Explaining A Process of Reasoning, an objection

Stalnaker proposes that a possible worlds analysis of propositions allows us to escape the dilemma facing reconstructions of arguments used to explain a process of reasoning.  The idea is, supposing someone sees a footprint in the sand, and they immediately infer that a person has been walking in the sand within the last few hours, one may explain this inference by constructing a deductively valid argument of this process of reasoning.  The restructured argument adds some suppressed premises, e.g. such impressions are made only by human feet, to the explicit premise (the perceptual belief).  Now, the dilemma faced by the reconstruction concerns its correctness as an explanation.  The suppressed premises must be accounted for, but how exactly must they have entered into the initial inference?  The reconstruction either imposes on the agent implausible unconscious processes, or it fails to be an explanation, but is rather a model of how the inference might have happened.

Stalnaker’s account constructs belief states as sets of possible worlds, and individual beliefs as negative properties of belief states.  The explanation above is correct, since the belief state will be one relative to which the premise entails the conclusion, and the suppressed premises can be though of as properties of the initial belief, i.e. properties which show that that belief state is one relative to which the explicit premise entails the conclusion.  An argument may be extracted for further analysis as follows:

1.  if for all possible worlds compatible with the initial belief state of the agent in which the premise is true, the conclusion is also true, then initial belief state of the agent is one relative to which the premise entails the conclusion.

2.  The suppressed premises are properties of the initial belief state which show that the belief state is one relative to which the explicit premise entails the conclusion.

3.  (1) and (2).

4.  if (3) and the initial belief state of the agent contains no possible worlds in which the premises listed are false, then the reconstructed argument is a literal description of the situation.

5.  If the reconstructed argument is a literal description of the situation, then it is a correct explanation.

6.  The reconstructed argument is a correct explanation.

The objection I wish to raise here concerns the bloated premise (4).  Essentially I’ve packed the key properties which an argument must have in order to be considered a correct explanation.  A great advantage of this account allows a complicated reconstruction to have many suppressed premises, while still being a literal description – as Stalnaker notes.  The problem, however, lies in the multitude of reconstructed arguments that could be assessed as literal descriptions of the situation.  The problem, then, is not that it can’t explain the situation, but rather that it has too many explanations. 

A weakened Benacerraf dilemma seems to face Stalnaker’s explanations.  The suppressed premises may be few in number or many; depending on how complicated we wish to make our explanation.  But which explanation is the correct one based on the explicit premise, inferred conclusion, and stipulated suppressed premises?  They are all correct, it seems, according to Stalnaker’s account.  But that doesn’t seem right.  We weren’t hoping to just create an imaginative model of how the inference might have been made, but rather to correctly explain it.  But an imaginative model is what we appear to be left with, for the suppressed premises, which show that the belief state is one relative to which the explicit premise entails the conclusion, may be near infinite in number.  And since these suppressed premises are what differ from one argument reconstruction to another, then we are left with near infinite possible explanations.  A weakened Benacerraf dilemma would conclude that for any explanation, we should not accept it. 

The conception of beliefs as negative properties of a belief state was supposed to elucidate this problem of reconstructing arguments.  Instead, it has left us with no explanations which we can accept.  Perhaps, then, there is something wrong with considering beliefs as negative properties of a belief state.  

Maybe some active (not tacit) problems for Stalnaker

Let me start by briefly summing up my understanding of Stalnaker's position in chapter 5. Stalnaker holds that if we allow the concept of acceptance states which are more fundamental than belief or desire states, then we can explain conflicting beliefs as beliefs held in different acceptance states, and deductive reasoning as the understanding which accompanies the merger of two acceptance states. For the acceptance state hypothesis to be true means that the three conditions Stalnaker lays out on pg. 82 must always be true:

1. If P is a member of a set of accepted propositions, and P entails Q, then Q is a member of that set.

2 If P and Q are each members of a set of accepted propositions, then P & Q is a member of that set.

3. If P is a member of a set of accepted propositions, then not-P is not a member of that set.

I think one of the key claims Stalnaker makes is that acceptance can be compartmentalized. This is also the first thing I would like to question. What gives us the ability to compartmentalize our acceptance states? Is it the fact that we can suspend belief periodically to allow different sets of circumstances (different acceptance states)? For instance, in philosophy we sometimes use extraodinary hypothetical situations which could never actually happen in real life to test a hypothesis. Are we not temporarily suspending our beliefs about the world right now to entertain the beliefs of a different acceptance state? The fact that beliefs could affect acceptance states (and not the other way arround) seems to suggest that beliefs are more fundamental (I'm not sure how Kosher this is).

1. If A causes changes in B, then A is more fundamental than B.

2. Beliefs/desires cause the change in acceptance states.

3. Therefore, Beliefs/desires are more fundamental than acceptance states.

I think another problem with Stalnaker's view is that the problem of Deduction poses a bigger problem than he gives credit. I do not think that his answer of tacit beliefs and active beliefs solves the problem because both are still beliefs that you must actually hold. Hypothetically speaking, what if an acceptance state of mine entailed a belief which I could not hold because we are not sufficiently evolved enough at this point to grasp such a concept? Would that concept still count as a tacit belief?

1. I believe that P

2. P entails that afsoldifjsewoifse (my mind cannot grasp such a concept so I mashed keys)

3. I believe that afsoldifjsewoifse

I realize that the trick here is that I could never find an actual example of this to show Stalnaker because recognizing such an example would mean that I could grasp afsoldifjsewoifse to begin with. I guess you would have to add a premise 4 to the above argument where 4. There exists concepts that my mind cannot grasp which can be logically entailed by my current beliefs.

My last thought is that there seems to be something fishy about having tacit beliefs in a completely closed system of belief (like the one Stalnaker accepts in response to Kyburg's "one single fat statement" objection. Stalnaker embraces the idea that all our inductive knowledge could be represented by one fat statement because it makes for one very thin proposition. Wouldn't you also have to include your tacit beliefs into this huge conjuction? If you do not, then it seems incomplete, and if you do then you cannot avoid the problem of deduction. I think this is the biggest problem Stalnaker faces.

A futile defense of Stalnaker

Stalnaker seems to have one hell of a time defending his view. I think this is partly due to his view being false (and vague), but let's see if we can help him out anyhow.
Mark Richard has a pretty clever argument against him. He considers an argument, and evaluates Stalnaker's methods of avoiding the deduction problem with respect to it. The argument is as follows (p.14)
(C) Barbers shave only those who do not shave themselves,
(D) The barber Jones shaved all those who attacked Lionel,
(E) Anderson shaves himself

(C&D&E) -> (A)&(C&D&E)
(A) Anderson did not attack Lionel

But also (C&D&E) -> (J)&(C&D&E)
(J) Jones did not attack Lionel.

Richard's argument runs roughly as follows:
(1) Stalnaker's view
(2) (1) -> (3)
(3) deductive inference is acheived when one considers two or more belief states, and integrates them by having as his/her new belief state the intersection of the states considered
(4) (3)->(5)
(5) There is only one deductive consequence of considering (C&D&E)
(6) (A) is distinct from (J)
(7) (A) and (J) are deductive consequences of considering (C&D&E)
(8) ~(6) (5, 7)
(9) (6)&~(6)
(10) ~(1)

I'd like to apologize to Chelsey for my rampant use of reductio.
(2) is supported in Stalnaker, I'll throw in a couple of quotes
"A person may be disposed, in one kind of context, or with respect to one kind of action, to behave in ways that are correctly explained by one belief state, and at the same time be disposed in another kind of context or with respect to another kind of action to behave in ways that would be explained by a different belief state."(p.83)
And Richard quoting Stalnaker:
"There may be propositions whose truth might be discovered by a purely deductive inquiry... The thesis [is] that acquiring deductive knowledge is putting one's seperate belief states together"
(4) is derived by presuming that the only (or best) way of integrating one's beliefs is to take the intersection of them (the possible worlds). This is the natural way of looking at belief integration under this model, and moreover it's not clear how else one could integrate beliefs.
(6) is supposed to be obvious. Intuitively there are two distinct propositions under question. (7) is assumed by hypothesis). The rest follows.

