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The dominant metaphor of conceptual relativism, that of differing points of view, seems to betray an underlying paradox. Differentpoints of view make sense, but only if there is a common co-ordinate system on which to plot them yet the existence of a common system belies the claim of dramatic incomparability.

Donald Davidson

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Donald Davidson
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More quotes by Donald Davidson

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Terminological infelicities have a way of breeding conceptual confusion.
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There is no such thing as a language, not if a language is anything like what many philosophers and linguists have supposed. Thereis therefore no such thing to be learned, mastered, or born with. We must give up the idea of a clearly defined shared structure which language-users acquire and then apply to cases.
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If we cannot find a way to interpret the utterances and other behaviour of a creature as revealing a set of beliefs largely consistent and true by our standards, we have no reason to count that creature as rational, as having beliefs, or as saying anything.
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Even if someone knew the entire physical history of the world, and every mental event were identical with a physical, it would notfollow that he could predict or explain a single mental event (so described, of course).
Donald Davidson
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Mental events such as perceivings, rememberings, decisions, and actions resist capture in the net of physical theory.
Donald Davidson
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Nothing in the world, no object or event, would be true or false if there were not thinking creatures.
Donald Davidson