Austin, John Langshaw | Internet encyclopedia of philosophy (2023)

J.L. Austin was one of the most influential British philosophers of his day for his rigorous thinking, extraordinary personality, and innovative philosophical method. According to John Searle, he was passionate about and hated by his contemporaries. Like Socrates, he seemed to destroy all philosophical orthodoxy without presenting an equally comforting alternative orthodoxy.

Austin is best known for two major contributions to contemporary philosophy: first, his "linguistic phenomenology," a unique method of philosophical analysis of everyday language concepts and expressions; and second, speech act theory, the notion that all language use has a performative dimension (in the well-known catchphrase “to say something is to do something”). Speech act theory has had consequences and significance in areas of inquiry as diverse as the philosophy of language, ethics, political philosophy, legal philosophy, linguistics, artificial intelligence, and feminist philosophy.

This article describes Austin's linguistic method and speech act theory, and describes his original contributions to epistemology and the philosophy of action. Finally, it focuses on two main developments in speech act theory: the dispute between conventionalism and intentionalism, and the debate over free speech, pornography, and censorship.

Index

1. life and method
2. philosophy of language
   1. meaning and truth
   2. Speech acts
3. epistemology
   1. sense and Sensibility
   2. other thoughts
      1. Knowledge of certain empirical facts.
      2. Knowledge of another person's mental states.
4. philosophy of action
5. Herbs
   1. speech act theory
      1. conventionalism and intentionalism
      2. Freedom of expression and pornography
   2. epistemology
6. References and further reading
   1. primary sources
   2. secondary sources

1. Life and method

John Langshaw Austin was born on March 26, 1911 in Lancaster, England. He was educated as a classical scholar at Balliol College Oxford. He came to philosophy through the study of Aristotle, who had a lasting influence on his own philosophical method. He also worked on the philosophy of Leibniz and translated Frege's work.the essential🇧🇷 Austin spent his entire academic life at Oxford where he was White's Professor of Moral Philosophy from 1952 until his death in 1960 in the British Army in 1945 with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Austin published only seven articles. According to Searle, Austin's reluctance to publish was partly a feature of his own attitude, but it was also part of Oxford's culture at the time: "Oxford had a long tradition of non-publishing throughout life, in fact it was considered somewhat vulgar post (Searle 2001, 227) Most of Austin's work was published posthumously and includes a collection of papers (Austin 1961) and two lecture series reconstructed by the editors from Austin's lecture notes : Lectures on Perception, edited by Geoffrey Warnock (Austin 1962a) and the 1955 Harvard William James Lectures on Speech Acts, edited by James O. Urmson (Austin 1962b) for the first edition and by Urmson and Marina Sbisa for the second (Austin 1975).

Austin was deeply dissatisfied not only with the traditional way of philosophizing, but also with logical positivism (of which Alfred J. Ayer was the leading figure at Oxford). In particular, his discontent was directed against the practice of a type of philosophy which, in Austin's view, was responsible for stark dichotomies and, instead of clarifying the issues at hand, seemed to lead to oversimplification and dogmatic bias. . Austin thus developed a new methodology and a new philosophical style that became a paradigmcommon language philosophy🇧🇷 Austin does not claim that this method is the only correct method. Rather, he provides a valuable preliminary approach to at least some of the most intractable problems in the Western philosophical tradition, such as those of freedom, responsibility, and perception. According to Austin, the starting point of philosophy should be the analysis of the concepts and expressions of everyday language and the recognition of our common language. This would help, on the one hand, to dismantle "philosophical errors" caused by the way philosophers use certain common words, and, on the other hand, to access the actual features of the world captured by the expressions we use to describe them. . 🇧🇷

common language isnothe last word - in principle, it can be supplemented, improved and replaced anywhere. remember that it isesaFirsthierba [Austin 1956a/1961, 185]

According to Austin, common language encapsulates all the distinctions and connections made by humans, as if our words in everyday use "have withstood the long test of the survival of the fittest" (Austin 1956a/1961, 182). 🇧🇷 First of all, it is necessary to carefully examine the terminology that we have available and develop a list of expressions relevant to the field in question: a kind of “linguistic phenomenology” carried out with the help of the dictionary and the imagination and looks for combinations of expressions and synonyms, invents linguistic thought experiments and unusual contexts and settings, and speculates on our linguistic reactions to them. The study of everyday language allows us to pay attention to the richness of linguistic facts and to approach philosophical problems from a fresh and unprejudiced perspective.

Certainly this is not a new methodology in the history of philosophy. However, today this strategy is carried out with particular care and on a large scale on the one hand and is jointly discussed and evaluated on the other in order to reach a reasonable consensus. For Austin, philosophy is not a quest to follow, but a collective work. Indeed, this was the essence of Austin's "Saturday mornings," weekly meetings held in Oxford during the semester and attended by philosophers of language, morality, and law. Austin's method lent itself better to philosophical discussion and inquiry than to publication: we can, however, fully appreciate it.How to do things with words(1962b) and in such articles as A Plea for Excuses (1956a) and Ifs and Cans (1956b).

Austin's method has been seen by some as pedantic, a mere insistence that we must use our words carefully, without genuine interest in the phenomena that give rise to our philosophical concerns. In fact, there are limits to the methodology: on the one hand, many philosophical questions remain intact even after careful reformulation; on the other hand, our everyday language does not embodyathe distinctions that might be relevant to a philosophical investigation (cf. Searle 2001, 228-229). Austin is concerned not only with language, but also with spoken phenomena, as he says: "It takes two to make a truth" (Austin 1950/1961, 124fn; cf. Martin 2007).

2. Philosophy of language

a. meaning and truth

Through his innovative methodology, Austin takes a new approach to our everyday language. Philosophers and logicians such as Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, the former Ludwig Wittgenstein, Alfred Tarski, and Willard Quine are known to want to construct a perfect language for philosophical and scientific communication, that is, an artificial language that is free from all ambiguities and imperfections. that characterize natural languages. On the other hand, ordinary language philosophers (besides Austin also later Wittgenstein, Friedrich Waismann, Paul Grice, Peter Strawson) see natural language as an object of autonomous analysis, and its apparent imperfections as a sign of richness and expressiveness.

