[C] [Wittrs] Re: Proper Names --Wittgenstein, Russell, Kripke

  • From: "J D" <ubersicht@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Wed, 03 Feb 2010 18:20:51 -0000

SW,

As you may or may not have noticed, some of the issues regarding proper names 
are actually connected with some of the issues in my recent remarks of the 
grammar of pictures.  More on that is soon to come but I thought I'd offer some 
comments here.  I won't comment on Kripke or Russell (except to mention that 
Russell's work on proper names actually goes through various changes and does 
go beyond the theory of descriptions) but I will offer some comments and 
clarifications you may yet find helpful.

"As I understand it, Wittgenstein's basic point is that people confuse the 
meaning of a name with its bearer."

That's one confusion he addresses.  There are others including remarks to those 
who do not identify the meaning of a name with its bearer.

"He uses Moses and Excalibur as examples"

While Excalibur is used as an example of problems attending to identifying the 
meaning of a name with its bearer, the Moses example is addressed to those who 
would wish to identify any single rule as governing the use of a proper name.

"Because proper names (PNs) mean something apart from their bearer, they take 
on SENSE and are subject to the 'law' (forgive me) of meaning is use."

(I was prepared to "forgive", recognizing a convenient shorthand alluding to 
Wittgenstein's remarks on meaning and use and "law" being used in a jocular 
fashion, but this seems to get you into trouble later, so perhaps my being 
pedantic about this is still necessary.)

Actually, even when we focus on the bearer, this can yet be thought of in terms 
of use:

        43. For a large class of cases--though not for all--in which we employ 
the word "meaning" it can be defined
thus: the meaning of a word is its use in the language.

        And the meaning of a name is sometimes explained by pointing to its 
bearer.


"But what are the senses of PNs? I have listed four. 'Moses' can mean: (a) a 
title or rule (the man who saved the Israelites); (b) a description (the old 
person with a grey beard who works down the road); (c) ostensibility (that 
person right there); or (d) a branding (Moses is DNA profile such-and-such, or 
Social Security Number 233-33-5953)."

I'm not sure I see the point in sharply dividing (a) and (b).  A title or role 
is readily assimilated to a description, e.g. "the person who held thus and 
such a position" is a description as much as "...who works down the road".  And 
descriptions that are not titles can be transformed into titles, as in "the 
person who earned the highest grades in her class" and "class valedictorian".  
"The person who received the most votes", "the person who crossed the finish 
line first", and so forth.

Likewise, "the person assigned thus and such Social security number" is a 
description.

And if we did need to make finer distinctions here (it depends on our purposes 
in drawing these distinctions) we should attend to differences in how different 
"brands" (a misleading simile for various reasons) are used.

A DNA profile may be used to assign a name to a bodily remains (particularly in 
war or after a disaster) or to identify a missing child found years later.  
Here it is being used as a rule for the use of the proper name.  A military DNA 
database can be compared to a color chart, giving the rules for matching a 
particular color to the name of that color.

But (and there are laws, regulations, and rulings governing this) that same 
databse can also be used in other ways, such as connecting a name with a 
definite description ("the father of so and so"), where we may or may not have 
one or more candidates to consider; or an indefinite description ("someone with 
increased susceptibility to such and such ailment"), where the name of the 
individual is not in question.

With a criminal database, we may try to link the description, "the person (or 
one of the people) who raped so and so", with a name in the database.  But of 
course we also take DNA sample of suspects in custody whose names are not in 
question.  Likewise, parents of an abducted child may provide personal affects 
of their child to confirm the identity of someone who is found years later, 
whose name is in question.

There are various connections made between names, descriptions, DNA, and 
putative bearers of names or descriptions.

The (lawful) use of a Social Security number is a different matter.  Possessing 
of the card, knowing the number, knowing the mother's maiden name, the place 
and date of birth, having additional photographic identification, and so forth, 
may all be considered.  If I don't have the card or know the number, I may not 
be able to confirm my identity for various purposes.  But if I do, I may yet be 
guilty of malfeasance if the number is not assigned to me.  Typically, my right 
to use the name and the number stands (or falls) as a single issue.

Where the SSN distinguishes one "Jane Smith" from another, the right of Jane to 
call herself or be called by that name is not in dispute.  What may be in 
dispute are the legitimacy of various descriptions being ascribed to her, e.g. 
"the person who has accrued this much in benefits".

"Therefore, PN's accurately exist as four BEHAVIORS."

Be very careful here.  Proper names are words.  Using a proper name is a 
behavior.  The practice of using proper names is an institution.  And this 
practice is involves following rules.  But when there are different rules 
applied to the use of the same proper name or the same word, this is not 
necessarily different behavior (as if when using a word, the user always were 
thinking of one rule or another).

Having "a whole series of props in readiness," being "ready to lean on one if 
another should be taken from under me" (PI 79) does not imply that I always 
have one rule or another "in mind" when I used a proper name.

