Reference

This paper deals with the semantics and meta-semantics for ordinary names in fiction. It has recently been argued by some philosophers that when ordinary names are used in fictional contexts, they change their semantic contents and work as fictional names in general. In this paper, I argue that there is no compelling reason to believe that such reference changes occur and defend the view that whether those names refer to real or fictional objects depends on which semantic intentions speakers have.

Academic discussions of the count/mass distinction in Chinese feature three general problems, upon which this essay critically reflects: 1) Most studies focus either on modern or on classical Chinese thus representing parallel discussions that never intersect; 2) studies on count/mass grammar are often detached from reflections on count/mass semantics, which results in serious theoretical and terminological flaws; 3) approaches to Chinese often crucially depend on observations of English grammar and semantics, as, e.g., many/much vs. few/little patterns, the use of plural (...) inflections, etc., which is seldom justified. The article investigates the relevant discourse on the count/mass issue in classical and modern Chinese and concludes with exploring two distinct areas related to countability: the semantics of singular in contexts in which objects are introduced as referential-indefinite and the semantics of number and countability as revealed in diangu. (shrink)

In this chapter, Nonsense is approached as a category that reveals a close relation both to order and disorder, rationality and illogicality, conventionality and arbitrariness, reality and dream. Among its various illustrations, quite a prominent role is assigned to the Duchess’ sentence, which, in spite of being universally acknowledged as one of the best pieces of Nonsense, is rarely discussed in detail in philosophical and literary investigations: ‘Be what you would seem to be’ - or, if you’d like it put (...) more simply – ‘Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise.’. (shrink)

Whatever theoretical perspective one adopts for interpreting Alice (mathematics, physics, psychoanalysis, etc.), reading it unfailingly turns into a series of unexpected discoveries. Yet probably no other readings prove to be as adventurous as the philosophical ones. Philosophers are inspired by the book to address a vast variety of issues, from the problem of internal meanings, i.e. the relation of saying to meaning, up to the existence of God and the creation of the world. In this chapter, I have tried to (...) trace some of the most impressive philosophical adventures in Wonderland that might give birth to still more stirring new ideas and discoveries in the future. (shrink)

What is involved in having a singular thought about an ordinary object? On the leading epistemic view, one has this capacity if and only if one has belief-forming dispositions which would reliably enable one to get its properties right (Dickie, 2015). I first argue that Dickie’s official view entails surprising and unpalatable claims about either rationality or singular thought, before offering a precisification. Once we have reached that level of abstraction, it becomes difficult to see what is distinctively epistemic about (...) the framework. If we are to tease out the delicate connection between singular thought and knowledge, we should suspend the assumption that there is a homogeneous core, present in all cases of such thought, and that it is from there that its (univocal) epistemic character derives. (shrink)

According to the “standard framing” of racial appeals in political speech, politicians generally rely on coded language to communicate racial messages. Yet recent years have demonstrated that politicians often express quite explicit forms of racism in mainstream political discourse. The standard framing can explain neither why these appeals work politically nor how they work semantically. This paper moves beyond the standard framing, focusing on the politics and semantics of one type of explicit appeal, candid racial communication. The linguistic vehicles of (...) CRC are neither true code words, nor slurs, but a conventionally defined class of “racialized terms.”. (shrink)

Perceptual representations pick out individuals and attribute properties to them. This paper considers the role of perceptual attribution in determining or guiding perceptual reference to objects. We consider three extant models of the relation between perceptual attribution and perceptual reference–all attribution guides reference, no attribution guides reference, or a privileged subset of attributions guides reference–and argue that empirical evidence undermines all three. We then defend a flexible-attributives model, on which the range of perceptual attributives used to guide reference shifts adaptively (...) with context. This model underscores the remarkable and dynamic intelligence of our perceptual capacities. We elucidate implications of the model for the boundary between perception and propositional thought. (shrink)

Perceptual representations pick out individuals and attribute properties to them. This paper considers the role of perceptual attribution in determining or guiding perceptual reference to objects. We consider three extant models of the relation between perceptual attribution and perceptual reference–all attribution guides reference, no attribution guides reference, or a privileged subset of attributions guides reference–and argue that empirical evidence undermines all three. We then defend a flexible-attributives model, on which the range of perceptual attributives used to guide reference shifts adaptively (...) with context. This model underscores the remarkable and dynamic intelligence of our perceptual capacities. We elucidate implications of the model for the boundary between perception and propositional thought. (shrink)

