New Essays on Singular Thought

New Essays on Singular Thought Edited by Robin Jeshion

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

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© The several contributors 2010 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2010 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Library of Congress Control Number: 2010920514 Typeset by Laserwords Private Limited, Chennai, India Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by MPG Books Group, Bodmin and King's Lynn ISBN 978-0-19-956788-1

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, Acknowledgements For ideas, suggestions, and conversation at the initial stages of this project, warm thanks to Michael Nelson, Arthur Sullivan, and Kenneth Taylor. Peter Momchiloff, editor extraordinaire, offered encouragement, sage advice, and excellent guidance from its inception to publication. My PhD student Courtney Morris did outstanding work on the Index. The terrific copy and managing editors at Oxford University smoothly and efficiently brought this project to a close. Thanks especially to Elizabeth Stone, Joy Mellor, and Catherine Berry.

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Contents Notes on Contributors

Introduction to New Essays on Singular Thought

Xl

1

Robin Jeshion

Part I The Structure of Singular Thought

1. Getting a Thing into a Thought

37 39

Kent Bach

2. Three Perspectives on Quantifying In

64

Nathan Salmon

3. On Singularity

77

Kenneth A. Taylor

Part II Conditions on Singular Thought 4. Singular Thought: Acquaintance, Semantic Instrumentalism, and Cognitivism

103 105

Robin Jeshion

5. Singular Thought: In Defence of Acquaintance Fran~ois

141

Recanati

Part III Demonstrative and Communication-Based Reference and Thought 6. Demonstrative Reference, the Relational View of Experience, and the Proximality Principle

191 193

John Campbell

7. We are Acquainted with Ordinary Things

213 .

Imogen Dickie

8. Millian Externalism Arthur Sullivan

246

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CONTENTS

Part IV Thinking of Nothing

271

9. Fictional Singular Imaginings Manuel Garda-Carpintero

273

10. Intentionality without Exotica R. M. Sainsbury

300

Index

319

Notes on Contributors Kent Bach, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at San Francisco State University, was educated at Harvard College and the University of California, Berkeley. He has written extensively in philosophy of language, theory of knowledge, and philosophy of mind. His books include Thought and Reference and, with Michael Harnish, Linguistic Communication and Speech Acts. John Campbell is Willis S. and Marion Slusser Professor at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of Past, Space and Self and Reference and Consciousness. He is currently working on causation in psychology. Imogen Dickie is an associate professor at the University of Toronto. Her current research focuses on how our thought and speech about ordinary material objects work. She has published papers in The Philosophical Quarterly, Philosophical Studies, Dialectica, and The Canadian Journal of Philosophy. Manuel Garda-Carpintero is Professor at the Department of Logic, History and Philosophy of Science, University of Barcelona, and Director of the Master and Ph.D. Program Analytic Philosophy. He works on the philosophy oflanguage and is preparing a book on the nature of speech acts, focusing on assertion and ancillary speech acts such as presupposition and reference. RobinJeshion is Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Riverside. She has written numerous articles in philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, history of analytic philosophy, and the epistemology of mathematics, and is the author of the forthcoming book Singular Thought. Fran ACQUAINTANCE, SEMANTIC INSTRUMENTALISM

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in instances in which one lacks a known acquaintance relation with the object of thought. Mental names, for Hannan, are mental representations of individuals, just as names in language are public linguistic representations of individuals. Mental names may be introduced by those who believe that there exists a unique thing satisfying a certain condition. In this way, an agent may come to have beliefs about an individual that uniquely satisfies the condition, despite the fact that she lacks what Hannan calls a "nonquestion-begging" means of identifying that individual. To have a belief about an individual I, it is enough to believe a proposition of the fonn "A* is F," where "A*" is a mental name for 1. 28 In virtue of the agent thinking with the stipulatively introduced mental name, the belief is singular and "about" its object. We can summarize this thesis as follows: Mental Names Sustain Singular Thought: Thinking of an individual I with a mental name that refers to I is sufficient for thinking a singular thought about 1. That is, nothing more is needed for thinking a singular thought besides thinking with a mental name. Thus, for Hannan, agents may have beliefs about individuals with which they are unacquainted by introducing mental names for them and thinking of them with those mental names. It is important to appreciate that Hannan conceives of the act of naming as being, in the first instance, a cognitive act, not simply a public stipulation or a physical act like a stroke of a pen. Hannan sees the agent as directly introducing mental names into cognition. And, furthennore, the introduction of a public name would have to be accompanied or antedated by the introduction of a corresponding mental name. This view tallies naturally with Kaplan's account of name introduction, with Hannan's mental names playing virtually the same theoretical role as Kaplan's linguistic intentions. For Kaplan, public names may be freely introduced into the public language only so long as things are cognitively aright; that is, only so long as one has the right linguistic intention, which is something within one's power to choose. Thus, public name introduction is not independent of what happens cognitively, yet we have the power to generate linguistic intentions with semantics. The parallelism between Hannan's mental names and Kaplan's linguistic intentions give reason to incorporate Hannan's claims on what accounts 28

