Resolving the Dispute Between Ideal and Ordinary Language Approaches

2019 ◽  
pp. 220-244
Author(s):  
Oskari Kuusela
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language ◽  
Ordinary Language ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Scientific Methodology ◽  
Philosophical Methodology ◽  
Ideal Language ◽  
Language School ◽  
Language Schools ◽  
Adequate Method ◽  
The Ideal

This chapter addresses the long-standing dispute on logic and philosophical methodology between the so-called ideal and ordinary language schools of analytic philosophy, and proposes a resolution to it. While the ideal language school emphasizes the importance of the simplicity and exactness of concepts for philosophical clarity, the ordinary language school regards it as crucial to philosophy to clarify the concepts and the uses of natural language in their actual complexity, viewing emphasis on simplicity and exactness as misguided. For the ideal language school this, again, comes across as a dismissal of good scientific methodology. The proposed resolution draws on the later Wittgenstein’s account of idealization in logic, from the point of view of which the notion of relevance is crucial for understanding the completeness of philosophical accounts. This enables us to satisfy simultaneously the different requirements of the two schools for an adequate method, explaining how one can both meet the ideals of simplicity and exactness in logical clarification and acknowledge the complexity of the concepts and uses of natural language. The last section compares Wittgensteinian clarificatory models with Carnapian explications, and explains the benefits of the former over the latter.

Pragmatics

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francois Recanati
Keyword(s):  
Natural Language ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Formal Semantics ◽  
Ordinary Language ◽  
Formal Languages ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Ordinary Language Philosophy ◽  
Language Philosophy ◽  
Ideal Language ◽  
Truth Conditional

Analytic philosophers have made lasting contributions to the scientific study of language. Semantics (the study of meaning) and pragmatics (the study of language in use) are two important areas of linguistic research which owe their shape to the groundwork done by philosophers. Although the two disciplines are now conceived of as complementary, the philosophical movements out of which they grew were very much in competition. In the middle of the twentieth century, there were two opposing ‘camps’ within the analytic philosophy of language. The first – ‘ideal language philosophy’, as it was then called – was that of the pioneers, Frege, Russell and the logical positivists. They were, first and foremost, logicians studying formal languages and, through these formal languages, ‘language’ in general. Work in this tradition (especially that of Frege, Russell, Carnap, Tarski and later Montague) gave rise to contemporary formal semantics, a very active discipline developed jointly by logicians, philosophers and grammarians. The other camp was that of so-called ‘ordinary language philosophers’, who thought important features of natural language were not revealed, but hidden, by the logical approach initiated by Frege and Russell. They advocated a more descriptive approach, and emphasized the ‘pragmatic’ nature of natural language as opposed to, for example, the ‘language’ of Principia Mathematica. Their own work (especially that of Austin, Strawson, Grice and the later Wittgenstein) gave rise to contemporary pragmatics, a discipline which (like formal semantics) has developed successfully within linguistics in the past thirty years. From the general conception put forward by ordinary language philosophers, four areas or topics of research emerged, which jointly constitute the core of pragmatics: speech acts; indexicality and context-sensitivity; non-truth-conditional aspects of meaning; and contextual implications. In the first half of this entry, we look at these topics from the point of view of ordinary language philosophy; the second half presents the contemporary picture. From the first point of view, pragmatics is seen as an alternative to the truth-conditional approach to meaning associated with ideal language philosophy (and successfully pursued within formal semantics). From the second point of view, pragmatics merely supplements that approach.

Epilogue

2019 ◽  
pp. 245-246
Author(s):  
Oskari Kuusela
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
Natural Language ◽  
Ordinary Language ◽  
Philosophical Methodology ◽  
Language Games ◽  
Philosophy Of Logic ◽  
Logical Models ◽  
The Status ◽  
Specific Sense ◽  
Bold Claim

