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Full Idea
Some empty names sentences can be understood, so appear to be meaningful ('Pegasus was sired by Poseidon'), ...some appear to be co-referential ('Santa Claus'/'Father Christmas'), and some appear to be straightforwardly true ('Pegasus doesn't exist').
Gist of Idea
Sentences with empty names can be understood, be co-referential, and even be true
Source
Sarah Sawyer (Empty Names [2012], 1)
Book Ref
'Routledge Companion to Phil of Language', ed/tr. Russell/Graff Faria [Routledge 2015], p.153
A Reaction
Hang on to this, when the logicians arrive and start telling you that your talk of empty names is vacuous, because there is no object in the 'domain' to which a predicate can be attached. Meaning, reference and truth are the issues around empty names.
| 18935 | Semantic theory should specify when an act of naming is successful [Sawyer] |
| 18934 | Sentences with empty names can be understood, be co-referential, and even be true [Sawyer] |
| 18938 | Frege's compositional account of truth-vaues makes 'Pegasus doesn't exist' neither true nor false [Sawyer] |
| 18945 | Millians say a name just means its object [Sawyer] |
| 18947 | Definites descriptions don't solve the empty names problem, because the properties may not exist [Sawyer] |