Empty name
Encyclopedia
In the philosophy of language
, an empty name is a proper name that has no referent
.
The problem of empty names is that empty names have a meaning that it seems they shouldn't have. The name "Pegasus
" is empty; there is nothing to which it refers. Yet though there is no Pegasus, we know what the sentence "Pegasus has two wings" means. We can even understand the sentence "There is no such thing as Pegasus." But what can the meaning of a proper name be, except the object to which it refers?
There are three broad ways which philosophers have tried to approach this problem.
Some philosophers, such as Alexius Meinong
have argued that there are two senses of the verb "exists", exemplified by the sentence "there are things that do not exist". The first, signified by "there are", is the so-called "wide sense", including Pegasus, the golden mountain, the round square &c. The second, signified by "exist" is the so-called "narrow sense", encompassing only things that are real or existent. The difficulty with this "two sense" theory is that there is no strong evidence that there really are two such distinct senses of the verb "to be".
Philosophy of language
Philosophy of language is the reasoned inquiry into the nature, origins, and usage of language. As a topic, the philosophy of language for analytic philosophers is concerned with four central problems: the nature of meaning, language use, language cognition, and the relationship between language...
, an empty name is a proper name that has no referent
Sense and reference
Sinn and bedeutung are usually translated, respectively, as sense and reference. Two different aspects of some terms' meanings, a term's reference is the object that the term refers to, while the term's sense is the way that the term refers to that object.Sinn and bedeutung were introduced by...
.
The problem of empty names is that empty names have a meaning that it seems they shouldn't have. The name "Pegasus
Pegasus
Pegasus is one of the best known fantastical as well as mythological creatures in Greek mythology. He is a winged divine horse, usually white in color. He was sired by Poseidon, in his role as horse-god, and foaled by the Gorgon Medusa. He was the brother of Chrysaor, born at a single birthing...
" is empty; there is nothing to which it refers. Yet though there is no Pegasus, we know what the sentence "Pegasus has two wings" means. We can even understand the sentence "There is no such thing as Pegasus." But what can the meaning of a proper name be, except the object to which it refers?
There are three broad ways which philosophers have tried to approach this problem.
- The meaning of a proper name is not the same as the object (if there is any) it refers to. Hence, though "Pegasus" refers to nothing, it still has a meaning. The German philosopher Gottlob FregeGottlob FregeFriedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege was a German mathematician, logician and philosopher. He is considered to be one of the founders of modern logic, and made major contributions to the foundations of mathematics. He is generally considered to be the father of analytic philosophy, for his writings on...
seems to have held a theory of this sort. He says that the sentence "Odysseus was set ashore at Ithaca while sound asleep" obviously has a sense. ... the thought [expressed by that sentence] remains the same whether "Odysseus" has reference or not." Bertrand RussellBertrand RussellBertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, OM, FRS was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic. At various points in his life he considered himself a liberal, a socialist, and a pacifist, but he also admitted that he had never been any of these things...
may also have held a similar theory, that a proper name is a disguised definite descriptionDefinite descriptionA definite description is a denoting phrase in the form of "the X" where X is a noun-phrase or a singular common noun. The definite description is proper if X applies to a unique individual or object. For example: "the first person in space" and "the 42nd President of the United States of...
that signifies some unique characteristic. If any object has this characteristic feature, the name has a referent. Otherwise it is empty. Perhaps "AristotleAristotleAristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
" means "the teacher of Alexander". Since there was such a person, "Aristotle" refers to that person. By contrast, "Pegasus" may mean "the winged horse of BellerophonBellerophonBellerophon or Bellerophontes is a hero of Greek mythology. He was "the greatest hero and slayer of monsters, alongside of Cadmus and Perseus, before the days of Heracles", and his greatest feat was killing the Chimera, a monster that Homer depicted with a lion's head, a goat's body, and a...
". Since there was no such horse, the name has no referent. This is the so-called description theory of namesTheory of descriptionsThe theory of descriptions is the philosopher Bertrand Russell's most significant contribution to the philosophy of language. It is also known as Russell's Theory of Descriptions...
