display all the ideas for this combination of texts
2 ideas
23506 | Names are primitive, and cannot be analysed [Wittgenstein] |
Full Idea: A name cannot be dissected any further by means of a definition: it is a primitive sign. | |
From: Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921], 3.26) | |
A reaction: All logicians and analytic philosophers seem to agree on this. He means terms which pick out specific objects. |
7089 | A name is primitive, and its meaning is the object [Wittgenstein] |
Full Idea: A name means an object; an object is its meaning. ...A name cannot be dissected further by means of a definition: it is a primitive sign. | |
From: Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921], 3.203/3.26) | |
A reaction: This is the optimistic view of names, that they are the point at which language plugs into the world (Russell preferred demonstratives for that job). Kripke's baptismal view of names has the same aspiration. |