point that, when an utterer
U deploys a hedge with an indicative sentence, there is not merely an implied
claim that the whole statement is true but also that is true. The implied
or expressed claim by the utterer to trustworthiness need not be very
strong. The whole point of a hedge is to modify or weaken (if not, as
Grice would have it, flout) the claim by U to full trustworthiness which would
be implied by the unhedged assertion. But even if U utters “He is, I
suppose, at home;” or “I guess that the penny will come down
heads," U expresses, or for Urmson plainly implies, with however
little reason, that this is what U accepts as worth the trust by A. Now Grice
and Urmson meet an objection which is made by some philosophers to this
comparison. Grice and Urmson intend to meet the objection by a fairly detailed
examination of the example which they themselves would most likely choose. In
doing this Grice and Urmson further explain the use of a parenthetical
verb. The adverb is "probably" and the verb is “I believe.” To
say, that something is probable, the imaginary objector will say, is to imply
that it is reasonable to believe, that the evidence justifies a guarded claim
for the trust or trustworthiness of U and the truth of the statement. But to
say that someone else, a third person, believes something does not imply that
it is reasonable for U or A to believe it, nor that the evidence justifies the
guarded or implied claim to factivity or truth which U makes. Therefore,
the objector continues, the difference between the use of “I believe” and
“probably” is not, as Grice and Urmson suggest, merely one of nuance and degree
of impersonality. In one case, “probably,” reasonableness is implied; in the
other, “believe,” it is not. This objection is met by Grice and Urmson. They do
so by making a general point. To use the rational-reasonable distinction
in “Conversational implicature” and “Aspects,” there is an implied claim by U
to reasonableness. Further to an implied claim to trust whenever a
sentence is uttered in a standard context, now Grice and Urmson add, to meet
the sceptical objection about the contrast between “probably” and “I believe”
that, whenever U makes a statement in a standard context there is an implied
claim to reasonableness. This contention must be explained alla Kant. Cf.
Strawson on the presumption of conversational relevance, and Austin, Moore,
Nowell-Smith, Grant, and Warnock. To use Hart’s defeasibility, and Hall’s
excluder, unless U is acting or story-telling, or preface his remarks with some
such phrase as “I know Im being silly, but …” or, “I admit it is
unreasonable, but …” it is, Grice and Urmson think, a presupposition or
expectation of communication or conversation that a communicator will not make
a statement, thereby implying this trust, unless he has some ground,
however tenuous, for the statement. To utter “The King is visiting Oxford
tomorrow,” or “The President of the BA has a corkscrew in his pocket,” and
then, when asked why the utterer is uttering that, to answer “Oh, for
no reason at all,” would be to sin, theologically, against the basic
conventions governing the use of discourse. Grice goes on to provide a Kantian
justification for that, hence his amusing talk of maxims and stuff.
Therefore, Urmson and Grice think there is an implied or expressed claim
to reasonableness which goes with all our statements, i.e. there is
a mutual expectation that a communicator will not make a statement unless he is
prepared to claim and defend its reasonablenesss. Cf. Grice’s desideratum of
conversational candour, subsumed under the over-arching principle of
conversational helpfulness (formerly conversational benevolence-cum-self-love). Grice
thinks that the principle of conversational benevolence has to be weighed
against the principle of conversational self-love. The result is the
overarching principle of conversational helpfulness. Clarity gets in the
picture. The desideratum of conversational clarity is a reasonable requirement
for conversants to abide by. Grice follows some observations by
Warnock. The logical grammar of “trust,” “candour,” “charity,”
“sincerity,” “decency,” “honesty,” is subtle, especially when we are
considering the two sub-goals of conversation: giving and receiving
information/influencing and being influenced by others. In both sub-goals,
trust is paramount. The explorations of trust has become an Oxonian hobby, with
authors not such like Warnock, but Williams, and others. Grice’s essay is
entitled, “Trust, metaphysics, value.” Trust as a corollary of the principle of
conversational helpfulness. In a given conversational setting, assuming
the principle of conversational helpfulness is operating, U is assumed by A to
be trustworthy and candid. There are two modes of trust, which relate to
the buletic sub-goal and the doxastic sub-goal which Grice assumes the
principle of conversational helpfulness captures: giving and receiving information,
and influencing and being influenced by others. In both sub-goals, trust
is key. In the doxastic realm, trust has to do, not so much or only, with
truth (with which the expression is cognate), or satisfactoriness-value, but
evidence and probability. In the buletic realm, there are the dimensions of
satisfactoriness-value (‘good’ versus ‘true’), and ‘ground’ versus evidence,
which becomes less crucial. But note that one is trustworthy regarding BOTH the
buletic attitude and the doxastic attitude. Grice mentions this or that buletic
attitudes which is not usually judged in terms of evidential support (“I vow to
thee my country.”) However, in the buletic realm, U is be assumed as
trustworthy if U has the buletic attitude he is expressing. The cheater, the insincere,
the dishonest, the untrustworthy, for Grice is not irrational, just repugnant.
How immoral is the idea that honesty is the best policy? Is Kant right in
thinking there is no right to refrain from trust? Surely it is indecent. For
Kant, there is no motivation or ‘motive,’ pure or impure, behind telling the
truth – it’s just a right, and an obligation – an imperative. Being trustworthy
for Kant is associated with a pure motive. Grice agrees. Decency comes into the
picture. An indecent agent may still be rational, but in such a case,
conversation may still be seen as rational (if not reasonable) and surely not
be seen as rational helpfulness or co-operation, but rational adversarial
competition, rather, a zero-sum game. Grice found the etymology of ‘decent’ too
obscure. Short and Lewis have “dĕcet,” which they deem cognate with Sanscrit
“dacas,” ‘fame,’ and Grecian “δοκέω,‘to seem,’ ‘to think,’ and with Latin
‘decus,’ ‘dingus.’ As an impersonal verb, Short and Lewis render it as ‘it is
seemly, comely, becoming,; it beseems, behooves, is fitting, suitable, proper
(for syn. v. debeo init.): decere quasi aptum esse consentaneumque tempori et
personae, Cic. Or. 22, 74; cf. also nunc quid aptum sit, hoc est, quid maxime
deceat in oratione videamus, id. de Or. 3, 55, 210 (very freq. and class.; not
in Caesar). Grice’s idea of decency is connected to his explorations on
rational and reasonable. To cheat may be neither unreasonable nor
rational. It is just repulsive. Indecent, in other words. In all this,
Grice is concerned with ordinary language, and treasures Austin questioning
Warnock, when Warnock was pursuing a fellowship at Magdalen. “What would you
say the difference is between ‘Smith plays cricket rather properly’ and ‘Smith
plays cricket rather incorrectly’?” They spent the whole dinner over the
subtlety. By desserts, Warnock was in love with Austin. Cf. Grice on his
prim and proper Aunt Matilda. The exploration by Grice on trust is Warnockian
in character, or vice versa. In “Object of morality,” Warnock has trust as key,
as indeed, the very object of morality. Grice starts to focus on trust in an
Oxford seminars on the implicatum. If there is a desideratum of conversational
candour, and the goal of the principle of conversational helpfulness is that of
giving and receiving information, and influencing and being influenced by
others, ‘false’ ‘information’ is just no information – Since exhibiteness
trumps protrepsis, this applies to the buletic, too. Grice loved that Latin
dictum, “tuus candor.” He makes an early defence of this in his fatal objection
to Malcolm. A philosopher cannot intentionally instill a falsehood in his
tutee, such as “Decapitation willed the death of Charles I” (the alleged
paraphrase of the paradoxical philosopher saying that ‘causing’ is ‘willing’
and rephrasing “Decapitation was the cause of the death of Charles I.” There
is, for both Grice and Apel, a transcendental (if weak) justification, not just
utilitarian (honesty as the best policy), as Stalnaker notes in his
contribution to the Grice symposium for APA. Unlike Apel, the transcendental
argument is a weak one in that Grice aims to show that conversation that did
not abide by trust would be unreasonable, but surely still ‘possible.’ It is
not a transcendental justification for the ‘existence’ of conversation
simpliciter, but for the existence of ‘reasonable,’ decent conversation. If we
approach charity in the first person, we trust ourselves that some of our
beliefs have to be true, and that some of our desires have to be satisfactory
valid, and we are equally trusted by our conversational partners. This is
Grice’s conversational golden rule. What would otherwise be the point of
holding that conversation is rational co-operation? What would be the point of
conversation simpliciter? Urmson follows Austin, so Austin’s considerations on
this, notably in “Other minds,” deserve careful examination. Urmson was of
course a member of Grice’s play group, and these are the philosophers that we
consider top priority. Another one was P. H. Nowell-Smith. At least two of his
three rules deserve careful examination. Nowell-Smith notes that this or that ‘rule’
of contextual implication is not meant to be taken as a ‘rigid rule’. Unlike
this or that rule of entailment, a conversational rule can be broken without
the utterer being involved in self-contradiction or absurdity. When U uses an
expression to make a statement, it is contextually implied that he believes it
to be true. Similarly, when he uses it to perform any of the other jobs for
which sentences are used, it is contextually implied that he is using it for
one of the jobs that it normally does. This rule is often in fact broken.
Anti-Kantian lying, Bernhard-type play-acting, Andersen-type story-telling, and
Wildeian irony is each a case in which U breaks the rule, or flouts the
expectation, either overtly or covertly. But each of these four cases is a
secondary use, i.e. a use to which an expression cannot logically or
conceptually be put unless, as Hart would have it, it has a primary use. There is
no limit to the possible uses to which an expression may be put. In many cases
a man makes his point by deliberately using an expression in a queer way or
even using it in the ‘sense’ opposite to its unique normal one, as in irony
(“He is a fine friend,” implying that he is a scoundrel). The distinction
between a primary and a secondary use is important because many an argument
used by a philosopher consists in pointing out some typical example of the way
in which some expression E is used. Such an argument is always illegitimate if
the example employed is an example of a secondary use, however common such a
use may be. U contextually implies that he has what he himself believes to be
good reasons for his statement. Once again, we often break this rule and we
have special devices for indicating when we are breaking it. Phrases such as
‘speaking offhand …,’ 'I do not really know but …,’ and ‘I should be inclined
to say that …,’ are used by scrupulous persons to warn his addressee that U has
not got what seem to him good reasons for his statement. But unless one of
these guarding phrases is used we are entitled to believe that U believes
himself to have good reasons for his statement and we soon learn to *mistrust*
people who habitually infringe this rule. It is, of course, a mistake to infer
from what someone says categorically that he has in fact good reasons for what
he says. If I tell you, or ‘inform’ to you, that the duck-billed platypus is a
bird (because I ' remember ' reading this in a book) I am unreliable; but I am
not using language improperly. But if I tell you this without using one of the
guarding phrases and without having what I think good reasons, I am. What U
says may be assumed to be relevant to the interests of his addressee. This is
the most important of the three rules; unfortunately it is also the most
frequently broken. Bores are more common than liars or careless talkers. This
rule is particularly obvious in the case of answers to questions, since it is
assumed that the answer is an answer. Not all statements are answers to
questions; information may be volunteered. Nevertheless the publication of a
text-book on trigonometry implies that the author believes that there are
people who want to learn about trigonometry, and to give advice implies a
belief that the advice is relevant to one’s addressee's problem. This rule is
of the greatest importance for ethics. For the major problem of ethics is that
of bridging the gap between a decisions, an ought-sentence, an injunction, and
a sentence used to give advice on the one hand and the statements of *fact*,
sometime regarding the U’s soul, that constitute the reasons for these on the
other. It is in order to bridge these gaps that insight into necessary
synthetic connexions is invoked. This rule of contextual implication may help
us to show that there is no gap to be bridged because the reason-giving
sentence must turn out to be also *practical* from the start and not a
statement of *fact*, even concerning the state of the U’s soul, from which a practical
sentence can somehow be deduced. This rule is, therefore, more than a rule of
good manners; or rather it shows how, in matters of ordinary language, rules of
good manners shade into logical rules. Unless we assume that it is being
observed we cannot understand the connexions between decisions, advice, and
appraisals and the reasons given in support of them. Refs.: The main reference is in the first set of ‘Logic and
conversation.’ Many keywords are useful, not just ‘candour,’ but notably
‘trust.’ (“Rationality and trust,” c. 9-f. 5, “Trust, metaphysics, and value,”
c. 9-f. 20, and “Aristotle and friendship, rationality, trust, and decency,” c.
6-f. 18), BANC.
desideratum
of conversational clarity. “Candour” and “clarity’ are somewhat co-relative for
Grice. He is interested in identifying this or that desideratum. By having two
of them, he can play. So, how UNCLEAR can a conversationalist be provided he
WANTS to be candid? Candour trumps clarity. But too much ‘unperspicuity’ may
lead to something not being deemed an ‘implicatum’ at all. Grice is especially
concerned with philosopher’s paradoxes. Why would Strawson say that the usage
of ‘not,’ ‘and,’ ‘or,’ ‘if,’ ‘if and only if,’ ‘all,’ ‘some (at least one),
‘the,’ do not correspond to the logician’s use? Questions of candour and
clarity interact. Grice’s first application, which he grants is not original,
relates to “The pillar box seems red” versus “The pillar box is red.” “I would
not like to give the false impression that the pillar box is not red” seems
less clear than “The pillar box is red” – Yet the unperspicuous contributin is
still ‘candid,’ in the sense that it expresses a truth. So one has to be
careful. On top, philosophers like Lewis were using ‘clarity is not enough’ as
a battle cry! Grice’s favourite formulations of the imperatives here are
‘self-contradictory,’ and for which he uses ‘[sic]’, notably: “Be perspicuous
[sic]’ and “Be brief. Avoid unnecessary prolixity [sic].’
desirability:
This Grice calls the Jeffrey operator. If Urmson likes ‘probably,’ Grice likes
‘desirably.’ This theorem is a corollary of the desirability axiom by Jeffrey,
which is: "If prob XY = 0, for a prima facie PF(A V B) A (x E w)] = PFA A (x E w)] + PfB A
(x El+ w)]. This is the account by Grice of the adaptability of a pirot to its
changeable environs. Grice borrows the notion of probability (henceforth,
“pr”) from Davidson, whose early claim to fame was to provide the logic of the
notion. Grice abbreviates probability by Pr. and compares it to a buletic operator
‘pf,’ ‘for prima facie,’ attached to ‘De’ for desirability. A rational agent
must calculate both the probability and the desirability of his
action. For both probability and desirability, the degree is crucial.
Grice symbolises this by d: probability in degree d; probability in degree
d. The topic of life Grice relates to that of adaptation and surival, and
connects with his genitorial programme of creature construction (Pology.): life
as continued operancy. Grice was fascinated with life (Aristotle, bios) because
bios is what provides for Aristotle the definition (not by genus) of
psyche. The steps are as follows. Pf(p ⊃!q)/Pr(p
⊃ q); pf((p1 ^ p2) ⊃!q)/pr(p1 ^ p2 ⊃q); pf((p1 ^ p2 ^ p3) ⊃!q)/pr(p1 ^ p2 ^ p3 ^ p4 ⊃q);
pf (all things before me ⊃!q)/pr (all things before me ⊃
q); pf (all things considered ⊃ !q)/pr(all things considered ⊃ q); !q/|- q; G wills !q/G judges q. Strictly, Grice avoids
using the noun probability (other than for the title of this or that lecture).
One has to use the sentence-modifier ‘probably,’ and ‘desirably.’ So the
specific correlative to the buletic prima facie ‘desirably’ is the doxastic ‘probably.’
Grice liked the Roman sound to ‘prima facie,’ ‘at first sight’: “exceptio, quae prima facie justa videatur.” Refs.:
The two main sources are “Probability, desirability, and mood operators,” c.
2-f. 11, and “Modality, desirability and probability,” c. 8-ff. 14-15. But most
of the material is collected in “Aspects,” especially in the third and fourth
lectures. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
deutero-esperanto:
Grice genially opposed to the idea of a convention. He hated a convention. A language
is not conventional. Meaning is not conventional. Communication is not
conventional. He was even unhappy with the account of convention by Lewis in
terms of an arbitrary co-ordination. While the co-ordination bit passes
rational muster, the arbitrary element is deemed a necessary condition, and
Grice hated that. For Grice there is natural, and iconic. When a representation
ceases to be iconic and becomes, for lack of a better expression, non-iconic,
things get, we may assume conventional. One form of correlation in his last
definition of meaing allows for a conventional correlation. “Pain!,” the P
cries. There is nothing in /pein/ that minimally resembles the pain the P is
suffering. So from his involuntary “Ouch” to his simulated “Ouch,” he thinks he
can say “Pain.” Bennett explored the stages after that. The dog is shaggy is
Grices example. All sorts of resultant procedures are needed for reference and
predication, which may be deemed conventional. One may refer nonconventionally,
by ostension. It seems more difficult to predicate non-conventionally. But
there may be iconic predication. Urquhart promises twelve parts of speech: each
declinable in eleven cases, four numbers, eleven genders (including god,
goddess, man, woman, animal, etc.); and conjugable in eleven tenses, seven
moods, and four voices. The language will translate any idiom in any other
language, without any alteration of the literal sense, but fully representing
the intention. Later, one day, while lying in his bath, Grice designed
deutero-esperanto. The obble is fang may be current only for Griceian
members of the class of utterers. It is only this or that philosophers practice
to utter The obble is fang in such-and-such circumstances. In this case,
the utterer U does have a readiness to utter The obble is feng in such-and-such
circumstances. There is also the scenario in which The obble is fang is may be
conceived by the philosopher not to be deemed current at all, but
the utterance of The obble is feng in such-and-such circumstances is part
of some system of communication which the utterer U (Lockwith,, Urquart,
Wilkins, Edmonds, Grice) has devised but which has never been put into
operation, like the highway code which Grice invent another day again while
lying in his bath. In that case, U does this or that basic or resultant
procedure for the obble is feng in an attenuated but philosophically legitimate
fashion. U has envisaged a possible system of practices which involve a
readiness to utter Example by Grice that does NOT involve a convention in this
usage. Surely Grice can as he indeed did, invent a language, call it
Deutero-Esperanto, Griceish, or Pirotese, which nobody at Oxford ever uses to
communicat. That makes Grice the authority - cf. arkhe, authority, government
(in plural), "authorities" - and Grice can lay down, while lying in
the tub, no doubt - what is proper. A P can be said to potch of some obble
o as fang or as feng. Also to cotch of some obble o, as fang or feng; or to
cotch of one obble o and another obble o as being fid to one another.” In symbols:
(Ex)(Ey).Px ^ Oy ^ potch(x, y, fang) (Ex)(Ey).Px ^ Oy ^ potch(x, y, feng)
(Ex)(Ey).Px ^ Oy ^ cotch(x, y, fang) (Ex)(Ey).Px ^ Ox ^ cotch(x, y, feng)
(Ex)(Ey).Px ^ Oz ^ Oy ^ cotch(x, fid(y,z)). Let’s say that Ps (as Russell and
Carnap conceived them) inhabit a world of obbles, material objects, or
things. To potch is something like to perceive; to cotch something like to
think. Feng and fang are possible descriptions, much like our adjectives. Fid
is a possible relation between obbles. Grice provides a symbolisation for
content internalisation. The perceiver or cognitive Subjects perceives or
cognises two objects, x, y, as holding a relation of some type. There is
a higher level that Ps can reach when the object of their potchings and
cotchings is not so much objects but states of affairs. Its then that the
truth-functional operators will be brought to existence “^”: cotch(p ^ q)
“V”: cotch(p v q) “)”: )-cotch(p ) q) A P will be able to reject a
content, refuse-thinking: ~. Cotch(~p). When P1 perceives P2, the reciprocals
get more complicated. P2 cotches that P1!-judges that p. Grice
uses ψ1 for potching and ψ2
for cotching. If P2 is co-operative, and abides by "The Ps Immanuel,"
P2 will honour, in a Kantian benevolent way, his partners goal by adopting
temporarily his partners goal potch(x (portch(y, !p)) ⊃ potch(x, !p). But by then, its hardly simpler
ways. Especially when the Ps outdo their progenitor Carnap as metaphysicians.
The details are under “eschatology,” but the expressions are here “α izzes α.” This
would be the principle of non-contradiction or identity. P1 applies it war, and
utters War is war which yields a most peculiar implicature. “if α izzes β ∧ β izzes γ, α izz γ.” This is transitivity, which is
crucial for Ps to overcome Berkeley’s counterexample to Locke, and define their
identity over time. “if α hazzes β, α izzes β.” Or, what is accidental is not
essential. A P may allow that what is essential is accidental while misleading,
is boringly true. “α hazzes β iff α hazzes x ∧ x izzes β.” “If β is a katholou or universalium, β is
an eidos or forma.” For surely Ps need not be stupid to fail to see
squarrelhood. “if α hazzes β ∧ α
izzes a particular, γ≠α ∧ α izz β.” “α izzes predicable
of β iff ((β izzes α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazzes x ∧ x
izzes α). “α izzes essentially predicable of β ⊃⊂ β izzes α α
izzes non-essentially/accidentally predicable of β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(β hazzes x ∧ x
izzes α). α = β iff α izzes β ∧ β
izzes α. “α izzes an atomon, or individuum ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(β izzes α ⊃ α
izzes β). “α izzes a particular ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(α izzes predicable of β ⊃ (α izzes β ∧ β
izzes α)). α izzes a universalium ⊃⊂ ◊(∃β)(α izzes predicable of α ∧ ~(α izzes β ∧ β
izzes α). α izzes some-thing ⊃ α
izzes an individuum. α izzes an eidos or forma ⊃ (α izzes some-thing ∧ α izzes a universalium); α izzes predicable of β ⊃⊂ (β izzes α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazzes x ∧ x
izzes α). “ α izzes essentially predicable of α α izzes accidentally
predicable of β ⊃ α ≠ β. ~(α izzes accidentally predicable of
β) ⊃ α ≠ β. α izzes an kathekaston or particular ⊃ α izzes an individuum; α izz a particular ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izz α). ~(∃x).(x
izzes a particular ∧ x izzes a forma) ⊢ α
izzes a forma ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izzes α). x izzes a particular ⊃ ~(∃β)(α izzes β); α izzes a forma ⊃ ((α izzes predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ β
hazzes α); α izzes a forma ∧ β
izzes a particular ⊃ (α izzes predicable of β ⊃⊂ β hazzes A); (α izzes a particular ∧ β izzes a universalium ∧ β izzes predicable of α) ⊃ (∃γ)(α ≠ γ ∧ γ
izzes essentially predicable of α). (∃x)
(∃y)(x izzes a particular ∧ y
izzes a universalium ∧ y izzes predicable of x ⊃ ~(∀x)(x izzes a universalium ∧ x izzes some-thing). (∀β)(β izzes a universalium ⊃ β izzes some-thing). α izzes a particular) ⊃ ~∃β.(α ≠ β ∧ β
izzes essentially predicable of α). (α izzes predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ α
izzes non-essentially or accidentally predicable of β. Grice
is following a Leibnizian tradition. A philosophical language is any
constructed language that is constructed from first principles or certain
ideologies. It is considered a type of engineered language.
