H. P. Grice
H. P. Grice was born on High Street, Harborne, Staffordshire,
England.
"It used to be Staffordshire; then it became Warwickshire; and now it's Brum!"
Grice attends Corpus Christi, Oxford. Lit. Hum. (Phil.). "I was sent straight from Clifton, on a classics scholarship, so trust that as a 'Midlands scholarship boy' I was going to land on Corpus!"
Grice is a Fellow, St John’s. "Fellow with a capital F."
Grice serves nearly five years’ wartime service in the Royal Navy, first in the North Atlantic and later in Admiralty intelligence.
"I was almost killed, but, as Descartes would say, I was not."
FBA. "I was uncertain about what I intended to talk, so I opted for 'intention and uncertainty.'"
Refs.: "Studies in the Way of Words," -- I titled my volume after Locke. He speaks of a way of ideas, a way of words, and a way of things -- not in that order!"
***
Grice is, no doubt, one of the most gifted and respected philosophers at Oxford -- even St. John's!
Grice sets "highly high" standards and, typically Oxonian, is reluctant to publish, which he thinks, "at most," 'vulgar,' and "at least" '*very* vulgar.'
Like Socrates, Grice exerts a deep influence through tutorials and seminars as University Lecturer. "If Socrates held an Athenian dialectic, I held an Oxonian one!"
Grice explores topics in Aristotle (Cat. and De Int.), metaphysics, ethics, and philosophical psychology, but he is mainly known for his witticisms about conversation!
Grice's 'popular side,' as he calls it, and strongest influence is in the philosophy of language and 'communication,' which Grice sees as part of philosophical methodology.
"Communication, rather than language -- since language possibly does not exist!"
In the appropriate Griceian parlance, with respect to an emissor E of an emissum e, Grice stresses the importance of exploring, within the range, domain, or realm, what E communicates, what E *explicitly* communicates, usually very little -- and far less than most philosophers have the emissor to be communicating -- viz. that p, on a given occasion by uttering e.
Grice indeed attempts to 'reduce,' -- "conceptually, not literally!" -- what E communicates, viz. that p, by providing an analysandum of E's communicating that p simpliciter and, E's explicitly communicating that p (by stating that p, or ordering that p be the case), which Grice contrasts to E's IMPLICITLY communicating that p -- "and which Austin so frequently ignores!"
Grice explains how what E *explicitly* communicates hardly covers what E communicates simpliciter. "But us philosophers at Oxford are used at this: witness C. K. Grant, and his 'pragmatic implication,' or Nowell-Smith and his 'contextual implication.'"
In his invited contribution to a symposium for the Aristotelian Society, Grice gives the example:
'The pillar box seems red'
E surely 'states' that the pillar box seems red (pace Bar-Hillel, for whom a phenomenalist utterance is hardly a statement, and so Bar-Hillel would have Grice 'making as if to state') but implies or implicitly communicates, in a cancellable way, that the recipient, usually Strawson, on the face of the utterance's guarded syntax, may doubt about the pillar box BEING red, as you will.
Like Austin, Grice defends conceptual analysis as a philosophical methodology and what he calls some 'sophisticated' form of the analytic/synthetic distinction, notably to irritate American philosopher W. V. Quine, who visited him at St. John's, but was rude to him during a seminar.
By characterizing the distinction between what Grice calls, 'roughly,' 'logical inference' (the explicatum or explicitum) from 'pragmatic inference' (the implicatum), Grice corrects a few philosophical mistakes by his tutee P. F. Strawson and his colleague J. L. Austin (among others -- "I also managed to criticise, just narrowing to my playgroup, R. M. Hare, H. L. A. Hart, and S. N. Hampshire -- you see, we are very parochial at Oxford.")
Grice deploys his 'shining new tool,' as he calls his 'disimplicatum' 'to somewhat devastating effect,' even if braving this or that 'shining new skid' against overzealous strains of “ordinary"-language philosophy.
Yet, he never abandons his great talent -- and in any case, what an English Oxonian philosopher is 'expected' to pay attention to -- the conversational nuances (indeed 'disimplicata') of philosophese.
In the proceeding, Grice undercuts the most influential argument (that Strawson calls tentative -- and thus "not fair criticising" --) for a philosophically significant notion of the “presuppositum” as a variety of the conversational implicatum.
His famous cancellation goes: "The king of France ain't bald; indeed, France happens to be a monarchy, for as long as I remember, Strawson."
Grice makes significant contributions to the debate about the semantics of a proper name, especially a void one, like "Marmaduke Bloggs," Russell's definite description, especially a void one, like "the Merseyside climber on hands and knees of Mt. Everest") and this or that pronouns or pronominal phrase, like "whoever he was, is, or will be."
"I learned from Austin that we should start with the adverb and then proceed upwards."
Grice sketches a philosophical psychology and a theory of value (for his Carus) (axiologicum, validatum) that provide the basis of explorations on the actum, the soul, the animatum, and meta-ethics, and "what have you."
The view that the only useful thing to say about the meaning of an expression is that it is usable in such-and-such circumstances, exercises a powerful influence as patronised by philosophers at the Oxford Grice knew. "They avoid theory like the rats."
"And Ryle's distinction between the use and the usage didn't help!"
Ryle, and worse, Austin, and almost every other English Oxonian philosophers, undercut philosophical positions or dispose of philosophical problems by pointing to some alleged 'misuse' or 'inappropriateness,' by some Oxonian standard, of some expression plays an essential role in the presentation of the position or problem.
Consider an attempt to analyse 'to know' in terms of 'to believe' along the following lines:
The examinee apparently knows that Waterloo was fought in 1815
iff
(1)
The examinee believes that Waterloo was fought in 1815 ('That's what he said')
(2) Waterloo was fought in 1815.
and
(3) The examineee, or the author of the history manual he is relying on, is justified in believing that (2).
It might be charged that it is a feature of the use of “believe” that E does not use 'believe' if E can sincerely state the stronger "The examinee *knows* that Waterloo was fought in 1815" instead.
As Grice puts it in his tutorial:
"One big philosophical mistake: what is known by me to be the case is not also believed by me to be the case."
"Incidentally, I shall call this the 'Principle of Conversational Fortitude.'"
Such a mistake ("To know is to give a guarantee" -- Austin) might be supported by observing that it would be inappropriate for a woman, or lady, say, Queen Anne, to say “I believe Queen Anne is dead” when she knows (rather than merely believe) that Queen Anne (her majestic self) is dead, and has been dead for some time now.
So, it might be concluded that the proposed analysis must be discarded because clause (1), ascribing 'belief,' to the knower, conflicts with the 'ordinary' use of "The examinee believes that Waterloo was fought in 1815" -- never mind Queen Anne.
Grice accepts that a theory of E communicating that p must be sensitive to use (if not 'usage') and attempted to reduce the phenomenon to E's intending that recipient R believe or do that p.
Two important ideas come out of this sensitivity to use, or usage.
The first is that the bit of philosophese,
"by uttering x, E communicates that p"
be analysed in terms of a "sophisticated" recipient-directed intentions on the part of E.
The second is that the ONLY philosophically articulate concept (i. e. not a metabolic, animistic, transferred use) is that of emissor E communicating that p, even one-off, by doing something on a particular occasion.
What E communicates by producing x on a given occasion is a function of what E intends, in a sophisticated way, to get across to his recipient R.
The basic Griceian idea is, very roughly, that for an “informational-type” utterance, the piece of philosophical jargon,
'by uttering x, E communicates that p'
iff, or =df,
E utters x intending to produce in some recipient R the state of the soul that p by means of R’s recognition of this intention.
By uttering
"Strawson went to bed and took off his boots."
Grice does not explicitly convey "in that order."
He only implies it (or impicitly communicates it), in a cancellable way.
"But not in that order, mind!"
Grice wants any adequate explanation of the possibility of a conventional implicatum and disimplicatum to flow from a completely general conversational rational-choice theory
To demonstrate or proof, or detect, the definite existence of conversational implicatum distinct an implicatum that may not be conversational, or an explicatum (under which he places Moore's entailment), Grice considers what he knew as "typical Oxonian tutorial behaviour."
Suppose at Collections, Ryle asks Grice for an evaluation of his tutee Strawson, whom he tutored for only one term, and for the logic paper in PPE only.
At Collections, Grice utters to Ryle:
“Strawson has beautiful handwriting. It touches your heart. And he does mind his ps and qs."
If Grice leaves it at that, Strawson gets, as he did, a second (PPE).
"Your suppressiones veri never cease to amaze me, Grice," says Ryle with a smile.
"Are you implying Strawson is no good?"
"Hardly."
"By uttering 'Hardly' I no longer can be claimed to have implied what Ryle was accusing me of."
To Ryle, who at the time, was not familiar with Strawson, much, what Grice implies, indicates, or suggests differs from what he explicitly conveys.
Grice uses 'explicitly convey' freely, allowing that the assignment of 'denotata' (in 'he') is not a necessary condition ("Are we talking about the same Strawson?" "I never knew he had a twin").
Suppose we turn to another of his tuttees.
Grice utters (1) rather than (2) of one of his tutee's girlfriend:
(1)
"To echo the Great War ditty, she seems honest, but she seems poor."
(2)
"To echo the Great War ditty, she seems honest and her parents seem the same."
At Oxford, class-conscious as it is, Grice very likely will be taken to be implying that there is (or that someone might think there is) some sort of contrast the poverty of the parents of the girlfriend of his tutee and and the *honesty* of the parents of the girlfriend of his tutee:
She was poor, but she was honest,
and her parents were the SYME
till she met a city slicker
and she lost her honest NYME.
victim of the feller's WHYME.
Surely this stupid Tommy ditty is no part of what Grice explicitly conveys because it does not contribute in any way to the truth conditions of the utterance.
By uttering (1), Grice states, only, that his tutee's girlfriend is poor and that she is honest.
Surely this does not entail that there is anything wrong about her parents.
The implication in question Grice is what Grice calls a "convention" colourful implicatum.
According to Grice, by uttering (1) Grice is performing two acts, on different floors.
Grice is stating that his tutee's girlfriend is poor and honest. That's the first floor.
Or the first floor and the mezzanine, to allow for the 'conjunctum.'
Then from the second floor, Grice is and implying, indicating (or suggesting) that someone (perhaps Ryle, echoing class-conscious Oxford) has a certain attitude toward what is stated, especially as it concerns the tutee's girlfriend's parents, and his tutee's antic in calling himself her boyfriend.
Grice is hardly interested in this idea, but he knows many at Oxford are -- notably Dummett, obsessed with Frege as he was.
Grice just leaves it at the claim that a conventional implicatum is determined (at least in part) by this or that 'arbitrary' conventions (alla Lewis) governing what Grice, feeling pretentious, calls the 'syncategorematon' "but."
"Etymologically, 'by-out' -- go figure."
Grice does stress, however, that the sort of implicatum we have just been considering is not a presuppositum (as originally defined by Strawson -- who used 'implicatum,' originally, -- and adopted by others).
q is a presupposition of p, just in case the truth or falsity of p requires the truth of q.
If the truth of p requires the truth of q, but the falsity of q does not, q is a Mooreian entailment of p, which is not cancellable ("He is a three-year old, but he is an adult.")
More precisely, if p presupposes q, p lacks a truth value if q is false.
But as Grice points out, an utterance of "The parents of my tutee's girlfriend are poor" can well be false even if the implied proposition is false, effectively scotching the idea that the implicatum is presuppositum, at least not on the standard semantic conception of that notion.
It is Grice’s view that any alleged presupposition is either an entailment (in the affirmative case -- you cease to eat iron) or a conversational implicatum (in the negative case -- you do not cease to eat iron).
For something to be (part of) what Grice explicitly communicates, it must also be (part of) what Grice communicates simpliciter, i. e., it must be backed by a complex intention of the sort that forms the backbone of Grice’s theory what it is for Grice to 'communicate' that p.
If E utters the sentence "My wife is the cream in my coffee" on Grice’s account Grice should not be SERIOUSLY taking to be putting forward the literal proposition to the effect that that Mrs. Grice is the cream in Grice's coffee, with all this materially implies.
Grice will have made as if to 'state' or communicate that his wife is the cream in his coffee.
For it is Grice’s view that a statement of the form “by uttering x, Grice explicitly communicates that p” entails, alla Moore, the corresponding statement of the form “by uttering x, Grice communicates that p.”
On Grice’s account, one cannot 'unintentionally' communicate that p something.
This fact has interesting consequences for, for example, "the many malaprops I witnessed Davidson proffer with a straight face."
As Grice puts it, "While an unwanted baby is still a baby, an unwanted impicatum is a contradictio in terminis."
Grice’s oeuvre provides a breakdown of what Grice communicates.
