All human beings understand the behaviors of others as causal results of their mental states. Phi... more All human beings understand the behaviors of others as causal results of their mental states. Philosophers call this ability folk psychology and developmental researchers call it theory of mind (ToM). My dissertation concerns how this reasoning works and how it is acquired. First, I develop and expand a theory of how folk psychology develops in childhood. This is the Perceptual Access Reasoning, or PAR theory of the Fabricius lab. Contrary to the two views dominant in the field, I argue that ToM (belief reasoning or BR) is acquired around 6 years of age after undergoing two preliminary cognitive stages, reality reasoning (RR) and perceptual access reasoning (PAR). Neither of the first two satges of ToM development involve an understanding of mental representation. Evidence for the PAR hypothesis comes from the failure of 4and 5-year-olds on a false belief task which includes a third, irrelevant, alternative; their failure on true belief tasks; and their failure on no belief tasks. O...
"Discoveries happen in math too, and Fregeanism is really about discovery."-Jason Stanl... more "Discoveries happen in math too, and Fregeanism is really about discovery."-Jason Stanley11. IntroductionSainsbury and Tye (2012) argue for their Originalist theory of concepts on the basis that it solves seven well-known puzzles. These puzzles are traditionally seen as puzzles about language, and in particular puzzles concerning semantic content. Sainsbury and Tye argue that they have analogues as applied to the content of thoughts. In this paper I argue that their solution of Frege's Identity Puzzle (Frege 1892) is implausible, because Originalism fails to explain the difference in cognitive significance which Frege took to be the puzzling explanandum. In the next section I briefly review Frege's Puzzle before explaining the putative solution of Sainsbury and Tye in Section 3. The bulk of the paper is Section 4, where I lay out in detail the reason for finding the Originalist solution unsatisfying. In concluding I briefly put the project of this paper in perspective of Sainsbury and Tye's book, and point out a take-home message of the book which remains even if Originalism fails.2. Frege's PuzzleAlthough Frege's puzzle of identity (1892) is familiar, a brief reminder may be important for understanding where Sainsbury and Tye go wrong in their solution. True identity statements of the form 'a = a' are trivial and uninformative, yet true identity statements of the form 'a = b' (where 'b' is a name which refers to the same object as 'a') can be significant and informative. The names 'Phosphorous' and 'Hesperus' were names given to the planet Venus by the Ancient Babylonians, who thought incorrectly that the astronomical bodies which they saw in the morning sky and in the evening sky were two different objects (at least according to philosophical legend).2 This results in the following statements for illustration:(1) Hesperus is Hesperus.(2) Hesperus is Phosphorous.If the meaning of a name is nothing over and above its referent,3 then (1) and (2) have the same meaning, since the names 'Hesperus' and 'Phosphorous' designate the same object. However, (1) and (2) "have different cognitive values," as Frege puts it (p. 78). For instance, someone could believe (1) but not believe (2), as presumably the Babylonians did. Furthermore, (1) is trivial in the sense that it doesn't add to our knowledge, but (2) was an important discovery about the world. Frege's solution was to divide semantic content (which he called "thoughts") into two parts: Besides the referent ("bedeutung") of a name or other expression, there is also the sense ("sinn"), "wherein the mode of presentation [of the referent] is contained" (p. 57).4Sainsbury and Tye note that this puzzle about sentences and their constituent names has an analogue for thoughts and their constituent concepts (as Fodor and others have previously realized). Putting the puzzle in these terms, they sum it up thus (p. 4):The concept HESPERUS would seem to represent just what the concept PHOSPHOROUS represents. So how can there be a difference between the thought that Hesperus is Hesperus (trivial) and the thought that Hesperus is Phosphorous (an important empirical discovery)?3. The Originalist SolutionSainsbury and Tye present some arguments against Frege's solution to the puzzle (22-26), most of which are familiar from Kripke (1980). For instance, one argument is that differences in knowledge concerning e.g. Aristotle would result in idiosyncrasies of sense associated with the name 'Aristotle,' but we all presumably share the same concept ARISTOTLE when we think thoughts about him (Sainsbury & Tye 2012, p. 17, 24). Since these arguments are well-known and I am sympathetic to them, I won't rehearse them here, but instead turn the focus to their positive view. The key Fregean principle which they reject is that cognitive differences such as that between (1) and (2) are to be explained by a difference in semantic content (p. …
