The paper proposes to grasp handwritten signature as a metaphysical invention of the so-called “Western” civilization, where the signature is supposed to make possible juridical identification of the person who wrote it. However, despite this expectation of reliability, the Western handwritten signature is an aporetic sign, which is considered to be authentic (unrepeatable) and conventional (repeatable) at the same time. Because the signature is a sign of juridical identification and its authenticity can always be forged, Jacques Derrida tries to deconstruct (...) the contradictory functioning of Western metaphysics, which leads to confusion in our expectations of authenticity and identity in our uses of signatures. By proposing a new reading of Derridean texts concerning writing, the paper focuses on the pragmatical paradox that grounds our contradictory legal politics of signing: because the exact manual reproduction of a line is impossible, no one can satisfy the legislative obligation to sign conformably to the model signature. That’s the aporia of trace’s recognition, which establishes the signature as a sign: on the one hand, the signature is supposed to represent the juridical identity of the person who traced it; on the other hand, the signature, which constantly changes its graphical form, makes every certain identification impossible. In order to question the juridical identity traditionally guaranteed by the signature, this paper invites to grasp the legal practice of signing as a subversive performativity, which is produced during the passage between recognition of juridical identity requested by the law and its simultaneous and inevitable transgression. Finally, the paper proposes a new approach to the signature as a visual performance of the self, based on a reevaluation of the altercation between Jacques Derrida and John Searle concerning the iterative character of traces and performatives. (shrink)

Sally Haslanger; XIV*—Ontology and Pragmatic Paradox, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 92, Issue 1, 1 June 1992, Pages 293–314, https://doi.org/1.

As several philosophers have noticed, the meaning of an utterance is twofold: besides what it says, there is what it shows—or rather what the uttering of the utterance shows. In certain cases, a contradiction may arise between what is said and what is is shown. Contradictions of this type, called ‘pragmatic contradictions’, must be carefully distinguished from ordinary contradictions, i.e., from contradictions internal to what is said.

One version of Moore’s Paradox is the challenge to account for the absurdity of beliefs purportedly expressed by someone who asserts sentences of the form ‘p & I do not believe that p’. The absurdity of these beliefs is philosophically puzzling, given that Moorean sentences are contingent and often true; and express contents that are unproblematic when presented in the third-person. In this paper I critically examine the most popular proposed solution to these two puzzles, according to which Moorean (...) beliefs are absurd because Moorean sentences are instances of pragmatic paradox; that is to say, the propositions they express are necessarily false-when-believed. My conclusion is that while a Moorean belief is a pragmatic paradox, it is not just another pragmatic paradox, because this diagnosis does not explain all the puzzling features of Moorean beliefs. In particularly, while this analysis is plausible in relation to the puzzle posed by characteristic of Moorean sentences, I argue that it fails to account for. I do so in the course of an attempt to formulate the definition of a pragmatic paradox in more precise formal terms, in order to see whether the definition is satisfied by Moorean sentences, but not by their third-person transpositions. For only an account which can do so could address adequately. After rejecting a number of attempted formalizations, I arrive at a definition which delivers the right results. The problem with this definition, however, is that it has to be couched in first-person terms, making an essential use of ‘I’. Thus the problem of accounting for first-/third-person asymmetry recurs at a higher order, which shows that the Pragmatic Paradox Resolution fails to identify the source of such asymmetry highlighted by Moore’s Paradox. (shrink)

Most instantiations of the inference ‘y; so if x, y’ seem intuitively odd, a phenomenon known as one of the paradoxes of the material conditional. A common explanation of the oddity, endorsed by Mental Model theory, is based on the intuition that the conclusion of the inference throws away semantic information. We build on this explanation to identify two joint conditions under which the inference becomes acceptable: (a) the truth of x has bearings on the relevance of asserting y; and (...) (b) the speaker can reasonably be expected not to be in a position to assume that x is false. We show that this dual pragmatic criterion makes accurate predictions, and contrast it with the criterion defined by the mental model theory of conditionals, which we show to be inadequate. (shrink)

There is widespread agreement that we cannot know of a lottery ticket we own that it is a loser prior to the drawing of the lottery. At the same time we appear to have knowledge of events that will occur only if our ticket is a loser. Supposing any plausible closure principle for knowledge, the foregoing seems to yield a paradox. Appealing to some broadly Gricean insights, the present paper argues that this paradox is apparent only.

