more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
In Frege's account sentences such as 'Pegasus does not exist' will be neither true nor false, since the truth-value of a sentence is its referent, and the referent of a complex expression is determined by the referent of its parts.
Gist of Idea
Frege's compositional account of truth-vaues makes 'Pegasus doesn't exist' neither true nor false
Source
Sarah Sawyer (Empty Names [2012], 2)
Book Ref
'Routledge Companion to Phil of Language', ed/tr. Russell/Graff Faria [Routledge 2015], p.154
A Reaction
We can keep the idea of 'sense', which is very useful for dealing with empty names, but tweak his account of truth-values to evade this problem. I'm thinking that meaning is compositional, but truth-value isn't.
Related Idea
Idea 18937 If sentences have a 'sense', empty name sentences can be understood that way [Frege, by Sawyer]
| 18937 | If sentences have a 'sense', empty name sentences can be understood that way [Frege, by Sawyer] |
| 18940 | It is a weakness of natural languages to contain non-denoting names [Frege] |
| 18939 | In a logically perfect language every well-formed proper name designates an object [Frege] |
| 6439 | Names are meaningless unless there is an object which they designate [Russell] |
| 18943 | Russell implies that all sentences containing empty names are false [Sawyer on Russell] |
| 10426 | A name has got to name something or it is not a name [Russell] |
| 13361 | An expression is only a name if it succeeds in referring to a real object [Bostock] |
| 10429 | It is best to say that a name designates iff there is something for it to designate [Sainsbury] |
| 19001 | 'Pegasus doesn't exist' is false without Pegasus, yet the absence of Pegasus is its truthmaker [Yablo] |
| 12446 | Names function the same way, even if there is no object [Azzouni] |
| 18946 | Unreflectively, we all assume there are nonexistents, and we can refer to them [Reimer] |
| 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] |