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Contextualism, comparatives and gradability

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Abstract

Contextualists about knowledge ascriptions perceive an analogy between the semantics they posit for “know(s)” and the semantics of comparative terms like “tall” and “flat”. Jason Stanley has recently raised a number of objections to this view. This paper offers a response by way of an alternative analogy with modified comparatives, which resolves most of Stanley’s objections. Rather than being ad hoc, this new analogy in fact fits better with platitudes about knowledge and facilitates a better understanding of the semantics of gradability, such that an explanation of most of Stanley’s disanalogies becomes available. In addition, I argue that there are reasons to doubt Stanley’s claim that “knows(s)” cannot switch its content within a discourse, due to what may happen when we ascribe knowledge of more than one proposition.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, 94305-2155, USA

    Daniel Halliday

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  1. Daniel Halliday
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Correspondence to Daniel Halliday.

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An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2004 Graduate Student Philosophy Conference, Brown University, and I’d like to thank the organisers and participants, especially Ben Jarvis, my commentator. I’m also grateful to participants in a graduate seminar at Sheffield university and to Jenny Saul for useful comments on subsequent drafts.

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Halliday, D. Contextualism, comparatives and gradability. Philos Stud 132, 381–393 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-005-2532-x

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