Abstract
Hilary Putnam’s views on analyticity, synonymy, and meaning-change loom large in his writing on logic, mathematics, and science. In “The analytic and the synthetic” (Scientific explanation, space, and time, Minnesota studies in the philosophy of science. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, pp. 358–397, 1962), Putnam argues that (i) Quine is wrong in claiming that there just is no analytic-synthetic distinction, but (ii) Quine is right in arguing that analyticity plays no significant role in the philosophy or science (except, perhaps, linguistics). In some interesting ways, Putnam’s views on these matters connect with those developed in Friedrich Waismann’s “Analytic-synthetic”, published serially in Analysis (Analysis 10:25–40, [1949], Analysis 11:25–38, [1950], Analysis 11:49–61, [1951a], Analysis 11:115–124, [1951b], Analysis 13:1–4, [1952], Analysis 13:73–89, [1953]), around the same period as Quine’s “Two dogmas of empiricism” (Philosophical Review 60:20–43, 1951). Waismann provides a rich and subtle conception of analyticity and meaning, and the role that analyticity and synonymy play in linguistic interpretation (see also Waismann in Proceedings of theAristotelian Society, Supplementary 19:119–150, [1945]).
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Notes
- 1.
Each article in the analyticity series, including the last one, ends with “(To be continued)”, so it is safe to conclude that the article was never finished. Waismann does not come to a firm conclusion. The only mention of Quine is in the first number (1949), where the main theme of “Truth by convention” (Quine 1936) is endorsed.
- 2.
A similar idea was echoed by Poincaré (1908, 235), with a somewhat ironic prediction (given the accuracy of hindsight):
In astronomy ‘straight line’ means simply ‘path of a ray of light’. If therefore negative parallaxes were found … two courses would remain open to us; we might either renounce Euclidean geometry, or else modify the laws of optics and suppose that light does not travel rigorously in a straight line. It is needless to add that all the world would regard the latter solution as the most advantageous.
- 3.
In light of the developments concerning Pluto, not to mention asteroids and planets of other stars, Waismann’s example is not a good definition. Maybe something like “a vixen is a female fox” would be better.
- 4.
There is, of course, a rich literature on the question of whether words like “female” stand for “natural” scientific classifications, whether they are social constructions, etc. See, for example, Haslanger (2015).
- 5.
The connection between this and Putnam’s views on logical and geometrical terms is straightforward. I don’t know whether, for these purposes, Putnam would consider identity a logical term (pace Quine) or a law-cluster term or something else.
- 6.
Waismann (1952) illustrates this point in some detail with the evolution of the word “simultaneous”. Is there any semantic fallout of the theory of relativity? Are we to say that a brand new word, with a new meaning, was coined (even though it has the same spelling as an old word), or should we say instead that we have discovered some new and interesting features of an old word? Did Einstein discover a hidden and previously unnoticed context-sensitivity in the established meaning of the established word “simultaneous” (or its German equivalent), even though he showed no special interest in language as such? Or did Einstein introduce a brand new theoretical term, to replace an old term whose use had scientifically false presuppositions? As above, those are unhelpful questions; they invoke the “too blurred expression” of “same meaning”. “Simultaneous” here qualifies as a Putnamian “law-cluster” term.
References
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Shapiro, S. (2018). Changing the Subject: Quine, Putnam and Waismann on Meaning-Change, Logic, and Analyticity. In: Hellman, G., Cook, R. (eds) Hilary Putnam on Logic and Mathematics. Outstanding Contributions to Logic, vol 9. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96274-0_8
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