mark richard, commitment

8/2/2019 Mark Richard, Commitment

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CommitmentAuthor(s): Mark RichardReviewed work(s):Source: Nos, Vol. 32, Supplement: Philosophical Perspectives, 12, Language, Mind, andOntology (1998), pp. 255-281Published by: Blackwell PublishingStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2676150 .

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Philosophical erspectives, 2, Language,Mind,and Ontology, 998

COMMITMENT

Mark RichardTufts University

Thanks o Quine, the question,Howdo ourbeliefscommit s to various ortsof objects?, s usually recast as the question, How do our theoriescome to becommittedo various orts of objects?The latter question, says Quine, is oneabout semantic properties such as reference and satisfaction:The assuming of objects is a mental act, and mental acts are notoriously difficult topin down this one more thanmost. Little can be done in the way of tracking houghtprocesses except when we can put words to them. For something objective that wecan get our teeth into we must go after the words....If we turn our attention to thewords, then what had been a question of assuming objects becomes a question ofverbalreferenceo objects. To ask what theassumingf an object consists in is to askwhat referringo the object consists in. (TT, 2)

To be precise, Quine says, questions about commitment are questions about thetruthconditions of our quantifications:We can very easily involve ourselves in ontological commitments by saying, forexample, thatthere s somethingbound variable)which red houses and sunsets havein common.... But this is, essentially, the onlyway we can...: by our use of boundvariables....we are convicted of a particularontological presupposition f, and onlyif, the alleged presuppositumhas to be reckoned among the entities over which ourvariables range in orderto renderone of our affirmations rue. (OW, 12-3)Section I of this paperargues hatthe notion of ontological commitment s farmore intensional than Quine would have us believe. Accounts like Quine's are

subject to co.unter-example nless modified to involve intensional notions suchas synonymy. Once so modified, an account along Quine's lines turnsout equiv-alent to one on which a theory is committed to Ks provided it (has a theoremwhich) saysthat there are Ks.Sections II throughV consider the prospects for such an account. Section IIraises an "internalproblem"for it: although a theory can be committed to uni-


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256 / MarkRichardcornsbut notcentaurs, t is notclear(given the non-existence of the unicornandthe centaur), that we can distinguishbetween saying thatunicorns,and sayingthatcentaurs,exist. Section III attempts to solve this problem.The solution re-quirescareful attention to the semantics of constructionslike 'is ontologicallycommittedto'; Section IV pursuessome of the fine points of these semantics.Finally,sectionV raises an "externalproblem" or bothQuine's account ofcommitmentand its intensionalheir. Put simply,the problemis this:we believewhat's said by sentences we understandand accept; we can understandand ac-cept sentenceswhich expressexistentialquantificationover Fs withoutthinkingtheyinvolve such;but we arenotcommittedto Fs unless we takeourselves to beexistentiallyquantifyingoversuch.I argue hattheproblem s genuine,but do notattempt o solve it here.

It has often been observedthatQuine's accountof ontologicalcommitmentis modalized ('has to be reckoned'), and that such modalizationought be anembarassment or someone like Quine. I will considerCartwright'sreformula-tion of Quine's account,whichcashes out themodal diomin termsof derivability:(C) An elementarytheory,T,presupposesobjects of a kindK f andonly if there isin T an open sentence 0 having a as its sole free variablesuch that (i) (3a)0a is atheoremof T;(ii) it follows fromthe semanticalrules of T thatfor every x, + is trueof x only if x is a member of K. OTM, 10)

By 'the semanticalrules' of T, Cartwright ells us, he means "thosewhich statewhatChurchcalls theextensional artof the semantics"of thetheory,essentiallythe principles which would would be involved in anTaskiancharacterization ftruth or the language of T. (OTM, 1 1)I take it the generalidea is clear.1Suppose Brodospeaks a firstorderversionof English, and holds a theory in which 'fflx x is an Albanian dentist' occurs.Ignoring the structureof 'Albaniandentist', a semantictheoryfor his languagemay be expectedto contain a clause like

1. for any x, x satisfies 'x is anAlbaniandentist'iff x is anAlbaniandentist.We can thusderivefrom the semantic theorythatfor every x, x satisfies 'x is anAlbaniandentist'only if x is anAlbaniandentist.2And so Brodo is convincted ofcommitmentto Albaniandentists.

There is no suchthing as thesemanticalrules for a(n interpreted)anguage.To give semanticalrules, in the sense Cartwrighthas in mind, we need only fixthe extensions of predicates(andnames andfunction symbols, if such be avail-able), specify the domainfor the quantifiers,andchase truththrough he courseof thelanguage's constructions.3But of coursetherewill bemanyways to do this.


