Devitt Singular Terms PDF

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Singular TermsAuthor(s): Michael DevittSource: The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 71, No. 7 (Apr. 18, 1974), pp. 183-205Published by: Journal of Philosophy, Inc.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2025347.

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THE JOURNALOF PHILOSOPHYVOLUME LXXI, NO. 7, APRIL I8, 1974~~~~~~ * -+ -

SINGULAR TERMS *T HE mainproblemngiving he emanticsfproper amesis that of explainingthenature of the link betweennameand object in virtueof which the formerdesignatesthelatter.' From Frege and Russell throughto Strawsonand Searle,the solution has been sought n the descriptions f theobject thatusersof the name associate with the name. Saul Kripkehas shownthat all such sense-theories f namesare mistaken.They are mis-taken not merely n detailsbut in fundamentals. e has also indi-* Earlier draftsof thispaper were givenat theAustralianNational Universityand the University f Sydney n October, 1972. It has benefitedfrom commentsmade on those occasions. Also, it has benefitedfrommany other comments,especiallythose made by HartryField.1I use the term designate' to express the relationshipbetween any definitesingular-term oken and its object, and also that between the person who pro-duiced that token and the object (but see the qualificationsat the end of secs. 5and 7). I have no special fondnessforthe term,but it seems more apt thall th-leother available ordinary semantic terms, refer' and 'deniote'.

Ordinary language provides us with veryfew words to express the relation-shipsbetween words and the world (reflecting, resumably, he lack of interest nsemantics n ordinary ife). All of themhave very wide uses. So, in startingonscientificemantics,we have available to us only a meager vocabularyfor mark-ing the many distinctions hatwe may findappropriate. For example, the linksbetween proper name and object, definite descriptionand object, and demon-strative nd object are all very different,nd we might well use differentermsfor them.Also, we might use different erms for the relationship between theuser of these singular terms and the objects. However, we can manage wellenough here with the one term, designate'.Nothing hinges on this terminologi-cal question. In doing semanticswe are not analyzing ordinary usage. Weare concernedwith the nature of the relationships themselves,whatever theyare called. Thus with a proper name, we are concernedwith the nature of acertainrelationshipit has to just one object (whichwe might ordinarily say isits bearer, the object it refers o, the object it designates, etc.). The rela-tionshipin question is picked out by its crucial bearing on the truthvalue ofsentences ontainingthename.There is a further iscuission f usage in sec. 6.

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I84 T HTHE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYcated wherethe truth f the matter ies, namelyn a causal theoryof propernames.2This will be the central oncern f the paper.

In part I shall develop the causal theory, onfiningmy attentionto nonemptynames in purely referential osition. In. part II Ishall first onsiderdefinite escriptions, rguing that a distinctionrecently rawn by Donnellan4 is to be explained in terms f causallinks to objectssimilarto thoserevealed n part fornames.Second,I shall draw and explain a similar distinctionfor demonstrativesand personal pronouns.Making use of thesedistinctions, shall re-turnto the discussion f propernames n part iI.I1. The central dea of the causal theory f propernames s thatourpresentuses of a name, say Aristotle', esignate the famousGreekphilosopherAristotle, ot n virtue f the various thingswe (rightly)believe true of him, but in virtue of a causal network tretchingback from our uses to the firstuses of the name to designateAristotle.Our presentuses of a name borrow theirreference romearlier uses. It is this social mechanism hat enables us all to desig-nate the same thingby a name.

This central idea makes our presentuses of a name causallydependenton earlier usesof it.These causal links do not, however,take us to the object. In virtueof what do the first ses of a namedesignatea certainobject?We can see, perhaps,how we are de-pendent on our ancestors,but how did they manage?Other questionsoccur to us. What is the nature of this causalnetwork? ow did itbeginand howdid itgrow?Whathasmycausalconnection oAristotle ottodo withmy present ct ofdesignating2 Namingand Necessity, n D. Davidson and G. Harman, ds.,Semanticsof Natural Language (Dordrecht: eidel; New York: Humanities, 972),pp.253-555. first eard Kripke's iewsat Harvard n Fall 1967. As a resultdeveloped causal theoryfproper ames nmyPh.D. thesis, he SemanticsofProper Names: A Causal Theory,HarvardUniversity,972.Kripke's aper hasmuch ncommon ithhis 1967 ectures,ut goesbeyond hemncertain espects.One or twoofthesedevelopmentsre alongsimilar ines to those n mythesis,whichwas written eforeKripke's aperwas available.The present aper islargely rawn romhapteri ofthethesis.Some imilar riticismsf sense heoriesre tobe foundn Keith . Donnellan,ProperNames nd Identifyingescriptions,nDavidson nd Harman, p. cit.,pp.356-379.8I use name(s)' s short orproper ame(s)'.Nameswithinn opaquecontext,nd empty ames, othrequire pecialtreat-ment.4 Referencend Definite escriptions, hilosophical eview,Lxxv,3 (July1966): 281-304,hereafter,Donnellan1966 ; and PuttingHumptyDumptyTogetherAgain, bid.,LxXVII, 2 (April1968):203-215,hereafterDonnellan1968.



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SINGULAR TERMS I85him?Could a use of a name be causally inked in the appropriateway to morethan one object?2. First Usesof a ProperNamne.A paradigm ituationfornaming sone in which a name is given to a previously nnamed object in aface-to-faceonfrontation t a naming ceremony. The sort ofceremonyhat eaps to mindhere is a christeningeremony r thelaunchingof a ship. Mostly,however, uch formaland elaborateproceduresmerely ivereligious nd public expression o what hasalready been established nformallynd more privately.The object n the paradigm s likely obe a humbleone,and so weshall take such a case to illustrate namingceremony.Thinkingabout names has not been helped by limitingattention to thefamous and thegrand.) Considerthe case of our late cat. We ac-quired her as a kitten.My wifesaid, Let us call her 'Nana' afterZola's courtesan. agreed.Thus Nana was named.This is thetypicalwayfora name to be bestowed, ut thereareothers.We shall discussthese in section9.What happened to thosepresent t the namingof Nana? Theyperceived the ceremony, singat least theireyes and ears. To per-ceive something s to be causally affected y it. As a result of theeffectthad on them, heywere n a positiontouse the name Nana'later to designatethe cat. What theygained at the ceremony, tseems appropriateto say,was an ability to designate Nana by'Nana'. 5Let us expand thisstory little, onsideringmy situationat thenaming. gainedthe abilityfrom erceiving hecomplexeventthatconstituted he naming ceremony. saw Nana. I saw myNvife.heardmy wife's uggestion. was aware of agreeing. knewwhichobjectshe was suggesting name for.6As a resultof thecausal inter-action at that ceremony mong my wife,Nana, and myself, ninteraction n which Nana occupied a certainplace (that of anobject beingnamed), I gained my ability.