Moore’s paradox in belief is the fact that beliefs of the form ‘ p and I do not believe that p ’ are ‘absurd’ yet possibly true. Writers on the paradox have nearly all taken the absurdity to be a form of irrationality. These include those who give what Timothy Chan calls the ‘pragmatic solution’ to the paradox. This solution turns on the fact that having the Moorean belief falsifies its content. Chan, who also takes the (...) absurdity to be a form of irrationality, objects to this solution by arguing that it is circular and thus incomplete. This is because it must explain why Moorean beliefs are irrational yet, according to Chan, their grammatical third-person transpositions are not, even though the same proposition is believed. But the solution can only explain this asymmetry by relying on a formulation of the ground of the irrationality of Moorean beliefs that presupposes precisely such asymmetry. I reply that it is neither necessary nor sufficient for the irrationality that the contents of Moorean beliefs be restricted to the grammatical first-person. What has to be explained is rather that such grammatical non-first-person transpositions sometimes, but not always, result in the disappearance of irrationality. Describing this phenomenon requires the grammatical first-person/non-first person distinction. The pragmatic solution explains the phenomenon once it is formulated in de se terms. But the grammatical first-person/non-first-person distinction is independent of, and a fortiori, different from, the de se /non- de se distinction presupposed by pragmatic solution, although both involve the first person broadly construed. Therefore the pragmatic solution is not circular. Building on the work of Green and Williams I also distinguish between the irrationality of Moorean beliefs and their absurdity. I argue that while all irrational Moorean beliefs are absurd, some Moorean beliefs are absurd but not irrational. I explain this absurdity in a way that is not circular either. (shrink)

Communication is not as smooth a process as current pragmatic theories depict it. In Rapaport’s words “We almost always fail […]. Yet we almost always nearly succeed: This is the paradox of communication”. This paper claims that there is a need for an approach that is able to explain this “bumpy road” by analyzing both the positive and negative features of the communicative process. The paper presents a socio-cognitive approach to pragmatics that takes into account both the societal (...) and individual factors including cooperation and egocentrism that, as claimed here, are not antagonistic phenomena in interaction. This approach is considered an alternative to current theories of pragmatics that do not give an adequate account of what really happens in the communicative process. They consider communication an idealistic, cooperation-based, context-dependent process in which speakers are supposed to carefully construct their utterances for the hearer taking into account all contextual factors and hearers do their best to figure out the intentions of the speakers. This approach relies mainly on the positive features of communication including cooperation, rapport and politeness while almost completely ignores the untidy, trial-and-error nature of communication and the importance of prior contexts captured in the individual use of linguistic units. The overemphasis on cooperative, societal, contextual factors has led to disregard individual factors such as egocentrism and salience that are as important contributors to the communicative process as cooperation, context and rapport. The socio-cognitive approach is presented as a theoretical framework to incorporate and reconcile two seemingly antagonistic sides of the communicative process and explain the dynamic interplay of prior and actual situational contexts. (shrink)

Although formal analysis provides us with interesting tools for treating Curry’s paradox, it certainly does not exhaust every possible reading of it. Thus, we suggest that this paradox should be analysed with non-formal tools coming from pragmatics. In this way, using Grice’s logic of conversation, we will see that Curry’s sentence can be reinterpreted as a peculiar conditional sentence implying its own consequent.

In this paper, a pragmatic approach to the phenomenon of free choice permission is proposed. Free choice permission is explained as due to taking the speaker (i) to obey certain Gricean maxims of conversation and (ii) to be competent on the deontic options, i.e. to know the valid obligations and permissions. The approach differs from other pragmatic approaches to free choice permission in giving a formally precise description of the class of inferences that can be derived based on (...) these two assumptions. This formalization builds on work of Halpern and Moses (1984) on the concept of ‘only knowing’, generalized by Hoek et al., (1999, 2000), and Zimmermann’s (2000) approach to competence. (shrink)

The Knowability Paradox is a logical argument showing that if all truths are knowable in principle, then all truths are, in fact, known. Many strategies have been suggested in order to avoid the paradoxical conclusion. A family of solutions –ncalled logical revision – has been proposed to solve the paradox, revising the logic underneath, with an intuitionistic revision included. In this paper, we focus on so-called revisionary solutions to the paradox – solutions that put the blame on (...) the underlying logic. Specifically, we analyse a possibile translation of the paradox into a modified intuitionistic fragment of a logic for pragmatics inspired by Dalla Pozza and Garola in 1995. Our aim is to understand if KILP is a candidate for the logical revision of the paradox and to compare it with the standard intuitionistic solution to the paradox. (shrink)

