As it emerged in the late twentieth century, Empire promised a new era of global cooperation and stability through a seamless integration of late capitalism and neoliberal technocracy. Premised as an end to history itself, all that was left to accomplish was to tinker at the margins, stimulate corporate enterprise, embrace financialization and technological innovation, and encourage liberal rights and inclusion. As we enter the third decade of the twenty-first century, the narrative fictions sustaining Empire have broadly collapsed at the (...) level of symbolic identification and belief. Empire has entered into a period of global emergency and mutation. Engaging with Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s work, this paper considers what might emerge when we read education into the circuitry of Empire’s decay. First, we locate Empire within foundational tensions in modernity, using Kantian philosophy and colonialism as examples, to foreground the idea of education as immanent to historical processes of creativity, resistance, and innovation. Second, we highlight dead-end responses, from space colonization to neo-fascism, as representations of how modes of education circulate to stabilize and contain Empire’s crises, specifically in relation to capitalism, nationalism, and identity. Lastly, the paper develops a political ontology of education after Empire. (shrink)

In this article we study how members of an interdisciplinary research team use an online forum for communicating about their research project. We use the concepts of "community of practice" and "connectivity" to consider the online interaction within a wider question of how people from different academic traditions "do" interdisciplinarity. The online forum for this Grey and Pleasant Land project did not take off as hoped, even after a series of interventions and amendments, and we consider what the barriers were (...) and how they might be overcome. Barriers to involvement included participants' expectations of interaction and collaboration--expectation that real interaction happens elsewhere, tensions between academic discourse and forum talk norms, unfamiliarity with the technology, and different conceptions of appropriate academic discussion. We suggest that common academic practice does not prepare us well for creating interdisciplinary research communities through online collaboration tools, whereas such tools are our best bet currently for including geographically dispersed members in collaborative projects. Therefore, careful planning and competence building would be necessary if such tools are to be used in collaborative research. Suggested interventions, based on our experience, include providing a more focused forum, making technical support easily available, and setting up particular tasks or items to debate, within a preset, synchronous timeframe, focusing on issues relevant to the project at that time. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to examine two major arguments in favour of the philosophical thesis that the meaning of an expression is its use, and not its referent or what it corresponds to. A second philosophical thesis which is closely related to the first is that the study of the ordinary, “actual” uses of certain expressions is not of purely linguistic interest but in fact is a way, probably the only proper way, of solving the problems of (...) traditional philosophy; in the sequel to the present article, we shall examine one major argument in favour of this second thesis. Both theses occupy a place of central importance in the dominant movement in contemporary British philosophy, to which we shall refer as “the philosophy of ordinary language”. Together they seem to constitute the basis of the most characteristic claim of this movement: that traditional philosophic discourse is logically improper and that philosophy is a legitimate cognitive discipline only if it is concerned with “the spatial and temporal phenomenon of language” by describing “the actual use of language”. Both theses are necessary for the justifi cation of this more general claim. (shrink)

This dissertation defends an account of linguistic meaning and propositional mental content in terms of linguistic practice. In other words, it clarifies and defends the counterintuitive claim that linguistic communication is prior, rather than posterior, in the order of explanation to the semantic features of thought and talk. The project's point of departure is Robert Brandom's comprehensive recent theory of linguistic practice. Two core theses characterize Brandom's theory. First, meaning and content are to be understood in terms of (...) the norms of inference relating the sentences of a natural language to each other. Second norms of inference are to be explained in terms of certain normative attitudes that speakers take towards each other implicitly in linguistic practice. In the sense of the second explanatory thesis, linguistic practice explains meaning and content qua norms of inference, according to Brandom. ;For the sake of my project I agree with both theses. However, I take issue with Brandom's efforts to substantiate the second, explanatory thesis. The negative parts of my project argue that Brandom's specific account of meaning and content in terms of implicit normative attitudes is in some respects underdeveloped and in other respects problem laden. It therefore needs both elaboration and revision. The positive parts of my project offer an alternative account of meaning and content in terms of implicit non-native attitudes---an account that avoids the shortcomings of Brandom's approach. The heart of this alternative account is the notion of a we-attitude, borrowed from Wilfrid Sellars' theory of moral judgments. I argue that if speakers take such we-attitudes towards the linguistic performances they exchange, they both take certain implicit normative attitudes towards each other and recognize themselves as bound by the corresponding norms. And normative attitudes thus conceived suffice, I argue, to explain norms of inference themselves, hence meaning and content. Central themes of this project are, among other, the objectivity of semantic norms, the possibility to reduce semantic norms to normative attitudes, and the holistic character of meaning. (shrink)

