Glüer II 185
Externalism/Putnam/Kripke: Externalism is about correct causal chains between word and object. >
Causal theory.
Externalism/DavidsonVsKripke, DavidsonVsPutnam: Externalism is about complete sentences and interpretation.
Reference of single words/Davidson: is a theoretical construct - ((s) derived from whole sentences).
- - -
I (a) 8
Def Externalism/Davidson: Events and objects by which a belief is evoked determine at the same time their content.
DavidsonVs: (s) nothing outside the mind determines a belief.
Externalism: shows the correctness (not infallibility) of the majority of judgments - (Davidson Pro).
- - -
I (d) 72
Externalism/Davidson: pro this variant: Externalism stems from twin earth examples, not from linguistic division of labor. Therefore it is no threat of the first person authority.
Radical interpretation: interpreter has to find out the factors, by means of indirect evidence, that first determine the content of the thought of the others - there is no room for error for one's own content because the same factors determine both thoughts.
I (d) 74
Externalism/Burge: two forms:
a) social, meaning from linguistic practice (community)
b) importance of causal history (learning history) dependent on the individual.
Burge: causal relationship to the object in order to comprehend content.
DavidsonVsBurge: does not protect against error.
- - -
Frank I 626ff
Externalism/Davidson: It does not matter if mental states are individuated by something outside, just like sunburn ceases to be on the skin because it has an external cause.
Donald Davidson (1984a): First Person Authority, in: Dialectica 38 (1984),
101-111
- - -
Frank I 663
Externalism/first person/authority: If thoughts are externally determined, then the subject does not necessarily need to know what it thinks of - if the externalism is correct, then:
VsFrege: thoughts cannot be completely comprehended.
VsDescartes: inner states are not certain.
Burge: False use of terms: There is the possibility to not know one's own thoughts.
DavidsonVsBurge: Beliefs depend on other beliefs, therefore less strong possibility of error - DavidsonVsBurge: Intent of successful communication has no necessary connection to the correct identification of meaning.
I 663-667
Externalism: Putnam: Distinguishing inner and "ordinary" external beliefs - Fodor: "methodological solipsism": is only observing internal states.
Burge: External factors find their way into the determination of the contents via "thought experiments". - E.g., wrongly used terms: wrong beliefs about oneself e.g. "I have arthrite in the bones".) >
Arthrite/shmarthrite.
DavidsonVsBurge: initially pro: the content is not determined by what is going on in the person, but: content is determined so strong holistically that individual confusion of ideas cannot be so decisive, and therefore no rigid rules for the attribution of thoughts, we are not compelled to ascribe to the words of another person the same meaning as that person him- or herself.
I 676
Mind/tradition/DavidsonVsDescartes: If there were a stage with alleged representatives of the objects, how can the mind pave its way out? - Anyway, the "objects" do not interest him, but their cousins, the propositions.
But the mind has not the solution "in mind": externalism: all that helps to determine the object must likewise be grasped by the mind when it should know in which state it is.
Donald Davidson (1987): Knowing One's Own Mind, in: Proceedings and
Adresses of the American Philosophical Association LX (1987),441-4 58
