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Abstract
The thesis that meaning is normative has come under much scrutiny of late. However, there are aspects of the view that have received comparatively little critical attention which centre on meaning’s capacity to guide and justify linguistic action. Call such a view ‘justification normativity’ (JN). I outline Zalabardo’s (1997) account of JN and his corresponding argument against reductive-naturalistic meaning-factualism and argue that the argument presents a genuine challenge to account for the guiding role of meaning in linguistic action. I then present a proposal regarding how this challenge may be met. This proposal is then compared to recent work by Ginsborg (2011; 2012), who has outlined an alternative view of the normativity of meaning that explicitly rejects the idea that meanings guide and justify linguistic use. I outline how Ginsborg utilises this notion of normativity in order to provide a positive account of what it is to mean something by an expression which is intended to serve as a response to Kripke’s semantic sceptic. Finally, I argue that Ginsborg’s response to the sceptic is unsatisfactory, and that, insofar as it is able to preserve our intuitive view of meaning’s capacity to guide linguistic action, my proposal is to be preferred.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Bob Hale, Chris Hookway, Alex Miller, Yonatan Shemmer, Chris Daly, Krzysztof Posłajko and three anonymous referees who have all contributed helpful and insightful comments on various versions of this material. I am also grateful to the organisers of the 2014 Cracow Workshop in Analytic Philosophy, and to the other participants for their helpful comments and suggestions.
Notes
1 The view has its roots in Boghossian, Citation1989, and is defended by Whiting, Citation2007.
2 For extended discussion see Bohossian, Citation1989, Citation2005; Hattiangadi, Citation2006, 2007; Whiting, Citation2007; Glüer and Wikforss, Citation2009; Miller, Citation2010.
3 See, e.g., Fodor, Citation1990; Wikforss, Citation2001; Hattiangadi, Citation2006, 2007; Glüer and Wikforss, Citation2009.
4 Miller also discusses a modified Argument from Motivational Internalism which postulates an internal link between meaning something by an expression and being motivated to use it only in ways that are linguistically correct. However, he argues that, while not straightforwardly susceptible to counter-example, even this modified argument fails as the internal link between meaning and motivation cannot be successfully established (Miller, Citation2012, p. 352 ff).
5 It is important to note that Zalabardo is offering a reconstruction of the normativity argument contained in Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language, and not pressing the argument on his own behalf. My comments regarding what Zalabardo argues or contends are therefore to be taken with an appropriate grain of salt.
6 Of course, the question of whether there is anything I ‘should’ do with the expression ‘blue’ is contested. If you like, replace ‘should’ with ‘it would be semantically correct to’ both here and hereafter. Nothing in what follows turns on this distinction.
7 As noted above, Zalabardo takes this to mean that my procedures must involve conscious engagement with the MCFs.
8 Glüer and Pagin (Citation1999) argue that it is not sufficient to be normatively guided by a rule (or by meaning) that the rule merely features in the practical reasoning which lies behind one’s intentions to act. In addition, the rule must play a motivating, and not a merely doxastic role in such reasoning (pp. 211–12). I leave this issue aside here. The problem we are concerned with is the more basic one of how meaning comes to figure in practical reasoning at all.
9 Zalabardo himself notes that each of premises (1) to (3) might be challenged. For Zalabardo’s own suggested responses to each of these premises see Zalabardo, Citation2002 (1997), pp. 288–93. My response to the argument expands on Zalabardo’s proposed challenge to premise (2).
10 My thanks to Daniel Whiting and Alex Miller for pointing out this line of response.
11 I am grateful to Daniel Whiting for pointing out the first analogy, and to Alex Miller for pointing out the second.
12 Re. Wright, Citation1989, p. 630 n. 6.
13 I am thankful to an anonymous referee for helpful comments on the details of this proposal.
14 My thanks to Krzysztof Posłajko for pointing out this objection.
15 In fact, there is a tradition of appealing to speakers’ tacit (as opposed to conscious) knowledge of semantic principles and axioms as constituting the best explanation of their linguistic capacities and behaviour. See, e.g., Dummett, Citation1976; Evans, Citation1981.
16 The example is from Smith, Citation2004, p. 50.
17 See also Smith, Citation2004, pp. 141–2.
18 Ginsborg (Citation2012, p. 134) does allow that the automaton would be an excellent indicator of blue things, but ultimately denies that mere indication is sufficient for linguistic meaning.
19 In the case of ceteris paribus clauses, the main difficulty is to specify their content in such a way that does not already assume what is meant, which would render the account circular (Kripke, Citation1982, p. 27ff). For further discussion see Boghossian, Citation1989, p. 539 ff; Kusch, Citation2006, p. 100ff; Hattiangadi, Citation2007, p. 108ff.