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Commitmer1t / 257Supposethat as a matterof fact all AlbaniandentistsareSlavic utilitarians,andvice versa.Then we do no harm o the semantictheory containing1,quasemantictheory, f we replace(1) thereinwith

2. for any x, x satisfies 'x is an Albanian dentist'iff x is a Slavic utilitarian.Let Brodo's theorybe simply 'fflxx is anAlbaniandentist'. It follows from thesemantic theorywe now have for Brodo's languagethatfor any x, x satisfies 'xis an Albaniandentist'only if x is a Slavic utilitarian.But of course Brododoesnot incur commitmentto Slavic utilitarianssimply by thinking that there areAlbaniandentists.Given the plurality of systems of semanticalrules for any interpreted an-guage, Cartwright' accountof Quine's criterionwould seem to face a dilemma.Eitherwe replace'thesemanticalrules'in (C) with 'some set of semanticalrules',or we replace it with 'every set of semanticalrules'. If we make the formerre-placement,we have the absurd resultjust noted. But if we make the latter re-placement,we haveno less absurdresults.It does not follow fromthe semanticaltheorybasedon 2 that for every x, x satisfies 'is an Albaniandentist'only if x isan Albaniandentist.But Brodo's theory commits him to such, none the less.It occurs to one that the problem is that it is a contingent matter(in theexample)thatthe extentofAlbaniandentistryandSlavic enthusiasm or Benthamco-incide.A semanticalsystem for a languageL must, in its basis, interpreteachsimple term of L with one which is necessarily co-extensive therewith.Some-thing in a languageL* whose form andmeaningis roughly indicatedby

4. for any x, x satisfies Sbx n L iff x is Fcan be partof an adequatesemanticalsystem (in L*) for L if, but only if, Sbx n Lis trueof u at a possible worldw iff x isF in L* is true of u at w, for any (possible)objectu and worldw. If this strictureon semantictheoriesis displeasingto Quine,well, too bad.He can at least restcontentthat, once we properlyunderstandwhatit is for something to be a semantical system for a language, his criterionofcommitmentpasses muster.

We have not disposedof theproblem, that therewill be a pluralityof seman-tic accountsof a language.Suppose,for illustration' sake,that(of metaphysicalnecessity) somethingis aperson iff it is a materialobjectof sortS. Thenthere areat least two things a semantictheorycan say aboutEnglish's 'person':that it istrueof x iff x is a person,and thatit is trueof x iff x is a materialobject of type S.So there continueto be two ways to understandCartwright' accountof Quine'scriterion:as requiringonly thatsomesemantics for a theoryimply, of anexisten-tially quantifiedpredicate,that it is satisfiedonly by Ks, or as requiring hat allthe semanticsimply this. Call these the E and theU interpretations, espectively.Thereare also two ways to understandhe Cartwright' use of itfollows romtheoryT thatS. On one understanding,we might take this to mean thatT has a


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258 / MarkRichardtheorem,t, andwhat t says is such that, of metaphysicalnecessity, it is true onlyif it is true that S. On this understanding, f it is metaphysicallynecessary that ifS, then S*, then if it follows from T that S, it follows from T that S*. Call thism-following.Wemight also adoptamorerefined notion of following from,whichI will call -following.To say that it f-follows from T that S is to say thatT has atheoremwhich says that S.4 Note that even if persons are, of necessity, all andonly thematerialobjects of sort S, still to say thatJonesis aperson is not therebyto saythat she is amaterialobject of sort S; thus, it canf-follow from a theory thatJones is a person without its f-following that she is a materialobject of sort S,even given the necessaryco-incidence of the two.There arethus fourways to understandCartwright' suggestion. Butnone ofthem, I am afraid, s tenable.

TheE-interpretationoupledwithm-following. personwho simplymakesa mistake about the chemical composition of salt-thinking that it consists ofsodium,hydrogen,andchlorine is notcommitted o absolutelyeverything hereis or could be. Forexample, such a person is not committed,simply by his mis-take, to alien abductees.But, given widely acceptedviews about kinds and ne-cessity, salt is necessarilysodiumchloride, and thusnecessarilynot a compoundof sodium,hydrogen, andchlorine.5Now, the naturalsemantics for the languageof the theory

