Mmm… Pudding!

 


Michael O’Rourke

Department of Philosophy

University of Idaho

Moscow, Idaho 83844-3016

morourke@uidaho.edu

 

 

In Part II, Chapter XXIV of Don Quixote de la Mancha, we are told that “[t]he proof of the pudding is in the tasting. By a small sample we may judge of the whole piece.”1  This proverb, or cliché as one might have it, lives on in the present day, several centuries after Cervantes penned his masterpiece, although it is often shortened into what some regard as objectionable forms, e.g., “The proof is in the pudding” or “The proof of the pudding.”  Sayings with long and varied lives can credit their longevity to some kernel of truth they capture, and in this case, the truth is interesting and complex.  Often, the saying is used to caution against precipitous judgment, encouraging a more prudent “wait and see” attitude that can be the wiser choice in many difficult situations.  This reveals the connection between the saying and justification, or more broadly, evaluation—we are advised against judging until we can evaluate the finished foodstuff.2 

            In my view, the truth expressed by this proverb is a philosophical one and the use to which it is put is typically philosophical, in the sense that it enjoins us to modify the conceptual framework we use to judge our “pudding.”  Furthermore, as I will argue, this proverb can be used as a lens through which to evaluate certain closely related styles of argument, styles that appeal to both philosophers and non-philosophers alike.   In this talk, I begin by canvassing a number of attempts to give the meaning of this saying; as we will see, it is slippery and difficult to pin down.  We leave the first section with three determinants of meaning that we further develop and augment in the second section.  After serving up a detailed analysis of the saying, we proceed to distinguish several important common uses of the saying.  With our analysis and this distinction in hand, we use the saying to frame an examination of various argument styles, focusing primarily on philosophical arguments.  We conclude by considering whether we as philosophers should have such high regard for the advice that “the proof of the pudding is in the tasting.”

 

Bottoms Up!

For a common and widely used proverb, it is surprising that “the proof of the pudding is in the tasting” (PiP) does not lend itself to uniform interpretation.  It isn’t difficult to find a number of divergent analyses, whose differences are instructive. By way of beginning, then, I consider a few example with a view to identifying the common determinants of meaning that shape them. This “bottom up” approach will feed into the “top down” approach I employ in the next section. 

First, though, it is useful to comment on the meaning of the word ‘proof’ as it appears in this saying.  While it suggests definitive justification, the term is employed here in a different sense, viz., as synonymous with ‘test.’  Thus, it is used in the same sense as its cognates are in ‘proving ground’ and ‘the exception that proves the rule.’  You don’t prove pudding as you might the Pythagorean Theorem, but you can certainly test it.  In fact, I recommend it.

A common way to analyze the meaning of a saying like this is to serve up other sayings or pithy expressions that are related or analogous in meaning.  Consider the following examples:

(1)               Don’t jump to conclusions. (Magnuson 2003)

(2)               Seeing is believing. (Wallraff 2001, Quinion 2004)

(3)               Whatever will be, will be. (Wallraff 2001)

(4)               Nature will out. (Wallraff 2001)

(5)               Results are what count. (Ask Yahoo 2002, Clarion Call 2004)

(6)               Actual use is the best test. (Hirsch, Kett, and Trefil 2002)

(7)               Actions speak louder than words. (Quinion 2004)

(8)               It’s not how you start, but how you finish.  (Clarion Call 2004)

At first glance, this list of sayings seems to be all over the place, from actions to conclusions to uses to Doris Day.  While there is no unanimity about PiP, closer inspection reveals a uniform drift.  These examples cluster around the following common axes that can be used to frame a more careful analysis: outcome, evaluation, and practice.  We will consider each of these in turn.

