[Wittrs] Re: What is Conceptual Analysis?
- From: "SWM" <SWMirsky@xxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 21 May 2010 12:27:56 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Joseph Polanik <jPolanik@...> wrote:
>
> SWM wrote:<snip>
> . . . I referred to Searle's claim of "conceptual truth". You
> >raised the question of what anyone meant by that and how did we know
> >what Searle meant.
>
> I was explaining the difference between true and ersatz identity.
>
> [Joe]: the meaning of 'identity' that is consistent with the is of
> constitution (and, often, with claims of constitution not using 'is')
> is not identical to the meaning of 'identity' that is consistent with
> Leibniz's Law.
>
> when you took us on a tangent with a new claim
>
> [Stuart]: That's certainly true but the idea of "conceptually true" is
> dependent on the notion of logical identity (a thing is the same as
> itself).
>
> I then asked for the basis of this new claim
>
> [Joe]: what is the basis of your claim that "the idea of 'conceptually
> true' is dependent on the notion of logical identity"?
>
> you then presented your evidence that some people use 'conceptual truth'
> as a synonym for 'analytic truth'.
>
Given that that was taken from commonly available on-line sources and thus
pretty standard, it was evidence of how the word is used. However you then
chose to discuss "analytic truth" which is clearly to go so far afield as to
lead us away from the original issue which was whether Searle called the claim
that "Syntax does not constitute and is not sufficient for semantics"
"conceptually true". He did. He further said that that just means we can see
the truth of the claim by thinking about it, i.e., thinking about the meanings
of the terms in question. He went on to note that this was to say the claim in
question was "trivially true" which is to say that no one needs to research it
in order to discover the truth. One just needs to pay attention to the meanings.
> >You seem to want to make this a debate about "analytical truth" which,
> >as most of us will know, is an ongoing controversy in modern
> >philosophy
>
> Searle intends the third axiom as an informative statement; so, he
> would be the first to claim that the third axiom is not analytically
> true.
>
Searle says it's "conceptually true". Insofar as "conceptual truth" is what
analysis of the philosophical variety aims at it is one and the same, whatever
Searle's take on the ongoing controversies of philosophy as an analytic
exercise. However, the text I offered from Searle goes pretty far in showing
what he had in mind, i.e., to address questions of conception.
> you are, in effect, defending yourself from the claim of conflating
> constitution with identity and the claim of conflating constitution with
> causation --- by conflating analytically true with conceptually true.
> they are not the same.
>
> Joe
>
>
I am returning us to the issue rather than allowing you to push us down yet
another side path so that we can forget the original point which was that
Searle said of the third premise ("Syntax does not constitute and is not
sufficient for semantics") that it is "conceptually true."
As to the question of identity, I have long said on this and other lists that
"identity" means many different things and that only one of those things is the
logical rule that a thing is the same as itself. Searle's decision to use
"constitutes" in his formulation conveniently blurs the various distinctions,
thereby contributing to the tendency of the reader to elide a non-identity
claim with a non-causality claim.
SWM
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