grammar: Odly, Oxonians, who rarely go to grammar schools, see
‘grammar’ as a divinity, and talk of the logical grammar of a Ryleian
agitation, say. It sounds high class because there is the irony that an Oxonian
philosopher is surely not a common-or-garden grammarian, involved in the
grammar of, say, “Die Deutsche Sprache.” The Oxonian is into the logical
grammar. It is more of a ‘linguistic turn’ expression than the duller
‘conceptual analysis,’ or ‘linguistic philosophy.’ cf. logical form, and
Russell, “grammar is a pretty good guide to logical form.” while philosophers
would use grammar jocularly, Chomsky didnt. The problem, as Grice notes, is
that Chomsky never tells us where grammar ends (“or begins for that matter.”)
“Consider the P, karulising elatically.” When Carnap introduces the P, he talks
syntax, not grammar. But philosophers always took semiotics more seriously than
others. So Carnap is well aware of Morriss triad of the syntactics, the
semantics, and the pragmatics. Philosophers always disliked grammar, because
back in the days of Aelfric, philosophia was supposed to embrace dialectica and
grammatica, and rhetorica. “It is all part of philosophy.” Truth-conditional
semantics and implicata. Refs.: One source is an essay on ‘grammar’ in the H.
P. Grice Papers, BANC.
Grice’s handwave. A sort of handwave can mean in a one-off act of communication
something. It’s the example he uses. By a sort of handwave, the emissor
communicates either that he knows the route or that he is about to leave the
addressee.
Grice’s myth. This is G. R. Grice, of the social-contract fame. Cf.
Strawson and Wiggins comparing Grice’s myth with Plato’s, and they know what
they are talking about.
Grice’s predicament. S draws a pic- "one-off predicament"). ...
Clarendon, 1976); and Simon
Blackburn, Spreading the Word (Oxford: Clarendon, 1984) ... But
there is an obvious way of emending the account, as Grice points
out. ... Blackburn helpfully
suggests that we can cut through much of this complexity by ... The above
account is intended to capture the notion of one-off meaning. Walking in a
forest, having gone some way ahead of the rest of the party, I draw an arrow at
a fork of a path, meaning that those who are following me should go straight
on. Gricean considerations
may be safely ignored. Only when trying to communicate by nonconventional means
("one-off predicament," Blackburn,
1984, chap. Blackburn's mission
is to promote the philosophy of language as a pivotal enquiry ... and
dismissed; the Gricean model
might be suitable to explain one-off acts. The Gricean mechanism
with its complex communicative intentions has a clear point in what Blackburn calls
“a one-off predicament”
- a situation in which an ...
gricism.. In analogy with Grecism, we have a Gricism, a Griceian
cliché. Cf. a ‘grice’ and ‘griceful’ in ‘philosopher’s lexicon.’
grecianism: why was Grice obsessed with Socrates’s convesations? He
does not say. But he implicates it. For the Athenian dialecticians, it is all a
matter of ta legomena. Ditto for the Oxonian dialecticians. Ta legomena becomes
ordinary language. And the task of the philosopher is to provide reductive
analysis of this or that concept in terms of necessary and sufficient
conditions. Cf. Hospers. Grices review of the history of philosophy (Philosophy
is but footnotes to Zeno.). Grice enjoyed Zenos answer, What is a friend? Alter
ego, Allego. ("Only it was the other Zeno." Grice tried to apply the
Socratic method during his tutorials. "Nothing like a heartfelt dedication
to the Socratic art of mid-wifery, seeking to bring forth error and to strangle
it at birth.” μαιεύομαι (A.“μαῖα”), ‘to serve as a midwife, act a; “ἡ
Ἄρτεμις μ.” Luc. D Deor.26.2. 2. cause delivery to take place, “ἱκανὴ ἔκπληξις
μαιεύσασθαι πρὸ τῆς ὥρας” Philostr. VA1.5. 3. c. acc., bring to the birth,
Marin.Procl.6; ὄρνιθας μ. hatch chickens, Anon. ap. Suid.; αἰετὸν κάνθαρος
μαιεύσομαι, prov. of taking vengeance on a powerful enemy, Ar. Lys.695 (cf.
Sch.). 4. deliver a woman, esp. metaph. in Pl. of the Socratic method, Tht.
149b. II. Act., Poll. 4.208, Sch. OH.4.506. Pass., τὰ ὑπ᾽ ἐμοῦ μαιευθέντα
brought into the world by me, Pl. Tht. 150e, cf. Philostr.VA5.13. Refs.: the
obvious references are Grice’s allusions to Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Zeno,
The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
hazzing: under conjunctum, we see that the terminology is varied.
There is the copulatum. But Grice prefers to restrict to use of the copulatum
to izzing and hazzing. Oddly Grice sees hazzing as a predicate which he
formalizes as Hxy. To be read x hazzes y, although sometimes he uses ‘x hazz
y.’ Vide ‘accidentia.’ For Grice the role of métier is basic since it shows
finality in nature. Homo sapiens, qua pirot, is to be rational.
hint hinting. Grice spends quite a long section in
“Retrospective epilogue” to elucidate “Emissor E communicates that p via a
hint,” versus “Emissor E communicates that p via a suggestion.” Some level of
explicitness (vide candour) is necessary. If it is too obscure it cannot be
held to have been ‘communicated’ in the first place! Cf. Holdcroft, “Some forms
of indirect communication” for the Journal of Rhetoric. Grice had to do a bit
of linguistic botany for his “E implicates that p”: To do duty for ‘imply,’
suggest, indicate, hint, mean, -- “etc.” indirectly or implicitly convey.
heterological: Grice and Thomson go heterological. Grice was
fascinated by Baron Russell’s remarks on heterological and its implicate. Grice
is particularly interested in Russell’s philosophy because of the usual Oxonian
antipathy towards his type of philosophising. Being an irreverent
conservative rationalist, Grice found in Russell a good point for
dissent! If paradoxes were always sets of propositions or arguments or
conclusions, they would always be meaningful. But some paradoxes are
semantically flawed and some have answers that are backed by a pseudo-argument
employing a defective lemma that lacks a truth-value. Grellings paradox,
for instance, opens with a distinction between autological and heterological
words. An autological word describes itself, e.g., polysyllabic is
polysllabic, English is English, noun is a noun, etc. A heterological word
does not describe itself, e.g., monosyllabic is not monosyllabic, Chinese is
not Chinese, verb is not a verb, etc. Now for the riddle: Is
heterological heterological or autological? If heterological is
heterological, since it describes itself, it is autological. But if
heterological is autological, since it is a word that does not describe itself,
it is heterological. The common solution to this puzzle is that
heterological, as defined by Grelling, is not what Grice a genuine
predicate ‒ Gricing is!In other words, Is heterological
heterological? is without meaning. That does not mean that an utterer, such as
Baron Russell, may implicate that he is being very witty by uttering the
Grelling paradox! There can be no predicate that applies to all and only those
predicates it does not apply to for the same reason that there can be no barber
who shaves all and only those people who do not shave themselves. Grice
seems to be relying on his friend at Christ Church, Thomson in On Some
Paradoxes, in the same volume where Grice published his Remarks about the
senses, Analytical Philosophy, Butler (ed.), Blackwell, Oxford,
104–119. Grice thought that Thomson was a genius, if ever there is one!
Plus, Grice thought that, after St. Johns, Christ Church was the second most
beautiful venue in the city of dreaming spires. On top, it is what makes Oxford
a city, and not, as villagers call it, a town. Refs.: the main source is
Grice’s essay on ‘heterologicality,’ but the keyword ‘paradox’ is useful, too,
especially as applied to Grice’s own paradox and to what, after Moore, Grice
refers to as the philosopher’s paradoxes. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
ideationalism. Alston calls Grice an ideationalist, and Grice takes it as
a term of abuse. Grice would occasionally use ‘mental.’ Short and Lewis have
"mens.” “terra corpus est, at mentis ignis est;” so too, “istic est de
sole sumptus; isque totus mentis est;” f. from the root ‘men,’ whence ‘memini,’ and ‘comminiscor.’ Lewis and Short render
‘mens’ as ‘the mind, disposition; the heart, soul.’ Lewis and Short have
‘commĭniscor,’ originally conminiscor ), mentus, from ‘miniscor,’ whence also ‘reminiscor,’
stem ‘men,’ whence ‘mens’ and ‘memini,’
cf. Varro, Lingua Latina 6, § 44. Lewis and Short render the verb as,
literally, ‘to ponder carefully, to reflect upon;’ ‘hence, as a result of
reflection; cf. 1. commentor, II.), to devise something by careful thought, to
contrive, invent, feign. Myro is perhaps unaware of the implicata of ‘mental’
when he qualifies his -ism with ‘modest.’ Grice would seldom use mind (Grecian
nous) or mental (Grecian noetikos vs. æsthetikos). His sympathies go for more
over-arching Grecian terms like the very Aristotelian soul, the anima, i. e.
the psyche and the psychological. Grice discusses G. Myro’s essay, ‘In defence
of a modal mentalism,’ with attending commentary by R. Albritton and S. Cavell.
Grice himself would hardly use mental, mentalist, or mentalism himself, but
perhaps psychologism. Grice would use mental, on occasion, but his Grecianism
was deeply rooted, unlike Myro’s. At Clifton and under Hardie (let us recall he
came up to Oxford under a classics scholarship to enrol in the Lit. Hum.) he
knows that mental translates mentalis translates nous, only ONE part, one
third, actually, of the soul, and even then it may not include the ‘practical
rational’ one! Cf. below on ‘telementational.’ Refs.: The reference to mentalism
in the essay on ‘modest mentalism,’ after Myro, in The H. P. Grice Papers,
BANC.
ideatum. Quite used by Grice. Cf. Conceptum. Sub-perceptual.
idem A
key philosophical notion that encompasses linguistic, logic, and metaphysical
issues, and also epistemology. Possibly the central question in philosophy.
Vide the principle of ‘identity.’ amicus est tamquam alter idem,” a second self, Identicum.
Grecian ‘tautotes.’ late L. identitās (Martianus
Capella, c425), peculiarly formed from ident(i)-, for L. idem ‘same’ + -tās,
-tātem: see -ty. Various suggestions have been offered as to the
formation. Need was evidently felt of a noun of condition or quality from
idem to express the notion of ‘sameness’, side by side with those of ‘likeness’
and ‘oneness’ expressed by similitās and ūnitās: hence the form of the
suffix. But idem had no combining
stem. Some have thought that ident(i)-
was taken from the L. adv. "identidem" ‘over and over again,
repeatedly’, connexion with which appears to be suggested by Du Cange's
explanation of identitās as ‘quævis actio repetita’. Meyer-Lübke suggests
that in the formation there was present some association between idem and id
ens ‘that being’, whence "identitās" like "entitās."
But assimilation to "entitās" may have been
merely to avoid the solecism of *idemitās or *idemtās. sameness. However originated, "ident(i)-" (either from
adverb "identidem" or an assimilation of "id ens," "id
ens," that being, "id entitas" "that entity") became
the combining stem of idem, and the series ūnitās, ūnicus, ūnificus, ūnificāre,
was paralleled by identitās, identicus, identificus, identificāre: see identic,
identific, identify above.] to OED 3rd:
identity, n. Pronunciation: Brit./ʌɪˈdɛntᵻti/ , U.S. /aɪˈdɛn(t)ədi/
Forms: 15 idemptitie, 15 ydemptyte, 15–16 identitie, 15– identity, 16
idemptity. Etymology: < Middle French
identité, ydemtité, ydemptité, ydentité (French identité) quality or condition
of being the same (a1310; 1756 in sense ‘individuality, personality’, 1801 in
sense ‘distinct impression of a single person or thing presented to or
perceived by others’) and its etymon post-classical Latin identitat-,
identitas quality of being the same (4th cent.), condition or fact that a
person or thing is itself and not something else (8th cent. in a British
source), fact of being the same (from 12th cent. in British sources), continual
sameness, lack of variety, monotony (from 12th cent. in British sources; 14th
cent. in a continental source) < classical Latin idem same (see idem
n.) + -tās (see -ty suffix1) [sameness], after post-classical Latin
essentitas ‘being’ (4th cent.).The Latin word was formed to provide a
translation equivalent for ancient Greek ταὐτότης (tautotes) identity. identity:
identity was a key concept for Grice. Under identity, he views both identity
simpliciter and personal identity. Grice advocates psychological or soul
criterianism. Psychological or soul criterianism has been advocated, in one
form or another, by philosophers such as Locke, Butler, Duncan-Jones, Berkeley,
Gallie, Grice, Flew, Haugeland, Jones, Perry, Shoemaker and Parfit, and
Quinton. What all of these theories have in common is the idea that, even
if it is the case that some kind of physical states are necessary for being a
person, it is the unity of consciousness which is of decisive importance for
personal identity over time. In this sense, person is a term which picks out a
psychological, or mental, "thing". In claiming this, all
Psychological Criterianists entail the view that personal identity consists in
the continuity of psychological features. It is interesting that Flew has an
earlier "Selves," earlier than his essay on Locke on personal
identity. The first, for Mind, criticising Jones, "The self in sensory
cognition"; the second for Philosophy. Surely under the tutelage of Grice.
Cf. Jones, Selves: A reply to Flew, Philosophy. The stronger thesis
asserts that there is no conceivable situation in which bodily identity would
be necessary, some other conditions being always both necessary and sufficient.
Grice takes it that Locke’s theory (II, 27) is an example of this latter
type. To say "Grice remembers that he heard a noise",
without irony or inverted commas, is to imply that Grice did hear a noise. In
this respect remember is like, know, a factive. It does not follow from this,
nor is it true, that each claim to remember, any more than each claim to know,
is alethic or veridical; or, not everything one seems to remember is something
one really remembers. So much is obvious, although Locke --
although admittedly referring only to the memory of actions, section 13
-- is forced to invoke the providence of God to deny the latter. These
points have been emphasised by Flew in his discussion of Locke’s views on
personal identity. In formulating Locke’ thesis, however, Flew makes a mistake;
for he offers Lockes thesis in the form if Grice can remember Hardies doing
such-and-such, Grice and Hardie are the same person. But this obviously will
not do, even for Locke, for we constantly say things like I remember my brother
Derek joining the army without implying that I and my brother are the same
person. So if we are to formulate such a criterion, it looks as though we have
to say something like the following. If Derek Grice remembers joining my, he is
the person who did that thing. But since remembers doing means remembers
himself doing, this is trivially tautologous, and moreover lends colour to
Butlers famous objection that memory, so far from constituting personal
identity, presupposes it. As Butler puts it, one should really think
it self-evident that consciousness of personal identity presupposes, and
therefore cannot constitute, personal identity; any more than knowledge, in any
other case, can constitute truth, which it presupposes. Butler then asserts
that Locke’s misstep stems from his methodology. This wonderful mistake may
possibly have arisen from hence; that to be endued with consciousness is
inseparable from the idea of a person, or intelligent being. For this might be
expressed inaccurately thus, that consciousness makes personality: and from
hence it might be concluded to make personal identity. One of the points that
Locke emphasizes—that persistence conditions are determined via defining kind
terms—is what, according to Butler, leads Locke astray. Butler
additionally makes the point that memory is not required for personal
persistence. But though present consciousness of what we at present do and feel
is necessary to our being the persons we now are; yet present consciousness of
past actions or feelings is not necessary to our being the same persons who
performed those actions, or had those feelings. This is a point that others
develop when they assert that Lockes view results in contradiction. Hence
the criterion should rather run as follows. If Derek Grice claims to remember
joining the army. We must then ask how such a criterion might be
used. Grices example is: I remember I smelled a smell. He needs two
experiences to use same. I heard a noise and I smelled a smell.The singular
defines the hearing of a noise is the object of some consciousness. The pair
defines, "The hearing of a noise and the smelling of a smell are objects
of the same -- cognate with self as in I hurt me self, -- consciousness. The
standard form of an identity question is Is this x the same x as that x
which E and in the simpler situation we are at least presented with just
the materials for constructing such a question; but in the more complicated
situation we are baffled even in asking the question, since both the
transformed persons are equally good candidates for being its Subjects, and the
question Are these two xs the same (x?) as the x which E is not a recognizable
form of identity question. Thus, it might be argued, the fact that we could not
speak of identity in the latter situation is no kind of proof that we could not
do so in the former. Certainly it is not a proof, as Strawson points out to
Grice. This is not to say that they are identical at all. The only case in
which identity and exact similarity could be distinguished, as we have just
seen, is that of the body, same body and exactly similar body really do mark a
difference. Thus one may claim that the omission of the body takes away all
content from the idea of personal identity, as Pears pointed out to
Grice. Leaving aside memory, which only partially applies to the case,
character and attainments are quite clearly general things. Joness character
is, in a sense, a particular; just because Jones’s character refers to the
instantiation of certain properties by a particular (and bodily) man, as
Strawson points out to Grice (Particular and general). If in ‘Negation and
privation,’ Grice tackles Aristotle, he now tackles Locke. Indeed, seeing that
Grice went years later to the topic as motivated by, of all people, Haugeland,
rather than perhaps the more academic milieu that Perry offers, Grice became
obsessed with Hume’s sceptical doubts! Hume writes in the Appendix that when he
turns his reflection on himself, Hume never can perceive this self without
some one or more perceptions. Nor can Hume ever perceive any
thing but the perceptions. It is the composition of these, therefore,
which forms the self, Hume thinks. Hume grants that one can conceive a thinking
being to have either many or few perceptions. Suppose, says Hume, the mind to
be reduced even below the life of an oyster. Suppose the oyster to have only
one perception, as of thirst or hunger. Consider the oyster in that situation.
Does the oyster conceive any thing but merely that perception? Has the oyster
any notion of, to use Gallies pretentious Aristotelian jargon, self or
substance? If not, the addition of this or other perception can never give
the oyster that notion. The annihilation, which this or that philosopher,
including Grices first post-war tutee, Flew, supposes to follow upon
death, and which entirely destroys the oysters self, is nothing but
an extinction of all particular perceptions; love and
hatred, pain and pleasure, thought and sensation. These therefore
must be the same with self; since the one cannot survive the other.
Is self the same with substance? If it be, how can that question have
place, concerning the subsistence of self, under a change of
substance? If they be distinct, what is the difference betwixt them? For his
part, Hume claims, he has a notion of neither, when conceived distinct
from this or that particular perception. However extraordinary Hume’s
conclusion may seem, it need not surprise us. Most
philosophers, such as Locke, seems inclined to think, that personal
identity arises from consciousness. But consciousness is nothing but
a reflected thought or perception, Hume suggests. This is Grices quandary about
personal identity and its implicata. Some philosophers have taken Grice as
trying to provide an exegesis of Locke. However, their approaches surely
differ. What works for Grice may not work for Locke. For Grice it is
analytically true that it is not the case that Person1 and
Person may have the same experience. Grice explicitly states that he
thinks that his logical-construction theory is a modification of Locke’s
theory. Grice does not seem terribly interested to find why it may not, even if
the York-based Locke Society might! Rather than introjecting into Lockes shoes,
Grices strategy seems to dismiss Locke, shoes and all. Specifically, it not
clear to Grice what Lockes answer in the Essay would be to Grices question
about this or that I utterance that he sets his analysis with. Admittedly,
Grice does quote, albeit briefly, directly from Lockes Essay. As far as any
intelligent being can repeat the idea of any past action with the same
consciousness it had of it at first, and with the same consciousness it has of
any present action, Locke claims, so far the being is the same personal self.
Grice tackles Lockes claim with four objections. These are important to
consider since Grice sees as improving on Locke. A first objection concerns
icircularity, with which Grice easily disposes by following Hume and appealing
to the experience of memory or introspection. A second objection is Reid’s
alleged counterexample about the long-term memory of the admiral who cannot
remember that he was flogged as a boy. Grice dismisses this as involving too
long-term of a memory. A third objection concerns Locke’s vagueness about the
aboutness of consciousness, a point made by Hume in the Appendix. A fourth
objection concerns again circularity, this time in Locke’s use of same in the
definiens ‒ cf. Wiggins, Sameness and substance. It’s extraordinary that
Wiggins is philosophising on anything Griceian. Grice is concerned with the
implicatum involved in the use of the first person singular. I will be fighting
soon. Grice means in body and soul. The utterance also indicates that this is
Grices pre-war days at Oxford. No wonder his choice of an example. What else
could he have in his soul? The topic of personal identity, which label Hume and
Austin found pretentious, and preferred to talk about the illocutionary force
of I, has a special Oxonian pedigree, perhaps as motivated by Humes challenge,
that Grice has occasion to study and explore for his M. A. Lit. Hum. with
Locke’s Essay as mandatory reading. Locke, a philosopher with whom Oxford
identifies most, infamously defends this memory-based account of I. Up in
Scotland, Reid reads it and concocts this alleged counter-example. Hume, or
Home, if you must, enjoys it. In fact, while in the Mind essay he is not too
specific about Hume, Grice will, due mainly to his joint investigations with
Haugeland, approach, introjecting into the shoes of Hume ‒ who is idolised in
The New World ‒ in ways he does not introject into Lockes. But Grices quandary
is Hume’s quandary, too. In his own approach to I, the Cartesian ego, made
transcendental and apperceptive by Kant, Grice updates the time-honoured
empiricist mnemonic analysis by Locke. The first update is in style. Grice
embraces, as he does with negation, a logical construction, alla Russell, via
Broad, of this or that “I” (first-person) utterance, ending up with an analysis
of a “someone,” third-person, less informative, utterance. Grices immediate
source is Gallie’s essay on self and substance in Mind. Mind is still a review
of psychology and philosophy, so poor Grice has not much choice. In fact, Grice
is being heterodoxical or heretic enough to use Broad’s taxonomy, straight from
the other place of I utterances. The logical-construction theory is a third
proposal, next to the Bradleyian idealist pure-ego theory and the
misleading covert-description theory. Grice deals with the Reids alleged
counterexample of the brave officer. Suppose, Reid says, and Grice quotes
verbatim, a brave officer to have been flogged when a boy at school, for
robbing an orchard, to have taken a standard from the enemy in his first
campaign, and to have been made a general in advanced life. Suppose also, which
must be admitted to be possible, that when he2 took the
standard, he2 was conscious of his having been flogged at
school, and that, when made a general, he3 was conscious of his2 taking
the standard, but had absolutely lost the consciousness of his1 flogging. These
things being supposed, it follows, from Lockes doctrine, that he1 who is
flogged at school is the same person as him2 who later takes
the standard, and that he2 who later takes the standard is the
same person as him3 who is still later made a general. When it
follows, if there be any truth in logic, that the general is the same person
with him1 who is flogged at school. But the general’s
consciousness does emphatically not reach so far back as his1 flogging.
Therefore, according to Locke’s doctrine, he3 is emphatically
not the same person as him1 who is flogged. Therefore, we can say about the
general that he3 is, and at the same time, that he3 is
not the same person as him1 who was flogged at
school. Grice, wholl later add a temporal suffix to =t yielding, by
transitivity. The flogged boy =t1 the brave officer. And the
brave officer =t2 the admiral. But the admiral ≠t3 the
flogged boy. In Mind, Grice tackles the basic analysans, and comes up with a
rather elaborate analysans for a simple I or Someone statement. Grice just
turns to a generic affirmative variant of the utterance he had used in
Negation. It is now someone, viz. I, who hears that the bell tolls. It is the
affirmative counterpart of the focus of his earlier essay on negation, I do not
hear that the bell tolls. Grice dismisses what, in the other place, was
referred to as privileged-access, and the indexicality of I, an approach that
will be made popular by Perry, who however reprints Grices essay in his
influential collection for the University of California Press. By allowing for
someone, viz. I, Grice seems to be relying on a piece of reasoning which hell
later, in his first Locke lecture, refer to as too good. I hear that the bell
tolls; therefore, someone hears that the bell tolls. Grice attempts to reduce
this or that I utterance (Someone, viz. I, hears that the bell tolls) is in
terms of a chain or sequence of mnemonic states. It poses a few quandaries
itself. While quoting from this or that recent philosopher such as Gallie and
Broad, it is a good thing that Grice has occasion to go back to, or revisit,
Locke and contest this or that infamous and alleged counterexample presented by
Reid and Hume. Grice adds a methodological note to his proposed
logical-construction theory of personal identity. There is some intricacy of
his reductive analysis, indeed logical construction, for an apparently simple
and harmless utterance (cf. his earlier essay on I do not hear that the bell
tolls). But this intricacy does not prove the analysis wrong. Only that Grice
is too subtle. If the reductive analysis of not is in terms of each state which
I am experiencing is incompatible with phi), that should not be a minus, or
drawback, but a plus, and an advantage in terms of philosophical progress. The
same holds here in terms of the concept of a temporary state. Much later,
Grice reconsiders, or revisits, indeed, Broads remark and re-titles his
approach as the (or a) logical-construction theory of personal identity. And,
with Haugeland, Grice re-considers Humes own vagaries, or quandary, with
personal identity. Unlike the more conservative Locke that Grice favours in the
pages of Mind, eliminationist Hume sees ‘I’ as a conceptual muddle, indeed a
metaphysical chimæra. Hume presses the point for an empiricist verificationist
account of I. For, as Russell would rhetorically ask, ‘What can be more direct
that the experience of myself?’ The Hume Society should take notice of Grices
simplification of Hume’s implicatum on I, if The Locke Society won’t. As a
matter of fact, Grice calls one of his metaphysical construction routines the
Humeian projection, so it is not too adventurous to think that Grice considers
I as an intuitive concept that needs to be metaphysically re-constructed
and be given a legitimate Fregeian sense. Why that label for a construction
routine? Grice calls this metaphysical construction routine Humeian projection,
since the mind (or soul) as it were, spreads over its objects. But, by mind,
Hume does not necessarily mean the I. Cf. The minds I. Grice is especially
concerned with the poverty and weaknesses of Humes criticism to Lockes account
of personal identity. Grice opts to revisit the Lockeian memory-based of this
or that someone, viz. I utterance that Hume rather regards as vague, and
confusing. Unlike Humes, neither Lockes nor Grices reductive analysis of
personal identity is reductionist and eliminationist. The reductive-reductionist
distinction Grice draws in Retrospective epilogue as he responds to
Rountree-Jack on this or that alleged wrong on meaning that. It is only natural
that Grice would be sympathetic to Locke. Grice explores these issues with Haugeland
mainly at seminars. One may wonder why Grice spends so much time in a
philosopher such as Hume, with whom he agreed almost on nothing! The answer is
Humes influence in the Third World that forced Grice to focus on this or that
philosopher. Surely Locke is less popular in the New World than Hume is. One
supposes Grice is trying to save Hume at the implicatum level, at least. The
phrase or term of art, logical construction is Russells and Broads, but Grice
loved it. Rational reconstruction is not too dissimilar. Grice prefers Russells
and Broads more conservative label. This is more than a terminological point.
If Hume is right and there is NO intuitive concept behind I, one cannot
strictly re-construct it, only construct it. Ultimately, Grice shows that, if
only at the implicatum level, we are able to provide an analysandum for this or
that someone, viz. I utterance without using I, by implicating only this
or that mnemonic concept, which belongs, naturally, as his theory of negation
does, in a theory of philosophical psychology, and again a lower branch of it,
dealing with memory. The topic of personal identity unites various interests of
Grice. The first is identity “=” simpliciter. Instead of talking of the meaning
of I, as, say, Anscombe would, Grice sticks to the traditional category, or
keyword, for this, i. e. the theory-laden, personal identity, or even personal
sameness. Personal identity is a type of identity, but personal adds something
to it. Surely Hume was stretching person a bit when using the example of a soul
with a life lower than an oyster. Since Grice follows Aristotles De Anima, he
enjoys Hume’s choice, though. It may be argued that personal adds Locke’s
consciousness, and rational agency. Grice plays with the body-soul distinction.
I, viz someone or somebody, fell from the stairs, perhaps differs from I will
be fighting soon. This or that someone, viz. I utterance may be purely bodily.
Grice would think that the idea that his soul fell from the stairs sounds, as
it would to Berkeley, harsh. But then theres this or that one may be mixed
utterance. Someone, viz. I, plays cricket, where surely your bodily mechanisms
require some sort of control by the soul. Finally, this or that may be purely
souly ‒ the one Grice ends up analysing, Someone, viz. I, hear that the bell
tolls. At the time of his Mind essay, Grice may have been unaware of the
complications that the concept of a person may bring as attached in adjective
form to identity. Ayer did, and Strawson and Wiggins will, and Grice learns
much from Strawson. Since Parfit, this has become a common-place topic for
analysis at Oxford. A person as a complexum of a body-soul spatio-temporal
continuant substance. Ultimately, Grice finds a theoretical counterpart here. A
P may become a human, which Grice understands physiologically. That is not
enough. A P must aspire, via meteousis, to become a person. Thus, person
becomes a technical term in Grices grand metaphysical scheme of things.
Someone, viz. I, hear that the bell is tolls is analysed as ≡df, or
if and only if, a hearing that the bell tolls is a part of a total
temporary tn souly state S1 which is one
in a s. such that any state Sn, given this or that
condition, contains as a part a memory Mn of the
experience of hearing that the bell tolls, which is a component in some
pre-sequent t1n item, or contains an experience of hearing
that the bell tolls a memory M of which would, given this or that
condition, occur as a component in some sub-sequent t2>tn item,
there being no sub-set of items which is independent of the rest. Grice
simplifies the reductive analysans. Someone, viz. I, hears that the bell tolls
iff a hearing that the bell tolls is a component in an item of an interlocking
s. with emphasis on lock, s. of this or that memorable and memorative
total temporary tn state S1. Is Grice’s Personal
identity ever referred to in the Oxonian philosophical literature? Indeeed.
Parfit mentions, which makes it especially memorable and memorative. P. Edwards
includes a reference to Grices Mind essay in the entry for Personal identity,
as a reference to Grice et al on Met. , is referenced in Edwardss encyclopædia
entry for metaphysics. Grice does not attribute privileged access or
incorrigibility to I or the first person. He always hastens to add that I can
always be substituted, salva veritate (if baffling your addressee A) by someone
or other, if not some-body or other, a colloquialism Grice especially detested.
Grices agency-based approach requires that. I am rational provided thou art,
too. If, by explicitly saying he is a Lockeian, Grice surely does not wish us
to see him as trying to be original, or the first to consider this or that
problem about I; i.e. someone. Still, Grice is the philosopher who explores
most deeply the reductive analysis of I, i.e. someone. Grice needs the
reductive analysis because human agency (philosophically, rather than
psychologically interpreted) is key for his approach to things. By uttering The
bell tolls, U means that someone, viz. himself, hears that the bell tolls, or
even, by uttering I, hear, viz. someone hears, that the bell tolls, U means
that the experience of a hearing that the bell tolls is a component in a
total temporary state which is a member of a s. such that each member
would, given certain conditions, contain as an component one
memory of an experience which is a component in a pre-sequent member, or
contains as a component some experience a memory of which would,
given certain conditions, occur as a component in a post-sequent member;
there being no sub-set of members which is independent of the rest.
Thanks, the addressee might reply. I didnt know that! The reductive bit to
Grices analysis needs to be emphasised. For Grice, a person, and consequently,
a someone, viz. I utterance, is, simpliciter, a logical construction out of
this or that Humeian experience. Whereas in Russell, as Broad notes, a
logical construction of this or that philosophical concept, in this case
personal identity, or cf. Grices earlier reductive analysis of not, is thought
of as an improved, rationally reconstructed conception. Neither Russell nor
Broad need maintain that the logical construction preserves the original
meaning of the analysandum someone, viz. I, hears that the bell tolls, or I do
not hear that the bell tolls ‒ hence their paradox of reductionist analysis.
This change of Subjects does not apply to Grice. Grice emphatically intends to
be make explicit, if rationally reconstructed (if that is not an
improvement) through reductive (if not reductionist) analysis, the concept Grice
already claims to have. One particular development to consider is within Grices
play group, that of Quinton. Grice and Quinton seem to have been the only two
philosophers in Austins play group who showed any interest on someone, viz. I.
Or not. The fact that Quinton entitles his thing “The soul” did not help. Note
that Woozley was at the time editing Reid on “Identity,” Cf. Duncan-Jones on
mans mortality. Note that Quintons immediate trigger is Shoemaker. Grice writes
that he is not “merely a series of perceptions,” for he is “conscious of a
permanent self, an I who experiences these perceptions and who is now
identical with the I who experienced perceptions yesterday.” So, leaving aside
that he is using I with the third person verb, but surely this is no use-mention
fallacy, it is this puzzle that provoked his thoughts on temporal-relative “=”
later on. As Grice notes, Butler argued that consciousness of experience can
contribute to identity but not define it. Grice will use Butler in his
elaboration of conversational benevolence versus conversational self-interest.
Better than Quinton, it is better to consider Flew in Philosophy, 96, on Locke
and the problem of personal identity, obviously suggested as a term paper by
Grice! Wiggins cites Flew. Flew actually notes that Berkeley saw Lockes problem
earlier than Reid, which concerns the transitiveness of =. Recall that Wigginss
tutor at Oxford was a tutee by Grice, Ackrill. Refs.: The main references
covering identity simpliciter are in “Vacuous Names,” and his joint work on
metaphysics with G. Myro. The main references relating to the second group, of
personal identity, are his “Mind” essay, an essay on ‘the logical-construction
theory of personal identity,’ and a second set of essays on Hume’s quandary,
The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
illatum,
f. illātĭo (inl- ), ōnis,
f. infero, a logical
inference, conclusion: “vel illativum rogamentum. quod ex acceptionibus colligitur et infertur,” App.
Dogm. Plat. 3, pp. 34, 15. – infero: to conclude, infer, draw an inference, Cic. Inv. 1, 47, 87; Quint. 5, 11, 27.
illusion: cf. veridical memories, who needs them? hallucination
is Grice’s topic.Malcolm argues in Dreaming and Skepticism and in his Dreaming
that the notion of a dream qua conscious experience that occurs at a definite
time and has definite duration during sleep, is unintelligible. This
contradicts the views of philosophers like Descartes (and indeed Moore!), who,
Malcolm holds, assume that a human being may have a conscious thought and a
conscious experience during sleep. Descartes claims that he had been deceived
during sleep. Malcolms point is that ordinary language contrasts consciousness
and sleep. The claim that one is conscious while one is sleep-walking is
stretching the use of the term. Malcolm rejects the alleged counter-examples
based on sleepwalking or sleep-talking, e.g. dreaming that one is climbing
stairs while one is actually doing so is not a counter-example because, in such
a case, the individual is not sound asleep after all. If a person is in any
state of consciousness, it logically follows that he is not sound asleep. The
concept of dreaming is based on our descriptions of dreams after we have
awakened in telling a dream. Thus, to have dreamt that one has a thought during
sleep is not to have a thought any more than to have dreamt that one has
climbed Everest is to have climbed Everest. Since one cannot have an experience
during sleep, one cannot have a mistaken experience during sleep, thereby
undermining the sort of scepticism based on the idea that our experience might
be wrong because we might be dreaming. Malcolm further argues that a report of
a conscious state during sleep is unverifiable. If Grice claims that he and
Strawson saw a big-foot in charge of the reserve desk at the Bodleian library,
one can verify that this took place by talking to Strawson and gathering
forensic evidence from the library. However, there is no way to verify Grices
claim that he dreamed that he and Strawson saw a big-foot working at the
Bodleian. Grices only basis for his claim that he dreamt this is that Grice
says so after he wakes up. How does one distinguish the case where Grice
dreamed that he saw a big-foot working at The Bodleian and the case in which he
dreamed that he saw a person in a big-foot suit working at the library but,
after awakening, mis-remembered that person in a big-foot suit as a big-foot
proper? If Grice should admit that he had earlier mis-reported his dream and
that he had actually dreamed he saw a person in a big-foot suit at The
Bodleian, there is no more independent verification for this new claim than
there was for the original one. Thus, there is, for Malcolm, no sense to the
idea of mis-remembering ones dreams. Malcolm here applies one of Witters ideas
from his private language argument. One would like to say: whatever is going to
seem right to me is right. And that only means that here we cannot talk about
right. For a similar reason, Malcolm challenges the idea that one can assign a
definite duration or time of occurrence to a dream. If Grice claims that he ran
the mile in 3.4 minutes, one could verify this in the usual ways. If, however,
Grice says he dreamt that he ran the mile in 3.4 minutes, how is one to measure
the duration of his dreamt run? If Grice says he was wearing a stopwatch in the
dream and clocked his run at 3.4 minutes, how can one know that the dreamt
stopwatch is not running at half speed (so that he really dreamt that he ran
the mile in 6.8 minutes)? Grice might argue that a dream report does not carry
such a conversational implicata. But Malcolm would say that just admits the
point. The ordinary criteria one uses for determining temporal duration do not
apply to dreamt events. The problem in both these cases (Grice dreaming one saw
a bigfoot working at The Bodleian and dreaming that he ran the mile in 3.4
minutes) is that there is no way to verify the truth of these dreamt events —
no direct way to access that dreamt inner experience, that mysterious glow of
consciousness inside the mind of Grice lying comatose on the couch, in order to
determine the facts of the matter. This is because, for Malcolm, there are no
facts of the matter apart from the report by the dreamer of the dream upon
awakening. Malcolm claims that the empirical evidence does not enable one to
decide between the view that a dream experience occurs during sleep and the
view that they are generated upon the moment of waking up. Dennett agrees with
Malcolm that nothing supports the received view that a dream involves a
conscious experience while one is asleep but holds that such issues might be
settled empirically. Malcolm also argues against the attempt to provide a
physiological mark of the duration of a dream, for example, the view that the
dream lasted as long as the rapid eye movements. Malcolm replies that there can
only be as much precision in that common concept of dreaming as is provided by
the common criterion of dreaming. These scientific researchers are misled by
the assumption that the provision for the duration of a dream is already there,
only somewhat obscured and in need of being made more precise. However, Malcolm
claims, it is not already there (in the ordinary concept of dreaming). These
scientific views are making radical conceptual changes in the concept of
dreaming, not further explaining our ordinary concept of dreaming. Malcolm
admits, however, that it might be natural to adopt such scientific views about
REM sleep as a convention. Malcolm points out, however, that if REM sleep is
adopted as a criterion for the occurrence of a dream, people would have to
be informed upon waking up that they had dreamed or not. As Pears observes,
Malcolm does not mean to deny that people have dreams in favour of the view
that they only have waking dream-behaviour. Of course it is no misuse of
language to speak of remembering a dream. His point is that since the concept
of dreaming is so closely tied to our concept of waking report of a dreams, one
cannot form a coherent concept of this alleged inner (private) something that
occurs with a definite duration during sleep. Malcolm rejects a certain
philosophical conception of dreaming, not the ordinary concept of dreaming,
which, he holds, is neither a hidden private something nor mere outward
behaviour.The account of dreaming by Malcolm has come in for considerable
criticism. Some argue that Malcolms claim that occurrences in dreams cannot be
verified by others does not require the strict criteria that Malcolm proposes
but can be justified by appeal to the simplicity, plausibility, and predictive
adequacy of an explanatory system as a whole. Some argue that Malcolms account
of the sentence I am awake is inconsistent. A comprehensive programme in
considerable detail has been offered for an empirical scientific investigation
of dreaming of the sort that Malcolm rejects. Others have proposed various
counterexamples and counter arguments against dreaming by Malcolm. Grices
emphasis is in Malcolms easy way out with statements to the effect that
implicata do or do not operate in dream reports. They do in mine! Grice
considers, I may be dreaming in the two essays opening the Part II:
Explorations on semantics and metaphysics in WOW. Cf. Urmson on ‘delusion’ in
‘Parentheticals’ as ‘conceptually impossible.’ Refs.: The main reference is
Grice’s essay on ‘Dreaming,’ but there are scattered references in his
treatment of Descartes, and “The causal theory of perception” (henceforth,
“Causal theory”), The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
imperative
mode: At one point, Grice loved the “psi,” Actions are alright, but we need to
stop at the psi level. The emissor communicates that the addressee thinks that
the emissor has propositional attitude psi. No need to get into the logical
form of action. One can just do with the logical form of a ‘that’-clause in the
ascription of a state of the soul. This should usually INVOLVE an action, as in
Hare, “The door is shut, please.” like Hare, Grice loves an imperative. In this
essay, Grice attempts an exploration of the logical form of Kant’s concoction.
Grice is especially irritated by the ‘the.’ ‘They speak of Kant’s categorical
imperative, when he cared to formulate a few versions of it!” Grice lists them
all in Abbott’s version. There are nine of them! Grice is interested in the conceptual
connection of the categorical imperative with the hypothetical or suppositional
imperative, in terms of the type of connection between the protasis and the
apodosis. Grice spends the full second Carus lecture on the conception of
value on this. Grice is aware that the topic is central to Oxonian
philosophers such as Hare, a member of Austin’s Play Group, too, who regard the
universability of an imperative as a mark of its categoricity, and indeed,
moral status. Grice chose some of the Kantian terminology on purpose.Grice
would refer to this or that ‘conversational maxim.’A ‘conversational maxim’
contributes to what Grice jocularly refers to as the ‘conversational
immanuel.’But there is an admission test.The ‘conversational maxim’ has to be
shown that, qua items under an overarching principle of conversational
helpfulness, the maxim displays a quality associated with conceptual, formal,
and applicational generality. Grice never understood what Kant meant by the
categoric imperative. But for Grice, from the acceptability of the the immanuel
you can deduce the acceptability of this or that maxim, and from the
acceptability of the conversational immanuel, be conversationally helpful, you
can deduce the acceptability of this or that convesational maxim. Grice hardly
considered Kants approach to the categoric imperative other than via the
universability of this or that maxim. This or that conversational maxim,
provided by Grice, may be said to be universalisable if and only if it displays
what Grice sees as these three types of generality: conceptual, formal, and
applicational. He does the same for general maxims of conduct. The results are
compiled in a manual of universalisable maxims, the conversational immanuel, an
appendix to the general immanuel. The other justification by Kant of the
categoric imperative involve an approach other than the genitorial
justification, and an invocation of autonomy and freedom. It is the use by
Plato of imperative as per categoric imperative that has Grice expanding on
modes other than the doxastic, to bring in the buletic, where the categoric
imperative resides. Note that in the end Kant DOES formulate the categoric
imperative, as Grice notes, as a real imperative, rather than a command, etc.
Grice loved Kant, but he loved Kantotle best. In the last Kant lecture, he
proposes to define the categorical imperative as a counsel of prudence, with a
protasis Let Grice be happy. The derivation involves eight stages! Grice found
out that out of his play-group activities with this or that linguistic nuance
he had arrived at the principle, or imperative of conversational helpfulness,
indeed formulated as an imperative: Make your contribution such as is required,
at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose of the conversation in
which you are engaged. He notes that the rationality behind the idea of
conversation as rational co-operation does not preclude seeing rationality in conversation
as other than cooperation. The fact that he chooses maxim, and explicitly
echoes Kant, indicates where Grice is leading! An exploration on Paton on the
categorical imperative. Grice had previously explored the logical form of
hypothetical or suppositional imperatives in the Kant (and later Locke)
lectures, notably in Lecture IV, Further remarks on practical and alethic
reasons. Here he considers topics related to Hares
tropic-clistic neustic-phrastic quartet. What does it mean to say that
a command is conditional? The two successors of Grices post as
Tutorial Fellow at St. Johns, Baker Hacker, will tackle the same issue with
humour, in Sense and nonsense, published by Blackwell (too irreverent to be
published by the Clarendon). Is the logical form of a maxim, .p⊃!q, or !(.p ⊃.q),
etc. Kant thought that there is a special
sub-class of hypothetical or suppositional imperative (which he
called a counsels of prudence) which is like his class of technical imperative,
except in that the end specified in a full specfication of the imperative is
the special end of eudæmonia (the agents eudæmonia). For
Grice, understanding Kant’s first version of the categorical imperative
involves understanding what a maxim is supposed to be. Grice
explores at some length four alternative interpretations of an
iffy buletic (as opposed to a non-iffy buletic): three formal, one material.
The first interpretation is the horseshoe interpretation. A blind logical
nose might lead us or be led to the assumption of a link between a
buletically iffy utterance and a doxastically iffy utterance. Such a link
no doubt exists, but the most obvious version of it is plainly
inadequate. At least one other philosopher besides Grice has noticed that If he
torments the cat, have him arrested! is unlikely to express an
buletically iffy utterance, and that even if one restricts oneself to
this or that case in which the protasis specifies a will, we find pairs of
examples like If you will to go to Oxford, travel by AA via Richmond! or
If you will to go to Cambridge, see a psychiatrist! where it is plain that one
is, and the other is not, the expression of a buletically iffy utterance. For
fun, Grice does not tell which! A less easily eliminable suggestion, yet one
which would still interprets the notion of a buletically iffy utterance in
terms of that particular logical form to which if, hypothetical or
suppositional and conditional attach,
would be the following. Let us assume that it is established, or conceded, as
legitimate to formulate an if utterance in which not only the apodosis is
couched in some mode other than the doxastic, as in this or that conditional
command. If you see the whites of their eyes, shoot fire! but also the protasis
or some part (clause) of them. In which case all of the following might be
admissible conditionals. Thus, we might have a doxastic protasis (If the cat is
sick, take it to the vet), or a mixed (buletic-cum-doxastic protasis (If you
are to take the cat to the vet and theres no cage available, put it on Marthas lap!),
and buletic protasis (If you are to take the cat to the vet, put it in a
cage!). If this suggestion seems rebarbative, think of this or that quaint if
utterance (when it is quaint) as conditionalised versions of this or that
therefore-sequence, such as: buletic-cum-doxastic premises (Take the cat
to the vet! There isnt a cage. Therefore; Put the cat on Marthas lap!), buletic
premise (Take the cat to the vet! Put it in a cage!). And then, maybe, the
discomfort is reduced. Grice next considers a second formal interpretation or
approach to the buletically iffy/non-iffy utterance. Among if utterances with a
buletic apodosis some will have, then, a mixed doxastic-cum buletic protasis
(partly doxastic, partly buletic), and some will have a purely doxastic protasis
(If the cat is sick, take him to the vet!). Grice proposes a definition of the
iffy/non-iffy distinction. A buletically iffy utterance is an iffy utterance
the apodosis of which is buletic and the protasis of which is buletic or mixed
(buletic-cum-dxastic) or it is an elliptical version of such an iffy utterance.
A buletically non-iffy utterance is a buletic utterance which is not iffy or
else, if it is iffy, has a purely doxastic protasis. Grice makes three quick
comments on this second interpretation. First, re: a real imperative. The
structures which are being offered as a way of interpreting an iffy and a
non-iffy imperative do not, as they stand, offer any room for the
appearance this or that buletic modality like ought and should which are so prominently
visible in the standard examples of those kinds of imperatives. The imperatives
suggested by Grice are explicit imperatives. An explicit buletic utterance is
Do such-and-such! and not You ought to do such and such or, worse, One ought to
do such and such. Grice thinks, however, that one can modify this suggestion to
meet the demand for the appearance or occurrence of ought (etc) if such
occurrence is needed. Second, it would remain to be decided how close the
preferred reading of Grices deviant conditional imperatives would be to the
accepted interpretation of standard hypothetical or
suppositional imperatives. But even if there were some divergence that
might be acceptable if the new interpretation turns out to embody a more
precise notion than the standard conception. Then theres the neustical versus
tropical protases. There are, Grice thinks, serious doubts of the admissibility
of conditionals with a NON-doxastic protasis, which are for Grice connected
with the very difficult question whether the doxastic and the buletic modes are
co-ordinate or whether the doxastic mode is in some crucial fashion (but
not in other) prior (to use Suppess qualification) to the buletic. Grice
confesses he does not know the answer to that question. A third formal interpretation links
the iffy/non-iffy distinction to the absolute-relative value distinction. An
iffy imperatives would be end-relative and might be analogous
to an evidence-relative probability. A non-iffy imperatives would not
be end-relative. Finally, a fourth Interpretation is not formal, but
material. This is close to part of what Kant says on the topic. It is a
distinction between an imperative being escapable (iffy), through the
absence of a particular will and its not being escapable (non-iffy). If we understand
the idea of escabability sufficiently widely, the following imperatives
are all escapable, even though their logical form is not in every case the
same: Give up popcorn!, To get slim, give up popcorn!, If you will to get slim,
give up popcorn! Suppose Grice has no will to get slim. One might say that
the first imperative (Give up popcorn!) is escaped, provided giving up
popcorn has nothing else to recommend it, by falsifying You should give up
popcorn. The second and the third imperatives (To get slim, give up
pocorn! and If you will to get slim, give up popcorn!) would not, perhaps,
involve falsification but they would, in the circumstances, be
inapplicable to Grice – and inapplicability, too, counts, as escape. A
non-iffy imperative however, is in no way escapable. Re: the Dynamics of
Imperatives in Discourse, Grice then gives three examples which he had
discussed in “Aspects,” which concern arguments (or therefore-chains). This we
may see as an elucidation to grasp the logical form of buletically iffy
utterance (elided by the therefore, which is an if in the metalanguage)
in its dynamics in argumentation. We should, Grice suggests,
consider not merely imperatives of each sort, together with the range
of possible characterisations, but also the possible forms of argument into
which_particular_ hypothetical or suppositional imperatives might enter.
Consider: Defend the Philosophy Department! If you are to defend the
philosophy department, learn to use bows and arrows! Therefore, learn to
use bows and arrows! Grice says he is using the dichotomy of original-derived
value. In this example, in the first premise, it is not specified whether the
will is original or derived, the second premise specifies conducive to (means),
and the conclusion would involve a derived will, provided the second premise is
doxastically satisfactory. Another example would be: Fight for your country! If
you are to fight for your country, join up one of the services! Therefore, join
up! Here, the first premise and the conclusion do not specify the protasis. If
the conclusion did, it would repeat the second premise. Then theres Increase
your holdings in oil shares! If you visit your father, hell give you some oil
shares. Therefore, visit your father! This argument (purportedly) transmits
value. Let us explore these characterisations by Grice with the aid of
Hares distinctions. For Hare in a hypothetical or suppositional imperative, the
protasis contains a neustic-cum-tropic. A distinction may be made between this
or that hypothetical or suppositional imperative and a term used by Grice
in his first interpretation of the hypothetical or suppositional
imperative, that of conditional command (If you see the whites of their
eyes, shoot fire!). A hypothetical or suppositional imperative can
be distinguished from a conditional imperative (If you want to make bread,
use yeast! If you see anything suspicious, telephone the police!) by the
fact that modus ponens is not valid for it. One may use hypothetical,
suppositional or conditional imperative for a buletic utterance which features
if, and reserve conditional command for a command which is expressed by an
imperative, and which is conditional on the satisfaction of the protasis.
Thus, on this view, treating the major premise of an argument as a
hypothetical or suppositional imperative turns the therefore-chain invalid.
Consider the sequence with the major premise as a hypothetical or suppositional
imperative. If you will to make someone mad, give him drug D! You
will to make Peter mad; therefore, give Peter drug D! By uttering this
hypothetical or suppositional imperative, the utterer tells his addressee A
only what means to adopt to achieve a given end in a way which
does not necessarily endorse the adoption of that end, and hence of
the means to it. Someone might similarly say, if you will to make
someone mad, give him drug D! But, of course, even if you will to do
that, you must not try to do so. On the other hand, the
following is arguably valid because the major premise is a conditional
imperative and not a mere hypothetical or suppositional one. We have
a case of major premise as a conditional imperative: You will to make someone
mad, give him drug D! Make Peter mad! Therefore, give Peter drug D!.
We can explain this in terms of the presence of the neustic in
the antecedent of the imperative working as the major premise.
The supposition that the protasis of a hypothetical or suppositional
imperative contains a clause in the buletic mode neatly explains why the argument
with the major premise as a hypothetical or suppositional imperative
is not valid. But the argument with the major premise as a conditional
imperative is, as well as helping to differentiate a suppositional or
hypothetical or suppositional iffy imperative from a conditional iffy
imperative. For, if the protasis of the major premise in the hypothetical or
suppositional imperative is volitival, the mere fact that you will to make
Peter mad does not license the inference of the imperative to
give him the drug; but this _can_ be inferred from the major premise
of the hypothetical or suppositional imperative together with an
imperative, the minor premise in the conditional
imperative, to make Peter mad. Whether the subordinate
clause contains a neustic thus does have have a consequence as
to the validity of inferences into which the complex sentence
enters. Then theres an alleged principle of mode constancy in buletic and
and doxastic inference. One may tries to elucidate Grices ideas on the
logical form of the hypothetical or suppositional imperative proper.
His suggestion is, admittedly, rather tentative. But it might be
argued, in the spirit of it, that an iffy imperative is of the
form ((!p⊃!q) Λ .p)) ∴ !q
But this violates a principle of mode constancy. A phrastic must
remain in the same mode (within the scope of the same tropic) throughout
an argument. A conditional imperative does not violate the principle of
Modal Constancy, since it is of the form ((p⊃!q) Λ
!p)) ∴ !q The question of the logical form of
the hypothetical or suppositional imperative is
too obscure to base much on arguments concerning it. There is an
alternative to Grices account of the validity of an argument featuring a conditional
imperative. This is to treat the major premise of a conditional
imperative, as some have urged it should be as a doxastic utterance tantamount
to In order to make someone mad, you have to give him drug D. Then an
utterer who explicitly conveys or asserts the major premise of a conditional
imperative and commands the second premise is in consistency committed to
commanding the conclusion. If does not always connect phrastic with
phrastic but sometimes connects two expressions consisting of a phrastic
and a tropic. Consider: If you walk past the post office, post the
letter! The antecedent of this imperative states, it seems, the
condition under which the imperative expressed becomes operative,
and so can not be construed buletically, since by uttering a buletic
utterance, an utterer cannot explicitly convey or assert that a condition
obtains. Hence, the protasis ought not be within the scope of the
buletic !, and whatever we take to represent the form of the
utterance above we must not take !(if p, q) to do so. One way out. On
certain interpretation of the isomorphism or æqui-vocality Thesis between
Indicative and Imperative Inference the utterance has to be construed
as an imperative (in the generic reading) to make the doxasatic
conditional If you will walk past the post office, you will post
the letter satisfactory. Leaving aside issues of the implicature of if,
that the utterance can not be so construed seems to be shown by
the fact that the imperative to make the associated doxastically iffy
utterance satisfactory is conformed with by one who does not walk past the
post office. But it seems strange at best to say that the utterance
is conformed with in the same circumstances. This strangeness or
bafflingliness, as Grice prefers, is aptly explained away in terms of the implicatum.
At Oxford, Dummett is endorsing this idea that a
conditional imperative be construed as an imperative to make an
indicative if utterance true. Dummett urges to divide conditional
imperatives into those whose antecedent is within the power of
the addressee, like the utterance in question, and those in which it
is not. Consider: If you go out, wear your coat! One may be not so much
concerned with how to escape this, as Grice is, but how to conform it. A child
may choose not to go out in order to comply with the imperative. For an
imperative whose protasis is_not_ within the power of the addressee (If anyone
tries to escape, shoot him!) it is indifferent whether we treat it as a
conditional imperative or not, so why bother. A small
caveat here. If no one tries to escape, the imperative is *not violated*.
One might ask, might there not be an important practical difference
bewteen saying that an imperative has not been violated and that
it has been complied with? Dummett ignores this distinction. One may
feel think there is much of a practical difference there. Is Grice
an intuitionist? Suppose that you are a frontier guard and
the antecedent has remained unfulfilled. Then, whether we say that you complied with
it, or simply did not *violate* it will make a great deal
of difference if you appear before a war crimes tribunal. For
Dummett, the fact that in the case of an imperative expressed by a conditional
imperative in which the antecedent is not within the agents power, we should
*not* say that the agent had obeyed just on the ground that the protassi is
false, is no ground for construing an imperative as expressing a
conditional command: for there is no question of fixing what shall
constitute obedience independently of the determination of what shall
constitute disobedience. This complicates the issues. One may with Grice (and
Hare, and Edgley) defend imperative inference against other Oxonian
philosophers, such as Kenny or Williams. What is questioned by the sceptics
about imperative inference is whether if each one of a set of imperatives
is used with the force of a command, one can infer a _further_ imperative
with that force from them. Cf. Wiggins on Aristotle on the practical
syllogism. One may be more conservative than Hare, if not Grice. Consider If
you stand by Jane, dont look at her! You stand by Jane; therefore, dont look at
her! This is valid. However, the following, obtained by anti-logism, is not: If
you stand by Jane, dont look at her! Look at her! Therefore, you dont stand by
Jane. It may seem more reasonable to some to deny Kants thesis, and maintain
that anti-logism is valid in imperative inference than it is to hold onto Kants
thesis and deny that antilogism is valid in the case in question. Then theres
the question of the implicata involved in the ordering of modes. Consider:
Varnish every piece of furniture you make! You are going to make a table;
therefore, varnish it! This is prima facie valid. The following, however,
switching the order of the modes in the premises is not. You are going to
varnish every piece of furniture that you make. Make a table! Therefore;
varnish it! The connection between the if and the therefore is metalinguistic,
obviously – the validity of the therefore chain is proved by the associated if
that takes the premise as, literally, the protasis and the consequence as the
apodosis. Conversational Implicature at the Rescue. Problems with
or: Consider Rosss infamous example: Post the letter! Therefore, post the
letter or burn it! as invalid, Ross – and endorsed at Oxford by Williams.
To permit to do p or q is to permit to do p and to permit to do q.
Similarly, to give permission to do something is to lift a prohibition
against doing it. Admittedly, Williams does not need this so we are
stating his claim more strongly than he does. One may review Grices way
out (defense of the validity of the utterance above in terms of the
implicatum. Grice claims that in Rosss infamous example (valid, for Grice),
whilst (to state it roughly) the premises permissive presupposition (to
use the rather clumsy term introduced by Williams) is entailed by it, the
conclusions is only conversationally implicated. Typically for an
isomorphist, Grice says this is something shared by
indicative inferences. If, being absent-minded, Grice asks his wife, What
have I done with the letter? And she replies, You have posted it or burnt it,
she conversationally implicates that she is not in a position to say which
Grice has done. She also conversationally implicates that Grice may not have
post it, so long as he has burnt it. Similarly, the future tense indicative, You
are going to post the letter has the conversational implicature You may be not
going to post the letter so long as you are going to burn it. But this
surely does not validate the introduction rule for OR, to wit: p;
therefore, p or q. One can similarly, say: Eclipse will win. He may not, of
course, if it rains. And I *know* it will *not* rain. Problems with and.
Consider: Put on your parachute AND jump out! Therefore, jump out! Someone who
_only_ jumps out of an æroplane does not fulfil Put on your parachute and
jump out! He has done only what is necessary, but not sufficient to
fulfil it. Imperatives do not differ from indicatives in this respect,
except that fulfilment takes the place of belief or doxa, which is the form of
acceptance apprpriate to a doxasatic utterance, as the Names implies.
Someone who is told Smith put on his parachute AND jumped out is entitled
to believe that Smith jumped out. But if he believes that this is _all_
Smith did he is in error (Cf. Edgley). One may discuss Grices test of
cancellability in the case of the transport officer who says: Go via Coldstream
or Berwick! It seems the transport officers way of expressing himself is
extremely eccentric, or conversationally baffling, as Grice prefers – yet
validly. If the transport officer is not sure if a storm may block one
of the routes, what he should say is _Prepare_ to go via Coldstream or
Berwick! As for the application of Grices test of explicit cancellation here,
it yield, in the circumstances, the transport officer uttering Go either via
Coldstream or Berwick! But you may not go via Coldstream if you do
not go via Berwick, and you may not go via Berwick if you do not go via Coldstream.
Such qualifications ‒ what Grice calls explicit cancellation of the
implicature ‒ seem to the addressee to empty the buletic mode of
utterance of all content and is thus reminiscent of Henry Fords utterance to
the effect that people can choose what colour car they like provided it is
black. But then Grice doesnt think Ford is being illogical, only Griceian and
implicatural! Refs.: There is at least one essay just about the categorical
imperative, but there are scattered references wherever Grice considers the
mood markers, The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
Implicatum,
or Grice’s implication. In this entry we will explore how Grice sees the
‘implicatum’ that he regards as ‘conversational’ as applied to the emissor and
in reference to the Graeco-Roman classical tradition. Wht is implicated may not
be the result of any maxim, and yet not conventional – depending on a feature
of context. But nothing like a maxim – Strawson Wiggins p. 523. Only a
CONVERSATIONAL IMPLICATUM is the result of a CONVERSATIONAL MAXIM and the
principle of conversational helpfulness. In a ‘one-off’ predicament, there may
be an ‘implicatum’ that springs from the interaction itself. If E draws a
skull, he communicates that there is danger. If addressee runs away, this is
not part of the implicatum. This Grice considers in “Meaning.” “What is meant”
should cover the immediate effect, and not any effect that transpires out of
the addressee’s own will. Cf. Patton on Kripke. One thief to another: “The cops
are coming!” The
expressiom “IMPLICATION” is figures, qua entry, in a philosophical dictionary
that Grice consulted at Oxford. In the vernacular, there are two prominent
relata: entailment and implicature, the FRENCH have their “implication.” When
it comes to the Germans, it’s more of a trick. There’s the “nachsichziehen,”
the “zurfolgehaben,” the “Folge(-rung),” the “Schluß,” the “Konsequenz,” and of
course the “Implikation” and the “Implikatur,” inter alia. In Grecian, which Grice learned at Clifton, we
have the “sumpeplegmenon,” or “συμπεπλεγμένον,” if you must, i. e. the
“sum-peplegmenon,” but there’s also the “sumperasma,” or “συμπέϱασμα,” if you
must, “sum-perasma;” and then there’s the “sunêmmenon,” or “συνημμένον,” “sun-emmenon,”
not to mention (then why does Grice?) the “akolouthia,” or “ἀϰολουθία,” if you
must, “akolouthia,” and the “antakolouthia,” ἀνταϰολουθία,” “ana-kolouthia.”
