Reduction and Elimination in Philosophy and the Sciences
Reduction and Elimination in Philosophy and the Sciences
Reduction and Elimination in Philosophy and the Sciences
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222<br />
Dispens<strong>in</strong>g with Particulars: Underst<strong>and</strong><strong>in</strong>g Reference Through Anaphora — Peter Meyer<br />
s<strong>in</strong>gular term John Doe is coreferential with <strong>the</strong> pronoun<br />
he <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> utterance token <strong>in</strong> question.<br />
3. Consequences <strong>and</strong> applications<br />
The account of l<strong>in</strong>guistic reference briefly sketched here<br />
shares many of its strong po<strong>in</strong>ts with Br<strong>and</strong>om’s approach,<br />
s<strong>in</strong>ce, <strong>in</strong> many cases, Br<strong>and</strong>om’s ‘substitutional’ analyses<br />
have a ‘coreferentialist’ analogue. For lack of space, only<br />
some h<strong>in</strong>ts can be given here. Thus, <strong>the</strong> account is highly<br />
neutral with respect to ontological questions, which helps<br />
to solve some well-known problems by actually dissolv<strong>in</strong>g<br />
<strong>the</strong>m. Thus, Qu<strong>in</strong>ean concerns with <strong>the</strong> ‘<strong>in</strong>scrutability of<br />
reference’ simply do not arise when <strong>the</strong> basic question is<br />
not which object is referred to on a given occasion, but<br />
which o<strong>the</strong>r utterances ‘refer to <strong>the</strong> same th<strong>in</strong>g’. Similarly,<br />
<strong>the</strong> well-known quarrels about, say, description vs. ‘Millian’<br />
<strong>the</strong>ories, or <strong>the</strong> Kripke belief puzzles (Kripke 1980), can be<br />
given ra<strong>the</strong>r down-to-earth analyses that, <strong>in</strong>cidentally, bear<br />
some similarity to <strong>the</strong> l<strong>in</strong>e of reason<strong>in</strong>g <strong>in</strong> Katz’s “new <strong>in</strong>tensionalism”<br />
(Katz 2004) without shar<strong>in</strong>g most of its general<br />
outlook on semantic or metaphysical questions.<br />
Less perspicuously, <strong>the</strong> account proposed here<br />
might help to throw <strong>in</strong>to relief subtle preconceptions about<br />
what may or may not be regarded as a ‘proper’ particular<br />
for a <strong>the</strong>ory of reference. The volatile <strong>in</strong>tuitions<br />
surround<strong>in</strong>g <strong>the</strong> concept of rigid designation are a case <strong>in</strong><br />
po<strong>in</strong>t: In <strong>the</strong> narrowly scoped read<strong>in</strong>g of <strong>the</strong> sentence The<br />
president of France might have been bald, <strong>the</strong> subject is<br />
usually <strong>in</strong>terpreted as a quantified expression of some<br />
sort; <strong>in</strong> ord<strong>in</strong>ary parlance (not Br<strong>and</strong>om’s, to be sure), it is<br />
assumed to denote different <strong>in</strong>dividuals <strong>in</strong> different<br />
possible worlds. On <strong>the</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r h<strong>and</strong>, a rigid <strong>in</strong>terpretation<br />
(which takes <strong>the</strong> nom<strong>in</strong>al phrase to denote some k<strong>in</strong>d of<br />
“generic concept”) cannot simply be dismissed on a priori<br />
grounds. Indeed, a ‘generic’ read<strong>in</strong>g of <strong>the</strong> nom<strong>in</strong>al phrase<br />
<strong>in</strong> question would seem ra<strong>the</strong>r natural <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> context of a<br />
legal or political discussion of <strong>the</strong> duties or obligations of<br />
‘<strong>the</strong> president of France’ or even ‘<strong>the</strong> present president of<br />
France’, when what is at stake is not a certa<strong>in</strong> person but<br />
properties or requirements concern<strong>in</strong>g a political function.<br />
Posit<strong>in</strong>g such k<strong>in</strong>ds of <strong>in</strong>dividuals is not as far-fetched as it<br />
might seem; for <strong>in</strong>stance, <strong>the</strong> term <strong>the</strong> mice that <strong>in</strong>habit my<br />
kitchen every w<strong>in</strong>ter might be taken to denote a particular<br />
with remarkably complex identity criteria, perta<strong>in</strong><strong>in</strong>g to a<br />
reoccurr<strong>in</strong>g temporary presence of a group of animals<br />
whose members are possibly different every time.<br />
The present proposal differs, however, markedly<br />
from Br<strong>and</strong>om’s <strong>in</strong> be<strong>in</strong>g much less committed to a picture<br />
of reference as be<strong>in</strong>g ‘about particular objects’. On close<br />
read<strong>in</strong>g, this picture still figures prom<strong>in</strong>ently <strong>in</strong> Br<strong>and</strong>om:<br />
First, <strong>the</strong> particulars <strong>in</strong> a representationalist conception of<br />
reference are supposed to correspond to Br<strong>and</strong>om’s<br />
equivalence classes of terms; second, s<strong>in</strong>gular terms, on<br />
Br<strong>and</strong>om’s view, can get <strong>the</strong> empirical content <strong>the</strong>y have<br />