5 In order to gain this ability theymust already have several other abilities.To gain the ability to use this name, theymust alreadyhave the ability to usenames in general. And theymust realize that a name can be bestowed on anobject by a ceremonyof the sort witnessed.This requires, inter alia, that theyhave the abilityto use 'her' to designate objects (see fn. 6).6Clearly the role of 'her' in my wife's remark is important here. It wasbecause it designatedNana that the name was bestowedon her at thisceremony.We discuss the role ofpersonalpronounsin sec. 7. Foreshadowingthatdiscussion,we can saynow that her' designatedthe cat because of the place shehad in thecausal explanation of mywife'sutterance.My wife might have used a definitedescription (e.g., 'our cat') instead of apronoun to pick out Nana. See sec. 5 fordiscussion of this.



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i86 THE JOURNALOF PHILOSOPHYA few minutes later I exercisedmy ability: I said Nana ishungry. hat first se ofthenamedesignatedNana. How? It desig-

nated her, because it was in factproducedby an abilitythataroseout of the above ceremonyn which she had a certainplace. Inotherwords, t was because Nana had that special place in thecausal explanationof myutterance hat the name designatedher.The central dea of the causal theorywas thatpresentuses of aname are causally inked to first ses.We see now that first ses arecausally inked to theobject.7Our account restson talk of abilities to designateobjects byname. What is suchan ability?We cannotoffer reduction, utwecan point toward one. As materialistswe expect the advance ofscience,particularly europhysiology,o show us that t is a certainsortof stateof the centralnervoussystem.t is a statewhich isbrought bout in a languageuserbyperceptionof a namingcere-mony (and in other ways to be described) and which is apt toproduce (in part) certainsortsof utterances, iz.,utterances singthe name in question. It is such states,whatevertheyare, thatlargely onstitute helinks betweennames and theirobjects.8We shall saythatunderlying he use of a name is a causal chaingrounded n theobject thename designates. he chain underlyingmyfirst se of Nana' beginswithNana at hernamingceremony;trunsthroughmyperception fthatceremony; rom henon it ismyabilitythusgained to use 'Nana' to designateher.3. Later Uses ofa ProperName. Two ofus gained our abilities todesignateNana by her name at the namingceremony.All others,directly r indirectly,orrowtheirreference rom hese two.Many gain theabilitydirectly rom ne ofthetwo. might ntro-duce themto the cat: (i) She is called 'Nana', or (ii) This isNana. This ceremony laystherole forthemthattheearliernam-ing ceremonyplayed forme. Their perceptionof Nana in thatintroductionwill mean thatunderlying heir ateruses of 'Nana'will be causal chainsgrounded n her.I mightpass on the ability n Nana's absence: (iii) Our cat iscalled 'Nana', or (iv) Nana is our cat. An abilitythus gainedwould also be causallygrounded n Nana, althoughthisis not soapparent forNana is absent). n thefirst lace, in usingormention-ing the name 'Nana', I have exercisedmyabilitywhich is causally

7 In sec. 6 we shall considersome apparent exceptions.8 Can we relate these states to nonlinguisticbehavior? I think we can relatethem to pointing,but that is another story which we shall not attempthere.



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SINGULAR TERMS I87groundedin Nana. The person addressedhearsmyremark.Thiscausally inks himthroughmy abilityto Nana. In the secondplace,wemustconsider he role of our cat'. So farwe havenotconsidered(save in note 6) the role of theothersingulartermsused to desig-nateNana at thetimeabilitiesare gained.There was,forexample,mywife'suse of 'her' in thenamingceremony,my use of 'she' in(i), 'this' in (ii), and now 'our cat' in (iii) and (iv). Such singulartermshave an important ole in causallygrounding he ability todesignateby name in the object.We must set aside showing this,however, ntil we have discussedtheseterms n part I.9

There is one other mportantway I mightpass on the ability:might se thename n an ordinary redication. or example, mightsay, v) Nana is hiding. Someone who hearsthis s in a positionto borrowhis reference romme.10 f he does, he gains an abilitythat s causallygrounded n Nana via the ability exercised n mak-ing theremark.We have seen how those present t a namingceremony an passon the ability to designate n object by itsname. There are manyusersof a namewhoneitherwere at thenamingceremony orhavecome to theiruse from nyonewho was at it. We are all in thissituationwith Cicero'.Consideragain the case of Nana. Those who gained the namefromthe two of us presentat the naming ceremonywere thenin asgood a positiontopass it on as wewere.And theypass it on insimilar ways.People are told, The Devitts'cat is called 'Nana',or Nana is an unusuallypatterned at, and thereby ain the ap-propriate bility.Their lateruses of thename designateNana be-causeshe is in facttheobjectat the base ofthecausal chainsunder-lyingthoseuses,chains thatrun through everalpeople's abilities.And so the chainscontinue:people acquire and use the name longafterNana is withus.

9 Had Nana another name known to the auditor, I could of course pass on'Nana' byusing it.10Sense-theories equiremuch more extensiveknowledgeforsomeone to use aname properly.What we primarilyreject in rejectingthese theories is this in-sistence on knowledge: the link between name and object is not mediated bydescriptions associated with the name which are true of just that one object.However, we need to go further:we do not require that a user of a name haveany substantial set of beliefs involving the name (whether true or false). Andnow we seem to be going even further: we are requiring scarcely any beliefs.Perhaps this goes a little beyond our ordinary intuitions.Precisely where weordinarilydraw the line is unclear, although it is clear that we do not requiremany beliefs. n the lightof the causal theory here seems no reason to reject acase like the one discussed seealso fn.36,below).



