Refs.: Luigi
Speranza, "Grice e Michelstaedter: retorica e persuasione," per il
Club Anglo-Italiano, The Swimming-Pool Library, Villa Grice, Liguria, Italia.
migliio: essential
Italian philosopher. Gianfranco Miglio Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to
navigationJump to search Gianfranco Miglio Gianfranco Miglio 1960s.jpg Senatore
della Repubblica Italiana Durata mandato 23
aprile 1992 – 29 maggio 2001 Legislature XI,
XII, XIII Gruppo parlamentare Lega
Nord (1992-1994), Misto (1994-2001) Coalizione PdL
(1994), PpL (1996) Circoscrizione Lombardia
Collegio Como
Sito istituzionale Dati generali Partito politico DC (1943-1959) LN (1992-1994) PF (1994-2001)
Titolo di studio laurea in
giurisprudenza Università Università
Cattolica del Sacro Cuore Professione docente
universitario Gianfranco Miglio (Como, 11 gennaio 1918 – Como, 10 agosto 2001)
è stato un giurista, politologo, accademico e politico italiano. Sostenitore
della trasformazione dello Stato italiano in senso federale o, addirittura,
confederale, fra gli anni ottanta e i novanta è considerato l'ideologo
della Lega Lombarda, in rappresentanza della quale fu anche senatore, prima di "rompere"
con Umberto Bossi dando vita alla breve stagione del Partito Federalista.
Polo scolastico "Gianfranco Miglio" ad Adro. Costituzionalista
e scienziato della politica, fu senatore della Repubblica Italiana nella XI,
XII e XIII legislatura. Ha insegnato presso l'Università Cattolica del
Sacro Cuore di Milano, ove fu preside della Facoltà di Scienze politiche dal
1959 al 1989. È stato allievo di Alessandro Passerin d'Entrèves e Giorgio
Balladore Pallieri, sotto la cui docenza si è formato sui classici del pensiero
giuridico e politologico. Colpito da ictus nel 2000, non si riprese e
morì ottantatreenne nella sua stessa città natale, Como, circa un anno dopo. Il
funerale si tenne a Domaso, sul Lago di Como, comune d'origine del padre e sede
di una villa nella quale il professore si rifugiava spesso; in seguito Miglio è
stato tumulato nel locale cimitero, a fianco dei membri della sua
famiglia[1][2][3][4]. Indice 1 I
primi anni 2 Sviluppo
del lavoro scientifico 2.1 Miglio
storico dell'amministrazione 2.1.1 La
Fondazione italiana per la storia amministrativa 2.1.2 Gli Acta italica 2.1.3 L'edizione
dei lavori della commissione Giulini 2.1.4 Il
saggio Le contraddizioni dello stato unitario 2.1.5 Miglio e Otto Brunner 2.1.6 La chiusura
della FISA 2.2 Miglio
scienziato della politica e costituzionalista 2.2.1 Miglio e Lorenz Von
Stein 2.2.2 Miglio
e Carl Schmitt 2.2.3 La
fine dello stato e il ritorno al medioevo 3 L'impegno
politico diretto e il federalismo 4 Miglio
e la mafia 5 Opere
5.1 Prefazioni
5.2 Opere
su Gianfranco Miglio 5.2.1 In
lingua inglese 6 Bibliografia
7 Note
7.1 Altri
progetti 8 Collegamenti
esterni I primi anni Laureatosi in Giurisprudenza all'Università Cattolica nel
1940 con una tesi sulle Origini e i primi sviluppi delle dottrine giuridiche
internazionali pubbliche nell'età moderna, evitò l'arruolamento per la
Seconda guerra mondiale a causa di un difetto uditivo congenito, e poté
divenire assistente volontario alla cattedra di Storia delle dottrine
politiche, che d'Entreves tenne sino alla fine degli anni quaranta nella
medesima università[5][6][7]. Libero docente nel 1948, Miglio si dedicò
negli anni cinquanta allo studio delle opere di storici e giuristi, soprattutto
tedeschi: dai quattro volumi del Deutsche Genossenschaftsrecht che Otto Von Gierke
scrisse tra il 1869 e il 1913, ai saggi di storia amministrativa di Otto
Hintze, alcuni dei quali, negli anni seguenti, vennero tradotti in italiano dal
suo allievo e ferrato germanista Pierangelo Schiera (O. Hintze, Stato e
società, Zanichelli 1980). Fu di quegli anni l'incontro del giovane
Miglio con l'immensa produzione scientifica di Max Weber: il professore comasco
fu uno dei primi ad aver studiato a fondo Economia e Società, l'opera più
importante del sociologo tedesco che era stata completamente trascurata in
Italia. Sviluppo del lavoro scientifico Miglio storico
dell'amministrazione Alla fine degli anni cinquanta, Miglio fondò con il
giurista Feliciano Benvenuti l'ISAP Milano (Istituto per la Scienza
dell'Amministrazione Pubblica), ente pubblico partecipato da Comune e Provincia
di Milano, di cui ricopri per alcuni anni la carica di vicedirettore. In un
saggio memorabile intitolato Le origini della scienza dell'amministrazione
(1957), il professore comasco descriveva con elegante chiarezza le radici
storiche della disciplina. L'interesse per il campo dell'amministrazione era
dovuto in quegli anni alle politiche pianificatrici che gli stati andavano
conducendo per l'incremento della crescita economica. La Fondazione
italiana per la storia amministrativa Ben presto Miglio sentì tuttavia
l'esigenza di studiare in modo più sistematico la storia dei poteri pubblici
europei e, negli anni sessanta, costituì la Fondazione italiana per la storia
amministrativa: un istituto le cui ricerche vennero condotte con rigoroso
metodo scientifico. A tal proposito, il professore aveva appositamente
preparato per i collaboratori della fondazione uno schema di istruzioni
divenuto famoso per chiarezza e organicità. In realtà, fondando la F.I.S.A.
Miglio si era posto l'ambizioso obiettivo di scrivere una storia
costituzionale che prendesse in esame le amministrazioni pubbliche
esistite in luoghi e tempi diversi: in tal modo egli sarebbe riuscito a
tracciare una vera e propria tipologia delle istituzioni dal medioevo all'età
contemporanea, al cui interno sarebbero stati indicati i tratti distintivi o,
viceversa, gli elementi comuni di ogni potere pubblico. Ma v'era un'altra
ragione che aveva indotto Miglio a studiare i poteri pubblici in un'ottica,
come scriveva lui stesso, analogico-comparativa. Servendosi di un metodo
scientifico che Hintze aveva parzialmente seguito nella prima metà del
Novecento, il professore comasco intendeva definire l'evoluzione storica dello
stato moderno, storicizzando in tal modo le stesse istituzioni
contemporanee. Gli Acta italica La fondazione pubblicava tre collezioni:
gli Acta italica, l'Archivio (diviso in due collane: la prima riguardante
ricerche e opere strumentali, la seconda dedicata alle opere dei maggiori
storici dell'amministrazione) e gli Annali. Tra i più autorevoli lavori storici
pubblicati nell'Archivio, si ricordano il volume sui comuni italiani di Walter
Goetz e il famoso saggio di Pietro Vaccari sulla territorialità del contado
medievale. Nella prima serie alcuni giovani studiosi poterono invece pubblicare
le loro ricerche di storia delle istituzioni: Gabriella Rossetti, allieva dello
storico Cinzio Violante, vi diede alle stampe un approfondito studio sulla
società e sulle istituzioni nella Cologno Monzese dell'Alto Medioevo; Adriana
Petracchi pubblicò la prima parte di un'interessante ricerca sullo sviluppo
storico dell'istituto dell'intendente nella Francia dell'ancien régime; occorre
inoltre ricordare il poderoso volume di Pierangelo Schiera sul cameralismo
tedesco e sull'assolutismo nei maggiori stati germanici. Su tutt'altro piano si
poneva invece la collezione della F.I.S.A. denominata Acta italica: al suo
interno dovevano essere pubblicati i documenti relativi all'amministrazione
pubblica degli stati italiani preunitari: è probabile che l'ispirazione per
quest'ultima serie fosse venuta a Miglio dallo studio delle opere di
Hintze: verso la fine del XIX secolo, lo storico tedesco aveva infatti scritto
alcuni saggi sull'amministrazione prussiana pubblicandoli negli Acta borussica,
un'autorevole collana che raccoglieva le fonti storiche dello stato degli
Hohenzollern. L'edizione dei lavori della commissione Giulini Tra i
volumi degli Acta italica, occorre ricordare l'edizione dei lavori della
Commissione Giulini curata da Nicola Raponi nel 1962, uno studio cui Miglio
tenne molto e di cui si servì, molti anni dopo, per la stesura del celebre
saggio su Vocazione e destino dei lombardi (in AA.VV. La Lombardia moderna,
Electa 1989, ripubblicato in G. Miglio, Io, Bossi e la Lega, Mondadori 1994).
La commissione - i cui lavori avevano avuto luogo a Torino dal 10 al 26 maggio
1859 sotto la presidenza del nobile milanese Cesare Giulini della Porta - aveva
il compito di elaborare progetti di legge che sarebbero entrati in vigore in
Lombardia nel periodo immediatamente successivo alla guerra. Cavour, che in
quegli anni ricopriva la carica di primo ministro, voleva che il governo, nel
sancire l'annessione dei nuovi territori al Piemonte di Vittorio Emanuele,
mantenesse separati gli ordinamenti amministrativi delle due regioni, lasciando
che in Lombardia continuassero a sussistere una parte delle istituzioni
austriache esistenti. Il saggio Le contraddizioni dello stato unitario
Nel saggio magistrale Le contraddizioni dello stato unitario (1969) scritto in
occasione del convegno per il centenario delle leggi di unificazione, Miglio
prese in esame gli effetti devastanti che l'accentramento amministrativo aveva
provocato nel sistema politico italiano. La classe politica italiana non fu
capace di elaborare un ordinamento amministrativo che consentisse allo stato di
governare adeguatamente un territorio esteso dalle Alpi alla Sicilia.
Ricorrendo a una felice similitudine, il professore scrisse che la scelta di
estendere le norme piemontesi a tutta Italia fu come "far indossare a un
gigante il vestito di un nano". Secondo Miglio, i nostri "padri della
patria", spaventati dalle annessioni a cascata e dalle circostanze
fortunose in cui era avvenuta l'unificazione, preferirono conservare
ottusamente gli istituti piemontesi, costringendo la stragrande maggioranza
degli italiani ad essere governati da istituzioni che, oltre ad essere
percepite come "straniere", si rivelarono palesemente
inefficienti. Nel saggio, Miglio aveva però messo in luce un altro dato
fondamentale; il professore scrisse che il paese, quantunque fosse stato
formalmente unito dalle norme piemontesi, continuò nei fatti a restare diviso
ancora per molti anni: le leggi, che il Parlamento emanava dalle Alpi alla
Sicilia, venivano infatti interpretate in cento modi diversi nelle regioni
storiche in cui il Paese continuava, nonostante tutto, ad essere naturalmente
articolato. Era il federalismo che, negato alla radice dalla classe politica
liberal-nazionale in nome dell'unità, si prendeva ora la rivincita traducendosi
in forme evidenti di "criptofederalismo".[senza fonte] Miglio e
Otto Brunner Furono inoltre fondamentali, nella formazione del professor
Miglio, i lavori dello storico austriaco Otto Brunner: di questo eminente studioso
di storia medievale Miglio non solo fece tradurre svariati saggi (O.Brunner,
Per una nuova storia costituzionale e sociale, Vita e Pensiero 1970), ma
promosse anche la pubblicazione dell'opera monumentale Land und Herrschaft: in
questo lavoro - uscito per la prima volta nel 1939 - Brunner aveva preso in
esame la costituzione materiale degli ordinamenti medievali, ponendo in
evidenza i numerosi elementi di diversità tra la civiltà dell'età di mezzo e
quella moderna, soprattutto nel modo di concepire il diritto. La traduzione
di Land und Herrschaft, affidata inizialmente alle cure di Emilio Bussi,
sarebbe dovuta comparire nell'elegante collana della F.I.S.A. già negli anni
sessanta. Interrotto negli anni seguenti, il lavoro venne invece portato a
compimento solo nei primi anni ottanta dagli allievi Pierangelo Schiera e
Giuliana Nobili. Pubblicato da Giuffré con il titolo di "Terra e
potere", il capolavoro di Brunner apparve nel 1983 negli Arcana imperii,
la collana di scienza della politica di cui Miglio era divenuto direttore nei
primi anni Ottanta. Il professore comasco si occupò inoltre dei contributi
recati alla scienza dell'amministrazione da parte di altri due storici e
giuristi tedeschi: Lorenz Von Stein e Rudolf Gneist. La chiusura della
FISA Negli anni Settanta la F.I.S.A. dovette chiudere i battenti per
mancanza di fondi. Il professor Miglio, ricordando a distanza di tempo la fine
di quell'autorevole collana di storia delle istituzioni, ne espose le ragioni
con un breve commento: "Malgrado la sua efficienza, la F.I.S.A. ebbe vita
breve: gli enti che provvedevano al suo finanziamento, non scorgendo l'utilità
"politica" immediata della sua attività, strinsero i cordoni della
borsa". Miglio scienziato della politica e costituzionalista Negli
anni ottanta, il degenerarsi del clima politico in Italia indusse il professor
Miglio ad occuparsi di riforme istituzionali; egli intendeva contribuire in tal
modo alla modernizzazione del paese. Fu così che, nel 1983, raggruppando un
gruppo di esperti di diritto costituzionale e amministrativo stese un organico
progetto di riforma limitato alla seconda parte della costituzione. Ne uscirono
due volumi che, pubblicati nella collana Arcana imperii, vennero completamente
trascurati dalla classe politica democristiana e socialista. Tra le proposte
più interessanti avanzate dal "Gruppo di Milano" - così venne
definito il pool di professori coordinati da Miglio - v'era il rafforzamento
del governo guidato da un primo ministro dotato di maggiori poteri, la fine del
bicameralismo perfetto con l'istituzione di un senato delle regioni sul modello
del Bundesrat tedesco, ed infine l'elezione diretta del primo ministro da
tenersi contemporaneamente a quella per la camera dei deputati. Secondo
il gruppo di Milano, queste e numerose altre riforme avrebbero garantito
all'Italia una maggiore stabilità politica, cancellando lo strapotere dei
partiti e salvaguardando la separazione dei poteri propria di uno stato di
diritto. Diversamente dalla F.I.S.A., la collana Arcana imperii era incentrata
esclusivamente sullo studio scientifico dei comportamenti politici. Il citato
volume di Brunner costituì pertanto un'eccezione perché, come si è avuto
modo di accennare, esso doveva essere pubblicato negli eleganti volumi della
F.I.S.A. già negli anni sessanta. All'interno della collana Arcana imperii
vennero invece inseriti saggi e contributi di psicologia politica, di etologia,
di teoria politica, di economia, di sociologia e di storia. Miglio
intendeva costituire un vero e proprio laboratorio dove lo scienziato della
politica, servendosi dei risultati portati alla disciplina dalle diverse
scienze sperimentali, fosse in grado di conseguire una formazione scientifica
che si ponesse all'avanguardia; dal 1983 al 1995 vi vennero pubblicati più di
trenta volumi. Si ricordano, tra gli altri: lo studio di Lorenzo Ornaghi sulla
dottrina della corporazione nel ventennio fascista, l'edizione degli scritti
schmittiani su Thomas Hobbes, la pubblicazione - interrotta - di alcune opere
di Lorenz Von Stein, il trattato di diritto costituzionale del tedesco Rudolph
Smend. Degni di nota anche gli scritti degli economisti Ludwig Von Mises e
Friedrich Von Hayek. I volumi, di squisita fattura, non poterono tuttavia
eguagliare l'elegante veste tipografica di quelli pubblicati dalla F.I.S.A., ed
un identico destino parve accomunare le due collane: anche in questo caso,
Miglio fu infatti costretto a sospendere le pubblicazioni. Miglio e
Lorenz Von Stein Alla formazione del pensiero politico di Gianfranco Miglio
contribuirono le opere sociologiche di Lorenz Von Stein e i saggi di Carl
Schmitt sulle categorie del politico. Secondo Stein, in ogni comunità sono
presenti due realtà irriducibili: lo stato e la società. La società è il
terreno della libera iniziativa, ove gli uomini forti vincono sui deboli e
tentano di stabilizzare le loro posizioni attraverso l'ordinamento giuridico;
lo stato è invece il luogo ove regna il principio di uguaglianza. Per Stein
esso non può che identificarsi con la monarchia: il re è infatti l'unica
autorità in grado di intervenire a sostegno dei più deboli. Già a partire dalla
seconda metà del Settecento i monarchi, attraverso il potere di ordinanza,
erano stati in grado di modificare le costituzioni giuridiche cetuali
all'interno dei loro territori, una politica ch'essi avevano potuto condurre in
porto non senza grosse difficoltà, a vantaggio del bene comune: questo era
accaduto soprattutto in Austria, in Prussia e in Sassonia, ma anche nella
Lombardia austriaca e nel Granducato di Toscana. È probabile che Stein,
quando sosteneva che il ruolo dello stato dovesse controbilanciare quello della
società, avesse in mente il riformismo illuminato delle grandi monarchie
assolute di fine Settecento (la Prussia di Federico II, l'Austria di Giuseppe
II). In realtà, le sue dottrine sociologiche si ponevano all'interno dello
stato liberale e partivano dal presupposto che la monarchia, lungi dall'essere
un potere assoluto, dovesse comunque fare i conti con il potere della società
attestato nei parlamenti. Secondo Stein ogni comunità prospera solo quando
stato e società sono in equilibrio, ugualmente vitali ed operanti. Anche il
professor Miglio credeva che ogni comunità fosse dominata da due realtà
irriducibili ma, a differenza di Lorenz Von Stein, egli non le identificava nello
stato e nella società: Non lo stato, perché è una realtà storica inserita nel
tempo e, come tutte le creature e specie viventi, destinata a decadere,a
scomparire ed essere sostituita da altre forme di aggregazione politica; non la
società perché Stein la considerava in un'ottica esclusivamente
economico-giuridica e l'aveva tenuta artificiosamente separata dall'altra
realtà, lo stato. Miglio e Carl Schmitt Tornando alla formazione di
Miglio, fu senza dubbio decisivo l'incontro con l'eminente giurista tedesco
Carl Schmitt, le cui opere erano state in gran parte trascurate dagli
intellettuali italiani. L'aiuto che Schmitt aveva finito per prestare al regime
hitleriano, in particolare nel sostenere la legalità delle leggi razziali in un
sistema di diritto internazionale, furono più che sufficienti per oscurare in
Italia la sua imponente produzione scientifica. In realtà, i rapporti di
Schmitt con il nazismo furono di breve durata: nella seconda metà degli anni
trenta, il giurista di Plettenberg aveva preso definitivamente le distanze da
Hitler.[senza fonte] Di Schmitt il professor Miglio apprezzò gli studi di
scienza politica e di diritto internazionale: nel 1972 curò assieme a Schiera
l'edizione italiana di alcuni saggi pubblicati dal Mulino con il titolo Le
categorie del politico. Nella prefazione al volume, il professore si soffermò
sui decisivi contributi portati da Schmitt alla scienza politologica.
L'antologia destò scalpore nel mondo accademico. Norberto Bobbio sostenne che,
con quegli scritti, Miglio aveva "destabilizzato la sinistra
italiana". È dall'incontro con la grande produzione scientifica di Carl
Schmitt che Miglio riuscì quindi a "fabbricarsi" gli strumenti per
costruire una parte importante del suo modello sociologico. Nel Begriff des
Politischen, Schmitt aveva infatti scoperto che l'essenza del politico è
fondata sul conflitto tra amico e nemico: è uno scontro all'ultimo sangue
perché la guerra politica porta normalmente all'eliminazione fisica
dell'avversario. Non a caso il giurista tedesco sostenne che l'esempio più
emblematico di scontro politico fosse la guerra civile (Bürgerkrieg) tra
fazioni partigiane: qui il tasso di conflittualità tra amico e nemico è sempre
stato altissimo. Chi ha gli stessi amici non può che avere gli stessi nemici
del proprio compagno di lotta. Si crea in altre parole un clima di solidarietà
tra i membri del gruppo che è decisivo nella guerra contro i nemici. Il
rapporto politico è sempre esclusivo, volto a marcare l'identità del gruppo in
opposizione a quella degli altri. Schmitt aveva inoltre scoperto che
l'avvento dello stato moderno aveva portato a due risultati di eccezionale
portata storica. Primo: la fine delle guerre civili all'interno del territorio
(le faide e le guerre confessionali del XVI-XVII secolo) con l'annientamento
del ruolo politico detenuto sino a quel momento dalle fazioni in lotta (dai
partiti confessionali ai ceti). Da quel momento i sovrani furono i supremi
garanti dell'ordine all'interno degli stati, territori sempre più estesi
ch'essi governarono servendosi di un apparato amministrativo regolato dal
diritto. Il secondo grande risultato fu per certi versi una conseguenza del
primo: l'avvento dello stato moderno portò nello stesso periodo all'erezione di
un sistema di diritto internazionale (ius publicum europeum) assolutamente
vincolante per i paesi che vi aderirono. Anche in questo caso, il tasso di
politicità (cioè l'aggressività delle parti in lotta, gli stati) venne
fortemente limitato: le guerre legittime, intraprese solo dagli stati, vennero
condotte da quel momento in base alle regole dello ius publicum europaeum. Si
trattava quindi di conflitti a basso tasso di politicità, non foss'altro perché
la vittoria di una delle parti in lotta non poteva portare in alcun modo
all'annientamento dell'avversario, il cui diritto di esistenza era tutelato dal
diritto e accettato da tutti gli stati. La crisi dello ius publicum
europaeum, divenuta palese alla fine della Prima guerra mondiale e acuitasi
ulteriormente con lo scoppio delle guerre partigiane nei decenni successivi,
resero palese a Schmitt la fine della regle de droit su cui si era fondato
l'universo giuridico occidentale nei rapporti internazionali tra stati sovrani.
La guerra civile e, in modo particolare, l'estrema politicizzazione avvenuta
durante le guerre mondiali con la criminalizzazione degli avversari persuasero
Schmitt che la fine dello ius publicum europaeum era ormai compiuta. In questo,
il giurista tedesco vide soprattutto il fallimento della civiltà giuridica
occidentale nel suo supremo tentativo di fondare i rapporti umani unicamente
sulle basi del diritto. Anche Miglio prese atto della fine dello ius
publicum europaeum ma, a differenza di Schmitt, non credette che tale processo
segnasse la fine del diritto e la vittoria definitiva delle leggi aggressive
della politica. Fondando il suo originale modello sociologico,
egli sostenne che tutte le comunità umane si sono sempre rette su due tipi
di rapporti: l'obbligazione politica e il contratto-scambio. Ai suoi occhi, lo
stato (moderno) era stato un autentico capolavoro perché, apportando un
contributo decisivo alla sua costituzione, i giuristi dell'età moderna erano
riusciti a regolare la politica inserendola in un compiuto sistema di norme
fondato sulla razionalità del diritto, sull'impersonalità del comando e sui
concetti di contratto e rappresentanza: tutti elementi appartenenti alla sfera
del contratto/scambio. Secondo il professore, il crollo dello ius
publicum europeum aveva però messo in crisi la stessa impalcatura su cui si reggeva
lo stato, che ora dimostrava tutta la sua storicità. Diversamente da Schmitt,
che era rimasto legato all'idea dell'organizzazione statale, Miglio sosteneva
che la civiltà occidentale, soprattutto dopo il 1989, stesse attraversando una
fase di transizione al termine della quale lo stato verrà probabilmente
sostituito da altre forme di comunità ove obbligazione politica e
contratto/scambio si reggeranno in un nuovo equilibrio. La fine dello
stato e il ritorno al medioevo Con il crollo del muro di Berlino (1989), il
professore ritenne che lo stato moderno fosse giunto al capolinea. Il progresso
tecnologico e, in modo particolare, il più alto livello di ricchezza cui erano
giunti i paesi occidentali lo convinsero che negli anni successivi sarebbero avvenuti
cambiamenti di portata radicale, tali da coinvolgere anche la costituzione
(Verfassung) degli ordinamenti politici. Secondo Miglio, lo stato avrà in
futuro crescenti difficoltà nel garantire servizi efficienti alla popolazione.
Ciascun cittadino, vedendo accresciuto il proprio tenore di vita in forza
dell'economia di mercato, sarà infatti portato ad avere sempre meno fiducia nei
lenti meccanismi della burocrazia pubblica, ch'egli riterrà inadeguata a
soddisfare i suoi standard di vita. L'elevata produttività dei paesi
avanzati e la vittoria definitiva dell'economia di mercato su quella pubblica
porterà in altri termini a nuove forme di aggregazione politica al cui interno
i cittadini saranno destinati a contare in misura molto maggiore rispetto a quanto
non lo siano oggi nei vasti stati in cui si trovano inseriti. Secondo il
professore gli stati democratici, ancora fondati su istituti rappresentativi
risalenti all'Ottocento, non riusciranno più a provvedere agli interessi della
civiltà tecnologica del secolo XXI. Con il crollo del muro di Berlino e la fine
della guerra fredda, si creano in altri termini le premesse perché la politica
cessi di ricoprire un ruolo primario nelle comunità umane e venga invece
subordinata agli interessi concreti dei cittadini, legati alla logica di
mercato. La fine degli stati moderni porterà secondo Miglio alla
costituzione di comunità neofederali dominate non più dal rapporto politico di
comando-obbedienza, bensì da quello mercantile del contratto e della mediazione
continua tra centri di potere diversi: sono i nuovi gruppi in cui sarà
articolato il mondo di domani, corporazioni dotate di potere politico ed
economico al cui interno saranno inseriti gruppi di cittadini accomunati dagli
stessi interessi. Secondo il professore, il mondo sarà costituito da una
società pluricentrica, ove le associazioni territoriali e categoriali vedranno
riconosciuto giuridicamente il loro peso politico non diversamente da quanto
avveniva nel medioevo. Di qui l'appello a riscoprire i sistemi politici
anteriori allo stato, a riscoprire quel variegato mosaico medievale costituito
dai diritti dei ceti, delle corporazioni e, in particolar modo, delle libere
città germaniche. Il professore studiò a fondo gli antichi sistemi
federali esistiti tra il medioevo e l'età moderna: le repubbliche urbane
dell'Europa germanica tra il XII e il XIII secolo, gli ordinamenti elvetici
d'antico regime, la Repubblica delle Province Unite e, da ultimo, gli Stati
Uniti tra il 1776 e il 1787. Ai suoi occhi, il punto di forza risiedeva
precisamente nel ruolo che quei poteri pubblici avevano saputo riconoscere alla
società nelle sue articolazioni corporative e territoriali. Miglio dedicò i
suoi ultimi anni allo studio approfondito di questi temi, progettando di
scrivere un volume intitolato l'Europa degli Stati contro l'Europa delle città.
Il libro è rimasto incompiuto per la morte del professore. L'impegno
politico diretto e il federalismo Nel 1943, a 25 anni, Miglio si iscrisse alla
neonata Democrazia Cristiana, che lasciò nel 1959[8], quando divenne preside
della Facoltà di Scienze politiche dell'Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di
Milano; Miglio rimase comunque legato culturalmente alla DC fino al 1968. Il 27
aprile 1945, nell'immediato domani della Liberazione, fu tra i fondatori, a
Como, del movimento federalista “Il Cisalpino”, con altri docenti
dell'Università Cattolica di Milano. Ispirato alle idee di Carlo Cattaneo, il
programma del “Cisalpino” prevedeva la suddivisione del territorio italiano su
base cantonale, secondo il modello svizzero, con la costituzione di tre grandi
macroregioni (Nord, Centro e Sud). Nel 1971 il suo nome venne proposto
per il conferimento del titolo di Commendatore dell'Ordine al Merito della
Repubblica Italiana, ma una volta informato del fatto rifiutò di accettare
l'onorificenza, che venne annullata con un successivo Decreto presidenziale
l'anno seguente. Nel 1990 Miglio si avvicinò alla Lega Nord. Eletto nel 1992 al
Senato della Repubblica come indipendente nelle liste della Lega Nord-Lega
Lombarda (da allora a Miglio fu attribuito l'appellativo lombardo di Profesùr),
per quattro anni (dal 1990 al 1994) lavorò per il partito con l'intento di
farne un'autentica forza di cambiamento. In questo periodo elaborò un
progetto di riforma federale fondato sul ruolo costituzionale assegnato
all'autorità federale e a quella delle macroregioni o cantoni (del Nord o
Padania, del Centro o Etruria, del Sud o Mediterranea, oltre alle cinque
regioni a statuto speciale). Questa architettura costituzionale prevedeva
l'elezione di un governo direttoriale composto dai governatori delle tre
macroregioni, da un rappresentante delle cinque regioni a statuto speciale e
dal presidente federale. Quest'ultimo, eletto da tutti i cittadini in due
tornate elettorali, avrebbe rappresentato l'unità del paese. I
puntisalienti del progetto, esposti nel Decalogo di Assago del 1993, vennero
fatti propri dalla Lega Nord solo marginalmente: il segretario federale,
Umberto Bossi, preferì infatti seguire una politica di contrattazione con
lo stato centrale che mirasse al rafforzamento delle autonomie regionali.
Il dissenso di Miglio, iniziato al congresso leghista di Assago, si acuì dopo
le elezioni politiche del 1994, dove fu rieletto al Senato, quando il
professore si disse non d'accordo sia ad allearsi con Forza Italia, sia a
entrare nel primo governo Berlusconi. Soprattutto Miglio non gradì che per il
ruolo di ministro delle Riforme istituzionali fosse stato scelto Francesco
Speroni al suo posto[9]. Bossi reagì spiegando: «Capisco che Miglio sia
rimasto un po' irritato perché non è diventato ministro, ma non si può dire che
non abbiamo difeso la sua candidatura. Il punto è che era molto difficile
sostenerla, perché c'era la pregiudiziale di Berlusconi e di Fini contro di lui.
Di fatto, il ministero per le Riforme istituzionali a lui non lo davano. (
[...] ) Se Miglio vorrà lasciare la strada della Lega, libero di farlo. Ma
vorrei ricordargli che è arrivato alla Lega nel '90 e che, a quell'epoca, il
movimento aveva già raggranellato un sacco di consiglieri regionali». In
conclusione per Bossi, Miglio «pare che ponga solo un problema di poltrone e la
difesa del federalismo non è questione di poltrone»[10]. Il giorno dopo, 16
maggio 1994, in aperto dissidio con Umberto Bossi, Miglio lascia la Lega Nord
dicendo di Bossi: «Spero proprio di non rivederlo più. ( [...] ) . Per Bossi il
federalismo è stato strumentale alla conquista e al mantenimento del potere.
L'ultimo suo exploit è stato di essere riuscito a strappare a Berlusconi cinque
ministri. Tornerò solo nel giorno in cui Bossi non sarà più
segretario»[11]. Nonostante ciò, moltissimi militanti e sostenitori
leghisti continuarono a provare grande simpatia e ammirazione per il professore
e per le sue teorie[12]. Alcuni dirigenti della Lega tennero comunque vivo il
dialogo con Miglio, in particolar modo Giancarlo Pagliarini, Francesco Speroni
e il presidente della Libera compagnia padana Gilberto Oneto, al quale il
professore era particolarmente legato. In particolare Miglio fu in stretti
rapporti con l'ex deputato leghista Luigi Negri, col quale fondò il Partito
Federalista. Nel 1996 fu eletto ancora una volta al Senato, nel collegio di
Como per il Polo per le Libertà, iscrivendosi al gruppo misto. Negli anni
in cui la Lega si spostò su posizioni indipendentiste (1996-1999), il
professore si riavvicinò alla linea del partito, sostenendo a più riprese la
piena legittimità del diritto di secessione della Padania dall'Italia come
sottospecie del più antico diritto di resistenza medievale. Miglio e la
mafia Nella sua originale riflessione sul contrasto tra i regimi giuridici
"freddi" e "caldi" Miglio sostenne la necessità di
sviluppare, all'interno delle diverse società e culture, ordini giuridici in
grado di rispondere alle specifiche esigenze.[13][14] In maniera provocatoria,
egli giunse a dichiararsi favorevole al «mantenimento anche della mafia e della
'ndrangheta. Il Sud deve darsi uno statuto poggiante sulla personalità del
comando. Che cos'è la mafia? Potere personale, spinto fino al delitto. Io non
voglio ridurre il Meridione al modello europeo, sarebbe un'assurdità. C'è anche
un clientelismo buono che determina crescita economica. Insomma, bisogna
partire dal concetto che alcune manifestazioni tipiche del Sud hanno bisogno di
essere costituzionalizzate»[15]. La sua riflessione puntava a cogliere quali
fossero le ragioni profonde alla base di mafia, camorra e 'ndrangheta (insieme
a ciò che genera il consenso attorno a queste organizzazioni criminali), perché
solo istituzioni che sono in sintonia con la comunità - nel caso specifico, che
non dimentichino la centralità del rapporto personale piuttosto che impersonale
nella società meridionale - possono creare una vera alternativa al
presente. Opere La controversia sui limiti del commercio neutrale fra
Giovanni Maria Lampredi e Ferdinando Galiani. Ricerche sulla genesi
dell'indirizzo positivo nella scienza del diritto delle genti, Milano, Ispi,
1942. La crisi dell'universalismo politico medioevale e la formazione
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Univ. Padova", n. 13, 1942. La struttura ideologica della monarchia
greca arcaica ed il concetto "patrimoniale" dello Stato nell'eta
antica, in: "Jus. Rivista di scienze giuridiche", nuova serie, anno
V, fasc. IV, ottobre 1954. Le origini della scienza dell'amministrazione,
Milano, Giuffrè, 1957. L'unità fondamentale di svolgimento dell'esperienza
politica occidentale, in: "Rivista internazionale di scienze
sociali", anno LXV, fasc. V, settembre-ottobre 1957. I cattolici di fronte
all'unità d'Italia, in: "Vita e pensiero", fasc. 12, 1959.
L'amministrazione nella dinamica storica, in: Istituto per la Scienza
dell'Amministrazione Pubblica, Storia Amministrazione Costituzione, n. 12,
Bologna, Il Mulino, 2004 (1961). Le trasformazioni dell'attuale regime
politico, in: "Jus. Rivista di scienze giuridiche", anno XVI, fasc.
I, 1965. Il ruolo del partito nella trasformazione del tipo di ordinamento
politico vigente. Il punto di vista della scienza della politica, Milano, La
nuova Europa editrice, 1967. L'unificazione amministrativa e i suoi
protagonisti, a cura di e con Feliciano Benvenuti, Vicenza, Neri Pozza, 1969.
La trasformazione delle università e l'iniziativa privata, in: Atti del I
Convegno su: Università: problemi e proposte, promosso dal Rotary Club di
Milano-Centro (8-9 novembre 1969), s.l., s.n., 1969. Una Costituzione in
"corto circuito", in: "Prospettive nel mondo", n. 19-20,
1978. Ricominciare dalla montagna. Tre rapporti sul governo dell'area alpina nell'avanzata
eta industriale, Milano, Giuffrè, 1978. La Valtellina. Un modello possibile di
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1978. Utopia e realtà della Costituzione, in "Prospettive del mondo",
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scientifico-tecnologica. Il caso della tarda antichità, in Tecnologia, economia
e società nel mondo romano. Atti del Convegno di Como, 27-29 settembre 1979,
Como, s.n., 1980. Genesi e trasformazioni del termine-concetto Stato, in Stato
e senso dello Stato oggi in Italia. Atti del Corso di aggiornamento culturale
dell'Università cattolica, Pescara, 20-25 settembre 1981, Milano, Vita e
pensiero, 1981. Guerra, pace, diritto. Una ipotesi generale sulle regolarità
del ciclo politico, in: Umberto Curi (a cura di), Della guerra, Venezia,
Arsenale, 1982. Una repubblica migliore per gli italiani. Verso una nuova
costituzione, Milano, Giuffrè, 1983. Le contraddizioni interne del sistema
parlamentare-integrale, in: "Rivista italiana di Scienza Politica",
a. XIV, n. 2, agosto 1984. Considerazioni sulle responsabilità, in:
"Synesis, periodico dell'Associazione italiana centri culturali", a.
II, n. 1, 1985. Le regolarità della politica. Scritti scelti raccolti e
pubblicati dagli allievi, 2 voll., Milano, Giuffrè, 1988. ISBN 88-14-01702-6 Il
nerbo e le briglie del potere. Scritti brevi di critica politica, 1945-1988,
Milano, Edizioni del Sole 24 ore, 1988. Una Costituzione per i prossimi
trent'anni. Intervista sulla terza Repubblica, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1990. ISBN
88-420-3685-4 Per un'Italia federale, Milano, Il Sole 24 ore, 1990. Come
cambiare. Le mie riforme, Milano, A. Mondadori, 1992. ISBN 88-04-36046-1 Italia
1996. Così è andata a finire, con "Il Gruppo del lunedì", Collezione
Frecce, Milano, A. Mondadori, 1993. ISBN 88-04-37880-8; ed. Oscar Saggi, 1996.
ISBN 88-04-40894-4 Disobbedienza civile, con Henry David Thoreau, Milano, A.
Mondadori, 1993. ISBN 88-04-36755-5 Io, Bossi e la Lega. Diario segreto dei
miei quattro anni sul Carroccio, Milano, A. Mondadori, 1994. ISBN 88-04-39395-5
Come cambiare. Le mie riforme per la nuova Italia, Milano, A. Mondadori, 1994.
ISBN 88-04-37755-0 Modello di Costituzione Federale per gli italiani, Milano,
Fondazione per un'Italia Federale, 1995. Federalismi falsi e degenerati,
Milano, Sperling & Kupfer, 1997. ISBN 88-200-2401-2 Federalismo e
secessione. Un dialogo, con Augusto Antonio Barbera, Milano, A. Mondadori,
1997. ISBN 88-04-42388-9 Padania, Italia. Lo stato nazionale è soltanto in crisi
o non è mai esistito?, con Marcello Veneziani, Firenze, Le Lettere, 1997. ISBN
88-7166-315-2 Le barche a remi del Lario. Da trasporto, da guerra, da pesca, e
da diporto, con Massimo Gozzi e Gian Alberto Zanoletti, Milano, Leonardo arte,
1999. ISBN 88-7813-468-6 L'Asino di Buridano. Gli italiani alle prese con
l'ultima occasione di cambiare il loro destino, Vicenza, Neri Pozza, 1999. ISBN
88-7305-722-5 L'Asino di Buridano. Gli italiani alle prese con l'ultima
occasione di cambiare il loro destino. Nuova edizione, pref. di Roberto
Formigoni, postf. di Sergio Romano, Varese, Edizioni Lativa, 2001. AA. VV.,
Gianfranco Miglio: un uomo libero, coll. Quaderni Padani, nn. 37-38, La Libera
Compagnia Padana, Novara, 2002. AA. VV., Un Miglio alla libertà, audiolibro,
coll. Laissez Parler, Treviglio, La Libera Compagnia Padana - Leonardo Facco
Editore, 2005. AA. VV., Gianfranco Miglio: gli articoli, coll. Quaderni Padani,
nn. 64-65, La Libera Compagnia Padana, Novara, 2006. AA. VV., Gianfranco
Miglio: le interviste, coll. Quaderni Padani, nn. 69-70, La Libera Compagnia
Padana, Novara, 2007. L'Asino di Buridano. Gli italiani alle prese con l'ultima
occasione di cambiare il loro destino, pref. di Roberto Formigoni, coll. I
libri di Libero - Miglio n. 1, Firenze, Editoriale Libero, 2008. ISSN 1591-0423
Padania, Italia. Lo stato nazionale è soltanto in crisi o non è mai esistito?,
con Marcello Veneziani, intr. di Marco Ferrazzoli, coll. I libri di Libero -
Miglio n. 2, Firenze, Editoriale Libero, 2008. ISSN 1591-0423 Federalismo e
secessione. Un dialogo, con Augusto Antonio Barbera, coll. I libri di Libero -
Miglio n. 4, Firenze, Editoriale Libero, 2008. ISSN 1591-0423 Disobbedienza
civile, con Henry David Thoreau, coll. I libri di Libero - Miglio n. 5,
Firenze, Editoriale Libero, 2008. ISSN 1591-0423 La controversia sui limiti del
commercio neutrale fra Giovanni Maria Lampredi e Ferdinando Galiani, pref. di
Lorenzo Ornaghi, Torino, Aragno, 2009. ISBN 978-88-8419-394-0 AA. VV.,
Gianfranco Miglio: scritti brevi, interviste, coll. Quaderni Padani, nn. 84-85,
La Libera Compagnia Padana, Novara, 2009. Lezioni di politica. 1. Storia delle
dottrine politiche. 2. Scienza della politica, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2 voll., a
cura di Davide G. Bianchi e Alessandro Vitale, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2011. ISBN
978-88-15-23329-5 Discorsi parlamentari, con un saggio di Claudio Bonvecchio,
Senato della Repubblica, Archivio storico, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2012. ISBN
88-15-23479-9 L'Asino di Buridano. Gli italiani alle prese con l'ultima
occasione di cambiare il loro destino, coll. Opere scelte di Gianfranco Miglio,
a cura di Stefano Bruno Galli, Milano, Guerini e Associati, 2014. ISBN
978-88-6250-501-7 Considerazioni retrospettive e altri scritti, coll. Opere
scelte di Gianfranco Miglio, a cura di Stefano Bruno Galli, Milano, Guerini e
Associati, 2015 Lo scienziato della politica, coll. Opere scelte di Gianfranco
Miglio, a cura e con intr. di Stefano Bruno Galli, Milano, Guerini e Associati,
2016. ISBN 978-88-6250-601-4 Guerra, pace, diritto, con un saggio di Massimo
Cacciari, La Nuova Guerra, [S.l. - Milano], Editrice La Scuola, 2016. ISBN
978-88-350-4502-1 Scritti politici, a cura di Luigi Marco Bassani, pref. di
Giuseppe Valditara, coll. I libri del Federalismo, Roma, Pagine, 2016. ISBN
978-88-7557-489-5 Modello di Costituzione Federale per gli italiani, pref. di
Lorenzo Ornaghi, a cura di Andrea Spallino, Torino, G. Giappichelli Editore,
2017. ISBN 978-88-9211-083-0 La Padania e le grandi regioni, in: Innocenzo
Gasparini, L'unità economico-sociale della Padania. In appendice: Guido Fanti,
Gianfranco Miglio, con intr. e a cura di Stefano Bruno Galli, Fano,
Associazione Gilberto Oneto - Il Cerchio, 2018. ISBN 978-88-8474-515-6 Carl
Schmitt. Saggi, a cura di Damiano Palano, Brescia, Scholé - Editrice Morcelliana,
2018. ISBN 978-88-284-0038-7 Le origini e i primi sviluppi delle dottrine
giuridiche internazionali pubbliche nell'età moderna, pref. di Lorenzo Ornaghi,
intr. di Damiano Palano, Torino, Aragno, 2018. ISBN 979-88-8419-875-4 Vocazione
e destino dei Lombardi, a cura e con pref. di Stefano Bruno Galli, [S.l. -
Milano], Regione Lombardia, [s.d. - 2018]. Prefazioni Gilberto Oneto, Bandiere
di libertà: Simboli e vessilli dei Popoli dell'Italia settentrionale. In
appendice le bandiere dei popoli europei in lotta per l'autonomia, intr. di
Gianfranco Miglio, Effedieffe, Milano, 1992, ISBN 88-85223-04-4 Gianfranco
Morra, Breve storia del pensiero federalista, pref. di Gianfranco Miglio,
Milano, Oscar Mondadori, 1993. ISBN 978-88-0437-640-8 Governo Provvisorio della
Padania, Manuale di resistenza fiscale, pref. di Gianfranco Miglio, 2ª ed.,
Gallarate, 1996 Gilberto Oneto, Croci draghi aquile e leoni. Simboli e bandiere
dei popoli padano-alpini, pref. alla prima edizione di Gianfranco Miglio,
Roberto Chiaramonte Editore - La Libera Compagnia Padana, Collegno (TO), 2005
Opere su Gianfranco Miglio Alberto Sensini, Prima o seconda Repubblica? A
colloquio con Aldo Bozzi e Gianfranco Miglio, Napoli, Edizioni scientifiche
italiane, 1986. Lorenzo Ornaghi e Alessandro Vitale (a cura di), Multiformità e
unità della politica. Atti del Convegno tenuto in occasione del 70º compleanno
di Gianfranco Miglio, 24-26 ottobre 1988, Milano, Giuffrè, 1992. ISBN
88-14-02676-9 Giorgio Ferrari, Gianfranco Miglio. Storia di un giacobino nordista,
Milano, Liber internazionale, 1993. ISBN 88-8004-006-5 Mario Bevilacqua,
Insidia mito e follia nel razzismo di Gianfranco Miglio, in "Il
rinnovamento", 24, n. 217, 1994. Alessandro Campi, Schmitt, Freund,
Miglio. Figure e temi del realismo politico europeo, Firenze, Akropolis/La
Roccia di Erec, 1996. ISBN 88-85928-10-2 Giovanni Di Capua, Gianfranco Miglio,
scienziato impolitico, pref. di Giancarlo Galli, Soveria Mannelli (Catanzaro),
Rubbettino, 2006. ISBN 88-498-1495-X Alessandro Vitale, La costituzione e il
cambiamento internazionale. Il mito della costituente, l'obsolescenza della
costituzione e la lezione dimenticata di Gianfranco Miglio, Torino, CIDAS,
2007. Luca Romano (a cura di), Il pensiero federalista di Gianfranco Miglio:
una lezione da ricordare. Atti del Convegno di studi, Venezia 17 aprile 2009,
Sala del Piovego di Palazzo Ducale, Venezia, Consiglio regionale del
Veneto-Caselle di Sommacampagna, Cierre, 2010. ISBN 9788883143946 Fulco
Lanchester, Miglio costituzionalista, Rivista di politica: trimestrale di
studi, analisi e commenti, 3, 2011, Soveria Mannelli (Catanzaro), Rubbettino,
2011. In lingua inglese The Cultural Roots of the Federalist Revolution. Telos
97 (Autunno 1997). New York, Telos Press, pagg. 33–40. C. Lottieri, Gianfranco
Miglio (1918-2001). Telos 122 (Inverno 2002). New York, Telos Press, pagg.
101–110. Bibliografia Damiano Palano, Il cristallo dell'obbligazione
politica in ID., Geometrie del potere. Materiali per la storia della scienza
politica italiana, Milano, Vita e Pensiero, 2005. ISBN 88-343-1273-2 Note ^
Maroni: voglio riprendere l'eredità di Gianfranco Miglio - MiglioVerde, su
www.miglioverde.eu. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2017. ^ Bossi a sorpresa al
convegno su Miglio a Domaso:"Un grande" - Ciao Como, su CiaoComo, 10
agosto 2011. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2017. ^ la Repubblica/politica: È
morto Gianfranco Miglio, su www.repubblica.it. URL consultato il 14 giugno
2017. ^ Ticinonline - COMO: Lunedì a Domaso i funerali di Gianfranco Miglio.
URL consultato il 14 giugno 2017. ^ Riletture: Gianfranco Miglio (1918-2001),
su www.ariannaeditrice.it. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2017. ^ GIANFRANCO
MIGLIO | il ricordo a 15 anni dalla scomparsa | Terre di Lombardia, su
www.terredilombardia.info. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2017. ^ Francesco
D'Alessandro, Cristianesimo e cultura politica: l'eredità di otto illustri
testimoni, Paoline, 2006, ISBN 978-88-315-3006-4. URL consultato il 14 giugno
2017. ^ Gianfranco Morra, [Miglio]La vita e le opere, La Voce di Romagna, 8
agosto 2011, p. 5. ^ Il silenzio di Miglio fa paura alla Lega ^ Bossi: Miglio
pensa solo alla poltrona ^ Miglio: "con Bossi è un amore finito" ^
Miglio torna nell'arena: è l'occasione buona ^ Gianfranco Miglio, Una
repubblica mediterranea?, in AA.VV., Un'altra Repubblica? Perché, come, quando,
Laterza, Roma-Bari, 1988, 110-118. ^ Umberto Rosso, Miglio l'antropologo.
'Diverso l'uomo del Sud', in la Repubblica, 11 settembre 1993. ^ «Non mi fecero
ministro perché avrei distrutto la Repubblica» Altri progetti Collabora a Wikiquote
Wikiquote contiene citazioni di o su Gianfranco Miglio Collabora a Wikimedia
Commons Wikimedia Commons contiene immagini o altri file su Gianfranco Miglio
Collegamenti esterni Gianfranco Miglio, su Treccani.it – Enciclopedie on line,
Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Gianfranco Miglio, in
Enciclopedia Italiana, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su
Wikidata Gianfranco Miglio, in Dizionario di storia, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia
Italiana, 2010. Modifica su Wikidata Gianfranco Miglio, in Dizionario
biografico degli italiani, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su
Wikidata Gianfranco Miglio / Gianfranco Miglio (altra versione) / Gianfranco
Miglio (altra versione), su senato.it, Senato della Repubblica. Modifica su
Wikidata Gianfranco Miglio, su Openpolis, Associazione Openpolis. Modifica su
Wikidata Registrazioni di Gianfranco Miglio, su RadioRadicale.it, Radio
Radicale. Modifica su Wikidata Istituto per la scienza dell'amministrazione
pubblica, su isapistituto.it. URL consultato il 14 aprile 2019 (archiviato
dall'url originale il 17 novembre 2018). Interviste Intervista sulla Secessione
della Padania, 1996, su prov-varese.leganord.org. URL consultato il 3
novembre 2006 (archiviato dall'url originale il 9 luglio 2006). Commemorazione
di Miglio nel 1º anniversario della scomparsa di Alessandro Campi, su
giovanipadani.leganord.org (archiviato dall'url originale il 14 maggio 2006).
«Non mi fecero ministro perché avrei distrutto la Repubblica», Il Giornale,
1999, su newrassegna.camera.it. Interviste a Miglio sui "Quaderni della
Libera Compagnia Padana" dal 1991 al 2001 (PDF), su laliberacompagnia.org.
Documenti politici Sezione di approfondimento sul pensiero di Gianfranco Miglio
Archiviato il 20 novembre 2009 in Internet Archive., dal sito ufficiale della
Lega Nord Controllo di autorità VIAF
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Identities (EN) lccn-n79065316 Biografie Portale Biografie Politica Portale
Politica Categorie: Senatori dell'XI legislatura della Repubblica
ItalianaSenatori della XII legislatura della Repubblica ItalianaSenatori della
XIII legislatura della Repubblica ItalianaGiuristi italiani del XX
secoloPolitologi italianiAccademici italiani del XX secoloNati nel 1918Morti
nel 2001Nati l'11 gennaioMorti il 10 agostoNati a ComoMorti a ComoPolitici
della Lega NordPolitici del Partito Federalista (Italia)Studenti
dell'Università Cattolica del Sacro CuoreProfessori dell'Università Cattolica
del Sacro CuoreFederalisti[altre]
Refs.: Luigi Speranza,
"Grice e Miglio," per il Club Anglo-Italiano, The Swimming-Pool
Library, Villa Grice, Liguria, Italia. Speranza “Saturdays and Mondays”
middle platonism, the period of Platonism
between Antiochus of Ascalon and Plotinus, characterized by a rejection of the
skeptical stance of the New Academy and by a gradual advance, with many
individual variations, toward a comprehensive dogmatic position on metaphysical
principles, while exhibiting a certain latitude, as between Stoicizing and
Peripateticizing positions, in the sphere of ethics. Antiochus himself was much
influenced by Stoic materialism (though disagreeing with the Stoics in ethics),
but in the next generation a neo-Pythagorean influence made itself felt,
generating the mix of doctrines that one may most properly term Middle
Platonic. From Eudorus of Alexandria (fl. c.25 B.C.) on, a transcendental,
two-world metaphysic prevailed, featuring a supreme god, or Monad, a secondary
creator god, and a world soul, with which came a significant change in ethics,
substituting, as an ‘end of goods’ (telos), “likeness to God” (from Plato,
Theaetetus 176b), for the Stoicizing “assimilation to nature” of Antiochus. Our
view of the period is hampered by a lack of surviving texts, but it is plain
that, in the absence of a central validating authority (the Academy as an
institution seems to have perished in the wake of the capture of Athens by
Mithridates in 88 B.C.), a considerable variety of doctrine prevailed among
individual Platonists and schools of Platonists, particularly in relation to a
preference for Aristotelian or Stoic principles of ethics. Most known activity
occurred in the late first and second centuries A.D. Chief figures in this
period are Plutarch of Chaeronea (c.45–125), Calvenus Taurus (fl. c.145), and
Atticus (fl. c.175), whose activity centered on Athens (though Plutarch
remained loyal to Chaeronea in Boeotia); Gaius (fl. c.100) and Albinus (fl.
c.130) – not to be identified with “Alcinous,” author of the Didaskalikos; the
rhetorician Apuleius of Madaura (fl. c.150), who also composed a useful
treatise on the life and doctrines of Plato; and the neo-Pythagoreans Moderatus
of Gades (fl. c.90), Nicomachus of Gerasa (fl. c.140), and Numenius (fl.
c.150), who do not, however, constitute a “school.” Good evidence for an
earlier stage of Middle Platonism is provided by the Jewish philosopher Philo
of Alexandria (c.25 B.C.–A.D. 50). Perhaps the single most important figure for
the later Platonism of Plotinus and his successors is Numenius, of whose works
we have only fragments. His speculations on the nature of the first principle,
however, do seem to have been a stimulus to Plotinus in his postulation of a
supraessential One. Plutarch is important as a literary figure, though most of
his serious philosophical works are lost; and the handbooks of Alcinous and
Apuleius are significant for our understanding of second-century Platonism.Luigi
Speranza, “Middle Griceianism and Middle Platonism, Compared.”
Miletusians, or Ionian Miletusians, or Milesians,
the pre-Socratic philosophers of Miletus, a Grecian city-state on the Ionian
coast of Asia Minor. Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes produced the earliest philosophies,
stressing an “arche” or material source from which the cosmos and all things in
it were generated: water for Thales, and then there’s air, fire, and earth –
the fifth Grice called the ‘quintessentia.’
more
grice to the mill:
Mill: Scots-born philosopher (“One should take grice to one mill but not to the
mill –“ Grice --) and social theorist. He applied the utilitarianism of his
contemporary Bentham to such social matters as systems of education and
government, law and penal systems, and colonial policy. He also advocated the
associationism of Hume. Mill was an influential thinker in early
nineteenth-century London, but his most important role in the history of
philosophy was the influence he had on his son, J. S. Mill. He raised his more
famous son as a living experiment in his associationist theory of education.
His utilitarian views were developed and extended by J. S. Mill, while his
associationism was also adopted by his son and became a precursor of the
latter’s phenomenalism. More grice to the mill -- Mill, Scots
London-born empiricist philosopher and utilitarian social reformer. He was the
son of Mill, a leading defender of Bentham’s utilitarianism, and an advocate of
reforms based on that philosophy. Mill was educated by his father (and thus “at
Oxford we always considered him an outsider!” – Grice) in accordance with the
principles of the associationist psychology adopted by the Benthamites and
deriving from David Hartley, and was raised with the expectation that he would
become a defender of the principles of the Benthamite school. Mill begins the
study of Grecian at three and Roman at eight, and later assisted Mill in
educating his brothers. He went to France to learn the language (“sc. French
--” Grice ), and studied chemistry and mathematics at Montpellier. He wrote
regularly for the Westminster Review, the Benthamite journal. He underwent a
mental crisis that lasted some months. This he later attributed to his rigid
education; in any case he emerged from a period of deep depression still advocating
utilitarianism but in a very much revised version. Mill visits Paris during the
revolution, meeting Lafayette and other popular leaders, and was introduced to
the writings of Saint-Simon and Comte. He also met Harriet Taylor, to whom he
immediately became devoted. They married only in 1851, when Taylor died. He
joined the India House headquarters of the East India Company, serving as an
examiner until the company was dissolved in 1858 in the aftermath of the Indian
Mutiny. Mill sat in Parliament. Harriet dies and is buried at Avignon, where
Mill thereafter regularly resided for half of each year. Mill’s major works are
his “System of Logic, Deductive and Inductive,” “Political Economy,” “On
Liberty,” “Utilitarianism,” in Fraser’s Magazine, “The Subjection of Women” –
Grice: “I wrote a paper for Hardie on this. His only comment was: ‘what do you
mean by ‘of’?” --; “An Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy,” and
“Religion.” His writing style is excellent, and his history of his own mental
development, the “Autobiography” is a major Victorian literary text. His main
opponents philosophically are Whewell and Hamilton, and it is safe to say that
after Mill their intuitionism in metaphysics, philosophy of science, and ethics
could no longer be defended. Mill’s own views were later to be eclipsed by
those of such Oxonian lumaries as T. H. Green, F. H. Bradley, and the other
Oxonian Hegelian idealists (Bosanquet, Pater). His views in metaphysics and
philosophy of science have been revived and defended by Russell and the logical
positivists, while his utilitarian ethics has regained its status as one of the
major ethical theories. His social philosophy deeply infuenced the Fabians and
other groups on the English left; its impact continues. Mill was brought up on
the basis of, and to believe in, the strict utilitarianism of his father. His
own development largely consisted in his attempts to broaden it, to include a
larger and more sympathetic view of human nature, and to humanize its program
to fit this broader view of human beings. In his own view, no doubt largely
correct, he did not so much reject his father’s principles as fill in the gaps
and eliminate rigidities and crudities. He continued throughout his life his
father’s concern to propagate principles conceived as essential to promoting
human happiness. These extended from moral principles to principles of
political economy to principles of logic and metaphysics. Mill’s vision of the
human being was rooted in the psychological theories he defended. Arguing
against the intuitionism of Reid and Whewell, he extended the associationism of
his father. On this theory, ideas have their genetic antecedents in sensation,
a complex idea being generated out of a unique set of simple, elementary ideas,
through associations based on regular patterns in the presented sensations.
Psychological analysis reveals the elementary parts of ideas and is thus the
means for investigating the causal origins of our ideas. The elder Mill
followed Locke in conceiving analysis on the model of definition, so that the
psychological elements are present in the idea they compose and the idea is
nothing but its associated elements. Mill emerged from his mental crisis with
the recognition that mental states are often more than the sum of the ideas
that are their genetic antecedents. On the revised model of analysis, the
analytical elements are not actually present in the idea, but are present only
dispositionally, ready to be recovered by association under the analytical set.
Moreover, it is words that are defined, not ideas, though words become general
only by becoming associated with ideas. Analysis thus became an empirical task,
rather than something settled a priori according to one’s metaphysical
predispositions, as it had been for Mill’s predecessors. The revised psychology
allowed the younger Mill to account empirically in a much more subtle way than
could the earlier associationists for the variations in our states of feeling.
Thus, for example, the original motive to action is simple sensations of
pleasure, but through association things originally desired as means become
associated with pleasure and thereby become desirable as ends, as parts of
one’s pleasure. But these acquired motives are not merely the sum of the simple
pleasures that make them up; they are more than the sum of those genetic
antecedents. Thus, while Mill holds with his father that persons seek to
maximize their pleasures, unlike his father he also holds that not all ends are
selfish, and that pleasures are not only quantitatively but also qualitatively
distinct. In ethics, then, Mill can hold with the intuitionists that our moral
sentiments are qualitatively distinct from the lower pleasures, while denying
the intuitionist conclusion that they are innate. Mill urges, with his father
and Bentham, that the basic moral norm is the principle of utility, that an
action is right provided it maximizes human welfare. Persons always act to
maximize their own pleasure, but the general human welfare can be among the
pleasures they seek. Mill’s position thus does not have the problems that the
apparently egoistic psychology of his father created. The only issue is whether
a person ought to maximize human welfare, whether he ought to be the sort of
person who is so motivated. Mill’s own ethics is that this is indeed what one
ought to be, and he tries to bring this state of human being about in others by
example, and by urging them to expand the range of their human sympathy through
poetry like that of Wordsworth, through reading the great moral teachers such
as Jesus and Socrates, and by other means of moral improvement. Mill also
offers an argument in defense of the principle of utility. Against those who,
like Whewell, argue that there is no basic right to pleasure, he argues that as
a matter of psychological fact, people seek only pleasure, and concludes that
it is therefore pointless to suggest that they ought to do anything other than
this. The test of experience thus excludes ends other than pleasure. This is a
plausible argument. Less plausible is his further argument that since each
seeks her own pleasure, the general good is the (ultimate) aim of all. This
latter argument unfortunately presupposes the invalid premise that the law for
a whole follows from laws about the individual parts of the whole. Other moral
rules can be justified by their utility and the test of experience. For
example, such principles of justice as the rules of property and of promise
keeping are justified by their role in serving certain fundamental human needs.
Exceptions to such secondary rules can be justified by appeal to the principle
of utility. But there is also utility in not requiring in every application a
lengthy utilitarian calculation, which provides an objective justification for
overlooking what might be, objectively considered in terms of the principle of
utility, an exception to a secondary rule. Logic and philosophy of science. The
test of experience is also brought to bear on norms other than those of
morality, e.g., those of logic and philosophy of science. Mill argues, against
the rationalists, that science is not demonstrative from intuited premises.
Reason in the sense of deductive logic is not a logic of proof but a logic of
consistency. The basic axioms of any science are derived through generalization
from experience. The axioms are generic and delimit a range of possible
hypotheses about the specific subject matter to which they are applied. It is
then the task of experiment and, more generally, observation to eliminate the
false and determine which hypothesis is true. The axioms, the most generic of
which is the law of the uniformity of nature, are arrived at not by this sort
of process of elimination but by induction by simple enumeration: Mill argues
plausibly that on the basis of experience this method becomes more reliable the
more generic is the hypothesis that it is used to justify. But like Hume, Mill
holds that for any generalization from experience the evidence can never be
sufficient to eliminate all possibility of doubt. Explanation for Mill, as for
the logical positivists, is by subsumption under matter-of-fact
generalizations. Causal generalizations that state sufficient or necessary and
sufficient conditions are more desirable as explanations than mere
regularities. Still more desirable is a law or body of laws that gives
necessary and sufficient conditions for any state of a system, i.e., a body of
laws for which there are no explanatory gaps. As for explanation of laws, this
can proceed either by filling in gaps or by subsuming the law under a generic
theory that unifies the laws of several areas. Mill argues that in the social
sciences the subject matter is too complex to apply the normal methods of
experiment. But he also rejects the purely deductive method of the Benthamite
political economists such as his father and David Ricardo. Rather, one must
deduce the laws for wholes, i.e., the laws of economics and sociology, from the
laws for the parts, i.e., the laws of psychology, and then test these derived
laws against the accumulated data of history. Mill got the idea for this
methodology of the social sciences from Comte, but unfortunately it is vitiated
by the false idea, already noted, that one can deduce without any further
premise the laws for wholes from the laws for the parts. Subsequent
methodologists of the social sciences have come to substitute the more
reasonable methods of statistics for this invalid method Mill proposes. Mill’s
account of scientific method does work well for empirical sciences, such as the
chemistry of his day. He was able to show, too, that it made good sense of a
great deal of physics, though it is arguable that it cannot do justice to
theories that explain the atomic and subatomic structure of matter – something
Mill himself was prepared to acknowledge. He also attempted to apply his views
to geometry, and even more implausibly, to arithmetic. In these areas, he was
certainly bested by Whewell, and the world had to wait for the logical work of
Russell and Whitehead before a reasonable empiricist account of these areas
became available. Metaphysics. The starting point of all inference is the sort
of observation we make through our senses, and since we know by experience that
we have no ideas that do not derive from sense experience, it follows that we
cannot conceive a world beyond what we know by sense. To be sure, we can form
generic concepts, such as that of an event, which enable us to form concepts of
entities that we cannot experience, e.g., the concept of the tiny speck of sand
that stopped my watch or the concept of the event that is the cause of my
present sensation. Mill held that what we know of the laws of sensation is
sufficient to make it reasonable to suppose that the immediate cause of one’s
present sensation is the state of one’s nervous system. Our concept of an
objective physical object is also of this sort; it is the set of events that
jointly constitute a permanent possible cause of sensation. It is our inductive
knowledge of laws that justifies our beliefs that there are entities that fall
under these concepts. The point is that these entities, while unsensed, are (we
reasonably believe) part of the world we know by means of our senses. The
contrast is to such things as the substances and transcendent Ideas of
rationalists, or the God of religious believers, entities that can be known
only by means that go beyond sense and inductive inferences therefrom. Mill
remained essentially pre-Darwinian, and was willing to allow the plausibility
of the hypothesis that there is an intelligent designer for the perceived order
in the universe. But this has the status of a scientific hypothesis rather than
a belief in a substance or a personal God transcending the world of experience
and time. Whewell, at once the defender of rationalist ideas for science and
for ethics and the defender of established religion, is a special object for
Mill’s scorn. Social and political thought. While Mill is respectful of the
teachings of religious leaders such as Jesus, the institutions of religion, like
those of government and of the economy, are all to be subjected to criticism
based on the principle of utility: Do they contribute to human welfare? Are
there any alternatives that could do better? Thus, Mill argues that a
free-market economy has many benefits but that the defects, in terms of poverty
for many, that result from private ownership of the means of production may
imply that we should institute the alternative of socialism or public ownership
of the means of production. He similarly argues for the utility of liberty as a
social institution: under such a social order individuality will be encouraged,
and this individuality in turn tends to produce innovations in knowledge,
technology, and morality that contribute significantly to improving the general
welfare. Conversely, institutions and traditions that stifle individuality, as
religious institutions often do, should gradually be reformed. Similar
considerations argue on the one hand for democratic representative government
and on the other for a legal system of rights that can defend individuals from
the tyranny of public opinion and of the majority. Status of women. Among the
things for which Mill campaigned were women’s rights, women’s suffrage, and
equal access for women to education and to occupations. He could not escape his
age and continued to hold that it was undesirable for a woman to work to help
support her family. While he disagreed with his father and Bentham that all
motives are egoistic and self-interested, he nonetheless held that in most
affairs of economics and government such motives are dominant. He was therefore
led to disagree with his father that votes for women are unnecessary since the
male can speak for the family. Women’s votes are needed precisely to check the
pursuit of male self-interest. More generally, equality is essential if the
interests of the family as such are to be served, rather than making the family
serve male self-interest as had hitherto been the case. Changing the relation
between men and women to one of equality will force both parties to curb their
self-interest and broaden their social sympathies to include others. Women’s
suffrage is an essential step toward the moral improvement of humankind. Grice:
“I am fascinated by how Griceian Mill can be.” “In treating
of the ‘proposition,’ some considerations of a comparatively elementary nature
respecting its form must be premised,and the ‘import’ which the emisor conveyed
by a token of an expression of a ‘proposition’ – for one cannot communicate but
that the cat is on the mat -- . A
proposition is a move in the conversational game in which a feature (P) is
predicated of the subject (S) – The S is P – The subject and the predicate – as
in “Strawson’s dog is shaggy” -- are all that is necessarily required to make
up a proposition. But as we can not conclude from merely seeing two “Strawson’s
dog” and “shaggy” put together, that “Strawson’s dog” is the subject and
“shaggy” the predicate, that is, that the predicate is intended to be ‘predicated’
of the subject, it is necessary that there should be some mode or form of indicating
that such is, in Griceian parlance, the ‘intention,’ sc. some sign to signal
this predication – my father says that as I was growing up, I would say “dog
shaggy” – The explicit communication of a predication is sometimes done by a
slight alteration of the expression that is the predicate or the expression
that is the subject – sc., a ‘casus’ – even if it is ‘rectum’ – or ‘obliquum’
-- inflectum.” Grice: “The example Mill
gives is “Fire burns.”” “The change from ‘burn’ to ‘burns’ shows that the
emisor intends to predicate the predicate “burn” of the subject “fire.” But
this function is more commonly fulfilled by the copula, which serves the
purporse of the sign of predication, “est,” (or by nothing at all as in my
beloved Grecian! “Anthropos logikos,” -- when the predication is, again to use
Griceian parlance, ‘intended.’” Grice: “Mill gives the example, ‘The king of
France is smooth.” “It may seem to be implied, or implicated – implicatum, implicaturum
-- not only that the quality ‘smooth’ can be predicated of the king of France, but
moreover that there is a King of France. Grice: “Mill notes: ‘It’s different
with ‘It is not the case that the king of France is smooth’”. “This, however
should not rush us to think that ‘is’ is aequi-vocal, and that it can be
‘copula’ AND ‘praedicatum’, e. g. ‘… is a spatio-temporal continuant.’ Grice:
“Mill then gives my example: ‘Pegasus is [in Grecian mythology – i. e. Pegasus
is *believed* to exist by this or that Grecian mythographer], but does not
exist.’” “A flying horse is a fiction of some Grecian poets.” Grice: “Mill
hastens to add that the annulation of the implicaturum is implicit or
contextual.” “By uttering ‘A flying horse is a Griceian allegory’ the emisor
cannot possibly implicate that a flying horse is a spatio-temporal continuant,
since by uttering the proposition itself the emisor is expressly asserting that
the thing has no real existence.” “Many volumes might be filled” – Grice: “And
will be filled by Strawson!” -- with the frivolous speculations concerning the nature
of being (ƒø D½, øPÃw±, ens, entitas, essentia, and the like), which have
arisen from overlooking the implicaturum of ‘est’; from supposing that when by
uttering “S est P” the emisor communicates that S is a spatio-temporal
continuant. when by uttering it, the emisor communicates that the S is some *specified*
thing, a horse and a flier, to be a phantom, a mythological construct, or the
invention of the journalists (like Marmaduke Bloggs, who climbed Mt. Everest on
hands and knees) even to be a nonentity (as a squared circle) it must still, at
bottom, answer to the same idea; and that a proposition must be found for it
which shall suit all these cases. The fog which rises from this very narrow
spot diffuses itself over the whole surface of ontology. Yet it becomes us not
to triumph over the great intellect of Ariskant because we are now able to
preserve ourselves from many errors into which he, perhaps inevitably, fell.
The fire-teazer of a steam-engine produces by his exertions far greater effects
than Milo of Crotona could, but he is not therefore a stronger man. The
Grecians – like some uneducated Englishman -- seldom knew any language but their
own! This render it far more difficult for *them* than it is for us, to acquire
a readiness in detecting the implicaturum. One of the advantages of having
accurately studied Grecian and Roman at Clifton, especially of those languages
which Ariskant used as the vehicle of his thought, is the practical lesson we
learn respecting the implicaturm, by finding that the same expression in
Grecian, say (e. g. ‘is’) corresponds, on different occasions, to a different
expression in Gricese, say (i. e. ‘hazz’). When not thus exercised, even the
strongest understandings find it difficult to believe that things which fall
under a class, have not in some respect or other a common nature; and often
expend much labour very unprofitably (as is frequently done by Ariskant) in a
vain attempt to discover in what this common nature consists. But, the habit
once formed, intellects much inferior are capable of detecting even an
impicaturum which is common or generalised to Grecian and Griceses: and it is
surprising that this sous-entendu or impicaturum now under consideration,
though it is ordinary at Oxford as well as in the ancient, should have been overlooked
by almost every philosopher until Grice. Grice: “Mill was proud of Mill.” “The
quantity of futilitarian speculation which had been caused by a misapprehension
of the nature of the copula, is hinted at by Hobbes; but my father is the first
who distinctly characterized the implicaturm, and point out to me how many
errors in the received systems of philosophy it has had to answer for. It has,
indeed, misled the moderns scarcely less than the ancients, though their
mistakes, because our understandings are not yet so completely emancipated from
their influence, do not appear equally irrational. Refs.: H. P.
Grice, “Grice to the Mill,” L. G. Wilton, “Mill’s mentalism,” for the Grice
Club. Grice treasured Hardie’s invocation of Mill’s method during a traffic
incident on the HIhg. Mill’s methods, procedures for discovering necessary
conditions, sufficient conditions, and necessary and sufficient conditions,
where these terms are used as follows: if whenever A then B (e.g., whenever
there is a fire then oxygen is present), then B is a necessary (causal)
condition for A; and if whenever C then D (e.g., whenever sugar is in water,
then it dissolves), then C is a sufficient (causal) condition for D. Method of
agreement. Given a pair of hypotheses about necessary conditions, e.g., (1)
whenever A then B1 whenever A then B2, then an observation of an individual
that is A but not B2 will eliminate the second alternative as false, enabling
one to conclude that the uneliminated hypothesis is true. This method for
discovering necessary conditions is called the method of agreement. To
illustrate the method of agreement, suppose several people have all become ill
upon eating potato salad at a restaurant, but have in other respects had quite
different meals, some having meat, some vegetables, some desserts. Being ill
and not eating meat eliminates the latter as the cause; being ill and not
eating dessert eliminates the latter as cause; and so on. It is the condition
in which the individuals who are ill agree that is not eliminated. We therefore
conclude that this is the cause or necessary condition for the illness. Method
of difference. Similarly, with respect to the pair of hypotheses concerning
sufficient conditions, e.g., (2) whenever C1 then D whenever C2 then D, an
individual that is C1 but not D will eliminate the first hypothesis and enable
one to conclude that the second is true. This is the method of difference. A
simple change will often yield an example of an inference to a sufficient
condition by the method of difference. If something changes from C1 to C2, and
also thereupon changes from notD to D, one can conclude that C2, in respect of
which the instances differ, is the cause of D. Thus, Becquerel discovered that
burns can be caused by radium, i.e., proximity to radium is a sufficient but
not necessary condition for being burned, when he inferred that the radium he
carried in a bottle in his pocket was the cause of a burn on his leg by noting
that the presence of the radium was the only relevant causal difference between
the time when the burn was present and the earlier time when it was not.
