Lexicon of Arguments

 

I 230
Animals/Davidson: since animals have no language, they also have no concepts.
>Concepts, >Language, >Animals, >Animal language, >Language and thinking, >Thinking without language.
ProustVsDavidson: Davidson uses a Cartesian strategy.
>Cartesianism.
I 231
Triangulation: triangulation seems impossible in animals, because the absence of a shared symbolic language does not allow access to intersubjectivity.
>Triangulation.
Concepts/Davidson: concepts are normative because each has its particular application conditions. With this, Davidson takes up Descartes' basic idea.
1. If an organism has the concept of X, it is predisposed to decide whether something is X or not.
2. The term can then be applied to new cases.
3. Concepts form an inferential structure (a theory).
>Predication, >True-of.
I 232
Concept/Animal/ProustVsDavidson: it is not an overstated assumption that certain animals can form concepts that make important aspects of their environment understandable to them.
Possibly social animals (dogs, primates, etc.) have theories for the organization of social relations.
These theories contain concepts for dominant animals, offspring, enemies, allies, as well as the inferential and associative links between these categories for sharing food, protection, partnering, etc.
Cf. >Theory of Mind.