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Thomas Reid. Philosophy of Language. Social Operations of the Mind. Public Intelligibility. Shared Linguistic Environment.
This dissertation investigates the conditions of language for the so-called “social operations of the mind” in the philosophy of Thomas Reid (1710–1796). According to Reid, language consists of all the signs used by human beings to communicate thoughts, intentions, desires, and purposes. Among the operations of the mind, Reid distinguishes solitary operations, such as perceiving, remembering, judging, and reasoning, from social operations, such as promising, commanding, testifying, questioning, and requesting information. The research focuses on social operations insofar as they make possible the public communication of the intentional states of linguistic agents. According to Reid, social operations depend upon two original principles of our nature: the principle of veracity and the principle of credulity. By means of these principles, human beings are naturally inclined both to speak the truth and to trust what others tell them. These principles ground the relations of trust and dependence necessary for social operations, social life, language, and human communication. However, this dissertation questions whether such conditions, although necessary, are sufficient to guarantee the successful performance of the social operations of the mind. The thesis advances the hypothesis that social operations also require complementary conditions updated and expanded from the conditions proposed by Reid. The first condition is the condition of language (LC1), according to which social operations require a linguistic system operating within the ordinary course of the faculties of language. These are internal conditions belonging to the original constitution of the linguistic faculties. The second condition is the extern condition of the linguistic environment (LC2), according to which social operations depend upon a perceptual environment with communal and pact-based dimensions that favor the public recognition of their normative practices. I shall defend the thesis that the social operations of the mind in Thomas Reid depend not only on the ordinary functioning of the faculties of language (CL1), but also on an appropriate linguistic-social environment (CL2), structured by perceptual, communal, and covenantal conditions that make possible their public intelligibility and normative success.