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i88 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPY-IYUnder each of our uses ofa namelies a causal chain. These causalchains are linked together nd formthe cansal networ-kor the

name.So far we have considered nlythose uses of a name which passit on. In fact,most uses of a name are to an audience thatalreadyhas it. Each of theseuses reinforcesn a member f the audience theability he has with thename. It establishes urther ausal linkagesbetweenhim and theobject. Underlying person'suse of a namemay therefore e manycausal chains all groundedin the object:theremaybe a causal network nderlying is use. The over-allnet-workforthe name is theunion of all such individual networks.It is a commonplace hat person n a positionto pick up a namemay fail to do so: he may fail to pay attention t an introduction;the requiredability o designate heobject is not acquired. Further,a personwho had theuse of a name may lose it; the abilityfadesthrough ack of exercise.114. AmbiguousProperNames. So far I have ignored, s writers nproper names are prone to, the factthat most proper nameshavemore than one bearer; they are ambiguous. The ambiguityof'Nana' was clear from he start, or t was Zola's use of it that edto its being bestowedon our cat.And there re many namesmuchmore ambiguous than 'Nana': consider John',for example. Weneed to extend our discussion to take account of this fact ofambiguity.12Which objectdoes a name designate? t is natural to say that itdesignates he object the speakerhad in mind or meant. This wasan insight f sense-theorists.'3learlywhat we need then s a satis-factorynalysisof thisvague talk.With such an analysis n hand,the solution to our problemof ambiguitywould be in sight: aspeakerdesignatedone object and not anotherby 'John',becausehe had it inmind.In general,one has an object in mind in virtueof a causal con-nection betweenone's stateofmind and theobject.With the help

11 This loss of ability is a failureof memory.For a sense theory,what is for-gotten s the required associated descriptions.For the causal theory he inabilityto produce descriptions usually associated with a name is evidence for loss ofability with the name, but does not constitute t.

12 Many philosophers have felt that ambiguities n names are removed by thecontextof use, by which is meant the context external to the speaker'smind. Ihave criticized this view, claiming that the context is only the guide to anunderlyingreality,not the reality tself; see my Semantics and the AmbiguityofProper Names, forthcoming.13 See particularly, . F. Strawson, ndividuals (London: Methuen, 1959), p. 182.



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SINGULAR TERMS I89of this,we are in the positionto incorporate he insightof sense-theorists nto our causal theoryby giving the followingroughanalysisofhavingan object in mindin usinga name (meaninganobjectby name):14

Foranyx,y,andz, x hady in mind nuttering token fthenametype (xmeant nuttering token fthename ype ) if andonlyfx hadan ability odesignate byz and that bilitywasexercisedntheproductionfthat oken f .What bearingdoes thishave on theproblemof theambiguity fnames?Take the name type John'. It is probably the case thatmost of us can designateabout thirty ifferent eople with thisname.Those who can each have thesamenumberofdistinct bili-ties nvolving hename,causallybased on thatnumberof objects.When theyutter thename having a certainperson n mind,thereis (normally)one and only one of theseabilitiesexercised n theproductionof the token.Which object a personhas in mind de-pendson whichabilityhe in fact xercises.We can sayroughly lso thata name tokendesignates n object

ifand only fthespeakerhad the object in mind meanttheobject)in utteringhe token.Whydo we qualifyour claimshere ( roughly, normally )?Be-cause thereare a numberof cases that throwdoubt on themasthey tand.These are caseswhere thingsgo wrong fora speaker.We shalldiscussthem n section10.More thanone ability to use a certainnamemay be involved nthe causal explanation of an utteranceeven thoughonly one isexercised.Consi-der,or example, my earlier-mentionedtterance,Nana is hungry. Although exercisedmyabilityto designate urcat in saying this,myabilityto designateZola's courtesanby thename (setting side here any problemsof such talk about emptynames)certainly ad somie ausal role in myutterance: twaspartlybecause of thatabilitythatour cat was given her name. The ut-terance,however,was about thecat,not thecourtesan, ecause theabilityused to produceit arose from namingceremonynvolvingthecat; we are not concernedwith the causal explanationof thatceremony.Each timewe heara nameused,we must, n understandingt,as-sociate it with an ability (unless we forma new ability on thestrengthf it). It is possible to do thiswrongly nd hence to mis-

14 uch ocutions an be construedpaquely, o thatone canmeanTully butnot mean Cicero.Our concerns with the transparentonistrual.



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I90 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYunderstand he remark.Misunderstandings re commonwith veryambiguous names like 'John'. We shall consider the consequencesofthem ater in section 10). As a resultof manyremarks sing thename type 'John', we acquire many beliefs concerningvariouspeople ofthatname. The beliefs oncerning ifferenteople are,insome sense, stored eparatelywith theirrespective bilities.We shall return to the discussionof propernames in part iii.

1U5. Donnellan's Distinction.We have claimed thatnames designatetheirobjects because theyare causally inked to them.Can we sayanything imilarabout definite escriptions? t first ight t seemsnot: a definite escription esignates he object it describes.15 ow-ever, nvestigation f a recent distinctionmade by Keith Donnel-lan 16 suggests hatthis s too hasty.Donnellan distinguishes wo uses of definitedescriptions, nattributive se and a referential se:

A speakerwhouses definiteescriptionttributivelyn an assertionstatesomethingboutwhoever r whatevers the o-and-so. speakerwho usesa definiteescriptioneferentiallyn an assertion,n theotherhand,usesthedescriptiono enable his audience o pickoutwhom r whathe is talkingboutand states omethingbout thatperson r thing1966, . 285).

Donnellan bringsout his distinctionby giving a number of ex-amples,particularlyfsituationswherehe claimsa person s speak-ing about (ibid., 286), referringo (295), sayingsomethingof(301), someone n usinga description,ven thoughthedescriptiondoes not correctly escribethatperson.These are referential sesof thedescription.Attributive sesdiffern thisrespect.We wouldnaturallymarkthe distinction y sayingthat in a referential sethe speakerhas a certainobject in mind in using the description,whereas n an attributive se he does not.17Considertwo of Donnellan's examples.Suppose

. .. someoneaid .. in 1960before ehadany dea thatMr.Gold-waterwouldbe theRepublicannomineen 1964, The Republicancandidate orpresidentn 1964 will be a conservative293).15 M,oreprecisely,he definite escriptionthe F' designates he one andonly bject hatF' is true f.16Donnellan1966and 1968.Myown awarenessf thisdistinctions due toC. B. Martin,who has been urging t in lectures ormany years.'I Donnellan mplicitly arks t thiswayhimselfn manyplaces e.g., bid.,287).



