Linguistic Intuitions

1. Linguistic Intuitions Michael Johnson

2. Outline • 0. Outline • 1. Metasemantics • 2. Intuitions • 3. A Puzzle about Intuitions • 4. Confronting the Puzzle • 5. A Realist Solution • 6. Conclusions

3. 1. Metasemantics

4. Lexical vs. Meta- Semantics Lexical Semantics Metasemantics Answers the question: In virtue of what do individual words mean what they do, rather than something else, or nothing at all? Answers the question: What do individual words mean?

5. Today’s Talk Today I’ll be concerned with metasemantic accounts of reference: that is, accounts of why words have the referents they do, rather than other referents or no referents at all.

6. The Descriptive Theory of Reference According to Descriptivism, names are disguised definite descriptions. Descriptivism: A name refers to the object, if there is one, that uniquely satisfies the description whose disguise it is. Tired example: ‘Aristotle’ might be associated with the description ‘last great philosopher of Antiquity.’ So ‘Aristotle’ refers to Aristotle because Aristotle is the last great philosopher of antiquity.

7. Causal Theories of Reference According the Causal Theories, causal, lawful, or informational connections between word and world make it the case that words mean what they do. One example of a causal theory is this dumbed-down version of Evans: Evans: A name N in a society S refers to the object that is the dominant causal source of S’s N-involving beliefs. Example: ‘Aristotle’ refers to Aristotle because it is largely Aristotle’s doings and goings that are the cause of our ‘Aristotle’-involving beliefs.

8. 2. intuitions

9. The Final Frontier • Let’s suppose that most Americans believe all & only the following about Neil Armstrong: • He was the first man in space. • He was an American. • In this scenario, most Americans are wrong. Yuri Gagarin was the first man in space.

10. The Anti-Descriptivist Intuition If you accepted my last claim, that in the scenario described, most Americans are wrong that Neil Armstrong was the first man in space, then you have anti-descriptivist intuitions. There are only two candidates for the description ‘Neil Armstrong’ is a disguise for: 1. ‘The first man in space’ 2. ‘An American who was the first man in space’

11. The Anti-Descriptivist Intuition 1. ‘The first man in space’ If (1) determines the referent of ‘Neil Armstrong,’ then most Americans are right, because Yuri Gagarin was the first man in space.

12. The Anti-Descriptivist Intuition 2. ‘An American who was the first man in space’ If (2) determines the referent of ‘Neil Armstrong,’ then most Americans are neither wrong nor right, because no one was an American who was the first man in space.

13. 3. A puzzle about intuitions

14. The Evidential Relevance of Intuitions Many philosophers have found this sort of argument compelling. Many have converted to some or another causal theory of reference because of just such arguments. But why? Why are intuitions about these cases any sort of evidence at all?

15. The Evidential Relevance of Intuitions After all, nothing about Evans’ theory predicts, entails, or even suggests that if it’s true, we should have intuitions that accord with it. And nothing about Descriptivism says we can’t be convinced it’s false, even when it’s true. Both theories are equally compatible with the fact that we have the intuitions we do. So the intuitions just don’t seem to be evidence one way or another.

16. Today’s Talk In this talk, I am going to claim that our intuitions are evidence for which theory is true. But also, in a deeper sense, I’m going to claim that neither theory is true.

17. A Crude Model of Semantic Intuitions We are given a story, S (e.g. the Neil Armstrong Story). We are asked to decide on the basis of the story whether some conclusion C follows, e.g. whether most Americans’ beliefs are wrong. We take S, add to it our background beliefs B, and answer: • “Yes” if we compute C from S & B. • “No” if we compute not-C from S & B. • “I don’t know/ underspecified” if we cannot compute either C or not-C from S & B.

18. A Reconstruction Add in the background beliefs B1 and B2 to the Neil Armstrong story S: B1: Neil Armstrong is the dominant causal source of most Americans’ ‘Neil Armstrong’ involving beliefs. B2: A name N in a society S refers to the object that is the dominant causal source of S’s N-involving beliefs. S & B1 & B2 entail C, that most Americans are wrong. So, assuming everyone believes B1, the fact that we are inclined to answer “C is true” is evidence that we hold B2. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t have the intuitions we do.

