[lit-ideas] Re: Ditto
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 22 Feb 2012 11:40:34 -0500 (EST)
In a message dated 2/22/2012 12:56:18 P.M. UTC-02,
donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
what are other people doing when they post like this (a v recent one was
Mike's)? [Endorsement? Mistake?]
---
Donal McEvoy endorses a "meta-linguistic", as he calls it, theory of 'post
repeat', or 're-tweet'. The complexities of the phenomenon CAN _sometimes_
be explained via 'echoic mention'. Sometimes not.
Grice discovered that Strawson's so-called "ditto" theory of truth did not
allow for Tarskian uses:
"Strawson was influenced by Ramsey's consideration, that to assert (or
state) that a proposition is true is to assert (or state) that proposition
_simpliciter_."
In Strawson's view, what an utterer MEANS when he utters, "p is true" is
"p" PLUS, U's "reasserting", "endorsing", but also "conceding", "confirming"
p.
-----
Grice believes the 'ditto' theory does not explain occurrences of "true" as
in
"What the policeman said was true."
----
This does not relate to McEvoy's point, since the content of "p" is being
ENDORSED and MENTIONED (hence his use of 'metalinguistic'), still Grice's
point is valid:
"Now assertion presumably involves commiting oneself,
and while it is possible to commit myself to the
contents of the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church
of England without knowing what they _say_), I do not
think I should be _properly_ regared as having
COMMITTED myself to the content of the
policeman's statement, merely in virtue of having
said that it was true. When to my surprise I learn that
the policeman actually said, "Monkeys can talk", I say,
perhaps, "Well, I was wrong", NOT "I withdraw that", or
"I withdraw my commitment to that." I never was committed to
it.
Now, to apply to Geary's case:
----
The content of Geary's post was as follows:
--- begin quoted text:
On Mon, Feb 20, 2012 at 2:15 PM, Torgeir Fjeld <_torgeir_fjeld@xxxxxxxxx
(mailto:torgeir_fjeld@xxxxxxxx) > wrote:
The list now exhibits symptoms of what one German thinker would have
referred to as the eternal recurrence of phil.lit. Should our question not be
if
these returning contributors are passers-by, with a temporary indulgence in
a past community worth only the sentimental singular stab, or if they will
remain and share of their knowledge, flair and talent for that which is
pleasing to the aesthetically minded intellect?
Best regards,
Torgeir Fjeld
Oslo, Norway
---- end quoted text.
The statements include this one:
"The list exhibits symptoms of eternal recurrence."
What Geary adds is:
Phatic wrote that the list exhibits symptoms of eternal recurrence.
----
To answer McEvoy:
>what are other people doing when they post like this (a v recent one was
Mike's)? [Endorsement?
A 'retweet' is still a different thing.
An explicit endorsement, to qualify as per Strawson's "ditto" theory, would
have needed to have Geary making this explicit, alla:
"Phatic wrote TRULY:
"the list exhibits symptoms of eternal recurrence."
Without that basic adverb, 'truly', there is no endorsement, on the part of
Geary, to his committing to the list exhibiting symptoms of eternal
recurrence.
The implicature seems to be other.
Cheers,
Speranza
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