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SINGULAR TERMS I9ISuppose the udgmentwas based on an assessmentfover-all rendswithinthe party. The description n that utterance s used attri-butively:thespeakerdoes not have anyparticularobject in mind;he is speakingabout whoeverhappens to become the candidate in1964. n contrast,

. .. suppose hatJones asbeencharged itlhmith'smurderndhehasbeen placedon trial.magine hat here s a discussionfJones'sodd behavior t his trial.We might umup our impressionsfhisbehavior ysaying, Smith'smurderers insane 286).The description ere s usedreferentially.he speakerhas a certainobject n mind,namelyJones.Leave asidefor moment hequestionof the enmanticignificanceof this.The distinction eems to be a good one. However, t criesout forexplanation. How can a speakermanage to refer to anobject using a description hat does not describeit? In virtueofwhat s there a right hing o be pickedout by the audience (304)?We have earliergiven a causal analysisof having an object inmindin using a name.This pointsto what we need to sayhere.Itwas because of our experiencesofJonesduring his trial,and ourbeliefs about him, that we used 'Smith's murderer' n that utter-ance. Similarly,t was becautse fmyexperiences fNana, and mybeliefs about her, that I used 'our cat' in those earlier remarksaimed at passingon hername, (iii) and (iv). In a sense,the objectitselfeadsus touse theparticulardefinite escriptionn suchcases.On theotherhand, Goldwaterhad (near enough) no role at all inbringing bout theuse of The Republican candidateforpresidentin 1964'. There was no causal link betweenthespeakerand Gold-water n virtueofwhichthe speakerutteredwhathe did.There can be a causal linkoftherequiredkind even thoughthespeakerhashad no direct xperience ftheobject: itwill be a causalconnectionrunningthroughothersback to speakerswho did ex-periencethe object. Thus, someone who has heard about our catfromme, but has nevermet her, can have her in mind by 'theDevitts' cat'. And we can all have Aristotle n mind by 'thephilosopherwho taughtAlexanderthe Great'. One can borrowtheabilityto have somethingn mind.We have said nexttonothing bout thenature ofthecausal con-nectionrequiredforhaving n object nmind n usinga description.Rather,we have reliedon theveryobviousdifferenceetweenthecausal explanations freferential nd attributive ses; in particular,on the veryobvious differencen the causal role of the object



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SINGULAR TERMS I93tion is best drawnby lookingto the cause of utterances. t is bestdrawn thisway,because the causal theory oes a long way towardexplaining t.Donnellan's termreferential's not appropriateforme. I followQuine's use of 'refer', ccording to which even predicatesrefer.therefore eplace 'referential'with the somewhatclumsy designa-tional'. I prefer alk of tokensto talk of uses of types.So, in myhands, Donnellan's distinctionbecomes that between attributivedefinite-description-tokensbriefly a-descriptions )and designa-tional definite-description-tokensbrieflyd-descriptions ). ccord-ing to myusage, then, both a-descriptions nd d-descriptionsmayrefer, utonlyd-descriptions aydesignate.6. The Semantic ignificance fDonnellan'sDistinction.The seman-ticsignificance f the causal link betweena name-token nd an ob-ject is clear, but what is the significancef thatbetweena descrip-tion-tokennd an object? 8 After ll, even an a-descriptionnablesus to say something bout the object described.We have alreadygranted to Donnellan's distinction, nd hence to this link, somesignificancet the evel ofintuitive emantics. ut Donnellan makesmore substantial laims for thedistinction t that evel.These con-cern therole of a d-descriptionnd, related to this and more im-portantly),hetruth alues of sentencesontaining ne.(1) According oDonnellan, a d-descriptionrefers o theobjectthe speaker had in mind even when it does not correctly escribethatobject.Further,he sentence ontaining hed-descriptions trueor falseaccording s the predicate n it is trueor falseof that objectwhich thespeakerhad in mind.19 n all Donnellan's examples thed-description oes not correctly escribeanything; o the choice isbetweenreference o what the speakerhad in mind and referencefailure.Donnellan plumps fortheformer.He does not discuss anyexample wherethe speakerhas one object in mind but the d-de-scriptionhe uses correctly escribes nother.However, the implica-tion of his discussion s clear: in such a case thed-description efersto thefirst bjectand the truth alue of thesentencedepends on itscharacteristics.20

Donnellan's claims are too strong. First,many of his remarks using18Kripke,op. cit.,p. 343n,doubts thatDonnellan's distinctionhas any seman-ticsignificance.19See, e.g., Donnellan 1966, p. 295. Donnellan allows that in some extremecircumstances, his may not be the case.20 See ibid., p. 301, particularly he sentence: It does not matterherewhetheror not thewoman has a husband or whether, f she does, Jones is her husband(myemphasis).



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194 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYthe term refer' eem to presuppose that,pre-theoretically,here sa clear-cut emanticnotion picked out by this term which it isour task to investigate.21n fact,thisterm n philosophy s largelya termof art gaining its meaningsfromthe semantic theories nwhich t is embodied.This is trueof Donnellan's use, as it is alsoof mine.The pre-theoreticalordinary )use of the term s so loosethat tcan encompass variety f sulchmeanings.Donnellan's claimsabout reference become substantial, atherthan merely verbal,therefore,nly when we see theirbearingon his claims about truth.Suppose that I was under the misapprehension hat Nana wasour neighbor's cat whichwe were looking after for a while; mywifehad told me thisstory n order to get Nana into the house.The day afterher arrival, he disappears. Talking about this aterin the day, I say, Our neighbor'scat has disappeared. Now, infact,our neighborhas a cat, Jemima,whom I have neverseen orheard of and who is safely t home. Did 'our neighbor's at' referto Nana or Jemima?My claim is that, taken on its own, this s apurely verbal question. Clearly, my description is semanticallylinkedto bothcats, thoughthe linksare of a differentind: I hadNana in mind,but the object mydescription orrectly escribedwasJemima.Whetherwe say thatthedescriptionrefers o ( desig-nates, or denotes ) the one or theother s ofno interest ntil wesee whatfollowswithinthe theory rom o saying.This bringsus to the second point. Donnellan wiouldsay (itseems) that I referred o Nana and, hence, that what I said wastrue.We are herefacedwith a substantial uestionto which Don-nellan gives a simpleanswer. t seemsto me thatthe correct nsweris far from imple. When we attendto the semantic ink to Nanawe are indeed inclined to say the sentence s true,but when we at-tend to the differentink to Jemimawe are inclined to say it isfalse.Considering he whole picture,we don't know what to say.There is one thing we might say which,despite its paradoxicalsound,seemsto me to be right: thatit was partlytrueand partlyfalse.Weshalldiscuss henotion ofPartialtruthn section10.In cases of the sortDonnellan discusses,where the descriptiondoes not correctly escribeanything nd so there s only one ob-ject involved,we are more ikelyto acceptthat thestatements trueor falseas thecasemaybe withthatone object.But wremightprefer

