On the Distinction Between the Analytic and the Synthetic

Author(s): John Wild and J. L. Coblitz

Source: Philosophy and Phenomenological Research , Jun., 1948, Vol. 8, No. 4 (Jun.,
1948), pp. 651-667
Published by: International Phenomenological Society

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2103689

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 ON THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE ANALYTIC
AND THE SYNTHETIC

Among the many philosophical doctrines associated with the develop-

ment of modern logic, there is no theory more widely accepted than that of
the clear-cut distinction between analytic and synthetic propositions. It is
accepted as a more or less established first principle of logic not only by
present day textbooks, but also by the authors of more advanced systematic
treatises on the subject.
At first sight this would seem to be an encouraging indication of genuine
progress in the field, and of fundamental agreement among qualified in-
vestigators. But the less sophisticated inquirer, seeking exact definitions
of these terms, and an unambiguous explanation of the distinction, suffers
surprising frustrations as he works his way through the voluminous litera-
ture.
He is disappointed that the ordinary textbook merely states the distinc-
tion as a commonplace which must be taken for granted with hardly any
explanation. But after all, one cannot expect too much from a textbook.
When he finds a similar lack of precise definition even in more advanced
works he begins to fall into more grievous confusion. When he discovers
deep lines of cleavage in the doctrines of those who have attempted to give
an adequate account of these concepts, his confusion is tinged with be-
wilderment. He begins to wonder whether this famous Kantian doctrine
really can be defended as a basic and authenticated principle of logic.
In the following pages we wish to present certain reasons for raising this
question.
Contemporary attempts to clarify the meaning of the distinction between
the analytic and the synthetic fall into two major groups, each of which
finds some support in the very authoritative but very ambiguous discussion
of the Critique of Pure Reason. On the one hand, there are those which
proceed from a logical point of view, explaining the difference between
analytic and synthetic in terms of the relation between the subject and
predicate of a proposition. From this standpoint, a proposition is analytic
if the subject in some sense "includes" the predicate, synthetic if the
predicate lies outside the subject. On the other hand, there are those
which proceed from an epistemological point of view, explaining the differ-
ence between analytic and synthetic in terms of noetic origin. From this
standpoint, a proposition is. analytic if it is certified or validated a prior
solely by reference to the meaning of the proposition, synthetic if it is
verified a posteriori from empirical fact.

651

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652 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

In most contemporary discussions of the subject, these two approaches

are merged, and it is generally assumed that if S includes P, the proposition
must also be a priori; that if P lies beyond the range of S, the propositio
must be a posteriori. This assumption, however, is far from being self-
evident. Why should the logical form of a proposition necessarily depend
on its mode of derivation? Is it not possible that a proposition which is
logically analytic (S includes P) may be epistemologically synthetic (de-
rived from experience), and that a proposition which is logically synthetic
may be epistemologically analytic?
Such theses have been defended by eminent philosophers. Kant, for
example, held that certain propositions were both synthetic and a priori.
Hence we have no right at the beginning to take for granted that the two
ways of distinguishing the analytic from the synthetic are necessarily con-
nected. This requires a demonstration which is certainly not supplied
by the best known contemporary treatments of the subject. Not only do
they merge these two diverse conceptions without carefully distinguishing
them, but they also fail to distinguish interpretations of these which a more
careful analysis would reveal to be radially different.
Is modem logical analysis really clear as to the meaning of the two
terms analytic and synthetic? We are convinced that this question cannot
be answered with a confident affirmative. Not only are different senses
merged and confused with one another, but certain senses, when carefully
examined, turn out to be often false and sometimes impossible. Let us
first (I) examine the logical distinction, and then (II) the epistemological
distinction.

I. THE LOGICAL DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE ANALYTIC AND

THE SYNTHETIC

Though this approach is seldom clearly defined and analyzed, it is

constantly suggested in the contemporary literature. When thinking
along these lines, the author refers to the analytic and the synthetic as
different ways in which the subject and the predicate of a proposition may
be formally related. But the exact nature of this relation is far from clear.
There are at least two very different ways in which it is at present con-
ceived, neither one of which will bear a careful scrutiny. First, it may be
conceived as a relation of inclusion; second as a relation of complete identity,
or a strict tautology. Let us now examine these in this order.

