Download - Referential Theory
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
1/13
Theories of Meaning
REFERENTIAL
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
2/13
Referential Theory of Meaning - isthat the meaning of a term is the
things in the world it refers to.
Referential Theory - is confounded
by terms that have the samereferent but different meaning, suchas 'morning star' and 'evening star'.
2
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
3/13
Referential Theory
linguistic expressions have themeanings they do because they standfor things; what they mean is whatthey stand for.
words are like labels; they are
symbols that represent, designate,name, denote or refer to items in theworld:
3
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
4/13
4
the name Adolf Hitler denotes (theperson) Hitler; the noun dog refers
to dogs, as do the French chien andthe German Hund.
The cat sat on the matrepresents some cats sitting onsome mat
The cats designating that cat,the mats designating the mat
sat on denoting the relation of
sitting-on.
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
5/13
5
Some Problems in Referential
Theory of MeaningProblem 1. Not every word doesname or denote any actual
object/thing.
First,there are the names ofnonexistent items like Pegasus
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
6/13
6
pronouns of quantification, as in
(1) I saw nobody.
But to what does nobody refer?
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
7/137
Second, consider a simple subject-predicate sentence:
(2) Ralph is fat.
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
8/138
Third, there are words thatgrammatically are nouns but do not,
intuitively, name either individualthings or kinds of things -- not evennonexistent things or abstract
items such as qualities.
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
9/139
Fourth, many parts of speech otherthan nouns do not even seem to refer
to things of any sort or in any way atall: very, of, and, the, a,yes, and for that matter hey and
alas.
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
10/1310
Problem 2: According to the
Referential theory, a sentence is alist of names. But a mere list ofnames does not say anything.
(3) Fred Martha Irving Phyllis
cannot be used to assert anything,even if Martha or Irving is anabstract entity rather than a physicalobject.
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
11/1311
One might suppose that if the nameof an individual is concatenated with
the name of a quality, as in
(4) Ralph fatness,
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
12/1312
Problem 3: There are specificlinguistic phenomena that seem toshow that there is more to meaningthan reference.
In particular, co referringterms are often not synonymous; thatis, two terms can share theirreferent but differ in meaning
John Paul and the Pope, for example.
-
7/30/2019 Referential Theory
13/13
13
Referential Theory
We mean what we say.
Word designates objects.
Facts has relation between objects.
Sentences capture the relations of
objectsA true statement corresponds tofacts.