21 See e.g., ibid., p. 293. This is a common presupposition, s some of Donnel-lan's references o the views of others show.At one point (1968, p. 210) Donnellan himself claims that dispute here ismerelyverbal. Yet many of his claims about reference have the ring of some-thingfarmore substantial than thiswould allowv.



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SINGULAR TERMS 195to say, and I thinkwe should say,thatit is partlytrue false)andpartly ruth-valueless.

Initiallywe grantedto Donnellan's distinction,nd hence to thecausal link, ome ntuitive emantic ignificance.We have nowgonea littlefurther:we have seen that it bears on the truthvalues ofstatements: ecause I had Nana in mind, Our neighbor's at hasdisappeared is not simplyfalse; though it is not simply true,as Donnellan claims,either.And the distinctionhas more signifi-cance yet.(2) It has oftenbeen notedthatmanyof the definite escriptionsthatwe ordinarilyuse correctly escribe ots of objects; Russell'suniquenesscondition s not satisfied. onsider the sentence, Putthebook on the table ; theworldis full of books and tables.Fol-lowingour earlierusage,we shall call these, ambiguous definitedescriptions.Just s the solution to theproblemofambiguousnameshas beensought n the context, o also has that of ambiguousdescriptions.One is inclined, as Donnellan points out, to save Russell's viewbyrelying n the context to supplyfurther ualifications n thedescription omake tunique (Donnellan 1968,p. 204n).Donnellanhimself eems to suggestthat the contextsettleswhich object anambiguousd-description efers o.22We, on the otherhand, makeuse of our explanation of Donnellan's distinctionto offerananalysishereanalogoustoour earlier nalysisfor mbiguousnames.An ambiguous d-descriptiondesignates the object the speakerhad in mind;23 .e., it designatesthe object that causally resultsin the use of the description.Our earlierspeakerdesignatedthisbook and that table because of theirspecial place in the causalexplanation of his utterance. The external context is merelya guide tothisreality.4This discoverys certainly f semanticsignificance. he causallink has a role in determining he designatumof a d-descriptionand, hence,the truthvalue of thesentence ontaining t.(3) We lhavepointed out earlier (in section2) that a definitedescriptionmay be used at a naming ceremony o pick out theobject to be named. So the connectionbetween a name tokenanditsobjectmay be mediated bya description. learly f thatconnec-

22 His remarkshere are only suggestive: he is not attemptingan analysis.23 We are now ignoringcaseswhere the descriptiondoes not correctly escribetheobject in mind.240ur argumentagainst the contextual view here would be similar to thatagainst it fornames; see my Semanitics nd the Ambiguityof Proper Names,Op. cit.



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I96 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYtion is to be an unbrokencausal chain, as we have claimed, thatdescriptionmustbe a d-description; nlya d-descriptions causallybased on the object. And what we find n all normalnamingcere-monies, ndeed, s thatthemediatingdescriptions a d-description.We can,however, nvent omevery bnormalnamingceremonieswhere t is not. Let us call theheaviestfish n the sea 'Oscar'. 'Theheaviest fish n the sea' is an a-description. f we go on to use'Oscar', thename would not be causally based on an object.Wouldthis count as a naming ceremony, nd would 'Oscar' count as aname?We need not legislateon thisratheruninterestinguestion.'Ve shallmerelynote thatthe naming-ceremonynd the nameare abnormal and thattheydiffer romnormalones in therespectnoted.We shall markthedifference y calling the likes of 'Oscar'attributivenames (briefly,-names),reserving he term name'for henormalones.25This bearing of our discussionof definitedescriptions n thesemantics fnames may not seemvery ignificant.or, even ifwhatwe have claimed to be abnormal were normal,what differencewould it make to thesemantics fnames? The causal chain wouldnot run rightto an object,but it would stillbe linked to the ob-ject describedby thedescription. his is a good point,and it bringsus to ourfinal emark n this ection.(4) Perhaps the mostsignificantspect of thedistinctionwe havemade betweend-descriptionsnd a-descriptions,nd hencebetweennames and a-names, s its importantbearingon the semanticsofpropositional-attitudend modal contexts.But thiswe mustleavetoanother ime.

We havementioned arlier in section5) that to saymore on thenature ofDonnellan's distinctionwe need an analysisofbeliefcon-texts. We see now that we need this also to appreciate its fullsignificance.7. Demonstratives.We next considerdemonstratives nd personalpronouns briefly,demonstratives ).When a demonstratives used out of the blue to designate nobject, t is clearthat there s some causal linkbetweenthespeaker

25A moredifficult ase is the following. uppose we detectunexplained irregu-larities n themovementof the planets. This leads us to conclude that there s aplanet of a certain mass (M) in a certain orbit (0) outside the range of ourtelescopes. One of us says: I name the planet of mass M in orbit 0 'Vulcan'.On our account the description s an a-description, nd 'Vulcan' an a-name. Yet'Vulcan' would functionmuch like a normal name. The justificationl or ourprocedureis alluded to in par. (4) below.



