Names & Essences: Ruth Marcus on Quine’s Kripke

Saul Kripke claims that the statement

“Aristotle might not have been a philosopher.”

isn't necessarily false because at other possible worlds Aristotle might have been born in an environment that banned any kind of philosophy. Kripke, on the other hand, takes the statement

“Aristotle might not have been Aristotle.”

to be necessarily false at every possible world because Aristotle at all worlds would have been Aristotle (even if not a philosopher). This is the case because our name ‘Aristotle’ is what Kripke calls a ‘rigid designator’. Rigid designators designate the same individual at all possible worlds at which that individual exists. Thus the statement ‘Aristotle might not have been Aristotle’ is false – necessarily false. Kripke still uses the past tense in his example. That is, “Aristotle might not have been a philosopher” is true at some possible worlds because at these worlds Aristotle might have been born (as we have said) in a world which banned or didn't even have philosophy. Though “Aristotle might not have been Aristotle” is false because at every possible world at which Aristotle exists he would have been born as, well, Aristotle.

The rigid designator ‘Aristotle’ still applies to Aristotle at every possible world. It does so because it's not a ‘description’, like our ‘is a philosopher’. Thus, in essentialist terms, ‘Aristotle’ doesn't pick out Aristotle descriptively or conceptually, but essentially. And if ‘Aristotle’ picks out at all, it only does so because it picks out Aristotle’s essence. This essence can't be anything to do with any of our descriptions of Aristotle – not even “is a philosopher”. Instead ‘Aristotle’ picks out or designates the object Aristotle. Not only that: because descriptions have been banished from the reference-relation ‘Aristotle’ must only refer to Aristotle’s essence; as Quine, in Ruth Marcus [1990], argues. Thus the Kripkean position on proper names entails a parallel commitment to essences.

According to this analysis, when Marcus says that Quine mistakenly fuses or conflates rigid designators with essences, she's wrong. According to Quine, the Kripkean theory is a commitment to the idea that rigid designators pick out essences. According to Marcus, on the other hand, Quine believes that Kripkean proper names are themselves essences (as it were). Perhaps, however, what Quine meant wasn't that proper names are themselves essences but that they entail, on Kripke’s theory, a necessary commitment to essences. Indeed surely Quine can’t have believed that proper names are taken by Kripke to be essences. A name, in and of itself, couldn't be an essence or an essential property of a person or object, not even according to Quine (or anyone!). However, the way that Marcus puts it, Quine’s position does seem strange. According to Marcus,

“for Quine, the trouble… came down to essentialism… [it] suggested to him that objects have their proper names necessarily [1990]”.

Instead of believing, on Kripke’s reading, that

1. Objects have their proper names necessarily.

Quine meant:

2. Kripkean proper names (or the belief in them) entail that they necessarily designate the essences of the objects named by them.

It's not, then, Quine’s belief that an object has its proper name necessarily. Again, how could Quine think this? On a de re reading, to call an object’s name essential is to speak nonsense. Perhaps, however, on a de dicto reading we can say that there's a semantic relation between names and their objects in which that relation is necessary (or essential). And that's what Kripke, of course, thinks. Though Quine doesn't believe that objects have their proper names necessarily. This would mean that Quine might have confused the de re with a de dicto reading of Kripke. That is, instead of objects having essences in the ontological sense of properties, he applies the same de re to the names of objects. That is, objects essentially (not necessarily) and literally have their names, as it were, ‘in’ them or ‘attached’ to them. Perhaps, however, it's not Quine who made this mistake; but Marcus. She has read Quine as mistaking a de re reading of Kripke with a de dicto reading. Perhaps Marcus means all this when she says that Quine believes that Kripke argues that “objects have their proper names necessarily” [1990]. So what she means is that Quine believes that objects have their proper names essentially.

Kripke himself makes a de re/de dicto distinction in this way:

de dicto = the relation between proper names (or the use of them) is that they name their objects necessarily.

de re = objects have their properties essentially.

Quine could accept the fact that Kripke evidently makes this distinction. That proper names can't be essential to objects; but that they are involved in the necessary relation named as de dicto above. Quine accepts these Kripkean distinctions. He may think that Kripke himself misuses the distinction between the de re and the de dicto above. He doesn't confuse or conflate them; though he does fuse, and therefore misuse, them. Thus:

Proper names designate their objects necessarily for all name-users. They aren't the essences of the named objects.

