After a quote from Feyerabend he considers what would be involved in the case where the content was held firm while the conceptual scheme changes, and one finds oneself in a different world.

A favourite argument of mine comes next, one I have borrowed many times, so I will quote at length:

Suppose that in my office of Min- ister of Scientific Language I want the new man to stop using words that refer, say, to emotions, feelings, thoughts and inten- tions, and to talk instead of the physiological states and happen- ings that are assumed to be more or less identical with the mental riff and raff. How do I tell whether my advice has been heeded if the new man speaks a new language? For all I know, the shiny new phrases, though stolen from the old language in which they refer to physiological stirrings, may in his mouth play the role of the messy old mental concepts.

Thus falls the Churchland's attempt to eliminate folk psychology. — Banno

This dovetails nicely with thought, belief, and meaning as correlations. In this case, shiny new phrases play the role of the messy old mental concepts solely by virtue of shared referent.

So, any conceptual scheme worthy of consideration will be true.

What, then, can we say about being true?

T-sentences present a bare minimum It's pretty much undeniable that: "p" is true if and only if p.

Of course, plenty will deny it, especially in an on-line philosophy forum where denying stuff is what we do. From what I've seen over time, those who deny T-sentences simple have not understood them.

I just deleted a detailed account of the bits of a T-sentence, because on thinking about it its probably better to keep it simple. Folk over-think them far too much.

Yet the totality of such English sentences uniquely determines the extension of the concept of truth for English.

So here we have the whole of the truth.

Who'd have thought it could be so simple.

What we must agree on is that any theory of truth that does not stand in good stead with convention T can be rejected out of hand.

We ought also note Tarski's generalisation.

s is true IFF p

in which "s" is some statement and "p" is a translation of that statement.

T-sentences present a bare minimum It's pretty much undeniable that: "p" is true if and only if p. — Banno

Deflated truth? One has to assume that epistemically, I might be an uneducated pleb that can't understand academic rigour, and that may as well be true too...

SO let's now apply convention T to conceptual schemes.

We saw that any conceptual scheme worthy of the title must be true. What we want to know is if there can be a conceptual scheme that is both true and untranslatable.

So slot that into our generalised T-sentence, replacing "s" with the mooted untranslatable conceptual scheme, and "p" with the impossible translation.

s is true IFF p

Think on that a bit. I hope it is obvious that we could not know that s is true, unless we had a translation of s; but by the very presumption that s is untranslatable, we reach an impasse.

We could not know that some untranslatable conceptual scheme was indeed true.

Hence, the very idea of a true, untranslatable conceptual scheme is incoherent.

QED?

When I say model, I mean mathematical, or at least computational. Davidson seems to see conceptual schema (or at least the claim of conceptual schema which he is dismantling) as a filing cabinet with all the content (the way the world is) filed away. I see conceptual schemes more as rules for behaviour, not content-mediated at all. — Isaac

Davidson makes pretty much the same point as you, in dividing conceptual schemes into those that organise stuff and those that fit stuff. Yours is of the fit variety.

so this is about your version.

SO it seems to me that your version of conceptual schemes has been addressed twice. Firstly, if your scheme is not intended to be true but merely predictive, then it's not a conceptual scheme of the sort being discussed here, and is irrelevant. Secondly, if your scheme divides the world into stuff and what we do with it then it is based on a false premise.

Not sure I follow you.


Um, actually, I am sure I don't follow you.

Per Quine, the ability to apply logic to new situations has to be innate. It can't be learned. — frank

He said something like that?

And yet in Two Dogmas, he rejects the distinction between analytic and synthetic propositions.

You version of Quine does not match with mine.

Notice that the "p" on the left is quoted, not used - I have had so many arguments with folk on these fora simply because they didn't... — Banno

We ought also note Tarski's generalisation.

s is true IFF p

in which "s" is some statement and "p" is a translation of that statement. — Banno

Typo or I didn't...

So, any conceptual scheme worthy of consideration will be true. — Banno

What does it mean for a conceptual scheme to be true or false? How would we tell the difference?

Thanks.

Davidson's approach is intrinsically extensional. He does this of course to simplify the discussion; but moreover, he elsewhere goes to great lengths to suggest that all that intensional stuff is irrelevant.