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SINGULAR TERMS 197and theobject in virtueofwhichhe uses the demonstrative. e isperceiving he object,or has justperceived t. It is thecausal actionof the object on him that led him (in part) to do what he did.Because of thiswe can truly ay thathe had thatobject in mind inusing the demonstrative. hus, at our earlier naming ceremony,my wifehad Nana in mind in using her' in that t was the causalaction of Nana on my wife that ed her to use thepronoun.26Commonly, he out of the blue demonstrative ill be accom-panied by a pointinggesture fhand or eye towardtheobject. Onits own this gesturewould very oftenbe insufficiento identifythedesignatum.What determines hatone aspect and not anotherof the vaguely indicated environment s designated is that thespeaker had that aspect in mind. We look to what caused thebehavior in order to remove ambiguities.27ometimes,no gestureis called for-it is not with I' 28-and, other times,none is given.Againwe look to tlle cause of theutterance o determine eference.Suppose that the object pointed to and the object in mind aredifferent. hichis designated? his is similar o thequestionraisedconcerningourneighbor's at' in section6 and to thequestion thatwill come up in section 10 for various names. I urge a similaranswer.29When a demonstratives not used out of theblue, thespeakermaynothave an object in mind. And a demonstratives oftennotso used: it may depend for its referenceupon determinants nantecedent erbiage ; 0 It is a waytocross-refer.31n sucha case thedemonstrative orrows characteristicsromthe singular term onwhich t depends. f thatsingularterm s causally inked to an ob-ject so that the speakerhad that object in mind, then so also isthedemonstrative.f not,not. If it is dependenton an earlier outof the blue demonstrative,r a name,or a d-description,hen itwill be so linked. If, on the otherhand, it is dependent on an a-

26 It can be shown (aftera discussion of belief-contexts) hat this causal linkbetween demonstrative nd object is the basic link on which the links betweenname and object, and descriptionand object, ultimatelydepend.27 Note that,at this point,designation s related to nonlinguisticbehavior.28 The brief general account we are giving here degenerates somewhatwith'I', but nevertheless s still applicable.A full accountof out of the blue demonstrativeswould have to take note ofthe differences mong demonstratives, nd of the role that an accompanyinggeneral term can play. The account here is much simplified.29 Discussions with Ross Poole have helped me in writing these last twoparagraphs.30,W. V. Quine, Word and Object (Cambridge,Mass.: MIT Press, 1960), p. 113.31Definitedescriptions e.g., 'the man') can also be used to cross-refer. heremarks n thisparagraph apply to such descriptions lso.



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i98 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYdescription, n a-name,or an indefinite ingular term, hen it willnot. For example,both the definite escription nd the demonstra-tive are causally linked to an object in the first f the followingsentences, utneither re in the second:

Our cat is hungry ecause he hasn't atenfor everal ours.The heaviest ishn the ea is not a shark or s it a whale.I call a demonstrative here the speakerhas an object in mind adesignational demonstrative oken (briefly, d-demonstrative )and one where the speaker does not have an object in mind an

attributive emonstrative oken (briefly, a-demonstrative ). c-cording to my usage, then, both a-demonstrativesnd d-demon-strativesmayrefer, ut onlyd-demonstratives aydesignate.I shall use the termd-term' orname-tokens,-descriptions,ndd-demonstratives.nalogously,a-term'.We mustnowreturn opropernames.III8. Further nvolvements fan Object.Nana is involved n the causalnetwork orher name at morepointsthan tsbeginning t her nam-ing ceremony; henetworks multiply rounded n her.This arises, n thefirst lace, because of the role of othersingu-lar terms n passing on, and reinforcing,bilities with names.Suppose I pass on 'Nana' bymeansof (ii), This is Nana, togetherwitha pointinggesture.Nana will be bothmediately nd immedi-ately causally involvedin this passingon. She will be mediatelyinvolvedvia the abilityI exercisein using her name, an abilitygrounded n her at thenaming ceremony. he will be immediatelyinvolvedin that this' is a d-demonstrative:he is presentat theutterance, nd her presence eads to myuse of the demonstrative.Thus, someonewho gains an abilityfromthis utterancewill gainone that is doubly grounded in Nana. And the situationwouldhave been similarhad Nana been absentand had I used a d-descrip-tion to pass on hername, say, bymeansof (iii) or (iv).Nana is always mediately nvolvedwhen her name is used todesignateher.However, n the secondplace,shemaybe immediatelyinvolved n that use (even thoughno other ingulartermfeatures).Suppose Nana is present nd her presence eads someone to desig-nate her byname,thusexercising is abilityto do this.He is in thepositionwherehe hasher nmindquite independentlyf his abilityto use hername. This could have led him to use a demonstrativeto designateher,but instead it led him to use her name. She is



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SINGULAR TERAIS 199again cauisally nvolvcdbollt mediatelyand immediatelyn thatutterance.

If an object is pickedout byan a-descriptiont itsnaming,thenany tokenbased on thisnamingwillbe an a-name section ); the ob-ject is not involved n thecausal network or that term t the net-work's eginning. t maybecome nvolved ater,however, n ways ustindicated. If it does, then the networkbecomesgrounded in theobject: a-names re replaced bynames.9. Other Ways of Naming. Manynamesare acquirednot at a nam-ing ceremony ut throughuse. Nicknames, n particular, re com-monlynot bestowedceremonially, ut rather are used, seem apt,and hence catch on. Other names may be similarly cquired. Apreviouslyunnamed animal or place may be called by a certainname on some occasion and the name catch on. In criminalandunderground political circles, people often adopt new names.Authors ften dopt pseudonyms.A name of thiskind may have to be used severaltimesforanobject beforewe would accord t the status f being ts name (or oneofits names).But this s not important. aclhoftheseuses,even thefirst,esignates he object.How can thisbe? In virtueof what does such a first se designatethe object? Our answer s along familiar ines. The speakerhad theobjectin mind.He had it in mind in virtueof a causal connection.This connectionmighthave led him to use a certain descriptionhad he beensearching ora description o designate t, or a certaindemonstrative ad he been searching or a demonstrative, ut didlead him to use a certain name when he was sear-ching or an aptname for it. Part of what he intended was to bestow the name(provisionally, erhaps) on the object.Somenamesareacquiredwithout ither eremonyruse. When achild is born in our society,t automatically akes ts parents' astname; those presenthave the name already available to label it.The causal network tarts t the birth,withtheseface-to-faceon-frontations etweenthe child and the first sers of its name.Many have claimed thatwe cannot refer o futureobjects byname.32Our theory ccordswell withsuchclaims: causes mustpre-cede effects; o the naming ceremony nvolving the object mustprecede the causal network hat t gives rise to. These claims,how-ever, seem unduly rigid.There seem to be occasions wherewe do

32 See, e.g., Richard M. Gale and IrvingThalberg. The Generalityof Predic-tions, thisJOURNAL, LXII, 8 (Apr. 15, 1965): 195-210; references re to be foundthere to earlier writingsby Peirce, Ryle, Mayo, and Ayer.



