Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Actualism and Thisness', 'Letters to Jourdain' and 'A Theory of Conditionals'

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7 ideas

5. Theory of Logic / F. Referring in Logic / 1. Naming / a. Names
8447 In 'Etna is higher than Vesuvius' the whole of Etna, including all the lava, can't be the reference [Frege]
     Full Idea: The reference of 'Etna' cannot be Mount Etna itself, because each piece of frozen lava which is part of Mount Etna would then also be part of the thought that Etna is higher than Vesuvius.
     From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.43)
     A reaction: This seems to be a straight challenge to Kripke's baptismal account of reference. I think I side with Kripke. Frege is allergic to psychological accounts, but the mind only has the capacity to think of the aspect of Etna that is relevant.
5. Theory of Logic / F. Referring in Logic / 1. Naming / b. Names as descriptive
8448 Any object can have many different names, each with a distinct sense [Frege]
     Full Idea: An object can be determined in different ways, and every one of these ways of determining it can give rise to a special name, and these different names then have different senses.
     From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.44)
     A reaction: This seems right. No name is an entirely neutral designator. Imagine asking a death-camp survivor their name, and they give you their prison number. Sense clearly intrudes into names. But picking out the object is what really matters.
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / d. Individuation by haecceity
16463 Adams says actual things have haecceities, but not things that only might exist [Adams,RM, by Stalnaker]
     Full Idea: Adams favours haecceitism about actual things but no haecceities for things that might exist but don't.
     From: report of Robert Merrihew Adams (Actualism and Thisness [1981]) by Robert C. Stalnaker - Mere Possibilities 4.2
     A reaction: This contrasts with Plantinga, who proposes necessary essences for everything, even for what might exist. Plantinga sounds crazy to me, Adams merely interesting but not too plausible.
10. Modality / B. Possibility / 8. Conditionals / a. Conditionals
14286 In nearby worlds where A is true, 'if A,B' is true or false if B is true or false [Stalnaker]
     Full Idea: Consider a possible world in which A is true and otherwise differs minimally from the actual world. 'If A, then B' is true (false) just in case B is true (false) in that possible world.
     From: Robert C. Stalnaker (A Theory of Conditionals [1968], p.34), quoted by Dorothy Edgington - Conditionals (Stanf) 4.1
     A reaction: This is the first proposal to give a possible worlds semantics for conditional statements. Edgington observes that worlds which are nearby for me may not be nearby for you.
10. Modality / E. Possible worlds / 2. Nature of Possible Worlds / a. Nature of possible worlds
14285 A possible world is the ontological analogue of hypothetical beliefs [Stalnaker]
     Full Idea: A possible world is the ontological analogue of a stock of hypothetical beliefs.
     From: Robert C. Stalnaker (A Theory of Conditionals [1968], p.34), quoted by Dorothy Edgington - Conditionals (Stanf) 4.1
     A reaction: Sounds neat and persuasive. What is the ontological analogue of a stock of hopes? Heaven!
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 7. Meaning Holism / a. Sentence meaning
8446 We understand new propositions by constructing their sense from the words [Frege]
     Full Idea: The possibility of our understanding propositions which we have never heard before rests on the fact that we construct the sense of a proposition out of parts that correspond to words.
     From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.43)
     A reaction: This is the classic statement of the principle of compositionality, which seems to me so obviously correct that I cannot understand anyone opposing it. Which comes first, the thought or the word, may be a futile debate.
19. Language / B. Reference / 4. Descriptive Reference / a. Sense and reference
8449 Senses can't be subjective, because propositions would be private, and disagreement impossible [Frege]
     Full Idea: If the sense of a name was subjective, then the proposition and the thought would be subjective; the thought one man connects with this proposition would be different from that of another man. One man could not then contradict another.
     From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.44)
     A reaction: This is an implicit argument for the identity of 'proposition' and 'thought'. This argument resembles Plato's argument for universals (Idea 223). See also Kant on existence as a predicate (Idea 4475). But people do misunderstand one another.