Clearly, both methods can be generalized to cover any finite number of
hypotheses in the set of alternatives. The two methods can be combined in the
joint method of agreement and difference to yield the discovery of conditions
that are both necessary and sufficient. Sometimes it is possible to eliminate
an alternative, not on the basis of observation, but on the basis of previously
inferred laws. If we know by previous inductions that no C2 is D, then
observation is not needed to eliminate the second hypothesis of (2), and we can
infer that what remains, or the residue, gives us the sufficient condition for
D. Where an alternative is eliminated by previous inductions, we are said to
use the method of residues. The methods may be generalized to cover
quantitative laws. A cause of Q may be taken not to be a necessary and
sufficient condition, but a factor P on whose magnitude the magnitude of Q
functionally depends. If P varies when Q varies, then one can use methods of
elimination to infer that P causes Q. This has been called the method of
concomitant variation. More complicated methods are needed to infer what
precisely is the function that correlates the two magnitudes. Clearly, if we
are to conclude that one of (1) is true on the basis of the given data, we need
an additional premise to the effect that there is at least one necessary
condition for B and it is among the set consisting of A1 and A2. 4065m-r.qxd
08/02/1999 7:42 AM Page 571 Mimamsa mimesis 572 The existence claim here is
known as a principle of determinism and the delimited range of alternatives is
known as a principle of limited variety. Similar principles are needed for the
other methods. Such principles are clearly empirical, and must be given prior
inductive support if the methods of elimination are to be conclusive. In
practice, generic scientific theories provide these principles to guide the
experimenter. Thus, on the basis of the observations that justified Kepler’s
laws, Newton was able to eliminate all hypotheses concerning the force that
moved the planets about the sun save the inverse square law, provided that he
also assumed as applying to this specific sort of system the generic
theoretical framework established by his three laws of motion, which asserted
that there exists a force accounting for the motion of the planets
(determinism) and that this force satisfies certain conditions, e.g., the
action-reaction law (limited variety). The eliminative methods constitute the
basic logic of the experimental method in science. They were first elaborated
by Francis Bacon (see J. Weinberg, Abstraction, Relation, and Induction, 1965).
They were restated by Hume, elaborated by J. F. W. Herschel, and located
centrally in scientific methodology by J. S. Mill. Their structure was studied
from the perspective of modern developments in logic by Keynes, W. E. Johnson,
and especially Broad. Refs.: H. P. Grice, “Grice to the Mill,” G. L. Brook,
“Mill’s Mentalism”, Sutherland, “Mill in Dodgson’s Semiotics.”
Icon: Iconicity and mimesis. Grice: “If it
hurts, you involuntarily go ‘Ouch.’ ‘Ouch’ can voluntarily become a vehicle for
communication, under voluntary control. But we must allow for any expression to
become a vehicle for communication, even if there is no iconic or mimetic
association -- (from Greek mimesis, ‘imitation’), the modeling of one thing on
another, or the presenting of one thing by another; imitation. The concept
played a central role in the account formulated by Plato and Aristotle of what
we would now call the fine arts. The poet, the dramatist, the painter, the
musician, the sculptor, all compose a mimesis of reality. Though Plato, in his
account of painting, definitely had in mind that the painter imitates physical
reality, the general concept of mimesis used by Plato and Aristotle is usually
better translated by ‘representation’ than by ‘imitation’: it belongs to the
nature of the work of art to represent, to re-present, reality. This
representational or mimetic theory of art remained far and away the dominant
theory in the West until the rise of Romanticism – though by no means everyone
agreed with Plato that it is concrete items of physical reality that the artist
represents. The hold of the mimetic theory was broken by the insistence of the
Romantics that, rather than the work of art being an imitation, it is the
artist who, in his or her creative activity, imitates Nature or God by
composing an autonomous object. Few contemporary theorists of art would say
that the essence of art is to represent; the mimetic theory is all but dead. In
part this is a reflection of the power of the Romantic alternative to the
mimetic theory; in part it is a reflection of the rise to prominence over the
last century of nonobjective, abstract painting and sculpture and of “absolute”
instrumental music. Nonetheless, the phenomenon of representation has not
ceased to draw the attention of theorists. In recent years three quite
different general theories of representation have appeared: Nelson Goodman’s
(The Languages of Art), Nicholas Wolterstorff’s (Works and Worlds of Art), and
Kendall Walton’s (Mimesis as Make-Believe). Refs.: H. P. Grice, “Aristotle’s
mimesis and Paget’s ta-ta theory of communication.”
Ta-ta: Paget: author beloved by Grice,
inventor of what Grice calls the “ta-ta” theory of communication.
Grice’s bellow -- “Ouch” – Grice’s theory
of communication in “Meaning revisited.” Grice’s paradox of the ta-ta. Why
would a simulation of pain be taken as a sign of pain if the sendee recognises
that the emisor is simulating a ‘causally provoked,’ rather than under
voluntary control, expression of pain. Grice’s wording is subtle and good. “Stage
one in the operation involves the supposition that the creature actually
voluntarily produces a certain sort of behaviour which is such that its
nonvoluntary production would be evidence that the creature is, let us say, in
pain.” Cf. Ockham, ‘risus naturaliter significat interiorem laetitiam.’ But the
laughter does NOT resemble the inner joy. There is natural causality, but not
iconicity. So what Grice and Ockham are after is ‘artificial laughter’ which
does imitate (mimic) natural laughter. “Risus significat naturaliter interiorem
laetitiam.” “Risus voluntaries significat NON-naturaliter interiorem
laetitiam.” Ockham wants to say that it is via the iconicity of the artificial
laughter that the communication is effected. So if ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny,
non-natural communication recapitulates natural communication. “Risus
voluntarius non-significat naturaliter (via risus involutarius significans
naturaliter) interiorem laetitiam. “The
kinds of cases of this which come most obviously to mind will be cases of
faking or deception.” “A creature normally voluntarily produces behaviour not
only when, but *because*, its nonvoluntary production would be evidence that
the creature is in a certain state, with the effect that the rest of the world,
other creatures around, treat the production, which is in fact voluntary, as if
it were a nonvoluntary production.” “That is, they come to just the same
conclusion about the creature’s being in the state in question, the signalled state.”
Note Grice’s technical use of Shannon’s ‘signal.’ “The purpose of the creature’s producing the
behaviour voluntarily would be so that the rest of the world should think that
it is in the state which the nonvoluntary production would signify.” Note that at this point, while it is behaviour
that signifies – the metabolia has to apply ultimately to the emisor. So that
it is the creature who signifies – or it signifies. The fact that Grice uses
‘it’ for the creature is telling – For, if Grice claims that only rational Homo
sapiens can communicate, Homo sapiens is an ‘it.’ “In stage two not only does creature X produce
this behaviour voluntarily, instead of nonvoluntarily, as in the primitive
state.” By primitive he means Stage 0. “… but we also assume that it is
*recognised* by another creature Y, involved with X in some transaction, as
being the voluntary production of certain form of behaviour the nonvoluntary
production of which evidences, say, pain.” So again, there is no iconicity. Does
the “Ouch” in Stage 0 ‘imitate’ the pain. How can ‘pain,’ which is a state of
the soul, be ‘imitated’ via a physical, material, medium? There are ways. Pain
may involve some discomfort in the soul. The cry, “Ouch,” involuntary,
‘imitates this disturbance or discomfort. But what about inner joy and the
laughter. Ape studies have demonstrated that the show of teeth is a sign of
agreession. It’s not Mona Lisa’s smile. So Mona Lisa’s inner joy is signified
by her smile. Is this iconic? Is there a resemblance or imitation here? Yes.
Because the inner joy is the opposite of discomfort, and the distended muscles
around the mouth resemble the distended state of the immaterial soul of Mona
Lisa. As a functionalist, Grice was also interested in the input. What makes
Mona Lisa smile? What makes you to utter “Ouch” when you step on a thorn? Is
the disturbance (of pain, since this is the example Grice uses) or the
distension of joy resemble the external stimulus? Yes. Because a thorn on the
ground is NOT to be there – it is a disturbance of the environment. Looking at
Leonardo da Vinci who actually is commanding, “Smile!” is enough of a stimulus
for “The Gioconda” to become what Italians call ‘the gioconda.’ “That is, creature X is now supposed not just
to simulate pain-behaviour, but also to be recognised as simulating
pain-behaviour.” “The import of the recognition by Y that the production is
voluntary UNDERMINES, of course, any tendency on the part of Y to come to the
conclusion that creature X is in pain.” “So, one might ask, what would be
required to restore the situation: what COULD be ADDED which would be an
‘antidote,’ so to speak, to the dissolution on the part of Y of the idea that X
is in pain?” “A first step in this direction would be to go to what we might
think of as stage three.” “Here, we suppose that creature Y not only recognises
that the behaviour is voluntary on the part of X, but also recognises that X
*intends* Y to recognise HIS [no longer its] behaviour as voluntary.” “That is,
we have now undermined the idea that this is a straightforward piece of
deception.” “Deceiving consists in trying to get a creature to accept certain
things AS SIGNS [but cf. Grice on words not being signs in ‘Meaning’] as
something or other without knowing that this is a faked case.” “Here, however, we would have a sort of perverse
faked case, in which something is faked but at the same time a clear indication
is put in that the faking has been done.” Cf. Warhol on Campbell soup and why Aristotle
found ‘mimesis’ so key “Creature Y can be thought of as initially BAFFLED by
this conflicting performance.” “There is this creature, as it were, simulating
pain, but announcing, in a certain sense, that this is what IT [again it, not
he] is doing.” “What on earth can IT be up to?” “It seems to me that if Y does
raise the question of why X should be doing this, it might first come up with
the idea that X is engaging in some form of play or make-believe, a game to
which, since X’s behaviour is seemingly directed TOWARDS Y [alla Kurt Lewin], Y
is EXPECTED OR INTENDED to make some appropriate contribution. “Cases
susceptible of such an interpretation I regard as belonging to stage four.” “But,
we may suppose, there might be cases which could NOT be handled in this way.” “If
Y is to be expected to be a fellow-participant with X in some form of play, it
ought to be possible for Y to recognise what kind of contribution Y [the sendee
– the signalee] is supposed to make; and we can envisage the possibility that Y
has no clue on which to base such recognition, or again that though SOME form of
contribution seems to be SUGGESTED, when Y obliges by coming up with it, X,
instead of producing further pain-behaviour, gets cross and perhaps repeats its
original, and now problematic, performance.” [“Ouch!”]. “We now reach stage five, at which Y supposes
not that X is engaged in play, but that what X is doing is trying to get Y to
believe OR ACCEPT THAT X *is* in pain.” That is, not just faking that he is in
pain, but faking that he is in pain because he IS in pain. Surely the pain
cannot be that GROSS if he has time to consider all this! So “communicating
pain” applies to “MINOR pain,” which the Epicureans called “communicable pains”
(like a tooth-ache – Vitters after reading Diels, came up with the idea that
Marius was wrong and that a tooth-pain is NOT communicable! “: that is, trying to get Y to believe in or
accept the presence of that state in X which the produced behaviour, when
produced NONVOLUNTARILY, in in fact a natural sign of, naturally means.” Here
the under-metabolis is avoidable: “when produced nonvolutarily, in in fact THE
EFFECT OF, or the consequence of.” And if you want to avoid ending a sentence
with a preposition: “that STATE in X of which the produced behaviour is the
CONSEQUENCE or EFFECT. CAUSATUM. The causans-causatum distinction. “More specifically, one might say that at
stage five, creature Y recognises that creature X in the first place INTENDS
that Y recognise the production of the sign of pain (of what is USUALLY the
sign of pain) to be voluntary, and further intends that Y should regard this
first intention I1 as being a sufficient reason for Y to BELIEVE that X is in
pain.” But would that expectation occur in a one-off predicament? “And that X
has these intentions because he has the additional further INTENTION I3 that Y should
not MERELY have sufficient REASON for believing that X is in pain, but should
actually [and AND] believe it.” This substep shows that for Grice it’s the
INFLUENCING and being influenced by others (or the institution of decision),
rather than the exchange of information (giving and receiving information),
which is basic. The protreptic, not the exhibitive. “Whether or not in these
circumstances X will not merely recognise that X intends, in a certain rather
QUEER way, to get Y to believe that X is in pain, whether Y not only recognises
this but actually goes on to believe that X is in pain, would presumably DEPEND
on a FURTHER SET OF CONDITIONS which can be summed up under the general heading
that Y should regard X as TRUSTWORTHY [as a good meta-faker!] in one or another
of perhaps a variety of ways.” This is Grice’s nod to G. J. Warnock’s complex
analysis of the variety of ways in which one can be said to be ‘trustworthy’ –
last chapter of ‘trustworthiness in conversation,’ in Warnock’s brilliant, “The
object of morality.” “For example, suppose Y thinks that, either in general or
at least in THIS type of CASE [this token, a one-off predicament? Not likely!] X
would NOT want Y to believe that X is in pain UNLESS [to use R. Hall and H. L.
A. Hart’s favourite excluder defeater] X really WERE in pain.” [Cf. Hardie,
“Why do you use the subjunctive?” “Were Hardie to be here, I would respond!” –
Grice]. “Suppose also (this would perhaps not apply to a case of pain but might
apply to THE COMMUNICATION of other states [what is communicated is ONLY a
state of the soul] that Y also believes that X is trustworthy, not just in the
sense of not being malignant [malevolent, ill-willed, maleficent], but also in
the sense of being, as it were, in general [semiotically] responsible, for
example, being the sort of creature, who takes adequate trouble to make sure
that what HE [not it] is trying to get the other creature to believe is in fact
the case.” Sill, “’I have a toothache” never entails that the emisor has a
toothache! – a sign is anything we can lie with!” (Eco). “… and who is not
careless, negligent, or rash.” “Then, given the general fulfilment of the idea
that Y regards X either in general or in this particular case of being
trustworthy in this kind of competent, careful, way, one would regard it as
RATIONAL [reasonable] not only for Y to recognise these intentions on the part
of X that Y should have certain beliefs about X’s being in pain, but also for Y
actually to pass to adopting these beliefs.” Stage six annuls mimesis, or lifts the requirement of mimesis – “we relax this
requirement.” “As Judith Baker suggests, it would be unmanly to utter (or ‘let
out’) a (natural) bellow!” Here Grice speaks of the decibels of the emission of
the bellow – as indicating this or that degree of pain. But what about “It’s
raining.” We have a state of affairs (not necessarily a state in the soul of the
emissor). So by relaxing the requirement, the emissor chooses a behaviour which
is “suggestive, in some recognizable way” with the state of affairs of rain
“without the performance having to be the causal effect of (or ‘response to,’
as Grice also has it) that state of affairs, sc. that it is raining. The connection becomes “non-natural,” or
‘artificial’: any link will do – as long as the correlation is OBVIOUS,
pre-arranged, or foreknown. – ‘one-off predicament’. There are problems with
‘stage zero’ and ‘stage six.’ When it comes to stage zero, Grice is supposing,
obviously that a state of affairs is the CAUSE of some behaviour in a creature
– since there is no interpretant – the phenomenon may very obliquely called
‘semiotic.’ “If a tree falls in the wood and nobody is listening…” – So stage
zero need not involve a mimetic aspect. Since stage one involves ‘pain,’ i.e.
the proposition that ‘X is in pain,’ as Grice has it. Or as we would have it,
‘A is in pain’ or ‘The emisor is in pain.’ Althought he uses the metaphor of
the play where B is expected or intended to make an appropriate contribution or
move in the game, it is one of action, he will have to accept that ‘The emisor
is in pain’ and act appropriately. But Grice is not at all interested in the
cycle of what B might do – as Gardiner is, when he talks of a ‘conversational
dyad.’ Grice explores the conversational ‘dyad’ in his Oxford lectures on the
conversational imlicaturum. A poetic line might not do but: “A: I’m out of
gas.” B: “There’s a garage round the corner.” – is the conversational dyad. In
B’s behaviour, we come to see that he has accepted that A is out of gas. And
his ‘appropriate contribution’ in the game goes beyond that acceptance – he
makes a ‘sentence’ move (“There is a garage round the corner.”). So strictly a
conversational implicaturum is the communicatum by the second item in a
conversational dyad. Now there are connections to be made between stage zero
and stage six. Why? Well, because stage six is intended to broaden the range of
propositions that are communicated to be OTHER than a ‘state’ in the emisor – X
is in pain --. But Grice does not elaborate on the ‘essential psychological
attitude’ requirement. Even if we require this requirement – Grice considers
two requirements. The requirement he is interested in relaxing is that of the
CAUSAL connection – he keeps using ‘natural’ misleadingly --. But can he get rid
of it so easily? Because in stage six, if the emisor wants to communicate that
the cat is on the mat, or that it is raining, it will be via his BELIEF that
the cat is on the mat or that it is raining. The cat being on the mat or it
being raining would CAUSE the emisor to have that belief. Believing is the
CAUSAL consequence. Grice makes a comparison between the mimesis or resemblance
of a bellow produced voluntarily or not – and expands on the decibels. The
‘information’ one may derive at stage 0 of hearing an emisor (who is unaware
that he is being observed) is one that is such and such – and it is decoded by
de-correlating the decibels of the bellow. More decibels, higher pain. There is
a co-relation here. Grice ventures that perhaps that’s too much information (he
is following someone’s else objection). Why would not X just ‘let out a natural
bellow.’ Grice states there are – OBVIOUSLY – varioius reasons why he would not
– the ‘obviously’ implicates the objection is silly (typical tutee behaviour). The first is charming. Grice, seeing the
gender of the tutee, says that it woud be UNMANLY for A to let out a natural
bellow. He realizes that ‘unmanly’ may be considered ‘artless sexism’ (this is
the late mid-70s, and in the provinces!) – So he turns the ‘unmanly’ into the
charmingly Oxonian, “ or otherwise uncreaturely.” – which is a genial piece of
ironic coinage! Surely ‘manly’ and ‘unmanly,’ if it relates to ‘Homo sapiens,’
need not carry a sexist implicaturum. Another answer to the obvious objection
that Grice gives relates to the level of informativeness – the ‘artificial’ (as
he calls it) – His argument is that if one takes Aristotle’s seriously, and the
‘artificial bellow’ is to ‘imitate’ the ‘natural bellow,’ it may not replicate
ALL THE ‘FEATURES’ – which is the expression Grice uses -- he means semiotic distinctive feature --. So
he does not have to calculate the ‘artificial bellow’ to correlate exactly to
the quantity of decibels that the ‘natural bellow’ does. This is important from
a CAUSAL point of view, or in terms of Grice’s causal theory of behaviour. A
specific pain (prooked by Stimulus S1) gives the RESPONSE R2 – with decibels
D1. A different stimulus S2 woud give a different RESPONSE R2, with different
decibels D2. So Grice is exploring the possibility of variance here. In a
causal involuntary scenario, there is nothing the creature can do. The stimulus
Sn will produce the creature Cn to be such that its response is Rn (where Rn is
a response with decibels – this being the semiotic distinctive feature Fn – Dn.
When it comes to the ‘artificial bellow,’ the emisor’s only point is to express
the proposition, ‘I am in pain,’ and not ‘I am in pain such that it causes a
natural bellow of decibels Dn,” which would flout the conversational postulate of
conversational fortitude. The overinformativeness would baffle the sendee, if
not the sender). At this point there is a break in the narrative, and Grice, in
a typical Oxonian way, goes on to say, “But then, we might just as well relax
the requirement that the proposition concerns a state of the sender.” He gives
no specific example, but refers to a ‘state of affairs’ which does NOT involve
a state of the sender – AND ONE TO WHICH, HOWEVER, THE SENDER RESPONDS with a
behaviour. I. e. the state of the affairs, whatever it is, is the stimulus, and
the creature’s behaviour is the response. While ‘The cat is on the mat’ or ‘It
is raining’ does NOT obviously ‘communicate’ that the sender BELIEVES that to
be, the ‘behaviour’ which is the response to the external state of affairs is
mediated by this state – this is pure functionalism. So, in getting at stage
six – due to the objection by his tutee – he must go back to stage zero. Now,
he adds MANY CRUCIAL features with these relaxations of the requirements. Basically
he is getting at GRICESE. And what he says is very jocular. He knows he is
lecturing to ‘service professionals,’ not philosophers, so he keep adding
irritating notes for them (but which we philosophers find charming), “and we
get to something like what people are getting at (correctly, I would hope) when
they speak of a semiotic system!” These characteristics are elaborated under
‘gricese’ – But in teleological terms they can even be ordered. What is the
order that Grice uses? At this stage, he has already considered in detail the
progression, with his ‘the dog is shaggy,’ so we know where he is getting at –
but he does not want to get philosophically technical at the lecture. He is
aiming then at compositionality. There is utterance-whole and utterance-part,
or as he prefers ‘complete utterance’ and ‘non-complete utterance’. ‘dog’ and
‘shaggy’ would be non-complete. So the external ‘state of affairs’ is Grice’s
seeing that Strawson’s dog is shaggy and wanting to communicate this to Pears
(Grice co-wrote an essay only with two Englishmen, these being Strawson and
Pears – ‘The three Englishmen’s essay,’ as he called it’ --. So there is a
state of affairs, pretty harmless, Strawson’s dog is being shaggy – perhaps he
needs a haircut, or some brooming. “Shaggy” derives from ‘shag’ plus –y, as in
‘’twas brillig.’ – so this tells that it is an adjectival or attribute
predication – of the feature of being ‘shaggy’ to ‘dog.’ When the Anglo-Saxons
first used ‘dog’ – the Anglo-Saxon ‘Adam,’ he should have used ‘hound’. Grice
is not concerned at the point with ‘dog,’ since he KNOWS that Strawson’s dog is
“Fido” – dogs being characteristically faithful and the Strawsons not being
very original – “I kid” --. In this case, we need a ‘communication function.’
The sender perceives that Fido is shaggy and forms the proposition ‘Fido is
shaggy.’ This is via his belief, caused by his seeing that Fido is shaggy. He
COMPOSES a complete utterance. He could just utter, elliptically, ‘shaggy’ –
but under quieter circumstances, he manages to PREDICATE ‘shagginess’ to
Strawson’s dog – and comes out with “Fido is shaggy.” That is all the
‘syntactics’ that Gricese needs (Palmer, “Remember when all we had to care
about was nouns and verbs?”) (Strictly, “I miss the good old days when all we
had to care was nouns and verbs”). Well here we have a ‘verb,’ “is,” and a noun
– “nomen adjectivum” – or ‘adjective noun’, shaggy. Grice is suggesting that
the lexicon (or corpus) is hardly relevant. What is important is the syntax.
Having had to read Chomsky under Austin’s tutelage (they spent four Saturday
mornings with the Mouton paperback, and Grice would later send a letter of
recommendation on one of his tutees for study with Chomsky overseas). But Grice
has also read Peano. So he needs a set of FINITE set of formation rules – that
will produce an INFINITE SET of ‘sentences’ where Grice highers the decibels
when he says ‘infinite,’ hoping it will upset the rare Whiteheadian philosopher
in the audience! Having come up with “Fido is shaggy,’ the sender sends it to
the sendee. “Any link will do” – The link is ‘arranged’ somehow – arranged
simpliciter in a one-off predicament, or pre-arranged in two-off predicament,
etc. Stages 2, 3, 4, and 5 – have all to do with ‘trustworthy’ – which would
one think otiose seeing that Sir John Lyons has said that prevarication in the
golden plover and the Homo sapiens is an essential feature of language! (But we
are at the Oxford of Warnock!). So, the sender sends “Fido is shaggy,’ and
Pears gets it. He takes Grice to be expressing his belief that Strawson’s dog
is shaggy, and comes not only to accept that Grice believes this, but to accept
that Strawson’s dog is shaggy. As it happens, Pears recommends a bar of soap to
make his hairs at least look ‘cuter.’ Refs.: H. P. Grice, “A teleological model
of communication.”
minimal transformationalism. Grice: “I wonder where Chomsky got the idea of a
‘transformation’?” -- Grice was proud that his system PIROTESE ‘allowed for the
most minimal transformations.” transformational
grammar Philosophy of language The most powerful of the three kinds of grammar
distinguished by Chomsky. The other two are finite-state grammar and
phrasestructure grammar. Transformational grammar is a replacement for
phrase-structure grammar that (1) analyzes only the constituents in the
structure of a sentence; (2) provides a set of phrase-structure rules that
generate abstract phrase-structure representations; (and 3) holds that the
simplest sentences are produced according to these rules. Transformational
grammar provides a further set of transformational rules to show that all
complex sentences are formed from simple elements. These rules manipulate
elements and otherwise rearrange structures to give the surface structures of
sentences. Whereas phrase-structure rules only change one symbol to another in
a sentence, transformational rules show that items of a given grammatical form
can be transformed into items of a different grammatical form. For example,
they can show the transformation of negative sentences into positive ones,
question sentences into affirmative ones and passive sentences into active
ones. Transformational grammar is presented as an improvement over other forms
of grammar and provides a model to account for the ability of a speaker to generate
new sentences on the basis of limited data. “The central idea of
transformational grammar is determined by repeated application of certain
formal operations called ‘grammatical transformations’ to objects of a more
elementary sort.” Chomsky, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. Refs.: Luigi
Speranza, “Grice: “Some like Quine, but Chomsky’s MY man,” per il Club
Anglo-Italiano, The Swimming-Pool Library, Villa Grice, Liguria, Italia.
miracle, an extraordinary
event brought about by God. In the medieval understanding of nature, objects
have certain natural powers and tendencies to exercise those powers under
certain circumstances. Stones have the power to fall to the ground, and the
tendency to exercise that power when liberated from a height. A miracle is then
an extraordinary event in that it is not brought about by any object exercising
its natural powers – e.g., a liberated stone rising in the air – but brought
about directly by God. In the modern understanding of nature, there are just
events (states of objects) and laws of nature that determine which events
follow which other events. There is a law of nature that heavy bodies when
liberated fall to the ground. A miracle is then a “violation” of a law of
nature by God. We must understand by a law a principle that determines what
happens unless there is intervention from outside the natural order, and by a
“violation” such an intervention. There are then three problems in identifying
a miracle. The first is to determine whether an event of some kind, if it
occurred, would be a violation of a law of nature (beyond the natural power of
objects to bring about). To know this we must know what are the laws of nature.
The second problem is to find out whether such an event did occur on a
particular occasion. Our own memories, the testimony of witnesses, and physical
traces will be the historical evidence of this, but they can mislead. And the
evidence from what happened on other occasions that some law L is a law of
nature is evidence supporting the view that on the occasion in question L was
operative, and so there was no violation. Hume claimed that in practice there
has never been enough historical evidence for a miracle to outweigh the latter
kind of counterevidence. Finally, it must be shown that God was the cause of
the violation. For that we need grounds from natural theology for believing
that there is a God and that this is the sort of occasion on which he is likely
to intervene in nature.
misfire: used by Grice in Meaning Revisited. Cf.
Austin. “When the utterance is a misfire, the procedure which we purport to
invoke is disallowed or is botched: and our act (marrying, etc.) is void or
without effect, etc. We speak of our act as a purported act, or perhaps an
attempt, or we use such an expression as ‘went through a form of marriaage’ by
contrast with ‘married.’ If somebody issues a performative utterance, and the
utterance is classed as a misfire because the procedure invoked is not
accepted , it is presumably persons other than the speaker who do not
accept it (at least if the speaker is speaking seriously ). What would be
an ex- ample ? Consider ‘I divorce you*, said to a wife by her
husband in a Christian country, and both being Chris- tians rather than
Mohammedans. In this case it might be said, ‘nevertheless he has not
(successfully) divorced her: we admit only some other verbal or
non-verbal pro- cedure’; or even possibly ‘we (we) do not admit any
procedure at all for effecting divorce — marriage is indis- soluble’. This
may be carried so far that we reject what may be called a whole code of
procedure, e.g. the code of honour involving duelling: for example, a
challenge may be issued by ‘my seconds will call on you’, which is
equivalent to ‘ I challenge you’, and we merely shrug it off The general
position is exploited in the unhappy story of Don Quixote. Of
course, it will be evident that it is comparatively simple if we never
admit any ‘such’ procedure at all — that is, any procedure at all for doing
that sort of thing, or that procedure anyway for doing that particular
thing. But equally possible are the cases where we do sometimes —
in certain circumstances or at certain hands — accept n
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T\llt 1 n nrttT at* amaiitvwifnnaati at* af ULIL 111
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here we may often be in doubt (as in 28
Horn to do things with Words the naming example above)
whether an infelicity should be brought into our present class A. i or
rather into A. 2 (or even B. i or B. 2). For example, at a party,
you say, when picking sides, ‘I pick George’: George grunts ‘I’m
not playing.’ Has George been picked? Un- doubtedly, the situation is an
unhappy one. Well, we may say, you have not picked George, whether
because there is no convention that you can pick people who aren’t
playing or because George in the circumstances is an inappropriate object
for the procedure of picking. Or on a desert island you may say to me ‘Go
and pick up wood’; and I may say 4 1 don’t take orders from you’ or
‘you’re not entitled to give me orders’ — I do not take orders from you
when you try to ‘assert your authority’ (which I might fall in with but
may not) on a desert island, as opposed to the case when you are the
captain on a ship and therefore genuinely have authority.
missum: If Grice uses psi-transmission (and
emission, when he speaks of ‘pain,’ and the decibels of the emission of a
bellow) he also uses transmission, and mission, transmissum, and missum. Grice
was out on a mission. Grice uses ‘emissor,’ but then there’s the ‘missor.’ This
is in key with modern communication theory as instituted by Shannon. The
‘missor’ ‘sends’ a ‘message’ to a recipient – or missee. But be careful, he may
miss it. In any case, it shows that e-missor is a compound of ‘ex-‘ plus
‘missor,’ so that makes sense. It transliterates Grice’s ut-terer (which
literally means ‘out-erer’). And then there’s the prolatum, from proferre,
which has the professor, as professing that p, that is. As someone said, if H.
P. Girce were to present a talk to the Oxford Philosophical Society he would
possibly call it “Messaging.” c. 1300,
"a communication transmitted via a messenger, a notice sent through some
agency," from Old French message "message,
news, tidings, embassy" (11c.), from Medieval Latin missaticum, from Latin missus "a sending away,
sending, dispatching; a throwing, hurling," noun use of past participle
of mittere "to
release, let go; send, throw" (see mission). The Latin word is glossed in Old English by ærende. Specific religious sense of
"divinely inspired communication via a prophet" (1540s) led to
transferred sense of "the broad meaning (of something)," which is
attested by 1828. To get the message "understand" is by 1960.
m’naghten: a rule in England’s
law defining legal insanity for purposes of creating a defense to criminal
liability: legal insanity is any defect of reason, due to disease of the mind,
that causes an accused criminal either not to know the nature and quality of
his act, or not to know that his act was morally or legally wrong. Adopted in
the Edward Drummond-M’Naghten case in England in 1843, the rule harks back to
the responsibility test for children, which was whether they were mature enough
to know the difference between right and wrong. The rule is alternatively
viewed today as being either a test of a human being’s general status as a
moral agent or a test of when an admitted moral agent is nonetheless excused
because of either factual or moral/legal mistakes. On the first (or status)
interpretation of the rule, the insane are exempted from criminal liability
because they, like young children, lack the rational agency essential to moral
personhood. On the second (or mistake) interpretation of the rule, the insane
are exempted from criminal liability because they instantiate the accepted
moral excuses of mistake or ignorance. Refs.: H. P. Grice and H. L. A. Hart,
‘Legal rules;’ D. F. Pears, “Motivated irrationality.”
mnemic
causation,
a type of causation in which, in order to explain the proximate cause of an
organism’s behaviour, it is necessary to specify not only the present state of
the organism and the present stimuli operating upon it, but also this or that
past experience of the organism. The term was introduced by Russell in The
Analysis of Mind, and borrowed, but never returned, by Grice for his Lockeian
logical construction of personal identity or “I” in terms of an chain of
mnemonic temporary states. “Unlike Russell, I distinguish between the mnemic
and the mnemonic.”
Modus -- mode of co-relation: a technical jargon, under ‘mode’ – although Grice uses ‘c’
to abbreviate it, and sometimes speaks of ‘way’ of ‘co-relation’ – but ‘mode’
was his favourite. Grice is not sure
whether ‘mode’ ‘of’ and ‘correlation’ are the appropriate terms. Grice speaks
of an associative mode of correlation – vide associatum. He also speaks of a
conventional mode of correlation (or is it mode of conventional correlation) –
vide non-conventional, and he speaks of an iconic mode of correlation, vide
non-iconic. Indeed he speaks once of ‘conventional correlation’ TO THE
ASSOCIATED specific response. So the
mode is rather otiose. In the context when he uses ‘conventional correlation’
TO THE ASSOCIATED specific response, he uses ‘way’ rather than mode – Grice
wants ‘conventional correlation’ TO THE ASSOCIATED specific RESPONSE to be just
one way, or mode. There’s ASSOCIATIVE correlation, and iconic correlation, and
‘etc.’ Strictly, as he puts it, this or that correlation is this or that
provision of a way in which the expressum is correlated to a specific response.
When symbolizing he uses the informal “correlated in way c with response r’ –
having said that ‘c’ stands for ‘mode of correlation.’ But ‘mode sounds too
pretentious, hence his retreat to the more flowing ‘way.’ Modus – modelllo --
model theory:
Grice, “The etymology of ‘model’ is fascinating.” H. P. Grice, “A conversational model.” Grice: “Since the object of the present exercise, is to
provide a bit of theory which will explain, for a certain family of
cases, why is it that a particular implicaturum is present, I
would suggest that the final test of the adequacy and utility of this
model should be: can it be used to construct an explanation of the presence of
such an implicaturum, and is it more comprehensive and more economical than any
rival? is the no doubt pre-theoretical explanation which one would be
prompted to give of such an implicaturum consistent with, or better still a
favourable pointer towards the requirements involved in the model? cf.
Sidonius: Far otherwise: whoever disputes with you will find those protagonists
of heresy, the Stoics, Cynics, and Peripatetics, shattered with their own arms
and their own engines; for their heathen followers, if they resist the
doctrine and spirit of Christianity, will, under your teaching, be caught
in their own familiar entanglements, and fall headlong into their
own toils; the barbed syllogism of your arguments will hook the
glib tongues of the casuists, and it is you who will tie
up their slippery questions in categorical clews, after the
manner of a clever physician, who, when compelled by reasoned thought, prepares
antidotes for poison even from a serpent.qvin potivs experietvr qvisqve
conflixerit stoicos cynicos peripateticos hæresiarchas propriis armis propriis
qvoqve concvti machinamentis nam sectatores eorum Christiano dogmati ac sensvi
si repvgnaverint mox te magistro ligati vernaculis implicaturis in
retia sua præcipites implagabvntur syllogismis tuæ propositionis vncatis
volvbilem tergiversantvm lingvam inhamantibvs dum spiris categoricis lubricas
qvæstiones tv potivs innodas acrivm more medicorvm qui remedivm contra venena
cum ratio compellit et de serpente conficivnt.” Grice: “Since the object of the
present exercise, is to provide a bit of theory which will explain,
for a certain family of cases, why is it that a particular
conversational implicaturum is present, I would suggest that
the final tess of the adequacy
and utility of this MODEL should be various. First: can the model be used to
construct an explanation (argumentum) of the presence of this or that
conversational implicaturum? Second, is the model it more comprehensive than
any rival in providing this explanation? Third, is the model more economical
than any rival in providing this explanation? Fourth, is the no
doubt pre-theoretical (antecedent) explanation which one would be
prompted to give of such a conversational implicaturum consistent with the
requirements involved in the model. Fifth: is the no doubt pre-threoretical
(antecedent) explanation which one would be prompted to give of such a
conversational implciaturum better
still, a favourable POINTER towards the requirements involved in the model? Cf.
Sidonius: Far otherwise: whoever disputes with you will find those protagonists
of heresy, the Stoics, Cynics, and Peripatetics, shattered with their own arms
and their own engines; for their heathen followers, if they resist the
doctrine and spirit of Christianity, will, under your teaching, be caught
in their own familiar entanglements, and fall headlong into their
own toils; the barbed syllogism of your arguments will hook the
glib tongues of the casuists, and it is you who will tie
up their slippery questions in categorical clews, after the
manner of a clever physician, who, when compelled by reasoned thought, prepares
antidotes for poison even from a serpent -- qvin potivs experietvr qvisqve
conflixerit stoicos cynicos peripateticos hæresiarchas propriis armis propriis
qvoqve concvti machinamentis nam sectatores eorum Christiano dogmati ac sensvi
si repvgnaverint mox te magistro ligati vernacvlis implicatvris in
retia sva præcipites implagabvntur syllogismis tuæ propositionis vncatis
volvbilem tergiversantvm lingvam inhamantibvs dum spiris categoricis lvbricas
qvæstiones tv potivs innodas acrivm more medicorvm qui remedivm contra venena
cvm ratio compellit et de serpente conficivnt. qvin
potivs experietvr qvisqve conflixerit stoicos cynicos peripateticos
hæresiarchas propriis armis propriis qvoqve concvti machinamentis nam
sectatores eorum Christiano dogmati ac sensvi si repvgnaverint mox te
magistro ligati vernacvlis IMPILICATVRIS in retia sva præcipites
implagabvntur syllogismis tuæ propositionis vncatis volvbilem tergiversantvm
lingvam inhamantibvs dum spiris categoricis lubricas qvæstiones tv potivs
innodas acrivm more medicorvm qui remedivm contra venena cvm ratio compellit et
de serpente conficivnt. So Grice has the phenomenon: the conversational
implcaturum – the qualifying adjective is crucial, since surely he is not
interested in non-conventional NON-conversational implicatura derived from
moral maxims! --. And then he needs a MODEL – that of the principle or
postulate of conversational benevolence. It fits the various requirements.
First: the model can be used to construct an explanation (argumentum) of the
presence of this or that conversational implicaturum. Second, REQUIREMENT OF
PHILOSOPHICAL GENERALITY -- the model is
more comprehensive than any rival. Third, the OCCAM requirement: the model is
more ECONOMICAL than any rival – in what sense? – “in providing this
explanation” of this or that conversational implicaturum. Fourth, the J. L.
Austin requirement, this or that requirement involved in the model is SURELY
consistent with the no doubt pre-theoretical antecedent explanation
(argumentum) that one would be prompted to give. Fifth, the second J. L. Austin
requirement: towards this or that requirement involved in the model the
no-doubt pre-theoretical (antecedent) explanation (argument) that one would be
prompted to give is, better still, a favourable pointer. Grice’s oversuse of
‘model’ is due to Max Black, who understands model theory as a branch of philosophical
semantics that deals with the connection between a language and its
interpretations or structures. Basic to it is the characterization of the
conditions under which a sentence is true in structure. It is confusing that
the term ‘model’ itself is used slightly differently: a model for a sentence is
a structure for the language of the sentence in which it is true. Model theory
was originally developed for explicitly constructed, formal languages, with the
purpose of studying foundational questions of mathematics, but was later
applied to the semantical analysis of empirical theories, a development
initiated by the Dutch philosopher Evert Beth, and of natural languages, as in
Montague grammar. More recently, in situation theory, we find a theory of
semantics in which not the concept of truth in a structure, but that of information
carried by a statement about a situation, is central. The term ‘model theory’
came into use in the 0s, with the work on first-order model theory by Tarski,
but some of the most central results of the field date from before that time.
The history of the field is complicated by the fact that in the 0s and 0s, when
the first model-theoretic findings were obtained, the separation between
first-order logic and its extensions was not yet completed. Thus, in 5, there
appeared an article by Leopold Löwenheim, containing the first version of what
is now called the Löwenheim-Skolem theorem. Löwenheim proved that every
satisfiable sentence has a countable model, but he did not yet work in
firstorder logic as we now understand it. One of the first who did so was the
Norwegian logician Thoralf Skolem, who showed in 0 that a set of first-order
sentences that has a model, has a countable model, one form of the
LöwenheimSkolem theorem. Skolem argued that logic was first-order logic and
that first-order logic was the proper basis for metamathematical
investigations, fully accepting the relativity of set-theoretic notions in
first-order logic. Within philosophy this thesis is still dominant, but in the
end it has not prevailed in mathematical logic. In 0 Kurt Gödel solved an open
problem of Hilbert-Ackermann and proved a completeness theorem for first-order
logic. This immediately led to another important model-theoretic result, the
compactness theorem: if every finite subset of a set of sentences has a model
then the set has a model. A good source for information about the model theory
of first-order logic, or classical model theory, is still Model Theory by C. C.
Chang and H. J. Keisler 3. When the separation between first-order logic and
stronger logics had been completed and the model theory of first-order logic
had become a mature field, logicians undertook in the late 0s the study of
extended model theory, the model theory of extensions of first-order logic:
first of cardinality quantifiers, later of infinitary languages and of
fragments of second-order logic. With so many examples of logics around where sometimes classical theorems did
generalize, sometimes not Per Lindström
showed in 9 what sets first-order logic apart from its extensions: it is the
strongest logic that is both compact and satisfies the LöwenheimSkolem theorem.
This work has been the beginning of a study of the relations between various
properties logics may possess, the so-called abstract model. Refs.: H. P.
Grice, “The postulate of conversational co-operation,” Oxford.
senofane: “Or as Strawson would prefer, Xenophanes, but since he emigrated
to Italy, we might just as well use an “S”” – Grice. Grice: “You have to be
careful when you research for this in Italy – they spell it with an ‘s’!” -- Grecian
philosopher, a proponent of an idealized conception of the divine, and the
first of the pre-Socratics to propound epistemological views. Born in Colophon,
an Ionian Grecian city on the coast of Asia Minor, he emigrated as a young man
to the Grecian West Sicily and southern Italy. The formative influence of the
Milesians is evident in his rationalism. He is the first of the pre-Socratics
for whom we have not only ancient reports but also quite a few verbatim
quotations fragments from his “Lampoons” Silloi and from other
didactic poetry. Xenophanes attacks the worldview of Homer, Hesiod, and
traditional Grecian piety: it is an outrage that the poets attribute moral
failings to the gods. Traditional religion reflects regional biases blond gods
for the Northerners; black gods for the Africans. Indeed, anthropomorphic gods
reflect the ultimate bias, that of the human viewpoint “If cattle, or horses,
or lions . . . could draw pictures of the gods . . . ,” frg. 15. There is a
single “greatest” god, who is not at all like a human being, either in body or
in mind; he perceives without the aid of organs, he effects changes without
“moving,” through the sheer power of his thought. The rainbow is no sign from
Zeus; it is simply a special cloud formation. Nor are the sun or the moon gods.
All phenomena in the skies, from the elusive “Twin Sons of Zeus” St. Elmo’s
fire to sun, moon, and stars, are varieties of cloud formation. There are no
mysterious infernal regions; the familiar strata of earth stretch down ad infinitum.
The only cosmic limit is the one visible at our feet: the horizontal border
between earth and air. Remarkably, Xenophanes tempers his theological and
cosmological pronouncements with an epistemological caveat: what he offers is
only a “conjecture.” In later antiquity Xenophanes came to be regarded as the
founder of the Eleatic School, and his teachings were assimilated to those of
Parmenides and Melissus. This appears to be based on nothing more than
Xenophanes’ emphasis on the oneness and utter immobility of God. Refs.: Luigi
Speranza, “Senofane in Italia.”
sensus -- modified Occam’s razor: Grice was obsessed with ‘sense,’ and thought Oxonian
philosohpers were multiplying it otiosely – notably L. J. Cohen (“The diversity
of meaning”). The original razor is what Grice would have as ‘ontological,’ to
which he opposes with in his ‘ontological marxism’. Entities should not be
multiplied beyond the necessity of needing them as honest working entities. He
keeps open house provided they come in help with the work. This restriction
explains what Grice means by ‘necessity’ in the third lecture – a second sense
does not do any work. The implicaturum does. Grice loved a razor, and being into analogy
and focal meaning, if he HAD to have semantic multiplicity, for the case of
‘is,’ (being) or ‘good,’ it had to be a UNIFIED semantic multiplicity, as
displayed by paronymy. The essay had circulated since the Harvard days, and it
was also repr. in Pragmatics, ed. Cole for Academic
Press. Personally, I prefer dialectica. ‒ Grice. This is
the third James lecture at Harvard. It is particularly useful for Grices
introduction of his razor, M. O. R., or Modified Occams Razor, jocularly
expressed by Grice as: Senses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.
An Englishing of the Ockhams Latinate, Entia non sunt multiplicanda præter
necessitatem. But what do we mean sense. Surely Occam was right with his
Entia non sunt multiplicanda præter necessitatem. We need to translate that
alla linguistic turn. Grice jokes: Senses are not be multiplied beyond
necessity. He also considers irony, stress (supra-segmental fourth-articulatory
phonology), and truth, which the Grice Papers have under a special f. in the s.
V . Three topics where the implicaturum helps. He is a scoundrel may
well be the implicaturum of He is a fine friend. But cf. the pretense
theory of irony. Grice, being a classicist, loved the etymological
connection. With Stress, he was concerned with anti-Gettier uses of
emphatic know: I KNOW. (Implicaturum: I do have conclusive
evidence). Truth (or is true)
sprang from the attention by Grice to that infamous Bristol symposium between
Austin and Strawson. Cf. Moores paradox. Grice wants to defend correspondence
theory of Austin against the performative approach of Strawson. If is true implicates someone previously
affirmed this, that does not mean a ditto implicaturum is part of the
entailment of a is true utterance, further
notes on logic and conversation, in Cole, repr. in a revised form, Modified
Occams Razor, irony, stress, truth. The preferred citation should be the
Harvard. This is originally the third James lecture, in a revised
form.In that lecture, Grice introduced the M. O. R., or Modified Occams
Razor. Senses are not be multiplied beyond necessity. The point is
that entailment-cum-implicaturum does the job that multiplied
senses should not do! The Grice Papers contains in a different f. the
concluding section for that lecture, on irony, stress, and truth. Grice
went back to the Modified Occams razor, but was never able to formalise it! It
is, as he concedes, almost a vacuous methodological thingy! It is interesting
that the way he defines the alethic value of true alrady cites satisfactory. I
shall use, to Names such a property, not true but factually satisfactory. Grices
sympathies dont lie with Strawsons Ramsey-based redundance theory of truth, but
rather with Tarskis theory of correspondence. He goes on to claim his trust in
the feasibility of such a theory. It is, indeed, possible to construct a theory
which treats truth as (primarily) a property, not true but factually
satisfactory. One may see that point above as merely verbal and not involving
any serious threat. Lets also assume that it will be a consequence, or
theorem, of such a theory that there will be a class C of utterances
(utterances of affirmative Subjects-predicate sentences [such as snow is white
or the cat is on the mat of the dog is hairy-coated such that each member of C
designates or refers to some item and indicates or predicates some class (these
verbs to be explained within the theory), and is factually satisfactory
if the item belongs to the class. Let us also assume that there can be a
method of introducing a form of expression, it is true that /it is buletic
that and linking it with the notion of
factually or alethic or doxastic satisfactory, a consequence of which will be
that to say it is true that Smith is happy will be equivalent to saying that
any utterance of class C which designates Smith and indicates the class of
happy people is factually satisfactory (that is, any utterance which assigns
Smith to the class of happy people is factually satisfactory. Mutatis mutandis
for Let Smith be happy, and buletic satisfactoriness. The move is
Tarskian. TBy stress, Grice means suprasegmental phonology, but he was too much
of a philosopher to let that jargon affect him! Refs.: The locus
classicus, if that does not sound too pretentious, is Essay 3 in WoW, but there
are references elsewhere, such as in “Meaning Revisited,” and under
‘semantics.’ The only one who took up Grice’s challenge at Oxford was L. J.
Cohen, “Grice on the particles of natural language,” which got a great response
by Oxonian R. C. S. Walker (citing D. Bostock, a tutee of Grice), to which
Cohen again responded “Can the conversationalist hypothesis be defended.” Cohen
clearly centres his criticism on the razor. He had an early essay, citing
Grice, on the DIVERSITY of meaning. Cohen opposes Grice’s conversationalist
hypothesis to his own ‘semantic hypothesis’ (“Multiply senses all you want.”). T. D. Bontly
explores the topic of Grice’s MOR. “Ancestors of this essay were presented at
meetings of the Society for Philosophy and Psychology (Edmonton, Alberta), of
the the Pacific Division of the American Philosophical Association (San
Francisco, CA) and at the University of Connecticut. I am indebted to all three
groups and particularly to the commentators D. Sanford (at the Society for
Philosophy and Psychology) and M. Reimer (at the APA). Thanks also to the
following for helpful comments or discussion (inclusive): F. Adams, A. Ariew,
P. Bloom, M. Devitt, B. Enc, C. Gaulker, M. Lynch, R. Millikan, J. Pust, E.
Sober, R. C. Stalnaker, D. W. Stampe, and S. Wheeler.” Bontly
writes, more or less (I have paraphrased him a little, with good intentions,
always!) “Some philosophers have appealed to a principle which H. P. Grice, in
his third William James lecture, dubs Modified Occam’s Razor (henceforth, “M.
O. R.”): “Senses – rather than ‘entities,’ as the inceptor from Ockham more
boringly has it -- are not to be multiplied beyond necessity’.” What
is ‘necessity’? Bontly: “Superficially, Grice’s “M. O. R.”
seems a routine application of Ockham’s principle of parsimony: ‘entities are
not to be multiplied beyond necessity. Now, parsimony arguments, though common
in science, are notoriously problematic, and their use by Grice faces one
objection or two. Grice’s “M. O. R.” makes considerably more sense in light of
certain assumptions about the psychological processes involved in language
development, learning, and acquisition, and it describes recent *empirical*, if
not philosophical or conceptual, of the type Grice seems mainly interested in
-- findings that bear these assumptions out. [My] resulting account solves
several difficulties that otherwise confront Grice’s “M. O. R.”, and it draws
attention to problematic assumptions involved in using parsimony to argue for
pragmatic accounts of the type of phenomena ‘ordinary-language’ philosophers
were interested in. In more general terms, when an expression E has two or more
uses – U1 and U2, say -- enabling its users to express two or more different
meanings – M1 and M2, say -- one is tempted to assume that E is semantically
(i.e. lexically) ambiguous, or polysemous, i.e., that some convention, constituting
the language L, assign E these two meanings M1 and M2 corresponding to its two
uses U1 and U2. One hears, for instance, that ‘or’ is ambiguous (polysemous)
between a weak (inclusive) (‘p v q’) and a strong (exclusive) sense, ‘p w q.’ Grice
actually feels that speaking of the meaning or sense of ‘or’ sounds harsh
(“Like if I were asked what the meaning of ‘to’ is!”). But in one note from a
seminar from Strawson he writes: “Jones is between Smith and Williams.” “I
wouldn’t say that ‘between’ is ambiguous, even if we interpret the sentence in
a physical sense, or in an ordering of merit, say.” Bontly:
“Used exclusively, an utterance of ‘p or q’ (p v q) entails that ‘p’ and ‘q’
are NOT both true. Used inclusively, it does not. Still, ambiguity is not the
only possible explanation.” (This reminds me of Atlas, “Philosophy WITHOUT
ambiguity!” – ambitious title!). The phenomenon can also be approached
pragmatically, from within the framework of a general theory conversation alla
Grice. One could, e. g., first, maintain that ‘p or q’ is unambiguously
monosemous inclusive and, second, apply Grice’s idea of an ‘implicaturum’ to
explain the exclusive.” I actually traced this, and found that O.
P. Wood in an odd review of a logic textbook (by Faris) in “Mind,” in the 1950s,
makes the point about the inclusive-exclusive distinction, pre-Griceianly!
Grice seems more interested, as you later consider, the implicaturum: “Utterer
U has non-truth-functional grounds for uttering ‘p or q. Not really the
‘inclusive-exclusive’ distinction. Jennings deals with this in “The genealogy
of disjunction,” and elsewhere, and indeed notes that ‘or’ may be a dead
metaphor from ‘another.’ Bontly goes on: “On any such account, ‘p
or q’ would have two uses U1 and U2 and two standard interpretations, I1 and
I2, but NEVER two ‘conventional’ meanings,” M1 and M2 Or take ‘and’ (p.q) which
(when used as a sentential connective) ordinarily stands for truth-functional
conjunction (as in 1a, below). Often enough, though, ‘p and q’ seems to imply
temporal priority (1b), while in other cases it suggests causal priority (1c).
(1) a. Bill bought a shirt and Christy [bought] a sweater. b. Adam took off his
shoes and [he] got into bed. c. “Jack fell down and [he] broke his crown, and
Jill came tumbling o:ter.” (to rhyme with ‘water’ in an earlier
line.”Apparently Grice loved this nursery rhyme too, “Jack is an Englishman; he
must, therefore, be brave,” Jill says.” (Grice, “Aspects of reason.”)Bontly:
“Again, one suspects an ambiguity, M1 and M2, but Grice argues that a
‘conversational’ explanation is available and preferable. According to the
‘pragmatist’ or ‘conversationalist’ hypothesis’ (as I shall call it), a
temporal or a causal reading of “and” (p.q) may be part of what the UTTERER
means, but such a reading I2, are not part of what the sentence means, or the
word _and_ means, and thus belong in a general theory of conversation, not the
grammar of a specific language.” Oddly, I once noticed that Chomsky, of all
people, and since you speak of ‘grammar,’ competence, etc. refers to “A.”
Albert? P. Grice in his 1966! Aspects of the theory of syntax. “A. P. Grice
wants to say that the temporal succession is not part of the meaning of ‘and.’”
I suspect one of Grice’s tutees at Oxford was spreading the unauthorized word! Bontly:
“Many an alleged ambiguity seems amenable to Grice’s conversationalist
hypothesis. Besides the sentential connectives or truth-functors, a pragmatic
explanation has been applied fruitfully to quantifiers (Grice lists ‘all’ and
‘some (at least one’), definite descriptions (Grice lists ‘the,’ ‘the
murderer’), the indefinite description (‘a finger’, much discussed by Grice,
“He’s meeting a woman this evening.”), the genitive construction (‘Peter’s
bat’), and the indirect speech act (‘Can you pass the salt?’) — to mention just
a few. The literature on the Griceian treatment of these phenomena is
extensive. Some classic treatments are found in the oeuvre of philosophers like
Grice, Bach, Harnish, and Davis, and linguists like Horn, Gazdar, and Levinson.
But the availability of a pragmatic explanation poses an interesting
methodological problem. Prima facie, the alleged ‘ambiguity’ M1 and M2, can now
be explained either semantically (by positing two or more senses S1 and S2, or
M1 and M2, of expression E) or pragmatically (by positing just one sense (S)
plus one super-imposed implicaturum, I).Sometimes, of course, one approach or
the other is transparently inadequate. When the ‘use’ of E cannot be derived
from a general conversational principle, the pragmatic explanation seems a
non-starter.” Not for a radically radical pragmatist like Atlas! Ambitious!
Similarly, an ambiguity- or polysemy- based explanation seems out of the
question where the interpretation of E at issue is highly context-dependent.”
(My favourite is Grice on “a,” that you analyse in term of ‘developmental’ or
ontogenetical pragmatics – versus Millikan’s phylogenetical! But, in many
cases, a semantic, or polysemy, and a conversational explanations both appear
plausible, and the usual data — Grice’s intuitions about how the expression can
and cannot be used, should or shouldn’t beused — appear to leave the choice of
one of the two hypotheses under-determined.These were the cases that most
interest Grice, the philosopher, since they impinge on various projects in
philosophical analysis. (Cf. Grice, 1989, pp. 3–21 and passim).” Notably
the ‘ordinary-language’ philosophy ‘project,’ I would think. I love the fact
that in the inventory of philosophers who are loose about this (as in the reference
you mention above, pp. 3-21, he includes himself in “Causal theory of
perception”! “To adjudicate these border-line cases, Grice (1978) proposes a
methodological principle which he dubs “Modified Occam’s Razor,” M. O. R.”
‘Senses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.’ (1978, pp. 118–119) “(I
follow Grice in using the Latinate ‘Occam’ rather than the Anglo-Saxon ‘Ockham’
which is currently preferred). More fully, the idea is that one should not
posit an alleged special, stronger SENSE S2, for an expression E when a general
conversational principle suffices to explain why E, which bears only Sense 1,
S1, receives a certain interpretation or carries implicaturum I. Thus, if the
‘use’ (or an ‘use’) of E can be explained pragmatically, other things being
equal, the use should be explained pragmatically.” Griceians appeal to M. O. R.
quite often,” pragmatically bearded or not! (I love Quine’s idea that Occam’s
razor was created to shave Plato’s beard. Cfr. Schiffer’s anti-shave! It is
affirmed, in spirit if not letter, by philosopher/linguist Atlas and Levinson,
philosopher/linguist Bach, Bach and philosopher Harnish, Horn, Levinson,
Morgan, linguist/philosopher Neale, philosopher Searle, philosopher Stalnaker,
philosopher Walker (of Oxford), and philosopher Ziff” (I LOVE Ziff’s use,
seeing that he could be otherwise so anti-Griceian, vide Martinich, “On Ziff on
Grice on meaning,” and indeed Stampe (that you mention) on Ziff on Grice on
meaning. One particularly forceful statement is found in “of all people”
Kripke, who derides the ambiguity hypothesis as ‘the lazy man’s approach in
philosophy’ and issues a strong warning.”
When I
read that, I was reminded that Stampe, in some unpublished manuscripts, deals
with the loose use of Griceian ideas by Kripke. Stampe discusses at length,
“Let’s get out of here, the cops are coming.” Stampe thinks Kripke is only
superficially a Griceian! Kripke: “‘Do not posit an ambiguity unless
you are really forced to, unless there are really compelling theoretical (or
intuitive) grounds to suppose that an ambiguity really is present’ (1977, p.
20). A similar idea surfaces in Ruhl’s principle of “mono-semic” bias’. One’s
initial effort is directed toward determining a UNITARY meaning S1 for a
lexical item E, trying to attribute apparent variations (S2) in meaning to
other factors. If such an effort fails, one tries to discover a means of
relating the distinct meanings S1 and S2. If this effort fails, there are
several words: E1 and E2 (1989, p. 4).” Grice’s ‘vice’ and Grice’s ‘vyse,’
different words in English, same in Old Roman (“violent.”). Ruhl’s position
differs from Grice’s approach. Whereas Grice takes word-meaning to be its
WEAKEST exhibited meaning, Ruhl argues that word-meaning can be so highly
abstract or schematic as to provide only a CORE of meaning, making EVEN the
weakest familiar reading a pragmatic specialisation.” Loved
that! Ruhl as more Griceian than Grice! Indeed, Grice is freely using the very
abstract notion of a Fregeian ‘sense,’ with the delicacy you would treat a
brick! “The difference between Grice’s and Ruhl’s
positions raises issues beyond the scope of the present essay (though see
Atlas, 1989, for further discussion).” I will! Atlas knows everything you wanted
to know, and more, especially when it comes to linguists! He has a later book
with ‘implicaturum’ in its subtitle.
“Considering
the central role that “M. O. R.” plays in Grice’s programme, one is thus
surprised to find barely any attention paid to whether it is a good principle —
to whether it is true that a pragmatic explanation, when available, is in
general more likely to be true than its ‘ambiguity’ or polysemy, or bi-semy, or
aequi-vocal rival.” Trying to play with this, I see that Grice
loves ‘aequi-vocal.’ He thinks that ‘must’ is ‘aequi-vocal’ between an alethic
and a practical ‘use.’ It took me some time to process that! He means that
since it’s the ‘same,’ ‘aequi’, ‘voice’, vox’. So ‘aequi-vocal’ IS ‘uni-vocal.’
The Aristotelian in Grice, I guess!
“Grice
himself offers vanishingly little argument.” How extended is a Harvard
philosophical audience’s attention-span? “Examining just two (out of the blue,
unphilosophical) cases where we seem happy to attribute a secondary or
derivative sense S2 to one word or expression E, but not another, Grice notes
that, in both cases, the supposition that the expression E has an additional
sense S2 is not superfluous, or unparsimonious, accounting for certain facets
of the use of E that cannot, apparently, be explained pragmatically.” I wonder
if a radically radical pragmatist would agree! I never met a polysemous
expression! Grice concludes that, therefore, ‘there is as yet no reason NOT to
accept M. O. R. ’ (1978, p. 120) — faint praise for a principle so important to
his philosophical programme! Besides this weak argument for “M. O. R.,” Grice
(1978) also mentions a few independent, rather loose, tests for alleged
ambiguity.” (“And how to fail them,” as Zwicky would have it!) But Grice’s
rationale for “M. O. R.,” presumably, is a thought Grice does not bother to
articulate, thinking perhaps that the principle’s name, its kinship with
Occam’s famous razor, ‘Do not multiply entities beyond necessity,’ made its
epistemic credentials sufficiently obvious already.” Plus,
Harvard is very Occamist!“To lay it out, though, the thought is surely that
parsimony -- and other such qualities as simplicity, generality, and
unification -- are always prized in scientific (and philosophical?)
explanation, the more parsimonious (etc.) of two otherwise equally adequate
theories being ipso facto more likely to be true. If, as would seem to be the
case, a pragmatic explanation were more parsimonious than its semantic, or
‘conventionalist,’ or ambiguity, or polysemic, or polysemy or bi-semic rival,
the conversational explanation would be supported by an established, received,
general principle of scientific inference.”
I love
your exploration of Newton on this below! Hypotheses non fingo! “Certainly,
some such argument is on Grice’s mind when he names his principle as he does,
and much the same thought surely lies behind Kripke’s references to ‘general
methodological considerations’ and ‘considerations of economy’ Other ‘Griceian’
appeals to these theoretical virtues are even more transparent. Linguist J. L.
Morgan tells us, for instance, that ‘Occam’s Razor dictates that we take a
Gricean account of an indirect speech act as the correct analysis, lacking
strong evidence to the contrary’ Philosopher Stalnaker argues that a major
advantage accrues to a pragmatic treatment of Strawson’s presupposition in that
‘there will then be no need to complicate the semantics or the lexicon’” or
introduce metaphysically dubious truth-value gaps! Linguist S. C. Levinson
suggests that a major selling point for a conversational theory in general is
that such a theory promises to ‘effect a radical simplification of the
semantics’ and ‘approximately halve the size of the lexicon’.” So we don’t need
to learn two words, ‘vyse’ and ‘vice.’ There can be little doubt, therefore,
that a Griceian takes parsimony to argue for the pragmatic approach.” I
use the rather pedantic and awful spelling “Griceian,” so that I can keep the
pronunciation /grais/ and also because Fodor used it! And non-philosophers,
too! “But a parsimony argument is notoriously
problematic, and the argument for “M. O. R.” is no exception. The preference
for a parsimonious theory is surprisingly difficult to justify, as is the
assumption that a pragmatic explanation IS more parsimonious. This does not
mean Grice’s “M. O. R.” is entirely without merit. On the contrary, Grice is
right to hold that senses should not be multiplied, if a conversational
principle will do.” But the justification for M. O. R. need have nothing to do
with the idea that parsimony is, always and everywhere, a virtue in scientific
theories.” Also because we are dealing with
philosophy, not science, here? What makes Grice’s “M. O. R.” reasonable,
rather, is a set of assumptions about the psychological processes involved in
language learning, development, and acquisition, and I will report some
empirical (rather than conceptual, as Grice does) evidence that these
assumptions are, at least, roughly correct. One disclaimer. While I shall
defend Grice’s “M. O. R.,” and therefore the research programme initiated by
Grice, it is not my goal here to vindicate any specific pragmatic account, nor
to argue that any given linguistic phenomenon requires a pragmatic
explanation.” This reminds me of Kilgariff, a Longman
linguist. He has a lovely piece, “I don’t believe in word SENSE!” I think he
found that Longman had, under ‘horse’: 1. Quadruped animal. 2. Painting of a
horse, notably by Stubbs! He did not like that! Why would ‘sense,’ a Fregeian
notion, have a place in something like ‘lexicography,’ that deals with corpuses
and statistics? “The task is, rather, to understand the
logic of a particular type of inference, a type of Griceian inference that can
be and has been employed by a philosopher such as Grice who disagree on many
other points of theory. Since it would be impossible within the confines of
this essay to discuss these disagreements, or to do justice to the many ways in
which Grice’s paradigm or programme has been revised and extended
(palaeo-Griceians, neo-Griceians, post-Griceians), my discussion is confined to
a few hackneyed examples hackneyed by Grice himself, and to Grice’s orthodox
theory, if a departure therefrom will be noted where relevant. The
conversational explanation of an alleged ambiguity or polysemy or bi-semy aims
to show how an utterer U can take an expression E with one conventional meaning
and use it as if it had other meanings as well. Typically, this requires
showing how the utterer U’s intended message can be ‘inferred,’ with the aid of
a general principle of communicative behaviour, from the conventional meaning
or sense of the word E that U utters. In Grice’s pioneering account, for
instance, the idea is that speech is subject to a Principle of Conversational
Co-Operation (In earlier Oxford seminars, where he introduced ‘implicaturum’ he
speaks of two principles in conflict: the principle of conversational
self-interest, and the principle of conversational benevolence! I much love
THAT than the rather artificial Kant scheme at Harvard). ‘Make your
conversational contribution, or move, such as is required, at the stage at
which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the conversational
exchange in which you are engaged.’(1975, p. 44). “Sub-ordinate to the
Principle of Conversational Co-Operation are four conversational maxims (he was
jocularly ‘echoing’ Kant!) falling under the four Kantian conversational
categories of Quality, Quantity, Relation, and Modus. Roughly: Make your
contribution true. Kant’s quality has to do with affirmation and negation,
rather. Make your contribution informative. Kant’s quantity has to do with
‘all’ and ‘one,’ rather. Make your contribution relevant. Kant’s relation God
knows what it has to do with. Make your contribution perspicuous [sic]. Kant’s
modus has to do with ‘necessary’ and ‘contingent.’ Grice
actually has ‘sic’ in the original “Logic and Conversation.” It’s like the
self-refuting Kantian. Also in ‘be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity’”
‘proguard obfuscation,’ sort of thing? “… further specifying what cooperation
entails (pp. 45–46).” It’s sad Grice did not remember about the
principle of conversational benevolence clashing with the principle of
conversational self-interest, or dismissed the idea, when he wrote that
‘retro-spective’ epilogue about the maxims, etc. Bontly: “Unlike the
constitutive (to use Anscombe and Searle, not regulative) principles of a
grammar, the Principle of Conversational Co-Operation and the conversational,
universalisable, maxims are to be thought of not as an arbitrary convention –
vide Lewis -- but rather as a rational STRATEGY or guideline (if ‘strategy’ is
too strong) for achieving one’s communicative ends.” I
DO think ‘strategy’ is too strong. A strategist is a general: it’s a zero-sum
game, war. I think Grice’s idea is that U is a rational agent dealing with his
addressee A, another rational agent. So, it’s not strategic rationality, but
communicative rationality. But then I’m being an etymologist! Surely chess
players speak of ‘strategies,’ but then they also speak of ‘check mate,” kill
the king! Bontly quotes from Grice: “‘[A]nyone who cares about the goals that
are central to conversation,’ says Grice, ought to find the principle of
conversational cooperation eminently reasonable (p. 49).” If
not rational! I love Grice’s /: rational/reasonable. He explores on this later,
“The price of that pair of shoes is not reasonable, but hardly irrational!” Bontly:
“Like a grammar, however, the principle of conversational co-operation is
(supposedly) tacitly known (or assumed) by conversationalists, who can thus
call on it to interpret each other’s conversational moves.” Exactly.
Parents teach their children well, not to lie, etc. “These interpretive
practices being mutual ‘knowledge,’ or common ground, moreover, an utterer U
can plan on his co-conversationalist B using the principle of conversational
cooperation, to interpret his own utterances, enabling him to convey a good
deal of information (and influencing) implicitly by relying on others to infer
his intended meaning.”INFORMING seems to do, because, although Grice makes a
distinction between ‘informing’ and ‘influencing,’ he takes an ‘exhibitive’
approach. So “Close the door!” means “I WANT YOU To believe that I want you to
close the door.” I.e. I’m informing – influencing VIA informing. “Detailed
discussions of Grice’s principle of conversational cooperation are found in
many of the essays collected in Grice (1989), as well as in the work by
linguists like Levinson (1983) and linguist/philosopher Neale (1992).
Extensions and refinements of Grice’s approach are developed by linguist Horn (1972),
linguist/philosopher Bach and philosopher Harnish (1979), linguist Gazdar
(1979), linguist/philosopher Atlas and philosopher Levinson (1981),
anthropologist Sperber and linguist Wilson (1986), linguist/philosopher Bach
(1994), linguisdt Levinson (2000), and linguist Carston (2002).). The Principle
of conversational cooperation and its conversational maxims allow Grice to draw
a distinction between two dimensions of an utterer’s meaning within the total
significance.” I never liked that Grice uses “signification,”
here when in “Meaning” he had said: “Words, for all that Locke said, are NOT
signs.” “We apply ‘sign’ to traffic signals, not to ‘dog’.” Bontly:
“That which is ‘closely related to the conventional meaning of the word’
uttered is what the utterer has SAID (1975, p. 44),” or the explicatum, or
explicitum. That which must instead be inferred with the aid of the principle
of conversational cooperation is what the utterer U has conversationally
implicated, the IMPLICATURUM (pp. 49–50), or implicitum. This dichotomy is in
several ways oversimplified. First, Grice (1975, 1978) also makes room for
‘conventional’ implicaturums (“She was poor BUT she was honest”) and
non-conversational non-conventional implicaturums (“Thank you,” abiding with
the maxim, ‘be polite’), although these dimensions are both somewhat
controversial (cf. Bach’s attack on conventional implicaturum) and can be set
aside here. Also controversial is the precise delineation of Grice’s notion of
what is said.” He grants he is using ‘say’ ‘artifiicially,’ which means,
“natural TO ME!.” Some (anthropologist Sperber and linguist Wilson, 1986;
linguist Carston, 1988, 2002; philosopher Recanati, 1993) hold that ‘what is
said,’ the DICTUM, the explicatum, or explicitum, is significantly underdetermined
by the conventional meaning of the word uttered, with the result that
considerable pragmatic intrusive processing must occur even to recover what the
utterer said.” And Grice allows that an implicaturum can
occur within the scope of an operator.“Linguist/philosopher Bach disagrees,
though he does add an ‘intermediate’ dimension (that of conversational
‘impliciture’) which is, in part, pragmatically determined, enriched, or
intruded. For my purpose, the important distinction is between that element of
meaning which is conventional or ‘encoded’ and that element which is
‘inferred,’ ab-duced, or pragmatically determined, whether or not it is
properly considered part of what is said,” in Grice’s admittedly artificial use
of this overused verb! (“A horse says neigh!”) A conversational implicaturum
can itself be either particularized (henceforth, PCIs) or generalized (GCIs)
(56).” Most familiar examples of implicaturum are particularised, where the
inference to the utterer U’s intended meaning relies on a specific assumption
regarding the context of utterance.”
Grice’s
first example, possibly, “Jones has beautiful handwriting” (Grice 1961).“Alter
that context much at all and the implicaturum will simply disappear, perhaps to
be replaced by another. With a generalised implicaturum, on the other hand, the
inference or abduction to U’s intended interpretation is relatively
context-independent, going through unless special clues to the contrary are
provided to defeat it.”Love the ‘defeat.’ Levinson cites one of Grice’s
unpublications as “Probability, defeasibility, and mood operators,” where Grice
is actually writing, “desirability.”!
“For
instance, an utterance of the sentence” ‘SOME residents survived the
earth-quake,’ would quite generally, absent any special clues to the contrary,
seem to implicate that not all survived. All survived, alas, seems to be, to
some, no news. Cruel world. No special ‘stage-setting’ has to be provided to
make the implicaturum appreciable. No particular context needs to be assumed in
order to calculate the likely intended meaning. All one needs to know is that
an utterer U who thought that everyone, all residents survived the earthquake
(or that none did?) would probably make this stronger assertion (in keeping
with Grice’s first sub-maxim of Quantity: ‘Make your contribution as
informative as required’).” Perhaps it’s best
to deal with buildings. “Some – some 75%, I would say -- of the buildings did
not collapse after the earth-quake on the tiny island, and fortunately, no
fatalities need be reported. It wasn’t such a big earth-quake as pessimist had
predicted.” “A Gricean should maintain that the
‘ambiguity’ of “some” -> “not all” canvassed at the outset can all be
explained in terms of a generalized conversational implicaturum. For instance,
linguist Horn shows, in his PhD on English, how an exclusive use of ‘or’ can be
treated as a consequence of the maxim of Quantity. Roughly, since ‘p AND q’ is
always ‘more informative,’ stronger, than ‘p or q’, an utterer U’s choosing to
assert only the disjunction would ordinarily indicate that he takes one or the
other disjunct to be false. He could assert the conjunction anyway, but then he
would be violating Grice’s first submaxim of Quality: ‘Do not say what you
believe to be false’ For similar reasons, the assertion of a disjunction would
ordinarily seem to implicate that the utterer U does not know which disjunct is
true (otherwise he would assert that disjunct rather than the entire
disjunction) and hence, and this is the way Grice puts it, which is
technically, the best way, that the utterer wants to be ‘interpreted’ as having
some ‘non-truth-functional grounds’ for believing the disjunction (philosopher
Grice, 1978; linguist Gazdar, 1979). For recall that this all goes under the
scope of a psychological attitude. In “Method in psychological philosophy: from
the banal to the bizarre,” repr. in “The conception of value,” Grice considers
proper disjunctions: “The eagle is not sure whether to attack the rabbit or the
dove.” I think Loar plays with this too in his book for Cambridge on meaning
and mind and Grice. “Grice (1981) takes a similar line with
regard to asymmetric uses of ‘and’.”
