scholarly journals Frege’s Puzzle and Cognitive Relationism: An Essay on Mental Files and Coordination

Disputatio ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (56) ◽  
pp. 1-40
Author(s):  
Paolo Bonardi
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Content ◽  
Semantic Relation ◽  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Mental Files ◽  
Frege's Puzzle ◽  
Modes Of Presentation

AbstractThis paper will critically examine two solutions to Frege’s puzzle: the Millian-Russellian solution proposed by Salmon and Braun, which invokes non-semantic modes of presentation (guises, ways of believing or the like); and Fine’s relationalist solution, which appeals to semantic coordination. Special attention will be devoted to discussing the conception of modes of presentation as mental files and to elucidating the nature of coordination. A third solution to Frege’s puzzle will be explored which, like Salmon’s and Braun’s, adopts the Millian-Russellian semantics but, like Fine’s, involves coordination instead of modes of presentation; however, coordination will not be conceived as a semantic relation but as a cognitive and subjective relation, which provides no contribution to semantic content. This novel Millian-Russellian account involving cognitive coordination will be labelled cognitive relationism.

Cognition and recognition

2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 213-235
Author(s):  
Nathan Salmon
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Content ◽  
The Other ◽  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Kit Fine ◽  
Strict Criterion ◽  
Frege's Puzzle ◽  
Multiple Occurrence ◽  
Semantic Relationism

Abstract Expressions are synonymous if they have the same semantic content. Complex expressions are synonymously isomorphic in Alonzo Church’s sense if one is obtainable from the other by a sequence of alphabetic changes of bound variables or replacements of component expressions by syntactically simple synonyms. Synonymous isomorphism provides a very strict criterion for synonymy of sentences. Several eminent philosophers of language hold that synonymous isomorphism is not strict enough. These philosophers hold that ‘Greeks prefer Greeks’ and ‘Greeks prefer Hellenes’ express different propositions even if they are synonymously isomorphic. They hold that the very recurrence (multiple occurrence) of ‘Greeks’ contributes to the proposition expressed something that indicates the very recurrence in question. Kit Fine argues that this thesis, which he labels semantic relationism calls for a radically new conception of semantics. I have argued that the relevant phenomenon is wholly pragmatic, entirely non-semantic. Here I supplement the case with a new argument. No cognition without recognition—or almost none. With this observation, standard Millianism has sufficient resources to confront Frege’s puzzle and related problems without injecting pragmatic phenomena where they do not belong.

scholarly journals A Puzzle about Logical Analysis

Philosophia ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Rinner
Keyword(s):  
Complete Solution ◽  
Definite Descriptions ◽  
Logical Analysis ◽  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Main Thesis ◽  
Frege's Puzzle ◽  
Belief Ascriptions

AbstractIn this paper, I will present a puzzle for logical analyses, such as Russell’s analysis of definite descriptions and Recanati’s analysis of ‘that’-clauses. I will argue that together with Kripke’s disquotational principles connecting sincere assent and belief such non-trivial logical analyses lead to contradictions. Following this, I will compare the puzzle about logical analysis with Frege’s puzzle about belief ascriptions. We will see that although the two puzzles do have similarities, the solutions to Frege’s puzzle cannot be applied mutatis mutandis to the puzzle about logical analysis. Hence, to say it with Kripke, the main thesis of this paper is that the puzzle is a puzzle. A complete solution to the puzzle promises a better understanding of both logical analyses and belief ascriptions.

Frege's Puzzle.

1987 ◽  
Vol 96 (3) ◽  
pp. 455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graeme Forbes ◽  
Nathan Salmon
Keyword(s):  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Frege's Puzzle

Kripke on Epistemic and Metaphysical Possibility

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Soames
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Singular Proposition ◽  
Metaphysical Possibility ◽  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Frege's Puzzle ◽  
Necessary A Posteriori ◽  
Errors And Confusions

This chapter discusses Saul Kripke’s treatment of the necessary a posteriori and concomitant distinction between epistemic and metaphysical possibility. It extracts the enduring lessons of his treatment of these matters and disentangles them from errors and confusions that mar some of his most important discussions. It argues that there are two Kripkean routes to the necessary a posteriori—one correct and philosophically far-reaching; the other incorrect, philosophically misleading, and the source of damaging errors that persist to this day. It connects two false principles involved in the second, unsuccessful, route to the necessary a posteriori with the plausible and potentially correct idea that believing a singular proposition that o is F always involves also believing a richer more descriptively informative proposition in which some further property plays a role in the agent’s thoughts about o. It explains why this idea will not save the failed second route to the necessary a posteriori and suggests that it may help reconcile Kripke’s insights with the lessons of Frege’s puzzle.

scholarly journals Patterns, noise, and Beliefs

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-51
Author(s):  
Lajos Ludovic Brons
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Gettier Cases ◽  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Daniel Dennett ◽  
Belief Reports ◽  
Frege's Puzzle ◽  
Principle Of Charity

In “Real Patterns” Daniel Dennett developed an argument about the reality of beliefs on the basis of an analogy with patterns and noise. Here I develop Dennett’s analogy into an argument for descriptivism, the view that belief reports do no specify belief contents but merely describe what someone believes, and show that this view is also supported by empirical evidence. No description can do justice to the richness and specificity or “noisiness” of what someone believes, and the same belief can be described by different sentences or propositions (which is illustrated by Dennett’s analogy, some Gettier cases, and Frege’s puzzle), but in some contexts some of these competing descriptions are misleading or even false. Faithful (or truthful) description must be guided by a principle (or principles) related to the principle of charity: belief descriptions should not attribute irrationality to the believer or have other kinds of “deviant” implications.

Why Definite Descriptions Really are Referring Terms

2005 ◽  
Vol 68 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-79
Author(s):  
John-Michael Kuczynski
Keyword(s):  
Definite Descriptions ◽  
Referring Expressions ◽  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Complex Demonstratives ◽  
Frege's Puzzle ◽  
King Of France

According to Russell, '... the phi ...' means: 'exactly one object has phi and ... that object ...'. Strawson pointed out that, if somebody asked how many kings of France there were, it would be deeply inappropriate to respond by saying '... the king of France ...': the respondent appears to be presupposing the very thing that, under the circumstances, he ought to be asserting. But it would seem that if Russell's theory were correct, the respondent would be asserting exactly what he was asked to assert. So Russell's theory wrongly predicts that the respondent's answer will be appropriate. Russellians deal with this by saying that this anti-Russellian intuition embodies our reaction not to what is semantically encoded in the respondent's words, but to what is pragmatically imparted by them. So Russell's theory is correct: the fact that it appears wrong is due to the distorting effects of pragmatics. In this paper I show that pragmatic phenomena cannot possibly be responsible for the just mentioned anti-Russellian intuition. No matter how hard we try to put the blame on pragmatics, Russell's theory still falls short. It follows that defi nite descriptions really are what they appear to be: referring expressions. I argue that defi nite descriptions are complex demonstratives; and, within that framework, I deal with cases where defi nite descriptions appear to be functioning non-referentially. I also solve Frege's puzzle within the framework defi ned by my treatment of defi nite descriptions taken in conjunction with Kripke-Kaplan semantics.

scholarly journals Does Semantic Relationism Solve Frege’s Puzzle?

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bryan Pickel ◽  
Brian Rabern
Keyword(s):  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Frege's Puzzle ◽  
Semantic Relationism

A Solution to Frege's Puzzle

1993 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 17 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Bealer
Keyword(s):  
Frege’S Puzzle ◽  
Frege's Puzzle
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