DISAGREEMENTS: AN INTRODUCTION.

• Author: Molder, Bruno

Annoying, fundamental, fun, superficial, painful, inspiring--disagreements come in all shapes and sizes and are part and parcel of human existence. Not all disagreements need solving and sometimes we can happily live with them. For example, disagreements about taste often do not need a resolution--we do not have to agree whether red is more beautiful than blue, or whether one ought to take one's coffee with milk and sugar (as opposed to taking it black). Diverse viewpoints, opinions, beliefs and attitudes often constitute a valuable resource. And yet, in all domains of life there is also work to be done in overcoming disagreements, whether by hashing out compromises or by winning and losing arguments.

The proper categorization of disagreements, the unpacking of premises, contexts and conclusions has been an important tradition in philosophy. However, a focused and systematic study of disagreement(s) should be of interest and relevance outside of philosophy as well. It is a significant philosophical insight (with practical consequences) that different kinds of disagreement require different resolution strategies. Consequently, before one adopts a strategy for resolving a particular disagreement, it is important to identify the kind of disagreement one is faced with. In what follows, we will briefly introduce the main kinds of disagreement.

Some disagreements are merely apparent--a predicament that primarily occurs when the disagreeing parties are, unbeknownst to them, merely talking past each other. Roughly, two parties talk past each other when the relevant terms they use have different meanings. In this way, they can unwittingly make claims that are not in fact incompatible, and, once they realize this, there should be no disagreement. For example, Mike and June (think they) disagree about whether the music playing at a neighbour's is loud. Mike says it is loud (meaning that he can hear it), June claims that it is not loud (she can hear the music, but it does not disturb her and so does not constitute being loud for her). One could reasonably say that the disagreement in this case is merely verbal. Such disagreements are very common and although concluding that they are verbal is one way of solving them, working one's way towards the realisation that they are in fact verbal, might take considerable effort, time and skill.

However, another situation wherein it may be debated whether the two parties in fact disagree is so-called 'faultless disagreement', where no party is in error. A disagreeing party can be at fault if the disagreement is over facts and the party gets the facts wrong. One can also be in error, if one bases one's position on a faulty or inapplicable theory. Such cases, it is said sometimes, involve genuine disagreement. However, in the case of faultless disagreement, both parties can be right. One way to make sense of this situation is to point out that they are right on their own terms, that is, if their claims are to be evaluated in different contexts. For example, imagine a disagreement between two people over whether their dinner is delicious, where one of them takes the dinner to be delicious (and he really likes its taste), whereas the other finds the dinner to be very good by her taste, but nothing remarkable. Once properly spelled out, we can see that both of them can be right. But then--did they really disagree in the frst place, or were they instead talking past each other? Making sense of faultless disagreements is a contentious matter (see MacFarlane 2007). One way to argue that faultless disagreements do not involve talking past each other is to view them as metalinguistic disputes, that is, negotiations on what is the best or preferred use of a given contested term or what standard is appropriate in a given context (Sundell 2011). In that case, there is a substantive issue between the disputing parties about the appropriate usage of the terms (say, 'delicious dinner' in the above example), even if the disputants are not aware that they are engaged in such a negotiation. A second, and somewhat more radical, way to argue that faultless disagreements do not involve talking past one another is to establish a theory of content and truth...