The intention here is that of giving a formal underpinning to the idea of 'meaning-is-use' which, even if based on proofs, it is rather different from proof-theoretic semantics as in the Dummett-Prawitz tradition. Instead, it is based on the idea that the meaning of logical constants are given by the explanation of immediate consequences, which in formalistic terms means the effect of elimination rules on the result of introduction rules, i. e. the so-called reduction rules. For that we (...) suggest an extension to the Curry-Howard interpretation which draws on the idea of labelled deduction, and brings back Frege's device of variable-abstraction to operate on the labels (i. e., proof-terms) alongside formulas of predicate logic. (shrink)

The intention here is that of giving a formal underpinning to the idea of ‘meaning-is-use’ which, even if based on proofs, it is rather different from proof-theoretic semantics as in the Dummett–Prawitz tradition. Instead, it is based on the idea that the meaning of logical constants are given by the explanation of immediate consequences, which in formalistic terms means the effect of elimination rules on the result of introduction rules, i.e. the so-called reduction rules. For that we suggest (...) an extension to the Curry– Howard interpretation which draws on the idea of labelled deduction, and brings back Frege’s device of variable-abstraction to operate on the labels (i.e., proof-terms) alongside formulas of predicate logic. (shrink)

The intention here is that of giving a formal underpinning to the idea of ‘meaning-is-use’ which, even if based on proofs, it is rather different from proof-theoretic semantics as in the Dummett–Prawitz tradition. Instead, it is based on the idea that the meaning of logical constants are given by the explanation of immediate consequences, which in formalistic terms means the effect of elimination rules on the result of introduction rules, i.e. the so-called reduction rules. For that we suggest (...) an extension to the Curry– Howard interpretation which draws on the idea of labelled deduction, and brings back Frege’s device of variable-abstraction to operate on the labels (i.e., proof-terms) alongside formulas of predicate logic. (shrink)

"The purpose of this book is to examine and explicate a definition given in Philosophical Investigations. The definition of the meaning of a word is that "the meaning of a word is its use in the language." Hallet understands this as a definition in the strict sense of the word. In Chapter I, the author look to the Tractatus for its treatment of the picture theory of meaning and the Bedeutung/Sinn distinction. The conclusion which he pulls from (...) the early work is that, for Wittgenstein, meaning was already in a proposition by way of the meaning of names. Yet, only in the use or application, i.e. in a proposition with sense is meaning revealed. Although the Tractatus is far from saying that meaning is use, certain guiding themes are elaborated and carried into later works; namely, the search for meaning, the impossibility of meaning outside use, and meaning as revealed by use. Chapter II, III, and especially IV bear the brunt of establishing Hallet's thesis that Wittgenstein presented a significant and sound definition. He begins by showing what Wittgenstein proved meaning not to be: meaning is not images, objects, mental referents, nor feelings. All of these theories have convincing confirmation in certain respects, yet analysis, i.e. observation of the actual working of language, shows each to be too narrow. In making his transition to the true definition, the author shows Wittgenstein elaborating theses that meaning is to be found in the system or context of language. These are elaborated only to be cast aside as were the previous suggestions. The pattern elicited from these examinations is that meaning is use and, hence, defined as such. To explicate the definition, Hallett presents and examines seven characteristics of use: complexity, regularity and utility, abstraction, openness, vagueness, variety, and family resemblances. The book concludes with a consideration of the major objections to Wittgenstein's definition."-The Review of Metaphysics. (shrink)

