H. P. Grice
St. John's, Oxford
H. P. Grice, M. A. Lit. Hum., F. B. A, Tutorial Fellow
in Philosophy, St. John's, Oxford.
1938. Negation and privation, negation, 1961, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 4-folders 10-11, BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: “not,”
negation, privation, verificationism, introspection, sense data, sense datum,
logical form, unary operator, knowledge, unary functor, incompatibility, Wiggins. For incompatibility, v. Sheffer, A set of five independent postulates for Boolean algebras, with application to logical constants, Trans. American Mathematical Society, vol. 14. Grice starts with Aristotle's "apophasis" in Int.17a25. The Grice was always lured by the potentiality of a joint philosophical endeavour, and he treasured his collaboration with Strawson that was followed by a collaboration with Austin on Categoriae and De Interpretatione. So what does Aristotle say in "De
interpretatione"? Surely Aristotle could have started by referring to Plato's "Parmenides," so aptly analysed by Wiggins. Since Aristotle is more of a don than a poet, he has to give "not" a name has:"ἀπόφασις ἐστιν ἀπόφανσίς τινος ἀπό τινος", "a predication of one
thing away from another, i.e. negation of
it. This is Grice's reflection, in a verificationist vein, of two types of this or that negative utterance. While he uses a souly verb or predicate for one of them, he'll go back to the primaacy of 'potching' at a later stage. A pirot potches that the obble is fang. So it is convenient to introduce this or that souly verb. His first example concerns a sense-datum. His second example concerns an introspection, both properly in the first person that he is obsessed with. 'I don't hear a noise,' or 'I do not hear a
noise, 'to get 'not' in full, or 'I do not hear that the
bell is ringing,' or, as he feared a simple-present form might trigger the wrong implicatum, in the non-Anglo-Saxon continuous-tense variant Grice
gives, 'I am not hearing that the bell is ringing,' and 'I am
not hearing a noise.' His sense datum example involves a colour: 'I do not see that the pillar-box is blue,' or with neg-lowering, the paradoxical 'I see that the pillar-box is not blue,' or 'I am not seeing that the pillar-box is blue, or again neg-lowered to 'I am seeing that the pillar-box is not red', and or, with elided subject, alla Russell, and Bradley, 'That is
not blue.' Cf. Ryle on a symposium on Bradley on internal relations pre-dating the Grice essay. 'The proposition 'This is red' is incompatible with the proposition 'This is not coloured.'" Surely, each is co-related to some affirmative counterpart. For Grice's introspection case: 'I hear that the bell is ringing' or I am hearing
*that* the bell is ringing,' I hear that the bell is ringing,' 'I am
hearing that the bell is ringing. For Grice's visual sense datum case: 'I see that the pillar-box is red' or 'That is red. Grice associates each with a psychological (or 'souly') state, attitude, or stance, ψ . In the case of an utterer U uttering 'I do
not hear that the bell is ringing,' the source, reason, ground, knowledge, or belief, upon which U bases his utterance is the absence, or absentia, or privatio, or apophasis, verified by introspection, of a co-relative psychological (or souly) state, stance, or attitude, ψ, co-related to the negative utterance's affirmative counterpart, 'I hear that the bell is ringing,' which does not feature the 'not' operator. For the visual sense-datum case, Grice co-relates 'I do not see that the
pillar box is blue' or 'That is not blue' with a slightly similar affirmative counterpart featuring a different colour: 'I see
that the pillar box is red' or 'That is red,' which again does not feature 'not,' and it is alleged by Grice to be the
source, reason, ground, knowledge or belief for U to utter 'I do not see that the pillar box
is blue' or 'That is not blue,' on the ground of U sees that the pillar box is red. In the "hear" auditory sense-datum example, unlike that of the
*visual* sense-datum example, Grice thinks he needs not appeal to a different
experience. Surely 'I hear that the bell is silent' is illogical. Had he started with 'I am hearing a sound of G major' 'I am hearing a sound of A major' might have done. In the lack of a different experience, Grice bases the negative utterance on the utterer's
felt absence, absentia, or privatio, of apophasis of the experience, which is thereby
negated. The utterance featuring 'not' is explained by the aid of (or reductively analysed in terms of) an introspection, ultimately related to the utterer's confronted with the
absence or privation of an experience involving the auditory sense datum, 'I hear that the
bell is ringing.' The utterance involving a 'colour' term denotating a visual sense datum and featuring 'not, 'I do not
see that the pillar box is blue,' is thus explained in terms, not of an
absence or privation of the experience, but of an experience involving a
different colour word denotating a different visual sense datum. There are
parallels and ways of generalising that allow for a unified account. Each pair of affirmative and
negative utterance involves a perceptual experience in different modes -- the auditory mode (U's
hearing) and the visual mode (U's seeing), thus generalisable in terms of U's perceiving or sensing, 'I do not sense or sense that the α is φ ' vs. the absence of a possible, potential, but not actualised experience, 'I sense that the α is φ' or the presence of the
experience involving a different sense datum, 'I perceive or sense that the α is φ2.' The keyword then would be the philosophy of perception,
which will prove to be a long-standing interest of Grice's, and his close collaborator G. J. Warnock. The important distinction, as Grice observes, is
that, by uttering 'That is not red,' U does not explicitly convey (but
merely implies) the perceptual experience attached to the agent-based first
person. Grice does not expand on the 'informative' vs. 'indicative' distinction of the utterance. Cf. 'sight unseen.' By uttering 'I do not hear that
the bell is ringing,' the U explicitly conveys the perceptual experience attached to the agent-based first person and the utterance seems thus like a more natural
utterance to receive a direct introspective analysis, even if in the slightly
negative-loaded concept of absence, privation, absentia or privatio of a possible, potential, non-actualised experience.
In relying on introspection as a basis for the utterer's knowledge or belief -- 'introspective
knowledge,' indeed -- Grice is being very Oxonian in the best empiricist
tradition. Grice's attempt to 'eliminate' 'not' via a reductionist reductive analysis along verificationist empiricist lines succeeds. 'Someone (for
surely 'I' can always be replaced by the less informative 'someone,' i.e. U, does not see that the pillar box is
blue' is based and uttered on the ground that "U sees that the pillar
box is red.' 'U does not hear that the bell is ringing' is based
and uttered on the absence,, absentia, or privatio, of an introspection, or the
absence, absentia, privatio, of a possible, potential, but not actualised experience arrived
by introspection whose content involves the utterer hearing that the bell is
ringing. Grice is involved in serious philosophical studies under the tutelage
of Hardie at Corpus. While his philosophical socialising is limited ('having
been born on the wrong side of the tracks'), first at Corpus, and
then at Merton, and ending at St. John's, he fails to attend the seminal
Thursday-evening meetings at All Souls of the play group of the seven: J. L. Austin, A. J. Ayer, I. Berlin, S. N. Hampshire, H. L. A Hart, D. MacDermott, D.
MacNabb, and A. D. Woozley. But Grice tutors Strawson, and learns all about the linguistic
botany methodology on his return from the navy. At St. John's, his having Strawson as his tutee starts a life-long friendship and collaboration.
Indeed, Grice turns back to the topic of 'not' or negation in seminars later at
Oxford in the early 1960s -- the MS being dated 1961 -- in connection with Strawson's cursory treatment of 'not' in "Introduction to logical theory" almost a decade earlier. Grice indeed
includes 'not,' naturally, as the first item, qua unary
satisfactory-value-functor (unlike the dyadic co-ordinate "and," "or," and the dyadic sub-ordinate and
"if") in his list of vernacular counterparts to this or that 'formal
device,' in this case, ~. Cf. 'Smith has NOT ceased from eating iron,' in "Causal Theory." In the fourth William James lecture,
Grice explores a role for negation along the lines of Cook Wilson's Statement
and Inference. Grice's 'Vacuous names' contains Gentzen-type syntactic
inference rules for both the introduction (+, ~) and the elimination (- , ~) of "not" or negation,
and the correlative value assignation. His motivation is to qualify 'not' with a subscript scope-indicating device on ~' for this or that tricky case like 'The climber of Mt. Everest on hands and
knees is not to atttend the party in his honour.' Cancelling the implicata of "That is not blue" or "I am not hearing that the bell is rining" seems trickier, if not impossible. "I am not hearing that the bell is ringing because I don't exist" or "because there is no me" is illogical. "That is not blue because that does not exist, or because there is no that," do not eliminate "not." Cf. 'The king of France is NOT bald because there is NO king of France.' In "Presupposition," Grice uses square brackets for the subscript scope indicating device. 'Do not arrest [the intruder]!', the square-bracket device
for assigning common-ground status. In ‘Method in philosophical psychology
(from the banal to the bizarre),’ Grice plays with the internalisation of 'not' within the scope of a psychological or souly predicate denotating a
psychological state, stance, or attitude ψ. In the Kant lectures on aspects of
reasoning, he explores 'not' within the scope of this or that mode
operator, as in the buletic utterance, 'Do not do
it!', 'Do not arrest the intruder! and wonders about the logical form: !~p, or ~!p? He also touches on this or that mixed-mode
utterance, and in connection with the minor problem of presupposition
('Smith has not ceased from eating iron,' because Smith does not exist -- cf. Hamlet sees that his father is on the rampants, but the sight is not reciprocated' -- 'Macbeth sees that Banquo is near him, but his vision is not reciprocated') within the scope of an operator
other than the indicative mode. In his commentary in P. G. R. I. C. E., he
expands on this metaphysical construction routine of Humeian projection with
the pre-intuitive concept of negation, specifying four stages this intuitive concept undergoes until it becomes fully rationally
recostructed, as something like a Fregeian sense. Grice is interested in
applying Cook Wilson's Statement and inference' to explore what the
role of 'not' might be, and he succeds in finding one. The role is explained in
terms of the conversational implicatum. By uttering 'Smith has NOT been to
prison yet,' U implies that some utterer has, somewhere, sometime,
expressed an opinion to the contrary. Is there a strict conceptual distinction,
as Grice suggests, between ‘negation’ and ‘privation’? If ‘privation’ involves
or presupposes negation, one might appeal to something like Modified Occam’s
Razor, do not multiply negations beyond necessity. In his choice of examples,
Grice seems to be implicating that an empirically verifiable, observational
utterance, such as 'U does not see that the pillar box is blue' not because U
does not exist, but on the basis of U's knowing, believing and indeed seeing that the pillar box is red, is
a ‘negation, proper. An utterance arrived via introspection, such as 'U does not
hear that the bell is ringing' on the basis of his knowing that he is aware of
the absence of an experience to that effect, is a ‘privation.’ Or not! Of
course, Grice is ultimately looking for the rationale behind the conversational
implicatum in terms of a principle of conversational helpfulness underlying his
picture of conversation as rational co-operation. To use his pirotological
jargon in 'Method,' in Pirotese, Pirot-1 utters “p” explicitly
conveying that p; Pirot-2 feels like negating that. By uttering "~p", U2 explicitly
conveys that ~p. Pirot-1 volunteers to Pirot-2, "~p", explicitly conveying that ~p, e.g. 'Not raining!'. Surely a rational creature should be capable
to deny this or that, as Grice puts it in 'Indicative Conditionals.' Interestingly, Grice does not consider (as Gazdar does) the other possible
unitary functors (three in a standard binary assignation of values) – just
negation, which reverses the satisfactory-value of the radix or neustic.
In terms of systematics, it may be convenient to regard Grice’s view on
negation (and privation) as his outlook on the operators as this or that procedure
by the utterer that endows him with this or that basic expressive, operative power
(in this case, his proficiency with 'not') as co-related with this or
that device in general, whose vernacular expression will bear a formal counterpart. Many of Grice's comments addressed to this more general topic of this or that satisfactoriness-preserving operator thus apply to 'not,' and
raise the question about the explicitum or explicatum of 'not.' A
Griceian should not be confused. The fact that Grice does not explicitly mention 'not' or negation, but explores the concept of a ‘formal device’ in general, does not mean that what he
says about formal device may not be particularised to apply to 'not' or negation. His
big concession is that Whitehead and Russell (and Peano before them) are right about the explicitum or
explicatum of 'not' being '~.' Or, more formally, that, by
uttering 'Not-p,' U explicitly conveys that ~p. Any
divergence is explained via the implicatum.' A 'not' utterance is horribly uninformative, and not each of them is of philosophical interest.
Grice joked with Bradley and Searle's 'The man in the next table is not lighting the cigarette with a
twenty-dollar bill,' the denotatum of the subject being a Texas oilman in his country club, and thus, the odd implicatum is usually to the effect that someone thought otherwise. In terms of
Cook-Wilson, the role has more to do with the expressive power of a rational
creature to deny a molecular utterance such as 'p and q.' Let's take a closer look at the way rephrases two
examples involving 'not' as attached to an auditory and a visual sense datum 'I do not hear
that the bell is ringing' from the absence of the experience of hearing
it, and 'I do not see that the pillar box is blue' from U's sensing
that the pillar box is red, depend on Kant's concept of the synthetic a
priori with which Grice tests with his children's playmates. 'Can a
sweater be red and green all over? No stripes allowed!' Can a pillar-box be blue and red all over? Cf. Ryle's symposium on negation with
Mabbott, for the Aristotelian Society, a source for Grice's reflexion, and Ryle's later reflection that the proposition, 'This (pillar box_ is [only] red' is incompatible with 'This (pillar box) is [only] blue.' As a
conversational implicatum, Grice’s examples can be re-phrased, unhelpfully, as 'I am unhearing a
noise' and 'That's unred.' This point however important,
since it shows that 'negation' and "not" are not co-extensive, and the implicatum is non-detachable. 'Not' is hardly primtive pure Anglo-Saxon, but the abbreviation of
'ne-aught;' with 'ne' as the proper, pure, amorphous Anglo-Saxon negation. Grice's view of
conversation as rational co-operation, as displayed in this or that
conversational implicatum necessitates that the implicatum is never attached to
this or that expression (here 'not,' since Strawson uses it) when the
vernacular provides a wealth of expressive ways to be negative! Grice possibly chose 'negation' not because, as with this or that 'nihilistic
philosopher,' such as Schopenhauer, he found the concept a key one. But one may
well say that this is the Schopenhauerian in Griceian: approaching 'not' in linguistic, empiricist, or conceptual key. His priority is with 'By uttering x (by which U explicitly conveys that ~p), U implicitly
conveys that q." The essay thus is an elaboration on this implicated 'q.' For the record, 'nihilism; was coined by philosopher Friedrich Heinrich
Jacobi. 'Negatio' and 'privatio' is each a time-honoured item in the philosophical
lexicon, with which mediaeval 'speculative grammarians' are especially obsessed. 'Negatio translates Aristotle's 'apophasis,' there is nĕgātĭo , ōnis, f. nego, I. a
denying, denial, negation, Cic. Sull. 13, 39: “negatio inficiatioque facti,” id. Part. 29, 102.— II. In
partic., a word that denies, a negative, App. Dogm. Plat.
3, p. 32, 38. As for Grice's other word, there is prīvātĭo , ōnis, f. privo, I.a taking away, privation of
a thing (class.): “doloris,” Cic. Fin. 1, 11, 37 and 38; “2, 9, 28: culpæ,” Gell. 2, 6, 10. The negatio-privation distinction is perhaps
not attested in Greek. ἀπόφασις (A), εως, ἡ, (ἀπόφημι). A.denial, negation, opp. κατάφασις, Pl.Sph.263e; ἀ. ἐστιν ἀπόφανσίς τινος ἀπό τινος a predication of one
thing away from another, i.e. negation of
it, Arist.Int.17a25, cf.APo. 72a14; ἀ. τινός negation, exclusion of a
thing, Pl.Cra.426d; δύο ἀ. “μίαν κατάφασιν ἀποτελοῦσι” Luc.Gall.11. If he was not the first to explore
philosophically 'negation,' Grice may be regarded as a philosopher who most explored negation as
occurring in a 'that'-clause followed by a 'propositional complexus' that
contains "~," and as applied to a personal agent. The utterer
means that ~p.' In what ways is that to be interpreted? Grice confessed
to never been impressed by Ayer and 'the crudities and
dogmatisms that seemed too pervasive.' Is he being an empiricist and a verificationist? Let's go back to 'This is
not red' and I am not hearing a noise.' Grice's suggestion
is that the incompatible fact offering a solution to this problem is the
fact that the utterer of 'I am not hearing a noise' is indicating (and informing) that U merely entertains the positie (affirmative) proposition, 'I am hearing a noise,' without having an attitude of certainty towards it. More
generally, Grice is proposing, like Bradley and Bosanquet, a more basic subject-predicate utterance. 'The α is not β.' "To state 'I do
not know that α is β is to state," iff, as Grice would
prefer, 'every present mental process of mine has some
characteristic incompatible with knowledge that α is β.' One may propose
a doxastic weaker version, replacing the dogmatic Oxonian 'know' with
'believe'. Grice's view of 'compatibility' is an application of the Sheffer stroke that
he'll later use in accounts of 'not'. ~p iff 'p|p' or ~p ≡df p|p. But then, as Gazdar has pointed out, Sheffer is hardly Griceian. Then there's the idea of the
pregnant proposition 'I'm not hearing a nose' as pregnant with 'I am hearing a nose' as the scholastic and mediæval philosopher would put it. Grice's main proposal may be seen as drawing on this or that verificationist assumption by Ayer, who actually has a later essay on 'not' and falsity. Grice's proposed analysis would please Ayer since it can be
subjected to a process of verification, on the understanding that perception through the senses ('It is red') and introspection
('Every present mental process of mine ...') is each an empirical phenomenon. But there are subtleties to be drawn. At Oxford, Grice's view on negation will influence philosophers like Wiggins, and in a negative way, L. J. Cohen, who raises the topic of the occurrence of 'negation' in embedded clauses, and motivating R. C. S. Walker with a reply (itself countered by Cohen -- 'Can the conversationalist hypothesis be defended?). So problems remain, as they should!
1941. Personal identity, Mind, vol. 50, pp. 330-50, repr. in J. R.
Perry, Personal identity, University of California Press, Berkeley, David Hume,
Hume's quandary about personal identity, Hume on personal identity,
Hume's account of personal identity, personal identity, revisited, the
logical-construction theory of personal identity, 1977, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series II (Essays), carton 4-folder 12 and Series V (Topical), carton 7-folders
7-9, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: "I," personal identity, first person, first
personal pronoun, Locke, Hume, someone, somebody. If in 'Negation and privation,' Grice tackles Aristotle, he now tackles Locke. This is Grice’s quandary about
personal identity: the implicata. Some philosophers have taken Grice as trying
to provide an exegesis of Locke. However, their approaches differ. What works
for Grice may not work for Locke. For Grice is is analytic that not person-1
and person-2 may have the same experience. Grice explicitly states that he 'thinks' that his (logical-construction) 'theory' is a 'modification' of Locke's theory. He does not seem terribly interested to find why it may not. Rather than introjecting into Locke's shoes, Grice's strategy seems to
dismiss Locke (if not his shoes). Specifically, it 'not being clear' to Grice what Locke's answer in the 'Essay' would be to
Grice's question about this or that 'I' utterance. Grice does quote
directly from the 'Essay.' As Locke states it: 'As
far as any intelligent being can repeat the idea of any past action with
the same consciousness it had of it at first, and with the same consciousness
it has of any present action, so far [the being] is the 'same' 'personal' self.' Grice then proposes to tackle the four objections Grice sees Locke's theory may yield. The first is initial circularity, easily disposed by appealing to memory or introspection. The second is Reid's alleged counterexample. The third concerns the 'aboutness' of 'consciousness.' The fourth, the alleged circularity in Locke's using 'same' in the definiens -- cf. Wiggins, 'Sameness and substance.' Grice is
concerned with the implicatum involved in the use of the first person singular
('I will be fighting soon) since his pre-war days at Oxford. No
wonder his choice of an example. The topic of 'personal identity' (which label
Austin found pretentious, and preferred to talk about the illocutionary force
of 'I') has a special Oxonian pedigree that Grice has occasion to study
and explore for his M. A. Lit. Hum. Locke, a philosopher with whom Oxford
identifies most, famously defends this memory-based account of 'I' that
receives this alleged counter-example by some Scots philosophers, notably Reid -- and Hume, or Home, if you must. In fact, while in the 'Mind' essay he is not too
specific about Hume, Grice will, due mainly to
his joint investigations with J. C. Haugeland, approach, introjecting into the shoes of Hume -- who is idiolised in the New World -- in ways he does not introject into Locke's. But Grice's quandary is Hume's quandary, too!
In his own approach to 'I' (the Cartesian ego, made transcendental and apperceptive by Kant), Grice updates the time-honoured empiricist mnemonic analysis by Locke. The first update is 'style.' Grice embraces a 'logical construction' of this or that 'I' utterance, ending up with an analysis of a 'someone' utterance). Grice's immediate source is Gallie's essay on self and substance in the pages of Mind, which was still then a 'review of psychology and philosophy.' In fact, Grice is being heterodoxical or heretic enough to use the
taxonomy by Broad, 'from the other place' of "I" utterances, too. The logical-construction theory is a third option, next to the idealist 'pure-ego' theory and the misleading 'covert-description' theory. Grice deals with the Reid's counterexample of the brave officer. Suppose a brave officer to have been flogged when a boy at school, for robbing an orchard, to have taken a standard from the enemy in his first campaign, and to have been made a general in advanced life. Suppose also, which must be admitted to be possible, that when he took the standard, he was conscious of his having been flogged at school, and that when made a general he was conscious of his taking the standard, but had absolutely lost the consciousness of his flogging. These things being supposed, it follows, from Mr. Locke's doctrine, that he who was flogged at school is the 'same' 'person' who later takes the standard, and that he who later takes the standard is the 'same' 'person' who is still later made a general. When it follows, if there be any truth in logic, that the general is the same person with him who was flogged at school. But the general’s 'consciousness' does emphatically not reach so far back as his flogging. Therefore, according to Mr. Locke's doctrine, he is emphatically not the 'same' 'person' who was flogged. Therefore, the general is, and at the same time is not the 'same' 'person' as him who was flogged at school. Grice comes up with a rather
elaborate analysans' for a simple 'I' statement. He turns to a generic affirmative variant of the utterance he had used in 'Negation.' It is now: 'I am, viz. someone is, hearing a noise,' the affirmative counterpart of the focus of his earlier
essay on negation ('I am not hearing a noise). Grice
dismisses the privileged-access and the indexicality of 'I,' an approach that will be made popular by J. R. Perry, who however reprints Grice's essay in his influential collection for the University
of California Presss. Grice seems to be relying on 'reasoning which is too
good.' 'I am hearing a noise; therefore, someone is hearing a noise.' Grice's attempt to reduce this or that 'I' utterance ('I am hearing a
noise) is in terms of a chain of mnemonic states. It poses a few quandaries
itself. While quoting from recent philosophers such as Gallie and Broad, it is
a good thing that Grice has occasion to go back to, or revisit, Locke and
contest this or that infamous counterexample presented by Reid and Hume. Grice adds a methodological note to his 'logical-construction' theory of personal identity. The intricacy of his reductive analysis (indeed logical construcction) for an
apparently simple utterance (cf. his earlier essay on 'I am not hearing a
noise' in terms of 'each state which I am experience is incompatible with ...') should not be a minus, or drawback, but a plus, and an advantage in terms of philosophical progress. Much later, Grice reconsiders, or revisits, indeed, Broad's remark and re-titles his approach as
"the" or "a" "logical-construction theory of personal
identity." It is indeed Haugeland who has Grice re-consider Hume's
vagaries with personal identity. Unlike the more conservative Locke that Grice
favours, eliminationist Hume sees 'I' as a conceptual muddle, indeed a metaphysical chimæra. Hume presses the point for an 'empiricist'
verificationist account of 'I.' For, as Russell would rhetorically ask, 'What
can be more direct that the experience of myself?,' The Hume Society should
take notice of Grice's simplification of Hume's implicatum on 'I.' As
a matter of fact, Grice calls one of his metaphysical construction routines the 'Humeian projection,' so it is not too adventurous to think that
Grice might have considered 'I' as an intuitive concept that needs to
be 'metaphysically re-constructed' and be given a legitimate Fregeian sense.
Grice calls one of his metaphysical construction routines 'Humeian
projection,' since the 'mind' (or soul) as it were, 'spreads over' its objects.
But, by 'mind,' Hume does not necessarily mean the 'I.' Cf. 'The
mind's I.' Grice is especially concerned with the poverty and weaknesses of Hume's
criticism to Locke's account of personal identity. Grice opts to revisit the Lockeian
memory-based of this or that 'I' utterance that Hume rather regards as 'vague,'
and 'confusing.' Unlike Hume's, neither Locke's nor Grice's analysis of personal identity is, if reductive, reductionist and eliminationist. It is only natural that Grice would be sympathetic to Locke. Grice
explores these issues with J. C. Haugeland mainly at seminars. One wonders why
Grice spends so much time in a philosopher such as Hume, with whom he agreed
almost on nothing! One supposes Grice is trying to save Hume at the implicatum
level, at least. The phrase or term of art, 'logical construction' is Russell's and Broad's, but Grice loved it. Rational reconstruction is not too dissimilar. Grice prefers Russell's and Broad's more conservative label. This is more than a
terminological point. If Hume is right and there is NO 'intuitive' concept behind 'I,' one cannot strictly re-construct it, only 'construct' it!
Ultimately, Grice shows that, if only at the implicatum level, we are able to
provide an analysandum for this or that 'I' (or 'someone') utterance without using 'I,' by implicating only this or that mnemonic concept, which belongs,
naturally, in a theory of philosophical psychology. The topic of personal
identity unites various interests of Grice. The first is ‘identity,'
simpliciter. Instead of talking of the meaning of 'I,' as, say, Anscombe would,
Grice sticks to the traditional category, or keyword, for this, i. e. the
theory-laden, 'personal identity,' or even 'personal sameness.' Personal identity is a type of identity, but
what does ‘personal’ add to it. Consciousness, and rational agency. Grice plays with the body/soul distinction. 'I, viz someone or somebody, fell from the stairs. This or that 'I' utterance may be purely 'bodily.' But this or that one may be mixed ('I play, viz. somebody plays, cricket'). Finally, this or that may be purely 'soully.' -- the one Grice ends up analysing: 'I hear, viz. someone hears, that the bell is tolling.' At the time
of his "Mind" essay, Grice may have been unaware of the complications that the
concept of a ‘person’ (as attached in adjective form to 'identity') may bring.
Ayer did, and Strawson and Wiggins will, and Grice learns much from Strawson. A person as a
complex for a body-soul spatio-temporal continuant substance. Ultimately, Grice
finds a theoretical counterpart here. A pirot may become a human, but that is
not enough. A pirot must aspire, via metousiosis, to become a person. Thus,
'person' becomes a technical term in Grice’s grand metaphysical scheme of
things. 'I hear, viz. someone hears, that the bell is tolling' is analysed as ≡df a hearing that the bell tolls is a component in a total temporary souly state which is
an item in a series of this or that total temporary state, such that each item of this series given this or that condition, contains, as an item, this or that memory of the experience of hearing that the bell tolls, which is a component in some pre-sequent item, or contains as a somponent an experience of hearing that the bell tolls a memory of
which would, given this or that condition, occur as a component in
some sub-sequent item; and there is no sub-set of items which is
independent of the rest.' Grice 'simplifies' the reductive analysans as: "A hearing that the bell tolls is an component in an item of an interlocking series of this or that memorable and memorative total temporary state.' Is his 'Personal
identity' ever referred to in the Oxonian philosophical liteerature? Indeeed, P. Edwards includes a reference to
Grice's Mind essay in the entry for 'Personal identity,' as a
reference to Grice et al on "Metaphysics," is referenced in Edwards's
encyclopædia entry for 'metaphysics.' Grice does not attribute privileged
access or incorrigibility to 'I' or the first person. He always
hastens to add that 'I' can always be substituted, salva veritate (if
baffling your addressee) by 'someone or other,' if if not 'some-body or other.' Grice's agency-based approach requires that. I am rational provided thou art,
too. If, by explicitly saying he is a Lockeian, and surely not wishing to
see himself as the first to consider this or that problem about 'I; i.e.
someone,' Grice is the philosopher who most explored the 'reductive
analysis' of 'I, i.e. someone.' Grice needs the reductive analysis,
because human agency (philosophically, rather than psychologically interpreted)
is key for his approach to philosophy. By uttering 'The bell tolls,' U means that he or
someone hears that the bell tolls, or even, by uttering 'I, hear, viz. someone hears, that the bell tolls,' U means that the experience of a hearing that the bell tolls is a component in a total temporary *state* which is a member of
a series such that each member would, given certain conditions, contain as
an component one memory of an experience which is a component in a
pre-sequent member, or contains as a component some *experience* a memory
of which would, given certain conditions, occur as a component in a
post-sequent member; there being no sub-set of members which is
independent of the rest. The 'reductive' bit needs to be emphasised. For Grice, a person, and consequently, an 'I' utterance, is a logical
construction out of this or that experience. Whereas in Russell, as Broad
notes, a logical construction of this or that philosophical concept to thought of as an 'improved,' 'rationally reconstructed' conception, and thus both Russell and Broad would allow that it does not 'preserve' the original meaning of the analysandum 'I' -- hence their paradox of reductionist analysis), this is not so for Grice.
Grice intends to be making explicit, if rationally reconstruct (if that's not an improvement) through reductive (if not reductionist) analysis, the concept he already has.
1946. The sceptic’s
implicatum, common sense and scepticism, repr. in Studies in the way
of words, in part II, explorations in semantics and metaphysics, as essay 8, and 'G. E. Moore and Philosopher's Paradoxes,' as essay 9,
1953, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 4-folder 13, BANC
MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: common sense, scepticism, implicatum, the sceptic's
implicature, philosopher's paradox, paradox, G. E. Moore, ordinary language,
'ordinary-language' philosophy, Norman Malcolm. The sceptic’s
implicatum. While Grice groups these two essays as dealing with one single
theme, strictly, only this or that philosopher's paradox (not all) may count as
'sceptical.' This or that philosopher's paradox may well NOT be 'sceptic' but
rather 'dogmatic' at all. In fact, Grice defines 'philosopher's paradox' as
anything "repugnant to common sense," shocking, or extravagant -- to
Malcolm's ears, that is! While it is, strictly, slightly odd to quote this
as "(1946)" just because, by a stroke of the pen, Grice writes
that date in the Harvard volume, we will follow his charming practice. This is vintage
Grice. Grice always takes the sceptic's challenge seriously, as any serious
philosopher should. Grice's takes both the sceptic's explicatum and the sceptics's implicatum as self-defeating, as a very affront to our idea of rationality, conversational or
other. V: "Conversations with a sceptic: Can he be slightly more
conversational helpful?" Hume's sceptical attack is partial, and
targeted only towards practical reason, though. Yet, for Grice, reason is
one. You cannot really attack 'practical' or buletic reason without attacking
'theoretical' or doxastic reason. There is such thing as a general
'rational acceptance,' to use Grice's term, that the sceptic is getting at. Grice likes to play with the idea that ultimately every syllogism is buletic or practical. If, say, a syllogism by Eddington looks doxastic, that is because Eddington cares
to 'omit the practical tail,' as Grice puts it. And Eddinton is not even a
philosopher, they say. Grice is here concerned with a Cantabrigian topic
popularised by G. E. Moore. As Grice recollects, Some like Witters,
but Moore's my man. Unlike Cambridge analysts such as
Moore, Grice sees himself as a 'linguistic-turn' Oxonian analyst. So it is
only natural that Grice would connect time-honoured scepticism (of Pyrrho's vintage) and common sense with 'ordinary language', so mis-called, the
elephant in Grice's room. σκέψις , εως, ἡ, (σκέπτομαι)A.viewing, perception by the senses, ἡ διὰ τῶν ὀμμάτων ς. Pl.Phd.83a; observation of auguries, Hdn.8.3.7.II. examination, speculation, consideration,
“τὸ εὕρημα πολλῆς σκέψιος” Hp. VM4, cf. Pl.Alc.1.130d; βραχείας ς. Id.Tht.201a; ϝέμειν ς. take thought of a thing, v.l. in E.Hipp.1323; ἐνθεὶς τῇ τέχνῃ ς. Ar.Ra. 974; “ς. ποιεῖσθαι” Pl.Phdr.237d;“ς. προβέβληκας” Id.Phlb.65d;“ς. λόγων” Id.R.336e; ς. περί τινος inquiry into, speculation on a thing, Id.Grg.487e, etc.; “περί τι” Id.Lg.636d;“ἐπὶ σκέψιν τινὸς ἐλθεῖν” X. Oec.6.13.2. speculation, inquiry,
“ταῦτα ἐξωτερικωτέρας ἐστὶ σκέψεως” Arist.Pol.1254a34; ἔξω τῆς νῦν ς. Id.Ph.228a20; οὐκ οἰκεῖα τῆς παρούσης ς. Id.EN1155b9, etc.3. hesitation, doubt, esp. of the Sceptic or Pyrthonic philosophers, AP7.576 (Jul.); the Sceptic philosophy, S.E.P.1.5; οἱ ἀπὸ τῆς ς. the Sceptics, ib.229.4. in politics, resolution, decree, “συνεδρίον” Hdn.4.3.9, cf. Poll.6.178. If scepticism attacks common sense and fails, Grice seems to be implicating, that ‘ordinary' language philosophy is a good antidote to scepticism. Since what language other than 'ordinary' language' does common sense speak? Well, strictly, common sense doesn't speak. The man in the street does. Grice addresses this topic in a Mooreian way in a later essay, also repr. in Studies, 'G. E. Moore and philosopher's paradoxes,' repr. in Studies in the Way of Words. As with his earlier 'Common sense and scepticism,' Grice tackles Moore's and Malcolm's claim that 'ordinary' language, so-called, solves a few of 'philosopher''s paradoxes. 'Philosopher' is Grice's witty way to generalise over your common-or-garden,"any, philosopher, especially of the type he found eccentric, the sceptic included. Grice finds this or that problem in this overarching Cantabrigian manoeuvre, as over-simplifying a pretty convoluted terrain. While he cherishes Austin's 'Some like Witters, but Moore's MY man!' Grice finds Moore too Cantabrigian to his taste. While an Oxonian thoroughbred, Grice is a bit like Austin, 'Some like Witters, but Moore's my man,' with this or that caveat. Again, as with his treatment of Descartes or Locke, Grice is hardly interested in finding out what Moore really means. He is a philosopher, not a historian of philosophy, and he knows it. While Grice agrees with Austin's implicature that Moore goes well above Witters, if that's the expression ('even if some like him'), we should find the Oxonian equivalent to Moore. Grice would NOT name Ryle, since he sees him, and his followers, almost every day. There is something apostolic about Moore that Grice enjoys, which is just as well, seeing that Moore is one of the
'twelve.' Grice found it amusing that the members of the Conversazione Society would still be nicknamed 'apostles' 'when their number exceeded the initial 12.' Grice spends some time exploring what Malcolm, a follower of Witters, which does not help, as it were, has to say about Moore in connection with that particularly 'Oxonian' turn of phrase, such as ''ordinary' language' is. For Malcolm's Moore, a 'paradox' by a 'philosopher' arises when 'philosopher' fails to abide by the dictates of 'ordinary' language. This infuriates Grice. Surely the ordinary man says ridiculous, or silly, as Russell prefers, things, such as "Smith is lucky," "Departed spirits walk along this road on their way to Paradise," "I know there are infinite stars," and "I wish I were Napoleon," or “I wish that I had been Napoleon," which does not mean that the utterer wishes that he were like Napoleon, but that he wishes that he had lived not in the his century but in the XVIIIth century. Grice is being specific about this. It is true that an ordinary use of language, as Malcolm suggests, cannot be self-contradictory unless the ‘ordinary use of language’ is *defined* by stipulation as non-self contradictory, in which case an appeal to ordinary language becomes useless against this or that paradox by Philosopher. 'I wish that I had been Napoleon’ seems to involve nothing but an ordinary use of language by any standard but that of freedom from absurdity. ‘I wish that I had been Napoleon’ is not, as far as Grice can see, ‘philosophical,’ but something which may have been said and meant by numbers of ordinary people. Yet, ‘I wish that I had been Napoleon’ is open to the suspicion of self-contradictoriness, absurdity, or some other kind of meaninglessness. And in this context suspicion is all Grice needs. By uttering ‘I wish that I had been Napoleon’ U hardly means the same as he would if he uttered ‘I wish I were like Napoleon.' 'I wish that I had been Napoleon’ is suspiciously self-contradictory, absurd, or meaningless, if, as uttered by an utterer in a century other than the XVIIIth century, say, the utterer is understood as expressing the proposition that the utterer wishes that he had lived in the XVIIIth century, and not in his century, in which case he-1 wishes that he had not been him-1? But blame it on the buletic. That Moore himself is not too happy with Malcolm's criticism can be witnessed by a cursory glimpse at hi 'reply' to Malcolm. Grice is totally against this view that Malcolm ascribes to Moore as a view that is too broad to even claim to be true. Grice's implicature is that Malcolm is appealing to Oxonian turns of phrase, such as 'ordinary' language,' but not taking proper Oxonian care in clarifying the nuances and stuff in dealing with, admittedly, a non-Oxonian philosopher such as Moore. When dealing with Moore, Grice is not necessarily concerned with scepticism. 'Time is unreal,' e.g. is hardly a sceptic utterance. Yet Grice lists it as one of Philosopher's paradoxes. So, there are various keywords to consider here. Grice would start with “common sense.” That's what he does when he reprints this essay in Studies in the way of words, with his attending note in both the 'Preface' and the 'Retrospective Epilogue' on how he organizes the themes and strands. 'Common sense' is one keyword there. Scepticism is another. It is intruiging that in the first two essays opening Part II, “Explorations in semantics and metaphysics” in Way of Words, it seems it’s Malcolm, rather than the dryer Moore, who interests Grice most. While he would provide exegeses of this or that dictum by Moore, and indeed, Moore’s response to Malcolm, Grice seems to be more concerned with applications of his own views. Notably in “Philosopher’s Paradoxes.” The ‘fatal’ objection Grice finds for the paradox-propounder (not necessarily a sceptic, although a sceptic may be one of the paradox propounders) significantly rests on Grice's reductive analysis of 'meaning that ...' as ascribed to this or that utterer U. Grice elaborates on circumstances that he’ll later take up in the 'Retrospective Epilogue. 'I find myself not understanding what I mean' is dubiously acceptable. If meaning, Grice is saying, is about an utterer U intending to get his addressee A to believe that U psi-s that p, U must think there is a good chance that A will recognise what he is supposed to believe, by, perhaps, being aware of the U's practice or by a supplementary explanation which might come from U. In which case, U should not be meaning what Malcolm claims he might mean. No utterer should intend his addressee to believe what is ‘conceptually impossible,’ or incoherent, or blatantly false (“Charles I’s decapitation willed Charles I’s death.”), unless you are Queen in "Through the Looking Glass." 'I believe five impossible things before breakfast, and I hope you'll soon get the proper training to follow suit -- cf. Tertulian, "Credo, quia absurdum est." Admittedly, Grice edits the “Philosopher’s Paradoxes” essay. It is only Grice's final objection which is reprinted in Studies, even if he provides a good detailed summary of the previous sections. Grice appeals to Moore on later occasions. In “Causal Theory,” Grice lists, as a third philosophical mistake, the opinion by Malcolm that Moore did not know how to use ‘know.’ Grice brings up the same example again in “Prolegomena.” The use of Moore may well be a misuse. While at Madison, Wisconsin, he is lecturing at that a hall eccentrically-built with indirect lighting simulating actual sun rays, Moore infamously utters, “I know that there is a window behind that curtain,” when there was not. In 'Retrospective Epilogue,' Grice uses “M” to abbreviate Moore’s fairy godmother – along with G (Grice’s), A (Austin’s), R (Ryle’s) and Q (Quine’s)! One simple way to approach Grice's quandary with Malcolm's quandary with Moore is then to focus on 'know.' How can Malcolm claim that Moore is guilty of misusing 'know'? The most extensive exploration by Grice on 'know' is in Grice's third William James lecture (but cf. his seminar on 'Knowledge and belief,' and his remarks on 'Some of our beliefs NEED to be true,' in 'Meaning revisited.' The examinee knows that the battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815. Nothing odd about that, nor about Moore's uttering 'I know these are my hands.' Grice is perhaps the only one of the Oxonian philosophers of Austin's play group who took 'common sense' so seriously, if only to crticise Malcom's zeal with it. For Grice, common sense = ordinary language, whereas for the typical Austinian, "ordinary language" = the language of the man in the street.
“τὸ εὕρημα πολλῆς σκέψιος” Hp. VM4, cf. Pl.Alc.1.130d; βραχείας ς. Id.Tht.201a; ϝέμειν ς. take thought of a thing, v.l. in E.Hipp.1323; ἐνθεὶς τῇ τέχνῃ ς. Ar.Ra. 974; “ς. ποιεῖσθαι” Pl.Phdr.237d;“ς. προβέβληκας” Id.Phlb.65d;“ς. λόγων” Id.R.336e; ς. περί τινος inquiry into, speculation on a thing, Id.Grg.487e, etc.; “περί τι” Id.Lg.636d;“ἐπὶ σκέψιν τινὸς ἐλθεῖν” X. Oec.6.13.2. speculation, inquiry,
“ταῦτα ἐξωτερικωτέρας ἐστὶ σκέψεως” Arist.Pol.1254a34; ἔξω τῆς νῦν ς. Id.Ph.228a20; οὐκ οἰκεῖα τῆς παρούσης ς. Id.EN1155b9, etc.3. hesitation, doubt, esp. of the Sceptic or Pyrthonic philosophers, AP7.576 (Jul.); the Sceptic philosophy, S.E.P.1.5; οἱ ἀπὸ τῆς ς. the Sceptics, ib.229.4. in politics, resolution, decree, “συνεδρίον” Hdn.4.3.9, cf. Poll.6.178. If scepticism attacks common sense and fails, Grice seems to be implicating, that ‘ordinary' language philosophy is a good antidote to scepticism. Since what language other than 'ordinary' language' does common sense speak? Well, strictly, common sense doesn't speak. The man in the street does. Grice addresses this topic in a Mooreian way in a later essay, also repr. in Studies, 'G. E. Moore and philosopher's paradoxes,' repr. in Studies in the Way of Words. As with his earlier 'Common sense and scepticism,' Grice tackles Moore's and Malcolm's claim that 'ordinary' language, so-called, solves a few of 'philosopher''s paradoxes. 'Philosopher' is Grice's witty way to generalise over your common-or-garden,"any, philosopher, especially of the type he found eccentric, the sceptic included. Grice finds this or that problem in this overarching Cantabrigian manoeuvre, as over-simplifying a pretty convoluted terrain. While he cherishes Austin's 'Some like Witters, but Moore's MY man!' Grice finds Moore too Cantabrigian to his taste. While an Oxonian thoroughbred, Grice is a bit like Austin, 'Some like Witters, but Moore's my man,' with this or that caveat. Again, as with his treatment of Descartes or Locke, Grice is hardly interested in finding out what Moore really means. He is a philosopher, not a historian of philosophy, and he knows it. While Grice agrees with Austin's implicature that Moore goes well above Witters, if that's the expression ('even if some like him'), we should find the Oxonian equivalent to Moore. Grice would NOT name Ryle, since he sees him, and his followers, almost every day. There is something apostolic about Moore that Grice enjoys, which is just as well, seeing that Moore is one of the
'twelve.' Grice found it amusing that the members of the Conversazione Society would still be nicknamed 'apostles' 'when their number exceeded the initial 12.' Grice spends some time exploring what Malcolm, a follower of Witters, which does not help, as it were, has to say about Moore in connection with that particularly 'Oxonian' turn of phrase, such as ''ordinary' language' is. For Malcolm's Moore, a 'paradox' by a 'philosopher' arises when 'philosopher' fails to abide by the dictates of 'ordinary' language. This infuriates Grice. Surely the ordinary man says ridiculous, or silly, as Russell prefers, things, such as "Smith is lucky," "Departed spirits walk along this road on their way to Paradise," "I know there are infinite stars," and "I wish I were Napoleon," or “I wish that I had been Napoleon," which does not mean that the utterer wishes that he were like Napoleon, but that he wishes that he had lived not in the his century but in the XVIIIth century. Grice is being specific about this. It is true that an ordinary use of language, as Malcolm suggests, cannot be self-contradictory unless the ‘ordinary use of language’ is *defined* by stipulation as non-self contradictory, in which case an appeal to ordinary language becomes useless against this or that paradox by Philosopher. 'I wish that I had been Napoleon’ seems to involve nothing but an ordinary use of language by any standard but that of freedom from absurdity. ‘I wish that I had been Napoleon’ is not, as far as Grice can see, ‘philosophical,’ but something which may have been said and meant by numbers of ordinary people. Yet, ‘I wish that I had been Napoleon’ is open to the suspicion of self-contradictoriness, absurdity, or some other kind of meaninglessness. And in this context suspicion is all Grice needs. By uttering ‘I wish that I had been Napoleon’ U hardly means the same as he would if he uttered ‘I wish I were like Napoleon.' 'I wish that I had been Napoleon’ is suspiciously self-contradictory, absurd, or meaningless, if, as uttered by an utterer in a century other than the XVIIIth century, say, the utterer is understood as expressing the proposition that the utterer wishes that he had lived in the XVIIIth century, and not in his century, in which case he-1 wishes that he had not been him-1? But blame it on the buletic. That Moore himself is not too happy with Malcolm's criticism can be witnessed by a cursory glimpse at hi 'reply' to Malcolm. Grice is totally against this view that Malcolm ascribes to Moore as a view that is too broad to even claim to be true. Grice's implicature is that Malcolm is appealing to Oxonian turns of phrase, such as 'ordinary' language,' but not taking proper Oxonian care in clarifying the nuances and stuff in dealing with, admittedly, a non-Oxonian philosopher such as Moore. When dealing with Moore, Grice is not necessarily concerned with scepticism. 'Time is unreal,' e.g. is hardly a sceptic utterance. Yet Grice lists it as one of Philosopher's paradoxes. So, there are various keywords to consider here. Grice would start with “common sense.” That's what he does when he reprints this essay in Studies in the way of words, with his attending note in both the 'Preface' and the 'Retrospective Epilogue' on how he organizes the themes and strands. 'Common sense' is one keyword there. Scepticism is another. It is intruiging that in the first two essays opening Part II, “Explorations in semantics and metaphysics” in Way of Words, it seems it’s Malcolm, rather than the dryer Moore, who interests Grice most. While he would provide exegeses of this or that dictum by Moore, and indeed, Moore’s response to Malcolm, Grice seems to be more concerned with applications of his own views. Notably in “Philosopher’s Paradoxes.” The ‘fatal’ objection Grice finds for the paradox-propounder (not necessarily a sceptic, although a sceptic may be one of the paradox propounders) significantly rests on Grice's reductive analysis of 'meaning that ...' as ascribed to this or that utterer U. Grice elaborates on circumstances that he’ll later take up in the 'Retrospective Epilogue. 'I find myself not understanding what I mean' is dubiously acceptable. If meaning, Grice is saying, is about an utterer U intending to get his addressee A to believe that U psi-s that p, U must think there is a good chance that A will recognise what he is supposed to believe, by, perhaps, being aware of the U's practice or by a supplementary explanation which might come from U. In which case, U should not be meaning what Malcolm claims he might mean. No utterer should intend his addressee to believe what is ‘conceptually impossible,’ or incoherent, or blatantly false (“Charles I’s decapitation willed Charles I’s death.”), unless you are Queen in "Through the Looking Glass." 'I believe five impossible things before breakfast, and I hope you'll soon get the proper training to follow suit -- cf. Tertulian, "Credo, quia absurdum est." Admittedly, Grice edits the “Philosopher’s Paradoxes” essay. It is only Grice's final objection which is reprinted in Studies, even if he provides a good detailed summary of the previous sections. Grice appeals to Moore on later occasions. In “Causal Theory,” Grice lists, as a third philosophical mistake, the opinion by Malcolm that Moore did not know how to use ‘know.’ Grice brings up the same example again in “Prolegomena.” The use of Moore may well be a misuse. While at Madison, Wisconsin, he is lecturing at that a hall eccentrically-built with indirect lighting simulating actual sun rays, Moore infamously utters, “I know that there is a window behind that curtain,” when there was not. In 'Retrospective Epilogue,' Grice uses “M” to abbreviate Moore’s fairy godmother – along with G (Grice’s), A (Austin’s), R (Ryle’s) and Q (Quine’s)! One simple way to approach Grice's quandary with Malcolm's quandary with Moore is then to focus on 'know.' How can Malcolm claim that Moore is guilty of misusing 'know'? The most extensive exploration by Grice on 'know' is in Grice's third William James lecture (but cf. his seminar on 'Knowledge and belief,' and his remarks on 'Some of our beliefs NEED to be true,' in 'Meaning revisited.' The examinee knows that the battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815. Nothing odd about that, nor about Moore's uttering 'I know these are my hands.' Grice is perhaps the only one of the Oxonian philosophers of Austin's play group who took 'common sense' so seriously, if only to crticise Malcom's zeal with it. For Grice, common sense = ordinary language, whereas for the typical Austinian, "ordinary language" = the language of the man in the street.
1948. Peirceian reflections, Grice’s rhapsody on a theme by Peirce,
intending, intender, agency, meaning, repr. in Studies in the way of words, part II, explorations in semantics and metaphysics, as essay 14, The Oxford
Philosophical Society, The Philosophical Review, vol. 66, pp.
377-88, C. S. Peirce's theory of signs, cf. meaning revisited, philosophical
psychology, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (The Essays of H. P. Grice), carton
1-folder 16 and carton 4-folder 5, and Series V (Topical), carton 8-folder 29,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keyword: sign, meaning, intention, Peirce, Stevenson, Welby, Ewing, Ogden,
Richards. The Peirce in Grice’s soul. "Meaning" provides an excellent
springboard to Grice to centre his analysis on 'psychological' or 'soul-y'
verbs as involving the agent and the first person: smoke only figuratively
'means' fire, and the expression 'smoke' only figuratively (or metabolically) 'means' that there is fire. It is this or that utterer (say, Grice) who means, say, by uttering
"Where there's smoke there's fire," or "ubi fumus, ibi ignis," that where there's smoke there's fire. A meantNN
something by x is (roughly) equivalent to A intended the utterance
of x to produce some effect in an audience by means of the recognition of this
intention"; and we may add that to ask what A meant is to ask for a
specification of the intended effect (though, of course, it may not always be
possible to get a straight answer involving a 'that'-clause, for
example, a belief that ...). As he notes, he provides a more
specific example involving the 'that'-clause at a later stage. By uttering x the utterer U means that-ψb-dp iff (Ǝ.φ).(Ǝ.f).(Ǝ.c):
I. U utters x intending x to be such that anyone who has φ will think
that (i) x has f (ii) f is correlated in way c with ψ-ing that p (iii) (Ǝ.φ'): U intends x
to be such that anyone who has φ' will think, via thinking (i) and
(ii), that U ψ-s that p (iv) in view of (3), U ψ-s that p; and II (operative only for
certain substituends for 'ψb-d'). U utters x intending that, should there actually be anyone who
has φ, he will, via thinking (iv), himself ψ that p; and III. It is not the
case that, for some inference-element E, U intends x to be such that anyone who
has φ will both (i') rely on E in coming to ψ (or think that U ψ-s) that p and (ii') think that
(Ǝ.φ'): U intends x to be such that anyone who has φ' will come
to ψ (or think that U ψ-s) that p without relying on
E. Besides St. John The Baptist, and Salome, Grice cites few names
in "Meaning." But he makes a point about C. L. Stevenson! For
Stevenson, smoke 'means' fire. “Meaning" develops out of an interest by
Grice on the philosophy of C. S. Peirce. In his essays on Peirce, Grice quotes
from many other authors, including, besides Peirce himself (!), C. K. Ogden, I.
A. Richards, and A. C. Ewing, or "A. C. 'Virtue is not a fire-shovel'
Ewing," as Grice called him, and this or that cricketer! Grice had no
intention to submit "Meaning" to publication! Bennett, however,
guessed that Grice had decided to publish it in 1957, just a year after his
"Defence of a dogma." Bennett's argument is that "Defence of a
dogma" pre-supposes some notion of 'meaning.’ However, a different story
may be told, not necessarily contradicting Bennett's! It is Strawson who
submits the essay by Grice to "The Philosophical Review." Strawson
had attended Grice's talk on Meaning for The Oxford Philosophical Society, and
liked it! Since "In defence of a dogma" was co-written with Strawson,
the intention Bennett ascribes to Grice may well have been Strawson's. Oddly,
Strawson later provides a famous alleged counter-example to Grice on meaning in
"Intention and convention in speech acts," which has Grice dedicating
a full William James lecture (No. 5) to it! An interesting fact, that confused
a few, is that H. L. A. Hart quotes from Grice's "Meaning” in his critical
review of Holloway for The Philosophical Quarterly. Hart quotes Grice
pre-dating the publication of "Meaning.” Hart's point is that Holloway
should have gone to Oxford! In "Meaning," Grice may be seen as a
practitioner of 'ordinary-language' philosophy: witness his explorations of the
factivity or lack thereof of various uses of "to mean." The second
part of the essay, for which he became philosophically especially popular,
takes up an intention-based approach to semantic notions. The only authority
Grice cites, in typical Oxonian fashion, is Stevenson, who, from The New World
(and via Yale, too!) had been defending an emotivist theory of ethics, and
making a few remarks on how "to mean" is used, with scare quotes, in
something like a 'causal' account ("Smoke 'means' fire."). After its
publication Grice's account received "almost as many alleged
counterexamples as rule-utilitarianism" (B. J. Harrison), but mostly
outside Oxford, and in The New World. New-World philosophers seem to have seen
Grice's attempt as reductionist and as oversimplifying. At Oxford, the sort of
counterexample Grice received, before Strawson, was of the Urmson-type:
refined, and subtle. 'I think your account leaves bribery behind.' On the other hand, in the New World -- in what Grice calls the "Latter-Day
School of Nominalism," Quine is having troubles with empiricism. “Meaning"
was reprinted in various collections, notably in P. F. Strawson's Philosophical
Logic (and it should be remembered that it was Strawson who had the thing typed
and submitted for publication!). Why "Meaning" should be reprinted in
a collection on "Philosophical Logic" only Strawson knows! But Grice
does say that his account may help clarify the meaning of '... entails...'! It
may be Strawson's implicature that Parkinson should have reprinted (and not
merely credited) Grice's Meaning in HIS series for Oxford on "The theory of
meaning"! The preferred quotation for Griceians is of course Grice 1948,
seeing that Grice recalled the exact year when he gave the talk for the
Philosophical Society at Oxford! It is however, the publication in The
Philosophical Review, rather than the quieter evening at the Oxford
Philosophical Society, that occasioned a tirade of alleged counter-examples by
New-World philosophers. Granted, one or two Oxonians -- Urmson and Strawson --
fell in! Urmson criticises the sufficiency of Grice's account, by introducing
an alleged counter-example involving bribery. Grice will consider a way out of
Urmson's alleged counter-example in his fifth Wiliam James Lecture, rightly
crediting and thanking Urmson for this! Strawson's alleged counter-example was
perhaps slightly more serious, if regressive. It also involves the sufficiency
of Grice's analysis. Strawson's "rat-infested house" alleged
counter-example started a chain which required Grice to avoid, ultimately, any
'sneaky' intention by way of a recursive clause to the effect that, for utterer
U to have meant that p, all meaning-constitutive intentions should be 'above
board.' But why this obsession by Grice with 'mean'? He is being funny. Spots
surely don't mean -- They don't have a mind! Yet Grice opens with a specific sample. Those spots mean, to the doctor, that you, dear, have measles. Mean? Yes, dear, 'mean,' doctor's orders. Those spots 'mean' measles.
But how does the doctor know? Can't he be in the wrong? Not really, 'mean' is factive, dear! Or so Peirce thought. Grice is amazed that
Peirce thought that some meaning is factive. 'The hole in this piece of cloth 'means' that a bullet went through is' is one of Peirce's examples. Surely, as Grice notes, this is an unhappy example. The hole in the cloth may well have caused by
something else, or 'fabricated.' (Or 'the postmark 'means' that the letter went through the post.') Yet, Grice was having Oxonian tutees aware that Peirce was krypto-technical. Grice chose for one of his
pre-"Meaning" seminars (i.e. 1947) on Peirce's 'general' theory of signs, with emphasis on 'general,' and Peirce's correspondence with Lady Welby. Peirce, rather than the Vienna circle, becomes, in vein with Grice's dissenting
irreverent rationalism, important as a source for Grice's attempt to 'English'
Peirce. Grice's implicature seems to be that Peirce, rather than Ayer, cared
for the subtleties of 'meaning' and 'sign', never mind a verificationist theory
about them! Peirce ultra-Latinate-cum-Greek taxonomies have Grice very nervous,
though. He knew that his students were proficient in the classics, but still!
Grice thus proposes to reduce all of Peirceian divisions and sub-divisions
("one sub-division too many") to 'mean.' In the proceedings, he
quotes from Ogden, Richards, and Ewing. In particular, Grice was fascinated by
Peirce's correspondence with Lady Viola Welby, as reprinted by Ogden/Richards
in, well, their study on the 'meaning' of meaning! Grice thought 'the
science of symbolism' pretentious, but then he almost thought Lady Viola
Welby 'slightly pretentious, too, if you've seen her; beautiful lady!' It is via Peirce that Grice explores examples
such as those spots 'meaning' measles. Peirce's obsession is with weathercocks almost as Ockham was with circles on wine-barrels. Old-World Grice's use of New-World Peirce is
illustrative, thus, of the Oxonian linguistic turn focused on 'ordinary' language. While Peirce's background was not philosophical, Grice thought it
comical enough. He would say that Peirce is an 'amateur,' but then he said the
same thing about Mill, whom Grice had to study by heart to get his B. A. Lit.
Hum.! Plus, as Watson commented, "What's wrong with 'amateur'? Give me an
amateur philosopher ANY day, if I have to choose from 'professional'
Hegel!" In finding Peirce krypo-technical, Grice is ensuing that his
tutees, and indeed any Oxonian philosophy student (he was university lecturer)
be aware that 'to mean' should be more of a priority than this or that jargon by
this or that (New World?) philosopher!? Partly! Grice wanted his students to
think on their own, and draw their own conclusions! Grice cites A. C. Ewing,
Ogden/Richards, and many others. A. C. Ewing, while Oxford-educated, had ended
up at Cambridge (Scruton almost had him as his tutor!) and written some points
on "Meaninglessness"! “Those spots mean measles." Grice finds
Peirce 'krypto-technical' and proposes to "English" him into an
'ordinary-language' philosopher. Surely it is not 'important' whether we
consider a measles spot a 'sign,' a 'symbol,' or an 'icon.' One might just as well find a
doctor in London who thinks those spots 'symbolic.' If Grice feels like
Englishing Peirce, he does not altogether fail! 1957. Meaning, reprints,
of 'Meaning' and other essays, a collection of reprints and offprints of
Grice's essays. Meaning becomes a central topic of at least two strands in
“Retrospective epilogue.” The first strand concerns the idea of the centrality
of the utterer. What Grice there calls “meaning BY” (versus meaning TO), i.e.
as he also puts it, ‘active or agent’s meaning.’ Surely he is right in
defending an agent-based account to ‘meaning.’ Peirce need not, but Grice must,
because he is working with an English root, ‘mean,’ that is only figurative
applicable to non-agentive items (“Smoke ‘means’ rain”). On top, Grice wants to
conclude that only RATIONAL creatures (like persons) can meanNN properly.
Non-human animals may have a correlate. This is a truly important point for
Grice since he surely is seen as promoting a NON-convention-based approach to
‘meaning,’ and also defending from the charge of circularity in the
non-semantic account of propositional attitudes. His final picture is a
rationalist one. Pirot 1 wants to communicate about a danger to Pirot 2. This
presupposes there IS a danger (item of reality). Then Pirot 1 *believes* there
is a danger, and communicates to Pirot 2 that there is a danger. This simple
view of conversation as rational co-operation underlies Grice’s account of
meaning too, now seen as an offshoot of philosophical psychology, and indeed
biology, as he puts it. Meaning as yet another survival mechanism. While Grice
would NEVER use cognates like ‘significance’ in his Oxford Philosophical
Society talk, he eventually starts to use such Latinate cognates at a later
stage of his development. In "Meaning," Grice does not explain his
goal. By sticking with a root that the Oxford curriculum did not necessarily
recognised as 'philosophical' (amateur Peirce did!), Grice is implicating that
he is starting an 'ordinary-language' botanising on his own repertoire! Grice
was amused by A. C. Ewing's reliance on very Oxonian examples contra Freddie
Ayer: "Surely "Virtue ain't a fire-shovel" is perfectly
meaningful, and if fact true, if, I'll admit, somewhat misleading and
practically purposeless at Cambridge." Again, Grice's dismissal of
"natural" meaning is due to the fact that "natural meaning"
prohibits its use in the first person and followed by a 'that'-clause. "I
mean-N that p" sounds absurd, no communication-function seems in the
offing. Grice found, with Suppes, all types of primacy (ontological, axiological, psychological) in utterer's meaning. In 'Retrospective epilgoeu,' he
goes back to the topic, as he reminisces that it is his suggestion that there are two allegedly distinguishable meaning concepts, even if one is 'metabolical,' which may be
called 'natural' meaning and 'non-natural' meaning. There is this or that test (notably factivity-entailment vs. cancelation, but also scare quotes) which may be brought to bear to distinguish one concept from the other. We may, for
example, inquire whether a particular occurrence of the predicate 'mean' is factive or non-factive, i. e., whether for it to be true that [so
and so] means that p, it does or does not have to be the case that it is true
that p. Again, one may ask whether the use of quotation marks to enclose the
specification of what is meant would be inappropriate or appropriate. If factivity is present and quotation marks is be inappropriate, we have
a case of natural meaning. Otherwise the meaning involved is non-natural
meaning. We may now ask whether there is a single overarching idea which lies
behind both members of this dichotomy of uses to which the predicate 'meaning that ...' seems to be subject. If there is such a central idea it might
help to indicate to us which of the two concepts is in greater need of further
analysis and elucidation and in what direction such elucidation should proceed. Grice confesses that he has only fairly recently come to believe that there is such an overarching idea
and that it is indeed of some service in the proposed inquiry. The idea behind
both uses of 'mean' is that of consequence, or 'consequentia,' as Hobbes has it. If [x] means that p, something which includes p or the idea of p, is a consequence of [x]. In the metabolic 'natural' use of 'meaning that p,' p, this or that consequence, is this or that state of affairs. In the literal, non-metabolic, basic, 'non-natural' use of 'meaning that p,' (as in Smith means that his neighbour's three-year child is an adult), p, this or that consequence is this or that conception or complexus which
involves some other conception. This perhaps suggests that of the two concepts it is, as it should, 'non-natural' meaning which is more in need of further elucidation. It
seems to be the more specialised of the pair, and it also seems to be the less
determinate. We may, e. g., ask how this or that conception enters the picture. Or we may ask whether what enters the picture is the conception itself or its justifiability. On these counts Grice should look favorably on the idea that, if
further analysis should be required for one of the pair, the notion of 'non-natural' meaning would be first in line. There are factors which
support the suitability of further analysis for the concept of 'non-natural' meaning. 'MeaningNN that p' ('non-natural meaning') does not look as if
it names an original feature of items in the world, for two reasons which are
possibly not mutually independent. One reason is that, given suitable background conditions,
meaning, can be changed by fiat. The second reason is that the presence of meaningNN is dependent on a framework provided by 'communication,' if that's not too circular.
commūnĭcātĭo , ōnis, f. communico (several times in Cic., elsewh. rare),I.a making common, imparting, communicating.
commūnĭcātĭo , ōnis, f. communico (several times in Cic., elsewh. rare),I.a making common, imparting, communicating.
