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Title: Inquiries into Truth and Interpretation (Philosophical Essays of Donald Davidson) by Donald Davidson ISBN: 0-19-924629-7 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 December, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $21.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.25 (4 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Philosophy Of Language (Eyebeam Not Included)
Comment: The "occult quality" by which we are able to understand others' minds at all is addressed by Donald Davidson in later work, under the heading "triangulation": but those unconcerned with "positional analyses" of apple trees will still find much to appreciate in this well-thumbed book (recently reprinted with a few extra essays). It contains the essay "On The Very Idea Of A Conceptual Scheme", a gentle and reasoned "deconstruction" of Kuhn's paradigm analysis of scientific change, as well as challenging essays on the nature of metaphor, revealing a marvelous grasp of "metaphysical" signification as it has historically been practiced in English literature.
In fact, to my mind this is the most important work of analytic philosophy ever; both for these "rarities" and his famous application of Tarskian principles to natural language. And to Davidson's credit, his work in both categories rather readily permits of "charitable" interpretations, although the latter work actually involves quite a bit more Bayesian decision theory than is commonly available. Available in the same obsolete format: *Essays On Actions And Events*, also a much-disputed contribution to puzzlement concerning precursors. Available only in a new edition: *Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective*, your handy guide to figuring out what all this hath wrought. Yours for the having, yours for the grasping; not quite a light entertainment and not quite the secret truth of the world.
Rating: 5
Summary: One of the greatest works in contemporary philosophy!
Comment: I've been reading this book now for a year and I'm finally starting to understand what Davidson is trying to say. Davidson isn't the best of writers and like the other reviewer says sometimes a mere sentence can contain many ideas. Fortunately the struggle is rewarded. When you consider Davidson's goal, it's not a miracle that he isn't easy. Davidson thinks that an adequate theory of meaning should explain how it is possible for a speaker to understand potentially an infinite number of sentences although the number of words is finite. I find this question extremely interesting and this might be the reason why I like Davidson so much, despite his writing style. Davidson has inherited from Quine a suspicion towards intensional entities such as meanings. Therefore he tries to explain the concept of meaning through the concept of truth.
The first part of the book deals with topics in the philosophy of language, but at the end of the book Davidson addresses some other topics like radical interpretation, the relationship between language and reality, the idea of a conceptual scheme and a topic I especially find fascinating, the nature of metaphor. The book ends with an article on conventions in which Davidson introduces some of the ideas he later develops in his classic paper "A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs".
My main interest in philosophy are the problems of interpretation and I especially find Davidson's views on the indeterminicity of interpretation extremely interesting.
I think there are so many mysterious views on language nowadays, which have become almost dogmatic. Davidson manages to clear the air and I think his views on language are still very interesting. Like it says in the back cover "Struggle and learn". It will be worth it.
Rating: 4
Summary: very hard to read, but pays
Comment: As the previous reviewer says, the book contains many of Davidson's seminal papers in the philosophy of language. This book, however, cannot be used as an introduction to anything, not to philosophy of language and not even to Davidson's. His style is extremely compressed, and sometimes he merely intimates what should be carefully explained. What it ideally takes two paragraphs to say, Davidson says in two lines; each sentence is therefore crammed up with thoughts; at some places the author becomes oracular.
I would love to say that Ramberg's book on Davidson can be of help for the beginner, but I must confess instead that I find Davidson's "Inquires" an excellent commentary on Ramberg.
This book will be understood only by those who are already trained in philosophy of language and who understand some logic too. I said "only by", not "by all".
For critical comments on the contents of the book, I refer the reader to a rather harsh and carping review by Jonathan Bennett, I think it was in "Mind", 1985.
As one reviewer in the backcover says, "struggle and learn". Here you have a great book by a great philosopher of language.
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Title: Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective (Philosophical Essays of Donald Davidson) by Donald Davidson ISBN: 0198237537 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $22.00 |
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Title: Essays on Actions and Events (Philosophical Essays of Donald Davidson) by Donald Davidson ISBN: 0199246270 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $21.95 |
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Title: Word and Object (Studies in Communication) by Willard Van Orman Quine ISBN: 0262670011 Publisher: MIT Press Pub. Date: 15 March, 1964 List Price(USD): $27.00 |
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Title: Mind and World by John McDowell ISBN: 0674576101 Publisher: Harvard University Press Pub. Date: 01 August, 1996 List Price(USD): $19.50 |
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Title: Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature by Richard Rorty ISBN: 0691020167 Publisher: Princeton University Press Pub. Date: 01 January, 1981 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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