Because of this distinction Kripke also believes, Quine thinks, that proper names designate the essences of the objects they name. Kripke does believe this. He does so because, as we've already shown, Kripke argues that “Aristotle might not have been a philosopher” is true because of his aforementioned modal arguments. He believes that “Aristotle might not have been Aristotle” is false precisely because the name ‘Aristotle’ designates Aristotle’s essence, not the contingent properties specified by descriptions or concepts. Thus there's a strong logical relation and connection set up between

1. Names and the naming-relation are necessary and constitute the necessity of the reference-relation.

and

2. The relation between named object and name/namer in the reference-relation is necessary. The name and the naming process pick out only their named object’s essence, not its contingent properties specified and picked out by contingent descriptions and concepts.

Thus Quine doesn't believe that

Objects have their proper names necessarily.

which is what Marcus argues. Kripke may think that they have them essentially, even if he isn’t aware of this. He may think names are essential, Quine may argue that this is because he thinks them necessary, in the way specified as de dicto above. And this fusion, unknown or known to Kripke, is neither the result of Quine or Kripke’s conflation and misuse of the de re/de dicto distinction; but the (unintended) fusion of the two. And this fusion of the de dicto ‘necessarily’ with the de re ‘essential’ is a philosophical misuse, on a Quinian reading. That is, Kripke inadvertently (or not) begins with the de dicto

1. The reference-relation between proper names (or their use) and their objects is that they name their objects necessarily.

and ends with the de re

2. Objects have their names essentially.

which is what Marcus thinks Quine believes. But although Kripke never states ii) above, Quine believes it (of Kripke!), if implicitly, because he does believe that Kripkean proper names must be seen to only pick out the essences of named objects. And one can only believe this if one also believes that

Objects have their names essentially.

which is an unintended (or intended) consequence of believing that the reference-relation of designating is a necessary one. Thus proper names are necessary in this de dicto sense and they only designate the essences of named objects. Again, this may be Quine’s conclusion. Therefore his reading (right or wrong) of Kripke’s position because Kripke set up a necessary relation between

The necessary reference-relation or naming process

and the fact that

Proper names pick out or designate only the essences of named objects.

Kripke did so, as we've seen, because he fused, not confused, the de dicto reference- or naming-relation and the idea that named objects have essences, which is a de re idea. The de dicto relation requires de re essentialism. The necessary naming-relation is necessary if and only if it designates or picks out the essences of named objects. The de dicto relation is only necessary because of the essential properties of named objects. If named objects didn't have essences, then the reference-relation couldn't be necessary because it only has this modal property due to the relation set up between proper names and the essences of named objects. That relation would only be contingent, Kripke believes, if names picked out conceptual or descriptive properties (which he in fact believes). Conversely, if named objects don't have essences, then there could never be a necessary reference-relation between them and their names. Indeed there would only be a contingent relation between named objects without essences and their descriptions or conceptual predicates (which is what Kripke believes).

Thus Marcus is incorrect to think that only Quine himself believes that proper names must be the essential properties of named objects in Kripke’s scheme. She would be correct, on the other hand, to also add that Quine only put it this way (if he did put it this way) because he believes that Kripke himself fused de dicto necessity with de re essentialism. If Marcus believes that Quine thinks the former, then it is she herself who confuses the necessary de dicto with the essential de re; at least in the case of her reading of Quine. However, as we've said, Kripke didn't so much as confuse the de re with the de dicto but fuse them because of the necessary relation set up between proper names and their named objects. We can conclude that if Kripke, implicitly or explicitly, accepts the necessary relation between the de dicto and the de re, then we can argue that, in a sense, de re essentialism (which is vital to Kripke’s project) owes much of it power and point due to the necessary relation between objects (or the essences of objects) with the de dicto naming process. That is, de re essences could never be specified or even talked about as being ‘mind-independent’ because all acceptances of de re essences would depend upon - and be determined by - the necessary de dicto relation between proper names and essences. Though Kripkean proper names are only supposed to designate essences (not contingent properties), there would still be a necessary relation between proper names and essences. That, in turn, means that any talk of mind-independent essences would be illegitimate because every essence would be a named essence set up by the de dicto necessary relation between proper name and the named object. Thus every spoken-about essence could never be classed as a ‘mind-independent essence’ because it would be a named essence, set up by the necessary de dicto naming-relation – even if that relation is indeed necessary and named objects are deemed to have essences.

If my Quine is correct (i.e., that Kripke needed to fuse the de dicto with the de re), then Marcus is wrong to say that Quine’s Kripke is a misreading. If she's correct, then Quine does hold the strange position that proper names are the necessary properties of Kripkean named objects. Therefore Quine wouldn't argue that Kripke fuses the de re with the de dicto in thinking that (though he may still believe this). This doesn't mean, however, that Kripke doesn't fuse the de re with the de dicto, only that Marcus’s belief about Quine’s Kripke is correct. However, I do believe that Kripke may have fused the two. I also believe that Quine thinks this too; despite Marcus’s position on what Quine argues (if he does say, or mean, such things).

