If we could take it to a different thread? Some of us want to move on.

Take what to a different thread? Did you not read my last sentence?

His causal theory is inextricably bound to his attack on descriptivism. How do you not know that?

I don't agree. But if that is your view then rebutting assertions of his claim that descriptivism fails are squarely on topic and belong in this thread.

It's up to you. If you want to accentuate the positive and move on to lecture 3 and his positive proposals, great. If you want to accentuate the negative and harp on about why all non-Kripkeans, and especially descriptivists, are wrong, expect rebuttal.

"That country over there" might count as a definite description; "some country over there" never will. Even if you try to twist the context to make it so. — Banno

"That country over there" if "there" is implicitly referring to a continent is a definite description that distinguishes countries over here or any where else from countries over there. The fact that 'that' is used also indicates that the speaker has a definite country in mind, but that the particualr country in mind has not been specified. "That country over there presently called Albania" is a definite description.

You are simply wrong on this.

In any case quibbles over whether definite descriptions are absolute or relative aside, it is the assertion that a definite description which is 'time, date and place stamped' is effectively a rigid designator, and the assertion that, for example, 'Donald Trump' is really shorthand for "an unspecified entity called Donald Trump", the latter of which is itself a definite description that picks out all entities named Donald Trump from those which are not so named that is at issue here.

Do you want to accentuate the positive and move on to lecture 3 and his positive proposals, great — andrewk

Sure. What are your thoughts on that?

Yes, I would like to move on to that too.

"A country bordering Greece" might well be sufficient. despite not being a definite description.

Now, since the question has a correct answer, then the question must have referred to something. That is, the question is clearly about Albania, and hence a correct answer will also be about Albania.

Again, you are just wrong. — Banno

"A country bordering Greece" is a definite description that distinguishes all countries bordering Greece from those which do not. "A country called Albania which on the 4th of January 2018 borders Greece" does uniquely pick out Albania, and can thus be used as rigid designator. Sure it is Albania being talked about, but that depends upon its having been called 'Albania', and its having been called 'Albania' is a contingent matter, since it could have been called something else, in which case we would not be talking about Albania, but about the entity which is presently called Albania.

You seem to be reifying the name, and ignoring the fact that a name 'X' is really shorthand for 'an entity called X' (which is itself a definite description that distinguishes all entities called 'X' from all entities not called 'X') and that it is the entity itself, whatever we might call it, which is being spoken about.

I could play tit for tat and reply with "you are just wrong with this" but I actually don't think it is so much a matter of being wrong or right, but of looking at it from different perspectives. One or other of the perspectives might be more useful, but that would depend on what we are trying to do.

Personally I find the idea that when someone asks about Albania, even if they have no idea at all who or what 'Albania' refers to, they are nonetheless referring to Albania, to be misconceived and even confusing at worst; or an empty tautology at best. You don't seem to want to address this, but rather just to keep insisting 'you are wrong, you are wrong' without provided any argument.

Cool. Let's do that. — frank

SO the first aspect is the application of the discussion of names to kinds.

I mentioned earlier - in pages hidden by the surrounding murk - that this seems to me a consequence of the extensional nature of modal semantics. No one commented on that, so I will go along that line.

SO we get to p.144, and identity. Three different ones:

1. Identity of mind with body
2. Identity of (for example) pain with a certain neural pattern
3. Identity of types of mental states with types of brain states.

So, from this post, it seems to me problematic that Kripke does not go into much detail about the origins of "pain", C-fibres, mental states and so on. It seems to me that necessity here is provoked by the origin of the terms.

SO we used the word "water" to refer to water, then we find that water is hydrogen dioxide; and the convention advocated by Kripke is that water is therefore necessarily hydrogen dioxide; that is, anything that is water-like but not hydrogen dioxide is not water.

So why not say that "pain" refers to pain, and that if we found that pain and certain nerve impulses are occur always together, why not claim that pain is necessarily those impulses?

Let 'A' name a particular pain sensation, and let 'B' name
the corresponding brain state, or the brain state some identity
theorist wishes to identify with A. Prima facie, it would seem
that it is at least logically possible that B should have existed
Oones's brain could have been in exactly that state at the time
in question) without Jones feeling any pain at all, and thus
without the presence of A. (p.146)

Let 'A' name water, and let 'B' name the corresponding chemical... Prima facie, it would seem
that it is at least logically possible that B should have existed... without the presence of A

Well, no. As Kripke himself says.

"A country bordering Greece" is a definite description that distinguishes all countries bordering Greece from those which do not. — Janus

No, it isn't. It does not single out ONE THING. Bold, all caps, italic, just to push the point.

Actually, it does, it singles out ONE class.

And a definite description singles out an individual. The.

..."A" country is not a class of countries.

It's a pedantic point you're both making. 'A country bordering Greece' does single out all individuals that belong to the class of countries that border Greece. "Countries bordering Greece" singles out the same individuals, and also singles out the class of such individuals.

Anyway you are pedantically focusing on a point which is of little consequence instead of addressing the more difficult objections to your view. "The country called Albania, which borders Greece" is a definite description by your own definition. It is also a rigid designator, whereas 'Albania' by itself is not a rigid designator except in principle, because it could be the name of a country, a person, a pet, a type of vacuum cleaner and so on and on.

The same goes for people's proper names because there could be hundreds or thousands of people with the same name. All it takes is more than one. You need to address this objection, and forget about pedantic quibbles over what constitutes definite descriptions.

"Some" country is not a class of countries. Being a country that borders Greece is the only necessary and sufficient condition that need be met in order to be picked out by "some country that borders Greece".

