[(Language, Thought and Other Biological Categories: New Foundations for Realism)] [Author: Ruth Garrett Millikan] published on

by Ruth Garrett Millikan

Preface by Daniel C. Dennett Beginning with a general theory of function applied to body organs, behaviors, customs, and both inner and outer representations, Ruth Millikan argues that the intentionality of language can be described without reference to speaker intentions and that an understanding of the intentionality of thought can and should be divorced from the problem of understanding consciousness. The results support a realist theory of truth and of universals, and open the way for a nonfoundationalist and nonholistic approach to epistemology. Ruth Millikan is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Connecticut at Storrs. A Bradford Book.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Linguistics, Language, Evolution

Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 1984

Reviews

[Dave Peticolas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whoa, I did it. I read this incredibly dense book reconstructing meaning, ontology, and epistemology upon materialist, realist terms. I had to start over at one point. But I made it and I'm glad I did. Not that the writing was bad, not at all. But the concepts were heavy-duty. Going to read more Millikan.

[Peachy Keen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Millikan's book will be challenging to read for those unfamiliar with the topic (basically, meaning, mental representation), since she engages with various preceding philosophers, but it will also be challenging for those who ARE familiar with the topic, since her project involves re-defining some main concepts (e.g., 'intension,' 'intentionality,' 'representation,' 'concept,' 'belief,' 'substance,' 'property,' etc.) and introducing new ones, as well as a whole new direction of thinking.

Particularly for those interested in the topic (and who've read in this area), the book is worth the substantial amount of effort it demands--sort of. But it is just so much harder than it needs to be. She gets off track too much in debating previous philosophers--sometimes when she does this, it clarifies her own position, but I wouldn't say it usually works like this. For instance, her disagreements with Leibniz and Aristotle about properties is essentially to say they have a different account of what properties are-- but her account is complicated enough that it's just a useless distraction, since their views--Aristotle's in particular--are weird themselves. How much weirdness must you subject your reader to at once, Millikan?

Don't get too hung up on the details of the book. The most interesting insights will come through even if you don't know what Wittgenstein said wrong or whatever. And you can come back to them.

[Pierrot Seban · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book (LTOBC) is so rich and dense. I don't know that I would have gotten as much out of it if I had not previously read the absolute masterpiece of pedagogy and synthetic exposition that is Beyond Concepts (BC), which makes frequent reference to LTOBC and allowed me to have the whole picture in mind from the get go. I went to read LTOBC attracted by the promise of a theory of natural functions, and boy was this delivered. But in the end, the master stroke, the thunderous proposition, is indeed the attack on what she calls "meaning rationalism", the idea that what our thoughts mean, or even only that our thoughts mean, that we have intentionality, is a priori or internal, something we can be sure of by inspection. This is such a huge deal that I won't know how to react to it for a while.

I would actually recommend starting with the more recent BC and then coming back to LTOBC if left wanting more, because it is a much more difficult book. But 5 stars for sure.

[Jerry Balzano]

Difficult book.
Worth the work?
Seems like it COULD be .. but ....