Weren't you considering majoring in philosophy? — Noah Te Stroete

I am. But, I don't know how to deal with my apathy and anhedonia. It's a deep issue of ADHD also. I can't focus for shiet.

It's been years since I've read it myself, and I don't remember his arguments any more, but I DO know that you would be well-served reading Kripke if you truly want an understanding of the topic. — Noah Te Stroete

I'll give it a try. Thanks.

I've dealt with apathy and anhedonia for years. It was just a matter of getting on medication that my body could metabolize (my doctor gave me a genetic test for favorable medications), and changing my perspective on life.

PM me if you want to talk further. I can relate.

two points:

1) the gist of naming and necessity is that Kripke argues that you can have analytic a posteriori truths. His famous example is the claim that 'water is H2O', which can't be known a priori but is analytic in the sense that what we mean by the conventional term "water" - what water is - is just the material identified scientifically as H20 and not any of the numerous possible descriptions of water (such as being "wet" or "clear" etc.)

2) Don't major in philosophy. it's a waste of an education. You can pursue it just fine as a hobby. If you're going to drop big bucks on an education study something useful to society and the economy. I'd recommend engineering, bio sciences, comp sci, or business...unless of course you have a trust fund, in which case do whatever you want.

Naming and Necessity also deals with the contingent a priori, but those weren't the parts I was referring to. I was referring to the parts where he deals with the referential theory of language, namely the historical/causal relationship between names and their referants.

As far as majoring in philosophy, it may or may not be a waste of money. If you double major in something "useful" as Mentalusion suggested, then it can enhance your education. Also, beware of student loans.

analytic a posteriori truths. His famous example is the claim that 'water is H2O', which can't be known a priori but is analytic in the sense that what we mean by the conventional term "water" - what water is - is just the material identified scientifically as H20 and not any of the numerous possible descriptions of water (such as being "wet" or "clear" etc.) — Mentalusion

An analytic truth is a necessary truth knowable a priori. Kripke talked of necessary truths knowable a posteriori. For example, it is necessarily true that water is H20 in that in no possible world could water be anything but H20. It is knowable a posteriori because it is knowable through experience, i.e. you have to do tests on water to determine that it is indeed H20 and not something else.

Examples of empty names are; Santa Claus, Harry Potter, and Pegasus. [...] Yet, those empty names don't refer to any person or object in the world. — Posty McPostface

Harry is an idea, and an idea is a real, if non-material, object in the world, n'est ce pas?

Asking what is the meaning of a word is in many cases a category error that arises from taking a concept to which the property 'has a meaning' is applicable, like a paragraph and sometimes a sentence, and then breaking that concept down to a level of granularity at which the property is no longer applicable.

For example, asking 'what is the meaning of the word "Pegasus"?' is like asking 'what is the hardness of a salt molecule?' (NaCl). A salt crystal has a measurable hardness, but a molecule does not, because hardness is a feature of how tightly molecules are bound together.

It is easy to infer an uncontroversial meaning for the statement 'Pegasus was white with grey dapples on the sides', in the context of a story involving Pegasus, or a class in which ancient myths are being discussed. Given that, trying to infer a meaning for the word 'Pegasus' in isolation is unnecessary, and also doomed to fail.

My e-book reader has a German-English dictionary with the unusual feature that for many words there is no direct definition given. Instead it gives a number of phrases that use the word, and the meanings of each phrase. It was disconcerting to use at first and took some getting used to. But now I see the point and I find it more helpful than the usual dictionary style.

I'm not sure the example gets to the difference between type/token and proper names. It seems to me that both speakers there are using proper names. the only possible type/token implication is that one could see the lexical entity 'john smith' as a type for the two token names "John Smith [1]" and "John Smith [2]" given the name is a homonym. I think the more nature description though would just be say there's any ambiguity in the name: they just sound alike but in fact reference two different things, like a river 'bank' vs. a financial 'bank'. — Mentalusion

When two or more people have the same name, there's ambiguity. You're right about that. But the hint, here, is in how language treats words syntacticly:

A proper name doesn't take articles; semantically, it doesn't need to, because a proper name is definite by itself. Normally, ambiguities are resolved pragmatically rather than through syntax: "Joe" is far from a unique name, but if you say "I'm talking to Joe," people usually know who you mean through context. (It's, of course, possible to miss parts of the context and create an ambiguity that your conversation partner doesn't automatically resolve.)

If you resolve the ambiguity syntactically, by adding articles (either indefinite, or definite), you make a shift from a proper name to regalur noun: "a John Smith" does not have the same meaning as "John Smith", even though the same person can be the referent for both (more precisesly "a referent" in the former case and "the referent" in the latter case). In the case of "a John Smith", he's part of a class (all people named "John Smith" are "a John Smith" - being named like that becomes the meaning of a type, and having that name makes you a token); in the case of "John Smith" he's uniquely named (and it doesn't matter that other people have the same name).

What's philosophyically difficult here, I think, is the precise relation between semantics, pragmatics and syntax (and theoretically morphology - but not in this case).

Generally I don't have an issue with your claims about how syntax can operate with proper names, and even think the type/token distinction could be useful for explaining the non-definite use of the proper name vs. the definite. I took my claim about the "lexical entity 'john smith'" to be basically consistent with that. However, my concern is exactly with what the actual context of the situation is here and the intentional state of the postal carrier. The package carrier not standing at the door wanting to give the package to anyone who happens to be named John Smith so he can happily walk off feeling like he did his job competently. Rather, he wants to give the package to the John Smith to whom the person who sent it addressed it to, he just doesn't know who that is. In other words, s/he isn't just looking for "a" John Smith, he's looking for "the" John Smith the package is addressed to. So, I just don't see that the syntactic distinctions you bring up - while legitimate in and of themselves - apply to this particular situation here since, in fact, given the context, it does not seem to me that either of the names are empty in the example given.

Re, the last paragraph, does that simply sidestep the issues the correspondence theory of meaning has wrt. to empty names and instead advocate a contextualist/pragmatic approach to meaning?

Yes, I'm assuming a correspondence theory. I'm not sure how it side steps any questions though.

Yes, I'm assuming a correspondence theory. I'm not sure how it side steps any questions though. — Mentalusion

In the correspondence theory what objectifies, through denotation or maybe descriptions, meaning? Contextualist or pragmatic interpretations give rise in my view to what @andrewk has posted about the topic.

1) I guess I didn't find @andrewk 's post really clarified much. On the contrary, far from being a category mistake, meanings are exactly the kinds of thing you ask about in connection with words. And I also don't think asking whether salt is hard is a category error. It might not ultimately be a scientifically helpful avenue of inquiry, but it's not a category error. Now, asking whether salt is even or odd, on the other hand, would imply a category error as I understand that fallacy.

2) I wasn't ultimately addressing the larger issue of empty names, only how the example of @Dawnstorm was not necessarily analogous to that of "Pegasus", "santa claus" or whatever. A correspondence theorist might agree those latter names are empty, but deny that either of the "Joe Smiths" in @Dawnstorm 's example were.

3) In terms of the larger issue of empty names, the original question merely asked how supposed empty names can have meanings. One possible way they can have meanings is under a correspondence theory of truth, according to which, strictly speaking, the truth value of any such name will always be false because there is no such actual thing in the world like "Pegasus" or "santa claus". (I take it generally that a consequence of any correspondence theory is that there are really only two possible meanings for any proposition: true or false)

3) In terms of the larger issue of empty names, the original question merely asked how supposed empty names can have meanings. One possible way they can have meanings is under a correspondence theory of truth, according to which, strictly speaking, the truth value of any such name will always be false because there is no such actual thing in the world like "Pegasus" or "santa claus". (I take it generally that a consequence of any correspondence theory is that there are really only two possible meanings for any proposition: true or false) — Mentalusion

But, doesn't the fact that Pegasus or Santa have meaning without material ontological significance in some way refute the strictly material correspondence theory of truth?

not at all. Of course, they are not properly "names" for the correspondence theory I'm thinking of so not technically empty in the first place, but I think it can easily deal with the fact that they nonetheless have meaning.

I also don't think asking whether salt is hard is a category error. — Mentalusion

I didn't say it was. It is uncontroversial that 'salt', which in common parlance refers to a crystal of many millions of molecules, or a collection of such crystals, is hard. The category error is to ask whether a molecule of NaCl, or a molecule of any compound, is hard.

Re, the last paragraph, does that simply sidestep the issues the correspondence theory of meaning has wrt. to empty names and instead advocate a contextualist/pragmatic approach to meaning? — Wallows

I think so. It finds them to be non-problems. The problem is 'dissolved', to use a popular, but not inappropriate, term.

Yes, sorry, I did misquote, but still don't think it's a category error. It doesn't seem to me impossible to assess the hardness of a molecule in the same way it would be impossible to assess whether a molecule was 'odd' or 'even', which was the point.

What would hardness refer to on the level of a single molecule?

Don't know, maybe it's inability to permeate other molecules? The point was only that it's not inherently non-sensical to ask the question in the same way it would be to ask whether, for example, numbers are hard. It might not be a scientifically interesting question to ask, but that doesn't make it a category error. Also, realize the issue isn't even whether molecules real are hard or not, but whether it even makes sense to ask the question about them. I don't see anything in the common understanding of either molecules or hardness that necessarily prevents them from having that quality however you define it. In fact, it's a typical question to ask about physical bodies (which I take molecules to be) whether they are hard, soft, extended, geometric, colored, etc. This is much different from asking "hey, are numbers hard?" To which the response is "uhhh..."

I'm actually a little unclear as to why people think molecules wouldn't, in fact, be hard in some relevant way in the first place.

Generally I don't have an issue with your claims about how syntax can operate with proper names, and even think the type/token distinction could be useful for explaining the non-definite use of the proper name vs. the definite. I took my claim about the "lexical entity 'john smith'" to be basically consistent with that. However, my concern is exactly with what the actual context of the situation is here and the intentional state of the postal carrier. The package carrier not standing at the door wanting to give the package to anyone who happens to be named John Smith so he can happily walk off feeling like he did his job competently. Rather, he wants to give the package to the John Smith to whom the person who sent it addressed it to, he just doesn't know who that is. In other words, s/he isn't just looking for "a" John Smith, he's looking for "the" John Smith the package is addressed to. So, I just don't see that the syntactic distinctions you bring up - while legitimate in and of themselves - apply to this particular situation here since, in fact, given the context, it does not seem to me that either of the names are empty in the example given. — Mentalusion

But a lexical entity "John Smith" being different from a proper name "John Smith" or not is highly relevant for the type/token distinction. (I've had some minor linguistic education, but I know most about syntax and less about semantics, so there's that to bear in mind when reading my posts.)

Yes, there's an ambiguity with the names. But to talk about the ambiguity you need a word that encompasses both names.

With respect to empty names, ambiguity matters, too. "Harry Potter" is not itself an empty name. You need to know who it refers to (i.e. a fictional character) to know whether it is empty.

We have three cases, here:

1. "John Smith is a common name." -- Referent of "John Smith": a name

2. "This parcel is for John Smith." -- Referent of "John Smith": a specific person.

3. "This parcel is for a John Smith." -- Referent of "John Smith": a group of persons defined by holding the name "John Smith"; Referent of "a John Smith": a specific (but not specified) person.

"Harry Potter is an empty name," uses "Harry Potter" in the first meaning, but there's an implicit assumption as to the identy:

The sentence "The Harry Potter from Rowling's book is an empty name," is a category error. The Harry Potter from Rowling's books is a person, not a name. You'd have to say "Harry Potter is an empty name when it refers to Rowling's character." When I'd be arguing that "Harry Potter" is not an empty name because my neighbour is called that, I'd have misunderstood the concept.

