Michael Dummett on Donald Davidson's Radical Interpretation

 

The way Michael Dummett puts Davidsonian ‘interpretation’ makes it sound far too complex and even ludicrous.

“I’m not using 'interpretation' is the way that Davidson does. For Davidson, the hearer’ interpretation is constructing a whole theory of meaning for the speaker, selecting between the possible interpretations, the interpretations which language leaves us to do on the basis of probability and so on.” (222)

Fancy being required to “construct a whole theory of meaning” before one could possibly understand what it was the speaker actually said.

Wasn’t Donald Davidson primarily talking interpretation as it occurs between a member of the home language and that of an alien language of some kind? In that case, it's a feasible and believable idea that one would be required to construct a whole theory of meaning for the utterances of the alien speaker. If it's only about understanding our fellow English speakers, on the other hand, this can’t be the case.

It's of course the case that even in the case of our fellow English speakers that there may be many possible interpretations we can adopt of what it is the English speaker is saying. This too seems to reinforce the other position of the “indeterminacy of meaning”; though that may not be that directly connected to that thesis.

In addition, Dummett talks says that in Davidson the interpretation we choose is found on the “basis of probability”. That is, the probability that the speaker was saying x rather than y. And, according to Davidson’s ‘principle of charity’, we are much more likely to choose x rather than y if our interpretation y commits us the belief that the speaker is, say, irrational or speaking about something that's obviously false.

The implication again seems to be that the existence of abstract thoughts or propositions will get us out of this Davidsonian bind in that if such things exist, then this will severely limit the number and type of interpretations available to us or which we will choose. Perhaps it follows from this that if Davidson didn't believe in propositions or thoughts, then it is bound to be the case that we will have many possible ways of interpreting what it is the speaker has said. However, this can also applied to Dummett’s position even though he believes in thoughts or propositions. Dummett himself concedes this point. That is, even if abstract thoughts or propositions do in fact exist, their existence alone doesn't guarantee the fact that we will get them right or interpret their linguistic expressions correctly.

Dummett then goes on to offer his own alternative to Davidson’s position:

“That’s not at all what I mean. He would be very silly if he were saying that, you realise. You do so without thinking, you rule out interpretations which would make someone else’s remarks just silly.”

It's a very strong claim to say that non-Davidsonian interpretation occurs “without thinking”. Really? How would that work? How can one interpret a speaker without thinking? Does he mean this literally? If he does, then it doesn't seem to make sense at all. Perhaps any thinking that does go on in interpretation is ‘tacit’ or ‘implicit’ thinking; though thinking nonetheless. Interpretation is, after all, an act of thinking or of thought.

Dummett also seems to borrow Davidson’s ‘principle of charity’ when he says that “you rule out interpretations which would make someone else’s remarks just silly” (222). That is, we may initially think that the speaker has indeed made a “silly remark”. However, we come to realise, quite quickly, that he or she simply couldn’t have said or meant what we thought he or she said or meant. Clearly this would apply to a sentence such as “I’m going to swallow the colour blue”. However, things aren't quite that simple with sentences such as “I die every day” or sentences which contain other metaphors or poeticisms. We interpret such utterances both routinely and easily without even for a second believing that the speaker really thinks that he dies every day. There are of course locutions that are even more subtle and difficult than that. For example, “I can’t do that!” Does the speaker really mean that he can’t do something; or, say, that he simply doesn't want to do something (perhaps breaking a law).

A Fragment on Jean-Paul Sartre's Positions on Free Will

It's strange how a philosopher who was - and still is - popular in leftwing circles (as well as among “radicals”) should have enunciated a position on free will that's very similar to that which is advanced by conservatives and religious people (both in history and still today). That is Jean-Paul Sartre's belief (at least in his existentialist phase) that we have total (or complete) freedom of will.

That position can be summed up by Sartre's own phrase: “There are no excuses.”

However, it can be said that the act of “rejecting our own freedom” is itself an act of free will. After all, a negative choice is still a choice. Even when you choose to submit to a dictator, that may still be an act of free choice (if not freedom).

All this may be explained by Eric Fromm's phrase (as well as his book title): “The fear of freedom.” And that's basically a version of Sartre's own “bad faith”.

Are we as free as Sartre claimed? 

Well, Sartre himself rejected his earlier “existentialist position” when he embraced Marxism in the 1960s. He once said that his earlier views were a “disgrace”. He did try to fuse existentialism with what he called “humanism” and Marxism; though Marxism seems to have come out on top.

In any case, Sartre came to believe that “economic reality” (or the “class nature of society”) was not only a major restriction of freedom: it also effectively negated free will in that many people have what Marxists calls “false consciousness”. Therefore they couldn't make "genuine choices".

The fact is that all sorts of things determine our “wills”, minds or selves, not just economic realities: genes, upbringings, culture, etc. So is there any free will (or freedom of the will) left after all that?

What is the Meaning of “What is the meaning of Life?”?

If the question “What is the purpose of life?” is fundamental and important, surely it begs two questions.

i) Why assume that there's a purpose of life (or a purpose to life) at all?

ii) Why should there only be one purpose (one meaning) to life?

Usually, when people ask this question it's because they think they believe that they already know the answer. Such people are really asking the following question:

“Do you want to know what the purpose [meaning] of life is?”

And the answer will usually be a religious one; though sometimes it may be “spiritual” or have something to do with what the questioner himself thinks the purpose/meaning of life is.

People may have their own views as to what the purposes of their own lives may be for themselves. Though what they believe doesn't depend on their also believing that there's a single purpose to/of life which they must somehow discover. (Or that they need to be told what it is by someone else.)