I. In gen.: “largitio et communicatio civitatis,” Cic. Balb. 13, 31: “quaedam societas et communicatio utilitatum,” id. Fin. 5, 23, 65: “consilii,” id. Fam. 5, 19, 2: “sermonis,” id. Att. 1, 17, 6: criminis cum pluribus, Tiro ap. Gell. 7, 3, 14: “nominum,” i. e. the like appellation of several objects, Plin. 24, 14, 80, § 129: “juris,” Dig. 23, 2, 1: “damni,” ib. 27, 3, 1, § 14.—II. In rhet., a figure of speech, = ἀνακοίνωσις, in accordance with which one turns to his hearers, and, as it were, allows them to take part in the inquiry, Cic. de Or. 3, 53, 204; Quint. 9, 1, 30; 9, 2, 20 and 23. It seems to Grice, then, at
least reasonable and possibly even ephatically mandatory, to treat the claim that a communication vehicle, such as this and that expression 'means' that p, in this transferred, metaphoric, or metabolic use of 'means that ...' as being reductively analysable in terms of this or that feature of this or that utterer, communicator, or user of this or that expression. The use of 'meaning that ...' as applied to this or that expression is posterior to and explicable through the utterer-oriented, or utterer-relativised use, i.e. involving a reference to this or that communicator or user of this or that expression. More specifically, one should license a metaphorical use of 'mean,' where one allows the claim that this or that expression 'means' that p, provided that this or that utterer, in this or that 'standard' fashion, means that p, i.e. in terms of this or that souly statee toward this or that propositional complexus this or that utterer ntends, in a standardly fashion, to produce by his uttering this or that utterance. That this or that expression 'means' (in this metaphorical use) that p is thus explicable either in terms of this or that souly state which is standardly intended to produce in this or that addressee A by this or that utterer of this or that expression, or in this or that souly staken up by this or that utterer toward this or that activity or action of this or that utterer of this or that expression.
1949. Ryle publishes 'The concept of mind' and Grice writes, or unpublishes, 'Disposition and intention,' citing Ryle, The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: disposition, intention. Grice's attitude towards Ryle is difficult to assess. His most favourable assessment comes from "Retrospective epilogue," but then he is referring to Ryle's fairy godmother.
Initially, he mentions Ryle as a philosopher engaged in, and possibly dedicated to the practice of the prevailing Oxonian methodology, i.e. 'ordinary-language' philosophy. Initially, then, Grice enlists Ryle in the regiment of 'ordinary-language' philosophers. After introducing 'Athenian dialectic' and 'Oxonian dialectic,' Grice traces some parallelisms, which should not surprise. It is tempting to suppose that Oxonian dialectic reproduces some ideas of Athenian dialectic. It would actually be surprising if there were no parallels. Ryle was, after all, a skilled and enthusiastic student of Grecian philosophy. Interestingly, Grice then has Ryle's fairy godmother as proposing the idea that, far from being a basis for rejecting the analytic-synthetic distinction, opposition that there are initially two distinct bundles of statements, bearing the labels 'analytic' and 'synthetic,' lying around in the world of thought waiting to be noticed, provides us with the key to making the analytic-synthetic distinction acceptable. The essay has a verificationist ring to it. Recall Ayer and the verificationists trying to hold water with concepts like 'fragile' and the problem of counterfactual conditionals vis-a-vis observational and theoretical concepts. Grice's essay has two parts: one on 'disposition' as such, and the second, the application to a type of psychological disposition, which would be 'phenomenalist' in a way, or verificationist, in that it derives from introspection of, shall we say, empirical phenomena. Grice is going to analyse, "I want a sandwich." One person wrote in his manuscript, 'there is something with the way Grice goes to work,' ... Still. Grice says that 'I want a sandwich' (or 'I will that I eat a sandwich') is problematic, for analysis, in that it seems to refer to experience that is essentially private and unverifiable. An analysis of 'intending that p' in terms of 'being disposed that p is satisfied' solves this. Smith wants a sandwich, or he wills that he eats a sandwich, much as Toby needs nuts, 'if' Smith opens the fridge and gets one. Smith is disposed to act such that p is satisfied. This Grice opposes to the a 'special episode' analysis of 'intending that p.' An utterance like 'I want a sandwich" iff by uttering the utterance, the utterer is describing this or that private experience, this or that private sensation. This or that sensation may take the form of a highly specific souly sate, like what Grice calls a sandwich-wanting-feeling. But then, if he is not happy with the 'privacy' 'special-episode' analysis, Grice is also dismissive of Ryle's behaviourism in 'The concept of mind,' fresh from the press in 1949, which would describe the utterance in terms purely of this or that observable response, or behavioural output, provided this or that sensory input. Grice became friendlier with 'functionalism' after Lewis taught him how. The problem or crunch is with the first person. Surely, Grice claims, one does not need to wait to 'observe' oneself heading for the fridge before one is in a position to know that he is hungry. Grice poses a problem for the protocol-reporter. You see or observe someone else, Samith, that Smith wants a sandwich, or wills that he eats a sandwich. You ask for evidence. But when it is the agent himself who wants the sandwich, or wills that he eats a sandwich, Grice melodramatically puts it, "I am not in the audience, not even in the front row of the stalls; I am on the stage." Genial, as you will agree. Grice then goes on to offer an analysis of 'intend,' his basic and target attitude, which he has just used to analyse and rephrase Peirce's "mean" and which does relies on this or that piece of dispositional evidence, without divorcing itself completely from the privileged status or access of first-person introspective knowledge. In "Intention and uncertainty," Grice weakens his reductive analysis of 'intending that,' from neo-Stoutian, based on 'certainty,' or 'assurance,' to neo-Prichardian, based on predicting. All very Oxonian: Stout was the sometime Wilde reader in mental philosophy (a post usually held by a psychologist, rather than a philosopher -- Stout's favourite philosopher is psychologist William James! -- and Prichard was Cliftonian and the proper White chair of moral philosophy. And while in "Intention and uncertainty," he allows that 'willing that...' may receive a 'physicalist' treatment, qua state, he'll later turn a 'functionalist' in his Method in philosophical psychology (from the banal to the bizarre).'
1951. A pint of philosophy, Grice on Gordon, a pint of philosophy,
by Alfred Brooks Gordon (Dexter, Me.) includes notes by Grice, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
V (Topical), carton 8, folder 27, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Gordon. A
pint of philosophy with Grice! Figurative! This is an attempt 'to formulate a philosophy of the minimum fundamental ideas that all people on the earth should come to know.' Reviewed by A. M. Honoré: "Short measure." THere is a note on Gordon, Stanley Plummer scholar, e: Bowdoin and Harvard, in "The Eastern Gazette." "I always loved Alfred Brooks Gordon!" -- H. P. Grice. Grice was slightly disapppointed that Gordon had not included the 'fundamental idea' of implicature in his pint. "Short measure, indeed!"
1954. Identity, category, predicable, categories: Aristotle and
beyond, categories, with J. L. Austin and P. F. Strawson, Categoriæ, Aristotle's
Categoriæ, 1955, 1956, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series I (The Correspondence of
H. P. Grice, IA -- Code), carton 1-folders 5-6, Series II (Esssays), carton
4-folders 6-7, Series III (The Doctrines), carton 5-folder 22, and Series
V (Topical), carton 6-folders 15 and 23, carton 7-folder 10, and carton
9-folder 13, BANC MSS 90/a35c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keywords: Grice, Code, izzing,
hazzing. category, Aristotle, Strawson, Austin, category shift,
Categoriæ, identity, relative identity, the Grice-Myro theory of identity,
metaphysics, Myro, Code. Grice’s category shift. If Grice, like Humpty Dumpty, opposes the Establishment with his meaning liberalism ('what a word means is what I mean'), he certainly should be concerned with category shifts! Plus, he was a closet Platonist. 'As Plato once remarked, having the ability to see horses but not horsehood is a mark of stupidity. Grice would give joint
seminars at Oxford with J. L. Austin on the first two books of Aristotle's
Organon, Categoriae, and De Interpretatione. Grice found
Aristotle's use of a 'category,' κατηγορία, a bit of a geniality. Aristotle is using
legalese (from 'kata,' against, on, and 'agoreuô' [ἀγορεύω], speak in
public), and uses it to designate both the prosecution in a trial and
the attribution in a logical proposition — that is, the questions that must be
asked with regard to a subject, and the answers that can be given. As a representative
of the 'linguistic turn' in philosophy, Grice is attracted to the idea that a
category can thus be understood variously, as applying to the realm of reality
(ontology), but also to the philosophy of language (category of expression) and
to philosophical psychology (category of representation). Grice kept his
explorations on categories under two very separate, shall we say, categories:
his explorations with J. L. Austin (very serious), and those with P. F.
Strawson (more congenial). Where is Smith's altruism? Nowhere to be seen.
Should we say it is idle (otiose) to speak of altruism? No, it is just an
attribute, which, via category shift, can be made the subject of your sentence,
Strawson. It's not spatio-temporal, though, right? Not really. -- I don't
particularly like your 'trouser words.' The essay is easy to date since Grice
notes that Strawson reproduced some of the details in his
"Individuals," dated 1959. Grice thought Aristotle was the best! Or
at any rate almost as good as Kantotle! Aristotle saw Categoriæ, along with De
Interpretatione as part of his 'Organon.' However, philosophers of
language tend to explore these topics without a consideration of the later
parts of the Organon dealing with the syllogism, the tropes, and the topics --
"the boring bits!" The reason Grice is attracted to the Aristotelian
category (as Austin and Strawson equally were) is that 'category' allows for a
'linguistic-turn' reading. Plus, it's a nice, pretentious (in the Oxonian way)
piece of philosophical jargon! (Aristotle couldn't find 'category' in the
'koine,' so he had to coin it!). While meant by Aristotle in a primarily
ontological way, Oxonian philosophers hasten to add that a 'category of
expression,' as Grice puts it, is just as valid a topic for philosophical
exploration. His tutee Strawson will actually publish a book on subject and
predicate in grammar! ("Trivial, Strawson!"). Grice will later add an
intermediary category, which is the subject of his philosophical psychology. As
such, a category can be construed ontologically, or representationally: the
latter involving philosophical psychological concepts, and expressions
themselves. For Aristotle, as Grice and Austin, and Grice and Strawson, were
well aware as they educated some of the poor at Oxford ("Only the poor learn
at Oxford" -- Arnold), there are (at least -- at most?) ten categories.
Grice doesn't (really) care about the number. But the first are important.
Actually the very first: there's 'substantia prima,' such as Grice. And then
there's 'substantia secunda,' such as Grice's rationality. The 'essentia.' Then
there are various types of 'attributes.' But, as Grice sharply notes, even
'substantia secunda' may be regarded as an 'attribute.' Grice's favourite game
with Strawson was indeed "Category Shift," or "Subject-ification,"
as Strawson preferred. Essence may be introduced as a sub-type of an attribute.
We would have 'substantia prima' AND 'attribute,' which in turn gets divided
into 'essential' (the izzing) and 'non-essential' (the hazzing). While Austin
was not so fun to play with, Strawson is. "Banbury is a very altruist
person." Where is his altruism? Nowhere to be seen, really. Yet we may
sensically speak of Banbury's altruism. It's just a matter of a 'category
shift'! (Grice scores). Grice was slightly disappointed, but he perfectly
understood, that Strawson, who had footnoted Grice as 'the tutor from whom I
never ceased to learn about logic' in "Introduction to Logical
Theory," fails to acknowledge that most of the research in Strawson's "Individuals:
an essay in descriptive (not revisionary) metaphysics" derives from the
conclusions reached at his joint philosophical investigations with Grice. Grice
will later elaborate on this with A. D. Code -- who was keen on Grice's other
game, The hazz and the hazz not, the izz. But then 'tutor
from whom I never ceased to learn about metaphysics' sounds slightlier
clumsier, as far as the implicature goes! Categories, 1973, The Grice-Myro
theory of identity, Relative identity, Grice on "=," The Grice-Myro
theory of identity, identity, notes, with G. Myro, metaphysics, philosophy,
1974, 1977, 1980, with A. D. Code, Grice izz Grice – or izz he? The idea that
"=" is unqualified requires qualification. Whitehead and Russell
ignored this. Grice and Myro didn't! Grice wants to allow for “It is the case
that a = b /t1” and “ It is not the case that a = b /t2.” The idea is
intuitive, but philosophers of a Leibnizian bent are too accustomed to deal
with "=" as an absolute. Grice applies this to 'human' vs. 'person.'
A human may be identical to a person, but cease to be so. Indeed, Grice's earlier attempt to produce a reductive analsysis of 'I' may be seen as remedying a circularity he detected in Locke about 'same' (Cf. Wiggins, Sameness and substance). Grice makes Peano
feel deeply Griceian, as Grice lists his “=” postulates, here for
consideration. ἄτομος , ον,Logic, individual, of terms, Pl.Sph.229d; of the εἶδος, Arist.Metaph.1034a8, de An.414b27.2. individual, Id.APo.96b11, al.: Subst. ἄτομον, τό, Id.Cat. 1b6, 3a38, Metaph.1058a18 (pl.), Plot.6.2.2, al.
subst.: indīvĭdŭum , i, n., an atom, indivisible particle: “ex illis individuis, unde omnia Democritus gigni affirmat,” Cic. Ac. 2, 17 fin.: “ne individuum quidem, nec quod dirimi distrahive non possit,” id. N. D. 3, 12, 29.—
Note the use of alethic modalities for necessity and possibility, starting with (11). 1. ⊢ (α izz α). This would be the principle of non-contradiction or identity. Grice applies it wo 'war': 'War is war,' as yielding 'a most peculiar implicature.' 2. ⊢ (α izz β ∧ β izz γ) ⊃ α izz γ This above is transitivity. 2. ⊢ α hazz β ⊃ ~(α izz β). Or, what is accidental is not essential. Grice allows that 'what is essential is accidental' is, while misleading, true. 4. ⊢ α hazz β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(α hazz x ∧ x izz β) 5. ⊢ (∀β)(β is a universalium ⊃ β is a forma). This above defines a 'universalium' as a 'forma,' or 'eidos.' 6. ⊢ (α hazz β ∧ α is a particular) ⊃ (∃γ).(γ≠α ∧ α izz β) 7. ⊢ α is predicable of β ⊃⊂ ((β izz α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazz x ∧ x izz α) 8. ⊢ α is essentially predicable of β ⊃⊂ β izz α 9. ⊢ α is non-essentially/accidentally predicable of β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(β hazz x ∧ x izz α) 10. ⊢ α = β ⊃⊂ α izz β ∧ β izz α 11. ⊢ α is an individuum ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(β izz α ⊃ α izz β) 12. ⊢ α is a particular ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(α is predicable of β ⊃ (α izz β ∧ β izz α)) 13. ⊢ α is a universalium ⊃⊂ ◊(∃β)(α is predicable of α ∧ ~(α izz β ∧ β izz α) 14. ⊢ α is some-thing ⊃ α is an individuum15. ⊢ α is a forma ⊃ (α is some-thing ∧ α is a universalium) 16. ⊢ α is predicable of β ⊃⊂ (β izz α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazz x ∧ x izz α) 17. ⊢ α is essentially predicable of α 18. ⊢ α is accidentally predicable of β ⊃ α ≠ β 19. ⊢ ~(α is accidentally predicable of β) ⊃ α ≠ β 20. ⊢ α is a particular ⊃ α is an individuum 21. ⊢ α is a particular ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izz α) 22. ⊢~ (∃x).(x is a particular ∧ x is a forma) 23. ⊢ α is a forma ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izz α) 24. ⊢ x is a particular ⊃ ~(∃β)(α izz β) 25. ⊢ α is a forma ⊃ ((α is predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ β hazz α) 26. ⊢ α is a forma ∧ β is a particular ⊃ (α is predicable of β ⊃⊂ β hazz A) 27. ⊢ (α is a particular ∧ β is a universalium ∧ β is predicable of α) ⊃ (∃γ)(α ≠ γ ∧ γ is essentially predicable of α) 28. ⊢ (∃x) (∃y)(x is a particular ∧ y is a universalium ∧ y is predicable of x ⊃ ~(∀x)(x is a universalium ∧ x is some-thing) 29. ⊢ (∀β)(β is a universalium ⊃ β is some-thing) 30. ⊢ α is a particular) ⊃ ~∃β.(α ≠ β ∧ β is essentially predicable of α) 31. ⊢ (α is predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ α is non-essentially or accidentally predicable of β. The use of this or that doxastic modality, necessity and possibility, starting with (11) above, make this a good place to consider one philosophical mistake Grice mentions in "Causal Theory": 'What is actual is not also possible.' (Cf. 'What is essential is also accidental.' He is criticising a 'contemporary' (if 'dated') form of 'ordinary-language' philosophy, where the philosopher detects a nuance, and embarks risking colliding with the facts, rushing ahead to exploit it before he can clarify it! Grice liked to see his explorations on "=" as belonging to metaphysics, as the Series on his "Doctrines" at the Grice Collection testifies. While Grice presupposes the use of "=" in his treatment of 'the' king of France, he also explores a relativisation of "=." His motivation was an essay by Wiggins, almost Aristotelian in spirit, against Strawson's criterion of space-time continuancy for the identification of the 'substantia prima.' Grice wants to apply '=' to cases were the time continuancy is made explicit. This yields that 'a=b' in scenario S, but that it may not be the case that "a = b" in a second scenario S'. Myro had an occasion to expand on Grice's views in his contribution on the topic for Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories, Ends, or P. G. R. I. C. E. for short. Myro mentions his System Ghp, a highly powerful/hopefully plausible version of Grice's System Q, "in gratitude to” to Grice. Grice explored also the logic of izzing and hazzing with A. D. Code. Grice and Myro developed a Geach-type of 'qualified identity.' The formal aspects were developed by Myro, and also by Code. Grice discussed Wiggins's Sameness and substance, rather than Geach. Cf. Wiggins and Strawson on Grice for the British Academy. At Oxford, Grice was more or less given free rein to teach what he wanted. He found the New World slightly disconcerting at first. At Oxford, he expected his tutees to be willing to 'read' the classics in the vernacular Greek. His approach to teaching was diagogic, as Socrates's! Even in his details of 'izzing' and 'hazzing.' "Greek enough to me!," as a student recalled! 1980, correspondence with A. D. Code, Grice sees in Code an excellent Aristotelian. They collaborated on an exploration of Aristotle's underlying logic of essential and non-essential predication, for which they would freely use such verbal forms as 'izzing' and 'hazzing.' 1980, izzing and hazzing, The Grice Papers, A. D. Code on the significance of the middle book in Aristotle's Metaphysics, keywords: Aristotle, metaphysics, the middle book. Very middle. Grice never knew what was middle for Aristotle, but admired Code too much to air this! The organisation of Aristotle's metaphysics was a topic of much concern for Grice. With Code, Grice coined 'izzing' and 'hazzing' to refer to essential and non-essential attribution. Izzing and hazzing, Aristotle on the multiplicity of being, Aristotle on multiplicity, The Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 1988, posthumously ed. by B. F. Loar, keywords: Aristotle, multiplicity, izzing, hazzing, being, good, Code. Grice offers a thorough discussion of Owen’s treatment of Aristotle as leading us to the 'snares' of ontology. Grice distinguishes between 'izzing' and 'hazzing,' which he thinks help in clarifying, 'more axiomatico,' what Aristotle is getting at with his remarks on 'essential' versus 'non-essential' predication. Surely, for Grice, 'being,' nor indeed 'good,' should not be multiplied beyond necessity, but izzing and hazzing *are* already multiplied. The Grice Papers contains drafts of the essay eventually submitted for publication by Loar “in memoriam” Grice.' Note that the Grice Papers contains a typically Griceian 'un-publication,' entitled 'Aristotle and multiplicity' simpliciter. Rather than "Aristotle *on*," as the title for The Pacific Philosophical Quarterly piece goes. Note also that, since it's 'multiplicity' simpliciter, it refers to Aristotle on two key ideas: being and the good. As Code notes in his contribution to P. G. R. I. C. E., Grice first presents his thoughts on izzing and hazzing publicly at Vancouver. R. B. Jones has developed the axiomatic treatment favoured by Grice. For Grice there is 'multiplicity' in both 'being' and 'good' (ton agathon), both accountable in terms of conversational implicata, of course. If in "Prolegomena," Grice was interested in criticising himself, in essays of historical nature like these, Grice is seeing Aristotle's "Athenian dialectic" as a foreshadow of the "Oxonian dialectic," and treating him as an equal. Grice is yielding his razor: senses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity. But then Aristotle is talking about the 'multiplicity' of '... is ...' and '... is good.' Surely, there are ways to turn Aristotle into the monoguist he has to be! There is a further item in the Grice collection that combines Aristotle on being with Aristotle on good, which is relevant in connection with this. Aristotle on being and good ("ἀγαθός"), 1970, keywords: Aristotle, being, good (agathon), "ἀγαθός." As from this folder, the essays are ordered alphabetically, starting with "Aristotle,” Grice will explore Aristotle on 'being' or "is" and "good" ("ἀγαθός") in explorations with A. D. Code. Grice comes up with 'izzing' and 'hazzing' as the two counterparts to Aristotle's views on, respectively, essential and non-essential predication. Grice's views on Aristotle on 'the good' (strictly, there is no need to restrict Arisstotle's use to the neuter form, since he employs "ἀγαθός") connect with Grice's Aristotelian idea of 'eudaimonia,' that he explores elsewhere. Strictly: Aristotle on being and the good. If that had been Grice's case, he would have used the definite article. Otherwise, 'good' may well translate as masculine, "ἀγαθός" -- the agathetic implicatum. He plays with Dodgson, 'cabbages and kings.' For what 'is' a 'good' cabbage as opposed to 'a cabbage'? It does not require very sharp eyes, but only our willingness to use the eyes one has, to see that speech is permeated with the notion of purpose.” “To say what a certain kind of thing is is only too frequently partly to say that it is for.” “This feature applies to talk of, e. g., ships, shoes, sailing wax, and kings; and, possibly and perhaps most excitingly, it extends even to cabbages!” Although Grice suspects Urmson might disagree. v. Grice on Urmson's apples. Grice at his jocular best. If he is going to be a Kantian, he will. He uses Kantian jargon to present his theory of conversation. This he does only at Harvard. The implicature being that talking of vaguer assumptions of helpfulness would not sound too convincing. So he has the maxim, the super-maxim, and the sub-maxim. A principle and a maxim is Kantian enough. But when he actually echoes Kant, is when he introduces what he later calls the conversational categories – the keyword here is ‘conversational category,' as 'categoria' is used by Aristotle and Kant -- or Kantotle. Grice surely knew that, say, his “Category of Conversational Modality” had nothing to do with the Kantian Category of Modality. Still, he stuck with the idea of four categories (versus Aristotle's 'ten,' 'eight' or 'seven,' as the text you consult may tell you): category of conversational quantity (which at Oxford he had formulated in much vaguer terms like ‘strength’ and informativeness and entailment), the category of conversational quality (keyword: principle of conversational trust), and the category of conversational relation, where again Kant’s ‘relation’ has nothing to do with the maxim Grice associates with this category. In any case, his Kantian joke may be helpful when considering the centrality of the concept ‘category’ simpliciter that Grice had to fight with with his pupils at Oxford – he was lucky to have Austin and Strawson as co-lecturers! Grice was irritated by Liddell and Scott defining 'kategoria' as 'category.' 'I guess I knew that.' He agreed with their second shot, "predicable." Ultimately, Grice's concern with 'category' is his concern with 'person,' or 'prote ousia,' as used by Aristotle, and as giving a rationale to Grice's agency-based approach to the philosophical enterprise. Aristotle used kategorein in the sense of to predicate, assert something of something, and kategoria. The prote ousia is exemplified by 'o tis anthropos.' It is obvious that Grice wants to approach Aristotle's semantics and Aristotle's metaphysics "at one fell swoop." Grice reads Aristotle's Metaphysics, and finds it 'understandable.' Consider the adjective 'French' (which Aristotle does NOT consider) -- as it occurs in phrases such as Michel Foucault is a French citizen. H. P. Grice is not a French citizen Michel Foucault once wrote a nice French poem. J. O. Urmson once wrote a nice French essay on pragmatics. Michel Foucault was a French professor. Michel Foucault is a French professor. Michel Foucault is a French professor of philosophy. The following features are perhaps significant. The appearance of the adjective 'French' (or Byzantine, as the case might be -- cf. "I'm feeling French tonight") in these phrases is what Grice calls 'adjunctive' rather than 'conjunctive,' or 'attributive.' A French poem is not necessarily something which combines the separate features of being a poem and being French, as a tall philosopher would simply combine the features of being tall and of being a philosopher. 'French' in 'French poem,' occurs _adverbially_. 'French citizen' _standardly_ means "citizen of France." 'French poem' _standardly_ means "poem in French". But it is a _mistake_ to suppose that this fact _implies_ that there is this or that _meaning_ (or, worse, this or that Fregeian _sense_) of the expression 'French'. In any case, only metaphorically or metabolically can we say that 'French' 'means' this or that or has sense. An utterer MEANS. An utterer MAKES SENSE. Cf. R. Paul's doubts about capitalizing 'major.' 'French' means, and figuratively at that, only one thing, viz. 'of or pertaining to France.' And 'English' only means 'of or pertaining to England.' 'French' may be what Grice (unfollowing his remarks on "The general theory of context") call 'context-sensitive'. One might indeed say, if you like, that while 'French' means -- or 'means' only this or that, or that its only sense is this or that, 'French' still means, again figuratively, a variety of things. 'French' means-in-context "of or pertaining to France. Symbolise that as Expression E 'means'-in-context that p. Expression E 'means-in-context C2 that p2. Relative to Context C1 'French' means 'of France'; as in the phrase 'French citizen.' Relative to context C2, 'French' means 'in the French language, as in the phrase, 'French poem' -- whereas 'history' does not behave, like this. Whether the focal item is a universal or a particular is, contra Aristotle, quite irrelevant to the question of what this or that related adjective "means," or what its sense is. The medical art is no more what an utterer means when he utters the adjective 'medical', as is 'France' what an utterer means by the adjective 'French'.W hile the attachment of this or that context may suggest an interpretation in context of this or that expression as uttered by the utterer U, it need not be the case that such a suggestion is indefeasible. It might be e.g. that 'French poem' would have to mean, "poem composed in French", unless there were counter indications, that brings the utterer and the addressee to a different context C3. In which case, perhaps what the utterer means by 'French poem' is 'poem composed by a French competitor' in this or that competition. For 'French professor' there would be two obvious things an utterer might mean. "Disambiguation" will depend on the wider expression-context or in the situtational context attaching to the this or that circumstance of utterance.
1955. Please, agreebleness, leasure, Aristotle on pleasure, Aristotle: pleasure, hedonism, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 4, folder 8, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: hedonism, pleasure, Aristotle, agreeableness, happiness, system of ends, ends, end, desire, satisfaction, delight. Griceian pleasures! ἡδονή, Dor. ἁδονά (or in Trag.chorus ἡδονά S.OT1339), ἡ, (ἥδομαι). A. enjoyment, pleasure, first in Simon.71, S.l.c., Hdt.1.24, al.; prop. of sensual pleasures, αἱ τοῦ σώματος or περὶ τὸ σῶμα ἡ., X.HG 4.8.22,6.1.4; αἱ κατὰ τὸ σῶμα ἡ. Pl.R.328d; σωματικαὶ ἡ. Arist.EN 1151a13; αἱ περὶ πότους καὶ περὶ ἐδωδὰς ἡ. Pl R.389e; but also ἀκοῆς ἡ. Th.3.38; ἡ ἀπὸ τοῦ εἰδέναι ἡ. Pl.R.582b; of malicious pleasure, ἡ ἐπὶ τοῖς τῶν φίλων κακοῖς, ἐπὶ ταῖς λοιδορίαις ἡ., Id.Phlb.50a, D.18.138; ἡδονῇ ἡσσᾶσθαι, ἡδοναῖς χαρίζεσθαι, to give way to pleasure, Th. l.c., Pl.Lg.727c; κότερα ἀληθείη χρήσομαι ἢ ἡδονῆ; shall I speak truly or so as to humour you? Hdt.7.101; εἰ ὑμῖν ἡδονὴ τοῦ ἡγεμονεύειν ib.160; ἡ. εἰσέρχεταί τιϝι εἰ . . one feels pleasure at the thought that . ., Id.1.24; ἡδονὴν ἔχειν τινός to be satisfied with. , S.OC 1604; ἡδονὴν ἔχει, φέρει, Pherecr.145.2, Alex.263.6; ἡδονὴ ἰδέσθαι (like θαῦμα ἰδέσθαι), of a temple, Hdt.2.137: with Preps. in Adv. sense, “δαίμοσιν πρὸς ἡδονήν” A.Pr.494; ὃ μέν ἐστι πρὸς ἡ. D.18.4; πρὸς ἡ. λέγειν to speak so as to please another, S.El.921, Th.2.65; “δημηγορεῖν” D.4.38; “οὐ πρὸς ἡ. οἱ ἦν τὰ ἀγγελλόμενα” Hdt.3.126; “πάντα πρὸς ἡ. ἀκούοντας” D.8.34; later “πρὸς ἡδονῆς εἶναί τινι” Parth.8.8, Lib. Or.12.1; “καθ᾽ ἡδονὴν κλύειν”
subst.: indīvĭdŭum , i, n., an atom, indivisible particle: “ex illis individuis, unde omnia Democritus gigni affirmat,” Cic. Ac. 2, 17 fin.: “ne individuum quidem, nec quod dirimi distrahive non possit,” id. N. D. 3, 12, 29.—
Note the use of alethic modalities for necessity and possibility, starting with (11). 1. ⊢ (α izz α). This would be the principle of non-contradiction or identity. Grice applies it wo 'war': 'War is war,' as yielding 'a most peculiar implicature.' 2. ⊢ (α izz β ∧ β izz γ) ⊃ α izz γ This above is transitivity. 2. ⊢ α hazz β ⊃ ~(α izz β). Or, what is accidental is not essential. Grice allows that 'what is essential is accidental' is, while misleading, true. 4. ⊢ α hazz β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(α hazz x ∧ x izz β) 5. ⊢ (∀β)(β is a universalium ⊃ β is a forma). This above defines a 'universalium' as a 'forma,' or 'eidos.' 6. ⊢ (α hazz β ∧ α is a particular) ⊃ (∃γ).(γ≠α ∧ α izz β) 7. ⊢ α is predicable of β ⊃⊂ ((β izz α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazz x ∧ x izz α) 8. ⊢ α is essentially predicable of β ⊃⊂ β izz α 9. ⊢ α is non-essentially/accidentally predicable of β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(β hazz x ∧ x izz α) 10. ⊢ α = β ⊃⊂ α izz β ∧ β izz α 11. ⊢ α is an individuum ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(β izz α ⊃ α izz β) 12. ⊢ α is a particular ⊃⊂ □(∀β)(α is predicable of β ⊃ (α izz β ∧ β izz α)) 13. ⊢ α is a universalium ⊃⊂ ◊(∃β)(α is predicable of α ∧ ~(α izz β ∧ β izz α) 14. ⊢ α is some-thing ⊃ α is an individuum15. ⊢ α is a forma ⊃ (α is some-thing ∧ α is a universalium) 16. ⊢ α is predicable of β ⊃⊂ (β izz α) ∨ (∃x)(β hazz x ∧ x izz α) 17. ⊢ α is essentially predicable of α 18. ⊢ α is accidentally predicable of β ⊃ α ≠ β 19. ⊢ ~(α is accidentally predicable of β) ⊃ α ≠ β 20. ⊢ α is a particular ⊃ α is an individuum 21. ⊢ α is a particular ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izz α) 22. ⊢~ (∃x).(x is a particular ∧ x is a forma) 23. ⊢ α is a forma ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izz α) 24. ⊢ x is a particular ⊃ ~(∃β)(α izz β) 25. ⊢ α is a forma ⊃ ((α is predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ β hazz α) 26. ⊢ α is a forma ∧ β is a particular ⊃ (α is predicable of β ⊃⊂ β hazz A) 27. ⊢ (α is a particular ∧ β is a universalium ∧ β is predicable of α) ⊃ (∃γ)(α ≠ γ ∧ γ is essentially predicable of α) 28. ⊢ (∃x) (∃y)(x is a particular ∧ y is a universalium ∧ y is predicable of x ⊃ ~(∀x)(x is a universalium ∧ x is some-thing) 29. ⊢ (∀β)(β is a universalium ⊃ β is some-thing) 30. ⊢ α is a particular) ⊃ ~∃β.(α ≠ β ∧ β is essentially predicable of α) 31. ⊢ (α is predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ α is non-essentially or accidentally predicable of β. The use of this or that doxastic modality, necessity and possibility, starting with (11) above, make this a good place to consider one philosophical mistake Grice mentions in "Causal Theory": 'What is actual is not also possible.' (Cf. 'What is essential is also accidental.' He is criticising a 'contemporary' (if 'dated') form of 'ordinary-language' philosophy, where the philosopher detects a nuance, and embarks risking colliding with the facts, rushing ahead to exploit it before he can clarify it! Grice liked to see his explorations on "=" as belonging to metaphysics, as the Series on his "Doctrines" at the Grice Collection testifies. While Grice presupposes the use of "=" in his treatment of 'the' king of France, he also explores a relativisation of "=." His motivation was an essay by Wiggins, almost Aristotelian in spirit, against Strawson's criterion of space-time continuancy for the identification of the 'substantia prima.' Grice wants to apply '=' to cases were the time continuancy is made explicit. This yields that 'a=b' in scenario S, but that it may not be the case that "a = b" in a second scenario S'. Myro had an occasion to expand on Grice's views in his contribution on the topic for Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories, Ends, or P. G. R. I. C. E. for short. Myro mentions his System Ghp, a highly powerful/hopefully plausible version of Grice's System Q, "in gratitude to” to Grice. Grice explored also the logic of izzing and hazzing with A. D. Code. Grice and Myro developed a Geach-type of 'qualified identity.' The formal aspects were developed by Myro, and also by Code. Grice discussed Wiggins's Sameness and substance, rather than Geach. Cf. Wiggins and Strawson on Grice for the British Academy. At Oxford, Grice was more or less given free rein to teach what he wanted. He found the New World slightly disconcerting at first. At Oxford, he expected his tutees to be willing to 'read' the classics in the vernacular Greek. His approach to teaching was diagogic, as Socrates's! Even in his details of 'izzing' and 'hazzing.' "Greek enough to me!," as a student recalled! 1980, correspondence with A. D. Code, Grice sees in Code an excellent Aristotelian. They collaborated on an exploration of Aristotle's underlying logic of essential and non-essential predication, for which they would freely use such verbal forms as 'izzing' and 'hazzing.' 1980, izzing and hazzing, The Grice Papers, A. D. Code on the significance of the middle book in Aristotle's Metaphysics, keywords: Aristotle, metaphysics, the middle book. Very middle. Grice never knew what was middle for Aristotle, but admired Code too much to air this! The organisation of Aristotle's metaphysics was a topic of much concern for Grice. With Code, Grice coined 'izzing' and 'hazzing' to refer to essential and non-essential attribution. Izzing and hazzing, Aristotle on the multiplicity of being, Aristotle on multiplicity, The Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 1988, posthumously ed. by B. F. Loar, keywords: Aristotle, multiplicity, izzing, hazzing, being, good, Code. Grice offers a thorough discussion of Owen’s treatment of Aristotle as leading us to the 'snares' of ontology. Grice distinguishes between 'izzing' and 'hazzing,' which he thinks help in clarifying, 'more axiomatico,' what Aristotle is getting at with his remarks on 'essential' versus 'non-essential' predication. Surely, for Grice, 'being,' nor indeed 'good,' should not be multiplied beyond necessity, but izzing and hazzing *are* already multiplied. The Grice Papers contains drafts of the essay eventually submitted for publication by Loar “in memoriam” Grice.' Note that the Grice Papers contains a typically Griceian 'un-publication,' entitled 'Aristotle and multiplicity' simpliciter. Rather than "Aristotle *on*," as the title for The Pacific Philosophical Quarterly piece goes. Note also that, since it's 'multiplicity' simpliciter, it refers to Aristotle on two key ideas: being and the good. As Code notes in his contribution to P. G. R. I. C. E., Grice first presents his thoughts on izzing and hazzing publicly at Vancouver. R. B. Jones has developed the axiomatic treatment favoured by Grice. For Grice there is 'multiplicity' in both 'being' and 'good' (ton agathon), both accountable in terms of conversational implicata, of course. If in "Prolegomena," Grice was interested in criticising himself, in essays of historical nature like these, Grice is seeing Aristotle's "Athenian dialectic" as a foreshadow of the "Oxonian dialectic," and treating him as an equal. Grice is yielding his razor: senses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity. But then Aristotle is talking about the 'multiplicity' of '... is ...' and '... is good.' Surely, there are ways to turn Aristotle into the monoguist he has to be! There is a further item in the Grice collection that combines Aristotle on being with Aristotle on good, which is relevant in connection with this. Aristotle on being and good ("ἀγαθός"), 1970, keywords: Aristotle, being, good (agathon), "ἀγαθός." As from this folder, the essays are ordered alphabetically, starting with "Aristotle,” Grice will explore Aristotle on 'being' or "is" and "good" ("ἀγαθός") in explorations with A. D. Code. Grice comes up with 'izzing' and 'hazzing' as the two counterparts to Aristotle's views on, respectively, essential and non-essential predication. Grice's views on Aristotle on 'the good' (strictly, there is no need to restrict Arisstotle's use to the neuter form, since he employs "ἀγαθός") connect with Grice's Aristotelian idea of 'eudaimonia,' that he explores elsewhere. Strictly: Aristotle on being and the good. If that had been Grice's case, he would have used the definite article. Otherwise, 'good' may well translate as masculine, "ἀγαθός" -- the agathetic implicatum. He plays with Dodgson, 'cabbages and kings.' For what 'is' a 'good' cabbage as opposed to 'a cabbage'? It does not require very sharp eyes, but only our willingness to use the eyes one has, to see that speech is permeated with the notion of purpose.” “To say what a certain kind of thing is is only too frequently partly to say that it is for.” “This feature applies to talk of, e. g., ships, shoes, sailing wax, and kings; and, possibly and perhaps most excitingly, it extends even to cabbages!” Although Grice suspects Urmson might disagree. v. Grice on Urmson's apples. Grice at his jocular best. If he is going to be a Kantian, he will. He uses Kantian jargon to present his theory of conversation. This he does only at Harvard. The implicature being that talking of vaguer assumptions of helpfulness would not sound too convincing. So he has the maxim, the super-maxim, and the sub-maxim. A principle and a maxim is Kantian enough. But when he actually echoes Kant, is when he introduces what he later calls the conversational categories – the keyword here is ‘conversational category,' as 'categoria' is used by Aristotle and Kant -- or Kantotle. Grice surely knew that, say, his “Category of Conversational Modality” had nothing to do with the Kantian Category of Modality. Still, he stuck with the idea of four categories (versus Aristotle's 'ten,' 'eight' or 'seven,' as the text you consult may tell you): category of conversational quantity (which at Oxford he had formulated in much vaguer terms like ‘strength’ and informativeness and entailment), the category of conversational quality (keyword: principle of conversational trust), and the category of conversational relation, where again Kant’s ‘relation’ has nothing to do with the maxim Grice associates with this category. In any case, his Kantian joke may be helpful when considering the centrality of the concept ‘category’ simpliciter that Grice had to fight with with his pupils at Oxford – he was lucky to have Austin and Strawson as co-lecturers! Grice was irritated by Liddell and Scott defining 'kategoria' as 'category.' 'I guess I knew that.' He agreed with their second shot, "predicable." Ultimately, Grice's concern with 'category' is his concern with 'person,' or 'prote ousia,' as used by Aristotle, and as giving a rationale to Grice's agency-based approach to the philosophical enterprise. Aristotle used kategorein in the sense of to predicate, assert something of something, and kategoria. The prote ousia is exemplified by 'o tis anthropos.' It is obvious that Grice wants to approach Aristotle's semantics and Aristotle's metaphysics "at one fell swoop." Grice reads Aristotle's Metaphysics, and finds it 'understandable.' Consider the adjective 'French' (which Aristotle does NOT consider) -- as it occurs in phrases such as Michel Foucault is a French citizen. H. P. Grice is not a French citizen Michel Foucault once wrote a nice French poem. J. O. Urmson once wrote a nice French essay on pragmatics. Michel Foucault was a French professor. Michel Foucault is a French professor. Michel Foucault is a French professor of philosophy. The following features are perhaps significant. The appearance of the adjective 'French' (or Byzantine, as the case might be -- cf. "I'm feeling French tonight") in these phrases is what Grice calls 'adjunctive' rather than 'conjunctive,' or 'attributive.' A French poem is not necessarily something which combines the separate features of being a poem and being French, as a tall philosopher would simply combine the features of being tall and of being a philosopher. 'French' in 'French poem,' occurs _adverbially_. 'French citizen' _standardly_ means "citizen of France." 'French poem' _standardly_ means "poem in French". But it is a _mistake_ to suppose that this fact _implies_ that there is this or that _meaning_ (or, worse, this or that Fregeian _sense_) of the expression 'French'. In any case, only metaphorically or metabolically can we say that 'French' 'means' this or that or has sense. An utterer MEANS. An utterer MAKES SENSE. Cf. R. Paul's doubts about capitalizing 'major.' 'French' means, and figuratively at that, only one thing, viz. 'of or pertaining to France.' And 'English' only means 'of or pertaining to England.' 'French' may be what Grice (unfollowing his remarks on "The general theory of context") call 'context-sensitive'. One might indeed say, if you like, that while 'French' means -- or 'means' only this or that, or that its only sense is this or that, 'French' still means, again figuratively, a variety of things. 'French' means-in-context "of or pertaining to France. Symbolise that as Expression E 'means'-in-context that p. Expression E 'means-in-context C2 that p2. Relative to Context C1 'French' means 'of France'; as in the phrase 'French citizen.' Relative to context C2, 'French' means 'in the French language, as in the phrase, 'French poem' -- whereas 'history' does not behave, like this. Whether the focal item is a universal or a particular is, contra Aristotle, quite irrelevant to the question of what this or that related adjective "means," or what its sense is. The medical art is no more what an utterer means when he utters the adjective 'medical', as is 'France' what an utterer means by the adjective 'French'.W hile the attachment of this or that context may suggest an interpretation in context of this or that expression as uttered by the utterer U, it need not be the case that such a suggestion is indefeasible. It might be e.g. that 'French poem' would have to mean, "poem composed in French", unless there were counter indications, that brings the utterer and the addressee to a different context C3. In which case, perhaps what the utterer means by 'French poem' is 'poem composed by a French competitor' in this or that competition. For 'French professor' there would be two obvious things an utterer might mean. "Disambiguation" will depend on the wider expression-context or in the situtational context attaching to the this or that circumstance of utterance.
1955. Please, agreebleness, leasure, Aristotle on pleasure, Aristotle: pleasure, hedonism, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 4, folder 8, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: hedonism, pleasure, Aristotle, agreeableness, happiness, system of ends, ends, end, desire, satisfaction, delight. Griceian pleasures! ἡδονή, Dor. ἁδονά (or in Trag.chorus ἡδονά S.OT1339), ἡ, (ἥδομαι). A. enjoyment, pleasure, first in Simon.71, S.l.c., Hdt.1.24, al.; prop. of sensual pleasures, αἱ τοῦ σώματος or περὶ τὸ σῶμα ἡ., X.HG 4.8.22,6.1.4; αἱ κατὰ τὸ σῶμα ἡ. Pl.R.328d; σωματικαὶ ἡ. Arist.EN 1151a13; αἱ περὶ πότους καὶ περὶ ἐδωδὰς ἡ. Pl R.389e; but also ἀκοῆς ἡ. Th.3.38; ἡ ἀπὸ τοῦ εἰδέναι ἡ. Pl.R.582b; of malicious pleasure, ἡ ἐπὶ τοῖς τῶν φίλων κακοῖς, ἐπὶ ταῖς λοιδορίαις ἡ., Id.Phlb.50a, D.18.138; ἡδονῇ ἡσσᾶσθαι, ἡδοναῖς χαρίζεσθαι, to give way to pleasure, Th. l.c., Pl.Lg.727c; κότερα ἀληθείη χρήσομαι ἢ ἡδονῆ; shall I speak truly or so as to humour you? Hdt.7.101; εἰ ὑμῖν ἡδονὴ τοῦ ἡγεμονεύειν ib.160; ἡ. εἰσέρχεταί τιϝι εἰ . . one feels pleasure at the thought that . ., Id.1.24; ἡδονὴν ἔχειν τινός to be satisfied with. , S.OC 1604; ἡδονὴν ἔχει, φέρει, Pherecr.145.2, Alex.263.6; ἡδονὴ ἰδέσθαι (like θαῦμα ἰδέσθαι), of a temple, Hdt.2.137: with Preps. in Adv. sense, “δαίμοσιν πρὸς ἡδονήν” A.Pr.494; ὃ μέν ἐστι πρὸς ἡ. D.18.4; πρὸς ἡ. λέγειν to speak so as to please another, S.El.921, Th.2.65; “δημηγορεῖν” D.4.38; “οὐ πρὸς ἡ. οἱ ἦν τὰ ἀγγελλόμενα” Hdt.3.126; “πάντα πρὸς ἡ. ἀκούοντας” D.8.34; later “πρὸς ἡδονῆς εἶναί τινι” Parth.8.8, Lib. Or.12.1; “καθ᾽ ἡδονὴν κλύειν”
καθ᾽ ἡδονὰς τῷ δήμῳ τὰ πράγματα ἐνδιδόναι ib.65; ἐν ἡδονῇ ἐστί τινι it is a pleasure or delight to
another, Hdt.4.139; folld. by inf., E.IT494; by acc. et inf., Hdt.7.15; ἐν ἡδονῇ ἔχειν τινάς to take pleasure in
them, Th.3.9; ἐν ἡδονῇ ἄρχοντες, opp. οἱ λυπηροί, Id.1.99; “μεθ᾽ ἡδονῆς” Id.4.19; “ὑφ᾽ ἡδονῆς” S.Ant.648, etc.; ὑπὸ τῆς ἡ. Alex.24, 110.23: as
dat. modi, ἡδονᾷ with pleasure, S. OT1339 (lyr.), cf. Hdt.2.137 (f.l.). 2. concrete, a
pleasure, S.El. 873 (pl.), Ar.Nu.1072 (pl.); ἡδοναὶ τραγημάτων sweetmeats, Sopat. 17. 3. Pl., desires
after pleasure, pleasant lusts, X.Mem.1.2.23, Ep.Tit.3.3, al. II. in Ion. Philosophers, taste,
flavour, usu. joined with χροιή, Diog.Apoll.5, Anaxag.4 (pl.),
cf. Arist.PA660b9, Thphr. HP4.4.7, LXX Nu.11.8, Eudem. ap. Ath.9.369f, Mnesith. ap. eund.8.357f. Note that Aristotle uses "somatike
hedone." As a Lit. Hum. Oxon., and especially as a tutee of Hardie at
Corpus, Grice is almost too well aware of the centrality of 'hedone' in
Aristotle's system! "Pleasure" is rendered "placitum" (as
in "ad placitum") in scholastic philosophy, but that's because
scholastic philosophy is not as Hellenic as it should be! Actually, Grice
prefers 'agreeable.' One of Grice's requisites for an ascription of
'eudaemonia' ('to have a fairy godmother') precisely has the system of ends an
agent chooses to realise to be an 'agreeable' one. One form, or 'mode,' of
agreeableness, as Grice notes, is, unless counteracted, automatically attached
to the attainment of an object of desire, such attainment being routinely a
source of satisfaction. The generation of such a satisfaction thus provides an
independent ground for preferring one system of ends to another. However, some other 'mode' of agreeableness, such as being a source of delight, for
example, which are _not routinely associated with the fulfilment of this or
that desire, could discriminate, independently of other features relevant to
such a preference, between one system of ends and another. Further, a system of
ends the operation of which is specially agreeable is stable not only
vis-à-vis a rival system, but also against the somewhat weakening effect of
incontinence, or 'akrasia,' if you mustn’t! A disturbing influence, as
Aristotle knew from experience, is more surely met by a principle in consort
with a supporting attraction than by the principle alone! Grice's favourite
'hedonistic' implicatum was 'Please!,' as in 'Please, please me!'
1955. Can I have a pain in my tail?, The H. P. Grice Papers,
BANC MSS 90/135c. Keywords: pain, tailbone pain. A discussion of a
category mistake. Cf. Grice: "I may be categorically mistaken but I'm not
categorically confused." It is only natural that if Grice was interested
on Aristotle on 'pleasure' he would be interested on Aristotle on
'pain.' λύπη, ἡ, A. pain of body, opp. ἡδονή, Id.Phlb. 31c, etc.; also, sad plight or condition, Hdt.7.152. 2. pain of mind, grief, ib.16.“ά; δῆγμα δὲ λύπης οὐδὲν ἐφ᾽ ἧπαρ προσικνεῖται” A.Ag.791 (anap.); τί γὰρ καλὸν ζῆν βίοτον, ὃς λύπας φέρει; Id.Fr.177, cf. S.OC 1217 (lyr.), etc.; “ἐρωτικὴ λ.” Th.6.59; “λύπας προσβάλλειν” Antipho 2. 2.2; “λ. φέρειν τινί” And.2.8; opp. χαρά, X.HG7.1.32.
1955. Metaphysics, with P. F. Strawson and D. F. Pears, in D. F. Pears, The nature of metaphysics, proceedings of the BBC Third programe lectures, Macmillan, London, Metaphysics, in D. F. Pears, The Nature of Metaphysics, London, Macmillan, Metaphysics, while the Macmillan came out in 1957, the broadcast was in 1955. The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folders 26-27 and carton 8-folder 2, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: metaphysics, presupposition, Aristotle, Kant, Hume, Collingwood. “Some like Hegel, but Collingwood's *my* man!” -- Grice. Grice participated in two consecutive evenings of the series of programmes on metaphysics organised by D. F. Pears. Actually, charming Pears felt pretentious enough to label the meetings to be about the 'nature' of metaphysics! Grice ends up discussing, as he should, Collingwood on presupposition. Metaphysics remained a favourite topic for Grice's philosophical explorations, as it is evident from his essay on 'Metaphysics, Philosophical Eschatology, and Plato's Republic,' reprinted in his Studies in the way of words. Possibly Hardie is to blame, since he hardly tutored Grice on metaphysics! Grice's two BBC lectures are typically dated in tone. It was the ("good ole") days when philosophers thought they could educate the non-elite by dropping names like Collingwood and stuff! The Third Programme was extremely popular, especially among the "uneducated ones at London," as Pears almost put it, as it was a way for Londoners to get to know "what is going on" down at Oxford, the only place an uneducated (or educated, for that matter) Londoner at the time was interested in displaying some interest about! I mean, Johnson is right: if a man is tired of the nature of metaphysics, he is tired of life! Since the authorship is Grice/Strawson/Pears, 'Metaphysics,' in D. F. Pears, The Nature of Metaphysics, The BBC Third Programme, it is somewhat difficult to identify what paragraphs were actually read by Grice (and which ones by Pears and which ones by Strawson). But trust the sharp Griceian to detect the correct implicature! There are many ("too many") other items covered by these two lectures: Kant, Aristotle, in no particular order. And in The Grice Collection, for that matter, that cover the field of metaphysics. In the New World, as a sort of tutor in the graduate programme, Grice was expected to cover the discipline at various seminars. "Only I dislike 'discipline'!" Perhaps his clearest exposition is in the opening section of his 'Metaphysics, philosophical eschatology, and Plato's Republic,' reprinted in his Studies in the way of words, where he states, bluntly that all you need is ... metaphysics! 1980, metaphysics, Miscellaneous, metaphysics notes, Grice would possible see metaphysics as a class – ‘category’ figuring large. He was concerned with the methodological aspects of the metaphysical enterprise, since he was enough of a relativist to allow for one metaphysical scheme to apply to one area of discourse (one of Eddington’s tables) and another metaphysical scheme to apply to another (Eddington’s other table). In the third programme for the BBC Grice especially enjoyed criticising John Wisdom's innovative look at metaphysics as a bunch of 'self-evident falsehoods' ("We're all alone"). Grice focuses on Wisdom on the knowledge of other minds. He also discusses Collingwood's presuppositions, and Bradley on the reality-appearance distinction. Grice's reference to Wisdom was due to A. C. Ewing's treatment of Wisdom on metaphysics. Grice's main motivation here is defending metaphysics against Ayer. Ayer thought to win more Oxonian philosophers than he did at Oxford, but he was soon back in London. Post-war Oxford had become conservative and the would stand to the nonsense of Ayer's claiming that metaphysics is nonsense, especially, as Ayer's implicature also was, that philosophy is nonsense! Perhaps the beset summary of Griceian metaphysics is his "From Genesis to Revelations: a new discourse on metaphysics."
1956. Grice defends a topdogma of empiricism. In defence of a 'dogma,' in Studies in the Way of Words, London: Harvard University Press, 1989, with P. F. Strawson, the analytic-synthetic distinction, in defence of a dogma, from The Philosophical Review, vol. 66, pp. 141-58, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 6-folders 13-14, and 31, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: analytic-synthetic distinction. The locus classicus for the 'ordinary-language' philosophical response to Quine in "Two dogmas of empiricism." Grice and Strawson claim that '... is analytic" does have an 'ordinary-language' use, as attached two a type of behavioural conversational response. To an analytically false move (such as 'My neighbour's three-year-old son is an adult') the addressee A is bound to utter, "I don't understand you! You are not being figurative, are you?." To a synthetically false move, on the other hand (such as 'My neighbour's three-year-old understands Russell's Theory of Types'), the addressee A will jump with, 'Can't believe it!' The topdogma of 'analyticity' is for Grice very important to defend. Philosophy depends on it! He knows that to many his claim to fame is his "In defence of a dogma," the topdogma of analyticity, no less. He eventually turns to a 'pragmatist' justification of the distinction. This pragmatist justification is still in accordance with what he sees as the use of 'analytic' in 'ordinary language'. His infamous examples are as follows. My neighbour's three-year old understands Russell's Theory of Types. A: Hard to believe, but I will. "My neighbour's three-year old is an adult." Metaphorically? No. Then I don't understand you, and what you've just said is, in my scheme of things, analytically false. Ultimately, there are 'conversational' criteria, based on this or that principle of conversational helfpulness. Grice is also circumstantially concerned with the 'synthetic a priori,' and he would ask his children's playmates: "Can a sweater be red and green all over? No stripes allowed!" The distinction is ultimately Kantian, but it had brought to the fore by the 'linguistic turn,' Oxonian and other! In defence of a dogma, 'Two dogmas of empiricism,' Keywords: the analytic-synthetic distinction. For Quine, there are two. Grice is mainly interested in the first one: that there is a distinction between the analytic and the synthetic. Grice considers Empiricism as a monster on his way to the Rationalist City of Eternal Truth. Grice came back time and again to explore the analytic-synthetic distinction. But his philosophy remained constant. His sympathy is for the practicality of it, its rationale. He sees it as involving formal calculi, rather than his own theory of conversation as rational co-operation which does not presuppose the analytic-synthetic distinction, even if it explains it! Grice would press the issue here: if one wants to prove that such a theory of conversation as rational co-operation has to be seen as ‘philosophical,’ rather than some other way, some idea of ‘analyticity’ may be needed to justify the philosophical enterprise. Cf. the synthetic a priori, that fascinated Grice most than anything Kantian else! “Can a sweater be green and red all over? No stripes allowed.” With "In defence of a dogma," Grice and Strawson attack a New-World philosopher. Grice had previously collaborated with Strawson in an essay on 'Metaphysics' (actually a three-part piece, with D. F. Pears as the third author). The example Grice chooses to refute Quine's attack of the top-dogma is the Aristotelian idea of the peritrope, as Aristotle refutes Antiphasis in 'Metaphysics' (v. Ackrill, Burnyeat and Dancy). Grice explores chapter Γ 8 of Aristotle’s Metaphysics. In Γ 8, Aristotle presents two self-refutation arguments against two theses, and calls the asserter, “Antiphasis,” T1 = Everything is true, and T2 = Everything is false, Metaph. Γ 8, 1012b13–18. Each thesis is exposed to the stock objection that it eliminates itself. An utterer who explicitly conveys that everything is true also makes the thesis opposite to his own true, so that his own is not true (for the opposite thesis denies that his is true), and any utterer U who explicitly conveys that everything is false also belies himself. Aristotle does not seem to be claiming that, if everything is true, it would also be true that it is false that everything is true and, that, therefore, “Everything is true” must be false: the final, crucial inference, from the premise ‘phorseshoe~p’ to the conclusion ‘~p’ is missing. But it is this extra inference that seems required to have a formal refutation of Antiphasis’s T1 or T2 by 'consequentia mirabilis.' The nature of the argument as a purely dialectical silencer of Antiphasis is confirmed by the case of T2, “Everything is false." An utterer who explicitly conveys that everything is false unwittingly concedes, by self-application, that what he is saying must be false too. Again, the further and different conclusion ‘Therefore; it is false that everything is false’ is missing. That proposal is thus self-defeating, self-contradictory (and comparable to Grice's addressee using 'adult' to apply to three-year old, without producing the 'creature'), oxymoronic, and suicidal. This seems all that Aristotle is interested in establishing through the self-refutation stock objection. This is not to suggest that Aristotle did not believe that ‘Everything is true’ or ‘Everything is false’ is false, or that he excludes that he can prove its falsehood. Grice notes that this is not what Aristotle seems to be purporting to establish in 1012b13–18. This holds for a περιτροπή (peritrope) argument, but not for a περιγραφή (perigraphe) argument ("συμβαίνει δὴ καὶ τὸ θρυλούμενον πᾶσι τοῖς τοιούτοις λόγοις, αὐτοὺς ἑαυτοὺς ἀναιρεῖν. ὁ μὲν γὰρ πάντα ἀληθῆ λέγων καὶ τὸν ἐναντίον αὑτοῦ λόγον ἀληθῆ ποιεῖ, ὥστε τὸν ἑαυτοῦ οὐκ ἀληθῆ (ὁ γὰρ ἐναντίος οὔ φησιν αὐτὸν ἀληθῆ), ὁ δὲ πάντα ψευδῆ καὶ αὐτὸς αὑτόν.") It may be emphasized that Aristotle’s argument does not contain an explicit application of 'consequentia mirabilis.' Indeed, no extant self-refutation argument before Augustine, Grice is told by Mates, contains an explicit application of 'consequentia mirabilis.' This observation is a good and important one, but Grice has doubts about the consequences one may draw from it. One may take the absence of an explicit application of "consequentia mirabilis" to be a sign of the purely dialectical nature of the self-refutation argument. This is questionable. The formulation of a self-refutation argument (as in Grice's addressee, "Sorry, I misused 'adult.'") is often compressed and elliptical and involves this or that implicatum. One usually assumes that this or that piece in a dialectical context has been omitted and should be supplied (or worked out, as Grice prefers) by the addressee. But in this or that case, it is equally possible to supply some other, non-dialectical piece of reasoning. In Aristotle’s arguments from Γ 8, e.g., the addressee may supply an inference to the effect that the thesis which has been shown to be self-refuting is not true. For if Aristotle takes the argument to establish that the thesis has its own contradictory version as a consequence, it must be obvious to Aristotle that the thesis is not true (since every consequence of a true thesis is true, and two contradictory theses cannot be simultaneously true). On the further assumption (that Grice makes explicit) that the principle of bivalence is applicable, Aristotle may even infer that the thesis is false. It is perfectly plausible to attribute such an inference to Aristotle and to supply it in his argument from Γ 8. On this account, there is no reason to think that the argument is of an intrinsically dialectical nature and cannot be adequately represented as a non-dialectical proof of the non-truth, or even falsity, of the thesis in question. It is indeed difficult to see signs of a dialectical exchange between two parties (of the type of which Grice and Strawson are champions) in Γ 8, 1012b13–18. One piece of evidence is Aristotle’s reference to the person, the utterer, as Grice prefers who explicitly conveys or asserts (ὁ λέγων) that T1 or that T2. This reference by the Grecian philosopher to the Griceian utterer or asserter of the thesis that everything is true would be irrelevant if Aristotle's aim is to prove something about T1's or T2's propositional content, independently of the act by the utterer of uttering its expression and thereby explicitly conveying it. However, it is not clear that this reference is essential to Aristotle’s argument. One may even doubt whether the Grecian philosopher is being THAT Griceian, and actually referring to the asserter of T1 or T2. The *implicit* (or implicated) grammatical subject of Aristotle's "ὁ λέγων" (1012b15) might be λόγος, instead of the utterer qua asserter. "λόγος" is surely the implicit grammatical subject of "ὁ λέγων" shortly after ( 1012b21–22. 8). The passage may be taken to be concerned with λόγοι -- this or that statement, this or that thesis -- but not with its asserter. In the "Prior Analytics," Aristotle states that no thesis ('A three-year old is an adult') can necessarily imply its own contradictory ("A three-year old is not an adult") (2.4, 57b13–14). One may appeal to this statement in order to argue for Aristotle's claim that a self-refutation argument should NOT be analyzed as involving an implicit application of 'consequentia mirabilis.' Thus, one should deny that Aristotle’s self-refutation argument establishes a necessary implication from the self-refuting thesis to its contradictory. However, this does not explain what other kind of consequence relation Aristotle takes the self-refutation argument to establish between the self-refuting thesis and its contradictory (although dialectical necessity has been suggested). Aristotle’s argument suffices to establish that “Everything is false” is either false or liar-paradoxical. If a thesis is liar-paradoxical (and Grice loved, and overused the expression), the assumption of its falsity leads to contradiction as well as the assumption of its truth. But 'Everything is false' is only liar-paradoxical in the unlikely, for Aristotle perhaps impossible, event that everything distinct from this thesis is false. So, given the additional premise that there is at least one true item distinct from the thesis 'Everything is false,' Aristotle can safely infer that the thesis is false. As for Aristotle's "ὁ γὰρ λέγων τὸν ἀληθῆ λόγον ἀληθῆ ἀληθής,", or eliding the "γὰρ," "ὁ λέγων τὸν ἀληθῆ λόγον ἀληθῆ ἀληθής," (ho legon ton alethe logon alethe alethes) may be rendered as either: 'The statement which states that the true statement is true is true,' or, more alla Grice, as 'He who says (or explicitly conveys, or indicates) that the true thesis is true says something true.' It may be argued that it is quite baffling (and figurative or analogical or metaphoric) in this context, to take 'ἀληθής' to be predicated of the Griceian utterer, a person ('true' standing for 'truth teller,' 'trustworthy'), to take it to mean that he says something true, rather than his statement stating something true, or his statement being true. But cf. Liddell/Scott: ἀληθ-ής [α^], Dor. ἀλα_θής , ές, (λήθω, of persons, truthful, honest (not in Hom., v. infr.), “ἀ. νόος” Pi.O.2.92; “κατήγορος” A.Th.439; “κριτής” Th.3.56; οἶνος ἀ. `in vino veritas', Pl.Smp.217e; “ὁ μέσος ἀ. τις” Arist.EN 1108a20. Admittedly, this or that non-Griceian passage in which it is 'λόγος,' and not the utterer, which is the implied grammatical subject of 'ὁ λέγων' can be found in Metaph. Γ 7, 1012a24–25; Δ 6, 1016a33; Int. 14, 23a28–29; De motu an. 10, 703a4; Eth. Nic. 2.6, 1107a6–7. 9. So the topic is controversial. Indeed such a non-Griceian exegesis of the passage is given by Alexander of Aphrodisias (in Metaph. 340.26–29):9, when Alexander observes that the statement, i.e. not the utterer, that says that everything is false (ὁ δὲ πάντα ψευδῆ εἶναι λέγων λόγος) negates itself, not himself, because if everything is false, this very statement, which, rather than, by which the utterer, says that everything is false, would be false, and how can an utterer be FALSE? So that the statement which, rather than the utterer who, negates it, saying that not everything is false, would be true, and surely an utterer cannot be 'true.' Does Alexander misrepresent Aristotle’s argument by omitting every Griceian reference to the asserter or utterer qua rational personal agent, of the thesis? If the answer is negative, even if the occurrence of 'ὁ λέγων' at 1012b15 refers to the asserter, or utterer, qua rational personal agent, this is merely an accidental feature of Aristotle’s argument that cannot be regarded as an indication of its dialectical nature. None of this is to deny that some self-refutation argument may be of an intrinsically dialectical nature; it is only to deny that every one is This is in line with Burnyeat’s view that a dialectical self-refutation, even if qualified, as Aristotle does, as 'ancient,' is a subspecies of self-refutation, but does not exhaust it. Granted, a dialectical approach may provide a useful interpretive framework for many an "ancient" self-refutation argument. A statement like “If proof does not exist, proof exists” -- that occurs in a anti-sceptical self-refutation argument reported by Sextus Empiricus -- may receive an attractive 'dialectical' re-interpretation. It may be argued that such a statement should not be understood at the level of what is explicated, but should be regarded as an elliptical reminder of a complex dialectical argument which can be described as follows. Cf. If thou claimest that proof doth not exist, thou must present a proof of what thou assertest, in order to be credible, but thus thou thyself admitest that proof existeth. A similar point can be made for Aristotle’s famous argument in the Protrepticus that one must philosophise. A number of sources state that this argument relies on the implicature, 'If one must not philosophize, one must philosophize.' It may be argued that this implicature is an elliptical reminder of a dialectical argument such as the following. If thy position is that thou must not philosophise, thou must reflect on this choice and argue in its support, but by doing so thou art already choosing to do philosophy, thereby admitting that thou must philosophise. The claim that every instance of an "ancient" self-refutation arguments is of an intrinsically dialectical nature is thus questionable, to put it mildly. V also 340.19–26, and A. Madigan, tcomm., Alexander of Aphrodisias: On Aristotle’s “Metaphysics” 4, Ithaca, N.Y., Burnyeat, 'Protagoras and Self-Refutation in Later Greek Philosophy,.' Grice's implicature is that Quine should have learned Greek before refuting Aristotle. 'But then *I* don't speak Greek!,' Strawson refuted.