I believe Stalnaker already has a response to this up his sleeve. Recall Stalnaker chapter (4), in which he discusses the sentence 'Jim is a doctor' as said in the mouth of a child and an adult. I left that paper at school, so I won't quote. However, Stalnaker seems to have the view that the child does not understand the propositions that Jim is a doctor as well as an adult because there are many situations under which the adult could determine the truth value of the proposition, but the child could not. For instance, if the child is unaware that philosophers are Doctors (or has some dim notion of it) then the child wouldn't know the truth value of the proposition if Jim had been a philosopher.
This is all kind of rough and ready, and I think it conflicts with other things Stalnaker says, but let's run with it. On this picture the child and the adult are actually grasping (understanding, whatever) a different set of worlds when considering the proposition that Jim is a doctor. This seems a lot like some sort of descriptivism about that-clauses. There's a set of worlds that a speaker associates with a that-clause. If this is true, there can be multiple associations. This could tell against (4). It may be true that one performs deductive inference by taking the intersection of belief states. However, these belief-states don't match up directly to propostions in the ways that (4) requires. When one considers the consequences of (C&D&E), one takes the intersection of the sets of worlds one currently associates with (C&D&E). This set of worlds is not, however, the set of worlds determined by (C&D&E). So for (4) to be false one merely has to make the deduction twice, each time associating (C&D&E) with different sets of worlds.
This sort of approach can also account for deductive error, and various hooded-man type situations. However, the drawback is that it is descriptivism, and falls prey to the 100,000,000 lethal objections to descriptivism. It also makes it nearly impossible for propositions to be shareable.
On a side note, I can't decide whether or not this is actually Stalnaker's view.

An extraction of an argument from Richards and some words about it

I doubt this will count as a comment paper, but I did the work and thought I may as well share it!

Richards runs an argument of this sort against a possible-worlds semantics, which seems to be the more popular flavor of the 'unstructured proposition theory':

1. According to a possible-worlds semantics, the truth of a valid arguments premises ensures that of its conclusions, and the worlds in which all its premises are true are exactly the world in which all the premises and the conclusion are true.
2. Therefore valid arguments are logical truths. (from 1)
3. Valid arguments are not logical truths.
4. Therefore possible-worlds semantics is false. (from 1 - 3)

I hope that that is structured OK. I really cannot tell!

Richard gives an example with the argument:

Barbers shave only those who do not shave themselves; the barber Jones shaved all the men who attacked Lionel; hence, Jones didn't attack Lionel

which is clearly valid. This of course means that the truth of the premise ensures the truth of the conclusion. This means that the worlds where the premises are true are the worlds where the premises are true and the conclusion is true.

This also means that the intension of:

Barbers shave only those who do not shave themselves, and the barber Jones shaved all the men who attacked Lionel

is the intension of:

Barbers shave only those who do not shave themselves, and the barber Jones shaved all the men who attacked Lionel, and Jones didn't attack Lionel.

But then that means that it is a truth of logic that:

Whoever believes that (barbers shave only those who do not shave themselves, and the barber Jones shaved all the men who attacked Lionel), believes that (barbers shave only those who do not shave themselves, and the barber Jones shaved all the men who attacked Lionel, and Jones didn't attack Lionel).

And as Richard points out, this doesn't seem to be a truth, let alone a logical one.

It seems that the unstructured proposition theorist casts too wide a net. They may go on to offer a more restricted interpretation, but it fails as well. It seems that generally unstructured proposition theories have a heck of a time with deduction.

Concern Post #2

Maybe I can state my concern over AEs and propositions to a general concern over Types and Tokens.

I seems that Mr. Realist would want to hold that:

red rot rouge

all are instances of the same word-type. The 'redness' type. I'm not totally sure how they would go about expressing this, probably just with saying: these words all express redness. Likewise:

△ ▽ ▷ ► ▼ ◬ ▿ ◿ ▲

all are instances of ▲ity, or triangularity.

Now it seems that Mr. Realist is going to have some problems. Maybe they are just small and bred by my personal confusion. But 'redness' seems to be an English word. If there is an English and a German red-type, this seems to be really the talk of a English and German red-token-class. (Same for the triangle case, with the variety of shapes and designs.) Thus, the Sellarsean move to introduce honest-to-God types: 'red' in English, 'rot' in German, 'rouge' in French all play the same role. Each are •red•s.

Mr. Realist cannot be happy with this, I don't think. Triangularity is supposed to be an abstract entity, not some sort of functional class! Likewise, the sign-designs *△*, *▽*, *▷*, etc. are all of the triangular-kind. Mr. Nominalist wants to say that each shape is called triangular, where Mr. Realist wants to say that each shape is an instance of a three-sided closed-plain figure, i.e. instances of triangularity.

To claim that each shape plays the triangular role, that each is a •triangle• cannot make Mr. Realist very happy at all. We might say that the German 'dreieck' and English 'triangle' each play the same linguistic role: each are •triangle•s. Likewise,

△ ▽ ▷ ► ▼ ◬ ▿ ◿ ▲

are each distinct token-classes of the triangle type. Each shape stands for triangularity, in that: "This is a triangle" is true of each shape.

Mr. Realist cannot seem to be happy about this at all.

It seems that Mr. Realist wants the type to be an entity in the full-blooded sense, distinct from its tokens. The type should be able to be real (or on some accounts, exist) even if its tokens do not exist (or are not real, on those same accounts). To claim that types are only functions seems be incompatible with Mr. Realist's general philosophy. Mr. Realist wants us to have to compare things in the world against things in Platonic heaven to see what they really are. We have to compare instances and exemplifications with the damn Universal! Not with a function!

Certainly we can claim that types or numbers are real, even if they are just functions or structures, but I don't think we are being full-blooded, honest-to-God realists any more. What need have we of Universals when we outsource their explanatory role to functions?

Also, I see a problem in that presumably "the universal blah" and "an instance of the universal blah" seem to be rigid designators, where "the structure that plays the role blah" does not seem to be. Consider:

The killer of Jones is Smith.

It seems that there could be possible worlds where Smith didn't kill Jones. So the killer of Jones isn't a single entity which we can necessarily identify with Smith. Other people could play the killer role. Or no one could. Doesn't the same problem crop up if we want Universals and their instances? It seems that if we appeal to a structuralist account, then in any world, we can literally identify a different entity with the structure! This cannot make Mr. Realist happy at all. That

◣

is an instance of ◣ity seems to be necessary, not just a matter of the shape fitting a role! But this seems to be false, doesn't it.

Help Quell My Concern

I still am concerned about the Benacerraf Dilemma; that it works.

If we say that there is an entity or a class of entities which are abstract entities or propositions, it seems to me that there has to be a sort of closed criteria to differentiate that single or that single kind of entity. Imagine if we thought that there was such thing as a cat or a kind of thing as cats, but that all sorts of other animals could be identified as cats.

It seems to me like having ten photographs of alleged Sasquatches. Now some true believer wants to say that in any given photo there is a Sasquatch, and in the totality of photos a kind of thing that is a Sasquatch. If the skeptic says: That could be anything in the photo!, can the true believer really get away with saying: Oh well, I guess there is a Sasquatch structure or function which many different things and kinds of things can fill! This seems absurd.

Or imagine finding a dead body. This seems like compelling proof of a murder to the conspiracy theorist. He can construct a theory based on evidence to identify the murderers as Smith or Jones. But the skeptic can point out that the theory is so loose that anyone can fit this role. There are alternative explanation for the dead body for the skeptic. There is no single killer here, nor even a single kind of killer for this body.

If "The dude who wrote Naming and Necessity", "One half of Kripkenstein, the half who isn't Wittgenstein", and "Saul Kripke" are all equally good linguistic representations of Saul Kripke, don't we have to abandon the notion that there is a single linguistic representation of Kripke, or a single kind of linguistic representation of Kripke? I'm not even sure that there is a single type or class of linguistic expressions that pick out Kripke. There are many equally good linguistic representations, many equally good kinds of linguistic representations.

This all seems like a Wittgensteinean move against Universals, with the example of what makes all games games. It seems there is just a family resemblance, a messy cross-section of related but distinct criteria. If we can say that there are cat entities and a kind of entities that are cats, we surely avoid the B.D. If we cannot say that there are proposition entities and a kind of entities that are propositions in the same manner, we should probably drop the notion that they are entities like cats are entities. I don't see this as overly devastating except to Platonism, which is false anyhow.

Thoughts?

King vs Schiffer

At the beginning of chapter 4 of his book, King is mainly concerned with Stephen Schiffer's objection to structured propositions. He writes the objection out as follows:

(1) If any theory of structured propositions is true, then (a) 'barks' in Ralph believes that Fido barks' functions as a singular term whose referent is a constituent of the structured proposition to which the that-clause refers.

