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lfs and Cans -II

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

D. F. Pears
D. F. Pears*
Affiliation:
Christ Church, Oxford
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Extract

The dispositional analysis of sentences ascribing powers and abilities to things and people runs into many difficulties. The situation is especially complex and confusing when such ascriptions are brought to bear on particular occasions, and carry some implication about the opportunities available on those occasions. Some of these difficulties are produced by superficial confusions, but I shall concentrate on those that beset any version of the dispositional analysis. Three difficulties will be examined, one presented by Lehrer, and two by Austin.

Lehrer presents his difficulty as a refutation of Moore's dispositional analysis of “X could have acted otherwise”, which was “If X had chosen, he would have acted otherwise”. I shall introduce his objection by relating it to the distinctions drawn in Part I.· Expressed in my terminology, his point is that Moore's analysis presupposes that choosing is not an S-factor, and yet it might conceivably be an S-factor.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 1 , Issue 3 , March 1972 , pp. 369 - 391
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1972

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References

1 Loc. cit.

2 “Hypotheticals and Can, another look”, Analysis 1968. See also Lehrer's rejoiner “Cans without its”, ibid., and Aune's “Reply to Lehrer”, ibid. 1970.

3 See Chisholm, loc. cit.

4 This possibility was suggested by Phillipa Foot in discussion.

5 The argument that follows is a development of a suggestion made by George Myro in discussion.

6 This reply is very effectively developed by Bruce Aune in his two criticisms of Lehrer, “Hypotheticals and Can, another look”, Analysis 1967Google Scholar, and “Reply to Lehrer”, ibid. 1970.

7 Loc. cit.

8 Ethics (Pelican Books, 1952), chs. 19 and 20.

9 Loc. cit. p. 175.

10 Loc. cit. p. 171, footnote. Irving Thalberg argues that this footnote appears to contradict the passage on p. 175, and that the way ro remove the contradiction is to observe that “Smith will run a mile” entails “Smith can run a mile” only because the verb “can” here has its secondary meaning “succeed”, so that the two sentences mean the same (“Austin on Abilities” in Symposium on J. L. Austin ed. Fann, K. T. Routledge, 1969, pp. 182 If)Google Scholar. But it is not ,clear what point Austin is making in the footnote, and there is an alternative to Thalberg's remedy.

When Austin claims that R alone entails P, his claim can be defended without interpreting P as “Smith succeeds in running a mile”. For Smith's running a mile proves that it is possible that he should run a mile, and since running a mile involves trying to do something which is at least closely related to running a mile, it also proves that he has the capacity to run a mile, even though the proof of this last statement requires the truth of Q. This is characteristic of cases in which we do not commonly need to draw the distinction between doing A as the full action A, and doing A not as the full action A.

This explanation will be developed in what follows. Thalberg's explanation, that the verb “can” here has its secondary meaning “succeed”, will not be discussed. It would need to be worked out in detail, and pitted against the rival theory that, when there is an implication of success, it can be explained as a conversational implicature.

11 Pp. 125-35.

12 Thalberg makes this point about rifle-shooting, and also the related point that different abilities require characteristically different success-rates. Loc. cit. p. 187 ff.

13 An example used by M. R. Ayers, loec. cit. p. 134.Google Scholar

14 Loc. cit. pp. 173–7.