A Non-Reductionist Response to Kripke’s Wittgenstein’s Sceptical Argument

Abstract

Abstract This chapter uses the notion of blind rule-following defended in Chapter 4 to provide a non-reductionist response to the sceptical argument about meaning adumbrated in Chapter 2 above. Accepting a rule is a matter of intending to exercise an ability to conform one’s behaviour to the dictates of the rule; understanding a linguistic expression in a particular way is a matter of having an intention to exercise an ability to use the expression in accord with a correctness condition. Crucially, exercise of the relevant abilities needn’t be mediated by interpretation. The chapter shows how this form of non-reductionism avoids the objections to primitivism raised by Kripke’s Wittgenstein in the course of the sceptical argument. It argues that recent work fails to respect the insights of §201(b). It finishes by responding to a number of objections.