VRG: Maddy on Putnam

The chapter on Putnam concludes the first part of Maddy’s book. So far, she has traced the SP’s progress towards a philosophy that is immune against the siren song of external justification. In the preceding chapter she presented the outline of a philosophical naturalism that in contrast to Quine’s original, is unencumbered by traditional philosophical questions, in particular those that might provide a foothold for the skeptic.

I’m recalling this because it shaped my expectations about the Putnam chapter. I expected Putnam to be criticised for bringing elements of external justification to the “inside” of scientific inquiry rather than joining the SP on her route towards unadulterated naturalism. It is not clear to me if this is what Maddy is doing here. To me the Putnam chapter looks more like a stand-alone engagement with diverse aspects of Putnam’s anti-naturalistic position, in the course of which many previous points about “external” issues (especially those against Kant and Carnap) are restated. I have difficulties seeing how this chapter advances on the preceding ones or how it brings them to some sort of conclusion. This probably shows just how limited my understanding of this discussion is.

One major topic in this chapter is Putnam’s critique of scientific realism (pp, 98-102). For Maddy difficulties begin when Putnam (still in his early naturalistic phase) casts scientific realism in semantic terms, i.e. as the claim that scientific statements are either true or false. She thinks this bias towards theorising estranges Putnam from the empirical side of the naturalistic project and leads him to a peculiar two-level account of how scientific statements are justified. The semantic gloss on scientific realism suggests that it is committed to the notion that true scientific statements correspond to unconceptualised reality. Putnam rejects this notion of correspondence as metaphysical because unconceptualised reality and our concepts are incomparable in the last instance. Instead, as is well known, he suggests that theories in general provide us with a rationally acceptable picture of the world at large (internalism). In turn, ordinary scientific explanations are constrained by this picture. They do not refer to the mind-dependent world at large. Therefore they can still be said to correspond unproblematically to a mind-independent world (internal realism).

As before, when discussing the two-level theories of Kant and Carnap, Maddy agrees with the account of the constrained inquiry but denies that there is a second level in virtue of which the basic inquiry is constrained. So her SP is an internal realist who denies that Putnam’s internalism is needed to frame the basic inquiry. In rather close analogy to her previous critiques of two-level theories, Maddy claims not to understand why there is an additional issue about the relation between theories and the world at large (p. 101, also pp. 104-5). To the SP there is no reality sans phrase but the world as described by natural science. Similarly, there is no general conceptuality but language as described by science. Clearly, then, the problem that concepts and world are incomparable with each other does not arise for her, and there is no pressure towards Putnam’s internalism either. The world of science, broadly understood, provides the common denominator for words and world. Ground level inquiry is self-contained. Internal realism does not need constraints but can stand on its own.

This leads on to Maddy’s more specific points against Putnam’s anti-naturalism. Putnam argues that belief in the world as an independent structure goes hand in hand with holding that there is a single true theory (p. 106). As science evolves, however, statements about an independent world pass from one correct theory to the next and change their truth values in the process. If anything, says Putnam, this should convince us of the theory-dependence of the world. Maddy replies that there can be several correct ways of accounting for the world as an independent structure which do not reduce to each other or disprove each other. Her correct theories are not true theories in Putnam’s sense, of course, because they do not (attempt to) say anything about the world at large. They are sets of reasonable beliefs which can be compatible with each other. Therefore the properties of the world are not theory-dependent.

I will skip the epistemological interlude (pp. 107-10). Apart from giving Maddy the opportunity to repeat large chunks of an earlier debate, as I read it the discussion of cultural relativity is mainly a preface to the truth theoretic conclusion of the chapter. But I had difficulties understanding this conclusion, so I might be wrong. Putnam asserts, metaphysical issues aside, that those operating with one single method, like the SP, also must adhere to a single concept of truth. Taking my method to be the only method means dismissing the possibility of alternatives. Seeing no merit in what these alternatives could be and thus overriding them, I claim right assertibility for my statements and justify my dismissive attitude towards the possibility of alternatives in the name of the norms of “my” culture. This is self-refuting because right assertibility is not simply assertibility according to parochial norms. So monolithic truth claims are self-refuting -- unless “my” culture is not parochial but totally encompassing, which contradicts our understanding of a culture.

Maddy denies that this point affects the SP (pp. 110-11). In her view adopting a single method does not force the SP to adopt a specific definition of truth alongside it. The SP is mainly interested in the assessment of truth claims. In assessing these claims, the SP does not commit herself to any particular definition of truth. She simply checks if it is reasonable to believe X in the light of her other beliefs and her methods, or may be prompted to adjust these methods and beliefs in the light of X. So she doesn’t say “X is rightly assertible according to my standards” at all. In fact, if she did say something like this, there would be no space left for her constant self-assessment. This is the final criticism of Putnam. Due to his truth theoretic bias, he underplays the role of empirical confirmation and theory revision, both of which are crucial for the full-blooded naturalist.

Just two questions: (1) One might wonder how Maddy’s notion of the world as seen by science qualifies as independent reality. Sure, Maddy dismisses this as a traditional worry. She thinks this worry is based on too strong a notion of independence according to which reality is strictly beyond our best understanding. She takes independence to mean that there is a difference between our experience of reality and reality, not that reality is unconceptualised. If we grant this, it seems to me, we imply that our experience lags behind our concepts. Is this intuitive? Maddy obviously believes this. She thinks that we can conceptualise reality without experiencing it, e.g. have theories whose experimental confirmation is delayed (p. 107). But then, if I make the experiment that allows me to experience what the theory anticipates, do I experience independent reality.