Perceptual representations pick out individuals and attribute properties to them. This paper considers the role of perceptual attribution in determining or guiding perceptual reference to objects. We consider three extant models of the relation between perceptual attribution and perceptual reference–all attribution guides reference, no attribution guides reference, or a privileged subset of attributions guides reference–and argue that empirical evidence undermines all three. We then defend a flexible-attributives model, on which the range of perceptual attributives used to guide reference shifts adaptively (...) with context. This model underscores the remarkable and dynamic intelligence of our perceptual capacities. We elucidate implications of the model for the boundary between perception and propositional thought. (shrink)

Recent advances in the Super Linguistics of pictures have laid the Super Semantic foundation for modelling the phenomena of narrative sequencing and co-reference in pictorial and mixed linguistic-pictorial discourses. We take up the question of how one arrives at the pragmatic interpretations of such discourses. In particular, we offer an analysis of: (i) the discourse composition problem: how to represent the joint meaning of a multipicture discourse, (ii) observed differences in narrative sequencing in prima facie equivalent linguistic vs. pictorial discourses, (...) and (iii) the phenomenon of co-referencing across pictures. We extend Segmented Discourse Representation Theory to spell out a formal Super Pragmatics that applies to linguistic, pictorial and mixed discourses, while respecting the particular ‘genius’ of either medium and computing their distinctive pragmatic interpretations. (shrink)

In this paper we present a solution to Saul Kripke’s Puzzle About Belief Meaning and use, Dordrecht, 1979) based on Kaplan’s metaphysical picture of words. Although it is widely accepted that providing such a solution was one of the main incentives for the development of Kaplan’s theory, it was never presented by Kaplan in a systematic manner and was regarded by many as unsatisfactory. We agree with these critiques, and develop an extension of Kaplan’s theory by introducing the notion of (...) “conservative” word uses, as well as arguing for the restriction of Kripke’s Disquotational Principle only to such uses. This restriction allows us to solve Kripke’s Puzzle by arguing that the assent of the puzzle’s protagonist does not allow disquotation and ascription of corresponding inconsistent belief, as it contains the non-conservative use of a proper name. At the end of the paper, we defend two of Kaplan’s theses that we find essential for our argument to work: that individuation of word tokens involves taking into account the intention of the speaker, and that different uniquely referring proper names of the same shape should be regarded as different homonymous words. (shrink)

This is an unpublished piece from July 1998. It discusses the use of semantic notions such as reference in the Canberra Plan, the question whether this use creates a problematic circularity if the Canberra Plan is applied to the semantic notions themselves, and the relation of this question to Putnam’s model-theoretic argument. I used some of the ideas in later papers such as (Price 2004, 2009) and (Menzies & Price, 2009), but the bulk of discussion of the relation of my (...) concern to Putnam’s argument (and to responses to Putnam by others) never made it into print. (shrink)

We offer an interpretation of the mental files framework that eliminates the metaphor of files, information being contained in files, etc. The guiding question is whether, once we move beyond the metaphors, there is any theoretical role for files. We claim not. We replace the file-metaphor with two theses: the semantic thesis that there are irreducibly relational representational facts (viz. facts about the coordination of representations); and the metasemantic thesis that processes tied to information-relations ground those facts. In its canonical (...) statement, the ‘file’-theory makes reference to a certain kind of relational representational feature, and a certain kind of mental activity. Mental files need not come into it. In short, we posit mental filing without mental files. Our interpretation avoids awkward problems that arise on the standard interpretation and clarifies the explanatory commitments of the theory. (shrink)

A *qualation* does not contain merely references to qualia, but contains actual qualia. There are many differences to equations. Qualations are irreducibly 1st-person and are required for the statement of a hard problem.

The text is translated from W.V.O.Quine: From a Logical Point of View. Harvard University Press. Second Edition, 1980. pp. 130-139.

