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.
Grice starts with Aristotle's "apophasis" in Int.17a25 ("The potentialities of joint endeavours continues to lure me. The collaboration with Strawson was followed by other collaborations of varying degrees of intensity, with (for example) Austin on Aristotle's Categories and De Interpretatione [...]." This is
So what does Aristotle say in "De interpretatione"? Aristotle has: "ἀ. ἐστιν ἀπόφανσίς τινος ἀπό τινος, "a predication of one thing away from another, i.e. negation of it. Grice's reflection, in a verificationist vein, of two types of utterance: "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 in a non-Anglo-Saxon continuous-tense variant Grice gives, "I am not hearing *that* the bell is ringing," and "I am not hearing a noise," fearing the simple- present form might trigger the wrong implicatum), and "I do not see *that* the pillar box is blue" (or "I am not seeing *that* the pillar box is blue," or "That is not blue.") Surely, each is co-related to some affirmative counterpart, viz.: "I hear *that* the bell is ringing" (or "I am hearing *that* the bell is ringing", "I hear a noise," "I am hearing a noise") and "I see *that* the pillar box is red" (or "That is red"). But associates each with a psychological state, attitude, or stance. In the case of an utterer U uttering "I do not hear *that* the bell is ringing," the source or reason, ground or knowledge upon which an utterer bases his utterance is the *absence* (absentia, privatio), 'verified' by introspection, of the same psychological state, stance, or attitude, co-related to the affirmative counterpart, "I hear that the bell is ringing," which does *not* feature the "not" operator. Grice co-relates "I do *not* see *that* the pillar box is blue" (or "That is not blue") with "I see that the pillar box is red" (or "That is red"), which does *not* feature "not," and is alleged by Grice to be the source or reason for Utterer U to utter "I do not see that the pillar box is blue" (or "That is not blue," on the ground of U's seeing that the pillar box is red. In the "hear" example, unlike that of the *visual* sense-datum example, Grice thinks he needs not appeal to a different experience ("I hear that the bell is silent"), but to the utterer's felt absence (absentia or privatio) of the experience, which is thereby negated. The utterance featuring "not" is explained with the aid of an introspection, ultimately related to the utterer's confronted with the absence or privation of an experience involving the auditory sense datum ('The bell is ringing,' 'noise'). 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 that allow for a unified account. Each pair of affirmative and negative utterance -- involves a perceptual verb, in two modes: auditory (U's hearing) and visual (U's seeing), generalisable in terms of U's sensing ("I do not sense that the alpha is phi") vs. the absence of a possible experience "I sense that the alpha is phi" or the presence of the experience involving a different sense daum ("I sense that the alpha is phi-2"). The keyword then would be the philosophy of perception, which will prove to be a long-standing interest of Grice's, and his colse 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 verb attached to the agent-based first person (cf. 'sight unseen'). By uttering "I do not hear that the bell is ringing," the U explicitly conveys the perceptual verb attached to the agent-based first person and thus seem like a more natural utterance to receive a direct introspective analysis, even if in the slightly negative-loaded concept of 'absentia' or 'privatio' of a possible experience. In relying on introspection as a basis of knowledge -- 'introspective knowledge,' indeed -- Grice is being very Oxonian in the best empiricist tradition. Grice's attempt, via reductive-reductionist analysis, to 'eliminate' "not" along verificationist 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 of "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, privatio) of an introspection, or the absence (absentia, privatio) of a possible (but not actual) 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 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 Austin's seminal Thursday-evening "Play Group of the Seven" meetings at All Souls with A. J. Ayer, I. Berlin, S. N. Hampshire, H. L. A Hart, D. MacDermott, D. MacNabb, and A. D. Woozley. But Grice learns all about the "linguistic botany" methodology on his return from the navy. At St. John's, he has Strawson as his tutee -- which starts a life-long friendship and collaboration. Indeed, Grice turns back to the topic of negation in seminars later at Oxford (vide Grice 1961) in connection with Strawson's cursory treatment of "not" in "Introduction to logical theory." Grice indeed includes "not," naturally, as the first item, qua unary satisfactory-value-functor (unlike "and," "or," and "if") in his list of vernacular counterparts to this or that 'formal device' -- in this case, "~." 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 the introduction (+,~) and elimination (-,~) for negation, and the correlative value assignation. He adds a subscript device on "~", for cases like "It The climber of Mt. Everest on hands and knees is not to atttend the party in his honour." In "Presupposition," he adds "Do not [arrest the intruder]!," the square-bracket device for assigning common-ground status, In "Method in philosophical psycholgoy" he plays with the internalisation of "not" within the scope of a psychological verb denotating a psychological state, tance, or attitude. In the Kant lectures on aspects of reasoning, he explores "not" within the scope of this or that mode operator, as in an imperatival (or boulomaic) utterance ("Don't do it!" "Don't arrest the intruder!") and this or that mixed-mode utterances, and in connection with the minor problem of presupposition ("Smith has not ceased from eating iron").within the scope of an operator other than the indicative mode ("Don't do it!" "Don't arrest the intruder!"). 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 the 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. It 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 the contrary opinion. 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 that the pillar box is red, is a ‘negation,’ while 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 “x” explicitly conveying that p; Pirot-2 feels like negate that. By uttering x2, U2 explicitly conveys that ~p. Or Pirot-1 volunteers x3, explicitly conveying that ~p ("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 this or that procedure by the utterer 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 his comments addressed to this more general topic (satisfactoriness-preserving operators) 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 negation, but ‘formal device’ in general, does not mean that what he says about formal device may not be particularised to apply to negation. His big concession is that Whitehead and Russell are right about the explicitum or explicatum of "not" being "~" (Or, more formally, "by uttering "Not!", the utterer explicitly conveys that ~p. Any divergence is explained via the 'implicatum.' "Not" utterances are horribly uninformative, and not all of them are of philosophical interest. Grice joked with Searle's "He's not lighting the cigarette with a twenty-dollar bill," 'he' being a Texas oilman in his club, and thus, the 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.q." Grice's two examples involving 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 this 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. As a conversational implicatum, Grice’s examples can be re-phrased, “I’m unhearing a noise” and "That's unred." This point is particularly important, since it shows that 'negation' and "not" are not co-extensive. First, "not," is hardly pure Anglo-Saxon (being the abbreviation of 'ne-aught;' 'ne' was the proper Anglo-Saxon negation). Second, 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 used 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 or conceptual key. If his priority is for "By uttering x (by which U explicitly conveys that ~p), U implicitly conveys that q." The essay thus is an elaboration on 'q.' For the record, "nihilism" was coined by philosopher Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi. "Negatio" was already an item in the philosophical lexicon. 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 was 'privatio.' prīvātĭo , ōnis, f. privo, I.a taking away, privation of a thing (class.): “doloris,” Cic. Fin. 1, 11, 37 and 38; “2, 9, 28: culpae,” 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. Grice was not the first to explore philosophically 'negation,' but the philosoher 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.")