1958. Oxford philosophy and linguistic botanising, rev. 1970, post-war Oxford philosophy, in Studies in the Way of Words, Part II: Explorations in semantics and metaphysics, Essay, philosophy and ‘ordinary’ language, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 1-folder 19, carton 3-folder 6, carton 4-folder 15, and Series V (Topical), carton 8-folder 3, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Oxford philosophy, linguistic botanising, 'ordinary language' philosophy. What were Grice's first impressions when arriving at Oxford. He was going to LEARN! "Only the poor learn at Oxford" was an adage he treasured, since he wasn't one! Let's start with an alphabetical listing of Grice's Play Group companions: J. L. Austin, A. G. N. Flew, P. L. Gardiner, H. P. Grice, R. M. Hare, H. L. A. Hart, S. N. Hampshire, P. H. Nowell-Smith, D. F. Pears, A. M. Quinton, P. F. Strawson, J. F. Thomson, J. O. Urmson, G. J. Warnock. Grice’s main Oxonian association is St. John's, Oxford. By "Oxford Philosophy," Grice notably refers to J. L. Austin's Play Group, of which he was a member. But Grice had Oxford associations pre-war, and after the demise of Austin. But back to the Play Group, this, to some, infamous, playgroup, met on Saturday mornings at different venues at Oxford, including Grice's own St. John's -- apparently, Austin's favourite venue. Austin regarded himself and his 'kindergarten' as 'linguistic' or 'language' 'botanists.' The idea was to list various 'ordinary' uses of this or that 'philosophical notion." Austin: "They say philosophy is about language; well, then, let's botanise!" Grice's involvement with 'Oxford philosophy' of course predated his associations with Austin's play group. He always said he was fortunate of having been a tutee to Hardie at Corpus. Corpus, Oxford. Grice would occasionally refer to the emblematic pelican, so prominently displayed at Corpus. Grice had an interim association with the venue one associates most directly with philosophy, Merton --: Grice, Merton, Oxford. While Grice loved to drop Oxonian names, notably his 'rivals,' such as Dummett or Anscombe, he knew when not to. His "Post-war Oxford philosophy," as opposed to more specific items in The Grice Collection, remains 'general' in tone, and intended as a defense of the 'ordinary-language' approach to philosophy. Surprisingly, or perhaps not (for those who knew Grice), he takes a pretty idiosyncratic characterisation of conceptual analysis. Grice's philosophical problems emerge with Grice's idiosyncratic use of this or that expression. Conceptual analysis is meant to solve HIS problems, not others'! Repr. in Grice, Studies in the Way of Words. Grice finds it important to reprint this since he had updated thoughts on the matter, which he displays in his "Conceptual analysis and the province of philosophy." The topic represents one of the strands he identifies behind the unity of his philosophy. By "post-war Oxford philosophy," Grice meant the period he was interested in. While he had been at Corpus, Merton, and St. John's in the pre-war days, for some reason, he felt that he had made history in the post-war period. The historical reason Grice gives is understandable enough. In the pre-war days, Grice was the good student and the new fellow of St. John's -- the other one was Mabbott. But he had not been able to engage in philosophical discussion much, other than with other tutees of Hardie. After the war, Grice indeed joins Austin's more popular, less secretive 'Saturday mornings.' Indeed, for Grice, 'post-war' means 'all philosophy after the war' (and not just say, the forties!) since he never abandoned the methods he developed under Austin, which were pretty congenial to the ones he had himself displayed in the pre-war days, in essays like 'Negation' and 'Personal Identity.' Grice is a a bit of an expert on Oxonian philosophy. He sees himself as a member of the school of analytic philosophy, rather than the abused term 'ordinary-language' philosophy. This is evident by the fact that he contributed to such polemic -- but typically Oxonian -- volumes such as Butler, Analytic Philosophy, published by Blackwell (of all publishers). Grice led a very social life at Oxford, and held frequent philosophical discussions with philosophers such again in alphabetical order, as Austin, Gardiner, Hampshire, Hart, Nowell-Smith, Pears, Quinton, Strawson, Thomson, Urmson, Warnock, and many others. Post-war Oxford philosophy, 1958, miscellaneous, Oxford philosophy, in Studies in the Way of Words, Part II, Semantics and Metaphysics, Essay. By Oxford philosophy, Grice meant his own! Grice went back to the topic of philosophy and ‘ordinary language,’ as one of his essays is precisely entitled, "Philosophy and ‘ordinary language,'" 1970, philosophy and 'ordinary' language,’ keywords: 'ordinary-language' philosophy, linguistic botanising. Grice is not really interested in 'ordinary' language as a philologist might. He SPOKE 'ordinary' language, he thought. The point had been brought to the fore by Austin. "If they think philosophy is a play on words, well then, let's play the game." Grice's interest is methodological. Malcolm had been claiming that 'ordinary language' is incorrigible. While Grice agreed that 'language can be clever,' he knew that Aristotle was possibly right when he explored 'ta legomena' in terms of the 'many' and the selected 'wise,' 1960, philosophy and 'ordinary language,' philosophy and 'ordinary language,' keywords: philosophy, 'ordinary language'. At the time of writing, ''ordinary-language' philosophy' had become, "even within Oxford," a bit of a term of abuse. Grice tries to defend Austin's approach to it, while suggesting ideas that Austin somewhat ignored, like what an utterer implies by the use of an 'ordinary-language' expression, rather than what the expression itself does. Grice is concerned, contra Austin, in explanation (or 'explanatory adequacy'), not taxonomy (or 'descriptive adequacy'). Grice disregards Austin's piecemeal approach to 'ordinary language,' as Grice searches for 'the big picture of it all.' Grice never used 'ordinary language' seriously. The phrase was used, as he explains, by those who HATED 'ordinary-language' philosophy. There's no such thing as 'ordinary language.' Surely you cannot fairly describe the idiosyncratic linguistic habits of an Old Cliftonian as even 'remotely' 'ordinary.' "Extra-ordinary" more likely! As far as the 'philosophy' bit goes, this is what Bergmann jocularly described as the 'linguistic turn.' But as Grice notes, the linguistic turn involves both the 'ideal language' and the 'ordinary language.' Grice defends Austin's choice of the 'ordinary' seeing that 'it was what he had to hand!' While Grice seems to be in agreement with the tone of his Wellesley talk, his idioms there in (“You’re crying for the moon! Philosophy need not be grand!”) seem to contrast with his more grandiose approach to philosophy. His struggle was to defend the minutiæ of linguistic botanising, that had occupied most of his professional life, with a grander view of the discipline. He blamed Oxford for that. Never in the history of philosophy had philosophers shown such an attachment to ordinary language as they did in post-war Oxford, Grice liked to say. Having learned Greek and Latin at Clifton, Grice saw in Oxford a way to go back to English! He never felt the need to explore ‘Continental’ modern languages like German or French. Aristotle was of course cited in Greek, but Descartes is almost not cited, and Kant is cited in the translation available to Oxonians then. Grice is totally right that never has philosophy experienced such a fascination with 'ordinary' use except at Oxford. "The ruthless and unswerving association of philosophy with ordinary language has been peculiar to the Oxford scene." While many found this attachment to 'ordinary usage' insidious, as Warnock put it, "it fit me and Grice to a T," implicating you need a sort of innate disposition towards it! Strawson perhaps never had it! And that's why Grice's arguments contra Strawson rest on further minutiæ whose detection by Grice never ceased to amaze his tutee! In this way, Grice felt he WAS Austin's heir! While Grice is associated with, in chronological order, Corpus, Merton, and St. John's, it is only St. John's that counts for the Griceian! For it is at St. John's he was a Tutorial Fellow in Philosophy! And we love him as a philosopher!
1961. The causal theory of perception, in Studies in the Way of
Words, Part II, Explorations in semantics and metaphysics, Essay (without the
excursus on implication), 1989, repr. from The Aristotelian Society,
Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volume 35, no. 1, pp.
121-153. repr. in G. J. Warnock, The philosophy of perception, 1968, Symposium
with A. R. White. Chair: R. Braithwaite, Cambridge, with R. O. Warner, 1975,
knowledge and belief, 1977, Causation colloquium, causality, cause, Stanford,
1980, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III (The Doctrines), carton 5-folder 18,
Series IV (Associations), carton 6-folder 7, and Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder
22 and carton 8-folders 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Price, seeming that,
perceiving that, sensing that, causal theory of perception, implicature,
perception, pirotology, knowledge, belief, doxastic, epistemic, Urmson,
entailment. Note that Price is also cited by Grice in 'Personal identity.' Grice: That pillar box seems red to me. The locus classicus in the
philosophical literature for Grice's implicatum. Grice introduces a
'dout-or-denial' condition for an utterance of a 'phenomenalist' report
("That pillar-box seems red to me"). Grice attacks
neo-Wittgensteinian approaches that regard the report as _false_. In a long
excursus on 'implication,' he compares the phenomenalist report with utterances
like “He has beautiful handwriting" (He is hopeless at philosophy), a
particularised conversational implicatum; 'My wife is in the kitchen or the
garden' (I have non-truth-functional grounds to utter this), a generalised
conversational implicatum; 'She was poor but she was honest' (a Great-War
witty (her poverty and her honesty contrast), a 'conventional' implicatum; and 'Have you stopped beating your wife?' -- an old Oxonian conundrum. 'You
have been beating your wife, 'cf. Smith has not ceased from eating iron', a presupposition. More importantly, he considers
different tests for each concoction! Those for the conversational implicatum
will become crucial: cancellability, calculability, non-detachability, and
indeterminacy. In the proceedings he plays with something like the principle of
conversational helpfulness, as having a basis on a view of conversation as
rational co-operation, and as giving the rationale to the implicatum. Past the
excursus, and back to the issue of perception, he holds a conservative view as
presented by Price at Oxford. One interesting reprint of Grice's essay is in
Davis's volume on 'Causal Theories,' since this is where it belongs!
White's response is usually ignored, but shouldn't. White is an interesting
Australian philosopher at Oxford who is usually regarded as a practitioner of
'ordinary-language' philosophy. However, in his response, White hardly touches
the issue of the 'implicature' with which Grice is primarily concerned. Grice
found that a full reprint from the Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society in a
compilation also containing the William James Harvard would be too repetitive.
Therefore, he omits the 'excursus' on 'implication.' However, the way Grice
re-formulates, in 1987, what that 'excursus' covers is very interesting. There
is the conversational implicatum, particularised ('Smith has beautiful
handwriting') and generalised ('My wife is in the kitchen or in the
garden'). Then there is the præsuppositum, or presupposition ("You
haven't stopped beating your wife"). Finally, there is the CONVENTIONAL
implicatum ('She was poor, but she was honest'). Even at Oxford,
Grice's implicature goes, philosophers -- even Oxonian philosophers -- use
'imply' for all those 'different animals'! Warnock had attended Austin's
"Sense and Sensibilia" (not to be confused with Austen's Sense and
Sensibility). But Warnock, for obvious reasons, preferred philosophical investigations
with Grice. Warnock reminisces that Grice once tells him, and not on a Saturday morning,
either, 'How clever language is'' For they had found that 'ordinary language'
does NOT need the concept of a visum. Grice and Warnock spent lovely occasions
exploring what Oxford has as "the philosophy of perception." While
Grice later came to see philosophy of perception as a bit or an offshoot of
'philosophical psychology,' 'the philosophy of perception' is concerned with
that treasured bit of the Oxonian philosopher's lexicon, the sense-datum,
always in the singular! The 'cause' involved is crucial. Grice plays with an
‘evolutionary’ justification of the ‘material’ thing as the denotatum of a
perceptual judgement. If a material thing causes the sense-datum of a nut, that
is because the squarrel (or squirrel) will not be nourished by the sense datum
of the nut; only by the nut! There are many other items in the Grice Collection
that address the topic of perception – notably with Warnock (on ‘vision,’ cf.
‘visa’ -- ‘taste’, and ‘perception,’ in general – And we should not forget that
Grice contributed a splendid essay on the distinction of the senses to Butler’s
“Analytic philosophy,” which in a way, redeemed a rather old-fashioned
discipline by shifting it to the idiom of the day. 1959. The philosophy of
perception: a retrospective, with G. J. Warnock, the philosophy of perception,
keywords: perception, the philosophy of perception, visum. Warnock was
possibly the only philosopher at Oxford Grice felt congenial enough to engage
in different explorations in the so-called 'philosophy of perception.' Their
joint adventures involved the disimplicature of a 'visum.' Grice later
approached sense data in more 'evolutionary' terms: a material thing is to be
vindicated transcendentally, in the sense that it is a material thing (and not
a sense datum or collection thereof) that nourishes a creature like a human.
Grice was particularly grateful to Warnock. By reprinting the full symposium on
"The Causal Theory of Perception" in his influential series of Oxford
Readings in Philosophy, Warnock had spread Grice's lore of implicature all
over! In some parts of the draft he uses "more on visa," 1959,
vision, 1969, vision, with G. J. Warnock, Keywords: vision. Of the five
senses, Grice and Warnock are particularly interested in 'seeing.' As Grice
will put it later, 'see' is a factive. It presupposes the existence of the
event reported after the 'that'-clause. A 'visum,' however, as an intermediary
between the material thing and the perceiver does not seem necessary in
'ordinary' discourse. Warnock will reconsider Grice's views too ("On what
is seen," in Sibley). While Grice uses 'vision,' he knows he is interested
in Philosopher's paradox concerning 'seeing,' notably Witters on 'seeing as.'
1959, vision, taste and the philosophy of perception, keywords: vision,
seeing. As an Oxonian philosopher, Grice was of course more interested in
'seeing' than in 'vision.' He said that Austin would criticise even the use of
things like 'sensation' and 'volition'! 1959, taste, The Grice Papers, keyword:
taste, the objects of the five senses, the philosophy of perception,
perception, the philosophy of perception, , keywords: philosophy of perception,
vision, taste, perception. Mainly with Warnock. Warnock reprinted Grice's
"Causal Theory of Perception" in his influential Reading in
Philosophy, "The philosophy of perception," 1959, perception, with G.
J. Warnock, with R. O. Warner, keywords: perception. Warnock learned about
perception much more from Grice than from Austin! 1959, taste, 1960, The
philosophy of perception, the philosophy of perception, notes with G. J.
Warnock on visum, keywords: visum, Warnock, Grice, the philosophy of
perception. Grice kept the lecture notes to a view of
publishing a retrospective. Warnock recalled Grice saying, "How
clever language is!" Grice took the offer by Harvard University Press, and
it was a good thing he reprinted part of “Causal theory.” However, the relevant
bits for his theory of conversation as rational co-operation lie in the excursus
which he omitted. What is Grice’s implicature: that one should consider the topic rather than the method here. Keywords being ‘sense datum,’ and
‘causation,’ rather than conversational helpfulness. After all, “That pillar
box seems red to me,” does not sound very helpful. But the topic of ‘Causal
Theory’ is central for his view of conversation as rational co-operation. Why?
Pirot 1 gets an impression of danger as caused by the danger out there. He
communicates the danger to Pirot 1, causing in Pirot 2 some behaviour. Without
‘causation,’ or causal links, the very point of offering a theory of
conversation as rational co-operation seems minimized. On top, as a
metaphysician, he was also concerned with ‘cause’ simpliciter. He was
especially proud that Price’s ‘Casual Theory of Perception’ had been reprinted
along with his essay in the influential volume by Davis on “Causal Theories.”
In “Actions and events,” he further explores ‘cause’ now in connection with
Greek ‘aitia’. As Grice notes, the original usage of this very Grecian item is
the one we find in ‘rebel without a cause,’ cause-to, rather than cause-because.
The two-movement nature of ‘causing’ is reproduced in the conversational exchange:
a material thing causes a sense datum which causes an expression which gets
communicated, thus causing a psychological state which will cause a behaviour.
This ‘causation’ is almost ‘representational’. A material thing or a situation
cannot govern our actions and behaviours, but a re-præsentatum of it might.
“Govern our actions and behaviour” is Grice’s correlate of what a team of
North-Oxfordshire cricketers can do for North-Oxfordshire: what North
Oxfordshire cannot do for herself, “namely, engage in a game of cricket”! In
Retrospective Epilogue he casts doubts on the point of his causal approach. It
is a short paragraph that merits much exploration. Basically, Grice is saying
his causalist approach is hardly an established thesis. He also proposes a
similar serious objection to his view in “Some remarks about the senses,” the
other essay in the philosophy of perception in Studies. As he notes, both
engage with “some fundamental questions in the philosophy of perception,” which
is hardly the same thing as saying that they provide an answer to each
question! Grice: The issue with which I have been mainly concerned may be
thought rather a fine point, but it is certainly not an isolated one. There are
several philosophical theses or dicta which would I think need to be examined
in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis
which I have been discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same general
kind. Examples which occur to me are the following. You cannot see a knife as a
knife, though you may see what is not a knife as a knife. When Moore said he
knew that the objects before him were human hands, he was guilty of misusing
the word "know". For an occurrence to be properly said to have a
cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual. For an action to be properly
described as one for which the agent is responsible, it must be the sort of
action for which people are condemned. What is actual is not also possible. What
is known by me to be the case is not also believed by me to be the case. I have
no doubt that there will be other candidates besides the six which I have
mentioned. I must emphasize that I am not saying that all these examples are
importantly similar to the thesis which I have been criticizing, only that, for
all I know, they may be. To put the matter more generally, the position adopted
by my objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre which is
characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing. I am not
condemning this kind of manoeuvre; I am merely suggesting that to embark on it
without due caution is to risk collision with the facts. Before we rush ahead
to exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detectcd, we should make sure
that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuanccs they are.” The Causal
Theory of Perception, Knowledge and belief, 1977, keywords: knowledge, belief, philosophical
psychology. Grice: the doxastic implicatum. “I know” only implicates 'I do not believe.' The following is philosopher’s mistake. 'What is known by me to be the case is NOT
also believed by me to be the case.' The topic had attracted the attention of
some Oxonian philosophers such as J. O. Urmson in "Parenthetical
verbs." Urmson speaks of a 'scale': 'I know' can be used
parenthetically, as 'I believe' can. For Grice, to utter "I
believe" is obviously to make a weaker conversational move than you
would if you utter 'I know.' And in this case, an approach to informativeness
in terms of entailment *is* in order, seeing that “I know” ENTAILS “I believe.”
The addressee is thus allowed to infer that the utterer is not in a position to
make the stronger claim. The mechanism is explained via his principle of
conversational helpfulness. Philosophers tend two over-use these two basic
psychological states, attitudes, or stances. Grice is concerned with
Gettier-type cases, and also the 'factivity' of 'know' versus the non-factivity
of 'believe.' Grice follows Hintikka's lexicological innovations: the logic of
belief is 'doxastic;' the logic of knowledge is 'epistemic.' The last thesis
that Grice lists in "Causal Theory" that he thinks rests on a big
mistake he formulates as: “What is known by me to be the case is NOT also
believed by me to be the case." What are his attending remarks? Grice
writes: “The issue with which I have been mainly concerned may be thought
rather a fine point, but it is certainly not an isolated one." “There are
several philosophical theses or dicta which would I think need to be examined
in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis
which I have been discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same general kind."
“An example which occurs to me is the following: What is known by me to be the
case is not also believed by me to be the case.” “I must emphasise that I am
not saying that this example is importantly similar to the thesis which I have
been criticising, only that, for all I know, it may be." “To put the
matter more generally, the position adopted by my objector seems to me to
involve a type of manoeuvre which is characteristic of more than one
contemporary mode of philosophizing." “I am not condemning this kind of
manoeuvre." “I am merely suggesting that to embark on it without due
caution is to risk collision with the facts." “Before we rush ahead to
exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detected, we should make sure that
we are reasonably clear what SORT of nuances they are!” The ætiological
implicatum. Grice. "For an occurrence to be properly said to have a cause,
it must be something abnormal or unusual." This is an example Grice lists
in "Causal theory" but NOT in "Prolegomena." "For an
occurrence to be properly said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal
or unusual." Similar commentary to his example on
'responsible'/condemnable apply. The objector may stick with the fact that he
is only concerned with proper utterances. Surely Grice wants to go to a
pre-Humeian account of causation, possible Aristotelian. Keyword: Aetiologia.
Where everything has a cause, except, for Aristotle, God! What are his
attending remarks? Grice writes: “The issue with which I have been mainly
concerned may be thought rather a fine point, but it is certainly not an
isolated one." “There are several philosophical theses or dicta which
would I think need to be examined in order to see whether or not they are
sufficiently parallel to the thesis which I have been discussing to be amenable
to treatment of the same general kind." “An example which occurs to me is
the following: What is known by me to be the case is not also believed by me to
be the case.” “I must emphasise that I am not saying that this example is importantly
similar to the thesis which I have been criticizing, only that, for all I know,
it may be." “To put the matter more generally, the position adopted by my
objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre which is characteristic of
more than one contemporary mode of philosophising." “I am not condemning
this kind of manoeuvre." “I am merely suggesting that to embark on it
without due caution is to risk collision with the facts." Before we rush
ahead to exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detected, we should make
sure that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuances they are!” Causal
theory, cause, causality, causation, conference, colloquium, Stanford, 1980,
keywords: cause, metaphysics, the abnormal/unusual implicatum, ætiology, ætiological
implicatum. Grice: the ætiological implicatum. Grice's explorations on 'cause'
are very rich. He is concerned with some alleged misuse of 'cause' in ordinary
language. If as Hume suggests, to cause is to will, one would say that
"The decapitation of Charles I willed his death," which sounds harsh,
“if not ungrammatical, too!” Grice later relates 'cause' to the Greek 'aitia,'
as he should. He notes collocations like 'rebel without a cause.' For the
Greeks, or Grecians, as he called them, and the Griceians, it's a CAUSE TO
which one should be involved in elucidating. A "cause to..."
connects with the idea of 'freedom.' Grice was constantly aware of the threat
of MECHANISM, and his idea was to provide philosophical room for the idea of
'finality,' which is not 'mechanistically derivable.' This leads him to
discussion of overlap and priority of, say, a physical-cum-physiological versus
a psychological theory explaining this or that piece of rational behaviour.
Grice can be Wittgensteinian when citing Anscombe's translation: No
psychological concept without the behaviour the concept is brought to
explain. It is best to place his later treatment of cause with his
earlier one in “Causal Theory.” It’s surprising Grice does not apply his
example of a philosopher’s mistake to the ‘causal’ bit of his ‘causal theory.’
Grice states the philosophical mistake as follows: "For an occurrence to
be properly said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal or
unusual." This is an example Grice lists in "Causal theory" but
NOT in "Prolegomena.' 'For an occurrence to be properly said to have a
cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual.' A similar commentary to
his example on 'responsible'/condemnable applies: The objector may stick with
the fact that he is only concerned with PROPER utterances. Surely Grice wants
to embrace a pre-Humeian account of causation, possible Aristotelian. Keyword: Aitiologia, where everything has a cause, except, for Aristotle, God!
What are his attending remarks? Grice writes: “The issue with which I have been
mainly concerned may be thought rather a fine point, but it is certainly not an
isolated one.' There are several philosophical theses or dicta which
would Grice thinks need to be examined in order to see whether or not they are
sufficiently parallel to the thesis which Grice has been discussing to be amenable
to treatment of the same general kind. One example which occurs to Grice is
the following: 'For an occurrence to be properly said to have a cause, it must
be something abnormal or unusual.' Grice feels he must emphasise that he is not saying
that this example is importantly similar to the thesis which I have been
criticizing, only that, for all I know, it may be." “To put the matter
more generally, the position adopted by my objector seems to me to involve a
type of manoeuvre which is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of
philosophizing." “I am not condemning this kind of manoeuvre." “I am
merely suggesting that to embark on it without due caution is to risk collision
with the facts." “Before we rush ahead to exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detected, we should make sure that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuances they are!” Re: responsibility/condemnation – cfr. Mabbott,
“Flew on punishment,” Philosophy, 30, 1955. And also Hart. At Corpus, Grice
enjoyed his tutor Hardie’s resourcefulness in the defence of what may be a
difficult position, a characteristic illustrated by an incident which Hardie
himself once told Grice about himself. “Hardie had parked his car and gone to a
cinema.”“Unfortunately, Hardie had parked his car on top of one of the strips
on the street by means of which traffic-lights were, at the time, controlled by
the passing traffic.” “As a result, the lights are jammed, and it requires
*four* policemen to lift Hardie’s car off the strip.” “The police decides to
prosecute.” Grice indicated to Hardie that this hardly surprised him and asked
him how he fared. “‘Oh,’ Hardie says, ‘I got off.’” Then Grice asks Hardie how
on earth he managed that! “Quite simply,” Hardie answered. “I just invoked
Mill’s method of difference.” “The police charged me with causing an
obstruction at 4 p.m.” “I told the police that, since my car was parked at 2
p.m., it could not have been *my* car which caused the obstruction at *4* p.m.”
This relates to an example in "Causal Theory" that he Grice does not
discuss in "Prolegomena," but which may relate to H. L. A. Hart, and
closer to Grice, to J. D. Mabbott's essay, "A. G. N. Flew on
punishment," in Philosophy, vol. 30. Grice states the philosophical
mistake as follows: "For an action to be properly described as one for
which the agent is responsible, it must be thc sort of action for which people
are condemned." As applied to Hardie. Hardie was IRRESPONSIBLE? In any
case, while condemnable, he was not! Grice writes: “The issue with which I have
been mainly concerned may be thought rather a fine point, but it is certainly
not an isolated one." “There are several philosophical theses or dicta
which would I think need to be examined in order to see whether or not they are
sufficiently parallel to the thesis which I have been discussing to be amenable
to treatment of the same general kind." “An example which occurs to me is
the following: For an action to be properly described as one for which the agent
is responsible, it must be the sort of action for which people are
condemned." “I must emphasise that I am not saying that this example is
importantly similar to the thesis which I have been criticizing, only that, for
all I know, it may be." “To put the matter more generally, the position
adopted by my objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre which is
characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing." “I
am not condemning this kind of manoeuvre." “I am merely suggesting that to
embark on it without due caution is to risk collision with the facts."
“Before we rush ahead to exploit the linguistic NUANCES which we have detected,
we should make sure that we are reasonably clear what SORT of nuances they
are!” The modal example (“What is actual is NOT also possible”) discussed under
“Indicative conditonals,” 1967. Grice on Macbeth’s implicature:
seeing a dagger as a dagger. Grice elaborates on this in
"Prolegomena," but the austerity of "Causal theory" is
charming, since he does not give a quote or source. OBVIOUSLY: Witters! Grice
writes: Witters might say "You can*not* see a knife *as a knife*, though
you may see what is *not* a knife as a knife." Grice writes: “The issue
with which I have been mainly concerned may be thought rather a fine point, but
it is certainly not an isolated one." “There are several philosophical
theses or dicta which would I think need to be examined in order to see whether
or not they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis which I have been discussing
to be amenable to treatment of the same general kind." An example which
occurs to Grice is the following: 'You can*not* see a knife *as a knife*,
though you may see what is *not* a knife as a knife."" Grice feels that he must
emphasise that he is not saying that this example is importantly similar to the
thesis which I have been criticizing, only that, for all I know, it may
be." “To put the matter more generally, the position adopted by my
objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre which is characteristic of
more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing." “I am not condemning
this kind of manoeuvre." “I am merely suggesting that to embark on it
without due caution is to risk collision with the facts." “Before we rush
ahead to exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detected, we should make
sure that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuances they are!” Is this a
dagger which I see before me,/The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch
thee./I have thee not, and yet I see thee still./Art thou not, fatal vision,
sensible/To feeling as to sight? or art thou but/A dagger of the mind, a false
creation,/Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?/I see thee yet, in form as
palpable/As this which now I draw./Thou marshall'st me the way that I was
going;/And such an instrument I was to use./Mine eyes are made the fools o' the
other senses,/Or else worth all the rest; I see thee still,/And on thy blade
and dudgeon gouts of blood,/Which was not so before. There's no such thing:/It
is the bloody business which informs/Thus to mine eyes./Now o'er the one
halfworld/Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse/The curtain'd sleep;
witchcraft celebrates/Pale Hecate's offerings, and wither'd murder,/Alarum'd by
his sentinel, the wolf,/Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy pace./With
Tarquin's ravishing strides, towards his design/Moves like a ghost. Thou sure
and firm-set earth,/Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear/Thy very
stones prate of my whereabout,/And take the present horror from the time,/Which
now suits with it. Whiles I threat, he lives:/Words to the heat of deeds too
cold breath gives.[a bell rings] I go, and it is
done; the bell invites me./Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell/That summons
thee to heaven or to hell. The Moore example is used both in "Causal
Theory" and "Prolegomena." But the use in "Causal
Theory" is more austere: PHILOSOPHICAL MISTAKE: Malcolm: "When Moore
said he knew that the objects before him were human hands, he was guilty of
misusing the word "know"." Grice writes: “The issue with which I
have been mainly concerned may be thought rather a fine point, but it is
certainly not an isolated one." “There are several philosophical theses or
dicta which would I think need to be examined in order to see whether or not
they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis which I have been discussing to be
amenable to treatment of the same general kind." “An example which occurs
to me is the following: "When Moore said he knew that the objects before
him were human hands, he was guilty of misusing the word
"know"." "I must emphasise that I am not saying that this example
is importantly similar to the thesis which I have been criticizing, only that,
for all I know, it may be." “To put the matter more generally, the
position adopted by my objector seems to me to involve a type of manoeuvre
which is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of
philosophizing." “I am not condemning this kind of manoeuvre." “I am
merely suggesting that to embark on it without due caution is to risk collision
with the facts." “Before we rush ahead to exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detected, we should make sure that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuances they are!” So SURELY Grice is MEANING: "I know that the
objects before me are human hands" as uttered by Moore is possibly TRUE!
Grice was amused by the fact that while at Madison, Wisc., Moore gave the
example: "I KNOW that behind those curtains there is a window."
"ACTUALLY he was WRONG, as he soon realised when the educated Madisonians
corrected him with a roar of unanimous laughter!" “You see, the lecture
hall of the University of Wisconsin at Madison is a rather, shall we say,
striking space.” “The architect designed the lecture hall with a parapet
running around the wall just below the ceiling, cleverly rigged with *indirect*
lighting to create the illusion that sun light is pouring in through windows
from outside.” “So, G. E. Moore comes to give a lecture one sunny day.”
“Attracted as he was to this eccentric architectural detail, Moore gives an
illustration of certainty as attached to common sense.” “Pointing to the space
below the ceiling, Moore utters.” "We know more things than we think we
know.” “I *know*, for example, that the sunlight shining in from outside proves
..." “At which point he was somewhat startled (in his reserved
Irish-English sort of way) when his audience burst out laughing!” “Is that a
proof of anything?” Grice is especially concerned with "I seem..." He
needs a paradeigmatic sense-datum utterance, and intentionalist as he was, he
finds it in "I seem to see a red pillar box before me." He is relying
on G. A. Paul. Grice would generalise a sense datum by "phi." "I
seem to perceive that the alpha is phi." He agrees that while 'cause' may
be too much, any sentence using 'because' will do: At a circus: "You seem
to be seeing that an elephant is coming down the street because an elephant is
coming down the street." Grice found the causalist theory of perception
particularly attractive since its objection commits "one same mistake
twice": he mischaracterises the cancellable implicatum of both
"seem" and "cause"! While Grice is approaching the
philosophical item in the philosophical lexicon, 'perceptio,'
he is at this stage more interested in vernacular "that-" clauses
such as "sensing that", or even more vernacular ones like
"seeming that," if not seeing that"! perceptĭo ,
ōnis, f. perceptio, as used by Cicero (Ac. 2, 7, 22) translating
"catalepsis," I.a taking, receiving; a
gathering in, collecting. I. Lit., Ambros. in
Luc. 4, 15: “frugum fruetuumque reliquorum,” Cic. Off. 2,
3, 12: “fructuum,” Col. 1, 3, 2.— II. Trop., perception, comprehension (cf.:
“notio, cognitio): animi perceptiones,” notions, ideas, Cic.
Ac. 2, 7, 22: cognitio aut perceptio, aut si verbum e verbo volumus comprehensio,
quam κατάληψιν illi
vocant, id. ib. 2, 6, 17. Philos., direct apprehension of
an object by the mind, Zeno Stoic.1.20, Luc.Par.4,
al.; “τῶν μετεώρων” Philostr.Her.10.9; ἀκριβὴς κ. certainty, Herod.Med. ap. Aët.9.37:
pl., perceptions, Stoic.2.30, Luc.Herm.81,
etc.; introduced into Latin by Cicero, Plu.Cic.40.
As for 'causa,' he was even more sure he was exploring a time-honoured
philosophical topic: causa (by
Cicero, and also a little after him, caussa , Quint. 1, 7,
20; so Fast. Prænest. pp. 321, 322; Inscr. Orell. 3681; 4077; 4698
al.; in Mon. Ancyr. 3, 1 dub.), æ, f. perh. root cav- of caveo, prop. that
which is defended or protected; cf. cura, I.that by, on
account of, or through which any thing takes place or is
done; a cause, reason, motive, inducement; also,
in gen., an occasion, opportunity (opp.
effectis, Quint. 6, 3,
66; 7, 3, 29:
“factis,” id. 4, 2, 52; 12, 1, 36 al.;
very freq. in all periods, and in all kinds of discourse. In its different
meanings syn. with ratio, principium, fons, origo, caput; excusatio, defensio;
judicium, controversia, lis; partes, actio; condicio, negotium, commodum, al.).
Correlated to "aition," or "aitia," cause, “δι᾽ ἣν αἰτίην ἐπολέμησαν” Hdt.Prooem.,
cf. Democr.83, Pl.Ti.68e, Phd.97a sq.,
etc.; on the four causes of Arist. v. Ph.194b16, Metaph.983a26:—αἰ. τοῦ γενέσθαι or
“γεγονέναι” Pl.Phd.97a;
“τοῦ μεγίστου ἀγαθοῦ τῇ πόλει αἰτία ἡ κοινωνία” Id.R.464b:—dat. αἰτίᾳ for
the sake of, “κοινοῦ τινος ἀγαθοῦ” Th.4.87,
cf. D.H.8.29:—αἴτιον (cf.
“αἴτιος” 11.2)
is used like αἰτία in
the sense of cause, not in that of accusation.
1962. Some remarks
about the senses, in Studies in the Way of Words, in Part II, Explorations
in semantics and metaphysics, Essay, 1989, from R. J. Butler, Analytic
Philosophy, Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 133-53, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
II (Essays), BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keywords: the objects of the five senses. The five
senses, as Urmson notes, are "to see that the sun is shining",
"to hear that the car collided", "to feel that her pulse is
beating", "to smell that something has been smoking" and "to
taste that." An interesting piece in that it was commissioned by Butler,
who knew Grice from his Oxford days. Grice cites O. P. Wood and R. Albritton.
Grice is concerned with a special topic in the philosophy of perception,
notably the identification of the traditional 'five' senses: vision, audition,
taste, smell, and tact. He introduces what is regarded in the philosophical
literature as the first 'thought-experiment,' in terms of the senses that
Martians may have. They have two pairs of eyes: are we going to allow that they
'see' with both pairs? Grice introduces a sub-division of seeing: a Martian x-s
an object with his upper pair of eyes, but he y-s an object with the lower pair
of eyes. In his exploration, he takes a 'realist' stance, which respects the
'ordinary' discursive ways to approach issues of perception. A second
interesting point is that in allowing this to be reprinted in Butler's
"Analytic philosophy," Grice is demonstrating that 'analytic
philosophers' should NOT be obsessed with 'ordinary language.' Butler's
compilation, a rather dry one, is meant as a response to the more linguistic
oriented ones by A. G. N. Flew (Grice's first tutee at St. John's, as it
happens), also published by Blackwell, and containing pieces by Austin, and
company. One philosopher who took Grice very seriously on this was Coady, in
his "The senses of the Martians." Grice provides a serious objection
to his own essay in “Retrospective Epilogue” “We see with our eyes.” I.e. ‘eye’
is teleologically defined. He notes that his way of distinguishing the senses
is hardly an established thesis. Grice actually advances this topic in his
earlier "Causal Theory": "I see nothing absurd in the idea that
a non-specialist concept should contain, so to speak, a blank space to be
filled in by the specialist; that this is so, e.g., in the case of the concept
of "seeing" is perhaps indicated by the consideration that if we were
in doubt about the correctness of speaking of a certain creature with peculiar
sense-organs as "seeing" objects, we might well wish to hear from a
specialist a comparative account of the human eye and the relevant sense-organs
of the creature in question." He returns to the point in
"Retrospective Epilogue" with a bit of 'doxastic humility,’ ‘We see
with our eyes’ is analytic -- but philosophers should take that more
seriously. Grice tested the playmates of his children, aged 7
and 9, with "Nothing can be green and red all
over". Instead, Morley Bunker preferred
philosophy undergrads. Ain't that boring? To give examples: ‘Summer
follows Spring’ was judged analytic by Morley-Bunker's informants, as
cited by Sampson, in "Making sense" (Clarendon) by highly significant
majorities in each group of subjects, while "We see with our eyes"
was given near-even split votes by each group. Over all, the philosophers were
somewhat more consistent with each other than the non-philosophers. But that global
finding conceals results for individual sentences that sometimes
manifested the opposed tendency. Thus, "Thunderstorms are electrical
disturbances in the atmosphere" is judged analytic by a highly significant
majority of the non-philosophers, while a (non-significant) majority of the philosophers
deemed it non-analytic or synthetic. In this case, it seems, philosophical
training (surely not brain-washing) induces the realisation that
well-established results of contemporary science are not necessary truths. In
other cases, conversely, cliches of current philosophical education impose
their own mental blinkers on those who undergo it: "Nothing can be
completely red and green all over” is judged analytic by a significant
majority of philosophers but only by a non-significant majority of
non-philosophers. All in all, Morley-Bunker's results argue strongly against
the notion that our inability to decide consistently whether or not some
statement is a necessary truth derives from lack of skill in ‘articularing’ our
underlying knowledge of the rules of our language. Rather, the inability comes
from the fact that the question as posed is unreal. We choose to treat a given
statement as open to question or as unchallengeable in the light of the overall
structure of beliefs which we have individually evolved in order to make
sense of our individual experience. Even the cases which seem clearly analytic
or synthetic are cases which individuals judge alike because the relevant
experiences are shared by the whole community, but even for such cases one can
invent hypothetical or suppositional future experiences which, if they should
be realised, would cause us to revise our judgements. This is not intended to
call into question the special status of the "truths of
logic", such as either "Either it is raining or it is not."
Unlike Katz, I am inclined to accept the traditional view according to which
"logical particles" such as "not" and "or" are
distinct from the bulk of the vocabulary in that the former really are governed
by clear-cut inference rules. Grice does expand on the point.
1962. Grice at Cornell, the Cornell Seminar, Grice's Seminar
at Cornell, 1966, The Grice Papers, Series III (Doctrines), carton 5-folder 1,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: philosophy of action. Historically important in
that they predate his Harvard William James lectures which made of him a
household name in New-World philosophy. Harman cites a seminar by Grice on
trying at Brandeis, 1962.
1963. Grice's three lectures on trying at Brandeis. Cf. his later remarks on 'trying' (to cash a cheque) in 'Prolegomena' at Harvard.
1964. Logic and conversation, Oxford, rev. 1967, conversational
implicature, 1965, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 1-folders
21-23 and carton 4-folder 9, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: logic, conversation,
implicature, principle of conversational helpfulness, desideratum of
conversational clarity, desideratum of conversational candour, principle of
conversational self-interest, principle of conversational
benevolence. Reprinted in revised form as Part I of Studies in the
Way of Words. Grice felt the need to go back to his 'explantion' of the
nuances about 'seem' and 'cause' ("Causal theory of perception.") He
had used Smith's "My wife is in the kitchen or the bedroom" as
relying on a requirement of discourse. But there must be more to it. Variations
on a theme by Grice: "Make your contribution such as is required, at
the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk
exchange in which you are engaged." Variations on a theme by
Grice. "I wish to represent a certain subclass of non-conventional
implicaturcs, which I shall call conversational implicaturcs, as
being essentially connected with certain general features of discourse; so my
next step is to try to say what these features are." "The following
may provide a first approximation to a general principle. Our talk exchanges do
not normally consist of a succession of disconnected remarks, and would not be
rational if they did. They are characteristically, to some degree at least,
cooperative efforts; and each participant recognizes in them, to some extent, a
common purpose or set of purposes, or at least a mutually accepted direction.
This purpose or direction may be fixed from the start (e.g., by an initial
proposal of a question for discussion), or it may evolve during the exchange;
it may be fairly definite, or it may be so indefinite as to leave very
considerable latitude to the participants (as in a casual conversation). But at
each stage, SOME possible conversational moves would be excluded as
conversationally unsuitable. We might then formulate a rough general principle
which participants will be expected (ceteris paribus) to observe, namely: Make
your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it
occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you
are engaged. One might label this the Co-operative
Principle." "We might then formulate a rough general principle
which participants will be expected (ceteris paribus) to
observe, namely: "Make your contribution such as is required,
at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the
talk exchange in which you are engaged." One might label this the
Cooperative Principle." Strictly, the principle itself is not
co-operative: conversants are. Less literary variant: Make your move
such as is required by the accepted goal of the conversation in which you are
engaged. But why “LOGIC” and conversation? "Logica" had been
part of the 'trivium' for ages -- "Although they called it 'dialectica,'
then." Grice on the seven liberal arts. Moved by P. F.
Strawson's treatment of the 'formal' devices in "Introduction to Logical
Theory," Grice targets these, in their 'ordinary-discourse' counterparts.
Strawson indeed characterizes Grice as his ‘logic’ tutor – Strawson was
following a P. P. E., and his approach to logic was practical. His ‘philosophy’
tutor was Mabbott. For Grice, with a M. A. Lit. Hum.the situation was
different. He knew that the Categoria and De Interpretatione of his beloved
Aristotle were part of the Logical Organon which had been so influential in the
history of philosophy. Grice attempts to reconcile Strawson's observations
with the idea that the 'formal' devices reproduce some sort of 'explicatum,' or
'explicitum,' as identified by Whitehead and Russell in 'Principia
Mathematica.' In the proceedings, Grice has to rely on some general
features of discourse, or conversation as a rational co-operation. The
alleged divergence between the 'ordinary-language' operators and their 'formal'
counterparts is explained in terms of the conversational implicata, then.
I.e. the content of the psychological attitude that the addressee A has to
ascribe to the utterer U to account for any divergence between the formal
device and its alleged 'ordinary-language' counterpart, while still assuming
that U is engaged in a co-operative transaction. The utterer and his
addressee are seen as caring for the mutual goals of conversation -- the
exchange of information and the institution of decisions -- and judging that
conversation will only be profitable (and thus reasonable and rational) if
conducted under some form of principle of 'conversational
helpfulness.' "The observation of a principle
of conversational helpfulness is reasonable (rational) along
the following lines: anyone who cares about the goals that are central to
conversation/communication (such as giving and receiving information,
influencing and being influenced by others) must be expected to have an
interest, given suitable circumstances, in participating in a conversation that
will be profitable ONLY on the assumption that it is conducted in general
accordance with a principle of conversational helpfulness." In
titling his seminar "Logic and Conversation," Grice is thinking
Strawson. After all, in the seminal "Introduction to Logical Theory,"
that every Oxonian student was reading, Strawson had the cheek to admit that he
never ceased to learn logic from his tutor, Grice. Yet he elaborates a totally
anti Griceian view of things. To be fair to Strawson, the only segment where he
acknwoledges Grice's difference of opinion is a brief footnote, concerning the
'strength' or lack thereof, of this or that quantified utterance. Strawson uses
an adjective that Grice will seldom do, 'pragmatic'. On top, Strawson
attributes the adjective to 'rule.' For Grice, in Strawson's wording, there is
this or that 'pragmatic rule' to the effect that one should make a stronger
rather than a weaker conversational move. Strawson's Introduction was published
BEFORE Grice aired his views for the Aristotelian Society. In this seminar then
Grice takes the opportunity to correct a few misunderstandings. Important
in that it is Grice's occasion to introduce the principle of conversational
helpfulness as generating implicata under the assumption of rationality. The
lecture makes it obvious that Grice's interest is methodological, and not
'philological.' He is not interest in conversation per se, but only as the
source for his principle of conversational helpfulness and the notion of the
conversational implicatum, which springs from the distinction between what an
utterer implies and what his expression does, a distinction 'apparently denied
by Witters and all too frequently ignored by Austin.' 'Logic and
conversation,' an Oxford seminar, 1964, keywords: implicatum, principle of
conversational helpfulness, eywords: conversational implicature, conversational
implicatum. "Conversational Implicature" Grice's main
invention, one which trades on the distinction between what an utterer IMPLIES
and what his expression does. "A distinction apparently denied by
Witters, and all too frequently ignored by, of all people,
Austin." Grice is implicating that Austin's sympathies were for the
'subjectification' of "Linguistic Nature." Grice remains an
obdurate individualist, and never loses sight of the distinction that gives
rise to the conversational implicatum, which can very well be
hyper-contextualised, idiosyncratic, and perfectly particularised! His
Oxonian example: "I can very well mean that my tutee is to bring me a
philosophical essay next week by uttering "It is raining."" As
Grice notes: “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 implicature 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] implicature[…], and – is it
more comprehensive and more economical than any rival? b) [is] the no
doubt pre-theoretical explanation[…] which one would be prompted to
give of such [an] implicature[…] consistent with, or better still [a]
favourable pointer[…] towards the requirements involved in the model?” “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 [emphasis mine]; 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.” If
Grice lectured on “Logic and Conversation” on implicature he must have thought
that Strawson’s area was central. Yet, as he had done in “Causal theory” and as
he will at Harvard, Grice kept collecting philosophers’ mistakes. So it’s best
to see Grice as a methodologist, and as using “logic and conversation” as an
illustration of his favourite manoeuvre, indeed, central philosophical
manoeuver that gave him a place in the history of philosophy. Restricting this
manoeuvre to just an area minimises it. On the other hand, there has to be a
balance: surely ‘logic and conversation’ is a topic of intrinsic interest, and
we cannot expect all philosophers – unless they are Griceians! – to keep a
broad unitarian view of philosophy as avirtuous whole!
(“Philosopher, like virtue, is entire. – Destructive implicature to it: “Mr.
Puddle is our man in æsthetics” implicates He is not good at it). What is
important to Grice is that the mistakes of these philosophers (notably
Strawson!) arise from some “linguistic phenomena,”or, since we must use
singular expressions this or that “linguistic phenomenon.” Or as Grice puts it,
it is this or that ‘linguistic phenomenon’ which provides the material for the
philosopher to make his mistake! So, to solve it, his theory of conversation as
rational co-operation is posited – technically, as a way to explain (never
merely describe, which Grice found boring -- if English, cf. never explain, never apologise -- Jacky Fisher: 'Never contradict. Never explain.') these phenomena – his principle of
conversational helpfulness and the idea of a conversational implicatum. The
latter is based not so much on rationality per se, but on the implicit-explicit
distinction that he constantly plays with, since his earlier semiotic-oriented
explorations of Peirce. But back to this or that linguistic phenomenon, while
he would make fun of Searle for providing this or that “linguistic phenomenon”
that “no philosopher would ever feel excited about,” Grice himself was a bit of
a master in illustrating this a philosophical point with this or that
“linguistic phenomenon” that would not be necessarily connected with
philosophy. He rarely quotes authors, but surely the section in 'Causal theory' where he lists seven philosophical theses (which are ripe for an
implicatum treatment) would be familiar enough for anybody to be able to drop a
name to attach to each! At Harvard, almost every example Grice gives of this or that
linguistic phenomenon is UN-authored (and sometimes he expands on his OWN view
of them, just to amuse his audience – and show how committed to this or that
thesis he was), but some are not unauthored. And they all belong to ‘the
linguistic turn’: He quotes from Gilbert Ryle (who thought he knew about
‘ordinary language’), Ludwig Wittgenstein, J. L. Austin (he quotes him in great
detail, from “Pretending,” “Plea of excuses,” and “No modification without
aberration,”), P. F. Strawson (in “Introduction to Logical theory” and on
‘Truth’ for Analysis), H. L. A. Hart (as “I have heard him expand on this”), J.
R. Searle, and B. S. Benjamin. He implicates Hare (on ‘good’). Etc. When we
mention the ‘explicit’/’implicit’ distinction as source for the implicatum, we
are referring to Grice’s own wording in 'Retrospective Epilogue' where he
mentions an utterer as conveying in “some explicit fashion this or that, as
opposed to a ‘gentler,' more (midland or southern) English, way, via implicature, or implIciture, if you mustn’t. Cf. Fowler: As a southern Englishman, I've stopped trying a northern Englishman the distinction between 'ought' and 'shall.'' 'He seems to get it always wrong.' It
may be worth exploring how this connects with rationality. His point would be
that that an assumption that the rational principle of ‘conversational
helpfulness’ is in order allows Pirot 1 not just to convey “in a direct
explicit fashion” that p, but “in an implicit fashion” that q. Where “q” is the
implicatum. The principle of conversational helpfulness as generator of this or
that ‘implicata,’ to use Grice’s word (‘generate’). Surely, “He took off his
boots and went to bed; I won’t say in which order” sounds hardly in the vein of
conversational helpfulness – but provided Grice does not see it as ‘logically
incoherent,’ it is still a rational (if not reasonable) thing to say. The
‘point’ may be difficult to discern, but you never know. The utterer may be
conveying, “Viva Boole!” Grice’s point about ‘rationality’ is mentioned in his
later “Prolegomena,” on at least two occasions. “Rational behaviour” is the
phrase he uses (as applied first to ‘communication’ and then to ‘discourse’)
and in stark opposition with a convention-based approach he rightly associates
with Austin. Grice is here less interested here as he will be on 'rationality,'
but coooperation as such. Helpfulness as a reasonable expecation (normative?), a mutual one
"between decent chaps," as he puts it. His charming "decent
chap" is so Oxonian. His tutee would expect no less -- and indeed no more!
1966. Certainty, Descartes on clear and distinct perception, in Studies
in the Way of Words, Part II, Explorations on semantics and metaphysics,
Descartes on 'clear and distinct perception,' in Studies in the Way of
Words, Part II: Explorations on Semantics and metaphysics, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 1, folder 20, and Series V (Topical), carton
6-folders 27-28, and carton 8-folder 26, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Descartes,
clear and distinct perception, certainty. From Descartes to Stout and back. Stout indeed uses both 'intention' and 'certainty,' and in the same paragraph. Stout notes that, at the outset, performance falls far short of intention. Only a certain series of contractions of certain muscles, in proper proportions and in a proper order, is capable of realising the end aimed at, with the maximum of rapidity and certainty, and the minimum of obstruction and failure, and corresponding effort. At the outset of the process of acquisition, muscles are contracted which are superfluous, and which therefore operate as disturbing conditions. Grice's immediate trigger, however, is Ayer on
'sure that,' and 'having the right to be sure,' as his immediate trigger later will be Hampshire and Hart. Grice had high regard for S. N. Hampshire's brilliant "Thought and action." He was also concerned with
Stout's rather hasty UNphilosophical, but more 'scientifically psychologically-oriented' remarks about 'assurance' in practical
concerns. He knew too that he was exploring an item of the philosopher's
lexicon ("certus") that had been brought to the forum when Anscombe
and von Wright translate Witter's German expression ‘Gewißheit’
in ‘Über Gewißheit’ as "Certainty." The Grecians were never
sure about being sure. But the modernist turn brought by Descartes meant that
Grice now had to deal with 'incorrigibility' and 'privileged access' to this or
that pirot, notably himself ("When I intend to go, I don't have to observe
myself, I'm on the stage, not in the audience," or "Only I can say
"I will to London," expressing my intention to do so. If you say,
"You will go” you are expressing yours!" Grice found Descartes
very funny -- in a French way! Grice is interested in contesting A. J.
Ayer and other Oxford philosophers, on the topic of a criterion for
'certainty.' In so doing, Grice choses Descartes's time-honoured criterion
of 'clarity' and 'distinction,' as applied to perception. Grice does
NOT quote Descartes in French! In the proceedings, Grice distinguishes
between two 'kinds' of certainty apparently ignored by Descartes: (a)
OBJECTIVE CERTAINTY: Ordinary-language variant: ‘It is certain that
p,’ whatever ‘it’ refers to. (b) SUBJECTIVE
CERTAINTY: Ordinary-language variant: "I am certain that
p." "I" being, of course, Grice, "in my bestest days,
of course!" There are further items on Descartes in the Grice
Collection, notably in the last series, of topics arranged
alphabetically. Grice never cared to publish his views on Descartes until
he found an opportunity to do so when compiling his Studies in the Way of
Words. Grice is NOT interested in an exegesis of Descartes's thought. He
doesn't care to give a reference to any edition of Descartes's oeuvre. But he
plays with 'certain'. "It is certain that p" is objective certainty,
apparently. "I am certain that p" is subjective certainty, rather.
Oddly, Grice will turn to UNcertainty as it connects with intention in his
British Academy lecture. Grice's interest in Descartes connects with
Descartes's search for a criterion of 'certainty' in terms of 'clarity' and
'distinction' of this or that perception. Having explored the philosophy
of perception with Warnock, it's only natural he wanted to give Descartes's
rambles a second and third look! 1966, Descartes on clear and distinct
perception, in Studies in the Way of Words, Part II, Semantics and Metaphysics,
Essay, "Descartes on clear and distinct perception and Malcom on
dreaming," Keyword: perception, Descartes, clear
and distinct perception, Malcolm, dreaming. Descartes meets Malcolm, and
vice versa. Descartes on 'clear and distinct perception,' in
Studies in the Way of Words, "Descartes on clear and distinct perception,"
1966, Descartes on clear and distinct perception, in Studies in the Way of
Words, Part II, Semantics and Metaphysics, Essay. Grice gives a short overview
of Cartesian metaphysics for the BBC third programme. The
best example, Grice thinks, of a metaphysical snob is
provided by Descartes, about whose idea of certainty Grice had
philosophised quite a bit, since it’s in total contrast with
Moore’s! Descartes is a very scientifically minded philosopher, with very clear ideas about the proper direction for science. Descartes,
whose middle name seems to have been “Euclid,” thinks that mathematics,
and in particular geometry, provides the model for a
scientific procedure, or method. And this determines
all of Descartes’s thinking in two ways. First, Descartes
thinks that the fundamental method in science is
the axiomatic
deductive method of geometry, and this Descartesconceives (as
Spinoza morality “more
geometrico”) of as rigorous reasoning from
a self-evident axiom (“Cogito, ergo
sum.”). Second, Descartes thinks that the subject
matter of physical science, from mechanics to medicine, must be fundamentally the same as the subject
matter of geometry! The only characteristics that the
objects studied by geometry poses are spatial characteristics.
So from the point of view of science in general, the only important features of things in the physical world were also their spatial characteristics,
what he called ‘extensio,’ ‘res extensa.’ Physical science in general is a kind
of dynamic, or kinetic,
geometry. Here we have an exclusive preference for a certain type of scientific method, and a certain type of scientific explanation: the method is deductive, the type of explanation mechanical. These
beliefs about the right way to do science are exactly reflected in Descartes's
“ontology” – one of the two branches of metaphysics; the other is philosophical
eschatology, or the study of categories), and it is reflected in his doctrine, that is, about what “really”
exists. Apart from God, the divine substance, Descartes
recognises just two kinds of substance, two types of real entity. First, there
is material substance, or matter; and the belief that
the only scientifically important
characteristics of things in the physical world are their spatial characteristics goes over, in the language of “metaphysics,”into the doctrine that these are their only
characteristics. Second, and to Ryle’s horror, Descartes recognizes
the mind or soul, or the
mental substance, of which the essential characteristic
is
thinking; and thinking itself, in its pure form at least, is
conceived of as simply the intuitive grasping of
this or that self-evident axiom and this or that of
its deductive consequence. These restrictive doctrines about reality and knowledge naturally call for adjustments elsewhere in our
ordinary scheme of things. With the help of
thedivine substance, these are duly provided.
It is not always obvious that the metaphysician's scheme involves this kind of “ontological”
preference, or favoritism, or prejudice, or snobbery this tendency, that is, to
promoteone or two categories of
entity to the rank of the real, or of the ultimately real, to the exclusion of others,
Descartes’s ‘entia realissima.’ One is taught at Oxford that epistemology
begins with the Moderns such as Descartes, which is not true. Grice was concerned with 'certain,' which was applied in Old
Roman times to this or that utterer: the person who is made certain in
reference to a thing, certain, sure: “certi sumus periisse omnia,” Cic. Att. 2,
19, 5: “num quid nunc es certior?” Plaut. Am. 1,
1, 191: “posteritatis,”
i. e. of posthumous fame, Plin. Ep. 9,
3, 1: “sententiæ,” Quint. 4, 3,
8: “judicii,” Sen. Ep. 45,
9: “certus de suā geniturā,” Suet. Vesp.
25: “damnationis,” id. Tib. 61:
“exitii,” Tac. A. 1, 27:
“spei,” id. H. 4, 3:
“matrimonii,” id. A. 12, 3:
“certi sumus, etc.,” Gell. 18, 10,
5.—In class. prose mostly in the phrase certiorem facere aliquem (de
aliquā re, alicujus rei, with a foll, acc. and inf., with a rel.-clause or absol.), to
inform, apprise one of a thing: “me certiorem face,” Ter. Phorm.
4, 3, 69: “ut nos facias certiores,” Plaut. Curc.
5, 2, 32: “uti se (sc. Cæsarem) de his rebus certiorem faciant,” Cæs. B. G. 2,
2: “qui certiorem me sui consilii fecit,” Cic. Att. 9,
2, a, 2: “Cæsarem certiorem faciunt, sese non facile ab oppidis vim hostium prohibere,” Cæs. B. G. 1,
11: “faciam te certiorem quid egerim,” Cic. Att. 3,
11, 1.— With subj. only: “milites certiores facit, paulisper intermitterent proelium,” Cæs. B. G. 3,
5 fin.—Pass.: “quod crebro certior per me fias de omnibus rebus,” Cic. Fam. 1,
7, 1; so Cæs. B. G. 1,
7; Sall. J. 104,
1: “Cæsar certior factus est, tres jam copiarum partes Helvetios id flumen transduxisse,” Cæs. B. G. 1,
12; so id. ib. 1, 21; 1, 41; 2, 1; Sall. J. 82,
2; Nep. Att. 12,
3: “factus certior, quæ res gererentur,” Cæs. B. C. 1,
15: “non consulibus certioribus factis,” Liv. 45, 21,
4.—Also in posit., though rarely: “fac me certum quid tibi est,” Plaut. Ps. 1,
1, 16; 4, 6, 35; Verg. A. 3,
179: “lacrimæ suorum Tam subitæ matrem certam fecere ruinæ,” Ov. M. 6, 268.—
1966. Eudaimonia, eudæmonia, "a philosophy of life,"
happiness, notes, some reflections about ends and happiness, in Aspects of
reason, Clarendon, Correspondence with R. O. Warner, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series I (Correspondence), carton 1-folder 9, Series II (Essays), carton 4-folder
16, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 6, and carton 8, folder 28, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: ends, 'telos,' happiness, Kantotle, eudaimonia, philosophical
biology, philosophical psychology, eudæmon, fairy godmother, Warner. H. P.
Grice’s fairy godmother. Grice took 'life' seriously: philosophical biology!
"Philosophy of life" is dated 1966 in P. G. R. I. C. E. Grice’s fairy
godmother. “Much the most plausible conjecture regarding what Greek eudaimonia
means, is namely that ‘eudaimonia’ is to be understood as the name for that
state or condition which one’s good dæmon would, if he could, ensure for one.”