I don't know if Marcus misread Quine’s position. And I don't know if she herself conflates or simply fuses the de dicto with the de re because of her reading of Quine’s Kripke. If she thinks what she thinks about Quine’s Kripke, as we have interpreted it, then she wouldn't say what she says about it. Perhaps this also means that Marcus too either confuses the de re/de dicto distinction, or she actually fuses it (as (my) Quine’s Kripke does). Because we've already said that Quine couldn’t think that Kripkean proper names are ‘necessary’ (therefore essential on this reading) properties of named objects. If Quine doesn't think this, then it may be that Marcus didn't only confuse the de re with the de dicto (and vice versa), but, like Quine’s Kripke, she fused them too. However, as we've argued, Kripke’s fusion of the de dicto with the de re doesn't automatically mean that he also confused them. Perhaps such a fusion could only have come about because of some other confusion on Kripke’s part. That confusion might have been the result of the implicit or explicit fusion of the de dicto with the de re.

Finally, Kripke may knowingly fuse the two; yet he may not accept our other conclusion about such a fusion: that it goes against the point and power of the de re classification and disallows any talk about the mind-independent essences of named objects.

References and Further Reading

Kripke, S – (1971) ‘Identity and necessity’, in Identity and Individuation, New York, ed. M. Munitz

Marcus, R. B – (1990) ‘A Backward Look at Quine’s Animadversions on Modalities’, in Perspectives on Quine, eds. R. B. Barrett and R. F. Gibson, Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, pp.230-43
Quine, W. V. O. – (1966) The Ways of Paradox and Other Essays, Random House

Bertrand Russell’s Paradox

What is the primary feature of Bertrand Russell’s Paradox? It's one of self-reference. Thus it's like the Liar Paradox in which a sentence (or speaker) speaks about itself (or himself). With Russell’s Paradox, it's a case of a set (or a class) referring to itself or including itself as a member of itself.

What about sets that contain themselves as members? Consider this set:

Set X = the set of all the sets I've written about today

Today I've written about the set of all the things owned by Paul Murphy, the set of all writing implements, the set of arseheads, among others. All these are subsets of the set of all the sets I have written about today. But, in that case, I've also written about the set of all I've written about today – today. Thus this set will be a set (or a subset) of itself. That is, the set of the sets I've written about today will be a member of the set of all the sets I've written about today.

Let’s call my previous sets S, H, B and L. We also have Set X – the set of all the sets I've written about today. Now take another set:

Set Z = the set of all sets that don’t contain themselves as elements

Well, Set S, the set of all things that are owned by Paul Murphy, isn't itself owned by Paul Murphy - so it's not a member of itself. Neither are sets H, B and L. Set X, the set of all sets I've written about today, is a member of itself because it too is a set I've written about today.

What about Set Z above: the set of all sets that don’t contain themselves as elements/members? The question is:

Is Set Z an element of itself?

If Set Z isn't an element of itself, then it's a member of the set of all sets that aren't members of themselves. If it is an element of itself, then it can’t be a member of itself. Though if it isn’t a set that doesn’t contain itself as a member, then it is indeed a member of the set of all sets that don’t contain themselves as elements (of itself).

That means that if it is, it isn’t. And if it isn’t, it is. Or, alternatively, Set Z above both is and is not a member of itself. This is a contradiction.

This is the same problem that we have with the Liar Paradox. If everything the Liar says is false, then what he's saying must be false. He's saying that what he's saying is false. Therefore what he is saying must be true. Though if what the liar is saying is true, then it must be false. (Because everything he says is false.) Thus what he says is both true and false. This is, again, a contradiction.

Quine's 'On What There Is' (1948)

What is Existence?

The American philosopher W.V.O. Quine (1908–2000) discussed what he called the “old Platonic riddle of non-being” (or Plato’s beard) in his paper ‘On What There Is’ (1948).

The position is that if we talk about something, then it must exist or have some kind of being. Indeed even if we talk about something that doesn’t exist, then it must still (in some way) have being — otherwise “what is it that there is not?”.

Of course it depends here on what’s meant by the word “exist”. Traditionally, there have been different (as it were) modes of existence. So the problem is more difficult than it initially looks. However, even if we accept an entirely mental or a non-spatiotemporal existence, then what kind of being or existence would a round square have? Even that… thing, according to Alexius Meinong (1853 — 1920) at least , has some kind of existence or being.

Quine doesn’t tackle the issue of modes of existence in his paper: he does tackle the issue of meaning and reference.

Meaning and Reference

Quine takes the case of the mythical winged horse Pegasus.

McX (Quine’s fictional adversary) argued that if

“Pegasus were not [] we should not be talking about anything when we use the word”.

