Re-defining “Meaning”: Defending Semantic Internalism over Externalism

Abstract

This chapter considers the objection that conventionalism’s picture of meaning is predicated on a debunked Wittgensteinian semantics. It thus considers the dominant approach to semantics in the philosophy of language, semantic externalism. This approach holds that the meaning of a referring expression (a kind term) is the kind to which it refers, where a kind is a language-independent essence. The essence of a kind term is thought to be the “internal nature” of the objects falling under its extension. Moreover, this internal nature is thought to be discoverable by the relevant science. Wittgenstein’s conventionalism, by contrast, provides an internalist rather than an externalist semantics because it posits that grammar is arbitrary (a matter of convention) and thus not responsible to the facts. If this is correct, then there is no essence of racism for science to discover. The author argues that Kripke and Putnam’s seminal arguments for externalism can be used to support conventionalism; hence, they do not demonstrate the plausibility of externalist semantics over internalist semantics. He concludes that Wittgensteinian semantics should not be rejected on the basis of standard arguments for externalism.