Though Grice’s main topic is Reasons, together with some more detailed questions pertaining thereto, it might be a good idea for Grice, before embarking on that matter, to give a brief résumé of the principal suggestions which he has made, particularly as he should like to add one or two reflections before leaving the subject of Reasoning. 

Grice takes, as a stalking horse, a thesis which characterizes reasoning as (roughly) the production in thought, or speech, of a sequence of ideas (propositions) consisting of an initial set (ultimate premisses) together with further members each of which is derivable, by a canonical (formally valid) principle of inference, from its predecessors in the sequence. 

In comment on this thesis  Grice proceeded on a few main lines.

That emendation was plainly required in view of the fact that not all reasoning is good reasoning, even though, normally, even bad reasoning uses, or misuses, a good principle of inference. 

The obvious emendation would be to substitute for "derivable by canonical principles" the phrase "*thought* by the reasoner to be derivable by canonical principles".

That further trouble arose from the obvious fact that most actual reasoning is informal, or 'incomplete' — for example, enthymematic —, and therefore such that no sane reasoner could suppose his reasonings, as they stand, to conform to a canonical principle of inference.

The natural emendation, namely, that the sequence, which is to be supposed to conform, or to be thought by the reasoner to conform, to a canonical principle, is not the actually produced sequence but an expansion of it, incorporating additional premisses which the reasoner supposedly has in mind, itself ran into difficulties;

 for either the so-amended thesis merely demands that the reasoner should think that there exists such an expansion (without, perhaps, having any idea what it is), in which case some examples (for example, the "Shropshire" example) would undeservingly receive the title of reasoning; 

or 

the amended thesis demands that the reasoner have a particular supplementation in mind, in which case the indeterminacy which in many actual cases afflicts attempts to identify such a supplementation, would disqualify from being reasonings examples which one would wish to allow as reasonings.

That a consideration of sequences which are "too good to be reasonings" (too well-behaved) prompted the thought that the provisional thesis had left out a central characteristic of reasoning, namely, its connection with the will; 

more particularly, that reasoning is typically an activity, with goals and purposes, notably the solution of problems.

 Once this feature is recognized, there seems to be an easy solution to the quandary set up in (2); 

for we may think of the reasoner as intending his production of the conclusion to be the production of something which is an informal consequence of his premiss (premisses), a state of affairs which is evidently distinguishable from merely thinking that a certain proposition is, somehow or other, informally derivable from a given set of propositions.

That attention to a further class of reasonings (like the poor professor's lament) suggested that there is a not at all clearly demarcated range of features which reasonings possess, and which are by no means irrelevant to their character as reasonings, but which it would be vain to ask a philosopher to try to capture. 

The status of such features might be to some extent illuminated if we distinguish between reason as a flat (non-variable) capacity (the capacity to apply inferential rules) and reason as a variable (degree-bearing) capacity, in which interpretation it is an excellence or competence, and is differentiated into a variety of subordinate excellences or competencies. 

Further, the two interpretations may well not be disconnected; 

for it might be possible to derive from the notion of reason as a flat capacity, together with the information that it is to be deployed in the solution of problems, an a priori identification of some or all of the special competencies into which variable reason is differentiated; 

and such a derivation might be regarded as a modest success in a programme of deriving (practical consequences) from the concept of a rational being.

That the concept of a rational being would be enlarged, and its potentialities as a derivational source enhanced, if it is allowed as an essential feature of reason that it is to be regulative of a pre-rational self containing such elements as appetites and feelings.

It is now time Grice thinks to pursue a little further, with a beadier eye and a less rhetorical style, the examination of the suggested distinction, and the sketched connection, between 'flat' and 'variable' reason (rationality). 

According to the picture presented which I would call Picture (1), there is a kind of rationality (R") which is 

 non-variable (flat, not admissible of differences of degree)

basic (ultimate with respect to not definable in terms of

variable rationality)

non-valuational (the attribution of R' is not an ascription of merit or demerit)

central to (essential to) the type (and maybe also to the tokens of the type) Rational Being (alternatively, central to being a non-deformed, non-maimed, Rational Being];

underlying one or more kinds of rationality (R, R°,...), which are 

variable;

valuational (in that differences of degree with respect to R' (R',....) are or involve differences in value).

And to say that R' underlies R is to mean that the status of R' as a dimension of or excellence (and of some or all specifications of R- as subordinate dimensions of excellence) is derivable, by some appropriate method of derivation, from (a) the (inescapable) fact that subjects of such excellence (rational beings) possess R', together perhaps with (b) certain further facts of high generality, Opposed to Picture (1), one might envisage an upholder of Picture 2), the central idea of which would be that, while it may well be possible to identify a flat concept of rationality as well as a variable concept, any flat concept there may be will not be basic, but will in fact arise from a variable concept of rationality by the imposition thereon of one or another form of limitation; and that being so, since the flat concept will be positioned in the variable concept, the former concept cannot provide a foundation for the valuational status of the latter.

There is a variety of considerations which might be involved in an attempt to support Picture (2), or to assail Picture (1). 

One part of such a campaign might be to comment adversely upon the highly schematic character of Picture (1), as presented, and to demand an increase in definition which might not be easy to find. 

Picture 1) seems to leave undetermined even crucial items: 

we are not given a characterization of the class of qualities which are specifications of variable rationality; 

we are not told what modes of derivation are to be used to establish these qualities as dimensions of excel-lence; 

we are not provided with a clear identification either of flat rationality or of whatever auxiliary premisses will be needed for such accusations. 

Until these gaps are filled (it may be said there is no thesis to discuss.

These animadversions might be accompanied by some further salvoes.

 It might be argued that Picture (2) rather than Picture (1) accords with the standard situation with respect to related flat and variable attributes; 

in such cases it is generally the case that the flat concept arises by some kind of limitation imposed on the variable concept;

 a large house (flat-largeness) is one which is larger (has a higher degree of variable largeness- or size) than most houses, 

and so for most examples. 

There is (it might be said) a reason to suppose this conceptual pattern to apply to the particular case of flat and variable rationality. 

There is more than one candidate for the title (on some interpretation or other) of flat rationality; 

for example, it might be possible to be rational in the sense of being

'adequately rational' or perfectly rational, that is, of not suffering from any of some favoured class of failings or deficiencies;

 this primitive sense of "rational' could be used to pick out a certain level of positive rationality (variable), such as a respectable level thereof.

But any such concepts as these, though flat and non-basic, would have no claim to be universal (or near-universal) features of human beings. 

The most relevant, therefore, of possible flat concepts would be one which could be represented as applicable to any creature with some degree or other of (variable) rationality, whose measure of rationality is not zero.

 In so far as such a model of flat rationality can be rigorously applied, it will entail that no determinate level of rationality above zero is the largest possible level (above zero); 

so Picture (2) will escape the embarrassment of having to claim (as Picture (1) claims) that there is a specifiable minimal competence which characterizes all rational beings, a claim which, to the extent that Picture (1) as the core of their rationality relies on the analogy with chess, seems to involve attributing to all rational creatures, as the core of their rationality, an unfailing competence with respect to certain rudimentary inferential moves. 

Such an attribution (it may be suggested) is nothing but a latter-day revival of the Cartesian idea [Regulae) of the infallibility of deduction, and is no more acceptable now than it was then.

An accurate assessment of the merits of the contenders in the kind of confrontation which Grice has just staged is rendered doubly difficult by two lacunae in philosophical enquiry; 

there is, so far as Grice knows, no adequately systematic treatment of the logical characteristics and implications of the family of concepts which includes such items as capacities, capabilities, aptitudes, powers, potentialities, and other related ideas;

 nor is there available a thoroughgoing study of the relations between variable and non-variable attributes. 

But despite this handicap, some sort of reply can, Grice thinks, be made to the advocate of Picture (2). 

One might begin by suggesting that to regard Picture (1) (as presented) as being a thesis, even a vague thesis to be first sharpened and then examined for truth, may not be the best way of looking at it.

 As is not unusual with philosophical ideas, it may be illegitimate to demand or expect that Picture (1) be first clarified and then tested for truth; 

there may be no viable method of separating, even in thought, exposition from criticism, in which case the cry "You first tell me what you are maintaining, and then we can see whether it is correct" may be quite out of place. 

Picture (1) is better regarded as a research project than as a hazily expressed thesis;' 

and the most realistic way of implementing it might be somewhat as follows.

Grice is at this point indebted to discussion with Isaacson.

Without having as yet any very clear idea of the proper way to characterize or determine the boundaries of variable rationality, we obtain, from intuition or from the standard assumptions made by philosophers, some set of qualities which appear to be intellectual excellences, and also to be of a kind which, intuit-ively, ought to be established as excellences by the method sketched in Picture (1), if any excellences are so attributable. 

This list might consist in, for instance, such items as clear-headedness, a sense of relevance, flexibility, and inventiveness 

Making a provisional assumption that such items are establishable, one then enquires what kind of method of derivation, and what minimum range of initial premisses relating to the essential character of rational beings (treated, perhaps, at this point as identifiable with human beings) and their condition or environment would be sufficient to confer upon the items in question their assumed status as excellences.

 If this undertaking yields results then one enquires what other admissible excellences are derivable from this material, and what general characterization one could give of the range of derivable excellences, being prepared to make adjustments to any list of excellences, Grice’s characterization thereof, any group of premisses, and any system of derivation, should such adjustment yield a better theoretical structure (by whatever standards the merits of such structures are judged).

 If these efforts are persistently unre-warded, or are little rewarded, one abandons the enterprise, and with it Picture (1).

This predominantly Aristotelian methodology might perhaps be enriched by a more Kantian underpinning. 

It might be possible to produce an argument, in advance of a clarification, sharpening, and construction justification of Picture (1), to the effect that some structure or other of the kind schematically described in the initial presentation of that picture is rationally demanded; it might

 Candidates for specialized R-exceliences (application (a) to people; (b) to logical operations, states, etc.)

Clear-headedness

Thoroughness

Tenacity in argument

Flexibility

Orderliness

Breadth

Sense of relevance

Intellectual caution

"Nose' (intuitiveness)

Inventiveness

Subtlety 

Memory

be contended that, in advance of knowing about the appropriate list of excellences which fall under the heading of variable rationality, what method of derivation is to be employed, and what precisely the premisses of such a derivation are to be, there is a good reason to accept the idea that there must be a non-variable concept of rationality (whatever its composition may be) from which whatever excellences there may be, which are determinations of variable rationality, derive somehow or other their status.

 Now Grice cannot himself, as of now, propound such an argument (though Grice suspects that there may be one); but Grice thinks he can point to a poor relation of such an argument, namely, a general argument which would at least cast doubt on Picture (2), even if it did not directly support Picture (1).

 In a fashion which certainly owes a debt to Aristotle's distinction between dunameis alogoi and dunameis meta logou, one might distinguish a variety of types of capacity. 

First we might point to a sub-class of capacities the fulfilments of which are not admissible objects of endeavour:

 whether because to talk that way would be nonsensical or because the cash value of what one was saying would be totally obscure, we would not be ready to allow that someone could be seeking or trying to actualize on a particular occasion the human capacities of growth or of digestion, though of course one might perfectly well seek to foster those capacities (perhaps by taking pills). 

Other capacities are such that one can seek their fulfilment at a particular moment; 

I can for example make up my mind to knit a pair of socks this afternoon.

But the presence of the endeavour is by no means necessary either for knitting or for exercising (realizing) one's capacity to knit.

If wearing my night-cap, with my eyes closed, and snoring like a bursting dam, I sit clacking away with knitting needles and a sweater steadily takes shape, it seems to me that I may be both knitting and exercising my capacity to knit. 

Furthermore, if I am a total nitwit at knitting, I might in a waking state be trying to knit but not knit-ting. 

Sometimes, however, trying to x (to do something which in fact is instantiated in x) is a necessary condition for x-ing, or for realizing a capacity for x-ing, or for both.

 It seems to me plausible to suppose that for one to compose a limerick about the Absolute, or for me to exercise, with respect to the Absolute, my capacity for composing limericks, it is required that 1 should be seeking(trying, meaning) to compose a limerick, or at least to do something of a sort such that intentionally to do something of that sort is to compose a limerick. 

Sometimes, again, it seems that trying to x is sufficient for x-ing;

 if I am trying to treat you with respect, it may be that (at least on one reading of the phrase) I am treating you with respect, and am perhaps also exercising (in one sense) my capacity for treating people with respect, no matter how ham-handedly I in fact behave.

Now it seems that, if we could maintain (to speak, for a moment, a little loosely) that in the case of the capacity which constitutes rationality (variable rationality), the exercise of this capacity even in the lowest degree has, both as a necessary condition and as a sufficient condition, that the exercise is seeking to exercise rationality, we would have given an argument which would undermine Picture (2), in so far as Picture (2) implies that there is no minimal degree of positive, variable rationality. 

For if seeking to be rational (to exercise rationality) is tantamount to being rational, one is not being more or less rational in accordance with the degree to which one's performance is successful in meeting certain standards of performance. 

To put the matter a little more accurately, suppose that we start with certain material conditions for rational performance Pp. P which we will call conditions for proto-rationality. 

These might include such things as following certain primitive inferential rules.

Further suppose that for X to perform/behave rationally is for X to produce some performance and with the intention that, in performing, he should be fulfilling the conditions for proto-rationality, or some particular one (or more) of these conditions; 

and,

 that 

for X to be rational is for X to have the capacity to perform rationally. 

Inadequacy in conforming to the conditions for proto-rationality will not lower his degree of rationality, since that depends, not on the facts of his performance, but on the purpose behind it. 

Loss of rationality as a capacity can be achieved only if X is, or becomes, incapable of seeking or trying to be rational (to exhibit rationality). 

The prospects for this argument depend, of course, on the possibility of supporting the initial supposition, namely, that rationality is a capacity for the actualization of which, on an occasion, it is both necessary and sufficient that its actualization on that occasion is aimed at or soughtfor; 

though Grice shall not attempt here to support that claim, Grice is inclined to think that it could be supported.

It is worth noting that the course of this discussion has begun to exhibit a striking analogy with a certain once-fashionable problem in ethics, the relation between (as they used to say) doing one's duty and acting from a certain motive, in particular a sense of duty.

Just as exercising rationality might be represented as consisting in doing something from the thought that to do that thing is to conform to dictates of reason, so acting dutifully (doing one's duty) consists in doing something from the thought that to do that thing is to conform to the dictates of duty. 

It might be worth getting this problem down from its dusty shelf.

For if the analogy is established it may not be long before some alert philosopher, remembering Kant, seeks to explain the analogy by hypothesizing that the capacity for morality is a special case of rationality.

Now, while it might be that the argument, which I have been sketching, makes it difficult to uphold Picture (2), it is by no means clear that the supporter of Picture (1) has been given much cause for rejoicing; 

for the argument might also be unfavourable to the idea of a basic flat rationality which serves as a foundation for excellences in respect of variable rationality. Indeed it may be important to see that these are not the only pictures in the gallery. 

Grice shall now suggest a third picture, applying it in the first case to the concept of reasoning, with the idea that a parallel pattern might be applied to rationality.

There are three observations Grice should like to make. 

All involve, Grice thinks, the adumbration of further questions which very much deserve exploration, exploration which, in the case of some or all of them, would generate enquiries likely to be large in both scope and depth.

• Pattern A (Picture (2))

X exhibits rationality" iff x exhibits some degree of [variable] rationality".

No minimum (determinate) degree of rationalityy

Pattern B (Picture (1))

X exhibits rationality iff x seeks to exhibit proto-rationality,

There may be degrees of proto-rationality, but 

to be rational' x does not have to exhibit any of these: 

he might fall off the scale of proto-rationality, but fall within (non-variable rationality) since he is seeking to fall on scale or proto-rationality. 

One who has no proto-rationality may still be rational', since rationality is a matter of seeking proto-rationality 

The thought that bad reasoning normally, though perhaps not invariably, uses, or misuses, the same inferential principles as good reasoning (good principles) prompts in me the further thought that the concept of reasoning may be what I might call ‘value-paradigmatic. 

Its position may not be like that of such concepts as those of (say) a climate, a mountain, or a shower of rain (though even here Grice has some questions), where it can be independently specified what is to count as an instance of the concept, and then, should there be a need, standards of valuation can subsequently be invoked and specified, so that distinction can be made between climates which are good and those which are not.

 It is rather that, to explain what reasoning is (and maybe what the term 'reasoning' means), it is necessary, in the first instance, to specify what good reasoning is, and then to stipulate that 'reasoning" applies to good reasoning and also to sequences which approxim-ate, to a given degree, to good reasoning;

 the idea of good reasoning is, in a certain sense, prior to the idea of reasoning. 

It is, to Grice’s mind, a crucially important question what is the range of value-paradigmatic concepts; 

how far do they extend? 

It does not require very sharp eyes, but only the willingness to use the eyes one has, to see that our speech and thought are permeated with the notion of purpose; 

to say what a certain kind of thing is is only too frequently partly to say what it is for. 

This feature applies to our talk and thought of, for example, ships, shoes, sealing wax, and kings; and, possibly and perhaps most excitingly, it extends even to cabbages. 

Grice suspects that it applies to items which are related, in one or another of a variety of ways, to the notion of life (including that notion itself). 

It seems, moreover, a short step from allowing that a certain piece or segment of thought or vocabulary is impregnated with the notion of purpose to allowing that it is impregnated with the notion of value. 

Now the possibility that one might have to accord a wide range to value-paradigmatic concepts could hardly be bad news to the 'far-out rationalist, who wants to derive significant substantial conclusions from the idea of a rational being; 

and it might very well be bad news to the far-out descriptivist, who wishes to interpret or reconstruct our language so as to free it from valuational mythology. 

To eschew value-notions in scientific enquiry is one thing (which may well be laudable);

 to make the same ideal part of one's philosophical methodology is quite another thing;

 totally to lop off valuation might carry with it a total lopping off of usable description.

Grice has tried to make use of the notion of intention to distinguish between (a) reasoning from A to B (thinking that A, and so that B) and (b) thinking that B is a consequence of A, and thinking that A and thinking that B. 

This suggests to me that inferential rules have two aspects or, if you like, two versions; 

a descriptive version (for example, 'B is a consequence of A, or 'A implies B') and a prescriptive version (for example, either 'if you accept A, then accept B' or 'if you accept A, then you ought to accept B*). 