ABSTRACT.The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than... more ABSTRACT.The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more glamorous cousin-viz. the problem of vacuous or empty names-but perhaps a careful examination of the former may shed some light on the latter, as well as on aesthetics more generally. In this paper I argue that proper names occurring in fiction directly refer to the actual persons, places and things. I offer a theory for consideration which handles Kroon's "Real-Fictional Problem," which is a puzzle concerning direct reference accounts of such names. I also present some reasons why this theory is preferable to the highly influential account in Lewis's "Truth in Fiction"-the modal realist solution to Kroon's puzzle which is originally suggested in the closing of Kroon's "Make-Believe and Fictional Reference." I present an objection to the modal realist solution involving anaphora. Next, I examine French's Lewisian account from "Places of Fiction," and argue that my suggestion better accords with our intuitions about fiction, and also that it is more applicable to other areas of aesthetics.Keywords: semantics, names, fiction, philosophy of language, FredKroon, Peter French, David Lewis, modal realism1. IntroductionAlthough some think that Kripke definitively rang the death knell for description theories of names,1 Fred Kroon raises a puzzle about direct reference theories of genuine names occurring in fictional contexts.2 The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more glamorous cousin-viz. the problem of vacuous or empty names- but perhaps a careful examination of the former may shed some light on the latter, as well as on aesthetics more generally. In this paper I argue that a treatment inspired by but importantly distinct from Frege's3 can solve these kinds of puzzles while still avoiding Kripke's criticisms. I also argue that genuine names in fiction refer to the actual objects in our world, thereby avoiding an intuitive objection to any Lewis-type account of genuine names in fiction, such as Kroon's original solution and the treatment offered by Peter French.4The paper has seven sections. In the next section I briefly introduce some useful terminology. In the third, I discuss Kroon's "Real-Fictional Problem," which he presents as an objection to any direct reference theory of names in fiction. In the fourth, I offer a solution to the Kroon objection which is compatible with a direct reference view. In the fifth, I argue that French's treatment conflicts with the intuition that genuine proper names in fiction refer to the actual people and places, and present arguments against the modal realist solution to the Real-Fictional Problem based upon anaphoric evidence, the meaning of fictional works, and ordinary language use. In the sixth, I consider some difficulties for my view and sketch a solution. Finally, I consider how my proposal might be applied to problems of reference and truth in the philosophy of fiction, and in aesthetics and the philosophy of language more generally.2. Genuine and Fictional Proper NamesTwo distinct sorts of proper names occur in many fictions. Take the Woody Allen film Annie Hall as an example of a fictional work. There are proper names such as Alvy Singer, the name of the main character, and names such as New York, the name of the city in which the main character lives and identifies with. Intuitively, there is a fundamental difference between names such as Alvy Singer, which the writer invents, and names such as New York with which most viewers are familiar and encounter in non-fictional contexts. It would be useful to have a technical term for these two distinct categories of proper names, but I have yet to encounter one in the literature. Thus, in this paper I shall call names of the first variety, which are invented by an artist, fictional proper names, and names of the second sort, which are existent prior to the work of fiction and uncontroversially have referents which exist in the real world when used in a non-fictional context, genuine proper names. …
In contrast with the two dominant views in Theory of Mind development, the Perceptual Access Reas... more In contrast with the two dominant views in Theory of Mind development, the Perceptual Access Reasoning hypothesis of Fabricius and colleagues is that children don’t understand the mental state of belief until around six years of age. Evidence for this includes data that many children ages 4 and 5, who pass the standard 2-location false belief task, nonetheless fail the true belief task, and often fail a 3-location false belief task by choosing the irrelevant option. These findings can be explained by the PAR hypothesis but pose challenges for the two dominant views. I argue against an alternate hypothesis which is proposed by Anika Fiebich in a recent paper. According to Fiebich, PAR is not a distinct transitional stage in children's theory of mind development, but is a fast and frugal System 1 heuristic which fades once children become fluent in social reasoning. However, I point out a number of problems with Fiebich's proposal and argue for the superiority of the PAR hypothesis. I also present five reasons to be skeptical about the findings of Perner and Horn which purportedly show that 4- and 5-year-olds can pass the 3-location false belief task when suitably modified. This is a further difficulty for Fiebich’s proposal, since she relies on these findings in her fluency theory. Finally, I sketch a dual systems theory of mind account based upon the PAR hypothesis which is different from Fiebich’s.