A core presumption of object oriented ontology and other speculative realisms is that there is a world independent of the mind that can be successfully inquired and should take center stage in our reflections again. A profound case for this realist presumption is found in Meillassoux’s After Finitude. He aims to secure our access to reality as it is in itself by refuting correlationism according to which we cannot escape reality as it is thought by us. He presents three arguments: (...) ancestrality, facticity and mathematization. On the first argument correlationism fails because it cannot render scientific statements about an universe anterior to us meaningful. I address the worry that he might not take this to be a real argument against correlationism and argue that it in any case fails. On the second argument correlationism is flawed since it remains committed to absolute possibilities. I argue that this argument is untenable as well. On his third argument correlationism fails because science reveals a mathematically describable reality indifferent to our existence. I argue that the almost perfect mathematization of nature can actually be cashed out as an argument for correlationism. I conclude by proposing an alternative way of showing that mathematics is the language of the absolute understood as a radical contingent hyperchaos. (shrink)

This is a primer on Steven James Bartlett's book CRITIQUE OF IMPURE REASON: HORIZONS OF POSSIBILITY AND MEANING. ●●●●● -/- Some books are long and complex. The Critique of Impure Reason is such a book. It is long enough and complex enough so that it may be a service to some readers to offer a primer to introduce and partially summarize the book’s objectives and method. Here, the author of Critique of Impure Reason: Horizons of Possibility and Meaning provides such (...) a guide, a vade mecum to accompany a reader should he or she embark on a study of the long and complex work. ●●●●● -/- The book is available in a printed edition, ISBN 978-0-578-88646-6, from online booksellers such as Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and through independent bookstores. The book is also available as an eBook, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.5458352, through Zenodo, PhilSci, PhilPapers, HAL, and other online archives. (shrink)

Enactivism has influentially argued that the traditional intellectualist ‘act-content’ model of intentionality is insufficient both phenomenologically and naturalistically, and minds are built from world-involving bodily habits – thus, knowledge should be regarded as more of a skilled performance than an informational encoding. Radical enactivists have assumed that this insight must entail non-representationalism concerning at least basic minds. But what if it could be shown that representation is itself a form of skilled performance? I sketch the outline of such an account (...) from the perspective of Peirce’s pragmatist semiotics, which theorises signs as habits of associating specific cues with appropriate acts and schemas of ensuing experience. Within this framework, I argue, a naturalistic account of propositional structure can be constructed which transcends the symbolic – and in some instances even the linguistic – sphere, and offers new insights regarding the Information Processing Challenge, and the Hard Problem of Content. (shrink)

Augustine famously claims every word is a name. Some readers take Augustine to thereby maintain a purely referentialist semantic account according to which every word is a referential expression whose meaning is its extension. Other readers think that Augustine is no referentialist and is merely claiming that every word has some meaning. In this paper, I clarify Augustine’s arguments to the effect that every word is a name and argue that ‘every word is a name’ amounts to the claim that (...) for any word, there exist tokens of that word which are autonymous nouns. Augustine takes this to be the result of universal lexical ambiguity or equivocity and I clarify how Augustine’s account of metalinguistic discourse, which is one of the most detailed to have survived from antiquity, differs from some ancient and modern theories. (shrink)

يقدم هذا البحث معالجة تحليلية موجزة للاتجاهات الأساسية في فلسفة اللغة المعاصرة، وهي ثلاثة: 1- الاتجاه الممتد من فريجه ورسل وفتجنشتين المبكر عبر الوضعية المنطقية وكواين وديفيدسون ودميت وبتنام وكريبكي. ويهتم بالعلاقة بين المعنى والصدق والإشارة. والسؤال الأساسي في هذا الاتجاه هو: ما شروط صدق الجملة؟ 2- الاتجاه الممتد من مور وفتجنشتين المتأخر ومدرسة أكسفورد (رايل، وأوستن وستراوسون، وجرايس) وسيرل وهابرماس وبراندوم. ويهتم بالعلاقة بين اللغة والمتكلم. والسؤال الأساسي في هذا الاتجاه هو: ما العلاقة بين المعنى والاستعمال. 3- الاتجاه الذي (...) يمثله تشومسكي وتلاميذه في علم اللغة مثل كاتز وفودور ومن سايرهم. ويهتم بالمعرفة اللغوية. والسؤال الأساسي في هذا الاتجاه هو: كيف نفسر الإبداع اللغوي؟ . (shrink)