            One is ill advised to taste pudding before it is done—it’s soupy and scalding hot.  In fact, it really isn’t pudding until it sets up, and it is only then that the taste test is appropriate.  This is the outcome on which PiP focuses, and this aspect receives emphasis in the analyses above, where we find prominent mention of conclusions, what will be, results, and how we and Nature finish.  Another aspect receiving emphasis above is evaluation, through mention of believing, counting, testing, and “speaking louder.”  The stress on seeing in (2) is meant to call attention to what can rightly justify a belief. Counting in (5) and “speaking louder” in (7) indicate what should be given most weight in one’s evaluation.  And testing in (6) corresponds to the process of evaluation.  That this aspect stands out is not surprising, given that PiP is about testing the pudding, which is one very important way of evaluating it.  Finally, there is practice.  To test the pudding by tasting is to act—PiP focuses on the interaction of evaluator and evaluated.  This also emerges in the list above: jumping, seeing, use, action, and both starting and finishing are things we do.  No one of these attempts captures all of these aspects, but taken together they focus our attention on the right place, viz., on the activity of evaluating outcomes. 

 

Once Again, From the Top!

In the preceding section, we began at the bottom, collecting attempts at semantic analysis and  examining them so as to identify a common core of meaning.  This search for analogues is one way of isolating the meaning of a phrase. It determines structure much in the way that stars determine constellations, by revealing the clear edges that form the boundaries of the semantic space occupied by the phrase.  This has yielded a three dimensional framework for further work, with the three axes being outcomes, evaluation, and practice.  But we are after the structure of this space, and we have run up against the limits of this approach. We now adopt a more top down approach within this framework, focusing on PiP itself.  This will yield two results: first, a deeper appreciation for the dimensions of the framework, and second, a generalized analysis that brings out additional nuances of meaning left concealed by the analogue approach.

            We seek the structure of PiP.  The three dimensional space carved out by outcome, evaluation, and activity contains a variety of structures, of which PiP is only one.  A structure comprises elements standing in fixed relations with one another.  We have three central elements, viz., testing, pudding, and tasting.  The relations between these will depend on our three dimensions of meaning.  First, we consider the relation between testing and tasting. The evaluation dimension is grounded in the use of “proof” in the saying.  We evaluate, or test, pudding by tasting it.  We might watch someone make it and be concerned about what we encounter (tapioca, anyone?), or our mouths may start to water as we watch the dark chocolate being shaved into the pot.  But PiP cautions us against reading too much into the process.  Like (1), it cautions us against jumping to conclusions about the pudding before we actually taste it.  After all, tapioca may look like paste but ahh, the taste, while if I’m the one shaving chocolate, you should probably look forward to burned pudding.  Thus, the success of our pudding venture will ultimately hinge on the outcome.  Of course, the process that got us there is important, and good process can certainly control the variables and lead us with confidence toward good product, but if something unforeseen goes awry and it fails the taste test, we will wind up scraping the contents of the pot into the trash just the same. 

This suggests another saying that illuminates the relation between the outcome and evaluation dimensions:

(9)               The ends justify the means.

Not all means, mind you—there are some means that could not redeemed by a smile and the smacking of lips (e.g., hemlock to accent the flavor of almond pudding).  But when success hinges on the outcome, the means can be forgiven if the end is worth the wait.  As we have seen, this also has its inverse—if the pudding tastes bad, then it must be evaluated negatively, high quality ingredients notwithstanding.           

A second relation underpinning this proverb obtains between pudding and tasting, a relation grounded in the nature of pudding.  We might even say that being tasteable, or being eatable, is an essential quality of the stuff.  Of course, in a particular case it need not be eaten to be pudding—a cupful can be pudding even if it remains on the tray until the party’s over. But pudding is a food, and whatever else you do with it, its nature is that of a food.  And the nature of a food is that it be eaten.  Thus, you could say that pudding is essentially eatable—it isn’t pudding if it can’t be eaten.3 (Something may be pudding-like, but that’s not necessarily as tasty.)  So the type of evaluation and the nature of the thing evaluated—i.e., the tasting and the pudding—are related in this way: the nature of the thing evaluated will constrain the type of evaluation that it is appropriate to conduct.

