Dictionary of Arguments


Philosophical and Scientific Issues in Dispute
 
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The author or concept searched is found in the following 2 controversies.
Disputed term/author/ism Author Vs Author
Entry
Reference
Dummett, M. Schiffer Vs Dummett, M. I 221
Verificanistical semantics/Dummett/Schiffer: (not truth-theoretical): verification conditions instead of truth conditions. Dummett: (like Davidson): we must ask what form a meaning theory (m.th.) would have to take to find out what meaning is. This M.Th. should be able to specify the meaning of all words and propositions. (Dummett 1975, p. 97).
Dummett: pro compositionality (with Wittgenstein): no systematic meaning theory is possible without explaining the understanding of infinitely many sentences. Therefore one must, like Chomsky and Wittgenstein, accept that we have an implicit capture some general principles. (Dummett 1978, p. 451).
DummettVsDavidson: the meaning theory does not have to contain any truth theory (tr.th.).
Verification condition/verification conditions/Dummett: (for propositions) the verification conditions are also recursively specified. Schiffer: but that does not follow that a compositional truth-theoretic semantics does not exist as well.
I 222
Dummett: with the specification of the verification conditions the meaning theory could at the same time specify the truth conditions (Dummett 1978 Foreword). Verification conditions/SchifferVsDummett: it is not clear how the verification conditions should look like.
Relation theory/meaning theory/Schiffer: when I argued VsRelation theory, I had a standard meaning theory in mind. The relation theory for belief is wrong when languages have no compositional truth-theoretical semantics (tr.th.sem.). Otherwise, it would be true!.
Verificationist meaning theory/Verif. m.th./relation theory/Dummett/Schiffer: with a verificationist meaning theory could the relation theory maybe also be true?.
I 225
Use theory/Dummett/Schiffer: for Dummett the point of use theory is: "the meaning of a word is uniquely determined by the observable characteristics of its linguistic use". (Dummett 1976, 135). SchifferVsDummett: but what counts as "observable characteristic" and what as "openly shown" ?. Does Dummett think that a description of the use in purely behavioral, non-semantic and non-psychological terms would be sufficient that a word has a specific meaning? That would be too implausible as that Dummett would accept that. Still, he notes that the description should not use any psychological or semantic terms.
Meaning/Dummett/Schiffer: should therefore also become understandable for beings who have no semantic or psychological concepts themselves! So even for Marsians. (Also McDowell understands him like this, 1981, 237).
McDowellVsDummett: according to Dummett it must be possible to give a description of our language behavior that is understandable for extraterrestrials. That does not work, because the intentional "(content-determining) is not reducible to the non-intentional.
Content/McDowellVsDummett/SchifferVsDummett: is not detectable for extraterrestrials. ((s) Not "speechless", but only those who do not share our intentional vocabulary).
I 226
Ad. 4: ("To know which recognizable circumstances determine a proposition as true or false"). Schiffer: that means how do we get from behaviorism to anti-realism?.
Manifestation/SchifferVsDummett: this one makes do here even with pronounced psychological terms!.
1. Recognizing (that the conditions are met) is itself a form of knowledge, which in turn contains belief. You cannot describe that non-psychologically.
2. How can one then achieve the further conclusion that a purified attribution should ascribe a skill that can only be "openly shown"? (The showing understood behavioristically).
Behaviorism/Dummett/Schiffer: However, I am not ascribing any behaviorism to Dummett, I ascribe him nothing, I just wonder what his position is.
meaning theory/m.th./Dummett: thinks that natural languages have a m.th.! Their core will be recursively definable verif. cond..
Anti-Realism/Schiffer: here Dummett is uncertain whether the m.th. should have falsification conditions, but that will not affect my subsequent criticism.
1. Whether the knowledge that a state of affair exists, counts as verification of a proposition.
I 227
Could depend on extralinguistic knowledge and not by the understanding of the proposition! We usually need background information. Understanding/SchifferVsDummett: then it should not be about verification conditions!.
Direct verification conditions/Dummett: has to exist for each single proposition!.
QuineVsDummett/Schiffer: (Quine 1953b): direct verification conditions cannot exist for every proposition. ((s) ~Theories are not verifiable proposition by proposition).
2. Surely there are meaningful propositions that have no recognizable conditions that would turn out this proposition as true or false.
Dummett/Schiffer: insists, however, that a proposition must be shown as true or false and in fact "conclusively" (conclusive verifiability). (1978, 379). This leads to anti-realism.
((s) Def anti-realism/Dummett/(s): is exactly to demand that the verification must be performed in order to understand a proposition. The realism would waive the verification.)
Anti-realism/Dummett: you still should not rely too heavily on the anti-realism! Because often a "conclusive verification" is not to obtain!.
Schiffer: so Dummett itself holds the verification conditions contestable!.
I 228
Pain/Verification/Wittgenstein/Dummett/Schiffer: Dummett quotes Wittgenstein with consent: that pain behaviors can be refuted. (Dummett 1978, S. XXXV) SchifferVsDummett: then the m.th. needs contestable criteria as well as contestable conditions!.
Problem: this applies to most empirical judgments E.g. "That is a dog".
3. We know what kind of semantic values we must attribute to the non-logical constants (predicates and singular term) in the conditional sentences in a truth-theoretic semantics. But how shall that look like in the alternative with verification conditions instead of truth conditions?.
Solution/Dummett: the verificationist semantics will make every predicate an effective means available, so that it can be determined for each object whether the predicate applies to the object or the singular term references to the object.
I 230
Relation theory/SchifferVsDummett: the by me disapproved relation theory for propositional attitudes (belief as a relation to belief objects) seems inevitable for Dummett. ((s) because of the relation of predicates to objects to which they must apply verifiable). Problem: that can only happen in a finite theory, and for propositional attitude it would have to be infinite, because for each prop the VB would have to be found individually.
Relation theory/Schiffer: has to assume propositional attitude as E.g. "believes that Australians drink too much" as semantically primitive - namely, 2-figure predicate between believer and content).