False belief tasks have enjoyed a monopoly in the research on children’s development of a theory ... more False belief tasks have enjoyed a monopoly in the research on children’s development of a theory of mind. They have been granted this status because they promise to deliver an unambiguous assessment of children’s understanding of the representational nature of mental states. Their poor cousins, true belief tasks, have been relegated to occasional service as control tasks. That this is their only role has been due to the universal assumption that correct answers on true belief tasks are inherently ambiguous regarding the level of the child’s understanding of mental states. It has also been due to the universal assumption that nothing in the child’s developing theory of mind would lead to systematically incorrect answers on true belief tasks. We review new findings that 4- and 5-year-olds do err, systematically and profoundly, on the true belief versions of all the extant belief tasks. This reveals an intermediate level of understanding in the development of children’s theory of mind. Researchers have been unaware of this intermediate level because it produces correct answers in false belief tasks. A simple two-task battery – one true belief task and one false belief task – is sufficient to remove the ambiguity from each task. The new findings show that children do not acquire an understanding of beliefs, and hence a representational theory of mind, until after 6 years of age, or two years later than most developmental psychologists have concluded. This raises the question of how to interpret other new findings that infants are able to pass false belief tasks. We review these new infant studies, as well as recent studies on chimpanzees, in light of older children’s failure on true belief tasks, and end with some speculation about how all of these new findings might be reconciled.
In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist ... more In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist theory of concepts on the basis that it solves seven well-known puzzles. These puzzles are traditionally seen as puzzles about language, and in particular puzzles concerning semantic content. Sainsbury and Tye argue that they have analogues as applied to the content of thoughts. In this paper I argue that their solution of Frege’s Identity Puzzle (from “On Sense and Reference”) is implausible, because Originalism fails to explain the difference in cognitive significance which Frege took to be the puzzling explanandum.
The semantics of racial slurs has recently become a locus of debate amongst philosophers. While e... more The semantics of racial slurs has recently become a locus of debate amongst philosophers. While everyone agrees that slurs are offensive, there is disagreement about the linguistic mechanism responsible for this offensiveness. This paper places the debate about racial slurs into the context of a larger issue concerning the interface between semantics and pragmatics, and argues that even on minimalist assumptions, the offensiveness of slur words is more plausibly due to their semantic content rather than any pragmatic mechanism (including conventional implicature). Finally, I note that slurs make a good test case for expanding our semantic theories beyond the truth conditional tradition of Frege, which will be necessary in order to broaden the types of expressions handled by semantic theories.
In this paper I adopt Kaplan’s framework for distinguishing between descriptive and expressive co... more In this paper I adopt Kaplan’s framework for distinguishing between descriptive and expressive content. Racial slurs are an especially difficult challenge for truth-conditional semantics because of their projection behaviors. That is to say, the offensive content of slurs “scopes out” of logical operators. I argue that racial slurs express contempt and lack descriptive content, so that many sentences containing slurs are not truth apt. My theory accounts for the intuition of the ordinary speaker who refuses to assent to the truth of a sentence containing a slur, but accepts the same statement made using a neutral counterpart of that slur. Weaknesses of rival theories (including those of Williamson, Hom, and Richard) are briefly discussed.
The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more... more The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more glamorous cousin—viz. the problem of vacuous or empty names—but perhaps a careful examination of the former may shed some light on the latter, as well as on aesthetics more generally. In this paper I argue that proper names occurring in fiction directly refer to the actual persons, places and things. I offer a theory for consideration which handles Kroon’s “Real-Fictional Problem,” which is a puzzle concerning direct reference accounts of such names. I also present some reasons why this theory is preferable to the highly influential account in Lewis’s “Truth in Fiction”— the modal realist solution to Kroon’s puzzle which is originally suggested in the closing of Kroon’s “Make-Believe and Fictional Reference.” I present an objection to the modal realist solution involving anaphora. Next, I examine French’s Lewisian account from “Places of Fiction,” and argue that my suggestion better accords with our intuitions about fiction, and also that it is more applicable to other areas of aesthetics.
In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist ... more In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist theory of concepts on the basis that it solves seven well-known puzzles. These puzzles are traditionally seen as puzzles about language, and in particular puzzles concerning semantic content. Sainsbury and Tye argue that they have analogues as applied to the content of thoughts. In this paper I argue that their putative solution to Frege’s Identity Puzzle (from “On Sense and Reference”) is implausible, because Originalism fails to explain the difference in cognitive significance which Frege took to be the puzzling explanandum.
