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David Henderson Draft, Comments Welcome II. Casting About for a Promising Approach to the Subject
and to What Is A Priori III. The Promising Approach to A Priori Conceptual Truths IV. Objections and Refinements I. My Concerns Actions
are done for reasons. The reasons are
beliefs and desires, which are physical states that causally interact in a
rather special way. Their interaction exhibits
a characteristic pattern: it is rational, at least in certain important
respects. My concern in this paper is
to say something about how we know these things. Is all this known or knowable a priori? And, if so, what elaborations of these claims are also so
knowable? (For example, can we know a
priori to what extent beliefs, desires, and actions must be rational?) This issue arises
most insistently when I read the work of Donald Davidson. Famously, Davidson writes of “constitutive
(or synthetic a priori) laws [or principles]… within a conceptual domain”
(1980b, p. 221). We are to find such
principles at work “constituting ideas” and “sustaining concepts” (1980b, p.
221). In the conceptual domain of
intensional psychology, there are said to be such constitutive principles
associated with the assignment of content: “the content of a propositional
attitude derives from its place in the pattern [of states]”; and that pattern
is said to involve “a large degree of consistency,” or rationality, and correctness
(1980b, 221). Davidson
explains that these constitutive criteria can be denied or repudiated.[1] However, in doing so, one would have
“changed the subject.” Apparently, when
we decide not to accept a certain constitutive principle or criterion, we cease
to use the old concept that was thereby constituted. Using different concepts, we then discourse on a different
subject (Davidson 1980b, p. 216).[2] There
is something compelling in the idea that, in various domains, there are certain
central principles that cannot be denied without doing something that might be
called “changing the subject.” It is
also plausible that these matters might be understood in terms of
“concepts.” At the same time, along
with Davidson, I wish to make sense of all this in a way that does not
presuppose the analytic-synthetic distinction.
Davidson’s discussion, with its somewhat cryptic or at least compressed,
talk of “concepts” held in place, or “ideas” constituted, by “whole set[s] of
axioms, laws or postulates” seems not to take us far in the direction of a
clear positive alternative.[3] Suppose we have in
hand a workable general understanding of the subject, concepts, and the a
priori. What can be said of the
rationality of beliefs, desires, and actions?
It does seem that certain elements of rationality are central to our
understanding of propositional attitudes and the ways that they cause
actions. But, while it may be a priori
that beliefs, desires, and actions are rational in certain respects, are those
respects enough to make it a priori that agents are predominantly or largely
rational? I will reveal my suspicions at this point. I believe that we must indeed attribute significant rationality to agents. However, I also believe that much of this requirement is a function of the nature of current theory, and most of what is required here is not a priori. Our attributions of these contentful states are informed by what in the way of rationality (and irrationality) is explicable or understandable in terms of our psychological theories (Henderson 1993). But, when we get a better general handle on what is a priori, I think that we also have good reason to think that little of the rationality indicated by our best theories is a priori. II. Casting About for a Promising Approach to the Subject and to What Is A PrioriFormulating our issues in terms of changing the subject seems fecund. It calls to mind those perspectives that have been fruitful in understanding how scientists working within significantly different theories and research traditions can nevertheless talk to each other about a shared subject, and in understanding how experts and nonexperts can manage to exchange questions and information about a shared subject. Central to our managing in these contexts is what Kitcher (1993) calls “the referential use” of a concept. In this use, one employs a concept with a deference to reference as fixed either by a community’s expertise or by a tradition of interaction with kinds in the world. One thereby brackets or treats as negotiable most of what one antecedently thinks one knows about the things referred to. Our concept then refers to a (perhaps ill-understood) kind (quantity, or individual) with which relevant portions of the community interact(ed). The subject is that kind (quantity, or individual). The payoff of this referential use—and the attendant understanding of concepts and subjects—is substantial: we can thereby keep alive multiple research traditions in a field, learning from each other. We thereby avoid becoming lodged in local epistemic-theoretical maxima. We can appropriate results from various historical and contemporary communities, and the cumulative character of scientific work is thereby sustained. We remain open to learning just how badly we have been mistaken about a subject. This usage also is important for understanding that epistemic and semantic situation in which we can be lead to abandon what was once held so central in our theories about a subject. An account that accommodates these aspects of the semantics of concepts is crucial in understanding the subject about which we theorize. Even
so, there may be limits to the understanding that comes from focusing
exclusively on the referential use.[4] At least in many of its forms, work of this
sort seems particularly unpromising ground for understanding a priori
truths. The reason is that such work
understands concepts in an externalist fashion, and commonly affords the
epistemic agent little access to the content of those concepts that he or she
may have acquired. Still, it seems that
such referential understandings of “the subject” must be central when the issue
becomes whether one has changed the subject or instead come to say deeply
different things about an old subject.
Recent
work by Chalmers and Jackson promises both to build on the sort of externalist
semantics introduced by Putnam (1989, 1975) and Kripke (1972) and to do so in a
way that yet finds a basis for significant a priori truths. It aspires to identifying a less externalist
core to the semantics of concepts.
While I have my doubts about certain details, and about the ultimate
success of the a priorist aspirations, pursuing this program will help us
improve our appraisal of the prospects for a priori truths (including any
having to do with the rationality of actions and their causes). III. The Promising Approach to A Priori Conceptual TruthsVarious thought
experiments lead us to appreciate that content—that which determines the
referent or extension of a term—does not supervene on physical states internal
to an individual agent. We all know the
story and the judgements that support this conclusion.[5] Our judgments reflect two functions
associated with our concepts. The first
is a function from possible worlds (or centered possible worlds)[6]
to what has come to be called the content of a given concept: (D)
F: Wc®Content (D) represents the partial determination of content by elements of centered worlds that are beyond the skin of any individual speaker. Content here is basically that which settles the referents or extension of the concept in possible worlds. Such content is the second function associated with a term; it is a function from possible worlds to extensions or referents: (C)
F: W®R For illustration,
Consider the English concept “water.” C for water picks out H2O as
the extension of “water” in any world: Cwater F: W®the H2O in each world This function is itself determined
by “water” being a rigid kind-concept, and by it picking out H2O in
the actual world. It is common to use
the phrase, “watery stuff” to stand for whatever it is that makes certain stuff
the referent of “water” in the actual
world. Unpacking and articulating what makes for “watery stuff” is a
delicate matter. In any case, for
“water”, C is determined by the fact
that, in the actual world, the watery stuff is H2O. Of course, in another possible world, the
watery stuff might be something else—the XYZ of philosophical lore. What the
“watery stuff” is in the actual world determines the content of “water.” The function D (above) from possible worlds to contents (the Cs above) thus yields the actual
content for “water” as its value when the value of its argument is our world
(the actual world, or any H2O world for that matter). We might summarize Dwater: If
the actual world is an H2O world, then [W®the H2O], It
the actual world is an XYZ world, then [W® the XYZ] D and C provide the inspiration for distinguishing two intensions associated with a concept.[7] One determines the extension of the concept
in any possible world (considered as counterfactual)[8]—
C does this. However, as Kripke, Putnam, and many others
have pointed out, one can acquire and employ a concept without knowing its
extension and without knowing C. According to Jackson and Chalmers, what
one knows by virtue of having acquired a concept is how the extension of that
concept is fixed in the actual world.
Knowing this much, we can consider each possible world under the
supposition that it is the actual world.
