Experimental Philosophy and the Philosophy of Language: A Defence of the Ambiguity Thesis

<p>In this thesis I employ the experimental method to inform three important debates within the philosophy of language. These three debates can loosely be characterised as the following: Strawsonianism vs. Russellianism about the meaning of definite descriptions (Chapter 2), Millianism vs. Descriptivism about the meaning of proper names (Chapter 3), and Internalism vs. Externalism about natural kind terms (Chapter 4). To investigate these debates I use surveys to test the intuitions of ordinary language users, that is, non-philosophers, about the meaning of various terms and phrases in natural language. This included New Zealand undergraduate students, students in China, and participants in the US in order to investigate any cross-cultural differences. The results of these three studies indicate substantial variation in the intuitions held among ordinary language users. I use this variation to defend an ambiguity thesis. According to this thesis, some terms and phrases as they occur in natural language (specifically, proper names, natural kind terms, and definite descriptions) have multiple meanings associated them. No one disambiguation is correct outside of a context of utterance. If the ambiguity thesis is accepted, various philosophical puzzles disappear. I will also address a number of objections that face the general program of this thesis.</p>

Experimental Philosophy and the Philosophy of Language: A Defence of the Ambiguity Thesis

<p>In this thesis I employ the experimental method to inform three important debates within the philosophy of language. These three debates can loosely be characterised as the following: Strawsonianism vs. Russellianism about the meaning of definite descriptions (Chapter 2), Millianism vs. Descriptivism about the meaning of proper names (Chapter 3), and Internalism vs. Externalism about natural kind terms (Chapter 4). To investigate these debates I use surveys to test the intuitions of ordinary language users, that is, non-philosophers, about the meaning of various terms and phrases in natural language. This included New Zealand undergraduate students, students in China, and participants in the US in order to investigate any cross-cultural differences. The results of these three studies indicate substantial variation in the intuitions held among ordinary language users. I use this variation to defend an ambiguity thesis. According to this thesis, some terms and phrases as they occur in natural language (specifically, proper names, natural kind terms, and definite descriptions) have multiple meanings associated them. No one disambiguation is correct outside of a context of utterance. If the ambiguity thesis is accepted, various philosophical puzzles disappear. I will also address a number of objections that face the general program of this thesis.</p>

Kuhn, Putnam and the Reference

In some of his writings, Kuhn criticized Putnam’s causal theory of reference for natural kind terms put forward in his classic paper “The Meaning of ‘Meaning’” claiming that Putnam’s theory cannot explain the reference changes of natural kind terms. After looking into Kuhn’s objections to Putnam’s reference theory, some of the main features of Kuhn’s incommensurability thesis and some traits of Putnam’s later version of his theory, we will argue, on the one hand, that Putnam’s later reference theory contains some components that enhance the explanation of the reference change of natural kind terms, and on the other hand, that Kuhn’s and Putnam’s views on reference do no differ that much, especially in virtue ofcertain similarities between Kuhn’s incommensurability thesis and Putnam’s thesis of conceptual relativity.

Two approaches to natural kinds

Philosophical treatments of natural kinds are embedded in two distinct projects. I call these the philosophy of science approach and the philosophy of language approach. Each is characterized by its own set of philosophical questions, concerns, and assumptions. The kinds studied in the philosophy of science approach are projectible categories that can ground inductive inferences and scientific explanation. The kinds studied in the philosophy of language approach are the referential objects of a special linguistic category—natural kind terms—thought to refer directly. Philosophers may hope for a unified account addresses both sets of concerns. This paper argues that this cannot be done successfully. No single account can satisfy both the semantic objectives of the philosophy of language approach and the explanatory projects of the philosophy of science approach. After analyzing where the tensions arise, I make recommendations about assumptions and projects that are best abandoned, those that should be retained, and those that should go their separate ways. I also recommend adopting the disambiguating terminology of “scientific kinds” and “natural kinds” for the different notions of kinds developed in these different approaches.

Homeostatic Property Cluster Theory without Homeostatic Mechanisms: Two Recent Attempts and their Costs

The homeostatic property cluster theory (HPC) is widely influential for its ability to account for many natural-kind terms in the life sciences. However, the notion of homeostatic mechanism has never been fully explicated. In 2009, Carl Craver interpreted the notion in the sense articulated in discussions on mechanistic explanation and pointed out that the HPC account equipped with such notion invites interest-relativity. In this paper, we analyze two recent refinements on HPC: one that avoids any reference to the causes of the clustering of properties and one that replaces homeostatic mechanisms with causal networks represented by causal graphs. We argue that the former is too slender to account for some inductive inference in science and the latter, thicker account invites interest-relativity, as the original HPC does. This suggests that human interest will be an un-eliminative part of a satisfactory account of natural kindness. We conclude by discussing the implication of interest-relativity to the naturalness, reality, or objectivity of kinds and indicating an overlooked aspect of natural kinds that requires further studies.

Being Sceptical about Kripkean A Posteriori Necessities and Natural Kinds

The article discusses Saul Kripke’s influential theories of a posteriori necessary truths and natural kinds. With respect to the statements of identity involving proper names, it is argued that although their truth is a posteriori and necessary in the specific sense of counterfactual invariance, this is of no significance for substantial philosophical issues beyond the philosophy of language, because this counterfactual invariance is a trivial consequence of the use of proper names as rigid designators. The case is made that the expansion of the realm of necessary a posteriori truths to the statements of theoretical identity that involve “natural kind terms”, as well as the Kripkean essentialist theory of natural kinds, have no weighty argumentative support and fit badly both with science and language practice. This sets the stage for the development of an appropriately sophisticated “descriptivist” account of meaning and reference that would be better suited for a widened range of Kripke-Putnam style thought experiments. The general outlines of such a descriptivist account are provided.

Natural kind terms again

The new externalist picture of natural kind terms due to Kripke, Putnam, and others has become quite popular in philosophy. Many philosophers of science have remained sceptical. Häggqvist and Wikforss have recently criticised this view severely. They contend it depends essentially on a micro-essentialist view of natural kinds that is widely rejected among philosophers of science, and that a scientifically reasonable metaphysics entails the resurrection of some version of descriptivism. It is argued in this paper that the situation is not quite as dark for the new theory of reference as many critics suggest. There are several distinct questions here which should not be conflated and ought to be dealt with one by one. Descriptivism remains arguably problematic.

Semantics of legal concepts and natural kind terms: D. Patterson’s arguments

The paper is devoted to the analysis of the arguments of the american legal philosopher Dennis Patterson regarding the applicability of the natural kinds terms to the semantics of the legal language. Based on the Ronald Dworkin’s theory of law, reasonable criticized by D. Patterson, the features of the formation and interpretation of legal concepts are considered. Arguments are presented that demonstrate the content of R. Dworkin and D. Patterson’s methodological approach to the interpretation of the semantics of legal concepts as well as argumentation regarding the normativity of legal reality, the objects of which are displayed in the content of legal concepts