Orgf.2021.28101 ISSN 1335-0668 (Print)
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Organon F, Volume 28, 2021, Issue 1 Special Issue Names and Fictions Piotr Stalmaszczyk Guest Editor Contents Piotr Stalmaszczyk: Preface ........................................................................... 2 Research Articles Fiora Salis: The Meanings of Fictional Names ............................................... 9 Mark Sainsbury: Fictional Names: Reference, Definiteness and Ontology ..... 44 Alberto Voltolini: Real Authors and Fictional Agents (Fictional Narrators, Fictional Authors) ........................................................... 60 Stefano Predelli: Fictional Tellers: A Radical Fictionalist Semantics for Fictional Discourse ........................................................................... 76 Eleonora Orlando: Fictional Names and Fictional Concepts: A Moderate Fictionalist Account ........................................................................ 107 Juliana Faccio Lima: How Can Millians Believe in Superheroes? .............. 135 Merel Semeijn – Edward N. Zalta: Revisiting the ‘Wrong Kind of Object’ Problem ........................................................................................... 168 Nathan Hawkins: Frege’s Equivalence Thesis and Reference Failure ........ 198 Louis Rouillé: Anti-Realism about Fictional Names at Work: A New Theory for Metafictional Sentences ................................................ 223 Eros Corazza – Christopher Genovesi: On Anaphors Linked to Names Used Metaphorically ........................................................................ 253 Organon F 28 (1) 2021: 2–8 ISSN 2585-7150 (online) https://doi.org/10.31577/orgf.2021.28101 ISSN 1335-0668 (print) Preface The landscape of fiction is of fictional names such as ‘Desde- marked with names. Contributions to mona,’ and ‘Middle-earth’. The paper this special issue of Organon F inves- provides an overview of the two tigate the various relations holding strands in the philosophical debate between different types of names and on the semantics of proper names: fictions. Though the authors offer dif- Millianism and the Fregean ap- ferent theoretical stances and ap- proach. Salis assumes that there are proaches, they successfully search for no fictional entities, hence names the internal logic governing the usage such as ‘Desdemona’ are referring ex- and interpretation of names in fic- pressions without referents; neverthe- tion. The papers demonstrate that less, she argues that the correct se- the discussion between Millianism mantics for discourse about fictional and the Fregean approach, the con- characters is Millian, and she devel- troversies between realism and anti- ops a pragmatic account of the mean- realism, and varying approaches to ingfulness of fictional names that reference, result in further develop- combines two aspects of meaning, so- ments and modifications of the indi- cial—or intersubjective—and psy- vidual theories, leading to a better chologistic—or subjective. The un- understanding of names in fictions. derlying assumption in this account In the opening paper Fiora Salis is that fiction is a communicative ef- comprehensively discusses the mean- fort, namely a social interaction be- ing of fictional names and provides tween an author (or, possibly, group appropriate theoretical background of authors) and an audience, and key for further discussion. Salis assumes to this account is the recognition that that there are no fictional entities of fictional names are introduced in any peculiar kind, no fictional people, works of fiction that function as scaf- no fictional places and no fictional ob- folding for the construction of inter- jects, and she devotes her paper to ex- subjective meaning. In search for the plaining the apparent meaningfulness best solution, the integrated approach, © The Author. Journal compilation © The Editorial Board, Organon F. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attri- bution-NonCommercial 4.0 International Public License (CC BY-NC 4.0). Preface 3 Salis follows Walton’s account of fic- nothing they represent*, though they tion, and Stalnaker’s idea of the no- represent people and places. Sains- tion of common ground. Her account bury concludes that we can happily is ontologically parsimonious and se- combine commonsensical realism mantically uniform; it also provides about fictions (novels, plays), which the resources to explain key features really exist, with irrealism about the of the intentionality of thought and fictional characters, people and discourse about fictional characters. places they portray, which typically Mark Sainsbury discusses fic- do not. tional names in the theoretical con- Alberto Voltolini observes that a text of reference, definiteness and