We complete our analysis by examining testing and pudding.  PiP does not just say that the test of pudding is its eatability or its tastiness.  As we noted above, the saying focuses less on an intrinsic property of the pudding and more the activity of one who tests it. That is, on the activity of testing, which in the case of pudding involves tasting. Note here the ambiguity in the word ‘test’—between the property on which qualitative evaluation depends (i.e., a criterion or basis for evaluation) and the actual activity of testing.  The former is intended when we speak of the test of an honest man, or the true test of friendship, where the latter is intended when we speak of math tests and test bans. Here, the term is meant equivocally, but the emphasis is on activity, i.e., on the actual act of tasting. Note that this requires that the item in question, i.e., the object/event/situation that stands in for pudding, must be testable. 

So reflection on testing and pudding unveils the fact that PiP focuses on outcome in two ways: the outcome of the cooking process for pudding, and the outcome of the testing process for the taster.  In light of the relationship between the type of test and the nature of the thing tested, the outcome of the testing process for the tester must also be constrained by the nature of the thing tested.  In the case of pudding, the relevant outcome concerns how the pudding tastes; with other things, the relevant outcome will differ, but it will always depend on the nature of the thing tested.   If this nature-constrained outcome for the tester is favorable, then the evaluation is positive; otherwise, it is negative.  Activity ties outcome and evaluation together—it is what connects the two and what is required by our saying.

Up to this point, we have focused our attention on dessert, but the proverb encourages us to think more broadly.  Our analysis puts us in a position to serve up the following general rendering of PiP, one that does justice to its many employments:

“The proof of the pudding is in the tasting,” where X plays the role of the pudding ≡df Where X is the type of thing that can be tested, the evaluation of X is based on certain nature-specific consequences for the tester who interacts in certain nature-constrained ways with X.

Obviously, this is still fast and loose.  The terms ‘nature-specific consequences’ and ‘nature-constrained ways’ are vague, but it is unclear whether further reflection would supply greater precision given the complex dependence of the activity of evaluation on the nature of the outcomes evaluated.  For our purposes in what follows, though, this analysis will do the job.

 

The Many Uses of Pudding

To this point, we have not spoken directly about the many uses of PiP, although they are clearly in the background when we pursue the analogue approach.  After all, we are working with a saying, i.e., a linguistic vehicle used to convey advice, and when it comes to sayings the Wittgensteinian mantra that meaning is use could not be more true. The structure of PiP readies it for certain types of use. With our general analysis of PiP in hand, we can now turn to these with a greater appreciation for their subtle character. A general classification of these uses will prove helpful as we explore the argumentative implications of PiP in the next section. 

We use the saying in at least the following ways:

(a)                Caution. As we have seen, PiP can serve in a cautionary role.  If you are in charge of developing the object/event/situation to be evaluated, you could use it to warn against rushing to judgment about the outcome based on what one might think are questionable means.  (“Sour cream in chocolate cake?!?”) As a critic, you might use it to warn the developer against being too confident about the quality of the outcome based on the quality of the means. Each of the analogue phrases could be used in this way, but this role seems especially appropriate for (1), (2), (7), and (8).  By highlighting consequences and nature dependence, the general analysis of PiP makes plain its suitability for such uses.

(b)               Announcement of Evaluative Standard. Either developer or critic can use PiP to call attention to the fact that assessment will be outcomes based—it will be consequentialist and not principle-based.  We could have means that are deal breakers, but typically, the quality of the object/event/situation will depend on its character qua the type of thing it is.  Phrases (2) and (5) through (9) stress the relevance of PiP to this purpose, and our general analysis expresses it explicitly.