Trust clever Cicero to regard anything ‘Grecian’ as not displaying enough
gravitas, and thus rendering everything into Roman. There’s the “illatio,” from
‘in-fero.’ The Romans adopted two different roots for this, and saw them as
having the same ‘sense’ – cf. referro, relatum, proferro, prolatum; and then
there’s the “inferentia,”– in-fero; and then there’s the “consequentia,” --
con-sequentia. The seq- root is present in ‘sequitur,’ non sequitur. The ‘con-‘
is transliterating Greek ‘syn-’ in the three expressions with ‘syn’:
sympleplegmenon, symperasma, and synemmenon. The Germans, avoiding the
Latinate, have a ‘follow’ root: in “Folge,” “Folgerung,” and the verb
“zur-folge-haben. And perhaps ‘implicatio,’
which is the root Grice is playing with. In Italian and French it
underwent changes, making ‘to imply’ a doublet with Grice’s ‘to implicate’ (the
form already present, “She was implicated in the crime.”). The strict opposite
is ‘ex-plicatio,’ as in ‘explicate.’ ‘implico’ gives both ‘implicatum’ and
‘implicitum.’ Consequently, ‘explico’ gives both ‘explicatum’ and ‘explicitum.’
In English Grice often uses ‘impicit,’ and ‘explicit,’ as they relate to communication,
as his ‘implicatum’ does. His ‘implicatum’ has more to do with the contrast
with what is ‘explicit’ than with ‘what follows’ from a premise. Although in
his formulation, both readings are valid: “by uttering x, implicitly conveying
that q, the emissor CONVERSATIONALY implicates that p’ if he has explicitly
conveyed that p, and ‘q’ is what is required to ‘rationalise’ his
conversational behavioiur. In terms of the emissor, the distinction is between
what the emissor has explicitly conveyed and what he has conversationally
implicated. This in turn contrasts what some philosophers refer metabolically
as an ‘expression,’ the ‘x’ ‘implying’ that p – Grice does not bother with this
because, as Strawson and Wiggins point out, while an emissor cannot be true,
it’s only what he has either explicitly or implicitly conveyed that can be
true. As Austin says, it’s always a FIELD where you do the linguistic botany.
So, you’ll have to vide and explore: ANALOGY, PROPOSITION, SENSE, SUPPOSITION,
and TRUTH. Implication denotes a relation between propositions and statements
such that, from the truth-value of the protasis or antecedent (true or false),
one can derive the truth of the apodosis or consequent. More broadly, we can
say that one idea ‘implies’ another if the first idea cannot be thought without
the second one -- RT: Lalande, Vocabulaire technique et critique de la
philosophie. Common usage makes no strict differentiation between “to imply,”
“to infer,” and “to lead to.” Against Dorothy Parker. She noted that those of
her friends who used ‘imply’ for ‘infer’ were not invited at the Algonquin. The
verb “to infer,” (from Latin, ‘infero,’ that gives both ‘inferentia,’
inference, and ‘illatio,’ ‘illatum’) meaning “to draw a consequence, to deduce”
(a use dating to 1372), and the noun “inference,” meaning “consequence” (from
1606), do not on the face of it seem to be manifestly different from “to imply”
and “implication.” But in Oxonian usage, Dodgson avoided a confusion. “There
are two ways of confusing ‘imply’ with ‘infer’: to use ‘imply’ to mean ‘infer,’
and vice versa. Alice usually does the latter; the Dodo the former.” Indeed,
nothing originally distinguishes “implication” as Lalande defines it — “a
relation by which one thing ‘implies’ another”— from “inference” as it is
defined in Diderot and d’Alembert’s Encyclopédie (1765): “An operation by which
one ACCEPTS (to use a Griceism) a proposition because of its connection to
other propositions held to be true.” The same phenomenon can be seen in the
German language, in which the terms corresponding to “implication,” “Nach-sich-ziehen,”
“Zur-folge-haben,” “inference,” “Schluß”-“Folgerung,” “Schluß,” “to infer,”
“schließen,” “consequence,” “Folge” “-rung,” “Schluß,” “Konsequenz,”
“reasoning,” “”Schluß-“ “Folgerung,” and “to reason,” “schließen,” “Schluß-folger-ung-en
ziehen,” intersect or overlap to a large extent. In the French language, the
expression “impliquer” reveals several characteristics that the expression does
not seem to share with “to infer” or “to lead to.” First of all, “impliquer” is
originally (1663) connected to the notion of contradiction, as shown in the use
of impliquer in “impliquer contradiction,” in the sense of “to be
contradictory.” The connection between ‘impliquer’ and ‘contradiction’ does not,
however, explain how “impliquer” has passed into its most commonly accepted
meaning — “implicitly entail” — viz. to lead to a consequence. Indeed, the two
usages (“impliquer” connected with contradiction” and otherwise) constantly
interfere with one another, which certainly poses a number of difficult
problems. An analogous phenomenon can be found in the case of “import,”
commonly given used as “MEAN” or “imply,” but often wavering instead, in
certain cases, between “ENTAIL” and “imply.” In French, the noun “import” itself
is generally left as it I (“import existentiel,” v. SENSE, Box 4, and cf.
that’s unimportant, meaningless). “Importer,”
as used by Rabelais, 1536, “to necessitate, to entail,” forms via It.“importare,” as used by Dante), from the
Fr. “emporter,” “to entail, to have as a consequence,” dropped out of usage,
and was brought back through Engl. “import.” The nature of the connection
between the two primary usages of L. ‘implicare,’ It. ‘implicare,’ and Fr.
‘impliquer,’ “to entail IMPLICITitly” and “to lead to a consequence,”
nonetheless remains obscure, but not to a Griceian, or Grecian. Another
difficulty is understanding how the transition occurs from Fr. “impliquer,” “to
lead to a consequence,” to “implication,” “a logical relation in which one
statement necessarily supposes another one,” and how we can determine what in
this precise case distinguishes “implication” from “PRAE-suppositio.” We
therefore need to be attentive to what is implicit in Fr. “impliquer” and
“implication,” to the dimension of Fr. “pli,” a pleat or fold, of Fr. “re-pli,”
folding back, and of the Fr. “pliure,” folding, in order to separate out
“imply,” “infer,” “lead to,” or “implication,” “inference,” “consequence”—which
requires us to go back to Latin, and especially to medieval Latin. Once we
clarify the relationship between the usage of “implication” and the medieval
usage of “implicatio,” we will be able to examine certain derivations (as in
Sidonius’s ‘implicatura,” and H. P. Grice’s “implicature,” after ‘temperature,’
from ‘temperare,’) or substitutes (“entailment”) of terms related to the
generic field (for linguistic botanising) of “implicatio,” assuming that it is
difficulties with the concept of implication (e. g., the ‘paradoxes,’ true but
misleading, of material versus formal implication – ‘paradox of implication’
first used by Johnson 1921) that have given rise to this or that newly coined
expression corresponding to this or that original attempt. This whole set of
difficulties certainly becomes clearer as we leave Roman and go further
upstream to Grecian, using the same vocabulary of implication, through the
conflation of several heterogeneous gestures that come from the systematics in
Aristotle and the Stoics. The Roman Vocabulary of Implication and the Implicatio
has the necessary ‘gravitas,’ but Grice, being a Grecian at heart, found it had
‘too much gravitas,’ hence his ‘implicature,’ “which is like the old Roman
‘implicare,’ but for fun!” A number of different expressions in medieval Latin
can express in a more or less equivalent manner the relationship between
propositions and statements such that, from the truth-value of the antecedent
(true or false), one can derive the truth-value of the consequent. There is
“illatio,” and of course “illatum,” which Varro thought fell under ‘inferre.’
Then there’s the feminine noun, ‘inferentia,’ from the ‘participium praesens’
of ‘inferre,’ cf. ‘inferens’ and ‘ilatum.’ There is also ‘consequentia,’ which
is a complex transliterating the Greek ‘syn-,’ in this case with ‘’sequentia,’
from the deponent verb. “I follow you.” Peter Abelard (Petrus Abelardus, v.
Abelardus) makes no distinction in using the expression “consequentia” for the
‘propositio conditionalis,’ hypothetical. Si est homo, est animal. If Grice is
a man, Grice is an animal (Dialectica, 473 – Abelardus uses ‘Greek man,’ not
Grice.’ His implicature is ‘if a Greek man is a man, he is therefore also some
sort of an animal’). But Abelardus also uses the expression “inferentia” for ‘same
old same old’ (cf. “Implicature happens.”). Si non est iustus homo, est non
iustus homo. Grice to Strawson on the examiner having given him a second. “If
it is not the case that your examiner was a fair man, it follows thereby that
your examiner was not a fair man, if that helps.” (Dialectica., 414). For some reason, which Grice found obscure,
‘illatio” appears “almost always” in the context of commenting on Aristotle’s
“Topics,” – “why people found the topic commenting escapes me” -- aand denotes
more specifically a reasoning, or “argumentum,” in Boethius, allowing for a “consequentia”
to be drawn from a given place. So Abelardus distinguishes: “illatio a causa.”
But there is also “illatio a simili.” And there is “iillatio a pari.” And there
is “illatio a partibus.” “Con-sequentia” sometimes has a very generic usage,
even if not as generic as ‘sequentia.” “Consequentia est quaedam habitudo inter
antecedens et consequens,” “Logica modernorum,” 2.1:38 – Cfr. Grice on
Whitehead as a ‘modernist’! Grice draws his ‘habit’ from the scholastic
‘habitudo.’ Noe that ‘antededens’ and ‘consequens.’ The point is a tautological
formula, in terms of formation. Surely ‘consequentia’ relates to a
‘consequens,’ where the ‘consequens’ is the ‘participium praesens’ of the verb
from which ‘consequentia’ derives. It’s like deving ‘love’ by ‘to have a
beloved.’ “Consequentia” is in any case present, in some way, without the
intensifier ‘syn,’ which the Roman gravitas added to transliterate the Greek
‘syn,’ i. e. ‘cum.’ -- in the expression “sequitur” and in the expression
“con-sequitur,” literally, ‘to follow,’ ‘to ensue,’ ‘to result in’). Keenan
told Grice that this irritated him. “If there is an order between a premise and
a conclusion, I will stop using ‘follow,’ because that reverts the order. I’ll
use ‘… yields …’ and write that ‘p yields q.’” “Inferentia,” which is cognate
(in the Roman way of using this expression broadly) with ‘illatio,’ and
‘illatum,’ -- frequently appears, by contrast, and “for another Grecian
reason,” as Grice would put it -- in the context of the Aristotle’s “De
Interpretatione,” on which Grice lectures only with J. L. Austin (Grice
lectured with Strawson on “Categoriae,” only – but with Austin, from whom Grice
learned – Grice lectured on both “Categoriae’ AND “De Interpretatione.” -- whether it is as part of a commentarium on Apuleius’s
Isagoge and the Square of Oppositions (‘figura quadrata spectare”), in order to
explain this or that “law” underlying any of the four sides of the square. So,
between A and E we have ‘propositio opposita.’ Between A and I, and between E
and O, we have propositio sub-alterna. Between A and O, and between E and I, we
have propositio contradictoria. And between I and O, we have “propositio
sub-alterna.” -- Logica modernorum, 2.1:115. This was irritatingly explored by
P. F. Strawson and brought to H. P. Grice’s attention, who refused to accept
Strawson’s changes and restrictions of the ‘classical’ validities (or “laws”)
because Strawson felt that the ‘implication’ violated some ‘pragmatic rule,’
while still yielding a true statement. Then there’s the odd use of “inferentia”
to apply to the different ‘laws’ of ‘conversio’ -- from ‘convertire,’
converting one proposition into another (Logica modernorum 131–39). Nevertheless,
“inferentia” is used for the dyadic (or triadic, alla Peirce) relationship of ‘implicatio,’
which for some reason, the grave Romans were using for less entertaining
things, and not this or that expressions from the “implication” family, or
sub-field. Surprisingly, a philosopher
without a classical Graeco-Roman background could well be mislead into thinking
that “implicatio” and “implication” are disparate! A number of treatises,
usually written by monks – St. John’s, were Grice teaches, is a Cicercian
monastery -- explore the “implicits.” Such a “tractatus” is not called
‘logico-philosophicus,’ but a “tractatus implicitarum,” literally a treatise on
this or that ‘semantic’ property of the
proposition said to be an ‘implicatum’ or an ‘implication,’ or ‘propositio re-lativa.’
This is Grice’s reference to the conversational category of ‘re-lation.’
“Re-latio” and “Il-latio” are surely cognate. The ‘referre’ is a bring back;
while the ‘inferre’ is the bring in. The propositio is not just ‘brought’
(latum, or lata) it is brought back. Proposition Q is brought back (relata) to
Proposition P. P and Q become ‘co-relative.’ This is the terminology behind the
idea of a ‘relative clause,’ or ‘oratio relativa.’ E.g. “Si Plato tutee
Socrates est, Socratos tutor Platonis est,” translated by Grice, “If Strawson was
my tutee, it didn’t show!”. Now, closer to Grice “implicitus,” with an “i”
following the ‘implic-‘ rather than the expected ‘a’ (implica), “implicita,”
and “implicitum,” is an alternative “participium passatum” from “im-plic-are,”
in Roman is used for “to be joined, mixed, enveloped.” implĭco (inpl- ), āvi,
ātum, or (twice in Cic., and freq. since the Aug. per.) ŭi, ĭtum (v. Neue,
Formenl. 2, 550 sq.), 1, v. a. in-plico, to fold into; hence, I.to infold,
involve, entangle, entwine, inwrap, envelop, encircle, embrace, clasp, grasp
(freq. and class.; cf.: irretio, impedio). I. Lit.: “involvulus in pampini
folio se,” Plaut. Cist. 4, 2, 64: “ut tenax hedera huc et illuc Arborem
implicat errans,” Cat. 61, 35; cf. id. ib. 107 sq.: “et nunc huc inde huc
incertos implicat orbes,” Verg. A. 12, 743: “dextrae se parvus Iulus
Implicuit,” id. ib. 2, 724; cf.: “implicuit materno bracchia collo,” Ov. M. 1,
762: “implicuitque suos circum mea colla lacertos,” id. Am. 2, 18, 9:
“implicuitque comam laevā,” grasped, Verg. A. 2, 552: “sertis comas,” Tib. 3,
6, 64: “crinem auro,” Verg. A. 4, 148: “frondenti tempora ramo,” id. ib. 7,
136; cf. Ov. F. 5, 220: in parte inferiore hic implicabatur caput, Afran. ap.
Non. 123, 16 (implicare positum pro ornare, Non.): “aquila implicuit pedes
atque unguibus haesit,” Verg. A. 11, 752: “effusumque equitem super ipse
(equus) secutus Implicat,” id. ib. 10, 894: “congressi in proelia totas Implicuere
inter se acies,” id. ib. 11, 632: “implicare ac perturbare aciem,” Sall. J. 59,
3: “(lues) ossibus implicat ignem,” Verg. A. 7, 355.—In part. perf.: “quini
erant ordines conjuncti inter se atque implicati,” Caes. B. G. 7, 73, 4:
“Canidia brevibus implicata viperis Crines,” Hor. Epod. 5, 15: “folium
implicatum,” Plin. 21, 17, 65, § 105: “intestinum implicatum,” id. 11, 4, 3, §
9: “impliciti laqueis,” Ov. A. A. 2, 580: “Cerberos implicitis angue minante
comis,” id. H. 9, 94: “implicitamque sinu absstulit,” id. A. A. 1, 561:
“impliciti Peleus rapit oscula nati,” held in his arms, Val. Fl. 1, 264. II.
Trop. A. In gen., to entangle, implicate, involve, envelop, engage: “di
immortales vim suam ... tum terrae cavernis includunt, tum hominum naturis
implicant,” Cic. Div. 1, 36, 79: “contrahendis negotiis implicari,” id. Off. 2,
11, 40: “alienis (rebus) nimis implicari molestum esse,” id. Lael. 13, 45:
“implicari aliquo certo genere cursuque vivendi,” id. Off. 1, 32, 117:
“implicari negotio,” id. Leg. 1, 3: “ipse te impedies, ipse tua defensione
implicabere,” Cic. Verr. 2, 2, 18, § 44; cf.: multis implicari erroribus, id.
Tusc. 4, 27, 58: “bello,” Verg. A. 11, 109: “eum primo incertis implicantes
responsis,” Liv. 27, 43, 3: “nisi forte implacabiles irae vestrae implicaverint
animos vestros,” perplexed, confounded, id. 40, 46, 6: “paucitas in partitione
servatur, si genera ipsa rerum ponuntur, neque permixte cum partibus
implicantur,” are mingled, mixed up, Cic. Inv. 1, 22, 32: ut omnibus copiis
conductis te implicet, ne ad me iter tibi expeditum sit, Pompei. ap. Cic. Att.
8, 12, D, 1: “tanti errores implicant temporum, ut nec qui consules nec quid
quoque anno actum sit digerere possis,” Liv. 2, 21, 4.—In part. perf.: “dum rei
publicae quaedam procuratio multis officiis implicatum et constrictum tenebat,”
Cic. Ac. 1, 3, 11: “Deus nullis occupationibus est implicatus,” id. N. D. 1,
19, 51; cf.: “implicatus molestis negotiis et operosis,” id. ib. 1, 20, 52:
“animos dederit suis angoribus et molestiis implicatos,” id. Tusc. 5, 1, 3:
“Agrippina morbo corporis implicata,” Tac. A. 4, 53: “inconstantia tua cum
levitate, tum etiam perjurio implicata,” Cic. Vatin. 1, 3; cf. id. Phil. 2, 32,
81: “intervalla, quibus implicata atque permixta oratio est,” id. Or. 56, 187:
“(voluptas) penitus in omni sensu implicata insidet,” id. Leg. 1, 17, 47: “quae
quatuor inter se colligata atque implicata,” id. Off. 1, 5, 15: “natura non tam
propensus ad misericordiam quam implicatus ad severitatem videbatur,” id. Rosc.
Am. 30, 85; “and in the form implicitus, esp. with morbo (in morbum): quies
necessaria morbo implicitum exercitum tenuit,” Liv. 3, 2, 1; 7, 23, 2; 23, 40,
1: “ubi se quisque videbat Implicitum morbo,” Lucr. 6, 1232: “graviore morbo
implicitus,” Caes. B. C. 3, 18, 1; cf.: “implicitus in morbum,” Nep. Ages. 8,
6; Liv. 23, 34, 11: “implicitus suspicionibus,” Plin. Ep. 3, 9, 19; cf.:
“implicitus terrore,” Luc. 3, 432: “litibus implicitus,” Hor. A. P. 424:
“implicitam sinu abstulit,” Ov. A. A. 1, 562: “(vinum) jam sanos implicitos
facit,” Cael. Aur. Acut. 3, 8, 87.— B. In partic., to attach closely, connect
intimately, to unite, join; in pass., to be intimately connected, associated,
or related: “(homo) profectus a caritate domesticorum ac suorum serpat longius
et se implicet primum civium, deinde mortalium omnium societate,” Cic. Fin. 2,
14, 45: “omnes qui nostris familiaritatibus implicantur,” id. Balb. 27, 60:
“(L. Gellius) ita diu vixit, ut multarum aetatum oratoribus implicaretur,” id.
Brut. 47, 174: “quibus applicari expediet, non implicari,” Sen. Ep. 105, 5.— In
part. perf.: “aliquos habere implicatos consuetudine et benevolentia,” Cic.
Fam. 6, 12, 2: “implicatus amicitiis,” id. Att. 1, 19, 8: “familiaritate,” id.
Pis. 29, 70: “implicati ultro et citro vel usu diuturno vel etiam officiis,”
id. Lael. 22, 85. —Hence, 1. implĭcātus (inpl- ), a, um, P. a., entangled,
perplexed, confused, intricate: “nec in Torquati sermone quicquam implicatum
aut tortuosum fuit,” Cic. Fin. 3, 1, 3: “reliquae (partes orationis) sunt
magnae, implicatae, variae, graves, etc.,” id. de Or. 3, 14, 52: vox rauca et
implicata, Sen. Apocol. med. — Comp.: “implicatior ad loquendum,” Amm. 26, 6,
18. — Sup.: “obscurissima et implicatissima quaestio,” Gell. 6, 2, 15: “ista
tortuosissima et implicatissima nodositas,” Aug. Conf. 2, 10 init.— 2.
im-plĭcĭtē (inpl- ), adv., intricately (rare): “non implicite et abscondite,
sed patentius et expeditius,” Cic. Inv. 2, 23, 69. -- “Implicare” adds to these
usages the idea of an unforeseen difficulty, i. e. a hint of “impedire,” and
even of deceit, i. e. a hint of “fallere.” Why imply what you can exply? Cf.
subreptitious. subreption (n.)"act of obtaining a favor by fraudulent
suppression of facts," c. 1600, from Latin subreptionem (nominative subreptio), noun of action from past-participle
stem of subripere, surripere (see surreptitious).
Related: Subreptitious. surreptitious
(adj.)mid-15c., from Latin surrepticius "stolen, furtive,
clandestine," from surreptus, past
participle of surripere "seize
secretly, take away, steal, plagiarize," from assimilated form of sub "from under" (hence,
"secretly;" see sub-) + rapere "to snatch" (see rapid). Related: Surreptitiously. The source of the philosophers’s usage of
‘implicare’ is a passage from Aristotle’s “De Int.” on the contrariety of proposition
A and E (14.23b25–27), in which “implicita” (that sould be ‘com-plicita,’ and
‘the emissor complicates that p”) renders Gk. “sum-pepleg-menê,” “συμ-πεπλεγμένη,”
f. “sum-plek-ein,” “συμ-πλέϰein,” “to bind together,” as in ‘com-plicatio,’
complication, and Sidonius’s ‘complicature,’ and Grice’s ‘complicature,’ as in
‘temperature,’ from ‘temperare.’ “One problem with P. F. Strawson’s exegesis of
J. L. Austin is the complicature is brings.” This is from the same family or
field as “sum-plokê,” “συμ-πλοϰή,” which Plato (Pol. 278b; Soph. 262c) uses for
the ‘second articulation,’ the “com-bination” of sounds (phone) that make up a
word (logos), and, more philosophically interesting, for ‘praedicatio,’ viz.,
the interrelation within a ‘logos’ or ‘oratio’ of a noun, or onoma or nomen, as
in “the dog,” and a verb, or rhema, or verbum, -- as in ‘shaggisising’ -- that
makes up a propositional complex, as “The dog is shaggy,” or “The dog
shaggisises.” (H. P. Grice, “Verbing from adjectiving.”). In De Int. 23b25-27,
referring to the contrariety of A and O, Aristotle, “let’s grant it” – as Grice
puts it – “is hardly clear.” Aristotle writes: “hê de tou hoti kakon to agathon
SUM-PEPLEG-MENÊ estin.” “Kai gar hoti ouk agathon anagkê isôs hupolambanein ton
auton.”“ἡ δὲ τοῦ ὅτι ϰαϰὸν τὸ ἀγαθὸν συμπεπλεγμένη ἐστίν.”“ϰαὶ γὰϱ ὅτι οὐϰ ἀγαθὸν
ἀνάγϰη ἴσως ὑπολαμϐάνειν τὸν αὐτόν.” Back in Rome, Boethius thought of bring
some gravitas to this. “Illa vero quae est,” Boethius goes,” Quoniam malum est
quod est bonum, IMPLICATA est. Et enim: “Quoniam non bonum est.” necesse est
idem ipsum opinari (repr. in Aristoteles latinus, 2.1–2.4–6. In a later vulgar
Romance, we have J. Tricot). “Quant au jugement, “Le bon est mal” ce n’est en
réalité qu’une COMBINAISON de jugements, cars sans doute est-il nécessaire de
sous-entendre en même temps “le bon n’est pas le bon.” Cf. Mill on ‘sous-entendu’
of conversation. This was discussed by H. P. Grice in a tutorial with
Reading-born English philosopher J. L. Ackrill at St. John’s. With the help of H. P. Grice, J. L. Ackrill
tries to render Boethius into the vernacular (just to please Austin) as
follows. “Hê de tou hoti kakon to agathon SUM-PEPLEG-MENÊ estin, kai gar hoti
OUK agathon ANAGKê isôs hupo-lambanein ton auton” “Illa vero quae est, ‘Quoniam
malum est quod est bonum,’ IMPLICATA est, et enim, ‘Quoniam non bonum est,’ necesse
est idem ipsum OPINARI. In the vernacular: “The belief expressed by the
proposition, ‘The good is bad,’ is COM-PLICATED or com-plex, for the same person
MUST, perhaps, suppose also the proposition, ‘The good it is not good.’” Aristotle
goes on, “For what kind of utterance is “The good is not good,” or as they say
in Sparta, “The good is no good”? Surely otiose. “The good” is a Platonic
ideal, a universal, separate from this or that good thing. So surely, ‘the
good,’ qua idea ain’t good in the sense that playing cricket is good. But
playing cricket is NOT “THE” good: philosophising is.” H. P. Grice found
Boethius’s commentary “perfectly elucidatory,” but Ackrill was perplexed, and
Grice intended Ackrill’s perplexity to go ‘unnoticed’ (“He is trying to
communicate his perplexity, but I keep ignoring it.” For Ackrill was
surreptitiously trying to ‘correct’ his tutor. Aristotle, Acrkill thought, is
wishing to define the ‘contrariety’ between two statements or opinions, or not
to use a metalanguage second order, that what is expressed by ‘The good is bad’
is a contrarium of what is expressed by ‘The good is no good.’” Aristotle starts,
surely, from a principle. The principle states that a maximally false
proposition, set in opposition to a maximally true proposition (such as “The
good is good”), deserves the name “contraria” – and ‘contrarium’ to what is
expressed by it. In a second phase, Aristotle then tries to demonstrate, in a
succession of this or that stage, that ‘The good is good’ understood as a
propositio universalis dedicativa – for all x, if x is (the) good, x is good (To
agathon agathon estin,’ “Bonum est bonum”) is a maximally true proposition.” And
the reason for this is that “To agathon agathon estin,” or “Bonum bonum est,”
applies to the essence (essentia) of “good,” and ‘predicates’ “the same of the
same,” tautologically. Now consider Aristotle’s other proposition “The good is
the not-bad,” the correlative E form, For all x, if x is good, x is not bad. This
does not do. This is not a maximally true proposition. Unlike “The good is
good,” The good is not bad” does not apply to the essence of ‘the good,’ and it
does not predicate ‘the same of the same’ tautologically. Rather, ‘The good is
not bad,’ unless you bring one of those ‘meaning postulates’ that Grice rightly
defends against Quine in “In defense of a dogma,” – in this case, (x)(Bx iff
~Gx) – we stipulate something ‘bad’ if it ain’t good -- is only true notably
NOT by virtue of a necessary logical implication, but, to echo my tutor, by
implicature, viz. by accident, and not by essence (or essential) involved in
the ‘sense’ of either ‘good’ or ‘bad,’ or ‘not’ for that matter. Surely Aristotle
equivocates slightly when he convinced Grice that an allegedly maximally false
proposition (‘the good is bad’) entails or yields the negation of the same
attribute, viz., ‘The good is not good,’ or more correctly, ‘It is not the case
that the good is good,’ for this is axiomatically contradictory, or
tautologically and necessarily false without appeal to any meaning postulate.
For any predicate, Fx and ~Fx. The question then is one of knowing whether ‘The
good is bad’ deserves to be called the contrary proposition (propositio
contraria) of ‘The good is good.’ Aristotle notes that the proposition, ‘The
good is bad,’ “To agathon kakon estin,” “Bonum malum est,” is NOT the maximally
false proposition opposed to the maximally true, tautological, and empty, proposition,
“The good is good,” ‘To agathon agathon estin,’ “Bonum bonum est.” “Indeed,
“the good is bad” is sumpeplegmenê, or COMPLICATA. What the emissor means is a
complicatum, or as Grice preferred, a ‘complicature. Grice’s complicature
(roughly rendered as ‘complification’) condenses all of the moments of the
transition from the simple idea of a container (cum-tainer) to the “modern”
ideas of implication, Grice’s implicature, and prae-suppositio. The ‘propositio
complicate,’ is, as Boethius puts it, duplex, or equivocal. The proposition has a double meaning – one explicit, the
other implicit. “A ‘propositio complicata’ contains within itself [“continet in
se, intra se”]: bonum non est.” Boethius then goes rightly to conclude (or
infer), or stipulate, that only a “simplex” proposition, not a propositio
complicata, involving some ‘relative clause,’ can be said to be contrary to
another -- Commentarii in librum Aristotelis Peri hermêneais, 219. Boethius’s
exegesis thesis is faithful to Aristotle. For Aristotle, nothing like “the good
is not bad,” but only the tautologically false “the good is not good,” or it is
not the case that the good is good, (to agathon agathon esti, bonum bonum est),
a propositio simplex, and not a propositio complicate, is the opposite (oppositum,
-- as per the ‘figura quadrata’ of ‘oppoista’ -- of “the good is good,” another
propositio simplex. Boethius’s analysis of “the good is bad,” a proposition
that Boethius calls ‘propositio complicate or ‘propositio implicita’ are
manifestly NOT the same as Aristotle’s. For Aristotle, the “doxa hoti kakon to
agathon [δόξα ὅτι ϰαϰὸν τὸ ἀγαθόν],” the opinion according to which the good is
bad, is only ‘contrary’ to “the good is good” to the extent that it “con-tains”
(in Boethius’s jargon) the tautologically false ‘The good is not good.’ For
Boethius, ‘The good is bad’ is contrary to ‘the good is good’ is to the extent
that ‘the good is bad’ contains, implicitly, the belief which Boethius
expresses as ‘Bonum NON est —“ cf. Grice on ‘love that never told can be” –
Featuring “it is not the case that,” the proposition ‘bonum non est’ is a
remarkably complicated expression in Latin, a proposition complicata indeed.
‘Bonum non est’ can mean, in the vernacular, “the good is not.” “Bonum non est”
can only be rendered as “there is nothing good.’ “Bonum non est’ may also be
rendered, when expanded with a repeated property, the tautologically false ‘The
good is not good” (Bonum non bonum est). Strangely, Abelard goes in the same
direction as Aristotle, contra Boethius. “The good is bad” (Bonum malum est) is “implicit” (propositio implicita or
complicate) with respect to the tautologically false ‘Bonum bonum non est’ “the
good is not good.”Abelardus, having read Grice – vide Strawson, “The influence
of Grice on Abelardus” -- explains clearly the meaning of “propositio
implicita”: “IMPLYING implicitly ‘bonum non bonum est,’ ‘the good is not good’
within itself, and in a certain wa containing it [“IM-PLICANS eam in se, et
quodammodo continens.” Glossa super Periermeneias, 99–100. But Abelard expands
on Aristotle. “Whoever thinks ‘bonum malum est,’ ‘the good is bad’ also thinks
‘bonum non bonum est,’ ‘the good is not good,’ whereas the reverse does not
hold true, i. e. it is not the case that whoever thinks the tautologically
false ‘the good is not good’ (“bonum bonum non est”) also think ‘the good is
bad’ (‘bonum malum est’). He may refuse to even ‘pronounce’ ‘malum’ (‘malum
malum est’) -- “sed non convertitur.” Abelard’s explanation is decisive for the
natural history of Grice’s implication. One can certainly express in terms of
“implication” what Abelard expresses when he notes the non-reciprocity or
non-convertibility of the two propositions. ‘The good is bad,’ or ‘Bonum malum
est’ implies or presupposes the tautologically true “the good is not good;’It
is not the case that the tautologically false “the good is not good” (‘Bonum
bonum non est’) implies ridiculous “the good is bad.” Followers of Aristotle
inherit these difficulties. Boethius and
Abelard bequeath to posterity an interpretation of the passage in Aristotle’s
“De Interpretatione” according to which “bonum malum est” “the good is bad” can
only be considered the ‘propositio opposita’ of the tautologically true ‘bonum
bonum est’ (“the good is good”) insofar as, a ‘propositio implicita’ or
‘relativa’ or ‘complicata,’ it contains the ‘propositio contradictoria, viz.
‘the good is not good,’ the tautologically false ‘Bonum non bonum est,’ of the
tautologically true ‘Bonum bonum est’ “the good is good.” It is this meaning of
“to contain a contradiction” that, in a still rather obscure way, takes up this
analysis by specifying a usage of “impliquer.” The first attested use in French
of the verb “impliquer” is in 1377 in Oresme, in the syntagm “impliquer
contradiction” (RT: DHLF, 1793). These same texts give rise to another
analysis. A propositio implicita or pregnant, or complicate, is a proposition
that “implies,” that is, that in fact contains two propositions, one
principalis, and the other relative, each a ‘propositio explicita,’ and that
are equivalent or equipollent to the ‘propositio complicata’ when paraphrased.
Consider. “Homo qui est albus est animal quod currit,” “A man who is white is
an animal who runs.” This ‘propositio complicate contains the the propositio
implicita, “homo est albus” (“a man is white”) and the propositio implicita,
“animal currit” (“an animal runs.”). Only
by “exposing” or “resolving” (via ex-positio, or via re-solutio) such an ‘propositio
complicata’ can one assign it a truth-value. “Omnis proposition implicita habet
duas propositiones explicitas.” “A proposition implicita “P-im” has (at least)
a proposition implicita P-im-1 and a different proposition implicita P-im-2.”
“Verbi gratia.” “Socrates est id quod est homo.” “Haec propositio IMplicita
aequivalet huic copulativae constanti ex duis propositionis explicitis. Socrates
est aliquid est illud est homo. Haec proposition est vera, quare et propositio
implicita vera. Every “implicit proposition” has two explicit propositions.”
“Socrates is something (aliquid) which is a man.” This implicit proposition,
“Socrates is something shich is a man,” is equivalent or equipoent to the
following conjunctive proposition made up of two now EXplicit propositions, to
wit, “Socrates is something,” and “That something is a man.” This latter
conjunctive proposition of the two explicit propositions is true. Therefore,
the “implicit” proposition is also true” (Tractatus implicitarum, in Giusberti –
Materiale per studum, 43). The two “contained” propositions are usually relative
propositions. Each is called an ‘implicatio.’ ‘Implicatio’ (rather than
‘implicitio’) becomes shorthand for “PROPOSITIO implicita.” An ‘implicatio’
becomes one type of ‘propositio
exponibilis,’ i. e. a proposition that is to be “exposed” or paraphrased for its
form or structure to be understood. In
the treatises of Terminist logic, one chapter is by custom devoted to the
phenomenon of “restrictio,” viz. a restriction in the denotation or the
suppositio of the noun (v. SUPPOSITION). A relative expression (an
implication), along with others, has a restrictive function (viz., “officium
implicandi”), just like a sub-propositional expression like an adjective or a
participle. Consider. “A man, Grice, who
argues, runs to the second base.” “Man,”
because of the relative expression or clause “who runs,” is restricted to
denoting the present time (it is not Grice, who argues NOW but ran YESTERDAY).
Moreover there is an equivalence or equipolence between the relative expression
“qui currit” and the present participle “currens.” Running Grice argues. Grice
who runs argues. Summe metenses, Logica modernorum, 2.1:464. In the case in
which a relative expression is restrictive, its function is to “leave something
that is constant,” “aliquid pro constanti relinquere,” viz., to produce a pre-assertion
that conditions the truth of the main super-ordinate assertion without being
its primary object or topic or signification or intentio. “Implicare est pro
constanti et involute aliquid significare.” “Ut cum dicitur homo qui est albus
currit.” “Pro constanti” dico, quia
praeter hoc quod assertitur ibi cursus de homine, aliquid datur intelligi,
scilicet hominem album; “involute” dico quia praeter hoc quod ibi proprie et
principaliter significatur hominem currere, aliquid intus intelligitur,
scilicet hominem esse album. Per hoc patet quod implicare est intus plicare. Id
enim quod intus “plicamus” sive “ponimus,” pro constanti relinquimus. Unde
implicare nil aliud est quam subiectum sub aliqua dispositione pro constanti
relinquere et de illo sic disposito aliquid affirmare. Ackrill translates to
Grice: “To imply” is to signify something by stating it as constant, and in a pretty
‘hidden’ manner – “involute.” When I state that the man
runs, I state, stating it as constant, because, beyond (“praeter”) the main
supra-ordinate assertion or proposition that predicates the running of the man,
my addressee is given to understand something else (“aliquid intus
intelligitur”), viz. that the man is white; This is communicated in a hidden
manner (“involute”) because, beyond (“praeter”) what is communicated (“significatur”)
primarily, principally (“principaliter”) properly (“proprie”), literally, and
explicitly, viz. that the man is running, we are given to understand something
else (“aliquid intus intelligutur”) within (“intus”), viz. that the man is white. It follows from this that implicare is
nothing other than what the form of the expression literally conveys, intus
plicare (“folded within”). What we fold
or state within, we leave as a constant.
It follows from this that “to imply” is nothing other than leaving
something as a constant in the subject (‘subjectum’), such that the subject (subjectum,
‘homo qui est albus”) is under a certain disposition, and that it is only under
this disposition that something about the subjectum is affirmed” -- De
implicationibus, Nota, 100) For the record: while Giusberti (“Materiale per
studio,” 31) always reads “pro constanti,” the MSS occasionally has the pretty
Griciean “precontenti.” This is a case of what the “Logique du Port-Royal”
describes as an “in-cidental” assertion. The situation is even more complex,
however, insofar as this operation only relates to one usage of a relative
proposition, viz. when the proposition is restrictive. A restriction can
sometimes be blocked, or cancelled, and the reinscriptions are then different
for a nonrestrictive and a restrictive
relative proposition. One such case of a blockage is that of “false
implication” (Johnson’s ‘paradox of ‘implicatio’) as in “a [or the] man who is
a donkey runs,” (but cf. the centaur, the man who is a horse, runs) where there
is a conflict (“repugnantia”) between what the determinate term itself denotes
(homo, man) and the determination (ansinus, donkey). The truth-values of a proposition
containing a relative clause or propositio thus varies according to whether it
is restrictive, and of composite meaning, as in “homo, qui est albus, currit”
(A man, who is white, runs), or non-restrictive, and of divided meaning, as in
“Homo currit qui est albus” (Rendered in the vernacular in the same way, the
Germanic languages not having the syntactic freedom the classical languages do:
A man, who is white, is running. When the relative is restrictive, as in “Homo,
qui est albus, curris”, the propositio implicits only produces one single
assertion, since the relative corresponds to a pre-assertion. Thus, it is the
equivalent, at the level of the underlying form, to a proposition conditionalis
or hypothetical. Only in the second case can there be a “resolution” of the proposition
implicita into the pair of this and that ‘propositio explicita, to wit, “homo
currit,” “homo est albus.”—and an equipolence
between the complex proposition implicita and the conjunction of the first
proposition explicita and the second proposition explicitta. Homo currit et
ille est albus. So it is only in this second case of proposition irrestrictiva that one can say that “Homo currit, qui est
albus implies “Homo currit,” and “Homo est albus” and therefore, “Homo qui est
albus currit.” The poor grave Romans are having trouble with Grecisms. The
Grecist vocabulary of implication is both disparate and systematic, in a
Griceian oxymoronic way. The grave Latin “implicare” covers and translates an
extremely varied Grecian field of expressions ready to be botanized, that bears
the mark of heterogeneous rather than systematic operations, whether one is
dealing Aristotle or the Stoics. The passage through grave Roman allows us to
understand retrospectively the connection in Aristotle’s jargon between the “implicatio”
of the “propositio implicita,” sum-pepleg-menê, as an interweaving or
interlacing, and conclusive or con-sequential implicatio, sumperasma, “συμπέϱασμα,”
or “sumpeperasmenon,” “συμπεπεϱασμένον,” “sumpeperasmenê,” “συμπεπεϱασμένη,” f.
perainein, “πεϱαίνein, “to limit,” which is the jargon Aristotle uses in the
Organon to denote the conclusion of a syllogism (Pr. Anal. 1.15.34a21–24). If
one designates as A the premise, tas protaseis, “τὰς πϱοτάσεις,” and as B the
con-clusion, “to sumperasma,” συμπέϱασμα.” Cf. the Germanic puns with
‘closure,’ etc. When translating
Aristotle’s definition of the syllogism at Prior Analytics 1.1.24b18–21, Tricot
chooses to render as the “con-sequence” Aristotle’s verb “sum-bainei,” “συμ-ϐαίνει,”
that which “goes with” the premise and results from it. A syllogism is a
discourse, “logos,” “λόγος,” in which, certain things being stated, something
other than what is stated necessarily results simply from the fact of what is
stated. Simply from the fact of what is stated, I mean that it is because of
this that the consequence is obtained, “legô de tôi tauta einai to dia tauta
sumbainei,” “λέγω δὲ τῷ ταῦτα εἶναι τὸ διὰ ταῦτα συμϐαίνει.” (Pr. Anal. 1.1,
24b18–21). To make the connection with “implication,” though, we also have to
take into account, as is most often the case, the Stoics’ own jargon. What the
Stoics call “sumpeplegmenon,” “συμπεπλεγμένον,” is a “conjunctive” proposition;
e. g. “It is daytime, and it is light” (it is true both that A and that B). The
conjunctive is a type of molecular proposition, along with the “conditional”
(sunêmmenon [συνημμένον] -- “If it is daytime, it is light”) and the
“subconditional” (para-sunêmmenon [παϱασυνημμένον]; “SINCE it is daytime, it is
light”), and the “disjunctive” (diezeugmenon [διεζευγμένον] -- “It is daytime, or it is night.” Diog. Laert.
7.71–72; cf. RT: Long and Sedley, A35, 2:209 and 1:208). One can see that there
is no ‘implicatio’ in the conjunctive, whereas there is one in the ‘sunêmmenon’
(“if p, q”), which constitutes the Stoic expression par excellence, as distinct
from the Aristotelian categoric syllogism.Indeed, it is around the propositio conditionalis
that the question and the vocabulary of ‘implicatio’ re-opens. The Aristotelian
sumbainein [συμϐαίνειν], which denotes the accidental nature of a result,
however clearly it has been demonstrated (and we should not forget that
sumbebêkos [συμϐεϐηϰός] denotes accident; see SUBJECT, I), is replaced by “akolouthein”
[ἀϰολουθεῖν] (from the copulative a- and keleuthos [ϰέλευθος], “path” [RT:
Chantraine, Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque, s.v. ἀϰόλουθος]),
which denotes instead being accompanied by a consequent conformity. This
connector, i. e. the “if” (ei, si) indicates that the second proposition, the
con-sequens (“it is light”) follows (akolouthei [ἀϰολουθεῖ]) from the first
(“it is daytime”) (Diog. Laert, 7.71). Attempts, beginning with Philo or
Diodorus Cronus up to Grice and Strawson to determine the criteria of a “valid”
conditional (to hugies sunêmmenon [τὸ ὑγιὲς συνημμένον] offer, among other
possibilities, the notion of emphasis [ἔμφασις], which Long and Sedley
translate as “G. E. Moore’s entailment” and Brunschwig and Pellegrin as
“implication” (Sextus Empiricus, The Skeptic Way, in RT: Long and Sedley, The
Hellenistic Philosophers, 35B, 2:211 and 1:209), a term that is normally used
to refer to a reflected image and to the force, including rhetorical force, of
an impression. Elsewhere, this “emphasis” is explained in terms of dunamis [δύναμις],
of “virtual” content (“When we have the premise which results in a certain
conclusion, we also have this conclusion virtually [dunamei (δυνάμει)] in the
premise, even if it is not explicitly indicated [kan kat’ ekphoran mê legetai (ϰἂν
ϰατ̕ ἐϰφοϱὰν μὴ λέγεται)], Sextus Empiricus, Against the Grammarians 8.229ff., D.
L. Blank, 49 = RT: Long and Sedley, G36 (4), 2:219 and 1:209)—where connecting
the different usages of “implication” creates new problems. One has to understand
that the type of implicatio represented by the proposition conditionalis
implies, in the double usage of “contains implicitly” and “has as its
consequence,” the entire Stoic system. It is a matter of to akolouthon en zôêi
[τὸ ἀϰόλουθον ἐν ζωῇ], “consequentiality in life,” or ‘rational life, as Grice
prefers, as Long and Sedley translate it (Stobeus 2.85.13 = RT: Long and Sedley,
59B, 2:356; Cicero prefers “congruere,” (congruential) De finibus 3.17 = RT:
Long and Sedley, 59D, 2:356). It is akolouthia [ἀϰολουθία] that refers to the
conduct con-sequent upon itself that is the conduct of the wise man, the chain
of causes defining will or fate, and finally the relationship that joins the
antecedent to the con-sequent in a true proposition. Goldschmidt, having cited
Bréhier (Le système stoïcien), puts the emphasis on antakolouthia [ἀνταϰολουθία],
a Stoic neologism that may be translated as “reciprocal” implicatio,” and that
refers specifically to the solidarity of virtues (antakolouthia tôn aretôn [ἀνταϰολουθία
τῶν ἀϱετῶν], Diog. Laert. 7.125; Goldschmidt, as a group that would be
encompassed by dialectical virtue, immobilizing akolouthia in the absolute
present of the wise man. “Implicatio” is, in the final analysis, from then on,
the most literal name of the Stoic system. Refs.: Aristotle. Anal. Pr.. ed. H. Tredennick, in Organon, Harvard; Goldschmidt, Le système
stoïcien et l’idée de temps. Paris: Vrin, Sextus Empiricus. Against the
Grammarians, ed. D. L. Blank. Oxford: Oxford. END OF INTERLUDE. Now for
“Implication”/“Implicature.” Implicatura was used by Sidonius in a letter (that
Grice found funny) and used by Grice in seminars on conversational helpfulness
at Oxford. Grice sets out the basis of a systematic approach to communication,
viz, concerning the relation between a proposition p and a proposition q in a
conversational context. The need is felt by Sidonius and Grice for
‘implicature,’ tdistinct from “implication,” insofar as “implication” is used
for a relation between a proposition p and a proposition q, whereas an
“implicature” is a relation between this or that statement, within a given
context, that results from an EMISSOR having utterered an utterance (thereby
explicitly conveying that p) and thereby implicitly conveying and implicating
that q. Grice thought the distinction was ‘frequently ignored by Austin,’ and
Grice thought it solved a few problems, initially in G. A. Paul’s
neo-Wttigensteinian objections to Price’s causal theory of perception (“The
pillar box seems red to me; which does not surprise me, seeing that it is
red”). An “implication” is a relation
bearing on the truth or falsity of this or that proposition (e. g. “The pillar
box seems red” and, say, “The pillar box MAY NOT be red”) whereas an “implicature”
brings an extra meaning to this or that statement it governs (By uttering “The
pillar box seems red” thereby explicitly conveying that the pillar box seems
red, the emissor implicates in a cancellable way that the pillar box MAY NOT be
red.”). Whenever “implicature” is determined according to its context (as at
Collections, “Strawson has beautiful handwriting; a mark of his character. And
he learned quite a bit in spite of the not precisely angelic temperament of his
tutor Mabbott”) it enters the field of pragmatics, and therefore has to be
distinguished from a presupposition. Implicatio simpliciter is a relation
between two propositions, one of which is the consequence of the other (Quine’s
example: “My father is a bachelor; therefore, he is male”). An equivalent of “implication”
is “entailment,” as used by Moore. Now, Moore was being witty. ‘Entail’ is
derived from “tail” (Fr. taille; ME entaill or entailen = en + tail), and prior
to its logical use, the meaning of “entailment” is “restriction,” “tail” having
the sense of “limitation.” As Moore explains in his lecture: “An entailment is
a limitation on the transfer or handing down of a property or an inheritance.
*My* use of ‘entailment’ has two features in common with the Legalese that
Father used to use; to wit: the handing down of a property; and; the limitation
on one of the poles of this transfer. As I stipulate we should use “entailment”
(at Cambridge, but also at Oxford), a PROPERTY is transferred from the
antecedent to the con-sequent. And also, normally in semantics, some LIMITATION
(or restriction, or ‘stricting,’ or ‘relevancing’) on the antecedent is
stressed.” The mutation from the legalese to Moore’s usage explicitly occurs by
analogy on the basis of these two shared common elements. Now, Whitehead had
made a distinction between a material (involving a truth-value) implication and
formal (empty) implication. A material implication (“if,” symbolized by the
horseshoe “ ⊃,” because “it resembles an arrow,”
Whitehead said – “Some arrow!” was Russell’s response) is a Philonian
implication as defined semantically in terms of a truth-table by Philo of
Megara. “If p, q” is false only when the antecedent is true and the con-sequent
false. In terms of a formalization of communication, this has the flaw of
bringing with it a counter-intuitive feeling of ‘baffleness’ (cf. “The pillar
box seems red, because it is”), since a false proposition implies materially
any proposition: If the moon is made of green cheese, 2 + 2 = 4. This “ex falso
quodlibet sequitur” has a pedigreed history. For the Stoics and the Megarian
philosophers, “ex falso quodlibet sequitur” is what distinguishes Philonian
implication and Diodorean implication. It traverses the theory of consequence
and is ONE of the paradoxes of material implication that is perfectly summed up
in these two rules of Buridan: First, if P is false, Q follows from P; Second, if
P is true, P follows from Q (Bochenski, History of Formal Logic). A formal (empty)
implication (see Russell, Principles of Mathematics, 36–41) is a universal
conditional implication: Ɐx (Ax ⊃ Bx), for any x, if
Ax, then Bx. Different means of resolving the paradoxes of implication have
been proposed. All failed except Grice’s. An American, C. I. Lewis’s “strict”
implication (Lewis and Langford, Symbolic Logic) is defined as an implication
that is ‘reinforced’ such that it is impossible for the antecedent to be true
and the con-sequent false. Unfortunately, as Grice tells Lewis in a
correspondence, “your strict implication, I regret to prove, has the same
alleged flaw as the ‘material’ implication that your strict implication was
meant to improve on. (an impossible—viz., necessarily false—proposition strictly
implies any proposition). The relation of entailment introduced by Moore in
1923 is a relation that seems to avoid this or that paradox (but cf. Grice,
“Paradoxes of entailment, followed by paradoxes of implication – all
conversationally resolved”) by requiring a derivation of the antecedent from
the con-sequent. In this case, “If 2 + 2 = 5, 2 + 3 = 5” is false, since the
con-sequent is stipulated not be derivable from the antecedent. Occasionally,
one has to call upon the pair “entailment”/“implication” in order to
distinguish between an implication in qua material implication and an
implication in Moore’s usage (metalinguistic – the associated material
implication is a theorem), which is also sometimes called “relevant” if not
strictc implication (Anderson and Belnap, Entailment), to ensure that the
entire network of expressions is covered. Along with this first series of
expressions in which “entailment” and “implication” alternate with one another,
there is a second series of expressions that contrasts two kinds of
“implicature,” or ‘implicata.’ “Implicature” (Fr. implicature, G. Implikatur)
is formed from “implicatio” and the suffix –ture, which expresses, as Grice
knew since his Clifton days, a ‘resultant aspect,’ ‘aspectum resultativus’ (as
in “signature”; cf. L. temperatura, from temperare). “Implicatio” may be thought as derived from
“to imply” (if not ‘employ’) and “implicature” may be thought as deriving from
“imply”’s doulet, “to implicate” (from L. “in-“ + “plicare,” from plex; cf. the
IE. plek), which has the same meaning. Some mistakenly see Grice’s
“implicature” as an extension and modification of the concept of presupposition,
which differs from ‘material’ implication in that the negation of the
antecedent implies the consequent (the question “Have you stopped beating your
wife?” presupposes the existence of a wife in both cases). An implicature
escapes the paradoxes of material implication from the outset. In fact, Grice,
the ever Oxonian, distinguishes “at least” two kinds of implicature,
conventional and non-conventional, the latter sub-divided into non-conventional
non-converastional, and non-conventional conversational. A non-conventional
non-conversational implicatum may occur in a one-off predicament. A Conventional
implicature and a conventional implicatum is practically equivalent, Strawson
wrongly thought, to presupposition prae-suppositum, since it refers to the
presuppositions attached by linguistic convention to a lexical item or
expression. E. g. “Mary EVEN loves
Peter” has a relation of conventional implicature to “Mary loves other entities
than Peter.” This is equivalent to: “ ‘Mary EVEN loves Peter’ presupposes ‘Mary
loves other entities than Peter.’ With this kind of implicature, we remain
within the expression, and thus the semantic, field. A conventional
implicature, however, is surely different from a material implicatio. It does
not concern the truth-values. With conversational implicature, we are no longer
dependent on this or that emissum, but move into pragmatics (the area that
covers the relation between statements and contexts. Grice gives the following
example: If, in answer to A’s question about how C is getting on in his new job
at a bank, B utters, “Well, he likes his colleagues, and he hasn’t been to in
prison yet,” what B implicates by the proposition that it is not the case that
C has been to prison yet depends on the context. It compatible with two very
different contexts: one in which C, naïve as he is, is expected to be entrapped
by unscrupulous colleagues in some shady deal, or, more likely, C is well-known
by A and B to tend towards dishonesty (hence the initial question). References:
Abelard, Peter. Dialectica. Edited by L. M. De Rijk. Assen, Neth.: Van Gorcum,
1956. 2nd rev. ed., 1970. Glossae super Periermeneias. Edited by Lorenzo
Minio-Paluello. In TwelfthCentury Logic: Texts and Studies, vol. 2,
Abelaerdiana inedita. Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 1958. Anderson,
Allan Ross, and Nuel Belnap. Entailment: The Logic of Relevance and Necessity.
Vol. 1. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1975. Aristotle. De
interpretatione. English translation by J. L. Ackrill: Aristotle’s Categories
and De interpretatione. Notes by J. L. Ackrill. Oxford: Clarendon, 1963. French
translation by J. Tricot: Organon. Paris: Vrin, 1966. Auroux, Sylvain, and
Irène Rosier. “Les sources historiques de la conception des deux types de
relatives.” Langages 88 (1987): 9–29. Bochenski, Joseph M. A History of Formal
Logic. Translated by Ivo Thomas. New York: Chelsea, 1961. Boethius. Aristoteles
latinus. Edited by Lorenzo Minio-Paluello. Paris: Descleé de Brouwer, 1965.
Translation by Lorenzo Minio-Paluello: The Latin Aristotle. Toronto: Hakkert,
1972. Commentarii in librum Aristotelis Peri hermêneias. Edited by K. Meiser.
Leipzig: Teubner, 1877. 2nd ed., 1880. De Rijk, Lambertus Marie. Logica
modernorum: A Contribution to the History of Early Terminist Logic. 2 vols.
Assen, Neth.: Van Gorcum, 1962–67. “Some
Notes on the Mediaeval Tract De insolubilibus, with the Edition of a Tract
Dating from the End of the Twelfth-Century.” Vivarium 4 (1966): 100–103. Giusberti,
Franco. Materials for a Study on Twelfth-Century Scholasticism. Naples, It.:
Bibliopolis, 1982. Grice, H. P. “Logic and Conversation.” In Syntax and
Semantics 3: Speech Acts, edited by P. Cole and J. Morgan, 41–58. New York:
Academic Press, 1975. (Also in The Logic of Grammar, edited by D. Davidson and
G. Harman, 64–74. Encino, CA: Dickenson, 1975.) Lewis, Clarence Irving, and
Cooper Harold Langford. Symbolic Logic. New York: New York Century, 1932. Meggle,
Georg. Grundbegriffe der Kommunikation. 2nd ed. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1997. Meggle,
Georg, and Christian Plunze, eds. Saying, Meaning, Implicating. Leipzig: Leipziger
Universitätsverlag, 2003. Moore, G. E.. Philosophical Studies. London: Kegan
Paul, 1923. Rosier, I. “Relatifs et relatives dans les traits terministes des
XIIe et XIIIe siècles: (2) Propositions relatives (implicationes), distinction
entre restrictives et non restrictives.” Vivarium 24: 1 (1986): 1–21. Russell,
Bertrand. The Principles of Mathematics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1903. Speranza, Luigi. Join the Grice Club! Strawson, P. F.. “On Referring.”
Mind 59 (1950): 320–44.
incorrigibility: On WoW: 142, Grice refers to the ‘authority’ of the
utterer as a ‘rational being’ to DEEM that an M-intention is an antecedent
condition for his act of meaning. Grice uses ‘privilege’ as synonym for
‘authority’ here. But not in the phrase ‘privileged access.’ His point is not
so much about the TRUTH (which ‘incorrigibility’ suggests), but about the
DEEMING. It is part of the authority or privilege of the utterer as rational to
provide an ACCEPTABLE assignment of an M-intention behind his utterance.
Indicatum.
Οριστική oristike
Inferentia.
Cf. illatio. Consequentia. Implicatio. Grice’s implicature and what the emissor
implicates as a variation on the logical usage.
Infinite-off
predicament, or ∞-off predicament.
inscriptum -- inscriptionalism -- nominalism. While Grice pours scorn
on the American School of Latter-Day
Nominalists, nominalism, as used by Grice is possibly a misnomer. He
doesn’t mean Occam, and Occam did not use ‘nominalismus.’ “Terminimus’ at most.
So one has to be careful. The implicature is that the nominalist calls a ‘name’
what others shouldn’t. Mind, Grice had
two nominalist friends: S. N. Hamphsire (Scepticism and meaning”) and A. M.
Quinton, of the play group! In “Properties and classes,” for the Aristotelian
Society. And the best Oxford philosophical stylist, Bradley, is also a
nominalist. There are other, more specific arguments against universals.
One is that postulating such things leads to a vicious infinite regress. For
suppose there are universals, both monadic and relational, and that when an
entity instantiates a universal, or a group of entities instantiate a
relational universal, they are linked by an instantiation relation. Suppose now
that a instantiates the universal F. Since there
are many things that instantiate many universals, it is plausible to suppose
that instantiation is a relational universal. But if instantiation is a
relational universal, when a instantiates F, a, F and
the instantiation relation are linked by an instantiation relation. Call this
instantiation relation i2 (and suppose it, as is
plausible, to be distinct from the instantiation relation (i1)
that links a and F). Then since i2 is
also a universal, it looks as if a, F, i1 and i2 will
have to be linked by another instantiation relation i3,
and so on ad infinitum. (This argument has its source in Bradley
1893, 27–8.)
insinuation insinuate. A bit of linguistic botany, “E implicates that
p” – implicate to do duty for, in alphabetic order: mean, suggest, hint,
insinuate, indicate, implicitly convey, indirectly convey, imply.
intensionalism: Grice finds a way to relieve a predicate that is vacuous
from the embarrassing consequence of denoting or being satisfied by the empty
set. Grice exploits the nonvoidness of a predicate which is part of the
definition of the void predicate. Consider the vacuous predicate:‘... is
married to a daughter of an English queen and a pope.'The class '... is a
daugther of an English queen and a pope.'is co-extensive with the
predicate '... stands in relation to a sequence composed of the
class married to, daughters, English queens, and popes.'We correlate the
void predicate with the sequence composed of relation R, the set ‘married
to,’ the set ‘daughters,’ the set ‘English queens,’ and the set ‘popes.'Grice
uses this sequence, rather than the empty set, to determine the explanatory
potentiality of a void predicate. The admissibility of a nonvoid predicate
in an explanation of a possible phenomenon (why it would happen if it did
happen) may depends on the availability of a generalisation whithin which the
predicate specifies the antecedent condition. A non-trivial
generalisations of this sort is certainly available if derivable from some
further generalisation involving a less specific antecedent condition,
supported by an antecedent condition that is specified by means a nonvoid
predicate.
intentionalism: Cf. Suppes’s specific section. when Anscombe comes out
with her “Intention,” Grice’s Play Group does not know what to do. Hampshire is
almost finished with his “Thought and action” that came out the following year.
