fassler. phil lang final paper. propositions

8/13/2019 Fassler. Phil Lang Final Paper. Propositions

1/11

1

Molly Fassler

Professor Avnur

Phil 199

20 December 2013

Are Propositions Too Weird?

The assertion that a given statement means something (or, perhaps slightly more

controversial, has meaning) is so ordinary and familiar that it may seem obvious and indisputable.

But to assert that some statement (for the purposes of this paper, take statements to include

anything communicable through language, such as voiced utterances, certain thoughts, and some

written words) means something is not as simple and uncontroversial as it may originally appear,

for this assertion requires some foundational support that is, at the very least, not obvious.

Namely, it requires an explanation of what it is to meanor to have meaning. That is to say,

it must answer: in virtue of what is something meaningful? Proposition theorists posit that

separate entities,propositions,

and a statement

s having a certain relation to such an entity is

what makes the statement meaningful. Such entities entities that exist outside of space-time,

among other specific properties at the very least seem extremely strange considering other

laws and properties which we take to be true about the world. Some object that propositions are,

just too weird to serve as an explanation of meaning. They argue that, as described,

propositions simply do not fit in with our normal conceptions of how things in our world work

or what types of things exist in our world and thus, any proposition-based theory of meaning

cannot possibly be correct. While I grant that initially, propositions may seem to contradict

certain laws about the nature of the world that are often taken to be absolutely true, I argue that

they are not really as weird as one might think, and should thus not be objected to on such

grounds.


2/11

1

z

Theories of Meaning

Theories of meaning attempt to answer what it is that makes a given statement

meaningful. Any adequate answer to this question, any theory of meaning, must be able to

explain all of the features we typically ascribe to meaning. Lycan calls these features the

meaning facts(Lycan, pp.65). These facts include, but are not limited to, the following:

i. That some noises or jumbles of letters are meaningful and others are.

This seems obviously true. For there is some distinguishing feature between a statement such as

Dogs have furand Ruf evan sgod such that one is comprehensible and the other is not.

ii. That two distinct statements can have the same meaning. (Synonymity)

I can say both Snow is whiteand La neige est blancheand, although they are different

statements, they both seem to express the same thing.

iii. That one statement can have multiple meanings. (Ambiguity)

Ambiguity arises when a statements meaning is unclear. That is not to say that it has no

meaning, just that there it has multiple possible meanings. Abbott and Costellos Whos on

First?routine is perhaps the best example of ambiguity. When Abbott informs Costello Whos

on firstCostello clearly understands some meaning from that statement the problem is that

he gains a different meaning than the one Abbott believes the statement to have. This is because

the simple statement Whos on firstis ambiguous it could either mean that Abbott, too, is

wondering which player is playing the first base position (the meaning Costello understands) or,

it could mean there is a player, named Who,who is playing the first base position (the meaning

intended by Abbott).

iv. That one statement can contain or entail a separate statement. (Entailment) (Lycan, pp.


3/11

2

65-6)

One can state Hes fat and uglyand such a statement entails both that hes fat and that hes

ugly. The original statement is made up of constituent parts which are themselves meaningful.

The Proposition Theory

The Proposition Theory of meaning is generally attributed to Frege, Moore, and Russell

and aims to answer the question of meaning by claiming that there are abstract entities that

statements can have a specific kind of relationship to and by virtue of this relationship become

meaningful. These abstract entities are propositions(Freges term was thoughtbut for the

purposes of this paper I will stick to propositions). Propositions, in the most general

description, are what a collections of wordsmean (Moore, pp. 57). So, when I say Dogs have

furit is meaningful by virtue of its having a certain type of relation to the proposition that

dogs have fur (Lycan, pp. 69). Propositions are the contents of statements expressible by a

thatclause. When I state The moon is full,this statement expresses something outside of

just the words themselvesit expresses that the moon is full. Similarly, when I have any act of

consciousness like belief, a desire, or a thought, I have a belief, desire, or a thought that

something, and that something is other than the act(Ryle, pp. 93). That other something that

comprises the content of such attitudes or statements is the proposition.

Propositions are extremely useful for explaining how we seem to communicate with each

other. Intuitively, we feel that statements translated into different languages can communicate the

exact same sentiment. Proposition theories account for this by explaining that the two statements,

although different, have similar relations to a singular proposition. For this to be the case, a

proposition is something that is separate from both the words that express them and the objects in


4/11

3

the world to which they correspond. Positing separate entities, although perhaps objectionable, is

nevertheless very helpful in explaining the meaning facts. I have just described how the

proposition theory explains synonymity, and the theory seems to deal with the others equally

easily.

