Several of these essays have been printed whole in journals; others are in varying degrees new. Two main themes run through them. One is the problem of meaning, particularly as involved in the notion of an analytic statement. The other is the notion of ontological, commitment, particularly as involved in the problem of universals.

This highly acclaimed book is a major contribution to the philosophy of language as well as a systematic interpretation of Frege, indisputably the father of ...

Our only channel of information about the world is the impact of external forces on our sensory surfaces. So says science itself. There is no clairvoyance. How, then, can we have parlayed this meager sensory input into a full-blown scientific theory of the world? This is itself a scientific question. The pursuit of it, with free use of scientific theory, is what I call naturalized epistemology. The Roots of Reference falls within that domain. Its more specific concern, within that domain, (...) is reference to concrete and abstract objects: what such reference consists in, and how we achieve it. (shrink)

Absolute identity seems at first sight to be presupposed in the branch of formal logic called identity theory. Classical identity theory may be obtained by adjoining a single schema to ordinary quantification theory.

In the first twelve chapters of this book, I am concerned with the Fregean notion of an object (the reference of a proper name) and its connection with the notion of identity. The rest of the book is devoted to a discussion of the problem of personal identity.

Gareth Evans's two articles on the syntax and semantics of pronouns unfortunately seem to have been written far more with the desire of showing Peter Geach to have been wrong all along the line than in an endeavour to formulate, clearly and coherently, a comprehensive theory of his own. Some scattered passages of constructive theorizing there are, and in the latter part of this note I shall have something to say about them; but the controversial motive prevails.It would be wearisome (...) for me, and unrewarding for readers, if I were to work through Evans's arguments against me in detail: his misrepresentations of me are frequent and gross, and exposure of them in detail, together with restatement of the arguments misrepresented, would take up many more pages than the articles themselves. I here document just two of the more flagrant examples; with this warning before their eyes, readers may be disposed not to believe Evans's account of my works without checking for themselves. (shrink)