Date: 16-Mar-2006
From: Magda Dumitru <magdalena_dumitruyahoo.com>
Subject: Reading Philosophy of Language
Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/16/16-3034.html
EDITORS: Hornsby, Jennifer; Longworth, Guy TITLE: Reading Philosophy of Language SUBTITLE: Selected Texts with Interactive Commentary SERIES: Reading Philosophy PUBLISHER: Blackwell Publishing YEAR: 2005
Magda Dumitru, independent scholar
''Reading Philosophy of Language'' belongs to a successful series of introductory books to philosophy, offering a refreshing, hands-on approach to texts written by reputed scholars in the field. As editors Jennifer Hornsby and Guy Longworth mention in their ''Introduction'', the volume is intended for the use of students wishing to know what it means to do philosophy of language: ''Our aim has been to help you [...] pinpoint your agreements and disagreements with the texts, and to articulate your reason for agreeing or disagreeing.'' (p. 2). The texts alluded to belong to a different author each of them, and are distributed over six chapters. Every chapter includes three texts, each accompanied by an introduction (bio-bibliographic) and editors' commentary. The chapters are preceded by a ''Sources and Acknowledgments'' section and by an ''Introduction'', and are followed by ''Further Reading'' and an ''Index''.
The topics illustrated by the texts include the relationship between mind and reference, mind and action, and understanding and knowledge, as well as the mechanisms of non-literal meaning. The purpose of this review is not to offer a commentary on the original texts, but to discuss the job done by the editors in choosing and analyzing them. In the following, summaries will be given for the contents of each chapter, as well as a brief critical evaluation. The ''References'' section includes all the texts discussed in the book.
SUMMARY
Chapter 1 ''Reference and Meaning'' The excerpt from Book III of ''An Essay Concerning Human Understanding'' by John Locke introduces and discusses the implications of the thesis according to which words signify ideas that speaker and hearer share about real objects: ''Words being voluntary signs, they cannot be voluntary signs imposed by him [the speaker] on things he knows not.'' (p. 11). In his text ''Of Names'', John Stuart Mill employs 'names' to refer to both nouns and sentences. Mill proposes a threefold distinction of names: general vs. individual, concrete vs. abstract, and connotative vs. non-connotative. General names stand for ''an indefinite number of things'', while individual names are ''capable of being truly affirmed [...] of one thing'' (p. 19). A concrete name ''stands for a thing'', while an abstract name ''stands for an attribute of a thing'' (p. 20).The third distinction is the most important one, according to Mill: ''Whenever they [names] have properly any meaning, the meaning resides not in what they denote, but in what they connote. The only names of objects which connote nothing are proper names'' (p. 25). A connotative name ''denotes a subject, and implies a state'', while a non-connotative name ''signifies a subject only, or an attribute only'' (p. 22). The text from Gottlob Frege, ''On Sense and Reference'', discusses the famous 'identity puzzle'. According to Frege, identity may be either a relation between objects (e.g. 'Hesperus is Phosphorus'), or a relation between names (or signs) of objects (e.g. 'Hesperus is Hesperus'). The two example sentences have the same, unique reference, and yet only the first sentence is informative (has cognitive value), since to one reference are associated two different senses. The relation between sense and reference is the following: ''To the sign there corresponds a definite sense and to that in turn a definite reference, while to a given reference (an object) there does not belong only a single sign'' (p. 33).
Chapter 2 ''Speech and Action'' The central issue in this chapter is whether and how accounts of meaning may fit accounts of language use. The first author discussed is John Langshaw Austin, with a text on performativity. Although there are sometimes grammatical criteria that establish whether a verb is performative (e.g. 1st person singular present indicative active), the author considers that there may be other ways for evaluating utterances: felicity conditions. The second author discussed is William P. Alston, with a text on the relationship between 'meaning' and 'force': ''the meaning of a linguistic expression is to be elucidated in terms of the use of that expression'' (p. 64). Considerable discussion is also targeting the nature of language use and the distinction illocutionary/perlocutionary. The third text belongs to John R. Searle who acknowledges, with Austin and against Alston, that meaning and action ought to be separated. Searle discusses the notion of ''illocutionary effect'' on the hearer - reminiscent of Grice's notion of ''speaker meaning''.
