Skip to main content

Questions tagged [externalism]

The tag has no usage guidance.

2 votes
1 answer
81 views

In the Twin Earth thought experiment, why doesnt "water" turn out to be a hypernym (parent term)?

Background Putnam's Twin Earth thought experiment asks us to imagine a planet called Twin Earth, which is exactly like Earth except on Twin Earth their water is not H2O, but rather, XYZ. The ...
Hal's user avatar
  • 1,230
3 votes
1 answer
373 views

Why is Davidson's Swampman not an argument against Davidson's semantic theory?

In the swampman argument, Davidson imagines a character named Swampman, who is spontaneously formed from a swamp due to a freak lightning strike. This strike coincidentally arranges a swarm of ...
Hal's user avatar
  • 1,230
1 vote
2 answers
131 views

Are there canonical strong arguments for Moore's "here is an hand" argument proving that you are not me?

If Moore is wrong about the external world a strange situation emerge: the very skeptical people that criticise him must be inside Moore's mind. Actually, if the critics are right, Moore himself must ...
eugenio's user avatar
  • 29
-1 votes
3 answers
133 views

Burden of proof and solipsism

If we say that the burden of proof is on the one making the claim and thus we should only believe in something if we have proof and should otherwise discard it, than the saying that an external world ...
Rayyan khan's user avatar
1 vote
0 answers
60 views

"Hesperus", "The Evening Star", and externalist theories of concepts

If two names, "N1" and "N2", are introduced into the language for exactly the same purpose, but are made known to a speaker, S, in different circumstances, then it's possible for ...
Remster's user avatar
  • 111
1 vote
0 answers
31 views

epistemic externalism and content externalism

Putnam's original twin earth experiment shows that the meaning of "water" is determined by external factors. This is an epistemic fact about knowledge and meaning: What we really mean by ...
Amit Hagin's user avatar
  • 1,018