In a formal language, semantic conventions assign a fixed meaning to each term and sentence once and for all. By contrast, natural language expressions appearessentially incomplete🇧🇷 As a result, it seems impossible to fully verify our everyday phrases. The meaning of our terms is only partially limited, depending on the beliefs, desires, goals, activities, and institutions of our language community. Boundaries, even when temporary, are unstable and open to new uses and new conventions in unusual situations. In "The meaning of a word", Austin considers different pronunciation contexts of sentences with familiar terms to create unusual occasions of use: extraordinary or strange cases want to test our intuitions and reveal hidden moments of tension in natural language. What shall we say about "It's a goldfinch" said about a goldfinch who "does something outrageous (he blows up, quotes Mrs. Woolf, or whatever)"? (Austin 1940/1961, 88). Austin's main point is that, in principle, it is impossible to anticipate every possible circumstance that might cause us to change or withdraw a lawsuit. Our daily conditions are extremely flexible and can still be used in special cases. Regarding "This man is neither home nor away from home", Austin writes: "Somehow we can't see what 'could mean': there are no semantic conventions, explicit or implicit, to cover this case: It's not banned yet anyway - No restrictive rules about what we can and can't sayin exceptional cases(Austin 1940/1961, 68). What would we say of a dead man lying in his bed? that he is home? That he is not at home?

Should the statement "France is hexagonal" be considered true or false? According to Austin, we must consider the objectives and intentions of the speaker, the circumstances of the expression and the commitments we assume when we affirm something. The statements are not simply true or false, but more or less factual, appropriate, exaggerated and crude: 'true' and 'false' [...] do not represent anything simple; but only in a general dimension that, under these circumstances, for this audience, for these purposes, and with these intentions, it is right or appropriate to say something, as opposed to wrong” (Austin 1975, 145).

B. Speech acts

Austin's most famous contribution to contemporary philosophy is his theory ofSpeech acts, featured inHow to do things with words(Austin 1975). Whereas for philosophers, who are primarily interested in formal languages, the main function of language is to describe reality, state things, and make claims about the world, for Austin our expressions have a variety of different uses. A similar point is made inphilosophical investigationsvon Wittgenstein, who emphasizes the "innumerable" possible uses of our sentences (Wittgenstein 1953: § 23). Austin contrasts Wittgenstein's "desperate" image of the myriad uses of language with his precise catalog of the various speech acts we can perform, a taxonomy akin to that employed by an entomologist attempting to classify the many (but not myriad) species. of beetles.

Not all statements are statements of fact. See examples from Austin

(1) I call this ship the "Queen Elizabeth"

as expressed when a ship is launched, or

(2) I bet you six cents that it will rain tomorrow.

The crier of (1) or (2) is notdescribethe opening ceremony or a bet, butmanufacturingEast. By uttering these sentences we produce new facts, "as opposed to producing consequences, in the sense of producing things in a 'normal' way, i.h. changes in the natural course of things" (Austin 1975: 117): Pronouncing ( 1) or (2) we modify social reality, introduce new conventions and assume obligations. In the first classes ofHow to do things with words, Austin outlines an attempt to distinguish between constatives and performatives that will be abandoned in later lessons.constatives, on the one hand there are sentences like

(3) The cat is on the carpet:

They are intended to describe facts and are evaluated as true or false.performativeas (1) and (2), on the other handdisapproval gestureinstead ofMessagesomewhat: They perform actions that are determined by norms and institutions (eg, the act of marriage or baptism) or social conventions (eg, the act of gambling or making a promise) and do not appear to be evaluable as true or false. This last disputed claim is not defended ("I state this self-evident and do not dispute it", Austin 1975, 6): the claim is only preliminary and may be revised in the light of later sections (Austin 1975, 4n).

According to Austin, it is possible and fruitful to shed light on standard cases of successful communication and to specify the conditions for a performative to function correctly, with an emphasis on non-standard cases and communicative failures. As stated, performatives cannot be evaluated as true or false, but are subject to various kinds of invalidity or failure called "unhappiness." In some cases, an attempt to perform an action fails or "fails." The law is "null and void" due to the violation of two sets of rules:

A.1: There must be an accepted conventional procedure with a certain conventional effect, which procedure involves the utterance of certain words by certain persons under certain circumstances;

A.2: This procedure must be invoked in appropriate circumstances and by appropriate persons.

Other mishaps concern the processing of the procedure, since it must be carried out by all the parties involved

B.1: right, and

B.2: complete.

After all, there are cases when an action is achieved, but there is oneabuseof the procedure for infringement of two types of rules:

C.1: The procedure must be performed by the speaker with appropriate thoughts, feelings, or intentions;

C.2: The participants must then behave according to the procedure carried out.

Like I said, inHow to do things with wordsAustin distinguishes between constatives and performatives only as a precursor to his main thesis, namely that all language use has a performative dimension. The supposed performative class seems to allow only certain verbs (such as promise, bet, excuse, send), all in the first person singular present. However, any attempt to characterize the class using grammatical or lexical criteria is doomed to failure. In fact, we can do the act of ordering, say, with an explicit performative as in

(4) I order you to close the door

but also with

(5) Close the door!

Likewise, there are performative verbs for acts of confirmation, affirmation or conclusion, as in

(6) I affirm that the earth is flat.

