Year: 2019
Type: article
Abstract: The distinction between a merely ‘rigidifying’ dthat and a directly-referential take on dthat-terms is well known, and is explicitly highlighted by Kaplan in Afterthoughts, his 1989 commentary on Demonstratives. What is not equally widely recognized is that Afterthoughts also oscillates between three different directly referential proposals. This essay discusses the semantic and philosophical implications of these different directly-referential interpretations of ‘dthat’, paying particular attention to (a) the relationships between syntactic and propositional structure, (b) the structure and makeup of contexts in the semantics of indexical languages, (c) the significance of context shifting devices and of so-called operators on character, and (d) the aims and scope of propositional semantics.
Source: Synthese
Author: Stefano Predelli
Institution: University of Nottingham
Language: English
Subfield: Language and Linguistics
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $2,690
OpenAlex ID: W4252923554