Grice is lecturing on how a “dispositional” reductive analysis of ‘intention’
falls short of his favoured instrospectionalism. Had he not fallen for an
intention-based semantics (or strictly, an analysis of "U means that
p" in terms of U intends that p"), Grice would be obsessed with
an analysis of ‘intending that …’ James makes an observation about the
that-clause. I will that the distant table slides over the floor toward me. It
does not. The Anscombe Society. Irish-born Anscombe’s views are often discussed
by Oxonian philosophers. She brings Witters to the Dreaming Spires, as it
were. Grice is especially connected with Anscombes reflections on intention. While
he favoures an approach such as that of Hampshire in Thought and Action, Grice borrows
a few points from Anscombe, notably that of direction of fit, originally Austin’s. Grice
explicitly refers to Anscombe in “Uncertainty,” and in his reminiscences he
hastens to add that Anscombe would never attend any of the Saturday mornings of
the play group, as neither does Dummett. The view of Ryle is standardly
characterised as a weaker or softer version of behaviourism According to this
standard interpretation, the view by Ryle is that a statements containin this
or that term relating to the ‘soul’ can be translated, without loss of meaning,
into an ‘if’ utterance about what an agent does. So Ryle, on this account, is
to be construed as offering a dispositional analysis of a statement about the
soul into a statement about behaviour. It is conceded that Ryle does not
confine a description of what the agent does to purely physical behaviour—in
terms, e. g. of a skeletal or a muscular description. Ryle is happy to speak of
a full-bodied action like scoring a goal or paying a debt. But the soft
behaviourism attributed to Ryle still attempts an analysis or translation of
statement about the soul into this or that dispositional statement which is
itself construed as subjunctive if describing what the agent does. Even this
soft behaviourism fails. A description of the soul is not analysable or
translatable into a statement about behaviour or praxis even if this
is allowed to include a non-physical descriptions of action. The list of
conditions and possible behaviour is infinite since any one proffered
translation may be ‘defeated,’ as Hart and Hall would say, by a slight
alteration of the circumstances. The defeating condition in any particular case
may involve a reference to a fact about the agent’s soul, thereby rendering the
analysis circular. In sum, the standard interpretation of Ryle construes him as
offering a somewhat weakened form of reductive behaviourism whose reductivist
ambition, however weakened, is nonetheless futile. This characterisation
of Ryle’s programme is wrong. Although it is true that he is keen to point out
the disposition behind this or that concept about the soul, it would be wrong
to construe Ryle as offering a programme of analysis of a ‘soul’ predicate in
terms of an ‘if’ utterance. The relationship between a ‘soul’ predicate and the
‘if’ utterance with which he unpack it is other than that required by this kind
of analysis. It is helpful to keep in mind that Ryle’s target is the
official doctrine with its eschatological commitment. Ryle’s argument serves to
remind one that we have in a large number of cases ways of telling or settling
disputes, e. g., about someone’s character or intellect. If A disputes a
characterisation of Smith as willing that p, or judging that p, B may point to
what Smith says and does in defending the attribution, as well as to features
of the circumstances. But the practice of giving a reason of this kind to
defend or to challenge an ascription of a ‘soul’ predicates would be put under
substantial pressure if the official doctrine is correct. For Ryle to
remind us that we do, as a matter of fact, have a way of settling disputes
about whether Smith wills that he eat an apple is much weaker than saying that
the concept of willing is meaningless unless it is observable or verifiable; or
even that the successful application of a soul predicate requires that we have
a way of settling a dispute in every case. Showing that a concept is one for
which, in a large number of cases, we have an agreement-reaching procedure,
even if it do not always guarantee success, captures an important point,
however: it counts against any theory of, e. g., willing that would render it
unknowable in principle or in practice whether or not the concept is
correctly applied in every case. And this is precisely the problem with the
official doctrine (and is still a problem, with some of its progeny. Ryle
points out that there is a form of dilemma that pits the reductionist against
the dualist: those whose battle-cry is ‘nothing but…’ and those who insist
on ‘something else as well.’ Ryle attempts a dissolution of the dilemma by
rejecting the two horns; not by taking sides with either one, though part of
what dissolution requires in this case, as in others, is a description of how
each side is to be commended for seeing what the other side does not, and
criticised for failing to see what the other side does. The attraction of
behaviourism, Ryle reminds us, is simply that it does not insist on an occult
happening as the basis upon which a ‘soul’ term is given meaning, and points to
a perfectly observable criterion that is by and large employed when we are
called upon to defend or correct our employment of a ‘soul’ term. The problem
with behaviourism is that it has a too-narrow view both of what counts as
behaviour and of what counts as observable. Then comes Grice to play with
meaning and intending, and allowing for deeming an avowal of this or that souly
state as, in some fashion, incorrigible. For Grice, while U does have, ceteris
paribus privileged access to each state of his soul, only his or that avowal of
this or that souly state is deemed incorrigible. This concerns communication as
involving intending. Grice goes back to this at Brighton. He plays with G
judges that it is raining, G judges that G judges that it is raining. Again,
Grice uses a subscript: “G judges2 that it is raining.” If now G
expresses that it is raining, G judges2 that it is raining. A
second-order avowal is deemed incorrigible. It is not surprising the the
contemporary progeny of the official doctrine sees a behaviourist in Grice. Yet
a dualist is badly off the mark in his critique of Grice. While Grice does
appeal to a practice and a habif, and even the more technical ‘procedure’ in
the ordinary way as ‘procedure’ is used in ordinary discussion. Grice does not
make a technical concept out of them as one expect of some behavioural
psychologist, which he is not. He is at most a philosophical psychologist, and
a functionalist one, rather than a reductionist one. There is nothing in any
way that is ‘behaviourist’ or reductionist or physicalist about Grice’s talk.
It is just ordinary talk about behaviour. There is nothing exceptional in
talking about a practice, a customs, or a habit regarding communication. Grice
certainly does not intend that this or that notion, as he uses it, gives anything
like a detailed account of the creative open-endedness of a
communication-system. What this or that anti-Griceian has to say IS essentially
a diatribe first against empiricism (alla Quine), secondarily against a Ryle-type
of behaviourism, and in the third place, Grice. In more reasoned and dispassionate
terms, one would hardly think of Grice as a behaviourist (he in fact rejects
such a label in “Method”), but as an intentionalist. When we call Grice an
intentionalist, we are being serious. As a modista, Grice’s keyword is
intentionalism, as per the good old scholastic ‘intentio.’ We hope so. This is
Aunt Matilda’s conversational knack. Grice keeps a useful correspondence with
Suppes which was helpful. Suppes takes Chomsky more seriously than an Oxonian
philosopher would. An Oxonian philosopher never takes Chomsky too seriously. Granted,
Austin loves to quote “Syntactic Structures” sentence by sentence for fun,
knowing that it would never count as tutorial material. Surely “Syntactic
Structures” would not be a pamphlet a member of the play group would use to
educate his tutee. It is amusing that when he gives the Locke lectures, Chomsky
cannot not think of anything better to do but to criticise Grice, and citing him
from just one reprint in the collection edited by, of all people, Searle. Some
gratitude. The references are very specific to Grice. Grice feels he needs to
provide, he thinks, an analysis ‘mean’ as metabolically applied to an expression.
Why? Because of the implicatum. By uttering x (thereby explicitly conveying
that p), U implicitly conveys that q iff U relies on some procedure in his and
A’s repertoire of procedures of U’s and A’s communication-system. It is this
talk of U’s being ‘ready,’ and ‘having a procedure in his repertoire’ that
sounds to New-World Chomsky too Morrisian, as it does not to an Oxonian.
Suppes, a New-Worlder, puts himself in Old-Worlder Grice’s shoes about this. Chomsky
should never mind. When an Oxonian philosopher, not a psychologist, uses ‘procedure’
and ‘readiness,’ and having a procedure in a repertoire, he is being Oxonian
and not to be taken seriously, appealing to ordinary language, and so on.
Chomsky apparently does get it. Incidentally, Suppess has defended Grice
against two other targets, less influential. One is Hungarian-born J. I. Biro,
who does not distinguish between reductive analysis and reductionist analysis,
as Grice does in his response to Somervillian Rountree-Jack. The other target
is perhaps even less influential: P. Yu in a rather simplistic survey of the
Griceian programme for a journal that Grice finds too specialized to count, “Linguistics
and Philosophy.” Grice is always ashamed and avoided of being described as “our
man in the philosophy of language.” Something that could only have happened in
the Old World in a red-brick university, as Grice calls it. Suppes contributes to PGRICE with an
excellent ‘The primacy of utterers meaning,’ where he addresses what he rightly
sees as an unfair characterisations of Grice as a behaviourist. Suppes’s use of
“primacy” is genial, since its metabole which is all about. Biro actually responds
to Suppes’s commentary on Grice as proposing a reductive but not reductionist
analysis of meaning. Suppes rightly characterises Grice as an Oxonian ‘intentionalist’
(alla Ogden), as one would characterize Hampshire, with philosophical
empiricist, and slightly idealist, or better ideationalist, tendencies, rather.
Suppes rightly observes that Grice’ use of such jargon is meant to impress. Surely
there are more casual ways of referring to this or that utterer having a basic
procedure in his repertoire. It is informal and colloquial, enough, though, rather
than behaviouristically, as Ryle would have it. Grice is very happy that in the
New World Suppes teaches him how to use ‘primacy’ with a straight face! Intentionalism
is also all the vogue in Collingwood reading Croce, and Gardiner reading Marty
via Ogden, and relates to expression. In his analysis of intending Grice is
being very Oxonian, and pre-Austinian: relying, just to tease leader Austin, on
Stout, Wilson, Bosanquet, MacMurray, and Pritchard. Refs.: There are two sets
of essays. An early one on ‘disposition and intention,’ and the essay for The
British Academy (henceforth, BA). Also his reply to Anscombe and his reply to
Davidson. There is an essay on the subjective condition on intention.
Obviously, his account of communication has been labeled the ‘intention-based
semantic’ programme, so references under ‘communication’ above are useful.
BANC.
izzing: under ‘conjunctum,’ we see that there is an alternative
vocabulary, of ‘copulatum.’ But Grice prefers to narrow the use of ‘copula’ to
izzing’ and ‘hazzing.’ Oddly, Grice sees izzing as a ‘predicate,’ and
symbolises it as Ixy. While he prefers ‘x izzes y,’ he also uses ‘x izz y.’
Under izzing comes Grice’s discussion of essential predicate, essence, and
substance qua predicabilia (secondary substance). As opposed to ‘hazzing,’
which covers all the ‘ta sumbebeka,’ or ‘accidentia.’
labours: the twelve
labours of Grice. They are twelve. The first is Extensionalism. The second is
Nominalism. The third is Positivism. The fourth is Naturalism. The fifth is
Mechanism. The sixth is Phenomenalism. The seventh is Reductionism. The eighth
is physicalism. The ninth is materialism. The tenth is Empiricism. The eleventh
is Scepticism, and the twelfth is functionalism. “As
I thread my way unsteadily along the tortuous mountain path which is supposed
to lead, in the long distance, to the City of Eternal Truth, I find myself
beset by a multitude of demons and perilous places, bearing names like
Extensionalism, Nominalism, Positivism, Naturalism, Mechanism, Phenomenalism,
Reductionism, Physicalism, Materialism, Empiricism, Scepticism, and
Functionalism; menaces which are, indeed, almost as numerous as those
encountered by a traveller called Christian on another well-publicized
journey.”“The items named in this catalogue are obviously, in many cases, not
to be identified with one another; and it is perfectly possible to maintain a
friendly attitude towards some of them while viewing others with hostility.” “There are many persons, for example, who view Naturalism
with favour while firmly rejecting Nominalism.”“And it is not easy to see how
anyone could couple support for Phenomenalism with support for
Physicalism.”“After a more tolerant (permissive) middle age, I have come to
entertain strong opposition to all of them, perhaps partly as a result of the
strong connection between a number of them and the philosophical technologies
which used to appeal to me a good deal more than they do now.“But how would I
justify the hardening of my heart?” “The
first question is, perhaps, what gives the list of items a unity, so that I can
think of myself as entertaining one
twelve-fold antipathy, rather than twelve discrete antipathies.” “To this question my answer is that all the items are forms
of what I shall call Minimalism, a
propensity which seeks to keep to a minimum (which may in some cases be zero)
the scope allocated to some advertised philosophical commodity, such as
abstract entities, knowledge, absolute value, and so forth.”“In weighing the
case for and the case against a trend of so high a degree of generality as
Minimalism, kinds of consideration may legitimately enter which would be out of
place were the issue more specific in character; in particular, appeal may be
made to aesthetic considerations.”“In favour of Minimalism, for example, we
might hear an appeal, echoing Quine, to the beauty of ‘desert landscapes.’”“But
such an appeal I would regard as inappropriate.”“We are not being asked by a
Minimalist to give our vote to a special, and no doubt very fine, type of
landscape.”“We are being asked to express our preference for an ordinary sort
of landscape at a recognizably lean
time; to rosebushes and cherry-trees in
mid-winter, rather than in spring or summer.”“To change the image somewhat,
what bothers me about whatI am being offered is not that it is bare, but that
it has been systematically and relentlessly undressed.”“I am also adversely
influenced by a different kind of unattractive feature which some, or perhaps
even all of these betes noires seem to possess.”“Many of them are guilty of
restrictive practices which, perhaps, ought to invite the attention of a Philosophical
Trade Commission.”“They limit in advance the range and resources of
philosophical explanation.”“They limit its range by limiting the kinds of
phenomena whose presence calls for explanation.”“Some prima-facie candidates
are watered down, others are washed away.”“And they limit its resources by
forbidding the use of initially tempting apparatus, such as the concepts
expressed by psychological, or more generally intensional, verbs.”“My own
instincts operate in a reverse direction from this.”“I am inclined to look
first at how useful such and such explanatory ideas might prove to be if
admitted, and to waive or postpone enquiry into their certificates of
legitimacy.”“I am conscious that all I have so far said against Minimalsim has
been very general in character, and also perhaps a little tinged with
rhetoric.”“This is not surprising in view of the generality of the topic.”“But
all the same I should like to try to make some provision for those in search of
harder tack.”“I can hardly, in the present context, attempt to provide fully
elaborated arguments against all, or even against any one, of the diverse items
which fall under my label 'Minimalism.’”“The best I can do is to try to give a
preliminary sketch of what I would regard as the case against just one of the
possible forms of minimalism, choosing one which I should regard it as
particularly important to be in a position to reject.”“My selection is
Extensionalism, a position imbued with the spirit of Nominalism, and dear both
to those who feel that 'Because it is red' is no more informative as an answer
to the question 'Why is a pillar-box called ‘red’?' than would be 'Because he
is Grice' as an answer to the question 'Why is that distinguished-looking
person called "Grice"?', and also to those who are particularly
impressed by the power of Set-theory.”“The picture which, I suspect, is liable
to go along with Extensionalism is that of the world of particulars as a domain
stocked with innumerable tiny pellets, internally indistinguishable from one
another, butdistinguished by the groups within which they fall, by the 'clubs'
to which they belong; and since the clubs are distinguished only by their
memberships, there can only be one club to which nothing belongs.”“As one might
have predicted from the outset, this leads to trouble when it comes to the
accommodation of explanation within such a system.”“Explanation of the actual
presence of a particular feature in a particular subject depends crucially on
the possibility of saying what would be the consequence of the presence of such
and such features in that subject, regardless of whether the features in
question even do appear in that subject, or indeed in any subject.”“On the face
of it, if one adopts an extensionalist view-point, the presence of a feature in
some particular will have to be re-expressed in terms of that particular's
membership of a certain set.”“But if we proceed along those lines, since there
is only one empty set, the potential
consequences of the possession of in fact unexemplified
features would be invariably the same, no matter how different in meaning the
expressions used to specify such features would ordinarily be judged to
be.”“This is certainly not a conclusion which one would care to accept.”“I can
think of two ways of trying to avoid its acceptance, both of which seem to me
to suffer from serious drawbacks.”
linguistic botany: Feeling Byzanthine. Possibly the only occasion when Grice
engaged in systematic botany. Like Hare, he would just rather ramble around. It
was said of Hare that he was ‘of a different world.’ In the West Country, he
would go with his mother to identify wild flowers, and they identied “more than
a hundred.” Austin is not clear about ‘botanising.’ Grice helps. Grice was a
meta-linguistic botanist. His point was to criticise ordinary-language
philosophers criticising philosophers. Say: Plato and Ayer say that episteme is
a kind of doxa. The contemporary, if dated, ordinary-language philosopher
detects a nuance, and embarks risking collision with the conversational facts
or data: rushes ahead to exploit the nuance without clarifying it, with wrong
dicta like: What I known to be the case I dont believe to be the case. Surely,
a cancellable implicatum generated by the rational principle of conversational
helpfulness is all there is to the nuance. Grice knew that unlike the
ordinary-language philosopher, he was not providing a taxonomy or description,
but a theoretical explanation. To not all philosophers analysis fits them to a
T. It did to Grice. It did not even fit Strawson. Grice had a natural talent
for analysis. He could not see philosophy as other than conceptual analysis.
“No more, no less.” Obviously, there is an evaluative side to the claim that
the province of philosophy is to be identified with conceptual analysis. Listen
to a theoretical physicist, and hell keep talking about concepts, and even
analysing them! The man in the street may not! So Grice finds himself fighting
with at least three enemies: the man in the street (and trying to reconcile
with him: What I do is to help you), the
scientists (My conceptual analysis is meta-conceptual), and synthetic
philosophers who disagree with Grice that analysis plays a key role in
philosophical methodology. Grice sees this as an update to his post-war Oxford
philosophy. But we have to remember that back when he read that paper, post-war
Oxford philosophy, was just around the corner and very fashionable. By the time
he composed the piece on conceptual analysis as overlapping with the province
of philosophy, he was aware that, in The New World, anaytic had become, thanks
to Quine, a bit of an abusive term, and that Grices natural talent for
linguistic botanising (at which post-war Oxford philosophy excelled) was not
something he could trust to encounter outside Oxford, and his Play Group! Since
his Negation and Personal identity Grice is concerned with reductive analysis.
How many angels can dance on a needles point? A needless point? This is Grices
update to his Post-war Oxford philosophy. More generally concerned with the
province of philosophy in general and conceptual analysis beyond ordinary
language. It can become pretty technical. Note the Roman overtone of province.
Grice is implicating that the other province is perhaps science, even folk
science, and the claims and ta legomena of the man in the street. He also likes
to play with the idea that a conceptual enquiry need not be philosophical.
Witness the very opening to Logic and conversation, Prolegomena. Surely not all
inquiries need be philosophical. In fact, a claim to infame of Grice at the
Play Group is having once raised the infamous, most subtle, question: what is
it that makes a conceptual enquiry philosophically interesting or important? As
a result, Austin and his kindergarten spend three weeks analysing the distinct
inappropriate implicata of adverbial collocations of intensifiers like highly
depressed, versus very depressed, or very red, but not highly red, to no avail.
Actually the logical form of very is pretty complicated, and Grice seems to minimise
the point. Grices moralising implicature, by retelling the story, is that he
has since realised (as he hoped Austin knew) that there is no way he or any
philosopher can dictate to any other philosopher, or himself, what is it that
makes a conceptual enquiry philosophically interesting or important. Whether it
is fun is all that matters. Refs.: The main references are meta-philosophical,
i. e. Grice talking about linguistic botany, rather than practicing it. “Reply
to Richards,” and the references under “Oxonianism” below are helpful. For
actual practice, under ‘rationality.’ There is a specific essay on linguistic
botanising, too. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
lit. hum. (philos.): While Grice would take tutees under different curricula, he
preferred Lit. Hum. So how much philosophy did this include. Plato, Aristotle,
Locke, Kant, and Mill. And that was mainly it. We are referring to the
‘philosophy’ component. Ayer used to say that he would rather have been a
judge. But at Oxford of that generation, having a Lit. Hum. perfectly qualified
you as a philosopher. And people like Ayer, who would rather be a juddge, end
up being a philosopher after going through the Lit. Hum. Grice himself comes as
a “Midlands scholarship boy” straight from Clifton on a classics scholarship,
and being from the Midlands, straight to Corpus. The fact that he got on so
well with Hardie helped. The fact that his interim at Merton worked was good.
The fact that the thing at Rossall did NOT work was good. The fact that he
becamse a fellow at St. John’s OBVIOUSLY helped. The fact that he had Strawson
as a tutee ALSO helped helped. H. P. Grice, Literae Humaniores (Philosophy),
Oxon.
logical form: What other form is there? Grammatical? Surface versus deep
structure? God knows. It’s not even clear with Witters! Grice at least has a
theory. You draw a skull to communicate there is danger. So you are concerned
with the logical form of “there is danger.” An exploration on logical form can
start and SHOULD INCLUDE what Grice calls the ‘one-off predicament,” of an open
GAIIB.” To use Carruthers’s example and Blackburn: You draw an arrow to have
your followers choose one way on the fork of the road. The logical form is that
of the communicatum. The emissor means that his follower should follow the left
path. What is the logical form of this? It may be said that “p” has a simplex
logical form, the A is B – predicate calculus, or ‘predicative’ calculus, as
Starwson more traditionally puts it! Then there is molecular complex logical
form with ‘negation,’ ‘and’, ‘or’, and ‘if.’. you can’t put it in symbols, it’s
not worth saying. Oh, no, if you can put it in symbols, it’s not worth saying.
Grice loved the adage, “quod per litteras demonstrare volumus, universaliter
demonstramus.”
low-subjective contraster: in WoW: 140, Grice distinguishes between a subjective
contraster (such as “The pillar box seems red,” “I see that the pillar box is
red,” “I believe that the pillar box is red” and “I know that the pillar box is
red”) and an objective contraster (“The pillar box is red.”) Within these
subjective contraster, Grice proposes a sub-division between nonfactive
(“low-subjective”) and (“high-subjective”). Low-subjective contrasters are “The
pillar box seems red” and “I believe that the pillar box is red,” which do NOT
entail the corresponding objective contraster. The high-subjective contraster,
being factive or transparent, does. The entailment in the case of the
high-subjective contraster is explained via truth-coniditions: “A sees that the
pillar box is red” and “A knows that the pillar box is red” are analysed ‘iff’
the respective low-subjective contraster obtains (“The pillar box seems red,”
and “A believes that the pillar box is red”), the corresponding objective
contraster also obtains (“The pillar box is red”), and a third condition
specifying the objective contraster being the CAUSE of the low-subjective
contraster. Grice repeats his account of suprasegmental. Whereas in “Further
notes about logic and conversation,” he had focused on the accent on the
high-subjective contraster (“I KNOW”), he now focuses his attention on the
accent on the low subjective contraster. “I BELIEVE that the pillar box is
red.” It is the accented version that gives rise to the implicatum, generated
by the utterer’s intention that the addressee’s will perceive some restraint or
guardedness on the part of the utterer of ‘going all the way’ to utter a claim
to ‘seeing’ or ‘knowing’, the
high-subjective contraster, but stopping short at the low-subjective
contraster.
martian conversational implicatum: “Oh, all the difference in the world!” Grice
converses with a Martian. About Martian x-s that the pillar box is
red. (upper x-ing organ) Martian y-s that the pillar box is red. (lower y-ing
organ). Grice: Is x-ing that the pillar box is red LIKE y-ing that the
pillar-box is red? Martian: Oh, no; there's all the difference in the world!
Analogy x smells sweet. x tastes sweet. Martian x-s the the pillar box is
red-x. Martian y-s that the pillar box is red-y. Martian x-s the pillar box is
medium red. Martian y-s the pillar box is light red.
maximum: Grice uses ‘maximum’ variously. “Maximally effective
exchange of information.” Maximum is used in decision theory and in value
theory. Cfr. Kasher on maximin. “Maximally effective exchange of information”
(WOW: 28) is the exact phrase Grice uses, allowing it should be generalised. He
repeats the idea in “Epilogue.” Things did not change.
mentatum: Grice prefers psi-transmission. He knows that ‘mentatum’
sounds too much like ‘mind,’ and the mind is part of the ‘rational soul,’ not
even encompassing the rational pratical soul. If perhaps Grice was unhappy
about the artificial flavour to saying that a word is a sign, Grice surely
should have checked with all the Grecian-Roman cognates of mean, as in his
favourite memorative-memorable distinction, and the many Grecian realisations,
or with Old Roman mentire and mentare. Lewis and Short have
“mentĭor,” f. mentire, L and S note, is prob. from root men-, whence mens and
memini, q. v. The original meaning, they say, is to invent, hence, but
alla Umberto Eco with sign, mentire comes to mean in later use what Grice (if
not the Grecians) holds is the opposite of mean. Short and Lewis render mentire
as to lie, cheat, deceive, etc., to pretend, to declare falsely: mentior nisi
or si mentior, a form of asseveration, I am a liar, if, etc.: But also,
animistically (modest mentalism?) of things, as endowed with a mind. L and S go
on: to deceive, impose upon, to deceive ones self, mistake, to lie or speak
falsely about, to assert falsely, make a false promise about; to feign,
counterfeit, imitate a shape, nature, etc.: to devise a falsehood, to
assume falsely, to promise falsely, to invent, feign, of a poetical
fiction: “ita mentitur (sc. Homerus), Trop., of inanim. grammatical
Subjects, as in Semel fac illud, mentitur tua quod subinde tussis, Do what your
cough keeps falsely promising, i. e. die, Mart. 5, 39, 6. Do what your cough
means! =imp. die!; hence, mentĭens, a fallacy, sophism: quomodo
mentientem, quem ψευδόμενον vocant, dissolvas;” mentītus, imitated,
counterfeit, feigned (poet.): “mentita tela;” For “mentior,” indeed, there is a
Griceian implicatum involving rational control. The rendition of mentire as to
lie stems from a figurative shift from to be mindful, or inventive, to
have second thoughts" to "to lie, conjure up". But Grice would
also have a look at cognate “memini,” since this is also cognate with “mind,”
“mens,” and covers subtler instances of mean, as in Latinate, “mention,” as in
Grices “use-mention” distinction. mĕmĭni, cognate with "mean" and
German "meinen," to think = Grecian ὑπομένειν, await (cf. Schiffer,
"remnants of meaning," if I think, I hesitate, and therefore re-main,
cf. Grecian μεν- in μένω, Μέντωρ; μαν- in μαίνομαι, μάντις; μνᾶ- in μιμνήσκω,
etc.; cf.: maneo, or manere, as in remain. The idea, as Schiffer well
knows or means, being that if you think, you hesitate, and therefore, wait and
remain], moneo, reminiscor [cf. reminiscence], mens, Minerva, etc. which L and
S render as “to remember, recollect, to think of, be mindful of a
thing; not to have forgotten a person or thing, to bear in mind (syn.:
reminiscor, recordor).” Surely with a relative clause, and to make mention
of, to mention a thing, either in speaking or writing (rare but
class.). Hence. mĕmĭnens, mindful And then Grice would have a look at
moneo, as in adMONish, also cognate is “mŏnĕo,” monere, causative from the root
"men;" whence memini, q. v., mens (mind), mentio (mention); lit. to
cause to think, to re-mind, put in mind of, bring to ones recollection; to
admonish, advise, warn, instruct, teach (syn.: hortor, suadeo, doceo). L
and S are Griceian if not Grecian when they note that ‘monere’ can be used
"without the accessory notion [implicatum or entanglement, that is] of
reminding or admonishing, in gen., to teach, instruct, tell, inform, point
out; also, to announce, predict, foretell, even if also to
punish, chastise (only in
Tacitus): “puerili verbere moneri.” And surely, since he loved to re-minisced,
Grice would have allowed to just earlier on just minisced. Short and Lewis
indeed have rĕmĭniscor, which, as they point out, features the root men; whence
mens, memini; and which they compare to comminiscere, v. comminiscor, to recall
to mind, recollect, remember (syn. recordor), often used by the Old
Romans with with Grices beloved that-clause, for sure. For what is
the good of reminiscing or comminiscing, if you cannot reminisce that Austin
always reminded Grice that skipping the dictionary was his big mistake! If
Grice uses mention, cognate with mean, he loved commenting Aristotle. And
commentare is, again, cognate with mean. As opposed to the development of the
root in Grecian, or English, in Roman the root for mens is quite represented in
many Latinate cognates. But a Roman, if not a Grecian, would perhaps be puzzled
by a Grice claiming, by intuition, to retrieve the necessary and sufficient
conditions for the use of this or that expression. When the Roman is told that
the Griceian did it for fun, he understands, and joins in the fun! Indeed,
hardly a natural kind in the architecture of the world, but one that fascinated
Grice and the Grecian philosophers before him! Communication.
meta-ethics: Grice is ‘meta-ethically’ an futilitarian, since he
provides a utilitarian backing of Kantian rationalism, within his empiricist,
naturalist, temperament. For Grice it is complicated, since there is an ethical
or practical side even to an eschatological argument. Grice’s views on ethics
are Oxonian. At Oxford, meta-ethics is a generational thing: there’s Grice, and
the palaeo-Gricieans, and the post-Gricieans. There’s Hampshire, and Hare, and
Nowell-Smith, and Warnock. P. H. Nowell Smith felt overwhelmed by Grice’s
cleverness and they would hardly engage in meta-ethical questions. But Nowell
Smith felt that Grice was ‘too clever.’ Grice objected Hare’s use of
descriptivism and Strawsons use of definite descriptor. Grice preferred to say
“the the.”. “Surely Hare is wrong when sticking with his anti-descriptivist
diatribe. Even his dictum is descriptive!” Grice was amused that it all started
with Abbott BEFORE 1879, since Abbott’s first attempt was entitled, “Kant’s
theory of ethics, or practical philosophy” (1873). ”! Grices explorations on
morals are language based. With a substantial knowledge of the classical
languages (that are so good at verb systems and modes like the optative, that
English lacks), Grice explores modals like should, (Hampshire) ought to
(Hare) and, must (Grice ‒ necessity). Grice is well aware of Hares
reflections on the neustic qualifications on the phrastic. The imperative has
usually been one source for the philosophers concern with the language of morals. Grice
attempts to balance this with a similar exploration on good, now regarded as
the value-paradeigmatic notion par excellence. We cannot understand, to
echo Strawson, the concept of a person unless we understand the concept of a
good person, i.e. the philosopher’s conception of a good person.
Morals is very Oxonian. There were in Grices time only three chairs of
philosophy at Oxford: the three W: the Waynflete chair of metaphysical
philosophy, the Wykeham chair of logic (not philosophy, really), and the White
chair of moral philosophy. Later, the Wilde chair of philosophical
psychology was created. Grice was familiar with Austin’s cavalier attitude
to morals as Whites professor of moral philosophy, succeeding Kneale. When
Hare succeeds Austin, Grice knows that it is time to play with the neustic
implicatum! Grices approach to morals is very meta-ethical and starts with
a fastidious (to use Blackburns characterisation, not mine!) exploration of
modes related to propositional phrases involving should, ought to, and
must. For Hampshire, should is the moral word par excellence. For
Hare, it is ought. For Grice, it is only must that preserves that sort of
necessity that, as a Kantian rationalist, he is looking for. However, Grice
hastens to add that whatever hell say about the buletic, practical or boulomaic
must must also apply to the doxastic must, as in What goes up must come down.
That he did not hesitate to use necessity operators is clear from his axiomatic
treatment, undertaken with Code, on Aristotelian categories of izzing and
hazzing. To understand Grices view on ethics, we should return to the idea
of creature construction in more detail. Suppose we are
genitors-demigods-designing living creatures, creatures Grice calls Ps. To
design a type of P is to specify a diagram and table for that type plus
evaluative procedures, if any. The design is implemented in animal stuff-flesh
and bones typically. Let us focus on one type of P-a very sophisticated type
that Grice, borrowing from Locke, calls very intelligent rational Ps. Let me be
a little more explicit, and a great deal more speculative, about the possible
relation to ethics of my programme for philosophical psychology. I shall
suppose that the genitorial programme has been realized to the point at which
we have designed a class of Ps which, nearly following Locke, I might call very
intelligent rational Ps. These Ps will be capable of putting themselves in the
genitorial position, of asking how, if they were constructing themselves with a
view to their own survival, they would execute this task; and, if we have done
our work aright, their answer will be the same as ours . We might, indeed,
envisage the contents of a highly general practical manual, which these Ps
would be in a position to compile. The contents of the initial manual would
have various kinds of generality which are connected with familiar discussions
of universalizability. The Ps have, so far, been endowed only with the
characteristics which belong to the genitorial justified psychological theory;
so the manual will have to be formulated in terms of that theory, together with
the concepts involved in the very general description of livingconditions which
have been used to set up that theory; the manual will therefore have conceptual
generality. There will be no way of singling out a special subclass of
addressees, so the injunctions of the manual will have to be addressed,
indifferently, to any very intelligent rational P, and will thus have
generality of form. And since the manual can be thought of as being composed by
each of the so far indistinguishable Ps, no P would include in the manual
injunctions prescribing a certain line of conduct in circumstances to which he
was not likely to be Subjects; nor indeed could he do so even if he would. So
the circumstances for which conduct is prescribed could be presumed to be such
as to be satisfied, from time to time, by any addressee; the manual, then, will
have generality of application. Such a manual might, perhaps, without
ineptitude be called an immanuel; and the very intelligent rational Ps, each of
whom both composes it and from time to time heeds it, might indeed be ourselves
(in our better moments, of course). Refs.: Most of Grice’s theorizing on ethics
counts as ‘meta-ethic,’ especially in connection with R. M. Hare, but also with
less prescriptivist Oxonian philosophers such as Nowell-Smith, with his
bestseller for Penguin, Austin, Warnock, and Hampshire. Keywords then are
‘ethic,’ and ‘moral.’ There are many essays on both Kantotle, i.e. on Aristotle
and Kant. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
modus: or mode. ἔγκλισις , enclisis,
mood of a verb, D.H.Comp.6, D.T.638.7, A.D. Synt.248.14, etc.Grice uses psi-asrisk, to be read asterisk-sub-psi. He is
not concerned with specficics. All the specifics the philosopher can take or
rather ‘assume’ as ‘given.’ The category of mode translates ‘tropos,’ modus.
Kant wrongly assumed it was Modalitat, which irritated Grice so much that he
echoed Kant as saying ‘manner’! Grice is a modista. He sometimes uses ‘modus,’
after Abbott. The earliest record is of course “Meaning.” After elucidating
what he calls ‘informative cases,’ he moves to ‘imperative’ ones. Grice agreed
with Thomas Urquhart that English needed a few more moods! Grice’s seven
modes.Thirteenthly, In lieu of six moods which other languages have at most,
this one injoyeth seven in its conjugable words. Ayer had said that
non-indicative utterances are hardly significant. Grice had been freely using
the very English not Latinate ‘mood’ until Moravcsik, of all people, corrects him: What
you mean ain’t a mood. I shall call it mode just to please you, J. M. E.
The sergeant is to muster the men at dawn is a perfect imperative. They shall
not pass is a perfect intentional. A version of this essay was presented in a
conference whose proceedings were published, except for Grices essay, due to
technical complications, viz. his idiosyncratic use of idiosyncratic
symbology! By mode Grice means indicative or imperative. Following
Davidson, Grice attaches probability to the indicative, via the doxastic, and
desirability to the indicative, via the buletic-boulomaic. He also
allows for mixed utterances. Probability is qualified with a suboperator
indicating a degree d; ditto for desirability, degree d. In some of the drafts,
Grice kept using mode until Moravsik suggested to him that mode was a better
choice, seeing that Grices modality had little to do with what other authors
were referring to as mood. Probability, desirability, and modality, modality, desirability,
and probability; modality, probability, desirability. He would use mode
operator. Modality is the more correct term, for things like should,
ought, and must, in that order. One sense. The doxastic modals are
correlated to probability. The buletic or boulomaic modals are correlated to
desirability. There is probability to a degree d. But there is also
desirability to a degree d. They both combine in Grices attempt to
show how Kants categorical imperative reduces to the hypothetical or
suppositional. Kant uses modality in a way that Grice disfavours, preferring
modus. Grice is aware of the use by Kant of modality qua category in the reduction
by Kant to four of the original ten categories in Aristotle). The Jeffrey-style
entitled Probability, desirability, and mode operators finds Grice at his
formal-dress best. It predates the Kant lectures and it got into so much detail
that Grice had to leave it at that. So abstract it hurts. Going further than
Davidson, Grice argues that structures expressing probability and desirability
are not merely analogous. They can both be replaced by more complex structures
containing a common element. Generalising over attitudes using the symbol ψ,
which he had used before, repr. WoW:v, Grice proposes G ψ that p. Further,
Grice uses i as a dummy for sub-divisions of psychological attitudes. Grice
uses Op supra i sub α, read: operation supra i sub alpha, as Grice was
fastidious enough to provide reading versions for these, and where α is a dummy
taking the place of either A or B, i. e. Davidsons prima facie or desirably,
and probably. In all this, Grice keeps using the primitive !, where a more
detailed symbolism would have it correspond exactly to Freges composite
turnstile (horizontal stroke of thought and vertical stroke of assertoric
force, Urteilstrich) that Grice of course also uses, and for which it is
proposed, then: !─p. There are generalising movements here but also merely
specificatory ones. α is not generalised. α is a dummy to serve as a
blanket for this or that specifications. On the other hand, ψ is indeed
generalised. As for i, is it generalising or specificatory? i is a dummy for
specifications, so it is not really generalising. But Grice generalises over
specifications. Grice wants to find buletic, boulomaic or volitive as he
prefers when he does not prefer the Greek root for both his protreptic and
exhibitive versions (operator supra exhibitive, autophoric, and operator supra
protreptic, or hetero-phoric). Note that Grice (WoW:110) uses the asterisk * as
a dummy for either assertoric, i.e., Freges turnstile, and non-assertoric, the
!─ the imperative turnstile, if you wish. The operators A are not mode
operators; they are such that they represent some degree (d) or measure of
acceptability or justification. Grice prefers acceptability because it connects
with accepting that which is a psychological, souly attitude, if a general one.
Thus, Grice wants to have It is desirable that p and It is believable
that p as understood, each, by the concatenation of three elements. The first
element is the A-type operator. The second element is the protreptic-type
operator. The third element is the phrastic, root, content, or proposition
itself. It is desirable that p and It is believable that p share the
utterer-oriented-type operator and the neustic or proposition. They only differ
at the protreptic-type operator (buletic/volitive/boulomaic or
judicative/doxastic). Grice uses + for concatenation, but it is best to use ^,
just to echo who knows who. Grice speaks in that mimeo (which he delivers in
Texas, and is known as Grices Performadillo talk ‒ Armadillo + Performative) of
various things. Grice speaks, transparently enough, of acceptance: V-acceptance
and J-acceptance. V not for Victory but for volitional, and J for judicative.
The fact that both end with -acceptance would accept you to believe that both
are forms of acceptance. Grice irritatingly uses 1 to mean the doxastic, and 2
to mean the bulematic. At Princeton in Method, he defines the doxastic in terms
of the buletic and cares to do otherwise, i. e. define the buletic in terms of
the doxastic. So whenever he wrote buletic read doxastic, and vice versa. One
may omits this arithmetic when reporting on Grices use. Grice uses two further
numerals, though: 3 and 4. These, one may decipher – one finds oneself as an
archeologist in Tutankamons burial ground, as this or that relexive attitude.
Thus, 3, i. e. ψ3, where we need the general operator ψ, not just
specificatory dummy, but the idea that we accept something simpliciter. ψ3
stands for the attitude of buletically accepting an or utterance: doxastically
accepting that p or doxastically accepting that ~p. Why we should be concerned
with ~p is something to consider. G wants to decide whether to believe p
or not. I find that very Griceian. Suppose I am told that there is a volcano in
Iceland. Why would I not want to believe it? It seems that one may want to
decide whether to believe p or not when p involves a tacit appeal to value.
But, as Grice notes, even when it does not involve value, Grice still needs trust
and volition to reign supreme. On the other hand, theres 4, as attached to an
attitude, ψ4. This stands for an attitude of buletically accepting an or
utterance: buletically accepting that p, or G buletically accepting that ~p, i.
e. G wants to decide whether to will, now that p or not. This indeed is
crucial, since, for Grice, morality, as with Kantotle, does cash in desire, the
buletic. Grice smokes. He wills to smoke. But does he will to will to smoke?
Possibly yes. Does he will to will to will to smoke? Regardless of what Grice
wills, one may claim this holds for a serious imperatives (not Thou shalt not
reek, but Thou shalt not kill, say) or for any p if you must (because if you
know that p causes cancer (p stands for a proposition involving cigarette) you
should know you are killing yourself. But then time also kills, so what gives?
So I would submit that, for Kant, the categoric imperative is one which allows
for an indefinite chain, not of chain-smokers, but of good-willers. If, for
some p, we find that at some stage, the P does not will that he wills that he
wills that he wills that, p can not be universalisable. This is proposed in an
essay referred to in The Philosophers Index but Marlboro Cigarettes took no
notice. One may go on to note Grices obsession on make believe. If I say, I
utter expression e because the utterer wants his addressee to believe that the
utterer believes that p, there is utterer and addresse, i. e. there are two
people here ‒ or any soul-endowed creature ‒ for Grices
squarrel means things to Grice. It even implicates. It miaows to me while I was
in bed. He utters miaow. He means that he is hungry, he means (via implicatum)
that he wants a nut (as provided by me). On another occasion he miaowes
explicating, The door is closed, and implicating Open it, idiot. On the other
hand, an Andy-Capps cartoon read: When budgies get sarcastic Wild-life
programmes are repeating One may note that one can want some other person
to hold an attitude. Grice uses U or G1 for utterer and A or G2 for addressee.
These are merely roles. The important formalism is indeed G1 and G2. G1 is a
Griceish utterer-person; G2 is the other person, G1s addressee. Grice dislikes
a menage a trois, apparently, for he seldom symbolises a third party, G3. So, G
ψ-3-A that p is 1 just in case G ψ2(G ψ1 that p) or G ψ1 that ~p is 1. And here
the utterers addressee, G2 features: G1 ψ³ protreptically that p is 1 just
in case G buletically accepts ψ² (G buletically accepts ψ² (G doxastically
accepts ψ1 that p, or G doxastically accepts ψ1 that ~p))) is 1. Grice seems to
be happy with having reached four sets of operators, corresponding to four sets
of propositional attitudes, and for which Grice provides the paraphrases. The
first set is the doxastic proper. It is what Grice has as doxastic,and which
is, strictly, either indicative, of the utterers doxastic, exhibitive state, as
it were, or properly informative, if addressed to the addressee A, which is
different from U himself, for surely one rarely informs oneself. The second is
the buletic proper. What Grice dubs volitive, but sometimes he prefers the
Grecian root. This is again either self- or utterer-addressed, or
utterer-oriented, or auto-phoric, and it is intentional, or it is
other-addressed, or addressee-addressed, or addressee- oriented, or
hetero-phoric, and it is imperative, for surely one may not always say to
oneself, Dont smoke, idiot!. The third is the doxastic-interrogative, or
doxastic-erotetic. One may expand on ? here is minimal compared to the
vagaries of what I called the !─ (non-doxastic or buletic turnstile), and which
may be symbolised by ?─p, where ?─ stands for the erotetic turnstile. Geachs
and Althams erotetic somehow Grice ignores, as he more often uses the Latinate
interrogative. Lewis and Short have “interrŏgātĭo,” which they render as “a
questioning, inquiry, examination, interrogation;” “sententia per
interrogationem, Quint. 8, 5, 5; instare interrogation; testium; insidiosa; litteris
inclusæ; verbis obligatio fit ex interrogatione et responsione; as rhet. fig.,
Quint. 9, 2, 15; 9, 3, 98. B. A syllogism: recte genus hoc interrogationis
ignavum ac iners nominatum est, Cic. Fat. 13; Sen. Ep. 87 med. Surely more
people know what interrogative means what erotetic means, he would not say ‒
but he would. This attitude comes again in two varieties: self-addressed or
utterer-oriented, reflective (Should I go?) or again, addresee-addressed, or
addressee-oriented, imperative, as in Should you go?, with a strong hint that
the utterer is expecting is addressee to make up his mind in the proceeding,
not just inform the utterer. Last but not least, there is the fourth kind, the
buletic-cum-erotetic. Here again, there is one varietiy which is
reflective, autophoric, as Grice prefers, utterer-addressed, or utterer-oriented,
or inquisitive (for which Ill think of a Greek pantomime), or
addressee-addressed, or addressee-oriented. Grice regrets that Greek (and
Latin, of which he had less ‒ cfr. Shakespeare who had none) fares better in
this respect the Oxonian that would please Austen, if not Austin, or Maucalay,
and certainly not Urquhart -- his language has 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.These vocal mannerisms will result in the production of
some pretty barbarous English sentences; but we must remember that what I shall
be trying to do, in uttering such sentences, will be to represent supposedly
underlying structure; if that is ones aim, one can hardly expect that ones
speech-forms will be such as to excite the approval of, let us say, Jane Austen
or Lord Macaulay. Cf. the quessertive, or quessertion, possibly iterable,
that Grice cherished. But then you cant have everything. Where would you put
it? Grice: The modal implicatum.
Grice sees two different, though connected questions about
mode. First, there is the obvious demand for a characterisation, or
partial characterisation, of this or that mode as it emerges in this or that
conversational move, which is plausible to regard as modes primary habitat)
both at the level of the explicatum or the implicatum, for surely an indicative
conversational move may be the vehicle of an imperatival implicatum. A second,
question is how, and to what extent, the representation of mode (Hares neustic)
which is suitable for application to this or that conversational move may be
legitimately exported into philosophical psychology, or rather, may be grounded
on questions of philosophical psychology, matters of this or that psychological
state, stance, or attitude (notably desire and belief, and their species). We
need to consider the second question, the philosophico- psychological question,
since, if the general rationality operator is to read as something like
acceptability, as in U accepts, or A accepts, the appearance of this or that
mode within its scope of accepting is proper only if it may properly occur
within the scope of a generic psychological verb I accept that . Lewis and
Short have “accepto,” “v. freq. a. accipio,” which Short and Lewis render as “to
take, receive, accept,” “argentum,” Plaut. Ps. 2, 2, 32; so Quint. 12, 7, 9;
Curt. 4, 6, 5; Dig. 34, 1, 9: “jugum,” to submit to, Sil. Ital. 7, 41. But in
Plin. 36, 25, 64, the correct read. is coeptavere; v. Sillig. a. h. l. The
easiest way Grice finds to expound his ideas on the first question is by
reference to a schematic table or diagram (Some have complained that I seldom
use a board, but I will today. Grice at this point reiterates his
temporary contempt for the use/mention distinction, which which Strawson
is obsessed. Perhaps Grices contempt is due to Strawsons obsession. Grices
exposition would make the hair stand on end in the soul of a person especially
sensitive in this area. And Im talking to you, Sir Peter! (He is on the
second row). But Grices guess is that the only historical philosophical
mistake properly attributable to use/mention confusion is Russells argument
against Frege in On denoting, and that there is virtually always an acceptable
way of eliminating disregard of the use-mention distinction in a particular
case, though the substitutes are usually lengthy, obscure, and
tedious. Grice makes three initial assumptions. He avails himself of
two species of acceptance, Namesly, volitive acceptance and judicative
acceptance, which he, on occasion, calls respectively willing that p and
willing that p. These are to be thought of as technical or
semi-technical, theoretical or semi-theoretical, though each is a state which
approximates to what we vulgarly call thinking that p and wanting that p,
especially in the way in which we can speak of a beast such as a little
squarrel as thinking or wanting something ‒ a nut, poor darling
little thing. Grice here treats each will and judge (and accept) as a
primitive. The proper interpretation would be determined by the role of
each in a folk-psychological theory (or sequence of folk-psychological
theories), of the type the Wilde reader in mental philosophy favours at Oxford,
designed to account for the behaviours of members of the animal kingdom, at
different levels of psychological complexity (some classes of creatures being
more complex than others, of course). As Grice suggests in Us meaning,
sentence-meaning, and word-meaning, at least at the point at which (Schema Of
Procedure-Specifiers For Mood-Operators) in ones syntactico-semantical
theory of Pirotese or Griceish, one is introducing this or that mode (and
possibly earlier), the proper form to use is a specifier for this or that
resultant procedure. Such a specifier is of the general form, For the
utterer U to utter x if C, where the blank is replaced by the appropriate
condition. Since in the preceding scheme x represents an utterance or
expression, and not a sentence or open sentence, there is no guarantee that
this or that actual sentence in Pirotese or Griceish contains a perspicuous and
unambiguous modal representation. A sentence may correspond to more than
one modal structure. The sentence is structurally ambiguous
(multiplex in meaning ‒ under the proviso that senses are not to be
multiplied beyond necessity) and will have more than one reading, or parsing,
as every schoolboy at Clifton knows when translating viva voce from Greek or
Latin, as the case might be. The general form of a procedure-specifier for a
modal operator involves a main clause and an antecedent clause, which follows
if. In the schematic representation of the main clause, U represents an
utterer, A his addressee, p the radix or neustic; and Opi represents that
operator whose number is i (1, 2, 3, or 4), e.g g., Op3A represents
Operator 3A, which, since ?⊢ appears in the Operator column for 3A)
would be ?A ⊢ p. This
reminds one of Grandys quessertions, for he did think they were iterable
(possibly)). The antecedent clause consists of a sequence whose elements
are a preamble, as it were, or preface, or prefix, a supplement to a
differential (which is present only in a B-type, or addressee-oriented case), a
differential, and a radix. The preamble, which is always present, is
invariant, and reads: The U U wills (that) A A judges (that) U (For surely meaning is a species of intending
is a species of willing that, alla Prichard, Whites professor,
Corpus). The supplement, if present, is also invariant. And the idea
behind its varying presence or absence is connected, in the first instance,
with the volitive mode. The difference between an ordinary expression of
intention ‒ such as I shall not fail, or They shall not
pass ‒ and an ordinary imperative (Like Be a little kinder to
him) is accommodated by treating each as a sub-mode of the volitive mode,
relates to willing that p) In the intentional case (I shall not fail), the
utterer U is concerned to reveal to his addressee A that he (the utterer U)
wills that p. In the imperative case (They shall not pass), the utterer U is
concerned to reveal to his addressee A that the utterer U wills that the
addresee A will that p. In each case, of course, it is to be
presumed that willing that p will have its standard outcome, viz., the
actualization, or realisation, or direction of fit, of the radix (from expression
to world, downwards). There is a corresponding distinction between two uses of
an indicative. The utterer U may be declaring or affirming that p, in
an exhibitive way, with the primary intention to get his addressee A to judge
that the utterer judges that p. Or the U is telling (in a protreptic way)
ones addressee that p, that is to say, hoping to get his addressee to
judge that p. In the case of an indicative, unlike that of a volitive, there is
no explicit pair of devices which would ordinarily be thought of as sub-mode
marker. The recognition of the sub-mode is implicated, and comes from
context, from the vocative use of the Names of the addressee, from the presence
of a speech-act verb, or from a sentence-adverbial phrase (like for your
information, so that you know, etc.). But Grice has already, in his
initial assumptions, allowed for such a situation. The
exhibitive-protreptic distinction or autophoric-heterophoric distinction, seems
to Grice to be also discernible in the interrogative mode (?). Each differentials
is associated with, and serve to distinguish, each of the two basic modes
(volitive or judicative) and, apart from one detail in the case of the
interrogative mode, is invariant between autophoric-exhibitive) and
heterophoric-protreptic sub-modes of any of the two basic modes. They are
merely unsupplemented or supplemented, the former for an exhibitive sub-mode
and the latter for a protreptic sub-mode. The radix needs (one hopes) no
further explanation, except that it might be useful to bear in mind that Grice
does not stipulated that the radix for an intentional (buletic exhibitive
utterer-based) incorporate a reference to the utterer, or be in the first
person, nor that the radix for an imperative (buletic protreptic
addressee-based) incorporate a reference of the addresee, and be in the second
person. They shall not pass is a legitimate intentional, as is You shall
not get away with it; and The sergeant is to muster the men at dawn, as uttered
said by the captain to the lieutenant) is a perfectly good
imperative. Grice gives in full the two specifiers derived from the
schema. U to utter to A autophoric-exhibitive ⊢ p if U wills that A judges that U judges
p. Again, U to utter to A ! heterophoric-protreptic p if U wills that A A
judges that U wills that A wills that p. Since, of the states denoted by
each differential, only willing that p and judging that p are strictly cases of
accepting that p, and Grices ultimate purpose of his introducing this
characterization of mode is to reach a general account of expressions which are
to be conjoined, according to his proposal, with an acceptability operator, the
first two numbered rows of the figure are (at most) what he has a direct use
for. But since it is of some importance to Grice that his treatment of
mode should be (and should be thought to be) on the right lines, he adds a
partial account of the interrogative mode. There are two varieties of
interrogatives, a yes/no interrogatives (e. g. Is his face clean? Is the king
of France bald? Is virtue a fire-shovel?) and x-interrogatives, on which Grice
qua philosopher was particularly interested, v. his The that and the why.
(Who killed Cock Robin?, Where has my beloved gone?, How did he fix
it?). The specifiers derivable from the schema provide only for yes/no interrogatives,
though the figure could be quite easily amended so as to yield a restricted but
very large class of x-interrogatives. Grice indicates how this could be
done. The distinction between a buletic and a doxastic interrogative
corresponds with the difference between a case in which the utterer U indicates
that he is, in one way or another, concerned to obtain information (Is he at
home?), and a case in which the utterer U indicates that he is concerned to
settle a problem about what he is to do ‒ Am I to leave the door open?, Shall I
go on reading? or, with an heterophoric Subjects, Is the prisoner to be
released? This difference is fairly well represented in grammar, and much
better represented in the grammars of some other languages. The hetero-phoric-cum-protreptic/auto-phoric-cum-
exhibitive difference may not marked at all in this or that grammar, but
it should be marked in Pirotese. This or that sub-mode is, however, often quite
easily detectable. There is usually a recognizable difference between a
case in which the utterer A says, musingly or reflectively, Is he to be
trusted? ‒ a case in which the utterer might say that he is just
wondering ‒ and a case in which he utters a token of the same
sentence as an enquiry. Similarly, one can usually tell whether an utterer A
who utters Shall I accept the invitation? is just trying to make up his
mind, or is trying to get advice or instruction from his addressee. The
employment of the variable α needs to be explained. Grice borrows a little
from an obscure branch of logic, once (but maybe no longer) practised, called,
Grice thinks, proto-thetic ‒ Why? Because it deals with this or that first
principle or axiom, or thesis), the main rite in which is to quantify over, or
through, this or that connective. α is to have as its two substituents
positively and negatively, which may modify either will or judge, negatively
willing or negatively judging that p is judging or willing that ~p. The
quantifier (∃1α) . . . has to
be treated substitutionally. If, for example, I ask someone whether John
killed Cock Robin (protreptic case), I do not want the addressee merely to will
that I have a particular logical quality in mind which I believe to apply. I
want the addressee to have one of the Qualities in mind which he wants me to
believe to apply. To meet this demand, supplementation must drag back the
quantifier. To extend the schema so as to provide specifiers for a single
x-interrogative (i. e., a question like What did the butler see? rather than a
question like Who went where with whom at 4 oclock yesterday afternoon?),
we need just a little extra apparatus. We need to be able to superscribe a
W in each interrogative operator e.g., together with the proviso that a radix
which follows a superscribed operator must be an open radix, which contains one
or more occurrences of just one free variable. And we need a chameleon
variable λ, to occur only in this or that quantifier. (∃λ).Fx is to be regarded as a way of
writing (∃x)Fx. (∃λ)Fy is a way of writing (∃y)Fy. To provide a specifier for a
x-superscribed operator, we simply delete the appearances of α in the specifier
for the corresponding un-superscribed operator, inserting instead the
quantifier (∃1λ) () at the
position previously occupied by (∃1α) (). E.g. the specifiers for Who
killed Cock Robin?, used as an enquiry, would be: U to utter to A killed Cock Robin if U wills A to judge U to
will that (∃1λ) (A should
will that U judges (x killed Cock Robin)); in which (∃1λ) takes on the shape (∃1x) since x is the free variable within
its scope. Grice compares his buletic-doxastic distinction to prohairesis/doxa
distinction by Aristotle in Ethica Nichomachea. Perhaps his simplest
formalisation is via subscripts: I will-b but will-d not. Refs.: The main
references are given above under ‘desirability.’ The most systematic treatment
is the excursus in “Aspects,” Clarendon. BANC.
modified Occam’s razor: The original razor is what Grice would have as
‘ontological,’ to which he opposes with in his ‘ontological marxism’. Entities
should not be multiplied beyond the necessity of needing them as honest working
entities. He keeps open house provided they come in help with the work. This
restriction explains what Grice means by ‘necessity’ in the third lecture – a
second sense does not do any work. The implicatum does. Grice loved a razor, and being into analogy
and focal meaning, if he HAD to have semantic multiplicity, for the case of
‘is,’ (being) or ‘good,’ it had to be a UNIFIED semantic multiplicity, as
displayed by paronymy. The essay had circulated since the Harvard days, and it
was also repr. in Pragmatics, ed. Cole for Academic
Press. Personally, I prefer dialectica. ‒ Grice. This is
the third James lecture at Harvard. It is particularly useful for Grices
introduction of his razor, M. O. R., or Modified Occams Razor, jocularly
expressed by Grice as: Senses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.
An Englishing of the Ockhams Latinate, Entia non sunt multiplicanda præter
necessitatem. But what do we mean sense. Surely Occam was right with his
Entia non sunt multiplicanda præter necessitatem. We need to translate that
alla linguistic turn. Grice jokes: Senses are not be multiplied beyond
necessity. He also considers irony, stress (supra-segmental fourth-articulatory
phonology), and truth, which the Grice Papers have under a special f. in the s.
V . Three topics where the implicatum helps. He is a scoundrel may
well be the implicatum of He is a fine friend. But cf. the pretense theory
of irony. Grice, being a classicist, loved the etymological
connection. With Stress, he was concerned with anti-Gettier uses of
emphatic know: I KNOW. (Implicatum: I do have conclusive evidence). Truth
(or is true) sprang from the attention
by Grice to that infamous Bristol symposium between Austin and
Strawson. Cf. Moores paradox. Grice wants to defend correspondence theory
of Austin against the performative approach of Strawson. If is true implicates someone previously
affirmed this, that does not mean a ditto implicatum is part of the entailment
of a is true utterance, further notes on
logic and conversation, in Cole, repr. in a revised form, Modified Occams
Razor, irony, stress, truth. The preferred citation should be the Harvard. This
is originally the third James lecture, in a revised form.In that lecture,
Grice introduced the M. O. R., or Modified Occams Razor. Senses are
not be multiplied beyond necessity. The point is that
entailment-cum-implicatum does the job that multiplied senses should not
do! The Grice Papers contains in a different f. the concluding section for that
lecture, on irony, stress, and truth. Grice went back to the Modified
Occams razor, but was never able to formalise it! It is, as he concedes, almost
a vacuous methodological thingy! It is interesting that the way he defines the
alethic value of true alrady cites satisfactory. I shall use, to Names such a
property, not true but factually satisfactory. Grices sympathies dont lie
with Strawsons Ramsey-based redundance theory of truth, but rather with Tarskis
theory of correspondence. He goes on to claim his trust in the
feasibility of such a theory. It is, indeed, possible to construct a
theory which treats truth as (primarily) a property, not true but factually
satisfactory. One may see that point above as merely verbal and not involving
any serious threat. Lets also assume that it will be a consequence, or
theorem, of such a theory that there will be a class C of utterances
(utterances of affirmative Subjects-predicate sentences [such as snow is white
or the cat is on the mat of the dog is hairy-coated such that each member of C
designates or refers to some item and indicates or predicates some class (these
verbs to be explained within the theory), and is factually satisfactory
if the item belongs to the class. Let us also assume that there can be a
method of introducing a form of expression, it is true that /it is buletic
that and linking it with the notion of
factually or alethic or doxastic satisfactory, a consequence of which will be
that to say it is true that Smith is happy will be equivalent to saying that
any utterance of class C which designates Smith and indicates the class of
happy people is factually satisfactory (that is, any utterance which assigns
Smith to the class of happy people is factually satisfactory. Mutatis mutandis
for Let Smith be happy, and buletic satisfactoriness. The move is
Tarskian. TBy stress, Grice means suprasegmental phonology, but he was too much
of a philosopher to let that jargon affect him! Refs.: The locus
classicus, if that does not sound too pretentious, is Essay 3 in WoW, but there
are references elsewhere, such as in “Meaning Revisited,” and under
‘semantics.’ The only one who took up Grice’s challenge at Oxford was L. J.
Cohen, “Grice on the particles of natural language,” which got a great response
by Oxonian R. C. S. Walker (citing D. Bostock, a tutee of Grice), to which
Cohen again responded “Can the conversationalist hypothesis be defended.” Cohen
clearly centres his criticism on the razor. He had an early essay, citing Grice,
on the DIVERSITY of meaning. Cohen opposes Grice’s conversationalist hypothesis
to his own ‘semantic hypothesis’ (“Multiply senses all you want.”)
modus
optativus. optative enclisis (gre:
ευκτική έγκλιση, euktike enclisis, hence it may be seen as a modus optatīvus
myth: It’s odd that he gives the example of a ‘social contract’,
developed by G. R. Grice as a ‘myth’ as his own on ‘expressing pain.’ “My
succession of stages is a methodological myth designed to exhibit the
conceptual link between expression and communication. Rather than Plato, he
appeals to Rawls and the myth of the social conpact! Grice knows a little about
Descartess “Discours de la methode,” and he is also aware of similar obsession by
Collingwood with philosopical methodology. Grice would joke on midwifery, as
the philosopher’s apter method at Oxford: to strangle error at its birth. Grice
typifies a generation at Oxford. While he did not socialize with the crème de la
crème in pre-war Oxford, he shared some their approach. E.g. a love affair with
Russell’s logical construction. After the war, and in retrospect, Grice liked
to associate himself with Austin. He obviously felt the need to belong to a
group, to make a difference, to make history. Many participants of the play group
saw themselves as doing philosophy, rather than reading about it! It was long
after that Grice started to note the differences in methodology between Austin
and himself. His methodology changed a little. He was enamoured with formalism
for a while, and he grants that this love never ceased. In a still later phase,
he came to realise that his way of doing philosophy was part of literature
(essay writing). And so he started to be slightly more careful about his style
– which some found florid. The stylistic concerns were serious. Oxonian
philosophers like Holloway had been kept away from philosophy because of the
stereotype that the Oxonian philosophers style is pedantic, when it neednt! A
philosopher should be allowed, as Plato was, to use a myth, if he thinks his
tutee will thank him for that! Grice loved to compare his Oxonian dialectic
with Platos Athenian (strictly, Academic) dialectic. Indeed, there is some
resemblance of the use of myth in Plato and Grice for philosophical
methodological purposes. Grice especially enjoys a myth in his programme in
philosophical psychology. In this, he is very much being a philosopher.
Non-philosophers usually criticise this methodological use of a myth, but they
would, wouldnt they. Grice suggests that a myth has diagogic relevance.
Creature construction, the philosopher as demi-god, if mythical, is an easier
way for a philosophy don to instil his ideas on his tutee than, say, privileged
access and incorrigibility. Refs.: The main source is Grice’s essay on ‘myth’,
in The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
objectivism: Grice reads Meinong on objectivity and finds it funny!