Tarski’s assessment that natural language is inconsistent on account of the Liar Paradox is shown to be incorrect: what Tarski’s theorem in fact shows is that Truth is not a property of sentences but of propositions. By using propositions rather than sentences as the bearers of Truth, semantic closure within the same language is easily obtained. Tarski’s contrary assessment was partly based on confusions about propositions and their grammatical expression. But more centrally it arose through blindness to pragmatic (...) factors in language — a blindness that was common in his time, and it has continued to the present day, in discussions of ‘Open Pairs’, and Yablo-type paradoxes, for instance. For completeness, it is also shown that the Fixed Point Theorem does not apply to propositions, because of categorical differences between sentences and propositions — also predicates and properties. (shrink)

This paper defends a pragmatical approach to vagueness. The vagueness-adaptive logic VAL is a good reconstruction of and an excellent, instrument for human reasoning processes in which vague predicates are involved. Apart from its proof-theory and semantics, a Sorites-treating model based on it is presented, disarming the paradox. The paper opens perspectives with respect to the construction of theories by means of vague predicates.

The thesis that high probability suffices for rational belief, while initially plausible, is known to face the Lottery Paradox. The present paper proposes an amended version of that thesis which escapes the Lottery Paradox. The amendment is argued to be plausible on independent grounds.

A paradoxical attitude exists toward professional philosophy: philosophical inquiry is considered important and complex, but professionals are deemed irrelevant and unnecessary. This paradox doubly affects sport philosophy as evidenced by the field’s marginalization in higher education and sociopolitical discourse. To counter the sport philosophy paradox, I present a pragmatically oriented three-dimensional approach to inquiry that turns the field “inside-out”. A community of engaged, melioratively oriented sport philosophy inquirers in this 3D model collectively conducts theoretical, applied, and instrumental inquiry. (...) Each dimension is outlined in detail from a professional sport philosophy perspective, and implications are considered relative to the field’s future endeavors. (shrink)

[[[ (Here only the chapters 3 – 8, see *** ) First I argue that the prohibition of linguistic self-reference as a solution to the antinomy problem contains a pragmatic contradiction and is thus not only too restrictive, but just inconsistent (chap.1). Furthermore, the possibilities of non-restrictive strategies for antinomy avoidance are discussed, whereby the explicit inclusion of the – pragmatically presuposed – consistency requirement proves to be the optimal strategy (chap.2). ]]] The central question here is that about (...) the actual reason for antinomic structures. It turns out to be a form of negative self-conditioning (chap.3). This makes it necessary to clarify the status of negative concepts (chap.4). The generalization of these considerations (chap.5) leads to the actual analysis of the antinomic basic structure (chap.6): Decisively for the pragmatics of the concept is that it positively owns a meaning, so that positivity is always constituted by the concept qua concept. Thus a negative concept is characterized by a fundamental ambivalence: From a semantic point of view it has negative character, in its pragmatic status as a concept, however, it has positive character. If the meaning is especially that of a negative self-reference, the ambivalence leads to the antinomic constellation of a negative self-condition – that is the crux of the matter here! The concept thus possesses the property defined by it exactly when it does not possess it and vice versa. A closer analysis shows that the function of reflective structures for the occurrence of antinomies has to be judged much more differentiated than previous opinions suggest. Not only are four forms of reflectivity to be distinguished in this context – ontic, semantic, pragmatic reflectivity, and especially the form of negative self-condition; but it is also apparent that these are intertwined with each other in a way that is difficult to be understood. The astonishing variety of relationships associated with this makes the irritation that has always emanated from the antinomy problem appear more comprehensible. In the developed pragmatic perspective furtheron parallels to the structure of self-consciousness become visible (chap.7). I conclude with considerations about the significance of the antinomic structure for the problem of dialectics, especially for the synthesis formation of mutually exclusive terms (chap.8). (shrink)

Scientific representation: A long journey from pragmatics to pragmatics Content Type Journal Article DOI 10.1007/s11016-010-9465-5 Authors James Ladyman, Department of Philosophy, University of Bristol, 9 Woodland Rd, Bristol, BS8 1TB UK Otávio Bueno, Department of Philosophy, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL 33124, USA Mauricio Suárez, Department of Logic and Philosophy of Science, Complutense University of Madrid, 28040 Madrid, Spain Bas C. van Fraassen, Philosophy Department, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94132, USA Journal Metascience Online (...) ISSN 1467-9981 Print ISSN 0815-0796. (shrink)

