Assertion and Conditionals
Assertion and Conditionals
Paperback
This book develops in detail the simple idea that assertion is the expression of belief. In it the author puts forward a version of 'probabilistic semantics' which acknowledges that we are not perfectly rational, and which offers a significant advance in generality on theories of meaning couched in terms of truth conditions. It promises to challenge a number of entrenched and widespread views about the relations of language and mind. Part I presents a functionalist account of belief, worked through a modified form of decision theory. In Part II the author generates a theory of meaning in terms of 'assertibility conditions', whereby to know the meaning of an assertion is to know the belief it expresses.
Product details
No date availablePaperback
9780521071291
280 pages
225 × 152 × 16 mm
0.36kg
Table of Contents
- 1. Cartesianism, behaviourism and the philosophical context
- Part I. Belief:
- 2. A theory of the mind
- 3. Belief and decision
- 4. Computation
- 5. Truth conditions
- Part II. Meaning:
- 6. Realism and truth-theory
- 7. Assertion
- Part III. Conditionals:
- 8. Indicative conditionals
- 9. Truth and triviality
- 10. Logic without truth
- 11. Generalising the probabilistic semantics of conditionals.