“And my good dæmon is a being motivated, with respect to me, solely by concern
for my well-being or happiness." "To change the idiom, "eudæmonia"
is the general characterization of what a full-time and unhampered fairy
godmother would secure for you." Grice is concerned with the specific
system of ends that 'eudaimonia' consists for for both Kant and Aristotle (or
Kantotle for short). Grice borrows, but never returns, some reflections by his
fomer tuttee at St. John's, J. L. Ackrill. Ackrill's point is about the
etymological basis for 'eudaimonia,' from 'eudaimon,' or good dæmon, as Grice
prefers. Grice thinks the metaphor should be disimplicated, and taken quite
'literally.' Grice concludes with a set of ends that justify our ascription of
'eudaemonia' to the agent. For Grice, as for Aristotle, and indeed Kant
(Kantotle, in short), a 'telos' and 'eudaemonia' are related in subtle ways.
For 'eudaemonia' we cannot deal with just ONE end, but a system of ends
(Although such a system may be a singleton). Grice specifies a subtle way of
characterising 'end' so that a particular ascription of an 'end' may ENTAIL an
ascription of 'eudaemonia.' Grice follows the textual criticism of his former
tutee, J. L. Ackrill, in connection with the Socratic point that 'eudaemonia'
IS literally related to the 'eudaemon.' Warner has explored Grice's concept of
'happiness,' notably in P. G. R. I. C. E. Warner was especially helpful with
Grice's third difficult Carus lecture, a metaphysical defence of absolute
value. Warner also connected with Grice in such topics as the philosophy of
perception (seen in an evolutionary light) and the Kantotelian idea of
happiness. In response to Warner's overview of Grice's oeuvre for the
festschrift (that Warner co-authored with Grandy), Grice refers to the editors
by the collective name of "Richards." While Grice felt he had to use
'happiness,' he is always having Aristotle's 'eudaimonia' in mind! The
implicata of “Smith is happy" are more complex than Kantotle thought!
Austen knew! (“You decide if you’re happy!” — Emma). Ultimately, for Grice, the
rational life is the happy life! Grice took 'life' seriously: philosophical
biology! Grice is clear when reprinting the Descartes paper in Studies (where
he does quote from Descartes sources quite a bit, even if he implicates he is
“no Cartesian scholar” – what Oxonian would? --: it concerns ‘certainty.’ And
certainty was originally Cantabrigian (Moore), but also Oxonian, in parts. Ayer
was saying that ‘to know’ is to ‘assure’ that one is certain or sure. So he
could connect. Grice will at various stages of his development play and explore
this authoritative voice of introspection: incorrigibility and privileged
access. He surely wants to say that a declaration of an intention is
authoritative. And he plays with “meaning,” too when provoking Malcolm in a don
recollection: Grice: I want you to bring me a paper tomorrow. Strawson: You
mean a newspaper? Grice: No, a philosophical essay. Strawson: How do you know?
Are you certain you mean that? Grice finds not being certain about what one
means Strawsonian and otiose! (“Tutees!”). Grice loved to place himself in the
role of the philosophical hack, dealing with his tutee’s inabilities, a whole
week long – until he could find refreshment in para-philosophy on the Saturday
morning! Now, the logical form of ‘certain’ is a trick. Grice would symbolize
it as numbering of operators. If Pirot ψs p, Pirot ψs ψs p, and Pirot ψs ψs ψs p, and so ad infinitum. This is a bit like
certainty. But not quite! When he explores trust, Grice considers something
like a backing for it. But does conclusive evidence yield certainty? He doesn’t
think so. Certainty, for Grice should apply to any psychological attitude,
state or stance. And it is just clever of him that when he had to deliver that
lecture at London he chose intention and uncertainty as its topic, just to
provoke. Not surprisingly, the “Intention and Uncertainty” piece opens with
“the sceptic’s challenge.” And he won’t conclude that the intender is certain.
Only that there’s some good chance (p greater than 0.5) that what he intends
will get through! "When there is a will, there is a way," “When there
is a neo-Prichardian will-ing, there is a palæo-Griceian way-ing!" Perhaps
by ‘know’ Moore means “certain.” Grice was amused by the fact that Moore
thought that he knew that behind the curtains at the lecture hall at the
University of Wisconsin at Madison, there was a window, when there wasn’t. He
uses Moore’s misuse of ‘know’ – according to Malcolm – both in “Causal theory”
and “Prolegomena.” And of course this relates to the topic of the sceptic’s
implicature, 1946 above, with the two essays “Scepticism and Common sense” and
“Moore and Philosopher’s Paradoxes” reprinted (one partially) in Studies. With regard to 'certainty,' it is interesting to compare it, as Grice does, not so much with privileged access, but with incorrigibility. Do we not have privileged access to our own beliefs and desires? And, worse still, may it not be true that at least some of our avowals of our beliefs and desires are incorrigible? One of Grice's problems is, as he puts it, "how to accommodate privileged access" and, "maybe, incorrigibility." This or that a second-order state may be, in some fashion, "incorrigible." On the contrary, for Grice, this or that lower-order, first-order judging is only a matter for privileged access. Note that while he is happy to allow 'privileged access' to lower-order souly states, only those who are replicated at a higher-order or second-order may, "in some fashion," be said to count as an 'incorrigible' avowal. "It rains." Pirot judges it rains (privileged access). Pirot judges that Pirot judges that it rains (incorrigibile). The justification is conversational. "It rains" says the pirot, or expresses the pirot. Grice wants to be able to say that if a pirot expresses that p, the pirot judges-2 that p. If the pirot expresses that it rains, the pirot judges that he judges that it rains. In this fashion, his second-order, higher-order judging is incorrigible, only. Although Grice may allow for it to be corrected by a third-order judging. It is not required that we should stick with 'judging' here. "Let Smith return the money that he owes to Jones." If pirot expresses !p, pirot psi-s-2 that !p. His second-order, higher-order buletic state is incorrigibile (if ceteris paribus is not corrected by a third-order buletic or doxastic state). His first-order buletic state is a matter only of privileged access.
1966. Dreaming, The H.
P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 8-folder 26, BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Malcolm,
dreaming, Descartes, implicatum Grice dreaming. Malcolm argues in “Dreaming and
Skepticism” and in his “Dreaming” that the notion of a dream qua conscious
experience that occurs at a definite time and has definite duration during
sleep, is "unintelligible." This contradicts the views of
philosophers like Descartes (and indeed Moore!), who, Malcolm holds, assume
that a human being may have a conscious thought and a conscious experience
during sleep. Descartes claims that he had been deceived during sleep.
Malcolm’s point is that ordinary language contrasts consciousness and sleep.
The claim that one is conscious while one is sleep-walking is "stretching
the use of the term." Malcolm rejects the alleged counter-examples based
on sleepwalking or sleep-talking, e.g. dreaming that one is climbing stairs
while one is actually doing so is not a counter-example because, in such a
case, the individual is not sound asleep after all. "If a person is in any
state of consciousness, it logically follows that he is not sound asleep."
The concept of dreaming is based on our descriptions of dreams after we have
awakened in "telling a dream." Thus, to have dreamt that one has a
thought during sleep is not to have a thought any more than to have dreamt that
one has climbed Everest is to have climbed Everest. Since one cannot have an
experience during sleep, one cannot have a mistaken experience during sleep,
thereby undermining the sort of scepticism based on the idea that our
experience might be wrong because we might be dreaming. Malcolm further argues
that a report of a conscious state during sleep is unverifiable. If Grice
claims that he and Strawson saw a big-foot in charge of the reserve desk at the
Bodleian library, one can verify that this took place by talking to Strawson
and gathering forensic evidence from the library. However, there is no way to
verify Grice’s claim that he dreamed that he and Strawson saw a big-foot working
at the Bodleian library. Grice's only basis for his claim that he dreamt this
is that Grice says so after he wakes up. How does one distinguish the case
where Grice dreamed that he saw a big-foot working at The Bodleian Library and
the case in which he dreamed that he saw a person in a big-foot suit working at
the library but, after awakening, mis-remembered that person in a big-foot suit
as a big-foot proper? If Grice should admit that he had earlier mis-reported
his dream and that he had actually dreamed he saw a person in a big-foot suit
at The Bodleian, there is no more independent verification for this new claim
than there was for the original one. Thus, there is, for Malcolm, no sense to
the idea of mis-remembering one’s dreams. Malcolm here applies one of Witter's
ideas from his “private language argument,": "One would like to say:
whatever is going to seem right to me is right. And that only means that here
we can’t talk about ‘right’." For a similar reason, Malcolm challenges the
idea that one can assign a definite duration or time of occurrence to a dream.
If Grice claims that he ran the mile in 3.4 minutes, one could verify this in
the usual ways. If, however, Grice says he dreamt that he ran the mile in 3.4
minutes, how is one to measure the duration of his dreamt run? If Grice says he
was wearing a stopwatch in the dream and clocked his run at 3.4 minutes, how
can one know that the dreamt stopwatch is not running at half speed (so that he
really dreamt that he ran the mile in 6.8 minutes)? Grice might argue that a
dream report does not carry such a conversational implicata. But Malcolm would
say that just admits the point. The ordinary criteria one uses for determining
temporal duration do not apply to dreamt events. The problem in both these
cases (Grice dreaming one saw a bigfoot working at The Bodleian library and
dreaming that he ran the mile in 3.4 minutes) is that there is no way to verify
the truth of these dreamt events — no direct way to access that dreamt inner
experience, that mysterious glow of consciousness inside the mind of Grice
lying comatose on the couch, in order to determine the facts of the matter.
This is because, for Malcolm, there are no facts of the matter apart from the
dreamer’s report of the dream upon awakening. Malcolm claims that the empirical
evidence does not enable one to decide between the view that a dream experience
occurs during sleep and the view that they are generated upon the moment of
waking up. Dennett agrees with Malcolm that nothing supports the received view
that a dream involves a conscious experience while one is asleep but holds that
such issues might be settled empirically. Malcolm also argues against the
attempt to provide a physiological mark of the duration of a dream, for
example, the view that the dream lasted as long as the rapid eye movements.
Malcolm replies that "there can only be as much precision in that common
concept of dreaming as is provided by the common criterion of dreaming."
These scientific researchers are misled by the assumption that the provision
for the duration of a dream "is already there, only somewhat obscured and
in need of being made more precise." However, Malcolm claims, it is not
already there (in the ordinary concept of dreaming). These scientific views are
making “radical conceptual changes” in the concept of dreaming, not further
explaining our ordinary concept of dreaming. Malcolm admits, however, that it
might be natural to adopt such scientific views about REM sleep as a
convention. Malcolm points out, however, that if REM sleep is adopted as a
criterion for the occurrence of a dream, "people would have to be
informed upon waking up that they had dreamed or not." Malcolm does not
mean to deny that people have dreams in favour of the view that they only have
waking dream-behaviour (Pears, 1961, 145). "Of course it is no misuse of
language to speak of ‘remembering a dream’." His point is that since the
concept of dreaming is so closely tied to our concept of waking report of a
dreams, one cannot form a coherent concept of this alleged inner (private)
something that occurs with a definite duration during sleep. Malcolm rejects a
certain philosophical conception of dreaming, not the ordinary concept of
dreaming, which, he holds, is neither a hidden private something nor mere
outward behaviour. Malcolm’s account of dreaming has come in for considerable
criticism. Some argue that Malcolm’s claim that occurrences in dreams cannot be
verified by others does not require the strict criteria that Malcolm proposes
but can be justified by appeal to the simplicity, plausibility, and predictive
adequacy of an explanatory system as a whole. Some argue that Malcolm’s account
of the sentence “I am awake” is inconsistent. A comprehensive programme in
considerable detail has been offered for an empirical scientific investigation
of dreaming of the sort that Malcolm rejects. Others have proposed various
counterexamples and counter arguments against Malcolm’s account of dreaming.
Grice's emphasis is in Malcolm's easy way out with statements to the effect
that 'implicata' do or do not operate in dream reports. "They do in
mine!" Grice considers, “I may be dreaming” in the two essays opening the
Part II: Explorations on semantics and metaphysics in Studies in the Way of
Words.
1967. Logic and
conversation, repr. in Studies in the Way of Words, Part I, in revised
form (1987). The William James Memorial Lectures on Logic and
Conversation, Harvard. The William James Memorial Lectures on Logic and
Conversation, in Studies in the Way of Words, as Part I, “Logic and
Conversation,” The William James lectures on logic and conversation, The
H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 1-folders 24, 25, and 26,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: logic, conversation, implicature. A set of seven
lectures, entitled as follows. Lecture 1, 'Prolegomena;' Lecture 2: 'Logic and
Conversation;' Lecture 3: 'Further notes on logic and conversation;' Lecture 4:
'Indicative conditionals;' Lecture 5: 'Utterer's meaning and intentions;'
Lecture 6: 'Utterer's meaning, sentence-meaning, and word-meaning;' and Lecture
7: 'Some models for implicature.' "I hope they don't expect me to lecture
on James!" Grice admired James, but not vice versa. Grice
entitled the set as being "Logic and Conversation." That is the
title, also, of the second lecture. Grice keeps those titles seeing that it was
way the whole set of lectures were frequently cited, and that the second
lecture had been published under that title in Davidson and Harman, The
Logic of Grammar. The content of each lecture is indicated below. In
the first, Grice manages to quote from Witters. In the last, he
didn't! The original set consisted of seven lectures. To wit:
Prolegomena, Logic and conversation, Further notes on logic and conversation,
Indicative Conditionals, Utterer's meaning and intentions, Utterer's meaning,
sentence-meaning, and word meaning, and Some models for implicature. They were
pretty successful at Oxford. While the notion of an 'implicatum' had been
introduced by Grice at Oxford, even in connection with a principle of
conversational helpfulness, he takes the occasion now to explore the type of
rationality involved. Observation of the principle of conversational
helpfulness is rational (reasonable) along the following lines: anyone who
cares about the two central goals to conversation (give/receive information,
influence/be influened) is expected to have an interest in participating in a
conversation that is only going to be profitable given that it is conducted
along the lines set by the principle of conversational helpfulness. In
"Prolegomena" he lists J. L. Austin, P. F. Strawson, R. M. Hare, H. L. A. Hart, and himself, as
victims of a disregard for the implicatum. In the third lecture he introduces
his razor, "Senses are not to be muliplied beyond necessity." In
"Indicative conditionals" he tackles Strawson on 'if' as not
representing the horse-shoe of Whitehead and Russell. The next two lectures,
"Utterer's meaning and intentions" and "Utterer's meaning,
sentence-meaning, and word-meaning" refine his earlier, more austere,
account of this particularly Peirceian phenomenon. He concludes the lectures
with an exploration on the relevance of the implicatum to philosophical
psychology. Grice was well aware that many philosophers had become
enamoured with the series, and would love to give it a ‘continuous perusal.’
The set is indeed grandiose. It starts with a “Prolegomena” to set the scene:
He notably quotes himself in it, which helps, but also Strawson, which sort of
justifies the general title. In the second lecture, “Logic and Conversation,”
he expands on the principle of conversational helpfulness and the
explicitum/implicatum distinction – all very rationalist! The third lecture is
otiose in that he makes fun of Ockham: Senses are not to be multiplied beyond
necessity. The fourth lecture, on “Indicative conditionals,” is indeed on MOST
of the formal devices he had mentioned on Lecture II, notably the functors
(rather than the quantifiers and the iota operator, with which he deals in
“Presupposition and conversational implicature,” since, as he notes, they refer
to reference). This lecture is the centrepiece of the set. In the fifth lecture, he
plays with ‘mean,’ and discovers that it is attached to the implicatum or the implicitum. In the sixth lecture, he becomes a ‘nominalist,’ to use Bennett’s
phrase, as he deals with ‘dog’ and ‘shaggy’ in terms of this or that
‘resultant’ procedure – “don’t ask me what they are!” --. Finally, in “Some
models for implicature,” he attacks the charge of circularity, and refers to
“nineteenth-century explorations” on the idea of ‘thought without language’
alla Wundt. I don’t think a set of William James lectures had even been so
comprehensive!
1967. Prolegomena, in
Studies in the Way of Words, Part I, "Logic and Conversation," Essay
1, the first William James lecture, ifs and cans, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series II (Essays) and Series V (Topical), carton 7-folders 11-12, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords:
meaning, use, implicatum, Austin, Strawson. A discussion of Oxonian
philosophers of Grice's play group, notably J. L. Austin, P. F. Strawson, H. L.
A. Hart, and R. M. Hare. He adds himself for good measure ("A causal theory
of perception"). Philosophers, even at Oxford, have to be careful with the
attention that is due to 'general principles of discourse.' Grice quotes
philosophers of an earlier generation, such as Ryle, and some interpreters or
practitioners of Oxonian analysis, such as Benjamin and Searle. He even manages
to quote from Witters's "Philosophical investigations," on seeing a
banana as a banana. There are further items in the Grice collection that
address Austin’s manoeuvre, 1970, Austin on ifs and cans, Ifs and cans,
keywords: conditional, power. Two of Grice's favourites. He opposed
Strawson's view on 'if.' Grice thought that 'if' was the horseshoe of Whitehead
and Russell, provided we add an implicatum to an entailment. The 'can' is
merely dispositional, if not alla Ryle, alla Grice! 1970. Ifs and cans,
keywords: Austin, intention, disposition. Austin had brought the topic to
the fore as an exploration of free will. D. F. Pears had noted that
'conversational' implicature may account for the conditional perfection ('if'
yields 'iff'). Cf. M. R. Ayers on Austin on 'if' and 'can.' Recall that for Grice the most idiomatic way to express a 'disposition' is with the subjective mode, the 'if', and the 'can' -- "The ice can break." Cf. the mistake: "It is not the case that what you must do, you can do." The can-may distinction is one Grice played with too. As with 'will' and 'shall,' the attachment of one mode to one of the lexemes is pretty arbitrary and not etymologically justified -- pace Fowler on it being a privilege of this or that Southern Englishman as Fowler is. If he calls it
“Prolegomena,” he is being jocular. “Philosophers’ Mistakes” would have been
too provocative. B. S. Benjamin erred, and so did Gilbert Ryle, and Ludwig
Witters, and ‘my friends’, J. L. Austin (the mater that wobbled), and in order
of seniority, H. L. A. Hart (“I heard him defend this about ‘carefully’ –
‘stopping at every door in case a dog comes out at breakned speed’), R. M. Hare
(To say ‘good’ is to approve), and Strawson (Introduction to Logical theory:
“To utter “if p, q” is to implicate some inferrability”, To say ‘true!’ is to
endorse – Analysis). If he ends with Searle, he is being jocular. He quotes
Searle from an essay in “British philosophy” in Lecture I, and from an essay in
“Philosophy in America” in Lecture V. He loved Searle, and expands on the Texas
oilmen’s club example! We may think of Grice as a linguistic botanizer or a
‘meta-linguistic’ botanizer: his hobby was to collect philosophers’ mistakes,
and he catalogued them. In “Causal theory” he produces his first list of seven:
1: the pillar box seems red to me; 2. One cannot see a dagger as a dagger; 3.
Moore didn’t know that the objects before him were his own hands; 4. What is
actual is not also possible. 5. For someone to be called ‘responsible,’ his
action should be condemnable; 6. A cause must be given only of something
abnormal or unusual (cf. ætiology). 7. If you know it, you don’t believe it. In
the Prolegomena, the taxonomy is more complicated. Examples A (the use of an
expression, by Ryle, Wittgenstein, Austin, Hart, and Benjamin), Examples B
(Strawson on ‘and,’ ‘or,’ and especially ‘if’), and Examples C (Strawson on
‘true’ and Hare on ‘good’ – the ‘performative theories’). But even if his
taxonomy is more complicated, he makes it more SO by giving other examples as
he goes on to DISCUSS how to assess the philosophical mistake. Cf. his
elaboration on ‘trying,’ “I saw Mrs. Smith cashing a cheque,’ ‘Trying to cash a
cheque, you mean.’ Or cf. his remarks on ‘remember,’ and ‘There is an analogy
here with a case by Wittgenstein.” In summary, he wants to say. It’s the
philosopher who makes his big mistake. He has detected, as Grice has it, some
conversational nuance. Now he wants to exploit it. But before rushing ahead to
exploit the conversational nuance he has detected, or identified, or collected
in his exercise of linguistic botanising, the philosopher should let us know
with clarity what type of a nuance it is. For Grice wants to know that the
nuance depends on a general principle (of goal-directed behaviour in general,
and most likely rational) governing discourse – that participants in a
conversation should be aware of, and not on some minutiæ that has been
identified by the philosopher making the mistake, unsystematically, and merely
descriptively, and taxonomically, but without ONE drop of explanatory adequacy.
The fact that he directs this to his junior Strawson is the sad thing. The rest
are all Grice’s seniors! The point is of philosophical interest, rather than
other. And he keeps citing philosophers, Tarski or Ramsey, in the third William
James leture, to elaborate the point about ‘true’ in “Prolegomena.” He never
seems interested in anything but an item being “of philosophical interest,”
even if that means HIS and MINE! On top, he is being Oxonian: “Only at Oxford
my colleagues were so obsessed, as it has never been seen anywhere else, about
the nuances of conversation. Only they were all making a big mistake in having
no clue as to what the underlying theory of conversation as rational co-operation
would simplify things for them – and how! If I introduce the explicatum as a
concession, I shall hope I will be pardoned!” Is Grice's intention epagogic, or
diagogic in ‘Prolegomena’? Is he trying to educate Strawson, or just delighting
in proving Strawson wrong? We think the former. The fact that he quotes himself
shows that Grice is concerned with something he still sees, and for the rest of
his life will see, as a valid philosophical problem. If philosophy generated no
problmes it would be dead.
1967. Logic and conversation, in Studies in the Way of
Words, Part I, "Logic and Conversation," Essay 2, from
Davidson/Harman, The Logic of Grammar, pp. 64-75, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series II (Essays), BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. An elaboration of his Oxonian seminar on "Logic
and conversation." There's a principle of conversational helpfulness,
which includes a desideratum of conversational candour and a desideratum of
conversational clarity, and the sub-principle of conversational self-interest
clashing with the sub-principle of conversational benevolence. The whole point
of the manoeuvre is to provide a rational basis for a conversational
'implicatum,' as his term of art goes. Observation of the principle of
conversational helpfulness is rational/reasonable along the following lines:
anyone who is interested in the two goals conversation is supposed to serve --
give/receive information, influence/be influenced -- should only care to enter
a conversation that will be only profitable under the assumption that it is
conducted in accordance with the principle of conversational helfpulness, and
attending desiderata and sub-principles. Grice takes special care in listing
tests for the proof that an implicatum is conversational in this rather
technical usage: a conversational implicatum is rationally calculable (it is
the content of a psychological state, attitude or stance that the addressee
assigns to the utterer on condition that he is being helpful), non-detachable,
indeterminate, and very cancellable, thus never part of the 'sense' and never
an 'entailment' of this or that piece of philosophical vocabulary. Logic and
conversation, in Davidson and Harman, The Logic of Grammar, 1975, also in Cole
and Morgan, 1975, repr. in a revised form in Grice, 1989, 1967, Logic
and conversation, the second William James lecture, keywords: principle of
conversational helpfulness, implicatum, cancellability. While the essay
was also reprinted by Cole and Morgan, Grice always cited it from the
Davidson's and Harman's two-column reprint in The Logic of Grammar. Most people
without a philosophical background first encounter Grice through this
essay. Philosophers usually get first acquainted with his "In
defence of a dogma," or "Meaning." In "Logic and
Conversation," Grice re-utilises the notion of an implicatum and the
principle of conversational helpfulness that he had introduced at Oxford
to a more select audience. Grice's idea is that the observation of the
principle of conversational helfpulness is rational (reasonable) along the
following lines: anyone who is concerned with the two goals which are
central to conversation (to give/receive information, to influence/be
influenced) should be interested in participating in a conversation that
is only going to be profitable on the assumption that it is conducted
along the lines of the principle of conversational helfpulness. Grice's
point is methodological. He is not at all interested in conversational exchanges
as such. Unfortunately, the essay starts "in media res," and skips
Grice's careful list of Oxonian examples of 'disregard' for the key idea
of what a conversant implicates by the conversational move he makes. His
concession is that there is an explicatum or explicitum (roughly, the
logical form) which is beyond pragmatic constraints. This concession
is easily explained in terms of his overarching irreverent, conservative,
dissenting rationalism. This lecture alone had been read by a few
philosophers leaving them confused. I don’t know what Davidson and Harman were
thinking when they reprinted just this in “The logic of grammar.” I mean: it’s
obviously ‘in media res.’ Grice starts with the ‘logical devices,’ and never
again takes the topic up. Then he explores metaphor, irony, and hyperbole, and
surely the philosopher who bought “The logic of grammar” must be left puzzled!
He had to wait sometime to see the thing in full completion. Oxonian
philosophers would, out of etiquette, hardly quote from ‘unpublished’ material!
Cohen had to rely on memory, and that’s why he got all his Grice wrong! And so
did Strawson in “If and the horseshoe.” Even Walker responding to Cohen is
relying on memory. Few philosophers quote from The logic of grammar. At
Oxford, everybody knew what Grice was up to. Hare was talking ‘implicature’ in
Mind in 1967, and Pears was talking ‘conversational implicature’ in “Ifs and
cans.” And Platts was dedicating a full chapter to “Causal Theory of
Perception.” It seems the Oxonian etiquette was to quote from “Causal Theory.”
It was obvious that Grice’s implication excursus had to read ‘implicature’! In
a few dictionaries of philosophy, such as Hamlyn’s, under ‘implication,’ a
reference to Grice’s locus classicus “Causal Theory” is made – Passmore quotes from
“Causal theory” in “Hundred years of philosophy.” Very few Oxonians would care
to buy a volume published in Encino! NOT many Oxonian philosophers ever quoted
"The logic of grammar," though. At Oxford, Grice's implicata remained
part of the unwritten doctrines of a few. And philosophers would NOT cite a
cajoled essay in the references.
1967. Further notes on logic and
conversation, in Studies in the Way of Words, published in Peter
Cole, Pragmatics, for Academic Press, London, in Part I, Logic
and conversation, essay 3, from P. Cole, Pragmatics, pp. 113-27, The
H. P Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 2-folder 24, and Series V
(Topical), carton 7-folder 13, 'Irony, Stress, and Truth,' BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: Modified Occam's razor, implicature. The
essay had circulated since the Harvard days, and it was also reprinted by Peter
Cole in his Pragmatics for Academic Press. "Personally, I
prefer 'dialectica.'" -- Grice. This is the third William James
lecture at Harvard. It is particularly useful for Grice's introduction of
his razor, M. O. R., or Modified Occam's Razor, jocularly expressed by Grice as: "Senses are not to be multiplied
beyond necessity.” An Englishing of the Ockham's 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, and truth, which the Grice Papers have under a special folder in
the Series V (Topical). Three topics where the implicatum
helps. "He is a scoundrel" may well be the IMPLICATUM of
"He is a fine friend." But cfr. the pretense theory of irony.
Grice, being a classicist, loved the etymological connection. With Stress,
he was concerned with anti-Gettier uses of emphatic 'know': "I KNOW."
(Implicatum: I do have conclusive evidence"). "Truth" (or
"... is true") sprang from Grice's attention to that infamous Bristol
symposium between Austin and Strawson. Grice wants to defend Austin's
correspondence theory against Strawson's 'performative' approach. If
"... is true" implicates "someone previously affirmed
this," that does not mean a 'ditto' implicatum is part of the entailment of a "... is true" utterance. 1967, 1978. Further notes
on logic and conversation, in Peter Cole (1978), repr. in a revised form in
Grice (1989), 1967, further notes on logic and conversation, keywords: Modified
Occam's Razor, irony, stress, truth. The preferred citation should be
Grice 1967:III. This is originally the third William James lecture,
in a revised form. In that lecture, Grice introduced the M. O.
R., or Modified Occam's Razor. Senses are not be multiplied
beyond necessity. The point is that entailment-cum-implicatum does
the job that multiplied senses should not do! The Grice Papers contains in
a different folder the concluding section for that lecture, on irony, stress,
and truth. Grice went back to the Modified Occam’s 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 name such a property, not 'true'
but 'factually satisfactory'." Grice's sympathies don't lie with
Strawson's Ramsey-based redundance-theory of truth, but rather with Tarski's
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.
Let's 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
subject-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. The two standard truth definitions are
at first glance not definitions of truth at all, but definitions of a more
complicated relation involving assignments of objects to variables:
"a satisfies the formula F," (where the symbol ‘F' is a placeholder for a name of a particular
formula of the object language). In fact satisfaction reduces to truth in this
way: ‘aa’ satisfies the formula ‘FF’ if and only if
taking each free variable in ‘FF’ as a name of the
object assigned to it by aa makes the
formula FF into a true sentence. So it follows that our
intuitions about when a sentence is true can guide our intuitions about when an
assignment SATISFIES a formula. But none of this can enter into the formal
definition of truth, because ‘taking a variable as a name of an object’ is a
semantic notion, and Tarski’s truth definition has to be built only on notions
from syntax and set theory (together with those in the object-language); In
fact Tarski’s reduction goes in the other direction: if the formula FF has no free variables, to say that FF is true is to say that every assignment SATISFIES
it. The reason why Tarski defines SATISFACTION directly, and then deduces a
definition of truth, is that 'satisfaction obeys recursive conditions in
the following way. if FF is a compound
formula, to know which assignments satisfy FF, it’s enough to know
which assignments satisfy the immediate constituents of FF. Here are two typical examples: The assignment a satisfies the formula ‘ F and GG’ if and only if aa satisfies FF and aa satisfies GG. The
assignment aa satisfies the formula ‘For all xx, GG’ if and only if for
every individual ii, if bb is the
assignment that assigns ii to the
variable xx and is otherwise exactly like aa, then bb satisfies GG. We have to use a different approach for atomic
formulas. But for these, at least assuming for simplicity that LL has no function symbols, we can use the
metalanguage copies #(R)#(R) of the predicate symbols RR of the object language. Thus The assignment aa SATSIFIES the formula R(x,y)R(x,y) if and only if #(R)(a(x),a(y))#(R)(a(x),a(y)). (Warning: the
expression ## is in the meta-meta-language, not in the
meta-language MM. We may or may not be able to find a
formula of MM that expresses ## for predicate
symbols; it depends on exactly what the language LL is.). Subject
to this or that mild reservation, Tarski’s definition of SATISFACTION is compositional,
meaning that the class of assignments which SATISFY a compound
formula FF is determined solely by (1) the
syntactic rule used to construct FF from its
immediate constituents and (2) the classes of assignments that satisfy these
immediate constituents. This is sometimes phrased loosely as: 'satisfaction' is
defined recursively. But this formulation misses the central point, that the
above don’t contain any syntactic information about the immediate constituents.
Compositionality explains why Tarski switches from 'true' to 'satisfied.' You
can’t define whether ‘For all x,Gx,G’ is true in terms
of whether GG is true, because in general GG has a free variable xx and so it isn’t
either true or false. The reservation is that Tarski’s definition of
satisfaction in Tarski's essay doesn’t in fact mention the class of assignments
that 'satisfy' a formula FF. Instead, as we saw,
he defines the relation ‘aa 'satisfies' FF’, which determines what that class is. This is probably
the main reason why some people (including Tarski himself in conversation have
preferred NOT to describe the definition as compositional. But the class
format, which is compositional on any reckoning, does appear in an early
variant of the truth definition in Tarski’s essay on definable sets of real
numbers. Tarski had a good reason for preferring the format ‘aa satisfies FF’ in his essay, viz.
that it allowed him to reduce the set-theoretic requirements of the truth
definition. He spells out these requirements carefully. ‘Compositionality’
first appears in an essay by Putnam. In talking about compositionality, we have
moved to thinking of Tarski’s definition as a semantics, i.e. a way of
assigning ‘meanings’ to formulas. Here we take the meaning of a sentence to be
its truth value. Compositionality means essentially that the meanings assigned
to formulas give at least enough information to determine the
truth values of sentences containing them. One can ask conversely whether
Tarski’s semantics provides only as much information as we need about
each formula, in order to reach the truth values of sentences. If the answer is
yes, we say that the semantics is fully abstract (for truth).
One can show fairly easily, for any of the standard languages of logic, that
Tarski’s definition of satisfaction is in fact fully abstract. As it
stands, Tarski’s definition of "satisfaction" is not an explicit
definition, because "satisfaction" for one formula is defined in
terms of "satisfaction" for other formulas. So to show that it is
formally correct, we need a way of converting it to an explicit definition. One
way to do this is as follows, using either higher order logic or set theory.
Suppose we write SS for a binary relation between
assignments and formulas. We say that SS is a satisfaction
relation if for every formula G,SG,S meets the
conditions put for satisfation of GG by Tarski’s
definition. E.g., if GG is ‘G1G1 and G2G2’, SS should satisfy
the following condition for every assignment aa: S(a,G) if and only
if S(a,G1) and S(a,G2).S(a,G) if and only
if S(a,G1) and S(a,G2). We can define
‘'SATISFACTION' relation’ formally, using the recursive clauses and the
conditions for atomic formulas in Tarski’s recursive definition. Now we prove,
by induction on the complexity of formulas, that there is exactly one
satisfaction relation SS. (There are some
technical subtleties, but it can be done.) Finally we define aa satisfies FF if and only if:
there is a satisfaction relation SS such that S(a,F)S(a,F). It is then a technical exercise to show that
this definition of satisfaction is materially adequate. Actually one must first
write out the counterpart of Convention TT for satisfaction
of formulas, but I leave this to the reader. The remaining truth
definition in Tarski’s 1933 paper – the third as they appear in the paper – is
really a bundle of related truth definitions, all for the same
object-language LL but in different
interpretations. The quantifiers of LL are assumed to
range over a particular class, call it AA; in fact they are
second order quantifiers, so that really they range over the collection of
subclasses of AA. The class AA is not named explicitly in the object language, and
thus one can give separate truth definitions for different values of AA, as Tarski proceeds to do. So for this section of the
paper, Tarski allows one and the same sentence to be given different
interpretations; this is the exception to the general claim that his object
language sentences are fully interpreted. But Tarski stays on the straight and
narrow: he talks about ‘truth’ only in the special case where AA is the class of all individuals. For other values
of AA, he speaks not of ‘truth’ but of ‘correctness in the
domain AA’.These truth or correctness definitions don’t fall out
of a definition of "satisfaction." In fact they go by a much less
direct route, which Tarski describes as a ‘purely accidental’ possibility that
relies on the ‘specific peculiarities’ of the particular object
language. there is no hope of giving a definition of satisfaction by
recursion on the complexity of formulas. The remedy is to note that the explicit form
of Tarski’s truth definition in Section 2.1 above didn’t require a recursive
definition; it needed only that the conditions on the satisfaction
relation SS pin it down uniquely. For Henkin’s first style of
language this is still true, though the reason is no longer the
well-foundedness of the syntax. For Henkin’s second style of language, at least
in Hintikka’s notation (see the entry on independence friendly logic), the syntax is well-founded, but the
displacement of the quantifier scopes means that the usual quantifier clauses
in the definition of satisfaction no longer work. How can we analyze
atisfaction? The answer to this question is in some ways reminiscent to our
answer of how to construct a theory of truth for a language with only finitely
many sentences. So see how, first suppose that our language has only three
names and three predicates, ‘Bob’, ‘Jane’, and ‘Nancy’ and ‘is nice’, ‘is
mean,’ and ‘is lazy.’ We can then give the following analysis, indeed,
definition, of satisfaction. An item I satisfies predicate p ≡df [(p=“is nice”
and i is nice) ∨ (n=“is mean” and i
is mean) ∨ (n=“is lazy” and i
is lazy)] There is an analogy between the material-adequacy constraint which
Tarski set on the theory of truth, and similar constraints which we should
expect a definition of satisfaction to meet. Just as a theory of truth should
imply every instance of ‘S’ is 1 in L iff S so we should expect our theory of satisfaction
to imply every instance of the following schema. I satisfies ‘is F’ in L iff i
is F. We arrive at Tarski’s first-order definition as a definition of
satisfaction which makes no use of concepts other than those employed in the
object-language itself.
1967. Indicative conditionals, the fourth William James lecture, in Studies in the way of words, part I (Logic and conversation), essay 4, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 29, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: unary functor, not, binary functor, and, or, if, Cook Wilson. In "Prolegomena," Grice had quoted verbatim from Strawson's infamous idea that there is a SENSE of inferrability with 'if.' While the lecture covers much more than 'if' ("He only said 'if';" "Oh, no, he said a great deal more than that!," the title was never meant to be original. Grice in fact provides a rational justification for the three connectives ("and," "or," and "if") and before that, the unary functor "not." Embedding, Indicative conditionals: embedding, 1971, "Not" and "If," Michæl Sinton on "Grice on Denials of Indicative Conditionals," keywords: "not," "if." Strawson had elaborated on what he felt was a divergence between Whitehead's and Russell's 'horseshoe,' and 'if.' Grice thought Strawson's observations could be understood in terms of entailment + implicatum ("Robbing Peter to Pay Paul"). But problems, as first noted to Grice, by L. J. Cohen, of Oxford, remain, when it comes to the scope of the implicatum within the operation of, say, 'negation.' Analogous problems arise with implicata for the other earlier dyadic functors, "and" and "or," and Grice looks for a single explanation of the phenomenon. The qualification 'indicative' is modal. "Ordinary language" allows for 'if' utterances to be in modes other than the imperative. "Counter-factual," if you need to be philosophical krypto-technical, 'subjective' is you are more of a classicist! Grice took a cavalier to the problem: Surely it won’t do to say “You couldn’t have done that, since you were in Seattle,” to someone who figuratively tells you he’s spend the full summer cleaning the Aegean stables. This, to philosophers, is the centerpiece of the lectures. Grice takes good care of “not,” “and,” “or,” and concludes with the “if” of the ‘title.’ For each, he finds a métier, alla Cook Wilson in “Statement and Inference.” And they all connect with rationality. So he is using material from his Oxford seminars on the principle of conversational helpfulness. Plus Cook Wilson makes more sense at Oxford than at Harvard! The last bit, citing Kripke and Dummett, is meant as jocular. What is important is the ‘teleological’ approach to the operators, where a note should be made about dyadicity. In “Prolegomena,” when he introduces the topic, he omits “not” (about which he was almost obsessed!). He just gives an example for “and” (He went to bed and took off his dirty boots”), one for “or” (the garden becomes Oxford and the kitchen becomes London, and the implicatum is in terms, oddly, of ‘ignorance’: “My wife is either in Town OR Country,”making fun of “Town AND Country”), and “if”. His favourite illustration for “if” is Cock Robin: "If the Sparrow did not kill him, the Lark did!” This is because Grice is serious about the erotetic, i.e. question/answer, format Cook Wilson gives to things, but he manages to bring Philonian and Megarian into the picture, just to impress! Most importantly, he introduces the square brackets! He’ll use them again in “Presupposition and Conversational Implicature” and turns them into subscripts in “Vacuous Names.” This is central. For he wants to impoverish the idea of the implicatum. The explicitum is minimal, and any divergence is syntactic-cum-pragmatic import. The scope devices are syntactic and eliminable, and as he knows: what the eye no longer sees, the heart no longer grieves for! The modal implicatum. Since Grice uses ‘indicative,’ for the title of his third William James lecture ("Indicative Conditionals") surely he implicates 'subjunctive' -- i.e. that someone might be thinking that he should give an account of indicative*-cum-subjective* 'if.' This relates to an example Grice gives in “Causal Theory,” that he does not reproduce in “Prolegomena." Grice states the philosophical mistake as follows: “What is actual is *not* also possible.” Grice seems to be suggesting that a subjective conditional would involve one or other of the modalities, he is not interested in exploring. On the other hand, J. L. Mackie has noted that Grice’s conversationalist hypothesis (Mackie quotes verbatim from Grice’s “principle of conversational helpfulness”) allows for an explanation of the subjective “if” that does not involve Kripke-type paradoxes involving possible worlds, or other. In “Causal Theory,” Grice notes that the issue with which he has been mainly concerned may be thought rather a fine point, but it is certainly not an isolated one. There are several philosophical theses or dicta which would he thinks need to be examined in order to see whether or not they are sufficiently parallel to the thesis which Grice has been discussing to be amenable to treatment of the same general kind. An examples which occurs to me is the following. What is actual is *not* also possible. I must emphasise that I am not saying that [this example is] importantly similar to the thesis which I have been criticizing, only that, for all I know, it may be. To put the matter more generally, the position adopted by Grice’s objector seems to Grice to involve a type of manoeuvre which is characteristic of more than one contemporary mode of philosophizing. He is not condemning that kind of manoeuvre. He is merely suggesting that to embark on it without due caution is to risk collision with the facts. Before we rush ahead to exploit the linguistic nuances which we have detected, we should make sure that we are reasonably clear what sort of nuances they are. 'If' was also of special interest to Grice for many other reasons. He defends a 'dispositional' account of 'intending that' in terms of 'ifs and cans.' He considers 'akrasia' conditionally. He explored the hypothetical-categorical distinction in the buletic mode. He was concerned with 'therefore' as involved with the 'associated' 'if' of entailment.
1967. Utterer's meaning
and intentions, repr. in Studies in the way of words, the fifth William James lecture, part I, Logic and
conversation, essay 5, The Philosophical Review, vol. 72 (issue
2), pp. 147-77, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays) carton 1-folders
28-30, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: utterer's meaning, intention. Grice is not an
animist. While he allows for natural phenomena to mean ("smoke means
fire"), 'meaning' is best ascribed to some utterer, where this 'meaning'
is nothing but the intentions behind his utterance. This is the fifth
William James lecture. Grice was careful enough to submit it to "The
Philosophical Review," since it is a strictly philosophical development of
the views expressed in "Meaning" which Strawson had submitted on
Grice's behalf to the same "Review" and which had had a series of
responses by various philosophers. Among these philosophers is Strawson himself
in "Intention and convention in the the theory of speech acts," also
in "The Philosophical Review." Grice quotes from very many other
philosophers in this essay, including: J. O. Urmson, D. W. Stampe, P. F.
Strawson, S. R. Schiffer, and J. R. Searle. P. F. Strawson is
especially relevant since he started a series of alleged counter-examples with
his infamous example of the 'rat-infested house.' Grice particularly
treasured Stampe's alleged counter-example involving his beloved bridge! Anita
Avramides wrote her Oxon D. Phil on that, under Strawson! This is Grice's
occasion to address some of the criticisms -- in the form of alleged
counter-examples, typically, as his later reflections on epagoge versus diagoge
note -- by J. O. Urmson, P. F. Strawson,and other philosophers associated with
Oxford, such as J. R. Searle, D. W. Stampe, and S. R. Schiffer. The final
'analysandum' is pretty complex (of the type that he did find his analysis of
"I am hearing a sound" complex in "Personal identity" -- hardly
an obstacle for adopting it), it became yet another target of attack by
especially New-World philosophers in the pages of Mind, Nous, and other
journals. 1967. Utterer’s meaning and intentions, The
Philosophical Review, repr. in Grice (1989), 1967, utterer's meaning and
intentions, The Philosophical Review, keywords: utterer's meaning,
intention. This is officially the fifth William James lecture. Grice takes up
the analysis of 'meaning' he had presented back in 1948 at the Oxford
Philosophical Society. Motivated mainly by J. O. Urmson's and Strawson's attack
in "Intention and convention in speech acts," that offered an alleged
counter-example to the sufficiency of Grice's analysis, Grice ends up
introducing so many intention that he almost trembled. He ends up seeing
'meaning' as a value-paradeigmatic concept, perhaps never realisable in a
sublunary way. But it is the analysis in this particular essay where he is at
his formal best. He distinguishes between protreptic and exhibitive utterances,
and also modes of correlation (iconic, conventional). He symbolises the utterer
and the addressee, and generalises over the type of psychological state,
attitude, or stance, "meaning" seems to range (notably indicative vs.
imperative). He formalises the 'reflexive' intention, and more importantly, the
'overtness' of communication in terms of a self-referential recursive intention
that disallows any 'sneaky' intention to be brought into the picture of
meaning-constitutive intentions. By uttering x the utterer U means that *ψ p
iff (Ǝφ) (Ǝf) (Ǝc): I. The utterer U utters x intending x to be such that
anyone who has φ will think that (i) x has f (ii) f is correlated in
way c with ψ-ing that p (iii) (Ǝφ'): U intends x to be such that
anyone who has φ' will think, via thinking (i) and (ii), that U psi-s that
p (iv) in view of (3), U ψ-s that p; and II (operative only
for certain substituends for "*ψ") U utters x intending that,
should there actually be anyone who has φ, he will, via thinking (iv),
himself ψ that p; and III. It is not the case that, for some
inference-element E, U intends x to be such that anyone who has φ will
both (i') rely on E in coming to ψ (or think that U ψ-s) that p
and (ii') think that (Ǝ φ'): U intends x to be such that anyone who has φ' will come to ψ (or think that U ψ-s) that p without relying on
E. Grice thought he had dealt with 'Logic and conversation' enough! So he
feels of revising his 'Meaning.' After all, Strawson had had the cheek to
publish Grice’s Meaning and then go on to criticize it in “Intention and
Convention in Speech Acts.” So this is Grice’s revenge, and he wins! He ends
with the most elaborate theory of ‘mean’ that an Oxonian could ever hope for.
And to provoke the informalists such as Strawson (and his ‘disciples’ at Oxford
– “led” by Strawson) he pours existential quantifiers like the plague! He
manages to quote from J. O. Urmson, whom he loved! No word on Peirce, though,
who had originated all this! His implicature: “I’m not going to be reprimanted
‘in informal discussion’ about my misreading Peirce at Harvard!” The concluding
note is about ‘artificial substitutes’ for iconic representation, and meaning
as a ‘human institution.’ Very grand!
1967. Utterer's
meaning, sentence-meaning, and word-meaning, repr. in Studies in the way
of words, the sixth William James lecture, part I, Logic and
conversation, essay 6, The Foundations of Language, pp. 225-42,
The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 1-folder 27, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: utterer's meaning, sentence-meaning, word-meaning. The phrase
'utterer' is meant to provoke. Grice thinks that 'speaker' is too narrow.
"Surely you can mean by just UTTERING stuff!" This is the sixth
William James lecture, as published in "The Foundations of Language."
As it happens, it became a popular lecture, seeing that J. R. Searle selected
this from the whole set for his Oxford reading in philosophy, "The philosophy
of language.” It is also the essay cited by Chomsky in his influential John
Locke lectures. Chomsky takes Grice to be a 'behaviourist,' even along
Skinner's lines, which provoked a reply by Suppes, later reprinted in P. G. R.
I. C. E., or Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories,
Ends. (In The New World, the "H. P." was often given in a more
"simplified" form.). Grice wants to keep on playing. In
"Meaning," he had said "x means that p" is surely reducible
to utterer U means that p. In this lecture, he lectures us as to how to
proceed. In so doing he invents this or that procedure: some basic, some
resultant. When Chomsky reads the reprint in Searle's Philosophy of Language,
he cries: "Behaviourist! Skinnerian!" It was Suppes who comes to
Grice's defence. "Surely the way Grice uses expressions like 'resultant'
procedure are never meant in the strict 'behaviourist' way." Suppes
concludes that it is much fairer to characterise Grice as an 'intentionalist.' Published in
The Foundations of Language, ed. by J. F. Staal, The Grice Papers, Repr.in
J. R. Searle, The Philosophy of Language, Oxford, 1967, Utterer's meaning,
sentence-meaning, and word-meaning, the sixth William James Lecture,
Foundations of Language, keywords: utterer's meaning, sentence-meaning,
word-meaning, resultant procedure, basic procedure. Staal asked Grice to
publish the sixth William James lecture for a newish periodical publication of
whose editorial board he was a member. The fun thing is Grice complied! This is
Grice’s shaggy-dog story. He does not seem too concerned about ‘resultant’
procedures. As he’ll later say, “Surely I can create Deutero-Esperanto and
become its master!” For Grice, the primacy is the idiosyncratic, particularized
utterer in THIS or THAT occasion. He KNOWS a philosopher CRAVES for generality,
so he provokes the generality-searcher with divisions and sub-divisions of
‘mean.’ But his heart does not seem to be there, and he is just being
overformalistic and technical for the sake of it. “I am glad that Putnam, of
all people, told me in an aside, “You’re being too formal, Grice”. I stopped
with symbolism since!”
1967. Some models for
implicature, in Studies in the way of words, the seventh William James
lecture, part I, 'Logic and conversation,' essay 6, The H. P.
Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. A rather obscure exploration on the connection of
semiotics and philosophical psychology. Grice is aware that there is an
allegation in the air about a possible 'vicious' circle in trying to define
'category of expression' in terms of a 'category of representation.' He does
not provide a solution to the problem which he'll take up in his "Method
in philosophical psychology," in his role of President of the American
Philosophical Association. It is THE IMPLICATURE behind the lecture that
matters, since Grice will go back to it, notably in the Retrospective Epilogue.
For Grice, it’s all rational enough. There’s a pirot, in a situation, say of
Danger – a bull --. He perceives the bull. The bull’s attack CAUSES this
perception. “Bull!” the pirot screams, and causes in Pirot 2 a rearguard
movement. So where is the circularity? Some pedants would have it that “Bull”
cannot be understood in a belief about a BULL which is about a BULL. Not Grice!
It is nice that he brought back ‘implicature,’ which had become obliterated in
the lectures, back to ‘title’ position! But it is also noteworthy, that these
are not explicitly RATIONALIST models for implicature. He had played with a
‘model,’ and an explanatory one at that, for implicature, in his Oxford
seminar, in terms of a principle of conversational helpfulness, a desideratum
of conversational clarity, a desideratum of conversational candour, and two
sub-principles: a principle of conversational benevolence, and a principle of
conversational self-interest! Surely Harvard could be spared of the details!
1969. Identificatory and non-identificatory uses of definite
description, Grice on “the,” Grice on “not,” “System G,” Vacuous names, in
Davidson and Hintikka, Words and objections: essays on the work of W. V.
Quine, Dordrecht: Reidel, pp. 118-45. The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II
(Essays), carton 1-folder 31, and carton 2-folders 1-4, BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords:
vacuous name, identificatory, non-identificatory, definite
description. Grice's favourite vacuous name is
Bellerophon. This is an essay commissioned by Donald Davison and
Jaako Hintikka for "Words and objects: essays in the work of W. V.
Quine" for Reidel. "Words and objects" had appeared
(without Grice's contribution) as a special issue of "Synthese." Grice's
contribution, along with Quine's "Reply” to Grice," appeared only in
the reprint of that special issue for Reidel in Dordrecht. Grice cites
from various philosophers (and logicians -- this was the time when logic was
starting to be taught OUTSIDE philosophy departments, or 'sub-faculties'), such
as G. Myro, B. Mates, K. S. Donnellan, P. F.
Strawson, Grice was particularly proud to be able to quote Mates "by
mouth or book." Grice takes the opportunity, in his tribute to Quine,
to introduce one of two of his syntactical devices to allow for conversational
implicata to be given maximal scope. The device in "Vacuous
Names" is a subscription device to indicate the ordering of introduction
of this or that operation. Grice wants to give room for utterances of a
special 'existential' kind be deemed rational/reasonable, provided the
principle of conversational helfpulness is thought of by the addressee to be
followed by the utterer. "Someone isn't attending the party organised
by the Merseyside Geographical Society." "That is Marmaduke
Bloggs, who climbed Mt. Everest on hands and knees." "But who,
as it happened, turned out to be an invention of the journalists at the
Merseyside Newsletter." 1969, in Donald Davidson and Jaako
Hintikka, Words and objections: essays on the work of W. V. Quine, Dordrecht,
Reidel, 1969, Vacuous names, The Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), keywords: identificatory use, non-identificatory use,
subscript device. Davidson and Hintikka were well aware of the 'New-World'
impact of the 'Old-World' ideas displayed by Grice and Strawson in their
attack to Quine. Quine had indeed addressed Grice's and Strawson's
'sophisticated' version of the paradigm-case argument in "Word and
Object." Davidson and Hintikka arranged to publish a special issue
for a periodical publication, to which P. F. Strawson had already contributed.
It was only natural, when Davidson and Hintikka were informed by Reidel of
their interest in turning the special issue into a separate volume, that they
would approach the other infamous member of the dynamic duo! Commissioned
by Donald Davidson and J. Hintikka for Words and objections: essays on the work
of W. V. Quine. Grice introduces a subscript device to account for
'implicata' of utterances like "Marmaduke Bloggs won't be attending
the party; he was invented by the journalists." In the later section,
he explores identificatory and non identificatory uses of 'the' without
involving himself in the problems Donnellan did! Some philosophers,
notably Ostertag, have found the latter section the most intriguing bit, and
thus Ostertag cared to reprint the section on Descriptions for his edited MIT
volume on the topic. The essay is structured very systematically with an
initial section on a calculus alla Gentzen, followed by implicata of vacuous
names such as "Marmaduke Bloggs," to end with definite descriptions
(repr. by Ostertag) and psychological predicates. It’s best to focus
on a few things here. First his imaginary dialogues on Marmaduke Bloggs,
brilliant! Second, this as a preamble to his “Presupposition and conversational
implicature.” There is a quantifier phrase (‘the’) and two uses of it: one is
an identificatory use (“the haberdasher is clumsy,” or “THE haberdasher is
clumsy,” as Grice prefers) and then there’s a derived, non-identificatory use:
‘the’ haberdasher (whoever she was!) shows her clumsiness. The use of the
numeric subscripts were complicated enough to delay the publication of this.
The whole thing was a special issue of a journal. Grice’s contribution came
when Reidel turned that into a volume. Grice later replaced his numeric
subscript device by square brackets. Perhaps the square brackets are not subtle
enough, though. Grice’s contribution, ‘Vacuous Names,’ (later reprinted in
part in Ostertag’s volume on Definite descriptions) concludes with an
exploration of “the” phrases, and further on, with some intriguing remarks on
the subtle issues surrounding the scope of an ascription of a predicate
standing for a psychological state or attitude. Grice’s choice of an
ascription now notably involves an ‘opaque’ (rather than ‘factive,’ like
‘know’) psychological state or attitude: ‘wanting,’ which he symbolizes as
“W.” Grice considers a quartet of utterances: Jack wants someone to
marry him; Jack wants someone or other to marry him; Jack
wants a particular person to marry him, and There is
someone whom Jack wants to marry him.Grice notes that “there
are clearly at least *two* possible readings” of an utterance
like our (i): a first reading “in which,” as Grice puts it, (i) might be
paraphrased by (ii).” A second reading is one “in which it might be
paraphrased by (iii) or by (iv).” Grice goes on to symbolize the
phenomenon in his own version of a first-order predicate calculus. ‘Ja wants
that p’ becomes Wjap where ‘ja’ stands for the individual constant
“Jack” as a super-script attached to the predicate standing for Jack’s
psychological state or attitude. Grice writes: “Using the apparatus of
classical predicate logic, we might hope to represent,” respectively, the
external reading and the internal reading (involving an intentio
secunda or intentio obliqua) as (Ǝx)WjaFxja and Wja(Ǝx)Fxja.
Grice then goes on to discuss a slightly more complex, or oblique, scenario
involving this second internal reading, which is the one that interests us, as
it involves an ‘intentio seconda.’Grice notes: “But suppose that Jack wants a
specific individual, Jill, to marry him, and this because Jack has been
“*deceived* into thinking that his friend Joe has a highly delectable sister
called Jill, though in fact Joe is an only child.” The Jill Jack eventually
goes up the hill with is, coincidentally, another Jill, possibly
existent. Let us recall that Grice’s main focus of the whole essay is, as the
title goes, ‘emptiness’! “In these circumstances, one is inclined to say that
(i) is true only on reading (vii),” where the existential
quantifier occurs within the scope of the psychological-state or
-attitude verb, “but we cannot now represent (ii) or (iii), with
‘Jill’ being vacuous, by (vi),” where the existential quantifier (Ǝx)
occurs outside the scope of the psychological-attitude
verb, want, “since [well,] Jill does not really exist,” except as a
figment of Jack’s imagination. In a manoeuver that I interpret as ‘purely
intentionalist,’ and thus favouring by far Suppes’s over Chomsky’s
characterisation of Grice as a mere ‘behaviourist,’ Grice hopes that
“we should be provided with distinct representations
for two familiar readings” of, now: Jack wants Jill to marry him and
Jack wants ‘Jill’ to marry him. It is at this point that Grice applies a
syntactic scope notation involving sub-scripted numerals, (ix) and (x),
where the numeric values merely indicate the order of introduction of the
symbol to which it is attached in a deductive schema for the predicate calculus
in question. Only the first formulation represents the internal reading (where
‘ji’ stands for ‘Jill’): W2ja4F1ji3ja4 and
W3ja4F2ji1ja4. Note
that in the second formulation, the individual constant for “Jill,” ‘ji,’ is
introduced prior to ‘want,’ – ‘ji’’s sub-script is 1, while ‘W’’s sub-script is
the higher numerical value 3. Grice notes: “Given that Jill does not exist,”
only the internal reading “can be true,” or alethically satisfactory.
Grice sums up his reflections on the representation of the opaqueness of a verb
standing for a psychological state or attitude like that expressed by ‘wanting’
with one observation that further marks him as an intentionalist, almost of a
Meinongian type. He is willing to allow for ‘existential’ phrases in cases of
‘vacuous’ designata, provided they occur within opaque psychological-state or
attitude verbs, and he thinks that by doing this, he is being faithful to the
richness and exuberance of ‘ordinary’ discourse, while keeping Quine happy. As
Grice puts it, “we should also have available to us
also three neutral, yet distinct, (Ǝx)-quantificational forms
(together with their isomorphs),” as a philosopher who thinks that Wittgenstein
denies a distinction, craves for a generality! “Jill” now becomes “x.” W4ja5Ǝx3F1x2ja5, Ǝx5W2ja5F1x4ja3, Ǝx5W3ja4F1x2ja4.
As Grice notes, since in (xii) the individual variable ‘x’ (ranging over
‘Jill’) “does not dominate the segment following the ‘(Ǝx)’
quantifier, the formulation does not display any ‘existential’
or de re, ‘force,’ and is suitable therefore for representing the internal
readings (ii) or (iii), “if we have to allow, as we do have, if we want to
faithfully represent ‘ordinary’ discourse, for the possibility of expressing
the fact that a particular person, Jill, does not actually exist.” At least
Grice does not write, “really,” for he knew that Austin detested a ‘trouser
word’! Grice concludes that (xi) and (xiii) “will be derivable” from each of
(ix) and (x), while (xii) will be “derivable only” from (ix). Grice had been
Strawson’s logic tutor at St. John’s (Mabbott was teaching the grand stuff!)
and it shows! One topic that especially concerned Grice relates to the
introduction and elimination rules, as he later searches for 'generic'
satisfactoriness. Grice
wonders "[W]hat should be said of Takeuti's
conjecture (roughly) that the nature of the introduction rule
determines the character of the elimination rule? There seems to
be no particular problem about allowing an introduction rule which
tells us that, if it is established in X's 'personalized' system that φ,
then 'it is necessary with respect to X that φ ' is true (establishable). The
accompanying elimination rule is, however, slightly less promising. If we
suppose such a rule to tell us that, if one is committed to the idea that it is
necessary with respect to X that φ, then one is also committed to whatever is
expressed by φ, we shall be in trouble; for such a rule is not acceptable; φ
will be a volitive expression such as "let it be that X eats his hat";
and my commitment to the idea that X's system requires him to eat his hat does
not ipso facto involve me in accepting (volitively) "let X eat his
hat". But if we take the elimination rule rather as telling us that, if it
is necessary with respect to X that let X eat his hat, then "let X eat his
hat" possesses satisfactoriness-with-respect-to-X, the situation is
easier; for this version of the rule seems inoffensive, even for Takeuti, we
hope. A very interesting concept Grice introduces in the 'definite-descriptor' section of 'Vacuous names' is that of a conversational dossier, for which he uses the Greek letter delta. The key concept is that of conversational dossier overlap, common ground, or 'conversational pool.' Let us say that an utterer U has a dossier for a definite description D if there is a set of definite descriptions which include D, all the members of which the utterer supposes to be satisfied by one and the same item and the utterer U intends his addressee A to think (via the recognition that A is so intended) that the utterer U has a dossier for the definite description D which the utterer uses, and that the utterer U has specifically selected (or chosen, or picked) this specific D from this dossier at least partly in the hope that his addressee A has his own dossier for D which overlaps the utterer's dossier for D, viz. shares a substantial, or in some way specially favoured, su-bset with the utterer's dossier.
1969. Logico-semantic paradoxes, The Grice Papers, BANC MSS
90/135c. Keywords: logico-semantic paradox. Some of the
paradoxes of entailment, entailment and paradoxes. This is not the first time
Grice uses 'paradox.' As a classicist, he was aware of the nuances between
'paradox' (or 'paradoxon,' as he preferred, via Latin 'paradoxum,' and
'aporia,' for example. He was interested in Strawson's treatment of this or
that 'paradox of entailment.' He even called his own paradox involving
"if" and probablility "Grice's paradox." In "Grice's
paradox," Grice invites us to supposes that two chess players, Yog
and Zog, play 100 games under the following conditions. (1) Yog is white nine
of ten times. (2) There are no draws. And the results are: (1) Yog,
when white, won 80 of 90 games. (2) Yog, when black, won zero of ten
games. This implies that: (i) 8/9 times, if Yog was white, Yog won.
(ii) 1/2 of the time, if Yog lost, Yog was black. (iii) 9/10 that either Yog
wasn't white or he won. From these statements, it might appear one could
make these deductions by contraposition and conditional disjunction: ([a]
from [ii]) If Yog was white, then 1/2 of the time Yog won. ([b] from [iii])
9/10 times, if Yog was white, then he won. But both (a) and (b) are
untrue—they contradict (i). In fact, (ii) and (iii) don't provide enough information
to use Bayesian reasoning to reach those conclusions. That might be clearer if
(i)-(iii) had instead been stated like so: (i) When Yog was white, Yog
won 8/9 times. (No information is given about when Yog was black.) (ii) When
Yog lost, Yog was black 1/2 the time. (No information is given about when Yog
won.) (iii) 9/10 times, either Yog was black and won, Yog was black and lost,
or Yog was white and won. (No information is provided on how the 9/10 is
divided among those three situations.) Grice's paradox shows that the
exact meaning of statements involving conditionals and probabilities is more
complicated than may be obvious on casual examination.
1970. “Smith has
not ceased from beating his wife,” presupposition and conversational
implicature, in Peter Cole, Radical pragmatics, Academic Press, London, 1981,
pp. 183-97, repr. in a revised form in Grice, Studies in the Way of Words, in
Part II, Explorations in semantics and metaphysics, Essay, presupposition and
implicature, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 2-folder 25,
and Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 3, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: presupposition,
conversational implicature, implicature, Strawson. Grice: “The loyalty examiner
won’t summon you, don’t worry.” Grice's cancellation could be pretty subtle!
“Well, the loyalty examiner will not be summoning you at any rate.”
"If," Grice notes, "is is a matter of dispute whether the
government has a very undercover person who interrogates those whose loyalty is
suspect and who, if he existed, could be legitimately referred to as the
loyalty examiner; and if, further, I am known to be very sceptical about the
existence of such a person, I could perfectly well say to a plainly loyal
person,” “Well, the loyalty examiner will not be summoning you at any rate,"
“without, I would think, being taken to imply that such a person exists."
