Tetralogue by Timothy Williamson is a philosophy book for the commuter age. In a tradition going back to Plato, Timothy Williamson uses a fictional conversation to explore questions about truth and falsity, knowledge and belief. Four people with radically different outlooks on the world meet on a train and start talking about what they believe. Their conversation varies from cool logical reasoning to heated personal confrontation. Each starts off convinced that he or she is right, but then doubts creep in. During February, we will be posting a series of extracts that cover the viewpoints of all four characters in Tetralogue. What follows is an extract exploring Roxanna’s perspective.
Roxanna is a heartless logician with an exotic background. She would much rather be right than be liked, and as a result she argues mercilessly with the other characters.
Roxana: You appear not to know much about logic.
Sarah: What did you say?
Roxana: I said that you appear not to know much about logic.
Sarah: And you appear not to know much about manners.
Roxana: If you want to understand truth and falsity, logic will be more useful than manners. Do any of you remember what Aristotle said about truth and falsity?
Bob: Sorry, I know nothing about Aristotle.
Zac: It’s on the tip of my tongue.
Sarah: Aristotelian science is two thousand years out of date.
Roxana: None of you knows. Aristotle said ‘To say of what is that it is not, or of what is not that it is, is false, while to say of what is that it is, or of what is not that it is not, is true’. Those elementary principles are fundamental to the logic of truth. They remain central in contemporary research. They were endorsed by the greatest contributor to the logic of truth, the modern Polish logician Alfred Tarski.
Bob: Never heard of him. I’m sure Aristotle’s saying is very wise; I wish I knew what it meant.
Roxana: I see that I will have to begin right at the very beginning with these three.
Sarah: We can manage quite well without a lecture from you, thank you very much.
Roxana: It is quite obvious that you can’t.
Roxana: It is quite obvious that you can’t.
Zac: I’m afraid I didn’t catch your name.
Roxana: Of course you didn’t. I didn’t say it.
Zac: May I ask what it is?
Roxana: You may, but it is irrelevant.
Bob: Well, don’t keep us all in suspense. What is it?
Roxana: It is ‘Roxana’.
Zac: Nice name, Roxana. Mine is ‘Zac’, by the way.
Bob: I hope our conversation wasn’t annoying you.
Roxana: Its lack of intellectual discipline was only slightly irritating.
Bob: Sorry, we got carried away. Just to complete the introductions, I’m Bob, and this is Sarah.
Roxana: That is enough time on trivialities. I will explain the error in what the woman called ‘Sarah’ said.
Sarah: Call me ‘Sarah’, not ‘the woman called “Sarah” ’, if you please.
Bob: ‘Sarah’ is shorter.
Sarah: Not only that. We’ve been introduced. It’s rude to describe me at arm’s length, as though we weren’t acquainted.
Roxana: If we must be on first name terms, so be it. Do not expect them to stop me from explaining your error. First, I will illustrate Aristotle’s observation about truth and falsity with an example so simple that even you should all be capable of understanding it. I will make an assertion.
Bob: Here goes.
Roxana: Do not interrupt.
Bob: I was always the one talking at the back of the class.
Zac: Don’t worry about Bob, Roxana. We’d all love to hear your assertion. Silence, please, everyone.
Roxana: Samarkand is in Uzbekistan.
Sarah: Is that it?
Roxana: That was the assertion.
Bob: So that’s where Samarkand is. I always wondered.
Roxana: Concentrate on the logic, not the geography. In making that assertion about Samarkand, I speak truly if, and only if, Samarkand is in Uzbekistan. I speak falsely if, and only if, Samarkand is not in Uzbekistan.
Zac: Is that all, Roxana?
Roxana: It is enough.
Bob: I think I see. Truth is telling it like it is. Falsity is telling it like it isn’t. Is that what Aristotle meant?
Roxana: That paraphrase is acceptable for the present.
Have you got something you want to say to Roxanna? Do you agree or disagree with her? Tetralogue author Timothy Williamson will be getting into character and answering questions from Roxanna’s perspective via @TetralogueBook on Friday 20th March from 2-3pm GMT. Tweet your questions to him and wait for Roxanna’s response!
