| The goal of my dissertation is to propose and defend a unified account of the semantic content of proper names that can address all the following six problems facing various theories of proper names: The Modal Argument, the Epistemic Argument, the Semantic Argument, Frege's Puzzle, Belief Puzzles, and Empty Names.; I first defend a theory of reference concerning proper names. I argue that for every proper name, there is a structured web of community uses associated with it. Among the objects involved in the Kripkean causal network of the name, the object that stands out as the dominant bearer of the web of community uses is the referent of the name. Roughly, an object becomes the dominant bearer of the web of uses, if it either satisfies or causes the weighted most of the properties/uses in the web.; Secondly, I examine Nathan Salmon's and Scott Soames's defenses of the direct reference theory. For their strategies to succeed, they need the assumption that all the properties/beliefs (or at least the specific ones) in the web of community uses of a name are pragmatically imparted information and thus semantically irrelevant information. I adduce various examples to show that there are cases where we have strong intuitions that even specific properties/beliefs can collectively be semantically relevant. And I try to find good reasons to support and explain these intuitions.; Thirdly, I propose that the meaning of a name N can be given like this. N means the object that is the dominant bearer of the web of community uses in this (rigidified) world. On the surface, this is a version of rigidified cluster theory. However, I contend that in order to use this theory to solve all the aforementioned difficulties and more importantly, in order to understand our linguistic practices involving proper names, we must emphasize the indispensable roles played by social and pragmatic factors. Indeed, I submit and explain that in essence, this is a social, historical, holistic, and pragmatic viewpoint. |