Grice starts with Aristotle's "apophasis" in Int.17a25 ("The potentialities of joint endeavours continues to lure me. The collaboration with Strawson was followed by other collaborations of varying degrees of intensity, with (for example) Austin on Aristotle's Categories and De Interpretatione [...]." This is
So what does Aristotle say in "De interpretatione"? Aristotle has: "ἀ. ἐστιν ἀπόφανσίς τινος ἀπό τινος, "a predication of one thing away from another, i.e. negation of it. Grice's reflection, in a verificationist vein, of two types of utterance: "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 in a non-Anglo-Saxon continuous-tense variant Grice gives, "I am not hearing *that* the bell is ringing," and "I am not hearing a noise," fearing the simple- present form might trigger the wrong implicatum), and "I do not see *that* the pillar box is blue" (or "I am not seeing *that* the pillar box is blue," or "That is not blue.") Surely, each is co-related to some affirmative counterpart, viz.: "I hear *that* the bell is ringing" (or "I am hearing *that* the bell is ringing", "I hear a noise," "I am hearing a noise") and "I see *that* the pillar box is red" (or "That is red"). But associates each with a psychological state, attitude, or stance. In the case of an utterer U uttering "I do not hear *that* the bell is ringing," the source or reason, ground or knowledge upon which an utterer bases his utterance is the *absence* (absentia, privatio), 'verified' by introspection, of the same psychological state, stance, or attitude, co-related to the affirmative counterpart, "I hear that the bell is ringing," which does *not* feature the "not" operator. Grice co-relates "I do *not* see *that* the pillar box is blue" (or "That is not blue") with "I see that the pillar box is red" (or "That is red"), which does *not* feature "not," and is alleged by Grice to be the source or reason for Utterer U to utter "I do not see that the pillar box is blue" (or "That is not blue," on the ground of U's seeing that the pillar box is red. In the "hear" example, unlike that of the *visual* sense-datum example, Grice thinks he needs not appeal to a different experience ("I hear that the bell is silent"), but to the utterer's felt absence (absentia or privatio) of the experience, which is thereby negated. The utterance featuring "not" is explained with the aid of an introspection, ultimately related to the utterer's confronted with the absence or privation of an experience involving the auditory sense datum ('The bell is ringing,' 'noise'). 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 that allow for a unified account. Each pair of affirmative and negative utterance -- involves a perceptual verb, in two modes: auditory (U's hearing) and visual (U's seeing), generalisable in terms of U's sensing ("I do not sense that the alpha is phi") vs. the absence of a possible experience "I sense that the alpha is phi" or the presence of the experience involving a different sense daum ("I sense that the alpha is phi-2"). The keyword then would be the philosophy of perception, which will prove to be a long-standing interest of Grice's, and his colse 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 verb attached to the agent-based first person (cf. 'sight unseen'). By uttering "I do not hear that the bell is ringing," the U explicitly conveys the perceptual verb attached to the agent-based first person and thus seem like a more natural utterance to receive a direct introspective analysis, even if in the slightly negative-loaded concept of 'absentia' or 'privatio' of a possible experience. In relying on introspection as a basis of knowledge -- 'introspective knowledge,' indeed -- Grice is being very Oxonian in the best empiricist tradition. Grice's attempt, via reductive-reductionist analysis, to 'eliminate' "not" along verificationist 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 of "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, privatio) of an introspection, or the absence (absentia, privatio) of a possible (but not actual) 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 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 Austin's seminal Thursday-evening "Play Group of the Seven" meetings at All Souls with A. J. Ayer, I. Berlin, S. N. Hampshire, H. L. A Hart, D. MacDermott, D. MacNabb, and A. D. Woozley. But Grice learns all about the "linguistic botany" methodology on his return from the navy. At St. John's, he has Strawson as his tutee -- which starts a life-long friendship and collaboration. Indeed, Grice turns back to the topic of negation in seminars later at Oxford (vide Grice 1961) in connection with Strawson's cursory treatment of "not" in "Introduction to logical theory." Grice indeed includes "not," naturally, as the first item, qua unary satisfactory-value-functor (unlike "and," "or," and "if") in his list of vernacular counterparts to this or that 'formal device' -- in this case, "~." 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 the introduction (+,~) and elimination (-,~) for negation, and the correlative value assignation. He adds a subscript device on "~", for cases like "It The climber of Mt. Everest on hands and knees is not to atttend the party in his honour." In "Presupposition," he adds "Do not [arrest the intruder]!," the square-bracket device for assigning common-ground status, In "Method in philosophical psycholgoy" he plays with the internalisation of "not" within the scope of a psychological verb denotating a psychological state, tance, or attitude. In the Kant lectures on aspects of reasoning, he explores "not" within the scope of this or that mode operator, as in an imperatival (or boulomaic) utterance ("Don't do it!" "Don't arrest the intruder!") and this or that mixed-mode utterances, and in connection with the minor problem of presupposition ("Smith has not ceased from eating iron").within the scope of an operator other than the indicative mode ("Don't do it!" "Don't arrest the intruder!"). 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 the 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. It 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 the contrary opinion. 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 that the pillar box is red, is a ‘negation,’ while 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 “x” explicitly conveying that p; Pirot-2 feels like negate that. By uttering x2, U2 explicitly conveys that ~p. Or Pirot-1 volunteers x3, explicitly conveying that ~p ("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 this or that procedure by the utterer 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 his comments addressed to this more general topic (satisfactoriness-preserving operators) 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 negation, but ‘formal device’ in general, does not mean that what he says about formal device may not be particularised to apply to negation. His big concession is that Whitehead and Russell are right about the explicitum or explicatum of "not" being "~" (Or, more formally, "by uttering "Not!", the utterer explicitly conveys that ~p. Any divergence is explained via the 'implicatum.' "Not" utterances are horribly uninformative, and not all of them are of philosophical interest. Grice joked with Searle's "He's not lighting the cigarette with a twenty-dollar bill," 'he' being a Texas oilman in his club, and thus, the 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.q." Grice's two examples involving 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 this 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. As a conversational implicatum, Grice’s examples can be re-phrased, “I’m unhearing a noise” and "That's unred." This point is particularly important, since it shows that 'negation' and "not" are not co-extensive. First, "not," is hardly pure Anglo-Saxon (being the abbreviation of 'ne-aught;' 'ne' was the proper Anglo-Saxon negation). Second, 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 used 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 or conceptual key. If his priority is for "By uttering x (by which U explicitly conveys that ~p), U implicitly conveys that q." The essay thus is an elaboration on 'q.' For the record, "nihilism" was coined by philosopher Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi. "Negatio" was already an item in the philosophical lexicon. 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 was 'privatio.' prīvātĭo , ōnis, f. privo, I.a taking away, privation of a thing (class.): “doloris,” Cic. Fin. 1, 11, 37 and 38; “2, 9, 28: culpae,” 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. Grice was not the first to explore philosophically 'negation,' but the philosoher 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.")