Indeed,
I loved his “Jones got into bed and took off his clothes, but I do not want to
suggest in that order.” “Is that a linguistic offence?” Don’t think so!” “The
fourth submaxim of Manner,” ‘be orderly’ -- I tend to think this is ad-hoc and
that Grice had this maxim JUST to explain away the oddity of “She got a
children and married,” by Strawson in Strawson 1952. “says that utterers should
be ‘orderly,’ and when describing a sequence of events, an orderly presentation
would normally describe the events in the order in which they occurred. So an
utterance of (1b) (‘Jones took off his
trousers – he had taken off his shoes already -- and got into bed.’ “would
ordinarily (unless the utterer U ‘indicates’ otherwise) implicate that Jones
did so in that order, hence the temporal reading of ‘and’.” “(Grice’s (1981)
account of asymmetric ‘and’ seems NOT to account for causal interpretations
like (1c).”Ryle says in “Informal logic,” 1953, in Dilemmas, “She felt ill and
took arsenic,” has the conscript ‘and’ of Whitehead and Russell, not the
‘civil’ ‘and’ of the informalist. “Oxonian philosopher R. C. S. Walker – what
took him to respond to Cohen? Walker quotes from Bostock, who was Grice’s tutee
at St. John’s -- (1975, p. 136) suggests that the causal reading can be derived
from the maxim of Relation.”Nowell-Smith had spoken of ‘be relevant’ in Ethics.
But Grice HAD to be a Kantian!“Since conversationalists are expected to make
their utterances relevant, one expects that conjoined sentences will ‘have some
bearing to one another’, often a causal bearing. More nearly adequate accounts
of the temporal and causal uses of ‘and’ (so-called ‘conjunction buttressing’)
are found in linguist/philosopher Atlas and linguist Levinson (1981) and in
linguist Levinson (1983, 2000). Linguist Carston (1988, 2002) develops a rival
pragmatic account within the framework of anthropologist Sperber’s and linguist
Wilson’s Relevance Theory, on which temporal and causal readings are
explicatures rather than implicaturums. For the purposes of this essay, it is
immaterial which of these accounts best accords with the data. In these and
many other cases, it seems that a general principle regarding communicative
RATIONALITY can provide an alternative to positing a semantic
ambiguity.”Williamson is lecturing at Yale that ‘rationality’ has little to do
with it!“But a Gricean goes a step further and claims that the implicaturum
account (when available) is BETTER than an ambiguity or polysemy account. One
possible argument for the stronger thesis is that the various specialised uses
of ‘or’ (etc.) bear all the usual hallmarks of a conversational implicaturum. An
implicaturum is: calculable (i.e. derivable from what is said or dictum or
explicatum or explicitum via the Principle of conversational cooperation and
the conversational maxims); cancellable (retractable without contradiction),
and; non-detachable (incapable of being paraphrased away) Grice, 1975, pp. 50
and 57–58). They ought also to be, sort of, universal.” (Cf. Elinor Keenan
Ochs, “The universality of conversational implicaturum.” I hope Williamson
considers this. In Madagascar, they have other ‘norms’ of conversation: since
speakers are guarded, implicatura to the effect, “I don’t know” are never
invited! Unlike the true lexical ambiguity that arises from a language-specific
convention, an implicaturum derives rather from general features of communicative
RATIONALITY and should thus be similar across different languages (philosopher
Kripke, 1977; linguist Levinson, 1983).”I’m not sure. Cfr. Ochs in Madagascar.
But she is a linguist/anthropologist, rather than a philosopher? From a
philosophical point of view, perhaps the best who treated this issues is
English philosopher Martin Hollis in his essays on ‘rationality’ and
‘relativism’ (keywords!)“Since the ‘ambiguity’ in question here has all these
features, at least to some degree, the implicaturum approach may well seem
irresistible. It is well known, however, that none of the features listed on
various occasions by Grice are sufficient (individually or jointly) to
establish the presence of a conversational implicaturum (Grice, 1978; linguist
Sadock, 1978). Take calculability.” Or how to ‘work it out,’ to keep it
Anglo-Saxon, as pretentious Grice would not! The main difficulty is that a
conversationalimplicaturum can become fossilized, or ‘conventionalised’ over
time but remain calculable nonetheless, as happens with some ‘dead’ metaphors —
one-time non-literal uses which congealed into a new conventional meaning.” A
linguist at Berkeley worked on this, Traugott, on items in the history of the
English language, or H-E-L, for short, H.O.T.E.L, history of the English
language. I don’t think Grice considers this. He sticks with old Roman ‘animal’
-> ‘non-human’, strictly, having a ‘soul,’ or animus, anima. (I think
Traugott’s focus was on verb forms, like “I have eaten,” meaning, literally, “I
possess eating,” or something. But she does quote Grice and speaks of
fossilization. “For instance, the expression.” ‘S went to the bathroom’
(Jones?) could, for obvious reasons, be used with its original, compositional,
meaning to implicate that S ‘relieved himself’.” “The intended meaning would
still be calculable today.”Or “went to powder her nose?” (Or consider the
pre-Griceian (?) child’s overinformative, standing from table at dinner, “I’m
going to the bathroom to do number 2 (unless he is flouting the maxim). “But the
use has been absorbed, or encoded into some people’s grammar, as witnessed by
the fact that ‘S went to the bathroom on
the living room carpet.’ is not contradictory (linguist J. L. Morgan, 1978;
linguist Sadock, 1978).”I wonder what some contextualists at Yale (De Rose)
would say about that!? Cf. Jason Stanley, enfant terrible. “Grice’s
cancellability is similarly problematic. While one may cancel the exclusive
interpretation of ‘p or q’ (e.g. by adding ‘or possibly both’), the added
remark could just as well be disambiguating an ambiguous utterance as canceling
the implicaturum (philosopher Walker, 1975; linguist Sadock, 1978).”Excellent
POINT! Walker would be fascinated to see that Grice once coined ‘disimplicaturum’
for some loose uses. “Macbeth saw Banquo.” “That tie is yellow under that
light, but orange under this one.” Actually, Grice creates ‘disimplicaturum’ to
refute Davidson on intending: “Jones intends to climb Mt Everest next weekend.”
Intending DOES entail BELIEF, but people abuse ‘intend’ and use it ‘loosely,’
with one sense dropped. Similarly, Grice says, with “You’re the cream in my
coffee,” where the ‘disimplicaturum’ is TOTAL!“Non-detachability fares no
better. When two sentences are synonymous (if there is, pace Quine, such a
thing), utterances of them ought to generate the same implicaturum. But they
will also have the same semantic implications, so the non-detachability of an
alleged implicaturum shows very little if anything at all (linguist Sadock,
1978).”I never liked non-detachability, because it ENTAILS that there MUST be a
synonym expression: cfr. God? Divinity? “Universality is perhaps the best test
of the four.”I agree. When linguists like Elinor Keenan disregard this, I tend
to think: “the cunning of conversational reason,” alla Hollis. Grice was a
member of Austin’s playgroup, and the conversational MAXIMS were
‘universalisable’ within THAT group. That seems okay for both Kant AND
Hegel!“Since an implicaturum can fossilise into a conventional meanings,
however, it is always possible for a cross-linguistic alleged ‘ambiguity’ to be
pragmatic in some language though lexical in another.”Is that ‘f*rnication’? Or
is it Grice on ‘pushing up the daisies’ as an “established idiom” for ‘… is
dead’ in WJ5? Austin and Grice would I think take for granted THREE languages:
Greek and Roman, that they studied at their public schools – and this is
important, because Grice says his method of analysis is somehow grounded on his
classical education – and, well, English. Donald Davidson, in the New World,
would object to the ‘substantiation’ that speaking of “Greek” as a language,
say, may entail.“So while Grice’s tests are suggestive, they supply no clear
verdict on the presence of an implicaturum. Besides these inconclusive tests
for implicaturum, Grice could also appeal to various diagnostic tests for
alleged ambiguity.” “And how to fail them,” to echo Zwicky. Grice himself
suggests three, although none of them prove terribly helpful.”Loved your
terrible. Cfr. ‘terrific’. And the king entering St. Paul’s cathedral:
“Aweful!” meaning ‘awe-some!’“First, Grice points out that each alleged sense
Sn of an allegedly ambiguous word E ought to be expressible ‘in a reasonably
wide range of linguistic environments’ (1978, p. 117). The fact that the strong
implicaturum of ‘or’ is UNavailable within the scope of a negation, for
instance, would seem to count AGAINST alleged ambiguity or polysemy. On the
other hand, the strong implicaturum of ‘or’ IS available within the scope of a
propositional-attitude verb. A strong implicaturum of ‘and’ is arguably
available in both environments, within the scope of a negation, and within the
scope of a psychological-attitude verb. So the first test seems a
wash.”Metaphorically, or implicaturally. J“Second,
Grice says, if the expression E is ambiguous with one sense S2 being derived
(somehow) from the initial or original or etymological sense S1, that
derivative sense S2 ‘ought to conform to whatever principle there may be which
governs the generation of derivative senses’ (pp. 117–118).”GRICE AT HIS BEST!
I think he is trying to irritate Quine, who is seating on second row at
Harvard! (After all Quine thought he was a field linguist!)Bontly, charmingly:
“Not knowing the content of thi principle Grice invokes— and Grice gives us no
hint as to what it might be — we cannot bring it, alas, to bear here!”I THINK
he was thinking Ullman. At Oxford, linguists were working on ‘semantics,’ cfr.
Gardiner. And he just thought that it would be Unphilosophical on his part to
bore his philosophical Harvard audience with ‘facts.’ At one point he does
mention that the facts of the history of the English language (how ‘disc’ can
be used, etc.) are not part of the philosopher’s toolkit?“Third and finally,
Grice says, we must ‘give due (but not undue) weight to MY INTUITIONS about the
existence (or indeed non-existence) of a putative sense S2 of a word E.’ (p.
120).”Emphasis on ‘my’ mine! -- As I say, I never had any intuition about an
expression having an extra-putative sense. Not even ‘bank,’ – since in Old
Germanic, it’s all etymologically related!Bontly: “But, even granting the point
that ‘or’ is NON-INTUITIVELY ambiguous in quite the same way that ‘bank’ IS,
allegedly, INTUITIVELY ambiguous, the source of our present difficulty is
precisely the fact that ‘p or q’ often *seems* intuitively to imply that one or
the other disjunct is false.”Grice apparently uses ‘intuition’ and
‘introspection’ interchangeably, if that helps? Continental phenomenological
philosophers would make MUCH of this! For Grice’s intuitions are HIS own. In a
lecture at Wellesley, of all places (in Grice 1989) he writes: “My problems
with my use of E arise from MY intuitions about the use of E. I don’t care how
YOU use E. Philosophy is personal.” Much criticised, but authentic, in a
way!“Since he discounts the latter intuition, Grice cannot place much weight on
the former!”As I say, Grice’s intuitions are hard to fathom! So are his
introspections! Actually, I think that Grice’s sticking with introspections and
intuitions save him, as Suppes shows in PGRICE ed Grandy and Warner, from being
a behaviourist. He is, rather, an intentionalist!“While a complete review of
ambiguity tests is beyond the scope of this essay, we have perhaps seen enough
to motivate the methodological problem with which we began: viz., that an,
intuitive, alleged, ambiguity seems fit to be explained either semantically
(ambiguity thesis, polysemy, bi-semy) or pragmatically/conversationally, with
little by way of direct evidence to tell us which is which!”“If philosophy
generated no problems, it would be dead!” – Grice. J“Linguists Zwicky and Sadock review
several linguistic tests for ambiguity (e.g. conjunction reduction) and point
out that most are ill-suited to detect ambiguities where the meanings in
question are privative opposites,”Oddly, Grice’s first publication ever was on
“Negation and privation,” 1938!Bontly: “i.e. where one meaning is a
specialization or specification of the other (as for instance with the female
and neutral senses of ‘goose’).”Or cf. Urmson, “There is an animal in the
backyard.” “You mean Aunt Matilda?”Bontly: “Since the putative ambiguities of
‘or’ and the like are all of this sort, it seems inevitable that these tests
will fail us here as well. For further discussion, see linguist Horn (1989, pp.
317–18 and 365–66) and linguist Carston (2002, pp. 274–77).It is hardly
surprising, therefore, to find that a Gricean typically falls back on a
methodological argument like parsimony, as instantiated in “M. O. R.”Let’s now
turn to Parsimony and Its Problems. It may, at first, be less than obvious why
an ambiguity or polysemy or bi-semy account should be deemed less parsimonious
than its Gricean rival.” Where the conventionalist or ambiguist posits an
additional sense S2, Grice adds, to S1, a conversational implicaturum, I”.
Cheap, but no free lunch! (Grice saves)Bontly: “Superficially, little seems to
be gained.” Ah, the surfaces of Oxford superficiality! “Looking closer,
however, the methodological virtues of the Grice’s approach seem fairly clear.”Good!Bontly:
“First, the principles and inference patterns that a pragmatic or
conversational account utilizes are independently motivated. The principles and
inference patterns are needed in any case to account for the relatively
un-controversial class of particularized implicatura, and they provide an
elegant approach to phenomena like figures of rhetoric, or speech -- metaphor,
irony, meiosis, litotes, understatement, sarcasm – cfr. Holdcroft -- and tricks
like Strawson’s presupposition. So it would seem that Grice can make do with
explanatory material already on hand, whereas the ambiguity or polysemy
theorist must posit a new semantic rule in each and every case. Furthermore,
the explanatory material has an independent grounding in considerations of
rationality.”I love that evening when Grice received a phonecall at Berkeley:
“Professor Grice: You have been appointed the Immanuel Kant Memorial Lecturer
at Stanford.” He gave the lectures on aspects of reason and reasoning!Bontly:
“Since conversation is typically a goal-directed activity, it makes sense for
conversationalists to abide by the Principle of Conversational Cooperation
(something like Kant’s categorical imperative, in conversational format) and
its (universalisable) conversational maxims, and so it makes sense for a
co-conversationalist to interpret the conversationalist accordingly. A
pragmatic explanation is therefore CHEAP – hence Occam on ‘aeconomicus’ -- the
principle it calls on being explainable by — and perhaps even reducible to — facts
about rational behavior in general.”I loved your “REDUCE.” B. F. Loar indeed
thought, and correctly, that the maxims are ‘empirical generalisations over
functional states.’ Genius!Bontly: A pragmatic account is not only more
economic, or cheaper. It also reveals an orderliness or systematicity that
positing a separate lexical ambiguity or polysemy or bisemy in each and every
case would seem to miss (linguist/philosopher Bach). To a Griceian, it is no
accident that a sentential connective or truth-functor (“not,” “and,” “or,” and
“if”), a quantified expression (Grice’s “all” and “some (at least one)”) and a
description (Grice’s “the”) all lend themselves to a weak and a stronger
interpretation”Cf. Holdcroft, “Weak or strong?” in “Words and deeds.”Bontly:
“Note, for instance, that a sentence with the logical form ‘Some Fs are
Gs’, and the pleonethetic, to use
Geach’s and Altham’s coinage, ‘Most Fs are Gs’, and ‘A few Fs are Gs’ are all
allegedly ‘ambiguous’ in the SAME way. Each of those expressions has an obvious
weak reading in addition to a stronger reading: ‘Not all Fs are Gs’.Good
because Grice’s first examination was: “That pillar-box seems red to me.” And
he analyses the oddness in terms of ‘strength.’ (Grice 1961). He tries to
analyse this ‘strength’ in terms of ‘entailment,’ but fails (“Neither ‘The
pillar-box IS red’ NOR ‘The pillar-box SEEMS red’ entail each other.”)Bontly:
For the conventionalist or polysemy theorist, there is no apparent reason why
this should be so. There is no reason, that is, why three etymologically
unrelated words (“some,” “most,” and “few”) should display the SAME pattern of
alleged ambiguity. The Gricean, on the other hand, explains each the SAME way,
by appealing to some rational principle of conversation. The implicatura are
all ‘scalar’ quantity implicatura, attributable to the utterer U’s having
uttered a weaker, less informative, sentence than he might have.” Linguist
Levinson, 1983). Together, these considerations make a persuasive case for the
Grice’s approach. A pragmatic explanation is more economical, and the resulting
view of conversation is more natural and unified. Since economy and unification
are both presumably virtues to be sought in a scientific or philosophical
explanation — virtues which for brevity I lump together under Occamist
‘parsimony’ — it would NOT be unreasonable to conclude that a pragmatic
explanation is (ceteris paribus) a better explanation. So it seems that Grice’s
principle, the “M. O. R.” is correct. Senses ought not to be multiplied when pragmatics
will do. Still, there are several reasons to be suspicious of the parsimony
argument. “I lay out three. It bears emphasis that none of these are objections
to the pragmatic approach per se.” I have no quarrel with the theory of
conversation or particular attempts to apply it to conversational phenomena.
The objections focus rather on the role that parsimony (or simplicity, or
generality, etc.) plays in arguments PRO the implicaturum and CONTRA ambiguity
or polysemy.” Then, there’s Dead Metaphors. First is a worry that parsimony is
too blunt an instrument, generalizing to unwanted conclusions. Versions of this
objection appear in philosopher Walker (1975), linguist Morgan (1978), and
linguist Sadock (1978).” More recently, Reimer (1998) and Devitt (forthcoming)
use it to argue against a Gricean treatment of the referential/attributive
distinction.”But have they read Grice’s VACUOUS NAMES? I know you did! Grice
notes: “My distinction has nothing to do with Donnellan’s!” Grice’s approach is
syntactic: ‘the’ and “THE,” identificatory and non-identificatory uses. R. M.
Sainsbury and D. E. Over have worked on this. Fascinating. Bontly: “For as with
the afore-mentioned so-called ‘dead’ metaphor, it can happen that a word has a
secondary use that is pragmatically predictable, and yet fully conventional. In
many such cases, of course, the original, etymological meaning is long
forgotten: e. g. the contemporary use of ‘fornication’, originally a euphemism
for activities done in fornice (that is, in the vaulted underground dwellings
that once served as brothels in Rome). (I owe this [delightful] example to Sam
Wheeler). Few speakers recall the original meaning, so the metaphor can no
longer be ‘calculated,’ as Grice’s “You’re the cream in my coffee!” (title of song)
can!” The metaphor is both dead _and buried_.”Still un-buriable?“In other
cases, however, speakers do possess the information to construct a Gricean
explanation, and yet the metaphor is dead anyway.”Reimer’s (1998) example of
the verb ‘incense’ is a case in point. One conventional meaning (‘to make or
become angry’) began life as a metaphorical extension of the other (‘to make
fragrant with incense’). The reason for the extension is fairly transparent
(resting on familiar comparisons of burning and emotion), but the use allegedly
represents an additional sense nonetheless.”What dictionaries have as ‘fig.’
But are we sure that when the dictionaries list things like 1., 2., 3., they
are listing SENSES!? Cf. Grice, “I don’t give a hoot what the dictionary says,”
to Austin, “And that’s where you make your big mistake.” Once Grice actually
opened the dictionary (he was studying ‘feeling + adj.’ – he got to
‘byzantine,’ finding that MOST adjectives did, and got bored!Bontly: Such
examples suggest that an implicaturum makes up an important source of
semantic—and, according to linguist Levinson (2000), syntactic—innovation. A
linguistic phenomenon can begin life as a pragmatic specialization or an
extension and subsequently become conventionalized by stages, making it
difficult to determine at what point (and for which ‘utterers’) a use has
become fully conventional. One consequence is that an expression E can have,
allegedly, a second sense S2, even when a pragmatic explanation appears to make
it explanatorily superfluous, and parsimony can therefore mislead.”I’m not sure
dictionary readers read ‘fig.’ as a different ‘sense,’ and lexicographers need
not be Griceian in style!Bontly: “A related point is that an ambiguity account
needn’t be LESS unified than an implicaturum account after all. If pragmatic
considerations can explain the origin and development of new linguistic
conventions, the ambiguity or polysemy theorist can provide a unified
dia-chronic account of how several un-related expressions came to exhibit similar
patterns of alleged ‘ambiguity.’ Quantifiers like ‘some’, ‘most’, and ‘a few’
may be similarly allegedly ambiguous today because they generated similar implicaturums
in the past (cf. Millikan, 2001).”OKAY, so that’s the right way to go then?
Diachrony and evolution, right?Bontly: “Then, there’s Tradeoffs. A ‘dead’
metaphor suggests that parsimony is too strong for the pragmatist’s purposes,
but as a pragmatic account could have hidden costs to offset the semantic
savings, parsimony may also be too weak! E. g. an implicaturum account looks,
at least superficially, to multiply (to use Occam’s term) inferential labour,
leaving it to the addressee to infer the utterer’s intended meaning from the
words uttered, the context, and the conversational principle. Thus there are
trade-offs involved, and the account which is semantically more parsimonious
may be less parsimonious all things considered.”Grice once invited the “P. E.
R. E.,” principle of economy of rational effort, though. Things which seem to
be psychologically UNREAL are just DEEMED, tacitly, to occur.Bontly: “To be
clear, this is not to suggest that the ambiguity or polysemy account can
dispense with inference entirely. Were the exclusive and inclusive senses of
‘or’ BOTH lexically encoded (as they were in Old Roman, ‘vel’ and ‘aut,’ hence
Whitehead’s choice of ‘v’ for ‘p v q’) still hearers would need to infer from
contextual clues which meaning were intended. The worry is not, therefore, so
much that the implicaturum account increases the number of inferences which
conversants or conversationalists have to perform. The issue concerns rather
the complexity of these inferences. Alleged dis-ambiguation is a highly
constrained process. In principle, one need only choose the relevant sense Sn,
from a finite list represented in the so-called ‘mental lexicon’. Implicaturum
calculation, on the other hand, is a matter of finding the best explanation
(abductively, alla Hanson) for an utterer’s utterance, the utterer’s meaning
being introduced as an explanatory hypothesis, answering to a ‘why’ question.
Unlike dis-ambiguation, where the various possible readings are known in
advance, in the conversational explanation, the only constraints are provided
by the addressee’s understanding of the context and the conversational
principle. So it appears that Grice’s approach saves on the lexical semantics
by placing a greater inferential burden on utterer and addressee.”But Grice
played bridge, and loved those burdens. Stampe actually gives a lovely bridge
alleged counter-example to Grice (in Grice 1989).Bontly: “Now, a Gricean can
try to lessen this load in various ways. Grice can argue, for instance, that
the inference used to recover a generalised implicaturum is less demanding than
that for a particularized one, that familiarity with types of generalised
implicate can “stream-line” the inferential process, and so on.”Love that, P.
E. R. E., or principle of economy of rational effort, above?!Bontly: “We
examine these moves. There’s Justification. Another difficulty with Grice’s
appeals to parsimony is the most fundamental. On the one hand, it can hardly be
denied that parsimony plays a role in scientific, if not philosophical,
inference.” Across the sciences, if not in philosophy, it is standard practice
to cite parsimony (simplicity, generality, etc.) as a reason to choose one
hypothesis over another; philosophers often do the same.”Bontly’s ‘often’
implicates, ‘often not’! Grice became an opponent of his own minimalism at a
later stage of his life, vide his “Prejudices and predilections; which become,
the life and opinions of Paul Grice,” by Paul Grice!Bontly: “At the same time,
however, it remains quite mysterious, if that’s the word, why parsimony (etc.)
should be given such weight by Occamists like Grice. If it were safe to assume
that Nature is simple and economical, the preference for theories with these
qualities would make perfect sense. Sir Isaac Newton offers such an ontological
rationale for parsimony in the “Principia.” Sir Isaac writes (in Roman?) “I am
to admit no more cause of a natural thing than such as are true and sufficient
to explain its appearance.” “To this purpose, the philosopher says that Nature
does nothing in vain, and more is in vain when less serves.” “For Nature is
pleased with simplicity, and affects not the pomp of a superfluous cause.”
“While a blanket assertion about the simplicity of Nature is hardly uncommon in
the history of science, today it is viewed with suspicion.” Bontly: “Newton’s reasons were presumably
theological.” “If I knew that the Creator values simplicity and economy, I
should expect the creatION to display these qualities as well.” “Lacking much
information about the Creator’s tastes, however, the assumption becomes quite
difficult, if not impossible, to support.”Cfr. literature on ‘biological
diversity.’Bontly: “(Sober discusses several objections to an ontological
justification for the principle of parsimony. Philosopher of science Mary Hesse
surveys several other attempts to justify the use of parsimony and simplicity in
scientific inference. Philosophers of science today are largely persuaded that
the role of parsimony is ‘purely methodological’ epistemological, pragmatist,
rather than ontological — that it is rational to reject unnecessary posits (or
complex, dis-unified theories) no matter what Nature is like. One might argue,
for instance, that the principle of parsimony is really just a principle of
minimum risk. The more existence claims one accepts, the greater the chance of
accepting a falsehood. Better, then, to do without any existence claim one does
not need. Philosopher J. J. C. Smart attributes this view to John Stuart
Mill.”Cf. Grice: “Not to bring more Grice to the Mill.”Bontly: “Now, risk
minimization may be a reasonable methodological principle, but it does not
suffice to explain the role of parsimony in natural science. When a theoretical
posit is deemed explanatorily superfluous, the accepted practice is not merely
to withhold belief in its existence but to conclude positively that it does not
exist. As Sober notes, ‘Occam’s razor preaches atheism about unnecessary
entities, not just a-gnosticism.’” Similarly, Grice’s razor tells us that we
should believe an expression E to be unambiguous, aequi-vocal, monosemous,
unless we have evidence for a second meaning. The absence of evidence for this
alleged additional, ‘multiplied’ ‘sense’ is presumed to count as evidence that
this alleged second, additional, multiplied, sense is absent, does not exist.
But an absence of evidence is not the same thing as evidence of an absence.”
The difficult question about scientific methodology is why we should count one
as the other. Why, that is, should a lack of evidence for an existence claim
count as evidence for a non-existence claim? The minimum risk argument leaves
this question unanswered. Indeed, philosophers of science have had so little
success in explaining why parsimony should be a guide to truth that many are
tempted to conclude that it and the other ‘super-empirical virtues’ have no
epistemic value whatsoever. Their role is rather pragmatic, or aesthetic.”This
is in part Strawson’s reply in his “If and the horseshoe” (1968), repr. in
PGRICE, in Grandy/Warner. He says words to the effect: “Grice’s theory may be
more BEAUTIFUL than mine, but that’s that!” (Strawson thinks that ‘if’ acts as
‘so’ or ‘therefore’ but in UNASSERTED clauses. So it’s a matter of a
‘conventional’ IMPLICATURUM to the inferrability of “if p, q” or “p; so, q.” I
agree with Strawson that Grice’s account of ‘conventional’ implicaturum is not
precisely too beautiful?Bontly: “Parsimony can make a theory easier to
understand or apply, and it pleases those of us with a taste for desert
landscapes, but (according to these sceptics) they do not make the theory any
more likely to be true.”The reference to the ‘desert landscape’ is genial. Cfr.
Strawson’s “A logician’s landscape.” Later in life, Grice indeed found it
unfair that an explanation of cherry trees blooming in spring should be
explained as a ‘desert landscape.’ “That’s impoverishing it!”Bontly: “van
Fraassen, for instance, tells us that a super-empirical virtue ‘does not
concern the relation between the theory and the world, but rather the use and
usefulness of the theory; it provide reasons to prefer the theory independently
of questions of truth.” “If that were correct, it would be doubtful that
parsimony can shoulder the burden Grice places on it.” “For then the
conventionalist may happily grant that a pragmatic explanation is clever and
elegant, and beautiful.” “The
conventionalist can agree that an implicaturum account comprehends a maximum of
phenomena with a minimum of theoretical apparatus.” “But when it comes to
truth, or alethic satisfactoriness, as Grice would prefer, a conventionalist
may insist that parsimony is simply irrelevant.” “One Gricean sympathizer who
apparently accepts the ‘aesthetic’ view of parsimony is the philosopher of
science R. C. S. Walker (1975), who claims that the ‘[c]hoice between Grice’s
and Cohen’s theories is an aesthetic matter’ and concludes that ‘we should not
regard either the Conversationalist Hypothesis or its [conventionalist] rivals
as definitely right or wrong.’” Cfr. Strawson in Grandy/Warner, but Strawson is
no Griceian sympathiser! “Now asking Grice to justify the principle of
parsimony may seem a bit unfair.” “Grice also assumes the reality of the
external world, the existence of intentional mental states, and the validity of
modus ponens.” “Need Grice justify these assumptions as well?” “Of course not!”
“But even if the epistemic value of parsimony is taken entirely for granted, it
is unclear why it should even count in semantics.” “All sides agree, after all,
that many, perhaps even most, expressions of natural language are allegedly
‘ambiguous.’” “There are both poly-semies, where one word has multiple, though
related, meanings (‘horn’, ‘trunk’), and homo-nymies, where two distinct words
have converged on a single phonological form (‘bat’, ‘pole’).” “The distinction between poly-semy and
homo-nymy is notoriously difficult to draw with any precision, chiefly because
we lack clear criteria for the identity of words (Bach).” “If words are
individuated phono-logically, there would be no homo-nyms.” “If words are
individuated semantically, there would be no poly-semies.” “Individuating words
historically leads to some odd consequences: e.g., that ‘bank’ is poly-semous
rather than homo-nymous, since the ‘sense’ in which it means financial
institution and the ‘sense’ in which it means edge of a river are derived from
a common source.” “I owe this example to David Sanford. For further discussion,
see Jackendoff.”Soon at Hartford. And Sanford is right!Bontly: “Given that
ambiguity is hardly rare, then, one wonders whether a semantic theory ought
really to minimize it (cf. Stampe, 1974).” “One might indeed argue that the
burden of proof here is on the pragmatist, not the ambiguity or polysemy
theorist.” “Perhaps we ought to assume, ceteris paribus, that every regular use
of an expression represents a SPECIAL sense.” “Such a methodological policy may
be less economical than Grice’s, but it does extend the same pattern of
explanation to all alleged ambiguities, and it might even accord better with
the haphazard ways in which natural languages are prone to evolve (Millikan,
2001).”Yes, the evolutionary is the way to go!Bontly: “So Grice owe us some
reason to think that parsimony and the like should count in semantics.” “He
needn’t claim, of course, that parsimony is always and everywhere a reason to
believe a hypothesis true.” “He needn’t produce a global justification for
Occam’s Razor, that is—a local justification, one specific to language, would
suffice.” “I propose to set aside the larger issue about parsimony in general,
therefore, and argue that Modified Occam’s Razor can be justified by
considerations peculiar to the study of language.” “Now for A Developmental
Account of Semantic Parsimony.” “My
approach to parsimony in linguistics is inspired by Sober’s work on parsimony
arguments in evolutionary biology.”And Grice was an evolutionary philosopher of
sorts.Bontly: “In Sober’s view, philosophers have misunderstood the role of
parsimony in scientific inference, taking it to function as a global,
domain-general principle of scientific reasoning (akin perhaps to an axiom of
the probability calculus).” “A more realistic analysis, Sober claims, shows
that parsimony arguments function as tacit references to domain-specific
process assumptions — to assumptions (whether clearly articulated or not) about
the process(es) that generate the phenomena under study.” “Where these
processes tend to be frugal, parsimony is a reasonable principle of
theory-choice.” “Where they are apt to be profligate, it is not.” “What makes
parsimony reasonable in one area of inquiry may, on Sober’s view, be quite
unrelated to the reasons it counts in another.” “Parsimony arguments in the
units of selection controversy, for instance, rest on one set of process
assumptions (i.e. assumptions about the conditions necessary for ‘group’
selection to occur).” “The application of parsimony to ‘phylogenetic’ inference
rests on a completely different set of assumptions (about rates of evolutionary
change).” “As Sober notes, in either case the assumptions are empirically
testable, and it could turn out that parsimony is a reliable principle of
inference in one, both, or neither of these areas. Sober’s approach amounts to
a thorough-going local reductionism about parsimony.It counts in theory-choice
if and only if there are domain-specific reasons to think the theory which is
more economical (in some specifiable respect) is more likely to be true. The
‘only if’ claim is the more controversial part of the bi-conditional, and I
need not defend it here. For present purposes I need only the weaker claim that
domain-specific assumptions can be sufficient to justify using parsimony — that
parsimony is a sensible principle of inference if the phenomena in question
result from processes themselves biased, as it were, towards parsimony. Now, in
natural-language semantics, the phenomena in question are ordinarily taken to be
the semantic rules or conventions shared by a community of speakers.”Cf.
Peacocke on Grice as applied to ‘community of utterers,’ in Evans/McDowell,
Truth and meaning, Oxford. Bontly: “The task is to uncover the ‘arbitrary’
mappings between a sound and a meaning (or concepts or referent) of which
utterers have tacit knowledge. This ‘semantic competence’ is shaped by both the
inputs that language learners encounter and the cognitive processes that guide
language acquisition from infancy through adulthood. So the question is whether
that input and these processes are themselves biased toward semantic parsimony
and against the acquisition of multiple meanings for single phonological forms.
As I shall now argue, there are several reasons to suspect that such a bias
should exist. Psychologists often conceptualize learning in general and word
learning in particular as a process of generating and testing hypotheses. A
child (or, in many cases, an adult) encounters an unfamiliar word, forms one or
more hypotheses as to its possible meaning, checks the hypotheses against the
ways in which he hears the word used, and finally adopts one such hypothesis.
This ‘child-as-scientist’ model is plainly short on details, but whatever
mechanism implements the generating and testing, it would seem that the process
cannot be repeated with every subsequent exposure to a word. Once a hypothesis
is accepted — a word learned — the process effectively halts, so that the next
time the child hears that word, he doesn’t have to hypothesize. Instead, the
child can access the known meaning and use it to grasp the intended message.
For that reason, an unfamiliar word ought to be the only one to trigger the
learning process, and that of course makes ambiguity problematic. Take a person
who knows one meaning of an ambiguous word, but not the other. To him, the word
is not unfamiliar, even when used with an unfamiliar meaning. At least, it will
not sound unfamiliar. So, the learning process will not kick in unless some
other source of evidence suggests another, as-yet-unknown meaning. Presumably
the evidence will come from ‘anomalous’ utterances: i.e. uses that are
contextually absurd, given only the familiar meaning. This is not to say, of
course, that hearing one anomalous utterance would be sufficient to re-start
the learning process. Since there are other reasons why an utterance may seem
anomalous (e.g. the utterer simply misspoke), it might take several anomalies
to convince one that the word has another meaning. In the absence of anomalies,
however, it seems highly unlikely that learners would seriously entertain the
possibility of a second sense. A related point is that acquisition involves, or
is at least thought to involve, a variety of ‘boot-strapping’ operations where
the learner uses what he knows of the language in order to learn more.”Oddly
Grice has a bootstrap principle (it relates to having one’s metalanguage as
rich as one’s object-language.Bontly: “It has been argued, for instance, that
children use semantic information to constrain hypotheses about words’
syntactic features (Pinker) and, conversely, syntactic information to constrain
hypotheses about words’ semantic features (Gleitman). Likewise, children must
surely use their knowledge of some words’ meanings to constrain hypotheses as
to the meanings of others, thus inferring the meanings of unfamiliar words from
context. However, that process only works insofar as one can safely assume that
the familiar words in an utterance are typically used with their familiar
meanings. If it were assumed that familiar words are typically used with
unknown meanings, the bootstraps would be too weak. Together, these
considerations point to the hypothesis that language acquisition is
semantically conservative. Children will posit new meanings for familiar words
only when necessary—only when they encounter utterances that make no sense to
them, even though all the words are familiar. Interestingly, experimental work
in language acquisition provides empirical evidence for much the same conclusion.
Psychologists have long observed that children have considerable difficulties
learning and using homo-nyms (Peters and Zaidel), leading many to suspect that
young children operate under the helpful, though mistaken, assumption that a
word can have but one meaning (Slobin). Children have similar difficulties
acquiring synonyms and may likewise assume that a given meaning can be
represented by at most one word. (Markman & Wachtel, see Bloom for a
different explanation). I cannot here survey the many experimental studies
bearing on this hypothesis, but one series of experiments conducted by Michele
Mazzocco is particularly germane. Mazzocco presents children from several
age-groups, as well as adults, with stories designed to mimic one’s first
encounter with the secondary meaning of an ambiguous word. To control the
effects of antecedent familiarity with secondary meanings, the stories used
familiar words (e.g., ‘rope’) as if they had further unknown meanings—as
‘pseudo-homo-nyms’.For comparison, other stories included a non-sense word
(e.g. ‘blus’) used as if it had a conventional meaning — as a ‘pseudo-word’ —
to mimic one’s first encounter with an entirely unfamiliar word.”Cf. Grice’s
seminar at Berkeley: “How pirots karulise elatically: some simpler ways.”“A
pirot can be said to potch or cotch an
obble as fang or feng or fid with another obble.”“A person can be said to
perceive or cognize an object as having the property f or f2 or being in a
relation R with another object.”Bontly: Some stories, finally, used only
genuine words with only their familiar meanings. After hearing a story,
subjects are presented with a series of illustrations and asked to pick out the
item referred to in the story. In a subsequent experiment, subjects had to act
out their interpretations of the stories. In the pseudo-homo-nym condition, one
picture would always illustrate the word’s conventional but contextually
inappropriate meaning, one would depict the unfamiliar but contextually
appropriate meaning, and the rest would be distractors. As one would expect,
adults and older children (10- to 12-year-olds) performed equally well on these
tasks, reliably picking out the intended meanings for familiar words, non-sense
words and pseudo-homonyms alike. Young children (3- to 5-year-olds), on the
other hand, could understand the stories where familiar words were used
conventionally, and they were reasonably good at inferring the intended
meanings of non-sense words from context, but they could not do so for
pseudo-homonyms. Instead, they reliably chose the picture illustrating the
familiar meaning, even though the story made that meaning quite inappropriate.
These results are noteworthy for several reasons. It is significant, first of
all, that spontaneous positing of ambiguities did not occur. As long as the
known meaning of a word comported with its use in a story, subjects show not
the slightest tendency to assign that word a new, secondary meaning—just as one
would expect if the acquisition process were semantically conservative. Second,
note that performance in the non-sense word condition confirms the familiar
finding that young children can acquire the meanings of novel words from
context — just as the bootstrapping procedure suggests. Unlike older children
and adults, however, these young children are unable to determine the meanings
of pseudo-homo-nyms from context, even though they could do so for pseudo-words
— exactly what one would expect if young children assumed that words can have
one meaning only. Why young children would have such a conservative bias
remains controversial. Unfortunately it would take us too far afield to delve
into this debate here. Doherty finds evidence that the understanding of
ambiguity is strongly correlated with a grasp of synonymy, suggesting that these
biases have a common source.” Doherty also finds evidence that the
understanding of ambiguity/synonymy is strongly predicted by the ability to
reason about false beliefs, suggesting the intriguing hypothesis that young
children’s biases are due to their lack of a representational ‘theory of
mind’).” Cf. Grice on transmission of
true beliefs in “Meaning, revisited.” – a transcendental argument.Bontly:
“Nonetheless, Mazzocco’s results provide empirical evidence for our conjecture
that a person will typically posit a second meaning for a known word only when
necessary (and, as with young children, not always then). And that, of course,
is precisely the sort of process assumption that would make Grice’s “M. O. R.”
a reasonable principle for theory choice in semantics. For we have been
operating under the assumption that the principal task of linguistic semantics
is to describe the competent speaker’s tacit linguistic knowledge. If that
knowledge is shaped by a process biased toward semantic parsimony, our semantic
theorizing ought surely to be biased in the same direction. Is Pragmatism
Vindicated?” That said, the question is still open whether Grice’s “M. O. R.,”
understood now developmentally, ontogenetically, and not phylogenetically, as
perhaps Millikan would prefer, has such consequences as Gricea typically
assumes. In particular, it remains for us to consider whether and, if so, when
the above process assumptions favor implicaturum hypotheses over ambiguity
hypotheses, and the answer would seem to hang on two further issues. First,
there is in each case the question whether a child learning the language will
find it necessary to posit a second sense for a given expression. The fact that
linguists, apprised as they are of the principles of conversation, find it
unnecessary to introduce a second sense for (e.g.) ‘or’ does NOT imply that
children would find it unnecessary. For one thing, children might acquire the
various uses of ‘or’ well before they have any pragmatic understanding
themselves.”Cfr. You can eat the cake or the sandwich.”Bontly: Even if they do
not, the order in which the various uses are acquired could make considerable
difference.It may be, for instance, that a child who first learned the
inclusive use of ‘or’ would have no need to posit a second exclusive sense,
whereas a child who originally interpreted ‘or’ exclusively might need
eventually to posit an additional, inclusive sense. So we may well have to
determine what meaning children first attach to an expression in order to
determine whether they would find it necessary to posit a second. The issues
raised above are pretty clearly empirical ones, and significant inter-personal
differences could complicate matters considerably. Just for the sake of
argument, however, let us grant that children do indeed first learn to
interpret ‘or’ inclusively, to interpret ‘and’ as mere conjunction, and so on.
Let us assume, that is, that the meanings which Grice typically takes to be
conventional are just that. In fact, the assumption that weak uses are typically
learned first has garnered some empirical support, as one referee brought to my
attention. Paris shows that children are less likely than adults to interpret
‘or’ exclusively (see also Sternberg, and Braine and Rumain). More recent
experimental work indicates that children first learn to interpret ‘and’
a-temporally (Noveck and Chevaux) and ‘some’ weakly (as compatible with ‘all’)
(Noveck, 2001). Even so, it remains an interesting question whether children
would posit secondary senses for any of these expressions, and Grice would be
on firm ground in arguing that they would not. First, the ‘ambiguities’
discussed at the outset all involve secondary uses which can, with the help of
pragmatic principles, be understood in terms of the presumed primary meaning of
the expression. If a child, encountering this secondary use for the first time,
already knows the primary meaning, and if he has moreover an understanding of
the norms of conversation—if he is a ‘Griceian child’ —, he ought to be able to
understand the secondary use perfectly well. He can recover the implicaturum
and infer the speaker’s meaning from the encoded meaning of the utterance. To
the ‘Griceian child,’ therefore, the utterance would not be anomalous. It would
make perfect sense in context, giving him no reason to posit a secondary
meaning. But what about children who are not yet Griceans — children too young
to understand pragmatic principles or to have the conceptual resources to make
inferences about other people’s likely communicative intentions? While there
seems to be no consensus as to when pragmatic abilities emerge, several
considerations suggest that they develop fairly early. Bloom argues that
pragmatic understanding is part of the best account of how children learn the
meanings of words. Papafragou discusses evidence that children can calculate implicaturums
as early as age three. Such children, knowing only the primary meaning of the
expression, would be unable to recover the conversational implicaturum and thus
unable to grasp the secondary use of the expression via the pragmatic route.
Nonetheless, I argue that they would still (at least in most cases) find it
unnecessary to posit a second meaning for the expression. Consider: the
‘ambiguities’ at issue all involve secondary meanings which are specificatory,
being identical to the primary but for some additional feature making it more
restricted or specific. The primary and second meanings would thus be
privative, as opposed to polar, opposites; Zwicky and Sadock). What a speaker means
when he uses the expression in this secondary way, therefore, would typically
imply the proposition he would mean if he were speaking literally (i.e. if he
were using the primary meaning of the expression). One could thus say something
true using the secondary sense only in contexts where one could say something
true using the primary sense—whenever ‘P exclusive-or Q’ is true, so is ‘P
inclusive-or Q’; whenever ‘P and-then Q’ is true, so is ‘P and Q’; and so on.
Thus even when the intended meaning involves the alleged second sense, the
utterance would still come out true if interpreted with the primary sense in
mind. And this means, crucially, that the utterance would not seem anomalous,
there being no obvious clash between the primary interpretation of the
utterance and the conversational context. The utterance may well be
pragmatically inappropriate when interpreted this way, but our pre-Gricean
child is insensitive to such niceties. Otherwise, he would be already a
‘Gricean’ child. On our account, therefore, the pre-Gricean child still sees no
need to posit a second meaning for the expression, even though he could not
grasp the intended (specificatory) meaning. We may illustrate the above with
the help of an ‘ambiguity’ in the indefinite description (“a dog”) made famous
by Grice. A philosopher would ordinarily take an expressions of the form ‘an F’
to be a straightforward existential quantifier, “(Ex)”, as would seem to be the
case in ‘I am going to a meeting’ On the other hand, an utterance of ‘I broke a
finger’ seems to imply that it is my finger which I broke (unless you are a
nurse – I think Horn’s cancellation goes), whereas ‘I saw a dog in the
backyard’ would seem to carry the opposite sort of implication — i.e. that it
was not my dog which I saw.”Grice finds this delightful ‘reductio’ of the
sense-positer: “a” would have _three_ senses!Bontly: “We have then the
potential for a three-way ambiguity, but our ruminations on word learning argue
against it.”Take a child who has learned (somehow) the weak (existential
quantier) use of ‘an F’ (Ex)Fx, but has for some reason never been exposed to
strong uses: ‘my,’ ‘not mine.’ Now the child hears his mother say ‘Come look!
There is a dog in the backyard!’ Running to the window, the child sees not his
mother’s pet dog Fido, but some strange dog, that is not her mother’s. To an
adult, this would be entirely predictable.” Using the indefinite description ‘a
dog’ (logical form, “(Ex)Dx”) instead of the name for the utterer’s dog would
lead one to expect that Fido (the utterer’s dog) is not the dog in
question.”Actually, like Ryle, Grice has a shaggy-dog story in WJ5, “That dog
is hairy-coated.” “Shaggy, if you must!”. Bontly: “And if the child were of an
age to have a rudimentary understanding of the pragmatic aspects of language
use, he would make the same prediction and thus see no need here to posit a
second ‘sense’ for ‘an F,’ and take ‘not mine’ as an implicaturum.”It’s
different with what Grice would have as an ‘established idiom’ (his example,
“He’s pushing up the daisies,” but not “He is fertilizing the daffodils”) as
one might argue that “I broke a finger” is. Bontly: “The child would not,
because the intended, contextually appropriate interpretation would be clear
given the primary meaning plus pragmatics, or implicaturum. But even if the
child fails to grasp the intended meaning of his mother’s remark, it still
seems unlikely that the child would be compelled to posit an ambiguity. No
matter what the child’s mother means, there is, after all, a dog in the
backyard (“Gotcha! That’s _a_ dog, my Fido is, ain’t it?!”). So the primary
interpretation still yields a true proposition. While the ‘pre-Gricean child’
thus misses (part of) the intended meaning of the utterance, still he would not
experience a clash between his interpretation and the contextually appropriate
interpretation. Perhaps the pre-Gricean child could be forced to see an
anomaly. Consider the following example. A parent offers her pre-Gricean child
dessert, saying, ‘Ice-cream, or cake?’ When the child helps himself to some of
each, the mother removes the cake with a look of annoyance and says:‘I said
ice-cream OR cake’. “While the mother’s
behavioural response makes it abundantly clear that the child’s ‘inclusive’
interpretation is inappropriate, there are several reasons why he might still
refrain from positing an ambiguity. For one, young children, who are more
Griceian (even pre-Griceian) and logical than a few adults, appear to operate
under the assumption that a word can have one meaning only, and it may be that
pre-Gricean children are simply unable to override this assumption. This would
seem particularly likely if Doherty is right that the ability to understand
ambiguity requires a robust ‘theory of mind’.At any rate, the position taken here
is that recognition of anomaly is necessary for one to posit a second meaning,
not that it is sufficient. Contrast this with a similar case where, coming to
the window, the child sees no dog but does see (e.g.) a motorcycle, a tree, a
bird, and a fence.Then he would have reason to consider an ambiguity, though
other explanations might also fit.” “Perhaps Mom was joking or hallucinating.”
The claim is, then, that language acquisition works in such a way as to make it
unlikely that learners would introduce a second senses for the ‘ambiguities’ in
question. Of course, that claim is contingent on a very large assumption —
viz., that the meaning which Grice take to be lexically ‘encoded’ is indeed the
primary meaning of the expression — and that assumption may be mistaken.” In
the continuing debate over Donnellan’s referential/attributive distinction, for
instance, Grice takes it as uncontroversial that Russell on ‘the’ provides at
least one of the conventional interpretations for sentences of the form ‘The king
of France is bald’ (i.e., the attributive interpretation).” Grice’s example in
“Vacuous names,” that Bontly quotes, is
“Jones’s butler mixed our coats and hats,” when “Jones’s butler” is actually
Jones’s haberdasher dressed as a butler for the occasion.” So Grice
distinguishes between THE butler (identificatory) and ‘the’ butler
(non-identificatory, whoever he might be). Bontly: From there, they argue that
we needn’t posit a secondary (referential) semantics for descriptions since the
referential use can be captured by Russell’s theory supplemented by Grice’s
pragmatics. Grice, 1969 (Vacuous Names); Kripke, 1977; Neale, 1990). From a
developmental perspective, however, the ‘uncontroversial’ assumption that
Russell on ‘the’ provides the primary meaning for description phrases is
certainly questionable. It being likely that the vast majority of descriptions
children hear early in life are used referentially, Grice’s position could
conceivably have things exactly backwards— perhaps the referential is primary with
the attributive acquired later, either as an additional meaning or a pragmatic
extension. Still, the fact, if it is a fact, that a referential use is more
common in children’s early environment does not imply that the referential is
acquired first.” Exclusive uses of ‘or’ are at least as frequent as inclusive
uses, and yet there is a good deal of evidence that the inclusive is
developmentally primary. (Paris, Sternberg, Braine and Rumain). Either way, the
point remains that plausible assumptions about language acquisition do indeed
justify a role for parsimony in semantics. These ‘process’ assumptions may, of
course, turn out to be incorrect.” If the evidence points the other way—if it
emerges that the learning process posits ambiguities quite freely—then Grice’s
“M. O. R.” could conceivably be groundless.”Making it a matter of empirical
support or lack thereof, and that was perhaps why Millikan thought that was the
wrong way to go? But then if she thought the evolutionary was the right way to
go, wouldn’t THAT make Grice’s initially ‘sort of’ analytic pragmatist
methodological philosophical decision a matter of fact or lack thereof? Bontly:
“Nonetheless, we can see now that the debate between Grice and the
conventionalists is ultimately an empirical, rather than, as Grice perhaps
thougth, a conceptual one. Choices between pragmatic and semantic accounts may
be under-determined by Grice’s intuitions about meaning and use, but they need
not be under-determined tout court. Then there’s Tradeoffs, Dead Metaphors, and
a Dilemma. The developmental approach to parsimony provides some purchase on
the problems regarding tradeoffs and dead metaphors as well. The former problem
is that parsimony can be a double-edged sword. While an ambiguity account does
multiply senses, the implicaturum account appears to multiply inferential
labour. Hearers have to ‘work out’ or ‘calculate’ the utterer’s meaning from
the conversational principle, without the benefit of a list of possible
meanings as in disambiguation. Pragmatic inference thus seems complex and
time-consuming. But the fact is that we are rarely conscious of engaging in any
reasoning of the sort Grice requires, pace his Principle of Economy of Rational
Effort. Consequently, the claim that communicators actually work through all
these complicated inferences seems psychologically unrealistic. To combat these
charges, Grice’s response is to claim that implicaturum calculation is largely
unconscious and implicit.”Indeed Grice’s principle of economy of rational
effort. Bontly: “Background assumptions can be taken for granted, steps can be
skipped, and only rarely need the entire process breach the surface of
consciousness. This picture seems particularly plausible with a generalised implicaturum
as opposed to a particularized one.” When a particular use of an expression E,
though unconventional, has become standard or regular (“I broke a finger”?
“He’s pushing up the daisies”), the inferential process can be considerably
stream-lined; it gets ‘short-circuited’ or ‘compressed by precedent’ (Bach and
Harnish). “Bach’s and Harnish’s notion of short-circuited inference is similar
to but not quite the same as J. L. Morgan’s notion of short-circuited implicaturum.
The latter involves conventions of use (as Searle would put it), to which Bach
and Harnish see their account as an alternative. Levinson objects to Bach’s and
Harnish’s characterization of default inferences as those compressed by the
weight of precedent. A generalised implicaturum, Levinson says, ‘is generative,
driven by general heuristics and not dependent on routinization’ But Levinson’s
complaint against Bach and Harnish may seem uncharitable. Even on Bach’s and
Harnish’s view, where a default inference is that ‘compressed by the weight of
precedent’, a generalised implicaturum is still generative: it is still
generated by the maxims of conversation. Only the stream-lined character of the
inference is dependent on precedent, not the implicaturum itself. If the
addressee has calculated the EXCLUSIVE meaning of ‘or’ enough times in the past
(from his mother, we’ll assume) it
becomes the default, allowing one to proceed directly to the exclusive
interpretation (unless something about the context provides a clue that the
standard interpretation would here be inappropriate. Now, the idea that the
generalised implicaturum can be the default interpretation, reached without all
the fancy inference, provides an obvious reply to the worry about tradeoffs.
While it is true that a pragmatic inference, as Grice calls it, in contrast with
the ‘logical inference, -- “Retrospective Epilogue” -- are in principle
abductive, fairly complex and potentially laborious, familiarity can simplify
the process enormously, to the point where it becomes no more difficult than
dis-ambiguation.” But the appeal to a default interpretation raises an
interesting difficulty that (to my knowledge) Grice never adequately addressed.
It is now quite unclear why this default interpretation should be considered an
implicaturum rather than an additional sense of the expression.”Because it’s
cancellable?Bontly: “To say that it is a default interpretation is, after all,
to say that utterers and addressees learn to associate that interpretation with
the type of expression in question. The default meaning is known in advance,
and all one has to do is be on the lookout for information that could rule it
out. “‘Short-circuited’ implicaturum-calculation is thus hard to differentiate
from disambiguation, making Grice’s hypothesis look more like a notional
variant than a real competitor to the ambiguity hypothesis. Insofar as Grice
has considered this problem, his answer appears to be that linguistic meanings,
being conventional, are inherently arbitrary.”cf. Bach and Harnish, 1979, pp.
192–195).”Indeed, in his evolutionary take on language, it all starts with
Green’s self-expression. You get hit, and you express pain unvoluntarily. Then
you proceed to simulate the response in absence of the hit, but the meaning is
“I’m in pain.” Finally, you adopt the conventions, arbitrary, and say, ‘pain,’
which is only arbitrarily connected with, well, the pain. It is the last stage
that Grice stresses as ‘artificial,’ and ‘arbitrary,’ “non-iconic,” as he
retorts to Peirceian terminology he was familiar with since his Oxford days.
Bontly: “The exclusive use of ‘or’, on the other hand, is entirely predictable
from the conversational principle, so there is nothing arbitrary about it. Thus
the exclusive interpretation cannot be part of the encoded meaning, even if it
is the default interpretation. Familiarity with that use, in other words, can
remove the need to go through the canonical inference, but it does not change
the fact that the use has a ‘natural’ (i.e., non-conventional, principled,
indeed rational) explanation. It doesn’t change the fact that it is calculable.
At this point, however, Grice’s defense of default pragmatic interpretations
collides with our remaining issue, the problem of a dead metaphor, such as “He
is pushing up the daisies.”” Or as Grice prefers, an ‘established’ or ‘recognised’
‘idiom.’Bontly: “A metaphor and other conversational implicatura can become
conventionalized and ‘die’, turning into new senses. In many such cases the
original rationale for the use is long forgotten, but in other cases the dead
metaphor remains calculable. A dead metaphors thus pose a nasty, macabre?,
dilemma for Grice.”Especially if the implicaturum is “He is dead”!Bontly: “On
the one hand, it is tempting to argue that a dead metaphor involves a new
conventional meaning precisely because the interpretation in question is no
longer actually inferred via Gricean inferences (though one could do so if one
had to—if, say, one somehow forgot that the expression had this secondary
meaning). If a conversational implicaturum had to be not just calculaBLE but
actually calculatED, that would suffice to explain why this one-time, one-off, implicaturum
is now semantically significant. But that reply is apparently closed to
pragmatists, for then it will be said that the same is true of (e.g.) the
exclusive use of ‘or.’ The exclusive interpretation is certainly calculabLE,
but since no one actually calculatES it (except in the most unusual of
circumstances, as Grice at Harvard!), the implication should be considered
semantic, not pragmatic. On the other hand, Grice might maintain that an implicaturum
need only be calculabLE and stick by their view that the exclusive reading of
‘or’ is conversationally implicated. But then we shall have to face the
consequence that many a dead metaphor (“He is pushing up the daisies”) is
likewise calculabLE and thus, according to the present view, ought not to be
considered conventional meanings of the expressions in question, which in most
cases seems quite wrong.”I’m never sure what Grice means by an ‘established
idiom.’ Established by whom? Perhaps he SHOULD consult the dictionary every now
and then! Sad the access to OED3 is so expensive!Bontly: What one needs,
evidently, is some reason to treat these two types of cases differently.To
treat the exclusive use of ‘or’ as an implicaturum (even though it is only
rarely calculatED as such) while at the same time to view (e.g.) the once
metaphorical use of ‘incense’ (or ‘… pushing up the daisies”) as semantically
significant (even though it remains calculabLE).” And the developmental account
of parsimony offers just such a reason. On the present view, the reason that
the ambiguity account has the burden of proof has to do with the nature of the
acquisition, learning, ontogenetical process and specifically with the
presumption that language learners will avoid postulating unnecessary senses.
But the implicaturum must be calculable by the learner, given his prior
understanding of the expression E and his level of pragmatic
sophistication.”Grice was a sophisticated. As I think Dora B.-O knows, Moore
has been claiming that Grice’s idea that animals cannot mean, because they are
not ‘sophisticated’ enough, is an empirical claim, even for Grice!Bontly: “t
may be, therefore, that children at the relevant developmental stage have no
difficulty understanding the exclusive use of ‘or’ (etc.) as an implicaturum
and yet lack the understanding necessary to predict that ‘incense’ could be
used to mean to make or become angry, or that to say of someone that he ‘is
pushing up the daisies,’ means that, having died and getting buried, the corpse
is helping the flowers to grow. The child might not realize, for instance, that
‘incense’ also means an aromatic substance that burns with a pleasant odour,
and even those who do probably lack the general background knowledge necessary
to appreciate the metaphorical connections between burning and emotion.”Cf.
Turner and Fauconnier on ‘blends.’Bontly: Either way, the metaphor would be
dead to the child, forcing him to learn that use the same way they learn any
arbitrary convention.”It may do to explore ‘established idioms’ in, say, parts
of England, which are not so ‘established’ in OTHER parts. Nancy Mitford with
his U and non-U distinction may do. “He went to Haddon Hall” invites, for
Mitford, the ‘unintended’ implicaturum that the utterer is NOT upper-class.
“Surely we drop “hall.’ What else can Haddon be?” But the inference may be
lacking for a non-U addressee or utterer. Similarly, in the north of England,
“our Mary,” invites the implicaturum of ‘affection,’ and this may go over the
head of members of the south-of-England community.Bontly: “The way out of the
dilemma, then, is to look to learning.”Alla Kripkenstein?Bontly: To the problem
of tradeoffs, Grice can reply that it is better to multiply (if we must use the
Occamist verb) inferences – logical inference and pragmatic inference -- than
multiply senses because language acquisition is biased in that direction. And
Grice may likewise answer the problem of a dead metaphor, or established idiom
like, “He’s been pushing up the daisies for some time, now. The reason that
Grice’s “M. O. R.” does not mandate an implicaturum account for Grice as well
is that such a dead metaphor or established idiom is not calculable by children
at the time they learn such expressions, even if they are calculable by some
adult speakers.”Is that a fact? I would think that a child is a ‘relentless
literalist,’ as Grice called Austin. “Pushing up the daisies?” “I don’t see any
daisies!”I think Brigitte Nerlich has a similar example re: irony: MOTHER: What
a BEAUTIFUL day! (ironically)CHILD: What do you mean? It’s pouring and nasty. MOTHER:
I was being ironic.I don’t think the child is going to posit a second sense to
‘beautiful’ meaning ‘nasty.’Bontly: “For the deciding question in applying Grice’s
“M. O. R.” is NOT whether the implicaturum account is available to a
philosopher like Grice, but whether it is available to the learner! On this way
of carving things up, by the way, some alleged ambiguities which Grice would
treat as implicatura could turn out to be semantically significant after all.
Likewise, some allegedly dead metaphor may turn out to be very much alive.”
Look! He did kick the bucket!” “But he’s PRETENDING to die, dear! Some uses,
finally, may vary from utterer to utterer, there being no guarantee that every
utterer will have learned the use in the same way. As a conclusion, a better
understanding of developmental processes might therefore enlarge our
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The Grice Papers, BANC, Bancroft.
MESURA
-- CUM-MESURATUM -- commensuratum: There’s commensurability and there’s
incommensurability – “But Protagoras never explies what makes man commensurable
– only implies it!” In the philosophy of science, the property exhibited by two
scientific theories provided that, even though they may not logically
contradict one another, they have reference to no common body of data.
Positivist and logical empiricist philosophers of science like Carnap had long
sought an adequate account of a theoryneutral language to serve as the basis
for testing competing theories. The predicates of this language were thought to
refer to observables; the observation language described the observable world
or (in the case of theoretical terms) could do so in principle. This view is
alleged to suffer from two major defects. First, observation is infected with
theory – what else could specify the meanings of observation terms except the
relevant theory? Even to perceive is to interpret, to conceptualize, what is
perceived. And what about observations made by instruments? Are these not
completely constrained by theory? Second, studies by Kuhn, Paul Feyerabend, and
others argued that in periods of revolutionary change in science the adoption
of a new theory includes acceptance of a completely new conceptual scheme that
is incommensurable with the older, now rejected, theory. The two theories are
incommensurable because their constituent terms cannot have reference to a
theory-neutral set of observations; there is no overlap of observational
meaning between the competitor theories; even the data to be explained are
different. Thus, when Galileo overthrew the physics of Aristotle he replaced
his conceptual scheme – his “paradigm” – with one that is not logically
incompatible with Aristotle’s, but is incommensurable with it because in a
sense it is about a different world (or the world conceived entirely
differently). Aristotle’s account of the motion of bodies relied upon occult
qualities like natural tendencies; Galileo’s relied heavily upon contrived
experimental situations in which variable factors could be mathematically
calculated. Feyerabend’s even more radical view is that unless scientists
introduce new theories incommensurable with older ones, science cannot possibly
progress, because falsehoods will never be uncovered. It is an important
implication of these views about incommensurability that acceptance of theories
has to do not only with observable evidence, but also with subjective factors,
social pressures, and expectations of the scientific community. Such acceptance
appears to threaten the very possibility of developing a coherent methodology
for science.
modus: Grice was an expert on mode. There is one mode too many.
If Grice found ‘senses’ obsolete (“Sense are not to be multiplied beyond
necessity”), he was always ready to welcome a new mode – e. g. the quessertive
--. or mode. ἔγκλισις , enclisis, mood of a verb, D.H.Comp.6, D.T.638.7, A.D. Synt.248.14,
etc.Many times, under ‘mode,’ Grice describes what others call ‘aspect.’ Surely
‘tense’ did not affect him much, except when it concerned “=”. But when it came
to modes, he included ‘aspect,’ so there’s the optative, the imperative, the
indicative, the informational, and then the future intentional and the future
indicative, and the subjunctive, and the way they interact with the praesens,
praeteritum and futurum, and wih the axis of what Aristotle called ‘teleios’
and ‘ateleios,’ indefinite and definite, or ‘perfectum, and ‘imperfectum, ‘but
better ‘definitum’ and ‘indefinitum.’ Grice
uses psi-asrisk, to be read asterisk-sub-psi. He is not concerned with
specficics. All the specifics the philosopher can take or rather ‘assume’ as
‘given.’ The category of mode translates ‘tropos,’ modus. Kant wrongly assumed
it was Modalitat, which irritated Grice so much that he echoed Kant as saying
‘manner’! Grice is a modista. He sometimes uses ‘modus,’ after Abbott. The
earliest record is of course “Meaning.” After elucidating what he calls
‘informative cases,’ he moves to ‘imperative’ ones. Grice agreed with Thomas
Urquhart that English needed a few more moods! Grice’s seven
modes.Thirteenthly, In lieu of six moods which other languages have at most,
this one injoyeth seven in its conjugable words. Ayer had said that non-indicative
utterances are hardly significant. Grice had been freely using the very English
not Latinate ‘mood’ until Moravcsik, of all people, corrects him: What you
mean ain’t a mood. I shall call it mode just to please you, J. M. E. The
sergeant is to muster the men at dawn is a perfect imperative. They shall not
pass is a perfect intentional. A version of this essay was presented in a
conference whose proceedings were published, except for Grices essay, due to
technical complications, viz. his idiosyncratic use of idiosyncratic
symbology! By mode Grice means indicative or imperative. Following
Davidson, Grice attaches probability to the indicative, via the doxastic, and
desirability to the indicative, via the buletic-boulomaic. He also
allows for mixed utterances. Probability is qualified with a suboperator
indicating a degree d; ditto for desirability, degree d. In some of the drafts,
Grice kept using mode until Moravsik suggested to him that mode was a better
choice, seeing that Grices modality had little to do with what other authors
were referring to as mood. Probability, desirability, and modality, modality,
desirability, and probability; modality, probability, desirability. He would
use mode operator. Modality is the more correct term, for things like should,
ought, and must, in that order. One sense. The doxastic modals are
correlated to probability. The buletic or boulomaic modals are correlated to
desirability. There is probability to a degree d. But there is also
desirability to a degree d. They both combine in Grices attempt to
show how Kants categorical imperative reduces to the hypothetical or
suppositional. Kant uses modality in a way that Grice disfavours, preferring
modus. Grice is aware of the use by Kant of modality qua category in the
reduction by Kant to four of the original ten categories in Aristotle). The
Jeffrey-style entitled Probability, desirability, and mode operators finds
Grice at his formal-dress best. It predates the Kant lectures and it got into
so much detail that Grice had to leave it at that. So abstract it hurts. Going
further than Davidson, Grice argues that structures expressing probability and
desirability are not merely analogous. They can both be replaced by more
complex structures containing a common element. Generalising over attitudes
using the symbol ψ, which he had used before, repr. WoW:v, Grice proposes G ψ
that p. Further, Grice uses i as a dummy for sub-divisions of psychological
attitudes. Grice uses Op supra i sub α, read: operation supra i sub alpha, as
Grice was fastidious enough to provide reading versions for these, and where α
is a dummy taking the place of either A or B, i. e. Davidsons prima facie or
desirably, and probably. In all this, Grice keeps using the primitive !, where
a more detailed symbolism would have it correspond exactly to Freges composite
turnstile (horizontal stroke of thought and vertical stroke of assertoric
force, Urteilstrich) that Grice of course also uses, and for which it is
proposed, then: !─p. There are generalising movements here but also merely
specificatory ones. α is not generalised. α is a dummy to serve as a
blanket for this or that specifications. On the other hand, ψ is indeed
generalised. As for i, is it generalising or specificatory? i is a dummy for
specifications, so it is not really generalising. But Grice generalises over
specifications. Grice wants to find buletic, boulomaic or volitive as he
prefers when he does not prefer the Greek root for both his protreptic and
exhibitive versions (operator supra exhibitive, autophoric, and operator supra
protreptic, or hetero-phoric). Note that Grice (WoW:110) uses the asterisk * as
a dummy for either assertoric, i.e., Freges turnstile, and non-assertoric, the
!─ the imperative turnstile, if you wish. The operators A are not mode
operators; they are such that they represent some degree (d) or measure of
acceptability or justification. Grice prefers acceptability because it connects
with accepting that which is a psychological, souly attitude, if a general one.
Thus, Grice wants to have It is desirable that p and It is believable
that p as understood, each, by the concatenation of three elements. The first
element is the A-type operator. The second element is the protreptic-type
operator. The third element is the phrastic, root, content, or proposition
itself. It is desirable that p and It is believable that p share the
utterer-oriented-type operator and the neustic or proposition. They only differ
at the protreptic-type operator (buletic/volitive/boulomaic or
judicative/doxastic). Grice uses + for concatenation, but it is best to use ^,
just to echo who knows who. Grice speaks in that mimeo (which he delivers in
Texas, and is known as Grices Performadillo talk ‒ Armadillo + Performative) of
various things. Grice speaks, transparently enough, of acceptance: V-acceptance
and J-acceptance. V not for Victory but for volitional, and J for judicative.
The fact that both end with -acceptance would accept you to believe that both
are forms of acceptance. Grice irritatingly uses 1 to mean the doxastic, and 2
to mean the bulematic. At Princeton in Method, he defines the doxastic in terms
of the buletic and cares to do otherwise, i. e. define the buletic in terms of the
doxastic. So whenever he wrote buletic read doxastic, and vice versa. One may
omits this arithmetic when reporting on Grices use. Grice uses two further
numerals, though: 3 and 4. These, one may decipher – one finds oneself as an
archeologist in Tutankamons burial ground, as this or that relexive attitude.
Thus, 3, i. e. ψ3, where we need the general operator ψ, not just
specificatory dummy, but the idea that we accept something simpliciter. ψ3
stands for the attitude of buletically accepting an or utterance: doxastically
accepting that p or doxastically accepting that ~p. Why we should be concerned
with ~p is something to consider. G wants to decide whether to believe p
or not. I find that very Griceian. Suppose I am told that there is a volcano in
Iceland. Why would I not want to believe it? It seems that one may want to
decide whether to believe p or not when p involves a tacit appeal to value.
But, as Grice notes, even when it does not involve value, Grice still needs
trust and volition to reign supreme. On the other hand, theres 4, as attached
to an attitude, ψ4. This stands for an attitude of buletically accepting an or
utterance: buletically accepting that p, or G buletically accepting that ~p, i.
e. G wants to decide whether to will, now that p or not. This indeed is
crucial, since, for Grice, morality, as with Kantotle, does cash in desire, the
buletic. Grice smokes. He wills to smoke. But does he will to will to smoke?
Possibly yes. Does he will to will to will to smoke? Regardless of what Grice wills,
one may claim this holds for a serious imperatives (not Thou shalt not reek,
but Thou shalt not kill, say) or for any p if you must (because if you know
that p causes cancer (p stands for a proposition involving cigarette) you
should know you are killing yourself. But then time also kills, so what gives?
So I would submit that, for Kant, the categoric imperative is one which allows
for an indefinite chain, not of chain-smokers, but of good-willers. If, for
some p, we find that at some stage, the P does not will that he wills that he
wills that he wills that, p can not be universalisable. This is proposed in an
essay referred to in The Philosophers Index but Marlboro Cigarettes took no
notice. One may go on to note Grices obsession on make believe. If I say, I
utter expression e because the utterer wants his addressee to believe that the
utterer believes that p, there is utterer and addresse, i. e. there are two
people here ‒ or any soul-endowed creature ‒ for Grices
squarrel means things to Grice. It even implicates. It miaows to me while I was
in bed. He utters miaow. He means that he is hungry, he means (via
implicaturum) that he wants a nut (as provided by me). On another occasion he
miaowes explicating, The door is closed, and implicating Open it, idiot. On the
other hand, an Andy-Capps cartoon read: When budgies get sarcastic Wild-life
programmes are repeating One may note that one can want some other person
to hold an attitude. Grice uses U or G1 for utterer and A or G2 for addressee.