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200 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYuse thenames of a future bject, particularlywhere there existsa plan or blueprintfor theobject. We need not go along withtheclaims.We can allow such names although, n our terminology,they re a-names.10. Mistakes and Other Failures. The picturepresented o farhasbeen briefly s follows.When a name occurs n a statement, hereis underlying hat occurrencea causal networkgrounded in anobject. In virtueof this thename tokendesignates heobject.Thisis an idealized picture.Many thingscan go wrong,and typicallysome of themwill have gone wrong.More than one object willusuallybe appropriatelyinkedto a name token.First, woobjects an be involved t thegainingorreinforcingf anability, one mediately nd one immediately. his is apparent nlight of our discussionof how an ability can be doubly groundedin an object (section 8). Suppose for example my statement ii),This is Nana, is false: it is actuallyJemima. I am mistaken, rperhaps I am lying.) Any ability gained as a result will begrounded n Nana via myuse of hername,and in Jemimavia thedemonstrative.Would later uses of Nana', arisingfrom his,desig-nate Nana or Jemima,neither, r both? Or suppose that the ob-ject immediately nvolved, n the use of 'Nana', as a result of herpresence, s not Nana (as we supposed in section8), but Jemima.In a sense,the speakerhas both cats in mind in using the name.What is designatedby that use and hence will be designated bysomeonewhouses thenameas a result f t? 3The examples become harder when we consider the role ofdefinite escriptions. uppose thatJemima s theobject correctly e-scribedas our cat and yetI state, Nana is our cat. Here wemustdistinguishmistakes nd lies.34First,suppose I am lying: Ihave Jemima n mind in using our cat', knowing quite well thatNana is not our cat. Once again, any ability with Nana' gainedfrom hiswill be causally grounded n both cats.Secondly, upposeI ammistaken: have Nana in mindin using our cat',butwronglythinkthisdescriptions true of her. We have already discussedthedifficultiesf such a description in section6). We need add here

83 I mention ome furtheromplicationsn passing. a) A sentenceike (i) to(iv) thatwould normally pass on a name may be false and yet therenot be twoobjects nvolved: heremaybe one or evennone. (b) The speakermightbeboth ying nd mistaken, iththeresult hathis lie cancels ut his mistake(a possibilityuggested yManfred onThun).84 I sparethereader escriptionsf plausible ettingsor he mistakesnd lieswe areherecontemplating.



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202 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYthree ypes f failurewe have just discussed mplydemonstrateheneed forthesequalifications.36 hatmore can we saynow?

We shall sayno moreofhavingan object in mind. This notionwas but a stepping tone to our account of designation byname),which s forus thatrelation betweenname and objectwhichhas acrucialbearing on truth.What mustwe concludeabout designationand truth s a resultof thisdiscussion?I shallmake use here of an idea ofHartry ield's.37He has arguedthatmanyscientificerms re refererntiallyndeterminate. is mainexample is theNewtonian term mass'. He claims (in the light ofthespecial theory frelativity)hatthere s no matter ffactaboutwhether his termdenoted relativisticmass (= totalenergy/c2)rpropermass (= nonkineticenergy/c2). he term,however,wasnot denotationless.Rather, it partially denoted both relativisticmass and propermass.With the aid of this new semanticnotionField is able to give a truthdefinition eldingdesiredtruthvaluesfor Newton's utterances.For example, the followingNewtonianassertion omesout true:To accelerate body uniformlyetweenany pair of differentvelocities, oreforces required f themassof thebody s greater.Others ome outneither ruenorfalse.A fairly traightforwardevelopmentof this approach enablesus to assignappropriate degreesof truth to thesetruth-valuelesssentences.38or example, instead of sayingmerelythat 'a' par-tiallydenotes b and partiallydenotesc, we saythat t denotesb todegreep and c todegreeq. We can thenexplain thedegreeoftruthof the sentencecontaining a' in terms partly)of these degrees

ofdenotation.39What thefailureswe have discussed n thissectionshow is thata name tokenmay partiallydesignate morethanone object: to acertaindegree tdesignatesb, to anotherdegree, . Withthehelp ofthis we can give a truthdefinitionyieldingintuitively esirable86Furtherreasonsforqualification,at least if we are trying o capture all ourordinary intuitions on the matter, are to be found in Kripke, op. cit., par-ticularly p. 301. Kripke gives some examples that suggest elements of truthin sense-theories.And we could give others. These examples strike me as

peripheral. It is appropriate thatwe should reviseour intuitionsabout theminthe ightof thecausal theory.37 Theory Change and the Indeterminacyof Reference, this JOURNAL, LXX,14 (Aug. 16, 1973): 462-481.38The developmentis also due to Field, but does not appear in the articlecited.39 Cf. the standardreferential emantics,which explains truth n terms partly)of denotation; see Field, Tarski's Theory of Truth, this JOURNAL, LXIX, 13(July13, 1972): 347-375.



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SINGULAR TERMS 203truthvalues. Thus, supposeJoe half-designates ilhelm and half-designatesKarl by 'Liebknecht'. The following entences f Joe's:

Liebknechtwas a socialist.Liebknechtwas a Swiss.Liebknechtwas theproto-martyrf GermanCommunism.comeout true,false,and half-true,espectively.n othercases,theassigning fdegrees fdesignationwillnot be so simple. n most, fcourse, herewill be arbitrarinessn thedecision.What is importantto our theorys thatwe look to the causal explanationofthetokenin question n makingour decision.Many sentences hatwe wouldbeforehave deemed truemay come out not fullytrue,but, say,90 per cent true. But this need not disturbus. If Field is right,partialtruths all we can hope forfrommuchofourmostcherishedscience.11. EarlierInsightsCaptured.We shall concludebynotingvariousinsightsof earlier theoriesof proper names which are fully orpartly apturedbyour theory.First,we mustagreewithMill: a propername designatesbut itdoesnot imply nyattributes. 0Both Russell and theearlyWittgenstein eld an almostmysticalviewof therelationship etweena name and itsbearer. t is a rela-tionship ftheutmostntimacy: henatureof a nameis suchthat timmediatelynd directly ocuses ttention n theobject (and that'sall it does).We have seen thatnamesare, n a quite clearsense, m-mediate pointersto theirobjects.But the relationship s not theleastbit ineffable;t is a matter or cientificnvestigation.

