Table Of ContentQUINE:A GUIDE FOR
THE PERPLEXED
THE GUIDES FOR THE PERPLEXED SERIES
Benjamin Hutchens, Levinas: A Guide for the Perplexed
Alex Thomson, Adorno: A Guide for the Perplexed
Claire Colebrook, Deleuze: A Guide for the Perplexed
Chris Lawn, Gadamer: A Guide for the Perplexed
Mark Addis, Wittgenstein: A Guide for the Perplexed
Matheson Russell, Husserl: A Guide for the Perplexed
Eric Mattews, Merleau-Ponty: A Guide for the Perplexed
QUINE:A GUIDE FOR
THE PERPLEXED
GARY KEMP
continuum
N E WR K • L O N D O N
Continuum International Publishing Group
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First published 2006
www. continuumbooks. com
© Gary Kemp 2006
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval
system, without prior permission from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 0 8264 8486 7 (hardback) 0 8264 8487 5 (paperback)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kemp, Gary, 1960 Oct. 15-
Quine : a guide for the perplexed / Gary Kemp.
p. cm. — (The guides for the perplexed series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8264-8486-7 (hardback) — ISBN 0-8264-8487-5 (pbk.)
1. Quine, W. V. (Willard Van Orman). I. Title. II. Guides for the
perplexed.
B945.Q54K46 2006
191—dc22 2005037798
Typeset by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk
Printed and bound in Great Britain by Ashford Colour Press Ltd.,
Gosport, Hampshire
CONTENTS
Abbreviations vi
Preface ix
1 Philosophy as Quine found it 1
Quine as philosopher and anti-philosopher 1
Empiricism and the claims of science 3
Logical empiricism 5
Linguistic frameworks, analyticity and tolerance 8
2 Convention, analyticity and holism 13
Truth by Convention': preliminaries 13
Truth by Convention': Quine's objections 16
The first dogma of Two Dogmas': analyticity 19
The second dogma: reductionism 23
Further points on definition, postulation and the limits
of syntax 29
3 The indeterminacy of translation 35
From criticism to construction 35
Aproaching the natives 38
Stimulus meaning and observation sentences 40
Synonymy and analyticity considered anew 46
Analytical hypotheses 47
Indeterminacy of translation 52
Reflecting on indeterminacy 56
4 Naturalized epistemology and the roots of reference 68
Reciprocal containment 68
Evidence and the connection of language to the world 73
Focusing on the individual 76
The psychology of learning 79
V
CONTENTS
Language: observation sentences to theory 85
Reference 8
5 Truth, ontology and the language of science 95
The ontological question 95
The actuary of science 9
To be is to be the value of a boundvariable105 105
Posits, reality and reduction 110
Ontological relativity 115
Truth 19
6 Extenionality and abstract ontology 128
Causality and dispositions 128
'No entity without identity': abstract objects, good and
bad 132
Propositional atitudes 137
Modality 145
7 Science, philosophy and common sense 151
The rejection of first philosophy 151
Quine and analytic philosophy 155
Lingering questions 164
Bibliography 174
Index 1
vi
ABBREVIATIONS
Quine's writings are noted in the text according to the following
scheme of abbreviation.
FLPV: From a Logical Point of View
FM: 'Facts of the Matter'
IPOS: 'In Praise of Observation Sentences'
ML: Mathematical Logic
NEN: 'Notes on Existence and Necessity'
OR: Ontological Relativity and Other Essays
PL\ Philosophy of Logic
PT: Pursuit of Truth
Q: Quiddities
QQ: 'Quine on Quine' (sentences by Quine, arranged by Burton
Dreben)
RIT: 'On the Reasons for the Indeterminacy of Translation'
RR: The Roots of Reference
SS: From Stimulus to Science
SLP: Selected Logic Papers
TT: Theories and Things
WB: The Web of Belief
WO: Word and Object
WP: The Ways of Paradox
vii
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PREFACE
Frege and Russell were analytic philosophy's great pioneers. And it
was Wittgenstein who inspired something like devotion, and whose
name crops up most outside academic philosophy. But within the
hardnosed professional practice of analytic philosophy over the past
60 years, the most thoroughly influential has been Willard Van
Orman Quine (1908-2000). He formulated the most incisive criti-
cisms of logical positivism in the 1930s and 1940s, inaugurated many
of the signature analytical topics of the 1950s and 1960s, elaborated
challenging new paradigms in ontology and epistemology in the
1970s and 1980s, and published some of his most lucid philosophical
writing as late as the 1990s. Along the way, he not only contributed
to the rise of mathematical logic, but did more than anyone to estab-
lish the central role it has come to play in philosophical analysis.
Since the Second World War Quine has shaped the philosophical
landscape in which we live.
Nevertheless, much of what is most powerful and deeply interesting
in Quine is not widely understood, and many of his specific
claims have provoked more antagonism than admiration. Indeed a
certain caricature of Quine is easy to draw, and widely subscribed
to: the nay-sayer, who is said to be 'sceptical' of this or that philo-
sophical idea, to 'reject' this one or 'deem unintelligible' that one. An
imperious party-pooper. The caricature is unjustified, but to explain
why is not simple. Quine was above all a systematic philosopher,
and the force of his particular claims cannot always be appreciated
without understanding the larger framework or perspective from
which they emerge. Analytical philosophy often looks as if it has
no such framework or perspective, as if it were really only the piece-
meal application of a method, not the imposition of any particular
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