Chapter 3 ''Meaning and Truth'' The chapter opens with a text from Donald Davidson where he introduces the notion of ''radical interpretation'' - which is to be discussed ''without essential use of such linguistic concepts as meaning, interpretation, synonymy, and the like'' (p. 96). A well-known adage of Davidson's is that ''meaning is truth-conditions'': ''[...] assuming translation, Tarski was able to define truth; the present idea is to take truth as basic and to extract an account of translation or interpretation'' (p. 101). The following text belongs to Scott Soames, who argues against a relation between meaning-facts and speakers' semantic competence: ''knowledge of truth conditions [...] is neither necessary nor sufficient for understanding a language'' (p. 118). The last text belongs to Crispin Wright, who maintains that there should be a closer connection between linguistic competence and Semantic theory: semantic properties of words and sentences ''must be grounded in speakers' intentions''. The chapter closes with an appendix offering an account of Tarski's theory of truth.
Chapter 4 ''Knowledge of Language'' The main issue discussed in this chapter is whether competence is a kind of knowledge or a practical ability. The excerpt from Noam Chomsky tackles this issue by establishing an innate, universal status of language knowledge: tacit knowledge, as part of the ''universal grammar''. Therefore language knowledge cannot be a practical ability; the use of knowledge belongs to ''performance'', while innate knowledge belongs to ''competence''. From Michael Dummett a text was chosen which qualifies knowledge of language as ''implicit'', intermediate between knowledge of facts and practical ability: ''There is no gap between knowing what it is to speak Spanish and knowing how to do so'' (p. 174). Welcome is also a discussion of two major views in philosophy of language: language viewed as a code (before Frege) and language as belonging to specific theories of meaning (in the analytical tradition). The last text is due to John Campbell, who embraces a ''robust view'' (which he calls ''cognitivism'') on language knowledge, considered to be ordinary knowledge. Understanding is not to be dissociated from structure perception: ''the knowledge constitutive of understanding relates primarily to words and their composition into sentences'' (p. 197).
Chapter 5 ''Meaning and Compositionality'' The main question put in this chapter is whether a compositional view on meaning is necessary for speakers' understanding of novel sentences. The first author discussed is Paul Horwich, who embraces a deflationary view on compositionality: ''Just as being water consists in being made of H2O, and just as redness consists in reflecting certain wavelengths of light, so the meaning property of 'dogs bark' consists in its construction property'' (p. 219). Semantic properties of words are not given in terms of truth-conditions, but by stating their meanings; again, compositionality is related to understanding. James Higginbotham's views in the text chosen are close to those expressed in the texts chosen from Chomsky and Davidson: semantic knowledge resides in tacit knowledge of a truth-theory by competent speakers. The text from Paul Pietroski argues against Horwich's account of meaning: ''[...] it doesn't follow that if you can associate each sentence of English with its meaning, you thereby understand English'' (p. 235). Pietroski maintains that a theory of meaning should be able to explain crosslinguistic generalizations, as well as the semantics of determiners, quantifiers and semantic relations.
Chapter 6 ''Non-literal Meaning'' Merrie Bergmann's text offers ''a theoretical account of the assertive use of metaphor'' (p. 252). She takes salience to be the landmark of metaphorical use: content is a ''direct function of salient characteristics [...] of the expression'' (p. 254). The metaphorical meaning of words and sentences is contained in their literal meaning, hence metaphor is context dependent. In his text, Martin Davies compares approaches to metaphor by Black and Davidson; he agrees with Black that ''we lack an adequate account of metaphorical thought'' (Black 1979, p. 192), but also with Davidson's view that ''what the metaphor prompts or inspires is not entirely, or even at all, recognition of some truth or fact'' (Davidson p. 253). The last author discussed, Kent Bach, supports a similar view of non-literality, namely that it must be a question of use. He further introduces the notion of ''impliciture'', present in sentences like ''Rich and Ann are engaged'' (impliciture: 'presumably to each other'). Bach thinks that sentence non-literality is a pervasive phenomenon, and defines implicitures as involving ''an unexpressed qualification on what is said'' (p. 291).
CRITICAL EVALUATION
''Reading Philosophy of Language'' is an excellent guide for students of Philosophy of Language of all levels, although some familiarity is assumed with certain concepts - 'truth', for instance, is used in the first chapter (the section on Frege), but discussed later, in the third. The texts are well-chosen, from a variety of sources (including radio performances), and are arranged both thematically and chronologically. The ''Reading Philosophy'' series has no pretense to exhaustivity, which may explain why landmark names such as Russel, Wittgenstein, and Quine are only briefly mentioned. Nevertheless, the goal of the book is served well by having a wide array of authors discussed, from 'sacred monsters' of Linguistic Semantics (Frege, Austin, Searle, Davidson, Chomsky) to famous philosophers (Locke, Mill, Dummett) and contemporary scholars (Alston, Soames, Wright, Higginbotham, Campbell, Horwich, Pietroski, Bergmann, Davies, Bach). Several authors make reference to other authors' texts, also included in the anthology (e.g. Davies refers to Bergmann); 'intertextuality' is also encouraged by some of the editors' comments, like those in the first chapter, for instance, where theses by Mill are compared to those by Frege and Locke. Interactivity is enhanced when editors give specific assignments in their commentary sections to the readers of the volume, asking them to form an opinion and argue for it. Commentary sections are well structured and detailed, although, at times, somewhat uneven - the commentary to Davidson, for example, is particularly clear, while the commentary to Chomsky is rather cursory, and the one to Dummett is essentially a summary.
