WILLIAMSON ON ASSERTION
Date Issued
2004-07-31
Date
2004-07-31
Author(s)
DOI
922411H002030
Abstract
Williaimson (1995) argues that any attempt to apply the S4 axiom of normal modal logic to a
naïve notion of assertibility would fail to find a satisfactory account of the notion of
assertibility to serve as the intended interpretation of ‘A’ in the desired characteristic formula
(A4) Ap→ AAp. In particular, granted the primitiveness and primacy of knowledge, (A4)
would render some undesirable consequences, notably the KK principle: Kp→ KKp, which
could hardly hold in any reasonable notion of knowing. Williamson (1996, 2000) further
proposes the knowledge rule for assertion, a constitutive rule in character, according to which
an agent S asserts that p only if S knows that p, in symbols, (AK) Ap→Kp. It follows that if
we accept (AK) and reject (KK), then we would be forced to reject (A4). And Williamson
takes this as an argument against anti-realist’s programme for a theory of meaning.
In this talk, I shall firstly argue, based on Williamson’s knowledge account of assertion, that
assertion is a strong normative concept in that (AKA) Ap→ KAp holds, that is, when an agent
S makes an assertion that p, S would not merely know that p, but also know that she/he is
making an assertion that p. As Williamson (2000) rightly points out, there is a special
normative relationship between knowing and asserting, in that the speech act of assertion
must be based on certain rules of assertion, which are essentially constitutive and should be
characterized in terms of the notion of knowing. In particular, assertion is a kind of speech
act, which is to be taken as the vehicle for transmitting knowledge: ‘We express and
communicate our knowledge by making assertions.’ (2000:238) This also suggests a strong
normative relation between knowing and asserting as (AKA) shows. For we have some type
of acts with a certain norm in that whenever one performs an act of this type, one knows
clearly what one is doing. And strikingly, assertion, taken as overt speech act, belongs to such
a type. Accordingly, when ‘Ap’ holds, it would never happen to any rational agent that she/he
does not know that she/he is asserting that p. This would justify (AKA). Meanwhile, it can be
argued that (AKA) would not imply the KK principle, though it will imply a weak version of
the KK principle, i.e., (AKK) Ap→ (Kp→KKp), which is harmless.
Moreover, since the primary purpose of asserting is to communicate knowledge－‘We need
assertion to transmit knowledge’ (2000:267; 1996:520), and since assertion is essentially a
kind of overt speech act, it can be further argued that when an agent S asserts that p, not only
the content of what she/he asserts (i.e., ‘p’) but also the making of this assertion (i.e.,‘Ap’)
become transmitted knowledge. Now it would perfectly make sense to claim that to be a
transmitted knowledge only if it is asserted. Therefore, if ‘Ap’ is understood as a transmitted
knowledge, then ‘AAp’ holds. I believe that this account of assertibility would provide a
sensible interpretation for ‘A’ in (A4). In fact, it can be shown that both (AKA) and (AKK)
can be derived from (A4) and (AK). We then have a satisfactory account of assertibility
without rendering fallacious consequence.
Subjects
WILLIAMSON
ASSERTION
Publisher
臺北市：國立臺灣大學哲學系暨研究所
Type
report
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