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What to read as preparation for reading some core “analytic” figures like Quine, Putnam, and Davidson?

Brian Leiter

A relatively new reader of the blog writes:

The reason I'm writing was to solicit your reccomendations on how best to go about learning the basics of analytical philsophy. I was a philosophy minor in college, from which I graduated two years ago, but never got a chance to take many classes in logic and dabbled mainly in older continental thinkers and simple applied ethics. I'm not a huge math person and I have to admit that some of the more technical aspects of the early analytical thinkers turn me off, but I'd like to get a sufficient background in the subject so that I might read later thinkers such as Quine, Putnam, and Davidson, who do seem to have some very interesting things to say. I really would value your advice!

What do readers recommend?

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27 responses to “What to read as preparation for reading some core “analytic” figures like Quine, Putnam, and Davidson?”

  1. Robert Johnson

    The Routledge contemporary introductory series is pretty good (e.g., Loux's *Metaphysics*, Lycan's *Philosophy of Language*, and Heil's *Philosophy of Mind*).

    Reply
  2. Marinus Ferreira

    The sooner you get over your aversion for the technical stuff, the better. Some of the most far-reaching work in analytic philosophy has been in philosophic semantics, which, after all, kicked the whole thing off. My advice is to familiarise yourself with the rise and fall of logical positivism: the extreme enthusiasm that followed the advances in logic and lead to verificationism, evidentialism, emotivism, (philosophical) behaviourism, etc., and then the various fatal problems all of these parts of the project came to face. This, I think, very nicely sets up the background for what follows, and gives a good idea of what all the technical advances and the emphasis on rigour and precision actually amounts to. Ayer's 'Language, Truth and Logic' is a magnificent statement of logical positivism, and philosophy has benefited no end to the clarity of his position and the various ways in which much of it has been shown to be wrong.

    Reply
  3. Michael Kremer

    It's pretty impossible to read Quine et al without knowing something about the technical side of things. Nonetheless here's a (rather long) set of suggested readings. All these can be found relatively easily.

    Gottlob Frege: the selections from Begriffsschrift and Foundations of Arithmetic in Mike Beaney's Frege Reader; On Sinn and Bedeutung (On Sense and Reference also in Frege Reader).

    G.E. Moore, "Refutation of Idealism"

    C.S. Peirce, "The Fixation of Belief" and "How to Make our Ideas Clear"

    William James, Pragmatism

    Bertrand Russell: "On Denoting," The Problems of Philosophy, Lectures on Logical Atomism.

    Ludwig Wittgenstein: Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

    Carnap, Hahn and Neurath: "The Scientific Conception of the World: The Vienna Circle"

    Moritz Schlick: "The Turning Point in Philosophy," "The Foundation of Knowledge" (in A.J. Ayer, Logical Positivism)

    Rudolf Carnap: "The Elimination of Metaphysics through the Logical Analysis of Language" (in Ayer, above); "On the Character of Philosophic Problems" (1st issue of the journal Philosophy of Science); "Empiricism, Semantics and Ontology"

    Alfred Tarski: "The Semantic Conception of Truth"

    Wittgenstein: The Blue Book; first 130 or so sections of the Philosophical Investigations)

    J.L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words

    Gilbert Ryle, The Concept of Mind

    Wilfrid Sellars, Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind

    Thomas Kuhn, Structure of Scientific Revolutions

    Well, I could keep going but this list would certainly keep anyone busy for a long time.

    Reply
  4. walto

    I think I'd start with Russell's _Problems of Philosophy_ if you haven't read that yet. Then read his "On Denoting" along with Strawson's response, "On Referring." I agree with the above comment that Ayer's book is nice way to understand logical positivism. I think I'd follow that with Austin's _Sense and Sensibility_, which treats it very harshly (and is really fun to read). Perhaps then you should move on to Urmson's _Philsophical Analysis_.

