Saunders and Wallace Reply
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8399290 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Simon Saunders (0000-0002-8292-3014), David Wallace (0000-0003-2385-5979) |
| Year | 2008 |
| Volume | 59 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 315-317 |
| Publication date | 2008-09-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-0882 • E-ISSN: 1464-3537 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/bjps/axn024 |
| OpenAlex | W2109877952 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 4 |
Words have no function save as they play a role in sentences: their semantic features are abstracted from the semantic features of sen-tences, just as the semantic features of sentences are abstracted from their part in helping people achieve goals or realize intentions. (Davidson 2001, p. 220) Paul Tappenden’s objections to our view boil down to two interconnected points: 1. We provide no mechanism by which words succeed in referring to the objects to which they are supposed to refer. 2. We extrapolate illicitly from non-branching to branching cases, without acknowledging the metaphysical novelty of the latter. We find the first objection difficult to understand. We have explained exactly the rules that determine which objects are referred to by referential expressions; what more does Tappenden want? As we say in our paper, “we do not believe there are any metaphysical truths when it comes to the meanings of everyday
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| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |