Vacuous Names

Abstract

Of those who are approximately my contemporaries, Professor W. V. Quine is one of the very few to whom I feel I owe the deepest of professional debts, the debt which is owed to someone from whom one has learned something very important about how philosophy should be done, and who has, in consequence, helped to shape one’s own mode of thinking. I hope that he will not think it inappropriate that my offering on this occasion should take the form not of a direct discussion of some part of Word and Object, but rather of an attempt to explore an alternative to one of his central positions, namely his advocacy of the idea of the general eliminability of singular terms, including names. I hope, also, that he will not be too shocked by my temerity in venturing into areas where my lack of expertise in formal logic is only too likely to be exposed. I have done my best to protect myself by consulting those who are in a position to advise me; they have suggested ideas for me to work on and have corrected some of my mistakes, but it would be too much to hope that none remain.¹