Gilbert Harman
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198238027
- eISBN:
- 9780191597633
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198238029.003.0012
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind
Rejects several arguments for the claim that a theory of meaning ought to take the form of a theory of truth. Sketches a conceptual role semantics in which the meanings of logical constants are ...
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Rejects several arguments for the claim that a theory of meaning ought to take the form of a theory of truth. Sketches a conceptual role semantics in which the meanings of logical constants are determined in large part by implications involving those logical constants, where implication is to be explained in terms of truth. Although truth‐conditions are sometimes relevant to meaning, this is only the case for the meanings of logical constants.Less
Rejects several arguments for the claim that a theory of meaning ought to take the form of a theory of truth. Sketches a conceptual role semantics in which the meanings of logical constants are determined in large part by implications involving those logical constants, where implication is to be explained in terms of truth. Although truth‐conditions are sometimes relevant to meaning, this is only the case for the meanings of logical constants.
Tim Maudlin
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780199247295
- eISBN:
- 9780191601781
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199247293.003.0007
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Language
A second inferential system that preserves permissibility rather than truth is developed. All classical theorems are shown to be necessarily permissible to assert. The two inferential systems are ...
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A second inferential system that preserves permissibility rather than truth is developed. All classical theorems are shown to be necessarily permissible to assert. The two inferential systems are compared.Less
A second inferential system that preserves permissibility rather than truth is developed. All classical theorems are shown to be necessarily permissible to assert. The two inferential systems are compared.
W. V. Quine
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195139167
- eISBN:
- 9780199833214
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019513916X.003.0010
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
In this essay, Quine reflects on his philosophical development, taking a steadfast adherence to extensionalism as a unifying principle of his whole philosophy starting as far back as the 1930s. Quine ...
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In this essay, Quine reflects on his philosophical development, taking a steadfast adherence to extensionalism as a unifying principle of his whole philosophy starting as far back as the 1930s. Quine calls two sentences coextensive if they have the same truth value, two general terms or predicates coextensive if they are true of just the same objects, and two singular terms coextensive if they designate the same object. Extensionalism is the general doctrine that no distinction is clear and philosophical significant if it cannot be captured by differences in extensions. Intensionalism, by contrast, takes distinctions of meaning as irreducible and prior to distinctions of extension. The philosophical origin his extensionalism Quine takes to be his seeing that the intensional ontology of propositional functions not only does no mathematical work in Russell’s and Whitehead’s Principia Mathematica, but, in addition, had no clear criteria of individuation. Quine’s doctoral dissertation was thus concerned with reinterpreting the Principia extensionally. Much of the rest of his career consisted of meeting other philosophically significant challenges to extensionalism. The most important challenges discussed in this essay are the idiom of logical implication, predicates of irreferential singular terms, and propositional attitude ascriptions. The two most important strategies for meeting these challenges are the elimination of singular terms via Russell’s theory of descriptions and semantic ascent.Less
In this essay, Quine reflects on his philosophical development, taking a steadfast adherence to extensionalism as a unifying principle of his whole philosophy starting as far back as the 1930s. Quine calls two sentences coextensive if they have the same truth value, two general terms or predicates coextensive if they are true of just the same objects, and two singular terms coextensive if they designate the same object. Extensionalism is the general doctrine that no distinction is clear and philosophical significant if it cannot be captured by differences in extensions. Intensionalism, by contrast, takes distinctions of meaning as irreducible and prior to distinctions of extension. The philosophical origin his extensionalism Quine takes to be his seeing that the intensional ontology of propositional functions not only does no mathematical work in Russell’s and Whitehead’s Principia Mathematica, but, in addition, had no clear criteria of individuation. Quine’s doctoral dissertation was thus concerned with reinterpreting the Principia extensionally. Much of the rest of his career consisted of meeting other philosophically significant challenges to extensionalism. The most important challenges discussed in this essay are the idiom of logical implication, predicates of irreferential singular terms, and propositional attitude ascriptions. The two most important strategies for meeting these challenges are the elimination of singular terms via Russell’s theory of descriptions and semantic ascent.
