....

Of course it makes perfectly good sense to talk about rejecting or

correcting commonsense beliefs and there are no doubt many strata of
them. Some of them may be properly called philosophical, like for example
belief that there are minds or spirits and that they are separable from bodies,
that there there are bodies or physical objects in general, or perhaps even
that there are values and that they are involved in the very structure of
natural change and causality. Certainly all such beliefs can be called into
question and possibly rejected or corrected. But the philosophical appeal to
commonsense categories is not an appeal to commonsense beliefs,
especially not to commonsensense philosophical beliefs, for indeed they
stand in need of philosophical criticism and correction.
he philosopher appeals to something far more basic and fundamental
than beliefs of any kind!he appeals to that structure of commitments in
terms of "hich beliefs, attitudes, intentions, experiences, thoughts, actions
and the like are possible. #ll of these are mental states or performances.
hey are possible only to the extent the maind has the capacity to structure
itself into such states and acts. his capability, insofar as it is relevant for
our purposes, is constituted by categorial commitments. $n fact, for the mind
to have a set of categorial commitments is for it to have the capability of
certain kinds of experiences, thoughts attitudes, intentions, actions and the
like.
%anguage is very closely related to mind. $t "ill serve us "ell as an
analogy. %anguage has a basic structure "hich makes it possible for us to
make statements of various kinds, to ask questions, to give instructions, and
to perform other linguistic acts. # language "hich lacked a naming
capability, for example, if "e could call it a language at all, "ould be lacking
in categorial equipment. $n like manner, a mind incapable of experiencing
objects as in an objective space&time continuum as distinct from objects
simply as contents of consciousness "ould lack certain categorial
equipment. $t "ould lack the capability of genuinely operating in experience
and thought "ith the category of physical objects' or, in short, physical
objects "ould not be category for such a mind.
$t is a fundamental thesis of our position that the categorial commitments
of the mind sho" themselves in the form or structure of experience, thought
and action in the "ay in "hich the categorial commitments of a language
sho" themselves in the structure of sentences. $n fact, "e contend that
there can be no separation of language from mind. he structure of a
language is the structure of a mind. he higher acts of the human mind are
linguistically dependent, for language is their instrument. (hen "e think in
a language our thought has the structure of the language. Our experiences,
especially those "hich are distinct and clearly delineated, may be
linguistically expressed or articulated in much the same "ay as our thoughts
and beliefs....he fact that experiences lend themselves to such translation
or articulation "ould seem to imply that the experiences and the sentences
"hich articulate them have a common categorial structure, for if it "ere
other"ise our language "ould not have the categorial capability of saying
"hat "e experience.
$f this is a correct vie" of the categories of commonsense experience and
language, "hat kind of sense can "e make out of talk about rejecting or
correcting the categories of commonsense)
*erhaps those "ho speak this "ay think that reality has its o"n categorial
structure per se and that someho" the philosopher can get at that structure
and in terms of his kno"ledge of it and reject or correct the categories of
commonsense....$ "ish to contend that there is no "ay of getting at and
talking about the categorial structure of the "orld per se. #ll such talk about
the "orld is necessarily of it in relation to some "ay of experiencing it and to
some language in "hich "e talk about it.
he classical rationalist seems to have thought that "e could talk about
the categorial structure of the "orld per se, for he thought rational intuition
could so discern the necessary structure of reality. But even if "e admitted
such an epistemic capability "e "ould not be entitled to talk about the "orld
per se, but only about the structure of the "orld as discerned by this faculty.
his $ assume "as +ant,s point in talking about the objects of a possible
rational intuition as noumena rather than as things in themselves. here is
no reason to assume that such noumena "ould be any closer to things per
se than phenomenal. -urthermore, any such intuition, insofar as it could be
regarded as yielding kno"ledge about the "orld, "ould have to be
linguistically expressible, and the categorial structure of the language "ould
transcend and indeed structure the kno"ledge formulated in it. his
language "ould be either the commonsense language or one specially suited
to the categorial capabilities of the rational faculty. $n the former case, the
categories of common sense "ould be operative in such kno"ledge and it
"ould not di.er categorially from connsense kno"ledge. $n the latter case,
although it might be categorially di.erent from commonsense kno"ledge, it
could not be used to reject or to correct commonsense categories. *erhaps
"e "ould simply have to accept both. But there is no such alternative
language and "e need not bother to decide "hat "e "ould do if there "ere.