We identify a normative paradox of responsible management education. Business educators aim to promote social values and develop ethical habits and socially responsible mindsets through education, but they attempt to do so with theories that have normative underpinnings and create actual normative effects that counteract their intentions. We identify a limited conceptualization of freedom in economic theorizing as a cause of the paradox. Economic theory emphasizes individual freedom and understands this as the freedom to choose from available options. (...) However, conceptualizing individuals as profit-maximizing actors neglects their freedom to reflect on the purposes and goals of their actions. We build on the work of pragmatist philosopher John Dewey, who distinguishes between habitualized and creative problem-solving behaviors, conceptualizes knowledge construction as a process of interdependent scientific social inquiry, and understands actors as having the freedom to determine what kind of people they wish to be. We apply pragmatist theory to business education and suggest equipping students with a plurality of theories, supplementing neoclassical economics with other economic perspectives and views from other disciplines on economic behavior. Moreover, we suggest putting students into learning situations that require practical problem solution through interdependent social inquiry, encouraging ethical reflection. In doing so, we contribute by linking the problematic conceptions of freedom identified in economic theorizing to the debate on responsible management education. We conceptualize a pragmatist approach to management education that explicitly re-integrates the freedom to discursively reflect on the individual and societal purpose of business activity and thereby makes existing tools and pedagogies useful for bringing potential freedom back into business. (shrink)

Two Experiments demonstrate the existence of a “collapse illusion”, in which reasoners evaluate Truthteller-type propositions (“I am telling the truth”) as if they were simply true, whereas Liar-type propositions (“I am lying”) tend to be evaluated as neither true nor false. The second Experiment also demonstrates an individual differences pattern, in which shallow reasoners are more susceptible to the illusion. The collapse illusion is congruent with philosophical semantic truth theories such as Kripke's (1975), and with hypothetical thinking theory's principle of (...) satisficing, but can only be partially accounted for by the model theory principle of truth. Pragmatic effects related to sentence cohesion further reinforce hypothetical thinking theory interpretation of the data, although the illusion and cohesion data could also be accounted for within a modified mental model theory. (shrink)

Over the last decade, patient and public involvement (PPI) has become a requisite in applied health research. Some funding bodies demand explicit evidence of PPI, while others have made a commitment to developing PPI in the projects they fund. Despite being commonplace, there remains a dearth of engagement with the ethical and theoretical underpinnings of PPI processes and practices. More specifically, while there is a small (but growing) body of literature examining the effectiveness and impact of PPI, there has been (...) relatively little reflection on whether the concept/practice of PPI is internally coherent. Here, the authors unpick a ‘paradox’ within PPI, which highlights a tension between its moral and pragmatic motivations and its implementation. The authors argue that this ‘professionalisation paradox’ means we need to rethink the practice, and purpose, of PPI in research. (shrink)

A paradox is constructed employing four languages L1-L4, such that L1 is a metalanguage for L3, L3 for L2, and L2 for L1; L4 functions as the semantic meta-metalanguage for each of L1-L3. The paradox purports to show that no omniscient being can exist, given that there is a set of true sentences (each true within its respective language) from L1, L2, and L3 that no omniscient being can believe.The remainder of the paper consists in an examination of (...) some attempts at challenging the paradox on syntactic, semantic and pragmatic grounds. Just which of these attempts are the most promising for the religious person is a question which is left open. (shrink)

As far as ‘modern’ logical theories of vagueness are concerned, a main distinction can be drawn between ‘semantical’ ones and ‘pragmatical’ ones. The latter are defended here, because they tend to retake into account important contextual dimensions of the problem abandoned by the former. Their inchoate condition seems not alarming, since they are of surprisingly recent date. This, however, could very well be an accidental explanation. That is, the true reason for it might sooner or later turn out to be (...) bearing exactly on the fundamental human limitations, when it comes to theorizing, that these approaches are urging us to appreciate. (shrink)

This critical editorial introduction summarizes and explicates Frederick Will’s pragmatic realism and his account of the nature, assessment, and revision of cognitive and practical norms in connection with: the development of Will’s pragmatic realism, Hume’s problem of induction, the oscillations between foundationalism and coherentism, the nature of philosophical reflection, Kant’s ‘Refutation of Idealism’, the open texture of empirical concepts, the correspondence conception of truth, Putnam’s ‘internal realism’, the redundancy theory of truth, sociology of knowledge, the governance of practice (...) by norms and the assessment and revision of norms in practice, scientific realism, the alleged independence of reason and tradition, rule-following, legal realism, ethical intuitionism and moral relativism, the regress problem (both in epistemology and in moral theory), the paradox of analysis, and culminating in Will’s account of the philosophical governance of norms. These issues are discussed in close consideration of the views of: William Alston, John Dewey, Descartes, Leibniz, Waismann, Austin, Russell, Schlick, Ayer, Richard Rorty, Michael Williams, Hempel, Carnap, Simon Blackburn, Ramsey, Strawson, Kuhn, Wilfrid Sellars, Wittgenstein, Nozick, Dretske, Quine, Barbara Herman, Hardy Jones, Marcus Singer, and Gerd Buchdahl. (shrink)