will have as a theorem thatfor any x, x satisfies 'is a [pure]sample of salt com-posed of sodium, hydrogen, and chlorine' only if x is a [pure] sample of saltcomposed of sodium, hydrogen,and chlorine. And from this it m-follows thatsomethingsatisfies the predicate in questiononly if it is an alien abductee.TheU-interpretationoupledwithm-following. xactly the same objectionarises here, since any semantic theory which correctlyinterprets5's predicatewill have a theorem saying something necessarily equivalentto the claim, thatsomethingsatisfies the predicate iff it is a sample of salt composed of the threeelements.6TheE-interpretationoupledwith -following.One correct accountof thesemantics of (the languageof) (5) will have as a theorem that something x sat-isfies 5's predicate iff x is a sampleof salt composed of sodium,hydrogen, andchlorineand x was abductedby aliens. Forone way to give a correctaccount of5's semanticsprocedesthus: observe thatsamples of sodium make up the exten-sion of 'sodium', samples of hydrogen thatof 'hydrogen', samples of chlorinethat of 'chlorine',and thatsomething x is in the extension of 'salt' iff either (a) xis not composed of sodium,hydrogen, andchlorine,and x is a sample of salt, or(b) x is composed of sodium, hydrogen, and chlorine,and x is a sample of saltabductedby aliens. So it will f-follow from a theorem of a correctsemantics for(5) that(5)'s predicate is true of somethingif and only if it is composed of thethreeelements, is a sampleof salt, and was abductedby aliens. And so it f-follows


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Commitment / 259from these semanticsthat the predicateis true of something only if it was ab-ductedby aliens.7TheU-interpretationoupledwith -following.Berkeleythinksthereareonlyspirits.And so he thinks thatpersonsare spiritsof a certain sort S*. Supposethat,in fact, Berkeley is wrong:personsare (of necessity) material objects of sort S.Then we canbuildan adequatesemanticalaccountof Berkeley's languageL with

6. for any x, x satisfies 'person' in L iff x is a materialobjectof sort S.Such an accountneed not employ 'person'or any of its synonyms. Now, to saythatsomethingsatisfies a predicate ff it is a materialobject of sortS is not to saythatsomethingsatisfiesthepredicate ff it is a person.So it will notf-follow fromsucha semantic accountof Berkeley's languagethat Berkeley's theory, 'fflxx isa person' s trueonly if for some x, such thatx is aperson, x satisfies 'is aperson'So on the present nterpretation f Cartwright' account,Berkeley's theory s notcommittedto persons.Is some version of (C) tenable?We might furtherrestrictwhat counts as asemantic heory,requiring hatsomething n a languageL* whose form andmean-ing is roughlyindicatedby

4. for any x, x satisfies Xx in L iff x is Fcanbe partof an adequatesemanticalsystem (in L*) forL if, butonly if, Xx in Lis synonymous ith x is F in L*. Suppose we say this, and understand followsfrom' n termsof f-following. If we also require hatsemantic heoriesbe "pure"-thatis, be free of "extraneous nformation" such as an axiom thatsalt does notcontainchlorine),we can avoid the objections above.At this point, highly intensional elements have enteredinto our character-izationof ontologicalcommitment.In fact, it is difficult to see what significantdifferencethere is, between (C) so understood,and a criterionsuch as

(S) A theory T is ontologically committed to Ks providedit has a theoremwhich says that thereareobjects of kind K.(Here, 'K' is schematic.) For consider what is required,on the presentunder-standingof (C), for a theoryT to be committedto, say, dogs. It will have to havea theorem H(x+(xsuch that, given that a semantic theory interprets+ with asynonym, ,of 0, thetheoryf-entailsthat+ is trueof somethingonly if it is a dog.Since the theory must be pure, it presumably has this entailmentin virtue of atheoremto the effect thatsomething satisfies + iff it is an F. Now, if F itself is asynonym for 'dog', then, of course, T has a theorem which says that there aredogs. But how else could the entailmentarise?Well, if 0 meant somethinglike'blackdog', or 'dog whichchasedthe catthatkilledthe rat', the entailmentwouldgo through.But in that case, too, T (unless it was so logically impoverishedthat


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260 / MarkRichardit could not infer that there are dogs from the claim that there are black dogs)would have as a theoremthat there are dogs. And I must say it is difficult to seehow else the entailment n question could arise.

As I see it, any version of Quine's criterionwhich has some chanceof beingacceptablewill turnout equivalentto (S). And this, it seems to me, should not beso surprisingon reflection. Even if personsare(necessarily)materialobjects ofsort S, someone who thinks thereare materialobjectsof type S does not have obe committed to the existence of persons, and a person who thinks there arepersons does nothave o be committedto theexistence of materialobjectsof sortS. Forthinking hatthereare materialobjects of sort Sjust isn t hinking hattherearepersons (even given the necessaryco-incidence of the two). To be committedto persons,however, you need to thinkthatthere are some.Exactly thesame pointapplies if we shift from thelevel of thought o the level of language. Since you cansay thatthere arematerialobjectsof a certain sort without saying thatthere arepersons, a theorythat says that there arematerialobjects of a certainsort is nottherebycommitted to persons, even given the necessaryco-incidence. Berkeleymay have been referringo materialobjects when he talkedabout tables, chairs,andpeople, but he was nottherebycommittedo materialobjects. Tothink other-wise is simply to confuse the notions of reference and satisfaction with the ex-quisitely ntensionalnotionof ontologicalcommitment.As thepassagefrom Quineat the beginning of this discussion makes clear,Quine's account of ontologicalcommitmentbegins with just such a confusion.II