Philosophical languages were popular in Early Modern times, partly motivated by
the goal of recovering the lost Adamic or Divine language. The term
“ideal language” is sometimes used near-synonymously, though more modern
philosophical languages such as “Toki Pona” are less likely to involve such an
exalted claim of perfection. It may be known as a language of pure
ideology. The axioms and grammars of the languages together differ from
commonly spoken languages today. In most older philosophical languages,
and some newer ones, words are constructed from a limited set of morphemes that
are treated as "elemental" or fundamental. "Philosophical
language" is sometimes used synonymously with "taxonomic
language", though more recently there have been several conlangs constructed
on philosophical principles which are not taxonomic. Vocabularies of
oligo-synthetic communication-systems are made of compound expressions, which
are coined from a small (theoretically minimal) set of morphemes;
oligo-isolating communication-systems, such as Toki Pona, similarly use a
limited set of root words but produce phrases which remain s. of distinct
words. Toki Pona is based on minimalistic simplicity, incorporating
elements of Taoism. Láadan is designed to lexicalize and grammaticalise the
concepts and distinctions important to women, based on muted group
theory. A priori languages are constructed languages where the vocabulary
is invented directly, rather than being derived from other existing languages
(as with Esperanto, or Grices Deutero-Esperanto, or Pirotese or Ido). It all
starts when Carnap claims to know that pritos karulise elatically. Grice as
engineer. Pirotese is the philosophers engaging in Pology. Actually, Pirotese
is the lingo the Ps parrot. Ps karulise elatically. But not all of
them. Grice finds that the Pological talk allows to start from
zero. He is constructing a language, (basic) Pirotese, and the
philosophical psychology and world that that language is supposed to represent
or denote. An obble is a Ps object. Grice introduces potching and
cotching. To potch, in Pirotese, is what a P does with an obble: he perceives
it. To cotch is Pirotese for what a P can further do with an obble: know or
cognise it. Cotching, unlike potching, is factive. Pirotese would
not be the first language invented by a philosopher. Refs.: While the
reference to “Deutero-Esperanto’ comes from “Meaning revisited,” other keywords
are useful, notably “Pirotese” and “Symbolo.” Also keywords like “obble,” and “pirot.”
The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
diagoge:
Grice contrasted epagoge with diagoge. But epagoge is induction, so here we’ll
consider his views on probability and how it contrastds with diagoge. The
diagoge is easy to identity: Grice is a social animal, with the BA, Philosophy,
conferences, discussion, The American Philosophical Association, transcripts by
Randall Parker, from the audio-tapes contained in c. 10 within the same s. IV
miscellaneous, Beanfest, transcripts and audio-cassettes, s. IV, c. 6-f. 8, and f.
10, and s. V, c. 8-f.
4-8 Unfortunately, Parker typed carulise for karulise, or not. Re:
probability, Grice loves to reminisce an anecdote concerning his tutor Hardie
at Corpus when Hardie invoked Mills principles to prove that Hardie was
not responsible for a traffic jam. In drafts on word play, Grice would
speak of not bringing more Grice to your Mill. Mills System of Logic was part
of the reading material for his degree in Lit. Hum.at Oxford, so he was
very familiar with it. Mill represents the best of the English empiricist
tradition. Grice kept an interest on inductive methodology. In his Life
and opinions he mentions some obscure essays by Kneale and Keynes on the topic.
Grice was interested in Kneales secondary induction, since Grice saw this as an
application of a construction routine. He was also interested in
Keyness notion of a generator property, which he found metaphysically
intriguing. Induction. Induction ‒ Mill’s Induction, induction, deduction,
abduction, Mill. More Grice to the Mill. Grice loved Hardies playing with
Mill’s method of difference with an Oxford copper. He also quotes Kneale and
Keynes on induction. Note that his seven-step derivation of akrasia relies on
an inductive step! Grice was fortunate to associate with Davidson, whose
initial work is on porbability. Grice borrows from Davidson the idea that
inductive probability, or probable, attaches to the doxastic, while prima facie
attaches to desirably, or desirability. Jeffreys notion of
desirability is partition-invariant in that if a proposition, A, can be
expressed as the disjoint disjunction of both {B1, B2, B3} and {C1, C2, C3}, ∑
Bi ∈ AProb (Bi ∣∣ A).
Des (Bi) = ∑Ci ∈ A Prob (Ci ∣∣ A).
Des (Ci). It follows that applying the rule of desirability maximization
will always lead to the same recommendation, irrespective of how the decision
problem is framed, while an alternative theory may recommend different courses
of action, depending on how the decision problem is
formulated. Here, then, is the analogue of Jeffreys desirability
axiom (D), applied to sentences rather than propositions: (D) (prob(s and t) =
0 and prob(s or t) "# 0, ⊃ d
( ) prob(s)des(s)+ prob(t)des(t) es s or t =-"---- prob( s) + prob(t )
(Grice writes prob(s) for the Subjectsive probability of sand des(s) for the
desirability or utility of s.) B. Jeffrey admits that "desirability"
(his terms for evidential value) does not directly correspond to any single
pre-theoretical notion of desire. Instead, it provides the best systematic
explication of the decision theoretic idea, which is itself our best effort to
make precise the intuitive idea of weighing options. As Jeffrey remarks, it is
entirely possibly to desire someone’s love when you already have it. Therefore,
as Grice would follow, Jeffrey has the desirability operator fall under the
scope of the probability operator. The agents desire that p provided he judges
that p does not obtain. Diagoge/epagoge, Grices audio-files, the audio-files,
audio-files of various lectures and conferences, some seminars with Warner and
J. Baker, audio files of various lectures and conferences. Subjects: epagoge,
diagoge. A previous folder in the collection contains the transcripts.
These are the audio-tapes themselves, obviously not in folder. The kind of
metaphysical argument which I have in mind might be said, perhaps, to exemplify
a dia-gogic or trans-ductive as opposed to epa-gogic or in-ductive approach to
philosophical argumentation. Hence Short and Lewis have, for ‘diagoge,’ the
cognates of ‘trādūco,’ f. transduco. Now, the more emphasis is placed on
justification by elimination of the rival, the greater is the impetus given to
refutation, whether of theses or of people. And perhaps a greater emphasis on a
diagogic procedure, if it could be shown to be justifiable, would have an
eirenic effect. Cf. Aristotle on diagoge, schole, otium. Liddell and Scott
have “διαγωγή,” which they render as “literally carrying across,” -- “τριήρων”
Polyaen.5.2.6, also as “carrying through,” and “hence fig.” “ἡ διὰ πάντων αὐτῶν
δ., “taking a person through a subject by instruction, Pl. Ep.343; so, course
of instruction, lectures, ἐν τῇ ἐνεστώσῃ δ. prob. in Phld. Piet.25; also
passing of life, way or course of life, “δ. βίου” Pl. R.344e: abs., Id.
Tht.177a, etc., way of passing time, amusement, “δ. μετὰ παιδιᾶς” Arist. EN
1127b34, cf. 1177a27; “δ. ἐλευθέριος” Id. Pol.1339b5; διαγωγαὶ τοῦ συζῆν public
pastimes, ib.1280b37, cf. Plu.126b (pl.). also delay, D.C. 57.3. management,
τῶν πραγμάτων δ. dispatch of business, Id.48.5. IV. station for ships, f. l. in
Hdn.4.2.8. And there are other entries to consider: διαγωγάν: διαίρεσιν,
διανομήν, διέλευσιν. Grice knew what he was talking about! Refs.: The main
sources listed under ‘desirability,’ above. There is a specific essay on
‘probability and life.’ Good keywords, too, are epagoge and induction The H. P.
Grice Papers, BANC.
dictum:
It is Hare who introduced ‘dictum’ in the Oxonian philosophical literature in
his T. H. Green Essay. Hare distinguishes between the ‘dictum,’ that the cat is
on the mat, from the ‘dictor,’ ‘I state that the cat is on the mat, yes.’ ‘Cat,
on the mat, please.’ Grice often refers to Hare’s play with words, which he
obviously enjoys. In “Epilogue,” Grice elaborates on the ‘dictum,’ and turns it
into ‘dictivitas.’ How does he coin that word? He starts with Cicero, who has
‘dictivm,’ and creates an abstract noun to match. Grice needs a concept of a
‘dictum’ ambiguous as it is. Grice distinguishes between what an Utterer
explicitly conveys, e. g. that Strawson took off his boots and went to bed.
Then there’s what Grice implicitly conveys, to wit: that Strawson took off his
boots and went to bed – in that order. Surely Grice has STATED that Strawson
took off his boots and went to bed. Grice has ASSERTED that Strawson took off
his boots and went to bed. But if Grice were to order Strawson: “Put on your
parachute and jump!” the implicata may differ. By uttering that utterance,
Grice has not asserted or stated anything. So Grice needs a dummy that will do
for indicatives and imperatives. ‘Convey’ usually does – especially in the
modality ‘explicitly’ convey. Because by uttering that utterance Grice has
explicitly conveyed that Strawson is to put on his parachute and jump. Grice
has implicitly conveyd that Strawson is to put on his parachute and THEN jump,
surely.
disgrice: In PGRICE, Kemmerling speaks of disgricing as
the opposite of gricing. The first way to disgrice Kemmerling calls
‘strawsonising.’For Strawson, even the resemblance (for Grice, equivalence in
terms of 'iff' -- cf. his account of what an syntactically structured
non-complete expression) between (G) There is not a single volume in
my uncle’s library which is not by an English author,’and the negatively
existential form (LFG) ~ (Ex)(Ax . ~ Bx)’ is deceptive, ‘It is not
the case that there exists an x such
that x is a book in Grice’s uncle’s library and x is written by an Englishman. FIRST, 'There is not a single volume in uncle’s
library which is not by an English author' --
as normally used, carries the presupposition -- or entails, for Grice -- (G2) Some (at least one) book is in
Grice’s uncle’s library. SECOND, 'There is not a single volume in
Grice’s uncle’s library which is not by an English author,’ is far from being
'entailed' by (G3e) It is not the case that there is some (at least one)
book in my room. If we give ‘There not a
single book in my room which is not by an English author’ the modernist
logical form ‘~ (Ex)(Ax .~ Bx),’ we see
that this is ENTAILED by the
briefer, and indeed logicall stronger (in terms of entailments) ~ (Ex)Ax. So when Grice, with a solemn face, utters, ‘There
is not a single foreign volume in my uncle’s library, to reveal later that the library is empty, Grice should expect
his addressee to get some odd feeling. Surely not the feeling of having been
lied to -- or been confronted with an initial false utterance --, because we
have not. Strawson gets the feeling of having been made "the victim of a sort
of communicative outrage." "What you say is outrageous!" This
sounds stronger than it is. An outrage is believed to be an evil deed, offense,
crime; affront, indignity, act not within established or reasonable
limits," of food, drink, dress, speech, etc., from Old French outrage "harm, damage;
insult; criminal behavior; presumption, insolence, overweening" (12c.),
earlier oltrage (11c.),
From Vulgar Latin ‘ultraticum,’
excess," from Latin ultra,
beyond" (from suffixed form of PIE root *al- "beyond"). Etymologically, "the passing
beyond reasonable bounds" in any sense. The meaning narrowed in English
toward violent excesses because of folk etymology from out + rage. Of injuries to feelings,
principles, etc., from outrage, v. outragen,
"to go to excess, act immoderately," from outrage (n.) or from Old
French oultrager. From
1580s with meaning "do violence to, attack, maltreat." Related: Outraged; outraging. But Strawson gets the
feeling of having been made "the victim of a sort of communicative
outrage.” When Grice was only trying to tutor him in The Organon. Of
course it is not the case that Grice is explicitly conveying or expressing that
there there is some (at least one) book in his uncle's room. Grice has not said
anything false. Or rather, it is not the case that Grice utters an
utterance which is not alethically or doxastically satisfactory. Yet what Grice
gives Strawson the defeasible, cancellable, license to to assume that
Grice thinks there is at least one book. Unless he goes on to cancel the
implicature, Grice may be deemed to be misleading Strawson. What Grice
explicitly conveys to be true (or false) it is necessary (though not sufficient)
that there should at least one volume in his uncle’s library -- It is not the
case that my uncle has a library and in that library all the books are
autochthonous to England, i.e. it is not the case that Grice’s uncle has a
library; for starters, it is not the case that Grice has a literate uncle. Of
this SUBTLE, nuantic, or cloudy or foggy, "slight or delicate degree of
difference in expression, feeling, opinion, etc.," from Fr. nuance "slight
difference, shade of colour,” from nuer "to
shade," from nue "cloud," from Gallo-Roman nuba, from
Latin nubes "a
cloud, mist, vapour," sneudh- "fog," source also of
Avestan snaoda "clouds,"
Latin obnubere "to
veil," Welsh nudd "fog," Greek nython, in
Hesychius "dark, dusky") According to Klein, the French usage is a
reference to "the different colours of the clouds,” in reference to color
or tone, "a slight variation in shade; of music, as a French term in
English -- 'sort' is the relation between ‘There is not a volume in my
uncle's library which is not by an English author,’ and ‘My uncle's
library is not empty. RE-ENTER GRICE. Grice suggested that Strawson see such a
fine point such as that, which Grice had the kindness to call an 'implicatum', the
result of an act of an ‘implicatura’ (they were both attending Kneale’s seminar
on the growth and ungrowth of logic) is irrelevant to the issue of
‘entailment’. It is a 'merely pragmatic’ implicatum, Grice would say, bringing
forward a couple of distinctions: logical/pragmatic point; logical/pragmatic
inference; entailment/implicatum; conveying explicitly/conveying implicitly;
stating/implicating; asserting/implying; what an utterer means/what the
expression 'means' -- but cf. Nowell-Smith, who left Oxford after being
overwhelmed by Grice, "this is how the rules of etiquette inform the rules
of logic -- on the 'rule' of relevance in "Ethics," 1955. If to call
such a point, as Grice does, as "irrelevant to logic" is vacuous in
that it may be interpreted as saying that that such a fine foggy point is not
considered in a modernist formal system of first-order predicate calculus with
identity, this Strawson wishes not to dispute, but to emphasise. Call it his
battle cry! But to 'logic' as concerned with this or that relation between this
or that general class of statement occurring in ordinary use, and the attending
general condition under which this or that statement is correctly called 'true'
or 'false,' this fine foggy nice point would hardly be irrelevant. GRICE'S
FORMALIST (MODERNIST) INTERPRETATION. Some 'pragmatic' consideration, or
assumption, or expectation, a desideratum of conversational conduct obviously underlies
and in fact 'explains' the implicatum, without having to change the ‘sense’ of
Aristotle’s syllogistics in terms of the logical forms of A, E, I, and O. If we
abide by an imperative of conversational helpfulness, enjoining the maximally
giving and receiving of information and the influencing and being influenced by
others in the institution of a decisions, the sub-imperative follows to the
effect, ‘Thou shalt NOT make a weak move compared to the stronger one that thou
canst truthfully make, and with equal or greater economy of means.’ Assume the
form ‘There is not a single … which is not . . .,’ or ‘It is not the case
that ... there is some (at least one) x that ... is not ... is introduced
in ‘ordinary’ language with the same SENSE as the expression in the
‘ideal’ language, ~(Ex)(Ax and ~Bx). Then prohibition inhibits the utterance of
the form where the utterer can truly and truthfully simply convey
explicitly ‘There is not a single ..., i. e. ~(Ex)(Fx). It is
defeasible prohibition which tends to confer on the overprolixic form ('it is
not the case that ... there is some (at least one) x that is not ...') just
that kind of an implicatum which Strawson identifies. But having
detected a nuance in a conversational phenomenon is not the same thing as
rushing ahead to try to explain it BEFORE exploring in some detail what kind of
a nuance it is. The mistake is often commited by Austin, too (in "Other Minds,"
and "A Plea for Excuses"), and by Hart (on 'carefully'), and by Hare
(on "good"), and by Strawson on 'true,' (Analysis), ‘the,’ and 'if --
just to restrict to the play group. Grice tries to respond to anti-sense-datum
in "That pillar box seems red to me,” but Strawson was not listening. The overprolixic form in the ‘ordinary’
language, ‘It is not the case that there is some (at least one x) such that ...
x is not ...’ would tend, if it does not remain otiose, to develop or generate
just that baffling effect in one's addressee ('outrage!') that Strawson identifies,
as opposed to the formal-device in the ‘ideal’ language with which the the
‘ordinary’ language counterpart is co-related. What weakens our resistance
to the negatively existential analysis in this case more than in the case of
the corresponding "All '-sentence is the powerful attraction of the
negative opening phrase There is not …'. To avoid misunderstanding
one may add a point about the neo-traditionalist interpretation of the forms of
the traditional Aristotelian system. Strawson is not claiming that it
faithfully represents this or that intention of the principal exponent of the
Square of Opposition. Appuleius, who knows, was perhaps, more interested in
formulating this or that theorem governing this or that logical relation of
this or that more imposing general statement than this or that everyday general
statement that Strawson considers. Appuleius, who knows, might have
been interested, e. g., in the logical powers of this or that
generalisation, or this or that sentence which approximates more closely to the
desired conditions that if its utterance by anyone, at any time, at any place,
results in a true statement, so does its utterance by anyone else, at any other
time, at any other place. How far the account by the neo-traditionalist
of this or that general sentence of 'ordinary' langauge is adequate for every
generalization may well be under debate. Refs.: H. P. Grice, “In defence of
Appuleius,” BANC.
disimplicatum:
the target is of course Davidson having the cheek to quote Grice’s Henriette
Herz Trust lecture for the BA! Lewis and Short have ‘intendere’ under ‘in-tendo,’
which they render as ‘to stretch out or forth, extend, also to turn ones
attention to, exert one’s self for, to purpose, endeavour,” and finaly as
“intend”! “pergin, sceleste, intendere hanc arguere?” Plaut. Mil. 2, 4,
27 Grices tends towards claiming that you cannot extend what you dont
intend. In the James lectures, Grice mentions the use of is to mean seem (The
tie is red in this light), and see to mean hallucinate. The reductive analyses
of being and seeing hold. We have here two cases of loose use (or
disimplicature). Same now with his example in “Intention and Uncertainty”
(henceforth, “Uncertainty”): Smith intends to climb Mt. Everest +
[common-ground status: this is difficult]. Grices response to Davidsons pretty
unfair use of Grices notion of conversational implicature in Davidsons analysis
of intention caught a lot of interest. Pears loved Grices reply. Implicatum here
is out of the question ‒ disimplicatum may not. Grice just saw that his theory
of conversation is too social to be true when applied to intending. The
doxastic condition is one of the entailments in an ascription of an intending.
It cannot be cancelled as an implicatum can. If it can be cancelled, it is best
seen as a disimplicatum, or a loose use by an utterer meaning less than what he
says or explicitly conveys to more careful conversants. Grice and Davidson
were members of The Grice and Davidson Mutual Admiration
Society. Davidson, not being Oxonian, was perhaps not acquainted with
Grices polemics at Oxford with Hart and Hampshire (where Grice sided with
Pears, rather). Grice and Pears hold a minimalist approach to
intending. On the other hand, Davidson makes what Grice sees as the same
mistake again of building certainty into the concept. Grice finds that to
apply the idea of a conversational implicatum at this point is too social to be
true. Rather, Grice prefers to coin the conversational disimplicatum: Marmaduke
Bloggs intends to climb Mt Everest on hands and knees. The utterance
above, if merely reporting what Bloggs thinks, may involve a loose use of
intends. The certainty on the agents part on the success of his enterprise
is thus cast with doubt. Davidson was claiming that the agents belief in
the probability of the object of the agents intention was a mere conversational
implicatum on the utterers part. Grice responds that the ascription of
such a belief is an entailment of a strict use of intend, even if, in cases
where the utterer aims at a conversational disimplicatum, it can be
dropped. The addressee will still regard the utterer as abiding by
the principle of conversational helpfulness. Pears was especially interested in
the Davidson-Grice polemic on intending, disimplicature, disimplicature. Strictly,
a section of his reply to Davidson. If Grices claim to fame is implicature, he
finds disimplicature an intriguing notion to capture those occasions when an
utterer means LESS than he says. His examples include: a loose use of intending
(without the entailment of the doxastic condition), the uses of see in
Shakespeareian contexts (Macbeth saw Banquo, Hamlet saw his father on the
ramparts of Elsinore) and the use of is to mean seems (That tie is blue under
this light, but green otherwise, when both conversants know that a change of
colour is out of the question. He plays with Youre the cream in my coffee being
an utterance where the disimplicature (i.e. entailment dropping) is total.
Disimplicature does not appeal to a new principle of conversational
rationality. It is perfectly accountable by the principle of conversational
helpfulness, in particular, the desideratum of conversational candour. In everyday explanation we exploit, as Grice notes,
an immense richness in the family of expressions that might be thought of as
the wanting family. This wanting family includes expressions like want, desire,
would like to, is eager to, is anxious to, would mind not…, the idea of appeals to me, is thinking of, etc. As Grice
remarks, The likeness and differences within this wanting family demand careful
attention. In commenting on Davidsons treatment of wanting in
Intending, Grice notes: It seems to Grice that the picture of the soul
suggested by Davidsons treatment of wanting is remarkably tranquil and, one
might almost say, computerized. It is the picture of an ideally decorous board
meeting, at which the various heads of sections advance, from the standpoint of
their particular provinces, the case for or against some proposed course of
action. In the end the chairman passes judgement, effective for action;
normally judiciously, though sometimes he is for one reason or another
over-impressed with the presentation made by some particular member. Grices
soul doesnt seem to him, a lot of the time, to be like that at all. It is more
like a particularly unpleasant department meeting, in which some members shout,
wont listen, and suborn other members to lie on their behalf; while the
chairman, who is often himself under suspicion of cheating, endeavours to
impose some kind of order; frequently to no effect, since sometimes the meeting
breaks up in disorder, sometimes, though it appears to end comfortably, in
reality all sorts of enduring lesions are set up, and sometimes, whatever the
outcome of the meeting, individual members go off and do things unilaterally.