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. 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 'theory' is a 'modification' of Locke's theory, and he does not seem too interested to find why it may not. His strategy seems to dismiss Locke, as "not being clear" to Grice what Locke's answer to Grice's question about "I" statements would be. Grice does quote directly from the "Essay," when Locke states that "For 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 it is the same personal self." He proposes to tackle the objections he sees Locke's thesis may yield, namely four (circularity -- easily disposed by appealing to 'memory or introspection -- Reid, aboutness, circularity of "same"). 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") had a special Oxonian pedigree that Grice had occasion to study and explore for his M. A. Lit. Hum. Locke, a philosopher with whom Oxford identifes most, famously defends a memory-based account of "I" that received some alleged counter-example by some Scots philosophers, notably Reid. And Hume! (Or "Home," if you must). In fact, while he is not too specific about Hume in the "Mind" essay, Grice will, due mainly to his joint investigations with J. C. Haugeland, approach Hume's 'quandary,' too! In his own approach to "I," Grice updates the time-honoured Lockeian analysis. Grice embraces a 'logical construction' of "I" utterances, and relies on Gallie. In fact, Grice is heterodoxical enough to use the taxonomy by Broad ('from the other place') of "I" utterances, too. Grice deals with the Reid-type counterexample, and comes up with a rather elaborate 'analysans' for a simple "I" statement, such as "I am hearing a noise," the affirmative counterpart of the focus of his earlier essay on negation ("I am not hearing a noise"). In fact, Grice dismisses the 'indexical' approach that will be made popular by J. R. Perry (who reprinted 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 "I" statements ("I am hearing a noise") in terms of a chain of mnemonic states 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 the infamous counterexamples presented by Reid and Hume. Grice concludes on a methodological note. The intricacy of one's analysis for an apparently simple utterance (cf. his earlier essay on "I am not hearing a noise") should not be a minus, but a plus. Much later, Grice later 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, indeed metaphysical chimaera. Hume presses the point for an 'empiricist' verificationist account of "I." For, as Russell would say, "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 "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,' 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 of Hume's criticism to Locke on personal identity. Grice opts to revisit the Lockeian memory-based on "I" utterances that Hume rather regards as 'vague,' and 'confusing.' Locke's approach to identity is NOT eliminationist as Hume's is, and it is only natural that Grice would be sympathetic to it. 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 Broad's, but Grice loved it. Rational reconstruction is not too dissimilar, but Grice prefers Broad's more conservative label. This is more than a terminological point. If Hume is right and there is NO 'intuitive' concept of "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 an "I" utterance WITHOUT using "I," by implicating only 'mnemonic' concepts, which belong, 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.’ Personal identity is a type of identity, but what does ‘person’ add? Consciousness? Grice plays with the soul/body distinction ("I fell from the stairs"). Some "I" utterances are purely 'bodily,' some are purely 'soully,' and some are mixed! At the time of his "Mind" essay, he was unaware of the complications that the concept of a ‘person’ (as attached in adjective form to 'identity') may bring. Ayer did, and Strawson 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. "Someone heard a noise" is analysed as "A past hearing of a noise is an element in a total temporary state which is a member of a series of total temporary states such that every member of the series would, given certain conditions, contain as an element a memory of some experience which is an element in some previous member, or contains as an element some experience a memory of which would, given certain conditions, occur as an element in some subsequent member; there being no sub-set of members which is independent of the rest." -- which Grice 'simplifies' as "A past hearing of a noise is an element in a member of an interlocking series of memorative and memorable total temporary states". Was his "Personal identity" ever referred to? 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 encyclopaedia 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," if not "somebody." His agency-based approach requires that: "I am rational provided YOU are, too." By explicitly saying he is a Lockeian, Grice surely will NOT like to see himself as the first to consider this or that problem about "I; i.e. someone." But he was the philosopher who most explored the 'reductive analysis' of "I, i.e. someone." He needs the reductive analysis, because human agency (philosophically, rather than psychologically interpreted) is key for his approach to philosophy ("By uttering x, U means that he or someone is hearing a noise," or even "By uttering "I, i.e. someone is hearing a noise, U means that the experience of a hearing of a noise is an element 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."
1946. The sceptic’s implicatum, common sense and scepticism, repr. in Studies in the Way of Words, 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 eyes, 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 the practice! This is vintage Grice! Grice always took the sceptic's challenge seriously, as any serious philosopher should! In his later reflections, Grice's took the sceptic's impicatum as a very affront to our idea of rationality, conversational or other. Vide: "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; so you cannot really attack 'practical' reason without attacking 'theoretical' or doxastic reason, too! There is something like a more general 'rational acceptance,' to use Grice's term, that the sceptic is getting at! Grice liked to play with the idea that ultimately all syllogism is 'practical.' If, say, a syllogism by Einstein looks doxastic, that is because Einstein cares to 'omit the practical tail,' as Grice puts it! And Einstein 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 (yes, of the Stoa infame) and common sense with 'ordinary language', so mis-called, the elephant in Grice's room. If scepticism attacks common sense and fails, Grice seems to be implicating, ‘ordinary-language’ philosophy is a good antidote to scepticism, too! Since what language other than 'ordinary language' does common sense speak? ("Well, strictly, common sense doesn't speak!"). In fact, Grice re-addresses this topic in a strictly 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 Moore's attempt at humour to symbolise "any" philosopher, especially of the type he found eccentric, the sceptic included. Grice finds problems in this overarching Cantabrigian manoeuvre, as over-simplifying a pretty convoluted terrain. While Grice treasured Austin's "Some like Witters, but Moore's MY man!" perhaps he found Moore too Cantabrigian to his taste! While an Oxonian thoroughbred, Grice was a bit like Austin, "Some like Witters, but Moore's my man." While Grice would agree that Moore goes '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 saw him almost every day! "There is something apostolic about Moore that I enjoy," Grice would say, referring to the fact that Moore was one of the apostles. Grice spends some time exploring what Malcolm, a follower of Witters, as it were, has to say about Moore in connection with that particularly "Oxonian" turn of phrase, "ordinary language." For Malcolm's Moore, a 'paradox' by a 'philosopher' arises when 'Philosopher' fails to abide by the dictates of Ordinary Language. That Moore was not too happy with Malcolm's criticism can be witnessed by just a glimpse at Moore's "Reply to Norman Malcolm"! Grice is totally against this view that Malcolm ascribes to Moore as being TOO BROAD to even claim to be true! Perhaps Grice's implicature is that Malcolm is appealing to Oxonian turns of phrase ('ordinary language') but not taking proper Oxonian care (in clarifyng 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,” for example, is hardly a sceptic utterance, yet Grice lists as one of philosopher's paradoxes. So, there are various keywords to consider here. Grice would start with “common sense.” In his “Preface” and “Retrospective Epilogue” to Studies in the Way of Words, that’s how he organizes the themes and strands. “Common Sense” is one keyword there. Scepticism is another. In his two essays opening Part II, “Explorations in semantics and metaphysics” in Way of Words, it seems it’s MALCOLM who interests Grice most. While Grice would provide exegeses of Moore’s dicta, and indeed, Moore’s response to Malcolm, he 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) rests on Grice's analysis of meaning. Grice elaborates on circumstances that he’ll later take up in the “Retrospective Epilogue” (“I find myself not understanding what I mean” – dubiously acceptable). If meaning, Grice is saying, is about an utterer intending to get his addressee to believe something, the utterer must think there is a good chance that the addressee will recognise what he is supposed to believe, by being aware of the utterer’s practice or by a supplementary explanation. In which case, the utterer CANNOT be meaning what Malcolm claims he might mean, because no utterer would intend his addressee to believe what is ‘conceptually impossible,’ or incoherent, or blatantly false (“Charles I’s decapitation willed Charles I’s death.”). Grice edits the “Philosopher’s Paradoxes” essay. It’s only the FINAL objection which is reprinted in Studies, but he provides a good summary of the previous sections. Grice will use Moore’s example on two later occasions, at least. In “Causal Theory,” he 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 lecturing at that eccentrically-constructed hall at Madison, Wisconsin, -- with indirect lighting simulating actual sun rays, the hall, not the state -- Moore infamously said, “I know THERE is a window behind that curtain,” when there wasn’t! In 1987, 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 to focus on "know." How can Malcolm claim that Moore is guilty of misusing "know"? The most extensive exploration is in Grice's third William James lecture. "The examinee knows that the battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815." Nothing odd about that, nor about Moore's use, "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! For him, common sense = ordinary language, whereas for the typical Austinian, "ordinary language" = the language of the ordinary man.
