T. Wharton writes in "Why do humans communicate?":
>Neale [...] raises the issue of the 'purpose'
>of communication when discussing Grice's (1969)
>revision of Clause (1) of his original 3-clause
>characterisation of non-natural meaning. Grice
>makes a change from
>"U intends... (1) A to produce some particular response r"
>to
>"U intends... (1) A to think that U thinks that p".
>This leads Grice to distinguish between utterances in which
>the speaker's intention is to get the hearer to think
>that the speaker holds a particular belief (or some other propositional
>attitude), and utterances uttered with the _further_ intention of getting
>the hearer to come to hold that belief or propositional attitude (on the
>strength of their thinking that the speaker holds that belief or
>propositional attitude).
>Neale goes on (p. 545): "One worry about the suggested revision is that it
>does not comport well with the commonly held view that the primary purpose
>of communication is the transfer of information about the world: on the
>revised account, the primary purpose seems to be the transfer of information
>about one's mental states." Neale is referring back to a point originally
>made in McDowell (1980) "The primary point of making assertions is not to
>instill into others beliefs about one's assertions, but to inform others ...
>about the subject matter of one's assertions (which need not be, though of
>course it may be, the asserter's beliefs)."
Re: Neale's
"One worry about the suggested revision is that it
does not comport well with the commonly held view
that the primary purpose of communication is the
transfer of information about the world."
Well, for the record, while Grice's "exhibitive"-"protreptic" distinction
comes in Lecture V (WOW, p. 111, published as Wharton notes, in 1969), it
seems Grice's general comment on the 'goals that are central to
conversation/COMMUNICATION' come earlier on WOW, p. 30 (he uses 'purpose'
on p. 28):
"[A]nyone who cares about the goals that
are central to conversation/COMMUNICATION
(such as giving and receiving information,
influencing and being influenced by others)
must be expected to have an interest [...]
in participating in talk exchanges that will
be profitable only on the assumption that they
are conducted in general accordance with
the Cooperative Principle and the maxims." WOW, p. 30.
Rather, the exhibitive-protreptic distinction is aimed to cover some
alleged counterexamples directed against the _necessity_ of the analysans
("the three-prong analysis too strong", WOW, p. 105), a different animal
altogether, one may think?
Wharton writes:
>Grice makes a change from
>"U intends... (1) A to produce some particular response r" to
>"U intends... (1) A to think that U thinks that p".
>This leads Grice to distinguish between utterances in which
>the speaker's intention is to get the hearer to think
>that the speaker holds a particular belief (or some other propositional
>attitude), and utterances uttered with the _further_ intention of getting
>the hearer to come to hold that belief or propositional attitude (on the
>strength of their thinking that the speaker holds that belief or
>propositional attitude).
Note that Grice's change is a subtle one: while proposing a distinction
("exhibitive-protreptic"), he is very careful to formulate the conditions
such that 'protreptic' _ENTAILS_ 'exhibitive', as it were. Thus he writes:
"and (for some cases) (8) A,
on the basis of the fulfilment of (6),
himself to psi that p."
WOW, p. 112
Those cases being, indeed, the 'protreptic' cases he just introduced. Cf.
the very final re-definition:
II. (operative only for certain substituends
for "asterisk-sub-psi") U uttered x intending that,
should there actually be anyone who has phi, he
would via thinking (4) himself psi that p. [...]
III. It is not the case that, for some inference-
element E, U intends x to be such that anyone who
has phi will [...] rely on E in coming to Psi + that p.
WOW, p. 114.
Grice has a relevant note here: "psi +" is to be read as "psi" if clause
(II) is operative, and as "think that U psi-s" if clause (II) is
nonoperative." In other words, clause (II) is or is not operative in,
respectively, protreptic and exhibitive 'utterances'.
(For the record, 'protreptic' (as used by Grice, WOW, 111) is recognised by
the OED (why would it not?) -- I append the entry below --. Perhaps someone
should mailto:oed3@oup.co.uk about the relevant Gricean usages, though).
As I say, Grice's 'exhibitive-protreptic' distinction comes out as a
possible solution to deal with the alleged counterexamples 'directed toward
shoing the three-prong analysans too strong' (examinee, confession,
reminding, review of fats, conclusion of argument, and the
countersuggestible man). He explicitly makes the distinction vis a vis the
contrasting pair:
exhitibive: "You shall not cross the barrier".
protreptic: "Do not cross the barrier."