. The difficulty with this account is that we may always use a proper name to deny that the individual bearing the name actually has some characteristic feature. So, we can meaningfully say that Aristotle was not the teacher of Alexander. But if "Aristotle" means "teacher of Alexander", it would follow that this assertion is self-contradictory, which it is not. Saul KripkeSaul KripkeSaul Aaron Kripke is an American philosopher and logician. He is a professor emeritus at Princeton and teaches as a Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the CUNY Graduate Center...
proposed this argument in a series of influential papers in the 1970s. Another difficulty is that different people may have different ideas about the defining characteristics of any individual. Yet we all understand what the name means. The sole information carried by the name seems to be the identityIdentity (philosophy)In philosophy, identity, from , is the relation each thing bears just to itself. According to Leibniz's law two things sharing every attribute are not only similar, but are the same thing. The concept of sameness has given rise to the general concept of identity, as in personal identity and...
of the individual that it belongs to. This information therefore cannot be descriptive, it cannot describe the individual. As John Stuart MillJohn Stuart MillJohn Stuart Mill was a British philosopher, economist and civil servant. An influential contributor to social theory, political theory, and political economy, his conception of liberty justified the freedom of the individual in opposition to unlimited state control. He was a proponent of...
argued, a proper name tells us the identity of its bearer, without telling us anything else about it. Naming is rather like pointing. - A theory that became influential following Kripke's attack is that empty proper names, have, strictly speaking, no meaning. This is the so-called direct-reference theory. Versions of this theory have been defended by Keith DonnellanKeith DonnellanKeith Donnellan is a contemporary philosopher and Professor Emeritus of the UCLA department of Philosophy. He has made important contributions to the philosophy of language, most notably to the analysis of proper names and definite descriptions...
, David KaplanDavid Kaplan (philosopher)David Benjamin Kaplan is an American philosopher and logician teaching at UCLA. His philosophical work focuses on logic, philosophical logic, modality, philosophy of language, metaphysics, and epistemology. He is best known for his work on demonstratives, on propositions, and on reference in...
, Nathan SalmonNathan SalmonNathan U. Salmon is an American philosopher in the analytic tradition, specializing in metaphysics, philosophy of language, and philosophy of logic.- Biography :...
, Scott SoamesScott SoamesScott Soames is a professor of philosophy at the University of Southern California. He specializes in the philosophy of language and the history of analytic philosophy...
and others. The problem with the direct-reference theory is that names appear to be meaningful independently of whether they are empty. Furthermore, negative existential statements using empty names are both true and apparently meaningful. How can "Pegasus does not exist" be true if the name "Pegasus", as used in that sentence, has no meaning? - There are no empty names. All names have a referent. The difficulty with this theory is how to distinguish names like "Pegasus" from names like "Aristotle". Any coherent account of this distinction seems to require that there are, i.e. there exist, objects that do not exist. Given that "Pegasus does not exist" is true, it follows that the referent of "Pegasus" does not exist. Hence there is something — the referent of "Pegasus" — that does not exist.
Some philosophers, such as Alexius Meinong
Alexius Meinong
Alexius Meinong was an Austrian philosopher, a realist known for his unique ontology...
have argued that there are two senses of the verb "exists", exemplified by the sentence "there are things that do not exist". The first, signified by "there are", is the so-called "wide sense", including Pegasus, the golden mountain, the round square &c. The second, signified by "exist" is the so-called "narrow sense", encompassing only things that are real or existent. The difficulty with this "two sense" theory is that there is no strong evidence that there really are two such distinct senses of the verb "to be".
See also
- Meinong's jungleMeinong's jungleMeinong's jungle is the name given to the repository of non-existent entities in the ontology of Alexius Meinong.Meinong, an Austrian philosopher active at the turn of the 20th century, believed that since non-existent things could apparently be referred to, they must have some sort of being, which...
- Ontological commitmentOntological commitmentIn the philosophy of language and metaphysics, an ontological commitment is said to be necessary in order to make a proposition in which the existence of one thing is presupposed or implied by asserting the existence of another. We are “committed” to the existence of the second thing, even though...
- Meta-ontologyMeta-ontologyMetaontology is the branch of metaphysics that deals with the nature of ontology and ontological questions. The term owes its popularization to Peter van Inwagen's 1998 paper of the same name. However, the subject itself is much older, going back at least to Rudolf Carnap's distinction,...