So let us considercriterion(S). Puttingthe point about 'dog' and 'black dog'to the side, it would seem that a sentence will say that there are Ks only if itinvolves existentialquantificationof a predicate P such that,necessarily,some-thing is in the extension of P iff it is of kind K. So (S) preserves a link betweenontological commitment andquantification.But as a sentencedoes not say thatthere are Ks whenever it is such a quantification, S) is notobviously liable to ourobjections to (C).A prima facie problem s that a theorymay be committedto centaursbut notto unicorns. It is not clear that this can be explained in terms of what sentencessuch as

1. There arecentaurs2. There areunicornssay, since it is not altogetherclear that these sentencescan be plausiblytaken tosay differentthings.Themetaphysician ells us thatnot only are therenounicorns, herecould nothave been any.8For there to be unicorns, some determinate(possible) specieswouldhave to (possibly) be the species unicorn. So mereresemblance n pheno-


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Commitment / 261type to the unicorn of myth would not make an animal a unicorn; if we have aspecies, we must have a more or less determinategenotype, or type of genotype.But since there are many genotypes which would do equally well in generatingunicornishphenotypes, nothing makes it determinate hat this as opposed to thatgenotype is the genotype of the unicorn. So, there could not be a species, theunicorn.The reasoning applies to centaurs,too.

Suppose this argumentsound. Then even if we identify what is said withconstructions from something more finely individuated than possible worldsintensions-say individuals, attributes,and relations it is not clear that we candifferentiate what (1) and (2) say. If the metaphysician is right, there are notattributescorresponding o 'is a unicorn' and 'is a centaur', for their existencerequires the existence of the corresponding species. Given this, and that sen-tences whose parts pointwise pick out the same individuals, attributesand rela-tions do not differ in what they say, (1) and (2) do not say different things.9

On a Fregean account of propositions, the matter turns on the sense of apredicate ike 'is a centaur'. If such is the sense of some predicate such as 'is abeast with the lower body of a horse and the head of a man', we run afoul of whatthe metaphyscian ells us. If, like some contemporaryFregeans, we tie the exis-tence of a sense to the existence of a reference and take a sense to present a (typeof ) state of affairs, we seem barred rom even postulating a proposition for 1 or2 to express.lIf a Fregean account is to be of help, senses must adhereto general terms sothat (a) 'unicorn'and 'centaur'are assigned different senses, while (b) the senses

they are assigned not only do not present anything, they could not. One mightmodalize a descriptive sense in the attemptto satisfy (a) and (b). For there are,actually,no beasts with the lower body of a horse and the head of a man; and this(thatthere areactually none) is necessary. So nothing could be an instance of thekind whose actual instances are half horse, half man. Similarly for 'unicorn'.This is not guaranteed o satisfy (b). Therecouldhave been half horse halfmen, though they would not have been centaurs.In a situation n which there hadbeen such, but they were causally isolated from us and our forebears, the beastswould not have been in the extension of our term 'centaur' So even if, in point oflucky fact, there are not half horse half men, we have no reason to think that ingenerala "modalizedsense" of a predicate ike 'centaur'will be empty,much lessnecessarily so. A successful solution to our problem should guarantee his.1l

Some say that on their mundane uses, seemingly empty names from fic-tion and myth in fact refer to fictional and mythological characters. f so, 'Ulys-ses fell asleep' non-problematically expresses a proposition, since 'Ulysses'non-problematicallymakes a contribution o what is said either the characterto which it refers, or a way of thinking thereof. Given that the characterParis isdistinct from Ulysses, 'Paris fell asleep' non-problematicallyexpresses yet an-other proposition. One might go on to suggest that seemingly empty predicatesfrom fiction and myth express fictional properties, and thus sentences such as(1) and (2) non-problematicallysay different things.


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262 / MarkRichardThe suggestionis tenableonly on some views of what is said. Fictionalob-jects are (on most views) abstractobjects of some sort; in general, a fictionalF isnot anF. I see no more reasonto think thatfictionalpropertiesareproperties han

