Complex Demonstratives qua Singular terms

EROS CORAZZA COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS ABSTRACT. In a recent book, Jeffrey King (King 2001) argues that complex demonstratives, i.e., noun phrases of the form ‘this/that F ’, are not singular terms. As such, they are not devices of direct reference contributing the referent to the proposition expressed. In this essay I challenge King’s position and show how a direct reference view can handle the data he proposes in favor of the quantificational account. I argue that when a complex demonstrative cannot be interpreted as a singular term, it is best understood as a case of deferred reference – in which case it should be viewed as an anaphora inheriting its value from a quantified term – or as an emphatic description. 1. Complex demonstratives, i.e., noun phrases of the form ‘that F’, have received particular attention in recent times. The main reason for this revival is that it is thought that they pose problems to the traditional account of demonstratives as directly referring terms, inaugurated by Kaplan (1977). In that account, a demonstrative expression is viewed as a singular term contributing the object (the content) into what is said, i.e., into the proposition expressed. Kaplan suggests that the linguistic meaning (the character) of a demonstrative (‘this’, ‘that’, ‘she’, etc.), unlike the character of a pure indexical (‘I’, ‘now’, ‘today’, . . . ), together with context (agent, time, place and possible world), is not enough to select a referent. For this reason, demonstrative expressions are often accompanied by a pointing gesture or demonstration and the referent is whatever the demonstration demonstrates. While the reference of a pure indexical is secured by contextual parameters (such as the agent, time and place of the utterance), the reference of a demonstrative is fixed by these parameters plus something else, such as a pointing gesture, ostension or demonstration. More recently, Kaplan (1989) has argued that what is relevant in fixing the reference of a demonstrative is the speaker’s directing intention; the demonstration is a manifestation of this intention. Within this framework, complex demonstratives fall in the category of demonstratives and are taken to be referring terms1 The descriptive material accompanying the demonstrative is viewed along the lines of the demonstration and/or directing intention. As such, it Erkenntnis 59: 263–283, 2003. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. 264 EROS CORAZZA assists in selecting the referent, the propositional constituent. Let us call this the referentialist position. In a recent book, King (2001) puts forward a strong case for thinking that complex demonstratives are not referring terms. They do not contribute a referent to what is said. Instead, they must be treated as quantified expressions like ‘all Fs’, ‘few Fs’, ‘the F’, ‘many Fs’, . . . . The demonstrative in a complex demonstrative is considered to be a determiner (like ‘all’, ‘some’, ‘the’, ‘most’, . . . ) of a quantified noun phrase. Call this position the quantificational view. Although the idea has been suggested before – by Barwise and Cooper (1981) and Neale (1993) – King’s discussion of this phenomenon is the most exhaustive so far. If King is right the direct reference picture, as popularized by Kaplan, is seriously undermined. The category of referring terms is considerably reduced and the referentialist’s story in the remaining cases is threatened. It is possible to argue that simple demonstratives are referring terms while complex demonstratives are quantified expressions, indeed, Lepore and Ludwig (2000) advocate such a position.2 But for those such as myself who favor treating simple and complex demonstratives in a unified manner, King’s arguments have particular bite. King himself is well aware of this. At the end of the book, he urges that simple demonstratives should be treated along with complex demonstratives and not as devices of direct reference. That would leave only pure indexicals and proper names in play within the referentialist picture, and the application to proper names is by no means certain. 2. In this section I shall concentrate on the following three arguments that appear to present the greatest challenge to the referentialist position (see King 2001, Chap. 1). After sketching my position and explained how it can be invoked to explain some of King’s examples (Section 3), I shall deal (Section 4) with the other arguments King proposes in favor of the quantificational account. 2.1. No Demonstration, No Speaker Reference Use One can use a complex demonstrative without being or having been in perceptual contact with the referent. In that case, one does not have a specific individual in mind. One could understand complex demonstratives used this way by assimilating them to definite descriptions used attributively: (1) Igor believes that that student who scored 100 on the exam is a genius COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS (2) 265 That hominid who discovered fire is a genius Following King’s suggestion, utterances of (1) and (2) should be understood as: (1)a. Igor believed that that/the student, whoever s/he is, who scored 100 on the exam is a genius (2)a. That/the hominid, whoever s/he is, who discovered fire is a genius 2.2. The Quantification in Use Complex demonstratives may contain a pronoun bound by a higher quantifier: (3) Every father1 dreads that moment when his1 oldest child leaves home (4) Most avid skiers1 remember that first black diamond run they1 attempted to ski where ‘his’ in (3) is bound by ‘every father’ and ‘they’ in (4) by ‘most avid skiers’. The natural understanding of a complex demonstrative containing a bound pronoun is to view it as a quantified expression. (3) and (4) should thus be treated as follows: (3)a. Every father dreads the/some/all/. . . moment(s) when his oldest child leaves home (4)a. Most avid skiers remember the/all/few/. . . first black diamond run(s) they attempted to ski 2.3. The Narrow Scope Reading Like quantified expressions, some uses of complex demonstratives can have both the wide and narrow scope reading: (5) That professor who brought in the biggest grant in each division will be honored 266 (6) EROS CORAZZA That senator with most seniority on each committee is to be consulted If (5), for instance, continues: “In all, ten professors will be honored”, the complex demonstrative ‘that professor’ has a narrow scope reading. Since in this reading the complex demonstrative is not used to refer to a particular individual, it is hard to reconcile with the referentialist position. Under “the narrow scope reading”, (5) and (6) must be understood along: (5)a. The/some/few/most/. . . professor(s) who brought in the biggest grant in each division will be honored (6)a. The/few/many/no/. . . senator(s) with most seniority on each committee is (are) to be consulted According to King, there is, nonetheless, a substantial difference between complex demonstratives and other quantified expressions. The former, unlike the latter, rely on the speaker’s accompanying intention, for a use of a demonstrative may rest either on the speaker perceptual intention or the speaker attributive (or descriptive) intention. It is for this reason that it makes sense to say, “This book is better than this book” when faced with several books, while it makes no sense to say, “The book is better than the book”. The quantificational account King proposes suggests that the difference boils down to the difference between the determiners such as ‘that’ and ‘this’ and the other determiners (‘the’, ‘few’, ‘many’, ‘all’, . . . ). As the story goes, the semantics of ‘that’ allows speakers’ intentions to supplement the predicative material combined with ‘that’ to yield a quantified phrase. The predicative material restricts the domain of the quantification. ‘F’ in ‘that F’ expresses the property of being F : on top of that, the speaker’s intention may further restrict the domain of quantification. Before going further, it may be worth mentioning that “the quantification in use” and “the narrow scope reading" may not present a knock down argument against the Kaplanian idea that complex demonstrative are rigid designators. One can always adopt Kaplan’s dthat operator and argue that dthat-terms are the formal counterpart of complex demonstratives.3 A dthat-term may contain either a bound variable or a free one; either way, its denotation will depend on the variable assignment. However, the dthat-term is a rigid designator and thus a dthat-term (and a complex demonstrative) will be rigid for each assignment of the variable. A dthat-term may be scope sensitive as well. If a dthat-term or a complex demonstrative contains a quantifier like ‘this boy who drank all the beer’, COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 267 the quantifier ‘all the beer’ may take either narrow or wide scope. Here, too, the complex demonstrative is a rigid designator. In general, however, a dthat-term need not be a singular term. In his “Afterthoughts” Kaplan recognizes that, when he first introduced ‘dthat’, he confused two distinct uses, namely ‘dthat’ as an operator and ‘dthat’ as a demonstrative surrogate. In the former case, ‘dthat’ is better understood as a rigidifier and, as such, the dthat-term becomes a rigid designator without being a directly referential term.4 In the latter case, however, the dthat-term is a singular, directly referential, term. In order to represent complex demonstratives qua singular terms using ‘dthat’, we thus must understand it as a demonstrative surrogate: The operator interpretation is not what I originally intended. The word ‘dthat’ was intended to be a surrogate for a true demonstrative, and the description which completes it was intended to be a surrogate for the completing demonstration. On this interpretation ‘dthat’ is a syntactically complete singular term that requires no syntactical completion by an operand. (A ‘pointing’, being extralinguistic, could hardly be a part of syntax.) The description completes the character of the associated occurrence of ‘dthat’, but makes no contribution to content. . . . ‘Dthat’ is no more an operator than is ‘I’, though neither has a referent unless semantically ‘completed’ by a context in the one case and a demonstration in the other. (Kaplan 1989, p. 581) If the ‘dthat’ of a dthat-term is understood as a demonstrative surrogate, then the dthat-term will be a singular term. If one aims to represent complex demonstratives qua singular terms using Kaplan’s ‘dthat’, one may welcome the picture of complex demonstratives that I propose in the next section.5 3. I now try to sketch a referentialist picture that can be invoked to deal with some of King’s data without endorsing the quantificational position. The way in which I explain away the data, however, does not force one to accept the theory of complex demonstratives I now propose. I endorse a multiple proposition view, i.e., the view that a single utterance may express more than a single proposition. The multiple proposition view I have in mind should also capture the idea that indexicals refer and describe. Perry (1997), following Marti (1995), distinguishes between names (‘London’, ‘Plato’, etc.), indexicals (‘I’, ‘today’, ‘this’, ‘here’, etc.) and descriptions (‘the F ’). Descriptions, Perry argues, denote and describe while names name and refer: Terms refer if they contribute the object they designate, rather than some mode of presentation of it, to official content, so that their official contents are singular propositions about 268 EROS CORAZZA the object designated. Terms describe if they contribute a mode of presentation, a condition on objects, that they incorporate. (Perry 1997, pp. 345–346) Indexicals, on the other hand, are like definite descriptions in that they denote, but like names in that they refer: so indexicals denote and refer. If we take an utterance of ‘you’, for instance, it picks out a given referent (the addressee) and it describes it as the addressee of the utterance. An utterance of ‘today’ picks out the relevant day and describes it as the day of the utterance. Some alleged problems faced by the direct reference view evaporate if one gives up the assumption that an utterance expresses a single proposition.6 I shall show that if one adopts the view that a single utterance may express more than a single proposition, then one can deal with complex demonstratives in an elegant and straightforward way. The view that a single utterance may express/communicate/convey/. . . more than one proposition is not new; it plays a central role, for instance, in the works of Grice and Perry. Perry (1988) distinguishes between the proposition expressed (the official content) and the proposition created (the pure or reflexive truth condition) while Grice distinguishes between a proposition expressed and a proposition implicated. Bach (1999) also proposes a multiple proposition view in order to deal with alleged conventional implicature devices such as ‘even’, ‘too’, ‘despite’, ‘but’, ‘therefore’, etc. and non-restrictive relative clauses. Corazza (2002) applies this view to descriptions that function like proper names, such as ‘The Holy Virgin’, ‘The Beatles’, etc., while Dever (2001) and Corazza (2002a) apply the view to complex demonstratives. Roughly, an