The mere distinction between statements that can be evaluated according to the dimension of truth and falsehood (constatives) and statements that can be evaluated according to the dimension of happiness or unhappiness (performatives) is a mere illusion. To show this, Austin presents two arguments:

a) On the one hand, constatives can be evaluated as happy or unhappy: assertions, just like performatives, require appropriate conditions for their successful execution (for example, it does not seem appropriate to make an assertion in which one does not believe ) ;

b) On the other hand, performatives can be evaluated in terms of truth and falsehood, or in terms of a certain agreement with the facts: we say of a judgment that it is fair or unfair, of a piece of advice that it is good or bad, praise if it is deserved. or not.

Through a) and b) Austin concludes that the distinction between constatives and performatives is insufficient: all sentences are tools that we use to do something, totellsomething is always fordisapproval gesturesome. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a general theory of the use of language and of the actions we perform when uttering a sentence: a general theory of what Austin callsillocutionary force.

Within the same general speech act, Austin distinguishes three distinct acts: locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary.

• opeppermint wandAct is the act of saying something, the act of pronouncing certain expressions, syntactically well formed and significant. In addition, it can be analyzed in aphoneticallyact (pronouncing certain sounds), acomprehensiveAct (the act of pronouncing words, that is, sounds according to a certain vocabulary and grammar) and araeticAction (the act of using these words with a specific meaning – meaning or reference).
• Practicing a locutionary action is also andsoloperform an illocutionary act (Austin 1975, 98). An illocutionary action is a way of using language, and its execution is the execution of an action.Insidesay something instead of taking an actionagainSay something. It is equivalent toDoeswhat does a statement like (5) have in a given context: command, request, plea, or challenge.
• operlocutionaryThe action corresponds to the effects produced by the performance of an illocutionary action, its consequences (intentional or not) on the feelings, thoughts or actions of the participants. According to Austin, by saying what he says, the speaker performs a different type of action (for example, persuade, persuade, or warn) because he can be held responsible for these effects (cf. Sbisa 2006 and 2013). However, the perlocutionary consequences of illocutionary actions are not conventional, they are not totally under the control of the speaker, but they are related to the specific circumstances in which the action is performed. Austin makes another distinction between perlocutionaryobjects(the consequences that an illocutionary act produces by virtue of its force - how the warning can be a consequence of the illocutionary act of warning) and perlocutionaryaftermath(The consequences of an illocutionary action without systematic relation to its force: that is how surprising a consequence of illocutionary assertion can be) (Austin 1975: 118).

In the last classHow to do things with wordsAustin tentatively selects five illocutionary action classes, using a list of explicit performative verbs as a starting point: verditive, exercitive, accommodating, behavioral, expository.

• the class ofsentencesincludes acts (formal or informal) of making a judgment, appraisal, or sentence (eg, acquittal, appraisal, appraisal, diagnosis). These can be facts or figures.
• the class ofElaborateincludes acts to exercise authority, rights or influence (such as appointing, voting, commanding, warning). These assume that the speaker has some authority or influence.
• the class ofcommissionersincludes actions that force the speaker to do something (eg, promise, accept, agree, disagree, bet).
• the class ofexhibitsincludes actions that clarify reasons, arguments, or communications (eg, affirmations, denials, statements, descriptions, questions, answers).
• the class ofbehaveincludes actions related to attitudes and social behavior (eg, apologize, congratulate, praise, thank). These include reactions to other people's behavior or fate and are particularly prone to insincerity (Condition C.1).

Austin characterizes the illocutionary act as theconventionalAspect of language (as opposed to the perlocutionary act). As we have already said, for every speech act there must exist an accepted conventional procedure that has a certain conventional effect (Condition A.1): If the conventional procedure is carried out in accordance with other conditions, the action is carried out successfully. This statement seems plausible with respect to institutional or social acts (for example, naming ships or betting): The conventional dimension is manifested here because it is our society (and sometimes also our laws) that validate these acts. The claim seems less plausible in terms of speech acts in general: nothing conventional or semantic makes (5) a command, challenge, or request: the illocutionary power of the utterance is determined by the context of the utterance. More generally, according to Austin, the intentions of the speaker play only a minor role in the performance of a speech act (a violation of condition C.1 leads to an abuse of the procedure, but not to a failure of the speech act). ). Building on Gricean's insights, Peter Strawson argues that what makes (5) an act of illocutionary command rather than begging are the intentions of the speaker, intentions that the speaker can make available to the audience using linguistic conventions ( but you don't have to):

I do not want to deny that there may be conventional attitudes or procedures for pleading... But I do want to deny that pleading can only be done according to some of these conventions. What makes the words from X to Y areappealnot going is quite a complex thing, no doubt related to X's situation, his attitude towards Y, his behavior and his current intention. [Strawson 1964, 444; compare Warnock 1973 and Bach & Harnish 1979]

Marina Sbisa disagrees with Strawson's reading of the conventionality of illocutionary actions and identifies two different claims about Austin's conventionalism: (a) illocutionary actions are performed byconventional devices(for example, linguistic conventions); and (b) produce illocutionary actsconventional effects🇧🇷 Austin specifies three types of conventional effects: Performing an illocutionary action implies receiving aAbsorption, that is, to bring understanding of the meaning and power of language; the illocutionary act has an effect in a conventional way, rather than producing consequences in terms of changes in the natural course of events; and many illocutionary acts by convention invite a response or sequence (Austin 1975, 116-117). According to Sbisa, Austin deals very briefly with the conventionality of the effects produced by illocutionary acts (b) as opposed to the conventionality of the means by which we perform illocutionary acts (a), leaving room for Strawson's distinction between two groups of illocutionary acts: those that depend on a convention followed by the speaker and those that depend on a specific type of intention on the part of the speaker (Sbisa 2013, 26). See below § 5.a.