"Further, if I am well known to disbelieve in the existence of such a
person, though others are inclined to believe in him, when I find a man who is
apprised of my position, but who is worried in case he is summoned, I could try
to reassure him by saying,” “The loyalty examiner won’t summon you, don’t
worry." "Then it would be clear that I said this because I was sure
there is no such person." The lecture given in 1970 was variously
reprinted, but 1970 should remain the preferred citation. There are divergences
in the various drafts, though. The original source of this exploration was
a seminar. Grice is interested in re-conceptualising Strawson's manoeuvre
regarding 'presupposition' as involving what Grice disregards as a metaphysical
concoction: the truth-value gap. In Grice's view, based on a principle of
conversational 'tailoring' that falls under his principle of conversational
helpfulness -- indeed under the desideratum of conversational clarity ("be
perspicuous [sic]") -- 'The king of France is bald' ENTAILS there is a
king of France; while 'The king of France ain't bald' merely IMPLICATES
it. Grice much preferred Collingwood's to Strawson's presuppositions! Grice
thought, and rightly, too, that if his notion of the conversational implicatum
was to gain Oxonian currency, it should supersede Strawson's idea of the 'præ-suppositum.'
Strawson, in his attack to Russell, had been playing with Quine's idea of a
'truth-value gap.' Grice shows that neither the metaphysical concoction of a
truth-value gap nor the philosophical tool of the 'præ-suppositum' is needed:
"The king of France is bald" ENTAILS 'There is a king of
France." "The king of France ain't bald” on the other hand, merely
IMPLICATES it, as a perfectly adequate cancellation, abiding with the principle
of conversational helpfulness" is in the offing: "The king of France
ain't bald. What made you think he is? For starters, he ain't real!" Grice
credits Hans Sluga for having pointed out to him the way to deal with
"the" formally. Grice opts for the Whiteheadian-Russellian standard
rendition, in terms of the iota operator. Grice's take on Strawson is a strong
one. "The king of France is bald" entails there is a king of France.
“The king of France ain't bald" does not; only implicates it. Grice knew
he was not exactly robbing Peter to pay Paul, or did he? It is worth placing
the 1970 lecture in context. Soon after delivering in the New World his
exploration on the implicatum, Grice has no better idea than to promote
Strawson's philosophy in the New World. Strawson will later reflect on the
colder shores of the Old World, so we know what Grice had in mind! Strawson's
main claim to fame in the New World (and at least Oxford in the Old World) was
his "On referring," where he had had the cheek to say that by
uttering, "The king of France is not bald," the utterer IMPLIES that
there is a king of France. Strawson later changed that to "the utterer
PRESUPPOSES." So Grice knew what and who he was dealing with! Grice and
Strawson had entertained Quine at Oxford, and Strawson was particularly keen on
that turn of phrase he learned from Quine, 'the truth-value gap.' Grice,
rather, found it pretty repulsive: “Tertium exclusum!" So, Grice goes on
to argue that by uttering 'The king of France is bald,' one of the ENTAILMENTS
of the proposition explicitly conveyed is indeed 'There is a king of France.'
However, in its negative co-relate, things change. By uttering 'The king of
France ain't bald,' the utterer merely IMPLICATES (in a pretty cancellable
format) that he believes there is a king of France. ("The king of France
ain't bald: there's no king of France!"). The loyalty examiner is like the
King of France, in ways! The piece is crucial for Grice’s re-introduction of
the SQUARE BRACKET device: [The king of France] is bald; [The King of France]
ain’t bald. Whatever falls within the scope of the square brackets is to be
read as having attained “common-ground status” and therefore, out of the question,
to use Collingwood’s jargon! Grice was VERY familiar with Collingwood on
presupposition, meant as an attack on Ayer. Collingwood’s reflections on
presuppositions being either relative or absolute may well lie behind Grice’s
metaphysical construction of absolute value! The earliest exploration by Grice
on this is his infamous, "Smith has not ceased from beating his
wife," discussed by Ewing in "Meaninglessness" for Mind in 1937!
Grice goes back to the example in the excursus on "implying that" in
"Causal Theory," and it is best to revisit this source. Note that in
the reprint in "Studies" Grice does NOT go, "one example of
presupposition, which eventually is a type of conversational implicature."
Grice's antipathy to Strawson's 'presupposition' is 'metaphysical': he dislikes
the idea of a 'satisfactory-value-gap,' as he notes in the second paragraph to
"Logic and Conversation." And his antipathy crossed the
buletic-doxastic divide! Using 'φ' to
represent a sentence in either mode, he stipulate that "~φ" is
satisfactory just in case ⌈φ⌉ is
unsatisfactory. A 'crunch,' as he puts it, becomes obvious: '~ ⊢The
king of France is bald' may perhaps be treated as equivalent to '⊢~(The
king of France is bald).' But what about '~!Arrest the intruder'?"
"What do we say in cases like, perhaps, "Let it be that I now put my
hand on my head" or "Let it be that my bicycle faces north", in
which (at least on occasion) it seems to be that neither '!p' nor '!~p' is
either satisfactory or unsatisfactory?" If '!p' is neither satisfactory
nor unsatisfactory (if that make sense, which doesn't to me), does the
philosopher assign a *third* buletically satisfactory 'value' (0.5) to '!p'
(buletically 'neuter,' or 'indifferent'). Or does the philosopher say that we
have a buletically satisfactory value *gap*, as Strawson, following Quine,
might prefer? This may require careful consideration; but I cannot see that the
problem proves insoluble, any more than the analogous problem connected with
Strawson's doxastic presupposition is insoluble. The difficulty is not so much
to find a solution as to select the best solution from those which present
themselves."
1970. The Urbana lectures, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II,
carton 2-folders 5-8, and Series V (Topical), carton 8-folder 20, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: semantics The Grice Collection also contains a
folder for "Odd ends: Urbana and non-Urbana." Grice continues
with the elaboration of a formal calculus. He originally baptised it
"System Q" in honour of Quine. At a later stage, Myro will
re-name it "System G," in a special version, "System GHP,"
a highly powerful/hopefully plausible version of System G," "in
gratitude to Grice." Odd Ends: Urbana and Not Urbana, 1970, Odds and
ends: Urbana and not Urbana, or not-Urbana, or Odds and ends: Urbana and non
Urbana, or Oddents, urbane and not urbane, keywords: semantics, Urbana
lectures. The Urbana lectures were on language and reality. Grice kept
revising them, as these items show.
1970. Language and reality, The University of Illinois at
Urbana, The Urbana Lectures, Language and reference, language and reality, The
Urbana lectures, University of Illinois at Urbana, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 19, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: language, reference,
reality Grice favours a transcendental approach to communication. Our
beliefs worth communicating have to be true. Our orders worth communicating
have to refer to our willings.
1970. The 'that'-clause, Davidson on saying that, 'Davidson's
"On saying that,"' The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III (The
Doctrines), carton 6-folder 3, and Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 26, BANC
MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: 'that'-clause. Grice had explored 'that'-clauses
with Staal. He was concerned about the viability of Davidson's initially
appealing etymological approach to the 'that'-clause in terms of
'demonstration.' Grice had presupposed the logic of 'that'-clauses from a much
earlier stage, "Those spots mean that he has measles." The folder
contains a copy of Davidson's essay, "On saying that," 1980, the
'that'-clause, 1970, the 'that'-clause, with J. F. Staal. The 'that'-clause was
brought to the fore by Davidson, who, consulting the Oxford English Dictionary,
reminds philosophers that the English 'that' is VERY cognate with the German
idiom. More specifically, 'that' is a demonstrative, even if the syntax,
in English, hides this fact in ways which German syntax doesn't. Grice
NEEDS to rely on 'that'-clauses for his analysis of 'mean,' 'intend,' and
notably 'will.' He finds that Prichard's genial discovery was the license
to use 'willing' as pre-facing a 'that'-clause. This allows Grice to deals
with 'willing' as applied to a third person ("I will that he'll win the
chess match."). Philosophers who disregard this 'third-person' use
may indulge in introspection and subjectivism when they shouldn't! Grice said
that Prichard had to be given great credit for seeing that the accurate
specification of willing should be ‘willing that’ and not ‘willing
to.’ Analogously, following Prichard on 'willing,' Grice does not stipulate that the radix for an
'intentional' (Volitive A) incorporate a reference to the utterer ("be in
the first person"), nor that the radix for an 'imperative' (buletic B) or
desiderative in general, incorporate a reference of the addressee ("be in
the second person"). "They shall not pass" is a legitimate
intentional as is the "You shall not get away with it" (either
involves Prichard's 'wills that ...,' rather than 'wills to ...'). "And
"The sergeant is to muster the men at dawn" (uttered by a captain to
a lieutenant) is a perfectly good imperative, again involving Prichard's 'wills
that ...,' rather than 'wills to ...' .
1970. Intention and subjectivity, perspectivism, 'subjective'
conditions and intentions, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton
9-folder 15, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keywords: intention, subjective condition. Cf.
his dispositional account to 'intending.' A subjective condition takes
into account the intender's, rather than the ascriber's, point of
view: Marmaduke Bloggs intends to climb Mt. Everest on hands and knees.
Bloggs might reason: Given my present state, I should do what is
fun. Given my present state, the best thing for me to do would be to do
what is fun. For me in my present state it would make for my well-being,
to have fun. Having fun is good (or, a good). Climbing a mountain would be
fun. Climbing the Everest would be/make for climbing fun. So, I shall
climb the Everest. Even if a critic insisted that a practical syllogism is
the way to represent Blogg's finding something to be appealing, and that it
should be regarded as a respectable evaluation, the assembled propositions
don't do the work of a standard argument. The premises do not support or yield
the conclusion as in a standard argument. The premises may be said to yield the
conclusion, or directive, for the particular agent whose reasoning process it
is, only on the basis of a subjective condition: that the agent is in a
certain subjective state, e.g. feels like going out for dinner-fun. Rational
beings (the agent at some other time, or other individuals) who do not have
that feeling, will not accept the conclusion. They may well accept as true ‘It
is fun to climb Everest’, but will not accept it as a directive unless they
feel like it now. Someone wondering what to do for the summer might think that
if he were to climb Everest he would find it fun or pleasant, but right now she
does not feel like it.That is in general the end of the matter. The alleged
argument lacks normativity. It is not authoritative or directive unless there
is a supportive argument that he needs/ought to do something diverting/pleasant
in the summer. A practical argument is different. Even if an agent did not feel
like going to the doctor, an agent would think ‘I ought to have a medical check
up yearly, now is the time, so I should see my doctor’ to be a directive with
some force. It articulates a practical argument. Perhaps the strongest
attempt to reconstruct an (acceptable or rational) thought transition as a
standard arguments is to treat the subjective condition, ‘I feel like
having climbing fun in the summer’, as a premise, for then the premises would
support the conclusion. But the individual, whose thought transition we are examining,
does not regard a description of his psychological state as a consideration
that supports the conclusion. It will be useful to look more closely at a
variant of the example to note when it is appropriate to reconstruct thinking
in the form of argument. Bloggs, now hiking with a friend in the Everest,
comes to a difficult spot and says: ‘I don’t like the look of that, I am
frightened. I am going back’. That is usually enough for Bloggs to return,
and for the friend to turn back with him. Bloggs’s action of turning back,
admittedly motivated by fear, is, while not acting on reasons, nonetheless
rational unless we judge his fear to be irrational. Bloggs’s subjective
condition can serve as a premise, but only in a very different
situation. Bloggs resorts to reasons. Suppose that, while his friend does not
think Bloggs’s fear irrational, the friend still attempts to dissuade Bloggs
from going back. After listening and reflecting, Bloggs may say ‘I am so
frightened it is not worth it. I am not enjoying this climbing anymore’. Or ‘I
am too frightened to be able to safely go on’. Or ‘I often climb the Everest
and don’t usually get frightened. The fact that I am now is a good indication
that this is a dangerous trail and I should turn back’. These are reasons,
considerations implicitly backed by principles, and they could be the initial
motivations of someone. But in Bloggs’s case they emerged when he was
challenged by his friend. They do not express his initial practical reasoning.
Bloggs was frightened by the trail ahead, wanted to go back, and didn’t have
any reason not to. Note that there is no general rational requirement to
always act on reasons, and no general truth that a rational individual would be
better off the more often he acted on reasons. Faced with his friend’s objections,
however, Bloggs needed justification for acting on his fear. He reflected and
found reason(s) to act on his fear. Grice plays with ‘subjectivity’ already in
“Prolegomena.” Consider the use of ‘carefully.’ Surely we must include the
agent’s own idea of this. Or consider the use of phi and phi’ – surely we don’t
want the addressee to regard himself under the same guise with which the
utterer regards him. Or consider “Aspects of Reason”: Nixon must be appointed
professor of theology at Oxford. Does HE feel the need? Grice raises the topic
of subjectivity again in the Kant lectures just after his discussion of ‘mode,’
in a sub-section entitled, “Modalities: relative and absolute.” He finds the
topic central for his æqui-vocality thesis: subjective conditions seem
necessary to both practical and alethic considerations.
1970. Probability and life, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V
(Topical), carton 9-folder 4, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: life,
probability. Evolutionary account of the pirot's adaptability to its
changeable environs. Grice borrows the notion of probability from
Davidson, whose early claim to fame was to provide the logic of the
notion. Grice abbreviates probability by "Pr." and compares it
to a boulomaic operator, "De." for desirability. A rational
agent must calculate both the probability and the desirability of his
action. For both probability and desirability, the degree is crucial.
Grice symbolises this by 'd': probability in degree d; probability in degree
d'. The topic of life Grice relates to that of adaptation and surival, and
connects with his genitorial programme of creature construction
("pirotology."): life as continued operancy. Grice was fascinated with
'life' (Aristotle, 'bios') because 'bios' is what provides for Aristotle the
definition (not by genus) of 'psyche.'
1970. Heterological, Russell and heterologicality, The H. P.
Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 8, BANC, MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Russell,
heterological, Grelling, J. F. Thomson. Grice and Thomson go
‘heterological.’ Grice was fascinated by Baron Russell's remarks on
'heterological.' And its implicata! Grice was particularly interested
in Russell's philosophy because of the usual Oxonian antipathy towards his type
of philosophising. Being an irreverent conservative rationalist, Grice
found in Russell a good point for dissent! If paradoxes were always sets
of propositions or arguments or conclusions, they would always be
meaningful. But some paradoxes are semantically flawed and some have
answers that are backed by a pseudo-argument employing a defective “lemma” that
lacks a truth-value. Grelling’s paradox, for instance, opens with a distinction
between autological and heterological words. An autological word describes
itself, e.g., ‘polysyllabic’ is polysllabic, ‘English’ is English, ‘noun’ is a
noun, etc. A heterological word does not describe itself, e.g.,
‘monosyllabic’ is not monosyllabic, ‘Chinese’ is not Chinese, ‘verb’ is not a
verb, etc. Now for the riddle: Is ‘heterological’ heterological or
autological? If ‘heterological’ is heterological, since it describes
itself, it is autological. But if ‘heterological’ is autological, since it
is a word that does not describe itself, it is heterological. The common
solution to this puzzle is that ‘heterological’, as defined by Grelling, is not
what Grice a genuine predicate -- ""Gricing" is!"In other
words, “Is ‘heterological’ heterological?” is without meaning. "That
does not mean that an utterer, such as Baron Russell, may implicate that he is
being very witty by uttering the Grelling paradox!" There can be no
predicate that applies to all and only those predicates it does not apply to for
the same reason that there can be no barber who shaves all and only those
people who do not shave themselves. Grice seems to be relying on his
friend at Christ Church, J. F. Thomson in “On Some Paradoxes”, in the same
volume where Grice published his “Remarks about the senses,” Analytical
Philosophy, R. J. Butler (ed.), Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 104–119. Grice
thought that Thomson was a “genius, if ever there is one!” Plus, Grice thought
that, after St. John's, Christ Church was the second most beautiful venue in
the 'city' of dreaming spires. "On top, it is what makes Oxford a city,
and not, as villagers call it, a 'town'!
1970. Grice's Frege, Frege: words and
sentences, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder
2, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: Frege, Fregean sense, Fregeian sense, Farbung, aber,
"She was poor but she was honest.” Freges Farbung, Grices Implikatur.
Frege was the topic of Dummett's explorations. A tutee of Grice's once
brought Dummett's "Frege" to a tutorial and told Grice that he
intended to explore this. "Have you read it?" "No I
haven't," Grice answered. And after a pause, he went on: "And I hope
I won't." "Hardly promising," the tutee thought. Some
authors, including Grice, but alas, not Frege, have noted some similarities
between Grice's notion of a 'conventional' implicature and Frege's schematic
and genial rambles on 'colouring.' "Aber Farbung," as Frege would
state! Grice was more interested in the idea of a "Fregeian" sense,
but he felt that if he had to play with Frege's 'aber' he should! One of
Grice's metaphysical construction-routines (Humeian projection) is aimed at the
generation of concepts, in most cases the 'rational reconstruction' of an
intuitive concept displayed in 'ordinary discourse.' "We arrive at
something like a Fregeian sense!" Grice exclaimed, with an intonation of
"Eureka!" almost. And then he went back to Frege. Grice's German
was good, so he could read Frege, "in the vernacular." For fun, he
read Frege to his children (Grice's, not Frege's): "In einem obliquen
Kontext," Frege says," Grice says, "kann ja z. B. die Ersetzung
eines „aber" durch ein „und", die in einem direkten Kontext keinen
Unterschied des Wahrheitswerts ergibt, einen solchen Unterschied
bewirken." "I'll make that easy for you, darlings: 'und' is 'and,'
and 'aber' is 'but.' "But surely, Papa, 'aber' is not cognate with
'but'!" "It's not. That's Anglo-Saxon, for you. 'But' is strictly
Anglo-Saxon short for 'by-out;' we lost 'aber' when we sailed the North
Sea." Grice went on: "Damit wird eine Abgrenzung von Sinn und Färbung
(oder Konnotationen) eines Satzes fragwürdig." "I. e. he is saying
that "She was poor but she was honest" only conventionally implicates
that there is a contrast between her poverty and her honesty." "I
guess he heard the ditty during the War?" Grice ignored that remark, and
went on: "Appell und Kundgabe wären ferner von Sinn und Färbung genauer zu
unterscheiden. Ich weiß so auf interessante Bedeutungs Komponenten hin,
bemüht sich aber nicht, sie genauer zu differenzieren, da er letztlich nur
betonen will, daß sie in der Sprache der Logik keine Rolle spielen."
"They play a role in the lingo," that is!" "What do?"
"Stuff like 'but'.” "But surely they are not RATIONAL conversational
implicata!?" "No, dear, just conventional tricks you can ignore on a
nice summer day!" Grice however was NEVER interested in the CONVENTIONAL
implicatum. He identifies it because he felt he must! Surely, the way English
speakers learn to use stuff like, “on the one hand,” and “on the other,” (or
how Grice learned how to use “men” and “de” in Greek), or “so,” or “therefore,”
or “but” versus “and,” is just to allow that he would STILL use the verb
‘imply’ in such cases – but surely he wants ‘conversational’ to stick with
‘rationality’: ‘conversational maxim’ and ‘converational implicatum’ ONLY apply
to things which can be justified transcendentally, and not idiosyncrasies of
usage! Grice follows Alonzo Church in noting that Russell misreads Frege as
being guilty of ignoring the use-mention distinction, when he doesn’t. One
thing that Grice minimises is that Frege's "assertion sign" is
composite. That's why G. P. Baker prefers to use the dot '.' as the doxastic
correlative for the buletic sign "!" which is NOT composite. The sign
„├‟ is composite. Frege explains his "Urteilstrich" -- the vertical
component of his sign "├" as "conveying assertoric force."
The principal role of the *horizontal* component as such is to prevent the
appearance of assertoric force belonging to a token of what does not express a
thought (e.g. the expression "22"). "─p" expresses a
thought even if "p" does not.) cf. Hare's four sub-atomic particles:
phrastic (dictum), neustic (dictor), tropic, and clistic, and cf. Grice on the
'radix' controversy: "We don't want the '.' in 'p' to become a 'vanishing'
sign!"
1971. Intention and uncertainty, Proceedings of The British
Academy, vol. 57, pp. 263-79, also published separately as an offprint,
Intention and disposition, 1946, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II
(Essays), carton 2-folders 9-10, and Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 30,,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: intention, uncertainty, Prichard, willing, willing to
vs. willing that, D. F. Pears, Davidson, disimplicature, Hart, Hampshire,
certainty, decision, Ansombe, Kenny, disposition, Ryle. I shan’t but I’m not certain
I won’t – Grice. How uncertain can Grice be? This is the Henriette Herz British
Academy lecture, and as such published in The Proceedings of the British
Academy. Grice calls himself a neo-Prichardian (after the Oxford
philosopher) and cares to quote from a few other philosophers -- some of whom
he was not necessarily associated with: such as Kenny and Anscombe, and some of
whom he was, notably D. F. Pears. Grice's motto: "Where there is a
neo-Prichardian willing, there is a palæo-Griceian way!" Grice quotes
Pears, of Christ Church, as the philosopher he found especially congenial to
explore areas in what both called 'philosophical psychology,' notably the
tricky use of 'intending' as displayed by a few philosophers even in their own
circle, such as Hampshire and Hart in "Intention, decision, and
certainty." The title of Grice's lecture is meant to provoke that
pair of Oxonian philosophers Grice knew so well and who were too ready to bring
in 'certainty' in an area that requires deep philosophical
exploration. This is the Henriette Herz Trust annual lecture. It
means it's delivered annually by different philosophers, not always Grice!
Grice had been appointed a FBA in 1966, but he took his time to deliver his
lecture. With your lecture, you implicate, "Hi!" Grice, and
indeed Pears, were motivated by Hampshire's and Hart's essay on intention and
certainty in "Mind." Grice knew Hampshire well, and had actually
enjoyed his "Thought and Action." He preferred Hampshire's
"Thought and action" to Anscombe's "Intention." "Trust
Oxford being what it is that TWO volumes on intending are published in the same
year! Which one shall I read first?" Eventually, neither -- immediately.
Rather, Grice managed to unearth some sketchy notes by Prichard (he calls
himself a neo-Prichardian) that Urmson had made available for the Clarendon
Press -- notably Prichard's essay on 'willing THAT.' "Only a genius
like Prichard will distinguish 'will to' (almost unnecessary) from 'will that'
(so crucial)." For Grice, '... wills that ...', unlike '... wills to...',
is properly generic, in that "p," that follows the 'that'-clause, need
NOT refer to the subject of the sentence. "Surely I can will that Smith
wins the match!" But Grice also quotes Anscombe (whom otherwise would not
count, although they did share a discussion panel at the American Philosophical
Association) and Kenny, besides Pears. Of Anscombe, Grice borrows (but
never returns) the 'direction-of-fit' term of art (actually Austinian). From A.
J. P. Kenny, Grice borrows (AND returns) the concept of 'voliting.' His most
congenial approach was Pears's. Grice had of course occasion to explore
‘disposition’ and ‘intention’ on earlier occasions. Grice is especially
concerned with a 'dispositional' analysis to 'intending.' He will later
reject it in "Intention and uncertainty." But that was Grice for
you! Grice is especially interested in distinguishing his views from RYLE's
over-estimated dispositional account of intention, which Grice sees as
'reductionist,' and indeed 'eliminationist,' "if not boringly
'behaviourist,' even in analytic key!" The logic of 'dispositions' is
tricky, as Grice will later explore in connection with 'rationality' (rational
propension or propensity) and metaphysics (the 'as if' operator). While
Grice focuses on UNcertainty, he is being funny! He knew that Oxonians
like Hart and Hampshire were OBSESSED with ‘certainty’. “I was so
surprised that Hampshire and Hart were claiming decision and intention are
psychological states about which the agent is 'certain,' that I decided on
the spot that that could certainly be a nice topic for my British Academy
lecture!" Grice granted that in some cases, a declaration of an intention
can be authorative in a certain ‘certain’ way (“i.e. as implicating
‘certainty’”). But Grice wants us to consider: “Marmaduke Bloggs intends
to climb Mt. Everest.” “Surely he can’t be certain he’ll
succeed.” Grice used the same example at the American Philosophical
Association, of all places. To amuse Grice, Davidson, who was present,
said: “Surely that’s *just* an implicature!” "*Just*?!' Grice
was almost furious in his British guarded sort of way. “Surely not
*just*!” D. F. Pears, who was also present, tried to reconcile: “If I
may, Davidson, I think Grice would take it that, if ‘certainty’ is implicated,
the whole thing becomes too social to be true.” They kept discussing
implicature versus entailment. “Is ‘certainty’ ENTAILED then?” Davidson
asked. “No, DISIMPLICATED!” was Grice’s curt reply. The next day, he
explained to Davidson that he had invented the concept of ‘disimplicature’ just
to tease him, and just one night before, while musing in the hotel room! Talk
of ‘UNcertainty” was thus for Grice intimately associated with his concern
about the misuse of ‘know’ to mean ‘certain, especially in the exegeses that
Malcolm made popular about, of all people, G. E. Moore! (vide “Scepticism and common
sense” and “Moore and philosopher’s paradoxes” above, and “Causal Theory” and
“Prolegomena” for a summary of Malcom’s misunderstanding Moore! Grice manages
to quote from Stout (“Voluntary action”) and Brecht. And he notes that not all
speakers are as sensitive as they should be (e.g. distinguishing modes, as
realised by ‘shall’ vs. ‘will’). He emphasizes the fact that Prichard has to be
given great credit for seeing that the accurate specification of willing should
be ‘willing that’ and not ‘willing to.’ Grice is especially interested in
proving Stoutians (like Hampshire and Hart) wrong by drawing from Aristotle's
prohairesis-doxa distinction, or in his parlance, the buletic-doxastic
distinction. Grice quotes from Aristotle: "[prohairesis] cannot be opinion
[doxa]; for opinion is thought to relate to all kinds of things, no less to
eternal things and impossible things than to things in our own power; and it is
distinguished by its falsity or truth, not by its badness or goodness, while
choice is distinguished rather by these. Now with opinion in general perhaps no
one even says it is identical. But it is not identical even with any kind of
opinion; for by CHOOSING OR DECIDING (prohairesis) what is good or bad we are
men of a certain character, which we are not by holding this or that opinion
(doxa). And we choose to get or avoid something good or bad, but we have
opinions about what a thing is or whom it is good for or how it is good for
him; we can hardly be said to opine to get or avoid anything. And choice is
praised for being related to the right object rather than for being rightly
related to it, opinion for being truly related to its object. And we choose
what we best know to be good, but we opine what we do not quite know; and it is
not the same people that are thought to make the best choices and to have the
best opinions, but some are thought to have fairly good opinions, but by reason
of vice to choose what they should not. If opinion precedes choice or
accompanies it, that makes no difference; for it is not this that we are
considering, but whether it is identical with some kind of opinion. What, then,
or what kind of thing is it, since it is none of the things we have mentioned?
It seems to be voluntary, but not all that is voluntary to be an object of
choice. Is it, then, what has been decided on by previous deliberation? At any
rate choice involves a rational principle and thought. Even the name seems to
suggest that it is what is chosen before other things." His final analysis
of "A intends that p" is in terms of (1) a buletic condition ("A
wills that p"), and (2) an attending doxastic condition ("A judges
that (1) causes p"). Grice ends this essay with a nod to D. F. Pears and
an open point about the JUSTIFIABILITY (other than evidential) for the
ACCEPTABILITY of the agent's deciding and intending versus the evidential
justifiability of the agent's PREDICTING that what he intends will be
satisfied. It is important to note that in his earlier "Disposition and
intention," Grice dedicates the first part to 'counterfactual'
"if" IN GENERAL. This is a logical point. THEN as an account for a
'psychological' concept ("psi"): "If A does A [sensory input], A
does B [behavioural output" (No "psi" without the behavioural
output that "psi" is meant to EXPLAIN). His problem is with the first
person: the functionalist "I" does not need a 'black box.' The
keywords here would be both incorrigibility and privileged access. Pirotology
only explains their 'evolutionary' import.
1971. Entailment, The
American Philosophical Association, joint symposium held by the American
Philosophical Association and the Association for Symbolic Logic, symposium
with Dana Scott and Robert K. Meyer. Dec. 27, 1971, Sixty-Eighth Annual Meeting
of the American Philosophical Association, Eastern Division, Statler Hilton
Hotel, New York, and P. F. Strawson, on G. E. Moore’s entailment. Grice takes a
look at Strawson's unpublication. 1971. Entailment, Paradoxes of entailment,
Entailment and paradoxes, Joint symposium held by The Association for Symbolic
Logic and the American Philosophical Association, The Statler Hilton, New York,
The H. P. Grice Papers, Series IV (Associations), carton 6-folder 4, and Series
V (Topical), carton 6-folder 33, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keyword: entailment, paradoxes of
entailment, paradox. The symposium was held in New York with Dana Scott and R.
K. Meyer. The notion had been "mis-introduced" (according to
Strawson) in the philosophical literature by G. E. Moore. Grice is especially
interested in the "ENTAILMENT + IMPLICATUM" pair. A philosophical
expression may be said to be co-related to an ENTAILMENT (which is rendered in
terms of a reductive analysis). However, the use of the expression may
co-relate to this or that IMPLICATUM which is rendered 'reasonable' in the
light of the addressee's assumption that the utterer is ultimately abiding by a
principle of conversational helfpulness. Grice thinks many philosophers take an
IMPLICATUM as an ENTAILMENT when they surely shouldn't! Grice was more
interested than Strawson was in G. E. Moore's coinage of 'entailment' for
logical consequence. As an analyst, Grice knew that a true conceptual analysis
needs to be reductive (if not reductionist). The prongs the analyst lists are
thus 'entailments' of the concept in question. Philosophers, however, may
misidentify what is an entailment for an implicature, or vice versa. Initially,
Grice was interested in the second family of cases. With his coinage of
'disimplicature,' Grice expands his interest to cover the first family of
cases, too. Grice remains a philosophical methodologist. He is not so much
concerned with any area or discipline or philosophical concept per se (unless
it's rationality), but with the misuses of some tools in the philosophy of
language as committed by some of his colleagues at Oxford. While 'entailment,'
was, for Strawson 'mis-introduced' in the philosophical literature by Moore,
'entailment' seems to be less involved in paradoxes than 'if' is. Grice
connects the two, as indeed his tutee Strawson did! As it happens, Strawson's
"Necessary propositions and entailment statements" is his very first
published essay, with "Mind," a re-write of an unpublication
unwritten elsewhere, and which Grice read. The relation of 'consequence' may be
considered a meta-conditional, where paradoxes arise. Grice's Bootstrap is
a principle designed to impoverish the metalanguage so that the philosopher can
succeed in the business of pulling himself up by his own! Grice then takes a
look at Strawson’s very first ‘publication’ (an unpublication he had written
elsewhere). Grice finds Strawson thought he could “provide a simple solution to
the so-called “paradoxes of entailment.” At the time, Grice and Strawson were
pretty sure that nobody then accepted, “if indeed anyone ever did and did
make," the identification of the relation symbolised by the horseshoe with
the relation which G. E. Moore calls "entailment,” p⊃q, i. e. ~(pΛ~q)’ is rejected as an analysis of
“p entails q” because it involves this or that allegedly paradoxical
implicatum, as that any false proposition entails any proposition and any true
proposition is entailed by any proposition. It is a commonplace that Lewis's
amendment had consequences scarcely less paradoxical in terms of the implicata!
For if "p" is impossible (i.e. self-contradictory), it is impossible
that p and ~q. And if q is necessary, ~q is impossible and it is
impossible that p and ~q; i. e., if “p entails q” means “it is impossible that
p and ~q” *any* necessary proposition is entailed by any proposition and any
self-contradictory proposition entails any proposition. On the other hand,
Lewis's definition of entailment (i.e. of the relation which holds from p to q
whenever q is deducible from p) obviously commends itself in some respects.
Now, it is clear that the emphasis laid on the
"expression-mentioning" character of the intensional contingent
statement by writing ‘pΛ~q’ is impossible instead of ‘It is impossible that p
and ~q’ does not avoid the alleged paradoxes of entailment. But it is equally
clear that the addition of some provision does avoid them: Strawson
proposes that one should use "... entails ..." such that no necessary
statement and no negation of a necessary statement can significantly be said to
entail or be entailed by any statement; i. e. the function “p entails q” cannot
take necessary or self-contradictory statements as arguments. The expression “p
entails q” is to be used to mean “‘p⊃q’ is necessary, and neither ‘p’ nor ‘q’ is
either necessary or self-contradictory,” or “‘pΛ~q’ is impossible and neither
‘p’ nor ‘q,’ nor either of their contradictories, is necessary.” Thus, the
paradoxes are avoided. For let us assume that "p1" expresses a
contingent, and "q1" a necessary, proposition. ‘p1 and ~q1’ is now
impossible because ‘~q1’ is impossible. But ‘q1’ is necessary. So, by that
provision, ‘p1’ does NOT entail ‘q1.’ We may avoid the paradoxical assertion
that p1 entails q2 as merely falling into the equally paradoxical assertion
that “‘p1’ entails ‘q1’ is necessary.” For: If q is necessary, “‘q’ is
necessary” is, though true, not necessary, but a *contingent* *intensional*
statement. Hence: “~(‘q’ is necessary)” is, though false, possible. Hence
“p1Λ~(‘q1’ is necessary)" is, though false, possible. Hence "p1"
does NOT entail "’q1’ is necessary.” Thus, by adopting the view that an
“entailment” statement (and other intensional statements) are non-necessary,
and that no necessary statement or its contradictory can entail or be entailed
by any statement, Strawson thinks he can avoid the paradox that a necessary
proposition is entailed by any proposition, and indeed all the other associated
paradoxes of entailment. Grice objected that Strawson’s cure was worse than
Moore’s disease! The denial that a necessary proposition can entail or be
entailed by any proposition (and, therefore, that necessary propositions can be
related to each other by the entailment-relation) is too high a price to pay
for the solution of the paradoxes. And here is where Grice’s implicature is
meant to do the trick! Or not! When Levinson proposed "+>" for
conversationally implicature, he is thinking of contrasting it with "⊢". But things ain't that easy.
Even the grammar is more complicated: "By uttering "He is an
adult," U explicitly conveys that he is an adult. What U explicitly
conveys ENTAILS that he is not a child. What U implies is that he should be
treated accordingly.
1971. Formal semantics, Summer institute on philosophy of language, UC/Irvine, formal semantics.
1972. Reply to G. E. M. Anscombe, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series II (Essays), carton 4-folder 26, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: intention,
Anscombe. Anscombe's views were often discussed by Oxonian philosophers.
She had brought Witters to the "Dreaming Spires," as it
were. Grice was especially connected with Anscombe's reflections on
'intention.' While Grice favoured an approach such as Hampshire, in
"Thought and Action," he borrows a few points from Anscombe, notably
that of 'direction of fit' (originally Austin's). Grice explicitly refers
to Anscombe in "Intention and uncertainty," and in his reminiscences
he hastens to add that Anscombe would never attend any of Austin's Saturday
mornings, as neither would Dummett. Ryle's view is standardly
characterised as a weaker or “softer” version of behaviourism (Smith and Jones,
144). According to this standard interpretation, Ryle's view is that statements
containing psychological terms can be translated, without loss of meaning, into
subjunctive conditionals about what the individual will do in various
circumstances. So Ryle (on this account) is to be construed as offering a
dispositional analysis of psychological statements into behavioural ones. It is
conceded that Ryle does not confine his descriptions of what the agent will do
(under the circumstances) to purely physical behaviour—in terms, say, of
skeletal or muscular descriptions—but is happy to speak of full-bodied actions
like scoring a goal or paying a debt. But the “soft” behaviourism
attributed to Ryle still attempts an analysis (or translation) of psychological
statements into a series of dispositional statements which are themselves
construed as subjunctive "if" describing what the agent will do
(albeit under the relevant action description) under various circumstances.
Even this “soft” behaviourism is bound to fail, however, since psychological
vocabulary is not analysable or translatable into behavioural statements
even if these are allowed to include descriptions of actions.
For the list of conditions and possible behaviour will be infinite since any
one proffered translation can be defeated by slight alteration of the circumstances;
and the defeating conditions in any particular case may involve a reference to
facts about the agent's mind, thereby rendering the analysis circular. In sum,
the standard interpretation of Ryle construes him as offering a somewhat
weakened form of reductive behaviourism whose reductivist ambitions, however
weakened, are nonetheless futile. But this characterisation of Ryle's
programme is simply wrong. Although it is true that Ryle was keen to point out
the dispositional nature of many psychological concepts, it would be wrong to
construe him as offering a programme of analysis of psychological predicates
into a series of subjunctive conditionals. The relationship between
psychological predicates and the "if" sentences with which we can “unpack”
them is other than that required by this kind of analysis. It will be
helpful to keep in mind that Ryle's target is the Official Doctrine with its
attendant ontological, epistemological, and semantic commitments. His arguments
serve to remind us that we have in a large number of cases ways of telling or
settling disputes, for example, about someone's character or intellect. If you
dispute my characterisation of someone as believing or wanting something, I
will point to what he says and does in defending my particular attribution (as
well as to features of the circumstances). But our practice of giving reasons
of this kind to defend or to challenge ascriptions of mental predicates would
be put under substantial pressure if the Official Doctrine were correct. For
Ryle to remind us that we do, as a matter of fact, have a way of settling
disputes about whether someone is vain or whether she is in pain is much weaker
than saying that a concept is meaningless unless it is verifiable; or even that
the successful application of mental predicates requires that we have a way of
settling disputes in all cases. Showing that a concept is one for which, in a
large number of cases, we have agreement-reaching procedures (even if these do
not always guarantee success) captures an important point, however: it counts
against any theory, say, of vanity or pain that would render it unknowable in
principle or in practice whether or not the concept is
correctly applied in every case. And this was precisely the problem with the
Official Doctrine (and is still a problem, as I suggested earlier, with some of
its contemporary progeny). Ryle points out in a later essay that there is
a form of dilemma that pits the reductionist against the duplicationis:
those whose battle cry is “Nothing but…” and those who insist on “Something
else as Well…”. Ryle attempts a dissolution of these types of dilemma by
rejecting the two horns; not by taking sides with either one, though part of
what dissolution requires in this case, as in others, is a description of how
both sides are to be commended for seeing what the other side does not, and
criticised for failing to see what the other side does. The attraction of
behaviourism, he reminds us, is simply that it does not insist on occult
happenings as the basis upon which all mental terms are given meaning, and
points to the perfectly observable criteria that are by and large employed when
we are called upon to defend or correct our employment of these mental terms.
The problem with behaviourism is that it has a too-narrow view both of what
counts as behaviour and of what counts as observable.
1972. Pirots karulise elatically, potching and cotching obbles,
Pirotese, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: Pirotese, creature construction, philosophical
psychology. Grice was fascinated by Carnap's "pirots" which
karulise elatically. Grice adds 'potching' for something like 'perceiving' and
'cotching' for something like 'cognising.'
1973.
Mode, modality, probability (doxastic), and desirability (buletic),
probability, desirability, and mode operators, conference on implicature, The
H. P. Grice Papers, Series II, carton 2-folder 11, and Series V (Topical), carton
8-folders 14-15, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keywords: modality, probability, desirability,
direction of fit, the buletic-doxastic distinction, mode-marker, modal,
acceptance, acceptability, imperative, intentional, interrogative, indicative,
informational, inquisitive. Grice had been freely using the very English 'mood'
until J. M. E Moravcsik, of all people, corrected 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 Grice's 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
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 Grice's
'modality' had little to do with what other authors were referring to as
'mood.' Probability, desirability, and modality, 1977, modality, desirability,
and probability, keywords: 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 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 Grice's attempt to
show how Kant's categorical imperative reduces to the hypothetical or
suppositional. Kant uses 'modality' in a way that Grice disfavours, preferring
'modus.' Grice is aware that Kant's use of 'modality' is qua category
(Kant's reduction to four of Aristotle's original ten
categories). “Probability, desirability, and mode operators" is Grice
at his formal 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 in 1967 -- repr. WoW:v, Grice proposes
"X 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 'alpha' is a dummy taking
the place of either "A" or "B," i. e. Davidson's
"prima facie" and "probably". In all this, Grice keeps
using the 'primitive' "!," where a more detailed symbolism would have
it correspond exactly to Frege's 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
'boulomaic' or 'volitive' as he prefers (I prefer the Greek root) for both his
'protreptic' and exhibitive versions (operator supra A and operator supra B).
Note that Grice (WoW:110) had used the asterisk (*) as a dummy for either
'assertoric,' i.e., Frege's turnstile, and 'non-assertoric, 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. I prefer 'acceptability' because it connects with
"accepting that..." which IS a psychological 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 B-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 A-type operator and the neustic or proposition.
They only differ at the B-type operator (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 Grice's
"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
belief, and "2" to mean 'desire'. But two years later, in 1975,
"Method", he defines '1' in terms of '2,' and CARES NOT to do
otherwise -- i. e. define 2 in terms of 1. So whenever he wrote '1' in 1973,
read 2, and vice versa. One may omits this arithmetic when reporting on Grice's
use. Grice uses two further numerals, though: 3 and 4. These, one may decipher
– one finds oneself as an archeologist in Tutankamon's 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. The
pirot wants to decide whether to believe p or not. I find that very Gricean.
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, there's 4, as attached to an attitude, ψ4. This stands for an
attitude of buletically accepting an “or” utterance: buletically accepting that
p, or the pirot buletically accepting that ~p, i. e. the pirot 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
‘Though 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 us, so what
gives? So I would submit that, for Kant, the categorial 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 pirot 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 Philosopher's Index" but
Marlboro Cigarettes took no notice. One may go on to note Grice's 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 things -- for my
cat means things to me (he even implicates: the other day he miaowed to me
while I was in bed -- He utters 'miaow'. He means that he is hungry, he means
(via implicatum) that he wants food (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-Capp's 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 for utterer and A for addressee. These are merely roles. The important
formalism is indeed x and y. x is one person; y is the OTHER person. Grice
dislikes a menages a trois, apparently, for he seldom symbolises a 'third'
party, z. So, ‘X ψ-3-A that p’ is 1 just in case "X ψ2 [X ψ1 that p] or X
ψ1 that ~p’ is 1. And here the utterer’s addressee, 'y,’ features: "X ψ³B
that p’ is 1 just in case "X buletically accepts ψ² (X buletically
accepts ψ² (X doxastically accepts ψ1 that p, or X 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 calls 'judicative', and which is, strictly, either
"indicative" (of the utterer’s belief, exhibitive, as it were) or properly
"informative," if addressed to 'y', or addressee A, which is
different from 'x,' 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-addressed, or utterer-oriented, and it
is intentional, or it is other-addressed, or addressee-addressed, or addressee-
oriented, and it is imperative, for surely one may not always say to oneself,
‘Don't 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'. Geach's and Altham's
"erotetic" somehow Grice ignores, as he more often uses the Latinate
‘interrogative.’ interrŏgātĭo , ōnis, f. id.,I.a questioning, inquiry, examination, interrogation (class.).I. In gen.: “sententia per interrogationem,” Quint. 8, 5, 5: “instare interrogatione,” id. 6, 3, 38: “testium,” Tac. A. 6, 47: “insidiosa,” Plin. Ep. 1, 5, 7: “litteris inclusæ,” Dig. 48, 3, 6, § 1.— Absol., Cic. Fam. 1, 9, 7; Quint. 5, 7, 3: “verbis obligatio fit ex interrogatione et responsione,” Gai. Inst. 2, 92. —II. In partic.A. 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 I'll 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. Cf. the
quessertive, or quessertion, possibly iterable, that Grice cherished. But then
you can't have everything. Where would you put it? Grice: The modal
implicatum. Grice sees two different, though connected questions about
mode. First, there is the obvious demand for a characterisation, or
partial characterisation, of this or that mode as it emerges in this or that
conversational move (which is plausible to regard as mode's primary
habitat) both at the level of the explicatum or the implicatum (for surely an
'indicative' conversational move may be the vehicle of an 'imperatival'
implicatum. A second, question is how, and to what extent, the representation
of mode (Hare's '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 sub-specifications). 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 Utterer accepts, or Addressee 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...". 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 my contempt is due to
his obsession!). Grice's exposition would make the hair stand on end in
the soul of a person especially sensitive in this area. "And I'm talking
to YOU, Sir Peter!" (He is on the second row). But Grice's guess
is that the only historical philosophical mistake properly attributable to
use/mention confusion is Russell's 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, namely, 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 "Utterer's meaning,
sentence-meaning, and word-meaning," at least at the point at which
(Schema Of Procedure-Specifiers For Mood-Operators) in one's
syntactico-semantical theory of Pirotese, 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 would be of the general
form, "For the utterer U to utter "x" if
...," 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 will contain a perspicuous and unambiguous modal
representation. A sentence may correspond to more than one
modal structure. The sentence will then be 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 "Op-i "
represents that operator whose number is i (1, 2, 3, or 4). E.
g., "Op-3A" represents Operator 3A, which, since '? ⊢'
appears in the Operator column for 3A) would be "? A ⊢ p"
(This reminds one of Grandy's 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 Utterer U wills (that) Addressee A
judges (that) U ..." (For surely "meaning" is a species of
"intending" is a species of "willing that," alla
Prichard). 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 Utterer is telling (in a protreptic
way) one's 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 name 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 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 'A' (exhibitive) and 'B'
(protreptic) sub-modes of any of the two basic modes. They are merely
unsupplemented or supplemented, the former for an 'A' or exhibitive sub-mode
and the latter for a 'B' or 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' (Volitive
exhibitive utterer-based) incorporate a reference to the utterer, or be in the
first person, nor that the radix for an 'imperative' (Volitive 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 specifiers derived
from the schema. (1) Utterer U to utter to Addressee A "exhibitive
"⊢ p" if U wills that A judges that U
judges p. (2) U to utter to Addressee A "! protreptic p" if U
wills that Addressee A judges that U wills that Addressee 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 Grice's 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
(for example, "Is his face clean?" "Is the king of France
bald?" "Is virtue a fire-shovel?") and 'W' interrogatives
("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 'W'
interrogatives. Grice indicates how this could be done. The
distinction between a volitive and a judicative interrogative corresponds with
the difference between a case in which the utterer indicates that he is, in one
way or another, concerned to obtain information ("Is he at home?"),
and a case in which the utterer indicates that he is 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 fairly well represented in grammar,
and much better represented in the grammars of some other languages. The
protreptic-exhibitive difference may not marked at all in this or that
grammar, but it should be marked in Pirotese. The submodes are, however,
often quite easily detectable. There is usually a recognizable difference
between a case in which the utterer 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 the same sentence as an enquiry.
Similarly, we can usually tell whether an utterer 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?), the main rite in which was to quantify over
(or through) connectives. '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' W-interrogative (i. e., a question like "What
did the butler see?" rather than a question like "Who went where
with whom at 4 o'clock 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, so that (∃λ).Fx
is to be regarded as a way of writing (∃x)Fx, while (∃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 Aristotle's
prohairesis/doxa distinction
in "Ethica Nichomachea." Perhaps his simplest formalisation is via
subscripts: "I will-b but will-d not."
1973. The power structure of the soul, with Judith Baker, The
H. P. Grice Papers. Keywords: soul, power structure. Grice
preferred 'soul' to 'mind,' since it was truer to his 'philosophical
PSYCHO-logy! The idea is Platonic. Keyword: tripartite soul. Freud challenged
the ‘power structure’ of Plato’s soul: it’s the libido that takes control, not
the ‘logos.’ Grice takes up this polemic. Aristotle takes up Plato's challenge,
each type of 'soul' is united to the next by the idea of 'life.' The animal soul,
between the vegetative and the rational, is not detachable.
1974. Yet more misunderstanding, towards an analysis of
'intending,' Davidson on intending, reply to Donald Davidson on 'Intending,'
The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 2-folders
17-18, BANC MSS 92/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California at Berkeley. Keywords: intention, intending, believing,
implicature, disimplicature, Davidson. In the William James lectures, Grice
mentions the use of "is" to mean "seem" (The tie is red in
this light), and "see" to mean "hallucinate." The reductive
analyses of being and seeing hold. We have here two cases of 'loose' use (or
disimplicature). Same now with his example in "Intention and
uncertainty": "Smith intends to climb Mt. Everest" +
[common-ground status: this is difficult]. Grice's response to Davidson's
pretty unfair use of Grice's notion of conversational implicature in Davidson's
analysis of intention caught a lot of interest. D. F. Pears loved Grice's
reply. Implicatum here is out of the question -- disimplicatum may not. Grice
just saw that his theory of conversation is too social to be true when applied
to 'intending.' The doxastic condition is one of the entailments in an
ascription of an intending. It cannot be cancelled as an implicatum can. If it
can be cancelled, it is best seen as a disimplicatum, or a loose use by an
utterer meaning less than what he says or explicitly conveys to more careful
conversants. Grice and Davidson were members of "The Grice and
Davidson Mutual Admiration Society." Davidson, not being Oxonian, was
perhaps not acquainted with Grice's polemics at Oxford with Hart and Hampshire
(where Grice sided with Pears, rather). Grice and Pears hold a
'minimalist' approach to 'intending.' On the other hand, Davidson makes
what Grice sees as 'the same mistake' again of building 'certainty' into the
concept. Grice finds that to apply the idea of a conversational implicatum
at this point is 'too social to be true.' Rather, Grice prefers to coin the
conversational disimplicatum: Marmaduke Bloggs intends to climb Mt Everest
on hands and knees. The utterance above, if merely reporting what Bloggs
thinks, may involve a 'loose' use of "intends." The certainty on
the agent's part on the success of his enterprise is thus cast with
doubt. Davidson was claiming that the agent's belief in the probability of
the object of the agent's intention was a mere conversational implicatum on the
utterer's part. Grice responds that the ascription of such a belief is an
entailment of a strict use of 'intend,' even if, in cases where the utterer
aims at a conversational disimplicatum, it can be 'dropped.' The
addressee will still regard the utterer as abiding by the principle of
conversational helpfulness. D. F. Pears was especially interested in the
Davidson-Grice polemic on intending. 1974. Disimplicature. Disimplicature,
keywords: disimplicature. Strictly, a section of his reply to Davidson. If
Grice's claim to fame is 'implicature,' he finds 'disimplicature' an intriguing
notion to capture those occasions when an utterer means LESS than he says. His
examples include: a loose use of 'intending' (without the entailment of the
doxastic condition), the uses of 'see' in Shakespeareian contexts
("Macbeth saw Banquo," "Hamlet saw his father on the ramparts of
Elsinore") and the use of "is" to mean "seems"
("That tie is blue under this light, but green otherwise," when both
conversants know that a change of colour is out of the question. He plays with "You're
the cream in my coffee" being an utterance where the disimplicature (i.e.
entailment dropping) is total. "Disimplicature" does not appeal to a
new principle of conversational rationality. It is perfectly accountable by the
principle of conversational helpfulness, in particular, the desideratum of
conversational candour. In everyday
explanation we exploit, as Grice notes, “an immense richness in the family of
expressions that might be thought of as the ‘wanting family.’ This ‘wanting’
family includes expressions like "want,” "desire,” "would like
to,” "is eager to,” "is anxious to,” "would mind not…,” “the
idea of ... appeals to me,” is thinking of,” etc.' As Grice remarks, “The
likeness and differences within this “wanting” family demand careful
attention.” In commenting on Davidson's treatment of wanting in
'Intending', Grice notes: “It seems to me that the picture of the soul
suggested by Davidson's treatment of wanting is remarkably tranquil and, one
might almost say, computerized. It is the picture of an ideally decorous board
meeting, at which the various heads of sections advance, from the standpoint of
their particular provinces, the case for or against some proposed course of
action. In the end the chairman passes judgement, effective for action;
normally judiciously, though sometimes he is for one reason or another
over-impressed with the presentation made by some particular member. My soul
doesn't seem to me, a lot of the time, to be like that at all. It is more like
a particularly unpleasant department meeting, in which some members shout,
won't listen, and suborn other members to lie on their behalf; while the
chairman, who is often himself under suspicion of cheating, endeavours to
impose some kind of order; frequently to no effect, since sometimes the meeting
breaks up in disorder, sometimes, though it appears to end comfortably, in
reality all sorts of enduring lesions are set up, and sometimes, whatever the
outcome of the meeting, individual members go off and do things unilaterally.”
Could it be that Davidson, of the New World, and Grice, of the Old World, have
different ‘idiolects’ regarding ‘intend’? Could well be! It is said that the
New World is prone to hyperbole, so perhaps in Grice’s more cautious use,
‘intend’ is RESTRICTED to the conditions HE wants it to restrict it too! Odd
that for all the generosity he displays in “Post-war Oxford philosophy”
(“Surely I can help you analyse YOUR concept of this or that, even if my use of
the corresponding expression does not agree with yours”), he goes to attack
Davidson, and just for trying to be nice and apply the ‘conversational
implicatum’ to ‘intend’! Genial Grice! It is natural Davidson, with his
naturalistic tendencies, would like to see 'intending' as merely invoking in a
weak fashion the idea of a strong psychological state as 'belief.' And it's
natural that Grice hated that!
1975. Super-relation, super-relatives, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 16, BANC MSS 90/135c. The Bancroft
Library, University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: super-relative. Very
Super.
1974. Type-progression in pirotology, method in philosophical
psychology: from the banal to the bizarre, in The Conception of Value,
Clarendon, 1975, Presidential address to the American Philosophical Association
(Pacific Division), Proceedings and addresses of the American
Philosophical Association, pp. 23-53, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II
(Essays), carton 2-folders 19-21, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: philosophical psychology,
pirotology, immanuel. He notes in a footnote he delivered this as an earlier
lecture. Grice's "Method" is reprinted in The Conception of
Value. Grice was forever grateful to Carnap for having coined
'pirot.' "Or having thought to have coined. Apparently, someone
had used the expression before him to mean some sort of exotic
fish." Grice wasn't sure what his presidential address to the
American Philosophical Association will be about. He chose "the
banal" (i.e. the 'ordinary-language' counterpart of something like a
'need' we ascribe to a squirrel to gobble nuts) and the 'bizarre': the
philosopher's construction of 'need' and other 'psychological,' now theoretical
terms. In the proceedings, Grice creates the discipline of
'pirotology.' He cares to mention very many philosophers: Aristotle, D. K.
Lewis, G. Myro, L. Witters, F. R. Ramsey, G. Ryle, and a few others! The
essay became popular when, of all people, Ned Block, cited it as a
programme in 'functionalism,' which it is! Grice's method in functionalist
philosophical psychology. Introduces pirotology as a creature-construction
discipline. Repr. in The Conception of Value, it reached a wider audience.
The essay is highly subdivided, and covers a lot of ground. Grice starts by
noting that, contra Ryle, he wants to see psychological predicates as
theoretical concepts. The kind of theory he is having in mind is 'folksy.' The
first creature he introduces to apply his method is Toby, a squarrel, that is a
reconstructed squirrel. Grice gives some principles of pirotology. Maxims of
rational behaviour compound to form what he calls an immanuel, of which The
Conversational Immanuel is a part. Grice concludes with a warning against the
Devil of Scientism, but acknowledges perhaps he was giving much too credit to Myro's
influence on this! 1975. Method in philosophical psychology: from the
banal to the bizarre, in The Conception of Value, Clarendon, repr. from
The Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association, Method
in philosophical psychology: from the banal to the bizarre, Proceedings and
Addresses of the American Philosophical Association, keywords: philosophical
psychology, pirotology. The IMMANUEL section is perhaps the most important from
the point of view of conversation as rational co-operation. For he identifies
THREE types of generality: formal, applicational, and content-based. Also, he
ALLOWS for there being different types of ‘imannuels.’ Surely one should be the
conversational immanuel. Ryle would say that one can have a manual, yet now
know how to use it! And there’s also the Wittgenstein-type problem: how do we
say that the conversationalist is FOLLOWING the immanuel? Perhaps the statement
is too strong – cf. ‘following a rule’ – and Grice’s problems with resultant
and basic procedures, and how the former derive from the latter! This connects
with Chomsky, and in general with Grice’s antipathy towards ‘constitutive’
rules! In Intention and Uncertainty Grice had warned that his interpretation of
Prichard's "willing that ..." as a "state" should NOT
preculde a "physicalist" analysis, but in "Method" it's all
AGAINST physicalism. Grice's concern is
with every-day psychological explanation, an explanation which employs this or
that every-day psychological principle. By such a principle Grice means a
relatively stable body of generally-accepted principles, of which the following
are examples. If a person desires p, and believes (p horseshoe q) other things
being equal the person desires q. If a person desires p and desires q, other
things being equal, the person acts on the stronger of the two desires if the
person acts on either. If a person stares at a coloured surface and
subsequently stares at a white surface, other things being equal-the person
will have an after-image. Grice do not intend to suggest that every-day
principle is as simple and easy to formulate as these examples. As Grice
repeatedly emphasises, the principles we explicitly or implicitly employ are
many, varied, rich, and subtle. Take desire. In every-day explanation we exploit
'an immense richness in the family of expressions that might be thought of as
the "wanting family"; this family includes expressions like
"want", "desire", "would like to ", "is
eager to", "is anxious to", "would mind not ... ",
"the idea of ... appeals to me", "is thinking of",
etc.'" Grice remarks that 'the likeness and differences within this family
demand careful attention'. The systematic exposition of these likenesses and
differences is itself an important (and not unpleasant) philosophical task. But
we are concerned with Grice's overall view of psychological explanation, and,
to see what Grice thinks, it will be useful first to consider how we would
explain the behaviour of a certain sort of robot. Suppose we are presented with
a rather peculiar robot, and a diagram that we can use to predict and explain
its behaviour. The robot is peculiar in that it has a panel of lights on its
forehead -- say sixty-four small lights in an eight-by-eight pattern. Each
square represents a possible configuration of lights, and the diagram
correlates possible configurations with each other. Some squares are correlated
with more than one other square. For example, ClcC2 means that
configuration C is followed by C 1 or C2. The diagram describes a finite, non-deterministic
automaton. No transition probabilities are given. We can use the diagram to
predict and explain the configurations that appear on the robot's forehead
because the robot is so constructed that the configurations succeed one
another in the ways represented in the diagram. So, if we observe configuration
C, we can predict that C 1 or C2 will follow. If we observe Cl, we can explain
its occurrence by pointing out that C must have preceded it. All we can explain
so far are configurations of lights. Can we explain behaviour -- e.g., the
robot's raising its left arm? Suppose we are provided with a table which has
entries like: if configuraton C occurs at t, the robot raises its arm at t+1.
We succeed in predicting and explaining the robot's behaviour, except that
occasionally our predictions are falsified. The robot does not always work
according to the diagram. Temporary electronic defects and vagaries account for
the falsified predications. The diagram and table represent the way the robot
is designed to work, not the way it always does work. Apart from the infrequent
electronically-explained lapses, explanation and prediction proceed untroubled
until one day a large number of our predictions are falsified. Suspecting a
massive electronic disorder, we return the robot. The manufacturer explains
that the robot was programmed to be self-regulating. The robot has an internal
representation of the diagram and table we were given, and it was also
programmed to use this or that "evaluative" principle to determine
whether to operate in accord with the diagram and table. E.g., suppose the
robot is in configuration C and that the immediate successor of C is C 1. The
robot determines by this or that "evaluative" principle not to move
into Cl, but to arrive at C2 instead. The robot was engineered so that it will
in certain situations employ this or that "evaluative" principle, and
so its states will change, in accord with the results of its evaluations. When
we ask for the "evaluative" principle, it is given to us, but it does
not improve our predictive power as much as we may have hoped. First the robot
has the power to formulate a new subsidiary evaluative principle. It formulates
this new principle using its original evaluative principle plus information
about the environment and the consequences of its past actions. We may simply
not know, at any given time, exactly what subsidiary principle the robot is
employing. Second, the robot may -- to some extent -- revise or replace its
original evaluative principle, i.e., it may, in the light of a principles --
original or subsidiary -- plus information about its environment and past
actions, revise or replace its original principle. So we may not know exactly
what original principles the robot is using. When we complain that we have lost
our ability to predict and explain the robot's behaviour, we are told that
the situation is not so bad. First, in programming the robot, an evaluative
principle is made immune to revision and replacement, so we can always count on
the robot's operating with this principle. Second, we are not at a total loss
to determine what evaluative principle-subsidiary or otherwise-the robot
employs. We possess the diagram and table as well as knowledge of the original
evaluative principle. The robot uses the diagram, table, and principles to
arrive at a new principle, and we can replicate this process. Third, we can
replicate the processes that lead the robot to deviate from the diagram and
table. To the extent that we have identified the robot's evaluative procedure,
we can use it just as the robot does to determine whether it will act in accord
with the diagram and table. Of course, there is the problem of determining when
the robot will employ its evaluative principle, but we might be provided with a
new table with entries like: if C occurs at t, the robot will employ its
evaluative principle at t+1. Fourth, we can often predict and explain the
robot's behaviour just as we did before the evaluative principle complicated
the picture, for the robot does not always employ its evaluative principle to
diverge from the diagram and table. On the contrary, it was designed to
minimize the use of the principle since their use requires significant time and
energy. An important part of Grice's view of everyday psychological explanation
can be put this way. Such explanation is similar to the explanation and
prediction of the robot's behaviour. There are four points to note here. First,
an every-day psychological principle plays a role in explanation and prediction
that is similar to the role of the diagram and table. Think of the robot's
lights as representing a psychological state. Then the diagram and table
express relations among complexes consisting of a psychological state and
behaviour. An everyday psychological principle clearly expresses such a
relations (although this is not all it does). Second, people use an 'evaluative
principle' in ways analogous to the use the robot makes of his. This point is
an essential part of Grice's view of rationality. Grice holds that the picture
of rationality given us by Kantotle as something which essentially functions to
regulate, direct, and control a pre-rational impulse, an inclination, and a
disposition, is the right picture. One of the things an everyday psychological
principle give us is a specification of how a pre-rational impulse,
inclination, or disposition operates, just as the diagram and table represent
how the robot operates apart from employing its evaluative principle. People
can, through deliberation, rationally regulate, direct, control and monitor a
pre-rational pattern of thought or action just as the robot can regulate,
direct, control and monitor its operation in accord with the diagram and table.
So what is this 'evaluative principle' people employ? It is included among what
we have been calling an everyday psychological principle, for it does not
merely specify how our pre-rational part operates. Consider e.g: If a person
believes p and that p horseshoe q, and the person believes ~q, the person
should stop believing p or stop believing q. Conformity to this principle is a
criterion of rationality, although this is not to say that the principle may
not have exceptions in quite special circumstances. One important 'evaluative'
principle is the conception of 'eudæmonia.' Grice suggests that 'eudæmonia'
consists in having a set of ends meeting certain conditions -- where an
important necessary condition is that the set of ends be 'suitable for the
direction of life', and much of 'Some Reflections' is devoted to explaining
this condition. Grice suggests that if an individual asks what it is for him to
be happy, the answer consists in identifying a system of ends which is a
specific and personalized derivative, determined by that individual's
character, abilities, and situation in the world, of the system constitutive of
eudæmonia in general. This specific and personalized derivative figures
prominently in deliberation, for a person may use it to regulate, direct,
control, and monitor his pre-rational inclination. Third, recall that we
imagined that the robot could replace and revise its evaluative principle.