(Call this considering possible
worlds as actual.) Knowing how the
reference of a given concept is fixed in the actual world, we then can know
what the extension of the concept is in each possible world considered as actual. Supposedly then, for any acquired concept,
one knows the extension of that concept in possible worlds considered as actual
by virtue of knowing how the extension of that concept is fixed in the actual
world. If this is correct, then by virtue of having acquired
a concept, we know a function from possible worlds considered as actual to
extensions (in those worlds). We know
this independently of any knowledge about what world is the actual world. We can know this without knowledge of what
is the actual content, C, for that
concept. Functions from worlds to
extensions are termed “intensions.” So,
we know an intension. Chalmers calls
this the primary intension of the
concept—as it can be known prior to knowing C, which comes to be termed the secondary
intension of the concept.[9] He writes: The primary intension of a concept is a function from
worlds to extensions reflecting the way that actual world extension is
fixed. In a given world, it picks out
what the referent of the concept would be if that world turned out to be
actual. … The primary intension of a
concept … specifies how reference
depends on the way the external world turns out, so it does not itself depend
on the way the external world turns out (Chalmers 1996, p. 57). Put simply, the central idea is
that the primary intension is that, “which fixes reference in the actual world”
(p. 59). Following Chalmers, I will
here speak of the primary intension, or simply P. Chalmer’s and Jackson’s claim is that we can
know a concept’s primary intension simply by virtue of having acquired a
concept. Block and Stalnaker (forthcoming) provide useful complimentary treatment of primary intension. They define it in terms of a kind of composite of the functions D and C, with coordinated values being assigned to the argument places: The primary intension,
like the secondary intension, takes just one argument into extensions, though
in this case the argument is centered worlds.
The value of the primary intension for a given centered world as
argument is defined to be the same as the value of the two-dimensional
intension [the functions C and D] for the pair of arguments consisting
of the centered world and the same world, uncentered (Block and Stalnaker,
forthcoming). In effect, if one knows D, then without knowledge of what world
is the actual world, one can know what the extension of an understood concept
is in any given possible world, on the
supposition that that world is the actual world. “Slightly more intuitively, to get the value of the primary
intension on a given world, ask what the extension would be in that world
considered as actual.” Jackson and
Chalmers seek to identify a class of a priori truths that can be arrived at by
a kind of conceptual analysis. The
project begins with a recognition of the externalist character of the content of
concepts (and of the problem it poses for traditional conceptual
analysis). The general idea in
distilling out the primary intension of a concept has been to skim off the
externalist element in what was traditionally conceived of as “meaning” or
“content”—relegating it to the secondary intention and leaving us with
something more internal. The result is
to be something that, free of externalist complications, is known or understood in acquiring the concept. Primary intension is supposed to be just this. Further, primary intension, as that which
determines the extension of the term in any world considered as actual, holds independently of what world is the
actual world. Thus, insofar as it
can be articulated, primary intention promises to provide truths that (a) are
knowable solely on the basis of having acquired a concept, and (b) are knowable
without any further information about what the world is like. This is pretty much what it takes to have a
priori knowledge. Thus, primary
intension is thought to provide a reformed and rehabilitated basis for what can
be known a priori. IV. Objections and RefinementsThere is something
in what Chalmers and Jackson propose.
But, it is less than they hope.
For many concepts, nothing can do quite what primary intention is
advertised as doing. The
reference-fixing role assigned to it commonly cannot be served by what serves
the epistemic role assigned to it. Why does primary intension (P) seem to be the fountainhead of significant a priori knowledge? Part of the story is that, for any concept,
one can know that a formulation that correctly reflects its primary intension
would be true of all in its extension in any world considered as actual. So, one can know that “a correct formulation”
of it holds true in the actual world without any knowledge of what world is the
actual world (See Jackson’s aspirations 1998, p. 51). But, we must be very careful
regarding just what qualifies as a priori on this line of thought. The
following would seem to be a priori: any
formulation that correctly reflects what fixes the extension of a concept in
worlds considered as actual, provides truths about what satisfies that concept
in the actual world. We can know
this much, independent of any knowledge
about which world is the actual world. However, it is tempting to then
suppose that correct formulations provide us substantive a priori knowledge about what satisfies a given
concept. Unfortunately, such high a
priorist aspirations overlook something
central to the a priori as an epistemological matter, and it is after all
an epistemological matter. What is a priori is what can be known by an
individual epistemic agent to be true by way of competent reflection upon what
is minimally required for the acquisition of the relevant concepts. I do not think primary intension (P) can provide this. We may know
that a correct formulation of a concept's primary intension would hold of all
in that concept's extension, but this
avails us little in the search for significant a priori knowledge unless a
correct formulation of that primary intension is appropriately accessible by
virtue of having acquired the concept.
I doubt that correct formulations of primary intension generally are so
accessible. There is an important sense in
which P, as that which fixes
reference in worlds considered as actual, is not as cleansed of externalist
elements as Jackson and Chalmers seem to think.[10] As a result, the primary intension, P, for a given concept need not be accessible to individuals who have
acquired that concept, as it would need
to be, were it to issue in a priori knowledge.
Significant knowledge of the primary intension (adequate to yielding
significant a priori knowledge) need not be learned when acquiring a
concept. Recall that primary intension is
to reflect a stripping away of certain externalist elements of content--for
example, those determining that the concept “water” refers to H2O
rather than to XYZ. Such contributions
of the world to intension are said to make for secondary intension. Primary intension is not conditioned by the
world in such a way. Still, primary intension retains an
externalist character. Consider Chalmer's formulation--as it seems as
guarded and precise as any: primary intension is “a function from worlds to
extensions reflecting the way that actual world extension is fixed” (1996, pp.
58-9). Full and correct formulations of
primary intensions must then be enough to fix extensions of concepts in the
actual world, and in worlds considered as actual.[11] Whatever the details, commonly the primary
intension of a concept would seem to "reflect" (or "turn
on," or "be sensitive to") the sorts of matters discussed in
Kripke’s discussions of reference fixing and Putnam’s discussions of “meaning.” Even when we are considering just how
reference in the actual world is fixed, this retains a healthy externalist
element. For many concepts, a full and
substantive correct formulation of primary intension commonly would make
reference to such things as the historical interaction of a linguistic
community with stuff having a certain crudely appreciated but consistently
keyed-upon character. It must make
reference to patterns of deference across historical stages of a community and
across differences in learning. And, if
the formulation--along with P itself--is to fully reflect how
reference is fixed in the actual world, it must include enough on these matters
to fix the distinct referents of concepts in the actual world—with H2O
as the extension of “water,” CH3CH2OH as the extension of
“grain alcohol,” the stuff with atomic number 79 as the extension of “gold,”
and the stuff with atomic number 42 as the extension of “molybdenum,” …. Obviously, all this includes rather a lot
“outside the head or skin” of individual language users. P retains rather a lot of
externalist dross. But, then, primary intension is not something an individual language learner, qua competent language user, must know, have acquired, or have anything approaching full cognitive access to. I will continue to use the term ‘primary intension’, or 'P', for the function that reflects how reference is fixed in the actual world. We have found that P cannot play the epistemic role assigned to it, for it (or a full and correct formulation of it) is not something learned by individual language users in acquiring a concept—it is not something to which one has access by virtue of having acquired a concept--and so cannot be the basis for reflection drawing only on what is thereby learned. What is epistemically accessible in a fashion
that might make for claims with an a priori status is whatever any individual must have learned in order to “hook
into” the linguistic community, acquiring
the concept thereby. More will be
required in connection with some concepts than with others. But, in many cases, this will be little more
than the realization that there is some pattern of referring to a kind in the
community.[12] One must recognize that individuals can
often acquire concepts on the basis of very little learned information. This (commonly paltry) informational
requirement can be seen as a minimal
individualistic component of primary intention, or Pi.[13] Summarizing my misgivings: it is not P as such that is epistemically accessible—and that
might make for certain claims being a priori.