Philosophy of Language, introduces students to the main issues and theories in twenty-first-century philosophy of language, focusing specifically on linguistic phenomena. Author Salah Ismail divided the book into seven chapters. Ch. I, Philosophy of language: Defining term and Indication of trends. Ch.2, Empirical theory in language learning (Quine). Ch.3, Mental theory in language learning and its knowledge (Chomsky). Ch.4, Theories of meaning, surveys the competing theories of linguistic meaning and compares their various advantages and liabilities; theory of ideas, theory of (...) verification, use theory. Ch.5, Theory of communication- intention. Ch.6, Pragmatics and rules of conversation. Ch.7, Language, truth and reality. يعالج الكتاب الموضوعات الأساسية في فلسفة اللغة وهي المعنى والإشارة والصدق، بالإضافة إلى تعلم اللغة ومعرفتها. ويعرض بأسلوب رصين وبدقة نظريات الفلاسفة المعاصرين في هذه الموضوعات بداية من فتجنشتين، ومرورا بكواين وتشومسكي وجرايس، إلى جون سيرل في وقتنا الحالي. وستجد فيه إجابات عن أسئلة من قبيل: كيف نتعلم اللغة؟ وما المعنى؟ وكيف تعني الكلمات ما تعنيه؟ وما شروط صدق الجملة؟ وما الاختلاف بين معنى الجملة والمعنى لدى المتكلم؟ وكيف يكون التواصل اللغوي ممكنا؟ وما قواعد المحادثة؟ وما الاختلاف بين علم الدلالة وعلم الاستعمال؟ ويدافع المؤلف عن نظرية الاستعمال في المعنى . (shrink)

Eco/logical R/evolution, is the story of mankind, told with words of a great and wonderful subjective odyssey, the never-ending quest; for objective truths and collective Eudaimonia. The author raises the issues; of political weakness and widespread confusion, about logical analytical errors, of which we find many of in Old Marxist Ideology. As a conscious effort, is thus made, to expel the mental subjugation of Platonic Idealism, away from the clenches Aristotelian Realism, and its bastard offspring; Old Historical Materialism. The book (...) identifies, in the works of Darwin and Marx, a wide range of worrying philosophical incompatibilities, such that are clearly found; in their respective theories and research methodologies. -/- We hereby propose; that a New Marxist Philosophy of Science, stands a probable chance; at unifying the Natural and Social Sciences. As the convergence of truths is manifest, thus, it is mapped out in detail by the author, out of necessity. It invokes, a Marxist Metaphysical Identity, for the sole purpose off; presenting a teleological framework, for New Marxist Theory. -/- NOTE: Reader must look up each word in a dictionary, which they see on both sides of the "/" when found in the middle of a word. (shrink)

Este artigo é uma breve introdução à filosofia da linguagem. Ele se concentra nos problemas que surgem a partir de dois conceitos centrais: referência e significado. Em particular, o foco central é no problema fundacional da referência e no problema descritivo do significado, assim como a relação entre eles. Embora esta de modo algum seja uma introdução exaustiva ao tema, muitos conceitos centrais são clarificados, como por exemplo teoria da referência, termo singular, termo geral, teoria do significado, composicionalidade, conteúdo, significado (...) linguístico, implicatura conversacional, vagueza, etc. Espera-se que sirva como um primeiro contato com a disciplina, principalmente voltado a estudantes de filosofia, filosofia da linguagem e áreas afins. (shrink)

Este artigo é uma breve introdução à filosofia da linguagem. Ele se concentra nos problemas que surgem a partir de dois conceitos centrais: referência e significado. Em particular, o foco central é no problema fundacional da referência e no problema descritivo do significado, assim como a relação entre eles. Embora esta de modo algum seja uma introdução exaustiva ao tema, muitos conceitos centrais são clarificados, como por exemplo teoria da referência, termo singular, termo geral, teoria do significado, composicionalidade, conteúdo, significado (...) linguístico, implicatura conversacional, vagueza, etc. Espera-se que sirva como um primeiro contato com a disciplina, principalmente voltado a estudantes de filosofia, filosofia da linguagem e áreas afins. (shrink)