(2) If (a), then the following inference is valid:
Ralph believes that Fido barks
Therefore, (Something Exists x)(Ralph believes that Fido x)

(3) But the inference isn't even coherent, let alone valid.

(4) Therefore, No theory of structured propositions is true.

King's method of rejecting this objection is to find a way to reject (1). To do this he gives three statements which are entailed by Schiffer's argument. The successful rejection of any of these three statements, according to King, results in the defense of Structured Proposition Theory (SPT). I will give the first two claims, but no the third because I am not concerned with it at this time:

i) Structured proposition theorists, including Russellians, are committed to the claim that the referent of a that-clause is determined by the referents of the expressions in it and how they are combined syntactically (CH), and so all the expressions in a that-clause (including 'barks' in 'that Fido barks') must be referring expressions.

ii) STPs, including Russellians, are committed to the claim that that-clauses are referring expressions.

King states that in order to disprove (i) all you need to do is disprove (ii) because (i) is entailed by (ii). King's argument against (ii), as far as I can tell, is that instead of referring expresions, you can hold that a belief ascription such as 'Lucy believes that Fido barks' is true iff Lucy stands in the belief relation to the proposition that Fido barks. In this case no referring expression is needed.

Basically, King showed that there actually are that-clauses which are not referring expressions.

a) Belief ascription that-clauses ('Lucy believes that Fido barks') are not referring expressions

b) If (ii), then all that-clauses are referring expressions

c) (a), therefore ~(ii)

The reason that I focused on King's argument against (ii) is that I think there might be something fishy about it. You would think that if it were as simple as it appears above to reject (ii), Schiffer, a University level academic, would not have committed himself to such a vulnerable premise. I think the error in King's argument must lie in the nature of Belief ascription that-clauses. It does not look like they are the same type of that-clauses which Schiffer is talking about in his descriptions (even though according to Schiffer type of that-clause shouldn't matter because of how he thinks all SPT's fall prey to his objection).

I am also curious about this belief relation which King has no problem incorporating into his structured proposition theory. On page 103 King described the things, according to SPTs, that the constituents of propositions are: "objects, properties, and relations". It kind of seems like squeezing beliefs into the equation is cheating a bit. Obviously, either belief imports something into propositions which stands in the place of referring expressions (which I think King would agree with) or it is not the type of that-clause proposition Schiffer is objecting to. Other that this semi-objection to King, I think I mostly agree with his rejection of Schiffer's referrent expressionism objection.

One last note. Both Schiffer and King use variations of (2) to support their objection.

(2) Ralph believes that Fido barks, therefore (something exists x)(Ralph believes that Fido x)

Schiffer calls it incoherent and invalid. I can't figure out why this is such a problem though. Schiffer especially confuses me on the issue because of his insistence on how 'barks' is a singular term with the co-referential expression 'the property of being a barker'. So the claim above is (something exists (the property of being a barker))(Ralph believes that Fido barks ('barks' is co-referential with 'the property of being a barker' and so can be substituted in for grammarical correctness). I just don't see why this is "incoherent and invalid.

A possible worlds analysis argument, and an objection

Stalnaker suggests that the possible worlds analysis of propositions will correctly interpret our intuitions about attributions of tacit, or presupposed, beliefs.  We may conclude, for example, that someone literally believed a tacit or presupposed belief.  However, under a linguistic view of content, according to which beliefs are sentence-like representations of propositions, we should have to concede that our attributions are not literally correct.  The linguistic view, in this case, may be taken to assert the following:

1.  Our beliefs are sentence-like representations of propositions.

2.  If (1), then our minds must represent our beliefs

3.  Our minds must represent our beliefs.

4.  But, our minds are finite.

5.  (1) and (2) and (3). (triple conjunction, but for brevity’s sake, let’s suppose it happened in sequence)

6.  If (1) and (2) and (3), then it is not the case that our minds can represent an infinite amount of beliefs

7.  If it is not the case that our minds can represent an infinite amount of beliefs, then our minds cannot represent all of the tacit beliefs we take for granted

8.  If our minds cannot represent all of our tacit beliefs we take for granted, then the belief attributions of tacit beliefs are not literally correct.

9.  So, if (1) and (2) and (3), then the belief attributions of tacit beliefs are not literally correct. (from 5-8)

10.  Therefore, the belief attributions of tacit beliefs are not literally correct.

 

Stalnaker wants to reject premise (1).  His suggestion is that if (7) is correct, then, we should not conceive of belief as sentence – like representations of propositions.  His alternative conception of beliefs goes as follows:

11.  If attitudes are primarily attitudes to possible states of the world, then a belief state can be represented as a set of possible worlds and to believe that P is to be in a belief state that lacks any possible world in which P is false.

12.  If a belief state can be represented as a set of possible worlds and to believe that P is to be in a belief state that lacks any possible world in which P is false, then the finite mind could have an infinite number of separate beliefs.

13.  if the finite mind could have an infinite number of separate beliefs, then the mind can literally believe all of the tacit beliefs we take for granted.

14.  if the mind can literally believe all of the tacit beliefs we take for granted, then the belief attributions of tacit beliefs is literally correct.

15.  So, if attitudes are primarily attitudes to possible states of the world, then the belief attributions of tacit beliefs is literally correct.

16.  Attitudes are primarily attitudes to possible states of the world.

17.  Therefore, the belief attributions of tacit beliefs are literally correct.

18.  If (16) and (17), then (1) is false.

 

Hopefully this does some justice to Stalnaker’s argument against the Linguistic view of propositions, though I would appreciate some feedback.  My argument notwithstanding, I would like to continue to evaluate Stalnaker’s possible worlds analysis of propositions.  Stalnaker’s view holds that to believe P is to be in a belief state which lacks any possible world in which P is false.  What I would like to propose is that this conception of beliefs is inadequate to explain one of our less desirable traits, that is, our ability to hold two contradictory beliefs (e.g. God exists, and God does not exist). What believing two contradictory beliefs would entail under his view, it seems, is that one represents both a world in which P is true, and a world in which not-P is true, or that P is false.  But this cannot happen, since to believe that P is to be in a belief state which lacks any possible world in which P is false.  Contradictory beliefs are necessary falsehoods, so let’s turn briefly to what he has to say about such matters.

 

Stalnaker discusses a problem for his view:  if mathematical truths are necessary, then there can be no doubt about the truth of the propositions themselves.  So, everyone must know that mathematical propositions which are necessarily true are true (or that those which are necessarily false are false).  The problem, however, lies in our inability to know right away that some given mathematical statement which is necessarily true or false is true or false.  Stalnaker locates the problem in the difficulty in our assessing which proposition is being expressed by a mathematical statement (especially if it is sufficiently complex).  The objects of belief in these cases, then, are propositions about the relation between statements and what they say. Such a person’s belief, according to Stalnaker, would consist in a proposition about the relation between the statement, “God exists and God does not exist”, and the necessarily false proposition P and not P. Such a person (I am supposing) would know all the relevant information about that the relation between the statement and the false proposition.  Their knowing this is not in doubt.  But, just because their beliefs consist of propositions about the relation between the statement and the necessarily false proposition does not appear to explain anything about how a person can hold two contradictory beliefs.  My suggestion is that there appears to be something wrong with his analysis of the content of beliefs in mathematical truths and falsehoods.  And if we must rely on his previous concept of beliefs as properties of belief states, we are no better off.  However, perhaps I have missed Stalnaker’s point, as may be evident, so perhaps this is not a problem for his view after all.