Rather, it is the minimal
individualistic component of primary intension—Pi. Again, for
any given concept, a correct formulation of P would be true of all that satisfies that concept (in the actual
world). But, correct formulations are not epistemically accessible in a way
that allows one to parlay this general point into a set of a priori truths
reflecting the contents of correct formulations of P for particular concepts. Instead, for any concept, a (sometimes) very thin component of P, the minimal information learned by an individual
in acquiring the concept, Pi, is all
that is epistemically accessible simply by virtue of having acquired the
concept. It is correct formulations of Pi that constitute the a priori payoff of concepts. It behooves us to get a clearer view of just what
the contents of Pis are like. Concepts vary somewhat. We can think of general concepts as
exhibiting four patterns, derived from two dimensions. One dimension is represented by the distinction
between descriptive concepts and rigid kind concepts. For rigid kind concepts, their P and their C
diverge. Descriptive concepts are not rigid. As a result, the P and C for
such terms are almost identical (C
being in effect a copy of P over the
space of uncentered worlds). Such variation
in concepts matters little for our purposes here. Our issues turn on how the Pi for a given concept are related to its P, rather than on the relation between its P and C. Commonly, it is not required of someone acquiring a concept that they know much about what goes into fixing the reference of the concept in the actual world. Commonly, little is required beyond what is needed for the intention to defer to a community usage that is itself poorly glimpsed. And, when more is required, it is often rather short of the kind of knowledge that would really fix reference in the actual world. The second dimension of variation has to do with how much or how little is required. In high-deferential concepts, little more is required than what is minimally needed to underlay a deference to how those around me employ the concept—especially the relevant (historical and contemporary) experts (whoever they might be). “Elm” and ‘arthritis’ provide paradigm high-deferential concepts. “Molybdenum” is another high-deferential concept. In contrast, for low-deferential concepts, rather more is demanded of one acquiring the concept. Certain simple functional concepts, such as “pump” seem a case in point. “Water” is less deferential than many other substance terms. (Obviously, this second dimension is less dichotomous than the first.) With some simplification,[14] we can view the matter as in Figure 1. Figure 1: Kinds of Concepts and some examples
For a high-deferential concept, Pi carries
little of the information in or about P. To have acquired a concept such as
“molybdenum” it is probably sufficient to know that it is some stuff that the relevant
chemical experts (whoever they might be) manage to pick out. It seems likely that P for molybdenum turns on the interactions of certain historical
experts with a stuff—a stuff that is homogeneous in its essential
microstructure.[16] However, before knowing anything
approximating the historical story "reflected in" the P for ‘molybdenum’, and before knowing
the theoretical understandings that arose from the ensuing investigation, I
could have acquired the concept.
Despite such ignorance, I could competently assert of my first custom
bicycle frame (Milan, circa 1981) that it was made from a steel hardened with
molybdenum. For a low deferential concept, Pi carries somewhat more of the
information in or about P. To have acquired a (descriptive-kind) concept
such as ‘being a pump’ one at least knows the functional principle behind
something qualifying as a pump. To have
acquired the (rigid-kind) concept of
“water,” it seems that one must have learned that water is a potable
liquid, and one must have learned enough to pick out salient cases in one’s
local environment.[17] This is to require that we learn enough to
take a (somewhat active role or) local place in the patterned interaction with
a stuff in our environment, an interaction that constitutes the P for “water.” But, it is not to require that we have
learned enough to correctly articulate the P
for “water.” In general, when
high-deferential concepts are in play, there is very little that can be known a
priori. As we have seen, the a priori is tied to Pi.[18] For
example, with “molybdenum,” one can know that molybdenum is the stuff that the
relevant experts (do or did) interact with in association with the concept
(where just who the relevant experts are is commonly left to be sorted out). [19],
[20] What constitutes a
change in subject when a high-deferential concept is in use would seem to allow
wild variation in what is said or thought about the (unchanged) subject. I could claim that I have arthritis in my
thigh. I could claim that molybdenum is
an acid used in the curing of steel. In
both cases, I would be quite wrong and could rightly be corrected, because in so claiming or believing I have
not changed the subject.[21] One might think
that low-deferential concepts give rise to a significant body of a priori
knowledge. It is true that they give rise to more substantial a priori truths
than do high-deferential concepts. But,
if one comes with expectations such as Jackson’s and Chalmers’, one will be
disappointed. The crucial question is
just what one must have learned in acquiring such low-deferential concepts as
“water,” and “temperature?” The Pis for
typical low-deferential concepts are meager in comparison with what is Jackson
and Chalmers portray as the correct and full formulations of the relevant Ps. At least for concepts such as “temperature”
and “water,” Pi seems to have a lot to
do with the ability to pick out contextually
prominent samples (salient cases in local environments). In acquiring this ability, one learns a
crude phenomenology (in the scientists sense).[22] For example, all who have acquired the term
‘temperature’ (and/or the coordinate terms for ranges in a commonsensical
temperature scale—‘hot’/‘hotter’ and ‘cold’/‘colder’) thereby have acquired
certain understandings of the functional-role(s) associated with ranges or
changes of temperature. For example,
one probably knows that enough change from hot to cold, or in the opposite
direction, can induce phase-changes in certain familiar materials. In particular, one probably knows something
of water changing from liquid to a gas, or to a solid (or the reverse). One might know that when certain (locally prominent) things (such as paper,
or leaves) get hot enough, they burn.
One might know that when things get hot enough, they cause discomfort
when touched—even injury. And, provided
the individual lives in a cold climate, he or she learns that when it is cold
outside, this can cause a distinctive discomfort—even injury. We might sum up such information as follows: what is minimally known by anyone who has acquired the concept of “temperature” is probably something like the following. 1.
Temperature is a “quantity.” (Which is only to say that material objects can have more or less
of it.) The ones that have relatively
more are warm or even hot, and those with relatively little of it are cool or
even cold, 2.
Some general knowledge associated with environmentally
salient, yet quite rudimentary, phenomenological regularities, and 3.
Whatever scattered information is needed enable one to
pick out certain locally prominent hot things, and cold things—that is, samples
of high and low temperature. I think that this pretty much
exhausts the minimal individualist component of primary intension (the Pi)
for "temperature." If this is
roughly correct, then we have grounds for taking a deflationist stance with
regard to some pretensions to significant a priori knowledge. Compare my reconstruction of the Pi for "temperature" with
Jackson's (1998, p. 58-9) treatment of “temperature” as a functional-role
concept whose P is a matter of what
fulfills “the T-role in the ideal gas laws.”
Failing to distinguish P and Pi (perhaps abetted by an
over-estimation of the contents of correct formulations of P), he must conclude that the ideal gas laws are (within the relevant
ranges of temperatures and volumes) a priori!