only through entry moves of <strong>the</strong> language game,<br />
specifically, non-<strong>in</strong>ferential perception reports that use<br />
unrepeatable l<strong>in</strong>guistic items tied up anaphorically with<br />
repeatable ones. Empirically contentful terms are<br />
prototypically l<strong>in</strong>ked to classes of ‘external circumstances’<br />
that Br<strong>and</strong>om calls “reference classes”. This way, a<br />
surpris<strong>in</strong>gly direct relation between l<strong>in</strong>guistic expressions<br />
<strong>and</strong> a nonl<strong>in</strong>guistic reference class sneaks <strong>in</strong>, as it were,<br />
through <strong>the</strong> back door.<br />
In stark contrast, <strong>the</strong> approach presented here<br />
allows for a much broader underst<strong>and</strong><strong>in</strong>g of <strong>the</strong> semantic<br />
<strong>and</strong> pragmatic nature of anaphoric relations, even <strong>in</strong> cases<br />
where ‘syntactically conditioned’ anaphoric relations clearly<br />
cannot be correlated with <strong>the</strong> idea of one <strong>and</strong> <strong>the</strong> same<br />
‘th<strong>in</strong>g’ be<strong>in</strong>g referred to twice. In a sense, what is proposed<br />
here is a radically deflationary attitude towards <strong>the</strong> notion<br />
of object. To take a simple example, <strong>the</strong> two sentences<br />
John was told that his mo<strong>the</strong>r had left <strong>and</strong> Every boy was<br />
told that his mo<strong>the</strong>r had left are completely analogous as<br />
to grammatical structure; yet, Br<strong>and</strong>om would, similar to<br />
many logic-based semantic approaches, be forced to<br />
assume that <strong>the</strong> semantic analyses of <strong>the</strong> two sentences<br />
differ with respect to quantification, with <strong>the</strong> consequence<br />
that <strong>the</strong> anaphoric pronoun his must be treated differently<br />
<strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong>se two cases. However, a philosophical account of<br />
reference should be able to say someth<strong>in</strong>g about why this<br />
difference is so difficult to expla<strong>in</strong> to a layperson. This<br />
requirement becomes more urgent <strong>in</strong> a strictly relational<br />
view on grammatical structure as proposed <strong>in</strong> (Meyer<br />
2003), where I argue that assign<strong>in</strong>g a grammatical<br />
structure to a sentence token supervenes on pragmatically<br />
grounded relationships between this <strong>and</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r utterance<br />
tokens: If such a view is on <strong>the</strong> right track, <strong>the</strong>n it is difficult<br />
to expla<strong>in</strong> why <strong>the</strong> two sentences can be ascribed parallel<br />
syntactic structures <strong>in</strong> spite of differ<strong>in</strong>g significantly <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong>ir<br />
semantic makeup.<br />
Indeed, <strong>the</strong> alleged semantic difference between our<br />
two example sentences virtually disappears <strong>in</strong> a<br />
‘coreferentialist’ perspective, where both sentences<br />
receive a parallel treatment: The two terms <strong>in</strong> question can<br />
simply be said to be coreferential <strong>in</strong> both cases, <strong>the</strong><br />
difference resid<strong>in</strong>g ra<strong>the</strong>r <strong>in</strong> what I have called above <strong>the</strong><br />
‘k<strong>in</strong>d of l<strong>in</strong>k’ between <strong>the</strong> coreferential expressions. In<br />
o<strong>the</strong>r words, traditional l<strong>in</strong>guistic issues concern<strong>in</strong>g<br />
quantification <strong>and</strong> scope relations can be h<strong>and</strong>led<br />
successfully <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> account presented here. That <strong>the</strong> idea<br />
of deny<strong>in</strong>g any fundamental difference between <strong>the</strong><br />
anaphoric relations <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> two sentences is not simply out<br />
of place is suggested by o<strong>the</strong>rwise widely differ<strong>in</strong>g<br />
conceptions that try to use a unified description for<br />
quantified <strong>and</strong> non-quantified sentences; a remarkable<br />
recent example is (Shapiro 2004) who, follow<strong>in</strong>g ideas of<br />
Kit F<strong>in</strong>e <strong>and</strong> o<strong>the</strong>rs, assimilates a sentence such as Every<br />
sheep is white to <strong>the</strong> type of sentence exemplified by Dolly<br />
is white by propos<strong>in</strong>g a logic of arbitrary <strong>and</strong> <strong>in</strong>def<strong>in</strong>ite<br />
objects that is suitable for real-world language process<strong>in</strong>g<br />
tasks via semantic networks. Surpris<strong>in</strong>gly, much recent<br />
work on knowledge representation <strong>in</strong> this area is<br />
compatible with <strong>the</strong> non-denotational approach I propose<br />
(see also Helbig 2 2008) <strong>and</strong> deserves to be placed under<br />
more scrut<strong>in</strong>y by philosophers of language.