It's not unlike Wittgenstein pointing out that the beetle drops out of the discussion - the beetle being the messy, unspoken, intensional stuff. But where are Davidson just ignores intensionality, Wittgenstein takes it to be the most important bit. I'm with Witti.

I watched that program; I thought the Himba showed great dignity and wisdom in dealing with a family that to them would have been childish.

That's not a criticism of the Moffatts. Any western family dropped into that situation would be childish.

Nothing is in principle untranslatable, but in practice in so many cases, life's too short. — unenlightened

Yep. Language is how we live our lives, and all this analysis is pretty much irrelevant, a jigsaw puzzle, a distraction...

Or for me at the moment, procrastination. I so hate marking.

We could not know that some untranslatable conceptual scheme was indeed true.

Hence, the very idea of a true, untranslatable conceptual scheme is incoherent. — Banno

Right.

He said something like that? — Banno

Yes. Truth by Convention. An innate ability isn't analytic knowledge. We have all sorts of innate abilities. It shouldn't be surprising that some of them have to do with applying logic.

I do not think that conceptual schemes inhere in the mind without or prior to language. To quite the contrary... — creativesoul

Glad to hear it. But sometimes...

Yeah. Have you read the article?

It's strange that many continental philosophers like Habermas or Derrida might chime in here and say, if everyone we're so full of compassion and understanding, why all the wars in the world?

Care to take a shot at that one, @Banno?

Perhaps it's just that I would not call using logic an ability... It's just beinh coherent.

As for what's innate, I'll leave that tot he psychologists.

Charity here is not compassion. It's a fucking hammer.

Charity here is not compassion. It's a fucking hammer. — Banno

See, and you do have to resort to intentionality, don't you? And, that's where your or Davidson's analysis becomes flimsy.

intentionality — Wallows

Intensionality. Not the same thing.

Intensionality. Not the same thing. — Banno

Relatable in the least one should suppose.

Anyway, how do you address that beetle? I have one, and so do you; but, we shouldn't be behaviorist about their relatability?

Edit: Talking lions, family resemblances, language games, etc.

This is a thread about Davidson. I've enough to do with just that.

I get a bit pissed off with folk - not you, of course - who think philosophy is easy.

Did you read the article linked in the OP.

This is a thread about Davidson. I've enough to do with just that. — Banno

OK, I'll respect that.

I get a bit pissed off with folk - not you, of course - who think philosophy is easy. — Banno

Well, you can lead by example, or just interpret away. I figure you're somewhat more of the example and showing rather than telling type.

Did you read the article linked in the OP. — Banno

Bits and pieces; but, lemme redo that.

SO I hope I've shown that the centre of the argument is about truth and translation rather than common coordinate systems, although of course the two are not unrelated.

First, then, the purported cases of complete failure. It is tempting to take a very short line indeed: nothing, it may be said, could count as evidence that some form of activity could not be interpreted in our language that was not at the same time evidence that that form of activity was not speech behavior. If this were right, we probably ought to hold that a form of activity that cannot be interpreted as language in our language is not speech behavior. Putting matters this way is unsatisfactory, however, for it comes to little more than making translatability into a familiar tongue a criterion of languagehood. — Davidson, Conceptual Schema, pg.7

Languagehood, eh? So, he's the blacksmith here?

The dolphins are worth considering.

They show langauge-like behaviour. The task then would be to find instances of that behaviour to which we could attach an english description... "that was a very tasty fish", or whatever. We could then write

"click-squeek-click" is true iff that is a tasty fish.

But what if all they are doing is playing instrumental music? Base riffs an lead solos. A language without truth.

@unenlightened?

An author could write a story about untranslatable conceptual schemes and the idea would be coherent. But that's not the kind of scheme Davidson is addressing. He's talking about identifying conceptual schemes while supposedly immersed in one. That's what's incoherent.

the idea would be coherent. — frank

The story would be coherent, but not the scheme.

Davidson talks a lot about the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis glancingly, can you elaborate on how he does away with the cognitivism of the hypothesis, seemingly?

The story would be coherent, but not the scheme. — Banno

The earthings wouldn't be able to make sense of the alien language, true.

I disagree. Can you see why, after reading this thread?