Hannan (1977: 174).

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for and sustains singular thought as one of our main theses of Semantic Instrumentalism. Putting Kaplan and Harman's views together gives the most complete account of the theory. I shall call it the Kaplan-Harman version of Semantic Instrumentalism. Overall, Kaplan and Harman advocate a view according to which we are in full and complete control of whether or not we directly refer to and so have singular thoughts about those objects we are not acquainted with yet can denote with definite descriptions. This full and complete control is autonomous insofar as it depends upon nothing in our social environment and nothing in our cognitive life apart from our choice about whether to use a directly referential expression. Such directly referential expressions are introduced by the agent's manipulation of the semantics, which requires having the appropriate linguistic intentions. Yet these linguistic intentions can be produced at will by the agent. Singular thoughts about the named individual are produced because agent's thought tracks the semantics: the agent's thought about the named individual is singular because by having the linguistic intentions to think directly about that individual, the agent has a mental name that refers to it, and which is itself sufficient for sustaining singular thought about it. Consequently, we generate singular thought at will. Furthermore, it is only by virtue of the manipulation of semantics that we can secure singular thoughts in the absence of acquaintance. Here is a summary of Kaplan - Harman Semantic Instrumentalism. I have given reformulations of Intentions Constrain Name Introduction and Free Naming Intention Production in terms of mental names, which I prefer. Let I be an individual with which one is unacquainted. Overall Statement of Kaplan-Harman Singular Thought Production: One can have singular thoughts about I by virtue of introducing a directly referential expression, whose reference is fixed with "the F ," and I satisfies the description "the F." Free Descriptive Name Introduction: One can always introduce a descriptive name "N" into the language by fixing its reference with a definite description "the F," used attributively, so long as one believes there exists a unique referent of' 'the F." Mental Names Constrain Public Name Introduction: One can introduce a descriptive name whose reference is fixed with "the F" just in case one has introduced a corresponding mental name into cognition.

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Free Mental Name Production: One can introduce a mental name into cognition if one chooses to do so. Free Choice to Not Think Singularly: One can refrain from thinking singularly about I by refraining from introducing a directly referential expression, whose reference is fIxed with "the F," and I satisfIes the description "the F." Necessity of Semantic Manipulation: The only mechanism by which one could have a singular thought about an individual with which one is unacquainted is by DIRT introduction-by manipulating the semantics of direct reference. Mental Names Sustain Singular Thought: Thinking of I with a mental name that refers to I is sufficient for thinking a singular thought about 1.

§5. What's Wrong with Semantic Instrumentalism? On Kaplan-Harman Semantic Instrumentalism, the idea that anyone can freely introduce descriptive names (and other DIRTS) rests upon its two subsidiary justifying theses, that mental names constrain public name introduction and that one can, just by choice, introduce mental names into cognition. It seems to me that Kaplan and Harman were right in holding that public name introduction requires that one introduces or already has a corresponding mental name in cognition. Mental name production is prior to public name production. Where Semantic Instrumentalism goes wrong is in regarding the generation of mental names as unconstrained and determined exclusively by the agent's choice. Free Mental Name Production is amiss. One cannot simply choose to have a mental name for an individual. One can have such intentions only in the right conditions. Semantic Instrumentalism supposes that we can will a singular intention. But how? By thinking harder, more intensely, with feeling? This lacks plausibility. Few embrace voluntarism about belief or the production of other (nonsemantical) intentions. We should take the same negative attitude here. Mental name production is not wholly under agential control. It is under cognition's control. What distinguishes those instances in which mental names are introduced and those in which their production is stalled? The answer concerns not the individual-to-be-named's epistemic relation, but rather that individual's