Meinong distinguishes four classes of objects: ‘Objekt,’ simpliciter, which can
be real (like horses) or ideal (like the concepts of difference, identity,
etc.) and “Objectiv,” e.g. the affirmation of the being (Sein) or non-being
(Nichtsein), of a being-such (Sosein), or a being-with (Mitsein) - parallel to
existential, categorical and hypothetical judgements. An “Objectiv” is close to
what contemporary philosophers call states of affairs (where these may be
actual—may obtain—or not). The third class is the dignitative, e.g. the true,
the good, the beautiful. Finally, there is the desiderative, e.g. duties, ends,
etc. To these four classes of objects correspond four classes of psychological
acts: (re)presentation (das Vorstellen),
for objects thought (das Denken), for the objectives feeling (das Fühlen), for
dignitatives desire (das Begehren), for the desideratives. Grice starts with
subjectivity. Objectivity can be constructed as non-relativised
subjectivity. Grice discusses of Inventing right and wrong by Mackie. In
the proceedings, Grice quotes the artless sexism of Austin in talking
about the trouser words in Sense and Sensibilia. Grice tackles all the
distinctions Mackie had played with: objective/Subjectsive, absolute/relative,
categorical/hypothetical or suppositional. Grice quotes directly from Hare:
Think of one world into whose fabric values are objectively built; and think of
another in which those values have been annihilated. And remember that in both
worlds the people in them go on being concerned about the same things—there is
no difference in the Subjectsive value. Now I ask, what is the difference
between the states of affairs in these two worlds? Can any answer be given
except, none whatever? Grice uses the Latinate objective (from objectum). Cf.
Hare on what he thinks the oxymoronic sub-jective value. Grice considered more
seriously than Barnes did the systematics behind Nicolai Hartmanns
stratification of values. Refs.: the most explicit allusion is a specific essay
on “objectivity” in The H. P. Grice Papers. Most of the topic is covered in “Conception,”
Essay 1. BANC.
objectivum. Here the contrast is what what is subjective, or
subjectivum. Notably value. For Hartmann and Grice, a value is rational,
objective and absolute, and categorical (not relative).
objectum. For Grice the subjectum is prior. While ‘subject’ and
‘predicate’ are basic Aristotelian categories, the idea of the direct object or
indirect object seems to have little philosophical relevance. (but cf. “What is
the meaning of ‘of’? Genitivus subjectivus versus enitivus objectivus. The
usage that is more widespread is a misnomer for ‘thing’. When an empiricist
like Grice speaks of an ‘obble’ or an ‘object,’ he means a thing. That is
because, since Hume there’s no such thing as a ‘subject’ qua self. And if there
is no subject, there is no object. No Copernican revolution for empiricists.
one-off communicatum. The condition for an action to be taken in a specific way in cases
where the audience must recognize the utterer’s intention (a ‘one-off
predicament’). The recognition of the C-intention does not have to occur ‘once
we have habits of taking utterances one way or another.’
Blackburn: From one-off
AIIBp to one-off GAIIB. Surely we have to generalise the B into the
PSI. Plus, 'action' is too strong, and should be replaced by
'emitting'This yields From EIIψp GEIIψp. According
to this assumption, an emissor who is not assuming his addressee shares any
system of communication is in the original situation that S. W. Blackburn, of
Pembroke, dubbs “the one-off predicament, and one can provide
a scenario where the Griciean conditions, as they are meant to hold, do hold,
and emissor E communicates that p i. e. C1, C2, and C3, are fulfilled.
. be accomplished in the "one-off predicament"
(in which no linguistic or other conventional ...The Gricean mechanism
with its complex communicative intentions has a clear point in what Blackburn
calls “a one-off predicament” - a . Simon Blackburn's "one-off
predicament" of communicating without a shared
language illustrates how Grice's theory can be applied to iconic signals such
as the ...Blackburn's
"one-off predicament" of communicating without a shared language
illustrates how Grice's theory can be applied to iconic signals such as the
drawing of a skull to wam of danger. See his Spreading the Word. III. 112.Thus S may draw a pic- "one-off predicament"). ... Clarendon, 1976); and Simon
Blackburn, Spreading the
Word (Oxford: Clarendon, 1984) ...by
Blackburn in “Spreading the word.” Since Grice’s main motivation is to progress
from one-off to philosophers’s mistakes, he does not explore the situation. He
gets close to it in “Meaning Revisited,” when proposing a ‘rational
reconstruction,’ FROM a one-off to a non-iconic system of communication, where
you can see his emphasis and motivation is in the last stage of the progress.
Since he is having the ‘end result,’ sometimes he is not careful in the
description of the ‘one-off,’ or dismissive of it. But as Blackburn notes, it
is crucial that Grice provides the ‘rudiments’ for a ‘meaning-nominalism,’
where an emissor can communicate that p in a one-off scenario. This is all
Grice needs to challenge those accounts based on ‘convention,’ or the idea of a
‘system’ of communication. There is possibly an implicature to the effect that
if something is a device is not a one-off, but that is easily cancellable. “He
used a one-off device, and it worked.”
ontogenesis. it is interesting that Grice was always enquiring his
childrens playmates: Can a sweater be red and green all over? No stripes
allowed! One found a developmental account of the princile of conversational
helpfulness boring, or as he said, "dull." Refs.: There is an
essay on the semantics of children’s language, BANC.
optimum: If (a) S accepts at t an alethic acceptability-conditional
C 1 , the antecedent of which favours, to degree d, the consequent of C 1 , (b)
S accepts at t the antecedent of C 1 , end p.81 (c) after due search by S for
such a (further) conditional, there is no conditional C 2 such that (1) S
accepts at t C 2 and its antecedent, (2) and the antecedent of C 2 is an
extension of the antecedent of C 1 , (3) and the consequent of C 2 is a rival
(incompatible with) of the consequent of C 1 , (4) and the antecedent of C 2
favours the consequent of C 2 more than it favours the consequent of C 1 : then
S may judge (accept) at t that the consequent of C 1 is acceptable to degree d.
For convenience, we might abbreviate the complex clause (C) in the antecedent
of the above rule as 'C 1 is optimal for S at t'; with that abbreviation, the
rule will run: "If S accepts at t an alethic acceptability-conditional C 1
, the antecedent of which favours its consequent to degree d, and S accepts at
t the antecedent of C 1 , and C 1 is optimal for S at C 1 , then S may accept
(judge) at t that the consequent of C 1 is acceptable to degree d." Before
moving to the practical dimension, I have some observations to make.
ontological
marxism: Note the use of ‘ontological’ in
‘ontological’ Marxism. Is not metaphysical Marxism, so Grice knows what he is
talking about. Many times when he uses ‘metaphysics,’ he means ‘ontological.’ Ontological for Grice is at least liberal. He is
hardly enamoured of some of the motivations which prompt the advocacy of
psycho-physical identity. He has in mind a concern to exclude an entity such as
as a ‘soul,’ an event of the soul, or a property of the soul. His taste is for
keeping open house for all sorts of conditions of entities, just so long as
when the entity comes in it helps with the housework, i. e., provided that
Grice see the entity work, and provided that it is not detected in illicit
logical behaviour, which need not involve some degree of indeterminacy, The
entity works? Ergo, the entity exists. And, if it comes on the recommendation
of some transcendental argument the entity may even qualify as an entium
realissimum. To exclude an honest working entitiy is metaphysical snobbery, a
reluctance to be seen in the company of any but the best. A category, a
universalium plays a role in Grice’s meta-ethics. A principles or laws
of psychology may be self-justifying, principles connected with the
evaluation of ends. If these same principles play a role in determining
what we count as entia realissima, metaphysics, and an abstractum would be
grounded in part in considerations about value (a not unpleasant
project). This ontological Marxism is latter day. In “Some remarks,” he
expresses his disregard for what he calls a “Wittgensteinian” limitation in
expecting behavioural manifestation of an ascription about a soul. Yet in
“Method” he quotes almost verbatim from Witters, “No psychological postulation
without the behaviour the postulation is meant to explain.” It was possibly D.
K. Lewis who made him change his mind. Grice was obsessed with Aristotle on
‘being,’ and interpreted Aristotle as holding a thesis of unified semantic
‘multiplicity.’ This is in agreement with the ontological Marxism, in more than
one ways. By accepting a denotatum for a praedicatum like ‘desideratum,’ Grice
is allowing the a desideratum may be the subject of discourse. It is an
‘entity’ in this fashion.
oratio obliqua: The idea of ‘oratio’ is central. Grice’s sentence. It
expresses ‘a thought,’ a ‘that’-clause. Oratio recta is central, too. Grice’s
example is “The dog is shaggy.” The use of ‘oratio’ here Grice disliked. One
can see a squarrel grabbing a nut, Toby judges that a nut is to eat. So we
would have a ‘that’-clause, and in a way, an ‘oratio obliqua,’ which is what
the UTTERER (not the squarrel) would produce as ‘oratio recta,’ ‘A nut is to
eat,’ should the circumstance obtains. At some points he allows things like
“Snow is white” means that snow is white. Something at the Oxford Philosohical
Society he would not. Grice is vague in this. If the verb is a ‘verbum dicendi,’
‘oratio obliqua’ is literal. If it’s a verbum sentiendi or percipiendi, volendi,
credendi, or cognoscenti, the connection is looser. Grice was especially
concerned that buletic verbs usually do not take a that-clause (but cf. James:
I will that the distant table sides over the floor toward me. It does not!).
Also that seems takes a that-clause in ways that might not please Maucalay.
Grice had explored that-clauses with Staal. He was concerned about the
viability of an initially appealing etymological approach by Davidson to the
that-clause in terms of demonstration. Grice had presupposed the logic of
that-clauses from a much earlier stage, Those spots mean that he has
measles.The f. contains a copy of Davidsons essay, On saying that, the
that-clause, the that-clause, with Staal . Davidson quotes from Murray et
al. The Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford. Cf. Onions, An Advanced English
Syntax, and remarks that first learned that that in such contexts evolved
from an explicit demonstrative from Hintikkas Knowledge and Belief. Hintikka
remarks that a similar development has taken place in German Davidson owes the
reference to the O.E.D. to Stiezel. Indeed Davidson was fascinated by the fact
that his conceptual inquiry repeated phylogeny. It should come as no surprise
that a that-clause utterance evolves through about the stages our ruminations
have just carried us. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the use of
that in a that-clause is generally held to have arisen out of the demonstrative
pronoun pointing to the clause which it introduces. The sequence goes as
follows. He once lived here: we all know that; that, now this, we all know: he
once lived here; we all know that, or this: he once lived here; we all know
that he once lived here. As Hintikka notes, some pedants trying to display
their knowledge of German, use a comma before that: We all know, that he once
lived here, to stand for an earlier :: We all know: that he once lived
here. Just like the English translation that, dass can be omitted in a sentence. Er glaubt, dass die Erde eine Scheibe sei. He believes that the Earth is a disc. Er
glaubt, die Erde sei eine Scheibe. He believes the Earth is a disc. The
that-clause is brought to the fore by Davidson, who, consulting the OED,
reminds philosophers that the English that is very cognate with the German
idiom. More specifically, that is a demonstrative, even if the syntax, in
English, hides this fact in ways which German syntax doesnt. Grice needs
to rely on that-clauses for his analysis of mean, intend, and notably
will. He finds that Prichards genial discovery was the license to use willing
as pre-facing a that-clause. This allows Grice to deals with willing as
applied to a third person. I will that he wills that he wins the chess match.
Philosophers who disregard this third-person use may indulge in introspection
and Subjectsivism when they shouldnt! Grice said that Prichard had to be given
great credit for seeing that the accurate specification of willing should be
willing that and not willing to. Analogously, following Prichard on
willing, Grice does not stipulate that
the radix for an intentional (utterer-oriented or
exhibitive-autophoric-buletic) incorporate a reference to the utterer (be in
the first person), nor that the radix for an imperative (addressee-oriented or
hetero-phoric protreptic buletic) or desiderative in general, incorporate a
reference of the addressee (be in the second person). They shall not pass is a
legitimate intentional as is the ‘you shall not get away with it,’either
involves Prichards wills that, rather than wills to). And the sergeant is to
muster the men at dawn (uttered by a captain to a lieutenant) is a perfectly
good imperative, again involving Prichards wills that, rather than wills to. Refs.:
The allusions are scattered, but there are specific essays, one on the
‘that’-clause, and also discussions on Davidson on saying that. There is a
reference to ‘oratio obliqua’ and Prichard in “Uncertainty,” BANC.
optimum. See validum. For Grice, the validum can
attain different shapes or guises. One is the optimum. He uses it for “Emissor
E communicates thata p” which ends up denotating an ‘ideal,’ that can only be
deemed, titularily, to be present ‘de facto.’ The idea is that of the infinite,
or rather self-reference regressive closure. Vide Blackburn on “open GAIIB.” Grice
uses ‘optimality’ as one guise of value. Obviously, it is, as Short and Lewis
have it, the superlative of ‘bonum,’ so one has to be careful. Optimum is used
in value theory and decision theory, too.
Cf. Maximum, and minimax. In terms of the principle of least
conversational effort, the optimal move is the least costly. To utter, “The
pillar box seems red” when you can utter, “The pillar box IS red” is to go into
the trouble when you shouldn’t. So this maximin regulates the conversational
exchange. The utterer is meant to be optimally efficient, and the addressee is
intended to recognise that.
ostensum: In his analysis of the two basic procedures, one involving
the subjectum, and another the praedicatum, Grice would play with the utterer
OSTENDING that p. This relates to his semiotic approach to communication, and
avoiding to the maximum any reference to a linguistic rule or capacity or
faculty as different from generic rationality. In WoW:134 Grice explores what
he calls ‘ostensive correlation.’ He is exploring communication scenarios where
the Utterer is OSTENDING that p, or in predicate terms, that the A is B. He is
not so much concerned with the B, but with the fact that “B” is predicated of a
particular denotatum of “the A,” and by what criteria. He is having in mind his
uncle’s dog, Fido, who is shaggy, i.e. fairy coated. So he is showing to
Strawson that that dog over there is the one that belongs to his uncle, and
that, as Strawson can see, is a shaggy dog, by which Grice means hairy coated.
That’s the type of ‘ostensive correlation’ Grice is having in mind. In an
attempted ostensive correlation of the predicate B (‘shaggy’) with the feature
or property of being hairy coated, as per a standard act of communication in
which Grice, uttering, “Fido is shaggy’ will have Strawson believe that Uncle
Grice’s dog is hairy coated – (1) U will perform a number of acts in each of
which he ostends a thing (a1, a2, a3,
etc.). (2) Simultaneously with each ostension, he utters a token of the
predicate “shaggy.” (3) It is his intention TO OSTEND, and to be recognised as
ostending, only things which are either, in his view, plainly hairy-coated, or
are, in his view, plainly NOT hairy-coated. (4) In a model sequence these
intentions are fulfilled. Grice grants that this does not finely distinguish
between ‘being hairy-coated’ from ‘being such that the UTTERER believes to be
unmistakenly hairy coated.’ But such is a problem of any explicit correlation,
which are usually taken for granted – and deemed ‘implicit’ in standard acts of
communication. In primo actu non indiget volunta* diiectivo , sed sola_»
objecti ostensio ...
non potest errar* ciica finem in universali ostensum , potest tamen secundum eos ...
oxonianism: See playgroup. The playgroup was Oxonian. There are
aspects of Grice’s philosophy which are Oxonian but not playgroup-related, and
had to do with his personal inclinations. The fact that it was Hardie who was
his tutor and instilled on him a love for Aristotle. Grice’s rapport with H. A.
Prichard. Grice would often socialize with members of Ryle’s group, such as O.
P. Wood, J. D. Mabbott, and W. C. Kneale. And of course, he had a knowleddge of
the history of Oxford philosophy, quoting from J. C. Wilson, G. F. Stout, H. H.
Price, Bosanquet, Bradley. He even had his Oxonian ‘enemies,’ Dummett, Anscombe.
And he would quote from independents, like A. J. P. Kenny. But if he had to
quote someone first, it was a member of his beloved playgroup: Austin,
Strawson, Warnock, Urmson, Hare, Hart, Hampshire. Grice cannot possibly claim
to talk about post-war Oxford philosophy, but his own! Cf. Oxfords post-war
philosophy. What were Grices first impressions when arriving at
Oxford. He was going to learn. Only the poor learn at Oxford was an adage he
treasured, since he wasnt one! Let us start with an alphabetical listing
of Grices play Group companions: Austin, Butler, Flew, Gardiner, Grice, Hare,
Hampshire, Hart, Nowell-Smith, Parkinson, Paul, Pears, Quinton, Sibley,
Strawson, Thomson, Urmson, and Warnock. Grices main Oxonian
association is St. Johns, Oxford. By Oxford Philosophy, Grice notably
refers to Austins Play Group, of which he was a member. But Grice had
Oxford associations pre-war, and after the demise of Austin. But back to the
Play Group, this, to some, infamous, playgroup, met on Saturday mornings at different
venues at Oxford, including Grices own St. John’s ‒ apparently, Austins
favourite venue. Austin regarded himself and his kindergarten as
linguistic or language botanists. The idea was to list various ordinary uses of
this or that philosophical notion. Austin: They say philosophy is about
language; well, then, let’s botanise! Grices involvement with Oxford
philosophy of course predated his associations with Austins play group. He
always said he was fortunate of having been a tutee to Hardie at Corpus.
Corpus, Oxford. Grice would occasionally refer to the emblematic pelican,
so prominently displayed at Corpus. Grice had an interim association with
the venue one associates most directly with philosophy, Merton
‒: Grice, Merton, Oxford. While Grice loved to drop Oxonian
Namess, notably his rivals, such as Dummett or Anscombe, he knew when not to.
His Post-war Oxford philosophy, as opposed to more specific items in The Grice
Collection, remains general in tone, and intended as a defense of the ordinary-language
approach to philosophy. Surprisingly, or perhaps not (for those who knew
Grice), he takes a pretty idiosyncratic characterisation of conceptual
analysis. Grices philosophical problems emerge with Grices idiosyncratic use of
this or that expression. Conceptual analysis is meant to solve his problems,
not others, repr. in WOW . Grice finds it important to reprint this since
he had updated thoughts on the matter, which he displays in his Conceptual
analysis and the province of philosophy. The topic represents one of the
strands he identifies behind the unity of his philosophy. By post-war
Oxford philosophy, Grice meant the period he was interested in. While he
had been at Corpus, Merton, and St. Johns in the pre-war days, for some reason,
he felt that he had made history in the post-war period. The historical
reason Grice gives is understandable enough. In the pre-war days, Grice
was the good student and the new fellow of St. Johns ‒ the other one was
Mabbott. But he had not been able to engage in philosophical discussion
much, other than with other tutees of Hardie. After the war, Grice indeed joins
Austins more popular, less secretive Saturday mornings. Indeed, for Grice,
post-war means all philosophy after the war (and not just say, the forties!)
since he never abandoned the methods he developed under Austin, which were
pretty congenial to the ones he had himself displayed in the pre-war days, in
essays like Negation and Personal identity. Grice is a bit of an expert on
Oxonian philosophy. He sees himself as a member of the school of analytic
philosophy, rather than the abused term ordinary-language philosophy. This
is evident by the fact that he contributed to such polemic ‒ but
typically Oxonian ‒ volumes such as Butler, Analytic Philosophy,
published by Blackwell (of all publishers). Grice led a very social life
at Oxford, and held frequent philosophical discussions with the Play group
philosophers (alphabetically listed above), and many others, such as Wood.
Post-war Oxford philosophy, miscellaneous, Oxford philosophy, in WOW, II,
Semantics and Met. , Essay. By Oxford philosophy, Grice means his own. Grice
went back to the topic of philosophy and ordinary language, as one of his
essays is precisely entitled, Philosophy and ordinary language, philosophy and
ordinary language, : ordinary-language philosophy, linguistic botanising. Grice
is not really interested in ordinary language as a philologist might. He spoke
ordinary language, he thought. The point had been brought to the fore by
Austin. If they think philosophy is a play on words, well then, lets play
the game. Grices interest is methodological. Malcolm had been claiming
that ordinary language is incorrigible. While Grice agreed that language can be
clever, he knew that Aristotle was possibly right when he explored ta
legomena in terms of the many and the selected wise, philosophy and
ordinary language, philosophy and ordinary language, : philosophy, ordinary
language. At the time of writing, ordinary-language philosophy had become,
even within Oxford, a bit of a term of abuse. Grice tries to defend
Austins approach to it, while suggesting ideas that Austin somewhat ignored,
like what an utterer implies by the use of an ordinary-language expression,
rather than what the expression itself does. Grice is concerned, contra
Austin, in explanation (or explanatory adequacy), not taxonomy (or descriptive
adequacy). Grice disregards Austins piecemeal approach to ordinary
language, as Grice searches for the big picture of it all. Grice never used
ordinary language seriously. The phrase was used, as he explains, by those who
HATED ordinary-language philosophy. Theres no such thing as ordinary language.
Surely you cannot fairly describe the idiosyncratic linguistic habits of an Old
Cliftonian as even remotely ordinary. Extra-ordinary more likely! As far as the
philosophy bit goes, this is what Bergmann jocularly described as the
linguistic turn. But as Grice notes, the linguistic turn involves both the
ideal language and the ordinary language. Grice defends the choice by Austin of
the ordinary seeing that it was what he had to hand! While Grice seems to be in
agreement with the tone of his Wellesley talk, his idioms there in. Youre
crying for the moon! Philosophy need not be grand! These seem to contrast with
his more grandiose approach to philosophy. His struggle was to defend the
minutiæ of linguistic botanising, that had occupied most of his professional
life, with a grander view of the discipline. He blamed Oxford for that. Never
in the history of philosophy had philosophers shown such an attachment to
ordinary language as they did in post-war Oxford, Grice liked to say.
Having learned Grecian and Latin at Clifton, Grice saw in Oxford a way to go
back to English! He never felt the need to explore Continental modern languages
like German or French. Aristotle was of course cited in Greek, but Descartes is
almost not cited, and Kant is cited in the translation available to Oxonians
then. Grice is totally right that never has philosophy experienced such a
fascination with ordinary use except at Oxford. The ruthless and unswerving
association of philosophy with ordinary language has been peculiar to the
Oxford scene. While many found this attachment to ordinary usage insidious, as
Warnock put it, it fit me and Grice to a T, implicating you need a sort of
innate disposition towards it! Strawson perhaps never had it! And thats why
Grices arguments contra Strawson rest on further minutiæ whose detection by
Grice never ceased to amaze his tutee! In this way, Grice felt he WAS Austins
heir! While Grice is associated with, in chronological order, Corpus, Merton,
and St. Johns, it is only St. Johns that counts for the Griceian! For it is at
St. Johns he was a Tutorial Fellow in Philosophy! And we love him as a
philosopher. Refs.: The obvious keyword is “Oxford.” His essay in WoW on
post-war Oxford philosophy is general – the material in the H. P. Grice papers
is more anecdotic. Also “Reply to Richards,” and references above under
‘linguistic botany’ and ‘play group,’ in BANC.
palæo-Griceian: H. P. Grice was the first member of the play group to come
up with a system of ‘pragmatic rules.’ Or perhaps he wasn’t. In any case,
palaeo-Griceian refers to any attempt by someone who is an Oxonian English
philosopher who suggested something like H. P. Grice later did! There are
palaeo-Griceian suggestions in Bradley – “Logic” --, Bosanquet, J. C. Wilson
(“Statement and inference”) and a few others. Within those who interacted with
Grice to provoke him into the ‘pragmatic rule’ account were two members of the
play group. One was not English, but a Scot: G. A. Paul. Paul had been to ‘the
other place,’ and was at Oxford trying to spread Witters’s doctrine. The
bafflement one gets from “I certainly don’t wish to cast any doubt on the
matter, but that pillar box seems red to me; and the reason why it is does,
it’s because it is red, and its redness causes in my sense of vision the
sense-datum that the thing is red.” Grice admits that he first came out with
the idea when confronted with this example. Mainly Grice’s motivation is to
hold that such a ‘statement’ (if statement, it is, -- vide Bar-Hillel) is true.
The other member was English: P. F. Strawson. And Grice notes that it was
Strawson’s Introduction to logical theory that motivated him to apply a
technique which had proved successful in the area of the philosophy of
perception to this idea by Strawson that Whitehead and Russell are ‘incorrect.’
Again, Grice’s treatment concerns holding a ‘statement’ to be ‘true.’
Besides
these two primary cases, there are others. First, is the list of theses in
“Causal Theory.” None of them are assigned to a particular philosopher, so the
research may be conducted towards the identification of these. The theses are,
besides the one he is himself dealing, the sense-datum ‘doubt or denial’
implicatum: One, What is actual is not also possible. Two, What is known to be
the case is not also believed to be the case. Three, Moore was guilty of
misusing the lexeme ‘know.’ Four, To say that someone is responsible is to say
that he is accountable for something condemnable. Six, A horse cannot look like
a horse. Now, in “Prolegomena” he add further cases. Again, since this are
palaeo-Griceian, it may be a matter of tracing the earliest occurrences. In
“Prolegomena,” Grice divides the examples in Three Groups. The last is an easy
one to identity: the ‘performatory’ approach: for which he gives the example by
Strawson on ‘true,’ and mentions two other cases: a performatory use of ‘I
know’ for I guarantee; and the performatory use of ‘good’ for ‘I approve’
(Ogden). The second group is easy to identify since it’s a central concern and
it is exactly Strawson’s attack on Whitehead and Russell. But Grice is clear
here. It is mainly with regard to ‘if’ that he wants to discuss Strawson, and
for which he quotes him at large. Before talking about ‘if’, he mentions the
co-ordinating connectives ‘and’ and ‘or’, without giving a source. So, here
there is a lot to research about the thesis as held by other philosophers even
at Oxford (where, however, ‘logic’ was never considered a part of philosophy
proper). The first group is the most varied, and easier to generalise, because
it refers to any ‘sub-expression’ held to occur in a full expression which is
held to be ‘inappropriate.’ Those who judge the utterance to be inappropriate
are sometimes named. Grice starts with Ryle and The Concept of Mind –
palaeo-Griceian, in that it surely belongs to Grice’s previous generation. It
concerns the use of the adverb ‘voluntary’ and Grice is careful to cite Ryle’s
description of the case, using words like ‘incorrect,’ and that a ‘sense’
claimed by philosophers is an absurd one. Then there is a third member of the
playgroup – other than G. A. Paul and P. F. Strawson – the Master Who Wobbles,
J. L. Austin. Grice likes the way Austin offers himself as a good target –
Austin was dead by then, and Grice would otherwise not have even tried – Austin
uses variables: notably Mly, and a general thesis, ‘no modification without
aberration.’ But basically, Grice agrees that it’s all about the ‘philosophy of
action.’ So in describing an agent’s action, the addition of an adverb makes
the whole thing inappropriate. This may relate to at least one example in
“Causal” involving ‘responsible.’ While Grice there used the noun and
adjective, surely it can be turned into an adverb. The fourth member of the
playgroup comes next: H. L. A. Hart. Grice laughs at Hart’s idea that to add
‘carefully’ in the description of an action the utterer is committed to the
idea that the agent THINKS the steps taken for the performance are reasonable.
There is a thesis he mentions then which alla “Causal Theory,” gets uncredited
– about ‘trying.’ But he does suggest Witters. And then there is his own ‘doubt
or denial’ re: G. A. Paul, and another one in the field of the philosophy of
perception that he had already mentioned vaguely in “Causal”: a horse cannot
look like a horse. Here he quotes Witters in extenso, re: ‘seeing as.’ While
Grice mentions ‘philosophy of action,’ there is at least one example involving
‘philosophical psychology’: B. S. Benjamin on C. D. Broad on the factiveness of
‘remember.’ When one thinks of all the applications that the ‘conversational
model’ has endured, one realizes that unless your background is philosophical, you
are bound not to realise the centrality of Grice’s thesis for philosophical
methodology.
paradigm-case argument: Grice tries to give the general form of this argument, as
applied to Urmson, and Grice and Strawson. I wonder if Grice thought that
STRAWSON’s appeal to resentment to prove freewill is paradigm case? The idiom
was coined by Grice’s first tutee at St. John’s, G. N. A. Flew, and he applied
it to ‘free will.’ Grice later used it to describe the philosophising by Urmson
(in “Retrospetive”). he issue of analyticity is, as Locke puts it, the issue of
whats trifle. That a triangle is trilateral Locke considers a trifling
proposition, like Saffron is yellow. Lewes (who calls mathematical propositions
analytic) describes the Kantian problem. The reductive analysis of meaning Grice
offers depends on the analytic. Few Oxonian philosophers would follow Loar, D.
Phil Oxon, under Warnock, in thinking of Grices conversational maxims as
empirical inductive generalisations over functional states! Synthesis may do in
the New World,but hardly in the Old! The locus classicus for the
ordinary-language philosophical response to Quine in Two dogmas of empiricism.
Grice and Strawson claim that is analytic does have an ordinary-language use,
as attached two a type of behavioural conversational response. To an
analytically false move (such as My neighbours three-year-old son is an adult)
the addressee A is bound to utter, I dont understand you! You are not being
figurative, are you? To a synthetically false move, on the other hand (such as
My neighbours three-year-old understands Russells Theory of Types), the
addressee A will jump with, Cant believe it! The topdogma of analyticity
is for Grice very important to defend. Philosophy depends on it! He
knows that to many his claim to fame is his In defence of a dogma, the topdogma
of analyticity, no less. He eventually turns to a pragmatist justification
of the distinction. This pragmatist justification is still in accordance
with what he sees as the use of analytic in ordinary language. His infamous
examples are as follows. My neighbours three-year old understands Russells
Theory of Types. A: Hard to believe, but I will. My neighbours three-year
old is an adult. Metaphorically? No. Then I dont understand you, and
what youve just said is, in my scheme of things, analytically false.
Ultimately, there are conversational criteria, based on this or that principle
of conversational helfpulness. Grice is also circumstantially concerned with
the synthetic a priori, and he would ask his childrens playmates: Can a
sweater be red and green all over? No stripes allowed! The distinction is
ultimately Kantian, but it had brought to the fore by the linguistic turn,
Oxonian and other! In defence of a dogma, Two dogmas of empiricism, :
the analytic-synthetic distinction. For Quine, there are two. Grice is
mainly interested in the first one: that there is a distinction between the
analytic and the synthetic. Grice considers Empiricism as a monster on his way
to the Rationalist City of Eternal Truth. Grice came back time and again
to explore the analytic-synthetic distinction. But his philosophy remained
constant. His sympathy is for the practicality of it, its rationale. He sees it
as involving formal calculi, rather than his own theory of conversation as
rational co-operation which does not presuppose the analytic-synthetic
distinction, even if it explains it! Grice would press the issue here: if one
wants to prove that such a theory of conversation as rational co-operation has
to be seen as philosophical, rather than some other way, some idea of
analyticity may be needed to justify the philosophical enterprise. Cf. the
synthetic a priori, that fascinated Grice most than anything Kantian else! Can
a sweater be green and red all over? No stripes allowed. With In defence of a
dogma, Grice and Strawson attack a New-World philosopher. Grice had previously
collaborated with Strawson in an essay on Met.
(actually a three-part piece, with Pears as the third author). The
example Grice chooses to refute attack by Quine of the top-dogma is the
Aristotelian idea of the peritrope, as Aristotle refutes Antiphasis in
Met. (v. Ackrill, Burnyeat and Dancy).
Grice explores chapter Γ 8 of Aristotles Met. . In Γ 8, Aristotle
presents two self-refutation arguments against two theses, and calls the
asserter, Antiphasis, T1 = Everything is true, and T2 = Everything is false,
Metaph. Γ 8, 1012b13–18. Each thesis is exposed to the stock objection
that it eliminates itself. An utterer who explicitly conveys that everything is
true also makes the thesis opposite to his own true, so that his own is not
true (for the opposite thesis denies that his is true), and any utterer U who
explicitly conveys that everything is false also belies
himself. Aristotle does not seem to be claiming that, if everything
is true, it would also be true that it is false that everything is true and,
that, therefore, Everything is true must be false: the final, crucial
inference, from the premise if, p, ~p to the conclusion ~p is
missing. But it is this extra inference that seems required to have a
formal refutation of Antiphasiss T1 or T2 by consequentia mirabilis. The
nature of the argument as a purely dialectical silencer of Antiphasis is
confirmed by the case of T2, Everything is false. An utterer who explicitly
conveys that everything is false unwittingly concedes, by self-application,
that what he is saying must be false too. Again, the further and different
conclusion Therefore; it is false that everything is false is
missing. That proposal is thus self-defeating, self-contradictory (and
comparable to Grices addressee using adult to apply to three-year old, without
producing the creature), oxymoronic, and suicidal. This seems all that
Aristotle is interested in establishing through the self-refutation stock
objection. This is not to suggest that Aristotle did not believe that
Everything is true or Everything is false is false, or that he excludes that he
can prove its falsehood. Grice notes that this is not what Aristotle seems
to be purporting to establish in 1012b13–18. This holds for a περιτροπή
(peritrope) argument, but not for a περιγραφή (perigraphe) argument (συμβαίνει
δὴ καὶ τὸ θρυλούμενον πᾶσι τοῖς τοιούτοις λόγοις, αὐτοὺς ἑαυτοὺς ἀναιρεῖν. ὁ
μὲν γὰρ πάντα ἀληθῆ λέγων καὶ τὸν ἐναντίον αὑτοῦ λόγον ἀληθῆ ποιεῖ, ὥστε τὸν
ἑαυτοῦ οὐκ ἀληθῆ (ὁ γὰρ ἐναντίος οὔ φησιν αὐτὸν ἀληθῆ), ὁ δὲ πάντα ψευδῆ καὶ
αὐτὸς αὑτόν.) It may be emphasized that Aristotles argument does not
contain an explicit application of consequentia mirabilis. Indeed, no
extant self-refutation argument before Augustine, Grice is told by Mates,
contains an explicit application of consequentia mirabilis. This observation is
a good and important one, but Grice has doubts about the consequences one may
draw from it. One may take the absence of an explicit application of
consequentia mirabilis to be a sign of the purely dialectical nature of the
self-refutation argument. This is questionable. The formulation of a
self-refutation argument (as in Grices addressee, Sorry, I misused adult.) is often
compressed and elliptical and involves this or that implicatum. One
usually assumes that this or that piece in a dialectical context has been
omitted and should be supplied (or worked out, as Grice prefers) by the
addressee. But in this or that case, it is equally possible to supply some
other, non-dialectical piece of reasoning. In Aristotles arguments from Γ
8, e.g., the addressee may supply an inference to the effect that the thesis
which has been shown to be self-refuting is not true. For if Aristotle
takes the argument to establish that the thesis has its own contradictory
version as a consequence, it must be obvious to Aristotle that the thesis is
not true (since every consequence of a true thesis is true, and two
contradictory theses cannot be simultaneously true). On the further
assumption (that Grice makes explicit) that the principle of bivalence is
applicable, Aristotle may even infer that the thesis is false. It is
perfectly plausible to attribute such an inference to Aristotle and to supply
it in his argument from Γ 8. On this account, there is no reason to think
that the argument is of an intrinsically dialectical nature and cannot be
adequately represented as a non-dialectical proof of the non-truth, or even
falsity, of the thesis in question. It is indeed difficult to see signs of
a dialectical exchange between two parties (of the type of which Grice and
Strawson are champions) in Γ8, 1012b13–18. One piece of evidence is
Aristotles reference to the person, the utterer, as Grice prefers who explicitly
conveys or asserts (ὁ λέγων) that T1 or that T2. This reference by the
Grecian philosopher to the Griceian utterer or asserter of the thesis that
everything is true would be irrelevant if Aristotles aim is to prove something
about T1s or T2s propositional content, independently of the act by the
utterer of uttering its expression and thereby explicitly conveying
it. However, it is not clear that this reference is essential to
Aristotles argument. One may even doubt whether the Grecian philosopher is
being that Griceian, and actually referring to the asserter of T1 or T2. The
*implicit* (or implicated) grammatical Subjects of Aristotles ὁ λέγων (1012b15)
might be λόγος, instead of the utterer qua asserter. λόγος is surely the
implicit grammatical Subjects of ὁ λέγων shortly after ( 1012b21–22.
8). The passage may be taken to be concerned with λόγοι ‒ this or
that statement, this or that thesis ‒ but not with its
asserter. In the Prior Analytics, Aristotle states that no thesis (A
three-year old is an adult) can necessarily imply its own contradictory (A
three-year old is not an adult) (2.4, 57b13–14). One may appeal to this
statement in order to argue for Aristotles claim that a self-refutation
argument should NOT be analyzed as involving an implicit application of
consequentia mirabilis. Thus, one should deny that Aristotles self-refutation
argument establishes a necessary implication from the self-refuting thesis to
its contradictory. However, this does not explain what other kind of
consequence relation Aristotle takes the self-refutation argument to establish
between the self-refuting thesis and its contradictory, although dialectical
necessity has been suggested. Aristotles argument suffices to establish that
Everything is false is either false or liar-paradoxical. If a thesis is
liar-paradoxical (and Grice loved, and overused the expression), the assumption
of its falsity leads to contradiction as well as the assumption of its
truth. But Everything is false is only liar-paradoxical in the unlikely,
for Aristotle perhaps impossible, event that everything distinct from this
thesis is false. So, given the additional premise that there is at least
one true item distinct from the thesis Everything is false, Aristotle can
safely infer that the thesis is false. As for Aristotles ὁ γὰρ λέγων τὸν ἀληθῆ
λόγον ἀληθῆ ἀληθής,, or eliding the γὰρ, ὁ λέγων τὸν
ἀληθῆ λόγον ἀληθῆ ἀληθής, (ho legon ton alethe logon alethe alethes) may be
rendered as either: The statement which states that the true statement is true
is true, or, more alla Grice, as He who says (or explicitly conveys, or
indicates) that the true thesis is true says something true. It may be argued
that it is quite baffling (and figurative or analogical or metaphoric) in
this context, to take ἀληθής to be predicated of the Griceian utterer, a
person (true standing for truth teller, trustworthy), to take it to mean
that he says something true, rather than his statement stating something true,
or his statement being true. But cf. L and S: ἀληθής [α^], Dor. ἀλαθής, [α^],
Dor. ἀλαθής, ές, f. λήθω, of persons, truthful, honest (not in Hom., v. infr.),
ἀ. νόος Pi. O.2.92; κατήγορος A. Th. 439; κριτής Th. 3.56; οἶνος ἀ. `in vino
veritas, Pl. Smp. 217e; ὁ μέσος ἀ. τις Arist. EN 1108a20. Admittedly, this or
that non-Griceian passage in which it is λόγος, and not the utterer, which is
the implied grammatical Subjects of ὁ λέγων can be found in Metaph. Γ7,
1012a24–25; Δ6, 1016a33; Int. 14, 23a28–29; De motu an. 10, 703a4; Eth. Nic.
2.6, 1107a6–7. 9. So the topic is controversial. Indeed such a
non-Griceian exegesis of the passage is given by Alexander of Aphrodisias (in
Metaph. 340. 26–29):9, when Alexander observes that the statement, i.e. not the
utterer, that says that everything is false (ὁ δὲ πάντα ψευδῆ εἶναι λέγων λόγος)
negates itself, not himself, because if everything is false, this very
statement, which, rather than, by which the utterer, says that everything is
false, would be false, and how can an utterer be FALSE? So that the statement
which, rather than the utterer who, negates it, saying that not everything is
false, would be true, and surely an utterer cannot be true. Does Alexander
misrepresent Aristotles argument by omitting every Griceian reference to the
asserter or utterer qua rational personal agent, of the thesis? If the answer
is negative, even if the occurrence of ὁ λέγων at 1012b15 refers to the
asserter, or utterer, qua rational personal agent, this is merely an accidental
feature of Aristotles argument that cannot be regarded as an indication of its
dialectical nature. None of this is to deny that some self-refutation argument
may be of an intrinsically dialectical nature; it is only to deny that every
one is This is in line with Burnyeats view that a dialectical self-refutation,
even if qualified, as Aristotle does, as ancient, is a subspecies of
self-refutation, but does not exhaust it. Granted, a dialectical approach may
provide a useful interpretive framework for many an ancient self-refutation
argument. A statement like If proof does not exist, proof exists ‒ that occurs
in an anti-sceptical self-refutation argument reported by Sextus
Empiricus ‒ may receive an attractive dialectical re-interpretation.
It may be argued that such a statement should not be understood at the
level of what is explicated, but should be regarded as an elliptical reminder
of a complex dialectical argument which can be described as follows. Cf. If
thou claimest that proof doth not exist, thou must present a proof of what thou
assertest, in order to be credible, but thus thou thyself admitest that proof
existeth. A similar point can be made for Aristotles famous argument in the
Protrepticus that one must philosophise. A number of sources state that this
argument relies on the implicature, If one must not philosophize, one must
philosophize. It may be argued that this implicature is an elliptical reminder
of a dialectical argument such as the following. If thy position is that thou
must not philosophise, thou must reflect on this choice and argue in its
support, but by doing so thou art already choosing to do philosophy, thereby
admitting that thou must philosophise. The claim that every instance of an
ancient self-refutation arguments is of an intrinsically dialectical nature is
thus questionable, to put it mildly. V also 340.19–26, and A. Madigan, tcomm.,
Alexander of Aphrodisias: On Aristotles Met.
4, Ithaca, N.Y., Burnyeat, Protagoras and Self-Refutation in Later Greek
Philosophy,. Grices implicature is that Quine should have learned Greek before
refuting Aristotle. But then *I* dont speak Greek! Strawson refuted. Refs.: The
obvious keyword is ‘analytic,’ in The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
paradox: For one, Grice does not follow Aristotle, but Philo.
the conditional If Alexander exists,
Alexander talks or If Alexander exists, he has such-and-such an age is not
true—not even if he is in fact of such-and-such an age when the proposition is
said. (in APr 175.34–176.6)⁴³ ⁴³
… δείκνυσιν ὅτι μὴ οἷόν τε δυνατῷ τι ἀδύνατον ἀκολουθεῖν, ἀλλ᾿ ἀνάγκη ἀδύνατον
εἶναι ᾧ τὸ ἀδύνατον ἀκολουθεῖ, ἐπὶ πάσης ἀναγκαίας ἀκολουθίας. ἔστι δὲ ἀναγκαία
ἀκολουθία οὐχ ἡ πρόσκαιρος, ἀλλὰ ἐν ᾗ ἀεὶ τὸ ἑπόμενον ἕπεσθαι ἔστι τῷ τὸ εἰλημμένον
ὡς ἡγούμενον εἶναι. οὐ γὰρ ἀληθὲς συνημμένον τὸ εἰ ᾿Αλέξανδρος ἔστιν, ᾿Αλέξανδρος
διαλέγεται, ἢ εἰ ᾿Αλέξανδρος ἔστι, τοσῶνδε ἐτῶν ἐστι, καὶ εἰ εἴη ὅτε λέγεται ἡ
πρότασις τοσούτων ἐτῶν
vide
Barnes. ... έχη δε και επιφοράν το 5 αντικείμενον τώ ήγουμένω, τότε ο
τοιούτος γίνεται δεύτερος αναπόδεικτος, ώς το ,,ει ημέρα έστι, φώς έστιν ουχί δέ γε φώς έστιν ουκ
άρα ...εί ημέρα εστι ,
φως έστιν ... eine
unrichtige ( μοχθηρόν ) bezeichnet 142 ) , und Zwar war es besonders Philo ... οίον , ,
εί ημέρα εστι
, φως έστιν , ή άρχεται από ψεύδους και λήγει επί ψεύδος ... όπερ ήν λήγον .
bei der Obwaltende Conditional - Nexus gar nicht in Betracht ...Philo: If it is day, I am talking. One of Grice’s favorite
paradoxes, that display the usefulness of the implicatum are the so-called
‘paradoxes of implication.’ Johnson, alas, uses ‘paradox’ in the singular. So
there must be earlier accounts of this in the history of philosophy. Notably in
the ancient commentators to Philo! (Greek “ei” and Roman “si”). Misleading but
true – could do.” Note that Grice has an essay on the ‘paradoxes of
entailment’. As Strawson notes, this is misleading. For Strawson these are not
paradoxes. The things are INCORRECT. For Grice, the Philonian paradoxes are
indeed paradoxical because each is a truth. Now, Strawson and Wiggins challenge
this. For Grice, to utter “if p, q” implicates that the utterer is not in a
position to utter anything stronger. He implicates that he has
NON-TRUTH-FUNCTIONAL REASON or grounds to utter “if p, q.” For Strawson, THAT
is precisely what the ‘consequentialist’ is holding. For Strawson, the utterer
CONVENTIONALLY IMPLIES that the consequent or apodosis follows, in some way,
from the antecedent or protasis. Not for Grice. For Grice, what the utterer
explicitly conveys is that the conditions that obtain are those of the
Philonian conditional. He implicitly conveys that there is n inferrability, and
this is cancellable. If Strawson holds that it is a matter of a conventional
implicatum, the issue of cancellation becomes crucial. For Grice, to add that
“But I don’t want to covey that there is any inferrability between the protasis
and the apodosis” is NOT a contradiction. The utterer or emissor is NOT
self-contradicting. And he isn’t! The first to use the term ‘paracox’ here is a
genius. Possibly Philo. It was W. E. Johnson who first used the expression
'paradox of implication', explaining that a paradox of this sort arises
when a logician proceeds step by step, using accepted
principles, until a formula is reached which conflicts with common sense
[Johnson, 1921, 39].The paradox of implication assumes many forms, some of which
are not easily recognised as involving mere varieties of the same
fundamental principle. But COMPOUND PROPOSITIONS 47
I believe that they can all be resolved by the consider- ation that
we cannot ivithotd qjialification apply a com- posite and (in particular)
an implicative proposition to the further process of inference. Such
application is possible only when the composite has been reached
irrespectively of any assertion of the truth or falsity of its
components. In other words, it is a necessary con- dition for further
inference that the components of a composite should really have been
entertained hypo- thetically when asserting that composite. §
9. The theory of compound propositions leads to a special development
when in the conjunctives the components are taken — not, as hitherto,
assertorically — but hypothetically as in the composites. The
conjunc- tives will now be naturally expressed by such words as
possible or compatible, while the composite forms which respectively contradict
the conjunctives will be expressed by such words as necessary or
impossible. If we select the negative form for these conjunctives, we
should write as contradictory pairs : Conjunctives {possible)
Composites {fiecessary) a. p does not imply q 1,
p is not implied by q c. p is not co-disjunct to q d. p
is not co-alternate to q a, p implies q b, p is
implied by q c, p is co-disjunct to q d, p is
co-alternate to q Or Otherwise, using the term 'possible'
throughout, the four conjunctives will assume the form that the
several conjunctions — pq^pq, pq ^-nd pq — are respectively /^i*-
sidle. Here the word possible is equivalent to being merely
hypothetically entertained, so that the several conjunctives are now
qualified in the same way as are the simple components themselves.
Similarly the four 48 CHAPTER HI corresponding
composites may be expressed negatively by using the term 'impossible,'
and will assume the form that the ^^;yunctions pq^ pq, pq and pq are
re- spectively impossible, or (which means the same) that the
^zVjunctions/^, ^^, pq Rnd pq are necessary. Now just as 'possible* here
means merely 'hypothetically entertained/ so 'impossible' and 'necessary'
mean re- spectively 'assertorically denied' and 'assertorically
affirmed/ The above scheme leads to the consideration of the
determinate relations that could subsist of p to q when these eight
propositions (conjunctives and composites) are combined in
everypossibleway without contradiction. Prima facie there are i6 such
combinations obtained by selecting a or ay b or 3, c or c, d or J for one
of the four constituent terms. Out of these i6 combinations, how-
ever, some will involve a conjunction of supplementaries (see tables on
pp. 37, 38), which would entail the as- sertorical affirmation or denial
of one of the components / or q, and consequently would not exhibit a
relation of p to q. The combinations that, on this ground, must be
disallowed are the following nine : cihcd, abed, abed, abed] abed,
bacd, cabd, dabc\ abed. The combinations that remain to be admitted
are therefore the followino- seven : abld, cdab\ abed, bald,
cdab^ dcab\ abed. In fact, under the imposed restriction, since a
or b cannot be conjoined with c or d, it follows that we must always
conjoin a with c and d\ b with e and d\ c with a and b\ ^with a and b.
This being understood, the COMPOUND PROPOSITIONS 49
seven permissible combinations that remain are properly to be
expressed in the more simple forms: ab, cd\ ab, ba, cd, dc\ and
abed These will be represented (but re-arranged for purposes
of symmetry) in the following table giving all the possible relations of
any proposition/ to any proposition q. The technical names which 1
propose to adopt for the several relations are printed in the second
column of the table. Table of possible relations of
propositio7i p to proposition q. 1. {a,b)\ p implies and is
implied by q 2. (a, b) : p implies but is not implied by q,
3. {b^d): p is implied by but does not imply q, 4.
{djb^'c^d): p is neither implicans nor impli cate nor co-disjunct
nor co-alternate to g. 5. {dy c)\ /is co-alternate but not
co-disjunct to $r, 6. {Cyd):
/isco-disjunctbutnotco-alternateto$^. 7. {Cjd)'. p is co-disjunct
and co-alternate to q, p is co-implicant to q p is
super-implicant to q. p is sub-implicant to q. p is
independent of q p is sub-opponent to q p is
super-opponent to q, p is co-opponent to q, Here the symmetry
indicated by the prefixes, co-, super-, sub-, is brought out by reading
downwards and upwards to the middle line representing independence.
In this order the propositional forms range from the supreme degree of
consistency to the supreme degree of opponency, as regards the relation
of/ to ^. In tradi- tional logic the seven forms of relation are known
respec- tively by the names equipollent, superaltern, subaltern,
independent, sub-contrary, contrary, contradictory. This latter
terminology, however, is properly used to express the formal relations of
implication and opposition, whereas the terminology which I have adopted
will apply indifferently both for formal and for material relations. One of Grice’s claims to fame is his paradox, under ‘Yog
and Zog.’ Another paradox that Grice examines at length is paradox by Moore.
For Grice, unlike Nowell-Smith, an utterer who, by uttering The cat is on the
mat explicitly conveys that the cat is on the mat does not thereby implicitly
convey that he believes that the cat is on the mat. He, more crucially expresses
that he believes that the cat is on the mat ‒ and this is not cancellable. He
occasionally refers to Moores paradox in the buletic mode, Close the door even
if thats not my desire. An imperative still expresses someones desire. The
sergeant who orders his soldiers to muster at dawn because he is following the
lieutenants order. Grices first encounter with paradox remains his studying
Malcolms misleading exegesis of Moore. Refs.: The main sources given under
‘heterologicality,’ above. ‘Paradox’ is a good keyword in The H. P. Grice
Papers, since he used ‘paradox’ to describe his puzzle about ‘if,’ but also
Malcolm on Moore on the philosopher’s paradox, and paradoxes of material
implication and paradoxes of entailment. Grice’s point is that a paradox is not
something false. For Strawson it is. “The so-called paradoxes of ‘entailment’
and ‘material implication’ are a misnomer. They statements are not paradoxical,
they are false.” Not for Grice! Cf. aporia. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.
perceptum:
the traditional distinction is perceptum-conceptum: nihil est in intellectu
quod prius non fuerit in sensu. this is Grice on sense-datum. Grice feels that
the kettle is hot; Grice sees that the kettle is hot; Grice perceives that the
kettle is hot. WoW:251 uses this example. It may be argued that the use of
‘see’ is there NOT factive. Cf. “I feel hot but it’s not hot.” Grice modifies
the thing to read, “DIRECTLY PERCEIVING”: Grice only indirectly perceives that
the kettle is hot’ if what he is doing is ‘seeing’ that the kettle is hot. When
Grice sees that the kettle is hot, it is a ‘secondary’ usage of ‘see,’ because
it means that Grice perceives that the kettle has some visual property that INDICATES
the presence of hotness (Grice uses phi for the general formula). Cf. sensum.
Lewis and Short have “sentĭo,”
which they render, aptly, as “to sense,” ‘to discern by the senses; to feel,
hear, see, etc.; to perceive, be sensible of (syn. percipio).” Note that Price is also cited by Grice in Personal
identity. Grice: That pillar box seems red to me. The locus classicus in the
philosophical literature for Grices implicatum. Grice introduces a
dout-or-denial condition for an utterance of a phenomenalist report (That
pillar-box seems red to me). Grice attacks neo-Wittgensteinian approaches that
regard the report as _false_. In a long excursus on implication, he compares
the phenomenalist report with utterances like He has beautiful handwriting (He
is hopeless at philosophy), a particularised conversational implicatum; My wife
is in the kitchen or the garden (I have non-truth-functional grounds to utter
this), a generalised conversational implicatum; She was poor but she was
honest (a Great-War witty (her poverty and her honesty contrast), a
conventional implicatum; and Have you stopped beating your wife? an old
Oxonian conundrum. You have been beating your wife, cf. Smith has not ceased
from eating iron, a presupposition. More importantly, he considers different
tests for each concoction! Those for the conversational implicatum will become
crucial: cancellability, calculability, non-detachability, and indeterminacy.
In the proceedings he plays with something like the principle of conversational
helpfulness, as having a basis on a view of conversation as rational
co-operation, and as giving the rationale to the implicatum. Past the excursus,
and back to the issue of perception, he holds a conservative view as presented
by Price at Oxford. One interesting reprint of Grices essay is in Daviss volume
on Causal theories, since this is where it belongs! White’s response is usually
ignored, but shouldnt. White is an interesting Australian philosopher at Oxford
who is usually regarded as a practitioner of ordinary-language philosophy.
However, in his response, White hardly touches the issue of the implicature
with which Grice is primarily concerned. Grice found that a full reprint from
the PAS in a compilation also containing the James Harvard would be too
repetitive. Therefore, he omits the excursus on implication. However, the way
Grice re-formulates what that excursus covers is very interesting. There is the
conversational implicatum, particularised (Smith has beautiful handwriting) and
generalised (My wife is in the kitchen or in the garden). Then there is the
præsuppositum, or presupposition (You havent stopped beating your wife).
Finally, there is the conventional implicatum (She was poor, but she was
honest). Even at Oxford, Grices implicature goes, philosophers ‒ even Oxonian
philosophers ‒ use imply for all those different animals! Warnock had attended
Austins Sense and Sensibilia (not to be confused with Sense and Sensibility by
Austen), which Grice found boring, but Warnock didnt because Austin reviews his
"Berkeley." But Warnock, for obvious reasons, preferred
philosophical investigations with Grice. Warnock reminisces that Grice once
tells him, and not on a Saturday morning, either, How clever language is, for
they find that ordinary language does not need the concept of a visum. Grice
and Warnock spent lovely occasions exploring what Oxford has as the philosophy
of perception. While Grice later came to see philosophy of perception as a bit
or an offshoot of philosophical psychology, the philosophy of perception is
concerned with that treasured bit of the Oxonian philosophers lexicon, the
sense-datum, always in the singular! The cause involved is crucial. Grice plays
with an evolutionary justification of the material thing as the denotatum of a
perceptual judgement. If a material thing causes the sense-datum of a nut, that
is because the squarrel (or squirrel) will not be nourished by the sense datum
of the nut; only by the nut! There are many other items in the Grice Collection
that address the topic of perception – notably with Warnock, and criticizing
members of the Ryle group like Roxbee-Cox (on vision, cf. visa ‒ taste, and
perception, in general – And we should not forget that Grice contributed a
splendid essay on the distinction of the senses to Butlers Analytic philosophy,
which in a way, redeemed a rather old-fashioned discipline by shifting it to
the idiom of the day, the philosophy of perception: a retrospective, with
Warnock, the philosophy of perception, : perception, the philosophy of
perception, visum. Warnock was possibly the only philosopher at Oxford
Grice felt congenial enough to engage in different explorations in the
so-called philosophy of perception. Their joint adventures involved the
disimplicature of a visum. Grice later approached sense data in more
evolutionary terms: a material thing is to be vindicated transcendentally, in
the sense that it is a material thing (and not a sense datum or collection
thereof) that nourishes a creature like a human. Grice was particularly
grateful to Warnock. By reprinting the full symposium on “Causal theory” of
perception in his influential s. of Oxford Readings in Philosophy, Warnock had
spread Grices lore of implicature all over! In some parts of the draft he uses
more on visa, vision, vision, with Warnock, vision. Of the five senses,
Grice and Warnock are particularly interested in seeing. As Grice will put it
later, see is a factive. It presupposes the existence of the event reported
after the that-clause; a visum, however, as an intermediary between the
material thing and the perceiver does not seem necessary in ordinary discourse.
Warnock will reconsider Grices views too (On what is seen, in Sibley). While
Grice uses vision, he knows he is interested in Philosophers paradox concerning
seeing, notably Witters on seeing as, vision, taste and the philosophy of
perception, vision, seeing. As an Oxonian philosopher, Grice was of course
more interested in seeing than in vision. He said that Austin would criticise
even the use of things like sensation and volition, taste, The Grice Papers,
keyword: taste, the objects of the five senses, the philosophy of perception,
perception, the philosophy of perception; philosophy of perception, vision,
taste, perception. Mainly with Warnock. Warnock repr. Grice’s “Causal
theory” in his influential Reading in Philosophy, The philosophy of perception,
perception, with Warnock, with Warner; perception. Warnock learns about
perception much more from Grice than from Austin, taste, The philosophy of perception,
the philosophy of perception, notes with Warnock on visum, : visum, Warnock,
Grice, the philosophy of perception. Grice kept the lecture notes to
a view of publishing a retrospective. Warnock recalled Grice
saying, how clever language is! Grice took the offer by Harvard University
Press, and it was a good thing he repr. part of “Causal theory.” However, the
relevant bits for his theory of conversation as rational co-operation lie in
the excursus which he omitted. What is Grices implicature: that one should
consider the topic rather than the method here, being sense datum, and
causation, rather than conversational helpfulness. After all, That pillar box
seems red to me, does not sound very helpful. But the topic of Causal theory is
central for his view of conversation as rational co-operation. Why? P1 gets
an impression of danger as caused by the danger out there. He communicates the
danger to P1, causing in P2 some behaviour. Without
causation, or causal links, the very point of offering a theory of conversation
as rational co-operation seems minimized. On top, as a metaphysician, he was
also concerned with cause simpliciter. He was especially proud that Price’s
section on the casual theory of perception, from his Belief, had been repr.
along with his essay in the influential volume by Davis on “Causal theories.”
In “Actions and events,” Grice further explores cause now in connection with
Greek aitia. As Grice notes, the original usage of this very Grecian item is
the one we find in rebel without a cause, cause-to, rather than cause-because.
The two-movement nature of causing is reproduced in the conversational
exchange: a material thing causes a sense datum which causes an expression
which gets communicated, thus causing a psychological state which will cause a
behaviour. This causation is almost representational. A material thing or a
situation cannot govern our actions and behaviours, but a re-præsentatum of it
might. Govern our actions and behaviour is Grices correlate of what a team of
North-Oxfordshire cricketers can do for North-Oxfordshire: what North
Oxfordshire cannot do for herself, Namesly, engage in a game of cricket! In
Retrospective epilogue he casts doubts on the point of his causal approach. It
is a short paragraph that merits much exploration. Basically, Grice is saying
his causalist approach is hardly an established thesis. He also proposes a
similar serious objection to his view in Some remarks about the senses, the
other essay in the philosophy of perception in Studies. As he notes, both engage
with some fundamental questions in the philosophy of perception, which is
hardly the same thing as saying that they provide an answer to each question!
Grice: The issue with which I have 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 I think need to be examined in order
to see whether or not they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis which I have
been discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same general kind. Examples
which occur to me are the following six. You cannot see a knife ‘as’ a knife,
though you may see what is not a knife ‘as’ a knife (keyword: ‘seeing as’).
When he said he ‘knew’ that the objects before him were human hands, Moore was
guilty of misusing ‘know.’ For an occurrence to be properly said to have a
‘cause,’ it must be something abnormal or unusual (keyword: ‘cause’). For an
action to be properly described as one for which the agent is ‘responsible,’ it
must be the sort of action for which people are condemned (keyword:
responsibility). What is actual is not also possible (keyword: actual). What is
known by me to be the case is not also believed by me to be the case (keyword:
‘know’ – cf. Urmson on ‘scalar set’). And cf. with the extra examples he
presents in “Prolegomena.” I have no doubt that there will be other candidates
besides the six which I have mentioned. I must emphasize that I am not saying
that all these examples are importantly similar to the thesis which I have been
criticizing, only that, for all I know, they may be. To put the matter more
generally, the position adopted by my objector seems to me to involve a type of
manoeuvre which is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of
philosophizing. I am not condemning this kind of manoeuvre. I am 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
detectcd, we should make sure that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuances
they are. “Causal theory”, knowledge and belief, knowledge, belief,
philosophical psychology. Grice: the doxastic implicatum. I know only
implicates I do not believe. The following is a mistake by a philosopher. What is
known by me to be the case is not also believed by me to be the case. The topic
had attracted the attention of some Oxonian philosophers such as Urmson in
Parenthetical verbs. Urmson speaks of a scale: I know can be used
parenthetically, as I believe can. For Grice, to utter I believe is obviously
to make a weaker conversational move than you would if you utter I know.
And in this case, an approach to informativeness in terms of entailment is in
order, seeing that I know entails I believe. A is thus allowed to infer that
the utterer is not in a position to make the stronger claim. The mechanism is
explained via his principle of conversational helpfulness. Philosophers tend
two over-use these two basic psychological states, attitudes, or stances. Grice
is concerned with Gettier-type cases, and also the factivity of know versus the
non-factivity of believe. Grice follows the lexicological innovations by
Hintikka: the logic of belief is doxastic; the logic of knowledge is epistemic.
The last thesis that Grice lists in Causal theory that he thinks rests on a big
mistake he formulates as: What is known by me to be the case is NOT also
believed by me to be the case. What are his attending remarks? Grice writes:
The issue with which I have 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 I think need to be examined in order to see whether
or not they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis which I have been
discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same general kind. An example
which occurs to me is the following: What is known by me to be the case is not
also believed by me to be the case. I must emphasise that I am not saying that
this example is importantly similar to the thesis which I have been
criticising, only that, for all I know, it may be. To put the matter more
generally, the position adopted by my objector seems to me to involve a type of
manoeuvre which is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of
philosophizing. I am not condemning this kind of manoeuvre. I am 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! The ætiological implicatum. Grice. For an occurrence to be
properly said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual. This
is an example Grice lists in Causal theory but not in Prolegomena. But cf.