(c)                Announcement of Strategy.  Given (b), it makes sense to expect the developer to do her work in a way that is guided by the outcomes.  Thus, the saying could be used to express a way of assessing the merits of the elements that feed into the process of development.  Alternatively, it could be used to announce an unwillingness to consider step-by-step criticism until the final stage of the process has been reached.  The general analysis supports this type of use, and while none of our sayings get at this employment directly, (1), (7), and (9) are closely related.

(d)               Expression of Attitude. Through all of these uses, a certain attitude emerges that accompanies PiP.  When used by the developer, it can bespeak confidence and optimism about the results to come; in the mouth of a critic, it can express a prudent caution. In addition, it reveals a willingness to let final judgment stand or fall based on the consequences for the evaluator; that is, it is associated with an anti-dogmatic open mindedness about the possible results of the process. All of our phrases get at aspects of this attitude, probably more effectively than the general analysis since they are less about structural specification and more about sage counsel.

This list is not intended to exhaust the possibilities, but rather canvass the principal employments of PiP.  It will be useful to keep them in mind when we turn to argument styles in the next section. Of these, the attitude is most relevant to our work there, given the influence that attitude has on the practice of argument and the fact that style emerges in practice.

 

Pudding and Philosophy

Now, for the philosophical payoff. As a career move, close analysis of clichés is probably not the wisest course, even for philosophers of language.  Fortunately, that is not the move I’m making with this paper.  Granted, I am closely analyzing a cliché, but I do so because it is deeply philosophical and because it can be used to illuminate certain argument styles that are prevalent within philosophy.  As I see it, PiP is an epistemic cliché that captures a way of thinking about evaluation.  In effect, it corresponds to a particular type of epistemic orientation, an attitude toward argumentation that guides judgment and criticism. When operating under its influence, one will justify claims about quality and success in a particular fashion.

            There are several characteristic features of this attitude that determine this mode of evaluation.  As we have seen, PiP requires that we be essentialist about the thing evaluated—call this X—taking X to have a nature that fully emerges at the end of a development process.  The nature of X constrains our evaluation, which is fundamentally consequentialist in character.  PiP forces us to pay attention to outcomes, and in particular, the outcome of a nature-constrained interaction between X and the evaluator.  As employed by the arguer, PiP marks an anti-skepticism that will keep her going even in the face of initial and intermediate criticism.  Accompanying this will typically be an optimism about the results—this is what keeps her going through the gauntlet of naysayers. Even so, PiP obligates the arguer to deal with the outcome, however that might go, thus corresponding to a type of fallibilism about the process.  It might taste good in the end, but it might taste bad.  In a situation where one argues that the proof of the pudding is in the tasting, one will be committed to a view and pursue defense of that view to the end, aware of the fact that the end will bring final judgment on the matter.

            Given that philosophy is in the argument business, it isn’t surprising to find this attitude on display in the literature.  In the next few paragraphs, we’ll consider three appearances of it.  First, consider the fallibilist epistemology of Roderick Chisholm, a foundationalist who develops a sophisticated formal theory of knowledge in Chisholm (1989).  This work begins with a chapter entitled, “The Skeptic’s Challenge,” a bold opening for a philosopher interested in making epistemic headway.  In considering the philosophical skeptic, Chisholm engages in burden shifting, arguing that the skeptic can give us no “positive reasons for being skeptical about the possibility of succeeding in the epistemic enterprise” (Chisholm 1989, 4). Without this, epistemologists are justified in having “faith in themselves,” a faith that amounts to a presupposition of success. Speaking to the justification of this faith, Chisholm recommends withholding judgment until the results are in—a move that is itself justified given that the skeptic can supply no affirmative reason for their view.  This is a classic PiP argument: Chisholm does not set out to refute the skeptic; rather, he is interested only in developing his own positive, anti-skeptical view with an eye to establishing its ultimate sanction through the vigor of the final product.  In that case, the faith will be justified and we will have an epistemic answer that the skeptic cannot undermine.  As he uses it, the PiP attitude motivates primarily an anti-skeptical strategy, but he also uses it illuminate where proper evaluation will come; this latter employment serves as a caution to the presumptuous skeptic who would want to force Chisholm’s hand before his work is complete. On display here are all the elements—the optimism, or faith, of a true believer who enjoins the skeptic to wait until the final results are in before judging his view, a view that will stand or fall based on its own merits as a theory of knowledge.