Schi I
St. Schiffer
Remnants of Meaning Cambridge 1987
Realism Antirealism Vs Realism Read III 273
Antirealist: Begreifen muß gezeigt werden, Verstehen muß sich manifestieren - Wahrheit nicht beweis-transzentdent -VsTrad: Verstehen von kontrafaktischen Situationen kann nicht manifestiert, nicht mittgeteilt , folglich nicht erworben werden.
III 274
"Manifestationsherausforderung": welches Recht haben wir, Sprechern ein Verständnis von Ausdrücken zuzusprechen, das über das hinausgeht, was sie in ihrem sprachlichen Verhalten zeigen können? Das ist das dritte Argument des KonstruktivismusVsRealismus. Frage: was als Manifestation zählen darf .Aus einer endlichen Menge von Postulaten kann man rekursiv eine potenziell unendliche Ausgabe erzeugen. Problem: wie kann das lernende Kind die Sprache verstehen, wenn es nicht auf diese tatsächliche Menge festgelegt ist, sondern nur auf Manifestationen?
Chomskys Antwort: es gibt vorprogrammierte Strukturen. Logik
III 275
Lücke zwischen Beweismaterial und Theorie: braucht freilich nicht auf diese Weise geschlossen zu werden. Der Anti-Realist schließt sie dadurch, dass er bestreitet, dass die Theorie derartig über die Daten hinausgeht! Bedeutung kann nichts anderes sein, als Sprecher in ihrem Gebrauch manifestieren. Damit wird bestritten, 1. daß Bedeutung ein privates Element haben kann.
es wird bestritten, daß Wahrheit, als beweis-transzendenter Begriff verstanden, der zentrale Begriff in der Bedeutungstheorie sein kann. Ein solcher Wahrheitsbegriff (der Realisten, also unabhängig von der Erkenntnis) könnte im Begriff der Bedeutung keine Rolle spielen. Wir müssen im Stande sein ihn mit unserem Gebrauch zu manifestieren.(>Dummett, Anti-Realismus)
Konstruktivismus: Die Bedeutung muss in einem Begreifen dessen bestehen, was als ihre Verifikation zählen würde. Das heißt, die Bedeutung kann nicht in dem Vorliegen einer Situation bestehen, ohne dass wir im Stande sind diese Situation zu erkennen.
III 276
Klassische Erklärung: versucht die Bedeutung auf möglicherweise beweistranszendente Tatsachen zu gründen.
III 278
Die Herausforderung liegt darin, dass eine derartige Identifikation von Bedeutung mit Wahrheitsbedingungen, die von Verifikation getrennt ist, solche Aussagen bedeutungsleer lassen wird. Der Skeptiker fordert uns zu Recht auf, zu sagen, wie solche Aussagen als wahr erwiesen werden können. (Jones). Er lehnt es zu Unrecht ab, auf eine Antwort zu warten.
Cartwright I 87
Anti-Realismus/Wissenschaft/Cartwright: Operationalismus, Instrumentalismus, Positivismus und konstruktiver Empirismus (Van Fraassen). Der Schluß auf die Beste Erklärung ist niemals gerechtfertigt. Anti-RealismusVsRealismus: das ist eine falsche Sicht dessen, was wir tun, wenn wir etwas erklären: Erklärungen sind Organisation von Wissen. Und organisierende Kraft hat nichts mit Wissen zu tun.

Re III
St. Read
Thinking About Logic: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Logic. 1995 Oxford University Press
German Edition:
Philosophie der Logik Hamburg 1997

Car I
N. Cartwright
How the laws of physics lie Oxford New York 1983

CartwrightR I
R. Cartwright
A Neglected Theory of Truth. Philosophical Essays, Cambridge/MA pp. 71-93
In
Theories of Truth, Paul Horwich Aldershot 1994

CartwrightR II
R. Cartwright
Ontology and the theory of meaning Chicago 1954