MUSTN'T WHATEVER IS REFERRED TO EXIST?<sup>1</sup>

Plumer, Gilbert

doi:10.1111/j.2041-6962.1989.tb00505.x

Cited by 22 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…See Kaplan and , Salmon , Almog , and Smith and in favor of obstinacy. Plumer (), Steinman (), and Stanley (, 567) express reservations about some arguments for obstinacy.…”

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confidence: 99%

Names and Obstinate Rigidity

Murday¹

2013

The Southern J of Philosophy

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Names are rigid designators, but what kind of rigidity do they exhibit? Both "obstinately" and "persistently" rigid designators pick out O at every world at which they pick out anything at all. They differ in that obstinately rigid designators also pick out O at worlds at which O fails to exist; persistently rigid designators have no extension whatsoever at worlds at which O fails to exist. The question whether names are obstinate or persistent arises in two contexts: in arguments against rigidified descriptivism (on the grounds that names and rigidified descriptions exhibit different kinds of rigidity) and in considerations about what it means for an expression to be "directly referential." This paper contends that names are persistent, not obstinate. The position thus clarifies the relationship between Millian theories of names and rigid designation, in addition to undermining attempts to rehabilitate the modal argument against rigidified descriptivism.Names are rigid designators. While that thesis is no longer controversial, multiple debates about the meaning of names continue. There is first the skirmish between rigidified descriptivists and their Kripkean opponents. Secondly, antidescriptivists disagree amongst themselves about the meaning of names. In both of these debates, one sometimes hears the claim that names are obstinately rigid as opposed to being merely rigid. This paper argues that such a claim is erroneous; whether descriptivism is true or not, names (like rigid descriptions) are merely persistently rigid.The paper will proceed as follows: Section 1 defines 'obstinacy' and explains the relevance to Kripke's modal argument. Section 2 reviews David Kaplan's content/extension distinction, which is presupposed throughout the paper. Sections 3 and 4 address and rebut arguments alleging a direct connection between (a) obstinate rigidity and (b) direct reference and/or Millian theories of names. Finally, section 5 returns to the debate between rigidified Brendan Murday is Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Ithaca College. His primary research interests are in metaphysics, epistemology, and the philosophy of language, particularly two-dimensional semantics and the problem of the criterion.

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“…See Kaplan and , Salmon , Almog , and Smith and in favor of obstinacy. Plumer (), Steinman (), and Stanley (, 567) express reservations about some arguments for obstinacy.…”

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confidence: 99%

Names and Obstinate Rigidity

Murday¹

2013

The Southern J of Philosophy

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“…), Language, Truth, and Logic. Oxford University Press; Murday (2013) 87 Murday(2013), p240 88 Plumer (1989), p7 and p10 89 Branquinho, João (2003). In defense of obstinacy.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…There should thus be no question that a statement such as 'Aristotle is a philosopher' would be false or meaningless if we tried to generate that proposition in a time context before Aristotle was born if using the language available to native denizens of that time context. The more interesting question for our purposes would be to ask what happens if we were to generate a proposition from the same sentence uttered 93 Murday (2013), p238 94 Plumer (1989), p513 95 Almog (1986) p220 96 Ibid., p231 at a time context when Aristotle was alive (e.g. the year 340 BC), then evaluated the resultant proposition at a time context before his existence.…”

Section: Gappy Propositions Vs Arguments For Obstinate Rigiditymentioning

confidence: 99%

Gappy Propositions and the Nature of Rigidity

Skrzynski¹

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<p>During the 1980s, there was much debate as to whether the potential rigidity of names allowed for such terms to refer to their objects in worlds where that object did not exist. Those who supported this idea supported an obstinate account of rigidity, and those who rejected the idea supported an account of persistent rigidity. No clear conclusion was ever reached between the two sides. In this thesis, I will raise a novel argument in support of persistent rigidity using a modern theory about singular propositions known as the gappy proposition view. My conclusion is that such a view can help resolve the earlier debate about the nature of rigidity by showing how gappy propositions may be utilised to undermine the strongest arguments once raised by the obstinate rigidity theorists.</p>

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Nondescriptive Meaning and Reference

Davis

2005

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Part I of this book is a concise exposition of the expression theory of meaning, according to which meaning consists in the expression of thoughts, their component ideas, or other mental states. The theory is founded on the fact that thoughts are event types with a constituent structure, and that thinking is a fundamental propositional attitude distinct from belief. It can account for interjections, syncategorematic terms, pejorative terms, conventional implicatures, and other cases of nondescriptive meaning that have long been seen as difficult for both ideational and referential theories of meaning. Part II defends the analysis of speaker and word reference in terms of the expression of ideas by exploring the vague connection of reference with predication, and reviewing the difficulties of alternative approaches, both descriptivist and causal. Part III shows how the expression theory can account for the meaning of names, and the distinctive way in which their meaning determines their reference. The problems with Millian theories show that the meaning of a name consists in the expression of an idea. The problems with Fregean theories show that the ideas expressed by names are atomic or basic. A name is directly and rigidly referential because the extension of the idea it expresses is not determined by the extensions of component ideas. This account of names does not preclude the use of a possible worlds or situation semantics to systematize their formal referential properties. The referential properties of ideas can also be set out recursively by providing a generative theory of ideas, assigning extensions to atomic ideas, and formulating rules whereby the semantic value of a complex idea is determined by the semantic values of its contents. Arguments for the logical necessity of identity statements expressed using non-synonymous names are shown to be unsound, along with various twin earth arguments.

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MUSTN'T WHATEVER IS REFERRED TO EXIST?¹

Cited by 22 publications

References 12 publications

Names and Obstinate Rigidity

Names and Obstinate Rigidity

Gappy Propositions and the Nature of Rigidity

Nondescriptive Meaning and Reference

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MUSTN'T WHATEVER IS REFERRED TO EXIST?1

Cited by 22 publications

References 12 publications

Names and Obstinate Rigidity

Names and Obstinate Rigidity

Gappy Propositions and the Nature of Rigidity

Nondescriptive Meaning and Reference

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Resources

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MUSTN'T WHATEVER IS REFERRED TO EXIST?¹