what follows from 'i promise . . .'?

Canadian Journal of Philosophy

What Follows from 'I Promise . . .'?Author(s): Robert M. MartinSource: Canadian Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 3, No. 3 (Mar., 1974), pp. 381-387Published by: Canadian Journal of PhilosophyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40230452 .

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CANADIAN JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY Volume III, Number 3, March 1974

What Follows from 7 Promise . . .?1

ROBERT M. MARTIN, Dalhousie University

Searle's famous attempt at what might loosely be called deriving ought from is has received much critical attention; but the main lines of attack on his attempt have been (as Searle himself has shown) irrelevant, mistaken, or otherwise defective. I shall here offer an account of what, I feel, really centrally has gone wrong with his attempt. I shall use the version of the derivation attempt which is found in Searle's book, Speech Acts.2

The attempted derivation has, as its important steps, the following statements:

7. S uttered the words, "I hereby promise to perform A for you, H." 2. S promised to perform A for H. 3. S placed himself under a (prima facie) obligation to perform

AforH. 4. S is under a (prima facie) obligation to perform A for H. 5. S ought (prima facie) to do A for H.3 Now, I admit that, with suitable qualifications and additions of

uncontroversial premises, the derivation of steps 3-5 can be accom- plished from step 2. If S promised to perform A for H, then S placed himself under a prima facie obligation to do A for H, and ought, prima facie, to do A for H. This is the case since promising is (means) placing oneself under an obligation. There is no is-ought jump here, for to say that S promised is already to mean that he ought (prima 1 I am very grateful to Professor David Braybrooke for his helpful criticisms and

suggestions on earlier drafts of this paper. A version of this paper was read at the annual meetings of the Canadian Philosophical Association, June 1972.

2 John R. Searle, Speech Acts. Cambridge: The Cambridge University Press, 1970.

Chapters 3 and 8. 3 Ibid., p. 177, adapted. Actually this is a form for many derivations, where variables

are replaced by names of people, descriptions of acts, etc. 'Conditions C here refers to a complicated list of conditions that make the locution a genuine promise, and not some other speech act (e.g., a prediction), and not meaningless. Examples of these conditions: Act A is a future act, predicated of S; it is not obvious to both S and H and S will do A in the normal course of events; etc. This list of conditions is found

Ibid., pp. 57-62. I do not entirely agree with Searle's list, but I think that my dis-

agreements make little difference to the substance of this paper, and I shall ignore them.

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R. M. Martin What Follows from 7 Promise . . .?

facie) to do what he promised. The only passage here is from one sort of ought-statement to another, where the two are synonymous. I believe that the is-ought jump occurs between 7 and 2.

Searle says that 2 follows from 7 if: 7a. Under certain conditions, C, anyone who utters the words, "I

hereby promise to perform A for you, H," promised to do A for H; and

76. Conditions C obtain.4 It is certainly true that 2 follows deductively from 1, 1a, and 7b. What is in question, here, however, is whether or not these three premises contain anything which could be called an evaluative statement; for if any one does, then the passage from premises to conclusion is not an is-ought passage, but rather an ought-ought passage (which no- body denies is possible). It seems clear that 7 and 1b are descriptive; but I want to argue that 7a is evaluative. Searle claims that 7a states "an empirical fact about English usage."5 If it simply states what is only a empirical fact, then it is, I suppose, a descriptive statement. Is 7a the statement of an empirical fact?

Since to promise is to become (prima facie) obligated, we can telescope a number of steps into one premise which will make the evaluative nature of 7a more perspicuous:6

1a'. If conditions C obtain, and if S utters the words, "I hereby promise to perform A for you, H," then S ought (prima facie) to perform A for H.

Now premise 7a', together with premises 7 and 1b, directly imply the conclusion.