Indeed McX argued that it would even be “nonsense to say that Pegasus is not”. This is also why some philosophers believed that the locution “God does not exist” is as meaningless as “God exists”. In this case, McX would argue:

Who is this God who doesn’t exist?

This was the problem which Bertrand Russell attempted to solve in his paper ‘Existence and Description’. The issue can be called the Problem of Empty Reference (see ‘empty name’).

Quine himself refers to Russell’s well-known take on the problem; and he largely endorses it.

Russell himself attempted to solve this problem by getting rid of proper names and definite descriptions. Thus the statement

(1) “The author of Waverley was a poet.”

became

(2) “Someone (better: something) wrote Waverley and was a poet, and nothing else wrote Waverley.”

Thus (2) is the (supposed) logical form (as it were) beneath the surface (or everyday grammar) of (1). So we can ask here if (2) is a translation, a version or simply an alternative of or to (1). It seems that (2) is an alternative rather than a logically precise version or translation of (1). That is, (1) may well be philosophically problematic as it stands. However, that doesn’t make (2) a translation or even a version of it.

Moreover, when someone utters (1), he doesn’t (as it’s often put) “really mean” (2). He may well be making philosophical mistakes when he utters (1). However, that doesn’t make (2) a version or translation of (1).

For example, the words “nothing else wrote Waverley” would probably be further from the mind of the utterer of (1) as anything could be. Thus (2), in that case, is more of a logical or philosophical (as it were) imposition than a version or translation.

Quine goes into a little detail as to why Russell substituted (2) for (1).

As stated, it was primarily an attempt to get rid of proper names. What we have in (2) is a substitution of “variables of quantification” for the original names. The quantifiers in (2) are “something” and “nothing”. So these quantifiers aren’t names. They don’t work like names. instead, what they do is “refer to entities generally”.

How did this help both Russell and Quine?

This is how the argument goes.

If you don’t name a specific thing, then you’re not ontologically committed to that thing’s existence. “The author of Waverley” is a definite description of a specific individual. The quantifier “something”, on the other hand, isn’t naming a specific individual and therefore it’s not existentially or ontologically committed. In other words, in (2) the speaker is talking about some thing, not about a specific individual — named either by a definite description or by a proper name.

The problem is more pronounced when someone makes an utterance about someone’s or something’s non-existence (as in the God example).

Again, to what or to whom is the speaker referring if that person or thing doesn’t exist?

So we have an original locution and a (?) again:

(1) “The author of Waverley is not.”

becomes

(2) “Either each thing failed to write or two or more things wrote Waverley.”

In (2) above the quantifier is more convoluted in expression. Instead of the quantifier “everything”, we now have “each thing” (a version of the universal quantifier). Here the speaker doesn’t talk about a specific entity (i.e. the author of Waverley). He talks about “each thing” or about “two or more things”. As Quine put it, the second version “contains no expression purporting to name the author of Waverley”.

Later in the paper Quine recapitulated on these issues.

Again, Quine stressed the need to erase names. So what do we use to refer to entities? We use variables. More precisely and as Quine puts it: “[T]o be assumed as an entity is [] to be reckoned as the value of a variable.” And the point of variables is that they are non-specific. That is, they don’t name particulars. As Quine pointed out, variables are therefore like pronouns (e.g., “it”, “this”, “that”, “those”, “who”, “which”, etc.).

So what’s the point of these logical substitutions to the originals?

The point is to stop us naming non-existents and thus allow an escape from Plato’s beard.

[The reasons for this approach can’t be gone into here. I suggest that the reader consult Russell’s original paper.]

Quine follows his account of Russell’s position with an account of Gottlob Frege’s notion of sense and reference.

Sense & Reference

What is the meaning of a proper name?

In Quine’s and Frege’s examples, what are the meanings of the names “Morning Star” and “Evening Star”?

The reference of those names (i.e., the star itself) can’t be the meaning of the two proper names because they both refer to the same thing: viz., the planet Venus.

This distinction between meaning and reference had already been well made before Quine. However, Quine used it to get back to the Pegasus problem he tackled earlier in his paper.

The reason why McX made his mistake about believing that names must refer is that he

“confused the alleged named object Pegasus with the meaning of the word ‘Pegasus’”.

Thus McX didn’t distinguish reference from meaning (as also in the Venus example). McX believed that the meaning of the name ‘Pegasus’ must be the thing Pegasus. But, as Frege showed, if the reference were identical with the meaning, then the planet Venus wouldn’t have two different names.

It follows that we can now talk about all sorts of non-existents without committing ourselves to their existence. If reference isn’t identical with meaning (or Fregean “sense”), then a name can have meaning without it also having a specific reference — at least a spatiotemporal reference. And that’s what Pegasus is meant to be: a spatiotemporal winged horse; not an idea in one mind (or in many minds) or an abstract object.