When a statement is meaningful, it differs from a non-meaningful statement because it

expresses a proposition. As Moore argues, there is obviously some distinction from simply

hearing a collection of words and understanding their meaning. For when we are faced with a

meaningful statement, we do not simply hear it like we hear noises. To use Moorean terms, we

apprehenda proposition as well (Moore, pp.57). When a statement is ambiguous, this is

because there are two propositions that it may be expressing. And when a statement entails

another, this is because the given proposition contains constituent propositions. This a simple

summary of different proposition theories, but one can still see how proposition theories are

relatively intuitive. They seem to align quite well with how we usually understand the meaning

facts.

The Objection

As described, propositions are typically taken to possess essential properties, and the

objection I will address rests on at least some of these properties being contradictory to our other

facts about the world. Firstly, propositions are independent of language. As shown with the

account of synonymity, propositions do not belongto any language (Iacona, pp. 327). Because

the source of the meaning of the words lies outside the words themselves, different words can

latch onto the same meaning. Furthermore, propositions are mind-independent. Thus, twominds can have distinct thoughts that express the same proposition. Notice that the proposition is

a separate entity from the thought itself. Hence, two people can indeed be thinking the same


5/11

4

thought, at least in the sense that the meaningful content of their thoughts is the same. These two

properties get at perhaps the strangest property of propositions: they are unlocalized. That is to

say, they exist outside of space and time.

Propositions, unlike introspections that might express them, are publicly accessible. I

might think to myself that I am hungry. This thought itself is only accessible to me it exists

only in my mind (which may very well be my brain). But the proposition that this thought

expresses (that I am hungry) can very well be expressed to others and apprehendedby others.

The proposition expressed by my thought is not located in my mind, and indeed it seems there is

no location at all with which a proposition can be identified.

Similarly, a proposition is eternal. I can think that I am hungry now and if I think that I am

hungry next week, the proposition that serves as the content of both of these thoughts hold an

identical proposition (the constituent proposition that I am hungry). This suggests that the

proposition exists whether or not I am thinking a thought that uses it in its content. Thus

propositions are exist outside of the limits and bounds of time.

Suddenly propositions seem very weird indeed. It seems very strange that such things such

as thoughts or statements, which have spatio-temporal locations, somehow have a relation to

something outside of space and time. And yet proposition theorists hold that, There certainly are

in the Universe such things as propositions: the sort of thing that I mean by a proposition is

certainly one of the things that is(Moore with italics added, pp. 56). But if a proposition is,

it, at the very least isin very different way than most everything we usually say something is

in the universe.

Typically, one is inclined to say there are at most two sorts of things that exist in the world:

physical and mental (some may simply restrict the categories to the physical). Propositions imply


6/11

5

a third sort of being.Entities that exhibit this third sort, which Ryle refers to as the Third

Realm,do not exist, for they are not anywhere or anywhen, but they are in some other way, for

they too have qualities and relations(Ryle, pp. 104). Other things in the universe dogs and

brains and peopleunlike propositions, exist in the universe. Explaining meaning through

propositions then, not only posits additional types of entities in the universe, but also that there is

another type of beingin the world. Herein lies the objection I wish to address: that positing

propositions as an explanation of meaning require a reforming so drastic of our conceptions of

the rules about the world our rules about how things exist in the worldthat they are, at best

unlikely, and at worst impossible. The objection is not that the proposition theory posits

extraneous entities (not an Occams Razor objection), but instead that the entities it

necessitates are too weird; they are too unlike anything else in the known or accepted universe,

to have explanatory relevance. The objection does not entail a rejection of meaning (although it

does allow for such a belief; for more on this see Quine, specifically pp. 11 or pp.47-48 or

Harman on Quine), but only that if there is really such a thing as meaning, then it cannot be

derived from such things as propositions.

There seem to be three main assumptions about the nature of the universe that those who

object to any proposition theory on the previously stated grounds hold at least one of assumptions

these to be true: i) That beings exist; ii) That entities must cause; iii) That entities that cause

must cause only within their domain. I would like to examine exactly how propositions seem to

contradict with each of these supposed laws.

I) That beings exist.When we think of things that are,we typically would think of things what we would

have no problem also describing as existing. For everything that isseems to necessarily exist


7/11

6

somewhere at sometime in our universe. My dog both is and exists. Similarly, my mind, the

trees outside, etc. It is hard to think of anything, but as proposition theorists might argue, not

impossible, that isbut does not existas well. Indeed, it is hard even to know what thedifference is between these two states because we typically think of them as synonymous terms.

