Some objections

In this section, I shall provide a brief overview of some problems raised by Wright’s version of response-dependence, apart from those already mentioned. Some of them will be discussed later in the thesis.

The univocity objection

Wright’s provisional equations say, not that extensions are determined by judgements in C-conditions, but that in C-conditions, judgements determine extensions. This raises the question what determines whether the concept applies in cases where the C-conditions are not met. And if something different does the extension-determining job for these cases, with what right do we say that there is one, not two concepts in play? The natural response is that ‘the concept applies if it would be judged to apply if the C-conditions were met’. But this answer would raise conditional fallacy problems. Accordingly, Wright has shifted the focus to provisional equations, and thus barred himself from giving this answer. How, then, can the challenge be met? We shall discuss this problem further in Ch. 8.30

Reconciling substantiality with a priority and independence

A second problem is a prima facie conflict between the substantiality requirement and the a priority requirement.31 The gist of the problem is this: In order to be anywhere near complete, a list of substantial C-conditions, on the recipe of Wright’s suggestion for colours above, would need to contain material that we cannot know a

artefact of the way they are formulated – in particular, a function of whether a set of sufficient conditions are given for qualifying for thehigherdegree of realism (which is the case for cognitive command) or a set of sufficient conditions for realism being limitedin a certain way (as is the case with the Euthyphro contrast).

There are also other features that need to be taken into account. In the case of Euthyphronism, it makes a difference what exact group of judgements and C-conditions we are talking about. Dependence on best judgements about meanings is not the same as dependence on best judgements about another subject matter, e.g. colours, humour, or whatever. So even if there is a sort of response- dependence that is infectious, it is probably not response-dependence in the sense of failing the order of determination test.

30

The problem was raised by Wright (1992), p. 125.

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priori. For example, it is presumably not a priori that a black and white disc would seem to change colour when spinning fast, and so that such cases need to be excluded by the C-conditions. How can we take such cases into account in a way that respects both the substantiality and the a priority constraint? This problem provides the stage setting for Ch. 7 on C-conditions. It poses a challenge to other response- dependence accounts as well as Wright’s. A similar problem arises about reconciling substantiality and independence.

The content of extension-determining judgements

A third problem, also related to independence considerations, has been raised by Mark Johnston. The worry is similar to Boghossian’s objection to Euthyphronism about intentional states. But Johnston’s worry targets Euthyphronist theses in general. The worry is this: The disputed concepts feature in the alleged extension- determining judgements. If these judgements are to be able to determine anything at all, the concepts they involve, including the ones under discussion, must already have content and extensions. And, the thought is, this extension cannot be determined by best judgements, because it is a prerequisite for these judgements having any content at all.32

Wright’s response to this objection is that it gains purchase if, but only if, the order in question is a temporal one. If the order is temporal, it is correct that the concepts involved in the judgements must have their extension fixed before they can determine anything else. But if the order is logical, the situation is different. There is still a constraint like the one that motivated the independence condition: the concepts must not be used in ways that are inconsistent with a Euthyphronic order of determination. But this constraint can be met in less demanding ways than by prohibiting the use of the concepts altogether. For example, as Wright suggests, it could be done by allowing them only in intentional contexts. The thought seems to be that such use would presuppose that the concepts have some extension, but not

which extension they have, or how that extension is determined. Perhaps this suggestion could be supported by a holistic story like the one invoked in the reply to

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Boghossian’s objection. This might amount to taking on board Johnston’s point33 that the relation between best judgements and facts must be interdependence rather than one-way dependence, at least in the case of intentional states. But Wright could presumably do this without changing the spirit of his proposal.

Apart from the problems mentioned here, there are also a couple of more general objections to the idea of response-dependence of subject matter. One is the conditional fallacy problems which are the subject of Ch. 8. Another is Johnston’s missing explanation argument. This will be presented in the exposition of Johnston’s view, to which we shall now turn. The exposition of Johnston’s account will be briefer than that of Wright’s because Johnston’s core ideas are simpler to explain than Wright’s, and because some relevant issues, e.g. the motivation for the substantiality, a priority and necessity conditions, have already been discussed.