    When you do start Quine, be sure to start with "On What There Is" and "Two Dogmas of Empiricism" before trying _Word and Object_. For Davidson, be sure you don't miss "Anomalous Monism."

    Reply
  5. Colin

    Scott Soames' two volume history of analytic philosophy is a good overview, and fairly balanced in terms of technical vs. broader philosophical insight.

    But I'm also a bit confused about the question. Is the student expressing a desire to know more about the history of analytic philosophy or is the student expressing a desire to know more about contemporary "analytic" philosophy as practiced in Anglophone universities and journals? As far as I can tell the former is absolutely not required for the latter. Quine, Davidson, and Putnam are not terribly widely read, nor do they seem clearly understood, by the majority of Anglophone philosophers working today (or those under say, 45). Lots of name and slogan dropping, to be sure, but not a lot of clear comprehension and discussion (not that this is necessarily a bad thing).

    BL COMMENT: I take it the reader wanted to know what background reading s/he needed to do in order to be able to then read folks like Quine, Putnam, and Davidson. I am surprised by, and skeptical of, the claim that these folks are not widely read now.

    Reply
  6. Daniel Lindquist

    I'll focus on the specific figures named, since I more or less got started with those three, too:

    Just start reading Putnam. He's a good writer, generally. He also has a lot of synoptic stuff, and most of the things he's written since the 80s is almost conversational in tone. And he has a few pieces on Levinas, to tie in to what you are more familiar with.

    Quinean/Davidsonian themes will come up often enough in Putnam to help midwife you into reading those figures, but I would also recommend reading a little book by Quine & Ullian called "The Web of Belief". It covers a lot of Quinean topics in an introductory fashion, and was intentionally written at a level appropriate for sharp high-schoolers. If you find "Two Dogmas of Empiricism" baffling, remember that "The Web of Belief" gives you the sort of picture of inquiry Quine wants people to end up with, and work backwards from there to help figure out what's going on in "Two Dogmas". Once "Two Dogmas" starts to make sense to you, read Davidson's "On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme" for Davidson's critique of Quine. All of these can be read without any formal logic.

    Frege's "Sense and Reference" and Russell's "On Denoting" are good background to a lot of things in analytic philosophy, and are largely non-technical: They're in plain prose.

    Given who you want to start reading and where you're coming from, I would also recommend reading some of Richard Rorty's work. Just pick up some essay collections and browse until you find attractive titles. He has a lot of synoptic work bringing together continental philosophers and more analytic stuff, and is as non-technical a writer as you can find. Also, if you absolutely hate reading Rorty, that's probably a sign that you actually don't want to read a lot of Putnam/Davidson (or at least nothing either of them wrote after around 1980).

    Reply
  7. kurt

    Having taught "On Denoting" to some pretty good college-level students, I'm pretty sure they—and I—might quibble with it being "non-technical." But Russell's discussion of the basic issue in his Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy might be a better way to get introduced to these things (along with the Frege mentioned above). I guess I would suggest "breezing" through the Soames volumes, see what interests you, and then start pursuing those you find engaging. Certainly Putnam is accessible, and more accessible the more recent, the Quine and Carnap mentioned above are extremely useful, and Davidson's "Conceptual Scheme" piece (and Quine's rejoinder, "On the Very Idea of a Third Dogma," although "surrender" might be more accurate than "rejoinder) are all fundamental. I might add Rorty's "Introduction" to his collection "The Linguistic Turn."

    Oh yeah: get used to quotation marks, and the use-mention distinction.

    Reply
  8. Eric

    For the very basics, the Martinich/Sosa anthology "Analytic Philosophy-An Anthology" from Blackwell has most of the core readings of analytic philosophy along with an introduction. There's also a Martinich/Sosa Blackwell Companion to Analytic Philosophy which breaks down key figures in analytic philosophy (each thinker gets a chapter) with a useful anthology.

