A past winner of the Diagram Prize for Oddest Book Title of the Year as
"Unsolved Problems of Modern Theory of Lengthwise Rolling", which reminded me
of ... Grice of course (the sky also reminds me of Grice) ... and Popper.
We were discussing a problem-solving versus a conceptual-analytic approach
to, say, legal philosophy, and I was suggesting that a problem-solving
approach would seem to tend towards an utilitarian ethics. But McEvoy
emphasised that a solution can be true. I suppose I can imagine scenarios
where that
is the case, but it would possibly strike Grice at first that 'true
solution' is a bit of a category mistake, unless proved otherwise!
"Unsolved Problems of Modern Theory of Lenghtwise Rolling" is about
metalworking. Another winner of the Diagram Prize was "How to avoid huge
ships",
about how to avoid huge ships.
In any case, for Witters, as Rush Rhees noted there are
i. problem
ii. unsolved problem
iii. unsolvable problem
Rhees rephrased that in terms of 'questions', for the Oxonian ear, which
merited him a participation in a meeting of the Aristotelian society. For
Rhees then there are
iv. question
v. unanswered question
vii. unanswerable question
It should be pointed out that if anyone made the phrase 'pseudo-' (as
applied to problem) in philosophy in the twentieth century, that was Witters.
He
would thus add to the list:
viii. pseudo-problem
and I suppose
ix. pseudo-solution
But being creative Witters would rather say that a pseudo-problem asks for
a DIS-solution, rather than a solution, which brings us to
x. dissolved problem
and perhaps
xi. dissolvable problem
or something like that.
Cheers.
Speranza
