Should we trust our intuitions? Deflationary accounts of the analytic data

Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 103 (3):299-323 (2003)
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Abstract

At least since W. V. O. Quine's famous critique of the analytic/synthetic distinction, philosophers have been deeply divided over whether there are any analytic truths. One line of thought suggests that the simple fact that people have ' intuitions of analyticity' might provide an independent argument for analyticities. If defenders of analyticity can explain these intuitions and opponents cannot, then perhaps there are analyticities after all. We argue that opponents of analyticity have some unexpected resources for explaining these intuitions and that, accordingly, the argument from intuition fails.

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Author Profiles

Eric Margolis
University of British Columbia
Stephen Laurence
University of Sheffield

Citations of this work

The rise and fall of experimental philosophy.Antti Kauppinen - 2007 - Philosophical Explorations 10 (2):95 – 118.
Concepts and conceptual analysis.Stephen Laurence & Eric Margolis - 2003 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 67 (2):253-282.
The analytic/synthetic distinction.Gillian Russell - 2007 - Philosophy Compass 2 (5):712–729.

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References found in this work

Word and Object.Willard Van Orman Quine - 1960 - Cambridge, MA, USA: MIT Press.
Concepts: Where Cognitive Science Went Wrong.Jerry A. Fodor - 1998 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.
Naming and Necessity.S. Kripke - 1972 - Tijdschrift Voor Filosofie 45 (4):665-666.

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