Direct reference theory
A direct reference theory is a theory of meaning that claims that the meaning of an expression lies in what it points out in the world. It stands in contrast to mediated reference theories.
John Stuart Mill
The philosopher John Stuart Mill was one of the earliest modern advocates of a direct reference theory beginning in 1843.[1] In his A System of Logic Mill introduced a distinction between what he called "connotation" and "denotation." Connotation is a relation between a name (singular or general) and one or more attributes. For example, ‘widow’ denotes widows and connotes the attributes of being female, and of having been married to someone now dead. If a name is connotative, it denotes what it denotes in virtue of object or objects having the attributes the name connotes. Connotation thus determines denotation. The same object can, on the other hand, be denoted with several names with different connotations. A name can have connotation but no denotation. Connotation of a name, if it has one, can be taken to be its meaning in Mill.[2]
According to Mill, most individual concrete names are connotative, but some, namely proper names, are not. In other words, proper names do not have meaning. All general terms, on the other hand, are according to Mill connotative. In sum, Mill’s overall picture resembles very much the description theory of reference, though his take on proper names is an exception.[2]
Bertrand Russell
A paradigm example of a direct reference theory is that of philosopher Bertrand Russell. In his direct reference theory, Russell first distinguished between a "logical subject" and a "grammatical subject." The former is the thing in the real world - the referent; while the latter is a description or concept. He then claimed that in logic a "feeling for reality" had to be maintained in order to save discussion from a whole host of troubles. And since the logical subject was made up only of reference, tied together in strings by propositional functions, in logic there was no meaning except reference.
Russell was also quite alive to the topic of descriptions. His particular interest was in "definite and indefinite descriptions." Definite descriptions have the form of "the such-and-such", and indefinite descriptions have the form of "a such-and-such". Russell then made a surprising argument: that "descriptions had meaning only if they were put into bigger statement(s)." This is because his method of translating sentences necessitated that they be rewritten in logical notation, and an isolated description cannot be effectively captured by any such notation.
Take the sentence, "The king of France is bald", for instance. For Russell, what it really translates as (in a reformed, better English) is:
There is at least one x such that: x and nothing else is a King of France, and x is bald.
In this newer, better form, the word "the" no longer appears; it is diffused throughout the rest of the logical translation. This, for Russell, is why the definite description "the king of France" is not meaningful on its own; the word, 'the', doesn't work unless it appears in the context of a full sentence.
Furthermore, the above can be expressed in a more strict logical form (where K(x) means "x is the king of France", B(x) means "x is bald", the bullet means "and", and the arrow means "if-then"):
Which says: "there is an x such that: x is bald and x is a king of France; and for every y that is a king of France, x is y; and every z that is a king of France is bald". This is a very long way of stating that something is both uniquely king of France and bald.
For Russell, this logical form would provide the speaker of a language with metaphysical insight as to what they are actually speaking about.
Ruth Barcan Marcus
Ruth Barcan Marcus advanced a theory of direct reference for proper names at a symposium in which Quine, and Kripke were participants: published in Synthese, 1961 with Discussion in Synthese 1962. She called directly referring proper names "tags". Kripke urged such a theory in 1971 and thereafter. He called such directly referring proper names "rigid designators".
Saul Kripke
Later on, the philosopher Saul Kripke would defend direct reference theory when it comes to proper names. Kripke claims that proper names do not have any "senses" at all, because senses only offer contingent facts about things.
To explain, he uses the formal explanation of possible worlds. The possible worlds thought-experiment first takes the subject, and then tries to imagine the subject in other possible worlds. Taking George W. Bush, for example. First (1) the thought-experiment must state that the name "George W. Bush" is the name used to describe the particular individual man that is typically meant. Then (2), the experimenter must imagine the possible states of affairs that reality could have been - where Bush was not president, or went into a different career, was never born at all, etc. When this is done, it becomes obvious that the phrase "President of the United States in 2004" does not necessarily describe George W. Bush, because it is not necessarily true in all possible worlds; it only contingently describes him. By contrast, for instance, the word "apple" will always describe the same things across all possible worlds, because of premise (1). So use of the word "apple" to describe apples is true in all possible worlds.
Terms that are true across all possible worlds in this way are called "rigid designators."
Criticism
You cannot make sense of a name, if you know nothing of the name, the bearer, and their relatedness. The reference or meaning of a name presupposes the "knowing subject" and relevant knowledge indeed. The name George W. Bush for example means nothing to those children who have no idea who or what the bearer is. Then, the direct reference theory without the "knowing subject" mediating is simply too simplistic. The mediated reference theory will be an inevitable alternative.
See also
- Causal theory of reference
- Descriptivist theory of names
- Frege's Puzzle
- Sense and reference
- The Meaning of Meaning
References
- ^ Stainton, Robert J. (1996). Philosophical Perspectives on Language. Broadview Press. p. 61. ISBN 9781551110868.
- ^ a b "John Stuart Mill – Connotation and Denotation". University of Helsink. 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-30.