Abstract
Keith Donnellan’s distinction between the attributive and referential uses of definite descriptions has spurred debates regarding the truth conditions of the utterance “the F is G” with definite descriptions used referentially. In this article, I present a semantic account of referential descriptions, grounded in the contextual factors of the utterance, including the speaker’s intention and presupposition as well as the interlocutor’s recognition of them. This account is called the IPR-semantic account, according to which the speaker’s intention (I) and presupposition (P) and the interlocutor’s recognition (R) jointly determine whether “the F” in an utterance “the F is G” is used referentially or attributively, and the meaning of “the F” is determined by whether it is used referentially or attributively. Moreover, I argue that the meaning of the referential description “the F” is the intended object e, embodied with a property H that has prompted the speaker to presuppose that e is F and to intend to use “the F” to refer to e, as well as the interlocutor to recognize the presupposition and intention. According to the IPR-semantic account, the utterance “the F is G” with “the F” used referentially expresses a singular proposition, namely, that e is G, and it is true if and only if the intended object e is G. Additionally, I argue that the IPR-semantic account not only surpasses some alternative semantic accounts but also outperforms Kripke’s pragmatic account.
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Notes
In this article, I use “definite description” and “description” interchangeably.
See Neale (2004: 68–9) for a nice depiction of the Unitarian School.
Not a few scholars have interpreted Donnellan as an Ambiguity Theorist in the sense that he thinks “the F is G” can express two different propositions depending on whether “the F” in the sentence’s utterance is used referentially or attributively. This perspective finds support in the works of Kripke (1977: 256, 262), Reimer (1998), Neale (2004), and Capuano (2021). Some have taken Donnellan as a Contextual Sensitivity Theorist on the grounds that he claims that the truth conditions of an utterance “the F is G” vary, depending on whether “the F” is used referentially or attributively (Récanati, 1989). In this article, I suggest that Donnellan agrees with the Unitarian School because he displays a reluctance to attribute semantic significance to the referential use of definite descriptions.
“A speaker who uses a definite description attributively in an assertion states something about whoever or whatever is the so-and-so. A speaker who uses a definite description referentially in an assertion, on the other hand, uses the description to enable his audience to pick out whom or what he is talking about and states something about that person or thing” (Donnellan, 1966: 285, emphasis mine).
It is important to notice that the description “Smith’s murderer” differs from the description “the murderer” in virtue of the fact that the former is complete whereas the latter is incomplete. I express my gratitude to an anonymous reviewer who brought to my attention the distinction between “the murderer” and “Smith’s murderer.” However, this dissimilarity does not undermine the analysis of the referential use of definite descriptions in a given context. For “the murderer” can be completed to “Smith’s murderer” or “the murderer of Smith” with the aid of the contextual cues on which the sentence “The murderer is insane” is uttered.
Donnellan’s stance on the nature of truth in relation to the utterance is not definitively conclusive. While he remains uncertain about whether the truth of the utterance is exclusively driven by pragmatics, he does reject the notion that it is purely semantic in nature. For the purposes of this article, I assume that Donnellan leans towards accepting the pragmatic explanation for the truth conditions. This assumption coheres with his perspective as outlined in Donnellan (1966: 297, 302).
In his original article, Donnellan uses “φ” rather than “F,” but for the conformity of symbols, I use “F” instead (see Donnellan (1968: 206)).
This view is further defended by Stalnaker (1970: 285) and Capuano (2021: 1861–2). However, Strawson (1950: 343–4) rejects this view on the grounds that if no entity in the occasion on which the utterance is made satisfies “the F,” we will give neither a “yes” nor “no” response to the question “Is the F G?”.
By “designate,” I mean either “denote” or “refer to.”
Strawson also recognizes the distinction between a sentence and an utterance of a sentence, consistent with my viewpoint. However, there exists a nuanced difference between his perspective and mine. Strawson asserts that a proposition is expressed by the use of a sentence, while my stance maintains that a proposition is expressed by an utterance of a sentence situated within a specific context. For deeper insight into Strawson’s perspective, his work (1950: 326) offers further elaboration on this matter.
This view is shared by Stalnaker (1970: 277).
Given that this article centers on exploring the truth conditions of the utterance “the F is G” when “the F” is employed referentially, I will refrain from delving extensively into the meaning of “the F” when used attributively, concentrating instead on the nuances of its referential usage. For discussions of the attributive use, see Neale (2004) and Capuano (2021).
For the detailed characterization of the scene, see Donnellan (1966: 285).