Quine separates meaning and reference. However, what had he to say about meanings themselves?

This is where Quine was much more original and less Fregean.

Meanings

Quine’s position on meaning (or meanings) is quite radical — or at least it was in 1948.

To put it plainly: Quine rejects meanings — at least as traditionally characterised. However, in order to stop people getting too outraged, he almost immediately stated: “[I do not] thereby deny that words and statements are meaningful.” At a prima facie level, Quine’s statement appears to contradict his position. However, Quine went on to clarify his position on meaning/s.

As just shown, Quine agreed that certain locutions are either meaningful or meaningless. However, this isn’t because these locutions express pre-existing entities that we call “meanings”. Meanings aren’t abstract entities in the (Platonic or Fregean) Third Realm, mental entities in the mind, and they aren’t mental images.

So what’s left for meanings to be?

Quine clarifies his position in the following manner.

Quine accepts that two locutions can have the same meaning. However, they don’t do so because both locutions match a pre-existing abstract meaning or “mental idea” that’s somehow expressed by the two locutions.

So why did Quine believe that they have the same meaning?

To Quine, it’s simply a case of language referring to language, rather than language referring to abstract entities, mental ideas or even denotata. That is, both locutions have the same meaning if they can be expressed by a third version that expresses (more or less) the same thing (usually “in a clearer language than the original”).

Thus “the meaning of” sentence S is given by another sentence, rather than by S matching up to an abstract entity or mental idea we call a “meaning”. If the meaning of S were an abstract entity, then how could a locution match it at all? How can a contingent verbal locution possibly match something that’s a timeless non-linguistic… thing? How do you match such completely unlike things?

Quine called these different linguistic versions of the same sentence “synonyms”. So just as single words can have their synonyms, so too can whole sentences and perhaps even collections of sentences.

Towards the end of the paper ‘On What There Is’ Quine gets away from ontology and enters the realm of epistemology.

The Epistemology of What There Is

How do we describe and know what there is?

Quine’s principle answer is: via conceptual schemes.

Of course there are alternative conceptual schemes. However, according to Quine, they aren’t all mutually exclusive. That is, there isn’t only one way of describing or knowing the world correctly (as metaphysical realists may well believe).

The two conceptual schemes Quine discussed were that of the physicalist and that of the phenomenalist.

Simplistically speaking, the physicalist offers us a world of objects (such as a penny). The phenomenalist, on the other hand, offers us a world of (amongst other things) a round sensum rather than the object we call a “penny”. According to Quine (qua pragmatist), both conceptual schemes have their advantages.

Quine was very easy-going about conceptual schemes… but only up to a point! The phenomenalist offers us a world of “scattered sense events” rather than one of objects qua objects. Thus when we see a penny as a penny (i.e., rather than as a round sensum), we’re effectively “simplifying our over-all reports”. That is, we assign “sense data to objects” to simplify things.

Despite the fact that it was stated earlier that Quine didn’t see these particular conceptual schemes as being mutually exclusive, Quine did believe that they’re — at least in a weak sense — in competition with one another. However, although they’re in competition, both still have their advantages. As Quine put it, each “deserves to be developed”. So it mainly depends on what we want from our conceptual schemes. In fact Quine describes the phenomenalist’s conceptual scheme as an epistemological enterprise. The physicalist’s conceptual scheme, on the other hand, is physical.

Reference

W.V. Quine, ‘On What There Is’, from the Review of Metaphysics (1948)

[I can be found on Twitter here.]

Umberto Eco as Philosophical Realist?

It's strange (at least to me) that a fashionable Continental philosopher should advance what can be deemed to be a commonsensical philosophical position.

The point is that regardless of the literary and philosophical flamboyances of Continental, relativist, postmodern, poststructuralist, etc. philosophers, even they believe that there's a “independent and real world out there” (as it's often put). Sure, that may not be to say much; though Umberto Eco does come close to saying what this position amounts to.

Is it "metaphysical realism"? I don't really know. It depends.

In any case, it all boils down to there being a “red object out there”; as Eco puts it. Or, alternatively, even when relativists (for example) talk about the “silver circle”, they know “that's the moon” (not, say, the sun) that they're “talking about”.

And to demonstrate that point, Umberto Eco says:

“Had Ptolemy pointed instead at a silver circle the other would have said, 'No, that's the moon, we're talking about that object over there.'..."

Of course Eco's opponent may (or no doubt will) simply say: Yes; but what do you mean by “the same thing”? The problem is this same thing is at the very heart of the issue. Indeed, in a certain sense, to say we're “talking about the same thing” is to say very little (philosophically). Though, when talking commonsensically, it's to say a lot.

