Dans leLachèsde Platon, Socrate attribue à son interlocuteur la connaissance du courage et tente de reconstruire cette connaissance sous forme discursive. Son attribution de connaissance à Lachès détermine son comportement discursif dans le dialogue, nécessitant qu’il s’abstienne de juger erronés les propos son interlocuteur, qu’il interprète l’erreur apparente comme une erreur de discours plutôt que de connaissance, et qu’il cherche la vérité sous-jacente au contenu manifeste des paroles de Lachès. La méthode de Socrate dans cet elenchos peut être décrite comme (...) une sorte d’«exégèse épistémique», qui cherche à extraire et à donner une forme discursive à la connaissance de la vertu dont elle suppose que l’interlocuteur est déjà possesseur. (shrink)

A common starting point for ‘going hybrid’ is the thought that moral discourse somehow combines belief and desire-like aspects, or is both descriptive and expressive. Hybrid meta-ethical theories aim to give an account of moral discourse that is sufficiently sensitive to both its cognitive and its affective, or descriptive and expressive, dimensions. They hold at least one of the following: moral thought: moral judgements have belief and desire-like aspects or elements; moral language: moral utterances both ascribe properties and express desire-like (...) attitudes. This entry concerns hybrid theories of moral language. The main division within such theories is between those treating the expression of desire-like attitudes as semantic and those treating it as pragmatic. This entry exclusively focuses on pragmatic forms of and examines the prospects for treating moral attitude expression as working via certain standard pragmatic mechanisms. I explain these mechanisms, outline the properties that standardly define them, and test to see whether moral attitude expression matches them. At the end, I briefly explain a more minimal pragmatic alternative. The main conclusions are that we should disregard presupposition and conventional implicature views and that the most plausible options for a pragmatic hybrid view are a generalised conversational implicature view and a more minimal pragmatic view. (shrink)

This paper focuses on Horwich's metaphilosophical interpretation of Wittgenstein. Specifically, it focuses on Horwich's charge that all philosophy is irrational. First, I coordinate the various aspects of Horwich's metaphilosophical program to make sense of his charge of irrationality against philosophy. Second, I argue that this metaphilosophical program misfires in two distinct ways. However, third, I close by calling attention to what I posit to be a critical insight of Horwich's account.

In response to Stephen Neale (2016), I argue that aphonic expressions, such as PRO, are intentionally uttered by normal speakers of natural language, either by acts of omitting to say something explicitly, or by acts of giving phonetic realization to aphonics. I argue, also, that Gricean intention-based semantics should seek divorce from Cartesian assumptions of transparent access to propositional attitudes and, consequently, that Stephen Schiffer's so-called meaning-intention problem is not powerful enough to banish alleged cases of over-intellectualization in contemporary philosophy (...) of language and mind. (shrink)

cal practice: the enterprise of specifying information about the world for use in computer systems. Knowledge representation as a field also encompasses conceptual results that call practitioners’ attention to important truths about the world, mathematical results that allow practitioners to make these truths precise, and computational results that put these truths to work. This chapter surveys this practice and its results, as it applies to the interpretation of natural language utterances in implemented natural language processing systems. For a broader perspective (...) on such technical practice, in all its strengths and weaknesses, see (Agre 1997). Knowledge representation offers a powerful general tool for the science of language. Computational logic, a prototypical formalism for representing knowledge about the world, is also the model for the level of logical form that linguists use to characterize the grammar of meaning (Larson and Segal 1995). And researchers from (Schank and Abelson 1977) to (Shieber 1993) and (Bos to appear) have relied crucially on such representations, and the inference methods associated with them, in articulating accounts of semantic relations in language, such as synonymy, entailment, informativeness and contradiction. The new textbooks (Blackburn and Bos 2002a, Blackburn and Bos 2002b) provide an excellent grounding in this research, and demonstrate how deeply computational ideas from knowledge representation can inform pure linguistic study. In this short chapter, I must leave much of.. (shrink)

An information recovery problem is the problem of constructing a proposition containing the information dropped in going from a given premise to a given conclusion that folIows. The proposition(s) to beconstructed can be required to satisfy other conditions as well, e.g. being independent of the conclusion, or being “informationally unconnected” with the conclusion, or some other condition dictated by the context. This paper discusses various types of such problems, it presents techniques and principles useful in solving them, and it develops (...) algorithmic methods for certain classes of such problems. The results are then applied to classical number theory, in particular, to questions concerning possible refinements of the 1931 Gödel Axiom Set, e.g. whether any of its axioms can be analyzed into “informational atoms”. Two propositions are “informationally unconnected” [with each other] if no informative (nontautological) consequence of one also follows from the other. A proposition is an “informational atom” if it is informative but no information can be dropped from it without rendering it uninformative (tautological). Presentation, employment, and investigation of these two new concepts are prominent features of this paper. (shrink)