These aspects or versions will of course be systematically related. 

But it is not at all clear how the prescriptive version should be formulated; 

for example, the first of the patterns I have just mentioned ('if you accept A, then accept B*) will hardly prove satisfactory. 

If I were conscientious about observing rules of inference, and were familiar with the inferential rules needed to prove geometrical theorems, and then were unfortunate enough to look at Euclid's axioms, I should be chained to my desk until Judgment Day, dutifully deriving theorems from axioms, theorems from theorems, and so on. 

I would be the first to allow that Euclid's work was good, but hardly that good. 

How, then, should prescriptive versions be formulated in a less demanding way?

Grice has talked undiscriminatingly about subsidiary excellences (competences) falling under the generic notion of excellence of reason. 

But there are plainly some distinctions to be made.

We should at least need a distinction between excellences which are specificatory of excellence at reasoning, and those which are ancillary to such excellence. 

Just as good eyesight is indispensable for excellence at tennis, but (unlike having a powerful service) is not itself a part of excellence at tennis, so having a reasonably good memory (unlike critical acumen) is not itself an excellence of reason.

 How are such distinctions as this to be more fully characterized?

To return from methodological sermonizing, if the idea of value-paradigmatic concepts has merit,  it may be no more difficult to suppose that rationality (or reason) is such a concept than to suppose that reasoning is. 

This supposition with respect to rationality will give us Picture (3).

Grice passes on now to a consideration of the general nature of reasons.

Grice thinks we may find, in our talk about reasons, three main kinds of case.

The first is that class of cases exemplified by the use of such a sentence as 

"The reason why the bridge collapsed was that the girders were made of cellophane". 

Variant forms would be exemplified in "

The (one) reason for the collapse of the bridge was that..." and 

"The fact that the girders were made of cellophane was the (one) reason for the collapse of the bridge (why the bridge collapsed)*, and so on. 

This type of case includes cases in which that for which the (a) reason is being given is an action. 

We can legitimately use such a sentence form as 

"The reason why he resigned his office (for his resigning his office) was that p"; and, so far as I can see, the same range of variant forms will be avail-able. I shall take as canonical (paradigmatic) for this type of case (type (1)) the form "The (a) reason why A was (is) that B°.

The significant features of a type (1) case seem to me to include

the following.

The canonical form is 'factive both with respect to A and to B. If I use it, I imply both that it is true that A and that it is true that B.

If the reason why A was that B, then B is the explanation of its being the case that A; and if one reason why A was (that) B, then B is one explanation of its being the case that A, and if there are other explanations (as it is implicated that there are, or may be) then A is overdetermined; and (finally) if a part of the reason why A was that B, then Bis a part of the explanation of As being so. 

This feature is not unconnected with the previous one; if B is the explanation of A, then both Band A must be facts; and if one fact is a reason for another fact, then it looks as if the connection between them must be that the first explains the second.

In some, but not all, cases in which the reason why A was that B, we can speak of B as causing, or being the cause of, A (As being the case). 

If the reason why the bridge collapsed was that the girders were made of cellophane, then we can say that the girders' being made of cellophane caused the bridge to collapse (or, at least, caused it to collapse when the bus drove onto it). 

But not

in all cases; 

it might be true that the reason why X took offence was that all Tibetans are specially sensitive to comments on their appearance, though it is very dubious whether it would be proper to describe the fact, or circumstance, that all Tibetans have this particular sensitivity as the cause of, or as causing, X to take offence.

However, it may well be true that if B does cause A, then the (or

a) reason why A is that B.

The canonical form employs 'reason' as a count-noun; 

it allows us to speak (for example) of the reason why A, of there being more than one reason why A, and so on. 

But for type (1) cases we have, at best, restricted licence to use variants in which 'reason' is used as a mass-noun. "There was considerable reason why the bridge collapsed (for the bridge collapsing)" and "The weakness of the girders was some reason why the bridge collapsed" are oddities; so is "There was good reason why the bridge collapsed", though

"There was a good reason why the bridge collapsed" is better; 

but

"There was (a) bad reason why the bridge collapsed" is terrible.

The discomforts engendered by attempts to treat 'reason' as a mass-noun persist even when A specifies an action; "There was considerable reason why he resigned his office" is unhappy, though one would not object to, for example, "There was considerable reason for him to resign his office", which is not a type (1) case.

Relativization to a person is, Grice thinks, excluded, unless (say) the relativizing for X' means "in X's opinion", as in "for me, the reason why the bridge collapsed was.

 Again, this feature persists even when A specifies an action:

 "For him, the reason why he resigned was ..." and "The reason for him why he resigned

was..."

are both unnatural (for different reasons).

Grice shall call type (1) cases "reasons why" or "explanatory rcasons"

(2) The cases which I am allocating to type (2) are a slightly less tidy family than those of type (1). Examples are:

"The fact that they were a day late was some

(a) reason for thinking that the bridge had collapsed."

"The fact that they were a day late was a reason for postponing the conference."

We should particularly notice the following variants and allied examples (among others):

That they were a day late was reason to think that the bridge had collapsed.

There was no reason why the bridge should have collapsed.

The fact that they were so late was a (gave) good reason for us to think that ..

He had reason to think that... (to postpone...) but he seemed unaware of the fact.

The fact that they were so late was a reason for wanting (for us to want) to postpone the meeting.

Grice shall take as the paradigmatic form for type (2) "That B was (a) reason (for X) to A", where "A" may conceal a psychological verb like "think", "want", or "decide", or may specify an action.

Salient features seem to me to include the following.

Unlike type (1), where there is double factivity, the paradigmatic form is non-factive with respect to A, but factive with respect to B; 

with regard to B, however, modifications are available which will cancel factivity; for example, "If it were (is) the case that B, that would be a reason to A?"

In consonance with the preceding feature, it is not claimed that B explains A (since A may not be the case), nor even that if A were the case B would explain it (since someone who actually does the action or thinks the thought specified by A may not do so because of B).

 It is, however, in my view (though some might question my view) claimed that B is a justification (final or pro-visional) for doing, wanting, or thinking whatever is specified in A. 

The fact that B goes at least some way towards making it the case that an appropriate person or persons should (or should have) fulfil (fulfilled) A.

The word "cause" is still appropriate, but in a different grammatical construction from that used for type (1), 

In Example (1), the fact that they were so late is not claimed to cause anyone to think that the bridge had collapsed, but it is claimed to be (or to give) cause to think just that.

(d) Within type (2), 'reason' may be treated either as a count-noun or as a mass-noun. Indeed, the kinds of case which form type 2) seem to be the natural habitat of 'reason' as a mass-noun. 

A short version of an explanation of this fact (to which I was helped by Myro) seems to me to be that (i) 

there are no degrees of explanation: there may be more than one explanation, and something may be a part (but only a part) of the explanation, but a set of facts either does explain something or it does not. 

There are, however, degrees of justification (justifiability); one action or belief may be more justifiable, in a given situation, than another (there may be a better case for it). 

 Justifiability is not just a matter of the number of supporting considerations, but rather of their combined weight (together with their outweighing the considerations which favour a rival action or belief).

 So a mass-term is needed, together with specifications of degree or magnitude.

That B may plainly be a reason for a person or people to A; 

indeed, when no person is mentioned or implicitly referred to, it is very tempting to suppose that it is being claimed that the fact that B would be a reason for anyone, or any normal person, to A.

One might call type (2) cases "justificatory reasons" or "reasons for (to)".

Examples:

John's reason for thinking Samantha to be a witch was that he had suddenly turned into a frog.

John's reason for wanting Samantha to be thrown into the pond was that (he thought that) she was a witch.

John's reason for denouncing Samantha was that she kept turning him into a frog.

John's reason for denouncing Samantha was to protect himself against recurrent metamorphosis.

If X's reason for doing (thinking) A was that B, it follows that X A-ed because B (because X knew (thought) that B). 

If X's reason for doing (wanting, etc.) A was to B, it follows that X A-ed in order to (so as to) B. The sentence form "X had several reasons for A-ing, such as that (to) B" falls, in my scheme, under type (3), unlike the seemingly similar sentence "X had reason to A, since B", which 1 locate under type (2).

The paradigmatic form 1 take as being "X's reason(s) for A-ing was that B (to B)".

Salient features of type (3) cases should be fairly obvious.

In type (3) cases reasons may be either of the form that B or of the form to B. If they are of the former sort, then the paradigmatic form is doubly factive, factive with respect both to A and to B. It is always factive with respect to A (A-ing). 

When it is factive with respect to B, factivity may be cancelled by inserting "X thought that" before B.

Type (3) reasons are "in effect explanatory". If X's reason for A-ing was that (to) B, X's thinking that B (or wanting to B) explains his A-ing. 

The connection between type (3) reasons being, in effect, explanatory, and their factivity is no doubt parallel to the connection which obtains for type (1) reasons. I reserve the question of the applicability of "cause" to a special concluding

So far as Grice can see, "reason" cannot, in type (3) cases, be treated as a mass-noun. 

This may be accounted for by the explanatory character of reasons of this type. We can, however, here talk of reasons as being bad; X's reasons for A-ing may be weak or appalling.

