Two
Dogmas of Empiricism
The
Analytic-Synthetic Distinction and Reductionism
Quine’s goals
Modern empiricism has been
conditioned in large part by two dogmas. One is a belief in some fundamental
cleavage between truths which are analytic, or grounded in meanings
independently of matters of fact and truths which are synthetic, or
grounded in fact. The other dogma is reductionism: the belief that each
meaningful statement is equivalent to some logical construct upon terms which
refer to immediate experience…One effect of abandoning them is…a blurring of
the supposed boundary between speculative metaphysics and natural science.
Another effect is a shift toward pragmatism.
•
Negative: trashing the “two dogmas” of logical positivism
–
the
analytic/synthetic distinction
–
reductionism
•
Positive: “naturalizing
philosophy”
–
Understanding ontology as a matter of pragmatic decision, comparable to
the natural sciences
Quine’s plan
•
Debunk the two central dogmas of Logical Positivism (“Empiricism”) using circularity arguments to show that we
can’t come up with
an adequate non-question-begging account of analyticity is, so out go:
–
The analytic/synthetic distinction
– Reductionism:
“the belief that
each meaningful [factual] statement is equivalent to some logical construct
upon terms which refer to immediate experience.”
•
“Naturalizing” philosophy
– by “blurring the
supposed boundary between speculative metaphysics and natural science” which reflects the distinction between analytic
and synthetic sentences where
–
the
former are supposed to be the business of philosophy and the latter the
business of the natural sciences.
The Circularity Arguments: Background
for analyticity
Historical and Popular Understanding of Analyticity
·
A statement is analytic when it is true
by virtue of meanings and independent of fact.
o Kant:
an analytic statement is “one that attributes to its subject no more than is
already conceptually contained in the subject.”
·
Necessary and contingent propositions
o
(Leibniz: “truth of reason” vs. “truths of fact”)
·
A statement is necessary iff it is true at all
possible worlds, i.e. it is not logically possible that it be false (Leibniz)
·
its
denial is self-contradictory
·
A statement is contingent iff it is not
necessary
Problems:
Kant’s definition
·
restricts the definition to sentences in
subject-predicate form
·
and is metaphorical:
what do we mean by “contained”?
Raises the questions:
What is “meaning”? What is synonomy
(sameness of meaning)?
What are logical possibility and necessity?
What is self-contradiction?
And what on earth are “possible worlds”?
Analyticity as truth in virtue of meaning
alone
•
Proposal: a
sentence is analytic iff true in virtue of meanings
and independent of fact.
•
Problem: What
is MEANING?
•
The meaning of an expression in the sense that interests us is not
its reference or extension.
–
The extension of a singular term is the object it names
–
The extension of a general term, or predicate, is the set
of objects of which the general term is true
The
extensions of some predicates
- The extension of “Morning Star” is Venus.
- The extension of Evening Star” is Venus.
- Thus these two terms have the same reference/ extension, but NOT the
same meaning.
- Meaning ≠ Extension
- “Things with hearts” ≠ “Things with lungs”
Meanings
(Intensions)
•
Problem: Analyticity
has to be understood in terms of meanings (intensions) rather than extensions
of terms
•
But what are these meanings/intensions anyway?
•
Properties? Individual concepts or Fregean
senses?
Quine speaks: Once
the theory of meaning is sharply separated from the theory of reference, it is
a short step to recognizing as the business of a theory of meaning simply the synonomy of linguistic forms and the analyticity of
statements; meanings themselves, as obscure intermediary entities, may well be
abandoned.
•
We don’t need intentions (meaning)—providing we can give an
account of synonomy and analyticity. (Where these are seen as relations between
sentences.)
Rephrasing
away bad things
Alice and Betty are of the same
height
–
Surface grammar suggests that this attributes a 3-place relation
to Alice, Betty and Height.
–
But we can rephrase it as
Alice is exactly as tall as Betty
–
What we really have is a 2-place relation between Alice and Betty
–
Height has been exorcized!
–
(i.e.
we don’t need to account for some “thing” that each possesses.”)
The
Exorcism: paraphrasing away intensions
“Bachelor” and “unmarried male” have the same meaning.
– Surface
grammar again suggest that this says there’s a 3-place on “bachelor,” “unmarried male” and a Meaning.