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 eyes, 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 the practice! This is vintage Grice! Grice always took the sceptic's challenge seriously, as any serious philosopher should! In his later reflections, Grice's took the sceptic's impicatum as a very affront to our idea of rationality, conversational or other. Vide: "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; so you cannot really attack 'practical' reason without attacking 'theoretical' or doxastic reason, too! There is something like a more general 'rational acceptance,' to use Grice's term, that the sceptic is getting at! Grice liked to play with the idea that ultimately all syllogism is 'practical.' If, say, a syllogism by Einstein looks doxastic, that is because Einstein cares to 'omit the practical tail,' as Grice puts it! And Einstein 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 (yes, of the Stoa infame) and common sense with 'ordinary language', so mis-called, the elephant in Grice's room. If scepticism attacks common sense and fails, Grice seems to be implicating, ‘ordinary-language’ philosophy is a good antidote to scepticism, too! Since what language other than 'ordinary language' does common sense speak? ("Well, strictly, common sense doesn't speak!"). In fact, Grice re-addresses this topic in a strictly 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 Moore's attempt at humour to symbolise "any" philosopher, especially of the type he found eccentric, the sceptic included. Grice finds problems in this overarching Cantabrigian manoeuvre, as over-simplifying a pretty convoluted terrain. While Grice treasured Austin's "Some like Witters, but Moore's MY man!" perhaps he found Moore too Cantabrigian to his taste! While an Oxonian thoroughbred, Grice was a bit like Austin, "Some like Witters, but Moore's my man." While Grice would agree that Moore goes '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 saw him almost every day! "There is something apostolic about Moore that I enjoy," Grice would say, referring to the fact that Moore was one of the apostles. Grice spends some time exploring what Malcolm, a follower of Witters, as it were, has to say about Moore in connection with that particularly "Oxonian" turn of phrase, "ordinary language." For Malcolm's Moore, a 'paradox' by a 'philosopher' arises when 'Philosopher' fails to abide by the dictates of Ordinary Language. That Moore was not too happy with Malcolm's criticism can be witnessed by just a glimpse at Moore's "Reply to Norman Malcolm"! Grice is totally against this view that Malcolm ascribes to Moore as being TOO BROAD to even claim to be true! Perhaps Grice's implicature is that Malcolm is appealing to Oxonian turns of phrase ('ordinary language') but not taking proper Oxonian care (in clarifyng 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,” for example, is hardly a sceptic utterance, yet Grice lists as one of philosopher's paradoxes. So, there are various keywords to consider here. Grice would start with “common sense.” In his “Preface” and “Retrospective Epilogue” to Studies in the Way of Words, that’s how he organizes the themes and strands. “Common Sense” is one keyword there. Scepticism is another. In his two essays opening Part II, “Explorations in semantics and metaphysics” in Way of Words, it seems it’s MALCOLM who interests Grice most. While Grice would provide exegeses of Moore’s dicta, and indeed, Moore’s response to Malcolm, he 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) rests on Grice's analysis of meaning. Grice elaborates on circumstances that he’ll later take up in the “Retrospective Epilogue” (“I find myself not understanding what I mean” – dubiously acceptable). If meaning, Grice is saying, is about an utterer intending to get his addressee to believe something, the utterer must think there is a good chance that the addressee will recognise what he is supposed to believe, by being aware of the utterer’s practice or by a supplementary explanation. In which case, the utterer CANNOT be meaning what Malcolm claims he might mean, because no utterer would intend his addressee to believe what is ‘conceptually impossible,’ or incoherent, or blatantly false (“Charles I’s decapitation willed Charles I’s death.”). Grice edits the “Philosopher’s Paradoxes” essay. It’s only the FINAL objection which is reprinted in Studies, but he provides a good summary of the previous sections. Grice will use Moore’s example on two later occasions, at least. In “Causal Theory,” he 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 lecturing at that eccentrically-constructed hall at Madison, Wisconsin, -- with indirect lighting simulating actual sun rays, the hall, not the state -- Moore infamously said, “I know THERE is a window behind that curtain,” when there wasn’t! In 1987, 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 to focus on "know." How can Malcolm claim that Moore is guilty of misusing "know"? The most extensive exploration is in Grice's third William James lecture. "The examinee knows that the battle of Waterloo was fought in 1815." Nothing odd about that, nor about Moore's use, "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! For him, common sense = ordinary language, whereas for the typical Austinian, "ordinary language" = the language of the ordinary man.
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 "MEANS" fire: it's 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, when he writes: "By uttering x the utterer U means THAT *ψ p 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 '*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." 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. “A bullet went through this cloth," is one of Peirce's examples. “Surely," Grice notes, "this is an unhappy example. The hole in the cloth may well have caused by something else, or 'fabricated.'" Yet, Grice was having Oxonian students aware that Peirce was krypto-technical! Grice chose for one of his pre-"Meaning" seminars (i.e. 1947) on Peirce's theory of signs. 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). 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.' “I may 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.
1953. A pint of philosophy, Grice on Gordon, a pint of philosophy, by Alfred Brook Gordon, 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! "I always loved Alfred Brook Gordon!" -- H. P. Grice.
1954. Identity, category, predicable, categories: Aristotle and beyond, categories, with J. L. Austin and P. F. Strawson, Categoriae, Aristotle's Categoriae, 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, Categoriae, identity, relative identity, the Grice-Myro theory of identity, metaphysics, Myro, Code. Grice’s category shift. Grice would give joint seminars at Oxford with J. L. Austin on the first two books of Aristotle's Organon: "Categories" 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 Categoriae, 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 "the 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. Grice makes Peano feel deeply Griceian, as Grice lists his “=” postulates, here for consideration. Note the use of alethic modalities for necessity and possibility, starting with (11). 1. ⊢ (α izz α) 2. ⊢ (α izz β ∧ β izz γ) ⊃ α izz γ 3. ⊢ α hazz β ⊃ ~(α izz β) 4. ⊢ α hazz β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(α hazz x ∧ x izz β) 5. ⊢ (∀β)(β is a universal ⊃ β is a form) 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 accidentally predicable of β ⊃⊂ (∃x)(β hazz x ∧ x izz α) 10. ⊢ α = β ⊃⊂ α izz β ∧ β izz α 11. ⊢ α is an individual ⊃⊂ □(∀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 universal ⊃⊂ ◊(∃β)(α is predicable of α ∧ ~(α izz β ∧ β izz α) 14. ⊢ α is some-thing ⊃ α is an individual 15. ⊢ α is a form ⊃ (α is some-thing ∧ α is a universal) 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 individual 21. ⊢ α is a particular ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izz α) 22. ⊢~ (∃x)(x is a particular ∧ x is a form) 23. ⊢ α is a form ⊃ ~(∃x)(x ≠ α ∧ x izz α) 24. ⊢ x is a particular ⊃ ~(∃β)(α izz β) 25. ⊢ α is a form ⊃ ((α is predicable of β ∧ α ≠ β) ⊃ β hazz α) 26. ⊢ α is a form ∧ β is a particular ⊃ (α is predicable of β ⊃⊂ β hazz A) 27. ⊢ (α is a particular ∧ β is a universal ∧ β is predicable of α) ⊃ (∃γ)(α ≠ γ ∧ γ is essentially predicable of α) 28. ⊢ (∃x) (∃y)(x is a particular ∧ y is a universal ∧ y is predicable of x ⊃ ~(∀x)(x is a universal ∧ x is some-thing) 29. ⊢ (∀β)(β is a universal ⊃ 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 accidentally predicable of β. The use of alethic modalities, 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." 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 Collecction 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. 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 -- cfr. "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 can we say that 'French' means 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'. While 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” S.Tr.197; καθ᾽ ἡδονήν [ἐστί] μοι c.inf., A.Pr.263; καθ᾽ ἡ. τι δρᾶν, ποιεῖν, Th.2. 37,53; 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 'eudaimonia' ('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!"
