On Denoting
Classic article from 1905 on theory of definite descriptions. Appears to find a solution to problems: denotative theory of meaning. Philosophy of language: how is it that sentences or words mean things.
Most attractive idea is that bit of language mean things by connecting with the real world. We want to say sentences can be true, by represent the real world. Words mean things by denoting (picking out) things in the world. Obviously lots of parts of grammar do not do this.
Proper names of a person picks out a person in the world. (But names are not unique!) There are names like Frodo and Sherlock Holmes that don't actually pick anything out in the world.
Meinong said: subject words really do pick out something, just not from this world. There are "real" things that exist in other worlds. The unicorn has a horn can be true only if there are unicorns someplace. Even a round square must exist, even just to say that it doesn't exist. Meinong's ontological slum.
Frege said: propositions have a kind of existence. You have to expand your ontology beyond the physical world. Russell and Quine want to keep the ontology minimal. Belief in electron is like belief in dark matter. Draws a difference between sense and reference. Example: the king of France is bald. Russell does not like the existence of "senses" without existence of thing being sensed. All things that don't exist refer to the null set. This is a problem because all things that don't exist are the same thing. The unicorn is the king of France. Or you say the sentence does not have a truth value.
Russell says: puzzles are like experiments in physical sciences.
- Substitutivity: George IV wanted to know whether Walter Scott was the author of Waverly. If you replace "Walter Scott" with "the author of Waverly" then the sense of the meaning is changed. These denote the same thing, but there is still a difference. A definite description can behave like names, but they are not actually names. Predicate logic and grammar follow different rules.
- Excluded Middle: Things have to be true or not true. "The king of France is bald" is neither true nor false. Bivalence says it must be one, and the negation must be the other.
- Negative Existentialism: "The king of France does not exist" is a problem for Meinog since things have to exist in order to talk about them, even to say they don't exist.
Notice the difference between "The snake spoke to Eve" and "A snake spoke to Eve"
(∃x)(Snake(x) and Talk(x, eve))
The core of this is that definite descriptions do not pick something out in the world. The "author of Waverly" does not pick out something in the world. The only thing that picks out things in the world are proper names. Eventually he drops those and decides the "this" and "that" are the only things that pick out things.
Video 2
The horse ran past me.
Something is such that it is a horse and it ran past me.
The author of On Denoting is a pipe smoker.
Something is such that it wrote On Denoting, and nothing else wronte On Denoting and it is a pipe smoker.
Video 3
What is language, and how does it have any meaning.
References
Intro to ordinary language philosophy and J.L. Austin's "Sense and Sensibilia"