However, as we have seen, it is Pi
that is epistemically relevant, and the Pi
for (even a low-deferential concept such as) “temperature” is much thinner than
suggested by Jackson’s presentation. One might wonder whether there is a significant
distinction between P and Pi, at least in the case of low-deferential
descriptive concepts. To this point, I
have said little to question Chalmer’s and Jackson’s strong characterizations
of the Ps for various concepts. Yet there is reason for concern on this
point. To begin with, there is a
certain vagueness in many presentations of primary intension. On all accounts, primary intension is that
which fixes the extension of the concept in the actual world, and thus in
worlds considered as actual. Or,
rather, it is a function reflecting how reference in the actual world is
fixed. Now, as I have understood
primary intensions to this point, full articulate formulations of the primary
intension of a given concept would provide a nicely filled in account of those
aspects of things in the world that make a certain thing, quantity, or
what-have-you, the referent of the relevant concept. In this, I have sought to honor Chalmer’s and Jackson’s faith
that (correct formulations of) primary intensions would contain significant
substantive and interesting information.
By drawing on primary intension, we supposedly are to be able to know
that water is the potable stuff filling the lakes and rivers—or something like
this—and that temperature is that quantity that fulfills the T-role in the
ideal gas laws. If this falls out of
knowledge of primary intension, then a correct formulation of it must include
the substantive characterization of water as the dominant potable stuff in the
lakes and rivers, and of temperature as that quantity that (in a mole of a gas)
is related to pressure and volume according to the formula pV=KT (where K is a
constant). I have also sought to
accommodate the suggestion (from Krpike and Putnam, echoed clearly in Jackson
and faintly in Chalmers) that what fixes referent of some concepts is not some
description of the properties of a stuff or what-have-you, but particulars
regarding the historically situated interaction of (elements of a) community with
a stuff, quantity, or what-have-you.
When we take this into account, while still looking for primary
intensions to deliver significant a priori knowledge, we get the result that
(correct and full formulations of) primary intension must include rather a lot
of story regarding the historically situated interactions of a community with
the stuff (or whatever) in question.
This is the line I have taken above—supposing that, if one knows the
primary intension of the term, one would (have internal access to) a
substantive characterization that would determine, for each world, what
comprised the referent of the relevant concept. However, a more
modest understanding of the relevant Ps
is possible. On this alternative
understanding, the distinction between P
and Pi becomes tenuous for such
concepts: One might think to treat the P
for low-deferential descriptive concepts in terms of a ramsification of the
crude phenomenology that I have associated with their Pi—a ramsification that is then taken with a large “grain of
salt.” (This approach is quite in
keeping with the influence of Lewis () on this literature.) On this
alternative understanding of the Ps
for these concepts, the distinction between P and Pi may not be of
great importance, but one must then carefully resist excessive estimates of the
content of the P for low-deferential
functional-role concepts.[23] On the immodest understanding of the Ps for these concepts, the distinction
between P and Pi is of great importance, for Pi,
and not P, is epistemically
accessible as a basis for a priori truths.
In either case, in appraising the extent of the a priori, we can focus
on Pi and ignore P.
For, either P is
epistemically inert (as in the immodest understanding), or P is something of a reflection of Pi for low-deferential concepts (as in the modest understanding).[24] V. Applications to Belief, Desire, and Action Like “temperature,” “belief” and “desire” are
low-deferential functional-role concepts.
Upon reflection, the parallels are striking. First, there are parallels in what we must learn in acquiring
these concepts. One who has acquired
these concepts must be able to pick out locally salient cases—although one need
not be able to formulate general truths that fully characterize the functional
states at issue. While their Pi is sufficiently substantive that one who has
acquired these concepts can then apply them with reasonable success to easy
cases in their local environment, their Pi
remains a quite limited reflection of the states referred to. Second, these concepts are functional-role
concepts. They deal with states that
are the states they are (beliefs and desires with such-and-such contents) by
virtue of their role in a pattern of causal interactions. Thus, just as “temperature” is a
functional-role concept embedded in an evolving theory (or family of related
theories), so the concepts of intentional psychology are embedded in an
evolving family of theories or understandings.[25] Theories provide our best, but
nondefinatory, understanding of these functional roles. It is quite plausible that the concepts of “belief”
and “desire” are minimally associated with a crude phenomenology that one must
appreciate in order to have acquired the concept. To get some handle on the outlines and extent of that
phenomenology, one must think in terms of what the simplest folk, contemporary
and historical, are supposed to know or have known about “beliefs and desires.” Clearly, it falls quite short of being a “ramsification” of our
best theories, or even of central elements of our best theories. My earlier
reconstruction of the Pi for
“temperature” was intended as an approximation. In the same register, I now suggest a plausible approximate
formulation of the Pi for “belief” and
“desire.” First, it is common to remark on the pervasive
association of these concepts with the simple rationalizing form of action
explanation. We typically explain an
action A of an agent by noting that
the agent desired some end, E, and
believed that by A-ing, he or she
could (probably) bring about E. Such "atomic rationalizing
explanations" focus on the most local and rudimentary of belief/desire
causal interactions. They are
ubiquitous. Suppose someone did not so much as know that beliefs and desires
interact to cause actions in the local way reflected in atomic rationalizing
explanations. We could not count such a
person as having understood or acquired the concepts of belief and desire. So, this much is a part of the Pi for these concepts. Second, we all know that, even though an agent
desires some end, E, and believes
that by A-ing he or she could
(probably) bring about E, yet that
agent might not A. We commonly find this explicable in terms of
an overriding causal chain featuring yet other beliefs and desires. Such explanations may refer to the desire
for some end, G, stronger than the agent’s desire for E. We all know that desires
come in varying strengths, and that a strong desire can dominate another,
weaker, desire with the effect of precluding some effects that weaker desire
might otherwise have had. The knowledge
that desires vary in strength, and that stronger desires dominate weaker
desires, seems to be a component of the Pi
for “belief” and “desire.” Third, it is common to recognize other causes for an
agent failing to take an action that is indicated by certain of that agent's
beliefs and desires. For example, the
agent may believe that there are more effective, or less costly, means to a
given end. To recognize this much is to
recognize that sometimes agents choose among prospective actions on the basis
of beliefs about the relative effectiveness of certain means to a desired
end. It is plausible that one who did
not know of such interactions would not be counted as having acquired the
concept of “belief.” Finally, it seems a commonplace that one can “know”
or believe something, without that belief having its characteristic causal
impact on thinking and decision because one temporarily failed to recall what one nevertheless continued
to know or believe. Some distinction
crudely corresponding to that between standing and occurrent beliefs and
desires seems to be a commonplace.
While I am not at all confident of its status, one might at least
entertain including this much in a reconstruction of the Pi for “belief” and “desire.” Summarizing these points, we might begin a rough
catalog of the components of the Pi for
"belief" and "desire" with the following four items: 1.
Beliefs and desires
causally interact in a fashion to produce actions in conformity to atomic
rationalizing explanation, 2.
Desires vary in
strength, and that stronger desires dominate—interfering with (to the point of
blocking) some of the common causal effects of other (weaker) desires, 3.
Sometimes agents
choose among prospective actions on the basis of beliefs about the relative
effectiveness of certain actions for a desired end, 4.
An agent may have
standing beliefs that do not become occurrent beliefs in a given stretch of
thinking, and, as a result, such beliefs do not come to effect the outcome of
that thought as they might otherwise. Certain crude understandings having to do with the
interaction of beliefs with other beliefs should be added to this list 5.
