Philosophy 257 Behavior and Other Minds

Asst. Prof James Pryor Dept. of Philosophy

Chihara & Fodor

Exposition of Wittgenstein

Chihara & Fodor liken the criteria theorists' views about mental states to the operationalist's view of expressions like "is 3 feet long." The operationalist says that knowing the meaning of "three feet long" requires knowing how to determine whether that predicate can be correctly applied to a thing. Similarly, the criteria theorist says that knowing the meaning of "pain" requires knowing what counts as good behavioral evidence for believing that a person is in pain.

What Is a Criterion?

Chihara & Fodor point out that:

• A criterion for p is not a sufficient condition for p.

  The ball's going through the basket is a criterion for a goal's being scored, but it's not a sufficient condition for a goal's being scored (the ball must be in play). So a criterion for p can at best be a necessary condition for p.

• However, a criterion for p isn't a necessary condition for p's obtaining, either, since what counts as a criterion for p is situation-relative.

  In some situations, we'd say that the ball's going through the basket is a criterion for p; but in other situations a goal can be scored even though the ball didn't go through the basket (e.g., if the shot was illegally deflected).

  At best, we can say that a criterion for p is something which counts as a necessary condition for p in certain situations. It need not be a necessary condition for p simpliciter.

• We can use the following as a test for criterion-hood:

  If you can learn what it is for something to be Y without learning that X is something on the basis of which one can tell whether the thing is Y, then X is not a criterion for Y. If, on the other hand, acquiring the concept of Y requires recognizing that X counts as good evidence for taking something to be Y, then X is a criterion for Y.

  Remember, on Malcolm's view, it's part of understanding what it is for p to obtain that you recognize of p's criteria that they give you some reason to believe that p.

• Any change of criteria for Y involves changing the concept of Y.

Why Believe in Criteria?

Why? According to Chihara & Fodor (pp. 141-2), Wittgenstein's argument is that empirically justifying the claim that behavior of certain sorts is evidence of toothache would require us to have some independent way of determining when someone else has toothache, and we don't have an independent way of determining such things. Chihara & Fodor cite a similar argument of Shoemaker's.

Is this so? Aren't there other views besides criteria theory which say we have non-empirical justification for believing that behavior of certain sorts is evidence for toothache?

According to Chihara & Fodor, Wittgenstein argues against skepticism as follows:

1. If the skeptic were right, then (i) it would be impossible to teach the meaning of "pain," and (ii) impossible to tell whether a child had grasped the meaning of "pain."

   If we're considering a skeptic about any knowledge of other minds whatsoever, then (ii) is no surprise. Such a skeptic says we can't know whether others believe or understand anything. If, however, we're just considering a skeptic about our knowledge of others' sensations, then (ii) might be an unexpected and unattractive consequence of that skeptic's views.

2. Hence, no sense can be given to the hypothesis that other people feel "pains," as the skeptic uses the term "pain."

   Why is this supposed to follow from (i) and (ii), above?

Chihara & Fodor's Criticism of Wittgenstein

Hence, Wittgenstein says:

The question whether the dreamer's memory deceives him when he reports the dream after waking cannot arise.

1. On the one hand, Wittgenstein might be saying: For all x, it's impossible to justifiably believe of x that he's given a mistaken dream report.

   Chihara & Fodor criticize this claim.

2. On the other hand, what Wittgenstein has in mind might just be this: It's part of understanding the expression "dream" that one recognize that dream reports are good evidence for the existence and character of dreams--albeit defeasible evidence. So the question which "can't arise" is: Do dream reports in general give some reason to believe that there were dreams of the reported sort? (That question "can't arise" because understanding the expression "dream" requires already knowing the answer to the question.)

   But questions of the following sort can arise: Is there any evidence which defeats so-and-so's report that he had a dream in which such-and-such took place?

Some of Chihara & Fodor's criticisms of the criteria theorist don't depend on whether the criteria theorist's makes the first or the second claim. For instance, on Chihara & Fodor's account, the criteria theorist says that a change in criteria for Y involves changing the concept of Y; and Chihara & Fodor think this is an "unnatural way of counting concepts." They're right, but that objection doesn't seem decisive.

Inference to the Best Explanation

1. Observations have shown that X is correlated with Y, or
2. X is a criterion for Y.

No doubt there are such methods of inductive justification, and practicing scientists rely on them all the time. But let's face it, we have no more than the vaguest hand-waving understanding of what they are. Chihara and Fodor say that such justifications appeal to the "simplicity, plausibility, and predictive adequacy of an explanatory system as a whole."

According to Chihara & Fodor, what we learn when we learn what "pain" and "dream" mean are not criteria, but a naive theory of pain and dreams, and how they interact with other states, environmental stimuli, and behavior.

So your concept of pain is akin to the physicist's concept of a charged particle; and your justification for believing that behavior of certain sorts is evidence of pain is akin to the physicist's justification for believing that tracks in a cloud chamber are evidence of charged particles. The hypothesis that others are in pain is the best explanation you have of why they behave the way they do in the situations you find painful.

Chihara & Fodor point out that if we adopt their account of the concepts of dreaming, and their account of what our justification is for taking certain sorts of behavior to be evidence for dreams, then there are ways to learn what a dream is which involve neither learning criteria for dreams nor having any awareness of dreams "in one's own case." (I suggested earlier that the criteria theorist's qualms about learning what mental states are "from one's own case" are better understood as having a different target.)