Hey Michael! I want to critique the following...

You wrote:

For the realist there is a large class of statements whose truth-value is strictly undecidable since it lies beyond our utmost powers of verification or falsification yet concerning which we can rightfully assert that they must be either true or false – objectively so – despite our lack of knowledge concerning them. What decides that value is the way things stand in reality, that is, the existence of certain truth-makers (facts, circumstances, real-world [including historical] events, mathematical or other such abstract verities) to which those statements correspond in their role as truth-bearers. Truth is conceived as recognition-transcendent in the sense that it depends not at all on the scope and limits of our cognitive or epistemic powers.

I'm not even sure if the above is an accurate report of "for the realist". I note a bit of confusion though. The reason given for a statement's truth-value being undecidable doesn't square with what is later claimed to decide that value. Both are utterly inadequate on my view, and I tend to call myself a realist.

Sometimes we cannot check to see if a statement is true/false. So, in these cases we cannot determine whether or not it is true/false by virtue of looking. However our determination of that isn't necessary. The statement is either true or false despite our inability to check and see which. Justification for that?

Common sense:Statements don't suddenly become true/false upon verification/falsification.

What sense does it make to say that the statement's 'truth-value' is 'undecidable' in these situations? None as far as I'm concerned. Such talk unnecessarily complicates the matter and adds nothing but terminological confusion, by virtue of conflating what a statement's being true takes with what our awareness of that takes. A bewitchment - like many and/or most - stemming from a gross misunderstanding of the role that correspondence and the necessary presupposition thereof plays in everything ever thought, believed, spoken and/or written.


Truth-makers and truth-bearers = Bewitchment.

Talk about truth-value, truth-makers, and truth-bearers leading to conclusions about truth = Bewitchment.

For the anti-realist, conversely, any truth-apt statement has to meet the condition that its truth-value can be specified in terms of some available proof-procedure or method of verification [my emphasis]. To suppose otherwise is to believe – nonsensically – that we could somehow acquire or manifest a grasp of what it takes for that statement to be true (or false) while lacking just the kind of knowledge required to decide the issue either way. In which case we should think of truth as 'epistemically constrained', or of statements as possessing a truth-value only in so far as we can (or at any rate could in principle) find it out by some investigative means. The realist must therefore be deluded – metaphysically out on a limb – if he or she asserts the existence of truths that would lie beyond our utmost cognitive, epistemic, or probative reach.

Truth-apt = able to be verified/falsified.

Common sense:Statements don't suddenly become true/false upon verification/falsification.

Conclusion = the notion of truth-apt conflates being true/false with being verifiable/falsifiable.

So...

Both sides conflate what a statement's being true takes with what our awareness of that takes. Both sides work from an emaciated conceptual framework. The degree of equivocation regarding the term "truth" is astounding. The degree of acceptance...

Shameful.

Even TGW essentially admits this by allowing that we may have the practical ability to use a word, say "gold", without knowing everything about gold. — Srap Tasmaner

i don't admit this. things we don't know about will very much affect us, and our language use. again the mistake is thinking language is self-contained and transparent. it's kantianism: people live in a self-sustaining bubble (note michael's use of simulations, video games). but what you know ain't the same as what affects you. once michael understands this simple pt., the rest falls apart. there are even many things you don't know, and probably can't know, about your own practices!

things we don't know about will very much affect us, and our language use — The Great Whatever

Then I misunderstood. I thought you had said all there is to using the word "gold" correctly was getting its extension right, which you can do whether you know or can know everything about gold.

The battleground is the conflation of truth and meaning...

the extension/intension distinction doesn't matter here. to use 'gold,' you have to be able to pick out samples of gold – that doesn't just mean happening to point to the right samples, it might also mean using 'intensional' capacities that allow you to figure out which things are gold. to do this, however, you may very well need only a superficial sensory clue, as to its color for example. gold, of course, is infinitely complex beyond this mere sensory signal.

michael would like the use of the term to be exhausted by the superficial signal one happens to use to identify the sample. he cannot imagine that there is something to what one refers to beyond the signs by which one recognizes it. for him, language is a closed, self-contained system, like a video game with its own perceptually closed logic.

but this is itself not how we use language; we don't take ourselves to be referring to some metal-insofar-only-as-it's yellow, but that metal, what it is be damned (in fact, we may even, mysteriously as far as michael is concerned, wonder what the metal is, what its properties are! but how oh how, if all there is to say about the referent of the word is locked into how we use it, and all there is to how we use it are the signs by which we recognize how to use it?)

note the precariousness of the position: what you say about the referent of 'gold,' you say about gold – b/c/ the two are of course one and the same. so are we really expected to believe that we know everything about the way this word is used, that things we don't or can't recognize have nothing to do with the use of the word? but how can this be, if the way it's used is to refer to that metal – and there may be next to nothing about that metal we know, or might even be able to know?

the extension/intension distinction doesn't matter here. to use 'gold,' you have to be able to pick out samples of gold – that doesn't just mean happening to point to the right samples, it might also mean using 'intensional' capacities that allow you to figure out which things are gold. to do this, however, you may very well need only a superficial sensory clue, as to its color for example. gold, of course, is infinitely complex beyond this mere sensory signal. — The Great Whatever

But whether the word "gold" has been used correctly doesn't depend on whether you just happen to be pointing at the right sample or used some sensory clues or something. You don't even have to know that it's gold.

