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1995 - TheAntiNaturalismofSomeLanguageCenteredAccountsofB (Retrieved 2018-02-20)
1995 - TheAntiNaturalismofSomeLanguageCenteredAccountsofB (Retrieved 2018-02-20)
1995 - TheAntiNaturalismofSomeLanguageCenteredAccountsofB (Retrieved 2018-02-20)
of Belief
Ruth BARCAN
MARCUS’
Summary
Common sense explanationsof human action are often framed in terms of an agent’s beliefs
and desires. Recent widely received views also take believing and desiring (as well wishing, in-
tending and even thinking) as attitudes of an agent to linguistic or quasi-linguistic entities. It is
here claimed that such a narrow view of cognitive attitudes is not supportable, since even
among linguals non-verbal responses are often overriding evidence for belief and desire, even
where they run counter to sincere verbal assents. The view is also curiously non naturalistic in
that it disallows ascribing beliefs and desires altogether to non-linguals and pre-linguals. In the
present paper a “common sense” explanation of action in accordance with the triad <Desire,
Belief, Action, is seen as a useful phenomenological“theory”provided that language centrality
is not taken as essential.
See S. Kripke. “APuzzle About Belief,” Meaning and Use, ed. A. Margalit (Dordrecht,
1979): 234-83.
“Onsense and Nomenatum” and other essays in G. Frege. Translationsfrom The Phil-
osophical Writings, trans. P. Geach and M. Black (Oxford, Blackwell, 1952).
The Anti-Naturalism of Some Language Centered Accounts of Belief 115
4 See for example, A. Plantinga, The Nature of Necessity (New York: Oxford Press,
1974) and R.Chisholm, “Events and Propositions,” Now, IV, 1 (1970).
G. Frege, Philosophicaland Mathematical Correspondence,ed. G. Gabriel,et al. (Chi-
Modularity of Mind
(Cambridge, Mass.:MIT Press, 1983).
“Thought and Talk,” in Mind and Language, ed. Samuel Gattenplan(New York: Ox-
ford Press 1975).
116 Ruth Barcan Marcus
coreferential terms converts true belief claims into false ones. Language is a
means of “fine tuning.” We sometimes mistakenly or ambiguously report the
thoughts of others or even of ourselves. We do not always “know our own
mind,” but non-language users make no attributions at all.
Granted that faulty attributions to language users can often, be corrected
by proper interpretation - often by an agent’s first-person honest testimony
about what he or she thinks, believes, desires, although recent research seems
to support the conclusionthat even sincerefirst person verbal accounts of rea-
sons for behavior are not as reliable as we supposed. But confirming assents
are not possible in the case of non-linguals.
Yet is that, on the face of it, sufficient grounds for denying a non-lingual
thoughts, beliefs, or desires altogether? That is a large step. Davidson claims
that any attribution of thoughts of any kind to “dumb creatures,” to non-lan-
guage users, is ruled out altogether. Not because of the obvious difficulties of
correct attribution and fine tuning but because all thought he says is essen-
tially linked to language. Davidson outlines some considerationsby virtue of
which ”to have a thought would be to have a disposition to utter certain sen-
tences with appropriate force under given circumstances.” He sets out to
show, “that only creatures with speech have thoughts” and that believing,
doubting, desiring and other “sentential” attitudes, are not detachable from
thinking or conversely.
The argument runs something like this. The basis for interpretation is the
sentential attitude - the attitude of holding true. A feeling about sentences.
That feeling is in turn a function of what the sentence means and what else is
believed. The meaning of the sentence is given by agreed upon truth condi-
tions in a linguistic community on an extension of a Tarski-style semantics. It
is also taken as true that most beliefs are correct since too many false beliefs
frustrate the possibility of identifyingtrue beliefs. A large set of sharedstable
beliefs is required to identify further beliefs whether true or false. On this ac-
count we are supposed to see how essential common agreed upon assentings
are to a theory of belief. Not only must there be a large measure of agreement
but “a theory of interpretation cannot be correct that makes a man assent to
very many false sentences. It must generally be the case that a sentence is true
when a speaker holds it to be. . .A method of interpretation. ..puts the inter-
pretation in general agreement with the speaker.” On Davidson’s account,
which he calls a theory of radical interpretation, concepts of truth and error
are language bound and “Belief takes up the slack between objective truth
and sentences held true.’’ But, and here is the giant step, belief as an attitude
outside of the context of a shared language is therefore not intelligible. More
generally, only a speech interpreter can have the concept of a thought or the
118 Ruth Barcan Marcus
lo “Some Revisionary Proposals about Belief and Believing,” Philosophy and Phenom-
enological Research I (Supplement 1990): 133-53. Also Modalities Oxford 1993.
l1 “Rational Animals” in Actions and Events, ed. E. Le Pore and B. I. McLaughlin
(Blackwell, 1985): 473-80.