What Grice conventionally implicates and what he explicitly communicates are both closely tied to the conventional meaning of the sentence uttered ("unless they are not, as in Humpty Dumpty's conversations with Alice").
They are taken by Grice as exhausting what Grice ("when not in one of my Humpty-Dumpty moves) conventionally communicates, i. e. by virtue of a D. K. Lewis-type arbitration.
Let us now turn to what Grice NON-conventionally (non-arbitrarily) communicates.
Recall again, the day Strawson got his second, with Grice's terse evaluation of Strawson.
By uttering the sentence
“Strawson has beautiful handwriting and he minds his ps and qs,”
Grice explicitly communicates (or made as if to communicate explicitly) that Strawson has beautiful handwriting and that Strawson minds his ps and qs.
In addition, on Grice’s own account, Grice conversationally implicated, ironically, that Strawson is not much good at Lit. Hum. -- but that's okay: he is being examined for a PPE.
A conversational implicatum is a cancellable species of implicatum and is to be seriously contrasted with the non-cancellable conventional implicatum
The principal difference between a conventional and a conversational implicatum is that the existence of a conventional implicatum depends upon the presence of some particular arbitrary device (such as Frege's "aber") whereas the existence of a conversational implicatum does not.
Grice proposes to explain the possibility of a divergence between what Grice explicitly communicates and what he communicates simpliciter by appeal to the nature and purpose of rational concerted co-operative conversational interaction.
Relevance is a virtue.
Utterances are not 'relevant' unless in scare quotes.
The emissor is relevant.
By uttering "Lovely weather" he is being relevant, because, as Hobbes notes in "Computatio" with is Roman-history example, he expects his recipient will look for the missing LINK (the co-relatum) and find it.
England.
"It used to be Staffordshire; then it became Warwickshire; and now it's Brum!"
Grice attends Corpus Christi, Oxford. Lit. Hum. (Phil.). "I was sent straight from Clifton, on a classics scholarship, so trust that as a 'Midlands scholarship boy' I was going to land on Corpus!"
Grice is a Fellow, St John’s. "Fellow with a capital F."
Grice serves nearly five years’ wartime service in the Royal Navy, first in the North Atlantic and later in Admiralty intelligence.
"I was almost killed, but, as Descartes would say, I was not."
FBA. "I was uncertain about what I intended to talk, so I opted for 'intention and uncertainty.'"
Refs.: "Studies in the Way of Words," -- I titled my volume after Locke. He speaks of a way of ideas, a way of words, and a way of things -- not in that order!"
***
Grice is, no doubt, one of the most gifted and respected philosophers at Oxford -- even St. John's!
Grice sets "highly high" standards and, typically Oxonian, is reluctant to publish, which he thinks, "at most," 'vulgar,' and "at least" '*very* vulgar.'
Like Socrates, Grice exerts a deep influence through tutorials and seminars as University Lecturer. "If Socrates held an Athenian dialectic, I held an Oxonian one!"
Grice explores topics in Aristotle (Cat. and De Int.), metaphysics, ethics, and philosophical psychology, but he is mainly known for his witticisms about conversation!
Grice's 'popular side,' as he calls it, and strongest influence is in the philosophy of language and 'communication,' which Grice sees as part of philosophical methodology.
"Communication, rather than language -- since language possibly does not exist!"
In the appropriate Griceian parlance, with respect to an emissor E of an emissum e, Grice stresses the importance of exploring, within the range, domain, or realm, what E communicates, what E *explicitly* communicates, usually very little -- and far less than most philosophers have the emissor to be communicating -- viz. that p, on a given occasion by uttering e.
Grice indeed attempts to 'reduce,' -- "conceptually, not literally!" -- what E communicates, viz. that p, by providing an analysandum of E's communicating that p simpliciter and, E's explicitly communicating that p (by stating that p, or ordering that p be the case), which Grice contrasts to E's IMPLICITLY communicating that p -- "and which Austin so frequently ignores!"
Grice explains how what E *explicitly* communicates hardly covers what E communicates simpliciter. "But us philosophers at Oxford are used at this: witness C. K. Grant, and his 'pragmatic implication,' or Nowell-Smith and his 'contextual implication.'"
In his invited contribution to a symposium for the Aristotelian Society, Grice gives the example:
'The pillar box seems red'
E surely 'states' that the pillar box seems red (pace Bar-Hillel, for whom a phenomenalist utterance is hardly a statement, and so Bar-Hillel would have Grice 'making as if to state') but implies or implicitly communicates, in a cancellable way, that the recipient, usually Strawson, on the face of the utterance's guarded syntax, may doubt about the pillar box BEING red, as you will.
Like Austin, Grice defends conceptual analysis as a philosophical methodology and what he calls some 'sophisticated' form of the analytic/synthetic distinction, notably to irritate American philosopher W. V. Quine, who visited him at St. John's, but was rude to him during a seminar.
By characterizing the distinction between what Grice calls, 'roughly,' 'logical inference' (the explicatum or explicitum) from 'pragmatic inference' (the implicatum), Grice corrects a few philosophical mistakes by his tutee P. F. Strawson and his colleague J. L. Austin (among others -- "I also managed to criticise, just narrowing to my playgroup, R. M. Hare, H. L. A. Hart, and S. N. Hampshire -- you see, we are very parochial at Oxford.")
Grice deploys his 'shining new tool,' as he calls his 'disimplicatum' 'to somewhat devastating effect,' even if braving this or that 'shining new skid' against overzealous strains of “ordinary"-language philosophy.
Yet, he never abandons his great talent -- and in any case, what an English Oxonian philosopher is 'expected' to pay attention to -- the conversational nuances (indeed 'disimplicata') of philosophese.
In the proceeding, Grice undercuts the most influential argument (that Strawson calls tentative -- and thus "not fair criticising" --) for a philosophically significant notion of the “presuppositum” as a variety of the conversational implicatum.
His famous cancellation goes: "The king of France ain't bald; indeed, France happens to be a monarchy, for as long as I remember, Strawson."
Grice makes significant contributions to the debate about the semantics of a proper name, especially a void one, like "Marmaduke Bloggs," Russell's definite description, especially a void one, like "the Merseyside climber on hands and knees of Mt. Everest") and this or that pronouns or pronominal phrase, like "whoever he was, is, or will be."
"I learned from Austin that we should start with the adverb and then proceed upwards."
Grice sketches a philosophical psychology and a theory of value (for his Carus) (axiologicum, validatum) that provide the basis of explorations on the actum, the soul, the animatum, and meta-ethics, and "what have you."
The view that the only useful thing to say about the meaning of an expression is that it is usable in such-and-such circumstances, exercises a powerful influence as patronised by philosophers at the Oxford Grice knew. "They avoid theory like the rats."
"And Ryle's distinction between the use and the usage didn't help!"
Ryle, and worse, Austin, and almost every other English Oxonian philosophers, undercut philosophical positions or dispose of philosophical problems by pointing to some alleged 'misuse' or 'inappropriateness,' by some Oxonian standard, of some expression plays an essential role in the presentation of the position or problem.
Consider an attempt to analyse 'to know' in terms of 'to believe' along the following lines:
The examinee apparently knows that Waterloo was fought in 1815
iff
(1)
The examinee believes that Waterloo was fought in 1815 ('That's what he said')
(2) Waterloo was fought in 1815.
and
(3) The examineee, or the author of the history manual he is relying on, is justified in believing that (2).
It might be charged that it is a feature of the use of “believe” that E does not use 'believe' if E can sincerely state the stronger "The examinee *knows* that Waterloo was fought in 1815" instead.
As Grice puts it in his tutorial:
"One big philosophical mistake: what is known by me to be the case is not also believed by me to be the case."
"Incidentally, I shall call this the 'Principle of Conversational Fortitude.'"
Such a mistake ("To know is to give a guarantee" -- Austin) might be supported by observing that it would be inappropriate for a woman, or lady, say, Queen Anne, to say “I believe Queen Anne is dead” when she knows (rather than merely believe) that Queen Anne (her majestic self) is dead, and has been dead for some time now.
So, it might be concluded that the proposed analysis must be discarded because clause (1), ascribing 'belief,' to the knower, conflicts with the 'ordinary' use of "The examinee believes that Waterloo was fought in 1815" -- never mind Queen Anne.
Grice accepts that a theory of E communicating that p must be sensitive to use (if not 'usage') and attempted to reduce the phenomenon to E's intending that recipient R believe or do that p.
Two important ideas come out of this sensitivity to use, or usage.
The first is that the bit of philosophese,
"by uttering x, E communicates that p"
be analysed in terms of a "sophisticated" recipient-directed intentions on the part of E.
The second is that the ONLY philosophically articulate concept (i. e. not a metabolic, animistic, transferred use) is that of emissor E communicating that p, even one-off, by doing something on a particular occasion.
What E communicates by producing x on a given occasion is a function of what E intends, in a sophisticated way, to get across to his recipient R.
The basic Griceian idea is, very roughly, that for an “informational-type” utterance, the piece of philosophical jargon,
'by uttering x, E communicates that p'
iff, or =df,
E utters x intending to produce in some recipient R the state of the soul that p by means of R’s recognition of this intention.
By uttering
"Strawson went to bed and took off his boots."
Grice does not explicitly convey "in that order."
He only implies it (or impicitly communicates it), in a cancellable way.
"But not in that order, mind!"
Grice wants any adequate explanation of the possibility of a conventional implicatum and disimplicatum to flow from a completely general conversational rational-choice theory
To demonstrate or proof, or detect, the definite existence of conversational implicatum distinct an implicatum that may not be conversational, or an explicatum (under which he places Moore's entailment), Grice considers what he knew as "typical Oxonian tutorial behaviour."
Suppose at Collections, Ryle asks Grice for an evaluation of his tutee Strawson, whom he tutored for only one term, and for the logic paper in PPE only.
At Collections, Grice utters to Ryle:
“Strawson has beautiful handwriting. It touches your heart. And he does mind his ps and qs."
If Grice leaves it at that, Strawson gets, as he did, a second (PPE).
"Your suppressiones veri never cease to amaze me, Grice," says Ryle with a smile.
"Are you implying Strawson is no good?"
"Hardly."
"By uttering 'Hardly' I no longer can be claimed to have implied what Ryle was accusing me of."
To Ryle, who at the time, was not familiar with Strawson, much, what Grice implies, indicates, or suggests differs from what he explicitly conveys.
Grice uses 'explicitly convey' freely, allowing that the assignment of 'denotata' (in 'he') is not a necessary condition ("Are we talking about the same Strawson?" "I never knew he had a twin").
Suppose we turn to another of his tuttees.
Grice utters (1) rather than (2) of one of his tutee's girlfriend:
(1)
"To echo the Great War ditty, she seems honest, but she seems poor."
(2)
"To echo the Great War ditty, she seems honest and her parents seem the same."
At Oxford, class-conscious as it is, Grice very likely will be taken to be implying that there is (or that someone might think there is) some sort of contrast the poverty of the parents of the girlfriend of his tutee and and the *honesty* of the parents of the girlfriend of his tutee:
She was poor, but she was honest,
and her parents were the SYME
till she met a city slicker
and she lost her honest NYME.
victim of the feller's WHYME.
Surely this stupid Tommy ditty is no part of what Grice explicitly conveys because it does not contribute in any way to the truth conditions of the utterance.
By uttering (1), Grice states, only, that his tutee's girlfriend is poor and that she is honest.
Surely this does not entail that there is anything wrong about her parents.
The implication in question Grice is what Grice calls a "convention" colourful implicatum.
According to Grice, by uttering (1) Grice is performing two acts, on different floors.
Grice is stating that his tutee's girlfriend is poor and honest. That's the first floor.
Or the first floor and the mezzanine, to allow for the 'conjunctum.'
Then from the second floor, Grice is and implying, indicating (or suggesting) that someone (perhaps Ryle, echoing class-conscious Oxford) has a certain attitude toward what is stated, especially as it concerns the tutee's girlfriend's parents, and his tutee's antic in calling himself her boyfriend.
Grice is hardly interested in this idea, but he knows many at Oxford are -- notably Dummett, obsessed with Frege as he was.
Grice just leaves it at the claim that a conventional implicatum is determined (at least in part) by this or that 'arbitrary' conventions (alla Lewis) governing what Grice, feeling pretentious, calls the 'syncategorematon' "but."
"Etymologically, 'by-out' -- go figure."
Grice does stress, however, that the sort of implicatum we have just been considering is not a presuppositum (as originally defined by Strawson -- who used 'implicatum,' originally, -- and adopted by others).
q is a presupposition of p, just in case the truth or falsity of p requires the truth of q.
If the truth of p requires the truth of q, but the falsity of q does not, q is a Mooreian entailment of p, which is not cancellable ("He is a three-year old, but he is an adult.")
More precisely, if p presupposes q, p lacks a truth value if q is false.