Could it be that Davidson, of the New World, and Grice, of the Old World, have
different idiolects regarding intend? Could well be! It is said that the New
World is prone to hyperbole, so perhaps in Grices more cautious use, intend is
restricted to the conditions HE wants it to restrict it too! Odd that for all
the generosity he displays in Post-war Oxford philosophy (Surely I can help you
analyse you concept of this or that, even if my use of the corresponding
expression does not agree with yours), he goes to attack Davidson, and just for
trying to be nice and apply the conversational implicatum to intend! Genial
Grice! It is natural Davidson, with his naturalistic tendencies, would like to
see intending as merely invoking in a weak fashion the idea of a strong
psychological state as belief. And its natural that Grice hated that! Refs.:
The source is Grice’s comment on Davidson on intending. The H. P. Grice Papers,
BANC.
disjunctum: Aulus Gellius (The Attic Nights, XVI, 8)
tells us about this disjunction: “There also is ■ another type of a^twpa which
the Greeks call and we call disjunctum, disjunctive sentence. Gellius notes
that ‘or’ is by default ‘inclusive’: where one or several propositions may be
simultaneously true, without ex- cluding one another, although they may also
all be false. Gellius expands on the non-default reading of exclusive
disjunction: pleasure is either good or bad or it is neither good nor bad (“Aut
malum est voluplas, aut bonum, aul neque bonum, neque malum est”). All the
elements of the exclusive disjunctive exclude one another, and their
contradictory elements, Gr. avTtxs'-p.sva, are incompatible with one another”.
“Ex omnibus quae disjunguntiir, unum esse verum debet, falsa cetera.”Grice
lists ‘or’ as the second binary functor in his response to Strawson. But both
Grice and Strawson agreed that the Oxonian expert on ‘or’ is Wood. Mitchell is
good, too, though. The relations between “v” and “or” (or “either ... or …”)
are, on the whole, less intimate than those between “.” and “and,” but less
distant than those between “D” and “if.” Let us speak of a statement made by
coupling two clauses by “or” as an alternative statement ; and let us speak of
the first and second alternatesof such a statement, on analogy with our talk of
the antecedent and consequent of a hypothetical statement. At a bus-stop,
someone might say: “Either we catch this bus or we shall have to walk all the
way home.” He might equally well have said “If we don't catch this bus, we
shall have to walk all the way home.” It will be seen that the antecedent of
the hypothetical statement he might have made is the negation of the first
alternate of the alternative statement he did make. Obviously, we should not
regard our catching the bus as a sufficient condition of the 'truth' of either
statement; if it turns out that the bus we caught was not the last one, we
should say that the man who had made the statement had been wrong. The truth of
one of the alternates is no more a sufficient condition of the truth of the
alternative statement than the falsity of the antecedent is a sufficient
condition of the truth of the hypothetical statement. And since 'p"Dpyq'
(and, equally, * q"3p v q ') is a law of the truth-functional system, this
fact sufficiently shows a difference between at least one standard use of “or” and
the meaning given to “v.” Now in all, or almost all, the cases where we are
prepared to say something of the form “p or q,” we are also prepared to say
something of the form 4 if not-p, then q \ And this fact may us to exaggerate
the difference between “v” and “or” to think that, since in some cases, the
fulfilment of one alternate is not a sufficient condition of the truth of the
alternative statement of which It is an alternate, the fulfilment of one
alternate is a sufficient condition of the truth of an alternative statement.
And this is certainly an exaggeration. If someone says ; “Either it was John or
it was Robert but I couldn't tell which,” we are satisfied of the truth of the
alternative statement if either of the alternates turns out to be true; and we
say that the speaker was wrong only if neither turns out to be true. Here we
seem to have a puzzle ; for we seem to be saying that * Either it was John or
it was Robert ' entails 4 If it wasn't John, it was Robert * and, at the same
time, that ‘It was John’ entails the former, but not the latter. What we are
suffering from here is perhaps a crudity in our notion of entailraent, a
difficulty In applying this too undifferentiated concept to the facts of speech
; or, if we prefer it, an ambiguity in the notion of a sufficient condition.
The statement that it was John entails the statement that it was either John or
Robert in the sense thai it confirms it; when It turns out to have been John,
the man who said that either It was John or it was Robert is shown to have been
right. But the first statement does not entail the second in the sense that the
step ‘It was John, so it was either John or Robert’ is a logically proper step,
unless the person saying this means by it simply that the alternative statement
made previously was correct, i.e., 'it was one of the two '. For the
alternative statement carries the implication of the speaker's uncertainty as
to which of the two it was, and this implication is inconsistent with the
assertion that it was John. So in this sense of * sufficient condition ', the
statement that it was John is no more a sufficient condition of (no more entails)
the statement that it was either John or Robert than it is a sufficient
condition of (entails) the statement that if it wasn't John, it was Robert. The
further resemblance, which we have already noticed, between the alternative
statement and the hypothetical statement, is that whatever knowledge or
experience renders it reasonable to assert the alternative statement, also
renders it reasonable to make the statement that (under the condition that it
wasn't John) it was Robert. But we are less happy about saying that the hypothetical
statement is confirmed by the discovery that it was John, than we are about
saying that the alternative statement is confirmed by this discovery. For we
are inclined to say that the question of confirmation of the hypothetical statement
(as opposed to the question of its reasonableness or acceptability) arises only
if the condition (that it wasn't John) turns out to be fulfilled. This shows an
asymmetry, as regards confirmation, though not as regards acceptability,
between 4 if not p, then q ' and * if not qy then p ' which is not mirrored in
the forms ‘either p or q’ and ‘either q or p.’ This asymmetry is ignored in the
rule that * if not p, then q ' and ‘if not q, then p’ are logically equivalent,
for this rule regards acceptability rather than confirmation. And rightly. For
we may often discuss the l truth ' of a subjunctive conditional, where the
possibility of confirmation is suggested by the form of words employed to be
not envisaged. It is a not unrelated difference between * if ' sentences and
‘or’ sentences that whereas, whenever we use one of the latter, we should also
be prepared to use one of the former, the converse does not hold. The cases in
which it does not generally hold are those of subjunctive conditionals. There
is no ‘or’ sentence which would serve as a paraphrase of ‘If the Germans had
invaded England in 1940, they would have won the war’ as this sentence would
most commonly be used. And this is connected with the fact that c either . . .
or . . .' is associated with situations involving choice or decision. 4 Either
of these roads leads to Oxford ' does not mean the same as ' Either this road
leads to Oxford or that road does’ ; but both confront us with the necessity of
making a choice. This brings us to a feature of * or ' which, unlike those so
far discussed, is commonly mentioned in discussion of its relation to * v ' ;
the fact, namely, that in certain verbal contexts, ‘either … or …’ plainly
carries the implication ‘and not both . . . and . . .', whereas in other
contexts, it does not. These are sometimes spoken of as, respectively, the exclusive
and inclusive senses of ‘or;’ and, plainly, if we are to identify 4 v’ with
either, it must be the latter. The reason why, unlike others, this feature of
the ordinary use of “or” is commonly mentioned, is that the difference can
readily be accommodated (1 Cf. footnote to p. 86.In the symbolism of the
truth-functional system: It is the difference between “(p y q) .~ (p . q)”
(exclusive sense) and “p v q” (inclusive sense). “Or,” like “and,” is commonly
used to join words and phrases as well as clauses. The 4 mutuality difficulties
attending the general expansion of 4 x and y are/ 5 into * x is /and y is/' do
not attend the expansion of 4 x or y isf into c r Is/or y is/ ? (This is not to
say that the expansion can always correctly be made. We may call “v” the
disjunctive sign and, being warned against taking the reading too seriously,
may read it as ‘or.' While he never approached the topic separately, it’s easy
to find remarks about disjunction in his oeuvre. A veritable genealogy of
disjunction can be traced along Griceian lines. Refs.: Grice uses an
illustration involving ‘or’ in the ‘implication’ excursus in “Causal Theory.”
But the systematic account comes from WoW, especially essay 4.
ditto: Grice disliked Strawson’s ditto
theory in Analysis of ‘true’ as admittive performatory. 1620s, "in the
month of the same name," Tuscan dialectal ditto "(in) the said (month
or year)," literary Italian detto, past participle of dire "to
say," from Latin dicere "speak, tell, say" (from PIE root *deik-
"to show," also "pronounce solemnly"). Italian used
the word to avoid repetition of month names in a series of dates, and in this
sense it was picked up in English. Its generalized meaning of "the
aforesaid, the same thing, same as above" is attested in English by 1670s.
In early 19c. a suit of men's clothes of the same color and material through
was ditto or dittoes (1755). Dittohead, self-description of followers of U.S.
radio personality Rush Limbaugh, attested by 1995. dittoship is from 1869.
dossier:
Grice’s favourite vacuous name is ‘Bellerophon.’ ‘Vacuous names’ is an
essay commissioned by Davison and Hintikka for Words and objections: essays on
the work of W. V. Quine (henceforth, W and O) for Reidel, Dordrecht. “W and O” had
appeared (without Grices contribution) as a special issue of Synthese. Grices
contribution, along with Quines Reply to Grice, appeared only in the reprint of
that special issue for Reidel in Dordrecht. Grice cites from various
philosophers (and logicians ‒ this was the time when logic was starting to
be taught outside philosophy departments, or sub-faculties), such as Mitchell,
Myro, Mates, Donnellan, Strawson, Grice was particularly
proud to be able to quote Mates by mouth or book. Grice takes the
opportunity, in his tribute to Quine, to introduce one of two of his
syntactical devices to allow for conversational implicata to be given maximal
scope. The device in Vacuous Namess is a subscription device to indicate
the ordering of introduction of this or that operation. Grice wants to
give room for utterances of a special existential kind be deemed
rational/reasonable, provided the principle of conversational helfpulness is
thought of by the addressee to be followed by the utterer. Someone isnt
attending the party organised by the Merseyside Geographical Society. That
is Marmaduke Bloggs, who climbed Mt. Everest on hands and knees. But who,
as it happened, turned out to be an invention of the journalists at the
Merseyside Newsletter, “W and O,” vacuous name, identificatory use,
non-identificatory use, subscript device. Davidson and Hintikka were well aware
of the New-World impact of the Old-World ideas displayed by Grice and
Strawson in their attack to Quine. Quine had indeed addressed Grices and
Strawsons sophisticated version of the paradigm-case argument in Word and
Object. Davidson and Hintikka arranged to publish a special issue for a
periodical publication, to which Strawson had already contributed. It was only
natural, when Davidson and Hintikka were informed by Reidel of their interest
in turning the special issue into a separate volume, that they would approach
the other infamous member of the dynamic duo! Commissioned by Davidson and
Hintikka for “W and O.” Grice introduces a subscript device to account for
implicata of utterances like Marmaduke Bloggs won’t be attending the
party; he was invented by the journalists. In the later section, he
explores identificatory and non identificatory uses of the without involving
himself in the problems Donnellan did! Some philosophers, notably
Ostertag, have found the latter section the most intriguing bit, and thus
Ostertag cared to reprint the section on Descriptions for his edited MIT volume
on the topic. The essay is structured very systematically with an initial
section on a calculus alla Gentzen, followed by implicata of vacuous Namess
such as Marmaduke Bloggs, to end with definite descriptions, repr. in Ostertag,
and psychological predicates. It is best to focus on a few things here.
First his imaginary dialogues on Marmaduke Bloggs, brilliant! Second, this as a
preamble to his Presupposition and conversational implicature. There is a
quantifier phrase, the, and two uses of it: one is an identificatory use (the
haberdasher is clumsy, or THE haberdasher is clumsy, as Grice prefers) and then
theres a derived, non-identificatory use: the haberdasher (whoever she was! to
use Grices and Mitchells addendum) shows her clumsiness. The use of the numeric
subscripts were complicated enough to delay the publication of this. The whole
thing was a special issue of a journal. Grices contribution came when Reidel
turned that into a volume. Grice later replaced his numeric subscript device by
square brackets. Perhaps the square brackets are not subtle enough,
though. Grices contribution, Vacuous Namess, later repr. in part “Definite
descriptions,” ed. Ostertag, concludes with an exploration of the phrases, and
further on, with some intriguing remarks on the subtle issues surrounding the
scope of an ascription of a predicate standing for a psychological state or
attitude. Grices choice of an ascription now notably involves an
opaque (rather than factive, like know) psychological state or attitude:
wanting, which he symbolizes as W. At least Grice does not write,
really, for he knew that Austin detested a trouser word! Grice concludes that
(xi) and (xiii) will be derivable from each of (ix) and (x), while (xii) will
be derivable only from (ix).Grice had been Strawsons logic tutor at St. Johns
(Mabbott was teaching the grand stuff!) and it shows! One topic that especially
concerned Grice relates to the introduction and elimination rules, as he later
searches for generic satisfactoriness. Grice
wonders [W]hat should be said of Takeutis conjecture (roughly)
that the nature of the introduction rule determines the character of
the elimination rule? There seems to be
no particular problem about allowing an introduction rule which tells
us that, if it is established in Xs personalized system that φ, then it is
necessary with respect to X that φ is true (establishable). The accompanying
elimination rule is, however, slightly less promising. If we suppose such a
rule to tell us that, if one is committed to the idea that it is necessary with
respect to X that φ, then one is also committed to whatever is expressed by φ,
we shall be in trouble; for such a rule is not acceptable; φ will be a volitive
expression such as let it be that X eats his hat; and my commitment to the idea
that Xs system requires him to eat his hat does not ipso facto involve me in
accepting (buletically) let X eat his hat. But if we take the elimination rule
rather as telling us that, if it is necessary with respect to X that let X eat
his hat, then let X eat his hat possesses satisfactoriness-with-respect-to-X,
the situation is easier; for this version of the rule seems inoffensive, even
for Takeuti, we hope. A very interesting concept Grice introduces in the
definite-descriptor section of Vacuous Namess is that of a conversational
dossier, for which he uses δ for a definite descriptor. The key concept is that
of conversational dossier overlap, common ground, or conversational pool. Let
us say that an utterer U has a dossier for a definite description δ if there is
a set of definite descriptions which include δ, all the members of which the
utterer supposes to be satisfied by one and the same item and the utterer U
intends his addressee A to think (via the recognition that A is so intended)
that the utterer U has a dossier for the definite description δ which the
utterer uses, and that the utterer U has specifically selected (or chosen, or
picked) this specific δ from this dossier at least partly in the hope that his
addressee A has his own dossier for δ which overlaps the utterers dossier for δ,
viz. shares a substantial, or in some way specially favoured, su-bset with the
utterers dossier. Its unfortunate that the idea of a dossier is not better
known amog Oxonian philosophers. Unlike approaches to the phenomenon by other
Oxonian philosophers like Grices tutee Strawson and his three principles
(conversational relevance, presumption of conversational knowledge, and
presumption of conversational ignorance) or Urmson and his, apter than
Strawsons, principle of conversational appositeness (Mrs.Smiths husband just
delivered a letter, You mean the postman!?), only Grice took to task the idea
of formalising this in terms of set-theory and philosophical
psychology ‒ note his charming reference to the utterers hope (never
mind intention) that his choice of d from his dossier will overlap with some d
in the dossier of his his addressee. The point of adding whoever he may be for
the non-identificatory is made by Mitchell, of Worcester, in his Griceian
textbook for Hutchinson. Refs.: The main reference is Grice’s “Vacuous names,”
in “W and O” and its attending notes, BANC.
economy: and effort. This Grice also refers to as
‘maximum,’ ‘maximal,’ optimal. It is part of his principle of economy of
rational effort. Grice leaves it open as how to formulate this. Notably in
“Causal,” he allows that ‘The pillar box seems red” and “The pillar box is red”
are difficult to formalise in terms in which we legitimize the claim or
intuition that ‘The pillar box IS red” is ‘stronger’ than ‘The pillar box seems
red.’ If this were so, it would provide a rational justification for going into
the effort of uttering something STRONGER (and thus less economical, and more
effortful) under the circumstances. As in “My wife is in the kitchen or in the
bedroom, and the house has only two rooms (and no passages, etc.)” the reason
why the conversational implicatum is standardly carried is to be found in the
operation of some such general principle as that giving preference to the
making of a STRONGER rather than a weaker statement in the absence of a reason
for not so doing. The implicatum therefore is not of a part of the meaning of
the expression “seems.” There is however A VERY IMPORTANT DIFFERENCE between
the case of a ‘phenomenalist’ statement (Bar-Hillel it does not count as a
statement) and that of disjunctives, such as “My wife is in the kitchen or ind
the bedroom, and the house has only two rooms (and no passages, etc.).” A
disjunctive is weaker than either of its disjuncts in a straightforward LOGICAL
fashion, viz., a disjunctive is entailed (alla Moore) by, but does not entail,
each of its disjuncts. The statement “The pillar box is red” is NOT STRONGER
than the statement, if a statement it is, “The pillar box seems red,” in this
way. Neither statement entails the other. Grice thinks that he has,
neverthcless a strong inclination to regard the first of these statements as
STRONGER than the second. But Grice leaves it open the ‘determination’ of in
what fashion this might obtain. He suggests that there may be a way to provide
a reductive analysis of ‘strength’ THAT YIELDS that “The pillar box is red” is
a stronger conversational contribution than “The pillar box seems red.”
Recourse to ‘informativeness’ may not do, since Grice is willing to generalise
over the acceptum to cover informative and non-informative cases. While there
is an element of ‘exhibition’ in his account of the communicatum, he might not
be happy with the idea that it is the utterer’s INTENTION to INFORM his
addressee that he, the utterer, INTENDS that his addressee will believe that
he, the utterer, believes that it is raining. “Inform” seems to apply only to
the content of the propositional complexum, and not to the attending ‘animata.’
egcrateia: the
geniality of Grice was to explore theoretical akrasia. Of course, it does not
paint a good picture of the philosopher why he should be obsessed with
‘akrasia,’ when Aristotle actually opposed the notion to that of ‘enkrateia,’
or ‘continence.’ Surely a philosopher needs to provide a reductive analysis of
‘continence,’ first; and the reductive analysis of ‘incontinence’ will follow.
Aristotle, as Grice well knew, is being a Platonist here, so by ‘continence,’
he meant a power structure of the soul, with the ‘rational’ soul containing the
pre-rational or non-rational soul (animal soul, and vegetal soul). And right he
was, too! So, Grice's twist is Έγκράτεια, sic in capitals! Liddell
and Scott has it as ‘ἐγκράτεια’ [ρα^], which they render as “mastery over,” as used by Plato in
The Republic: “ἐ. ἑαυτοῦ,” meaning ‘self-control’ (Pl. R.390b; ἐ. ἡδονῶν καὶ ἐπιθυμιῶν control over them, ib.430e, cf. X.Mem.2.1.1, Isoc.1.21; “περί τι” Arist.EN1149a21, al. Liddell
and Scott go on to give a reference to Grice’s beloved “Eth. Nich.” (1145b8) II. abs., self-control, X. Mem.1.5.1, Isoc.3.44, Arist. EN. 1145b8, al., LXX Si.18.30, Act.Ap. 24.25, etc. Richards, an emotivist, as well as Collingwood (in
“Language”) had made a stereotype of the physicist drawing a formula on the
blackboard. “Full of emotion.” So the idea that there is an UN-emotional life
is a fallacy. Emotion pervades the rational life, as does akrasia. Grice was
particularly irritated by the fact that Davidson, who lacked a background in
the humanities and the classics, could think of akrasia as “impossible”! Grice
was never too interested in emotion (or feeling) because while we do say I feel
that the cat is hungry, we also say, Im feeling byzantine. The concept of
emotion needs a philosophical elucidation. Grice was curious about a linguistic
botany for that! Akrasia for Grice covers both buletic-boulomaic and doxastic
versions. The buletic-boulomaic version may be closer to the concept of an
emotion. Grice quotes from Kennys essay on emotion. But Grice is looking for
more of a linguistic botany. As it happens, Kennys essay has Griceian
implicata. One problem Grice finds with emotion is that feel that sometimes behaves like thinks that Another is that there is no good Grecian word
for emotio. Kenny, of St. Benets, completed his essay on emotion under
Quinton (who would occasionally give seminars with Grice), and examined by two
members of Grices Play Group: Pears and Gardiner. Kenny connects an emotion to
a feeling, which brings us to Grice on feeling boringly byzantine! Grice
proposes a derivation of akrasia in conditional steps for both
buletic-boulomaic and doxastic akrasia. Liddell
and Scott have “ἐπιθυμία,” which they render as desire, yearning, “ἐ.
ἐκτελέσαι” Hdt.1.32; ἐπιθυμίᾳ by passion, oπρονοίᾳ, generally, appetite, αἱ
κατὰ τὸ σῶμα ἐ. esp. sexual desire, lust, αἱ πρὸς τοὺς παῖδας ἐ.; longing after
a thing, desire of or for it, ὕδατος, τοῦ πιεῖν;” “τοῦ πλέονος;” “τῆς
τιμωρίας;” “τῆς μεθ᾽ ὑμῶν πολιτείας;’ “τῆς παρθενίας;’ “εἰς ἐ. τινὸς ἐλθεῖν;’ ἐν
ἐ. “τινὸς εἶναι;’ “γεγονέναι;” “εἰς ἐ. τινὸς “ἀφικέσθαι θεάσασθαι;” “ἐ. τινὸς
ἐμβαλεῖν τινί;” “ἐ. ἐμποιεῖν ἔς τινα an inclination towards;” =ἐπιθύμημα, object
of desire, ἐπιθυμίας τυχεῖν;” “ἀνδρὸς ἐ., of woman, “πενήτων ἐ., of sleep. There
must be more to emotion, such as philia, than epithumia! cf. Grice on Aristotle
on philos. What is an emotion? Aristotle, Rhetoric II.1; Konstan “Pathos
and Passion” R. Roberts, “Emotion”; W. Fortenbaugh, Aristotle on Emotion; Simo
Knuuttila, Emotions in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy. Aristotle, Rhet.