‘responsible’ – and Hart and Honoré on accusation -- accusare "call
to account, make complaint against," from ad causa, from “ad,” with regard
to, as in ‘ad-’) + causa, a cause; a lawsuit,’ v. cause. For an occurrence to be properly said to have a cause, it
must be something abnormal or unusual. Similar commentary to his example on
responsible/condemnable apply. The objector may stick with the fact that he is
only concerned with proper utterances. Surely Grice wants to go to a
pre-Humeian account of causation, possible Aristotelian, aetiologia. Where
everything has a cause, except, for Aristotle, God! What are his attending
remarks? Grice writes: The issue with which I have 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 I think need to be examined
in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis
which I have been discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same general
kind. An example which occurs to me is the following: What is known by me to be
the case is not also believed by me to be the case. 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 my objector seems to me to involve a type of
manoeuvre which is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of philosophising.
I am not condemning this kind of manoeuvre. I am 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! Causal
theory, cause, causality, causation, conference, colloquium, Stanford, cause,
metaphysics, the abnormal/unusual implicatum, ætiology, ætiological implicatum.
Grice: the ætiological implicatum. Grices explorations on cause are very rich.
He is concerned with some alleged misuse of cause in ordinary language. If as
Hume suggests, to cause is to will, one would say that the decapitation of
Charles I wills his death, which sounds harsh, if not ungrammatical, too. Grice
later relates cause to the Greek aitia, as he should. He notes collocations
like rebel without a cause. For the Greeks, or Grecians, as he called them, and
the Griceians, it is a cause to which one should be involved in elucidating.
A ‘cause to’ connects with the idea of freedom. Grice was constantly aware of
the threat of mechanism, and his idea was to provide philosophical room for the
idea of finality, which is not mechanistically derivable. This leads him to
discussion of overlap and priority of, say, a physical-cum-physiological versus
a psychological theory explaining this or that piece of rational behaviour.
Grice can be Wittgensteinian when citing Anscombes translation: No
psychological concept without the behaviour the concept is brought to
explain. It is best to place his later treatment of cause with his
earlier one in Causal theory. It is surprising Grice does not apply his example
of a mistake by a philosopher to the causal bit of his causal theory. Grice
states the philosophical mistake as follows: For an occurrence to be properly
said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual. This is an
example Grice lists in Causal theory but not in Prolegomena. For an occurrence
to be properly said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual.
A similar commentary to his example on responsible/condemnable applies: The
objector may stick with the fact that he is only concerned with PROPER
utterances. Surely Grice wants to embrace a pre-Humeian account of causation,
possible Aristotelian. Keyword: Aitiologia, where everything has a cause,
except, for Aristotle, God! What are his attending remarks? Grice writes: The
issue with which I have 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 Grice 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. One
example which occurs to Grice is the following: For an occurrence to be
properly said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual. Grice
feels he must emphasise that he is 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 my
objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre which is characteristic of
more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing. I am not condemning this
kind of manoeuvre. I am 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! Re:
responsibility/condemnation. Cf. Mabbott, Flew on punishment, Philosophy. And
also Hart. At Corpus, Grice enjoys his tutor Hardies resourcefulness in the
defence of what may be a difficult position, a characteristic illustrated by an
incident which Hardie himself once told Grice about himself. Hardie had parked
his car and gone to a cinema. Unfortunately, Hardie had parked his car on top
of one of the strips on the street by means of which traffic-lights were, at
the time, controlled by the passing traffic. As a result, the lights are
jammed, and it requires four policemen to lift Hardies car off the strip. The
police decides to prosecute. Grice indicated to Hardie that this hardly
surprised him and asked him how he fared. Oh, Hardie says, I got off. Then
Grice asks Hardie how on earth he managed that! Quite simply, Hardie answers. I
just invoked Mills method of difference. The police charged me with causing an
obstruction at 4 p.m. I told the police that, since my car was parked at 2
p.m., it could not have been my car which caused the obstruction at 4 p.m. This
relates to an example in Causal theory that he Grice does not discuss in
Prolegomena, but which may relate to Hart, and closer to Grice, to Mabbotts
essay on Flew on punishment, in Philosophy. Grice states the philosophical
mistake as follows: For an action to be properly described as one for which the
agent is responsible, it must be thc sort of action for which people are
condemned. As applied to Hardie. Is Hardie irresponsible? In any case, while
condemnable, he was not! Grice writes: The issue with which I have 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 I
think need to be examined in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently
parallel to the thesis which I have been discussing to be amenable to treatment
of the same general kind. An example which occurs to me is the following: For
an action to be properly described as one for which the agent is responsible,
it must be the sort of action for which people are condemned. 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 my objector seems to me to
involve a type of manoeuvre which is characteristic of more than one
contemporary mode of philosophizing. I am not condemning this kind of
manoeuvre. I am 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. The modal example, what is
actual is not also possible, should discussed under Indicative conditonals,
Grice on Macbeth’s implicature: seeing a dagger as a dagger. Grice elaborates
on this in Prolegomena, but the austerity of Causal theory is charming, since
he does not give a quote or source. Obviously, Witters. Grice writes: Witters
might say that one cannot see a knife as a knife, though one may see what is
not a knife as a knife. The issue, Grice notes, with which I have 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 I
think need to be examined in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently
parallel to the thesis which I have been discussing to be amenable to treatment
of the same general kind. An example which occurs to Grice is the following:
You cannot see a knife as a knife, though you may see what is not a knife as a
knife. Grice feels that he must emphasise that he is 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 my objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre
which is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing. I
am not condemning this kind of manoeuvre. I am 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! Is this a
dagger which I see before me, the handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch
thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. Art thou not, fatal vision,
sensible to feeling as to sight? or art thou but A dagger of the mind, a false
creation, Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain? I see thee yet, in form as
palpable as this which now I draw. Thou marshallst me the way that I was going;
and such an instrument I was to use. Mine eyes are made the fools o the other
senses, Or else worth all the rest; I see thee still, and on thy blade and
dudgeon gouts of blood, which was not so before. Theres no such thing: It is
the bloody business which informs Thus to mine eyes. Now oer the one halfworld
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse The curtaind sleep; witchcraft
celebrates Pale Hecates offerings, and witherd murder, Alarumd by his sentinel,
the wolf, Whose howls his watch, thus with his stealthy pace. With
Tarquins ravishing strides, towards his design Moves like a ghost. Thou sure
and firm-set earth, Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear Thy very
stones prate of my whereabout, And take the present horror from the time, Which
now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives: Words to the heat of deeds too
cold breath gives. I go, and it is done; the bell invites me. Hear it not,
Duncan; for it is a knell that summons thee to heaven or to hell. The Moore
example is used both in “Causal theory” and “Prolegomena.” But the use in
“Causal Theory” is more austere: Philosophers mistake: Malcolm: When Moore said
he knew that the objects before him were human hands, he was guilty of misusing
the word know. Grice writes: The issue with which I have 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 I think need to be
examined in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently parallel to the
thesis which I have been discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same
general kind. An example which occurs to me is the following: When Moore said
he knew that the objects before him were human hands, he was guilty of misusing
the word know. 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 my objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre which is
characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing. I am not
condemning this kind of manoeuvre. Grice 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! So surely
Grice is meaning: I know that the objects before me are human hands as uttered
by Moore is possibly true. Grice was amused by the fact that while at Madison,
Wisc., Moore gave the example: I know that behind those curtains there is a
window. Actually he was wrong, as he soon realised when the educated
Madisonians corrected him with a roar of unanimous laughter. You see, the
lecture hall of the University of Wisconsin at Madison is a rather, shall we
say, striking space. The architect designed the lecture hall with a parapet
running around the wall just below the ceiling, cleverly rigged with indirect
lighting to create the illusion that sun light is pouring in through windows
from outside. So, Moore comes to give a lecture one sunny day. Attracted as he
was to this eccentric architectural detail, Moore gives an illustration of
certainty as attached to common sense. Pointing to the space below the ceiling,
Moore utters. We know more things than we think we know. I know, for example,
that the sunlight shining in from outside proves At which point he was somewhat startled (in
his reserved Irish-English sort of way) when his audience burst out laughing!
Is that a proof of anything? Grice is especially concerned with I seem He needs
a paradeigmatic sense-datum utterance, and intentionalist as he was, he finds
it in I seem to see a red pillar box before me. He is relying on Paul. Grice
would generalise a sense datum by φ I seem to perceive that the alpha is phi.
He agrees that while cause may be too much, any sentence using because will do:
At a circus: You seem to be seeing that an elephant is coming down the street
because an elephant is coming down the street. Grice found the causalist theory
of perception particularly attractive since its objection commits one same
mistake twice: he mischaracterises the cancellable implicatum of both seem and
cause! While Grice is approaching the philosophical item in the
philosophical lexicon, perceptio, he is at this stage more interested in
vernacular that- clauses such as sensing that, or even more vernacular ones like
seeming that, if not seeing that! This is of course philosophical (cf.
aesthetikos vs. noetikos). L and S have “perceptĭo,” f. perceptio, as used by
Cicero (Ac. 2, 7, 22) translating catalepsis, and which they render as “a
taking, receiving; a gathering in, collecting;’ frugum fruetuumque reliquorum,
Cic. Off. 2, 3, 12: fructuum;’ also as perception, comprehension, cf.: notio,
cognition; animi perceptiones, notions, ideas; cognitio aut perceptio, aut si
verbum e verbo volumus comprehensio, quam κατάληψιν illi vocant; in philosophy,
direct apprehension of an object by the mind, Zeno Stoic.1.20, Luc. Par. 4,
al.; τῶν μετεώρων;” ἀκριβὴς κ. Certainty; pl., perceptions, Stoic.2.30, Luc.
Herm.81, etc.; introduced into Latin by Cicero, Plu. Cic. 40. As for “causa” Grice
is even more sure he was exploring a time-honoured philosophical topic. The
entry in L and S is “causa,’ perh. root “cav-“ of “caveo,” prop. that which is
defended or protected; cf. “cura,” and that they render as, unhelpfully, as
“cause,” “that by, on account of, or through which any thing takes place or is
done;” “a cause, reason, motive, inducement;” also, in gen., an occasion,
opportunity; oeffectis; factis, syn.
with ratio, principium, fons, origo, caput; excusatio, defensio; judicium,
controversia, lis; partes, actio; condicio, negotium, commodum, al.);
correlated to aition, or aitia, cause, δι᾽ ἣν αἰτίην ἐπολέμησαν,” cf. Pl. Ti.
68e, Phd. 97a sq.; on the four causes of Arist. v. Ph. 194b16, Metaph. 983a26:
αἰ. τοῦ γενέσθαι or γεγονέναι Pl. Phd. 97a; τοῦ μεγίστου ἀγαθοῦ τῇ πόλει αἰτία
ἡ κοινωνία Id. R. 464b: αἰτίᾳ for the sake of, κοινοῦ τινος ἀγαθοῦ.” Then there
is “αἴτιον” (cf. ‘αἴτιος’) is used like “αἰτία” in the sense of cause, not in
that of ‘accusation.’ Grice goes back to perception at a later stage,
reminiscing on his joint endeavours with akin Warnock, Ps karulise elatically,
potching and cotching obbles, Pirotese, Pirotese, creature construction,
philosophical psychology. Grice was fascinated by Carnaps Ps which
karulise elatically. Grice adds potching for something like perceiving and
cotching for something like cognising. With his essay Some remarks about
the senses, Grice introduces the question by which criterion we
distinguish our five senses into the contemporary philosophy of perception. The
literature concerning this question is not very numerous but the discussion is
still alive and was lately inspired by the volume The Senses2. There are four
acknowledged possible answers to the question how we distinguish the senses,
all of them already stated by Grice. First, the senses are distinguished by the
properties we perceive by them. Second, the senses are distinguished by the
phenomenal qualities of the perception itself or as Grice puts it “by the
special introspectible character of the experiences” Third, the senses are
distinguished by the physical stimuli that are responsible for the relevant
perceptions. Fourth, The senses are distinguished by the sense-organs that are
(causally) involved in the production of the relevant perceptions. Most
contributions discussing this issue reject the third and fourth answers in a
very short argumentation. Nearly all philosophers writing on the topic vote
either for the first or the second answer. Accordingly, most part of the debate
regarding the initial question takes the form of a dispute between these two
positions. Or” was a big thing in Oxford philosophy. The only known
published work of Wood, our philosophy tutor at Christ Church, was an essay in
Mind, the philosophers journal, entitled “Alternative Uses of “Or” ”, a work
which was every bit as indeterminate as its title. Several years later he
published another paper, this time for the Aristotelian Society, entitled On
being forced to a conclusion. Cf. Grice and Wood on the demands of conversational
reason. Wood, The force of linguistic rules. Wood, on the implicatum of or in
review in Mind of Connor, Logic. The five senses, as Urmson notes, are to see
that the sun is shining, to hear that the car collided, to feel that her pulse
is beating, to smell that something has been smoking and to taste that. An
interesting piece in that it was commissioned by Butler, who knew Grice from
his Oxford days. Grice cites Wood and Albritton. Grice is concerned with a
special topic in the philosophy of perception, notably the identification of
the traditional five senses: vision, audition, taste, smell, and tact. He
introduces what is regarded in the philosophical literature as the first
thought-experiment, in terms of the senses that Martians may have. They have
two pairs of eyes: are we going to allow that they see with both pairs? Grice
introduces a sub-division of seeing: a Martian x-s an object with his upper
pair of eyes, but he y-s an object with the lower pair of eyes. In his
exploration, he takes a realist stance, which respects the ordinary discursive
ways to approach issues of perception. A second interesting point is that in
allowing this to be repr. in Butlers Analytic philosophy, Grice is
demonstrating that analytic philosophers should NOT be obsessed with ordinary
language. Butlers compilation, a rather dry one, is meant as a response to the
more linguistic oriented ones by Flew (Grices first tutee at St. Johns, as it
happens), also published by Blackwell, and containing pieces by Austin, and
company. One philosopher who took Grice very seriously on this was Coady, in
his The senses of the Martians. Grice provides a serious objection to his own
essay in Retrospective epilogue We see with our eyes. I.e. eye is
teleologically defined. He notes that his way of distinguishing the senses is
hardly an established thesis. Grice actually advances this topic in his earlier
Causal theory. Grice sees nothing absurd in the idea that a non-specialist
concept should contain, so to speak, a blank space to be filled in by the
specialist; that this is so, e.g., in the case of the concept of seeing is
perhaps indicated by the consideration that if we were in doubt about the
correctness of speaking of a certain creature with peculiar sense-organs as
seeing objects, we might well wish to hear from a specialist a comparative
account of the human eye and the relevant sense-organs of the creature in
question. He returns to the point in Retrospective epilogue with a bit of
doxastic humility, We see with our eyes is analytic ‒ but
philosophers should take that more seriously. Grice tested the
playmates of his children, aged 7 and 9, with Nothing can be green
and red all over. Instead, Morley Bunker preferred
philosophy undergrads. Aint that boring? To give examples:
Summer follows Spring was judged analytic by Morley-Bunkers informants, as
cited by Sampson, in Making sense (Clarendon) by highly significant majorities
in each group of Subjectss, while We see with our eyes was given near-even
split votes by each group. Over all, the philosophers were somewhat more
consistent with each other than the non-philosophers. But that global finding
conceals results for individual sentences that sometimes manifested the
opposed tendency. Thus, Thunderstorms are electrical disturbances in the
atmosphere is judged analytic by a highly significant majority of the
non-philosophers, while a non-significant majority of the philosophers deemed
it non-analytic or synthetic. In this case, it seems, philosophical training,
surely not brain-washing, induces the realisation that well-established results
of contemporary science are not necessary truths. In other cases, conversely,
cliches of current philosophical education impose their own mental blinkers on
those who undergo it: Nothing can be completely red and green all over is
judged analytic by a significant majority of philosophers but only by a
non-significant majority of non-philosophers. All in all, the results argue
strongly against the notion that our inability to decide consistently whether
or not some statement is a necessary truth derives from lack of skill in
articulating our underlying knowledge of the rules of our language. Rather, the
inability comes from the fact that the question as posed is unreal. We choose
to treat a given statement as open to question or as unchallengeable in the
light of the overall structure of beliefs which we have individually
evolved in order to make sense of our individual experience. Even the cases
which seem clearly analytic or synthetic are cases which individuals judge
alike because the relevant experiences are shared by the whole community, but
even for such cases one can invent hypothetical or suppositional future
experiences which, if they should be realised, would cause us to revise our
judgements. This is not intended to call into question the special status of
the truths of logic, such as either Either it is raining or it is not. He
is of course inclined to accept the traditional view according to which logical
particles such as not and or are distinct from the bulk of the vocabulary in
that the former really are governed by clear-cut inference rules. Grice
does expand on the point. Refs.: Under sense-datum, there are groups of essays.
The obvious ones are the two essays on the philosophy of perception in WOW. A
second group relates to his research with G. J. Warnock, where the keywords are
‘vision,’ ‘taste,’ and ‘perception,’ in general. There is a more recent group
with this research with R. Warner. ‘Visum’ and ‘visa’ are good keywords, and
cf. the use of ‘senses’ in “Some remarks about the senses,” in BANC.
philosophical: His feeling of superiority as a philosopher is obvious in
various fields. He certaintly would not get involved in any ‘empirical’ survey
(“We can trust this, qua philosophers, as given.”) Grice held a MA (Lit. Hum.)
– Literae Humaniores (Philosophy). So he knew what he was talking about. The
curriculum was an easy one. He plays with the fact that empiricists don’t
regard philosophy as a sovereign monarch: philosophia regina scientiarum,
provided it’s queen consort. In “Conceptual analysis and the province of
philosophy,” he plays with the idea that Philosophy is the Supreme Science. Grice
was somewhat obsessed as to what ‘philosohical’ stood for, which amused the
members of his play group! His play group once spends five weeks in an effort
to explain why, sometimes, ‘very’ allows, with little or no change of meaning,
the substitution of ‘highly’ (as in ‘very unusual’) and sometimes does not (as
in ‘very depressed’ or ‘very wicked’); and we reached no conclusion. This
episode was ridiculed by some as an ultimate embodiment of fruitless frivolity.
But that response is as out of place as a similar response to the medieval
question, ‘How many angels can dance on a needle’s point?’” A needless point?For
much as this medieval question is raised in order to display, in a vivid way, a
difficulty in the conception of an immaterial substance, so The Play Group
discussion is directed, in response to a worry from me, towards an examination,
in the first instance, of a conceptual question which is generally agreed among
us to be a strong candidate for being a question which had no philosophical
importance, with a view to using the results of this examination in finding a
distinction between philosophically important and philosophically unimportant
enquiries. Grice is fortunate that the Lit. Hum. programme does not have much
philosophy! He feels free! In fact, the lack of a philosophical background is
felt as a badge of honour. It is ‘too clever’ and un-English to ‘know’ things.
A pint of philosophy is all Grice wanted. Figurative. This is Harvardite Gordon’s
attempt to formulate a philosophy of the minimum fundamental ideas that all
people on the earth should come to know. Reviewed by A. M. Honoré: Short measure.
Gordon, a Stanley Plummer scholar, e: Bowdoin and Harvard, in The Eastern
Gazette. Grice would exclaim: I always loved Alfred Brooks Gordon! Grice was
slightly disapppointed that Gordon had not included the fundamental idea of
implicature in his pint. Short measure, indeed. Grice gives seminars on
Ariskant (“the first part of this individual interested some of my tutees; the
second, others.” Ariskant philosophised in Grecian, but also in the pure
Teutonic, and Grice collaborated with Baker in this area. Curiously, Baker
majors in French and philosophy and does research at the Sorbonne. Grice would
sometimes define ‘philoosphy.’ Oddly, Grice gives a nice example of
‘philosopher’ meaning ‘addicted to general, usually stoic, reflections about
life.’ In the context where it occurs, the implicatum is Stevensonian. If
Stevenson says that an athlete is usually tall, a philosopher may occasionally
be inclined to reflect about life in general, as a birrelist would. Grice’s
gives an alternate meaning, intended to display circularity: ‘engaged in
philosophical studies.’ The idea of Grice of philosophy is the one the Lit.
Hum. instills. It is a unique
experience, unknown in the New World, our actually outside Oxford, or post-Grice,
where a classicist is not seen as a philosopher. Once a tutorial fellow in
philosophy (rather than classics) and later university lecturer in philosophy
(rather than classics) strengthens his attachment. Grice needs to regarded by
his tutee as a philosopher simpliciter, as oppoosed to a prof: the Waynflete is
a metaphysician; the White is a moralist, the Wykeham a logician, and the Wilde
a ‘mental’. For Grice’s “greatest living philosopher,” Heidegger, ‘philosophy’
is a misnomer. While philology merely discourses (logos) on love, the philosopher
claims to be a wizard (sophos) of love. Liddell and Scott have “φιλοσοφία,”
which they render as “love of knowledge, pursuit thereof, speculation,” “ἡ φ.
κτῆσις ἐπιστήμης.” Then there’s “ἡ πρώτη φ.,” with striking originality,
metaphysic, Arist. Metaph. 1026a24. Just one sense, but various ambiguities
remain in ‘philosopher,’ as per Grice’s two
usages. As it happens, Grice is both addicted to general, usually stoic,
speculations about life, and he is a member of The Oxford Philosophical
Society.Refs.: The main sources in the Grice Papers are under series III, of
the doctrines. See also references under ‘lingusitic botany,’ and Oxonianism. Grice
liked to play with the adage of ‘philosophia’ as ‘regina scientiarum.’ A
specific essay in his update of “post-war Oxford philosophy,” in WoW on
“Conceptual analysis and the province of philosophy,” BANC.
physiological. In “Some remarks about the senses,” Grice distinguishes a
physicalist identification of the senses (in terms of the different stimuli and
the mechanisms that connects the organs to the brain) versus other criteria,
notably one involving introspection and the nature of ‘experience’ –
“providing,” he adds, that ‘seeing’ is an experience! Grice would use
‘natural,’ relying on the idea that it’s Grecian ‘physis.’ Liddell and Scott
have “φύσις,” from “φύω,” and which they render as “origin.” the natural form
or constitution of a person or thing as the result of growth, and hence nature,
constitution, and nature as an originating power, “φ. λέγεται . . ὅθεν ἡ
κίνησις ἡ πρώτη ἐν ἑκάστῳ τῶν φύσει ὄντων” Arist.Metaph.1014b16; concrete, the
creation, 'Nature.’ Grice is casual in his use of ‘natural’ versus
‘non-natural’ in 1948 for the Oxford Philosophical Society. In later works,
there’s a reference to naturalism, which is more serious. Refs.: The keyword
should be ‘naturalism,’ but also Grice’s diatribes against ‘physicalism,’ and
of course the ‘natural’ and ‘non-natural,’ BANC.
playgroup: While Austin
belonged to the first and the second playgroups, there were notorious
differences. In the first playgroup, he was not the master, and his resentment
towards Ayer can be seen in “Sense and Sensibilia.” The second playgroup had
Austin as the master. It is said that the playgroup survived Austin’s demise with
Grice’s leadership – But Grice’s playgroup was still a different thing – some
complained about the disorderly and rambling nature – Austin had kept a very
tidy organisation and power structure. Since Grice does NOT mention his own
playgroup, it is best to restrict playgroup as an ironic sobriquet by Grice to
anything but a playgroup, conducted after the war by Austin, by invitation
only, to full-time university lecturers in philosophy. Austin would hold a
central position, and Austin’s motivation was to ‘reach’ agreement. Usually,
when agreement was not reached, Austin could be pretty impolite. Grice found
himself IN THE PLAYGROUP. He obviously preferred a friendlier atmosphere, as
his own group later testified. But he was also involved in philosophical activity
OTHER than the play group. Notably his joint endeavours with Strawson, Warnock,
Pears, and Thomson. For some reason he chose each for a specific area: Warnock
for the philosophy of perception (Grice’s implicature is that he would not
explore meta-ethics with Warnock – he wouldn’t feel like, nor Warnock would).
Philosophy of action of all things, with J. F. Thomson. Philosophical
psychology with D. F. Pears – so this brings Pears’s observations on intending,
deciding, predicting, to the fore. And ontology with P. F. Strawson. Certainlty
he would not involve with Strawson on endless disagreements about the alleged
divergence or lack thereof between truth-functional devices and their
vernacular counterparts! Grice also mentions collaboration with Austin in
teaching – “an altogether flintier experience,” as Warnock knows and “Grice can
testify.” – There was joint seminars with A. M. Quinton, and a few others. One
may add the tutorials. Some of his tutees left Griceian traces: A. G. N. Flew,
David Bostock, J. L. Ackrill, T. C. Potts. The term was meant ironically. The playgroup
activities smack of military or civil service! while this can be safely called Grice’s
playgroup, it was founded by Austin at All Souls, where it had only seven
members. After the war, Grice joined in. The full list is found elsewhere. With
Austin’s death, Grice felt the responsibility to continue with it, and plus, he
enjoyed it! In alphabetical order. It is this group that made history. J. L. Austin, A. G. N. Flew, P. L. Gardiner,
H. P. Grice, S. N. Hampshire, R. M. Hare, H. L. A. Hart, P. H. Nowell-Smith, G. A. Paul, D. F. Pears,
P. F. Strawson, J. F. Thomson, J. O. Urmson, G. J. Warnock, A. D. Woozley.
Grice distinguishes it very well from Ryle’s group, and the group of neo-Wittgensteinians.
And those three groups were those only involved with ‘ordinary language.’
principium. Grice. Principle
of conversational helpfulness. “I call it ‘principle,’ echoing Boethius.”Mention should also he made of Boethius’ conception, that
there are certain principles, sentences which have no demonstration — probatio
— which he calls principales propositiones or probationis principia. Here is
the fragment from his Commentary on Topics treating of principles; El iliac
quidem (propositiones) quarum nulla probatio est, maximae ac principales
vocantur, quod his illas necesse est approbari, quae ut demonstrari valeant,
non recusant/ est auteni maxima proposiiio ut liaec « si de aequalibus aequalia
demas, quae derelinquitur aequalia sunt », ita enim hoc per se notion est, ut
aliud notius quo approbari valeat esse non possit; quae proposi- tiones cum
(idem sui natura propria gerant, non solum alieno ad (idem non egent argumento,
oerum ceteris quoque probationis sclent esse principium; igitur per se notae propositiones,
quibus nihil est notius, indemonstrabiles ac maxime et principales vocantur
(“Indeed those sentences that have no demonstration are called maximum or
principal [sentences], because they are not rejected since they are necessary
to those that have to be demonstrated and which are valid for making a
demonstration ; but a maximum sentence such as « if from equal [quantifies],
equal [quantities] are taken, what is left are equal [quantities]*, is self-
evident, and there is nothing which can be better known self-evidently valid,
and self- demonstrating, therefore they are sentences containing their
certitude in their very nature and not only do they need no additional argument
to demonstrate their certitude, but are also the principles of demonstration of
the other [sentences]; so they are, self-evident sen- tences, nothing being
better known than they are, and are called undemonstrable or maxi- mum and
principal”). Boethius’ idea coincides with Aristotle’s; deduction must start
from somewhere, we must begin with something unproved. The Stagirite, how-
ever, gave an explanation of the existence of principles and the possibility of
their being grasjied by the active intellect, whereas with Boethius princi-
ples appear as severed from the sentences demonstrated in a more formal manner:
there are two kinds of sentences: some which are demonstrable and others which
need no demonstration
practical reason: In “Epilogue” Grice states that the principle of
conversational rationality is a sub-principle of the principle of rationality,
simpliciter, which is not involved with ‘communication’ per se. This is an
application of Occam’s razor: Rationalities are not to be multiplied beyond
necessity.” This motto underlies his aequi-vocality thesis: one reason: desiderative
side, judicative side. Literally, ‘practical reason’ is the buletic part of the
soul (psyche) that deals with praxis, where the weighing is central. We dont
need means-end rationality, we need value-oriented rationality. We dont need
the rationality of the means – this is obvious --. We want the rationality of
the ends. The end may justify the means. But Grice is looking for what
justifies the end. The topic of freedom fascinated Grice, because it merged the
practical with the theoretical. Grice sees the conception of freedom as
crucial in his elucidation of a rational being. Conditions of freedom are
necessary for the very idea, as Kant was well aware. A thief who is forced to
steal is just a thief. Grice would engage in a bit of language botany, when
exploring the ways the adjective free is used, freely, in ordinary language:
free fall, alcohol-free, sugar-free, and his favourite: implicature-free.
Grices more systematic reflections deal with Pology, or creature construction.
A vegetals, for example is less free than an animal, but more free than a
stone! And Humans are more free than non-human. Grice wants to deal with some
of the paradoxes identified by Kant about freedom, and he succeeds in solving
some of them. There is a section on freedom in Action and events for PPQ where he expands on eleutheria and notes the
idiocy of a phrase like free fall. Grice was irritated by the fact that his
friend Hart wrote an essay on liberty and not on freedom, cf. praxis. Refs.:
essays on ‘practical reason,’ and “Aspects,” in BANC.
praedicabilia. Something Grice knew by heart from giving seminars at
Oxfrod on Aristotle’s categories with Austin and Strawson. He found the topic
boring enough to give the seminar ALONE!
prædicatum: vide Is there a praedicatum in Blackburn’s one-off
predicament. He draws a skull and communicates that there is danger. The
drawsing of the skull is not syntactically structured. So it is difficult to
isolate the ‘praedicatum.’ That’s why Grice leaves matters of the praedicatum’
to reductive analyses at a second stage of his programme, where one wants to
apply, metabolically, ‘communicate’ to what an emissum does. The emissum of the
form, The S is P, predicates P of S.
Vide subjectification, and subjectum. Of especial interest to Grice and
Strawson. Lewis and Short have “praedīco,” which they render as “to say or
mention before or beforehand, to premise.” Grice as a modista is interested in
parts of speech: nomen (onoma) versus verbum (rhema) being the classical, since
Plato. The mediaeval modistae like Alcuin adapted Aristotle, and Grice follows
suit. Of particular relevance are the ‘syncategoremata,’ since Grice was
obsessed with particles, and we cannot say that ‘and’ is a predicate! This
relates to the ‘categorema.’ Liddell and Scott have “κατηγόρ-ημα,” which they
render as “accusation, charge,” Gorg.Pal.22; but in philosophy, as “predicate,”
as per Arist.Int.20b32, Metaph.1053b19, etc.; -- “οὐκ εὔοδον τὸ ἁπλοῖν
ἐστι κ.” Epicur.Fr.18. – and as “head of predicables,” in Arist.Metaph.1028a33,Ph.201a1,
Zeno Stoic.1.25, etc.; περὶ κατηγορημάτων Sphaer.ib.140. The term syncategorema
comes from a passage of Priscian in his Institutiones grammatice II , 15. “coniunctae plenam faciunt orationem, alias autem
partes, κατηγορήματα, hoc est consignificantia, appellabant.”
A distinction is made between two types of word classes ("partes
orationis," singular, "pars orationis") distinguished by
philosophers since Plato, viz. nouns (nomen, onoma) and verbs (verbum, rhema)
on the one hand, and a 'syncategorema or consignificantium. A
consignificantium, just as the unary functor "non," and any of the
three dyadic functors, "et," "vel" (or "aut") and
"si," does not have a definitive meaning on its own -- cf.
praepositio, cited by Grice, -- "the meaning of 'to,' the meaning of
'of,'" -- rather, they acquire meaning in combination or when con-joined
to one or more categorema. It is one thing to say that we employ a certain part
of speech when certain conditions are fulfilled and quite another to claim that
the role in the language of that part of speech is to say, even in an extended
sense, that those conditions are fulfilled. In Logic, the verb 'kategoreo' is
'predicate of a person or thing,' “τί τινος” Arist.Cat.3a19,al., Epicur.Fr.250;
κυρίως, καταχρηστικῶς κ., Phld.Po.5.15; “ἐναντίως ὑπὲρ τῶν αὐτῶν” Id.Oec.p.60
J.: —more freq. in Pass., to be predicated of . . , τινος Arist.Cat.2a21, APr.
26b9, al.; “κατά τινος” Id.Cat.2a37; “κατὰ παντὸς ἢ μηδενός” Id.APr.24a15: less
freq. “ἐπί τινος” Id.Metaph.998b16, 999a15; so later “ἐφ᾽ ἑνὸς οἴονται θεοῦ
ἑκάτερον τῶν ὀνομάτων -εῖσθαι” D.H.2.48; “περί τινος” Arist. Top.140b37; “τὸ
κοινῇ -ούμενον ἐπὶ πᾶσιν” Id.SE179a8: abs., τὸ κατηγορούμενον the
predicate, opp. τὸ ὑποκείμενον (the subject), Id.Cat.1b11,
cf.Metaph.1043a6, al.; κατηγορεῖν καὶ -εῖσθαι to be subject and predicate,
Id.APr.47b1. BANC.
prejudices: the life and opinions of H. P. Grice, by H. P. Grice!
PGRICE had been in the works for a while. Knowing this, Grice is able to start
his auto-biography, or memoir, to which he later adds a specific reply to this
or that objection by the editors. The reply is divided in neat sections. After
a preamble displaying his gratitude for the volume in his honour, Grice
turns to his prejudices and predilections; which become, the life and opinions
of H. P. Grice. The third section is a reply to the editorss overview of his
work. This reply itself is itself subdivided into questions of meaning and
rationality, and questions of Met. , philosophical psychology, and value. As
the latter is repr. in “Conception” it is possible to cite this sub-section
from the Reply as a separate piece. Grice originally entitles his essay in
a brilliant manner, echoing the style of an English non-conformist, almost:
Prejudices and predilections; which become, the life and opinions of H. P.
Grice. With his Richards, a nice Welsh surNames, Grice is punning on the first Names
of both Grandy and Warner. Grice is especially concerned with what Richards see
as an ontological commitment on Grices part to the abstract, yet poorly
individuated entity of a proposition. Grice also deals with the alleged
insufficiency in his conceptual analysis of reasoning. He brings for good
measure a point about a potential regressus ad infinitum in his account of a
chain of intentions involved in meaning that p and communicating that p. Even
if one of the drafts is titled festschrift, not by himself, this is not
strictly a festschrift in that Grices Names is hidden behind the acronym:
PGRICE. Notably on the philosophy of perception. Also in “Conception,”
especially that tricky third lecture on a metaphysical foundation for objective
value. Grice is supposed to reply to the individual contributors, who
include Strawson, but does not. I cancelled the implicatum! However, we may
identify in his oeuvre points of contacts of his own views with the
philosophers who contributed, notably Strawson. Most of this material is
reproduced verbatim, indeed, as the second part of his Reply to Richards, and
it is a philosophical memoir of which Grice is rightly proud. The life and
opinions are, almost in a joke on Witters, distinctly separated. Under Life,
Grice convers his conservative, irreverent rationalism making his early initial
appearance at Harborne under the influence of his non-conformist father, and
fermented at his tutorials with Hardie at Corpus, and his associations with
Austins play group on Saturday mornings, and some of whose members he lists
alphabetically: Austin, Gardiner, Grice, Hampshire, Hare, Hart, Nowell-Smith,
Paul, Pears, Strawson, Thomson, Urmson, and Warnock. Also, his joint
philosophising with Austin, Pears, Strawson, Thomson, and Warnock. Under
Opinions, Grice expands mainly on ordinary-language philosophy and his
Bunyanesque way to the City of Eternal Truth. Met. , Philosophical
Psychology, and Value, in “Conception,” is thus part of his Prejudices and
predilections. The philosophers Grice quotes are many and varied, such as
Bosanquet and Kneale, and from the other place, Keynes. Grice spends some
delightful time criticising the critics of ordinary-language philosophy such as
Bergmann (who needs an English futilitarian?) and Gellner. He also quotes from
Jespersen, who was "not a philosopher but wrote a philosophy of
grammar!" And Grice includes a reminiscence of the bombshells brought from
Vienna by the enfant terrible of Oxford philosophy Freddie Ayer, after being
sent to the Continent by Ryle. He recalls an air marshal at a dinner with
Strawson at Magdalen relishing on Cook Wilsons adage, What we know we know. And
more besides! After reminiscing for Clarendon, Grice will go on to reminisce
for Harvard University Press in the closing section of the Retrospective
epilogue. Refs.: The main source is “Reply to Richards,” and references to
Oxonianism, and linguistic botanising, BANC.
prescriptivism: Surely there are
for Grice at least two different modes, the buletic, which tends towards the
prescriptive, and the doxastic, which is mostly ‘descriptive.’ One has to be
careful because Grice thinks that what a philosopher like Strawson does with
‘descriptive’ expression (like ‘true,’ ‘know’ and ‘good’) and talk of
pseudo-descriptive. What is that gives the buletic a ‘prescritive’ or deontic
ring to it? This is Kant’s question. Grice kept a copy of Foots on morality as
a system of hypothetical imperatives. “So Somervillian Oxonian it hurts!”.
Grice took virtue ethics more seriously than the early Hare. Hare will end up a
virtue ethicist, since he changed from a meta-ethicist to a moralist embracing
a hedonistic version of eudaemonist utilitarianism. Grice was more
Aristotelianly conservative! Unlike Hares and Grices meta-ethical sensitivities
(as members of the Oxonian school of ordinary-language philosophy), Foot
suggests a different approach to ethics. Grice admired Foots ability to make
the right conceptual distinction. Foot is following a very Oxonian
tradition best represented by the work of Warnock. Of course, Grice was
over-familiar with the virtue vs. vice distinction, since Hardie had instilled
it on him at Corpus! For Grice, virtue and vice (and the mesotes), display
an interesting logical grammar, though. Grice would say that rationality is a
virtue; fallacious reasoning is a vice. Some things Grice takes more of a
moral standpoint about. To cheat is neither irrational nor unreasonble: just
plain repulsive. As such, it would be a vice ‒ mind not getting
caught in its grip! Grice is concerned with vice in his account of akrasia or
incontinentia. If agent A KNOWS that doing x is virtuous, yet decides to do ~x,
which is vicious, A is being akratic. For Grice, akratic behaviour applies
both in the buletic or boulomaic realm and in the doxastic realm. And it
is part of the philosopher’s job to elucidate the conceptual intricacies
attached to it. 1. prima-facie (p⊃!q)
V probably (p⊃q). 2. prima-facie ((A and B) ⊃!p) V probably ( (A and B) ⊃p). 3. prima-facie ((A and B and C) ⊃!p) V probably ( (A and B and C,) ⊃p). 4. prima-facie ((all things before P V!p) V
probably ((all things before P) ⊃ p). 5.
prima-facie ((all things are considered ⊃ !p)
V probably (all things are considered, ⊃ p). 6.
!q V .q 7. Acc. Reasoning P wills that !q V Acc. Reasoning P that judges
q. Refs.: The main sources under ‘meta-ethics,’ above, BANC.
Prince Maurice’s parrot: The ascription of ‘that’-clause
in the report of a communicatum by a pirot of stage n-1 may be a problem by a
priot in stage n. Do we want to say that the parrot communicates that he finds
Prince Maurice an idiot? While some may not be correct that Griciean principles
can be explained on practical, utilitarian grounds, Grice’s main motivation is
indeed to capture the ‘rational’ capacity. Since I think I may be confident,
that, whoever should see a creature of his own shape or make, though it had no
more reason all its life than a cat or a parrot, would call him still a man; or
whoever should hear a cat or a parrot discourse, reason, and philosophize,
would call or think it nothing but a cat or a parrot; and say, the one was a
dull irrational man, and the other a very intelligent rational parrot. A
relation we have in an author of great note, is sufficient to countenance the
supposition of a rational parrot. His words
are: "I had a mind to know, from Prince Maurice's own mouth, the account
of a common, but much credited story, that I had heard so often from many
others, of an old parrot he had in Brazil, during his government there, that
spoke, and asked, and answered common questions, like a reasonable creature: so
that those of his train there generally concluded it to be witchery or
possession; and one of his chaplains, who lived long afterwards in Holland,
would never from that time endure a parrot, but said they all had a devil in
them. I had heard many particulars of this story, and as severed by people hard
to be discredited, which made me ask Prince Maurice what there was of it. He
said, with his usual plainness and dryness in talk, there was something true,
but a great deal false of what had been reported. I desired to know of him what
there was of the first. He told me short and coldly, that he had heard of such
an old parrot when he had been at Brazil; and though he believed nothing of it,
and it was a good way off, yet he had so much curiosity as to send for it: that
it was a very great and a very old one; and when it came first into the room
where the prince was, with a great many Dutchmen about him, it said presently,
What a company of white men are here! They asked it, what it thought that man
was, pointing to the prince. It answered, Some General or other. When they
brought it close to him, he asked it, D'ou venez-vous? It answered, De
Marinnan. The Prince, A qui estes-vous? The Parrot, A un Portugais. The Prince,
Que fais-tu la? Parrot, Je garde les poulles. The Prince laughed, and said,
Vous gardez les poulles? The Parrot answered, Oui, moi; et je scai bien faire;
and made the chuck four or five times that people use to make to chickens when
they call them. I set down the words of this worthy dialogue in French, just as
Prince Maurice said them to me. I asked him in what language the parrot spoke,
and he said in Brazilian. I asked whether he understood Brazilian; he said No,
but he had taken care to have two interpreters by him, the one a Dutchman that
spoke Brazilian, and the other a Brazilian that spoke Dutch; that he asked them
separately and privately, and both of them agreed in telling him just the same
thing that the parrot had said. I could not but tell this odd story, because it
is so much out of the way, and from the first hand, and what may pass for a
good one; for I dare say this Prince at least believed himself in all he told
me, having ever passed for a very honest and pious man: I leave it to
naturalists to reason, and to other men to believe, as they please upon it;
however, it is not, perhaps, amiss to relieve or enliven a busy scene sometimes
with such digressions, whether to the purpose or no." I have taken care that the reader should have the story at
large in the author's own words, because he seems to me not to have thought it
incredible; for it cannot be imagined that so able a man as he, who had
sufficiency enough to warrant all the testimonies he gives of himself, should
take so much pains, in a place where it had nothing to do, to pin so close, not
only on a man whom he mentions as his friend, but on a Prince in whom he
acknowledges very great honesty and piety, a story which, if he himself thought
incredible, he could not but also think ridiculous. The Prince, it is plain,
who vouches this story, and our author, who relates it from him, both of them
call this talker a parrot: and I ask any one else who thinks such a story fit
to be told, whether, if this parrot, and all of its kind, had always talked, as
we have a prince's word for it this one did,- whether, I say, they would not
have passed for a race of rational animals; but yet, whether, for all that,
they would have been allowed to be men, and not parrots? For I presume it is
not the idea of a thinking or rational being alone that makes the idea of a man
in most people's sense: but of a body, so and so shaped, joined to it: and if
that be the idea of a man, the same successive body not shifted all at once,
must, as well as the same immaterial spirit, go to the making of the same man.
principle of economy of rational
effort: Blackburn draws a skull to
communicate that there is danger. The skull complete with the rest of the body
will not do. So abiding by this principle has nothing to do with an arbitrary
convention. Vide principle of least conversational effort. Principle of
conversational least effort. No undue effort (candour), no unnecessary trouble
(self-love) if doing A involves too much conversational effort, never worry:
you will be DEEMED to have made the effort. Invoked by Grice in “Prejudices and
predilections; which become, the life and opinions of H. P. Grice.” When Grice
qualifies this as ‘rational’ effort, what other efforts are there? Note that
the lexeme ‘effort’ does NOT feature in the formulation of the principle
itself. Grice confesses to be strongly inclined to assent to the principle of economy
of rational conversational effort or the principle of economy of conversational
effort, or the principle of economy of conversational expenditure, or the
principle of minimisation of rational expenditure, or the principle of
minimization of conversational expenditure, or the principle of minimisation of
rational cost, or the conversational maximin. The principle of least cost. The
principle of economy of rational expenditure states that, where there is a
ratiocinative procedure for arriving rationally at certain outcome, a procedure
which, because it is ratiocinative, involves an expenditure of time and energy,
if there is a NON-ratiocinative, and so more economical procedure which is
likely, for the most part, to reach the same outcome as the ratiocinative
procedure, provided the stakes are not too high, it is rational to employ the
cheaper though somewhat less reliable non-ratiocinative procedure as a substitute
for ratiocination. Grice thinks this principle would meet with genitorial
approval, in which case the genitor would install it for use should opportunity
arise. This applies to the charge of overcomplexity and ‘psychological
irreality’ of the reasoning involved in the production and design of the
maximally efficient conversational move and the reasoning involved in the recognition
of the implicatum by the addressee. In “Epilogue” he goes by yet another motto,
Do not multiply rationalities beyond necessity: The principle of conversational
rationality, as he calls it in the Epilogue, is a sub-principle of a principle
of rationality simpiciter, not applying to a pursuit related to
‘communication,’ as he puts it.
While the verb is ‘profero – the participle
corresponds to the ‘implicatum’: what the emissor profers. profer (v.)c. 1300, "to
utter, express," from Old French proferer (13c.)
"utter, present verbally, pronounce," from Latin proferre "to
bring forth, produce," figuratively "make known, publish, quote,
utter." Sense confused with proffer. Related: Profered; profering.
propositio
universalis: cf. substitutional
account of universal quantification, referred to by Grice for his treatment of
what he calls a Ryleian agitation caused by his feeling Byzantine. Vide inverted
A. A proposition (protasis), then, is a sentence affirming or denying something
of something; and this is either universal or particular or indefinite. By
universal I mean a statement that something belongs to all or none of
something; by particular that it belongs to some or not to some or not to all;
by indefinite that it does or does not belong, without any mark of being
universal or particular, e.g. ‘contraries are subjects of the same science’, or
‘pleasure is not good’. (Prior Analytics I, 1, 24a16–21.)
propositional
complexum: In logic, the first
proposition of a syllogism (class.): “propositio est, per quem locus is
breviter exponitur, ex quo vis omnis oportet emanet ratiocinationis,” Cic. Inv.
1, 37, 67; 1, 34, 35; Auct. Her. 2, 18, 28.— B. Transf. 1. A principal subject,
theme (class.), Cic. de Or. 3, 53; Sen. Ben. 6, 7, 1; Quint. 5, 14, 1.— 2.
Still more generally, a proposition of any kind (post-Aug.), Quint. 7, 1, 47, §
9; Gell. 2, 7, 21.—Do not expect Grice to use the phrase ‘propositional
content,’ as Hare does so freely. Grices proposes a propositional complexum,
rather, which frees him from a commitment to a higher-order calculus and the
abstract entity of a feature or a proposition. Grice regards a proposition as
an extensional family of propositional complexa (Paul saw Peter; Peter was seen
by Paul). The topic of a propositional complex Grice regards as Oxonian in
nature. Peacocke struggles with the same type of problems, in his essays on
content. Only a perception-based account of content in terms of qualia
gets the philosopher out of the vicious circle of appealing to a linguistic
entity to clarify a psychological entity. One way to discharge the burden
of giving an account of a proposition involves focusing on a range of utterances,
the formulation of which features no connective or quantifier. Each expresses a
propositional complexum which consists of a sequence simplex-1 and
simplex-2, whose elements would be a set and an ordered sequence of this or
that individuum which may be a member of the set. The propositional
complexum ‘Fido is shaggy’ consists of a sequence of the set of shaggy
individua and the singleton consisting of the individuum Fido. ‘Smith loves
Fido’ is a propositional complexum, i. e., a sequence whose first element
is the class “love” correlated to a two-place predicate) and a the ordered pair
of the singletons Smith and Fido. We define alethic satisfactoriness. A
propositional complexum is alethically satisfactory just in case the sequence
is a member of the set. A “proposition” (prosthesis) simpliciter is defined as
a family of propositional complexa. Family unity may vary in
accordance with context.
Proprium: ian idiom. See Nicholas White's "The
Origin of Aristotle's Essentialism," Review of Metaphysics ~6. (September
1972): ... vice versa. The proprium is
a necessary, but non-essential, property. ... Alan Code pointed this out to
me. ' Does Aristotle ... The
proprium is defined by the fact that it only holds of a
particular subject or ... Of the appropriate answers some are more specific or
distinctive (idion) and
are in ... and property possession comes close to what Alan Code in a seminal
paper ... but "substance of" is what is "co-extensive
(idion) with each
thing" (1038b9); so ... by an alternative name or definition, and by
a proprium) and the
third which is ... Woods's idea (recently nicknamed "Izzing before
Having" by Code and Grice) . As my chairmanship was
winding down, I suggested to Paul Grice on
one of his ... in Aristotle's technical sense of an idion (Latin proprium), i.e., a characteristic or
feature ... Code,
which, arguably, is part of the theory of Izzing and Having: D. Keyt. a proprium, since proprium belongs to the genus of
accident. ... Similarly, Code claims
(10): 'In its other uses the predicate “being'' signifies either “what
... Grice adds
a few steps to show that the plurality of universals signified correspond ...
Aristotle elsewhere calls an idion.353
If one predicates the genus in the absence of. has described it by a paronymous
form, nor as a property (idion),
nor ... terminology of Code and Grice.152 Thus there is no indication
that they are ... (14,20-31) 'Genus' and 'proprium'
(ἰδίου) are said homonymously in ten ways, as are. Ackrill replies to
this line of argument (75) as follows: [I]t is perfectly clear that Aristotle’s
fourfold classification is a classification of things and not names, and that
what is ‘said of’ something as subject is itself a thing (a species or genus)
and not a name. Sometimes, indeed, Aristotle will speak of ‘saying’ or
‘predicating’ a name of a subject; but it is not linguistic items but the
things they signify which are ‘said of a subject’… Thus at 2a19 ff. Aristotle
sharply distinguishes things said of subjects from the names of those things.
This last argument seems persuasive on textual grounds. After all, τὰ καθ᾽
ὑποκειμένου λεγόμενα ‘have’ definitions and names (τῶν καθ᾽ υποκειμένου
λεγομένων… τοὔνομα καὶ τὸν λὸγον, 2a19-21): it is not the case that they ‘are’
definitions and names, to adapt the terminology of Code and Grice.152 See A.
Code, ‘Aristotle: Essence and Accident’, in Grandy and Warner (eds.),
Philosophical Grounds of Rationality (Oxford, 1986), 411-39: particulars have
their predicables, but Forms are their predicables. Thus there is no indication
that they are linguistic terms in their own right.
ψ-transmissum: In a one-off predicament, the emissor draws a skull
to indicate that there is danger. So his belief and desire were successfully
transmitted. A good way to formulate the point of communication. Note that
Grice is never sure about analsans and analysandum: Emissor communicates THAT P
iff Emissor M-INTENDS THAT addressee is to psi- that P. Which seems otiose. “It
is raining” can be INFORMATIVE, but it is surely INDICATIVE first. So it’s moke
like the emissor intends his addressee to believe that he, the utterer believes
that p (the belief itself NOT being part of what is meant, of course). So,
there is psi-transmission not necessarily when the utterer convinces his
addressee, but just when he gets his addressee to BELIEF that he, the utterer, psi-s
that p. So the psi HAS BEEN TRANSMITTED. Surely when the Beatles say “HELP”
they don’t expect that their addressee will need help. They intend their
addressee to HELP them! Used by Grice in WoW: 287, and emphasised by J. Baker.
The gist of communication. trans-mitto or trāmitto , mīsi, missum, 3, v. a. I.
To send, carry, or convey across, over, or through; to send off, despatch,
transmit from one place or person to another (syn.: transfero, traicio,
traduco). A. Lit.: “mihi illam ut tramittas: argentum accipias,” Plaut. Ep. 3,
4, 27: “illam sibi,” id. ib. 1, 2, 52: “exercitus equitatusque celeriter
transmittitur (i. e. trans flumen),” are conveyed across, Caes. B. G. 7, 61:
“legiones,” Vell. 2, 51, 1: “cohortem Usipiorum in Britanniam,” Tac. Agr. 28:
“classem in Euboeam ad urbem Oreum,” Liv. 28, 5, 18: “magnam classem in
Siciliam,” id. 28, 41, 17: “unde auxilia in Italiam transmissurus erat,” id.
23, 32, 5; 27, 15, 7: transmissum per viam tigillum, thrown over or across, id.
1, 26, 10: “ponte transmisso,” Suet. Calig. 22 fin.: in partem campi pecora et
armenta, Tac. A. 13, 55: “materiam in formas,” Col. 7, 8, 6.— 2. To cause to
pass through: “per corium, per viscera Perque os elephanto bracchium
transmitteres,” you would have thrust through, penetrated, Plaut. Mil. 1, 30;
so, “ensem per latus,” Sen. Herc. Oet. 1165: “facem telo per pectus,” id.
Thyest. 1089: “per medium amnem transmittit equum,” rides, Liv. 8, 24, 13:
“(Gallorum reguli) exercitum per fines suos transmiserunt,” suffered to pass
through, id. 21, 24, 5: “abies folio pinnato densa, ut imbres non transmittat,”
Plin. 16, 10, 19, § 48: “Favonios,” Plin. Ep. 2, 17, 19; Tac. A. 13, 15: “ut
vehem faeni large onustam transmitteret,” Plin. 36, 15, 24, § 108.— B. Trop. 1.
To carry over, transfer, etc.: “bellum in Italiam,” Liv. 21, 20, 4; so,
“bellum,” Tac. A. 2, 6: “vitia cum opibus suis Romam (Asia),” Just. 36, 4, 12:
vim in aliquem, to send against, i. e. employ against, Tac. A. 2, 38.— 2. To
hand over, transmit, commit: “et quisquam dubitabit, quin huic hoc tantum
bellum transmittendum sit, qui, etc.,” should be intrusted, Cic. Imp. Pomp. 14,
42: “alicui signa et summam belli,” Sil. 7, 383: “hereditas transmittenda
alicui,” to be made over, Plin. Ep. 8, 18, 7; and with inf.: “et longo
transmisit habere nepoti,” Stat. S. 3, 3, 78 (analog. to dat habere, Verg. A.
9, 362; “and, donat habere,” id. ib. 5, 262); “for which: me famulo famulamque
Heleno transmisit habendam,” id. ib. 3, 329: “omne meum tempus amicorum
temporibus transmittendum putavi,” should be devoted, Cic. Imp. Pomp. 1, 1:
“poma intacta ore servis,” Tac. A. 4, 54.— 3. To let go: animo transmittente
quicquid acceperat, letting pass through, i. e. forgetting, Sen. Ep. 99, 6:
“mox Caesarem vergente jam senectā munia imperii facilius tramissurum,” would
let go, resign, Tac. A. 4, 41: “Junium mensem transmissum,” passed over,
omitted, id. ib. 16, 12 fin.: “Gangen amnem et quae ultra essent,” to leave
unconquered, Curt. 9, 4, 17: “leo imbelles vitulos Transmittit,” Stat. Th. 8,
596.— II. To go or pass over or across, to cross over; to cross, pass, go
through, traverse, etc. A. Lit. 1. In gen. (α). Act.: “grues cum maria
transmittant,” Cic. N. D. 2, 49, 125: “cur ipse tot maria transmisit,” id. Fin.
5, 29, 87; so, “maria,” id. Rep. 1, 3, 6: “satis constante famā jam Iberum
Poenos transmisisse,” Liv. 21, 20, 9 (al. transisse): “quem (Euphratem) ponte,”
Tac. A. 15, 7: “fluvium nando,” Stat. Th. 9, 239: “lacum nando,” Sil. 4, 347:
“murales fossas saltu,” id. 8, 554: “equites medios tramittunt campos,” ride through,
Lucr. 2, 330; cf.: “cursu campos (cervi),” run through, Verg. A. 4, 154:
quantum Balearica torto Funda potest plumbo medii transmittere caeli, can send
with its hurled bullet, i. e. can send its bullet, Ov. M. 4, 710: “tectum
lapide vel missile,” to fling over, Plin. 28, 4, 6, § 33; cf.: “flumina disco,”
Stat. Th. 6, 677.—In pass.: “duo sinus fuerunt, quos tramitti oporteret:
utrumque pedibus aequis tramisimus,” Cic. Att. 16, 6, 1: “transmissus amnis,”
Tac. A. 12, 13: “flumen ponte transmittitur,” Plin. Ep. 8, 8, 5.— (β). Neutr.:
“ab eo loco conscendi ut transmitterem,” Cic. Phil. 1, 3, 7: “cum exercitus
vestri numquam a Brundisio nisi summā hieme transmiserint,” id. Imp. Pomp. 12,
32: “cum a Leucopetrā profectus (inde enim tramittebam) stadia circiter CCC.
processissem, etc.,” id. Att. 16, 7, 1; 8, 13, 1; 8, 11, 5: “ex Corsicā subactā
Cicereius in Sardiniam transmisit,” Liv. 42, 7, 2; 32, 9, 6: “ab Lilybaeo
Uticam,” id. 25, 31, 12: “ad vastandam Italiae oram,” id. 21, 51, 4; 23, 38,
11; 24, 36, 7: “centum onerariae naves in Africam transmiserunt,” id. 30, 24,
5; Suet. Caes. 58: “Cyprum transmisit,” Curt. 4, 1, 27. — Pass. impers.: “in
Ebusum insulam transmissum est,” Liv. 22, 20, 7.—* 2. In partic., to go over,
desert to a party: “Domitius transmisit ad Caesa rem,” Vell. 2, 84 fin. (syn.
transfugio).— B. Trop. (post-Aug.). 1. In gen., to pass over, leave untouched
or disregarded (syn praetermitto): “haud fas, Bacche, tuos taci tum tramittere
honores,” Sil. 7, 162; cf.: “sententiam silentio, deinde oblivio,” Tac. H. 4, 9
fin.: “nihil silentio,” id. ib. 1, 13; “4, 31: aliquid dissimulatione,” id. A.
13, 39: “quae ipse pateretur,” Suet. Calig. 10; id. Vesp. 15. — 2. In partic.,
of time, to pass, spend (syn. ago): “tempus quiete,” Plin. Ep. 9, 6, 1: so, “vitam
per obscurum,” Sen. Ep. 19, 2: steriles annos, Stat. S. 4, 2, 12: “aevum,” id.
ib. 1, 4, 124: “quattuor menses hiemis inedia,” Plin. 8, 25, 38, § 94: “vigiles
noctes,” Stat. Th. 3, 278 et saep. — Transf.: “febrium ardorem,” i. e. to
undergo, endure, Plin. Ep. 1, 22, 7; cf. “discrimen,” id. ib. 8, 11, 2:
“secessus, voluptates, etc.,” id. ib. 6, 4, 2.
quasi-demonstratum: Grice was obsessed with this or that. An
abstractum (such as “philosopher”) needs to be attached in a communicatum by
what Grice calls a ‘quasi-demonstrative,’ and for which he uses “φ.” Consider,
Grice says, an utterance, out of the blue, such as ‘The philosopher in the
garden seems bored,’ involving two iota-operators. As there may be more that a
philosopher in a garden in the great big world, the utterer intends his
addressee to treat the utterance as expandable into ‘The A which is φ is
B,’ where “φ” is a quasi-demonstrative epithet to be identified in a particular
context of utterance. The utterer intends that, to identify the denotatum
of “φ” for a particular utterance of ‘The philosopher in the garden seems
bored,’ the addressee wil proceed via the identification of a particular
philosopher, say Grice, as being a good candidate for being the philosopher
meant. The addressee is also intended to identify the candidate for a denotatum
of φ by finding in the candidate a feature, e. g., that of being the garden at
St. John’s, which is intended to be used to yield a composite epithet
(‘philosopher in St. John’s garden’), which in turn fills the bill of being the
epithet which the utterer believes is being uniquely satisfied by the
philosopher selected as the candidate. Determining the denotatum of “φ”
standardly involve determining what feature the utterer believes is uniquely
instantiated by the predicate “philosopher.” This in turn involves satisfying
oneself that some particular feature is in fact uniquely satisfied by a
particular actual item, viz. a particular philosopher such as Grice seeming
bored in the garden of St. John’s.
ramseyified
description. Applied by Grice in
“Method.”Agent A is in a D state just in case there is a predicate
“D” introduced via implicit definition
by nomological generalisation L within theory θ, such L obtains, A
instantiates D. Grice distinguishes the ‘descriptor’ from a more primitive
‘name.’ The reference is to Ramsey. Refs: “Philosophical psychology,” in BANC.
Reductive-reductionist distinction. Against J. M.