(1) The Analytic and the Synthetic as a Relation of Inclusion

and Exclusion Between Subject and Predicate

This conception crops up again and again in the recent literature. It is

suggested by Professor C. I. Lewis in Mind and the World Order. Ac-
cording to Professor Lewis, a proposition of the form All A is B is analytic

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 DIsTINCrIoN BETWEEN ANALYTIC AND SYNTHETIC 653

or a priori when the "concept A includes or implies the concept B."1 It is

synthetic when A does not include B. This definition derives, of course,
from Kant's famous discussion in the Critique of Pure Reason. Kant's
formulation reads as follows: "Either the predicate B belongs to the subject
A as something which is (covertly) contained in this concept A; or B lies
outside the concept A. In the one case, I entitle the judgment analytic,
in the other synthetic."'
We are not given any very clear analysis of just what is meant by the
term "inclusion." That a logical relation of implication subsists between
the terms of a necessary proposition is, of course, undisputed, but the fact
that such a relation subsists does not make the proposition analytic, in the
sense of connecting subject with predicate by means of some such relation
as that of "inclusion." What does it mean to say that a certain concept is
included in another? We can understand clearly enough the meaning of
inclusion in its usual, i.e., spatial connotation, as when we say this room
includes a shelf of books, or the English alphabet includes twenty-six letters,
but in application to concepts, the sense of the term remains singularly
obscure.
It suggests, following the spatial analogy, that the subject term is some-
how logically wider than the predicate term so that in the necessary judg-
ment, the "logically wider" term represents the subject which contains or
includes the "logically smaller" predicate term. But this "logical spacing,"
if we may so call it, is a very misleading analogy. In what sense is the
subject term in the proposition 7 + 5 = 12 logically wider than the predi-
cate term? And in the proposition "red is a color," it is the predicate that
appears to be more extensive in logical space than the subject.
Furthermore, even if we are presented with a necessary proposition such
as Kvant's famous example, body is extended, in which the subject seems
to include the predicate and something else besides, it is difficult to see
in terms of the spatial metaphor, how the proposition is then necessarily
true. It will have the form ab is b. But if the subject is a spatial whole
consisting of a plus b, and the predicate consists of b alone, we shall be
asserting that a spatial whole of some sort is one of its parts. This can
never be truly asserted. Is a whole book shelf one of its component books?
Is the alphabet the letter A? If spatial inclusion is not what is meant,
then we must ask those who use this term what they mean exactly by
"inclusion."

(2) The Analytic and the Synthetic as a Relation of Tautology

Writers who have perceived the unsatisfactoriness of appealing to such
vague terminology have usually proceeded to explain necessary propositions

1 C. I. Lewis, Mind and the World Order, p. 316; cf. p. 434.

2 Kant, op. cit. (A7), translated by N. K. Smith, (MacMillan. 1933).

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654 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

as mere tautologies, adopting as the paradigm of all analytic judgmen

Principle of Identity. Propositions in which a logically necessary relation
between subject and predicate is recognized are alleged to be tautological
i.e., to be statements in, which there is a repetition of a term in the predicate
already asserted in the subject. Now the examples of tautologies, -exclud-
ing for the moment those which can be picked from logic and mathematics,
which are current in many contemporary logical textbooks, are not very
fortunate, for there is considerable doubt that they are even propositions.
AMiss Stebbing cites "A red rose is a rose" as an example of a necessary
proposition, and asserts that "such propositions are usually called tau-
tologies."3 Similar examples are cited in other text-books.4
First of all it should be observed that Miss Stebbing's example in fact
has the form ab is a, and if this form is taken as the form of tautologies
which depend upon the Principle of Identity, it would, of course, be false,
for the copula cannot express identity where there is no precise connotative
equivalence between predicate and subject. In the formula ab is a, the
copula must express some other relation than identity if it is to express a
true relation. But what is this relation?
To be genuinely tautological, the term rose must be omitted, because it
alters the logical meaning of the copula and the statement must read simply,
"red is red" which then expresses a true identity. N-ow a sentence such as
"red is red" or Gertrude Stein's "A rose is a rose is a rose" is, we contend,
no proposition at all, and consequently cannot claim to be an example of a
logically necessary proposition. These sentences indeed are not meaning-
less-mere noises. They are enunciations of meaning-the identical
meaning again and again. A unit meaning is expressed, but it is the unit
meaning of the term, not that of a complex of diverse terms.
The reiteration of a unit meaning can never create a complex meaning,
i.e., a unit meaning which comprehends subordinate diverse meanings,
and every genuine proposition expresses a complex meaning. Unless
unit meaning embracing diverse concepts is taken as the differentiating
factor between sentences which express propositions and those that do not,
it would be difficult to explain why a proposition seems always to convey
information, to be an accretion to knowledge. "Red is red" conveys no
information whatever, but "red is color" and "7 + 5 = 12" do convey
information, or, at least, plainly seem to do so. For this reason, no doubt,
we find them interesting and illuminating.
This analysis suggests a certain principle that we may call the Principle

I L. S. Stebbing, A Modern Elementary Logic (Methuen, London, 1943), p. 156.

4Bennett & Baylis, Formal Logic-A Modern Introduction (Prentiss Hall, 1939)
p.51.