With reference to Polish logical-philosophical tradition two formal theories of language syntax have been sketched and then compared with each other. The first theory is based on the assumption that the basic linguistic stratum is constituted by object-tokens (concrete objects perceived through the senses) and that the types of such objects (ideal objects) are derivative constructs. The other is founded on an opposite philosophical orientation. The two theories are equivalent. The main conclusion is that in syntactic researches it is redundant (...) to postulate the existence of abstract linguistic entities. Earlier, in a slightly different form, the idea was presented in paper "Logiczne podstawy ontologii składni języka" (1988). (shrink)

Conceptual engineers aim to revise rather than describe our concepts. But what are concepts? And how does one engineer them? Answering these questions is of central importance for implementing and theorizing about conceptual engineering. This paper discusses and criticizes two influential views of this issue: semanticism, according to which conceptual engineers aim to change linguistic meanings, and psychologism, according to which conceptual engineers aim to change psychological structures. I argue that neither of these accounts can give us the full story. (...) Instead, I propose and defend the Dual Content View of Conceptual Engineering. On this view, conceptual engineering targets concepts, where concepts are understood as having two kinds of contents: referential content and cognitive content. I show that this view is independently plausible and that it gives us a comprehensive account of conceptual engineering that helps to make progress on some of the most difficult problems surrounding conceptual engineering. (shrink)

From the apparently trivial problem of homonyms, I argue that proper names as they occur in natural languages cannot be characterised as strings of sounds or characters. This entails, first, that the proper names philosophers talk about are not physical entities, like strings, but abstractions that, second, may be better characterised as triples (s, m, C), where s is the string that conveys the meaning m in a set of contexts C. Third, the generality principle of compositionality may be put (...) into question, for apparently its converse holds in some cases. Finally, the prominence of context for determining the meaning expressed by a sign suggests a strong connection between proper names and indexicals. This connection has been largely overlooked by the analytic tradition, in spite that both proper names and indexicals have been among their hottest topics. This may be because the analytic literature about proper names has been decisively influenced by Frege’s work, which was better suited for formal languages. Izydora Dąmbska and Jerzy Pelc, with their semiotic background, were able to have a finer understanding of this quasi-indexical character of proper names. (shrink)

This book discusses the two main construals of the explanatory goals of semantic theories. The first, externalist conception, understands semantic theories in terms of a hermeneutic and interpretive explanatory project. The second, internalist conception, understands semantic theories in terms of the psychological mechanisms in virtue of which meanings are generated. It is argued that a fruitful scientific explanation is one that aims to uncover the underlying mechanisms in virtue of which the observable phenomena are made possible, and that a scientific (...) semantics should be doing just that. If this is the case, then a scientific semantics is unlikely to be externalist, for reasons having to do with the subject matter and form of externalist theories. It is argued that semantics construed hermeneutically is nevertheless a valuable explanatory project. (shrink)

Since 1976 Hilary Putnam has on many occasions proposed an argument, founded on some model-theoretic results, to the effect that any philosophical programme whose purpose is to naturalize semantics would fail to account for an important feature of every natural language, the determinacy of reference. Here, after having presented the argument, I will suggest that it does not work, because it simply assumes what it should prove, that is that we cannot extend the metatheory: Putnam appears to think that all (...) we may determinately say about the relations between words and entities in the world is what the model theory tells us, but he has never offered justifications for that. At the end of the article, I will discuss the apparently reliable intuition that seems to me to be at the root of the argument, that is that, given a formal theory, there is an infinite number of ways of connecting it to, or of projecting it onto, the world. I will suggest that we should resist this intuition, because it rests on a very doubtful notion of world, which assumes that for any class of objects there is a corresponding property. (shrink)

After briefly introducing the topic of reference, which has a long tradition but did not become a major issue until the last century, when language started to occupy center-stage in philosophy, and after mentioning some of the open problems that the semantic revolution promoted by Saul Kripke and others in the late 1960s and early 1970s left us, which are dealt with in the volume, I offer a preview of the papers collected in the latter, explaining how the volume is (...) organized and how the papers relate to one another. (shrink)