The purpose of this book is to examine and explicate a definition given in Philosophical Investigations. The definition of the meaning of a word is that "the meaning of a word is its use in the language." Hallett understands this as a definition in the strict sense of the word. In Chapter I, the author looks to the Tractatus for its treatment of the picture theory of meaning and the Bedeutung/sinn distinction. The conclusion which he pulls from (...) the early work is that, for Wittgenstein, meaning was already in a proposition by way of the meaning of names. Yet, only in the use or application, i.e., in a proposition with sense is meaning revealed. Although the Tractatus is far from saying that meaning is use, certain guiding themes are elaborated and carried into later works; namely, the search for meaning, the impossibility of meaning outside use, and meaning as revealed by use. Chapter II, III, and especially IV bear the brunt of establishing Hallett’s thesis that Wittgenstein presented a significant and sound definition. He begins by showing what Wittgenstein proved meaning not to be: meaning is not images, objects, mental referents, nor feelings. All of these theories have convincing confirmation in certain respects, yet analysis, i.e., observation of the actual working of language, shows each to be too narrow. In making his transition to the true definition, the author shows Wittgenstein elaborating the theses that meaning is to be found in the system or context of language. These are elaborated only to be cast aside as were the previous suggestions. The pattern elicited from these examinations is that meaning is use and, hence, defined as such. To explicate the definition, Hallett presents and examines seven characteristics of use: complexity, regularity and utility, abstraction, openness, vagueness, variety, and family resemblances. The book concludes with a consideration of the major objections to Wittgenstein’s definition. There are too many objections presented to be handled justly. For the most part, the argument is superficial, usually presuming a familiarity with the issue, and with but an indication of how the objection could be handled. The strength of the book is that it gives an organization to Wittgenstein’s later thinking, especially by way of the above-mentioned seven characteristics. In identifying and elucidating them, Hallett does Wittgenstein students a great service. Its chief weakness, although pale in regard to the overall worth, is that the main thesis is not firmly established. To say that a precise and complete definition is given is contrary to what is maintained throughout the Investigations, and perhaps a serious misreading of the German word, erklaren, as the precise English phrase, "to define." There are extensive notes and an adequate index.—W. A. F. (shrink)

The purpose of this book is to examine and explicate a definition given in Philosophical Investigations. The definition of the meaning of a word is that "the meaning of a word is its use in the language." Hallett understands this as a definition in the strict sense of the word. In Chapter I, the author looks to the Tractatus for its treatment of the picture theory of meaning and the Bedeutung/sinn distinction. The conclusion which he pulls from (...) the early work is that, for Wittgenstein, meaning was already in a proposition by way of the meaning of names. Yet, only in the use or application, i.e., in a proposition with sense is meaning revealed. Although the Tractatus is far from saying that meaning is use, certain guiding themes are elaborated and carried into later works; namely, the search for meaning, the impossibility of meaning outside use, and meaning as revealed by use. Chapter II, III, and especially IV bear the brunt of establishing Hallett’s thesis that Wittgenstein presented a significant and sound definition. He begins by showing what Wittgenstein proved meaning not to be: meaning is not images, objects, mental referents, nor feelings. All of these theories have convincing confirmation in certain respects, yet analysis, i.e., observation of the actual working of language, shows each to be too narrow. In making his transition to the true definition, the author shows Wittgenstein elaborating the theses that meaning is to be found in the system or context of language. These are elaborated only to be cast aside as were the previous suggestions. The pattern elicited from these examinations is that meaning is use and, hence, defined as such. To explicate the definition, Hallett presents and examines seven characteristics of use: complexity, regularity and utility, abstraction, openness, vagueness, variety, and family resemblances. The book concludes with a consideration of the major objections to Wittgenstein’s definition. There are too many objections presented to be handled justly. For the most part, the argument is superficial, usually presuming a familiarity with the issue, and with but an indication of how the objection could be handled. The strength of the book is that it gives an organization to Wittgenstein’s later thinking, especially by way of the above-mentioned seven characteristics. In identifying and elucidating them, Hallett does Wittgenstein students a great service. Its chief weakness, although pale in regard to the overall worth, is that the main thesis is not firmly established. To say that a precise and complete definition is given is contrary to what is maintained throughout the Investigations, and perhaps a serious misreading of the German word, erklaren, as the precise English phrase, "to define." There are extensive notes and an adequate index.—W. A. F. (shrink)

