R. B. Jones, who contributes elsehwere, etc. is worried, in a way, about his "positivism". He is a metaphysical positivist. We are elucidating that elsewhere, but I have then elsewhere made a passing comment to Grice´s use of Strawson´s somewhat silly distinction between
descriptive
and
revisionary
-- which every philo student is corrupted about at an early stage of his "Anglo-Saxon development" (In Paris, they don´t care)
Grice loved to poke fun on Russell -- the Welsh philosopher, born in Monmouthshire --I hear: "He was not Welsh; Monmoutshire was then part of England", to which I echo my father, who was born in Buenos Aires, echoing Wellington: "the fact that you were born in a stable does not make you a horse".
This Welshman (Lord Bertrand Arhur William, third Baron of Russell) called people silly (In his "Mr. Strawson on referring", he refers to Strawson as caring to analyse "silly things silly people say on silly days" -- but I fail to see what´s silly about "The king of France is NOT bald". It was _his_ silly example in the first place) wrote in an immemorial quote:
The grammar of English should be "a pretty good
guide to" logical form.
He was trying to echo Mill (vide my Grice to the Mill):
every logic is a lesson in sentence.
every sentence is a lesson in logic.
every lesson is a sentence in logic.
etc.
Grice comments, (words)
"Surely it´s NOT! Why, the dictum self-refutes".
Strictly, Grice notes, it should be
"a prettiLY good guide".
"Why, one may just as well say that since my niece Sue is pretty good at what she doeas she is both pretty and good, which she ain´t, my chum, she ain´t."
Ah well.
Russell spoiled it all, or makes it worse than it was, when, to befriend the stone-man in us, he says, "a pretty good guide" to stone-age "metaphysics". "Physics!", Grice corrected.
"Surely you are not expectiang our regular caveman to be able to distinguish between physics and metaphysics."
Grice loved this cartoon strip reproduced by F. R. Palmer in is "Grammar" for Penguin.
One caveman to another, by a fire:
"Remember when all we had to care about was nouns and verbs?"
JL
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Sorry to be so deathly serious, but its who I am,.... why is Strawson's distinction silly?
ReplyDeleteRBJ
Well, for three reasons? (The "?" to mark my Valley-Girlism. Today I feel like a Valley Girl -- cfr. T. Nagel, "What it is like to be a bat")
ReplyDeletei. Surely it is rather silly to try to _revise_ metaphysics with a straight face. We are given a metaphysical scheme of things, and we have to deal with it.
ii. Even if we don't like it, it's never worth revising it. It's like when Chomsky had his T, theory, later developed to ST, standard theory, then EST, extended standard theory, then REST, revised extended standard theory. In peace! I add.
iii. I don't think there's anything _wrong_ with metaphysics as it _stands_. We don't need to lay it to rest. It is standing allright, thankyou.
ObG: Grice got so irritated with attempts at revisionary metaphysics that he'd say: "Surely if the metaphysical scheme of _English_ as we knew it is obsolete, obscene or obdurate, that is surely no need to throw the baby out with the water. The study of _metaphysics_ as embedded in our 'language', or the language of 'hoi polloi', 'ta legomena', is a very good topic, time-honoured, too, for philosophical reflection.
Recall that Socrates found that _wonder_ led to philosophy. It's the wonderment of ... ordinary use? "He is fair", "He is just", "He is beautiful", "He is virtuous". He then went, "what is far?", "what is just?", "what is beauty?", "what is virtue?".
Without a starting point -- a start line, as it were -- in the philosophical race, which is given by 'ta legomena' of 'hoi polloi', there's not even a motivation to run the race and get, hopefully, with the wise, to the finish line.
Or so it seemed to _Grice_. :)
JL
"I took my Grice to the party" -- to the tune of "The song is ... Noel Gay"