utterance containing a complex demonstrative expresses two distinct propositions. An utterance such as “That F is G”, where the complex demonstrative picks out Jon, expresses the proposition that Jon is F and the distinct proposition that Jon is G. The predicative information contained in the nominal part of a complex demonstrative is best understood on the model of information carried by terms appearing within parenthesis or in non-restrictive relative clauses (or in utterances containing appositives). The semantics of an utterance such as “That apple is rotten” should be understood on the model of the semantics of utterances such as “Jane, who just received her degree, will join our company”, “Bush (the president of the USA) is far from popular in Iraq”. In uttering sentences like these, it is likely that the speaker appeals to the information carried by the linguistic material appearing within the parenthesis in order to help the audience to identify the referent. No doubt more should be said about the multiple proposition view and how it applies to complex demonstratives (for a detailed account see Dever 2001 and COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 269 Corazza 2002a). According to the multiple proposition view, an utterance like: (7) That woman with the red hat [indicating Mary] is Jane’s sister will be analyzed along: (7)a. b. That, who is a woman with a red hat, is Jane’s sister That (who is a woman with a red hat) is Jane’s sister (7), like (7a) and (7b), expresses two distinct propositions: the proposition that Mary is a woman with a red hat and the distinct proposition that Mary is Jane’s sister. It is an open question whether (7) is true iff both proposition are true or whether (7) can inherit its truth value from the proposition that Mary is Jane’s sister regardless of the truth value of the proposition that Mary is a woman with a red hat. This issue, though, does not affect my argument against the quantificational account of ‘that’-phrases.7 If this is the right treatment of complex demonstratives the question arises of how it can be applied to deal with King’s first challenge. To this task I now turn. According to “the non demonstration no speaker reference use”, one can use a complex demonstrative without being or having been in perceptual contact with the referent (and thus without having a specific individual in mind). This is, it seems to me, the most challenging criticism the referentialist friend needs to address. If we consider (2) [That hominid who discovered how to start fire is a genius], how can we treat the complex demonstrative within the direct reference framework? One way to accommodate such uses would be to treat them as instances of so-called deferred reference or deferred demonstration (e.g., when one points to Jane’s office door and says “She is not in today” to convey that Jane is not in, or when one points to a Ferrari and says “He must be rich”, intending to convey that the owner of that car must be rich, or again when one points to a footprint and says, “He must have been a giant”). In the first case, the speaker has a specific individual in mind, Jane, while in the second and third case she uses ‘he’ in an “attributive” way. All these cases, though, involve deferred reference. With the case of deferred reference one may express a singular proposition or a general proposition. In the Sue case one expresses the singular proposition having Sue as constituent while in the Ferrari case one expresses a general proposition. The constituent singled out by ‘he’ is not an individual but the condition of being the owner of the Ferrari that the alleged referent must satisfy. The speaker does not refer to the office door or the Ferrari, yet the pronouns ‘she’ and ‘he’ do not seem to be used as quantified terms. So, 270 EROS CORAZZA whatever story one may tell about the treatment of deferred reference, the very same story can be told about “the no demonstration no speaker reference use”. One way to deal with deferred reference is to argue that two distinct propositions are expressed, one of which is entailed or presupposed by the discourse situation.8 When one points to a footprint, one often intends to talk about the individual who left it (but not always: if a bear hunter says “It is fresh”, she is probably intending to refer to the footprint itself, not to the bear that left it). In the paradigmatic case, one “expresses” two propositions: the (presupposed) general proposition that there is a specific individual who left the footprint and the proposition that it is a giant. The value of the pronoun ‘it’ corresponds to the individual, whoever it happens to be, who left the footprint. In cases like these, the pronoun can be viewed as an anaphora, inheriting its reference from a tacit initiator. The same story can be told for (2). This utterance expresses (or presupposes) the proposition that there is a unique hominid who discovered fire and expresses the proposition that that hominid must have been a genius. The complex demonstrative works like an anaphoric pronoun, inheriting its value from the tacit initiator ‘the hominid who discovered fire’. Since it inherits its value from a definite description it will not contribute to the expression of a singular proposition. The fact that in these cases a complex demonstrative does not contribute to the expression of a singular proposition does not militate, though, in favor of the thesis that complex demonstratives are quantified expression. All it proves is that when a complex demonstrative qua anaphoric pronoun inherits its value from a quantified term, say a definite description, it contributes to expressing a general proposition. This parallels the case when a pronoun, say ‘s/he’, inherits its value from a quantified expression, as in the Ferrari example. The main point I am trying to make is that the multiple proposition view enables us to explain how there might be demonstrative uses that do not require perceptual experiences. Such uses can be understood as short to uses of anaphoric pronouns. Like the latter they may contribute in the expression of singular propositions or general propositions depending of the nature of the antecedent they inherit their value from. In “Jon visited us last night. That charming man almost convinced us to buy his old car”, the ‘that’-phrase ‘that charming man’ being anaphoric on ‘Jon’ contributes to the expression of a singular proposition insofar as it inherits its value from the NP ‘Jon’.9 If one pursues this path, however, one assumes that the pronouns used in the deferred reference cases and the complex demonstratives as they appear in “the no demonstration no speaker reference use”, qua