tothinkthat ictionalanimals areanimals.If not,and a sentence's predicatesmustrefer to or expressproperties f the sentencesays something,we have no reasonto thinkthat (1) and(2) say anything,muchless differentthings.12There s a morepressingworry.Supposefor thenoncethatthere arefictionaland mythological objects and properties,and that our talk of unicornsmakes(moreor less) determinateclaims because it involves reference to such. It is notthe commitmentof our theories to unicornswhich needs explaining,for we arenot so committed.It is thecommitmentof those who, unlike us, takeunicorntalkat face value which needs explaining. I think we shouldbe dubious thatthe talkof suchpeoplecan be understood n terms of referenceto (mythical)unicornsandthe (mythical)propertyof being one. If I amright, nvokingmythologicalobjectsgets us no purchaseon the problemsentences (1) and(2) present.I can make this out most easily by examiningNathanSalmon's account offictional andmythicaldiscourse.13According to Salmon,when someone makesupa story,shecreatescharacters,a sort of abstractobject.14 he (typically) makesup namesfor these characterswhich, accordingto the story,aretheirnames. Intelling the story,thecreatordoes notactuallyrefer to thefictionalcharacterswiththeirfictionalnames;rather, hepretends o use thenamesto referto them.Oncethe story is told, speakers"import"nto non-fictionaldiscourse the use of thesenamesto refer to thecharacters n question.Thus, 'HoldenCaulfield' as we use itnames a real fictional object;Holden Caulfieldreally does exist.This is supposed to carryover straightforwardlyo myths-that is, to falsetheoriestakento be true.She who makes upsucha theorycreatesabstractobjectswhich arethe referents of those termsof the theory which arenormallytaken tobe non-referring:

An accidentalstoryteller,Le Verrierattempted n all sincerity to use 'Vulcan'to referto a real planet.The attempt ailed, but not for lack of a referent....Plausibly, as theancientsunwittinglyreferred o a planetbelieving it to be a star,so astronomers ikeLe Verrier n using 'Vulcan'may have unknowinglyreferred o Babinet's mythicalplanet,15 aying andbelieving ever so manyfalse things about it. [NE, 40]One might wonder why the fiction writershould be supposed to create a(particular) ictional object. A more apt description of fictionizing seems to bethatwhen someone tells a story,and she and her auditorsare awarethat she ismerely telling a story,the authorraises a character which is a set of character-

istics) to salience. Be thatas it may, my primaryworry concerns Salmon's ex-tension of his account to the realmof false theories andmyths.Why should wesuppose that the false theorizer creates certain fictional characters?And evensupposing thatthe false theorizerdoes this, why supposethat such arethe refer-ents of her uses of what arenaturally akento be the empty termsof hertheory?I will concentrateon the latterquestion,since the appealto fictional objects and


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Commitment / 263attributes s of help in explaining how false theories incur ontological commit-ments only if false theorizersrefer to such objects and attributes.There is a certain plausibility to the idea that someone who intentionallymakes up a fiction, as well as those who recognize a fiction as such, refer tofictional charactersusing theirnames from the fiction. The story teller apparentlyhas a way to correctly describe the object in question ('the character am tellinga story about who is, in my story, thus and so'). The fictionalizer thus has a sortof "cognitive fix" on the characters n her story. She will associate this way ofthinking with her uses of the character's (fictional) name. Given this, and theplausible claim that the fictionalizer (sometimes) intends to use the name as aname of the character, t is plausible that she in fact does so use it. Those who"import" he fictional name into non-fictional discourse can be expected to rec-ognize the reference and to have a cognitive fix on the fictional object as well.Intendingas they do, to refer with the object's name to the object on which theyare fixated, there is nothing particularlymysterious in the proposal that they areable to so refer.But there are significant disanalogies, between an intentional story tellerand one who propounds a false theory. Consider the false theorizer.There will(almost) never be associated with her (intutively) empty terms some descrip-tive way of singling out their purportedmythical referent. Rather, there is (intypical cases) a fairly standardsort of intention, of the sort which is presentwhen one successfully fixes the reference of a novel vocabulary item by de-scription. But in this case the description will not denote. Neither is it partic-ularly plausible that the myth maker has a non-descriptive way of thinking ofthe alleged mythical referent of her terms. After all, the myth maker has nosensory contact with a mythical object; nor does she begin her myth makingwith the sort of non-descriptive mode of conceptualizing the mythical objectavailable to someone who alreadyhas a name for it. The upshot is that it isquite implausible that the false theorizer has an intention, de re or de dicto,which connects the vocabulary she introduces (with a non-denoting descrip-tion) with the fictional object she allegedly creates. So the false theorizer hasno intention plausibly described as an intention, with respect to a certain fic-tional object or property set, to refer to it. Why should we suppose that sherefers to some such object, as opposed to, say, her left thumb, the present mon-arch of England, or (most plausibly) nothing at all?16Salmon suggests that if we deny that 'Vulcan' as used by Le Verrier efers toa mythical planet we will have to say that, when a name is introduced with anon-denoting description (as, arguably, he ancestor of our 'Hesperus' was), thename does not refer.

