Indeterminate Identity, Contingent Identity and Abelardian Predicates

Abstract

Evans's reasoning provides, in essence, a conclusive argument for the view that indeterminacy in identity statements must be regarded as due to semantic indeterminacy and not as due to indeterminacy in the world. But there are various reasons why some philosophers are reluctant to endorse this conclusion. In what follows I wish to consider one such reason, namely, the evident availability, if Evans's argument is accepted, of an apparently parallel argument against the possibility of contingent identity. I shall be arguing that the appearance of parallelism is illusory, a fact which can be made evident by attention to the linguistic phenomenon of (what I wish to call) Abelardian predicates.