    There's also a cheap, but helpful, anthology from Hackett by Ammerman called "Classics of Analytic Philosophy" that helped me understand the basic framework of the development of analytic philosophy as a grad student.

    Much of what Michael Kremer mentions above, by the way, is excerpted or reprinted in these two collection.

    Reply
  9. Colin

    My confusion concerned the student's interest in "learning the basics of analytical philosophy" which, to me, does not clearly coincide with reading intensively in the history of early or middle analytic philosophy.

    I'm also surprised that no one has yet mentioned Kripke's "Naming and Necessity" – it's very clear, non-technical, and massively influential. Maybe it is not the best way to learn about Frege, but it is massively influential on how people read Frege or Russell.

    Also, I totally concede that specialists in a variety of fields might still read large quatities of Quine, Davidson, or Putnam. But I think that a great many people never get beyond reading one or two papers by each of the authors. Perhaps this would make for an interesting poll?

    Reply
  10. Ian Proops

    I'd recommend, in addition to Michael Kremer's very helpful list, the introductory syllabus for beginning graduate students compiled by my colleague, Sinan Dogramaci.

    This contains considerably more than the inquirer needs, but it might prove useful for further reading on selected topics. Incidentally, I'd recommend Russell's rich and yet accessible work, *The Problems of Philosophy,* as a terrific place to start.

    Reply
  11. Ian Proops

    Sorry, here's the link:
    http://www.sinandogramaci.net/Site/Teaching_files/Reading%20List%20for%20Ph.D%20students.pdf

    Reply
  12. David Livingsone Smith

    Simon Evnine's book on Donald Davidson is an excellent introduction – one that helped me immensely. Grayling's introduction to philosophical logic surveys a number of core issues in an accessible way.

    Reply
  13. Charles Wolverton

    A case study in following Daniel Lindquist's suggestion:

    A few years ago my position re philosophy was worse (or perhaps better?) than the reader's in that I had no formal (and almost no informal) background in philosophy. Once started down the philosophy (specifically, of mind) path, I almost immediately stumbled upon and read a good bit of Rorty (instant resonance), thereby having pretty good perspective (or at least a perspective) on Sellars ("Empiricism and Phil of Mind"), Davidson, Wittgenstein (PI), et al once I tackled them myself (or in the case of EPM, once tackled and thrown for a loss; subsequently obtaining the deVries-Triplett explication has been very helpful).

    Since I had (and still have) read very little of the early material, I found Roger Scruton's "Modern Philosophy" helpful as a reference for the many new concepts encountered. I'm obviously not competent to critique its content, but it has the advantages of being topically organized and covering each topic at a quite accessible level. The online Stanford Encyclopedia of Phil can sometimes serve that purpose, but I often find the length and comprehensiveness of its entries detracting from its usefulness in getting the basics of an unfamiliar concept.

    This approach seems to have worked well for me. It happens that I have extensive math and technical background, but the only aspect that seems obviously relevant is having learned to deal comfortably with abstractions. I'd guess anything that yields that ability (eg, con law) would suffice as background.

    Suggested Rorty readings, in order:

    "Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity" – first three or four chapters

    "Rorty and his Critics", which includes relatively accessible essays by Davidson, Putnam, Brandom, McDowell, and Williams – plus one by Ramberg that is noteworthy in that it changed Rorty's mind on some key issues but seems not widely known; I've used that essay as a measure of progress, having gone from initially understanding hardly a word to mostly "getting it" a year or more later.

    "Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature", his signature work.

    PS: My experience is too limited to mean much in support of "colin", but I read a lot of phil of mind stuff on the Internet, participate in blogs, and seldom see mention of Davidson, Sellars, or Rorty. I must be wrong, but it sure seems that familiarity with EPM, Davidson's "3 Varieties", PMN, and Ramberg's essay would be helpful in many discussions that otherwise seem to go nowhere.

