[lit-ideas] From the banal to the bizarre
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 11 Aug 2012 10:42:09 -0400 (EDT)
In a message dated 8/11/2012 3:41:43 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
"[E]veryone always does exactly what they want to do."
>There's something interestingly odd about that proposition.
If N means his claim in a testable way, then how is it be tested?
If it is not testable, how is its truth to be evaluated or decided?
Clearly not scientifically.
It also relates to this question by D. Davidson,
"Is weakness of the will [akrasia] possible?"
Grice answered, yes.
Grice & Baker, "Davidson on weakness of the will", in Essays on Davidson,
1985, Oxford University Press.
Grice's interest in 'weakness of the will' was broader, and he was not just
interested in refuting Davidson. In "Aspects of reason", Grice reconsiders
"weakness of the will". He thinks there is 'weakness of belief', too: 'a
theoretical counterpart for weakness of the will'.
But it's true that Grice was also influenced by Kenny, in "Practical
Inferences", Analysis, 1965, so one has to be careful. Usually the above is
considered a folk-psychological law to enter as a major premise in a practical
syllogism:
Peter is hungry.
Peter sees a sandwich.
Peter wants to eat the sandwich.
--- Everyone always does exactly what they want to do.
--------
--- Therefore, Peter eats the sandwich.
(Grice's example is with "A squirrel gobbles nuts").
"Everybody always does exactly what they want to do" requires a
refinement, perhaps, in the choice of verbs. "Want" is a Norwegian verb, I
think,
cognate with "lack": 'that floor wants sweeping'. So 'desire' or 'wish' may be
preferrable. Note that 'need' is still a different thing.
What we may want is a 'bouletic' operator
B(x, p) -- x has conative attitude B towards p.
Then we need a DOXASTIC operator, such that x realises that there are ways
to achieve p.
Finally, assuming lack of weakness of the will, etc., x will do what he has
to do to achieve p.
And so on. Grice expands on this in his "Method in philosophical
psychology: from the banal to the bizarre". We may need to postulate privileged
access and incorrigibility: if x wants to do p, he KNOWS he wants to do p. He
cannot be self-deceived --. The requirements are such that Grice ends up
seeing these as 'normative', rather. And so on.
"Method in philosophical psychology" was reprinted, fortunately, in Grice's
second book, "The conception of value".
Cheers,
Speranza
Grice, Studies in the way of words, 1989.
Grice, The conception of value, 1991.
Grice, Aspects of reason, 2001.
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