I suppose Searle should say that 1a' also states an empirical fact about English usage. (It merely is 7a, with substitutions of synonymous terms.) But 1a is not such a statement of fact. Some empirical facts about English users are: People (in general) who speak English perform locutions of this sort when they want to place themselves under obligations, and regard themselves (and other utterers of such locutions) as being obligated by virtue of their having performed such locutions under the appropriate conditions. The following statement is used to assert a fact about English usage:

/. It is a rule of the English language that: If certain conditions (C) obtain, and if a speaker (S) utters words of the form, 'I hereby promise to perform A for you, H', then S ought, prima facie, to perform A for H.

I take it that this statement is factually true. I have some worries about calling it empirical, since the existence of rules is not exactly

4 Ibid., pp. 177-178, adapted. 5 Ibid. 6 My telescoping does not burke any issues. I do not think that there is any problem

in going from 2 to 5, although some commentators have thought this. The passage from 2 to 5 is basically, in my opinion, the replacement of synonymous expres- sions. The purpose of the telescoping is to make the evaluative nature of 'S promised' more perspicuous, by replacing it with a synonymous but clearly evaluative locution.

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R. M. Martin What Follows from 'I Promise . . .?

something one might discover in as straightforwardly empirically a way as the existence of, say, craters on the other side of the moon; but there do seem to be empirical procedures that an anthropologist from some other society might use to discover this truth about the existence of this rule in our linguistic society. I realize that some might want to claim that the discovery of the existence of a rule in some society is different from the discovery of a mere regularity there, and that the latter discovery is straightforwardly empirical and the former not; I shall not, then, insist that / states an empirical fact. It seems clear, however, that / is a statement which should be called descriptive

-

an "/s-statement". But / is not at all equivalent to 1a'. The former refers to a rule and asserts that it exists as part of a certain rule-

system; but the latter seems rather ambiguous in function, sometimes

characteristically usable in a quite different way. To clarify this, let us

compare: ii. It is a rule of Kwakiutl Indian society that all gifts must be

repaid within a year with double the value, and

Hi. All gifts must be repaid within a year with double the value. Now, ii seems to be an anthropological descriptive /s-statement;

but how about ///? I think that Hi might be uttered with two different kinds of force.

(1) Suppose that I ask you, "What is the rule Kwakiutl Indians have concerning gift-giving?" and you reply by stating Hi. Here, it seems clear, the linguistic act you have performed in uttering Hi could have been performed in just the same way by uttering ii. In

fact, Hi, here, seems just to be a shortened form of ii. And if ii is used descriptively, as an /s-statement, then, in this use of Hi, Hi is also the preformance of an /s-statement.

(2) But suppose that you gave me one cow last June, and that you let me know that you expect me to give you two cows by next June: I ask you why you expect this, and you reply with Hi. Here, it seems

clear, you are not making an /s-statement at all; rather you are

using Hi, instead, as equivalent to: 'One ought to (or must) repay . . .'. This is a clear case of an ought-statement.

What I am claiming, then, is that Hi may be used either in a descriptive or in a normative way. One way of telling the difference between these two uses of the same sentence is to discover what is (loosely speaking) implied by7 the particular use of that sentence. When it is the case that you gave me one cow last June, with your use of Hi

normatively, you imply that I ought to give you two cows by next

June. /// used descriptively, however, has no such implication; it can be used with or without this implication, with the same assertive force. The complication is that when it is clear to speaker and hearer that the speaker is an ordinary Kwakiutl Indian, he may actually be

7 I am using "implies" here in a rather loose sense- not the normal logicians' sense of logical implication, but rather to mean something like involves or suggests indirectly.

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R. M. Martin What Follows from 'I Promise . . .7

using // not simply to give information about what's included in a certain mode of rules, but rather to make an ought-statement. Compare:

iv. People ought not to steal, v. I think that people ought not to steal,

vi. We think that people ought not to steal. v/7. Christians think that people ought not to steal. (Spoken when

it's clear that the speaker is a Christian.) v, vi, and v/7 can, in certain contexts, be used normatively, although they look superficially to be in descriptive form. The distinction between normative and descriptive, then, does not rigidly follow the form of the sentence used, but is a characteristic of the use of the sentence and not of the sentence itself; There is a distinction here, but it must be made in context, by considering what is implied by that use.