            A second instance of PiP in action can be found in the work of John Perry on the topic of consciousness.  Specifically, Perry sets out a view he calls “antecedent physicalism,” by which he means the view held by “someone who is committed to physicalism in the sense that she or he sees some compelling reasons for it and will not give it up without seeing some clear reason to do so” (Perry 2001, 27). His account of consciousness depends on a common sense commitment to the phenomena of consciousness along with a commitment to physicalism as the proper account of that phenomena. The dualist may insist that their criticisms be taken seriously, but as with Chisholm and the skeptic, the antecedent physicalist can proceed “without even a sidelong glance at the argument of dualists” (Perry 2001, 28). Ultimately, the view will adequately explain the phenomena or it won’t, but in advance of final judgment, the antecedent physicalist is under no obligation to relinquish her view; rather, she should formulate it under the presumption that it is correct.3  This is also a PiP argument, cautioning dualists to wait for the anti-skeptical development of a physicalism that will be vindicated in the end, or so he hopes.

            For our third example, we turn toWilliam James’ essay, “The Will to Believe.” As we have seen, faith is an important part of a PiP argument—confidence that one’s view will eventually prevail is what keeps theorists going in the face of deep skepticism. But while Chisholm and Perry concern themselves with the faith of an epistemologist and physicalist, respectively, James focuses on a more obvious faith, viz., the faith of the religious believer.  This essay, James announces, is “an essay in justification of faith, a defence of our right to adopt a believing attitude in religious matters, in spite of the fact that our merely logical intellect may not have been coerced” (James 1956, 1-2).  In arguing for this, James carves out a space for faith by insisting that most of our consequential beliefs are not forced upon us by our intellect, and that we settle many “genuine options” with our “passional nature.”4 That is, “[o]ur passional nature not only lawfully may, but must, decide an option between propositions, whenever it is a genuine option that cannot by its nature be decided on intellectual grounds” (James 1956, 11).  While it is true that with respect to many speculative questions we can wait until the intellect speaks, this is not true for all; in particular, James argues that the question of religious belief represent forced options about which no coercive evidence is available.  In this case, for those who regard religious belief as a living option, “faith based on desire is certainly a lawful and possibly an indispensable thing” (James 1956, 25). James pursues a PiP strategy in this essay, arguing that for those who regard religious belief as a genuine option, the justification for belief is to be found in the life that one leads and the results that accrue to the believer at the end of that life.  Clearly, this is a choice final vindication of which is dependent on consequences, and if the believer is correct, these consequences will depend on the nature of the life led under the influence of the belief. As he puts it, the strength of his view lies “in the outcome, the upshot, the terminus ad quem” (James 1956, 17). The entire essay is anti-skeptical, aimed as it is justifying faith, and it is imbued with a profound religious optimism.  A feature that sets it apart from other, similar defenses of faith is its anti-dogmatism—it is an avowedly fallibilist account, one that claims knowledge but not certainty about that knowledge.

            Each of these philosophers pursues a line of argument motivated by the PiP attitude.  In philosophy, as in argumentative disciplines generally, one finds several discourse situations.  Philosophical work might be collaborative, marked by proposal and compromise, or it might be adversarial, marked by counterproposal and refutation. At times, though, when participants are at loggerheads, compromise is not an option and refutation is unavailable. The options at this point appear to be opting out of the conversation and taking up tennis, or pursuing one’s own argumentative goals in spite of the resistance forthcoming from the other side. The PiP attitude often guides the latter pursuit, where one remains optimistic about the eventual success of one’s efforts in spite of skepticism, insisting that the line of argument will be compelling when complete.  Thus, the point here is that PiP is an expression of a way of thinking—of an attitude toward cognitive progress—that influences argumentative style and substance.  When influencing theory construction, this attitude is endgame focused, operating in full knowledge of the fact that something will come together in the end (or not.)