The post Trains of thought: Roxanna appeared first on OUPblog.
Tetralogue by Timothy Williamson is a philosophy book for the commuter age. In a tradition going back to Plato, Timothy Williamson uses a fictional conversation to explore questions about truth and falsity, knowledge and belief. Four people with radically different outlooks on the world meet on a train and start talking about what they believe. Their conversation varies from cool logical reasoning to heated personal confrontation. Each starts off convinced that he or she is right, but then doubts creep in. During February, we will be posting a series of extracts that cover the viewpoints of all four characters in Tetralogue. What follows is an extract exploring Bob’s perspective.
Bob is just an ordinary guy who happens to be scared of witches. His beliefs are strongly rooted in personal experience, and this approach brings him to blows with the unyelidingly scientific Sarah.
Sarah: That’s unfair! You don’t expect all the scientific resources of the Western world to be concentrated on explaining why your garden wall collapsed, do you? I’m not being dogmatic, there’s just no reason to doubt that a scientific explanation could in principle be given.
Bob: You expect me to take that on faith? You don’t always know best, you know. I’m actually giving you an explanation. (Mustn’t talk too loud.) My neighbour’s a witch. She always hated me. Bewitched my wall, cast a spell on it to collapse next time I was right beside it. It was no coincidence. Even if you had your precious scientific explanation with all its atoms and molecules, it would only be technical details. It would give no reason why the two things happened at just the same time. The only explanation that makes real sense of it is witchcraft.
Sarah: You haven’t explained how your neighbour’s muttering some words could possibly make the wall collapse.
Bob: Who knows how witchcraft works? Whatever it does, that old hag’s malice explains why the wall collapsed just when I was right beside it. Anyway, I bet you can’t explain how deciding in my own mind to plant some bulbs made my legs actually move so I walked out into the garden.
Sarah: It’s only a matter of time before scientists can explain things like that. Neuroscience has made enormous progress over the last few years, discovering how the brain and nervous system work.
Bob: So you say, with your faith in modern science. I bet expert witches can already explain how spells work. They wouldn’t share their knowledge around. Too dangerous. Why should I trust modern science more than witchcraft?
Sarah: Think of all the evidence for modern science. It can explain so much. What evidence is there that witchcraft works?
Bob: My garden wall, for a start.
Sarah: No, I mean proper evidence, statistically significant results of controlled experiments and other forms of reliable data, which science provides.
Bob: You know how witches were persecuted, or rightly punished, in the past. Lots of them were tortured and burnt. It could happen again, if they made their powers too obvious, doing things that could be proved in court. Do you expect them to let themselves be trapped like that again? Anyway, witchcraft is so unfashionable in scientific circles, how many scientists would risk their academic reputations taking it seriously enough to research on it, testing whether it works?
Sarah: Modern science has put men on the moon. What has witchcraft done remotely comparable to that?
Bob: For all we know, that alleged film of men on the moon was done in a studio on earth. The money saved was spent on the military. Anyway, who says witchcraft hasn’t put women on the moon? Isn’t assuming it hasn’t what educated folk call ‘begging the question’?
Sarah: I can’t believe I’m having this conversation. Do you seriously deny that scientific journals are full of evidence for modern scientific theories? Isn’t all of that evidence against witchcraft?
Bob: How do we know how much of that so-called evidence is genuine? There have been lots of scandals recently about scientists faking their results. For all we know, the ones who get caught are only the tip of the iceberg.
Sarah: Well, if you prefer, look at all the successful technology around you. You’re sitting on a train, and I notice you have a laptop and a mobile phone. Think of all the science that went into them. You’re not telling me they work by witchcraft, are you?
Bob: Lots of modern science and technology is fine in its own way. I went to hospital by ambulance, not broom, thank goodness. None of that means modern science can explain everything.
Have you got something you want to say to Bob? Do you agree or disagree with him? Tetralogue author Timothy Williamson will be getting into character and answering questions from Bob’s perspective via @TetralogueBook on Friday 6th March from 2-3pm GMT. Tweet your questions to him and wait for Bob’s response!
The post Trains of thought: Bob appeared first on OUPblog.