Most people are
“fairly good” at seeing the “obvious” implications of their beliefs—when
something makes it worth their while to think about the relevant matters and
when they then call many of the appropriate beliefs to mind. (There is variation across people here.) (One probably knows enough to generate some
concrete examples of good ways of reasoning that can be expected. One can rate some cases for “obviousness.”) 6.
People can commonly be
led to reason badly. Some ways of
thinking that would be good are just too difficult for most of us. (There is some variation on what reasoning
people find (too) difficult.) 7.
Some internal and
external contexts increase peoples’ susceptibility to bad reason. (Again, one can probably generate a few
examples.) There are presumably a few other claims that
represent components of Pi. There are claims about peoples’ desires, how
some are commonly keyed to certain biological matters, and (perhaps) how they
can be influenced in certain very general ways. I
believe that the vague and schematic claims in my catalog provide a reasonable
reflection of the limited sort of knowledge that constitutes the Pi for “beliefs” and “desires.”[26] The sketchy, schematic character of the
commonsense generalizations employed above is importantly to the point. As one employs the concepts of “belief” and
“desire,” learning more about the subject in the course of those applications,
one in principle could come to very
different views of the family of functional systems that constitute actual
believers and desirers. On those many matters
about belief and desire left undetermined by these schematic claims, one could
come to believe quite differently from what we have come to believe. Most
of us know rather a lot more about
actual believers and desirers than has been included in Pi. What more
we know is not a priori, and we could
have come to believe rather different things without thereby having come to
investigate a different subject. Again,
this is parallel to how we have gone well beyond the Pi for “temperature.” [27] All of
us believe much stronger things about the rationality of believers than is
entailed by the Pi for “belief.” In order to illustrate the scope for
variation in belief about belief and desire, to illustrate the scope for
beliefs that differ from our own more developed understandings without
constituting a change in subject, I now explore just how different one’s
beliefs about the rationality of belief and desire might be while remaining
compatible with Pi. To do this, I set out what I take to be an empirically false belief/desire
psychology. In
keeping with catalog items 1-4, beliefs and desires must at least interact in
little clusters or eddies to cause and rationalize action in the fashion
reflected in atomic rationalizing explanations. Further, the range of occurrent beliefs and desires that might
causally condition what action is preformed will commonly be wider than
mentioned in any one atomic rationalizing explanation. Multiple occurrent desires of varying strengths
may come into play. Beliefs about the
relative effectiveness of differing means for satisfying particular desires may
also become occurrent and operative.
But, granting all this, we might envision these processes diverging
sharply from what we think is normatively appropriate. Pi requires that occurrent beliefs and desires settle
into a decision that is controlled by the “stonger” desires.[28] However, it says nothing about how an
agent’s standing beliefs and desires become occurrent. By what dynamic do beliefs and desires get
“called into cognitive play.” We really
do not know all that much about this today—witness the recalcitrance of the
frame problem—although we suppose that agents commonly manage to “call to mind”
many of their beliefs and desires that would be relevant. Of course, we have some ideas about limits
to this—or systematic difficulties that folk might have in automatically
activating all the standing beliefs and desires that are relevant. But, compatible with Pi, one might believe that agents were really very bad
at this. So, the set of beliefs and
desires that enter into decision-making in any one episode might be a rather
small and half-hazard subset of the set of standing beliefs and desires that
are contentfully relevant and should be considered. In keeping with Pi as represented above, we must make sense of the
idea of desires with differing strengths.
But, this does not require as much as might be thought. The formulations above only require that
some scaling of desires be possible internal
to the individual episodes of reasoning issuing in a choice or decision. Just as reasoning might be inappropriately
selective in the beliefs and desires that happen to feature in any one stretch
of decision-making, so strength might be a property primarily of occurrent
desires internal to any one episode.
That is, there is no need to suppose that standing desires are comprised
in a robust (if somewhat evolving) preference structure. Perhaps agents have a set of standing
partialities and aversions that do not generally have relative strengths. The relative strengths of occurrent
partiality or aversion might then be almost wholly contextually engendered—as
desires become occurrent within a decision-context they come to have relative
strengths. For example, walking certain
streets in Amsterdam might induce certain episodic desires in some men that are
episodically stronger than the desire for an honest relationship with the
person with whom they individually share their domiciles. Pictures of children with distended bellies
may induce strong concern for world hunger, while the smells issuing from
certain restaurants may weaken it for purposes of episodic processing. Perhaps all decisions of agents are so
contextually conditioned. Recall the
“semi-autonomous structures of the mind” to which Davidson appeals when
attempting to make sense of weakness of the will (1980a). The present suggestion (again not intended
as an open empirical possibility) is
something of the limit case of this—each episode of decision-making might comprise
its own semi-autonomous structure in which occurrent desires interact according
to their contextually emergent relative strengths, within episodic eddies, in
combination with what contentfully relevant beliefs happen to become occurrent. If we
were to judge the agents just envisioned using our standards of rationality, we
would find them quite irrational. We
might well take advantage of their shifting episodic preference structures to
systematically drain them of resources.
Perhaps this would be facilitated were we do discover ways of
manipulating the contexts of decision to frame decisions in ways that
manipulated those contextually emergent preference orders. (This would provide a truly horrific variant
on the framing tendencies suggested by Tversky and Kahnaman 1981—one in which
the contextual or episodic frame engenders the preferences in a fashion much
deeper than the mere coloring of enduring preference orders that is envisioned
in that literature.) Further, not all
of such an agent's desires—aversions and affinities—would be considered in any
one episode. And not all the agent's
beliefs that are relevant to evaluating the costs and benefits associated with
any one course of action need be to called to mind. One might say that such an agent never really produces an “all
things considered” judgment, as the agent would never even approximate
considering all the relevant matters (as gauged in terms of their own standing
belief and desire states. I believe that
one would say that so inept a practical reasoner would be predominantly
irrational. I have
argued that what is a priori, what cannot be denied without changing the
subject, what must be believed in order to acquire and use our concepts is
fairly minimal. It is tied to what I
have termed individualist primary intention, Pi, a small component of what has been called primary intention, P. For many
concepts—high-deferential concepts such as “molybdenum,” for example—Pi is exceedingly thin: it can comprise little more
than the understanding that a set of experts (whose identity is undetermined)
refer to a kind of stuff, disease, or what have you, and the intenson to refer
to whatever they refer to. In other
cases—low-deferential concepts such as “temperature”—Pi is more substantive. I have presented what I take to be a plausible reconstruction of
the Pi for “temperature.” While this Pi is found to be rather more substantive that what was seen in the case
of “molybdenum,” it is nevertheless quite sketchy and schematic. It must be this sketchy if it is to
represent that minimal understanding possessed by anyone who has acquired the
concept, even those who come historically early, and those who are not
expert. Indeed, this limited character
of the Pi of such concepts is needed
when making sense of communication, regarding a shared subject, across
differing research traditions--a consideration that is particularly compelling
in the present context. My general
remarks on the Pi for various concepts,
and my treatment of "temperature" as a useful illustration, are
intended as correctives to the overreaching aspirations for significant a
priori knowledge found in writers such as Chalmers and Jackson. Finally, using "temperature" as a
model for our concepts of "belief" and "desire," I develop
a plausible parallel reconstruction of the Pi for these concept. I find that, while it is a priori that
agent's are rational in certain very limited respects, what is a priori here is
not enough to insure that people are predominantly rational. Block, N. and Stalnaker, R.
