William Child

Donald Davidson offers an explanation of first‐person authority that “traces the source of the authority to a necessary feature of the interpretation of speech.” His account is explained, and an interpretation is offered of its two key ingredients: the idea that by using the device of disquotation, a speaker can state the meanings of her words in a specially error‐free way, and the idea that a speaker cannot generally misuse her own words, because it is that use that gives her words their meaning. The account is defended against misinterpretations and criticisms. But it is argued that Davidson does not explain what is most puzzling about our knowledge of the meanings of our words, or about the asymmetry between our knowledge of our own minds and our knowledge of others' minds. Finally, Davidson's argument for the compatibility of first person authority and semantic externalism is explained and defended.

This chapter distinguishes two uses of the terms “inner” and “outer” in Wittgenstein's writings on philosophy of mind. It discusses the inner‐outer picture by exploring Wittgenstein's account of the origin and appeal of the picture, his reasons for rejecting it, and his own very different way of thinking of common‐sense psychology. The chapter considers his account of our relation to our own experiences and attitudes, and discusses his suggestion that utterances like 'I'm in pain' or 'I want an apple' are avowals or expressions of a person's experiences and attitudes. It discusses Wittgenstein's positive view of the relation between “inner” mental states and “outer” behavior. The inner–outer picture, as Wittgenstein describes it, has a metaphysical and an epistemic dimension. The inner–outer picture encourages the view that our use of language in self‐ascriptions of current experiences and attitudes is analogous to its use in talking about the non‐mental world.

Part 1 of this paper sketches Wittgenstein’s opposition to scientism in general. Part 2 explores his opposition to scientism in philosophy focusing, in particular, on philosophy of mind; how must philosophy of mind proceed if it is to avoid the kind of scientism that Wittgenstein complains about? Part 3 examines a central anti-scientistic strand in Wittgenstein’s Last Writings on the Philosophy of Psychology volume II: his treatment of the ‘uncertainty’ of the relation between ‘outer’ behaviour and ‘inner’ experiences and mental states.

Wittgenstein’s philosophy involves a general anti-platonism about properties or standards of similarity. On his view, what it is for one thing to have the same property as another is not dictated by reality itself; it depends on our classificatory practices and the standards of similarity they embody. Wittgenstein’s anti-platonism plays an important role in the private language sections and in his discussion of the conceptual problem of other minds. In sharp contrast to Wittgenstein’s views stands the contemporary doctrine of natural properties, which holds that there is an objective hierarchy of naturalness amongst properties, a hierarchy that is completely independent of our concepts or practices. Some authors have appealed to the natural properties view to offer an explicitly anti-Wittgensteinian account of sensation concepts. The paper discusses these competing views of properties and sensation concepts. It is argued that, if our account of concepts of conscious states starts from a commitment to natural properties, we are bound to recognize that our actual classificatory practices also play a crucial role in determining which properties our concepts pick out. On the other hand, if we start from the anti-platonist position, we are bound to recognize that we also need a notion of sameness of property that extends beyond our limited capacity to recognize similarity or sameness of property. The correct view, it is concluded, must occupy a middle position between an extreme anti-realism about properties and an extreme version of the natural properties view. It is suggested that Wittgenstein’s own view does just that.

It is natural to say that when we acquire a new concept or concepts, or grasp a new theory, or master a new practice, we come to see things in a new way: we perceive phenomena that we were not previously aware of; we come to see patterns or connections that we did not previously see. That natural idea has been applied in many areas, including the philosophy of science, the philosophy of religion, and the philosophy of language. And, in reflecting on the character of philosophy itself, Wittgenstein himself associates the introduction of a new concept in philosophy with the discovery of a new way of looking at things (PI §401), and says that the point of presenting us with an imagined example may be to change our way of looking at things (PI §144). The paper considers four interrelated questions about this association between seeing-as and change, novelty, or innovation. 1. Is there an important difference between the case where the change in someone’s way of seeing things involves the invention or discovery of a completely new concept, a completely new theory etc., and the case where it involves the person’s coming to understand an existing concept or theory? 2. Is there a special connection between seeing-as and conceptual or theoretical change or creativity: a connection that does not obtain between seeing-as and using or applying a familiar theory or system of concepts? 3. In cases where seeing-as is associated with novelty or creativity, is there any sense in which the fact that someone sees things in a new way can help to explain their conceptual or theoretical creativity? 4. To the extent that there is some association between seeing-as and novelty or creativity, why if at all does it matter that one experiences things in a certain way? Would someone who was aspect-blind be any worse off with respect to creativity or innovation than the rest of us? And if so, why?