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 DISTINCTION BETWEEN ANALYTIC AND SYNTHETIC 655

of Connotative Diversity, according to which any sentence whose constituent

terms are not connotatively diverse is not a proposition. A proposition,
consequently, must express more than the unit meaning of a single term.
It must not simply communicate a single meaning and repeat it by the
help of the copula, for plainly, no assertion or judgment is possible unless
at least two diverse terms are involved. Connotative diversity must be
present in every assertion which claims the status of propositions.
To avoid an obvious objection, viz., that there may be sentences which
contain diverse meanings and yet fail to express propositions, it is necessary
to enunciate a companion Principle of Connotative Unity, which stipulates
that the complex meaning-the propositional meaning-is to be a unity,
i.e., a logically coherent meaning. It is our contention that every proposi-
tion, empirical or a priori, necessary or contingent, embodies both these
principles.
It is easy to show that in the examples of necessary propositions already
cited, these principles are clearly realized. Consider again "red is a color."
That we have here two meanings, and not one, is evident from the fact that
'red" neither defines "color" nor "color" "red." "Color" connotes not
only "red" but all the other spectral hues. Hence they are connotatively
diversee terms. The simple formula of tautology consequently fails to give
a correct analysis of such propositions. As long as there is connotative
diversity there is some synthetic element in every genuine proposition, and
as long as there is connotative unity there is also an analytic element.
That these principles also apply to mathematical propositions may be
not so apparent but can be proved upon careful examination. If the
formula 7 + 5 = 12 is taken as simply asserting the identity of the left-
hand expression with the right-hand one, then we ought to be able to
substitute the one for the other. By doing so we indeed get a bare tau-
tology, but it is by no means equivalent in meaning with the original. 7
+ 5 = 7 + 5 is not the same judgment as 7 + 5 = 12. Wherein, then,
lies the difference, except in the fact that in the second there is a conn
diversity of terms which is absent from the first? Precisely how the con-
cept 12 connotatively differs from the concept 7 + 5 is a nice problem for
analysis.
A possible suggestion is that the difference may lie in a different ordering
of the same numerical units. Thus the same denotative extension which
lies between Athens and Thebes also lies between Thebes and Athens.
But the one order (Athens to Thebes) connotes something different from
the other (Thebes to Athens). Similarly, the sheer multitude of units
in 7 + 5 is the same as that in 12. But a different mode of ordering is
connoted in the two cases. In the first (7 + 5) we have two numerical
orders (each beginning with a first and culminating in a last) merely juxta-

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656 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

posed. In the second (12) we have one numerical order, beginning with a
first and ending with a last. Thus as in any other meaningful proposition,
there is an analytic as well as a synthetic element. Denotatively, any
instance of 7 + 5 is also an instance of 12 and vice versa, but connotatively
the-meanings are distinct. Present-day logic finds the tautological analysis
extremely suitable for its purposes precisely because it has adopted an
extensional treatment of propositions.
Definitions, at first sign, might appear to be exceptions to our principles.
It might be argued that between the definiens and definiendum there is
either connotative diversity, in which case the proposition is not a definition
because of lack of symmetry between the subject and predicate, or, if
there is no connotative diversity, the statement is not a proposition. The
latter alternative is the one we should accept. To define a complex con-
cept S we must know two things: (1) what its constitutive elements are;
and (2) that these are all there are. Thus if R (a, b, c) are all the defining
elements of S, then a definition of S would have the form S is R (a, b, c).
There is an exact symmetry of meaning and consequently the statement
asserts an identity. All definitions are thus identities of meaning and
express no connotative diversity.
However, a real definition is not a bare tautology of the form a is a.
This is the form not of a real definition but of a circular one. The real
definition must not merely repeat the same concept at the same level of
analysis (a tautology). It must repeat the same concept at a higher level
of analysis, dividing it into its constitutive elements and revealing their
relation in the whole. We may say, therefore, that a real definition is
analytically diverse though connotatively identical. Since it involves
no connotative diversity it is not a proposition.
A tautology, such as "A rose is a rose is a rose," is a unit of meaning
repeated in the same level of analysis which contributes nothing to the
illumination of the deflnierndum. Hence it is neither a proposition nor a
real definition but only the sheer repetition of an unanalyzed concept.