Forthcoming: “Conceptual Analysis, Dualism, and the Explanatory Gap,” Philosophical Review. BonJour, L. 1998: In Defense of Pure Reason. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press. Chalmers, D. 1996: The Conscious Mind. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press. ________. Forthcoming: “The
Components of Content,” Mind. Davidson, D. 1980a: “How is
Weakness of the Will Possible?” in Davidson, Essays on Actions and Events. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 21-42. ________. 1980b: “Mental
Events,” in Davidson, Essays on Actions
and Events. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 207-25. ________. 1980c: “Philosophy as
Psychology,” in Davidson, Essays on
Actions and Events. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 229-44. _______. 1980d: “Towards a
Unified Theory of Meaning and Action,” Grazer
Philosophische Studien 11: 1-12. ________. 1984a: “Belief and the
Basis of Meaning.” in Davidson, Inquiries
into Truth and Interpretation.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 141-54. ________. 1984b: “On the Very
Idea of a Conceptual Scheme,” in Davidson, Inquiries
into Truth and Interpretation.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 185-98. Graham, G. and Horgan, T. 19xx: "Southern Fundamentalism and the
Ends of Philosophy," Henderson, D. 1993: Interpretation
and Explanation in the Human Sciences.
State University of New York Press. ________. 1994: “Conceptual Schemes after Davidson,” in Preyer, Siebelt, and Ulfig (eds.), Language and Philosophy: On Donald
Davidson’s Philosophy. Kluwer. ________. 1991: "On the
Testability of Psychological Generalizations," Philosophy of Science 58, 586-606. Jackson, P. 1998: From Metaphysics to Ethics: A Defense of
Conceptual Analysis. Oxford:
Clarendon Press. Kitcher, P. 1993: The Advancement of Science. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press. Kripke, S. 1972: Naming and Necessity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press. Lewis, D. () Peacocke, C. 1992: A Study of Concepts. Cambridge, MA:
M.I.T. Press. Putnam, H. 1975: “The Meaning of
Meaning,” in Putnam, Mind, Language, and
Reality: Philosophical Papers, Vol. 2.
Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 215-71. ________. 1989: Representation and Reality. Cambridge, MA: M.I.T. Press. Quine, W. 1961: "Two Dogmas
of Empiricism," From a Logical Point
of View, 2nd ed.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Tverski, A. and Kahneman, D.
1981: “The Framing of Decisions and the Psychology of Choices,” in Science 221: 453-8. [1] Davidson both insists that
it would be distorting to think of these principles as either analytic or
synthetic and then goes on to write of them as "synthetic a priori"
truths. The tensions in his
presentation here reflect the difficulty of the issues. [2] Of course, Davidson has
argued that there are no incommensurable sentences. Sentences are integrated components of a language and languages
must be holistically commensurable.
However, there are apparently sentences whose interpretation or
translation necessitates the non-homophonic treatment of certain of their
components. He seems to believe that
the sentence, ‘People are predominantly rational in their beliefs and actions’,
as understood by Davidson and his linguistic community, is so secure that its
denial is unassertable (when taken homophonically). Were someone to utter the sentence ‘People are not preponderantly
rational in their beliefs and actions’, this would call for treating some of
the component terms in non-homophonic fashion.
Perhaps they have certain something different in mind by talk of
“rationality.” Are the same normative
standards being employed? Would the
speaker insist on their satisfaction at a similar level, or are they setting
the “rationality” bar set at the same height.
If the differences did not seem to come here, Davidson presumably would
conclude that the speaker was not really talking about beliefs and desires, but
something else. Perhaps the other is
Stephen Stich, and he is talking about tokens in B-boxes (whatever that would
be) but not beliefs. In effect, Davidson would insist that the new concepts can
be captured in terms of the old language and understandings, of which the
vocabulary and theory of propositional attitudes was but a part. So,
given that we are confronted by someone who holds true sentences different from
those we would, when should we conclude that they are discoursing on a
different subject. What sorts of
sentences matter deeply here? What
sorts do not? [3] The difficulty of these matter seems to me to be reflected both
in the compressed character of Davidson’s presentation and in his own reticence
regarding any “clear [or determinate] line between changing the subject and
changing what one says on an old subject” (1980b, 216). (Although Davidson manages the temerity to
“risk tresspass” by pronouncing certain claims a priori.) [4] The need to make sense of nuanced difficulties in communication
across research programs leads Kitcher to write of the “referential potential”
of a term (in effect, his reconstruction of “meaning”) as a composite of the
referential use and an attributive use that is rather more descriptivist in
character. [5] What here attracts me to
talk of possible worlds is its promise as a heuristic for thinking about
intuitive judgments and what we are prepared to hold constant and what we are
prepared to change in the face of new information. It does seem to me that we must recognize and accommodate the kind
of linguistic sanctity accorded certain continuing historical interactions with
stuff that are reflected in Kripke and Putnam’s thought experiments and the
possible world gloss that they give this.
However, while admiring the formal semantics that has been developed, I
commonly find myself pressing for concrete details about just what is supposed
to be constant across the possible worlds envisioned. For example, just what variations in language communities are allowed
when treating “our” concepts? (Compare
Block and Stalnaker’s (forthcoming) doubts about how the P for a given term is supposed to remain fixed across possible
worlds--given possible variations in linguistic communities.) At many points, the stories on offer seem
flimsy in the extreme, and I feel as though I am an anthropologist trying on a
elegant myth. I see how it works up to
a point, then feel that I am not supposed to press to hard at certain points. [6] A centered possible world is a possible world plus a designated
spatio-temporal location. These are
employed as the argument of this function in order to focus on utterances by
individuals who are located in communities.
After all, a possible world might contain stretches of both H2O
and XYZ, with corresponding communities interacting with each and talking of
“water” in each connection. [7] D is not an intension,
for, as used in these discussions, an intension is a function that fixes the
extension of a concept, depending on the world. D rather yields an
intension, C, as a value. [8] Again, C is determined by how things are in the actual world—for instance,
by whether the watery stuff there is H2O. With information about this, we can then consider each of (other)
the possible worlds on the supposition that they are counterfactual (not actual)
and ask what the extension of the concept in that world is. This is
considering possible world as counterfactual—against a background
understanding/presumption of which world is the actual world. [9] Jackson (1998, p. 48)
writes of the primary intension as the “A-intension.” He first specifies the A-extension of the term or concept: “for
each world w, what the term applies
to in w , given or under the
supposition that w is the actual
world, our world.” We grasp or can know
this, simply by virtue of having acquired a concept, and this A-extension is
determined as a matter of how reference is fixed in the actual world being
applied to each possible world under the supposition that it is actual (p. 49). [10] This crucial assumption comes to the fore explicitly in Chalmers
(1996, p. 58) and implicitly in Jackson’s faith (1998, p. 49) that primary
intension, which he terms A-intension, is what is learned by all who have
acquired a concept (both across the contemporary community and across its
historical stages). [11] There is some "wiggle room" here, although the wiggles
will not evade the force of my considerations.
