• Leontiskos
    3.7k
    If all of their dispositions to verbal behavior under all possible sensory stimulations were the same, then what would happen if they started talking to each other?Apustimelogist

    Doesn't the quote you provide imply that, if they started talking to each other, they may talk past each other entirely? If, "the meanings or ideas expressed in their identically triggered and identically sounded utterances could diverge radically," then they could simply talk past each other. Are you saying that even if they do talk past each other, they won't tend to register each other's speech as inscrutable?

    Quine clearly thinks that inscrutability of reference is not a barrier to communicationApustimelogist

    What definition of "inscrutable" would you offer, such that inscrutable reference poses no barrier to communication?
  • Banno
    26.1k
    This conversation is the heart of philosophy.Fire Ologist
    Yes, close to it.

    I think the best language to speak standing on this precipice is mystical, sort of pre-logical.Fire Ologist
    This is close to the sort of mystical view attributed to Wittgenstein, especially after the Tractatus, where he developed a precise logical language and then concluded that what is most important is what remains unsaid.

    He later expressed the view that the important stuff was expressed in our actions more than in our words.

    This is a part of the reason he is sometimes misunderstood as not having said much about ethics and aesthetics.
  • Janus
    16.7k
    What definition of "inscrutable" would you offer, such that inscrutable reference poses no barrier to communication?Leontiskos

    No clear way of showing just how words refer to what we take them to refer to? And no clear way of showing that they refer to exactly and exclusively what we take them to refer to.
  • Count Timothy von Icarus
    3.2k


    Edit: I also want to add that earlier, when I pointed out someone who is devoted to a very narrow tradition in a very narrow slice of history, I was accused of doing the same thing in terms of the medieval period. The difference is the difference between two decades of a narrow tradition and two millennia of a broad tradition. Medievals engaged and incorporated everyone, including Christian, Jewish, Islamic, and pagan thinkers. The continuity beginning with Plato and ending in the 15th century is quite remarkable. "Antiquated" was not a slur that had much power. Everything was fair game, and this led to an increasingly robust tradition. What we now find in the English-speaking world is the opposite: the yellow "do not cross" line is erected behind Descartes if not Russell, and you end up with a lot of relatively isolated thinkers who simply cannot cope with the perennial questions of philosophy, such as the perennial task of doing more than simply ignoring common language use.

    There is an irony in the general analytic tendency to ignore medieval thought (continentals do too, but less). No other period reflects the rigor and professionalization that analytic thought praises, nor the emphasis on logic, semantics, and signification, more than (particularly late) medieval thought. The early modern period has an explosion of creativity in part because philosophy was radically democratized and deprofessionalized (leading to both creativity of a good sort and some of a very stupid sort).

    It's unfortunate because so many debates are just rehashes that could benefit from past work, whereas contemporary thought also has a strong nominalist bias that even effects how realism might be envisaged or advocated for, and the earlier period does not have these same blinders.



    It would be quite difficult for them to misunderstand each other since I think misunderstanding generally happens when people use words in ways you don't expect, or you have no experience (and therefore expectations) of how words should be used.

    True, in a sense. In another though, if there is no fact of the matter as to reference, and one takes another's "that rake right there," to be definitive, one has misunderstood, no? If not the persons intent, then at least the reference.

    Its hard to envision that in the example passage assuming that each man is cognizant of their own dispositions for using words.

    Ah, but therein lies the counterintuitive part. If one takes themselves to be making definitive references, or, through one's understanding of one's own sense of making definitive references, takes others to be doing the same, one is mistaken about what is truly going on.

    I mentioned earlier in the thread that we could always reject Quine's perhaps overly constricted epistemic standards and particular notion of what is "observable," but if we stick with them this will be strange outcome. That people "get on" does not negate the fact that "rabbit" and "New York City," or "Donald Trump" are not determinant references referring to a particular species, municipality, or person. Our once and current Augustus is never present without his trademark hair, benevolent orange glow, etc. after all, so we might be referring to them, or Trumpian time-like slices, etc.
  • Banno
    26.1k
    That people "get on" does not negate the fact that "rabbit" and "New York City," or "Donald Trump" are not determinant references referring to a particular species, municipality, or person.Count Timothy von Icarus
    Take out determinate and I don't think Quine would disagree. Sometimes we may be mistaken as to what someone is referring to, but the gavagai fable shows that we might still get our rabbit stew.