But as Grice points out, an utterance of "The parents of my tutee's girlfriend are poor" can well be false even if the implied proposition is false, effectively scotching the idea that the implicatum is presuppositum, at least not on the standard semantic conception of that notion.
It is Grice’s view that any alleged presupposition is either an entailment (in the affirmative case -- you cease to eat iron) or a conversational implicatum (in the negative case -- you do not cease to eat iron).
For something to be (part of) what Grice explicitly communicates, it must also be (part of) what Grice communicates simpliciter, i. e., it must be backed by a complex intention of the sort that forms the backbone of Grice’s theory what it is for Grice to 'communicate' that p.
If E utters the sentence "My wife is the cream in my coffee" on Grice’s account Grice should not be SERIOUSLY taking to be putting forward the literal proposition to the effect that that Mrs. Grice is the cream in Grice's coffee, with all this materially implies.
Grice will have made as if to 'state' or communicate that his wife is the cream in his coffee.
For it is Grice’s view that a statement of the form “by uttering x, Grice explicitly communicates that p” entails, alla Moore, the corresponding statement of the form “by uttering x, Grice communicates that p.”
On Grice’s account, one cannot 'unintentionally' communicate that p something.
This fact has interesting consequences for, for example, "the many malaprops I witnessed Davidson proffer with a straight face."
As Grice puts it, "While an unwanted baby is still a baby, an unwanted impicatum is a contradictio in terminis."
Grice’s oeuvre provides a breakdown of what Grice communicates.
What Grice conventionally implicates and what he explicitly communicates are both closely tied to the conventional meaning of the sentence uttered ("unless they are not, as in Humpty Dumpty's conversations with Alice").
They are taken by Grice as exhausting what Grice ("when not in one of my Humpty-Dumpty moves) conventionally communicates, i. e. by virtue of a D. K. Lewis-type arbitration.
Let us now turn to what Grice NON-conventionally (non-arbitrarily) communicates.
Recall again, the day Strawson got his second, with Grice's terse evaluation of Strawson.
By uttering the sentence
“Strawson has beautiful handwriting and he minds his ps and qs,”
Grice explicitly communicates (or made as if to communicate explicitly) that Strawson has beautiful handwriting and that Strawson minds his ps and qs.
In addition, on Grice’s own account, Grice conversationally implicated, ironically, that Strawson is not much good at Lit. Hum. -- but that's okay: he is being examined for a PPE.
A conversational implicatum is a cancellable species of implicatum and is to be seriously contrasted with the non-cancellable conventional implicatum
The principal difference between a conventional and a conversational implicatum is that the existence of a conventional implicatum depends upon the presence of some particular arbitrary device (such as Frege's "aber") whereas the existence of a conversational implicatum does not.
Grice proposes to explain the possibility of a divergence between what Grice explicitly communicates and what he communicates simpliciter by appeal to the nature and purpose of rational concerted co-operative conversational interaction.
Conversation, as everybody knows, is, unless in suburbia, a characteristically purposeful and co-operative, collaborative, mutually helfpul, concerted enterprise governed by what Grice ironically and grandiosely calls "The Principle of Conversational Co-Öperation.
Grice formulates it, 'echoing Kant's categoric imperative, as something "wonderfully vague":
"Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged."
"Make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged."
Subsumed under the Conversational Imperative, Grice distinguishes twelve categories (as Kant did) subsumed under FOUR "FUNKTIONEN", so that the imperative ramifies into a diversity of this or that 'counsel of conversational prudence,' or 'conversational maxim' along these four 'functions,' as Kant calls them:
quantität --
Or
H. P. Grice's principle of conversational fortitude, in terms of informative content.
Or
H. P. Grice's principle of conversational fortitude, in terms of informative content.
qualität --
Or
H. P. Grice's desideratum of conversational candour.
Or
H. P. Grice's desideratum of conversational candour.
relation -- connectedness between material of previous conversational move and your own.
Or
H. P. Grice's Principle of Conversational Relevance (after Strawson, "Identifying reference and truth-values)
Or
H. P. Grice's Principle of Conversational Relevance (after Strawson, "Identifying reference and truth-values)
modus --
Or
H. P. Grice's desideratum of conversational clarity:
the self-defeating, "be perspicuous [sic]."
Or
H. P. Grice's desideratum of conversational clarity:
the self-defeating, "be perspicuous [sic]."
The maxims may be nubered:
quantität
1)
"Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of the exchange)"
"Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of the exchange)"
2)
"Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.
"Do not make your contribution more informative than is required.
qualität:
SUPER-MAXIM:
Try to make your contribution one that is true.
Specifically:
Specifically:
(3) Do not say what you believe to be false;
(4) Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.
Relation:
(5) Be relevant:
link "The weather has been delighftul" to "She is a wind bag."
link "The weather has been delighftul" to "She is a wind bag."
Modus:
SUPER-MAXIM:
"Be not perspicacious, but perspicuous [sic]"
"Be not perspicacious, but perspicuous [sic]"
Specifically:
(6) Be brief, avoid unnecessary prolixity [sic].
(7) Be orderly;
(8) Avoid ambiguity;
(9) Avoid obscurity of expression.
(10) Faciliate in your form of expression the appropriate reply.
"I call this a decalogue, and christen it, for Christ and Kant, the Immanuel, or your favourite conversational manual."
Grice’s basic idea is that there is a systematic correspondence between what E communicates and the assumptions required in order to preserve the supposition that E is observing the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation.
In the case of Grice evaluating Strawson at Collections, by stating that Strawson has beautiful handwriting and that he minds his ps and qs” (in this particular context), Grice seems to be joking, and he is.
The joke was on Strawson, who got a second.
Ryle knowing that Strawson is Grice's tutee (for the logic paper for the PPE), Grice IS in expected to do his tutorial duty (for which he is payed) and expand on Strawson's expertise on Whitehead's and Russell's Principia Mathematica, that Grice was supposed to have Strawson tutored on.
By Grice's cavalier remark, Ryle is naturally led to the conclusion that Grice is kindly trying to convey (via suppressio veri) something else, something more relevant to the purposes at hand.
In the circumstances, if Grice thinks that Strawson is brilliant in his treatment of Whitehead's and Russell's axiom of choice, Grice would have explicitly communicated so.
So Ryle is led to think that Grice, whom Ryle trusts, thinks that Strawson cares a hoot about Whitehead's and Russell's axiom of choice.
Seeing that Ryle is a closet Cantabrian, Grice is reluctant to admit or explicitly communicate so.
And so Grice conversationally implicates that Strawson should get a second.
Ryle is also independently convinced by the fact that the other examiner had lost Strawson's paper in the taxi.
Upon Ryle's frown, Grice's volunteered 'cancelling' remark,
"And, you know, Strawson types, or has someone type, his papers" does not really help (but was, if not on the surface, co-operative).
"And, you know, Strawson types, or has someone type, his papers" does not really help (but was, if not on the surface, co-operative).
That is why Grice qualifies this as Grice having only made "as if" to state or explicitly communicate that Strawson has beautiful handwriting and minds his ps and qs.
Grice could care less if what he utters induces (or activates) in Ryle the opinion that (Grice thinks that) Strawson has beautiful handwriting and that Straawson (literally) minds his ps and qs.
Grice's further attempts at cancellation are sympathetic:
"Literally, his typed thing, full of ps and qs, was all about what my tutee calls the 'predicative calculus."
Grice's further attempts at cancellation are sympathetic:
"Literally, his typed thing, full of ps and qs, was all about what my tutee calls the 'predicative calculus."
The truth-values of what Grice explicitly communicates (or made as if to communicate explicitly) and what Grice conversationally implicated may of course differ.
For all Grice and Ryle care, Strawson may have quite atrocious handwriting.
Grice may assume that Ryle assumes this.
After all Ryle can always confirm or disconfirm this by a glimpse of Strawson's hand-written application. "Was it atrociously hand-written?"
After all Ryle can always confirm or disconfirm this by a glimpse of Strawson's hand-written application. "Was it atrociously hand-written?"
Given the relevance of what Grice calls the conversational point of what is conversationally implicated, Grice trusts Ryle will hardly weigh the evidence on the handwriting front on giving Strawson a second, but more on the cancellable implicatum that Strawson disrespected Whitehead's and Russell's axiom of choice.
The truth-value of what Grice explicitly communicates (or makes as if to communicate explicitly) is a verum that may well be suppressed, or a falsum that may, for all Ryle does not care, suggested.
The primary message (literally 'missum,' or 'emissum') is to be found at the level of what is conversationally implicated.
In general, Grice claims, a conversationalist or emissor E conversationally implicates that which E must be assumed to think in order to maintain the assumption that E is observing the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation (and his ramifications in the decalogue of ten maxims), if not at the level of what Grice is joking about -- the joke on Strawson --, at least at the level of what is implicated.
At some overarching level of what is communicated, Grice is presumed to be observing the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation.
Grice's wording of this or that conversational maxim suggests some concern only what is explicitly conveyed (e.g. “Do not explicitly convey what you believe to be false”).
Grice's alternative wording concern, perhaps, what is communicated or conveyed simpliciter (e.g. “Be relevant”).
Grice's alternative wording concern, perhaps, what is communicated or conveyed simpliciter (e.g. “Be relevant”).
Grice is purposively displaying some looseness of expression.
Having read Kant for years, Grice knows that it is a VIRTUE to be vague.
This is Grice's expressed sentiment when correcting Straswon.
"We might need another maxim, No. 10, that turns our manual into a decalogue. This maxim will be, AS IT SHOULD, vague."
Having read Kant for years, Grice knows that it is a VIRTUE to be vague.
This is Grice's expressed sentiment when correcting Straswon.
"We might need another maxim, No. 10, that turns our manual into a decalogue. This maxim will be, AS IT SHOULD, vague."
In the case of 'be relevant,' it is neither what E conveys simpliciter or conveys explicitly. It is the EMISSOR who has to be relevant.
Relevance is a virtue.
Utterances are not 'relevant' unless in scare quotes.
The emissor is relevant.
By uttering "Lovely weather" he is being relevant, because, as Hobbes notes in "Computatio" with is Roman-history example, he expects his recipient will look for the missing LINK (the co-relatum) and find it.
In the case of 'You are prohibited to explicitly convey what you believe to be false' is a joke.
"My wife is the the cream in my cofee" is an example. As he says in "Indicative conditional."
"My wife is the the cream in my cofee" is an example. As he says in "Indicative conditional."
"She is not!" is not meant to refute that Grice stated that Mrs. Grice is literally the cream in his coffee.
Cf. the idiocy that he would only ascribe to ultra-literalist Austin: "You couldn't have been cleaning the Aegean stables in Seattle."
Except for the maxims under the FUNKTION of Modus (which can apply only to what is explicitly conveyed) it seems reasonable to understand Grice as allowing a maxim not to be fulfilled at the level of what is explicitly conveyed to be licensed or overridden by adherence at the level of what is implicated.
On such a view, blatantly violating a maxim at the level of what is explicitly conveyed but adhering to it at the level of what is implicated would obviously not involve a violation of the Principle of Converational Co-Operation.
Some important questions are still unanswered.
How are 'explicating' and implicating to be defined?
How is the implicatures 'argued'?
What is the status of the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims?
What happens when Grice cannot simultaneously observe all of the maxims?
It is important to see how Grice attempts to face such questions.
No one should deny that in the example of the evaluation of Strawson there is an intuitive and obvious distinction to be made between what Grice explicitly conveyed and what Grice conversationally implicated.
But in view of the sorts of example that really 'bother' Grice – “the Alpha is Beta,” “p or q,” “if p, q,” etc. – he could not rest with an intuitive distinction.
The example concerning the evaluation of Strawson is clear-cut, obvious, and uncontentious.
And herein lies the problem.
The examples of purported conversational implicature that most interest Grice are philosophically important ones with respect to which many philosophers have not felt the need to invoke such a distinction, or were unable "because not too bright" ("I am still surprised how unfrequently Austin cared to make such fine distinctions")
This might be because it is not at all obvious that there is such a distinction to be made in the cases in question (or if there is, how relevant it is), or because adherence to some form of the “meaning is use” dogma has blinded certain philosophers such as Austin to the possibility of such a distinction.
So Grice ultimately needs analyses of “what is explicated” and “what is conversationally implicated” in order to get philosophical profit out of these notions.
Grice hopes to analyze the notion of explicating in terms of E's intention.
A man who, by (in, when) explicating (or making as if to explicate) that p has implicated that q, has conversationally implicated that q, provided that
(1) he is to be presumed to be observing the conversational maxims, or at least the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation;
(2) the supposition that he is aware that q is required in order to make his explicadting or making as if to explicate p consistent with this presumption; and
(3) E thinks (and would expect R to think that E thinks) that it is within the competence of R (usually Ryle) to work out, or grasp intuitively, that the supposition mentioned in (2) is required.
