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While engaged in the analysis of philosophically central concepts, analytic philosophers have traditionally relied extensively on their own intuitions about when such concepts can be correctly applied. Intuitions have, however, come under increasingly critical scrutiny of late, and if they turned out not to be a reliable tool for the proper analysis of our concepts, then a radical reworking of analytic philosophy’s methodology would be in order. One influential line of criticism against the use of intuition argues that they only tell us about our conceptions of things, and not the things themselves. This venerable line of criticism can seem considerably strengthened if one endorses ‘‘externalist’’ accounts of meaning. Nevertheless, the move from semantic externalism to the rejection of intuitions will be shown to be illegitimate if one has a constitutive rather than expressive understanding of the relation between our intuitions and our concepts.

The view that analytic propositions are those which are true in virtue of rules of use is basically correct. But there are many kinds of rules of use, and rules of some of these kinds do not generate truth. There is nothing like a grammatical analytic, though grammatical rules are rules of use. So, this rules-of-use view falls short of being an explanatory account. My problem is to find what it is that is special about those rules of use which do generate truth. I shall argue that they are distinguished from others by their purpose rather than their content. Given their special purpose, one can explain how they generate truth. It will follow that linguistic regularities, considered apart from the purposes of those who use language, fail to provide a basis for understanding analyticity. On my account of it, analyticity turns out to be a less important characteristic of propositions than necessity. This is be- cause necessity, unlike analyticity, has its roots, not just in a contemporary system of usage, but in a wide family of systems of belief and usage. My efforts to deflate the philosophical value of the analytic will be summed up in the conclusion that analytic propositions can be contingent. I think this conclusion is behind the feeling that the propositions of logic and arithmetic are not merely analytic. For, if they were merely analytic, that is, true only in virtue of transitory conventions, then they would be contingent. Justice can be done to this feeling by the view that they are both analytic and necessary.

This paper investigates the relation between Carnap and Quine’s views on analyticity on the one hand, and their views on philosophical analysis or explication on the other. I argue that the stance each takes on what constitutes a successful explication largely dictates the view they take on analyticity. I show that although acknowledged by neither party (in fact Quine frequently expressed his agreement with Carnap on this subject) their views on explication are substantially different. I argue that this difference not only explains their differences on the question of analyticity, but points to a Quinean way to answer a challenge that Quine posed to Carnap. The answer to this challenge leads to a Quinean view of analyticity such that arithmetical truths are analytic, according to Quine’s own remarks, and set theory is at least defensibly analytic.

According to the so-called metaphysical conception of analyticity, analytic truths are true in virtue of meaning (or content) alone and independently of (extralinguistic) facts. Quine and Boghossian have tried to present a conclusive argument against the metaphysical conception of analyticity. In effect, they tried to show that the metaphysical conception inevitably leads into a highly implausible view about the truthmakers of analytic truths. We would like to show that their argument fails, since it relies on an ambiguity of the notion of 'independence of (extralinguistic) facts'. If one distinguishes between variation independence and existence independence, the unwelcome view about the truthmakers of analytic truths no longer follows. Thus, there is at best a challenge, but no conclusive argument. The door to the metaphysical conception of analyticity is still open.

In an important recent discussion of analyticity, Paul Boghossian (1997)1 argues for the following three claims: (i) While Quine’s well-known arguments against analyticity do undermine one type of analyticity (what Boghossian calls metaphysical analyticity), they fail to undermine another type (what he calls epistemic analyticity). (ii) Epistemic analyticity explains the a prioricity of logic and perhaps even the a prioricity of conceptual truths.

Conceptions of analytic truth -- Hume's fork -- Kant and the analytic/synthetic distinction -- Synthetic a priori propositions -- Bolzano and analyticity -- Analyticity in frege -- Russell's paradox and the theory of descriptions -- The Vienna circle -- Carnap and logical empiricism -- Carnap and Quine -- Demise of the aufbau -- Philosophy as logical syntax -- Logical and descriptive languages -- Physical languages -- Analyticity in syntax -- Carnap's move to semantics -- Explications -- Analyticity in a semantic setting -- Eliminating metaphysics : Carnap's final try -- W.V. Quine : explication is elimination -- Behaviorists ex officio -- Analyticity in the crosshairs -- Analyticity and its discontents -- Questioning analyticity -- Quine's two dogmas of empiricism -- Objections to the coherence of analytic -- Quine's coherence arguments : Carnap's reply -- Other responses to the coherence objection : Grice and Strawson on Quine -- A second dogma of empiricism -- Responses to the existence objections to analyticity -- Analyticity by convention -- Quine's developed attitude toward analyticity -- Analyticity and ontology -- Quine's naturalized ontology -- The indeterminacy of translation -- Some consequences of the indeterminacy arguments : ontological relativity and analyticity -- Responses to Quine's indeterminacy arguments -- Carnap's empiricism, semantics, and ontology -- Some Quinean and other responses to empiricism, semantics, and ontology -- Some recent connections between conceptual truths and ontology -- Quine's criterion of ontological commitment, causality, and exists -- Eli Hirsch and Ted Sider on mereological principles -- The Canberra Project : a resurrection of Carnap's aufbau -- Analyticity and epistemology -- Analytic truths and their role in epistemology : the classical position -- Objecting to the classical position -- Bonjour on moderate empiricism -- Quine's epistemology naturalized -- Quine and evidence : responses to circularity -- Kripke on a priority, analyticity, and necessity -- Analyticity repositioned -- The concept analytic -- One type of statement that might be reasonably called analytic -- Aside on two dimensionalism -- Analyticity and T-analyticity -- How analyticity avoids many common objections to analyticity -- Some brief comments on two other approaches to analyticity -- Mathematical claims as T-analytic -- A further potential application : pure and impure stipulata.