The Anti-Naturalism of Some Language Centered Accounts of Belief 119
the path it takes. But of course, he says, we know that those are the beliefs and
desires of the design engineer, and to attribute them to the missile is clearly
misattribution. The missile lacks the mental, physiological, or behavioral
complexity of a thinking being, as well as language. In the case of similar at-
tributions to some non-lingual animals we are misled by the fact that many
non-lingual animals have a repertoire of a wide range of non-longual behav-
ior, as well as physiologicalmake-up, similar to humans. It may be useful, Da-
vidson says, as a manner of speaking, to deploy a belief, desire, action frame-
work and vocabulary in the absence of further explanationsabout the origins
of the seemingly intentional actions as in the case of the missile. We can, he
says, “continue to explain the behavior of speechless creatures by attributing
propositional attitudes to them while at the same time recognizing that such
creatures do not actually have propositional attitudes and hence have no in-
tentions, thoughts, beliefs, desires.” Such creatures ore autometa.
Richard Jeffrey’s paper, “Animal Interpretation” is a succinct response.
He describes undertakings of animals which are continually adjusted to ends
and have all the features of intentional actions. He notes that rats have pat-
terns of preferenceswhich have the clear structure of probabilisticjudgments,
absent the conceptof subjectiveprobability. He claims, as have I, that we can
try to deploy a minimalist language in belief attribution to non-linguals which
more accurately describe non-lingual motives or intentions or beliefs. He re-
jects the implausible global, holistic, account of all belief - where ascribing a
belief also requires ascribing an awesomely complex (possibly total) network
of beliefs. We can,and I agree, determine that Fido is thirsty, desires to drink,
believes that there is something drinkable nearby, and would satisfy that
desire in the act of drinking as in the case of humans, without getting tangled
in the total web of objects of propositional, i.e., sentential, attitudes. We can
for example, empathize from our own experience. As Jeffery puts it, in the
case of animals, the nodes in the account are non-propositionaland sub-dox-
astic.
The range of believings of non-linguals are clearly vastly narrower than
our believings. We have beliefs about language, for example, about remote
pasts and futures, and also second order beliefs, second order desires and in-
tentions, and the like which figurein Davidson’s narrow account of rationality.
Such second order thoughts and intentions may in fact entail propositionalor
sentential attitudes. But recent research in animal psychology and psychology
of pre-linguals would seem to suggest that the apparent range of intentional,
Such a subtilityis a clear proof of the falshood, as the contrary simplicityof the truth, of
any system.
Let us therefore put our present system concerning the nature of the understanding
to this decisivetrial, and see whether it will equally account for the reasonings of beasts
as for those of the human species.
Here we must make a distinction betwixt those actions of animals, which are of a
vulgar nature, and seem to be on a level with their common capacities, and those more
extraordinary instances of sagacity, which they sometimes discover for their own pres-
ervation, and the propagation of their species. A dog, that avoids fire and precipices,
that shuns strangers, and caresses his master, affords us an instance of the first kind. A
bud, that chooses with such care and nicety the place and materials of her nest, and sits
upon her eggs for a due time, and in a suitable season, with all the precaution that a
chymist is capable of in the most delicate projection, furnishes us with a lively instance
of the second.
As to the former actions, I assert they proceed from a reasoning, that is not in itself
different, nor founded on different principles, from that which appears in human na-
ture. ‘Tis necessary in the first place, that there be some impressionimmediatelypresent
to their memory or senses, in order to be the foundation of their judgment. From the
tone of voice the dog infers his master’s anger, and foreseeshis own punishment. From a
certain sensation affecting his smell, he judges his game not to be far from him.
Sesondly, The inference he draws from the present impression is built on experi-
ence, and on his observation of the conjunction of objects in past instances. As you vary
this experience,he varies his reasoning. Make a beating follow upon one sign or motion
for some time, and afterwards upon another; and he will successively draw different
conclusions, according to his most recent experience.
Now let any philosopher make a trial, and endeavour to explain that act of the mind,
which we call belief, and give an account of the principles, from which it is deriv’d, inde-
pendent of the influence of custom on the imagination,and let his hypothesisbe equally
applicableto beasts as to the human species; and after he has done this, I promise to em-
brace his opinion. But at the same time I demand as an equitable condition, that if my
system be the only one, which can answer to all these terms, it may be receiv’d as entirely
satisfactory and convincing. And that ’tis the only one, is evident almost without any
reasoning.
Paul Churchland l5 said that what is called by him and others “folk psycho-
logy,” a “theory” which takes believing and intending as sentential or quasi-
sentential attitudes “has changed little or none since ancient times.” That is an
inaccurate and a - historical view. Hume’s Treatiseis explicity a theory of psy
chology. Granted that Plato described thinking as an internal dialogue, but for
Plato proper thinking was not about particulars. It was not about practical
reason. “Opinions” about particular persons or events were not for Plato of
doxastic interest. For Aristotle, who addressed practical as well theoretical
reasoning, not all reasoning is propositional. Aristotle’s account of practical
the quoted passage argues that attributing thought and reason to non-lingual
animals is so obvious it does not escape even the most stupid or ignorant folk.
