Abstract
Also available in #Danto, Narration and Knowledge, 298‑341. An analytic philosopher's attempt to dissolve problems in the philosophy of history by distinguishing "causal" or "internal" relations of language and world proper to science from "semantical" or "external" relations proper to philosophy. Danto criticizes a futile dialectic in which scientists making causal claims about the contents of reality (including language) and philosophers concerned with the semantical values of representations (such as truth and falsity) which hold between language and reality, but make no contributions to the contents of reality, believe they are both arguing over the same object. Danto argues that there is no common ground upon which to hold this debate, but grounds for confusion in that any linguistic representation of an object (including "historical language" in its representations of "historical reality") can be treated both internally as part of a causal explanation or externally in terms of its veridicality. He holds that "history‑as‑science" which is philosophically concerned with external veridical relations between historical language and historical reality is always threatened by the possibility of falling into "history‑as‑reality," a crass instrumentalism which accepts historical representations as just more bits of reality without regard for their truth or falsity. From this perspective Danto criticizes "Relativism," "historicism," and "Verstehen" as a means of knowledge. (David Hennigan) (Abstract via Allan Megill)