Abstract

Hans‐Johann Glock: The Relation between Quine and Davidson: The chapter assesses the interaction between our two protagonists from a historical, exegetical, and substantive perspective. The first section provides a brief biographical account, and contends that at the grand‐strategic level Quine and Davidson are united by a “logical pragmatism.” The next section presents their contrasting attitudes to naturalism. I then turn to more detailed comparisons concerning the philosophy of language: meaning and use, truth, radical interpretation, and the “third dogma of empiricism.” The final section compares and contrasts their conceptions of mental phenomena, focusing on the idea of anomalous monism. Davidson modifies Quinean ideas in significant ways, yet without compromising the naturalistic framework or abandoning empiricism altogether. But whereas Quine's naturalism tends to be scientistic, Davidson's naturalism is anthropological. Human beings, their actions and utterances are physical phenomena; yet they cannot be properly understood by physics, but only by reference to reasons.