anaphors, are cases of cross-sentential anaphora or unbound anaphora. What I just COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 271 said rests on the platitude that during a linguistic interchange lot of information remains unexpressed and is merely tacitly conveyed. Without this phenomenon communication would be, if not impossible, extremely difficult and slow. Thus, the existence of tacit initiators should not come as a surprise. These initiators may be understood to be what is taken for granted during a speech act. If the speaker does not believe that her audience is aware of this presupposed information she would simply express it. The basic idea I have in mind is that during a linguistic exchange many propositions are merely taken for granted. It may also be that nothing in the utterance itself may trigger or bring to salience the presupposed propositions. These presupposed propositions belong to the common background of beliefs, the beliefs the speaker and her audience share and assume they share. If the speaker does not assume that her audience is aware of the presuppositions in place, she can easily express them. Thus the tacit initiator could be expressed by the speaker.10 In terms of the multiple proposition view, an utterance such as ‘That F is G’, uttered demonstrating object o, expresses two singular propositions: that o is F and the distinct proposition that o is G. In the case of no demonstration no speaker reference, an utterance like ‘That F is G’ expresses both the general proposition that there is a (unique) F and the (general) proposition that it is G. One could thus object that, on the account I propose, complex demonstratives may not be singular terms in the case of no demonstration no speaker reference, for such utterances may express general propositions. Moreover, since I advocate the view that in some cases a complex demonstrative contributes to expressing a singular proposition (and thus is a singular term) and in the other cases it may contribute in expressing a general, quantified, proposition (and thus is not a singular term), one can also claim that I commit myself to the view that complex demonstratives are ambiguous expressions. My reaction to the ambiguity objection is that complex demonstratives should be viewed on a par with pronouns. Just as the pronoun ‘s/he’ can have two interpretations, i.e., it can be either a demonstrative or an anaphora, a complex demonstrative can act either as a singular term (and so contributes expressing a singular proposition) or as an anaphoric pronoun linked either to a singular term (and thus contributing to the expression of a singular proposition) or linked to a quantified expression (and thus contributing to the expression of a general proposition). The latter, as we have seen, is the interpretation I propose for “the no demonstrative no speaker reference use” of complex demonstratives. Complex demonstratives, like pronouns, can play two different syntactic roles: they can be referentially independent (i.e., work like demonstratives) or referentially dependent 272 EROS CORAZZA (i.e., work like anaphoric pronouns). The comparison with pronouns also underlines why my proposal can be adopted by the referentialist view. We do not take anaphora in pronouns as a threat to referentialism. Things are no different in the case of “the no demonstration no speaker reference use” of complex demonstratives. In short, I do not see a substantial difference between the treatment of complex demonstratives and of pronouns, as far as deferred reference is concerned. The former, just like the latter, can be interpreted as anaphoric terms inheriting their value either from a singular term or from a quantified NP. Besides, the model of deferred reference applies to “the no demonstration no speaker reference use” of complex demonstratives as well. “The quantification in use” challenge, “Every father dreads that moment when his oldest child leaves home” (where the complex demonstrative contains a bound pronoun), suggests that complex demonstratives must be analyzed as quantified expressions. The problem posed for the referentialist position is that it seems difficult to explain quantification into complex demonstratives under the assumption that they are singular referring terms. In this regard, complex demonstratives seem to display important similarities to quantified expressions. Sentences like these, however, are rather awkward and may be viewed more accurately as idiomatic uses of language. When binding is allowed, such as in (3) and (4), the bound complex demonstrative may often be interpreted as a definite description. In that case, ‘that’ can be understood as a different word – as a pragmatic tool that allows one to emphasize the description. It is something like an emphatic use of the determiner ‘the’. (Dever 2001 dismisses the quantifying-in case this way). My New Shorter Oxford Dictionary actually suggests this interpretation: “often interchangeable with the but usually more emphatic”.11 My understanding of sentences like these is that they constitute the exception rather than the norm. When translated, sentences like these do not usually come out well-formed; the complex demonstrative usually needs to be replaced by a definite description under translation. A literal translation of (3) [Every father dreads that moment when his oldest child leaves home] into French gives us the ungrammatical sentence: (3)a. ∗ Chaque père regrette ce moment lorsque son fils aîné quitte la maison For the translation to be appropriate, the complex demonstrative must be translated by a definite description, in our case ‘le moment’. We would thus have: COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS (3)b. 273 Chaque père regrette le moment lorsque son fils aîné quitte la maison This translation test seems to prove that these cases are rather unusual and that the bound demonstrative is best understood as an emphatic description. A similar story can be told about “the narrow scope reading”: it is unusual for a complex demonstrative to have the narrow scope reading. In these cases as well, the complex demonstrative may be best viewed as an emphatic description. Not all cases of quantifying in, however, can be understood along these lines. In some cases, substituting a ‘that’-phrase with a definite description gives rise to ungrammaticality (see King 2001, pp. 74–76). Consider, for instance: (8) Every professor1 cherishes that first publication of hers1 where the substitution of the complex demonstrative ‘that first publication of hers’ with a definite description gives the ungrammatical sentence: (8)a. ∗ Every professor1 cherishes the first publication of hers1 