"Let us [...] draw a distinction between what I might
call "PURELY [emphasis mine. 'Protreptic' utterances
are _also_ exhibitive, if not purely so. JLS] exhibitive"
utterances (utterances by which the utterer U intends
to impart a belief that he [U] has a certain
propositional attitude), and utterances which
ARE NOT ONLY EXHIBITIVE [emphasis mine. JLS] but
ALSO what I might call 'protreptic' (that is,
utterances by which U intends, via imparting the
belief that he [U] has a certain propositional
attitude, to induce a corresponding attitude in
the hearer." WOW, p. 111.
Interestingly, Grice reverted to the 'exhibitive-protreptic' distinction,
without mentioning the terminological detail, in his second John Locke
Lecture on Aspects of Reason.
Grice gives "in full" two examples of actual 'mode' specifiers:
i. U to utter to A |-[a] p if U wills (that)
A judges (that) U judges p.
ii. U to utter to A ![b] p if U wills (that)
A judges that U wills that A wills that p.
_Aspects of Reason_, Clarendon, p. 54.
In _Aspects of Reason_ Grice is interesed in the propositional attitude of
'accepting' (that p):
"Only judging that p and willing that p
[rather than anything having to do with
erotetics or the interrogative. JLS]
are, in my view, strictly cases of
acceptance that p [...] the ultimate purpose
of my introducing this characteristion
of moods [being] to reach a general account
of linguistic forms which are to be
conjoined, according to my proposal, with
an 'acceptability' operator." p. 55.
Grice's 'characterisation of moods' involves the 'resultant procedures'
which are conditional in nature -- the antecedent importing four different
elements:
i. the preamble
ii. the supplement
iii. the differential
iv. the radical.
"The antecedent clause consists of a sequence
whose elements are a preamble, a supplement
to a differential (which is present only in a
[b] [protreptic. JLS] -type case), a differential,
and a radical. The preamble, which is always present,
is invariant, and reads
"U wills (that) [A, addressee]
judges (that) U..."
The supplement, if present, is also invariant;
and the idea behind its varying presence or
absence is connected, in the FIRST instance
[emphasis mine. JLS], with the Volitive Mood
[...]. It seemed to me [when? JLS] that the
difference between ordinary expressions of
intention (such as "I shall not fail" or
"They shall not pass") and ordinary
imperatives (like "Be a little kinder to him")
could be accomodated by treating each as
A SPECIAL SUB-MOOD of a superior mood; the
characteristic feature of the superior mood
(Volitive) is that it relates to willing that p,
and in one subordinate case (the Intentional
case) the utterer is concerned to reveal to
the [addressee] that he (the utterer) wills
that p, while in the OTHER subordinate case
(Imperative), U is concerned to reveal to [A]
that U wills that [A] will that p. [...]. It
also seemed to me that there is a corresponding
distinction between two 'uses' of ordinary
indicatives; sometimes one is _declaring_ or
_affirming_ that p, one's itnention being
primarily to get the [addressee] to think
that the [utterer] thinks that p; while
sometimes one is _telling_ the [addressee]
that p, that is to say, hoping to get _him_
to think that p. It is true that in the
case of indicatives, unlike that of volitives,
there is no pair of devices which would
ordinarily be thought of as mood-markers
which serve to distinguish the sub-mood of
an indicative sentence; the recognition of
the sub-mood has to come from context,
from the vocative use of the name of [A],
from the presence of a speech-act verb,
or from a sentence-adverbial phrase (like
"for your information"). But I have already,
in my initial assumptions, allowed for
such a situation. [...]
The differentials are each associated
with, and serve to distinguish, 'superior'
moods (judicative, volitive) and [...]
are invariant between 'A' and 'B' sub-moods
[exhibitive and protreptic respectively.
JLS] of the superior mood; they are merely
unsupplemented or supplemented, the former
for an 'A' sub-mood and the latter for a
'B' sub-mood.
Aspects of Reason, p. 54.
(cf. 'Intention and Uncertainty' quote below).