3. Epistemology

There are two main examples of Austin's philosophical method applied to epistemological questions: the article "Other Minds" (1946) and the series of lecturessense and Sensibility, presented at Oxford and Berkeley during the decade 1947-1958 and published in 1962. Other Minds is a paper presented at the symposium of the same name at joint meetings of the Mind Association and the Aristotelian Society (John Wisdom, Alfred J . Ayer and Austin the main participants), and its topic was hotly debated in the mid-20th century. Insidesense and SensibilityAustin applies his linguistic analysis to the theory of sense data and to the more general fundamental theory of knowledge, in which sense data plays the fundamental role of the very structure of empirical knowledge, in order to achieve a clarification of the notion of perception.

a. sense and Sensibility

These lectures present a very detailed critique of the claims made by A.J. Yesterday inThe foundations of empirical knowledge.(1940) and to a lesser extent those contained in the book by H. H. Price.perception(1932) y GJ Warnockberkeley(1953). Austin challenges themperceive dataTheory according to which we never directly perceive material objects. On the contrary, affirms such a theory, we do not perceive anything more than sensory data.

The notion of sensory data is introduced to identify the object of perception in abnormal and extraordinary cases, for example, refraction, mirages, mirror images, hallucinations, etc. In such cases, perceptions may be "qualitatively illusory" or "existentially illusory", depending on whether the sense data endow material things with properties they do not actually possess, or whether the material things presented do not exist. In all these cases, the sense-data theorist asserts, we perceive the sense-data directly. The next step in this argument, called the argument from illusion, is to assert that, even in ordinary cases, we only directly perceive sense data.

Austin's goal is not to answer the question "What are the objects of perception?" answer. Austin aims, on the one hand, to get rid of "illusions like 'the illusion argument'" and, on the other hand, to offer a "technique for resolving philosophical concerns" by changing the meaning of words like "real", "appearance" . , "appear" and "appear".” (Austin 1962a, 4-5). The argument from illusion is flawed because it introduces a false dichotomy: that between sense data and material objects. Austin questions this dichotomy and the consequent claim that abnormal and illusory cognitions are not qualitatively different from normal and true cognitions (both sense data are perceived, albeit to different degrees), and presents different cases of cognitions showing that " there are none".1we "recognize" something like this, but many doAnderstypes, the number of which can, if possible, be reduced by scientific inquiry rather than philosophy” (Austin 1962a, 4).

In addition to chairs, tables, pens, and cigarettes, which the sense-data theorist calls examples of material objects, Austin calls attention to rainbows, shadows, flames, vapors, and gases as examples of things we normally we say that we perceive even when we classify. them as material things. Similarly, Austin argues, there is no one way in which we are "deceived by the senses" (that is, we perceive something unreal or immaterial), but "things can go wrong [...]AndersShapes - which are not to be generally classifiable and are not to be considered" (Austin 1962a, 13). Furthermore, Austin asks whether we would be inclined to speak of "illusions" in relation to dreams, perspective phenomena, photographs, reflections, or images in Recalling the familiarity of the circumstances in which we encounter these phenomena and the way in which we generally view them, Austin attempts to show how the dichotomies between sensory data and material objects, and between illusory and true perceptions, are actually wrong alternatives.

The facts of perceptions are "many and complicated", and analyzing words in their contexts of use allows us to make the fine distinctions made by some philosophers' "obsession" with certain words (for example, "real" and "reality"). ). annihilated'). ) and due to the lack of attention to the uses (not even remotely interchangeable) of verbs such as 'see', 'appear' and 'appear'. the argument from illusion is not about the usual use of these words, but about a new use that cannot be explained. Austin does not want to exclude the possibility of making new distinctions for theoretical purposes and thus correcting our linguistic practices by introducing technical terms, but he suggests always paying attention to the common use of our words to avoid simplifications and distortions.

As an example, Austin examines the word "real" and contrasts that word's common and well-established meaning, established by the way we use it every day, with the way sense data theorists use it in their arguments. . What Austin recommends is careful consideration of the common and multiple meanings of this word, so as not to postulate, for example, an unnatural quality projected by this word that is common to all things to which this word is attributed ('true ducks'). ', 'Cream "as is", "Actual Progress", "Actual Color", "Actual Shape", etc.).

Austin highlights the complexity of using "real" when he states that it is about (i)asignificant hungerWord that often plays the role of (ii).attitude word, a word by which “other words are adapted to meet the world's myriad and unpredictable demands on language” (Austin 1962a, 73). How "good" is (iii) aword dimension, namely. h “the most general and comprehensive concept of a whole group of concepts of the same type, concepts that fulfill the same function” (Austin 1962a, 71): d. h 'true', 'proper', 'genuine', 'living', 'natural', 'authentic', in contrast to terms like 'fake', 'artificial', 'false', 'false', 'synthetic', 'toy', but also nouns like 'dream', 'illusion', 'fata morgana', 'hallucination'.word pant) (Austin 1962a, 70).

To determine the meaning of "real" we must consider the forms and contexts in which it is used on a case-by-case basis. According to Austin, this is the only way we can avoid introducing false dichotomies (for a critique of Austin's attack on sense data, see Ayer 1967 and Smith 2002).

B. other thoughts

In this article, Austin addresses the philosophical problems of knowing another person's mental states (for example, that another man is angry) and the reliability of the reasons we invoke when justifying our claims about certain empirical facts (for example, that the bird that walks in my garden is a goldfinch). The focus of Austin's analysis is the skeptical result of the questioning of such a possibility by certain philosophers (in this case, Austin addresses some of John Wisdom's claims). As for the knowledge of certain empirical facts, "the human intellect and senses arenaturallyfallible and illusory" (Austin 1946/1961, 98), the skeptic claims that we should never, if ever, say that we know something beyond what I can now perceive with my senses, for example: "Here is something that looks red "to me now. On the other hand, the possibility of knowing the sensibilities of others is challenged by the notion of privileged access to our own feelings and sensibilities, so that we simply cannot "delude ourselves" about them in the best sense. " (Austin 1946/1961, 90). .

ME. Knowledge of certain empirical facts.

