Willard V. O. Quine - Two Dogmas of Empiricism
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- Опубліковано 16 чер 2021
- Quine's 1951 paper Two Dogmas of Empiricism is well-known for attacking the analytic-synthetic distinction and for being one of the most influential papers in analytic philosophy. In this video, I explain the argumentative (or rather: non-argumentative) structure of Quine's paper, consider on what grounds distinctions can be attacked, clarify the relation between Quine and Kant, explain the empiricist background against which Quine is working, and explain why the article could have so much impact.
Victor Gijsbers teaches philosophy at Leiden University in the Netherlands. This video is part of an ongoing look at various philosophical papers: • Philosophical Papers - Ігри
![Willard Van Orman Quine - On What There Is [Philosophy Audiobook]](/img/n.gif)
0:00 - Introduction
6:45 - Why Quine Isn't Encountering Kant
16:20 - 6 Ways to Attack a Distinction
21:43 - Quine's "Special" Attack on the Analytic/Synthetic Distinction
23:40 - Disingenuous Structure of Two Dogmas of Empiricism
32:39 - What is Quine Doing in Sec. I-IV
34:24 - Section III: Explanation of Interchangeability Salva Veritate
37:49 - Intensional vs. Extensional Languages
43:16 - Second Dogma of Reductionism
49:14 - Empiricism Without The Dogma
56:24 - Summary
Blessings on you !
Excellent coment, but dont you think philosophy can make reflections by contemplating reality, and see areas that science hasnt work on? Exceptions, non explored fields?
I study many things, but im more prolific seen things nobody pays attention that have consequences. So my difficulty is i work with synthetic a posteriori. Things that have consequences in the way we think, operate with reality.
I'm really glad you created a channel. You lessons are amazing
I've been checking your lectures on the Leiden University channel and it's really nice to see your own space now. Your lectures are very helpful. Thanks so much!
And people in comment sections are checking you out.
these videos really help with getting through philosophical ideas. thanks a lot!
Thank you so much for your lectures, they are extremely helpful and really pleasant to learn from! Many thanks :)
Thank you so much for these lectures, they are awesome!
Victor is a rock star!
Wonderful treatment.
I find it interesting that Quine emphasizes “truths” where Kant emphasizes “judgments.” I appreciate you bringing this to light.
FWIW - I would argue that all ethno-nationalists are racists, but not all racists are ethno-nationalists.
I think you'd be exactly right to argue that way!
enjoyed this video, well presented!
Thank you Victor!
Awesome discussion ... extremely helpful!
Glad you think so!
Great lecture. Even though I'm not a fan of the liberal-biased presuppositions baked into the hypotheticals of the first half, there were still some decent insights overall. The paradigm of modern liberalism is fairly incoherent, unjustified, and arbitrary, so that had me shaking my head lol
Keep up the amazing work anyhow
So interchangeability can only be achieved when there is an equality of extension among subject and predicate then. For example: if we take two subjects 'bachelor' and 'unmarried man', and a predicate, 'has eight letters', the predicate's extension would be a word itself, and thus only the subjects which have eight letters in their words will fit the predicate and so interchageability can be achieved. Because obviously the refferent of the predicate is the number of letters in a word. Also, interchangeability has in itself implied the notion reciprocity, so this fits well.
great video! Thanks
Could you summarize in a short paragraph how Quine addressed the analytic-synthetic distinction?
Hmm; I thought "creature with a heart" vs "kidney" was pointing out the semantic distinction as in "he has allot of heart" which makes sense, wherein "he has allot of kidney" wouldn't
Have I understood correctly? - Quine thinks that all a priori understanding is analytic, true by definition, and that the property of being analytic inevitably involves circular reasoning, for which an empirical observation is required to escape the circularity.
This would seem to me to invoke a particularly restricted definition of a priori, which ignores that the certainty of some kinds of knowledge is increased by further observations whereas other knowledge which could be categorised as synthetic a priori do not become more certain with more observations. An example of the latter would be that the interior angles of a triangle add up to a straight line: without knowing or understanding the proof, repeated observations might indeed make this seem more certain, but with the proof observation is superfluous. I would like to know whether Quine addresses this distinction.
brilliant!
You have been so helpful in my philosophy of science nursing class. I wish you could Zoom with me an my classmate just to say hello.
I am curious and see some loose connections I hope you might want to elucidate a bit, or make suggestions on how to elucidate them myself. 1) The web of believes concept seems to resonate with Lakatos' research programmes in the sense that he also speaks of core concepts and peripheral concepts in a scientific theory, that need to change somehow to fit empirical findings; 2) the concept also seem akin to the neural network theories in cognitive neuroscience and AI; 3) The idea that the structure of believes needs to be changed in order to fit empirical data seems reminiscent of Piagetian concepts like accommodation in his theories of cognitive development. I am wondering if Quine was having these kind of concepts in mind when he invented the concept of web of believes?
