Contrast the view of subjectivist semantics with the view that we are, for the most part, language consumers. Words come to us prepackaged with a semantic value. If we are to use those words, the words we have received, the words of our linguistic community, then we must defer to their meaning. Otherwise we play the role of language creators. In our culture, the role of language creators is largely reserved to parents, scientists and headline writers for Variety; it is by no means the typical use of language as subjectivist semanticists believe. To use language as language, to express something, requires an intentional act. But the intention that is required involve the typical consumer's attitude of compliance, not the producer's assertiveness. — David Kaplan, Afterthoughts, p. 602
Here is how the situation seems to me: you seem to think that we reference is something we achieve by some kind of individual mental effort. — Nagase
To be honest, though, I think this modal (and the variant epistemic) argument is useful for convincing yourself that there is something wrong with the descriptivist picture. But it's not very good in going to the root of the problem, which in my mind is the incorrect background semantical picture that I sketched above. Once you operate the gestalt shift from an individualist semantics to a communal semantics, I think the direct reference theory appears as the natural upshot of the shift, and it actually explains what is wrong with descriptivism and what is right with the direct reference theory. Or so it seems to me. — Nagase
Naming is not yet a move in a language-game — any more than putting a piece in its place on the board is a move in chess. One may say: with the mere naming of a thing, nothing has yet been done. Nor has it a name except in a game. — PI 49
But what exactly is meant by "that particular person"? Which attributes of a person are necessary and which are not? For example, can I be black, or a woman, or Jewish, or missing limbs, etc. in other possible worlds? Or do I need to be exactly the same person that I am (now?) in the actual world? What does "exactly the same" mean here? Does being male in this world count as a description or as a "constitutive property" of me (i.e. of "that particular person")? Where is the distinction drawn between a description and a constitutive property? — Luke
"That particular person" is Luke. No particular, and no set of, attributes determine that the person is Luke. — Banno
The identification ins in the specification of the possible world. Consider a possible world in which Luke is female. Consider a possible world in which Luke is Jewish. What guarantees that we are talking about Luke? The very specification that swts up the possible world. — Banno
But surely there are a set of attributes (or descriptions?) that determine me as a person? Height, weight, hair colour, eye colour, age, etc. — Luke
But there are a set of facts about Luke in the actual world, and then counterfactuals about Luke in (other) possible worlds, I thought? — Luke
As i see it, the notions of linguistic reference, causation and rigid-designation are part of an irreducible triad, in that each of these concepts cannot be understood without understanding the other two concepts. — sime
Perhaps. Do these determine your name? — Banno
Secondly, as I understand it, a proper name refers to the same person in all possible words. But what does its being necessary mean? — Luke
Would Kripke say a proper name refers to the same person in all possible worlds or a proper name is stipulated in all possible worlds? I think the latter — Richard B
Would Kripke say a proper name refers to the same person in all possible worlds or a proper name is stipulated in all possible worlds? I think the latter. — Richard B
I'd agree that in possible world semantics names are merely stipulated to refer to the same person. — Janus
seem to recall that being a person (or a human) is one (is that right?). Were there any others? — Luke
So here is Kripke's second move: he introduces fictional characters as abstract objects that are ontologically dependent (or grounded) on the existence of the fictional work as referents of such names. — Nagase
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