What Eco appears to do (at least at a prima facie level) is fuse some kind of anti-realism (or constructivism) with good-old-fashioned metaphysical realism. Though because this anti-realism vs. realism debate is so ancient and shopworn (as well as strewn with jargon), then perhaps we simply shouldn't get too bogged down with technical terms and just (as it were) go with the flow of everyday words... at least for now. (For example, most/all constructivists, unlike idealists, accept that there's “an independent world”.... though, again, what does that amount to?)

Anyway, firstly we have Umberto Eco's anti-realism (or constructivism) bit. He says:

“I hold that there can be no truth which is not the result of people interpreting reality, and hence resulting from a social contract.”

And then comes the realist angle. Eco says:

“But when we come across those lines of resistance that prevent us from making certain statements, that is the closest we can get to truth. There is something in reality that decrees: 'No, you cannot say this.'”

Of course it can now be asked what it is, exactly, which allows us to say “you cannot say this”. (Eco doesn't really specify at this point.) However, in his commonsensical example given earlier, that “silver circle” was clearly the moon and not the sun. (It certainly wasn't a flying teapot.)

In any case, what Eco seems to be saying is that it's easier to establish what we can't say is the case (or true) than it is to say what is the case (or true). 

For example, we can't say is that it's a flying teapot or even the sun; though perhaps in this - and many other examples - what we can say is the case (or true) is open to discussion. (It's not the sun or a flying teapot, maybe; though what about another planet, an optical illusion or the product of our "linguistic scheme”?)

Following on from this, Eco himself says that “[n]egation is the closest thing to truth”. That appears to be something a little like Karl Popper's falsificationism in that it's easier (according to Popper) to disprove (or prove false) a theory than it is to prove it (or show it to be true). Or, if we reject the notion of proof as being applicable to science, we can say that falsification is more conclusive than confirmation or corroboration.

In terms of simple statements or propositions, it's easier (or even more conclusive) to show that p is false that it is to show that p is true. That doesn't automatically mean that if we don't show that p is false, then p must be true. p may have neither truth-value at a particular moment in time. Nonetheless, negation, according to Eco, takes p out of the picture (as it were). Or, in Eco's own words, it's the case that “we cannot say [that p] because it crosses the limits”. (Thus saying that the moon is the sun/teacup “crosses the limits”.)

Common Sense

Umberto Eco boils all this down to common sense. In full, he says:

“I believe that much of the contemporary philosophy of language has rather forgotten that, in the end, they are all talking about the same thing.”

It's interesting that Eco singles out the philosophy of language here. After all, in 20th century French philosophy (which he refers to later) there hasn't really been a strong tradition which can be categorised as “the philosophy of language”; though there has been such a tradition in Anglo-American analytic philosophy. So it's a shame that Eco names no names when it comes to what he calls the philosophy of language.

Eco elaborates on the importance of common sense. He tells us “that the basic tool in philosophical thinking is common sense”. What's more, Eco thinks that “for the past thirty or forty years French philosophy has forgotten common sense”. He continues:

“I think it's high time that common sense, so fundamental to the history of philosophy, was reintroduced to the scene. Aristotle was, above all, a man of extraordinary common sense, as was Aquinas.”  

It's also interesting that Eco singles out French philosophy. Here again he names no names; though it's fairly easy to work out who he's talking about.

Remaining on the theme of common sense. Eco's fealty to common sense isn't some blind or reactionary adherence to something that can sometimes (even oftentimes) prove to be disastrously wrong. What he's saying is perhaps similar to what Hume, Thomas Reid, G.E. Moore and the late Wittgenstein believed. (Wittgenstein didn't speak that much about “common sense”; he referred more to “everyday language”.) So common sense must provide the grounding of one's philosophy (even of obscure metaphysical speculations). And because it's only a grounding (rather than a constricting chain), Eco also says:

“Philosophy goes beyond common sense in that philosophers question facts or ideas that others take for granted. But to go beyond does not necessarily mean to reject. Nor does it mean to go against.”

And here we have the notion of grounding again. Eco says:

“What it does mean is that the philosopher continues to use common sense in order to tackle problems that everyday life does not raise.”

So it's fairly hard to decide if Umberto Eco's position is realism or some kind of (mitigated) anti-realism. Regardless, it does seem rather commonsensical... if in a philosophical kind of way.

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*) All the quotations from Umberto Eco can be found in the book Predictions: 30 Great Minds on the Future (1999). The chapter on Eco is part of an interview conducted by Domenico Pacitti.

Wittgenstein on Doubt

Ludwig Wittgenstein’s case against scepticism (or at least against global scepticism) is simple. We can't doubt without exempting some things from doubt. As Wittgenstein himself puts it in his On Certainty (##341-4.)

