Overview
From a Logical Point of View is a collection of nine essays by W. V. O. Quine on logic, ontology, and the theory of meaning and reference. The essays are unified by a set of recurring concerns: what it is for a theory to be committed to the existence of certain objects; how meaning and reference are to be distinguished and analyzed; whether the notions of analyticity and synonymy can be made rigorous; and how much of mathematics and logic can be reconstructed without admitting abstract entities as genuine denizens of our ontology. The collection ranges from relatively informal philosophical argument—notably the essays on existence and on analyticity—to technical work in set theory and in the logic of reference and modality. Though the essays were originally written for different occasions and audiences, they were reworked for the volume, and several carry added sections responding to objections or taking note of later developments in the field.
“On What There Is”
The opening essay addresses the question of ontological commitment. It examines the old puzzle of how discourse about non-existent objects—Pegasus, say—can be meaningful without thereby populating the world with entities that do not exist. Quine presents the problem through the figure of “Plato’s beard,” the supposed ontological cost of admitting that a name must name something, and argues that Russell’s theory of descriptions provides the crucial device for avoiding that cost: a sentence apparently about a non-existent object can be paraphrased so that no expression within it purports to name the object. From this there emerges the essay’s central positive proposal: a theory is committed to those entities that must be counted among the values of its bound variables in order for the theory to be true. To ask what a theory says there is, then, is to ask what its quantifiers have to range over. Quine applies this criterion to the contrast between physical objects and abstract entities, and defends a pragmatic attitude toward the latter—classes and other universals are to be tolerated insofar as they are needed for science, not because of any special insight into their nature.
“Two Dogmas of Empiricism”
The best-known essay in the volume attacks what Quine calls two dogmas of empiricism: the belief in a fundamental cleavage between analytic truths (true by meaning alone) and synthetic truths (true by fact), and the belief that each meaningful statement can be reduced to some construction out of terms referring to immediate experience. The essay works through a series of attempts to make sense of analyticity—through definition, through synonymy, through interchangeability, through semantical rules—and argues that each attempt either presupposes the very notion it was meant to explain or fails to yield a principled distinction. The second dogma is met with an argument for holism in confirmation: verification is not distributed statement by statement but falls upon a corporate body of theory. The essay’s image is of a “field of force” of beliefs, with logic and mathematics near the center and observational statements at the periphery, where experience impinges on the whole. No statement, on this view, is in principle immune from revision, though considerations of conservatism and simplicity make us reluctant to disturb the center. The conclusion is not that the analytic–synthetic distinction is wholly meaningless but that it has no clear theoretical foundation, and that the empiricist’s traditional account of it must be abandoned.
“The Problem of Meaning in Linguistics”
This essay considers how the notion of meaning functions in linguistic inquiry and what can responsibly be made of it. It examines the linguist’s working concepts—significant sequences, morphemes, phonemes—and the various ways in which questions of meaning enter into grammatical and lexical description. Rather than treating “meaning” as a primitive, Quine proposes to approach it through the notion of synonymy, and he explores the difficulties that attend any attempt to specify what it is for two expressions to mean the same thing. The essay is continuous with the critique of analyticity, since it presses the question of what empirical content claims about meaning can have.
“Identity, Ostension, and Hypostasis”
The fourth essay considers how objects come to be posited and reidentified, and what role the notion of identity plays in that process. It connects identity with ostension—the pointing to and reidentifying of things—and with what Quine calls hypostasis, the positing of an entity where before there was only a way of speaking. The essay discusses the conditions under which we treat something as an enduring individual, the relation of identity over time to the retention of traits, and the way in which the grammar of terms shapes our ontology. It also considers the Heraclitean puzzle of the river and the contrast between terms that signify things and terms that signify stuff, anticipating distinctions that Quine would develop further elsewhere.
“New Foundations for Mathematical Logic”
This essay presents Quine’s system of set theory known as New Foundations, characterized by a stratified comprehension principle that restricts which predicates determine sets. The essay is a compact presentation of a formal system, aimed at exhibiting a foundation for mathematics that avoids the paradoxes while preserving as much of the naive comprehension idea as is consistent. The version printed in the book includes an added section relating the system to Quine’s own later work in mathematical logic and to other foundational systems, and discussing objections the system had attracted. It is the most technical piece in the collection and the one most directly addressed to mathematicians.