Austin engages in an examination of the kinds of responses we would make in ordinary, concrete, and specific circumstances to the challenge of our knowledge claims. For example, when answering a person's question, "How do you know that?" Given my "This is a goldfinch" statement, my answer could address my past experience of learning about goldfinches, and thus the criteria for determining that something is a goldfinch, or the circumstances of the present case, which allow me to determine that the bird now moving in my garden there is a goldfinch. The way our claims can be contested or incorrect under normal circumstances isSpecific(ways in which context helps us determine), and there arerecognized proceduresreasonable for the particular type of case that we can rely on to substantiate or verify such assertions.

The usual precaution of knowing "cannot be more than reasonable in relation to present intentions and purposes" (Austin 1946/1961, 88), as can the assumption that someone is wrong for a particular reason in being related to the specific case. Rather, the 'metaphysician's cunning', claims Austin, boils down to framing his doubts and questions in very general terms and 'not specifying or qualifying what might be wrong', 'so that I don't know how to prove' 'that she questioned (Austin 1946/1961, 87).

Drawing a parallel with the performative formula "I promise", Austin argues that by uttering "I know", the speaker is not describing his or her state of mind (that would be, in Austin's terms, a state of mind).descriptive error🇧🇷 Instead, under the right circumstances, yourdisapproving gesturesomething: Gives others their word, that is, their authority to say that "S is P".

Austin's analysis of epistemological terms in their general and specific uses aims to determine the conditions under which our statements are successful and happy speech acts. We normally invoke these conditions to justify our knowledge claims in case they are challenged.

Whether Austin's strategy against skeptical challenge, based on metaphysical and logical possibility, will prove successful is another question to be answered.

ii. Knowledge of another person's mental states.

Austin objects to the idea (as Wisdom asserts, for example) that we know another person's feelings (if we know them at all) solely by the physical symptoms of those feelings: we never know another person's feelings in ourselves, as we know. the feelings of others, ours. According to Austin, statements about another person's mental states can be treated as about certain empirical facts, although the former are more complex due to "the very specific (grammatical, logical) nature of feelings" (Austin 1946/1961, 105). . . It is precisely this peculiarity that Austin's analysis aims to illuminate in this article.

Saying to someone "I know you are angry" requires, on the one hand, a certain familiarity with the person to whom we are attributing the feeling; especially familiarity with situations of the same nature as the present one. On the other hand, it seems necessary to have had a first-person experience of the relevant feeling/emotion.

A feeling (for example, anger), Austin argues, is intimately related both to its natural expressions/manifestations and to the natural causes of those manifestations, so that "it seems fair to say that 'anger' is similar in many respects to having mumps." It is a description of a complete pattern of events, including cause, symptoms, feeling and manifestation, and possibly other factors as well” (Austin 1946/1961, 109).

Contrary to Wisdom's assertion that we never understand another person's anger, only the symptoms/signs of their anger, Austin draws attention to the ways in whichconversationabout the feelings of others and highlights the general pattern of events "inherent in the case of 'feelings' (emotions)" on which our attributions are based (Austin 1946/1961, 110). In addition, it is emphasized that ascribed and also self-attributed feelings and emotions are a problemrecognition, and from familiarity with the complexity of such a pattern, it seems to exist because of the way the relevant terms were learned to use.

Emotion terms, on the other hand, do notinaccurate, because on the one hand they are usually applied to very different situations, and on the other hand the patterns they cover are quite complex, so that in "unorthodox" cases an assignment can be delayed. Alongside this kind of intrinsic inaccuracy, doubts about the correctness of a sentiment attribution or its authenticity can arise from misunderstandings or misunderstandings. But these cases areespecialand, like the goldfinch, there are "established procedures" for dealing with them.

Unlike the Stieglitz, where "the Sensa are stupid" (Austin 1946/1961, 97), in the attribution of feeling "the very statement of feeling" occupies a special place within its complex pattern of events. (Austin 1946/1961, 113). According to Austin, “believing in other people, in authority and in testimony is an essential part of communication, an act in which we are all constantly involved. It is as much an indispensable part of our experience as making promises or playing competitive games or even feeling patches of color” (Austin 1946/1961, 115). Austin thus tries to block the skeptical argument by claiming that the ability to know the moods and feelings of others is a constitutive feature of our common practices as such, for which there is no "justification" (ibid.🇧🇷 Here one can also argue whether this is enough to refute skepticism.

4. Philosophy of action

Austin's contribution to action philosophy can be traced primarily in two articles: "A Plea for Excuses" (1956a) and "Three Ways of Spilling Ink" (1966), in which the terms "doing an action" and "do something" are used by the linguistic analysis of clarificationsexcuses, that is, taking into account "the different ways and the different words with which we occasionally try to detach ourselves from things to show that we have not acted 'freely' or that we have not been 'responsible'" (Austin 1966/1961, 273 ). According to the method appreciated by Austin, it is possible to shed light on normal and standard cases by analyzing special cases or failures. An examination of the excuses should allow us to understand the concept of action, through the preliminary explanation of the concepts of responsibility and freedom.

As far as "knowledge" is concerned, Austin's contribution is one of the mostclarification of use,which illuminates the concept of "performing an action".

Based on analysis of modifier phrases found in apologies (eg, "unintentional," "impulsive") and accusations ("intentional," "deliberate," "deliberate"), Austin says that it is possible to identify the various classification errors that affect the actions, and thus dismantle the complex internal details of theaction machinery🇧🇷 Far from being reduced to a few body movements, carrying out an action is divided into different steps: theintelligence, arecognitionthe situation thatplanning, adecision, I like itexecution🇧🇷 Also, in addition to the stages "in general, we can divide what could be called a plot into several different types, in differentextendsostages(Austin 1956a/1961, 201). In particular, when we use a specific term to describe what someone did, we can cover a smaller or larger set of events and distinguish the action from its consequences, results, or effects. Austin therefore points out that because of the different possible references to "what she did", it is crucial to determine "what modifies what", that is, what is being excused. we may or may not hold a person accountable for the act, so determining exactly what is justified is extremely important.