II.2-12; De An., Eth.N., and Top.; Emotions in Plato and Aristotle; Philosophy
of Emotion; Aristotle and the Emotions, De An. II.12 and III 1-3; De Mem. 1;
Rhet. II.5; Scheiter, “Images, Imagination, and Appearances, V. Caston, Why
Aristotle Needs Imagination” M. Nussbaum, “Aristotle on Emotions and Rational
Persuasion, J. Cooper, “An Aristotelian Theory of Emotion, G. Striker, Emotions
in Context: Aristotles Treatment of the Passions in the Rhetoric and his Moral
Psychology." Essays on Aristotles Rhetoric (J. Dow, Aristotles Theory of
the Emotions, Moral Psychology and Human Action in Aristotle PLATO. Aristotle, Rhetoric
I.10-11; Plato Philebus 31b-50e and Republic IV, D. Frede, Mixed feelings in
Aristotles Rhetoric." Essays on Aristotles Rhetoric, J. Moss, “Pictures
and Passions in Plato”; Protagoras 352b-c, Phaedo 83b-84a, Timaeus 69c STOICS The
Hellenistic philosophers; “The Old Stoic Theory of Emotion” The Emotions in Hellenistic
Philosophy, eEmotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian
Temptation, Sorabji, Chrysippus Posidonius Seneca: A High-Level Debate on
Emotion. Nussbaum, The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic
Ethics M. Graver, Preface and Introduction to Cicero on Emotion: Tusculan
Disputations 3 and 4 M. Graver, Stoicism and emotion. Tusculan Disputations 3
Recommended: Graver, Margaret. "Philo of Alexandria and the Origins of the
Stoic Προπάθειαι." Phronesis. Tusculan Disputations; "The Stoic
doctrine of the affections of the soul; The Stoic life: Emotions, duties, and
fate”; Emotion and decision in stoic psychology, The stoics, individual
emotions: anger, friendly feeling, and hatred. Aristotle Rhetoric II.2-3;
Nicomachean Ethics IV.5; Topics 2.7 and 4.5; Konstan, Anger, Pearson, Aristotle
on Desire; Scheiter, Review of Pearsons Aristotle on Desire; S. Leighton,
Aristotles Account of Anger: Narcissism and Illusions of Self‐Sufficiency: The Complex Evaluative World of Aristotles Angry
Man,” Valuing emotions. Aristotle Rhetoric II. 4; Konstan, “Hatred”
Konstan "Aristotle on Anger and the Emotions: the Strategies of
Status." Ancient Anger: Perspectives from Homer to Galen, C. Rapp, The
emotional dimension of friendship: notes on Aristotles account of philia in
Rhetoric II 4” Grice endeavours to give an answer to the question whether
and to what extent philia (friendship), as it is treated by Aristotle in Rhet.
II.4, can be considered a genuine emotion as, for example, fear and anger are.
Three anomalies are identified in the definition and the account of philia (and
of the associated verb philein), which suggest a negative response to the
question. However, these anomalies are analysed and explained in terms of the
specific notes of philia in order to show that Rhetoric II4 does allow for a
consideration of friendship as a genuine emotion. Seneca, On Anger (De
Ira) Seneca, On Anger Seneca, On Anger (62-96); K. Vogt, “Anger, Present
Injustice, and Future Revenge in Senecas De Ira” FEAR Aristotle, Rhet. II.5;
Nicomachean Ethics III.6-9 Aristotles Courageous Passions, Platos Laws;
“Pleasure, Pain, and Anticipation in Platos Laws, Book I” Konstan, “Fear”
PITY Aristotle, Rhetoric II. 8-9; Poetics, chs. 6, 9-19 ; Konstan, “Pity”
E. Belfiore, Tragic pleasures: Aristotle on plot and emotion, Konstan,
Aristotle on the Tragic Emotions, The Soul of Tragedy: Essays on Athenian
Drama SHAME Aristotle, Rhet. II.6; Nicomachean Ethics IV.9 Konstan, Shame
J. Moss, Shame, Pleasure, and the Divided Soul, B. Williams, Shame and
Necessity. Aristotle investigates two character traits, continence and
incontinence, that are not as blameworthy as the vices but not as praiseworthy
as the virtues. The Grecian expressions are’enkrateia,’ continence, literally
mastery, and krasia (“incontinence”; literally, lack of mastery. An akratic
person goes against reason as a result of some pathos (emotion, feeling”). Like
the akratic, an enkratic person experiences a feeling that is contrary to
reason; but unlike the akratic, he acts in accordance with reason. His defect
consists solely in the fact that, more than most people, he experiences
passions that conflict with his rational choice. The akratic person has not
only this defect, but has the further flaw that he gives in to feeling rather
than reason more often than the average person.
Aristotle distinguishes two kinds of akrasia: “propeteia,” or impetuosity
and “astheneia, or weakness. The person who is weak goes through a process of
deliberation and makes a choice; but rather than act in accordance with his
reasoned choice, he acts under the influence of a passion. By contrast, the
impetuous person does not go through a process of deliberation and does not
make a reasoned choice; he simply acts under the influence of a passion. At the
time of action, the impetuous person experiences no internal conflict. But once
his act has been completed, he regrets what he has done. One could say that he
deliberates, if deliberation were something that post-dated rather than
preceded action; but the thought process he goes through after he acts comes
too late to save him from error. It is
important to bear in mind that when Aristotle talks about impetuosity and
weakness, he is discussing chronic conditions. The impetuous person is someone
who acts emotionally and fails to deliberate not just once or twice but with
some frequency; he makes this error more than most people do. Because of this
pattern in his actions, we would be justified in saying of the impetuous person
that had his passions not prevented him from doing so, he would have
deliberated and chosen an action different from the one he did perform. The two kinds of passions that Aristotle
focuses on, in his treatment of akrasia, are the appetite for pleasure and
anger. Either can lead to impetuosity and weakness. But Aristotle gives pride
of place to the appetite for pleasure as the passion that undermines reason. He
calls the kind of akrasia caused by an appetite for pleasure (hedone)
“unqualified akrasia”—or, as we might say, akrasia simpliciter, “full stop.’
Akrasia caused by anger he considers a qualified form of akrasia and calls it
akrasia ‘with respect to anger.’ We thus have these four forms of akrasia:
impetuosity caused by pleasure, impetuosity caused by anger, weakness caused by
pleasure, weakness caused by anger. It should be noticed that Aristotle’s
treatment of akrasia is heavily influenced by Plato’s tripartite division of
the soul. Plato holds that either the spirited part (which houses anger, as
well as other emotions) or the appetitive part (which houses the desire for
physical pleasures) can disrupt the dictates of reason and result in action
contrary to reason. The same threefold division of the soul can be seen in
Aristotles approach to this topic. Although Aristotle characterizes akrasia and
enkrateia in terms of a conflict between reason and feeling, his detailed
analysis of these states of mind shows that what takes place is best described
in a more complicated way. For the feeling that undermines reason contains some
thought, which may be implicitly general. As Aristotle says, anger “reasoning
as it were that one must fight against such a thing, is immediately provoked.
And although in the next sentence he denies that our appetite for pleasure
works in this way, he earlier had said that there can be a syllogism that
favors pursuing enjoyment: “Everything sweet is pleasant, and this is sweet”
leads to the pursuit of a particular pleasure. Perhaps what he has in mind is
that pleasure can operate in either way: it can prompt action unmediated by a
general premise, or it can prompt us to act on such a syllogism. By contrast,
anger always moves us by presenting itself as a bit of general, although hasty,
reasoning. But of course Aristotle does
not mean that a conflicted person has more than one faculty of reason. Rather
his idea seems to be that in addition to our full-fledged reasoning capacity,
we also have psychological mechanisms that are capable of a limited range of
reasoning. When feeling conflicts with reason, what occurs is better described
as a fight between feeling-allied-with-limited-reasoning and full-fledged
reason. Part of us—reason—can remove itself from the distorting influence of
feeling and consider all relevant factors, positive and negative. But another
part of us—feeling or emotion—has a more limited field of reasoning—and
sometimes it does not even make use of it.
Although “passion” is sometimes used as a translation of Aristotles word
pathos (other alternatives are emotion” and feeling), it is important to bear
in mind that his term does not necessarily designate a strong psychological
force. Anger is a pathos whether it is weak or strong; so too is the appetite
for bodily pleasures. And he clearly indicates that it is possible for an
akratic person to be defeated by a weak pathos—the kind that most people would
easily be able to control. So the general explanation for the occurrence of
akrasia cannot be that the strength of a passion overwhelms reason. Aristotle
should therefore be acquitted of an accusation made against him by Austin in a
well-known footnote to ‘A Plea For Excuses.’ Plato and Aristotle, Austin says,
collapsed all succumbing to temptation into losing control of ourselves — a
mistake illustrated by this example. I am very partial to ice cream, and a
bombe is served divided into segments corresponding one to one with the persons
at High Table. I am tempted to help myself to two segments and do so, thus succumbing
to temptation and even conceivably (but why necessarily?) going against my
principles. But do I lose control of myself? Do I raven, do I snatch the
morsels from the dish and wolf them down, impervious to the consternation of my
colleagues? Not a bit of it. We often succumb to temptation with calm and even
with finesse. With this, Aristotle can agree. The pathos for the bombe can be a
weak one, and in some people that will be enough to get them to act in a way
that is disapproved by their reason at the very time of action. What is most remarkable about Aristotle’s
discussion of akrasia is that he defends a position close to that of Socrates.
When he first introduces the topic of akrasia, and surveys some of the problems
involved in understanding this phenomenon, he says that Socrates held that
there is no akrasia, and he describes this as a thesis that clearly conflicts
with the appearances (phainomena). Since he says that his goal is to preserve
as many of the appearances as possible, it may come as a surprise that when he
analyzes the conflict between reason and feeling, he arrives at the conclusion
that in a way Socrates was right after all. For, he says, the person who acts
against reason does not have what is thought to be unqualified knowledge; in a
way he has knowledge, but in a way does not.
Aristotle explains what he has in mind by comparing akrasia to the
condition of other people who might be described as knowing in a way, but not
in an unqualified way. His examples are people who are asleep, mad, or drunk;
he also compares the akratic to a student who has just begun to learn a
Subjects, or an actor on the stage. All of these people, he says, can utter the
very words used by those who have knowledge; but their talk does not prove that
they really have knowledge, strictly speaking.
These analogies can be taken to mean that the form of akrasia that
Aristotle calls weakness rather than impetuosity always results from some
diminution of cognitive or intellectual acuity at the moment of action. The
akratic says, at the time of action, that he ought not to indulge in this
particular pleasure at this time. But does he know or even believe that he
should refrain? Aristotle might be taken to reply: yes and no. He has some
degree of recognition that he must not do this now, but not full recognition.
His feeling, even if it is weak, has to some degree prevented him from
completely grasping or affirming the point that he should not do this. And so
in a way Socrates was right. When reason remains unimpaired and unclouded, its
dictates will carry us all the way to action, so long as we are able to
act. But Aristotles agreement with
Socrates is only partial, because he insists on the power of the emotions to
rival, weaken or bypass reason. Emotion challenges reason in all three of these
ways. In both the akratic and the enkratic, it competes with reason for control
over action; even when reason wins, it faces the difficult task of having to
struggle with an internal rival. Second, in the akratic, it temporarily robs
reason of its full acuity, thus handicapping it as a competitor. It is not
merely a rival force, in these cases; it is a force that keeps reason from
fully exercising its power. And third, passion can make someone impetuous; here
its victory over reason is so powerful that the latter does not even enter into
the arena of conscious reflection until it is too late to influence action.
That, at any rate, is one way of interpreting Aristotle’s statements. But it
must be admitted that his remarks are obscure and leave room for alternative
readings. It is possible that when he denies that the akratic has knowledge in
the strict sense, he is simply insisting on the point that no one should be
classified as having practical knowledge unless he actually acts in accordance
with it. A practical knower is not someone who merely has knowledge of general
premises; he must also have knowledge of particulars, and he must actually draw
the conclusion of the syllogism. Perhaps drawing such a conclusion consists in
nothing less than performing the action called for by the major and minor
premises. Since this is something the akratic does not do, he lacks knowledge;
his ignorance is constituted by his error in action. On this reading, there is
no basis for attributing to Aristotle the thesis that the kind of akrasia he
calls weakness is caused by a diminution of intellectual acuity. His
explanation of akrasia is simply that pathos is sometimes a stronger
motivational force than full-fledged reason.
This is a difficult reading to defend, however, for Aristotle says that
after someone experiences a bout of akrasia his ignorance is dissolved and he
becomes a knower again. In context, that appears to be a remark about the form
of akrasia Aristotle calls weakness rather than impetuosity. If so, he is
saying that when an akratic person is Subjects to two conflicting
influences—full-fledged reason versus the minimal rationality of emotion—his
state of knowledge is somehow temporarily undone but is later restored. Here,
knowledge cannot be constituted by the performance of an act, because that is
not the sort of thing that can be restored at a later time. What can be
restored is ones full recognition or affirmation of the fact that this act has
a certain undesirable feature, or that it should not be performed. Aristotle’s
analysis seems to be that both forms of akrasia — weakness and impetuosity
—share a common structure: in each case, ones full affirmation or grasp of what
one should do comes too late. The difference is that in the case of weakness
but not impetuosity, the akratic act is preceded by a full-fledged rational
cognition of what one should do right now. That recognition is briefly and
temporarily diminished by the onset of a less than fully rational affect. There is one other way in which Aristotle’s
treatment of akrasia is close to the Socratic thesis that what people call
akrasia is really ignorance. Aristotle holds that if one is in the special
mental condition that he calls practical wisdom, then one cannot be, nor will
one ever become, an akratic person. For practical wisdom is present only in
those who also possess the ethical virtues, and these qualities require
complete emotional mastery. Anger and appetite are fully in harmony with
reason, if one is practically wise, and so this intellectual virtue is
incompatible with the sort of inner conflict experienced by the akratic person.
Furthermore, one is called practically wise not merely on the basis of what one
believes or knows, but also on the basis of what one does. Therefore, the sort
of knowledge that is lost and regained during a bout of akrasia cannot be
called practical wisdom. It is knowledge only in a loose sense. The low-level
grasp of the ordinary person of what to do is precisely the sort of thing that
can lose its acuity and motivating power, because it was never much of an
intellectual accomplishment to begin with. That is what Aristotle is getting at
when he compares it with the utterances of actors, students, sleepers, drunks,
and madmen. Grice had witnessed how Hare had suffere to try and deal with how
to combine the geniality that “The language of morals” is with his account of
akrasia. Most Oxonians were unhappy with Hares account of akrasia. Its like, in
deontic logic, you cannot actually deal with akrasia. You need buletics. You
need the desiderative, so that you can oppose what is desired with the duty,
even if both concepts are related. “Akrasia” has a nice Grecian touch about it,
and Grice and Hare, as Lit. Hum., rejoiced in being able to explore what
Aristotle had to say about it. They wouldnt go far beyond Aristotle. Plato and
Aristotle were the only Greek philosophers studied for the Lit. Hum. To venture
with the pre-socratics or the hellenistics (even if Aristotle is one) was not
classy enough! Like Pears in Motivated irrationality, Grice allows that
benevolentia may be deemed beneficentia. If Smith has the good will to give
Jones a job, he may be deemed to have given Jones the job, even if Jones never
get it. In buletic akrasia we must consider the conclusion to be desiring what
is not best for the agents own good, never mind if he refrains from doing what
is not best for his own good. Video meliora proboque deteriora sequor. We
shouldnt be saying this, but we are saying it! Grice prefers akrasia, but
he is happy to use the translation by Cicero, also negative, of this:
incontinentia, as if continentia were a virtue! For Grice, the alleged paradox
of akrasia, both alethic and practical, has to be accounted for by a theory of
rationality from the start, and not be deemed a stumbling block. Grice is
interested in both the common-or-garden buletic-boulomaic version of akrasia,
involving the volitive soul ‒ in term of desirability ‒ and doxastic
akrasia, involing the judicative soul proper ‒ in terms of
probability. Grice considers buletic akrasia and doxastic akrasia ‒ the latter
yet distinct from Moores paradox, p but I dont want to believe that p, in
symbols p and ~ψb-dp. Akarsia,
see egcrateia. Refs.: The main references here are in three folders in two
different series. H. P. Grice, “Akrasia,” The H. P. Grice Papers, S. II, c.
2-ff. 22-23 and S. V, c. 6-f. 32, BANC.
emotion:
Grice enjoyed a bit of history of philosophy. Diog. Laert. of Zeno of Citium.
πρὸς τὸν εἰπόντα, "πολλοί σου καταγελῶσιν," "ἀλλ ἐγώ," ἔφη,
"οὐ κατα- γελῶμαι; to the question, who is a friend?, Zeno’s answer is, ‘a
second self (alter ego). One direct way to approach friend is via emotion,
as Aristotle did, and found it aporetic as did Grice. Aristotle discusses
philia in Eth. Nich. but it is in Rhet. where he allows for phulia to be an
emotion. Grice was very fortunate to have Hardie as his tutor. He overused
Hardies lectures on Aristotle, too, and instilled them on his own
tutees! Grice is concerned with the rather cryptic view by Aristotle of
the friend (philos, amicus) as the alter ego. In Grices cooperative,
concerted, view of things, a friend in need is a friend indeed! Grice is
interested in Aristotle finding himself in an aporia. In Nicomachean Ethics
IX.ix, Aristotle poses the question whether the happy man will need friends or
not. Kosman correctly identifies this question as asking not whether friends
are necessary in order to achieve eudæmonia, but why we require friends even
when we are happy. The question is not why we need friends to become happy, but
why we need friends when we are happy, since the eudæmon must be self-sufficient.
Philia is required for the flourishing of the life of practical virtue. The solution
by Aristotle to the aporia here, however, points to the requirement of
friendships even for the philosopher, in his life of theoretical
virtue. The olution by Aristotle to the aporia in Nicomachean Ethics IX.ix
is opaque, and the corresponding passage in Eudeiman Ethics VII.xii is scarcely
better. Aristotle thinks he has found the solution to this aporia. We must take
two things into consideration, that life is desirable and also that the good
is, and thence that it is desirable that such a nature should belong to oneself
as it belongs to them. If then, of such a pair of corresponding s. there is
always one s. of the desirable, and the known and the perceived are in general
constituted by their participation in the nature of the determined, so that to
wish to perceive ones self is to wish oneself to be of a certain definite
character,—since, then we are not in ourselves possessed of each such
characters, but only in participation in these qualities in perceiving and
knowing—for the perceiver becomes perceived in that way in respect in which he
first perceives, and according to the way in which and the object which he
perceives; and the knower becomes known in the same way— therefore it is for
this reason that one always desires to live, because one always desires to
know; and this is because he himself wishes to be the object known. Refs.:
There is an essay on “Emotions and akrasia,” but the topic is scattered in
various places, such as Grice’s reply to Davidson on intending. Grice has an
essay on ‘Kant and friendship,’ too, The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
entailment:
Grice thought that we probably did need an entailment. The symposium was held
in New York with Dana Scott and R. K. Meyer. The notion had been mis-introduced
(according to Strawson) in the philosophical literature by Moore. Grice is
especially interested in the entailment + implicatum pair. A philosophical
expression may be said to be co-related to an entailment (which is rendered in
terms of a reductive analysis). However, the use of the expression may
co-relate to this or that implicatum which is rendered reasonable in the light
of the assumption by the addressee that the utterer is ultimately abiding by a
principle of conversational helfpulness. Grice thinks many philosophers take an
implicatum as an entailment when they surely shouldnt! Grice was more interested
than Strawson was in the coinage by Moore of entailment for logical
consequence. As an analyst, Grice knew that a true conceptual analysis needs to
be reductive (if not reductionist). The prongs the analyst lists are thus
entailments of the concept in question. Philosophers, however, may misidentify
what is an entailment for an implicature, or vice versa. Initially, Grice was
interested in the second family of cases. With his coinage of disimplicature,
Grice expands his interest to cover the first family of cases, too. Grice
remains a philosophical methodologist. He is not so much concerned with any
area or discipline or philosophical concept per se (unless its rationality),
but with the misuses of some tools in the philosophy of language as committed
by some of his colleagues at Oxford. While entailment, was, for Strawson
mis-introduced in the philosophical literature by Moore, entailment seems to be
less involved in paradoxes than if is. Grice connects the two, as indeed his
tutee Strawson did! As it happens, Strawsons Necessary propositions and
entailment statements is his very first published essay, with Mind, a re-write
of an unpublication unwritten elsewhere, and which Grice read. The relation of
consequence may be considered a meta-conditional, where paradoxes
arise. Grices Bootstrap is a principle designed to impoverish the metalanguage
so that the philosopher can succeed in the business of pulling himself up by
his own! Grice then takes a look at Strawsons very first publication (an
unpublication he had written elsewhere). Grice finds Strawson thought he could
provide a simple solution to the so-called paradoxes of entailment. At the
time, Grice and Strawson were pretty sure that nobody then accepted, if indeed
anyone ever did and did make, the identification of the relation symbolised by
the horseshoe with the relation which Moore calls entailment, p⊃q, i. e. ~(pΛ~q) is rejected as an analysis of p entails q
because it involves this or that allegedly paradoxical implicatum, as that any
false proposition entails any proposition and any true proposition is entailed
by any proposition. It is a commonplace that Lewiss amendment had consequences
scarcely less paradoxical in terms of the implicata. For if p is impossible,
i.e. self-contradictory, it is impossible that p and ~q. And if q is
necessary, ~q is impossible and it is impossible that p and ~q; i. e., if p
entails q means it is impossible that p and ~q any necessary proposition is
entailed by any proposition and any self-contradictory proposition entails any
proposition. On the other hand, Lewiss definition of entailment (i.e. of the relation
which holds from p to q whenever q is deducible from p) obviously commends
itself in some respects. Now, it is clear that the emphasis laid on the
expression-mentioning character of the intensional contingent statement by
writing pΛ~q is impossible instead of It is impossible that p and ~q does not
avoid the alleged paradoxes of entailment. But it is equally clear that the
addition of some provision does avoid them. One may proposes that one
should use “entails” such that no necessary statement and no negation of a
necessary statement can significantly be said to entail or be entailed by any
statement; i. e. the function p entails q cannot take necessary or
self-contradictory statements as arguments. The expression p entails q is to be
used to mean p⊃q is necessary, and neither p nor q is either necessary or
self-contradictory, or pΛ~q is impossible and neither p nor q, nor either of
their contradictories, is necessary. Thus, the paradoxes are avoided. For let
us assume that p1 expresses a contingent, and q1 a necessary, proposition. p1
and ~q1 is now impossible because ~q1 is impossible. But q1 is necessary. So,
by that provision, p1 does not entail q1. We may avoid the paradoxical
assertion that p1 entails q2 as merely falling into the equally paradoxical
assertion that p1 entails q1 is necessary. For: If q is necessary, q is
necessary is, though true, not necessary, but a contingent intensional
(Latinate) statement. This becomes part of the philosophers lexicon: intensĭo,
f. intendo, which L and S render as a stretching out, straining, effort.