In type (2) cases, we speak of there being little reason, or even no! reason, to A. 

But in type (3) cases, since X's reasons are explanatory of his actions or thoughts, they have to exist. (I doubt if this is the full story, but it will have to do for the moment.)

(d) Of their very nature, type (3) reasons are relative to persons.

Because of their hybrid nature (they seem, as will in a moment, I hope, emerge, in a way to partake of the character both of type (1) and of type (2)) one might call them "Justificatory-Explanatory" reasons.

Grice is now in a position to formulate a systematizing hypothesis concerning the interrelations of the three types of case. 

Type

(3) reasons are, in effect, special cases of Type (1) reasons; they explain, but what they explain are actions and certain psychological attitudes. (ii) They are also closely connected with Type (2) reasons; 

if X's reason for A-ing is that B, it is not necessarily the case that the fact that B does justify X's A-ing; but it is necessarily the case that X regarded (even if only momentarily or subliminally) the fact that B as justifying him in A-ing. 

The presence to X of a certain consideration B as his (type (3)) reason for A-ing requires the presence, in X, of a belief that B is a type (2) reason for him to A.

 (ili) Though actions and certain psychological attitudes are

Type	Canonical form	Features (i) Factivity, (i) Explanatoriness, (iii) Cause, (iv) Mass- or Count-Noun, (v) Person-relativization
(1) Pure Explanatory	That B is (was) a (the) reason why A (The reason why A was that B)	(a) Factive (A): Factive (B) (b) B explains A (c) For non-general B, B causes A to be the case (that A) (d) "Reason' count-noun, never mass-noun (e) Person-relativization excluded
(2) Justificatory	That B is (was) (a) reason (for X) 10 A	(a) Non-factive (A); Factive (B) (b) B need not explain A, but justifies A (c) B is (a) cause (for X) to A (not A to be the case (that A)) (d) 'Reason' count-noun and mass-noun (e) Person-relativization not excluded
(3) Hybrid (Justificatory-Explanatory)	X's reason(s) for A-ing was (were) that B (to B)	(a) Factive (A): Factive for 'that B' non-factive for to B (b) Thought (desire) that B explains A (e) X's thought that (to) B not cause of X's A-ing, nor (invariably) cause for X to A (d) Reason count-noun, never mass-noun (e) Person-relativization demanded

sometimes explained by type (3) reasons, this is not invariably the case. Something which explains X's action or X's attitude may be something not correctly described as X's reason for doing that action or adopting that attitude. 

It might be that the reason why X embraced the policeman was that he was very drunk, or that the reason why X prodded the doorman's stomach was that it looked to him like a balloon. 

What made X do something, or impelled him to do it, will often be a type (1) reason for doing it without being a type (3) reason. 

Such items are not type (3) reasons because they are not thought of by X as justificatory. Fig. 1 summarizes these relations among the various types of reasons.

Two footnotes to conclude this section.

(a) Consider the following example: 

The fact that a dandelion derives its energy from photosynthesis is a reason for it to have leaves." (a) 

This example resembles type (2) examples, since, if the cited fact really is a reason for a plant to have leaves, it will at the same time be something which justifies the plant's having leaves.

But (b), unlike standard type (2) examples, in this case what is a reason for X's doing or being such-and-such is not ipso facto a reason for X's wanting to do or be such-and-such, nor for someone other than X to want X to be such-and-such; for dandelions do not have wants, and it is doubtful if any human being wants a dandelion to have leaves. 

Further, (c), some have taken reasons of this sort to provide a certain kind of explanation of X's being such-and-such (for example, of a dandelion's having leaves).

 If this be so, then we have justificatory reasons which explain the existence of the states of affairs which they justify, and do this without the mediation of a type (3) reason.

Difficulties of this sort lead some theorists to deny the existence of reasons of this special sort, to reject at least this kind of final cause. 

I am unhappy with such a course; in company with Aristotle and Kant, and other illustrious persons, 1 am inclined to think that final causes play an indispensable role in the foundations of ethics.

(2) The fact that if B is a (type (2)) reason to A, B can also be said to be (give) cause to A, shows that in one not negligible sense type (2) reasons are causes. 

Those, however, who debate whether reasons are causes usually (I think) have in mind type (3) reasons,If we consider the vernacular use of "cause", it is fairly plain that type (3) reasons are not causes, at least of that for which they are reasons. 

My love of cricket, which (let us say) was my reason for playing yesterday, may have caused me to neglect my work, but did not (in the vernacular sense of 'cause) cause me to play yesterday. 

But, of course, the debate is not really about whether reasons are causes in the vernacular sense; 

it is about whether to specify a type (3) reason as the explanation of an action is to give a "causal explanation" of the action, in a sense of "causal explana-tion" which is none too clear to me, and which (I sometimes suspect) is none too clear to the disputants.

I can now show my hand a little with regard to the future chap-ters. In the next two chapters I shall go into some detailed questions about justificatory reasons, with particular concern about the relation between the practical and the non-practical varieties of this kind of reason.

 After that, I hope to pay some attention to the matter of final causes.

So far, in talking about reason, I have been saying things which I have hoped would be generally applicable to reason, or to reasons, or to reasoning, without attending to the possibility that the existence of importantly different kinds of reasoning might impose qualifications and, indeed, introduce asymmetries which should have been taken into account. 

In particular, I have been paying no detailed attention to the relation between practical and non-practical (or as I shall call it, borrowing an invention of von Wright, alethic) reason (or reasoning). 

It is time to remedy this omission.

Kant insisted that it is one and the same faculty of reason which issues in alethic reasoning and in practical reasoning. 

How one should individuate faculties and capacities is a mystery which is very much unfathomed, though it is not, I hope, unfathomable; so perhaps we might make things a little easier if, instead of asking whether Kant's view is correct, we were to ask whether the word "reason' has the same meaning in the phrases 'alethic reason' and practical reason, or (alternatively) has different meanings whichare related by a greater or lesser measure of analogy. 

The distine-tion just introduced between having a single meaning and having a plurality of meanings which are analogically related is, of course, far from clear; but perhaps it is clear enough for use in raising ques-tions, even if it would need plastic surgery before being usable in solving them.' 

Most people (even philosophical people) would, 1 suspect, take the view that 'reason' has a single meaning in the two contexts, and there might be an even stronger consensus with regard to the answer to a parallel question about the word 'argument.

But, when we move to other words which seem to be very closely connected with reason, the situation seems to change.

 Kant (I sus-pect) would have been firmly in favour of the idea that the word ‘necessary' (and its cognates) has the same meaning (or meanings) in the two sentences (1) "It is necessary for you to go to the hospital tomorrow" and (2) "It is necessary that the paper will ignite" (or a little more idiomatically "The paper will necessarily ignite"), said when someone is about to put a match to the paper; though he would of course have allowed that there are enormously important differences between the two sorts of statement. 

But, whether or not Kant would have taken this position, I am certain that there are many who would not; and the case is similar with other allied words. It is almost common form to suppose that there are (at least) two senses of the word 'ought', exhibited severally in the sentences

(1) "You ought to get your hair cut" and (said several hours later, to someone else) (2) "His hair ought to be cut by now"; these are called (respectively) the practical and the epistemic ought. 

And what of "The roof must have fallen in" and "The butler must repair the roof"? Or, "Spinoza should win the 3.30, so you should put your money on him"?

I shall approach the exploration of this rather ill-defined array of problems by way of a brief discussion of a fairly recent attempt to exhibit an analogy between a certain sort of practical argument and a certain sort of alethic argument. 

In "How is Weakness of the Will Possible?"" Davidson offers a proposal which may be (with minor liberties) summarized as follows:

For a discussion of the distinction, see  Grice, "Prolegomena", in Studies in the Ways of Words (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1989), 3-21.|| 

I In Davidson, Essays on Actions and Events (Oxford

We should compare such sentences as

Given that the barometer falls, it will probably rain tonight.

Given that act a would be a lie and act b would not, b is better than a.

These may be regarded as exemplifying, respectively, the forms:

(1a) Prob (my p) and

(za) Pf (m,; b better than a).'

(ii) The logical analogy between these two forms (between the two 'connectives") comes out in the defeasible nature of arguments in which such sentences as (1) and (2) occur. 

The forms

p& (if p, g)

pär & (if p&r, not -q)

are inconsistent with one another; so an (ordinary deductive) inference from p& (if p. g) to q cannot be upset by the addition of a further true premiss. 

But the forms

(laa) Prob (m,; p) & m,

(tab) Prob (m,; p) & m.

(nac) Prob (m, & m.; p) & (m, & m.)

may all be true together; so, while in certain circumstances the non-demonstrative argument:

Prob (m, P)

m,

P

will be acceptable, it will not be acceptable (even though its pre-misses are known to be true), if, for example, it is also known to be true that (iac)) Prob (m, & m; p), and also that m, & m,. In parallel fashion, it will sometimes be proper to infer from (2) "Pf (Given that act a would be a lie and act b would not, b is better than a" together with 

"Act a would be a lie and act b would not" to "b is better than a"; 

but it will not be proper to infer to this conclusion if it is also known (for example) that act a would prevent a murder while act b would not.

