References
- I would like to thank Jocelyn Couture and Kai Nielsen, without whose encouragement and guidance I would never have awoken from my dogmatic slumber. I would also like to thank Dahlia Stein for her assistance and patience in editing the copy.
- Edwards , James C. 1982 . Ethics Without Philosophy: Wittgenstein and the Moral Life Florida : University Presses of Florida . 165
- Rorty , Richard . 1991 . Objectivity, Relativism and Truth Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . 2
- Davidson , Donald . 1985 . “ ‘On the Very Idea of Conceptual Scheme,’ ” . In Post-Analytic Philosophy John Rajchman and Cornel West, eds. (New York: Columbia University Press, 132
- Putnam , Hilary . 1981 . Reason, Truth and History Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . 49
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . 1958 . Philosophical Investigations Oxford : Basil Blackwell . ¶ 115
- ‘Weltbild In what follows, I shall often gloss over the admittedly significant differences between such notions as ‘language-games,’ ‘forms of life,’ ‘conceptual framework,’ ‘language,’ and ‘social practice.’ Although differences between these notions are important, they are not strictly relevant in what follows, which is primarily an argument against incommensurability. However, two points regarding the connection between some of these notions might be relevant here: the first is that our web of beliefs, our Weltbild, for reasons which will become clear, can often not be separated in a strict a priori manner from our concepts, language, or conceptual framework. The second is that Wittgenstein himself did not give a systematic account of notions such as ‘language-games’ and ‘forms of life.’ He used these terms in different ways for different purposes throughout his writings. This gives credence to the view, which I accept, that he was not interested in presenting a general account or theory of language and society. Perhaps I should add that I do not maintain that my interpretation of Wittgenstein conforms to all the remarks he made regarding the above mentioned notions; such a task, given the diversity of his comments, may not be possible, or even desirable. In this context, I particularly have his comments in Culture and Value in mind; for example: ‘one age misunderstands another; and a petty age misunderstands all others in its own nasty way.’ [Culture and Value, Peter Winch, trans, and G.H. von Wright, ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1980), 780. What I do hope to provide is a reasonable and charitable account (for good Davidsonian reasons) of many of his observations, which will allow one to avoid incommensurability and skepticism between languages and social practices.
- Ibid. ¶ 23
- Ibid. ¶ 241
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . 1969 . On Certainty New York : Harper . (¶ 167
- Ibid. ¶ 144
- Nielsen , Kai . 1991 . After the Demise of the Tradition: Rorty, Critical Theory, and the Fate of Philosophy Oxford : Westview Press . 102
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . On Certainty ¶ 94
- Davidson , Donald . 1987 . “The Methods of Truth in Metaphysics,’ in ” . In After Philosophy, End or Transformation? Kenneth Baynes, James Bohman, and Thomas McCarthy, eds. (Cambridge: MIT Press, 167
- Ibid.
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . On Certainty ¶ 204
- Ibid. ¶ 105
- Ibid. ¶ 509
- Edwards , James C. Ethics Without Philosophy 182
- Cavell , Stanley . 1964 . ‘Existentialism and Analytic Philosophy,’ . Daedalus , 93 963
- Wittgenstein . Phiosophical Investigations 23
- Conant , James . 1990 . “ ‘Introduction,’ Hilary Putnam ” . In Realism With a Human Face James Conant, ed. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univesity Press, xxxv
- Davidson , Danald . 1990 . “ ‘A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge,’ ” . In Reading Rorty Alan Malachowski, ed. (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 127
- Ibid. 135
- Winch , Peter . 1958 . The Idea of Social Science London : Routledge and Kegan Paul . 114
- Trigg , Roger . 1991 . “ ‘Wittgenstein and Social Science,’ ” . In Wittgenstein Centenary Essays Edited by: Phillip Griffiths , A. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . ed. 216
- 1991 . The Philosophical Quarterly , 41 In this essay, I do not consider the interpretation of Kuhn and Feyerabend which involves the discussion of incommensurability between different scientific theories. For example, Howard Sankey reads Kuhn and Feyerabend as arguing to the conclusion that ‘theories may be incommensurable with each other…. [T]he languages of some semantically variant theories fail to be fully inter-translatable, and… the content of such theories cannot be directly compared’ (‘Incommensurability, Translation and Understanding,’ [], 414). I do not see such ‘incommensurability’ as problematic. It should come as no surprise that different theories cannot be inter-translatable, just as it should come as no surprise that the vocabulary we use to describe actions cannot be translated into vocabulary in which we describe behavior or brain states. This is so, even if we wish to also say that the different theories or different descriptions explain or describe the same processes or events. What makes it possible for someone (anyone, in principle, given proper education) to interpret a theory, or ‘directly’ compare two different ‘incommensurable’ theories which describe the same state of affairs, is the theories’ relation to the background language or web of beliefs (with their interrelated and holistic character) that make up our Weltbild, which are necessarily commensurable. It is the idea of the possibility of different, incommensurable background languages, webs of belief or world-pictures that I wish to attack.
