[lit-ideas] Re: The Order of Aurality ratification of fiction
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 9 Mar 2012 14:36:32 +0000 (GMT)
________________________________
From: Phil Enns <phil.enns@xxxxxxxxx>
> In this light, I will re-assert my original claim that, in general,
for Wittgenstein, any language is, in principle, open to understanding
by any language user. >
Phil's 're-assertion' fails again to provide tenable grounds for inferring that
"any language is, in principle, open to understanding by any language user"
from the putative fact [as per the PLA] that any given language is governed by
'rules' that are 'public' in the sense that they cannot be established by
individual 'private' fiat.
Part of the problem here, I suggest, is Phil's analytically loose expressions:
for example, the key expression "any language is, in principle, open to
understanding
by any language user" is not quantified/qualified so as to make clear whether
this means: (a) 'any given language is, in principle, open to understanding
by any user of that given language'; or (b) 'any given language is, in
principle, open to understanding by any user of any other language'.
Sense (a) is not to the point, where in sense (a) 'any user of a given
language' sufficiently shares a 'form of life' with other users, as it is clear
that Phil intends the claim that "any language is, in principle, open to
understanding by any language user" to mean something that denies that a
sufficiently shared 'form of life' is a prerequisite for understanding any
given language. To sustain Phil's argument he must mean his claim in sense (b).
Yet what has been pointed out already is that just because any given language
is governed by rules accessible to users of that language (as per the PLA) does
not mean that any given language is accessible to users of otherlanguages (with
their different 'rules').
Perhaps due to the analytically loose formulation Phil uses, Phil's argument
slides between (a) and (b), and perhaps Phil does not realise this. For while
the PLA perhaps supports (a), it does not support (b); yet it would only
sustain Phil's argument if it did support (b). Yet, as above, in Phil's
formulation the key distinction between (a) and (b) is not drawn, and this may
explain why he is deceived that the PLA supports his argument. For the PLA, at
best, only supports (a); and (a), on analysis, does not sustain his argument at
all.
> I generalized from the more specific argument
that there can be no private language, because it would be impossible
to learn, and it would never be clear to oneself that one is following
the rules of that language. If all language is public, it is therefore
observable to any other language user.>
Here again the crucial distinction between (a) and (b) is again not drawn: so
when Phil reasons "If all language is public, it is therefore observable to any
other language user", Phil does not make clear whether "any other language
user" denotes (a) merely 'any other user of that given language' or (b) 'any
user of any other language'. This is crucial:- because only if it is true that
"If all language is 'public', it is therefore observable* to any user of any
other language", might we infer that differences in 'form of life' cannot
render one language incomprehensible to any user of any other language. But it
has already been pointed out that in the sense in which the PLA maintains "all
language is public" (by which it means, by the way, that "any given language
must be 'public'", not that "all language is 'public' to any user of any
language"), the PLA does not claim that therefore any given language is
therefore "observable"* to any user of any other
language.
*[On a lesser note, "observable" should, I suggest, be replaced by
"understandable" - lest, for example, we invite dispute about what is
"observable" about what is 'public' about language: W himself being clear, for
example, that he is not doing natural science].
>Now, this may be 'Cuisinart' thinking, but then I am not sure what isn't.>
Insofar as 'Cuisinart' aims to dice things finely enough or so they are fit for
purpose, Phil's thinking here is perhaps the opposite of 'Cuisinart'.
Donal
Who has a longstanding interest in the lengths some people will go to escape a
falsification (himself included)
Salop
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