Sense-theories akeuse ofa certainfact:a man's abilityto use aname is accompanied by various beliefs about its bearer whichhave arisen largelyfromthe historyof his experienceswith thename.Forus,each ofthese xperienceswillform link n thecausalnetwork nderlying is presentuse; thenetwork mbodiesthehis-tory.And, of course,thename user'sbeliefsabout the object willin part reflect hat history.We differ romsense-theoristsn notmakingthe connectionsbetweenname and object depend on thetruth f thosebeliefs.Some philosophers have indicated the importanceof referenceborrowing o the use ofnames.41We give it a centralrole. But wedo notrequirethatnameuserskeeptrack ftheirborrowings.Identity tatements ose a difficultyora theory f names.The40 A Systemof Logic (London: Longmans, eighth edition revised,new impres-sion 1961),p. 20.41 E.g., Strawson, p. cit.,p. 182n.



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204 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHYdifficultyrises from what Frege called the differing ognitivevalues of 'a = a' and 'a = b'.42 Awareness of this difficulty aspushed some philosophers way from he natural view that dentityis what it seems to be, a relation betweenobjects, toward the viewthat t s a relationbetween igns e.g., bid., p. 10). Objections to thelatterview ed Frege to his sense theory f names and led others 8 toeven moredesperate xpedients.One aspectof thedifferenceetweenthetwo statementshat hasbeen a sourceof worry s as follows: whereas a = b' seemsto besynthetic, contingent, nd empirical, a = a' seems obe ana-lytic, necessary, nd a priori. This aspectneed not worry s.We must sharply distinguishthe metaphysical term necessary'from the epistemological term a priori', as Kripke has pointedout (260-263). If we do, it is not hard to see that a = b', if true,is necessarilytrue (for names), even though it may be knownempirically305-311).However,wemust stillexplain the differingognitive alues ofthe two statements. his we can easily do. Frege rightly aw thatthe solution to the difficultyay in the differentmodesofpresenta-tion of the object associatedwith a' and 'b' (op. cit.,p. 57). Frege'smistake was to embody these modes within senses. For us themodes are the causal networksunderlyingthe names. There isnothing more to the meaning of names than these networks.Underlyinga' will be a verydifferentetwork rom hatunderlying'b'.44 Thus the cognitivevalue of 'a = a' will be very differentfrom hatof a = b'.We began this paper with the claim that the main problemingiving hesemantics fpropernames s thatofexplainingthenatureof the link betweenname and object in virtueofwhich theformerdesignates he latter. n considering hisproblem,manyhave seenthat the user of a name must, n some way, dentifyn object,theobject he has in mind. What does this dentificationmountto?The received nswerhas been that t is thespeaker's bilityto pro-

42 Philosophical Writings of Gottlob Frege, Peter Geach and Max Black, eds.(Oxford: Blackwell,second edition corrected,1960), p. 56.43 E.g., D. S. Shwayder, '= ', Mind, XV, 257 (January 1956): 16-37; DavidWiggins, Identity-Statements, n R. J. Butler, ed., Analytical Philosophy:Second Series (Oxford: Blackwell, 1965), pp. 40-71; Leonard Linsky, Referenceand Referents, n Charles E. Caton, ed., Philosophy and Ordinary Language(Urbana: Illinois, 1963), pp. 74-89.44 This will be so even if the speaker associates the same descriptionswith thetwvo ames. Hence the absurdityof John Searle's claim that 'Tully = Cicero' isanalytic for most of us; see Proper Names, Mind, LXVII, 266 (April 1958):166-173,reprinted n Caton, op. cit., pp. 154-161.



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DEMONSTRATIVE CONSTRUCTIONS, REFERENCE, AND TRUTH 205duce an identifying escriptionof the object. This is mistaken.41The speaker is indeed important, ut identification epends noton anything e could or would do but on whathe did: forunder-lyingwhat he did was a causal networkgrounded in an object.Only in this way does a speaker identify n object. Causal net-works inknamestotheworld.

MICHAEL DEVIITUniversityfSydney

DEMONSTRATIVE CONSTRUCTIONS, REFERENCE,AND TRUTH *ENTENCES whosenormal se involves demonstrativele-ment play a lead role in theemploymentnd acquisitionofLJ natural languages. Such sentences appear more than anyother kind in day-to-day ommunication.They occur repeatedlyin ordinaryempirical thinking.And they are the first entencesto be taught to a first-languageearner or radical translator). n-deed, given the limitsof our intelligence,memory,nd knowledge,it is doubtful hatwithout hemwe could learn language or utilizeit to describeparticularobjects,events, r experiences.The reasonfor this virtualomnipresence f sentences nvolvinga demonstra-tive element s that they repeculiarlydependentfor their nterpre-tation on the context of their use. Their truthvalue typicallydependson someone's actually speaking,writing, r thinking hemin a relevant ontext.The resulting ividend for anguagelearningis obviousness: since the correct nterpretationf these sentencesoccurs, as it were,on the spot, manyof them can be taught withrelativeease to the novice-one has merely o correlate hem withthe appropriate pots.The dividendfor communication nd think-ing is economy: a gesture aves a thousandwords.My aim in thispaper is to motivate nd sketch unifiedformaltheory f someof themostordinarykindsof sentencesnvolvingdemonstrativelement.The theorywill emphasizea point thathasnot been treatedwith sufficienteriousness n recentformal ac-counts.The point is thatordinary entences ontainingdemonstra-

45 The move froma correctview to a mistaken one is nicely illustrated bySearle's move fromhis axiom of identification o his principle of identifica-tion ; see his Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language (New York:Cambridge, 1969), pp. 77-88.* I am indebted to Gilbert Harman, David Kaplan, Dana Scott, and JohnWallace forcriticism f earlier versionsand to Harry Deutsch formany helpfuland stimulating conversations.

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