Of course, primary intension is strictly a function, and a "full
formulation" of it might then be just a list of world-extension
pairs. Now, while we obviously do not
have such a mapping "in our heads" by virtue of having acquired a
concept, we admittedly have a related form of dispositional knowledge: we have
a kind of sensitivity to counterfactual scenarios that reflect somewhat how reference is fixed in the
actual world. Perhaps just this,
cleaned up, is what folk have had in mind in insisting that we know or have
access to primary intensions of acquired concepts. My reservations would then have to do with getting from this
"knowledge" to knowledge of the sorts of substantive formulations
featured in the literature. [12] Something like this is suggested in one of Jackson’s own
formulation of what we have all learned in learning primary intension: “‘Water’ is a rigid designator for the kind
common to the watery exemplars we are, or the appropriate baptizers in our
language were, acquainted with. This is
what we grasp when we come to understand the word” (1998, p. 49). [13] After all, the pattern of deference on the part of some
individuals and of judgments on the part of (typically other) individuals is
part of what constitutes the full primary intension—part of what constitutes
the reference fixing in the actual world which the function P “reflects”. So, Pi, what an individual must learn in
having acquired a concept, insofar as it is of a piece with the minimal
judgmental and deferential tendencies required for acquiring the concept with
its full referetial mechanisms, is a piece of that wider context which the
function P “reflects.” [14] As just noted, I simplify by here treating the deferential
dimension as dichotomous, when it is really more continuous. But, there is also an important
simplification in treating individual concepts as each having a determinate
place on the deferential dimension. I
suspect that our talk of concepts, and our judgments regarding when someone is
employing "the same concept" as we, are sensitive to interests
informing these judgments. Thus, those
who are contextually interested in managing the ongoing communication and
coordination within a linguistic community (parents, teachers, and scientists
talking across research programs, for example) have an interest in overlooking
differences in information while attributing sameness of concept and subject. On the other hand, anthropologists and
developmental psychologists may be interested in treating concepts in a more
finegrained manner, so as to emphasize the differences in belief systems. I have sought to avoid such complications
here. As indicated earlier, the first
context, that having to do with communication across differences in beliefs, is
most relevant to understanding when we are properly thought to have changed the
subject. So, one can treat my
presentation as dealing with the central tendencies of concepts as these are
relevant in such contexts. [15] There are at least two
points at which the characterization of low deferential concepts is vague. One is marked by an ambiguity or slide in my
formulations: a slide between talk of "widely known features" and more
guarded talk of "sensitivity to features." The other has to do with whether what one is sensitive to must
characterize the stuff in some nonaccidental way—or might just feature in
prominent samples in a local environment (the relatively tasteless potable
stuff in the faucets, bottles, … ) What
must a child have learned in order to have acquired the concept of “water”? [16] The stuff was eventually isolated out of ores with a characteristic
appearance (almost the appearance of certain oxides and sulfides of lead, and
of graphite). Once isolated, the stuff
that was found to be a brittle, almost-infusible, silver-white metal, permanent
at ordinary temperatures, but quickly oxidized with heat. Later, it was found to be of a homogeneous
atomic structure--having atomic number 49. The interactions leading to these
developments began at least early in the 16th century, in the
context of mining where a set of similar materials were lumped under the
concept of “plumbago.” The ore
containing molybdenum, “molybdenite,” was distinguished at least by 1770s. I am unable to tell on the basis of my
hurried investigation just when the term ‘molybdenum’ was first used of the
isolated metal. The concept was in
usage at least by 1796. (The Oxford English Dictionary provide some useful
entries under ‘molybdenum’, and ‘plumbago’.) [17] But, the information
required for this can vary with one’s local environment. In certain regions, one is presumably
required to know that water is the dominant potable liquid in the lakes and
rivers. But, in arid regions, one might
be required to recognize water as the potable liquid in certain wells, or
facets and bottles—perhaps by taste.
One sometimes encounters the P
for ‘water’ characterized as “the dominant, clear, potable stuff of our
acquaintance” abbreviated as “the watery stuff of our acquaintance.” This seems helpful. What one minimally learns in acquiring the
concept might be to pick out environmentally salient samples of water—and thus
to become a ongoing part of our being acquainted with water. [18] One might insist that, in the process of learning or acquiring
certain concepts, some learn more than the minimal Pi. But, do they thereby come to have a richer basis for a priori
truths? Admittedly, some people do
learn from the start more than they need to know in order to have acquired a
concept. They may learn a little more about
the relevant experts, or they may learn somewhat more about the surface or even
deep properties of the stuff with which the relevant experts have
interacted. But, I find it hard to
conceive of this as “purely conceptual” in a sense that makes it properly
relevant to what is a priori knowable.
Surely it is not a priori that there was such a community (perhaps one
with such-and-such a group of “experts”), that it interacted with a homogeneous
stuff with such-and-such then widely appreciated properties, and so on. It seems that one must here feel the force
of Quine’s (1961) insistence that it is impossible to cleanly separate the
"conceptual" and the "factual" information or commitments
expressed in bits of language. At the
learning or acquiring of a particular concept, one may learn information that
reflects the contribution of the world (or world/community interaction) to that
concept's content. That information may
even be thought of as a component of P (but
not Pi). However, such information cannot
be given a principled sorting into a purely conceptual component as opposed to
a factual association with the concept.
Whatever might be learned in addition to Pi while acquiring a concept does not thereby qualify as a priori. [19] It is worth noting that what it takes to understand a language,
and a concept expressed in it, looks rather different when approaching the
matter from within or from without.
That is, when we consider what it takes to understand/acquire a
concept—and a highly deferential concept in particular—as a member of a language
community, then rather minimal demands are appropriate. But, when we consider what it takes to
understood some one or some peoples’ concept as an interpreter, rather more
seems called for. Here, it seems that
interpretive understanding requires understanding or appreciation of something
like P rather than just Pi.
To understand that some folk are referring to NaCl, one must appreciate
with which stuff the relevant folk in
the community have and do interact in association with that concept. One must then appreciate roughly who the
relevant experts are, and observe their interactions. To understand that they refer to it as NaCl, we would need to
find a complexity in their terms that corresponds to that in ours, and we would
need to find interactions in connection with the components that again mirror
ours for “sodium” and “chlorine” (and “chloride”). For our purposes here, the perspective of language users is the
most important—as we are concerned with when we have changed the subject. [20] This rather paltry a priori
truth is barely distinct from what can be know a priori about “calcium” or
“chromium”—as the what is a priori knowable about calcium and chromium can be
encompassed in the same formulation, changing only the designated syntactic
string which the relevant experts are said to have employed. Even this probably overstates the
distinctness of what can be known a priori about molybdenum--as it makes too
much of the syntactic anchor. People
speaking different languages can be said to share a concept, yet this concept
cannot be associated with a phonetic or syntactic anchor ('dog' and 'chein' are
associated with the same concept). We
may know a priori that molybdenum is the stuff with which the relevant experts
(whoever they might be) interacted in connection with the term 'molybdenum'. But, we do not know a priori that it is
distinct from the stuff with which the relevant experts interacted in
association with the term 'chromium'. [21] Indeed, without changing
the subject I could hold just about anything as long as I (in my ignorance)
still intend to defer to the referential practice of my community. Of course, my repeated and systematic
espousing of falsehoods under homophonic translation into English might serve
as the first indication of such willfulness.
My insistence that “Poor Molybdenum has a flea allergy” might serve as
the first indication or clue that I
have decided to use that cute and melodious phonetic string as a name for my
pet pitbull. To paraphrase Quine, in
part, the question here becomes whether a mistaken and ignorant belief or a
willful linguistic divergence is most likely.
