Understanding the other from an inferentialist perspective

Abstract

‘The other’ is one of the mysteries of modern philosophy. Since the other is thought to be essentially different from the self, how we can understand each other is a difficult problem. In the first place, what does it mean to understand the other? I address this question from the perspective of normative inferentialism, by explicating what it means to understand the other's beliefs and actions. I propose that we should distinguish between attributional and fundamental understanding. While attributional understanding serves to specify the other's ways of thinking, fundamental understanding is an endorsement of them. Contrasting these two types of understanding gives us a rational picture of how people understand each other.