These are merely roles. The important formalism is indeed G1 and G2. G1 is a
Griceish utterer-person; G2 is the other person, G1s addressee. Grice dislikes
a menage a trois, apparently, for he seldom symbolises a third party, G3. So, G
ψ-3-A that p is 1 just in case G ψ2(G ψ1 that p) or G ψ1 that ~p is 1. And here
the utterers addressee, G2 features: G1 ψ³ protreptically that p is 1 just
in case G buletically accepts ψ² (G buletically accepts ψ² (G doxastically
accepts ψ1 that p, or G doxastically accepts ψ1 that ~p))) is 1. Grice seems to
be happy with having reached four sets of operators, corresponding to four sets
of propositional attitudes, and for which Grice provides the paraphrases. The
first set is the doxastic proper. It is what Grice has as doxastic,and which
is, strictly, either indicative, of the utterers doxastic, exhibitive state, as
it were, or properly informative, if addressed to the addressee A, which is
different from U himself, for surely one rarely informs oneself. The second is
the buletic proper. What Grice dubs volitive, but sometimes he prefers the
Grecian root. This is again either self- or utterer-addressed, or
utterer-oriented, or auto-phoric, and it is intentional, or it is
other-addressed, or addressee-addressed, or addressee- oriented, or hetero-phoric,
and it is imperative, for surely one may not always say to oneself, Dont smoke,
idiot!. The third is the doxastic-interrogative, or doxastic-erotetic. One may
expand on ? here is minimal compared to the vagaries of what I called the
!─ (non-doxastic or buletic turnstile), and which may be symbolised by ?─p,
where ?─ stands for the erotetic turnstile. Geachs and Althams erotetic somehow
Grice ignores, as he more often uses the Latinate interrogative. Lewis and
Short have “interrŏgātĭo,” which they render as “a questioning, inquiry,
examination, interrogation;” “sententia per interrogationem, Quint. 8, 5, 5;
instare interrogation; testium; insidiosa; litteris inclusæ; verbis obligatio
fit ex interrogatione et responsione; as rhet. fig., Quint. 9, 2, 15; 9, 3, 98.
B. A syllogism: recte genus hoc interrogationis ignavum ac iners nominatum est,
Cic. Fat. 13; Sen. Ep. 87 med. Surely more people know what interrogative
means what erotetic means, he would not say ‒ but he would. This attitude comes
again in two varieties: self-addressed or utterer-oriented, reflective (Should
I go?) or again, addresee-addressed, or addressee-oriented, imperative, as in
Should you go?, with a strong hint that the utterer is expecting is addressee
to make up his mind in the proceeding, not just inform the utterer. Last but
not least, there is the fourth kind, the buletic-cum-erotetic. Here again,
there is one varietiy which is reflective, autophoric, as Grice prefers,
utterer-addressed, or utterer-oriented, or inquisitive (for which Ill think of
a Greek pantomime), or addressee-addressed, or addressee-oriented. Grice
regrets that Greek (and Latin, of which he had less ‒ cfr. Shakespeare who had
none) fares better in this respect the Oxonian that would please Austen, if not
Austin, or Maucalay, and certainly not Urquhart -- his language has twelve
parts of speech: each declinable in eleven cases, four numbers, eleven genders
(including god, goddess, man, woman, animal, etc.); and conjugable in eleven
tenses, seven moods, and four voices.These vocal mannerisms will result in the
production of some pretty barbarous English sentences; but we must remember
that what I shall be trying to do, in uttering such sentences, will be to
represent supposedly underlying structure; if that is ones aim, one can hardly
expect that ones speech-forms will be such as to excite the approval of, let us
say, Jane Austen or Lord Macaulay. Cf. the quessertive, or quessertion,
possibly iterable, that Grice cherished. But then you cant have everything. Where
would you put it? Grice: The modal
implicaturum. Grice sees two different, though connected questions about
mode. First, there is the obvious demand for a characterisation, or
partial characterisation, of this or that mode as it emerges in this or that
conversational move, which is plausible to regard as modes primary habitat)
both at the level of the explicatum or the implicaturum, for surely an
indicative conversational move may be the vehicle of an imperatival
implicaturum. A second, question is how, and to what extent, the representation
of mode (Hares neustic) which is suitable for application to this or that
conversational move may be legitimately exported into philosophical psychology,
or rather, may be grounded on questions of philosophical psychology, matters of
this or that psychological state, stance, or attitude (notably desire and
belief, and their species). We need to consider the second question, the
philosophico- psychological question, since, if the general rationality
operator is to read as something like acceptability, as in U accepts, or A
accepts, the appearance of this or that mode within its scope of accepting is
proper only if it may properly occur within the scope of a generic
psychological verb I accept that . Lewis and Short have “accepto,” “v.
freq. a. accipio,” which Short and Lewis render as “to take, receive, accept,”
“argentum,” Plaut. Ps. 2, 2, 32; so Quint. 12, 7, 9; Curt. 4, 6, 5; Dig. 34, 1,
9: “jugum,” to submit to, Sil. Ital. 7, 41. But in Plin. 36, 25, 64, the correct
read. is coeptavere; v. Sillig. a. h. l. The easiest way Grice finds to expound
his ideas on the first question is by reference to a schematic table or diagram
(Some have complained that I seldom use a board, but I will today. Grice
at this point reiterates his temporary contempt for the use/mention
distinction, which which Strawson is obsessed. Perhaps Grices contempt is due
to Strawsons obsession. Grices exposition would make the hair stand on end in
the soul of a person especially sensitive in this area. And Im talking to you,
Sir Peter! (He is on the second row). But Grices guess is that the
only historical philosophical mistake properly attributable to use/mention
confusion is Russells argument against Frege in On denoting, and that there is
virtually always an acceptable way of eliminating disregard of the use-mention
distinction in a particular case, though the substitutes are usually lengthy,
obscure, and tedious. Grice makes three initial assumptions.
He avails himself of two species of acceptance, Namesly, volitive
acceptance and judicative acceptance, which he, on occasion, calls respectively
willing that p and willing that p. These are to be thought of as
technical or semi-technical, theoretical or semi-theoretical, though each is a
state which approximates to what we vulgarly call thinking that p and wanting
that p, especially in the way in which we can speak of a beast such as a little
squarrel as thinking or wanting something ‒ a nut, poor darling
little thing. Grice here treats each will and judge (and accept) as a
primitive. The proper interpretation would be determined by the role of
each in a folk-psychological theory (or sequence of folk-psychological
theories), of the type the Wilde reader in mental philosophy favours at Oxford,
designed to account for the behaviours of members of the animal kingdom, at
different levels of psychological complexity (some classes of creatures being
more complex than others, of course). As Grice suggests in Us meaning,
sentence-meaning, and word-meaning, at least at the point at which (Schema Of
Procedure-Specifiers For Mood-Operators) in ones syntactico-semantical
theory of Pirotese or Griceish, one is introducing this or that mode (and
possibly earlier), the proper form to use is a specifier for this or that
resultant procedure. Such a specifier is of the general form, For the
utterer U to utter x if C, where the blank is replaced by the appropriate
condition. Since in the preceding scheme x represents an utterance or
expression, and not a sentence or open sentence, there is no guarantee that
this or that actual sentence in Pirotese or Griceish contains a perspicuous and
unambiguous modal representation. A sentence may correspond to more than
one modal structure. The sentence is structurally ambiguous (multiplex
in meaning ‒ under the proviso that senses are not to be multiplied
beyond necessity) and will have more than one reading, or parsing, as every
schoolboy at Clifton knows when translating viva voce from Greek or Latin, as
the case might be. The general form of a procedure-specifier for a modal
operator involves a main clause and an antecedent clause, which follows if. In
the schematic representation of the main clause, U represents an utterer, A his
addressee, p the radix or neustic; and Opi represents that operator whose
number is i (1, 2, 3, or 4), e.g g., Op3A represents Operator 3A, which,
since ?⊢ appears in the
Operator column for 3A) would be ?A ⊢ p. This reminds one of Grandys
quessertions, for he did think they were iterable (possibly)). The
antecedent clause consists of a sequence whose elements are a preamble, as it
were, or preface, or prefix, a supplement to a differential (which is present
only in a B-type, or addressee-oriented case), a differential, and a
radix. The preamble, which is always present, is invariant, and
reads: The U U wills (that) A A judges (that) U (For surely meaning is a species of intending
is a species of willing that, alla Prichard, Whites professor,
Corpus). The supplement, if present, is also invariant. And the idea
behind its varying presence or absence is connected, in the first instance,
with the volitive mode. The difference between an ordinary expression of
intention ‒ such as I shall not fail, or They shall not
pass ‒ and an ordinary imperative (Like Be a little kinder to
him) is accommodated by treating each as a sub-mode of the volitive mode,
relates to willing that p) In the intentional case (I shall not fail), the
utterer U is concerned to reveal to his addressee A that he (the utterer U)
wills that p. In the imperative case (They shall not pass), the utterer U is
concerned to reveal to his addressee A that the utterer U wills that the
addresee A will that p. In each case, of course, it is to be
presumed that willing that p will have its standard outcome, viz., the
actualization, or realisation, or direction of fit, of the radix (from expression
to world, downwards). There is a corresponding distinction between two uses of
an indicative. The utterer U may be declaring or affirming that p, in
an exhibitive way, with the primary intention to get his addressee A to judge
that the utterer judges that p. Or the U is telling (in a protreptic way)
ones addressee that p, that is to say, hoping to get his addressee to
judge that p. In the case of an indicative, unlike that of a volitive, there is
no explicit pair of devices which would ordinarily be thought of as sub-mode
marker. The recognition of the sub-mode is implicated, and comes from
context, from the vocative use of the Names of the addressee, from the presence
of a speech-act verb, or from a sentence-adverbial phrase (like for your
information, so that you know, etc.). But Grice has already, in his
initial assumptions, allowed for such a situation. The
exhibitive-protreptic distinction or autophoric-heterophoric distinction, seems
to Grice to be also discernible in the interrogative mode (?). Each differentials
is associated with, and serve to distinguish, each of the two basic modes
(volitive or judicative) and, apart from one detail in the case of the
interrogative mode, is invariant between autophoric-exhibitive) and
heterophoric-protreptic sub-modes of any of the two basic modes. They are
merely unsupplemented or supplemented, the former for an exhibitive sub-mode
and the latter for a protreptic sub-mode. The radix needs (one hopes) no
further explanation, except that it might be useful to bear in mind that Grice
does not stipulated that the radix for an intentional (buletic exhibitive
utterer-based) incorporate a reference to the utterer, or be in the first
person, nor that the radix for an imperative (buletic protreptic
addressee-based) incorporate a reference of the addresee, and be in the second
person. They shall not pass is a legitimate intentional, as is You shall
not get away with it; and The sergeant is to muster the men at dawn, as uttered
said by the captain to the lieutenant) is a perfectly good
imperative. Grice gives in full the two specifiers derived from the
schema. U to utter to A autophoric-exhibitive ⊢ p if U wills that A judges that U
judges p. Again, U to utter to A ! heterophoric-protreptic p if U wills that A
A judges that U wills that A wills that p. Since, of the states denoted by
each differential, only willing that p and judging that p are strictly cases of
accepting that p, and Grices ultimate purpose of his introducing this
characterization of mode is to reach a general account of expressions which are
to be conjoined, according to his proposal, with an acceptability operator, the
first two numbered rows of the figure are (at most) what he has a direct use
for. But since it is of some importance to Grice that his treatment of
mode should be (and should be thought to be) on the right lines, he adds a
partial account of the interrogative mode. There are two varieties of
interrogatives, a yes/no interrogatives (e. g. Is his face clean? Is the king
of France bald? Is virtue a fire-shovel?) and x-interrogatives, on which Grice
qua philosopher was particularly interested, v. his The that and the why.
(Who killed Cock Robin?, Where has my beloved gone?, How did he fix
it?). The specifiers derivable from the schema provide only for yes/no interrogatives,
though the figure could be quite easily amended so as to yield a restricted but
very large class of x-interrogatives. Grice indicates how this could be
done. The distinction between a buletic and a doxastic interrogative
corresponds with the difference between a case in which the utterer U indicates
that he is, in one way or another, concerned to obtain information (Is he at
home?), and a case in which the utterer U indicates that he is concerned to
settle a problem about what he is to do ‒ Am I to leave the door open?, Shall I
go on reading? or, with an heterophoric Subjects, Is the prisoner to be released?
This difference is fairly well represented in grammar, and much better
represented in the grammars of some other languages. The
hetero-phoric-cum-protreptic/auto-phoric-cum- exhibitive difference may
not marked at all in this or that grammar, but it should be marked in Pirotese.
This or that sub-mode is, however, often quite easily detectable. There is
usually a recognizable difference between a case in which the utterer A says,
musingly or reflectively, Is he to be trusted? ‒ a case in which the
utterer might say that he is just wondering ‒ and a case in which he
utters a token of the same sentence as an enquiry. Similarly, one can usually
tell whether an utterer A who utters Shall I accept the invitation? is
just trying to make up his mind, or is trying to get advice or instruction from
his addressee. The employment of the variable α needs to be
explained. Grice borrows a little from an obscure branch of logic, once
(but maybe no longer) practised, called, Grice thinks, proto-thetic ‒ Why?
Because it deals with this or that first principle or axiom, or thesis), the
main rite in which is to quantify over, or through, this or that connective. α
is to have as its two substituents positively and negatively, which may modify
either will or judge, negatively willing or negatively judging that p is
judging or willing that ~p. The quantifier (∃1α) . . . has to be treated
substitutionally. If, for example, I ask someone whether John killed Cock
Robin (protreptic case), I do not want the addressee merely to will that I have
a particular logical quality in mind which I believe to apply. I want the
addressee to have one of the Qualities in mind which he wants me to believe to
apply. To meet this demand, supplementation must drag back the
quantifier. To extend the schema so as to provide specifiers for a single
x-interrogative (i. e., a question like What did the butler see? rather than a
question like Who went where with whom at 4 oclock yesterday afternoon?),
we need just a little extra apparatus. We need to be able to superscribe a
W in each interrogative operator e.g., together with the proviso that a radix
which follows a superscribed operator must be an open radix, which contains one
or more occurrences of just one free variable. And we need a chameleon
variable λ, to occur only in this or that quantifier. (∃λ).Fx is to be regarded as a way of
writing (∃x)Fx. (∃λ)Fy is a way of writing (∃y)Fy. To provide a specifier for a
x-superscribed operator, we simply delete the appearances of α in the specifier
for the corresponding un-superscribed operator, inserting instead the
quantifier (∃1λ) () at the
position previously occupied by (∃1α) (). E.g. the specifiers for Who
killed Cock Robin?, used as an enquiry, would be: U to utter to A killed Cock Robin if U wills A to judge U to
will that (∃1λ) (A should
will that U judges (x killed Cock Robin)); in which (∃1λ) takes on the shape (∃1x) since x is the free variable within
its scope. Grice compares his buletic-doxastic distinction to prohairesis/doxa
distinction by Aristotle in Ethica Nichomachea. Perhaps his simplest
formalisation is via subscripts: I will-b but will-d not. Refs.: The main
references are given above under ‘desirability.’ The most systematic treatment
is the excursus in “Aspects,” Clarendon. BANC. modus. “The
distinction between Judicative and Volitive Interrogatives corresponds with the
difference between cases in which a questioner is indicated as being, in one
way or another, concerned to obtain information ("Is he at home?"),
and cases in which the questioner is indicated as being concerned to settle a
problem about what he is to do ("Am I to leave the door open?",
"Is the prisoner to be released?", "Shall I go on
reading?"). This difference is better represented in Grecian and Roman.”The Greek word was ‘egklisis,’ which Priscian translates as
‘modus’ and defines as ‘inclinatio anima, affectionis demonstrans.’ The Greeks
recognised five: horistike, indicativus, pronuntiativus, finitus, or definitivus,
prostastike, imperativus, euktike, optativus, hypotaktike (subjunctivus, or
conjunnctivus, but also volitivus, hortativus, deliberativus, iussivus,
prohibitivus anticipativus ) and aparemphatos infinitivus or infinitus. Modus -- odus optativus.
optative enclisis (gre: ευκτική έγκλιση, euktike
enclisis, hence it may be seen as a modus optatīvus. Something that fascinated
Grice. The way an ‘action’ is modalised in the way one describes it. He had
learned the basics for Greek and Latin at Oxford, and he was exhilarated to be
able to teach now on the subtleties of the English system of ‘aspect.’ To ‘opt’
is to choose. So ‘optativus’ is the deliberative mode. Grice proved the freedom
of the will with a “grammatical argument.” ‘Given that the Greeks and the
Romans had an optative mode, there is free will.” Romans, having no special
verbal forms recognized as Optative, had no need of the designation modus optativus.
Yet they sometimes used it, ad imitationem. Modus
-- modality:
Grice: “Modality is the manner in which a proposition (or statement) describes
or applies to its subject matter. Derivatively,’ modality’ refers to
characteristics of entities or states of affairs described by this or that
modal proposition. Modalities are classified as follows. An assertoric proposition
is the expression of a mere fact. Alethic modality includes necessity and
possibility. The latter two sometimes are referred to respectively as the
apodeictic modality and the problematic modality – vide Grice’s category of
conversational mode – which covers three categories under what Kant calls the
‘Funktion’ of Mode – the assertoric, the apodeictic and the problematic). Grice
takes ‘must’ as basic and defines ‘may’ in terms of ‘must.’ Causal modality
includes causal necessity or empirical necessity and causal possibility or
empirical possibility. The deontic modality includes obligation and
permittedness. Of course this hardly means that ‘must’ is polysemous. It is
‘aequi-vocal’ at most. There is epistemic modality or modalities such as
knowing that and doxastic modality (what Grice calls ‘credibility,’ as opposed
to ‘desirability’) or modalities ones such as believing that. There is
desiderative modality such as ‘willing that’ (what Grice calls ‘desirability’
as prior to ‘credibility.’) Following medieval philosophers, a proposition can
be distinguished on the basis of whether the modality is introduced via
adverbial modification of the “copula” or verb (“sensus divisus”) – as in
Grice’s “Fido is shaggy” versus “Fido may be shaggy” – (in Roman, “Fidus est
fidelis” versus “Fidus sit fidelis” – Grice: “Not to be confused with “Fido,
sit!” ) or via a modal operator that modifies the proposition (“sensus
compositus” – as preferred by Strawson: “It is the case that,” “It is not the
case that,” “It must be the case that” and “It may be the case that”). Grice
actually calls ‘adverbial modifier’ the external version. The internal version
he just calls, as everybody at Clifton does, ‘conjugation’ (“We are not
Tarzan!”). Grice: "In Gricese, in the instance in which the
indicative occurs after "acsian" here is no doubt in the minds of
those who ask the question, the content of the dependent clause being by them
regarded as a fact.
Mk. X. 2. Da genealsehton him pharisei and hine axodon hwseber alyfS senegum men his wif forlsetan. Interrogabant eum: INTERROGABANT EUM: SI LICET Si licet. L. XII. 36. beo gelice pam mannum be hyra hlaforde abidafr hwsenne he sy fram
gyftum gecyrred.
L. XXII. 24. hi flitun betwux him hwylc hyra wsere
yldest. J. XIX. 24.
uton hleotan hwylces
ures heo sy. Mk. XV. 24. hi hlotu wurpon, hwset
gehwa name.
mittentes sortem
super eis, quis quid tolleret. MITTENTES SORTEM SVPER EIS, QVIS QVID TOLLERET. M. XXVII. 49. Uton geseon hwseber Helias cume and wylle
hyne alysan. Mk. V. 14. hi ut eodon bset hi
gesawon hwset par gedon wsere. L. XIX. 3.he wolde geseon hwylc se hselend
wsere. Mk. IX. 34.hi on wege smeadon hwylc hyra yldost wsere. Mk. IX.
10. L. XI, 38. XXII. 23. L. XIV. 28. Hwylc eower wyle timbrian anne stypel, hu ne sytt he serest and
teleS pa andfengas be him behefe synt, hwseder he hsebbe hine to
full-fremmenne?
L. I. 29. ba wearS heo on his sprsece gedrefed, and pohte
hwset seo greting wsere.
L. Ill, 15. XIV.
31. L. IX. 46.
bset gepanc eode on hig,
hwylc hyra yldest wsere. Mk. XV. 47. Da com Maria Magdalene and Josepes Maria, and beheoldon hwar he
geled wsere. aspiciebant. ubi poneretur ASPICIEBANT. VBI
PONERETVR.
(Looked around, in order
to discover). The notion of purpose is sometimes involved, the indirect
question having something of the force of a final clause: Mk.
XIII. 11. ne foresmeage ge hwset ge specan. L. XXI. 14. *) Direct rather than indirect question. L. XII. 22. ne beo ge ymbehydige eowre
sawle hwset ge etan, ne eowrum lichaman hwset ge scrydun. M. VI, 25. L. XII. 11. ne beo ge embebencynde hu oSSe hwset ge specon
oSSe andswarian. M. X. 19. ne bence ge hu oSSe hwset ge
sprecun. L. XII. 29.
Nelle ge secean hwset ge
eton oSSe drincon.
J. XIX. 12. and sySSan sohte Pilatus hu he hyne forlete. quaerebat Pilatus dimittere eum. QVAEREBAT PILATVS DIMITTERE EVM 2. When the content of the dependent clause is regarded as an actual
fact, which is the case when the leading verb expresses the act of learning,
perceiving, etc., the indicative is used. M. VI. 28. BesceawiaS secyres Man
hu hig weaxaO. M. XXI. 16.gehyrst bu hwset pas cwseoab? M. XXVII. 13. Ne gehyrst Jm hu fela sagena hig ongen be
secgeaS?
L. XVIII. 6. M. IX.
13.leornigeab hwset is, ic wylle mildheortnesse
nses onssegdnesse. M. XXI. 20. loca nu hu hrsedlice bset fic-treow forscranc. Mk. XV. 4. loca hu mycelum hi be wregea§. M. XII. 4.Ne
rsedde ge hwset David dyde hu he ineode on Godes hus, and set ba
offring-hlafas?
L. VI, 4. Mk. XII. 26. Be bam deadum ■ bset hi arison, ne rsedde ge on Moyses bec hu God
to him cwseb?
Mk. I, 26. Mk. V. 16. hi rehton him ba Se hit gesawon hu hit gedon wses. L.
VIII. 36.
Da cyddon him ba Se
gesawon hu he wses hal geworden. L. XXIII. 55.hig gesawon ba
byrgene and hu his lichama aled wses. J. XX. 14.heo geseah hwar se
hselend stod.
Vidit Jesum stantem. *) VIDIT IESVM STANTEM. Not the endeavour to learn, perceive, which
would require the SUBJUNCTIVE. L. XXIV. 6.
gebencao hu he spsec wiS
eow. recordamini.
Mk. VIII. 19.
3.After verbs of knowing both the indicative and subjunctive are used, usually
the indicative. See general statement before § 2. a)
Indicative:*) L. XIII. 27. Ne cann ic hwanon ge
synt. Mk. XIV, 68. M. VI. 8. eower fseder wat hwset eow bearf
ys. M. XX. 22.
Gyt nyton hwset gyt
biddab. L. XIII. 25. nat ic hwanon ge
synt. J. IX. 21. we nyton humete he nu
gesyhb. quomodo autem nunc videat, nescimus. QVOMODO AVTEM NVNC, NESCIMVS. J. IX. 25. gif he synful is, bset ic nat. si peccator est, nescio. SI PECCATOR EST, NESCIO. I know not if he is a sinner. gif he synful is, bset ic nat. "Gif he synful is, ᚦaet ic nat." In Oxonian:
"If he sinful is,
that I know not. M. XXVI. 70. Mk. IX. 6. X, 28. XIII, 33, 35. L. IX,
33. XX, 7. XXII, 60. L. XXIII. 34. J. II. 9. III. 8. V. 13. VII.
27, 27, 28. VIII. 14, 14. J. IX. 29. 30. X. 6. XIII. 18. XIV. 5. XV.
15. b)
Indicative and
subjunctive: L. X. 22. nan man nat hwylc IS se
sunu buton se fseder, ne hwylc SI Se fseder buton se sunu. -- In Latin, both times have subjunctive third person singular,
"sit".)
c)
Subjunctive. a. In the protasis of a conditional sentence: J.
VII. 51.Cwyst bu demS ure se senine man buton hyne man ser gehyre and wite
hwset he do? J. XI. 57. pa pharisei hsefdon beboden gif hwa wiste
hwaer he wsere paet he hyt cydde bset hig mihton hine niman. Translating
the Latin subjunctive in 21 instances, the indic. in 9. As a rule, the mood (or mode, as Grice prefers)
of the Latin (or Roman, as Grice prefers) verb does not determine the O. E. (or
A. S., as Grice prefers) usage. In Anglo-Saxon, Oxonian,
and Gricese, "si" seems to be no more than a literal (mimetic)
rendering of Roman "sit," the correct third person singular
subjunctive.
Ms. A. reads
"ys" with'-sy" above. The Lind. gloss reads
"is". M. XXIV. 43. WitaS bset gyf se hiredes ealdor wiste on hwylcere tide se beof
towerd waere witodlice he wolde wacigean. si sciret paterfamilias qua hora fur
venturus esset vigilaret,
(Cf. J. IV, 10. Gif bu wistest — hwaet se is etc. Si scirest quis est. SI SCIREST QVIS EST. /J. In the apodosis of a conditional sentence: J. VII.
17. gyf hwa wyle his willan don he gecwemo (sic. A.B.C. gecnsewS) be
bsere lare hwseber heo si of Gode hwseber be ic he me sylfum
spece. L. VII. 39. Gyf be man witega wsere
witodlice he wiste hwset and hwylc bis wif wsere be his sethrinb bset heo
synful is.
sciret utique quae et
qualis est mulier. SCIRET VTIQVE QVAE ET QVALIS EST MULIER. y. After a hortatory subjunctive. M. VI.
3. Nyte bin wynstre hwset do bin swybre. 4. After verbs of
saying and declaring. a) Here the indicative is used when the
dependent clause contains a statement rather than a question. L. VIII.
39. cyS hu mycel be God gedon h3efS. L. VIII. 47.Da bset wif
geseah bset hit him nses dyrne heo com forht and astrehte hig to his fotum and
geswutulude beforan eallum folce for hwylcum binge heo hit sethran and hu heo
wearS sona hal. ob quam causam tetigerit eum, indicavit; et quemadmodum
confestim SANATA SIT. Further examples of the indicative are. L. XX.
2.*) Sege us on hwylcum anwalde wyrcst bu Sas
bing oSSe hwset ys se Se be bisne anwald sealde. L. VI. 47. iElc bara be to me cymb and mine sprseca
gehyi*S and pa deb, ic him setywe hwam he gelic is. b) When the subordinate clause refers to the future
both the indicative and subjunctive are used: *) Direct
question, as the order of the words shows. Mk. XIII. 4. Sege us hwsenne bas bing gewurdon (A. geweorSon,
H. gewurSen, R. gewurdon) and hwylc tacen bid
bsenne ealle bas Sing onginnaS beon geendud. (Transition to direct
question.) Dic nobis, quando ista fient? DIC NOBIS, QVANDO ISTA FIENT? et quod signum erit? ET QVOD SIGNVM
ERIT? M. XXIV. 3. Sege us hwsenne bas Sing
gewurbun and hwile tacn si bines to-cymes. J. XVIII. 32. he geswutelode hwylcon deaSe lie swulte. qua
morte ESSET moriturus. c) When the question presents a distinct alternative, so that the
idea of doubt and uncertainty is prominent, the subjunctive in Gricese,
Oxonian, and Anglo-Saxon, qua conjugated version, is used: M. XXVI.
63. Ic halsige be Surh bone lyfiendan God, b*t Su secge us gyf \>u sy
Crist Godes sunu. L. XXII. 67. J. X. 24. d) The following is
hortatory as well as declarative: L. XII. 5. Ic eow setywe
hwsene ge ondredon. Ostendam autem vobis, quem TIMEATIS. 5. In
three indirect questions which in the original are direct, the subjunctive is
used: M. XXIV. 45.Wens (sic. A. H. & R. wenst) \>u
hwa sy getrywe and gleaw BEOW? Quis, putas, EST fidelis
servus? QVIS, PVTAS, EST FIDELIS SERVS. M. XXVI. 25. Cwyst
bu lareow hwseSer ic hyt si? Numquid ego sum? NVMQVID EGO SVM, J. VII. 26. CweSe we hwseber ba ealdras
ongyton ^set bis IS Crist?
Numquid vere cognoverunt
principes, quia hie EST Christus? § 11. RELATIVE CLAUSES. Except
in the relations discussed in the following the indicative is used in relative
clauses. Grice:
"The verb 'to be' is actually composed of three different stems -- not
only in Aristotle, but in Gricese." CONIUGATVM, persona, s-stem
(cognate with Roman "sit"), b-stem, w-stem (cognate with Roman,
"ero") MODVS INFINITVUM, the verb "sīn,” the verb
"bion,” the verb "wesan.” MODVS INDICATIVM PRAESENS prima singularis:
"ik" -- Oxonian "I" "em" Oxonian, "am."
Bium wisu secunda singularis: "thū" -- Oxonian: "thou"
"art" Oxonian "art" bis(t) wisis tertia singularis:
"hē" Oxonian, 'he' "ist" (Cognate with Roman
"est") Oxonian 'is' *bid wis(id) prima, secunda, tertia, pluralis "sindun"
*biod wesad MODVS INDCATIVVM PRAETERITVM prima singularis "was"
Oxonian: "was." seconda singularis ""wāri"
Oxonian "were" tertia singularis "was" Oxonian
"was" prima, secunda, tertia, pluralis "wārun" Oxonian
"were" MODVS SVBIVCTIVVM PRAESENS prima, secunda, tertia,
singularis "sīe" (Lost in Oxonian after Occam) "wese"
(cognate with "was", and Roman, "erat") prima, secunda,
tertia, pluralis "sīen" wesen MODVS SVBIVNCTIVVM
PRAETERITUM prima, secunda, tertia, singularis wāri prima, secunda,
tertia, pluralis wārin MODVS IMPERATIVUM singularis "wis,"
"wes" (Cognate with "was" and Roman "erat")
pluralis wesad MODVS PARTICIPIVM PRAESENT wesandi (cognate with Cicero's
"essens" and "essentia" MODVS PARTICIPIVM PRAETERITVM "giwesan"
The present-tense forms of 'be' with the w-stem, "wesan" are
almost never used. Therefore, wesan is used as IMPERATIVE,
in the past tense, and in the participium prasesens versions of
"sīn" -- Grice: "I rue the day when the Bosworth and Toller
left Austin!" -- "Now the OED, is not supposed to include Anglo-Saxon
forms!") and does not have a separate meaning. The b-stem is only met
in the present indicative of wesan, and only for the first and second persons
in the singular. So we see that if Roman had the 'est-sit"
distinction, the Oxonians had "The 'ist'/"sīe"/"wese"
tryad). Grice: "To simplify the Oxonian forms and make
them correlative to Roman, I shall reduce the Oxonian triad,
'ist'/'sīe'/"wese" to the division actually cognate with Roman:
'ist'/'sīe." And so, I shall speak of the
'ist'/'sīe" distinction, or the 'est-sit' distinction
interchangeably." Today many deny the
distinction or confine attention just to modal operators. Modal operators in
non-assertoric propositions are said to produce referential opacity or oblique
contexts in which truth is not preserved under substitution of extensionally
equivalent expressions. Modal and deontic logics provide formal analyses of
various modalities. Intensional logics investigate the logic of oblique
contexts. Modal logicians have produced possible worlds semantics
interpretations wherein propositions MP with modal operator M are true provided
P is true in all suitable (e.g., logically possible, causally possible, morally
permissible, rationally acceptable) possible worlds. Modal realism grants
ontological status to possible worlds other than the actual world or otherwise
commits to objective modalities in nature or reality. modus: the study of the
logic of the operators ‘it is possible that’ (or, as Grice prefers, “it may be
that”) and ‘it is necessary that’ (or as Grice prefers, “It must be that…”). For
some reason, Grice used ‘mode’ at Oxford – but ‘manner’ in the New World! The
sad thing is that when he came back to the Old World, to the puzzlmenet of
Old-Worlders, he kept using ‘manner.’ So, everytime we see Grice using
‘manner,’ we need to translate to either the traditional Oxonian ‘modus,’ or
the Gricese ‘mode.’ These operators Grice symbolizes by a diamond and a square
respectively. and each can be defined in terms of the other. □p (necessarily p) is equivalent to ¬◇¬p ("not possible that not-p") ◇p (possibly p) is equivalent to ¬□¬p ("not necessarily
not-p").
To say that Fido may be shaggy is to say that it is not necessarily false. Thus
possP could be regarded as an abbreviation of -Nec-p Equally, to say that Fido
*must* be shaggy is to deny that its negation is possible. Thus Af could be
regarded as an abbreviation of -B-f. Grice prefers to take ‘poss” as primitive
(“for surely, it may rain before it must pour!”). Grice’s ystem G of modality
is obtained by introducing Poss. and Nec. If system, as Grice’s is, is
classical/intuitionist/minimal, so is the corresponding modal logic. Grice
surely concentrates on the classical case (“Dummett is overconcentraating on
the intuitionist, and nobody at Oxford was, is, or will be minimal!”). As with any kind of logic, there are three
components to a system of modal logic: a syntactics, which determines the system
or calculus + and the notion of well-formed formula (wff). Second, a semantics,
which determines the consequence relation X on +-wffs. Third, a pragmatics or
sub-system of inference, which determines the deductive consequence relation Y
on +-wffs. The syntactis of the modal operators is the same in every system.
Briefly, the modal operator is a one-place or unary ‘connective,’ or operator,
strictly, since it does not connect two atoms into a molecule, like negation.
There are many different systems of modal logic, some of which can be generated
by different ways of setting up the semantics. Each of the familiar ways of
doing this can be associated with a sound and complete system of inference.
Alternatively, a system of inference can be laid down first and we can search
for a semantics for it relative to which it is sound and complete. Grice gives
primacy to the syntactic viewpoint. Semantic consequence is defined in modal
logic in the usual classical way: a set of sentences 9 yields a sentence s, 9 X
s, iff if no “interpretation” (to use Grice’s jargon in “Vacuous Names”) I
makes all members of 9 true and s false. The question is how to extend the
notion of “interpretation” to accommodate for “may be shaggy” – and “must be
shaggy”. In classical sentential logic, an interpretation is an assignment to
each sentence letter of exactly one of the two truth-values = and where n % m !
1. So to determine relative possibility in a model, we identify R with a
collection of pairs of the form where each of u and v is in W. If a pair is in
R, v is possible relative to u, and if is not in R, v is impossible relative to
u. The relative possibility relation then enters into the rules for the
evaluating modal operator. We do not want to say, e. g. that at the actual
world, it is possible for Grice to originate from a different sperm and egg,
since the only worlds where this takes place are impossible relative to the
actual world. So we have the rule that B f is true at a world u if f is true at
some world v such that v is possible relative to u. Similarly, Af is true at a
world u if f is true at every world v which is possible relative to u. R may
have simple first-order properties such as reflexivity, (Ex)Rxx, symmetry,
(Ex)(Ey)(Rxy P Ryx), and transitivity, (Ex)(Ey)(Ez)((Rxy & Ryz) P Rxz), and
different modal systems can be obtained by imposing different combinations of
these on R (other systems can be obtained from higher-order constraints). The
least constrained system is the system Ghp, in which no structural properties
are put on R. In G-hp we have B (B & C) X B B, since if B (B & C) holds
at w* then (B & C) holds at some world w possible relative to w*, and thus
by the truth-function for &, B holds at w as well, so B B holds at w*.
Hence any interpretation that makes B (B & C) true (% true at w*) also
makes B B true. Since there are no restrictions on R in G-hp, we can expect B
(B & C) X B B in every system of modal logic generated by constraining R.
However, for G-hp we also have C Z B C. For suppose C holds at w*. B C holds at
w* only if there is some world possible relative to w* where C holds. But there
need be no such world. In particular, since R need not be reflexive, w* itself
need not be possible relative to w*. Concomitantly, in any system for which we
stipulate a reflexive R, we will have C X B C. The simplest such system is
known as T, which has the same semantics as K except that R is stipulated to be
reflexive in every interpretation. In other systems, further or different
constraints are put on R. For example, in the system B, each interpretation
must have an R that is reflexive and symmetric, and in the system S4, each
interpretation must have an R that is reflexive and transitive. In B we have B
C Z B B C, as can be shown by an interpretation with nontransitive R, while in
S4 we have B AC Z C, as can be shown by an interpretation with non-symmetric R.
Correspondingly, in S4, B C X B B C, and in B, B AC X C. The system in which R
is reflexive, transitive, and symmetric is called S5, and in this system, R can
be omitted. For if R has all three properties, R is an equivalence relation,
i.e., it partitions W into mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive
equivalence classes. If Cu is the equivalence class to which u belongs, then
the truth-value of a formula at u is independent of the truth-values of
sentence letters at worlds not in Cu, so only the worlds in Cw* are relevant to
the truth-values of sentences in an S5 interpretation. But within Cw* R is
universal: every world is possible relative to every other. Consequently, in an
S5 interpretation, we need not specify a relative possibility relation, and the
evaluation rules for B and A need not mention relative possibility; e.g., we
can say that B f is true at a world u if there is at least one world v at which
f is true. Note that by the characteristics of R, whenever 9 X s in K, T, B, or
S4, then 9 X s in S5: the other systems are contained in S5. K is contained in
all the systems we have mentioned, while T is contained in B and S4, neither of
which is contained in the other. Sentential modal logics give rise to
quantified modal logics, of which quantified S5 is the bestknown. Just as, in
the sentential case, each world in an interpretation is associated with a
valuation of sentence letters as in non-modal sentential logic, so in
quantified modal logic, each world is associated with a valuation of the sort
familiar in non-modal first-order logic. More specifically, in quantified S5,
each world w is assigned a domain Dw – the things that exist at w – such that
at least one Dw is non-empty, and each atomic n-place predicate of the language
is assigned an extension Extw of n-tuples of objects that satisfy the predicate
at w. So even restricting ourselves to just the one first-order extension of a
sentential system, S5, various degrees of freedom are already evident. We
discuss the following: (a) variability of domains, (b) interpretation of
quantifiers, and (c) predication. (a) Should all worlds have the same domain or
may the domains of different worlds be different? The latter appears to be the
more natural choice; e.g., if neither of of Dw* and Du are subsets of the
other, this represents the intuitive idea that some things that exist might not
have, and that there could have been things that do not actually exist (though
formulating this latter claim requires adding an operator for ‘actually’ to the
language). So we should distinguish two versions of S5, one with constant
domains, S5C, and the other with variable domains, S5V. (b) Should the truth of
(Dn)f at a world w require that f is true at w of some object in Dw or merely
of some object in D (D is the domain of all possible objects, 4weWDw)? The
former treatment is called the actualist reading of the quantifiers, the
latter, the possibilist reading. In S5C there is no real choice, since for any
w, D % Dw, but the issue is live in S5V. (c) Should we require that for any
n-place atomic predicate F, an n-tuple of objects satisfies F at w only if
every member of the n-tuple belongs to Dw, i.e., should we require that atomic
predicates be existence-entailing? If we abbreviate (Dy) (y % x) by Ex (for ‘x
exists’), then in S5C, A(Ex)AEx is logically valid on the actualist reading of
E (%-D-) and on the possibilist. On the former, the formula says that at each
world, anything that exists at that world exists at every world, which is true;
while on the latter, using the definition of ‘Ex’, it says that at each world,
anything that exists at some world or other is such that at every world, it
exists at some world or other, which is also true; indeed, the formula stays
valid in S5C with possibilist quantifiers even if we make E a primitive logical
constant, stipulated to be true at every w of exactly the things that exist at
w. But in S5V with actualist quantifiers, A(Ex)AEx is invalid, as is (Ex)AEx –
consider an interpretation where for some u, Du is a proper subset of Dw*.
However, in S5V with possibilist quantifiers, the status of the formula, if
‘Ex’ is defined, depends on whether identity is existence-entailing. If it is
existenceentailing, then A(Ex)AEx is invalid, since an object in D satisfies
(Dy)(y % x) at w only if that object exists at w, while if identity is not
existence-entailing, the formula is valid. The interaction of the various
options is also evident in the evaluation of two well-known schemata: the
Barcan formula, B (Dx)fx P (Dx) B fx; and its converse, (Dx) B fx P B (Dx)fx.
In S5C with ‘Ex’ either defined or primitive, both schemata are valid, but in
S5V with actualist quantifiers, they both fail. For the latter case, if we
substitute -E for f in the converse Barcan formula we get a conditional whose
antecedent holds at w* if there is u with Du a proper subset of Dw*, but whose
consequent is logically false. The Barcan formula fails when there is a world u
with Du not a subset of Dw*, and the condition f is true of some non-actual
object at u and not of any actual object there. For then B (Dx)f holds at w*
while (Dx) B fx fails there. However, if we require atomic predicates to be
existence-entailing, then instances of the converse Barcan formula with f
atomic are valid. In S5V with possibilist quantifiers, all instances of both
schemata are valid, since the prefixes (Dx) B and B (Dx) correspond to (Dx)
(Dw) and (Dw) (Dx), which are equivalent (with actualist quantifiers, the
prefixes correspond to (Dx 1 Dw*), and (Dw) (Dx 1 Dw) which are non-equivalent
if Dw and Dw* need not be the same set). Finally in S5V with actualist
quantifiers, the standard quantifier introduction and elimination rules must be
adjusted. Suppose c is a name for an object that does not actually exist; then
- Ec is true but (Dx) - Ex is false. The quantifier rules must be those of free
logic: we require Ec & fc before we infer (Dv)fv and Ec P fc, as well as
the usual EI restrictions, before we infer (Ev)fv. Refs.: H. P. Grice:
“Modality: Desirability and Credibility;” H. P. Grice, “The may and the may
not;” H. P. Grice, “The Big Philosophical Mistake: ‘What is actual is not also
possible’.” modus: Grice: “In Roman,
‘modus’ may have been rendered as ‘way’, ‘fashion’ – but I will not, and use
‘modus’ as THEY did! ‘Modus’ is used in more than one ‘modus’ in philosophy. In
Ariskantian logic, ‘modus’ refers either to the arrangement of universal,
particular, affirmative, or negative propositions within a syllogism, only
certain of which are valid this is often tr., confusingly, as ‘modus’ in
English – “the valid modes, such as Barbara and Celarent.” But then ‘modus’ may
be used to to the property a proposition has by virtue of which it is necessary
or contingent, possible or impossible, or ‘actual.’ In Oxonian scholastic
metaphysics, ‘modus’ is often used in a not altogether technical way to mean
that which characterizes a thing and distinguishes it from others. Micraelius,
in his best-selling “Lexicon philosophicum,” has it that “a mode does not
compose a thing, but distinguishes it and makes it determinate.” ‘Modus’ is also
used in the context of the modal distinction in the theory of distinctions to
designate the distinction that holds between a substance and its modes or
between two modes of a single substance. ‘Modus’ also appears in the technical
vocabulary of medieval speculative ‘grammar’ or ‘semantics’ (“speculative
semantics” makes more sense) -- in connection with the notions of the “modus
significandi,” “the modus intelligendi” (more or less the same thing), and the
“modus essendi.” The term ‘modus’ becomes especially important when Descartes
(vide Grice, “Descartes on clear and distinct perception”), Spinoza (vide S. N.
Hampshire, “Spinoza”), and Locke each take it up, giving it three somewhat
different special meanings within their respective systems. Descartes (vide
Grice, “Descartes on clear and distinct perception”) makes ‘modus’ a central
notion in his metaphysics in his Principia philosophiae. For Descartes, each
substantia is characterized by a principal attribute, ‘cogitatio’ for ‘anima’
and ‘extensio’ for ‘corpus’. Modes, then, are particular ways of being extended
or thinking, i.e., particular sizes, shapes, etc., or particular thoughts,
properties in the broad sense that individual things substances have. In this way,
‘modus’ occupies the role in Descartes’s philosophy that ‘accident’ does in
Aristotelian philosophy. But for Descartes, each mode must be connected with
the principal attribute of a substance, a way of being extended or a way of
thinking, whereas for the Aristotelian, accidents may or may not be connected
with the essence of the substance in which they inhere. Like Descartes, Spinoza
recognizes three basic metaphysical terms, ‘substania,’ ‘attributum’, and
‘modus’. Recalling Descartes, Spinoza defines ‘modus’ as “the affections of a
substance, or that which is in another, and which is also conceived through
another” Ethics I. But for Spinoza, there is only one substance, which has all
possible attributes. This makes it somewhat difficult to determine exactly what
Spinoza means by ‘modus’, whether they are to be construed as being in some say
a “property” of God, the one infinite substance, or whether they are to be
construed more broadly as simply individual things that depend for their
existence on God, just as Cartesian modes depend on Cartesian substance.
Spinoza also introduces somewhat obscure distinctions between modus infinitus
and modus finitus, and between immediate and mediate infinite modes. Now, much
closer to Grice, Englishman and Oxonian Locke uses ‘mode’ in a way that
evidently derives from Descartes’s usage, but that also differs from it. For
Locke, a ‘modus’ is “such complex idea – as Pegasus the flying horse --, which
however compounded, contain not in them the supposition of subsisting by
themselves, but are considered as Dependences on, or Affections of Substances”
Essay II. A ‘modus,’ for Locke, is thus an idea that represents to us the a ‘complex’
propertiy of a thing, sc. an idea derived from what Locke a ‘simple’ idea that
come to us from experience. Locke distinguishes between a ‘modus simplex,’ like
number, space, and infinity, which are supposed to be constructed by
compounding the SAME simple idea many times, and ‘modus complexum,’ or ‘modus
mixtum,’ a mode like obligation or theft, which is supposed to be compounded of
at least two simple ideas of a different sort.
Refs.: Grice applies Locke’s idea of the modus mixtum in his ‘labour’
against Empiricism, cf. H. P. Grice, “I may care a hoot what the dictionary
says, but it is not the case that I care a hoot what Micraelius’s “Lexicon
philosophicum” says.” Modus – modulus -- Grice
against a pragmatic or rational module: from Latin ‘modulus,’ ‘little mode.’ the commitment to functionally independent and
specialized cognitive system in psychological organizatio, or, more generally,
in the organization of any complex system. A ‘modulus’ entails that behavior is
the product of components with subordinate functions, that these functions are
realized in discrete physical systems, and that the subsystems are minimally
interactive. Organization in terms of a modulus varies from simple
decomposability to what Herbert Simon calls near decomposability. In the
former, component systems are independent, operating according to intrinsically
determined principles; system behavior is an additive or aggregative function
of these independent contributions. In the latter, the short-run behavior of
components is independent of the behavior of other components; the system
behavior is a relatively simple function of component contributions. Gall
defends a modular organization for the mind/brain, holding that the cerebral
hemispheres consist of a variety of organs, or centers, each subserving
specific intellectual and moral functions. This picture of the brain as a
collection of relatively independent organs contrasts sharply with the
traditional view that intellectual activity involves the exercise of a general
unitary ‘faculty’ in a variety of this or that‘domain’, where a ‘domain’ is not
a ‘modulus’ -- a view that was common to Descartes and Hume as well as Gall’s
major opponents such as Flourens. By the middle of the nineteenth century,
Bouillaud and Broca (a French doctor, of Occitan ancestry – brooch, broca –
thorn --) defended the view that language is controlled by localized structures
in the left hemisphere and is relatively independent of other cognitive
activities. It was later discovered by Wernicke that there are at least two
centers for the control of language, one more posterior and one more anterior.
On these views, there are discrete physical structures responsible for communication,
which are largely independent of one another and of structures responsible for
other psychological functions. This is therefore a modular organization. This
view of the neurophysiological organization of communication continues to have
advocates, though the precise characterization of the functions these two
centers serve is controversial. Many more recent views have tended to limit
modularity to more peripheral functions such as vision, hearing, and motor
control and speech, but have excluded “what I am interested in, viz. so-called
higher cognitive processes.” – H. P. Grice, “The power structure of the soul.” Modus -- modus ponendo ponens: 1 the argument
form ‘If A then B; A; therefore, B’, and arguments of this form compare fallacy
of affirming the consequent; 2 the rule of inference that permits one to infer
the consequent of a conditional from that conditional and its antecedent. This
is also known as the rule of /-elimination or rule of /- detachment. modus tollendo tollens: 1 the argument form
‘If A then B; not-B; therefore, not-A’, and arguments of this form compare
fallacy of denying the antecedent; 2 the rule of inference that permits one to
infer the negation of the antecedent of a conditional from that conditional and
the negation of its consequent.
molyneux question: also called Molyneux’s
problem, the question that, in correspondence with Locke, William Molyneux or
Molineux, 1656 98, a Dublin lawyer and member of the Irish Parliament, posed
and Locke inserted in the second edition of his Essay Concerning Human
Understanding 1694; book 2, chap. 9, section 8: Suppose a Man born blind, and
now adult, and taught by his touch to distinguish a Cube, and a Sphere of the
same metal, and nighly of the same bigness, so as to tell, when he felt one and
t’other, which is the Cube, which the Sphere. Suppose then the Cube and Sphere
placed on a Table, and the Blind Man to be made to see. Quære, Whether by his
sight, before he touch’d them, he could now distinguish, and tell, which is the
Globe, which the Cube. Although it is tempting to regard Molyneux’s question as
straightforwardly empirical, attempts to gauge the abilities of newly sighted
adults have yielded disappointing and ambiguous results. More interesting,
perhaps, is the way in which different theories of perception answer the
question. Thus, according to Locke, sensory modalities constitute discrete
perceptual channels, the contents of which perceivers must learn to correlate.
Such a theory answers the question in the negative as did Molyneux himself.
Other theories encourage different responses.
mondolfo: essential Italian philosopher. Like
Grice, Mondolfo believed seriously in the longitudinal unity of philosophy and
made original research on the historiography of philosophy, especially during
the Eleatic, Agrigento, and later Roman periods. Rodolfo Mondolfo Da
Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search
Rodolfo Mondolfo Rodolfo Mondolfo (Senigallia, 20 agosto 1877 – Buenos Aires,
16 luglio 1976) è stato un filosofo italiano. Indice 1 Biografia 2 Opere
3 Note
4 Bibliografia
5 Altri
progetti 6 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Nacque in provincia di Ancona, ultimogenito di Vito Mondolfo
e Gismonda Padovani, una famiglia benestante di commercianti di origine
ebraica.[1] Suo fratello maggiore Ugo Guido (1875 - 1958) fu uno storico,
membro del Partito Socialista Italiano sin dalla sua fondazione e stretto
collaboratore di Filippo Turati alla rivista "Critica sociale". Anche
Rodolfo aderisce alle idee marxiste e socialiste. Tra il 1895 ed il 1899
compie gli studi universitari a Firenze[1], dove raggiunge il fratello,
anch'egli studente dell'ateneo fiorentino, e si laurea in Lettere e Filosofia
con Felice Tocco, discutendo una tesi su Condillac dal titolo: "Contributo
alla storia della teoria dell'associazione", un lavoro da cui saranno poi
tratti alcuni dei suoi primi saggi di storia della filosofia. Insieme i
due fratelli frequentavano un gruppo di giovani socialisti, di cui facevano
parte Gaetano Salvemini, Cesare Battisti ed Ernesta Bittanti.[2] Fino al
1904 Mondolfo si dedica all'insegnamento nei licei nelle città di Potenza,
Ferrara e Mantova.[1] Nel 1904 inizia la carriera universitaria con un
incarico all'Università di Padova, in sostituzione di Roberto Ardigò. Nel
1910 si trasferisce ad insegnare Storia della filosofia all'Università di
Torino, dove rimarrà sino al 1914, anno in cui ottiene la stessa cattedra
all'Università di Bologna.[1] Nell'immediato primo dopoguerra, a Senigallia,
viene eletto consigliere comunale nelle file del Partito Socialista Italiano,
al quale anch'egli aveva aderito sin dagli anni universitari, ma questo sarà
l'unico incarico ufficiale ricoperto da Mondolfo nel partito. Gli anni che
vanno dall'inizio del secolo al 1926 sono forse quelli in cui è più intensa e
fervida l'attività letteraria e politica di Mondolfo: nel 1903 inizia infatti
la sua collaborazione con la rivista "Critica Sociale",[1] protrattasi
fino al 1926, anno in cui la rivista viene soppressa dal regime fascista.
In questo stesso periodo pubblica alcune delle sue opere più importanti come i
"Saggi per la storia della morale utilitaria" di Hobbes (1903) ed
Helvetius (1904), "Tra il diritto di natura e il comunismo", (1909),
"Rousseau nella formazione della coscienza moderna" (1912), "Il
materialismo storico in F. Engels" (1912), "Sulle orme di Marx"
(1919). Nel 1925 Mondolfo è tra i firmatari del Manifesto degli intellettuali
antifascisti, redatto da Benedetto Croce. Dopo il 1926, per la soppressione
della rivista a cui collabora più attivamente, e per l'inasprirsi dei controlli
e delle censure poste dal regime fascista, nell'evidente impossibilità di
proseguire i suoi studi sulla dottrina marxista, si dedica allo studio del
pensiero filosofico greco. Ciò nonostante, pur in questo periodo, grazie alla
politica di Giovanni Gentile che volle coinvolgere studiosi di diverso
orientamento nell'impresa,[3] collabora con l'Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana
e scrive la voce Socialismo pubblicata nella prima edizione dell'Enciclopedia
Treccani (Volume XXXI, 1936).[4][5] Nel maggio 1939, in seguito alle
leggi razziali fasciste che vietavano agli ebrei di ricoprire cariche
pubbliche, Mondolfo scrisse il proprio curriculum di benemerenze e vi inserì lo
stesso Gentile come testimone il quale "nel 1937 ebbe a propormi per il
Premio Reale di filosofia presso la R. Accademia dei Lincei"[6]. Gentile
autorizzò Mondolfo a citarlo tra i testimoni e tentò inutilmente di farlo
rientrare tra gli esclusi dalle leggi razziali[7]. Costretto a lasciare
l'Italia Gentile scrisse al filosofo Coriolano Alberini e lo aiutò a trovare
lavoro in Argentina[7] dove intendeva trasferirsi insieme con la moglie e i
figli. Qui, nel 1940, dopo un breve periodo di incertezze, riesce ad ottenere
un incarico presso l'Università di Córdoba per un seminario di filosofia ed una
cattedra di greco antico[1]. Mondolfo scrisse in seguito a Gentile
ringraziandolo per l'"amicizia fraterna"[8]. Nel 1946 ha inizio
in Argentina il periodo del regime peronista, che si protrarrà sino al 1955, e
di lì a poco sarà seguito dalla dittatura militare argentina. Sono anni questi
che fanno rivivere a Mondolfo molte delle spiacevoli esperienze passate in
Italia durante il fascismo.[9] Anche se in Argentina non si dedica attivamente
alla vita politica, è proprio per contrasti di tipo politico con l'ambiente
universitario di Córdoba che nel 1948 preferisce trasferirsi all'università di
Tucumán, in cui ottiene la cattedra di Storia della filosofia antica che
mantiene fino al 1952,[9] anno in cui si trasferisce a Buenos Aires dove muore
il 16 luglio del 1976.[1] Il suo archivio personale è depositato in parte a
Firenze presso la Fondazione di Studi Storici Filippo Turati ed in parte presso
la Biblioteca di Filosofia Università degli Studi di Milano.[10] Opere Il
materialismo storico in Federico Engels, Formiggimi, 1912; La Nuova Italia,
1952; La Nuova Italia, 1973. Sulle orme di Marx (1919), Cappelli, 1923. L'infinito
nel pensiero dei Greci, Felice Le Monnier, 1934; La Nuova Italia, 1968.
Problemi e metodi di ricerca nella storia della filosofia, Zanichelli, 1935; La
Nuova Italia, Firenze, 1952 (nuova edizione Milano, Bompiani 2012). Gli albori
della filosofia in Grecia, «La Nuova Italia», n. 1, 20 gennaio 1936; Editrice
Petite Plaisance, Pistoia, 2010. La comprensione del soggetto umano nella
cultura antica (1955), La Nuova Italia, 1967 (nuova edizione Milano, Bompiani
2012). Alle origini della filosofia della cultura, Il Mulino, 1956. Il pensiero
politico nel Risorgimento italiano, Nuova accademia, 1959. Cesare Beccaria,
Nuova Accademia Editrice, 1960. Moralisti greci: la coscienza morale da Omero a
Epicuro, Ricciardi, 1960. Da Ardigò a Gramsci, Nuova Accademia, 1962. Il
concetto dell'uomo in Marx, Città di Senigallia, 1962. Momenti del pensiero
greco e cristiano, Morano, 1964. Umanismo di Marx. Studi filosofici 1908-1966,
Einaudi, 1968. Il contributo di Spinoza alla concezione storicistica, Lacaita,
1970. Polis, lavoro e tecnica, Feltrinelli, 1982. Educazione e socialismo,
Lacaita, 2005. Gli eleati, Bompiani, 2011. Note Vedi Paolo Favilli,
Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, riferimenti in Collegamenti esterni. ^ Fu
una delle prime donne italiane a conseguire la laurea (cfr. Le donne
nell'Università di Firenze). Il 7 agosto 1899 sposò civilmente a Firenze in
Palazzo Vecchio Cesare Battisti. La sorella di Ernesta, Irene, sposerà Giovanni
Battista Trener, per anni collaboratore di Cesare. ^ Amedeo Benedetti,
L'Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani e la sua biblioteca, "Biblioteche
Oggi", Milano, n. 8, ottobre 2005, p. 40. ^ Enciclopedia Treccani, vedi
alla voce futuro di Cesare Medail, Corriere della Sera, 11 ottobre 2000, p. 35,
Archivio storico. ^ Rodolfo Mondolfo, «SOCIALISMO» la voce nella Enciclopedia
Italiana, Volume XXXI, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 1936. ^ Paolo
Simoncelli, p. 41. Paolo Simoncelli, p. 42. ^ Paolo Simoncelli, p.
43. Vedi Fabio Frosini, Il contributo italiano alla storia del Pensiero -
Filosofia, riferimenti in Collegamenti esterni. ^ Archivio Rodolfo Mondolfo.
Inventari a cura di Stefano Vitali e Piero Giordanetti. Ministero per i beni
culturali e ambientali. Ufficio Centrale per i beni archivistici. Bibliografia
Archivio Rodolfo Mondolfo. Inventari, a cura di Stefano Vitali e Piero
Giordanetti, Roma, Ministero per i beni culturali e ambientali. Ufficio
Centrale per i beni archivistici, 1997. Paolo Simoncelli "Non credo
neanch'io alla razza" Gentile e i colleghi ebrei, Le Lettere, Firenze, 2013
L. Vernetti, R. Mondolfo e la filosofia della prassi, Morano, 1966. E. Bassi,
Rodolfo Mondolfo nella vita e nel pensiero socialista, Tamari, 1968. A.
Santucci (a cura di), Pensiero antico e pensiero moderno in Rodolfo Mondolfo,
Cappelli, Bologna 1979. N. Bobbio, Umanesimo di Rodolfo Mondolfo, in Maestri e
compagni, Passigli Editore, Firenze 1984. M. Pasquini, Del Vecchio, il kantismo
giuridico e la sua incidenza nell'elaborazione di Rodolfo Mondolfo (1906-1909),
Alfagrafica, Città di Castello, 1999. C. Calabrò, Il socialismo mite. Rodolfo
Mondolfo tra marxismo e democrazia, Polistampa, Firenze 2007. E. Amalfitano,
Dalla parte dell'essere umano. Il socialismo di Rodolfo Mondolfo, L'asino
d'oro, Roma 2012. Altri progetti Collabora a Wikisource Wikisource contiene una
pagina dedicata a Rodolfo Mondolfo Collabora a Wikiquote Wikiquote contiene
citazioni di o su Rodolfo Mondolfo Collabora a Wikimedia Commons Wikimedia
Commons contiene immagini o altri file su Rodolfo Mondolfo Collegamenti esterni
Rodolfo Mondolfo, su Treccani.it – Enciclopedie on line, Istituto
dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Rodolfo Mondolfo, in
Enciclopedia Italiana, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su
Wikidata Rodolfo Mondolfo, in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, Istituto
dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Rodolfo Mondolfo, su
siusa.archivi.beniculturali.it, Sistema Informativo Unificato per le
Soprintendenze Archivistiche. Modifica su Wikidata Opere di Rodolfo Mondolfo,
su openMLOL, Horizons Unlimited srl. Modifica su Wikidata (EN) Opere di Rodolfo
Mondolfo, su Open Library, Internet Archive. Modifica su Wikidata Fabio
Frosini, MONDOLFO, Rodolfo, in Il contributo italiano alla storia del Pensiero:
Filosofia, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 2012. Rodolfo Mondolfo. Vita
opere e pensiero a cura di Diego Fusaro, sito "filosofico.net". Fondo
Rodolfo Mondolfo Università degli Studi di Milano. Biblioteca di Filosofia.
Fondo Rodolfo Mondolfo Fondazione di Studi Storici Filippo Turati. V · D · M
Vincitori del Premio Marzotto (1951-1968) Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 17300457 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 1021 8538 · SBN IT\ICCU\RAVV\007730 · LCCN
(EN) n79064000 · GND (DE) 119246651 · BNF (FR) cb12361915z (data) · BNE (ES)
XX1184598 (data) · BAV (EN) 495/183011 · WorldCat Identities (EN)
lccn-n79064000 Biografie Portale Biografie Ebraismo Portale Ebraismo Filosofia
Portale Filosofia Università Portale Università Categorie: Filosofi italiani
del XX secoloNati nel 1877Morti nel 1976Nati il 20 agostoMorti il 16 luglioNati
a SenigalliaMorti a Buenos AiresEbrei italianiPolitici del Partito Socialista
ItalianoItaliani emigrati in ArgentinaPremiati con l'Archiginnasio d'oroMembri
dell'Accademia delle Scienze di Torino[altre]. Refs.: Luigi
Speranza, "Grice, Mondolfo, e la filosofia greco-romana," per il Club
Anglo-Italiano, The Swimming-Pool Library, Villa Grice, Liguria, Italia.
Monte: essential Italian
philosopher. Guidobaldo Del Monte Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to
navigationJump to search Ritratto di
Guidobaldo Del Monte Guidobaldo Del Monte o Guidubaldo Bourbon Del Monte
(Pesaro, 11 gennaio 1545 – Mombaroccio, 6 gennaio 1607) è stato un matematico,
filosofo, astronomo e marchese italiano.
Indice 1 Biografia 1.1 Opere
di Del Monte 1.2 Opere
su Del Monte 2 Note
3 Bibliografia
4 Voci
correlate 5 Altri
progetti 6 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Mecanicorum liber,
1615 Suo padre, Ranieri, originario da un famiglia benestante di Urbino,
discendente dalla schiatta dei Bourbon del Monte Santa Maria, fu notato per il
suo ruolo bellico e fu autore di due libri sull'architettura militare. Il duca
di Urbino, Guidobaldo II della Rovere, gli attribuì, per meriti, il titolo di
Marchese del Monte, dunque la famiglia divenne nobile solo un generazione prima
di Guidobaldo. Alla morte del padre, ottenne il titolo di Marchese. Guidobaldo studiò matematica all'Università
di Padova, nel 1564. Mentre era lì, strinse una grande amicizia con il poeta
Torquato Tasso (1544-1595). Guidobaldo
poi combatté nel conflitto in Ungheria, tra l'impero degli Asburgo e l'Impero
Ottomano. Al termine della guerra, tornò nella sua tenuta a Mombaroccio, vicino
Urbino, dove passava i giorni studiando matematica, meccanica, astronomia e
ottica. Studiò matematica con l'aiuto di Federico Commandino (1509-1575).
Divenne amico di Bernardino Baldi (1533-1617), che fu anch'esso studente di
Commandino. Nel 1588 venne nominato ispettore delle fortificazioni del
Granducato di Toscana, pur continuando a risiedere nel Ducato di Urbino. In quegli anni, Del Monte corrispondeva con
numerosi matematici inclusi Giacomo Contarini (1536-1595), Francesco Barozzi
(1537-1604) e Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), e con alcuni di loro si dice abbia
avuto anche relazioni più che professionali.
L'invenzione per la costruzione di poligoni regolari e per dividere in
un numero determinato di segmento qualsiasi linea fu incorporata come
caratteristica del compasso geometrico e militare di Galileo. Proprio
Guidobaldo fu fondamentale nell'aiutare Galilei nella sua carriera universitaria,
che a 26 anni era un promessa ma disoccupato. Del Monte raccomandò il toscano
al suo fratello Cardinale, che a sua volta parlò con il potente Duca di
Toscana, Ferdinando I de' Medici. Sotto la sua protezione, Galileo ebbe una
cattedra di matematica all'Università di Pisa, nel 1589. Guidobaldo divenne un
amico fidato di Galileo e lo aiutò nuovamente nel 1592, quando dovette
necessariamente fare domanda per poter insegnare matematica all'Università di
Padova[1], a causa dell'odio e della macchinazione di Giovanni de' Medici, un
figlio di Cosimo de' Medici, contro Galileo. Nonostante la loro amicizia,
Guidobaldo fu un critico di alcune teorie di Galileo, come quella relativa alla
legge dell'isocronismo delle oscillazioni.
Guidobaldo scrisse un importante libro sulla prospettiva, intitolato
Perspectivae Libri VI, pubblicato a Pesaro nel 1600, che avrà ampia diffusione
nel corso del XVII. Fu sicuramente, anche secondo il parere di Galileo, uno dei
massimi studiosi di meccanica e matematica del Cinquecento. Mechanicorum liber, Pisauri, 1577 Opere di
Del Monte (LA) Guidobaldo Dal Monte, Mechanicorum liber, Pisauri, Girolamo
Concordia, 1577. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2015. (LA) Guidobaldo Dal Monte,
Planisphaeriorum universalium theorica, Pisauri, Girolamo Concordia, 1579. URL
consultato il 14 giugno 2015. (LA) Guidobaldo Dal Monte, De ecclesiastici
calendarii restitutione, Pisauri, Girolamo Concordia, 1580. URL consultato il
14 giugno 2015. (LA) Guidobaldo Dal Monte, Perspectivae libri sex, Pisauri, Girolamo
Concordia, 1600. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2015. (LA) Guidobaldo Dal Monte,
Problematum astronomicorum libri septem, Venetiis, Bernardo Giunta, Giovanni
Battista & C Ciotti, 1609. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2015. (LA)
Guidobaldo Dal Monte, De cochlea, Venetiis, Evangelista Deuchino, 1615. URL
consultato il 14 giugno 2015. (LA) Guidobaldo Dal Monte, Mecanicorum liber,
Venetiis, Evangelista Deuchino, 1615. URL consultato il 14 giugno 2015. Opere
su Del Monte Le mechaniche
dell'illustriss. sig. Guido Vbaldo de' marchesi Del Monte: tradotte in volgare
dal sig. Filippo Pigafetta, Venetia, 1581 Le mechaniche dell'illustriss. sig.
Guido Vbaldo de' marchesi Del Monte: tradotte in volgare dal sig. Filippo
Pigafetta nelle quali si contiene la vera dottrina di tutti gli istrumenti
principali da mouer pesi grandissimi con picciola forza, in Venetia, appresso
Francesco di Franceschi senese, 1581. Due lettere inedite di Guidobaldo del
Monte a Giacomo Contarini, pubblicate ed illustrate [da] Antonio Favaronota, Venezia,
[900. I sei libri della prospettiva di Guidobaldo dei marchesi Del Monte dal
latino tradotti interpretati e commentati da Rocco Sinisgalli, presentazione di
Gaspare De Fiore, Roma, 1984. La teoria sui planisferi universali di Guidobaldo
Del Monte, a cura di Rocco Sinisgalli, Salvatore Vastola, Firenze, 1994.[2]
Note ^ "Solo nel settembre del 1592 Galileo (che nel frattempo era stato
molto probabilmente anche suo ospite) poteva occupare la cattedra di Padova,
grazie anche all’intervento del D., che nell’ambiente veneto poteva contare,
oltre che sull’amicizia di un Contarini e di un Pinelli, sull’autorità e
l’influenza di Giambattista Del Monte, generale delle fanterie della
Repubblica": https://www.fondazionecardinalefrancescomariadelmonte.it/guidobaldo-del-monte/.
^ Questo testo proviene in parte dalla relativa voce del progetto Mille anni di
scienza in Italia, opera del Museo Galileo. Istituto Museo di Storia della
Scienza di Firenze (home page), pubblicata sotto licenza Creative Commons
CC-BY-3.0 Bibliografia G. Galilei, Le opere, t. VI, Società editrice
fiorentina, Firenze 1847, su books.google.it. S. Hildebrandt, The Parsimonious
Universe: Shape and Form in the Natural World, Springer Verlag, 1996. ISBN
0387979913 Lives of Eminent Persons, Baldwin and Cradock, London 1833. A.
Giostra, La stella o cometa nelle lettere di Guidobaldo dal Monte a pier Matteo
Giordani, Giornale di Astronomia, Vol. 29 n° 3, 2003. A. Becchi - D. Bertoloni
Meli - E. Gamba (eds): Guidobaldo del Monte. Theory and Practice of the
Mathematical Disciplines from Urbino to Europe, Edition Open Access, Berlin
2013. Voci correlate Galileo Galilei Guidobaldo II della Rovere Mombaroccio
Altri progetti Collabora a Wikisource Wikisource contiene una pagina dedicata a
Guidobaldo Del Monte Collabora a Wikimedia Commons Wikimedia Commons contiene
immagini o altri file su Guidobaldo Del Monte Collegamenti esterni Guidobaldo
Del Monte, in Enciclopedia Italiana, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana.
Modifica su Wikidata Guidobaldo Del Monte, in Dizionario biografico degli
italiani, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata (EN)
Guidobaldo Del Monte, su MacTutor, University of St Andrews, Scotland. Modifica
su Wikidata Opere di Guidobaldo Del Monte / Guidobaldo Del Monte (altra versione)
/ Guidobaldo Del Monte (altra versione), su openMLOL, Horizons Unlimited srl.
Modifica su Wikidata (EN) Opere di Guidobaldo Del Monte, su Open Library,
Internet Archive. Modifica su Wikidata (EN) Aterini B. (2015),‘Guidobaldo del
Monte (1545 -1607)’, in Cigola, M. (Ed.), Distinguished Figures in Descriptive
Geometry and Its Applications for Mechanism Science: From the Middle Ages to
the 17th Century , vol. 30 serie 'History of Mechanism and Machine
Science',direction by Ceccarelli M., New York, London: Ed. Springer, pp. 153 -
180. ISBN 978-3-319-20196-2 (Print). DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-20197-9 7.
Online:https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-319-20197-9_7#page-1
Biografia di Guidobaldo Del Monte sul sito del comune di Mombaroccio, su
mombaroccio.eu. URL consultato il 9 marzo 2007 (archiviato dall'url originale
il 9 ottobre 2007). Biografia in The Galileo Project, su galileo.rice.edu.
Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 66622386 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0000 8344 3253 · SBN IT\ICCU\BVEV\020190 · LCCN
(EN) nr95008823 · GND (DE) 100653138 · BNF (FR) cb135173214 (data) · BNE (ES)
XX5567877 (data) · BAV (EN) 495/6634 · CERL cnp01368065 · WorldCat Identities
(EN) lccn-nr95008823 Astronomia Portale Astronomia Biografie Portale Biografie
Matematica Portale Matematica Categorie: Matematici italiani del XVI
secoloFilosofi italiani del XVI secoloAstronomi italianiNati nel 1545Morti nel
1607Nati l'11 gennaioMorti il 6 gennaioNati a PesaroMorti a Mombaroccio[altre]Refs.:
Luigi Speranza, "Grice e del Monte," per Il Club Anglo-Italiano, The
Swimming-Pool Library, Villa Grice, Liguria, Italia.