II. THE EPISTEMOLOGICAL DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE

ANALYTIC AND THE SYNTHETIC

Most modem discussions of the analytic and the synthetic involve one
or the other or both of the two formal distinctions we have just considered.
But in addition to these formal distinctions, there is another epistemological
distinction which usually emerges before the discussion is brought to its
close. This way of distinguishing between the analytic and the synthetic
does not merely concern the logical relation between the subject and the
predicate of a proposition. It concerns the very nature of knowledge it-
self, and a supposed radical antithesis between what has come to be called

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 DIsTINCTIoN BETWEEN ANALYTIC ANTD SYNTHETIC 657

a prior and a posteriori knowledge, which can be traced back to the sources
of modem idealistic thought in Kant and its incipience in Hume. To
those who accept this doctrine it seems so obvious that they very seldom
take the pains of seriously examining it or analyzing it, but throw it forth
as something that must now be accepted as almost self-evident by anyone
even superficially acquainted with modem research in the fields of logic
and epistemology. In brief the doctrine is essentially this.
The process of knowing is regarded not as the apprehension of an object
by the mind, but rather as an act of making or moulding something by
the mind, like the moulding of a statue out of marble by the sculptor. This
idealistic conception requires two distinct factors in any act of knowledge.
First, there must be the raw material of sensation which is simply presented
to the mind, as the marble is presented to the sculptor. Then there is the
ordering activity of the mind which spontaneously works this raw material
into a theoretical order, as the motions of the sculptor work the marble into
the form of a statue.
The raw sensations constitute the a posteriori factor of knowledge. This
is indefinitely variable and as Professor Lewis says: "All empirical knowl-
edge is probable only."5 We can never be sure what sensations will be
presented to us, nor indeed that any will be presented. The actual content
of knowledge comes from this source, but not its form. This is provided
by the spontaneous a priori action of the mind, which imposes its forms
on the raw material of experience. The a posterior factor is commonly
termed synthetic because it is something supposed to lie beyond the spon-
taneous act of knowing. The a priori factor is commonly termed analytic
in this sense of the word because it can be grasped from an analysis of the
knowing act itself without passing beyond it to any object whatsoever.
This picture of the analytic as the a priori and of the synthetic as the
a posteriori is usually associated with one or another of the purely formal
views of this distinction which we have just considered. But it is not
based upon a purely formal analysis of subject and predicate. It goes much
deeper than this. It is founded on a conception of the nature of knowledge,
a complete epistemology which must claim therefore: (1) to account for
what we commonly take to be human knowledge and its objectivity, to-
gether with other basic facts of cognition; (2) in particular, the basic fact of
intentionality attaching to every phase of the noetic act; and (3) the basic
fact of necessity which also characterizes knowledge in its most evident
instances. The epistemology of the a priori as we may call it, like any
complete epistemology, must make these claims. Can it show that they
are justified? Let us examine them briefly one by one.

iLewis, op. cit., p. 37.

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658 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

(1). Does the Epistemology of the A Priori Account for What Is

Commonly Recognized as the Phenomenon of
Human Knowledge?

Every theory is an attempt to give an intelligible explanation of some

fact already known to exist. Hence when the theory of anything is pre-
sented to us we have a right first of all to raise the fundamental question
as to whether it explains this fact or rather some other. The epistemology
of the a priori is an attempt to give an intelligible explanation of the evident
fact of knowledge. Does it explain this fact, or rather perhaps some other?
This is the question we are now raising.
To explain how raw materials are formed and molded into new artefacts
not in existence before is certainly to explain a vast variety of making or
productive processes with which we are all familiar. But do we commonly
recognize these as being noetic in character? Men certainly bring new
things into existence by making processes, but we distinguish such pro-
cesses from the act of knowing. To know a making process is not similar
to the making process which is known. The two processes may often be
closely intertwined. For instance, it seems impossible that any making
process should be successfully achieved unless something were known
about the raw materials and the artefact to be made from them. But.
surely the two processes are specifically distinct. We suggest that, the
major point of distinction is this.
The material object of a making process is molded into something differ-
ent that was not there in the beginning. Otherwise nothing new would be
produced, and the whole making enterprise would be a failure. But the
object of an act of knowing remains unaltered and is not in the least affected
by its being known. For instance, if the noetic activities of the astronomer
in examining the solar system should change the system, and make it into
something quite different, would we ever say that he had come to know it?
No alteration in any material object has ever been observed to result from
its being truly known. By the acts of knowing, the mind apprehends the
characteristics of the external world as they are presented to us. It is an
intelligible explanation of this very mysterious but very evident fact which
is sought from epistemology.
The Kantian picture of a productive mind, forming raw materials into
an ordered experience, which underlies the modem conception of the a
priori vs. the a posteriori simply does not apply to the well-known fact of
knowledge. It is no doubt a very good explanation of some fact. It is
not an explanation of this fact. It applies to a process of making or mold-
ing by which some new entity is brought into existence. It does not and
cannot explain the original phenomenon of knowing by which something
is apprehended precisely as it is objectively with no new production what-

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 DIsTINcTIoN BETWEEN ANALYTIC AND SYNTHmVIC 659

soever. The epistemology of the a priori does not account for what is
commonly recognized as the phenomenon of human knowledge.