Propositions, however, do not exist anywhere or anywhenin our universe, and thus contradictthis supposed law of the universe. However, as we will see in the Benacerraf-type reply, this is a

more controversial claim than one may initially believe it to be.

II) That entities must cause.

Some hold that anything described as entity (as propositions are) must have some causal

power (Ryle, pp. 106). Things that are in this universe seem also to cause. Propositions,

however, do not. This assumption about entities seems to fit in quite well for those who ascribe

to any sort of causal theory of knowledge on which knowledge of X requires some sort of causal

relation to X (Benacerraf, pp. 671). And the causal theory of knowledge certainly seem to match

with our intuitions of how we say we know that entities in the world exist. For us to know that

entities exist requires that the entity itself caused our knowledge of its existence. As Iocana

argues, we have no such relation to propositions, and thus it seems unreasonable to argue for

propositions as an explanation of meaning (Iocana, pp. 244). Propositions, as they have qualities

and relations to other entities in the universe, must also have some sort of causal interaction with

those entities. However, propositions, as they exist independent of space and time, cannot have

what we would deem causal power (Lycan, pp. 72).


8/11


9/11

8

must necessarily existand so this should not pose at threat to propositions either.As Benacerraf argues, numbers, should not be thought of as objectsor entities.

Similarly, propositions should not be described as such. Objects can be identified and can act

individually, whereas numbers are really stand-ins not for an individual but for a whole system of

relations. (pp. 69). A number is not an individual object; 6is not something by itself, but ratheran abstract structure,and the elementsof the structure have no properties other than thoserelating them to other elementsof the same structure(pp. 70). 6is a relationship of less than7 and more than 5, and without any other number, 6 would seem to lose its entire identity.

Objects can be identified witha number, such as when we say There is 1 studentbut that isnot to say that student and 1 is the same thing. Instead, the identification of studentwith 1serves to identify the student as having a relationship within an abstract structure. Similarly,

statements can be identified witha proposition, but that is not to say that the statement is identical

to a proposition. Rather, meaningful collections of words are meaningful because they are

identified with a particular relation within an abstract structure. A proposition then, is a specific

relation within an abstract structure. Similar to numbers, is not an objector entity,and thusneed not causelike objects and entities do, and thus the proposition theory avoids assumption iiand iii, and with them the too weirdobjection as a whole.

One might ask the nature of the abstract structure of propositions. Someone might object

that the meaning of a statement cannot be less thanor more thanthe meaning of another likenumbers can, and thus to characterize propositions as Benacerraf characterizes numbers would be

a mistake. But meanings do relate to each other, and it seems to be just this relation that

characterizes a meaning itself. The word snowis not meaningful if we imagine it withoutrelating to other meanings: meanings of whiteor wateror weather. Propositions, as


10/11

9

meanings, are relations. They cannot be understood individually. When a statement is

meaningful, it is meaningful in virtue of being identified with a specific relation within an

abstract structure.

The too weirdobjection fails to invalidate proposition theories of meaning. It is in fact,commonly accepted, as evidenced by numbers, that there are alternative ways of beingtoexisting. Additionally, propositions as relations within an abstract structure, are not objects orentities, and thus do not need to cause. The supposed assumptions that propositions contradict

are either not assumptions worth holding on to, or do not actually contradict with the

characterization of propositions. Proposition theories of meaning then, cannot be objected on the

grounds of propositions being too obscure to our conceptions of the universe.

Works Cited

Benacerraf, Paul. "What Numbers Could Not Be." The Philosophical Review 74.1 (1965): 47-73.

JSTOR. Web.

Harman, Gilbert. "Quine on Meaning and Existence, I. The Death of Meaning." The Review of

Metaphysics 21.1 (1967): 124-51. JSTOR. Web.

Iacona, Andrea. "The Expressing Relation." Dialectica 56.3 (2002): 235-60. Web.

Lycan, William G. Philosophy of Language: A Contemporary Introduction. London: Routledge,

2000. Print.

Moore, G. E. Some Main Problems of Philosophy. London: Allen & Unwin, 1953. Print.

Quine, W. V. From a Logical Point of View. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard UP, 1961. Print.

Russell, Bertrand. "On Propositions: What They Are and How They Mean." Proceedings of the

Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes 2 (1919): 1-43. JSTOR. Web.


11/11

fassler. phil lang final paper. propositions

Documents