In the second lecture of "Naming and Necessity," Saul Kripke presented a new and quite convincing picture of the reference of proper names. At the same time, however, he expressed some skepticism towards the possibility of developing it into a full-blown theory by offering “more exact conditions for reference to take place.” In this paper, after discussing the reasons for his skepticism, I hint at how I think Kripke’s picture could be developed and offer an outline of a theory of (...) reference based on it. One of the key notions my ‘theory’ makes use of is that of repetition, which I take from Kaplan’s “Words.”. (shrink)

In this paper, I focus on the alleged distinction between speaker’s reference and semantic reference. I begin by discussing Saul Kripke’s notion of speaker’s reference and the theoretical roles it is supposed to play, arguing that they do not justify the claim that reference comes in two different sorts and highlighting that Kripke’s own definition makes the notion incompatible with the nowadays widely endorsed Gricean project, which aims at explaining semantic reference in terms of speaker’s reference. I then examine an (...) alternative account of speaker’s reference offered by Michael Devitt within his causal theory and express some doubts about its suitability for explaining proper name semantic reference. From all this, I conclude that there is at least some tension between Kripke’s chain of communication picture and the attempt to explain (Griceanly, so to say) semantic properties in terms of speakers’ mental states. (shrink)

In “Semantics of Fictional Terms,” Garcia-Carpintero critically surveys the most recent literature on the topic of fictional names. One of his targets is realism about fictional discourse. Realists about fictional discourse believe that: (a) it contains true sentences that have fictional names as their subjects; (b) sentences containing names can be true only if those names have referents; (c) fictional names have fictional characters – abstract objects – as their referents. The fundamental problem that arises for realists is that not (...) all true sentences containing fictional names are plausibly about abstract objects. This leads to the need to introduce disjunctive conceptions of property attribution that Garcia-Carpintero claims are implausible, and that realism should therefore be rejected. He also maintains, however, that (a) is correct. I agree. Furthermore, I am also committed to anti-realism about fictional discourse – that fictional names have no referents. Garcia-Carpintero claims that my view is simply a notational variant of realism. I argue that this is false – that my view could not possibly be a notational variant of any extant realist theory. (shrink)

This essay uses a mental files theory of singular thought—a theory saying that singular thought about and reference to a particular object requires possession of a mental store of information taken to be about that object—to explain how we could have such thoughts about abstract mathematical objects. After showing why we should want an explanation of this I argue that none of three main contemporary mental files theories of singular thought—acquaintance theory, semantic instrumentalism, and semantic cognitivism—can give it. I argue (...) for two claims intended to advance our understanding of singular thought about mathematical abstracta. First, that the conditions for possession of a file for an abstract mathematical object are the same as the conditions for possessing a file for an object perceived in the past—namely, that the agent retains information about the object. Thus insofar as we are able to have memory-based files for objects perceived in the past, we ought to be able to have files for abstract mathematical objects too. Second, at least one recently articulated condition on a file’s being a device for singular thought—that it be capable of surviving a certain kind of change in the information it contains—can be satisfied by files for abstract mathematical objects. (shrink)

This is an extended review of Juhani Yli-Vakkuri & John Hawthorne's book: Narrow Content (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018)..

The standard versions of predicativism are committed to the following two theses: proper names are count nouns in all their occurrences, and names do not refer to objects but express name-bearing properties. The main motivation for predicativism is to provide a uniform explanation of referential names and predicative names. According to predicativism, predicative names are fundamental and referential names are explained by appealing to a null determiner functioning like “the” or “that.” This paper has two goals. The first is to (...) reject the predicativists’ explanation of the two types of names. I present three syntactic counterexamples to the predicativists’ account of referential names: incorporation, modification, and measure phrase uses. The second goal is to present a novel strategy to explain the two types of names. I propose that referential names are fundamental but that there are null morphemes available for transforming a name into a count noun. (shrink)