(2) Regarding the deflated correspondence relation between word and world, Maddy claims that both our world and our words are shaped scientifically. Doesn’t this turn words into items of the world as seen by science? Linguists may not find this an unusual thought, of course. Still, in Maddy’s context, do different aspects of the world as seen by science still make for a telling correspondence relation with respect to independent reality? Or do we need an aspect change so that words return from, and stand over against, the world for this? In that case, I have difficulties seeing how this aspect change could be performed without a two-level theory. On the other hand, so much discursive work has gone into Maddy’s word-world relation to start with that understanding it in coherentist terms doesn’t look out of place at all.

Reading Group: Abela on Putnam & Kant

No actual reading group this week - were just online. So I don't have the benefit of other's thoughts and, as a result, I don't have a great deal to say.

The gist of Abela's short paper is that Kant's empirical realism should be sharply distinguished from Putnam's internal realism. Three ways of distinguishing the two are considered, only the last of which is found to be ultimately compelling.

(1) "The first concerns the greater generality of Kant's account of cognition as compared with Putnam's treatment" (50)
(2) "The second involves an alleged belief constraining/informing connection between noumenal reality and phenomenal reality in Kant's account that is rejected by Putnam" (50)
(3) Kant should be viewed as "repudiating the interface model of cognition enforced by scheme content dualism", whereas this is not the case with "Putnam's internal realism, with its fundamental commitment to the interface model of cognition" (54)

I'm going to ignore (1), say a little about (2), and then something on (3).

Abela thinks that (2) misrepresents Kant, attributing to him a distinction between scheme and content that he does not in fact hold. He also suggests that only a two-world interpretation would take this view. On the face of it I don't see why either of these two claims are compelling. As I understand it, the idea is the naive one that there is some way the world is in itself and this has some role to play in experience. For instance, it accounts for the fact that I am now experiencing grey damp weather rather than blazing sunshine (and so are those around me, as opposed to those in Arizona). It is far from clear that, in and of itself, this amounts to accepting something called 'the scheme-content distinction'. Sure, we might then give a two-world spin on this, with the attendant 'construction' of the empirical world, and perhaps that would involve something like a given being interpreted/chopped up in a certain way by the subject. And perhaps that amounts to a scheme-content distinction. But, in and of itself the naive thought does not appear to force that sort of reading, and if it is something that Putnam rejects, then we do have a way of distinguishing the two views.

On (3), it is somewhat unclear to me exactly what Abela is saying. On the face of it he rejects the interpretation of Kant as proposing a scheme-content distinction. However, as I said above, Abela tends to associate this with a two-world view and so to a mentalising of appearances. So, part of his rejection amounts to rejecting the mentalising of the empirical world. But, again, I just don't see why the scheme-content distinction requires the objects of experience to be mentalised. This is especially so, given that the scheme content appears to be understood along the lines of the naive thought above. As such, my impression is that Abela throws out the baby with the bathwater. In rejecting the idea that Kant's empirical world is in some way mental, he maintains that "it makes no sense to think of something outside of judgment as having an informative, evidential, or in any way belief constraining connection to empirical knowledge" (54). If this means that the way the world is plays no role whatsoever in determining belief, then I find it impossible to believe. But perhaps I'm reading this wrong and we should understand the claim as, something like, Davidson's view that only a belief can justify another belief. This makes sense, but is surely does travesty to the role that perceptual experience plays in our cognitive lives.

But, no doubt, I'm barking up the wrong tree here.

Idealism Workshop: Moore

In his paper, "Vats, Sets and Tits", Adrian Moore explored some of the relations between Putnam's proof that we could not be brains in vats, a certain form of scepticism concerning set theory, and a radical form of transcendental idealism. An appealing response to Putnam's original argument is to claim that it answers one kind of scepticism only to leave us with another - the worry that we cannot tell whether our thoughts are limited to our "phenomenal bubble" (a limited aspect of how things are). But this kind of scepticism can be answered, thinks Adrian, by pointing out that for the subject to describe his phenomenal bubble as failing to encompass all the things there are, he has thereby thought about all the things there are. One way to respond to this is to move to a radical form of transcendental idealism according to which we can achieve some kind of inexpressible insight into the possibility that my thoughts are only answerable to my phenomenal bubble.

But the existence of such an inexpressible insight does not vindicate transcendental idealism, at best it indicates that for all I know transcendental idealism may be true. As Wittgenstein pointed out, as soon as we try to draw the limits of the thinkable, we will fail (by thinking the supposedly unthinkable). Thus we cannot think of any insight we may have as the insight that our thinking is only answerable to the phenomenal bubble. In this way, we should resist the move to radical transcendental idealism.

In discussion a number of different issues came up. One was how we should think of the Cartesian dreaming hypothesis in relation to the various types of scepticism discussed. Another was whether we should accept that the brain in Putnam's vat can have thoughts at all, since it seems that he would be unable to think about (genuine) propositions, and that looks as though it may be a condition of the possibility of thought. Finally, there is the question as to what conception of thought is being assumed in the Wittgensteinian denial of the possibility of drawing a limit to thought. Might not some "thick" conceptions of what thought about an object requires block such a move?