Philosophy of Language.
When freely available, you can download the publication by clicking on the image on the left
|
On the Logical Philosophy of Assertive Graphs
Fellow: Daniele Chiffi authors, abstract & keywords
Authors: Daniele Chiffi, Ahti-Veikko Pietarinen Abstract: The logic of assertive graphs (AGs) is a modification of Peirce’s logic of existential graphs (EGs), which is intuitionistic and which takes assertions as its explicit object of study. In this paper we extend AGs into a classical graphical logic of assertions (ClAG) whose internal logic is classical. The characteristic feature is that both AGs and ClAG retain deep-inference rules of transformation. Unlike classical EGs, both AGs and ClAG can do so without explicitly introducing polarities of areas in their language. We then compare advantages of these two graphical approaches to the logic of assertions with a reference to a number of topics in philosophy of logic and to their deep-inferential nature of proofs. Keywords: Assertion, Assertive graphs, Existential graphs, Peirce, Classical vs. non-classical logical graphs, Deep inference, Inferentialism |
|
Pragmatic Ambiguity: The Thetic Function of Modality
Fellow: Paolo Di Lucia authors, abstract & keywords
Authors: Amedeo Conte, Paolo Di Lucia Abstract: the aim of this paper is to present an overview of the pragmatic aspects of ambiguity present in deontic sentences, which may have three pragmatic functions: a prescriptive or a descriptive or a constitutive function. This type of ambiguity is investigated on the lexical, phrasal, and sentential level. The discussion focuses on the deontic constructions of the German verb sollenand the English shall as they are used in legal texts. It also includes comments on the thetic function of the Latin imperative mood and the subjunctive mood. Keywords: modality, deonticity, speech act, mood, ambiguity, pragmatics |
|
Confusion of Tongues: A Theory of Normative Language
Fellow: Stephen Finlay abstract & keywords
Abstract: Can normative words like ‘good’, ‘ought’, and ‘reason’ be defined in entirely non-normative terms? This book argues that they can, advancing an end-relational theory of the meaning of this language as providing the best explanation of the many different ways it is ordinarily used. Whereas it is widely maintained that relational theories cannot account for the special features of moral and deliberative uses of these words, this book argues that the end-relational theory accommodates these features systematically on the basis of a single fundamental principle of conversational pragmatics. These challenges comprise the central problems of metaethics, including the connection between normative judgment and motivation, the categorical character of morality, the nature of intrinsic value, and the possibility of normative disagreement. This linguistic analysis has far-reaching implications for the metaphysics, epistemology, and psychology of morality, as well as for the nature and possibility of normative ethical theory. Most significantly it supplies a nuanced answer to the ancient Euthyphro Question of whether things are desired because they are judged to be good, or vice versa. Normative speech and thought may ultimately be just a manifestation of our nature as intelligent animals motivated by contingent desires for various conflicting ends. Keywords: normativity, morality, normative language, meaning, pragmatics, context, metaethics, end-relational. |
|
Determinate attitudes and indeterminate norms
Fellow: José Giromini abstract & keywords
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to offer a version of social normative pragmatism – that is, the approach that takes norms to be the result of shared practices – that comes closer to social reality than its cousins in the philosophy of language and the philosophy of mind. The purpose is presenting a framework that can be useful for social theorists sympathetic to normative concepts. This version introduces the concepts of the adoption of the normative stance, the projective structure of evaluation and a sketch of a theory of normative force in terms of accumulation of normative attitude. In order to motivate this conceptual tools, we present them as allowing us to overcome the traditional skeptical challenge put forward by Kripke. Keywords: Kripke's skeptical challenge, normative attitudes, normative stance, norms, social pragmatism |
|
Philosophical Pragmatics in Amedeo G. Conte
Fellow: Antonio Incampo abstract & keywords
Abstract: At the beginning of his essay “Minima deontica” (1988) Conte highlights how the title expressly alludes to Minima moralia (1951) by Theodor Adorno. It is not a simple word game. Quite the contrary. It is a true philosophical project. Even the Deontics, in fact, as semiotics of normative language, does not fail in the task of giving moral explanations of the world. This article explores some legal validity conditions that go back to the very concept of legal acts (they are conditions of “praxeological validity” to use Conte’s lexicon), demonstrating the importance that the “rules of function” have on the moral concept of good. Keywords: Deontics, Pragmatics, Praxeological Validity, Function, Rule of Function, Speech Act, Good. |
|
Speaking about the normativity of meaning
Fellow: Patrizio Lo Presti abstract
Abstract: Contemporary debate on the nature of meaning centres on whether meaning is normative. Agreement is widespread that meaning implies correctness, but disagreement on whether correctness is normative remains. Normativists argue that correctness implies obligations or permissions. Anti-normativists disagree and hold that correctness is a descriptive term. This paper argues that, fundamentally, meaning presupposes norms, but not in the generic normativist sense: a vocabulary is recognisable as part of alanguageifandonlyifitispartofapracticeofcommittingandentitlingtoask for and provide reasons for what is said. To commit and entitle is not obliged or permitted. It is a presupposition for speaking about obligations and permissions. |
|
The Norm of Assertion: A Constitutive Rule?