...Kripkesays that in using the name, or in attempting o use it, l9th century astron-omers failed to refer to anything. But this verdict seems to ignore their unintendedrelationship o the mythical planet. One might ust as well judge thatthe ancientswhointroduced Hesperus'as a name for the first starvisible in the dusk sky, unaware hatthe "star"was in fact a planet, failed to refer to that planet. [NE, 40]


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264 / MarkRichardIn the case of 'Hesperus',it is not true thatthe description 'the starwhich firstappears n the evening sky' is theonly hing whichhelpedestablish its reference.Those who introduced he term had a collection of intentions(manybased upontheir perceptionsof the relevant object) which were relevant to assessing thereferentof the term they introduced.Some of these (I presume)were intentions,withrespect to the planetand thevocabulary tem, thatthe latterrefer to the other.Otherswere intentionswhich, given certainof theirde rebeliefs ('that s a star')were most charitably nterpretedas such. The set of such intentionspresumablyconverged (in some sense of 'converge'which could use a definition) on Venus,making t determinate hatthe term ntroducedreferred o it. Butin thecase of thefalse theorizer,as I argued,therewill typically be no intentions which are plau-sibily taken to be ones which connect the termintroducedwith the relevant ab-stractobject, even when the speaker's intentions are interpretedusing one oranothercannon of charity.Invokingmythological objectsto explainmythologers'ontological commit-ments will be helpful only if the mythologercan be plausibly taken to refer tosuch objects. But if I am correct, it will in general be implausible to think thatsomeonerefersto amythologicalobject if she is not in apositiontorecognize thatthe object is mythological.And of course at that point she (typically) won't beontologically committed to it.III

Riding is a relation,and one can't be relatedto what isn't. So, since Pegasusis not, no one can ridePegasus.Commitment,one mightcontinue, is also a rela-tion, between theories and kinds. Since thereis no kind, the unicorn, no theorycan be committed to unicorns.Temptingas it is, I think we shouldreject this argument.Take the relation,hunting.If I am huntingSmith, I am related to him by the hunting relation, forhe is somethingfor which I hunt.But if I am hunting Smith, there will be somerepresentationor representational tate of mine in virtue of which it is Smith,as opposed to Jones or the odd possum, which I hunt.To say that I am huntingSmith is to say something like: I am engaged in a huntingand that hunting isguided by a Smith-representation.Given that a Smith-representation s a rep-resentation of Smith, hunting Smith is being related to him. Analagously, tosay that I am hunting Pegasus is to say something like: I am engaged in ahuntingand thathunting is guided by a Pegasus-representation.But given thata Pegasus-representations not a representationof anything,hunting Pegasus isnot being relatedto anything at least not to anything outside of the realm ofrepresentationsI propose to develop this suggestion at some length. Once developed, I willapply it to ontological commitment.When you say 'Richard s huntingSmith', 'Smith'is doing two things. It is,of course, referring o Smith. But it is also in one way or anotherallowing you torefer to, quantifyover, or otherwisedrag my representationsnto the discourse.


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Commitment / 265How does thishappen? Smith' itself is a representation.As such,there is a senseof 'translate' n which we can speak of it as translating,or failing to translate,otherrepresentations.Besides referring o Smith, 'Smith' in 'Richard s huntingSmith'determines a class of representations, hose of my representationsrans-latedby 'Smith'.17If this is on track,expressionsembeddedwithin 'hunts'and like verbssupplytwo things: their ordinarysemantic value and something which stands in thetranslation elation.I shallsupposethat t is anexpression's syntactictype,pairedwithits (ordinary i.e., unembedded)semanticvalue, whichis whattranslatesoris translated.18 will thustake such pairs to be the embeddedsemantic values ofexpressions. (Eventually I will adjust this to deal with expressions lacking anunembeddedsemanticvalue.) I will, admittedly bending usage somewhat, userepresentationor suchpairings, of a syntactic (or mental)item andwhat it rep-resents. I shall assume that if one representation ranslatesa second, then, if thefirst representsx, so does the second. So, if an expressionhas an unembeddedsemanticvalue, it translatesonly things which represent hat value.Where or s anexpression, use oror theembeddedemantic alueof oe.l9nessence, the proposal above was that ,Bhuntsor s trueprovided or ranslatessomethingwhich, as one might say,governs a hunt in which (what) ,B(names)isengaged.What is governance?As faras semantics is concerned, of course, it canbe a primitive. But the idea is (roughly) this. Hunts(usually) have goals, whichare given by certainpropositionalattitudesassociated with the hunt. A typicalgoal of a hunt is determinedby an intentionwhose naturalexpression will begiven by somethingwhose form andmeaningis roughlyindicated so: I will findNP.A representation overnsa hunt f it has the rightrelationto such anintention.What "rightrelation"means here depends on details about the natureofpropositionalattitudes. If you arewilling (as am I) to identify propositionalat-titudes with states with sentential structure,and with (the syntactic parts of)representationsas constituents, the relationwill be something like the relationwhichrepresentationr,u)bears to anintention iff something with r as its type isthe syntactic object of i, and this thing, as it thereoccurs, representsu. That is,simplifying and confusing use and mention madly: representationr governs ahuntof x's providedthat x carriesout the hunt with an intentionI willfind r.Prettymuch the full range on noun phrases can occupy the position of or nRichard untsoc propernames, demonstrativesandindexicals, anaphoricpro-nouns, quantifierphrases,andplurals such as 'ducks'. To what extent does theproposaladequatelycapturethe truthconditions of such sentences?Considerquantifierphrases.Accordingto the proposal, 'Richardhunts twoducks' is true(when 'two ducks'takes small scope with respect to 'hunts')pro-vided 'two ducks' (more precisely: ^'two ducks') translatessomething whichgoverns a hunt of Richard' . That is, roughlyspeaking, ust in case some huntofmine has as a goal that I find two ducks. This seems right.What doesn't seem rightis whattheproposal says of the smallscope readingof 'Richardhunts no ducks'or 'Richardhuntsfew ducks'. Theproposaltakes thefirst to be true (roughly) just in case I am engaged in a huntwhich has a goal I