(2) Does the Epistemology of the A Priori Account for All the Basic Facts
of This Well-Known Phenomeno-in Particular
the Fact of Intentionality?

An explanation of human knowledge (an epistemology) must not only

explain that non-productive apprehension which is its most distinctive
trait. It must also give an account of those other structural features
which always attend it. If it does not actually account for them, it must
at least put forth a theory which neither denies them, nor includes features
inconsistent with their presence in the phenomenon. Does the theory of
the a priori and the a posteriori succeed in finding a place for all the struc-
tural factors which are known to attend the phenomenon of knowledge?
This is the question we are now raising.
There is one such factor which is clearly contradicated by a prominent
feature of this doctrine. This is what has now come to be known as the
intentionality of all human thought. Human knowledge, and every noetic
element is of something, referring to something beyond itself. That which
lacks this relational aspect of reference to an object other than itself is
not noetic, for knowledge is the apprehension of something other than
itself, to which it must always refer in knowing. But the epistemological
theory we are now examining certainly contains one noetic element, the
so-called a priori, which by definition lacks any such intentional reference.
If it did, it would have to be viewed as a bare datum, and could not be
distinguished from the so-called a posteriori.
According to Professor Lewis, "There are, in our cognitive experience,
two elements: the immediate data, such as those of sense, which are pre-
sented or given to the mind, and a form, construction, or interpretation,
which represents the activity of thought."6 Hence, cognition is regarded
as a molding of the a posteriori matter by the a priori constructive action
of pure thought. "Mind makes classifications and determines meanings;
in so doing, it creates that truth without which there could be no other
truth."7 "The a priori is something made by mind and capable of altera-
tion."8
Many phases of noetic structure have been held up as exemplifying such
non-referential spontaneity, but they fail to stand up under close examina-
tion. Thus the propositional form has been regarded as an arbitrary act
of combining, simply imposed by the mind with no intentionality. But

6 Lewis, op. cit., p. 38.

Ibid., p. 40.
S Ibid., p. 237.

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660 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

this is clearly false. The union of subject and predicate is not an arbitrary
fiat, but rather a union which signifies or intends a union in rerum natura,
beyond the mental act of uniting, not merely between S and P as symbols
but between what is signified by the concept S and what is signified by the
concept P. At the present time, however, there is widespread agreement
that definitions and logical syntax are the clearest instances of non-referen-
tial, a priori activity of the mind. Let us now examine these in greater
detail, one by one.

A. Definition

It is commonly claimed that concepts and their definitions express a

purely arbitrary fiat of the mind in constructing certain modes of classifi-
cation without any intentional reference, which are then imposed upon
the random data of experience. But this is false. A concept can never
be without some intentional reference to something other than itself, no
matter how vague or confused this may be. If there is no such reference,
there is no concept at all. Thought begins with such concepts signifying
something other than themselves. The real definition of the concept is no
creative decree, but rather a set of subordinate, concepts each referring to
some subordinate phase of that which the original concept signifies in a
confused way.
How about a nominal definition? Surely here we are confronted with a
purely arbitrary mental act which in no way refers to anything beyond
itself, but which merely identifies two names, stipulating that the one means
just what the other means without in any way indicating what the real
meaning may be. It would be silly, of course, to deny that there are
nominal definitions of this sort, which merely assert that one name is sy
mous with another. But when we are told that "all the questions that are
discussed by logicians in connection with this mode of definition (per genus
et differentiam) are concerned with the possible ways of finding synonyms
in a given language for any given term,"9 certain questions must arise.
On this view, what we have called a real definition is only nominal.
According. to Mr. Ayer, "when we define an oculist as an eye doctor, wha
we are asserting is that in the English language, the two symbols 'oculist,
and 'eye doctor' are synonymous."10 We are simply expressing our sub-
jective intention to regard one arbitrary symbol as the equivalent of an-
other. This would seem to be a purely spontaneous a priori intervention
of the mind in knowledge without intentionality. But the reduction of real
definitions to nominal definitions will not bear a more careful examination.