Of course all that only holds under interpretations that map "gold" to gold.

My understanding of your view was that you're using the word "gold" right so long as you use it to pick out gold. When you talk about gold, you're talking about a substance that has properties you don't (and maybe can't) know about, but that doesn't mean you're using the word wrong.

whatever goes on beyond our recognition won't affect how we use our language — Srap Tasmaner

Yeah, that was very poorly expressed. Of course it would "affect" our language use, vaguely described. The issue I was aiming at was whether things we don't or can't know would show up in the meanings of our words. And they needn't, if we can still use the word "gold" correctly without knowing all sorts of things about gold.

For instance, suppose in the absence of temperatures at which gold melts, a population believes gold does not melt. We could say they're using the word "gold" correctly -- to pick out gold -- and have a false belief about it, about something they are successfully referring to; or we could say that "metal that does not melt" is part of the meaning of "gold" for them. In one sense, it doesn't matter, because in the circumstances in which they use the word "gold", their version of the word overlaps completely with the version that includes "melts above 1948F".

I'm not really seeing how "meaning" helps here. (Unless there are possible worlds in which gold doesn't melt, and I don't know how to figure that out.) In which case, we stick to what you said at first, that these folks are using the word "gold" correctly and have a false belief about gold. (All this hangs together: we can only say they have a false belief about gold, because we say they're using the word "gold" correctly.)

So the fact that there's a property of gold they cannot know doesn't affect whether they're using the word correctly. But the melting point of gold affects them in that they form a false belief about gold. It affects their language use in that, if asked to list metals that can melt, they won't list gold. But that's still using the word "gold" correctly, just saying something false about gold.

Are we on the same page up to here?

My understanding of your view was that you're using the word "gold" right so long as you use it to pick out gold. When you talk about gold, you're talking about a substance that has properties you don't (and maybe can't) know about, but that doesn't mean you're using the word wrong. — Srap Tasmaner

competence with use of a word doesn't just involve accidents, tho; if u don't know what gold is but just happen to use the word to point out what's actually gold on accident a bunch of times, in one sense u've used it 'correctly,' but in another u 'don't know how' to use the word, i.e. your competence isn't such that it guides you to actually referring to gold non-accidentally. this latter notion of competence makes use of what'd traditionally be called 'intensional' capacities, viz. a way of mapping words to their extensions via appropriate criteria.

there are of course many legitimate notions of 'using a word correctly,' & u must make clear which is at stake.

I agree, but it's a complication I was putting off.

So are you inclined to say that people who think gold doesn't melt know how to use the word "gold"?

yes, knowing how to use the word doesn't mean knowing everything about its referent. it means knowing what the word means - since the meaning of the word is just that it refers to such and such a substance, to know the meaning is just to know which substance that is. as with all knowledge, this can be mulitfaceted, incomplete, etc. competence with using the word is knowing how to employ it correctly, i.e. using it to refer to that substance.

By "corresponding" you appear to just mean "causally responsible". That's not the kind of correspondence I'm talking about. Obviously things have a cause. Consider the correspondence theory of truth. It claims that a statement is true if it corresponds to some obtaining state of affairs. If "correspondence" just meant "causally responsible" then every statement would be true as every utterance is caused by something. — Michael

Stay on target. Your argument was that language can't be used to refer to things outside of the simulation. I showed that if language can be used in the outside world to refer to things in the simulation, then why couldn't it be the reverse? Both the programmer and the simulated Michael would both be referring to the things in the simulation with their words. The programmer created the language you'd be using, and how you use it, in the first place. Your whole example of a simulation and how "language is use" is nonsense when you get down to the root of it.

The "language-is-use" crowd seems to forget that language is used primarily for communication - for transmitting information from one head to another. Information is about things, so we are transmitting sounds and scribbles that refer to other things that are not sounds or scribbles. When you speak or write, it creates ideas in my head that are not sounds and scribbles, but mostly visuals of what it is you are referring to.