Rountree.
re-praesentatum. Cf. Grice on Peirce’s representamen (“You don’t want
to go there,” – Grice to his tutees). It seems that in the one-off predicament,
iconicy plays a role: the drawing of a skull to indicate danger, the drawing of
an arrow at the fork of a road to indicate which way the emissor’s flowers, who
were left behind, are supposed to take (Carruthers). Suppose Grice joins the
Oxfordshire cricket club. He will represent Oxfordshire. He will do for
Oxfordshire what Oxfordshire cannot do for herself. Similarly, by uttering
“Smoke!,” the utterer means that there is fire somewhere. “Smoke!” is a communication-device
if it does for smoke what smoke cannot do for itself, influence thoughts and
behaviour. Or does it?! It MWheIGHT. But suppose that the fire is some distant
from the addresse. And the utterer HAS LEARNED That there is fire in the
distance. So he utters ‘Smoke!’ Where? Oh, you won’t see it. But I was told
there is smoke on the outskirts. Thanks for warning me! rĕ-praesento , āvi,
ātum, 1, v. a. I. To bring before one, to bring back; to show, exhibit,
display, manifest, represent (class.): “per quas (visiones) imagines rerum
absentium ita repraesentantur animo, ut eas cernere oculis ac praesentes habere
videamur,” Quint. 6, 2, 29: “memoriae vis repraesentat aliquid,” id. 11, 2, 1;
cf. Plin. Ep. 9, 28, 3: “quod templum repraesentabat memoriam consulatūs mei,”
Cic. Sest. 11, 26: si quis vultu torvo ferus simulet Catonem, Virtutemne
repraesentet moresque Catonis? * Hor. Ep. 1, 19, 14: “imbecillitatem ingenii
mei,” Val. Max. 2, 7, 6: “movendi ratio aut in repraesentandis est aut
imitandis adfectibus,” Quint. 11, 3, 156: “urbis species repraesentabatur
animis,” Curt. 3, 10, 7; cf.: “affectum patris amissi,” Plin. Ep. 4, 19, 1:
“nam et vera esse et apte ad repraesentandam iram deūm ficta possunt,” Liv. 8,
6, 3 Weissenb. ad loc.: “volumina,” to recite, repeat, Plin. 7, 24, 24, § 89:
“viridem saporem olivarum etiam post annum,” Col. 12, 47, 8: “faciem veri
maris,” id. 8, 17, 6: “colorem constantius,” to show, exhibit, Plin. 37, 8, 33,
§ 112: “vicem olei,” i. e. to supply the place of, id. 28, 10, 45, § 160; cf.
id. 18, 14, 36, § 134.— B. Of painters, sculptors, etc., to represent, portray,
etc. (post-Aug. for adumbro): “Niceratus repraesentavit Alcibiadem,” Plin. 34,
8, 19, § 88.—With se, to present one's self, be present, Col. 1, 8, 11; 11, 1,
26; Dig. 48, 5, 15, § 3.— II. In partic., mercant. t. t., to pay immediately or
on the spot; to pay in ready money: reliquae pecuniae vel usuram Silio
pendemus, dum a Faberio vel ab aliquo qui Faberio debet, repraesentabimus,
shall be enabled to pay immediately, Cic. Att. 12, 25, 1; 12, 29, 2: “summam,”
Suet. Aug. 101: “legata,” id. Calig. 16: “mercedem,” id. Claud. 18; id. Oth. 5;
Front. Strat. 1, 11, 2 Oud. N. cr.: “dies promissorum adest: quem etiam
repraesentabo, si adveneris,” shall even anticipate, Cic. Fam. 16, 14, 2; cf.
fideicommissum, to discharge immediately or in advance, Dig. 35, 1, 36.— B.
Transf., in gen., to do, perform, or execute any act immediately, without
delay, forthwith; hence, not to defer or put off; to hasten (good prose): se,
quod in longiorem diem collaturus esset, repraesentaturum et proximā nocte
castra moturum, * Caes. B. G. 1, 40: “festinasse se repraesentare consilium,”
Curt. 6, 11, 33: “petis a me, ut id quod in diem suum dixeram debere differri,
repraesentem,” Sen. Ep. 95, 1; and Front. Aquaed. 119 fin.: “neque exspectare
temporis medicinam, quam repraesentare ratione possimus,” to apply it
immediately, Cic. Fam. 5, 16, 6; so, “improbitatem suam,” to hurry on, id. Att.
16, 2, 3: “spectaculum,” Suet. Calig. 58: “tormenta poenasque,” id. Claud. 34:
“poenam,” Phaedr. 3, 10, 32; Val. Max. 6, 5, ext. 4: “verbera et plagas,” Suet.
Vit. 10: “vocem,” to sing immediately, id. Ner. 21 et saep.: “si repraesentari
morte meā libertas civitatis potest,” can be immediately recovered, Cic. Phil.
2, 46, 118: “minas irasque caelestes,” to fulfil immediately, Liv. 2, 36, 6
Weissenb. ad loc.; cf. Suet. Claud. 38: “judicia repraesentata,” held on the
spot, without preparation, Quint. 10, 7, 2.— C. To represent, stand in the
place of (late Lat.): nostra per eum repraesentetur auctoritas, Greg. M. Ep. 1,
1.
scepticism: Grice thinks ‘dogmatic’ is the opposite of ‘sceptic,’ and he
is right! Liddell and Scott have “δόγμα,” from “δοκέω,” and which they
render as “that which seems to one, opinion or belief;” Pl.R.538c; “δ. πόλεως
κοινόν;” esp. of philosophical doctrines, Epicur.Nat.14.7; “notion,”
Pl.Tht.158d; “decision, judgement,” Pl. Lg.926d; (pl.); public decree,
ordinance, esp. of Roman
Senatus-consulta, “δ. συγκλήτου” “δ. τῆς
βουλῆς” So note that there is nothing ‘dogmatic’ about ‘dogma,’ as it derives
from ‘dokeo,’ and is rendered as ‘that which seems to one.’ So the keyword
should be later Grecian, and in the adjectival ‘dogmatic.’ Liddell and Scott
have “δογματικός,” which they render as “of or for doctrines, didactic,
[διάλογοι] Quint.Inst.2.15.26, and “of persons, δ. ἰατροί,” “physicians who go
by general principles,” opp. “ἐμπειρικοί and μεθοδικοί,” Dsc.Ther.Praef.,
Gal.1.65; in Philosophy, S.E.M.7.1, D.L.9.70, etc.; “δ. ὑπολήψεις” Id.9.83; “δ.
φιλοσοφία” S.E. P.1.4. Adv. “-κῶς” D.L.9.74, S.E.P.1.197: Comp. “-κώτερον”
Id.M. 6.4. Why is Grice interested in
scepticism. His initial concern, the one that Austin would authorize, relates
to ‘ordinary language.’ What if ‘ordinary language’ embraces scepticism? What
if it doesn’t? Strawso notes that the world of ordinary language is a world of
things, causes, and stuff. None of the good stuff for the sceptic. what is
Grice’s answer to the sceptic’s implicature? The sceptic’s implicatum is a
topic that always fascinated Girce. While Grice groups two essays as dealing
with one single theme, strictly, only this or that philosopher’s paradox (not
all) may count as sceptical. This or that philosopher’s paradox may well not be
sceptical at all but rather dogmatic. In fact, Grice defines philosophers
paradox as anything repugnant to common sense, shocking, or extravagant ‒ to
Malcolms ears, that is! While it is, strictly, slightly odd to quote this
as a given date just because, by a stroke of the pen, Grice writes that
date in the Harvard volume, we will follow his charming practice. This is
vintage Grice. Grice always takes the sceptics challenge seriously, as any
serious philosopher should. Grices takes both the sceptics explicatum and the
scepticss implicatum as self-defeating, as a very affront to our idea of rationality,
conversational or other. V: Conversations with a sceptic: Can he be slightly
more conversational helpful? Hume’ sceptical attack is partial, and
targeted only towards practical reason, though. Yet, for Grice, reason is
one. You cannot really attack practical or buletic reason without attacking
theoretical or doxastic reason. There is such thing as a general rational
acceptance, to use Grice’s term, that the sceptic is getting at. Grice likes to
play with the idea that ultimately every syllogism is buletic or practical. If,
say, a syllogism by Eddington looks doxastic, that is because Eddington cares
to omit the practical tail, as Grice puts it. And Eddington is not even a
philosopher, they say. Grice is here concerned with a Cantabrigian topic popularised
by Moore. As Grice recollects, Some like Witters, but
Moore’s my man. Unlike Cambridge analysts such as Moore, Grice sees
himself as a linguistic-turn Oxonian analyst. So it is only natural that Grice
would connect time-honoured scepticism of Pyrrhos vintage, and common sense
with ordinary language, so mis-called, the elephant in Grices room. Lewis
and Short have “σκέψις,” f. σκέπτομαι, which they render as “viewing,
perception by the senses, ἡ διὰ τῶν ὀμμάτων ςκέψις, Pl. Phd. 83a;
observation of auguries; also as examination, speculation, consideration, τὸ
εὕρημα πολλῆς σκέψιος; βραχείας ςκέψις; ϝέμειν ςκέψις take thought of a
thing; ἐνθεὶς τῇ τέχνῃ ςκέψις; ςκέψις ποιεῖσθαι; ςκέψις προβέβληκας;
ςκέψις λόγων; ςκέψις περί τινος inquiry into, speculation on a thing;
περί τι Id. Lg. 636d;ἐπὶ σκέψιν τινὸς ἐλθεῖν; speculation, inquiry,ταῦτα
ἐξωτερικωτέρας ἐστὶ σκέψεως; ἔξω τῆς νῦν ςκέψεως; οὐκ οἰκεῖα τῆς παρούσης
ςκέψις; also hesitation, doubt, esp. of the Sceptic or Pyrthonic philosophers,
AP 7. 576 (Jul.); the Sceptic philosophy, S. E. P. 1.5; οἱ ἀπὸ τῆς
ςκέψεως, the Sceptics, ib. 229. in politics, resolution, decree, συνεδρίον
Hdn. 4.3.9, cf. Poll. 6.178. If scepticism attacks common sense and fails,
Grice seems to be implicating, that ordinary language philosophy is a good
antidote to scepticism. Since what language other than ordinary language does
common sense speak? Well, strictly, common sense doesnt speak. The man in the
street does. Grice addresses this topic in a Mooreian way in a later essay,
also repr. in Studies, Moore and philosophers paradoxes, repr. in Studies.
As with his earlier Common sense and scepticism, Grice tackles Moores and
Malcolms claim that ordinary language, so-called, solves a few of philosophers
paradoxes. Philosopher is Grices witty way to generalise over your
common-or-garden, any, philosopher, especially of the type he found eccentric,
the sceptic included. Grice finds this or that problem in this overarching
Cantabrigian manoeuvre, as over-simplifying a pretty convoluted
terrain. While he cherishes Austins Some like Witters, but Moores MY man!
Grice finds Moore too Cantabrigian to his taste. While an Oxonian thoroughbred,
Grice is a bit like Austin, Some like Witters, but Moores my man, with this or
that caveat. Again, as with his treatment of Descartes or Locke, Grice is
hardly interested in finding out what Moore really means. He is a philosopher,
not a historian of philosophy, and he knows it. While Grice agrees with Austins
implicature that Moore goes well above Witters, if that is the expression (even
if some like him), we should find the Oxonian equivalent to Moore. Grice would
not Names Ryle, since he sees him, and his followers, almost every day. There
is something apostolic about Moore that Grice enjoys, which is just as well,
seeing that Moore is one of the twelve. Grice found it amusing that the
members of The Conversazione Society would still be nickNamesd apostles when
their number exceeded the initial 12. Grice spends some time exploring what
Malcolm, a follower of Witters, which does not help, as it were, has to say
about Moore in connection with that particularly Oxonian turn of phrase, such
as ordinary language is. For Malcolms Moore, a paradox by philosopher
[sic], including the sceptic, arises when philosopher [sic], including the
sceptic, fails to abide by the dictates of ordinary language. It might merit
some exploration if Moore’s defence of common sense is against: the sceptic may
be one, but also the idealist. Moore the realist, armed with ordinary language
attacks the idealists claim. The idealist is sceptical of the realists claim.
But empiricist idealism (Bradley) has at Oxford as good pedigree as empiricist
realism (Cook Wilson). Malcolm’s simplifications infuriate Grice, and ordinary
language has little to offer in the defense of common sense realism against
sceptical empiricist idealism. Surely the ordinary man says ridiculous, or
silly, as Russell prefers, things, such as Smith is lucky, Departed spirits
walk along this road on their way to Paradise, I know there are infinite stars,
and I wish I were Napoleon, or I wish that I had
been Napoleon, which does not mean that the utterer wishes that
he were like Napoleon, but that he wishes that he had lived
not in the his century but in the XVIIIth century. Grice is being specific
about this. It is true that an ordinary use of language, as Malcolm
suggests, cannot be self-contradictory unless the ordinary use of language is
defined by stipulation as not self-contradictory, in which case an appeal to
ordinary language becomes useless against this or that paradox by Philosopher.
I wish that I had been Napoleon seems to involve nothing but an ordinary use of
language by any standard but that of freedom from absurdity. I wish
that I had been Napoleon is not, as far as Grice can see, philosophical, but
something which may have been said and meant by numbers of ordinary
people. Yet, I wish that I had been Napoleon is open to the suspicion of
self-contradictoriness, absurdity, or some other kind of
meaninglessness. And in this context suspicion is all Grice needs. By
uttering I wish that I had been Napoleon U hardly means the same as he
would if he uttered I wish I were like Napoleon. I wish that I had been
Napoleon is suspiciously self-contradictory, absurd, or meaningless, if, as
uttered by an utterer in a century other than the XVIIIth century, say, the
utterer is understood as expressing the proposition that the utterer wishes
that he had lived in the XVIIIth century, and not in his century, in which case
he-1 wishes that he had not been him-1? But blame it on the
buletic. That Moore himself is not too happy with Malcolms criticism can
be witnessed by a cursory glimpse at hi reply to Malcolm. Grice is totally
against this view that Malcolm ascribes to Moore as a view that is too broad to
even claim to be true. Grices implicature is that Malcolm is appealing to
Oxonian turns of phrase, such as ordinary language, but not taking proper
Oxonian care in clarifying the nuances and stuff in dealing with, admittedly, a
non-Oxonian philosopher such as Moore. When dealing with Moore, Grice is not
necessarily concerned with scepticism. Time is unreal, e.g. is hardly a sceptic
utterance. Yet Grice lists it as one of Philosophers paradoxes. So, there are
various to consider here. Grice would start with common sense. That is what he
does when he reprints this essay in WOW, with his attending note in both the
preface and the Retrospective epilogue on how he organizes the themes and
strands. Common sense is one keyword there, with its attending realism.
Scepticism is another, with its attending empiricist idealism. It is intriguing
that in the first two essays opening Grices explorations in semantics and
metaphysics it seems its Malcolm, rather than the dryer Moore, who interests
Grice most. While he would provide exegeses of this or that dictum by Moore,
and indeed, Moore’s response to Malcolm, Grice seems to be more concerned with
applications of his own views. Notably in Philosophers paradoxes. The fatal
objection Grice finds for the paradox propounder (not necessarily a sceptic,
although a sceptic may be one of the paradox propounders) significantly rests
on Grices reductive analysis of meaning that
as ascribed to this or that utterer U. Grice elaborates on circumstances
that hell later take up in the Retrospective epilogue. I find myself not
understanding what I mean is dubiously acceptable. If meaning, Grice claims, is
about an utterer U intending to get his addressee A to believe that U ψ-s that
p, U must think there is a good chance that A will recognise what he is
supposed to believe, by, perhaps, being aware of the Us practice or by a supplementary
explanation which might come from U. In which case, U should not be meaning
what Malcolm claims U might mean. No utterer should intend his addressee to
believe what is conceptually impossible, or incoherent, or blatantly false
(Charles Is decapitation willed Charles Is death.), unless you are Queen in
Through the Looking Glass. I believe five impossible things before breakfast,
and I hope youll soon get the proper training to follow suit. Cf. Tertulian,
Credo, quia absurdum est. Admittedly, Grice edits the Philosophers paradoxes
essay. It is only Grices final objection which is repr. in WOW, even if he
provides a good detailed summary of the previous sections. Grice appeals to
Moore on later occasions. In Causal theory, Grice lists, as a third
philosophical mistake, the opinion by Malcolm that Moore did not know how to
use knowin a sentence. Grice brings up the same example again in Prolegomena.
The use of factive know of Moore may well be a misuse. While at Madison,
Wisconsin, Moore lectures at a hall eccentrically-built with indirect lighting
simulating sun rays, Moore infamously utters, I know that there is a window
behind that curtain, when there is not. But it is not the factiveness Grice is
aiming at, but the otiosity Malcolm misdescribes in the true, if baffling, I
know that I have two hands. In Retrospective epilogue, Grice uses M to
abbreviate Moore’s fairy godmother – along with G (Grice), A (Austin), R (Ryle)
and Q (Quine)! One simple way to approach Grices quandary with Malcolm’s
quandary with Moore is then to focus on know. How can Malcolm claim that Moore
is guilty of misusing know? The most extensive exploration by Grice on know is
in Grices third James lecture (but cf. his seminar on Knowledge and belief, and
his remarks on some of our beliefs needing to be true, in Meaning
revisited. The examinee knows that the battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815.
Nothing odd about that, nor about Moores uttering I know that these are my
hands. Grice is perhaps the only one of the Oxonian philosophers of Austins
play group who took common sense realsim so seriously, if only to crticise
Malcoms zeal with it. For Grice, common-sense realism = ordinary language,
whereas for the typical Austinian, ordinary language = the language of the man
in the street. Back at Oxford, Grice uses Malcolm to contest the usual
criticism that Oxford ordinary-language philosophers defend common-sense
realist assumptions just because the way non-common-sense realist philosopher’s
talk is not ordinary language, and even at Oxford. Cf. Flews reference to
Joness philosophical verbal rubbish in using self as a noun. Grice is
infuriated by all this unclear chatter, and chooses Malcolms mistreatment of
Moore as an example. Grice is possibly fearful to consider Austins claims directly!
In later essays, such as ‘the learned’ and ‘the lay,’ Grice goes back to the
topic criticising now the scientists jargon as an affront to the ordinary
language of the layman that Grice qua philosopher defends. Refs.: The obvious
source is the essay on scepticism in WoW, but there are allusions in
“Prejudices and predilections, and elsewhere, in The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
semantic: In the one-off predicament, Emissor E emits x and
communicates that p. Since an intention with a content involving a psychological
state is involved and attached, even in a one-off, to ‘x,’ we can legitimately
say the scenario may be said to describe a ‘semantic’ phenomenon. Grice would
freely use ‘semantic,’ and the root for ‘semantics,’ that Grice does use,
involves the richest root of all Grecian roots: the ‘semion.’ Liddell and Scott
have “τό σημεῖον,” Ion. σημήϊον , Dor. σα_μήϊον IG12(3).452 (Thera, iv B.C.),
σα_μεῖον IPE12.352.25 (Chersonesus, ii B.C.), IG5(1).1390.16 (Andania, i B.C.),
σα_μᾶον CIG5168 (Cyrene); = σῆμα in all senses, and more common in Prose, but
never in Hom. or Hes.; and which they render as “mark by which a thing is
known,” Hdt.2.38;” they also have “τό σῆμα,” Dor. σᾶμα Berl.Sitzb.1927.161
(Cyrene), etc.; which they render as “sign, mark, token,” “ Il.10.466, 23.326,
Od.19.250, etc.” Grice lectured not only on Cat. But the next, De Int. As
Arsitotle puts it, an expression is a symbol (symbolon) or sign (semeion) of an
affections or impression (pathematon) of the soul (psyche). An affection of the
soul, of which a word is primarily a
sign, are the same for the whole of mankind, as is also objects (pragmaton) of
which the affections is a representation or likenes, image, or copiy
(homoiomaton). [De Int., 1.16a4] while
Grice is NOT concerned about the semantics of utterers meaning (how could he,
when he analyses means in terms of
intends , he is about the semantics of
expression-meaning. Grices second stage (expression meaing) of his
programme about meaning begins with specifications of means as applied to x, a token
of X. He is having Tarski and Davidson in their elaborations of schemata
like ‘p’ ‘means’ that p. ‘Snow is white’ ‘means’ that snow is white,
and stuff! Grice was especially concerned with combinatories, for both unary
and dyadic operators, and with multiple quantifications within a first-order
predicate calculus with identity. Since in Grice’s initial elaboration on
meaning he relies on Stevenson, it is worth exploring how ‘semantics’ and
‘semiotics’ were interpreted by Peirce and the emotivists. Stevenson’s main
source is however in the other place, though, under Stevenson. Refs.: The main
sources are his lectures on language and reality – part of them repr. in WOW.
The keywords under ‘communication,’ and ‘signification,’ that Grice occasionally
uses ‘the total signification’ of a remark, above, BANC.
semiological: or is it semiotics? Cf. semiological, semotic. Since Grice
uses ‘philosophical psychology’ and ‘philosopical biology,’ it may do to use
‘semiology,’ indeed ‘philosophical semiology,’ here. Oxonian semiotics is unique. Holloway
published his “Language and Intelligence” and everyone was excited. It is best
to see this as Grices psychologism. Grice would rarely use ‘intelligent,’ less
so the more pretentious, ‘intelligence,’ as a keyword. If he is doing it, it is
because what he saw as the misuse of it by Ryle and Holloway. Holloway, a PPE,
is a tutorial fellow in philosophy at All Souls. He acknowledges Ryle as his
mentor. (Holloway also quotes from Austin). Grice was amused that J. N.
Findlay, in his review of Holloway’s essay in “Mind,” compares Holloway to C.
W. Morris, and cares to cite the two relevant essay by Morris: The Foundation
in the theory of signs, and Signs, Language, and Behaviour. Enough for Grice to
feel warmly justified in having chosen another New-World author, Peirce, for
his earlier Oxford seminar. Morris studied under G. H. Mead. But is
‘intelligence’ part of The Griceian Lexicon?Well, Lewis and Short have
‘interlegere,’ to chose between. Lewis and Short have ‘interlĕgo , lēgi, lectum,
3, v. a., I’.which they render it as “to cull or pluck off here and there
(poet. and postclass.).in tmesi) uncis Carpendae manibus frondes, interque
legendae, Verg. G. 2, 366: “poma,” Pall. Febr. 25, 16; id. Jun. 5, 1.intellĕgo
(less correctly intellĭgo), exi, ectum (intellexti for intellexisti, Ter. Eun.
4, 6, 30; Cic. Att. 13, 32, 3: I.“intellexes for intellexisses,” Plaut. Cist.
2, 3, 81; subj. perf.: “intellegerint,” Sall. H. Fragm. 1, 41, 23 Dietsch);
“inter-lego,” “to see into, perceive, understand.” I. Lit. A. Lewis and Short
render as “to perceive, understand, comprehend.” Cf. Grice on his handwriting
being legible to few. And The child is an adult as being UNintelligible until
the creature is produced. In “Aspects,” he mentions flat rationality, and
certain other talents that are more difficult for the philosopher to
conceptualise, such as nose (i.e. intuitiveness), acumen, tenacity, and
such. Grices approach is Pological. If Locke had used intelligent to refer
to Prince Maurices parrot, Grice wants to find criteria for intelligent as
applied to his favourite type of P, rather (intelligent, indeed rational.).
Refs.: The most specific essay is his lecture on Peirce, listed under
‘communication, above. A reference to ‘criteria of intelligence relates. The H.
P. Grice Papers, BANC.
shaggy-dog story: This is the story that Grice tells in his lecture. He uses
a ‘shaggy-dog’ story to explain TWO main notions: that of ‘reference’ or
denotatio, and that of predicatio. He had explored that earlier when
discussing, giving an illustration “Smith is happy”, the idea of ‘value,’ as correspondence,
where he adds the terms for ‘denote’ and ‘predicatio,’ or actually,
‘designatio’ and ‘indicatio’, need to be “explained within the theory.” In the
utterance ‘Smith is happy,’ the utterer DESIGNATES an item, Smith. The utterer
also INDICATES some class, ‘being happy.’ Grice introduces a shorthand,
‘assign’, or ‘assignatio,’ previous to the value-satisfaction, to involve both
the ‘designatio’ and the ‘indicatio’. U assigns the item Smith to the class
‘being happy.’ U’s intention involves A’s belief that U believes that “the item
belongs to the class, or that he ASSIGNS the item to the class. A
predicate, such as 'shaggy,' in my shaggy-dog story, is a part of a bottom-up,
or top-bottom, as I prefer, analysis of this or that sentences, and a
predicate, such as 'shaggy,' is the only indispensable 'part,' or 'element,' as
I prefer, since a predicate is the only 'pars orationis,' to use the old
phrase, that must appear in every sentence. In a later lecture
he ventures with ‘reference.’ Lewis and Short have “rĕferre,” rendered as “to
bear, carry, bring, draw, or give back,” in a “transf.” usage, they render as
“to make a reference, to refer (class.),” asa in “de rebus et obscuris et
incertis ad Apollinem censeo referendum; “ad quem etiam Athenienses publice de
majoribus rebus semper rettulerunt,” Cic. Div. 1, 54, 122.” While Grice uses
‘Fido,’ he could have used ‘Pegasus’ (Martin’s cat, as it happens) and apply Quine’s
adage: we could have appealed to the ex hypothesi unanalyzable, irreducible
attribute of being Pegasus, adopting, for its expression, the verb
'is-Pegasus', or 'pegasizes'. And Grice could have played with ‘predicatio’ and
‘subjectio.’ Grice on subject. Lewis and Short have “sūbĭcĭo,” (less
correctly subjĭcĭo ; post-Aug. sometimes sŭb- ), jēci, jectum, 3, v. a.
sub-jacio. which they render as “to
throw, lay, place, or bring under or near (cf. subdo),” and in philosophy, “subjectum
, i, n. (sc. verbum), as “that which is spoken of, the foundation or subject of
a proposition;” “omne quicquid dicimus
aut subjectum est aut de subjecto aut in subjecto est. Subjectum est prima
substantia, quod ipsum nulli accidit alii inseparabiliter, etc.,” Mart. Cap. 4,
§ 361; App. Dogm. Plat. 3, p. 34, 4 et saep.—.” Note that for Mart. Cap. the
‘subject,’ unlike the ‘predicate’ is not a ‘syntactical category.’ “Subjectum
est prima substantia,” The subject is a prote ousia. As for correlation, Grice
ends up with a reductive analysis. By uttering utterance-token V, the
utterer U correlates predicate P1 with (and only with) each member of
P2 ≡ (∃R)(∃R') (1) U effects that (∀x)(R P1x ≡
x ∈ P1) and (2) U
intends (1), and (3) U intends that (∀y)(R'
P1y ≡ y ∈
P1), where R' P1 is an expression-type such that utterance-token V is a
sequence consisting of an expression-token p1 of expression-type P1 and an
expression-token p2 of expression-type P2, the R-co-relatum of which is a
set of which y is a member. And he is back with ‘denotare. Lewis and Short have
“dēnŏtare,” which they render as “to mark, set a mark on, with chalk, color,
etc.: “pedes venalium creta,”
It is interesting to trace Grice’s earliest investigations on this. Grice and
Strawson stage a number of joint seminars on topics related to the notions of
meaning, categories, and logical form. Grice and Strawson engage in systematic
and unsystematic philosophical exploration. From these discussions springs work
on predication and categories, one or two reflections of which are acknowledge
at two places (re: the reductive analysis of a ‘particular,’ “the tallest man
that did, does, or will exist” --) in Strawson’s “Particular and general” for
The Aristotelian Society – and “visible” as Grice puts it, but not
acknowledged, in Strawson’s “Individuals: an essay in descriptive
metaphysics.””
signatum: Cf. “to sign” as a verb – from French. As Grice notes,
there is a distinction between Aristotle’s use, in De Int., of ‘sumbolon,’ for
which Aristotle sometimes means ‘semeion,’ and their Roman counterparts, ‘signum’
sounds otiose enough. But ‘significo’ does not. There is this –fico thing that
sounds obtrusive. The Romans, however, were able to distinguish between ‘make a
sign,’ and just ‘signal.’ The point is important when Grice tries to apply the
Graeco-Roman philosophical terminology to a lexeme which does not belong in
there: “mean.” His example is someone in pain, uttering “Oh.” If he later gains
voluntary control, by uttering “Oh” he means that he is in pain, and even at a
later stage, provided he learns ‘lupe,’ he may utter the expression which is
somewhat correlated in a non-iconic fashion with something which iconically is
a vehicle for U to mean that he is in pain. In this way, in a
communication-system, a communication-device, such as “Oh” does for the state
of affairs something that the state of affairs cannot do for itself, govern the
addresee’s thoughts and behaviour (very much as the Oxfordshire cricket team
does for Oxfordshire what Oxfordshire cannot do for herself, viz. to engage in
a game of cricket. There’s rae-presentatum, for you! Short and Lewis have
‘signare,’ from ‘signum,’ and which they render as ‘to set a mark upon, to
mark, mark out, designate (syn.: noto, designo),’ Lit. A. In gen. (mostly poet.
and in post-Aug. prose): discrimen non facit neque signat linea alba, Lucil.
ap. Non. 405, 17: “signata sanguine pluma est,” Ov. M. 6, 670: “ne signare
quidem aut partiri limite campum Fas erat,” Verg. G. 1, 126: “humum limite
mensor,” Ov. M. 1, 136; id. Am. 3, 8, 42: “moenia aratro,” id. F. 4, 819: “pede
certo humum,” to print, press, Hor. A. P. 159; cf.: “vestigia summo pulvere,”
to mark, imprint, Verg. G. 3, 171: auratā cyclade humum, Prop. 4 (5), 7, 40.
“haec nostro signabitur area curru,” Ov. A. A. 1, 39: “locum, ubi ea (cistella)
excidit,” Plaut. Cist. 4, 2, 28: “caeli regionem in cortice signant,” mark,
cut, Verg. G. 2, 269: “nomina saxo,” Ov. M. 8, 539: “rem stilo,” Vell. 1, 16,
1: “rem carmine,” Verg. A. 3, 287; “for which: carmine saxum,” Ov. M. 2, 326:
“cubitum longis litteris,” Plaut. Rud. 5, 2, 7: “ceram figuris,” to imprint,
Ov. M. 15, 169: “cruor signaverat herbam,” had stained, id. ib. 10, 210; cf.
id. ib. 12, 125: “signatum sanguine pectus,” id. A. A. 2, 384: “dubiā lanugine
malas,” id. M. 13, 754: “signata in stirpe cicatrix,” Verg. G. 2, 379: “manibus
Procne pectus signata cruentis,” id. ib. 4, 15: “vocis infinitios sonos paucis
notis,” Cic. Rep. 3, 2, 3: “visum objectum imprimet et quasi signabit in animo
suam speciem,” id. Fat. 19, 43.— B. In partic. 1. To mark with a seal; to seal,
seal up, affix a seal to a thing (usually obsignare): “accepi a te signatum
libellum,” Cic. Att. 11, 1, 1: “volumina,” Hor. Ep. 1, 13, 2: locellum tibi
signatum remisi, Caes. ap. Charis. p. 60 P.: “epistula,” Nep. Pel. 3, 2:
“arcanas tabellas,” Ov. Am. 2, 15, 15: “signatis quicquam mandare tabellis,”
Tib. 4, 7, 7: “lagenam (anulus),” Mart. 9, 88, 7: “testamentum,” Plin. Ep. 2,
20, 8 sq.; cf. Mart. 5, 39, 2: “nec nisi signata venumdabatur (terra),” Plin.
35, 4, 14, § 33.—Absol., Mart. 10, 70, 7; Quint. 5, 7, 32; Suet. Ner. 17.— 2.
To mark with a stamp; hence, a. Of money, to stamp, to coin: “aes argentum
aurumve publice signanto,” Cic. Leg. 3, 3, 6; cf.: “qui primus ex auro denarium
signavit ... Servius rex primus signavit aes ... Signatum est nota pecudum,
unde et pecunia appellata ... Argentum signatum est anno, etc.,” Plin. 33, 3,
13, § 44: “argentum signatum,” Cic. Verr. 2, 5, 25, § 63; Quint. 5, 10, 62; 5,
14, 26: “pecunia signata Illyriorum signo,” Liv. 44, 27, 9: “denarius signatus
Victoriā,” Plin. 33, 3, 13, § 46: “sed cur navalis in aere Altera signata est,”
Ov. F. 1, 230: “milia talentūm argenti non signati formā, sed rudi pondere,”
Curt. 5, 2, 11.— Hence, b. Poet.: “signatum memori pectore nomen habe,”
imprinted, impressed, Ov. H. 13, 66: “(filia) quae patriā signatur imagine
vultus,” i. e. closely resembles her father, Mart. 6, 27, 3.— c. To stamp, i.
e. to license, invest with official authority (late Lat.): “quidam per ampla
spatia urbis ... equos velut publicos signatis, quod dicitur, calceis agitant,”
Amm. 14, 6, 16.— 3. Pregn., to distinguish, adorn, decorate (poet.): “pater
ipse suo superūm jam signat honore,” Verg. A. 6, 781 Heyne: caelum corona,
Claud. Nupt. Hon. et Mar. 273. to point out, signify, indicate, designate,
express (rare; more usually significo, designo; in Cic. only Or. 19, 64, where
dignata is given by Non. 281, 10; “v. Meyer ad loc.): translatio plerumque
signandis rebus ac sub oculos subiciendis reperta est,” Quint. 8, 6, 19:
“quotiens suis verbis signare nostra voluerunt (Graeci),” id. 2, 14, 1; cf.:
“appellatione signare,” id. 4, 1, 2: “utrius differentiam,” id. 6, 2, 20; cf.
id. 9, 1, 4; 12, 10, 16: “nomen (Caieta) ossa signat,” Verg. A. 7, 4: “fama
signata loco est,” Ov. M. 14, 433: “miratrixque sui signavit nomine terras,”
designated, Luc. 4, 655; cf.: “(Earinus) Nomine qui signat tempora verna suo,”
Mart. 9, 17, 4: “Turnus ut videt ... So signari oculis,” singled out, looked
to, Verg. A. 12, 3: signare responsum, to give a definite or distinct answer,
Sen. Ben. 7, 16, 1.—With rel.-clause: “memoria signat in quā regione quali
adjutore legatoque fratre meo usus sit,” Vell. 2, 115.— B. To distinguish,
recognize: “primi clipeos mentitaque tela Adgnoscunt, atque ora sono discordia
signant,” Verg. A. 2, 423; cf.: “sonis homines dignoscere,” Quint. 11, 3, 31:
“animo signa quodcumque in corpore mendum est,” Ov. R. Am. 417.— C. To seal,
settle, establish, confirm, prescribe (mostly poet.): “signanda sunt jura,”
Prop. 3 (4), 20, 15. “signata jura,” Luc. 3, 302: jura Suevis, Claud. ap. Eutr.
1, 380; cf.: “precati deos ut velint ea (vota) semper solvi semperque signari,”
Plin. Ep. 10, 35 (44). To close, end: “qui prima novo signat quinquennia
lustro,” Mart. 4, 45, 3.—Hence, A. signan-ter , adv. (acc. to II. A.),
expressly, clearly, distinctly (late Lat. for the class. significanter):
“signanter et breviter omnia indicare,” Aus. Grat. Act. 4: “signanter et
proprie dixerat,” Hier. adv. Jovin. 1, 13 fin. signātus, a, um, P. a. 1. (Acc.
to I. B. 1. sealed; hence) Shut up, guarded, preserved (mostly ante- and
post-class.): signata sacra, Varr. ap. Non. 397, 32: limina. Prop. 4 (5), 1,
145. Chrysidem negat signatam reddere, i. e. unharmed, intact, pure, Lucil. ap.
Non. 171, 6; cf.: “assume de viduis fide pulchram, aetate signatam,” Tert.
Exhort. 12.— 2. (Acc. to II. A.) Plain, clear, manifest (post-class. for “significans”
– a back formation!): “quid expressius atque signatius in hanc causam?” Tert.
Res. Carn.Adv.: signātē , clearly, distinctly (post-class.): “qui (veteres)
proprie atque signate locuti sunt,” Gell. 2, 6, 6; Macr. S. 6, 7 Comp.:
“signatius explicare aliquid,” Amm. 23, 6, 1.
significatum: Grice plays with the expression-communication distinction.
When dealing with a lexeme that does NOT belong in the Graeco-Roman tradition,
that of “mean,” he is never sure. His doubts were hightlighted in essays on
“Grice without an audience.” While Grice explicitly says that a ‘word’ is not a
sign, he would use ‘signify’ at a later stage, including the implicatum as part
of the significatum. There is indeed an entry for signĭfĭcātĭo, f.
significare. L and S render it, unhelpfully, as “a pointing
out, indicating, denoting, signifying; an expression, indication, mark, sign, token,
= indicium, signum, ἐπισημασία, etc., freq. and class. As with Stevenson’s
‘communico,’ Grice goes sraight to ‘signĭfĭco,’ also dep. “signĭfĭcor,” f.
‘significare,’ from signum-facere, to make sign, signum-facio, I make sign,
which L and S render as to signify, which is perhaps not too helpful. Grice, if
not the Grecians, knew that. Strictly, L and S render significare as to show by
signs; to show, point out, express, publish, make known, indicate; to intimate,
notify, signify, etc. Note that the cognate signify almost comes last, but not
least, if not first. Enough to want to coin a word to do duty for them all.
Which is what Grice (and the Grecians) can, but the old Romans cannot, with
mean. If that above were not enough, L and S go on, also, to betoken,
prognosticate, foreshow, portend, mean (syn. praedico), as in to betoken a
change of weather (post-Aug.): “ventus Africus tempestatem significat,
etc.,”cf. Grice on those dark clouds mean a storm is coming. Short
and Lewis go on, to say that significare may be rendered as to call, name; to
mean, import, signify. Hence, ‘signĭfĭcans,’ in rhet. lang., of
speech, full of meaning, expressive, significant; graphic, distinct,
clear: adv.: signĭfĭcanter, clearly, distinctly, expressly, significantly,
graphically: “breviter ac significanter ordinem rei protulisse;” “rem indicare
(with proprie),” “dicere (with
ornate),” “apertius, significantius
dignitatem alicujus defendere,” “narrare,”“disponere,” “appellare aliquid (with
consignatius);” “dicere (with probabilius).”
Strawson’s rat-infested house. Few in Grice’s playgroup had Grice’s analytic skills.
Only a few cared to join him in his analysis of ‘mean.’ The first was Urmson
with the ‘bribe.’ The second was Strawson, with his rat-infested house. Grice
re-writes Strawson’s alleged counterexample. To deal with his own rat-infested
house example, Strawson proposes that the analysans of "U means that
p" might be restricted by the addition of a further condition, namely that
the utterer U should utter x not only, as already provided, with the intention
that his addressee should think that U intends to obtain a certain response
from his addressee, but also with the intention that his addressee should think
(recognize) that U has the intention just mentioned. In Strawson's
example, in The Philosohical Review (that Grice cites on WOW:x) repr. in his
"Logico-Linguistic Papers," the potential home buyer is intended to
think that the realtor wants him to think that the house is rat-infested.
However, the potential house-buyer is not intended by the realtor to think that
he is intended to think that the realtor wants him to think that the house is
rat infested. The addressee is intended to think that it is only as a
result of being too clever for the realtor that he has learned that the
potential home buyer wants him to think that the house is
rat-infested; the potential home-buyer is to think that he is supposed to
take the artificially displayed dead rat as a evidence that the
house is rat infested. U wants to get A to believe that the house A is thinking
of buying is rat-infested. S decides to· bring about this belief in A by taking
into the house and letting loose a big fat sewer rat. For S has the
following scheme. He knows that A is watching him and knows that A
believes that S is unaware that he, A, is watching him. It isS's intention
that A should (wrongly) infer from the fact that S let the rat loose that S did
so with the intention that A should arrive at the house, see the rat, and,
taking the rat as "natural evidence", infer therefrom that the house
is rat-infested. S further intends A to realize that given the nature of the
rat's arrival, the existence of the rat cannot be taken as genuine or natural
evidence that the house is rat-infested; but S kilows that A will believe that
S would not so contrive to get A to believe the house is rat-infested unless
Shad very good reasons for thinking that it was, and so S expects and intends A
to infer that the house is rat-infested from the fact that Sis letting the rat
loose with the intention of getting A to believe that the house is
rat-infested. Thus S satisfies the conditions purported to be necessary and
sufficient for his meaning something by letting the rat loose: S lets the rat
loose intending (4) A to think that the house is rat-infested, intending
(1)-(3) A to infer from the fact that S let the rat loose that S did so
intending A to think that the house is rat-infested, and intending (5) A's
recognition of S's . intention (4) to function as his reason for thinking that
the house is rat-infested. But even though S's action meets these
conditions, Strawson feels that his scenario fits Grice's conditions in
Grice's reductive analysis and not yet Strawson's intuition about his own use
of 'communicate.' To minimise Strawson's discomfort, Grice brings an
anti-sneaky clause. ("Although I never shared Strawson's intuition about
his use of 'communicate;' in fact, I very rarely use 'communicate that...' To
exterminate the rats in Strawson's rat-infested house, Grice uses, as he
should, a general "anti-deception" clause. It may be that
the use of this exterminating procedure is possible. It may be that any
'backward-looking' clauses can be exterminated, and replaced by a general
prohibitive, or closure clause, forbidding an intention by the utterer to be
sneaky. It is a conceptual point that if you intend your addressee NOT TO
REALISE that p, you are not COMMUNICATING that p. (3A) (if) (3r)
(ic): (a) U utters x intending (I) A to think x possesses
f (2) A to thinkf correlated in way c with the type to which r
belongs (3) A to think, on the basis of the fulfillment of (I) and (3)
that U intends A to produce r (4) A, on the basis of the fulfillment of (3) to
produce r, and (b) There is no inference-element E such that U intends
both (I') A in his determination of r to rely on E (2') A to think Uto intend
(I') to be false. In the final version Grice reaches after considering alleged
counterexamples to the NECESSITY of some of the conditions in the analysans,
Grice reformulates. 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. Embedded in the general definition. 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.
subjectification:
Grice plays with this. It is a derivation of the ‘subjectum,’ which Grice knows
it is Aristotelian. Liddell and Scott have the verb first, and the neuter
singular later. “τὸ ὑποκείμενον,” Liddell and Scott note “has three main
applications.” The first is “to the matter (hyle) which underlies the form
(eidos), as opp. To both “εἶδος” and “ἐντελέχεια” Met. 983a30; second, to the
substantia (hyle + morphe) which underlies the accidents, and as opposed to
“πάθη,” and “συμβεβηκότα,” as in Cat. 1a20,27 and Met.1037b16, 983b16; third,
and this is the use that ‘linguistic’ turn Grice and Strawson are interested
in, “to the logical subject to which attributes are ascribed,” and here opp.
“τὸ κατηγορούμενον,” (which would be the ‘praedicatum’), as per Cat.1b10,21,
Ph.189a31. If Grice uses Kiparsky’s factive, he is also using ‘nominalisation’
as grammarians use it. Refs.: Grice, “Reply to Richards,” in PGRICE, also BANC.
subjectivism:
When Grice speaks of the subjective condition on intention, he is using
‘subject,’ in a way a philosophical psychologist would. He does not mean Kant’s
transcendental subject or ego. Grice means the simpler empiricist subject,
personal identity, or self. The choice is unfelicitious in that ‘subject’
contrasts with ‘object.’ So when he speaks of a ‘subjective’ person he means an
‘ego-centric’ condition, or a self-oriented condition, or an agent-oriented
condition, or an ‘utterer-oriented’ or ‘utterer-relative’ condition. But this
is tricky. His example: “Nixon should get that chair of theology.” The utterer
may have to put into Nixon’s shoes. He has to perceive Nixon as a PERSON, a
rational agent, with views of his own. So, the philosophical psychologist that
Grice is has to think of a conception of the self by the self, and the
conception of the other by the self. Wisdom used to talk of ‘other minds;’ Grice
might speak of other souls. Grice was concerned with intending folloed by a
that-clause. Jeffrey defines desirability as doxastically modified. It is
entirely possible for someone to desire the love that he already has. It is
what he thinks that matters. Cf. his dispositional account to intending. A
Subjectsive condition takes into account the intenders, rather than the
ascribers, point of view: Marmaduke Bloggs intends to climb Mt. Everest on
hands and knees. Bloggs might reason: Given my present state, I should do
what is fun. Given my present state, the best thing for me to do would be
to do what is fun. For me in my present state it would make for my
well-being, to have fun. Having fun is good, or, a good. Climbing a
mountain would be fun. Climbing the Everest would be/make for climbing
fun. So, I shall climb the Everest. Even if a critic insisted that a
practical syllogism is the way to represent Bloggs finding something to be
appealing, and that it should be regarded as a respectable evaluation, the assembled
propositions dont do the work of a standard argument. The premises do not
support or yield the conclusion as in a standard argument. The premises may be
said to yield the conclusion, or directive, for the particular agent whose
reasoning process it is, only on the basis of a Subjectsive condition:
that the agent is in a certain Subjectsive state, e.g. feels like going out for
dinner-fun. Rational beings (the agent at some other time, or other
individuals) who do not have that feeling, will not accept the conclusion. They
may well accept as true. It is fun to climb Everest, but will not accept it as
a directive unless they feel like it now. Someone wondering what to do for the
summer might think that if he were to climb Everest he would find it fun or
pleasant, but right now she does not feel like it. That is in general the end
of the matter. The alleged argument lacks normativity. It is not authoritative
or directive unless there is a supportive argument that he needs/ought to do
something diverting/pleasant in the summer. A practical argument is different.
Even if an agent did not feel like going to the doctor, an agent would think I
ought to have a medical check up yearly, now is the time, so I should see my
doctor to be a directive with some force. It articulates a practical
argument. Perhaps the strongest attempt to reconstruct an (acceptable or
rational) thought transition as a standard arguments is to
treat the Subjectsive condition, I feel like having climbing fun in the summer,
as a premise, for then the premises would support the conclusion. But the
individual, whose thought transition we are examining, does not regard a
description of his psychological state as a consideration that supports the
conclusion. It will be useful to look more closely at a variant of the
example to note when it is appropriate to reconstruct thinking in the form of
argument. Bloggs, now hiking with a friend in the Everest, comes to a
difficult spot and says: I dont like the look of that, I am frightened. I am going
back. That is usually enough for Bloggs to return, and for the friend to
turn back with him. Bloggss action of turning back, admittedly motivated by
fear, is, while not acting on reasons, nonetheless rational unless we judge his
fear to be irrational. Bloggss Subjectsive condition can serve
as a premise, but only in a very different situation. Bloggs resorts to
reasons. Suppose that, while his friend does not think Bloggss fear irrational,
the friend still attempts to dissuade Bloggs from going back. After listening
and reflecting, Bloggs may say I am so frightened it is not worth it. I am not
enjoying this climbing anymore. Or I am too frightened to be able to safely go
on. Or I often climb the Everest and dont usually get frightened. The fact that
I am now is a good indication that this is a dangerous trail and I should turn
back. These are reasons, considerations implicitly backed by principles, and
they could be the initial motivations of someone. But in Bloggss case they
emerged when he was challenged by his friend. They do not express his initial
practical reasoning. Bloggs was frightened by the trail ahead, wanted to go
back, and didnt have any reason not to. Note that there is no general
rational requirement to always act on reasons, and no general truth that a
rational individual would be better off the more often he acted on
reasons. Faced with his friends objections, however, Bloggs needed
justification for acting on his fear. He reflected and found reason(s) to act
on his fear. Grice plays with Subjectsivity already in Prolegomena. Consider
the use of carefully. Surely we must include the agents own idea of this. Or
consider the use of phi and phi – surely we dont want the addressee to regard
himself under the same guise with which the utterer regards him. Or consider “Aspects”:
Nixon must be appointed professor of theology at Oxford. Does he feel the need?
Grice raises the topic of Subjectsivity again in the Kant lectures just after
his discussion of mode, in a sub-section entitled, Modalities: relative and
absolute. He finds the topic central for his æqui-vocality thesis: Subjectsive
conditions seem necessary to both practical and alethic considerations. Refs.:
The source is his essay on intentions and the subjective condition, The H. P. Grice
Papers, BANC.
subjectum.
Grice is very familiar with this since it’s the literal transliteration of
Aristotle’s hypokeimenon, opp. in a specific context, to the ‘prae-dicatum,’ or
categoroumenon. And with the same sort of ‘ambiguity,’ qua opposite a category
of expression, thought, or reality. In philosophical circles, one has to be
especially aware of the subject-object distinction (which belong in
philosophical psychology) and the thing which belongs in ontology. Of course
there’s the substance (hypousia, substantia), the essence, and the sumbebekon,
accidens. So one has to be careful. Grice expands on Strawson’s explorations
here. Philosophy, to underlie, as the foundation in which something else
inheres, to be implied or presupposed by something else, “ἑκάστῳ τῶν ὀνομάτων .
. ὑ. τις ἴδιος οὐσία” Pl.Prt.349b, cf. Cra.422d, R.581c, Ti.Locr.97e: τὸ
ὑποκείμενον has three main applications: (1) to the matter which underlies the
form, opp. εἶδος, ἐντελέχεια, Arist.Metaph.983a30; (2) to the substance (matter
+ form) which underlies the accidents, opp. πάθη, συμβεβηκότα, Id.Cat.1a20,27,
Metaph.1037b16, 983b16; (3) to the logical subject to which attributes are
ascribed, opp. τὸ κατηγορούμενον, Id.Cat.1b10,21, Ph.189a31: applications (1) and
(2) are distinguished in Id.Metaph.1038b5, 1029a1-5, 1042a26-31: τὸ ὑ. is
occasionally used of what underlies or is presupposed in some other way, e. g.
of the positive termini presupposed by change, Id.Ph.225a3-7. b. exist, τὸ
ἐκτὸς ὑποκείμενον the external reality, Stoic.2.48, cf. Epicur.Ep.1pp.12,24 U.;
“φῶς εἶναι τὸ χρῶμα τοῖς ὑ. ἐπιπῖπτον” Aristarch. Sam. ap. Placit.1.15.5; “τὸ
κρῖνον τί τε φαίνεται μόνον καὶ τί σὺν τῷ φαίνεσθαι ἔτι καὶ κατ᾽ ἀλήθειαν
ὑπόκειται” S.E.M.7.143, cf. 83,90,91, 10.240; = ὑπάρχω, τὰ ὑποκείμενα πράγματα
the existing state of affairs, Plb.11.28.2, cf. 11.29.1, 15.8.11,13, 3.31.6,
Eun.VSp.474 B.; “Τίτος ἐξ ὑποκειμένων ἐνίκα, χρώμενος ὁπλις μοῖς καὶ τάξεσιν
αἷς παρέλαβε” Plu.Comp.Phil.Flam.2; “τῆς αὐτῆς δυνάμεως ὑποκειμένης” Id.2.336b;
“ἐχομένου τοῦ προσιόντος λόγου ὡς πρὸς τὸν ὑποκείμενον” A.D.Synt.122.17. c. ὁ
ὑ. ἐνιαυτός the year in question, D.S.11.75; οἱ ὑ. καιροί the time in question,
Id.16.40, Plb.2.63.6, cf. Plu.Comp.Sol.Publ.4; τοῦ ὑ. μηνός the current month,
PTeb.14.14 (ii B. C.), al.; ἐκ τοῦ ὑ. φόρου in return for a reduction from the
said rent, PCair.Zen.649.18 (iii B. C.); πρὸς τὸ ὑ. νόει according to the
context, Gp.6.11.7. Note that both Grice and Strawson oppose Quine’s Humeian
dogma that, since the subjectum is beyond comprehension, we can do with a
‘predicate’ calculus, only. Vide Strawson, “Subject and predicate in logic and
grammar.” Refs: H. P. Grice, Work on the categories with P. F. Strawson, The H.
P. Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c.
subperceptum. In WoW:139,
Grice refers to “the pillar box seems red” as “SUB-PERCEPTUAL,” the first of a
trio. The second is the perceptual, “A perceives that the pillar box is red,”
and the third, “The pillar box is red.” He wishes to explore the
truth-conditons of the subperceptum, and although first in the list, is last in
the analsysis. Grice proposes: ‘The pillar box seems red” iff (1) the pillar
box is red; (2) A perceives that the pillar box is red; and (3) (1) causes (2).
In this there is a parallelism with his quasi-causal account of ‘know’ (and his
caveat that ‘literally,’ we may just know that 2 + 2 = 4 (and such) (“Meaning
Revisited). In what he calls ‘accented sub-perceptum,’ the idea is that the U
is choosing the superceptum (“seems”) as opposed to his other obvious choices
(“The pillar box IS red,”) and the passive-voice version of the ‘perceptum’:
“The pillar box IS PERCEIVED red.” The ‘accent’ generates the D-or-D
implicatum: By uttering “The pillar box seems red,” U IMPLICATES that it is
denied that or doubted that the pillar box is perceived red by U or that the
pillar box is red. In this, the accented version contrasts with the unaccented
version where the implicatum is NOT generated, and the U remains uncommitted
re: this doubt or denial implicatum. It is this uncommitment that will allow to
disimplicate or cancel the implicatum should occasion arise. The reference
Grice makes between the sub-perceptum and the perceptum is grammatical, not
psychological. Or else he may be meaning that in uttering, “I perceive that the
pillar box is red,” one needs to appeal to Kant’s apperception of the ego. Refs.:
Pecocke, Sense and content, Grice, BANC.
subscriptum:
Grice plays with various roots of ‘scriptum.’ He was bound to. Moore had showed
that ‘good’ was not ‘descriptive.’ Grice thinks it’s pseudo-descriptive. So
here we have the first, ‘descriptum,’ where what is meant is Griceian: By
uttering the “The cat is on the mat” U means, by his act of describing, that
the cat is on the mat. Then there’s the ‘prae-scriptum.’ Oddly, Grice, when
criticizing the ‘descriptive’ fallacy, seldom mentions the co-relative
‘prescriptum.’ “Good” would be understood in terms of a ‘prae-scriptum’ that
appeals to his utterer’s intentions. Then there’s the subscriptum. This may
have various use, both in Grice. “I subscribe,” and in the case of “Pegasus
flies.” Where the utterer subscribes to his ontological commitment. subscript
device. Why does Grice think we NEED a subscript device? Obviously, his wife
would not use it. I mean, you cannot pronounce a subscript device or a
square-bracket device. So his point is ironic. “Ordinary” language does not
need it. But if Strawson and Quine are going to be picky about stuff –
ontological commitment, ‘existential presupposition,’ let’s subscribe and
bracket! Note that Quine’s response to Grice is perfunctory: “Brackets would
have done!” Grice considers a quartet of utterances: Jack wants someone to
marry him; Jack wants someone or other to marry him; Jack
wants a particular person to marry him, and There is someone whom
Jack wants to marry him.Grice notes that there are clearly at
least two possible readings of an utterance like our (i): a first reading
in which, as Grice puts it, (i) might be paraphrased by (ii).
A second reading is one in which it might be paraphrased by
(iii) or by (iv). Grice goes on to symbolize the phenomenon in his
own version of a first-order predicate calculus. Ja wants that p becomes Wjap
where ja stands for the individual constant Jack as a super-script attached to
the predicate standing for Jacks psychological state or attitude. Grice writes:
Using the apparatus of classical predicate logic, we might hope to represent,
respectively, the external reading and the internal reading (involving
an intentio secunda or intentio obliqua) as (Ǝx)WjaFxja
and Wja(Ǝx)Fxja. Grice then goes on to discuss a slightly more
complex, or oblique, scenario involving this second internal reading, which is
the one that interests us, as it involves an intentio seconda.Grice notes: But
suppose that Jack wants a specific individual, Jill, to marry him, and
this because Jack has been deceived into thinking that his friend Joe has a
highly delectable sister called Jill, though in fact Joe is an only child. The
Jill Jack eventually goes up the hill with is, coincidentally, another Jill,
possibly existent. Let us recall that Grices main focus of the whole essay is,
as the title goes, emptiness! In these circumstances, one is inclined to say
that (i) is true only on reading (vii), where the existential
quantifier occurs within the scope of the psychological-state or
-attitude verb, but we cannot now represent (ii) or (iii), with Jill
being vacuous, by (vi), where the existential quantifier (Ǝx)
occurs outside the scope of the psychological-attitude
verb, want, since [well,] Jill does not really exist, except as a figment
of Jacks imagination. In a manoeuver that I interpret as purely intentionalist,
and thus favouring by far Suppess over Chomskys characterisation of Grice as a
mere behaviourist, Grice hopes that we should be provided
with distinct representations for two familiar readings of,
now: Jack wants Jill to marry him and Jack wants Jill to marry him. It is at
this point that Grice applies a syntactic scope notation involving sub-scripted
numerals, (ix) and (x), where the numeric values merely indicate the order of
introduction of the symbol to which it is attached in a deductive schema for
the predicate calculus in question. Only the first formulation represents the
internal reading (where ji stands for Jill): W2ja4F1ji3ja4 and
W3ja4F2ji1ja4. Note
that in the second formulation, the individual constant for Jill, ji, is
introduced prior to want, – jis sub-script is 1, while Ws sub-script is the
higher numerical value 3. Grice notes: Given that Jill does not exist, only the
internal reading can be true, or alethically satisfactory. Grice sums up
his reflections on the representation of the opaqueness of a verb standing for
a psychological state or attitude like that expressed by wanting with one
observation that further marks him as an intentionalist, almost of a Meinongian
type. He is willing to allow for existential phrases in cases of vacuous
designata, provided they occur within opaque psychological-state or attitude
verbs, and he thinks that by doing this, he is being faithful to the richness
and exuberance of ordinary discourse, while keeping Quine happy. As Grice
puts it, we should also have available to us also three neutral, yet distinct,
(Ǝx)-quantificational forms (together with their isomorphs), as a philosopher
who thinks that Wittgenstein denies a distinction, craves for a generality!
Jill now becomes x. W4ja5Ǝx3F1x2ja5, Ǝx5W2ja5F1x4ja3, Ǝx5W3ja4F1x2ja4. As Grice
notes, since in (xii) the individual variable x (ranging over Jill) does not
dominate the segment following the (Ǝx) quantifier, the formulation does not
display any existential or de re, force, and is suitable therefore for
representing the internal readings (ii) or (iii), if we have to allow, as we do
have, if we want to faithfully represent ordinary discourse, for the
possibility of expressing the fact that a particular person, Jill, does not
actually exist.
sousentendu,
used by, of all people, Mill. An Examination of Sir
William Hamilton's Philosophybooks.google.com › books ... and speak with any
approach to precision, and adopting into logic a mere sous-entendu of common
conversation in its most unprecise form. If I say to any one, .
suggestio falsi
– suggest. Grice explores hint versus suggest in Retrospective epilogue. Also
cited by Strawson and Wiggins. The emissor’s implication is exactly this
suggestio, for which suggestum. To
suggest, advise, prompt, offer, bring to
mind: “quoties aequitas restitutionem suggerit,” Dig. 4,
6, 26 fin.; cf.: “quae (res) suggerit, ut Italicarum rerum esse credantur eae res,” reminds, admonishes, ib. 28, 5, 35 fin.: “quaedam de republicā,” Aur. Vict. Vir. Ill. 66, 2. — Absol.: “suggerente conjuge,” at the instigation of, Aur. Vict. Epit. 41, 11; cf.: “suggerente irā,” id. ib. 12, 10 suggestio falsi. Pl.
suggestiones falsi. [mod.L., = suggestion of what is false.] A
misrepresentation of the truth whereby something incorrect is implied to be
true; an indirect lie. Often in contexts with suppressio veri.
QUOTES: 1815 H. Maddock Princ. & Pract. Chancery I. 208
Whenever Suppressio veri or Suggestio falsi occur..they afford a sufficient
ground for setting aside any Release or Conveyance. 1855 Newspaper
& Gen. Reader's Pocket Compan. i.4 He was bound to say that the
suppressio veri on that occasion approached very nearly to a positive suggestio
falsi. 1898 Kipling Stalky & Co. (1899) 36 It seems..that
they had held back material facts; that they were guilty both of suppressio
veri and suggestio falsi. 1907 W. de Morgan Alice-for-Short xxxvi.
389 That's suppressio veri and suggestio falsi! Besides, it's
fibs! 1962 J. Wilson Public Schools & Private Practice i.
19 It is rare to find a positively verifiable untruth in a school
brochure: but it is equally rare not to find a great many suggestiones falsi,
particularly as regards the material comfort and facilities available.
1980 D. Newsome On Edge of Paradise 7 There are undoubted cases of
suppressio veri; on the other hand, he appears to eschew suggestio falsi.
--- Fibs indeed. Suppress, suggest. Write: "Griceland,
Inc." "Yes, I agree to become a Doctor in Gricean
Studies" EXAM QUESTION: 1. Discuss suggestio falsi in
terms of detachability. 2. Compare suppresio veri and suggestion falsi in
connection with "The king of France is bald" uttered during
Napoleon's time. 3. Invent things for 'suppressio falsi' and 'suggestio
veri'. 4. No. You cannot go to the bathroom.
suppresio veri:
to suppress. suggestio falsi. Pl. suggestiones
falsi. [mod.L., = suggestion of what is false.] A misrepresentation
of the truth whereby something incorrect is implied to be true; an indirect
lie. Often in contexts with suppressio veri. QUOTES: 1815 H. Maddock
Princ. & Pract. Chancery I. 208 Whenever Suppressio veri or Suggestio
falsi occur..they afford a sufficient ground for setting aside any Release or
Conveyance. 1855 Newspaper & Gen. Reader's Pocket Compan.
i.4 He was bound to say that the suppressio veri on that occasion
approached very nearly to a positive suggestio falsi. 1898 Kipling
Stalky & Co. (1899) 36 It seems..that they had held back material
facts; that they were guilty both of suppressio veri and suggestio falsi.
1907 W. de Morgan Alice-for-Short xxxvi. 389 That's suppressio veri
and suggestio falsi! Besides, it's fibs! 1962 J. Wilson Public
Schools & Private Practice i. 19 It is rare to find a positively
verifiable untruth in a school brochure: but it is equally rare not to find a
great many suggestiones falsi, particularly as regards the material comfort and
facilities available. 1980 D. Newsome On Edge of Paradise 7
There are undoubted cases of suppressio veri; on the other hand, he appears to
eschew suggestio falsi. --- Fibs indeed. Suppress, suggest.
Write: "Griceland, Inc." "Yes, I agree to
become a Doctor in Gricean Studies" EXAM QUESTION: 1.
Discuss suggestio falsi in terms of detachability. 2. Compare suppresio
veri and suggestion falsi in connection with "The king of France is
bald" uttered during Napoleon's time. 3. Invent things for
'suppressio falsi' and 'suggestio veri'. 4. No. You cannot go to the
bathroom.
summum genus.
The categories. There is infimum genus, or sub-summum. Talk of categories
becomes informal in Grice when he ‘echoes’ Kant in the mention of four
‘functions’ that generate for Kant twelve categories. Grice however uses the
functions themselves, echoing Ariskant, rather, as ‘caegory’. We have then a
category of conversational quantity (involved in a principle of maximization of
conversational informativeness). We have a category of conversational quality
(or a desideratum of conversational candour). We have a category of
conversational relation (cf. Strawson’s principle of relevance along with Strawson’s
principles of the presumption of knowledge and the presumption of ignorance).