    (The recently crowned orange man may be Pompey rather than Augustus - he's showing how popular support may be used to bypass the traditional power structure, but it may be those who come after him who take full advantage of this).
  • Arcane Sandwich
    2.2k
    I think we need to take a step back here, in this discussion. We're on page 15, this can go on and on, ad infinitum, if we don't look at this from another angle, IMHO.

    The OP asks what Quine means by inscrutability of reference. If someone (@Banno, for example) steps in and says "What Quine means is (fill in the blank)", then great. I have no quarrel with that. I'm not here to dispute people's knowledge of Quine's philosophy.

    However, matters are different IMHO if the discussion turns into something along the lines of "Is Quine right when he says references are inscrutable?" I believe he's wrong, and I'm not alone in thinking that he's wrong. That's why I brought up the stuff about Mario Bunge. I'm not trying to appeal to authority here, all I'm trying to say is that Bunge is far more articulate than I am, so I defer to his prose, which is obviously better than mine.

    But I'm not Bunge's lawyer. I'm not here to defend Bunge against every possible objection against his philosophy, because I honestly don't think that Bunge is right about everything. There are many key points that I disagree with him, for example I don't accept his dichotomy of conceptual existence and real existence (there's only real existence as far as I'm concerned). In more general terms, I don't believe in defending any philosopher against every conceivable objection. Why not? Because if you do that, then you run the risk of causing what Harman calls "The Puerto Rico Effect". I'll let him explain it:

    It is said that in Puerto Rico, red and green traffic lights display a curious reversal of roles. Drivers have flouted red lights to such a degree that the practice is now contagious, so that cars approaching a green light must stop from fear of those ignoring the red. Since my travels have never taken me to Puerto Rico, I cannot verify these reports. But I will take the liberty of coining the phrase ‘The Puerto Rico Effect’ to describe a similar phenomenon in readings of past philosophies. Since every great thinker is approached through an initial aura of widespread clichés, the critical scholar is always in a mood to reverse them. Good reasons should be given whenever this is done, since we must always respect the rights of the obvious. But of course there is nothing automatically false about such reversals.
    As suggested earlier, it is typical of the greatest thinkers that they support opposite interpretations, just as Aristotelian substance can be both hot and cold or happy and sad at different times or in different respects. Now, it seems to me that conventional wisdom is falsely reversed when Nietzsche is read as a democratic theorist, Spinoza as a thinker of plurality, Leibniz as a thinker of monism, Aristotle as reducing substance to the human logos, or Husserl as a realist, yet I have heard actual examples of all of these reversals.
    — Graham Harman,

    With that in mind, I'll say that I don't want to distort Bunge's (or anyone's) views. As far as I'm concerned, Bunge is right about a lot of things, and he's wrong about a few other things (some of which are key philosophical issues, such as the topic of existence). I'm not interested in creating a Puerto Rico Effect of Bunge's philosophy.

    So, I ask: is it possible that the trenchant defense of Quine's philosophy runs the risk of causing a Puerto Rico Effect here? If yes, then we should just be able to say that we disagree with Quine regarding his ideas on reference. That doesn't mean that we should throw his entire philosophy in the trash bin. Granted, sometimes my impatience gets the best of me, and I end up saying that Quine's views are nonsense. Despite that acknowledgement, I still disagree with Quine's ideas on reference. His mental experiment involving the word "gavagai" doesn't convince me. Is it an interesting philosophical experiment? Sure. But so is Descartes' hyperbolic doubt. But just because they're interesting thought experiments, that doesn't mean that I can't disagree with the ideas that are being entertained in those thought experiments, and others like them. The way I see it, Descartes is simply wrong to suppose that we can doubt everything except for the cogito ergo sum thesis. And Quine is simply wrong to suppose that what holds for gavagai holds for language in general. We can then have a discussion, and I of course recognize that I could be wrong. But if what it takes for me to be wrong here is a sort of Puerto Rico Effect reading of Quine, then it's reasonable for me to remain skeptical on such matters.