–
But we can rephrase as
“Bachelor” and “unmarried male” are synonymous
–
What we really have is a 2-place relation
–
(i.e. we don’t need
to account for some “thing” that each possesses.”
–
Meanings (intensions) have been exorcized!
Synonomy
•
Synonomy
rather than “sameness of meaning”
•
Even if there are no such things as “meanings” we can make do with synonomy
since we can rephrase away “meanings” in the way that we paraphrased away heights.
•
BUT now we have another problem: what is synonomy?
•
And we need synonomy to understand
analyticity!
•
The problem of analyticity
confronts us anew.
Two
types of analyticity
•
Logical truths: If
we suppose a prior inventory of logical particles, comprising ‘no,’ ‘un-,’ ‘if,’ ‘then,’ ‘and,’ etc.
then in general a logical truth is a statement which is true and remains true
under all reinterpretations of its components other than the logical particles.
(1)
No unmarried man is married.
(no ~x is
X) (Ax, Fx -> ~ (~F~x)
- These are logical truths,
and as such are analytic tautologies in the least problematic sense.
•
The other kind of analyticity
(2) No bachelor is married.
•
The second kind can only be turned into
the first kind if we recognize bachelor and unmarried male are synonymous.
“The characteristic of such a
statement is that it can be turned into a logical truth by putting synonyms for
synonyms… But] we still lack a proper characterization of this second class of
analytic statements…inasmuch as we have had in the above description to lean on
a notion of ‘synonomy’ which is
no less in need of clarification than analyticity itself.
Knowing that swapping
bachelor for unmarried man is a licensed swap requires knowing that the terms
are synonymous.
Therefore this cannot
very well be a TEST is synonymy.
Definition
•
There are those who find it
soothing to say that the analytic statements of the second class reduce to
those of the first class, the logical truths, by definition; ‘bachelor,’ for
example, is defined as ‘unmarried
man
•
But what do we mean by definition?
•
Every definition is either descriptive, i.e. lexicographical, or
explicative or stipulative and none will do the job!
•
Dilemma:
– Lexicographical and explicative definitions assume that we
already understand synonomy: for them “definition rests on synonymy rather than explaining it.”
–
Stipulative
definitions only go for a narrow range of cases
Descriptive
definitions
•
Lexicographical (dictionary) definition
–
Bachelor = unmarried male that never has been married
–
But we can ask whether dictionary definitions are correct,
i.e. whether they really capture synonymous terms. Since this is an open question, lexicographical
definitions cannot unpack the notion of synonymy.
Explication definition
•
Explication (contextual definition):
–
Appeals to pre-existing synonomies
•
the
purpose…is to improve upon the definiendum by
refining or supplementing its meaning. But even explication…does rest
nevertheless on other pre-existing synonomies…[T]he purpose of explication is to preserve the usage of
these favored contexts while sharpening the usage of other contexts.
•
So we’re back to synonomy--and no
wiser!
Stipulative definition
•
Example: definition of logical operators in terms of primitives
– Example:
‘if p then
q’ is
defined as ‘not-p or
q’
•
These definitions aren’t
arbitrary, but what fixes them depends on purposes in formulating artificial
languages
•
But all they can deliver is analyticity-in-L (e.g. In L, let A and
B be related analytically.)
•
So we can’t appeal to “truth by definition” to understand analyticity.
Interchangeability
A natural suggestion…is that the
synonymy of two linguistic forms consists simply in their interchangeability in
all contexts without change of truth value; interchangeability, in Leibniz’s phrase,
salva veritate.
•
Can we understand synonomy as intersubstitutivity salve veritate
(preserving truth value) so that, e.g.?
– On
this view, “bachelor
and “unmarried
male” are
synonymous comes to
– For
any sentence where “bachelor” occurs, “unmarried male” can be substituted and the truth value of
the sentence will stay the same.
The question remains whether
interchangeability salve veritate…is a strong
enough condition for synonymy, or whether…some non-synonymous expressions might
be thus interchangeable.
(i.e. this might not be
sufficient.)
•
Even if
necessary, it is not sufficient.