All human beings understand the behaviors of others as causal results of their mental states. Phi... more All human beings understand the behaviors of others as causal results of their mental states. Philosophers call this ability folk psychology and developmental researchers call it theory of mind (ToM). My dissertation concerns how this reasoning works and how it is acquired. First, I develop and expand a theory of how folk psychology develops in childhood. This is the Perceptual Access Reasoning, or PAR theory of the Fabricius lab. Contrary to the two views dominant in the field, I argue that ToM (belief reasoning or BR) is acquired around 6 years of age after undergoing two preliminary cognitive stages, reality reasoning (RR) and perceptual access reasoning (PAR). Neither of the first two satges of ToM development involve an understanding of mental representation. Evidence for the PAR hypothesis comes from the failure of 4and 5-year-olds on a false belief task which includes a third, irrelevant, alternative; their failure on true belief tasks; and their failure on no belief tasks. O...
"Discoveries happen in math too, and Fregeanism is really about discovery."-Jason Stanl... more "Discoveries happen in math too, and Fregeanism is really about discovery."-Jason Stanley11. IntroductionSainsbury and Tye (2012) argue for their Originalist theory of concepts on the basis that it solves seven well-known puzzles. These puzzles are traditionally seen as puzzles about language, and in particular puzzles concerning semantic content. Sainsbury and Tye argue that they have analogues as applied to the content of thoughts. In this paper I argue that their solution of Frege's Identity Puzzle (Frege 1892) is implausible, because Originalism fails to explain the difference in cognitive significance which Frege took to be the puzzling explanandum. In the next section I briefly review Frege's Puzzle before explaining the putative solution of Sainsbury and Tye in Section 3. The bulk of the paper is Section 4, where I lay out in detail the reason for finding the Originalist solution unsatisfying. In concluding I briefly put the project of this paper in perspective of Sainsbury and Tye's book, and point out a take-home message of the book which remains even if Originalism fails.2. Frege's PuzzleAlthough Frege's puzzle of identity (1892) is familiar, a brief reminder may be important for understanding where Sainsbury and Tye go wrong in their solution. True identity statements of the form 'a = a' are trivial and uninformative, yet true identity statements of the form 'a = b' (where 'b' is a name which refers to the same object as 'a') can be significant and informative. The names 'Phosphorous' and 'Hesperus' were names given to the planet Venus by the Ancient Babylonians, who thought incorrectly that the astronomical bodies which they saw in the morning sky and in the evening sky were two different objects (at least according to philosophical legend).2 This results in the following statements for illustration:(1) Hesperus is Hesperus.(2) Hesperus is Phosphorous.If the meaning of a name is nothing over and above its referent,3 then (1) and (2) have the same meaning, since the names 'Hesperus' and 'Phosphorous' designate the same object. However, (1) and (2) "have different cognitive values," as Frege puts it (p. 78). For instance, someone could believe (1) but not believe (2), as presumably the Babylonians did. Furthermore, (1) is trivial in the sense that it doesn't add to our knowledge, but (2) was an important discovery about the world. Frege's solution was to divide semantic content (which he called "thoughts") into two parts: Besides the referent ("bedeutung") of a name or other expression, there is also the sense ("sinn"), "wherein the mode of presentation [of the referent] is contained" (p. 57).4Sainsbury and Tye note that this puzzle about sentences and their constituent names has an analogue for thoughts and their constituent concepts (as Fodor and others have previously realized). Putting the puzzle in these terms, they sum it up thus (p. 4):The concept HESPERUS would seem to represent just what the concept PHOSPHOROUS represents. So how can there be a difference between the thought that Hesperus is Hesperus (trivial) and the thought that Hesperus is Phosphorous (an important empirical discovery)?3. The Originalist SolutionSainsbury and Tye present some arguments against Frege's solution to the puzzle (22-26), most of which are familiar from Kripke (1980). For instance, one argument is that differences in knowledge concerning e.g. Aristotle would result in idiosyncrasies of sense associated with the name 'Aristotle,' but we all presumably share the same concept ARISTOTLE when we think thoughts about him (Sainsbury & Tye 2012, p. 17, 24). Since these arguments are well-known and I am sympathetic to them, I won't rehearse them here, but instead turn the focus to their positive view. The key Fregean principle which they reject is that cognitive differences such as that between (1) and (2) are to be explained by a difference in semantic content (p. …
