Frege's Puzzle

Frege's Puzzle

Frege's Puzzle is a puzzle about the semantics of proper names, although the title is also sometimes applied to a related puzzle about indexicals. Frege introduced the puzzle at the beginning of his article "Über Sinn und Bedeutung" ("On Sense and Reference"), one of the most influential articles for Twentieth-Century analytic philosophers and philosophers of language.

The Puzzle

Consider the following two sentences:

(1) Hesperus is Hesperus.

(2) Hesperus is Phosphorus.

We can begin by noting that each of these sentences is true, and that 'Hesperus' refers to the same object as 'Phosphorus' (the planet Venus). Nonetheless, (1) and (2) seem to differ in what Frege called "cognitive value". One way of analyzing this notion is to say that a person could rationally believe (1) while denying (2). The problem, however, is that proper names are often taken to have no meaning beyond their reference (a view often associated with John Stuart Mill). But this seems to imply that if a person knows the meanings of the words in (1) and (2), he cannot rationally believe one and deny the other: (1) and (2) are "synonymous".

Frege's Solution

Frege took the puzzle to be proof that proper names must in fact have some form of meaning beyond their reference. His discussion of the puzzle is thus a springboard into his extremely influential semantics of proper names, according to which proper names have sense in addition to reference. The sense of a proper name is taken by Frege to amalgamate several semantic functions: it is the mode of presentation of the name, it is a bit of descriptive content associated with the name, it provides the name's cognitive value, and it determines the name's referent.

Frege therefore solves his puzzle by arguing that co-referring proper names such as 'Hesperus' and 'Phosphorus' have different senses. Although the senses of co-referring names determine the same referent, they generally furnish the names with different cognitive values.

New Theories of Reference and the Return of Frege's Puzzle

Frege's solution was definitive for much of the Twentieth Century. Only recently, with the rise of anti-descriptivist (and thus anti-Fregean) theories of reference, has Frege's Puzzle become a dominant problem in the philosophy of language. This trend began some time in the late 1960's and early 1970's, when such philosophers as Keith Donnellan, David Kaplan, Saul Kripke, Ruth Barcan Marcus, and Hilary Putnam began to entertain arguments against Frege's theory. Perhaps most influential in this regard is Kripke's book of lectures, "Naming and Necessity". To some extent, the resulting new theories of reference mark a return to the Millian view of proper names, and thus invite the problem of Frege's puzzle anew.

In the last several decades, then, many philosophers of language have attempted to work out a solution to the puzzle within the confines of direct-reference theories of proper names. Some of these philosophers include Nathan Salmon (e.g. in "Frege's Puzzle" and "Content, Cognition, and Communication"), Howard Wettstein (e.g. in "Has Semantics Rested on a Mistake?"), Scott Soames, David Kaplan, John Perry (e.g. in "Reference and Reflexivity"), and Joseph Almog.

ee also

* Sense and reference
* Direct reference theory
* Theory of descriptions
* Definite description
* Descriptivist theory of names
* Name
* Principle of compositionality
* Contextual theory of reference
* Mediated reference theory
* Causal theory of reference
* Rigid designator


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Нужно решить контрольную?

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Nathan Salmon — Nathan Ucuzoglu Salmon Full name Nathan Ucuzoglu Salmon Born January 2, 1951 Los Angeles, California Era 20th century 21st century Region Western Philosophy School Analytic philosophy …   Wikipedia

  • David Kaplan (philosopher) — For other people of the same name, see David Kaplan (disambiguation). David Benjamin Kaplan (born 1933) is an American philosopher and logician teaching at UCLA. His philosophical work focuses on logic, philosophical logic, modality, philosophy… …   Wikipedia

  • On Denoting — written by Bertrand Russell, is one of the most significant and influential philosophical essays of the 20th century. It was published in the philosophy journal Mind in 1905; then reprinted, in both a special 2005 anniversary issue of the same j …   Wikipedia

  • Direct reference theory — A direct reference theory is a theory of meaning that claims that the meaning of an expression lies in what it points out in the world. It stands in contrast to mediated reference theories. Contents 1 John Stuart Mill 2 Ruth Barcan Marcus 3 Saul… …   Wikipedia

  • J. J. C. Smart — John Jamieson Carswell Jack Smart AC (born 1920), often referred to as J.J.C. Smart, is a Scottish emeritus professor of philosophy at Monash University, Australia. He works in the fields of metaphysics, philosophy of science , philosophy of mind …   Wikipedia

  • analytic philosophy — n. a 20th cent. philosophic movement characterized by its method of analyzing concepts and statements in the light of common experience and ordinary language so as to eliminate confusions of thought and resolve many traditional philosophical… …   Universalium

  • Kent Bach — (born 1943) is a Professor of Philosophy at San Francisco State University. His primary areas of research include the philosophy of language, linguistics and epistemology. He is the author of three books: Exit existentialism: A philosophy of self …   Wikipedia

  • George Boolos — Infobox Person name = George Boolos birth date = birth date|1940|9|4|mf=y birth place = New York, New York, U.S. death date = death date and age|1996|5|27|1940|9|4|mf=y death place = Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.George Stephen Boolos (September… …   Wikipedia

  • mathematics — /math euh mat iks/, n. 1. (used with a sing. v.) the systematic treatment of magnitude, relationships between figures and forms, and relations between quantities expressed symbolically. 2. (used with a sing. or pl. v.) mathematical procedures,… …   Universalium

  • science, philosophy of — Branch of philosophy that attempts to elucidate the nature of scientific inquiry observational procedures, patterns of argument, methods of representation and calculation, metaphysical presuppositions and evaluate the grounds of their validity… …   Universalium

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”