Willard Van Orman Quine

288 burton s. dreben
on analytic philosophy, the topic of this session, and to prepare us
for Quine’s session with Donald Davidson starting at 4 o’clock this
afternoon, than to let Quine speak on Quine. I have woven a garland
from about 20 short papers, actually responses to works about
him, that Quine has written and sent off for publication in the past
two years. All except perhaps two of the sentences that follow are
Quine’s. In particular, for the indexical word ‘I’, hear the proper name
‘Quine’.
“What a speaker means by his words can be known by others.” I
agree, but what I am accepting is no more than this: “What paraphrases
the speaker would be prepared to accept, in describable
circumstances, can be known by others.” This is behaviorally acceptable,
and my intention in mentioning meaning runs no deeper.
[K]nowing what expressions mean consists, for me, in being disposed
to use them on appropriate occasions. I view the learning of language
as acquisition of speech dispositions. There is nothing in linguistic
meaning beyond what is to be gleaned from overt behavior. [But] we
still have dispositions to observable behavior to work from. (There is
observable behavior and dispositions to observable behavior. “Each
disposition, in my view, is a physical state or mechanism” [RR 10].
“It is just one or another physical property...oftheinternal structure
or composition of the disposed object” [FSS 21].) [L]inguistic behaviorism
can accommodate only intersubjective meaning. In support of
linguistic behaviorism, I expect no deductive argument. The doctrine
rests only on our observation of language acquisition and the empirical
implausibility of supplementary channels such as telepathy.
[L]inguistic behaviorism...disciplines data, not explanation. On
the explanatory side my readers are familiar rather with my recourse
to innate endowments. I cite instinct and hence natural selection to
explain induction, and to explain also our innate subjective standards
of perceptual similarity and their preestablished intersubjective harmony.
All this is essential to language readiness. Behaviorism welcomes
genetics, neurology, and innate endowments. It just excludes
mentalistic explanation. It defines mentalistic concepts rather, if at
all, by their observable manifestations in behavior.
[Some] adduce...samples of current linguistics under the misconception
that I, trammeled by behaviorism, underestimate the
translator. [They] misinterpret my conjecture of the indeterminacy
of translation. I postulate two ideal manuals of translation both of
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