Research Group
in Analytic Philosophy

Abstract

The method of explication aims at replacing a somewhat vague concept, the explicandum, by a less vague one, the explicatum, for a given purpose in a specific context. A proposed explicatum is measured along four criteria of adequacy: similarity to the explicandum, exactness, fruitfulness, and simplicity. Since the explicandum is vague, however, the parlance of right and wrong does not apply to an explicatum. At best, one may compare explicata with respect to their usefulness. In the theory of explication, the debate centers around the structure and procedure of explication, the criteria of adequacy and relations among them, and the scope of the method. Although the debate contains many subtle and insightful contributions, one can worry about certain tendencies. One such tendency is to uncritically accept the set of examples Carnap‘s initial exposition of the method gave. Another tendency is to privilege certain types of examples without argument. In each case, such decisions have consequences for the final account of explication one accepts. The source of such tendencies is that, within the debate about explication, the method is rarely, if ever, explicitly connected to broader metaphysical issues. Background assumptions about such issues are present and effective, but not put at center-stage of the debate. As a consequence, it is hard to evaluate whether the method is promising, to what extent it is promising, and exactly for which kinds of problems it is promising.
I put explication in perspective; I examine what kind of shape the method takes relative to different fundamental background assumptions, or convictions. To keep the exercise manageable, I focus only on two distinctive perspectives. Abstractly put, each perspective is marked by certain convictions centering on “structural” issues such as meaning determination, vagueness, and truth in relation to which Carnap‘s initial examples and additional ones may or may not appear as clear and illuminating, or even convincing.
These convictions address the very motivation for the method of explication and, while in each perspective the set of good examples and, relatedly, the motivation for the whole endeavour vary, in both of them there is room for explication although in different ways. The point of putting explication in perspective is to identify decisive points of departure in the interpretation of the examples and to gain, by that, more systematic control of these in the theorizing about explication.