Your whole example of a simulation and how "language is use" is nonsense when you get down to the root of it. — Harry Hindu

I'm not here to defend Wittgenstein's argument that meaning is use. I'm here to discuss if Dummett is right that such a view of language entails anti-realism.

Well, that is an argument that I have made before in discussions of "meaning-is-use". If anti-realism is the case, then yes, our words don't refer to anything, and would therefore be meaningless. That is the outcome of anti-realism - that everything is meaningless (including your experiences), as there is no reference. If solipsism, then your words can "mean" anything at any time as there aren't others that you have to communicate with - or they are figments of your imagination which could understand anything you say as they are created by you - similar to how the programmer makes the simulated you understand anything he wants.

Alright, so I want to see if we can work our way back toward the OP.

If we want to link meaning and truth conditions, we want not the word "gold" on its own, but the one-place predicate "... is gold". Then "Gold melts" comes out as a conditional, "If x is gold, then x melts."

Our hypothetical population correctly uses the predicate "... is gold" but incorrectly treats the conditional "If x is gold, then x melts" as false. But because they cannot (or do not) achieve temperatures at which gold would melt, then there are sentences they count as true for the wrong reason: place a golden idol over a campfire and they will say "It will not melt," which is true.

In fact, all of their statements about gold (and other metals) would be true if we substituted for "melts" something like "melts at temperatures we observe". Or maybe a better approach, more suitable for the campfire example, is "melts at this temperature". We can take "melts" as carrying with it an implied indexical.

In fact, the problem with our folks is the invalid inference from "We have only observed temperatures under 1500F" (say) to "There are only temperatures under 1500F." There may be scientists (or even philosophers!) among them who suggest they should really be saying "Gold has not been observed to melt at temperatures we have observed." (That will look like pedantry to some people, as just another way of saying, "Gold has not been observed to melt." Of course we have only observed the temperatures we have observed!)

All of these considerations seem to relate to the beliefs of our population rather than to the meanings of their words. But the sort of competence we were looking for should give us a way of mapping words onto observations, what we might describe as associating meanings with truth conditions.

The questions we are trying to get to have to do with how that function is constrained by its domain and by its range, by the domain of observations or possible observations, on the one hand, and the range of meanings that will get us from truth conditions, observed or not, to words, on the other.

But the sort of competence we were looking for should give us a way of mapping words onto observations, what we might describe as associating meanings with truth conditions. — Srap Tasmaner

i just don't see what observations have to do with anything. if the ppl say 'gold doesn't melt,' and by that it's understood to mean it doesn't melt ever, then they're wrong. what does it matter what they've observed?

competence is a slippery term. i think to be competent with 'gold,' all you have to know basically is that it refers to gold. of course all 'knowing that' and 'knowing what' is gradient, you can know how or that in some respects & not others. further, it's likely no competence is actually complete (as in frege puzzles, where speakers don't realize two expressions refer to the same thing).

i just don't see what observations have to do with anything. — The Great Whatever

a way of mapping words to their extensions via appropriate criteria. — The Great Whatever

That's the sort of thing I mean. I just mean "observation" in the sense that, presented with a sample of gold, you would assent to "That's gold." Nothing more subtle than that.

Very roughly, you could imagine recognizing gold, looking up gold in your lexicon, and finding it maps to the word "gold", so you say "That's gold." It's simplistic, but kind of what we want, right?

That's the sort of thing I mean. I just mean "observation" in the sense that, presented with a sample of gold, you would assent to "That's gold." Nothing more subtle than that. — Srap Tasmaner

i don't think competence with the word 'gold' requires an ability always to recognize gold. it just requires knowing that the word refers to that substance. there may be difficulties in actually figuring out when you're faced with that substance, and these are not semantic problems, but empirical ones with figuring out what something is (is it gold or not? my semantic competence will not tell me, though it will tell me, given that I already know it's gold, to call it 'gold' – my semantic competence will tell me, given that i know it's gold, to call it 'oro' instead).

I'm here to discuss if Dummett is right that such a view of language entails anti-realism. — Michael

It doesn't because truth becomes redundant with utility and use. If anything it draws a distinction between meaning derived from social-cultural use and scientific realism.

There's a distinction there, yes, and someone whose linguistic competence includes using the word "gold" properly, in whatever sense, may occasionally fail, but that failure we wouldn't usually describe as not knowing which word to use (though that happens too) but as not knowing whether the word applies in the case at hand.

But we immediately face an issue I'm not sure how to handle: competence using the word "gold" does require competence in recognizing gold. Neither needs to be perfect, but pretty reliable. We don't expect the congenitally blind to be able to acquire competence in using color words, for instance. And the only way we have to judge another's linguistic competence is by observing how consistently they link occasion features we recognize to words we expect. I don't want to leap to the conclusion that this is what competence consists of, but it is the criteria by which we judge it. (Just as there are criteria by which we pick out gold.)