    At the end of the day, it's not about Quine vs Bunge. It's about whether or not we ourselves agree or disagree with what they're saying. Who knows? Maybe they're both wrong.

    I hope that clarifies my position.
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    At the end of the day, it's not about Quine vs Bunge. It's about whether or not we ourselves agree or disagree with what they're saying. Who knows? Maybe they're both wrong.Arcane Sandwich

    Good points.

    There are many key points that I disagree with him, for example I don't accept his dichotomy of conceptual existence and real existence (there's only real existence as far as I'm concerned).Arcane Sandwich

    For the sake of simplicity I removed from a recent post the comment, "The trick for anyone opposing Quinian Actualism is drawing out the relation between conceptual and real existence."

    The reason I like the incorporation of Bunge into the thread has to do with what I called the precritical view, which is what I see as the proper starting point. If we start with the view that existence is not a predicate we are likely doing little more than parroting some popular philosophical idea. I mean, if everyone on the forum had a degree in (the exact same area) of philosophy, then sure, we could pick up a controversy at the most complex and developed juncture. But it is far from the truth that everyone has a degree in philosophy, much less the exact same area of philosophy. On such a forum the precritical view cannot be wholly ignored. Bunge provides confidence to the one who thinks it might be a dumb question to ask why existence can't be a predicate.
  • Banno
    26.1k
    That's an excellent post. well done.

    I'm stealing ‘The Puerto Rico Effect’ for my own use.

    I'm not here to be Quine's lawyer (neat expression), either, having mainly a secondary interest in his ideas as a precursor to Davidson. I entered in to this thread because the Op expressed a misunderstanding of Quine's argument.

    seems to have left the thread to us now. I don't say I blame them.

    One approach might be to look for a minimalist understanding of the Inscrutability of Reference. Something along the lines I have expressed a few times, most recently ; that Quine has pointed out that we might get our stew even if our references misfire. A pragmatic approach. We might thereby avoid the somewhat absurd view that Quine argued communicating is impossible.
  • Arcane Sandwich
    2.2k
    Sounds great, no objections from me on those points.
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    There is an irony in the general analytic tendency to ignore medieval thought (continentals do too, but less). No other period reflects the rigor and professionalization that analytic thought praises, nor the emphasis on logic, semantics, and signification, more than (particularly late) medieval thought. The early modern period has an explosion of creativity in part because philosophy was radically democratized and deprofessionalized (leading to both creativity of a good sort and some of a very stupid sort).Count Timothy von Icarus

    Yes, yes, yes! The reason I find Aquinas so useful on forums like this is because he is so close to analytic methodology. There is literally a school of thought called, "Analytic Thomism." But there are those who recognize this, such as Peirce, Deely, and Klima. A big part of Klima's project is demonstrating how medieval logic was more advanced than modern logic, and solves the modern problems better (such as, say, Russell's King of France).

    And as I pointed out earlier, both approaches achieve a systematic quality that can make them opaque to outsiders, and that when developed too far will lead to a revolt from laymen.

    It's unfortunate because so many debates are just rehashes that could benefit from past work, whereas contemporary thought also has a strong nominalist bias that even effects how realism might be envisaged or advocated for, and the earlier period does not have these same blinders.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Sure, although it is worth remembering that the late medieval period became very "nominalist," and therefore at that point you get very precise debates on so many of these issues. The fact that the nominalists had so simplified the landscape was a big factor in what survived. The Via Antiqua was harder to transmit than the simple nominalist framework.
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    No clear way of showing just how words refer to what we take them to refer to?Janus

    I think that's a good candidate. Quine may be saying little more than that terms are inscrutable apart from context ("holism").

