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Triangulation, Untranslatability, and Reconciliation

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Donald Davidson used triangulation to do everything from explicate psychological and semantic externalism, to attack relativism and skepticism, to propose conditions necessary for thought and talk. At one point Davidson tried to bring order to these remarks by identifying three kinds of triangulation, each operative in a different situation. Here I take seriously Davidson’s talk of triangular situations and extend it. I start by describing Davidson’s situations. Next I establish the surprising result that considerations from one situation entail the possibility that at any one time one language is partially untranslatable into another. Because the possibility is time-indexed, it need not conflict with Davidson’s own argument against the possibility of untranslatability. I derive the result, not to indict Davidson, but to propose a new kind of triangulation, the reconciliation of untranslatability, which I investigate. Insofar as triangulation is central to Davidson’s views, getting a handle on his various triangular situations is key to getting a handle on his contributions to philosophy. Insofar as those contributions have enriched our understanding of how language, thought, and reality interrelate, extending Davidson’s model promises to extend our understanding too.

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Notes

  1. Davidson (2002, p. 105) introduces triangulation. See Goldberg (2008) for triangulation’s relation to Lepore and Ludwig’s (2007a, pp. 337–42) account of Davidson’s semantic externalism.

  2. Verheggen writes: “The importance of the triangulation argument in Davidson’s philosophy cannot be overstated” (2007, p. 96). My only disagreement is over there being a single “argument.”

  3. Davidson borrows the notion of a quality space from Quine (1964, pp. 83–5; 1977, pp. 123–8).

  4. See Davidson (2001b, pp. 6–7; 2002, p. 128; 2005b, p. 140).

  5. See Davidson (2001b, p. 12).

  6. The closest that Davidson comes is describing the primitive and learning situations, without distinguishing primitive from linguistic learning, and then merely naming the interpretive situation (2001a). None of Davidson’s commentators describes the primitive, learning, and interpretive situations together, nor distinguishes primitive from linguistic learning. Bridges (2006) describes only the primitive, and the primitive and linguistic learning situations. Brink (2004), Child (2001), Fennell (2000), Glock (2003, p. 260), Hacker (1998), Lasonen and Marvan (2004), Montminy (2003), and Yalowitz (1999) describe only the linguistic learning situation. Pagin (2001) and Talmage (1997) describe only the linguistic learning and interpretive situations. Lepore and Ludwig (2007a, pp. 406–12) and Ramberg (2001) describe only the interpretive situation. Verheggen describes only the linguistic learning and interpretive situations (1997), and primitive and linguistic learning situations (2007), respectively.

  7. I do, however, refer in these notes to controversies concerning Davidson’s claims about triangulation. See Goldberg (2008) for further worries.

  8. See also Davidson (2001a, p. 293; 2002, pp. 117–8, 212; 2005b, p. 140).

  9. See Davidson (2001b, p. 8; 2002, pp. 83, 130, 202–3, 212) for his distal theory. See Davidson (2001b, pp. 10–1) for his disagreement with Quine. See also Glock (2003, pp. 185–8).

  10. See also Davidson (2005b, p. 140).

  11. See also Davidson (2002, pp. 130, 212–3; 2005b, pp. 140–1).

  12. Davidson thinks that the “only legitimate source of objectivity is intersubjectivity” (2001b, p. 13), which learning introduces. See also Davidson (2002, pp. 118, 130, 138–9) and Lasonen and Marvan (2004, p. 182). While Bridges (2006, pp. 292–5) and Montminy (2003, pp. 38–9) argue that a second person is not needed for objectivity, I take Pagin’s (2001, pp. 203) and Davidson’s (2002, pp. 212) responses to why a second person is needed for meaning to explain why it is needed for objectivity also; see note 14.

  13. See also Davidson (2002, pp. 37, 203, 213).

  14. Bridges (2006, pp. 295–6), Talmage (1997, p. 144), Verheggen (1997, pp. 363–5), and Yalowitz (1999, pp. 119–26) claim that Davidson has not explained why the second person is needed for meaning. According to Lasonen and Marvan (2004, p. 180, n. 5), Pagin (2001) claims that too. Nonetheless Pagin (2001, p. 203) himself explains why for Davidson the second person is required: to ensure that the first person’s responses are similar to themselves. See Davidson (2001b, p. 6; 2002, pp. 83, 212) and Brink (2004, p. 118).

  15. See also Davidson (2001a, p. 293; 2002, pp. 18, 29, 44, 117–22, 151, 202, 212–4). For ‘table’ to mean table is not for it to mean only table. Thus Davidson’s discussion of the linguistic learning situation is consistent with his indeterminacy of interpretation thesis; see note 23.

    Further, the learner would not learn the meaning of any of ‘table’ in vacuo. Were she to learn ‘table’ from triangulating a table with her teacher, the teacher would be saying other things to the learner also. The learner might even be able to learn ‘table’ only if the teacher has already introduced her to other objects, even if she has not named them. I take this to go some way toward making Davidson’s discussion of the linguistic learning situation, which seems atomistic, consistent with his commitment to holism (which, Ludwig (1993) is right, amounts more to molecularism). Nonetheless for simplicity I bracket concerns about holism.