 

Licking the Spoon

At this point, a critic may wonder, “Why isn’t PiP objectionable as an argument style? Think about what it demands from us: “Shut up, sit down, and wait until we’re finished!”  It amounts to a refusal to listen to legitimate critical concerns—of willfully begging the question against the critic.”  We will consider this question by way of conclusion. Developing this concern, we might also note that the PiP attitude requires that one proceed under the influence of a “passional” faith in their view, a requirement that seems at odds with the philosophical temperament.  Allowing that James is correct and this is not a dogmatic faith, it remains dogged nevertheless, and that alone seems to create a tension with the requirements of philosophical argumentation.  A faith-based approach that begs the question—what could be more anti-philosophical?

            I think this criticism is mistaken.  The discourse situation in which one argues under the influence of the PiP attitude is not ideal—one cannot do justice to the critic’s concerns without compromising one’s own view, and in these situations the critic has given no compelling reason to do this.  Thus, the critic’s concerns are not legitimate, since what they may regard as legitimate look just as question-begging as any PiP argument would in that situation.5 In these situations, it is philosophical fight or flight, and so long as you are willing to remain in the game, the fight demands the determined development of one’s own view even though you lack the resources to fend off your antagonist.

            As for the explicit acknowledgement of a role for faith, I find this a refreshing bit of honesty about argument in general. We almost never participate in meaningful dialogue unless we are guided by a view. As philosophers, we have opinions, and our careers depend on our ability to express them forcefully.  What James says of science and interest is also true of philosophy: “[f]or purposes of discovery .. science would be far less advanced than she is if the passionate desires of individuals to get their own faiths confirmed had been kept out of the game” (James 1956, 21).  No one of us possesses knockdown arguments in favor of our philosophical opinions, arguments that would refute any and all comers who would presume to disagree with us.  We are confident in our views, and as philosophers this confidence is grounded in argument, but it is a confidence with many blind spots; yet even though we know our confidence can be blind, we remain committed to our views.

            More generally, we have worldviews that shape how we interpret and evaluate incoming information, and how we act on that information.  Our argumentative actions and reactions are framed by these worldviews.  PiP, both as an expression and as an attitude, reflects how we typically operate—we move forward with an agenda that we seek to defend, and we do so under the assumption that we are right.  We believe that in the end our views will be vindicated, whether by us or by our fellows.  As philosophers, we are committed to following the coercive force of reason where it leads us, even if this goes against the flow of our own interest and publication record. But as James cogently points out, there are many substantive claims of great moment that aren’t determined by reason, one way or the other, and here our interest prevails.  Even where reason isn’t mute, it is often very slow in speaking, taking many lifetimes to get to its point.  Through it all, then, we find good philosophers who argue in faith for views that compel in the absence of confirmation. For them, “the proof of the pudding is in the tasting” represents a way of life.

 

References

Ask Yahoo. 3 September 2002. http://ask.yahoo.com/ask/20020903.html .

Bartlett, J. 2004. Familiar Quotations. http://www.bartleby.com/100/

Cervantes, M. 1700. Don Quixote de la Mancha. P. A. Motteux (trans.).

Chisholm, R. 1989. Theory of Knowledge, 3rd Ed. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall.

Clarion Call. 2004. “The Proof is in the Pudding!” http://www.clarion-call.org/yeshua/pudding/proof.htm .

Fischer, J. M. 2004. “The Transfer of Nonresponsibility.” In J. Keim Campbell, M. O’Rourke, and D. Shier (eds.), Freedom and Determinism. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press.

Herbison, B. J. 2004. “Notes on the Translation of Don Quixote.” http://herbison.com/herbison/broken_eggs_quixote.html .