(1) he is to be presumed to be observing the conversational maxims, or at least the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation;
(2) the supposition that he is aware that q is required in order to make his explicadting or making as if to explicate p consistent with this presumption; and
(3) E thinks (and would expect R to think that E thinks) that it is within the competence of R (usually Ryle) to work out, or grasp intuitively, that the supposition mentioned in (2) is required.
We appear to have here a set of necessary conditions. The conditions are not sufficient because conventional implicatures are not excluded.
Whenever there is a conversational implicature, the recipient R should be able to reason somewhat as follows:
(i) E has explicated that p;
(ii) there is no reason to suppose that E is not observing the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims;
(iii) E could not be doing this unless he thought that q;
(iv) E knows (and knows that R know that E knows) that R can see that U thinks the supposition that U thinks that q is required;
(v) U has done nothing to stop R thinking that q;
(vi) U intends R to think, or is at least willing to allow R to think, that q;
(vii) and so, U has implicated that q.
(i) E has explicated that p;
(ii) there is no reason to suppose that E is not observing the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims;
(iii) E could not be doing this unless he thought that q;
(iv) E knows (and knows that R know that E knows) that R can see that U thinks the supposition that U thinks that q is required;
(v) U has done nothing to stop R thinking that q;
(vi) U intends R to think, or is at least willing to allow R to think, that q;
(vii) and so, U has implicated that q.
In each of the cases Grice considers, it does seem to be possible to justify the existence of the implicature in question in this sort of way.
But notice that q is simply introduced without explanation in step (iii), so Grice has, due to the 'indeterminate' character of the implicaturm, purposively NOT provided an Arabic algorithm of for calculating the content of conversational implicatures, only to be refuted by Goedel.
A good deal of work needs to be done on the calculation of particular implicatures if Grice’s evident insights are to form the basis of a finally acceptable theory in empirical psychology.
"But that's up for psychologists. I'm a philosopher."
A necessary condition on conversational implicatures that is intimately connected to condition (3) is that they are intended.
This follows, if not from condition (3), at least from the fact that (a) what E implicates is part of what E communicates, and (b) what E communicates is determined by E's communicative intentions.
R may think that, by communicating that p, E has conversationally implicated that q (R may even have reasoned explicitly in the manner of (i)–(vii) above).
But if E did not intend the implication in question it will OBVIOUSLY not count as a conversational implicature.
"An implicatum is not like a baby -- My neighbour's baby was an unwanted baby -- still a baby -- My neighbour's 'implicature' was unitended -- therefore I was scared!"
We have, then, four conditions that are necessary but not sufficient for classifying an implication as a conversational implicature.
Moore's entailment does not seem to have been excluded, "as if I care."
In order that we may stay focused on the relation between the E and certain proposition, one may tweak on Grice’s jargon.
If the proposition p entails the proposition q, then if Quine is a competent Englishman who says that p, Quine thereby explicates that q.
If Quine states that his neighbour's three-year old is an adult, he states what Grice cannot possibly understand ("whatever creature Quine ends up eventually producing").
So if E is a perfectly competent conversationalist who has sincerely uttered the sentence “My neighbour's three-year old is an adult” not only has E stated that his neighbour's son is a three-years old, but he has also stated that the child is not a child.
It seems desirable, when it comes to Quine, that no proposition be both an entailment and a conversational implicature of the same utterance.
But it is not obvious that the conditions laid down thus far on conversational implicature actually rule out entailments made by Quine, especially when he rejects the notion.
Whatever his benevolent intentions, Grice cannot just impose a further condition to the definition to the effect that no entailment is a conversational implicature.
One of Grice’s avowed aims is to ward off certain ordinary language arguments by invoking a sharp distinction between what we are now calling conversational implicature and entailment; so it is not good enough for him (or Quine) to use the notion of an entailment in a definition of conversational implicature.
A fifth condition Grice imposes on conversational implicatures seems to help.
Unlike an entailment, a conversational implicature is supposed to be cancelable either explicitly or contextually, without contradiction.
If E explicitly conveys that p, and p entails q, E cannot go on to explicitly convey that not-q without contradiction.
Quine, e. g. cannot say "My neighbour's three-year-old is a child and an adult."
But if E explicitly conveys that p, and thereby conversationally implicates that q, Quine can go on to explicitly convey that not-q without contradiction, followed by a loud "Ha!"
If E explicitly conveys that p, and p entails q, E cannot go on to explicitly convey that not-q without contradiction.
Quine, e. g. cannot say "My neighbour's three-year-old is a child and an adult."
But if E explicitly conveys that p, and thereby conversationally implicates that q, Quine can go on to explicitly convey that not-q without contradiction, followed by a loud "Ha!"
Consider again the case of Grice's evaluation of Strawson. After uttering “Strawson has beautiful handwriting and minds his ps and qs,” Grice might (without irony) continue “Moreover, Strawson's recent modal solution to the paradoxes of entailment is a brilliant and original refutation of both G. E. Moore and C. I. Lewis.”
In the light of the first comment, this addition might be rather odd, but it would not result in Grice contradicting himself.
In addition to distinguishing conversational implicatures from entailments, the cancelability test is also supposed to distinguish conversational from conventional implicatures.
Although it will not lead to contradiction, attempting to cancel a conventional implicature will result in a transgression of some sort.
This is precisely because there is a distinct semantic component to conventional implicatures.
This is precisely because there is a distinct semantic component to conventional implicatures.
Putting these five conditions together, we come as close as we can with Grice’s machinery to a set of necessary and sufficient conditions on conversational implicature.
For Grice, the principles involved in an account of conversational implicature are to be grounded in a philosophical psychology that explicates the purportedly hierarchical relationships that hold between the various types of psychological states we ascribe to creatures that can reason and form complex intentions.
The beginnings of this line of thought can be traced to the end of his “Meaning.”
It contains the seeds of
(1) the view that the Principle of Convesational Co-Operation and conversational maxims (in particular the maxim enjoining relevance) are to play a central role not only in an account of possible divergences between what E explicates and what E communicates but also in an account of the resolution of ambiguities, and
(2) the view that the use of language is one form of rational activity and that the principles at work in the interpretation of linguistic behavior are (or are intimately related to) those at work in interpreting intentional non-linguistic behavior.
(1) the view that the Principle of Convesational Co-Operation and conversational maxims (in particular the maxim enjoining relevance) are to play a central role not only in an account of possible divergences between what E explicates and what E communicates but also in an account of the resolution of ambiguities, and
(2) the view that the use of language is one form of rational activity and that the principles at work in the interpretation of linguistic behavior are (or are intimately related to) those at work in interpreting intentional non-linguistic behavior.
Two questions spring to mind immediately.
(1) What are the relative rankings of the maxims in cases where it is hard (or impossible) for E to observe all of them (or all of them to the same degree), and why?
What is the basis, if any, since it's an axiom, or principle, for the assumption that speakers will in general (caeteris paribus and in the absence of indications to the contrary) proceed in the manner prescribed by the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims?
Grice is explicit about the position of at least one of the maxims of Quality in any hierarchy.
Suppose A is planning an itinerary for a vacation to Cornwall.
A wants to see his friend C, if so doing would not require too much additional traveling.
A asks B “Where does C live?”
B replies:
“On the border with Devon, almost."
B knows that A would like more specific information but he is not in a position to be more specific.
A asks B “Where does C live?”
B replies:
“On the border with Devon, almost."
B knows that A would like more specific information but he is not in a position to be more specific.
So B is faced with not fulfilling either a maxim of Quality or a maxim of Quantity.
Quality wins out.
The maxims of Quality have a very special status within Grice’s overall theory and Grice entertains the idea that the first maxim of Quality should be part of some broader background; the other maxims come into operation only on the assumption that the maxim of Quality is satisfied.
The maxims of Quality (or at least the first maxim of Quality) should not be thought of as admitting of degree or varying across universities, viz. Oxford and Cambridge.
In some sense this is an empirical matter; but unlike the maxims of Quantity and Manner, it does not seem very plausible to suppose that at Cambridge standardly philosophy dons behave (for particular reasons to be determined by anthropologists) as if they are boringly and always observing the maxims of Quality, and never utter an irony.
Grice was not satisfied with the idea that it is just a well-recognized empirical fact that people do behave in accordance with the maxims and the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation, that in childhood they learned to do so and have not lost the habit.
He wanted to find a basis that underlies our behavior and believed it would have a moral dimension: not only do we in fact behave in the required way, but it is reasonable for us to do so, and the practice is something we should not abandon given our common purposes or goals.
He wanted to find a basis that underlies our behavior and believed it would have a moral dimension: not only do we in fact behave in the required way, but it is reasonable for us to do so, and the practice is something we should not abandon given our common purposes or goals.
Conversation is one among a range of forms of rational activity for Grice.
Observance of the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims is reasonable (rational).
Anyone concerned about the goals central to communication must be expected to have an interest, given suitable circumstances, in participation in informational exchanges that will be profitable only on the assumption that they are conducted in general accordance with the principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims.
Observance of the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims is reasonable (rational).
Anyone concerned about the goals central to communication must be expected to have an interest, given suitable circumstances, in participation in informational exchanges that will be profitable only on the assumption that they are conducted in general accordance with the principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims.
On Grice’s view, value predicates such as “proper,” “correct,” “optimal,” and “relevant” cannot be kept out of an account of rational activity because a rational creature is essentially a creature that evaluates.
Whether a value-oriented approach to the interpretation of intentional behavior can be developed in a fruitful way remains to be seen.
Whether a value-oriented approach to the interpretation of intentional behavior can be developed in a fruitful way remains to be seen.
But as Grice’s work on ethics and philosophical psychology testifies, there is an answer of the precise location of the theory of conversation within a larger scheme.
One task of semantics is to provide a systematic characterization of judgments concerning truth, falsity, entailment, contradiction, and so on.
In the light of theoretical considerations, an initial judgment of, say, entailment might be rejected on the grounds that the perceived implication is an implicature rather than an entailment.
So far, we have considered only examples of what Grice calls “particularized” conversational implicature, examples in which there is no temptation to say that the relevant implication is an entailment (or a “presupposition”).
Of more philosophical interest are “generalized” conversational implicatures, the presence and general form of which depend little upon the particular contextual details.
Examples discussed by Grice include those attaching to utterances of sentences containing intentional and intensional expressions like “look,” “feel,” and “try,” and “logical” expressions such as “and”, “or,” “if,” “every,” “a,” and “the.”
According to Grice, philosophers who see divergences in meaning between “formal devices” such as "~," ".," "v," ")", “(Ax),” “(Ex),” and “(ix)” and their natural language counterparts tend to belong to one of two camps, which he calls “formalist” or modernist and “informalist" or neo-traditionalist (a joke, how can you be neo and traditionalist -- cf. neo-con).
In the light of theoretical considerations, an initial judgment of, say, entailment might be rejected on the grounds that the perceived implication is an implicature rather than an entailment.
So far, we have considered only examples of what Grice calls “particularized” conversational implicature, examples in which there is no temptation to say that the relevant implication is an entailment (or a “presupposition”).
Of more philosophical interest are “generalized” conversational implicatures, the presence and general form of which depend little upon the particular contextual details.
Examples discussed by Grice include those attaching to utterances of sentences containing intentional and intensional expressions like “look,” “feel,” and “try,” and “logical” expressions such as “and”, “or,” “if,” “every,” “a,” and “the.”
According to Grice, philosophers who see divergences in meaning between “formal devices” such as "~," ".," "v," ")", “(Ax),” “(Ex),” and “(ix)” and their natural language counterparts tend to belong to one of two camps, which he calls “formalist” or modernist and “informalist" or neo-traditionalist (a joke, how can you be neo and traditionalist -- cf. neo-con).
The informalist position is essentially the one taken by Strawson (and others of the “ordinary-language movement”).
The formalist camp is dominated by positivists and others who view natural language as inadequate to the needs of the science and philosophy of an age of precision.
A typical formalist recommends the construction of an “ideal” or “logically perfect” language such as the language of first-order quantification theory with identity (or some suitable extension thereof).
Since the meanings of the logical particles are perfectly clear, using an ideal language, philosophers can state propositions clearly, clarify the contents of philosophical claims, draw the limits of intelligible philosophical discourse, draw the deductive consequences of sets of statements, and generally determine how well various propositions sit with each other.
Grice views the formalists and informalists as mistaken in the assumption of semantic divergence. Both sides have taken mere pragmatic implications to be parts of the meanings of sentences of natural language containing “logical” expressions.
The formalist camp is dominated by positivists and others who view natural language as inadequate to the needs of the science and philosophy of an age of precision.
