Davidson’s Theory of Meaning

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Institution

Introduction

Philosophy has been a fundamental part of the human society. It has particularly played an immense role in enhancing the capacity of individuals to think critically about certain aspects of their lives, as well as generate ideas on the manner in which these issues should be viewed. Needless to say, different philosophers have come up with different theories aimed at explaining different aspects. Such was (and still is the case) for Davidson’s theory of meaning, an empirical theory whose philosophical work revolves around describing the form taken by a theory of meaning for a language, as well as the nature of evidence that will be deemed as confirming it (Lycan, 2008). Once these issues are sorted out, Davidson opines that there will not be any more questions pertaining to what the “meaning is” or even what the “meanings are. The theory of meaning aims at stating something, the knowledge of which would be sufficient in interpreting utterances of speakers of the language to which it would be applicable. The interpretation of a speaker revolves around saying what her utterances are saying.

Davidson underlines the fact that the theory has to give the meanings pertaining to infinitely numerous sentences. However, this knowledge has to be finitely specifiable if the language is tto be learnable (Lycan, 2008). In essence, a theory of meaning would not consist in an infinite number of sentences and their meanings, rather their meanings would have to be generated recursively. In this regard, Davidson proposes that a theory of meaning should be in the form of a Tarskian truth definition pertaining to a language (Lycan, 2008). The Tarskian truth definition pertaining to a language underlines the fact that there exists no need to suppress the obvious connection or link between a definition of truth and the concept of meaning. Tarski had stated that the definition functions through appropriating the necessary, as well as sufficient conditions pertaining to the truth in every sentence (Lycan, 2008). Giving truth conditions comes as a technique for giving the meaning of a sentence. The knowledge of the semantic truth pertaining to a language would essentially be the knowledge pertaining to what it is for any sentence to be truth. This amounts to the comprehension of the language.

Of particular note is the fact that Davidson was not concerned with the construction of actual theories of meaning for actual languages, rather he was concerned with getting clearer on how such a theory should look like. For Davidson, the explanation of the shape taken by a theory of meaning should specify the forms that the theorems and axioms of the theory should take, as well as the evidence that must be used in testing the theory (Lycan, 2008). Davidson underlines the fact that a rigorous explanation of the evidence and form that is appropriate to the theory of meaning would offer as much of a philosophical elucidation of the linguistic meaning as an individual would need or even reasonably expect.

Davidson offers two constraints pertaining to the form that theories of meanings would have. First, there is the compositionality constraint, which states that the theory of meaning pertaining to a natural language L has to show the manner in which the sentences pertaining to L would be determined by the features pertaining to the simple expressions that make up the sentences coupled with the order or the appearance of the expressions (Lycan, 2008). In addition, there is the constraint called convention T (Tarski style), which states that the theorems pertaining to a theory of meaning for object language L has to take the form of “S is true iff”, in which case “S” would be replaced by an expression in the metalanguage that refers to a sentence in L, while “P” would be replaced by translation pertaining to that sentence in the metalanguage.

However, Davidsonian theory of meaning has not escaped some element of criticism. First, it is worth noting that some sentences that do not have the truth conditions may still be meaningful. For example, a sentence such as “Are you enjoying the class?” is still meaningful. In addition, sentences that have similar truth conditions may still have different meanings. For instance, a sentence such as “We married and had a child” as opposed to “We had a child and married” look like they have similar truth conditions but would have different meanings. Moreover, Davidson’s theory of meaning does not provide clarity as to the manner in which the truth conditions pertaining to some complex sentences are dependent on those pertaining to their parts (Lycan, 2008). On the same note, it would be illogical to give meaning pertaining to a sentence such as “I am the inspector” by stating that “I am the inspector” is true if and only if (iff) I am the inspector as the truth will be dependent on the individual that is saying it. To this problem, Davidson would undoubtedly call for the relativization to the times, locations and speakers, where a theory of truth would be specific as to what it is for a certain sentence to be true as said by a certain person at a time and at a location (Lycan, 2008). In addition, Davidson’s T constraint has not escaped criticism. Critics have noted that not every other T-sentence has the capacity to give meanings. For instance, since “snow is white and grass is green”, it would follow that snow is white if and only if (iff) grass is green. In this case, the “iff” would be the material biconditional”. However, thi would entail the T-sentence: “Grass is green” is true if and only if snow is white. Davidson would counter this critique by borrowing from Tarski who stated that the T-sentense would be false as “Snow is white” does not come as synonymous with “Grass is green”. Even then, however, this would essentially be circular (Lycan, 2008). A theory of truth is subject to empirical testing. Rational English speakers, who also largely believe the truth would not be correctly interpreted as meaning that snow is white when saying grass is green. This would essentially entail some empirical evidence for denying any insinuation that there is an element of truth in insinuating that grass is green if an only if snow is white. This underlines the inadequacy of davidson’s insinuation as to the treatment of sentences when trying to determine their truth and meaning. Nevertheless, this theory can only be interpreted in conjunction with other theories, while taking care of the conditions that it places or the rules it espouses in the interpretation of the meaning of sentences.

References

Lycan, W. G (2008). Philosophy of Language: A Contemporary Introduction. New York: Routledge