I' 'Pf' is to be read as "prima facie". l(i) 

The defeasible character of such arguments requires that detachment should be subject to a "Principle of Total Evidence", the precise nature of which need not concern us just at the moment. 

Nor, I may add, shall t here be concerned with the use which Davidson makes of the material just presented in his attempt to dispose of his version of the 'paradox' of incontinence, except to mention that the conclusions of practical arguments which may be reached under licence from a PTE (for example, 'b is better than a') are called by him unconditional value judgements, to distinguish them from the conditional, or prima facie, judgements from which they may be derived.

Now for some signs of discomfort. 

So far as I can see, Davidson's connective "Pf, as distinct from 'Prob, is restricted in its occur-rences; it can occur legitimately only in contextual conjunction with pairs of sentences, the second of which is of the form "b is better than a". 

This suggests that, as a first move, we might join 'Pf and

'better' into a single ternary connective, preserving syntactical propriety by treating 'a' and 'b' not as stand-ins for action-designators (for example, "my telling a lie") but for action-sentences (for example, "I tell a lie"); and that as a second move we omit 'Pf, leaving ourselves with the simpler connective "better". 

We could (by a slight extension) then reach the following set of analogies:

"Prob (h: p)" as the analogue of "Good (h; a, b)"

"More prob (h; p. q)" as the analogue of "Better (h; a, b)".

The conditional/unconditional distinction would then be represented by the pair of distinctions between:

Better (h; b, a) and (ii) Better (b, a) and

Best (hia) and (ii) Best (a).

But now a slightly disturbing asymmetry appears. 

According to Davidson, the conclusion sometimes to be reached by detachment from the pair of premisses "Prob (hi p)" and "h" is "p"; whereas the operation of detachment on (say) "Best (h; a)" and "h" cannot yield "a" (that is, "x does A") but has to yield "Best (a)" (that is,"it is best that x does A"); in practical arguments, unlike probabilistic arguments, the special connective (in our revised scheme) will not disappear in the conclusion. 

If we pursue the course on which I have embarked, and maintain zeal for the maximizationof analogy, we should take the alethic analogue for "Best (a)" to be not "p", but "Prob (p)" (representing either "it is probable that P™ or "Probably P"); a structure, that is, which does not appear in Davidson's scheme. If we are to find, on the practical side, an analogue for "p" other than "Best (a)", we shall have to devise one, since so far none is provided.

On the alethic side, then, given premisses of the forms "Prob (h, p)" and "h", one may, under licence, come to rest either with:

I (a) "Probably p" or (b) "it is probable that p" or with “p”

We should not allow an excessive preoccupation with the maxim that probability is always relative to blind us to l(a) and I(b), or to prevent us from considering their relation to Il, and to one another. If our present direction is correct, "It is best that I do A" emerges as the practical analogue for either I(a) or I(b); and the practical analogue for Il is not hard to locate.

 If one function of probabilistic argument is to reach belief (that p), the corresponding function of practical argument should be to reach an intention or decision; and what should correspond to saying "P", as an expression of one's belief, is saying, "I shall do A", as an expression of one's intention or decision.

It seems to me that, at this point, Davidson might object to my procedure to date on two scores. 

First, a more recent paper of his made it clear that (as I had long suspected) he wished to identify my intending to do A with my making (or accepting) an unconditional value judgement in favour of my doing A; 

that being so, he could hardly be expected to go along with my proposal to distinguish between "Best (a)" and "I shall do A. 

My judging that Best (a) would for him be what I report when I say "I shall do A".

I have publicly advanced my objections to this account of intend-ing," and I shall not renew the battle, particularly as 1 am at the present moment using Davidson's paper more as a point of departure than as a target for attack. 

Secondly, it is possible that

Davidson, in Essays on Actions and Events.)

[* Grice, "Actions and Events".

he (or someone else) might be troubled on the grounds that, once I allow "I shall do A" as a possible conclusion of a practical argu-ment, I am licensing arguments as valid the conclusions of which cannot, or should not, be drawn by everyone who accepts their premisses. 

Suppose I have the premiss "Best that, if Tommy has been tormenting my cat, I ambush him on his way home from school"; 

l acquire also the premiss that Tommy has been tormenting my cat, together with a licence from the appropriate PTE; and 1 reach the conclusion (legitimately) that I shall ambush Tommy.

My next-door neighbour hears me rehearsing this argument; he cannot, logically, draw (as an expression of my intention) the conclusion that I shall ambush Tommy: 

he cannot decently draw, as an expression of his intention, the conclusion that I shall ambush Tommy; and he cannot sensibly draw, as an expression of his intention, that he will ambush Tommy. 

The best he can do is to comment that I have reached the conclusion which it was proper for me to reach. 

This phenomenon, of course, arises from the fact (or seeming fact) that in the practical area what are reasons for one person to do something may not be reasons for another person to do that thing, nor indeed to do anything at all. 

To one who would look askance at such arguments as this, I would reply that it is more important to provide for the legitimization of expressions of intention as conclusions of valid arguments than to preserve a favoured dogma about the interpersonal character of argument. In suggesting this reply, however, I am not closing my eyes to the possibility that the feature under debate might at some point prove a source of trouble.

To return to my project. 

I wish to suggest not merely that such structures as Prob (h; P) and Best (h; a) are analogous, but that they can be replaced by more complex structures containing a common constant. 

There seems to me to be some linguistic support for this idea. As already noted, words like 'reason' and 'justifica-tion' operate in both the alethic and the practical domain. 

"There is every reason to regard him as a fool" is, semantically, not very different from "In all probability he is a fool"; and "There is every reason to fire him" is not very different from "It is best to fire him".

Similar linguistic phenomena are to hand not only with respect to "justification" but also with respect to "ought" and "should". A further hint is provided by the behaviours of the phrase "it is tobe expected". 

To say, "It is to be expected of a lawyer that he will earn $100,000 a year", though not wholly unambiguous, seems to be on one interpretation close to "A lawyer will probably earn $100,000 a year". 

To say, "It is to be expected of a lawyer that he earn $100,000 a year" seems, however, to be obstinately practical in sense; it is asserted (somewhat curiously, perhaps) that it is in some way or other incumbent on a lawyer to earn that not insignificant income,

 If we accept the idea that the difference between these two statements, which consists in the difference between the presence of the verb-phrase "will earn" and that of the verb-phrase "earn", is a difference of mood, then it looks as if a shift from alethic to practical discourse may be signalled by a shift in mood with respect to a subordinate verb.

An initial version of the idea I want to explore is that we represent the sentences (1) 

"John should be recovering his health by now" 

and (2) "John should join AA" as having the following structures; first, a common "rationality" operator 'Acc, to be heard as "it is reasonable that", "it is acceptable that", "it ought to be that", "it should be that", or in some other similar way; next, one or other of two mood-operators, which in the case of (1) are to be written as ' and in the case of (2) are to be written as 1; and finally a radical, to be represented by 'r' or some other lower-case letter.

 The structure for (1) is Acc + F- + r, for (2) Acc +! + r, with each symbol falling within the scope of its prede-cessor. I am thinking of a radical in pretty much the same kind of way as recent writers who have used that term (or the term

'phrastic; 

I think of it as a sequence in the underlying structural representation of sentences, and I regard it as an undecided question whether there are any sentences in a natural language which contain a part which is a distinct surface counterpart of a radical (compare Wittgenstein's remarks about radicals in chemistry).

Obviously the next topic for me to take up is the characterization of mood-operators.

There are in fact two connected questions on which I shall try to find something to say. 

First, there is the obvious demand for acharacterization, or partial characterization, of mood-differences as they emerge in speech (which it is plausible to regard as their primary habitat); second, there is the question how, and to what extent, representations of moods, and so of mood-differences, which are suitable for application to speech may be legitimately imported into the representation of thought.

 We need to consider the second question, since, if the general rationality operator is to signify something like acceptability, then the appearances of mood-operators within its scope will be proper only if they may properly occur within the scope of the psychological verb "accept".

The easiest way for me to expound my ideas on the first of these questions is by reference to a schematic table or diagram (see Fig. 2). I should at this point reiterate my temporary contempt for the use/mention distinction; my exposition would make the hair stand on end in the soul of a person specially sensitive in this arca.

But my guess is that the only historical philosophical mistake properly attributable to use/mention confusion is Russell's argument against Frege in "On Denoting", and that there are virtually always acceptable ways of eliminating disregard of the distinction in a particular case, though the substitutes are usually lengthy, obscure, and tedious.

1 shall make three initial assumptions: (1)

 That I may avail myself of two species of acceptance, namely, I-acceptance and V-acceptance, which I shall, on occasion, call respectively "judging" and "will-ing". The latter pair of words are to be thought of as technical or semi-technical, though they will signify states which approximate to what we vulgarly call "thinking (that p)" and "wanting (that p)". especially in the senses in which we can speak of beasts as thinking or wanting something.

 I here treat judge and 'will' (and 'accept) as primitives; their proper interpretation would be determined by their role in a psychological theory (or sequence of psychological theories) designed to account for the behaviours of members of the animal kingdom, at different levels of psychological complexity (some classes of creatures being more complex than others). (2)

That, as 1 suggested in a published article (the exact title of which I always find it difficult to remember), at least at the point at which,

[° Grice, "Utterer's Meaning, Sentence-Meaning. and Word-Meaning", Foundations of Language, 4 (Aug, 1968), 235-48.](Main clause):

U to utter to H [a sentence of the form] Op. + P if...