Este artigo tem por objetivo geral destacar alguns aspectos fundamentais para o entendimento adequado do significado linguístico centrado na ideia de “uso”. A noção de uso enquanto determinante do significado foi proposta pela primeira vez por Wittgenstein nas Investigações Filosóficas. Desde então, surgiram muitas tentativas de compatibilizar a noção de uso com as demais perspectivas oferecidas pelo filósofo naquela obra, não obstante, a questão ainda permanece distante de atingir um consenso. Recentemente, a teoria do significado como uso proposta por Paul (...) Horwich, reacendeu o debate a respeito das noções de uso, significado e naturalismo semântico. A abordagem inspiradora de Horwich tem se revelado uma excelente estratégia tanto no que se refere a evidenciar a pertinência da proposta wittgensteiniana, como no sentido de oferecer soluções eficazes às objeções recorrentes que ela enfrenta. O objetivo específico deste trabalho é mostrar o modo como Horwich pretende resolver algumas daquelas objeções. (shrink)

: Debates about commodification in bioethics frequently appeal to Kant's famous second formulation of the categorical imperative, the formula requiring us to treat the rational (human) being as "an end in itself" and "never as a means only." In the course of her own treatment of commodification, Margaret Jane Radin observes that Kant's application of this formula "does not generate noncontroversial particular consequences." This is so, I argue, because Kant offers three different--and largely incompatible--interpretations of the formula. One focuses on (...) the obligation to preserve rational willing; the second stresses respect for human (physical) dignity and integrity; the third views respect for others as "ends in themselves" as primarily involving a willingness to govern one's conduct by a procedure of impartial co-legislation. Only the third of these interpretations, I conclude, offers a reasonable and coherent approach to moral judgment about the limits of commodification. (shrink)

Mark Richard presents an original theory of meaning, as the collection of assumptions speakers make in using it and expect their hearers to recognize as being made. Meaning is spread across a population, inherited by each new generation of speakers from the last, and evolving through the interactions of speakers with their environment.

What is the relation between later Wittgenstein’s method of dissolving philosophical problems by reminding us of how we would actually use words, and his famous statement that “meaning is use ” in Investigations §43? The idea is widespread among readers of Wittgenstein that a close relation obtains between the two. This paper addresses a specific type of answer to this question: answers which have drawn on remarks of Wittgenstein’s where he explicitly establishes a connection between this method and certain (...) misconceptions about meaning – remarks such as Investigations §117. The paper will discuss answers which have advanced the following claim: Since it is places such as §43 which play a main role in debunking misconceptions of this kind, Wittgenstein’s statement that “meaning is use” must be taken as directly related to the method of asking for the use of words. Drawing on so-called “therapeutic” readings of Wittgenstein, what I intend to show is that this seemingly straightforward answer fails to fully accommodate the fact that §43 is itself a reminder of how we would actually use a word. The paper sets out to show how truly acknowledging this forces us to rethink the relation between “meaning is use” and this method of Wittgenstein’s. (shrink)