Cognitive
Synonomy
•
[W]e are not concerned here with
synonymy in the sense of complete identity in psychological associations or
poetic quality…We are concerned only with what may be called cognitive
synonymy
– Compare
to Frege’s remarks about senses vs. ideas
•
What we need is an account of
cognitive synonymy not presupposing analyticity
•
Interchangeability salva veritate is
meaningless until relativized to a language
Quine Presents a Dilemma for this
Approach:
– Either the languages is extensional or rich and
non-extentional
– In
a purely extensional language non-synonymous terms are intersubstitutable salva veritate (hearted and kidneyed)
- The morning star (Venus)
rises in the morning.
- The evening star (still
Venus) rises in the morning.
But to say that these sentences don’t mean the same thing
requires know already know that the terms are not synonymous.
A language rich enough to block the intersubstitutability of
non-synonymous terms presupposes an understanding of analyticity.
• (The
morning star is the evening star is not an analytic statement.)
– (You have to
know they are no synonymous I order to block the “right” ones.)
Extensional
equivalence isn’t synonomy
•
“F and G are extensionally equivalent” means that all and only Fs are Gs
•
Fact: All and only
creatures with hearts are creatures with kidneys
•
BUT “creature
with a heart” and “creature with kidneys” aren’t cognitively synonymous
–
Sam believes that fish are creatures with hearts – true
–
Sam believes that fish are creatures with kidneys – false
•
Sam understands the phrases “creatures with hearts” and “creatures with kidneys,” but knowing what these terms mean doesn’t
help him here.
•
Therefore, extensional equivalence doesn’t’t capture the notion of cognitive synonomy - sameness of meaning—that we want.
Necessity
•
OK. But it is only a
contingent fact that creatures with hearts and creatures with kidneys. Perhaps
if we strengthened the requirement from contingent coextensive sets to
necessarily coextensive sets it would work.
•
(i.e. Necessarily all and only Fs are Gs does capture synonomy)
•
This fixes the heart/kidney problem; it is not the case that necessarily
all and only creatures with hearts are creatures with kidneys.
•
It is the case that necessarily all and only bachelors are
unmarried men.
•
If Tom understands what “bachelors” and “unmarried men” means then he knows that Dick and Harry
are bachelors if and only if he knows that Dick and Harry are unmarried men.
•
So “bachelors” and “unmarried men” are cognitively synonymous
So far so good.
But…
Quine claims we can’t use “necessarily”
•
But we could only know that “Necessarily all and only Fs are Gs” if we already know that “All and only Fs are Gs” is an analytic truth.
•
Remember: analyticity is what we were trying to explain but
–
We tried to explain analyticity in terms of synonomy
and then
– explained synonomy
of Fs and Gs in terms of a sentence using “necessarily”
– But
then it turned out that tacking “necessarily” in front of a sentence just said that that sentence
was analytic!
•
So an account of analyticity in terms of necessity is circular!
Intersubstitutivity is language
relative!
•
The richer the language the less intersubstitutivity
we get
•
Example: sentences of the form “If p then q” and “~p or q” are interchangeable in the truth-functional
language of propositional logic
– If
today is Wednesday then it’s sunny
•
But not in ordinary English where “if p then q” says more.
Extensional
language
•
Quine’s example of an extensional language is the language
of predicate logic, but so is English minus terms like “necessarily”
•
“Any two predicates which agree extensionally
(i.e., are true of the same objects) are interchangeable salve veritate” in such a language.
•
But consider “creature with a heart” and “creature with a kidney” which are extensionally equivalent.
•
[I]nterchangeability
salva veritate,
if construed in relation to an extensional language is not a sufficient
condition of cognitive synonymy in the sense needed for deriving analyticity.
A
Richer Language
•
Ordinary English, a richer language, includes words that can only
be understood if we already understand what analyticity is
•
Example: NECESSARILY
•
“Necessarily all and only bachelors are unmarried men” just comes to “’All and only bachelors are unmarried men’ is analytic.”
•
If a language contains an intensional adverb ‘necessarily…or
other particles to the same effect, then interchangebility
salva veitate
in such a language does afford a sufficient condition of cognitive synonymy;
but such a language is intelligible only if the notion of analyticity is
already clearly understood in advance.
If this is true,
they the whole discussion of “interchangeability” is a red herring/ waist of time.
Interchangeability
won’t do
•
A language in which interchangeability is sufficient for synonomy must be richer than a purely extensional language.
•
And the additional stuff will include words like “necessarily” which we can’t understand unless we already understand
analyticity
•
Which is what we were trying to understand in the first place!
