Page 36 - Communication and the Evolution of Society

13 What Is Universal Pragmatics?

language and their context-specific application; he has a pre-
theoretical knowledge of this rule system, which is at least suffi-
cient to enable him to produce the utterance in question. This
implicit rule consciousness is a know-how. The interpreter, in
turn, who not only shares but wants to understand this implicit
knowledge of the competent speaker, must transform this know-
how into a second-level know-that. This is the task of reconstruc-
tive understanding, that is, of meaning explication in the sense
of rational reconstruction of generative structures underlying the
production of symbolic formations. Since the rule consciousness
to be reconstructed is a categorial knowledge, the reconstruction
first leads us to the operation of conceptual explication.
Carnap put forward four requirements, which the explication
of a concept must fulfill in order to be adequate.
(1) The explicans should be /ike the explicandum, that is, from now
on the explicans should be able to be used in place of the explicandum
in all relevant cases. (2) There should be rules that fix the use of the
explicans (in connection with other scientific concepts) in an exact
manner. (3) The explicans should prove to be fruitful in regard to.
the formulation of general statements. (4) (Presupposing that require-
ments 1-3 can be met) the explicans should be as simple as possible.*9
Wunderlich sums up his reflections on the status of concept ex-
plications as follows:
Explication always proceeds (conformable to Carnap’s requirements
2-4) with regard to theories; either central concepts (like “meaning’’)
are explicated in such a way that entire theories correspond to them as
explicans, or different concepts are explicated interconnectedly. (2)
We always explicate with regard to clear cases, so as to be able in
connection with them to replace our intuitions with exact arguments.
But the theory can then also provide answers to borderline cases; or
we explicate separately what a clear borderline case is. (3) The lan-
guage of explication is at the same level as the explicandum language
(e.g., ordinary language or a standardized version derived from it).
Thus it is not a question here of a descriptive language or a metalan-
guage relative to the language of the explicandum (the explicans does
not describe the explicandum) .3°

In these reflections on the explication of concepts, one point
strikes me as insufficiently worked out—the evaluative accom-