DAVIDSON, ANALYTICITY, AND THEORY CONFIRMATION A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Georgetown University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy By Nathaniel Jason Goldberg, M.A. Washington, D.C. 12 December 2003 ii Copyright 2003 by Nathaniel Jason Goldberg All Rights Reserved iii DAVIDSON, ANALYTICITY, AND THEORY CONFIRMATION Nathaniel Jason Goldberg, M.A. Thesis Advisor: Linda Wetzel, Ph.D. ABSTRACT Few 20th-century thinkers have investigated the relations among language, thought, and reality as deeply as Donald Davidson has. In this dissertation I explore the work of Donald Davidson, reveal an inconsistency in it, and resolve that inconsistency in a way that complements a debate in the philosophy of science. I start by explicating Davidson's extensional account of meaning, presenting his seemingly disparate views as a coherent whole. Then I explicate Davidson's views on the dualism between conceptual schemes and empirical content, isolating four seemingly different arguments that Davidson makes against the dualism; I demonstrate that though the arguments fail each is ultimately meant to rely on his account of meaning. Next I show that Davidson's extensional account of meaning entails the analyticsynthetic distinction while also needing to reject it. I then propose a resolution to Davidson's dilemma. Rather than treating the interpretation of meaning as continuous with the holistic enterprise of science, as Quine treats translation, we should treat it as conceptually prior to science, as Kant treats epistemology. Nonetheless I recognize four reasons why Davidson himself would reject doing so. I therefore propose a view called 'transcendental semantics', based on Davidson's, but incorporating my resolution. Further, transcendental semantics, like Kant's transcendental idealism, posits a single iv conceptual scheme (though Kant's is concerned with Newtonian physics; transcendental semantics, interpretation). Finally, I show how positing such a scheme bolsters a promising neo-Carnapian account of theory confirmation proposed by Michael Friedman. Those who confirm theories, in science or otherwise, are first and foremost interpreters-a fact whose import emerges as anything but pedestrian during revolutions in thought. v Table of Contents Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 1 PART ONE DAVIDSON'S EXTENSIONAL ACCOUNT OF MEANING ................................. 11 Chapter 1 Extensional Account of Meaning ................................................................ 13 Chapter 2 Radical Interpretation ................................................................................. 56 Chapter 3 Extensional Account of Meaning and Radical Interpretation....................... 76 PART TWO DAVIDSON'S ARGUMENT AGAINST SCHEME-CONTENT DUALISM .............. 82 Chapter 4 Scheme-Content Dualism ........................................................................... 84 Chapter 5 Davidson's First Two Arguments against Scheme-Content Dualism ........... 96 Chapter 6 Davidson's Second Two Arguments against the Dualism ........................... 105 Chapter 7 Conclusions ................................................................................................ 137 PART THREE ANALYTICITY ............................................................................................ 143 Chapter 8 One Consequence of the Principle of Charity ............................................. 145 Chapter 9 Davidson and Quine on 'Analytic' ............................................................. 151 Chapter 10 Another Consequence of the Principle of Charity ....................................... 161 Chapter 11 Conclusions and Objections ....................................................................... 177 Chapter 12 Transcendental Semantics .......................................................................... 192 vi PART FOUR THEORY CONFIRMATION ........................................................................... 206 Chapter 13 Constitutive-Empirical Dualism ................................................................. 211 Chapter 14 Constitutive-Empirical Dualism: Kant to Carnap ........................................ 223 Chapter 15 Constitutive-Empirical Dualism: Quine to Friedman .................................. 243 Chapter 16 Holism and Friedman ................................................................................. 263 Chapter 17 Revolutions and Friedman .......................................................................... 281 Chapter 18 Revolutions and Transcendental Semantics ................................................ 308 Chapter 19 Objections and Conclusions ....................................................................... 324 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 344 Bibliography ....................................................................................................................