    What is Quine's intended conclusion? I don't think it is as radical as is being assumed. In a 1970 paper he says that the gavagai example is very limited, and demonstrates the inscrutability of terms rather than indeterminacy of translation of sentences.Leontiskos
  • Banno
    26.1k
    A few notes on treating existence as a predicate. We can of course do this, with some cost. The result is a logic that ranges over things that exist and things that do not exist. That is, it in effect has two domains, one of things that exist and one of things that... do not exist.

    The notation used is ∃!t for "t exists". Considerations of extensionality give us the definition ∃!t = ∃x(x=t).

    The result is Free Logic, forms of which may be axiomatised and shown to be consistent but usually incomplete. Nonexistent things can nevertheless have properties in a free logic. It's a cut-down version of possible world semantics.

    There's issues as to how to understand and interpret Free Logic. It is a good example of how a formal structure can help us understand what it is we are claiming when we say things like "Pegasus does not exist".

    In "Pegasus does not exist", Pegasus fails the quantification in ∃x(x=t), and therefore cannot accept the predication " ∃!".

    and again, it's about quantification.
  • Banno
    26.1k
    Quine may be saying little more than that terms are inscrutable apart from context ("holism").Leontiskos
    The dawn of a new day.

    That's pretty close to what is going on here. Reference takes place within a holistic context. Certainly Quine should not be understood as arguing that communication is impossible.
  • Arcane Sandwich
    2.2k
    Just out of curiosity, how would you handle the claim that the universal quantifier must have ontological import, if the existential quantifier has it? It would seem that whatever import ∃ has, ∀ must have it as well. Consider:

    1) ∀x(Sx ∧ Bx) - All sirens are beautiful.
    2) ∃x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Therefore, some sirens are beautiful.

    Does the statement "All sirens are beautiful" have ontological import, in your view?
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    That is, it in effect has two domains, one of things that exist and one of things that... do not exist.Banno

    Rather, the rejection of Quine's "to be" usually involves the idea that existence is not a predetermined category or domain. So, fiction aside, the crucial point is that you can posit an idea while prescinding from the question of whether or not it exists.

    How Bunge does this would be interesting to know, but note that he does not separate existent things from non-existent things. Instead he separates existing concepts/constructs from existing things. My guess is that he would say that an existing concept may or may not attach to an existing thing. Presumably Quine's point would hold with concepts, namely that there are no non-existing concepts. The intuition behind Quine's point is upheld throughout all of historical philosophy,* but what usually happens is that mental existence is second-tier, such that we can usefully talk about thoughts, intentions, beliefs, hopes, etc., without according them the status of things (entia). Nevertheless, there are no non-existent thoughts - at least identifiable thoughts.

    * The intuition being what Novak calls the principle of reference, "(PR) It is impossible to refer to that which is not."
  • Banno
    26.1k


    Not just I; free logic is a respectable part of logic. But I am no expert.

    If Ux(Sx⊃Bx) then ∃x(Sx⊃Bx) follows, in prop logic, and so presumably also in free logic, but it does not follow that ∃!x Sx - that Sirens exist; so the idea is that free logic allows Sirens to be beautiful and yet not exist.

    https://www.umsu.de/trees/#~6x(Sx~5Bx)~5~7x(Sx~5Bx)
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    Just out of curiosity, how would you handle the claim that the universal quantifier must have ontological import, if the existential quantifier has it? It would seem that whatever import ∃ has, ∀ must have it as well.Arcane Sandwich

    If Ux(Sx⊃Bx) then ∃x(Sx⊃Bx) followsBanno

    He seems to be asking whether the ontological import of existential quantification implies the ontological import of universal quantification. I think the point you are making has to do with what is called "inclusive logic" (or rather, inclusive logic is what fiddles with the ontological import of the universal quantifier):

