Proper Names
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Proper Names Aaron Lambert A thesis submitted to the Department of Philosophy in conformity with the requtemeatr for the degree of Master of A~ts Queen's University Kingston, Ontario, Canada May, 1997 @ Aaron Lambert, 1997 National Library BiblioWque nationale 1+m ,ma& du Canada Acgusitions and Acquisitions et Bibl~ographiSe~~ces sewbibliogaphiques The author has granted a non- L'auteur a accord6 une licence non exclusive licence allowing the exclusive pennettant a la National biof Canada to BibIioth&quenationale du Canada de reproduce, loan, distn'bate or sell reproduire, prh, distn'buerou copies of hismer thesis by any means vendre des copies de sa tWse de and in any form or fomat, making this thesis available to interested forme qut ce soit pour metbe des persons. exemplah.es de cette thbe a la disposition des pasonnes intQes&s. The author retains ownership of the L'auteur conserve la propriCt6 du copyright in Merthesis. Neither hit#auteur qui prot&gesa thh. Ni the thesis nor substantial extracts la these ni des exftaits substantiels de from it may be printed or otherwise celIe-ci ne doivent &re imprim& ou reproduced with the author's autrement reproduits sans son permission. Abstract The problem of proper nun- iaccounting for their meaning, that ir, lot the ability to provide retuence to objects of the world. We want to be able to uay that proper nama refer directly to objecta, rince that t their aaaumcd function in the use of ordinary language. But when ukd to rupply the meaning of r proper name, in general we are only able to oupply dedptive knowledge of an ~umedobject to which it refen, knowIdge which dmconsiderably hmwr to uaer. ken when the object b 8emibly present, we can only appeal to knowledge of catah sensations, or of certain idea; we cannot produce any entity which is nonndly thought to be, or to provide, the meaning of a proper name. In thir the& I explore the ilolutiom to this problem offered by variouu philo~o- phers, including Mill, Fkege, Rumell, Strawson and Kripke, all of whom have very different approaches. I condude that while $L of these thinkets have valuable in- rights into how we ought to think of objecta, how we actually think of objecta, how knowledge of objecta k obtained and rhard amongut urur of language, and to what extent thia knowledge ia nguind in providing the connection between a proper name and the object to which it rders, dl ruffec from the uame bdc inadequacy. This b the failure to get to grips with the problem of how the mental concept of a paxticular entity is abtracted from senuorg experience of the world, how it is independent of any patticulsr LnowIedge of the companding entity, how it functions to allow the idea of rderence to take place in the we of proper namcl, and how this idea of reference ia diatiact ftom the determination of rderence in practice, which is the acquisition of knowledge, of vatioua kinda, of an object in the normal use of its name. Acknowledgements A rpedd and num thank-you gom to my ruptrvisos, ProfitLome la, who provided not only inrightful critidm and encouragement at the critical momenta, but .Ira much appreciated enthudam and patience, and who met dl difliculties with a great mnae of humout. I would ahlike to utclld thanka to Dan Chamberlain, Hazy Laycock, AdMe Mercier, and Sergio Siamondo for their ad* in the preparation of tbl work. I wodd like to upnu my gratitude to The Department d Philomphy, The School of Graduate Studiea, and Student Ad,mpeddly to Dt. David Bakhont, Profagor Ron Andemon, and Pat Boptad, for sympathetic dvband help in procuring the finand urbtance that enabled me to complete my utudieu at Queen's. Finally, I would Ueto aay thanks to Maxine Whnand Jackie Doh- fot never failing to be the friends and comrader wh- presence at the Philoaopby Department at Queeda would be aorely mimed, and to ail the rttldentu at the CFD lab for putting up with me. Contents Acknowledgements 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Theproblem ........................... 2 1.2 The Strategy ........................... 3 2 Backgro~d 6 2.1 J.S.MU .............................. 6 2.1.1 On Connotation and Denotation ............. 7 2.1.2 Concluding RemarIts ................... 9 2.2 Gottlobhge ........................... 11 2.2.1 OnSensemdRefmmct ................. 11 2.2.2 On B~~ffwchn'f..................... 13 2.2.3 Concluding Remarlca ................... 14 2.3 Bdand Ruad ......................... 15 2.3.1 Rurrell'e Metaphyric ................... 15 2.3.2 On the Role of Proper Names .............. 19 CONTENTS iv 2.3.3 On the Meaning of Proper Namea ............ 21 2.3.4 OntheMbrenaofProp~~N8m~~........... 24 2.3.5 Concluding Ramarks ................... 28 2.4 P.F. Strawson ........................... 31 2.4.1 On RddgExpraaionr ................ 31 2.4.2 On Proper Namm ..................... 34 2.4.3 Concluding baks ................... 38 2.5 Summary and Conclusions .................... 