- Ibid. 216
- Rorty , Richard . “ ‘Cosmopolitanism Without Emancipation: A Response to Jean-François Lyotard/ ” . In Objectivity, Relativism and Truth 212
- Conant , James . Realism With a Human Face ed. lxix
- Rorty , Richard . Objectivity, Relativism and Truth 4
- Davidson , Donald . ‘Method of Truth in Metaphysics,’ 167
- Davidson , Donald . ‘On The Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme,’ 142
- Putnam , Hilary . 1981 . Reason, Truth and History Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . 117
- I will discuss in section IX the sense of ‘must’ used here.
- Davidson , Donald . 1985 . “ ‘Radical Interpretation,’ ” . In Truth and Interpretation Oxford : Oxford University Press . 137
- Nielsen , Kai . After the Demise of the Tradition 83
- Rorty , Richard . “ ‘Inquiry as Recontextualization/ ” . In Objectivity, Relativism and Truth 107
- Putnam , Hilary . 1981 . Reason, Truth and History Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . 117
- Davidson , Donald . 1985 . “ ‘Radical Interpretation,’ ” . In Truth and Interpretation Oxford : Oxford University Press . 168
- I believe that upon reflection, it would be very difficult to deny Davidson's position without appealing to some transcendental perspective or self-refuting skepticism. It is in this sense that we have no alternative. I will say more about this in section VII. The situation is not essentially different, at least not in any philosophically interesting way, if one learns a language from scratch, as a child does. For however one learns a language, as participant or radical interpreter, what one learns will have the properties of rationality, veridicality, and publicity, and, therefore, will not be incommensurable.
- Quine , W. V. 1969 . “ ‘Ontological Relativity,’ ” . In Ontological Relativity and Other Essays New York : Columbia University Press . (
- Davidson , Donald . ‘On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme,’ 141
- 1988 . Representation and Reality The reason I call this a pragmatic solution is that the decision to attribute a different concept to a person rather than a false belief can not be determined in advance through the use of a general, mechanical, decision procedure. The decision must be based on what Putnam calls our ‘general intelligence.’ As he argues: ‘the knowledge that one thing is reasonable charity while another thing would be excessive exhibits our full power of understanding… there is no hope of a theory of meaning or reference which applies to such difficult cases and which is independent of our… general intelligence’ (Hilary Putnam, [Cambridge, MA: MIT Press ] 14).
- Taylor , Charles . 1985 . “ ‘Understanding and Ethnocentricity,’ ” . In Philosophy and Human Sciences Philosophical Papers 2 Cambridge : Cambridge University Press . 128
- Rorty , Richard . Objectivity, Relativism and Truth 108
- Williams , Bernard . 1991 . ‘Terrestrial Thoughts, Extraterrestrial Science’ . London Review of Books , 13 (February 7, 13
- Putnam , Hilary . Reason, Truth and History 114
- I do not take up, although I acknowledge, the possibility of Quinean indeterminacy. Thus, with appropriate adjustments elsewhere in a translation scheme, all the evidence an interpreter has might justify two alternative translations for the native term ‘gavagi,’ one being ‘rabbithood,’ the other ‘rabbit parts.’ (Although are the causes of our beliefs, Quine opens the way for skepticism and relativity. As Davidson has argued: ‘Quine makes interpretation depend on patterns of sensory stimulation, while I make it depend on the external events and objects the sentence is interpreted as being about’ (? Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge,’ 313).
- Davidson , Donald . ‘Radical Interpretation 137
- Putnam , Hilary . Reason, Truth and History 114
- Rorty , Richard . 1982 . “ World Well Lost,’ ” . In Consequences of Pragmatism Minneapolis , MN : University of Minnesota Press . 7
- It might be argued that translation is not a necessary condition for understanding an alternative conceptual scheme since one can become bilingual and learn a language from scratch. But here, again, just as in the case of a child learning a language from scratch, the language learned will have the properties of rationality, veridicality and publicity. What can be said in the one language will, on the whole be able to be said in the other (on the whole, since there will be some exceptions, exceptions which presuppose a background of agreement). The bilingual speaker will not have access to two alternative conceptual schemes, if the argument is this essay is correct.
- Ibid.
- Putnam , Hilary . Reason, Truth and History 116
- This also explains the relativism inherent in the incommensurability thesis. The incoherence found in relativism often arises from the fact that it presupposes a transcendent perspective. Otherwise the relativist could not argue that one moral system is as ‘good’ as another, or one pattern of beliefs as ‘true’ as another.
