Thought skepticism

pp. 201-228

in: Joseph Mendola, Human thought, Berlin, Springer, 1997

Abstract

This chapter reviews the arguments of the thought skeptics, who deny that there are thoughts with intuitive contents of the sorts surveyed in Part One. If thoughts are to be vindicated, then we will need to locate the failures of the arguments of thought skeptics who presume a familiar concrete world but hold that such a world does not contain sufficient resources to constitute thoughts. But this chapter has another target as well. That is meaning skepticism, the claim that there are no meaningful words. This second focus is appropriate for two reasons: First of all, the machinations of words are a crucial resource in the realization of some of our thoughts. To properly discharge the task of Chapter Thirteen, to see how, if we assume a capacity for experience, other sorts of thought are possible, we need to have some sense of how language operates. Second, we need to consider the thought skeptics' arguments in detail, to exhibit the full range of difficulties which must be faced if we are to vindicate our thoughts, and certain of these arguments are in the first instance arguments for meaning skepticism. They are only indirectly arguments for thought skepticism.