Fellows: Neri Marsili abstract & keywords
Abstract: According to an influential hypothesis, the speech act of assertion is subject to a single ‘constitutive’ rule, that takes the form: ‘One must: assert that p only if p has C’. Scholars working on assertion interpret the assumption that this rule is ‘constitutive’ in different ways. This disagreement, often unacknowledged, threatens the foundations of the philosophical debate on assertion. This paper reviews different interpretations of the claim that assertion is governed by a constitutive rule. It argues that once we understand the full import of assuming that assertion is governed by a constitutive rule, it becomes clear that some fundamental assumptions of the current debate are mistaken, and others unwarranted. Keywords: Assertion, norms, speech act theory, constitutive rules, Testimony |
|
Assertion: A (Partly) Social Speech Act
Fellows: Neri Marsili authors, abstract & keywords
Authors: Neri Marsili, Mitchell Green Abstract: In a series of articles (Pagin, 2004, 2009), Peter Pagin has argued that assertion is not a social speech act, introducing a method (which we baptize ‘the P-test’) designed to refute any account that defines assertion in terms of its social effects. This paper contends that Pagin's method fails to rebut the thesis that assertion is social. We show that the P-test is both unreliable (because it overgenerates counterexamples) and counterproductive (because it ultimately provides evidence in favor of some social accounts). Nonetheless, we contend that assertion is not fully social. We defend an intermediate view according to which assertion is only a partly social speech act: assertions both commit the speaker to a proposition (a social component) and present their propositional content as true (a non-social component). The upshot is that assertion is in some important respect social, although it cannot be defined solely in terms of its social effects. Keywords: Assertion; Speech act theory, Performatives, Truth, Commitment, Linguistic normativity |
|
Towards a Unified Theory of Illocutionary Normativity
Fellows: Neri Marsili abstract
Abstract: Speech acts are governed by a variety of illocutionary norms. This chapter attempts to develop a common framework to study them, building on Sbisà’s (2019) work. Four families of illocutionary rules are identified: (i) Validity rules set conditions for (actual) performance; (ii) Cooperative rules set conditions for cooperative performance; (iii) Illocutionary goals set conditions for successful performance; (iv) Illocutionary obligations set conditions for compliance. Illocutionary rules are often taken to play a constitutive role: speech acts are said to be constituted by the unique set of rules that regulates them. Against this view, it is argued that many illocutionary rules are instead best construed as rationally derivable expectations of cooperation. This alternative paradigm provides fertile ground to reconcile disagreement between speech act theorists, and yields a promising explanation of how illocutionary norms are learned and evolve through time. |
|
Speaking – Maxims, Norms & Values
Fellow: Kevin Mulligan authors, abstract & keywords
Abstract: Three of the most important innovations in twentieth-century pragmatics were the anatomy of speech acts set out by Austin and Searle, Grice’s account of the nature and function of a speaker’s intentions and his introduction and applications of his conversational maxims. As is by now well-known, Oxonian accounts of speech acts were anticipated by the philosophies of social acts given by Reid and Reinach and, as Irène Rosier-Catach has demonstrated, even earlier, by medieval philosophers. Similarly, Grice’s account of the rôles of speaker’s intentions was partially anticipated by Marty. Grice’s maxims, on the other hand, are an Oxonian contribution to pragmatics which does not seem to have emerged from past philosophy in anything like the same way. In what follows, I consider the normative status of Grice’s maxims and sketch one way of understanding this status which takes seriously Grice’s ambition to provide a value-first account of his maxims. |
|
Pictures, content and normativity: the semantic of graphic rules
Fellow: Mariela Aguilera abstract & keywords
Abstract: In our daily lives, we can find that different kinds of representational media are employed in normative ways, to express different kinds of rules. Sometimes, this is overlooked by the primacy of discursive representations in our normative practices. However, a look into these practices often shows that they are more complex and richer, and particularly that they include more than one kind of representation. Regarding this, this paper will be focused on the capacity and limitations of different kinds of representational media to express normative contents, that is, to express the content of rules. Keywords: correction conditions, nonlinguistic representation, deontic pictures, instrumental maps |
|
Reply to ‘attempts’: a non-davidsonian account of trying sentences
Fellow: David-Hillel Ruben abstract