In determining whether someone is responsible for a particular act, for example a child who spilled paint in class, it is necessary to consider on a case-by-case basis whether the act was 'intentional', 'intentional' or 'intentional'. . shows the differences between the three terms in two steps. First, he considers imaginary actions, the description of which presents two of the terms as explicitly dissociated: eg, doing something intentionally but not intentionally (z. 277); intentionally but not intentionally (for example, acting arbitrarily); intentional but unintentional (for example, unintended but foreseeable consequences/results of some of my actions: ruining the debtor by insisting on payment of overdue debts; see Austin 1966/1961, 278); and intentionally, but not intentionally (the latter case seems bordering on impossibility and smacks of paradox). The logical limits of these combinations allow Austin to highlight the differences between the concepts examined. Subsequently, in a second step, these differences are demonstrated through an analysis of the grammar and philology of the terms (adjective endings, negative forms, prepositions used to form adverbial expressions, etc.). What emerges from this research is that each term marks different ways in which it is possible to perform an action, or different “aspects” of the action.

Austin's analysis of notions of agency and responsibility sheds light on that of freedom, which is illustrated by his examination of "all the ways in which every action may not be 'free'" (Austin 1956a/1961, 180). Like the word "genuine", the negative use of language also wears the pants with "free": the concept of freedom derives its meaning from terms that are excluded from one case to another by any use of the term "free". (For example, consider the following statements: "I had to run because he threatened me with a knife", "The glass fell out of my hand in surprise", "I can't stop checking my five email verification protocols" Considering the concrete and ordinary situations in which it is possible or not to determine the responsibility of a person for an action (where a question of responsibility arises), the concepts of freedom and responsibility emerge as closely intertwined In the words of Austin: "Just as 'truth' is not a name for a characteristic of statements, so 'freedom' is not a name for a characteristic of actions, but a name for a dimension on which actions are evaluated" (Austin 1956a/1961, 180) provide a positive explanation for the concept of freedom: rather, it is explained by paying attention to the various ways in which our actions can be free a.

5. Legacy

a. speech act theory

Since the late 1960s, speech act theory (SAT) has developed in several directions. Here we focus on two main threads: the controversy between conventionalism and intentionalism on the one hand, and the debate over pornography, free speech and censorship on the other.

I conventionalism and intentionalism

Peter Strawson's contribution to the Austin SAT, which incorporates insights from Paul Grice's analysis of the notion of unnatural meaning, marks the beginning of the controversy over the role of convention versus intention in speech act performance. Although almost all SAT developments contain, to varying degrees, both a conventionalist and an intentionalist element, it may be useful to distinguish two main traditions depending on how one element predominates over the other: a conventionalist, Austinian, and an intentionalist, Neo-Greek tradition. . There are two versions of conventionalism: John Searle's conventionalismmedium, and the conventionalism of Marina Sbisaeffects(distinction brand Sbisa).

Central to Searle's systematization of the SAT is the assumption that speaking a language amounts to a rule-governed activity, and that human languages ​​can be seen as conventional embodiments of a set of underlying foundations.constitutive rules, that is, rules that create an activity and not only regulate it, in the sense that the existence of such an activity logically depends on that of the rules that constitute it. Searle's analysis purports to specify a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for the successful performance of an illocutionary act (Searle focuses on the promise act, but the analysis extends to other types of illocutionary acts, of which different types have developed). SA classifications). Starting from the favorable conditions for carrying out an action, a set ofsemantic rulesto use the illocutionary force display device for this act is extracted. Searle's position, therefore, qualifies as a media convention, since the successful performance of an illocutionary action is achieved thanks to the agreement of the meaning of the statement used to perform it with the linguistic conventions of the language in which it is performed. the action. .

Sbisa developed Austin's thesis on the conventionality of the illocutionary force by relating it to the second of the three types of conventional effects characteristic of the illocutionary act: the production of states of affairs by means other than natural causality, that is, the production of effects. normative states of matters such as duties, obligations, privileges, rights, etc. According to Sbisa, any type of illocutionary act producesconventional effects, which correspond to "attributions or cancellations of each of the participants to modal predicates" (Sbisa 2001, 1797) that are conventional insofar as their production depends on intersubjective agreement. The mark of such effects, unlike physical actions, is that they are subject to nullity, theirconquerability.

The most important example of the intentionalist tradition within the SAT is the analysis developed by Kent Bach and Robert Harnish. Contrary to Searle's opinion, Bach and Harnish argue that the connection between the linguistic structure of an utterance and the illocutionary act it serves is never semantic or conventional, but ratherconcluding.

In order for the illocutionary act to be determined by the listener, in addition to "what is said" (the semantic content of the statement), it is also necessary: ​​the speaker's illocutionary communication capacityintention(this intention is reflexive: its realization consists in being recognized by the listener as destined for recognition); the contextual beliefs shared by the interlocutors; general beliefs about the communicative situation, playing the role of conjectures, d. h Expectations about the behavior of the interlocutor that are so fundamental that they constitute the conditions of possibility of the communicative exchange (elocutionary intention); and finally conversational assumptions derived from Grice's conversational maxims.

All these elements combine to produce the conclusion, which allows the listener to pass from the utterance level to the illocutionary level and through the locutionary level (note that Bach and Harnish, as well as Searle himself, in distinguishing from Austin's components deviate from the speech act). Bach and Harnish presented a model thatOutline of the speech act(SAS), which represents the pattern of reasoning that a listener follows (and expects the speaker to follow) to understand the illocutionary actAsan action of a certain type (for example, an order, a promise, an acknowledgment, etc.).

