-
Eve Gaudet, Quine on Meaning: The Indeterminacy of Translation (review)Philosophy in Review 27 (1): 30. 2007.
-
110Between primitivism and naturalism: Brandom’s theory of meaningActa Analytica 21 (3): 3-22. 2006.Many philosophers accept that a naturalistic reduction of meaning is in principle impossible, since behavioural regularities or dispositions are consistent with any number of semantic descriptions. One response is to view meaning as primitive. In this paper, I explore Brandom’s alternative, which is to specify behaviour in non-semantic but normative terms. Against Brandom, I argue that a norm specified in non-semantic terms might correspond to any number of semantic norms. Thus, his theory of me…Read more
-
227Conceptual role semanticsInternet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2006.In the philosophy of language, conceptual role semantics (hereafter CRS) is a theory of what constitutes the meanings possessed by expressions of natural languages, or the propositions expressed by their utterance. In the philosophy of mind, it is a theory of what constitutes the contents of psychological attitudes, such as beliefs or desires. CRS comes in a variety of forms, not always clearly distinguished by commentators. Such versions are known variously as functional/causal/computational ro…Read more
-
307Spinoza, the No Shared Attribute thesis, and the principle of sufficient reasonBritish Journal for the History of Philosophy 19 (3). 2011.British Journal for the History of Philosophy, Volume 19, Issue 3, Page 543-548, May 2011
-
813The Glass is Half Empty: A New Argument for Pessimism about Aesthetic TestimonyBritish Journal of Aesthetics 55 (1): 91-107. 2015.Call the view that it is possible to acquire aesthetic knowledge via testimony, optimism, and its denial, pessimism. In this paper, I offer a novel argument for pessimism. It works by turning attention away from the basis of the relevant belief, namely, testimony, and toward what that belief in turn provides a basis for, namely, other attitudes. In short, I argue that an aesthetic belief acquired via testimony cannot provide a rational basis for further attitudes, such as admiration, and that th…Read more
-
1115Nothing but the Truth: On the Norms and Aims of BeliefIn Timothy Chan (ed.), The Aim of Belief, Oxford University Press. 2013.That truth provides the standard for believing appears to be a platitude, one which dovetails with the idea that in some sense belief aims only at the truth. In recent years, however, an increasing number of prominent philosophers have suggested that knowledge provides the standard for believing, and so that belief aims only at knowledge. In this paper, I examine the considerations which have been put forward in support of this suggestion, considerations relating to lottery beliefs, Moorean beli…Read more
-
323Epistemic value and achievementRatio 25 (2): 216-230. 2012.Knowledge seems to be a good thing, or at least better than epistemic states that fall short of it, such as true belief. Understanding too seems to be a good thing, perhaps better even than knowledge. In a number of recent publications, Duncan Pritchard tries to account for the value of understanding by claiming that understanding is a cognitive achievement and that achievements in general are valuable. In this paper, I argue that coming to understand something need not be an achievement, and so…Read more
-
20Is there such a thing as a language?In William Irwin & Richard Brian Davis (eds.), Alice in Wonderland and Philosophy: Curiouser and Curiouser, Wiley. 2009.A paper aimed primarily at a non-academic audience in which I suggest that Lewis Carroll's Alice novels can be viewed, in part, as exploring two competing conceptions of language, conceptions that the philosopher Donald Davidson critically examines. According to the Institutional View, language is a system of rules regulating the use of words and words have the meanings that they do in virtue of those rules. According to the Invention View, what words mean is rather a matter of how the speaker i…Read more
-
417Does belief (only) aim at the truth?Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 93 (2): 279-300. 2012.It is common to hear talk of the aim of belief and to find philosophers appealing to that aim for numerous explanatory purposes. What belief 's aim explains depends, of course, on what that aim is. Many hold that it is somehow related to truth, but there are various ways in which one might specify belief 's aim using the notion of truth. In this article, by considering whether they can account for belief 's standard of correctness and the epistemic norms governing belief, I argue against certain…Read more
-
38A Luxury of the Understanding: On the Value of True Belief, by Allan Hazlett (review)Mind 125 (499): 918-922. 2016.
