A controversial quote by Grice

This is from Chapman's material. The quote is in the Grice Papers, Bancroft. It reads:

Grice writes:

"It repeatedly astonishes me that

people who whould themselves

readily admit to being devoid

of training, experience, or

knowledge in philosophy, and who

have plainly been endowed by

nature with no special gifts

of philosophical intelligence

should be so ready to

instruct professional philosophers

about the contents of the

body of philosophical truths."


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The context can be provided on request. But I would refer it to the $tanford issue we were discussing. The concept of individuation in quantum mechanics -- as per that entry. The things get so complicated, that just to narrow the thing to the 'ontological commitment' issue would need the scientist (physicist) to be pretty
aware of the 'ontological' discussion.

Usually, it is the philosopher who has to 'translate' all that the scientist says to
the 'philosophical jargon'. But in some cases, the implicature is other. And you get, e.g., a claim for 'eliminative materialist' (Grice's 'devil of scientism') on the emptiness of some 'philosophical truth' when no constructive counterpart is being offered. I am speaking VERY vaguely, and must get ready for the opera!