(Antecedent clause)

Operation Number (1) A В	(Preamble) U wills H judges U	none] wills H	(Supplement) | (Differential) judges	(Content,) (Operator) (Radical) P	(Mood-name)	Judicative, (Indicative') Judicative, (Indicative")
(2) A		none wills H	wills			Volitive, ('Intentional") Volitive, (Imperative")
(з) А		none] wills (3,o) (H	wills (3,o) (U a judges wills U a judges	?,F		Judicative Interrogative Judicative Interrogative
(4) A B		[non] wills (3,0) (H	wills (3,0) (U a wills wills U o wills	?!		Volitive Interrogative, Volitive Interrogatives

Notes: Interrogatives: (i) Legitimate substituends for 'o' are"

positively' and 'negatively': positively judging that p, and

negatively judging that p is judging that not-p.

(ii) The 'uniquely existential' quantifier (3,a) is to be given a 'substitutional' interpretation.

(i) 1f the differential is supplemented (as in a B case), the quantifier is 'dragged back', so as to appear immediately before "H in the supplement.in one's syntactico-semantical theory of a particular language, one is introducing mood-differences (and possibly earlier), the proper form to use is a specification of speech-procedures; such specifiers would be of the general form "For U (utterer) to utter o if.." where the blank is replaced by the appropriate condition.

(3) 

That since in the preceding scheme 'Ö' represents a structure and not a sentence or open sentence, there is no guarantee that actual sentences in the language under treatment will contain perspicuous and unambiguous representations of their moods or sub-moods; an individual sentence may correspond to two (or more) mood-different structures; the sentence will then be structurally ambiguous (multiplex in meaning) and will have more than one reading.

The general form of a procedure-specifier for a mood-operator. as you will see from Fig, 2, involves a main clause (which comes first) and an "antecedent" clause, which follows "if". In the schematic representation of the main clause, "U" represents an utterer, "H" a hearer,

"P" a radical; and "Op." represents that operator whose number is i; for example, "Op.." would represent Operator Number 3A, which (since "? F' appears in the Operator column for 3A) would be ?, +. 

The antecedent clause consists of a sequence whose elements are a preamble, a supplement to a differential (which is present only in a B-type case), a differential, and a radical. 

The preamble, which is always present, is invariant, and reads "U wills (that) H judges (that) U..*. 

The supplement, if present, is also invariant; and the idea behind its varying presence or absence is connected, in the first instance, with the Volitive Mood (see initial assumption (2) above). 

It seemed to me that the difference between ordinary expressions of intention (such as "I shall not fail" or "They shall not pass") and ordinary imperatives (Like "Be a little kinder to him") could be accommodated by treating each as a special sub-mood of a superior mood; the characteristic feature of the superior mood (Volitive) is that it relates to willing that p, and in one subordinate case (the Intentional case) the utterer is concerned to reveal to the hearer that he (the utterer) wills that p, while in the other subordinate case (Imperative), U is concerned to reveal to H that U wills that H will that p. (In each case, of course, it is to be presumed that willing that p will have its standard out-come, namely, the actualization of p.)

 It also seemed to me thatthere is a corresponding distinction between two "uses" of ordinary indicatives; sometimes one is declaring or affirming that p. one's intention being primarily to get the hearer to think that the speaker thinks that p; while sometimes one is telling the hearer that p, that is to say, hoping to get him to think that p. 

It is true that in the case of indicatives, unlike that of volitives, there is no pair of devices which would ordinarily be thought of as mood-markers which serves to distinguish the sub-mood of an indicative sentence; the recognition of the sub-mood has to come from context, from the vocative use of the name of H, from the presence of a speech-act verb, or from a sentence-adverbial phrase (like "for your information"). 

But I have already, in my initial assump-tions, allowed for such a situation. This A/B distinction seemed to me to be also discernible in interrogatives (of this, a little more later).

The differentials are each associated with, and serve to distin-guish, 'superior' moods (judicative, volitive) and, apart from one detail in the case of interrogatives, are invariant between 'A' and B' sub-moods of the superior mood; they are merely unsupple-mented or supplemented, the former for an 'A' sub-mood and the latter for a 'B sub-mood. 

The radical needs at this point (I hope) no further explanation, except that it might be useful to bear in mind that I have not stipulated that the radical for an 'intentional' (Volitive,) incorporate a reference to U ("be in the first person"), nor that the radical for an 'imperative (Volitive,) incorporate a reference of H. ("be in the second person"); 

"They shall not pass" is a legitimate intentional, as is "You shall not get away with it"; and "The sergeant is to muster the men at dawn" (said by a captain to a lieutenant) is a perfectly good imperative. 

I will give in full two examples of actual specifiers derived from the schema shown in Fig. 2.

U to utter to H Fa P if U wills (that) H judges (that) U judges p.

U to utter to H I, P if U wills that H judges that U wills that H wills that p.

Since, of the states denoted by differentials in the figure, only judging that p and willing that p are, in my view, strictly cases of acceptance that p, and the ultimate purpose of my introducing thischaracterization of moods is to reach a general account of linguistic forms which are to be conjoined, according to my proposal, with an 'acceptability' operator, the first two numbered rows of the figure are (at most) what I shall have a direct use for. But since it is of some importance to me that my treatment of moods should be (and should be thought to be) on the right lines, I have added a partial account of interrogatives, and I shall say a little more about them.

There are two varieties of interrogatives, 'Yes/No' interrog atives (for example, "Is his face clean?") and "W' interrogatives ("Who killed Cock Robin?", "Where has my beloved gone?", "How did he fix it?"). 

The specifiers derivable from the schema will provide only for "Yes/No' interrogatives, though the figure could be quite easily amended so as to yield a restricted but very large class of "W interrogatives; I shall in a moment indicate how this could be done.

The distinction between Judicative and Volitive Interrogatives corresponds with the difference between cases in which a questioner is indicated as being, in one way or another, concerned to obtain information ("Is he at home?"), and cases in which the questioner is indicated as being concerned to settle a problem about what he is to do ("Am I to leave the door open?",

"Is the prisoner to be released?", "Shall I go on reading?"). 

This difference is fairly well represented in English grammar, and much better represented in the grammars of some other languages.

(3) The A/B differences are (1 think) not marked at all in English grammar. They are, however, often quite casily detectable.

There is usually a recognizable difference between a case in which someone says, musingly or reflectively, "Is he to be trusted?" (a case in which the speaker might say that he was just wondering), and a case in which he utters the same sentence as an enquiry: similarly, we can usually tell whether someone who says "Shall I accept the invitation?" is just trying to make up his mind, or is trying to get advice or instruction from his audience.

(4) The employment of the variable o' needs to be explained.

I have borrowed a little from an obscure branch of logic, once (but maybe no longer) practised, called (I think) "proto-thetic" (why?), the main rite in which was to quantify over (or through)connectives, 'o' is to have as its two substituents "positively" and "negatively", which may modify the verbs "judge' and will; negatively judging or negatively willing that p is judging or willing that not-p. 

The quantifier (S,os) ... has to be treated substitutionally, as specified in note (ii). If, for example, I ask someone whether John killed Cock Robin (B case), I do not want him merely to will that I have a particular "Logical Quality" in mind which I believe to apply;

 I want him to have one of the "Qualities" in mind which he wants me to believe to apply. To meet this demand, supplementation must 'drag back' the quantifier.

(5) To extend the schema so as to provide specifiers for 'single W-interrogatives (that is, questions like "What did the butler see?" rather than questions like "Who went where with whom at 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon?"), we need just a little extra appa-ratus. We need to be able to superscribe a "W' in each interrogative operator (for example, ? +,?W, together with the proviso that a radical which follows a superscribed operator must be an ‘open' radical, which contains one or more occurrences of just one free variable. 

And we need what I might call a 'chameleon' variable X, to occur only in quantifiers, so that (3)) Ex is to be regarded as a way of writing (5x) Fx, while (SA) Fy is a way of writing (Sy) Fy. 

To provide specifiers for W-superscribed operators, we simply delete the appearances of ac in the specifier for the corresponding un-superscribed operator, inserting instead the quantifier

(3,2) (... ) at the position previously occupied by (3,) (...).

For example: the specifiers for "Who killed Cock Robin?" (used as an enquiry) would be: "U to utter to H "? W t: x killed Cock Robin' if U wills H to judge U to will that (S,X) (H should will that U judges (x killed Cock Robin))"; in which '(3,2)" will "take on" the shape '(S,x)' since 'x' is the free variable within its scope.

I propose now to return,' for a closer look, to an objection which I have already remarked upon briefly, and in a none too exact

['"Grice wrote this section and added it to the material in this chapter simply at the end.)

manner. In outline, the objection runs as follows. We find in the practical area, though not in the alethic area, non-trivial examples of relativization of particular modalities to individual persons; and the restructuring of such examples to the practical area bodes very ill for the contention that modalities are equivocal with respect to practical and alethic discussion. 