And honestly the ideal would be high empirical competence coupled with high linguistic competence. Failure of either sort degrades the effectiveness of communication, right?

may occasionally fail — Srap Tasmaner

they could fail all the time (say, if for some reason it became hard to identify gold, because the sign by which people identified it before went away)

but that failure we wouldn't usually describe as not knowing which word to use (though that happens too) but as not knowing whether the word applies in the case at hand. — Srap Tasmaner

it'd be described as not knowing whether something's gold. a consequence of that would be not knowing the word applies, but that's just an epiphenomenon. the point is they can't figure out it's gold.

competence using the word "gold" does require competence in recognizing gold. — Srap Tasmaner

right. it only means knowing that 'gold' refers to gold.

We don't expect the congenitally blind to be able to acquire competence in using color words, for instance — Srap Tasmaner

i don't think this is right. the blind might have certain difficulties figuring out that things are certain colors (though sometimes not - there are many ways to do this besides seeing them), but they know what the words mean, at least to a large extent. perhaps loss of vision results in some lack of semantic competence, but certainly not total.

And the only way we have to judge another's linguistic competence is by observing how consistently they link occasion features we recognize to words we expect. I don't want to leap to the conclusion that this is what competence consists of, but it is the criteria by which we judge it. (Just as there are criteria by which we pick out gold.) — Srap Tasmaner

this is just not right. we don't judge whether someone knows what 'gold' means by how good of a prospector they are.

criteria by which we happen to pick out a material don't determine what the word referring to the material means; 'gold' just means that very stuff, gold. we might use any number of criteria to pick it out, and these might change over time or disappear, or new ones might arise.

And honestly the ideal would be high empirical competence coupled with high linguistic competence. Failure of either sort degrades the effectiveness of communication, right? — Srap Tasmaner

lack of empirical competence only constrains communication in the sense that it'll be harder to say certain true things, because you can't figure out what's true. in general it would be absurd to expect competence in all empirical matters that involve the use of a word - then we could be omniscient just by learning a language.

But we immediately face an issue I'm not sure how to handle: competence using the word "gold" does require competence in recognizing gold. — Srap Tasmaner

Does it? Or does it not just require that we accept that there is such a thing as gold, and that the word is correctly used when it refers to that substance?

For example can I not competently say "Gold used to be found in those hills", even if I am not someone who can tell real gold from fool's gold?

Also, re the OP I would say that this kind of competent use presupposes some kind of realism and would be incompatible with antirealism; it presupposes that there really is such a substance as gold, and that it really was found in those hills, and so on.

For example can I not competently say "Gold used to be found in those hills", even if I am not someone who can tell real gold from fool's gold? — Janus

right. the above position claims, absurdly, that a competence in prospecting, metalworking, etc. is required to know what 'gold' means.

perhaps some minimal acquaintance with gold's features is needed to know what gold is, but the semantic competence is just to know, that given one knows what gold is, that the word 'gold' is what's used to refer to it.

Also, re the OP I would say that this kind of competent use presupposes some kind of realism and would be incompatible with antirealism; it presupposes that there really is such a substance as gold, and that it really was found in those hills, and so on. — Janus

This isn't incompatible with anti-realism. As I've said many times before, anti-realism isn't un-realism.

What's the difference between realism and anti-realism then?

I provided a good summary here.

For example can I not competently say "Gold used to be found in those hills", even if I am not someone who can tell real gold from fool's gold? — Janus

That looks like a nice example. If you pushed it farther, say gold has long since disappeared, you might say things like "They used to find something here they called 'gold'." But even if you're using the word they used, doesn't this seem like, I don't know, a lesser competence than they had, who actually knew what gold was?

we don't judge whether someone knows what 'gold' means by how good of a prospector they are. — The Great Whatever

Well I'm certainly not suggesting that. After all, we already agreed you can be competent using a word without knowing everything there is to know about either the referent or further uses of the word.

But when you teach a child "moon" they call everything in the sky "moon" and gradually zero in on restricting their utterances of "moon" to when the Moon is up there. That's when we'll start attributing competence, isn't it?

Maybe it's simpler to look at adults who already have a full complement of concepts and empirical abilities but are learning a new language.

Why isn't this a topic about pragmatism and the latter Wittgenstein? I don't see how there's even something unrealistic being said with such a tautology being there in the first place to start with as a premise.

I think you're just saying this: attributing to someone knowledge of what the word for gold is, presupposes that they know what gold is.

And that seems pretty straightforward.

that is not what i'm saying, although it may be a consequence of it. what i'm saying is super duper simple: to know what 'gold' means, you have to know it refers to gold. that's it.