Description
Book SynopsisRegardless of its particular topic, each of Donald Davidson''s essays is part of a comprehensive progrqamme to address questions about language, mind and action, and their interconnections. Themes from this larger programme permeate and bind his work on semantics: on the notions of meaning and truth, on theories of truth, reference, logical form and inference, compositionality, ''intentional'' operators, indeterminacy, conceptual relativism, skepticism and metaphor.
Twenty-eight critical essays, including a substantial introduction to Davidson''s philosophy of language, and three essays by Davidson himself, make up this volume. The volume''s six sections corespond to the major section of Davidson''s inquiries into Truth and Interpretation. Each contains critical essays addressing, interpreting and further develoing his views. The first section, written by the editor, gives an overview of the whole volume, the second section focuses on truth and meaning; the third, appli
Table of Contents
Preface Donald Davidson Preface: Ernest LePore Part I: Introduction 1. Truth in Meaning Part II: Truth and Meaning 2. Linguistic Theory and Davison's Program in Semantics: James Higginbotham 3. Learnability of Semantic Theory: Robert J. Matthews 4. Why Intensionalists Ought Not Be Fregeans: Jerrold J. Katz 5. How to Turn the `Tractatus' Wittgenstein into (Almost) Donald Davidson: J.J.C. Smart 6. Meaning, Holism and Use: Akeel Bilgrami Part III: Applications 7. The Meanings of Logical Constants: Gilbert Harman 8. Tenses, Temporal Quantifiers and Semantic Innocence: Barry Richards 9. What a Truth Theory Need Not Tell Us: Richard E. Grandy 10. On Davidson's `Saying That': Tyler Burge Part IV: Radical Interpretations 11. Translation Theories and the Decipherment of Linear B: John Wallace 12. Testing Theories of Interpretation: Bruce Vermazen 13. Semantics and Methodological Solipsism: William G. Lycan 14. Information and the Mental: Hilary Putnam 15. Davidson and Social Science: Michael Root Part V: Language and Reality 16. A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge: Donald Davidson 17. Empirical Content: Donald Davidson 18. Pragmaism, Davidson and Truth: Richard Rorty 19. Radical Interpretation and Epistemology: Colin McGinn 20. Radical Interpretation and Global Skepticism: Peter D. Klein 21. `Circular' Coherence and `Absurd' Foundations: Ernest Sosa 22. The Third Dogma: Robert Kraut 23. The Metaphysics of Interpretation: Carol Rovane Part VI: Limits of the Literal 24. A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs: Donald Davidson 25. The Parody of Conversation: Ian Hacking 26. `A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs': Some Comments on Davidson and Hacking: Michael Dummett 27. Indeterminacy of French Interpretation: Derrida and Davidson: Samuel C. Wheeler III 28. Metaphor, Dreamwork and Irrationality: Marcia Cavell Index.
