Vagueness, Semantics and Psychology (original) (raw)
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On the psychology of vague predicates
1999
Abstract: Most speakers experience unclarity about the application of predicates like tall and red to liminal cases. We formulate alternative psychological hypotheses about the nature of this unclarity, and report experiments that provide a partial test of them. A psychologized version of the 'vagueness-as-ignorance'theory is then advanced and defended.
Vagueness, logic and use: Four experimental studies on vagueness
2011
Abstract: Although arguments for and against competing theories of vagueness often appeal to claims about the use of vague predicates by ordinary speakers, such claims are rarely tested. An exception is Bonini et al.(1999), who report empirical results on the use of vague predicates by Italian speakers, and take the results to count in favor of epistemicism. Yet several methodological difficulties mar their experiments; we outline these problems and devise revised experiments that do not show the same results.
The No-Proposition View of Vagueness
This paper proposes a novel method of identifying the nature of vague sentences and a novel solution to the sorites paradox. The theory is motivated by patterns of use that language users display when using vague predicates. Identifying a coherent cause of this behaviour provides us with a theory of vague sentences that is behaviour—rather than paradox—led. The theory also provides a solution to the sorites paradox and is therefore more explanatory than other available theories of vagueness.
Vagueness and Its Boundaries: A Peircean Theory of Vagueness
2010
discussion, etc. The general connection of vagueness to other forms of indeterminacy is drawn from everyday discourse where ‘vagueness’ and ‘vague’ are used in competing ways and in an inconsistent manner. What is focused upon in subsequent chapters is uncertainty about the application of certain predicates to certain objects insofar as the application of the predicates (1) admit borderline cases, (2) admit higherorder vagueness, and (3) are sorites-susceptible (see below). Before addressing the sorites-susceptibility of vague terms, two relevant distinctions that apply to vague terms are intensional and extensional vagueness (and
Going beyond basic clarifications on vagueness, this essay aims to give vibrant, though very concise answers to four questions: (a) Are ‘vagueness’ and ‘ambiguity’ two equated phenomena? (b) What are the general forms and functions of linguistic vagueness? (c) What are the conceptual aspects of vagueness?, and (d) If vagueness is the consequence of communicative context, then, is it fair to be still adherent to Gricean tradition (Grice, 1975), and attribute ‘semanticity’ to linguistic expressions?
Vagueness” is context-dependence. A solution to the Sorites paradox
Approaching Vagueness, 1983
It is argued in this paper that the vagueness of natural language predicates arises from the fact that they are learned and used always in limited contexts and hence are incompletely defined. A semantics for natural language must take this into account by making the interpretation of predicates context-dependent. It is shown that a context dependent semantics also provides the means for an account of vagueness. These notions are first developed and argued for in abstract terms and are then applied to a solution of the prototype of vagueness puzzles: the paradox of the heap.
Drawing a Line in the Sand: A pragmatic theory of vagueness
The theory of vagueness I advocate here has three main parts: it is pragmatic, dynamic, and relies upon the notion of “open texture.” First, I argue for the pragmatic claim that there is no special class of words that are vague; rather, any word can be used vaguely. Next, I argue that natural language is rough and approximate--words have open texture--and so meaning is usually only partially settled. Then I explain the “dynamic” nature of vagueness: Discrepancies between how precisely a word is used and how much precision is required are worked out in conversation. So vagueness cannot be properly understood when considered statically, it must be considered as part of the dynamic process of communication. Finally, I put these three pieces together and show that vagueness, on this picture, is well modeled by bivalent, classical logic. In that way, I solve the sorites paradox by recommending a new perspective on the relationship between formal and natural languages, not by recommending substantive changes to either.
Vagueness as a Psychological Notion
Nous, 2000
In his "Vagueness and Partial Belief" 1 Stephen Schiffer claims that to solve the philosophical problem of vagueness is to solve the sorites paradox and to explicate the notion of a borderline case. He holds that vagueness is a psychological notion, and aims to offer an explanation of borderline cases that makes no semantic, epistemic, or metaphysical claims. He offers two reasons for taking vagueness to be a psychological notion:~a! a psychological status better explains the no-fact-ofthe-matter intuition many have about vague propositions, when compared to the epistemic and semantic theorists @p. 233#; and, b! propositions are not ontologically and conceptually independent of us, they're products of our linguistic and conceptual practices, they're mind and language created entities that exist all right. 2 Schiffer introduces a new notion of vague-related partial belief VPB, which differs from the notion of standard-related partial belief in that VPB is not required to obey the probability theory axioms. 3 Later, he recasts VPB as VPB* and defines the notion of a borderline case in terms of VPB*.