On Strawson's critique of explication as a method in philosophy

Mark Pinder

Research output: Contribution to journalArticle (Academic Journal)peer-review

19 Citations (Scopus)
326 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

In the course of theorising, it can be appropriate to replace one concept—a folk concept, or one drawn from an earlier stage of theorising—with a more precise counterpart. The best-known account of concept replacement is Rudolf Carnap’s ‘explication’. P.F. Strawson famously critiqued explication as a method in philosophy. As the critique is standardly construed, it amounts to the objection that explication is ‘irrelevant’, fails to be ‘illuminating’, or simply ‘changes the subject’. In this paper, I argue that this is an unfair characterisation of Strawson’s critique, spelling out the critique in more detail and showing that, fully understood, it is not undermined by extant responses. In light of both the critique and extant responses, I close by making some substantive comments about what explication can, and cannot, be used to do in philosophy.
Original languageEnglish
Number of pages27
JournalSynthese
Early online date14 Nov 2017
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 14 Nov 2017

Keywords

  • Explication
  • Carnap
  • Strawson
  • Change of subject
  • Methodology
  • Conceptual engineering

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