    Reply
  14. Angus Lander

    I majored in philosophy at an excellent college, was a junkie for the discipline [took twice the required number of courses, spent a lot of time reading philosophy on my own], did very well at the undergraduate level, and when I graduated lacked the expertise necessary to really understand not only Quine, Putnam, and Davidson, but also most of the materials mentioned above as helpful introductory stuff. (Soames's book was largely beyond me – I got it, but only sorta; and Michael Kremer's list of greatest hits is, to put it mildly, not something you'd just throw at a philosophy minor [or major] and say, "Let there be light.")

    Now, maybe I'm a dunce-cum-crank who gamed the system, Man Who Knew Too Little-style. But the lesson I prefer to draw is that unless you are a savant (no, really, a savant), or have deep training in a related field, the only way to grok Quine, Davidson and Putnam is to do (lots of) graduate work in philosophy.

    That this isn't an alternative for most of us (including me) is tragic, but nonetheless true.

    Reply
  15. Nat Green

    The work of Quine, Putnam, and Davidson (along with their contemporaries like Goodman, Kripke, David Lewis and John Searle) is largely unthinkable without the prior work of four big thinkers:

    Russell, Frege, Wittgenstein, Carnap.

    So I would start with readings in the major works of those four thinkers.

    Likewise, the American pragmatists (both major, like Peirce and James, and minor, like C.I. Lewis) figure heavily, as does the work of Wilfrid Sellars.

    Once you've covered those bases, there is an endless story here in looking to the work of such diverse figures (past and present) as:

    Tarski, Gilbert Ryle, Alan Turing, GH von Wright, Schlick, Popper, Mach, Hempel, Neurath, Bolzano, Husserl, Whitehead, Ayer, Moore, the Churchlands, Dennett, Soames, Kaplan, JJC Smart, Timothy Williamson, Michael Freidman, etc.

    Keep in mind that some people, myself included, find that there remain many gaps in understanding about the history involved here: that otherwise minor figures and movements (such as neo-Kantianism) may be more important than generally recognized.

    Finally, I would also very much recommend this book from Oxford University Press:

    "Future Pasts: The Analytic Tradition in Twentieth-Century Philosophy"
    Juliet Floyd (Editor), Sanford Shieh (Editor)

    Reply
  16. Matt Drabek

    I can't quite say the same about Putnam, but Quine and Davidson are rather widely cited in the humanities, particularly in conjunction with some of the most-cited continental philosophers (esp. Heidegger). So, I might ask the original questioner to what purpose she/he plans to put Quine and Davidson. If she/he is looking to read those figures within the context of debates in contemporary analytic philosophy, then surely the only way to go about it is to read the standard (focusing on philosophy of language and epistemology) analytic canon.

    But if the idea is to read Quine and Davidson within a different context, perhaps the postpositivist tradition in the philosophy of science or within some of the debates in the non-analytic traditions, then reading the analytic canon might not be the most productive use of one's time. My recommendation would be to look at the contemporary debates you're interested in where Quine, Davidson, and Putnam are used. What texts are they citing? Read those. John Zammito has a rather nice book on postpositivism in the philosophy of science that would make a fantastic introduction for someone interested in those issues, and he begins with a discussion of Quine and Thomas Kuhn. If they aren't from the analytic canon, then plow through the Stanford Encyclopedia's entries on analytic philosophy and consider the Martinich/Sosa anthology.

    Reply
  17. Ian Proops

    @ Angus Lander. You might find reading Jason Stanley's excellent essay, “Philosophy of Language in the 20th Century,” which is cited in the Dogramaci syllabus I mentioned, a good way to begin to get to grips with what is, admittedly, a daunting list of figures. Other resources, of course, include the *Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,* and *Philosophy Compass*, which contain numerous helpful introductory essays on particular figures.

