Facing Walter’s Dilemma IAIN STEWART 1. Jörgensen’s Dilemma and Walter’s Solution (a) Jörgensen’s Dilemma In the late 1930s, Jörgen Jörgensen identified the following “puzzle” as to what he termed “the logical character of imperatives” (Jörgensen 1937–38) or, more exactly, the possibility of such character: According to a generally accepted definition of logical inference only sentences which are capable of being true or false can function as premisses or conclusions in an inference; nevertheless it seems evident that a conclusion in the imperative mood may be drawn from two premisses one of which or both of which are in the imperative mood. (ibid.) For instance: Keep your promises Love your neighbour as yourself This is a promise Love yourself Therefore, Keep this promise Therefore, Love your neighbour In these examples, one or both of the premisses are in the imperative mood. Jörgensen reflects, in each example “the conclusion seems just as inescapable as the conclusion in any syllogism containing sentences in the indicative mood only.” Walter (1996) identifies this problem as Jörgensen’s Dilemma. He notes that Jörgensen then seeks solutions in theory of language but does not find anything that satisfies him. Jörgensen actually goes on from that, to place more hope in history of language; but he does so in the manner of evolution- ist speculation, which Walter rightly passes over. 1 © Blackwell Publishers Ltd 1997, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA. Ratio Juris. Vol. 10 No. 4 December 1997 (397–402) 1 Since the articles by Jörgensen and Walter are brief, page references will be dispensed with. Jörgensen’s examples of a syllogism involving imperatives, which are evidently misprinted in the original, are set out here as he seems to have intended. More detailed references to Kelsen’s work are provided in Stewart (1986, 1990).