Representing in language is one mode of representation which is a dra-
matic enlargement of our cognitive abilities but it is a natural ability and far
from the whole story about thought. Imaging, for example, is a mode of think-
ing. It is closer to direct perception but it is a mode of thinking. Some lan-
guage-centered accounts of thought, though they acknowledge mental “ac-
tion” like silent affirmations, have resisted the notion that there actually are
mental picturings. They claim that the notion of a mental-picture is mistaken
psychology, and a conceptual mistake at that. The status of mental images in
reasoning has been a matter of continuing debate among psychologists,*l al-
though its cognitive role is once again acquiring respectability.
There are very likely, even among language users, a wide range of cogni-
tive states and styles which ground belief and which have a wide range of
neuro-physiological underpinnings. The extraordinary thing about linguistic
capacity is that we can communicateabout what we believe through speech
acts in a public language despite the variant causal histories. The speech act of
assenting to a sentence ‘P’which assentingwe share with others in our speech
community may in each case terminate a process which emerges from quite
divergent mental or neurophysiologicalcausal histories. One can say impress-
ionistically, that we might view Hume as focussing on a narrow range of rep-
resentations; sensory or pictorial modes or representation. Language fo-
cussed theories of mind are preoccupied with linguistic representation which
are at some causal distance from objects represented. The causal link between
pictorial representation,perceptual and sensory experience, and the world, is
close. But as we Know, a picture theory of linguistic representation is not sus-
tainable. In a complex organism there is a chain of learning grounded initially
in encounters with the environment, and undergirded by our neuro-physio-
logy - which may show considerable individual variation given our variant
histories and cognitive styles. A genuine folk psychologist is more likely to
offer highly condemned platitudes such as that seeing and feeling is believing,
or that non-verbal behavior of even language users is a reliable guide to what
they believe, than that believing is having a pro-attitude to an understood sen-
tence by a member of a speech community. The Cartesian analogue of lan-
guage centered views is to see believing, thinking, intending, in all their
possible manifestations as necessarily restricted to language users. Replace
“havinga soul” with “having language”. Nor am I motivated to question this
languagecentered non-naturalistic account because I am one of those who
I1
The legitimacy of attack on what is called folk psychology should not be
addressed to the desire-belief-explanatory model of action, writ large, but
with the centrality of sententialor quasi-sentential entitiesor states as the only
proper objects of verbs such as think,intend, believe, desire, expect, and the
like. No language,then no thought, no intentions,no desires, etc. On an inter-
nalist folk-psychological view, the mind is in its essential features a complex
system of evocable attitudes to internal linguistic entities or semantical states
isolable and determinable. Hence the seeming plausibility of the mind as a
souped up Turing machine or conceivable as a brain in a vat. But it is not
plausible, although there are surely features of human mentality which can be
so described.
Nor is the implausibility simply that the objects of propositional attitudes
are on this “narrow” view, all in the mind (or head). Adding the “externalist
rider” which requires that the sentential object of attitudes must be inter-
preted sentences within the framework of a public language does not appreci-
ably ameliorate the implausibility. Meanings on an externalist account are
world bound and are not wholly in the agent’s head. But that does not make
the objects of thought, desire, belief, intention less linguistic, but only less so-
lipsistic.
It seems to me that the Desire-Belief model of action explanation is a
plausible, rough, phenomenologicaltheory provided that the role of language
is assigned its proper place. A kind of Copernicanrearrangementis warranted
with language no longer at center stage.
Complex organismsvary enormouslywith respect to their needs and capa-
cities - and those capacities will naturally play a role in action explanation.
The special capacitiesfor language and for the wide range of communication,
speculation, and inference it affords will, of course, play a role in human ac-
tion explanation, but it is hardly the whole story.
We began the paper by characterizingthe disquotation principle as central
to language-focussed accounts of belief. Sincere assent entailed belief and ar-
guably conversely, among competent non-confused language users. On a
more general account, the objects of believing are not necessarily linguistic
entities although such entities will sometimesbe the objects of believing as in
126 Ruth Barcan Marcus
** See T. Wilson, “Strangers to Ourselves: The Origins and Accuracy of Beliefs About
Ones Own Mental States,” ed. J. Harvey and G . Weary,Attribution in ContempomryPsycho-
logy (New York: Academic Press, 1988). Also, notes 26 and 28.
23 Principle D is adapted from R. B. Braithwaite, “The Nature of Believing” in Knowl-
edge und Belief, ed. A. P. Griffiths (Oxford Press,1967).
Braithwaite required the entertaining of proposiaons and that the agent act as S were
true. SinceBraithwaite’s propositions do seem to be quasi-linguistic entities, I have modifiedhis
Bcco\ult so that the principle is not essentially language bound. Braithwaite also required that S
bs contingent (or in my account, a possible state of affairs).
See my “SomeRevisionary Proposals About Belief and Believing”and ”Rationalityand
Believing the Impossible,” Journal of Philosophy LXXX (1983).
a Bmithwaite, p. 31.
The Anti-Naturalism of Some Language Centered Accounts of Belief 127
25 D. Premack, The Mind of An Ape (New York, 1983). Also Gavagai: Or the Future
History of the Animal Language Contmversy (Cambridge, Mass.:MIT Press, 1986).
128 Ruth Barcan Marcus