King’s moral (King 2001, p. 76, note 34) is that the “stylistic variant” does not apply here; the fact that the ‘that’-phrase in (8) cannot be grammatically replaced by a description shows that ‘that’-phrases and definite descriptions work semantically in very different ways. Of course, one need not accept this generalization. All it shows is that the complex demonstrative in (8) cannot be explained away as an emphatic description. It does not rule out the stylistic variant reading as the correct analysis in many cases (e.g., “Every father dreads that moment when his oldest child leaves home”, “Many pop stars treasure that song which made them famous”, . . . ). Different examples may be explained in different ways. What I have said above does not commit me to the view that every case where we quantify into a complex demonstrative can be explained as an emphatic description. I have stressed that these cases are best understood as idiomatic uses of language. Cross-linguistic evidence seems to support this fact. If, for instance, one literally translates (8) into Italian and French, one obtains the ungrammatical: (8)b. c. ∗ ∗ Ogni professore1 valorizza quella sua1 prima pubblicazione Chaque professeur1 estime celle sa1 première publication A correct translation forces us to replace the ‘that’-phrase with a description: (8)d. e. Ogni professore1 valorizza la sua1 prima pubblicazione Chaque professeur1 estime sa1 première publication 274 EROS CORAZZA Cross-linguistic comparisons show that we cannot derive a general moral from examples like these. As soon as we make a cross-linguistic comparison, we realize that we cannot end up with an interesting generalization about quantifying into complex demonstratives. Thus, I maintain that these examples are best viewed as idiomatic uses of language. As such, each case may be understood and analyzed in a quite different way. In favor of this understanding, we can note cases where we quantify into complex demonstratives, even when they clearly involve a demonstration. Lepore and Ludwig argue that in: (9) Each woman in this room1 admires that man she1 see at the podium we can quantify into a complex demonstrative, while it should clearly be understood as involving a singular term: It is easy to see that there can be demonstrative uses of ‘that’ in (9). The speaker may be pointing at one of two men everyone sees at the podium. A true assertion of (9) in the imagined circumstances would clearly involve a demonstration, although a universal quantifier binds a variable inside the complex demonstrative. No puzzle arises about this assertion because it is clear that there is a single man they see whom they all admire. So there cannot be anything semantically amiss with quantifying into complex demonstratives. (Lepore and Ludwig 2000, pp. 219–220). The general moral seems to be that, as far as quantifying into complex demonstratives is concerned, we cannot propose a unified account. Each case or situation may be analyzed in a different way. It is important to note that the examples proposed by King in favor of a quantificational account of complex demonstratives do not affect the direct reference view considering them as singular terms. One could object that the position I end up defending lacks the systematicity of King’s theory. For, to salvage direct reference I have ended up arguing that when complex demonstratives do not contribute to the expression of singular propositions they act either as anaphors bound by a quantified expression (the latter may be a tacit initiator) or constitute idiomatic uses of language. However, systematicity comes at a price.12 I think that the picture I have proposed has the advantage of recognizing the variegated ways ‘that’-phrases can work or, as some would say, the different language games they can enter. The key point is that the picture I have outlined does not force us to give up the intuition that in the paradigmatic case, i.e., when the speaker and her audience are in presence of, and in a perceptive contact with, the relevant referent (this could be labeled the demonstration speaker reference uses to echo King’s no demonstration no speaker reference uses) the complex demonstrative is used as a singular COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 275 term enabling the speaker and her audience to single out the relevant object of discourse. I think that it would seem far less appealing to start from these paradigmatic cases and argue that ‘that’-phrases are not devices of direct reference. From a methodological viewpoint I would claim that the picture I have proposed focuses to begin with on the paradigmatic cases (the demonstration the speaker reference use) and then explains away the non-paradigmatic uses as being either anaphoric or idiomatic. By contrast, King’s theory focuses on the borderline cases and ends up claiming that all uses of ‘that’-phrases are akin to the use of quantifiers. 4. The referentialist position I sketched in the previous section allows us to face three other arguments King proposes in favor of the quantificational account of complex demonstratives. The first concerns the so-called Bach– Peters sentences: (10)a. Every friend of yours1 who studied for it2 passed some math exam2 she1 was dreading b. That friend of yours1 who studied for it2 passed some math exam2 she1 was dreading where (as the subscripts indicate) each pronoun in each NP is interpreted as anaphoric on the other NP. At first sight, it seems that these sentences should be treated on a par and, thus, that the complex demonstrative ‘that friend of yours who studied for it’ must be treated like the uncontroversial quantifier phrase ‘every friend of yours who studied for it’. This is King’s moral. Are we forced to accept this conclusion? One can imagine a situation (similar to the one proposed by Lepore and Ludwig that I discussed in the previous section) in which the complex demonstrative in an utterance of (10b) should be understood as a singular term. Imagine that Jane has three friends, Adam, Sue and Jon who studied for a math exam that they all dreaded; Adam and Sue passed while Jon failed. Adam and Jon attend a party. Mary, pointing to Jon, tells Jane: (9)a. That friend of yours who studied for it passed some math exam he was dreading Pam, who is party to the conversation and knows the three students and their exam results, may well reply (pointing to Adam): 276 EROS CORAZZA (9)b. No, that friend of hers who studied for it passed some math exam he was dreading, and so did another friend who isn’t here tonight. In these cases, the demonstrative is used as a singular term.13 Hence, Bach–Peters sentences like (9) do not necessarily force a