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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 20 ideas with the same theme [giving meaning by possible worlds with two separate components]:

14893 Rigid designation creates a puzzle - why do some necessary truths appear to be contingent? [Kripke, by Macià/Garcia-Carpentiro]
14894 Indexicals have a 'character' (the standing meaning), and a 'content' (truth-conditions for one context) [Kaplan, by Macià/Garcia-Carpentiro]
14700 'Content' gives the standard modal profile, and 'character' gives rules for a context [Kaplan, by Schroeter]
16430 Two-D says that a posteriori is primary and contingent, and the necessity is the secondary intension [Stalnaker]
16431 In one view, the secondary intension is metasemantic, about how the thinker relates to the content [Stalnaker]
13972 Two-dimensionalism reinstates descriptivism, and reconnects necessity and apriority to analyticity [Soames]
14708 Rationalist 2D semantics posits necessary relations between meaning, apriority, and possibility [Chalmers, by Schroeter]
13958 The 'primary intension' is non-empirical, and fixes extensions based on the actual-world reference [Chalmers]
2399 Meaning has split into primary ("watery stuff"), and secondary counterfactual meaning ("H2O") [Chalmers]
13959 The 'secondary intension' is determined by rigidifying (as H2O) the 'water' picked out in the actual world [Chalmers]
13957 Primary and secondary intensions are the a priori (actual) and a posteriori (counterfactual) aspects of meaning [Chalmers]
13961 We have 'primary' truth-conditions for the actual world, and derived 'secondary' ones for counterfactual worlds [Chalmers]
14739 'Water' is two-dimensionally inconstant, with different intensions in different worlds [Chalmers, by Sider]
16351 In 2-D semantics, reference is determined, then singularity by the truth of a predication [Recanati]
16350 Two-D semantics is said to help descriptivism of reference deal with singular objects [Recanati]
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]
14705 Do we know apriori how we refer to names and natural kinds, but their modal profiles only a posteriori? [Schroeter]
14715 2D fans defend it for conceptual analysis, for meaning, and for internalist reference [Schroeter]
14716 2D semantics can't respond to contingent apriori claims, since there is no single proposition involved [Schroeter]