Soames and King are friends

After reading the Soames article I noticed a few parallels between it and what was going on in King chapter 4. I'll reconstruct a simple version of Soames' argument, note some considerations from King, and then see if a moral can be drawn.
So, here's the digression from Soames as to what an unstructured proposition would be like. First, we have to build a language. Suppose we have a domain D which is a set populated with individuals {d1,d2,...}. Next, we have a stock of predicates of varying addicity. We would have a stock of constants which would function like proper names, directly referring to a single member of the domain. We would have a stock of variables, which would also refer to a single member of the domain. Logical connectives and quantifiers would work as expected.
An interpretation would assign members of the domain to the constants, and there would be another assignment function assigning members of the domain to the variables.
At first glance, the unstructured propositions advocate "UPA" would equate the proposition expressed by a sentence in the language with the set of complete and consistent interpretations which make that sentence true. This won't work because all necessary propositions would be equated, and all necessarily false propositions would be equated. So the next move is to drop the completeness requirement. There may be some n-place predicate P and some set of n individuals {n1,n2,...} such that the interpretation doesn't make Pn1n2... true, but it doesn't make Pn1n1... false either. This still has the consequence of making all necessarily false propositions be the same. The next step is to drop the consistency requirement. So, an interpretation may assign Pn1n2... true, AND it may assign Pn1n2... false. So why isn't this a fine-grained enough notion to act as propositional content? Here's where the argument comes in. Consider Soames's (7)(p.205-206)
(^ signs will act as corner quotes here)
(7a) The semantic content of a conjunction (relative to a context) is the intersection of the semantic content of the conjuncts (relative to a context)
(7b) The semantic content of a disjunction (relative to a context) is the union of the semantic contents of the disjuncts (relative to a context).
(7c) The semantic content of an existential generalization ^for some x: Fx^ is the set of circumstances E such that for some object o in E, o “is f” in, or relative to, E.
I won't need (7d) and (7e) here. It's worth noting that the UPA needs some clause like (7) to account for the semantic content of complex sentences. Here's a simplified version of Soames' argument:
(1)A proposition is a set of fine-grained interpretations that abide by (7a-c) (assume for reductio)
(2)Proper names directly refer
(3)belief is a relation between an individual and a proposition expressible as 'Rap' which is itself a sentence of the language
(4)Lois believes that Clark can't fly and that Superman can fly.
(5)Lois believes the set of interpretations that makes 'Clark can't fly and Superman can fly' true (1,3,4)
(6)Clark is necessarily identical to Superman
(7)The situations that make 'Clark can't fly and Superman can fly' true are just those situations in which Kelal (who is Superman/Clark) is in the extension of the predicate can fly and in the extension of the predicate can't fly (2,6,7a)
(8)Lois believes the situations in which Kelal is in the extension of the predicate can fly and in the extension of the predicate can't fly (3,5,7)
(9)Lois believes the set of interpretations in which Clark can't fly, Superman can fly, and there is something such that it can't fly and it can fly (3,8,7c,7a)
(10)Lois believes that Clark can't fly, Superman can fly, and there is something such that it cant' fly and it can fly (1,9)
(11)~(10)
(12)(10)&~(10)
(13)~(1)
Soames doesn't spend much time defending (2) and (3). Luckily, Soames has another version of the argument that doesn't include (2), and King spends a great deal of time defending (3). I already wrote a post about King's defense of (3), so I'll cheat here and leave that aside. (2) is a fairly trivial consequence of Millianism.(4) and (6) are stipulated.
(5) follows from (1), (3) and (4) because on the view we're considering, the proposition which Lois believes just is the interpretation described in (5). (3) comes in to complete the picture by saying Lois's belief is correctly described as a relation between her and a proposition. Let Lois be l, and the believes relation be B. If Blp and p=p' then Blp'. So we can legitimately move from the fact that Lois believes that Clark can's fly and Superman can fly to her bearing the believing relation to the thing that is the proposition that Superman can fly and Clark can't fly (I.e. the situations that make it true). It's worth noting that if the relational account of propositional attitude verbs wasn't correct (for instance, if it were a 3 place relation involving modes of presentation) this move wouldn't work.
The inference to (7) is justified from (2),(6) and (7a). (2) states that if a proper name is used, the semantic content is just its referent. The referent of Clark and Superman is Kelal. (6) could've been rephrased as 'Clark and Superman both refer to Kelal', or something like that. (7a) states that when you have a conjunction, the semantic content is just those interpretations that make both conjuncts true. The state that makes 'Clark can't fly' is the state involving Kelal (premise (2)) being in the extension of can't fly. Likewise, 'Superman can fly' is the state involving Kelal being in the extension of can fly. The situation that makes both of those true is the one in which Kelal is in the extension of can fly and in the extension of can't fly. It's also worth nothing that without (2) this move wouldn't work. For instance, it could be held that the semantic content of names are descriptions that only derivatively refer to their referents. If this were so, then under different interpretations each name could change its referent. This would allow for an interpretation in which 'Clark' and 'Superman' don't co-refer.
(8) follows from (3), (5) and (7). (5) states that Lois believes a particular interpretation. (7) describes that same interpretation in different terms. (3) licenses the inference that therefore Lois believes the newly described interpretation (which is really the same as the old one). (9) is justified in a similar way as (8), invoking 7a and 7c to construct a different description of the interpretation that Lois believes. Note that 'there exists something which can fly and which can't fly' is a consequence of 'Kelal can fly and Kelal can't fly'. That means the latter claim is a subset of the existential claim. Since & denotes the intersection of the two propositions, adding '& there exists something which can fly and can't fly' won't change the set of situations reffered to. (10) finaly states the conclusion that Lois believes the interpretation under this new implausible description.
It should be noted that Soames reproduces the argument with no proper names (using demonstratives instead). This means a Fregian is not immune from this argument by denying (2). A Fregian might deny that demonstratives directly refer, but it's hard to see how one would do that. The major heavy-lifting premise in here is (3).
Aside from his rather extensive treatment of (3), King has an argument similar to this one against FC. Cresswell says that FC combined with a few other principles leads to the conclusion that propositions are unstructured. Let's look at FC again:
FC: The semantic value of a whole sentence is obtained by functions which are the semantic values of parts of that sentence operating on the semantic values of other parts. (p.113)
Take a look at Soames's 7a-7e, and then take a look at FC. Eureka! 7a-7e is just a more precise version of FC. 7a-7e gives rules for determining the semantic value of a sentence, based on functions which are themselves semantic values of parts of that sentence.
King argues against FC, again using (3). He makes reference to a particular sentence:
(17)That first order logic is complete is necessarily true and believed by Cresswell.
He sets thing up:(117)
“A verb of attitude is more than the intension of the sentence if embeds”
and strikes:
“it would seem that being necessary and being true must also be predicated of a structured entity in (17). But then it would appear that natural language sentences containing that-clauses in which truth or modality is ascribed, as well as sentences containing verbs of propositional attitude, must have parts whose semantic values are structured meanings or structured propositions”
King takes the argument I think one step further than Soames, offering an explanation for its conclusion. When we speak of propositions, predicating truth or necessity to them, we're simply not talking about interpretations, or truth-supporting circumstances. The proof is that if we assume we are (by assuming either 7a-7e or FC) then the truth conditions are just wrong.
The only way I can see to escape this argument is to deny the relational analysis of propositional attitude verbs.

An Objection from Stalnaker, and a Reply

I'm not sure if this will work. Let me know what you think.

The linguistic picture of content (LP) can be characterized as the conjunction of the following two theses:

(T1) The structure of an attitude ascription ^a v’s that P^ mirrors the syntactic structure of a sentence used to ascribe the belief that P to a.

(T2) The structure of an object of belief, P, mirrors the syntactic structure of those elements of sentences that are used to designate P.

If (LP) is true, then it seems to follow that propositional attitude ascriptions describe relations holding between agents and determinate, sentence like objects. The inference would basically look like this:

(i) If (LP) is true, then [the structure of an attitude ascription ^a v’s that P^ mirrors the syntactic structure of a sentence used to ascribe the belief that P to a] and [the structure of an object of belief, P, mirrors the syntactic structure of those elements of sentences that are used to designate P].

(ii) If [the structure of an attitude ascription ^a v’s that P^ mirrors the syntactic structure of a sentence used to ascribe the belief that P to a] and [the structure of an object of belief, P, mirrors the syntactic structure of those elements of sentences that are used to designate P], then an attitude ascription of the form ^a v’s that P^ expresses a relation between a and a determinate, sentence like object o.

(iii) So, if (LP) is true, then an attitude ascription of the form ^a v’s that P^ expresses a relation between a and a determinate, sentence like object o.

On 64/65, Stalnaker describes a case of propositional attitude ascription. If his description accurate, we have a counterexample to the principle expressed in the consequent of (iii), which would entail the falsity of (LP) (and hence the falsity of either (T1), (T2), or both, assuming that (LP) is meant to hold in all cases of attitude ascription). Here’s a version of the argument he runs.

Consider the following two true propositional attitude ascriptions:

(A1) Dan believes that Godel’s first incompleteness theorem is true.