E. g. oculorum, Scrib. Comp. 255. Also an intensifying, increase. Calorem suum
(sol) intensionibus ac remissionibus temperando fovet,” Sen. Q. N. 7, 1, 3. The
tune: “gravis, media, acuta,” Censor. 12. Hence:~(q is necessary) is,
though false, possible. Hence “p1Λ~(q1 is necessary)” is, though false,
possible. Hence p1 does NOT entail q1 is necessary. Thus, by adopting the view
that an entailment statement, and other intensional statements, are
non-necessary, and that no necessary statement or its contradictory can entail
or be entailed by any statement, Strawson thinks he can avoid the paradox that
a necessary proposition is entailed by any proposition, and indeed all the
other associated paradoxes of entailment. Grice objected that Strawsons cure
was worse than Moores disease! The denial that a necessary proposition can
entail or be entailed by any proposition, and, therefore, that necessary
propositions can be related to each other by the entailment-relation, is too
high a price to pay for the solution of the paradoxes. And here is where Grices
implicature is meant to do the trick! Or not! When Levinson proposed + for
conversationally implicature, he is thinking of contrasting it with ⊢. But things aint that easy. Even
the grammar is more complicated: By uttering He is an adult, U explicitly
conveys that he is an adult. What U explicitly conveys entails that he is not a
child. What U implies is that he should be treated accordingly. Refs.: One
good reference is the essay on “Paradoxes of entailment,” in the Grice papers;
also his contribution to a symposium for the APA under a separate series, The
H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
eschatology:
being and good, for Aristotle and Grice cover all. Good was a favourite of
Moore and Hare, as Barnes was well aware! Like Barnes, Grice dislikes Prichards
analysis of good. He leans towards the emotion-based approach by Ogden. If
Grice, like Humpty Dumpty, opposes the Establishment with his meaning
liberalism (what a word means is what I mean by uttering it), he certainly
should be concerned with category shifts. Plus, Grice was a closet Platonist.
As Plato once remarked, having the ability to see horses but not horsehood (ἱππότης) is a mark of stupidity – rendered by Liddell and Scott as “horse-nature, the
concept of horse” (Antisth. et Pl. ap. Simp.in Cat.208.30,32,
Sch.AristId.p.167F). Grice would endure the flinty
experience of giving joint seminars at Oxford with Austin on the first two
books of Aristotles Organon, Categoriae, and De Int. Grice finds the use of a
category, κατηγορία, by Aristotle a bit of a geniality. Aristotle is using
legalese, from kata, against, on, and agoreuô [ἀγορεύω], speak in public),
and uses it to designate both the prosecution in a trial and the
attribution in a logical proposition, i. e., the questions that must be asked
with regard to a Subjects, and the answers that can be given. As a
representative of the linguistic turn in philosophy, Grice is attracted to the
idea that a category can thus be understood variously, as applying to the realm
of reality (ontology), but also to the philosophy of language (category of
expression) and to philosophical psychology (category of
representation). Grice kept his explorations on categories under two very
separate, shall we say, categories: his explorations with Austin (very
serious), and those with Strawson (more congenial). Where is Smiths altruism?
Nowhere to be seen. Should we say it is idle (otiose) to speak of altruism? No,
it is just an attribute, which, via category shift, can be made the Subjects of
your sentence, Strawson. It is not spatio-temporal, though, right. Not
really. ‒ I do not particularly like your trouser words. The essay
is easy to date since Grice notes that Strawson reproduced some of the details in
his Individuals, which we can very well date. Grice thought Aristotle was the
best! Or at any rate almost as good as Kantotle! Aristotle saw Categoriæ, along
with De Int. as part of his Organon. However, philosophers of language
tend to explore these topics without a consideration of the later parts of the
Organon dealing with the syllogism, the tropes, and the topics ‒ the boring
bits! The reason Grice is attracted to the Aristotelian category (as Austin and
Strawson equally were) is that category allows for a linguistic-turn reading.
Plus, its a nice, pretentious (in the Oxonian way) piece of philosophical
jargon! Aristotle couldnt find category in the koine, so he had to coin it.
While meant by Aristotle in a primarily ontological way, Oxonian philosophers
hasten to add that a category of expression, as Grice puts it, is just as valid
a topic for philosophical exploration. His tutee Strawson will actually publish
a book on Subjects and predicate in grammar! (Trivial, Strawson!). Grice will
later add an intermediary category, which is the Subjects of his philosophical
psychology. As such, a category can be construed ontologically, or
representationally: the latter involving philosophical psychological concepts,
and expressions themselves. For Aristotle, as Grice and Austin, and Grice and
Strawson, were well aware as they educated some of the poor at Oxford (Only the
poor learn at Oxford ‒ Arnold), there are (at least ‒ at most?) ten
categories. Grice doesnt (really) care about the number. But the first are
important. Actually the very first: theres substantia prima, such as Grice. And
then theres substantia secunda, such as Grices rationality. The essentia. Then
there are various types of attributes. But, as Grice sharply notes, even
substantia secunda may be regarded as an attribute. Grices favourite game with
Strawson was indeed Category Shift, or Subjects-ification, as Strawson
preferred. Essence may be introduced as a sub-type of an attribute. We would
have substantia prima AND attribute, which in turn gets divided into essential,
the izzing, and non-essential, the hazzing. While Austin is not so fun to play
with, Strawson is. Smith is a very altruist person. Where is his altruism?
Nowhere to be seen, really. Yet we may sensically speak of Smiths altruism. It
is just a matter of a category shift. Grice scores. Grice is slightly
disappointed, but he perfectly understands, that Strawson, who footnotes Grice
as the tutor from whom I never ceased to learn about logic in Introduction to
logical lheory, fails to acknowledge that most of the research in Strawsons
Individuals: an essay in descriptive (not revisionary) metaphysics derives from
the conclusions reached at his joint philosophical investigations at joint
seminars with Grice. Grice later elaborates on this with Code, who is keen on
Grices other game, the hazz and the hazz not, the izz. But then tutor from whom
I never ceased to learn about metaphysics sounds slightlier clumsier, as far as
the implicature goes. Categories, the Grice-Myro theory of identity, Relative
identity, Grice on =, identity, notes, with Myro, metaphysics, philosophy, with
Code, Grice izz Grice – or izz he? The idea that = is unqualified requires
qualification. Whitehead and Russell ignored this. Grice and Myro didnt. Grice
wants to allow for It is the case that a = b /t1 and it is not the case that a
= b /t2. The idea is intuitive, but philosophers of a Leibnizian bent are too
accustomed to deal with = as an absolute. Grice applies this to human vs.
person. A human may be identical to a person, but cease to be so. Indeed,
Grices earlier attempt to produce a reductive analsysis of I may be seen as
remedying a circularity he detected in Locke about same. Cf. Wiggins, Sameness
and substance. Grice makes Peano feel deeply Griceian, as Grice lists his =
postulates, here for consideration. And if you wondered why Grice prefers
Latinate individuum to the Grecian. The Grecian is “ἄτομον,” in logic, rendered
by L and S as ‘individual, of terms,’ Pl. Sph. 229d; of the εἶδος or forma,
Arist. Metaph.1034a8, de An. 414b27.2. individual, Id. APo. 96b11, al.: as a
subst., τό ἄτομον, Id. Cat. 1b6, 3a38, Metaph.1058a18 (pl.), Plot. 6.2.2,
al. subst.; latinised from Grecian. Lewis and Short have “indīvĭdŭum,” an atom,
indivisible particle: ex illis individuis, unde omnia Democritus gigni
affirmat, Cic. Ac. 2, 17 fin.: ne individuum quidem, nec quod dirimi distrahive
non possit, id. N. D. 3, 12, 29. Note the use of individuum in alethic
modalities for necessity and possibility, starting with (11). ⊢ (α izzes α). This would be the principle of
non-contradiction or identity. Grice applies it to war: War is war, as yielding
a most peculiar implicature. (α izzes β ∧ β izzes γ) ⊃ α
izzes γ. This above is transitivity, which is crucial for Grices tackling of
Reids counterexample to Locke (and which according to Flew in Locke on personal
identity was predated by Berkeley. α hazzes β ⊃ ~(α izzes β). Or, what is accidental is not essential.
Grice allows that what is essential is accidental is, while misleading,
true. ⊢ α hazzes β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(α hazzes x ∧ x
izzes β) ⊢ (∀β)(β izzes a universalium ⊃ β izzes a forma). This above defines a universalium as
a forma, or eidos. (α hazzes β ∧ α
izzes a particular) ⊃ (∃γ).(γ≠α ∧ α izzes β) ⊢ α izzes predicable of β ⊃⊂ ((β izzes α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazzes x ∧ x
izzes α) ⊢ α izzes essentially predicable of β ⊃⊂ β izzes α ⊢ α
izzes non-essentially/accidentally predicable of β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(β hazzes x ∧ x
izzes α) α = β ⊃⊂ α izzes β ∧ β
izzes α ⊢ α izzes an individuum ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(β izzes α ⊃ α izzes β) ⊢ α
izzes a particular ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(α izzes predicable of β ⊃ (α izzes β ∧ β
izzes α)); α izzes a universalium ⊃⊂ ◊(∃β)(α izzes predicable of α ∧ ~(α izzes β ∧ β
izzes α) ⊢ α izzes some-thing ⊃ α
izzes an individuum. ⊢ α izzes a forma ⊃ (α izzes some-thing ∧ α izzes a universalium) 16. ⊢ α izzes predicable of β ⊃⊂ (β izzes α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazzes x ∧ x
izzes α) ⊢ α izzes essentially predicable of α ⊢ α izzes accidentally predicable of β ⊃ α ≠ β; ~(α izzes accidentally predicable of β) ⊃ α ≠ β 20. α izzes a particular ⊃ α izzes an individuum. ⊢ α izzes a particular ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izzes α) 22. ⊢~
(∃x).(x izzes a particular ∧ x
izzes a forma) α izzes a forma ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x
izzes α) x izzes a particular ⊃ ~(∃β)(α izz β) ⊢ α izzes a forma ⊃ ((α
izzes predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ β hazz α); α izzes a forma ∧ β izzes a particular ⊃ (α izzes predicable of β ⊃⊂ β hazz A) ⊢ (α
izzes a particular ∧ β izzes a universalium ∧ β izzes predicable of α) ⊃ (∃γ)(α ≠ γ ∧ γ
izzes essentially predicable of α) ⊢ (∃x) (∃y)(x izzes a particular ∧ y
izzes a universalium ∧ y izzes predicable of x ⊃ ~(∀x)(x izzes a universalium ∧ x izzes some-thing); (∀β)(β
izzes a universalium ⊃ β izzes some-thing) ⊢ α
izzes a particular) ⊃ ~∃β.(α ≠ β ∧ β
izzes essentially predicable of α); (α izzes predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β)⊃ α izzes non-essentially or
accidentally predicable of β. The use of this or that doxastic modality,
necessity and possibility, starting above, make this a good place to consider
one philosophical mistake Grice mentions in “Causal theory.” What is actual is
not also possible. Cf. What is essential is also accidental. He is criticising
a contemporary, if possible considered dated in the New World, form of
ordinary-language philosophy, where the philosopher detects a nuance, and
embarks risking colliding with the facts, rushing ahead to exploit it before he
can clarify it! Grice liked to see his explorations on = as belonging to metaphysics,
as the s. on his Doctrines at the Grice
Collection testifies. While Grice presupposes the use of = in his treatment of
the king of France, he also explores a relativisation of =. His motivation was
an essay by Wiggins, almost Aristotelian in spirit, against Strawsons criterion
of space-time continuancy for the identification of the substantia prima. Grice
wants to apply = to cases were the time continuancy is made explicit. This
yields that a=b in scenario S, but that it may not be the case that a = b in a
second scenario S. Myro had an occasion to expand on Grices views in his
contribution on the topic for PGRICE. Myro mentions his System Ghp, a highly
powerful/hopefully plausible version of Grices System Q, in gratitude to to
Grice. Grice explored also the logic of izzing and hazzing with Code. Grice and
Myro developed a Geach-type of qualified identity. The formal aspects were
developed by Myro, and also by Code. Grice discussed Wigginss Sameness and
substance, rather than Geach. Cf. Wiggins and Strawson on Grice for the BA. At
Oxford, Grice was more or less given free rein to teach what he wanted. He
found the New World slightly disconcerting at first. At Oxford, he expected his
tutees to be willing to read the classics in the vernacular Greek. His approach
to teaching was diagogic, as Socratess! Even in his details of izzing and
hazzing. Greek enough to me!, as a student recalled! correspondence with Code,
Grice sees in Code an excellent Aristotelian. They collaborated on an
exploration of Aristotles underlying logic of essential and non-essential
predication, for which they would freely use such verbal forms as izzing and
hazing, izzing and hazzing, Code on the significance of the middle book in
Aristotles Met. , Aristotle, metaphysics, the middle book. Very middle.
Grice never knew what was middle for Aristotle, but admired Code too much to
air this! The organisation of Aristotle’s metaphysics was a topic of much
concern for Grice. With Code, Grice coined izzing and hazzing to refer to
essential and non-essential attribution. Izzing and hazzing, “Aristotle on the
multiplicity of being” (henceforth, “Aristotle”) PPQ, Aristotle on multiplicity, “The Pacific
Philosophical Quarterly” (henceforth, “PPQ,” posthumously ed. by Loar,
Aristotle, multiplicity, izzing, hazzing, being, good, Code. Grice offers a
thorough discussion of Owens treatment of Aristotle as leading us to the snares
of ontology. Grice distinguishes between izzing and hazzing, which he thinks
help in clarifying, more axiomatico, what Aristotle is getting at with his
remarks on essential versus non-essential predication. Surely, for Grice,
being, nor indeed good, should not be multiplied beyond necessity,
but izzing and hazzing are already multiplied. The Grice Papers contains
drafts of the essay eventually submitted for publication by Loar in memoriam
Grice. Note that the Grice Papers contains a typically Griceian un-publication,
entitled Aristotle and multiplicity simpliciter. Rather than Aristotle on,
as the title for the PPQ piece goes. Note also that, since its
multiplicity simpliciter, it refers to Aristotle on two key ideas: being and
the good. As Code notes in his contribution to PGRICE, Grice first
presents his thoughts on izzing and hazzing publicly at Vancouver. Jones has
developed the axiomatic treatment favoured by Grice. For Grice there is
multiplicity in both being and good (ton agathon), both accountable in terms of
conversational implicata, of course. If in Prolegomena, Grice was interested in
criticising himself, in essays of historical nature like these, Grice is seeing
Aristotles Athenian dialectic as a foreshadow of the Oxonian dialectic, and
treating him as an equal. Grice is yielding his razor: senses are not to
be multiplied beyond necessity. But then Aristotle is talking about
the multiplicity of is and is good. Surely, there are ways to turn
Aristotle into the monoguist he has to be! There is a further item in
the Grice collection that combines Aristotle on being with Aristotle on good,
which is relevant in connection with this. Aristotle on being and good
(ἀγαθόν). Aristotle, being, good (agathon), ἀγαθός. As from this f.,
the essays are ordered alphabetically, starting with Aristotle, Grice will
explore Aristotle on being or is and good (ἀγαθός) in explorations with Code.
Grice comes up with izzing and hazzing as the two counterparts to Aristotles
views on, respectively, essential and non-essential predication. Grices views
on Aristotle on the good (strictly, there is no need to restrict Arisstotles
use to the neuter form, since he employs ἀγαθός) connect with Grices
Aristotelian idea of eudaemonia, that he explores elsewhere. Strictly:
Aristotle on being and the good. If that had been Grices case, he would have
used the definite article. Otherwise, good may well translate as masculine,
ἀγαθός ‒the agathetic implicatum. He plays with Dodgson, cabbages and
kings. For what is a good cabbage as opposed to a cabbage? It does not
require very sharp eyes, but only our willingness to use the eyes one has, to
see that speech is permeated with the notion of purpose. To say what a
certain kind of thing is is only too frequently partly to say that it is for. This
feature applies to talk of, e. g., ships, shoes, sailing wax, and kings;
and, possibly and perhaps most excitingly, it extends even to cabbages!
Although Grice suspects Urmson might disagree. v. Grice on Urmsons
apples. Grice at his jocular best. If he is going to be a Kantian, he
will. He uses Kantian jargon to present his theory of conversation. This he
does only at Harvard. The implicature being that talking of vaguer assumptions
of helpfulness would not sound too convincing. So he has the maxim, the super-maxim,
and the sub-maxim. A principle and a maxim is Kantian enough. But when he
actually echoes Kant, is when he introduces what he later calls the
conversational categories – the keyword here is conversational category, as
categoria is used by Aristotle and Kant ‒ or Kantotle. Grice surely
knew that, say, his Category of Conversational Modality had nothing to do with
the Kantian Category of Modality. Still, he stuck with the idea of four
categories (versus Aristotles ten, eight or seven, as the text you consult may
tell you): category of conversational quantity (which at Oxford he had
formulated in much vaguer terms like strength and informativeness and
entailment), the category of conversational quality (keyword: principle of
conversational trust), and the category of conversational relation, where again
Kants relation has nothing to do with the maxim Grice associates with this
category. In any case, his Kantian joke may be helpful when considering the
centrality of the concept category simpliciter that Grice had to fight with
with his pupils at Oxford – he was lucky to have Austin and Strawson as
co-lecturers! Grice was irritated by L and S defining kategoria as category. I
guess I knew that. He agreed with their second shot, predicable. Ultimately,
Grices concern with category is his concern with person, or prote ousia, as
used by Aristotle, and as giving a rationale to Grices agency-based approach to
the philosophical enterprise. Aristotle used kategorein in the sense
of to predicate, assert something of something, and kategoria. The prote
ousia is exemplified by o tis anthropos. It is obvious that Grice wants to
approach Aristotles semantics and Aristotles metaphysics at one fell swoop.
Grice reads Aristotles Met. , and finds it understandable. Consider the
adjective French (which Aristotle does NOT consider) ‒ as it occurs in phrases
such as Michel Foucault is a French citizen. Grice is not a French
citizen. Michel Foucault once wrote a nice French poem. Urmson once wrote
a nice French essay on pragmatics. Michel Foucault was a French
professor. Michel Foucault is a French professor. Michel Foucault
is a French professor of philosophy. The following features are perhaps
significant. The appearance of the adjective French, or Byzantine, as the
case might be ‒ cf. I’m feeling French tonight. In these phrases is what
Grice has as adjunctive rather than conjunctive, or attributive. A French poem
is not necessarily something which combines the separate features of being a
poem and being French, as a tall philosopher would simply combine the features
of being tall and of being a philosopher. French in French poem,
occurs adverbially. French citizen standardly means citizen of
France. French poem standardly means poem in French. But it is a mistake to
suppose that this fact implies that there is this or that meaning, or, worse,
this or that Fregeian sense, of the expression French. In any case, only
metaphorically or metabolically can we say that French means this or that or
has sense. An utterer means. An utterer makes sense. Cf. R. Pauls doubts about
capitalizing major. French means, and figuratively at that, only one thing,
viz. of or pertaining to France. And English only means of or
pertaining to England. French may be what Grice (unfollowing his remarks on
The general theory of context) call context-sensitive. One might indeed
say, if you like, that while French means ‒ or means only this or that, or that
its only sense is this or that, French still means, again figuratively, a
variety of things. French means-in-context of or pertaining to
France. Symbolise that as expression E means-in-context that p.
Expression E means-in-context C2 that p2. Relative
to Context C1 French means of France; as in the phrase French
citizen. Relative to context C2, French means in the French language, as in the phrase,
French poem ‒ whereas history does not behave, like this. Whether the
focal item is a universal or a particular is, contra Aristotle, quite
irrelevant to the question of what this or that related adjective means, or
what its sense is. The medical art is no more what an utterer means when he
utters the adjective medical, as is France what an utterer means by the
adjective French. While the attachment of this or that context may suggest an
interpretation in context of this or that expression as uttered by the utterer
U, it need not be the case that such a suggestion is indefeasible. It
might be e.g. that French poem would have to mean, poem composed in French,
unless there were counter indications, that brings the utterer and the
addressee to a different context C3. In which case, perhaps
what the utterer means by French poem is poem composed by a French competitor
in this or that competition. For French professor there would be two
obvious things an utterer might mean. Disambiguation will depend on the
wider expression-context or in the situational context attaching to
the this or that circumstance of utterance. Eschatology. Some like Hegel, but
Collingwoods *my* man! ‒ Grice. Grice participated in two consecutive
evenings of the s. of programmes on metaphysics organised by Pears. Actually,
charming Pears felt pretentious enough to label the meetings to be about the
nature of metaphysics! Grice ends up discussing, as he should, Collingwood on
presupposition. Met. remained a
favourite topic for Grices philosophical explorations, as it is evident from
his essay on Met. , Philosophical Eschatology, and Platos Republic, repr. in
his WOW . Possibly Hardie is to blame, since he hardly tutored Grice on
metaphysics! Grices two BBC lectures are typically dated in tone. It was the
(good ole) days when philosophers thought they could educate the non-elite by
dropping Namess like Collingwood and stuff! The Third Programme was extremely
popular, especially among the uneducated ones at London, as Pears almost put
it, as it was a way for Londoners to get to know what is going on down at
Oxford, the only place an uneducated (or educated, for that matter) Londoner at
the time was interested in displaying some interest about! I mean, Johnson is
right: if a man is tired of the nature of metaphysics, he is tired of life!
Since the authorship is Grice, Strawson, and Pears, Met. , in Pears, The Nature
of Met., The BBC Third Programme, it is somewhat difficult to identify what
paragraphs were actually read by Grice (and which ones by Pears and which ones
by Strawson). But trust the sharp Griceian to detect the correct implicature!