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.'
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 1988 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: “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."
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 1988 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: “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: "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, 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. Cfr. 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" (vide 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 (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 (p→¬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 writes: "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. "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 (See also 340.19–26, and Arthur Madigan, trans. and comm., Alexander of Aphrodisias: On Aristotle’s “Metaphysics” 4 (Ithaca, N.Y.), 139 and 181 n. 983. 10. Burnyeat, “Protagoras and Self-Refutation in Later Greek Philosophy," 59. 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 joins Austin's "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 was an EXPERT on Oxonian philosophy. He saw 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 minutiae 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!” 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 minutiae 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 and 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), 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 praesuppositum, 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: "Grice once told me, 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, Series V (Topical), Carton 8-Folders 21-22, 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, Series V (Topical), Carton 8-Folders 21-22, keyword: taste, the objects of the five senses, the philosophy of perception, perception, the philosophy of perception, Series V (Topical), Carton 8-Folders 21 -22, 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 (folders 23-24), with R. O. Warner (folder 25), Series V (Topical), Carton 8-Folders 23-24, keywords: perception. Warnock learned about perception much more from Grice than from Austin! 1959, taste, in Series V (Topical), Carton 8, 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 REPRAESENTATUM 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: (1) You cannot see a knife as a knife, though you may see what is not a knife as a knife. (2) When Moore said he knew that the objects before him were human hands, he was guilty of misusing the word "know". (3) For an occurrence to be properly said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual. (4) 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. (5) What is actual is not also possible. (6) 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, Series III (Doctrines), Carton 5-Folder 18, keywords: knowledge, belief, philosophical psychology. Grice: the doxastic implicatum. “I know” IMPLICATES “I don’t believe.” (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, Series IV (Associations), Carton 6-Folder 7, keywords: cause, metaphysics, the abnormal/unusual implicatum, aetiology, aetiological 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 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." “One example which occurs to me is the following.” “For an occurrence to be properly said to have a cause, it must be something abnormal or unusual." “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!” 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 me is the following: "You can*not* see a knife *as a knife*, though you may see what is *not* a knife as a knife."" “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!” 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.
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. Praenest. pp. 321, 322; Inscr. Orell. 3681; 4077; 4698 al.; in Mon. Ancyr. 3, 1 dub.), ae, 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" was judged ANALYTIC by a highly significant majority of the non-philosophers, while a (non-significant)
majority of the philosophers deemed it 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” was 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 "ARTICULATING" 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 future experiences which, if they should be realised, would cause us to revise our judgements. Nota Bene. 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. I shall not expand on this point here. (Sampson, op. cit. p.70ff).
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.
1963. Grice's three lectures on trying at Brandeis.
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 aesthetics” 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) 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, MOST of his examples of this or that linguistic phenomenon are 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’ way, via implicature, or implIciture, if you mustn’t! 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 EXPECTATION, a mutual one "between decent chaps," as he puts it. His charming "decent chap" is SO Oxonian! His pupil would expect no less (and 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), BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: Descartes, clear and distinct perception, certainty. Grice's immediate trigger is Ayer on 'sure that,' and 'having the right to be sure.' He was also concerned with Stout's rather hasty UNphilosophical 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," The Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), Carton 8, Folder 26, BANC MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. 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, Carton 6, Folders 27-28, "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, The Grice Papers, Series V (Topical), Carton 6, Folders 27 and 28, BANC MSS 90/135c, The University of California, Berkeley. 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: “sententiae,” 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. Caesarem) de his rebus certiorem faciant,” Caes. B. G. 2, 2: “qui certiorem me sui consilii fecit,” Cic. Att. 9, 2, a, 2: “Caesarem certiorem faciunt, sese non facile ab oppidis vim hostium prohibere,” Caes. B. G. 1, 11: “faciam te certiorem quid egerim,” Cic. Att. 3, 11, 1.— With subj. only: “milites certiores facit, paulisper intermitterent proelium,” Caes. B. G. 3, 5 fin.—Pass.: “quod crebro certior per me fias de omnibus rebus,” Cic. Fam. 1, 7, 1; so Caes. B. G. 1, 7; Sall. J. 104, 1: “Caesar certior factus est, tres jam copiarum partes Helvetios id flumen transduxisse,” Caes. B. G. 1, 12; so id. ib. 1, 21; 1, 41; 2, 1; Sall. J. 82, 2; Nep. Att. 12, 3: “factus certior, quae res gererentur,” Caes. 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: “lacrimae suorum Tam subitae matrem certam fecere ruinae,” Ov. M. 6, 268.—
1966. Eudaimonia, eudaemonia, "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, eudaemon, 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 daemon would, if he could, ensure for one.” “And my good daemon is a being motivated, with respect to me, solely by concern for my well-being or happiness." "To change the idiom, "eudaemonia" 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 daemon, 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 'eudaimonia' to the agent. For Grice, as for Aristotle, and indeed Kant (Kantotle, in short), a 'telos' and 'eudaimonia' are related in subtle ways. For 'eudaimonia' 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 'eudaimonia.' Grice follows the textual criticism of his former tutee, J. L. Ackrill, in connection with the Socratic point that 'eudaimonia' IS literally related to the 'eudaimon.' 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, he 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 WILLing, there is a palaeo-Griceian WAYing!" Perhaps by ‘know’ Moore means “CERTAIN.” Grice was amused by the fact that Moore THOUGHT 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.
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 bigfoot 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 Austin, Strawson, Hare, 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 IS THE CENTRAL lecture 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.' 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. You 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. aetiology). 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. THE PHILOSOPHER makes a big mistake. He has DETECTED, I think it’s the word he used, 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 minutiae 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 Lecture III 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!” Was Grice's intention epagogic, or diagogic in "Prolegomena"? Was 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* quoted 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 praeter necessitatem." But what do we mean 'sense'. Surely Occam was right with his Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter 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': "
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 ‘
’ is a placeholder for a name of a particular formula of the object language). In fact satisfaction reduces to truth in this sense: satisfies the formula if and only if taking each free variable in as a name of the object assigned to it by makes the formula 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 has no free variables, to say that 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 is a compound formula, to know which assignments satisfy , it’s enough to know which assignments satisfy the immediate constituents of . Here are two typical examples: The assignment satisfies the formula ‘
- and ’ if and only if satisfies and . The assignment
- satisfies the formula ‘For all , ’ if and only if for every individual , if is the assignment that assigns to the variable and is otherwise exactly like , then satisfies . We have to use a different approach for atomic formulas. But for these, at least assuming for simplicity that
has no function symbols, we can use the metalanguage copies of the predicate symbols of the object language. Thus:
- The assignment SATSIFIES the formula if and only if .