(A2) Baby logic Bob believes Godel’s first incompleteness theorem is true.

(1) (A1) and (A2) are true attitude ascriptions.

(2) If (1), then, if an attitude ascription of the form ^a v’s that P^ expresses a relation between a and a determinate, sentence like object o, then there exists a (unique) determinate, sentence-like object o such that Dan believes o and Bob believes o.

(3) So, if an attitude ascription of the form ^a v’s that P^ expresses a relation between a and a determinate, sentence like object o, then there exists a (unique) determinate, sentence-like object o such that Dan believes o and Bob believes o. (1,2)

But consider what Dan and Bob are able to infer on the basis of the beliefs attributed to them in (A1) and (A2), respectively. Presumably, Dan is able to infer all kinds of stuff, while Bob is able to infer next to nothing. We infer that while Dan fully understands the content of his assertion, Bob does not.

(4) Dan fully understands the content of his assertion.

(5) Baby logic Bob does not fully understand the content of his assertion.

(6) [(4) & (5)]

(7) If (6), then it is not the case that there exists a (unique) determinate, sentence-like object o such that Dan believes o and Baby logic Bob believes o.

(8) But if that’s right, then it is not the case that an attitude ascription of the form ^a v’s that P^ expresses a relation between a and a determinate, sentence like object.

(9) And if that’s right, then (LP) is false.

(10) So, (LP) is false. (6-9, iii)

I think there is at least one way out of this problem for the structured propositionalist. They can block the argument in premise (7), by denying the consequent of that conditional, and say the same thing in this case that they say when faced with problems posed by the substitution of co-designative proper names in propositional attitude contexts. One way to do this is to analyze an attitude ascription of the form ^a v’s that P^ as expressing a two place relation (v) that holds between a and P iff a three place relation holds between a, P, and some mode of presentation of P. If we construe a mode of presentation as a set of propositions that one is able to infer on the basis of believing P, we can see how it is that Dan and Bob are in a position to infer different things on the basis of standing in a two place relation of belief to P. They can do this because each of them stands in a two place relation of belief to P in virtue of being one of the relata of a three place relation holding between themselves, P, and some mode of presentation of P, where the mode of presentation of P in each of their respective cases is not the same.

Stalnaker Comment Paper

1. It is an apparent fact that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben.
2. If asked (even by himself) if Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben, Russell would assent.
3. If asked (even by himself) if he believed that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben, Russell would assent.
4. If Russell was not asked (even by himself) if Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben, he could not assent.
5. If Russell was not asked (even by himself) if he believed that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben, he could not assent.
6. If (2) and (4), then (7).
7. If Russell was not asked (even by himself) if Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben, he would not be able to believe it.
8. If (3) and (5), then (9).
9. If Russell was not asked (even by himself) if he believed that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben, he would not be able to believe it.
10. If (1) and (7), (or if (1) and (9) ), then (11).
11. The belief that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben is apparent, it is only a potential belief.
12. Russell's mind is just not big enough to store representations for all of the trivial and obvious facts that he takes for granted.
13. If (11) and (12), then (14).
14. For a potential belief to be actualized, potential believers must be asked (even by themselves) if they believe a potential belief.
15. Conclusion: Russell only has a potential belief that the apparent fact that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben is true.

Stalnaker believes that someone who models beliefs on sentence-like representations of propositions must give this answer. But he points out that apparent beliefs cannot be merely potential beliefs, because they may still play an actual psychological role in the believer's actions and reasoning even if the believer never entertains the proposition.

To deny 15, Stalnaker suggests that we should adopt a pragmatic picture of belief. We should conclude that literally Russell does believe that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben.

16. In some contexts, Russell's attitude towards a proposition may presuppose another proposition, or take it for granted.
17. If (16), then that presupposition was available to play the same role as his belief in the explanation of his behavior.
18. If (12), we should deny that a state of knowledge or belief as something with propositions as components at all.
19. Rather, attitudes should be seen as being primarily attitudes towards possible states of affairs of the world and not to the propositions that distinguish between those states.
20. Therefore, a belief state can be represented as a set of possible worlds. To believe that P is for the proposition that P to be true in all possible worlds in the belief state.

On this conception, beliefs are something negative: to believe that P is simply to be in a belief state which lacks any possible world which P is false. We can understand how a person has beliefs by default, or even if they are unimaginative.

Stalnaker considers an objection to (20): there surely area an infinite number of possible worlds compatible with anyone's belief state. He accepts this, but adds that a believer's representation of a space of possible worlds need not distinguish between them all; just as a finite perceiver might see a space which consists of an an infinite number of points. So too may a finite believer represent a space of possible worlds which in fact consists of an infinite number of possible worlds.

As for my 10¢, I'm happy to accept 15. I don't see why they should be given up. It seems intuitive to me that beliefs are something involving awareness. Jones may act in accordance with a rule or with his believing something, yet be unable to ascribe to himself his own rule-following or believing. He is, as it were, apeing or simply going through the motions. I think that one's acting like one believes isn't enough to make one an actual believer. I may be tempted to ascribe to Jones or a dog that they have a belief or know something given instances of behavior or whatever which I take to be actions that are in accordance with a rule or belief, but I think that self-ascription is important to differentiate a iron filing being attracted to a magnet, a thermometer rising when heated, or a dog digging for a bone from a contemplative and reflective Russell or Jones.

I think that we must deny that Russell literally believed the apparent belief that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben, even if Russell's belief states were compatible with only worlds where Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben. I presume that Russell didn't speak Egyptian or Cree, so it seems plainly absurd to think that he literally believes all sorts of Egyptian or Cree sentences because they are compatible with his belief states. Russell never entertained such sentences anymore than the proposition that Frege's left earlobe is smaller than Big Ben. So how could he literally believe it?

I suppose someone like Stalnaker may think: "If Russell would assent to the sentence "Russell believes that P" this shows that Russell believes that P, and that Russell believed that P before he was asked." But I'm inclined to think: "If Russell would assent to the sentence "Russell believes that P" this shows that Russell believes that P, but that Russell did not occurrently believe that P before he was asked. Perhaps in some sense Russell was disposed to believe that P, but this isn't enough for him to literally believe that P."

A Kantian Benacerraf

Might a Kantian improve the argument:

1) The forms of human experience are space and time
2) If abstracta / noumena exist, they exist entirely outside of space and time
3) ( (1) & (2) ) → (4)
4) Humans cannot have knowledge of abstracta / noumena because they are situated outside of human experience
5) If Platonism / noumenal realism is true, then ~(4)
6) Platonism / noumenal realism is not true.

It seems that we might conclude that transcendental idealism is the best we can do. This leaves open a heavy instrumentalism for AE, or a pragmatic justifications of AE.

Now, an obvious Sellarsean move is to deny (4) because it equates knowledge to some sort of empirical conception of knowledge. Just because noumena are located outside of human experience doesn't mean that we cannot know about them. An ABE or hypothetico-deductive argumentation might fit the bill. We then would still have room for a transcendental realism about noumenal entities, given that our scientific realism is radical and critical enough to allow it.

But, this being said, if we move to a transcendental realism which is sufficiently radical and critical, we may well face something like the original Benacerraf Dilemma, since such a critical and radical scientific realism presumably wants to still be in some sense physicalist about events and things. I certainly would want to resist Platonism, even if I deny the empiricism Kant uses to motivate (4). Platonic realism just seems to be plain old idealism to me.

Thoughts?