Now, let's return to Searle's attempted derivation, in its shortened form:

7. S uttered the words, "I hereby promise to perform A for you, H."

1a'. If conditions C obtain, and if S utters the words, "I hereby promise to perform A for you, H," then S ought, prima facie, to perform A for H.

76. Conditions C obtain. 5. S ought, prima facie, to do A for H.

Here, statement 7a' is of interest. If someone were to make this statement, would he be implying that S, whom he knew to have uttered the words in question under conditions C, ought, prima facie, to do A? If so, then it seems to me, the conclusion follows (in some sense) from the premises; the difficulty here, however, is that this would indicate that 7a' is being used normatively, as an endorsement of the rule; for it is only from this use of such a statement that such conclusions follow. But if 7a' is a statement of fact, answering the question, "What is the rule which English-speakers subscribe to regarding promising?" or "What rule regarding promising is part of the English-language-game?", then 5 does not follow. If it is being used in this sort of way, it is elliptical for, or equivalent to, "In the

English-language-game, there is the rule that: If S uttered the words. . . ." or for "Participants in the English-language-game take it as a rule that if S uttered the words. . . ." But 5 does not follow from any of these statements plus 7 and 76, any more than it follows from "It is a rule of Kwakiutl society that all gifts must be repaid double" and "I gave you the gift of one cow" that you must give me back two cows.

My attempt at showing that Searle has not provided a valid derivation of an ought-statement from exclusively /s-statements, then, takes the following form: I claim that, if we take all the premises as is- statements (a permissible option, since all those sentences may thus be used), then the conclusion does not follow; the conclusion follows if we take 7a' as an ought-statement, but then the premises are not all /s-statements. I think Searle's argument is a sort of equivocation:

384




we are urged, at first, to take la' as an /s-statement, but then the conclusion is derived from it as if it were used to make an ought- statement.

I think I have gone far enough at this point to provide a refuta- tion of Searle's claim that he has succeeded in deriving ought from is. But Searle's attempted derivation is peculiarly persuasive; in order to reinforce my claims, I shall consider a couple of counter-arguments to my position which, perhaps, capture the persuasive elements of Searle's kind of reasoning.

It might be objected: Surely we can determine if someone is playing a game (where game is conceived more broadly, as a system of rules) purely empirically, from inductive evidence; and since playing a game is being in the position that the rules of the game hola on the player (this is an analytic truth), we can conclude, From inductive evidence, that certain rules of the game hold on certain people; and if these rules hold, then if they do certain things, they incur certain obligations. So we can derive ought from is. The structure of this

argument is: 7. S has been doing actions D, E, F, in context K. 2. In general, people who do D, E, F, in context K, are playing

game G. 3. S is playing game G. 4. If anyone is playing any game, the rules of that game hold

on him. 5. Rule R is a rule of game G. 6. Rule R holds on S. 7. Rule R says: If anyone does A in context C, he ought to do B. 8. S has done A in context C. 9. Sought to do B.

What is supposed here is that 1 is an empirical fact, and 2 is an empirical generalization; 3 follows by induction; 4 is an analytic, conceptual truth about "games," and 5 is a truth about "game" G; 6 follows from 3, 4, and 5; 7 is a truth about "game" G, and 8 is an

empirical fact; 9 follows from 6, 7, and 8. The premises (1, 2, 4, 5, 7, and 8) are factual statements of one sort or another - /s-statements -

and the conclusion, 9, is an ought-statement. Q. E. D.?

