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SUMMARY:An unstable hybrid - dissolving the metaethical puzzle - Niklas M
 öller (Faculty of Philosophy)
DTSTART:20101117T130000Z
DTEND:20101117T140000Z
UID:TALK27962@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Sacha Golob
DESCRIPTION:In a series of papers\, Laura and François Schroeter (S2) hav
 e developed an account of conceptual competence. Recently\, they have argu
 ed that their \naccount applies also to the semantics of evaluative terms\
 , combining the central insights of two opposing camps while avoiding thei
 r pitfalls. Minimalist metaethical theorists such as Alan Gibbard have arg
 ued that the only criteria for competence with an evaluative term is using
  it to express one's motivational states: no matter what strange substanti
 ve criteria an agent has\, if she uses 'right' to express what she is moti
 vated to do\, she \nis competent with the term. Neo-descriptivists such as
  Jackson and Pettit\, on the other hand\, have argued that competence with
  an evaluative term requires a particular set of substantive criteria. On 
 S2's solution\, what is essential for competence with an evaluative term i
 s\, apart from a basic congruence in actual use\, participation in a share
 d epistemic practice: a person is competent with the meaning of an evaluat
 ive term if her use of a term is bound together in the right way with othe
 r speakers' use. In particular\, she must have a "coordinating intention t
 o use the term in a way that makes best sense of the communal practice." W
 hen this \nconnectedness is in place\, the person manages to mean the very
  same thing with her evaluative terms as other competent persons\, in spit
 e of substantial disagreement in actual application.\n\nIn my paper\, I ma
 ke two main claims. First\, I argue that S2's account is an unstable hybri
 d. It contains remnants of neo-descriptivist commitments that \nare\, on c
 loser inspection\, inconsistent with the main thrust of their argument. Wh
 en removing these neo-descriptivist remnants\, however\, their \naccount\,
  rather than supplying a distinct "third way" in metaethics\, is consisten
 t with several (broadly naturalistic) accounts of conceptual competence - 
 including Gibbard's own.\n\nSecondly\, I argue that it is not clear that t
 he "metaethical puzzle" is a puzzle at all. Rather\, aspects of the broadl
 y naturalistic account of meaning described above explain the phenomenon. 
 Neither is the phenomenon a specifically metaethical one\, but pertains in
  general - ie also for \ndescriptive terms - on all theories that assigns 
 semantic content holistically.
LOCATION:Seminar Room 1\, Department of History and Philosophy of Science
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