    Reply
  18. Timothy Scriven

    I would suggest that you don't trouble yourself by trying to read all the primary sources early on. Close attention to primary sources is important in analytic philosophy, but nowhere near as important in the areas of philosophy you've previously studied like continental philsoophy. You'll get a much clearer picture if you don't try to jump straight into the primary sources, and your reading will be more enjoyable to. Read well regarded introductory works like the Routledge introductions mentioned earlier this thread. I'd recomend you cover:

    Metaphysics
    Epistemology
    Philosophy of language
    Philosophy of mind (I personally recomend the introduction written by Jackson and Braddon-Mitchell)
    Meta-ethics and moral psychology
    (semi-optionally, since you've already covered it somewhat) Normative ethics
    (semi-optionally) the philosophy of science
    (optionally) political philosophy
    (optionally) aesthetics
    (optionally) philosophy of mathematics

    and read an introduction to logic, written for undergrads, covering syllogisms, the propositional calculus and the predicate calculus.

    Once you've covered that I'd recomend reading Soames' work "Philosophical analysis in the 20th century". After this, start to read up on primary sources at your leisure.

    Reply
  19. Jeff H

    As a graduate student working on the history of analytic philosophy, but not one prepared to read its history from my undergraduate or MA program, I can sympathize with your concern. I also was not a math person and struggled with logic. My MA program was a rather good 'analytic' department, but it had an utter contempt for any kind of historicism (even regarding the history of the analytic tradition!) and emphasized contemporary debates and interdisciplinary approaches to them. This left me in the miserable position of thinking I had what it took to read the older generations of analytic philosophy but not having the actual background knowledge (aside from wittgenstein) necessary.

    The older figures in the history of analytic are a bit of a challenge mainly in that their sense of the philosophical terrain (the way the describe problems, the various options they believe are available, the terminology that they take to be 'straightforward') can be surprisingly confusing to someone unfamiliar with their milieu.

    I agree with many of the suggestions already posted, and will try not to reiterate them. I do, however agree especially strongly with those who advised you learn about positivism, which will turn out to be extremely beneficial in not only understanding the dialectic that shaped analytic philosophy, but also the martial spirit of reforming zeal that animated that dialectic. Two works that help a great deal as accessible propadeutics in learning about positivism are "Language, Truth and Logic" by A.J. Ayer and "The Rise of Scientific Philosophy" by Hans Richenbach. Neither of them is, strictly speaking, a 'correct' account, but the get you started on the basics while keeping the reader engaged with non-technical prose. Once you're motivated to deal with this tradition, you'll see more of a purpose to the use of formal tools (and I've found that knowing this history has helped remedy my difficulties with logic somewhat). Once you're more engaged, Michael Friedman's "Reconsidering Logical Positivism" is excellent.

    Some other good books to keep in mind are Rorty's anthology "The Linguistic Turn" and Hans-Johnann Glock's meticulously researched and argued "What is Analytic Philosophy?". The last book is especially useful at preventing you from forming a glossy and superficial understanding of what analytic philosophy is based on only a handful of works. Finally, there are some good Youtube clips of Brian McGee interviewing various luminaries that were accessible from an earlier post on this blog. AJ Ayer does a summary of positivism, Bernard Williams of the ordinary-language movement, and Quine unenthusiastically explains himself. Davidson is a special case, read as much by him as possible, don't re-read one essay over and over thinking you'll just magically 'get it'.

    Reply
  20. Daniel Lindquist

    Wolverton's comment has reminded me that Davidson said he thought the best introduction to his later thought was "Three Varieties of Knowledge" (in "Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective"). "A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs" is another later paper that's very important if you want to get into Davidson's mature work. (I wouldn't start off by reading either of these, but they're both very important papers for Davidson, and for a lot of Davidsonians around the humanities. I've been surprised at where I've found "Epitaphs" cited.)

    Also, I'm pretty sure walto meant "Mental Acts", and not "Anomalous Monism", unless there's a paper by that title which I've been missing out on. ("Mental Events" is indeed not to be missed.)

