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Some Considerations Concerning “Interpretative Systems”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Harry V. Stopes-Roe
Harry V. Stopes-Roe*
Affiliation:
St. John's College, Cambridge
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Extract

In 1954 Hempel wrote “Once the idea of a partial specification of meaning is granted, it appears unnecessarily restrictive, however, to limit the sentences effecting such partial interpretation to reduction sentences in Carnap's sense. … Generally, then, a set of one or more theoretical terms, t1, t2 ⃛, tn, might be introduced by any set M of sentences such that (i) M contains no extralogical terms other than t1, t2 ⃛, tn, and observation terms, (ii) M is logically consistent, and (iii) M is not equivalent to a truth of formal logic. The last two of these conditions serve merely to exclude trivial extreme cases. A set M of this kind will be referred to briefly as an interpretative system, its elements as interpretative sentences.” This is the last move in a process in which the idea of definition has been widened beyond the explicit or equivalence definition which was the basis of earlier thought on the subject of introducing new words into a language. It would seem that the scheme proposed by Hempel must represent the final move, for it would seem difficult to conceive any more liberal description of a purely direct and verbal scheme (that is, one excluding watching, and processes of suggestion). Among the predecessors of Hempel in this liberalising movement I will mention Ramsey and Braithwaite whose views stem ultimately from Campbell, and are based on the idea that the “interpretative system” is essentially a scientific theory, and Carnap who introduced the particular notion of a “reduction sentence” (mentioned in the quotation above), and who was more directly the source of Hempel's own ideas.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 25 , Issue 3 , July 1958 , pp. 143 - 156
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1958

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References

1 C. G. Hempel “A logical appraisal of operationism”, The Scientific Monthly 79, Oct. 1954 p. 218. Hempel's notion of an “interpretative system” is much the same as, but a little wider than, Carnap's notion of “Meaning Postulates”—R. Carnap “Meaning Postulates”, Philos. Studies 3, Oct. 1952, pp. 65–73.

2 F. P. Ramsey “Theories” in “Foundations of mathematics” (Edited by R. B. Braithwaite) London (Routledge), 1931, p. 230.

3 R. B. Braithwaite “Scientific Explanation” Cambridge (U.P.), 1953, pp. 76 ff.

4 N. Campbell “Physics: the elements” Cambridge (U.P.) 1920, p. 122.

5 R. Carnap “Testability and Meaning” Philos. Sci., S (1936) and 4 (1937), reprinted by the Graduate Philosophy Club, Yale University, with additions and corrections, 1950. Compare also Carnap's “Meaning Postulates” Philos. Studies, 3, (1952). Particularly pp. 70–71.

6 I wish to thank Prof. Braithwaite, first for his book which was actually the source which started my own thought on the subject, and secondly for his generous and helpful discussion with me.

7 The following argument, or an analogue, holds for a very wide range of systems. For convenience I will frame my exposition in terms of “Principia Mathematica”.

8 The conjunctive, disjunctive, and prenex forms are discussed in Hilbert and Ackermann 3, 6 and 8, and in most standard texts on symbolic logic.

9 The atomicity of these contexts is not fundamental, but relative to the matter in hand. Some predicates may “ultimately” contain a modal reference, and thus not fall within condition A (“modality” being a second-level predicate); but if this is not relevant to a particular philosophical discussion, then for the purposes of that discussion condition A is satisfied, and the interpretative system may therefore be brought to the form being described.

10 It is not necessary that each “new term” appear only once: any may appear more than once in a given sentence with different (variable or constant) arguments, or sets of arguments if the term takes more than one argument. This situation characteristically arises when a recursive definition is re-framed in terms of a set of generalised reduction sentences—see sect. 4 below. Thus the representation given, with arguments omitted, could mislead. Carnap was not considering these possibilities.

11 A fuller account of the notion of a “connective” will be found in Carnap's “Formalisation of Logic”, Cambridge, Mass., (Harvard U.P.), 1947, p. 8.

12 ∼T 1.T 2 and T 2, implies ∼T 1; and ∼.T 1,T 2 and T 1 implies ∼T 2—but this is implied by O 1 &∼O 1, and therefore is useless.

13 Primitive recursion and certain other recursive schemes may be re-expressed by generalized reduction sentences—see sections 4 and 5 below.

14 It will be remembered that if an interpretative sentence with lone T or ∼T is implied by the set but not contained explicitly in it, then the process of making the set “transparent” will lead to this sentence being added to the set: thus the interpretative sentence for ∼ T 1 was added in the example at the end of section 2. See also next footnote. In addition to the case stated in the text, there is the degenerate case where only one of T and ∼T appears alone in a consequent, but with antecedent universal.

15 The modal status of this sentence, and others involved in reduction sentences, is a problem of some interest and difficulty which has never so far as I am aware been adequately discussed, and it can not be discussed in this article. It must be noticed, however, that if one requires necessary truth for the closure of this disjunction then it would be appropriate to say that the condition (i) was both necessary and sufficient within the general conditions stated above. But if mere factual truth is accepted, then one must reexamine the process whereby one re-frames the interpretative system so that it shall be “transparent”. Consider the system of (n+1) sentences, n of the form ‘Ai⊃αiTi’ together with ‘B⊃: ∼αiT1…αnTn’. Represent the variables as follows: those that appear as argument to “Ti’ only, represent by ‘ti'; and those that appear as argument to ‘Ti’ and one or more other T-terms, represent by ‘ui’, for all i (this representation of variables depends on the T'i considered). Then, under the hypothesis that (ui)(∃ti).Ai for all i, the interpretative system is equivalent to a set of 2n sentences with ‘Ti’ and ‘∼Ti’ appearing alone. Now, if each of (ui)(∃ti).Ai is a necessary truth for all i one might well feel it appropriate to use them in the “reduction” of the interpretative system to “transparency”, that is to say, one would feel that the set obtained was a mere re-expression of the original. But even if they are mere contingent accidents, it would remain true that the equivalence definitions obtained by their use would be de facto adequate, and the adequacy of these “definitions” would be precisely the same as that of the “definitions” obtained on the basis of the mere de facto (and not necessary) satisfaction of condition (i).

17 Op. Cit. Footnote 3 above: see Chap. III—the example of the 3 and 4 factor theories. 18 Op. Cit. Footnote 1 above: see p. 220 note 16.

19 The first two of the following groups are together equivalent to Braithwaite's group of “idle formulae” on p. 61.

20 In the limiting case of the so-called “uncertainty relations”, as they occur e.g. in the linear oscillator, the greater than or equal to sign is replaced by equality.