“Counting As” a Bridge Principle

Abstract

John Searle’s argument that social-scientific laws are impossible depends on a special open-ended feature of social kinds. We demonstrate that under a noncontentious understanding of bridging principles the so-called “counts-as” relation, found in the expression “X counts as Y in (context) C,” provides a bridging principle for social kinds. If we are correct, not only are social-scientific laws possible, but the “counts as” relation might provide a more perspicuous formulation for candidate bridge principles.

Searle on Collectively Intending Symbolic Social Institutional Status

“…3. Social activity, practices and institutions, is the fruit of collective intentionality, and as 11 See also Butchard and D'Amico 2011. such the concept of collective intentionality is indispensable in the adequate explanation of all social phenomena. * [*Searle considers collective intentionality to be logically and conceptually irreducible, whereas the proposed revisionary neo-Searlean social ontology does not.]…”