Conceptions of analytic truth -- Hume's fork -- Kant and the analytic/synthetic distinction -- Synthetic a priori propositions -- Bolzano and analyticity -- Analyticity in frege -- Russell's paradox and the theory of descriptions -- The Vienna circle -- Carnap and logical empiricism -- Carnap and Quine -- Demise of the aufbau -- Philosophy as logical syntax -- Logical and descriptive languages -- Physical languages -- Analyticity in syntax -- Carnap's move to semantics -- Explications -- Analyticity in a semantic setting -- Eliminating metaphysics : Carnap's final try -- W.V. Quine : explication is elimination -- Behaviorists ex officio -- Analyticity in the crosshairs -- Analyticity and its discontents -- Questioning analyticity -- Quine's two dogmas of empiricism -- Objections to the coherence of analytic -- Quine's coherence arguments : Carnap's reply -- Other responses to the coherence objection : Grice and Strawson on Quine -- A second dogma of empiricism -- Responses to the existence objections to analyticity -- Analyticity by convention -- Quine's developed attitude toward analyticity -- Analyticity and ontology -- Quine's naturalized ontology -- The indeterminacy of translation -- Some consequences of the indeterminacy arguments : ontological relativity and analyticity -- Responses to Quine's indeterminacy arguments -- Carnap's empiricism, semantics, and ontology -- Some Quinean and other responses to empiricism, semantics, and ontology -- Some recent connections between conceptual truths and ontology -- Quine's criterion of ontological commitment, causality, and exists -- Eli Hirsch and Ted Sider on mereological principles -- The Canberra Project : a resurrection of Carnap's aufbau -- Analyticity and epistemology -- Analytic truths and their role in epistemology : the classical position -- Objecting to the classical position -- Bonjour on moderate empiricism -- Quine's epistemology naturalized -- Quine and evidence : responses to circularity -- Kripke on a priority, analyticity, and necessity -- Analyticity repositioned -- The concept analytic -- One type of statement that might be reasonably called analytic -- Aside on two dimensionalism -- Analyticity and T-analyticity -- How analyticity avoids many common objections to analyticity -- Some brief comments on two other approaches to analyticity -- Mathematical claims as T-analytic -- A further potential application : pure and impure stipulata.

This is what many philosophers believe today about the analytic/synthetic distinction: In his classic early writings on analyticity -- in particular, in "Truth by Convention," "Two Dogmas of Empiricism," and "Carnap and Logical Truth" -- Quine showed that there can be no distinction between sentences that are true purely by virtue of their meaning and those that are not. In so doing, Quine devastated the philosophical programs that depend upon a notion of analyticity -- specifically, the linguistic theory of necessary truth, and the analytic theory of a priori knowledge.

Quine’s paper “Two Dogmas of Empiricism” is famous for its attack on analyticity and the analytic/synthetic distinction. But there is an element of Quine’s attack that should strike one as extremely puzzling, namely his objection to Carnap’s account of analyticity. For it appears that, if this objection works, it will not only do away with analyticity, it will also do away with other semantic notions, notions that (or so one would have thought) Quine does not want to do away with, in particular, it will also do away with truth. I shall argue that there is, indeed, no way for Quine to protect truth against the type of argument he himself advanced in “Two Dogmas” against Carnap’s notion of analyticity. If he wants to keep his argument, Quine has to discard truth along with analyticity. At the end of the paper I suggest an interpretation of Quine on which he can be seen as having done just that.

This article discusses how the words 'necessary' and 'analytic' are suitably used in philosophy. It is argued that analytic statements should not be called 'necessary'.