(Warning: the expression is in the meta-meta-language, not in the meta-language . We may or may not be able to find a formula of that expresses for predicate symbols; it depends on exactly what the language 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
is determined solely by (1) the syntactic rule used to construct 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 ’ is true in terms of whether is true, because in general has a free variable 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 F
. Instead, as we saw, he defines the relation ‘ 'satisfies' ’, 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 ‘ satisfies ’ in his essay, viz. that it allowed him to reduce the set-theoretic requirements of the truth definition. He spells out these requirements carefully. The name ‘compositional(ity)’ first appears in papers of Putnam in 1960 (published 1975) and Katz and Fodor in 1963 on natural language semantics. 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 S
for a binary relation between assignments and formulas. We say that is a satisfaction relation if for every formula meets the conditions put for SATISFACTION of by Tarski’s definition. For example, if is ‘ and ’, should satisfy the following condition for every assignment :
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 . (There are some technical subtleties, but it can be done.) Finally we define
satisfies if and only if: there is a satisfaction relation such that .
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 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
but in different interpretations. The quantifiers of are assumed to range over a particular class, call it ; in fact they are second order quantifiers, so that really they range over the collection of subclasses of . The class is not named explicitly in the object language, and thus one can give separate truth definitions for different values of , 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 is the class of all individuals. For other values of , he speaks not of ‘truth’ but of ‘correctness in the domain ’.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
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 analyses of designation and satisfaction
for the language: Definition of satisfaction
an object o satisfies a predicate p ≡df [(p=“is nice” and o is nice) ∨ (n=“is mean”
and o is mean) ∨ (n=“is lazy” and o is lazy)] You should notice that there is an analogy between the material adequacy constraint which
Tarski set on the theory of truth, and similar constraints which we should expect our definitions
of designation and satisfaction to meet. Just as a theory of truth for a language should imply
every instance of
‘S’ is true in L iff S
so we should expect our theories of designation and satisfaction to imply every instance of the
following two schemata:
‘n’ designates o in L iff o = n
o satisfies ‘is F’ in L iff o is F Tarski’s definition as a definition of truth, designation, and satisfaction for a language which
makes no use of concepts other than those employed in the language itself. H
1967. Indicative conditionals, the fourth William James lecture, in Studies in the Way of Words. Indicative conditionals, in Studies in the Way of Words, Part I ("Logic and Conversation"), Essay IV, 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," Michael 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 IS THE CENTRAL PIECE 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. AND 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 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 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 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!”
1967. Utterer's meaning and intentions, repr. in Studies in the Way of Words, Utterer's meaning and intentions, 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 *psi p iff (E.phi) (Ef) (Ec): I. The utterer U utters x intending x to be such that anyone who has phi will think that (i) x has f (ii) f is correlated in way c with psi-ing that p (iii) (E.phi'): U intends x to be such that anyone who has phi' will think, via thinking (i) and (ii), that U psi-s that p (iv) in view of (3), U psi-s that p; and II (operative only for certain substituends for "*psi") U utters x intending that, should there actually be anyone who has phi, he will, via thinking (iv), himself psi 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 phi will both (i') rely on E in coming to psi (or think that U psi-s) that p and (ii') think that (E. phi'): U intends x to be such that anyone who has phi' will come to psi (or think that U psi-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.' 1967. Utterer's meaning, sentence-meaning, and word-meaning,' 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 VI, 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), BANC MSS 90/135c, Berkeley, 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.
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.
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 'prae-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 'prae-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 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 Grice Papers, Series III (The Doctrines), Carton 6-Folder 3, BANC, MSS 90/135c, keywords: 'that'-clause. 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' (Volitive 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 aequi-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.
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), BANC MSS 90/135c, 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.
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 *un*certain 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 palaeo-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.
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 C. I. 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!
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.
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. 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. 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 turnstile 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, "psi", not just specificatory dummy, but the idea that we ACCEPT something simpliciter. "ψ3" is standards for the attitude of V-accepting which is iteself towards J-accepting [p] or J-accepting [~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 Grice notes that 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 V-accepting towards either the pirot V-accepts [p] or the pirot V-accepts [~p]", i. e. the pirot wants to decide whether to *will*, now that p or not. This indeed IS CRUCIAL, since, for Grice, morality does cash in DESIRE. 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 serious imperatives (not "You shalt not smoke", 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 cigareete) 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, today's 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 psi supra 3 sub A [p]" is true just in case "X psi supra 2 [x psi supra 1 [p] or x psi supra 1 [~p]" is true. And -- here 'y' features: "x ψ³ sub B [p]" is true just in case "x V-accepts (ψ²) [x V-accepts (ψ²) [x J-accept (ψ1) [p] or x J-accept (ψ1) [~p]]]" is true. 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 either "indicative" or "informative," if addressed to 'y', or addressee A, which is different from 'x,' for surely one cannot inform oneself. The second is the [boulomaic] proper. What Grice dubs 'volitive,' but I prefer the Greek root. This are either self-addressed and it is "intentional," or other-addressed, or addressee-addressed, or "imperative," for surely one cannot say to oneself, "Don't smoke, idiot!” The third is the doxastic-interrogative (how we create "?" here is minimal compared to the vagaries of what I called the "!─" (non-assertoric or 'boulomaic' 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 seems to prefer the Latinate "interrogative." 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, 'reflective' ("Should I go?") or again, addresee-addressed 'imperative' ("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 "volitive" or boulomaic cum erotetic. Here again, there is one varietiy which is reflective (or autophoric, as I prefer, utterer-addressed) or 'inquisitive' (for which I'll think of a Greek pantomime), or 'addressee-addressed.' Grice regrets that Greek (and Latin, of which he had "less" -- cfr. Shakespeare who had none) "fares better" in this respect than Oxonian. 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 (∃1 α) . . . 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 W-superscribed operator, we simply delete the appearances of 'α' in the specifier for the corresponding un-superscribed operator, inserting instead the quantifier (∃1 λ) (. . .) at the position previously occupied by (∃1 α) (. . .). 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 (∃1 λ) (A should will that U judges (x killed Cock Robin))"; in which '(∃1 λ)' will "take on" the shape '(∃1 x)' 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.
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. Grice (1974). 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!
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.
1975. Type-progression in pirotology, method in philosophical psychology: from the banal to the bizarre, in The Conception of Value, Clarendon, 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. 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 – cfr. ‘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.
