The Jowett Society (Friday - Week 8, HT25)

Abstract: The idea that communication is fundamentally a matter of thought sharing – often referred to as the ‘naive conception of communication’ – has come under significant strain in recent years. It is however unclear whether the array of arguments presented in the literature target a sufficiently charitable, or non-naive version of this idea. In this presentation, I will focus on intersubjective variability (regarding the ways of thinking attached to a particular utterance) and underdetermination (of the proposition associated with an utterance in a communicative exchange).

My aim is twofold. First, I will highlight a distinction between two aspects of the traditional notion of sense or cognitive value: the “conditions for something to be the reference” of a concept or thought, on the one hand, and the “ways of thinking” associated with such conditions, on the other. Second, I will apply this distinction to the debate at hand to suggest that thought sharing in the relevant sense concerns the former and not the latter notion. Once this is clarified, I will argue, the considerations against the naive conception based on intersubjective variability and underdetermination lose much of their traction. This account might thus offer a more accurate and promising approach to thought sharing and its fundamental role in successful communication.