Lastly, we have a category of conversational mode. For some reason, Grice uses
‘manner’ sometimes in lieu of Meiklejohn’s apt translation of Kant’s modality
into the shorter ‘mode.’ The four have Aristotelian pedigree, indeed Grecian
and Graeco-Roman: The quantity is Kant’s quantitat which is Aristotle’s posotes
(sic abstract) rendered in Roman as ‘quantitas.’ Of course, Aristotle derives
‘posotes,’ from ‘poson,’ the quantum. No quantity without quantum. The quality
is Kant’s qualitat, which again has Grecian and Graeco-Roman pediegree. It is
Aristotel’s poiotes (sic in abstract), rendered in Roman as qualitas. Again,
derived from the more basic ‘poion,’ or ‘quale.’ Aristotle was unable to find a
‘-tes’ ending form for what Kant has as ‘relation.’ ‘pros it’ is used, and
first translated into Roman as ‘relatio.’ We see here that we are talking of a
‘summum genus.’ For who other but a philosopher is going to lecture on the ‘pros
it’? What Aristotle means is that Socrates is to the right of Plato. Finally,
for Grice’s mode, there is Kant’s wrong ‘modalitat,’ since this refers to
Aristotle ‘te’ and translated in Roman as ‘modus,’ which Meiklejohn, being a
better classicist than Kant, renders as ‘mode,’ and not the pretentious
sounding ‘modality.’ Now for Kant, 12 categories are involved here. Why?
Because he subdivides each summum genus into three sub-summum or ‘inferiore’
genus. This is complex. Kant would DISAGREE with Grice’s idea that a subject
can JUDGE in generic terms, say, about the quantum. The subject has THREE
scenarios. It’s best to reverse the order, for surely unity comes before
totality. One scenario, he utters a SINGULAR or individual utterance (Grice on
‘the’). The CATEGORY is the first category, THE UNUM or UNITAS. The one. The
unity. Second scenario, he utters a PARTICULAR utterance (Grice’s “some (at
least one). Here we encounter the SECOND category, that of PLURALITAS, the
plurum, plurality. It’s a good thing Kant forgot that the Greeks had a dual
number, and that Urquhart has fourth number, a re-dual. A third scenario: the
nirvana. He utters a UNIVERSAL (totum) utterance (Grice on “all”). The category
is that of TOTUM, TOTALITAS, totality. Kant does not deign to specify if he
means substitutional or non-substitutional. For the quale, there are again
three scenarios for Kant, and he would deny that the subject is confronted with
the FUNCTION quale and be able to formulate a judgement. The first scenario
involves the subject uttering a PROPOSITIO DEDICATIVA (Grice elaborates on this
before introducing ‘not’ in “Indicative conditionals” – “Let’s start with some
unstructured amorophous proposition.” Here the category is NOT AFFIRMATION, but
the nirvana “REALITAS,” Reality, reale.Second scenario, subject utters a
PROPOSITIO ABDICATIVA (Grice on ‘not’). While Kant does not consider affirmatio
a category (why should he?), he does consider NEGATIO a category. Negation. See
abdicatum. Third scenario, subject utters an PROPOSITIO INFINITA. Here the
category is that of LIMITATION, which is quite like NEGATIO (cf. privatio,
stelesis, versus habitus or hexis), but not quite. Possibly LIMITATUM. Regarding
the ‘pros ti.’ The first scenario involves a categorema, PROPOSITIO CATEGORICA.
Here Kant seems to think that there is ONE category called “INHERENCE AND
SUBSTISTENCE or substance and accident. There seem rather two. He will go to
this ‘pair’ formulation in one more case in the relation, and for the three
under modus. If we count the ‘categorical pairs’ as being two categories. The
total would not be 12 categories but 17, which is a rather ugly number for a
list of categories, unles it is not. Kant is being VERY serious here, because
if he has SUBSTISTENCE or SUBSTANCE as a category, this is SECUNDA SUBSTANTIA
or ‘deutero-ousia.’ It is a no-no to count the prote ousia or PRIMA SUBSTANTIA
as a category. It is defined as THE THING which cannot be predicated of
anything! “SUMBEBEKOS” is a trick of Kant, for surely EVERYTHING BUT THE SUBSTANCE
can be seen as an ‘accidens’ (In fact, those who deny categories, reduce them
to ‘attribute’, or ‘property.’ The second scenario involves an ‘if’ Grice on
‘if’ – PROPOSITIO CONDITIONALIS – hypothetike protasis -- this involves for the
first time a MOLECULAR proposition. As in the previous case, we have a
‘category pair’, which is formulated either as CAUSALITY (CAUSALITAS) and
DEPENDENCE (Dependentia), or “cause’ (CAUSA) and ‘effect’ (Effectum). Kant is
having in mind Strawson’s account of ‘if’ (The influence of P. F. Strawson on
Kant). For since this is the hypothetical, Kant is suggeseting that in ‘if p,
q’ q depends on p, or q is an effect of its cause, p. As in “If it rains, the
boots are in the closet.” (J). The third scenario also involves a molectural proposition, A
DISJUNCTUM. PROPOSITIO DISJUNCTIVA. Note that in Kant, ‘if’ before ‘or’! His
implicature: subordination before coordination, which makes sense. Grice on
‘or.’ FOR SOME REASON, the category here for Kant is that of COMMUNITAS (community)
or RECIPROCITAS, reciprocity. He seems to be suggesting that if you turn to the
right or to the left, you are reciprocally forbidden to keep on going straight.
For the modus, similar. Here Kant is into modality. Again, it is best to
re-order the scenarios in terms of priority. Here it’s the middle which is
basic. The first scenario, subject utters an ASSERTORIC. The category is a
pair: EXISTENCE (how is this different from REALITY) and NON-EXISTENCE (how is
this different from negation?). He has in mind: ‘the cat is in the room,’ ‘the
room is empty.’ Second scenario, the subject doubts. subject utters a
problematical. (“The pillar box may be red”). Here we have a category pair:
POSSIBILITIAS (possibility) and, yes, IMPOSSIBILITAS – IMPOSSIBILITY. This is
odd, because ‘impossibility’ goes rather with the negation of necessity. The
third and last scenario, subject utters an APODEICTIC. Here again there is a
category pair – yielding 17 as the final number --: NECESSITAS, necessity, and
guess what, CONTINGENTIA, or contingency. Surely, possibilitas and contingentia
are almost the same thing. It may be what Grice has in mind when he blames a
philosopher to state that ‘what is actual is not also possible.’ Or not.
syntactics: When
Grice uses ‘unsructured’ he sometimes expands this into ‘syntactically
unstructured.’ Since syntax need not be linguistic, this is an interesting
semiotic perspective by Grice. He is allowing for compositionality in a semotic
system with a comibinatory other than the first, second, and third
articulation. The Latinate is ‘contactum.’ Morris thought he was being bright
when he proposed ‘syntactics,’ “long for syntax,” he wrote. syntax, περὶ τῆς ς. τῶν λεγομένων, title of work by Chrysipp., Stoic.2.6, cf. Plu.2.731f (pl.);
“τὴν ς. τῶν ὀνομάτων” Gal.16.736, cf. 720; περὶ συντάξεως, title of work by A.D.; but also, compound forms, Id.Conj.214.7; ποιεῖσθαι μετά τινος τὴν ς. ib.221.19; also, rule
for combination of sounds or letters, τὸ χ (in δέγμενος)“ εἰς γ μετεβλήθη, τῆς ς. οὕτως ἀπαιτούσης” EM252.45, cf. Luc.Jud. Voc.3; also, connected speech, ἐν τῇ ς. ἐγκλιτέον Sch.Il.16.85.Grice’s presupposition is that a
‘syntactics’ is not enough for a system to be a ‘communication-system’. Nothing
is communicated. With the syntagma, there is no communicatum. Grice loved two
devices of the syntactic kind: subscripts and square brackets (for the
assignment of common-ground status). Grice is a conservative
(dissenting rationalist) when it comes to syntax and semantics. He hardly uses
pragmatics albeit in a loose way (pragmatic import, pragmatic inference), but
was aware of Morriss triangle. Syntax is presented along the lines of
Gentzen, i.e. a system of natural deduction in terms of inference rules of
introduction and elimination for each formal device. Semantics pertains
rather to Witterss truth-values, i.e. the assignment of a satisfactory-valuation:
the true and the good. A syntactic approach to Grice’s System does not require
value-assignment. The system is constructed alla Gentzen with introduction and
elimination rules which are regarded as syntactic in nature. One can easily
check that the rules statedabove adequately characterise the meaning of
classical conjunction which is true iff both conjuncts are true. Hence the
syntactic deducibility relation coincides with the semantic relation of /=
or logical consequence (or entailment). Refs.: The most direct source is “Vacuous
names,” but the keyword ‘syntax’ is helpful. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
tautologum: As
Strawson and Wiggins note, by
coining implicature Grice is mainly interested in having the MAN implying this
or that, as opposed to what the man implies implying this or that. So, in
Strawson and Wiggins’s rephrasing, the implicature is to be distinguished with
the logical and necessary implication, i. e., the ‘tautological’ implication. Grice
uses ‘tautological’ variously. It is tautological that we smell smells, for
example. This is an extension of ‘paradigm-case,’ re: analyticity. Without
‘analytic’ there is no ‘tautologicum.’ tautŏlŏgĭa , ae, f., = ταυτολογία,I.a repetition of the same
meaning in different words, tautology, Mart. Cap. 5, § 535; Charis,
p. 242 P. ταὐτολογ-έω ,A.repeat what has been said, “περί τινος” Plb.1.1.3; “ὑπέρ τινος” Id.1.79.7; “τ. τὸν λόγον” Str.12.3.27:—abs., Plb.36.12.2, Phld. Po.Herc.994.30, Hermog.Inv.3.15.
Oddly why Witters restricts tautology to truth-table propositional logic,
Grice’s two examples are predicate calculus: Women are women and war is war.
4.46 GER [→OGD | →P/M] Unter den möglichen Gruppen von Wahrheitsbedingungen
gibt es zwei extreme Fälle. In dem einen Fall ist der Satz für sämtliche
Wahrheitsmöglichkeiten der Elementarsätze wahr. Wir sagen, die
Wahrheitsbedingungen sind t a u t o l o g i s c h. Im zweiten Fall ist der Satz
für sämtliche Wahrheitsmöglichkeiten falsch: Die Wahrheitsbedingungen sind k o
n t r a d i k t o r i s c h. Im ersten Fall nennen wir den Satz eine
Tautologie, im zweiten Fall eine Kontradiktion. 4.461 GER [→OGD | →P/M] Der
Satz zeigt was er sagt, die Tautologie und die Kontradiktion, dass sie nichts
sagen. Die Tautologie hat keine Wahrheitsbedingungen, denn sie ist
bedingungslos wahr; und die Kontradiktion ist unter keiner Bedingung wahr.
Tautologie und Kontradiktion sind sinnlos. (Wie der Punkt, von dem zwei Pfeile
in entgegengesetzter Richtung auseinandergehen.) (Ich weiß z. B. nichts über
das Wetter, wenn ich weiß, dass es regnet oder nicht regnet.) 4.4611 GER [→OGD
| →P/M] Tautologie und Kontradiktion sind aber nicht unsinnig; sie gehören zum Symbolismus,
und zwar ähnlich wie die „0“ zum Symbolismus der Arithmetik. 4.462 GER [→OGD |
→P/M] Tautologie und Kontradiktion sind nicht Bilder der Wirklichkeit. Sie
stellen keine mögliche Sachlage dar. Denn jene lässt j e d e mögliche Sachlage
zu, diese k e i n e. In der Tautologie heben die Bedingungen der
Übereinstimmung mit der Welt—die darstellenden Beziehungen—einander auf, so
dass sie in keiner darstellenden Beziehung zur Wirklichkeit steht. 4.463 GER
[→OGD | →P/M] Die Wahrheitsbedingungen bestimmen den Spielraum, der den
Tatsachen durch den Satz gelassen wird. (Der Satz, das Bild, das Modell, sind
im negativen Sinne wie ein fester Körper, der die Bewegungsfreiheit der anderen
beschränkt; im positiven Sinne, wie der von fester Substanz begrenzte Raum, worin
ein Körper Platz hat.) Die Tautologie lässt der Wirklichkeit den
ganzen—unendlichen—logischen Raum; die Kontradiktion erfüllt den ganzen
logischen Raum und lässt der Wirklichkeit keinen Punkt. Keine von beiden kann
daher die Wirklichkeit irgendwie bestimmen. 4.464 GER [→OGD | →P/M] Die
Wahrheit der Tautologie ist gewiss, des Satzes möglich, der Kontradiktion
unmöglich. (Gewiss, möglich, unmöglich: Hier haben wir das Anzeichen jener
Gradation, die wir in der Wahrscheinlichkeitslehre brauchen.) 4.465 GER [→OGD |
→P/M] Das logische Produkt einer Tautologie und eines Satzes sagt dasselbe, wie
der Satz. Also ist jenes Produkt identisch mit dem Satz. Denn man kann das
Wesentliche des Symbols nicht ändern, ohne seinen Sinn zu ändern. 4.466 GER
[→OGD | →P/M] Einer bestimmten logischen Verbindung von Zeichen entspricht eine
bestimmte logische Verbindung ihrer Bedeutungen; j e d e b e l i e - b i g e
Verbindung entspricht nur den unverbundenen Zeichen. Das heißt, Sätze, die für
jede Sachlage wahr sind, können überhaupt keine Zeichenverbindungen sein, denn
sonst könnten ihnen nur bestimmte Verbindungen von Gegenständen entsprechen.
(Und keiner logischen Verbindung entspricht k e i n e Verbindung der
Gegenstände.) Tautologie und Kontradiktion sind die Grenzfälle der
Zeichenverbindung, nämlich ihre Auflösung. 4.4661 GER [→OGD | →P/M] Freilich
sind auch in der Tautologie und Kontradiktion die Zeichen noch mit einander
verbunden, d. h. sie stehen in Beziehungen zu einander, aber diese Beziehungen
sind bedeu- tungslos, dem S y m b o l unwesentlich. 4.46 OGD [→GER | →P/M]
Among the possible groups of truthconditions there are two extreme cases. In
the one case the proposition is true for all the truth-possibilities of the
elementary propositions. We say that the truth-conditions are tautological. In
the second case the proposition is false for all the truth-possibilities. The
truth-conditions are self-contradictory. In the first case we call the
proposition a tautology, in the second case a contradiction. 4.461 OGD [→GER | →P/M]
The proposition shows what it says, the tautology and the contradiction that
they say nothing. The tautology has no truth-conditions, for it is
unconditionally true; and the contradiction is on no condition true. Tautology
and contradiction are without sense. (Like the point from which two arrows go
out in opposite directions.) (I know, e.g. nothing about the weather, when I
know that it rains or does not rain.) 4.4611 OGD [→GER | →P/M] Tautology and
contradiction are, however, not nonsensical; they are part of the symbol- ism,
in the same way that “0” is part of the symbolism of Arithmetic. 4.462 OGD
[→GER | →P/M] Tautology and contradiction are not pictures of the reality. They
present no possible state of affairs. For the one allows every possible state
of affairs, the other none. In the tautology the conditions of agreement with
the world—the presenting relations— cancel one another, so that it stands in no
presenting relation to reality. 4.463 OGD [→GER | →P/M] The truth-conditions
determine the range, which is left to the facts by the proposition. (The
proposition, the picture, the model, are in a negative sense like a solid body,
which restricts the free movement of another: in a positive sense, like the
space limited by solid substance, in which a body may be placed.) Tautology
leaves to reality the whole infinite logical space; contradiction fills the
whole logi- cal space and leaves no point to reality. Neither of them,
therefore, can in any way determine reality. 4.464 OGD [→GER | →P/M] The truth
of tautology is certain, of propositions possible, of contradiction impossible.
(Certain, possible, impossible: here we have an indication of that gradation
which we need in the theory of probability.) 4.465 OGD [→GER | →P/M] The
logical product of a tautology and a proposition says the same as the
proposition. Therefore that product is identical with the proposition. For the
essence of the symbol cannot be altered without altering its sense. 4.466 OGD
[→GER | →P/M] To a definite logical combination of signs corresponds a definite
logical combination of their meanings; every arbitrary combination only
corresponds to the unconnected signs. That is, propositions which are true for
ev- ery state of affairs cannot be combinations of signs at all, for otherwise
there could only correspond to them definite combinations of objects. (And to
no logical combination corresponds no combination of the objects.) Tautology
and contradiction are the limiting cases of the combination of symbols, namely
their dissolution. 4.4661 OGD [→GER | →P/M] Of course the signs are also
combined with one another in the tautology and contradiction, i.e. they stand
in relations to one another, but these relations are meaningless, unessential
to the symbol. 4.46 P/M [→GER | →OGD] Among the possible groups of
truthconditions there are two extreme cases. In one of these cases the
proposition is true for all the truth-possibilities of the elementary
propositions. We say that the truth-conditions are tautological. In the second
case the proposition is false for all the truth-possibilities: the
truth-conditions are contradictory. In the first case we call the proposition a
tautology; in the second, a contradiction. 4.461 P/M [→GER | →OGD] Propositions
show what they say: tautolo- gies and contradictions show that they say
nothing. A tautology has no truth-conditions, since it is unconditionally true:
and a contradiction is true on no condition. Tautologies and contradictions
lack sense. (Like a point from which two arrows go out in opposite directions
to one another.) (For example, I know nothing about the weather when I know
that it is either raining or not raining.) 4.4611 P/M [→GER | →OGD] Tautologies
and contradictions are not, however, nonsensical. They are part of the
symbolism, much as ‘0’ is part of the symbolism of arithmetic. 4.462 P/M [→GER
| →OGD] Tautologies and contradictions are not pictures of reality. They do not
represent any possible situations. For the former admit all possible
situations, and latter none. In a tautology the conditions of agreement with
the world—the representational relations—cancel one another, so that it does
not stand in any representational relation to reality. 4.463 P/M [→GER | →OGD]
The truth-conditions of a proposition determine the range that it leaves open
to the facts. (A proposition, a picture, or a model is, in the negative sense,
like a solid body that restricts the freedom of movement of others, and, in the
positive sense, like a space bounded by solid substance in which there is room
for a body.) A tautology leaves open to reality the whole—the infinite whole—of
logical space: a contradiction fills the whole of logical space leaving no
point of it for reality. Thus neither of them can determine reality in any way.
4.464 P/M [→GER | →OGD] A tautology’s truth is certain, a proposition’s
possible, a contradiction’s impossible. (Certain, possible, impossible: here we
have the first indication of the scale that we need in the theory of
probability.) 4.465 P/M [→GER | →OGD] The logical product of a tautology and a
proposition says the same thing as the proposition. This product, therefore, is
identical with the proposition. For it is impossible to alter what is essential
to a symbol without altering its sense. 4.466 P/M [→GER | →OGD] What
corresponds to a determinate logical combination of signs is a determinate
logical combination of their meanings. It is only to the uncombined signs that
absolutely any combination corresponds. In other words, propositions that are
true for every situation cannot be combinations of signs at all, since, if they
were, only determinate combinations of objects could correspond to them. (And
what is not a logical combination has no combination of objects corresponding
to it.) Tautology and contradiction are the limiting cases—indeed the
disintegration—of the combination of signs. 4.4661 P/M [→GER | →OGD] Admittedly
the signs are still combined with one another even in tautologies and
contradictions—i.e. they stand in certain relations to one another: but these
relations have no meaning, they are not essential to the symbol. Grice would
often use ‘tautological,’ and ‘self-contradiction’ presupposes ‘analyticity,’
or rather the analytic-synthetic distinction. Is it contradictory, or a
self-contradiction, to say that one’s neighbour’s three-year-old child is an
adult? Is there an implicatum for ‘War is not war’? Grice refers to Bayes in
WOW re Grices paradox, and to crazy Bayesy, as Peter Achinstein does (Newton
was crazy, but not Bayesy). We can now, in principle, characterize
the desirability of the action a 1 , relative to each end (E1 and E2), and to
each combination of ends (here just E1 and E2), as a function of the
desirability of the end and the probability that the action a 1 will realize
that end, or combination of ends. If we envisage a range of possible actions,
which includes a 1 together with other actions, we can imagine that each such
action has a certain degree of desirability relative to each end (E1 and (or)
E2) and to their combination. If we suppose that, for each possible action,
these desirabilities can be compounded (perhaps added), then we can suppose
that one particular possible action scored higher (in actiondesirability
relative to these ends) than any alternative possible action; and that this is
the action which wins out; that is, is the action which is, or at least should,
end p.105 be performed. (The computation would in fact be more complex than I
have described, once account is taken of the fact that the ends involved are
often not definite (determinate) states of affairs (like becoming
President), but are variable in respect of the degree to which they might be
realized (if ones end is to make a profit from a deal, that profit might be of
a varying magnitude); so one would have to consider not merely the likelihood
of a particular actions realizing the end of making a profit, but also the
likelihood of its realizing that end to this or that degree; and this would
considerably complicate the computational problem.) No doubt most readers are
far too sensible ever to have entertained any picture even remotely resembling
the "Crazy-Bayesy" one I have just described. Grice was
fascinated by the fact that paradox translates the Grecian neuter paradoxon.
Some of the paradoxes of entailment, entailment and paradoxes. This is not the
first time Grice uses paradox. As a classicist, he was aware of the nuances
between paradox (or paradoxon, as he preferred, via Latin paradoxum, and
aporia, for example. He was interested in Strawsons treatment of this or that
paradox of entailment. He even called his own paradox involving if and
probablility Grices paradox.
telementationalism: The coinage is interesting. Since
Grice has an essay on ‘modest mentalism,’ and would often use ‘mental’ for
‘psychological,’ it does make sense. ‘Ideationalism’ is analogous. this is a
special note, or rather, a very moving proem, on Grices occasion of delivering
his lectures on ‘Aspects of reason and reasoning’ at Oxford as the Locke Lectures
at Merton. Particularly apt in mentioning, with humility, his having failed,
*thrice* [sic] to obtain the Locke lectureship, Strawson did, at once, but
feeling safe under the ægis of that great English philosopher (viz. Locke!
always implicated, never explicited) now. Grice starts the proem in a very
moving, shall we say, emotional, way: I find it difficult to convey to you just
how happy I am, and how honoured I feel, in being invited to give these
lectures. Difficult, but not impossible. I think of this university and this
city, it has a cathedral, which were my home for thirty-six years, as my
spiritual and intellectual parents. The almost majestic plural is Grices implicature
to the town and gown! Whatever I am was originally fashioned here; I never left
Oxford, Oxford made me, and I find it a moving experience to be, within these
splendid and none too ancient walls, once more engaged in my old occupation of
rendering what is clear obscure, by flouting the desideratum of conversational
clarity and the conversational maxim, avoid obscurity of expression, under be
perspicuous [sic]!. Grices implicature on none too ancient seems to be
addressed to the truly ancient walls that saw Athenian dialectic! On the other
hand, Grices funny variant on the obscurum per obscurius ‒ what Baker found as
Grices skill in rendering an orthodoxy into a heterodoxy! Almost! By clear
Grice implicates Lewis and his clarity is not enough! I am, at the same time,
proud of my mid-Atlantic [two-world] status, and am, therefore, delighted that
the Old World should have called me in, or rather recalled me, to redress, for
once, the balance of my having left her for the New. His implicature seems to
be: Strictly, I never left? Grice concludes his proem: I am, finally, greatly
heartened by my consciousness of the fact that that great English philosopher,
under whose ægis I am now speaking, has in the late afternoon of my days
extended to me his Lectureship as a gracious consolation for a record threefold
denied to me, in my early morning, of his Prize. I pray that my present
offerings may find greater favour in his sight than did those of long ago. They
did! Even if Locke surely might have found favour to Grices former offerings,
too, Im sure. Refs.: The allusions to Locke are in “Aspects.” Good references
under ‘ideationalism,’ above, especially in connection with Myro’s ‘modest
mentalism,’ The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
teleology: the objectivum. Grice speaks of the objective as a maxim.
This is very Latinate. So if the maxim is an objective, the goal is the
objective, or objectivum. Meaning "goal, aim" (1881) is from
military term objective point (1852),
reflecting a sense evolution in French. This
is an expansion on the desideratum. Cf. ‘desirable,’ and ‘desirability,’ and
‘end.’ Grice feels like introducing goal-oriented conceptual machinery. In a
later stage of his career he ensured that this machinery be seen as NOT
mechanistically derivable. Which is odd seeing that in the ‘progression’ of the
‘soul,’ he allows for talk of adaptiveness and survival which suggest a
mechanist explanation. If an agent has a desideratum that means that, to echo
Bennett, A displays a goal-oriented behaviour, where the goal is the ‘telos.’
Smoke cannot ‘mean’ fire, because smoke doesn’t really behave in a
goal-oriented matter. Grice does play with the idea of finality in nature,
because that would allow him to justify the objectivity of his system. how does
soul originate from matter? Does the vegetal soul have a telos.
Purposive-behaviour is obvious in plants (phototropism). If it is present in
the vegetal soul, it is present in the animal soul. If it is present in the
animal soul, it is present in the rational soul. With each stage, alla
Hartmann, there are distinctions in the specification of the telos. Grice could
be more continental than Scheler! Grices métier. Unity of science was a very
New-World expression that Grice did not quite buy. Grice was brought up in a
world, the Old World, indeed, as he calls it in his Proem to the Locke
lectures, of Snows two cultures. At the time of Grices philosophising, philosophers
such as Winch (who indeed quotes fro Grice) were contesting the idea that
science is unitary, when it comes to the explanation of rational behaviour.
Since a philosophical approach to the explanation of rational behaviour,
including conversational behaviour (to account for the conversational
implicata) is his priority, Grice needs to distinguish himself from those who
propose a unified science, which Grice regards as eliminationist and
reductionist. Grice is ambivalent about science and also playful (philosophia
regina scientiarum). Grice seems to presuppose, or implicate, that, since there
is the devil of scientism, science cannot get at teleology. The devil is in the
physiological details, which are irrelevant. The language Grice uses to
describe his Ps as goal-oriented, aimed at survival and reproduction, seems
teleological and somewhat scientific, though. But he means that ironically! As
the scholastics use it, teleology is a science, the science of telos, or
finality (cf. Aristotle on telos aitia, causa finalis. The unity of science is
threatened by teleology, and vice versa. Unified science seeks for a
mechanistically derivable teleology. But Grices sympathies lie for detached
finality. Grice is obsessed with the Greek idea of a telos, as slightly overused
by Aristotle. Grice thinks that some actions are for their own sake. What is
the telos of Oscar Wilde? Can we speak of Oscar Wilde’s métier? If a tiger is
to tigerise, a human is to humanise, and a person is to personise. Grice
thought that teleology is a key philosophical way to contest mechanism, so
popular in The New World. Strictly, and Grice knew this, teleology is
constituted as a discipline. One term that Cicero was unable to translate! For
the philosopher, teleology is that part of philosophy that studies the realm of
the telos. Informally, teleological is opposed to mechanistic. Grice is
interested in the mechanism/teleology debate, indeed jumps into it, with a goal
in mind! Grice finds some New-World philosophers too mechanistic-oriented, in
contrast with the more two-culture atmosphere he was familiar with at Oxford!
Code is the Aristotelian, and he and Grice are especially concerned in the idea
of causa finalis. For Grice only detached finality poses a threat to Mechanism,
as it should! Axiological objectivity is possible only given finality or
purpose in Nature, the admissibility of a final cause. Refs.: There are
specific essays on ‘teleology,’ ‘final cause,’ and ‘finality,’ the The Grice
Papers. Some of the material published in “Reply to Richards” (repr. in “Conception”)
and “Actions and events,” The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
‘that’-clause: Grice’s priority for the ‘that’-clause is multiple. He
dislikes what he calls an ‘amorphous’ propositional complex. His idea is to
have at least ‘The S is P,’ one act involving a subjectum or denotatum, and one
involving the praedicatum. There is also what he calls sub-perceptual
utterances. They do look like structured (“That red pillar seems red”) but they
are not perceptual reports like “I perceive that the pillar box is red.” At
points he wanst to restrict utterer’s communucatum to a ‘that’-clause; but
ignoring Austin’s remark that to wonder about what a ‘word’ ‘means’ is
senseless, Grice sometimes allows for things like ‘The cat sat on the mat’ to
‘mean’ that the cat sat on the mat. Grice thinks that his account of ‘the
red-seeming pillar box’ succeeded, and that it was this success that prompted
him to apply the thing to other areas, notably Strawson, but one hopes, all the
theses he presents in “Causal” and “Prolegomena.” But he does not go back to
the is/seems example, other than perhaps the tie is/seems blue. The reason is
that the sense-datum theory is very complex. Note “seems.” “It seems to me
that…” but the ‘that’-clause not as a content of a state of the agent. If the
pillar box seems red to Grice because it is red, what ‘that’-clause are we
talking about to involve in the implicatum? And what generates the implicatum.
“By uttering “The pillar box seems red,” U conversationally implicates that
there is a denial or doubt, somewhere as to whether the pillar box IS red.” Grice
thought of Staal as particularly good at this type of formalistic philosophy,
which was still adequate to reflect the subtleties of ordinary
language. How do we define a Griceian action? How do we define a
Griceian event? This is Grices examination and criticism of Davidson, as a
scientific realist, followed by a Kantian approach to freedom and causation.
Grice is especially interested in the logical form, or explicitum, so that he
can play with the implicatum. One of his favourite examples: He fell on his
sword, having tripped as he crossed the Galliæ. Grice manages to quote from
many and varied authors (some of which you would not expect him to quote) such
as Reichenbach, but also Robinson, of Oriel, of You Names it fame (for any x,
if you can Names it, x exists). Robinson has a brilliant essay on parts of Cook
Wilsons Statement and inference, so he certainly knows what he is talking
about. Grice also quotes from von Wright and Eddington. Grice offers a
linguistic botanic survey of autonomy and free (sugar-free, free fall,
implicature-free) which some have found inspirational. His favourite is
Finnegans alcohol-free. Finnegans obvious implicature is that everything is
alcohol-laden. Grice kept a copy of Davidsons The logical form of action
sentences, since surely Davidson, Grice thought, is making a primary
philosophical point. Horses run fast; therefore, horses run. A Davidsonian
problem, and there are more to come! Smith went fishing. Grices category shift
allows us to take Smiths fishing as the grammatical Subjects of an action
sentence. Cf. indeed the way to cope with entailment in The horse runs fast;
therefore, the horse runs. Grices Actions and events is Davidsonian in
motivation, but Kantian in method, one of those actions by Grice to promote a
Griceian event! Davidson had published, Grice thought, some pretty influential
(and provocative, anti-Quineian) stuff on actions and events, or events and
actions, actually, and, worse, he was being discussed at Oxford, too, over
which Grice always keeps an eye! Davidsons point, tersely put, is that while
p.q (e.g. It is raining, and it is pouring) denotes a concatenation of events.
Smith is fishing denotes an action, which is a kind of event, if you are
following him (Davidson, not Smith). However, Davidson is fighting against the
intuition, if you are a follower of Whitehead and Russell, to symbolise the
Smith is fishing as Fs, where s stands for Smith and F for fishing. The logical
form of a report of an event or an action seems to be slightly more
complicated. Davidsons point specifically involves adverbs, or adverbial
modifiers, and how to play with them in terms of entailment. The horse runs
fast; therefore, the horse runs. Symbolise that! as Davidson told Benson Mates!
But Mates had gone to the restroom. Grice explores all these and other topics
and submits the thing for publication. Grice quotes, as isnt his wont, from
many and various philosophers, not just Davidson, whom he saw every Wednesday,
but others he didnt, like Reichenbach, Robinson, Kant, and, again even a
physicist like Eddington. Grice remarks that Davidson is into hypothesis,
suppositio, while he is, as he should, into hypostasis, substantia. Grice then
expands on the apparent otiosity of uttering, It is a fact that grass is green.
Grice goes on to summarise what he ironically dubs an ingenious argument.
Let σ abbreviate the operator
consists in the fact that , which, when prefixed to a sentence,
produces a predicate or epithet. Let S abbreviate Snow is white,
and let G abbreviate Grass is green. In that case, xσS is 1 just
in case xσ(y(y=y and S) = y(y=y) is 1, since the first part of the
sub-sentence which follows σ in the main sentence is logically equivalent
logically equivalent to the second part. And xσ(y(y=y and S) =
y(y=y) is 1 just in case xσ(y(if y=y, G) = y(y=y) is 1,
since y(if y=y, S) and y(if y=y, G) are each a singular term, which, if
S and G are both true, each refers to y(y=y), and are therefore co-referential
and inter-substitutable. And xσ(y(if y=y, G) = y(y=y) is true just in
case xσG is 1, since G is logically equivalent to the sub-sentence which
follows σ. So, this fallacy goes, provided that S and G are both 1,
regardless of what an utterer explicitly conveys by uttering a token of it, any
event which consists of the otiose fact that S also consists of the otiose fact
that G, and vice versa, i. e. this randomly chosen event is identical to
any other randomly chosen event. Grice hastens to criticise this slingshot
fallacy licensing the inter-substitution of this or that co-referential
singular term and this or that logically equivalent sub-sentence as
officially demanded because it is needed to license a patently valid, if
baffling, inference. But, if in addition to providing this benefit, the
fallacy saddles the philosopher with a commitment to a hideous consequence, the
rational course is to endeavour to find a way of retaining the benefit
while eliminating the disastrous accompaniment, much as in set theory it
seems rational to seek as generous a comprehension axiom as the need to
escape this or that paradox permits. Grice proposes to retain the
principle of co-reference, but prohibit is use after the principle of
logical equivalence has been used. Grice finds such a measure to have
some intuitive appeal. In the fallacy, the initial deployment of
the principle of logical equivalence seems tailored to the production
of a sentence which provides opportunity for trouble-raising application
of the principle of co-referentiality. And if that is what the game
is, why not stop it? On the assumption that this or that problem which
originally prompts this or that analysis is at least on their way towards
independent solution, Grice turns his attention to the possibility of
providing a constructivist treatment of things which might perhaps have
more intuitive appeal than a naïve realist approach. Grice begins with a
class of happenstance attributions, which is divided into this or that basic
happenstance attribution, i.e. ascriptions to a Subjects-item of an
attribute which is metabolically expressible, and this or that non-basic
resultant happenstance attribution, in which the attribute ascribed,
though not itself metabolically expressible, is such that its possession
by a Subjects item is suitably related to the possession by that or by some
other Subjects item, of this or that attribute which is metabolically
expressible. Any member of the class of happenstance attributions may be
used to say what happens, or happens to be the case, without talking about
any special entity belonging to a class of a happening or a happenstance. A
next stage involves the introduction of the operator consists of the fact that This
operator, when prefixed to a sentence S that makes a happen-stance
attribution to a Subjects-item, yields a predicate which is satisfied by an
entity which is a happenstance, provided that sentence S is doxastically
satisfactory, i. e., 1, and that some further metaphysical condition obtains,
which ensures the metaphysical necessity of the introduction into reality of
the category of a happenstance, thereby ensuring that this new category is
not just a class of this or that fiction. As far as the slingshot fallacy,
and the hideous consequence that all facts become identical to one Great Big
Fact, in the light of a defence of Reichenbach against the realist attack,
Grice is reasonably confident that a metaphysical extension of reality will not
saddle him with an intolerable paradox, pace the caveat that, to some, the
slingshot is not contradictory in the way a paradox is, but merely an
unexpected consequence ‒ not seriously hideous, at that. What this
metaphysical condition would be which would justify the metaphysical extension
remains, alas, to be determined. It is tempting to think that the
metaphysical condition is connected with a theoretical need to have this or
that happenstance as this or that item in, say, a causal relation. Grice goes
on to provide a progression of linguistic botanising including free. Grice
distinguishes four elements or stages in the step-by-step development of
freedom. A first stage is the transeunt causation one finds in
inanimate objects, as when we experience a stone in free fall. This is Hume’s
realm, the atomistss realm. This is external or transeunt casuation, when an
object is affected by processes in other objects. A second stage is internal or
immanent causation, where a process in an object is the outcome of previous
stages in that process, as in a freely moving body. A third stage is the
internal causation of a living being, in which changes are generated in a
creature by internal features of the creature which are not earlier stages of
the same change, but independent items, the function or finality of which is to
provide for the good of the creature in question. A fourth stage is a
culminating stage at which the conception of a certain mode by a human of
something as being for that creatures good is sufficient to initiate the doing
of that thing. Grice expands on this interesting last stage. At this stage, it
is the case that the creature is liberated from every factive cause. There is
also a discussion of von Wrights table of adverbial modifiers, or Grices
pentagram. Also an exploration of specificity: Jack buttering a parsnip in the
bathroom in the presence of Jill. Grice revisits some of his earlier concerns,
and these are discussed in the appropriate places, such as his exploration on
the Grecian etymology of aition. “That”-clause should be preferred to ‘oratio obliqua,’
since the latter is a misnomer when you ascribe a psychological state rather
than an utterance. Refs.: The main sources are given under ‘oratio obliqua’
above, The BANC.
theory: Grice needs a theory. For those into implicata and
conversation as rational cooperation, when introducing the implicatum he
mentions ‘pre-theoretical adequacy’ of the model. So he is thinking of the
conversational theory as a theory in the strict sense, with ‘explanatory’ and
not merely taxonomical power. So one task is to examine in which way the
conversational theory is a theory that explains, rather than merely ad hoc ex
post facto commentary. Not so much for
his approach to mean. He polemises with Rountree, of Somerville, that you dont
need a thory to analyse mean. Indeed, you cannot have a theory to analyse mean,
because mean is a matter of intuition, not a theoretical concept. But Grice
appeals to theory, when dealing with willing. He knows what willing means
because he relies on a concept of folk-science. In this folk-science, willing
is a theoretical concept. Grice arrived at this conclusion by avoiding the
adjective souly, and seeing that there is no word to describe willing other
than by saying it is a psychoLOGICAL concept, i.e. part of a law within that
theory of folk-science. That law will include, by way of ramsified naming or
describing willing as a predicate-constant. Now, this is related to
metaphysics. His liberal or ecunmenical metaphysics is best developed in terms
of his ontological marxism presented just after he has expanded on this idea of
willing as a theoretical concept, within a law involving willing (say, Grices
Optimism-cum-Pesimism law), within the folk-science of psychology that explains
his behaviour. For Aristotle, a theoria, was quite a different animal, but it
had to do with contemplatio, hence the theoretical (vita contemplativa) versus
the practical (vita activa). Grices sticking to Aristotle’srare use of theory
inspires him to develop his fascinating theory of the theory-theory. Grice realised that there is no way to refer
to things like intending except with psychological, which he takes to mean,
belonging to a pscyhological theory. Grice was keen to theorise on
theorising. He thought that Aristotle’s first philosophy (prote philosophia)
is best rendered as Theory-theory. Grice kept using Oxonian English spelling,
theorising, except when he did not! Grice calls himself folksy: his
theories, even if Subjects to various types of Ramseyfication, are popular in
kind! And ceteris paribus! Metaphysical construction is disciplined
and the best theorising the philosopher can hope for! The way Grice
conceives of his theory-theory is interesting to revisit. A route by which
Grice hopes to show the centrality of metaphysics (as prote philosophia) involves
taking seriously a few ideas. If any region of enquiry is to be successful
as a rational enterprise, its deliverance must be expressable in the
shape of one or another of the possibly different types of theory. A
characterisation of the nature and range of a possible kind of
theory θ is needed. Such a body of characterisation must itself
be the outcome of rational enquiry, and so must itself exemplify
whatever requirement it lays down for any theory θ in general. The
characterisation must itself be expressible as a
theory θ, to be called, if you like, Grice politely puts it, theory-theory,
or meta-theory, θ2. Now, the specification and justification of the ideas
and material presupposed by any theory θ, whether such account
falls within the bounds of Theory-theory, θ2 would be properly called
prote philosophia (first philosophy) and may turn out to relate to what is
generally accepted as belonging to the Subjects matter of metaphysics. It
might, for example, turn out to be establishable that any theory θ has
to relate to a certain range of this or that Subjects item, has to attribute to
each item this or that predicate or attribute, which in turn has to fall within
one or another of the range of types or categories. In this way, the
enquiry might lead to recognised metaphysical topics, such as the nature of
being, its range of application, the nature of predication and a systematic
account of categories. Met. , philosophical eschatology, and Platos
Republic, Thrasymachus, social justice, Socrates, along with notes on Zeno, and
topics for pursuit, repr.in Part II, Explorations in semantics and
metaphysics to WOW , metaphysics, philosophical eschatology, Platos Republic,
Socrates, Thrasymachus, justice, moral right, legal right, Athenian dialectic.
Philosophical eschatology is a sub-discipline of metaphysics concerned with
what Grice calls a category shift. Grice, having applied such a technique to
Aristotle’s aporia on philos (friend) as alter ego, uses it now to tackle
Socratess view, against Thrasymachus, that right applies primarily to morality,
and secondarily to legality. Grice has a specific reason to include this in his
WOW Grices exegesis of Plato on justice displays Grices take on the fact that
metaphysics needs to be subdivided into ontology proper and what he calls
philosophical eschatology, for the study of things like category shift and
other construction routines. The exploration of Platos Politeia thus becomes an
application of Grices philosophically eschatological approach to the item just,
as used by Socrates (morally just) and Thrasymachus (legally just). Grice has one
specific essay on Aristotle in PPQ. So he thought Plato merited his own essay,
too! Grices focus is on Plato’s exploration of dike. Grice is concerned with a
neo-Socratic (versus neo-Thrasymachean) account of moral justice as
conceptually (or axiologically) prior to legal justice. In the proceeding, he
creates philosophical eschatology as the other branch to metaphysics, along
with good ol ontology. To say that just crosses a categorial barrier (from
the moral to the legal) is to make a metaphysical, strictly eschatological,
pronouncement. The Grice Papers locate the Plato essay in s. II, the Socrates essay in s. III, and the Thrasymachus essay, under social
justice, in s. V. Grice is well aware that in his account of fairness, Rawls
makes use of his ideas on personal identity. The philosophical elucidation of
fairness is of great concern for Grice. He had been in touch with such
explorations as Nozicks and Nagels along anti-Rawlsian lines. Grices ideas on
rationality guide his exploration of social justice. Grice keeps revising the
Socrates notes. The Plato essay he actually dates. As it happens, Grices most
extensive published account of Socrates is in this commentary on Platos Republic:
an eschatological commentary, as he puts it. In an entertaining fashion, Grice
has Socrates, and neo-Socrates, exploring the logic and grammar of just against
the attack by Thrasymachus and neo-Thrasymachus. Grices point is that, while
the legal just may be conceptually prior to the moral just, the moral just is
evaluationally or axiologically prior. Refs.: There is a specific essay on
‘theorising’ in the Grice Papers, but there are scattered sources elsewhere,
such as “Method” (repr. in “Conception”), BANC.
uncertainty: One of Grice’s problem is with ‘know’ and ‘certainty.’ He
grants that we only know that 2 + 2 = 4. He often identifies ‘knowledge’ with
‘certainty.’ He does not explore a cancellation like, “I am certain but I do
not know.” The reason being that he defends common sense against the sceptic,
and so his attitude towards certainty has to be very careful. The second
problem is that he wants ‘certainty’ to deal within the desiderative realm. To
do that, he divides an act of intending into two: an act of accepting and act
of willing. The ‘certainty’ is found otiose if the intender is seen as ‘willing
that p’ and accepting that the willing will be the cause for the desideratum to
obtain. n WoW:141, Grice proposes that
‘A is certain that p’ ENTAILS either ‘A is certain that he is certain that p,
OR AT LEAST that it is not the case that A is UNCERTAIN that A is certain that
p.” ‘Certainly,’ appears to apply to utterances in the credibility and the
desirability realm. Grice sometimes uses ‘to be sure.’ He notoriously wants to
distinguish it from ‘know.’ Grice explores the topic of incorrigibility and
ends up with corrigibility which almost makes a Popperian out of him. In the
end, its all about the converational implciata and conversation as rational
co-operation. Why does P2 should judge that P1 is being more or less certain
about what he is talking? Theres a rationale for that. Our conversation does
not consist of idle remarks. Grices example: "The Chairman of the British
Academy has a corkscrew in his pocket. Urmsons example: "The king is
visiting Oxford tomorrow. Why? Oh, for no reason at all. As a philosophical
psychologist, and an empiricist with realist tendencies, Grice was obsessed
with what he called (in a nod to the Kiparskys) the factivity of know. Surely,
Grices preferred collocation, unlike surely Ryles, is "Grice knows that
p." Grice has no problem in seeing this as involving three clauses: First,
p. Second, Grice believes that p, and third, p causes Grices belief. No mention
of certainty. This is the neo-Prichardian in Grice, from having been a
neo-Stoutian (Stout was obsessed, as a few Oxonians like Hampshire and Hart
were, with certainty). If the three-prong analysis of know applies to the
doxastic, Grices two-prong analysis of intending in ‘Intention and UNcertainty,’
again purposively avoiding certainty, covers the buletic realm. This does not
mean that Grice, however proud he was of his ignorance of the history of
philosophy (He held it as a badge of honour, his tuteee Strawson recalls), had
read some of the philosophical classics to realise that certainty had been an
obsession of what Ryle abusively (as he himself puts it) called Descartes and
the Establishments "official doctrine"! While ps true in Grices
analysis of know is harmless enough, there obviously is no correlate for ps
truth in the buletic case. Grices example is Grice intending to scratch his
head, via his willing that Grice scratches his head in t2. In this case, as he
notes, the doxastic eleent involves the uniformity of nature, and ones more or
less relying that if Grice had a head to be scratched in t1, he will have a
head to be sratched in t2, when his intention actually GETS satisfied, or
fulfilled. Grice was never worried about buletic satisfaction. As the intentionalist
that Suppes showed us Grice was, Grice is very much happy to say that if Smith
intends to give Joness a job, the facct as to whether Jones actually gets the
job is totally irrelevant for most philosophical purposes. He gets more serious
when he is happier with privileged access than incorrigibility in “Method.” But
he is less strict than Austin. For Austin, "That is a finch implies that
the utterer KNOWS its a finch. While Grice has a maxim, do not say that for
which you lack adequate evidence (Gettiers analysandum) and a
super-maxim, try to make your contribution one that is true, the very
phrasing highlights Grices cavalier to this! Imagine Kant turning on his grave.
"Try!?". Grice is very clever in having try in the super-maxim, and a
prohibition as the maxim, involving falsehood avoidance, "Do not say what
you believe to be false." Even here he is cavalier. "Cf. "Do not
say what you KNOW to be false." If Gettier were wrong, the combo of maxims
yields, "Say what you KNOW," say what you are certain about! Enough
for Sextus Empiricus having one single maxim: "Either utter a
phenomenalist utterance, a question or an order, or keep your mouth
shut!." (cf. Grice, "My lips are sealed," as cooperative or
helfpul in ways -- "At least he is not lying."). Hampshire, in
the course of some recent remarks,l advances the view that self-prediction is
(logically) impossible. When I say I know that I shall do X (as against, e.g.,
X will happen to me, or You will do X), I am not contemplating myself, as I
might someone else, and giving tongue to a conjecture about myself and my
future acts, as I might be doing about someone else or about the behaviour ofan
animal -for that would be tantamount (if I understand him rightly) to looking
upon myself from outside, as it were, and treating my own acts as mere caused
events. In saying that I know that I shall do X, I am, on this view, saying
that I have decided to do X: for to predict that I shall in certain
circumstances in fact do X or decide to do X, with no reference to whether or
not I have already decided to do it - to say I can tell you now that I shall in
fact act in manner X, although I am, as a matter of fact, determined to do the
very opposite - does not make sense. Any man who says I know myself too well to
believe that, whatever I now decide, I shall do anything other than X when the
circumstances actually arise is in fact, if I interpret Hampshires views
correctly, saying that he does not really, i.e. seriously, propose to set
himself against doing X, that he does not propose even to try to act otherwise,
that he has in fact decided to let events take their course. For no man who has
truly decided to try to avoid X can, in good faith, predict his own failure to
act as he has decided. He may fail to avoid X, and he may predict this; but he
cannot both decide to try to avoid X and predict that he will not even try to
do this; for he can always try; and he knows this: he knows that this is what
distinguishes him from non-human creatures in nature. To say that he will fail
even to try is tantamount to saying that he has decided not to try. In this
sense I know means I have decided and (Murdoch, Hampshire, Gardiner and Pears,
Freedom and Knowledge, in Pears, Freedom and the Will) cannot in principle be
predictive. That, if I have understood it, is Hampshires position, and I have a
good deal of sympathy with it, for I can see that self-prediction is often an
evasive way of disclaiming responsibility for difficult decisions, while
deciding in fact to let events take their course, disguising this by
attributing responsibility for what occurs to my own allegedly unalterable
nature. But I agree with Hampshires critics in the debate, whom I take to be
maintaining that, although the situation he describes may often occur, yet circumstances
may exist in which it is possible for me both to say that I am, at this moment,
resolved not to do X, and at the same time to predict that I shall do X,
because I am not hopeful that, when the time comes, I shall in fact even so
much as try to resist doing X. I can, in effect, say I know myself well. When
the crisis comes, do not rely on me to help you. I may well run away; although
I am at this moment genuinely resolved not to be cowardly and to do all I can
to stay at your side. My prediction that my resolution will not in fact hold up
is based on knowledge of my own character, and not on my present state of mind;
my prophecy is not a symptom of bad faith (for I am not, at this moment,
vacillating) but, on the contrary, of good faith, of a wish to face the facts.
I assure you in all sincerity that my present intention is to be brave and
resist. Yet you would run a great risk if you relied too much on my present
decision; it would not be fair to conceal my past failures of nerve from you. I
can say this about others, despite the most sincere resolutions on their part,
for I can foretell how in fact they will behave; they can equally predict this
about me. Despite Hampshires plausible and tempting argument, I believe that
such objective self-knowledge is possible and occur. From Descartes to
Stout and back. Stout indeed uses both intention and certainty, and in the
same paragraph. Stout notes that, at the outset, performance falls far short of
intention. Only a certain s. of contractions of certain muscles, in proper
proportions and in a proper order, is capable of realising the end aimed at,
with the maximum of rapidity and certainty, and the minimum of obstruction and
failure, and corresponding effort. At the outset of the process of acquisition,
muscles are contracted which are superfluous, and which therefore operate as
disturbing conditions. Grices immediate trigger, however, is Ayer on sure
that, and having the right to be sure, as his immediate trigger later will be
Hampshire and Hart. Grice had high regard for Hampshires brilliant Thought and
action. He was also concerned with Stouts rather hasty UNphilosophical,
but more scientifically psychologically-oriented remarks about assurance in
practical concerns. He knew too that he was exploring an item of the
philosophers lexicon (certus) that had been brought to the forum when Anscombe
and von Wright translate Witters German expression Gewißheit in Über
Gewißheit as Certainty. The Grecians were never sure about being sure. But
the modernist turn brought by Descartes meant that Grice now had to deal with
incorrigibility and privileged access to this or that P, notably himself (When
I intend to go, I dont have to observe myself, Im on the stage, not in the
audience, or Only I can say I will to London, expressing my intention to do so.
If you say, you will go you are expressing yours! Grice found Descartes
very funny ‒ in a French way. Grice is interested in contesting Ayer and other
Oxford philosophers, on the topic of a criterion for certainty. In so doing,
Grice choses Descartess time-honoured criterion of clarity and distinction, as
applied to perception. Grice does NOT quote Descartes in
French! In the proceedings, Grice distinguishes between two kinds of
certainty apparently ignored by Descartes: (a) objective
certainty: Ordinary-language variant: It is certain that p, whatever
it refers to, cf. Grice, it is an illusion; what is it? (b) Subjective
certainty: Ordinary-language variant: I am certain that p. I
being, of course, Grice, in my bestest days, of course! There are further
items on Descartes in the Grice Collection, notably in the last s. of topics
arranged alphabetically. Grice never cared to publish his views on
Descartes until he found an opportunity to do so when compiling his WOW. Grice
is not interested in an exegesis of Descartess thought. He doesnt care to give
a reference to any edition of Descartess oeuvre. But he plays with certain. It
is certain that p is objective certainty, apparently. I am certain that p is
Subjectsive certainty, rather. Oddly, Grice will turn to UNcertainty as it
connects with intention in his BA lecture. Grices interest in Descartes
connects with Descartess search for a criterion of certainty in terms of
clarity and distinction of this or that perception. Having explored the
philosophy of perception with Warnock, its only natural he wanted to give
Descartess rambles a second and third look! Descartes on clear and distinct
perception, in WOW, II semantics and metaphysics, essay, Descartes on clear and
distinct perception and Malcom on dreaming, perception, Descartes, clear and
distinct perception, Malcolm, dreaming. Descartes meets Malcolm, and vice
versa. Descartes on clear and distinct perception, in WOW, Descartes
on clear and distinct perception, Descartes on clear and distinct perception,
in WOW, part II, semantics and metaphysics, essay. Grice gives a short overview
of Cartesian metaphysics for the BBC 3rd programme. The best example,
Grice thinks, of a metaphysical snob is provided by Descartes, about
whose idea of certainty Grice had philosophised quite a bit, since it is in
total contrast with Moore’s. Descartes is a very scientifically minded philosopher, with very clear ideas about the proper direction for science. Descartes,
whose middle Names seems to have been Euclid, thinks that mathematics, and in
particular geometry, provides the model for a scientific procedure, or
method. And this determines all of Descartess thinking in two ways. First,
Descartes thinks that the fundamental method in science is the axiomatic
deductive method of geometry, and this Descartes conceives (as Spinoza morality
more geometrico) of as rigorous reasoning from a self-evident axiom (Cogito,
ergo sum.). Second, Descartes thinks that the Subjects matter of physical
science, from mechanics to medicine, must be fundamentally the same as the
Subjects matter of geometry! The only characteristics that the objects studied
by geometry poses are spatial characteristics. So from the point of view of
science in general, the only important features of things in the physical world
were also their spatial characteristics, what he called extensio, res extensa.
Physical science in general is a kind of dynamic, or kinetic, geometry.
Here we have an exclusive preference for a certain type of scientific
method, and a certain type of scientific explanation: the method is deductive,
the type of explanation mechanical. These beliefs about the right way to do
science are exactly reflected in Descartess ontology, one of the two branches
of metaphysics; the other is philosophical eschatology, or the study of
categories), and it is reflected in his doctrine, that is, about what really
exists. Apart from God, the divine substance, Descartes recognises just
two kinds of substance, two types of real entity. First, there is material
substance, or matter; and the belief that the only scientifically important
characteristics of things in the physical world are their spatial
characteristics goes over, in the language of metaphysics, into the doctrine
that these are their only characteristics. Second, and to Ryle’s horror,
Descartes recognizes the mind or soul, or the mental substance, of which the
essential characteristic is thinking; and thinking itself, in its pure form at
least, is conceived of as simply the intuitive grasping of this or
that self-evident axiom and this or that of its deductive consequence. These
restrictive doctrines about reality and knowledge naturally call for
adjustments elsewhere in our ordinary scheme of things. With the help of the divine
substance, these are duly provided. It is not always obvious that the
metaphysicians scheme involves this kind of ontological preference, or
favoritism, or prejudice, or snobbery this tendency, that is, to promote one or
two categories of entity to the rank of the real, or of the ultimately real, to
the exclusion of others, Descartess entia realissima. One is taught at Oxford
that epistemology begins with the Moderns such as Descartes, which is not true.
Grice was concerned with “certain,” which was applied in Old Roman times to
this or that utterer: the person who is made certain in reference to a thing,
certain, sure. Lewis and Short have a few quotes: “certi sumus periisse omnia;”
“num quid nunc es certior?,” “posteritatis, i. e. of posthumous fame,”
“sententiæ,” “judicii,” “certus de suā geniturā;” “damnationis;” “exitii,”
“spei,” “matrimonii,” “certi sumus;” in the phrase “certiorem facere aliquem;”
“de aliquā re, alicujus rei, with a foll, acc. and inf., with a rel.-clause or absol.;”
“to inform, apprise one of a thing: me certiorem face: “ut nos facias certiores,”
“uti Cæsarem de his rebus certiorem faciant;” “qui certiorem me sui consilii
fecit;” “Cæsarem certiorem faciunt, sese non facile ab oppidis vim hostium
prohibere;” “faciam te certiorem quid egerim;” with subj. only, “milites
certiores facit, paulisper intermitterent proelium,” pass., “quod crebro
certior per me fias de omnibus rebus,” “Cæsar certior factus est, tres jam
copiarum partes Helvetios id flumen transduxisse;” “factus certior, quæ res
gererentur,” “non consulibus certioribus factis,” also in posit., though
rarely; “fac me certum quid tibi est;” “lacrimæ suorum tam subitæ matrem certam
fecere ruinæ,” uncertainty, Grice loved the OED, and its entry for will
was his favourite. But he first had a look to shall. For Grice, "I shall
climb Mt. Everest," is surely a prediction. And then Grice turns to the
auxiliary he prefers, will. Davidson, Intending, R. Grandy and Warner,
PGRICE. “Uncertainty,” “Aspects.” “Conception,” Davidson on intending,
intending and trying, Brandeis.”Method,” in “Conception,” WOW . Hampshire and Hart.
Decision, intention, and certainty, Mind, Harman, Willing and intending in PGRICE.
Practical reasoning. Review of Met. 29.
Thought, Princeton, for functionalist approach alla Grice’s “Method.” Principles
of reasoning. Rational action and the extent of intention. Social theory and practice.
Jeffrey, Probability kinematics, in The logic of decision, cited by Harman in
PGRICE. Kahneman and Tversky, Judgement under uncertainty, Science, cited by
Harman in PGRICE. Nisbet and Ross, Human inference, cited by Harman in PGRICE.
Pears, Predicting and deciding. Prichard, Acting, willing, and desiring, in
Moral obligations, Oxford ed. by Urmson
Speranza, The Grice Circle Wants You. Stout, Voluntary action. Mind 5,
repr in Studies in philosophy and psychology, Macmillan, cited by Grice,
“Uncertainty.” Urmson, ‘Introduction’ to Prichard’s ‘Moral obligations.’ I
shant but Im not certain I wont – Grice. How uncertain can Grice be? This is the
Henriette Herz BA lecture, and as such published in The Proceedings of the BA. Grice
calls himself a neo-Prichardian (after the Oxford philosopher) and cares to
quote from a few other philosophers ‒ some of whom he was not
necessarily associated with: such as Kenny and Anscombe, and some of whom he
was, notably Pears. Grices motto: Where there is a neo-Prichardian
willing, there is a palæo-Griceian way! Grice quotes Pears, of Christ Church,
as the philosopher he found especially congenial to explore areas in what both
called philosophical psychology, notably the tricky use of intending as
displayed by a few philosophers even in their own circle, such as Hampshire and
Hart in Intention, decision, and certainty. The title of Grices lecture is
meant to provoke that pair of Oxonian philosophers Grice knew so well and who
were too ready to bring in certainty in an area that requires deep
philosophical exploration. This is the Henriette Herz
Trust annual lecture. It means its delivered annually by different
philosophers, not always Grice! Grice had been appointed a FBA earlier, but he
took his time to deliver his lecture. With your lecture, you implicate,
Hi! Grice, and indeed Pears, were motivated by Hampshires and Harts essay on
intention and certainty in Mind. Grice knew Hampshire well, and had
actually enjoyed his Thought and Action. He preferred Hampshires Thought and
action to Anscombes Intention. Trust Oxford being what it is that TWO volumes
on intending are published in the same year! Which one shall I read first?
Eventually, neither ‒ immediately. Rather, Grice managed to unearth some
sketchy notes by Prichard (he calls himself a neo-Prichardian) that Urmson had
made available for the Clarendon Press ‒ notably Prichards essay on willing
that. Only a Corpus-Christi genius like Prichard will distinguish will to,
almost unnecessary, from will that, so crucial. For Grice, wills that ,
unlike wills to, is properly generic, in
that p, that follows the that-clause, need NOT refer to the Subjects of the
sentence. Surely I can will that Smith wins the match! But Grice also quotes
Anscombe (whom otherwise would not count, although they did share a discussion
panel at the American Philosophical Association) and Kenny, besides
Pears. Of Anscombe, Grice borrows (but never returns) the direction-of-fit
term of art, actually Austinian. From Kenny, Grice borrows (and returns) the
concept of voliting. His most congenial approach was Pearss. Grice had of
course occasion to explore disposition and intention on earlier
occasions. Grice is especially concerned with a dispositional analysis to
intending. He will later reject it in “Uncertainty.” But that was
Grice for you! Grice is especially interested in distinguishing his views from
Ryles over-estimated dispositional account of intention, which Grice sees as
reductionist, and indeed eliminationist, if not boringly behaviourist, even in
analytic key. The logic of dispositions is tricky, as Grice will later explore
in connection with rationality, rational propension or propensity, and
metaphysics, the as if operator). While Grice focuses on uncertainty, he is
trying to be funny. He knew that Oxonians like Hart and Hampshire were obsessed
with certainty. I was so surprised that Hampshire and Hart were claiming
decision and intention are psychological states about which the agent is
certain, that I decided on the spot that that could certainly be a nice
topic for my BA lecture! Grice granted that in some cases, a declaration of an
intention can be authorative in a certain certain way, i. e. as implicating
certainty. But Grice wants us to consider: Marmaduke Bloggs intends to climb
Mt. Everest. Surely he cant be certain hell succeed. Grice used the
same example at the APA, of all places. To amuse Grice, Davidson, who was
present, said: Surely thats just an implicature! Just?! Grice was
almost furious in his British guarded sort of way. Surely not
just! Pears, who was also present, tried to reconcile: If I may,
Davidson, I think Grice would take it that, if certainty is implicated, the
whole thing becomes too social to be true. They kept discussing
implicature versus entailment. Is certainty entailed then? Cf. Urmson on
certainly vs. knowingly, and believably. Davidson asked. No,
disimplicated! is Grices curt reply. The next day, he explained to
Davidson that he had invented the concept of disimplicature just to tease him,
and just one night before, while musing in the hotel room! Talk of uncertainty
was thus for Grice intimately associated with his concern about the misuse of
know to mean certain, especially in the exegeses that Malcolm made popular
about, of all people, Moore! V. Scepticism and common sense and Moore and
philosophers paradoxes above, and Causal theory and Prolegomena for a summary
of Malcoms misunderstanding Moore! Grice manages to quote from Stouts Voluntary
action and Brecht. And he notes that not all speakers are as sensitive as they
should be (e.g. distinguishing modes, as realised by shall vs. will). He
emphasizes the fact that Prichard has to be given great credit for seeing that
the accurate specification of willing should be willing that and not willing
to. Grice is especially interested in proving Stoutians (like Hampshire and
Hart) wrong by drawing from Aristotles prohairesis-doxa distinction, or in his
parlance, the buletic-doxastic distinction. Grice quotes from Aristotle.