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significance to the subject. A mental name can be initiated only if the individual-to-be-named is in the relevant way significant to the thinker. Our thought experiment underscores this point. What divides set 2 and set 3 cases is that the individuals in the latter set are all significant to the thinkers. Not so for the former. In the set 3 cases, our subjects have interests, goals, knowledge and affective states tied to the subject of thought.. I and the rest of society feared the Unabomber, and there was a societal interest in capturing him. Fear creates significance. LeV errier and fellow scientists had an interest in making sense of their fund of astrononucal evidence. Contrast both cases with Newman 1, Julius, dthat(the shortest spy). Obviously, in all of these cases, the individuals (supposed to be named) are entirely insignificant to the agents, having no impact whatsoever on the agent's actions, plans, emotions. Think also of the parking ticket example. When I walk past a car with a parking ticket, and I have no interest whatsoever in the car's owner, I cannot simply choose to have my deferred pronoun in "she's going to be upset" function as a device of direct reference. Insofar as I have no interest in tracking the car owner, no affective states associated with the car owner, n~y mind is tailored to use the pronoun merely as going proxy for an attributive use of a description. Of course, I use a pronoun here, a term whose standard linguistic function is to refer, in a context of use, to the speaker's intended referent, as well as to pick up reterence anaphorically. But in this context, cognition does not yield the referential use. Or COlnpare the footprints and bearprints cases. Semantically, structurally, and evidentially, they are alike. In both cases, I make an assertion involving a deferred demonstrative or pronoun. In both, I lack a perceptually-based means of identifying the subjects and so have no acquaintance with them, except in the extended sense in which I stand in evidential relations to traces of them. In both cases, I have roughly the same kind and amount of evidence: I know the species and sex of the print-maker. With respect to impact on affective states, goals, and interests, they differ dramatically. Given my utter lack of interest in the source of the human footprints, my remark about his having big feet is a linguistic flourish, and the pronoun is a term of laziness. By contrast, the bearprint case resonates as singular because I begin to worry and undertake deliberation, planning, and action in connection to that bear. The affective component creates significance tor me, which in turn inspires action. Consequendy, my mind treats that

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bear as an individual, creating a mental name for it, and my use of the deferred pronoun is singular. Once agents-as-choosers are recognized as non-autonomous in determining mental name production, we are naturally led to evaluate Semantic Instrumentalism's commitment to our ability to control the production of singular thoughts by refraining from introducing directly referential expressions into the language. So, what about Free Choice to Not Think Singularly? If we wish to adhere to an acquaintance condition, or if we simply wish to refrain from bringing a nanle into the language, can we refrain fronl having singular thoughts about individuals? I am dubious. This is not up to us, not within our power. When the conditions are ripe for singular thought, cognition creates singular thoughts for us and we cannot put a halt to them. Think of our Unabomber example. When I heard about the Unabomber, I, like everyone else, was well aware of the epistemic gaps in the community's relation to the bomber and I knew that "Unabomber" was a descriptive name. Even if I had had a desire "not to confound the skeptics," I could not have prevented myself from thinking singularly about him. Because I feared him, and was moved to avoid university mailrooms, my mind treated him on a par with others individuals to whom I orient my actions. I could not have reined in my thought to ensure that it is descriptive and non-singular. In the Dessert Sensations example, my father was initiating specific plans significant to his livelihood, and inextricably enmeshed with his emotions. He too could not have constrained his singular thinking about his planned business, and thus his introduction of "Dessert Sensations" was neither the original nor sole cause of his singular thinking about his future business. He introduced the name to serve in cognition as the standard and effective means of thinking of the business for which he was invariably already engaging in singular thought about constructing his business, as well as to eventually serve as the public name by which others would eventually refer to and think of that business. Or think of our adoption case, involving someone who knows of her adoption and longs to understand her biological roots. Indeed, she experiences intense emotional needs connected to her biological mother--needs for a sense of self-understanding, belonging, identity. Despite her lack of acquaintance, she wonders very specifically about her character, about what sort of life she'd have had with her; about whether and how they are

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alike. She is plainly a deeply significant individual to her, wrapped up in her emotional and imaginative life. Her thought about her mother has the same singular structure as her thought about individuals with whom she is acquainted. It seems impossible for her to somehow have put a halt to the formation of such thought. Initiating singular thoughts is a function that the mind invariably carries through for us. We cannot prevent it. Cognition, not agency, is here in control. This immediately raises a challenge to the last feature of Semantic Instrumentalism, Necessity