This paper seeks to question the position of ZF as the dominant system of set theory, and in particular to examine whether there is any philosophical justification for the axiom of foundation. After some historical observations regarding Poincare and Russell, and the notions of circularity and hierarchy, the iterative conception of set is argued to be a semi-constructvist hybrid without philosophical coherence. ZF cannot be justified as necessary to avoid paradoxes, as axiomatizing a coherent notion of set, nor on (...) class='Hi'>pragmatic grounds, and should be replaced by a system allowing non-well-founded sets. (shrink)

To accept ‘pragmatic encroachment’ is to take the view that whether you are in a position to know is in part a function of practical stakes. This position strikes many as not just unorthodox but extremely implausible. According to Jeremy Fantl and Matthew McGrath (F&M), however, the best account of the prima facie oddity of certain utterances incorporates just such a pragmatist maneuver. In reaching this conclusion, F&M begin with Trent Dougherty and Patrick Rysiew’s (D&R’s) theory as the best (...) on offer (2009a: 63/2009b: 20), but go on to raise objections to D&R’s recent account of the relevant oddity in purely pragmatic (i.e., extra-semantic) terms and to develop it in directions quite inimical to the general outlook established in D&R 2009 and D&R forthcoming. In this brief note, we reply to F&M’s objections and show that their development in the direction of interest-relativism is ill-founded: the relevant phenomena provide no grounds for budging on the issue of pragmatic encroachment. In addition, in the course of meeting F&M’s objections, an original account of certain Moore-paradoxical sentences is given, and the issue of how probable a proposition needs to be to be known is addressed. The result is a quite general defense of a commonsense, evidence-based approach to the relevant phenomena (quite apart from a defense of D&R). (shrink)

Pragmatic Revolt in American History: Carl Becker and Charles Beard by Cushing Strout: ONE of the most striking characteristics of the modern mind, has been its preoccupation with history. In earlier times the historical sense was neither sophisticated nor pervasive, but now even science and religion, long-revered guardians of timeless truths, are approached historically. "To regard all things in their historical setting appears, indeed," as Carl Becker has said, "to be an instructive procedure of the modern mind. We do (...) it without thinking, because we can scarcely think at all without doing it." This relatively new intellectual awareness of the historical dimension of life has been paralleled by the modern tendency toward secularization, the acceptance of the concrete world of human history as the source of ultimate values and fulfillment. The modern mind has looked to history not only as a mode of understanding but also as a final destiny. It has been primarily concerned with the secular problems posed by the workings of the historical process, and it has had the confidence to believe that those problems could be solved in and through the very process which generated them. LIBERALISM, among modern historical forces, has characteristically expressed this secular commitment to control of the historical process, though, paradoxically, its confidence has been based less on the development of historical thought than on the new powers, which natural science and technology have produced. Because man has learned to control nature, liberals have believed that men could achieve progress in history. (shrink)

: According to C. S. Peirce, there are two ways of explaining what a sign means, namely, a definition and a precept. A precept tells the interpreters of a sign what the sign means by prescribing what they have to do in order to find or become acquainted with an object of the sign. A precept for a concept specifies how an interpreter can determine whether the concept is applicable to a given situation or object.Peirce accepted the scholastic definition of (...) truth, according to which a proposition is true if and only if its subject and predicate refer to the same thing, and applied this analysis to complex as well as singular propositions. However, this account does not tell how an interpreter can become acquainted with the objects of the predicate "true," that is, true propositions: it is not a good precept for the concept of truth. On the other hand, the so-called pragmatic conception of truth, truth as the limit or end of inquiry, can be regarded as a precept for truth, or as a general form of such a precept.The requirement that concepts should have precepts attached to them is a version of Peirce's principle of pragmatism. The availability of precepts should make it possible for an interpreter to determine whether a concept is applicable to a given situation, or whether a given proposition is true. Thus the principle of pragmatism is closely related to the principle knowability, according to which any truth should be knowable. Some formulations of the principle of knowability lead to a paradox. The paper discusses several forms of the principle of knowability, and it is argued that the existence of precept for a proposition entails only a relatively weak form of the principle.Keywords: Action. Inquiry. Knowledge. Meaning. Peirce. Pragmatism. Precept.Resumo: Segundo C. S. Peirce, há dois modos de explicar o que um signo significa, a saber, uma definição e um preceito. Um preceito diz aos intérpretes de um signo o que o signo significa, prescrevendo o que eles devem fazer para encontrar ou inteirar-se de um objeto do signo. Um preceito para um conceito especifica como um intérprete pode determinar se o conceito é aplicável a uma dada situação ou a um dado objeto.Peirce aceitou a definição escolástica de verdade, segundo a qual uma proposição é verdadeira se, e somente se, seu sujeito e seu predicado se referirem à mesma coisa, e aplicou essa análise tanto a proposições complexas quanto a singulares. Entretanto, essa visão não informa como um intérprete pode inteirar-se dos objetos do predicado "verdadeiro", ou seja, proposições verdadeiras: não é um bom preceito para o conceito de ver- On a Pragmatic Theory of Meaning and Knowledge dade. De outro lado, a assim chamada concepção pragmática de verdade, a verdade como o limite ou fim da investigação, pode ser vista como um preceito para a verdade, ou como uma forma geral de tal preceito.A exigência de que conceitos tenham preceitos ligados a eles é uma versão do princípio do pragmatismo de Peirce . A disponibilidade de preceitos deve tornar possível que um intérprete determine se um conceito é aplicável a uma dada situação, ou seja, se certa proposição é verdadeira. Portanto, o princípio do pragmatismo está intimamente ligado ao princípio da cognoscibilidade, segundo o qual toda verdade pode ser conhecida. Algumas formulações do princípio da cognoscibilidade levam a um paradoxo. O artigo discute algumas formas não-paradoxais do princípio da cognoscibilidade, defendendo que a existência de um preceito para uma proposição exige apenas uma forma relativamente fraca do princípio.Palavras-chave: Ação. Investigação. Conhecimento. Significação. Peirce. Pragmatismo. Preceito. (shrink)