Montanism, a charismatic, schismatic
movement in early Christianity, originating in Phrygia in the late second
century. It rebuked the mainstream church for laxity and apathy, and taught
moral purity, new, i.e. postbiblical, revelation, and the imminent end of the
world. Traditional accounts, deriving from critics of the movement, contain
exaggerations and probably some fabrications. Montanus himself, abetted by the
prophetesses Maximilla and Prisca, announced in ecstatic speech a new, final
age of prophecy. This fulfilled the biblical promises that in the last days the
Holy Spirit would be poured out universally Joel 2: 28ff.; Acts 2: 16ff. and
would teach “the whole truth” Jon. 14:26; 16:13. It also empowered the
Montanists to enjoin more rigorous discipline than that required by Jesus. The
sect denied that forgiveness through baptism covered serious subsequent sin;
forbade remarriage for widows and widowers; practiced fasting; and condemned
believers who evaded persecution. Some later followers may have identified
Montanus with the Holy Spirit itself, though he claimed only to be the Spirit’s
mouthpiece. The “new prophecy” flourished for a generation, especially in North
Africa, gaining a famous convert in Tertullian. But the church’s bishops
repudiated the movement’s criticisms and innovations, and turned more
resolutely against postapostolic revelation, apocalyptic expectation, and
ascetic extremes.
mooreism: g. e. – and his paradox: cited by H. P. Grice. Irish
London-born philosopher who spearheaded the attack on idealism and was a major
supporter of realism in all its forms: metaphysical, epistemological, and
axiological. He was born in Upper Norwood, a suburb of London; did his undergraduate
work at Cambridge ; spent 84 as a fellow of Trinity ; returned to Cambridge in
1 as a lecturer; and was granted a professorship there in 5. He also served as
editor of Mind. The bulk of his work falls into four categories: metaphysics,
epistemology, ethics, and philosophical methodology. Metaphysics. In this area,
Moore is mainly known for his attempted refutation of idealism and his defense
thereby of realism. In his “The Refutation of Idealism” 3, he argued that there
is a crucial premise that is essential to all possible arguments for the
idealistic conclusion that “All reality is mental spiritual.” This premise is:
“To be is to be perceived” in the broad sense of ‘perceive’. Moore argued that,
under every possible interpretation of it, that premise is either a tautology
or false; hence no significant conclusion can ever be inferred from it. His
positive defense of realism had several prongs. One was to show that there are
certain claims held by non-realist philosophers, both idealist ones and
skeptical ones. Moore argued, in “A Defense of Common Sense” 5, that these
claims are either factually false or self-contradictory, or that in some cases
there is no good reason to believe them. Among the claims that Moore attacked
are these: “Propositions about purported material facts are false”; “No one has
ever known any such propositions to be true”; “Every purported physical fact is
logically dependent on some mental fact”; and “Every physical fact is causally
dependent on some mental fact.” Another major prong of Moore’s defense of
realism was to argue for the existence of an external world and later to give a
“Proof of an External World” 3. Epistemology. Most of Moore’s work in this area
dealt with the various kinds of knowledge we have, why they must be
distinguished, and the problem of perception and our knowledge of an external
world. Because he had already argued for the existence of an external world in
his metaphysics, he here focused on how we know it. In many papers and chapters
e.g., “The Nature and Reality of Objects of Perception,” 6 he examined and at
times supported three main positions: naive or direct realism, representative
or indirect realism, and phenomenalism. Although he seemed to favor direct
realism at first, in the majority of his papers he found representative realism
to be the most supportable position despite its problems. It should also be
noted that, in connection with his leanings mood toward representative realism,
Moore maintained the existence of sense-data and argued at length for an
account of just how they are related to physical objects. That there are
sense-data Moore never doubted. The question was, What is their ontological
status? With regard to the various kinds of knowledge or ways of knowing, Moore
made a distinction between dispositional or non-actualized and actualized
knowledge. Within the latter Moore made distinctions between direct
apprehension often known as knowledge by acquaintance, indirect apprehension,
and knowledge proper or propositional knowledge. He devoted much of his work to
finding the conditions for knowledge proper. Ethics. In his major work in
ethics, Principia Ethica 3, Moore maintained that the central problem of ethics
is, What is good? meaning by this, not
what things are good, but how ‘good’ is to be defined. He argued that there can
be only one answer, one that may seem disappointing, namely: good is good, or,
alternatively, ‘good’ is indefinable. Thus ‘good’ denotes a “unique, simple
object of thought” that is indefinable and unanalyzable. His first argument on
behalf of that claim consisted in showing that to identify good with some other
object i.e., to define ‘good’ is to commit the naturalistic fallacy. To commit
this fallacy is to reduce ethical propositions to either psychological
propositions or reportive definitions as to how people use words. In other
words, what was meant to be an ethical proposition, that X is good, becomes a
factual proposition about people’s desires or their usage of words. Moore’s
second argument ran like this: Suppose ‘good’ were definable. Then the result
would be even worse than that of reducing ethical propositions to non-ethical
propositions ethical propositions would
be tautologies! For example, suppose you defined ‘good’ as ‘pleasure’. Then
suppose you maintained that pleasure is good. All you would be asserting is
that pleasure is pleasure, a tautology. To avoid this conclusion ‘good’ must
mean something other than ‘pleasure’. Why is this the naturalistic fallacy?
Because good is a non-natural property. But even if it were a natural one,
there would still be a fallacy. Hence some have proposed calling it the
definist fallacy the fallacy of
attempting to define ‘good’ by any means. This argument is often known as the
open question argument because whatever purported definition of ‘good’ anyone
offers, it would always be an open question whether whatever satisfies the
definition really is good. In the last part of Principia Ethica Moore turned to
a discussion of what sorts of things are the greatest goods with which we are
acquainted. He argued for the view that they are personal affection and
aesthetic enjoyments. Philosophical methodology. Moore’s methodology in
philosophy had many components, but two stand out: his appeal to and defense of
common sense and his utilization of various methods of philosophical/conceptual
analysis. “A Defense of Common Sense” argued for his claim that the commonsense
view of the world is wholly true, and for the claim that any view which opposed
that view is either factually false or self-contradictory. Throughout his
writings Moore distinguished several kinds of analysis and made use of them
extensively in dealing with philosophical problems. All of these may be found
in the works cited above and other essays gathered into Moore’s Philosophical
Studies2 and Philosophical Papers 9. These have been referred to as
refutational analysis, with two subforms, showing contradictions and
“translation into the concrete”; distinctional analysis; decompositional
analysis either definitional or divisional; and reductional analysis. Moore was
greatly revered as a teacher. Many of his students and colleagues have paid
high tribute to him in very warm and grateful terms. Moore’s paradox, as first discussed by G. E.
Moore, the perplexity involving assertion of what is expressed by conjunctions
such as ‘It’s raining, but I believe it isn’t’ and ‘It’s raining, but I don’t
believe it is’. The oddity of such presenttense first-person uses of ‘to
believe’ seems peculiar to those conjunctions just because it is assumed both
that, when asserting roughly,
representing as true a conjunction, one
also asserts its conjuncts, and that, as a rule, the assertor believes the asserted
proposition. Thus, no perplexity arises from assertions of, for instance, ‘It’s
raining today, but I falsely believed it wasn’t until I came out to the porch’
and ‘If it’s raining but I believe it isn’t, I have been misled by the weather
report’. However, there are reasons to think that, if we rely only on these
assumptions and examples, our characterization of the problem is unduly narrow.
First, assertion seems relevant only because we are interested in what the
assertor believes. Secondly, those conjunctions are disturbing only insofar as
they show that Moore’s paradox Moore’s paradox 583 583 some of the assertor’s beliefs, though
contingent, can only be irrationally held. Thirdly, autobiographical reports
that may justifiably be used to charge the reporter with irrationality need be
neither about his belief system, nor conjunctive, nor true e.g., ‘I don’t
exist’, ‘I have no beliefs’, nor false e.g., ‘It’s raining, but I have no
evidence that it is’. So, Moore’s paradox is best seen as the problem posed by
contingent propositions that cannot be justifiably believed. Arguably, in
forming a belief of those propositions, the believer acquires non-overridable
evidence against believing them. A successful analysis of the problem along
these lines may have important epistemological consequences. Refs.: Grice, “Oxford seminars.” Grice
dedicated a full chapter to the Moore paradox. Mainly, Moore is confused in
lexicological ways. An emisor EXPRESSES the belief that p. What the emisor
communicates is that p, not that he believes that p. He does not convey
explicitly that he believes that p, nor implicitly. Belief and its expression
is linked conceptually with the mode – indicative (‘est’); as is desire and its
expression with the imperative mode (“sit”).
mos,
ethos: ethos:
Grice: “I love Lorenz, and he loved his geese.” -- Grice: “In German, ‘deutsche’ means
‘tribal.’” -- philosophical ethology – phrase used by Grice for his creature
construction routine. ethical constructivism, a form of anti-realism about
ethics which holds that there are moral facts and truths, but insists that these
facts and truths are in some way constituted by or dependent on our moral
beliefs, reactions, or attitudes. For instance, an ideal observer theory that
represents the moral rightness and wrongness of an act in terms of the moral
approval and disapproval that an appraiser would have under suitably idealized
conditions can be understood as a form of ethical constructivism. Another form
of constructivism identifies the truth of a moral belief with its being part of
the appropriate system of beliefs, e.g., of a system of moral and nonmoral
beliefs that is internally coherent. Such a view would maintain a coherence
theory of moral truth. Moral relativism is a constructivist view that allows
for a plurality of moral facts and truths. Thus, if the idealizing conditions
appealed to in an ideal observer theory allow that different appraisers can
have different reactions to the same actions under ideal conditions, then that
ideal observer theory will be a version of moral relativism as well as of
ethical constructivism. Or, if different systems of moral beliefs satisfy the
appropriate epistemic conditions e.g. are equally coherent, then the truth or
falsity of particular moral beliefs will have to be relativized to different
moral systems or codes. -- ethical objectivism, the view that the objects of
the most basic concepts of ethics which may be supposed to be values,
obligations, duties, oughts, rights, or what not exist, or that facts about
them hold, objectively and that similarly worded ethical statements by different
persons make the same factual claims and thus do not concern merely the
speaker’s feelings. To say that a fact is objective, or that something has
objective existence, is usually to say that its holding or existence is not
derivative from its being thought to hold or exist. In the Scholastic
terminology still current in the seventeenth century ‘objective’ had the more
or less contrary meaning of having status only as an object of thought. In
contrast, fact, or a thing’s existence, is subjective if it holds or exists
only in the sense that it is thought to hold or exist, or that it is merely a
convenient human posit for practical purposes. A fact holds, or an object
exists, intersubjectively if somehow its acknowledgment is binding on all
thinking subjects or all subjects in some specified group, although it does not
hold or exist independently of their thinking about it. Some thinkers suppose
that intersubjectivity is all that can ever properly be meant by objectivity.
Objectivism may be naturalist or non-naturalist. The naturalist objectivist
believes that values, duties, or whatever are natural phenomena detectable by
introspection, perception, or scientific inference. Thus values may be
identified with certain empirical qualities of anybody’s experience, or duties
with empirical facts about the effects of action, e.g. as promoting or
hindering social cohesion. The non-naturalist objectivist eschewing what Moore
called the naturalistic fallacy believes that values or obligations or whatever
items he thinks most basic in ethics exist independently of any belief about
them, but that their existence is not a matter of any ordinary fact detectable
in the above ways but can be revealed to ethical intuition as standing in a
necessary but not analytic relation to natural phenomena. ‘Ethical
subjectivism’ usually means the doctrine that ethical statements are simply
reports on the speaker’s feelings though, confusingly enough, such statements
may be objectively true or false. Perhaps it ought to mean the doctrine that
nothing is good or bad but thinking makes it so. Attitude theories of morality,
for which such statements express, rather than report upon, the speaker’s
feelings, are also, despite the objections of their proponents, sometimes
called subjectivist. In a more popular usage an objective matter of fact is one
on which all reasonable persons can be expected to agree, while a matter is
subjective if various alternative opinions can be accepted as reasonable. What
is subjective in this sense may be quite objective in the more philosophical
sense in question above. -- ethics, the
philosophical study of morality. The word is also commonly used interchangeably
with ‘morality’ to mean the subject matter of this study; and sometimes it is
used more narrowly to mean the moral principles of a particular tradition,
group, or individual. Christian ethics and Albert Schweitzer’s ethics are
examples. In this article the word will be used exclusively to mean the
philosophical study. Ethics, along with logic, metaphysics, and epistemology,
is one of the main branches of philosophy. It corresponds, in the traditional
division of the field into formal, natural, and moral philosophy, to the last
of these disciplines. It can in turn be divided into the general study of goodness,
the general study of right action, applied ethics, metaethics, moral
psychology, and the metaphysics of moral responsibility. These divisions are
not sharp, and many important studies in ethics, particularly those that
examine or develop whole systems of ethics, are interdivisional. Nonetheless,
they facilitate the identification of different problems, movements, and
schools within the discipline. The first two, the general study of goodness and
the general study of right action, constitute the main business of ethics.
Correlatively, its principal substantive questions are what ends we ought, as
fully rational human beings, to choose and pursue and what moral principles
should govern our choices and pursuits. How these questions are related is the
discipline’s principal structural question, and structural differences among
systems of ethics reflect different answers to this question. In contemporary
ethics, the study of structure has come increasingly to the fore, especially as
a preliminary to the general study of right action. In the natural order of
exposition, however, the substantive questions come first. Goodness and the
question of ends. Philosophers have typically treated the question of the ends
we ought to pursue in one of two ways: either as a question about the
components of a good life or as a question about what sorts of things are good
in themselves. On the first way of treating the question, it is assumed that we
naturally seek a good life; hence, determining its components amounts to determining,
relative to our desire for such a life, what ends we ought to pursue. On the
second way, no such assumption about human nature is made; rather it is assumed
that whatever is good in itself is worth choosing or pursuing. The first way of
treating the question leads directly to the theory of human well-being. The
second way leads directly to the theory of intrinsic value. The first theory
originated in ancient ethics, and eudaimonia was the Grecian word for its
subject, a word usually tr. ‘happiness,’ but sometimes tr. ‘flourishing’ in
order to make the question of human well-being seem more a matter of how well a
person is doing than how good he is feeling. These alternatives reflect the
different conceptions of human well-being that inform the two major views
within the theory: the view that feeling good or pleasure is the essence of
human well-being and the view that doing well or excelling at things worth
doing is its essence. The first view is hedonism in its classical form. Its
most famous exponent among the ancients was Epicurus. The second view is
perfectionism, a view that is common to several schools of ancient ethics. Its
adherents include Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics. Among the moderns, the
best-known defenders of classical hedonism and perfectionism are respectively
J. S. Mill and Nietzsche. Although these two views differ on the question of
what human well-being essentially consists in, neither thereby denies that the
other’s answer has a place in a good human life. Indeed, mature statements of
each typically assign the other’s answer an ancillary place. Thus, hedonism, as
expounded by Epicurus, takes excelling at things worth doing exercising one’s intellectual powers and
moral virtues in exemplary and fruitful ways, e.g. as the tried and true means to experiencing
life’s most satisfying pleasures. And perfectionism, as developed in
Aristotle’s ethics, underscores the importance of pleasure the deep satisfaction that comes from doing
an important job well, e.g. as a natural
concomitant of achieving excellence in things that matter. The two views, as
expressed in these mature statements, differ not so much in the kinds of
activities they take to be central to a good life as in the ways they explain
the goodness of such a life. The chief difference between them, then, is
philosophical rather than prescriptive. The second theory, the theory of
intrinsic value, also has roots in ancient ethics, specifically, Plato’s theory
of Forms. But unlike Plato’s theory, the basic tenets of which include certain
doctrines about the reality and transcendence of value, the theory of intrinsic
value neither contains nor presupposes any metaphysical theses. At issue in the
theory is what things are good in themselves, and one can take a position on
this issue without committing oneself to any thesis about the reality or
unreality of goodness or about its transcendence or immanence. A list of the
different things philosophers have considered good in themselves would include
life, happiness, pleasure, knowledge, virtue, friendship, beauty, and harmony.
The list could easily be extended. An interest in what constitutes the goodness
of the various items on the list has brought philosophers to focus primarily on
the question of whether something unites them. The opposing views on this
question are monism and pluralism. Monists affirm the list’s unity; pluralists
deny it. Plato, for instance, was a monist. He held that the goodness of
everything good in itself consisted in harmony and therefore each such thing owed
its goodness to its being harmonious. Alternatively, some philosophers have
proposed pleasure as the sole constituent of goodness. Indeed, conceiving of
pleasure as a particular kind of experience or state of consciousness, they
have proposed this kind of experience as the only thing good in itself and
characterized all other good things as instrumentally good, as owing their
goodness to their being sources of pleasure. Thus, hedonism too can be a
species of monism. In this case, though, one must distinguish between the view
that it is one’s own experiences of pleasure that are intrinsically good and
the view that anyone’s experiences of pleasure, indeed, any sentient being’s
experiences of pleasure, are intrinsically good. The former is called by Sidgwick
egoistic hedonism, the latter universal hedonism. This distinction can be made
general, as a distinction between egoistic and universal views of what is good
in itself or, as philosophers now commonly say, between agent-relative and
agent-neutral value. As such, it indicates a significant point of disagreement
in the theory of intrinsic value, a disagreement in which the seeming
arbitrariness and blindness of egoism make it harder to defend. In drawing this
conclusion, however, one must be careful not to mistake these egoistic views
for views in the theory of human well-being, for each set of views represents a
set of alternative answers to a different question. One must be careful, in
other words, not to infer from the greater defensibility of universalism
vis-à-vis egoism that universalism is the predominant view in the general study
of goodness. Right action. The general study of right action concerns the
principles of right and wrong that govern our choices and pursuits. In modern
ethics these principles are typically given a jural conception. Accordingly,
they are understood to constitute a moral code that defines the duties of men
and women who live together in fellowship. This conception of moral principles
is chiefly due to the influence of Christianity in the West, though some of its
elements were already present in Stoic ethics. Its ascendancy in the general
study of right action puts the theory of duty at the center of that study. The
theory has two parts: the systematic exposition of the moral code that defines
our duties; and its justification. The first part, when fully developed,
presents complete formulations of the fundamental principles of right and wrong
and shows how they yield all moral duties. The standard model is an axiomatic
system in mathematics, though some philosophers have proposed a technical
system of an applied science, such as medicine or strategy, as an alternative.
The second part, if successful, establishes the authority of the principles and
so validates the code. Various methods and criteria of justification are
commonly used; no single one is canonical. Success in establishing the
principles’ authority depends on the soundness of the argument that proceeds
from whatever method or criterion is used. One traditional criterion is
implicit in the idea of an axiomatic system. On this criterion, the fundamental
principles of right and wrong are authoritative in virtue of being self-evident
truths. That is, they are regarded as comparable to axioms not only in being
the first principles of a deductive system but also in being principles whose
truth can be seen immediately upon reflection. Use of this criterion to
establish the principles’ authority is the hallmark of intuitionism. Once one
of the dominant views in ethics, its position in the discipline has now been
seriously eroded by a strong, twentieth-century tide of skepticism about all
claims of self-evidence. Currently, the most influential method of
justification consistent with using the model of an axiomatic system to expound
the morality of right and wrong draws on the jural conception of its
principles. On this method, the principles are interpreted as expressions of a
legislative will, and accordingly their authority derives from the sovereignty
of the person or collective whose will they are taken to express. The oldest
example of the method’s use is the divine command theory. On this theory, moral
principles are taken to be laws issued by God to humanity, and their authority
thus derives from God’s supremacy. The theory is the original Christian source
of the principles’ jural conception. The rise of secular thought since the
Enlightenment has, however, limited its appeal. Later examples, which continue
to attract broad interest and discussion, are formalism and contractarianism.
Formalism is best exemplified in Kant’s ethics. It takes a moral principle to
be a precept that satisfies the formal criteria of a universal law, and it
takes formal criteria to be the marks of pure reason. Consequently, moral
principles are laws that issue from reason. As Kant puts it, they are laws that
we, as rational beings, give to ourselves and that regulate our conduct insofar
as we engage each other’s rational nature. They are laws for a republic of
reason or, as Kant says, a kingdom of ends whose legislature comprises all
rational beings. Through this ideal, Kant makes intelligible and forceful the
otherwise obscure notion that moral principles derive their authority from the
sovereignty of reason. Contractarianism also draws inspiration from Kant’s
ethics as well as from the social contract theories of Locke and Rousseau. Its
fullest and most influential statement appears in the work of Rawls. On this
view, moral principles represent the ideal terms of social cooperation for
people who live together in fellowship and regard each other as equals.
Specifically, they are taken to be the conditions of an ideal agreement among
such people, an agreement that they would adopt if they met as an assembly of
equals to decide collectively on the social arrangements governing their
relations and reached their decision as a result of open debate and rational
deliberation. The authority of moral principles derives, then, from the
fairness of the procedures by which the terms of social cooperation would be arrived
at in this hypothetical constitutional convention and the assumption that any
rational individual who wanted to live peaceably with others and who imagined
himself a party to this convention would, in view of the fairness of its
procedures, assent to its results. It derives, that is, from the hypothetical
consent of the governed. Philosophers who think of a moral code on the model of
a technical system of an applied science use an entirely different method of
justification. In their view, just as the principles of medicine represent
knowledge about how best to promote health, so the principles of right and
wrong represent knowledge about how best to promote the ends of morality. These
philosophers, then, have a teleological conception of the code. Our fundamental
duty is to promote certain ends, and the principles of right and wrong organize
and direct our efforts in this regard. What justifies the principles, on this
view, is that the ends they serve are the right ones to promote and the actions
they prescribe are the best ways to promote them. The principles are
authoritative, in other words, in virtue of the wisdom of their prescriptions.
Different teleological views in the theory of duty correspond to different
answers to the question of what the right ends to promote are. The most common
answer is happiness; and the main division among the corresponding views
mirrors the distinction in the theory of intrinsic value between egoism and
universalism. Thus, egoism and universalism in the theory of duty hold,
respectively, that the fundamental duty of morality is to promote, as best as
one can, one’s own happiness and that it is to promote, as best as one can, the
happiness of humanity. The former is ethical egoism and is based on the ideal
of rational self-love. The latter is utilitarianism and is based on the ideal
of rational benevolence. Ethical egoism’s most famous exponents in modern
philosophy are Hobbes and Spinoza. It has had few distinguished defenders since
their time. Bentham and J. S. Mill head the list of distinguished defenders of
utilitarianism. The view continues to be enormously influential. On these
teleological views, answers to questions about the ends we ought to pursue
determine the principles of right and wrong. Put differently, the general study
of right action, on these views, is subordinate to the general study of
goodness. This is one of the two leading answers to the structural question
about how the two studies are related. The other is that the general study of
right action is to some extent independent of the general study of goodness. On
views that represent this answer, some principles of right and wrong, notably
principles of justice and honesty, prescribe actions even though more evil than
good would result from doing them. These views are deontological. Fiat justitia
ruat coelum captures their spirit. The opposition between teleology and
deontology in ethics underlies many of the disputes in the general study of
right action. The principal substantive and structural questions of ethics
arise not only with respect to the conduct of human life generally but also
with respect to specific walks of life such as medicine, law, journalism,
engineering, and business. The examination of these questions in relation to
the common practices and traditional codes of such professions and occupations
has resulted in the special studies of applied ethics. In these studies, ideas
and theories from the general studies of goodness and right action are applied
to particular circumstances and problems of some profession or occupation, and
standard philosophical techniques are used to define, clarify, and organize the
ethical issues found in its domain. In medicine, in particular, where rapid
advances in technology create, overnight, novel ethical problems on matters of
life and death, the study of biomedical ethics has generated substantial
interest among practitioners and scholars alike. Metaethics. To a large extent,
the general studies of goodness and right action and the special studies of applied
ethics consist in systematizing, deepening, and revising our beliefs about how
we ought to conduct our lives. At the same time, it is characteristic of
philosophers, when reflecting on such systems of belief, to examine the nature
and grounds of these beliefs. These questions, when asked about ethical
beliefs, define the field of metaethics. The relation of this field to the
other studies is commonly represented by taking the other studies to constitute
the field of ethics proper and then taking metaethics to be the study of the
concepts, methods of justification, and ontological assumptions of the field of
ethics proper. Accordingly, metaethics can proceed from either an interest in
the epistemology of ethics or an interest in its metaphysics. On the first
approach, the study focuses on questions about the character of ethical
knowledge. Typically, it concentrates on the simplest ethical beliefs, such as
‘Stealing is wrong’ and ‘It is better to give than to receive’, and proceeds by
analyzing the concepts in virtue of which these beliefs are ethical and
examining their logical basis. On the second approach, the study focuses on
questions about the existence and character of ethical properties. Typically,
it concentrates on the most general ethical predicates such as goodness and
wrongfulness and considers whether there truly are ethical properties
represented by these predicates and, if so, whether and how they are interwoven
into the natural world. The two approaches are complementary. Neither dominates
the other. The epistemological approach is comparative. It looks to the most
successful branches of knowledge, the natural sciences and pure mathematics,
for paradigms. The former supplies the paradigm of knowledge that is based on
observation of natural phenomena; the latter supplies the paradigm of knowledge
that seemingly results from the sheer exercise of reason. Under the influence
of these paradigms, three distinct views have emerged: naturalism, rationalism,
and noncognitivism. Naturalism takes ethical knowledge to be empirical and
accordingly models it on the paradigm of the natural sciences. Ethical
concepts, on this view, concern natural phenomena. Rationalism takes ethical
knowledge to be a priori and accordingly models it on the paradigm of pure mathematics.
Ethical concepts, on this view, concern morality understood as something
completely distinct from, though applicable to, natural phenomena, something
whose content and structure can be apprehended by reason independently of
sensory inputs. Noncognitivism, in opposition to these other views, denies that
ethics is a genuine branch of knowledge or takes it to be a branch of knowledge
only in a qualified sense. In either case, it denies that ethics is properly
modeled on science or mathematics. On the most extreme form of noncognitivism,
there are no genuine ethical concepts; words like ‘right’, ‘wrong’, ‘good’, and
‘evil’ have no cognitive meaning but rather serve to vent feelings and
emotions, to express decisions and commitments, or to influence attitudes and
dispositions. On less extreme forms, these words are taken to have some
cognitive meaning, but conveying that meaning is held to be decidedly secondary
to the purposes of venting feelings, expressing decisions, or influencing
attitudes. Naturalism is well represented in the work of Mill; rationalism in
the works of Kant and the intuitionists. And noncognitivism, which did not
emerge as a distinctive view until the twentieth century, is most powerfully
expounded in the works of C. L. Stevenson and Hare. Its central tenets,
however, were anticipated by Hume, whose skeptical attacks on rationalism set
the agenda for subsequent work in metaethics. The metaphysical approach is
centered on the question of objectivity, the question of whether ethical predicates
represent real properties of an external world or merely apparent or invented
properties, properties that owe their existence to the perception, feeling, or
thought of those who ascribe them. Two views dominate this approach. The first,
moral realism, affirms the real existence of ethical properties. It takes them
to inhere in the external world and thus to exist independently of their being
perceived. For moral realism, ethics is an objective discipline, a discipline
that promises discovery and confirmation of objective truths. At the same time,
moral realists differ fundamentally on the question of the character of ethical
properties. Some, such as Plato and Moore, regard them as purely intellective
and thus irreducibly distinct from empirical properties. Others, such as
Aristotle and Mill, regard them as empirical and either reducible to or at
least supervenient on other empirical properties. The second view, moral
subjectivism, denies the real existence of ethical properties. On this view, to
predicate, say, goodness of a person is to impose some feeling, impulse, or
other state of mind onto the world, much as one projects an emotion onto one’s
circumstances when one describes them as delightful or sad. On the assumption
of moral subjectivism, ethics is not a source of objective truth. In ancient
philosophy, moral subjectivism was advanced by some of the Sophists, notably
Protagoras. In modern philosophy, Hume expounded it in the eighteenth century
and Sartre in the twentieth century. Regardless of approach, one and perhaps
the central problem of metaethics is how value is related to fact. On the
epistemological approach, this problem is commonly posed as the question of
whether judgments of value are derivable from statements of fact. Or, to be more
exact, can there be a logically valid argument whose conclusion is a judgment
of value and all of whose premises are statements of fact? On the metaphysical
approach, the problem is commonly posed as the question of whether moral
predicates represent properties that are explicable as complexes of empirical
properties. At issue, in either case, is whether ethics is an autonomous
discipline, whether the study of moral values and principles is to some degree
independent of the study of observable properties and events. A negative answer
to these questions affirms the autonomy of ethics; a positive answer denies
ethics’ autonomy and implies that it is a branch of the natural sciences. Moral
psychology. Even those who affirm the autonomy of ethics recognize that some
facts, particularly facts of human psychology, bear on the general studies of
goodness and right action. No one maintains that these studies float free of
all conception of human appetite and passion or that they presuppose no account
of the human capacity for voluntary action. It is generally recognized that an
adequate understanding of desire, emotion, deliberation, choice, volition,
character, and personality is indispensable to the theoretical treatment of
human well-being, intrinsic value, and duty. Investigations into the nature of
these psychological phenomena are therefore an essential, though auxiliary,
part of ethics. They constitute the adjunct field of moral psychology. One area
of particular interest within this field is the study of those capacities by
virtue of which men and women qualify as moral agents, beings who are
responsible for their actions. This study is especially important to the theory
of duty since that theory, in modern philosophy, characteristically assumes a
strong doctrine of individual responsibility. That is, it assumes principles of
culpability for wrongdoing that require, as conditions of justified blame, that
the act of wrongdoing be one’s own and that it not be done innocently. Only
moral agents are capable of meeting these conditions. And the presumption is
that normal, adult human beings qualify as moral agents whereas small children
and nonhuman animals do not. The study then focuses on those capacities that
distinguish the former from the latter as responsible beings. The main issue is
whether the power of reason alone accounts for these capacities. On one side of
the issue are philosophers like Kant who hold that it does. Reason, in their
view, is both the pilot and the engine of moral agency. It not only guides one
toward actions in conformity with one’s duty, but it also produces the desire
to do one’s duty and can invest that desire with enough strength to overrule
conflicting impulses of appetite and passion. On the other side are
philosophers, such as Hume and Mill, who take reason to be one of several
capacities that constitute moral agency. On their view, reason works strictly
in the service of natural and sublimated desires, fears, and aversions to
produce intelligent action, to guide its possessor toward the objects of those
desires and away from the objects of those fears. It cannot, however, by itself
originate any desire or fear. Thus, the desire to act rightly, the aversion to
acting wrongly, which are constituents of moral agency, are not products of reason
but are instead acquired through some mechanical process of socialization by
which their objects become associated with the objects of natural desires and
aversions. On one view, then, moral agency consists in the power of reason to
govern behavior, and being rational is thus sufficient for being responsible
for one’s actions. On the other view, moral agency consists in several things
including reason, but also including a desire to act rightly and an aversion to
acting wrongly that originate in natural desires and aversions. On this view,
to be responsible for one’s actions, one must not only be rational but also
have certain desires and aversions whose acquisition is not guaranteed by the
maturation of reason. Within moral psychology, one cardinal test of these views
is how well they can accommodate and explain such common experiences of moral
agency as conscience, weakness, and moral dilemma. At some point, however, the
views must be tested by questions about freedom. For one cannot be responsible
for one’s actions if one is incapable of acting freely, which is to say, of
one’s own free will. The capacity for free action is thus essential to moral
agency, and how this capacity is to be explained, whether it fits within a
deterministic universe, and if not, whether the notion of moral responsibility
should be jettisoned, are among the deepest questions that the student of moral
agency must face. What is more, they are not questions to which moral
psychology can furnish answers. At this point, ethics descends into
metaphysics. ethnography, an open-ended
family of techniques through which anthropologists investigate cultures; also,
the organized descriptions of other cultures that result from this method.
Cultural anthropology ethnology is based primarily on fieldwork through which
anthropologists immerse themselves in the life of a local culture village,
neighborhood and attempt to describe and interpret aspects of the culture.
Careful observation is one central tool of investigation. Through it the anthropologist
can observe and record various features of social life, e.g. trading practices,
farming techniques, or marriage arrangements. A second central tool is the
interview, through which the researcher explores the beliefs and values of
members of the local culture. Tools of historical research, including
particularly oral history, are also of use in ethnography, since the cultural
practices of interest often derive from a remote point in time. ethnology, the comparative and analytical
study of cultures; cultural anthroplogy. Anthropologists aim to describe and
interpret aspects of the culture of various social groups e.g., the hunter-gatherers of the Kalahari,
rice villages of the Chin. Canton Delta, or a community of physicists at
Livermore Laboratory. Topics of particular interest include religious beliefs,
linguistic practices, kinship arrangements, marriage patterns, farming
technology, dietary practices, gender relations, and power relations. Cultural
anthropology is generally conceived as an empirical science, and this raises
several methodological and conceptual difficulties. First is the role of the
observer. The injection of an alien observer into the local culture unavoidably
disturbs that culture. Second, there is the problem of intelligibility across
cultural systems radical translation.
One goal of ethnographic research is to arrive at an interpretation of a set of
beliefs and values that are thought to be radically different from the
researcher’s own beliefs and values; but if this is so, then it is questionable
whether they can be accurately tr. into the researcher’s conceptual scheme.
Third, there is the problem of empirical testing of ethnographic
interpretations. To what extent do empirical procedures constrain the
construction of an interpretation of a given cultural milieu? Finally, there is
the problem of generalizability. To what extent does fieldwork in one location
permit anthropologists to generalize to a larger context other villages, the dispersed ethnic group
represented by this village, or this village at other times? ethnomethodology, a phenomenological approach
to interpreting everyday action and speech in various social contexts. Derived
from phenomenological sociology and introduced by Harold Garfinkel, the method
aims to guide research into meaningful social practices as experienced by
participants. A major objective of the method is to interpret the rules that
underlie everyday activity and thus constitute part of the normative basis of a
given social order. Research from this perspective generally focuses on mundane
social activities e.g., psychiatrists
evaluating patients’ files, jurors deliberating on defendants’ culpability, or
coroners judging causes of death. The investigator then attempts to reconstruct
an underlying set of rules and ad hoc procedures that may be taken to have
guided the observed activity. The approach emphasizes the contextuality of
social practice the richness of unspoken
shared understandings that guide and orient participants’ actions in a given
practice or activity. H. P. Grice, “The Teutons, according to Tacitus.”
dilemma. Grice: “Ryle overuses the word
dilemma in his popularization, “Dilemmas”.” 1 Any problem where morality is
relevant. This broad use includes not only conflicts among moral reasons but
also conflicts between moral reasons and reasons of law, religion, or
self-interest. In this sense, Abraham is in a moral dilemma when God commands
him to sacrifice his son, even if he has no moral reason to obey. Similarly, I
am in a moral dilemma if I cannot help a friend in trouble without forgoing a
lucrative but morally neutral business opportunity. ’Moral dilemma’ also often
refers to 2 any topic area where it is not known what, if anything, is morally
good or right. For example, when one asks whether abortion is immoral in any
way, one could call the topic “the moral dilemma of abortion.” This epistemic
use does not imply that anything really is immoral at all. Recently, moral
philosophers have discussed a much narrower set of situations as “moral
dilemmas.” They usually define ‘moral dilemma’ as 3 a situation where an agent
morally ought to do each of two acts but cannot do both. The bestknown example
is Sartre’s student who morally ought to care for his mother in Paris but at
the same time morally ought to go to England to join the Free and fight the Nazis. However, ‘ought’ covers
ideal actions that are not morally required, such as when someone ought to give
to a certain charity but is not required to do so. Since most common examples
of moral dilemmas include moral obligations or duties, or other requirements,
it is more accurate to define ‘moral dilemma’ more narrowly as 4 a situation
where an agent has a moral requirement to do each of two acts but cannot do
both. Some philosophers also refuse to call a situation a moral dilemma when
one of the conflicting requirements is clearly overridden, such as when I must
break a trivial promise in order to save a life. To exclude such resolvable
conflicts, ‘moral dilemma’ can be defined as 5 a situation where an agent has a
moral requirement to adopt each of two alternatives, and neither requirement is
overridden, but the agent cannot fulfill both. Another common move is to define
‘moral dilemma’ as 6 a situation where every alternative is morally wrong. This
is equivalent to 4 or 5, respectively, if an act is morally wrong whenever it
violates any moral requirement or any non-overridden moral requirement.
However, we usually do not call an act wrong unless it violates an overriding
moral requirement, and then 6 rules out moral dilemmas by definition, since
overriding moral requirements clearly cannot conflict. Although 5 thus seems
preferable, some would object that 5 includes trivial requirements and
conflicts, such as conflicts between trivial promises. To include only tragic
situations, we could define ‘moral dilemma’ as 7 a situation where an agent has
a strong moral obligation or requirement to adopt each of two alternatives, and
neither is overridden, but the agent cannot adopt both alternatives. This
definition is strong enough to raise the important controversies about moral
dilemmas without being so strong as to rule out their possibility by
definition. Refs.: H. P. Grice, “Ryle’s dilemmas: are they?”
epistemology, the discipline, at the
intersection of ethics and epistemology, that studies the epistemic status and
relations of moral judgments and principles. It has developed out of an
interest, common to both ethics and epistemology, in questions of justification
and justifiability in epistemology, of
statements or beliefs, and in ethics, of actions as well as judgments of
actions and also general principles of judgment. Its most prominent questions
include the following. Can normative claims be true or false? If so, how can
they be known to be true or false? If not, what status do they have, and are
they capable of justification? If they are capable of justification, how can
they be justified? Does the justification of normative claims differ with
respect to particular claims and with respect to general principles? In
epistemology recent years have seen a tendency to accept as valid an account of
knowledge as entailing justified true belief, a conception that requires an
account not just of truth but also of justification and of justified belief.
Thus, under what conditions is someone justified, epistemically, in believing
something? Justification, of actions, of judgments, and of principles, has long
been a central element in ethics. It is only recently that justification in
ethics came to be thought of as an epistemological problem, hence ‘moral
epistemology’, as an expression, is a fairly recent coinage, although its
problems have a long lineage. One long-standing linkage is provided by the
challenge of skepticism. Skepticism in ethics can be about the existence of any
genuine distinction between right and wrong, or it can focus on the possibility
of attaining any knowledge of right and wrong, good or bad. Is there a right
answer? is a question in the metaphysics of ethics. Can we know what the right
answer is, and if so how? is one of moral epistemology. Problems of perception
and observation and ones about observation statements or sense-data play an
important role in epistemology. There is not any obvious parallel in moral
epistemology, unless it is the role of prereflective moral judgments, or
commonsense moral judgments moral
judgments unguided by any overt moral theory
which can be taken to provide the data of moral theory, and which need
to be explained, systematized, coordinated, or revised to attain an appropriate
relation between theory and data. This would be analogous to taking the data of
epistemology to be provided, not by sense-data or observations but by judgments
of perception or observation statements. Once this step is taken the parallel
is very close. One source of moral skepticism is the apparent lack of any
observational counterpart for moral predicates, which generates the question
how moral judgments can be true if there is nothing for them to correspond to.
Another source of moral skepticism is apparently constant disagreement and
uncertainty, which would appear to be explained by the skeptical hypothesis
denying the reality of moral distinctions. Noncognitivism in ethics maintains
that moral judgments are not objects of knowledge, that they make no statements
capable of truth or falsity, but are or are akin to expressions of attitudes.
Some other major differences among ethical theories are largely epistemological
in character. Intuitionism maintains that basic moral propositions are knowable
by intuition. Empiricism in ethics maintains that moral propositions can be
established by empirical means or are complex forms of empirical statements.
Ethical rationalism maintains that the fundamental principles of morality can
be established a priori as holding of necessity. This is exemplified by Kant’s
moral philosophy, in which the categorical imperative is regarded as synthetic
a priori; more recently by what Alan Gewirth b.2 calls the “principle of
generic consistency,” which he claims it is selfcontradictory to deny. Ethical
empiricism is exemplified by classical utilitarianism, such as that of Bentham,
which aspires to develop ethics as an empirical science. If the consequences of
actions can be scientifically predicted and their utilities calculated, then
ethics can be a science. Situationism is equivalent to concrete case
intuitionism in maintaining that we can know immediately what ought to be done
in specific cases, but most ethical theories maintain that what ought to be
done is, in J. S. Mill’s words, determined by “the application of a law to an
individual case.” Different theories differ on the epistemic status of these
laws and on the process of application. Deductivists, either empiricistic or
rationalistic, hold that the law is essentially unchanged in the application;
non-deductivists hold that the law is modified in the process of application.
This distinction is explained in F. L. Will, “Beyond Deduction.” There is
similar variation about what if anything is selfevident, Sidgwick maintaining
that only certain highly abstract principles are self-evident, Ross that only
general rules are, and Prichard that only concrete judgments are, “by an act of
moral thinking.” Other problems in moral epistemology are provided by the
factvalue distinction and controversies
about whether there is any such distinction
and the isought question, the question how a moral judgment can be
derived from statements of fact alone. Naturalists affirm the possibility,
non-naturalists deny it. Prescriptivists claim that moral judgments are
prescriptions and cannot be deduced from descriptive statements alone. This
question ultimately leads to the question how an ultimate principle can be
justified. If it cannot be deduced from statements of fact, that route is out;
if it must be deduced from some other moral principle, then the principle
deduced cannot be ultimate and in any case this process is either circular or
leads to an infinite regress. If the ultimate principle is self-evident, then
the problem may have an answer. But if it is not it would appear to be
arbitrary. The problem of the justification of an ultimate principle continues
to be a leading one in moral epistemology. Recently there has been much
interest in the status and existence of “moral facts.” Are there any, what are
they, and how are they established as “facts”? This relates to questions about
moral realism. Moral realism maintains that moral predicates are real and can
be known to be so; anti-realists deny this. This denial links with the view
that moral properties supervene on natural ones, and the problem of
supervenience is another recent link between ethics and epistemology.
Pragmatism in ethics maintains that a moral problem is like any problem in that
it is the occasion for inquiry and moral judgments are to be regarded as
hypotheses to be tested by how well they resolve the problem. This amounts to
an attempt to bypass the isought problem and all such “dualisms.” So is
constructivism, a development owing much to the work of Rawls, which contrasts
with moral realism. Constructivism maintains that moral ideas are human
constructs and the task is not epistemological or metaphysical but practical
and theoretical that of attaining reflective
equilibrium between considered moral judgments and the principles that
coordinate and explain them. On this view there are no moral facts. Opponents
maintain that this only replaces a foundationalist view of ethics with a
coherence conception. The question whether questions of moral epistemology can
in this way be bypassed can be regarded as itself a question of moral
epistemology. And the question of the foundations of morality, and whether
there are foundations, can still be regarded as a question of moral
epistemology, as distinct from a question of the most convenient and efficient
arrangement of our moral ideas. Refs.: H. P. Grice, “Our knowledge of right and
wrong: do we have it? Is it intuitive as Oxonians believe?”
mos: ethos -- meta-ethics:
morality, an informal public system applying to all rational persons, governing
behavior that affects others, having the lessening of evil or harm as its goal,
and including what are commonly known as the moral rules, moral ideals, and
moral virtues. To say that it is a public system means that all those to whom
it applies must understand it and that it must not be irrational for them to
use it in deciding what to do and in judging others to whom the system applies.
Games are the paradigm cases of public systems; all games have a point and the
rules of a game apply to all who play it. All players know the point of the
game and its rules, and it is not irrational for them to be guided by the point
and rules and to judge the behavior of other players by them. To say that
morality is informal means that there is no decision procedure or authority
that can settle all its controversial questions. Morality thus resembles a
backyard game of basketball more than a professional game. Although there is
overwhelming agreement on most moral matters, certain controversial questions
must be settled in an ad hoc fashion or not settled at all. For example, when,
if ever, abortion is acceptable is an unresolvable moral matter, but each
society and religion can adopt its own position. That morality has no one in a
position of authority is one of the most important respects in which it differs
from law and religion. Although morality must include the commonly accepted
moral rules such as those prohibiting killing and deceiving, different
societies can interpret these rules somewhat differently. They can also differ
in their views about the scope of morality, i.e., about whether morality
protects newborns, fetuses, or non-human animals. Thus different societies can
have somewhat different moralities, although this difference has limits. Also
within each society, a person may have his own view about when it is justified
to break one of the rules, e.g., about how much harm would have to be prevented
in order to justify deceiving someone. Thus one person’s morality may differ
somewhat from another’s, but both will agree on the overwhelming number of
non-controversial cases. A moral theory is an attempt to describe, explain, and
if possible justify, morality. Unfortunately, most moral theories attempt to
generate some simplified moral code, rather than to describe the complex moral
system that is already in use. Morality does not resolve all disputes. Morality
does not require one always to act so as to produce the best consequences or to
act only in those ways that one would will everyone to act. Rather morality
includes both moral rules that no one should transgress and moral ideals that
all are encouraged to follow, but much of what one does will not be governed by
morality. H. P. Grice, “Meta-ethics in postwar Oxford philosophy: Hare,
Nowell-Smith, myself, and others!” mos,
ethos – meta-ethical -- meta-ethics:, Grice: “The Romans should have a verb for
‘mos,’ since it’s very nominational!” Surely what we need is something like
Austin’s ‘doing things.’” mos ,
mōris, m. etym. dub.; perh. root ma-, measure; cf.: maturus, matutinus; prop.,
a measuring or guiding rule of life; hence, I.manner, custom, way, usage,
practice, fashion, wont, as determined not by the laws, but by men's will and
pleasure, humor, self-will, caprice (class.; cf.: consuetudo, usus). I. Lit.:
“opsequens oboediensque'st mori atque imperiis patris,” Plaut. Bacch. 3, 3, 54: Grice: “Cicero was
being brilliant when he found that ‘mos’ nicely translates Grecian ‘ethos’ –
cf. Grice’s ethology. Ethologica -- Philosophical
ethology -- 1 the subfield of psychology that traces the development over time
of moral reasoning and opinions in the lives of individuals this subdiscipline
includes work of Jean Piaget, Lawrence Kohlberg, and Carol Gilligan; 2 the part
of philosophy where philosophy of mind and ethics overlap, which concerns all
the psychological issues relevant to morality. There are many different
psychological matters relevant to ethics, and each may be relevant in more than
one way. Different ethical theories imply different sorts of connections. So
moral psychology includes work of many and diverse kinds. But several
traditional clusters of concern are evident. Some elements of moral psychology
consider the psychological matters relevant to metaethical issues, i.e., to
issues about the general nature of moral truth, judgment, and knowledge.
Different metaethical theories invoke mental phenomena in different ways:
noncognitivism maintains that sentences expressing moral judgments do not
function to report truths or falsehoods, but rather, e.g., to express certain
emotions or to prescribe certain actions. So some forms of noncognitivism imply
that an understanding of certain sorts of emotions, or of special activities
like prescribing that may involve particular psychological elements, is crucial
to a full understanding of how ethical sentences are meaningful. Certain forms
of cognitivism, the view that moral declarative sentences do express truths or
falsehoods, imply that moral facts consist of psychological facts, that for
instance moral judgments consist of expressions of positive psychological
attitudes of some particular kind toward the objects of those judgments. And an
understanding of psychological phenomena like sentiment is crucial according to
certain sorts of projectivism, which hold that the supposed moral properties of
things are mere misleading projections of our sentiments onto the objects of
those sentiments. Certain traditional moral sense theories and certain
traditional forms of intuitionism have held that special psychological
faculties are crucial for our epistemic access to moral truth. Particular views
in normative ethics, particular views about the moral status of acts, persons,
and other targets of normative evaluation, also often suggest that an
understanding of certain psychological matters is crucial to ethics. Actions,
intentions, and character are some of the targets of evaluation of normative
ethics, and their proper understanding involves many issues in philosophy of
mind. Also, many normative theorists have maintained that there is a close
connection between pleasure, happiness, or desiresatisfaction and a person’s
good, and these things are also a concern of philosophy of mind. In addition,
the rightness of actions is often held to be closely connected to the motives,
beliefs, and other psychological phenomena that lie behind those actions.
Various other traditional philosophical concerns link ethical and psychological
issues: the nature of the patterns in the long-term development in individuals
of moral opinions and reasoning, the appropriate form for moral education and
punishment, the connections between obligation and motivation, i.e., between
moral reasons and psychological causes, and the notion of free will and its
relation to moral responsibility and autonomy. Some work in philosophy of mind
also suggests that moral phenomena, or at least normative phenomena of some
kind, play a crucial role in illuminating or constituting psychological
phenomena of various kinds, but the traditional concern of moral psychology has
been with the articulation of the sort of philosophy of mind that can be useful
to ethics. Refs.: H. P. Grice,
“Meta-ethics in post-war Oxford philosophy: Hare, Nowell-Smith, myself, and
others!” H. P. Grice, “The morality of morality.” H. P. Grice, “Lorenz and the
‘ethologie der ganse.’”
“practical reason” – Grice: “In ‘practical
reason,’ we have Aristotle at his best: the category is ‘action,’ and the
praedicabile is ‘rational.’ Now ‘action’ is supracategorial: It’s STRAWSON who
acts, not his action!” -- -- “Or ‘to do things,’ as Austin would put it!” -- moral
rationalism, the view that the substance of morality, usually in the form of
general moral principles, can be known a priori. The view is defended by Kant in
Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals, but it goes back at least to Plato.
Both Plato and Kant thought that a priori moral knowledge could have an impact
on what we do quite independently of any desire that we happen to have. This
motivational view is also ordinarily associated with moral rationalism. It
comes in two quite different forms. The first is that a priori moral knowledge
consists in a sui generis mental state that is both belief-like and
desire-like. This seems to have been Plato’s view, for he held that the belief
that something is good is itself a disposition to promote that thing. The
second is that a priori moral knowledge consists in a belief that is capable of
rationally producing a distinct desire. Rationalists who make the first claim have
had trouble accommodating the possibility of someone’s believing that something
is good but, through weakness of will, not mustering the desire to do it.
Accordingly, they have been forced to assimilate weakness of will to ignorance
of the good. Rationalists who make the second claim about reason’s
action-producing capacity face no such problem. For this reason, their view is
often preferred. The best-known anti-rationalist about morality is Hume. His
Treatise of Human Nature denies both that morality’s substance can be known by
reason alone and that reason alone is capable of producing action.
Griceian realism: a metaethical view
committed to the objectivity of ethics. It has 1 metaphysical, 2 semantic, and
3 epistemological components. 1 Its metaphysical component is the claim that
there are moral facts and moral properties whose existence and nature are
independent of people’s beliefs and attitudes about what is right or wrong. In
this claim, moral realism contrasts with an error theory and with other forms
of nihilism that deny the existence of moral facts and properties. It contrasts
as well with various versions of moral relativism and other forms of ethical
constructivism that make moral facts consist in facts about people’s moral
beliefs and attitudes. 2 Its semantic component is primarily cognitivist.
Cognitivism holds that moral judgments should be construed as assertions about
the moral properties of actions, persons, policies, and other objects of moral
assessment, that moral predicates purport to refer to properties of such
objects, that moral judgments or the propositions that they express can be true
or false, and that cognizers can have the cognitive attitude of belief toward
the propositions that moral judgments express. These cognitivist claims
contrast with the noncognitive claims of emotivism and prescriptivism,
according to which the primary purpose of moral judgments is to express the
appraiser’s attitudes or commitments, rather than to state facts or ascribe
properties. Moral realism also holds that truth for moral judgments is
non-epistemic; in this way it contrasts with moral relativism and other forms
of ethical constructivism that make the truth of a moral judgment epistemic.
The metaphysical and semantic theses imply that there are some true moral
propositions. An error theory accepts the cognitivist semantic claims but
denies the realist metaphysical thesis. It holds that moral judgments should be
construed as containing referring expressions and having truth-values, but
insists that these referring expressions are empty, because there are no moral
facts, and that no moral claims are true. Also on this theory, commonsense
moral thought presupposes the existence of moral facts and properties, but is
systematically in error. In this way, the error theory stands to moral realism
much as atheism stands to theism in a world of theists. J. L. Mackie introduced
and defended the error theory in his Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong, 7. 3
Finally, if moral realism is to avoid skepticism it must claim that some moral
beliefs are true, that there are methods for justifying moral beliefs, and that
moral knowledge is possible. While making these metaphysical, semantic, and
epistemological claims, moral realism is compatible with a wide variety of
other metaphysical, semantic, and epistemological principles and so can take
many different forms. The moral realists in the early part of the twentieth
century were generally intuitionists. Intuitionism combined a commitment to
moral realism with a foundationalist moral epistemology according to which
moral knowledge must rest on self-evident moral truths and with the
nonnaturalist claim that moral facts and properties are sui generis and not
reducible to any natural facts or properties. Friends of noncognitivism found
the metaphysical and epistemological commitments of intuitionism extravagant
and so rejected moral realism. Later moral realists have generally sought to
defend moral realism without the metaphysical and epistemological trappings of
intuitionism. One such version of moral realism takes a naturalistic form. This
form of ethical naturalism claims that our moral beliefs are justified when
they form part of an explanatorily coherent system of beliefs with one another
and with various non-moral beliefs, and insists that moral properties are just
natural properties of the people, actions, and policies that instantiate them.
Debate between realists and anti-realists and within the realist camp centers
on such issues as the relation between moral judgment and action, the rational
authority of morality, moral epistemology and methodology, the relation between
moral and non-moral natural properties, the place of ethics in a naturalistic
worldview, and the parity of ethics and the sciences.
Quinque sense: visum, olfactum, gustum,
tactum, auditum – quinque organa: oculus, etc. Grice: “I am particularly
irritated by Pitcher, of all people, quoting me to refute my idea that a
‘pain-sense’ is an otiosity! Of course
it is!” – “And I used to like Pitcher when he was at Oxford!” -- Some reamarks
about ‘senusus.’ – Grice’s Modified occam’s razor: “Do not multiply senses
beyond necessity – let there be five: visum, auditum, tactum, gustum, and
olfactum --. “Some remarks about the (five?) senses” – Grice: “Grice: “And then
there’s Shaftesbury who thinks he is being witty when he speaks of a ‘moral’
“sense”!” -- moral sense theory, an ethical theory, developed by some British
philosophers notably Shaftesbury,
Hutcheson, and Hume according to which
the pleasure or pain a person feels upon thinking about or “observing” certain
character traits is indicative of the virtue or vice, respectively, of those
features. It is a theory of “moral perception,” offered in response to moral
rationalism, the view that moral distinctions are derived by reason alone, and
combines Locke’s empiricist doctrine that all ideas begin in experience with
the belief, widely shared at the time, that feelings play a central role in
moral evaluation and motivation. On this theory, our emotional responses to
persons’ characters are often “perceptions” of their morality, just as our
experiences of an apple’s redness and sweetness are perceptions of its color
and taste. These ideas of morality are seen as products of an “internal” sense,
because they are produced in the “observer” only after she forms a concept of
the conduct or trait being observed or contemplated as when a person realizes that she is seeing
someone intentionally harm another and reacts with displeasure at what she
sees. The moral sense is conceived as being analogous to, or possibly an aspect
of, our capacity to recognize varying degrees of beauty in things, which modern
writers call “the sense of beauty.” Rejecting the popular view that morality is
based on the will of God, Shaftesbury maintains rather that morality depends on
human nature, and he introduces the notion of a sense of right and wrong,
possessed uniquely by human beings, who alone are capable of reflection.
Hutcheson argues that to approve of a character is to regard it as virtuous.
For him, reason, which discovers relations of inanimate objects to rational
agents, is unable to arouse our approval in the absence of a moral sense.
Ultimately, we can explain why, for example, we approve of someone’s temperate
character only by appealing to our natural tendency to feel pleasure sometimes
identified with approval at the thought of characters that exhibit benevolence,
the trait to which all other virtues can be traced. This disposition to feel
approval and disapproval is what Hutcheson identifies as the moral sense. Hume
emphasizes that typical human beings make moral distinctions on the basis of
their feelings only when those sentiments are experienced from a disinterested
or “general” point of view. In other words, we turn our initial sentiments into
moral judgments by compensating for the fact that we feel more strongly about
those to whom we are emotionally close than those from whom we are more
distant. On a widely held interpretation of Hume, the moral sense provides not
only judgments, but also motives to act according to those judgments, since its
feelings may be motivating passions or arouse such passions. Roderick Firth’s
787 twentieth-century ideal observer theory, according to which moral good is
designated by the projected reactions of a hypothetically omniscient,
disinterested observer possessing other ideal traits, as well as Brandt’s
contemporary moral spectator theory, are direct descendants of the moral sense
theory. Refs: H. P. Grice:
“Shaftesbury’s moral sense: some remarks about the ‘senses’ of this
‘expression’!” Refs.: H. P. Grice, G. J. Warnock, and J. O. Urmson: “The Roman
names for the five senses.” Luigi Speranza, “The senses in iconography.” The
Anglo-American Club. --.
MEDIUS
-- mediautum-inmediatum distinction, the: mediatum: Grice is all
about the mediatum. This he call a ‘soul-to-soul’ transfer. Imagine you pick up
a rose, the thorn hurts you. You are in pain. You say “Ouch.” You transmit this
to the fellow gardener. The mediacy means, “Beware of the thorn. It may hurt
you.” “I am amazed that in The New World, it’s all about immediacy (Chisholm)
when there’s so much which is mediately of immediate philosophical importance!”
immediatum: Grice: “Here the ‘in-’
is negative!” – the presence to the mind without intermediaries. The term
‘immediatum’ and its cognates have been used extensively throughout the history
of philosophy, generally without much explanation. Descartes, e.g., explains
his notion of thought thus: “I use this term to include everything that is
within us in a way that we are IMMEDIATELY aware of it” (Second Replies).
Descartes offers no explanation of immediate awareness, but the implicaturum is
“contextually cancellable.” “Only an idiot would not realise that he is
opposing it to mediated experience.” – Grice. Grice is well aware of this.
“Check with Lewis and Short.” “mĕdĭo , 1, v. a.
medius, I.to halve, divide in the middle (post-class.), Apic. 3, 9. — B.
Neutr., to be in the middle: “melius Juno mediante,” Pall. Mart. 10, 32.” “So
you see, ‘mediare’ can be transitive, but surely Descartes means it in the
intransitive way – something mediates or something doesn’t – Clear as water!” However,
when used as a primitive in this way, ‘immediatum’ may simply mean that
thoughts are the immediate objects of perception because thoughts are the only
things perceived in the strict and proper sense that no perception of an
intermediary is required for the person’s awareness of them. Sometimes
‘immediate’ means ‘not mediated’. (1) An inference from a premise to a
conclusion can exhibit logical immediacy because it does not depend on other
premises. This is a technical usage of proof theory to describe the form of a
certain class of inference rules. (2) A concept can exhibit conceptual
immediacy because it is definitionally primitive, as in the Berkeleian doctrine
that perception of qualities is immediate, and perception of objects is defined
by the perception of their qualities, which is directly understood. (3) Our
perception of something can exhibit causal immediacy because it is not caused
by intervening acts of perception or cognition, as with seeing someone
immediately in the flesh rather than through images on a movie screen. (4) A
belief-formation process can possess psychological immediacy because it
contains no subprocess of reasoning and in that sense has no psychological mediator.
(5) Our knowledge of something can exhibit epistemic immediacy because it is
justified without inference from another proposition, as in intuitive knowledge
of the existence of the self, which has no epistemic mediator. A noteworthy
special application of immediacy is to be found in Russell’s notion of
knowledge by acquaintance. This notion is a development of the venerable
doctrine originating with Plato, and also found in Augustine, that
understanding the nature of some object requires that we can gain immediate
cognitive access to that object. Thus, for Plato, to understand the nature of
beauty requires acquaintance with beauty itself. This view contrasts with one
in which understanding the nature of beauty requires linguistic competence in
the use of the word ‘beauty’ or, alternatively, with one that requires having a
mental representation of beauty. Russell offers sense-data and universals as
examples of things known by acquaintance. To these senses of immediacy we may
add another category whose members have acquired special meanings within
certain philosophical traditions. For example, in Hegel’s philosophy if (per
impossibile) an object were encountered “as existing in simple immediacy” it
would be encountered as it is in itself, unchanged by conceptualization. In
phenomenology “immediate” experience is, roughly, bracketed experience.
Monti: Paolo Rossi Monti Da
Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search Paolo Rossi
Monti (Urbino, 30 dicembre 1923 – Firenze, 14 gennaio 2012) è stato un filosofo
e storico della scienza italiano. Firma di Paolo Rossi Monti in una
lettera a Antonio Banfi datata 6 febbraio 1946 Indice 1 Biografia 2 Attività
pubblicistica 3 Pensiero
4 Riconoscimenti
5 L'archivio
e la biblioteca 6 Opere
7 Note
8 Bibliografia
9 Altri
progetti 10 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Paolo Rossi ha studiato prima ad Ancona e poi a Bologna, dove
nel 1942 si è iscritto a filosofia. Si è laureato nel 1946 a Firenze, con il
filosofo dell'umanesimo Eugenio Garin, con il quale nel 1947 ha conseguito
anche il diploma di perfezionamento. Fra il 1947 e il 1949 ha insegnato storia
e filosofia al Liceo Classico "Plinio il Giovane" di Città di
Castello (PG). Dal 1950 al 1959 è stato assistente di Antonio Banfi all'Università
degli Studi di Milano. Fra il 1950 e il 1955 ha lavorato all'Enciclopedia dei
ragazzi presso la casa editrice Mondadori. Dal 1955 ha insegnato storia
della filosofia, prima all'Università degli Studi di Milano (fino al 1961), poi
a Cagliari (1961-1962) e Bologna. Nel 1962 è stato adottato dalla zia
materna Elena Monti. Di conseguenza il suo cognome e quello dei suoi figli è
diventato Rossi Monti nei documenti ufficiali. Tuttavia, poiché all'epoca il
filosofo aveva già pubblicato tre libri e diversi saggi con il cognome Rossi,
ha deciso per chiarezza di continuare ad utilizzare, nell'attività culturale,
il solo cognome Rossi. Dal 1966 si è definitivamente stabilito a Firenze,
dove ha tenuto fino al 1999 la cattedra di storia della filosofia presso la
facoltà di lettere dell'Università. Nello stesso 1999 è stato nominato
professore emerito dall'Università di Firenze. Fra i suoi figli, Mario
Rossi Monti (1953), psichiatra, è ordinario di psicologia all'Università di
Urbino. Attività pubblicistica Paolo Rossi si è sempre occupato di storia
della filosofia e della scienza, con particolare riguardo al Cinquecento e al
Seicento, pubblicando centinaia di saggi e articoli su riviste italiane e
straniere. Ha curato edizioni di diversi autori, tra i quali Cattaneo (Mondadori),
Bacone (UTET), Vico (Rizzoli), Diderot (Feltrinelli), Rousseau (Sansoni), e
diretto diverse collane scientifiche e filosofiche per le case editrici
Feltrinelli, Sansoni e La Nuova Italia. Ha diretto la collana "Storia
della scienza" dell'editore Olschki insieme con il filosofo Walter
Bernardi. Ha partecipato alla direzione di varie riviste, tra le quali la
Rivista di filosofia, e ai comitati di consulenza di numerose altre, tra le
quali European Journal of Philosophy, Révue internationale d'histoire et
méthodologie de la psychiatrie, Science in Context, Time and Society. Le
collaborazioni con giornali italiani vanno dalla rubrica "Scienza e
filosofia" sul settimanale Panorama alla rubrica "Storia delle
idee" per il supplemento culturale La Domenica del quotidiano Il Sole 24
ore (dal 1999 alla morte). Nel 1988 è stato eletto presidente del
comitato scientifico del centro di studi filosofici "Antonio Banfi"
di Reggio Emilia. È stato membro dell'Accademia Europea dal 1989 e membro
onorario della Società Italiana di Psicopatologia. Nel 1997 è stato nominato
presidente della «Società italiana per lo studio dei rapporti tra scienza e
letteratura». È stato uno dei promotori del "Festival della
Filosofia della Scienza di Città di Castello", del quale è stato direttore
scientifico negli anni 2008, 2009 e 2010. Pensiero Ha dedicato studi
particolarmente approfonditi a Francesco Bacone(che per primo fece conoscere al
pubblico italiano), ma il campo nel quale ha dato il contributo più innovativo
è quello della cosiddetta "rivoluzione scientifica" del Seicento.
Rossi sostiene che la scienza, a cavallo tra XVI e XVII secolo, ha vissuto un
vero e proprio mutamento di paradigma. Il carattere rivoluzionario dei
mutamenti nel modo di fare scienza avvenuti all'epoca di Bacone e Galileo
grazie a una serie di fattori: la nuova visione della natura, non più divisa
tra corpi naturali e "artificiali", la dimensione continentale (e, in
prospettiva, mondiale) della nuova cultura scientifica, l'autonomia dal
pensiero religioso, la pubblicità dei risultati. Un'altra importante novità fu
costituita, secondo Rossi, dal formarsi di un'autonoma comunità scientifica
internazionale, "una sorta di autonoma Repubblica della Scienza [...] dove
non esiste l'ipse dixit". Si è dedicato per oltre trent'anni al tema
della memoria, in chiave filosofica e storica, al quale ha dedicato nel 1991 il
saggio Il passato, la memoria, l'oblio con il quale ha vinto il Premio
Viareggio.[1] Nei suoi ultimi anni ha analizzato e denunciato l'esistenza
di diverse forme di "ostilità alla scienza" (il
"primitivismo" e l'"antiscienza") che, come forma di
reazione allo sviluppo tecnologico e industriale, propugnano come soluzione di
tutti i mali il ritorno a un mondo premoderno idealizzato e il rifiuto della
razionalità. Riconoscimenti Nel 1972 è stato eletto membro del
"Comitato 08" del Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (rieletto nel
1977). È stato presidente sia della Società Filosofica Italiana (dal 1980 al
1983) sia della Società Italiana di Storia della Scienza (dal 1983 al 1990). È
stato socio corrispondente dell'Accademia Pontaniana di Napoli dal 1981, socio
corrispondente dell'Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei dal 1988 e socio nazionale
della stessa dal 1992. Nel 1985 ha ricevuto la Medaglia Sarton per la
storia della scienza dalla «American History of Science Society» (USA) e
successivamente la Medaglia Pictet dalla «Société de Physique et d'Histoire
Naturelle de Genève». Il 7 settembre 2009 gli è stato conferito il Premio
Balzan per la storia delle scienze "per i suoi decisivi contributi allo
studio dei fondamenti intellettuali della scienza dal Rinascimento
all'Illuminismo". La Società Psicoanalitica Italiana lo ha insignito del
Premio Musatti nel 2008[2]. L'archivio e la biblioteca Paolo Rossi ha
lasciato la propria collezione privata di libri e documenti alla biblioteca del
Museo Galileo, che nel giugno 2012 ne ha ricevuta una prima tranche. Il
materiale archivistico raccoglie scritti e appunti a tema storico-filosofico e
storico-scientifico, relazioni tenute a convegni e conferenze, minute, bozze di
stampa e materiali preparatori per pubblicazioni, documenti attinenti
all'attività di docenza e divulgazione, nonché un'ampia selezione di ritagli e
articoli di argomento vario tratti dalle maggiori testate italiane e una
raccolta di documenti di Antonio Banfi[3]. Nella biblioteca privata,
invece, ai numerosi testi di storia della filosofia e storia della scienza, si
affiancano volumi di argomento diverso, che rispecchiano i molteplici interessi
di chi li ha raccolti, così come si sono evoluti nel corso di una vita:
politica, sociologia, religione, in una ricca raccolta di monografie[4],
miscellanee[5] e periodici[6]. Opere Giacomo Aconcio, Milano, F.lli
Bocca, 1952 L'interpretazione baconiana delle favole antiche, Milano, F.lli
Bocca. 1952 Francesco Bacone: dalla magia alla scienza, Bari, Laterza, 1957
Clavis Universalis: arti della memoria e logica combinatoria da Lullo a
Leibniz, Milano, Napoli, R. Ricciardi, 1960 I filosofi e le macchine:
1400-1700, Milano, Feltrinelli, 1962 Galilei, Roma-Milano, CEI-Compagnia
Edizioni Internazionali, 1966 Il pensiero di Galileo Galilei: una antologia
dagli scritti, Torino, Loescher Editore, 1968 Le sterminate antichità: studi
vichiani, Pisa, Nistri-Lischi, 1969 Storia e filosofia: saggi sulla
storiografia filosofica, Torino, Einaudi, 1969 Aspetti della rivoluzione
scientifica, Napoli, A. Morano, 1971 La rivoluzione scientifica: da Copernico a
Newton, Torino, Loescher, 1973 (nuova edizione Pisa, Edizioni ETS, 2020)
Immagini della scienza, Roma, Editori Riuniti, 1977 I segni del tempo: storia
della Terra e storia delle nazioni da Hooke a Vico, Milano, Feltrinelli, 1979 I
ragni e le formiche: un'apologia della storia della scienza, Bologna, Il
Mulino, 1986 Storia della scienza moderna e contemporanea (direzione
dell'opera) , Torino, Utet, 1988 La scienza e la filosofia dei moderni: aspetti
della rivoluzione scientifica, Torino, Bollati Boringhieri, 1989 Paragone degli
ingegni moderni e postmoderni, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1989 Il passato, la memoria,
l'oblio: sei saggi di storia delle idee, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1991, (Premio
Viareggio, 1992) La filosofia (direzione dell'opera), Torino, Utet, 1995
Naufragi senza spettatore: l'idea di progresso, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1995 La
nascita della scienza moderna in Europa, Roma, Laterza, 1997 Le sterminate
antichità e nuovi saggi vichiani, Scandicci, La Nuova Italia, 1999 Un altro
presente: saggi sulla storia della filosofia, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1999 Bambini,
sogni, furori: tre lezioni di storia delle idee, Milano, Feltrinelli, 2001 Il
tempo dei maghi: Rinascimento e modernità, Milano, R. Cortina, 2006 Speranze,
Bologna, Il Mulino, 2008 Mangiare, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2011 Un breve viaggio e
altre storie: le guerre, gli uomini, la memoria, Milano, R. Cortina, 2012 Note
^ Premio letterario Viareggio-Rèpaci, su premioletterarioviareggiorepaci.it.
URL consultato il 9 agosto 2019. ^ Vincitori del Premio Musatti [collegamento
interrotto], su SpiWeb - Società Psicoanalitica Italiana. URL consultato il 15
gennaio 2012. ^ Inventario del Fondo archivistico (PDF), su
opac.museogalileo.it. ^ Fondo librario: le monografie moderne (PDF), su
opac.museogalileo.it. ^ Fondo librario: le miscellanee (PDF), su
opac.museogalileo.it. ^ Fondo librario: i periodici (PDF), su opac.museogalileo.it.
Bibliografia Storia della filosofia, Storia della scienza: saggi in onore di
Paolo Rossi, a cura di Antonello La Vergata e Alessandro Pagnini, Nuova Italia,
Firenze, 1995. Segni e percorsi della modernità: saggi in onore di Paolo Rossi,
a cura di Ferdinando Abbri e Marco Segala, Dipartimento di Studi Filosofici
dell'Università di Siena, 2000. Antonio Rainone, «Rossi Monti, Paolo» in
Enciclopedia Italiana - VI Appendice, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia
Italiana, 2000. John L. Heilbron (a cura di), Advancements of learning: essays
in honour of Paolo Rossi, Firenze, L.S. Olschki, 2007, ISBN 978-88-222-5655-3.
Ferdinando Abbri, Paolo Rossi (30 December 1923-14 January 2012), in Nuncius,
vol. 27, n. 1, 2012, pp. 1-10. AA. VV., «Rossi (propr. Rossi Monti), Paolo» in
Dizionario di filosofia, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 2009. Paolo
Rossi, un maestro, Pisa, Edizioni della Normale, 2013, ISBN 978-88-7642-460-1.
Pietro Rossi, Tra Banfi e Garin: la formazione filosofica di Paolo Rossi, in
Rivista di filosofia, vol. 2014, n. 2, pp. 168-184. Altri progetti Collabora a
Wikiquote Wikiquote contiene citazioni di o su Paolo Rossi Monti Collegamenti
esterni Paolo Rossi Monti, su Treccani.it – Enciclopedie on line, Istituto
dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Paolo Rossi Monti, in
Enciclopedia Italiana, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su
Wikidata Paolo Rossi Monti, in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, Istituto
dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Paolo Rossi Monti, su
siusa.archivi.beniculturali.it, Sistema Informativo Unificato per le
Soprintendenze Archivistiche. Modifica su Wikidata Opere di Paolo Rossi Monti,
su openMLOL, Horizons Unlimited srl. Modifica su Wikidata Registrazioni di
Paolo Rossi Monti, su RadioRadicale.it, Radio Radicale. Modifica su Wikidata
Sito ufficiale Paolo Rossi, su paolorossimonti.altervista.org. URL consultato
il 29 aprile 2019 (archiviato dall'url originale il 5 marzo 2016). Biografia
dell'enciclopedia multimediale RAI delle scienze filosofiche, su emsf.rai.it.
URL consultato il 28 febbraio 2006 (archiviato dall'url originale il 12 agosto
2009). Rassegna stampa del sito web italiano per la filosofia, su
lgxserver.uniba.it. URL consultato il 28 febbraio 2006 (archiviato dall'url
originale il 2 novembre 2010). Per una scienza libera, intervista a Paolo Rossi
(2003) Opere di Paolo Rossi su StoriaModerna.it, su stmoderna.it. intervista
(giugno 2006) Società Psicoanalitica Italiana, videointervista (giugno
2011)[collegamento interrotto] Paolo Rossi: memoria e reminiscenza, sul portale
RAI Filosofia, su filosofia.rai.it. Il Fondo Rossi nella biblioteca del Museo
Galileo, su museogalileo.it. V · D · M Vincitori del Premio Viareggio per la
saggistica Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 100176550 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 1031 6808 · SBN IT\ICCU\MILV\001441 · LCCN
(EN) n79095598 · GND (DE) 135670586 · BNF (FR) cb120191990 (data) · BNE (ES)
XX1101608 (data) · BAV (EN) 495/73603 · NDL (EN, JA) 00454745 · WorldCat
Identities (EN) lccn-n79095598 Biografie Portale Biografie Filosofia Portale
Filosofia Categorie: Filosofi italiani del XX secoloStorici della scienza
italianiNati nel 1923Morti nel 2012Nati il 30 dicembreMorti il 14 gennaioNati a
UrbinoMorti a FirenzeVincitori del premio BalzanFilosofi della storiaVincitori
del Premio Viareggio per la saggistica[altre]
mos, costume – Grice: “Can a single
individual have an idio-mos, a practice? He certainly can device a set of
pratices that nobody ever puts into use, as in my New Hightway Code, or my
Deutero-Esperanto.” moral scepticism, any metaethical view that raises
fundamental doubts about morality as a whole. Different kinds of doubts lead to
different kinds of moral skepticism. The primary kinds of moral skepticism are
epistemological. Moral justification skepticism is the claim that nobody ever
has any or adequate justification for believing any substantive moral claim.
Moral knowledge skepticism is the claim that nobody ever knows that any
substantive moral claim is true. If knowledge implies justification, as is
often assumed, then moral justification skepticism implies moral knowledge
skepticism. But even if knowledge requires justification, it requires more, so
moral knowledge skepticism does not imply moral justification skepticism.