I demonstrate that a "speech act" theory of meaning for imperatives is—contra a dominant position in philosophy and linguistics—theoretically desirable. A speech act-theoretic account of the meaning of an imperative !φ is characterized, broadly, by the following claims. -/- LINGUISTIC MEANING AS USE !φ’s meaning is a matter of the speech act an utterance of it conventionally functions to express—what a speaker conventionally uses it to do (its conventional discourse function, CDF). -/- IMPERATIVE USE AS PRACTICAL (...) !φ's CDF is to express a practical (non-representational) state of mind—one concerning an agent's preferences and plans, rather than her beliefs. -/- Opposed to speech act accounts is a preponderance of views which deny that a sentence's linguistic meaning is a matter of what speech act it is used to perform, or its CDF. On such accounts, meaning is, instead, a matter of "static" properties of the sentence—e.g., how it depicts the world as being (or, more neutrally, the properties of a model-theoretic object with which the semantic value of the sentence co-varies). On one version of a static account, an imperative 'shut the window!' might, for instance, depict the world as being such that the window must be shut. -/- Static accounts are traditionally motivated against speech act-theoretic accounts by appeal to supposedly irremediable explanatory deficiencies in the latter. Whatever a static account loses in saying (prima facie counterintuitively) that an imperative conventionally represents, or expresses a picture of the world, is said to be offset by its ability to explain a variety of phenomena for which speech act-theoretic accounts are said to lack good explanations (even, in many cases, the bare ability to offer something that might meet basic criteria on what a good explanation should be like). -/- I aim to turn the tables on static accounts. I do this by showing that speech act accounts are capable of giving explanations of phenomena which fans of static accounts have alleged them unable to give. Indeed, for a variety of absolutely fundamental phenomena having to do with the conventional meaning of imperatives (and other types of practical language), speech act accounts provide natural and theoretically satisfying explanations, where a representational account provides none. (shrink)

This paper defends the use-based metasemantic project against the problem of meaning without use, which allegedly shows the predictions of use-based metasemantic accounts to be indeterminate with respect to unusably long or complex expressions. This criticism is commonly taken to be decisive, prompting various retreats and contributing to the project’s eventual decline. Using metasemantic conventionalism as a case study, I argue the following: either such expressions do not belong to used languages or their meanings are uniquely determined by use. (...) Thus, the alleged problem of meaning without use offers no challenge to the use-based metasemantic project generally, nor to conventionalism in particular. (shrink)

Showing that the arithmetic mean number of offspring for a trait type often fails to be a predictive measure of fitness was a welcome correction to the philosophical literature on fitness. While the higher mathematical moments of a probability-weighted offspring distribution can influence fitness measurement in distinct ways, the geometric mean number of offspring is commonly singled out as the most appropriate measure. For it is well-suited to a compounding process and is sensitive to variance in offspring number. The geometric (...) mean thus proves to be a predictively efficacious measure of fitness in examples featuring discrete generations and within- or between-generation variance in offspring output. Unfortunately, this advance has subsequently led some to conclude that the arithmetic mean is never a good measure of fitness and that the geometric mean should accordingly be the default measure of fitness. We show not only that the arithmetic mean is a perfectly reasonable measure of fitness so long as one is clear about what it refers to, but also that it functions as a more general measure when properly interpreted. It must suffice as a measure of fitness in any case where the geometric mean has been effectively deployed as a measure. We conclude with a discussion about why the mathematical equivalence we highlight cannot be dismissed as merely of mathematical interest. (shrink)

Our knowledge about the world is often expressed by generic sentences, yet their meanings are far from clear. This book provides answers to central problems concerning generics: what do they mean? Which factors affect their interpretation? How can one reason with generics? Cohen proposes that the meanings of generics are probability judgments, and shows how this view accounts for many of their puzzling properties, including lawlikeness. Generics are evaluated with respect to alternatives. Cohen argues that alternatives are induced by the (...) kind as well as by the predicated property, and thus provides a uniform account of the varied interpretations of generics. He studies the formal properties of alternatives and provides a compositional account of their derivation by focus and presupposition. Cohen uses his semantics of generics to provide a formal characterization of adequate default reasoning, and proves some desirable results of this formalism. (shrink)

This paper considers David Best’s claim that descriptions of events in sport as being ‘dramatic’ or ‘tragic’ employ those terms in a figurative sense, along with Stephen Mumford’s rejection of that...