A typical formalist recommends the construction of an “ideal” or “logically perfect” language such as the language of first-order quantification theory with identity (or some suitable extension thereof).
Since the meanings of the logical particles are perfectly clear, using an ideal language, philosophers can state propositions clearly, clarify the contents of philosophical claims, draw the limits of intelligible philosophical discourse, draw the deductive consequences of sets of statements, and generally determine how well various propositions sit with each other.
Grice views the formalists and informalists as mistaken in the assumption of semantic divergence. Both sides have taken mere pragmatic implications to be parts of the meanings of sentences of natural language containing “logical” expressions.
The case of “and” highlights some important methodological considerations.
Although it is plausible to suppose that “and” (when it is used to conjoin sentences) functions semantically just like “.” there are certainly sentences in which it appears to function rather differently:
1 Jack and Jill got married and Jill gave birth to twins.
2 Nero yelled and the prisoner began to tremble.
Someone who uttered (1) would typically be taken to imply that Jack and Jill got married before Jill gave birth to twins.
And someone who uttered (2) would typically be taken to imply that Nero’s yelling contributed in some way to the prisoner’s trembling.
Thus one might be led to the view that “and” is not always understood as “.” that it is (at least) three ways ambiguous between truth-functional, temporal, and causal readings.
The postulation of semantically distinct readings looks extravagant and Grice suggests it is good methodological practice to subscribe to "modified Occam’s razor."
Snses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.
Given the viability of the distinction between what is said and what is meant, if a pragmatic explanation is available of why a particular expression appears to diverge in meaning in different linguistic environments (or in different conversational settings) then ceteris paribus the pragmatic explanation is preferable to the postulation of a semantic ambiguity.
Grice’s idea is that the implication of temporal sequence attaching to an utterance of
(1) can be explained in terms of the fact that each of the conjuncts describes an event (rather than a state) and the presumption that U is observing the submaxim of Manner enjoining orderly deliveries.
It seems to be Grice’s view, then, that by uttering (1) U will conversationally implicate (rather than say) that Jack and Jill got married before Jill gave birth to twins (if this is correct then what is conversationally implicated would appear to entail what is said in this case).
Similarly, the implication of causal connection attaching to an utterance of (2) is apparently to be explained in terms of the presumption that the speaker is being relevant.
Before looking at problems for this proposal, I want first to get clear about its strengths.
Although it is plausible to suppose that “and” (when it is used to conjoin sentences) functions semantically just like “.” there are certainly sentences in which it appears to function rather differently:
1 Jack and Jill got married and Jill gave birth to twins.
2 Nero yelled and the prisoner began to tremble.
Someone who uttered (1) would typically be taken to imply that Jack and Jill got married before Jill gave birth to twins.
And someone who uttered (2) would typically be taken to imply that Nero’s yelling contributed in some way to the prisoner’s trembling.
Thus one might be led to the view that “and” is not always understood as “.” that it is (at least) three ways ambiguous between truth-functional, temporal, and causal readings.
The postulation of semantically distinct readings looks extravagant and Grice suggests it is good methodological practice to subscribe to "modified Occam’s razor."
Snses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.
Given the viability of the distinction between what is said and what is meant, if a pragmatic explanation is available of why a particular expression appears to diverge in meaning in different linguistic environments (or in different conversational settings) then ceteris paribus the pragmatic explanation is preferable to the postulation of a semantic ambiguity.
Grice’s idea is that the implication of temporal sequence attaching to an utterance of
(1) can be explained in terms of the fact that each of the conjuncts describes an event (rather than a state) and the presumption that U is observing the submaxim of Manner enjoining orderly deliveries.
It seems to be Grice’s view, then, that by uttering (1) U will conversationally implicate (rather than say) that Jack and Jill got married before Jill gave birth to twins (if this is correct then what is conversationally implicated would appear to entail what is said in this case).
Similarly, the implication of causal connection attaching to an utterance of (2) is apparently to be explained in terms of the presumption that the speaker is being relevant.
Before looking at problems for this proposal, I want first to get clear about its strengths.
Conversational explanations trump semantic ambiguities on grounds of theoretical economy and generality.
A conversational explanation is free: the mechanisms appealed to are already in place and independently motivated.
The generality lost by positing several readings of “and” is quite considerable.
First, implications of (e.g.) temporal priority and causal connection attach to uses of the counterparts of “and” across unrelated languages.
Second, implications of the same sorts would surely arise even for speakers of a language containing an explicitly truth-functional connective “.”
Third, the same implications that attach to utterances of “p and q” would attach to an utterance of the two sentence sequence “p. q” not containing an explicit device of conjunction.
On methodological grounds, then, pragmatic accounts of the temporal and causal implications in (1) and (2) are preferable to accounts that appeal to semantic ambiguity.
A conversational explanation is free: the mechanisms appealed to are already in place and independently motivated.
The generality lost by positing several readings of “and” is quite considerable.
First, implications of (e.g.) temporal priority and causal connection attach to uses of the counterparts of “and” across unrelated languages.
Second, implications of the same sorts would surely arise even for speakers of a language containing an explicitly truth-functional connective “.”
Third, the same implications that attach to utterances of “p and q” would attach to an utterance of the two sentence sequence “p. q” not containing an explicit device of conjunction.
On methodological grounds, then, pragmatic accounts of the temporal and causal implications in (1) and (2) are preferable to accounts that appeal to semantic ambiguity.
Grice opposes postulating idiosyncratic pragmatic rules with which to derive generalized implicatures.
Conversational implicatures must be explicable in terms of the Cooperative Principle and maxims, construed as general antecedent assumptions about the rational nature of conversation.
To call an implicature “generalized” rather than “particularized” is only to acknowledge the fact that the presence of the implicature is relatively independent of the details of the particular conversational context, a fact that is to be explained by the cooperative nature of conversation.
A second challenge to classical logic semantics came from Strawson, who challenged Russell on the grounds that the theory does not do justice to ordinary usage.
Emissors use descriptions to refer, not to quantify, and hence Russell’s theory is open to a number of objections.
Conversational implicatures must be explicable in terms of the Cooperative Principle and maxims, construed as general antecedent assumptions about the rational nature of conversation.
To call an implicature “generalized” rather than “particularized” is only to acknowledge the fact that the presence of the implicature is relatively independent of the details of the particular conversational context, a fact that is to be explained by the cooperative nature of conversation.
A second challenge to classical logic semantics came from Strawson, who challenged Russell on the grounds that the theory does not do justice to ordinary usage.
Emissors use descriptions to refer, not to quantify, and hence Russell’s theory is open to a number of objections.
But according to Grice, a number of Strawson’s objections can be defused by distinguishing sentence meaning, what is said, and what is meant.
In Grice’s terminology, one of Strawson’s main complaints against Russell is that his theory conflates the meaning of a sentence “the K is not B” and what U says by uttering this sentence (and similarly the subsentential counterparts of these notions) and so cannot explain the fact that U may say different things on different occasions by uttering the same sentence.
Grice is right that Strawson can get no mileage out of Russell’s failure to separate sentence meaning and what is said in his discussions. Upon reflection it is clear that Russell’s concern is with what is said rather than sentence meaning.
If Russell were being more precise, he would not say that the sentence “the K is not B” is equivalent to the sentence “there is exactly one K and every K is not B”; rather, he would say that what E says by uttering “the K is B” on a particular occasion is that there is exactly one K and every K is not B (occurrences of “K” in the foregoing may, of course, be elliptical).
In Grice’s terminology, one of Strawson’s main complaints against Russell is that his theory conflates the meaning of a sentence “the K is not B” and what U says by uttering this sentence (and similarly the subsentential counterparts of these notions) and so cannot explain the fact that U may say different things on different occasions by uttering the same sentence.
Grice is right that Strawson can get no mileage out of Russell’s failure to separate sentence meaning and what is said in his discussions. Upon reflection it is clear that Russell’s concern is with what is said rather than sentence meaning.
If Russell were being more precise, he would not say that the sentence “the K is not B” is equivalent to the sentence “there is exactly one K and every K is not B”; rather, he would say that what E says by uttering “the K is B” on a particular occasion is that there is exactly one K and every K is not B (occurrences of “K” in the foregoing may, of course, be elliptical).
The fact that a description (or any other quantified noun phrase) may contain an indexical component (“the King of France,” “every man here,” etc.) does not present a problem: all this means is that there are some descriptions that are subject to the Theory of Descriptions and a theory of indexicality.
Grice is surely right, then, that although we need a sharp distinction between sentence meaning and what is said (and their subsentential counterparts), Strawson’s appeal to this distinction when challenging Russell is empty.
Grice neatly disposes of the view that descriptions are ambiguous between Russellian and referential (or identificatory) readings.
When a description is used to identify something, what E means diverges from what E says.
What E says is given by the Russellian expansion but E also intends to communicate information about some particular individual, and although this is part of what E means, it is not part of what E says.
This provides a perfectly satisfactory account of what is going on when E uses a description that does not fit its target, but such cases are not needed to see Grice’s distinctions at work.
Grice is surely right, then, that although we need a sharp distinction between sentence meaning and what is said (and their subsentential counterparts), Strawson’s appeal to this distinction when challenging Russell is empty.
Grice neatly disposes of the view that descriptions are ambiguous between Russellian and referential (or identificatory) readings.
When a description is used to identify something, what E means diverges from what E says.
What E says is given by the Russellian expansion but E also intends to communicate information about some particular individual, and although this is part of what E means, it is not part of what E says.
This provides a perfectly satisfactory account of what is going on when E uses a description that does not fit its target, but such cases are not needed to see Grice’s distinctions at work.
According to Grice, when a description is used in an identificatory way, there will always be a mismatch between what E says and what E means (even where the description uniquely fits the individual the speaker intends to communicate information about) because what is said is, on Russell’s account, analyzable as a quantificational proposition, whereas what is meant will always include a singular or object-dependent proposition.
Again, methodological considerations strongly favour the Gricean account of referential usage over an account that posits a semantic ambiguity.
(1) If we were taught explicitly Russellian truth conditions, referential usage would still occur.
(2) exactly parallel phenomena occur with indefinite descriptions and other quantified noun phrases.
(3) modified Occam’s razor enjoins us to opt for the simpler of two theories, other things being equal.
Subsequently, far more detailed defenses of Russell along Gricean lines have been proposed by other philosophers, but the debts these works owe to Grice are considerable.
More generally, a debt is owed to Grice for rejuvenating the position that classical logic is a remarkably useful tool as far as the semantics of natural language is concerned.
The theory of meaning Grice attempted to analyse or explicate what is said and what is implicated in terms of intention, belief, desire, and recognition.
(1) If we were taught explicitly Russellian truth conditions, referential usage would still occur.
(2) exactly parallel phenomena occur with indefinite descriptions and other quantified noun phrases.
(3) modified Occam’s razor enjoins us to opt for the simpler of two theories, other things being equal.
Subsequently, far more detailed defenses of Russell along Gricean lines have been proposed by other philosophers, but the debts these works owe to Grice are considerable.
More generally, a debt is owed to Grice for rejuvenating the position that classical logic is a remarkably useful tool as far as the semantics of natural language is concerned.
The theory of meaning Grice attempted to analyse or explicate what is said and what is implicated in terms of intention, belief, desire, and recognition.
Analyzing locutions of the forms “X did Y intentionally,” “X caused Y,” “X is true,” “X entails Y,” and so on, has been seen by many philosophers as a central task of philosophy.
Grice’s analyses of “by uttering X, U meant that p,” “X means ‘p’,” and “by uttering X, U said that p” seem to have a reductive and explicative flavour in that it appears to be his view that locutions of the forms can be wholly explicated without appealing to semantical concepts.
He begins with what people mean rather than with what this or that expression, sign, or action means, seeking to analyze this in terms of complex audience-directed intentions on the part of the utterer, and to analyze utterance-type meaning (e.g. sentence meaning and word meaning) in terms of utterer’s meaning.
Grice’s analyses of “by uttering X, U meant that p,” “X means ‘p’,” and “by uttering X, U said that p” seem to have a reductive and explicative flavour in that it appears to be his view that locutions of the forms can be wholly explicated without appealing to semantical concepts.
He begins with what people mean rather than with what this or that expression, sign, or action means, seeking to analyze this in terms of complex audience-directed intentions on the part of the utterer, and to analyze utterance-type meaning (e.g. sentence meaning and word meaning) in terms of utterer’s meaning.
Although Grice aims to neutralize many ordinary language maneuvers with his saying/implicating distinction, one of the driving forces behind his work is still the idea that the meaning of an expression is a function of what its users do with it.
Abstracting away from certain details, the direction of analysis for Grice is obvious enough.
The idea is to begin by providing an analysis of
(1) utterer’s meaning, and then to use this analysis in an analysis of (2) utterance-type meaning.