There are many (too many) other items covered by these two lectures: Kant,
Aristotle, in no particular order. And in The Grice Collection, for that
matter, that cover the field of metaphysics. In the New World, as a sort of
tutor in the graduate programme, Grice was expected to cover the discipline at
various seminars. Only I dislike discipline! Perhaps his clearest exposition is
in the opening section of his Met. , philosophical eschatology, and Platos
Republic, repr. in his WOW , where he states, bluntly that all you need is metaphysics! metaphysics, Miscellaneous,
metaphysics notes, Grice would possible see metaphysics as a class – category
figuring large. He was concerned with the methodological aspects of the
metaphysical enterprise, since he was enough of a relativist to allow for one
metaphysical scheme to apply to one area of discourse (one of Eddingtons
tables) and another metaphysical scheme to apply to another (Eddingtons other
table). In the third programme for the BBC Grice especially enjoyed criticising
John Wisdoms innovative look at metaphysics as a bunch of self-evident
falsehoods (Were all alone). Grice focuses on Wisdom on the knowledge of other
minds. He also discusses Collingwoods presuppositions, and Bradley on the
reality-appearance distinction. Grices reference to Wisdom was due to Ewings
treatment of Wisdom on metaphysics. Grices main motivation here is defending
metaphysics against Ayer. Ayer thought to win more Oxonian philosophers than he
did at Oxford, but he was soon back in London. Post-war Oxford had become
conservative and would not stand to the nonsense of Ayers claiming that
metaphysics is nonsense, especially, as Ayers implicature also was, that
philosophy is nonsense! Perhaps the best summary of Griceian metaphysics is his
From Genesis to Revelations: a new discourse on metaphysics. It’s an
ontological answer that one must give to Grices metabolic operation from
utterers meaning to expression meaning, Grice had been interested in the
methodology of metaphysics since his Oxford days. He counts as one
memorable experience in the area his participation in two episodes for the BBC
Third Programme on The nature of metaphysics with the organiser, Pears, and his
former tutee, Strawson on the panel. Grice was particularly keen on
Collingwoods views on metaphysical presuppositions, both absolute and
relative! Grice also considers John Wisdoms view of the metaphysical
proposition as a blatant falsehood. Grice considers Bradleys Hegelian
metaphysics of the absolute, in Appearance and reality. Refs.: While Grice’s
choice was ‘eschatology,’ as per WoW, Essay, other keywords are useful, notably
“metaphysics,” “ontology,” “theorizing,” and “theory-theory,” in The H. P.
Grice Papers, BANC.
explanation:
Unlike Austin, who was in love with a taxonomy, Grice loved an explanation. “Ἀρχὴν
δὲ τῶν πάντων ὕδωρ ὑπεστήσατο, καὶ τὸν κόσμον ἔμψυχον καὶ δαιμόνων πλήρη.
“Arkhen de ton panton hudor hupestesato.” Thales’s doctrine is that water is
the universal primary substance, and that the world is animate and full of
divinities. “Ἀλλὰ Θαλῆς μὲν ὁ τῆς τοιαύτης ἀρχηγὸς φιλοσοφίας ὕδωρ φησὶν εἶναι
(διὸ καὶ τὴν γῆν ἐφ᾽ ὕδατος ἀπεφήνατο εἶναι), λαβὼν ἴσως τὴν ὑπόληψιν ταύτην ἐκ
τοῦ πάντων ὁρᾶν τὴν τροφὴν ὑγρὰν οὖσαν καὶ αὐτὸ τὸ θερμὸν ἐκ τούτου γιγνόμενον
καὶ τούτῳ ζῶν (τὸ δ᾽ ἐξ οὗ γίγνεται, τοῦτ᾽ ἐστὶν ἀρχὴ πάντων) – διά τε δὴ τοῦτο
τὴν ὑπόληψιν λαβὼν ταύτην καὶ διὰ τὸ πάντων τὰ σπέρματα τὴν φύσιν ὑγρὰν ἔχειν,
τὸ δ᾽ ὕδωρ ἀρχὴν τῆς φύσεως εἶναι τοῖς ὑγροῖς. εἰσὶ δέ τινες οἳ καὶ τοὺς
παμπαλαίους καὶ πολὺ πρὸ τῆς νῦν γενέσεως καὶ πρώτους θεολογήσαντας οὕτως
οἴονται περὶ τῆς φύσεως ὑπολαβεῖν‧ Ὠκεανόν τε γὰρ καὶ Τηθὺν ἐποίησαν τῆς γενέσεως πατέρας
[Hom. Ξ 201], καὶ τὸν ὅρκον τῶν θεῶν ὕδωρ, τὴν καλουμένην ὑπ᾽ αὐτῶν Στύγα τῶν
ποιητῶν‧ τιμιώτατον μὲν γὰρ τὸ πρεσβύτατον,
ὅρκος δὲ τὸ τιμιώτατόν ἐστιν. εἰ μὲν οὖν [984a] ἀρχαία τις αὕτη καὶ παλαιὰ
τετύχηκεν οὖσα περὶ τῆς φύσεως ἡ δόξα, τάχ᾽ ἂν ἄδηλον εἴη, Θαλῆς μέντοι λέγεται
οὕτως ἀποφήνασθαι περὶ τῆς πρώτης αἰτίας. (Ἵππωνα γὰρ οὐκ ἄν τις ἀξιώσειε
θεῖναι μετὰ τούτων διὰ τὴν εὐτέλειαν αὐτοῦ τῆς διανοίας)‧ Ἀναξιμένης δὲ ἀέρα καὶ Διογένης πρότερον ὕδατος καὶ μάλιστ᾽
ἀρχὴν τιθέασι τῶν ἁπλῶν σωμάτων.” De caelo: “Οἱ δ᾽ ἐφ᾽ ὕδατος κεῖσθαι [sc. τὴν
γὴν]. τοῦτον γὰρ ἀρχαιότατον παρειλήφαμεν τὸν λόγον, ὅν φασιν εἰπεῖν Θαλῆν τὸν
Μιλήσιον, ὡς διὰ τὸ πλωτὴν εἶναι μένουσαν ὥσπερ ξύλον ἤ τι τοιοῦτον ἕτερον (καὶ
γὰρ τούτων ἐπ᾽ ἀέρος μὲν οὐθὲν πέφυκε μένειν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐφ᾽ ὕδατος), ὥσπερ οὐ τὸν
αὐτὸν λόγον ὄντα περὶ τῆς γῆς καὶ τοῦ ὕδατος τοῦ ὀχοῦντος τὴν γῆν‧ οὐδὲ γὰρ τὸ ὕδωρ πέφυκε μένειν μετέωρον, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπί τινός
[294b] ἐστιν. ἔτι δ᾽ ὥσπερ ἀὴρ ὕδατος κουφότερον, καὶ γῆς ὕδωρ‧ ὥστε πῶς οἷόν τε τὸ κουφότερον κατωτέρω κεῖσθαι τοῦ
βαρυτέρου τὴν φύσιν; ἔτι δ᾽ εἴπερ ὅλη πέφυκε μένειν ἐφ᾽ ὕδατος, δῆλον ὅτι καὶ
τῶν μορίων ἕκαστον [αὐτῆς]‧
νῦν δ᾽ οὐ φαίνεται τοῦτο γιγνόμενον, ἀλλὰ τὸ τυχὸν μόριον φέρεται εἰς βυθόν,
καὶ θᾶττον τὸ μεῖζον. The problem of the nature of matter, and its
transformation into the myriad things of which the universe is made, engaged
the natural philosophers, commencing with Thales. For his hypothesis to be
credible, it was essential that he could explain how all things could come into
being from water, and return ultimately to the originating material. It is
inherent in Thaless hypotheses that water had the potentiality to change to the
myriad things of which the universe is made, the botanical, physiological,
meteorological and geological states. In Timaeus, 49B-C, Plato had Timaeus
relate a cyclic process. The passage commences with that which we now call
“water” and describes a theory which was possibly that of Thales. Thales would
have recognized evaporation, and have been familiar with traditional views,
such as the nutritive capacity of mist and ancient theories about spontaneous
generation, phenomena which he may have observed, just as Aristotle believed
he, himself had, and about which Diodorus Siculus, Epicurus (ap. Censorinus,
D.N. IV.9), Lucretius (De Rerum Natura) and Ovid (Met. I.416-437) wrote. When
Aristotle reported Thales’s pronouncement that the primary principle is water,
he made a precise statement: Thales says that it [the nature of things] is
water, but he became tentative when he proposed reasons which might have
justified Thaless decision. Thales’s supposition may have arisen from
observation. It is Aristotle’s opinion that Thales may have observed, that the
nurture of all creatures is moist, and that warmth itself is generated from
moisture and lives by it; and that from which all things come to be is their
first principle. Then, Aristotles tone changed towards greater confidence. He
declared: Besides this, another reason for the supposition would be that the
semina of all things have a moist nature. In continuing the criticism of
Thales, Aristotle wrote: That from which all things come to be is their first
principle (Metaph. 983 b25). Simple
metallurgy had been practised long before Thales presented his hypotheses, so
Thales knew that heat could return metals to a liquid state. Water exhibits
sensible changes more obviously than any of the other so-called elements, and
can readily be observed in the three states of liquid, vapour and ice. The
understanding that water could generate into earth is basic to Thaless watery
thesis. At Miletus it could readily be observed that water had the capacity to
thicken into earth. Miletus stood on the Gulf of Lade through which the
Maeander river emptied its waters. Within living memory, older Milesians had
witnessed the island of Lade increasing in size within the Gulf, and the river
banks encroaching into the river to such an extent that at Priene, across the
gulf from Miletus the warehouses had to be rebuilt closer to the waters edge.
The ruins of the once prosperous city-port of Miletus are now ten kilometres
distant from the coast and the Island of Lade now forms part of a rich
agricultural plain. There would have been opportunity to observe other areas
where earth generated from water, for example, the deltas of the Halys, the
Ister, about which Hesiod wrote (Theogony, 341), now called the Danube, the
Tigris-Euphrates, and almost certainly the Nile. This coming-into-being of land
would have provided substantiation of Thaless doctrine. To Thales water held
the potentialities for the nourishment and generation of the entire cosmos.
Aëtius attributed to Thales the concept that even the very fire of the sun and
the stars, and indeed the cosmos itself is nourished by evaporation of the
waters (Aëtius, Placita). It is not
known how Thales explained his watery thesis, but Aristotle believed that the
reasons he proposed were probably the persuasive factors in Thaless
considerations. Thales gave no role to the Olympian gods. Belief in generation
of earth from water was not proven to be wrong until A.D. 1769 following
experiments of Antoine Lavoisier, and spontaneous generation was not disproved
until the nineteenth century as a result of the work of Louis Pasteur.The first
philosophical explanation of the world was speculative not practical. has its
intelligibility in being identified with one of its parts (the world is water).
First philosophical explanation for Universe human is rational and the world in
independent; He said the arché is water; Monist: He believed reality is
one Thales of Miletus, first
philosophical explanation of the origin and nature of justice (and Why after all, did a Thales is Water.” Without the millions of species
that make up the biosphere, and the billions of interactions between them that
go on day by day,.Oddly, Grice had spent some time on x-questions in the Kant
lectures. And why is an x-question. A philosophical explanation of
conversation. A philosophical explanation of implicature. Description vs.
explanation. Grice quotes from Fisher, Never contradict. Never explain.
Taxonomy, is worse than explanation, always. Grice is exploring the
taxonomy-description vs. explanation dichotomy. He would often criticise
ordinary-language philosopher Austin for spending too much valuable time on
linguistic botany, without an aim in his head. Instead, his inclination, a
dissenting one, is to look for the big picture of it all, and disregard a
piece-meal analysis. Conversation is a good example. While Austin would
Subjectsify Language (Linguistic Nature), Grice rather places rationality
squarely on the behaviour displayed by utterers as they make conversational
moves that their addressees will judge as rational along specific
lines. Observation of the principle of conversational helpfulness is
rational (reasonable) along the following lines: anyone who cares about the two
goals which are central to conversation, viz. giving and receiving information,
and influencing and being influenced by others, is expected to have an interest
in taking part in a conversation which will only be profitable (if not
possible) under the assumption that it is conducted along the lines of the
principle of conversational helpfulness. Grice is not interested in
conversation per se, but as a basis for a theory that explains the mistakes
ordinary-language philosophers are making. The case of What is known to be the
case is not believed to be the case. Refs.: One good source is the “Prejudices
and predilections.” Also the first set of ‘Logic and conversation.” There is
also an essay on the ‘that’ versus the ‘why.’ The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
expressum:
Grice
liked an abbreviation, especially because he loved subscripts. So, he starts to
analyse the ‘ordinary-language’ philosohper’s mistake by using a few symbols:
there’s the phrase, or utterance, and there’s the expression, for which Grice
uses ‘e’ for a ‘token,’ and ‘E’ for a type. So, suppose we are considering
Hart’s use of ‘carefully.’ ‘Carefully’ would be the ‘expression,’ occurring
within an utterance. Surely, since Grice uses ‘expression’ in that way, he also
uses to say what Hart is doing, Hart is expressing. Grice notes that
‘expressing’ may be too strong. Hart is expressing the belief THAT if you utter
an utterance containing the ‘expression’ ‘carefully,’ there is an implicatum to
the effect that the agent referred to is taking RATIONAL steps towards
something. IRRATIONAL behaviour does not count as ‘careful’ behaviour. Grice
uses the same abbreviations in discussing philosophy as the ‘conceptual
analysis’ of this or that expression. It is all different with Ogden,
Collingwood, and Croce, that Collingwood loved! "Ideas, we may say generally, are
symbols, as serving to express some actual moment or phase of experience and
guiding towards fuller actualization of what is, or seems to be, involved in
its existence or MEANING . That no idea is ever wholly adequate MEANS that the
suggestiveness of experience is inexhaustible" Forsyth, English
Philosophy, 1910, . Thus the significance of sound, the meaning of an utterance
is here identical with the active response to surroundings and with the natural
expression of emotions
According to Husserl, the function of expression
is only directly and immediately adapted to what is usually described as the
meaning (Bedeutung) or the sense (Sinn) of the speech or parts of speech. Only
because the meaning associated with a wordsowid expresses something, is that
word-sound called 'expres- sion' (Ideen, p. 256 f). "Between the ,nearnng
and the what is meant, or what it expresses, there exists an essential
relation, because the meaning is the expression of the meant through its own
content (Gehalt) What is meant (dieses Bedeutete) lies in the 'object' of the
thought or speech. We must therefore distinguish these three-Word, Meaning,
Object "1 Geyser, Gp cit p z8 PDF compression, OCR, web optimization using
a watermarked evaluation copy of CVISION PDFCompresso These complexities are
mentioned here to show how vague are most of the terms which are commonly
thought satisfactory in this topic. Such a word as 'understand' is, unless
specially treated, far too vague to serve except provisionally or at levels of
discourse where a real understanding of the matter (in the reference sense) is
not possible. The multiple functions of speech will be classified and discussed
in the following chapter. There it will be seen that the expression of the
speaker's intention is one of the five regular language functions.
Grice hated Austin’s joke, the utteratum, “I
use ‘utterance’ only as equivalent to 'utteratum;' for 'utteratio' I use ‘the
issue of an utterance,’” so he needed something for ‘what is said’ in general,
not just linguistic, ‘what is expressed,’ what is explicitly conveyed,’ ex-prĭmo
, pressi, pressum, 3, v. a. premo. express (mostly poet. and in postAug. prose;
“freq. in the elder Pliny): (faber) et ungues exprimet et molles imitabitur
aere capillos,” Hor. A. P. 33; cf.: “alicujus furorem ... verecundiae ruborem,”
Plin. 34, 14, 40, § 140: “expressa in cera ex anulo imago,” Plaut. Ps. 1, 1,
54: “imaginem hominis gypso e facie ipsa,” Plin. 35, 12, 44, § 153; cf.:
“effigiem de signis,” id. ib.: “optime Herculem Delphis et Alexandrum, etc.,” id.
34, 8, 19, § 66 et saep.: “vestis stricta et singulos artus exprimens,”
exhibiting, showing, Tac. G. 17: “pulcher aspectu sit athleta, cujus lacertos
exercitatio expressit,” has well developed, made muscular, Quint. 8, 3, 10.
freedom:
Grice was especially concerned with Kants having brought back the old Greek
idea of eleutheria for philosophical discussion. Refs.: the obvious keywords
are “freedom” and “free,” but most of the material is in “Actions and events,”
in PPQ, and below under ‘kantianism’ – The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.Bratman, of
Stanford, much influenced by Grice (at Berkeley then) thanks to their
Hands-Across-the-Bay programme, helps us to understand this Pological
progression towards the idea of strong autonomy or freedom. Recall that Grices
Ps combine Lockes very intelligent parrots with Russells and Carnaps
nonsensical Ps of which nothing we are told other than they karulise
elatically. Grices purpose is to give a little thought to a question. What are
the general principles exemplified, in creature-construction, in progressing
from one type of P to a higher type? What kinds of steps are being made? The
kinds of step with which Grice deals are those which culminate in a licence to
include, within the specification of the content of the psychological state of
this or that type of P, a range of expressions which would be inappropriate
with respect to this lower-type P. Such expressions include this or that
connective, this or that quantifier, this or that temporal modifier, this or
that mode indicator, this or that modal operator, and (importantly) this or
that expression to refer to this or that souly state like … judges that … and … will that … This or
that expression, that is, the availability of which leads to the structural
enrichment of the specification of content. In general, these steps will be
ones by which this or that item or idea which has, initially, a legitimate
place outside the scope of this or that souly instantiable (or, if you will,
the expressions for which occur legitimately outside the scope of this or that
souly predicate) come to have a legitimate place within the scope of such an
instantiable, a step by which, one might say, this or that item or ideas comes
to be internalised. Grice is disposed to regard as prototypical the sort of
natural disposition or propension which Hume attributes to a person, and which
is very important to Hume, viz. the tendency of the soul to spread itself upon
objects, i.e. to project into the world items which, properly or primitively considered,
is a feature of this or that souly state. Grice sets out in stages the
application of aspects of the genitorial programme. We then start with a
zero-order, with a P equipped to satisfy unnested, or logically amorphous,
judging and willing, i.e. whose contents do not involve judging or willing. We
soon reach our first P, G1. It would be advantageous to a P0 if
it could have this or that judging and this or that willing, which relate to
its own judging or willing. Such G1 could be equipped to
control or regulate its own judgings and willings. It will presumably be
already constituted so as to conform to the law that, cæteris paribus, if it
wills that p and judge that ~p, if it can, it makes it the case that p in its
soul To give it some control over its judgings and willings, we need only
extend the application of this law to the Ps judging and willing. We equip the
P so that, cæteris paribus, if it wills that it is not the case that it wills
that p and it judges that they do will that p, if it can, it makes it the case
that it does not will that p. And we somehow ensure that sometimes it can do
this. It may be that the installation of this kind of control would go hand in
had with the installation of the capacity for evaluation. Now, unlike it is the
case with a G1, a G2s intentional effort depends on the motivational strength
of its considered desire at the time of action. There is a process by which
this or that conflicting considered desire motivates action as a broadly causal
process, a process that reveals motivational strength. But a G2 might itself
try to weigh considerations provided by such a conflicting desire B1 and B2 in
deliberation about this or that pro and this or that con of various
alternatives. In the simplest case, such weighing treats each of the things
desired as a prima facie justifying end. In the face of conflict, it weighs
this and that desired end, where the weights correspond to the motivational
strength of the associated considered desire. The outcome of such deliberation,
Aristotle’s prohairesis, matches the outcome of the causal motivational process
envisioned in the description of G2. But, since the weights it
invokes in such deliberation correspond to the motivational strength of this or
that relevant considered desire (though perhaps not to the motivational
strength of this or that relevant considered desire), the resultant activitiy
matches those of a corresponding G2 (each of whose desires, we
are assuming, are considered). To be more realistic, we might limit ourselves
to saying that a P2 has the capacity to make the transition
from this or that unconsidered desire to this or that considered desire, but
does not always do this. But it will keep the discussion more manageable to
simplify and to suppose that each desire is considered. We shall not want this
G2 to depend, in each will and act in ways that reveal the motivational
strength of this or that considered desire at the time of action, but for a G3 it
will also be the case that in this or that, though not each) case, it acts on
the basis of how it weights this or that end favoured by this or that
conflicting considered desire. This or that considered desire will concern
matters that cannot be achieved simply by action at a single time. E. g. G3 may
want to nurture a vegetable garden, or build a house. Such matters will require
organized and coordinated action that extends over time. What the G3 does now
will depend not only on what it now desires but also on what it now expects it
will do later given what it does now. It needs a way of settling now what it
will do later given what it does now. The point is even clearer when we remind
ourselves that G3 is not alone. It is, we may assume, one of some number of G3;
and in many cases it needs to coordinate what it does with what other G3 do so
as to achieve ends desired by all participants, itself included. These
costs are magnified for G4 whose various plans are interwoven so that a change
in one element can have significant ripple effects that will need to be
considered. Let us suppose that the general strategies G4 has for responding to
new information about its circumstances are sensitive to these kinds of costs.