    Angus Lander: What Putnam were you trying to read? I have a hard time believing a sharp undergrad couldn't get a lot out of "Renewing Philosophy" or "The Threefold Cord", but his early work (or even later work on, say, quantum logic and why he gave it up) is a different story.

    Reply
  21. alex

    Analyticity edited by Harris jr. and Severens is actually great, although I think its been out of print for a while.

    Ways of Worldmaking by Nelson Goodman is an absolute must. I can't believe he hasn't been mentioned yet.

    Reply
  22. Tommy

    I certainly agree with Timothy Scriven that some introductory, text-book type things would be much the best starting point so that the student can orient him/herself and have some technicalities explained so that they are at least not totally baffling and intimidating. Much better plan than trying to plunge straight into Carnap or Tarski (!). The 2 books that I get the impression my students find most useful for getting a handle on philosophy of language (and that seem to me would be the best introductions to the sort of mainstream "analytic" philosophy the original question was interested in):
    Greg McCulloch – Game of the Name (classic intro to Frege, Russell, Kripke, Evans)
    Alex Miller – Philosophy of Language (particularly clear intros to some stuff from Quine and Davidson)
    If you really mastered these two books, you would be very well placed to have a crack at some classic Quine, Davidson and Putnam . . .

    Other good introductory texts:
    Michael Williams – Problems of knowledge (MUCH better than the Audi epistemology textbook)
    Duncan Pritchard – Knowledge (Very short and very good, from Palgrave press.)
    Tim Crane – both The Mechanical Mind and Elements of Mind (wonderfully clear introductions to philosophy of mind)
    Kim – Philosophy of Mind (new 3rd edition covers consciousness even more thoroughly)

    For philosophy of science, the Curd & Cover anthology has brilliant introductory essays and summaries/explanations of classic articles. Great way to ease into proper "analytic" papers.

    For philosophy of logic I've always thought the Grayling book has a rather pompous blustery tone that encourages students to bluff and fudge. Sainsbury's Logical Forms is much better. As for a straight introduction to Logic, my students always seem to like the (short) Wilfrid Hodges book best. The Barwise & Etchemendy "Language, Proof and Logic" is a totally awesome textbook, but I guess its sheer bulk could be intimidating . . .

    Reply
  23. P Steck

    On the most basic level, you need to know and understand formal logic. This alone would have been very helpful in my first readings of anything suggested above. Any logic textbook will be able to introduce you to the subject.

    Reply
  24. Ben burgis

    As someone else mentioned, one worry about a lot of the suggestions above is that, given the actual question that was asked, an anthology of original sources seems like exactly the wrong way to go.

    I would strongly second the suggestion of Lycan's "Philosophy of Language: A Contemporary Introduction." It covers an impressive array of basic figures in the so-called "analytic tradition" in a way that's both impressively rigorous and impressively accessible to beginning students. (Both classes I've used it in have been in Korea, where students' difficulties in accessing this material are obviously considerably more severe.) In terms of Colin's worry, above, about the quesioner's ambiguity between "analytic philosophy" (e.g. philosophy as practiced in contemporary "analytic" departments and journals) and "analytic phiosophy" (e.g. the writings of various historical philosophies strongly associated with "the analytic tradition"), I'd say it functions remarkably well as an introduction to both.

    Reply
  25. Ivars Neiders

    "Spreading the Word" by Simon Blackburn may be a good place to start. I wonder that nobody has mentioned this book yet.

    Reply
  26. Simon

    As the person who originally solicited Brian for this advice, I want to thank all of you heartily! Your comments are much appreciated.

    Reply
  27. Nat Green

    Simon if you are still reading I would also recommend the following unjustly forgotten book:

    "Semantics and Necessary Truth: An Inquiry Into the Foundations of Analytic Philosophy" by Arthur Pap (Yale University Press, 1958)

    Reply

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