It's at this stage that Grice presents in a figure a "schema of
procedure-specifiers for mood-operators", which in a simplified format
(excluding 'erotetic' operators -- which he symbolises by "?" and which may
be seen as a sub-type of the "!" operator) runs as follows:
Main clause:
U to utter to A Op1 + p if
Antecedent clause
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
| | | | | |
|mode| preamble |supplement|differential|radical|
|_ _ |_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _|
| | | | | |
||-a |U wills A judges U| [none] | judges | p |
|_ _ | _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _|_ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _|
| | | | | |
||-b | ... | wills A | ... | ... |
|_ _ | _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _|_ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _|
| | | | | |
| !a | ... | [none] | wills | ... |
|_ _ | _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _|_ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _|
| | | | | |
| !b | ... | wills A | ... | ... |
|_ _ | _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _|_ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _ _ _ |_ _ _ _|
"Note: If the differential is supplemented (as in a [b] [protreptic. JLS]
case) the quantifier is 'dragged back', so as to appear immediately before
[A] in the supplement."
Interestingly, Grice further explored aspects of English modality in his
British Academy Lecture, "Intention and Uncertainty", where he quotes from
Bertold Brecht's _Regufee Conversations_:
"Denmark was at one time plagued by a
succession of corrupt finance ministers.
[...] To deal with this situation, a law
was passed requiring periodic inspection
of the books of the Finance Minister. A
certain Finance Minister, when visited by
the inspectors, said to them 'If you
inspect my books, I shall not continue to
be your finance minister. They retired in
confusion, and only eighteen months later
it wsa discovered that the Finance Minister
had spoken nothing other than the literal
truth."
Grice, 'Intention and Uncertainty',
Oxford, p. 11
Grice comments
"This anecdote [...] exploits a modal ambiguity
in the future tense, between (a) the future
indicated or factual, and (b) the future
intentional. This ambiguity extends beyond
the first person form of the tense; there is
a difference between
'There will-F be light'
(future factual) and
'There will-I be light'
(future intentional); God might have uttered
the second sentence while engaged in the
Creation. Sensitive Engish speakers (which
most of us are not) may be able to mark this
distinction by discriminating between 'shall'
and 'will'. 'I shall-I go to London' stands
to 'I intend to go to London' analogously
to the way in which 'Oh for rain tomorrow!'
stands to 'I wish for rain tomorrow'. Just as
no one else can say JUST what I say when I
say "I shall-I go to London". If someone else
says "Grice will go to London", he will be
expressing his, not my, intention that I
shall go." (p. 11).
For it's the exhibition that's basic, protrepsis only coming later, in the
differential cases (only), you see...
Wharton concludes his interesting post,
>And [for all Neale said and quotes McDowell]
>Grice can't have been _wrong_, for God's sake...
Indeed, as he (Grice) successfully led as (via protrepsis) to accept...
Cheers,
JL
====
Appendix:
From the OED2:
protreptic (pr@U'trEptIk), a. and sb.
[as adj. ad. Gr. protreptikos
fitted to urge on, hortative, instructive,
f. pro, pro-2 + trep-ein to
turn, direct the course of; as sb. ad.
late L. protrepticon (-um) = Gr.
protreptikon, neuter of the adj.]
A adj. Directive, instructive, didactic.
1658 Phillips, Protreptick, doctrinal,
or giving instructions.
1850 Maurice Mor. & Met. Philos. (1854) I. 47
The discipline of the habit or character
he [Clement] would call protreptic.
B sb. A book, writing, or speech intended to
exhort or instruct; an exhortation, instruction.
1656 Blount Glossogr., Protreptick, a book of
instruction, a doctrinal.
1678 Cudworth Intell. Syst. 125
To rank Anaximander amongst the Divine
Philosophers, as he [Clement] doth in his
Protreptick to the Greeks.
1678 Cudworth Intell. Syst. 371
That this Pythagorick Prayer was directed to the
Supreme Numen and King of Gods, Jamblichus
thus declares in his Protrepticks.
1899 A. B. Cook in Classical Rev. Nov. 418/1
In the mind of Ischomachus' wife the bear-dance..
bulked larger than the protreptics of her
husband.
So protreptical a., of protreptic nature.
1667-8 Bp. Ward Serm. Infidelity (1670) 3
The means used..are partly
Didactical, and partly Protreptical.
1895 R. G. Moulton Proverbs p. x,
Early proverbs are philosophical, not
protreptical.
==
J L Speranza, Esq
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Calle 58, No 611 Calle Arenales 2021
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jls@netverk.com.ar
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