Another kind of skeptical view in metaethics rests on linguistic analysis. Some
emotivists, expressivists, and prescriptivists argue that moral claims like
“Cheating is morally wrong” resemble expressions of emotion or desire like
“Boo, cheating” or prescriptions for action like “Don’t cheat”, which are
neither true nor false, so moral claims themselves are neither true nor false.
This linguistic moral skepticism, which is sometimes called noncognitivism,
implies moral knowledge skepticism if knowledge implies truth. Even if such
linguistic analyses are rejected, one can still hold that no moral properties
or facts really exist. This ontological moral skepticism can be combined with
the linguistic view that moral claims assert moral properties and facts to
yield an error theory that all positive moral claims are false. A different
kind of doubt about morality is often raised by asking, “Why should I be
moral?” Practical moral skepticism answers that there is not always any reason
or any adequate reason to be moral or to do what is morally required. This view
concerns reasons to act rather than reasons to believe. Moral skepticism of all
these kinds is often seen as immoral, but moral skeptics can act and be
motivated and even hold moral beliefs in much the same way as non-skeptics.
Moral skeptics just deny that their or anyone else’s moral beliefs are
justified or known or true, or that they have adequate reason to be moral. moral
status, the suitability of a being to be viewed as an appropriate object of
direct moral concern; the nature or degree of a being’s ability to count as a
ground of claims against moral agents; the moral standing, rank, or importance
of a kind of being; the condition of being a moral patient; moral
considerability. Ordinary moral reflection involves considering others. But
which others ought to be considered? And how are the various objects of moral
consideration to be weighed against one another? Anything might be the topic of
moral discussion, but not everything is thought to be an appropriate object of
direct moral concern. If there are any ethical constraints on how we may treat
a ceramic plate, these seem to derive from considerations about other beings,
not from the interests or good or nature of the plate. The same applies,
presumably, to a clod of earth. Many philosophers view a living but insentient
being, such as a dandelion, in the same way; others have doubts. According to
some, even sentient animal life is little more deserving of moral consideration
than the clod or the dandelion. This tradition, which restricts significant
moral status to humans, has come under vigorous and varied attack by defenders
of animal liberation. This attack criticizes speciesism, and argues that
“humanism” is analogous to theories that illegitimately base moral status on
race, gender, or social class. Some philosophers have referred to beings that
are appropriate objects of direct moral concern as “moral patients.” Moral
agents are those beings whose actions are subject to moral evaluation;
analogously, moral patients would be those beings whose suffering in the sense
of being the objects of the actions of moral agents permits or demands moral
evaluation. Others apply the label ‘moral patients’ more narrowly, just to
those beings that are appropriate objects of direct moral concern but are not
also moral agents. The issue of moral status concerns not only whether beings
count at all morally, but also to what degree they count. After all, beings who
are moral patients might still have their claims outweighed by the preferred
claims of other beings who possess some special moral status. We might, with
Nozick, propose “utilitarianism for animals, Kantianism for people.” Similarly,
the bodily autonomy argument in defense of abortion, made famous by Thomson,
does not deny that the fetus is a moral patient, but insists that her/his/its
claims are limited by the pregnant woman’s prior claim to control her bodily
destiny. It has often been thought that moral status should be tied to the
condition of “personhood.” The idea has been either that only persons are moral
patients, or that persons possess a special moral status that makes them
morally more important than nonpersons. Personhood, on such theories, is a
minimal condition for moral patiency. Why? Moral patiency is said to be
“correlative” with moral agency: a creature has both or neither. Alternatively,
persons have been viewed not as the only moral patients, but as a specially
privileged elite among moral patients, possessing rights as well as
interests.
more grice to
the mill: SOUS-ENTENDU,
-UE, part. passé, adj. et subst. masc. I. − Part. passé de sous-entendre*. A. −
Empl. impers. Il est sous-entendu que + complét. à l'ind. Il est inutile de
préciser que. Synon. il va sans dire que.Elle lui écrivit (...) que (...) elle
aurait enfin, après avoir été si souvent reçue chez eux, le plaisir de les
inviter à son tour. De lui, elle ne disait pas un mot, il était sous-entendu
que leur présence excluait la sienne (Proust,Swann,1913, p. 301). B. − Empl.
ell. à valeur de prop. part. Sous-entendu (inv., le locuteur suppléant ce qui
n'est pas exprimé mais suggéré). Ce qui signifie par là (que). Mon cher Ami,
Encore une! sous-entendu: demande de croix d'honneur (Flaub.,Corresp.,1871, p.
287). II. − Adjectif A. − Synon. implicite, tacite; anton. avoué, explicite,
formulé. 1. Qu'on laisse entendre sans l'exprimer. Le lendemain, à table, mon
mari me dit (je me demandai d'abord s'il n'y avait pas là quelque dessein
sous-entendu): − Sais-tu ce que m'a annoncé Brassy? Gurgine a essayé de se tuer
(Daniel-Rops,Mort,1934, p. 291). 2. Qui reste implicite. Je me rappelle (...)
d'avoir lu dans la déclaration des droits de l'homme cette maxime sous-entendue
dans tous les codes qu'on nous a donnés depuis: « Tout ce qui n'est pas défendu
par la loi ne peut être empêché, et nul ne peut être contraint à faire ce
qu'elle n'ordonne pas » (Bonald,Législ. primit.,t. 1, 1802, p. 152).Toute
mélodie commence par une anacrouse exprimée ou sous-entendue (D'Indy,Compos.
mus.,t. 1, 1897-1900, p. 35). B. − GRAMM. Qui n'est pas exprimé, mais que le
sens ou la syntaxe pourrait suppléer aisément. Observez qu'ainsi est tantôt
adverbe, tantôt conjonction. (...) Il est encore adverbe dans celle-ci [cette
phrase], ainsi que la vertu, le crime a ses degrés; il signifie de la même manière.
C'est que, qui est la conjonction qui lie ensemble la phrase exprimée, le crime
a ses degrés, avec la phrase sous-entendue, la vertu a ses degrés (Destutt de
Tr.,Idéol. 2,1803, p. 140).L'intelligence fait donc naturellement usage des
rapports d'équivalent à équivalent, de contenu à contenant, de cause à effet,
etc., qu'implique toute phrase, où il y a un sujet, un attribut, un verbe,
exprimé ou sous-entendu (Bergson,Évol. créatr.,1907, p. 149). III. − Subst.
masc. A. − Au sing. Comportement de celui qui sous-entend les choses sans les
exprimer explicitement. C'est la plus immense personnalité que je connaisse
[Zola], mais elle est toute dans le sous-entendu: l'homme ne parle pas de lui,
mais toutes les théories, toutes les idées, toutes les logomachies qu'il émet
combattent uniquement, à propos de tout et de n'importe quoi, en faveur de sa
littérature et de son talent (Goncourt, Journal, 1883, p. 251). B. − P. méton.
1. Parfois péj. Ce qui est sous-entendu, insinué dans des propos ou dans un
texte, ou p. ext., par un comportement. Synon. allusion, insinuation.Plus libre
que ses confrères, il ne craignait pas, − bien timidement encore, avec des
clignements d'yeux et des sous-entendus, − de fronder les gens en place
(Rolland,J.-Chr.,Adolesc., 1905, p. 365). − Au sing. à valeur de neutre. Henry
Céard a passé avec moi toute la journée, causant du roman qu'il fait, − et
qu'il veut faire dans le gris, le voilé, le sous-entendu (Goncourt,,
Journal1878, p. 1276). − En partic. Allusion grivoise. Les conversations
fourmillaient d'allusions et de sous-entendus dont la grivoiserie me choquait
(Beauvoir,Mém. j. fille,1958, p. 165). 2. Ce qui n'est pas exprimé
explicitement. Synon. restriction, réticence.Personne ne dit: « Je suis », si
ce n'est dans une certaine attitude très instable et généralement apprise, et
on ne le dit alors qu'avec quantité de sous-entendus: il y faut parfois un long
commentaire (Valéry, Variété IV,1938, p. 228). REM. Sous-entente, subst.
fém.,vx. a) Action de sous-entendre par artifice; p. méton., ce qui est ainsi
sous-entendu. Il ne parle jamais qu'il n'y ait quelque sous-entente à ce qu'il
dit. Il y a quelque sous-entente à cela (Ac. 1798-1878). b) Gramm. Synon. de
sous-entendu. (Ds Bally 1951). Prononc. et Orth.: [suzɑ ̃tɑ ̃dy]. Ac. 1694:
sousentendu, -ue, 1718: sousentendu, -üe, dep. 1740: sous-entendu, -ue. Fréq.
abs. littér.: 249. Fréq. rel. littér.: xixes.: a) 189, b) 230; xxes.: a) 480,
b) 484. Bbg. Ducrot (O.). Le Dire et le dit. Paris, 1984, pp. 13-31. −
Kerbrat-Orecchioni (C.). L'Énonciation. De la subjectivité ds le lang. Paris,
1980, 290 p., passim. more grice
to the mill: sous-entendu: used by, of all people, Mill. An Examination of
Sir William Hamilton's Philosophybooks.google.com › books ... and speak with
any approach to precision, and adopting into [the necessary sufficient clauses
of a piece of philosophical conceptual analysis] a mere sous-entendu of common
conversation in its most unprecise form. If I say to any one, Cf.
understatement, as opposed to overstatement. The ‘statement’ thing complicates
things, ‘underunderstanding’ seems better, or ‘sub-understanding,’ strictly.
Trust Grice to bring more Grice to the Mill and provide a full essay, indeed
theory, and base his own philosophy, on the sous-tentendu! Cf. Pears, Pears
Cyclopaedia. “The English love meiosis, litotes, and understatement. The French
don’t.” Note all the figures of rhetoric cited by Grice, and why they have
philosophical import. Many entries here: hyperbole, meiosis, litotes, etc.
Grice took ‘sous-entendu’ etymologically serious. It is UNDERSTOOD. Nobody
taught you, but it understood. It is understood is like It is known. So “The
pillar box seems red” is understood to mean, “It may not be.” Now a
sous-entendu may be cancellable, in which case it was MIS-understood, or the
emissor has changed his mind. Grice considers the paradoxes the understanding
under ‘uptake,’ just to make fun of Austin’s informalism. The ‘endendu’ is what
the French understand by ‘understand,’ the root being Latin intellectus, or
intendo.
macaulay: Grice: “Unlike Whitehead, I care
for style; so when it comes to ‘if,’ we
have to please Macaulay – the verbs change, for each mode – and sub-mode!” --
Grice: A curious phenomenon comes to light. I
began by assuming (or stipulating) that the verbs 'judge' and 'will'
(acceptance-verbs) are to be 'completed' by radicals (phrastics). Yet when the
machinery developed above has been applied, we find that the verb 'accept' (or
'think') is to be completed by something of the form 'Op + p', that is, by a
sentence. Perhaps we might tolerate this syntactical ambivalence; but if we
cannot, the remedy is not clear. It would, for example, not be satisfactory to
suppose that 'that', when placed before a sentence, acts as a 'radicalizer' (is
a functor expressing a function which takes that sentence on to its radical);
for that way we should lose the differentiations effected by varying
mode-markers, and this would be fatal to the scheme. This phenomenon certainly
suggests that the attempt to distinguish radicals from sentences may be
misguided; that if radicals are to be admitted at all, they should be
identified with indicative sentences.
The operator '⊢'
would then be a 'semantically vanishing' operator. But this does not wholly
satisfy me; for, if '⊢'
is semantically vacuous, what happens to the subordinate distinction made by
'A' and 'B' markers, which seems genuine enough? We might find these markers
'hanging in the air', like two smiles left behind by the Cheshire Cat. Whatever
the outcome of this debate, however, I feel fairly confident that I could
accommodate the formulation of my discussion to it. Fuller Exposition of the
'Initial Idea' First, some preliminary points. To provide at least a modicum of
intelligibility for my discourse, I shall pronounce the judicative end p.72
operator '⊢'
as 'it is the case that', and the volitive operator '!' as 'let it be that';
and I shall pronounce the sequence 'φ, ψ' as 'given that φ, ψ'. These vocal
mannerisms will result in the production of some pretty barbarous 'English
sentences'; but we must remember that what I shall be trying to do, in uttering
such sentences, will be to represent supposedly underlying structure; if that
is one's aim, one can hardly expect that one's speech-forms will be such as to
excite the approval of, let us say, Jane Austen or Lord Macaulay. In any case,
less horrendous, though (for my purposes) less perspicuous, alternatives will,
I think, be available. Further, I am going to be almost exclusively concerned
with alethic and practical arguments, the proximate conclusions of which will
be, respectively, of the forms 'Acc (⊢ p)' and 'Acc (! p)'; for example, 'acceptable (it is the
case that it snows)' and 'acceptable (let it be that I go home)'. There will be
two possible ways of reading the latter sentence. We might regard 'acceptable'
as a sentential adverb (modifier) like 'demonstrably'; in that case to say or
think 'acceptable (let it be that I go home)' will be to say or think 'let it
be that I go home', together with the qualification that what I say or think is
acceptable; as one might say, 'acceptably, let it be that I go home'. To adopt
this reading would seem to commit us to the impossibility of incontinence; for
since 'accept that let it be that I go home' is to be my rewrite for 'Vaccept
(will) that I go home', anyone x who concluded, by practical argument, that
'acceptable let it be that x go home' would ipso facto will to go home.
Similarly (though less paradoxically) any one who concluded, by alethic
argument, 'acceptable it is the case that it snows', would ipso facto judge
that it snows. So an alternative reading 'it is acceptable that let it be that
I go home', which does not commit the speaker or thinker to 'let it be that I
go home', seems preferable. We can, of course, retain the distinct form
'acceptably, let it be that (it is the case that) p' for renderings of
'desirably' and 'probably'. Let us now tackle the judicative cases. I start
with the assumption that arguments of the form 'A, so probably B' are sometimes
(informally) valid; 'he has an exceptionally red face, so probably he has high
blood pressure' might be informally valid, whereas 'he has an exceptionally red
face, so probably he has musical talent' is unlikely to be allowed informal
validity. end p.73 We might re-express this assumption by saying that it is
sometimes the case that A informally yields-with-probability that B (where
'yields' is the converse of 'is inferable from'). If we wish to construct a
form of argument the acceptability of which does not depend on choice of
substituends for 'A' and 'B', we may, so to speak, allow into the
object-language forms of sentence which correspond to metastatements of the
form: 'A yields-with-probability that B'; we may allow ourselves, for example,
such a sentence as "it is probable, given that he has a very red face,
that he has high blood pressure". This will provide us with the
argument-patterns: “Probable, given A, that B A So, probably, B” or “Probable,
given A, that B A So probably that B” To take
the second pattern, the legitimacy of such an inferential transition will not
depend on the identity of 'A' or of 'B', though it will depend (as was stated
in the previous chapter) on a licence from a suitably formulated 'Principle of
Total Evidence'. The proposal which I am considering (in pursuit of the 'initial
idea') would (roughly) involve rewriting the second pattern of argument so that
it reads: It is acceptable, given that it is the case that A, that it is the
case that B. It is the case that A. To apply this schema to a particular case,
we generated the particular argument: It is acceptable, given that it is the
case that Snodgrass has a red face, that it is the case that Snodgrass has high
blood pressure. It is the case that Snodgrass has a red face. So, it is
acceptable that it is the case that Snodgrass has high blood pressure. end p.74
If we make the further assumption that the singular 'conditional' acceptability
statement which is the first premiss of the above argument may be (and perhaps
has to be) reached by an analogue of the rule of universal instantiation from a
general acceptability statement, we make room for such general acceptability
sentences as: It is acceptable, given that it is the case that x has a red
face, that it is the case that x has high blood pressure. which are of the form
"It is acceptable, given that it is the case that Fx, that it is the case
that Gx'; 'x' here is, you will note, an unbound variable; and the form might
also (loosely) be read (pronounced) as: "It is acceptable, given that it
is the case that one (something) is F, that it is the case that one (it) is
G." All of this is (I think) pretty platitudinous; which is just as well,
since it is to serve as a model for the treatment of practical argument. To
turn from the alethic to the practical dimension. Here (the proposal goes) we
may proceed, in a fashion almost exactly parallel to that adopted on the
alethic side, through the following sequence of stages: (1) Arguments (in
thought or speech) of the form: Let it be that A It is the case that B so, with
some degree of desirability, let it be that C are sometimes (and sometimes not)
informally valid (or acceptable). (2) Arguments of the form: It is desirable,
given that let it be that A and that it is the case that B, that let it be that
C Let it be that A It is the case that B so, it is desirable that let it be
that C should, therefore, be allowed to be formally acceptable, subject to
licence from a Principle of Total Evidence. (3) In accordance with our proposal
such arguments will be rewritten: end p.75 It is acceptable, given that let it
be A and that it is the case that B, that let it be that C Let it be that A It
is the case that B so, it is desirable that let it be that C (4) The first
premisses of such arguments may be (and perhaps have to be) reached by instantiation
from general acceptability statements of the form: "It is acceptable,
given that let one be E and that it is the case that one is F, that let it be
that one is G." We may note that sentences like "it is snowing"
can be trivially recast so as (in effect) to appear as third premisses in such
arguments (with 'open' counterparts inside the acceptability sentence; they can
be rewritten as, for example, "Snodgrass is such that it is
snowing"). We are now in possession of such exciting general acceptability
sentences as: "It is acceptable, given that let it be that one keeps dry
and that it is the case that one is such that it is raining, that let one take
with one one's umbrella." (5) A
special subclass of general acceptability sentences (and of practical arguments)
can be generated by 'trivializing' the predicate in the judicative premiss
(making it a 'universal predicate'). If, for example, I take 'x is F' to
represent 'x is identical with x' the judicative subclause may be omitted from
the general acceptability sentence, with a corresponding 'reduction' in the
shape of the related practical argument. We have therefore such argument
sequences as the following: (P i ) It is acceptable, given that let it be that
one survives, that let it be that one eats So (by U i ) It is acceptable, given
that let it be that Snodgrass survives, that let it be that Snodgrass eats (P 2
) Let it be that Snodgrass survives So (by Det) It is acceptable that let it be
that Snodgrass eats. We should also, at some point, consider further
transitions to: (a) Acceptably, let it be that Snodgrass eats, and to: (b) Let
it be that Snodgrass eats. end p.76 And we may also note that, as a more
colloquial substitute for "Let it be that one (Snodgrass) survives
(eats)" the form "one (Snodgrass) is to survive (eat)" is
available; we thus obtain prettier inhabitants of antecedent clauses, for
example, "given that Snodgrass is to survive". We must now pay some
attention to the varieties of acceptability statement to be found within each
of the alethic and practical dimensions; it will, of course, be essential to
the large-scale success of the proposal which I am exploring that one should be
able to show that for every such variant within one dimension there is a
corresponding variant within the other. Within the area of defeasible
generalizations, there is another variant which, in my view, extends across the
board in the way just indicated, namely, the unweighted acceptability
generalization (with associated singular conditionals), or, as I shall also
call it, the ceteris paribus generalization. Such generalization I take to be
of the form "It is acceptable (ceteris paribus), given that φX, that
ψX" and I think we find both practical and alethic examples of the form;
for example, "It is ceteris paribus acceptable, given that it is the case
that one likes a person, that it is the case that one wants his company",
which is not incompatible with "It is ceteris paribus acceptable, given
that it is the case that one likes a person and that one is feeling ill, that
one does not want his company". We also find "It is ceteris paribus
acceptable, given that let it be that one leaves the country and given that it
is the case that one is an alien, that let it be that one obtains a sailing
permit from Internal Revenue", which is compatible with "It is
ceteris paribus acceptable, given that let it be that one leaves the country
and given that it is the case that one is an alien and that one is a close
friend of the President, that let it be that one does not obtain a sailing
permit, and that one arranges to travel in Air Force I". I discussed this
kind of generalization, or 'law', briefly in "Method in Philosophical
Psychology"1 and shall not dilate on its features here. I will just remark
that it can be adapted to handle 'functional laws' (in the way suggested in
that address), and that end p.77 it is different from the closely related use
of universal generalizations in 'artificially closed systems', where some
relevant parameter is deliberately ignored, to be taken care of by an extension
to the system; for in that case, when the extension is made, the original law
has to be modified or corrected, whereas my ceteris paribus generalization can
survive in an extended system; and I regard this as a particular advantage to
philosophical psychology. In addition to these two defeasible types of
acceptability generalization (each with alethic and practical sub-types), we
have non-defeasible acceptability generalizations, with associated singular
conditionals, exemplifying what I might call 'unqualified', 'unreserved', or
'full' acceptability claims. To express these I shall employ the (constructed)
modal 'it is fully acceptable that . . .'; and again there will be occasion for
its use in the representation both of alethic and of practical discourse. We
have, in all, then, three varieties of acceptability statement (each with
alethic and practical sub-types), associated with the modals "It is fully
acceptable that . . . " (non-defeasible), 'it is ceteris paribus
acceptable that . . . ', and 'it is to such-and-such a degree acceptable that .
. . ', both of the latter pair being subject to defeasibility. (I should
re-emphasize that, on the practical side, I am so far concerned to represent
only statements which are analogous with Kant's Technical Imperatives ('Rules
of Skill').)
more, H: “Not to be confused with the
other More, who was literally beheaded when he refused to swear to the Act of
Supremacy which metaphorically named Henry VIII the head of the C. of E.” -- English
philosopher, theologian, and poet, the most prolific of the Cambridge
Platonists. He entered Christ’s , where he spent the rest of his life after
becoming Fellow . He was primarily an apologist of anti-Calvinist,
latitudinarian stamp whose inalienable philosophico- theological purpose was to
demonstrate the existence and immortality of the soul and to cure “two enormous
distempers of the mind,” atheism and “enthusiasm.” He describes himself as “a
Fisher for Philosophers, desirous to draw them to or retain them in the
Christian Faith.” His eclectic method deployed Neoplatonism notably Plotinus
and Ficino, mystical theologies, cabalistic doctrines as More misconceived
them, empirical findings including reports of witchcraft and ghosts, the new
science, and the new philosophy, notably the philosophy of Descartes. Yet he
rejected Descartes’s beast-machine doctrine, his version of dualism, and the
pretensions of Cartesian mechanical philosophy to explain all physical
phenomena. Animals have souls; the universe is alive with souls. Body and
spirit are spatially extended, the former being essentially impenetrable,
inert, and discerpible divisible into parts, the latter essentially penetrable,
indiscerpible, active, and capable of a spiritual density, which More called
essential spissitude, “the redoubling or contracting of substance into less
space than it does sometimes occupy.” Physical processes are activated and
ordered by the spirit of nature, a hylarchic principle and “the vicarious power
of God upon this great automaton, the world.” More’s writings on natural
philosophy, especially his doctrine of infinite space, are thought to have
influenced Newton. More attacked Hobbes’s materialism and, in the 1660s and
1670s, the impieties of Dutch Cartesianism, including the perceived atheism of
Spinoza and his circle. He regretted the “enthusiasm” for and conversion to
Quakerism of Anne Conway, his “extramural” tutee and assiduous correspondent.
More had a partiality for coinages and linguistic exotica. We owe to him ‘Cartesianism’
coined a few years before the first appearance of the equivalent, and the substantive
‘materialist.’ “But he never coined ‘implicaturum,’” – Grice.
more, Sir Thomas: English humanist,
statesman, martyr, and saint. A lawyer by profession, he entered royal service and
became lord chancellor. After refusing to swear to the Act of Supremacy, which
named (“metaphorically,” – Grice) Henry
VIII the head of the C. of E. h, More was (“ironically, but literally” – Grice)
beheaded as a traitor. Although his writings include biography, poetry,
letters, and anti-heretical tracts, his only philosophical work, Utopia
published in Latin, 1516, is his masterpiece. Covering a wide variety of
subjects including government, education, punishment, religion, family life,
and euthanasia, Utopia contrasts European social institutions with their
counterparts on the imaginary island of Utopia. Inspired in part by Plato’s
Republic, the Utopian communal system is designed to teach virtue and reward it
with happiness. The absence of money, private property, and most social
distinctions allows Utopians the leisure to develop the faculties in which
happiness consists. Because of More’s love of irony, Utopia has been subject to
quite different interpretations. H. P. Grice, “A personal guide to the 39
articles, compleat with their 39 implicatura.”
Morelli Raffaele
Morelli Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search
Niente fonti! Questa voce o sezione sull'argomento medici italiani non cita le
fonti necessarie o quelle presenti sono insufficienti. Puoi migliorare questa
voce aggiungendo citazioni da fonti attendibili secondo le linee guida sull'uso
delle fonti. Raffaele Morelli Raffaele Morelli (Milano, 5 novembre 1948)
è uno psichiatra, psicoterapeuta, filosofo e saggista italiano.
Indice 1 Biografia
2 Opere
3 Note
4 Altri
progetti 5 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Si laurea in Medicina e Chirurgia presso l'Università degli
Studi di Pavia nel 1973, e l'anno dopo assolve all'obbligo di leva a Trieste dove
presta attenzione alle problematiche relazionali dei militari nello svolgimento
delle proprie mansioni; si è poi specializzato in Psichiatria presso
l'Università degli Studi di Milano nel 1977.[1] Dal 1979 è direttore
dell'Istituto Riza, gruppo di ricerca che pubblica la rivista Riza
Psicosomatica ed altre pubblicazioni specializzate, con lo scopo di
"studiare l'uomo come espressione della simultaneità psicofisica
riconducendo a questa concezione l'interpretazione della malattia, della sua
diagnosi e della sua cura". Inoltre è direttore delle riviste Dimagrire e
Salute Naturale. Dall'attività dell'Istituto Riza è sorta anche la Scuola
di Formazione in Psicoterapia ad indirizzo psicosomatico, riconosciuta
ufficialmente dal Ministero dell'università e della ricerca scientifica e
tecnologica nell'ottobre del 1994. Raffaele Morelli è anche
vicepresidente della SIMP (Società Italiana di Medicina
Psicosomatica).[2] Ha partecipato a numerose trasmissioni televisive sia
per la RAI sia per Mediaset (Maurizio Costanzo Show, Tutte le mattine, Matrix,
ecc.) e per la radio. Nelle sue opere ci sono molti riferimenti alle
dottrine orientali.[senza fonte] Opere Verso la concezione di un sé
psicosomatico. Il corpo è come un grande sogno della mente, con Diego Frigoli e
Gianlorenzo Masaraki, Milano, UNICOPLI, 1979; Milano, Edizioni Libreria
Cortina, 1980. ISBN 88-7043-011-1 La dimensione respiratoria. Studio
psicosomatico del respiro, con Gianlorenzo Masaraki, Milano, Masson Italia,
1981. ISBN 88-214-1950-9. Dove va la medicina psicosomatica, a cura di,
Milano-Roma, Riza libri, Endas, 1982. Il sacro. Antropoanalisi, psicosomatica,
comunicazione, con Erminio Gius e Carlo Tosetti, Milano, Riza-Endas, 1983.
Convegno internazionale Mente-corpo: il momento unificante. Milano, 24-26
ottobre 1986. Atti, a cura di e con Piero Parietti, Milano, UNICOPLI, Riza,
1987. ISBN 88-7061-321-6. I sogni dell'infinito, a cura di e con Franco
Sabbadini, Milano, Riza, 1989. ISBN 88-7071-031-9. Autostima. Le regole
pratiche, Milano, a cura dell'Istituto Riza di medicina psicosomatica, 1997.
ISBN 88-900173-0-9. Il talento. Come scoprire e realizzare la tua vera natura,
Milano, Riza, 1998. ISBN 88-7071-028-9. Ansia, con testi di Piero Parietti e
Vittorio Caprioglio, Milano, Riza, 1999. ISBN 88-7071-029-7. Insonnia, con
testi di Piero Parietti e Vittorio Caprioglio, Milano, Riza, 1999. ISBN
88-7071-030-0. Cefalea, con testi di Piero Parietti e Vittorio Caprioglio,
Milano, Riza, 1999. ISBN 88-7071-031-9. Lo psichiatra e l'alchimista. Romanzo,
Milano, Riza, 2000. ISBN 88-7071-040-8. Le nuove vie dell'autostima. Se piaci a
te stesso ogni miracolo è possibile, Milano, Riza, 2001. ISBN 88-7071-047-5.
Conosci davvero tuo figlio? Sconosciuto in casa. Dal delitto di Novi Ligure al
disagio di una generazione, con Gianna Schelotto, Milano, Riza, 2001. ISBN
88-7071-051-3 Come essere felici, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. Cosa dire e non
dire nella coppia, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. Come mantenere il cervello
giovane, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. Come affrontare lo stress, Milano, A.
Mondadori, 2003. Come amare ed essere amati, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. Come
dimagrire senza soffrire, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. Come risvegliare l'eros,
Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. Come star bene al lavoro, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003.
Come essere single e felici, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. Cosa dire o non dire
ai nostri figli, Milano, A. Mondadori, 2003. La rinascita interiore, Milano,
Riza, 2003. ISBN 88-7071-064-5 Volersi bene. Tutto ciò che conta è già dentro
di noi, Milano, Riza, 2003. L'amore giusto. C'è una persona che aspetta solo
te, Milano, Riza, 2004. Vincere i disagi. Puoi farcela da solo perché li hai
creati tu, Milano, Riza, 2004. Felici sul lavoro. Come ritrovare il benessere
in ufficio, Milano, Riza, 2004. I figli felici. Aiutiamoli a diventare se
stessi, Milano, Riza, 2004. La gioia di vivere. Scorre spontaneamente dentro di
noi, Milano, Riza, 2004. Essere se stessi. L'unica via per incontrare il
benessere, Milano, Riza, 2004. Accendi la passione. È la scintilla che risveglia
l'energia vitale, Milano, Riza, 2004. Alle radici della felicità. Editoriali
dal 1980 al 1990 pubblicati su Riza psicosomatica, rivista mensile delle
Edizioni Riza, Milano, Riza, 2004. ISBN 88-7071-072-6 Ciascuno è perfetto.
L'arte di star bene con se stessi, Milano, Mondadori, 2004. ISBN 88-04-52085-X.
Il segreto di vivere. Aforismi, Milano, Riza, 2004. ISBN 88-7071-075-0.
Realizzare se stessi, Milano, Riza, 2005. Vincere la solitudine, Milano, Riza,
2005. Dimagrire senza fatica, Milano, Riza, 2005. Amare senza soffrire, Milano,
Riza, 2005. Guarire con la psiche, Milano, Riza, 2005. Superare il tradimento,
Milano, Riza, 2005. Dizionario della felicità, 6 voll, Milano, Riza, 2005. Non
siamo nati per soffrire, Milano, Mondadori, 2005. L'autostima. Le cinque
regole. Vivere la vita. Adesso, Milano, Riza, 2006. Conoscersi. L'arte di
valorizzare se stessi. Via le zavorre dalla mente, Milano, Riza, 2006. I figli
difficili sono i figli migliori, Milano, Riza, 2006. Il matrimonio è in
crisi... che fortuna!, Milano, Riza, 2006. Autostima 2007. I consigli di
Raffaele Morelli per un anno di felicità, Milano, Riza, 2006. Le parole che
curano, Milano, Riza, 2006. ISBN 88-7071-095-5 Perché le donne non ne possono
più... degli uomini, Milano, Riza, 2006. Le piccole cose che cambiano la vita,
Milano, Mondadori, 2006. ISBN 88-04-56010-X. Come trovare l'armonia in se
stessi, Milano, Oscar Mondadori, 2007. ISBN 978-88-04-57101-8. Ama e non
pensare, Milano, Mondadori, 2007. ISBN 978-88-04-57240-4. Curare il panico. Gli
attacchi vengono per farci esprimere le parti migliori di noi stessi, con
Vittorio Caprioglio, Milano, Riza, 2007. Non dipende da te. Affidati alla vita
così realizzi i tuoi desideri, Milano, Mondadori, 2007. ISBN 978-88-7071-113-4.
L'alchimia. L'arte di trasformare se stessi, Milano, Riza, 2008. Il sesso è
amore. Vivere l'eros senza sensi di colpa, Milano, Mondadori, 2008. ISBN
978-88-04-58339-4. Puoi fidarti di te, Milano, Mondadori, 2009. ISBN
978-88-04-59350-8. La felicità è dentro di te, Milano, Mondadori, 2009. ISBN
978-88-04-59365-2. L'unica cosa che conta, Milano, Mondadori, 2010. ISBN
978-88-04-59811-4. La felicità è qui. Domande e risposte sulla vita, l'amore,
l'eternità, con Luciano Falsiroli, Milano, Mondadori, 2011, ISBN
978-88-04-61173-8. Guarire senza medicine. La vera cura è dentro di te, Milano,
Mondadori, 2012. ISBN 978-88-04-62394-6. Lezioni di autostima. Come imparare a
stare beni con se stessi e con gli altri, Milano, Mondadori, 2013. ISBN
978-88-04-62845-3. Il segreto dell'amore felice, Milano, Mondadori, 2013. ISBN
978-88-04-63356-3. La saggezza dell'anima. Quello che ci rende unici, Milano,
Mondadori, 2014. ISBN 978-88-04-64627-3. Pensa magro. Le 6 mosse psicologiche
per dimagrire senza dieta, Milano, Mondadori, 2014. ISBN 978-88-04-64048-6.
Vincere il panico. [Le parole per capirlo, i consigli per affrontarlo, cosa
fare per guarirlo], con Vittorio Caprioglio, Milano, Mondadori, 2015. ISBN
978-88-04-64423-1. Nessuna ferita è per sempre. Come superare i dolori del
passato, Milano, Mondadori, 2015. ISBN 978-88-04-65817-7. Solo la mente può
bruciare i grassi. Come attivare l'energia dimagrante che è dentro di noi,
Milano, Mondadori, 2016. ISBN 978-88-04-66352-2. Breve corso di felicità. Le
antiregole che ti danno la gioia di vivere, Milano, Mondadori, 2017. ISBN
978-88-04-67954-7. La vera cura sei tu, Milano, Mondadori, 2017. ISBN
978-88-04-68354-4. Il meglio deve ancora arrivare. Come attivare l'energia che
ringiovanisce, Milano, Mondadori, 2018. ISBN 978-88-04-68355-1. Il potere
curativo del digiuno. La pratica che rigenera corpo e mente, con Michael
Morelli, Milano, Mondadori, 2018. ISBN 978-88-04-68504-3. Segui il tuo destino.
Come riconoscere se sei sulla strada giusta, Milano, Mondadori, 2019. ISBN
978-88-04-70879-7. Il manuale della felicità. Le dieci regole pratiche che ti
miglioreranno la vita, Milano, Mondadori, 2019. ISBN 978-88-04-71300-5. Pronto
soccorso per le emozioni. Le parole da dirsi nei momenti difficili, Milano,
Mondadori, 2020. ISBN 978-88-04-72745-3. Note ^ Sito Mondadori ^ SIMP -
Direttivo, simpitalia.com. URL consultato il 4 febbraio 2015. Altri
progetti Collabora a Wikiquote Wikiquote contiene citazioni di o su Raffaele
Morelli Collegamenti esterni www.riza.it - Sito ufficiale dell'istituto Riza,
su riza.it. (EN) Raffaele Morelli, su Internet Movie Database, IMDb.com.
Modifica su Wikidata Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 90151317 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 0774 6663 · SBN IT\ICCU\CFIV\066494 · LCCN
(EN) n79131368 · GND (DE) 14309310X · WorldCat Identities (EN) lccn-n79131368
Biografie Portale Biografie Letteratura Portale Letteratura Medicina Portale
Medicina Psicologia Portale Psicologia Categorie: Psichiatri
italianiPsicoterapeuti italianiFilosofi italiani del XX secoloFilosofi italiani
del XXI secoloNati nel 1948Nati il 5 novembreNati a MilanoDirettori di
periodici italianiFondatori di riviste italianeSaggisti italiani del XX
secoloSaggisti italiani del XXI secoloStudenti dell'Università degli Studi di
MilanoStudenti dell'Università degli Studi di Pavia[altre]
MorettiG Giampiero Moretti Da Wikipedia,
l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search Giampiero Moretti
(Roma, 19 marzo 1955) è un filosofo italiano.
Indice 1 Biografia
2 Opere
originali 3 Opere
curate o tradotte 4 Note
Biografia Nasce a Roma, nel borghese quartiere Trieste, primo di due fratelli.
Ottiene nel 1973 il diploma di maturità classica presso il Liceo Giulio Cesare.
Successivamente, nel 1977, consegue una prima laurea in Giurisprudenza, con una
tesi in filosofia del diritto, e, nel 1980, una seconda in filosofia, con una
tesi in filosofia morale, entrambe presso l'Università di Roma La Sapienza. È
poi borsista presso l'Università di Friburgo in Brisgovia, dove imposta un
progetto di ricerca che, partendo dall'interpretazione del pensiero di Martin
Heidegger, mira ad un'analisi critica delle categorie filosofico-estetiche del
“romantico” in Germania, con particolare attenzione alle opere di autori del
romanticismo di Heidelberg, quali Friedrich Creuzer, Joseph Görres, i Fratelli
Grimm e Johann Jakob Bachofen, che contribuisce a tradurre e a far conoscere in
Italia[1]. Al suo rientro insegna dapprima materie letterarie nelle scuole
medie e, in seguito, filosofia presso la Scuola germanica di Roma. La sua ricerca si amplia poi al pensiero
estetico di Novalis, di cui cura la prima edizione completa in lingua italiana
della Opera filosofica[2]; durante questo periodo consegue il dottorato di
ricerca in Estetica presso l'università di Bologna. Nel 1992 vince la cattedra
di professore associato di Estetica all'Università di Bari; dal 2000 è
professore ordinario di Estetica presso l'Università di Napoli
L’Orientale. Redattore di Itinerari e
Studi Filosofici, collabora con varie altre riviste filosofiche (Agalma,
Rivista di Estetica, Studi di Estetica, aut aut, Nuovi Argomenti, Filosofia e
Società, Filosofia Oggi, Estetica) e ha spesso partecipato a trasmissioni RAI
su temi filosofici[3] e a numerosi convegni [4]. Opere originali Heidelberg romantica. Studio
sui rapporti poesia-mito-storia e arte-natura nel preromanticismo e in J.
Görres, F. Creuzer, J. e W. Grimm, J. J. Bachofen, Itinerari, Lanciano, 1984;
seconda edizione rivista e accresciuta, Cosmopoli, Bologna-Roma, 1995. Anima e
immagine. Sul «poetico» in L. Klages, Aesthetica pre-print, Palermo, 1985 Nichilismo
e romanticismo. Estetica e filosofia della storia fra Ottocento e Novecento,
Cadmo, Roma, 1988 Hestia. Interpretazione del romanticismo tedesco, Ianua,
Roma, 1988 L'estetica di Novalis. Analogia e principio poetico nella profezia
romantica, Rosenberg & Sellier, Torino, 1991 La segnatura romantica.
Filosofia e sentimento da Novalis a Heidegger, Hestia, Cernusco L., 1992 Il
genio, il Mulino, Bologna, 1998 Il poeta ferito. Hölderlin, Heidegger e la
storia dell'essere, Editrice La Mandragora, Imola, 1999 Anima e immagine. Studi
su Ludwig Klages, Mimesis, Milano, 2001 Heidelberg romantica. Romanticismo
tedesco e nichilismo europeo, terza edizione rivista, Guida Editori, Napoli,
2002 Introduzione all'estetica del Romanticismo tedesco, Nuova Cultura, Roma, 2007
Il genio, nuova edizione ampliata, Morcelliana, Brescia, 2011 - ISBN
9788837224813 Per immagini. Esercizi di ermeneutica sensibile, Moretti &
Vitali, Bergamo, 2012 Heidelberg romantica. Romanticismo tedesco e nichilismo
europeo, nuova edizione rivista, Morcelliana, Brescia, 2013 - ISBN
978-88-372-2682-4 Novalis. Pensiero, poesia, romanzo Morcelliana, Brescia, 2016
- ISBN 9788837228309 Opere curate o tradotte Romano Guardini, Hölderlin, a cura
di Giampiero Moretti, Morcelliana, Brescia 2014 - ISBN 978-88-372-2749-4
Novalis, Scritti filosofici, a cura di Fabrizio Desideri e Giampiero Moretti,
Morcelliana, Brescia 2019 - EAN 9788837231972 Note ^ J. J. Bachofen, Il
matriarcato, scelta antologica con introduzione e note di Moretti, 2ª edizione,
Christian Marinotti Editore, Milano, 2003 ^ Novalis, Opera filosofica, vol. I,
Einaudi, Torino, vol. I, 1993 ^ Un video con una trasmissione RAI del prof.
Moretti ^ Un video con un intervento del prof. Moretti Controllo di autorità VIAF (EN)
66488212 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0000 8145 6747 · SBN IT\ICCU\CFIV\026377 · LCCN (EN)
n87848585 · BNF (FR) cb12059312g (data) · BNE (ES) XX1468083 (data) · WorldCat
Identities (EN) lccn-n87848585 Biografie Portale Biografie Filosofia Portale
Filosofia Categorie: Filosofi italiani del XX secoloFilosofi italiani del XXI
secoloNati nel 1955Nati il 19 marzoNati a Roma[altre]
MoriMaurizio? Maurizio Mori Da
Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search Niente
fonti! Questa voce o sezione sull'argomento filosofi italiani non cita le fonti
necessarie o quelle presenti sono insufficienti. Puoi migliorare questa voce
aggiungendo citazioni da fonti attendibili secondo le linee guida sull'uso
delle fonti. Maurizio Mori Maurizio Mori
(Cremona, 11 maggio 1951) è un filosofo italiano. È professore ordinario di Filosofia morale e
bioetica all’Università di Torino e presidente della Consulta di Bioetica
Onlus, un'associazione di volontariato culturale per la promozione della
bioetica laica. L’etica e la bioetica con le varie problematiche connesse sono
le tematiche al centro dei suoi interessi filosofici e teorici. Indice 1 Biografia
2 Temi
di ricerca 3 Riviste
4 Pubblicazioni
Biografia Mori ha studiato all’Università degli Studi di Milano, dove ha
conseguito la laurea (con Andrea Bonomi e Claudio Pizzi) e il dottorato sotto
la guida di Uberto Scarpelli e Mario Jori. Ha studiato due semestri
all’Università di Helsinki con G.H. von Wright, e ha un M.A. in Philosophy
dalla University of Arizona, dove ha studiato con Joel Feinberg, Allen Buchanan
e Jules Coleman. In Italia ha insegnato all’Università del Piemonte Orientale
(Alessandria) e all’Università di Pisa, prima di essere chiamato a Torino. Temi di ricerca Mori ha studiato i temi della
metaetica e della logica dell’etica con le problematiche della teoria etica. Ha
tradotto in italiano i Metodi dell’etica di Henry Sidgwick e Etica di W.K.
Frankena. È stato tra i primi in Italia a occuparsi di bioetica, nella quale ha
dato contributi in tutti i principali settori, con particolare attenzione
all’aborto e alla fecondazione assistita. Sollecitato dai casi Welby e Englaro
ha dato contributi anche sul fine-vita a difesa dell’autonomia individuale. Per
primo ha teorizzato la contrapposizione paradigmatica tra bioetica laica e
bioetica cattolica, derivante dal fatto che quest’ultima propone un’etica della
sacralità della vita caratterizzata da divieti assoluti, mentre l’altra avanza
un’etica della qualità della vita senza assoluti e soli divieti prima facie.
Infine, sin dalla fine degli anni ’70 ha prestato grande attenzione al problema
della liberazione animale. Riviste Nel
1993 Mori ha fondato Bioetica. Rivista interdisciplinare (Ananke Lab, Torino),
e da allora ne è il direttore. È membro di numerosi comitati, tra cui il
comitato scientifico di Notizie di Politeia, di Iride del Journal of Medicine
and Philosophy e altre. Pubblicazioni
Manuale di bioetica. Verso una civiltà biomedica secolarizzata. Nuova edizione
aggiornata, Le Lettere, Firenze, 2013. Introduzione alla bioetica. 12 temi per
capire e discutere, Daniela Piazza Editore, Torino, 2015. Il caso Eluana
Englaro. La “Porta Pia” del vitalismo ippocratico ovvero perché è moralmente
giusto sospendere ogni intervento, Pendragon, Bologna, 2008. Aborto e morale.
Per capire un nuovo diritto, Einaudi, Torino, 2008. La fecondazione
artificiale. Una nuova forma di riproduzione umana, Laterza, Roma-Bari, 1995.
La fecondazione artificiale: questioni morali nell'esperienza giuridica,
Giuffrè, Milano, 1988. Utilitarismo e morale razionale. Per una teoria etica
obiettivista, Giuffrè, Milano, 1986. (In collaborazione con Carlo Flamigni) La
legge sulla procreazione medicalmente assistita. Paradigmi a confronto, Net,
Milano, 2005. (In collaborazione con Giovanni Fornero) Laici e cattolici in
bioetica: storia e teoria di un confronto, Le Lettere, Firenze, 2012. (In
collaborazione con Carlo Flamigni) La fecondazione assistita dopo 10 anni di
legge 40. Meglio ricominciare da capo!, Ananke editore, Torino, 2014. (In
collaborazione con Carlo Flamigni) Questa è la scienza, bellezze! La
fecondazione assistita come novo modo di costruire le famiglie, Ananke Lab,
Torino, 2016. Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 61254532 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 2026 874X · SBN IT\ICCU\CFIV\007437 · LCCN
(EN) no2004040405 · BNF (FR) cb12883362k (data) · WorldCat Identities (EN)
lccn-no2004040405 Biografie Portale Biografie Filosofia Portale Filosofia
Categorie: Filosofi italiani del XX secoloFilosofi italiani del XXI secoloNati
nel 1951Nati l'11 maggioNati a CremonaBioeticaStudenti dell'Università degli
Studi di MilanoProfessori dell'Università degli Studi di Torino[altre]
Moriggi Stefano Moriggi Da Wikipedia,
l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search Niente fonti! Questa
voce o sezione sugli argomenti storici italiani e filosofi italiani non cita le
fonti necessarie o quelle presenti sono insufficienti. Puoi migliorare questa
voce aggiungendo citazioni da fonti attendibili secondo le linee guida sull'uso
delle fonti. Abbozzo storici italiani Questa voce sugli argomenti storici italiani
e filosofi italiani è solo un abbozzo. Contribuisci a migliorarla secondo le
convenzioni di Wikipedia. Stefano Moriggi (Milano, 21 agosto 1972) è uno
storico e filosofo italiano, specializzato in teoria e modelli della
razionalità, fondamenti della probabilità e di pragmatismo americano. Docente all'università di Brescia, Parma,
all'Università Statale di Milano e presso la European School of Molecular
Medicine (SEMM), è conosciuto al grande pubblico attraverso la trasmissione TV
E se domani di Rai 3 e per alcuni interventi ad altre trasmissioni (in
particolare di Corrado Augias). [1] [2] [3] [4]
Pubblicazioni Le tre bocche di Cerbero, con E. Sindoni (Bompiani, 2004)
Perché esiste qualcosa anziché nulla? Vuoto, Nulla, Zero, con P.Giaretta e
G.Federspil (Itaca 2004) Perché la tecnologia ci rende umani, con G. Nicoletti
(Sironi, 2009) Connessi. Beati quelli che sapranno pensare con le macchine (San
Paolo, 2014) School Rocks! La scuola spacca, con A. Incorvaia (San Paolo,
2011), con prefazione rap di Frankie Hi-nrg Note ^
http://www.wired.it/attualita/2014/04/18/connessi-pensare-la-macchina-pensare-con-le-macchine/
^ http://www.smau.it/speakers/stefano.moriggi/ ^
https://unimib.academia.edu/StefanoMoriggi ^
https://scholar.google.it/scholar?hl=it&q=stefano+moriggi&btnG=&lr=
Collegamenti esterni Sito ufficiale, su stefanomoriggi.it. Modifica su Wikidata
Blog ufficiale, su stefanomoriggi.it. Modifica su Wikidata Opere di Stefano
Moriggi, su openMLOL, Horizons Unlimited srl. Modifica su Wikidata Biografie
Portale Biografie Filosofia Portale Filosofia Storia Portale Storia Categorie:
Storici italiani del XX secoloStorici italiani del XXI secoloFilosofi italiani
del XX secoloFilosofi italiani del XXI secoloNati nel 1972Nati il 21 agostoNati
a Milano[altre]
mosca: Essential Italian
philosopher, who made pioneering contributions to the theory of democratic
elitism. Combining the life of a
professor with that of a politician, he taught such subjects as
constitutional law, public law, political science, and history of political
theory; at various times he was also an editor of the Parliamentary
proceedings, an elected member of the Chamber of Deputies, an under-secretary
for colonial affairs, a newspaper columnist, and a member of the Senate. For
Mosca ‘elitism’ refers to the empirical generalization that a society is ruled
by an organised minority. His democratic commitment is embodied in what he
calls juridical defense: the normative principle that political developments
are to be judged by whether and how they prevent any one person, class, force,
or institution from dominating the others. Mosca’s third main contribution is a
framework consisting of two intersecting distinctions that yield four possible
ideal types, defined as follows: in autocracy, authority flows from the rulers
to the ruled. In liberalism, from the ruled to the rulers. In democracy, the
ruling class is open to renewal by members of other classes; in aristocracy it
is not. He was influenced by, and in turn influenced, positivism, for the
elitist thesis presumably constitutes the fundamental “law” of political
“science.” Even deeper is his connection with the tradition of Machiavelli’s
political realism. There is also no question that he practiced an empirical
approach. In the tradition of elitism, he may be compared and contrasted with
Pareto, Michels, and Schumpeter; and in the tradition of political philosophy, to Croce, Gentile, and
Gramsci. Refs.: H. P. Grice: “Mosca’s liberalism;” Luigi Speranza, "Grice e Mosca," per il Club Anglo-Italiano,
The Swimming-Pool Library, Villa Grice, Liguria, Italia.
MottaDellaAvogadro Emiliano
Avogadro della Motta Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to
navigationJump to search Niente fonti! Questa voce o sezione sull'argomento
politici italiani non cita le fonti necessarie o quelle presenti sono
insufficienti. Puoi migliorare questa voce aggiungendo citazioni da fonti
attendibili secondo le linee guida sull'uso delle fonti. Segui i suggerimenti
del progetto di riferimento. Emiliano Avogadro della Motta (Vercelli, 16
ottobre 1798 – Torino, 9 febbraio 1865) è stato un politico e filosofo
italiano. Indice 1 Biografia
2 Attività
parlamentare 3 Opere
3.1 Opere
di carattere storico-filosofico-sociale 3.2 Opuscoli
di carattere devozionale 3.3 Opuscoli
di carattere storico-giuridico 3.4 Articoli
di riviste 4 Bibliografia
4.1 Alcune
opere riguardanti l'autore e la sua famiglia 4.2 Volumi e tesi sull'autore 5 Altri
progetti 6 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Nacque a Vercelli dal conte Ignazio della Motta e da Ifigenia
Avogadro di Casanova, entrambi appartenenti a nobili famiglie di vassalli e
visconti, i cui antenati risalgono a poco oltre il mille. Tra gli Avogadro vi
fu anche Amedeo, inventore della legge sui fluidi. Il ramo degli Avogadro della
Motta si estinguerà nel 1944, con la morte di Emiliano II, suo nipote.
Emiliano frequentò con profitto gli studi e si laureò in utroque iure, ma
proseguì lo studio in diverse aree della teologia e della filosofia,
trasformando le dimore familiari in “piccole accademie” dove giuristi,
filosofi, studiosi di diritto canonico e vescovi si riunivano, per discutere
vari argomenti ed approfondire la filosofia moderna e i diversi aspetti del
nascente socialismo. Il 13 agosto 1833 ricevette l'incarico, che già fu
del padre e che manterrà fino al 1847, di riformatore degli studi del
Vercellese e in un'epoca in cui si guardava ancora con diffidenza
all'istruzione delle classi popolari, egli visitava ciclicamente le scuole
d'ogni ordine, scegliendone accuratamente gli insegnanti, convinto che
l'istruzione e l'educazione fossero un diritto di tutti e dovessero procedere
simultaneamente. Nel 1837 assunse la carica di Consigliere di Formigliana
e continuò a dedicarsi allo sviluppo culturale della natia Vercelli, ove fondò
la Società di Storia Patria, per incrementare gli studi sul glorioso passato
della città. Nel 1843 divenne membro del Consiglio Generale del Debito Pubblico
e più tardi sindaco di Collobiano e “Consigliere di Sua Maestà per il pubblico
insegnamento”. Nel 1852 la sua notorietà varcò i confini del Piemonte,
allorché ricevette l'eccezionale invito di partecipazione alla fase
preparatoria della definizione del dogma dell'Immacolata e le sue riflessioni
ebbero un seguito fra alcuni importanti gesuiti, come il direttore de La Civiltà
Cattolica, che fece dono a papa Pio IX del Saggio intorno al socialismo. Luigi
Taparelli d'Azeglio, richiamandosi ad Avogadro, espresse la propria preferenza
per una condanna esplicita di tali errori, da includere nella bolla di
definizione del dogma, ma l'autore sollecitò apertamente la distinzione di due
argomenti (definizione del dogma e condanna degli errori) dalla portata tanto
diversa e lo stesso Pio IX incaricò la Commissione, che aveva già lavorato
sulla definizione del dogma, di esaminare gli errori moderni e di preparare il
materiale necessario per la bolla e chiese al cardinale Fornari di invitare
formalmente alcuni laici a collaborare. Avogadro fu l'unico laico italiano ad
essere interpellato e inviò a Roma una risposta singolare e ricca di argomentazioni.
Ben presto la Commissione incaricata abbandonò la trattazione univoca dei due
argomenti e la solenne definizione su Maria sarà fatta da Pio IX l'8 dicembre
1854, mentre l'esame degli errori si trascinerà per altri dieci anni, mentre
prevaleva in ambito ecclesiastico l'idea di una severa condanna. Attività
parlamentare Dall'8 dicembre 1853 al 1859 diventò membro attivo nella vita
politica, quale deputato eletto nel collegio di Avigliana e operò nelle file
dello stesso schieramento politico della Destra. La proposta avanzata in
Parlamento di ridurre il numero delle feste, indusse Avogadro a scrivere un
apposito opuscolo, per difendere la dignità dell'uomo che, in quanto
essere intelligente e creativo, «senza tempo libero non vive da uomo, e mal lo
conoscono gli economisti che altro non sanno procacciargli se non “lavoro e
pane”». In Parlamento prendeva spesso la parola, come il 17 gennaio 1857,
contro il progetto di legge che prevedeva l'obbligo del servizio militare e
criticò la cessione di Nizza e Savoia alla Francia, smascherando le reali
intenzioni che sull'Italia nutriva l'ambiguo Napoleone III. Nel 1860
ricevette la decorazione della Croce di Ufficiale dei Santi Maurizio e Lazzaro
e continuò a scrivere, oltre a collaborare con l'Armonia, l'Unità cattolica,
l'Apologista, il Conservatore, rivista quest'ultima stampata a Bologna e di cui
è ritenuto uno dei fondatori e collaboratori. Morì "giovedì 9 febbraio
1865 alle 3½ in Torino”, come annotano diversi giornali e riviste, non ultima
La Civiltà Cattolica, che gli dedicò un sentito necrologio. Opere Opere
di carattere storico-filosofico-sociale Saggio intorno al Socialismo e alle
dottrine e tendenze socialistiche, Torino, Zecchi e Bona, 1851. Sul valore
scientifico e sulle pratiche conseguenze del sistema filosofico dell'Abate
Rosmini, Napoli, Societa Editrice Fr. Giannini, 1853. Teorica dell'istituzione
del matrimonio e della guerra moltiforme cui soggiace per Emiliano Avogadro
conte della Motta già Riformatore delle R. Scuole provinciali degli Stati
Sardi, a spese della Societa Editrice Speirani e Tortone, 1853. Teorica
dell'istituzione del matrimonio Parte II che tratta della guerra moltiforme cui
soggiace, per E. Avogadro conte della Motta già deputato al Parlamento
Subalpino, Torino, Edizione Speirani e Figli, 1862. Teorica dell'istituzione
del matrimonio e della guerra a cui soggiace, Parte III che tratta delle difese
e dei rimedi, con una Appendice intorno alla ricerca del principio teorico
morale generatore degli uffizi e dei doveri coniugali, Torino, Edizione
Speirani e Tortone, 1854, per Emiliano Avogadro conte della Motta deputato al
Parlamento Nazionale, Torino, Tipografia Speirani e Tortone, 1859. Teorica
dell'istituzione del matrimonio e della guerra a cui soggiace, Parte IV
Documenti per E. Avogadro conte della Motta già deputato al parlamento
nazionale, Torino, Edizione Speirani e Tortone, 1860. Gesù Cristo nel secolo
XIX, Studi religiosi e sociali, Modena, Tipografia dell'Immacolata Concezione,
1873. Pubblicazione postuma. La filosofia dell'Abate Antonio Rosmini esaminata
da Emiliano Avogadro-conte Della Motta, Napoli, Societa Editrice Fr. Giannini,
1877. Opuscoli di carattere devozionale La festa di S. Michele e il mese di
ottobre agli angeli santi, Torino, Marietti, 1863. Il mese di novembre dedicato
a suffragio dei morti, 3ª ediz. Torino, Marietti, 1881. Le colonne di S.
Chiesa. Omaggi a S. Giovanni Battista e ai Santi Apostoli nel mese di giugno e
novena per la festa dei Santi Principi Pietro e Paolo, Torino, Marietti, 1863.
Il mese di dicembre in adorazione al Verbo Incarnato Gesu nascente e ad onore
di Maria Madre SS.ma, Torino, Marietti, 1863. Opuscoli di carattere
storico-giuridico Rivista retrospettiva di un fatto seguito in Vercelli con
osservazioni al diritto legale di libera censura, Vercelli, De Gaudenzi, 1848.
Delle feste sacre e loro variazioni nel Regno subalpino, Torino, Marietti,
1849. Quistioni di diritto intorno alle istituzioni religiose e alle loro
persone e proprietà, in occasione della Proposta di Legge fatta al Parlamento
torinese per la soppressione di alcune corporazioni, Torino, Marietti, 1849.
Cenni sulla Congregazione degli Oblati dei SS. Eusebio e Carlo eretta nella
Basilica di S. Andrea in Vercelli e sulla proposta sua soppressione. Per un
elettore Vercellese, Torino, Marietti (non datato). Parole di conciliazione
sulla questione della circolare di S. E. Arcivescovo di Torino, 1850. Del
diritto di petizione e delle petizioni pel ritorno di S. E. l'Arcivescovo di
Torino, 1850. Lo statuto condanna la Legge Siccardi, Torino, Fontana, 1850.
Erroneità e pericoli di alcune teorie ed ipotesi invocate a sostegno della
proposta di Legge di soppressione di vari stabilimenti religiosi, Torino,
Speirani e Tortone, 1855. Alcuni schiarimenti intorno alla natura della Proprietà
Ecclesiastica allo stato di povertà religiosa, ed alle quistioni relative ai
diritti e ai mezzi temporali di sussistenza della Chiesa. Con una Appendice
intorno alla legalità nell'esecuzione della legge 29 maggio 1855 sulle
Corporazioni religiose, Torino, Speirani e Tortone, 1856. Considerazioni sugli
affari dell'Italia e del Papa, Torino, Speirani e Tortone, 1860. Una quistione
preliminare al Parlamento Torinese, Torino, Speirani e Tortone, 1860. Il
progetto di revisione del Codice Civile Albertino e il matrimonio civile in
Italia, Torino, Speirani e Figli, 1861. La Rivoluzione e il Ministero Torinese
in faccia al Papa ed all'Episcopato Italiano. Riflessioni retrospettive e
prospettive, Torino, Speirani, 1861. Articoli di riviste L'Armonia: 16 marzo 1850,
29 settembre 1853, 30 gennaio 1862. Civiltà Cattolica: Serie I, vol. I,
341-352: Recensione a Rivista retrospettiva sopra la discussione delle leggi
Siccardi, Serie I, vol. I, 385-403; Serie I, vol. VIII, 72-82; Serie I, vol.
VIII, 377-396; Serie II, vol. II, 434-442; Serie II, vol. III; Serie II, vol.
VI, 289-300; Serie II, vol. X, 668-672; Serie IV, vol. VI, 318-329; Serie IV,
vol. IX, 325-337; Serie IV, vol. XI, 194-206; Serie V, vol. VII, 343; Serie VI,
vol. I, 623; Serie XIV, vol. IV, 707-711. Unità Cattolica: 9 agosto 1861; 9
febbraio 1866; 11 febbraio 1871. Bibliografia Alcune opere riguardanti l'autore
e la sua famiglia Archivio della Famiglia Avogadro di Collobiano e della Motta,
a cura di Angelo Ballestreri, segretario della Famiglia, 1849, presso
l'Archivio Storico di Torino. Avogadro della Motta, in Enciclopedia
storico-nobiliare italiana, promossa e diretta dal marchese Vittorio Spreti,
vol. I, Milano MCMXXVIII. Avogadro di Vigliano F., Pagine di storia Vercellese
e Biellese, in Antologia, a cura di M. Cassetti, Vercelli 1989. Avogadro di
Vigliano F., Antiche vicende di alcuni feudi Biellesi degli Avogadro di San
Giorgio Monferrato (e poi Conti di Collobiano e di Motta Alciata), Estratto
dalla Illustrazione biellese, XIX, Biella 1941. Corboli G., Per le nozze del
Conte Federico Sclopis di Salerano e della Contessa Isabella Avogadro, Cremona,
Feraboli, 1838. De Gregory G., Historia della Vercellese letteratura ed arti,
parte IV, Torino 1824. Di Crollallanza G. B., Dizionario storico-blasonico delle
famiglie nobili e notabili italiane estinte e fiorenti, vol. I, Sala Bolognese
1986. Dionisotti C., Notizie biografiche dei vercellesi illustri, Biella, Amos,
MDCCCLXI. Manno A., Il patriziato Subalpino. Notizie di fatto storiche,
genealogiche, feudali ed araldiche desunte da documenti, vol. I, Firenze
MDCCCXCV. I vescovi di Italia. Il Piemonte, a cura di Savio F., Torino, Bocca,
1898. Bonvegna G., Filosofia sociale e critica dello Stato moderno nel pensiero
di un legittimista italiano: Emiliano Avogadro della Motta in Annali Italiani.
Rivista di studi storici, anno I, n. 2, luglio-dicembre 2002, pp. 177–196.
Bonvegna G., Il rapporto tra fede e ragione in Avogadro della Motta, in Sensus
Communis, vol. 4 (2003), n. 1 (gennaio-marzo), pp. 19–36. Valentino V., E.
Avogadro della Motta (1798-1865), un difensore rigoroso dei diritti della
Chiesa e del Papa, in Divinitas, rivista internazionale di ricerca e di critica
teologica, anno XLVI, n. 2 (2003). Volumi e tesi sull'autore Bonvegna G.,
Emiliano Avogadro della Motta. Il pensiero filosofico-politico e la critica al
socialismo, Tesi di laurea in Filosofia. Università Cattolica, Milano 2000. De
Gaudenzi L., Ultima parola su di una pretesa ritrattazione del Conte Emiliano
Avogadro della Motta, Mortara, Cortellezzi, 1889. De Gaudenzi L.,
Un'asserzione del P. Fr. Paoli D.I.D.C. riguardante il Conte Emiliano
Avogadro-della Motta, tolta ad esame, Mortara, Cortellezzi, 1889. De Gaudenzi
P. G., Istruzione del vescovo di Vigevano al Ven.do Suo Clero sul Matrimonio,
Vigevano, Spargella, 1874. Manacorda G., Storiografia e socialismo, Padova
1967. Martire G., E. Avogadro in Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. II, Roma, 1949,
coll. 553-554. Omodeo A., L'opera politica del conte di Cavour, Parte I
(1848-1857), Firenze 1940. Pirri P. (a cura di), Carteggi del P. L. Taparelli
d'Azeglio, vol. XIV di Biblioteca di Storia Italiana Recente (1800-1870),
Torino 1932. La scienza e la fede, vol. XXIV, Napoli 1851. Spadolini G.,
L'opposizione cattolica da porta Pia al '98, 3ª edizione, Firenze 1955. Storia
del Parlamento Italiano, diretta da N. Rodolico, vol. IV, Palermo 1966.
Traniello F., Cattolicesimo conciliarista. Religione e cultura nella tradizione
Rosminiana Lombardo-Piemontese (1825-1870), Milano 1970. Valentino V., Il
matrimonio e la vita coniugale nel pensiero di Emiliano Avogadro, Tesi di
licenza in teologia presso la Facoltà teologica dell'Italia Centrale, Anno
Accademico 1998-1999. Valentino V., Il conte Emiliano Avogadro 1798-1865.
Un'introduzione alla vita e alle opere, Vercelli, Saviolo, 2001. Valentino V.,
Un laico tra i teologi, Vercelli, 2003. A cura di Valentino V., E. Avogadro
della Motta, Il pensiero di V. Gioberti, Genova 2009. Verucci G., E. Avogadro
in Dizionario Biografico Italiano, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, vol.
IV, Roma 1962, coll. 686-688. Altri progetti Collabora a Wikisource Wikisource
contiene una pagina dedicata a Emiliano Avogadro della Motta Collegamenti
esterni Guido Verucci, Emiliano Avogadro della Motta, in Dizionario biografico
degli italiani, vol. 4, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 1962. Modifica su
Wikidata (EN) Opere di Emiliano Avogadro della Motta, su Open Library, Internet
Archive. Modifica su Wikidata Emiliano Della Motta (Avogadro), su
storia.camera.it, Camera dei deputati. Modifica su Wikidata Controllo di
autorità VIAF
(EN) 66703759 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0000 6133 5120 · SBN IT\ICCU\CUBV\010482 · LCCN
(EN) n2002048529 · GND (DE) 124694756 · BNF (FR) cb145445760 (data) · BAV (EN)
495/24331 · CERL cnp01379739 · WorldCat Identities (EN) lccn-n2002048529
Biografie Portale Biografie Cattolicesimo Portale Cattolicesimo Filosofia
Portale Filosofia Politica Portale Politica Categorie: Politici italiani del
XIX secoloFilosofi italiani del XIX secoloNati nel 1798Morti nel 1865Nati il 16
ottobreMorti il 9 febbraioNati a VercelliMorti a TorinoDeputati della V
legislatura del Regno di SardegnaDeputati della VI legislatura del Regno di
Sardegna[altre]
Motterlini Matteo Motterlini
Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search Matteo Motterlini
(Milano, 6 gennaio 1967) è un filosofo ed economista italiano, specializzato in
filosofia della scienza, economia comportamentale e neuroeconomia. È noto
per i suoi lavori in ambito psicoeconomico su processi decisionali, emozioni e
razionalità umana; e per le sue ricerche in ambito epistemologico sulla
razionalità della scienza e il metodo scientifico, con particolare riferimento
ai contributi di Imre Lakatos e Paul Feyerabend. Indice 1 Carriera accademica e
altri incarichi 2 Studi
e ricerche 2.1 Pro
e contro il metodo 2.2 Metodo
e cognizione in economia 2.3 Neuroeconomia
e evidence-based policy 3 Pubblicazioni
3.1 Libri
3.2 Alcuni
articoli scientifici 4 Note
5 Altri
progetti 6 Collegamenti
esterni Carriera accademica e altri incarichi Attualmente è E.ON Professor in
Behavior Change. Environment, Heath and Education all'Università Vita-Salute
San Raffaele di Milano - dove è professore ordinario di Logica e Filosofia
della Scienza. È stato Consigliere per le Scienze Sociali e Comportamentali
della Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri (DPCM 5 maggio 2016) (dal 5.4.2016
all'1.6.2018). Laureatosi in filosofia all'Università di Milano, dove ha
portato a termine il proprio dottorato in filosofia della scienza, ha
conseguito il Master of Science in Logic and Scientific Method e ottenuto il
Graduate Diploma in Economics alla London School of Economics and Political
Science. È stato ricercatore di economia politica e professore associato di
filosofia della scienza presso l'Università di Trento; Visiting Associate
Professor al Department of Social and Decision Sciences della Carnegie Mellon
University di Pittsburgh, Visiting Research Scholar al Department of Psychology
della UCLA. Dal 2007 è professore ordinario di filosofia della scienza presso
l'Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele. Tra gli altri incarichi è
collaboratore de Il Corriere Economia, Il Corriere della Sera e Il Sole 24 Ore,
per cui ha curato per anni il blog Controvento. È stato consulente scientifico
di MilanLab, A.C. Milan[1], fondatore e direttore di Anima FinLab, di Anima
Sgr, centro di ricerca di finanza comportamentale e Scientific advisor di
MarketPsychData, Ls Angeles. È direttore del CRESA (Centro di ricerca in
epistemologia sperimentale e applicata), da lui fondato a Milano nel 2007
presso la facoltà di filosofia dell'Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele. I
progetti di ricerca del centro si concentrano su vari aspetti della cognizione
umana, dal linguaggio al rapporto tra mente e cervello, dall'economia
comportamentale alle neuroscienze cognitive della decisione, con particolare
attenzione all'indagine sperimentale multidisciplinare e alle sue ricadute
pratiche e applicative (per esempio nell'ambito del policy making e
dell'evidence-based policy). A inizio 2013, ha avviato il progetto di
finanza comportamentale per Schroder Italia, dal quale è nato Investimente[2],
un test psicofinanziario al servizio di risparmiatori, promotori finanziari e
private banker, per raccogliere e quindi analizzare i dati riguardanti le
decisioni di investimento e i bias cognitivi nell'ambito della gestione del
risparmio. Attualmente è direttore dell'E.ON Customer Behavior Lab e
Chief Behavior Officer di E.ON Italia; stesso incarico che ricopre per il
Gruppo Ospedaliero San Donato. Studi e ricerche Pro e contro il metodo I
suoi primi lavori analizzano la proposta falsificazionista di Karl Popper,
rivelando le difficoltà in cui si imbatte il progetto demarcazionista e
anti-induttivista. Affrontano quindi il modo in cui Imre Lakatos ha preteso
superare alcune di queste difficoltà, e insieme raccogliere la ‘sfida di Duhem'
circa il carattere olistico del controllo empirico, tenendo conto delle
immagini che scienziati e matematici hanno avuto della loro stessa pratica e
riferendosi a particolari casi storici come termine di confronto. La sua
ricostruzione del progetto filosofico di Lakatos si avvale di un'originale
analisi del materiale dell'Archivio Lakatos. Una selezione del quale,
accompagnata da un importante apparato critico, è pubblicata in italiano Sull'orlo
della scienza e in edizione ampliata per University of Chicago Press (1999, For
and Against Method)[3]. Nel suo Reconstructing Lakatos (Studies in the History
and Philosophy of Science) e nella monografia Imre Lakatos. Scienza, matematica
e storia avanza una nuova interpretazione del progetto razionalista di Lakatos
come il prodotto di una peculiare combinazione delle idee di Popper e di Hegel.
Ciò è motivo della straordinaria fecondità del pensiero lakatosiano, ma anche
di una inesauribile tensione al suo interno. Una tensione che viene illustrata
affrontando la relazione tra filosofia della scienza e storia della scienza in
riferimento alla questione della valutazione di una data metodologia in base
alle 'ricostruzioni razionali' a cui essa conduce. Nell'idea che le varie
metodologie vadano confrontate con la storia della scienza è contenuto il germe
di una logica della scoperta in cui i canoni non siano fissati una volta per
sempre, ma mutano nel tempo, anche se con ritmi non necessariamente uguali a quelli
delle teorie scientifiche. Metodo e cognizione in economia In una fase
successiva i suoi studi si sono focalizzati su questioni di metodologia
dell'economia da una prospettiva interdisciplinare che combina riflessione
epistemologica, scienze cognitive, ed economia sperimentale con aspetti più
tecnici di teoria della scelta e della decisione individuale in condizioni
d'incertezza. Le ricerche di questo periodo analizzano criticamente lo status
delle assunzioni della teoria della scelta razionale, valutando l'impatto delle
violazioni comportamentali sistematiche alle restrizioni assiomatiche imposte
dai modelli normativi di razionalità. Avanzano quindi ragioni epistemologiche
per la composizione della frattura economia e psicologia cognitiva in ambito della
teoria della decisione; e suggeriscono di guardare ai recenti risultati
dell'economia cognitiva in prospettiva di una nuova sintesi 'quasi-razionale'
in cui i modelli neoclassici, integrati da teorie psicologiche che tengano
conto dei limiti cognitivi dei soggetti decisionali, rafforzano le previsioni
del comportamento economico degli esseri umani. Neuroeconomia e
evidence-based policy Le sue ricerche indagano le basi neurobiologiche della
razionalità umana attraverso lo studio dei correlati neurali dei processi
decisionali in contesti economico-finanziari, con particolare attenzione al
ruolo svolto dalle emozioni, dal rimpianto, e dall'apprendimento sociale.
