The myth of occurrence-based semantics

Abstract

The principle of compositionality requires that the meaning of a complex expression remains the same after substitution of synonymous expressions. Alleged counterexamples to compositionality seem to force a theoretical choice: either apparent synonyms are not synonyms or synonyms do not syntactically occur where they appear to occur. Some theorists have instead looked to Frege's doctrine of "reference shift" according to which the meaning of an expression is sensitive to its linguistic context. This doctrine is alleged to retain the relevant claims about synonymy and substitution while respecting the compositionality principle.

Pure Quotation in Linguistic Context

“…In this way they might insist that they vindicate all the principles as long as SYNONYMY is replaced with the relevant "use synonymy" counterpart. See Pickel and Rabern [24] for more discussion and criticism of this occurrence-based theory of quotation, and its specific commitments on compositionality and synonymy.…”

“…• On BQ5: Given that the endophoric theory retains COMPOSITIONALITY it accounts for the productive nature of quotation. 24 Turn to the more challenging cases:…”

“…(17) 'FgHj' is a not a word. ( [18]: 619) 24 Note that we also accommodate the idea that quotations are iterative. Iterated quotation is a standard objection to Davidson's paratactic view (see Saka ([35]: 119-20) on "the recursion problem" and D10 of Cappelen and Lepore [1]).…”

On Quantification and Extensionality

“…Here I tackle the extensionality question directly with respect to standard ("Tarskian") languages for quantification. Our discussion might also be usefully compared to that by Glanzberg and King [5], who react to Rabern's [16] diagnosis that the treatment of quantification in Kaplan [8] is not compositional (see Pickel and Rabern [12] for a critique). 4 We will make these criteria more precise below.…”

“…Equivalently, distinct members t 1 , t 2 of V ∪ C are Ext Λ -coextensive in M just in case t 1 and t 2 are both members of C andt 1 M = t 2 M . It follows that distinct members t 1 , t 2 of V ∪ C are Ext Λ -coextensive in M just in case t 1 M = t 2 M 12. (DC3 Ext Λ ) Where each of α 0 and α 1 is either a member of C , a member of P, a member of {∀, ∃}, or an open Λ-formula, α 0 and α 1 are Ext Λcoextensive in M just in case they are Ext Λ -true and Ext Λ -false in M of the same arrangements of members of the type hierarchy over M. It follows that: (a) If n ≥ 1 and α 0 and α 1 are both members of P n , they are Ext Λcoextensive in M just in case α 0 M…”