When trying to understand an unknown philosophy (or philosopher) we are taught that we should give that philosophy every possible opportunity to say something relevant. This practice is called using the Principle of Charity and there are various ways philosophers go about implementing it (via Wikipedia):
By believing
- The other uses words in the ordinary way;
- The other makes true statements;
- The other makes valid arguments;
- The other says something interesting.
I do not believe using any of these methods is sufficient if you want to be charitable.
Case 1:
We can be charitable by believing the other uses words in the ordinary way.
Even if the oracle (speaker or text) uses words in the ‘ordinary way’, it may be that those words are irrelevant to the current topic. Conversely the oracle may not use words in the ‘ordinary way’ but those words could still be relevant to the current topic.
For instance many people do not use English words in ways I consider ‘normal’ as a native English speaker, but it’s rather common that those folks have something very relevant to say about philosophy. On the other hand there are many people who speak English quite fluently without anything interesting to say.
Case 2:
We can be charitable by believing the other makes true statements.
Even if the oracle makes true statements, it may be that those true statements are irrelevant to the current topic. Conversely the oracle may not make true statements, but those false/ambiguous statements could still be relevant to the current topic.
For instance someone could be wrong but for the right reasons, i.e. he or she may have identified many of the critical presuppositions that underlie a topic. Though the person has made a mistake in deriving the conclusion, he or she may yet progress our understanding. On the other hand is a machine that continually prints out true statements of the sort “The sky is blue iff the sky is blue” and “Grass is yellow iff grass is yellow.” We wouldn’t find such a machine to be making relevant statements.
Case 3:
We can be charitable by believing the other makes valid arguments.
Even if the oracle makes valid arguments, it may be that those arguments are irrelevant to the current topic. Conversely the oracle may not make valid arguments, but those arguments could still be relevant to the current topic.
For instance a person may be right but for the wrong reasons, i.e. he or she may somehow have arrived at brilliant conclusions using the shoddiest reasoning practices. Just because this person has bad technical execution does not mean we should ignore his or her interesting results. On the other hand is the machine from the previous example that has perfect logical execution, but says nothing worthwhile.
Case 4:
We can be charitable by believing the other says something interesting.
This is question begging. We cannot use the concept of interesting to explain what makes something interesting or relevant.
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These examples show that the scheme illustrated above is insufficient to provide a charitable understanding of a text or philosopher.
