HOW PROPER NAMES HOW PROPER NAMES REALLY WORKREALLY WORK

byby

Claudio F. CostaClaudio F. Costa

Since I believe that I have the most convincing theory of proper names in the market, and since I am an aspie living far away from the so-called

civilized world, I feel myself compelled to make some advertisement of it.

What follows is a summary of my paper “A Meta-Descriptivist Theory of

Proper Names”, published in the journal Ratio, XXIV, 3, 2011.

As you probably know, according to the old theory of proper names (defended by Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein, Strawson and Searle), a proper name abbreviates a cluster of descriptions, which builds its meaning.

According to Searle, who defended this theory in its most sophisticated form, when

you use a proper name like ‘Aristotle’ you you are applying some indefinite sub-set of an are applying some indefinite sub-set of an

open set of co-referential identifying open set of co-referential identifying descriptions.descriptions.

‘ARISTOTLE’ =The tutor of Alexander

The author of the MetaphysicsThe greatest disciple of Plato…

My first point against this form of cluster theory is that the cluster is completely disordered. My first aim is TO PUT AN TO PUT AN ORDER IN THIS MESS…ORDER IN THIS MESS…

In order to achieve this aim I build a rule to regulate the cluster. This rule must be a This rule must be a meta-rulemeta-rule, and its expression is a , and its expression is a meta-meta-

descriptiondescription, since the descriptions , since the descriptions belonging to the cluster are belonging to the cluster are expressions of expressions of cognitive rules helping us to identify the cognitive rules helping us to identify the

object.object.

The aim of this meta-descriptive-rulemeta-descriptive-rule is to show what are the most fundamental

descriptions, how they work together, and what are the merely auxiliary descriptions.

But how to find the most fundamental descriptions?

To find what them all that you need is to use an incredibly simple method: look what the encyclopediasencyclopedias have to

say about proper names!

Consider, for example, the entry about Aristotle in the Wikipedia. The first thing that you will read is that Aristotle was born in 382 b.C. in Stagira and died in 322 b.C. in Chalcis, and that he produced the major philosophical system of antiquity.

Here you already see that philosophers like Gottlob Frege where lead astray by the choice of irrelevant descriptions like ‘the tutor of Alexander the Great’ to replace the name ‘Aristotle’.

What we will find at the toptop of encyclopedia enters are two fundamental descriptions-rules:

a LOCALIZING and aa LOCALIZING and a CHARACTERIZING description.CHARACTERIZING description.

The LOCALIZINGLOCALIZING DESCRIPTION gives us the spatio-temporal locationlocation and careercareer of the object.

And the CHARACTERIZINGCHARACTERIZING DESCRIPTION gives us the propertiesproperties which are the reasonreason why we use the name.

Although fundamental, none of these rules is essential in the sense of being necessarily applicable.

1) It is possible that in a possible world Aristotle does not satisfy the characterizing rule, for example, in the case he died as he were very young and never wrote his opus.

2) And it is also possible that Aristotle does not satisfy the localizing rule, for example, in a possible world where he was born and wrote his work two hundred years later in Rome. Kripke Kripke was prone to note this point!was prone to note this point!

Nevertheless, at least in somesome degreedegree a disjunctiondisjunction of these two

fundamental description-rules must be always satisfied, and this is the this is the

point Kripke was not prone to note…point Kripke was not prone to note…

- I cannot say that Aristotle was a Greek man who seduced Callas and married Jackeline.

- I cannot say that Aristotle was not a I cannot say that Aristotle was not a philosopher, but a fishmonger who lived in philosopher, but a fishmonger who lived in the late Renaissance, to borrow an example the late Renaissance, to borrow an example from John Searle. The reason is: in these from John Searle. The reason is: in these casescases neither the localizing nor the neither the localizing nor the characterizing rule is minimally characterizing rule is minimally satisfied.satisfied.

The final form of the meta-descriptive rule to be applied to any given cluster of descriptions presented by a proper name name is more

sophisticated, and I do not have time to demonstrate it here in any detail.

Nevertheless, here it goes: MDRMDR:A proper name N is used to A proper name N is used to referrefer to the to the object X belonging to a certain class C of object X belonging to a certain class C of objectsobjects IffIffIt can be assumed that X It can be assumed that X rightlyrightly originatesoriginates ((normally causal historically) our ) our awarenessawareness that that - X satisfies the - X satisfies the localizinglocalizing description for N description for N and/orand/or- X satisfies the - X satisfies the characterizingcharacterizing description description for Nfor Nsufficientlysufficiently and and moremore thanthan anyany otherother object object belonging to the class C of objects.belonging to the class C of objects.