“The questions that we raise and our doubts depend on the fact that some propositions are exempt from doubt, are as it were like hinges on which those [doubts] turn.

“That is to say, it belongs to the logic of our scientific investigations that certain things are in deed not doubted…

“My life consists in my being content to accept many things.” 

To put this at its simplest. 

Say that you're doubting a person’s thesis in geology. You wouldn't, thereby, also doubt the meanings of your own words or the words of the person who's offering his geological thesis. That would be semantic doubt, not geological doubt.

Similarly, you wouldn't doubt that the geologist were a person rather than a zombie or a machine. That would be a doubt about other minds, not a doubt about (again) geology.

Even if the other doubts aren't philosophical, they still needn't be geological doubts. 

For example, you may doubt the geologist’s honesty or why he's saying what he's saying. (You may doubt that you put your underpants on. If you did, then perhaps you wouldn't pay attention.) Thus, these doubts must be (as the philosopher David Lewis once put it) "properly ignored". 

What's at the heart of these "exemptions" is the "context" in which the doubt (or the exemption of doubt) takes place. As Wittgenstein (again) puts it:

“Without that context, the doubt itself makes no sense: ‘The game of doubting itself presupposes certainty’; ‘A doubt without an end is not even a doubt.’” (On Certainty, #115; #625.)

If one doubts everything, then there's no sense in doubting anything. Doubt occurs in the context of non-doubt. 

According to Descartes, one thing one can't doubt is that one is doubting. (Or one can't doubt the meanings of one’s words or that one’s words mean the same today as they did yesterday.) Even psychologically speaking, one needs a context for one’s doubt.

The Things We Cannot Doubt

The important point to make about Wittgenstein’s position is not that, as Timothy Chappell puts it, 

“there is some special class of privileged propositions that we simply can’t doubt”. 

This isn’t a Cartesian or "foundationalist" position. The propositions we mustn't doubt could be of (just about) any kind. The general point is that there must be some propositions (of whatever kind) which we mustn't doubt in order to get the ball rolling. We can't start ex nihilo - as Descartes ostensibly did. We must bounce off certain propositions which we don't doubt. We can't doubt, then, literally everything - again, as Descartes supposedly did.

What we choose not to doubt (indeed what we also choose to doubt) will depend on our context. That will determine the nature of our doubts (or our lack of doubt vis-à-vis particular propositions or possibilities). 

Timothy Chappell gives some very basic, and non-philosophical, examples of this. He writes:

“[I]n each context, there is a very great deal that is not in doubt: the existence of the chessboard, the reliability of the atlas, the possibility of generally getting shopping sums right. This background makes it possible to have doubts, and possible (in principle) to resolve them. Where there is no such background, says Wittgenstein, the doubt itself makes no sense.” 

We can create a table of what we can't doubt, and what we can doubt:

1a) The existence of the chessboard. 
1b) The sincerity of our chess opponent’s naivety.

2a) The (general) reliability of the atlas. 
2b) Whether or not the atlas is up-to-date.

3a) The possibility of (generally) getting our shopping sums right. 
3b) That one’s hangover (today) is affecting one’s arithmetical judgement.

To put the above another way. One couldn't doubt the sincerity of our chess opponent’s naivety if before that we actually doubted the existence of the chessboard. We wouldn't doubt whether or not our atlas was up-to-date if we had already doubted its general reliability. We wouldn't doubt our arithmetical skills during a hangover if we had already doubted our skills in all contexts.

Not only that: we can only resolve our lesser doubts if we simply disregard the more global (or extreme) doubts which might have proceeded them. That is, I can go ahead and win my chess opponent only if I simply disregard the possibility of the chessboard simply not existing in the first place.

Wittgenstein also seems to say that total (or global) doubt simply “makes no sense” because there needs to be a reason to doubt. If one doubts everything, then there can be no reason to doubt at all – unless the act of doubting (everything) is itself the reason to doubt! Perhaps the sceptic would concede that (according to Wittgenstein) senseless position!

Descartes’ Fallacy?

Chappell then offers us a logical argument against Descartes’ global or total doubt. He argues that it rests on a fallacious argument. He writes:

“Descartes – you could say – begins his philosophy by arguing that since any of our beliefs might be false, therefore all of our beliefs might be false. But this is a fallacious argument. (Compare: ‘Any of these strangers might be the Scarlet Pimpernel; therefore every one of these strangers might be the Scarlet Pimpernel.’) What is true of any belief is not necessarily true of every belief. So – the claim would be – Descartes’ system rests on a fallacy (the ‘any/all fallacy’, as it is sometimes called.)”

In fact Chappell's argument does seem to follow. That is, “if any of our beliefs might be false, therefore all of our beliefs might be false”. He isn't saying that all are false if one is false; but that all of them may be false if one is (found to be) false. On the other hand, perhaps that doesn’t logically follow. 