In the Introduction I made the bold claim that Wittgenstein transforms Frege’s and Russell’s logical and methodological ideas in a way that ‘can be justifiably described as a second revolution in philosophical methodology and the philosophy of logic, following Frege’s and Russell’s first revolution’. This claim was meant in a specific sense relating to the use of logical methods in philosophy, a discipline where we are often dealing with complex and messy concepts and phenomena, and having to clarify highly complicated and fluid uses of natural language. The situation is not quite the same in metamathematics, for example, and my claim was not intended to concern the employment of logical methods there, i.e. that Wittgenstein’s later philosophy of logic would constitute a revolution in this area too. For, while his later philosophy of logic has no difficulty explaining the possibility of the employment of calculi to clarify other calculi, in metamathematics there is perhaps no similarly pressing need for idealization as in philosophy, when we clarify complex concepts originating in ordinary language, since the targets of clarification in metamathematics are systems governed by strict rules themselves. Thus, this area of the employment of logical methods seems not as significantly affected. But I hope that my claim concerning the use of logical methods in philosophy can now be recognized as justified, or at least worth considering seriously, on the basis of what I have said about 1) the later Wittgenstein’s account of the status of logical clarificatory models, and how this explains the possibility of simple and exact logical descriptions, thus safeguarding the rigour of logic, 2) how his account of the function of logical models makes possible the recognition of the relevance of natural history for logic without compromising the non-empirical character of the discipline of logic, and 3) in the light of Wittgenstein’s introduction of new non-calculus-based logical methods for the purpose of philosophical clarification, such as his methods of grammatical rules, the method of language-games, and quasi-ethnology....

Wittgenstein on Logic as the Method of Philosophy

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oskari Kuusela
Keyword(s):  
Language Use ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Ordinary Language ◽  
Philosophical Approach ◽  
Philosophical Significance ◽  
The Status ◽  
Language Schools ◽  
Further Development ◽  
Philosophical Progress ◽  
The Ideal

This book is an examination of Wittgenstein’s early and late philosophies of logic in relation to accounts of logic and its philosophical significance in early and middle analytic philosophy, with particular reference to Frege, Russell, Carnap, and Strawson. It argues that not only the early but also the later Wittgenstein sought to further develop the logical-philosophical approaches of Frege and Russell. Throughout his career Wittgenstein’s aim was to resolve problems with and address the limitations of Frege’s and Russell’s accounts of logic and their logical methodologies so as to achieve the philosophical progress that originally motivated the logical-philosophical approach. By re-examining the roots and development of analytic philosophy, the book seeks to open up covered-up paths for the further development of analytic philosophy. It explains how Wittgenstein extends logical methodology beyond calculus-based logical methods and how his novel account of the status of logic enables one to do justice to the complexity and richness of language use and thought while retaining rigour and ideals of logic such as simplicity and exactness. The book also outlines the new kind of non-empiricist naturalism developed in Wittgenstein’s later work as well as explaining how Wittgenstein’s account of logic can be used to dissolve the longstanding methodological dispute between the ideal and ordinary language schools of analytic philosophy.

Gemeinsprachliche Ressourcen beim Wissens- und Wissenschaftstransfer - die Rolle der Deixis bei der propositionalen Komposition in universitären Vorlesungen in den Fächern Physik und Maschinenbau

Fachsprache ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 41 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 104-122
Author(s):  
Winfried Thielmann
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Transfer ◽  
Key Words ◽  
Mechanical Engineering ◽  
Academic Language ◽  
Ordinary Language ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Special Role ◽  
Academic Teaching

Abstract Languages for special purposes have mainly been considered from the point of view that they are specialized, i.e. that they satisfy the terminological needs of expression of specialized groups. The purpose of this contribution is to demonstrate that specialized discourses such as university lectures may make specific use of ordinary language devices. An analysis of sections from German lectures in physics and mechanical engineering reveals that deictics play a special role in propositional  composition. The findings are relevant for the general principles of linguistic science and knowledge transfer as well as for teaching German as a first or second academic language. Schlagwörter: Sprache wissenschaftlicher Lehre – Deixis – Physik – Maschinenbau – propositionale Komposition Key words: Language of academic teaching – deictics – physics – mechanical engineering – propositional composition

Conclusion: Rethinking Punishment

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Didier Fassin
Keyword(s):  
Social Inequality ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
The Social ◽  
Ideal Language ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Ideal

If punishment is not what we say it is, if it is not justified by the reasons we invoke, if it facilitates repeat offenses instead of preventing them, if it punishes in excess of the seriousness of the act, if it sanctions according to the status of the offender rather than to the gravity of the offense, if it targets social groups defined beforehand as punishable, and if it contributes to producing and reproducing disparities, then does it not itself precisely undermine the social order? And must we not start to rethink punishment, not only in the ideal language of philosophy and law but also in the uncomfortable reality of social inequality and political violence?

