On Truth and Meaning: Language, Logic and the Grounds of Belief

214 Pages·2006·1.384 MB·

by  Christopher Norris

On Truth and Meaning:
Language, Logic and the
Grounds of Belief
Christopher Norris
Continuum
On Truth and Meaning
Also available from Continuum:
Epistemology: Key Concepts in Philosophy, Christopher Norris
Deconstruction and the ‘Unfinished Project of Modernity’, Christopher Norris
On Truth and Meaning:
Language, Logic and the
Grounds of Belief
Christopher Norris
For Terry Hawkes
Continuum International Publishing Group
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#Christopher Norris 2006
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproducedortransmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording,oranyinformationstorageorretrievalsystem,withoutpriorpermission
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ChristopherNorrishasassertedhisrightundertheCopyright,DesignsandPatents
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue recordfor thisbook is availablefrom the British Library.
ISBN: 0-8264-9127-8 (hardback) 0-8264-9128-6(paperback)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Norris, Christopher,1947-
Ontruthandmeaning:language,logicandthegoundsofbelief/Christopher
Norris.
p.cm.
Includes index.
ISBN0-8264-9127-8 (hardback) –ISBN 0-8264-9128-6 (pbk.)
1. Analysis (Philosophy) 2.Languageand languages–Philosophy. 3.Knowledge,
Theory of. I.Title.
B808.5.N652006
121–dc22 2006000667
TypesetbyYHTLtd,London
PrintedandboundinGreatBritainbyMPGBooksLtd,Cornwall
Contents
Introduction and Acknowledgements 1
1. Who’s Afraid of Psychologism? Normativity, Truth, and
Epistemic Warrant 12
2. Meaning, Truth, and Causal Explanation: The ‘Humean
Condition’ Revisited 41
3. Epistemology, Language, and the Realism Debate 75
4. The Blank and the Die: More Dilemmas of Post-Empiricism 102
5. Ethics, Autonomy, and the Grounds of Belief 130
6. Kripkenstein’s Monsters: Anti-realism, Scepticism, and the
Rule-Following Debate 155
Index of names 203
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Preface
This book explores a range of contiguous issues in epistemology, ethics and
philosophyofmind,language,andlogic.Itmarksafurtherstageintheauthor’s
project of developing a realist, truth-based approach that would point a way
beyond the various unresolved dilemmas and dichotomies bequeathed by old-
style logical empiricism. In a series of closely argued chapters Norris draws out
the two chief kinds of deficit – normative and casual-explanatory – that have
characterized much recent work in the mainstream analytic line of descent. He
pinpoints theirsource in thevarious failedattempts,afterQuine, to makegood
the promise of a naturalized epistemology that would somehow remedy those
defects while not falling prey to the Quinean barrage of sceptical counter-
arguments. Elsewhere – as in the debate around Kripke’s reading of Wittgen-
stein on‘followingarule’–philosophershavesoughttoheadoffthethreatofa
yet more radical scepticism aimed at the very ground rules of logical thought.
The opening chapter sets the issues in a longer historical perspective by
examining Frege’s objectivist conception of mathematics, logic and the formal
sciences, his outright rejection of ‘psychologism’ in any guise, and the resultant
(mistaken)ideaamongmanyanalyticphilosophersthatthischargewasjustified
in the case of Husserlian transcendental phenomenology. Hence, Norris argues,
theriftthatopenedupbetweenthe‘twotraditions’ofcontemporaryphilosophic
thought, one consequence of which was the analytic failure to develop precisely
those normative resources that were needed in order to break out of the post-
Quineanimpasse.Hisbookthenproceedsthroughcriticalengagementwiththe
work of(amongothers)DonaldDavidson,SaulKripke,JohnMcDowell,Hilary
Putnam,RichardRortyandCrispinWright.Italsomountsavigorouschallenge
totheprominentstrainofanti-realistthinkingfirstespousedonlogico-semantic
and metaphysical grounds by Michael Dummett and more recently subject to
revision and refinement by Neil Tennant. A chapter on ‘Ethics, Autonomy, and
theGroundsofBelief’pursuestheseissuesintoadifferent thoughgermanearea
of enquiry. Altogether Norris’ book provides a wide-ranging and distinctively
angled perspective on some of the most challenging topics in current philoso-
phical debate.
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Introduction and Acknowledgements
This book has to do mainly with topics in epistemology and philosophy of
language, although it does take a few parallel routes (I hope not detours or
excursions)throughvariousneighbouringterrains.Amongitscentralthemesare
a number of much-rehearsed but as yet unresolved questions that have pre-
occupied many analytic philosophers since the demise of old-style logical
empiricism. They include the issue of priority between logic and psychology
posedmostforcefullybyFregeandstillamatterofdisputeinsomequarters;the
problem of ‘radical interpretation’ across variant paradigms or conceptual
schemes as raised by Quine, Kuhn, Davidson and others; the debate around
realism and anti-realism that has lately assumed centre-stage in consequence of
Dummett’s logico-semantic recasting of earlier verificationist arguments; the
issue as to what properly counts as ‘following a rule’, taken up by Saul Kripke
with presumptive warrant from late Wittgenstein; the role of causal reasoning
(orinferencetothebestexplanation)inepistemologyandphilosophyofscience;
and the question whether one can wrest a viable conception of free will or
autonomoushumanagencyandchoicefromacausal-realistapproachofthistype
when extended to philosophy of mind. Between them, these issues have pretty
much defined the agenda of current debate, at least in the mainstream analytic
journals and amongst the most prominent post-1970 arbiters of philosophic
relevance and worth. Then there are various related topics such as the extent to
which a middle-ground position – e.g., ‘internal’ (framework) realism or the
response-dispositional approach – might offer what’s needed by way of reply to
the anti-realist challenge or the rule-following paradox.
Meanwhile some broadly ‘analytic’ philosophers (among them John
McDowell and Robert Brandom) have shown an increased willingness to place
such concerns within a wider cultural and a longer chronological perspective,
lookingbacktoKant–evenHegel–fora bettersenseofwheretheseproblems
firsttookholdandmaybeforaglimpseofnewhorizonsbeyondthem.Soonthe
one hand it might plausibly be said that the present-day analytic scene is more
diverse and less set in its ways than at any time since Russell and Moore
famously announced their break with the discourse of German idealism, and
Frege just as firmly signalled his objections to the project of Husserlian phe-
nomenology.Ontheotherhanditislikelytostrikeanyreaderwithamorethan
passing knowledge of work in the post-Kantian mainland European tradition
thattheseoverturesfromtheanalyticsideofthefencearecouchedverymuchin