Promoting in the long run the satisfaction of its considered desires and
preferences. G4 is a somewhat sophisticated planning agent but
it has a problem. It can expect that its desires and preferences may well
change over time and undermine its efforts at organizing and coordinating its
activities over time. Perhaps in many cases this is due to the kind of temporal
discounting. So for example G4 may have a plan to exercise every day but may
tend to prefer a sequence of not exercising on the present day but exercising
all days in the future, to a uniform sequence the present day included. At the
end of the day it returns to its earlier considered preference in favour of
exercising on each and every day. Though G4, unlike G3, has the
capacity to settle on prior plans or plaices concerning exercise, this capacity
does not yet help in such a case. A creature whose plans were stable in ways in
part shaped by such a no-regret principle would be more likely than G4 to
resist temporary temptations. So let us build such a principle into the
stability of the plans of a G5, whose plans and policies are not derived solely
from facts about its limits of time, attention, and the like. It is also
grounded in the central concerns of a planning agent with its own future,
concerns that lend special significance to anticipated future regret. So let us
add to G5 the capacity and disposition to arrive at such hierarchies of
higher-order desires concerning its will. This gives us creature G6. There
is a problem with G6, one that has been much discussed. It is not clear why a
higher-order desire ‒ even a higher-order desire that a certain desire
be ones will ‒ is not simply one more desire in the pool of desires
(Berkeley Gods will problem). Why does it have the authority to constitute or
ensure the agents (i. e. the creatures) endorsement or rejection of a
first-order desire? Applied to G6 this is the question of whether, by virtue
solely of its hierarchies of desires, it really does succeed in taking its own
stand of endorsement or rejection of various first-order desires. Since it was
the ability to take its own stand that we are trying to provide in the move to
P6, we need some response to this challenge. The basic point is that
G6 is not merely a time-slice agent. It is, rather, and
understands itself to be, a temporally persisting planning agent, one who
begins, and continues, and completes temporally extended projects. On a broadly
Lockean view, its persistence over time consists in relevant psychological
continuities (e.g., the persistence of attitudes of belief and intention) and
connections (e.g., memory of a past event, or the later intentional execution
of an intention formed earlier). Certain attitudes have as a primary role the
constitution and support of such Lockean continuities and connections. In
particular, policies that favour or reject various desires have it as their
role to constitute and support various continuities both of ordinary desires
and of the politicos themselves. For this reason such policies are not merely
additional wiggles in the psychic stew. Instead, these policies have a claim to
help determine where the agent ‒ i.e., the temporally persisting agent ‒
stands with respect to its desires, or so it seems to me reasonable to say. The
psychology of G7 continues to have the hierarchical structure of pro-attitudes
introduced with G6. The difference is that the higher-order pro-attitudes of G6
were simply characterized as desires in a broad, generic sense, and no appeal
was made to the distinctive species of pro-attitude constituted by plan-like
attitudes. That is the sense in which the psychology of G7 is an extension of
the psychology of G6. Let us then give G7 such higher-order policies with the
capacity to take a stand with respect to its desires by arriving at relevant
higher-order policies concerning the functioning of those desires over time. G7 exhibits
a merger of hierarchical and planning structures. Appealing to planning theory
and ground in connection to the temporally extended structure of agency to be
ones will. G7 has higher-order policies that favour or challenge motivational
roles of its considered desires. When G7 engages in deliberative weighing of
conflicting, desired ends it seems that the assigned weights should reflect the
policies that determine where it stands with respect to relevant desires. But
the policies we have so far appealed to ‒ policies concerning what desires are
to be ones will ‒ do not quite address this concern. The problem is that one
can in certain cases have policies concerning which desires are to motivate and
yet these not be policies that accord what those desires are for a corresponding
justifying role in deliberation. G8. A solution is to give our creature, G8, the
capacity to arrive at policies that express its commitment to be motivated by a
desire by way of its treatment of that desire as providing, in deliberation, a
justifying end for action. G8 has policies for treating (or not
treating) certain desires as providing justifying ends, as, in this way,
reason-providing, in motivationally effective deliberation. Let us call such
policies self-governing policies. We will suppose that these policies are
mutually compatible and do not challenge each other. In this way G8 involves an
extension of structures already present in G7. The grounds on which G8 arrives
at (and on occasion revises) such self-governing policies will be many and
varied. We can see these policies as crystallizing complex pressures and
concerns, some of which are grounded in other policies or desires. These
self-governing policies may be tentative and will normally not be immune to
change. If we ask what G8 values in this case, the answer seems to be: what it
values is constituted in part by its higher-order self-governing policies. In
particular, it values exercise over nonexercise even right now, and even given
that it has a considered, though temporary, preference to the contrary. Unlike
lower Ps, what P8 now values is not simply a matter of its
present, considered desires and preferences. Now this model of P8 seems in
relevant aspects to be a partial) model of us, in our better moments, of
course. So we arrive at the conjecture that one important kind of valuing of
which we are capable involves, in the cited ways, both our first-order desires
and our higher order self-governing policies. In an important sub-class of
cases our valuing involves reflexive polices that are both first-order policies
of action and higher-order policies to treat the first-order policy as reason
providing in motivationally effective deliberation. This may seem odd. Valuing
seems normally to be a first-order attitude. One values honesty, say. The
proposal is that an important kind of valuing involves higher-order policies.
Does this mean that, strictly speaking, what one values (in this sense) is
itself a desire ‒ not honesty, say, but a desire for honesty? No, it does not.
What I value in the present case is honesty; but, on the theory, my valuing
honesty in art consists in certain higher-order self-governing policies. An
agents reflective valuing involves a kind of higher-order willing. Freud
challenged the power structure of the soul in Plato: it is the libido that
takes control, not the logos. Grice takes up this polemic. Aristotle takes up
Platos challenge, each type of soul is united to the next by the idea of life.
The animal soul, between the vegetative and the rational, is not detachable.
futurum indicativum: Grice is especially
concerned with the future for his analysis of the communicatum. “Close the
door!” By uttering “Close the door!,” U means that A is to close the door – in
the future. So Grice spends HOURS exploring how one can have justification to
have an intention about a future event. Grice is aware of the ‘shall.’ Grice
uses ‘shall’ in the first person to mean wha the calls ‘futurum indicativum.’
(He considers the case of the ‘shall’ in the second and third persons in his
analysis of mode). What are the conditions for the use of “shall” in the first
person. “I shall close the door” may be predictable. It is in the indicative
mode. “Thou shalt close the door,” and “He shall close the door” are in the
imperative mode, or rather they correspond to the ‘futurum intentionale.’ Since
Grice is an analytic philosopher, he specifies the analysis in the third person
(“U means that…”) one has to be careful. For ‘futurum indicativum’ we have
‘shall’ in the first person, and ‘will’ in the second and third persons. So for
the first group, U means that he will go. In the second group, U means that his
addressee or a third party shall go. Grice adopts a subscript variant, stick
with ‘will,’ but add the mode afterwards: so will-ind. will be ‘futurum
indicativum,’ and will-int. will be futurum intentionale. The OED has it as
“shall,” and defines as a Germanic preterite-present strong verb. In Old
English, it is “sceal,” and which the OED renders as “to owe (money,” 1425
Hoccleve Min. Poems, The leeste ferthyng þat y men shal. To owe (allegiance);
1649 And by that feyth I shal to god and yow; followed by an infinitive,
without to. Except for a few instances of shall will, shall may (mowe),
"shall conne" in the 15th c., the infinitive after shall is always
either that of a principal verb or of have or be; The present tense shall; in
general statements of what is right or becoming, = ought, superseded by the
past subjunctive should; in OE. the subjunctive present sometimes occurs in
this use; 1460 Fortescue Abs. and Lim. Mon. The king shall often times send his
judges to punish rioters and risers. 1562 Legh Armory; Whether are Roundells of
all suche coloures, as ye haue spoken of here before? or shall they be Namesd
Roundelles of those coloures? In OE. and occas. in Middle English used to
express necessity of various kinds. For the many shades of meaning in Old
English see Bosworth and Toller), = must, "must needs", "have
to", "am compelled to", etc.; in stating a necessary condition:
= `will have to, `must (if something else is to happen). 1596 Shaks. Merch. V.
i. i. 116 You shall seeke all day ere you finde them, & when you haue
them they are not worth the search. 1605 Shaks. Lear. He that parts vs, shall
bring a Brand from Heauen. c In hypothetical clause, accompanying the statement
of a necessary condition: = `is to. 1612 Bacon Ess., Greatn. Kingd., Neither
must they be too much broken of it, if they shall be preserued in vigor;
ndicating what is appointed or settled to take place = the mod. `is to, `am to,
etc. 1600 Shaks. A.Y.L. What is he that shall buy his flocke and pasture? 1625
in Ellis Orig. Lett. Ser. "Tomorrow His Majesty will be present to begin the Parliament which is thought
shall be removed to Oxford; in commands or instructions; n the second person, “shall”
is equivalent to an imperative. Chiefly in Biblical language, of divine
commandments, rendering the jussive future of the Hebrew and Vulgate. In Old
English the imperative mode is used in the ten commandments. 1382 Wyclif Exod.
Thow shalt not tak the Names of the Lord thi God in veyn. So Coverdale, etc. b)
In expositions: you shall understand, etc. (that). c) In the formula you shall
excuse (pardon) me. (now "must"). 1595 Shaks. John. Your Grace shall
pardon me, I will not backe. 1630 R. Johnsons Kingd. and Commw. 191 You shall
excuse me, for I eat no flesh on Fridayes; n the *third* person. 1744 in Atkyns
Chanc. Cases (1782) III. 166 The words shall and may in general acts of
parliament, or in private constitutions, are to be construed imperatively, they
must remove them; in the second and third persons, expressing the determination
by the Griceian utterer to bring about some action, event, or state of things
in the future, or (occasionally) to refrain from hindering what is otherwise
certain to take place, or is intended by another person; n the second person.
1891 J. S. Winter Lumley. If you would rather not stay then, you shall go down
to South Kensington Square then; in third person. 1591 Shaks. Two Gent. Verona
shall not hold thee. 1604 Shaks. Oth. If there be any cunning Crueltie, That can
torment him much, It shall be his. 1891 J. S. Winter Lumley xiv, `Oh, yes, sir,
she shall come back, said the nurse. `Ill take care of that. `I will come back,
said Vere; in special interrogative uses, a) in the *first* person, used in
questions to which the expected answer is a command, direction, or counsel, or
a resolve on the speakers own part. a) in questions introduced by an
interrogative pronoun (in oblique case), adverb, or adverbial phrase. 1600
Fairfax Tasso. What shall we doe? shall we be gouernd still, By this false
hand? 1865 Kingsley Herew. Where shall we stow the mare? b) in categorical
questions, often expressing indignant reprobation of a suggested course of
action, the implication (or implicature, or entailment) being that only a
negative (or, with negative question an affirmative) answer is conceivable.
1611 Shaks. Wint. T. Shall I draw the Curtaine? 1802 Wordsw. To the Cuckoo i, O
Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird, Or but a wandering Voice? 1891 J. S. Winter
Lumley `Are you driving, or shall I call you a cab? `Oh, no; Im driving,
thanks. c) In *ironical* affirmative in exclamatory sentence, equivalent to the
above interrogative use, cf. Ger. soll. 1741 Richardson Pamela, A pretty thing
truly! Here I, a poor helpless Girl, raised from Poverty and Distress, shall
put on Lady-airs to a Gentlewoman born. d) to stand shall I, shall I (later
shill I, shall I: v. shilly-shally), to be at shall I, shall I (not): to be
vacillating, to shilly-shally. 1674 R. Godfrey Inj. and Ab. Physic Such
Medicines. that will not stand shall I? shall I? but will fall to work on the
Disease presently. b Similarly in the *third* person, where the Subjects
represents or includes the utterer, or when the utterer is placing himself at
anothers point of view. 1610 Shaks. Temp., Hast thou (which art but aire) a
touch, a feeling Of their afflictions, and shall not my selfe, One of their
kinde be kindlier moud then thou art? In the second and third person, where the
expected answer is a decision on the part of the utterer or of some person
OTHER than the Subjects. The question often serves as an impassioned
repudiation of a suggestion (or implicature) that something shall be permitted.
1450 Merlin `What shal be his Names? `I will, quod she, `that it haue Names
after my fader. 1600 Shaks. A.Y.L.; What shall he haue that kild the Deare?
1737 Alexander Pope, translating Horaces Epistle, And say, to which shall our
applause belong, this new court jargon, or the good old song? 1812 Crabbe
Tales, Shall a wife complain? In indirect question. 1865 Kingsley Herew, Let
her say what shall be done with it; as a mere auxiliary, forming, with present
infinitive, the future, and (with perfect infinitive) the future perfect
tense. In Old English, the notion of the future tense is ordinarily expressed
by the present tense. To prevent ambiguity, wile (will) is not unfrequently
used as a future auxiliary, sometimes retaining no trace of its initial usage,
connected with the faculty of volition, and cognate indeed with volition. On
the other hand, sceal (shall), even when rendering a Latin future, can hardly
be said to have been ever a mere future tense-sign in Old English. It always
expressed something of its original notion of obligation or necessity, so
Hampshire is wrong in saying I shall climb Mt. Everest is predictable. In
Middle English, the present early ceases to be commonly employed in futural
usage, and the future is expressed by shall or will, the former being much
more common. The usage as to the choice between the two auxiliaries, shall and will,
has varied from time to time. Since the middle of the seventeenth century, with
Wallis, mere predictable futurity is expressed in the *first* person by shall,
in the second and third by will, and vice versa. In oratio obliqua, usage
allows either the retention of the auxiliary actually used by the original
utterer, or the substitution of that which is appropriate to the point of view
of the uttering reporting; in Old English, ‘sceal,; while retaining its primary
usage, serves as a tense-sign in announcing a future event as fated or divinely
decreed, cf. Those spots mean measle. Hence shall has always been the auxiliary
used, in all persons, for prophetic or oracular announcements of the future,
and for solemn assertions of the certainty of a future event. 1577 in Allen
Martyrdom Campion; The queene neither ever was, nor is, nor ever shall be the
head of the Church of England. 1601 Shaks. Jul. C. Now do I Prophesie. A Curse
shall light vpon the limbes of men. b In the first person, "shall" has,
from the early ME. period, been the normal auxiliary for expressing mere
futurity, without any adventitious notion. (a) Of events conceived as
independent of the volition of the utterer. To use will in these cases is now a
mark of, not public-school-educated Oxonian, but Scottish, Irish, provincial,
or extra-British idiom. 1595 in Cath. Rec. Soc. Publ. V. 357 My frend, yow and
I shall play no more at Tables now. 1605 Shaks. Macb. When shall we three meet
againe? 1613 Shaks. Hen. VIII, Then wee shall haue em, Talke vs to silence.
1852 Mrs. Stowe Uncle Toms C.; `But what if you dont hit? `I shall hit, said
George coolly; of voluntary action or its intended result. Here I shall or we
shall is always admissible except where the notion of a present, as
distinguished from a previous, decision or consent is to be expressed, in which
case ‘will’ shall be used. Further, I shall often expresses a determination
insisted on in spite of opposition. In the 16th c. and earlier, I shall often
occurs where I will would now be used. 1559 W. Cunningham Cosmogr. Glasse, This
now shall I alway kepe surely in memorye. 1601 Shaks. Alls Well; Informe him so
tis our will he should.-I shall my liege. 1885 Ruskin On Old Road, note:
Henceforward I shall continue to spell `Ryme without our wrongly added h. c In
the *second* person, shall as a mere future auxiliary appears never to have
been usual, but in categorical questions it is normal, e.g. Shall you miss your
train? I am afraid you will. d In the *third* person, superseded by will,
except when anothers statement or expectation respecting himself is reported in
the third person, e.g. He conveys that he shall not have time to write. Even in
this case will is still not uncommon, but in some contexts leads to serious
ambiguity. It might be therefore preferable, to some, to use ‘he shall’ as the
indirect rendering of ‘I shall.’ 1489 Caxton Sonnes of Aymon ii. 64 Yf your
fader come agayn from the courte, he shall wyll yelde you to the kynge
Charlemayne. 1799 J. Robertson Agric. Perth, The effect of the statute
labour has always been, now is, and
probably shall continue to be, less productive than it might. Down to the
eighteenth century, shall, the auxiliary appropriate to the first person, is
sometimes used when the utterer refers to himself in the third person. Cf. the
formula: `And your petitioner shall ever pray. 1798 Kemble Let. in Pearsons
Catal. Mr. Kemble presents his respectful compliments to the Proprietors of the
`Monthly Mirror, and shall have great pleasure at being at all able to aid them;
in negative, or virtually negative, and interrogative use, shall often = will
be able to. 1600 Shaks. Sonn. lxv: How with this rage shall beautie hold a
plea. g) Used after a hypothetical clause or an imperative sentence in a
statementsof a result to be expected from some action or occurrence. Now (exc.
in the *first* person) usually replaced by will. But shall survives in literary
use. 1851 Dasent Jest and Earnest, Visit Rome and you shall find him [the Pope]
mere carrion. h) In clause expressing the object of a promise, or of an
expectation accompanied by hope or fear, now only where shall is the ordinary
future auxiliary, but down to the nineteenth century shall is often preferred
to will in the second and third persons. 1628 in Ellis Orig. Lett. Ser., He is
confident that the blood of Christ shall wash away his sins. 1654 E. Nicholas
in N. Papers, I hope neither your Cosen Wat. Montagu nor Walsingham shall be permitted to
discourse with the D. of Gloucester; in impersonal phrases,
"it shall be well, needful", etc. (to do so and so). (now
"will"). j) shall be, added to a future date in clauses measuring
time. 1617 Sir T. Wentworth in Fortescue Papers. To which purpose my late Lord
Chancelour gave his direction about the 3. of Decembre shallbe-two-yeares; in
the idiomatic use of the future to denote what ordinarily or occasionally
occurs under specified conditions, shall was formerly the usual auxiliary. In
the *second* and *third* persons, this is now somewhat formal or rhetorical.
Ordinary language substitutes will or may. Often in antithetic statements
coupled by an adversative conjunction or by and with adversative force. a in
the first person. 1712 Steele Spect. In spite of all my Care, I shall every now
and then have a saucy Rascal ride by reconnoitring under my Windows. b) in the *second* person.
1852 Spencer Ess. After knowing him for years, you shall suddenly discover that
your friends nose is slightly awry. c) in the *third* person. 1793 W. Roberts
Looker-On, One man shall approve the same thing that another man shall condemn.
1870 M. Arnold St. Paul and Prot. It may well happen that a man who lives and
thrives under a monarchy shall yet theoretically disapprove the principle of
monarchy. Usage No. 10: in hypothetical, relative, and temporal clauses
denoting a future contingency, the future auxiliary is shall for all persons
alike. Where no ambiguity results, however, the present tense is commonly used
for the future, and the perfect for the future-perfect. The use of shall, when
not required for clearness, is, Grice grants, apt to sound pedantic by non
Oxonians. Formerly sometimes used to express the sense of a present
subjunctive. a) in hypothetical clauses. (shall I = if I shall) 1680 New
Hampsh. Prov. Papers, If any Christian shall speak contempteously of the Holy
Scriptures, such person shall be
punished. b) in relative clauses, where the antecedent denotes an as yet
undetermined person or thing: 1811 Southey Let., The minister who shall first
become a believer in that book will
obtain a higher reputation than ever statesman did before him. 1874 R. Congreve
Ess. We extend our sympathies to the unborn generations which shall follow us
on this earth; in temporal clauses: 1830 Laws of Cricket in Nyren Yng.
Cricketers Tutor, If in striking, or at any other time, while the ball shall be
in play, both his feet be over the popping-crease; in clauses expressing the
purposed result of some action, or the object of a desire, intention, command,
or request, often admitting of being replaced by may. In Old English, and
occasionally as late as the seventeenth century, the present subjunctive was
used exactly as in Latin. a) in final clause usually introduced by that. In
this use modern idiom prefers should (22 a): see quot. 1611 below, and the
appended remarks. 1879 M. Pattison Milton At the age of nine and twenty, Milton
has already determined that this lifework shall be an epic poem; in relative
clause: 1599 Shaks. Hen. V, ii. iv. 40: As Gardeners doe with Ordure hide those
Roots that shall first spring. The choice between should and would follows the
same as shall and will as future auxiliaries, except that should must sometimes
be avoided on account of liability to be misinterpreted as = `ought to. In
present usage, should occurs mainly in the first person. In the other persons
it follows the use of shall. III Elliptical and quasi-elliptical uses. Usage
No. 24: with ellipsis of verb of motion: = `shall go; he use is common in OHG.
and OS., and in later HG., LG., and Du. In the Scandinavian languages it is also
common, and instances occur in MSw.] 1596 Shaks. 1 Hen. IV, That with our small
coniunction we should on. 1598 Shaks. Merry W. If the bottome were as deepe as
hell, I shold down; n questions, what shall = `what shall (it) profit, `what
good shall (I) do. Usage No. 26: with the sense `is due, `is proper, `is to be
given or applied. Cf. G. soll. Usage No. 27: a) with ellipsis of active
infinitive to be supplied from the context. 1892 Mrs. H. Ward David Grieve,
`No, indeed, I havnt got all I want, said Lucy `I never shall, neither; if I
shall. Now dial. 1390 Gower Conf. II. 96: Doun knelende on mi kne I take leve,
and if I schal, I kisse hire. 1390 Gower Conf., II. 96: I wolde kisse hire
eftsones if I scholde. 1871 Earle Philol. Engl. Tongue 203: The familiar
proposal to carry a basket, I will if I shall, that is, I am willing if you
will command me; I will if so required. 1886 W. Somerset Word-bk. Ill warn our
Tomll do it vor ee, nif he shall-i.e. if you wish. c) with generalized ellipsis
in proverbial phrase: needs must that needs shall = `he must whom fate compels.
Usage No. 28: a) with ellipsis of do (not occurring in the context). 1477
Norton Ord. Alch., O King that shall These Workes! b) the place of the inf. is
sometimes supplied by that or so placed at the beginning of the sentence. The
construction may be regarded as an ellipsis of "do". It is distinct
from the use (belonging to 27) in which so has the sense of `thus, `likewise,
or `also. In the latter there is usually inversion, as so shall I. 1888 J. S.
Winter Bootles Childr. iv: I should like to see her now shes grown up. `So you
shall. Usage No. 29: with ellipsis of be or passive inf., or with so in place
of this (where the preceding context has is, was, etc.). 1615 J. Chamberlain in
Crt. And Times Jas.; He is not yet executed, nor I hear not when he shall.
Surely he may not will that he be executed.
futurum
intentionale: While Grice is always looking to cross the
credibility/desirability divide, there is a feature that is difficult to cross
in the bridge of asses. This is the shall vs. will. Grice is aware that ‘will,’
in the FIRST person, is not a matter of prediction. When Grice says “I will go
to Harborne,” that’s not a prediction. He firmly contrasts it with “I shall go
to Harborne” which is a perfect prediction in the indicative mode. “I will go
to Harborne” is in the ‘futurum intentionale.’ Grice is also aware that in the
SECOND and THIRD persons, ‘will’ reports something that the utterer must judge
unpredictable. An utterance like “Thou wilt go to London” and “He will go to
London” is in the ‘futurum indicativus.’ This is one nuance that Prichard
forgets in the analysis of ‘willing’ that Grice eventually adopts. Prichard
uses ‘will’ derivatively, and followed by a ‘that’-clause. Prichard quotes from
the New-World, where the dialect is slightly different. For William James had
said, “I will that the distant table slides over the floor toward me. And it
does not.” Since James is using ‘will’ in the first person, the utterance is
indeed NOT in the indicative, but the ‘intentional’ mode. In the case of the
‘communicatum,’ things get complicated, since U intends that A will believe
that… In which case, U’s intention (and thus will) is directed towards the
‘will’ of his addressee, too, even if it is merely to adopt a ‘belief.’ So what
would be the primary uses of the ‘will.’ In the first person, “I will go to
Harborne” is in the futurum intentionale. It is used to report the utterer’s
will. In the second and third person – “Thou will go to Harborne” and “He will
go to Harborne,” the utterer uses the futurum indicativum and utters a statement
which is predictable. Since analytic
philosophers specify the analysis in the third person (“U means that…”) one has
to be careful. For ‘futurum intentionale’ we have ‘will’ in the first person,
and ‘shall’ in the second and third persons. So for the first group, U means
that he SHALL go. In the second group, U means that his addressee or a third
party WILL go. Grice adopts a subscript variant, stick with ‘will,’ but add the
mode afterwards: so will-ind. will be ‘futurum indicativum,’ and will-int. will
be futurum intentionale. Grice distinguishes the ‘futurum imperativum.’ This
may be seen as a sub-class of the ‘futurum intentionale,’ as applied to the
second and third persons, to avoid the idea that one can issue a
‘self-command.’ Grice has a futurum imperativum, in Latin ending in -tō(te),
used to request someone to do something, or if something else happens first.
