If you like; They have acted. — Banno

But then we'd need a different term to refer to the way assertions are commonly demarcated -- that is, as occurrences of sentences where some individual is using them to judge the content as true. — J

their having performed that act. — Banno

Austin names some of them phonic, phatic, rhetic, which together form the locutionary act and lead on to the illocutionary and perlocutionary acts. — Banno

Nor could we fit the idea of "occurrence of a sentence" into our actual lives, — J

the mere occurrence of a sentence does not amount to an assertion of that sentence. — Banno

Okay, well these are clearly two different claims:

1. The cat is on the mat
2. I think that the cat is on the mat — Michael

Yes. In other words, two different assertions? — bongo fury

Yes. — Michael

So if I say: "an example of a proposition is: 'The cat is on the mat.'" I am saying something like: "it is true that S is an example of P," but crucially, not asserting S. — Count Timothy von Icarus

It's an assertion about a "name" right. — Count Timothy von Icarus

two different claims: — Michael

Of course, if "the cat is on the mat," is used as an example, it isn't being asserted, — Count Timothy von Icarus

I don't think this thread will ultimately get away from those sorts of puzzles, namely the puzzles of how and why the boundaries between the meta-language and object-language exist, and whether they ought to. — Leontiskos

It is interesting, though, that Banno thinks Frege's judgment-stroke is a functional symbol that can simply be nested contextually. So his difference with Frege has to do with whether the judgment-stroke belongs to the object language. — Leontiskos

(I wrote a bit about the general topic in <this post>, which is another thread where it came up.) — Leontiskos

Okay, and what are the questions that are at stake? — Leontiskos

let's not worry about whether it fits Frege's vision. The prefix, however we phrase it - "I hereby assert that...", "I think that...", "I judge that..." etc - does seem to iterate naturally. — bongo fury

You know the answer to that. — J

Srap Tasmaner I was using the turnstile as a shorthand for Frege's judgement stroke, so read "⊢⊢the cat is on the mat" as "I think that I think..." or "I think that I judge..." or whatever. Not as "...is derivable from..." — Banno

So in terms of syntax, de dicto is most similar to ☐∃(x)f(x) and de re, to ∃(x)☐(fx), [...] — Banno

[...] while in terms of semantics de dicto understands necessity as "true in every possible world"... — Banno

Note that [problematic statements] (30) and (31) are not to be confused with:

Necessarily (∃x) (x > 7),

Necessarily (∃x) (if there is life on the Evening Star then there is life on x),

which present no problem of interpretation comparable to that presented by (30) and (31). The difference may be accentuated by a change of example: in a game of a type admitting of no tie it is necessary that some one of the players will win, ... — Quine p.147

[...] while de re might understand necessity as "true in this (or some) world", a cumbersome notion incompatible with S5. — Banno

... one player of whom it may be said to be necessary that he win. — Quine p.147

What is this number which, according to ["(∃x)(x is necessarily is greater than 7"], is necessarily greater than 7? According to ["9 is necessarily greater than 7"], from which ["(∃x)(x is necessarily is greater than 7"] was inferred, it was 9, that is, the number of planets; but to suppose this would conflict with the fact that ["the number of planets is necessarily greater than 7"] is false. — Quine p.148

but we can be much clearer here using modal first order language than was possible in medieval times. — Banno

My understanding is that you are saying Quine rejects the idea that existence is a second-order predicate, — Leontiskos

and therefore Klima is mistaken in his claim, "[this] quite naturally leads to Quine's slogan..." — Leontiskos

Regardless, it makes sense to me that Quine would not want to call the quantifier a second-order predicate per se, but that he would nevertheless admit that it does bear on existence in a second-order manner. — Leontiskos

Is Quine here abandoning his idea that, "to be is to be a value of a bound variable"? — Leontiskos

This account, coupled with the Kantian-Fregean idea of existence as a second-order predicate, i.e., a quantifier, quite naturally leads to Quine’s slogan: “to be is to be a value of a bound variable”.2 — Klima

I also am puzzled about the utility and motivation of a second special doctrine which [Geach] puts forward, namely, that quantification is a second-level predicate. He elucidates this doctrine as follows :

" A first-level predicate can be attached to a name, in order to make an assertion about that which the name stands for ; a second-level predicate can be attached to such a first-level predicate in order to make an assertion about that which it stands for. Quine's misunderstanding of second-level pre-dicates arises from his unwillingness to admit that first-level predicates do stand for anything."

This doctrine is, as Mr. Geach remarks, to be found in Frege. It is also espoused in my own first book (1934). But neither of these circumstances counts in favour of the doctrine, and Mr. Geach also says nothing to raise the doctrine above the level of a bare pronunciamento. Surely we can understand quantifiers perfectly well with or without classifying them as predicates which make assertions about that which first-level predicates stand for. Nothing is achieved by this move except the creation of an opportunity to talk of first-level predicates as standing for something. — Quine reply to Geach

Ummm, what? — Darkneos

we could devise a more accurate notation “that makes I think internal to p: we may form the letter p by writing, in the shape of a p, the words I think.” — J

it might as well read, "this sentence token declares true that". But either way, you seem to be confusing utterance or inscription in the object language with utterance or inscription in the meta-language. Or at any rate, it's not my experience that a declarative sentence usually refers to its own semantic properties. And if it did so, the effort would be unnecessary, as is well known. The prefix would be entirely redundant."

What does Quine mean by the inscrutability of reference? — Darkneos

Trying to put Peirce in either nominalism or Platonism (label or categorize him) — Mapping the Medium

By labeling, — Mapping the Medium

By labeling, nominalism often concretizes properties that are actually relational. — Mapping the Medium

You are approaching this from a nominalist position,. — Mapping the Medium