Analogously, a person may change his conception of what it is for him to be
happy. But we also imagined that the robot had some evaluative principles it
could not change. On Grice's view, a person has this 'evaluative principle'
that cannot change. Not because a person programmed in; rather, it is a
principle a person cannot abandon if he is to count as rational. E. g. it is
plausible to suggest that a person must, to count as rational, have and employ
in deliberation at least some minimal conception of what it is for him to be
happy. Also it is plausible to suggest that this conception counts as a
conception of happiness only if it is a 'specific and personalized derivative'
of a conception of eudæmonia in general. So to count as happy, a person would
have to have and employ such a conception. These examples do not, of course,
exhaust the range of things one might hope to show necessary to counting as
rational. We should note here that our use of 'rational' may be a looser use
than Grice himself would indulge in. Grice regards 'rational' as a label for a
cluster of notions he would distinguish. Our looseness is an expositional
convenience. Fourth, everday psychological predictions and explanations are
sometimes falsified-like the prediction and explanations of the robot's
behaviour. And, just as in the case of the robot, this reveals no defect in
everyday psychological explanation. How can this be? In the robot example, the
diagram and table specify how the robot is designed to function; obviously,
minor deviations from the design do not justify regarding the information in
the diagram and table as either false or useless. Can anything similar be true
of people? Something somewhat similar is true, according to Grice, and this
because everyday psychology has special status. Grice argues that the
psychological theory which I envisage would be deficient as a theory to explain
behaviour if it did not contain provision for interests in the ascription of
psychological states otherwise than as tools for explaining and predicting
behaviour, interests (e.g.) on the part of one creature to be able to ascribe
these rather than those psychological states to another creature because of a *concern*
for the other creature. Within such a theory it should be possible to derive a
strong motivation on the part of the creature subject to the theory against the
abandonment of the central concepts of the theory (and so of the theory
itself), a motivation which the creature would (or should) regard as justified.
Indeed, only from within the framework of such a theory Girce think that
matters of evaluation, and so, of the evaluation of modes of explanation, can
be raised at all. If he conjectures aright, the entrenched system contains the
materials needed to justify its own entrenchment; whereas no rival system
contains a basis for the justification of anything at all. Suppose the
entrenched system contains the materials needed to justify its own entrenchment;
whereas no rival system contains a basis for the justification of anything at
all. Then while everyday psychology (or some preferred part of it) may not
specify how we are designed to think and act, it does specify how we *ought* to
think and act; for there can be no justification for failure to conform to (the
preferred part) of everyday psychology. There is another point which it is
worth noting here in passing. If everyday psychology is uniquely
self-justifying in the way Grice suggests, we must reject the suggestion that
everyday psychology is just a rough and ready theory that we will or could
eventually abandon without loss in favour of a more accurate and complete
'scientific' theory of behaviour. Grice remarks that we must be ever watchful against
the Devil of Scientism, who would lead us into myopic over-concentration on the
nature and importance of knowledge, and of 'scientific' knowledge in
particular; the Devil who is even so audacious as to tempt us to call in
question the very system of ideas required to make intelligible the idea of
calling in question anything at all; and who would even prompt us, in effect,
to suggest that since we do not really think but only think that we think, we
had better change our minds without undue delay. Now let us turn to meaning. In
'Meaning Revisited', Grice sets out to put one or two of the thoughts he had at
various times into some kind of focus, so that there might emerge some sort of
sense about not merely what kind of views about the nature of meaning he is
inclined to endorse, but also why it should be antecedently plausible to accept
this kind of view. When Grice says 'antecedently plausible', he means plausible
for some reasons other than that the view in question offers some prospects of
dealing with the intuitive data: the facts about how I use 'mean', and so on.
So I will be digging just a little bit into the background of the study of
meaning and its roots in such things as philosophical psychology. It is worth
emphasizing the point that the study has its roots in philosophical psychology,
for one trend in contemporary philosophy has been to regard the study of
meaning as 'first philosophy' (M. A. E. Dummett), as providing the framework
and the tools for any other philosophical investigation. This is clearly not
Grice's view. How can the roots of the study of meaning be in philosophical
psychology? Consider the utterer's meaning. Grice employs his conception of
everyday psychological explanation to provide a certain kind of rationale for
his account of utterer's meaning. The rationale consists essentially of three
claims. First, given our general psychological make-up (specified by everyday
psychology) and given our environment, it is frequently highly conducive to
realizing our ends that we be able to produce beliefs in each other. E. g.
suppose I need your help to escape the riptide that is carrying me out to sea.
You will help me if you believe I am caught in the riptide. How can I ensure
that you will believe that? Second, an especially effective way to produce this
belief is to do something m-intending thereby that I am caught in the riptide.
Consider what might happen if I do not have such an m-intention. Suppose I just
thrash about in the water. I intend you to see that my swimming is ineffective,
and to infer therefrom that I am caught. But you might think that I was simply
having a good time splashing about, or that I was just pretending to be in
trouble. If I can get you to realise that I intend by what I am doing to
produce in you the belief that I am caught, that realization will give you a
decisive reason to believe that I need help. So I do have a good and decisive
reason to m-intend that I am caught. And -- and this is the third claim -- I
have the ability to m-intend that I am caught. It is an everday psychological
fact that we can perform actions with the intention (1) that the audience
believe p; (2) that the audience recognize the intention (1); (3) that this
recognition be part of the audience's reason for believing p. This is a fact
about our pre-rational part, analogous to the facts about the robot's behaviour
which we can read off solely from the diagram and table without any appeal to
its evaluative procedures. We are just so 'designed' that we M-intend things at
various times. E. g., in the riptide case, I would utter 'I am caught in the
riptide, m-intending you to think that I am caught. These three points show
that it is rational for us to be so 'designed'. That is, it is rational for us
to be pre-rationally structured so as to employ m-intentions. To see why,
consider what we are doing in working through the three claims in question. We
note that we have a certain pre-rational structure involving an m-intention,
and we ask what can be said in favour of it. Given our ends and our
environment, there is a good decisive reason to have such a pre-rational
structure. So we discover that the m-intending structure passes rational
muster. It does not have to be inhibited. Rather it should be reinforced and
guided. The air of paradox in a pre-rational structure's being rational is
easily dispelled. To label a structure pre-rational is merely to see it as
present and operative independently of any attempt to evaluate whether and how
it should be regulated, directed, and controlled. To call such a structure
rational is to say that on evaluation one finds a good decisive reason to
allow the structure to remain operative instead of trying to inhibit or
eliminate it. Grice sometimes expresses the fact that a pre-rational structure
is rational by saying that it has a genitorial justification. Suppose we are
demi-gods -- genitors, as Grice says -- designing creatures. We are
constructing them out of animal stuff, so we are making creatures that will
perceive, desire, hope, fear, think, feel, and so on. The question before us
is: exactly what psychological principles should our creatures obey? We want,
so to speak, to decide on a specific diagram and table for them. As we work on
this problem, we discover that we have a good and decisive reason to make them
such that they employ an m-intention, for we have built into them a desire for
eudæmonia, and as we survey their environment and their physical powers, it is
clear that they have little chance for eudæmonia (or even survival) unless they
employ an m-intention. And, as benevolent genitors, we want them to have every
chance of eudæmonia. In appealing to happiness in this way we have departed
somewhat from Grice's treatment of creature construction. This deviation, which
is expositionally convenient here, is corrected in the section on ethics. So as
genitors we have a good and decisive reason to make our creatures M-intend.
Grice infers from this genitorial myth that it really is rational -- or, if one
likes, that we really have a good reason-to be so pre-rationally structured
that we M-intend. And the inference is a good one, for the technique of
genitorial creature construction is a more picturesque way of establishing that
M-intending passes rational muster. Grice sometimes uses this creature construction
technique to discover what aspects of our pre-rational structure are rational.
The idea is that the question 'What should we as genitors build into creatures
with human psychological capacities living in a human environment?' is easier
to answer than the question 'What aspects of our pre-rational structure are
rational?' As we have seen, M-intending is, for example, one structure that we
can cite in answer to both questions. Consider how surprising it would be if
language had no word that stood for M-intending. Our considerations reveal it
not only as a rational, but as a very important, prerational structure. Of
course, Grice does think we have an expression here: viz., 'mean'. This
linguistic thesis combined with the identification of M-intending as a rational
pre-rational structure provides a justification of Grice's account of utterer's
meaning. The concluding section of Grice's 'Meaning Revisited' is
relevant here, as it further illuminates the rational aspect of M-intending (or
speaker meaning as Grice calls it in 'Meaning Revisited'). Grice begins by
saying that, The general idea that he wants to explore, and which seems to me
to have some plausibility, is that something has been left out, by me and
perhaps by others too, in the analyses, definitions, expansions and so on, of
semantic notions, and particularly various notions of meaning. What has been
left out has in fact been left out because it is something which everyone
regards with horror, at least when in a scientific or theoretical frame of mind:
the notion of value. Though I think that in general we want to keep value
notions out of our philosophical and scientific enquiries-and some would say
out of everything else-we might consider what would happen if we relaxed this
prohibition to some extent. If we did, there is a whole range of different
kinds of value predicates or expressions which might be admitted in different
types of case. To avoid having to choose between them, I am just going to use
as a predicate the word 'optimal' the meaning of which could of course be more
precisely characterized later. Applying this idea to speaker-meaning (utterer's
meaning, as we have been saying), Grice makes two suggestions: first that, as a
first approximation, what we mean by saying that a speaker, by something he
says, on a particular occasion, means that p, is that he is in the optimal
state with respect to communicating, or if you like, to communicating that p.
Second, that the optimal state-the state in which he has an infinite set of
intentions-is in principle unrealisable, so that he does not strictly speaking
mean that p. However, he is in a situation which is such that it is legitimate,
or perhaps even mandatory, for us to deem him to satisfy the unfulfillable
condition. The optimal state is what the analysis of speaker meaning specifies.
Counter-examples advanced by Schiffer in Meaning suggest that this state is one
in which a speaker has an infinite number of intentions. We will not discuss
the counter-examples; we want to consider why it is reasonable to respond to
them by granting that the analysis of speaker meaning specifies an
unrealizable-but none the less ideal or optimal-state involving having an
infinite number of intentions. Consider an analogy. There is in sailing an
optimal setting for the sails-a setting that maximizes forward thrust. Any
reasonably complete text on sailing will explain at least some of the
relevant ærodynamic theory. Now this optimal setting is difficult if not
impossible to achieve while actually sailing-given continual shifts in wind
direction, the sudden changes of direction caused by waves, and the difficulty
in determining airflow patterns by sight. To deal with these practical
difficulties, the text supplies numerous rules of thumb which are relatively
easy to apply while sailing. Why not just drop the ærodynamic theory altogether
and just provide the reader/sailor with the rules of thumb? Because they are
rules of thumb. They hold (at best) other things being equal. To spot
exceptions and resolve conflicts as well as to handle situations not covered by
the rules, one needs to know what the ærodynamic optimum is. This optimum plays
a crucial role in guiding the use of the rules of thumb. Why should common
sense psychology not avail itself of various optima in this way? It is
plausible to think that it does given Grice's view of rationality as something
that plays an evaluative and guiding role with respect to pre-rational
inclinations and dispositions. Various optima would be especially suited to
such a role. And why should utterer's meaning not be such an optimum? Indeed,
there is some reason to think it is. Resultant procedures: What can we say
about sentence meaning? Is it possible to provide a rationale for the treatment
of sentence meaning in the context of Grice's philosophical psychology? The
account of sentence meaning has an explanatory role. Consider that a speaker of
a natural language can M-intend an extremely wide range of things, and
typically his audience will know what he M-in tends as soon as the audience
hears what is uttered. Attributing resultant procedures to language-users
explains these facts. There are two points to note: First, suppose U has the
procedure of uttering 'I know the route' if U wants A to think U thinks U knows
the route. What does it mean to suppose this? We can understand it as an
everday psychological principle. More precisely, the proposed principle is: if
a competent English speaker wants an audience to think the speaker knows the
route, then-other things being equal-the speaker may utter 'I know the route'.
This qualifies as an everyday psychological principle and-perhaps most
important-like (at least some) other everyday psychological principles this
principle has a normative aspect. Both knowledge of and conformity to this principle
are required if one is to count as a competent speaker. Turning from
utterers to audiences, it is, for similar reasons, plausible to suggest that it
is an everyday psychological fact that if a competent English speaker hears 'I
know the route', then he will-other things being equal-think the utterer thinks
he knows the route. (This principle could be derived from the first plus the
assumption that speakers are, about certain things, trustworthy.) There is
nothing mysterious about such everyday psychological principles. They specify
part of our psychological make-up, the way we are 'designed' -part of our
pre-rational structure, and the fact that we are so 'designed', certainly
explains the range of things we can M-intend and the ease with which we employ
such M-intentions. But-and this is the second point-we might have hoped for
much more by way of explanation, for there are mysteries here. In particular,
what is it for a person to have a resultant procedure? To see what the question
asks, imagine having an answer of the form: S has a resultant procedure P if
and only if where the dots are filled out by specification of certain
psychological and behavioural features. This would provide us with an
informative characterization of the psychological and behavioural capacities
underlying language use. Since there are infinitely many resultant procedures,
a reasonable way to provide answers would be (given any natural language) to
specify a finite set of basic procedures (for that language), from which the infinitely
many resultant procedures could be derived (in some suitable sense of
'derived'). Then we would provide a finite set of conditions of the form: S has
basic procedure P if and only if where the dots are replaced by a suitable
condition. But what counts as a 'suitable condition'? What psychological,
behavioural, or other properties does one have to have to count as possessing a
certain basic procedure P? As we said, Grice regards this as an open question.
Of course, this is not to say that the question is unimportant; on the
contrary, it is of fundamental importance if we want to know what capacities
underlie language use. One problem about Grice's account of meaning still
remains: does the appeal to propositions not vitiate the whole project? (Consider
section on ethics). One crucial point to consider is the PRIMACY (to use
Suppes's qualification) of the buletic over the doxastic. Grice was playing
with this for some time (Journal of Philosophy, vol. ). In Method, from the
mundane to the recondite, he is playful enough to say that primacy is 'no big
deal,' and that, if properly motivated, he might give a reductive analysis of
the buletic in terms of the doxastic. But his reductive analysis of the
doxastic in terms of the buletic runs as follows: "X judges that p"
iff "X wills as follows. "Given any situation in which (PROTASIS) 1.
X wills some end E. 2. There are *two* _non-empty_ classes, K1 and K2 of
action-types, such that: the _performance_ (by X) of an action-type belonging
to K1 will realise E1 just in case p IS TRUE, and the performance (by X) of an
action-type belonging to of K2 will realise E just in case p is *false*. 3.
(Closure clause): There is _no_ third non-empty class K3 of action-types such
that the performance (by X) of an action type belonging to will realise E
whether p is true or p is false,---APODOSIS: In such situation, X is to will
that X performs some action-type belonging to K1." Creature construction
allows for an account of freedom that will metaphysically justify absolute value. Philosopher H. Frankfurt has become famous for his
second-order and higher-order desires. Grice is exploring similar grounds in
what comes out as his "Method in philosophical psychology"
(originally American Philosophical Association presidential address, now
reprinted in "The conception of value"). M. J. Bratman, of Stanford,
much influenced by Grice (at Berkeley then) thanks to their
‘Hands-Across-the-Bay’ programme, helps us to understand this 'pirotological'
progression towards the idea of strong autonomy or freedom. Recall that Grice's
'pirots' combine Locke's ‘very intelligent parrots’ with Russell's and Carnap's
nonsensical 'pirots' of which nothing we are told other than they 'karulise
elatically'. Grice’s purpose is to give a little thought to a question. What
are the general principles exemplified, in creature-construction, in
progressing from one type of pirot to a higher type? What kinds of steps are
being made? The kinds of step with which Grice deals are those which culminate
in a licence to include, within the specification of the content of the
psychological state of this or that type of pirot, a range of expressions which
would be inappropriate with respect to this lower-type pirot. Such expressions
include this or that connective, this or that quantifier, this or that temporal
modifier, this or that mode indicator, this or that modal operator, and
(importantly) this or that expression to refer to this or that ‘souly’ state
like " … judges that …" and "… will that …” This or that expression,
that is, the availability of which leads to the structural enrichment of the
specification of content. In general, these steps will be ones by which this or
that item or idea which has, initially, a legitimate place outside the scope of
this or that souly instantiable (or, if you will, the expressions for which
occur legitimately outside the scope of this or that souly predicate) come to
have a legitimate place within the scope of such an instantiable, a step by
which, one might say, this or that item or ideas comes to be internalised.
Grice is disposed to regard as prototypical the sort of natural disposition or
propension which Hume attributes to a person, and which is very important to
Hume, viz. the tendency of the soul 'to spread itself upon objects,’ i.e. to
project into the world items which, properly or primitively considered, is a
feature of this or that souly state. Grice sets out in stages the application
of aspects of the genitorial programme. We then start with a zero-order, with a
pirot equipped to satisfy unnested, or logically amorphous, judging and
willing, i.e. whose contents do not involve judging or willing. We soon reach
our first pirot, P1. It would be advantageous to a pirot-0 if it could have this
or that judging and this or that willing, which relate to its own judging or
willing. Such pirot-1 could be equipped to control or regulate its own judgings
and willings. It will presumably be already constituted so as to conform to the
law that, cæteris paribus, if it wills that p and judge that ~p, if it can, it makes
it the case that p in its soul To give it some control over its judgings and
willings, we need only extend the application of this law to the pirot’s judging
and willing. We equip the pirot so that, cæteris paribus, if it wills that it
is not the case that it wills that p and it judges that they do will that p, if
it can, it makes it the case that it does not will that p. And we somehow
ensure that sometimes it can do this. It may be that the installation of this
kind of control would go hand in had with the installation of the capacity for
evaluation. Now, unlike it is the case with a pirot-1, a pirot-2's intentional
effort depends on the motivational strength of its considered desire at the
time of action. There is a process by which this or that conflicting considered
desire motivates action as a broadly causal process, a process that reveals
motivational strength. But a pirot-2 might itself try to weigh considerations
provided by such a a conflicting desire B1 and B2 in deliberation about this or
that pro and this or that con of various alternatives. In the simplest case,
such weighing treats each of the things desired as a prima facie justifying
end. In the face of conflict, it weighs this and that desired end, where the
weights correspond to the motivational strength of the associated considered
desire. The outcome of such deliberation, Aristotle’s prohairesis, matches the
outcome of the causal motivational process envisioned in the description of
Pirot-2. But, since the weights it invokes in such deliberation correspond to the
motivational strength of this or that relevant considered desire (though
perhaps not to the motivational strength of this or that relevant considered
desire), the resultant activitiy matches those of a corresponding pirot-2 (each
of whose desires, we are assuming, are considered). To be more realistic, we
might limit ourselves to saying that a pirot-2 has the capacity to make the
transition from this or that unconsidered desire to this or that considered
desire, but does not always do this. But it will keep the discussion more
manageable to simplify and to suppose that each desire is considered. We shall
not want this pirot-2 to depend, in each will and act in ways that reveal the
motivational strength of this or that considered desire at the time of action,
but for a pirot-3 it will also be the case that in this or that, though not
each) case, it acts on the basis of how it weights this or that end favoured by
this or that conflicting considered desire. This or that considered desire will
concern matters that cannot be achieved simply by action at a single time. E.
g. pirot-3 may want to nurture a vegetable garden, or build a house. Such
matters will require organized and coordinated action that extends over time.
What the pirot-3 does now will depend not only on what it now desires but also
on what it now expects it will do later given what it does now. It needs a way
of settling now what it will do later given what it does now. The point is even
clearer when we remind ourselves that pirot-3 is not alone. It is, we may
assume, one of some number of pirots-3; and in many cases it needs to
coordinate what it does with what other pirots-3 do so as to achieve ends
desired by all participants, itself included. Pirots-4. These costs are
magnified for a pirot-4 whose various plans are interwoven so that a change in
one element can have significant ripple effects that will need to be
considered. Let us suppose that the general strategies pirot-4 has for
responding to new information about its circumstances are sensitive to these
kinds of costs. Promoting in the long run the satisfaction of its considered
desires and preferences. Pirot-4 is a somewhat sophisticated planning agent but
it has a problem. It can expect that its desires and preferences may well
change over time and undermine its efforts at organizing and coordinating its
activities over time. Perhaps in many cases this is due to the kind of temporal
discounting. So for example pirot-4 may have a plan to exercise every day but
may tend to prefer a sequence of not exercising on the present day but
exercising all days in the future, to a uniform sequence the present day
included. At the end of the day it returns to its earlier considered preference
in favour of exercising on each and every day. Though pirot-4, unlike pirot-3,
has the capacity to settle on prior plans or plaices concerning exercise, this
capacity does not yet help in such a case. A creature whose plans were stable
in ways in part shaped by such a no-regret principle would be more likely than
pirot-4 to resist temporary temptations. Pirot-5. So let us build such a
principle into the stability of the plans of a pirot-5, whose plans and
policies are not derived solely from facts about its limits of time, attention,
and the like. It is also grounded in the central concerns of a planning agent
with its own future, concerns that lend special significance to anticipated
future regret. So let us add to pirot-5 the capacity and disposition to arrive
at such hierarchies of higher-order desires concerning its "will". Pirot-6.
This gives us a new creature, pirot-6. There is a problem with pirot-6, one
that has been much discussed. It is not clear why a higher-order desire -- even
a higher-order desire that a certain desire be one's "will" -- is not
simply one more desire in the pool of desires (Berkeley God's will problem).
Why does it have the authority to constitute or ensure the agent's (that is,
the creature's) endorsement or rejection of a first-order desire? Applied to
pirot-6 this is the question of whether, by virtue solely of its hierarchies of
desires, it really does succeed in taking its own stand of endorsement or
rejection of various first-order desires. Since it was the ability to take its
own stand that we are trying to provide in the move to pirot-6, we need some
response to this challenge. The basic point is that pirot-6 is not merely a
time-slice agent. It is, rather, and understands itself to be, a temporally
persisting planning agent, one who begins, and continues, and completes
temporally extended projects. On a broadly Lockean view, its persistence over
time consists in relevant psychological continuities (e.g., the persistence of
attitudes of belief and intention) and connections (e.g., memory of a past
event, or the later intentional execution of an intention formed earlier).
Certain attitudes have as a primary role the constitution and support of such
Lockean continuities and connections. In particular, policies that favour or
reject various desires have it as their role to constitute and support various
continuities both of ordinary desires and of the politicos themselves. For this
reason such policies are not merely additional wiggles in the psychic stew.
Instead, these policies have a claim to help determine where the agent -- i.e.,
the temporally persisting agent -- stands with respect to its desires. Or so it
seems to me reasonable to say. Pirot-7. So the psychology of pirot-7 continues
to have the hierarchical structure of pro-attitudes introduced with pirot-6.
The difference is that the higher-order pro-attitudes of pirot-6 were simply
characterized as desires in a broad, generic sense, and no appeal was made to
the distinctive species of pro-attitude constituted by plan-like attitudes.
That is the sense in which the psychology of pirot-7 is an extension of the
psychology of pirot-6. Let us then give pirot-7 such higher-order policies with
the capacity to take a stand with respect to its desires by arriving at
relevant higher-order policies concerning the functioning of those desires over
time. Pirot-7 exhibits a merger of hierarchical and planning structures.
Appealing to planning theory and ground in connection to the temporally
extended structure of agency to be one's "will". Pirot-7 has
higher-order policies that favour or challenge motivational roles of its
considered desires. When Pirot-7 engages in deliberative weighing of conflicting,
desired ends it seems that the assigned weights should reflect the policies
that determine where it stands with respect to relevant desires. But the
policies we have so far appealed to -- policies concerning what desires are to
be one's will -- do not quite address this concern. The problem is that one can
in certain cases have policies concerning which desires are to motivate and yet
these not be policies that accord what those desires are for a corresponding justifying
role in deliberation. Pirots-8. A solution is to give our creature -- call it
pirot-8 -- the capacity to arrive at policies that express its commitment to be
motivated by a desire by way of its treatment of that desire as providing, in
deliberation, a justifying end for action. Pirot-8 has policies for treating
(or not treating) certain desires as providing justifying ends -- as, in this
way, reason-providing -- in motivationally effective deliberation. Let us call
such policies self-governing policies. We will suppose that these policies are
mutually compatible and do not challenge each other. In this way pirot-8
involves an extension of structures already present in pirot-7. The grounds on
which pirot-8 arrives at (and on occasion revises) such self-governing policies
will be many and varied. We can see these policies as crystallizing complex
pressures and concerns, some of which are grounded in other policies or
desires. These self-governing policies may be tentative and will normally not
be immune to change. If we ask what pirot-8 values in this case, the answer
seems to be: what it values is constituted in part by its higher-order
self-governing policies. In particular, it values exercise over nonexercise
even right now, and even given that it has a considered (though temporary)
preference to the contrary. Unlike lower pirots, what pirot-8 now values is not
simply a matter of its present, considered desires and preferences. Now this
model of pirot-8 seems in relevant aspects to be a (partial) model of us (in
our better moments, of course. So we arrive at the conjecture that one
important kind of valuing of which we are capable involves, in the cited ways,
both our first-order desires and our higher order self-governing policies. In
an important sub-class of cases our valuing involves reflexive polices that are
both first-order policies of action and higher-order policies to treat the
first-order policy as reason providing in motivationally effective
deliberation. This may seem odd. Valuing seems normally to be a first-order
attitude. One values honesty, say. The proposal is that an important kind of
valuing involves higher-order policies. Does this mean that, strictly speaking,
what one values (in this sense) is itself a desire -- not honesty, say, but a
desire for honesty? No, it does not. What I value in the present case is
honesty; but, on the theory, my valuing honesty in art consists in certain
higher-order self-governing policies. An agent's reflective valuing involves a
kind of higher-order willing.
1975. The criteria of intelligence, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
III (The Doctrines), carton 5-folder 29, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords:
intelligence, criteria. In "Aspects of reason," he mentions
'flat' rationality, and certain other 'talents' that are more difficult for the
philosopher to conceptualise, such as 'nose' (i.e. intuitiveness), acumen,
tenacity, and such. Grice's approach is 'pirotological.' If Locke had used
'intelligent' to refer to Prince Maurice's parrot, Grice wants to find criteria
for 'intelligent' as applied to his favourite type of 'pirot,' rather
("intelligent, indeed rational.")
1976. Meaning, revisited, in Studies in the Way of Words, Part II:
Explorations in semantics and metaphysics, Essay, from N. V. Smith,
Mutual knowledge, Croom Helm, London, pp. 223-43, Remnants of meaning, Meaning
revisited, revisited, notes on Schiffer, philosophical psychology and meaning,
meaning and philosophical psychology, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II
(Essays), carton 1-folders 17-18, and Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 9
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: philosophical psychology, meaning. Grice know sees his former self.
If he was obsessed, after Ayer, with “mean,” he now wants to see if his
explnation of it (then based on his pre-theoretic intuition) is theoretically
advisable in terms other than dealing with those pre-theoretical facts, i.e.
how he deals with a lexeme like ‘mean.’ This is a bit like Grice: implicatum,
revisited. An axiological approach to meaning. Strictly a reprint of Grice
(1976), which should be the preferred citation. The date 1976 is given by Grice
himself, and he knew! Grice also composed some notes on Remnants on meaning, by
Schiffer. This is a bit like Grice's meaning re-revisited. S. R. Schiffer had
been Strawson's tutee at Oxford as a Rhode Scholar in the completion of
his D. Phil. on 'Meaning' (later published by Clarendon). Eventually, Schiffer
grew sceptic, and let Grice know about it! Grice did not find Schiffer's
arguments totally destructive, but saw the positive side to them. Schiffer's
arguments should remind any philosopher that the issues he is dealing are
profound and bound to involve much elucidation before they are solved. This is
a bit like Grice: implicatum, revisited. "Meaning revisited" (an
ovious nod to Evelyn Waugh's Yorkshire-set novel) is the title Grice chose for
a contribution to a symposium at Brighton organised by N. V. Smith.
"Meaning revisited" (although Grice has earlier drafts entitled
"Meaning and philosophical psychology") comprises three sections. In
the first section, Grice is concerned with the application of his "M. O.
R.," or "Modified Occam's Razor" now to the very lexeme,
"mean." Cf. How many 'senses' does 'sense' have? Cohen: The
"Senses" of Senses. In the second part, Grice explores an
'evolutionary' model of creature construction reaching a stage of non-iconic
representation. Finally, in the third section, motivated to solve what he calls
a 'major' problem -- versus the 'minor' problem concerning the transition
from 'utterer's meaning' to 'expression meaning' -- Grice attempts to
construct 'meaning' as a 'value-paradeigmatic' notion. A version was indeed
published in the proceedings of the Brighton symposium, by Croom Helm, London.
Grice has a couple of other drafts with variants on this title: philosophical
psychology and meaning, psychology and meaning. He kept, meaningfully, changing
the order! It is not arbitrary that Grice's fascinating exploration is in three
parts. In the first, where he applies his Modified Occam's razor to
"mean," he is revisiting Stevenson. "Smoke means fire" and
"I mean love," don't need different 'senses' of 'mean.' And Stevenson
was right when using 'scare' quotes for the "Smoke 'means' fire"
utterance. Grice was very much aware that that, the rather obtuse terminology
of 'senses', was exactly the terminology he had adopted in both
"Meaning" and the relevant William James lectures (V and VI) at
Harvard! Now, it's time to revisit and to echo Graves, say, 'goodbye to all
that'! In the second part he applies pirotology. While he knows his audience is
not philosophical -- it's not Oxford -- he thinks they still may get some
entertainment! We have a pirot feeling pain, simulating it, and finally
uttering, "I am in pain." In the concluding section, Grice becomes
Plato. He sees 'meaning' as an 'optimum,' i.e. a value-paradeigmatic notion
introducing 'value' in its guise of 'optimality.' Much like Plato thought
'circle' works in his idiolect. Grice played with various titles, in the Grice
Collection. There's 'philosophical psychology and meaning.' The reason is
obvious. The lecture is strictly divided in sections, and it's only natural
that Grice kept drafts of this or that section in his collection. In Studies in
the Way of Words, Grice notes that he re-visited his "Meaning
re-visited" in 1980, too! And he meant it! Surely, there is no way to
understand at least the FOUR stages of Grice’s development of his ideas about
meaning (1948, 1967, 1976 and 1987) without Peirce! It is obvious here that
Grice thought that 'mean' TWO figurative extensions of 'use.' Smoke 'means'
fire AND "'Smoke' means smoke." The latter is a transferred use in
that 'impenetrability' "means" 'let's change the topic if Dumpty
m-intends that it and Alice are to change the topic.
1976. The categorical imperative, Paton, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 24, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keyword: categorical
imperative. An exploration of the logical form of Kant's concoction. „Handle
nur nach derjenigen Maxime, durch die du zugleich wollen kannst, dass sie ein
allgemeines Gesetz werde.“ – Immanuel Kant: AA IV, 421„Handle nach der
Maxime, die sich selbst zugleich zum allgemeinen Gesetze machen kann.“ AA
IV, 436 „Handle so, daß die Maxime deines Willens jederzeit zugleich als
Prinzip einer allgemeinen Gesetzgebung gelten könne.“ AA V, 30 „Handle so,
daß der Wille durch seine Maxime sich selbst zugleich als allgemein
gesetzgebend betrachten könne.“ AA IV, 434 „Handle so, dass du die
Menschheit sowohl in deiner Person, als in der Person eines jeden anderen
jederzeit zugleich als Zweck, niemals bloß als Mittel brauchst.“ AA IV,
429 „Denn vernünftige Wesen stehen alle unter dem Gesetz, dass jedes derselben
sich selbst und alle andere niemals bloß als Mittel, sondern jederzeit zugleich
als Zweck an sich selbst behandeln solle.“ AA IV, 433, Naturgesetzformel Reich-der-Zwecke-Formel
„Handle so, als ob die Maxime deiner Handlung durch deinen Willen zum
allgemeinen Naturgesetze werden sollte.“ AA IV, 421 „Handle nach Maximen,
die sich selbst zugleich als allgemeine Naturgesetze zum Gegenstande haben
können.“ AA IV, 437, „Demnach muß ein jedes vernünftige Wesen so handeln,
als ob es durch seine Maximen jederzeit ein gesetzgebendes Glied im allgemeinen
Reiche der Zwecke wäre.“ AA IV, 438. Grice is interested in its
conceptual connection with the 'hypothetical or suppositional ' imperative, in
terms of the type of connection between the protasis and the
apodosis. Grice spends the full second Paul Carus lecture on the
conception of value on this. Grice is aware that the topic is central for
Oxonian philosophers such as R. M. Hare (a member of Austin's Play Group, too),
who will regard the UNIVERSABILITY of an imperative as a mark of its
categorial, indeed, moral status. He would refer to conversational maxims
as contributing to a CONVERSATIONAL IMMANUEL, if it can be shown that, qua
items under an overarching principle of conversational helpfulness, each
displays qualities associated with conceptual, formal, and applicational
generality. Grice never understood what Kant meant by the 'categoric
imperative.' But FOR GRICE, from the acceptability of the the immanuel you can
deduce the acceptability of this or that maxim, and from the acceptability of
the conversational immanuel ("Be conversational helpful") you can
deduce the acceptability of this or that convesational maxim. Grice hardly
considered Kant’s approach to the categoric imperative other than via the
universability of this or that maxim. This or that ‘conversational maxim,’
provided by Grice, may be said to be universalisable if and only if it displays
what Grice sees as these three types of generality: conceptual, formal, and
applicational. He does the same for general ‘maxims’ of conduct. The results
are compiled in a manual of universalisable maxims, the conversational
immanuel, an appendix to the general immanuel. The other justification by Kant
of the categoric imperative involve an approach other than the ‘genitorial
justification,’ and an invocation of ‘autonomy’ and ‘freedom.’ It is Paton’s
use of ‘imperative’ as per “categoric imperative” that has Grice expanding on
modes other than the doxastic, to bring in the ‘buletic,’ where the categoric
imperative resides. Note that in the end Kant DOES formulate the ‘categoric’
imperative, as Grice notes, as a ‘real’ imperative, rather than a ‘command,’
etc. Grice loved Kant, but he loved Kantotle best. In the last Kant lecture, he
proposes to define the ‘categorical imperative’ as a ‘counsel of prudence,’
with a protasis ‘Let Grice be happy.’ The derivation involves eight stages! Grice
found out that out of his play-group activities with this or that linguistic
nuance he had arrived at the ‘principle,’ or ‘imperative’ of ‘conversational
helpfulness,’ indeed formulated as an ‘imperative’: “Make your contribution
such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose
of the conversation in which you are engaged.” He notes that the rationality
behind the idea of conversation as rational co-operation does not preclude
seeing rationality in conversation as other than cooperation. The fact that he
chooses ‘maxim,’ and explicitly ‘echoes’ Kant, indicates where Grice is
leading!
1976. Type-progression in pirotology, Philosophical
psychology, philosophical psychology and meaning, meaning and philosophical
psychology, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folders 24-25,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: philosophical psychology, meaning. Meaning
is perhaps the psychological state, attitude, or stance, per
excellence. Grice coins "M-intention" for the bunch of
intentions a rational 'meaner' must mean before he even EXPLICATES
something! While not explicitly, Grice wants to supersede Peirce's merely
taxonomic approaches to the thing, more in the vein of Ogden and Richards.
Grice is being Aristotelian here. He wants the pirot to mean that p. In a lower
model of pirot, the pirot might NOT mean. Grice compares his 'evolutionary'
approach to "mean" to Aristotle's 'serial' approach to an item like
'soul' ("psyche") or 'number' or 'figure' -- 'three-sided,'
'four-sided,' etc. ("arithmos" and "skhematos")(414b20).
Soul is not strictly a genus. What holds the series together is not a
'definition' by genus, but the concept of 'life.' The series is finite and the
lowest (nutrient, phutos) and higher (rational, anthropos) types ARE separable
-- the middle type ("therios") isn't.
1977. The
buletic-doxastic divide, practical reason, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V
(Topical), carton 9-folder 1, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. "Practical Reason." Keyword:
reason, practical reason. With 'practical' Grice means 'buletic.'
"Praxis" involves 'acting,' and surely Grice presupposes acting.
"By uttering, i. e. by the act of uttering, expression x, U m-intends that
p." He occasionally refers to 'action' and 'behaviour' as the thing which
an ascription of a psychological state EXPLAINS. Grice prefers the idiom of
'soul.' There's the ratiocinative soul. Within the ratiocinative, there's the
executive soul and the merely administrative soul. Cicero had to translate
Aristotle into 'prudentia,' every time Aristotle talked of
'phronesis.' Grice was aware that Kant's terminology can be confusing.
Kant had used "pure" reason for reason in the doxastic
realm. Kant's critique of practical reason is HARDLY symmetrical to his
critique of 'doxastic' reason. Grice, with his 'æqui-vocality' thesis of
'must' ("must" crosses the doxastic-boulomaic divide), Grice is being
more of a symmetricalist.
1977. Epagoge, epagogic, Mill's induction, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series V (Topical) carton 7-folder 31, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: Mill, induction. Grice loved to
reminisce an anecdote concerning his tutor Hardie at Corpus when Hardie
invoked Mill's principles to prove that Hardie was not responsible for a
traffic jam. In drafts on word play, Grice would speak of not bringing
"more Grice to your Mill." Mill's System of Logic was part of
the reading material for his degree in Lit. Hum.at Oxford, so he was very
familiar with it. Mill represents the best of the English empiricist
tradition. Grice kept an interest on inductive methodology. In
his "Life and opinions" he mentions some obscure essays by
Kneale and Keynes on the topic. Grice was interested in Kneale's 'secondary
induction,' since Grice saw this as an application of a
construction routine. He was also interested in Keynes's notion of a
'generator property,' which he found metaphysically intriguing. Induction.
Induction -- Mill's Induction, keywords: induction, deduction, abduction,
Mill. More Grice to the Mill. Grice loved Hardie's playing with Mill's
Method of Difference with an Oxford copper. He also quotes Kneale and Keynes on
induction. Note that his seven-step derivation of 'akrasia' relies on an
'inductive' step!
1977. The Immanuel Kant Memorial Lectures, Aspects of
reason, Clarendon, Stanford, redelivered as The John Locke lectures,
repr. in Aspects of Reason, Oxford, The Clarendon Press, The
Grice Collection contains previous drafts of this, Aspects of Reason, The
H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays) carton 2-folders 29-30, Series III (The
Doctrines), carton 5-folders 10-13, Series IV (Associations), carton 6-folders
5-6, and Series V (Topical), carton 7-folders 21-22, and carton 9-folder 6, carton
5-folders 10-13, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keyword: reasoning. While each of the four lectures
credits their own entry below, it may do to reflect on Grice's overall aim.
Grice structures the lectures in the form of a philosophical dialogue with his
audience. The first lecture is intended to provide a bit of 'linguistic
botanising' for 'reasonable,' and 'rational.' In later lectures, Grice
tackles 'reason' qua noun. The remaining lectures are meant to explore what he
calls the "Aequi-vocality" thesis: "must" has only ONE
SENSE that crosses what he calls the 'doxastic' 'boulomaic' divide. He is
especially concerned -- this being the Kant lectures -- with Kant's attempt
to reduce the categorical imperative to a 'counsel of prudence.' Kant
re-introduces the Aristotelian idea of 'eudaimonia.' While a further
lecture on 'happiness' as the pursuit of a system of ends is NOT strictly
part of the either the Kant or the Locke lectures, it relates, since eudaimonia
may be regarded as the goal involved in the relevant imperative. Aspects
of reason, Clarendon, Stanford, The Immanuel Kant Memorial
Lectures, Aspects of reason, Clarendon, "Some aspects of
reason," The Immanuel Kant Memorial Lectures, Stanford, keywords: reason,
reasoning, reasons. The lectures were also delivered as the John Locke
lectures. Grice is concerned with the reduction of the categorical
imperative to the hypothetical or suppositional imperative. His main thesis he calls the
"AEQUI-vocality" thesis: "must" has only ONE sense,
that crossed the 'boulomaic/doxastic' divide. Aspects of reason, Clarendon,
Grice, Aspects of reason, Clarendon, John Locke lecture notes, keywords:
reason. On aspects of reason. Including extensive language botany on
'rational', 'reasonable,' and indeed 'reason' (justificatory, explanatory, and
mixed). At this point, Grice notes that linguistic botany is INDISPENSABLE
towards the construction of a more systematic explanatory theory. It is an
exploration of a range of uses of 'reason' that leads him to his
"Aequi-vocality" thesis that 'must' has only one sense! 1977, Aspects
of reason, Stanford, The Kant Lectures, Stanford, 1977. Aspects of reason
and reasoning, in Grice, Aspects of Reason, Clarendon, The John Locke
Lectures, Aspects of Reason, Grice, Aspects of reason, The Kant Lectures,
Stanford, Clarendon, keywords: reason, happiness. While Locke hardly
mentions 'reason,' his friend Burthogge does, and profusely! It was
slightly ironic that Grice had delivered these lectures as the Rationalist Kant
lectures at Stanford. He was honoured to be invited to Oxford. Officially,
to be a John Locke lecture you have to be *visiting* Oxford. While Grice
was a fellow of St. John's, he was still most welcome to give his set of
lectures on reasoning at the Sub-Faculty of Philosophy. He quotes very
many authors, including Locke! In his "proemium," Grice notes that
while he was rejected the Locke scholarship back in the day, he was extremely
happy to be under Locke's ægis now! When preparing for his second lecture, he
had occasion to revise some earlier drafts dated 1966, 1966, reasons,
Grice, Aspects of reason, Clarendon, Reasons, keywords: reason,
reasons. Linguistic analysis on 'justificatory,' 'explanatory' and 'mixed'
uses of 'reason.' While Grice knows that the basic use of 'reason' is qua
verb (reasoner reasons from premise P to conclusion C), he spends some time in
exploring 'reason' as noun. Grice found it a bit of a roundabout way to
approach rationality. However, his distinction between 'justificatory' and
'explanatory' 'reason' is built upon his linguistic botany on the use of
'reason' qua noun. Explanatory reason seems more basic for Grice than
'justificatory' reason. Explanatory reason EXPLAINS the rational agent's
behaviour. Grice is aware of Freud and his 'rationalizations.' An
agent may invoke some 'reason' for his acting which is not
'legitimate.' An agent may convince himself that he wants to move to
Bournemouth because of the weather; when in fact, his reason to move to
Bournemouth is to be closer to Cowes and join the yacht club there.
1977. Reason and
reasoning, the first Kant lecture, Stanford, The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: reason, reasoning. Grice’s enthymeme. Grice, the implicit reasoner!
As the title of the lecture implies, Grice takes the verb, "to
reason," as conceptually prior. A reasoner reasons, briefly, from a
premise to a conclusion. There are types of reason: flat reason and gradual
reason. He famously reports Shropshire, another tutee with Hardie, and his
proof on the immortality of the human soul. Grice makes some remarks on
'akrasia' as key, too. The first lecture is then dedicated to an elucidation,
and indeed attempt at a 'conceptual' analysis in terms of intentions and
doxastic conditions reasoner R intends that premise P yields conclusion C and
believes his intention will cause his entertaining of the conclusion from his
entertaining the premise. One example of particular interest for a study of the
use of 'conversational reason' in Grice is that of the connection between
implicatum and reasoning. Grice entitles the sub-section of the lecture as ‘Too
good to be reasoning,’ which is of course a joke. Cf. "too much love will
kill you,” and “There's no such thing as too much of a good thing”
(Shakespeare, As you like it). Grice notes: "I have so far been
considering difficulties which may arise from the attempt to find, for all
cases of actual reasoning, reconstructions of sequences of utterances or
explicit thoughts which the reasoner might plausibly be supposed to think of as
conforming to some set of canonical patterns of inference." "I turn
now to a different class of examples, with regard to which the problem is not
that it is difficult to know how to connect them with canonical patterns, but
rather that it is only too easy (or shall I say 'trivial') to make the
connection. Like some children (not many), some cases of reasoning are too well
behaved for their own good. Suppose someone says to Grice, and It is very
interesting that Grice gives 'conversational examples.’ ‘Jack has arrived,’
Grice replies, “I conclude from that that Jack has arrived.” Or he says “Jack
has arrived AND Jill has *also* arrived,” And Grice replies, "I conclude
that Jill has arrived."(via Gentzen's conjunction-elimination). Or he
says, “My wife is at home.” And Grice replies, “I reason from that that someone
(viz. your wife) is at home. Is there not something very strange about the
presence in my three replies of the verb "conclude" (in example I and
II) and the verb "reason" (in the third example)?" misleading,
but doxastically fine, professor! It is true, of course, that if instead of my
first reply I had said (vii) vii. So Jack has arrived, has he?’ the strangeness
would have been removed. But here ‘so’ serves not to indicate that an inference
is being made, but rather as part of a not that otiose way of expressing
surprise." “One might just as well have said (viii).” viii. Well, fancy
that! Now, having spent a sizeable part of his life exploiting it, Grice is not
unaware of the truly fine distinction between a statement's being false (or
axiologically satisfactory), and its being true (or axiologically satisfactory)
but otherwise conversationally or pragmatically misleading or inappropriate or
pointless, and, on that account and by such a fine distinction, a statement, or
an utterance, or conversational move which it would be improper (in terms of
the reasonable/rational principle of conversational helfpulness) in one way or
another, to make." It is worth considering Grice’s reaction to his own
distinction. Entailment is in sight! But Grice does not find himself lured by
the idea of using that distinction here! Because Moore’s entailment, rather
than Grice’s implicatum is entailed. Or because explicatu, rather than
implicatum is involved. Suppose, again, that I were to break off the chapter at
this point, and switch suddenly to this argument." ix. I have two hands
(here is one hand and here is another). If had three more hands, I would have
five. If I were to have double that number I would have ten, and if four of
them were removed six would remain. So I would have four more hands than I have
now. "Is one happy to describe this performance as reasoning?"
Depends who's one and what's happy!? "There is, however, little doubt that
I have produced a canonically acceptable chain of statements." So surely
that's reasoning, if only conversationally misleadingly called so! "Or
suppose that, instead of writing in my customary free and easy style, I had
framed my remarks (or at least the argumentative portions of my remarks) as a
verbal realization, so to speak, of sequences of steps in strict conformity
with the rules of a natural-deduction system of first-order predicate logic. I
give, that is to say, an updated analogue of a medieval disputation."
Implicature: Gentzen is Ockham! "Would those brave souls who continued to
read be likely to think of my performance as the production of reasoning, or
would they rather think of it as a crazy formalisation of reasoning conducted
at some previous time? Depends on 'crazy' or 'formalisation.' One is reminded
of Grice telling Strawson, If you cannot formalise, don't say it; Strawson: Oh,
no! If I can formalise it, I shan't say it! The points suggested by this stream
of rhetorical questions may be summarized as follows. Whether the samples
presented FAIL to achieve the title of "reasoning", and thus be
deemed 'reasoning,' or whether the samples achieve the title, as we may
figuratively put it, by the skin of their teeth, perhaps does not very greatly
matter. For whichever way it is, the samples seem to offend against something
(different things in different cases, I'm sure) very central to our conception
of reasoning. So central that Moore would call it entailment! A mechanical
application of a ground rule of inference, or a concatenation thereof, is
reluctantly (if at all) called reasoning. Such a mechanical application may
perhaps legitimately enter into (i.e. form individual steps in) authentic
reasonings, but they are not themselves reasonings, nor is a string of them. There
is a demand that a reasoner should be, to a greater or lesser degree, the
author of his reasonings. Parroted sequences are not reasonings when parroted,
though the very same sequences might be reasoning if not parroted. Piroted sequences
are another matter. Some of the examples Grice gives are deficient because they
are aimless or pointless. Reasoning is characteristically addressed to this or
that problem: a small problem, a large problem, a problem within a problem, a
clear problem, a hazy problem, a practical problem, an intellectual problem;
but a problem! A mere flow of ideas minimally qualifies (or can be deemed) as
reasoning, even if it happens to be logically respectable." "But if
it is directed, or even monitored (with intervention should it go astray, not
only into fallacy or mistake, but also into such things as conversational
irrelevance or otiosity!), that is another matter! Finicky over-elaboration of
intervening steps is frowned upon, and in extreme cases runs the risk of forfeiting
the title of reasoning. In conversation, such over-elaboration will offend
against this or that conversational maxim, against (presumably) some suitably
formulated maxim conjoining informativeness. As Grice noted with regard to ix.
That pillar box seems red to me. That would be 'baffling' if the addressee
fails to detect the 'communication-point.' An utterance is supposed to inform,
and what is (IX) meant to inform its addressee? "In thought, it will be
branded as pedantry or neurotic caution! If a distinction between brooding and
conversing is to be made! "At first sight, perhaps, one would have been
inclined to say that greater rather than lesser explicitnessness is a merit.
Not that inexplicitness, or implicatum-status, as it were -- is bad, but that,
other things being equal, the more explicitness the better." "But now
it looks as if proper explicitness (or explicatum-status) is an Aristotelian
mean, or mesotes, and it would be good some time to enquire what determines
where that mean lies." "The burden of the foregoing observations
seems to me to be that the provisional account of reasoning, which has been
before us, leaves out something which is crucially important." "What
it leaves out is the conception of reasoning, as I like to see conversation, as
a purposive activity, as something with goals and purposes." "The
account or picture leaves out, in short, the connection of reasoning with the
will! Moreover, once we avail ourselves of the great family of additional ideas
which the importation of this conception would give us, we shall be able to
deal with the quandary which I laid before you a few minutes ago."
"For we could say (for example) that R reasons (informally) from p to c
just in case R thinks that p and intends that, in thinking c, he should be
thinking something which would be the conclusion of a formally valid argument
the premisses of which are a supplementation of p. This will differ from merely
thinking that there exists some formally valid supplementation of a transition
from p to c, which I felt inclined NOT to count as (or deem) reasoning. I have
some hopes that this appeal to the purposiveness or goal-oriented character of
authentic reasoning or good reasoning might be sufficient to dispose of the
quandary on which I have directed it. But I am by no means entirely confident
that this is the case, and so I offer a second possible method of handling the
quandary, one to which I shall return later when I shall attempt to place it in
a larger context. We have available to us (let us suppose) what I might call a
'hard way' of making inferential moves. We in fact employ this laborious,
step-by-step procedure at least when we are in difficulties, when the course is
not clear, when we have an awkward (or philosophical) audience, and so forth. An
inferential judgement, however, is a normally desirable undertaking for us only
because of its actual or hoped for destinations, and is therefore not desirable
for its own sake (a respect in which, possibly, it may differ from an
inferential capacity). Following the hard way consumes time and energy. These
are in limited supply and it would, therefore, be desirable if occasions for
employing the hard way were minimized. A substitute for the hard way, the quick
way, which is made possible by habituation and intention, is available to us,
and the capacity for it (which is sometimes called intelligence, and is known
to be variable in degree) is a desirable quality. The possibility of making a
good inferential step (there being one to be made), together with such items as
a particular inferer's reputation for inferential ability, may determine
whether on a particular occasion we suppose a particular transition to be
inferential (and so to be a case of reasoning) or not. On this account, it is
not essential that there should be a single supplementation of an informal
reasoning which is supposed to be what is overtly in the inferer's mind, though
quite often there may be special reasons for supposing this to be the case. So
Botvinnik is properly credited with a case of reasoning, while Shropshire is
not.
1977. Reason and reasons, Aspects of reason, Clarendon,
the second Kant lecture, The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California. Keywords: reason, reasons,
justificatory reason, explanatory reason, justificatory-cum-explanatory
reason. Drawing from his recollections of an earlier linguistic botany on
'reason' (Grice, 1966), Grice distinguishes between 'justificatory' reason and
'explanatory' reason. There is a special case of 'mixed' reason,
'explanatory-cum-justificatory.' The lecture can be seen as the way an exercise
that Austin took as 'taxonomic' can lead to explanatory adequacy, too!
1977. The boulomaic-doxastic divice, practical and alethic
reasons, Aspects of reason, Clarendon, the third Kant lecture, The H. P.
Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library. Keywords: practical
reason, alethic reason, protrepic, exhibitive. The boulomaic (or volitive)
is a part of the soul; so is the doxatic (or judicative). Grice plays with
co-relative operators: desirability versus probability. Grice invokes the
'exhibitive'/'protreptic' distinction he had introduced in the fifth William
James lecture, now applied to psychological attitudes themselves.
1977. The boulomaic-doxastic device, further remarks on practical and alethic reasons, Aspects of reason, Clarendon, the fourth Kant lecture, The H. P. Grice Papers, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: practical reason, alethic reason, counsel of prudence, categorical imperative, happiness, probability, desirability, modality. Grice's attempt is to tackle the Kantian problem in the Grundlegung: how to derive the categorical imperative from a counsel of prudence. Under the assumption that the protasis is "Let the agent be happy," Grice does not find it obtuse at all to construct a universalisable imperative out of a mere 'motive'-based counsel of prudence. Grice has an earlier paper on 'pleasure' which relates.
1977. The type-token distinction, form, type, and implication, The
H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 1, BANC MSS 90/135c,
The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keyword:
type-token distinction. Grice was not enamoured with the 'type'/'token' or
'token'/'type' distinction. His thoughts on 'logical form' were
provocative: "If you can't put it in logical form, it's not worth
saying." Strawson infamously reacted, but with a smile: "Oh, no!
If you CAN put it in logical form, it's not worth saying." Grice refers to
the type-token distinction when he uses “x” for ‘token’ and “X” for type. Since
J. F. Bennett cared to call Grice a “meaning-nominalist” we shouldn’t CARE
about “Xs” anyway! He expands on this in "Retrospective Epilogue."
1977. Philosophy,
carton 5-folders 14-15, Philosophy, miscellaneous, with J. Baker,
The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 8, folder 1, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: philosophy, Baker. Grice would give joint
seminars on philosophy with J. Baker. Oddly, Grice gives a nice example of
‘philosopher’ in 1967, “Addicted to general reflections about life.” In the
context where it occurs, Grice’s implicature is Stevensonian. If Stevenson had
said that an athlete is usually tall, a philosopher WILL occasionally be
inclined to reflect about life in general – a birrelist -! His other
definition: “Engaged in philosophical studies” seems circular. At least the
previous one defines philosophy by other than itself! Cfr. Quixote to Sancho:
“You are quite a philosopher” meaning ‘stoic,’ actually! Grice's idea of
philosophy was based on the the idea of philosophy that Lit. Hum. instills.
It's a unique experience! (unknown in the New World, our actually outside
Oxford, or post-Grice, where a 'classicist' is not seen as a serious
philosopher! Becoming a 'tutorial fellow in philosophy' and later 'university
lecturer in philosophy,' stressed his attachment. He had to been by this or
that pupil as a philosopher simpliciter (as oppoosed to a prof: the Waynflete
is seen as a metaphysician, the White is seen as moralist, the Wykeham is seen
as a logician, and the Wilde is seen as a philosophical psychologist! φιλοσοφ-ία , ἡ, A. love of knowledge, pursuit
there of, speculation, Isoc.12.209, Pl.Phd.61a, Grg. 484c,
al.; “ἡ φ. κτῆσις ἐπιστήμης” Id.Euthd.288d;
defined as ἄσκησις ἐπιτηδείου τέχνης, Stoic.
in Placit. 1 Prooem.2. 2. systematic, methodical
treatment of a subject, “ἐμπειρίᾳ μέτιθι καὶ φιλοσοφίᾳ” Isoc.2.35; ἡ περὶ τὰς ἔριδας φ. scientific
treatment of argumentation, Id.10.6; ἡ περὶ τοὺς λόγους φ. the study of
oratory, Id.4.10:
pl., “οἱ ἐν ταῖς φ. πολὺν χρόνον διατρίψαντες” Pl.Tht.172c;
“τέχναι καὶ φ.” Isoc.10.67. 3. philosophy, Id.11.22, Pl.Def.414b,
etc.; “ἱστορία φ. ἐστὶν ἐκ παραδειγμάτων” D.H.Rh.11.2:—Isoc. usu.
prefixes the Art., 2.51, 5.84, 7.45 (but
cf. 2.35 supr.);
sts. also in Pl. and Arist., as Pl.Grg.482a, Arist. Metaph.993b20, EN1177a25,
and so later, “διὰ τῆς φ. καὶ κενῆς ἀπάτης” Ep.Col.2.8;
but more freq. without Art., “τοῖς ἐν φιλοσοφίᾳ ζῶσιν” Pl. Phd.68c,
al., cf. Arist.Pol.1341b28,
al. (cf. “Πλάτων καὶ φ.” Plu.2.176d);
exc. when an Adj. or some qualifying word is added to “ἡ θεία φ.” Pl.Phdr.239b;
“ἐκείνου τῇ φ.” Id.Ly.213d;
“ἡ περὶ τὰ ἀνθρώπεια φ.” Arist.EN1181b15;
“ἡ τῶν Ἰταλικῶν φ.” Id.Metaph.987a31 (and
pl., αἱ εἰρημέναι φ. ib.29);
so later “ἡ Ἰωνικὴ φ.” D.L.1.122;
“ἡ δογματική, Ἀκαδημαϊκή, σκεπτικὴ φ.” S.E.P.1.4,
etc.; “ὁ Ἐμπεδοκλῆς ἐν ἀρχῇ τῆς φ.” Plu.2.607c,
etc.; esp. “ἡ πρώτη φ.” metaphysic, Arist.Metaph. 1026a24,
cf. 18.
Just one sense, but various ambiguities remain in "philosopher," as
per Grice's example "Grice is addicted to general speculations about
life," and "Grice is a member of The Oxford Philosophical Society.
1977. Freedom, teleology, and ethics, Hart on liberty,
Kantian, 1980, Kant's ethics, Aristotle's ethics, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
II (Essays), carton 2, folders 26, 27, and 28, Series III (The Doctrines), carton
5-folder 5-6, folders 8-9, folders 16-17, folders 27-28, and Series V
(Topical), carton 8-folders 16-17, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. P. G. R. I. C. E. cites “Kant’s
ethics,” and it is under this that most of Grice’s material on Kant should be
placed -- with a caveat to the occasional reference to Kant’s epistemology,
elsewhere. 1980. Aristotle's ethics, 1980, Aristotle's Nicomachean
Ethics" and "Aristotle's Ethics," keywords: Aristotle,
ethics. From Hardie. 1980. Freedom in
Kant's Grundlegung, freedom and morality in Kant's Grundlegung,
'Freedom and Morality in Kant's Foundations,' Keywords: Grundlegung, freedom,
autonomy, Kant, ethics. Why was Grice attracted to Kant's theory? First,
the logical analysis of the imperatives. Second, as he explored the
Grundlegung, the metaphysical foundation of freedom, and finality. While
teleology is usually NOT associated with Kant, Grice did! Grice would refer to
this, as Kantians do, as the Grundlegung. Grice was never happy with
'eleutheria,' qua Greek philosophical notion. "To literal to be true? By
"Foundations," Grice obviously means Kant's essay.Grice preferred to
quote Kant in English. The reason being that Grice was practising
"ordinary-language" philosophy; and you cannot expect much
'linguistic botany' in a language other than your own! Kant was not too
'ordinary' in his use of German, either! The English translations that
Grice used captured, in a way, all that Grice thought was worth capturing in
Kant's philosophy. Kant was not your 'standard' philosopher in the
programme Grice was familiar with: Lit. Hum. Oxon. However, Kant was
popular in The New World, where Grice lectured profusely. 1980. Kant's
ethics, Kant's Ethical Theory. An exploration of the categorial imperative and
its reduction to the hypothetical or suppositional one. 1980. KANT’S
ETHICS, Philosophy, Kant, With J. Baker. Notably the
categorical imperative. Cf. "Kant's Ethics.” The crucial belief
about a thing in itself that Kant thinks only practical reason can justify
concerns FREEDOM. Freedom is crucial because, on Kant’s view, any moral
appraisal presupposes that a human is free in that he has the ability to do otherwise.
To see why, consider Kant’s example of a man who commits a theft
(5:95ff.). Kant holds that for this man’s action to be morally wrong
(condemnable), it must have been within his voluntary control (he is deemed
responsible) in a way that it was within his power at the time NOT to have
committed the theft. If it is NOT within his control at the time, while
it may be useful to punish him in order to shape his behaviour or to influence
others, it nevertheless would be incorrect to say that his action is morally
wrong. Moral rightness and wrongness apply only to a free agent who
controls his action and has it in his power, at the time of his action, either
to act rightly or not. According to Kant and Grice, this is just common
sense. On these grounds, Kant rejects a type of compatibilism, which he calls
the “comparative concept of freedom” and associates with Leibniz. Kant has a
specific type of compatibilism in mind. There may be types of compatibilism
that do not fit Kant’s characterization of that view. On the compatibilist
view, as Kant understands it, an agent is free whenever the cause of his action
is within him. So an agent is not free only when something external to him
pushes or moves him, but he is free whenever the proximate cause of his body’s
movement is internal to him as an “acting being” (5:96). If we
distinguish between an involuntary convulsion and a voluntary bodily movement,
a free action is just a voluntary bodily movement. Kant and Grice ridicule
this view as a “wretched subterfuge” that tries to solve an ancient
philosophical problem "with a little quibbling about
words." This view, Kant and Grice say, assimilates freedom to “the
freedom of a turnspit,” or a projectile in flight, or the motion of a clock’s
hands (5:96–97). Grice's favourite phrase was the otiose English 'free
fall.' And he knew all the Grecian he needed to recognise the figurative
concept of 'eleutheria' as applied to 'ill' as "VERY FIGURATIVE, almost
implicatural!" The proximate cause of this movement is internal to the
turnspit, the projectile, and the clock at the time of the movement. This
cannot be sufficient for moral, rational responsibility. Why not? The
reason, Kant and Grice say, is ultimately that the cause of this movement
occurs in time. Return to the theft example. A compatibilist would say
that the thief’s action is free because its proximate cause is inside him, and
because the theft is not an involuntary convulsion but a voluntary
action. The thief decides to commit the theft, and his action flows from
this decision. According to Kant, however, if the thief’s DECISION is a
NATURAL phenomenon that occurs in time, it must be the effect of some cause
that occurred in a previous time. This is an essential part of Kant’s (if not
Grice's -- Grice quotes Eddington) Newtonian worldview and is grounded in the a
priori laws (specifically, the category of cause and effect) in accordance with
which our understanding constructs experience. Every event has a cause that
begins in an earlier time. If that cause too is an event occurring in
time, it must also have a cause beginning in a still earlier time, etc.
Every natural event occurs in time and is thoroughly determined by a causal
chain that stretches backwards into the distant past. So there is no room
for freedom in nature, which is deterministic in a strong way. The root of the
problem, for Kant, if not Grice, is time. For Grice it's SPACE and time!
Again, if the thief’s choice to commit the theft is a natural event in time, it
is the effect of a causal chain extending into the distant past. But the
past is out of his control now, in the present. Once the past is past, he
cannot change it. On Kant’s view, that is why his action would not be in
his control in the present if it is determined by events in the past.
Even if he could control those past events in the past, he cannot control them
now. But in fact past events were not in his control in the past either if they
too were determined by events in the more distant past, because eventually the
causal antecedents of his action stretch back before his birth, and obviously
events that occurred before his birth are not in his control. So if the
thief’s choice to commit the theft is a natural event in time, it is not now
and never was in his control, and he could not have done otherwise than to
commit the theft. In that case, it would be a mistake to hold him morally
responsible for it. Compatibilism, as Kant and Grice understand it, therefore
locates the issue in the wrong place. Even if the cause of the action is
internal to the agent, if it is in the past – e. g., if the action today is
determined by a decision the agent made yesterday, or from the character I
developed in childhood, it is not within the agent's control now. The real
issue is not whether the cause of the action is internal or external to the
agent, but whether it is in the agent's control now. For Kant, however, the
cause of action can be within the agent's control now only if it is not in
time. This is why Kant and Grice think that transcendental idealism is
the only way to make sense of the kind of freedom that morality
requires. For transcendental idealism allows that the cause of a action
may be a "thing in itself" outside of time: namely, the agetn's
noumenal self, which is free because it is not part of nature. No matter what
kind of character the agent have developed or what external influences act on
him, on Kant’s view every intentional, voluntary action is an immediate effect
of the agent's noumenal self, which is causally undetermined (5:97–98).
