What is the relation between inclusion, necessity, and/or existential dependency? — creativesoul

Where is the existential dependency for an empty name?

I'm not sure still what you mean by "entity being picked out successfully" here.

Sorry, I meant dummy subject.

:rofl:

What are those names empty of? They are meaningful because those who use them have drawn a correlation between the name and the imaginary entity, the referent, the thing being picked out. — creativesoul

Empty of a referent. That's the very definition of what constitutes an empty name. If you disagree with the definition and think that Harry Potter, Pegasus, or Santa Clause have a referent, then explain what they are. You say that the imaginary entity is what makes the name have a referent. I've never heard of talking like this so please explain this process.

See Wikipedia if you haven't already:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empty_name

I'm confused. Empty names are simply defined as proper names without an referent. I've provided examples of Pegasus, unicorns, Harry Potter, even old saint Nick as representative of the class falling under the category of being entities without a referent.

How do you respond to this?

So, your basically assuming that there are no such things as empty names at all?

From Wikipedia's entry on empty names:

A theory that became influential following Kripke's attack is that empty proper names, have, strictly speaking, no meaning. This is the so-called direct-reference theory. Versions of this theory have been defended by Keith Donnellan, David Kaplan, Nathan Salmon, Scott Soames and others. The problem with the direct-reference theory is that names appear to be meaningful independently of whether they are empty. Furthermore, negative existential statements using empty names are both true and apparently meaningful. How can "Pegasus does not exist" be true if the name "Pegasus", as used in that sentence, has no meaning?

The referent is the entity picked out by the name. If that counts as being an "empty name", what on earth counts as not being empty? — creativesoul

Question begging. What's the referent for Harry Potter?

Yeah, so the picture didn't come first, although a picture may be worth a thousand words. Still, Harry Potter or Santa Claus, or Pegasus are all empty names by definition of not having a referent.

Yeah, but the descriptions, and semantic content was arrived at by J.K Rowling's books on him. I didn't read Harry Potter so I never formed a mental image of him.

Surely, you've seen pictures of Harry Potter. — creativesoul

Yes, I have. He's got glasses and has a mark on his forehead. But, you didn't really answer the question, or did you?

The referent is the entity. — creativesoul

So, what's the referent for "Harry Potter"?

Yes, and that entity has features, or properties that are its descriptions about it.

Well, Santa Claus, clearly had no referent. Think about the sentence, "It is raining". The "it" in that sentence stands in as a dummy referent. Now, think analogously to empty names that are "entities" or semantically have content due to their descriptions.

Simple.

Are you actually claiming that "Santa Claus" has no referent? — creativesoul

Yes.

I'm asking you to explain to me what is meant by "empty name"... — creativesoul

An empty name has no referent. Examples include; a unicorn, Pegasus, Harry Potter?

I'm asking you to given an example.

Is that your example? — creativesoul

I just did.

It's an example of how the meaning and semantic content rests wholly within the descriptions ascribed to a fictitious entity that is Santa Claus.

Ok, I guess you can assert that Santa Clause is a plump, elderly man with a white beard who lives in the North Pole and delivers candy, presents, or coal depending on how nice you have been for the past year. All of the "a, who, how's" stand in as the descriptions of the person and what "he" does on Christmas, of giving out presents that time of year.

Just think about it. An empty name only has meaning with respect to its descriptive content because there is no referent.

Proper names also (not a feature exclusive to empty names only) hold descriptive semantic content. However, their meaning obtains in the actual world, given through their referent.

Does that help?

The referent is the entity. — creativesoul

For empty names, yes.
For proper names, no.

So, I would not say that descriptions, beyond the minimal 'the entity called such and such' are inherent in names; descriptions are contingent upon the actualities of this world that obtain in relation to the entities being named. — Janus

Yes, I don't disagree with that. I just thought of empty names as provides a counterargument towards Kripke's criticism of the descriptivist theory. So, @Banno, that seems to be the issue here in my view, that Kripke doesn't talk about empty names, where @Janus or I, might as well address the elephant in the room and say 'why not'?

I also think that names rely on descriptions (outside of ostensive contexts, which is most of the time) to fix their referents. — Janus

Yeah, so if we talk about "empty names", which Kripke does not want to introduce into N&N, by already stating that in the first page of Lecture I., in Naming and Necessity, due to the problem that it would entail with reconciling all of his views held in N&N wrt. to "empty names", then we are left with an incomplete picture of his philosophy or incomplete to my mind as I want to know what are Kripke's thoughts about "empty names", as they seem to only exist as descriptions without a referent, thus leaning on the descriptivist theory of reference to elucidate their semantic value if Kripke can't or doesn't want to address them.

I am not sure what you are thinking here, Wallows, but I would certainly like to see a coherent and consistent resolution to that! — Janus

I believe that fundamentally the difference between you and Banno in regards to what Kripke says in N&N, is that of semantic value for names or how names attain them in the actual world and/or in possible worlds. Is this correct?