If they were, equivocal non-trivial relativization should appear either in both kinds of discourse or in neither. Let us expand this objection in relation to an example, not (seemingly) different from some already adduced. Suppose someone were to say, in perhaps appropriately fervent tones,

"FLEW, the well-known atheist who happens to be Grice’s former pupil at St. John’s, must get the Oxford Chair of Theology".

" Depending on context, one might find three different interpretations, all of them falling within the volitive zone. (A) 

One might mean that it is vital (perhaps vital to the world, or to some microcosm which is momentarily taken as if it were the world), that Flew should be established in this position. 

On this interpreta-tion, one would not be laying on any agent's shoulders an incumbency to see to it, that this happy state be realized, unless it were on the shoulders of someone with a reputation for total ineffectiveness in mundane affairs, like The Almighty. (B) 

On another interpretation, one would be invoking a supposed incumbency, perhaps an incumbency on 'us' (whoever 'us' might be) to secure the result. (C) On what might be a particularly natural interpretation, one would be charging FLEW with an incumbency to secure his own election to this august chair. On both interpretations (B) and (C), one would be advancing the idea that it was necessary relative to some potential agent ('us' or FLEW) that FLEW obtain the chair.

On the alethic side, no such significant relativity is observable. 

One might mean by uttering the sentence that (for example) it is a one-horse race (a shoe-in) for FLEW; but that kind of necessity would not be relativized, except perhaps timidly to any person whatsoever as something which he (like everyone else) would have to admit, or alternatively to some particular person whose view it is that FLEW cannot but be chosen (and this is not an interesting interpreta-tion). 

A parallel phenomenon will (it may be alleged) be discernible with respect to the other modals, like 'ought' and should and there is (a) reason to (for). Citation of such phenomenon might also be reinforced by the observation that, in a number of cases, there are special words which incorporate relativity into their meaning;connected with the words "necessary' and ought, there are such words as 'need' and 'obligation' which it is plausible to regard as exclusively volitive (practical) and especially relative in meaning.

While the appearance of such specialized words in the language is not conclusive (it is notoriously difficult to find a procedure for distinguishing between the existence of a generic notion and the existence of a plurality of less generic notions related by analogy), the one-sidedness of relativization may well be held to be an obstacle in the Equivocality Thesis.

It seems to me that, initially, two main directions of reply present themselves: 

it might be claimed that the one-sidedness of relativization, even if genuine or fundamental, is not damaging to the Equivocality Thesis;' or (B) it might be argued that the one-sidedness of relativization is only a surface phenomenon, in that the relativized volitive modalities can be represented as being derivable from ulterior absolute modalities, and so as being in principle eliminable. Let us take these up in turn.

To see more clearly whether or not the admission of relativized modalities, even if one-sided, would damage the Equivocality Thesis, one might take a further look (this time in a slightly more formal way) at how such a thesis would be most securely established, 

It seems to me that it would be strong support for such a thesis if appropriate modal expressions could be introduced into a system of natural deduction, designed to handle both alethic and volitive moods, independently of any reference to the other constraints in such a system, and, in particular, independently of any reference to specific moods. 

We might hope to find, for each member of a certain family of modalities, an introduction rule and an elimination rule which would be analogous to the rules available for classical logical constants.

 Suggestions are not hard to come by.

Let us suppose that we are seeking to provide such a pair of rules for the particular modality of necessity. 

For an introduction rule we might consider the following (1 think equivalent) forms: (a)

"If a sentence ip is demonstrable then "Necessary is demonstrable;

(b) "Provided ep is dependent on no assumptions, to derive p' from necessary p". For an elimination rule we might consider "From "Necessary p to derive To. It is to be under-

See p. go for a statement of the Thesis.

stood, of course, that the values of the syntactical variable "p' would contain mood markers; both"-.the pig went to market *2 and "!the pig goes to market" would be proper substitutes for p' but "* the pig goes to market" would not (unless we accept the idea

that radicals are alethic sentences, already mentioned.

Of course, if we accept these suggestions, we shall also have to accept whatever uncomfortable consequences they may entail. In particular we shall have to meet the opposition of those who think, at least with respect to necessity, that there is a need to distinguish a semantic notion of necessity/validity from a syntactical, or partially syntactical, notion of provability. 

The grounds on which such a contention would be based might be a demand for a distinct notion of necessity by reference to which, in proofs of soundness or of completeness, the adequacy or strength of a particular notion of provability-in-a-system might be supported; or they might be the intuitively not unattractive idea that the non-provability and non-disprovability of some mathematician's thesis (say Fermat's con-jecture), should the thesis be neither provable nor disprovable, would not prohibit the thesis (or its negation) from being necessary; we just might never know to which of them necessity attaches.

 Such questions as these plainly deserve study; 

but Gricd himself has neither the time nor perhaps the competence to pursue them further, at this moment. 

The suggested elimination rule treats it as a general feature of necessity, holding across the board, that a statement about necessity entails the result of dropping the necessity operator; the use made of mood-operators allows the reversal of the standard idea that this feature attaches to (indicative) modal logic but not to deontic logic, since 'obligatory A' does not entail the truth of

'A. 

With respect to this suggestion the salient problem will be one of interpretation once it is understood that 'p' is not restricted to indicative mood-markers, but may cloak a volitive operator.

 What is it to mean to say that "Let it be that I eat my hat" is entailed by, or is derivable from, "It is necessary that let it be that I eat my hat" ("I must/have to eat my bat")? 

On the face of it two lines of interpretation seem to offer themselves: (i) 

to say that this derivability obtains is to say that one who says (thinks) *I must [have to] eat my hat with my head in it" is committed to seeing (accepting) (cannot consistently refuse to accept) "let it be that I eat my hat" (*T shall

I Where pis a sentence, Ve is the radical contained in (or underlying) ф.](intentional) eat my hat"): (ii) 

that it is to say that if satisfactori-ness (in this case truth) attaches to "It is necessary for me to eat my hat", then satisfactoriness (in form of practical value) attaches to "let me eat my hat" ("I shall (intentional) eat my hat"). 

Grice thinks we are at liberty to adopt either of these lines.

The adoption of the proposal under discussion will also involve further work in some other directions. I have sketched its application only to the idea of necessity; but there is, of course, a larger class of modals, including not only "necessary", but "ceteris paribus", "might", "probable", and so forth, to which the project of characterization by means of a pair of rules (introducing and eliminative) would have to be extended; and its extension might not be plain sailing. And the centrepiece of the programme will itself need some further elaboration. 

Can we be sure, for instance, that the provision of such a pair of rules is sufficient for the unique determination of a concept, or might it be that, while such concepts as those of modality require the availability of such pairs of rules, more than one modal concept (or even more than one con-cept, not necessarily in every case modal) may be associated with a single pair of rules, so that more than the provision of the rules will be needed for a full discrimination of any one concept? 

How are we to find out and justify the answer to such a question? 

And what should be said of the conjecture (roughly) that the nature of the introduction rule determines the character of the elimination rule? 

But these questions I shall now leave on one side, proceeding to more pressing matters.

Thave so far made no mention of the fairly obvious fact that, if the introduction rule for 'necessary in effect bids us ascribe necessity to whatever is demonstrable, then necessity is essentially relative to a system or theory, since it is within systems or theories that demonstration is achieved; and indeed is upon the constitu tion of the system or theory within which it is achieved that the possibility of demonstration depends. So long as the parent system is held invariant, reference to it may perhaps be safely omitted; but if the reference-system is not invariant, and if such variation carries with it variation in the type or dimension of necessity, then anonymity in such reference can no longer be safely preserved. 

This, I would suggest, is the situation which prevails; there are notorious different varieties of necessity-logical, metaphysical, physical,psychological, moral, practical, legal and (why not?) even ichthyo-logical (perhaps); 

and, as Grice sees things, each of these adverbs serves to indicate a more or less specific type of system or theory with references to which necessity (demonstrability) obtains.

Some of the consequences or likely developments of a position of this sort should not be ignored. 

The idea of treating types of necessity as explicable by a reference to the theory or system which determines demonstrability will, in certain cases, lead to a reversal of the assumptions about priority which some philosophers would be inclined to make. 

Many, Grice suspects, would regard it as rational to suppose that what a logical theory (system) does is to systematize a corpus of antecedently given logical necessities, and (perhaps an even more natural supposition) that moral theory does (or would if there were such a theory) systematize antecedent given obligations or incumbencies. 

But the present proposal would disallow these modes of thinking. If incumbencies are moral necessities, and moral necessities are what is demonstrable in an (acceptable) moral theory or system, the system comes first and cannot be informatively characterized as this system relating to incumbencies or moral necessities. 

Similarly a logical theory must be characterizable otherwise than by reference to its concern with logical necessities. 

This reversal of direction I find appealing, particularly as it would emphasize the central importance of the construction of theories or systems; no system, no necessity.

There is no reason to expect that the various theories or systems by reference to which the general characterizations of modality, such as necessity, are to be diversified, will be either detached from or independent of each other. 

Rather one should expect to find serial relationships within groups of systems: theory A (say logic) is presupposed by theory B (say metaphysics), which in turn is presupposed by theory C (say physics), which in turn is presupposed by theory D (say physiology), in which we may expect to find our

"theory-space" being stocked bit by bit with extensions of prior occupants thereof. 

But perhaps not every extension of a junior theory will give the (a new) adverbial with which to modify such modals as "necessary". 