quantificational interpretation of complex demonstratives. When the example forces a quantificational interpretation, i.e., when the complex demonstrative is not used to single out a specific individual (as in the situation just imagined), the complex demonstrative can be understood as an emphatic description. To put it in a nutshell, I do not see how a direct reference theorist could accept the view that ’that’-phrases must be given a unified treatment. The examples discussed seem to suggest the opposite view, viz., the view that different uses must be treated in different ways. Thus from the fact that some uses force a quantificational interpretation (i.e., the ‘that’-phrase is understood either as an emphatic description or an anaphora inheriting its value from a quantifier NP) it does not follow that all uses must be so understood. The second argument set out by King rests on VP deletion, a test for whether a NP is a singular term or a quantifier. Hence the grammaticality of: (11)a. Tiger birdied every hole Michael did b. Tiger birdied that hole that Michael did compared with the ungrammaticality of (12) ∗ Copp flunked Holmes, who Jubien did reveals complex demonstratives as akin to quantificational devices rather than singular terms. The basic idea underlying King’s argument rests on the syntactic behavior of ‘that’-phrases. That is to say, on the fact that complex demonstratives, like quantifiers, and unlike singular terms such as proper names, can be moved at the level of logical form (LF), the level of syntactic representations of the properties relevant for semantic interpretation.14 Thus: [O]n such approach to syntax, quantifier phrases and singular referring terms (such as names) are treated differently in the mapping from S-structure to LF. Quantifiers undergo “movement”. whereas referring expressions do not. This being so, whether an expression undergoes movement in the mapping to LF indicates whether it is a quantifier or not. (King 2001, p. 17) COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 277 It is this feature that is supposed to explain the grammaticality of (11a,b) and the ungrammaticality of (12).15 To be honest, I do not know whether singular terms (like proper names) can be moved at the LF level (as Larson and Ludlow (1993), for instance, argue). If they can, King’s argument does not hold. It should be mentioned that in the case of (11b) we have VP deletion in the nominal restriction of the complex demonstrative, for ‘that Michael did’ is a restrictive relative clause. In (12) we do not have comparable deletion.16 The parallel should thus be: (12)a. ∗ Copp flunked Holmes, who that man did which turns out to be ungrammatical as well. Furthermore, even in examples of VP deletion, a complex demonstrative can be used as a singular term. One can easily imagine a situation in which ‘that hole’ in (11b) is used to single out a specific hole. One can point to the relevant hole and utter (11b). The moral, as in the case of quantifying-in, is that we may not have a unified account subsuming all the relevant uses of ‘that’-phrases. In the cases and constructions which force a quantificational interpretation, ‘that’-phrases can be explained as emphatic descriptions. Intra-linguistic comparison seems, once again, to point in this direction. If one literally translates (11b) into Italian, one obtains the ungrammatical: (11)c. ∗ Tiger ha imbucato quel buco che ha Michael A correct translation must replace the complex demonstrative ‘quel buco’ with the description ‘il buco’: (11)d. Tiger ha imbucato il buco che ha Michael It is worth noticing that if the complex demonstrative in (11c) is interpreted as a singular term (e.g., ‘quel buco’ is accompanied by a pointing singling out a specific hole) (11c) would be accepted as grammatical. King’s third argument rests on the fact that quantified phrases exhibit weak crossover effects whilst referring expressions do not. In: (13)a. His mother loves some man b. His mother loves the man with the goatee ‘his’ cannot be interpreted as anaphoric on the quantifier ‘some man’ or the complex demonstrative ‘the man with the goatee’, i.e., we cannot get the following interpretation: (13)c. ∗ His1 mother loves some man1 d. ∗ His1 mother loves the man with the goatee1 278 EROS CORAZZA On the other hand, in: (14) His mother loves John ‘his’ can be interpreted as anaphoric on ‘John’. King’s moral is that these examples militate in favor of the quantificational interpretation of complex demonstratives as well: [I]t is generally held that the explanation as to why one cannot get an anaphoric reading in (13a,b) and sentences like them make essential reference to the fact that a quantifier phrase occurs in object position and, unlike a name, undergoes movement in the mapping to LF. After all, when this is not so, as in (14), we can get the anaphoric reading. (King 2001, pp. 18–19) The same holds for ‘that’-phrases. In: (15) His mother loves that man with the goatee17 ‘his’ cannot be anaphoric on the complex demonstrative ‘that man with the goatee’, i.e., it cannot be interpreted as: (15)a. ∗ His1 mother loves that man with the goatee1 It goes without saying, however, that if the complex demonstrative is interpreted as a referring term not coreferential with ’his’, (15) would be acceptable. We would get the following interpretation: (15)b. His1 mother loves that man with the goatee2 An utterance like this could well express the proposition that Jon’s mother loves Ivan (the man with the goatee). King even recognizes that, in some situations, the following is acceptable: (16) Well, his1 mother loves [pointing] him1 This is so because, according to King, the pronoun ‘him’ (which is the antecedent of the anaphora ‘his’) is a singular term. It seems to me that if (following King) we accept that (16) is grammatical, while (15a) is ungrammatical insofar as ‘his’ cannot be anaphoric on ‘that man with the goatee’, we gain further evidence in favor of the thesis that the complex demonstrative in (15a) goes proxy for an emphatic description. Thus (15a) is equivalent to (13d). This does not prove that complex demonstratives are quantifier terms; all it proves is that the ‘that’-phrase ‘that man with the goatee’ in (15) cannot be understood as a quantifier with the pronoun ‘his’ anaphoric on it. If the complex demonstrative and the pronoun ‘his’ are not COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 279 co-referential, i.e., they are independent singular terms, an utterance like (15) is well formed. Besides, a problem that the quantification account must take into consideration is the fact that complex demonstratives seem to be rigid designators. The referentialist position deals with