       Someone says to me: "Shew the children a game." I teach them gaming with 
dice, and the other says "I didn't
mean that sort of game." Must the exclusion of the game with dice have come 
before his mind when he gave me the
order? (PI, p.33)

And if circumstances arise that lead me to use one "prop" or another, it does 
not follow that my behavior in initially using the name would have been 
different prior to being questioned.  If a different question were asked, I 
should answer differently.  And that would not mean that I was lying about what 
I was doing.  The ability to appeal to different rules does not necessarily 
indicate different actual behavior.

"One of the things that is strange about PN's is that only some of the senses 
seem to rule the bearer. That is, one could say that Moses did not exist if the 
story of Israelites is false, even though a man named 'Moses' to whom the story 
was attributed did, in fact, exist."

One "could" say a great many things.

What does it mean to say that a man named "Moses" did exist?  That someone was 
named "Moses" but nothing in the story is true of him?  That's as relevant here 
as a landscaper named "Jesus" (pardon the crude stereotype) is to the question 
of historicity of Jesus.  When you add, "to whom the story was attributed", 
this prompts the question:  What do we mean by this "Moses", about whom many 
false things were said, from any number of other people named "Moses"?

And Wittgenstein does not say that some of the senses "rule the bearer".  He 
rightly challenges that idea:

 I shall perhaps say: By "Moses" I understand the man who did what the Bible 
relates of Moses, or at
any rate a good deal of it. But how much? Have I decided how much must be 
proved false for me to give up my
proposition as false? Has the name "Moses" got a fixed and unequivocal use for 
me in all possible cases? (PI 79)

If Bacon wrote the plays, then Shakespeare did not.  Or if "Shakespeare" is 
Bacon's pseudonym, then Bacon is Shakespeare.  But we believe other things 
about Shakespeare, such as that he had a career performing at The Globe.  If 
these (and other beliefs) also turned out false, we could say "Shakespeare did 
not exist."  We could also say that Bacon is Shakespeare, so Shakespeare did 
exist, but that many false beliefs had been attached to the pseudonym.

And why should we expect that the rules would be prepared in advance to 
determine which would be correct?

"It would be the same as saying 'George Washington was the man who could never 
tell a lie,' and learning that this is false -- he told many. And upon hearing 
of this, in your delusion, you might say, 'The George Washington I know doesn't 
exist.'"

That would be hyperbole and of course such expressions have their use.  But 
saying that George Washington did not exist in the sense that an archaeologist 
or hostorian might say that Moses did not would not be a matter of being 
disilusioned about any particular belief but rather finding that a great deal 
of military and political history was false.

"He says that the meaning of PN's is variable DURING THEIR DEPLOYMENT."

Yes.  But I don't know where you're getting the idea that he also said that 
other senses were fixed.

                                        So my definition of "N" would perhaps 
be "the man of whom all this is
true".--But if some point now proves false?--Shall I be prepared to declare the 
proposition "N is dead" false--even if
it is only something which strikes me as incidental that has turned out false? 
But where are the bounds of the
incidental?--If I had given a definition of the name in such a case, I should 
now be ready to alter it. (PI 79)

"Now, what does Wittgenstein's view of PN's do to Russell? Here, the idea of 
the theory of descriptions is in trouble, right? Because, after Wittgenstein, 
you cannot say of 'Moses' that it refers to (a) an X; (b) its definition -- 
because, (1) meaning is use; (2) the bearer and PN are different; and (c) the 
definition is in flux by virtue of the way the PN language game exists."

The Theory of Descriptions could be readily treated as providing a paradigm for 
rules explaining meaning as use, so (1) is a non sequitur.  If it is a flawed 
paradigm, that is not because it cannot be treated as an explanation of use.  
Furthermore, even if it couldn't be so treated, Wittgenstein's remarks on 
meaning and use would not be in conflict because he explicitly says, "though 
not for all" (cases), and proper names could be viewed as an exception.

Finally, ellipsis and joking references to "law" notwithstanding, PI 43 is not 
a thesis to be used to knock down other theses.  It is a set of truisms 
indicating alternative ways of understanding questions about meaning that will 
hopefully reduce some temptations to proffer theses at all.

(2) is very badly expressed.  Of course the bearer and the name are different, 
but who would suggest otherwise?  The name "George Washington" and the person 
George Washington couldn't be more different.

That the meaning of the name and the bearer of the name are different is 
something Wittgenstein would emphasize.  But not against the Theory of 
Descriptions.  Treating names as abbreviated descriptions is not at all the 
same as equating the meaning of a name with the bearer of that name.

The way that we may shift between using various descriptions in using a proper 
name would be a problem for some uses of the Theory of Descriptions, but not 
for others.

        And this can be expressed like this: I use the name "N" without a fixed 
meaning. (But that detracts as little
from its usefulness, as it detracts from that of a table that it stands on four 
legs instead of three and so sometimes
wobbles.)

        Should it be said that I am using a word whose meaning I don't know, 
and so am talking nonsense?--Say
what you choose, so long as it does not prevent you from seeing the facts. (And 
when you see them there is a good
deal that you will not say.)
(PI 79)


JPDeMouy

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