"Reference" is often thought of as "the act or procedure of fixing the sense to the referent. — Terrapin Station
So, what's your point; I'm not seeing it. — John
What made you think there would be people reading this thread who did not possess such rudimentary knowledge? — John
"Reference" is often thought of as "the act or procedure of fixing the sense to the referent." A la "How does reference work?" — Terrapin Station
'Reference' is believed by philosophers to be a relation between linguistic expressions (or perhaps some mental states) and things in the world, — Fafner
That's only believed by deficient philosophers to not involve acts or procedures. — Terrapin Station
But it's a question of definition, — Fafner
Why would you believe that I was talking about definitions in my post? You seriously believed that I was saying that the words "act or procedure" were to be found in some formal definition of "reference"? Why would you read my post that way? — Terrapin Station
I explicitly said "often thought of." That doesn't denote that I'm about to give a definition. You can't read. — Terrapin Station
First, it is a definition even if it doesn't apply to everyone who uses the term. — Fafner
What does the pronoun "it" stand for in that sentence? — Terrapin Station
Whatever you were talking about. — Fafner
I already told you that if you don't like the word 'definition' then you can drop it, I don't care. My point is the same whether you call what you said a 'definition' or something else. You say something false about the usage of the word 'reference' among all professional philosophers, and it doesn't change it even if you qualify it by 'often', because no one talks like this ever.I wasn't talking about definitions, though. So we're back to you not being able to comprehend how someone could say something like "often thought of as" and not be talking about a definition. So do we need to explain that, or . . . it sounds like you're not very attached now to whether we call my comment a statement of a definition and we can drop your first sentence, "It is a definition even if it doesn't apply to everyone who uses the term." Which option do you want to go with? — Terrapin Station
I already told you that if you don't like the word 'definition' then you can drop it, I don't care. — Fafner
I'm not asking what I want to do. I'm asking if you're okay in dropping that one sentence, or do you need an explanation of how my post can make sense while not being a definition One thing at a time. Don't type something if it's not important.. (And you and John doing this major thread crapping is certainly important.) — Terrapin Station
Listen, I don't want to argue about meaningless verbal questions. — Fafner
And I don't really want to have a conversation with someone who is so hell-bent on being combative that they can't even say whether they're okay with dropping a particular sentence--that's too much of a concession to make. — Terrapin Station
And I don't want conversations with people who can't be bothered to properly explain themselves. — Fafner
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