G. E. Moore famously observed that to assert ‘I went to the pictures last Tuesday but I do not believe that I did’ would be ‘absurd’. Moore calls it a ‘paradox’ that this absurdity persists despite the fact that what I say about myself might be true. Krista Lawlor and John Perry have proposed an explanation of the absurdity that confines itself to semantic notions while eschewing pragmatic ones. We argue that this explanation faces four objections. We give (...) a better explanation of the absurdity both in assertion and in belief that avoids our four objections. (shrink)

This dissertation opens, or perhaps re-opens, a dialogue between the work of Emmanuel Levinas and that of Gabriel Marcel. These two thinkers, each in his own way a philosopher of "the other," both provide us with descriptions of the intersubjective relationship. However, the remarkable similarity of these descriptions is matched by a frustrating incompatibility. The remarkable similarity manifests itself in the emphasis both philosophies place on the unique and in some sense inviolable position of the other person with respect to (...) the self and, further, in advocating the service of the other by the self. The incompatibility is the result of two entirely different, seemingly contradictory, accounts of the nature of the other person: Levinas insists the other person is absolutely other, while Marcel maintains this otherness in only relative. ;Following a short introduction, chapters two and three provide a foundation for the later chapters by offering a summary of the work of Levinas and Marcel respectively. Chapters four and five look critically at Marcel and Levinas in turn, identifying problems or ambiguities in their thought, and investigate the extent to which the points of opposition between them are insurmountable obstacles to a reconciliation. These chapters examine both the concrete and pragmatic implications of each thinker's philosophy and the transcendental positions that condition these implications. Chapter six, based on the preceding four chapters, attempts to ascertain why what appear to be responses to similar callings have resulted in dissimilar philosophies. The obstacle that ultimately prevents the harmonization of these two philosophies is a different understanding of "otherness," which is itself in no small part the result of different understandings of how one relates to God. Finally, the concluding chapter offers some brief thoughts on how this dialogue might proceed from here, given the similar inspiration, the parallel exposition and, yet, the fundamental incompatibility of these two thinkers. (shrink)

Late modern existence is built around ambivalences: subjects experience the structural paradoxes of global capitalism or information society as social suffering; yet they follow behaviour patterns reinforcing the unsustainable trajectories. The article explores the discourses justifying such structural paradoxes, while normalizing the related suffering. First, the pragmatic theory of justification (Boltanski, Thévenot) is reinterpreted from a modernization theoretical perspective: a distinction is drawn between traditional, classic and late modern ‘tests’, ‘critique’ and ‘cités’. In the second and third sections, the (...) gradual emptying of critique is analysed: as disillusionment reaches the sphere of subjective experiences, not even personal suffering can ground critique any more (Berlant), thus the impossibility of critique is demonstrated in a cynical manner (Sloterdijk). In the fourth section, the various cynical modalities of justification fitting the ambivalent contemporary existence are overviewed. Finally, a way out from the naturalized, quotidian cynicism is sketched: by turning cynicism’s logic against itself, the dialectics of justification can move forward. (shrink)