Abstract: In various of my writings, both in Philosophical Studies and elsewhere, I have argued that an account of trying sentences is available that does not require quantification over alleged attempts or tryings. In particular, adverbial modification in such sentences can be dealt with, without quantification over any such particulars. In ‘Attempts’, Jonathan D. Payton (Payton, 2021) has sought to dispute my claim. In this paper, I consider his claims and reply to them. I believe that my account withstands such scrutiny. In what follows, I refer to my book as ‘MA’, in giving page numbers to guide the reader. ‘Payton’ always refers to ‘Payton 2021’. |
|
Does language have a downtown? Wittgenstein, Brandom, and the game of "giving and asking for reasons"
Fellow: Pietro Salis abstract & keywords
Abstract: Wittgenstein’s Investigations proposed an egalitarian view about language games, emphasizing their plurality (“language has no downtown”). Uses of words depend on the game one is playing, and may change when playing another. Furthermore, there is no privileged game dictating the rules for the others: games are as many as purposes. This view is pluralist and egalitarian, but it says little about the connection between meaning and use, and about how a set of rules is responsible for them in practice. Brandom’s Making It Explicit attempted a straightforward answer to these questions, by developing Wittgensteinian insights: the primacy of social practice over meanings; the idea that meaning is use; the idea of rule–following to understand participation in social practices. Nonetheless, Brandom defended a non–Wittgensteinian conception of discursive practice: language has a “downtown”, the game of “giving and asking for reasons”. This is the idea of a normative structure of language, consisting of advancing claims and drawing inferences. By means of assertions, speakers undertake “commitments” that can be challenged/defended in terms of reasons (those successfully justified can gain “entitlement”). This game is not one among many: it is indispensable to the very idea of discursive practice. In this paper, my aim will be that of exploring the main motivations and implications of both perspectives. Keywords: Discursive Practice, Inferentialism, Language Games, Pluralism, Rule Following |
|
Three ways in which logic might be normative
Fellow: Florian Steinberger abstract
Abstract: Logic, the tradition has it, is normative for reasoning. Famously, the tradition was challenged by Gilbert Harman who argued that there is no straightforward connection between logical consequence and norms of reasoning. A number of authors (including John MacFarlane and Hartry Field) have sought to rehabilitate the traditional view of the normative status of logic against Harman. In this paper, I argue that the debate as a whole is marred by a failure of the disputing parties to distinguish three different types of normative assessment, and hence three distinct ways in which the question of the normativity of logic might be understood. Logical principles might be thought to provide the reasoning agent first-personal directives, they might be thought to serve as third-personal evaluative standards, or they might underwrite our thirdpersonal appraisals of others whereby we attribute praise and blame. I characterize the three normative functions in general terms. I then show how a failure to appreciate this threefold distinction has impeded progress by leading the disputants to talk past one another. Moreover, I show how the distinction paves the way for a more fruitful engagement with and, ultimately, resolution of the question. |
|
Logical pluralism and logical normativity
Fellow: Florian Steinberger introduction
Introduction: This paper explores an apparent tension between two widely held views about logic: that logic is normative and that there are multiple equally legitimate logics. The tension is this. If logic is normative, it tells us something about how we ought to reason. If, as the pluralist would have it, there are several correct logics, those logics make incompatible recommendations as to how we ought to reason. But then which of these logics should we look to for normative guidance? I argue that inasmuch as pluralism draws its motivation from its ability to defuse logical disputes—that is, disputes between advocates of rival logics—it is unable to provide an answer: pluralism collapses into monism with respect to either the strongest or the weakest admissible logic. The paper proceeds as follows: Section 2 provides a novel analysis of the normative structure of logical disputes. Logical disputes involve various types of normative assessments. In particular, I distinguish external assessments that question the correctness of the principles to which the agent assessed holds herself, and internal ones by which we criticize the agent for her failure to comply with her own principles. I identify and articulate the principles underlying these normative assessments. Section 3 offers a taxonomy of logical pluralisms and investigates the extent to which each of the taxa leaves room for the aforementioned normative assessments. Section 4 explores the consequences of the fact that an important class of pluralisms—the class that incorporates J.C. Beall and Greg Restall’s influential account—is incompatible with external assessments. I demonstrate that the vulnerability of these views to the well-known ‘collapse argument’1 is a consequence of their inability to account for such assessments. Ultimately such forms of pluralism suffer an ‘upward’ collapse into monism with respect to the strongest admissible logic. Section 5 investigates an alternative form of pluralism according to which logics are correct only relative to their appropriate domains of application. Drawing on the literature on alethic pluralism, I argue that at least when it comes to certain forms of cross-domain discourse such forms of domain-relative pluralism are subject to a different but symmetrically analogous form of ‘downward’ collapse into monism with respect to the weakest logic. Section 6 argues that on account of the findings of the previous section, the distinction between monism and domain-relative pluralism is merely terminological. Finally, I conclude that the only viable forms of ‘pluralism’ in light of the normativity of logic are ones that allow for normative conflicts and hence logical rivalry. |
|
Metasemantics for the Relaxed
Fellow: Christine Tiefensee abstract & keywords
Abstract: In this paper, I develop a metasemantics for relaxed moral realism. More precisely, I argue that relaxed realists should be inferentialists about meaning and explain that the role of evaluative moral vocabulary is to organise and structure language exit transitions, much as the role of theoretical vocabulary is to organise and structure language entry transitions. Keywords: Metasemantics, Relaxed normative, realism, Quietism, Inferentialism |
|
Mechanisms of illocutionary games
Fellow: Maciej Witek ABSTRACT
Abstract: The paper develops a score-keeping model of illocutionary games and uses it to account for mechanisms responsible for creating institutional facts construed as rights and commitments of participants in a dialogue. After introducing the idea of Austinian games—understood as abstract entities representing different levels of the functioning of discourse—the paper defines the main categories of the proposed model: interactional negotiation, illocutionary score, appropriateness rules and kinematics rules. Finally, it discusses the phenomenon of accommodation as it occurs in illocutionary games and argues that the proposed model presupposes an externalist account of illocutionary practice. |
|
Illocution and Accommodation in the Functioning of Presumptions
Fellow: Maciej Witek ABSTRACT & KEYWORDS
Abstract: In this paper, I develop a speech-act based account of presumptions. Using a score-keeping model of illocutionary games, I argue that presumptions construed as speech acts can be grouped into three illocutionary act types defined by reference to how they affect the state of a conversation. The paper is organized into two parts. In the first one, I present the score-keeping model of speech act dynamics; in particular, I distinguish between two types of mechanisms—the direct mechanism of illocution and the indirect one of accommodation—that underlie the functioning of illocutionary acts. In the second part, I use the presented model to distinguish between (1) the unilateral act of individual presumption, the point of which is to shift the burden of proof by making the hearer committed to justifying his refusal to endorse the proposition communicated by the speaker, whenever he refuses to endorse it, (2) the bilateral act of joint presumption—‘bilateral’ in that it is performed jointly by at least two conversing agents—the function of which is to confer on the proposition endorsed by the speaker the normative status of jointly recognized though tentative acceptability, and (3) the indirect or back-door act of collective presumption, the purpose of which is to sustain rules and practices to which the conversing agents defer the felicity of their conversational moves. Keywords: Presumptions · Burden of proof · Speech acts · Score-keeping · Accommodation · Illocution |
|
Coordination and Norms in Illocutionary Interaction
Fellow: Maciej Witek ABSTRACT
Abstract: My aim in this paper is to develop a model of the coordinative function of language conventions and, next, use it to account for the normative aspect of illocutionary practice. After discussing the current state of the philosophical debate on the nature of speech acts, I present an interactional account of illocutionary practice, which results from integrating Ruth G. Millikan’s biological model of language conventions within the framework of Austin’s theory of speech acts. Next, I elaborate on Millikan’s idea that the proper function of illocutionary conventions is coordinative and put forth a hypothesis according to which conventional patterns of linguistic interaction have been selected for the roles they play in producing and maintaining mental coordination between interacting agents. Finally, I use the resulting model of coordination to develop a naturalistic account of the so-called sincerity norms. Focusing my analysis on assertions and directives, I argue that the normative character of sincerity rules can be accounted for in terms of Normal conditions for proper functioning of speech acts understood as cooperative intentional signs in Millikan’s sense; I also discuss the possibility of providing a naturalistic account of the normative effects of illocutionary acts. |