  16. See Lepore and Ludwig (2007a, pp. 335–42) for Davidson’s attitude toward physical and social externalism.

  17. See Davidson (1993, p. 117; 2001c, pp. 276–7; 2002, pp. 88–9, 114–5; 2005a, p. 52; 2005b, essay 7) for his understanding languages as idiolects. See Davidson (2001c, essay 11; 2002, p. 89; 2005b, essays 7, 8) for his understanding idiolects as evolving.

  18. Verheggen (2007) takes what I have identified as triangulation’s use in the primitive and linguistic learning situations as a single argument explaining the possibility of meaning determination. While I agree that being in the former situation is a prerequisite for being in the latter, Davidson nonetheless treats each as a situation worth analyzing in its own right. His concerns include not only how meaning is determined but also how language itself evolved from primitive interactions.

  19. See Davidson (2001c, essay 8) for utterances that are not statements. See also Lepore and Ludwig (2007b, chap. 12).

  20. See Fodor and Lepore (1992, pp. 63–4).

  21. See Goldberg (2004b) for Davidson’s early formulations of the principle of charity. See Lepore and Ludwig (2007a, pp. 185–92) for this formulation.

  22. See Davidson (2002, p. 148).

  23. See below for worries about Davidson’s apparent shift between focusing on words when discussing the linguistic learning situation, and sentences when discussing the interpretive situation. Davidson also maintains that there can in principle be more than one charitable, Tarski-style truth theory for a language, and so more than one meaning for any utterances. This is his indeterminacy of interpretation thesis. For simplicity I bracket discussion of the thesis here, though see note 15, first paragraph.

  24. Ramberg agrees: “We can think of triangulation as symmetrical radical interpretation, where each is both interpreter and interpreted” (2001, p. 230). See also Davidson (2002, p. 121).

  25. See “Triangulation and Untranslatability” for what Davidson takes a conceptual scheme to be.

  26. See Goldberg (2004a) for Davidson’s argument against the very idea of a conceptual scheme, and Goldberg (2003) for his argument against Cartesian skepticism. See Goldberg (2008) for emphasis on triangulation’s role in each argument.

  27. See Goldberg and Rellihan (2008) for more on CE and PCE.

  28. Elsewhere I have shown how this commits them to what I have called ‘Kantian skepticism’ (Goldberg and Rellihan 2008) and ‘noumenalism’ (Goldberg 2008). As I have discussed elsewhere (Goldberg and Rellihan 2008), one’s environment can through natural selection shape the PCE with which one is born. Here we are concerned with whether being in the linguistic learning situation at some time shapes one’s PCE at that time.

  29. Elsewhere (Goldberg and Rellihan 2008) I have presented evidence that Davidson belongs in both groups, though I now think that the evidence more strongly supports his belonging in the former.

  30. See also Davidson (2002, p. 212).

  31. In fact Brink (2004), Fennell (2000, p. 150), Lasonen and Marvan (2004, pp. 187–90), Talmage (1997, p. 142), and Yalowitz (1999, p. 125) argue that for Davidson because the learner is already disposed to group objects into similarity classes, she must already possess the conceptual capacities to do so. If they are right, then for Davidson being in the linguistic learning situation always fails to increase one’s PCE. Below I argue that they are wrong.

  32. See note 28, second and third sentences.

  33. See Yalowitz (1999, pp. 115–7) for a related point. Child (2001, p. 33) also argues that to disallow the world any role in our classificatory systems is to reduce truth to mere verification in light of our own conceptual categories. As Child correctly notes, Davidson (2005a, chap. 2) would reject any such purely epistemic notion of truth. See note 28, second and third sentences, for considerations that via natural selection the world shapes our conceptual capacities.

  34. Because Davidson understands languages as evolving, for him, at t 1 and t 2 I speak the same language with different expressive powers rather than different languages. Either way, however, my argument still works.

  35. This triangulation would not happen in vacuo. My partner and I would talk about related things as well, so that I would learn other words and concepts also. See note 15, second paragraph, for similar considerations.

  36. Because Davidson understands languages are idiolects, and my neighbor and I speak different idiolects, for him, we speak different languages rather than different versions of the same language. Either way, however, my argument still works.

  37. See also Davidson (2002, pp. 43, 86, 117, 200).

  38. Considerations from note 35 apply here too.

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Acknowledgment

I would like to thank Alyssa Bernstein, Matthew Burstein, Elisa Hurley, Mark LeBar, James Petrik, Matthew Rellihan, Amy White, and several anonymous referees for invaluable comments.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, Washington and Lee University, Lexington, VA, USA

    Nathaniel Goldberg

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Goldberg, N. Triangulation, Untranslatability, and Reconciliation. Philosophia 37, 261–280 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-008-9171-3

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