Multilingualism and the Ideal of Unity in Diversity in the European Union. Key Concepts and Context

2020 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-282
Author(s):  
Roxana-Maria Nistor-Gâz ◽  
Delia Pop-Flanja
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Cultural And Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Tower Of Babel ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
Unity In Diversity ◽  
The Ideal

"In a world challenged by cultural diversity, this article aims to look at the great diversity of languages and cultures that coexist within the European Union. Building on the story of the Tower of Babel that explains, from a religious point of view, the cultural and linguistic diversity existing in the European Union, the authors tried to contextualize EU’s motto of “unity in diversity”, interpreted as an ideal involving a lot of effort and sometimes even many conflicts, but one that we should all fight for and strive to maintain. Keywords: linguistic diversity, ethnicity, nation, minority, majority, communication, unity in diversity"

Some Possible Lines of Development in Aircraft Engines

1921 ◽  
Vol 25 (123) ◽  
pp. 130-165
Keyword(s):  
Present State ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Aircraft Engines ◽  
Aero Engine ◽  
The Ideal

In the following paper the writer's aim is to indicate certain possible lines of development and research which his own investigations and preliminary experiments have shown to be at least worthy of serious consideration.If we review the present state of the art we find the position to be substantially as follows :—From a thermodynamic point of view the performance of the modern aero engine has approached so nearly to the ideal obtainable from the cycle on which it operates that there is little scope for improvement.

scholarly journals REPRESENTASI PEREMPUAN JAWA DALAM SERAT WULANG PUTRI: ANALISIS WACANA KRITIS

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 213
Author(s):  
Atin Fitriana
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Woman Writer ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Attitudes And Behavior ◽  
The Ideal

<p>The Javanese culture has a specific perspective on the ideal figure of women. This perspective is generally manifested in the classical texts, for example, in Serat Wulang Putri Adisara. Written by Nyi Adisara. Serat Wulang Putri contains the teachings for royal daughters in living their life as Javanese women based on Javanese teachings. In this manuscript, the readers can see the women figure portrayed from the perspective of a woman writer. This paper discusses the ideal women’s discourse in Serat Wulang Putri using the approach of critical discourse analysis from van Dijk. The analysis is conducted by considering the text’s microstructure, macrostructure, and cultural context. Through the analysis, we can see the ideal discourse of Javanese women based on Serat Wulang Putri. Furthermore, the text discusses women as figures who must pay attention to their attitudes and behavior, and can control their hearts, minds, and feelings. In this case, the author uses the male point of view to describe the characteristics of ideal Javanese women. Javanese women are also described as a weak figure and must obey what men command or expect from them.</p>

scholarly journals The Criteria of Ideal Man as Seen from Female Gaze in Free!

K ta Kita ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-172
Author(s):  
Dita Berlian
Keyword(s):  
Personality Traits ◽  
Sex Role ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Male Gaze ◽  
The Gaze ◽  
Female Gaze ◽  
Male Sex ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Female Audience ◽  
The Ideal

Japanese animations (anime) are worldwide known. They are targeted to various kinds of audience. A drama-sport anime entitled Free! is rarely found as the targeted audience is female audience. Because Free! targets female audience, the definition of the ideal men is defined from the point of view of the female audience. Therefore, the gaze which is used to identify the male protagonists is female gaze. By using the theory of male gaze and traditional male sex role themes, I found that there is a combination of masculinity and femininity in the male protagonists in Free!. The combined characteristics are shown in the physical appearance, personality traits, and roles. The appearance of this type of an ideal man leads to a new concept in Japan which is called bishōnen. Keywords: Anime, ideal man, masculinity, femininity, female gaze, bishōnen.

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