Name-bearing, reference, and circularity

Aidan Gray

doi:10.1007/s11098-013-0262-z

Abstract

Proponents of the predicate view of names explain the reference of an occurrence of a name N by invoking the property of bearing N. They avoid the charge that this view involves a vicious circularity by claiming that bearing N is not itself to be understood in terms of the reference of actual or possible occurrences of N. I argue that this approach is fundamentally mistaken. The phenomenon of 'reference transfer' shows that an individual can come to bear a name in virtue of the referential practices of a group of speakers. I develop a picture of name-bearing which captures this fact by treating the extension of name as a function of the way that extension is represented in the presuppositions of groups of speakers. I show that though there is a form of circularity inherent in this approach, it is not vicious circularity.

Highlights

Proponents of the predicate view of names explain the reference of an occurrence of a name N by invoking the property of bearing N
The semantic component of the theory holds that proper names are predicates - that is, they express properties of individuals
PV holds that proper names express metalinguistic properties

Summary

Circularity

Anyone who has recently advocated for PV has felt the need to respond to an influential argument in [Kripke, 1980]. Note that the proposal Kripke is attacking here is not precisely PV He seems to have in mind a view which treats names as simple referential terms whose reference is fixed by a uniquely identifying descriptive condition (“the man that I call ‘Glunk’ ”). If we hold to Kripke’s thought that name-bearing facts are determined by name-reference facts we are faced with circularity. It is no more essential to the property of bearing a certain name that one be referred to by that name than it is essential to the property of having a certain social security number that one be referred to by that number [Bach, 2002, 83] Both writers are explicitly responding to the circularity worry. One can use the predicate Alfred to refer to someone who bears that name for example, by employing a definite description of the form thenull Alfred. The standard picture of name-bearing associated with PV cannot capture these cases precisely because they reveal a dimension in which facts about name-bearing depend on facts about reference

Name-bearing according to the Predicate View

Name-bearing and presupposition

Circularity redux

Groups of speakers

Summing up