Hirsch, Jr., E. D., J. F. Kett, and J. Trefil. 2002. The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, 3rd Ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

James, W. 1956. The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy. New York: Dover Publications.

Magnuson, W. 2003. English Idioms: Sayings and Slang. http://home.t-online.de/home/toni.goeller/idiom_wm/ .

Oxford English Dictionary.

Perry, J. 2001. Knowledge, Possibility, and Consciousness. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press.

Quinion, M. 2004. “Proof of the Pudding.” http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-pro1.htm .

Wallraff, B. 2001. “Word Court.” The Atlantic Monthly 5: 128.

 

Notes

1. See Cervantes (1700).  This translation, while still common, has been largely discredited.  Motteux is said to have approached the project facetiously, with an eye to injecting a great amount of Cockney wit.  (See Herbison 2004.)  As a result, Motteux played “fast and loose” with many proverbs contained in the text.  By way of comparison, the more respected Ormsby translation, which appeared in 1885, contains no mention of pudding, and more to the point, the original text of Part II, Chapter XXIV does not contain the Spanish word for pudding, ‘budín’.  Nevertheless, Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations credits Cervantes with the saying, and that has influenced many to take it as fact that the proverb appears in Don Quixote.  (See Bartlett 2004 for a searchable, on-line version.) Another authoritative source, the Oxford English Dictionary, credits French critic and poet Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux with the first published use of the phrase in his Le Lutrin. Still others suggest that the proverb dates back to the 14th century—see Quinion (2004).

2. In this essay, I operate under the assumption that justification, evaluation, and judgment are related epistemic concepts. Justification is most clearly epistemic in character, but I see it as a species of evaluation—the justification of a belief is an evaluation of that belief relative to standards of evidentiary support.  Judgment, understood as mere choice, need not be connected to evaluation, but judgment is typically thicker than that and is grounded in prior evaluative deliberation and justificatory assessment.

3. You might make pudding for other reasons, e.g., to hold the filling together in a cherry pie, but there is an asymmetrical relation between its natural use and these uses.  Tapioca serves well in the role of pie catalyst because of its nature as pudding; it doesn’t serve well in its role as pudding because of its role as pie catalyst. In other words, it has certain characteristics that make it the type of pudding it is, and those also qualify it as useful for other purposes, but it doesn’t go the other way.

4. Compare the methodology employed by John Martin Fischer in his defense of compatibilism in Fischer (2004).  He grants that he has not “refuted the direct argument for incompatibilism,” but then he does not “feel any need to do so” (Fischer 2004, 203). He believes that there are “considerable attractions” to compatibilism, and the failure of the incompatibilists to establish their view affirmatively supplies “no reason (as yet) to abandon the compatibility claim” (Fischer 2004, 203).  This is the mark of a dialectical stalemate, a feature of the dialectical situations in which both Perry and Chisholm also find themselves.  But a stalemate is a stalemate on both sides, and it provides no reason for either to stop working in defense of their view; however, so long as it remains in force, neither side will be able to do much more than preach to the converted.  This brings out what we might call a “dialectical pessimism”—while these three philosophers are optimistic about the chances for their own views, they are rather pessimistic about the chances of convincing their critics.  In fact, the lack of concern for refutation would suggest that this is not really one of their primary concerns.

5.  A “genuine option” is a decision between two hypotheses, or things “proposed to our belief”, that are living, forced, and momentous.  To say that the option is living is to say that it represents two real possibilities for the believer.  To say that it is forced is to say that the believer cannot withhold judgment—even refraining from making a decision amounts to making a decision.  (E.g., believing in the Christian God or not believing, where withholding keeps you from potential rewards as certainly as rejection would.)  Finally, it is momentous if unique, significant, and not something that can be retracted. For more detail, see James (1956, 2-4).

6. See Fischer (2004, 203) for a forceful presentation of this point.