Simple Sentences, Substitution, and Intuitions
Title | Simple Sentences, Substitution, and Intuitions PDF eBook |
Author | Jennifer M. Saul |
Publisher | OUP Oxford |
Total Pages | 192 |
Release | 2010-08-05 |
Genre | Language Arts & Disciplines |
ISBN | 0191614580 |
The phenomenon of substitution failure is a longstanding focus of discussion for philosophers of language. Substitution failure occurs when a change from one co-referential name to another (e.g. from 'Superman' to 'Clark Kent') affects the truth-value of a sentence. Jennifer Saul has shown that this can occur even in the simplest of sentences. She presents the first full-length treatment of this puzzling feature of language, and explores its implications for the theory of reference and names, and for the methodology of semantics.
Intuitions, Substitutions, & a Causal Account of Reference Within Simple Sentences
Title | Intuitions, Substitutions, & a Causal Account of Reference Within Simple Sentences PDF eBook |
Author | |
Publisher | |
Total Pages | 0 |
Release | 2015 |
Genre | |
ISBN |
Referred to as the problem of substitutivity, there has been a consistent difficulty in accounting for when---and how---two co-referring names can be substituted, salva veritate, within a given utterance. More recently, this difficulty appears even for seemingly simple sentences---i.e. sentences that lack any opacity-producing content. For example, "Clark Kent went into the phone booth and Superman came out," may seem an accurate description of an event in Metropolis, whereas "Superman went into the phone booth and Clark Kent came out," seems infelicitous, at best. Alternatively, "Superman leaps more tall buildings than Clark Kent," strikes many competent language users as true, whereas "Superman leaps more tall buildings than Superman" must be false: The same individual cannot leap more tall buildings than himself. The debate on these simple sentences has been divided upon traditional semantic and pragmatic lines of reasoning. However, all the proposed solutions rely to some degree on the claim that two co-referring names, such as 'Superman' and 'Clark Kent', can convey or express additional content regarding distinct modes of presentation, guises, or aspects that a community of language users associate with each name. Lacking any psychological verb or other opacity producing content, though, presents a difficulty: How does this additional content become a relevant contribution to the utterance in question? I argue that a traditional causal account of direct reference can be expanded from its application to attitude ascriptions in order to resolve the problem of substitutivity for such simple sentences. In the proposal I put forward, I contend that a causal account of reference can avoid the two major objections found within this debate: A causal account explains how the meaningful content of two co-referring names like 'Superman' and 'Clark Kent' can be properly differentiated, and it also explains how rational, well-informed language users are able to deploy this distinction in simple, everyday utterances. The account I put forward extends a single solution to the problem of substitutivity within philosophy of language, both across traditionally opaque and simple sentence types and across proper names and singular terms, more generally
Experimental Research on Substitution Intuitions in Simple Sentences
Title | Experimental Research on Substitution Intuitions in Simple Sentences PDF eBook |
Author | Thomas Zimmerman |
Publisher | |
Total Pages | 88 |
Release | 2014 |
Genre | Grammar, Comparative and general |
ISBN |
The purpose of this thesis is to present and analyze experimental evidence involving anti-substitution intuitions about co-referential names in simple sentences. In her book Simple Sentences, Substitution, and Intuitions, Jennifer Saul claims that anti-substitution intuitions involving co-referential names in simple sentences are particularly resistant, so much so that they exist even when one is given an identity statement that shows that the two names refer to the same individual. She uses this claim to motivate her thesis that a psychological explanation is needed to understand why these anti-substitution intuitions exist. Her theory is that before people know that two names co-refer to an individual, they have two "nodes" or "mental files" that contain information that is associated with the name. Saul claims that the reason anti-substitution intuitions in simple sentences involving co-referential names are resistant is that when people find out that two names co-refer to an individual, they do not merge the nodes into a single node, but instead the nodes are kept separate and are linked. The linked nodes then are capable of sharing information, though they do not do so by default. Instead, good reasons are needed for the sharing of information. The experimental results show that, contrary to Saul's claims, anti-substitution intuitions of this sort are not resistant such that they persist even when one is given the identity statement. This evidence is used to call into doubt the psychological explanation given by Saul and is used to raise the possibility that a particular implicature view can better explain these anti-substitution intuitions.
Simple Sentences
Title | Simple Sentences PDF eBook |
Author | |
Publisher | |
Total Pages | |
Release | 1965 |
Genre | |
ISBN |
The Routledge Handbook of Linguistic Reference
Title | The Routledge Handbook of Linguistic Reference PDF eBook |
Author | Stephen Biggs |
Publisher | Routledge |
Total Pages | 789 |
Release | 2020-12-24 |
Genre | Philosophy |
ISBN | 1000226786 |
This Handbook offers students and more advanced readers a valuable resource for understanding linguistic reference; the relation between an expression (word, phrase, sentence) and what that expression is about. The volume’s forty-one original chapters, written by many of today’s leading philosophers of language, are organized into ten parts: I Early Descriptive Theories II Causal Theories of Reference III Causal Theories and Cognitive Significance IV Alternate Theories V Two-Dimensional Semantics VI Natural Kind Terms and Rigidity VII The Empty Case VIII Singular (De Re) Thoughts IX Indexicals X Epistemology of Reference Contributions consider what kinds of expressions actually refer (names, general terms, indexicals, empty terms, sentences), what referring expressions refer to, what makes an expression refer to whatever it does, connections between meaning and reference, and how we know facts about reference. Many contributions also develop connections between linguistic reference and issues in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of science.
Philosophy of Language and Webs of Information
Title | Philosophy of Language and Webs of Information PDF eBook |
Author | Heimir Geirsson |
Publisher | Routledge |
Total Pages | 204 |
Release | 2013-03-05 |
Genre | Philosophy |
ISBN | 1136180184 |
The nature of propositions and the cognitive value of names have been the focal point of philosophy of language for the last few decades. The advocates of the causal reference theory have favored the view that the semantic contents of proper names are their referents. However, Frege’s puzzle about the different cognitive value of coreferential names has made this identification seem impossible. Geirsson provides a detailed overview of the debate to date, and then develops a novel account that explains our reluctance, even when we know about the relevant identity, to substitute coreferential names in both simple sentences and belief contexts while nevertheless accepting the view that the semantic content of names is their referents. The account focuses on subjects organizing information in webs; a name can then access and elicit information from a given web. Geirsson proceeds to extend the account of information to non-referring names, but they have long provided a serious challenge to the causal reference theorist.
Attitude Reports
Title | Attitude Reports PDF eBook |
Author | Thomas Grano |
Publisher | Cambridge University Press |
Total Pages | 249 |
Release | 2021-06-03 |
Genre | Language Arts & Disciplines |
ISBN | 110853015X |
Propositional attitude reports are sentences built around clause-embedding psychological verbs, like Kim believes that it's raining or Kim wants it to rain. These interact in many intricate ways with a wide variety of semantically relevant grammatical phenomena, and represent one of the most important topics at the interface of linguistics and philosophy, as their study provides insight into foundational questions about meaning. This book provides a bird's-eye overview of the grammar of propositional attitude reports, synthesizing the key facts, theories, and open problems in their analysis. Couched in the theoretical framework of generative grammar and compositional truth-conditional semantics, it places emphasis on points of intersection between propositional attitude reports and other important topics in semantic and syntactic theory. With discussion points, suggestions for further reading and a useful guide to symbols and conventions, it will be welcomed by students and researchers wishing to explore this fertile area of study.