Kripke states the following on the very first page of Lecture I.

Some topics essential to a full presentation of the viewpoint argued here, especially that of existence statements and empty names, had to be omitted altogether. — Kripke, Naming and Necessity, Lecture I, footnote 1

He clearly states that they are essential to [the] full presentation of the viewpoint argued here, especially that of existence statements and empty names, had to be omitted altogether.

We can omit existence statements, as that seems to delve into phenomenology or whatnot. But, empty names, we should at least mention here. Where does Kripke elaborate on the existence of empty names? This should also resolve the dispute between @Janus and @Banno.

@Banno, what do you think about what I have stated? It seems to me that Kripke shouldn't have neglected the issue of empty names in Naming and Necessity.

So, I just checked the news and it seems that now the Democrats are in the House, they are able to give Mueller all the necessary tools he might have been waiting for to put into effect. Such as the ability to subpoena the phone records of Trump Jr. about whether Trump was aware of the collusion, which now nobody within the bounds of common sense and reason doubts, between Russian operatives and the then yet to be president's campaign managers and affiliates. If the phone records show that Trump knew about this, the case now moves onto the federal crime of conspiracy against the US government.

So, yeah, shit is hitting the fan for Trump.

For once, I'm glad we have the Patriot Act in the US.

Maybe I should rephrase the issue, as I am working on how to conceptualize possible worlds that are defined through counterfactuals that only exist in our world and who's laws of science/math/physics are identical to our own, so we have some way to establish an accessibility relation to our own, as in the example of water being H2O that is necessarily true in all possible worlds where that accessibility relation holds true.

Or in other words, in Frege's Sense and Reference, Kripe successfully addresses the issue of "reference"; but, what I think has been going on in the other thread is conflating a name's sense with its reference.

Does that make better sense? I'm still working on the idea; but, I think we both know why Kripke tells us on the first page that he won't be addressing the issue of empty names or fictional entities in his Naming and Necessity. In my opinion, this is because you have no referent for empty names or fictional entities and thus you can't separate the sense (or the sum total of descriptive content for an empty name) from a non-existent referent.

Or to sound nonsensical, the description of the empty name stands in for the designation of the term, much how like the "It" in the sentence of "It is raining", is a dummy subject/indexical and not a real one.

I am yet to see anyone provide a cogent logical distinction between 'X' and 'the entity referred to as 'X'' in everyday use. — Janus

For ostensive terms, this issue disappears if you assume something lacking in Kipke's Naming and Necessity. Namely, a form of counterfactual definitiveness across all possible worlds, guaranteeing an accessibility relation between them to stipulate that the same entity in our world, called "water", is, in fact, H20 in all possible worlds.

But, this fails when trying to denote entities that have no referent, like empty names, fictional entities, and such.

No, take your time. I started a separate thread on

The philosophical self is not the human being, not the human body, or the human soul,
with which psychology deals, but rather the metaphysical subject, the limit of the world — T 5.641

See:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/4876/the-philosophical-self

Yes, very confusing. I wonder what can that possibly mean, or do we just have to remain silent about the philosophical self?

This is something I want to address but would like to work up to it. — Fooloso4

Do you disagree with what @Pussycat has stated in the previous responses?

The subject does not belong to the world: rather, it is a limit of the world. — T 5.632

This quote has been of my interest recently. Does it imply a form of solipsism?

You mean something like "If I had a daughter then she'd be..."? — Michael

More like, "If Santa Claus existed then..."

Or more instantiating:

You, could have a daughter, either through biological means or adoption; but, Santa Claus just doesn't obtain in our world, or any for the matter.

Sort of harping on what @StreetlightX, has said... If we don't address the issue exclusively through the first person perspective, then the issue doesn't arise. In theory, we could all talk to one another in the third person, and eliminate the need for dualism in language through the first person, and get along well without the need to invoke the "cogito".

Yeah, I don't know how to proceed with this factoid in mind. It seems like a glaring example, that is brushed aside, of not being able to specify a referent that obtains to the same "entity" (however you define that metaphysically or ontologically, as Kripke seems to be inclined to state that entities exist in only an empirical manner) in (any) possible world, apart from the actual one.

This is sort of a roundabout way of stating that the "sense" of a name, under Kripkean semantics, is only restricted to the domain of the actual world. Or it could also mean that the sense of a name is conflated with the reference. What do you think about addressing this idea here?

Yes, do you know in which lectures he proceeds to talk about empty names and fictional entities like Santa Claus.

As far as I can understand, Kripke either brilliantly states that content or semantic value is mental and not always empirical or that because of this then the descriptivist might be right about semantic value of a counterfactual with no reference.

What would Kripke's say about empty names?

Anyone?