Grice expects that there are special laws or generalities which are common and peculiar to fish; but I would doubt whether this fact (if it be a fact) would give one a special type of necessity, namely, ichthyological necessity. 

It looks to me as if itmay be the case that any theory which creates a further adverbial to modify 'necessary' must provide an extension of a certain degree or kind of generality, which ichthyology would fail to reach; though I have no idea how such two types or levels of generality should be characterized.

We may now ask whether these reflections about the relativity of necessity (and maybe other modalities) to theories or systems will aid us in the defence of the Equivocality Thesis against the threat seemingly presented by one-sided relativization of such modalities to persons. 

Grice thinks that they may, provided that we can represent any personal relativity sometimes exhibited by practical modals as a special case of relativity to a given system. 

Let us consider what the import of the relativization of a particular modal, say 'necessary' to an individual person or creature, might be. 

One interesting possibility is that the relativization indicates a person whose judgement or opinion it is that something or other is the case: 

"For Dr Keate, it is necessary that every boy should be beaten at least once a week." 

This case is an uninteresting in that this kind of relativity is not restricted to practical modals, nor indeed to modals; "for ..? " works as a sentence-adverbial (

"For Dr Keate schoolboys are a species of reptile"). 

Three other more authentic cases of modality-relativization are also more interesting. 

The unidiomatic form "

It is necessary with respect to Mrs Thatcher that Mr Heath become an ambassador at once"

 might be interpreted as saying (a) 

that it is Mrs Thatcher who has ordained this fate for Mr Heath, (b)

 that it is she to whose advantage it would be thus to dispose of Mr Heath, (c) 

that it is her business to see that the transformation is effected. 

Leaving on one side for a moment the by no means unimportant first alternative, we might perhaps put the second and third modes of interpretation to work. It is not too difficult to envisage a body of precepts about how to behave, relating to a single particular person, who is intended to be both agent and beneficiary with respect to the operation of these pre-cepts; nor is it a great additional effort to suppose these precepts to be derivable from a limited number of parent precepts, still however retaining reference to the particular individual, and generally, with the aid of further factual premisses, a system which constitutes a self-help manual for that individual.

 It seems by no means out of the question that, if the references to that individual are tobe irreducible (not eliminable in favour of references to classes of person to which the individual belongs), then the first interpretation might also have to be brought into play; the manual is a manual for a particular individual (and for no other individual) just because he has legislated' (rightly or wrongly) what his ends are to be.

Grice is inclined to think of more or less articulated egoistic manuals of this sort as underlying morality.

We have now, 1 hope, reached the idea of relativized modalities as relating to establishability in a 'personalized system. Let us see if the pattern of introduction/elimination rules can be extended to relativized necessity, regarded in this light. There seems to be no particular problem about allowing an introduction rule which tells us that, if it is established in X's 'personalized' system that p; then "it is necessary with respect to X that @' is true (establishable).

The accompanying elimination rule is, however, slightly less promising. 

If we suppose such a rule to tell us that, if one is committed to the idea that it is necessary with respect to X that p, one is also committed to whatever is expressed by ‹p, we shall be in trouble; 

for such a rule is not acceptable, @ will be a volitive expression such as 

"let it be that X eats his hat with his head in it; and my commitment to the idea that X's system requires him to eat his hat with his head in it does not ipso facto involve me in accepting (volitively) "let X eat his hat with his head in it.

But if we take the elimination rule rather as telling us that, if it is necessary with respect to X that let X eat his hat, then "let X eat his hat with his head in it possesses satisfactoriness-with-respect-to-X, the situation is easier; for this version of the rule seems inoffensive. 

This interpretation of the elimination rule parallels the second option distinguished earlier, with respect to the form of the elimination rule for unrelativized necessity; 

so perhaps the deferred selection should be made, in favour of that option.

But let us, without relying on the encouraging aspect of procedure (A), turn our attention to an assessment of the prospects of procedure (B), that is, to an attempt to exhibit the seeming one-sidedness of the appearance of relativity in modalities in the practical zone as an illusion, a surface phenomenon explicable in terms of absolute modalities. 

Considered in relation to necessity, the idea would be that to say (for example) 

"It is necessary for FZlEW to apply for the Chair of Theology" 

"It is necessary relativeto RN that let RN apply for the chair of Theology") 

is merely to produce a specimen of conditional (hypothetical) necessity, a kind of necessity which is by no means confined to the practical (volitive) area. 

What is expressed by such an utterance can be represented as a consequence of a pair of premisses (a)

"It is necessary that let anyone who satisfies condition C apply for a chair in Theology" (when 'C' represents some possibly quite complex condition), and (b) 

"FLEW satisfies condition C"; 

indeed, if we allow ourselves to quantify over conditions (whatever they may be), we can represent its meaning by 

"There is a C such that it is necessary that let anyone who satisfies C apply for a chair in Theology; and FLES satisfies C*; 

this paraphrase uses no relativized modal, and (furthermore) is not importantly different in character from the proper expansion of the alethic 

"This bit of metal must dissolve in aqua regia — being gold.

Grice very much doubts if this attempt to conjure away relativization from the concept of practical necessity can succeed. 

In the example under discussion, FLEW is spoken of as being both the person who is or should be concerned about what is being stated to be a matter of necessity, and also the agent (or patient) whose doings (or sufferings) are of concern. 

Often the same person operates (as here) in both roles; 

and where this is so, it is cosy to fall into the idea that a single reference to the agent (or patient) is all that is needed, 

and so that relativization can be eliminated. 

But things are not always thus; 

It is necessary for (to) Grace that the Dnglish public retains its interest in cricket"

 is different in this respect. 

So we need to distinguish between the person for whom something is a reason (or is necessary), and the person about whom we are talking when we say what is necessary, or what there is a reason for. 

Moreover, it seems plausible to suggest that, when no one is explicitly or implicitly referred to as a person for whom something is necessary (or as called for by reason), the reason or the necessity is general, public or objective, rather than private or subjective.

The suggested treatment would represent it as of general concern that FLEW apply for the mentioned chair, which is quite inappropriate." It may surely be a matter of personal

 Nagel, The Possibility of Altruism (Oxford

private) necessity to FLEW that he apply for the chair,

 without it being a matter of proper concern to any other person that he so apply; 

and, while it is not clear exactly what kind or degree of intervention is sanctioned by a generally applicable (unrelativized) necessity, it is difficult to avoid the idea that some measure of intervention is justified, ex vi termini, in cases of such necessity.

The situation, already complex, is further complicated by a number of additional considerations.

 First, it might turn out to be the case that a relativized necessity, though distinct from an absolute necessity, can be backed or supported by an absolute necessity. 

The private necessity in the case of FLEW to apply for the chair, might be backed, in the first instance, by the ends which FLEW has, or has set for himself; 

but the adoption of these ends might not be arbitrary: 

there might be an acceptable generality affirming that for any one of a certain sort (which FLEW is) it is (or alternatively should be) a matter of private necessity to have these ends; 

and this generality might itself be a matter of some kind of necessity (alethic or practical). 

A Private necessity would be distinct from, but possibly supported by, a public necessity that in certain circumstances such a private necessitiy should obtain. 

Again, the backing of a private necessity by a public necessity might be not just a feature which is sometimes present, but one which was in one way or another demanded (alethically or practically). 

It might be possible to argue for the acceptability of an "Universalizability Principle relating to a private (relativized) necessity:

It is factually (alethically) necessary that, 

if it is necessary to someone X that p should be case [that let it be that pl. 

 there is some condition S such that X satisfies and (necessarily] for anyone y who satisfies S, it is (practically) necessary for him (y) that let it be that p (that p should be the case);

It is practically necessary that, if it is necessary to someone X that p should be the case,

let there be some condition S, such that X satisfies S, and [necessarily) for anyone y who satisfies S, it is (practically) necessary for him (y) that let it be that p (that p should be the case).

Of these principles, Grice must confess that Grice is attracted by the second, which makes it *not* a logical requirement, but so to speak a rational desideratum that one should accept something as a matter of practical necessity only if (and if) one can back its acceptance by a general principle about relativized necessity;

 this will allow people to be subject to a real private necessity which is nevertheless not rationally well founded. 

But at this point we are, Grice thinks, just scratching the surface of a very difficult and very important philosophical area.

Much more attention to it is needed.

Grice has, in the present section, given a moderately strong green light to the idea 

that the emergence of one-sided personal relativization in practical modalities would not damage the Equivocality Thesis, and a moderately strong red light to the idea 

that such one-sided relativization is an illusion, to be dissolved into underlying absolute modalities. 

Grice would conclude this discussion with a brief mention of a third possibility, namely,

 that relativization is real, but is not one-sided but two-sided, being found on the alethic side as well as the volitive (practical). 

Along these lines one might seek to treat the possession of essential properties (for example, perhaps the possession by a particular table of the property of being made of wood) as analogous to relativized practical necessities;

 it is perhaps essential to the existence of *this* table that it may be made of wood:

— a table not made of wood could not be *this* table — 

analogous to the way in which it might be (in a practical case) essential to the existence of a particular human being that he breathe and perform other vital human functions. 

But further discussion of this idea would belong to an occasion in which the notions of life, purpose, and final causes are under examination. 

H. P. Grice.