The paper discusses two aspects of Wittgenstein’s middle-period discussions of the self and the use of ‘I’. First, it considers the distinction Wittgenstein draws in his 1933 Cambridge lectures between two ‘utterly different’ uses of the word ‘I’. It is shown that Wittgenstein’s discussion describes a number of different and non-equivalent distinctions between uses of ‘I’. It is argued that his claims about some of these distinctions are defensible but that his reasoning in other cases is unconvincing. Second, the paper considers the distinction drawn in the Blue Book between the use of ‘I’ as subject and the use of ‘I’ as object. A number of commentators have contended that this Blue Book distinction between uses of ‘I’ is erroneous, that Wittgenstein soon realized that, and that he dropped the idea of such a distinction from his later work. Against those claims, it is argued that Wittgenstein’s distinction between the use of ‘I’ as subject and its use as object is correct and illuminating. And it is shown that, though we do not find the ‘as-subject’/’as-object’ terminology in Wittgenstein’s subsequent work, the essential point of the Blue Book distinction is not abandoned but remains in place in Philosophical Investigations.

A central theme in Wittgenstein’s post-Tractatus remarks on the limits of language is that we ‘cannot use language to get outside language’. One illustration of that idea is his comment that, once we have described the procedure of teaching and learning a rule, we have ‘said everything that can be said about acting correctly according to the rule’; ‘we can go no further’. That, it is argued, is an expression of anti-reductionism about meaning and rules. A framework is presented for assessing the debate between reductionist and anti-reductionist readings of Wittgenstein’s views about meaning and use. It is argued that that debate cannot be settled merely by reference to Wittgenstein’s general opposition to reductionism. An important argument for anti-reductionism about rules and meaning, from Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics, is discussed. Putative evidence of reductionism about meaning in the Brown Book is considered; an alternative reading is proposed. The nature of Wittgenstein’s anti-reductionism is examined. It is argued, first, that Wittgenstein accepts that semantic and normative facts supervene on non-semantic, non-normative facts and, second, that at many points his treatment of meaning and rules goes beyond the kind of pleonastic claim that is often taken to define non-reductionist, quietist, positions in philosophy.

The paper considers three questions. First, what is the connection between economics and agency? It is argued that causation and explanation in economics fundamentally depend on agency. So a philosophical understanding of economic explanation must be sensitive to an understanding of agency. Second, what is the connection between agency and causation? A causal view of agency-involving explanation is defended against a number of arguments from the resurgent noncausalist tradition in the literature on agency and action-explanation. If agency is fundamental to economic explanation, it is argued, then so is causation. Third, what is the connection between causal explanation and the natural sciences? It is argued that, though the explanations given in economics and other social sciences are causal explanations, they are different in kind from the causal explanations of the natural sciences. On the one hand, then, the causal explanations of the social sciences are irreducible to those found in the natural sciences. On the other hand, the causal relations described by the social sciences are not completely autonomous; they do not float free of, or operate independently from, the causal relations charted by the natural sciences.

