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Single Idea 7761
[filed under theme 10. Modality / E. Possible worlds / 3. Transworld Objects / b. Rigid designation
]
Full Idea
Kripke offers an intuitive test for telling whether a term is rigid: try the term in the sentence-frame "N might not have been N". (For example, try the terms 'Nixon' and 'President of the USA').
Gist of Idea
Test for rigidity by inserting into the sentence 'N might not have been N'
Source
report of Saul A. Kripke (Naming and Necessity lectures [1970]) by William Lycan - Philosophy of Language Ch.4
Book Ref
Lycan,William G.: 'Philosophy of Language' [Routledge 2000], p.54
A Reaction
Helpful, but if you try it, the results do not seem to be conclusive. You are left saying 'Well, it depends what you mean by...' Think of possible worlds with a crippled Nixon, twin Nixons, an honest Nixon, a robot Nixon, a dark skinned Nixon...
The
22 ideas
with the same theme
[items with fixed identity in all possible worlds]:
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13588
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A rigid designator (for all possible worlds) picks out an object by its essential traits
[Quine]
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11187
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In possible worlds, names are just neutral unvarying pegs for truths and predicates
[Marcus (Barcan)]
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9172
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A 'rigid designator' designates the same object in all possible worlds
[Kripke]
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9173
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We cannot say that Nixon might have been a different man from the one he actually was
[Kripke]
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5821
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Saying that natural kinds are 'rigid designators' is the same as saying they are 'indexical'
[Kripke, by Putnam]
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14068
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If Kripke names must still denote a thing in a non-actual situation, the statue isn't its clay
[Gibbard on Kripke]
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10436
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A rigid expression may refer at a world to an object not existing in that world
[Kripke, by Sainsbury]
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7761
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Test for rigidity by inserting into the sentence 'N might not have been N'
[Kripke, by Lycan]
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7693
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Kripke avoids difficulties of transworld identity by saying it is a decision, not a discovery
[Kripke, by Jacquette]
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4953
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We do not begin with possible worlds and place objects in them; we begin with objects in the real world
[Kripke]
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4961
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It is a necessary truth that Elizabeth II was the child of two particular parents
[Kripke]
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17003
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Kaplan's 'Dthat' is a useful operator for transforming a description into a rigid designation
[Kripke]
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11891
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Possibilities for an individual can only refer to that individual, in some possible world
[Plantinga, by Mackie,P]
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11881
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Rigid designators can be meaningful even if empty
[Evans, by Mackie,P]
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12138
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Identity across possible worlds is prior to rigid designation
[Brody]
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16408
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Rigid designation seems to presuppose that differing worlds contain the same individuals
[Stalnaker]
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14079
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Kripke's semantics needs lots of intuitions about which properties are essential
[Gibbard]
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11979
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It doesn't take the whole of a possible Humphrey to win the election
[Lewis]
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15530
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A logically determinate name names the same thing in every possible world
[Lewis]
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12237
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Rigid designation has at least three essentialist presuppositions
[Oderberg]
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15174
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A thing doesn't need transworld identity prior to rigid reference - that could be a convention of the reference
[Sidelle]
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15183
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'Dthat' operates to make a singular term into a rigid term
[Sidelle]
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