-
126The use of ‘use’Grazer Philosophische Studien 76 (1): 135-147. 2008.Many equate the meaning of a linguistic expression with its use. This paper investigates prominent objections to the equivalence claim and argues that they are unsuccessful. Once one suitably distinguishes the kind of use to be identified with meaning, the two do not diverge. Doing so, however, requires employing terms that are cognates of ‘meaning’ (if not ‘meaning’ itself). Nonetheless, I stress, this does not count against the equivalence claim. Moreover, one should not assume that the circul…Read more
-
108Review: A Sceptical Guide to Meaning and Rules: Defending Kripke's Wittgenstein (review)Mind 116 (464): 1132-1136. 2007.
-
142Particularly general and generally particular: language, rules and meaningLogique Et Analyse 53 (209): 77-90. 2010.Semantic generalists and semantic particularists disagree over the role of rules or principles in linguistic competence and in the determination of linguistic meaning, and hence over the importance of the notions of a rule or of a principle in philosophical accounts of language. In this paper, I have argued that the particularist’s case against generalism is far from decisive and that by moderating the claims she makes on behalf of her thesis the generalist can accommodate many of the considerat…Read more
-
177Languages, language-games, and forms of lifeIn Hans-Johann Glock & John Hyman (eds.), A Companion to Wittgenstein, Wiley-blackwell. 2017.In this paper, after outlining the methodological role Wittgenstein's appeal to language-games is supposed to play, I examine the picture of language which his discussion of such games and their relations to what Wittgenstein calls forms of life suggests. It is a picture according to which language and its employment are inextricably connected to wider contexts—they are embedded in specific natural and social environments, they are tied to purposive activities serving provincial needs, and caugh…Read more
-
61Meaning- theories and the principle of humanitySouthern Journal of Philosophy 44 (4): 697-716. 2006.In this paper, I briefly outline the notion of a truth-conditional meaning-theory and introduce two prominent problems it faces. The“extensionality problem” arises because not all correct specifications of truth-conditions are meaning-giving. The “explanatory problem”concerns the extent to which truth-conditional meaning-theories can contribute to the task of clarifying the nature of linguistic meaning.The “principle of humanity” is supposed to resolve both issues simultaneously. I argue that it…Read more
-
82Fregean sense and anti-individualismPhilosophical Books 48 (3): 233-240. 2007.The definitive version of this article is published in Philosophical Books 48.3 July 2007 pp. 233-240 by Blackwell Publishing, and is available at www.blackwell-synergy.com.
-
12Book Review: Maximilian de Gaynesfordl John McDowell. Polity, 2004 (review)Philosophical Papers 34 (1). 2005.NoAvailable Philosophical Papers Vol.34(1) 2005: 137-142
-
718If you justifiably believe that you ought to Φ, you ought to ΦPhilosophical Studies 173 (7): 1873-1895. 2016.In this paper, we claim that, if you justifiably believe that you ought to perform some act, it follows that you ought to perform that act. In the first half, we argue for this claim by reflection on what makes for correct reasoning from beliefs about what you ought to do. In the second half, we consider a number of objections to this argument and its conclusion. In doing so, we arrive at another argument for the view that justified beliefs about what you ought to do must be true, based in part …Read more
-
255Stick to the Facts: On the Norms of AssertionErkenntnis 78 (4): 847-867. 2013.The view that truth is the norm of assertion has fallen out of fashion. The recent trend has been to think that knowledge is the norm of assertion. Objections to the knowledge view proceed almost exclusively by appeal to alleged counterexamples. While it no doubt has a role to play, such a strategy relies on intuitions concerning hypothetical cases, intuitions which might not be shared and which might shift depending on how the relevant cases are fleshed out. In this paper, I reject the knowledg…Read more
-