Although people interested in either Philosophy or Linguistics may use the book, the main vocabulary used by editors is the one current in Philosophy of Language; only the averted reader will know, for instance, that 'meaning' and 'use' are studied by Semantics and Pragmatics, respectively. While a unification of the vocabularies proper to the two disciplines may not feasible, or even desirable, brief commentaries by editors on their interplay would have been a welcome addition.
Care was taken by editors to distinguish their notes from those provided by authors; for the sake of clarity, explanations are sometimes given in the very body of the commentary sections (e.g. the meaning of 'idiolect', p. 223). However, at other times, footnotes would be required, but are not offered (e.g. one may not know that 'ce' and 'être' are French words for 'this' and 'to be' respectively).
There are occasional style oversights, as in ''[...] it includes definite descriptions along with proper names proper.'' (p. 30), although typos seem to be a greater problem - ''his work in political and moral and philosophy'' instead of ''his work in political and moral philosophy'' (p. 17); ''becalled'' instead of ''be called'' (p. 68); ''1'' instead of ''I'' (p. 47); ''do do'' instead of ''do'' (p. 57); ''is distinct from he says'' instead of ''is distinct from what he says'' (p. 198); ''near x a t'' instead of ''near x at t'' (p. 304). Other typos are due exclusively to technical editing - misalignments like those on pp. 150, 206, 231, 270. All the shortcomings mentioned are however very small indeed; the great merit of the volume remains - that of inciting readers to make connections between the texts included, far beyond those offered in the commentaries, that may lead them to original and surprising conclusions.
REFERENCES
Alston, W. P. (1963) Meaning and Use. Philosophical Quarterly 13, pp. 107-124.
Austin, J. L. (1979) Performative Utterances. Philosophical Papers, 3rd edn., pp. 234-252, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Bach, K. (2001) Speaking Loosely: Sentence Non-literality. Figurative Language, ed. by P. French and H. K. Wettstein, Midwest Studies in Philosophy XXV, pp. 249-263, Oxford, Blackwell.
Bergmann, M. (1982) Metaphorical Assertions. Philosophical Review 91, pp. 229-245.
Campbell, J. (1982) Knowledge and Understanding. Philosophical Quarterly 32, pp. 17-29.
Chomsky, N. (1986) Knowledge of Language as a Focus of Inquiry. Knowledge of Language: Its Nature, Origin, and Use, pp. 1-14, Westport, CT, Praeger.
Davidson, D. (1973) Radical Interpretation. Dialectica 27, pp. 313-328, Oxford.
Davies, M. (1983) Idiom and Metaphor. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 83, pp. 67-86.
Dummett, M. (1993) What Do I Know When I Know a Language? The Seas of Language, pp. 94-105, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Frege, G. (1980) On Sense and Reference Translations from the Philosophical Writings of Gottlob Frege, 3rd edn., ed. by P. Geach and M. Black, pp. 56-78, Oxford, Blackwell.
Higginbotham, J. (1999) A Perspective on Truth and Meaning. The Philosophy of Donald Davidson, XXVII, pp. 671-686, Illinois, IL, Open Court.
Horwich, P. (1998) The Composition of Meanings. Meaning, pp. 154- 183, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Locke, J. (1690) An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book III, Ch.1, secs. 1-4 and Ch.2, secs. 2 and 4-8.
Mill, J. S. (1865) System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive, Vol. I, Book 1, Ch. 2, Of Names.
Pietroski, P. (2000) The Undeflated Domain of Semantics. Sats: The Nordic Journal of Philosophy 1, pp. 161-176.
Searle, J. R. (1969) Meaning. Speech Acts (Section 2.6), pp. 42-50, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
Soames, S. (1989) Semantics and Semantic Competence. Philosophical Perspectives 3, pp. 575-596.
Wright, C. (1987) Theories of Meaning and Speakers. Realism, Meaning, and Truth, pp. 204-238, Oxford, Blackwell.
ABOUT THE REVIEWER
Magda Dumitru is interested in topics of Cognitive Science and the Philosophy of Language, such as definiteness, genericity, plurality, tense, and aspect.
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