(3) What is said is then to be defined in terms of a near coincidence of utterer’s meaning and utterance-type meaning (for certain utterance-types); and finally
(4) conversational implicature is to be defined in terms of saying and utterer’s meaning.
Although Grice does not address this point directly, it is clear that the task of explicating the locution “by uttering x, U said that p” takes on some urgency for him, because the saying/implicating distinction is so central to his attempts to counter ordinary language arguments of the sort examined earlier.
Abstracting away from certain details, the direction of analysis for Grice is obvious enough.
The idea is to begin by providing an analysis of
(1) utterer’s meaning, and then to use this analysis in an analysis of (2) utterance-type meaning.
(3) What is said is then to be defined in terms of a near coincidence of utterer’s meaning and utterance-type meaning (for certain utterance-types); and finally
(4) conversational implicature is to be defined in terms of saying and utterer’s meaning.
Although Grice does not address this point directly, it is clear that the task of explicating the locution “by uttering x, U said that p” takes on some urgency for him, because the saying/implicating distinction is so central to his attempts to counter ordinary language arguments of the sort examined earlier.
A direct analysis of saying appears out of the question because Grice openly declares that he is using “say” in a special sense, and this precludes systematic appeal to intuitions about ordinary usage.
By contrast, when it comes to pronouncing on the truth of instances of “by uttering x, U meant that p,” Grice believes he can help himself to such intuitions, many of them quite subtle.
By contrast, when it comes to pronouncing on the truth of instances of “by uttering x, U meant that p,” Grice believes he can help himself to such intuitions, many of them quite subtle.
Strictly speaking, then, saying is to be defined rather than analyzed.
To some philosophers, Grice’s program seems to constitute something of a snub to serious compositional semantics.
The idea that sentence meaning is to be analyzed in terms of utterer’s meaning has been felt to conflict with
(1) the fact that knowing the meaning of a sentence is typically a necessary step in working out what U meant by uttering that sentence, i.e. for recovering U’s communicative intentions, and
(2) the fact that the meaning of a sentence is determined, at least in part, by the meanings of its parts (i.e. words and phrases) and the way the parts are put together (syntax).
Both of these charges are based on misunderstandings of Grice’s project, as will become clear.
The basic Gricean analysis of utterer’s meaning is this:
I. “By uttering x, U meant something” is true iff for some audience A, U uttered x intending:
(1) A to produce some particular response r,
(2) A to recognize that U intends (1), and
(3) A’s recognition that U intends (1) to function, in part, as a reason for (1).
To provide a specification of r, says Grice, is to say what U meant.
Where x is an “indicative” utterance, r is A’s believing something.
II. “By uttering x, U meant that p” is true iff for some audience A, U uttered x intending: (1) A to believe that p, (2) and (3) as above.
(1) utterer’s meaning
(2) utterance-type meaning
(3) what is said
(4) what is conversationally implicated
The “__ Æ __” is understood as “__ (or its analysis) plays a role in the analysis of __ (but not vice versa).”
This type of complex intention Grice calls an “M-intention”: by uttering x, U meant that p iff for some audience A, U uttered x M-intending A to believe that p.
Two general problems face II.
The first is that Grice provides a number of examples in which it would be correct to say that U means that p but incorrect to say that U intends A to believe that p (1989: 105–9).
To some philosophers, Grice’s program seems to constitute something of a snub to serious compositional semantics.
The idea that sentence meaning is to be analyzed in terms of utterer’s meaning has been felt to conflict with
(1) the fact that knowing the meaning of a sentence is typically a necessary step in working out what U meant by uttering that sentence, i.e. for recovering U’s communicative intentions, and
(2) the fact that the meaning of a sentence is determined, at least in part, by the meanings of its parts (i.e. words and phrases) and the way the parts are put together (syntax).
Both of these charges are based on misunderstandings of Grice’s project, as will become clear.
The basic Gricean analysis of utterer’s meaning is this:
I. “By uttering x, U meant something” is true iff for some audience A, U uttered x intending:
(1) A to produce some particular response r,
(2) A to recognize that U intends (1), and
(3) A’s recognition that U intends (1) to function, in part, as a reason for (1).
To provide a specification of r, says Grice, is to say what U meant.
Where x is an “indicative” utterance, r is A’s believing something.
II. “By uttering x, U meant that p” is true iff for some audience A, U uttered x intending: (1) A to believe that p, (2) and (3) as above.
(1) utterer’s meaning
(2) utterance-type meaning
(3) what is said
(4) what is conversationally implicated
The “__ Æ __” is understood as “__ (or its analysis) plays a role in the analysis of __ (but not vice versa).”
This type of complex intention Grice calls an “M-intention”: by uttering x, U meant that p iff for some audience A, U uttered x M-intending A to believe that p.
Two general problems face II.
The first is that Grice provides a number of examples in which it would be correct to say that U means that p but incorrect to say that U intends A to believe that p (1989: 105–9).
Suppose U is answering an examination question and says
“The Battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815.”
Here U meant that the Battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815.
But U did not M-intend the examiner to think that the Battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815 (typically, U will be under the impression that the examiner already knows the answer).
In response to this and related examples, Grice suggests that clause (1) of II. be changed to (11):
(11) A to think that U thinks that p. A distinction is then made between exhibitive utterances (utterances by which U M-intends to impart the belief that U has a certain propositional attitude) and protreptic utterances (utterances by which U M-intends, via imparting a belief that [U] has a certain propositional attitude, to induce a corresponding attitude in the hearer).
“The Battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815.”
Here U meant that the Battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815.
But U did not M-intend the examiner to think that the Battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815 (typically, U will be under the impression that the examiner already knows the answer).
In response to this and related examples, Grice suggests that clause (1) of II. be changed to (11):
(11) A to think that U thinks that p. A distinction is then made between exhibitive utterances (utterances by which U M-intends to impart the belief that U has a certain propositional attitude) and protreptic utterances (utterances by which U M-intends, via imparting a belief that [U] has a certain propositional attitude, to induce a corresponding attitude in the hearer).
The suggested revision may not seem to comport with the commonly held view that the primary purpose of communication is the transfer of information about the world.
On the revised account, the primary purpose seems to be the transfer of information about one’s mental states.
Another worry is that even if the proposed revision is an improvement, it does not weaken the analysis in such a way as to let in cases of reminding (some cases of which bring up another problem).
Suppose U knows that A thinks that p but needs reminding.
So U does something by which he means that p. Not only does it seem incorrect to say (as the original analysis would require) that U intends A to think that p – U knows that A already thinks that p – it also seems incorrect to say (as the modified analysis requires) that U intends A to think that U thinks that p (U may know that A already thinks that U thinks that p).
What seems to be needed here, says Grice, is some notion of an activated belief:
(1) needs to be changed not to (11) but to something more like (12):
(12) A actively to believe that U thinks that p. But there seems still to be a problem involving reminding.
On the revised account, the primary purpose seems to be the transfer of information about one’s mental states.
Another worry is that even if the proposed revision is an improvement, it does not weaken the analysis in such a way as to let in cases of reminding (some cases of which bring up another problem).
Suppose U knows that A thinks that p but needs reminding.
So U does something by which he means that p. Not only does it seem incorrect to say (as the original analysis would require) that U intends A to think that p – U knows that A already thinks that p – it also seems incorrect to say (as the modified analysis requires) that U intends A to think that U thinks that p (U may know that A already thinks that U thinks that p).
What seems to be needed here, says Grice, is some notion of an activated belief:
(1) needs to be changed not to (11) but to something more like (12):
(12) A actively to believe that U thinks that p. But there seems still to be a problem involving reminding.
Suppose A has invited B over for dinner tonight at seven-thirty. B has agreed to come but U doubts B will show up and says as much to A. At seven o’clock, U and A are deep in philosophical conversation and U, realizing that A has lost track of time, says “B will be here in half an hour.”
This type of example suggests we are better off with something like (13), at least for some cases:
(13) A actively to believe that p.
So perhaps a disjunctive clause is going to be required in any finally acceptable analysis.
Perhaps the problem with the first clause of II. is an instance of a more general difficulty concerning the content of the intention (or M-intention) characteristic of communicative behavior.
This seems to be the view of Searle.
One way of putting Searle’s general point is as follows.
By paying too much attention to examples in which U intends to induce in A some propositional attitude or other, Grice has mistakenly taken a particular type of intention that does in fact accompany many utterances – the sub-intention specified in clause (1) – to be an essential ingredient of communicative behavior.
But there are just too many cases of meaning involving linguistic (or otherwise conventional) utterances in which U does not seek to induce in an audience any propositional (or affective) attitude.
Searle brings up three problems.
First, it is not at all clear what attitude I M-intend to impart when making a promise by uttering a sentence of the form "I promise to __."
Second, sometimes I don’t care whether I am believed or not.
I just feel it is my duty to speak up; third, only an egocentric author intends me to believe that p because he has said so.
These are genuine difficulties for Grice’s analysis as it stands, but they do not seem to warrant abandoning Grice’s project.
Rather they suggest that the specification of the type of response mentioned in the first clause needs to be weakened to something like the following:
(14) A actively to entertain the belief/thought/proposition that p.
Of course, in many cases U also intends (or at least would like) A to go on to believe that p, but this fact would not enter into the analysis of utterer’s meaning.
A revision along these lines might provide the beginning of a way out of Searle’s problems.
The second problem is that clause (3) of II. seems problematic.
The original motivation for clause (2) is clear.
It is not enough, Grice points out, for U to mean that p, that U utter x intending A to think that p. U might leave B’s handkerchief near the scene of the murder with the intention of getting the detective (actively) to entertain the thought that B is the murderer.
But there is no temptation to say that by leaving the handkerchief, U meant that B is the murderer.
Hence clause (2), which requires U to intend A to recognize the intention specified in the first clause (however stated).
But what of clause (3)?
This type of example suggests we are better off with something like (13), at least for some cases:
(13) A actively to believe that p.
So perhaps a disjunctive clause is going to be required in any finally acceptable analysis.
Perhaps the problem with the first clause of II. is an instance of a more general difficulty concerning the content of the intention (or M-intention) characteristic of communicative behavior.
This seems to be the view of Searle.
One way of putting Searle’s general point is as follows.
By paying too much attention to examples in which U intends to induce in A some propositional attitude or other, Grice has mistakenly taken a particular type of intention that does in fact accompany many utterances – the sub-intention specified in clause (1) – to be an essential ingredient of communicative behavior.
But there are just too many cases of meaning involving linguistic (or otherwise conventional) utterances in which U does not seek to induce in an audience any propositional (or affective) attitude.
Searle brings up three problems.
First, it is not at all clear what attitude I M-intend to impart when making a promise by uttering a sentence of the form "I promise to __."
Second, sometimes I don’t care whether I am believed or not.
I just feel it is my duty to speak up; third, only an egocentric author intends me to believe that p because he has said so.
These are genuine difficulties for Grice’s analysis as it stands, but they do not seem to warrant abandoning Grice’s project.
Rather they suggest that the specification of the type of response mentioned in the first clause needs to be weakened to something like the following:
(14) A actively to entertain the belief/thought/proposition that p.
Of course, in many cases U also intends (or at least would like) A to go on to believe that p, but this fact would not enter into the analysis of utterer’s meaning.
A revision along these lines might provide the beginning of a way out of Searle’s problems.
The second problem is that clause (3) of II. seems problematic.
The original motivation for clause (2) is clear.
It is not enough, Grice points out, for U to mean that p, that U utter x intending A to think that p. U might leave B’s handkerchief near the scene of the murder with the intention of getting the detective (actively) to entertain the thought that B is the murderer.
But there is no temptation to say that by leaving the handkerchief, U meant that B is the murderer.
Hence clause (2), which requires U to intend A to recognize the intention specified in the first clause (however stated).
But what of clause (3)?
Grice wants this in order to filter out cases in which some natural feature of the utterance makes it completely obvious that p.
He worried about cases like this: in response to an invitation to play squash, Bill displays his bandaged leg.
He worried about cases like this: in response to an invitation to play squash, Bill displays his bandaged leg.
According to Grice, we do not want to say that Bill meant that his leg was bandaged (though we might want to say that he meant that he could not play squash, or even that he had a bad leg).
Many people’s intuitions are less robust than Grice’s here.
Many people’s intuitions are less robust than Grice’s here.
He seems to be worried that in cases like these there is something approximating natural 'meaning' (in scare quotes, alla Stevenson) that interferes with the idea of Bill non-naturally meaning that he has a bandaged leg.
Given the links Grice seeks to forge between natural and non-natural meaning, it is not clear why the putative presence of natural meaning is supposed to be problematic, and so it is not clear why the third clause of II. is needed.
Grice himself brings up cases that seem to create a problem for the third clause.
Suppose the answer to a certain question is “on the tip of A’s tongue.”