Parallelamente progetta ed esperimenta i modi in cui i risultati dell'economia
comportamentale e della neuroeconomia possono informare politiche
pubbliche più efficaci e basate sull'evidenza.[4] Queste ricerche sono
oggetto dei corsi di Filosofia della scienza e di Economia cognitiva e
neuroeconomia che insegna all'università San Raffaele, e hanno altresì trovato
diffusione attraverso numerosi articoli divulgativi e due libri, Economia
emotiva (2006) e Trappole mentali (2008), noti internazionalmente grazie alle
traduzioni in spagnolo, coreano, giapponese e cinese. Il suo ultimo libro è
Psicoeconomia di Charlie Brown. Strategia per una società più felice
(2014). Pubblicazioni Libri 1995. Sull'orlo della scienza. Imre Lakatos,
Paul K. Feyerabend: Pro e contro il metodo, Cortina, Milano. 1998. Popper, Il
Saggiatore-Flammarion, Milano 1999. For and Against Method. Including Lakatos's
Lectures on Method and the Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence', University of
Chicago Press, Chicago 2000. Imre Lakatos. Scienza, matematica e storia, Il
Saggiatore, Milano 2005. Decisioni mediche. Un approccio cognitivo (con
Vincenzo Crupi), Raffaello Cortina, Milano. 2005. (a cura di) Critica della
ragione economica. Tre saggi: Mc Fadden, Kahneman, Smith (con Massimo Piattelli
Palmarini), Il Saggiatore, Milano 2005. (a cura di) Economia cognitiva &
sperimentale (con Francesco Guala), Università Bocconi Editore, Milano ISBN
978-88-8350-030-5 2006. La dimensione cognitiva dell'errore in medicina (con
Vinceno Crupi, Gianfranco Gensini), a cura di, Fondazione Smith Kline, Franco
Angeli, Milano ISBN 978-88-464-7405-6 2006. Economia emotiva (Emotional
Economics), Rizzoli, Milano ISBN 978-88-17-00990-4 2008. Trappole mentali
(Cognitive Traps), Rizzoli, Milano ISBN 978-88-17-02383-2 2011. Mente, Mercati,
Decisioni. Introduzione all'economia cognitiva e sperimentale (con Francesco Guala),
Egea, Milano ISBN 978-88-8350-167-8 2015. Psicoeconomia di Charlie Brown.
Strategia per una società più felice, Rizzoli, Milano ISBN 9788817077286 Alcuni
articoli scientifici 2002. Lakatos between the Hegelian devil and the Popperian
blue sea. In Kampis, G., Kvasz, L., Stoeltzner, M. (eds.), Appraising Lakatos,
Mathematics, Methodology, and the Man. Vienna Circle Institute Library,
Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2002, pp. 23–52 . 2002. Reconstructing Lakatos. A
reassessment of Lakatos' philosophical project in light of the Lakatos Archive
, Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science , 33 (2002), pp. 487–509.
2003. Considerazioni epistemologiche e mitologiche sulla relazione tra
psicologia ed economia, Sistemi intelligenti, Il Mulino, XV, n. 1, pp. 107–115
2003. Metodo e standard di valutazione in economia. Dall'apriorismo a Friedman,
Studi Economici, 58, Milano, 2003, pp. 5–34. 2007. In search of the
neurobiological basis of decision-making, explanation, reduction and emergence
(con Michele Di Francesco e Matteo Colombo), in P. Churchand, M. Di Francesco
(eds.) Functional Neurology, n.4. 2007 , pp. 197–204. 2010. Understanding
Others' Regret: A fMRI Study, con Nicola Canessa, Cinzia Di Dio, Daniela
Perani, Paola Scifo, Stefano F. Cappa, Giacomo Rizzolatti, PlosONE', 2009 Oct
14; 4 (10) 2010. Vai in laboratorio e capirai il mercato (con Francesco Guala)
Prefazione a Vernon Smith, La razionalità in economia. Tra teoria e analisi
sperimentale, IBL, Milano. 2011. Neuroeconomia e Teoria del prospetto, voci
Enciclopedia dell'economia Garzanti, Milano. 2011. Learning from other peoples
experience: a neuroimaging study of decisional interactive-learning, con Nicola
Canessa, Federica Alemanno, Daniela Perani, Stefano Cappa, Neuroimage, 1; 55
(1), 353-62. 2013. The functional and structural neural basis of individual
differences in loss aversion, con Nicola Canessa, Stefano F.Cappa et. al., The
Journal of Neuroscience, 33(36):14307-1437 2015. Choice Architecture Matters:
The Case of Investor Protection within the Italian Crowdfunding Market”with
Elisa Broli European Company Law, 11, 5, pp. 259-267. 2019. “Testing donation
menus: on charitable giving for cancer research – evidence from a natural field
experiment” (con Marianna Baggio), Behavioural Public Policy, Page 1 of 22,
Cambridge University Press doi:10.1017/bpp.2019.13 Note ^ A.C. Milan ^
Investimente. Test dell'investitore consapevole ^ Recensione di Ian Hacking
sulla The London Review of Books ^ IlSole24Ore 22.5.2016
http://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/cultura/2016-05-18/motterlini-spinta-riforme--173517.shtml?uuid=ADAaR2J
Altri progetti Collabora a Wikiquote Wikiquote contiene citazioni di o su
Matteo Motterlini Collegamenti esterni Sito personale, su matteomotterlini.it.
Sito CRESA, su cresa.eu. URL consultato il 19 luglio 2013 (archiviato dall'url
originale il 28 gennaio 2013). Controllo di autorità VIAF (EN) 44469778 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 1631 6446 · SBN
IT\ICCU\MILV\050157 · LCCN (EN) nr98031308 · GND (DE) 1145989497 · BNF (FR)
cb13597350c (data) · BNE (ES) XX4673617 (data) · WorldCat Identities (EN)
lccn-nr98031308 Biografie Portale Biografie Economia Portale Economia Filosofia
Portale Filosofia Categorie: Filosofi italiani del XX secoloFilosofi italiani
del XXI secoloEconomisti italianiNati nel 1967Nati il 6 gennaioNati a
Milano[altre]
Motus – motivatum – Grice, “Must our
motives be impure?” “Obligation cashes out in motivation.” Motivatum -- motivation,
a property central in motivational explanations of intentional conduct. To
assert that Grice is driving to Lord’s today because she wants to see his
cricket team play and believes that they are playing today at Lord’s is to
offer an explanation of Grice’s action. On a popular interpretation, the
assertion mentions a pair of attitudes: a desire and a belief. Grice’s s desire
is a paradigmatic motivational attitude in that it inclines him to bring about
the satisfaction of that very attitude. The primary function of motivational
attitudes is to bring about their own satisfaction by inducing the agent to
undertake a suitable course of action, and, arguably, any attitude that has
that function is, ipso facto, a motivational one. The related thesis that only
attitudes having this function are motivational
or, more precisely, motivation-constituting is implausible. Grice hopes that the
Oxfordshire Cricket Team won yesterday. Plainly, his hope cannot bring about its
own satisfaction, since Grice has no control over the past. Even so, the hope
seemingly may motivate action e.g., Grice’s searching for sports news on her
car radio, in which case the hope is motivation-constituting. Some philosophers
have claimed that our beliefs that we are morally required to take a particular
course of action are motivation-constituting, and such beliefs obviously do not
have the function of bringing about their own satisfaction i.e., their truth.
However, the claim is controversial, as is the related claim that beliefs of
this kind are “besires” that is, not
merely beliefs but desires as well. Refs.: “Desire, belief, and besire.”
Motus – motivantional explanation -- Grice:
the explanatory-justificatory distinction – “To explain” is not to explicate,
but to render ‘plain’ – To justify is hardly to render ‘plain’! Grice is aware
of this, because he does not use the ‘explicatory-justificatory’ distinction.
Therefore, the ‘justificatory’ is conceptually prior – a philosopher looks for
justification – hardly to render stuff plain – “Quite the opposite: my claim to
fame is to follow the alleged professional duty of a philosophy professor: to
render obscure what is clear, and vice versa!” -- motivational explanation -- a
type of explanation of goal-directed behavior where the explanans appeals to
the motives of the agent. The explanation usually is in the following form:
Smith swam hard in order to win the race. Here the description of what Smith
did identifies the behavior to be explained, and the phrase that follows ‘in
order to’ identifies the goal or the state of affairs the obtaining of which
was the moving force behind the behavior. The general presumption is that the
agent whose behavior is being explained is capable of deliberating and acting
on the decisions reached as a result of the deliberation. Thus, it is dubious
whether the explanation contained in ‘The plant turned toward the sun in order
to receive more light’ is a motivational explanation. Two problems are thought
to surround motivational explanations. First, since the state of affairs set as
the goal is, at the time of the action, non-existent, it can only act as the
“moving force” by appearing as the intentional object of an inner psychological
state of the agent. Thus, motives are generally desires for specific objects or
states of affairs on which the agent acts. So motivational explanation is
basically the type of explanation provided in folk psychology, and as such it
inherits all the alleged problems of the latter. And second, what counts as a
motive for an action under one description usually fails to be a motive for the
same action under a different description. My motive for saying “hello” may
have been my desire to answer the phone, but my motive for saying “hello”
loudly was to express my irritation at the person calling me so late at
night.
Motus – motivus – “Obligation cashes on
motivation.” Grice, “Must our motives be impure?” -- motivational internalism, the view that moral
motivation is internal to moral duty or the sense of duty. The view represents
the contemporary understanding of Hume’s thesis that morality is essentially
practical. Hume went on to point out the apparent logical gap between
statements of fact, which express theoretical judgments, and statements about
what ought to be done, which express practical judgments. Motivational
internalism offers one explanation for this gap. No motivation is internal to the
recognition of facts. The specific internal relation the view affirms is that
of necessity. Thus, motivational internalists hold that if one sees that one
has a duty to do a certain action or that it would be right to do it, then
necessarily one has a motive to do it. For example, if one sees that it is
one’s duty to donate blood, then necessarily one has a motive to donate blood.
Motivational externalism, the opposing view, denies this relation. Its
adherents hold that it is possible for one to see that one has a duty to do a
certain action or that it would be right to do it yet have no motive to do it.
Motivational externalists typically, though not universally, deny any real gap
between theoretical and practical judgments. Motivational internalism takes
either of two forms, rationalist and anti-rationalist. Rationalists, such as
Plato and Kant, hold that the content or truth of a moral requirement
guarantees in those who understand it a motive of compliance.
Anti-rationalists, such as Hume, hold that moral judgment necessarily has some
affective or volitional component that supplies a motive for the relevant
action but that renders morality less a matter of reason and truth than of
feeling or commitment. It is also possible in the abstract to draw an analogous
distinction between two forms of motivational externalism, cognitivist and
noncognitivist, but because the view springs from an interest in assimilating
practical judgment to theoretical judgment, its only influential form has been
cognitivist.
Musatti Cesare Musatti Da
Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search Cesare Luigi
Eugenio[1] Musatti (Dolo, 21 settembre 1897 – Milano, 21 marzo 1989) è stato
uno psicologo, psicoanalista e filosofo italiano, tra i primi che posero le
basi della psicoanalisi, in Italia [2]. Indice 1 Biografia
1.1 Infanzia
1.2 Giovinezza
1.3 Maturità
1.4 Vecchiaia
2 Musatti
e il suicidio di Benussi 3 Note
4 Bibliografia
4.1 Opere
5 Altri
progetti 6 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Infanzia Nacque in località Casello 12[3] a Dolo, sulla
riviera del Brenta, nella casa di campagna del nonno paterno in cui i parenti
erano soliti trascorrere la villeggiatura. Figlio di Elia Musatti, ebreo
veneziano e deputato socialista amico di Giacomo Matteotti, e della napoletana
Emma Leanza, cattolica non praticante, Cesare non fu né circonciso, né
battezzato (durante le persecuzioni razziali si era procurato un falso
certificato di battesimo dalla parrocchia di Santa Maria in Transpontina di
Roma) e non professò mai alcun credo religioso. Frequentò il liceo
Foscarini di Venezia, poi si iscrisse dapprima alla facoltà di Scienze
dell'Università di Padova per il corso di Ingegneria, e immediatamente dopo
alla facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia[4], dove si laureò in filosofia il 3
novembre 1921 con 110 e lode[5]. Dopo la laurea, nel 1921 si iscrisse per due
anni al corso di Matematica della facoltà di Scienze matematiche, fisiche e
naturali di Padova, ma non sostenne esame alcuno[6]. Giovinezza A
diciannove anni fu chiamato a Roma per il servizio di leva. Dopo un periodo di
addestramento a Torino, nel 1917 fu mandato al fronte come ufficiale, con
impegni marginali. Finita la guerra tornò a Padova per terminare gli studi.
Sulla cattedra di Psicologia Sperimentale c'era Vittorio Benussi, allora
chiamato per chiara fama nel 1919 a insegnare a Padova dall'Università di
Graz. Musatti si laureò in filosofia nel 1921 e l'anno successivo divenne
assistente volontario del Laboratorio di psicologia sperimentale. Nel 1927
Benussi si uccise con il cianuro a causa di una grave forma di disturbo
bipolare, lasciando tutto nelle mani di Musatti e di Silvia De Marchi,
anch'essa assistente volontaria, che poi divenne sua moglie. Il suicidio di
Benussi fu scoperto da Musatti, il quale però lo nascose per paura di
ripercussioni negative sulla psicologia italiana in una situazione di fragilità
e precarietà accademica, sottoposta a pressioni da parte sia del regime
fascista, con le sue istanze gentiliane, che della Chiesa Cattolica. Negli anni
ottanta Musatti rivelò che Benussi s'era suicidato, non era morto a causa di un
malore. Nel 1928 Musatti divenne direttore del Laboratorio di Psicologia
dell'Università di Padova. Portò in Italia la Psicologia della Forma con
importanti lavori di livello internazionale. Dopo aver diffuso in Italia la
psicologia della Gestalt, divenne il primo studioso italiano di
psicoanalisi. Studiando la psicologia della suggestione e dell'ipnosi,
introdotta in Italia da Vittorio Benussi, approdò alla psicoanalisi, sulla
quale tenne il primo corso universitario italiano. Il corso si tenne presso
l'Università di Padova nell'anno accademico 1933-34. Musatti divenne allora uno
dei primi e più importanti rappresentanti italiani della psicoanalisi.
Nell'Italia degli anni '30 le teorie di Freud non erano state accolte bene né
dalle Università, né dalla Chiesa cattolica, a causa dell'ideologia culturale
gentiliana assunta dal fascismo. La Società psicoanalitica italiana, fondata
nel 1925, venne limitata anche dalle leggi razziali fasciste (1938), che
colpirono i membri ebrei della Società. Benché non fosse ebreo (poiché figlio
di madre cattolica), Musatti fu allontanato dall'insegnamento universitario che
svolgeva presso l'Università degli Studi di Urbino e declassato ad insegnante
di liceo. Maturità Nel 1940 fu nominato professore di Filosofia al Liceo
Parini di Milano. Nel 1943 Musatti si ritrovò con Lelio Basso,
Ferrazzutto e altri vecchi socialisti con l'intento di creare un partito erede
del Partito Socialista Italiano; ebbe l'incarico di trovare denaro per una
prima organizzazione e di allacciare rapporti col Partito Comunista
clandestino. Musatti lavorò anche durante la guerra. Nel 1944, nel periodo
dell'occupazione nazista, fu tratto in salvo dall'avvocato Paolo Toffanin
(1890-1971), fratello di Giuseppe Toffanin, che lo aiutò a trasferirsi a Ivrea,
ospite dell'amico Adriano Olivetti. Con il suo sostegno fondò un centro di
psicologia del lavoro. Ricoprì anche l'incarico di direttore della Scuola
Allievi Meccanici, scuola aperta per formare operai meccanici specializzati.
Successivamente fu richiamato dall'Esercito per andare sul fronte
francese. Nel 1947 ottenne all'Università degli Studi di Milano la prima
cattedra di Psicologia costituita nel dopoguerra in Italia, presso la Facoltà
di Lettere e Filosofia. Vi insegnò per venti anni. A Milano ebbe il periodo più
florido della sua ricerca scientifica: gli studenti affollavano le sue lezioni.
Musatti fu il leader del movimento psicoanalitico italiano nei primi anni del
dopoguerra. A quel periodo risale il suo “Trattato di Psicoanalisi”, pubblicato
da Einaudi nel 1949. Nel 1955 divenne direttore della “Rivista di
psicoanalisi”. Nel 1963 è presidente del Centro Milanese di Psicoanalisi
fondato da Franco Ciprandi, Renato Sigurtà e Pietro Veltri[7], che gli verrà
intitolato dopo la sua morte[7][8]. Nel 1976 è diventato curatore della
edizione italiana delle Opere di Sigmund Freud, della Casa Editrice Bollati
Boringhieri di Torino.[9]. Vecchiaia La località a lui dedicata
Musatti scrisse anche libri di letteratura, tra cui Il pronipote di Giulio
Cesare, che nel 1980 gli fece vincere il Premio Viareggio. Fu eletto per due
volte consigliere comunale di Milano nella lista del PSIUP e fu anche
consulente del Tribunale dei Minori del capoluogo lombardo. Sostenne sempre la
pace, il progresso dei lavoratori, l'emancipazione femminile ed i diritti
civili. Cesare Musatti era ateo, come ebbe a dichiarare in più
occasioni, l'ultima delle quali in uno dei "martedì letterari" del Casinò
di Sanremo. Morì nella sua abitazione di via Sabbatini a Milano il 21 marzo
1989; l'indomani dopo una cerimonia laica di commiato celebrata in forma
strettamente privata, la sua salma venne cremata a Lambrate. Le sue ceneri sono
tumulate, secondo le sue ultime volontà, nel cimitero comunale di Brinzio (VA),
località in cui era solito trascorrere i periodi di vacanza[10].
L'archivio di Cesare Musatti è conservato presso l'Aspi - Archivio Storico
della Psicologia Italiana dell'Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca[11].
Il comune di Dolo ha ribattezzato la sua località natale Casello 12 località
Cesare Musatti e gli ha intitolato il locale istituto professionale.
Musatti e il suicidio di Benussi Anche dopo la rivelazione che si era trattato
di un suicidio, Musatti non parlò mai volentieri della morte del maestro. Nel
generale silenzio dello studioso di Dolo emerge un'intervista uscita sul
quotidiano El País del 21 ottobre 1985. Nell'intervista Musatti confessa di
sognare a volte che in una caserma dei carabinieri in cui viene tradotto, il
commissario lo interroga sulla morte di tre sue mogli (si sposò quattro volte),
decedute tragicamente, e di Vittorio Benussi. A fine colloquio il militare
intima a Musatti di confessare di aver ucciso il maestro per prendere la
cattedra di psicologia. «Io gli rispondo – prosegue Musatti, da buon
psicoanalista – che sicuramente nel mio subconscio mi sono sentito responsabile
per questa e per altre morti. Il commissario, che non capiva nulla di
subconscio, decide: “Mi spiace professore, ma devo arrestarla”. Io allora gli
rispondo: ”Non è possibile commissario, perché si tratta di delitti commessi
più di cinquant'anni fa, e quindi sono prescritti!”»[12]. Note ^ Il nome
Cesare è un riferimento al prozio Cesare Musatti, medico pediatra (uno dei
primi in Italia) che aveva visitato il piccolo, nato settimino; Luigi era il
nome del bisnonno materno (Luigi Leanza, morto in carcere, partecipò alla
rivolta antiborbonica del 1848); Eugenio era il nome di un altro prozio
paterno, lo storico Eugenio Musatti; cfr. Musatti, p. IX-XIII ^ "Forse la
psicoanalisi in Italia è nata e morta con Cesare Musatti" (Umberto
Galimberti, Idee: il catalogo è questo, Milano, Feltrinelli, 1992, p. 125) ^ Il
nome allude alla fermata della tranvia Padova-Malcontenta-Fusina che il nonno,
presidente della Società Veneta Lagunare, odierna ACTV, aveva fatto aprire per
raggiungere più agevolmente Venezia. ^ Musatti, p. IX-XIII. ^ Archivio
dell'Università degli Studi di Padova, Carriere scolastiche della Facoltà di
Lettere e filosofia, reg. 2, pag. 174 ^ Archivio dell'Università degli Studi di
Padova, Carriere scolastiche della Facoltà di scienze matematiche, fisiche e
naturali, reg. 13, pag. 12. Opuscolo del Centro Milanese di Psicoanalisi,
a cura del Comitato Direttivo, redatto da L. Ambrosiano, P. Capazzi, P. Gammaro
Moroni, L.Reatto, L.Schwartz, M.Sforza, M.Stufflesser, p.4, 1994-1996 Milano ^
Per una storia del Centro Milanese di Psicoanalisi, a cura di P. Chiari,
Seminario tenuto il 15 gennaio 2009 presso il Centro Milanese di Psicoanalisi
Cesare Musatti, 15 gennaio 2009, Milano ^ Sigmund Freud, Opere, 12 voll., a
cura di Cesare Musatti. Torino, Bollati Boringhieri, prima ed. 1976-1980,
ultima ed. 2000-2003. ^ Silvia Giacomoni, Cerimonia privata per Cesare Musatti,
la Repubblica, 22 marzo 1989. URL consultato l'8 settembre 2018 (archiviato
l'11 gennaio 2018). ^ L'archivio Musatti è consultabile sul portale dell'Aspi,
all'indirizzo web Aspi - Archivio storico della psicologia italiana, Università
degli studi di Milano-Bicocca. URL consultato il 7 settembre 2018 (archiviato
il 12 luglio 2017). ^ D. Mont D'Arpizio, Vittorio Benussi, Padre della
psicologia padovana[collegamento interrotto], in La Difesa del popolo 2 marzo
2008, p. 35 Bibliografia Questo testo proviene in parte dalla relativa voce del
progetto Mille anni di scienza in Italia, opera del Museo Galileo. Istituto
Museo di Storia della Scienza di Firenze (home page), pubblicata sotto licenza
Creative Commons CC-BY-3.0 Cesare Musatti, Mia sorella gemella la psicoanalisi,
1ª ed., Pordenone, Edizioni Studio Tesi, 1991. Luciano Mecacci, Cesare L.
Musatti, voce dell'Enciclopedia italiana di scienze, lettere ed arti. Il
contributo italiano alla storia del pensiero. Ottava appendice, Roma, Istituto
della Enciclopedia Italiana, 2013, pp. 680–683. Opere 1926: Analisi del
concetto di realtà empirica, Il Solco, Città di Castello 1931: Forma e
assimilazione, in: Archivio italiano di psicologia 9, S. 61-156. 1931: Elementi
di psicologia della testimonianza, nuova edizione in Biblioteca Universale
Rizzoli, 1991 1937: Forma e movimento, Officine grafiche C. Ferrari, Venezia
1937, (Estratto da: Atti del Reale Istituto veneto di scienze, lettere ed arti
97, 1937-1938, seconda parte) 1938: Gli elementi della psicologia della forma,
Gruppo Universitario Fascista, Padova 1949: Trattato di psicoanalisi, Paolo
Boringhieri, Torino 1961: Super io individuale e Super io collettivo, Leo S.
Olschki Firenze 1964: Condizioni dell'esperienza e fondazione della psicologia,
Editrice Universitaria, Firenze 1967: Riflessioni sul pensiero psicoanalitico e
incursioni nel mondo delle immagini, Paolo Boringhieri, Torino 1974: Svevo e la
psicoanalisi, Leo S. Olschki, Firenze 1975: I rapporti personali Freud-Jung
attraverso il carteggio, Leo S. Olschki, Firenze 1977: Commemorazione
accademica, Leo S. Olschki, Firenze 1978: Nino Valeri, Leo S. Olschki Firenze
1979: Il pronipote di Giulio Cesare, Mondadori Milano 1981: A ciascuno la sua
morte, Leo S. Olschki, Firenze 1982: Hanno cancellato Livorno, Leo S. Olschki,
Firenze 1982: Mia sorella gemella la psicoanalisi, Editori Riuniti, Roma 1983:
Una famiglia diversa ed un analista di campagna, Leo S. Olschki, Firenze 1983:
Questa notte ho fatto un sogno, Editori Riuniti, Roma 1987: Chi ha paura del
lupo cattivo?, Editori Riuniti, Roma 1988: Psicoanalisti e pazienti a teatro, a
teatro, Mondadori, Milano 1989: Leggere Freud, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino
1991: Curar nevrotici con la propria autoanalisi, Mondadori, Milano 2019:
Geometrie non-euclidee e problema della conoscenza, a cura di Aurelio Molaro,
prefazione di Mauro Antonelli, Mimesis, Milano, 2019. Altri progetti Collabora
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(EN) 107533461 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0000 8346 2921 · SBN IT\ICCU\CFIV\006005 · LCCN
(EN) n80104152 · GND (DE) 119466112 · BNF (FR) cb12025961r (data) · BNE (ES)
XX1064442 (data) · NLA (EN) 35799965 · BAV (EN) 495/245503 · WorldCat
Identities (EN) lccn-n80104152 Biografie Portale Biografie Psicologia Portale
Psicologia Categorie: Psicologi italianiPsicoanalisti italianiFilosofi italiani
del XX secoloNati nel 1897Morti nel 1989Nati il 21 settembreMorti il 21
marzoNati a Dolo (Italia)Morti a MilanoPolitici del Partito Socialista
ItalianoPremiati con il Nettuno d'oroStudenti dell'Università degli Studi di
PadovaProfessori dell'Università degli Studi di PadovaProfessori
dell'Università degli Studi di MilanoScienziati atei[altre]
Mustè Marcello Mustè Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to
navigationJump to search Marcello Mustè Marcello Mustè (Roma, 8 settembre
1959) è uno storico della filosofia, filosofo e accademico italiano.
Indice 1 Biografia
2 Ricerche
3 Metodi
4 Opere
principali 4.1 Volumi
4.2 Articoli
(selezione) 5 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Laureato in filosofia con una tesi su Marx, dal 1984 al 1987
è stato borsista dell'Istituto italiano per gli studi storici di Napoli, dove
ha svolto attività didattica e di ricerca, collaborando con Gennaro Sasso. Dal
1985 al 1987 è stato redattore della “nuova serie” della “Rivista trimestrale”.
Nel 1991 ha conseguito il titolo di dottore di ricerca alla Sapienza. Dal 1997
al 2005 ha lavorato alla "Fondazione Giovanni Gentile per gli Studi
Filosofici" dell'Università "La Sapienza" in qualità di
“Segretario e Curatore dell'archivio e della biblioteca di Gentile”. È stato
professore a contratto di Storia della filosofia dal 2001 al 2007. Attualmente
è professore di filosofia teoretica all'Università La Sapienza di Roma. È
membro del Consiglio scientifico della Fondazione Gramsci e della Commissione
scientifica per la Edizione nazionale degli scritti di Antonio Gramsci. Ha
collaborato con l'Enciclopedia Italiana, in particolare ai volumi: Il
contributo italiano alla storia del pensiero. Filosofia (ottava appendice),
Enciclopedia machiavelliana e Croce e Gentile. La cultura italiana e l'Europa.
Ha diretto la rivista "Novecento" dal 1991 al 1999. Fa parte del
Comitato scientifico di alcune riviste, tra cui: "Giornale critico della
filosofia italiana", "Annali della Fondazione Gramsci", “La
Cultura”, “Filosofia italiana”. Scrive su diverse riviste scientifiche, tra le
quali, con maggiore continuità: "Giornale critico della filosofia
italiana", "La Cultura", "Studi storici", "Filosofia
italiana". Nel 2016 è stato nominato dal Ministero dei beni culturali
Segretario del "Comitato nazionale per il bicentenario della nascita di
Bertrando Spaventa". Dal 2012 al 2016 ha insegnato Ermeneutica filosofica,
in qualità di Visiting Professor, alla Pontificia Università Antonianum.
Ricerche Le sue ricerche si sono rivolte alla storia della filosofia italiana,
con contributi dedicati all'idealismo e al marxismo. Per quanto riguarda
l'idealismo italiano, ha indagato i momenti e le figure fondamentali (sino al
profilo complessivo pubblicato nel 2008) e le premesse nella filosofia
dell'Ottocento, specie in relazione al pensiero di Vincenzo Gioberti
(soprattutto con il libro del 2000 su La scienza ideale). Di particolare
interesse gli studi su Bertrando Spaventa e le monografie su Adolfo Omodeo e
Benedetto Croce. Ha dedicato saggi e ricerche al pensiero di Antonio Gramsci e
ad altri momenti del pensiero marxista italiano: del 2018 è la monografia su
Marxismo e filosofia della praxis, che ricostruisce la storia del marxismo
italiano da Labriola a Gramsci. Sono noti i suoi studi sul pensiero politico
nell'Italia contemporanea, con particolare riguardo alle figure di Franco
Rodano, Felice Balbo, Augusto Del Noce. Ha approfondito lo studio
dell'opera di Marx e in generale la storia della filosofia tedesca tra Hegel e
Nietzsche. Particolare attenzione ha poi rivolto (con il libro del 2005
su La storia e con altri scritti, tra cui quelli sull'evento e sulla teoria
delle fonti) alle questioni specifiche della teoria della storiografia.
Metodi Conduce l’indagine teoretica in stretta relazione con gli studi di
storia della filosofia e di storia della storiografia, in generale nell’ambito
della storia delle idee, adottando un metodo storico-critico che spesso
privilegia l’uso di fonti archivistiche e di documentazione inedita. Il suo
metodo cerca di coniugare l'analisi strutturale delle opere filosofiche con la
ricerca filologica sulle fonti e sulla tradizione dei testi, con particolare
riguardo ai processi di lungo periodo della filosofia italiana moderna e
contemporanea. Opere principali Volumi Adolfo Omodeo. Storiografia e
pensiero politico, Il Mulino, Bologna 1990. Benedetto Croce, Morano, Napoli
1990 Franco Rodano. Critica delle ideologie e ricerca della laicità, Il Mulino,
Bologna 1993 (Curatela) Carteggio Croce-Antoni, Il Mulino, Bologna 1996
Politica e storia in Marc Bloch, Aracne, Roma 2000 La scienza ideale. Filosofia
e politica in Vincenzo Gioberti, Rubbettino, Soveria Mannelli 2000 Franco
Rodano. Laicità, democrazia, società del superfluo, Studium, Roma 2000
(Curatela) Vincenzo Gioberti, Il governo federativo, Gangemi Editore, Roma 2002
(Curatela) Franco Rodano, Cristianesimo e società opulenta, Edizioni di storia
e letteratura, Roma 2002 (con Carlo Scognamiglio), Il giudizio sul nazismo. Le
interpretazioni dal 1933 a oggi, 2004,
http://www.filosofia.it/archivio/images/download/ebook/Giudizio_sul_nazismo_2004.pdf
La storia: teoria e metodi, Carocci, Roma 2005 (rist. 2006) La filosofia
dell'idealismo italiano, Carocci, Roma 2008 Croce, Carocci, Roma 2009 Tra
filosofia e storiografia. Hegel, Croce e altri studi, Aracne, Roma 2011 La
prassi e il valore. La filosofia dell'essere di Felice Balbo, Aracne, Roma 2016
Marxismo e filosofia della praxis. Da Labriola a Gramsci, Viella, Roma 2018 (Con
Giuseppe Vacca) In cammino con Gramsci, Viella, Roma 2020 Articoli (selezione)
L'ermeneutica di Hans Georg Gadamer, in «Rivista trimestrale», 1 (1986) Il
problema del mondo nel «Tractatus» di Wittgenstein, in «Rivista trimestrale», 3
(1987) Le fonti del giudizio marxiano sulla Rivoluzione francese nei
«Kreuznacher Hefte», in «Annali dell'Istituto Italiano per gli Studi Storici»,
7 (1987) L' «orizzonte liberale» di Dahrendorf, in «Critica marxista», 2 (1990)
Luigi Sturzo e il popolarismo nel giudizio di Piero Gobetti, in Luigi Sturzo e
la democrazia europea, Laterza, Roma-Bari 1990 Benedetto Croce e il problema
del diritto, in «Novecento», 4 (1992) Metodo storico e senso della libertà.
Adolfo Omodeo e i problemi della storiografia crociana, in «La Cultura», 2
(1993) Adolfo Omodeo. Il pensiero politico, in «Annali dell'Istituto Italiano
per gli Studi Storici», 11 (1993) Libertà e storicismo assoluto. Per
un'interpretazione del liberalismo di Croce, in Croce e Gentile fra tradizione
nazionale e filosofia europea, Editori Riuniti, Roma 1993 Hannah Arendt e la
società civile democratica, in «Novecento», 15 (1997) Sul giudizio politico, in
«Novecento», 16 (1998) Il marxismo politico nell'interpretazione di Augusto Del
Noce, in «Poietica», 11 (1999) Gioberti e Cartesio, in Storia, filosofia e
letteratura. Studi in onore di Gennaro Sasso, a cura di AA.VV., Bibliopolis,
Napoli, 1999 Comunismo e democrazia, in La democrazia nel pensiero politico del
Novecento, Aracne, Roma 1999 Guido Calogero, in «Belfagor», LV (2000), fasc. II
(31 mar.) Gioberti e Leopardi, in «La Cultura», XXXVIII (2000), n. 1 (apr.)
Verità e storia, in «Storiografia», n. 5/2001 Il significato della morale nella
filosofia di Gioberti, in Rosmini e Gioberti. Pensatori europei, a cura di G.
Beschin e L. Cristellon, Morcelliana, Brescia 2003 Il destino dell'evento nella
“nuova storia” francese, in «La Cultura», XLI (2003), n. 1 (apr.) Carattere e
svolgimento delle prime teorie estetiche di Benedetto Croce (1885-1913), «La
Cultura», XLI (2003), n. 3 (dic.) Liberalismo etico e liberismo economico, in
Croce filosofo liberale, a cura di M. Reale, LUISS University Press, Roma 2004
La teoria della storia in Benedetto Croce, in «Giornale critico della filosofia
italiana», LXXXIV (2005), fasc. II (mag.-ago.) L'idea di “Risorgimento” in
Gioberti, in «Quaderni della Fondazione Centro Studi Augusto Del Noce»,
2005-2006 Il significato delle fonti storiche, in «La Cultura», XLIV (2006), n.
3 (dic.) La storia: teoria e metodi, in «History and Theory», 45 (February
2006) Il passaggio all'antifascismo. Il 1925 di Benedetto Croce, in Anni di
svolta. Crisi e trasformazione nel pensiero politico della prima età
contemporanea, a cura di F.M. Di Sciullo, Rubbettino, Soveria Mannelli 2007
Alterità e principio del dialogo in Guido Calogero, in L'idea e la differenza.
Noi e gli altri, ipotesi di inclusione nel dibattito contemporaneo, a cura di
M.P. Paternò, Rubbettino, Soveria Mannelli 2008 Il principio del nous nella
filosofia di Guido Calogero, in «La Cultura», XLVIII (2010), n. 1 La filosofia
come sapere storico, in Il Novecento di Eugenio Garin. Atti del Convegno di
studi, a cura di G. Vacca e S. Ricci, Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana,
Roma, 2011 Vincenzo Gioberti, in Il contributo italiano alla storia del
pensiero. Filosofia, a cura di M. Ciliberto, Istituto della Enciclopedia
Italiana, Roma 2012, pp. 441–448 Lo storicismo italiano nel secondo dopoguerra,
in Il contributo italiano alla storia del pensiero. Filosofia, a cura di M.
Ciliberto, Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Roma 2012, pp. 706–716 Il
problema della libertà nella filosofia di Luigi Scaravelli, in «La Cultura», LI
(2013), n. 1 La libertà del volere nella filosofia di Benedetto Croce, in
Filosofia e politica. Saggi in onore di Mario Reale, a cura di G. Cesarale, M.
Mustè, S. Petrucciani, Mimesis, Milano 2013, pp. 165–174 Il senso della
dialettica nella filosofia di Bertrando Spaventa, in "Filosofia
italiana", apr. 2014 Storia, metodo, verità, in «La Cultura», 2014, n. 2
Gentile e Marx, «Giornale critico della filosofia italiana», XCIV (2015), vol.
XI, fasc. 1 (gen.-apr.), pp. 15–27 Togliatti e De Luca, «Studi storici», n.
2/2015, pp. 312–324 Gentile e Socrate, in La bandiera di Socrate. Momenti di
storiografia filosofica italiana nel Novecento, a cura di E. Spinelli e F.
Trabattoni, Sapienza Università Editrice, Roma 2016, pp. 39-58 Gentile e
Gioberti, «La Cultura», LIV (2016), n. 2 (lug.), pp. 295-323 Gramsci, Croce e
il canto decimo dell’Inferno di Dante, «Giornale critico della filosofia
italiana», 2017, fasc. 1 (gen-giu.), pp. 34-63 Bertrando Spaventa e Gioberti,
«Studi storici», 2017, n. 1, pp. 91-114 La presenza di Gramsci nella
storiografia filosofica e nella storia della cultura, «Filosofia italiana», n.
2/2017, pp. 9-29 Dialettica e società civile. Gramsci “interprete” di Hegel,
«Pólemos. Materiali di filosofia e critica sociale», 2018, n. 1, pp. 30-46 Marx
e i marxismi italiani, «Giornale critico della filosofia italiana», 2019, fasc.
1, pp. 25-43 La “via alla storia” di Carlo Ginzburg, in Streghe, sciamani,
visionari. In margine a “Storia notturna” di Carlo Ginzburg, a cura di Cora
Presezzi, Viella, Roma 2019, pp. 357-380 Filosofia e storia della filosofia
nella riflessione di Gennaro Sasso, «Filosofia italiana», n. 2/2018, feb. 2019,
pp. 59-73 Collegamenti esterni (EN) Opere di Marcello Mustè, su Open Library,
Internet Archive. Modifica su Wikidata Biografia e bibliografia di Mustè sul
web Sapienza Università di Roma. Dipartimento di studi filosofici ed
epistemologici, su lettere.uniroma1.it. Intervista di Mustè sulla storia della
"Rivista trimestrale" (versione digitalizzata) Intervista di Mustè su
Benedetto Croce del 2016
http://diacritica.it/letture-critiche/lo-storicismo-di-croce-e-la-morte-della-metafisica-intervista-a-marcello-muste.html
Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 113444220 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0000 8347 720X · SBN IT\ICCU\LO1V\031330 · LCCN
(EN) n91093429 · BNF (FR) cb12232666g (data) · BAV (EN) 495/103522 · WorldCat
Identities (EN) lccn-n91093429 Biografie Portale Biografie Filosofia Portale
Filosofia Storia Portale Storia Categorie: Storici della filosofia
italianiFilosofi italiani del XX secoloFilosofi italiani del XXI
secoloAccademici italiani del XX secoloAccademici italiani del XXI secoloNati
nel 1959Nati l'8 settembreNati a RomaProfessori della Sapienza - Università di
Roma[altre]
mystische -- mystical
experience, an experience alleged to reveal some aspect of reality not normally
accessible to sensory experience or cognition. The experience typically characterized by its profound
emotional impact on the one who experiences it, its transcendence of spatial
and temporal distinctions, its transitoriness, and its ineffability is often but not always associated with some
religious tradition. In theistic religions, mystical experiences are claimed to
be brought about by God or by some other superhuman agent. Theistic mystical
experiences evoke feelings of worshipful awe. Their content can vary from
something no more articulate than a feeling of closeness to God to something as
specific as an item of revealed theology, such as, for a Christian mystic, a
vision of the Trinity. Non-theistic mystical experiences are usually claimed to
reveal the metaphysical unity of all things and to provide those who experience
them with a sense of inner peace or bliss. mystische -- ystic -- mysticism, a
doctrine or discipline maintaining that one can gain knowledge of reality that
is not accessible to sense perception or to rational, conceptual thought.
Generally associated with a religious tradition, mysticism can take a theistic
form, as it has in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions, or a non-theistic
form, as it has in Buddhism and some varieties of Hinduism. Mystics claim that
the mystical experience, the vehicle of mystic
knowledge, is usually the result of spiritual training, involving some
combination of prayer, meditation, fasting, bodily discipline, and renunciation
of worldly concerns. Theistic varieties of mysticism describe the mystical
experience as granted by God and thus not subject to the control of the mystic.
Although theists claim to feel closeness to God during the mystical experience,
they regard assertions of identity of the self with God as heretical.
Non-theistic varieties are more apt to describe the experience as one that can
be induced and controlled by the mystic and in which distinctions between the
self and reality, or subject and object, are revealed to be illusory. Mystics
claim that, although veridical, their experiences cannot be adequately
described in language, because ordinary communication is based on sense
experience and conceptual differentiation: mystical writings are thus
characterized by metaphor and simile. It is con 593 troversial whether all mystical
experiences are basically the same, and whether the apparent diversity among
them is the result of interpretations influenced by different cultural
traditions. H. P. Grice, “Vitters and the mystic,” Luigi Speranza, “Vitters und
das mystische,” per il Club Anglo-Italiano, The Swimming Pool Library, Villa
Grice, Liguria, Italia.
myth: Grice was aware of Grice, the Welsh philosopher. For Grice
had turned a ‘myth,’ the myth of the compact, into a thing that would justify
moral obligation – When Grice, the Englishman, gives a mythical account of
communication, alla Plato and Paget, he faces the same problem – which he hopes
is “very minor,” compared to others. In this case, it’s not about ‘moral
obligation’ but about “something else.” Grice was possibly motivated by Quine’s
irreverent, “The mth of meaning,” a talk at France, “Le mythe de la
signification.” It’s odd that he gives the example of a ‘social contract’,
developed by G. R. Grice as a ‘myth’ as his own on ‘expressing pain.’ “My
succession of stages is a methodological myth designed to exhibit the
conceptual link between expression and communication. Rather than Plato, he
appeals to Rawls and the myth of the social conpact! Grice knows a little about
Descartess “Discours de la methode,” and he is also aware of similar obsession by
Collingwood with philosopical methodology. Grice would joke on midwifery, as
the philosopher’s apter method at Oxford: to strangle error at its birth. Grice
typifies a generation at Oxford. While he did not socialize with the crème de
la crème in pre-war Oxford, he shared some their approach. E.g. a love affair
with Russell’s logical construction. After the war, and in retrospect, Grice
liked to associate himself with Austin. He obviously felt the need to belong to
a group, to make a difference, to make history. Many participants of the play group
saw themselves as doing philosophy, rather than reading about it! It was long
after that Grice started to note the differences in methodology between Austin
and himself. His methodology changed a little. He was enamoured with formalism
for a while, and he grants that this love never ceased. In a still later phase,
he came to realise that his way of doing philosophy was part of literature
(essay writing). And so he started to be slightly more careful about his style
– which some found florid. The stylistic concerns were serious. Oxonian
philosophers like Holloway had been kept away from philosophy because of the
stereotype that the Oxonian philosophers style is pedantic, when it neednt! A
philosopher should be allowed, as Plato was, to use a myth, if he thinks his
tutee will thank him for that! Grice loved to compare his Oxonian dialectic
with Platos Athenian (strictly, Academic) dialectic. Indeed, there is some
resemblance of the use of myth in Plato and Grice for philosophical
methodological purposes. Grice especially enjoys a myth in his programme in
philosophical psychology. In this, he is very much being a philosopher.
Non-philosophers usually criticise this methodological use of a myth, but they
would, wouldnt they. Grice suggests that a myth has diagogic relevance.
Creature construction, the philosopher as demi-god, if mythical, is an easier
way for a philosophy don to instil his ideas on his tutee than, say, privileged
access and incorrigibility. myth of Er, a tale at the end of Plato’s Republic
dramatizing the rewards of justice and philosophy by depicting the process of
reincarnation. Complementing the main argument of the work, that it is
intrinsically better to be just than unjust, this longest of Plato’s myths
blends traditional lore with speculative cosmology to show that justice also
pays, usually in life and certainly in the afterlife. Er, a warrior who revived
shortly after death, reports how judges assign the souls of the just to heaven
but others to punishment in the underworld, and how most return after a
thousand years to behold the celestial order, to choose their next lives, and
to be born anew. Refs.: The main source is Grice’s essay on ‘myth’, in The H.
P. Grice Papers, BANC.
Nannini
Sandro Nannini Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to
navigationJump to search Niente fonti! Questa voce o sezione sull'argomento
filosofi non cita le fonti necessarie o quelle presenti sono insufficienti.
Commento: mancano fonti terze che in qualche modo certifichino
l'enciclopedicità Puoi migliorare questa voce aggiungendo citazioni da fonti
attendibili secondo le linee guida sull'uso delle fonti. Segui i suggerimenti
del progetto di riferimento. Sandro Nannini (Siena, 1946) è un filosofo,
accademico e politico italiano. Indice 1 Biografia 2 Opere
2.1 Monografie
2.2 Curatele
2.3 Saggi
3 Note
Biografia Ha studiato filosofia all'Università di Firenze con Sergio Landucci
e, inizialmente, con Cesare Luporini. Tra il 1970 e il 1991 ha accompagnato la
sua attività di ricerca in campo filosofico ed i suoi impegni accademici con
una intensa attività politica a Siena come militante del Partito Comunista
Italiano. È stato professore ordinario di Filosofia Morale all'Università di
Urbino (1986-1992) e di Filosofia Teoretica all’Università Università di Siena
(1992-2016), dove ha insegnato per alcuni anni anche filosofia della mente ed è
stato principale cofondatore e direttore di una scuola di dottorato
interdisciplinare in Scienze Cognitive (1999-2011). È stato inoltre più volte,
dal 1989 al 2017, visiting professor presso le Università di Osnabrück, North
London, Bremen e Oldenburg. Attualmente in pensione, è ancora pro tempore
Docente Senior presso l’Università di Siena e dal 2016 è direttore di Rivista
Internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia (RiFP). I suoi studi giovanili
si sono incentrati sulla filosofia delle scienze sociali, lo strutturalismo
francese e la storia del pensiero antropologico.[1] Successivamente, rivoltosi
alla filosofia analitica ed in particolare alla teoria dell’azione, ha cercato
di sviluppare il “naturalismo metodologico” criticando il ritorno di
neo-wittgesteiniani come G.H. von Wright alla distinzione storicistica tra
scienze della natura e scienze dello spirito.[2] Sempre muovendosi entro la
filosofia analitica, ma rivolgendo il proprio interesse alla filosofia pratica,
ha difeso il non cognitivismo in meta-etica.[3] A partire dagli anni Novanta
del xx secolo si è infine spostato dalla teoria dell’azione alla filosofia
della mente. In una prima fase si è occupato soprattutto della storia del
concetto di mente[4] [5], per approdare dopo il 2000 ad una forma di
naturalismo cognitivo basata su una soluzione fisicalistico-eliminativistica
del problema mente-corpo.[6][7] Opere Monografie (1981), Il pensiero
simbolico: Saggio su Lévi-Strauss, Bologna, Il Mulino. (1992), Cause e ragioni:
Modelli di spiegazione delle azioni umane nella filosofia analitica, Roma,
Editori Riuniti. (1998), Il Fanatico e l'Arcangelo: Saggi di filosofia
analitica pratica, Siena, Protagon. (2002), L'anima e il corpo: Una
introduzione storica alla filosofia della mente, Roma - Bari, Laterza; 10ª
edizione rivista e ampliata 2011. (2006), Seele, Geist und Körper: Historische
Wurzeln und philosophische Grundlagen der Kognitionswissenschaften (Deutsche
Bearbeitung von Sibylle Mahrdt), Frankfurt a. M., Peter Lang Verlag. (2007),
Naturalismo cognitivo: Per una teoria materialistica della mente, Macerata,
Quodlibet (2008), La Nottola di Minerva: Storie e dialoghi fantastici sulla
filosofia della mente, Milano, Mimesis. Curatele (1980), Educazione, individuo
e società in Emile Durkheim e nei suoi interpreti, Torino, Loescher. (2000 con
H.J. Sandkühler), Naturalism in the Cognitive Sciences and the Philosophy of
Mind, Frankfurt a.M., Peter Lang. (2007 con C. Lumer), Intentionality,
Deliberation and Autonomy: The Action-Theoretic Basis of Practical Philosophy,
London, Ashgate UK. (2013 con A. Zeppi), La mente può essere naturalizzata?,
Colle di Val D’Elsa (Siena), SeB Editori. Saggi (1990), Freud e l'antropologia,
in «La Cultura. Rivista di Filosofia, Letteratura e Storia», 28(1), numero
monografico “Studi su Sigmund Freud (1939-1989)”, 97-132. (1996), Symbol,
Künstliche Intelligenz und Philosophie des Geistes, in «Logos: Zeitschrift für
systematische Philosophie», 3(1), 75-96. (1996), Il materialismo “primario”, in
Aa. Vv., Il pensiero di Cesare Luporini, Milano, Feltrinelli, 140-153. (1999),
L'anomalia del mentale in Donald Davidson, «Rivista di filosofia», 90(1),
71-95. (1999), The Logical Connection Argument Again, in Egidi R. (a cura di),
In Search of a New Humanism. The Philosophy of Georg Henrik von Wright,
Dordrecht, Kluwer, 103-112. (2000), Cognitive Naturalism in the Philosophy of
Mind, in Nannini S., Sandkühler H.J. (a cura di), Naturalism in the Cognitive
Sciences and the Philosophy of Mind, Frankfurt a.M., Peter Lang, 2000, 41-62.
(2004), Mente e corpo nel dibattito contemporaneo, in A.Vv., L’anima, Milano,
Mondadori, 23-40. (2006), Theorien mentaler Repräsentation, in Sandkühler H.J.
(a cura di), Theorien und Begriffe der Repräsentation, Bremen,
Forschungsprojekt Repräsentation, 91-98. (2006), Mente, corpo e società nel
naturalismo forte, in «Nuova Civiltà delle Macchine», 24(2), 112-128. (2007),
Intentionality Naturalised, in M. Beaney, C. Penco, Massimiliano Vignolo (a cura
di), Explaining the Mental: Naturalist and Non-Naturalist Approaches to Mental
Acts and Processes, Newcastle upon Tyne UK, Cambridge Scholars Publ., 124-134.
(2007), Realismo scientifico e ontologia materialistica, in «Giornale di
metafisica», 29(2) (numero a cura di Nicolaci G., Perone U., Ontologia e
metafisica), 483-496. (2007), Il concetto di verità in una prospettiva
naturalistica, in Amoretti M.C., Marsonet M. (a cura di), Conoscenza e verità,
Milano, Giuffré, 45-69. (2009), L’Io come Direttore Assente, in Cardella V.,
Bruni D. (a cura di), Cervello, linguaggio, società: Atti del Convegno 2008 del
CODISCO, Coordinamento dei Dottorati Italiani di Scienze Cognitive, Roma,
CORISCO, 177-188. (2010), Orologi, menti e cervelli: Riflessioni preliminari su
tempo reale e tempo fenomenico tra fisica teorica e filosofia della mente, in
Amoretti M.C. (a cura di), Natura umana, natura artificiale, Milano, Angeli,
135-153. (2010), Cognitive naturalism and cognitive neuroscience: A defence of
eliminativism and a discussion with G. Roth, in De Caro M., Egidi R. (a cura
di), The Architecture of Knowledge: Epistemology, Agency, and Science, Roma,
Carocci, 35-56. (2011), La naturalizzazione delle rappresentazioni mentali, in
«Sistemi intelligenti», 23(1), 41-58. (2011), Kant e le scienze cognitive sulla
natura dell’Io, in Amoroso L., Ferrarin A., La Rocca C. (a cura di), Critica
della ragione e forme dell'esperienza: Studi in onore di Massimo Barale, Pisa,
Edizioni ETS, 415-432. (2013), Realismo scientifico e naturalismo cognitivo, in
Lanfredini R., Peruzzi A. (a cura di), A plea for balance in philosophy: Essays
in honour of Paolo Parrini, Pisa, ETS, 113-127. (2013), La coscienza può essere
naturalizzata?, in Nannini S., Zeppi A. (a cura di), La mente può essere naturalizzata?,
Colle di Val D’Elsa (Siena), SeB Editori, 117-142. (2013), Inconscio, coscienza
e intenzionalità nel naturalismo cognitivo, in «Sistemi intelligenti», 25(3),
453-467. (2014), La seconda svolta cognitiva in filosofia della mente, in
«Reti, saperi, linguaggi: Italian Journal of Cognitive Sciences», 3(2),
319-339. (2015), Time and Consciousness in Cognitive Naturalism, in «Rivista
internazionale di filosofia e psicologia» 6(3) 458-473. Note ^ Sandro Nannini,
Sandro e Nannini, Il pensiero simbolico: Saggio su Lévi-Strauss, Il Mulino,
1981. ^ Sandro Nannini, Cause e ragioni: Modelli di spiegazione delle azioni
umane nella filosofia analitica, Editori Riuniti., 1992. ^ Sandro Nannini, Il
Fanatico e l'Arcangelo: Saggi di filosofia analitica pratica., Protagon, 1998.
^ Sandro Nannini, L'anima e il corpo: Una introduzione storica alla filosofia
della mente, 10ª edizione rivista e ampliata 2011, Laterza. ^ Sandro Nannini,
Seele, Geist und Körper: Historische Wurzeln und philosophische Grundlagen der
Kognitionswissenschaften, Rielaborazione in tedesco di Sibylle Mahrdt, Peter
Lang Verlag., 2006. ^ Sandro Nannini, Naturalismo cognitivo: Per una teoria
materialistica della mente, Quodlibet, 2007. ^ Sandro Nannini, La Nottola di
Minerva: Storie e dialoghi fantastici sulla filosofia della mente, Mimesis,
2008. Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 61624008 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0000 6156 7095 · LCCN (EN) n82157618 · BNF (FR)
cb123598440 (data) · WorldCat Identities (EN) lccn-n82157618 Biografie Portale
Biografie Filosofia Portale Filosofia Categorie: Filosofi italiani del XX
secoloFilosofi italiani del XXI secoloAccademici italiani del XX
secoloAccademici italiani del XXI secoloPolitici italiani del XX secoloPolitici
italiani del XXI secoloNati nel 1946Nati a SienaStudenti dell'Università degli
Studi di FirenzeProfessori dell'Università degli Studi di Urbino[altre]
Nardi:
Bruno Nardi Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to
navigationJump to search Nessuna nota a piè di pagina Questa voce o sezione
sull'argomento filosofi è priva o carente di note e riferimenti bibliografici
puntuali. Sebbene vi siano una bibliografia e/o dei collegamenti esterni, manca
la contestualizzazione delle fonti con note a piè di pagina o altri riferimenti
precisi che indichino puntualmente la provenienza delle informazioni. Puoi
migliorare questa voce citando le fonti più precisamente. Segui i suggerimenti
del progetto di riferimento. Bruno Nardi (Spianate di Altopascio, 24 giugno
1884[1] – Roma, 9 luglio 1968[1]) è stato un filosofo italiano.
Indice 1 Biografia 2 Le
opere e gli studi su Dante 3 Riconoscimenti
4 Opere
principali 5 Note
6 Bibliografia
7 Voci
correlate 8 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Bruno Nardi, primogenito di una famiglia benestante, composta
di nove figli, viene avviato sin dalla tenera età alla carriera ecclesiastica.
Nel 1896 entra nel collegio dei frati francescani a Buggiano e nel 1900, a
sedici anni, diventa chierico, assumendo il nome di frate Angelo. Nel 1901 uscì
dal convento di Buggiano perché non aveva intenzione di continuare nella vita
religiosa, avendone perduta la vocazione. Proseguì gli studi di filosofia e
teologia frequentando il convento di Sant'Agostino di Nicosia in provincia di
Pisa. Volendo proseguire gli studi, i genitori gli indicarono un'unica strada,
quella di entrare in seminario e diventare prete. Nel 1902 Nardi venne ammesso
al seminario di Pescia e il 4 marzo 1907 diventò sacerdote. Qui si avvicinò
fugacemente al movimento Modernista, condannato da papa Pio X con l'Enciclica
Pascendi. Nel 1908 Nardi sostenne l'esame di concorso per una borsa di
studio triennale conferita dall'opera Pia Galeotti di Pescia al fine di
frequentare un corso di perfezionamento filosofico presso l'Università
Cattolica di Lovanio (Belgio). Nel 1909 Nardi aveva da poco iniziato a frequentare
l'Università Cattolica di Lovanio che già decise l'argomento della sua
tesi di laurea Sigieri di Brabante nella Divina Commedia e le fonti della
filosofia di Dante, che venne discussa nel 1911 con Maurice De Wulf. La lettura
dell'opera di Pierre Mandonnet, nella parte dedicata a Sigieri, non persuadeva
Nardi sulla soluzione data al problema della presenza di questo averroista nel
Paradiso dantesco. Due pregiudizi la inficiavano: il primo “consisteva in
un'inesatta visione storica di quello che nel Medio Evo e nel Rinascimento era
stato l'averroismo. Il secondo pregiudizio del Mandonnet era quello di ritenere
il pensiero filosofico di Dante conforme in tutto e per tutto a quello di San
Tommaso." Nel momento in cui Nardi entrava a Lovanio abbandonò il
modernismo teologico, ma non abbracciò la filosofia neo-scolastica che quella
Università belga stava elaborando. Non aveva senso per lui ripetere, sul finire
dell'Ottocento, nell'epoca del positivismo, l'operazione culturale di San
Tommaso che prevedeva l'unificazione di fede e ragione. Il metodo di
lavoro che Nardi seguì nel corso della sua vicenda di studioso e ricercatore,
rimase sempre improntato al massimo rigore filosofico, risentendo come una
traccia indelebile dell'esperienza di Lovanio, dove dovette affrontare studi
scientifici. Per Nardi l'interpretazione del testo coincide con la libertà, ma
tale atto libero non può attivarsi senza uno scrupoloso lavoro di scavo e
ricerca del materiale documentario, l'esatta interpretazione filosofica dei testi.
Ottenuta un'ulteriore borsa di studio dall'Opera Pia di Pescia per l'anno
scolastico 1911-12, il giovane sacerdote frequentò corsi di filosofia a Vienna,
Berlino, Bonn. Oltre alla pubblicazione negli anni 1911-12 della propria tesi
su Sigieri nella “Rivista di filosofia neo-scolastica”, Nardi vi pubblicò altri
interventi spesso critici con la linea editoriale del periodico. Intorno al
1912 Nardi si era iscritto ai corsi dell'Istituto di Studi Superiori di Firenze
perché voleva riconoscere in Italia la sua laurea in filosofia conseguita a
Lovanio. A Firenze discuterà la tesi di laurea in filosofia dedicata alla
figura del medico e filosofo padovano Pietro d'Abano. Nel 1912-13 Nardi
collaborava alla “Voce”, rivista fondata da Giuseppe Prezzolini con il quale
mantenne per lunghi anni una fitta corrispondenza. Nell'autunno 1914
Nardi volle abbandonare il sacerdozio. In una successiva lettera del 1941
indirizzata al vescovo Angelo Simonetti, spiegava che era stato l'ambiente
familiare a spingerlo nel 1907 a chiedere la sacra ordinazione, con preghiere e
minacce. Nel 1916 si trasferì a Mantova per insegnare filosofia presso il liceo
classico Virgilio, dove vi restò fino al 1934, anno in cui si trasferì a
Milano. A Mantova Nardi conobbe Giulietta Bertoldi che sposò nel 1921. Dal
matrimonio nacquero due figli: Tilde e Franco. Bruno Nardi nel 1938 ebbe
da Giovanni Gentile un incarico per l'insegnamento della filosofia medievale
presso la facoltà di lettere dell'Università di Roma. Tuttavia non ottenne la cattedra
universitaria (se non dopo molti anni), a causa dell'art. 5 del Concordato del
1929 in base al quale la curia romana escludeva i sacerdoti secolarizzati
dall’insegnamento. Nel 1960 gli fu assegnata la “Penna D’Oro” dal
presidente del Consiglio Fernando Tambroni. Nel 1962 gli fu conferita la laurea
honoris causa da parte dell’Università di Padova e nel 1964 da parte di quella
di Oxford. Le opere e gli studi su Dante Bruno Nardi si è dedicato
instancabilmente per di più in mezzo secolo allo studio del pensiero di Dante,
anche quando si occupava di Virgilio, di Sigieri di Brabante, di Pietro
Pomponazzi. Nardi ha saputo mettere in discussione schemi consolidati, ha
aperto strade nuove, ha formulato proposte inedite che ci permettono di avere
una più esatta comprensione dei testi danteschi. Una costante di Nardi è di
aver conservato sempre una propria autonomia, se non un vero e proprio
distacco, rispetto agli ambienti culturali in cui si era trovato ad agire,
fossero Lovanio, Firenze o Roma. Il coraggio con cui seppe polemicamente
ribaltare tesi consolidate negli ambienti accademici, gli fruttarono
ingiustamente isolamento e non adeguata considerazione rispetto alle sue
acquisizioni veramente anticipatrici. Basti pensare alle sue tesi
sull'averroismo latino, all'importanza data alla figura di Avicenna, di Alberto
Magno, al rifiuto del preteso tomismo di Dante. E se di Gentile parlava come di
un "vero e grande maestro", dandogli ragione nella sua polemica con
il De Wulf (relatore della sua tesi a Lovanio), Nardi pur tuttavia non aderirà
al Neoidealismo, ma vi trarrà soltanto spunti e stimoli per le sue
ricerche. L'incontro con Dante costituisce per Nardi l'episodio decisivo
della sua vita intellettuale e morale. Scriverà nel 1956: "in Dante trovai
il vero e primo maestro, quello a cui debbo la maggior gratitudine". Il
senso della sua ricerca è stato interrogare il "miracolo" della
Divina Commedia, questo "singolare poema sbocciato all'improvviso contro
tutte le buone regole dell'arte e del dittare"[2]. Secondo Nardi nella
commedia è custodita la Verità, che si è manifestata ad un poeta ispirato da
una profetica visione. La lunga fatica del Nardi è giunta a concludere che la
filosofia di Dante non si riduce a nessun sistema codificato; è una sintesi
complessa tendente a superare le antinomie e che mantiene intera la sua
spiccata originalità, il suo personalissimo pensiero. Per arrivare a coglierlo
occorre da una parte ristabilire il preciso significato delle parole in
rapporto alla terminologia filosofica e scientifica del Medioevo, e ricostruire
dall'altra l'ambiente culturale e l'atmosfera spirituale nelle quali Dante si
muoveva per arrivare a determinare la fonte, il libro letto da Dante.
Nardi ha gettato luce su molti elementi e suggestioni che Dante derivava dalla
filosofia araba e neoplatonica. Essenziali per comprendere Dante sono per Nardi
Alberto Magno e Sigieri più di Tommaso; così come il neoplatonismo e la cultura
araba più dello scolasticismo aristotelico. A Nardi interessava particolarmente
affrontare il tema della "visione dantesca", esperienza profetica che
seppe tradurre come nessun altro nel linguaggio della Divina Commedia. La
visione di Dante non è finzione letteraria, è rivelazione reale dell'aldilà,
concessa da Dio in virtù di un supremo privilegio. Dante visse il rapimento
mistico ed estatico al terzo cielo come esperienza reale. Dante credette di
essere sceso veramente nell'Inferno, salito veramente al Purgatorio e al
Paradiso. Per Nardi la Commedia si distacca dagli altri scritti di Dante, perché
ne è il loro compimento. Tale culmine si realizza attraverso un'esperienza
eccezionale, di origine mistico-religiosa a lui soltanto riservata, una
rivelazione che ha il potere di trasformare e rendere nuove tutte le altre
opere precedenti. L'opera dantesca, secondo Nardi, si deve suddividere in
tre fasi: la prima fase, che termina a venticinque anni, è sotto l'influsso di
Guinizzelli, assente del tutto la filosofia. La seconda fase, quella
filosofico-politico, coincide con le rime allegoriche, il Convivio, il De
vulgari eloquentia e la Monarchia. La terza fase, quella della poesia
profetica, coincide con la Divina Commedia, poema che segna il ritorno
all'unità della filosofia cristiana. Dante vi compare come profeta che deve
annunciare al mondo l'avvento di un inviato di Dio per la redenzione umana. La
Commedia è "poema sacro", la sua è poesia religiosa. Nardi vede in
questa terza fase finalmente riconciliarsi la speranza cristiana spezzatasi con
l'aristotelismo e l'avverroismo. Per Nardi l'aristotelismo è inconciliabile con
il cristianesimo, e il tomismo pertanto è "il più strano paradosso del
pensiero umano". La Commedia testimonia della riunificazione della
filosofia con la rivelazione di Dio. Dante visse una visione profetica,
esperienza che mancò ad Aristotele. Riconoscimenti Nel 1955 l'Accademia
dei Lincei gli ha conferito il Premio Feltrinelli per la Filosofia.[3]
Opere principali Dante e la cultura medievale: nuovi saggi di filosofia
dantesca, Bari, Laterza, 1949 Saggi e note di critica dantesca, Milano-Napoli,
Ricciardi, 1966 Saggi di filosofia dantesca, Firenze, La Nuova Italia, 1967
Studi di filosofia medievale, Roma, Ed. di storia e letteratura, 1979 Dante e
la cultura medievale, introduzione di Tullio Gregory, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1985
Note Paolo Falzone, NARDI, Bruno, in Dizionario biografico degli
italiani, vol. 77, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 2012. URL
consultato il 25 agosto 2018. ^ Bruno Nardi in "Giornale Critico della
Filosofia Italiana", XXXV (1956), p.278 ^ Premi Feltrinelli 1950-2011, su
lincei.it. URL consultato il 17 novembre 2019. Bibliografia Medioevo e
Rinascimento: studi in onore di Bruno Nardi, Firenze, Sansoni, 1955 Alberto
Asor Rosa, Dizionario della letteratura italiana del Novecento, ad vocem
Sigieri di Brabante e Alessandro Achillini, 24, 1943, pp. 101–145 Di un nuovo
commento alla canzone del Cavalcanti sull'amore, “Cultura neolatina”,Nardi,
Noterella poetica sull'averroismo di Guido Cavalcanti, Rassegna filosofica, 3,
1954 pp. 47–71, 5-7 1947, pp. 123– 156 Sigieri di Brabante e le fonti della
filosofia di Dante, in “Rivista di filosofia neoclassica” 1911, III e IV 1912,
pp. 174–180 Sigieri di Brabante nella Divina Commedia e le fonti della
filosofia di Dante, Spianate, 1912, pag. 11 La teoria dell'anima e la generazione
delle forme secondo Pietro d'Abano, pp. 723–737, “Rivista di filosofia
neoscolastica”, 1912, pp. 81–97 Vittorino da Feltre al paese natale di
Virgilio, in “Atti del IV Congresso nazionale di Studi Romani”, IV, Roma, 1938
pp. 174–180 Lyhomo (note al “Baldus” di T. Folengo), “Giornale critico della
filosofia italiana”, 1941. Nel mondo di Dante, Edizioni di Storia e
Letteratura, Roma, 1944. Sigieri di Brabante nel pensiero del rinascimento
italiano, Edizioni italiane, Roma, 1945. Dante profeta, in Dante e la cultura
medioevale. Nuovi saggi di filosofia dantesca, Bari, Laterza 1949, pp. 392–393
La mistica averroistica e Pico della Mirandola, L' aristotelismo padovano dal
XIV al XVI secolo, Firenze, Sansoni 1958; già edita in “Archivio di filosofia, Umanesimo
e Machiavellismo”, Padova 1949, pp. 55–74 Il naturalismo del Rinascimento,
Corso di storia della filosofia. Anno accademico 1948-1949, a cura di T.
Gregory, Roma, Edizioni Universitarie 1949. L'alessandrinismo nel Rinascimento,
Corso di Storia della filosofia. Anno accademico 1949-1950, a cura di I. Borzi
e C. R. Crotti, Roma, “La Goliardica” 1950 La fine dell'averroismo, in “Pensée
humaniste et tradition chrétienne aux XVeme et XVIeme siècle”, Paris, Boivin
1950, pp. 139–151 Gli scritti del Pomponazzi. “Giornale critico della filosofia
italiana”, 1950, Le opere inedite del pomponazzi. Il fragmento marciano del
commento al “De Anima” e il maestro del pomponazzi, Pietro Trapolino, pp.
427–442 Il problema della verità, soggetto e oggetto dell'conoscere nella
filosofia antica e medioevale, Editrice Universale di Roma, Roma, 1951. La
crisi del Rinascimento e il dubbio cartesiano, Corso di storia della filosofia.
Anno accademico 1950-1951, a cura di T. Gregory, “La Goliardica” 1951 Il
commento di Simplicio al “De Anima” nelle controversie della fine del sec. XV e
del sec. XVI, “Archivio di filosofia”, Padova 1951. La miscredenza e il
carattere morale di Nicoletto Vernia, Giornale critico della filosofia
italiana, 1951, pp. 103–108 Le opere inedite del Pomponazzi, “Giornale critico
della filosofia italiana” 1951. Le meditazioni di Cartesio, Lezioni di storia
della filosofia. Anno accademico 1951-1952, “La Goliardica”, Roma, 1952.
Pomponazzi… e la cicogna dell'intelletto, “Giornale critico della filosofia italiana”
1952, pp. 267–269 e 283-284 Il dualismo cartesiano, Corso di storia della
filosofia. Anno accademico 1952-1953, a cura di T. Gregory, “La Goliardica”,
Roma, 1953. Il dualismo cartesiano degli Occasionalisti a Leibniz, Corso di
storia della filosofia. Anno accademico 1953-1954, a cura di T. Gregory, “La
Goliardica”, Roma, 1954. Ancora qualche notizia e aneddoto su Nicoletto Vernia,
Giornale critico della filosofia italiana, 1955, pp. 496–503 Marcantonio e
Teofilo Zimara: due filosofi galatinesi del Cinquecento, “Archivio storico
Pugliese”, 1955 (apparso nel 1957), p. 39 Un'importante notizia su scritti di
Sigieri a Bologna e a Padova alla fine del sec. XV , “Giornale critico della
filosofia italiana”, 1956, pp. 204–209 Contributo alla biografia di Vittorino
da Feltre, “Bollettino del Museo civico di Padova”, 1956 (apparso nel 1958), p.
31 Letteratura e cultura del Quattrocento, in “La civiltà veneziana del
Quattrocento”, Firenze, Sansoni 1957, pp. 99–145 Appunti intorno al medico e
filosofo padovano Pietro Trapolin, In Miscellanea in onore di Roberto Cessi,
Edizioni di Storia e letteratura, Roma, 1958, pp. 21–46 Copernico studente a
Padova, in Mélanges offerts à Etienne Gilson, de l'Accadémie Française,
Toronto-Paris 1959. Studi e problemi di critica testuale. Convegno di studi di
filologia italiana nel centenario della Commissione per i Testi di Lingua, (7-9
aprile 1960) Bologna, pp. 273–305 L'aristotelismo della Scolastica e i
Francescani, in Studi di Filosofia Medioevale, Edizioni di Storia e letteratura,
Roma 1960, p. 206 Pietro Pomponazzi e la teoria di Avicenna intorno alla
generazione spontanea dell'uomo 1962 Mantuanitas vergilana, Edizioni
dell'Ateneo, Roma 1963 La scuola di Rialto e l'Umanesimo veneziano, in
Umanesimo Europeo e Umanesimo veneziano, Sansoni, Firenze 1963, pp. 39–139
Studi su Pietro Pomponazzi, Le Monnier, Firenze 1965” Saggi sull'Aristotelismo
Padovano dal secolo XIV al XVI, Le Monnier 1965 Corsi manoscritti di lezioni e
ritratto di Pietro Pomponazzi, in Atti del VI Convegno internazionale di studi
sul Rinascimento (sett. 1961), Sansoni, Firenze 1965, pp. 153–200 Studi su
Pietro Pomponazzi, Le Monnier, Firenze 1965. Saggi e note di critica dantesca,
Ricciardi 1966, pp. 268–305 Filosofia e teologia ai tempi di Dante in rapporto
al pensiero del poeta, in Saggi e note di critica dantesca, Ricciardi, Milano,
Napoli, 1966, pp. 3–109 Saggi e note sulla cultura veneta del Quattro e
Cinquecento, a cura di P. Mazzantini, Editrice Antenore, Padova 1968 Saggi
sulla cultura veneta del Quattro e del Cinquecento, a cura di P. Mazzantini,
Antenore, Padova 1971 Voci correlate Divina Commedia Collegamenti esterni Bruno
Nardi, su Treccani.it – Enciclopedie on line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia
Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Bruno Nardi, in Enciclopedia Italiana, Istituto
dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Bruno Nardi, in Dizionario
biografico degli italiani, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su
Wikidata Bruno Nardi, su siusa.archivi.beniculturali.it, Sistema Informativo
Unificato per le Soprintendenze Archivistiche. Modifica su Wikidata (EN) Opere
di Bruno Nardi, su Open Library, Internet Archive. Modifica su Wikidata (FR)
Pubblicazioni di Bruno Nardi, su Persée, Ministère de l'Enseignement supérieur,
de la Recherche et de l'Innovation. Modifica su Wikidata Tullio Gregory, Nardi,
Bruno, in Enciclopedia dantesca, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 1970. Un
profilo biografico nel sito "dante online", Consulenza scientifica
Società Dantesca Italiana. V · D · M Dante Alighieri V · D · M Vincitori del
Premio Feltrinelli Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 12327819 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 0870 2187 · SBN IT\ICCU\CFIV\110784 · LCCN
(EN) n83049414 · GND (DE) 119470691 · BNF (FR) cb120544863 (data) · BNE (ES)
XX1376779 (data) · NLA (EN) 35778078 · BAV (EN) 495/127043 · WorldCat
Identities (EN) lccn-n83049414 Biografie Portale Biografie Filosofia Portale
Filosofia Categorie: Filosofi italiani del XX secoloNati nel 1884Morti nel
1968Nati il 24 giugnoMorti il 9 luglioNati ad AltopascioMorti a RomaVincitori
del Premio Feltrinelli[altre]
naso del
camello – thing edge of the wedge -- argumentum ad domino: slippery slope argument, an argument that an action
apparently unobjectionable in itself would set in motion a train of events
leading ultimately to an undesirable outcome. The metaphor portrays one on the
edge of a slippery slope, where taking the first step down will inevitably
cause sliding to the bottom. For example, it is sometimes argued that voluntary
euthanasia should not be legalized because this will lead to killing unwanted
people, e.g. the handicapped or elderly, against their will. In some versions
the argument aims to show that one should intervene to stop an ongoing train of
events; e.g., it has been argued that suppressing a Communist revolution in one
country was necessary to prevent the spread of Communism throughout a whole
region via the so-called domino effect. Slippery slope arguments with dubious
causal assumptions are often classed as fallacies under the general heading of
the fallacy of the false cause. This argument is also sometimes called the
wedge argument. There is some disagreement concerning the breadth of the
category of slippery slope arguments. Some would restrict the term to arguments
with evaluative conclusions, while others construe it more broadly so as to
include other sorites arguments.
