| Abstract: | One central but unrecognized strand of the complex debate between W. V. Quine and Donald Davidson over the status of psychology
as a science turns on their disagreement concerning the compatibility of strict psychophysical, semantic-determining laws
with the possibility of error. That disagreement in turn underlies their opposing views on the location of semantic determinants:
proximal (on bodily surfaces) or distal (in the external world). This paper articulates these two disputes, their wider context,
and argues that both are fundamentally misconceived. There is no special tension between error and strict semantic-determining
laws; moreover, the purported bearing of that issue on the dispute over the location of semantic determinants depends upon
a mistaken conception of the relation between the nomic status of generalizations and degree of distance between explanans
and it explananda. Finally, the wider significance of these conclusions for related contemporary debates is noted. And independent
considerations about the possibility of communication, also present in Quine's and Davidson's thinking, are brought to bear
on the question of the location of semantic determinants.
This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date. |
