[C] [Wittrs] Re: Kripke's Language Game Solved
- From: "J D" <ubersicht@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 12 Feb 2010 01:05:34 -0000
SW,
A few thoughts. (No Kripke exegesis though. And I do not know whether and on
what points we agree or disagree.)
"Water does not contain sodium." Well, seawater is still called "water". So
is dishwater. And these both contain sodium. But for a particular purpose, we
can reserve "water" for, e.g. water distilled or filtered to a certain
standard. Then we might say that such filtered water will contain no more than
x parts per million of sodium. And this statement might be a definition of
water for purposes of some experiment, medical procedure, manufacturing
process, et al. Or it might be a specification of the efficacy of the
filtration process. Or it might be a standard by which the success of
filtering a particular batch of water is to be assessed.
"Water" used in such a restricted sense - purified water - is also H2O.
Chemists use chemical formulae to describe volumes, not just individual
molecules.
"Water molecules do not contain sodium." That's a rule of grammar. What would
we count a discovering that a water molecule contained a sodium atom?
(Keeping in mind various remarks of Wittgenstein's about certainty, about
symptoms and criteria, about shifting riverbeds, about agreement not only in
definitions but opinions, agreement not just in methods of measurement but in
results of measurement, and so forth.)
But there is a transition from talking about the molecules that make up "this
stuff" and talking about individual molecules.
Any attempt to define homo sapiens or any other species is going to face
borderline cases. (Basic evolutionary theory. And a consequence of the
literalness of "family resemblance" in such cases.)
Your use of "bearer-calls" and "bearer-assignments" is getting less and less
clear to me.
JPDeMouy
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