    It follows because, in classical first-order predicate logic, universal sentences have existential import: ‘∀x φ(x)’ logically entails ‘∃x φ(x)’. If we want to allow ‘∀x φ(x)’ to be true even when there are no φs (because there is nothing at all), then we do not want it to carry any ontological commitment. Ontological commitments should reside entirely with the existential quantifier. Implementing this is easy. We simply do logic so as to include interpretations with an empty domain—so-called, inclusive logic. According to the truth conditions for quantifiers in inclusive logic, all universal sentences are true in an empty domain, and all existential sentences are false. Once we have made the shift to inclusive logic, we can also say, what seems right, that conditional existential sentences—such as, ‘∃x φ(x) ⊃ ∃x y(x)’—carry no ontological commitment.Inclusive Logic/Free Logic | Ontological Commitment | SEP

    I think free logic has to do with the ontological commitments accompanying singular terms or unbound variables. Instead of rejecting them like Quine did, free logic retains singular terms but deprives them of any accompanying ontological commitment (cf. the same SEP section).

    Thus for free logic this does not follow: If (Sy ∧ By) then ∃x(Sx ∧ Bx)
    (Because the singular term y is not ontologically committing, whereas the existential quantifier is ontologically committing. Hence you could talk about beautiful sirens without committing to their existence.)

    Just out of curiosity, how would you handle the claim that the universal quantifier must have ontological import, if the existential quantifier has it?Arcane Sandwich

    Quine certainly thought so, but I don't know the arguments for that claim. That is, to say that if the existential quantifier has ontological import then the universal quantifier must also have ontological import is to reject inclusive logic.

    Note that for the medievals affirmative categoricals are "ontologically committing":

    If any of the two terms of an affirmative categorical is “empty”, then the term in question refers to nothing. But then, [...] “every affirmative proposition whose subject or predicate refers to nothing is false.”Gyula Klima, Existence and Reference in Medieval Logic, 3

    ---

    1) ∀x(Sx ∧ Bx) - All sirens are beautiful.
    2) ∃x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Therefore, some sirens are beautiful.
    Arcane Sandwich

    If Ux(Sx⊃Bx) then ∃x(Sx⊃Bx) followsBanno

    Note too how Banno's rewriting of the conjunction as an implication adds an additional layer of complexity. He rewrote it because Arcane's (1) actually means, "Everything is a beautiful siren," but the reason Arcane wanted a conjunction is because he was interested in ontological commitment, and a conditional obscures the idea of ontological commitment. This is what we should probably assess, even though (3) is farcical:

    3) ∀x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Everything is a beautiful siren.
    4) ∃x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Therefore, some siren is beautiful.

    i.e. "If this is valid, then the universal quantifier must have ontological import."
  • Banno
    26.1k
    Inclusive logic is much the same as free logic, but allowing for an empty domain.

    SO we have :
    Classical logic
    Existence is not a first order predicate
    All singular term refer to members of the domain
    The domain is not empty

    Free logic
    Existence is a first order predicate, and hence
    Singular terms can refer to things which are not members of the domain
    The domain is not empty

    Inclusive logic
    Existence is a first order predicate, and hence
    Singular terms can refer to things which are not members of the domain
    The domain may be empty
    Banno

    In Free Logic or Inclusive Logic, the existential quantifier explicitly asserts existence when paired with a predicate like ∃x(x=t), and existence becomes a property rather than a background assumption tied to the quantifiers. However, the universal quantifier can still range over both existent and nonexistent objects, depending on the framework.
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    In Free Logic or Inclusive Logic, the existential quantifier explicitly asserts existence when paired with a predicate like ∃x(x=t), and existence becomes a property rather than a background assumption tied to the quantifiers.Banno

    This is the point at issue, and according to SEP it is at best a controversial claim:

    Whether such [Meinongian] logics can legitimately be considered free is controversial. On older conceptions, free logic forbids any quantification over non-existing things...

    Historically, quantification over domains containing objects that do not exist has been widely dismissed as ontologically irresponsible. Quine (1948) famously maintained that existence is just what an existential quantifier expresses.
    5.5 Meinongian Logics | Free Logic | SEP

    So free logic is not free of Quinian intuitions, even though there is a push to abandon Quine's formula and make the logics more purely semantic, at least in some quarters. But I don't want to obscure the original question:

    Does the statement "All sirens are beautiful" have ontological import, in your view?Arcane Sandwich
  • Banno
    26.1k
    I'll leave you to it. I've found it best not to try to try to teach you logic.
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    - You find SEP unreliable?
  • Apustimelogist
    676
    Doesn't the quote you provide imply that, if they started talking to each other, they may talk past each other entirely?Leontiskos

    Well I guess if they have the same verbal dispositions then there would be no possibility of some event which would lead them to think they are talking past each other. There would be no reason to say they are talking past each other in any radical sense because their verbal dispositions are the same so they communicate perfectly.