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266 / MarkRichardmight voice with 'I find no ducks'. I suppose I could hunt with such a goal:perhapsI amafraidof ducks, or perhapsone of the hunts in which I am engagedis one which, for whateverreason,shouldn'tculminate in duckdiscovery. But Idon't think the sentence has a use on which it would be made true by such acircumstance.Suppose, for example,I am engaged in two huntsat once, one with Ted andone with David. The first is a huntfor mice, and, as Ted is afraidducks, a goal ofthathunt s thatwe find no ducks.The other is a huntfor David' s pet duck, Daffy.If this is how things are,then thereis no reading of 'Richardhunts no ducks' onwhich it is true. I draw the conclusion that the only way to combine 'Richardhunts' with an expression such as 'no ducks' or 'few ducks', so as to yield asentence possibly true, is to raise the quantifier out of the scope of 'Richardhunts'20For the truthof Richardhuntsoe,when or s a quantifierphrasewith smallscope, ormust be "existenceentailing".More exactly:Let us use 'determiner' orefer to theunembeddedsemanticvalues of expressions like 'a', 'every', 'at leasttwo', 'most', and so on, which combine with nouns to form nounphrases. Saythat a determinerD is existentially positive if, where d has D as it meaning, forany predicates P and Q, what's said by d Ps are Q necessitates or presupposeswhat's said by a P is Q. Let N be the unembedded semantic value of a nounphrase.Say thatN is existentially positive providedthat if N is of the semantictype of the unembedded emanticvalue of aquantifier i.e., of thecombinationofa determinerand a noun),then it is the resultof applying an existentiallypositivedeterminer o (somethingwhich could be) the unembeddedsemantic value of anoun;and say thatan embeddedsemanticvalue of a nounphrase is existentiallypositive providedits unembeddedvalue is.21Then we may adjustthe above pro-posal thus: ,Bhuntsoc s true provided that ôc s existentially positive and ittranslatessomething which governs a hunt of (what) ,B(names).A last adjustment, or the case where or s a plural,such as 'ducks' Richardhuntsducks s truewhen, and only when, a goal of one of my hunts is that I catchdeterminermanyducks,for some existentiallypositive determiner.Presumablythis is true if andonly if I hunt, anda goal of the huntis that I catcha duck. Saythat,where e is an expression, sing(ê) is ê, unless e is a ("bare")plural like'ducks';in that case, sing(ê) is âne', where 'e' is the singularform of e. (Forexample, sing(^'ducks') = ^'a duck'). Then ,Bhuntsor s true iff sing(ôr) sexistentiallypositive andtranslatessomething which governs a hunt of (what) ,B(names). Observe that it is perfectly possible to quantify into the position of'Smith' in ,B shunting mithwith a normal,objectualquantifierandproduce notjust a sensible sentencebut a true one, provided that, in the requisitenotion oftranslate,avariablev underassignment ranslatesarepresentation wheneverthevariable's assignment is whateverthe representation epresents.What of Richard s huntingunicorns?According to the above suggestion,this will be true ust in case Richardhunts, andwhat specifies a targetof thathuntis translatablewith 'a unicorn'22 Thecondition that the governingrepresentation


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Commitment / 267representwhatever s representedby 'a unicorn' s herevacuous, given that 'uni-corn' is without an unembeddedsemantic value, thatit thus representsnothing,and thatcomplexes with partswithoutsemanticvalues themselves lack such.