Grice himself brings up cases that seem to create a problem for the third clause.
Suppose the answer to a certain question is “on the tip of A’s tongue.”
U knows this; that is, U knows that A thinks that p but can’t quite remember.
So U reminds A that p by doing something by which he (U) means that p.
In such a scenario, even if U has the intention specified in the first clause (however stated), it does not seem to be the case that U has the intention specified in the third clause.
It is noteworthy that the examples Grice uses to justify the third clause involve non-linguistic utterances (Grice’s “St. John the Baptist” and “bandaged leg” cases).
So U reminds A that p by doing something by which he (U) means that p.
In such a scenario, even if U has the intention specified in the first clause (however stated), it does not seem to be the case that U has the intention specified in the third clause.
It is noteworthy that the examples Grice uses to justify the third clause involve non-linguistic utterances (Grice’s “St. John the Baptist” and “bandaged leg” cases).
However, it is possible to construct cases involving properly linguistic utterances in which the fact that p is made just as obvious by the utterance as in Grice’s non-linguistic cases.
Consider an utterance by me of (e.g.) “I’m right here” yelled in the direction of someone known to be looking for me.
Consider an utterance by me of (e.g.) “I’m right here” yelled in the direction of someone known to be looking for me.
Here there is a strong inclination to say that I did not mean what I said.
Problems await Grice if he does not concede the third clause is overly restrictive.
Ultimately, he wants to define locutions of the form "by uttering x, U said that p."
But one of the conjuncts in his proposed definiens is “by uttering x, U meant that p.”
So if he refuses to allow that (e.g.) I can mean that I can speak in a squeaky voice by uttering, in a squeaky voice, “I can speak in a squeaky voice,” Grice will be forced either to conclude that I have not said that I can speak in a squeaky voice, or else to abandon the idea of defining saying in terms of utterer’s meaning (he cannot, of course, say that in such a scenario I have only “made as if to say” that I can speak in a squeaky voice).
It would seem, then, that the third clause will have to be discarded (or at least modified) if saying requires meaning.
Ultimately, he wants to define locutions of the form "by uttering x, U said that p."
But one of the conjuncts in his proposed definiens is “by uttering x, U meant that p.”
So if he refuses to allow that (e.g.) I can mean that I can speak in a squeaky voice by uttering, in a squeaky voice, “I can speak in a squeaky voice,” Grice will be forced either to conclude that I have not said that I can speak in a squeaky voice, or else to abandon the idea of defining saying in terms of utterer’s meaning (he cannot, of course, say that in such a scenario I have only “made as if to say” that I can speak in a squeaky voice).
It would seem, then, that the third clause will have to be discarded (or at least modified) if saying requires meaning.
One positive result of discarding the third clause would be the disappearance of the “tip-of-the-tongue” problem.
Another would be that Bill could mean that he had a bandaged leg in the scenario above, which is not obviously incorrect.
Another would be that Bill could mean that he had a bandaged leg in the scenario above, which is not obviously incorrect.
When it comes to linguistic utterances, there might well be another interesting consequence.
Typically, linguistic utterances do not seem to be underwritten by intentions as complex as M-intentions.
Weakening the analysans by the removing clause (3) goes a long way toward quieting this worry.
However, there are grounds for thinking that the relevant intention will have to be more complex than the one specified by clauses (1) and (2).
The following type of example shows that clauses (1), (2), and (3) do not specify a rich enough intention (or batch of intentions).
Suppose A, a friend of mine, is about to buy a house.
I think the house is rat-infested, but I don’t want to mention this outright to A so I let rats loose in the house knowing that A is watching me.
I know that A does not know that I know that he is watching me do this.
I know A will not take the presence of my rats to be natural evidence that the house is rat-infested.
But I do know, indeed I intend, that A will take my letting rats loose in the house as grounds for thinking that I intend to induce in him the belief that the house is rat-infested.
Typically, linguistic utterances do not seem to be underwritten by intentions as complex as M-intentions.
Weakening the analysans by the removing clause (3) goes a long way toward quieting this worry.
However, there are grounds for thinking that the relevant intention will have to be more complex than the one specified by clauses (1) and (2).
The following type of example shows that clauses (1), (2), and (3) do not specify a rich enough intention (or batch of intentions).
Suppose A, a friend of mine, is about to buy a house.
I think the house is rat-infested, but I don’t want to mention this outright to A so I let rats loose in the house knowing that A is watching me.
I know that A does not know that I know that he is watching me do this.
I know A will not take the presence of my rats to be natural evidence that the house is rat-infested.
But I do know, indeed I intend, that A will take my letting rats loose in the house as grounds for thinking that I intend to induce in him the belief that the house is rat-infested.
Conditions (1)–(3) of II. above are fulfilled.
But surely it is not correct to say that by letting rats loose in the house I mean that the house is rat-infested.
The problem is that in this example my intentions are not wholly overt.
One possible remedy involves adding a fourth clause:
(4) A to recognize that U intends (2).
But the same sort of counterexample can still be generated, and then we need a fifth clause, then a sixth, and so on.
Grice proposed to block an infinite regress by adding a condition that would prohibit any “sneaky” intention: instead of adding additional clauses, his idea was to add a second part to the analysis, the rough import of which is that U does not intend A to be deceived about U’s intentions (1)–(3).
As long as U does not have a deceptive intention of this sort, U is deemed to mean that p.
Something like the following is best seen as the characterization of utterer’s meaning that Grice left us to explore and refine: III.
By uttering x, U meant that p iff for some audience A,
(1) U uttered x intending A actively to entertain the thought that p (or the thought that U believes that p)
(2) U uttered x intending A to recognize that U intends A actively to entertain the thought that p
(3) U does not intend A to be deceived about U’s intentions (1) and (2).
The idea of using utterer’s meaning to explicate sentence meaning is thought by some philosophers to conflict with the idea that the meaning of a sentence is a function of the meanings of its parts (i.e. words and phrases) and their syntactical organization.
But surely it is not correct to say that by letting rats loose in the house I mean that the house is rat-infested.
The problem is that in this example my intentions are not wholly overt.
One possible remedy involves adding a fourth clause:
(4) A to recognize that U intends (2).
But the same sort of counterexample can still be generated, and then we need a fifth clause, then a sixth, and so on.
Grice proposed to block an infinite regress by adding a condition that would prohibit any “sneaky” intention: instead of adding additional clauses, his idea was to add a second part to the analysis, the rough import of which is that U does not intend A to be deceived about U’s intentions (1)–(3).
As long as U does not have a deceptive intention of this sort, U is deemed to mean that p.
Something like the following is best seen as the characterization of utterer’s meaning that Grice left us to explore and refine: III.
By uttering x, U meant that p iff for some audience A,
(1) U uttered x intending A actively to entertain the thought that p (or the thought that U believes that p)
(2) U uttered x intending A to recognize that U intends A actively to entertain the thought that p
(3) U does not intend A to be deceived about U’s intentions (1) and (2).
The idea of using utterer’s meaning to explicate sentence meaning is thought by some philosophers to conflict with the idea that the meaning of a sentence is a function of the meanings of its parts (i.e. words and phrases) and their syntactical organization.
Grice’s project gets something “backwards” it is claimed.
Surely any attempt to model how we work out what someone means on a given occasion will progress from word meaning plus syntax to sentence meaning, and from sentence meaning plus context to what is said, and from what is said plus context to what is meant.
And this clashes with Grice’s view that sentence meaning is analyzable in terms of utterer’s meaning.
But this is incorrect.
Suppose there is a sentence Y of a language L such that Y means (pre-theoretically speaking) “Napoleon loves Josephine” (e.g. if L is Oxonian, the sentence “Napoleon loves Josephine” will do).
When O-speakers wish to mean that Napoleon loves Josephine they are more likely to use Y than a sentence Z that means (pre-theoretically speaking) “Wisdom is a virtue.”
Surely any attempt to model how we work out what someone means on a given occasion will progress from word meaning plus syntax to sentence meaning, and from sentence meaning plus context to what is said, and from what is said plus context to what is meant.
And this clashes with Grice’s view that sentence meaning is analyzable in terms of utterer’s meaning.
But this is incorrect.
Suppose there is a sentence Y of a language L such that Y means (pre-theoretically speaking) “Napoleon loves Josephine” (e.g. if L is Oxonian, the sentence “Napoleon loves Josephine” will do).
When O-speakers wish to mean that Napoleon loves Josephine they are more likely to use Y than a sentence Z that means (pre-theoretically speaking) “Wisdom is a virtue.”
To say this is not to say that it is impossible for U to mean that Napoleon loves Josephine by uttering Z, it’s just to say that normally (usually, typically, standardly) U has a much better chance of getting across the intended message by uttering Y.
Thus it might be suggested that an arbitrary sentence X means (in L) “Napoleon loves Josephine” iff (roughly) by uttering X, optimally, L-speakers mean (would/should mean) that Napoleon loves Josephine.
Grice is not committed to the absurd position that a hearer must work out what U meant by uttering a sentence X in order to work out the meaning of X.
Thus it might be suggested that an arbitrary sentence X means (in L) “Napoleon loves Josephine” iff (roughly) by uttering X, optimally, L-speakers mean (would/should mean) that Napoleon loves Josephine.
Grice is not committed to the absurd position that a hearer must work out what U meant by uttering a sentence X in order to work out the meaning of X.
To see this as a consequence of Grice’s theory is to ignore the connection between the theory of conversation and the theory of meaning.
It is Grice’s view that typically the hearer must establish what U has said (or made as if to say) in order to establish what U meant; and it is by taking into account the nature and purpose of rational discourse that the hearer is able to progress (via, for example, conversational implicature) from what U has said (or made as if to say) to what U meant.
An analysis of sentence meaning in terms of utterer’s intentions does not conflict with this idea.
We must distinguish
(1) accounts of what U said and what U meant by uttering X and (2) accounts of how hearers recover what U said and what U meant by uttering X.
An analysis of sentence meaning in terms of utterer’s intentions does not conflict with this idea.
We must distinguish
(1) accounts of what U said and what U meant by uttering X and (2) accounts of how hearers recover what U said and what U meant by uttering X.
What U meant by uttering X is determined solely by U’s communicative intentions; but of course the formation of genuine communicative intentions by U is constrained by U’s expectations.
U cannot be said to utter X M-intending A to ø if U thinks that there is very little or no hope that U’s production of X will result in A ø-ing.
U cannot be said to utter X M-intending A to ø if U thinks that there is very little or no hope that U’s production of X will result in A ø-ing.
If U M-intends A actively to entertain the belief that (U thinks) Napoleon loves Josephine, and U and A are both Midlander Oxonians, U may well utter the sentence “Napoleon loves Josephine.”
To say this is not to commit Grice to the view that sentences that are not directly (or so directly) connected to the proposition that Napoleon loves Josephine may not be employed to the same effect.
To say this is not to commit Grice to the view that sentences that are not directly (or so directly) connected to the proposition that Napoleon loves Josephine may not be employed to the same effect.
On the contrary, the theory of conversation is supposed to provide an explanation of how this is possible (in the right circumstances).
On the assumption that U and A are both operating in accordance with the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims, there may well be facts about the context of utterance, the topic of conversation, background information, and so on that make it possible for U to mean that Napoleon loves Josephine by uttering a very different sentence.
On the assumption that U and A are both operating in accordance with the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and maxims, there may well be facts about the context of utterance, the topic of conversation, background information, and so on that make it possible for U to mean that Napoleon loves Josephine by uttering a very different sentence.
U’s conception of such things as the context of utterance, the topic of conversation, background information, and A’s ability to work out what U is up to may all play roles in the formation of U’s intentions.
But this does not undermine the view that what determines what U means are U’s communicative intentions.
But this does not undermine the view that what determines what U means are U’s communicative intentions.
We can put aside, then, the question of the conceptual coherence of Grice’s analytical program; the interesting questions concern the adequacy of his concrete proposals for explicating sentence meaning and saying.
The basic idea is to analyze sentence meaning in terms of utterer’s meaning, and then define saying in terms of a near coincidence of utterer’s meaning and sentence meaning.
Sentence meaning for Grice is a species of complete utterance-type meaning, the relevant analysandum for which is “X means ‘p’,” where X is an utterance type and p is a specification of X’s meaning.
Grice puts forward the following as indicative of the general approach he is inclined to explore:
Sentence meaning for Grice is a species of complete utterance-type meaning, the relevant analysandum for which is “X means ‘p’,” where X is an utterance type and p is a specification of X’s meaning.
Grice puts forward the following as indicative of the general approach he is inclined to explore:
IV. For population group G -- say Oxonians, or members of Grice's playgroup, complete utterance-type X means “p” iff
(a) at least some (many) members of G have in their behavioral repertoires the procedure of uttering a token of X if they mean that p, and
(b) the retention of this procedure is for them conditional on the assumption that at least some (other) members of G have, or have had, this procedure in their repertoires.