    Ah, but therein lies the counterintuitive part. If one takes themselves to be making definitive references, or, through one's understanding of one's own sense of making definitive references, takes others to be doing the same, one is mistaken about what is truly going on.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Well, all this means is being able to anticipate the correct and incorrect times to use certain words.

    and one takes another's "that rake right there," to be definitive, one has misunderstood, no?Count Timothy von Icarus

    What definition of "inscrutable" would you offer, such that inscrutable reference poses no barrier to communication?Leontiskos

    Well I think them misunderstanding each other depends on if the other person agrees and corroborates or rejects their sentences when they have a conversation about it, after which they find out they have misunderstood and have the experience of having misunderstood.

    I think you can talk about the idea of an objective world that exists out there that you can engage with, without requiring a single determinate way to parcel [or carve] that world up. I think the same equally applies to parceling up or interpret[ing] how people use words.

    Edit: []
  • Banno
    26.1k
    You find SEP unreliable?Leontiskos
    Not SEP, no.
  • bongo fury
    1.7k
    What does Quine mean by the inscrutability of reference?Darkneos

    He means a) the relation of reference not happening to be a physical relation, but instead mere convention, or pretence; and b) the possibility of determining a non-physical relation, from observation of physical behaviours, not happening to be as straightforward as we might think.

    Why b? Who ever thought the possibility of determining a convention from observation of behaviours would be straightforward, and anyway why should that make it impossible?

    Well... people who thought that theories based on observation of the same behaviours should naturally converge towards a unique theory of what the behaviours meant. That's who. And those people being wrong about that would rule out a unique determination, at least.

    Why do people think a unique determination is a reasonable expectation? Quine talks about the consequences, not so much causes, of failure to perceive the indeterminacy. But it seems reasonable to blame this failure on the success of language in talking about real, physical relations. Its unreasonable effectiveness, if you will.
  • bongo fury
    1.7k
    Another cause might be the evident separation of convention and pretence (i.e. semantics) from syntax, in many cases. We are ready to add an interpretation to the physical behaviour of a calculator's cogs or capacitors, or to that of a cell's chromosomes. And some of the calculator's mechanical and syntactic behaviour affects display elements that partake in the semantic interpretations that we add; and some of the chromosome's mechanical and syntactic behaviour affects protein production that partakes similarly in our semantic interpretations. Still, the syntactic operations might carry on just as effectively without the interpretations.

    My point being, it almost seems as though meaning is physical after all?

    (Music to the ears of the bio-semioticians?)
  • Arcane Sandwich
    2.2k
    @Banno @Leontiskos

    It's true that ∀x(Sx ∧ Bx) is not the same as ∀x(Sx → Bx). And as Leontiskos keenly observed, I wanted to avoid the "→" symbol. Certainly, the statement "Everything is a beautiful siren" is false, so from (1) to (2) can be safely rejected. That being said, consider this other case:

    1) ∃x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Some sirens are beautiful
    2) ¬∀x¬(Sx ∧ Bx) - Therefore, some sirens are beautiful (or some other more sophisticated parse)

    To my mind, as far as ontological commitments go, this case is even worse than the preceding one, because those two formulas are interchangeable:

    https://www.umsu.de/trees/#(~7x(Sx~1Bx))~4(~3~6x~3(Sx~1Bx))

    So you could switch their places:

    2) ¬∀x¬(Sx ∧ Bx) - Some sirens are beautiful (or some other more sophisticated parse)
    1) ∃x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Therefore, some sirens are beautiful

