Making sense of speakers

Abstract

In chapter one it is argued that a theorist of creatures who think, have beliefs, talk, etc, about the world, is committed by his theory to the existence of thoughts, beliefs, utterances, etc, and the things those thoughts, beliefs, utterances, etc, are about. This claim is defended against three objections. In the second chapter the role of semantic theories is investigated; a theorist, it is argued, is committed to a semantic theory by his descriptions of subjects as saying things. From this certain constraints on semantic theories are deduced. Thirdly, a number of principles governing the description and explanation of the experiences and conduct of speakers are advanced. The objectivist character of these principles is clarified. The principles are then deployed in the fourth chapter in an attack on scepticism about our knowledge of other minds, with particular reference to our knowledge of the perceptions of others. The attack contains an argument that tries to do what Wittgenstein's Private Language Argument tried to do. The fifth chapter attempts to make some general points about the description and explanation of the experiences and conduct of speakers. It assigns a central role to perception and belief, and tries to show that the possibility of such explanations depends on there being such a thing as human nature, about which some general remarks are made. In the final chapter the thesis returns to the problem of commitments, and disputes about commitments. The discussion leads into the subject of realism; some standard elucidations of what realism is are criticised, and a better account drawing on material from earlier chapters on the explanation of belief is begun.