Natoli -- Salvatore Natoli Da
Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search Nota
disambigua.svg Disambi guazione – Se stai cercando l'omonimo politico, vedi Salvatore
Natoli (politico). Natoli (a sinistra) al convegno Le virtù dei Giusti e
l'identità dell'Europa[1] Salvatore Natoli (Patti, 18 settembre 1942) è un
filosofo e accademico italiano. Indice 1 Biografia 2 Attività
accademica 2.1 Filosofia
del dolore 3 Opere
4 Note
5 Altri
progetti 6 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Si è laureato in Filosofia presso l'Università Cattolica di
Milano, dove ha trascorso gli anni nel Collegio Augustinianum. Ha insegnato
logica alla Facoltà di Lettere e filosofia dell'Università Ca' Foscari di
Venezia e Filosofia della politica alla Facoltà di Scienze Politiche
dell'Università degli Studi di Milano.[2] Attualmente è professore
ordinario di Filosofia teoretica presso la Facoltà di scienze della formazione
dell'Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca. Attività accademica In
particolare, Salvatore Natoli è il propugnatore di un'etica neopagana che,
riprendendo elementi del pensiero greco (in particolare, il senso del tragico),
riesca a fondare una felicità terrena, nella consapevolezza dei limiti
dell'uomo e del suo essere necessariamente un ente finito[3], in
contrapposizione con la tradizione cristiana. Filosofia del dolore Una
particolare e approfondita analisi sul tema del dolore[4] è stata condotta da
Natoli in diverse sue opere.[5] Il dolore è parte essenziale della vita e
per gli antichi filosofi greci era l'altra faccia della felicità: «I
greci si sentono parte e momento della più grande e generale natura, crudele e
insieme divina, si sentono momento di quest'eterno e irrefrenabile fluire, ove
non vi è differenza tra bene e male allo stesso modo in cui il dolore si volge
nella gioia e la gioia nel dolore[6]» La natura infatti dava la vita e
nello stesso tempo crudelmente la toglieva. Il dolore in realtà fa parte della vita
ma non la nega: il dolore può essere vissuto e reso sopportabile se chi soffre
percepisce non la pietà dell'altro ma che la sua sofferenza è importante per
chi entra in rapporto con lui e con la sua sofferenza. Se chi soffre si sente
importante per qualcuno, anche se soffre ha motivo di vivere. Se non è
importante per nessuno può lasciarsi prendere dalla morte. Secondo Natoli
l'esperienza del dolore ha due aspetti: uno oggettivo, il danno («Nel momento
in cui la sofferenza è motivata attraverso la colpa, colui che soffre non solo
patisce il danno, ma ne diviene anche il responsabile»[7]); e uno soggettivo,
cioè come viene vissuta e motivata la sofferenza. La stessa sofferenza è
interpretata in modo differente da diverse culture: per alcune il dolore fa
parte della contingenza del mondo fenomenico, dell'apparenza per altre invece,
è vissuto intensamente come ad esempio nel cristianesimo dove al dolore viene
associata la redenzione. Vi è una circolarità tra il dolore e il senso che fa
sì che, pur essendo il dolore universale, ad ognuno appartenga un dolore
diverso. Vi è dunque un senso del dolore e un non senso che il dolore
causa. Il dolore infatti contraddice la ragione che non sa darsi spiegazione
del perché il dolore abbia colpito proprio quell'individuo e per quali colpe
quello abbia commesso e, infine, perché il dolore travagli il mondo. Il
tentativo di rispondere a queste fondamentali domande fa sì che l'individuo
scopra nuove forze in lui che generino un vittorioso uomo nuovo che, partendo
dall'esperienza del dolore, s'interroghi sul senso dell'esistere, tenendo
sempre presente però, che il dolore può segnare anche una definitiva
sconfitta. Nel dolore l'uomo può scoprire le sue possibilità di crescita
ma questo non vuol dire disprezzare il piacere, sostenendo che questo, invece,
ottunde gli animi. Il piacere invece affina la sensibilità come accade per chi
ascolta frequentemente una buona musica. Il piacere invece è negativo quando
diventa «monomaniaco, eccessivo, quando, anziché sviluppare la sensibilità, la
fossilizza in un punto di eccessiva stimolazione. E l'eccessivo stimolo
distrugge l'organo.»[8] A differenza del piacere, dell'amore che è dialogo tra
due, che è espansivo e affabulatorio anche quando è silenzioso, l'esperienza
del dolore chiude il singolo nella sua individualità e incomunicabilità, poiché
«il corpo sano sente il mondo, il corpo malato sente il corpo. E quindi il
corpo diventa una barriera tra il proprio desiderio, l'universo delle
possibilità, e la realizzabilità delle medesime possibilità.»[9] Sebbene
il dolore sia "insensato" si cerca di spiegarlo con le parole spesso
inutili ed allora si cerca dapprima la parola "efficace" che offre la
tecnica o la parola "efficace" della preghiera, della fede, che non
annulla il dolore, ma dà una speranza nel miracolo. L'efficace uso della parola
per spiegare il dolore fa sì che gli uomini trovino conforto nella comune
sofferenza, in quella universalità del dolore dove però ognuno rimane nella sua
singolarità di senso. La parola efficace della tecnica[10] per un verso ha
alleviato il dolore ma per un altro può creare delle condizioni di vita
tali per cui la stessa tecnica controlla il dolore senza togliere la malattia,
creando così un'esistenza prolungata senza futuro sotto la continua incombenza
della morte: «A partire dal Settecento, ma ancor più nel corso
dell’Ottocento, la tecnica è stata sempre di più associata alle filosofie del
progresso: infatti ha emancipato gli uomini dai vincoli naturali, ha ridotto il
peso della fatica, ha attenuato il dolore, ha accresciuto il benessere, ha
conteso lo spazio alla morte differendola sempre di più… ma la tecnica, oggi, è
nelle condizioni di interferire in modo profondo nei processi naturali
modificandone i cicli…[11]» Una soluzione all'inevitabilità del dolore può
essere l'adesione a un nuovo paganesimo secondo l'antica visione greca
dell'accettazione dell'esistenza del finito e della morte dell'uomo. «Il
cristianesimo ha alterato l'anima pagana. Nel momento in cui il sogno di un
mondo senza dolore è apparso, non ci si adatta più a questo dolore anche se si
crede che un mondo senza dolore non esisterà mai. La coscienza è stata visitata
da un sogno che non si cancella più, e anche se lo crede inverosimile tuttavia
vuole che ci sia.[12]» Anche il cristianesimo infatti teorizza l'uomo
finito, ma non essere naturale destinato alla morte, ma come creatura di Dio.
Per il cristiano la vita finita condotta secondo il dovere porta
all'accettazione della morte come passaggio a Dio. Per il neopaganesimo la vita
finita è degna di essere vissuta senza speranza di infinitezza ma vivendola
secondo un ethos, che non è dovere di obbedire a un comando morale con la
speranza di un premio eterno, ma buona e spontanea abitudine di una condotta
consapevole dell'universale fragilità umana. Magnifying glass icon
mgx2.svg Lo
stesso argomento in dettaglio: Dolore (filosofia). Opere Soggetto e fondamento.
Studi su Aristotele e Cartesio, Padova, Antenore, 1979 (nuova edizione Milano,
Feltrinelli, 2010. ISBN 978-88-07-72211-0. La scienza e la critica del
linguaggio (a cura di), Venezia, Marsilio, 1980. Ermeneutica e genealogia.
Filosofia e metodo in Nietzsche, Heidegger, Foucault, Milano, Feltrinelli,
1981. L'esperienza del dolore. Le forme del patire nella cultura occidentale,
Milano, Feltrinelli, 1986. ISBN 88-07-08045-1. Giovanni Gentile filosofo
europeo, Torino, Bollati Boringhieri, 1989. ISBN 88-339-0499-7. Vita buona vita
felice. Scritti di etica e politica, Milano, Feltrinelli, 1990. ISBN
88-07-10128-9. Teatro filosofico. Gli scenari del sapere tra linguaggio e
storia, Milano, Feltrinelli, 1991. ISBN 88-07-10139-4. L'incessante meraviglia.
Filosofia, espressione, verità, Milano, Lanfranchi, 1993. ISBN 88-363-0035-9.
La felicità. Saggio di teoria degli affetti, Milano, Feltrinelli, 1994. ISBN
88-07-10172-6. I nuovi pagani, Milano, Il Saggiatore, 1995. ISBN 88-428-0251-4.
Dizionario dei vizi e delle virtù, Milano, Feltrinelli, 1996. ISBN
88-07-81404-8. La politica e il dolore (con Leonardo Verga), Roma, EL, 1996.
ISBN 88-7910-717-8. Soggetto e fondamento. Il sapere dell'origine e la
scientificità della filosofia, Milano, Bruno Mondadori, 1996. ISBN
88-424-9417-8. Delle cose ultime e penultime. Un dialogo (con Bruno Forte),
Milano, Mondadori, 1997. ISBN 88-04-43386-8. Dialogo su Leopardi. Natura,
poesia, filosofia (con Antonio Prete), Milano, Bruno Mondadori, 1998. ISBN
88-424-9454-2. Progresso e catastrofe: dinamiche della modernità, Milano,
Marinotti, 1999. ISBN 88-8273-016-6. Dio e il divino. Confronto con il
cristianesimo, Brescia, Morcelliana, 1999. ISBN 88-372-1730-7. La politica e la
virtù (con Luigi Franco Pizzolato), Roma, Lavoro, 1999. ISBN 88-7910-859-X. La
felicità di questa vita. Esperienza del mondo e stagioni dell'esistenza,
Milano, Mondadori, 2000. ISBN 88-04-46655-3. L'attimo fuggente o della
felicità, Roma, Edup, 2001. ISBN 88-8421-026-7. Stare al mondo. Escursioni nel
tempo presente, Milano, Feltrinelli, 2002. ISBN 88-07-17062-0. Il cristianesimo
di un non credente, Magnano, Qiqajon, 2002. ISBN 88-8227-125-0. Libertà e
destino nella tragedia greca, Brescia, Morcelliana, 2002. ISBN 88-372-1883-4.
Stare al mondo. Escursioni nel tempo presente, Milano, Feltrinelli, 2002. ISBN
88-07-17062-0. Parole della filosofia o dell’arte di meditare, Milano,
Feltrinelli, 2004 ISBN 88-07-10365-6. La verità in gioco. Scritti su Foucault,
Milano, Feltrinelli, 2005.ISBN 88-07-81839-6. Guida alla formazione del
carattere, Brescia, Morcelliana, 2006. ISBN 88-372-2093-6. Sul male assoluto.
Nichilismo e idoli nel Novecento, Brescia, Morcelliana, 2006. ISBN
88-372-2163-0. I dilemmi della speranza: un dialogo (con Nichi Vendola),
Molfetta, La meridiana, 2006. ISBN 88-89197-91-9. La salvezza senza fede,
Milano, Feltrinelli, 2007. ISBN 978-88-07-81948-3. La mia filosofia: Forme del
mondo e saggezza del vivere, Pisa, Ets, 2007. ISBN 978-88-467-1913-3. L'attimo
fuggente e la stabilità del bene, (contiene la Lettera a Meneceo sulla felicità
di Epicuro), Roma, Edup, 2007. ISBN 978-88-8421-182-8. Edipo e Giobbe.
Contraddizione e paradosso, Brescia, Morcelliana, 2008. ISBN 978-88-372-2285-7.
Dialogo sui novissimi (con Francesco Brancato), Troina, Città Aperta, 2009.
ISBN 978-88-8137-397-0. Il crollo del mondo. Apocalisse ed escatologia,
Brescia, Morcelliana, 2009. ISBN 978-88-372-2353-3. L'edificazione di sé.
Istruzioni sulla vita interiore, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2010. ISBN
978-88-420-9389-3. Il buon uso del mondo. Agire nell'età del rischio, Milano,
Mondadori, 2010. ISBN 978-88-04-59696-7. Figure d'Occidente. Platone, Nietzsche
e Heidegger (con Massimo Donà e Carlo Sini, introduzione di Erasmo Silvio
Storace), Milano, AlboVersorio, 2011. ISBN 88-89130-76-8. Eros e Philia,
Milano, AlboVersorio, 2011. ISBN 978-88-89130-94-0. Nietzsche e il teatro della
filosofia, Milano, Feltrinelli, 2011. ISBN 978-88-07-72291-2. Le parole ultime.
Dialogo sui problemi del «fine vita» (con Ivan Cavicchi, Piero Coda e altri),
Bari, Dedalo, 2011. ISBN 978-88-220-6317-5. I comandamenti. Non ti farai idolo
né immagine, Bologna, Il mulino, 2011. ISBN 978-88-15-15045-5. Le verità del corpo,
Milano, AlboVersorio, 2012. ISBN 978-88-97553-11-3. Sperare oggi (con Franco
Mosconi), Trento, Il margine, 2012. ISBN 978-88-6089-096-2. Note ^ Le virtù dei
Giusti e l'identità dell'Europa ^ Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani alla voce
corrispondente ^ S. Natoli, La salvezza senza fede, Feltrinelli 2007 ^ Ove non
indicato diversamente, le informazioni contenute nel paragrafo "Filosofia
del dolore" hanno come fonte Enciclopedia multimediale delle Scienze
Filosofiche - Salvatore Natoli - Il senso del dolore Archiviato il 22 marzo
2014 in Internet Archive. ^ L'esperienza del dolore. Le forme del patire nella
cultura occidentale, La politica e il dolore, Dialogo su Leopardi: natura,
poesia, filosofia, Edipo e Giobbe: contraddizione e paradosso. ^ S.Natoli, La salvezza
senza fede, Feltrinelli 2007 p.61 ^ S.Natoli. op.cit, p.92 ^ S. Natoli, Op,
cit. ibidem. ^ S. Natoli, Op. cit. ibidem. ^ S. Natoli, L'esperienza del dolore
nell'età della tecnica Archiviato il 13 luglio 2015 in Internet Archive. ^
Salvatore Natoli: Siamo "finiti". E anche la tecnica lo è, da Europa,
6 dicembre 2006. ^ S. Natoli, I Nuovi pagani, Il saggiatore, Milano, 1995 Altri
progetti Collabora a Wikiquote Wikiquote contiene citazioni di o su Salvatore
Natoli Collegamenti esterni Salvatore Natoli, su Treccani.it – Enciclopedie on
line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana. Modifica su Wikidata Opere di
Salvatore Natoli / Salvatore Natoli (altra versione) / Salvatore Natoli (altra
versione), su openMLOL, Horizons Unlimited srl. Modifica su Wikidata (EN) Opere
di Salvatore Natoli, su Open Library, Internet Archive. Modifica su Wikidata
Registrazioni di Salvatore Natoli, su RadioRadicale.it, Radio Radicale.
Modifica su Wikidata Intervista a Salvatore Natoli, per Il Rasoio di Occam, di
Carlo Crosato. Video intervista su Asia.it, su asia.it. Dov'è la vittoria?
Salvatore Natoli e “l'Italia civile che resta minoranza” intervista di Paolo
Barbie, Il Fatto Quotidiano, 24 novembre 2013. Controllo di autorità VIAF (EN)
262005340 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 1019 9058 · SBN IT\ICCU\CFIV\018309 · LCCN (EN)
n81073060 · GND (DE) 13068791X · BNF (FR) cb12030023q (data) · BNE (ES)
XX1145959 (data) · BAV (EN) 495/234537 · WorldCat Identities (EN)
lccn-n81073060 Biografie Portale Biografie Filosofia Portale Filosofia Letteratura
Portale Letteratura Università Portale Università Categorie: Filosofi italiani
del XX secoloAccademici italiani del XX secoloNati nel 1942Nati il 18
settembreNati a PattiNatoliProfessori dell'Università Ca' FoscariProfessori
dell'Università degli Studi di MilanoProfessori dell'Università degli Studi di
Milano-BicoccaStudenti dell'Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore[altre]
natura: natura – natura humana -- human nature
– Grice distinguishes very sharply between a human and a person – a human
becomes a person via transubstantiation, a metaphysical routine – human nature
is a quality or group of qualities, belonging to all and only humans, that
explains the kind of being we are. We are all two-footed and featherless, but
‘featherless biped’ does not explain our socially significant characteristics.
We are also all both animals and rational beings (at least potentially), and
‘rational animal’ might explain the special features we have that other kinds
of beings, such as angels, do not. The belief that there is a human nature is
part of the wider thesis that all natural kinds have essences. Acceptance of
this position is compatible with many views about the specific qualities that
constitute human nature. In addition to rationality and embodiment, philosophers
have said that it is part of our nature to be wholly selfinterested,
benevolent, envious, sociable, fearful of others, able to speak and to laugh,
and desirous of immortality. Philosophers disagree about how we are to discover
our nature. Some think metaphysical insight into eternal forms or truths is
required, others that we can learn it from observation of biology or of
behavior. Most have assumed that only males display human nature fully, and
that females, even at their best, are imperfect or incomplete exemplars.
Philosophers also disagree on whether human nature determines morality. Some
think that by noting our distinctive features we can infer what God wills us to
do. Others think that our nature shows at most the limits of what morality can
require, since it would plainly be pointless to direct us to ways of living
that our nature makes impossible. Some philosophers have argued that human
nature is plastic and can be shaped in different ways. Others hold that it is
not helpful to think in terms of human nature. They think that although we
share features as members of a biological species, our other qualities are
socially constructed. If the differences between male and female reflect
cultural patterns of child rearing, work, and the distribution of power, our
biologically common features do not explain our important characteristics and
so do not constitute a nature. Grice -- Grice: beyond the natural/non-natural
distinction ABSTRACT. When we
approach, with Grice, the philosophical question involved in what we may call
the ‘natural’/ ‘non-natural’ distinction, various conceptual possibilities are
open to us. In this contribution, after providing a a historical survey of the
distinction with special focus on its
treatment by Grice, I offer a thesis which, echoing Bennett, I label
‘meaning-naturalism.’ Keywords: H.
Paul Grice, meaning, naturalism, non-natural meaning Introduction
Grice sees his approach to ‘meaning’ (or “meaning that …”, as he would
rather put it) as ‘rhapsody on a theme by Peirce.’ When he presents his “Meaning” to the Oxford
Philosophical Society (only to be published almost a decade later by The
Philosophical Review), Grice endows the philosophical community with a
full-blown ‘natural’/‘non-natural’ distinction, for which he has naturally
become somewhat infamously famous, as when a philosopher, exploring the
different causes of death of this or that other philosopher cites Grice as
having passed of ‘non-natural causes.’
What is Grice’s ‘natural’/‘non-natural’ distinction about? As a member of the so-called ‘Oxford school
of “ordinary-language” philosophy’ (he disliked the sobriquet), Grice seems
initially to have been concerned with what at a later stage he calls a
‘pre-theoretical’ exploration of this or that use of the lexeme ‘mean,’ notably
by Peirce. Grice finds Peirce’s attempt
to ‘replace’ the vernacular Anglo-Saxon ‘mean’ with ‘krypto-technical’ jargon
as not too sympathetic to these or those Oxonian ears. So, it is this lexeme,
or ‘expression,’ ‘mean,’ to which Grice’s distinction applies. Carefully, as Bennett would point out, using
lower-case ‘x’ and ‘y’ for tokens, Grice attempts to formulate the distinction into two separate
super-expressions, where the sub-expression “means that …” occurs: i. x
meansN that p. ii. x meansNN that q. What is ‘x’? Grice spends some time on this
double-edged elucidation (and indeed, the ‘that’-clause explication is a later
vintage). He grants that his main focus of concern is with (ii). In passing, he
makes some rather intriguing running commentary. It’s clear why Grice feels the need to spend
some time in explicating what he is about to do. Grice’s distinction, as he
formulates it, is supposed to ‘refine’ this or that distinction, made by this
or that philosopher. While ‘ordinary-language’ philosophers are taken as
approaching ‘ordinary-language,’ their underlying motivation is to criticise
this or that philosopher’s mischaracterisation of the linguistic nuance at
hand. Grice’s avowed aim in his talk to
the Oxford Philosophical Society is to shed light on, to use his
characteristically cavalier wording, ‘what people have been thinking,’ which in
that context, means ‘what other philosophers have been thinking’ – including
Ayer -- or even getting at, ‘when they speak of such things as “natural” versus
“conventional” signs.’ Grice thinks
that, by his sticking with ‘meaning that …’ (rather than ‘sign’) and
‘non-natural’ (rather ‘conventional’) he is setting a better scene. Why would
this be a conceptual improvement? Grice gives two reasons. First, and again, Grice presents himself as a
representative of the Oxonian school of ‘ordinary-language’ philosophy, and
exercising what these philosophers referred to this or that adventure in
‘linguistic botany.’ Grice thus sets to explore, introspectively, relying on
his intuitions behind his own usage, philosophical and other: a ‘word,’ for
example, Grice notes, he would not naturally describe as a ‘sign.’ In Grice’s
(but surely not Peirce’s) idio-lect, the expression ‘sign’ is restricted to
things like a traffic signal, say.
Second, and again in this adventure in ‘linguistic-botany,’ x (or
strictly ‘a,’ for ‘agent,’ now) that can ‘mean’ that p, in a way that is
specifically NON-factive (as he’ll later put it, echoing the Kiparskys) but which
need not be ‘conventional.’ Grice gives the example of ‘a gesture,’ which a few
philosophers would associate with Sraffa’s!
The historical background Grice’s
cavalier reference to ‘what people are getting at’ sounds charmingly Oxonian.
He surely has no intention to underestimate the knowledge of the fellow members
of The Oxford Philosophical Society. He won’t be seen as ‘going to lecture’
them. This is not a seminar, but a public occasion. He is allowed to be a
cavalier. Had this been a seminar, and being
indeed a Lit. Hum. Oxon., Grice knows he can trace the distinction he is
making, as he refines alternative ones, to Plato’s Cratylus, where we have
Socrates and his dialogical companion playing with various adverbial modifiers,
notably, ‘phusei’ and ‘thesei.’ Plato’s
‘phusei,’ surely translates to Grice’s ‘nature’ in ‘natural.’ Plato is
carefully in avoiding the subsantive nominative ‘phusis.’ His ‘phusei’ is meant
to modify the way something may such may be said to ‘mean’ (‘semein’). Possibly
the earliest incarnation of what later will be dubbed as the ‘pooh’ pooh theory
of language. Plato’s ‘thesei’ is
slightly more complicated. It is best to stay lexically conservative here and
understand it to mean, ‘by position,’ i.e. or, in Grice’s freer prose, by
convention. While Plato has to his disposal various other lexemes to do duty
for this, he chooses a rather weak one, and again, not in the nominative
“thesis,” but as applied to something that ‘means’ that p or q. In any case,
Plato’s interest, as indeed Grice’s, is ‘dialectic.’ That x (or a) means that q
thesei, by position, entails (as Plato would say if he could borrow from Moore)
that it is not the case that x (or a) means that q phusei, by nature. The
distinction is supposed to be absolute.
The ‘phusis’/‘thesis’ distinction undergoes a fascinating development in
the philosophical tradition, from Greek (or Grecian) into Latin (Roman), and
eventually makes it to scholastic philosophy: ‘per natura’/ ‘per positionem,’
or ‘ad placitum.’ Closer to Grice,
authors partly philosophising in Grice’s vernacular, such as Hobbes, who is
indeed fighting against Latin for the the use of the vernacular in
philosophical discourse, will speak of what Grice knew would be familiar
terminology to his Oxford audience: ‘natural sign’ versus, rather than Grice’s
intentionally rather ugly-sounding ‘non-natural,’ ‘artificial’ or
‘conventional’ sign. Grice does not use
‘scare quotes,’ but perhaps Umberto Eco would have wished he did! (Indeed, it
is best to see Grice as treating ‘a means that p’ as the only ‘literal’ use of
‘mean,’ with ‘natural’ and ‘expression-relative’ uses as ‘derivative, or
transferred, or figurative. While he does NOT use ‘scare quotes’ for his
examples of ‘meanN,’ as in iii. iii.
Smoke means that there is fire. Grice
cares to quote in the talk from just one rather recent philosopher who was
being discussed at Oxford in connection with A. J. Ayer’s approach to ‘moral’
language as being merely ‘emotive.’
Grice makes an explicit reference to Stevenson. While Grice finds
Stevenson’s account of the ‘non-natural’ use of “mean” ‘circular’ (in that it
relies on conditioning related to ‘communication,’ Stevenson explores various
‘natural’ uses of ‘mean’, and, to emphasise the figurative status, explicitly
employs ‘scare quotes.’ For Stevenson, (iii) becomes (iv). iv. Smoke ‘means’ that there is fire. For surely ‘smoke’ cannot have an
intention – and ‘mean’ is too close to ‘intend’ in the Anglo-Saxon vernacular
to allow smoke to mean that p or q – ‘mean’ at most. This is crucial (and
suggests just one way of the figuration of ‘mean,’ that will go two ways with
Grice when he sees this figuration as applying to ‘expression-relative’ uses of
‘mean,’ as in v. ‘There’s smoke’ ‘means’ that there’s
smoke. (Ubi fumus ibi ignis). By
carefully deploying scare-quotes, Stevenson is fighting against ‘animism.’ The
root of ‘mean’ is cognate with Latin ‘mentare’ and ‘mentire,’ and can notably
be traced back to ‘mens,’ the mind. Surely smoke cannot really (if we must use
one of those adverbs that Austin called ‘trouser words’) that there is fire –
just ‘mean’ it. A careful ‘utterer’ is using the same lexeme in an obviously
‘figurative’ way, and marking this fact explicitly by appealing to an ‘echoic,’
or as Grice may prefer, ‘trans-categorial,’ use. The ‘fun’ side to this (and for Grice,
‘philosophy need be fun’) is that Grice’s distinction then becomes now the
‘non-natural’/‘natural’ distinction. Scare quotes signal that the realm of ‘mean’
is the realm of the ‘mind,’ and not what Plato might have seen as the realm of
nature simpliciter. But back to Hobbes.
Indeed, Hobbes may be drawing on the earlier explorations on this in Latin, by,
of all people, Ockham, who speaks now of scenarios where ‘significare’ is
modified by the adverb ‘naturaliter,’ and scenarios where it is not. For this or that example of what Grice has as
the ‘natural’ use of ‘mean’, Ockham will stick with ‘significare,’ qualified by
‘naturaliter.’ vi. By smiling, Smith
means that he is happy. Or as Ockham
more generically puts it, vii. Risus
‘significat’ naturaliter interiorem laetitiam.
But Ockham can go pretty Griceian too, as when he wonders about a
‘circulus’ – of a wine barrel ‘artificially’ (or not ‘naturaliter’) placed, or
positioned, outside a building, yielding:
viii. Circulus ‘significat’ naturaliter vinum. The circle, even if artificially (or at least
not naturally) placed, is a ‘sign’ or means that wine which is being sold
inside the building (Ockham is playing with the composite nature of ‘significare,’
literally to ‘make sign’). In the Peirceian theme on which Grice offers his
rhapsody, and which he’ll later adopt in his “Retrospective epilogue,” there is
an iconicity involved in the ‘circulus’ scenario, where this ‘iconicity’
requires some conceptual elucidation.
Ockham’s use of the Latin ‘significare’ poses a further question.
Strictly, of course, is to ‘make’ (‘ficare’) a sign. Therefore, Grice feels its
Latinate counterpart, ‘signifies that…’ as too strong a way to qualify a thing
like an expression (or ‘word,’) which for him may not be a sign at all. Grice’s cavalier attitude and provocative
intent is further evidenced by the fact that, years later, when delivering the
William James lectures at Harvard, and refining his “Meaning,” he does mention
that his programme is concerned with the elucidation of the ‘total
signification’ of a remark as uttered by this or that utterer, into this or
that variety of this or that explicit and implicit component. When Grice refers to “what people are
thinking,” he is aware that Hobbes more or less maintains the Ockham (or
‘Occam,’ in Grice’s preferred spelling) paradigm, both in his work written in
his late scholastic Latin (“Computatio, sive logica”) and the vernacular
(“Leviathan”) which almost marks the beginning of so-called, by Sorley,
“English philosophy.” With the coming of
empiricism, with Locke’s Essay (1690), and later Mill’s “System of Logic
(mandatory reading at Oxford for the Lit. Hum. degree – “more Grice to the
Mill,” Grice will put it) it seems obvious that the tradition in which Grice is
immersed is not strange to ‘naturalism.’
“Nature” itself, as Plato already knew, need not be hypostasized. It is
a fascinating fact that, for years, Oxford infamously kept two different chairs
for the philosopher: one of ‘natural’ philosophy, and the Waynflete chair of
‘meta-physical philosophy,’ where ‘metaphysical’ is merely an obscure way of
referring to the ‘trans-natural.’ Or is it the other way around? Few empiricist philosophers need to postulate
the ‘unity’ (less so, the uniformity) of “Nature,” even if this or that
Griceians will later will. Witness Nancy Cartwright in the festschrift for
Grice edited by Grandy and Warner for Clarendon, Philosophical Grounds of
Rationality: Intentions, Categories, Ends (or “G. R. I. C. E.,” for short):
‘how the laws of nature lie.’ In its
simplest formulation, which should do for the purposes of this contribution,
the philosophical thesis of ‘naturalism’ may be understood as positing an
ontological continuum between this or that allegation concerning ‘Nature’ and
what is not nature (‘art,’ as in ‘artifice’).
And then, Grice comes to revisit “Meaning.” In 1976, Grice gets invited to a symposium at
Brighton and resumes his 1948 vintage ‘natural’/‘non-natural’ distinction. He
had more or less kept it all through the William James lectures. At Brighton,
Grice adds some crucial elaborations, in terms of what he now calls
‘philosophical psychology’ (Surely he doesn’t want to be seen as a ‘scientific’
psychologist). The audience is a different one, and not purely philosophical,
so he can be cavalier and provocative in a different way. While in his talk on “Meaning” for the Oxford
Philosophical Society Grice had, rather casually, referred to this or that
application, collocation, or occurrence, of the lexeme ‘mean’ as being this or
that (Fregeian) ‘sense’ of the lexeme ‘mean’ -- and thus yielding ‘mean’ as,
strictly, polysemous -- he now feels it’s time to weaken the claim to this or
that (Ryleian) ‘use,’ not (Fregeian) ‘sense,’ of “mean.” His motivation is obvious, and can be brought
back a point he makes in his third William James lectures, and which in fact
underlies his philosophical methodology regarding other philosophers’ mistakes
when dealing with this or that linguistic nuance. If you are going to be
Occamist, ‘senses,’ as specific entities, are not be multiplied beyond
necessity.’ Grice is playing the etymological game here, concerning ‘mean’
(mens, mind). His example, in “Meaning revisited,” concerns Smith as ‘being
caught in the grip of a vyse/vice.’ The root in both ‘vice’ and ‘vyse’ – Latin
‘vim’ – is cognate with ‘violence’ and gives two lexemes in Grice’s vernacular:
one applies to something like a carpenter’s tool, and the other to the opposite
of a virtue. Grice wants to explore how the ‘natural’/ ‘non-natural’
distinction may compare to the ‘vyse’/‘vice’ distinction. With ‘vice,’ Grice
suggests, we have, in his vernacular, as opposed to Latin, two different
lexemes (even if ultimately from a common Latin root, ‘vim,’ which surely
mitigates the case for polysemy). But with ‘mean,’ that’s surely that’s not the
case. The ultimate root is that of ‘mens,’ mind, and there’s no spelling
difference to deal with. Grice does not
reverse the order of the terms in his ‘natural’/’non-natural’ distinction,
though, as Eco would (“a sign is something you can use to lie”). Rather, he
allows for this or that loose, or figurative, or ‘disimplicatural’ use of
“means ….” His craving for a further philosophical generality justifies his
disimplicature. This generality is of two kinds, one of which he deem thems
‘conceptual,’ or ‘methodological,’ and the other ‘mythic.’ The ‘conceptual’ or methodological manoevure
is ontological in flavour. If there is a common core that both our (i) and (ii)
above share, it should be rephrasable by a neutral form for both the ‘natural’
and the ‘non-natural’ scenario: ix. p is a consequence of x/a ‘Consequentia’ is exactly the term used by
Hobbes (some would prefer post-sequentia) when considering the generic concept
of a ‘sign.’ It is thus very apt of Hacking (in his “Why does language matter
to philosophy?”) to see Hobbes as a pre-Griceian (or is it, Grice as a
post-Hobbesian?) When it comes to ‘naturalism’
proper, we have to be careful in our exegesis of it as label for this or that
philosophical overarching thesis. When reminiscing about his progress to ‘The
City of the Eternal Truth,’ in his parody of Bunyan’s, pilgrim Grice meets face
to face with the monster of “Naturalism.”
One may see this as Grice’s warning against some trends he found in The
New World, ‘the devil of scientism,’ as he called it, towards ‘reductionism’
and ‘eliminationism,’ as flourishing in the idea that a ‘final cause’ is
‘mechanistically reducible.’ In Grice’s philosophical psychology, ‘Naturalism’
for Grice, amounts to rejecting this or that psychological law when this or
that physiological law already explains the same phenomenon. Grice finds that
his Occamism for ‘mean’ is not enough here and fangles an ‘ontological
marxism’: this or that entity (an autonomous rational soul, say) that seems to
go against naturalism may be justified, ‘provided they help with the
house-work’ the philosopher is engaged in, in this case, and into the bargain,
saving the philosopher’s existence. The
spirit, however, if not the letter, of ‘naturalism’ as a grand philosophical
thesis still survives. Grice regards himself as ultimately a ‘constructivist.’
The realm of his ‘non-natural’ needs to be rooted in a previous realm of the
‘natural.’ He suggest here a ‘genitorially justified’ ‘myth’ for the
‘natural’/‘non-natural’ distinction:
x. a meaninngNN
that q derives from x meaningN that p
Grice is exploring ‘emergence’ as a viable concept in philosophical
psychology. Philosophical psychology is thus rooted in philosophical ethology.
This or that psychological (or souly) state, (or attitude, or stance) may be
understood as emerging from (or supervening on) a mere biological and
ultimately physical (i. e. natural) state. (He is clear about that in his
“Intention and uncertainty,” when, adopting the concept of ‘willing that’ from
Prichard, he allows it to be amenable to a ‘physicalist’ treatment). In his presidential address to the American
Philosophical Association, Grice feels the need to creates a new philosophical
sub-discipline, which he, echoing Carnap, christens ‘pirotology.’ Grice’s ‘pirotology’ concern Carnap’s
‘pirot,’ that ‘karulises elatically’ in his “Introduction to Semantics.” Grice
adds a nod to Locke’s reflection on Prince Maurice’s ‘parot’ being “very
intelligent, and rational.” The pirotological justification of the
‘natural’/‘non-natural’ distinction involves three stages. The first stage in the sequence or series involves
the pirot, P1, as a merely physical (or purely ‘natural’) entity, P1. The second stage involves our ‘natural’ pirot
giving way to the emergence, pretty much alla Nicolai Hartmann, of a now
bio-logical pirot P2 (a ‘human’), endowed with the goal of survival and
adaptation to its natural environment.
The third and last stage sees our P2 ‘re-constituting’ itself as now a
psycho-logical pirot P3, as a ‘person’, endowed with a higher type of ‘soul.’
(Grice is following Aristotle’s progression in “De anima.” Grice carefully avoids the use of ‘mind,’ in
what he felt was an over-use by philosophers in the discipline of ‘mental
philosophy,’ as it is referred to at Oxford in connection with Wilde. As a
Kantotelian, Grice sees the biological pirot P2 as having a ‘soul,’ even if not
a rational one. Grice was fascinated by Aristotle’s insight that, ‘soul,’ like
‘figure’ or ‘number,’ is a concept that cannot be defined by ‘genus,’ but only
within this or that ‘series,’ such as the three-stage one he provides from the
‘natural’ to the ‘non-natural’ pirot. It
is thus no easy exegetic task to make sense of Grice’s somewhat rhetorical
antipathy towards ‘Naturalism,’ but I shall leave that as an open
question. Beyond the distinction? In the end, for Grice, the key-word is not
‘culture,’ as opposed to ‘nature,’ but ‘rationality,’ as displayed by our
‘non-natural’ pirot P3. Rationality becomes the philosopher’s main concern, as
it is conceptualized to develop from this or that pre-rational propension,
which is biological and ultimately physical, i.e. natural. Grice’s exploration on the ‘natural’/
‘non-natural’ distinction thus agrees with a very naturalistic approaches to
things like adaptation and survival in a natural environment, and the evolution
of altruism (a ‘talking pirot’ who transfers his psychological attitude to
another pirot). While his tone remains
distinctively philosophical – and indeed displaying what he thought as a bit of
‘irreverent, conservative, dissenting rationalism,’ by his example he has indeed
shown that the philosopher’s say has a relevance that no other discipline can
provide. REFERENCES Grice, H. P. (1948).
‘Meaning,’ repr. in Studies in the Way of Words. Grice, H. P. (1975). ‘Method in philosophical
psychology: from the banal to the bizarre,’ Proceedings and Addresses of the American
Philosophical Association, repr. in Grice, 1991. Grice, H. P. (1976). ‘Meaning revisited,’
repr. in Studies in the Way of Words.
Grice, H. P. (1986). ‘Reply to Richards,’ in Richard Grandy and Richard
Warner, Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories, Ends.
Oxord: The Clarendon Press. Grice, H. P.
(1991). The conception of value. Oxford: The Clarendon Press. Hacking, I. M. (1977). Why does language matter
to philosophy? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hobbes, Thomas. Computatio sive logica. Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan. Locke, John. A theory concerning humane [sic]
understanding. Mellor, D. H. (n.d.)
‘Causes of deaths of philosophers’ (accessed February 20th, 2020)
https://www.phil.cam.ac.uk/people/teaching-research-pages/mellor/dhm11/deaths-dg.html Mill, J. S. A system of logic. London:
Macmillan. Ockham, William. Theory of
signs. Pietarinen, Ahti-Veikko and
Francesco Bellucci (2016). ‘H. Paul Grice’s Lecture Notes on Charles S.
Peirce’s Theory of Signs,’ International Review of Pragmatics,
8(1):82-129. Sorley, W. R. (1920). A
history of English philosophy. Cambridge. Refs.: H. P. Grice, “Natural and
non-natural, and naturalism.”
NECESSE
-- necessitatum: ananke,
when feeling very Grecian, Grice would use ‘ananke,’ instead of ‘must,’ which
he thought too English! Grecian, necessity. The term was used by early Grecian
philosophers for a constraining or moving natural force. In Parmenides frg. 8,
line 30 ananke encompasses reality in limiting bonds; according to Diogenes
Laertius, Democrianamnesis ananke 27 4065A-
27 tus calls the vortex that generates the cosmos ananke; Plato Timaeus
47e ff. refers to ananke as the irrational element in nature, which reason
orders in creating the physical world. As used by Aristotle Metaphysics V.5,
the basic meaning of ‘necessary’ is ‘that which cannot be otherwise’, a sense
that includes logical necessity. He also distinguishes Physics II.9 between
simple and hypothetical necessity conditions that must hold if something is to
occur. necesse – Grice: “The archaic Romans had ‘necessum,’ which they turned
to ‘necessum.’ The etymology is not clear [perh. Sanscr. naç, obtain; Gr. root ἐνεκ-; cf. ἀνάγκη; v. Georg
Curtius Gr. Etym. 424]. ichthyological necessity: topic-neutral:
Originally, Ryle’s term for logical constants, such as “of ” “not,” “every.”
They are not endowed with special meanings, and are applicable to discourse
about any subject-matter. They do not refer to any external object but function
to organize meaningful discourse. J. J. C. Smart calls a term topic-neutral if
it is noncommittal about designating something mental or something physical.
Instead, it simply describes an event without judging the question of its
intrinsic nature. In his central-state theory of mind, Smart develops a
topic-neutral analysis of mental expressions and argues that it is possible to
account for the situations described by mental concepts in purely physical and
topic-neutral terms. “In this respect, statements like ‘I am thinking now’ are,
as J. J. C. Smart puts it, topic-neutral. They say that something is going on
within us, something apt for the causing of certain sorts of behaviour, but
they say nothing of the nature of this process.” D. Armstrong, A Materialist
Theory of the Mind
nicoletti – Not under
‘Venezia’! -- paolo di venezia: philosopher, the son of Andrea Nicola, of
Venice – He was born in Fliuli Venezia Giulia, a hermit of Saint Augustine
O.E.S.A., he spent three years as a student at St. John’s, where the order of
St. Augustine had a ‘studium generale,’ at Oxford and taught at Padova, where
he became a doctor of arts. Paolo also held appointments at the universities of
Parma, Siena, and Bologna. Paolo is active in the administration of his order,
holding various high offices. He composed ommentaries on several logical,
ethical, and physical works of Aristotle. His name is connected especially with
his best-selling “Logica parva.” Over 150 manuscripts survive, and more than
forty printed editions of it were made,
His huge sequel, “Logica magna,” was a flop. These Oxford-influenced
tracts contributed to the favorable climate enjoyed by Oxonian semantics in
northern Italian universities. Grice: “My favourite of Paul’s tracts is his
“Sophismata aurea” – how peaceful for a philosopher to die while commentingon
Aristotle’s “De anima.”!” His nom de plum is “Paulus Venetus.”— Paolo da
Venezia Da Wikipedia, l'enciclopedia libera. Jump to navigationJump to search
Nota disambigua.svg Disambiguazione – "Paolo Veneto" rimanda qui. Se
stai cercando lo scrittore e vescovo nato a Venezia intorno al 1270, vedi
Paolino Minorita. Paolo da Venezia in
una stampa del XV secolo Paolo da Venezia, o Paolo Veneto, vero nome Paolo
Nicoletti (Udine, 1368 circa – Padova, 1428/1429), è stato un filosofo, teologo
e umanista italiano. Indice 1 Biografia
2 Opere
3 Note
4 Bibliografia
5 Altri
progetti 6 Collegamenti
esterni Biografia Eremitano[1], fu studente all'Università di Oxford e docente
all'Università di Padova dal 1408[1] ove ebbe tra gli allievi Paolo Della
Pergola[2]. Nel 1413 divenne ambasciatore veneto presso la corte polacca[1].
Per le sue idee teologiche, nel 1426, fu esiliato a Ravenna ma, due anni dopo,
gli fu consentito di tornare a Padova[1].
Fu seguace di Guglielmo di Ockham e Sigieri di Brabante[1] e autore di
vari trattati, tra cui alcuni commenti ad Aristotele [1]. Il suo trattato
Logica magna fu utilizzato come testo di insegnamento della logica
all'Università di Padova[1] e può essere considerato la maggiore opera di
logica formale prodotta dal Medioevo[3].
Opere Logica, 1546 Commenti alle
opere di Aristotele: Expositio in libros Posteriorum Aristotelis. Expositio
super VIII libros Physicorum necnon super Commento Averrois (1409). Expositio
super libros De generatione et corruptione. Lectura super librum De Anima.
Conclusiones Ethicorum. Conclusiones Politicorum. Expositio super Praedicabilia
et Praedicamenta (1428). Scritti sulla logica: Logica Parva or Tractatus
Summularum (1395-96). Logica Magna (1397-98). Quadratura. Sophismata Aurea. Altre
opere: Super Primum Sententiarum Johannis de Ripa Lecturae Abbreviatio (1401).
Summa philosophiae naturalis (1408). De compositione mundi. Quaestiones
adversus Judaeos. Sermones. Note Fonte:
Dizionario di Filosofia Treccani, riferimenti in bibliografia. ^ Vedi «Paolo
Della Pergola» in Dizionario di Filosofia Treccani. ^ Eugenio Garin, Storia
della filosofia italiana, terza ed., Edizione CDE su licenza della Giulio
Einaudi editore, Milano, 1989, vol. 1, p. 441. Bibliografia «Paolo Veneto», in
Enciclopedia Dantesca, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 1970. «Paolo
Veneto», in Dizionario di Filosofia Treccani, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia
Italiana, 2009. Alessandro D. Conti, PAOLO Veneto, in Dizionario biografico
degli italiani, vol. 81, Roma, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, 2014. URL
consultato il 22 febbraio 2018. Modifica su Wikidata Alessandro D. Conti:
Esistenza e verità: forme e strutture del reale in Paolo Veneto e nel pensiero
filosofico del tardo medioevo. Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo, Roma
1996 (= Nuovi studi storici, 33) A. R. Perreiah: "A Biographical
Introduction to Paul of Venice". In: Augustiniana 17 (1967), pp. 450–461.
Altri progetti Collabora a Wikisource Wikisource contiene una pagina dedicata a
Paolo da Venezia Collabora a Wikiquote Wikiquote contiene citazioni di o su
Paolo da Venezia Collabora a Wikimedia Commons Wikimedia Commons contiene
immagini o altri file su Paolo da Venezia Collegamenti esterni (LA) Paolo
Veneto, Logica, Venetiis, Bartolomeo Imperatore, Francesco Imperatore, 1546.
URL consultato il 30 giugno 2015. Enrico Gori, Paolo da Venezia, dal sito
Filosofico.net (URL visitato il 1º maggio 2013.) (EN) Alessandro Conti, Paul of
Venice, in Edward N. Zalta (a cura di), Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
Center for the Study of Language and Information (CSLI), Università di
Stanford. Controllo di autorità VIAF
(EN) 19672889 · ISNI (EN) 0000 0001 0876 0782 · SBN IT\ICCU\BVEV\021816 · LCCN
(EN) n83056270 · GND (DE) 118739646 · BNF (FR) cb118872179 (data) · BNE (ES)
XX1767338 (data) · NLA (EN) 35693384 · BAV (EN) 495/977 · CERL cnp00399282 ·
WorldCat Identities (EN) lccn-n83056270 Biografie Portale Biografie Filosofia
Portale Filosofia Categorie: Filosofi italiani del XIV secoloFilosofi italiani
del XV secoloTeologi italianiUmanisti italianiMorti nel 1428Nati a UdineMorti a
Padova[altre]. Refs.: H. P. Grice, “Paolo da
Harborne, and Paolo da Venezia,” lecture for the Club Griceiano
Anglo-Italiano, Bordighera.
NATURA -- natural intelligence --
artificial (or non-natural) intelligence, also called AI, the scientific effort
to design and build intelligent artifacts. Grice disliked the phrase
“artificial intelligence.” “Strictly, what Minsky means is ‘non-natural’
intelligence.’”Since the effort inevitably presupposes and tests theories about
the nature of intelligence, it has implications for the philosophy of mind perhaps even more than does empirical
psychology. For one thing, actual construction amounts to a direct assault on
the mindbody problem; should it succeed, some form of materialism would seem to
be vindicated. For another, a working model, even a limited one, requires a
more global conception of what intelligence is than do experiments to test
specific hypotheses. In fact, psychology’s own overview of its domain Arouet,
François-Marie artificial intelligence 53
53 has been much influenced by fundamental concepts drawn from AI.
Although the idea of an intelligent artifact is old, serious scientific
research dates only from the 0s, and is associated with the development of
programmable computers. Intelligence is understood as a structural property or
capacity of an active system; i.e., it does not matter what the system is made
of, as long as its parts and their interactions yield intelligent behavior
overall. For instance, if solving logical problems, playing chess, or
conversing in English manifests intelligence, then it is not important whether
the “implementation” is electronic, biological, or mechanical, just as long as
it solves, plays, or talks. Computers are relevant mainly because of their
flexibility and economy: software systems are unmatched in achievable active
complexity per invested effort. Despite the generality of programmable
structures and the variety of historical approaches to the mind, the bulk of AI
research divides into two broad camps
which we can think of as language-oriented and pattern-oriented,
respectively. Conspicuous by their absence are significant influences from the
conditionedresponse paradigm, the psychoanalytic tradition, the mental picture
idea, empiricist atomistic associationism, and so on. Moreover, both AI camps
tend to focus on cognitive issues, sometimes including perception and motor
control. Notably omitted are such psychologically important topics as affect,
personality, aesthetic and moral judgment, conceptual change, mental illness,
etc. Perhaps such matters are beyond the purview of artificial intelligence;
yet it is an unobvious substantive thesis that intellect can be cordoned off
and realized independently of the rest of human life. The two main AI paradigms
emerged together in the 0s along with cybernetic and information-theoretic
approaches, which turned out to be dead ends; and both are vigorous today. But
for most of the sixties and seventies, the language-based orientation dominated
attention and funding, for three signal reasons. First, computer data
structures and processes themselves seemed languagelike: data were
syntactically and semantically articulated, and processing was localized serial.
Second, twentieth-century linguistics and logic made it intelligible that and
how such systems might work: automatic symbol manipulation made clear, powerful
sense. Finally, the sorts of performance most amenable to the approach explicit reasoning and “figuring out” strike both popular and educated opinion as
particularly “intellectual”; hence, early successes were all the more
impressive, while “trivial” stumbling blocks were easier to ignore. The basic
idea of the linguistic or symbol manipulation camp is that thinking is like
talking inner discourse and, hence, that thoughts are like sentences.
The suggestion is venerable; and Hobbes even linked it explicitly to
computation. Yet, it was a major scientific achievement to turn the general
idea into a serious theory. The account does not apply only, or even
especially, to the sort of thinking that is accessible to conscious reflection.
Nor is the “language of thought” supposed to be much like English, predicate
logic, LISP, or any other familiar notation; rather, its detailed character is
an empirical research problem. And, despite fictional stereotypes, the aim is
not to build superlogical or inhumanly rational automata. Our human tendencies
to take things for granted, make intuitive leaps, and resist implausible
conclusions are not weaknesses that AI strives to overcome but abilities
integral to real intelligence that AI aspires to share. In what sense, then, is
thought supposed to be languagelike? Three items are essential. First, thought
tokens have a combinatorial syntactic structure; i.e., they are compounds of
welldefined atomic constituents in well-defined recursively specifiable
arrangements. So the constituents are analogous to words, and the arrangements
are analogous to phrases and sentences; but there is no supposition that they
should resemble any known words or grammar. Second, the contents of thought
tokens, what they “mean,” are a systematic function of their composition: the
constituents and forms of combination have determinate significances that
together determine the content of any wellformed compound. So this is like the
meaning of a sentence being determined by its grammar and the meanings of its
words. Third, the intelligent progress or sequence of thought is specifiable by
rules expressed syntactically they can
be carried out by processes sensitive only to syntactic properties. Here the
analogy is to proof theory: the formal validity of an argument is a matter of
its according with rules expressed formally. But this analogy is particularly
treacherous, because it immediately suggests the rigor of logical inference;
but, if intelligence is specifiable by formal rules, these must be far more
permissive, context-sensitive, and so on, than those of formal logic. Syntax as
such is perfectly neutral as to how the constituents are identified by sound,
by artificial intelligence artificial intelligence 54 54 shape, by magnetic profile and arranged
in time, in space, via address pointers. It is, in effect, a free parameter:
whatever can serve as a bridge between the semantics and the processing. The
account shares with many others the assumptions that thoughts are contentful
meaningful and that the processes in which they occur can somehow be realized
physically. It is distinguished by the two further theses that there must be
some independent way of describing these thoughts that mediates between
simultaneously determines their contents and how they are processed, and that,
so described, they are combinatorially structured. Such a description is
syntactical. We can distinguish two principal phases in language-oriented AI,
each lasting about twenty years. Very roughly, the first phase emphasized
processing search and reasoning, whereas the second has emphasized
representation knowledge. To see how this went, it is important to appreciate
the intellectual breakthrough required to conceive AI at all. A machine, such
as a computer, is a deterministic system, except for random elements. That is
fine for perfectly constrained domains, like numerical calculation, sorting,
and parsing, or for domains that are constrained except for prescribed
randomness, such as statistical modeling. But, in the general case, intelligent
behavior is neither perfectly constrained nor perfectly constrained with a
little random variation thrown in. Rather, it is generally focused and
sensible, yet also fallible and somewhat variable. Consider, e.g., chess
playing an early test bed for AI: listing all the legal moves for any given
position is a perfectly constrained problem, and easy to program; but choosing
the best move is not. Yet an intelligent player does not simply determine which
moves would be legal and then choose one randomly; intelligence in chess play
is to choose, if not always the best, at least usually a good move. This is
something between perfect determinacy and randomness, a “between” that is not
simply a mixture of the two. How is it achievable in a machine? The crucial
innovation that first made AI concretely and realistically conceivable is that
of a heuristic procedure. The term ‘heuristic’ derives from the Grecian word
for discovery, as in Archimedes’ exclamation “Eureka!” The relevant point for
AI is that discovery is a matter neither of following exact directions to a
goal nor of dumb luck, but of looking around sensibly, being guided as much as
possible by what you know in advance and what you find along the way. So a
heuristic procedure is one for sensible discovery, a procedure for sensibly
guided search. In chess, e.g., a player does well to bear in mind a number of
rules of thumb: other things being equal, rooks are more valuable than knights,
it is an asset to control the center of the board, and so on. Such guidelines,
of course, are not valid in every situation; nor will they all be best
satisfied by the same move. But, by following them while searching as far ahead
through various scenarios as possible, a player can make generally sensible
moves much better than random within the constraints of the game. This
picture even accords fairly well with the introspective feel of choosing a
move, particularly for less experienced players. The essential insight for AI
is that such roughand-ready ceteris paribus rules can be deterministically
programmed. It all depends on how you look at it. One and the same bit of
computer program can be, from one point of view, a deterministic, infallible
procedure for computing how a given move would change the relative balance of
pieces, and from another, a generally sensible but fallible procedure for
estimating how “good” that move would be. The substantive thesis about
intelligence human and artificial
alike then is that our powerful but
fallible ability to form “intuitive” hunches, educated guesses, etc., is the
result of largely unconscious search, guided by such heuristic rules. The
second phase of language-inspired AI, dating roughly from the mid-0s, builds on
the idea of heuristic procedure, but dramatically changes the emphasis. The
earlier work was framed by a conception of intelligence as finding solutions to
problems good moves, e.g.. From such a perspective, the specification of the
problem the rules of the game plus the current position and the provision of
some heuristic guides domain-specific rules of thumb are merely a setting of
the parameters; the real work, the real exercise of intelligence, lies in the
intensive guided search undertaken in the specified terms. The later phase,
impressed not so much by our problem-solving prowess as by how well we get
along with “simple” common sense, has shifted the emphasis from search and
reasoning to knowledge. The motivation for this shift can be seen in the
following two sentences: We gave the monkey the banana because it was ripe. We
gave the monkey the banana because it was hungry. artificial intelligence
artificial intelligence 55 55 The word
‘it’ is ambiguous, as the terminal adjectives make clear. Yet listeners
effortlessly understand what is meant, to the point, usually, of not even
noticing the ambiguity. The question is, how? Of course, it is “just common sense”
that monkeys don’t get ripe and bananas don’t get hungry, so . . . But three
further observations show that this is not so much an answer as a restatement
of the issue. First, sentences that rely on common sense to avoid
misunderstanding are anything but rare: conversation is rife with them. Second,
just about any odd fact that “everybody knows” can be the bit of common sense
that understanding the next sentence depends on; and the range of such
knowledge is vast. Yet, third, dialogue proceeds in real time without a hitch,
almost always. So the whole range of commonsense knowledge must be somehow at
our mental fingertips all the time. The underlying difficulty is not with speed
or quantity alone, but with relevance. How does a system, given all that it
knows about aardvarks, Alabama, and ax handles, “home in on” the pertinent fact
that bananas don’t get hungry, in the fraction of a second it can afford to
spend on the pronoun ‘it’? The answer proposed is both simple and powerful:
common sense is not just randomly stored information, but is instead highly
organized by topics, with lots of indexes, cross-references, tables,
hierarchies, and so on. The words in the sentence itself trigger the “articles”
on monkeys, bananas, hunger, and so on, and these quickly reveal that monkeys
are mammals, hence animals, that bananas are fruit, hence from plants, that
hunger is what animals feel when they need to eat and that settles it. The amount of search and
reasoning is minimal; the issue of relevance is solved instead by the
antecedent structure in the stored knowledge itself. While this requires larger
and more elaborate systems, the hope is that it will make them faster and more
flexible. The other main orientation toward artificial intelligence, the
pattern-based approach often called
“connectionism” or “parallel distributed processing” reemerged from the shadow of symbol
processing only in the 0s, and remains in many ways less developed. The basic
inspiration comes not from language or any other psychological phenomenon such
as imagery or affect, but from the microstructure of the brain. The components
of a connectionist system are relatively simple active nodes lots of them
and relatively simple connections between those nodes again, lots of them. One important type and
the easiest to visualize has the nodes divided into layers, such that each node
in layer A is connected to each node in layer B, each node in layer B is
connected to each node in layer C, and so on. Each node has an activation
level, which varies in response to the activations of other, connected nodes;
and each connection has a weight, which determines how strongly and in what
direction the activation of one node affects that of the other. The analogy
with neurons and synapses, though imprecise, is intended. So imagine a layered
network with finely tuned connection weights and random or zero activation
levels. Now suppose the activations of all the nodes in layer A are set in some
particular way some pattern is imposed
on the activation state of this layer. These activations will propagate out
along all the connections from layer A to layer B, and activate some pattern
there. The activation of each node in layer B is a function of the activations
of all the nodes in layer A, and of the weights of all the connections to it
from those nodes. But since each node in layer B has its own connections from
the nodes in layer A, it will respond in its own unique way to this pattern of
activations in layer A. Thus, the pattern that results in layer B is a joint
function of the pattern that was imposed on layer A and of the pattern of
connection weights between the two layers. And a similar story can be told
about layer B’s influence on layer C, and so on, until some final pattern is
induced in the last layer. What are these patterns? They might be any number of
things; but two general possibilities can be distinguished. They might be
tantamount to or substrata beneath representations of some familiar sort, such
as sentencelike structures or images; or they might be a kind or kinds of
representation previously unknown. Now, people certainly do sometimes think in
sentences and probably images; so, to the extent that networks are taken as
complete brain models, the first alternative must be at least partly right.
But, to that extent, the models are also more physiological than psychological:
it is rather the implemented sentences or images that directly model the mind.
Thus, it is the possibility of a new genus of representation sometimes called distributed representation that is particularly exciting. On this
alternative, the patterns in the mind represent in some way other than by
mimetic imagery or articulate description. How? An important feature of all
network models is that there are two quite different categories of pattern. On
the one hand, there are the relatively ephemeral patterns of activation in
various artificial intelligence artificial intelligence 56 56 groups of nodes; on the other, there are
the relatively stable patterns of connection strength among the nodes. Since
there are in general many more connections than nodes, the latter patterns are
richer; and it is they that determine the capabilities of the network with
regard to the former patterns. Many of the abilities most easily and “naturally”
realized in networks can be subsumed under the heading pattern completion: the
connection weights are adjusted perhaps
via a training regime such that the
network will complete any of the activation patterns from a predetermined
group. So, suppose some fraction say half of the nodes in the net are clamped
to the values they would have for one of those patterns say P while the
remainder are given random or default activations. Then the network, when run,
will reset the latter activations to the values belonging to P thus “completing” it. If the unclamped
activations are regarded as variations or deviations, pattern completion
amounts to normalization, or grouping by similarity. If the initial or input
nodes are always the same as in layered networks, then we have pattern
association or transformation from input to output. If the input pattern is a
memory probe, pattern completion becomes access by content. If the output
pattern is an identifier, then it is pattern recognition. And so on. Note that,
although the operands are activation patterns, the “knowledge” about them, the
ability to complete them, is contained in the connection patterns; hence, that
ability or know-how is what the network represents. There is no obvious upper
bound on the possible refinement or intricacy of these pattern groupings and
associations. If the input patterns are sensory stimuli and the output patterns
are motor control, then we have a potential model of coordinated and even
skillful behavior. In a system also capable of language, a network model or
component might account for verbal recognition and content association, and
even such “nonliteral” effects as trope and tone. Yet at least some sort of
“symbol manipulation” seems essential for language use, regardless of how networklike
the implementation is. One current speculation is that it might suffice to
approximate a battery of symbolic processes as a special subsystem within a
cognitive system that fundamentally works on quite different principles. The
attraction of the pattern-based approach is, at this point, not so much actual
achievement as it is promise on two
grounds. In the first place, the space of possible models, not only network
topologies but also ways of construing the patterns, is vast. Those built and
tested so far have been, for practical reasons, rather small; so it is possible
to hope beyond their present limitations to systems of significantly greater
capability. But second, and perhaps even more attractive, those directions in
which patternbased systems show the most promise skills, recognition, similarity, and the
like are among the areas of greatest
frustration for languagebased AI. Hence it remains possible, for a while at
least, to overlook the fact that, to date, no connectionist network can perform
long division, let alone play chess or solve symbolic logic problems. Refs.: H.
P. Grice, “Intelligence: natural and non-natural.”
Natura – natura-ars distinction -- natural
life -- artificial life, an interdisciplinary science studying the most general
character of the fundamental processes of life. These processes include
self-organization, self-reproduction, learning, adaptation, and evolution.
Artificial life or ALife is to theoretical biology roughly what artificial
intelligence AI is to theoretical psychology
computer simulation is the methodology of choice. In fact, since the
mind exhibits many of life’s fundamental properties, AI could be considered a
subfield of ALife. However, whereas most traditional AI models are serial
systems with complicated, centralized controllers making decisions based on
global state information, most natural systems exhibiting complex autonomous
behavior are parallel, distributed networks of simple entities making decisions
based solely on their local state information, so typical ALife models have a
corresponding distributed architecture. A computer simulation of evolving
“bugs” can illustrate what ALife models are like. Moving around in a
two-dimensional world periodically laden with heaps of “food,” these bugs eat,
reproduce, and sometimes perish from starvation. Each bug’s movement is
genetically determined by the quantities of food in its immediate neighborhood,
and random mutations and crossovers modify these genomes during reproduction.
Simulations started with random genes show spontaneous waves of highly adaptive
genetic novelties continuously sweeping through the population at precisely
quantifiable rates.C. Langston et al., eds., Artificial Life II 1. artificial
language artificial life 57 57 ALife
science raises and promises to inform many philosophical issues, such as: Is
functionalism the right approach toward life? When, if ever, is a simulation of
life really alive? When do systems exhibit the spontaneous emergence of
properties? Refs.: Grice: “Life: natural
and non-natural.” naturalism, the twofold view that 1 everything is composed of
natural entities those studied in the
sciences on some versions, the natural sciences
whose properties determine all the properties of things, persons
included abstracta like possibilia and mathematical objects, if they exist,
being constructed of such abstract entities as the sciences allow; and 2
acceptable methods of justification and explanation are continuous, in some
sense, with those in science. Clause 1 is metaphysical or ontological, clause 2
methodological and/or epistemological. Often naturalism is formulated only for
a specific subject matter or domain. Thus ethical naturalism holds that moral
properties are equivalent to or at least determined by certain natural
properties, so that moral judgments either form a subclass of, or are
non-reductively determined by the factual or descriptive judgments, and the
appropriate methods of moral justification and explanation are continuous with
those in science. Aristotle and Spinoza sometimes are counted among the
ancestors of naturalism, as are Democritus, Epicurus, Lucretius, and Hobbes.
But the major impetus to naturalism in the last two centuries comes from
advances in science and the growing explanatory power they signify. By the
1850s, the synthesis of urea, reflections on the conservation of energy, work
on “animal electricity,” and discoveries in physiology suggested to Feuerbach,
L. Buchner, and others that all aspects of human beings are explainable in
purely natural terms. Darwin’s theory had even greater impact, and by the end
of the nineteenth century naturalist philosophies were making inroads where
idealism once reigned unchallenged. Naturalism’s ranks now included H. Spencer,
J. Tyndall, T. H. Huxley, W. K. Clifford, and E. Haeckel. Early in the
twentieth century, Santayana’s naturalism strongly influenced a number of philosophers, as did Dewey’s. Still other
versions of naturalism flourished in America in the 0s and 0s, including those
of R. W. Sellars and M. Cohen. Today most New-World philosophers of mind are
naturalists of some stripe, largely because of what they see as the lessons of
continuing scientific advances, some of them spectacular, particularly in the
brain sciences. Nonetheless, twentieth-century philosophy has been largely
anti-naturalist. Both phenomenology in the Husserlian tradition and analytic
philosophy in the Fregean tradition, together with their descendants, have been
united in rejecting psychologism, a species of naturalism according to which
empirical discoveries about mental processes are crucial for understanding the
nature of knowledge, language, and logic. In order to defend the autonomy of
philosophy against inroads from descriptive science, many philosophers have
tried to turn the tables by arguing for the priority of philosophy over
science, hence over any of its alleged naturalist implications. Many continue
to do so, often on the ground that philosophy alone can illuminate the
normativity and intentionality involved in knowledge, language, and logic; or
on the ground that philosophy can evaluate the normative and regulative
presuppositions of scientific practice which science itself is either blind to
or unequipped to analyze; or on the ground that phi- losophy understands how
the language of science can no more be used to get outside itself than any
other, hence can no more be known to be in touch with the world and ourselves
than any other; or on the ground that would-be justifications of fundamental
method, naturalist method certainly included, are necessarily circular because
they must employ the very method at issue. Naturalists may reply by arguing
that naturalism’s methodological clause 2 entails the opposite of dogmatism,
requiring as it does an uncompromising fallibilism about philosophical matters
that is continuous with the open, selfcritical spirit of science. If evidence
were to accumulate against naturalism’s metaphysical clause 1, 1 would have to
be revised or rejected, and there is no a priori reason such evidence could in
principle never be found; indeed many naturalists reject the a priori
altogether. Likewise, 2 itself might have to be revised or even rejected in
light of adverse argument, so that in this respect 2 is self-referentially
consistent. Until then, 2’s having survived rigorous criticism to date is
justification enough, as is the case with hypotheses in science, which often
are deployed without circularity in the course of their own evaluation, whether
positive or negative H. I. Brown, “Circular Justifications,” 4. So too can
language be used without circularity in expressing hypotheses about the
relations between language and the prelinguistic world as illustrated by R.
Millikan’s Language, Thought and Other Biological Categories, 4; cf. Post,
“Epistemology,” 6. As for normativity and intentionality, naturalism does not
entail materialism or physicalism, according to which everything is composed of
the entities or processes studied in physics, and the properties of these basic
physical affairs determine all the properties of things as in Quine. Some
naturalists deny this, holding that more things than are dreamt of in physics
are required to account for normativity and intentionality and consciousness. Nor need naturalism be
reductive, in the sense of equating every property with some natural property.
Indeed many physicalists themselves explain how the physical, hence natural,
properties of things might determine other, non-natural properties without
being equivalent to them G. Hellman, T. Horgan, D. Lewis; see J. Post, The
Faces of Existence, 7. Often the determining physical properties are not all
properties of the thing x that has the non-natural properties, but include
properties of items separated from x in space and time or in some cases bearing
no physical relation to x that does any work in determining x’s properties
Post, “ ‘Global’ Supervenient Determination: Too Permissive?” 5. Thus
naturalism allows a high degree of holism and historicity, which opens the way
for a non-reductive naturalist account of intentionality and normativity, such
as Millikan’s, that is immune to the usual objections, which are mostly
objections to reduction. The alternative psychosemantic theories of Dretske and
Fodor, being largely reductive, remain vulnerable to such objections. In these
and other ways non-reductive naturalism attempts to combine a monism of
entities the natural ones of which
everything is composed with a pluralism
of properties, many of them irreducible or emergent. Not everything is nothing
but a natural thing, nor need naturalism accord totalizing primacy to the
natural face of existence. Indeed, some naturalists regard the universe as
having religious and moral dimensions that enjoy a crucial kind of primacy; and
some offer theologies that are more traditionally theist as do H. N. Wieman, C.
Hardwick, J. Post. So far from exhibiting “reptilian indifference” to humans
and their fate, the universe can be an enchanted place of belonging. Refs.: H.
P. Grice: “My labour against Naturalism.” Natura – naturalism -- naturalistic
epistemology, an approach to epistemology that views the human subject as a
natural phenomenon and uses empirical science to study epistemic activity. The
phrase was introduced by Quine “Epistemology Naturalized,” in Ontological Relativity
and Other Essays, 9, who proposed that epistemology should be a chapter of
psychology. Quine construed classical epistemology as Cartesian epistemology,
an attempt to ground all knowledge in a firmly logical way on immediate
experience. In its twentieth-century embodiment, it hoped to give a translation
of all discourse and a deductive validation of all science in terms of sense
experience, logic, and set theory. Repudiating this dream as forlorn, Quine
urged that epistemology be abandoned and replaced by psychology. It would be a
scientific study of how the subject takes sensory stimulations as input and
delivers as output a theory of the three-dimensional world. This formulation
appears to eliminate the normative mission of epistemology. In later writing,
however, Quine has suggested that normative epistemology can be naturalized as
a chapter of engineering: the technology of predicting experience, or sensory
stimulations. Some theories of knowledge are naturalistic in their depiction of
knowers as physical systems in causal interaction with the environment. One
such theory is the causal theory of knowing, which says that a person knows
that p provided his belief that p has a suitable causal connection with a
corresponding state of affairs. Another example is the information-theoretic
approach developed by Dretske Knowledge and the Flow of Information, 1. This
says that a person knows that p only if some signal “carries” this information
that p to him, where information is construed as an objective commodity that
can be processed and transmitted via instruments, gauges, neurons, and the
like. Information is “carried” from one site to another when events located at
those sites are connected by a suitable lawful dependence. The normative
concept of justification has also been the subject of naturalistic construals.
Whereas many theories of justified belief focus on logical or probabilistic
relations between evidence and hypothesis, naturalistic theories focus on the
psychological processes causally responsible for the belief. The logical status
of a belief does not fix its justificational status. Belief in a tautology, for
instance, is not justified if it is formed by blind trust in an ignorant guru.
According to Goldman Epistemology and Cognition, 6, a belief qualifies as
justified only if it is produced by reliable belief-forming processes, i.e.,
processes that generally have a high truth ratio. Goldman’s larger program for
naturalistic epistemology is called “epistemics,” an interdisciplinary
enterprise in which cognitive science would play a major role. Epistemics would
seek to identify the subset of cognitive operations available to the human
cognizer that are best from a truth-bearing standpoint. Relevant truth-linked
properties include problem-solving power and speed, i.e., the abilities to
obtain correct answers to questions of interest and to do so quickly. Close
connections between epistemology and artificial intelligence have been proposed
by Clark Glymour, Gilbert Harman, John Pollock, and Paul Thagard. Harman
stresses that principles of good reasoning are not directly given by rules of
logic. Modus ponens, e.g., does not tell you to infer q if you already believe
p and ‘if p then q’. In some cases it is better to subtract a belief in one of
the premises rather than add a belief in q. Belief revision also requires
attention to the storage and computational limitations of the mind. Limits of
memory capacity, e.g., suggest a principle of clutter avoidance: not filling
one’s mind with vast numbers of useless beliefs Harman, Change in View, 6.
Other conceptions of naturalistic epistemology focus on the history of science.
Larry Laudan conceives of naturalistic epistemology as a scientific inquiry
that gathers empirical evidence concerning the past track records of various
scientific methodologies, with the aim of determining which of these
methodologies can best advance the chosen cognitive ends. Naturalistic
epistemology need not confine its attention to individual epistemic agents; it
can also study communities of agents. This perspective invites contributions
from sciences that address the social side of the knowledge-seeking enterprise.
If naturalistic epistemology is a normative inquiry, however, it must not
simply naturalism, biological naturalistic epistemology 598 598 describe social practices or social
influences; it must analyze the impact of these factors on the attainment of
cognitive ends. Philosophers such as David Hull, Nicholas Rescher, Philip Kitcher,
and Alvin Goldman have sketched models inspired by population biology and
economics to explore the epistemic consequences of alternative distributions of
research activity and different ways that professional rewards might influence
the course of research.
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