39 3 The Causal Theory 46 3.1 Saul Kripke's Causal Chain Theory ............... 45 3.2 Against the Ref'Uae of Dcmiptione ............ 48 3.2.1 Reference in Possible Worlds ............... 49 On Rigid Designation in Possible Worlds ......... 51 On the Use of Deaiptions in Possible Worlds ...... 52 Concluding Remarks .................... 56 3.2.2 Reference in the Actual World .............. 57 On the Use of Vague and Chular Daaiptions..... 57 On the Use of Mistaken Descriptionb. .......... 60 Concluding Remarks .................... 62 3.3 The Elimination of Descriptive Refkrence ............ 64 3.3.1 InBaptism ........................ 65 3.3.2 Io Reidentification .................... 67 3.3.3 In the Communication of Names ............. 68 3.3.4 Concluding Remuks ................... 70 3.4 The Use of Intentions to Wkr .................. 71 CONTENTS v 3.4.1 htentiona are Necuaazy but not Suf6cient ....... 71 3.4.2 Inkntiom and Dcraiptive Refmace .......... 74 3.4.3 Concluding Rem~~~kr................... 76 3.5 Conrequcnar of Ktipke'~Theory ................ 77 3.5.1 Neamazy o poutcribti Knowbdge ............ 77 3.5.2 Contingent a priori Knowledge ............. 81 3.5.3 Etwentid Pmpertiea .................... 87 3.5.4 Concluding Remcvka ................... 93 3.6 SummaryandCondwiona ..................... 96 4 Conclusion 89 4.1 Thesolution ........................... 99 4.1.1 The Type Identity of Propa Nama ...........101 4.1.2 The Token Identity of Proper Namea ..........103 4.1.3 Concluding Ransrk~ ...................105 Notes and References 108 Selected Bibliography 119 Vita 122 Chapter 1 Introduction Generalisations of any kind are dangaous, and of such a broad and encorn- passing discipline as philosophy, they are perhaps doubly so. Nevertheless, I think it can be fairly raid that the greater part of the Weatern philomphical tradition has always been united in the common came of investigating ques- tions of truth, even if, as Bertrand Russell pointr out, it ir in the nature of philosophers to become disinterested in the problems of philosophy 6Wll as answers to them are in danger of being found.' A cursory glance over the history of philosophy tends to confirm that a great deal of time and effort has been spent on investigating both the nature of truthful statement8 about the world, and the word that maka them true. In recent times, however, science has become increasingly entnuted with investigations of the latter, while, not coincidmtdly, philosophy ha become increasingly dominated by questions of the formu. The result ir that language, alteady the medium of the investigation, is now also its primary focus.' CHAPTER 1. 1N.TRODUCTlON 2 If a philosophy of language ir to account for the capability of language to express t~ths,it must fint of all account for the capability of language to make reference to the world itself~rrtcogniuable partr of it-about which it expresses truths. It mmut, in dect, account for the relatiomhip between language and the world which justifha our speaking about the world. The most straightfonratd and convenient way, but by no means the only way, of referring to parts of the world in to we linguistic nipthat atand in for them directly. In ordinaxy language, these dgn8 are cakd proper naznea. The study of nameo provides an obvioua starting point for datifying the problems associated with the relatiomhip between language and the world. They are, if you like, the most primal of word types. The very fint linguistic acts of humans are to attach names to recognirable things of interat in their environment, and this is just ar true today, when each one of w starts out on the long road of learning language, as it waa when as a race we started out on the much longer road of creating it. 1.1 The Problem A name, of course, like any linguistic sign, is a sound ~pokenor a mark written; what makes it of interest is its meaning. What I am concerned to investigate here is the meaning, or significance, of proper names. But by this I am not concerned with the meaning of names m they might be discovered by looking in a dictionary. The name 'Jceebel' means, for example, according to the dictionary, 'A shameless or immoral wo~nm.'~But people who are shameless, immoral and female ate not all given the name 'Jezebel', aad CHAPTER 1. lNTROOUCTION neither ate all uses of the name applied ody to people who might have thae attributes; the name 'Jeaebel' could be given to amyone or, indeed, anything. As Hobbe8 said, a name is 'taken at phmre to 8me for a mark' of the individuality of some thing? Although a word that atarts out purely in that mode may come to be ~aociatedwith a general meaning by association with the qualities of the thing it happens to mark out, and a word may be chosen as a name for some thing because of such a genera meaning pmioudy picked up, this adjectival use of certain word8 that also act as propa names should not distract us from the separate issue of accounting for the relationship between a name, as a mark, and the particular thing it is a mask of.