The Philosophical Quarterly Vol. , No.

 October 

BOOK REVIEWS

Quine. B P H. (London: Routledge, . Pp. x + . Price £..)

The latest volume of the Arguments of the Philosophers series is on Quine. The author is
a leading Russell and Quine scholar, and this particular book has been keenly
anticipated over the last few years. Hylton’s earlier book on Russell, Russell, Idealism,
and the Emergence of Analytic Philosophy, is widely acknowledged as one of the best
currently available, so it is natural to expect high-quality material in this case too.
Readers will not be disappointed. But there is an important difference: whereas the
book on Russell contains analysis and historical reconstruction, this one offers ‘a
unified, sympathetic, and comprehensive treatment’ (p. ) of Quine’s philosophy.
The first half dwells mostly on Quine’s epistemology (chs –), whereas the second
half is mostly on metaphysics, or the ‘the structure of reality’ (chs –). There are
three introductory chapters, the first an overview of Quine’s naturalism, the second
on his historical background, and the third on the analytic–synthetic distinction.
There is also ch. , on indeterminacy of translation, and a concluding section.
The book as a whole covers nearly all of Quine’s work; the only major topic left
out is his more technical contributions to logic. It is elegantly written and presents
his philosophy in terms that are favourable and reasonable; Hylton renders Quine’s
arguments as cogent as possible, and in this regard it is hard to find another book
quite like this one. But apart from these matters of style and intent, the book also
stands out in more substantive ways. I shall briefly comment on three topics on
which Hylton is particularly incisive and differs most from other authors.
. Quine is often portrayed as a negative thinker whose main purpose is to de-
stroy traditional doctrines, especially those associated with meaning, modalities and
analyticity. Against that kind of approach, Hylton construes him as a systematic
philosopher whose approach to traditional notions can only be properly understood
within the context of his positive philosophical project. Quine’s philosophy, accord-
ing to Hylton, contains two main strands, ‘epistemic’ and ‘metaphysical’. Both are
set out by Quine’s naturalism, ‘the recognition that it is within science itself, and not
in some prior philosophy, that reality is to be identified and described’ (Theories and
Things, p. ).
Quine’s epistemology is an attempt to explain how we have come to acquire the
sophisticated theories of the world which we now have. Hylton calls this a ‘genetic
project’. As with anything else in Quine’s philosophy, this project is to be carried out
within natural science: it is natural science (broadly construed) investigating its own
origins. Because the project is undertaken at a very high level of abstraction and

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 BOOK REVIEWS 
generality, it is called ‘philosophical’, and that is all there is to the distinction be-
tween science and philosophy, on this view.
Quine’s metaphysics is an attempt at ‘limning the true and ultimate structure of
reality’ (Word and Object, p. ). Again this is to be carried out from within the
confines of our current best theories of the world, or natural science broadly
speaking. According to Hylton, this is a project of systematization and clarification,
hence the goal of finding the simplest and clearest framework (or ‘canonical nota-
tion’) for science. As in the case of the genetic project, the philosophical nature of
Quine’s contributions here lie not in any peculiarity of method or goal, but in their
high level of systematicness, abstraction and generality.
That Quine’s philosophy is to be conceived as having a metaphysical strand
alongside its epistemology is something of a novelty in the literature. Hylton himself
calls attention to this, by contrasting his reading with that of another important
author (Roger Gibson Jr) who construes Quine’s philosophy as centred predomin-
antly on epistemology (Hylton, p. , n. ). Certainly this is not metaphysics of the
traditional kind, but rather ‘metaphysics naturalized’ (p. ).
. In a paper published  years before this book, Hylton argued that Quine’s
qualms about the analytic–synthetic distinction should be set apart from his inde-
terminacy of translation arguments. This claim, new at the time, is restated in the
book. Discussion of the two topics is spaced four chapters apart (chs  and ). This
purports to show that they can be treated independently. Hylton’s view in this
regard is not shared by some other authors, e.g., Gary Ebbs, Rule-Following and
Reason. Indeterminacy of translation is often thought to affect nearly all of Quine’s
philosophy. Hylton argues that it ‘is of relatively little significance’: ‘If translation
were determinate then we could use that fact to define a notion of synonymy, and
hence of meaning. But that kind of notion of meaning would play neither of the roles
which have chiefly led philosophers to invoke the term “meaning”. It would not
explain language-acquisition or language-mastery. It would not underpin a notion of
truth by meaning which would play a fundamental epistemological role’ (p. ).
. Hylton also stresses that there is no argument in Quine against the analytic–
synthetic distinction. This is a point often misread. Quine himself traces the dis-
tinction in Roots of Reference (pp. –) and elsewhere. His criticisms have to do not
with the distinction, but with the use Carnap and others tried to make of it. What
Quine rejects is the idea of a set of epistemologically privileged sentences that are
not justified empirically. Even if one grants that there are sentences true in virtue of
meaning (analytic), their truth-values still hinge on how the world is, and in this
sense they are not epistemologically privileged. Ultimately their justification is
empirical, like that of any other any sentence. This is because the way we use each
word (what it means) is tied to the overall theory of the world we happen to have.
That whales are mammals and not fish is not just a matter of meaning, but an
empirical fact about the world. That energy and matter can be inter-defined is
an empirical claim of the theory of relativity, and not just a terminological stipula-
tion. The main support of Quine’s view is holism, the thesis that sentences are not in
general justified one at a time, but as a ‘corporate body’ (large sets of sentences at a
time). This is a thesis which Quine takes to be trivial and obvious (see Pursuit of Truth,
©  The Authors Journal compilation ©  The Editors of The Philosophical Quarterly
 BOOK REVIEWS

p. ), but it has deep consequences. Because sentences are in general justified col-
lectively, any reason one might have for accepting an individual sentence must
depend on whatever reasons one has for accepting the portions of the theory to
which it belongs. This is true even of analytic sentences: a choice of vocabulary (a
taxonomy) is part of what contributes to the empirical success of a theory as a whole.
Michael Friedman, in his Dynamics of Reason, has put forward a neo-Carnapian
view in which some sentences are constitutive of the meanings of others. He argues
that scientific practice is more structured than Quine suggests: different sentences
play different roles. But on Hylton’s reading, Quine’s account is set at a higher level
of generality and abstraction than Friedman’s, and does not deny any structuring of
the sentences within a theory. The point is merely that all sentences, including
Friedman’s constitutive sentences, are subject to empirical justification in so far as
the overall theory of which they are part is subject to confirmation by observations.
I shall finish with something that might be considered a drawback to the book.
While providing a detailed and sympathetic treatment of Quine’s philosophy, the
author has chosen to avoid nearly all comparisons with other philosophies. The
concluding chapter does have a short but very interesting discussion of three ways in
which Quine’s philosophy may be found wanting (pp. –). But the discussion is
abstract and does not engage directly with others. This is a trait that runs through
most of the book: the actual historical debates in which Quine figured so promin-
ently are mostly left out. There is also not much on Quine’s general influence on
contemporary philosophy, or what his legacy might be. In other words, this is an
insider’s account of the arguments; reckoning how they fare in relation to others was
not the author’s goal. The main achievement of the book is to show how forceful
and compelling Quine’s philosophy can be when it is understood systematically.
Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil R P S

©  The Author Journal compilation ©  The Editors of The Philosophical Quarterly