9 A. J. Ayer, Language, Truth, and Logic, pp. 67-8.

10 Ayer, loc. cit.

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 DISTINCTION BETWEEN ANALYTIC AND SYNTHETIC 661

A real definition defines the thing, not the word only. It analyzes what
is signified into those distinct elements which are only confusedly indicated
by the definiendum. That is why a real definition cannot contain the word
which it really defines or any mere synonym of this word. Such a def-
inition is circular. Thus the real definition of the term "oculist" (eye
doctor) does not contain the word "oculist" or any synonym of "oculist."
Doctor (the genus) does not signify the same as oculist, for some doctors
are not oculists. Neither does "eye" (the difference) signify the same.
An eye is not an oculist. But how about the two together? Is not every
eye doctor an oculist? Is it not true that the definition can be substituted
for the definiendum? Hence is not Mr. Ayer correct in holding that the
two are merely synonyms, two names, one of which is equivalent to the
other, in virtue of an arbitrary linguistic fiat? He is not correct. The
two names, or rather the one name, and the composite defining formula, can
be substituted one for the other, as is true of any real definition and its
deftniendurn. But this is not because of any linguistic convention. The
name and its defining formula are convertible because of the nature of the
thing, not because of any convention.
Such definitions are rightly called real, and they are quite distinct from
those called nominal. For instance, if I say the word oculist means the
same as the word opthalmologist, this is a nominal definition only. Here
the two words are convertible not primarily because of any real composition
in the thing, but because of a linguistic convention. Does this mean a
purely arbitrary eruption of the mind into the field of knowledge-a
purely a priori act having no reference to anything beyond? ANo! That
which is defined by a nominal definition must mean something real (which
may be really defined). Otherwise the two synonyms do not mean any-
thing at all. Then they are not names and hence not synonyms.
The ultimate reason for the equivalence of two names is that the real
definition of what they signify is the same. Even nominal definitions are
never purely a priori in the modern sense. Every nominal definition pre-
supposes a real definition which is prior to it. The nominal equivalence
of two names by itself can never make them really equivalent. It is
ultimately because they signify the same reality that two names are nomi-
nally equivalent. Every phase of the noetic act refers intentionally to
something actual other than itself which it apprehends. Prior to every
concept is the reality it apprehends. Prior to every symbol is the concept
for which it stands.

B. Logical Syntax
It may be said, however, that there is a sense in which the spoken or
written symbols precede the meanings which are arbitrarily imposed upon

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662 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

them. Surely it is possible to study what is now called the pure syntax
of a language, the relations which the signs have to one another wholly
apart from what they happen to signify. Surely such signs are absolutely
arbitrary and can be chosen a priori to signify anything whatsoever without
reference to any prior concept. How can it be maintained that there is
anything not arbitrary about an "arbitrary sign"?
This concept of a pure logical syntax is the last refuge of the idealistic
a priori, the notion that there is some prior noetic machinery which imposes
its structure on What is known. According to the positivists this a priori
mechanism is to be found in the structure of language. This view includes
three theses. First, the sign precedes its semantic or signifying function,
or as Mr. Morris says: "Semantics presupposes syntactics."'1 Second,
syntax, or the relations that signs have to one another, may be studied
without any reference to their significance. Thus, according to Carnap,
"If we abstract from the user of the language and analyze only the ex-
pressions and their designata we are in the field of semantics. And if
finally, we abstract from the designata also and analyze only the relations
between expressions, we are in (logical) syntax."'2 Finally, third, there is
no sense in which these arbitrary signs are dominated by any prior, stable
meaning which they always signify. Any one of them may signify any-
thing whatsoever. None of these theses will bear a careful examination.
Let us consider them one by one.
The first thesis is clearly false. No sign precedes its signifying function.
A "word" which has no significance is not an actual word. It is only a
noise, not a sign at all, but a physical disturbance of the air, or a physical
spot on paper. Such a physical entity cannot become a sign until it rela-
tively intends or signifies something other than itself. Hence it is false
that "semantics presupposes syntactics." The exact opposite is true.
Syntactics presupposes semantics.
The second thesis is also clearly false. If we try to study signs without
any reference to their significance we are not studying signs at all but
purely physical phenomena. "If finally, we abstract from the designata
also and analyze only the relations between expressions" we are not in
logical syntax. There are no logical relations whatsoever between such
physical entities. There are only physical relations of size and distance.
Logical relations arise only as a result of the genuine concepts which they
signify.
Finally, the third thesis also is false. The concept arbitrary sign has the
same meaning in all languages. It is in no sense arbitrary, but like all
other concepts refers to an actual entity with only one real definition,