19. Halfway There We’re closer now to solving our puzzle. Now we can see how our intuitions about cases are evidentially relevant to what metasemantic theories we (tacitly) believe. What remains is to provide a bridge between what metasemantic theories we (tacitly) believe and what metasemantic theories are actually true. Why is believing a certain metasemantic theory evidence of its truth?

20. The Synthetic A Priori The reason the gap seems difficult to bridge, though, is that it’s an instance of a much older problem. How could our intuitions, which are supposedly a priori, and not derived from experience, provide us knowledge of which metasemantic theory was true, which is a synthetic fact. How is the synthetic a priori possible?

21. 4. Confronting the puzzle

22. Four Ways to Bridge/ Trivialize the Gap • Anti-Intuitionist Realism: Deny that our intuitions have any evidential relevance to what metasemantic theory is true. • Semantic Skepticism: Deny that there are facts about reference and truth, explain our intuitions in a way that doesn’t advert to ‘tracking the truth.’ • Intuitionist Realism: Claim that we have genuine knowledge of mind-independent semantic facts without empirical investigation and explain how this is so. • Idealism: Claim that the semantic facts are constituted/ determined by mind-dependent facts like our intuitions/ our dispositions to have certain intuitions.

23. Option 1: Anti-Intuitionist Realism “I,” says the anti-intuitionist, “don’t think that intuitions have any evidential relevance to what metasemantic theory is true. You have to go investigate the facts before you can know what things mean or why they mean it…

24. Option 1: Anti-Intuitionist Realism “You think ‘cow’ applies to those brown mooing things because they’re what normally cause you to say things like ‘Look at that cow!’ But you don’t know that. ‘Cow’ could be true of all and only isosceles triangles, because it’s most frequently spoken on a Wednesday. What metasemantic theory is true is an a posteriori matter completely. You don’t know what ‘cow’ means or why until you have a PhD in linguistics and have done fieldwork in English-speaking countries.”

25. Here’s what I meant by giving the anti-intuitionist that farcical speech: If intuitions are evidentially irrelevant to which metasemantic theory is true, then those things that are evidentially relevant had better be close by, noticeable, and ubiquitous, otherwise we risk concluding that none of us know what ‘cow’ means.

26. Now I don’t actually know of any Anti-Intuitionist Realists, because the intuition haters I’m acquainted with are all skeptics. I’m happy to join the anti-intuitionist if no other option on my list pans out. But, in the absence of a really good story about what other than intuitions is evidence for which metasemantic theory is true, the view does sound a little… crazy.

27. Troubles for Anti-Intuitionist Realism Suppose a descriptivist traveler visits a “causal” community and attempts to learn the correct metasemantic theory for the natives. What differences will he notice about their behavior that will “tip him off” that they’re not descriptivists?

28. Troubles for Anti-Intuitionist Realism At least in the literature (e.g. Machery, Mallon, Nichols & Stich, 2004), when it’s claimed that two communities instantiate different metasemantic theories, the only difference described is the intuitions of the communities. But again, that is at best evidence of what the speakers believe.

29. Option 2: Semantic Skepticism “I,” says the Semantic Skeptic, “don’t accept that intuitions have evidential relevance to which metasemantic theory of reference is true. In fact, I don’t accept that anything has evidential relevance to which metasemantic theory is true, because none of them are. There is no reference and thus there is no true theory of why things refer to what they do. They don’t.”

30. Inverting the Theory of Reference Hartry Field (1990) has proposed a particularly “Humean” skeptical solution to the problem of the synthetic a priori in linguistic intuitions.

31. Inverting the Theory of Reference Field’s idea is that we accept a primitive inference rule: from “x is the dominant causal source of our N-involving beliefs” to derive “N refers to x”

32. Inverting the Theory of Reference But that’s the whole story. Just as Hume thought there was no causation, but we were primitively disposed to reason as if there were, Field thinks there is no reference, we just reason as though there is.

33. Semantic Skepticism I’ll reserve comment until later as to what reasons there are or at least could be to reject Semantic Skepticism.