This article explains why intercultural communication always should be studied in context and how even though misunderstanding is normally at stake in intercultural communication, one can argue that the promotion of mutual understanding actually is of mutual interest for all of humanity. Studying in context means paying attention to circumstances around the uses of signs as well as to the roles and moods of the users of signs. Promoting mutual understanding means avoiding a state of mind that implies the depreciation (...) of the other. To be intercultural, a communication must not be infected by prejudices. Any real attempt at intercultural communication is a paradoxical procedure. It supposes that human beings who engage in it at one and the same time recognize the stranger as similar and as different. Also, it can lead to acceptance of the other and a better understanding of what communication is about as well as to rejection and obscurantism. In this paper, I argue that even though people always relate in various ways to common and different cultural backgrounds, they still have to relate to common issues that govern their ways, and that focusing on those common issues and studying the various communicative contexts and contents help promoting mutual understanding, as these activities highlight the implicit role of the value of respect in all interpersonal communication. Human beings cannot avoid evaluating situations, contexts, relations, peoples and cultures. How can we establish that mutual respect and open-mindedness are better than disdain and dogmatism? Well, precisely by affirming that human relations commonly build on the inevitability of communicating and contrasting values and norms. Meaning in interaction permanently transforms cultural elements and patterns into something new. Intercultural communication becomes more respectable when it acknowledges the variety of ways humans interact meaningfully and the plurality of their logic of action. It is good and reasonable to value understanding because this variety and this pluralism always have kept the social alive and more than ever in our modern globalized world contribute to the creativity and interactivity of modern life. The interest of pragmatics in user attitudes, its focus on practical rather than on alethic modalities, can contribute to a more nuanced approach to intercultural communication, where the different elements of meaning in interaction can be studied in various bundles rather than in a single strand. (shrink)

In this article, I suggest an original solution to the Liar Paradox, based on the pragmatic theory of speech acts. This solution implies making a distinction between two concepts of truth: the intentional truth of a speaker’s utterances directed toward an addressee with the objective of obtaining a consensual agreement; the effective truth objectively recognized by the addressee in the speaker’s utterances. In view of reaching this new solution to the classic paradox, I conduct a critical review (...) of solutions put forward by Tarski, Kripke and Strawson. (shrink)

Solves what is sometimes, but not always, referred to as the third paradox of material implication. Readers downloading this piece should please also download the corrigendum. Note that "pragmatic" is here used in its original sense of context-sensitive, that is, adjacency. (This comment is made in response to an article in a student journal published in the western U.S. which claimed that I said that because something involves translation it must be pragmatic; that is so, in the (...) original sense; only grammaticality can ever be context-free; all meaning is context-sensitive, as "lawful" cannot meaningfully modify "whale."). (shrink)

Thomason (1979/2010)'s argument against competence psychologism in semantics envisages a representation of a subject's competence as follows: he understands his own language in the sense that he can identify the semantic content of each of its sentences, which requires that the relation between expression and content be recursive. Then if the scientist constructs a theory that is meant to represent the body of the subject's beliefs, construed as assent to the content of the pertinent sentences, and that theory satisfies certain (...) 'natural assumptions', then it implies that the subject is inconsistent if the beliefs include arithmetic. I challenge the result by insisting that the motivation for Thomason's principle (ii), via Moore's Paradox, leads to a more complex representation, in which stating the facts and expressing one's beliefs are treated differently. Certain logical connections among expressions of assent, and between expression and statement, are a matter of consequence on pain of pragmatic incoherence, not consequence on pain of classical logical inconsistency. But while this salvages the possibility that a modification of the above sort of representation could be adequate, Thomason's devastating conclusion returns if the scientist identifies himself as the subject of that representation, even when paying heed to the requirement of pragmatic coherence of the sort highlighted by Moore's Paradox. (shrink)

Here I present a new objection to the material or "hook" analysis of indicative conditionals - the thesis that an indicative conditional 'If A then C' has the truth-conditions of the so-called material conditional - based on Liar-like reasoning. This objection seems invulnerable to any Grice-Lewis-Jackson-inspired pragmatic rejoinder.