this easily and elegantly; since complex demonstratives contribute only the referent to the proposition expressed, it is always the individual referred to by the complex demonstrative in the context of utterance which travels to possible worlds (i.e., gets evaluated in other circumstances). If complex demonstratives are not singular terms, however, they do not contribute to expressing singular propositions and, therefore, rigidity cannot be accounted for along Kaplan’s lines: [T]hat phrases instruct us to go back to the original context of utterance and find the individual satisfying certain conditions in that context. Thus the same individual is selected regardless of the circumstance in which the proposition is being evaluated. In this way, the present view captures the rigidity of ‘that’ phrases without holding that they are directly referential. (King 2001, p. 39) King’s suggestion is reminiscent of Kaplan’s characterization of dthat qua rigidifier (to be distinguished from dthat qua demonstrative surrogate). As we saw in Section 2, a dthat-term qua rigidifier is a rigid designator without being a directly referential term, that is, without contributing the referent itself into what is said, the proposition expressed. The obvious problem faced by this interpretation is that all ‘that’-phrases qua quantified expressions are rigid designators, while normal quantifiers are not, in general, rigid. Moreover, if King’s account is correct, a ‘that’-phrase cannot be rigid when a complex demonstrative contains a pronoun bound by a higher order quantifier, as in (3) [Every father1 dreads that moment when his1 oldest child leaves home]. King’s solution relies on the speakers’ intention: whether a ’that’-phrase is rigid or not ultimately rests on the speaker’s intention. If the speaker has a perceptual intention, the complex demonstrative is rigid, while if she has a descriptive intention the complex demonstrative is non-rigid. In cases of no demonstration no speaker reference uses, for instance, the complex demonstratives is non-rigid: Because the speaker intends to talk about b and is using the predicate ‘F ’ to pick out b in the context of utterance in such a case, the speaker intends to express a proposition that tracks b across possible worlds and times, regardless of its possession of the property expressed by ‘F ’ at those worlds and times. . . . a speaker uses a ‘that’ phrase but has a descriptive intention instead of a perceptual one. . . . since the speaker has no individual in mind in such a case, he does not intend to express a proposition that tracks a particular thing across worlds and times regardless of its possession of the property expressed by ‘F ’. (King 2001, pp. 46–47) 280 EROS CORAZZA It goes without saying that the position I have defended can easily account for rigidity. If complex demonstratives are singular terms, then they are automatically rigid designators as well. When a complex demonstrative cannot be interpreted as a singular term, then it must be interpreted either as an emphatic description or as an anaphora inheriting its value from a quantified expression. In these cases the complex demonstrative qua quantified expression may not be a rigid designator. It is as simple as that. 5. I hope that I have been able to show how the direct reference view can meet King’s challenges. The picture I have proposed maintains that complex demonstratives are singular terms, which contribute their referent to the proposition expressed. Yet, I recognize that some uses of complex demonstratives receive a quantificational interpretation. In these cases they are best understood as emphatic descriptions. In many (the majority of) cases, however, a complex demonstrative simply works as a singular term. When the speaker and his audience do not perceive the referent, a complex demonstrative often works on the model of deferred reference. I interpreted deferred demonstratives (including deferred complex demonstratives) as anaphoric pronouns inheriting their value from an initiator, which can be tacit. The initiator may be a quantified or a singular term. On this model (which I explained using the multiple proposition view, but need not be so explained) the “no demonstration no speaker reference use” of complex demonstratives can easily be accounted for without having to commit ourselves, pace King, to the view that complex demonstratives are quantifier terms. The examples I discuss also show that a simple, single, model may not be invoked to explain the variegated uses of ‘that’-phrases. In particular, as the translation test shows, we cannot generalize and subsume under the quantificational treatment all the alleged uses of complex demonstratives that cannot be interpreted as singular terms. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For detailed comments on previous versions I would like to thank Jeff King. Comments by Paul Noordhof, Mark Whitsey and two referees for Erkenntnis have also been useful. This paper was written whilst on sabbatical (spring and autumn semesters 2002) supported by an AHRB (Arts and Humanities Research Board) research leave scheme. COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 281 NOTES 1 For simplicity sake in this paper I do not distinguish between complex demonstratives of the form ‘this/that F’ and complex demonstrative like ‘these/those F’. The latter are not, strictly speaking, singular terms. Yet they are referring expressions contributing the referents into the proposition expressed. Henceforth by singular term I merely mean a referring expression contributing the referent(s) into what is said, i.e., a term contributing in the expression of a singular proposition. 2 To be precise, Lepore and Ludwig (2000) argue that ‘that F ’ should be analyzed as: “the x: x is that & x is F ” where the description must be understood according to the Russellian theory. A sentence like “that F is G” will be analyzed as: “(the x: x is that & x is F ) is G”. In this analysis, the demonstrative ‘that’ plays a role in the nominal of the restricted quantifier. 3 I discussed dthat-terms and how they can be understood as singular terms in Corazza (2002). 4 “Complete dthat-terms would be rigid, in fact obstinately rigid. In this case the proposition would not carry the individual itself into a possible world but rather would carry instructions to run back home and get the individual who there satisfies certain specifications. The complete dthat-term would then be a rigid description which induces a complex ‘representation’ of the referent into the content” (Kaplan 1989, p. 580). 5 More on rigidity and the quantificational account of complex demonstratives in Section 4. 