"Some country that borders Greece" is not both necessary and sufficient for picking out a unique individual to the exclusion of all others.

Rather, it picks out a single country within a group. It is not capable of picking out an individual country to the exclusion of all others because it picks one out of many. If it picks one out of many, it is not picking out one to the exclusion of many. If it is not picking out one to the exclusion of many, it is not picking out one to the exclusion of all others. If it is not picking out one to the exclusion of all others, then it is not a fucking definite description...

For fuck's sake....

Anyway you are pedantically focusing on a point which is of little consequence instead of addressing the more difficult objections to your view. — Janus

If this would make any fucking sense at all, it would have been followed by an objection to something I said.

It wasn't.

:roll:

Goddamn..

See where paraconsistency leads when applied where it doesn't fucking belong?

Directly and relevantly address what I have written if you want a response.

I did, and I don't.

I'm going back to re-read some stuff in N&N. Trying to catch up to Banno. Kripke's arguments at least follow from what he said. Yours don't and as a result are moot and irrelevant.

The irony around here could be called "delicious" by some...

It just stuns me...

no, Janus. You have misunderstood definite descriptions from the get go, and wasted much of our time.

I do not think that "feeling pain" and "brain state" point to the same thing, do they? — creativesoul

Well, Kripke agrees with you. But we need more than that you think they are not the same while I think they are.

Here's how I understand Kripke's argument, on p. 146.

Let A be a pain, and B be a neural state, and the supposition to be rejected, that A is necessarily the same thing as B.

Now A is a pain, and hence necessarily a pain. If A and B are identical, then B is also necessarily a pain. But a brain state is not a pain.

Or being a pain is somehow a contingent property of A. Somehow A must be both a pain and not a pain.

SO, concludes Kripke, A and B cannot be the very same thing.

"The country called Albania, which borders Greece" is a definite description by your own definition. — Janus

No, it isn't. Again, you show your own confusion. My* definition is "The x such that δ(x)" For what you say here to work you would need a predicate something like "Albainiates", and a description something like "The x such that x Albaniates".

Your view is looking more and more like bullshit, Janus.

Edit: that is, not my own definition, but the one I gave earlier and that is accepted by logicians.

"A country bordering Greece" literally begins with an indefinite article.

:incredulous stare:

smdh

"The country called Albania, which borders Greece" is a definite description by your own definition. — Janus

This is a definite description, yes. The same thing, replacing the with a, is not. That would be an indefinite description. The way in which indefinite descriptions refer, if indeed they do, is different, and not at issue here.

It is also a rigid designator — Janus

It is not a rigid designator, since in another possible world, another country, besides the actual Albania, could be called Albania and border Greece. Say, a world with our geography, but in which Macedonia had been given the name 'Albania' instead. In that world, this description picks out (our) Macedonia, not (our) Albania.

whereas 'Albania' by itself is not a rigid designator except in principle, because it could be the name of a country, a person, a pet, a type of vacuum cleaner and so on and on. — Janus

The issue is not what a name could refer to. Being a rigid designator has nothing to do with the alternate ways the language could have been, so that the meaning of the word changes. The point is that the meaning of the word, as it is now, is such that it, as it is actually used, picks out the same individual relative to every world.

Do you have any thoughts on the critique of identity theorists at the end of the book?

That is for me the interesting part. Kripke's account looks fraught.

"The country called Albania, which borders Greece" is a definite description by your own definition. — Janus


This is a definite description, yes. The same thing, replacing the with a, is not. That would be an indefinite description. The way in which indefinite descriptions refer, if indeed they do, is different, and not at issue here. — Snakes Alive

'A country called Albania which borders Greece' is a definite description because there is only one of them; the logic is obvious.

It is not a rigid designator, since in another possible world, another country, besides the actual Albania, could be called Albania and border Greece. — Snakes Alive

The issue is not what a name could refer to. Being a rigid designator has nothing to do with the alternate ways the language could have been, so that the meaning of the word changes. The point is that the meaning of the word, as it is now, is such that it, as it is actually used, picks out the same individual relative to every world. — Snakes Alive

I don't see why the logic is not the same in both the case of the definite description and the case of the name. It is the fact that names and definite descriptions refer "rigidly" to what they do in the actual world that allows them to pick out the same entities relative to counterfactual scenarios.

It amazes me when others almost shriek that I do not adhere to Kripke's understanding of definite descriptions when it is that very understanding which I find seems impoverished and lacking in relation to our actual usage of description in discursive reference.

In any case I am going to cease participation in this thread unless I get some cogent argument, because I am not interested in the irrational reactions I have been getting from some others when their ideas are challenged. Exchanging ideas can be fun, exchanging insults not so much. :roll:

'A country called Albania which borders Greece' is a definite description because there is only one of them; the logic is obvious. — Janus

Dude, no it's not. Accept this and move on.

I doubt that equative constructions in natural language track the sort of numerical identity that must hold across worlds. Thus, Batman is Bruce Wayne (suppose), but he might not have been. The 'is' here seems to relate two numerically distinct individuals by means of a sort of world-relative coincidence. The identity theorist can lay claim to this sort of identity.

It's also not at all obvious that words like 'pain' are rigid designators. In fact, 'pain' is only apparently referential in one of its uses. It is usually a mass predicate, as in 'a lot of pain,' or 'the pain in my eye.' Here the predicate seems to apply to portions of an experiential quantity, or something like that. It's only when the word appears in argument position, as seeming to name the kind of experience itself, as in 'Pain is irritating,' that it might look to rigidly designate something (the 'experiential kind,' I suppose).