11 Charles Morris, Foundations of the Theory of Signs, p. 23;

12 Carnap, Introduction to Semantics, p. 9.

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 DISTINCTION BETWE\EN ANALYTIC AND SYNTHETIC 663

something chosen to bear a meaning. It is, however, an incomplete con-

cept. If in listening to a foreign language we only know that a word is
spoken without knowing what its meaning is, we have only a partial under-
standing of its nature. This incomplete concept can be completed only
by learning its precise significance. When we cannot complete it, but
know only that it is a word having some significance which might be any
one of a great number, we may be led to the fallacious conclusion that its
actual meaning is arbitrary (only one of many that it might be). As a
matter of fact it means one thing, with a single real definition.
It means this thing first of all because there is such a thing, second, be-
cause this has brought forth a concept of it, and third, because this physical
sign has been chosen to symbolize the concept. It is only the physical
sign that is arbitrarily chosen. Once it has become a sign, its significance
is never arbitrary. Meanings cannot be subjectively imposed on things.
It is rather the real things which necessarily (not arbitrarily) call forth our
concepts which are the same the world over in all languages, and then the
arbitrarily chosen symbols of these. Prior to concepts are the realities
they signify, and prior to symbols (whatever they may be) are concepts.
No meanings are ever arbitrary. If they were, it would be impossible to
translate from one language to another.
WTe must conclude, therefore, that the epistemology of the a priori
does not account for well-knowm factors of knowledge. In particular, it is
incompatible with the evident intentionality which characterizes every
phase of the noetic process. There is no concept that is not the concept
of something it apprehends, no symbol that is not the symbol of something
of which it is the symbol. There can be no purely a priori arbitrary symbol
that does not symbolize something beyond itself, no concept that does
not signify something it grasps or apprehends.

(3) Does the Epistemology of the A Priori Account for the Factor
of Necessity in Knowledge?

Knowledge is characterized by a certain necessity. By necessity we

mean what cannot be otherwise. If I know the Law of Contradiction to
be true, I know that an actual contradiction cannot be. If I know the
real definition of a man, I know what an entity must be if it is to be a man.
Otherwise it cannot be a man. This factor of necessity, present in all
knowledge, constitutes a stumbling block to the modem positivist. It is
quite clear that the modem concept of the a priori has been formulated
precisely in order to explain this bothersome factor in terms which are
acceptable to the self-styled empiricist."3 Does it really do this? Is the

1 Cf. Ayer, op. cit., ch. IV.

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664 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

notion of the a priori really able to account for noetic necessity? This is
the question we are now raising.
The traditional Kantian conception of the a prior tries to explain this
objective, noetic necessity by the subjective presence in the mind of an
operational machinery which always tends to produce the same result by
efficient constraint, as a knife always tends to slice what presses against it.
But the modem positivists have introduced certain modifications into
the Kantian conception. They have tried to remove from it any suggestion
of subjective or psychological compulsion. For them the a priori is
simply how the mind spontaneously chooses to deal with experience,
whatever the given facts may be. We may agree that this theory is no
doubt in many ways an improvement on the Kantian view, but where does
it leave us with respect to necessity? As a matter of fact it leaves us with
no necessity at all. The realm of the a posterior is admittedly only con-
tingent and probable. No necessity can accrue to knowledge from this
source. But the a priori is interpreted as a free choice between genuine
alternatives. This also is something that might be otherwise. and thus
not necessary. We are left with no necessity at all.
Thus, according to Professor Lewis: "The a priori represents the ac-
tivity of mind itself; it represents an attitude in some sense freely taken."'4
But what is "in some sense freely taken" is certainly not necessary. If
the mind can choose between different alternative categories and systems
of classification, then the a priori factor is certainly incapable of explaining
the necessity and universality that appertains to knowledge. As Professor
Lewis says, "It is given experience, the brute fact element in knowledge,
which the mind must accept willy-nilly."''5 But this is waived as a mere
welter of unpredictable data. Necessity is excluded from this, which
can at best yield only a faltering probability. How then are we to explain
that necessity which belongs to knowledge? Of course we may deny it.
But we are then denying an evident fact. If I know that the definition of a
square is a four-sided plane figure of equal sides, this is true necessarily
and admits of no exceptions. Nothing can be a square and not be this.
There can be no exceptions. Similarly such a principle as the Law of
Contradiction is universally and necessarily true. It admits of no possible
exception or alternative. But the modem notion of the a prior has alter-
natives. The modem a posterior has both alternatives and exceptions.
We submit therefore that neither the one nor the other nor the two in
combination can explain the objective necessity which is an evident fact
of knowledge.