Wittgenstein is usually taken to have held that the use of a term is not mentally constrained. That is utterly wrong. A use of language unconstrained by meaning is attributed by him to "meaning-blind" or "aspect-blind" creatures, not to us. We observe meaning when an aspect dawns on us; meaning is the impression (Eindruck) of a term as fitting something; hence, unlike pain, it cannot stand alone. That is a mentalistic theory of meaning: use is (...) determined by images (Vorstellungen) that play semantic roles in virtue of their aesthetic properties. Although a term may be arbitrarily interpreted, aesthetic reasons determine which interpretation be seen as right for it. (shrink)

Austin rejected the objectification of “meanings” and was also critical of the identification of meaning with truth-conditions. Much of his work appears to be inspired by a conception of meaning as use. In particular, apparently at least, his “performative utterances” are utterances whose understanding amounts to the understanding of their use. But Austin did not endorse the tendency, common in Ordinary Language Philosophy, to explain the meaning of linguistic expressions in terms of their use alone. His distinction (...) between locutionary meaning and illocutionary force was designed to avoid such a reduction. But it is unclear whether speech act theory can escape paying the price of a new objectification of meaning. (shrink)

This paper is about several little-known Latin funerary formulae of some interest. It is also intended as an addition to the growing literature on what are now called in English ‘support verbs’, with special focus on facio.

Don't look for the meaning; look for the use. A few years back the Yale deconstructionist Paul de Man wasposthumously discovered to have written repeatedly for a Belgiancollaborationist journal during the Nazi occupation. So far as I amaware, de Man in his American period espoused no particular politics. Indeed, the Left frequently regarded this as a cause for complaint, since most of them thought of de Man and deconstruction as being their natural allies.

Hirsch’s revision results from his attempt to think through the difficult question that underlies the whole essay: How does the movement of time and circumstance affect the stability of meaning? The first part of his answer is that the relation between original meaning and subsequent understanding or applications of that meaning is analogous to the relation between a concept and its extension. For example, if he reads Shakespeare’s sonnet 55 and applies it to his beloved, and one (...) of us reads it and applies it to his beloved, “that does not make the meaning of the sonnet different for us, assuming that we both understand that the text’s meaning is not limited to any particular exemplification but rather embraces many, many exemplifications” . That is, the sonnet has a status analogous to that of the concept “bicycle,” and the two applications have a status analogous to that of a three-speed and a ten-speed bicycle. Whereas Hirsch formerly considered such exemplifications part of a text’s significance, he now considers them part of its meaning. This revision indicates that for Hirsch meaning is not the product of a consciousness producing an intrinsic genre but of a consciousness communicating something broader and more general than an intrinsic genre—an intention-concept that can have numerous extensions or exemplifications, including many that the originating consciousness could not have anticipated. Formerly, Hirsch used intrinsic genre to describe that sense of the whole which governed the horizon of developing meaning and which, when the work was completed—when all the blanks were filled in—gave the work its specific determinate meaning. That is, determinacy of meaning was in large part a function of narrowing the class of implications; when the work was completed, the class of implications was restricted to those synonymous with expressed meaning. In short, in the old theory, meaning-intention is a “narrow,” not a broad “concept.” James L. Battersby, professor of English at Ohio State University, is the author of Rational Praise and Natural Lamentation: Johnson, Lycidas, and Principles of Criticism and Elder Olson: An Annotated Bibliography. He is currently at work on a study of the relationship between “thought” and structure in various genres. James Phelan is associate professor English at Ohio State University and the author of Worlds from Words: A Theory of language in Fiction. His work in progress concerns character and narrative progression. (shrink)

