{"id":6673,"date":"2016-02-09T16:07:56","date_gmt":"2016-02-09T16:07:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2016\/02\/09\/london-ed-on-intentional-identity\/"},"modified":"2016-02-09T16:07:56","modified_gmt":"2016-02-09T16:07:56","slug":"london-ed-on-intentional-identity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2016\/02\/09\/london-ed-on-intentional-identity\/","title":{"rendered":"London Ed on Geach on Intentional Identity"},"content":{"rendered":"
I am happy to see that Ed is back to blogging.  It have reproduced his latest entry<\/a> and added some comments.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Peter Geach (\u201cIntentional Identity.\u201d Journal of Philosophy<\/em> 64, 627-32, reprinted in Logic Matters<\/em>. Oxford: Blackwell, 1972) argues that the following sentence can be true even if there are no witches, yet can only be true if Hob and Nob are, as it were, thinking of the same witch. <\/span><\/p>\n

Hob thinks that a witch has blighted Bob\u2019s mare, and Nob wonders whether she<\/em> killed Cob\u2019s sow.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But how<\/em> it could be true? If we read it in the opaque<\/em> way of reading indirect speech clauses then each that-clause must stand on its own syntactically, but there is no way of interpreting the pronoun \u2018she\u2019 as a bound variable. The two thoughts add up, as it were, to \u2018for some x<\/em>, x<\/em> has blighted Bob\u2019s mare, and x<\/em> killed Cob\u2019s sow. But we can\u2019t split them up into two separate thoughts, because of the second part of the conjunction. I.e. the following is not well-formed. <\/span><\/p>\n

* Hob thinks that for some x<\/em>, x<\/em> has blighted Bob\u2019s mare, and Nob wonders whether x<\/em> killed Cob\u2019s sow.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

On the other hand, if we render the original sentence in the transparent<\/em> way, we have to presume the existence of a real witch, i.e. some witch such that Hob thinks that she has blighted Bob\u2019s mare, and Nob wonders whether she killed Cob\u2019s sow. Neither of these are satisfactory. I don\u2019t propose any answer yet, but I will start by noticing that the same problem attaches to saying what sentences say<\/em>, rather than what people think<\/em>. <\/span><\/p>\n

(1) A witch has blighted Bob\u2019s mare.<\/span>
(2) She killed Cob\u2019s sow.<\/span>
(3) Sentence (1) says that a witch has blighted Bob\u2019s mare.<\/span>
(4) Sentence (2) says that she (or the witch<\/em>) has blighted Bob\u2019s mare.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Clearly sentences (3) and (4) are true, even though sentences (1) and (2) are false. Yet the problem is exactly the same as the problem involving different thoughts. Thus we have simplified the problem. We don\u2019t have to worry about explaining thoughts in different minds, but only how we express the meaning of different sentences. Meanings are a little easier than thoughts.<\/span><\/div>\n

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……………………………..<\/span><\/div>\n
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Ed maintains that the problem of intentional identity can be put as a problem concerning what sentences say<\/em> rather than as a problem concerning what people think<\/em>.  Ed thinks that this reformulation renders the problem simpler and more tractable.  But here I object.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Strictly speaking, sentences don't say anything; people say things using sentences.  For (1) to express a thought or proposition, it must be assertively uttered by a definite person in definite circumstances.  What's more, the assertive utterance has to be thoughtful, i.e., made by a thinker who intends to express a proposition by his assertive utterance of (1).  So we are brought right back to people and their thoughts.  We have turned in a circle.  (Out of respect for Ed, I will not comment on the 'diameter' of the circle.)<\/span><\/div>\n
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To exfoliate or unwrap what I just wrote:<\/span><\/div>\n
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a. Strictly speaking<\/em>.  In philosophy we must speak and write strictly and avoid the sorts of shorthand expression that are perfectly acceptable in ordinary discourse.  Philosophy is not ordinary discourse.  It is (in part) an attempt to understand ordinary discourse, its logic, its ontological commitments, and its connections with thought.<\/span><\/div>\n
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b. Utterance<\/em>.  To utter a sentence is to produce a token of it consisting of sounds or phonemes.  If x is a token of y, then y is a type.  So (1) above represents a sentence-type.  What your eyes see is of course a token of that type, a token that deputizes for the type, which you cannot see with your eyes. The token you see is of course not an utterance, but an inscription consisting of visible marks.  To utter a sentence is only one way of tokening it.  To token is to produce a token in some  medium.<\/span><\/div>\n
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c. Assertive utterance<\/em>.  Not every tokening is assertive.  If I write or say 'Cats are animals' in English class to illustrate, say, noun-verb agreement, I have not asserted that cats are animals.  Assertion is a speech act.  I can utter a sentence without asserting anything even if the sentence is grammatically declarative.<\/span><\/div>\n
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d. Circumstances<\/em>.  There are many people in the world who rejoice under the nickname 'Bob.'  A context of utterance, or, more broadly, a context of tokening is required to know which Bob is being referred to when (1) is assertively uttered.<\/span><\/div>\n
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e. Thoughtful<\/em>. To say something I cannot merely mechanically  produce a token of a sentence even if the sentence upon being heard by a hearer conveys a proposition or thought to the hearer.  Voice synthesizers never say anything, even when they produce such sentence tokens as 'Your prescription is ready at Walgreen's pharmacy at the corner of Fifth and Vermouth.'  Saying involves a person or thinker's  intention to express a thought or proposition.<\/span><\/div>\n
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As for solving Geach's puzzle, I have nothing to propose with confidence.  But how would Ed counter the following suggestion?  Ed tells us that, "if we render the original sentence in the transparent<\/em> way, we have to presume the existence of a real witch, i.e. some witch such that Hob thinks that she has blighted Bob\u2019s mare, and Nob wonders whether she killed Cob\u2019s sow."<\/span><\/div>\n
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Ed is assuming that the particular quantifier is an existential quantifier.  He is assuming that 'Some witch is such that _______' is logically equivalent to 'There exists a witch  such that ________.'  The assumption is entirely plausible. But it could be rejected by a Meinongian.  If 'a witch' picks out a nonexistent item from the realm of Aussersein<\/em>, then what would be wrong with a transparent reading of the original sentence?  If there are nonexistent items, then one can  quantify over them using quantifiers that are objectual (as opposed to substitutional) but not existentially loaded.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Might Geach's puzzle dissolve on a Meinongian approach?  Is there any literature on this?
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\nRelated articles<\/legend>\n
\n
\"\"<\/a>Peter Geach on Worshipping the Right God<\/a><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>In What Sense Does an Indefinite Noun Phrase Refer?<\/a><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>The Delight of the 'Find'<\/a><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>In a Philosophical Conversation, Three's a Crowd<\/a><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>Zygotic Division: Was I Once a Zygote?<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/fieldset>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am happy to see that Ed is back to blogging.  It have reproduced his latest entry and added some comments.   ………………..   Peter Geach (\u201cIntentional Identity.\u201d Journal of Philosophy 64, 627-32, reprinted in Logic Matters. Oxford: Blackwell, 1972) argues that the following sentence can be true even if there are no witches, yet … Continue reading “London Ed on Geach on Intentional Identity”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[346,100],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6673","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-identity-and-individuation","category-intentionality"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6673","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6673"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6673\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6673"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6673"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6673"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}