G. E. Moore famously noted that saying 'I went to the movies, but I don't believe it' is absurd, while saying 'I went to the movies, but he doesn't believe it' is not in the least absurd. The problem is to explain this fact without supposing that the semantic contribution of 'believes' changes across first-person and third-person uses, and without making the absurdity out to be merely pragmatic. We offer a new solution to the paradox. Our solution is (...) that the truth conditions of any moorean utterance contradict its accuracy conditions. Thus we diagnose a contradiction in how the moorean utterance represents things as being; so we can do justice to the intuition that a Moore-paradoxical utterance is in some way senseless, even if we know what proposition it expresses. (shrink)

http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/1808-1711.2008v12n2p203 The preface paradox is the apparent pragmatic inconsistency that occurs when the author of a book declares in its preface that despite believing that it is highly probable that everything the book maintains is true it is also highly probable that the book contains at least some errors. The preface paradox has often been presented as an example of a logically inconsistent belief that it is nevertheless rational to accept, supporting the suggestion that rationality has nothing (...) immediately to do with avoiding formal logical inconsistency in one’s beliefs. In contrast with complicated received solutions, I explain a simple method of avoiding inconsistency in preface paradox assertions by indexing the two claims to distinct probability or justification sources, referencing in the first case the conscientious efforts to eliminate errors and in the second case the chagrin of past experience in discovering previously unsuspected errors in published writings. The solution thereby helps preserve the concept of rationality as logical consistency of belief, and avoids the conclusion that the preface paradox proves that it is sometimes rational to accept logically inconsistent beliefs. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Human Goodness: Pragmatic Variations on Platonic ThemesCatherine E. MorrisonHuman Goodness: Pragmatic Variations on Platonic Themes by Paul Schollmeier Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Pp. x + 302. $80.00, cloth.This is a book about spirits—human, godly, ghostly, and alcoholic. Paul Schollmeier's Human Goodness: Pragmatic Variations on Platonic Themes explores how humble humans act morally in an absurd world. Schollmeier contends that the Socratic spirit, or daimon, (...) of self-knowledge and hypothesis testing provides the foundation for a deeply human moral philosophy. It is, in Schollmeier's elegant phrasing, daimonic rather than eudaimonic, joining Aristotle and Plato with William James, as well as contributions from the ghosts of David Hume and Immanuel Kant and a few rounds of whiskey. Spirits abound! Mixing Socratic skepticism with Jamesian empiricism, Schollmeier argues that we act best when we apply general principles held as opinion (not as certain knowledge), and tested through experience, to our particular situation. When these opinions yield fruit, we find ourselves less at the whim of our capricious surroundings; when they do not, we are obliged to recognize the provisional nature of our opinions and change them. The ends of these day-to-day activities reflect a far grander cosmological order, one we ignore to our mortal (and moral) peril. It is by engaging in this intellectual activity that we are made happy, and it is in measured pursuit of this happiness that we are virtuous. Our actions are neither absolutely true nor perfect. They are instead the best that we can do. And for a reviewer attempting to encapsulate a finely nuanced book in a small space, this is comforting advice indeed. [End Page 190]The book begins with a puzzle: The curious twin claims in Plato's Apology that, true to the Delphic oracle's proclamation, Socrates is both wise and knows nothing. The key to this apparent paradox, Schollmeier contends, is the difference between divine knowledge, "ultimate, nonhypothetical knowledge of final causes" (6), and human knowledge, which is hypothetical only. Schollmeier marshals William James to argue that as humans, we encounter objects of knowledge perceptually; even our concepts are fashioned from this meager material. Without access to divine knowledge, humans must test hypotheses and assume that they are true only provisionally.James's (and Hume's) emphasis on the passions as the foundation for action, however, gives Schollmeier pause. In order to construct a moral philosophy that avoids absolutism but remains objective, Schollmeier argues for a harmony between the intellectual and the passional that is ultimately rational, our Socratic daimon. We are neither gods nor animals. Should we surrender rationality to desire, Schollmeier warns in concert with Socrates, our already fragile perceptual knowledge will be further distorted by fickle emotion. It is precisely because our grasp on the world is so tenuous that we must pay heed to cool intellect rather than hot passion.Such skepticism of our claim to know might make one hesitant to engage in the enigmatic world—but we have no choice! In order to find our hybrid daimon, both Socratic and pragmatic, Schollmeier suggests rhetoric as the methodology best suited to serving practical knowledge because it eschews certainty in favor of probability and acknowledges that the hypotheses on which we act are tentative and revisable. To this end, Schollmeier highlights the enthymeme and argument by example as the two techniques that best suit the nature of our hypothetical knowledge, and he urges a return to philodoxy, the love of opinion.Giving up our claim to certainty need not be a dismal proposition. Having established his methodology, Schollmeier begins building a moral philosophy that embraces an ontology of change and contends that our happiness provides us with stability in the form of a rational teleology. The objects of our human happiness are fleeting and changeable, so happiness cannot be static but is, rather, an activity that is its own end, "an activity that is an intellectual inquiry" (78). Our happiness is contingent on our ability to hypothetically determine, in our particular setting, our function and then fulfill this role to the best of our abilities. Depending on the setting, it may be dancing, parenting, or simply a lively... (shrink)