Applied to the name ‘Aristotle’ this general meta-descriptivist (form of) rule generates the rulerule ofof identificationidentification for the name ‘Aristotle’, which is:

RI-’Aristotle’:RI-’Aristotle’:The name ‘Aristotle’ is applied to refer to a man iff it rightly (causally) originates our awareness that this man was born in Stagira in 382 b.C. lived part of his life in Athena and died in Chalcis in 322 b.C. and/orand/orhe was the author of the main ideas of the Aristotelian opus, and that this (these) condition(s) is(are) satisfied by this man sufficiently and more than by any other man.

Of course, not all users of the name will know this rule.

Indeed, people may use the name ‘Aristotle’ knowing only auxiliary

descriptions like ‘the teacher of Alexander’, ‘the teacher of Alexander’, ‘the grandson of Achaeon’, ‘the husband of ‘the grandson of Achaeon’, ‘the husband of

Pythias’, ‘the master of those who know’, Pythias’, ‘the master of those who know’, ‘the philosopher mentioned by the ‘the philosopher mentioned by the

professor’…professor’… or even wrong (but convergentconvergent) descriptions like ‘a Greek general‘a Greek general’.

But there must be PRIVILEGED USERS who know this rule at least in partsknow this rule at least in parts, and people who use the name without knowing what they are saying must rely on the knowledge of these privileged users.

Without this the reference simply Without this the reference simply collapses!collapses!

The first advantage of the adoption of this The first advantage of the adoption of this rule of identification is that is easy to see rule of identification is that is easy to see that the that the meaningmeaning as as FREGEANFREGEAN SENSESENSE ( (as as INFORMATIO-NAL CONTENT, INFORMATIO-NAL CONTENT, ERKENNTNISWERTERKENNTNISWERT) of a proper name is ) of a proper name is NUCLEARLYNUCLEARLY constituted by its LOCALIZING constituted by its LOCALIZING and CHARACTERIZING description-rules.and CHARACTERIZING description-rules. Only SECONDARILY, in its FRINGES, the content of meaning is enriched by the AUXILIARY DESCRIPTION-RULES.

It is intuitive that Aristotle is much more necessarily ‘the Greek philosopher who

wrote the aristotelian opus’ than ‘the founder of the Lyceum’ or ‘the lover of

Herphylis’, since those descriptions convey to us only very contingent information.

The second advantage of rules of identification of this form is that they

allow us to explain rigidityrigidity within descriptivism!

Indeed, this rule of identification (differently from any detached

description) can be applied in all in all possible worlds where Aristotle existspossible worlds where Aristotle exists.

This rule can be even changed in the form of a descriptivedescriptive sentence that is analytic and necessary, if you wish.

A third great advantage of the proposed definition is that it can better explain why proper names are rigid while descriptions are flaccid.

It is simply because many descriptions are LOOSELY LINKEDLOOSELY LINKED WITH A PROPER NAME,

SO THAT THIS LINK CAN BE DISSOLVEDDISSOLVED IN A DIFFERENT POSSIBLE WORLD…

So, we think that Aristotle was ‘the founder of the Lyceum’ in our world, but since no since no description is description is necessarilynecessarily linked with the linked with the proper nameproper name, it can be that in a different world he never founded anything of the kind… remaining however our Aristotle.

This can be proved when we consider that when you choose descriptions that have no proper name to be put in their place and they are fundamental descriptions, they turn to be rigid. For example:

‘The assassination of the Austrian archduke Ferdinand in Sarayevo in 1914’.

or

‘The last Ice Age’.

Since these descriptions are not linked to any proper name, they will designate the same events in any possible worlds where these events occur.

Finally, all counterexamples to descriptivism imagined by can find a more complete descriptivist answer.

Consider, for example, Kripke’s famous Gödel’s counterexample.

Since the name Gödel is linked with the description ‘the inventor of the

incompletness theorem’, and, Kripke supposes, it has been discovered that he

has stolen this theorem from Schmidt, Kripke claims that according to

descriptivism Gödel should be Schmidt.

But we all know that even in this case Gödel remains Gödel and should not be

called ‘Schmidt’

Considering our rule of identification for Gödel, we see that Schmidt is far from satisfying its proper identifying rule…

for the person who satisfies the localizing description for Gödel

continues to be ‘the man who was born in 1905 in Brünn, who studied in

Wien and died in 1976 in Princeton’. Moreover, Gödel continues to satisfy

partially (by 2/3) the characterizing rule for Gödel, since the discovery of

the incompletness theorem was surelly not the only relevant thing he

did as a logician. He also married the beautiful Adele.

Of course there are a lot of other Of course there are a lot of other problems that you will see, if you are problems that you will see, if you are an informed reader,an informed reader,

but in this case I suggest you read the but in this case I suggest you read the paperpaper......