more on this theme     |     more from this text

Single Idea 14705

[filed under theme 19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 10. Two-Dimensional Semantics ]

Full Idea

Perhaps our best way of understanding names and natural kind terms is that we have apriori access to currently associated reference-fixing criterion, but only a posteriori access to the associated modal profile.

Gist of Idea

Do we know apriori how we refer to names and natural kinds, but their modal profiles only a posteriori?

Source

Laura Schroeter (Two-Dimensional Semantics [2010], 2.1)

Book Ref

'Stanford Online Encyclopaedia of Philosophy', ed/tr. Stanford University [plato.stanford.edu], p.13

A Reaction

This is the 'generalized' view of 2D semantics (covering everything, not just modals and indexicals). I know apriori what something is, but only study will reveal its possibilities. The actual world is easy to talk about, but possible worlds are harder.

The 19 ideas from Laura Schroeter

14695 Semantic theories show how truth of sentences depends on rules for interpreting and joining their parts [Schroeter]
14696 Simple semantics assigns extensions to names and to predicates [Schroeter]
14697 'Federer' and 'best tennis player' can't mean the same, despite having the same extension [Schroeter]
14698 Possible worlds semantics uses 'intensions' - functions which assign extensions at each world [Schroeter]
14699 Possible worlds make 'I' and that person's name synonymous, but they have different meanings [Schroeter]
14701 Array worlds along the horizontal, and contexts (world,person,time) along the vertical [Schroeter]
14702 If we introduce 'actually' into modal talk, we need possible worlds twice to express this [Schroeter]
14703 Superficial necessity is true in all worlds; deep necessity is thus true, no matter which world is actual [Schroeter]
14705 Do we know apriori how we refer to names and natural kinds, but their modal profiles only a posteriori? [Schroeter]
14704 2D semantics gives us apriori knowledge of our own meanings [Schroeter]
14706 Your view of water depends on whether you start from the actual Earth or its counterfactual Twin [Schroeter]
14711 Rationalists say knowing an expression is identifying its extension using an internal cognitive state [Schroeter]
14709 Possible worlds semantics implies a constitutive connection between meanings and modal claims [Schroeter]
14715 2D fans defend it for conceptual analysis, for meaning, and for internalist reference [Schroeter]
14714 Contradictory claims about a necessary god both seem apriori coherent [Schroeter]
14716 2D semantics can't respond to contingent apriori claims, since there is no single proposition involved [Schroeter]
14717 Internalist meaning is about understanding; externalist meaning is about embedding in a situation [Schroeter]
14719 In the possible worlds account all necessary truths are same (because they all map to the True) [Schroeter]
14720 Semantic theory assigns meanings to expressions, and metasemantics explains how this works [Schroeter]