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Meaning Theory and Autistic Speakers
Author(s) -
Glüer Kathrin,
Pagin Peter
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
mind and language
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.905
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1468-0017
pISSN - 0268-1064
DOI - 10.1111/1468-0017.00213
Subject(s) - grice , psychology , meaning (existential) , appeal , autism , linguistics , cognitive psychology , epistemology , pragmatics , developmental psychology , philosophy , political science , law , psychotherapist
Some theories of linguistic meaning, such as those of Paul Grice and David Lewis, make appeal to higher–order thoughts: thoughts about thoughts. Because of this, such theories run the risk of being empirically refuted by the existence of speakers who lack, completely or to a high degree, the capacity of thinking about thoughts. Research on autism during the past 15 years provides strong evidence for the existence of such speakers. Some persons with autism have linguistic abilities that qualify them as speakers, but manifest a severely impaired capacity to understand what it is to have beliefs