Why a Proper Name has a Meaning: Marty and Landgrebe vs. Kripke

Abstract

In Marty’s Untersuchungen zur Grundlegung der allgemeinen Grammatik und Sprachphilosophie (Marty 1908, 438f., henceforth ‘U’) there is a long footnote about the semantic status of proper names. This footnote occasioned a remarkable defence of the thesis that proper names have meaning. The discussion, found in L. Landgrebe’s work on Marty (Landgrebe 1934, § 16), presents strong arguments against the currently popular causal theory of proper names. These arguments, which have an obvious relevance to Kripke’s views, will be discussed in what follows. I will not go into Landgrebe’s critique of Marty’s views. Instead, I will emphasize the shared strand of systematic argument. But before we come to the relevant passages, a few basic reflections about Kripke’s work on proper names are in order.