A growing number of philosophers and linguists have argued that many, if not most, terms in our language should be understood as semantically context sensitive. In opposition to this trend, Herman Cappelen and Ernie Lepore defend a view they call "Semantic Minimalism", which holds that there are virtually no semantically context sensitive expressions in English once you get past the standard list of indexicals and demonstratives such as "I", "you", "this", and "that". While minimalism strikes many as obviously false, it (...) will be argued here that the view is more plausible than commonly assumed if one accepts the 'normative' conception of the relation between meaning and use characteristic of the literature on semantic externalism. That said, it is not clear that Cappelen and Lepore always conceive of their minimal semantic contents in this more normative fashion, and once this framework is place, a version of 'moderate contextualism' that they do not consider comes into view. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Our ascriptions of content to past utterances assign to them a level of conceptual continuity and determinacy that extends beyond what could be grounded in the usage up to their time of utterance. If one accepts such ascriptions, one can argue either that future use must be added to the grounding base, or that such cases show that meaning is not, ultimately, grounded in use. The following will defend the first option as the more promising of the two, (...) though this ultimately requires understanding the relation between use and meaning as ‘normative’ in two important ways. The first way is that the function from use to meaning must be of a sort that allows us to maintain a robust distinction between actual and correct use. The second sort of normativity is unique to theories that extend the grounding base into the future. In particular, if meaning is partially a function of future use, we can see our commitment to the ‘determinacy’ of meaning as a practical commitment that structures our linguistic practices rather than a theoretical commitment that merely describes them. (shrink)

The history and use of the acronym ‘BCS’ (named after Bardeen, Cooper and Schrieffer) in the science of superconductivity is traced and analysed. It is shown that a number of different theories are labelled ‘BCS’. The confusion in the application of the term ‘BCS’ is shown to be common because the term ‘theory’ itself is not precisely defined in physics. Recommendations are given to physics readers and students on how to distinguish between various theories referred to as ‘BCS’. Contributions from (...) scientists in different laboratories to the creation and formation of the superconductivity theory are indicated. (shrink)

This introduction brings to life the main themes in Indian philosophy of language by using an accessible translation of an Indian classical text to provide an entry into the world of Indian linguistic theories. -/- Malcolm Keating draws on Mukula's Fundamentals of the Communicative Function to show the ability of language to convey a wide range of meanings and introduce ideas about testimony, pragmatics, and religious implications. Along with a complete translation of this foundational text, Keating also provides: - Clear (...) explanations of themes such as reference, figuration and sentence meaning - Commentary illuminating connections between Mukula and contemporary philosophy - Romanized text of the Sanskrit - A glossary of terms and annotated bibliography - A chronology of important figures and dates -/- By complementing a historically-informed introduction with a focused study of an influential primary text, Keating responds to the need for a reliable guide to better understand theories of language and related issues in Indian philosophy. (shrink)

There has been a great deal of philosophical discussion about using people, using people intentionally, using people as a means to some end, and using people merely as a means to some end. In this paper, I defend the following claim about using people: NOT ALWAYS WRONG: using people—even merely as a means—is not always morally objectionable. Having defended that claim, I suggest that the following claim is also correct: NO ONE FEATURE: when it is morally objectionable to use people, (...) this is for many different kinds of reasons—there is no one wrong-making feature that every morally objectionable using has in common. After discussing these claims, I use them to present and motivate what I call the “precaution” theory of norms against using people. I conclude by considering a few cases from the criminal law context—cases that are naturally described as using people—to assess the moral appropriateness of this kind of use in these cases, and to demonstrate how the theory applies to the real world. (shrink)

The epistemological status of semantic components of ethnosemantics is investigated with reference to Wittgenstein's definition of the meaning of a word as its use in language. Semantic components, like the intension of words in logistic philosophy, constitute the conditions which must pertain to objects in order that they are denoted by particular words. "Componential meaning" is determined to be another form of "unitary meaning" and hence subject to the same critical arguments made by Wittgenstein against the latter's (...) three fundamental types: (1) meanings are objects, (2) meanings are images, and (3) meanings are feelings and mental experiences. A rebuttal to D'Andrade's labeling rule objection to the usage theory of meaning is presented. (shrink)

