Normativity in social accounts of reasoning: a Rylean approach

Abstract

In recent years, the philosophy and psychology of reasoning have made a ‘social turn’: in both disciplines it is now common to reject the traditional picture of reasoning as a solitary intellectual exercise in favour of the idea that reasoning is a social activity driven by social aims. According to the most prominent social account, Mercier and Sperber’s interactionist theory, this implies that reasoning is not a normative activity. As they argue, in producing reasons we are not trying to ‘get things right’; instead our aims are to justify ourselves and persuade others to accept our views. I will argue that even if interactionism has played a crucial role in bringing about the ‘social turn’ in our thinking about reasoning, it does not convince in its claim that reasoning is not a normative activity. Moreover, I argue that it is in fact perfectly possible to understand reasoning as a social tool that is also aimed at getting things right. I will propose that Gilbert Ryle’s conceptualization of reasoning as ‘didactic discourse’ offers one possible way to understand reasoning as both social and normative activity, and that as such his ideas could be of great value for the social turn in our thinking about reasoning.

The normativity of logic and the natural normativity of argumentation

“…There is a close connection between this second conception of reasoning and social psychologism, as both avoid characterising reasoning in terms of private entities of difficult access and propose, instead, an approach to reasoning dealing with public content. Thus, I endorse a conception of reasoning along these lines by following Mackenzie and the social turn in the philosophy and psychology of reasoning (Dutilh-Novaes, 2021; Kalis, 2022). In this externalist conception of reasoning, linguistic exchanges among agents make up a dialogue.…”

“…On the other hand, criticisms against the normativity assumption often stem from the traditional view of reasoning as a solitary process of drawing inferences. However, the social turn in the philosophy and psychology of reasoning has led to rejecting this traditional view in favour of considering reasoning as a social activity (Dutilh-Novaes, 2021;Godden, 2015;Kalis, 2022). Building on this line of argumentation, reasoning is a social process that occurs through linguistic interactions among agents.…”

“…Además, cuestiono visiones tradicionales del razonamiento que lo describen como un proceso privado y solitario. En cambio, caracterizo al razonamiento como una actividad social (Dutilh-Novaes, 2021;Godden, 2015;Kalis, 2022;Mackenzie, 1989). A partir de estas bases, exploro el concepto de la normatividad natural de la argumentación (Gilbert, 2007;Jackson, 2019).…”