The agent's noumenal self is an uncaused cause outside of time, which therefore
is not subject to the deterministic laws of nature in accordance with which
understanding and pure reason constructs experience. Many puzzles arise on this
picture that Kant does not resolve, and Grice tries. E.g. if understanding
constructs every appearance in the experience of nature, not only an appearance
of an action, why is the agent responsible only for his action but not for
everything that happens in the natural world? Moreover, if I am not alone
in the world but there is another noumenal self acting freely and incorporating
his free action into the experience he constructs, how do two transcendentally
free agents interact? How do you integrate one's free action into the
experience that the other's understanding constructs? In spite of these
unsolved puzzles, Kant holds that we can make sense of moral appraisal and
responsibility only by thinking about human freedom in this way, because it is
the only way to prevent natural necessity from undermining both. Since Kant
invokes transcendental idealism to make sense of freedom, interpreting his
thinking about freedom leads us back to disputes between the two-objects and
two-aspects interpretations of transcendental idealism. On the face of
it, the two-*objects* interpretation seems to make better sense of Kant’s view
of transcendental freedom than the two-aspects interpretation. If morality
requires that the agent be transcendentally free, it seems that his true self,
and not just an aspect of his self, must be outside of time, according to
Kant’s argument. But applying the two-*objects* interpretation to freedom
raises problems of its own, since it involves making a distinction between the
noumenal self and the phenomenal self that does not arise on the two-aspects
view. If only one noumenal self is free, and freedom is required for moral
responsibility, one's *phenomenal* self is not morally responsible. But how are
the noumenal self and the phenomenal self related, and why is punishment
inflicted on the phenomenal self? It is unclear whether and to what extent
appealing to Kant’s theory of freedom can help to settle disputes about the
proper interpretation of transcendental idealism, since there are serious questions
about the coherence of Kant’s theory on either interpretation! "Which is
good," Grice would end his lecture with!
1978. Ethics of virtue, arête, virtus, vitium, Aristotle, virtue,
Philippa Foot on virtues and vices, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical),
carton 9-folder 29. Keywords: Philippa Foot, virtue, vice, virtue ethics,
virtus, vitium, arete, kakon, flourishing. Grice admired Foot's ability to
make the right conceptual distinction. Foot is following a very Oxonian
tradition best represented by the work of G. J. Warnock. Of course, Grice
was over-familiar with the 'virtue' vs. 'vice' distinction, since Hardie had
instilled it on him at Corpus! For Grice, 'virtue' and 'vice' (and the
mesotes), display an interesting 'logical' grammar, though. Grice would say
that 'rationality' is a virtue; fallacious reasoning is a vice. Some
things Grice takes more of a moral standpoint about. To cheat is neither
irrational nor unreasonble: just plain 'repulsive.' As such, it
would be a 'vice' -- mind not getting caught in its grip! Grice is concerned
with 'vice' in his account of 'akrasia' or 'incontinentia.' If agent A KNOWS
that doing x is 'virtuous,' yet decides to do ~x, which is 'vicious,' A is
being 'akratic.' For Grice, akratic behaviour applies both in the doxastic
and the boulomaic realm. And it is part of the philosopher's job to
elucidate the conceptual intricacies attached to it. 1. pf(A,!p) V
pr(A,p). 2. pf(A and B,!p) V pr(A and B,p). 3. pf(A and B and C, !p)
V pr(A and B and C, p). 4. pf(all things before pirot,!p) V pr(all things
before pirot,p). 5. pf(ATC,!p) V pb(ATC,p). 6. !p V |- p. 7.
Reasoning pirot wills !p V Reasoning pirot judges p.
1978. Onto-genesis, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V
(Topical), carton 9-folder 10, "Semantics of Children's
Language," BANC MSS 90/135c, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: semantics, children's language, ontogenesis, ontology,
phylogeny, developmental pragmatics, learning,
acquisition. Interesting in that he was always enquiring his children's
playmates: "Can a sweater be red and green all over? No stripes
allowed!"
1979. Proem to the John Locke Lectures, aspects of reason,
Clarendon, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Locke,
Locke scholarship, Locke lecture, Oxford, town and gown. Grice’s Town and Gown.
A special note, or rather, a very moving proem, on Grice's occasion of
delivering his lectures on 'Aspects of reason and reasoning' at Oxford as the
John Locke Memorial Lectures at Merton. Particularly apt in mentioning, with
humility, his having failed, *thrice* [sic] to obtain the John Locke
lectureship (Strawson did, at once!), but feeling safe under the ægis of
"that great English philosopher" (viz. Locke! always implicated,
never explicited) now. Grice starts the proem in a very moving, shall we say,
emotional, way: “I find it difficult to convey to you just how happy I am, and
how honoured I feel, in being invited to give these lectures.” Difficult, but
not impossible. “I think of this university and this city [it has a cathedral],
which were my home for thirty-six years, as my spiritual and intellectual
parents." The almost majestic plural is Grice's implicature to the 'town
and gown'! "[W]hatever I am was originally fashioned here;" I never
left Oxford, Oxford made me, "and I find it a moving experience to be,
within these splendid and none too ancient walls, once more engaged in my old
occupation of rendering what is clear obscure," by flouting the
desideratum of conversational clarity and the conversational maxim, 'avoid
obscurity of expression,' under 'be perspicuous [sic]!'. Grice's implicature on
"none too ancient" seems to be addressed to the TRULY ancient walls
that saw "Athenian dialectic"! On the other hand, Grice's funny
variant on the 'obscurum per obscurius' -- what G. P. Baker found as Grice’s
skill in rendering an orthodoxy into an heterodoxy! Almost! By 'clear' Grice
implicates Lewis and his 'clarity is not enough!'. “I am, at the same time,
proud of my mid-Atlantic [two-world] status, and am, therefore, delighted that
the Old World should have called me in, or rather recalled me, to redress, for
once, the balance of my having left her for the New.” His implicature seems to
be: “Strictly, I never left?” Grice concludes his proem: “I am, finally,
greatly heartened by my consciousness of the fact that that great English
philosopher, under whose ægis I am now speaking, has in the late afternoon of
my days extended to me his Lectureship as a gracious consolation for a record
threefold denied to me, in my early morning, of his Prize. I pray that my
present offerings may find greater favour in his sight than did those of long
ago.” They did! Even if Locke surely might have found favour to Grice’s former
offerings, too, I'm sure!
1980. Correspondence with R. Wyatt, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series I (The Correspondence of H. P. Grice), carton 1-folders
10-12, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords:
Grice, Wyatt.
1980. Mentalism, modest mentalism, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
III (Doctrines), carton 5-folder 30, BANC, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: mentalism, philosophical
psychology. Grice would seldom use 'mind' (Grecian 'nous') or 'mental'
(Grecian 'noetikos' vs. 'æsthetikos'). His sympathies go for more over-arching
Grecian terms like the very Aristotelian 'soul,' (anima), i. e. the psyche and
the psychological.
1980. From Zeno to Socrates, topics for pursuit, Zeno, Socrates, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III (The Doctrines), carton 5, folder 31, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Zeno, Socrates. Grice's review of the history of philosophy ("Philosophy is but footnotes to Zeno.")
1980. Semantics, phonetics, syntax, and semantics, with J. F. Staal, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III (The Doctrines), carton 6-folders 1-2, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: semantics. Staal is particularly good at this type of 'formalistic' philosophy, which was still adequate to reflect the subtleties of 'ordinary language.
1980. Pirotese, Pirots, basic Pirotese, sentence semantics and syntax, pirots and obbles, methodology, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 8-folders 30-33, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: pirot, pirotese, pirotology, semantics, syntax, obble, creature construction, the genitorial programme. It all started when Carnap claimed to know that pirots karulise elatically. Grice as engineer. Pirotese is the philosopher's engaging in pirotology. Actually, pirotese is the lingo the pirots parrot. "Pirots karulise elatically." But not all of them. Grice finds that the pirotological talk allows to start from zero. He is constructing a language, "(basic) Pirotese," and the philosophical psychology and world that that language is supposed to represent or denote. An obble is a pirot's object. Grice introduces potching and cotching. To potch, in Pirotese, is what a pirot does with an obble: he perceives it. To cotch is Pirotese for what a pirot can further do with an obble: know or cognise it. Cotching, unlike potching, is factive.
1980. Semantics, language semantics, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 20, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: semantics, Tarski. Language semantics, alla Tarski.
1980. A philosopher's prospectus, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series II (Essays), carton 4-folder 14, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: prospectus.
1980. A seminar with Grice, seminar, Grice seminar, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series IV (Doctrines), carton 5-folders 2 and 8, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
1980. A philosophical talk, Philosophy, with J. Baker, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series IV (Associations), carton 5-folders 3-4, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
1980. “Amicus,” Kantotle, friendship, Aristotle, Aristotle's Ethica Nichomachæa, Aristotle's ethics, Aristotle on friendship, aporia, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 5- folder 7, and carton 6-folder 16-18, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Aristotle, ethics. Grice was 'very fortunate' to have Hardie as his tutor. He overused Hardie's lectures on Aristotle, too, and instilled them on his own tutees! Keywords: Aristotle, friendship. Grice is concerned with Aristotle's rather cryptic view of the friend (philos, amicus) as the 'alter ego.' In Grice's cooperative, concerted, view of things, a friend in need is a friend indeed! Grice is interested in Aristotle finding himself in an aporia. In Nicomachean Ethics IX.ix, Aristotle poses the question whether the happy man will need friends or not. Kosman correctly identifies this question as asking not whether friends are necessary in order to achieve eudæmonia, but "why we require friends even when we are happy." The question is not why we need friends to become happy, but why we need friends when we are happy, since the eudæmon must be self-sufficient. Philia is required for the flourishing of the life of practical virtue. Aristotle’s solution to the aporia here, however, points to the requirement of friendships even for the philosopher, in his life of theoretical virtue. Aristotle’s solution to the aporia in Nicomachean Ethics IX.ix is opaque, and the corresponding passage in Eudeiman Ethics VII.xii is scarcely better. Aristotle thinks he has found the solution to this aporia. "We must take two things into consideration, that life is desirable and also that the good is, and thence that it is desirable that such a nature should belong to oneself as it belongs to them. If then, of such a pair of corresponding series there is always one series of the desirable, and the known and the perceived are in general constituted by their participation in the nature of the determined, so that to wish to perceive one’s self is to wish oneself to be of a certain definite character,—since, then we are not in ourselves possessed of each such characters, but only in participation in these qualities in perceiving and knowing—for the perceiver becomes perceived in that way in respect in which he first perceives, and according to the way in which and the object which he perceives; and the knower becomes known in the same way— therefore it is for this reason that one always desires to live, because one always desires to know; and this is because he himself wishes to be the object known."
1967. The desideratum of conversational candour, trust and rationality, rationality and trust, trust, trust, metaphysics, and value, with J. Baker, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folders 5 and 20, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: trust, rationality. Trust and rationality are pre-requisites of conversation. Cf. Grice's desideratum of conversational candour, subsumed under the over-arching principle of conversational helpfulness (formerly 'conversational benevolence-cum-self-interest'). Grice thinks that the principle of conversational benevolence has to be weighed against the principle of conversational self-interest. The result is the overarching principle of conversational helpfulness. Clarity gets in the picture. The desideratum of conversational clarity is a reasonable requirement for conversants to abide by. Grice follows some of Warnock's observations. The logical grammar of 'trust' (and indeed 'candour') is subtle, especially when we are considering the two sub-goals of conversation: giving and receiving information/influencing and being influenced by others. In both sub-goals, trust is paramount. The explorations of trust had become an Oxonian hobby, with authors not such like Warnock, but B. A. O. Williams, and others. Keywords: trust, metaphysics, value. Trust as a corollary of the principle of conversational helpfulness. The logical grammar of 'trust' is an interesting one. Grice used to speak of 'candour.' In a given conversational setting, assuming the principle of conversational helpfulness is operating, the utterer U is assumed by the addressee A to be 'trustworthy.' There are two dimensions for trust, which relate to the TWO goals which Grice assumes the principle of conversational helpfulness captures: -- giving and receiving information, and influencing and being influenced by others. In both sub-goals, trust is key. In the doxastic realm, trust has to do, not so much with 'truth' (with which the expression is cognate) but 'evidence.' In the boulomaic realm, 'evidence' becomes less crucial. Grice mentions attitudes of the boulomaic type that are not usually judged in terms of evidential support. However, in the 'boulomaic' realm, utterer will be assumed as 'trustworthy' if the conative attitudes he displays are 'sincere.' Cf. 'decency.' A cheater for Grice is not 'irrational,' just repugnant!
1980. Philosophical psychology, needing, wanting, willing,
intending, wants and needs, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton
9-folders 30-31, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keywords: want, need, wanting, needing,
philosophical psychology, soul. "Want" etymologically means
"absence;" "need" should be preferred. The squarrel
(squirrel) Toby NEEDS intake of nuts, and you'll soon see gobbling them! There
is not much philosophical bibliography on these two 'psychological states'
Grice is analysing. Their logic is interesting: (i) Smith wants to play
cricket. (ii) Smith NEEDS to play cricket. Grice is concerned
with the propositional content attached to the 'want' and 'need'
predicate. "Wants that" sounds harsh; so does "need
that." Still, there are propositional attached to (i) and (ii):
"Smith plays cricket." Grice took a very cavalier attitude to
what linguists spend their lives analysing. He thought it was surely NOT
the job of the philosopher, especially from a prestigious university such as
Oxford, to deal with the arbitrariness of grammatical knots attached to this or
that English verb. He rarely used "English," but stuck with 'ordinary
language.' Surely, he saw himself in the tradition of Kantotle, and so,
aiming at grand philosophical truths: not conventions of usage, even his
own! 1. Squarrel Toby has a nut, N, in front of him. 2. Toby is short on
squarrel food (observed or assumed), so, 3. Toby wills squarrel food (by
postulate of Folk Pyschological Theory θ connecting willing with
intake of N). 4. Toby prehends a nut as in front (from (1) by Postulate of Folk
Psychological Theory θ, if it is assumed that "nut" and "in
front" are familiar to Toby). 5. Toby joins squarrel food with gobbling,
nut, and in front (i.e. Toby judges gobbling, on nut in front, for squarrel
food (by Postulate of Folk Psychological Theory θ with the aid of
prior observation. So, from 3, 4 and 5, 6. Tobby gobbles; and since a nut *is*
in front of him, gobbles the nut in front of him.
1980. Diagoge/epagoge, Grice's audio-files, the audio-files,
audio-files of various lectures and conferences, some seminars with R. O.
Warner and J. Baker, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series IV (Associations), Audio
files of various lectures and conferences, carton 10 -- No folders -- BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: epagoge, diagoge. A previous folder in the collection contains
the transcripts. These are the audio-tapes themselves, obviously not in
folders. “The kind of metaphysical argument which I have in mind might be
said, perhaps, to exemplify a ‘dia-gogic’ as opposed to ‘epa-gogic’ or
inductive approach to philosophical argumentation.” “Now, the more
emphasis is placed on justification by elimination of the rival, the greater is
the impetus given to refutation, whether of theses or of people.” “And
perhaps a greater emphasis on a ‘dia-gogic’ procedure, if it could be shown to
be justifiable, would have an eirenic effect.”
1980. Semantics, sentence semantics, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 11, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Truth-conditional, constructivist. While Grice is NOT concerned about the 'semantics' of utterer's meaning (how could he, when he analyses '... means ...' in terms of '... intends ...', he *is* about the semantics of SENTENCE meaning. Grice's second stage ('expression' meaing) of his programme about meaning begins with specifications of 'means' as applied to 'x,' a token of 'X.' He is having Tarski's and Davidson's elaborations of schemata like “"p" means that p.” "Snow is white" means that snow is white, and stuff! Grice was especially concerned with combinatories, for both unary and dyadic operators, and with multiple quantifications within a first-order predicate calculus with identity.
1980. Propositions as classes of propositional complexes, Proposition and propositional complex, sentence semantics and propositional complexes, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 12, BANC MSS 90/135c, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: propositional complex. Grice's propositional complex. Grice was keen on the concept of a 'propositional complex,' which allowed him NOT to commit to the abstract entity of a 'proposition,' if the latter is regarded as an extensional family of 'propositional complexes' (Paul saw Peter; Peter was seen by Paul). The topic of a propositional complex was one that Grice regarded as Oxonian in nature. C. A. B. Peacocke had struggled with the same type of problems, in his various essays on the theory of content. Only a perception-based account of content in terms of 'qualia' gets the philosopher out of the vicious circle of introducing linguistic entities to clarify psychological entities and vice versa. One way to discharge the obligation to give an account of a proposition is would involve, as its central idea, focusing on a primitive range of ‘simple’ statements, the formulation of which would involve no connective or quantifier, and treating each of these as ‘expressing’ a ‘propositional complex,’ which in such cases would consist of a sequence whose elements would be, first, a general item (a set or an attribute, according to preference) and, second, an ordered sequence of objects which might, or might not, instantiate or belong to the first item.”“The propositional complex associated with the sentence, ‘Grice is wise,’ might be thought of consisting of a sequence whose first ('general') member would be the set of wise persons, or (alternatively) the attribute wisdom, and whose second ('instantial' or 'particular') member would be Grice or the singleton of Grice; and the sentence, 'Strawson loves Grice', could be represented as expressing a propositional complex which is a sequence whose first element is love (considered either extensionally as a set or non-extensionally as an attribute) and whose second element is a sequence composed of Strawson and Grice, in that order.”“We can define a property of ‘factivity’ or ‘alethic satisfactoriness’ which will be closely allied to the notion of truth.”“A (simple) propositional complex will be factive or alethically satisfactory just in case its two elements (the general and instantial elements) are related by the appopriate predication relation, just in case (for example) the second element is a member of the set (possesses the attribute) in which the first element consists.”“A proposition may now, alla Chomsky, be represented as each consisting of a family of propositional complexes.”“The conditions for family unity may be thought of either as fixed or as variable in accordance with the context.”Grice's ontological views are-at least-liberal. As Grice says when commenting on the mind-body problem in 'Method in Philosophical Psychology', I am not greatly enamoured of some of the motivations which prompt the advocacy of psychophysical identifications; I have in mind a concern to exclude such 'queer' or 'mysterious' entities as souls, purely mental events, purely mental properties and so forth. My taste is for keeping open house for all sorts of conditions of entities, just so long as when they come in they help with the housework. Provided that I can see them work, and provided that they are not detected in illicit logical behaviour (within which I do not include a certain degree of indeterminacy, not even of numerical indeterminacy), I do not find them queer or mysterious at all. To fangle a new ontological Marxism, they work therefore they exist, even though only some, perhaps those who come on the recommendation of some form of transcendental argument, may qualify for the specially favoured status of entia realissima. To exclude honest working entities seems to me like metaphysical snobbery, a reluctance to be seen in the company of any but the best objects. [ 197 5, pp, 30-31.] One way entities can work is by playing a role in the explanation of what a proposition is. What would such an explanation look like? And, what sorts of entities would it put to work? Answering these questions will illustrate Grice's 'ontological Marxism' while clarifying the notion of a proposition. What work do the entities in a theory of propositions do? They are to produce a theory meeting three constraints. First, there are systematic relations between sentences and propositions. For example, the sentence 'Socrates runs' is correlated with the proposition that Socrates runs; the sentence 'snow is white' with the proposition that snow is white, and so on. There are two determinants of the proposition (or propositions) to which a sentence is related. One is the syntactic form of the sentence. The sentences 'Clearly, John spoke' and 'John spoke clearly' are related to different propositions by virtue of the different syntactic relations among their respective parts. The other determinant is the meaning of the parts of the sentence. The sentence 'snow is white' is correlated with the propositions that snow is white in part because 'snow' means what it does. On Grice's theory this correlation between sentences and propositions is effected by language-users resultant procedures. An adequate theory of propositions shoul explicitly characterize this systematic relation between sentences and propositions. Since there are infinitely many sentences, one would presumably give such a characterization recursively. The second constraint is that an account of what a proposition is should yield an adequate account of the relation of logical consequence that we exploit in everyday psychological explanation. For example, if you, by uttering an appropriate sentence, mean that you know the route and that Jones does as well, your audience may conclude that Jones knows the route. The conclusion, the proposition that Jones knows the route, is a logical consequence of the conjunctive proposition that you know the route and that Jones does as well. Given the assumption that you are trustworthy, your audience is entitled to the conclusion precisely because it is a logical consequence of the proposition you mean. We frequently exploit such relations of logical consequence in everyday psychological explanation, and an adequate theory of propositions should provide us with an adequate characterization of this relation. One may think (as we do) that this task is not really distinct from exhibiting the systematic relations between sentences and propositions, but it is worth stating the second constraint separately to emphasize the role of logical consequence in psychological explanation, and hence the relation of a theory of propositions to such explanation. The third constraint is that a theory of propositions should provide the basis, at least, for an adequate account of the relation between thought, action, and language on the one hand, and reality on the other. For example, one perceives the desk, walks over to sit at it, and utters sentences to mean things about it. Since propositions are the items we specify in specifying the content of a thought, perception, intention, act of meaning, and so on, an account of propositions should at least provide the basis for an account of the relation between mind and reality. Since Quine is the philosopher most generally associated with the rejection of propositions, it may be helpful briefly to compare his views with Grice's. Quine has two main arguments against propositions. The first is based on his arguments that synonomy is not a well-defined equivalence relation, the identity conditions for propositions are unclear and there is 'no entity without identity' (See, for example, W. V. Quine, Philosophy of Logic, Prentice-Hall, 1970, pp. 2-10). On this issue, Grice is not committed to an equivalence relation of synonomy (thus his remark about indeterminacy) but he parts company with Quine over whether clear identity conditions are required for a kind of entity. If they work they exist, whether we can always tell them apart or count them or not. There are many respectable entities for which we do not have criteria of identity. Suppose Grice's favourite restaurant moves. Is it a new restaurant with the same name? Or suppose it changes owners and names but nothing else. Or that it changes menu entirely? Or that it changes chefs? It would be foolish to look for a single criterion to answer these questions -- the answers go different ways in different contexts. But surely the concept of a restaurant is a useful one and restaurants do exist. Quine's second objection is that propositions do not work. Grice denies this allegation. The main reason for disagreement is perhaps due to Quine's attitude that concepts such as desire and belief are of, at most, secondary importance in the unified canonical science that is his standard for ontology. Grice does not believe that everyday psychological discourse is a temporary pre-scientific expedient to be done away with as soon as possible. On the contrary, Grice believes that at least some psychological concepts and explanations play a fundamental role in both semantics and ethics. To quote the relevant passage a second time: The psychological theory which I envisage would be deficient as a theory to explain behaviour if it did not contain provision for interests in the ascription of psychological states otherwise than as tools for explaining and predicting behaviour, interests (for example) on the part of one creature to be able to ascribe these rather than those psychological states to another creature because of a concern for the other creature. Within such a theory it should be possible to derive strong motivations on the part of the creatures subject to the theory against the abandonment of the central concepts of the theory (and so of the theory itself), motivations which the creatures would (or should) regard as justified. Indeed, only from within the framework of such a theory, I think, can matters of evaluation, and so, of the evaluation of modes of explanation, be raised at all. If I conjecture aright, then, the entrenched system contains the materials needed to justify its own entrenchment; whereas no rival system contains a basis for the justification of anything at all (1975b, 52). Now suppose -- as Grice thinks -- certain ways of thinking, certain CATEGORIES, are part of what is entrenched: there are certain concepts or categories that we CANNOT AVOID applying to reality. The entities in these categories are ENTIA REALISSIMA. We discover these categories by discovering what parts of everyday psychology are entrenched. The idea that there are necessary categories plays a role in Grice's views about ethics; in discussing this views we see why certain principles of everyday psychology are self-justifying, principles connected with the evaluation of ends. If THESE SAME principles played a role in determining what we count as ENTIA REALISSIMA, metaphysics would be grounded in part in considerations about value (a not unpleasant project).
1980. Rationality and akrasia, emotion and akrasia, emotions and
incontinence, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 32,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: akrasia, emotion. The concept of 'emotion' needs a philosophical
elucidation. Grice was curious about a linguistic botany for that! Akrasia for
Grice covers both boulomaic and doxastic versions. The boulomaic version may be
closer to the concept of an emotion. Grice quotes from A. J. P. Kenny's essay
on "emotion." But Grice is looking for more of a linguistic botany. As
it happens, Kenny's essay has Griceian implicata. Kenny was a Fellow of St.
Benet's, and completed his essay on emotion under A. M. Quinton (who would
occasionally give seminars with Grice), and examined by two members of Grice's
Play Group: D. F. Pears and P. L. Gardiner. Kenny connects an emotion to a
'feeling,' which brings us to Grice on 'feeling boringly byzantine'! Grice
proposes a derivation of akrasia in conditional steps for both boulomaic and
doxastic akrasia.
1980. Trust, decency, and rationality, Rationality, trust, and
decency, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 18, BANC,
MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library. Keywords: trust, decency,
rationality. Grice's idea of 'decency' is connected to his explorations on
'rational' and 'reasonable'. To cheat may be neither unreasonable nor
rational. It's just repulsive! Indecent, in other words. In all
this, Grice is concerned with 'ordinary language,' and treasures Austin's
question to Warnock (when Warnock was looking for a fellowship at Austin's
college): "Warnock: what would you say the difference is between (i)
and (ii)?" i. Smith plays cricket rather properly. ii. Smith
plays cricket rather incorrectly. "They spent the whole dinner over
such subtleties!" "And Warnock fell in love with
Austin." Grice's explorations on 'trust' are Warnockian in character
too. For Warnock, in "Object of morality," trust is key, indeed, the
very object of morality. Grice started to focus on trust in his Oxford seminars
on the implicatum. There is a desideratum of conversational candour. And a
subgoal of the principle of conversational helpfulness is that of giving and
receiving 'information.' "False 'information' is just no
information." Grice loved that Latin dictum, "tuus candor."
1980. In the tradition of Kantotle, Kantotle, Immanuel Kant, Kant,
Kant's ethics, Kant, mid-sentences, freedom, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III
(The Doctrines), carton 5-folders 14-18, and Series V (Topical), carton 7-folders
14-18, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: Kant, freedom, ethics. Grice was especially
concerned with Kant's having brought back the old Greek idea of 'eleutheria'
for philosophical discussion.
1980. Philosophy, lectures, Berkeley group, team notes, The
H. P. Grice Papers, Series III (The doctrines), carton 5-folder 26, and Series
V (Topical), carton 6-folder 21, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: philosophy
1980. Kant's ethics, Kant, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III
(The Doctrines), carton 5-folders 19-21, and folder 23, BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Kant,
ethics. Grice knew how to teach ethics. He taught Kant as if he were
teaching Aristotle, and vice versa. His students would say, "Here come
[sic] Kantotle!" Grice was obsessed with Kantotle. He would teach one or
the other as an ethics requirement. Back at Oxford, the emphasis was of course
Aristotle, but he was aware of some trends to introduce Kant in the Lit.Hum.
curriculum, not with much success! Strawson had done his share with Kant's
"pure" reason in "The bounds of sense," but White
professors of moral philosophy were usually not too keen on Kant's
"pratical" reason!
1980. Metaphysics and the language of philosophy, The H. P.
Grice Papers, Series III (Doctrines), carton 5-folder 24, BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords:
metaphysics, philosophical method. Grice had been interested in the methodology
of 'metaphysics' since his Oxford days. He counts as one memorable
experience in the area his participation in two episodes for the BBC Third
Programme on "The nature of metaphysics" with the organiser, D. F.
Pears, and his former tutee, P. F. Strawson on the panel. Grice was
particularly keen on Collingwood's views on metaphysical presuppositions,
"both absolute and relative!" Grice also considers John Wisdom’s
view of the metaphysical proposition as a ‘blatant falsehood.’ Grice considers Bradley’s
Hegelian metaphysics of the absolute, in “Appearance and reality.”
1980. Freedom, implicature-free, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series III (The Doctrines), carton 5-folder 25, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library. Keywords: freedom, Kant, implicature'free. The topic of 'freedom'
fascinated Grice, because it merged the practical with the theoretical.
Grice sees the conception of freedom as crucial in his elucidation of a
rational being. "Conditions of freedom" are necessary for the very
idea, as Kant was well aware. "A thief who is FORCED to steal is just a
'thief'." Grice would engage in a bit of language botany, when exploring
the ways the adjective 'free' is used, 'freely,' in 'ordinary language': 'free
fall,' 'alcohol-free,' 'sugar-free,' and his favourite: 'implicature-free.'
Grice's more systematic reflections deal with 'pirotology, or 'creature
construction'. A vegetals, for example is less free than an animal, but more
free than a stone! And Humans are more free than non-human. Grice wants to deal
with some of the paradoxes identified by Kant about freedom, and he succeeds in
solving some of them. There is a section on freedom in "Action and
events" for The Pacific Philosophical Quarterly where he expands on
'eleutheria' and notes the idiocy of a phrase like 'free fall.' Grice was
irritated by the fact that his friend H. L. A. Hart wrote an essay on liberty
and not on freedom.
1980. Grice's Frege, Frege, Words, and Sentences, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 2, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Frege, Farbung, aber. Frege was one of Grice's obsessions. A Fregeian sense is an explicatum, or implicitum, a concession to get his principle of conversational helpfulness working in the generation of conversational implicata, that can only mean progress for philosophy! "Fregeian senses are not to be multiplied beyond necessity." The employment of the routine of Humeian projection may be expected to deliver for us, as its result, a concept – the concept(ion) of value, say, in something like a Fregeian ‘sense,’ rather than an object. There is also a strong affinity between Frege's treatment of 'colouring' (of the German particle "aber," say) and Grice's idea of a convetional implicatum ("She was poor, BUT she was honest,/and her parents were the same,/till she met a city feller,/and she lost her honest name," as the vulgar Great War ditty went). Grice does not seem interested in providing a philosophical exploration of conventional implicata, and there is a reason for this. Conventional implicata are NOT essentially connected, as conversational implicata are, with RATIONALITY. Conventional implicata CANNOT be 'calculable.' They have less of a philosophical interest, too, in that they are NOT cancellable. Grice sees cancellability as a way to prove some (contemporary to him, if dated) "ordinary-language" philosophers who analyse an expression in terms of 'sense' and 'entailment,' where a cancellable conversational implicatum is all there is (to it). He mentions B. S. Benjamin in "Prolegomena" (and is very careful in noting how Benjamin misuses a Fregeian sense. In his "Causal Theory," Grice lists another mistake: "What is known to be the case is not believed to be the case." Grice gives pretty few example of a conventional implicatum: 'therefore,' as in Jill's utterance: "Jack is an Englishman; he is, therefore, brave." This is interesting because "therefore" compares to "so" which P. F. Strawson, in P. G. R. I. C. E., claims is the ASSERTED counterpart to "if." But Strawson was never associated with the type of linguistic botany that Grice was. Grice also mentions the idiom, "on the one hand/on the other hand," in some detail in "Retrospective Epilogue": "My aunt was a nurse in the Great War; my sister, on the other hand, lives on a peak at Darien." Grice thought that Frege had misused the use-mention distinction between Russell corrected that (Grice bases this on Alonzo Church).
1980. Kant's Grundlegung, Kant's Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Ethics, Kant's foundation of the metaphysics of morals, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7, folders 3-4, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keyword: Grundlegung. While Grice can't read Kant in German, he uses the English vernacular. Note the archaic 'metaphysic' sic in singular. More Kant.
1980. Semantics, grammar and semantics, with R. O. Warner, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 5, BANC MSS 90/135c The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Truth-conditional semantics and implicata.
1980. Causa finalis, to telos, finis, Teleology and unified science, teleology, the unity of science and teleology, unity of science and teleology, Hands Across the Bay and Beanfest, value, metaphysics, and teleology, finality, final cause (telos-aitia), with A. D. Code, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series IV (Associations), carton 6-folder 9, and Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 38 and carton 9-folder 23, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: unity of science, teleology, unified science, value, metaphysics, telos, finality, mechanism, final cause (telos-aitia), Code. Grice’s métier. "Unity of science" was a very "New-World" expression that Grice did not quite buy. Grice was brought up in a world, the "Old World," indeed, as he calls it in his "Proem" to the John Locke lectures, of C. P. Snow's 'two cultures.' At the time of Grice's philosophising, philosophers such as Peter Winch (who indeed quotes fro Grice) were contesting the idea that science is unitary, when it comes to the explanation of rational behaviour. Since a philosophical approach to the explanation of rational behaviour, including conversational behaviour (to account for the conversational implicata) is his priority, Grice needs to distinguish himself from those who propose a 'unified' science, which Grice regards as eliminationist and reductionist. Grice is ambivalent about 'science' and also playful ("philosophia regina scientiarum"). Grice seems to presuppose, or implicate, that, since there is the devil of scientism, science cannot get at teleology. The devil is in the physiological details, which are irrelevant. The language Grice uses to describe his pirots as goal-oriented, aimed at survival and reproduction, seems 'teleological' and somewhat 'scientific,' though. But he means that ironically! As the scholastics use it, 'teleology' is a science, the science of 'telos,' or finality (cf. Aristotle on 'telos aitia,' causa finalis. The unity of science is threatened by teleology, and vice versa. Unified science seeks for a 'mechanistically derivable' teleology. But Grice's sympathies lie for 'detached' finality. Grice is obsessed with the Greek idea of a 'telos,' as "slightly overused" by Aristotle. Grice thinks that some actions are 'for their own sake.' "What is the telos of Oscar Wilde?" "Can we speak of Oscar Wilde's métier?" If a tiger is to tigerise, a human is to humanise, and a person is to personise. Grice thought that teleology is a key philosophical way to contest mechanism, so popular in The New World. Strictly, and Grice knew this, 'teleology' is constituted as a 'discipline.' "One term that Cicero was unable to translate!" For the philosopher, 'teleology' is that part of philosophy that studies the realm of the 'telos.' Informally, 'teleological' is opposed to 'mechanistic'. Grice is interested in the mechanism/teleology debate, indeed jumps into it, with a goal in mind! Grice finds some New-World philosophers too mechanistic-oriented, in contrast with the more 'two-culture' atmosphere he was familiar with at Oxford! Code is the Aristotelian, and he and Grice are especially concerned in the idea of 'causa finalis.' For Grice only detached finality poses a threat to Mechanism, as it should!
1980. Benevolentia, metaphysics and ill-will, malevolentia,
The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 28. Keyword:
Ill-will, goodwilll. A conceptual elucidation. Interesting from a historical
point of view seeing that Grice had introduced a principle of conversational
benevolence (i.e. conversational goodwill) as early as 1964! Malevolentia was
over-used by Cicero, translating the Grecian.
1980. Myth, method and myth, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V
(Topical), carton 7-folder 30, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: myth, method. 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 Plato's "Athenian" (strictly,
"Academic") "dialectic." Indeed, there is some resemblance
between Plato's and Grice's use of 'myth' for philosophical methodological
purposes. Grice especially enjoyed a 'myth' in his programme in philosophical
psychology. In this, he was very much being a philosopher. Non-philosophers
usually criticise this methodological use of a 'myth,' but they would, wouldn't
they?
1980. Philosophy, conferences, discussion, The American
Philosophical Association, transcripts by Randall Parker, from the audio-tapes
contained in carton 10 within the same series IV (Associations), miscellaneous,
Beanfest, transcripts and audio-cassettes, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series IV
(Associations), carton 6-folder 8, and folder 10, and Series V (Topical),
carton 8-folders 4-8, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Unfortunately, Parker typed ‘carulise’ for
‘karulise.’ Or not.
1980. Theory-theory, metaphysics and theorising, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series II (The Essays), carton 4-folders 3-4, Series III (The
Doctrines), carton 5-folder 31, and Series V (Topical), carton 7-folder 29, and
carton 9-folder 14, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: metaphysics,
theorising, theory-theory, eschatology, Plato, Socrates,
Thrasymachus. Grice was keen to theorise on theorising. He thought
that Aristotle's 'first philosophy' (prote philosophia) is best rendered as
"Theory-theory"! Grice kept using Oxonian English spelling,
'theorising,' except when he did not! Grice calls himself 'folksy': his
theories, even if subject to various types of Ramseyfication, are 'popular' in
kind! And ceteris paribus! Metaphysical construction is disciplined
and the best theorising the philosopher can hope for! The way Grice
conceives of his “Theory-theory” is interesting to revisit. A route by which
Grice hopes to show the centrality of metaphysics (as 'prote philosophia')
involves taking seriously a few ideas. If any region of enquiry is to be
successful as a rational enterprise, its deliverance must be
expressable in the shape of one or another of the possibly different types of
theory. A characterisation of the nature and range of a possible kind of
theory θ is needed. Such a body of characterisation must itself
be the outcome of rational enquiry, and so must itself exemplify
whatever requirement it lays down for any theory θ in
general. The characterisation must itself be
expressible as a theory θ, to be called ("if you
like," Grice politely puts it!) “theory-theory,” or meta-theory, θ2.
Now, the specification and justification of the ideas and material presupposed
by any theory θ, whether such account falls within the bounds of
Theory-theory, θ2 would be properly called 'prote philosophia'
('first philosophy') and may turn out to relate to what is generally accepted
as belonging to the subject matter of metaphysics. It might, for example,
turn out to be establishable that any theory θ has to relate to a
certain range of this or that subject item, has to attribute to each item this
or that predicate or attribute, which in turn has to fall within one or another
of the range of types or categories. In this way, the enquiry might lead
to recognised metaphysical topics, such as the nature of being, its range of
application, the nature of predication and a systematic account of
categories. 1980. Metaphysics, philosophical eschatology, and Plato's
Republic, Thrasymachus, social justice, Socrates, along with notes on Zeno, and
topics for pursuit, repr.in Part II, Explorations in semantics and metaphysics
to Studies in the Way of Words. Keywords: metaphysics, philosophical
eschatology, Plato's Republic, Socrates, Thrasymachus, justice, moral right,
legal right, Athenian dialectic. Philosophical eschatology is a sub-discipline
of metaphysics concerned with what Grice calls a 'category shift.' Grice,
having applied such a technique to Aristotle's aporia on 'philos' ('friend') as
alter ego, uses it now to tackle Socrates's view, against Thrasymachus, that
'right' applies primarily to 'morality,' and secondarily to 'legality.' Grice
has a specific reason to include this in his “Studies in the Way of Words.”
Grice’s exegesis of Plato on justice displays Grice's take on the fact that
metaphysics needs to be subdivided into ontology proper and what he calls
'philosophical eschatology,' for the study of things like 'category shift’ and
other construction routines. The exploration of Plato’s “Politeia” thus becomes
an application of Grice’s philosophically eschatological approach to the item
'just,' as used by Socrates ('morally just') and Thrasymachus ('legally just').
Grice has one specific essay on Aristotle (published in The Pacific
Philosophical Quarterly). So he thought Plato merited his own essay, too!
Grice's focus is on Plato's exploration of 'dike.' Grice is concerned with a
neo-Socratic (versus neo-Thrasymachean) account of 'moral' justice as
conceptually (or axiologically) prior to 'legal' justice. In the proceeding, he
creates 'philosophical eschatology' as the OTHER branch to metaphysics, along with
good ol' ontology. To say that 'just' crosses a categorial barrier (from
the moral to the legal) is to make a metaphysical, strictly eschatological,
pronouncement. The Grice Papers locate the Plato essay in Series II, the
Socrates essay in Series III, and the Thrasymachus essay, under 'social
justice,' in Series V. Grice is well aware that in his account of 'fairness,'
Rawls makes use of his ideas on 'personal identity.' The philosophical
elucidation of 'fairness' is of great concern for Grice. He had been in touch
with such explorations as Nozick’s and Nagel’s along anti-Rawlsian lines.
Grice's ideas on rationality guide his exploration of 'social justice.' Grice
keeps revising the 'Socrates' notes. The Plato essay he actually dates 1988. As
it happens, Grice's most extensive published account of Socrates is in this
commentary on Plato's Republic: a 'eschatological' commentary, as he puts it.
In an entertaining fashion, Grice has Socrates, and neo-Socrates, exploring the
logic and grammar of 'just' against the attack by Thrasymachus and
neo-Thrasymachus. Grice's point is that, while the legal 'just' may be
conceptually PRIOR to the moral 'just,' the moral 'just' is evaluationally or
axiologically prior.
1980. The idea of a value system, value systems, The H. P.
Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folders 25-27, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: value system. The idea of a system of values (cf. 'system of
ends') is meant to unify the goals of the agent in terms of the pursuit of 'eudæmonia.'
Cf. Foot, morality as a system of conditional and suppositional imperatives.
1980. Semantic theory, semantics, syntax and semantics, The
H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folders 17-18, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: syntax, semantics. Especially the former.
Grice loved two devices of the syntactic kind: subscripts and square brackets
(for the assignment of 'common-ground status'). Grice is a
conservative (dissenting rationalist) when it comes to syntax and semantics. He
hardly uses 'pragmatics' albeit in a loose way ('pragmatic import,' 'pragmatic
inference'), but was aware of Morris's triangle. Syntax is presented along
the lines of Gentzen, i.e. a system of 'natural deduction' in terms of
inference rules of introduction and elimination for each formal
device. Semantics pertains rather to Witters's truth-values, i.e. the
assignment of a satisfactory-valuation: the true and the good.
1980. Philosophical explanation, the why, the 'that' and the
'why,' metaphysics, description/taxonomy vs. theoretical explanation, The H. P.
Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 19, BANC MSS 90/135c, The
Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords:
explanation, description, 'why,' 'what'. Taxonomy, is worse than
explanation, always. Grice is exploring the 'taxonomy-description' vs.
explanation dichotomy. He would often criticise 'ordinary-language' philosopher
Austin for spending too much valuable time on linguistic botany, 'without an
aim in his head.' Instead, his inclination, a dissenting one, is to look
for the 'big picture of it all,' and disregard a piece-meal
analysis. Conversation is a good example. While Austin would subjectify
'Language' (Linguistic Nature), Grice rather places rationality squarely on the
behaviour displayed by utterers as they make conversational moves that their
addressees will judge as 'rational' along specific lines. Observation of
the principle of conversational helpfulness is rational (reasonable) along the
following lines: anyone who cares about the two goals which are central to
conversation, viz. giving and receiving information, and influencing and being
influenced by others, is expected to have an interest in taking part in a
conversation which will only be profitable (if not possible) under the
assumption that it is conducted along the lines of the principle of
conversational helpfulness. Grice is not interested in conversation per se, but
as a basis for a theory that explains the mistakes 'ordinary-language'
philosophers are making. The case of "What is known to be the case is not
believed to be the case."
1981. Philosophy, miscellaneous, topics, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series V (Topical), carton 8-folders 9-13, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: philosophy.
Grice was a 'meta-linguistic botanist.' His point was to criticise
'ordinary-language' philosophers criticising philosophers. Say: Plato and Ayer
say that 'episteme' is a kind of 'doxa.' The 'contemporary,' if 'dated,'
ordinary-language philosopher detects a nuance, and embarks risking collision
with the conversational 'facts' or data: rushes ahead to EXPLOIT the nuance
without clarifying it, with wrong dicta like: "What I known to be the case
I don't believe to be the case." Surely, a cancellable implicatum
generated by the rational principle of conversational helpfulness is all there
is to the nuance. Grice knew that unlike the 'ordinary-language' philosopher,
he was not providing a taxonomy or description, but a theoretical explanation.
1982. Reflections on morals, meta-ethics, ethics, with J.
Baker, ethics, North Carolina notes, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II
(Essays), carton 4-folders 17-25, and Series V (Topical), carton 6-folders
34-36, and carton 9-folder 7, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: morals, meta-ethics.
Grice's explorations on morals are language based. With a substantial knowledge
of the classical languages ("that are so good at verb systems and modes
like the optative, that English lacks"), Grice explores modals
like "should," (Hampshire) "ought to" (Hare)
and, "must" (Grice -- 'necessity'. Grice is well aware of R. M.
Hare's reflections on the 'neustic' qualifications on the 'phrastic.' The
"imperative" has usually been one source for the philosopher's
concern with the language of morals. Grice attempts to balance this with a
similar exploration on 'good,' now regarded as the 'value-paradeigmatic' notion
par excellence. We cannot understand, to echo Strawson, 'the concept of a
person' unless we understand the concept of a good person, i.e. the
philosopher's conception of a good person. Morals is very Oxonian.
There were in Grice's time only *three* chairs of philosophy at Oxford: the
three W: The Waynflete chair of metaphysical philosophy, The Wykeham chair
of logic (not philosophy, really), and The White chair of moral
philosophy. Later, the Wilde chair of philosophical psychology was
created. Grice was familiar with Austin's cavalier attitude to morals as
White's professor of moral philosophy, succeeding Kneale. When R. M. Hare
succeeds Austin, Grice knows that it is time to play with the neustic
implicatum! Grice's approach to morals is very 'meta-ethical' and starts
with a fastidious (to use Blackburn's characterisation, not mine!) exploration
of 'modes' related to propositional phrases involving 'should,' 'ought to,' and
'must.' For Hampshire, 'should' is the moral word par excellence. For
Hare, it is 'ought.' For Grice, it is only "must" that preserves
that sort of necessity that, as a Kantian rationalist, he is looking for.
However, Grice hastens to add that whatever he'll say about the 'practical' or
boulomaic "must" must also apply to the 'doxastic' "must,"
as in "What goes up must come down." That he did not hesitate to use
'necessity' operators is clear from his axiomatic treatment, undertaken with A.
D. Code, on Aristotelian categories (izzing and hazzing). To understand
Grice's view on ethics, we should return to the idea of creature construction
in more detail. Suppose we are genitors-demigods-designing living creatures,
creatures Grice calls pirots. To design a type of pirot is to specify a diagram
and table for that type (plus evaluative procedures, if any). The design is
implemented in animal stuff-flesh and bones (typically). Let us focus on one
type of pirot-a very sophisticated type that Grice (borrowing from Locke) calls
'very intelligent rational pirots'. (Think of them very roughly as creatures
with the capacities for thought and action characteristic of persons.) Being
benevolent genitors, we want to design these pirots so as to maximize their
chances for survival. As Grice recently pointed out in conversation-by talk of
survival, he does not, in the case of very intelligent rational pirots, mean
simply staying alive. A full explanation of what Grice has in mind here would
require an account of his views on teleology; however, for our purposes a full
explanation is unnecessary. We need note only the following points. First, in
constructing pirots we build in certain ends, and for our purposes we may
imagine ourselves as having a fairly free hand in deciding what ends to select.
To build in an end is to construct the diagram and table so that the pirots
have that end as a standing, constant end-an end where they strive to realize
in all appropriate circumstances. The restriction to appropriate circumstances
is necessary for two reasons. First, we will want to endow the pirots with a
variety of ends, and we will not want a pirot to try to realize each end at
each moment of time. We want them to schedule their pursuit of ends in a way
that maximizes the realization of the whole array in the long run. Second,
we will, in the case of very intelligent rational pirots, want to give them the
(limited) ability to eliminate (or inhibit for a long time the pursuit of)
built-in ends should circumstances prove especially inappropriate. Now we can
explain what, for present purposes, we mean by 'survival': to maximize chances
for survival is to maximize chances for the realization of built-in ends. How
are we to design the pirots so as to maximize their chances for realizing the
built-in ends? The answer would be easy if we could take as given a very
detailed specification of the environment in which the pirots live. Then we
could tailor the diagram and table to that specific environment by building in
exactly the responses that the environment demands. But we cannot assume such a
specific description of the environment; on the contrary, we know that the
pirots will face a variety of changing environments. So we need to design the
pirots to function effectively in the widest possible range of environments. We
could, of course, avoid this if we were willing to descend periodically from
Olympus in order to redesign the pirots in response to each significant change
in the environment. But there is a more efficient way to achieve the same
result: we give the pirots the ability to redesign themselves. There are two
aspects to this ability. First among the ends we build in is the end of being
an end-setter. To be an end-setter requires that one have the (limited) ability
to adopt new ends and to eliminate ends one already has. To have the end of
being an end-setter is to have the end of employing this ability to adopt and
eliminate ends. This is not, as we will see, a complete specification of what
it is to be an end-setter, but it will suffice for the moment. By making the
pirots end-setters we will enable them to redesign themselves by altering what
they aim at. Second, to enable pirots to determine when to use their
end-setting ability, we have given them an appropriate set of evaluative
principles. These principles incorporate in the pirots some of our wisdom as
genitors. We do not need to descend periodically to redesign them because in a
sense we are always present-having endowed them with some of our divine
knowledge. What does this have to do with ethics? Grice answers this question
in 'Method in Philosophical Psychology'. To interpret the reference to
'rational capacities and dispositions' in the following passage, recall that,
given the connection between evaluative principles and rationality Grice spells
it out, we have, in giving the pirots evaluative principles, given them a
capacity for rational evaluation. Let me be a little more explicit, and a great
deal more speculative, about the possible relation to ethics of my programme
for philosophical psychology. I shall suppose that the genitorial programme has
been realized to the point at which we have designed a class of pirots which,
nearly following Locke, I might call 'very intelligent rational pirots'. These
pirots will be capable of putting themselves in the genitorial position, of
asking how, if they were constructing themselves with a view to their own
survival, they would execute this task; and, if we have done our work aright,
their answer will be the same as ours .... We might, indeed, envisage the
contents of a highly general practical manual, which these pirots would be in a
position to compile. The contents of the initial manual would have various
kinds of generality which are connected with familiar discussions of
universalizability. The pirots have, so far, been endowed only with the
characteristics which belong to the genitorial justified psychological theory;
so the manual will have to be formulated in terms of that theory, together with
the concepts involved in the very general description of livingconditions which
have been used to set up that theory; the manual will therefore have conceptual
generality. There will be no way of singling out a special subclass of
addressees, so the injunctions of the manual will have to be addressed,
indifferently, to any very intelligent rational pirot, and will thus have
generality of form. And since the manual can be thought of as being composed by
each of the so far indistinguishable pirots, no pirot would include in the
manual injunctions prescribing a certain line of conduct in circumstances to
which he was not likely to be subject; nor indeed could he do so even if he
would. So the circumstances for which conduct is prescribed could be presumed
to be such as to be satisfied, from time to time, by any addressee; the manual,
then, will have generality of application. Such a manual might, perhaps,
without ineptitude be called an immanuel; and the very intelligent rational
pirots, each of whom both composes it and from time to time heeds it, might
indeed be ourselves (in our better moments, of course). We can both explain and
motivate this approach to ethics by considering three objections. First, one
may complain that the above remarks are extremely vague. In particular, what
are the evaluative principles-the rational capacities and dispositions-with
which we endow the pirots? These principles play a central role in compiling
the manual (Immanuel). How can we evaluate the suggested approach to ethics
until we are told what these evaluative principles are? This complaint is
somewhat unjust-in the context of 'Method in Philosophical Psychology' at
least, for there Grice labels his remarks as speculative. But, more
importantly, Grice has done a considerable amount of work directed toward
providing this objection with the information it demands; this work includes
investigations of happiness, freedom, reasoning, and teleology. While the
examination of these projects is unfortunately beyond the scope of our
introduction, we should comment briefly on Grice's work on happiness. In 'Some
Reflections about Ends and Happiness', Grice develops an account of happiness,
and on this account it is clear that the conception of happiness could
certainly function as a central 'evaluative principle' in endsetting. It is
also worth remarking here that Grice's views on happiness are very
Aristotelian; Grice emphasizes the Kantian aspect of his view in the passage
quoted, but when the views are worked out, one finds a blend of Kantian and
Aristotelian themes. The second objection is that Grice's approach makes it too
easy to escape the demands of morality. What can Grice say to a personor
pirot-who rejects the manual, rejects moral demands and constraints? Suppose,
for example, that a person reasons as follows: If I continue to heed the voice
of morality, I will continue on occasion to sacrifice my welfare and interests
in favor of another's welfare and interests. Why should I be such a fool? After
all, what am I after except getting as much as I can of what I want.
Thorough-going egoism is the path to take; I'll have to resist these impulses
to help others, in the way I resist sweets when I am dieting. Perhaps I will be
able to condition such impulses out of myself in time. Does Grice's approach
have a reply to the consistent thorough-going egoist? It does-as Grice pointed
out in a recent conversation; the considerations which follow are based on that
conversation. First we need to provide a more detailed account of end-setting.
When we give our pirots the end of end-setting we have a good reason for giving
them each of the evaluative principles in order to build in the capacity to
redesign themselves, and we build in that capacity in order to maximize their
chances of realizing their ends over the widest possible range of environments.
So we have a good reason for giving them each of the end-setting evaluative
principles: namely, each one contributes to the capacity of redesigning in a
way that maximizes the chances of realizing encls. The pirots themselves are
capable of recognizing that the evaluative principles make such a contribution,
so each pirot has (or can have) a reason for having the evaluative principles.
(We are assuming that contributing to the maximization of the realization of
ends constitutes a good reason; a defence of this assumption would require an
examination of Grice's view on teleology.) A second essential point is that we
design the pirots so that they do not simply adopt or eliminate ends at will;
rather, they do so only when they have good reasons to do so-good reasons derived
from the evaluative principles that govern end-setting. We design them this way
in order to maximize their chances for the realization of their ends. We want
them to use their ability for end-setting only when the evaluative principles
we have built in determine that a change of ends is called for in order to
maximize the overall realization of ends. (In the typical case at least, an
end-setter will only alter some of his ends as to maximize the realization of
all his (remaining and newly adopted) ends.) An end-setter then has the end of
adopting or eliminating ends when he has good reasons to do so-where these
reasons are provided by evaluative principles; and these evaluative principles
are such that he has a good reason for having each of those principles. Let us
call such an end-setter a Gricean end-setter. Returning now to egoism, we can
distinguish three different situations in which one might try to reject the
'demands of morality'. Before going on, one may insist on knowing what we mean
by the 'demands of morality', but it is enough for present purposes that we
agree that morality demands at least that one does not always treat others
purely as means to one's own ends. It is this demand that the egoist described
earlier rejects. First, if the egoist is a Gricean end-setter who wishes to
remain a Gricean end-setter, then he cannot abandon the non-egotistical
principles since they are self-justifying and do not depend on other premisses.
Second, if the egoist envisioned is one who would cease to be a Gricean
end-setter, this too is impossible for a rational agent. Being a Gricean
end-setter is itself one of the self~ustifying ends, and thus it can be
abandoned only if one abandons reasoning. Finally, there is the question of
whether an agent who is not a Gricean end-setter can be an egoist. Again the
answer appears to be 'no', if the agent is rational and considers the question.
For being a Gricean end-setter can be seen on reflection to be a
self-justifying end, and thus must be adopted by any reflective rational agent.
Let this suffice as a brief indication of Grice's approach to the second
objection, and let us turn to the third and last objection. This objection
concerns what we have been calling 'the demands of morality'; the objection is
that the notion of demand is vague. What do we mean by 'demand' when we talk of
the 'demands of morality'? What kind of demand is this? What sort of claim is
it that morality has on us? Grice has done a considerable amount of work
relevant to this questionincluding 'Probability, Desirability, and Mood
Operators', the John Locke Lectures, and recent work on Kant. In explaining the
claim morality has on us, Grice employs distinctions and notation provided by
his theory of meaning. We can begin with the sentence 'Pay Jones the money!'
Grice assigns this sentence the following structure: !+I pay Jones the money
where '!' is the imperative mood operator and 'I pay Jones the money' is a
moodless sentence radical. This structure is embeddable in other sentences. In
particular, it occurs in both 'I should pay Jones the money' and 'I should not
pay Jones the money'. Grice assigns these the following structures: Acc+ ! +I
pay Jones the money; Not+ Ace+ ! +I pay Jones the money, where 'Ace' may be
read as 'it is acceptable that'. So if we read '!' as 'let it be the case
that', the whole string, 'Ace + ! I pay Jones the money' may be read as: 'It is
acceptable that (let) it be the case that I pay Jones the money' (whole 'Not+
Ace+! +I pay Jones the money' may be read as 'It is not the case that it is
acceptable that (let) it be the case that I pay Jones the money'). In
'Probability, Desirability, and Mood Operators' Grice motivates this assignment
of structures by arguing (in effect) that the sentence 'I should pay Jones the
money' means-on the central and important reading-that it is acceptable that
(let) it be the case that I pay Jones the money. The argument rests on an
analysis of practical reasoning and on the analysis of sentence meaning.
Actually, Grice does not say that 'I should pay Jones the money' means what we
just said it means. In 'Probability, Desirability, and Mood Operators' he is
much more circumspect. After discussing probability inferences, he writes,
Bearing in mind the variety of interpretations to which sentences containing
'ought' and 'should' are susceptible, I find it natural to take, as practical
analogues to sentences like 'an invalid is likely to be in retirement',
sentences like 'it is desirable for an invalid to keep in touch with his
doctor'. For expositional purposes, we use 'should-sentences' since the
interpretation we want these sentences to bear is clear, and the use of
'should-sentences' highlights the connections with ordinary moral reasoning.
Suppose morality demands that I pay Jones the money; that is, I act morally
only if I pay Jones the money. Grice holds that this is true only if an
appropriate sentence (or thought) is derivable from my evaluative principles-a
sentence (or thought) whose underlying structure is 'Acc+!+I pay Jones the
money'. I can, that is, derive that it is acceptable that (let) it be the case
that I pay Jones the money; in other words, that I should pay Jones the money.
Grice holds that since I derive this from evaluative principles, it is
necessary; that is, it is necessary that I should pay Jones the money. There
are two points to note in order to explain the claim morality has on us. First,
Grice holds that the self-justifying evaluative principles are necessarily
true, and he holds that I can show, e.g. that it is necessarily true that I
should pay Jones the money, by constructing a suitable derivation of 'I should
pay Jones the money' from my self-justifying evaluative principles. (These
claims follow from a general view Grice has of the nature of necessity, a view
that we will not consider here.) To be more precise, what I derive from my
evaluative principles is a sentence with the underlying structure: Acc+ 1 I pay
Jones the money, which we read as 'It is acceptable that (let) it be the case
that I pay Jones the money'. Since it is possible to construct an appropriate
derivation it is necessary that it is acceptable that (let) it be the case that
I pay Jones the money. This is how we should understand attaching 'necessary'
to a 'should-statement'. The sentence 'Necessarily, I should pay Jones the
money' expresses the necessary acceptability of the imperative 'Pay Jones the
money!' (Since my derivation will involve contingent information about the
circumstances C, we should represent what I derive as 'I should in these circumstances
C pay Jones the money'; this will be what is necessary. We ignore this detail.)
Second, it does not follow from the fact that it is necessary that I should pay
Jones the money that I will pay him the money. Even if it is necessary that it
is acceptable that (let) it be the case that I pay Jones the money, and even if
I derive this, I may not act on it. It is true that I cannot have a good reason
not to act on it; after all, I have derived the necessity of accepting the
imperative, 'Pay Jones the money!'; and as a Gricean end-setter I am committed
to acting on such reasons; but this does not mean I will. A person is capable
of irrationality-even in the face of acknowledged necessity. Now we are in a
position to explain what we mean by talk of the demands of morality. The
demands of morality are expressed by necessary 'should-statements'. Or perhaps
we may want to say that they are expressed by a special subset of such
statements. We need not investigate this possibility since it would not alter
the point we are making here-which is that the demands of morality express the
necessity of rational agents accepting and acting on certain imperatives (in so
far as they act rationally). Consider the role elements of Grice's theory of
meaning play in the above discussion of ethics, we have in a way returned to
the startingpoint of our exposition of Grice's views. And it is certainly high
time we let the discoverer of M-intentions formulate some in response to what
we have written. High time but not quite time. For one thing, we should note
that the discussion of ethics resolves an issue we suppressed when discussing
psychological explanation. At one point in that section, we wrote, with respect
to M-intending, 'Given our ends and our environment, there is good and decisive
reason to have such a pre-rational structure.' We did not raise the question of
what makes those considerations into a reason; we tacitly assumed that
relations to happiness and survival secured that the considerations counted as
reasons. The ethics discussion points the way to detailed and informative
treatment of this issue. Not that the discussion suggests that we were wrong to
appeal tacitly to happiness and survival; on the contrary, it indicates that we
should explain the reason-giving force of such considerations by examining the
role they play for a Gricean-end-setter.
1982. Correspondence with J. Baker, The Grice Papers, Series
I (The Correspondence of H. P. Grice, IA), carton 1-folder 2, BANC MSS
90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: Grice, Baker. Grice collaborated with Baker
mainly on work on ethics seen as an offspring, alla Kant, of philosophical
psychology. Akrasia was one such topic. Baker contributes to P. G. R. I. C. E.
("Philosophical Grounds of Rationality: Intentions, Categories,
Ends"), a festschrift for Grice, with an essay on the purity, and alleged
lack thereof, of morally evaluable motives. Do one's motives have to
be pure? For Grice morality cashes out in 'interest,' or desire. Baker also
contributes to a volume on Grice's honour published by Palgrave, Meaning
and analysis: essays on H. P. Grice. Baker is the organiser of a symposium
on the thought of Grice for the American Philosophical Association, the
proceedings of which are published in The Journal of Philosophy, with J. F.
Bennett as chair, and contributions by Baker, R. Grandy, and comments by R.
Stalnaker and R. Warner.
1982. The buletic-doxastic divide, the alethic-practical divide, The
Kantian problem, miscellaneous, value sub-systems, The H. P. Grice Papers,
Series V (Topical), carton 9-folders 25-27, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Kant's
problem. More than a value may co-ordinate in a system. One such is 'eudæmonia'
(cf. 'system of ends'). Kant's problem is the reduction of the categorical
imperative to the hypothetical or suppositional imperative. For Kant, a value tends
towards the subjective. Grice, rather, wants to offer a 'metaphysical' defence
of 'objective' value. Grice called the manual of conversational maxims the
Conversational Immanuel.
1982.
Axiology, value and rationalism, values and rationalism, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 28, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft
Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: value,
rationalism, axiology. Grice arrives at value (optimum, deeming) via Peirce's
meaning. But then there's the 'truth-value.' The sorry story, as Grice
calls it, of Deontic logic faces Jørgensen's dilemma. Jørgensen's
dilemma is best seen as a trilemma," Grice says. The following three
claims are incompatible: An inference requires that each element (the premise
and the conclusion) has what Boole, Peirce, and Frege call a truth
"value."But an "imperative" dos not have a
truth-value. It is alleged that there may be an inference between this or
that imperative. Responses to this problem involve rejecting one of the
three premises. The input-output logics reject the first
premise. They provide inference mechanism on elements without presupposing
that these elements have a truth value. Alternatively, one can deny the
second premise. One way to do this is to distinguish between the buletic
itself and an doxastic about it. According to this response, only the
doxastic about the buletic has a satisfactory, indeed doxastically
satisfactory, value. Finally, one can deny the third premise. But
this is to deny that there is a logic of imperatives worth
investigating. Grice preferred to define 'value' =df.