(a) at least some (many) members of G have in their behavioral repertoires the procedure of uttering a token of X if they mean that p, and
(b) the retention of this procedure is for them conditional on the assumption that at least some (other) members of G have, or have had, this procedure in their repertoires.
For a language containing no context-sensitive expressions, the technical difficulties involved in Grice’s use of the variable “p” both in and out of quotes can be remedied easily enough.
But once we turn (as we must) to complete utterance-type meaning for a language that contains indexicals such as “I” and “you,” demonstratives such as “this” and “that,” and anaphoric pronouns such as “him” and “her,” it is clear that some work is needed to transform IV. into something acceptable.
But once we turn (as we must) to complete utterance-type meaning for a language that contains indexicals such as “I” and “you,” demonstratives such as “this” and “that,” and anaphoric pronouns such as “him” and “her,” it is clear that some work is needed to transform IV. into something acceptable.
This is, some think, a very serious matter.
For without such a transformation, Grice simply will not be able to provide an analysis of utterance-type meaning for a language, and consequently he will not be able to provide the sort of definition of saying he wants.
What, then, is the precise relation between sentence meaning and saying for Grice?
For without such a transformation, Grice simply will not be able to provide an analysis of utterance-type meaning for a language, and consequently he will not be able to provide the sort of definition of saying he wants.
What, then, is the precise relation between sentence meaning and saying for Grice?
It might be thought that if we abstract away from the problems raised by indexicals and other expressions that highlight the gap between sentence meaning and what is said, we will be able to move directly from when uttered by U, X meant “p” to by uttering X, U said that p.
But there are two problems here.
First, only where an utterance-type has certain features do we want to say that a token of that type may be used to say something.
But there are two problems here.
First, only where an utterance-type has certain features do we want to say that a token of that type may be used to say something.
A motorist does not say anything, in Grice’s sense, when he indicates an intention to make a left turn by signalling.
Second, certain cases involving, for example, irony or conversational implicature can be used to show that we cannot make the relevant move directly.
If U utters the sentence “He is a fine friend” ironically, although it would be true to say that the sentence in question means “He is a fine friend,” it would not be true to say that U is saying that he is a fine friend, but that he is a scoundrel.
If U utters the sentence “He is a fine friend” ironically, although it would be true to say that the sentence in question means “He is a fine friend,” it would not be true to say that U is saying that he is a fine friend, but that he is a scoundrel.
On Grice’s account, since U does not mean that he is a fine friend (U has no intention of getting A to believe that (he believes that) he is a fine friend) U is only making as if to say that he is a fine friend
Parallel remarks could apply in the case of Grice's utterance of the sentence, "Strawson has wonderful handwriting and he minds his ps and qs."
Parallel remarks could apply in the case of Grice's utterance of the sentence, "Strawson has wonderful handwriting and he minds his ps and qs."
On Grice’s account, what is said is to be found in the area where sentence meaning and utterer’s meaning overlap.
Abstracting away from context-sensitive expressions once again, it looks as though something like the following preliminary definition is on the right track: V.
By uttering X, U said that p iff
(1) by uttering X, part of what U meant was that p
(2) X consists of a sequence of elements (such as words) ordered in a way licensed by a system of rules (syntactical rules), and
(3) X means “p” in virtue of the particular meanings of the elements in X, their order and their syntactical structure.
Grice’s unhappiness with V. derives from the existence of conventional implicatures.
Recall that Grice does not want to allow the sorts of implications that result from the use of words such as “but,” “yet,” “still,” “even,” and “moreover,” to count as part of what is said.
For example, if U (sincerely and non-ironically) utters the sentence “She is poor but she is honest,” U does not say that there is some sort of contrast between poverty and honesty (or between her poverty and her honesty).
Abstracting away from context-sensitive expressions once again, it looks as though something like the following preliminary definition is on the right track: V.
By uttering X, U said that p iff
(1) by uttering X, part of what U meant was that p
(2) X consists of a sequence of elements (such as words) ordered in a way licensed by a system of rules (syntactical rules), and
(3) X means “p” in virtue of the particular meanings of the elements in X, their order and their syntactical structure.
Grice’s unhappiness with V. derives from the existence of conventional implicatures.
Recall that Grice does not want to allow the sorts of implications that result from the use of words such as “but,” “yet,” “still,” “even,” and “moreover,” to count as part of what is said.
For example, if U (sincerely and non-ironically) utters the sentence “She is poor but she is honest,” U does not say that there is some sort of contrast between poverty and honesty (or between her poverty and her honesty).
Rather, U performs a “central" or "first-floor/mezzanine speech act,” by which U says that she is poor and she is honest, and performs in addition a "non-central" "second-floor speech act," by which U conventionally implicates some sort of attitude toward what is said.
Putting together what U says and what U conventionally implicates we get what U conventionally means.
So for Grice, at best the three conditions in V. define by uttering X, U conventionally meant that p rather than by uttering X, U said that p.
This is as far as Grice goes.
He leaves us with the non-trivial task of separating what U says and what U conventionally implicates, a brilliant Socratic terminus.
Putting together what U says and what U conventionally implicates we get what U conventionally means.
So for Grice, at best the three conditions in V. define by uttering X, U conventionally meant that p rather than by uttering X, U said that p.
This is as far as Grice goes.
He leaves us with the non-trivial task of separating what U says and what U conventionally implicates, a brilliant Socratic terminus.
The notion of what is said is for Grice a fundamentally important notion in philosophy.
If this or that philosopher is unclear about what he is saying (as opposed to what he or she is implicating), that philosopher is liable to make all sorts of mistakes, as is borne out, Grice thinks, by the crude way in which, e. g. Price's causal theory of perception and the Whitehead's and Russell's theory of descriptions have been written off by, respectively, a philosopher like Scots G. A. Paul or English P. F. Strawson respectively concerned with the nuances of 'ordinary' Oxonian.
Furthermore, not until what is said and what is conventionally implicated are separated can what is conversationally implicated be defined in the manner examined earlier.
So for Grice, an analysis of saying takes on some urgency, and it is unfortunate that he does not get any closer to one than he does in producing V. above.
However, it may well be that Grice has brought us as far as we can go without crossing our own paths.
Recall that he wants what is said to comprise the truth-conditional content of what is conventionally meant by someone making a statement; but he cannot appeal directly to truth conditions for fear of undermining one part of his project.
There may be no simple way out of this.
At the same time, only one part of Grice’s project seems threatened, at least outside Oxford: the possibility of providing a definition of saying in terms of utterance-type meaning and what is meant.
No appeal to truth-conditional content is needed in analyses of utterer’s meaning or utterance-type meaning, and to that extent Grice has certainly illuminated these important notions.
In so doing, he has also alerted us to a host of important distinctions that philosophers, linguists, cognitive scientists, and literary theorists ignore at their peril.
Viva Oxford!
If this or that philosopher is unclear about what he is saying (as opposed to what he or she is implicating), that philosopher is liable to make all sorts of mistakes, as is borne out, Grice thinks, by the crude way in which, e. g. Price's causal theory of perception and the Whitehead's and Russell's theory of descriptions have been written off by, respectively, a philosopher like Scots G. A. Paul or English P. F. Strawson respectively concerned with the nuances of 'ordinary' Oxonian.
Furthermore, not until what is said and what is conventionally implicated are separated can what is conversationally implicated be defined in the manner examined earlier.
So for Grice, an analysis of saying takes on some urgency, and it is unfortunate that he does not get any closer to one than he does in producing V. above.
However, it may well be that Grice has brought us as far as we can go without crossing our own paths.
Recall that he wants what is said to comprise the truth-conditional content of what is conventionally meant by someone making a statement; but he cannot appeal directly to truth conditions for fear of undermining one part of his project.
There may be no simple way out of this.
At the same time, only one part of Grice’s project seems threatened, at least outside Oxford: the possibility of providing a definition of saying in terms of utterance-type meaning and what is meant.
No appeal to truth-conditional content is needed in analyses of utterer’s meaning or utterance-type meaning, and to that extent Grice has certainly illuminated these important notions.
In so doing, he has also alerted us to a host of important distinctions that philosophers, linguists, cognitive scientists, and literary theorists ignore at their peril.
Viva Oxford!
REFERENCES:
Works by Grice:
Negation and privation
Dispositions and intention
Meaning
The causal theory of perception
Common sense and scepticism
G E Moore and philosopher's paradoxes
Oxford post-war philosophy
Conceptual analysis and the province of philosophy
Prolegomena
Logic and conversation
Further notes on logic and conversation
Indicative conditionals
Utterer's meaning and intentions
Utterer's meaning, sentence-meaning, and word-meaning
Some models of implicature
Some remarks about the senses
Meaning revisited
Presupposition and conversational implicature
Metaphysics, philosophical eschatology, and Plato's Republic
Actions and events
Aristotle on the multiplicity of being
Vacuous names
Akrasia, in Hintikka and Vermazen
Intention and uncertainty, The British Academy
Pirotese
Prejudices and predilections, which become the life and opinions of H. P. Grice.
Disimplicature
Aspects of reason and reasoning
The conception of value
In defense of a dogma
Definite descriptions in Russell and in the vernacular
Paradoxes of entailment
Can I have a pain in my tail?
Negation
1989: Studies in the Way of Words, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
1991: The Conception of Value, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
2001: Aspects of reason, Oxford: Clarendon.
Negation and privation
Dispositions and intention
Meaning
The causal theory of perception
Common sense and scepticism
G E Moore and philosopher's paradoxes
Oxford post-war philosophy
Conceptual analysis and the province of philosophy
Prolegomena
Logic and conversation
Further notes on logic and conversation
Indicative conditionals
Utterer's meaning and intentions
Utterer's meaning, sentence-meaning, and word-meaning
Some models of implicature
Some remarks about the senses
Meaning revisited
Presupposition and conversational implicature
Metaphysics, philosophical eschatology, and Plato's Republic
Actions and events
Aristotle on the multiplicity of being
Vacuous names
Akrasia, in Hintikka and Vermazen
Intention and uncertainty, The British Academy
Pirotese
Prejudices and predilections, which become the life and opinions of H. P. Grice.
Disimplicature
Aspects of reason and reasoning
The conception of value
In defense of a dogma
Definite descriptions in Russell and in the vernacular
Paradoxes of entailment
Can I have a pain in my tail?
Negation
1989: Studies in the Way of Words, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
1991: The Conception of Value, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
2001: Aspects of reason, Oxford: Clarendon.
Works by other authors (with special emphasis on English members of Grice's playgroup at Oxford):
Ackrill, J. L. Aristotle on eudaimonia.
Austin, J. L. Sense and sensibilia.
Austin, J. L. Philosophical Papers
Ackrill, J. L. Aristotle on eudaimonia.
Austin, J. L. Sense and sensibilia.
Austin, J. L. Philosophical Papers
Avramides, A. (1989) Meaning and Mind, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Grandy, R. E. and Warner, R. (eds.) (1986) Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories, Ends, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Hampshire, S. N. Thought and action.
Hare, R. M. The language of morals.
Hart, H. L. A. Review of John Holloway, The Philosophical Quarterly.
Martinich, A. P. (1984) Communication and Reference, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
Nowell-Smith, P. H. Ethics.
Pears, D. F. Philosophical psychology. London: Duckworth.
Peacocke, C. A. B. Grice. In Evans and McDowell, Truth and meaning. Oxford.
Schiffer, S. (1972) Meaning, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Searle, J. R. (1969) Speech Acts, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Strawson, P. F. (1971). Logico-Linguistic Papers.
Thomson, J. F. Freedom of the will. In Pears.
Urmson, J. O. Philosophical Analysis: its development between the two wars.
Warnock, G. J. (1967). 'Introduction' to The philosophy of perception. Oxford Readings in Philosophy.
Grandy, R. E. and Warner, R. (eds.) (1986) Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories, Ends, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Hampshire, S. N. Thought and action.
Hare, R. M. The language of morals.
Hart, H. L. A. Review of John Holloway, The Philosophical Quarterly.
Martinich, A. P. (1984) Communication and Reference, New York: Walter de Gruyter.
Nowell-Smith, P. H. Ethics.
Pears, D. F. Philosophical psychology. London: Duckworth.
Peacocke, C. A. B. Grice. In Evans and McDowell, Truth and meaning. Oxford.
Schiffer, S. (1972) Meaning, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Searle, J. R. (1969) Speech Acts, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Strawson, P. F. (1971). Logico-Linguistic Papers.
Thomson, J. F. Freedom of the will. In Pears.
Urmson, J. O. Philosophical Analysis: its development between the two wars.
Warnock, G. J. (1967). 'Introduction' to The philosophy of perception. Oxford Readings in Philosophy.
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