One belief (or “any” belief) being false doesn't entail every belief being false, or even their possibly being false. However, doesn’t it leave open that possibility? 

The analogy with the Scarlet Pimpernel doesn't work because, by definition, only one person can be this person. There's nothing strange about saying that every (or all) our beliefs may be false - or even that they are all false. Not all our beliefs need to be numerically identical. However, there can only be one other person who is numerically identical with the Scarlet Pimpernel. 

So saying that

“any of these strangers might be the Scarlet Pimpernel; therefore every one of these strangers might be the Scarlet Pimpernel” 

isn't the same as the Cartesian example at all. Two beliefs may both be false. However, they needn't be identical beliefs. On the other hand, if there were two people who were the Scarlet Pimpernel, then they'd need to be identical – indeed numerically identical.

The Language Game of Scepticism

Wittgenstein brings in his notion of language games to make sense of global doubt. Again, his argument against doubt is simple. That argument is that philosophical (or sceptical) doubts simply don't arise in any of our language games (outside philosophy!). Therefore we should ignore them! Chappell writes:

“The trouble with crazy sceptical hypotheses, according to Wittgenstein, is that they don’t crop up in any of the various language games that make up the texture of ordinary life in the world. That is why it doesn’t make sense to discuss them.” 

This means that “crazy sceptical hypotheses” don’t have any context. If they have no context (outside philosophy!), then “it doesn’t make sense to discuss them”. However, the septic (or philosopher) may reply:

So what! I don’t care if scepticism has "no context" or if there's no sceptical "language game". What I'm saying may still be legitimate and even true! In any case, why can’t scepticism (or philosophy generally) itself be a language game?

After all, philosophy is a language game (if we insist on using Wittgenstein's words) which has been played for over two thousand years. And scepticism itself has been an important and influential language game in our culture generally. What better example of a language game could you have?

Moreover, does scepticism only exist in the language game of philosophy? What about the many conspiracy theories that are so much a part of culture in the U.K and the U.S? These theories can be deemed to be sceptical in nature – after all, they distrust the truths of the “Establishment” or the “status quo”, just as the philosophical sceptics (in part) did.

In addition, shouldn’t a Wittgensteinian say that the very fact that that “crazy sceptical hypotheses” have been discussed at all means that they must have been discussed in one (or various) language games? Every discourse - crazy or sane - needs its own language game. Indeed, wasn’t that one of Wittgenstein’s points about language games?

Despite saying all that, Chappell states that 

“the sceptic isn’t playing any legitimate language game in his discourse, and so is talking nonsense”. 

Again, who says that the sceptic isn’t playing a language game? And who says that if the sceptic is playing a language game, then his language game isn't "legitimate"? Is it because it's not the language game (or language) of the ordinary man speaking "ordinary language"? The sceptic may again say:

So what! Why should I care about ordinary language or the ordinary man?

So I’m not sure why - or how - Wittgenstein excluded scepticism from all language games or denied that it's a legitimate language game. Chappell too appears to agree with this position against Wittgenstein’s chauvinism against the sceptical language game. He writes:

“[S]ince the sceptic’s discourse makes sense, it must be part of a Wittgensteinian language game – a particular form of human linguistic activity with its own rules – called the ‘scepticism game’.” 

Perhaps Wittgenstein might have replied:

But that’s where you're wrong! The sceptic’s discourse doesn't make sense. It's meaningless. It's meaningless precisely because it's not ordinary language. (It doesn't use accepted terms in the way that we use them in everyday life.) Therefore, the sceptic’s discourse doesn't make sense. It's nonsense.

It's certainly true that sceptical “linguistic activity” does indeed have “its own rules”. Indeed it can hardly not do. And because it does have its own rules, then it must also be a bona fide language game. However, it just happened to be a language game that Wittgenstein didn't like. (Just as William P. Alston – in his paper 'Yes, Virginia, There Is a Real World' - likes religious language games, though he doesn't like the language games of "relativism" or "scientism".) If we truly believe in Wittgensteinian language games (that is, in their existence and autonomy), then we simply can't pick and choose which ones we accept and which ones we reject. If it's a “human linguistic activity with its own rules”, then it's a language game. (That's whether or not we like it or agree with its beliefs or theories.) Indeed, according to the theory of language games, it's irrelevant if you or I (who belong to other language games) agree or disagree with other language games (to which we don’t belong). After all, all language games - almost by definition - are autonomous and thus beyond the criticisms of other language games. That is the truly relativistic aspect of Wittgensteinian languages games. And that's despite the fact that Wittgenstein himself - and many others - mightn't have liked the relativist language game itself.