'satisfactoriness.' Thus, '.p' can be 0 or 1, '!p' can be 0 or
1. "The form of the utterance will guide you as to how to read
'satisfactoriness,' which is my jargon for 'value' applicable both to an
indicative and an imperative." With 'satisfactoriness,' Grice offers a
variant to Hofstadter and McKinsey's 'satisfaction.' In their "On the
Logic of Imperatives," a syntax is elaborated for the imperative mode,
using 'satisfaction.'' "We understand an imperative to be *satisfied* (as
'The door is closed' may also be said to be satisfied iff the door is closed)
iff what is commanded is the case. Thus the fiat “Let the door be closed!” is
satisfied if the door is closed. We shall thus refer to the satisfaction of an
imperative." According to Hofstadter and McKinsey, the function is a
satisfaction-function. This or that unary operator and this or that
dyadic operator become this or that satisfaction-function. As Grice puts it, "an
inferential rule, which flat rationality is the capacity to apply, is
not an arbitrary rule. An inferential rule picks out this or that
transitions of acceptance in which transmission of the predicate
"satisfactory" (buletic/doxastic) is guaranteed or (in this or
that non-deductive case) to be expected." As Grice notes, since
the sentential form will indicate what species of value is involved, he uses
the generic 'satisfactory'. He imports into the object-language the phrase 'It
is buletically satisfactory that' and 'It is doxastically satisfactory that
...' '!p is buletically satisfactory' just in case '!p' is buletically
satisfactory. '⊢p is doxastically satisfactory just in case '⊢ p'
is doxastically satisfactory.' As Grice introduces 'it is acceptable
that' (with the syntactical provisions which he is using); on the buletic side,
'It is acceptable that !p' is doxastically satisfactory just in case ''!p' is
buletically satisfactory' is doxastically satisfactory. Grice goes on to provide this
or that generic or generalized versions of this or that
'satisfactoriness-functor,' using 'φ' and 'ψ' to represent sentences (in either
mode). Using 1-b/d for satisfactory and 0-b/d for unsatisfactory Grice
stipulates. "φ 'AND' ψ" is 1-b/d just in case "φ" 1-b/d
and "ψ" is 1-b/d. "φ 'OR' ψ" is 1-b/d just in
case one of the pair, "φ and ψ", is 1-b/d. "'IF' φ,
ψ" is satisfactory just in case either "φ" is 0-b/d or
"ψ" is 0-b/d. There are, however, a number of points to be made.
It is not fully clear to Grice just how strong the motivation would be for
introducing this or that mode-neutral connective -- "AND,"
"OR," and "IF" -- nor whether, if this or that connective
is introduced, this or that restriction should not be imposed. The problematic
examples are be, of course, the mixed-mode ones (those in which one clause is
buletic and the other doxastic). Grice, an Austinian at heart, finds it natural
to look for guidance from 'ordinary' language. "The beast is filthy and
don't touch it" (.p AND ~!p) and "The beast is filthy and I shan't
touch it" (.p AND ~!p) seem all right to Grice. But the commutated
"Don't touch the beast and it is filthy" (~!q AND .p) seems dubious.
"Touch the beast AND it will bite you" (!p AND .q), while idiomatic,
is not, at the IMPLICATUM level, a 'conjunction,' nor a genuine invitation to
touch the beast. "Smith is taking a bath OR leave the bath-room door
open" (.p OR !q) is, perhaps, intelligible. But the commutated "Leave
the bath-room door open or Smith is taking a bath" (!q OR .p) seems
considerably less so. It is perhaps worth noting that, in this or that
NON-mixed case, satisfactoriness is specifiable as buletic satisfactoriness or
doxastic satisfactoriness. But, for this or that mixed case, no such
specification would be available unless we make a special case, as Grice does
in "Method," for the buletic mode to be dominant over the doxastic
mode. The crunch comes, however, with "NOT", or negation, one of the
four possible unary satisfactoriness-functor, which Grice has been carefully
ignoring. "'NOT'⊢p' (~⊢p) might, perhaps, be
treated as satisfactoriness-functional/conditional equivalent to '⊢ not-p'
(⊢~p). But what about ''NOT'!p' (~!p)? Should we
treat is as buletically-satisfactoriness-functionally/conditionally equivalent
to "!'NOT'p" (!~p)? And what do we say in a case like, perhaps,
"Let it be that I now put my hand on my head" (!p) or "Let it be
that my bicycle faces north" (!p), in which, at least on occasion, it
seems to be that neither '!p' nor '!~p' is either buletically satisfactory or
buletically unsatisfactory? And what buletic satisfactory value do we assign to
'~!p' (how do we now introduce 'not'?) and to '~!~p' (how do we ELIMINATE
'not')? Do we proscribe this or that form altogether, for every cases? But that
would seem to be a pity, since '~ ! ~p' seems to be quite promising as a
representation for 'you may (permissive) do alpha that satisfies p'; i.e., the
utterer explicitly conveys his refusal to prohibit his addressee A doing alpha.
Do we disallow embedding of (or iterating) this or that form? But that (again
if we use "~!p" and "~!~p" to represent 'may') seems
too restrictive. Again, if '!p' is neither buletically satisfactory nor
buletically unsatisfactory (the utterer could care less) do we assign a 'value'
other than 1 or 0 to '!p' ('buletically neuter,' 0.5). Or do we say, echoing
Quine, that we have a buletically satisfactoriness value 'gap'? These and other
such problems would require careful consideration. Yet Grice cannot see that
those problems would prove insoluble, any more than this or that analogous
problem connected with Strawson's presupposition ("Don't arrest the
intruder!") are insoluble. In Strawson's case, the difficulty is not so
much to find a solution as to select the best solution from those which present
themselves. Grice takes up the topic of a calculus in connection with the
introduction rule and the elimination rule of a 'modal' such as
"must." We might hope to find, for each member of a certain
family of modalities, an introduction rule and an elimination rule which would be
analogous to the rules available for classical logical constants. Suggestions
are not hard to come by. Let us suppose that we are seeking to provide such a
pair of rules for the particular modality of necessity -- 'necessary,'
symbolised by □. For an introduction rule (□, +) Grice considers the following
(Grice thinks equivalent) forms: if 'φ' is demonstrable, '□φ' is demonstrable. Provided
'φ' is dependent on no assumptions, derive 'φ' from 'φ '". For an
elimination rule (□,
-), Grice
considers "From '□φ' derive 'φ'". It is to
be understood, of course, that the values of the syntactical variable 'φ' would
contain either a buletic or a doxastic mode markers. Both "!p" and
".p" would be proper substitutes for 'φ' but "p" would not.
Grice wonders: "[W]hat should be said of Takeuti's conjecture (roughly)
that the nature of the introduction rule determines the character of the
elimination rule? There seems to be no particular problem about allowing
an introduction rule which tells us that, if it is established in P's
'PERSONalised' system that φ, 'it is necessary, with respect to P, that φ' is
doxastically satisfactory. (establishable). The accompanying elimination rule
is, however, slightly less promising. If we suppose such a rule to tell us
that, if one is committed to the idea that it is necessary, with respect to P,
that φ, one is also committed to whatever is expressed by φ, we shall be in
trouble. For such a rule is not acceptable. φ will be a buletic expression such
as 'Let it be that Smith eats his hat.' And my commitment to the idea that
Smith's system requires him to eat his hat does not ipso facto involve me in
accepting (volitively) "Let Smith eat his hat". But if we take the
elimination rule rather as telling us that, if it is necessary, with respect to
X, that let X eat his hat, then "let X eat his hat" possesses
satisfactoriness-with-respect-to-X, the situation is easier. For this
person-relativised version of the rule seems inoffensive, even for Takeuti, we
hope. Grice, following Mackie, uses 'absolutism,' as opposed to 'relativism,'
which denies the rational basis to attitude ascriptions (but cf. Hare on
'subjectivism'). Grice is concerned with the absence of a thorough discussion
of 'value' by English philosophers, other than Hare (and he is only responding
to Mackie!). Continental philosophers, by comparison, have a special
discipline, 'axiology,' for it! Similarly, a continental-oriented
tradition Grice finds in The New World in philosophers of a pragmatist bent,
such as Carus. Grice wants to say that 'rationality' is a value, because
it is a faculty that a creature (human) displays to adapt and survive to his
changing environments. The implicature of the title is that values have been
considered in the English philosophical tradition, almost alla Nietzsche, to
belong to the realm 'irrational.' Grice grants that axiological implicatum
rests on a PRE-rational propension.
1982. Rationality and akrasia, incontinentia, in M. Hintikka and
B. Vermazen, Actions and events: essays on the work of Donald Davidson,
Clarendon, with a reply by Davidson, 1985, Davidson on weakness of the will,
akrasia, incontinence, the paradox of akrasia, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
II (Essays), carton 2-folders 22-23, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: akrasia, incontinence,
incontinentia, philosophical psychology, rationality. "Video meliora
proboque deteriora sequor." "We shouldn't be saying this, but we are
saying it!" Grice prefers 'akrasia,' but he is happy to use Cicero's
translation, also negative, of this: 'incontinentia,' "as if 'continentia'
were a virtue!" For Grice, the alleged paradox of 'akrasia,' both alethic
and practical, has to be accounted for by a theory of rationality from the
start, and not be deemed a 'stumbling block.' Grice is interested in both the
common-or-garden 'boulomaic' version of akrasia, involving the volitive 'soul''
-- in term of desirability -- and 'alethic' or doxastic 'akrasia,' involing the
judicative soul proper -- in terms of probability. Grice considers buletic
akrasia and doxastic akrasia -- the latter yet distinct from Moore's paradox,
"p but I don't want to believe that p," in symbols "p 'AND' ~ψb-dp."
1982.
Axiology, objective value, the conception of value, Clarendon, objectivity and
value, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 8-folder 18, BANC MSS
1990/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: relative value, objective value. Some background
for his third Carus lecture. He tries to find out what J. L. Mackie means when
he says that a value is ultimately 'subjective'. What about inter-subjective,
and constructively 'objective'? Grice constructs absolute value out of relative
value. But once a rational pirot constructs value, the pirot assigns absolute
status to 'rationality' qua value. The pirot cannot then choose NOT to be
rational at the risk of ceasing to exist (qua person, or essentially rationally
human agent). For Grice, a 'human,' as opposed to a 'person,' assigns RELATIVE
value to his rationality. A human is accidentally rational. A person is
necessarily so. "Adistinction seldom made by Aristotle and some of his
dumbest followers obsessed with the modal-free adage, "Homo rationale
animal." “falsa est (finitio), si dicas, Equus est animal rationale: nam est equus animal, sed irrationale,” Quint. 7, 3,
24: “homo est animal rationale,” id. 5, 10, 56;
cf. id. 5, 8, 7;
and: “nec si mutis finis voluptas, rationalibus quoque: quin immo ex contrario, quia mutis, ideo non rationalibus,” id. 5, 11, 35;
so without a subst.: “a rationali ad rationale (translatio),” id. 8, 6, 13.— “τὸ λογικόν ζῷον”
-- “τὸ λ. ζῷον” Chrysipp.Stoic.3.95; ἀρεταὶ λ., = διανοητικαί,
opp. ἠθικαί, Arist.EN1108b9.
λογικός, ή, όν,
(λόγος), ζῶον
λόγον ἔχον NE, 1098a3-5. "λόγον δὲ μόνον ἄνθρωπος ἔχει τῶν
ζῴων,” man alone of all animals possesses speech, from the Politics!
1982. Axiology, the rational motivation for objective value, the conception of value, Clarendon, objective value, rational motivation, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), carton 8-folder 19, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: value, axiology, rationality, objective value. As a matter of history, Grice reaches value (in its guises of 'optimum' and 'deeming') via his analysis of Peirce's meaning. Many notions are value-paradeigmatic. The most important of all philosophical notions, that of 'rationality,' presupposes objective value as one of its motivations. For Grice, 'ratio' can be understood 'cognoscendi' but also 'essendi.' "Rational motivation" involves both types of 'ratio.' While it's practical to restore 'axis' for Grice's 'value,' it's not easy to find Grecianisms for 'absolute’ (L. absolutus, from absolvere, In rhet. lang., unrestricted, unconditional, absolute “hoc mihi videor videre, esse quasdam cum adjunctione necessitudines, quasdam simplices et absolutas,” Cic. Inv. 2, 57, 170 .— 'objective' (L. objectum, from obicio -- objectus , ūs, m. obicio, I. a casting before, a putting against, in the way, or opposite, an opposing; or, neutr., a lying before or opposite (mostly poet. and in postAug. prose): dare objectum parmaï, the opposing of the shield, * Lucr. 4, 847: “vestis,” Col. 3, 19: “insula portum Efficit objectu laterum,” by the opposition, Verg. A. 1, 160: “cum terga flumine, latera objectu paludis tegerentur,” Tac. H. 3, 9: “molis,” id. ib. 5, 14: “regiones, quæ Tauri montis objectu separantur,” Gell. 12, 13, 27: “solem interventu lunæ occultari, lunamque terræ objectu,” the interposition, Plin. 2, 10, 7, § 47; cf.: eademque (terra) objectu suo umbram noctemque efficiat, Cic. Fragm. ap. Non. 243, 13 dub. (al. objecta soli): “hi molium objectus (i. e. moles objectas) scandere,” the projection, Tac. A. 14, 8.—II. Transf., that which presents itself to the sight, an object, appearance, sight, spectacle, Nep. Hann. 5, 2 (al. objecto)) and if not 'categoric.' (This is analogous to Grice's overuse of psychoLOGICAL when he just means 'souly.' It is perhaps his use of 'psychological' for 'souly' that leads to take any souly concept as a theoretical concept within a folksy psychoLOGICAL theory.
1983. Axiology, the conception of value, Clarendon, the
Paul Carus lectures, Clarendon, Oxford, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II, carton
2-folders 12-16, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keywords: objectivity, value, relative value,
absolute value, metaphysics, relative and absolute value, categorical
imperative, the axiological implicatum. Grice reaches the notion of value
through that of 'meaning.' If Peirce was simplistic, Grice ain't! But his
ultra-sophisticated analysis ends up being 'deemed' to hold in this or that
utterer. And 'deeming' is 'valuing,' as is 'optimum.' While Grice rarely used
'axiology,' he should! A set of three lectures, which
are individually identified below. "I love Carus!” Grice was
undecided as to what his Paul Carus lectures were be on. He explores
'meaning' under its 'value' "optimality" guise in "Meaning
revisited." Grice thinks that a 'value-paradeigmatic' notion allows
him to respond in a more apt way to what some critics were raising as a possible
'vicious circle' in his approach to 'semantic' and 'psychological'
notions. The Carus lectures are then dedicated to the 'construction,' alla
Hume, of a 'value-paradeigmatic' notion in general, and value
itself. Grice starts by quoting Austin and J. L. Mackie, of
Oxford. The lectures are intended to a general audience, provided it is a
philosophical general audience. Most of the second lecture is Grice's subtle
exploration of Kant's categorical imperative, with which he had struggled in
the last John Locke lecture on aspects of reasoning, notably the 'reduction' of
the categorical imperative to this or that 'counsel of prudence' with an
implicated protasis to the effect that the agent is aiming at ‘eudæmonia.’ The
three Paul Carus Lectures, Objectivity and value, Relative and absolute
value, and Metaphysics and value. There were three Paul Carus lectures.
The first lecture, "Objectivity and value," is a review of J. L.
Mackie's Inventing right and wrong; the second lecture, "Relative and
absolute value," is an exploration on the categorical imperative, and its
connection with a prior hypothetical or suppositional imperative; the third lecture,
"Metaphysics and value," is a metaphysical defence of absolute value.
The collective citation should be identified by each lecture separately, and
this is done below.
1983. Objectivity and value, the first Paul Carus lecture, The conception of value, Clarendon, value and objectivity, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: objectivity, value, axiology, J. L. Mackie. Grice starts with 'subjectivity.' Objectivity can be constructed as non-relativised subjectivity. A discussion of J. L. Mackie's Inventing right and wrong. In the proceedings, Grice quotes the 'artless sexism' of J. L. Austin in talking about the 'trouser words' in Sense and Sensibilia. Grice tackles all the distinctions Mackie had played with: objective/subjective, absolute/relative, categorical/hypothetical or suppositional . Grice quotes directly from R. M. Hare: "Think of one world into whose fabric values are objectively built; and think of another in which those values have been annihilated. And remember that in both worlds the people in them go on being concerned about the same things—there is no difference in the subjective value. Now I ask, what is the difference between the states of affairs in these two worlds? Can any answer be given except, none whatever?.” Grice uses the Latinate 'objective' (from 'objectum'). Cf. Hare on what he thinks the oxymoronic 'sub-jective value.'
1983. Axiology, relative and absolute value, the second Paul Carus
lecture, in The Conception of Value, Clarendon, The H. P. Grice Papers,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: relative value, absolute value. An
exploration on Paton on the categorical imperative. Grice had previously
explored the logical form of hypothetical or suppositional imperatives in the Kant (and later Locke) lectures,
notably in Lecture IV, "Further remarks on practical and alethic
reasons." Here he considers topics related to Hare's
tropic-clistic neustic-phrastic quartet. What does it mean to say that
a command is conditional? The two successors of Grice's post as
Tutorial Fellow at St. John's, G. P. Baker and P. M. S. Hacker, will tackle the
same issue with humour, in "Sense and nonsense," published by
Blackwell (too irreverent to be published by the Clarendon). Is the
logical form of a maxim, p horseshoe !q, or !(p horseshoe q), etc. Kant thought that there is a special sub-class of hypothetical
or suppositional imperative (which he
called a "counsels of prudence") which is like his class of technical
imperative, except in that the end specified in a full specfication of the
imperative is the special end of eudæmonia (the agent's eudæmonia). For
Grice, understanding Kant's first version of the categorical imperative
involves understanding what a maxim is supposed to be. Grice
explores at some length four alternative interpretations of an
iffy buletic (as opposed to a non-iffy buletic): three formal, one material. The
first interpretation is the horseshoe interpretation. A blind logical nose
might lead us or be led to the assumption of a link between a buletically
iffy utterance and a doxastically iffy utterance. Such a link no doubt
exists, but the most obvious version of it is plainly inadequate. At
least one other philosopher besides Grice has noticed that "If he torments
the cat, have him arrested!" is unlikely to express an
buletically iffy utterance, and that even if one restricts oneself to
this or that case in which the protasis specifies a will, we find pairs of
examples like "If you will to go to Oxford, travel by AA via Richmond!"
or "If you will to go to Cambridge, see a psychiatrist!" where it is
plain that one is, and the other is not, the expression of a buletically iffy
utterance. For fun, Grice does not tell which! A less easily eliminable
suggestion, yet one which would still interprets the notion of a buletically
iffy utterance in terms of that particular logical form to which
"if", 'hypothetical or suppositional ' and 'conditional' attach,
would be the following. Let us assume that it is established, or conceded, as
legitimate to formulate an 'if' utterance in which not only the apodosis is
couched in some mode other than the doxastic, as in this or that conditional
command. "If you see the whites of their eyes, shoot fire!" but also
the protasis or some part (clause) of them. In which case all of the following
might be admissible conditionals. Thus, we might have a doxastic protasis ("If
the cat is sick, take it to the vet”), or a mixed (buletic-cum-doxastic
protasis ("If you are to take the cat to the vet AND there's no cage
available, put it on Martha's lap!), and buletic protasis ("If you are to
take the cat to the vet, put it in a cage!”). If this suggestion seems
rebarbative, think of this or that quaint "if" utterance (when it is
quaint) as conditionalised versions of this or that
"therefore"-sequence, such as: buletic-cum-doxastic premises
("Take the cat to the vet! There isn't a cage. Therefore; Put the cat on
Martha's lap!"), buletic premise (“Take the cat to the vet! Put it in a
cage!"). And then, maybe, the discomfort is reduced. Grice next considers
a second formal interpretation or approach to the buletically iffy/non-iffy
utterance. Among 'if' utterances with a buletic apodosis some will have, then,
a 'mixed’ doxastic-cum buletic protasis (“partly doxastic, partly buletic”), and
some will have a purely doxastic protasis (“If the cat is sick, take him to the
vet!). Grice proposes a definition of the iffy/non-iffy distinction. A
buletically iffy utterance is an iffy utterance the apodosis of which is
buletic and the protasis of which is buletic or mixed (buletic-cum-dxastic) or
it is an elliptical version of such an iffy utterance. A buletically non-iffy
utterance is a buletic utterance which is not iffy or else, if it is iffy, has
a purely doxastic protasis. Grice makes three 'quick comments' on this second
interpretation. First, re: REAL IMPERATIVES: The structures which are being
offered as a way of interpreting an iffy and a non-iffy imperative do
not, as they stand, offer any room for the appearance this or that buletic
modality like 'ought' and 'should' which are so prominently visible in the
standard examples of those kinds of imperatives. The imperatives suggested by
Grice are explicit imperatives. An explicit buletic utterance is "Do
such-and-such!" and not 'You ought to do such and such” or, worse, “One
ought to do such and such'. Grice thinks, however, that one can modify this
suggestion to meet the demand for the appearance or occurrence of 'ought' (etc)
if such occurrence is needed. Second, it would remain to be decided how close
the preferred reading of Grice’s 'deviant' conditional imperatives would be to
the accepted interpretation of standard hypothetical or suppositional imperatives. But even if there were some
divergence that might be acceptable if the 'new' interpretation turns out to
embody a more precise notion than the standard conception. Third, NEUSTICAL vs
TROPICAL protases. There are, Grice thinks, serious doubts of the admissibility
of conditionals with a NON-doxastic protasis, which are for Grice connected
with the very difficult question whether the doxastic and the buletic modes are
co-ordinate or whether the doxastic mode is in some crucial fashion (but
not in other) _prior_ (to use Suppes’s qualification) to the buletic.
Grice confesses he does not know the answer to that question. A third formal interpretation links the
iffy/non-iffy distinction to the absolute-relative value distinction. An iffy
imperatives would be end-relative and might be analogous to an evidence-relative probability. A non-iffy
imperatives would not be end-relative. Finally, a
fourth Interpretation is not formal, but material. This is close to part of what Kant says on the topic. It
is a distinction between an imperative being escapable (iffy), through
the absence of a particular will and its
not being escapable (non-iffy). If we understand the idea of escabability sufficiently
widely, the following imperatives are all
escapable, even though their logical form is not in every case the same: "Give up
popcorn!," "To get slim, give up popcorn!", “If you will to get
slim, give up popcorn!" Suppose Grice has no will to get slim. One might say that the
first imperative (“Give up
popcorn!”) is 'escaped', provided giving up popcorn has nothing else to recommend it, by falsifying ‘You should give up
popcorn.’ The second and the third imperatives (“To get slim, give up
pocorn!” and “If you will to get slim, give up popcorn!”) would not, perhaps,
involve _falsification_ but they would, in the
circumstances, be inapplicable to Grice – and inapplicability, too, counts, as escape. A
non-iffy imperative however, is in no way
escapable. Re: the Dynamics of Imperatives in Discourse, Grice then gives three
examples which he had discussed in “Aspects of Reason,” which concern
_arguments_ (or “therefore”-chains). This we may see as an elucidation to grasp the logical form of
buletically iffy utterance (elided by the ‘therefore’, which is an ‘if’ in the
metalanguage) in its dynamics in argumentation. We should, Grice
suggests, consider not merely imperatives
of each sort, together with the range of possible characterisations, but
also the possible forms of _argument_ into which_particular_ hypothetical or
suppositional imperatives might enter. Consider: “Defend the Philosophy
Department! If you are to defend the
philosophy department, learn to use bows and arrows!
Therefore, learn to use bows and arrows!" Grice says he is using the
dichotomy of original-derived value. In this example, in the first premise, it
is not specified whether the will is original or derived, the second premise
specifies 'conducive to' (means), and the conclusion would involve a 'derived'
will, provided the second premise is doxastically satisfactory. Another example
would be: “Fight for your country! If you're to fight for your country, join up
(one of the services)! Therefore, join up!” Here, the first premise and the
conclusion do not specify the protasis. If the conclusion did, it would repeat
the second premise. Then there’s "Increase your holdings in oil shares! If
you visit your father, he'll give you some oil shares. Therefore, visit your
father!” This argument (purportedly) transmits value. Let us explore these
characterisations by Grice with the aid of R. M. Hare's distinctions. For
Hare in a hypothetical or suppositional imperative, the protasis contains a
neustic-cum-tropic. A distinction may be made between this or that 'hypothetical
or suppositional imperative' and a term used by Grice in his first
interpretation of the hypothetical or suppositional imperative, that of 'conditional command ('If you see the
whites of their eyes, shoot fire!”). A hypothetical
or suppositional imperative can be distinguished from a conditional imperative (“If
you want to make bread, use yeast!”, “If you see anything suspicious, telephone
the police!") by the fact that modus
ponens is not valid for it. One may use hypothetical, suppositional or conditional
‘imperative' for a buletic utterance which features ‘if,’ and reserve
'conditional command' for a command which is expressed by an imperative, and which is
conditional on the satisfaction of the protasis. Thus, on this view,
treating the major premise of an argument as a hypothetical or suppositional imperative turns
the “therefore”-chain invalid. Consider the sequence with the major premise as a
hypothetical or suppositional imperative. “If you will to make someone
mad, give him drug D! You will to make Peter
mad; therefore, give Peter drug D!” By uttering this hypothetical or
suppositional imperative, the utterer tells his addressee A only what means to adopt to achieve a given end in a way which does not necessarily endorse the adoption of that
end, and hence of the means to it. Someone might similarly say, "If you will to make someone mad, give him
drug D! But, of course, even if you will to do that, you must not try to do so.” On the other hand, the following is arguably valid because the major premise is a 'conditional'
imperative and not a mere hypothetical or suppositional one. We have a case of major premise
as a conditional imperative: “You will to make someone mad, give him drug D! Make Peter mad! Therefore, give Peter drug D!”. We can explain
this in terms of the presence of the neustic in the antecedent of the imperative working as the major premise. The supposition that the protasis of a hypothetical or
suppositional imperative contains a clause in the buletic mode neatly explains
why the argument with the major premise as a hypothetical or suppositional imperative is not
valid. But the argument with the major premise as a conditional imperative is, as well
as helping to differentiate a suppositional or hypothetical or suppositional
iffy imperative from a conditional iffy imperative. For, if the protasis of the
major premise in the hypothetical or suppositional imperative is volitival, the mere fact that you will to make
Peter mad does not license the inference of the imperative to give him the drug; but this _can_ be inferred from the major premise of the hypothetical
or suppositional imperative together with an imperative, the minor premise in
the conditional imperative, to make Peter mad. Whether the subordinate clause contains a neustic thus does have have a
consequence as to the validity of inferences into which the complex sentence
enters. The Principle of Mode
Constancy in Buletic and Doxastic Inference. One may tries to elucidate Grice's ideas on the
logical form of the hypothetical
or suppositional imperative proper. His suggestion is, admittedly, rather
tentative. But it might be argued,
in the spirit of it, that an iffy imperative is of the form ‘If !p, !q, .p; therefore, !q’ But this
violates a principle of MODE CONSTANCY. A phrastic must remain _in the same mode_ (within the scope
of the same _tropic_) throughout an argument.
A conditional imperative does not violate the principle of Modal Constancy, since it is
of the form ‘If p, !q, !p; therefore, !q’ The question of the logical form
of the hypothetical or
suppositional imperative is
too obscure to base much on arguments concerning it. There is an alternative to
Grice’s account of the validity of an argument featuring a conditional
imperative. This is to treat the major premise of a conditional
imperative, as some have urged it should be as a doxastic utterance tantamount
to "In order to make someone mad, you have to give him drug D".
Then an utterer who EXPLICITLY conveys or asserts the major premise of a
conditional imperative and _commands_ the second premise is in
consistency committed to commanding the conclusion. "If" does not always connect phrastic
with phrastic but sometimes connects two expressions consisting of a phrastic and a
tropic. Consider: "If you walk past the post office, post the
letter!" The antecedent of this
imperative states, it seems, the *condition* under which the imperative expressed becomes
operative, and so can _not_ be construed buletically, since by
uttering a buletic utterance, an utterer cannot *explicitly convey* or assert
that a condition obtains. Hence, the protasis ought not be within the scope of the buletic "!", and whatever we
take to represent the form of the utterance
above we must not take "!(if p, q)" to do so. One way out. On certain
interpretation of the isomorphism or æqui-vocality Thesis between
Indicative and Imperative Inference the utterance has to be construed as an imperative (in the generic
reading) to make the doxasatic
conditional "If you will walk past the post office, you will post the letter" satisfactory. Leaving aside issues
of the implicature of "if", that the utterance can _not_ be so construed seems to be shown by the fact that the imperative to make the associated
doxastically “iffy” utterance satisfactory is conformed with by one who does not walk past the
post office. But it seems strange at best to say that the utterance
is conformed with in the same circumstances. This 'strangeness’ or
‘bafflingliness,’ as Grice prefers, is aptly explained away in terms of the
implicatum. At Oxford, Dummett was endorsing this idea that a conditional imperative be
construed as an imperative to make an indicative “if” utterance true.
Dummett urges to divide conditional imperatives into those whose antecedent is
"within the power of the addressee,” like the utterance in
question, and those in which it is not. Consider: ‘If you go out, wear your
coat!’ One may be not so much concerned with how to *escape* this, as Grice is,
but how to *conform* it. A child may choose not to go out in order to comply
with the imperative. For an imperative whose protasis is_not_ within the power
of the addressee ("If anyone tries to escape, shoot him!”) it is
indifferent whether we treat it as a conditional imperative or not, so why
bother. A small caveat here.
If no one tries to escape, the imperative is *not violated*. One might ask, might there not be an important
practical difference bewteen saying that an imperative has not been violated and that
it has been complied with? Dummett ignores this
distinction. One may feel think there is much of a practical difference there. Is Grice an intuitionist? Suppose that you are a frontier
guard and the antecedent has remained
unfulfilled. Then, whether we say that you complied with it, or simply did not *violate* it
will make a great deal of difference if you appear before a war crimes tribunal.
For Dummett, the fact that in the case of an imperative expressed by a
conditional imperative in which the antecedent is not within the agent's power,
we should *not* say that the agent had obeyed just on the ground that the
protassi is false, is no ground for construing an imperative as expressing a
conditional command: for there is no question of fixing what shall
constitute obedience independently of the determination of what shall
constitute disobedience. This complicates the issues. One may with Grice (and
Hare, and Edgley) defend imperative inference against other Oxonian
philosophers, such as A. J. P. Kenny or B. A. O. Williams. What is questioned
by the sceptics about imperative inference is whether if each one of a set
of imperatives is used with the force of a command, one can infer a _further_
imperative with that force from them. Cf. Wiggins on Aristotle on the
practical syllogism. One may be more conservative than Hare, if not Grice.
Consider “If you stand by Jane, don't look at her! You stand by Jane;
therefore, don't look at her!” This is valid. However, the following, obtained
by anti-logism, is not: “If you stand by Jane, don't look at her! Look at her!
Therefore, you don't stand by Jane." It may seem more reasonable to some
to deny Kant’s thesis, and maintain that anti-logism is valid in imperative
inference than it is to hold onto Kant’s thesis and deny that antilogism is
valid in the case in question. Then there’s the question of the implicata involved
in the ordering of modes. Consider: “Varnish every piece of furniture you make!
You are going to make a table; therefore, varnish it! This is prima facie valid.
The following, however, switching the order of the modes in the premises is
not. "You are going to varnish every piece of furniture that you make.
Make a table! Therefore; varnish it!" The connection between the ‘if’ and
the ‘therefore’ is metalinguistic, obviously – the validity of the ‘therefore’
chain is proved by the ‘associated’ “if” that takes the premise as, literally,
the protasis and the consequence as the apodosis. Conversational
Implicature at the Rescue. Problems with "or": Consider Ross's
infamous example: “Post the letter! Therefore, post the letter or burn it!” as
'invalid,’ Ross 1944:38 – and endorsed at Oxford by B. A. O. Williams. To
permit to do p or q is to permit to do p and to permit to do q. Similarly,
to give permission to do something is to lift a prohibition against doing
it. Admittedly, Williams does not need this so we are stating his
claim more strongly than he does. One may review Grice’s way out (defense
of the validity of the utterance above in terms of the implicatum. Grice
claims that in Ross’s infamous example (valid, for Grice), whilst (to state it
roughly) the premise's "permissive presupposition" (to use the rather clumsy
term introduced by Williams) is entailed by it, the conclusion's is only *conversationally implicated*. Typically for an isomorphist, Grice says this is
something shared by indicative inferences. If, being absent-minded, Grice asks
his wife, ‘What have I done with the letter?' and she replies, ‘You have posted
it or burnt it,’ she conversationally implicates that she is not in a position
to say which Grice has done. She also conversationally implicates that Grice
may not have post it, so long as he has burnt it. Similarly, the future tense
indicative, "You are going to post the letter" has the conversational
implicature "You may be not going to post the letter so long as you are
going to burn it". But this surely does not validate the
introduction rule for “OR,” to wit: "p; therefore, p or
q"" One _can_ similarly, say: "Eclipse will win. He may not, of
course, if it rains. And I *know* it will *not* rain". Problems with
"and.” Consider: “Put on your parachute AND jump out! Therefore, jump
out!” Someone who _only_ jumps out of an æroplane does not fulfil 'Put on
your parachute and jump out!' He has done only what is necessary, but not
sufficient to fulfil it. Imperatives do not differ from indicatives in
this respect, except that fulfilment takes the place of belief or ‘doxa’, which
is the form of acceptance apprpriate to a doxasatic utterance, as the name
implies. Someone who is told ‘Smith put on his parachute AND jumped out’ is
entitled to believe that Smith jumped out. But if he believes that this is
_all_ Smith did he is in error” (Cf. R. Edgley). One may discuss Grice’s test
of cancellability in the case of the transport officer who says: "Go via
Coldstream or Berwick!" It seems the transport officer's way of
expressing himself is extremely *eccentric*, or ‘conversationally
baffling,’ as Grice prefers – yet ‘validly.’ If the transport officer is
not sure if a storm may block one of the routes, what he should say is
“_Prepare_ to go via Coldstream or Berwick!" As for the application of
Grice's test of explicit cancellation here, it yield, in the circumstances, the
transport officer uttering "Go either via Coldstream or
Berwick! But you may not go via Coldstream if you do not go via
Berwick, and you may not go via Berwick if you do not go via Coldstream."
Such qualifications -- what Grice calls ‘explicit cancellation of the implicature’
-- seem to the addressee to empty the buletic mode of utterance of all content
and is thus reminiscent of Henry Ford's utterance to the effect that people can
choose what colour car they like provided it is black. But then Grice doesn’t
think Ford is being illogical, only Griceian and implicatural!
1983. Axiology, metaphysics and value, the third and last
Paul Carus lecture, in The Conception of Value, Clarendon, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series II (Essays), BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: metaphysics, value. A
metaphysical defence of absolute value. The topic fascinates Grice, and he
invents a few routines to cope with it. Humeian projection rationally
reconstructs the intuitive concept 'being of value.' Category shift allows
to put a value such as Banbury's disinterestedness in grammatical subject
position (And does avoiding the answer that his disinterestedness is in the
next room -- since it's not a spatio-temporal continuan 'prote ousia' (Smith
is). But the most important routine is that of trans-substantion, or
‘metousiosis.’ A human reconstructs as a rational personal being, and alla
Kantotle, whatever he judges is therefore 'of absolute value.' The
issue involves for Grice the introduction of a 'telos' qua 'aition,'
'causa finalis' (final cause), role, or métier: the final cause of a tiger is
'to tigerise,' the final cause of a reasoner is to reason, the final cause
of a person is to personise. And this entails absolute value, now
metaphysically defended. The justification involves the idea of freedom. In something like a "shopping list" that Grice
provides for issues on 'free', he notes: "Attention to ... freedom calls
for formidably difficult ... undertakings" including the search for a
justification for the adoption (or abandonment) of an (ultimate) end. The point
is to secure that freedom does not 'dissolve into compulsion or chance' (p.
34). Grice proposes four items for this 'shopping list'.A first point is that
"full action calls for 'strong' freedom". Here one has to be careful
that since Grice abides by what he calls the "Modified Occam's Razor"
in the third William James lecture on ‘Some remarks about logic and
conversation,’ he would not like to think of this two ('strong freedom' and
'weak freedom') as being different _senses_ of the word 'free'. Again, his
'calls for' is best understood as 'presupposes'. It may connect with, say,
Kane's full-blown examples of decisions in practical settings that 'call for'
(or presuppose) libertarianism. A second point is that the desire-belief
characterisation of action (of the type favoured by Davidson and the early
Grice) has to accomodate for the fact that we need freedom which is strong. Strong
or serious autonomy or freedom ensures that this or that action is represented
as directed to this or that end which are is not merely the agent’s, but which
is also freely or autonomously adopted or pursued by the agent. Grice discussing
the case of the gym instructor commanding, ‘Raise your left arm!’ which relates.
The serious point then involves this 'free adoption' or 'free pursuit'. Note
Grice's use of this or that 'personal-identitity' pronoun: 'not merely mine,’
i.e. not merely the agent’s, but in privileged-access position. This connects
with what Aristotle says of actions as being 'up to me,’ and Kant's idea of the
transcendental ego. A will may be the agent’s in that the agent adopts it with
Kant's 'liberum arbitrium,’ and thus this or that low-level desire which is
circumstantial. A 'weak’ autonomy or freedom satisfactorily accounts for this
or that action as directed to an end which is mine. However, a 'strong’
autonomy or freedom, and a ‘strong’ autonomy or freedom only, accounts for this
or that action as directed to an end which is mine, but, unlike, say, some low-level
circumstantial desire which may have sprung out of some circumstantial
adaptability to a given scenario, is, first, autonomously or freely adopted by
the agent, and, second, autonomously or freely pursued by the agent. The use of
the disjunctive particle 'or' in the above is of some interest. Grice observes
that an agent may autonomously or freedly adopted an end, yet not autonomously
or freely pursue it, in this ‘strong’ connotation that ‘autonomous’ or 'free'
sometimes has. A further point relates to introduces causal indeterminacy. Any
attempt to remedy this situation by resorting to the introduction of chance or
causal indeterminacy will only infuriate this or that scientist without aiding
this or that moral philosopher. This remark by Grice has to be understood
casually. For, as it can be shown, this or that scientist may well have
resorted to precisely that introduction and in any case have not
self-infuriated. The professional tag that is connoted by 'the moral
philosopher' should also be seen as best implicated than entailed. A scientist
who does resort to the introduction of causal indeterminacy may be eo ipso be putting
forward a serious consideration regarding ethics or meta-ethics. In other
words, a cursory examination of the views of a scientist like Eddington,
beloved by Grice, or this or that moral philosophers like Kane should be born
in mind when considering this third point by Grice. Grice’s reference to
chance, random, and causal indeterminacy, should best be understood vis-à-vis
Aristotle's emphasis on 'tykhe' to the effect that this or that event may just
happen just 'by accident', which may well open a can of worms for the naive
Griceian, but surely not the sophisticated one (cf. his remarks on
‘accidentally,’ in Prolegomena). A further item in Grice's shopping list
involves the idea of ‘autonomous’ or ‘free’ as a value, or optimum. The
specific character of what Grice labels 'strong' autonomy or freedom may well turn
out to consist, Grice hopes, in the idea of this or that action as the outcome
of a certain kind of 'strong' valuation -- where this would include the
rational selection, as per, e.g. rational-decision theory) of this or that
ultimate end. What Grice elsewhere calls out-weighed (or extrinsically weighed)
rationality, where ‘rational’ applies, as it does with Kant’s ‘buletic’ reason,
to the end and not the means towards the end. Grice also pursues an alternative
line here. This or that action (this or that full human action) calls for the
presence of this or that reason, which require that the this or that ‘full
human’ action for which this or that reason accounts should be the outcome of this
or that ‘strong’ rational valuation. Like the more constructivist approach,
this line suggests that this or that action may require, besides strong autonomy
or freedom, now also strong valuation. Grice sets to consider how to adapt the
buletic-doxastic ‘soul’ progression to reach these goals. In the case of this
or that ultimate end, justification should be thought of as lying, directly, at
least, in this or that outcome not of the actual ‘phenomenal’ fulfilment of
this or that end, but rather of the, perhaps noumenal, presence-qua-end. Grice relates
to Kant’s views on the benevolentia or goodwill and malevolentia (evil will, or
illwill. Grice considers Smith’s action of 'giving Jones a job.’ Smith may be
deemed to have given Jones a job, whether or not Jones actually gets the job –
it’s Smith’s benevolentia, or goodwill, that matters. In a more general fashion
then, it is the mere presence of an end qua end of a given action that provides
the justification of the end, and not its phenomenal satisfaction or fulfilment. Furthermore,
the agent’s having such and such an end, E1, or such and such a combination of
ends, E1 and E2, would be justified by showing that the agent’s having this end
exhibits some desirable feature, such as this or that combo being harmonious, for
how can one combine one's desire to smoke with one's desire to lead a healthy
life? Harmony is one of Grice’s six requirements for a the application of
'happy’ to Smith’s ‘life.’ The buletic-doxastic souly ascription is back in
business at a higher level. The suggestion would involve an appeal, in the
justification of this or that end, to this or that higher-order end which would
be realised by having this or that lower, or first-order end of a certain sort.
Such valuation of this or that lower-order end lies within reach of a
buletic-doxastic souly ascription. Grice has an important caveat at this point.
This or that higher-order end involved in the defense would itself stand in
need of justification, and the regress might well turn out to be vicious. One
is reminded of Watson's requirement for a thing like freedom or personal
identity to overcome this or that alleged counterexample to freewill provided
by H. Frankfurt. It is after the laying of a shopping list, as it were,
and considerations such as those above that Grice concludes his reflection with
a defense of a noumenon, complete with the inner conflict that it brings. Attention
to the idea of ‘autonomous’ and ‘free’ leads the philosopher to the need to
resolve if not dissolve the most important unsolved problem of philosophy, viz.
how an agent can be, at the same time, a member of both the phenomenal world
and the noumenal world, or, to settle the internal conflict between one part of
our rational nature, the doxastic, even scientific, part which seems to call
for the universal reign of a deterministic law and the other buletic part which
insists that not merely moral responsibility but every variety of rational
belief demands exemption from just such a reign.
1983. Relative and absolute value, absolute value, aalues, morals,
absolutes, and the metapysical, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V
(Topical), carton 9-folder 24, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: relative and absolute
value, metaphysics, axiology. Grice uses 'relative' variously. His 'utterer's
meaning,' e. g. is relative. It is meaning-qua utterer-relativised, as he puts
it. The absolute, versus the relative, is constructed out of the relative,
though. There is hardly a realm of un-constructed reality. Grice is
especially concerned with J. L. Mackie's rather cavalier attitude towards the
relative and the absolute. Surely the 'absolute' IS a construction out of
the 'relative.' Grice takes a Kantotelian attitude. We designate a proper
judge, the ratiocinative part of the soul of a personal being. Whatever is
'relative' to this particular creature attains, ipso facto, 'absolute
value.' Grice proposes a reduction of what is valuable-absolute to what is
valuable-relative, and succeeds.
1984. Reply to Richards, in Philosophical Grounds of Rationality:
Intentions, Categories, Ends, Clarendon, ed. R. E. Grandy and R. Warner, pp.
45-108, prejudices and predilections; which become, the life and opinions of H.
P. Grice, Festschrift and Warner Notes, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II
(Essays), carton 4-folders 27-30, and Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 37,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley.
Keywords: autobiography. “The life and opinions of H. P. Grice,” by H. P.
Grice! P. G. R. I. C. E. had been in the works for awhile. Knowing this, Grice
is able to start his auto-biography, to which he later adds a specific 'reply'
to a few objections by the editors. The 'Reply' is divided in neat sections.
After a preamble displaying his gratitude for the volume in his honour, he
turns to his 'prejudices and predilections; which become, the life and opinions
of H. P. Grice.' The third section is a reply to the editors's overview of his
work. This reply itself is itself subdivided into questions of meaning and
rationality, and questions of "Metaphysics, philosophical psychology, and
value." As the latter is reprinted in "The conception of value,"
Clarendon, it is possible to cite this sub-section from the 'Reply' as a
separate piece. Grice originally entitles his essay in a brilliant manner,
echoing the style of an English non-conformist, almost: "Prejudices and
predilections; which become, the life and opinions of H. P. Grice." With
his "Richards," a nice Welsh surname, Grice is playing with the first
name of both Grandy and Warner. Grice is especially concerned with what
'Richards' see as a commitment on Grice's part to the abstract entity of a
'proposition.' Grice also deals with the alleged insufficiency in his
conceptual analysis of 'reasoning.' He brings for good measure a point about a
potential 'regressus ad infinitum' in his account of a chain of intentions
involved in meaning and communicating in general. While one of the drafts is
titled 'Festschrift,' not by himself, strictly, it is not a festschrift in that
the name is hidden behind the acronym: P(hilosophical) G(rounds of) R
(ationality:) I(ntentions,) C(ategories,) E(nds). Notably on the philosophy of
perception. Also on the conception of value, especially that tricky third
lecture on a metaphysical foundation for objective value. Grice was
supposed to reply to the individual contributors, but does not. “I cancelled
the implicatum!” However, we may identify in his oeuvre points of contacts of
his own views with the philosophers who contributed. Most of this material is
reproduced verbatim, indeed, as the second part of his "Reply to
Richards," and it was a philosophical memoir of which Grice was rightly
proud! The life and opinions are, almost in a joke on Witters, distinctly
separated. Under 'Life,' Grice convers his conservative, irreverent rationalism
making his early initial appearance under the influence of his non-conformist
father, and fermented at his tutorials with Hardie at Corpus, and his
associations with J. L. Austin's Play Group on Saturday mornings. Also, his
joint philosophising with P. F. Strawson, D. F. Pears, and J. Thomson. Under
'Opinions,' Grice mainly expands on 'ordinary-language' philosophy and his way
to the City of Eternal Truth. "Metaphysics, Philosophical Psychology,
and Value, in The Conception of Value, is thus part of his "Prejudices
and predilections." The authors Grice quotes are many and various. Grice
spends some delightful time criticising the critics of 'ordinary-language'
philosophy such as Bergmann and Gellner. He also quotes from Jespersen! And
Grice includes a reminiscence of the bombshells brought from Vienna by Freddie
Ayer, the enfant terrible of Oxford philosophy. He recalls an air marshal at a
dinner with Strawson recalling Cook Wilson's adage, 'What we know we know.' And
more besides!
1983. The concept of a universalium, Aristole on “to kath’holou,” universalia, universals, with M. Friedman, Group, Partial Working, Copy, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series V (Associations), carton 6-folder 11-12, and Series V (Topical), carton 9-folder 21-22, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: universalia, universalium, universalium ante re, universalium in re. Universalia as abstrata. Grice's concern with 'universalia' can be traced back to his reading of Aristotle's "Categoriæ." Other than the 'substantia prima,' it may be said that anything else -- attribute, etc. -- belongs in the realm of 'universalia' qua predicable. As such, a univeralium is not a spatio-temporal continuant. However, Grice's category shift allows a 'universalium' as a subject of discourse. The topic is approached formally by means of the notion of 'order.' First-order predicate calculus' ranges over this or that spatio-temporal continuant individual, in Strawson's use of the term. A higher-order predicate calculus ranges over this or that 'predicate' and beyond -- as such, a 'universalium' can only be 'referred to' in a second-order calculus. This is Grice's attempt to approach the Aristotelian and mediæval problem in pragmatic key. A higher category (anything but 'prote ousia' is a universalium. This is Grice doing history of philosophy. His main concern is with a 'universalium in re' as an abstract entity. He proposes an exploration of 'universalium in re' as a response to Extensionalism, so fashionable, he thinks, in the New World, within what he calls "The School of Latter-Day Nominalists." (He is aware that Bennett has called him a 'meaning'-nominalist!)
1985. Correspondence with P. Suppes, The H. P. Grice
Papers, Series I (The Correspondence of H. P. Grice, Sub-Series A), carton
1-folders 7-8, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of
California, Berkeley. Keywords: Grice, Suppes, utterer's meaning. Suppes
was involved in the P. G. R. I. C. E., and contributes an excellent "The
Primacy of Utterer's Meaning," where he addresses what he rightly sees as
an unfair characterisations of Grice as a behaviourist by three philosophers:
Yu, Biro, and Chomsky. Biro is able to respond to Suppes's commentary on Grice
as proposing a reductive but not reductionist analysis of meaning. Suppes
rightly characterises Grice as an 'intentionalist,' rather, and using such
jargon as 'basic procedure in one's repertoire' as 'informal' and 'colloquial,'
rather than 'behaviouristically,' as Ryle would.
1980. The Philosophy of Bealer, Bealer, Correspondence with G. P. Bealer, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series I (The Correspondence of H. P. Grice, 1A), carton 1-folder 4, and Series V (Topical), carton 6-folder 20, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Grice, Bealer, content. G. P. Bealer is one of Grice's most brilliant tutees! The Grice collection contains a full folder of correspondence with Bealer. Bealer refers to Grice in his influential Clarendon essay on content. Bealer is concerned with how 'pragmatic inference' may intrude in the ascription of a psychological state, attitude, or stance. Bealer loves to quote from Grice on definite descriptions "in Russell and in the vernacular," the implicature being that Russell is impenetrable!
1986. Actions and events, The Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 67, pp. 1-35, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 3-folders 1-5 and Series V (Topical), carton 7-folders 23 and 32, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: action, event, Davidson, logical form, freedom, cause. How do we define a Griceian action? How do we define a Griceian event? This is Grice's examination and criticism of Davidson, as a 'scientific' realist, followed by a Kantian approach to freedom and causation. Grice is especially interested in 'the logical form,' or explicitum, so that he can play with the implicatum! One of his favourite examples: "He fell on his sword," having tripped as he crossed the Galliæ. Grice manages to quote from many and varied authors (some of which you would not expect him to quote) such as Reichenbach, but also Robinson (of Oxford), von Wright and Eddington! Grice offers a 'linguistic botanic' survey of 'free' ("sugar-free," "free fall", "implicature-free") which some have found inspirational. His favourite is Finnegan's “alcohol-free." “His obvious implicature is that everything is alcohol-laden.” Grice kept a copy of Davidson's 'The logical form of action sentences,' since surely Davidson, Grice thought, is making a primary philosophical point. Horses run fast; therefore, horses run. A Davidsonian problem, and there are more to come! Smith went fishing. Grice's category shift allows us to take Smith's fishing as the grammatical subject of an 'action sentence.' Cf. indeed the way to cope with entailment in 'The horse runs fast; therefore, the horse runs.' Grice's "Actions and events" is Davidsonian in motivation, but Kantian in method, one of those actions by Grice to promote a Griceian event! Davidson had published, Grice thought, some pretty influential (and provocative, anti-Quineian) stuff on 'actions' and 'events,' or 'events and actions,' actually, and, worse, he was being discussed at Oxford, too, over which Grice always keeps an eye! Davidson's point, tersely put, is that while “p.q” (e.g. “It is raining, and it is pouring”) denotes a concatenation of *events*, "Smith went fishing" denotes an 'action,' which is a kind of 'event,' if you are following him (Davidson, not Smith). However, Davidson is fighting against the intuition, if you are a follower of Whitehead and Russell, to symbolise the "Smith is fishing" as “Fs,” where 's' stands for Smith and F for 'fishing.' The logical form of a report of an 'event' or an 'action' seems to be slightly more complicated. Davidson's point specifically involves 'adverbs,' or adverbial modifiers, and how to play with them in terms of entailment. “The horse runs fast; therefore, the horse runs.” "Symbolise that!” as Davidson told Benson Mates! But Mates had gone to the restroom. Grice explores all these and other topics and submits the thing to "The Pacific Philosophical Quarterly." Grice quotes, as isn't his wont, from many and various philosophers, not just Davidson, whom he saw every Wednesday, but others he didn't, like Reichenbach, Robinson, Kant, and, again even a physicist like Eddington. Grice remarks that Davidson is into 'hypothesis,' or 'suppositio,' while he is, as he should, into 'hypostasis,' or ‘substantia.’ Grice then expands on the apparent otiosity of uttering, ‘It is a fact that grass is green.’ Grice goes on to summarise what he ironically dubs an ‘ingenious argument.’ Let 'σ' abbreviate the operator "... consists in the fact that ...,” which, when prefixed to a sentence, produces a predicate or epithet. Let 'S' abbreviate 'Snow is white,’ and let 'G' abbreviate 'Grass is green.' In that case, ‘xσS’ is 1 just in case 'xσ(y(y=y and S) = y(y=y)' is 1, since the first part of the sub-sentence which follows σ in the main sentence is logically equivalent logically equivalent to the second part. And 'xσ(y(y=y and S) = y(y=y)' is 1 just in case 'xσ(y(if y=y, G) = y(y=y)' is 1, since 'y(if y=y, S)' and 'y(if y=y, G) are each a singular term, which, if S and G are both true, each refers to y(y=y), and are therefore co-referential and inter-substitutable. And 'xσ(y(if y=y, G) = y(y=y)' is true just in case 'xσG' is 1, since 'G' is logically equivalent to the sub-sentence which follows σ. So, this fallacy goes, provided that 'S' and 'G' are both 1, regardless of what an utterer explicitly conveys by uttering a token of it, any event which consists of the otiose fact that S also consists of the otiose fact that G, and vice versa, i. e. this randomly chosen event is identical to any other randomly chosen event. Grice hastens to criticise this slingshot fallacy licensing the inter-substitution of this or that co-referential singular term and this or that logically equivalent sub-sentence as officially demanded because it is needed to license a patently valid (if baffling) inference. But, if in addition to providing this benefit, the fallacy saddles the philosopher with a commitment to a 'hideous consequence', the rational course is to endeavour to find a way of retaining the benefit while eliminating the disastrous accompaniment, much as in set theory it seems rational to seek as generous a comprehension axiom as the need to escape this or that paradox permits. Grice proposes to retain the principle of co-reference, but prohibit is use after the principle of logical equivalence has been used. Grice finds such a measure to have some intuitive appeal. In the fallacy, the initial deployment of the principle of logical equivalence seems tailored to the production of a sentence which provides opportunity for trouble-raising application of the principle of co-referentiality. And if that is what the game is, why not stop it? On the assumption that this or that problem which originally prompts this or that analysis is at least on their way towards independent solution, Grice turns his attention to the possibility of providing a constructivist treatment of things which might perhaps have more intuitive appeal than a naïve realist approach. Grice begins with a class of happenstance attributions, which is divided into this or that basic happenstance attribution, i.e. ascriptions to a subject-item of an attribute which is metabolically expressible, and this or that non-basic resultant happenstance attribution, in which the attribute ascribed, though not itself metabolically expressible, is such that its possession by a subject item is suitably related to the possession by that or by some other subject item, of this or that attribute which is metabolically expressible. Any member of the class of happenstance attributions may be used to say what happens, or happens to be the case, without talking about any special entity belonging to a class of a happening or a happenstance. A next stage involves the introduction of the operator "... consists of the fact that ..." This operator, when prefixed to a sentence S that makes a happen-stance attribution to a subject-item, yields a predicate which is satisfied by an entity which is a happenstance, provided that sntence S is doxastically satisfactory, i. e. 1, and that some further metaphysical condition obtains, which ensures the metaphysical necessity of the introduction into reality of the category of a happenstance, thereby ensuring that this new category is not just a class of this or that fiction. As far as the slingshot fallacy, and the 'hideous consequence' that all facts become identical to one Great Big Fact, in the light of a defence of Reichenbach against the realist attack, Grice is reasonably confident that a metaphysical extension of reality will not saddle him with an intolerable paradox, pace the caveat that, to some, the slingshot is not contradictory in the way a paradox is, but merely an unexpected consequence -- not seriously hideous, at that. What this metaphysical condition would be which would justify the metaphysical extension remains, alas, to be determined. It is tempting to think that the metaphysical condition is connected with a theoretical need to have this or that happenstance as this or that item in, say, a causal relation. Grice goes on to provide a progression of linguistic botanising including ‘free.’ Grice distinguishes four elements or stages in the step-by-step development of freedom. First stage: "transeunt" causation: in inanimate objects. Hume's realm -- the atomists's realm. This is external or transeunt' casuation, when an object is affected by processes in other objects. A second stage is internal or immanent causation, where a process in an object is the outcome of previous stages in that process, as in a freely moving' body. A third stage is nternal causation of living beings, in which changes are generated in a creature by internal features of the creature which are not earlier stages of the same change, but independent items, the function or finality of which is to provide for the good of the creature in question. A fourth stage is a culminating stage at which the conception of a certain mode by a human of something as being for that creature's good is sufficient to initiate the doing of that thing. Grice expands on this interesting last stage. At this stage, it is the case that the creature is liberated from every factive cause.
1987. Conceptual
analysis and the province of philosophy, Studies in the Way of Words, Part II:
Explorations in semantics and metaphysics, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II
(Essays), BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: conceptual analysis, philosophy. Grice was since his
‘Negation’ and ‘Personal identity’ concerned with reductive analysis. How many
angels can dance on a needle’s point? A needless point? This is Grice's update
to his ‘Post war Oxford Philosophy.’ More generally concerned with the province
of philosophy in general and conceptual analysis beyond 'ordinary language.' It
can become pretty technical. Note the Roman overtone of 'province'! Grice is
implicating that the other province is perhaps science, but he also likes to
play with the idea that a conceptual enquiry need not be philosophical. Witness
the very opening to ‘Logic and Conversation,’ ‘Prolegomena.’ Surely not all inquiries
need be philosophical. In fact, a "claim to infame" of Grice at the
Play Group is having once raised the infamous, most subtle, question, what is
it that makes a conceptual enquiry philosophically interesting or important? As
a result, Austin and his 'kindergarten' spend three weeks analysing the
distinct inappropriate implicata of adverbial collocations like "highly
depressed" to no avail! Grice's moralising implicature, by retelling the
story, is that since then he realised (as he hoped Austin knew) that there is no
way he or any philosopher can dictate to others, or himself, what is it that
makes a conceptual enquiry philosophically interesting or important!
1987. Retrospective epilogue, to Studies in the Way of Words, Harvard University Press, London, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 3-folders 22-26 and carton 4-folders 1-2, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: latitudinal unity, meaning, conversational implicata, conversation as rational co-operation. Grice takes the opportunity of the compilation by Harvard of his 'studies in the way of words,’ “representative of the mid-60s,” to review the idea of philosophical progress in terms of eight different 'strands' which display, however, a consistent and distinctive unity. Grice keeps playing with 'valediction,' 'valedictory', 'prospective' and 'retrospective,' and the different drafts are all kept in The Grice Papers. In the 'Retrospective Epilogue' he provides input for his eight strands, and concludes with a fairy tale about his fairy godmother, G*! As he notes, Grice had dropped a few words in the 'preface' explaining the ordering of essays in the compilation. He mentions that he hesitated to follow Bennett's suggestion that the ordering of the essays be thematic and chronological. Rather, Grice chooses to publish the whole set of seven William James lectures as Part I. Part II is organised more or less thematically, though. In the "Retrospective Epilogue," Grice takes up this observation in the "Preface" that two ideas (Theme A and Theme B) underlie his Studies: that of meaning, and that of assertion vs. implication. The "Retrospective Epilogue" is thus an exploration on eight 'strands' he identifies in his own philosophy. Grice’s choice of ‘strand' should not mislead. For Grice, philosophy, like virtue, is entire. All the strands therefore display some 'latitudinal,' and, he hopes, 'longitudinal' unity. By these two types of 'unity,' Grice means the obvious fact that all branches of philosophy (philosophy of language, philosophy of perception, philosophical psychology, etc.) interact and overlap, and that a historical regard for one's philosophical predecessors is a must.
1987. 'Preface' to Studies in the Way of
Words, foreword, preliminary valediction, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
II (Essays), carton 9-folder 2, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Grice quotes from J. F. Bennett. More
importantly, Grice focuses on the 'assertion'/'non-assertion' distinction. He
overlooks the fact that for this or that beloved 'imperative utterance,'
asserting is out of the question. He needs a dummy to stand for a psychological
attitude of either boulesis or doxa, as in 'conveying explicitly' that the
addressee is to do A, or that p. The explicatum or explicitum sometimes does
the trick; sometimes it doesn't! Grice in fact subdivides his Theme A into 'assertion'
vs. 'implication,' or explicitly conveying that p vs. 'By uttering x (thereby
explicitly conveying that p), the utterer U conversationally implies that
q" -- and meaning simpliciter.
1988. Studies in the way of words, Harvard University Press, London, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series II (Essays), carton 3-folders 7-21, BANC, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: implicature, rationality. The title Grice eventually chooses for his compilation of essays is a tribute to Locke, who, although obsessed with his "new way of ideas," left room for the scientist's 'way of things, and, more to the point, for this or that study in the way of words. The 'studies' are organised in two parts: "Logic and conversation" and "Explorations in semantics and metaphysics." It also includes a Preface and a very rich "Retrospective epilogue." From Part I, The William James lectures, only three had not been previously published: "Prolegomena," "Indicative conditionals," and "Some models for implicature." From Part II, a few essays had not been published before, but Grice, nodding to the longitudinal unity of philosophy, is very careful and proud to date them.
1988. Rationality and Linguistic behaviour, correspondence with J.
F. Bennett, of Oxford, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series I (The Correspondence of
H. P. Grice -- IA), carton 1-folder 1, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library,
The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Grice, Bennett,
"Linguistic Behaviour." Oxford don, Christchurh, NZ-born Bennett
quotes Grice in his "Linguistic behaviour." Grice quotes Bennett
in the "Preface" to Studies in the Way of Words. Bennett has an
earlier essay on rationality, which evidences that the topic is key in Grice's
Oxford. Bennett has studied better than anyone the way Locke is Griceian: a
word does not just stand for idea, but for the utterer's intention to stand for
it!
1988. General correspondence, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series
I (The Correspondence of H. P. Grice, IB: General), carton 1-folders 10-14,
BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California,
Berkeley. Keywords: philosophical correspondence Grice was not
precisely a good, or reliable, as The British Academy puts it, correspondent.
In the Oxford manner, Grice prefers a face-to-face interaction, anyday. He
treasured his Saturday mornings under Austin's guidance, and he himself led the
Play Group after Austin's demise, which, as Owens reminisced, attained a kind
of cult status.
1988. Grice on Grice, essays on Grice, Griceana, Griceiana,
The H. P. Grice Papers, Series I (The Correspondence of H. P. Grice, IB:
General), carton 1-folder 15, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The
University of California, Berkeley. Keyword: secondary literature.
As one (even on the cold shores of Oxford, as one of Grice's tutees put it)
might expect, Grice is cited by various Oxford philosophers! Perhaps the first
to cite Grice in print is his tutee, P. F. Strawson, in Introduction to Logical
Theory. Early on, H. L. A. Hart quotes Grice on meaning in his review in
"The Philosophical Quarterly" of John Holloway's "Language and
Intelligence" before Grice's "Meaning" had been published.
Obviously, once Grice's and Strawson's "In defense of a dogma" and
Grice's "Meaning" are published by The Philosophical Review,
Grice is discussed profusely. References to his 'implicature' start to appear
in the literature at Oxford in the mid-1960s. It is particularly intriguing to
explore those philosophers Grice picks up for dialogue, too, and perhaps
arrange them alphabetically, from Austin to Warncok, say. And Griceian
references, Oxonian or other, as they should, keep counting!
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