Einstein and Benacceraf

The improved benacceraf epistemological argument went something like this:
1) humans exist entirely in space-time
2) if abstracta exist, they exist entirely outside of space-time
3) ((1)&(2))->(4)
4) it's likely that humans cannot have knowledge to abstracta
5) if platonism is true then ~(4)
6) platonism is not true

Consider the following argument that the previous argument is unsound:
1') humans exist entirely in the present
2') future events exist entirely outside the present
3') ((1')&(2'))->(4')
4') it's likely that humans cannot have knowledge of the future
5') ~(4')
6') (4')&~(4')
7') ~(1')v~(2')v~(3')
8') (7')->(9')
9') ~(1)v~(2)v~(3)

The claim is that (1')-(3') lead to absurdidty, and if this is right there must be something wrong with (1)-(3). Wes argued that (3') is false, since there's a way of knowing about the future. We simply reflect on the upstream causation that we've become aquainted with, and project that downstream. However, (3) can still be true, since there's no straitforward way of predicting what abstracta are like. I countered by saying that since causation makes sense only when looking at multiple times, (1') prevents us from knowing about causation as well (a similar argument could be formulated against knowledge of causation, instead of knowledge of the future). Appeal to memories doesn't seem to work, because if that's allowed then appeals to beliefs should be as well, and that would put pressure on (3). It was then considered that humans might be 4 dimensional time-worms, and thus (1') could be false. I countered that the argument could be run, not about humans, but about time-slices of humans. Hence the new absurdity would be that there's no human timeslice that knows anything about causation or the future (we don't know about the future or causation at any time). Curtis noted that I'm relying heavily on the notion of the present (in the first case) and on the notion of a timeslice (in the second case). Special relativity holds that there's no absolute present to appeal to, and similarly a timeslice in one inertial reference frame might be a 4-d time worm in another inertial reference frame. Thus appealing to timeslices is no good either. I believe I can counter this (blow the whistle on me if I'm doing any of this wrong Curtis).
Spacetime even A can cause spacetime event B iff B is in the future light-cone of A. Again, correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe if this relation holds between B and A, then B and A are said to be timewise seperated from each other. If neither B nor A is in the others future light-cone, then they are said to be spacewise seperated from each other. If they're right on the border, they're said to be lightlike seperated from each other. Ok so far?
So consider the huge 4-d mass of points that a human occupies. We can collect something that will act like a time-slice (for our purposes) by choosing a set of them that intuitively correspond to a complete body, such that no two of them are timelike seperated. By hypothesis, no two of these points are in a position to be causally related. Furthermore, that's an absolute, there's no reference frame in which they could be causally related.
I only need the claim that such a set of points exists that corresponds to a complete body. Then I can run the same argument about this entity to the effect that it cannot know anything about causation. Since it corresponds to an entire human body (and supposedly brain) then it will do for a timeslice that should know about causation, but does not not bennaceraff sorts of reasons.
I can think of a response or two to this, but I think I'll stop here.

Question for Dan

So the original argument does run:

1) humans exist entirely in space-time
2) if abstracta exist, they exist entirely outside of space-time
3) ((1)&(2))->(4)
4) it's likely that humans cannot have knowledge to abstracta
5) if platonism is true then ~(4)
6) platonism is not true

But for (1) and (2) you substitute 'space-time' for 'the present'. Thus:

1') humans exist entirely in the present
2') future events exist entirely outside the present

But it seems to be that (1') and (2') are counterparts not of (1) and (2) but:

A) humans exists entirely here
B) if abstracta exist, they exist entirely outside of here

Which seems to be a queer formulation. I think that being in the present 'time-wise' is the equivalent to being here 'space-wise'. If you are in the present, you are located in a segment of time. If you are here, you are located in a segment of space.

Is this ok? It seems that instead of (1') and (2') we should write (A') and (B'):

A') humans exist entirely in time
B') future events exist entirely outside time

where B') is false. I think that even if (1') is the correct rendering, it is false. Consider Wes qua spacetime worm. I exist in the present, where the present is Sept. 19, 2008 @ 11:10am. If we roll back the present to Sept. 19, 2007 @11:10am I exist there as well. Now, I don't exist if we roll back the present to Sept. 19, 1983 @11:10am, since I wasn't born yet. If we roll the present to Sept. 19, 2999 @11:10am I won't exist here either, But from the time I was born until I die, any segment of time we want to make the present, I exist.

Am I correct to see a disanalogy here? Or, if there is no disanalogy, that (1') is false?

A Wes Musing

In Time and the World Order Sellars writes:

"Now in the thing framework it is things which primarily exist, and in the 'event'framework it is 'events' which primarily exist. The contrast, in each case, is between items which are named (by both proper and common names) and the items which are either contextually introduced (e.g., events in the thing framework, and 'things' in the 'event'framework) or are at bottom linguistic entities (thus qualities, relations, facts)." p.594.

I bring this up for two reasons, both of which I hope are interesting.

1. a. When we talk about spacetime or spatiotemporal locations, do we run into a problem with pure processes? I mean by 'pure' 'objectless'. Sellars is interested to motivate that we may well end up with fundamental processes and not fundamental particles. We always could, as it were, conceptually cut up particles; or we could just focus on an event framework which tracks something like a C# through time.

It seems to me that a C# is an objectless process, just like a lightening flash. I guess, in a sense, a C# C#s, and a lightening-flash lightening-flashes. But even if we grant that in some sense a C# or a lightening flash is an entity, it doesn't seem to be a thing like a table or a chair, or like a electron or molecule.

So: I assume that a pure process is in time, since it is in the event framework. Need it to be in space? I hope it is still in the causal order, even if it is objectless.

2. Sellars seems to have something like Dorr's notion of superficial existence and fundamental existence in mind. In our framework we have a model and a commentary. The linguistic entities that are qualities, relations, facts, etc. are not pictured in the model but are given in the commentary. So it seems we could attribute to them a sort of superficial, albeit highly useful, existence. The fundamentally existing stuff, the events or things of the framework, are given in the model and have a sort of real and physical existence.

Someone who is 'just friends' with propositions might offer such a notion to show that propositions exist, even though they don't have a physical existence. If propositions occur, they may be like pure events and be in some sense objectless and without a spatial location. Does this really matter?