on- suitable account of fiction must in- tology. He starts from the premise volve a conceptual distinction be- that the use of definite expressions in tween (at least) the following figures, speculation is a good guide to under- or roles: real authors, fictional narra- standing the use of definite expres- tors, fictional authors. Real authors sions, especially names, in fiction. He are the real original utterers of fic- further observes that the underlying tion-involving sentences in their fic- fact which makes fiction possible and tional use, the one mobilizing pre- gives guidance about fictional names tense. They may coincide either with is that there is no need to suppose fictional narrators or with fictional that there exist entities to which such authors. A fictional narrator is the names refer. Following some other protagonist of a tale that is narrated theorists, Sainsbury introduces a spe- in the first person: the internal point cial convention, according to which of view on the tale. A fictional author iff x represents* y, there really is constitutes the tale’s external point of some entity, y, that x represents, but view that vividly manifests itself the weak reading, “x represents y”, when the tale is narrated by no pro- does not have this entailment. Alt- tagonist. Fictional narrators, how- hough “x represents* y” entails “x ever, never coincide with fictional au- represents y” the converse entailment thors. For either one or the other is fails. In other words, representation the fictional agent, the one-place fac- is purported representation*. Fic- tor of a narrow fictional context of tional names are as readily intro- interpretation whose contribution is duced and understood as other ex- to provide a fictional truth-condi- pressions in fiction, and as names in tional content to the fiction-involving non-fiction. Fictional names are dis- sentences of the relevant tale. Volto- tinctive in that typically there is lini provides in his paper a semantic Organon F 28 (1) 2021: 2–8 4 Preface reason to draw a distinction between names. The ensuing idea that fic- fictional narrators and fictional au- tional texts do not encode proposi- thors, independently of whether they tional content is accompanied by an are respectively the same as the real explanation of the contentful effects authors of fiction-involving sentences of fiction grounded on the idea of im- in their fictional use, as is sometimes partation. After some preliminaries the case. This reason hinges on the about genuine proper names, Predelli fact that in order for such sentences explains how a fiction’s content may to have determinate fictional truth- be conveyed by virtue of the fictional conditions in their fictional use, there impartations provided by a fictional must always be just one fictional teller. This idea is in turn developed agent for the narrow fictional context with respect to homodiegetic narra- that enables the relevant fiction-in- tives such as Doyle’s Holmes stories volving sentence to have those truth- and to heterodiegetic narratives such conditions. Hence, there must be a as Jane Austen’s Emma. Finally, he fictional agent, yet such an agent can applies this apparatus to cases of so- be either the fictional narrator or the called ‘talk about fiction’, as in the fictional author, but not both. This commentaries about those stories and reason allows for dispensing with ap- that novel. Predelli concludes with an pealing to an epistemic reason to optimistic note about possible exten- draw the very same distinction, a rea- sions of his approach, and about their son that mobilizes the alleged omnis- relationships with many other prop- cience of the fictional author. For, as erties of fictional discourse. concluded by Voltolini, there is no In the next paper devoted to the need that such an author be always fictionalist account, Eleonora Or- reliable. lando discusses fictional names and The next two papers are con- fictional concepts from a moderate cerned with radical fictionalist se- perspective. The thesis that she de- mantics and a moderate fictionalist fends in her essay is that a fictional account, respectively. First, Stefano name refers to an individual concept, Predelli presents his approach and understood as a mental file that proposes a dissolution of the so-called stores information, in the form of dif- ‘semantic problem of fictional name’ ferent descriptive concepts, about a by arguing that fictional names are purported individual. Given there is only fictionally proper names. His no material particular a fictional main thesis is that fictional proper name could be referring to, it will be names are merely fictionally proper construed as referring to the concept Organon F 28 (1) 2021: 2–8 Preface 5 of a particular, with which many de- members of the linguistic