Nigel Hems

This paper develops a species–genus account of knowledge and belief through a reconstruction of A.J. Ayer’s epistemology, with particular attention to its contrast with Gilbert Ryle’s generic distinction. It argues that basic statements, or basic beliefs, occupy a foundational role in Ayer’s account and possess a distinctive Ayerian epistemic warrant for empirical certainty grounded in observation. These statements are pre-dispositional and may be expressed categorically, independently of causal or hypothetical conditions. By integrating knowing-how with knowing-that, the paper clarifies the role of meaning rules in guiding the correct use of basic statements. It further shows how sense-data can be accommodated within this framework, preserving their epistemic function while avoiding the difficulties raised by Ryle’s critique.

In this paper, I argue for a systematic account of propositions as statements through reconstructive engagement with A. J. Ayer and Gilbert Ryle, using historical analysis as the method rather than the end to highlight their shared effort to eliminate mentalistic and realist assumptions. Both aim to explain factual and non-factual statements without appeal to intentional acts or abstract “objects of thought.” Ayer's Thinking and Meaning (1947, hereafter TaM) reduces propositions to meaningful symbols, while his later “Meaning and Intentionality" (1967, hereafter MaI) advances a more thoroughgoing eliminativism that dissolves propositional talk altogether. I respond by developing a framework that treats propositions as statements, preserving their role in ordinary language while avoiding metaphysical commitments. Drawing on Ryle's “Are There Propositions?” (1971b, hereafter ATP), I reconstruct the implicit conceptual structures of his account to articulate a triadic system of “thinking of … as,” matter–form schemata, and empirico-logical conditionals. These structures function as formal resources rather than ontological posits. The resulting reconstruction provides a novel anti-representationalist and anti-realist account of propositions—one that preserves the empirical significance of statements while bridging the divide between eliminativist and ontologically inflationary approaches.

Ayer’s Thinking and Meaning (1947, hereafter TaM) is concerned with eliminating facets of the commonly held conception of thinking. I argue that this strategy meets with stubborn resistance in the case of silent, or unspoken thoughts, which I set out to defend from elimination in this essay. Ayer’s early inclinations towards behaviouristic analysis evolved into a more charitable position, accommodating the theoretical distinguishability of inner experience from physical processes. In TaM, Ayer seeks to establish a neutral position for the mental realm by reducing the factors involved in thinking to the symbolic realm. I set out two specific arguments to demonstrate that Ayer’s attempt to address the reduction of the process of thought and the object of thought is unsuccessful in the case of unspoken thoughts. If my reasoning is sound, then the retention of processes of thought has significant implications for Ayer’s wider linguistic philosophy and indirectly supports methodologies that Ayer was implicitly opposing, such as phenomenological theories, which utilize the very acts and objects of thought Ayer aimed to eliminate in TaM.

This paper offers a defence of sense-datum statements from A.J. Ayer’s perspective that represents a response to Quine’s naturalistic ontology. Starting with Quine’s “On What There Is” (1948), and the following “Symposium” of 1951, I argue that Ayer’s proposed method of establishing sense-datum statements in his “Symposium” piece, which challenges Quine’s ontology of physical objects, is not a viable alternative to Quine’s scientific naturalism. I argue that by taking a broadly intensional approach, Ayer can offer a response to Quine’s position. More specifically, I contend that it is possible to form a distinctly non-scientific, epistemological account of sense-data by employing primitive “sensory predicates” within basic propositions. In terms of ontology, a technical ruling for “existence”, working alongside appropriate “meaning-rules”, legislates for basic sense-datum statements, thus distancing them from the regimented, extensionalised, stimulus meaning strategy indicative of Quine’s naturalistic ontology.