34. Option 3: Intuitionist Realism “I,” says the Intuitionist Realist, “am exactly the person for whom this problem is a problem for. So I must say something about it. Let me see here…”

35. Realist Response #1 (not a real Williamson quote) “Look, linguistic intuitions are intuitions (duh). If you’re gonna start being skeptical about some intuitions, you won’t have any principled place to stop. So unless you’re prepared to doubt all of science, why not just accept linguistic intuitions?”

36. Realist Response #1 But I am not an intuition skeptic. I like intuitions. Or at least, linguistic intuitions. I just want to know what justifies them, and this response just says: “Stop asking so many questions!”

37. Realist Response #2 (not an actual Bealer quote) “Look, linguistic intuitions are intuitions (duh). Intuitions are a basic source of evidence. They’re like seeing or smelling. You don’t go around doubting that a foul stench justifies the belief that there’s something stinky there. So don’t go doubting your linguistic intuitions either.”

38. Realist Response #2 The first thing to say is that this response is pure epistemic mysterianism. Not even Kant was satisfied with answers of that form, and he believed in the synthetic a priori.

39. Realist Response #2 The second thing to say is that the response isn’t just mysterian, it’s mistaken. If we could directly grasp the philosophical truths, we wouldn’t disagree with one another on philosophical matters so much. For the intuition-defender, this is the problem of conflicting intuitions.

40. The Problem of Conflicting Intuitions Machery, Mallon, Nichols, and Stich (2004) argue, from experiments they conducted on Western and East Asian subjects, that Westerners have intuitions that align with causal theories whereas East Asians have more descriptivist intuitions. I won’t argue that thatistrue, I’ll just point out that if it’s true, it gives the lie to the idea that we have direct intuitive access to the metasemantic facts. Two people with conflicting intuitions can’t both be right.

41. Option 4: Idealism “I,” says the Idealist, “have no problem of explaining how our intuitions are evidence for the semantic facts. According to me, the semantic facts depend upon, are grounded in, hold in virtue of, and are made true by our intuitions. If we had different intuitions, the semantic facts would be different.”

42. Two Types of Idealist Formal Idealist: The formal (structural) facts about our intuitions ground the semantic facts for the language we speak. Semantic Idealist: The semantic facts about our intuitions (the content of those intuitions) ground the semantic facts for the language we speak.

43. Formal Idealism e.g. Conceptual Role Semantics According to Conceptual or Inferential Role Semantics, a word means what it does because of the (formal) role it plays in inferences involving it. If you change those inferences– including the “intuition” inferences from a story to a judgment about the story– then you change what the word means.

44. Formal Idealism a.k.a. Conceptual Role Semantics This would explain how the synthetic a priori is possible. Unfortunately, CRS has to deny our intuitions: the anti-descriptivist intuitions are just as much anti-CRS intuitions. “Meaning ain’t in the head” is the slogan.

45. Semantic Idealism, e.g. Intention Based Semantics “The intention theorist seeks to reduce the having of content of marks and sounds to the having of content of psychological states…”

46. Semantic Idealism, e.g. Intention Based Semantics “Then, having reduced all questions about the semantical features of public language items to questions about mental content, he sees his task as having to answer those further questions, but free now to pursue those answers without any further appeal to public language semantical properties.” (1982)

47. Fodor against Semantic Idealism “[W]ords can’t have their meanings just because their users undertake to pursue some or other linguistic policies; or, indeed, because of any purely mental phenomenon, anything that happens purely ‘in your head.’…

48. Fodor against Semantic Idealism “…Your undertaking to call John ‘John’ doesn’t, all by itself, make ‘John’ a name of John. How could it? For ‘John’ to be John’s name, there must be some sort of real relation between the name and its bearer; and intentions don’t, per se, establish real relations…”

49. Fodor against Semantic Idealism “…This is because, of course, intentions are (merely) intentional; you can intend that there be a certain relation between ‘John’ and John and yet there may be no such relation. A fortiori, you can intend that there be a semantical relation… and yet there may be no such relation…”

50. Fodor against Semantic Idealism “…Mere undertakings connect nothing with nothing; ‘intentional relation’ is an oxymoron. For there to be a relation between ‘John’ and John, something has to happen in the world. That’s part of what makes the idea of a causal construal of semantic relations so attractive.”