A Study Of Davidson's Program Based On Transcendental Argument

It is a new task to restate the problems of contemporary analytic philosophy based on the approach of transcendental argumentation. Such studies, on the one hand, start a new approach for deepening the subjects concerning analytic philosophy, and on the other hand, shed light on reviewing and advancing the studies of transcendental arguments in the research background of analytic philosophy. This essay is just argued in this novel domain, which is said: reviewing Davidson's Program based on transcendental arguments. On the analysis of Davidson's series of works, we assume that the essential problem of Davidson's Program can be characterized as a transcendental question, i.e.,"The possibility of language-understanding/communicating". And thus, we take this transcendental question to govern the main topics of Davidson's Program. By analysis and discussion, we surprisingly found that the necessary conditions for the above question need the support of the main topics of Davidson's Program. However, the complete understanding and arguing of the main topics of Davidson's Program and their connections must be placed in the transcendental analytic frame about the possibility of language-understanding/communicating. Therefore, we believe that what we have done is appropriate, reasonable and effective. That is to say: it is appropriate that we take the transcendental question as the fundamental question of Davidson's transcendental argument; and it is reasonable to unify the main topics of Davidson's Program under such a transcendental question; and it is effective that we have given the arguments about the support between this transcendental question and the main topics of Davidson's Program. The whole essay has seven chapters. The first chapter is an introduction which illuminates the background and the clue concerning the arguments. The body of this essay, from Chapter 2 to Chapter 7, is divided into two sections. The first section includes Chapter 2 to Chapter 6.The principal tasks of them are to throw light on the main topics of Davidson's Program and their correlations. Our starting point is to explain the semantic basis of language-understanding in the second chapter which shows Davidson's way to construct his extensional theory of truth and meaning. The third chapter deals with the problem of how Davison using this theory of truth to make meaning of language intelligible. And here, according to the discussion about the connection between truth and interpretation, we give the formal and experiential limitation on the truth theory, which make the theory applicable to natural language. In the fourth chapter, we try to clarify the most important method of the theory of interpretation, which is called radical interpretation. This is a key point for language-understanding/communicating, since the ultimate purpose of the method is to understand the meaning of other person's thought and words. However, to make the radical interpretation possible, we have to consider holism, the principle of charity and semantic externalism as our ontological-epistemological justification. This topic is discussed in the fifth chapter, where we claim that only when these three ideas are fine unified, can the problem of "How is radical interpretation possible?"be solved. And in the sixth chapter we make efforts to explain the novel model of triangulation. It is a unified comprehensive model and as a content-constructing model for langue-understanding/communicating, in which, we completely demonstrate the main elements for language-understanding that concerns norms, social factors and objectivity. Meanwhile, the relevant problems that present in the process of arguing the main topics of Davidson's Program and correlations between each other could also be considered as parts of problems about"How is language-understanding/communicating possible?". We may abstract the problems from each chapter and describe them as follows in turn: "How do we make it possible for giving or talking meaning based on the Convention-T?","How is a interpreter understanding a speaker's behavior acts possible?","How is radical interpretation possible?", "How do we make it possible for semantic externalism justifying the verification of belief?", "How is it possible to take triangulation as a comprehensive model for language-understanding/communicating?". By all of the presents above, we may see that these topics and questions are dependent upon each other and correlated with each other. They not only link up together, but also go forward one by one, which together consist of an integrated picture explaining the main topics of Davidson's Program based on the approach of transcendental argumentation. In the second section, the seventh chapter of this essay, we draw a conclusive analysis. In comparison to Kant's transcendental argument, we illustrate the basic structure and distinctions of Davidson's transcendental argument. Thus, we try to demonstrate its inspiration about reconstructing the methodology of transcendental argument,metaphysics and epistemology, and also for reviewing and reputing skepticism. In our conclusion, we expect, on the one hand, the appropriateness, reasonability and effectiveness of the stated above; on the other hand, we exemplify the possible researches for advancing this subject in the future. Through the conclusive reflection and concrete perspective, we make sure that our task possesses an insight signification and an expansible room. Above all, the chief creative work in this essay may be concluded as follows: (1) We abstract the fundamental transcendental question called"How is language-understanding/communicating possible? "as a transcendental reconstruction and analysis for Davidson's Program, which provides a rigorous analytic frame for us to further research these subjects; (2) When we discuss the attitude of holding-true in the radical interpretation, we clarify the formal and evidential bases of radical interpretation with a creative idea; (3) We define holism, the principle of charity, and semantic externalism as a ontological-epistemological justification by unified them comprehensively, while we reveal the relation of them going forward each other and conditioned each other; (4) When we try to apply the triangulation to redescribe the main topics of Davidson's Program and their correlations between each other, we propose an idea that the communicational triangulation is a comprehensive model and content-constructing model for thought and language; (5) We illustrate the distinctions of Davidson's transcendental argument by contrasting it with Kant's transcendental argument, which may lay the foundations for further research.