The merit of the intentional analysis offered by Bach and Harnish is that it attempts to integrate SAT into a general description of linguistic communication whose aim is to provide a psychologically plausible explanation. A flaw in this approach seems to be related to a key element of the SAT itself: the emphasis onnormativeDimension generated by the performance of speech acts. The intentionalist analysis does not take this normative dimension into account, since it claims that the creation of commitments and commitments is a “moral” question that is not answered by the SAT. On the other hand, the conventionalist tradition, in its two variants, seems to show an opposite and equally unsatisfactory trend. In fact, it has been argued, particularly by relevance theorists (see Sperber and Wilson 1995), that the illocutionary level, as identified by the SAT, does not actually play a role in the process of linguistic comprehension. Relevance theorists object that it is an unfounded assumption that it plays a role like the one claimed by the SAT. In general, this objection leads speech act theorists to confront the cognitive turn in the philosophy of language and linguistics.

ii. Freedom of expression and pornography

A more striking application of speech act theory concerns the debate over free speech, pornography, and censorship (cf. Langton 1993, Hornsby 1993, Hornsby & Langton 1998, Saul 2006, Bianchi 2008). Liberal porn advocates argue that pornography, even when it is violent and demeaning, must be protected in order to uphold a fundamental principle: the right to free speech. On the other hand, Catharine MacKinnon argues that pornography violates women's right to freedom of expression: More specifically, pornography not only causes women's subordination and silence, but also constitutes women's subordination (a violation of their civil rights, equal marital status) and silence (a violation of their civil right to free speech; MacKinnon 1987). MacKinnon's thesis has been widely discussed and criticized. Rae Langton and Jennifer Hornsby offer a defense of her claim in terms of Austin's speech act theory: works of pornography can be understood as such.illocutionary actSubordinate or silence women. On the one hand, pornography (or at least violent and degrading pornography, in which women are portrayed as voluntary sexual objects) subordinates women, considers them inferior, and legitimizes their discrimination. Pornography, on the other hand, silences women by creating a communicative environment that robs them of their illocutionary potential. The claim that pornography silences women can be analyzed along the lines drawn by Austin. According to Langton (1993), the performance of a locutionary act can be prevented by preventing the expression of certain expressions, using physical force, institutional norms or intimidation (UEprofessional silence🇧🇷 Or one can avoid performing a perlocutionary action by ignoring the illocutionary action even if it is performed successfully (perlocutionary frustration🇧🇷 Or the performance of an illocutionary act can be prevented by creating a communicative environment that prevents the absorption of the power of the speech act or the recognition of the authority of the speaker, especially in what refers to women's rejection of unwanted sex (illocutionary deficit🇧🇷 In Langton and Hornsby's point of view, pornography can actually prevent women from performing the illocutionary act of refusing sex, contributing to situations where a woman's "no" is not recognized as a rejection and, consequently, a violation is looming. Against protecting pornography as a form of expression (a simple form of expression), Langton and Hornsby argue that pornography does more than justto express: Go deadatossilence the speech of women (a form of illocution), restricting their freedom of expression. So we are facing two different and contradictory rights, or rather different people who fight for the same right, the right to freedom of expression.

B. Epistemology

Austin's legacy has been taken up in epistemology by individual authors such as Charles Travis (2004) who claims to be unrepresentative of the debate on the nature of perception, and also by Michael G. F. Martin (2002) who represents a form of non-representation. -representation. representational realism.

Austin's work can be seen as a source of inspiration forContextualism in epistemology, but some scholars are reluctant to draw too much affinity by pointing out important differences between Austin's method and the contextualist approach (see, for example, Baz 2012 and McMyler 2011).

More generally, Mark Kaplan (2000, 2008) has insisted on the need to view our general knowledge attribution practices as a methodological constraint on epistemology so that it can preserve its own intellectual integrity. According to Kaplan, adopting an Austinian methodology in epistemology would undermine skeptical arguments about knowledge.

This Austinian bias is certainly in the minority in the epistemological landscape, but later contributions (Gustafsson and Sørli 2011, Baz 2012) have shown how Austin's method has played an important role in addressing various issues in the contemporary philosophical agenda, in epistemology, and in of science can play the philosophy of language, in particular.

6. References and further reading

a. primary sources

• Austin, John L. 1940. "The meaning of a word." The Moral Science Club of the University of Cambridge and the Jowett Society of the University of Oxford. Printed 1961, James O. Urmson and Geoffrey J. Warnock (eds.),philosophical articles(P. 55-75). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Austin, John L. 1946. "Other Thoughts."Annals of the Aristotelian Society,supplementary volumes20, 148-187. reprinted 1961, James O. Urmson and Geoffrey J. Warnock (eds.),philosophical articles(S. 76-116). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Austin, John L. 1950. "Truth."Annals of the Aristotelian Society,supplementary volumes24, 111-128. reprinted 1961, James O. Urmson and Geoffrey J. Warnock (eds.),philosophical articles(S. 117-133). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Austin, John L. 1956a. "Apologies."Annals of the Aristotelian Society57, 1-30. reprinted 1961, James O. Urmson and Geoffrey J. Warnock (eds.),philosophical articles(S. 175-204). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Austin, John L. 1956b. "Yes, and you".Annals of the Aristotelian Society42, 109-132. reprinted 1961, James O. Urmson and Geoffrey J. Warnock (eds.),philosophical articles(S. 205-232). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Austin, John L. 1961.philosophical articles. JO Urmson y GJ Warnock (eds.), Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Austin, John L. 1962a.sense and Sensibility, GJ Warnock (Hrsg.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Austin, John L. 1962b.How to do things with words. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Austin, John L. 1966. "Three Ways to Spill Ink."The philosophical review75, 427-440. Printed 1961, James O. Urmson and Geoffrey J. Warnock (eds.),philosophical articles(S. 272-287). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Austin, John L. 1975.How to do things with words, James O. Urmson and Marina Sbisa (eds.). Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd edition.