“Logic and the Reification of Universals”
Here Quine turns to the question of whether universals—properties, relations, classes—must be admitted as entities. The essay argues that the admission of classes is a matter of the economy of a theory rather than of logical necessity, and it sets out a program for doing without them. By treating class abstracts as a convenient notation that can be systematically eliminated in favor of schemata employing predicates, Quine shows how much of the work supposedly done by universals can be accomplished without positing them. The discussion is governed by the maxim that entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity, and by the further demand that anything admitted as an entity must have a clear criterion of identity. The result is a nominalistic tendency in ontology combined with a readiness to use the apparatus of classes as a labor-saving device.
“Notes on the Theory of Reference”
This essay is a technical examination of the semantic notions that connect language to the world. It distinguishes the theory of reference—truth, satisfaction, denotation, naming—from the theory of meaning, and it explores the relations among the referential notions and the difficulties that arise in defining them. The essay considers singular terms, general terms, and the different ways in which expressions may be said to stand for objects, and it introduces the theme of referential opacity, the failure of substitutivity of identity in certain contexts, which becomes central in the following essay.
“Reference and Modality”
The eighth essay addresses the problems that arise when modal notions—necessity and possibility—are combined with quantification and identity. It shows that the substitutivity of identical terms fails in modal contexts: statements that differ only by the replacement of co-referential singular terms may differ in truth value, since what is necessary of one may not be necessary of the other. Quine argues that quantified modal logic, if it is to be intelligible, requires a commitment to essentialism—the view that objects have properties essential to them independently of how they are described—and he regards that commitment as a serious cost. The essay distinguishes referential from non-referential positions and argues that modal operators create non-referential contexts in which the ordinary logic of reference breaks down.
“Meaning and Existential Inference”
The final essay examines the bearing of meaning on the validity of existential inference. It considers the move from a statement about a particular—say, that a certain thing is a man—to the general claim that there exists something that is a man, and it asks what account of terms and meanings is required to make sense of such inferences. The discussion touches on the distinction between singular and general terms, on the way meaning is related to reference, and on the conditions under which existential generalization is legitimate. It closes the volume by returning to the connections between the theory of meaning and the theory of reference that run throughout the collection.
Recurring Themes
Taken together, the essays develop a coherent outlook. Ontological questions are to be settled by attention to the quantificational structure of theories; meaning is to be approached through synonymy rather than through a primitive notion of analyticity; the empiricist picture of knowledge is to be replaced by a holistic account of confirmation; and abstract entities are to be admitted only as convenient posits, with a preference for dispensing with them where the work can be done by other means. The volume thus presents, in accessible and often informal prose, the central philosophical program with which Quine’s name is associated.
The Arguments of the Earlier Essays
The collection opens with “On What There Is,” which establishes the method of ontological commitment that the later essays presuppose. Quine translates philosophical questions about existence into questions about the range of bound variables in a canonical notation. He uses Russell’s theory of descriptions to show that apparent names of non-existent objects, such as Pegasus, can be paraphrased away, and he distinguishes the meaning of a term from its naming function. The essay defends a tolerant attitude toward abstract entities, admitting them when they are needed for systematic purposes.
“Two Dogmas of Empiricism” attacks the logical positivist distinction between analytic and synthetic statements. Quine examines attempts to define analyticity through definition, synonymy, interchangeability, and semantic rules, and he finds each attempt circular or otherwise inadequate. He also rejects the second dogma, reductionism, the view that each meaningful statement can be translated into a statement about immediate experience. The essay’s positive proposal is a pragmatic view of knowledge, but the critique of the two dogmas is independent of that proposal.
“The Problem of Meaning in Linguistics” examines the use of “meaning” in phonemics and morphemics. Quine argues that linguists often conflate meaning with other notions, and he recommends a behavioristic approach that defines synonymy in terms of stimulus and response. “Identity, Ostension, and Hypostasis” argues that identity is prior to ostension: to point to something and say “this is the same as that” presupposes a criterion of identity. Quine shows how our talk of abstract entities arises from the hypostasis of linguistic forms—the treatment of words and predicates as if they named entities. “New Foundations” presents a formal system of set theory that departs from the usual cumulative hierarchy, illustrating Quine’s willingness to revise even the foundations of mathematics in the service of a systematic ontology.
These essays, together with the later ones, form a connected argument. The book’s significance lies in its demonstration that logical analysis can yield substantive philosophical conclusions: it can expose the ontological commitments of theories, dissolve pseudo-problems about meaning and existence, and recommend a pragmatic and naturalistic attitude toward our conceptual scheme.