557Truth is (Still) the Norm for Assertion: A Reply to LittlejohnErkenntnis 80 (6): 1245-1253. 2015.In a paper in this journal, I defend the view that truth is the fundamental norm for assertion and, in doing so, reject the view that knowledge is the fundamental norm for assertion. In a recent response, Littlejohn raises a number of objections against my arguments. In this reply, I argue that Littlejohn’s objections are unsuccessful
-
90Oughts and thoughts: Rule-following and the normativity of content – Anandi Hattiangadi (review)Philosophical Quarterly 58 (233): 743-745. 2008.No Abstract
-
649It’s Not What You Said, It’s the Way You Said It: Slurs and Conventional ImplicaturesAnalytic Philosophy 54 (3): 364-377. 2013.In this paper, I defend against a number of criticisms an account of slurs, according to which the same semantic content is expressed in the use of a slur as is expressed in the use of its neutral counterpart, while in addition the use of a slur conventionally implicates a negative, derogatory attitude. Along the way, I criticise competing accounts of the semantics and pragmatics of slurs, namely, Hom's 'combinatorial externalism' and Anderson and Lepore's 'prohibitionism'
-
16Duncan Pritchard, Adrian Haddock and Alan Millar's The Nature and Value of Knowledge: Three Investigations (review)Philosophical Quarterly 61 (244): 645-648. 2011.
-
886Against Second‐Order ReasonsNoûs 51 (2): 398-420. 2017.A normative reason for a person to? is a consideration which favours?ing. A motivating reason is a reason for which or on the basis of which a person?s. This paper explores a connection between normative and motivating reasons. More specifically, it explores the idea that there are second-order normative reasons to? for or on the basis of certain first-order normative reasons. In this paper, I challenge the view that there are second-order reasons so understood. I then show that prominent views …Read more
-
857What is the Normativity of Meaning?Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 59 (3): 219-238. 2016.There has been much debate over whether to accept the claim that meaning is normative. One obstacle to making progress in that debate is that it is not always clear what the claim amounts to. In this paper, I try to resolve a dispute between those who advance the claim concerning how it should be understood. More specifically, I critically examine two competing conceptions of the normativity of meaning, rejecting one and defending the other. Though the paper aims to settle a dispute among propon…Read more
-
31Metaepistemology (edited book)Oxford University Press. 2018.Epistemology, like ethics, is normative. Just as ethics addresses questions about how we ought to act, so epistemology addresses questions about how we ought to believe and enquire. We can also ask metanormative questions. What does it mean to claim that someone ought to do or believe something? Do such claims express beliefs about independently existing facts, or only attitudes of approval and disapproval towards certain pieces of conduct? How do putative facts about what people ought to do or …Read more
-
49Review: Mark Wilson, Wandering significance: an essay on conceptual behaviour. Oxford University Press, 2006 (review)Metapsychology Online Reviews 10 (36). 2006.
-
2525Reasons for Belief, Reasons for Action, the Aim of Belief, and the Aim of ActionIn Clayton Littlejohn & John Turri (eds.), Epistemic Norms: New Essays on Action, Belief, and Assertion, Oxford University Press. 2013.Subjects appear to take only evidential considerations to provide reason or justification for believing. That is to say that subjects do not take practical considerations—the kind of considerations which might speak in favour of or justify an action or decision—to speak in favour of or justify believing. This is puzzling; after all, practical considerations often seem far more important than matters of truth and falsity. In this paper, I suggest that one cannot explain this, as many have tried, …Read more
-
25Mind, Method, and Morality: Essays in Honour of Anthony Kenny – Edited by John Cottingham and Peter Hacker (review)Philosophical Investigations 34 (1): 97-101. 2010.
Areas of Specialization
Epistemology |
Meta-Ethics |
Aesthetics |
17th/18th Century British Philosophy |
Philosophy of Language |
Areas of Interest
20th Century Philosophy |
Value Theory |