In this paper, we try to show why a formal definition of truth is not satisfactory (first point). Later, we expound (second point) the polemic between Austin and Strawson about truth with the intention to show that both refer to different problems concerning truth and to prove that Austin did not lose this confrontation and that we can recover some elements of his investigation for making an adequate approach to this notion. We will complete our definition of truth using the (...) latest thesis of Charles Travis and that will permit us to conclude with a semantic definition of truth for natural languages. (shrink)

We may think of the notion of “trust” primarily in epistemological terms or, alternatively, primarily in ethical terms. These different ways of thinking of trust are linked with different ways of picturing language, and my relation to the words of another. While an analogy with an individual continuing an arithmetical series has had a central place in discussions of language originating from Wittgenstein, Rush Rhees suggests that conversation provides a better model for thinking about language. Linking this with Knud Løgstrup’s (...) suggestion that “In its basic sense trust is essential to every conversation”, the paper develops the idea of speech as fundamentally a form of contact between human beings. With that, the constraints on which we need to focus if we are to grasp the nature of conversation are not, as in Grice’s influential treatment, maxims whose observance will aid the pursuit of certain general human ends. The relevant constraints are, rather, limits on our goal-directed activity: limits that are fundamental to our relations with others. It is within this framework that we must understand the form of “trust” that is central to conversation. (shrink)

Defined as vicarious sensorimotor experiencing, mental imagery is a powerful source of aesthetic enjoyment in everyday life and, reportedly, one of the commonest things readers remember about literary narratives in the long term. Furthermore, it is positively correlated with other dimensions of reader response, most notably with emotion. Until recent decades, however, the phenomenon of mental imagery has been largely overlooked by modern literary scholarship. As an attempt to strengthen the status of mental imagery within the literary and, more generally, (...) aesthetic discipline, this dissertation proposes an analysis positioned at a confluence of literary theory and the cognitive sciences, especially the emergent research framework of embodied cognition. Questions asked throughout the dissertation include the following: a) What are the basic varieties of mental imagery in the reading of literary narrative? b) By what contents or narrative strategies are they most likely to be prompted? c) What is it like to experience a mental image of a particular variety? d) What are its psychophysiological underpinnings? e) How does a mental image of a particular variety relate to perception? f) How does it relate to higher-order meaning-making? Four prototypical imagery varieties are distinguished on the basis of two variables with two values each (referential vs. verbal domain; inner vs. outer stance). Gradual transitions and in-between imagery varieties are acknowledged. The imagery typology and related hypotheses are grounded in introspection but carefully supported with indirect empirical evidence and, whenever possible, formulated so as to facilitate direct validation. (shrink)

The paper analyses the role played by the concept of ‘common ground’ in argumentation theories. If a common agreement on all the rules of a discursive exchange is required, either at the beginning or at the end of an argumentative practice, then no violation of the rules is possible. The paper suggests an alternative understanding of ‘common ground’ as something that can change during the development of the argumentative practice, and in particular something that can change without the practice being (...) stopped, just as one sometimes violates the rule of a game without stopping playing. The analysis of some historical examples shows that the violation of rules sometimes leads to a consensual change of a set of beliefs and values. The argumentative rationality thus needs to be reconsidered in the light of the analysis of the conditions under which it would be legitimate to change the rules of an argumentative practice: ‘common ground’ and the right to disagreement, even radical or violent, could then be defended as essential components of argumentative rationality. (shrink)

The following thesis starts from the question «why be moral?» and adresses an action-theoretic strategy for answering this question in the positive by reference to the constitutive natur of actions. In these debates, the epistemology of action has turned into a central issue. The thesis adresses these debates and develops a novel account of the epistemology: an account that may well turn out to provide a ground for the aforementioned constitutivist strategies.

¿Qué relaciones hay entre la intencionalidad -el contenido- de los conceptos y pensamientos y el significado -el contenido- de las palabras y oraciones? El presente artículo analiza esta cuestión distinguiendo en ella seis problemas diferentes que atienden a la naturaleza primitiva de la intencionalidad de lo mental, su expresión, el papel del lenguaje o de las instituciones lingüísticas en las condiciones de individuación del contenido mental. Una vez separados unos de otros esos seis problemas, el artículo llama la atención sobre (...) un aspecto del problema hacia el cual la reflexión de los últimos años parece haber dejado de ser sensible: la faceta conceptual del estudio de esas relaciones. Aunque Wittgenstein y Ryle nos previnieron de que el estudio de estas relaciones está lleno de callejones sin salida, muchos científicos y filósofos no parecen ser conscientes de ello. (shrink)

Although widely used across psychology, economics, and philosophy, the concept ofeffort is rarely ever defined. This article argues that the time is ripe to look for anexplicit general definition of effort, makes some proposals about how to arrive at thisdefinition, and suggests that a force-based approach is the most promising. Section 1presents an interdisciplinary overview of some chief research axes on effort, and arguesthat few, if any, general definitions have been proposed so far. Section 2 argues thatsuch a definition is (...) now needed and proposes a basic methodology to arrive at it, whosefirst step is to make explicit the various tacit assumptions about effort made acrosssciences and ordinary thinking. Section 3 unearths 4 different conceptions of effortfrom research on effort so far:primitive-feelings accounts,comparator-based accounts,resource-based accountsandforce-based accounts. It is then argued that the first 2kinds of accounts, although interesting in their own right, are not strictly speaking abouteffort. Section 4 considers the 2 most promising general approaches to efforts: re-source-based and force-based accounts. It argues that these accounts are not only compatible but actually extensionally equivalent. This notwithstanding, it explains why force-based accounts should be regarded as more fundamental than resource-basedaccounts -/- . (shrink)