    But notice that ¬∀x¬(Sx ∧ Bx) has no existential quantifier, it only has a negated universal quantifier. So, my question is the following: does ¬∀ have ontological import? How could it not, if it's equivalent to ∃? And if that's so, then does ∀ have ontological import, since it's equivalent to ¬∃? Of course, "all" is not identical to "none", but there are cases in which it's possible to switch one of these symbols for the other. Consider:

    3) ¬∃x(Sx ∧ Bx) - No siren is beautiful (alternatively, there are no beautiful sirens)
    4) ∀x¬(Sx ∧ Bx) - Therefore, no siren is beautiful (or some other more sophisticated parse)

    In this case, the two formulas are also interchangeable:

    https://www.umsu.de/trees/#~3~7x(Sx~1Bx)~4~6x~3(Sx~1Bx)

    Maybe it's just me, but I fail to understand how and why someone would treat ∃ and ∀ differently, as far as the discussion about ontological commitment goes. To my mind, either both of them have import, or neither of them does. I say that neither of them does. The existential quantifier should be called the "particularizing" quantifier instead (I didn't come up with that proposal, Bunge and some other folks have suggested that. I think that G. Priest says something along those lines as well, IIRC).

    I can definitely see the merits of free logic. But it just seems like overkill to me. What's nice about Bunge's ideas regarding the existence predicate is that we don't need to step outside the realm of classical, first order logic, so there is no need to adopt free logic in the first place, which means that there is no need to say that E!t can be defined as ∃x(x=t), for example. Besides, Bunge's approach also manages to accommodate the idea that proper nouns can be treated as individual constants. For example, instead of saying ¬∃x(Px) (Nothing pegasizes), it's possible to say instead ∃x(x=p ∧ ¬ERx) (there is an x, such that x is identical to Pegasus, and Pegasus does not really exist).

    Thoughts?

    EDIT: And, speaking for myself, if I don't accept Bunge's dichotomy between conceptual existence and real existence, then there is no need for me to use subscripts, as in ∃x(x=p ∧ ¬ERx). I can say instead: ∃x(x=p ∧ ¬Ex).
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    So, my question is the following: does ¬∀ have ontological import? How could it not, if it's equivalent to ∃? And if that's so, then does ∀ have ontological import, since it's equivalent to ¬∃?Arcane Sandwich

    I would say that the first thing to note is that what is equivalent is not ¬∀x(Fx) and ∃x(Fx), but rather ¬∀¬(Fx) and ∃x(Fx) (as well as ¬∃x(Fx) and ∀x¬(Fx)).

    Second, all of these puzzles tend to revolve around different senses of negation. In this case, whether ∀x(Fx) is ontologically committing is an interesting question, but ¬∀x(Fx) seems rather different with regard to ontological commitment. This is because ¬∀x(Fx) will be uncontroversially true whether the domain is empty or whether there is merely nothing that falls under the predicate F. Ergo: it is not controversial whether ¬∀x(Fx) involves ontological commitment (because it is consistent with an empty domain), whereas it is at least somewhat controversial whether ∀x(Fx) is ontologically committing (because it is arguably inconsistent with an empty domain). Put slightly differently: a non-empty domain does not foreclose the question of ontological commitment (with respect to that domain), whereas an empty domain does not bear on the question of ontological commitment, because there are no entities in question at all.

    It is also worth noting that appeals to the Tree Proof Generator (originally linked by Banno) are a form of begging the question. We are asking whether the ontological-commitment relation between the universal and existential quantifier should be different from the classical conception. The Tree Proof Generator just tells us what the classical conception is. It says nothing about whether it should be the way it is. For example, on inclusive logic your (2) does not follow. (Banno often begs the question with the Tree Proof Generator in these metalogical discussions.)

