Page 49 - Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Language

moral duties, or political activity, were held by many to be confined to issues discussable in linguistic terms. Examples were, respectively, the determination of necessary and sufficient conditions for predicating 'He knows that...' of someone, the definition of'duty' in terms of universal imperatives, and examination of the vocabulary of political dialogue.
1.5 Philosophical Concern about How Language
Itself Functions
The concept of meaning has been much discussed, and attention has been particularly focused on the role played by truth-conditions (Davidson 1984), veri- fiability (Ayer 1936), social conventions (Lewis 1969), or psychological factors (Grice 1957) in an adequate theory of meaning. A connected topic is the theory of reference, including questions about what the world has to be like for reference to be possible (Strawson
1959).
1.6 Quine's Holism
W. V. O. Quine (1953) argued that linguistic phil- osophers like Ayer (1936) are wrong to suppose that sentences expressing beliefs can be divided into two fundamentally different groups—those that are thought acceptable in virtue of empirically detectable facts, and those that are thought true solely in virtue of their meanings, such as My brother is in London and My brother is my sibling, respectively. Instead, all beliefs are at risk before the tribunal of experience, though each individual may be more reluctant to change some than others. Nevertheless, Quine (1960) endorsed the methodological strategy of what he calls 'semantic assent.' By semantic assent, speakers may, according to Quine, avoid difficulties that arise in talk- ing about the existence or nature of certain alleged things, events, or processes: they are to talk instead about the contexts in which it is appropriate to use those things' names. Correspondingly, theunderlying structure of mathematical and scientific theories is best disclosed by regimenting them into a logically more perspicuous notation.
1.7 Ordinary Language Philosophy
This is the philosophical perspective principally associated with J. L. Austin and his followers, as articulated in Austin's seminal paper (Austin 1957) and discussed in more detail in the article Ordinary Language Philosophy. The idea is that, by attention to the fine nuances of actual linguistic usage, a phil- osopher can notice important conceptual distinctions and relations which might provide new insights into traditional philosophical problems, including those of knowledge, ethics, and mind.
2. Linguistic Philosophy in the 1990s
In the first half of the twentieth century, analytical philosophy was describable as comprehensively
'linguistic,' sometimes because of the problems with which it dealt (Sects. 1.4, 1.5), sometimes because of the methods that it adopted (Sects. 1.1,1.2, 1.6), and sometimes because of the claims that it asserted (Sects. 1.3, 1.7). Since about 1960, however, analytical phil- osophers have progressively tended to take up less doctrinaire positions. For example, it is generally seen as a legitimate philosophical enterprise to discuss the rival merits of appealing to a presumptive social con- tract, or to the maximization of human happiness, for the foundations of justice (rather than merely focusing on the meanings of the terms used or the status of the speech acts involved). Substantive ethical issues about abortion, euthanasia, reverse discrimination, etc., are also thought legitimate subjects of philosophical debate. The results of psychological experiments are no longer regarded as being outside the domain of philosophical interest, since they may affect issues about memory, belief, rationality, etc. Nor is the nat- ure of time, or of matter, thought a suitable topic for discussion by philosophers unacquainted with rel- evant areas of theoretical physics. Those who still assert a comprehensively linguistic conception of phil- osophy, such as Dummett (1978: 458), have become rather rare.
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