Now, it is actually possible to create a concept of "empty names" such that an "empty name" is only an "empty name" if there are no real entities with that name. "Harry Potter (= 1) is an empty name because there is no Harry Potter (= 3)" is a different concept from "Harry Potter (= 1) is an empty name because Harry Potter (= 2) does not exist", and it's useful, if at all, in different contexts.

I think it's an important distinction, because it's easy to slip, and there may be contexts in which it's not clear what's being talked about, or in which the distinction is meaningless.

In my scenario, there is no empty name. But if someone played a prank and there is no "John Smith" at that address, then one of the names would be empty. (Or formulated for people who don't like the homonym theory: The name would only be empty if it referred to the non-existent recipient of the prank parcel.)

[For what it's worth, this thread is the first I ever heard of "empty names". My intuition was that it's about names that really don't refer to anyone. Maybe an author has made up a name, but is undecided if he'll ever use it and certainly has no character in mind. Such a name would exist, but it'd be "unused" and have no reference - i.e. the name can't be traced to any person fictional or real.]

I think I basically agree with you. If one is working with a theory of naming based loosely on the notion of a Kripkean rigid designator (which I am) or anything similar then there will never be "empty" names since by definition every name rigidly designates one and only one object in the world. In the case of fictional entities like Harry Potter, etc. what is designated is not some actual object/person, of course, but something else, whether you want to say the collective description of Potter in Rowling's works or the ideas people have about those works or whatever, you're right the name is not empty. The name refers to and designates something, just not an actual person.

Also, I agree that if you alter the postal carrier scenario such that it might involve a prank, or however else you want to change it, that changes the interpretation of the situation. But I think until such qualifications are noted, you have to assume people's intentions will follow reasonable expectations under the circumstances. It was for that reason the scenario didn't seem to me to get at the issue of "empty" names as well as other examples.

That said - and this is a parenthetical issue - I still don't think calling references to fictional entities "empty names" constitutes a category error. It's not the correct use of the concept of a name to be sure, but it's not a category error. It's just wrong. Not everything that's wrong is a category error.

Don't know, maybe it's inability to permeate other molecules? The point was only that it's not inherently non-sensical to ask the question in the same way it would be to ask whether, for example, numbers are hard. It might not be a scientifically interesting question to ask, but that doesn't make it a category error. Also, realize the issue isn't even whether molecules real are hard or not, but whether it even makes sense to ask the question about them. I don't see anything in the common understanding of either molecules or hardness that necessarily prevents them from having that quality however you define it. In fact, it's a typical question to ask about physical bodies (which I take molecules to be) whether they are hard, soft, extended, geometric, colored, etc. This is much different from asking "hey, are numbers hard?" To which the response is "uhhh..."

I'm actually a little unclear as to why people think molecules wouldn't, in fact, be hard in some relevant way in the first place. — Mentalusion

The reason it's considered a category error is because "hardness" doesn't actually make much sense if we get very microscopic. The initial concept (just what hardness is, just what counts as it) grew out of our "medium-sized dry goods" interaction with the world, but those sorts of properties don't translate to what we know about the world on an atomic or molecular level.

The whole idea of "empty names" stems from a theory of reference that is very misconceived.

Like I said above, it might not be a scientifically interesting question, but it's not a question that implicates a category error. I still don't see anything in your account that justifies calling the question about NaCl and hardness a category error. Maybe if you explained what you think a category mistake is, that might make me understand your use a little better.

The category error is in the "doesn't make much sense" and "doesn't translate" parts.

That's not what a category error is.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_mistake

In other words, the reason it doesn't make sense or doesn't translate is that an individual molecule is the "wrong kind of thing" to have hardness.

So you don't think molecules are physical objects?