ABSTRACT.The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than... more ABSTRACT.The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more glamorous cousin-viz. the problem of vacuous or empty names-but perhaps a careful examination of the former may shed some light on the latter, as well as on aesthetics more generally. In this paper I argue that proper names occurring in fiction directly refer to the actual persons, places and things. I offer a theory for consideration which handles Kroon's "Real-Fictional Problem," which is a puzzle concerning direct reference accounts of such names. I also present some reasons why this theory is preferable to the highly influential account in Lewis's "Truth in Fiction"-the modal realist solution to Kroon's puzzle which is originally suggested in the closing of Kroon's "Make-Believe and Fictional Reference." I present an objection to the modal realist solution involving anaphora. Next, I examine French's Lewisian account from "Places of Fiction," and argue that my suggestion better accords with our intuitions about fiction, and also that it is more applicable to other areas of aesthetics.Keywords: semantics, names, fiction, philosophy of language, FredKroon, Peter French, David Lewis, modal realism1. IntroductionAlthough some think that Kripke definitively rang the death knell for description theories of names,1 Fred Kroon raises a puzzle about direct reference theories of genuine names occurring in fictional contexts.2 The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more glamorous cousin-viz. the problem of vacuous or empty names- but perhaps a careful examination of the former may shed some light on the latter, as well as on aesthetics more generally. In this paper I argue that a treatment inspired by but importantly distinct from Frege's3 can solve these kinds of puzzles while still avoiding Kripke's criticisms. I also argue that genuine names in fiction refer to the actual objects in our world, thereby avoiding an intuitive objection to any Lewis-type account of genuine names in fiction, such as Kroon's original solution and the treatment offered by Peter French.4The paper has seven sections. In the next section I briefly introduce some useful terminology. In the third, I discuss Kroon's "Real-Fictional Problem," which he presents as an objection to any direct reference theory of names in fiction. In the fourth, I offer a solution to the Kroon objection which is compatible with a direct reference view. In the fifth, I argue that French's treatment conflicts with the intuition that genuine proper names in fiction refer to the actual people and places, and present arguments against the modal realist solution to the Real-Fictional Problem based upon anaphoric evidence, the meaning of fictional works, and ordinary language use. In the sixth, I consider some difficulties for my view and sketch a solution. Finally, I consider how my proposal might be applied to problems of reference and truth in the philosophy of fiction, and in aesthetics and the philosophy of language more generally.2. Genuine and Fictional Proper NamesTwo distinct sorts of proper names occur in many fictions. Take the Woody Allen film Annie Hall as an example of a fictional work. There are proper names such as Alvy Singer, the name of the main character, and names such as New York, the name of the city in which the main character lives and identifies with. Intuitively, there is a fundamental difference between names such as Alvy Singer, which the writer invents, and names such as New York with which most viewers are familiar and encounter in non-fictional contexts. It would be useful to have a technical term for these two distinct categories of proper names, but I have yet to encounter one in the literature. Thus, in this paper I shall call names of the first variety, which are invented by an artist, fictional proper names, and names of the second sort, which are existent prior to the work of fiction and uncontroversially have referents which exist in the real world when used in a non-fictional context, genuine proper names. …
In contrast with the two dominant views in Theory of Mind development, the Perceptual Access Reas... more In contrast with the two dominant views in Theory of Mind development, the Perceptual Access Reasoning hypothesis of Fabricius and colleagues is that children don’t understand the mental state of belief until around six years of age. Evidence for this includes data that many children ages 4 and 5, who pass the standard 2-location false belief task, nonetheless fail the true belief task, and often fail a 3-location false belief task by choosing the irrelevant option. These findings can be explained by the PAR hypothesis but pose challenges for the two dominant views. I argue against an alternate hypothesis which is proposed by Anika Fiebich in a recent paper. According to Fiebich, PAR is not a distinct transitional stage in children's theory of mind development, but is a fast and frugal System 1 heuristic which fades once children become fluent in social reasoning. However, I point out a number of problems with Fiebich's proposal and argue for the superiority of the PAR hypothesis. I also present five reasons to be skeptical about the findings of Perner and Horn which purportedly show that 4- and 5-year-olds can pass the 3-location false belief task when suitably modified. This is a further difficulty for Fiebich’s proposal, since she relies on these findings in her fluency theory. Finally, I sketch a dual systems theory of mind account based upon the PAR hypothesis which is different from Fiebich’s.