In Philosophical Investigations, Wittgenstein proposed the notion of meaning that accounts for the large variety of contexts in which we apply the term “meaning”. This paper agreement with the manner in which Wittgenstein enhance his conception of meaning emphasizing his methodology of observation and description of particular cases. By applying a descriptive approach, Wittgenstein demonstrated that meaning of the term does not reside in physical or mental objects as well as in its correlations. As a result of contrasting denotative theory (...) as well as the correspondence theory of meaning and recognizing the inadequacy of the accounts of meaning, he has proposed earlier in his Tractatus. But in later work, he has suggested that only one conception of meaning which could not be invalidated, at least for a large class of cases. This is none other than the notion of meaning which is regarded as public in nature. Consequently, the meaning of a term is not its denotation but its “use” in the language. Hence, by upholding the slogan i.e., “meaning is use” here I want to illustrate the supremacy of use over “naming” concerning to Wittgenstein’s Tractatus and Philosophical Investigations. (shrink)

Langdellian “science” and its “formalism” ignore ways form permits and even creates freedom of choice. For example, as Wordsworth notes, though the weaver is restricted by what his form of loom can weave, the weaver may nonetheless choose what and how he weaves. Furthermore, the loom creates weaving possibilities that do not exist without it. Such freedom alongside form is often lost on lawyers, judges, and teachers trained primarily in Langdellian redacted appellate cases where “facts” and other framed matters often (...) wrongly appear as simply given. Similarly, in the context of their redacted appellate cases, many current students may only see constraint in IRAC (Issue-Rule-Application-Conclusion) and other thought forms rather than the fastidious freedoms such forms both provide and create. -/- Overlooking such freedoms is not only misleading in itself. It also misses the need to study how such freedoms are and should be exercised. When facts are simply presented as “given” and strategic and other choices go unrecorded and unnoticed in redacted appellate opinions, no thorough analysis of these overlooked subjects can occur. This is extremely troubling since such overlooked subjects are at the very heart of the lawyer’s craft. -/- Attempting to remedy such Langdellian shortcomings, this article explores, among other things, five basic levels of thought and the framing choices in such levels of thought: references, issues, rules, application of rules, and conclusions. Though often merely taken as “given” in redacted appellate opinions, a good grasp of reference assures that parties are in fact talking about the same matter or matters (the “reference”). It also increases the likelihood of ascertaining and properly framing all the relevant “facts” in a manner reasonably and ethically consistent with a client’s real interests. Similarly, focusing on flexibility of issue framing both brings necessary focus on what is important in the reference and, to the extent reasonable and ethical, again increases the likelihood of frames most consistent with a client’s real interests. A good grasp of applicable rules and how to frame and apply them on its face increases the likelihood of representing a client well. A good grasp of conclusions and how to frame and hedge them also does the same. -/- Grasping the multilevel complexities in play at these multiple levels pushes us beyond briefing redacted appellate cases to the much more difficult and stimulating work of exploring and teaching good legal thought at all its levels. Legal writing professors are pioneers in this regard and others in the academy can learn much from them. -/- Keywords: RIRAC, IRAC, CREAC, Reference, Issue, Analysis, Rule, Application, Conclusion, Frame, Framing, Metaphor, Concept, Category, Legal Thought, Legal Analysis, Rhetoric, Langdell, Wordsworth, Form, Formalism, Sonnet, Text. (shrink)

Stojnić et al. (2013, 2017) argue that the reference of demonstratives is fixed without any contribution from the extra-linguistic context. On their `prominence/coherence' theory, the reference of a demonstrative expression depends only on its context-independent linguistic meaning. Here, we argue that Stojnić et al.’s striking claims can be maintained in only the thinnest technical sense. Instead of eliminating appeals to the extra-linguistic context, we show how the prominence/coherence theory merely suppresses them. Then we ask why one might be tempted to (...) try and offer such a view. Since we are rather sympathetic to the motivations we find, we close by sketching a more plausible alternative. (shrink)

Millikan's account of substance concepts is based on a notion of “substance” expanded from realist notions of individuals and natural kinds. Her metaphysical notion, based on “inductive potential,” is shown to be too puristic and needs to incorporate cognizing subjects. This could preserve the realist/nondescriptionist insight that the extension of substances is determined by the world.