Enjoyed the talk! I am still confused about Quine's big idea in section 6. I can avoid saying (not judging?) that the person who was to clean my apartment failed to do so after coming home to find my apartment messy only by assuming other facts: for example, someone (improbably) came into my apartment and messed it up after the cleaner had done his work. Is this a clear illustration of Quine’s idea? It seems to depend on “alternate facts” (subject to refutation as single claims), not alternate meanings or concepts. As such it is hard not to assume that there is a ‘fact of matter’ here. The terms - my apartment, clean, messy, etc. - seem to be shared, seem impossible not to share.
'Is my niece married (a lesbian union)?' I say she is; my friend says she isn’t, because as an evangelical Christian for him a necessary condition for a union to be a marriage is that it be between a man and a woman. Now here the truth depends on the meaning of marriage, and that meaning is only intelligible in a larger web of beliefs; both my friend and I would have to make major changes in our belief webs to change our position. That example comes to mind thinking about Quine.
My problem: I have always had trouble applying Quine’s idea to factual matters, since the meaning of ‘my apartment’ and ‘to clean my apartment’ can’t really mean different things without losing touch with reality altogether (e.g. believing we live in The Matrix). Of course there is vagueness with what it means to have cleaned my apartment; but in the example, the cleaner apparently did not show up at all: either he did or he didn't. Yes, that depends on other beliefs, I guess: there is a world of objects, etc. I could believe all conscious life is a dream, and thus my belief that there is a fact of the matter here does depend on beliefs that are not even in principle testable - is that what he means?
All events have a cause? Does that mean that someone or something causes a group of event or that event in the group has some cause or other? If it means that the group has a cause, some group members, might be uncaused.
In quantum physics, all events due not have a cause. There are probabilistic outcomes that do not have an underlying cause.
Did Putnam or Rorty appreciate the flimsiness of Quine's argument against the analytic-synthetic distinction?
Putnam wrote a long article in 1962, The Analytic and the Synthetic, which works through Quine's ideas. I believe he revisited and revised his ideas about this in the decades after. Rorty on the other hand seems, in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, simply glad to have a reason to ditch the distinction. He's simply not very interested in attempts to rescue it.
Loved this video. Best part for me was not the stuff about Kant or Quine (although that was great). Really enjoyed the critical thinking and counter argument mini tutorial on attacking distinctions and the nature of philosophy. Unfortunately it made me realize that philosophy as a program is almost hopeless. Maybe all philosophical problems lay in language and logic and the true value in studying philosophy is just to understand the risks and pitfalls of arguments and how to get the upper hand to win an argument and then run. Is this why Wittgenstein's program kind of represents an end to philosophy? In any case, you are a very competent teacher by providing a template for understanding and not just a myriad of philosophical propositions. I think I like Kant's approach over Quine but I'm writing this before the end of the video (confession). PS - not sure I agree at all on the hot topic of racism. Here is a distinction for you (just a proposition, not a judgement or a truth) ... (1) true racism is illogical and flawed and has evil consequences (a belief on the spectrum of beliefs about race) .... (2) the use of the term racism and the power of the idea as a weapon to destroy people (Chomsky calling Sam Harris a racist) is dangerous and equally illogical and evil. The distinction lays in the thing itself vs. the incarnations that are spawned, under the same name. Another example of the misuse of language. This one with very serious consequences. Question: if meta-ethicists fail to establish a difference between good and bad then discussions about racism are invalidated based on consequences for people and then hinge only on being inherently illogical (we as a class are one species with a spectrum of varieties) - so are some varieties good or bad or do all dogs go to heaven?
Quine’s idea of corporate beliefs obviates the need for sufficient evidence to belief anything. This is why science is the closest approximation to what exists or is real. Just because it works.
Hello ! I'm a neophyte learning philosophy by myself and a bookseller advice me web of believe from Willard v.o Quine. Could you please make a video about this book please. I would like to have the commentary from an expert :)
Good place to start a pursuit of philosophy 😂
I mean, if you have a judgment with respect to X, you have a belief with some propositional content about X. Sure judgments and propositions aren't the same thing, but I don't know that I would be able to understand a judgment with no "sentence-like thing" attached to it.
Astronomers assert that stars revolving around galactic centers obey the inverse square law.
They don't.
So dark matter. It's there but can't be detected. Nope
Because don't want to change core beliefs.
Muy rational.
Thank you, Dr Quine.
Hi, I think Supernova is not a theoretical term, and it is observational.
29:16
Could we say the same about postmodern stances towards truth and language (Nietzsche, Derrida)?
Just two years after, I am thinking: wow what was that Gijsbers-guy wearing😉
A wild wild shirt by Desigual. 😄
@@VictorGijsbers 😂
I love philosophy but I'm proud to say the rare times I picked up a book by Wittgenstein, Quine, or Kant I understood, well, nearly nothing. Some authors need to be argued and dissected for decades if not centuries for the meaning to appear... and so it goes. 🙂
The linguistic turn has been a disaster for the human race