Disagreement and the Normativity of Truth beneath Cognitive Command A Thesis Presented for the Degree of PhD in Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen. 2014 Filippo Ferrari BA in Philosophy, University of Bologna MA in Philosophy, University of Bologna Summary of the Salient Points of my Thesis The following is a list of the salient points and original contributions of my thesis: • Chapter 1: I outline the basic features of the framework within which I carry out my discussion of the normativity of truth in connection with disagreement. I defend the legitimacy of what I call the objectified form of judgment in domains beneath Cognitive Command. I do so by arguing that objectified judgments are amenable to sui generis conditions of defeat that do not affect more subjective forms of judgment. This provides us with a functional story in support of the use of the objectified idiom in domains of taste, moral and comedic. • Chapter 2: I accomplish two things. First, I present some important features concerning disagreement and I critically discuss how they are manifested differently in different areas as a function of the subject matter at issue. Second, I provide a comparative analysis of disagreements in some areas beneath Cognitive Command (taste, moral and comedic). I give what I take to be the best explanation of these differences in terms of the variable normative role that truth plays in such areas – from a lightweight constraint in the taste domain where truth does not exert any deontic constraint, to a more robust constraint in the moral domain where truth exerts a sui generis deontic constraint. I also argue that this normative variability in the deontic constraint can be modeled by means of the notion of alethic suberogation. • Chapter 3: I outline a framework for understanding the normative function that truth might play in enquiry in which I distinguish between four different aspects of the normativity of truth: the teleological, the evaluative, the deontic and the axiological. For each aspect, I critically discuss the various formulations that can be given, and I defend what I take to be the best formulation. I take it that this framework provides a valuable tool for conducting a systematic investigation into the normative aspects of enquiry. • Chapter 4: I address the question: What conception of truth should we adopt in the light of the results of my discussion? I set two desiderata – normative lightness and normative variability – that an account of truth has to meet in order to be explanatorily adequate with respect to the phenomena discussed in this thesis. I consider Horwich’s version of deflationism and, relying on the framework outlined in Chapter 3, I provide a detailed discussion of the various normative challenges against that view. I argue that Horwich’s deflationism faces difficulties for addressing some of these challenges. I will propose my own version of deflationism – what I call minimally inflated deflationism – and show that it fully addresses the normative challenges. I also show that it provides a satisfactory account of our desiderata. ! ! ! Per Viola Acknowledgements I was lucky enough to have around many great philosophers and good friends during my PhD, who contributed in different ways to shaping the ideas presented in this thesis, and also gave me invaluable support and encouragement. A special debt of gratitude goes to my teachers and supervisors, past and present. Viola Ghidoni first introduced me to philosophy at high school in my hometown. Her passion for philosophy and her great generosity as a teacher persuaded me to become a philosopher. It is hard to overestimate the importance that Viola had on me, both on a personal and on an intellectual level. Sadly, she passed away few years before this thesis was completed. I dedicate this work to her. Eva Picardi taught me philosophy during my undergraduate study in Bologna. Through her lectures and writings, I first appreciated what it really is to do philosophy and how deep and fascinating philosophical questions can be. Crispin Wright has been my supervisor during the time of my PhD at the Northern Institute of Philosophy. It would be impossible to summarize in few words the huge intellectual and philosophical influence that his ideas and his way of doing philosophy had on me. His passion, encouragement, intellectual depth and honesty have been an invaluable and constant source of inspiration for me over the years. The many philosophical conversations I had with him during my PhD shaped my way of thinking about philosophical issues. And anyone acquainted with Crispin’s ideas can tell how deeply they have influenced the content of this work. I have been extremely proud to have him as a supervisor. Carrie Ichikawa Jenkins has also been my supervisor for most part of my PhD. I can hardly imagine how this thesis could have been written without her extraordinary support and philosophical talent. I have learnt from her much of what I know about truth and many other philosophical topics. Special thanks also to Annalisa Coliva, my