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. 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, 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. Grice is interested in its conceptual connection with the 'hypothetical' 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
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. 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 'aequi-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, and Series IV (Associations), Carton 6-Folders 5-6, and Series V (Topical), Carton 7-Folders 21-22, and Carton 9-Folder 6, 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. Carton 6, Folders 5-6, 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 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. Carton 5-Folders 10-13, 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 aegis 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 me." It is VERY INTERESTING that Grice gives 'conversational examples.' A: Jack has arrived. "I reply: FIRST EXAMPLE: B: "I conclude from that that Jack has arrived." "Or he says (iii).” (iii) A: Jack has arrived AND Jill has *also* arrived. “And I reply (iv).” iv. SECOND EXAMPLE: "I conclude that Jill has arrived."(via Gentzen's conjunction-elimination). "Or he says (v).” v. My wife is at home. "And I reply (vi).” vi. THIRD EXAMPLE: "B: I reason from that that SOMEONE (viz. your wife) is at home." Grice: "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 example III)?" MISLEADING, BUT ALETHICALLY 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 my life EXPLOITING it, I am 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." GRICE'S REACTION TO HIS OWN DISTINCTION: entailment is in sight! "But I do NOT find myself lured by the idea of using that distinction here!" Because ENTAILMENT, rather than IMPLICATUM is entailed. Or because EXPLICATUM, 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: If you cannot formalise, don't say it; STRAWSON: Oh, no! If I can formalise it, I shan't say it! Grice: "The points suggested by this stream of rhetorical questions may be summarized as follows." (1) "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!" (2) "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." (3) "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! (4) "Some of the examples I gave 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!" (5) "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!" (6) "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 EXPLICITness 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, turther 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!
1977. Freedom, teleology, and ethics, Hart on liberty, Kantian, Kant's ethics, Aristotle's ethics, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III (The Doctrines), Carton 5-Folders 16-17, 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,' Series II (Essays), Carton 2, Folders 26, 27, and 28. Keywords: Grundlegung, freedom, autonomy. 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,Carton 5, Folders 5-6, Kant's Ethical Theory. An exploration of the categorial imperative and its reduction to the hypothetical one. 1980. KANT’S ETHICS. Carton 5, Folder 8, Philosophy, Kant, With J. Baker. Notably the categorical imperative. Cf. Carton 5, Folder 9, "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 aegis 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 aegis 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. 'aesthetikos'). 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 Nichomachaea, 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 eudaemonia, 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 eudaemon 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.”
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. Kant's ethics, The H. P. Grice Papers, Series III (The Doctrines), Carton 5-Folders 27-28, MSS 90/135c, The Bancroft Library, The University of California, Berkeley. Keywords: 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!
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. First, that, 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. Second, a characterisation of the nature and range of a possible kind of theory θ is needed. Third, 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. Fourth, 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. 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 'eudaemonia.'
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).
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 alethic-pratical 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 'eudaemonia' (cf. 'system of ends'). Kant's problem is the reduction of the categorical imperative to the hypothetical 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 imperative itself and an indicative about the it. According to this response, only the indicative about the imperative has a truth 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." (p. 447). 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 or 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' will be 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). ⌈φ and ψ⌉ is satisfactory just in case ⌈φ⌉ is satisfactory and ⌈ψ⌉ is satisfactory, ⌈φ or ψ⌉ is satisfactory just in case one of the pair, ⌈φ and ψ⌉, is satisfactory, and ⌈φ → ψ⌉ is satisfactory just in case either ⌈φ⌉ is unsatisfactory or ⌈ψ⌉ is satisfactory. There are, however, a number of points to be made. It is not fully clear to me just how strong the motivation would be for introducing such connectives, nor whether, if they are introduced, restrictions should not be imposed. The problematic examples will be, of course, the mixed ones (those in which one clause is buletic and the other doxastic). It seems natural to look for guidance from 'ordinary' language. "The beast is filthy and don't (I shan't) touch it" seems all right, but "Don't touch the beast and it is filthy" seems dubious, and "Touch the beast and it will bite you", while idiomatic, is not a conjunction, nor a genuine invitation to touch the beast. And "Either he is taking a bath or leave the bathroom door open" is perhaps intelligible, but "Leave the bathroom door open or he is taking a bath" seems considerably less so. It is perhaps worth noting that, in unmixed cases, satisfactoriness would be specifiable either as buletic satisfactoriness or as doxastic satisfactoriness. But for mixed cases no such specification would be available unless we make a special case, as Grice does in "Method" for the buletic mode to be dominant. The real crunch comes, however, with negation (which Grice has been carefully ignoring). 'Not ⊢p' might perhaps be treated as equivalent to '⊢ not-p', but what about 'Not ! p'? 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 '! A' nor '! ~A' is either satisfactory or unsatisfactory? What value do we assign to '~ ! A' and to '~ ! ~A'? Do we proscribe the forms altogether (for all cases)? But that would seem to be a pity, since '~ ! ~A' seems to be quite promising as a representation for 'you may (permissive) do A'; that is, I signify my refusal to prohibit your doing A. Do we disallow embedding of these forms? But that (again if we use them to represent 'may') seems too restrictive. Again, if '! A' is neither satisfactory nor unsatisfactory, do we assign a third 'value' to '! A' ('buletically neuter'), or do we say that we have a 'practical value gap'? These and other such problems would require careful consideration; but Grice cannot see that they would prove insoluble, any more than analogous problems connected with Strawson's presupposition are insoluble; in the latter 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. For an introduction rule we might consider the following (I think equivalent) forms: (a) "If a sentence 'φ' is demonstrable then 'Necessary' is demonstrable; (b) "Provided 'φ' is dependent on no assumptions, to derive ' φ ' from 'necessary φ '". For an elimination rule we might consider "From 'Necessary φ ' to derive ' φ '". It is to be understood, end p.58 of course, that the values of the syntactical variable ' φ ' would contain mood markers; both " "12 and " " would be proper substitutes for 'φ' but " " 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 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. As opposed to 'relativism,' which denies the rational basis to attitude ascriptions. Grice is concerned with the absence of a thorough discussion of 'value' by English philosophers. 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.
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 or 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' will be 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). ⌈φ and ψ⌉ is satisfactory just in case ⌈φ⌉ is satisfactory and ⌈ψ⌉ is satisfactory, ⌈φ or ψ⌉ is satisfactory just in case one of the pair, ⌈φ and ψ⌉, is satisfactory, and ⌈φ → ψ⌉ is satisfactory just in case either ⌈φ⌉ is unsatisfactory or ⌈ψ⌉ is satisfactory. There are, however, a number of points to be made. It is not fully clear to me just how strong the motivation would be for introducing such connectives, nor whether, if they are introduced, restrictions should not be imposed. The problematic examples will be, of course, the mixed ones (those in which one clause is buletic and the other doxastic). It seems natural to look for guidance from 'ordinary' language. "The beast is filthy and don't (I shan't) touch it" seems all right, but "Don't touch the beast and it is filthy" seems dubious, and "Touch the beast and it will bite you", while idiomatic, is not a conjunction, nor a genuine invitation to touch the beast. And "Either he is taking a bath or leave the bathroom door open" is perhaps intelligible, but "Leave the bathroom door open or he is taking a bath" seems considerably less so. It is perhaps worth noting that, in unmixed cases, satisfactoriness would be specifiable either as buletic satisfactoriness or as doxastic satisfactoriness. But for mixed cases no such specification would be available unless we make a special case, as Grice does in "Method" for the buletic mode to be dominant. The real crunch comes, however, with negation (which Grice has been carefully ignoring). 'Not ⊢p' might perhaps be treated as equivalent to '⊢ not-p', but what about 'Not ! p'? 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 '! A' nor '! ~A' is either satisfactory or unsatisfactory? What value do we assign to '~ ! A' and to '~ ! ~A'? Do we proscribe the forms altogether (for all cases)? But that would seem to be a pity, since '~ ! ~A' seems to be quite promising as a representation for 'you may (permissive) do A'; that is, I signify my refusal to prohibit your doing A. Do we disallow embedding of these forms? But that (again if we use them to represent 'may') seems too restrictive. Again, if '! A' is neither satisfactory nor unsatisfactory, do we assign a third 'value' to '! A' ('buletically neuter'), or do we say that we have a 'practical value gap'? These and other such problems would require careful consideration; but Grice cannot see that they would prove insoluble, any more than analogous problems connected with Strawson's presupposition are insoluble; in the latter 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. For an introduction rule we might consider the following (I think equivalent) forms: (a) "If a sentence 'φ' is demonstrable then 'Necessary' is demonstrable; (b) "Provided 'φ' is dependent on no assumptions, to derive ' φ ' from 'necessary φ '". For an elimination rule we might consider "From 'Necessary φ ' to derive ' φ '". It is to be understood, end p.58 of course, that the values of the syntactical variable ' φ ' would contain mood markers; both " "12 and " " would be proper substitutes for 'φ' but " " 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 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. As opposed to 'relativism,' which denies the rational basis to attitude ascriptions. Grice is concerned with the absence of a thorough discussion of 'value' by English philosophers. 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.