    Maybe it's just me, but I fail to understand how and why someone would treat ∃ and ∀ differently, as far as the discussion about ontological commitment goes.Arcane Sandwich

    Note that I proposed this, as it avoids the negation puzzles:

    This is what we should probably assess, even though (3) is farcical:

    3) ∀x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Everything is a beautiful siren.
    4) ∃x(Sx ∧ Bx) - Therefore, some [existing] siren is beautiful.

    i.e. "If this is valid, then the universal quantifier must have ontological import."
    Leontiskos

    ...but the difficulty may be unavoidable, given that no one would actually accept (3) were it ontologically committing. That is, someone who holds that universal quantification is ontologically committing would almost never use the universal quantifier to make unconditional claims, such as Sx ∧ Bx.

    I say that neither of them does.Arcane Sandwich

    I agree. More precisely, logic should be semantic in the first place, not ontological.* This is that difference between immediate signification and ultimate signification. When we proffer a logical sentence or argument, we are engaged in a form of ampliation. We are saying, at least in the first place, "How does this look to you? I am not committing to it. Let's first consider it as a thesis before committing to anything ontologically." Nevertheless, this "consideration" involves ontology secundum quid, precisely because part of our consideration is a consideration of the ontological question. Of course Quine might claim that we are never really arguing over existence, but that seems wrong on its face. With that said, the radical difference that arises by shifting to a "particularizing" quantifier is often underestimated.

    (This is similar to Kimhi's quest to find force in Frege's content.)

    * Note that this is precisely why essentialism is frowned upon in modern circles: because the modern form of logic is prejudiced against it. The closest predicate logic can get is modal essentialism, which is at best a problematic, second-rate form of essentialism. This is why Klima reworks the logical landscape before arguing for traditional essentialism. He provides a semantic logic that is neutral to the ontological question of essentialism before setting out the sense of traditional essentialism. He takes away the modern logician's hammer and replaces it with a more flexible tool before offering them something other than a nail.
  • Leontiskos
    3.7k
    There would be no reason to say they are talking past each other in any radical sense because their verbal dispositions are the same so they communicate perfectly.Apustimelogist

    Except Quine literally says, "the meanings or ideas expressed in their identically triggered and identically sounded utterances could diverge radically." If the meanings and ideas expressed by our identical utterances diverge radically, then I would say we are talking past each other by definition.

    This is what I think it comes down to:

    Are you saying that even if they do talk past each other, they won't tend to register each other's speech as inscrutable?Leontiskos

    The thesis you offer is that they would be objectively talking past each other without even knowing it. But that becomes more implausible the longer we draw out their conversation (say, from 15 seconds to 2 minutes to 5 minutes to 30 minutes...). The longer we talk the more likely we will realize that we are using words in radically different ways.
  • Apustimelogist
    676
    Except Quine literally says, "the meanings or ideas expressed in their identically triggered and identically sounded utterances could diverge radically." If the meanings and ideas expressed by our identical utterances diverge radically, then I would say we are talking past each other by definition.Leontiskos

    I would say that these meanings and ideas are imposed on the patterns of verbal behavior by an observer. You don't need these extraneous interpretations for people to communicate or use words, and the idea that you can coherently assign divergent meanings is something like a reductio to the thought that verbal behavior, language and understanding is anything above the physical events responsible for word-use. The idea of the two men in this idealized example talking past each other then would not really make much sense if their communication is perfectly fine. And if you think about it, each man's meanings would be indeterminate too, so what exactly are they talking past each other about in that regard? Rather, the fact that they can communicate fine is indicative that they are not talking past each other. If what you say in the following quote happens:

    But that becomes more implausible the longer we draw out their conversation (say, from 15 seconds to 2 minutes to 5 minutes to 30 minutes...). The longer we talk the more likely we will realize that we are using words in radically different ways.Leontiskos

    Then it is because their verbal dispositions are clearly not the same as had been thought. But Quine is saying that you can conceive of different meanings for the same verbal dispositions - that is the example.
  • Banno
    26.1k
    Why do people think a unique determination is a reasonable expectation? Quine talks about the consequences, not so much causes, of failure to perceive the indeterminacy. But it seems reasonable to blame this failure on the success of language in talking about real, physical relations. Its unreasonable effectiveness, if you will.bongo fury
    Interesting observation. So it is that becasue the word "gavagai" is so effective that folk have developed something like and expectation that it has a fixed referent?
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