Abstract
In this paper, I offer some considerations on the contextual dimension of reference and, then, I expatiate on the possibility that referential NPs refer to objects but at the same time they are linked with a conceptual presupposition, that explains why reference only does not work and is not an efficient way to represent certain NPs. I compare this issue of a conceptual presuppositions with the considerations on pragmatic or conversational presuppositions in papers by Capone or Macagno and Capone.
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Notes
- 1.
I am deepening some consequences of the public discussion by Donald Davidson and P.F. Strawson on the difference between objects and events. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE71QAOYav4&t=2692s.
- 2.
“In Frege’s account, a mind is directed at a particular by virtue of grasping a thought that has as a constituent a sense of the appropriate kind, determining that object as its associated Bedeutung” (McDowell 1998, p. 260).
- 3.
Accommodation is a dynamic process in which we start with asymmetric presuppositions and the asymmetry is bridged by the understanding that the hearer accepts a proposition that the speaker is presupposing, because, if he (the latter) did not accept it, he would have to say so. Since he says nothing, and, in particular, he does not object to adding that proposition to the common ground, it is presumed that he has accepted the proposition in question.
- 4.
The most obvious answer that comes to mind, is that something underspecified for semantics, as a pronominal, should be used to fix reference through contextual clues, and a relative clause of the non-restrictive type, that expresses a presupposition, should be used in combination. Non-restrictive relative clauses are known to be associated with presuppositions. The referential restrictions presumably would have to derive from contextual considerations, rather than from composition with non-restrictive relative clauses. There may be considerable difficulties with this proposal. It is not only the syntax that bothers me, but the syntax of logical form. How should we analyse ‘That man’? Presumably we need something like “He, who is a man and belongs to the non-empty set of men, and I am demonstrating through finger-pointing”. In this way we obtain for free the condition ‘There is an x, x is a man and x is unique in context C’, which is a presupposition of the presupposition.
- 5.
Garcìa-Carpintero (2000, p. 114) also thinks that modes of presentation are essential parts of justification acts.
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Donald Davidson and Sir Peter Strawson in conversation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE71QAOYav4&t=2692s
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Capone, A. (2023). Reference in Context. In: Capone, A., Penna, A. (eds) Exploring Contextualism and Performativity. Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology, vol 30. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12543-0_1
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