- Davidson , Donald . “ ‘Judging Interpersonal Interests,’ ” . In Foundations of Social Choice Theory Jon Elster and Aanund Hylland, eds. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 206
- There is a grain of truth in both the notions of correspondence and coherence. We can say that a statement (although not language as a whole) corresponds to reality in the trivial sense that, for example, ‘snow is white’ is true if and only if snow is white. And we can appeal to coherence, as Davidson does, to make the negative (holistic) point that the only thing which justifies a belief is another belief. But these interpretations of correspondence and coherence do not conflict, nor do they lead to any sort of metaphysical position.
- Rorty , Richard . ‘World Well Lost,’ 6
- 1922 . Tractatus: This point is reminiscent of a remark by Wittgenstein in his ‘Here we see that solipsism strictly carried out coincides with pure realism. The I in solipsism shrinks to an extensionless point and there is the reality co-ordinated with it’ (Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [London: Routledge & Kegan Paul ], ¶ 5.64). For Davidson, realism and idealism collapse into each other. Of course, I do not want my remarks to carry the weight of the thesis presented in Wittgenstein's Tractatus.
- Quine , W. V. 1969 . “ ‘Ontological Relativity,’ ” . In Ontological Relativity and Other Essays ‘And in practice we end the regress of background languages… by acquiescing in our mother tongue and taking its words at face value’ ([New York: Columbia University Press ], 49). I believe this is a basis of the appeal to ordinary language made by contemporary philosophers. For there is no more basic appeal, neither foundational nor transcendental, than the appeal to our mother tongue, the ordinary language within which we have been nurtured. In this sense the appeal may be said, if you like, to be not strictly empirical. See Kai Nielsen, ‘On There Being Philosophical Knowledge,’ Theoria 56 (1990), 193–225.
- When I use the word ‘natural,’ I wish to contrast ‘natural’ with ‘transcendental’ and ‘metaphysical.’ I do not wish to exclude anything else by the use of that word. In particular, I do not wish to imply that some of our statements are not intentional or not normative, nor do I wish to imply anything that can be taken to be reductionistic.
- Winch , Peter . Idea of Social Science 94
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . 1970 . Zettel G.E.M. Anscombe and G.H. von Wright, eds. (Berkeley: University of California Press, ¶ 430
- Davidson , Donald . ‘Judging Interpersonal Interests,’ 206
- Bouwsma , O. K. 1986 . Wittgenstein: Conversations, 1949–1951. Indianapolis : Hackett . 23–4
- See note 59.
- Davidson , Donald . ‘A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge,’ 128
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . Philosophical Investigations 109
- Conant , James . 1990 . Realism With A Human Face Cambridge , MA : Harvard University Press . ed. xxxii
- Wittgenstein . Philosophical Investigations ¶ 206
- Wittgenstein . On Certainty ¶ 156
- Cavell , Stanley . 1979 . The Claim of Reason: Wittgenstein, Skepticism, Morality and Tragedy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 83
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . On Certainty ¶ 509
- Wittgenstein , Ludwig . Philosophical Investigations ¶ 109
- Ibid. ¶ 115
- Ibid. ¶ 144
- Rorty , Richard . “ ‘Cosmopolitanism Without Emancipation,’ ” . In Objectivity, Relativism and Truth 216
- Rorty , Richard . Objectivity, Relativism and Truth 5
- Bouwsma , O. K. 1949 . Wittgenstein: Conversations 1951, 24
- Dworkin , Ronald . 1992 . “ ‘Pragmatism, Right Answers and True Banality,’ ” . In Pragmatism in Law and Society Michael Brent and William Wearer, eds. (Boulder, CO: Interview Press
- Rorty , Richard . 1979 . Philosophy and Mirror of Nature Princeton : Princeton University Press . 178
- Dworkin , Ronald . ‘Pragmatism, Right Answers and True Banality,’ 360
- Ibid. 361
- Ibid. 362
- Ibid.
- Ibid.
- Rorty , Richard . Philosophy and the Minor of Nature 178
- Ibid. 385
- Putnam , Hilary . Reason, Truth and History 117
- When we say reasonable, we are neither using a notion of ‘rationality’ that is relative to a culture or language-game, nor a transcendent notion of ‘rationality.’ The contrast between these alternatives has been eliminated, or so I have argued. We may, from this external perspective, also give a causal or functional account of their beliefs and social practices. Thus, for example, we may demonstrate that certain economic or productive forces determine certain beliefs and practices as Marx does. It is important to note that this (external) knowledge may be used when one enters into dialogue with those with whom we are engaged in order to argue for the truth or falsity of views with which we disagree. Thus, for example, we may use the functional or causal information we have garnered in our external study to point out that certain beliefs and practices are ideologically distorted.
- Dworkin , Ronald . ‘Pragmatism, Right Answers and True Banality,’ 364
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