In the case of highly deferential concepts, wide training in their use
is not such as to minimize the probability of mistaken beliefs. Still, there remain points at which mistakes
can be less likely than willfulness. Further, it is also worth noting that even with
high-deferential concepts, we commonly require some understanding of the sort
of thing referred to—we require that one know that molybdenum is a stuff, that
arthritis is a desease, and that elm is a kind of tree. Attributing a flea problem to “poor
Molybdenum” serves to tip us off to willful divergence on such rudimentary
matters. [22] “Phenomenology” comprises
generalizations at the (relatively) surface level. Such pieces of general knowledge may be somewhat scattered,
implicitly ceteris paribus, and need have no clear claim to nomicity. What is important is that it begin to
characterize what it is that is ultimately to be explained. (Oxford English Dictionary: “the division of
any science that describes and classifies its phenomena.”) [23] There are several reasons
why Jackson and Chalmers might resist this modest take on the primary
intensions. Notably, this alternative
treatment has the consequence that "temperature" may not pick out a unique
functional role as its P (now
reflecting just Pi) is applied
across possible worlds considered as actual.
After all, the crude phenomenology (ramsified, and taken with a grain of
salt) is compatible with many properties.[23] In some possible worlds, the modest P will have as referent these other
functional-role quantities. Now,
Jackson and Chalmers both want the P
for concepts such as "temperature" to each pick out determinate
invariant functional-role properties.
(This may be needed in order for their conceptual analyses, drawing on
putative Ps, to provide the bases
for the metaphysical results they each seek.)
So, one can understand why they each are drawn to the less modest
understanding of primary intensions. However,
looking at the matter from the point of view of an account of the workings of
our concepts, and what might fix their referents in the actual world, the more
modest understanding seems at least as plausible. [24] Peacocke (1992) takes a
rather different approach to concepts.
However, it is possible to relate some of what he says about concepts
with the themes developed here. On
Peacocke's account, concepts are abstract entities that are (uniquely)
possessed by a thinker when that thinker meets certain conditions specifying a
conceptual role (pp. 5-6, 100). Meeting
those conditions is a matter of the thinker being willing (or disposed) to make
certain transitions (p. 107-8). The
result is a kind of conceptual role semantics (p. 111). Of particular
significance for the themes developed here, Peacocke distinguishes between
possession conditions and attribution conditions (pp. 27-30). This distinction seems to parallel in some
respects my distinction between P
and Pi. Possession conditions are the identity- and
individuation-conditions for a concept.
One who possesses the concept is said to have fully "mastered"
the relevant possession conditions.
This is taken to require that their psychological dispositions conform
fully to the inferential/semantic role there specified. On the other hand, attribution conditions
have to do with when it is appropriate to employ a concept in characterizing
what an individual believes and says--when, that is, the content of their
beliefs or expressions employs the concept (even though they may be far from
mastering--and thus possessing--it).
Thus, on Peacocke's telling, one can employ certain concepts, having a
belief with the relevant contents, without possessing--mastering--those
concepts. For example one can have the
belief that elms are not beaches, there employing the concepts of
"elm" and "beach," without possessing the concepts of
"beach" and "elm."
It might seem that the a priori should be connected with concept possession,
rather than with simply having beliefs employing the concept. After all, what it takes to possess a
concept would seem to characterize what it takes to "acquire" that
concept, and the a priori is tied to what goes into concept acquisition. This would be to associate the a priori with
somethng corresponding more to P
than to Pi. This would have intriguing
implications. First, it would expand the scope for a priori
knowledge beyond what has been envsioned here.
But, just how much of an expansion is in the offing is determined by the
richness of possession conditions. The thinking in the present paper has honored the
constraint that concepts not be so finely individuated as to give rise to
incommensurability across theory change.
To honor this constraint while appropriating Peacocke's work, we would
then need to insist that possession conditions not be too rich. It is clear that, on Peacocke's account, one
can have beliefs about a subject, and thus transition dispositions in
connection with beliefs featuring a concept, without those transitions being a
part of the possession conditions for the relevant concept. This much is in keeping with the present
suggestion. It involves an indifference
to some differences in theoretical beliefs that otherwise would make for
incommensurability were possession conditions too finely individuated in terms
of inferential roles. With appropriate
thinness of possession condtions, the central results of my argument might be
preserved. Second, associating the a priori with having
mastered possession conditions, rather than merely Pi, would make for a particularly virulent form of externalism
concerning a priori knowledge. It
suggests that, for the many cases where we employ concepts that are to be
shared with a community of inquirers/users, the matter of whether we have
adequately mastered the relevant concepts--and thus possess the concept--is not
internally accessible in the epistemologist's sense. If we have not acquired the concept, the epistemic status of a
belief employing that concept cannot stem from our having acquired the
concept. Since whether we have acquired
the concept is not internalistically accessible, our epistemic status in
beliefs that may "feel a priori" is nevertheless not accessible. We may have a belief, and be a priori
justified in it, and yet that we are so justified may not be accessible to us. Third, I am
inclined to believe that there is something right about externalism with regard
to a priori justification. In learning a concept, one typically learns things
that are not components of P or Pi, even as one is learning Pi, and commonly something further
about P. When we then reflect on
what we have learned, beliefs about our subject occur to us. But, is seems likely that whether or not
these are components of P or Pi is accessible not internally to
us. After all, this is not a matter
clearly marked in the learning itself.
Indeed, it seems that we manage to sort what we have learned into Pi, P, and other only in the course of partly empirical reflections on
the workings of the relevant concepts. (See
also, Graham and Horgan.) [25] I believe
that we are rather less well off in being able to characterize the
functional-role of beliefs and desires. In part this is the result of these
terms having something of a family-resemblence character that is ill understood. After all, we know that the functional role
of beliefs can be, and is, modified through training. We know that different people reason somewhat differently, their
intensional states interacting somewhat differently, while yet having beliefs and
desires. Now,
“temperature” refers to a functional-role that can be ill-appreciated while one
yet manages to refer to temperature, and which would be well-described only in
(approximations to) correct theories containing functional analyses of the
relevant systems. Similarly, “belief”
and “desire” refer to functional states (or families of functional-states) that
can only be characterized with the development of correct psychological
theories with a healthy functional-role component. [26] I have not been a particularly vigilent gate keeper. If anything, I have been overly liberal in
allowing claims into my reconstruction of Pi. Little harm can come of allowing a somewhat
inflated reconstruction, as my concern is to show what does not follow from
this reconstruction. [27] Actually, I find the case of termperature rather tricky. If temperature is really a descriptive-kind
(and specifically a functional-kind) term, as I have been supposing following
Jackson and Chalmers, and if the P for “temperature” is the full
functional-role specification as they also seem to suppose, then one can know
that the ideal gas law holds of temperature in all possible worlds, and yet not
know this a priori. The mistake just
now envisioned in the text would be an empirical mistake on the part of someone
in our (the actual) world. But, it is
questionable whether it is just an empirical mistake on the part of some in
other possible worlds. One sticking
point has to do with whether one in another possible world can be using our concept
of "temperature." [28] Of course, this and like requirements are to be understood as
ceteris paribus—as beliefs about feasibility or probabilities might lead one to
pursue a weaker but apparently more attainable desire. |