external advisor, who encouraged me in pursuing my postgraduate studies, and gave me an extraordinary opportunity. Moreover, I am extremely grateful to Douglas Edwards for his many comments and critical discussions of my work. My conversations with him about truth, deflationism and pluralism have helped me a great deal in understanding some important details that I would have certainly missed otherwise. I have conducted most of the research for this thesis at the Northern Institute of Philosophy, where I had the chance to discuss my ideas with many great philosophers. I have immensely benefitted from: Guido Bacciagaluppi, Carl Baker, Francesco (Franz) Berto, Paolo Bonardi, Björn Brodowski, Thomas Brouwer, Eric Carter, Al Casullo, Ezra Cook, Aaron Cotnoir, Lars Dänzer, Dylan Dodd, Philip Ebert, Matti Eklund, Andreas Fjellstad, Peter Graham, Patrick Greenough, Casper Hansen, Richard Heck, Ole Hjortland, Gerry Hough, Torfinn Huvenes, Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawa, Nate Jezzi, Jinho Kang, Ivan Kasa, Balint Kekedi, Elisabetta Lalumera, Sandra Lindgren, Dan López de Sa, Alfonso Losada, Michael Lynch, Federico Luzzi, John MacFarlane, Aidan McGlynn, Toby Meadows, Giacomo Melis, Giovanni Merlo, Luca Moretti, Sebastiano Moruzzi, Julien Murzi, Nikolaj Pedersen, Walter Pedriali, Alex Plakias, Bob Plant, Matteo Plebani, Bob Plant, Jim Pryor, Grant Reaber, Mark Richard, Sonia Roca-Royes, Sven Rosenkranz, Marcus Rossberg, Andrea Sereni, Martin Smith, Declan Smithies, Paula Sweeney, Stephan Torre, Brian Weatherson, Han Wezenberg, Robbie Williams, Cory Wright, Jeremy Wyatt, Elia Zardini, Dan Zeman. A special thank goes to Sharon Coull, for her hard work, insuperable administrative skills, and, above all, for being such a good person. I should also mention that doing philosophy in Aberdeen would have been impossible without the great coffee from Kilau. I would like to thank especially Craig and Edwige Adam for their amazing coffee and friendship. I was visiting student at the LOGOS Research Centre for Philosophy in Barcelona, during spring 2011. I’m very grateful to Crispin Wright and Max Kölbel for arranging the visit. The time I spent at LOGOS has been great and very productive. I was lucky enough to have as a supervisor during my visit Max, who taught me a lot about truth and disagreement. He has been a constant source of philosophical inspiration during my PhD. In spring 2012 I was visiting student at the NYU philosophy department. I’m very grateful to Crispin Wright and Jim Pryor for arranging the visit, which provided me with a tremendous philosophical experience. I have benefitted immensely from the extraordinary philosophical atmosphere at NYU and especially from Kit Fine’s seminar on Truthmaking Semantics, Paul Horwich and Crispin Wright’s philosophy of language seminar, and Ralf Bader’s seminar on Topics in Ethics. I started developing my interests in normative issues while attending Ralf’s seminar. While I was in New York I also had the great opportunity to have insightful philosophical discussions about my project with Achille Varzi and with Carol Rovane. During the years of my PhD I have been visiting regularly COGITO Research Centre in Bologna. I thank all Cogitantes for extremely helpful conversations on many philosophical topics: among those I haven’t mentioned yet, Carla Bagnoli, Antonio Ferro, Paolo Leonardi, Paolo Maffezzioli, Alberto Naibo, Eugenio Orlandelli, Giorgio Volpe and Luca Zanetti. I have presented material from this thesis at various conferences and workshops, including: ECAP VII (Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Milan) in 2011, “Understanding Value” Conference (University of Sheffield) in 2012, International Summer School on Disagreement ( Miglieglia, Switzerland) in 2012, Second Reasoning Club Conference (Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa) in 2013, Relativism and Rational Tolerance Workshop (III), (NIP, Aberdeen) 2013, Final Basic Knowledge Workshop, (NIP, Aberdeen) in 2013, Pluralism Global Research Network: Workshop 1 (Yonsei University) in 2014. I’m grateful to all these and other audiences for extremely helpful feed-back on my ideas on truth and disagreement. Large parts of a final draft have been generously proofread by friends and colleagues: Thomas Brouwer, Nate Jezzi, Federico Luzzi, Alex Plakias, and Stephan Torre. I would like to express my gratitude for their help in such a tedious task. In writing this thesis, I have benefitted from a College of Arts and Social Sciences of Aberdeen University full scholarship from 2009 to 2012 and from a Royal Institute of Philosophy Jacobsen Fellowship from 2012 to 2013. I’m very grateful to both institutions for their financial support. I apologize in advance for all those people that should have been “acknowledged” but I did not mention. Moreover, I have left out “acknowledgements” concerning my extra- academic life during the time of my PhD – there would be too many. However, I wish to express my profound gratitude to four persons: Patrizia Arletti, Sergio Ferrari, Giulio Ferrari, and Valeria Roberti.