One of the most important problems of twentieth century analytic philosophy concern the place of the mind – and in particular, of consciousness and intentionality – in a physical universe. Brian Loar’s essays in the philosophy of mind in this volume include his major contributions in this area. His central concern was how to understand consciousness and intentionality from the subjective perspective, and especially, how to understand subjectivity in a physical universe. He was committed to the reality and reliability of (...) the subjective perspective; and he found that subjective phenomena like intentionality and consciousness are, in a certain sense, ineliminable and irreducible to objective ones. At the same time he believed that intentionality and consciousness are grounded in the physical. One of his great contributions was showing how to reconcile these two positions by being a conceptual and explanatory anti-reductionist about both consciousness and intentionality but a metaphysical reductionist nonetheless. He had a deep commitment to both physicalism and to the reality and significance of the subjective point of view. (shrink)

In this paper, I assess whether indexical attitudes, e.g. beliefs and desires, have any special properties or present any special challenge to theories of propositional attitudes. I being by investigating the claim that allegedly problematic indexical cases are just instances of the familiar phenomenon of referential opacity. Regardless of endorsing that claim, I provide an argument to the effect that indexical attitudes do have a special property. My argument relies on the fact that one cannot account for what is it (...) to share someone else’s indexical attitudes without rejecting some plausible thesis about propositional attitudes. In the end, I assess Herman Cappelen and Josh Dever’s considerations on intentional action and extract an argument from them that could – if successful – neutralize my own. I finish by arguing that their argument has an important flaw, thus failing to convince us that indexical attitudes are just as ordinary as any other. (shrink)

The metaphysics of representation poses questions such as: in virtue of what does a sentence, picture, or mental state represent that the world is a certain way? In the first instance, I have focused on the semantic properties of language: for example, what is it for a name such as ‘London’ to refer to something? Interpretationism concerning what it is for linguistic expressions to have meaning, says that constitutively, semantic facts are fixed by best semantic theory. As here developed, it (...) promises to give a reductive, universal and non-revisionary account of the nature of linguistic representation. -/- Interpretationism in general, however, is threatened by severe internal tension, due to arguments for radical inscrutability. These contend that, given the interpretationist setting, there can be no fact of the matter what object an individual word refers to: for example, that there is no fact of the matter as to whether “London” refers to London or to Sydney. -/- A series of challenges emerge, forming the basis for this thesis. 1. What sort of properties is the interpretationist trying to reduce, and what kind of reductive story is she offering? 2. How are inscrutability theses best formulated? Are arguments for inscrutability effective in their own terms? What kinds of inscrutability arise? 3. Is endorsing radical inscrutability a stable position? 4. Are there theoretical virtues—such as simplicity—that can be appealed to in discrediting the rival (empirically equivalent) theories that underpin inscrutability arguments? -/- In addressing these questions, I concentrate on diagnosing the source of inscrutability, mapping the space of ways of resisting the arguments for radical inscrutability, and examining the challenges faced in developing a principled account of linguistic content that avoids radical inscrutability. -/- The effect is not to close down the original puzzles, but rather to sharpen them into a set of new and deeper challenges. (shrink)

This is a commentary on MM McCabe's "First Chop your logos... Socrates and the sophists on language, logic, and development". In her paper MM analyses Plato's Euthydemos, in which Plato tackles the problem of falsity in a way that takes into account the speaker and complements the Sophist's discussion of what is said. The dialogue looks as if it is merely a demonstration of the silly consequences of eristic combat. And so it is. But a main point of MM's paper (...) is that there is serious philosophy in the Euthydemos, too. MM argues that to counter the sophist brothers Euthydemos and Dionysodoros, Socrates points out that that there are different aspects to the verb 'to say' that run in parallel to the different aspects of the very 'to learn'. So just as there is continuity rather than ambiguity between 'to learn' and 'to understand', so there is continuity between the different aspects of saying. Thus Socrates puts forward a teleological account of both learning and meaning. Following up on some of MM's thoughts, I argue that the sophists subscribe, despite appearance, to a theory of meaning that respects serious and widely accepted philosophical theses on meaning. -/- Forthcoming in the Australasian Philosophical Review. The curator of the volume is Fiona Leigh, and the committee also has Hugh Benson and Tim Clarke. You can find MM's paper as well as the commentaries by Nicholas Denyer and Russell E. Jones and Ravi Sharma (and myself) by registering. (shrink)