We might imagine:

``````````````````````````````````
````/ \```————————``|||||`````
````\ /`````````B``````````C``````
`````*````````````````````````````
`````*````````````````````````````
`````*````````````````````````````
`````A````````````````````````````

Which is a crude-as-hell model. This is the commentary: A is Jones. B is the 'says' relation. C is the saying 'Hello'. I want to say that the model is in the world, that Jones is in the world, that his saying occurs, and that what he says is in the world. I want to say that Jones has a spatial location, but not so much that his saying or the thing said does.

Might I not give a new commentary: A is Jones. B is the 'thinking' relation. C is the proposition that it is cold. Can't I make the same moves and give us propositions existing? It seems that either the proposition modeled by C is fundamentally real and in the world, or superficially real and in the commentary. It seems to be fundamentally real and in the world to me.

I hope this is not too crude or too obscure. Please tell me what you think.

argument against relational analysis of propositions

Bach's objection to RABR:
(RABR) verbs of propositional attitudes expresses a relation between persons and propositions; the claim that 'the semantic value of a “That” clause is a proposition': and the claim that in a true belief report, a proposition that the subject of the report believes must be specified.
(1) RABR
(2) (1) → (3)
(3) Propositional attitude verbs take as complements agents and propositions,
(4) The only thing relevant to the truth value associated with a well-formed sentence involving only an agent, a propositional attitude verb and a proposition, is which complements the relation denoted by the propositional attitude verb receives
(5) (3)&(4)
(6) (5) → ~(7)
(7) There is sometimes a change in truth value when substituting a that clause for a proposition description and vice versa, where the TC and the PD denote the same proposition.
(8) ~(7)
(9) (7)&~(7)
(10) ~(1)
This is set up as a reductio to RABR. Not much is said about how this argument is supposed to run, so I formulated an argument that fits neatly to the objections King considers. (1) is assumed for reductio. Part of the thesis of RABR is that propositional attitude verbs are relations between propositions and agents. Thus (2) is true. (4) is intuitively true. If, in fact, propositional attitude verbs are relations between agents and propositions, then the only thing that should matter to the truth value of a simple sentence involving only that relation and two relata, is whether or not the two relata are in fact related via the relations. Premise (6) is supported by the intuitive idea that proposition descriptions and that-clauses sometimes contribute only a single proposition to be evaluated as one of the relata of a propositional attitude verb. That is to say, they play the same role (contributing a proposition as a relata) and that a propositional description is capable to contributing the same proposition as some that-clause. If that's true, then substituting a TC for the appropriate PD should never change the truth value of a sentence. However, in support of (7), there are apparent cases in which substituting a TC for a PD or vice versa changes the truth value of a sentence, where intuitively the TC and PD contribute the same proposition.
King examines an objection to (4) that claims that syntax is also relevant to the truth value of propositions involving attitude verbs (142-143) but claims that the response is uninteresting. It's uninteresting in the sense that it can't explain ALL instances of substitution failure. He then goes on to examine denials of (7). There are various ways he considers of claiming that in instances of apparent substitution failure, the TC and the PD actually don't denote the same proposition (or denote other things as well) (145-146). While formally, it's possible that the TC and the PD don't denote the same proposition, he finds no plausible way of fleshing out the idea. He considers the proposition forms:
7a':[o[R[p]]]
7b':[o[R[q]]]
Where p is a that clause, and q is the corresponding PD, or vice versa. His dilemma is as follows:
(Lettered sentences are not themselves premises in the argument)
(1') 7a' and 7b' diverge in truth value
(2') (1') -> (3')
(3') (A) OR (B)
(4') ~(A)
(5') ~(B)
(6') ~(A)&~(B)
(7') ~(3')
(A) one of p or q determine some entity (or entities) o* in addition to the proposition, and this entity is relevant to the truth value of 7a' or 7b'. (the way the conglomeration is arranged will also be relevant)
(B) 7a' requires for its truth that o, R and p be arranged in one way, and 7b' requires those same things to be arranged in a different way for its truth.
In support of (2), the forms 7a' and 7b' are meant to stand for paradigmatic cases in which two sentences differ in truth value, but differ only in that a TC is substituted for a PD (or vice versa) where it appears the TC and PD denote the same proposition. King claims there are only two ways this could happen. One way is if there is more to the semantic content of the PD or the TC than merely denoting a proposition. This extra addition is denoted by o*. The only alternative King sees is that the TC and the PD make the proposition true or false in different ways, that is, they each require the proposition to be structured differently.
He claims (A) is false, simply because this o* is mysterious and elusive. Furthermore, there's not principled way to decide whether p contributes the o*, or q does. It's a merely ad-hoc construction that avoids the problem instead of addressing it.
He claims that (B) is false. I actually had a tough time phrasing (B) in such a way that it wasn't obviously false. In general, we've been speaking as if the logical structure of the propositions expressed by 7a' and 7b' were simple. In fact they are simple. And there's simply no way of restructuring them in the ways that (B) commands.
You'll notice that the last argument was a reductio of the consideration that 7a' and 7b' diverge in truth value. In fact King things they don't diverge in truth value, if the R remains constant in each case. This bring us to King's solution.
King denies (4), he does this by claiming that some propositional attitude verbs are ambiguous between two relations. So, in a case with apparent substitution failure, the TC is merely forcing one disambiguation of the propositional attitude verb, while the PD is forcing another. So, it's not the case that the only thing relevant to the truth value of the pertinent sentences is which relata the propositional attitude verb receives, it's also relevant which way the propositional attitude verb is disambiguated. He gives lots of independent evidence that these propositional attitude verbs are indeed ambiguous between relations.

Jubien's Second Argument

Jubien’s second argument against propositions concerns the arbitrary procedure by which we distinguish between propositions of the following sort:

 i)  All dogs are canines.

ii)  All canines are dogs.

 These propositions have a subextensive relation, which is the relation between properties expressed by ‘all’ (King, 132).  However, the mereological fusion of the constituents of these propositions by itself does not differentiate between (i) and (ii), for they both have the same constituents: being a canine, being a dog, and being subextensive.  What we must do is take into account the order of these properties with respect to the relation of subextensiveness.  His solution may be abstracted as follows: we may take the property of being the property of being x, the property of being y, and subextensiveness to assert that all x’s are y’s.  Therefore, by taking the property of being the property of being x we can distinguish which property is subextensive to the other.  However, claims Jubien, this account is arbitrary and stipulative, for we could just as well have taken the subextensive property to be the property of being x (while the other is the property of being the property of being y), instead of requiring that it be the property of being the property of being x.  Since this appears to show that neither mereological sum has any more claim to being the proposition in question, we are confronted by the Benacerraf dilemma (henceforth B – dilemma).  The B – dilemma leaves us with two equally suited entities as propositions with no principled reason to claim one over the other.  We may conclude that ontological theories of propositions cannot provide us with an account of what propositions are and hence fail. 

Lets extract a logical argument from Jubien’s dialectic:

Lets suppose that z is the mereological sum of the property of being the property of being a dog, the property of being a canine, and subextensiveness.  Let us also suppose that z’ is the mereological sum of the property of being a dog, the property of being the property of being a canine, and subextensiveness. 

 1. z

2. z’

3.  if (1), then z is the proposition all dogs are canines (henceforth (i)).

4.  if(2), then z’ is the proposition (i).

5.  z is the proposition (i).

6.  z’ is the proposition (i).

7.  (5) & (6)

8.  if (7), then there are 2 different mereological sums equally suited to be proposition (i).

9.  There are 2 different mereological sums equally suited to be proposition (i).

10.  if (9), then there is no principled reason by which we could favour one over the other.  

11.  There is no principled reason by which we could favour one over the other.

12.  If (11), then neither z nor z’ is the proposition (i).

13.  Neither z nor z’ is the proposition (i).

14.  if (13), then it is not the case that ontological theories of propositions can provide us an account of propositions. 

15.  It is not the case that ontological theories of propositions can provide us an account of propositions. 

 King, however, argues against both 3 and 4.  What Jubien assumes, for these conditionals to be true, is (a) that propositions are mereological sums of properties, relations, etc (King, 133).  Furthermore, it is also assumed that (b) there is only one unique some given parts (King, 133).  The problem got started up because these assumptions constrained the account of propositions.  They required a distinction between 2 mereological sums so that they could be the two different propositions (i.e. (i) and (ii)).  King rejects these assumptions, and argues that his alternative account allows properties to occupy different positions in the proposition.   King’s account allows a proposition such as all x’s are y’s to  differ from the proposition all y’s are x’s, since these properties (x and y) would occupy different positions in the proposition.  King gives the following examples of how this might work:  [ALL [x] [y]] for one proposition (such as (i)), and [ALL [y] [x]] for the other proposition (such as (ii)).  Jubien’s argument, concludes King, is limited to accounts of propositions which assume both (a) and (b), and that his (King’s) account is immune from Jubien’s argument, since it does not accept (a) and (b) and still accounts for the two different propositions. 

 Jubien, however, does not hold assumptions (a) and (b) just to make the propositionalist’s life harder.  He claims that for an ontological account of propositions to succeed, it must be consistent with our intuitions about propositional constituency, which, as King agrees, include properties and relations.  However, the type of propositions he considers are Platonic propositions, that is, propositions that are mind-independent and a-temporal.  If, propositions are Platonic propositions, then perhaps we have some reason to believe that (I) the truth value of a proposition is due to the representing nature of its internal constituents themselves, as he argues for in his first objection to ontological propositional accounts.  Now, it can be argued (and Jubien seems to argue), that if propositions are Platonic propositions, it cannot be that they received their truth value from something external, since we would be left to wonder if these propositions are merely surrogate accounts.  Furthermore, if this worry is warranted, then we must try to account for this internal representing, and perhaps the best way to accomplish this and still be consistent with Platonic intuitions is to accept assumption (II): propositions are mereological sums of properties and relations.  However, that this is the best way to accomplish this is left un-argued for here, but at least the possibility is left open.   

Benacerraf Dilemma, Quine, Kripkenstein

