the resume of the lecture: One of Quine's main targets is that first, we identify what we wanna talk about and then what we wanna say. So there is a connection between Word and World. First the connection of meaning (sense) and 2nd the question of reference. He wants to say there is a radical indeterminacy between meaning and reference. So even the question of what we are referring to and what we mean is complicated. So indeterminacy depends on the indeterminacy of translation. So if I tried to understand your speech it turns out highly ambiguous how I can translate that person's senses to my own. So at first, there is the indeterminacy of translation, then of reference and finally in meaning. "gavagai" is based on stimulus meaning (he pointed at it or...) it means rabbit. So maybe it means the noun rabbit or maybe it is a sentence "there is a rabbit" Stimulus meaning: Consider the class of observational that would increase the probability of that type of speech and the class that would decrease. This is the observational meaning of a sentence. So we can imagine stimulus meaning to have the same idea, S+ (stimulus condition that assent to a sentence) and S- (stimulus condition that dissent to a sentence) Justice is a word that has no stimulus meaning, under what condition I would assent for just or unjust actions. The same thing with a bachelor, you can't tell that someone is a bachelor just by looking at it. So this assent and dissent thing is only applicable for certain terms. So we are trying to identify the stimulus condition under which someone would assent to the rabbit. min 10:33 Can we take it for granted when the native assenting or dissenting? How do you know when someone is assenting or dissenting? Like recognizing the gesture. But some cultures have the opposite gestures for the opposite meaning. The easiest way is to repeat the words that the native will say, thus the gesture he will make is the assent (yes) gesture. So one source of indeterminacy is that the native may assent to the word "gavagai" in conditions that are different from what our linguist would assent to a rabbit. For a variety of reasons, nothing to do with it being linked to a rabbit but has to do with the fact that the native is going to be recognizing the presence of rabbits in conditions that are different than those under which the jingle linguist would recognize. So the question is how would you recognize the presence of a rabbit? You see one. Let us say the native is programmed to hunt rabbits, so is the native better at recognizing the presence of rabbits? Probably yes So the native may recognize the presence of a rabbit in conditions that you would not recognize. Maybe by seeing tracks, and he says "gavagai" and you do not see a rabbit. So here we see the importance of background information. So what would go into our stimulus meaning would depend on our background knowledge, how much you know about rabbits. So this is another source of indeterminacy. The first one was the grammatical indeterminacy between the two words, is it a noun or a sentence? min 22 Second indeterminacy is the background knowledge even. Now let us think about ontology, if you want to know the metaphysics of this tribe, what is the basic object of this universe according to this tribe? Are they sense data, physical objects, or time slices of physical objects (like Buddhists, who think the object is a combination of these momentary objects ), maybe they are Platonists. So the other translations are going to vary metaphysically from "gavagai". So maybe it is a rabbit or maybe : 1-rabbithood if you were a Platonist 2-Maybe they are talking about temporal slices of a rabbit 3-Or maybe they think "gavagai" is a verb like it is rabbiting (like it is raining). So it is an ontology of events 4-Maybe they believe in parts and think that wholes are complications of parts, so they really mean undetached rabbit parts. Now how can we know which of these ontologies describe their belief? Quine says that in the end you are not going to succeed and will not understand the natives. Why? How would you know how to frame any question for them in their language? He says it is radically indetermined. So think of the different options as translation manuals for how to translate things into the native language. He says we can make adjustments throughout the scheme so that we could not tell which of these is the appropriate translation. Where do these translation manuals differ? 1- Mass nouns are like gold, and water, which it is undifferentiated (uncountable) 2-Count nouns, like a rabbit, if someone asks how many rabbits did you see it? Both of these must-have application conditions, but with count nouns, we have something more, how to differentiate between the different persons or rabbits. So conditions of identity and individualization (when do I have the same and the different person). So maybe when it is a simple concept me translating "gavagai" into "rabbit" is ok no matter what their ontology is since they all include the idea of a rabbit, but when I wanna really understand them here is where the problem becomes harder. So the idea is what is the justification to translate "gavagai" as rabbit rather than the other options? The linguist has an ontology of ordinary physical objects and is reading that into the natives' speech, so he is reading things into the native language assumed by his own ontology. So we actually do choose from these different translation manuals, and we do it on the pragmatic ground of simplicity. But these translations for the fact of the matter whether such translation is right or not, the linguist is reading his own ontology into the native speech. In the end, we will have incompatible translation manuals. we are reading what is most natural to us, we are not discovering what is in the natives' minds. So in reality there is nothing to find out, it is not like the native has in his head these different types of ontology every time he speaks to decide among these different options. So what the linguist is doing, is not discovering some hidden fact about the natives, it is just a question of translating it into your own language. So not in the sense of what there is but even what the native thinks there is, there is no fact to the matter, we translate the native speech into something, and in doing that we are often adding some ontology to the native language that is not there, it is just our background language put into there own language when we translate it. In the end, there is no way of knowing what the ontology of your surroundings is really or even your own. Because all it comes down to is us reading our own scheme into even our own language.

Thank you very much Professor, you helped me clarify what's at stake in Quine's indetermination of translation.

Thanks for your Videos, they really help me!!!

Well, that ended on a very ominous note.

Hey, can somebody help me? I´ve been taking a look at the book Rule-Following & Realism by Gary Ebbs and I´m currently working on the theme of meaning, specifically, the scepticism about meaning. I thought that since meaning was an important subject for the logical positivism & for Quine in the discussion about the philosophy of science then, tackling the scepticism about meaning would shed some light in the landscape of the philosophy of science. Now, the problem is that I now know that Quine made the distinction between theories of meaning and theories of reference. And well, considering the other distincion between natural & formal language the plot thickens. it seems that the problem of the scepticism about meaning doesn´t even arise in the sciences due to the objectivity of the reference in the formal languages. On the other hand, in the philosophy of science one should not concern onself with the scepticism about meaning because theories of meaning, since Quine, had been cast out due to their incompetence to help science and only theories of reference set out the semantic landscape in those disciplines. At the end, it looks like the theme of meaning & it´s scepticism matters only to the philosophy of language. So, I could summerize in a question: is the link between meaning (and it´s problems i.e. scepticism) and the philosophy of science really lost after Quine? Or better, is there a way of reconnecting the theme of meaning to the philosophy of science without bringing back the problems Quine pointed out as the reasons to distinguish between theories of meaning & theories of reference? Thanks in advance & btw, great videos.

thank you very much eveeet teşekkürler

Please turn on the subtitle

I'm looking for a Bonevac's lecture where the whole class tries to define the word "chair", could anyone point me to it?

pheww... that was a sweet ride

"Yah no," means "yes I understand, but no I disagree."

I would observe the natives interacting with their children.

Zero is not.