Abstract
This chapter provides a historical introduction to points of view at the same time that offers a key distinction between two different models for explaining them. Points of view can be explained, first, following the model of propositional attitudes. This model assumes that a subject, a set of contents, and a set of relations between the subject and that content constitute the internal structure of a point of view. If one chooses to follow the second approach though, as this monograph does, the internal structure of a point of view is not directly addressed and, therefore, points of view are directly identified by their function and solely understood as ways of accessing the world.
Isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful.
without having to believe that there are fairies.
at the bottom of it too?
—Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
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Notes
- 1.
See Vázquez Campos and Liz Gutiérrez (2011: 385) for a more detailed explanation of these important distinctions, which specify what a point of view is, what is its nature, and some possible relations between different points of view.
- 2.
Some conceptual approaches to points of view have been highlighted before, such as Carnap’s appeal to conceptual frames, and Kuhn’s scientific paradigms. Other conceptual accounts can be found in Newton’s notion of absolute frames, Kant’s conceptual schemes, and Wittgenstein’s forms of life. Non-conceptual accounts would include, for instance, Russell’s notion of acquaintance, the ‘what it is like’ character of phenomenal qualia, and Peacocke’s notion of scenario content, betwixt many others.
- 3.
To understand what is at the core of this distinction is crucial. As it shall be shown in Sect. 2.3.1, it is the only way one can distinguish between a Kantian approach of “following the rule” (in which the notion of principle, or maxim, determine every possible action) and a non-deterministic approach to it (in which the important thing is not simply to adopt a particular rule but to act according to the dictates of a certain ruling). See also Chap. 3 for an answer regarding to the question of adopting a point of view.
- 4.
In the Treatise of Human Nature, Book III, Part III, Hume is equally explicit: “when manifesting approval or disapproval regarding other persons’ character traits, we do not do so based only on how they appear to our peculiar point of view… but we rather fix on some steady and general point of view; and always, in our thoughts, place ourselves in them, whatever may be our present situation.”
- 5.
Compare to Kant (1781/1787: A146/B185).
- 6.
See also Williams (1985). For criticism of this position, see Putnam (1992) and Nagel (1986).
- 7.
Moore (1997b: 18) states: “Anyone who wants to talk seriously about the ineffable, or to engage seriously with such talk, must be clear about what the domain of discourse is… it is states of knowledge. There is nothing to preclude talk about ineffable states of knowledge. What is impossible is to put them into words. The connection I see with Transcendental Idealism is this: Transcendental Idealism is the nonsense that results when one attempts (unsuccessfully, of course) to put certain ineffable states of knowledge into words. At one point in the book, having made this connection, I add: I cannot overemphasize that this does not constitute any kind of defense of Transcendental Idealism.”
- 8.
The literature regarding indexicality is gargantuan. However, of especial interest would be Needham (1975, 1976), Prior (1957, 1967, and 1968), and Romney (1977–1978).
- 9.
To be fair, I believe that, more than Sapir and Whorf, Moore swallows Dummett’s inferential theory of meaning all the way in.
- 10.
It seems to be an apparent inconsistency in this point of Hautamäki’s system though. On the one hand, it seems that, in Hautamäki’s system, points of view are primitive and, therefore, cannot be defined as a set of possible worlds. On the other hand, as Hautamäki points out, “a PoV selects a set of possible worlds, namely, those worlds which have a structure or features presupposed by the PoV. In these worlds, the PoV is satisfied” (Hautamäki 1983b: 226). Points of view are primitive with respect to the set of possible worlds that satisfy the point of view in question. This solves, according to Hautamäki, the apparent illusion of inconsistency. However, as it was pointed out in Sect. 1.3, these points of view still depend on the defining relations of such a set, which entail symmetrical grounding relations between points of view and the set of possible worlds satisfying them. As this book defends, I prefer to think of points of view as fundamental.
- 11.
As indicated before, it may not be totally fair to claim an inconsistency between the different perspectives that Hautamäki’s works approach to points of view over time. As he pointed me out in different occasions, his different articles and books have a primary purpose to set light over the general notion of points of view, and sometimes the account provided is different. For instance, Hautamäki (1983b) is an article about dialectal contradictions. Here, Hautamäki employs possible worlds to define points of view. In other words, in this article, a point of view is a set of possible worlds; however, this position is abandoned in his future papers. Contrarily, Hautamäki (1983a) presents points of view in the style of Kripke’s semantics. Here, points of view are undefined elements comparable to possible worlds, where two special operators are introduced to check what it is necessary and possible, and it is proven as complete for several versions of logic (K, S4, S5, etc.). I appreciate Hautamäki comments to clarify this point.
- 12.
This logic is based on Chellas (1980) work about propositional modal logic. In some sense, this work is also related with the context of conditionalization in deontic logic (also proposed by Chellas 1974). As Brandom (1982: 324) says, a judgment tells us something about what range of possibly countervailing considerations has been taken into account under certain circumstances, but it is a question of particular valuation to determine the concrete appropriate action. In a similar way, in Hautamäki’s system, a point of view selects a set of possible worlds that have the structure, or features, assumed by the point of view under consideration. A set of possible worlds is consistent with a certain point of view. Then, the point of view in question is identified with a non-empty set of possible worlds that satisfy the conditions indicated by the defining relations of the point of view itself, the role structure it provides (Hautamäki 1983b: 224–6). See also Appendix D in Prior (1957: 140–5).