•
The project is circular (but, sly question, are all circles
vicious?)
Semantical
Rules
•
Quine is alluding to Carnap’s project which we will largely ignore.
•
The jist of his worry here is that
appeal to semantical rules of a language, L, to explain analyticity only
explains analyticity-in-L.
•
But that doesn’t explain analyticity for any other
language or, what we’re after, the notion of analyticity as such.
END
PART I (and the First Dogma)
[A] boundary
between analytic and synthetic statements simply has not been drawn. That there
is such a distinction to be drawn at all is an unempirical dogma of
empiricists, a metaphysical article of faith.
•
We don’t know what analyticity is because
•
We still don’t know what synonomy is
•
Can we get at the idea of synonomy by
appeal to the Verification Theory of meaning?
Verification
Theory of Meaning & Reductionism
•
The verification theory of
meaning…is that the meaning of a statement is the method of empirically
confirming or infirming it. An analytic
statement is that limiting case which is confirmed no matter what.
•
Statement synonymy is said to be
likeness of method of empirical confirmation or infirmation…[What] is the nature of the relationship between a
statement and the experiences which contribute to or detract from its
confirmation?...The most naïve view…is radical reductionism. Every
meaningful statement is held to be translatable into a statement (true or
false) about immediate experience.
•
If this works we can understand both formal analyticity in terms
of logical truth, and informal analyticity/cognitive synonymy in terms of likeness
in verification/falsification conditions.
“So, if the verification theory
(of meaning) can be accepted as an adequate account of statement synonymy, the
notion of analyticity is saved after all.”
•
But for this to work the reduction process of synthetic statements
to direct experiences has to be doable.
•
Is it? Fat chance.
Phenomenalism:
an example of Reductionism
“Statement synonymy is said to be likeness of method of empirical
confirmation or infirmation…
• This raises the questions of what are these methods of empirical
confirmation are.
• What, in other words, is the nature of the relationship between a statement
and the experiences which contribute to or detract from its confirmation?
•
• “Locke and Hume held that every idea must either
originate directly in sense experience or else be compounded of ideas thus
originating…we might rephrase this doctrine in semantical jargon by saying that
a term, to be significant at all, must be either a name of a sense datum or a
compound of such names or an abbreviation of such a compound.
Two problems:
1. Physical Substance does not name a datum or compound
of data.
2. This renders mysterious what “object” are.
The first thing that appears when we begin to analyze
our common knowledge is that some of it is derivative and some of it is
primitive…the immediate facts perceived by sight or touch or hearing do not
need to be proved by argument…[but] what is actually
given in sense is much less than most people would naturally suppose and…what
at first sight seems to be given is really inferred.
·
Hume raise the specter of Phenomenalism as
the only metaphysical position consistent with Empiricism and science. (Seems
no objects as all.)
·
Mill (and on some interpretations Berkeley) understood physical
objects as “permanent
possibilities of sensation.”
·
Russell suggests they’re “logical constructions” out of objects of acquaintance—comparable
to “the
average plumber”
Objects of a kind, F, are said to be “logical
constructions” out of objects of another kind, G, if the facts about Fs reduce to facts about Gs, or everything said using the F vocabulary may be said
in a more basic or fundamental way referring only to Gs
The Average Plumber is a logical construction.
•
There is no such being as
the Average Plumber over and above regular plumbers!
•
The form of the sentence
“the Average Plumber has 2.3 children” is misleading: “the Average Plumber” does not refer to any
individual.
•
What we mean is that if we
divide the number of plumbers’ children by the number of plumbers we get 2.3
·
Ayer reconstructs phenomenalism as the claim that talk
about physical objects can be “reduced” to talk about experiences.
Verification
Theory of Meaning and Synonymy
·
Russell's concept of definition Quine
claims was an advance over the impossible term-by-term empiricism of Locke and
Hume. The statement, rather than the term, came with Frege and Russell and to be recognized as the unit
accountable to an empiricist critique.
·
“More reasonably, and without yet exceeding the limits
of what I have called radical reductionism, we may take full statements as our
significant units -- thus demanding that our statements as wholes be
translatable into sense-datum language, but not that they be translatable term
by term.”
·
Verificationists
assume “that each
statement, taken in isolation from its fellows, can admit of confirmation or
information at all.”