Paul Horwich claims that theories of meaning ought to accommodate the commonsense intuition that meanings play a part in explaining the use of words. Further, he argues that the view that best does so is that according to which the meaning of a word is constituted by a disposition to accept, in some circumstances, sentences in which it features. I argue that if meanings are construed thus, they will in fact fail to explain the use of words. I (...) also argue that if we insist, as Horwich does, on the commonsense assumption that meanings are a species of entity, all versions of the view that meaning is constituted by our dispositions to use words will have to be rejected. I do not, however, claim that such theories ought to be rejected. My point is that they are incompatible with the requirements of commonsense. Further, I suggest that it is premature to impose such requirements on theories of meaning. (shrink)

This article reconstructs Wittgenstein's philosophy of language. Language-game is a system of operating rules of meaning consists of internal relations between language expressions and their criteria. It is argued that the "meaning" of words is not their "use", but rather, the meaning is "explained" by their use. The famous #43 paragraph of "Philosophical Investigations" is interpreted as a distinction between explaining the meaning of words by their use "in the language", and explaining it by pointing to (...) criteria outside the language. These two types of explanations hold also for the meaning of "meaning". A third use of "meaning", called by Wittgenstein "the figurative employment of the work", signifies inner experiences accompany linguistic expressions. It is claimed that Wittgenstein dogmatically eliminates the description of this "use" of "meaning" from the grammar in order to exclude the inner experiences from the language-game. (shrink)

The prohibition on using others ‘merely as means’ is one of the best-known and most influential elements of Immanuel Kant’s moral theory. But it is widely regarded as impossible to specify with precision the conditions under which this prohibition is violated. On the basis of a re-examination of Kant’s texts, the article develops a novel account of the conditions for using someone ‘merely as a means’. It is argued that this account has not only strong textual support but also significant (...) philosophical advantages over alternative conceptions. (shrink)

It is often argued that clinical research should not violate the Kantian principle that people must not be used merely as a means for the purposes of others. At first sight, the practice of clinical research itself, however, seems to violate precisely this principle: clinical research is often beneficial to future people rather than to participants; even if participants benefit, all things considered, they are exposed to discomforts which are absent both in regular care for their diseases and in other (...) areas of daily life. Therefore, in this paper we will consider whether people are used merely as a means by being enrolled in clinical research. On the basis of recent studies of Kantian scholars we will argue that clinical research is compatible with the Kantian principle if the conditions of possible consent and end-sharing have been met. Participants are not used merely as a means if they have sufficient reasons to consent to being enrolled in clinical research and can share the ends of the researchers who use them. Moreover, we will claim that even if people are used merely as a means by participating in clinical research, it may not always be morally wrong to use them in this way. (shrink)

This article discusses the legal concept of excessive use of force by analyzing a particular incident that took place in Israel in the summer of 1997: eighty families, faced with dire housing needs, squatted in vacant apartments in an immigrant absorption center in the town of Mevasseret Zion near Jerusalem. After a period of failed attempts to persuade the families to leave the apartments peacefully, the police moved to evacuate the families, and did so by use of massive force. In (...) the article I describe the violent measures used by the State, and analyze the media portrayal of the squatting and the evacuation. I argue that both these forceful measures and the media portrayal of the squatting and evacuation cumulatively took part in constructing the squatters as criminal deviants rather than political protesters. I claim further that we should understand the concept of use of force not only as a means to achieve certain ends by the state, but also as a mechanism through which the state constructs a social problem and presents it in a manner beneficial to its own interests. Excessive use of force, in this sense, is not just a disproportionate response to a real or perceived threat posed by an individual or group, but a means by which the state fosters a belief that the individual or group present some danger, which must be tackled through the use of a certain level of force. By drawing a line between the legitimate and illegitimate use of force, the state affirms its monopoly on violence, which ultimately can be used to suppress political resistance. (shrink)

This book seeks to bring together the pragmatic theory of 'meaning as use' with the traditional semantic approach that considers meaning in terms of truth conditions. Daniel Gutzmann's new approach captures the entire meaning of complex expressions and overcomes the empirical gaps and conceptual problems associated with previous analyses.