However, when engaging in self-talk, wherein there seems to be no interlocutor present, the speaker can still use the description attributively if she presupposes that there is exactly one person who murdered Smith and intends to state something about that person. In the case of self-talk, even without another interlocutor present, the speaker effectively plays dual roles—as both speaker and listener—making her intention salient to herself as the hearer. Recognizing one’s own intention to use descriptions attributively or referentially is even easier for oneself as a hearer than for any other interlocutors. Therefore, the presence of other interlocutors besides the self-talker is unnecessary if the intention is to use descriptions attributively or referentially. I am grateful to an anonymous reviewer for bringing this aspect to my attention.
The IPR-semantic account of the referential use of the description shares similarities with the quasi-intentional account of demonstrative reference proposed by Reimer (1992). According to both views, intentions and other contextual features come into play in determining demonstrative reference. However, a distinction exists in that the IPR-semantic account incorporates the speaker’s intention within the context of the utterance, while the quasi-intentional view positions it in contrast to the context.
Capuano (2021: 1681) has also noticed that the property F bears a certain similarity to the intended object’s property H in cases where the speaker successfully used “the F” to refer to the intended object e.
The original case is taken from Linsky, which I read from both Donnellan (1966) and Kripke (1977). I take (1) as equivalent to “The husband of the woman is kind to her,” which is in the form “the F is G,” where “the F” is a definite description. Hence, I think, in this sentence, “the husband of the woman” does not differ from “her husband,” which is an expression with an indexical though.
At first glance, the proposed IPR-semantic account may seem similar to Graff’s (2001) perspective, which posits that definite descriptions are essentially predicative in nature. However, a deeper analysis reveals a clear divergence between the IPR-semantic account and Graff’s. Specifically, on the IPR-semantic account, the utterance “the F is G” expresses a singular proposition, distinct from the quantificational proposition championed by the Russellian perspective. This stands in contrast to Graff’s proposition, as highlighted by Elbourne (2013: 5), where the utterance with definite descriptions mirrors truth conditions aligning with the Russellian framework.
I am indebted to an anonymous reviewer for raising this objection.
I am grateful to an anonymous reviewer for bringing this to my attention.
I would like to express my gratitude to an anonymous reviewer for bringing up this possibility.
An anonymous reviewer reminded me that the speaker “could infer from the fact that the arsonist, Jones, was her old schoolmate, a more general proposition that the person being the arsonist is an old schoolmate of hers.” Therefore, the utterance could have an attributive interpretation. However, based on preceding analysis, it is not required for the speaker to possess a general intention for some respondents to interpret “the F” in the utterance “the F is G” as being used attributively. Nevertheless, it is acknowledged that the speaker’s having a general intention about “the F” is necessary for the attributive use of “the F” for the interlocutor.
I am indebted to an anonymous reviewer for highlighting that the speaker would not have an intention to state something about Jones because she does not know that Mr. Jones is an outstanding connoisseur of art.
Devitt (2007: 29), however, denies that Neale’s Gödelian completion is Russellian. By contrast, Elbourne (2013: 111) sees no reason to deny that the Gödelian completion has “the privilege (or misfortune) of being Russellian,” as long as “a proposition is the semantic value of a sentence that incorporates a definite article interpreted by a Russellian lexical entity.”
The notion of identity in Neale’s Gödelian completion has also been criticized by Schiffer (2005: 1176).
Following Kripke, I take a designator including both definite description and proper name.
According to Kripke, the man whom the speaker refers to is not the woman’s husband but her lover. It is because of her husband’s cruelty that she has been with her lover (1977: 256).
For a more detailed discussion of the cooperative principle, see Grice (1975).
Here, the implication is just a suggestion, rather than a logical implication.
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Acknowledgements
I would like to express my gratitude to the four anonymous reviewers for their invaluable challenges, objections, and suggestions, all of which significantly contributed to the improvement of this article. I am grateful to Qilin Li and Arthur Schipper for their thoughtful comments on earlier drafts. Furthermore, I am also grateful to Yijia Ding, Jiacheng He, Jiqi Liu, Xiaohui Yu, Tianyue Wu, Xingfei Zheng, Zijian Zhu, and other participants in the Philosophy in Progress Colloquium who provided valuable feedback on earlier drafts.
Funding
This research article is funded by the National Social Science Fund for Leading Talents in Philosophy and Social Science Project “Cognition, Action, and Self in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy” and China Scholarship Council (No. 202106010205).
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IPR-semantic account: Whether “the F” in an utterance “the F is G” is used referentially or attributively is jointly determined by the speaker’s intention (I) and presupposition (P) as well as the interlocutor’s recognition (R) of them, and the meaning of “the F” is determined by whether it is used referentially or attributively. And the meaning of the referential description “the F” is the intended object e, with a property H that has prompted the speaker to presuppose that e is F and to intend to use “the F” to refer to e, as well as the interlocutor to recognize the presupposition and intention.
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Li, W. The truth conditions of sentences with referentially used definite descriptions. AJPH 3, 34 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s44204-024-00167-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s44204-024-00167-6