What's the Meaning of "This''?: A Puzzle about Demonstrative Belief

David F. Austin

Published by Cornell University Press 1990

What's the Meaning of "This''?

A Puzzle about Demonstrative Belief

David F. Austin

https://doi.org/10.7591/9781501741074

Overview
Contents

About this book

A variety of examples in recent literature on philosophy of mind and language raise serious problems for the traditional analysis of belief (and the other so-called propositional attitudes) as a two-term relation between a believer and a proposition. Because of the attractiveness of the traditional analysis and the absence of a clear alternative, such examples raise genuine puzzles about belief. In this lucid and rigorous book, David F. Austin provides a new test case for any theory of the propositional attitudes. Focusing on a puzzle about beliefs that we express using the demonstratives "this" and "that," Austin shows that a key doctrine in the analytic tradition, the doctrine of propositions, is threatened by inconsistency. The author first explains why the traditional doctrine requires individual propositions to accommodate Kripkean intuitions for direct reference. Austin then formulates a deep puzzle about demonstrative belief, using the book's central example, the Two Tubes case, which involves simultaneous, consistent, occurrent, demonstrative beliefs resulting from direct visual perception. Austin argues that none of the leading propositional theories solves this puzzle, nor do the self-attributive views of Chisholm and Lewis, or Kaplan's three-term view. Austin concludes that although his puzzle remains a puzzle, it gives us reason to supplement, rather than abandon, the use of propositions in analyzing thought, and he sketches a three-term, Russian alternative.

Author / Editor information

David F. Austin is Associate Professor of Philosophy at North Carolina State University.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Preface Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
1. Introducing Individual Propositions Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
2. Getting Rid of Individual Propositions? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	16
3. It's Just Me Now: Schiffer on Belief Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	32
4. Rigid Belief Transformed: Plantinga and Ackerman on Essences Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	56
5. Believing Less by Believing More: Stalnaker and the Defeat of Belief Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	73
6. Two Nontraditional Analyses of Belief: Self-Attribution and Character Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	103
Postscript: Why the Puzzle Remains a Puzzle Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	135
APPENDIX. Must We Say What He Believes? On Semantics and Pragmatics in Belief Attribution Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	143
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	161
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	169

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 192
Keywords: Political Science & Political History; Philosophy

eBook

Published: June 30, 2019
ISBN: 9781501741074