Prohairesis cannot be opinion/doxa. For opinion is thought to relate to all
kinds of things, no less to eternal things and impossible things than to things
in our own power; and it is distinguished by its falsity or truth, not by its
badness or goodness, while choice is distinguished rather by these. Now with
opinion in general perhaps no one even says it is identical. But it is not
identical even with any kind of opinion; for by choosing or deciding, or
prohairesis, what is good or bad we are men of a certain character, which we
are not by holding this or that opinion or doxa. And we choose to get or avoid
something good or bad, but we have opinions about what a thing is or whom it is
good for or how it is good for him; we can hardly be said to opine to get or
avoid anything. And choice is praised for being related to the right object
rather than for being rightly related to it, opinion for being truly related to
its object. And we choose what we best know to be good, but we opine what we do
not quite know; and it is not the same people that are thought to make the best
choices and to have the best opinions, but some are thought to have fairly good
opinions, but by reason of vice to choose what they should not. If opinion precedes
choice or accompanies it, that makes no difference; for it is not this that we
are considering, but whether it is identical with some kind of opinion. What,
then, or what kind of thing is it, since it is none of the things we have
mentioned? It seems to be voluntary, but not all that is voluntary to be an
object of choice. Is it, then, what has been decided on by previous
deliberation? At any rate choice involves a rational principle and thought.
Even the Names seems to suggest that it is what is chosen before other things.
His final analysis of G intends that p is in terms of, B1, a buletic condition,
to the effect that G wills that p, and D2, an attending doxastic condition, to
the effect that G judges that B1 causes p. Grice ends this essay with a nod to
Pears and an open point about the justifiability (other than evidential) for
the acceptability of the agents deciding and intending versus the evidential
justifiability of the agents predicting that what he intends will be satisfied.
It is important to note that in his earlier Disposition and intention, Grice
dedicates the first part to counterfactual if general. This is a logical point.
Then as an account for a psychological souly concept ψ. If G does A, sensory
input, G does B, behavioural output. No ψ without the behavioural output that ψ
is meant to explain. His problem is with the first person. The functionalist I
does not need a black box. The here
would be both incorrigibility and privileged access. Pology only explains their
evolutionary import. Refs.: The main source is his BA lecture on ‘uncertainty,’
but using the keyword ‘certainty’ is useful too. His essay on Descartes in WoW
is important, and sources elsehere in the Grice Papers, such as the predecessor
to the “Uncertainty” lecture in “Disposition and intention,” also his
discussion of avowal (vide references above), incorrigibility and privileged
access in “Method,” repr. in “Conception,” BANC
universalium: see totum for Grice on “all” -- This is a Gricism. It all
started with arbor porphyriana. It is supposed to translate Aristotle’s “to
kath’olou” (which happens to be one of the categories in Kant, “alleheit,” and
which Aristotle contrasts with “to kath’ekastou,” (which Kant has as a
category, SINGULARITAS. For a nominalist, any predicate is a ‘name,’ hence
‘nominalism.’ Opposite ‘realism.’ “Nominalism” is actually a misnomer. The
opposite of realism is anti-realism. We need something like ‘universalism,’ (he
who believes in the existence, not necessary ‘reality’ of a universal) and a
‘particularist,’ or ‘singularist,’ who does not. Note that the opposite of
‘particularism,’ is ‘totalism.’ (Totum et pars). Grice holds a set-theoretical
approach to the universalium. Grice is willing to provide always a
set-theoretical extensionalist (in terms of predicate) and an intensionalist
variant in terms of property and category. Grice explicitly uses ‘X’ for
utterance-type (WOW:118), implying a distinction with the utterance-token. Grice
gets engaged in a metabolical debate concerning the reductive analysis of
what an utterance-type means in terms of a claim to the effect that, by
uttering x, an utterance-token of utterance-type X, the utterer means that
p. The implicature is x (utterance-token). Grice is not enamoured with the
type/token or token/type distinction. His thoughts on logical form are
provocative. f you cannot put it in logical form, it is not worth
saying. Strawson infamously reacted with a smile. Oh, no: if you CAN put
it in logical form, it is not worth saying. Grice refers to the type-token
distinction when he uses x for token and X for type. Since Bennett cares to
call Grice a meaning-nominalist we should not care about the type X anyway. He
expands on this in Retrospective Epilogue. Grice should have payed more
attention to the distinction seeing that it was Ogdenian. A common mode of
estimating the amount of matter in a printed book is to count the number of
words. There will ordinarily be about twenty thes on a page, and, of course,
they count as twenty words. In another use of the word word, however, there is
but one word the in the English language; and it is impossible that this word
should lie visibly on a page, or be heard in any voice. Such a Form, Peirce, as
cited by Ogden and Richards, proposes to term a type. A single object such as
this or that word on a single line of a single page of a single copy of a book,
Peirce ventures to call a token. In order that a type may be used, it has to be
embodied in a token which shall be a sign of the type, and thereby of the
object the type signifies, and Grice followed suit. Refs.: Some of the sources
are given under ‘abstractum.’ Also under ‘grecianism,’ since Grice was keen on
exploring what Aristotle has to say about this in Categoriae, due to his joint
research with Austin, Code, Friedman, and Strawson. Grice also has a specific Peirceian
essay on the type-token distinction. BANC.
Urmson’s
bribe. Urmson’s use of the bribe is
‘accidental.’ What Urmson is getting at is that if the briber intends the bribe
acts as a cause to effect a response, even a cognitive one, in the bribe, the
propositional complexum, “This is a bribe,” should not necessarily be
communicated. It is amazing how Grice changed the example into one about
physical action. They seem different. On the other hand, Grice would not have
cared to credit Urmson had it not believed it worth knowing that the criticism
arose within the Play Group (Grice admired Urmson). In his earlier “Meaning,”
Grice presents his own self-criticisms to arrive at a more refined analysis.
But in “Utterer’s meaning and intention,” when it comes to the SUFFICIENCY,
it’s all about other people: notably Urmson and Strawson. Grice cites Stampe
before Strawson, but many ignore Stampe on the basis that Strawson does not
credit him, and there is no reason why he should have been aware of it. But
Stampe was at Oxford at the time so this is worth noting. It has to be
emphasised that the author list is under ‘sufficiency.’ Under necessity, Grice
does not credit the source of the objections, so we can assume it is Grice
himself, as he had presented criticisms to his own view within the same
‘Meaning.’ It is curious that Grice loved Stampe. Grice CHANGED Urmon’s
example, and was unable to provide a specific scenario to Strawson’s alleged
counterexample, because Strawson is vague himself. But Stampe’s, Grice left
unchanged. It seems few Oxonian philosohpers of Grice’s playgroup had his
analytic acumen. Consider his sophisticated account of ‘meaning.’ It’s
different if you are a graduate student from the New World, and you have to
prove yourself intelligent. But for Grice’s playgroup companion, only three or
four joined in the analysis. The first is Urmson. The second is Strawson. The
case by Urmson involved a tutee offering to buy Gardiner an expensive dinner,
hoping that Gardiner will give him permission for an over-night visit to
London. Gardiner knows that his tutee wants his permission. The
appropriate analysans for "By offering to buy Gardiner an expensive
dinner, the tuttee means that Gardiner should give him permission for an
overnight stay in London" are fulfilled: (1) The tutee offers to buy
Gardiner an expensive dinner with the intention of producing a certain response
on the part of Gardiner (2) The tutee intends that Gardiner should recognize
(know, think) that the tutee is offering to buy him an expensive dinner with
the intention of producing this response; (3) The tutee intends that Gardiners
recognition (thought) that the tutee has the intention mentioned in (2) should
be at least part of Gardiners reason for producing the response mentioned. If
in general to specify in (i) the nature of an intended response is to specify
what was meant, it should be correct not only to say that by offering to buy
Gardiner an expensive dinner, the tutee means that Gardiner is to give him
permission for an overnight stay in London, but also to say that he meas that
Gardiner should (is to) give him permission for an over-night visit to London.
But in fact one would not wish to say either of these things; only that the
tutee meant Gardiner to give him permission. A restriction seems to be
required, and one which might serve to eliminate this range of counterexamples
can be identified from a comparison of two scenarios. Grice goes into a
tobacconists shop, ask for a packet of my favorite cigarettes, and when the
unusually suspicious tobacconist shows that he wants to see the color of my
money before he hands over the goods, I put down the price of the cigarettes on
the counter. Here nothing has been meant. Alternatively, Grice goes to his
regular tobacconist (from whom I also purchase other goods) for a packet of my
regular brand of Players Navy Cuts, the price of which is distinctive, say 43p.
Grice says nothing, but puts down 43p. The tobacconist recognizes my need, and
hands over the packet. Here, I think, by putting down 43p I meant
something-Namesly, that I wanted a packet of Players Navy Cuts. I have at the
same time provided an inducement. The distinguishing feature of the second
example seems to be that here the tobacconist recognized, and was intended to
recognize, what he was intended to do from my "utterance" (my putting
down the money), whereas in the first example this was not the case. Nor is it
the case with respect to Urmson’s case of the tutees attempt to bribe Gardiner.
So one might propose that the analysis of meaning be amended accordingly. U
means something by uttering x is true if: (i) U intends, by uttering x, to
induce a certain response in A (2) U intends A to recognize, at least in part
from the utterance of x, that U intends to produce that response (3) U intends
the fulfillment of the intention mentioned in (2) to be at least in part As
reason for fulfilling the intention mentioned in (i). This copes with Urmsons
counterexample to Grices proposal in the Oxford Philosophical Society talk
involving the tutee attempting to bribe Gardiner.
utterer. Cf. emissum,
emissor. Or ‘man’. Grice does not elaborate much on general gestures or signals.
His main example is a sort of handwave by which the emissor communicates that
either he knows the route or that he is about to leave the addressee. Even this
is complex. Let’s try to apply his final version of communication to the
hand-wave. The question of “Homo sapiens sapiens” is an interesting one. Grice
is all for ascribing predicates regarding the soul to what he calls the ‘lower
animals’. He is not ready to ascribe emissor’s meaning to them. Why? Because of
Schiffer! I mean, when it comes to the conditions of necessity of the reductive
analysis, he seems okay. When it comes to the sufficiency, there are two types
of objection. One by Urmson, easily dismissed. The second, first by Stampe and
Strawson, not so easily. But Grice agrees to add a clause limiting intentions
to be ‘in the open.’ Those who do not have a philosophical background usually
wonder about this. So for their sake, it may be worth considering Grice’s
synthetic a posteriori argument to refuse an emissor other than a Homo sapiens
sapiens to be able to ‘mean,’ if not ‘communicate,’ or ‘signify.’ There is an objection which is not mentioned by his editors,
which seems to Grice to be one to which Grice must respond. The objection may
be stated thus. One of the leading strands in Grice’s reductive analysis of an
emissor communicating that p is that communication is not to be regarded
exclusively, or even primarily, as a ‘feature’ of emissors who use what
philosophers of language call ‘language’ (Sprache, Taal, Langage, Linguaggio –
to restrict to the philosophical lexicon, cf. Plato’s Cratylus), and a fortiori
of an emissor who emits this or that “linguistic” ‘utterance.’ There are many
instances of NOTABLY NON-“linguistic” vehicles or devices of communication, within
a communication-system, which fulfil this or that communication-function; these
vehicles or devices are mostly syntactically un-structured or amorphous.
Sometimes, a device may exhibit at least some rudimentary syntactic structure,
in that we may distinguish a totum from a pars and identify a ‘simplex’ within
a ‘complexum.’ Grice’s intention-based reductive analysis of a communicatum,
based on Aristotle, Locke, and Peirce, is designed to allow for the possibility
that a non-“linguistic,” and, further, indeed a non-“conventional” 'utterance'
token, perhaps even manifesting some degree of syntactic structure, and not
just a block of an amorphous signal, may be within the ‘repertoire’ of
‘procedures’ of this or that organism, or creature, or agent, which, even if
not relying on any apparatus for communication of the kind that that we may
label ‘linguistic’ or otherwise ‘conventional,’
‘do’ this or that ‘thing’ thereby ‘communicating’ that p, or q. To
provide for this possibility, it is plainly necessary that the key ingredient in
any representation of ‘communicating,’ viz. intending that p, should be a ‘state’
of the emissor’s soul the capacity for which does not require what we may label
the ‘possession’ of, shall we say, a ‘faculty,’ of what philosophers call ‘a’
‘language’ (Sprache, Taal, langue, lingua – note that in German we do not
distinguish between ‘die Deutsche Sprache’ and ‘Sprache’ as ‘ein Facultat.’).
Now a philosopher, relying on this or that neo-Prichardian reductive analysis
of ‘intending that p,’ may not be willing to allow the possibility of such,
shall we call it, pre-linguistic
intending that p, or non-linguistic intending that p. Surely if the emissor
realizes that his addressee does not share what the Germans call ‘die Deutsche
Sprache,” the emissor may still communicate with his addresse this or that by
doing this or that. E. g. he may simulate that he wants to smoke a cigarette
and wonders if his addressee has one to spare. Against that objection, Grice
surely wins the day. But Grice grants that winning the day on THAT front may
not be enough. And that is because, as far as Grice’s Oxonian explorations on
communication go, in a succession of increasingly elaborate moves – ending with
a ‘closure’ clause which cut this succession of increasingly elaborate moves --
designed to thwart this or that scenario, later deemed illegitimate, involving
two rational agents where the emissor relies on an ‘inference-element’ that it
is not the case that he intends his addressee will recogise – Grice is led to
restrict the ‘intending’ which is to constitute a case of an emissor
communicating that p to C-intending. Grice suspects that whatever may be the
case in general with regard to ‘intending,’ C-intending seems for some reason
to Grice to be unsophisticatedly, viz. plainly, too sophisticated a ‘state’ of a soul to be found in an organism,
‘pirot,’ creature, that we may not want to deem ‘rational,’ or as the Germans
would say, a creature that is destitute of “Die Deutsche Sprache.” We need the
pirot to be “very intelligent, indeed rational.”Grice regrets that some may
think that what he thought were unavoidable rear-guard actions (ending with a
complex reductive analysis of C-intending) seem to have undermined the raison
d'etre of the Griciean campaign.”Unfortunately, Grice provides what he
admittedly labels “a brief reply” which “will have to suffice.” Why? Because “a
full treatment would require delving deep into crucial problems concerning the
boundaries between vicious and virtuous circularity.” Which is promising. It is
not something totally UNATTAINABLE. It reduces to the philosopher being
virtuously circular, only! Why is the ‘virtuous circle’ so crucial – vide
‘circulus virtuosus.’ virtŭōsus , a, um, adj. virtus, I.virtuous, good (late Lat.), Aug. c. Sec. Man. 10.
A circle is virtuous if it is not that bad. In this case, we need the ‘virtuous
circle’ because we are dealing with ‘a loop.’ This is exactly Schiffer’s way of
putting it in his ‘Introduction’ to Meaning (second edition). There is a
‘conceptual loop.’ Schiffer is not interested in ‘communicating;’ only
‘meaning.’ But his point can be transferred. He is saying that ‘U means that
p,’ may rely on ‘U intends that p,’ where ‘U intends that p’ relies on ‘U means
that p.’ There is a loop. In more generic terms:We have a creature, call it a
pirot P1 that, by doing thing T, communicates that p. Are we talking of the
OBSERVER? I hope so, because Grice’s favourite pirot is the parrot. So we have
Prince Maurice’s Parrot. Locke:
Since I think I may be confident, that, whoever should see a CREATURE of his
own shape or make, though it had no more reason all its life than a cat or a
PARROT, would call him still A MAN; or whoever should hear a cat or a parrot
discourse, reason, and philosophize, would call or think it nothing but a cat
or a PARROT; and say, the one was A DULL IRRATIONAL MAN, and the other A VERY
INTELLIGENT RATIONAL PARROT. A relation we have in an author of great note, is
sufficient to countenance the supposition of A RATIONAL PARROT. The author’s
words are: I had a mind to know, from Prince Maurice's own mouth, the account
of a common, but much credited story, that I had heard so often from many others,
of an old parrot he has, that speaks, and asks, and answers common questions,
like A REASONABLE CREATURE. So that those of his train there generally conclude
it to be witchery or possession; and one of his chaplains, would never from
that time endure A PARROT, but says all PARROTS have a devil in them. I had
heard many particulars of this story, and as severed by people hard to be
discredited, which made me ask Prince Maurice what there is of it. Prince
Maurice says, with his usual plainness and dryness in talk, there is something
true, but a great deal false of what is reported. I desired to know of him what
there was of the first. Prince Maurice tells me short and coldly, that he had
HEARD of such A PARROT; and though he believes nothing of it, and it was a good
way off, yet he had so much curiosity as to send for the parrot: that it was a
very great parrot; and when the parrot comes first into the room where Prince Maurice
is, with a great many men about him, the parrot says presently, What a nice
company is here. One of the men asks the parrot, ‘What thinkest thou that man
is?,’ ostending his finger, and pointing to Prince Maurice. The parrot answers,
‘Some general -- or other.’ When the man brings the parrot close to Prince
Maurice, Prince Maurice asks the parrot., “D'ou venez-vous?” The parrot answers,
“De Marinnan.” Then Prince Maurice goes on, and poses a second question to the
parrot. “A qui estes-vous?” The Parrot answers: “A un Portugais.” Prince
Maurice asks a third question. “Que fais-tu la?” The parrot answers: “Je garde
les poulles.”Prince Maurice smiles, which pleases the Parrot. Prince Maurice,
violating a Griceian maxim, and being just informed that p, asks whether p.
This is his fourth question. “Vous gardez les poulles?” The Parrot answers, “Oui,
moi; et je scai bien faire.” The Parrott appeals to Peirce’s iconic system and
makes the chuck four or five times that a man uses to make to chickens when a
man calls them. I set down the words of this worthy dialogue in French, just as
Prince Maurice said them to me. I ask Prince Maurice in what ‘language’ the
parrot speaks. Prince Maurice says that the parrot speaks in Brazilian. I ask
Prince William whether he understands the Brazilian language. Prince Maurice
says: No, but he has taken care to have TWO interpreters by him, the one a
Dutchman that spoke Brazilian, and the other a Brazilian that spoke Dutch; that
Prince Maurice asked them separatelyand privately, and both of them AGREED in
telling Prince Maurice just the same thing that the parrot had said. I could
not but tell this ODD story, because it is so much out of the way, and from the
first hand, and what may pass for a good one; for I dare say Prince Maurice at
least believed himself in all he told me, having ever passed for a very honest and
pious man. I leave it to naturalists to reason, and to other men to believe, as
they please upon it. However, it is not, perhaps, amiss to relieve or enliven a
busy scene sometimes with such digressions, whether to the purpose or no.Locke
takes care that the reader should have the story at large in the author's own
words, because he seems to me not to have thought it incredible.For it cannot
be imagined that so able a man as he, who had sufficiency enough to warrant all
the testimonies he gives of himself, should take so much pains, in a place
where it had nothing to do, to pin so close, not only on a man whom he mentions
as his friend, but on a prince in whom he acknowledges very great honesty and
piety, a story which, if he himself thought incredible, he could not but also
think RIDICULOUS. Prince Maurice, it is plain, who vouches this story, and our
author, who relates it from him, both of them call this talker A PARROT. And
Locke asks any one else who thinks such a story fit to be told, whether, if this
PARROT, and all of its kind, had always talked, as we have a prince's word for
it this one did,- whether, I say, they would not have passed for a race of RATIONAL
ANIMALS; but yet, whether, for all that, they would have been allowed to be
MEN, and not PARROTS? For I presume it is not the idea of A THINKING OR
RATIONAL BEING alone that makes the idea of A MAN in most people's sense: but
of A BODY, so and so shaped, joined to it: and if that be the idea of a MAN,
the same successive body not shifted all at once, must, as well as THE SAME IMMATERIAL SPIRIT, go to the making of
the same MAN. So back to Grice’s pirotology.But first a precis of the
conversation, or languaging:PARROT: What a nice
company is here.MAN (pointing to Prince Maurice): What thinkest thou that man
is?PARROT: Some general -- or other. (i. e. the parrot displays what Grice
calls ‘up-take.’ The parrot recognizes the man’s c-intention. So far is ability
to display uptake.PRINCE MAURICE: D'ou venez-vous?PARROT: De Marinnan.PRINCE
MAURICE: A qui estes-vous?PARROT: A un Portugais.PRINCE MAURICE: Que fais-tu
la?PARROT: Je garde les poulles.PRINCE MAURICE SMILES and flouts a Griceian
maxim: Vous gardez les poulles?PARROT (losing patience, and grasping the
Prince’s implicature that he doubts it): Oui, moi. Et je scai bien faire.(The
Parrott then appeals to Peirce’s iconic system and makes the chuck five times
that a man uses to make to chickens when a man calls them.)So back to
Grice:“According to my most recent speculations about communication, one should
distinguish between what I call the ‘factual’ or ‘de facto’ character of behind
the state of affairs that one might describe as ‘rational agent A communicates
that p,’ for those communication-relevant features which obtain or are present
in the circumstances) the ‘titular’
or ‘de jure’ character, viz. the nested C-intending which is only deemed to be
present. And the reason Grice calls it ‘nested’ is that it involves three
sub-intentions:(C) Emissor E communicates that (psi*) p iff Emissor E c-intends
that A recognises that E psi-s that p iffC1: Emissor E intends A to recognise
that A psi-s that p.C2: Emissor intends that A recognise C1 by A recognising C2C3:
There is no inference-element which is C-constitutive such that Emissor relies
on it and yet does not intend A to recognise.Grice:“The titular or de jure character
of the state of affairs that is described as “Emissor communicates that p,”
involves self-reference in the closure clause regarding the third intention,
C3, may be thought as being ‘regressive,’ or involving what mathematicians mean
when they use “, …;” and the translators of Aristotle, ‘eis apeiron,’
translated as ‘ad infinitum.’There may be ways of UNDEEMING this, i. e. of
stating that self-reference and closure are meant to BLOCK an infinite regress.
Hence the circle, if there is one – one feature of a virtuous circle is that it
doesn’t look like a circle simpliciter --
would be virtuous. The ‘de jure’ character stands for a situation which,
in Grice’s words, is “infinitely complex,” and so cannot be actually present in
toto – only DEEMED to be.”“In which case,” Grice concludes pointing to the
otiosity or rendering inoperative, “to point out that THE INCONCEIVABLE actual
presence of the ‘de jure’ character of ‘Emissor communicates that p’ WOULD,
still, be possible, or would be detectable, only via the ‘use’ of something
like ‘die Deutsche Sprache’ seem to serve little, if any, purpose.”“At its most
meagre, the factual or ‘de facto’ character consists merely in the pre-rational ‘counterpart’ of the state
of affairs describable by “Emissor E communicates that p,” which might amount
to no more than making a certain sort of utterance in order thereby to get some
creature to think or want some particular thing.This meagre condition does not
involve a reference to any expertise regarding anything like ‘die Deutsche
Sprache.’Let’s reformulate the condition.It’s just a pirot, at a ‘pre-rational’
level. The pirot does a thing T IN ORDER THEREBY to get some other pirot to
think or do some particular thing. To echo Hare,Die Tur ist geschlossen, ja.Die
Tur ist geschlossen, bitte.Grice continues as a corollary: “Maybe in a less
straightforward instance of “Emissor E communicates that p” there is actually
present the C-intention whose feasibility as an ‘intention’ suggests some
ability to use ‘die Deutsche Sprache.’But vide “non-verbal communication,”
pre-verbal communication, languaging, pre-conventional communication, gestural
communication – as in What Grice has as “a gesture (a signal).” Not necessary
‘conventional,’ and MAYBE ‘established’ – is one-off sufficient for
‘established’? I think so. By waving his hand in a particular way (“a
particular sort of hand wave”), the emissor communicates that he knows the
route (or is about to leave the addressee). Grice concludes about the less straightforward
instances, that there can be no advance guarantee when this will be so, i. e.
that there is actually present the C-intention whose feasibility as an
intention points to some capacity to use ‘die Deutsche Sprache.’Grice adds: “It
is in any case arguable that the use of ‘die Deutsche Sprache’ would here be an
indispensable aid to philosophising about communication, rather than it being an
element in the PHILOSOPHISING about communication! Philosophers
of Grice’s generation use ‘man’ on purpose to mean ‘mankind’. What a man means.
What a man utters. The utterer is the man. In semiotics one can use something
more Latinate, like gesturer, or emitter – or profferer. The distinction is
between what an utterer means and what the logical and necessary implication.
He doesn’t need to say this since ‘imply’ in the logical usage does not take
utterer as subject. It’s what the utterer SAYS that implies this or that. (Strawson
and Wiggins, p. 519). The utterer is possibly the ‘expresser.’
validum: ‘Valid,’ which is cognate with ‘value,’ a noun Grice
loved, is used by logicians. In Grice’s generalised alethic-cum-deontic logic,
‘valid’ applies, too. ‘Valid’ is contrasted to the ‘satisfactoriness’ value
that attaches directly to the utterance. ‘Valid’ applies to the reasoning, i.e.
the sequence of psychological states from the premise to the conclusion. How
common and insidious was the talk of a realm of ‘values’ at Oxford in the early
1930s to have Barnes attack it, and Grice defend it? ‘The realm of values’
sounds like an ordinary man’s expression, and surely Oxford never had a Wilson
Chair of Metaphysical Axiology. validum
is the correct form out of Roman ‘valeor.’ Grice finds the need for the English
equivalent, and plays with constructing the ‘concept’ “to be of value”! There’s
also the axiologicum. The root for ‘value’ as ‘axis’ is found in Grice’s
favourite book of the Republic, the First! Grice sometimes enjoys sounding
pretentious and uses the definite article ‘the’ indiscriminately, just to tease
Flew, his tutee, who said that talking of ‘the self’ is just ‘rubbish’. It is
different with Grice’s ‘the good’ (to agathon), ‘the rational,’ (to logikon),
‘the valuable’ (valitum), and ‘the axiological’. Of course, whilesticking with
‘value,’ Grice plays with Grecian “τιμή.” Lewis and Short have ‘vălor,’ f.
‘valeo,’ which they render as ‘value,’ adding that it is supposed to translate
in Gloss. Lab, Grecian ‘τιμή.’ ‘valor, τιμή, Gloss. Lab.’ ‘Valere,’ which of course algo gives English
‘valid,’ that Grice overuses, is said by Lewis and Short to be cognate with
“vis,” “robur,” “fortissimus,” cf. debilis” and they render as “to be strong.”
So one has to be careful here. “Axiology” is a German thing, and not used at
Clifton or Oxford, where they stick with ‘virtus’ or ‘arete.’ This or that
Graeco-Roman philosopher may have explored a generic approach to ‘value.’ Grice
somewhat dismisses Hare who in Language of Morals very clearly distinguishes
between deontic ‘ought’ and teleological, value-judgemental ‘good.’ For ‘good’
may have an aesthetic use: ‘that painting is good,’ the food is good). The
sexist ‘virtus’ of the Romans perhaps did a disservice to Grecian ‘arete,’ but
Grice hardly uses ‘arete,’ himself. It is etymologically unrelated to
‘agathon,’ yet rumour has it that ‘arete,’ qua ‘excellence,’ is ‘aristos,’ the
superlative of ‘agathon.’ Since Aristotle is into the ‘mesotes,’ Grice worries
not. Liddell and Scott have “ἀρετή” and render it simpliciter as “goodness,
excellence, of any kind,” adding that “in Hom. esp. of manly qualities”: “ποδῶν
ἀρετὴν ἀναφαίνων;” “ἀμείνων παντοίας ἀρετὰς ἠμὲν πόδας ἠδὲ μάχεσθαι καὶ νόον;”
so of the gods, “τῶν περ καὶ μείζων ἀ. τιμή τε βίη τε;” also of women, “ἀ. εἵνεκα
for valour,” “ἀ. ἀπεδείκνυντο,” “displayed brave deeds.” But when Liddell and Scott give the
philosophical references (Plathegel and Ariskant), they do render “ἀρετή,” as
‘value,’ generally,
excellence, “ἡ ἀ. τελείωσίς τις” Arist. Met. 1021b20, cf. EN1106a15, etc.; of
persons, “ἄνδρα πὺξ ἀρετὰν εὑρόντα,” “τὸ φρονεῖν ἀ. μεγίστη,” “forms of
excellence, “μυρίαι ἀνδρῶν ἀ.;” “δικαστοῦ αὕτη ἀ.;” esp. moral virtue, opp.
“κακία,” good nature, kindness, etc. We should not be so concerned about this,
were not for the fact that Grice explored Foot, not just on meta-ethics as a
‘suppositional’ imperratives, but on
‘virtue’ and ‘vice,’ by Foot, who had edited a reader in meta-ethics for the
series of Grice’s friend, Warnock. Grice
knows that when he hears the phrases value system, or belief system, he is
conversing with a relativist. So he plays jocular here. If a value is not a
concept, a value system at least is not what Davidson calls a conceptual
scheme. However, in “The conception of value” (henceforth, “Conception”) Grice
does argue that value IS a concept, and thus part of the conceptual scheme by
Quine. Hilary Putnam congratulates Grice on this in “Fact and value,” crediting
Baker – i. e. Judy – into the bargain. While utilitarianism, as exemplified by
Bentham, denies that a moral intuition need be taken literally, Bentham assumes
the axiological conceptual scheme of hedonistic eudaemonism, with eudaemonia as
the maximal value (summum bonum) understood as hedone. The idea of a system of values (cf.
system of ends) is meant to unify the goals of the agent in terms of the
pursuit of eudæmonia. Grice wants to disgress from naturalism, and the distinction between a description and anything
else. Consider the use of ‘rational’ as applied to ‘value.’ A naturalist holds
that ‘rational’ can be legitimately apply to the ‘doxastic’ realm, not to the
‘buletic’ realm. A desire (or a ‘value’) a naturalist would say is not
something of which ‘rational’ is predicable. Suppose, Grice says, I meet a
philosopher who is in the habit of pushing pins into other philosophers. Grice
asks the philosopher why he does this. The philosopher says that it gives him
pleasure. Grice asks him whether it is the fact that he causes pain that gives
him pleasure. The philosopher replies that he does not mind whether he causes
pain. What gives him pleasure is the physical sensation of driving a pin into a
philosopher’s body. Grice asks him whether he is aware that his actions cause
pain. The philosopher says that he is. Grice asks him whether he would not feel
pain if others did this to him. The philosopher agrees that he would. I ask him
whether he would allow this to happen. He says that he guesses he would seek to
prevent it. Grice asks him whether he does not think that others must feel pain
when he drives pins into them, and whether he should not do to others what he
would try to prevent them from doing to him. The philosopher says that pins
driven into him cause him pain and he wishes to prevent this. Pins driven by
him into others do not cause him pain, but pleasure, and he therefore wishes to
do it. Grice asks him whether the fact that he causes pain to other
philosophers does not seem to him to be relevant to the issue of whether it is
rationally undesirable to drive pins into people. He says that he does not see
what possible difference can pain caused to others, or the absence of it, make
to the desirability of deriving pleasure in the way that he does. Grice asks him what
it is that gives him pleasure in this particular activity. The philosopher
replies that he likes driving pins into a philosopher’s resilient body. Grice
asks whether he would derive equal pleasure from driving pins into a tennis
ball. The philosopher says that he would derive equal pleasure, that into what
he drives his pins, a philosopher or a tennis ball, makes no difference to him
– the pleasure is similar, and he is quite prepared to have a tennis ball
substituted, but what possible difference can it make whether his pins
perforate living men or tennis balls? At this point, Grice begins to suspect that
the philosopher is evil. Grice does not feel like agreeing with a naturalist,
who reasons that the pin-pushing philosopher is a philosopher with a very
different scale of moral values from Grice, that a value not being susceptible
to argument, Grice may disagree but not reason with the pin-pushing
philosopher. Grice rather sees the pin-pushing philosopher beyond the reach of
communication from the world occupied by him. Communication is as unattainable
as it is with a philosopher who that he is a doorknob, as in the story by
Hoffman. A value enters into the essence of what constitutes a person. The
pursuit of a rational end is part of the essence of a person. Grice does not
claim any originality for his position (which much to Ariskant), only validity.
The implicatum by Grice is that rationalism and axiology are incompatible, and
he wants to cancel that. So the keyword here is rationalistic axiology, in the
neo-Kantian continental vein, with a vengeance. Grice arrives at value
(validitum, optimum, deeming) via Peirce on meaning. And then there is the
truth “value,” a German loan-translation (as value judgment, Werturteil). The
sorry story of deontic logic, Grice says, faces Jørgensens
dilemma. The dilemma by Jørgensens is best seen as a trilemma, Grice says;
viz. Reasoning requires that premise and conclusion have what Boole, Peirce,
and Frege call a “truth” value. An imperative dos not have a “truth” value. There
may be a reasoning with an imperative as premise or conclusion. A philosopher
can reject the first horn and provide an inference mechanism on elements – the
input of the premise and the output of the conclusion -- which are not
presupposed to have a “truth” value. A philosopher can reject the second horn
and restrict ‘satisfactory’ value to a doxastic embedding a buletic (“He judges
he wills…”). A philosopher can reject the third horn, and refuse to explore the
desideratum. Grice generalizes over value as the mode-neutral ‘satisfactory.’
Both ‘p’ and “!p” may be satisfactory. ‘.p’ has doxastic value (0/1); ‘!p’ has
buletic value (0/1). The mode marker of
the utterance guides the addresse you as to how to read ‘satisfactory.’ Grice’s
‘satisfactory’ is a variation on a theme by Hofstadter and McKinsey, who elaborate
a syntax for the imperative mode, using satisfaction. They refer to what they
call the ‘satisfaction-function’ of a fiat. A fiat is ‘satisfied’ (as The door
is closed may also be said to be satisfied iff the door is closed) iff what is
commanded is the case. The fiat ‘Let the door be closed’ is satisfied if the
door is closed. An unary or dyadic operator becomes a satisfaction-functor. As Grice puts it, an inferential rule,
which flat rationality is the capacity to apply, is not
arbitrary. The inferential rule picks out a transition of acceptance in
which transmission of ‘satisfactory’ is guaranteed or expected. As Grice
notes, since mode marker indicate the species ‘satisfactory’ does. He imports into the object-language ‘It is satisfactory-d/p
that’ just in case psi-d/b-p is satisfactory. Alla Tarski, Grice
introduces ‘It is acceptable that’: It is acceptable that psi-d/b-p is
satisfactory-b/d just in case ‘psi-d/b-p is satisfactory-d/b’ is
satisfactory-b/d. Grice goes on to provide a generic
value-assignment for satisfactoriness-functors. For coordinators: “φ Λ ψ” is 1-b/d just in case φ is
1-b/d and ψ is 1-b/d. “φ ν ψ” is 1-b/d just in
case one of the pair, φ and ψ, is 1-b/d. For subordinator: “φ⊃ψ” is 1-b/d just in case either
φ is 0-b/d or ψ is 0-b/d. There are, however, a number of points to
be made. It is not fully clear to Grice just how strong the motivation is for
assigning a value to a mode-neutral, generic functor. Also he is assuming
symmetry, leaving room for a functor is introduced if a restriction is imposed.
Consider a bi-modal utterance. “The beast is filthy and do not touch it” and
“The beast is filthy and I shall not touch it” seem all right. The commutated
“Do not touch the beast and it is filthy” is dubious. “Touch the beast and it
will bite you,” while idiomatic is hardly an imperative, since ‘and’ is hardly
a conjunction. “Smith is taking a bath or leave the bath-room door open” is
intelligible. The commutated “Leave the bath-room door open or Smith is taking
a bath” is less so. In a bi-modal utterance, Grice makes a case for the buletic
to be dominant over the doxastic. The crunch comes, however, with one of the
four possible unary satisfactoriness-functors, especially with regard to the
equivalence of “~psi-b/d-p” and
“psi-b/d-~p). Consider “Let it be that I now put my hand on my head” or “Let it be that my bicycle faces north” in
which neither seems to be either satisfactory or unsatisfactory. And it is a
trick to assign a satisfactory value to “~psi-b/d-p” and “~psi-b/d~p.” Do we
proscribe this or that form altogether, for every cases? But that would seem to
be a pity, since ~!~p seems to be quite promising as a representation for you
may (permissive) do alpha that satisfies p; i.e., the utterer explicitly
conveys his refusal to prohibit his addressee A doing alpha. Do we disallow
embedding of (or iterating) this or that form? But that (again if we use ~!p
and ~!~p to represent may) seems too restrictive. Again, if !p is neither
buletically satisfactory nor buletically unsatisfactory (U could care less) do
we assign a value other than 1 or 0 to !p (desideratively neuter, 0.5). Or do
we say, echoing Quine, that we have a buletically satisfactoriness value gap?
These and other such problems would require careful consideration. Yet Grice
cannot see that those problems would prove insoluble, any more than this or
that analogous problem connected with Strawsons presupposition (Dont arrest the
intruder!) are insoluble. In Strawsons case, the difficulty is not so much to
find a solution as to select the best solution from those which present
themselves. Grice takes up the topic of a calculus in connection with the
introduction rule and the elimination rule of a modal such as must. We
might hope to find, for each member of a certain family of modalities, an
introduction rule and an elimination rule which would be analogous to the rules
available for classical logical constants. Suggestions are not hard to come by.
Let us suppose that we are seeking to provide such a pair of rules for the
particular modality of necessity □. For (□,+) Grice considers the following (Grice thinks equivalent)
forms: if φ is demonstrable, □φ is
demonstrable. Provided φ is dependent on no assumptions, derive φ from □φ. For (□,-), Grice considers From □φ derive φ. It is
to be understood, of course, that the values of the syntactical variable φ
would contain either a buletic or a doxastic mode markers. Both !p and .p would
be proper substitutes for φ but p would not. Grice wonders: [W]hat should be
said of Takeuti’s 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 P’s personalised system that φ, it is necessary, with respect
to P, that φ is doxastically satisfactory/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 P, that φ, 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 buletic
expression such as Let it be that Smith eats his hat. And my commitment to the
idea that Smiths system requires him to eat his hat does not ipso facto involve
me in accepting volitively Let Smith 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
person-relativised version of the rule seems inoffensive, even for Takeuti, we
hope. Grice, following Mackie, uses absolutism, as opposed to relativism, which denies the
rational basis to attitude ascriptions (but cf. Hare on Subjectsivism). Grice
is concerned with the absence of a thorough discussion of value by English
philosophers, other than Hare (and he is only responding to Mackie!).
Continental philosophers, by comparison, have a special discipline, axiology,
for it! Similarly, a continental-oriented tradition Grice finds in The New
World in philosophers of a pragmatist bent, such as Carus. Grice wants to
say that rationality is a value, because it is a faculty that a creature
(human) displays to adapt and survive to his changing environments. The
implicature of the title is that values have been considered in the English
philosophical tradition, almost alla Nietzsche, to belong to the realm
irrational. Grice grants that axiological implicatum rests on a PRE-rational
propension. While Grice could play with “the
good” in the New World, as a Lit. Hum. he knew he had to be slightly more
serious. The good is one of the values, but what is valuing? Would the New
Worlders understand valuing unattached to the pragmatism that defines them?
Grice starts by invoking Hume on his bright side: the concept of value, versus
the conception of value. Or rather, how the concept of value derives from the
conception of value. A distinction that would even please Aquinas
(conceptum/conceptio), and the Humeian routine. Some background for his third
Carus lecture. He tries to find out what Mackie means when he says that a value
is ultimately Subjectsive. What about inter-Subjectsive, and constructively
objective? Grice constructs absolute value out of relative value. But once a
rational pirot P (henceforth, P – Grice liked how it sounded like Locke’s
parrot) constructs value, the P assigns absolute status to rationality qua
value. The P cannot then choose not to be rational at the risk of ceasing to
exist (qua person, or essentially rationally human agent). A human, as opposed
to a person, assigns relative value to his rationality. A human is accidentally
rational. A person is necessarily so. A distinction seldom made by Aristotle
and some of his dumbest followers obsessed with the modal-free adage, Homo
rationale animal. Short and Lewis have “hūmānus” (old form: hemona humana
et hemonem hominem dicebant, Paul. ex Fest. p. 100 Müll.; cf. homo I.init.),
adj., f. “homo,” and which they render as “of or belonging to man, human.”
Grice also considers the etymology of ‘person.’ Lewis and Short have
‘persōna,’ according to Gabius Bassus
ap. Gell. 5, 7, 1 sq., f. ‘persŏno,’ “to sound through, with the second
syllable lengthened.’ Falsa est (finitio), si dicas, Equus est animal
rationale: nam est equus animal, sed irrationale, Quint.7,3,24:homo est animal
rationale; “nec si mutis finis voluptas, rationalibus quoque: quin immo ex
contrario, quia mutis, ideo non rationalibus;” “a rationali ad rationale;” “τὸ
λογικόν ζῷον,” ChrysiStoic.3.95; ἀρεταὶ λ., = διανοητικαί, oἠθικαί, Arist.
EN1108b9; “λογικός, ή, όν, (λόγος), ζῶον λόγον ἔχον NE, 1098a3-5. λόγον δὲ
μόνον ἄνθρωπος ἔχει τῶν ζῴων, man alone of all animals possesses speech, from
the Politics. Grice takes the stratification of values by Hartmann much more
seriously than Barnes. Grice plays with rational motivation. He means it
seriously. The motivation is the psychological bite, but since it is qualified
by rational, it corresponds to the higher more powerful bit of the soul, the
rational soul. There are, for Grice, the Grecians, Kantotle and Plathegel,
three souls: the vegetal, the animal, and the rational. As a matter of history,
Grice reaches value (in its guises of optimum and deeming) via his analysis of
meaning by Peirce. Many notions are value-paradeigmatic. The most
important of all philosophical notions that of rationality, presupposes
objective value as one of its motivations. For Grice, ratio can be
understood cognoscendi but also essendi, indeed volendi and fiendi, too.
Rational motivation involves a ratio cognoscendi and a ratio volendi;
objective, “objectum,” and “objectus,” ūs, m. f. “obicio,” rendered as “a
casting before, a putting against, in the way, or opposite, an opposing; or,
neutr., a lying before or opposite (mostly poet. and in postAug. prose): dare
objectum parmaï, the opposing of the shield” “vestis;” “insula portum efficit
objectu laterum,” “by the opposition,” “cum terga flumine, latera objectu
paludis tegerentur;” “molis;” “regiones, quæ Tauri montis objectu separantur;”
“solem interventu lunæ occultari, lunamque terræ objectu, the interposition,”
“eademque terra objectu suo umbram noctemque efficiat;” “al. objecta soli: hi
molium objectus (i. e. moles objectas) scandere, the projection,” transf., that
which presents itself to the sight, an object, appearance, sight, spectacle;”
al. objecto; and if not categoric. This
is analogous to the overuse by Grice of psychoLOGICAL when he just means
souly. It is perhaps his use of psychological for souly that leads to take
any souly concept as a theoretical concept within a folksy psychoLOGICAL
theory. Grice considered the stratification of values, alla Hartmann,
unlike Barnes, who dismissed him in five minutes. “Some like Philippa Foot, but
Hare is MY man,” Grice would say. “Virtue” ethics was becoming all the fashion,
especially around Somerville. Hare was getting irritated by the worse offender,
his Anglo-Welsh tutee, originally with a degree from the other place, Williams.
Enough for Grice to want to lecture on value, and using Carus as an excuse!
Mackie was what Oxonians called a colonial, and a clever one! In fact, Grice
quotes from Hares contribution to a volume on Mackie. Hares and Mackies
backgrounds could not be more different. Like Grice, Hare was a Lit. Hum., and
like Grice, Hare loves the Grundlegung. But unlike Grice and Barnes, Hare would
have nothing to say about Stevenson. Philosophers in the play group of Grice
never took the critique by Ayer of emotivism seriously. Stevenson is the thing.
V. Urmson on the emotive theory of ethics, tracing it to English philosphers
like Ogden, Barnes, and Duncan-Jones. Barnes was opposing both Prichard (who
was the Whites professor of moral philosophy – and more of an interest than
Moore is, seeing that Prichard is Barness tutor at Corpus) and Hartmann. Ryle
would have nothing to do with Hartmann, but these were the days before Ryle
took over Oxford, and forbade any reference to a continental philosopher, even
worse if a “Hun.” Grice reaches the notion of value through that of meaning. If
Peirce is simplistic, Grice is not. But his ultra-sophisticated analysis ends
up being deemed to hold in this or that utterer. And deeming is valuing, as is
optimum. While Grice rarely used axiology, he should! A set of three
lectures, which are individually identified below. I love Carus! Grice was
undecided as to what his Carus lectures were be on. Grice explores meaning
under its value optimality guise in Meaning revisited. Grice thinks that a
value-paradeigmatic notion allows him to respond in a more apt way to what some
critics were raising as a possible vicious circle in his approach to semantic
and psychological notions. The Carus lectures are then dedicated to the
construction, alla Hume, of a value-paradeigmatic notion in general, and value
itself. Grice starts by quoting Austin, Hare, and Mackie, of
Oxford. The lectures are intended to a general audience, provided it is a
philosophical general audience. Most of the second lecture is a subtle
exploration by Grice of the categorical imperative of Kant, with which he had
struggled in the last Locke lecture in “Aspects,” notably the reduction of the
categorical imperative to this or that counsel of prudence with an implicated
protasis to the effect that the agent is aiming at eudæmonia. The Carus
Lectures are three: on objectivity and value, on relative and absolute value,
and on metaphysics and value. The first lecture, on objectivity and value,
is a review Inventing right and wrong by Mackie, quoting Hare’s
antipathy for a value being ‘objective’. The second lecture, on relative and
absolute value, is an exploration on the categorical imperative, and its
connection with a prior hypothetical or suppositional imperative. The
third lecture, on metaphycis and value, is an eschatological defence of
absolute value. The collective citation should be identified by each lecture
separately. This is a metaphysical defence by Grice of absolute value. The
topic fascinates Grice, and he invents a few routines to cope with it.
Humeian projection rationally reconstructs the intuitive concept being of
value. Category shift allows to put a value such as the disinterestedness
by Smith in grammatical subject position, thus avoiding to answer that the
disinterestedness of Smith is in the next room, since it is not the
spatio-temporal continuan prote ousia that Smith is. But the
most important routine is that of trans-substantatio, or metousiosis. A
human reconstructs as a rational personal being, and alla Kantotle,
whatever he judges is therefore of absolute value. The issue involves for
Grice the introduction of a telos qua aition, causa finalis (final cause),
role, or métier. The final cause of a tiger is to tigerise, the
final cause of a reasoner is to reason, the final cause of a person is to
personise. And this entails absolute value, now metaphysically defended. The
justification involves the ideas of end-setting, unweighed rationality,
autonomy, and freedom. In something like a shopping list that Grice
provides for issues on free. Attention to freedom calls for formidably
difficult undertakings including the search for a justification for the
adoption or abandonment of an ultimate end. The point is to secure that freedom
does not dissolve into compulsion or chance. Grice proposes four items for this
shopping list. A first point is that full action calls for strong freedom. Here
one has to be careful that since Grice abides by what he calls the Modified
Occams Razor in the third James lecture on Some remarks about logic and
conversation, he would not like to think of this two (strong freedom and weak
freedom) as being different senses of free. Again, his calls for is best
understood as presupposes. It may connect with, say, Kanes full-blown examples
of decisions in practical settings that call for or presuppose
libertarianism. A second point is that the buletic-doxastic justification
of action has to accomodate for the fact that we need freedom which is strong.
Strong or serious autonomy or freedom ensures that this or that action is
represented as directed to this or that end E which are is not merely the
agents, but which is also freely or autonomously adopted or pursued by the
agent. Grice discusses the case of the gym instructor commanding, Raise your
left arm! The serious point then involves this free adoption or free pursuit.
Note Grices use of this or that personal-identity pronoun: not merely mine,
i.e. not merely the agents, but in privileged-access position. This connects
with what Aristotle says of action as being up to me, and Kant’s idea of the
transcendental ego. An end is the agents in that the agent adopts it with
liberum arbitrium. This or that ground-level desire may be circumstantial. A
weak autonomy or freedom satisfactorily accounts for this or that action as
directed to an end which is mine. However, a strong autonomy or freedom, and a
strong autonomy or freedom only, accounts for this or that action as directed
to an end which is mine, but, unlike, say, some ground-level circumstantial
desire which may have sprung out of some circumstantial adaptability to a given
scenario, is, first, autonomously or freely adopted by the agent, and, second,
autonomously or freely pursued by the agent. The use of the disjunctive
particle or in the above is of some interest. An agent may autonomously or
freely adopt an end, yet not care to pursue it autonomously or freely, even in
this strong connotation that autonomous or free sometimes has. A further point
relates to causal indeterminacy. Any attempt to remedy this situation by
resorting to causal indeterminacy or chance will only infuriate the scientist
without aiding the philosopher. This remark by Grice has to be understood
casually. For, as it can be shown, this or that scientist may well have
resorted to precisely that introduction and in any case have not
self-infuriated. The professional tag that is connoted by philosopher should
also be seen as best implicated than entailed. A scientist who does resort to
the introduction of causal indeterminacy may be eo ipso be putting forward a
serious consideration regarding ethics or meta-ethics. In other words, a
cursory examination of the views of a scientist like Eddington, beloved by
Grice, or this or that moral philosopher like Kane should be born in mind when
considering this third point by Grice. The reference by Grice to chance,
random, and causal indeterminacy, should best be understood vis-à-vis
Aristotles emphasis on tykhe, fatum, to the effect that this or that event may
just happen just by accident, which may well open a can of worms for the naive
Griceian, but surely not the sophisticated one (cf. his remarks on
accidentally, in Prolegomena). A further item in Grices shopping list involves
the idea of autonomous or free as a value, or optimum. The specific character
of what Grice has as strong autonomy or freedom may well turn out to
consist, Grice hopes, in the idea of this or that action as the outcome of a
certain kind of strong valuation ‒ where this would include the
rational selection, as per e.g. rational-decision theory, of this or that
ultimate end. What Grice elsewhere calls out-weighed or extrinsically weighed
rationality, where rational includes the buletic, of the end and not the means
to it. This or that full human action calls for the presence of this or that
reason, which require that this or that full human action for which this or
that reason accounts should be the outcome of a strong rational valuation. Like
a more constructivist approach, this line suggests that this or that action may
require, besides strong autonomy or freedom, now also strong valuation. Grice
sets to consider how to adapt the buletic-doxastic soul progression to reach
these goals. In the case of this or that ultimate end E, justification should
be thought of as lying, directly, at least, in this or that outcome, not on the
actual phenomenal fulfilment of this or that end, but rather of the, perhaps
noumenal, presence qua end. Grice relates to Kants views on the benevolentia or
goodwill and malevolentia, or evil will, or illwill. Considers Smiths action of
giving Jones a job. Smith may be deemed to have given Jones a job, whether or
not Jones actually gets the job. It is Smiths benevolentia, or goodwill, not
his beneficentia, that matters. Hence in Short and Lewis, we have
“bĕnĕfĭcentĭa,” f. “beneficus,” like “magnificentia” f. magnificus, and
“munificentia” f. munificus; Cicero, Off. 1, 7, 20, and which they thus render
as “the quality of beneficus, kindness, beneficence, an honorable and kind
treatment of others” (omaleficentia, Lact. Ira Dei, 1, 1; several times in the
philos. writings of Cicero. Elsewhere rare: quid praestantius bonitate et
beneficentiā?” “beneficentia, quam eandem vel benignitatem vel liberalitatem
appellari licet,” “comitas ac beneficentia,” “uti beneficentiā adversus
supplices,”“beneficentia augebat ornabatque subjectsos.” In a more general
fashion then, it is the mere presence of an end qua end of a given action that
provides the justification of the end, and not its phenomenal satisfaction or
fulfilment. Furthermore, the agents having such and such an end, E1, or
such and such a combination of ends, E1 and E2, would be justified by showing
that the agents having this end exhibits some desirable feature, such as this
or that combo being harmonious. For how can one combine ones desire to smoke
with ones desire to lead a healthy life? Harmony is one of the six requirements
by Grice for an application of happy to the life of Smith. The buletic-doxastic
souly ascription is back in business at a higher level. The suggestion would
involve an appeal, in the justification of this or that end, to this or that
higher-order end which would be realised by having this or that lower, or
first-order end of a certain sort. Such valuation of this or that lower-order
end lies within reach of a buletic-doxastic souly ascription. Grice has an
important caveat at this point. This or that higher-order end involved in the
defense would itself stand in need of justification, and the regress might well
turn out to be vicious. One is reminded of Watson’s requirement for a thing
like freedom or personal identity to overcome this or that alleged
counterexample to freewill provided by H. Frankfurt. It is after the
laying of a shopping list, as it were, and considerations such as those above
that Grice concludes his reflection with a defense of a noumenon, complete with
the inner conflict that it brings. Attention to the idea of autonomous and free
leads the philosopher to the need to resolve if not dissolve the most important
unsolved problem of philosophy, viz. how an agent can be, at the same time, a
member of both the phenomenal world and the noumenal world, or, to settle the
internal conflict between one part of our rational nature, the doxastic, even
scientific, part which seems to call for the universal reign of a deterministic
law and the other buletic part which insists that not merely moral
responsibility but every variety of rational belief demands exemption from just
such a reign. In this lecture, Grice explores freedom and value from a
privileged-access incorrigible perspective rather than the creature
construction genitorial justification. Axiology – v. axiological. Refs.:
The main source is The construction of value, the Carus lectures, Clarendon.
But there are scattered essays on value and valuing in the Grice Papers. H. P.
Grice, “Objectivity and value,” s. V, c. 8-f. 18, “The rational motivation for
objective value,” s. V, c. 8-f. 19, “Value,” s. V, c. 9-f. 20; “Value,
metaphysics, and teleology,” s. V, c. 9-f. 23, “Values, morals, absolutes, and
the metaphysical,” s. V., c. 9-f. 24;
“Value sub-systems and the Kantian problem,” s. V. c. 9-ff. 25-27; “Values and
rationalism,” s. V, c. 9-f. 28; while the Carus are in the second series, in
five folders, s. II, c-2, ff. 12-16, the H. P. Grice Papers, BANC.
verum: Grice’s main manoeuvre may be seen as intended to crack
the crib of reality. For he wants to say some philosophers engaged in
conceptual analysis are misled if they think an inappropriate usage reveals a
truth-condition. By coining ‘implicature,’ his point is to give room for
“Emissor E communicates that p,” as opposed to ‘emissum x ‘means’ ‘p.’
Therefore, Grice can claim that an utterance may very well totally baffling and
misleading YET TRUE (or otherwise ‘good’), and that in no way that reveals anything
about the emissum itself. This is due to the fact that ‘Emissor E communicates
that p’ is diaphanous. And one can conjoin what the emissor E communicates to
what he explicitly conveys and NOT HAVE the emissor contradicting himself or
uttering a falsehood. And that is what in philosophy should count. H. P. Grice
was always happy with a ‘correspondence’ theory of truth. It was what Aristotle
thought. So why change? The fact that Austin agreed helped. The fact that
Strawson applied Austin’s shining new tool of the performatory had him fashion
a new shining skid, and that helped, because, once Grice has identified a
philosophical mistake, that justifies his role as methodologist in trying to
‘correct’ the mistake. The Old Romans did not have an article. For them it is
the unum, the verum, the bonum, and the pulchrum. They were trying to translate
the very articled Grecian ‘to alethes,’ ‘to agathon,’ and ‘to kallon.’ Grecian
Grice is able to restore the articles. He would use ‘the alethic’ for the
‘verum,’ after von Wright. But occasionally uses the ‘verum’ root. E. g. when
his account of ‘personal identity’ was seen to fail to distinguish between a
‘veridical’ memory and a non-veridical one. If it had not been for Strawson’s
‘ditto’ theory to the ‘verum,’ Grice would not have minded much. Like Austin,
his inclination was for a ‘correspondence’ theory of truth alla Aristotle and
Tarski, applied to the utterance, or ‘expressum.’ So, while we cannot say that
an utterer is TRUE, we can say that he is TRUTHFUL, and trustworthy
(Anglo-Saxon ‘trust,’ being cognate with ‘true,’ and covering both the
credibility and desirability realms. Grice approaches the ‘verum’ in terms of
predicate calculus. So we need at least an utterance of the form, ‘the dog is
shaggy.’ An utterance of ‘The dog is shaggy’ is true iff the denotatum of ‘the
dog’ is a member of the class ‘shaggy.’ So, when it comes to ‘verum,’ Grice
feels like ‘solving’ a problem rather than looking for new ones. He thought
that Strawson’s controversial ‘ditto’ was enough of a problem ‘to get rid of.’
weapon: Grice’s shining new tool: Or weapon. Grice refers to the implicatum as a philosopher’s tool,
and that the fun comes in the application. Strawson and Wiggins p. 522, reminds
us of Austin. Austin used to say that when a philosopher “forges a new weapon,
he is also fshioning new skids to put under his feet.” It is perhaps
inappropriate that a memorial should mention this, but here they were, the
memorialists. They were suggesting that Grice forged a shining new tool, the
implicature, or implicatum – rather, he proposed a rational explanation for the
distinction between what an emissor means (e. g., that p) and what anything
else may be said, ‘metabolically,’ to “mean.” Suggesting an analogy with J. L.
Austin and his infelicitious notion of infelicity, which found him fashioning a
shining new skid, the memorialists suggest the same for Grice – but of course
the analogy does not apply.
Yog and Zog: “If” was a problem for Grice. According to Strawson and
Wiggins, this was Grice having forged his shining new tool – the distinction
between ‘By emitting x, An emissor coomunicates that p” and “The emissum x
‘means’ ‘p.’ Apply that to ‘if.’ In Strawson and Wiggins’s precis, for Grice,
‘p yields q’ is part of the conversational implicatum – for Strawson and
Wiggins it is part of the conventional implicatum. They agree on ‘p horseshoe q’ being the explicit emissum or
explicatum in “Emissor explicitly conveys and communicates that p horseshoe q.”
For Grice, the implicatum, which, being conversational is cancellable, is
calculated on the assumption that the addressee can work out that the emissor
has non-truth-functional grounds for the making of any stronger claim. For
Strawson, that non-truth-functional reason is precisely ‘p yields q,’ which
leads Strawson to think that the thing is not cancellable and conventionally
implicated. If Strawson were right that this is Grice forging a new shining
tool to crack the crib of reality and fashioning thereby a new shining skid
under his metaphysical feet, it would be almost the second use of the
tool! This is an expansion by Grice on
the implicatum of a ‘propositio conditionalis.’ Grice, feeling paradoxical,
invites us to suppose a scenario involving ‘if.’ He takes it as a proof
that his account of the conversational implicatum of ‘if’ is, as Strawson did
not agree, correct, and that what an utterer explicitly conveys by ‘if p, q’ is
‘p > q.’ that two chess players, Yog
and Zog, play 100 games under the following conditions. Yog is white nine of
ten times. There are no draws. And the results are: Yog, when
white, won 80 of 90 games. Yog, when black, won zero of ten games. This
implies that: 8/9 times, if Yog was white, Yog won. 1/2 of the time, if
Yog lost, Yog was black. 9/10 that either
Yog wasnt white or he won. From these statements, it might appear one
could make these deductions by contraposition and conditional
disjunction: If Yog was white, then 1/2 of the time Yog won. 9/10 times,
if Yog was white, then he won. But both propositions are untrue. They
contradict the assumption. In fact, they do not provide enough information to
use Bayesian reasoning to reach those conclusions. That might be clearer if the
propositions had instead been stated differently. When Yog was white, Yog won
8/9 times. No information is given about when Yog was black. When Yog lost, Yog
was black 1/2 the time. No information is given about when Yog won. (9/10
times, either Yog was black and won, Yog was black and lost, or Yog was white
and won. No information is provided on how the 9/10 is divided among those
three situations. The paradox by Grice shows that the exact meaning of
statements involving conditionals and probabilities is more complicated than
may be obvious on casual examination. Refs.: Grice’s interest with ‘if’ surely
started after he carefully read the section on ‘if’ and the horseshoe in
Strawson’s Introduction to Logical Theory. He was later to review his attack on
Strawson in view of Strawson’s defense in ‘If and the horseshoe.’ The polemic
was pretty much solved as a matter of different intuitions: what Grice sees as
a conversational implicatum, Strawson does see as an ‘implicatum,’ but a
non-defeasible one – what Grice would qualify as ‘conventional.’ Grice leaves
room for an implicatum to be nonconversational and yet nonconventional, but it
is not worth trying to fit Strawson’s suggestion in this slot, since Strawson,
unlike Grice, has nothing against a convention. Grice was motivated to
formulate his ‘paradox,’ seeing that Strawson was saying that the so-called
‘paradoxes’ of ‘entailment’ and ‘implication’ are a misnomer. “They are not
paradoxical; they are false!” Grice has specific essays on both the paradoxes
of entailment and the paradoxes of implication. The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC
MSS 90/135c, The University of California, Berkeley.
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