14 Lewis, op. cit., pp. 196-7.

15 Loc. cit. (my italics).

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 DISTINCTION BETWEEN ANALYTIC AND SYNTHETIC 665

Some positivists interpret the a priori as a mere linguistic convention, a

mode of manipulating symbols. But this is open to the same objection.
If necessary propositions are merely such conventions, in what sense are
they then called necessary? That is necessary which cannot be otherwise,
the contradictory of which is self-contradictory. But a linguistic convention
admits of an indefinite number of alternatives. According to Mr. Ayer
analyticc propositions" which are "necessary and certain" simply "record
our determination to use words in a certain fashion.. this is the sole
ground of their necessity."" But a few sentences further we are astounded
to discover that "it is perfectly conceivable that we should have employed
different linguistic conventions from those which we actually do employ.""7
Can we then be blamed for wondering just what Mr. Ayer means by nece
sity?
It is true that in one sense the Law of Contradiction is a linguistic con-
vention. We violate it unless we use symbols in a certain way. But
surely this does not explain the necessity of this law. We can just as ea
write down contradictory sentences as non-contradictory ones. The rules
of symbolic procedure cannot possibly explain the necessity of any known
truth. This objective necessity can be derived neither from the a priori
nor from the a posteriori as they are conceived by the modern empiricist.
It can be derived only from the known realities themselves to which our
symbols intentionally refer, through the concepts by which we signify them.
Sometimes the a priori is conceived as a purely syntactical form having
no content at all. Only such non-referential forms are necessary. All
propositions with any real empirical reference are contingent. Let us
take the proposition, red is a color. Either it has or does not have content.
Either it is necessary or it is not. Let us take the four possibilities: (1) it is
contingent and lacks content; (2) it is contingent and has content; (3) it is
necessary and lacks content; and (4) it is necessary and has content.
The first is evidently false. The second is false because the proposition
before us is commonly conceded to be necessary. A species necessarily is
connected with its genus. The third is false because the proposition is
clearly concerned with empirical content. Both red and color are facts of
experience.
The only remaining alternative is the fourth. The proposition is both
necessary and has real empirical content. We submit that this is the case.
But then, if so, the radical antithesis between the a priori as empty but
necessary and the a posterior as full of content but contingent must be
abandoned.

"Ayer, op. cit., p. 114.

17 bid.

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666 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

Here then is a second basic fact of knowledge which the epistemology

of the a priori is entirely unable to account for. That knowledge which we
are constantly attempting to approximate so far as possible, and which
now and again we actually achieve is clearly characterized by a certain
necessity. It is no mere compulsive force, but the natures of things which
constrains our reason to recognize their necessary implications. These
necessary unions and separations in reality are certainly not a posterior in
the modern sense, for the a posterior is conceived by the positivist as a
chaos of Humian atoms which can admit no necessary connections. But
neither are they a priori in the modern sense, for the a priori is conceive
as a free act of choice among many alternatives. No such psychological
act, even if it is regarded as subjectively compelled, can explain the ob-
jective necessity of knowledge.
We must conclude, therefore, that actual knowledge is neither a poste-
riori nor a priori in the modern sense, and that the epistemology of so-called
empiricism, while it may be the explanation of something, such as poetry,
is certainly not the explanation of what we call knowledge. Poetry, for
example, may be described as the free choice of one among many conven-
tional modes of dealing with an indefinite variety of sense data. But surely
knowledge is not the same as poetry. Apprehending is not the same as
making. The former is constrained in every phase by its object. The
latter is not so constrained. It chooses between alternative modes of
ordering its data. The knowing faculty does not choose at all. It simply
registers its object as it must be. There is no possible alternative except
that of not knowing at all. The modem epistemology of the a priori
does not account for this factor of necessity in knowledge.

III. CONCLUSION

Since we were concerned primarily with suggesting rather than develop-

ing constructive lines of thought, the general tenor of the preceding reflec-
tions admittedly has been critical and our conclusions are consequently
mainly negative.
In the first part, by means of the Principles of Connotative Diversity and
Unity, we criticized the two logical criteria for necessary propositions
favored by contemporary writers. We attempted to show the synthethic
as well as the analytic character that belongs to such propositions.
In the second part, which treated the problem epistemologically, we
endeavored to show that the epistemology which underlies the present-day
conception of the a priori is vulnerable on account of its inability to provide
any cogent explanation of three commonly recognized facts of knowl-
edge-viz., non-productive objectivity, intentionality, and necessity. If
these brief reflections contain a measure of truth, then it behooves philoso-

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 DISTINCTION BETWEEN ANALYTIC AND SYNTHETIC 667

phers to try to clarify and rectify the categories of the analytic and the
synthetic, which at the present time are as unclear and as uncertain in their
meaning as they are widespread in their use.
JOHN WILD.
J. L. COBLITZ.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY.

EXTRACTO

Este trabajo se propone valorar los principios mas importantes que se

encuentran en la base de la distincion entre lo analitico y lo sintetico,
establecida por los empiricos y positivistas contemporaneos. En la primera
parte se formulan dos principios, a saber, el de la Diversidad Connotativa
v el de la Unidad Connotativa, por medio de los cuales se critica aquella
distinci6n desde un punto de vista puramente l6gico. La conclusion es que,
logicamente hablando, cada juicio es a la vez analitico y sintetico.
En la segunda parte, donde el problema se trata epistemol6gicamente, se
intenta mostrar que la antitesis entre lo analitico y lo sintetico, como algo
(lerivado de una supuesta dualidad del a priori y el a posteriori, es infundada
porque deja de tomar en cuenta satisfactoriamente tres hechos del cono-
cimiento: lo. la objetividad no-productiva; 2o. la intencionalidad y 3o. la
necesidad.

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