That still wouldn't be the purpose/meaning of life. It would be a purpose of life for a single individual. What one person sees as his purpose to/in life isn't the purpose of life. It's the main purpose of his life. Nothing more.

Basically, when most people ask “What is the purpose/meaning of life?” they believe that this purpose/meaning exists separately from human minds.

Of course such a belief can become more metaphysical or complex than the way I've expressed it.

For example, physically it can be said: 

There must be a primary thing from which everything else owes its existence. 

However, where does purpose or meaning fit into that belief? We could all owe our physical existence to the First Cause or to the Big Bang. However, there's no built-in purpose or meaning here unless it's argued for; rather than simply assumed. (Most biological things owe their existence to air and water – are they “primary things”? Is the purpose/meaning of life air and water?)

Three Quick Thoughts on Searle's Biological Theory of Mind

 

Why is the brain-mind (intentionally) connected to its surroundings?
 

That question seems very fundamental.

 

However, I have a feeling that what are called “biological naturalists” (or at least some of them) may see it as a “pseudo question” in that biology itself provides the answer. In other words, brains are (intentionally) connected to the environment because that was the next evolutionary step up from simply reacting – physically - to stimuli in the environment. (That can't be “intentional” - or can it?)
 

So here we're back to the why of intentionality and therefore the why of consciousness.
 

Causal Powers

 

How do John Searle's “causal powers" fit into all this?
 

Searle's talk about causal powers refers to the fact that a certain level of complexity is what's required to bring about those causal powers which are necessary for intentionality, mind and consciousness.
 

Searle never never says that biological brains are the only things capable - in principle - of bringing about consciousness and intentionality (therefore semantics, in Searle-speak). He says that biological brains are the only things known which are complex enough to do so. It really is all about the biological and physical complexity of brains and therefore their causal powers.
 

Dualism?
 

Searle actually accuses those who accuse him of being a “dualist” of being, well, dualists (or at least some of them, depending on their overall philosophy of mind).

 

His basic position on this is that if computationalists or functionalists, for example, dispute the physical biology of brains and exclusively focus on syntax, computations and functions (the form/role rather than the physical embodiment), then that will surely lead to a kind of dualism. What I think he means by that is that there's a radical disjunction created between the actual physical reality of the brains and how these philosophers explain and account for intentionality, mind and consciousness.
 

Searle doesn't believe that only brains can give rise to minds. Searle's position is that only brains do give rise to minds. He's emphasising an empirical fact; though he's not denying the logical and metaphysical possibility that other things can bring forth minds.

 

Thoughts on the Privacy of Pain

 

The notion of particular pain x belonging to a single person, and to no one else, has been said to lead to the position of the necessary irreducibility of pain. (This position has been applied to all other phenomenal states too.) It’s also said that a particular pain is “not dependent for its existence on anyone else”.

So where do we go from there?

If we communicate our pain to others, then we’ll use a public language to do so. (Wittgenstein, of course, stressed the point that all languages must be public.) And even that private experience will be coloured by a public language — at least to some extent. So it can be accepted that there is a sensory or experiential aspect — or even basis — to the pain. However, that can’t be communicated in its (as it were) purity to another person or even to oneself! And it certainly isn’t what’s often called an “objective fact”.

So what is it?

Perhaps the sensory experience is an ineffable x (whether Locke’s “something, I know not what” or Wittgenstein’s own “beetle in a box”) which simply grounds public-talk and even self-talk about it.

Another argument for the particularity — and therefore (perhaps) non-scientific nature — of pain is summed up in this sentence:

“No one else could have that particular pain.”

Is that any more strange than the fact that this brick can’t be like that brick over there? In addition, the precise colour (or trope) of that bee over there is unique. And even public utterances about any given pain x are singular in the sense that each one will be unique in some way. So are pains are anymore particular than these other things?

It’s also argued that no one else can feel my particular pain in the way I feel it. Ditto. One brick may be very similar to another brick. Still, it’s not the same brick.

Pain as an Objective Fact

Some philosophers have argued that a person’s pain is an “objective fact”: as as objective as anything else.

Sure; a pain is real and part of reality; though is it also an objective fact or an objective… anything?

There is indeed “something it is like” to be stung by a bee. However, calling that something an “objective fact” doesn’t seem to be correct.

Of course none of the above is a complete denial of the private aspects of a particular pain. Yet since we take a very circuitous route to the physical reality of, say, DNA, atoms or electrons, perhaps we can do the same for pains. (It’s true that this isn’t an exact like-for-like comparison.) Nonetheless, being “externally identifiable” may still not be a necessary criterion for something’s being physical.

Just as we can’t perceive particles, so we can’t feel (or perceive) another person’s pain — except through that person’s verbal and bodily behaviour. We believe in the existence of, say, quarks because of a lot of theory, models and, yes, observable phenomena. Then again, the clues we have for another person’s pain don’t necessarily mean that the pain is physical. The clues (behaviour) are physical; though their causes may be non-physical. (Human behaviour being equivalent to the “traces” of particles in, say, a cloud chamber.)

Consequently, much of behaviourism was about ways to make pain — and the mental generally — externally identifiable and thus scientifically kosher. Yet it can still be said that pain — and other private mental phenomena - underpin (whatever that may mean) behaviour and language use; as well as mental functions as they’re expressed in (to use Quine’s term) “overt behaviour”.

So, when it came to behaviourism at least, all this meant that various philosophical problems still remained when it came to the privacy of pain and indeed all other mental states.

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