“Sī quid acciderit, scrībitō. If anything happens, write to me' (Cicero). ‘Ubi
nōs lāverimus, lavātō.’ 'When*we* have finished washing, *you* get washed.’
(Terence). ‘Crūdam si edēs, in acētum intinguitō.’ ‘If you eat cabbage raw, dip
it in vinegar.’ (Cato). ‘Rīdētō multum quī tē, Sextille, cinaedum dīxerit et
digitum porrigitō medium.’ 'Laugh loudly at anyone who calls you camp,
Sextillus, and stick up your middle finger at him.' (Martial). In Latin, some verbs have only a futurum
imperativum, e. g., scītō 'know', mementō 'remember'. In Latin, there is also a
third person imperative also ending in -tō, plural -ntō exists. It is used in
very formal contexts such as laws. ‘Iūsta imperia suntō, īsque cīvēs pārentō.’
'Orders must be just, and citizens must obey them' (Cicero). Other ways of
expressing a command or request are made with expressions such as cūrā ut 'take
care to...', fac ut 'see to it that...' or cavē nē 'be careful that you
don't...' Cūrā ut valeās. 'Make sure you keep well' (Cicero). Oddly, in Roman,
the futurum indicativum can be used for a polite commands. ‘Pīliae salūtem dīcēs
et Atticae.’ 'Will you please give my
regards to Pilia and Attica?' (Cicero. The OED has will, would. It is traced to
Old English willan, pres.t. wille, willaþ, pa. t. wolde. Grice was especially interested
to check Jamess and Prichards use of willing that, Prichards shall will and the
will/shall distinction; the present tense will; transitive uses, with simple
obj. or obj. clause; occas. intr. 1 trans. with simple obj.: desire, wish for,
have a mind to, `want (something); sometimes implying also `intend, purpose.
1601 Shaks. (title) Twelfe Night, Or what you will. 1654 Whitlock Zootomia 44
Will what befalleth, and befall what will. 1734 tr. Rollins Anc. Hist. V. 31 He
that can do what ever he will is in great danger of willing what he ought not.
b intr. with well or ill, or trans. with sbs. of similar meaning (e.g. good,
health), usually with dat. of person: Wish (or intend) well or ill (to some
one), feel or cherish good-will or ill-will. Obs. (cf. will v.2 1 b). See also
well-willing; to will well that: to be willing that. 1483 Caxton Gold. Leg. I
wyl wel that thou say, and yf thou say ony good, thou shalt be pesybly herde.
Usage No. 2: trans. with obj. clause (with vb. in pres. subj., or in periphrastic
form with should), or acc. and inf.: Desire, wish; sometimes implying also
`intend, purpose (that something be done or happen). 1548 Hutten Sum of
Diuinitie K viij, God wylle all men to be saued; enoting expression (usually
authoritative) of a wish or intention: Determine, decree, ordain, enjoin, give
order (that something be done). 1528 Cromwell in Merriman Life and Lett. (1902)
I. 320 His grace then wille that thellection of a new Dean shalbe emonges them
of the colledge; spec. in a direction or instruction in ones will or testament;
hence, to direct by will (that something be done). 1820 Giffords Compl. Engl.
Lawyer. I do hereby will and direct that my executrix..do excuse and release
the said sum of 100l. to him; figurative
usage. of an abstract thing (e.g. reason, law): Demands, requires. 1597 Shaks.
2 Hen. IV, Our Battaile is more full of Namess then yours Then Reason will, our
hearts should be as good. Usage No. 4 transf. (from 2). Intends to express,
means; affirms, maintains. 1602 Dolman La Primaud. Fr. Acad. Hee will that this
authority should be for a principle of demonstration. 2 With dependent
infinitive (normally without "to"); desire to, wish to, have a mind
to (do something); often also implying intention. 1697 Ctess DAunoys Trav. I
will not write to you often, because I will always have a stock of News to tell
you, which..is pretty long in picking up. 1704 Locke Hum. Und. The great Encomiasts of the Chineses, do all
to a man agree and will convince us that the Sect of the Literati are Atheists.
6 In relation to anothers desire or requirement, or to an obligation of some
kind: Am (is, are) disposed or willing to, consent to; †in early use sometimes
= deign or condescend to.With the (rare and obs.) imper. use, as in quot. 1490,
cf. b and the corresponding negative use in 12 b. 1921 Times Lit. Suppl. 10
Feb. 88/3 Literature thrives where people will read what they do not agree
with, if it is good. b In 2nd person, interrog., or in a dependent clause after
beg or the like, expressing a request (usually courteous; with emphasis,
impatient). 1599 Shaks. Hen. V, ii. i. 47 Will you shogge off? 1605 1878 Hardy
Ret. Native v. iii, O, O, O,..O, will you have done! Usage No. 7 Expressing
voluntary action, or conscious intention directed to the doing of what is
expressed by the principal verb (without temporal reference as in 11, and
without emphasis as in 10): = choose to (choose v. B. 3 a). The proper word for
this idea, which cannot be so precisely expressed by any other. 1685 Baxter
Paraphr., When God will tell us we shall know. Usage No. 8 Expressing natural
disposition to do something, and hence habitual action: Has the habit, or `a
way, of --ing; is addicted or accustomed to --ing; habitually does; sometimes
connoting `may be expected to (cf. 15). 1865 Ruskin Sesame, Men, by their
nature, are prone to fight; they will fight for any cause, or for none;
expressing potentiality, capacity, or sufficiency: Can, may, is able to, is
capable of --ing; is (large) enough or sufficient to.†it will not be: it cannot
be done or brought to pass; it is all in vain. So, †will it not be? 1833 N.
Arnott Physics, The heart will beat after removal from the body. Usage No. 10
As a strengthening of sense 7, expressing determination, persistence, and the
like (without temporal reference as in 11); purposes to, is determined to. 1539
Bible (Great) Isa. lxvi. 6, I heare ye voyce of the Lorde, that wyll rewarde,
etc; recompence his enemyes; emphatically. Is fully determined to; insists on
or persists in --ing: sometimes with mixture of sense 8. (In 1st pers. with
implication of futurity, as a strengthening of sense 11 a. Also fig. = must
inevitably, is sure to. 1892 E. Reeves Homeward Bound viii. 239, I have spent
6,000 francs to come here..and I will see it! c In phr. of ironical or critical
force referring to anothers assertion or opinion. Now arch. exc. in will have
it; 1591 Shaks. 1 Hen. VI, This is a Riddling Merchant for the nonce, He will
be here, and yet he is not here. 1728 Chambers Cycl., Honey, Some naturalists
will have honey to be of a different quality, according to the difference of
the flowers..the bees suck it from. Also, as auxiliary of the future tense with
implication (entailment rather than cancellable implicatum) of intention, thus
distinguished from ‘shall,’ v. B. 8, where see note); in 1st person: sometimes
in slightly stronger sense = intend to, mean to. 1600 Shaks. A.Y.L., To morrow
will we be married. 1607 Shaks. Cor., Ile run away Till I am bigger, but then
Ile fight. 1777 Clara Reeve Champion of Virtue, Never fear it..I will speak to
Joseph about it. b In 2nd and 3rd pers., in questions or indirect statements.
1839 Lane Arab. Nts., I will cure thee
without giving thee to drink any potion When King Yoonán heard his words,
he..said.., How wilt thou do this? c will do (with omission of "I"):
an expression of willingness to carry out a request. Cf. wilco. colloq. 1967 L.
White Crimshaw Memorandum, `And find out where the bastard was `Will do, Jim
said. 13 In 1st pers., expressing immediate intention: "I will" = `I
am now going to, `I proceed at once to. 1885 Mrs. Alexander At Bay, Very well;
I will wish you good-evening. b In 1st pers. pl., expressing a proposal: we
will (†wule we) = `let us. 1798 Coleridge Nightingale 4 Come, we will rest on
this old mossy bridge!, c figurative, as in It will rain, (in 3rd pers.) of a
thing: Is ready to, is on the point of --ing. 1225 Ancr. R. A treou þet wule
uallen, me underset hit mid on oðer treou. 14 In 2nd and 3rd pers., as
auxiliary expressing mere futurity, forming (with pres. inf.) the future, and
(with pf. inf.) the future pf. tense: corresponding to "shall" in the
1st pers. (see note s.v. shall v. B. 8). 1847 Tennyson Princess iii. 12 Rest,
rest, on mothers breast, Father will come to thee soon. b As auxiliary of future
substituted for the imper. in mild injunctions or requests. 1876 Ruskin St.
Marks Rest. That they should use their own balances, weights, and measures;
(not by any means false ones, you will please to observe). 15 As auxiliary of
future expressing a contingent event, or a result to be expected, in a supposed
case or under particular conditions (with the condition expressed by a
conditional, temporal, or imper. clause, or otherwise implied). 1861 M.
Pattison Ess. The lover of the
Elizabethan drama will readily recal many such allusions; b with pers.sSubjects
(usually 1st pers. sing.), expressing a voluntary act or choice in a supposed
case, or a conditional promise or undertaking: esp. in asseverations, e.g. I
will die sooner than, I’ll be hanged if, etc.). 1898 H. S. Merriman Rodens
Corner. But I will be hanged if I see what it all means, now; xpressing a
determinate or necessary consequence (without the notion of futurity). 1887
Fowler Deductive Logic, From what has been said it will be seen that I do not
agree with Mr. Mill. Mod. If, in a syllogism, the middle term be not
distributed in either premiss, there will be no conclusion; ith the notion of
futurity obscured or lost: = will prove or turn out to, will be found on
inquiry to; may be supposed to, presumably does. Hence (chiefly Sc. and north.
dial.) in estimates of amount, or in uncertain or approximate statements, the
future becoming equivalent to a present with qualification: e.g. it will be =
`I think it is or `it is about; what will that be? = `what do you think that
is? 1584 Hornby Priory in Craven Gloss. Where on 40 Acres there will be xiij.s.
iv.d. per acre yerely for rent. 1791 Grose Olio (1792) 106, I believe he will
be an Irishman. 1791 Grose Olio. C. How far is it to Dumfries? W. It will be
twenty miles. 1812 Brackenridge Views Louisiana, The agriculture of this
territory will be very similar to that of Kentucky. 1876 Whitby Gloss. sThis
word we have only once heard, and that will be twenty years ago. 16 Used where
"shall" is now the normal auxiliary, chiefly in expressing mere
futurity: since 17th c. almost exclusively in Scottish, Irish, provincial, or
extra-British use (see shall. 1602 Shaks. Ham. I will win for him if I can: if
not, Ile gaine nothing but my shame, and the odde hits. 1825 Scott in Lockhart
Ballantyne-humbug. I expect we will have some good singing. 1875 E. H. Dering
Sherborne. `Will I start, sir? asked the Irish groom. Usage No. 3 Elliptical
and quasi-elliptical uses; n absol. use, or with ellipsis of obj. clause as in 2:
in meaning corresponding to senses 5-7.if you will is sometimes used
parenthetically to qualify a word or phrase: = `if you wish it to be so called,
`if you choose or prefer to call it so. 1696 Whiston The. Earth. Gravity
depends entirely on the constant and efficacious, and, if you will, the
supernatural and miraculous Influence of Almighty God. 1876 Ruskin St. Marks
Rest. Very savage! monstrous! if you will. b In parenthetic phr. if God will
(†also will God, rarely God will), God willing: if it be the will of God,
`D.V.In OE. Gode willi&asg.ende (will v.2) = L. Deo volente. 1716
Strype in Thoresbys Lett. Next week, God willing, I take my journey to my
Rectory in Sussex; fig. Demands, requires (absol. or ellipt. use of 3 c). 1511
Reg. Privy Seal Scot. That na seculare personis have intrometting with thaim
uther wais than law will; I will well: I assent, `I should think so indeed.
(Cf. F. je veux bien.) Usage No. 18: with ellipsis of a vb. of motion. 1885
Bridges Eros and Psyche Aug. I will to thee oer the stream afloat. Usage No.
19: with ellipsis of active inf. to be supplied from the context. 1836 Dickens
Sk. Boz, Steam Excurs., `Will you go on deck? `No, I will not. This was said
with a most determined air. 1853 Dickens Bleak Ho. lii, I cant believe it. Its
not that I dont or I wont. I cant! 1885 Mrs. Alexander Valeries Fate vi, `Do
you know that all the people in the house will think it very shocking of me to
walk with you?.. `The deuce they will!; With generalized ellipsis, esp. in
proverbial saying (now usually as in quot. 1562, with will for would). 1639 J.
Clarke Paroem. 237 He that may and will not, when he would he shall not. c With
so or that substituted for the omitted inf. phr.: now usually placed at the
beginning of the sentence. 1596 Shaks. Tam. Shr. Hor. I promist we would beare
his charge of wooing Gremio. And so we wil. d Idiomatically used in a
qualifying phr. with relative, equivalent to a phr. with indef. relative in
-ever; often with a thing as subj., becoming a mere synonym of may: e.g. shout
as loud as you will = `however loud you (choose to) shout; come what will =
`whatever may come; be that as it will = `however that may be. 1732 Pope Mor.
Ess. The ruling Passion, be it what it will, The ruling Passion conquers Reason
still. 20 With ellipsis of pass. inf. A. 1774 Goldsm. Surv. Exp. Philos. The
airs force is compounded of its swiftness and density, and as these are
encreased, so will the force of the wind; in const. where the ellipsis may be
either of an obj. clause or of an inf. a In a disjunctive qualifying clause or
phr. usually parenthetic, as whether he will or no, will he or not, (with pron.
omitted) will or no, (with or omitted) will he will he not, will he nill he
(see VI. below and willy-nilly), etc.In quot. 1592 vaguely = `one way or
another, `in any case. For the distinction between should and would, v. note
s.v. shall; in a noun-clause expressing the object of desire, advice, or
request, usually with a person as subj., implying voluntary action as the
desired end: thus distinguished from should, which may be used when the persons
will is not in view. Also (almost always after wish) with a thing as Subjects,
in which case should can never be substituted because it would suggest the idea
of command or compulsion instead of mere desire. Cf. shall; will; willest;
willeth; wills; willed (wIld); also: willian, willi, wyll, wille, wil, will,
willode, will, wyllede, wylled, willyd, ied, -it, -id, willed; wijld, wilde,
wild, willid, -yd, wylled,willet, willed; willd(e, wild., OE. willian wk. vb. =
German “willen.” f. will sb.1, 1 trans. to wish, desire; sometimes with
implication of intention: = will. 1400 Lat. and Eng. Prov. He þt a lytul me
3euyth to me wyllyth optat longe lyffe. 1548 Udall, etc. Erasm. Par. Matt. v.
21-24 Who so euer hath gotten to hymselfe the charitie of the gospell, whyche
wylleth wel to them that wylleth yll. 1581 A. Hall Iliad, By Mineruas helpe,
who willes you all the ill she may. A. 1875 Tennyson Q. Mary i. iv, A great
party in the state Wills me to wed her; To assert, affirm: = will v.1 B. 4.
1614 Selden Titles Hon. None of this excludes Vnction before, but only wils him
the first annointed by the Pope. 2 a to direct by ones will or testament (that
something be done, or something to be done); to dispose of by will; to bequeath
or devise; to determine by the will; to attempt to cause, aim at effecting by
exercise of will; to set the mind with conscious intention to the performance
or occurrence of something; to choose or decide to do something, or that something
shall be done or happen. Const. with simple obj., acc. and inf., simple inf.
(now always with to), or obj. clause; also absol. or intr. (with as or so).
Nearly coinciding in meaning with will v.1 7, but with more explicit reference
to the mental process of volition. 1630 Prynne Anti-Armin. 119 He had onely a
power, not to fall into sinne vnlesse he willed it. 1667 Milton P.L. So
absolute she seems..that what she wills to do or say, Seems wisest. 1710 J.
Clarke tr. Rohaults Nat. Philos. If I will to move my Arm, it is presently
moved. 1712 Berkeley Pass. Obed. He that willeth the end, doth will the
necessary means conducive to that end. 1837 Carlyle Fr. Rev. All shall be as
God wills. 1880 Meredith Tragic Com. So great, heroical, giant-like, that what
he wills must be. 1896 Housman Shropsh. Lad xxx, Others, I am not the first,
Have willed more mischief than they durst; intr. to exercise the will; to
perform the mental act of volition. 1594 Hooker Eccl. Pol. To will, is to bend
our soules to the hauing or doing of that which they see to be good. 1830
Mackintosh Eth. Philos. Wks.. But what could induce such a being to will or to
act? 1867 A. P. Forbes Explan. Is this infinitely powerful and intelligent
Being free? wills He? loves He? c trans. To bring or get (into, out of, etc.)
by exercise of will. 1850 L. Hunt Table-t. (1882) 184 Victims of opium have
been known to be unable to will themselves out of the chair in which they were
sitting. d To control (another person), or induce (another) to do something, by
the mere exercise of ones will, as in hypnotism. 1882 Proc. Soc. Psych.
Research I. The one to be `willed would go to the other end of the house, if
desired, whilst we agreed upon the thing to be done. 1886 19th Cent. They are
what is called `willed to do certain things desired by the ladies or gentlemen
who have hold of them. 1897 A. Lang Dreams & Ghosts iii. 59 A young
lady, who believed that she could play the `willing game successfully without
touching the person `willed; to express or communicate ones will or wish with
regard to something, with various shades of meaning, cf. will, v.1 3.,
specifically: a to enjoin, order; to decree, ordain, a) with personal obj.,
usually with inf. or clause. 1481 Cov. Leet Bk. 496 We desire and also will you
that vnto oure seid seruaunt ye yeue your aid. 1547 Edw. VI in Rymer Foedera,
We Wyll and Commaunde yowe to Procede in the seid Matters. 1568 Grafton Chron.,
Their sute was smally regarded, and shortly after they were willed to silence.
1588 Lambarde Eiren. If a man do lie in awaite to rob me, and (drawing his
sword upon me) he willeth me to deliver my money. 1591 Shaks. 1 Hen. VI We doe
no otherwise then wee are willd. 1596 Nashe Saffron Walden P 4, Vp he was had
and.willed to deliuer vp his weapon. 1656 Hales Gold. Rem. The King in the
Gospel, that made a Feast, and..willed his servants to go out to the high-ways
side. 1799 Nelson in Nicolas Disp., Willing and requiring all Officers and men
to obey you; 1565 Cooper Thesaurus s.v. Classicum, By sounde of trumpet to will
scilence. 1612 Bacon Ess., Of Empire. It is common with Princes (saith Tacitus)
to will contradictories. 1697 Dryden Æneis i. 112 Tis yours, O Queen! to will
The Work, which Duty binds me to fulfil. 1877 Tennyson Harold vi. i, Get thou
into thy cloister as the king Willd it.; to pray, request, entreat; = desire v.
6. 1454 Paston Lett. Suppl. As for the questyon that ye wylled me to aske my
lord, I fond hym yet at no good leyser. 1564 Haward tr. Eutropius. The Romaines
sent ambassadoures to him, to wyll him to cease from battayle. 1581 A. Hall
Iliad, His errand done, as he was willde, he toke his flight from thence. 1631
[Mabbe] Celestina. Did I not will you I should not be wakened? 1690 Dryden
Amphitryon i. i, He has sent me to will and require you to make a swinging long
Night for him; fig. of a thing, to require, demand; also, to induce, persuade a
person to do something. 1445 in Anglia. Constaunce willeth also that thou doo
noughte with weyke corage. Cable and Baugh note that one important s. of prescriptions
that now form part of all our grammars -- that governing the use of will and
shall -- has its origin in this period. Previous to 1622 no grammar recognized
any distinction between will and shall. In 1653 Wallis in his Grammatica
Linguae Anglicanae states in Latin and for the benefit of Europeans that
Subjectsive intention is expressed by will in the first person, by shall in the
second and third, while simple factual indicative predictable futurity is
expressed by shall in the first person, by will in the second and third. It is
not until the second half of the eighteenth century that the use in questions
and subordinate clauses is explicitly defined. In 1755 Johnson, in his
Dictionary, states the rule for questions, and in 1765 William Ward, in his
Grammar, draws up for the first time the full set of prescriptions that
underlies, with individual variations, the rules found in later tracts. Wards
pronouncements are not followed generally by other grammarians until Lindley
Murray gives them greater currency in 1795. Since about 1825 they have often
been repeated in grammars, v. Fries, The periphrastic future with will and
shall. Will qua modal auxiliary never had an s. The absence of conjugation is a
very old common Germanic phenomenon. OE 3rd person present indicative of willan
(and of the preterite-present verbs) is not distinct from the 1st person
present indicative. That dates back at least to CGmc, or further if one looks
just as the forms and ignore tense and/or mood). Re: Prichard: "Prichard
wills that he go to London. This is Prichards example, admired by Grice
("but I expect not pleasing to Maucaulays ears"). The -s is
introduced to indicate a difference between the modal and main verb use (as in
Prichard and Grice) of will. In fact, will, qua modal, has never been used with
a to-infinitive. OE uses present-tense forms to refer to future events as well
as willan and sculan. willan would give a volitional nuance; sculan, an
obligational nuance. Its difficult to find an example of weorthan used to
express the future, but that doesnt mean it didnt happen. In insensitive
utterers, will has very little of volition about it, unless one follows Walliss
observation for for I will vs. I shall. Most probably use ll, or be going
to for the future.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment