PHIL-215 Chapter Notes - Chapter Quine: Rudolf Carnap, Logical Truth, Reductionism
Quine: the Two Dogmas of Empiricism Reading Notes
1. One is a belief in some fundamental cleavage between truths which are analytic, or grounded in
meanings independently of matters of fact, and truth which are synthetic, or grounded in fact.
2. The other dogma is reductionism: the belief that each meaningful statement is equivalent to some
logical construct upon terms which refer to immediate experience.
-will argue Both dogmas, are ill founded.
-One effect of abandoning them is, a blurring of the supposed boundary between speculative
metaphysics and natural science. Another effect is a shift toward pragmatism.
. BACKGROUND FOR ANALYTICITY
- Leibniz's distinction between truths of reason and truths of fact: Leibniz spoke of the truths of reason as true
in all possible worlds.
-this is to say that the truths of reason are those which could not possibly be false.
- In the same vein we hear analytic statements defined as statements whose denials are self-contradictory. But
this definition has, small explanatory value
- the notion of self contradictoriness, in the broad sense needed for this definition of analyticity, stands in
exactly the same need of clarification as does the notion of analyticity itself
-Kant conceived of an analytic statement as one that attributes to its subject no more than is already
conceptually contained in the subject.
-This formulation has two shortcomings: it limits itself to statements of subject-predicate form, and it appeals
to a notion of containment which is left at a metaphorical level.
-evident more from the use he makes of the notion of analyticity than from his definition of it, can be restated
thus: a statement is analytic when it is true by virtue of meanings and independently of fact
-general terms: With generalterms, or predicates, Whereas a singular term purports to name an entity, abstract
or concrete, a general term does not; but a general term is true of an entity,or of each of many, or of none. The
class of all entities of which a general term is true is called the extension of the term.
-The Aristotelian notion of essence was the forerunner of the modern notion of intension or meaning. For
Aristotle it was essential in men to be rational, accidental to be two-legged.
-an important difference between this attitude and the doctrine of meaning. From the latter point of view it may
indeed be conceded that rationality is involved in the meaning of the word 'man' while two-leggedness is not
-meaning and reference are distinct
Statements which are analytic by general philosophical acclaim arenot, indeed, far to seek. They fall into two
classes. Those of the first class, which may be called logically true, are typified by:
(i) No unmarried man is married.
The relevant feature of this example is that it is not merely true as it stands, but remains true under any and all
reinterpretations of 'man' and 'married'.
-a second class of analytic statements, typified by:
(2) No bachelor is married.
The characteristic of such a statement is that it can be turned into a logical truth by putting synonyms for
synonyms; thus (2) can be turned into (i) by putting 'unmarried man' for its synonym 'bachelor'. We still lack a
proper characterization of this second class of analytic statement.
-Carnap has tended to explain analyticity by appeal to what he calls state-descriptions. A state-description is
any exhaustive assignment of truth values to the atomic, or noncompound, statements of the language.
-All other statements of the language are, Carnap assumes, built up of their component clauses by means of the
familiar logical devices, in such a way that the truth value of any complex statement is fixed for each state-
description by specifiable logical laws.
-A statement is then explained as analytic when it comes out true under every state-description.
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
One effect of abandoning them is, a blurring of the supposed boundary between speculative metaphysics and natural science. Leibniz"s distinction between truths of reason and truths of fact: leibniz spoke of the truths of reason as true in all possible worlds. This is to say that the truths of reason are those which could not possibly be false. In the same vein we hear analytic statements defined as statements whose denials are self-contradictory. The notion of self contradictoriness, in the broad sense needed for this definition of analyticity, stands in exactly the same need of clarification as does the notion of analyticity itself. Kant conceived of an analytic statement as one that attributes to its subject no more than is already conceptually contained in the subject. This formulation has two shortcomings: it limits itself to statements of subject-predicate form, and it appeals to a notion of containment which is left at a metaphorical level.
