Third Paper Assignment PHL 303

(A)

Some philosophers accept a priori knowledge due to an apparent need to

accommodate into ones epistemic framework instances of the justification condition for a
given belief being independent of sensory experience. Analytic truths as well as
mathematics and logic appear to fit this description. Indeed there seem to be no shortage
of examples of propositions whose veracity does not derive or emerge from any empirical
data or experience. Rather, an epistemic agent seems able to apprehend the truth of some
claims simply by reflecting on their content that is, through pure thought or reason. Given
that the truths of mathematics and formal logic appear to be necessary and certain, some
may claim that a denial of the possibility of a priori knowledge - such that no proposition
with factual content can be infallible would involve empiricists in a kind of complete
scepticism. Similarly, there is a reluctance among many to give up the notion of necessary
truths, which Ayer, Hume and Kant all considered to be co-extensive with a priori
knowledge. That is, a claim is necessary if, and only if, it is known a priori for there can be
no appeal to contingent features of experience in claims of necessary truth. Such a
consequence is likely to be balked at by most and so many have either given way to
rationalism in saying that pure reason or thought is a genuine, independent source of
knowledge or sought to establish that we can know the propositions of mathematics and
logic a priori, but that they do not say anything about reality. To clarify, it is uncontroversial
that formal logic and mathematics express necessary truths, the necessary and the a priori
being co-extensive, and given that Humes mapping of the a posteriori onto the contingent
is widely accepted, empiricism must either make a significant concession to rationalism, or
provide an account of how a commitment to a priori knowledge does not violate the central
principles of empiricism. In either case, the acceptance of propositions being knowable a
priori is maintained.
(B)

Ayer suggests that it would be wrong to claim that empiricism is incompatible with a

priori knowledge and outright rejects the rationalist position on the matter. Rather, he seeks
to establish that the axioms of logic and mathematics and indeed any necessary
statement are both necessary and known a priori but are analytic statements in that

they have no factual content; they do not have any actual bearing on, or reference to, the
physical world, thus being compatible with empiricism and repudiating the notion of the
synthetic a priori. This appeal to the analyticity of a proposition forms a twofold strategy in
that Ayer attempts to show that a prioricity and necessity are nothing beyond analyticity,
and secondly that the notion of analyticity is compatible with the principles of empiricism.
Ayer defines analyticity essentially as truth by definition such that a proposition is
analytic when its validity depends solely on the definitions of the symbols it contains, the
argument going something like the following:
i)
ii)
iii)
iv)

A statement is analytic iff its truth is determined by the meaning of its

constituting expressions alone;
The truth of a statement is determined by the meaning of its constituting
expressions alone iff its truth can be ascertained solely by inspecting the meaning
of its constituting expressions;
The truth of the statement either p is true or p is untrue can be ascertained by
inspecting the meaning of the constituting expressions;
Either p is true or p is untrue is analytic.

If we grant that this is a correct characterisation of logic, mathematics and necessary

truths generally, then we can understand such axioms only by knowing the definitions of
their relevant constituent terms and that this definitional knowledge is enough to show that
a given proposition is true. To paraphrase Ayer, if one knows the function of the words
either, or, and not, then one can see that any proposition of the form Either p is true or
p is untrue is valid without recourse to experience. On Ayers view, understanding these
terms is simply a matter of deciding or stipulating that a certain class of sentences, or
inferences, will all be true. Thus, if all necessary and a priori truths are in this class, our
knowledge of necessary and a priori truths in an empiricist framework proves to be
unproblematic. Indeed, he claims that they are tautological, entirely devoid of any factual
content - aside from drawing attention to linguistic usages - and so cannot be confuted by
any experience of an epistemic agent. In this sense, empiricism may accommodate the
apodictic certainty of formal logic, mathematics, geometry and other necessary truths.
(C)

I find there to be several problematic elements with Ayers argument. Firstly, he

relies heavily on the notion of truth by definition, or linguistic convention, but does not give
a satisfactory account of what definitions actually are, which proves damaging for his

explanation of a prioricity in terms of analyticity. If, for instance, one were to interpret
definitions as a kind of notational abbreviation that, rather than having a functional role as
a premise to a theory, instead served as a license for rewriting theory, as Quine puts it,
then we have a relative notion of truth by definition. For instance, S can be true by
definition relative to S* if S* is both true and implies S. In real terms, we may thus view,
mathematics as definitionally constructible from logic. As a result, mathematics becomes
true by convention in a relative sense - mathematical truths become conventional
transcriptions of logical truths. This provides an explanation of both the necessity of
mathematical truths and the fact that such truths can be known a priori given the fact that
logical truths are necessary and knowable a priori. If this is plausibly the case, then Ayers
appeal to analyticity is weakened as logic must then rest on some manner of convention
other than definition now that the suitability of linguistic convention to serve as a
foundation for truth has been called into question. Ayer must therefore give an account of
how logic is true by convention in some non-relative sense which would explain its status as
necessary and a priori.
Secondly, if analyticity is to be used to explain both a prioricity and necessity, then
Ayer should be able to explain what analyticity is without employing notions of a prioricity
and necessity in his definition. I contend that this circularity cannot be avoided. To appeal to
Quine once more, he suggests a definition of analyticity such that a sentence is analytic if
and only if it can be turned into a logical truth by replacing synonyms with other synonyms.
As such, Ayer must provide a non-circular explanation of logical truth and synonymy. Logical
truth proves to be unproblematic in this regard, but synonymy poses more of an issue, even
if we take its most promising definition, such that two expressions e1 and e2 are
synonymous if e1 can be substituted for e2 in any intensional sentence without changing its
truth value. The argument that Ayer falls into a kind of circularity takes the following form:
1.

Statements have extensions and intensions and whether or not a statement has an
extension is a matter of whether or not its constituents have extensions.

2. Whether or not words have extensions depends on what other facts obtain these
facts are not internal to the statement. Therefore, necessarily true statements are
not true by virtue of their extensions.

3. Intensions are the linguistic meanings of words and are something a word can have
independently of any matter of fact external to their own meaning.
4. However, if linguistic meanings are something words can have independently of any
matter of fact external to their own meaning, then statements can have meanings
independently of matters of fact.
5. So, the only types of statements that can be necessarily true are those that are true
only by virtue of their meaning.
6. But the only type of statement that is true only by virtue of the meanings they have
are analytic statements.
7. Therefore, to say necessarily all As are also Bs is to say something like It is
analytically true that all As are Bs.
8. However, this presupposes analyticity in order to be able to make sense out of the
sentential operator it is necessarily the case that, which was to be used in a noncircular manner in order to identify analytic truths.
9. Therefore, we cannot produce an adequate account of analyticity in terms of
synonymy.

Due to the above considerations, the strength of Ayers arguments regarding the
compatibility of a priori knowledge with his form of empiricism is diminished.