Friday,
25 March 2005
Quine's Early Arguments
Concerning Analyticity
Gary Hardcastle, Bloomsburg
University, Philosophy
12:05
pm, 817R Cathedral
of Learning
Abstract: In November of 1934, the 26-year-old W.
v. O. Quine gave three “Lectures on Carnap” at Harvard
University. Ostensibly
a presentation of Rudolf Carnap’s recently articulated logical
syntax program, in these lectures Quine in fact pursues his own
distinctive project. My aim in the present talk is to explain
Quine’s three lectures, with convention, choice, and the evasion
of metaphysics at the center of my interpretation. I’ll
argue that such an understanding dissolves the tension detected
by Hylton (2000) between Quine’s demand for an explanation
of the a priori and the seemingly non-explanatory approach he in
fact pursues, as well as the tension detected by Creath (1990) between
Quine’s avowed aim of illuminating Carnapian doctrines and
various distinctly ‘Quinean” commitments. On my interpretation,
Quine’s 1934 lectures present an original, deep, and coherent
perspective, distinct from both Carnap’s logical syntax program
and the later viewpoint of Quine’s own “Truth by Convention.”
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