6 As I have already said, I am not claiming that the multiple proposition view I endorse is the only answer to King’s criticism of direct reference. One can explain away (at least some of) King’s worries without committing oneself to the multiple proposition picture. 7 In Corazza (2002a), I defend the view – contra Bach (1998), Dever (2001) and Neale (1999) – that an utterance such as (7a, b) can be true/false regardless of the truth value of the proposition that Mary is a woman with a red hat. I label the latter proposition the background proposition and the main proposition the official proposition. 8 It goes without saying, though, that one may tell another story about deferred reference. One can claim, for instance, that the referent of a deferred demonstrative is the individual, if any, raised to salience. In that case one can refer to something or to someone without the latter being present. The pointing gesture, for instance, may help in raising an object to salience without committing the speaker to the demonstrated object. One can have an object in mind and convey the relevant proposition with the object raised to salience as a constituent. On this account of deferred reference, the demonstrative is a singular term. In other cases one may not have a specific individual in mind, in which case the demonstrative goes proxy for an emphatic description, the speaker does not convey a singular proposition and hence the demonstrative is not a singular term. If one endorses this view of deferred reference, one meets King’s first objection to the referentialist position in a straightforward way. Be that as it may, the multiple proposition view, which is independently motivated (viz. it does not rest merely on the phenomenon of complex demonstratives) meets King’s “the no demonstration no speaker reference use” objection in an elegant way, and can also accommodate different situations. The multiple proposition view also helps us handle the phenomenon of deferred reference in an elegant way. 9 In Corazza (2004), it is argued that this model applies to some uses of so-called pure indexicals (‘now’, ‘here’, ‘today’, and the like) as well. In cases such as “In March 1914, Jane visited her mother, now an old woman”, ‘now’ is an anaphoric pronoun inheriting its 282 EROS CORAZZA reference from ‘March 1914’. I also show how a pure indexical qua anaphoric pronoun can inherit its reference from a tacit initiator (e.g., the historical present such as ‘today/this morning’ in “Today/this morning Hitler’s troops invaded Paris”, which inherit their value form a tacit temporal initiator). 10 For a more detailed account of a conception appealing to tacit initiators, see Corazza (2004). 11 The distinction between paradigmatic and non-paradigmatic cases is far from straightforward, and I do not have a clear-cut criterion with which to distinguish between them. A referee for this journal suggested that there may be something else going on in these quantifying-in cases. The suggestion was that the nominal part of the complex demonstrative does not mention an object but a kind of object. If this were the case, however, I do not see how it could be captured within a semantic account. I think that the best, and most intuitive, response is to treat these cases as emphatic descriptions. As we shall now see, the translation test seems to support this interpretation. 12 It is worth stressing that, in order to account for the different ways in which complex demonstratives can be understood when we quantify into them, King is forced to appeal to different speaker’s intentions, i.e., to either the speaker’s perceptual intention or the speaker’s attributive (or descriptive) intention. An analysis of (9) within King’s framework would appeal to the speaker’s perceptual intention, i.e., the complex demonstrative ’that man whom she sees at the podium’ is completed by the speaker’s perceptual intention. 13 Thanks to a referee for suggesting this example to me. 14 LF aims to capture the syntactic structures relevant to a semantic interpretation (see May 1985). 15 See King (2001, p. 175, note 16). 16 Thanks to a referee for pointing this out to me. 17 “It seems clear to me that the pronoun ‘his’ cannot be interpreted as anaphoric on ‘that man with the goatee’. Surely it is striking and suggestive that ‘that’ phrases cluster with quantifier phrases and not with referring expressions with respect to weak crossover effects. So again here we have some syntactic evidence that ‘that’ phrases are quantificational and not directly referential” (King 2001, p. 19). REFERENCES Barwise, J. and R. Cooper: 1981, ‘Generalized Quantifiers and Natural Language’, Linguistics and Philosophy 4, 159–219. Bach, K.: 1989, ‘The Myth of Conventional Implicature’, Linguistics and Philosophy 22, 327–366. Corazza, E.: 2002, ‘Description-Names’, Journal of Philosophical Logic 31, 313–326. Corazza, E.: 2002a, ‘ ‘She’ and ‘He’: Politically Correct Pronouns’, Philosophical Studies 111(2), 173–196. Corazza, E.: 2004, ‘On the Alleged Ambiguity of ‘Now’ and ‘Here’ ’, Synthese 138, forthcoming. Dever, J.: 2001, ‘Complex Demonstratives’, Linguistics and Philosophy 24, 271–330. Kaplan, D.: 1977, ‘Demonstratives’, in Almog et al. (eds.), 1989, Themes from Kaplan, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 481–563. Kaplan, D.: 1989, ‘Afterthoughts’, in Almog et al. (eds.), Themes from Kaplan, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 565–614. COMPLEX DEMONSTRATIVES QUA SINGULAR TERMS 283 King, J.: 2001, Complex Demonstratives: A Quantificational Account, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. Larson, L. and P. Ludlow: 1993, ‘Interpreted Logical Form’, Synthese 95, 305–555. Lepore, E. and K. Ludwig: 2000, ‘The Semantics and Pragmatics of Complex Demonstratives’, Mind 109, 199–240. Marti, G.: 1995, ‘The Essence of Genuine Reference’, Journal of Philosophical Logic 24, 275–289. May, R.: 1985, Logical Form. Its Structure and Derivation, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. Neale, S.: 1993, ‘Terms Limits’, Philosophical Perspectives 7, 89–124. Neale, S.: 1999, ‘Coloring and Composition’, in K. Murasugi and R. Stainton (eds.), Philosophy and Linguistics, Westview Press, Boulder, CO, pp. 35–82. Perry, J.: 1988, ‘Cognitive Significance and New Theories of Reference’, Noûs 22, 1–18. Perry, J.: 1997, ‘Indexicals and Demonstratives’, in R. Hale and C. Wright (eds.), Companion to the Philosophy of Language, Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 586–612. Department of Philosophy The University of Nottingham University Park Nottingham, NG9 2EJ UK E-mail: eros.corazza@nottingham.ac.uk Manuscript submitted 21 August 2002 Final version received 3 March 2003