This has just occurred to me, I hope it's not totally off base. But it seems that the line of argument behind the Benacerraf dilemma is something like a case of a failure of theoretical identification. So we can imagine that Mr. Body gets killed. The detective shows up and he creates a theory:

1. The victim was killed with a pipe. The victim is a male. He is...

And we can later, given certain facts we know about the victim, we can identify him with Mr. Body.

But if we don't have much to go on with regards to his killer, we just have our theoretical killer in our detective story. We know that this killer killed the victim, and that the victim is to be identified as Mr. Body.

It would seem that the Benacerraf dilemma applies when we think that either Jones or Smith killed Mr. Body. If we are sure that there was only one killer, say because there was only one set of foot prints, or one intruder captured on camera, it seems that we cannot identify both Jones and Smith as the killer. Since we cannot conclusively say that Jones or Smith is the killer, and since both are the best possible candidates, neither can be identified as the killer. We are stuck and have to come up with a better picture.

It seems to me that the Benacerraf dilemma runs the same way with Platonic propositions. If we say that there is a real entity out there that our theoretically posited Platonic entity (proposition) links up to, we need a specific and conclusive entity. If we just say it is some entity or other, this is like saying that Mr. Body was killed by some person or other. This seems to be uninformative and unhelpful.

So when we say:

2. The sentence "There is a date" expresses the proposition that there is a date

it seems that we'd have to give some account of what this proposition is. If it is an entity, which one? If we just say: "Ya, it is some entity or other" or decide to name this entity "p" we don't help ourselves. It could literally be anything. It's like calling Mr. Body's killed "Ned." But who is Ned?

Do I understand this correctly?

This seems like Quine with Radical Translation, that since we can always offer different systems of interpretation for sentences, meanings cannot be nicely pinned down like we want. This seems like Kripkenstein as well, with the worry that past patterns of behavior cannot be linked to rules or generalizations which justify future patterns of behavior. Since we can always offer different systems of interpretation for behavior, dispositions cannot be used to nicely justify conduct.

It would seem that a middle ground position like King, and something similar in Sellars and I'm sure others, nicely avoids the problems for propositions from the Benacerraf dilemma, the Quinean paradox about meaning and the Kripkensteinean paradox of rule following, and the related Wittgensteinean paradox of rule following.

I don't know if this going to be informative to anyone, but it seems rather interesting to me.

King's response to Jubien's first ontological objection

According to King, Jubien's objections to the existence of propositions somewhat do not apply to his version of what propositions are. King says that Jubien classifies his theory of propositions as an ontological account (as opposed to a mathematical variety). Jubien's definition of an ontological account is something that explains propositions as platonic in nature and having constituent parts (properties). King's propositional theory states that propositions actually are dependent on conscious entities and would not have existed without them. King's account of Jubien's 1st objection can be written as follows:

1) Propositions represent or have truth conditions as a result of their "internal make up".

2) Because of (1), the representational capacity of propositions must be grounded in the representational capacity of its constituents.

3) The representational capacity of the constituents of propositions must be grounded in the nature of the constituents themselves.

4) The nature of the constituents of propositions are unique mereological fusions or sums of properties and relations.

5) But mereological sums of properties and relations do not give way to unique propositions

6) Anything that is both necessarily unique and not unique at the same time cannot exist

7) Propositions must not exist

King responds by addressing the validity of the first Premise. The reason Jubien takes (1) to be the case is that if it were the case that propositions could represent or have truth conditions as a result of external causes, then something else could have been the proposition in question. If two things have the same claim to something then, according to Jubien, they fall prey to the Benacerraf dilemma and neither can say they are the real proposition (instead they are merely surrogates or models of it). In notational form this can be as follows:

i) An external cause that gave truth conditions to a proposition could have given it to other propositions.

ii) All propositions with the same truth conditions have an equal claim to being the true proposition.

iii) If more than one proposition can claim to be the true proposition then they fall prey to the Benacerraf dilemma

iv) Externally caused propositions fall prey to the Benacerraf dilemma.

At this point, King questions premise (i); whether Jubien means a) something actually has an equal claim to the proposition in question, or b) something could have an equal claim to the proposition in question.

In the case of (a), King outright rejects it as false. King states that "the facts I claim are propositions are intrinsically the most eligible facts for that role".

In the case of (b), King rejects this because only things that "actually are" can cause a Benacerraf dilemma.

By showing that premise (1) does not apply to his theory of propositions, King has in effect shielded his theory from all subsequent consequences of that premise, namely all of Jubien's arguments against propositions (kind of chopped the legs off of him).

It seems to me that King had already pointed out that his theory of propositions does not fall under the category of those objected to by Jubien. I would have been very surprised if, having already stated that, he ran into trouble defending his theory. I think at one point he even says that he will defend his theory from Jubien's objections for the "intrinsic interest of his arguments".

The only problem that I have is that I didn't quite catch where King does attribute his proposition's truth conditions from (an external source I imagine seeing how he is not a fan of the internal view). All I know is that according to him it could be an external source without having to worry about the Benacerraf dilemma.

Is King a Meinongian about possible propositions? If he is, does he need to be?

This post overlaps Wes’s post below to some extent. King argues that representation is external to propositions, but that no Benacerraf dilemma follows from this. The argument appears to rely on something like Meinongianism about possible propositions. But it’s not clear to me that it needs to.

Here’s a sketch of the argument. Let’s call the proposition semantically encoded by the sentence (S)

(S) ‘John loves babies’

‘p’

(assuming there is such an entity). The argument begins with the assumption that representation is external, and concludes by showing that no Benacerraf dilemma follows from this assumption.

(1) Representation is external.

If (1) were true, then, given Jubien’s argument for internal representation, in addition to p, either there actually exists some entity q that has an equal claim to being the proposition encoded by (S), or there could have existed an entity q that could have been the proposition encoded by (S).

(2) If (1), then some entity q actually exists and has a claim to be the proposition semantically encoded by (S), or some entity q could have existed, and could have been the proposition semantically encoded by (S).

Assuming (1) (as King does), we have (3):

(3) Some entity q actually exists and has a claim to be the proposition semantically encoded by (S), or some entity q could have existed, and could have been the proposition semantically encoded by (S). (1,2)

According to King, the first disjunct of (3) is false. It’s not the case, he argues, that the intentional activities of speakers that in fact brought p into existence also brought q into existence. If they did, then q would have actually had equal claim to being the proposition encoded by (S). But they didn’t. So the first disjunct of (3) is false.

(4) It’s not the case that some entity q actually exists and has some claim to be the proposition semantically encoded by (S).

So, given (3) and (4), we have (5):

(5) So, some entity q could have existed and could have been the proposition semantically encoded by (S). (3,4)

But the truth of (5) is not sufficient to generate a Benacerraf dilemma, since it’s not the case that more than one entity exists and has equal claim to being the proposition encoded by (S).

(6) If (5), then it is not the case that more than one entity exists and has equal claim to being the proposition semantically encoded by (S).

(7) So, it is not the case that more than one entity exists and has equal claim to being the proposition semantically encoded by (S). (5,6)

(8) So, representation is external, and it is not the case that more than one entity exists and has equal claim to being the proposition semantically encoded by (S); i.e., no Benacerraf dilemma follows. (1,7)

My concern is with the consequent of the conditional in (2), and so with the move from the subconclusion in (3) to that in (5). Given that King thinks (4) is true, it seems like holding (5) commits King to Meinongianism about possible candidates for being the proposition encoded by (S). At least, this much seems true: if (5) is true, then there are possible propositions that do not actually exist. Assuming that King takes actual existence to just BE existence, then this claim seems to commit King to saying that there are possible, non-existent entities. And this seems equivalent to some version of Meinongianism (Meinongian possibilism, I guess). Do the two disjuncts in the consequent of (2) exhaust all the options?

Let’s say we were uncomfortable with Meinongian possibilism. Maybe we think that whatever is in any way exists, and whatever exists in any way actually exists. If we thought this, then we’d probably be uncomfortable with Meinongian possibilism. But consider whatever activities on the parts of intentional agents King thinks are sufficient for bestowing truth-conditions (and hence representationality) on p. I’m not sure what these activities are (it sounds like he goes over it at some length in ch.2), but maybe it’s like this. Maybe together these activities constitute some complex relation R such that it is in virtue of intentional agents bearing R to p that p (actually) is the proposition semantically encoded by (S). Given that intentional agents do, actually, in fact bear R to p, why can’t King accept that there exists some entity q that intentional agents could have borne, but do not actually in fact bear, R to? King’s worry is that there might actually exist an entity q such that intentional agents actually bear R to both p and q. This would lead to a Benacerraf dilemma. But this isn’t the case here. In the case under consideration, there is only one entity that intentional agents bear R to. We may not know exactly which entity it is, or what it’s like (that seems like a job for the metaphysics of propositions). But if these thoughts are sound, we could rewrite (2) as (2’):

(2’) If (1), then some entity q actually exists and could have been the proposition semantically encoded by (S), or some entity q could have existed, and could have been the proposition semantically encoded by (S).

The foe of Meinong could then accept the first conjunct of (2’), deny the second, and still generate a conclusion that is the same as King’s (8). I suppose the real worry then is King’s claim that intentional actions on the parts of conscious agents literally bring p into existence. If intentional actions literally bring propositions into existence, then it wouldn’t be possible to say that some entity distinct from p actually exists and could have been the proposition encoded by (S). Could we avoid this worry by holding that the entity that is now, in fact, p- some type of structured complex, presumably- existed before the intentional actions of conscious agents, but that these actions somehow bestowed upon p its ‘propositionality’? This is admittedly vague, but if we could, then something like (2’) might work. What do you guys think?