Questions on Language and Necessity

[Apoi_Viitor]

Here's a quote I read, "To say something is necessarily true is not to say anything factual, rather it amounts declaring one's conformance to a specific language game. If I say all humans are mortal, what I am really saying is that if I were to come across an immortal being, I would not consider it human. If someone were to disagree with my definition, then our disagreement could not be solved by an investigation of the world; his disagreement simply means he is playing a different language game then I am. I can persuade him to accept my definition, but I could not prove him wrong in the sense in which I could, if he were to say for example, Bill Clinton is immortal."

So, aren't necessary truths ... necessary? Could language exist without a set of principles or ideas that are just agreed upon?

[Apoi_Viitor]

:confused: Anybody?

[Broletariat]

I agree with what you're guessing at. If we have no agreed upon definitions then there's no common ground between us, if there was no commongground between us, you couldn't understand my post because you'd have different definitions of words than I do.

[Book O'Dead]

Here's a quote I read, "To say something is necessarily true is not to say anything factual, rather it amounts declaring one's conformance to a specific language game. If I say all humans are mortal, what I am really saying is that if I were to come across an immortal being, I would not consider it human. If someone were to disagree with my definition, then our disagreement could not be solved by an investigation of the world; his disagreement simply means he is playing a different language game then I am. I can persuade him to accept my definition, but I could not prove him wrong in the sense in which I could, if he were to say for example, Bill Clinton is immortal."

So, aren't necessary truths ... necessary? Could language exist without a set of principles or ideas that are just agreed upon?

I suppose the answer to both questions is yes...and no.
Necessary thruths are necessary until they're not true anymore. And language exists even where principles and ideas are totally absent.
But communication among humans generally seems to rely [] primarily on a general consensus of ideas and principles, which, I suppose, are idealizations of our external, objective experience.

[syndicat]

no. what does it even mean to say necessity lies in language? in philosophy a distinction is made between de re and de dicto necessity. de re necessity refers to assertions about a thing having a property necessarily, that is, it couldn't exist without that property. this is held to be true in virtue of the nature of the thing in question. de dicto necessity refers to statements where the state of affairs that makes the statement true must obtain but couldn't fail to be the case. so, "Either john was born in Pittsburgh or he wasn't born there."

the bit about necessity being in language derives i suspect from the outmoded description theory of meaning. but reference of words is not based on descriptions. that's because people in a language community may have various ways to identify As where As are denoted by some linguistic item X.

[Apoi_Viitor]

reference of words is not based on descriptions. that's because people in a language community may have various ways to identify As where As are denoted by some linguistic item X.

Can you elaborate further on this?

[syndicat]

Jack and George have had different experiences of cats and know different things about them. so the descriptions they associate with "cat" in their mind will not be the same. but they're talking about the same animals. so the reference of "cat" for the people in a language community can't be based on some description "thing that has properties F, G, H".
so if a sentence

Cats are animals

is a necessary truth, it is so because of what cats are, not because of language. It's entirely contingent that "cat" refers to cats. So necessity has to lie not in language but in the nature of the things one is talking about.

[Apoi_Viitor]

Jack and George have had different experiences of cats and know different things about them. so the descriptions they associate with "cat" in their mind will not be the same. but they're talking about the same animals. so the reference of "cat" for the people in a language community can't be based on some description "thing that has properties F, G, H".

Err... I'm still confused.