B. Secondary sources

• Ayer, Alfred J. 1940.The foundations of empirical knowledge.. NovaYork: MacMillan.
• Yesterday, Alfred J. 1967. "Has Austin Refuted the Sense Data Theory?"synthesis17, 117-140.
• Bach, Kent y Harnish, Robert M. 1979.Verbal communication and speech acts. Cambridge: MIT Press.
  • The most important development of speech act theory towards an intentionalist/inferentialist framework of linguistic communication.
• Baz, Avner. 2012.When Words Are Necessary: ​​A Defense of Common Language Philosophy. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
  • The arguments against the philosophy of ordinary language are examined and dissected, and its general method is applied to the debate about the dependence of intuitions in philosophy and between contextualism and anti-contextualism in relation to knowledge.
• Berlin, Isaiah, Forguson, Lynd W., Pears, David F., Pitcher, George, Searle, John R., Strawson, Peter F. y Warnock, Geoffrey J. (Hrsg.). 1973.Essays on JL Austin. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  • Along with Fann in 1969 Austin's most important paper collection.
• BIANCHI, Claudia. 2008. "Indexicals, Speech Acts y Pornography".Analyze68, 310-316.
  • A defense of Langton's thesis that pornographic works are to be understoodillocutionary actsilence women.
• Fann, Kuang T. (Hrsg.), 1969.Symposium on JL Austin. Londres: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
  • The standard anthology of Austin's philosophy, featuring articles by various Austin colleagues and students.
• Gustafson, Martin and Sorli, Richard. (Property.). 2011.The philosophy of J.L. Austin. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • A collection of essays intended to reassess the meaning of Austin's philosophy and develop his ideas in relation to various issues on the contemporary philosophical agenda, particularly in epistemology and the philosophy of language.
• Hornby, Jennifer. 1993. "Speech Acts and Pornography."Feminine Philosophy Review10, 38-45.
• Hornsby, Jennifer and Langton, Rae. 1998. "Freedom of Thought and Expression."legal theory4, 21-37.
  • An analysis of pornography works like this.illocutionary actof subordination of the woman or illocutionary acts of silence of the woman.
• Kaplan, Marcos. 2000. "Why must an epistemology be true?"philosophy and phenomenological research61, 279-304.
• Kaplan, Marcos. 2008. "Austin's Walk with Skepticism". En John Greco (ed.),The oxford handbook of skepticism(S. 348-371). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Kaplan draws attention to common knowledge attribution practices as a methodological limitation that epistemology must respect and as a move that would undermine skeptical arguments about knowledge.
• Langton, Rae. 1993. "Speech Acts and Unsayable Acts."philosophy and public affairs22, 293-330.
  • A discussion of pornography as a form of speech act.
• Mackinnon, Catherine. 1987. "Francis Biddle's Sister: Pornography, Civil Rights, and Expression." In Catharine MacKinnon (ed.),Unmodified feminism: life and legal discourses(S. 163-197). Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
  • An impassioned plea against pornography as a violation of women's civil rights.
• Martin, Michael GF 2002. "The transparency of experience."mind and language17, 376-425.
• Martin, Michael GF 2007. „Austin:sense and SensibilityI visited again.London Philosophy Works, 1-31.
  • Austin's work on perception is discussed in terms of disjunctive theories of perception (Martin 2007) and a non-representative realist account of perception is presented (Martin 2002).
• McMyler, Benjamin. 2011. “Believe what a man says about his own feelings.” In Martin Gustafsson and Richard Sørli (eds.),The philosophy of J.L. Austin(Pages 114-145). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Precio, Henry H. (1932).perception. Londres: Methuen & Co.
• Saul, Jennifer. 2006. "Pornography, Speech Acts, and Context."Annals of the Aristotelian Society106, 229-248.
  • A critique of Langton's thesis.
• Wow, Marina. 2001. “Illocutionary force and degrees of force in the use of language”.pragmatics magazine33, 1791-1814.
• Wow, Marina. 2006. "Language Act Theory." In Jef Verschueren and Jan-Ola Oestman (eds.),Pragmatics Keys: Pragmatics Highlights Handbook, Volume 1(S. 229-244). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
• Sbia, Navy. 2013. “Language, idiom, idiom.” In Marina Sbisa and Ken Turner (eds.),Pragmatics of Speech Acts: Handbooks of Pragmatics, Vol.2. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
  • An overview of the Austin distinction and its reformulations.
• Sbisa, Navy and Turner, Ken (eds.).Pragmatics of speech acts:Pragmatics Manuals, Volume 2🇧🇷 Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
• SEARLE, John. 2001. "J.L. Austin (1911-1960)." In Aloysius P. Martinich and David Sosa (eds.),A Companion to Analytic Philosophy(S. 218-230). Oxford: Blackwell.
  • A biographical review and brief discussion of Austin's speech act theory.
• Smith, Arthur D. 2002.The perception problem. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
• Sperber, Dan y Wilson, Deirdre. 1986.Relevance: communication and cognition. Oxford: Blackwell.
  • Chapter 4, §10 presents a critique of speech act theory.
• Strawson, Peter F. 1964. "Intention and convention in speech acts."philosophical review73, 439-460.
  • The article that first discussed the role of conventional and intentional elements in the performance of speech acts.
• Travis, Carlos. 2004. “The Silence of the Senses”.Geist113, 57-94.
  • The representationalism of perception is defended, following lines of Austinian inspiration.
• Warnock, Geoffrey J. 1953.berkeley. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.
• Warnock, Geoffrey J. 1973. "Some Types of Performative Expression," Em Isaiah Berlin, Lynd W. Forguson, David F. Pears, George Pitcher, John R. Searle, Peter F. Strawson, and Geoffrey J. Warnock (eds.) ,Essays on JL Austin(P. 69-89). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 1953.philosophical investigations. Gertrude EM Anscombe (trans.). Oxford: Blackwell.
  • a discussion aboutuncountableUses to which we can fix our prayers.

Information about the author

federica berdini
Email:federica.berdini2@unibo.it
University of Bologna
Italia

mi

claudia white
Email:claudia.bianchi@unisr.it
Vita University greeting Saint Raffaele
Italia