One might claim that even though "e cannot correct the categories of
experience by fnding the categories of reality per se to be di.erent, "e can
make sense out of talk about rejecting or correcting the categories of
commonsense language by virtue of the possibility that they do not coincide
"ith the categories of mind and that "e can get at the categorial structure of
experience and thought independently of the categorial structure of
language and vice versa. $f this "ere possible it might be said that "e could
reconstruct the structure of language to make it /t the structure of
experience and thought. But such a distinction cannot be made out. o get
at, to investigate and to talk about the categorial structure of experience
involves putting it into language and so our analysis of it and talk about it is
of it as formulated in language and therefore as haing the structure of that
language. he situation is further confounded by the fact that our analysis of
and talk about the categorial structure of experience and thought must be
carried on in our language. herefore "e could not possibly /nd that the
categorial structure of our experience and thought "as di.erent from that of
the categorial structure of our commonsense thought....
#s $ suggested earlier, experience and language are very much alike and
may be thought of together. hey both have a semantic dimension!they
have objects. he very concept of an object is semantic. 0othing is an
object except insofar as it stands in a semantic relation, except insofar as it
is the object of an experience, of a thought, of a term in a sentence, or the
like. Both experience and language stand in logical relations' nothing else
does. 1xperiences may be veridical or illusory "here sentences may be true
of false' decisions and actions may be valid or justi/ed as "ell as imperative
sentences. $n describing either experience or language in use, "e have to
talk about that "hich it is about!its objects....(e can experience "hat has
been asserted in language. $t makes sense to talk about "hat is in a novel,
about the people in it and "hat they do, the houses, rivers, and landscapes
and the like in it. $t also makes sense to talk about "hat is in a person,s
mind, including "hat is in his dreams, his "akening experiences, his
thoughts, his intentions, his plans and the like. $t makes sense to ask
"hether that "hich is in a book is also in the "orld. $t makes the same kind
of sense to ask "hether that "hich is in a mind is also in the "orld.
2ere "e come upon the concept of the "orld. (hat kind of concept is
this) $t is obviously not an empirical concept. 0o theory of empirical
concept formation could account for it. $t could not be formed from the
experience of objects, for it must be operative in the experience of objects. $
suggest that "e cannot understand the concept except in relation to the
concept of mind or language. (e must /rst be concerned "ith "hat is in
mind or language. 2ere no important distinction is being made. $f everything
in mind cannot be put into language, certainly everything in language is
already in mind, for language means or functions semantically only as an
instrument of mind. (e /nd a distinction among things in the mind such
that "e say of some of them that they are in the mind only. Others "e say
are not only in the mind but in the "orld as "ell. $t is in marking this
distinction that the concept of the "orld has its place. he "orld is the
matrix in "hich "e locate objects of certain kinds of experience as distinct
from others, namely those "hich are appraised in epistemic categories.
Contents of non&epistemic experiences are not assigned to or located in the
"orld. 2ere $ am not talking about merely veridical experiences, even
though it is true that "e assign the contents of such experiences to the
external "orld. $ am talking about "hether a particular kind of experience is
subject to being appraised in epistemic terms. $n calling certain experiences
dreams, "e assign them a non&epistemic status. 3any "ould regard emotive
experiences as non&epistemic....
(e may establish that "e can talk about minds, physical objects, persons,
nations, particulars, universals, numbers, essences, spatial and temporal
relations, semantic and logical relations etc. 3any kinds of things may
appear to be in language. But the philosopher may "ant to kno" "hether all
these kinds of things that seem to be in language are also in the "orld.
here is only one "ay in "hich anything can be assigned a place in the
"orld, namely, as the object of an epistemic experience. herefore, the
philosopher has to determine by an analysis of the "ays it is meaningful to
talk about the di.erent modes of experience "hich are epistemic and "hich
are not. $n this "ay he determines our epistemic capabilities. 2e then
analy4es the meaning of di.erent modes of language to see if that "hich is
meant or apparently meant is the proper object of some mode of epistemic
experience. $f it is, it is given ontological status' if not, it is denied
ontological status. he limits of the kno"able are limits of the cognitively
meaningful and the limits of the cognitively meaningful are the limits of the
"orld. (e cannot conceive of ho" the "orld might be categorially di.erent
from the "ay "e experience it except insofar as "e might conceive of
experiencing it as categorially di.erent from the "ay "e do....
he noncogitivist in ethical theory, for example, doesn,t just /nd as a
matter of fact that value language does not have a cognitive function. 2e
operates "ith certain epistemological commitments "hich leave him no
other alternative....Ordinary experience and language have built in epistemic
and ontological commitments. (e cannot but operate "ithin these....$t
seems to me that a philosopher can hope to achieve success in his strange
enterprise only "hen he operates as a philosopher in such a "ay that that he
can achieve consistency "ith the epistemological and ontological
commitments built into his commonsense "ays of experiencing and
talking....