What is the relation between meaning and use? This chapter first defends a non-reductionist understanding of Wittgenstein’s suggestion that ‘the meaning of a word is its use in the language’; facts about meaning cannot be reduced to, or explained in terms of, facts about use, characterized non-semantically. Nonetheless, it is contended, facts about meaning do supervene on non-semantic facts about use. That supervenience thesis is suggested by comments of Wittgenstein’s and is consistent with his view of meaning and rule-following. Semantic supervenience is then defended against two criticisms: first, John McDowell’s suggestion that the supervenience thesis falsifies the epistemology of meaning and fails to accommodate common-sense truths about meaning; second, a series of counter-examples proposed by Stephen Kearns and Ofra Magidor, who argue that worlds may differ semantically without differing non-semantically. It is argued that neither criticism is convincing: we should accept the thesis that semantic facts supervene on non-semantic facts.

Is there a plausible middle position in the debate between realists and constructivists about categories or kinds? Such a position may seem to be contained in the account of triangulation that Donald Davidson develops in recent writings. On this account, the kinds we pick out are determined by an interaction between our shared similarity responses and causal relations between us and things in our environment. So kinds and categories are neither imposed on us by the nature of the world, nor imposed by us on an intrinsically unstructured reality. But the picture derivable from Davidson's account of triangulation can be interpreted in either of two ways. On one interpretation, it collapses into constructivism. On the other, it turns out to be very close to the most plausible versions of realism. It is argued that Davidson's attempts to distinguish his view from Putnam's realism about natural kinds are unsuccessful. So Davidson's account of triangulation does indeed suggest a plausible view of kinds. But that view is a version of traditional realist views, not an alternative to them.

Available from UMI in association with The British Library. Requires signed TDF. ;I deal with two themes: the idea that an account of thought should be given by giving an account of the ascription of thoughts by a radical interpreter--which I call interpretationism; and the idea that psychological concepts like action and perception are essentially causal. It has often been thought that these two themes conflict; or at least, that if they can co-exist, then they must be kept separate, and associated with different perspectives on behaviour. But is that right? I discuss the character of interpretationism and the nature of causal theories, and examine the extent to which the two themes are compatible. ;Chapter I explains and argues for an interpretationist approach, distinguishing between different interpretationist views, and defending interpretationism against various common objections. ;Chapter II examines the links between interpretationism and the anomalousness of the mental. I discuss a number of different arguments and distinguish a range of theses about anomalousness and indeterminacy which they may support. ;Chapter III discusses the motivation for causal theories. I explain why it matters that we should give causal theories within an interpretationist perspective rather than treating the two themes as insights of different perspectives; and I examine the difficulties of doing so. ;Chapter IV considers the causal theory of vision. I argue against the view that the interpretationist's conception of experience undermines the causal theory. ;Chapter V considers the case of action. I develop a substantive causal theory of action which responds to the following argument: that if we accept the interpretationist's claim that the mental is anomalous, then we must concede that mental properties cannot be causally relevant. ;From the particular cases, and on general grounds, I conclude that it is possible to adopt an interpretationist perspective which simultaneously sees the mental in causal terms; and that such a perspective is essential for an adequate understanding of the mind.

What is the relation between interpreting a person's speech and actions, on the one hand, and interpreting a written text, on the other? That question is considered in connection with the theories of interpretation offered by Donald Davidson and Paul Ricoeur. There are some important similarities between those theories. However, it is argued that Davidson and Ricoeur are divided on fundamental questions about the relation between meaning and intention, about the reference of texts, about the relation between the meanings of texts and the meanings of spoken words, and about the notion of correctness that applies to interpretation. On each of these points, it is contended, Davidson has the better of the dispute.

How should we understand our capacity to remember our past intentional states? And what can we leam from Wittgenstein's treatment of this topic? Three questions are considered. First, what is the relation between our past attitudes and our present beliefs about them? Realism about past attitudes is defended. Second, how should we understand Wittgenstein's view that self‐ascriptions of past attitudes are a kind of “response” and that the “language‐game” of reporting past attitudes is “the primary thing”? The epistemology and metaphysics of past‐tense self‐ascription are examined in the light of those comments, and our acquisition of the concept of past attitudes is discussed. Third, does Wittgenstein give us reason to think that the identity of a past attitude may be constituted, not by anything that was true of the subject at the time, but by her retrospective tendency to self‐ascribe it? It is argued that, contrary to some interpretations, he does not.