- 13.
A determination basis D = (D(i))I partitions a set of entities E so that the state function of E is an injection from E to the logical space XD (Hautamäki 1986: 30). Informally, it generates a Cartesian product of determinables, which bases the characteristics of an object expressed as a vector of determinates in a particular framework. For more precise definitions of these mathematical notions, I refer the interested reader to Hautamäki (1986: 38) and the references therein (see in particular Footnote 6 on page 60).
- 14.
It is important to notice that, with Hautamäki’s approach, points of view are not limited to define features of one, and only one, object (or whichever other entity of the world) at a time. One can emphasize this characteristic of Hautamäki’s account precisely because his logical system clarifies the theory developed in Sect. 4.3. By employing this account, the basis for defining a total space of objects in the world to which a point of view would provide access to is established.
- 15.
Hautamäki makes an interesting point about this. He writes: “Since the lattice of partial functions is continuous, the finite nature of a point of view will not prove to be a fatal restriction: Every total function is approximated by its finite parts” (Hautamäki 1986: 9). Since the number of determinables that form a certain point of view can be accessed is finite, in principle it is never possible to achieve a total, absolute representation of reality (contrarily to Moore’s suggestions in Sect. 2.3.1). However, the larger the number of determinables a concrete point of view provides, more accurate the approximation to reality that point of view offers. In Hautamäki’s words “it is the supremum of its approximations” and “it is the union of the points of view that it contains” (Hautamäki 1986: 79, 80). In posterior works, Hautamäki relates this impossibility of obtaining an absolute point of view to Keynes’ work on probability (especially Keynes 1921).
- 16.
In fact, Hautamäki (1983a) defines a Kripke-style model for this language as an structure <W, I, R, S, V> where W is a non-empty set of possible worlds, I is a non-empty set of points view, R and S are relations in W × I, or subsets of (W × I) × (W × I), and V is a valuation function from F × W × I to {0,1} such that
(i) V(¬p, w, i) = 1 iff V(p, w, i) = 0
(ii) V(p&q, w, i) = 1 iff V(p, w, i) = V(q, w, i) = 1
(iii) V(Lp, w, i) = 1 iff V(p, w′, i) = 1 for all w’ such that <w, i′> R<w′, i>
(iv) V(Ap, w, i) = 1 iff V(p, w, i′) = 1 for all i′ such that <w, i> S<w, i′>
Therefore, Hautamäki leaves also open the option of defining Rp as ¬A¬p.
- 17.
If one considers that truth-values can change, one will face the problem of semantic contradiction. But, according to Hautamäki (1983a: 195), this is not the case. One needs to consider though this kind of contradiction as dialectical more than semantic, like a kind of epistemological antinomy. Unlike semantic contradiction, where two conflicting propositions are always mutually exclusive, dialectical contradiction offers two different interpretations of the same object where one view complete each other. Therefore, this kind of contrapositions is understood as complementary oppositions. See Hautamäki (1983b).
- 18.
As Hautamäki has correctly reminded me in several personal communications, the idea of a functor for entities comes from the same nature of determinables, which would give a unique determinate value to entities when it applies to them. However, this definition of determinable is still formal: It is a couple <Di, Vi> where Di is the name of a property, or quality, or index, like color and Vi is the set of its values. Hence, besides the fact that the informal and epistemic interpretation of the status of determinables varies across Hautamäki’s work, the mathematical formalism that expresses it is the same. Modal Perspectivism employs such a mathematical formalism, since it is the better way to understand how points of view actually filter reality according to such determinables/functors.
- 19.
I agree with him regarding this point, and it is one of the reasons because I prefer to treat properties as dispositions.
- 20.
See Sect. 4.2 for further details.
- 21.
“An ontospace is neither given by the world nor is a perspective-independent representation of the world. It can be seen as a culturally constructed ‘archive’ of all dimensions possible in the context of discussion, referring to Foucault’s term (1972). Essentially, the conceptualization of the ‘world,’ manifested in the representational space, is relative to the perspective adopted” (Kaipainen and Hautamäki 2015: 254).
- 22.
Hautamäki has insisted to me multiple times that, besides the fact that it may be representational, this relativism cannot be considered subjective, since it appeals to objective, conventional perspectives.
- 23.
As Liz Gutiérrez and Vázquez Campos (2015a: 60–70) remind us, considered under a general scope Relativism is inconsistent if understood as showing maximal modal force, since it cannot state non-relative truth-conditions for states of affairs. Additionally, if consider as having a contingent modal force is untenable, for two reasons: On the one hand, it should be considered false because reality shows many spheres that seem to be independent of points of view and, on the other hand, its contingency seems difficult to combine with maximal generality.
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Colomina-Almiñana, J.J. (2018). Contextualizing Points of View. In: Formal Approach to the Metaphysics of Perspectives. Synthese Library, vol 392. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73655-6_2
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