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'?
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.'
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 'eudaemonia.' 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 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. 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'?"
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 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.
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.
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,' for example, is 'relative.' It is 'meaning' qua utterer-relativised, as he puts it. The absolute, versus the relative, is constructed OUT of the relative, thought. There is hardly a realm of UNconstructed 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 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 "Categoriae." 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 mediaeval 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, 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 Galliae. 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 concludes that Davidson is into 'hypothesis,' or 'suppositio,' while he is, as he should, into 'hypostasis,' or 'substantia'! Grice on "grass is green." An ingenious argument may be summarised as follows. Let 'sigma' abbreviate the operator "...consists in the fact that...", which, when prefixes to a sentence, produces a predicate (or epithet). Let 'S' abbreviate 'Snow is white' and let 'G' abbreviate 'Grass is green.' Then, (1) x sigma S is 1 just in case (2), 'x sigma (y(y=y & S) = y(y=y)' is 1, since the PARTS of the sub-sentences which follow the sigma
operator in the two main sentences are LOGICALLY EQUIVALENT. And (2) is 1 just in case (3) 'x sigma (y(y=y & G) = y(y=y)' is 1, since 'y(y=y & S)' and 'y(y=y & G) are singular terms, which, if S and G are both true, both refer to y(y=y), and are therefore co-referential and
inter-substitutable. And (3) is true just in case (4)
'x sigma *G*' is 1, since 'G' and the sub-sentence which follows sigma in (3) are logically
equivalent. So, this fallacy goes, provided that 'S' and 'G' are both 1, regardless of WHAT
THEY SAY, any event which consists of the FACT that S also consists of the fact
that G, and _vice versa_, i. e. any pair of randomly chosen events are identical. Grice hastens to criticise the slingshot argument: that a principle licensing the inter-substitution of this or that co-referential singular term and this or that logically equivalent sub-sentence is officially demanded because it is needed to license certain patently valid inferences. But, if in addition to providing
that G, and _vice versa_, i. e. any pair of randomly chosen events are identical. Grice hastens to criticise the slingshot argument: that a principle licensing the inter-substitution of this or that co-referential singular term and this or that logically equivalent sub-sentence is officially demanded because it is needed to license certain patently valid inferences. But, if in addition to providing
this benefit, the principle SADDLES the philosopher with a commitment to this '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. Such a measure would indeed have some intuitive appeal, since 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
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. Such a measure would indeed have some intuitive appeal, since 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
realist approach. We begin with a class H of 'happenstance-attributions', which
will be divided into *basic* happenstance-attributions, i.e. ascriptions to a subject-item of an attribute which is METABOLICALLY EXPRESSIBLE, and *resultant* happenstance-attributions, in which the attributes ascribed, though not themselves metabolically expressible, are such that their possession by a
subject-item is suitably related to the possession by that or by some other subject-item, of attributes which _are_ metabolically expressible. The members of class H of happenstance attributions may be used to SAY what 'happens' (or 'happens to be the case') without talking about any special
entities belonging to a class of happenings or happenstances." Grice's next stage involves the introduction of the an operator, "...consists of the fact that..." This operator, when prefixed to a sentence S which makes a happen-stance attribution to a subject-item, yields a PREDICATE
which will be SATISFIED by an ENTITY which IS a happenstance, provided (a) that
sentence S is true, and (b) provided that some FURTHER METAPHYSICAL CONDITION
obtains, which ensures the metaphysical NECESSITY of the introduction INTO
REALITY of the category of happenstances -- thereby ensuring that this new category is not just a class of fictions. As far as the slingshot fallacy (and the 'hideous consequence' that all
facts become identical -- to one Great Big Fact), Grice comments: In the light of a defence of Reichenbach against the realist attack, I can
perhaps be reasonably confident that this metaphysical EXTENSION OF REALITY
will NOT saddle us with any intolerable paradox, pace the caveat that to some the slingshot is not contradictory in the sense that a paradox is, but merely an unexpected consequence -- not seriously hideous, at that. What the metaphysical condition mentioned above would be
which would JUSTIFY the metaphysical extension remains, alas, to be determined. It
is tempting to think that it would be connected with a THEORETICAL NEED to
have happenstances as items in, say, causal relations.
will be divided into *basic* happenstance-attributions, i.e. ascriptions to a subject-item of an attribute which is METABOLICALLY EXPRESSIBLE, and *resultant* happenstance-attributions, in which the attributes ascribed, though not themselves metabolically expressible, are such that their possession by a
subject-item is suitably related to the possession by that or by some other subject-item, of attributes which _are_ metabolically expressible. The members of class H of happenstance attributions may be used to SAY what 'happens' (or 'happens to be the case') without talking about any special
entities belonging to a class of happenings or happenstances." Grice's next stage involves the introduction of the an operator, "...consists of the fact that..." This operator, when prefixed to a sentence S which makes a happen-stance attribution to a subject-item, yields a PREDICATE
which will be SATISFIED by an ENTITY which IS a happenstance, provided (a) that
sentence S is true, and (b) provided that some FURTHER METAPHYSICAL CONDITION
obtains, which ensures the metaphysical NECESSITY of the introduction INTO
REALITY of the category of happenstances -- thereby ensuring that this new category is not just a class of fictions. As far as the slingshot fallacy (and the 'hideous consequence' that all
facts become identical -- to one Great Big Fact), Grice comments: In the light of a defence of Reichenbach against the realist attack, I can
perhaps be reasonably confident that this metaphysical EXTENSION OF REALITY
will NOT saddle us with any intolerable paradox, pace the caveat that to some the slingshot is not contradictory in the sense that a paradox is, but merely an unexpected consequence -- not seriously hideous, at that. What the metaphysical condition mentioned above would be
which would JUSTIFY the metaphysical extension remains, alas, to be determined. It
is tempting to think that it would be connected with a THEORETICAL NEED to
have happenstances as items in, say, causal relations.
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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