This paper develops the view presented in our 1997 paper "Varieties of Quotation". In the first part of the paper we show how phenomena such as scare-quotes, echoing and mimicry can be treated as what we call Speech Act Heuristics. We then defend a semantic account of mixed quotation. Along the way we discuss the role of indexicals in mixed quotation and the noncancelability of reference to words in mixed quotation. We also respond to some objections raised by Recanati, Saka, (...) Stainton and Reimer. (shrink)

We describe and analyze an important cognitive obstacle in inter- and intra-community ar-gumentation processes, which we propose to call 'Cognitive Systemic Dichotomization'. This social phenomenon consists in the collective use of shared cognitive patterns based upon dichotomous schemati-zation of knowledge, values, and affection. We discuss the formative role of CSD on a community’s collec-tive cognition, identity, and public discourse, as well as the challenges it raises to reasoned argumentation, and how different approaches to argumentation undertake to face this obstacle to (...) the reasonable debate of issues of public concern. (shrink)

Finnish oral communication is often considered to be something of a minimalist exercise. A well-known expression of such communication is the so-called Proletariat Trilogy by the Finnish film-maker Aki Kaurismäki. This study presents an analysis of persuasive and argumentative dialogues in the manuscript to Shadows in Paradise. The approach is based on Searle’s speech acts, Grice’s conversational maxims, and Pragma-Dialectics. The result is a description of Finnish working-class everyday rhetoric as it is portrayed in the international breakthrough film of Kaurismäki.

This paper evaluates arguments presented by John Perry (and Ken Taylor) in favor of the presence of an unarticulated constituent in the proposition expressed by utterance of, for example, (1):1 1. It's raining (at t). We contend that these arguments are, at best, inconclusive. That's the critical part of our paper. On the positive side, we argue that (1) has as its semantic content the proposition that it is raining (at t) and that this is a location-neutral proposition. According to (...) the view we propose, an audience typically looks for a location when they hear utterances of (1) because their interests in rain are location- focused: it is the location of rain that determines whether we get wet, carrots grow, and roads become slippery. These are, however, contingent facts about rain, wetness, people, carrots, and roads – they are not built into the semantics for the verb 'rain'. (shrink)

A historical overview, with an attempt to rebut Grice's argument against Contextualism.

The deep operation of androcentrism in scientific argumentation demands recognition as a form of fallacy. On Walton’s account, fallacies are serious mistakes in argumentation that employ presumptions acceptable in other circumstances. There are only isolated cases in which androcentric pre-sumptions are acceptable, and I argue that androcentrism affects an overarching theme of generalization in science rather than an isolated scheme. Androcentrism is related to other ways of treating privileged people as exemplary humans, whose negative impact on processes of argumentation can (...) be described as the fallacy of “appeal to the standard.”. (shrink)

A belief ascription such as “Oedipus believes that his mother is the queen of Thebes” can be understood in two ways, one in which it seems true, and another in which it seems false. It can seem true because the woman who was, in fact, Oedipus’ mother was believed by him to be the queen of Thebes. It can seem false because Oedipus himself would have sincerely denied that Jocasta could be correctly characterized as “Oedipus’s mother.” Belief ascriptions thus seem (...) to admit of two interpretations, and this has suggested to many that belief predicates such as “________ believes that his mother is the queen of Thebes” are ambiguous between a de dicto and a de re reading.1 However, the impression of ambiguity is a function of the narrow ranges of examples that philosophers focus on. When we consider our ascriptional practices as a whole, the suggestion that belief predicates are ambiguous is neither plausible nor needed to explain the de dicto/de re distinction. The following will argue that understanding paradigmatic de dicto and de re ascriptions in terms of disavowals from a more basic sort of ascription is preferable to positing a simple ambiguity in which each of the two sorts of ascription are conceptually primitive. (shrink)

According to Grice's `Cooperative Principle', human communicators are involved in a cooperative endeavor. The speaker attempts to make herself understood and the listener, in turn, assumes that the speaker is trying to maximize the ease and effectiveness of communication. While pragmatists recognize that people do not always behave in such a way, the Cooperative Principle is generally assumed to hold. However, it is often the case that the interests of speakers and listeners diverge, at least to some degree. Communication can (...) arise in such situations when the cost of signaling is high enough that it aligns the interests of speaker and listener, but what happens when the cost of signaling is not sufficient to align the interests of those communicating? In these cases the theoretical prediction is that they will reach a partially informative system of communication. Using methods from experimental economics, we test whether theoretical predictions are borne out. We find that subjects do learn to communicate without the cooperative principle. (shrink)