False belief tasks have enjoyed a monopoly in the research on children’s development of a theory ... more False belief tasks have enjoyed a monopoly in the research on children’s development of a theory of mind. They have been granted this status because they promise to deliver an unambiguous assessment of children’s understanding of the representational nature of mental states. Their poor cousins, true belief tasks, have been relegated to occasional service as control tasks. That this is their only role has been due to the universal assumption that correct answers on true belief tasks are inherently ambiguous regarding the level of the child’s understanding of mental states. It has also been due to the universal assumption that nothing in the child’s developing theory of mind would lead to systematically incorrect answers on true belief tasks. We review new findings that 4- and 5-year-olds do err, systematically and profoundly, on the true belief versions of all the extant belief tasks. This reveals an intermediate level of understanding in the development of children’s theory of mind. Researchers have been unaware of this intermediate level because it produces correct answers in false belief tasks. A simple two-task battery – one true belief task and one false belief task – is sufficient to remove the ambiguity from each task. The new findings show that children do not acquire an understanding of beliefs, and hence a representational theory of mind, until after 6 years of age, or two years later than most developmental psychologists have concluded. This raises the question of how to interpret other new findings that infants are able to pass false belief tasks. We review these new infant studies, as well as recent studies on chimpanzees, in light of older children’s failure on true belief tasks, and end with some speculation about how all of these new findings might be reconciled.
In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist ... more In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist theory of concepts on the basis that it solves seven well-known puzzles. These puzzles are traditionally seen as puzzles about language, and in particular puzzles concerning semantic content. Sainsbury and Tye argue that they have analogues as applied to the content of thoughts. In this paper I argue that their solution of Frege’s Identity Puzzle (from “On Sense and Reference”) is implausible, because Originalism fails to explain the difference in cognitive significance which Frege took to be the puzzling explanandum.
The semantics of racial slurs has recently become a locus of debate amongst philosophers. While e... more The semantics of racial slurs has recently become a locus of debate amongst philosophers. While everyone agrees that slurs are offensive, there is disagreement about the linguistic mechanism responsible for this offensiveness. This paper places the debate about racial slurs into the context of a larger issue concerning the interface between semantics and pragmatics, and argues that even on minimalist assumptions, the offensiveness of slur words is more plausibly due to their semantic content rather than any pragmatic mechanism (including conventional implicature). Finally, I note that slurs make a good test case for expanding our semantic theories beyond the truth conditional tradition of Frege, which will be necessary in order to broaden the types of expressions handled by semantic theories.
In this paper I adopt Kaplan’s framework for distinguishing between descriptive and expressive co... more In this paper I adopt Kaplan’s framework for distinguishing between descriptive and expressive content. Racial slurs are an especially difficult challenge for truth-conditional semantics because of their projection behaviors. That is to say, the offensive content of slurs “scopes out” of logical operators. I argue that racial slurs express contempt and lack descriptive content, so that many sentences containing slurs are not truth apt. My theory accounts for the intuition of the ordinary speaker who refuses to assent to the truth of a sentence containing a slur, but accepts the same statement made using a neutral counterpart of that slur. Weaknesses of rival theories (including those of Williamson, Hom, and Richard) are briefly discussed.
The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more... more The problem of genuine names occurring in fictions has garnered much less attention than its more glamorous cousin—viz. the problem of vacuous or empty names—but perhaps a careful examination of the former may shed some light on the latter, as well as on aesthetics more generally. In this paper I argue that proper names occurring in fiction directly refer to the actual persons, places and things. I offer a theory for consideration which handles Kroon’s “Real-Fictional Problem,” which is a puzzle concerning direct reference accounts of such names. I also present some reasons why this theory is preferable to the highly influential account in Lewis’s “Truth in Fiction”— the modal realist solution to Kroon’s puzzle which is originally suggested in the closing of Kroon’s “Make-Believe and Fictional Reference.” I present an objection to the modal realist solution involving anaphora. Next, I examine French’s Lewisian account from “Places of Fiction,” and argue that my suggestion better accords with our intuitions about fiction, and also that it is more applicable to other areas of aesthetics.
In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist ... more In Seven Puzzles of Thought and How to Solve Them, Sainsbury and Tye argue for their Originalist theory of concepts on the basis that it solves seven well-known puzzles. These puzzles are traditionally seen as puzzles about language, and in particular puzzles concerning semantic content. Sainsbury and Tye argue that they have analogues as applied to the content of thoughts. In this paper I argue that their putative solution to Frege’s Identity Puzzle (from “On Sense and Reference”) is implausible, because Originalism fails to explain the difference in cognitive significance which Frege took to be the puzzling explanandum.
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