·
Sentences are synonymous exactly the same experiences count for
and against them.
·
A sentence is analytic if all experiences count for it--in
effect, if no experiences count for or against.
Quine’s
Holism
But Quine rejects the idea that one can understand the meaning of a
sentence purely in terms of its verification conditions. Instead he offers a
Holism
If we recognize with Pierce that the meaning of a sentence turns purely
on what would count as evidence for its truth, and if we recognized with Duhem that theoretical sentences have their evidence not as
a single sentences but only as larger blocks of theory, then the indeterminacy
of translation of theoretical sentences (or, mutatiis
nutandis, meaning holism) is the natural conclusion.
… Philosophers have rightly despaired of translating everything into
observational and logico-mathematical terms. They have
despaired of this even when they have not recognized, as the reason for this
irreducibility, that the statements largely do not have their private bundles
of empirical consequences.
Our statements about the external
world face the tribunal of sense experience not individually but only as a
corporate body. There is no firm distinction between a linguistic and factual
component of the truth of any individual statement.
Quine’s Holism
Empiricism
Without the Dogmas
·
Some statements are more entrenched in our corporate body of beliefs than others but all face the “tribunal of experience” together.
·
So no statements are “purely linguistic” (Analytic)
·
“The unit of empirical significance is the whole of
science”
The
Web of Belief
The totality of our so-called
knowledge or beliefs, from the most casual matters of geography and history to
the profoundest laws of atomic physics or even of pure mathematics and logic,
is a man-made fabric which impinges on
experience only along the edges.
·
The field whose boundary conditions are experience
·
Every belief/ statement is, in principle, revisable--the difference
between “logical
principles” and empirical
claims concerns the costs of revision
·
Physical objects then, are merely “posits” (like Homeric gods)
Ontology
(again)
·
What we admit to our ontology is a matter of what we need for the
best scientific theory
·
·
Physical objects?
·
Sets? Sets of sets?
·
Brick houses on Elm street?
“Best” us understood as “problem
solving.”
·
Protons?
·
Ids, egos and super egos?
·
Past lives?
Quine’s radical
pragmatism
•
“Now Carnap ["Empiricism, semantics, and ontology," Revue
internationale de philosophie 4 (1950), 20-40.] has
maintained10a that this is a question not of matters of fact
but of choosing a convenient language form, a convenient conceptual scheme or
framework for science. With this I agree, but only on the proviso that the same
be conceded regarding scientific hypotheses generally. Carnap
has recognized that he is able to preserve a double standard for ontological
questions and scientific hypotheses only by assuming an absolute distinction
between the analytic and the synthetic; and I need not say again that this is a
distinction which I reject.”
·
Likewise, when it comes to ontology everything is negotiable:
Ontological decisions are a matter of cost-benefit analysis reflecting on the
needs of science--an extension of common sense.
·
This serves to blur the distinction between philosophy/metaphysics
and science. For both, it shifts
questions of ontology in the direction of pragmatism
– The
“correct” ontology is the one that best serves the
purposes of the best science
–
If science progresses so that the best science requires a
different ontology then we adopt a different ontology.
My comment:
– If
science progresses/evolves so that the best science requires a
different ontology then we adopt a different ontology.
– These
are importantly different concepts.
Strictly speaking there can be no progress since there doesn’t seem to
be anything towards which we are “progressing” (or from which re are
“regressing.”)
– Peirce
talks about an “end of inquiry,” but it is hard to see how this isn’t just a
poetic myth.
– If
we get hit by an asteroid tomorrow, then the “end of inquiry is today.
The
Naturalization of Philosophy
Ontological questions…are on a par
with questions of natural science…the issue over there being classes seems more
a question of convenient conceptual scheme; the issue over there being
centaurs, or brick houses on Elm Street, seems more a question of fact. But I
have been urging that this difference is only one of degree, and that it turns
upon our vaguely pragmatic inclination to adjust one strand of the fabric of
science rather than another in accommodating some particular recalcitrant
experience. Conservatism figures in such choices, and so does the quest for
simplicity…Each man is given a scientific heritage plus a continuing barrage of
sensory stimulation; and the considerations which guide him in warping his
scientific heritage to fit his continuing sensory promptings are, where
rational, pragmatic.