But let us examine step 4 carefully. This step allows passage from the statement that S is playing G to the statement that the rules of G hold on S. Now, to say that a rule holds on someone, might be the normative endorsement of that rule, with the implication that the man should do what the rule says; or else it might simply be a descriptive statement, equivalent to "In that society, they have the rule" or "Here they think he should. . . ." Now, 6 allows the normative conclusion only if it is normative itself, as I have been arguing; but 6 follows from 5 only if it is being used descriptively. To state that S is playing game G is not to endorse the rules which constitute G. If we already endorse G, or are ourselves playing G sincerely, then we would be willing to assert that the obligations implied by the rules of the game hold on any player. But we can state that K, a Kwakiutl, is "playing" the "game" according to which gifts must be repaid

385




double, and yet not endorse the rules of the game. Imagine that the rules further specify that someone who has not repaid double in a year should be brutally tortured to death. We could say, perfectly consis- tently, that K (who has not repaid) is playing (i.e., is participating within the society which holds to the rules of) G, but that he should not be brutally tortured to death. Anyone who endorses G must, to be consistent, admit that K should be tortured to death, but simply to say that P is playing the game G is not to endorse the rules of G.

I think that the argument commits an equivocation on the locution, "Rule R holds." This can be used in an evaluative or in a descriptive sense. What 4 should say, in order to be an analytic, conceptual truth about games is: If anyone is playing a game, then the rules of that game hold (descriptive) on him. So what follows is 6 in the

descriptive sense. But 6, for the conclusion to follow, must be in the evaluative sense.

This equivocation slips by easily; I think something like it slipped by Searle. The reason that this happens is that readers (and writers) of such arguments are themselves players and, most likely, endorsers of the English-language-game

- the arguments are written in English! And when one talks about rules he himself endorses, it is easy to confuse descriptive and evaluative talk. To a person who accepts a certain rule, it seems to follow merely from the fact that someone is playing a game that he is subject to the obligations which actions within that game entail.

But it is possible, of course, not to accept the rules of a game. It is even possible to play a game (or, at least, to do those actions within the scope of the rules of a game) without accepting the rules; we might cynically take part in a socially constituted game with no intention of obeying the rules which make up the game. I might, then, in context C, say to you, "I promise to pay you $5 tomorrow," knowing that you will take this as obligating me to pay you $5 tomorrow; but without accepting the rules governing my speech-act in the English language. I would not then be inconsistent if I say that I am under no obligation to pay you tomorrow. But you would say: It does not matter whether or not you accept the rules; it is nevertheless the case that the rule holds (evaluative) on you. You would think that I am under the obligation anyway. How can it be that you regard me as being subject to rules I do not accept?

This situation is not at all uncommon. We often regard people as subject to rules they do not accept. Those who accept certain laws feel that these hold on everyone in the society, accepters and non- accepters alike. You might argue, in the promising case: The English- language-game is a well-established social game in our culture, and everyone in our culture who acts wjthin the scope of that game (performs those actions which are ruled on by rules of that game) thereby makes himself subject to the rules - makes it the case that the rules hold (evaluative) on him.

What seems to be lurking here is a further attempt to derive ought from is. This argument goes:

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R. M. Martin What Follows from 7 Promise . . .7

7. The English-language-game is a socially established game. 2. S is present in the society in which the game is being played. 3. The English-language-game includes rules regarding the perform-

ance of the locution, "I hereby promise . . ." 4. S has uttered the locution. 5. If G is a socially established game, and if S is present in the

society in which this game is being played, and if S performs any actions governed by the rules of G, then the rules of the game hold (evaluative) on S.

6. The rules in English concerning the locution, "I hereby promise . . ." hold (evaluative) on S.

But note that 5 is an evaluative premise. It says, in effect, that people ought to obey the rules of their society if they perform actions ruled

upon by such rules. To say exactly this is to hold a very conservative moral position- it disallows the morality of any civil disobedience and justifies the actions of Nazis in Nazi Germany. A more reasonable

position might be that people ought, prima facie, to obey the rules of their society. But this is also a moral position, and the statement of it is evaluative. It may be justifiable, but it is not itself derivable from exclusively descriptive premises. So in this latest attempt to derive ought from is, premise 5 is evaluative, and the attempt fails.

I conclude that consideration of the activity and rules of promising does not provide a promising way to derive ought from is.

February 1973

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what follows from 'i promise . . .'?

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