Whatgroundstranslationwhen the termtranslateddoes not have a referentorotherconventionalsemantic value? In practice,what is sufficient(and I thinknecessary) is thatthere should be tlle sort of overlap in the "mechanismsof ref-erence" of the two terms which guaranteesthat, were the terms to refer, theywould refer to the same thing. Thus, for example, we can translatethe Greekancestorof 'unicorn' herewithbecause the two termsareembedded n a "causal-historical" hain of transmission n such a way thatthey wouldhave to referto thesamething, if they were to refer to anythingat all.23Thinkof arepresentation-that is, of anexpressionwhichcan enter nto thingswhich (purportto) have truthconditionalcontent-as somethingwhich is sup-posed to "point"at anobjector aspectof theworld, which is its contribution o de-terminingthe truthconditional content of that of which it is a part. Call suchcontributions ontents. For expressionswhich manage to point at something-oneswithrepresentationalontent thesine qua non of adequate ranslations thatthetranslatingandtranslated xpressionshave the samecontent. Whenthetrans-latedexpression s withoutcontent,however, we canstill sensibly speak of trans-lating t, in sofaras we cansensiblyspeakof otherexpressionspointingat theworld"inthe sameway".The idea of grounding ranslationn such cases in overlapofreferentialmechanisms is one way so far as I can see the best way-of givingsubstanceto the idea thatcontentlessrepresentations"point n the same way".Before moving on to ontological commitment,we need to tidy up a looseend.Consider Richard s hunting orunicorns' Itrelatesme to sing(^ unicorns' ,which is a pair, P = ('a unicorn', its unembeddedsemanticvalue). The secondposition in the pair is empty,for (I presume)anexpressionlacks anunembeddedsemanticvalue when it has a partwhich lacks such.P is anunlovely creature, f it indeedexists, which it probablydoes not. Wethusrecharacterize he semanticvalue of an embeddedsimple expression e as afunction f from { 1,2 }, taking 1 to e and 2 to the unembeddedsemantic value off(1), if suchexists;otherwise f is undefinedat2. (Wethinkof the semanticvaluesof complex expressions as complexes built out of the semantic values of theirparts.) Suchfunctions can be thoughtof as formalrepresentationsof representa-tions.Translation s thus understoodas a relationbetween suchfunctions,subjectto the stricture:provided thatf and f' are defined at 2, trans(f,f') only if f(2) =f'(2); otherwise trans(f, f') only if there is the sort of overlapin the mechanismof referenceof f(1) and f'(1) discussed above.I suggest that thegeneralpattern or verbs like 'hunt' verbswhich take anNP complement, but for which argument orms such as

aVs detN1Necessarily,somethingis an N1 iff it is an N2So, a Vs det N2


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268 / MarkRichardfails is given by the above. WhenV is such a verb, ,BVs NP will be true ust incase what ,Bnames standsin appropriate elation to the embedded value of NP.Therelationwill, of course,vary with the value of V,but (so far as I can see), thesentence will be true only if NP is existentially positive in the sense given above.However, for some verbs, furtherrestrictionsneed to be placed upon theembeddednounphrase. Consider, n particular,Theory T is committed o NP. Ifwe confine our attentionto the case where the NP is a plural like 'ducks', wemightsay simply that a sentence of this formis trueprovided there is a sentenceS which is a theorem of T, S is an existentialquantificationof a predicateP, andSing(^NP)translates .24 (Sing is sing, savethatforplurals t yields the embeddedvalue of a plural's singularform.) Given that 'unicorn' will translatepredicateswhich 'centaur'does not, and vice versa, it will be possible for a theory to becommitted to unicorns but not centaurs, or to centaurs but not unicorns, thussolving the problem posed at the beginningof the last section.This is alright, as faras it goes, but it does not go very far.What if the NP is'Pegasus', or 'two ducks'?T, it seems to me, should be committed to Pegasus ifit has 'Pegasusexists' or 'there is such a thing as Pegasus' as theorem;but theseare notexistentialquantificationsof (thepredicate!)'Pegasus'.T shouldbe com-mitted to two ducks if it has 'thereare two ducks' or 'two ducksexist' as theorem;even if this is an existentialquantification,'two ducks' is not a predicate.More seriously, what of the existentiallypositive 'most ducks'? It seems tome that 'T is committed to most ducks' is not truesimply if T has 'most ducksexist' as a theorem; at most 'most ducks exist' committs one to a duck. 'T iscommitted to most ducks' makes scant sense it certainly says nothingtrue-unless the quantifier s raised.We have two problems. There is the typological problemof saying whichNPs can occupy the position of X in

A. T is committed to Xto yield a sentencepossibly truewhen the NPreceives small scope theproblemof specifying the com aptNPs. And we have the problem of assigning truthcon-ditions to the range of such sentences. Both problemsare, I think,soluble in thepresentframework,but the solutions, spelled out, involve a fair numberof de-tails. So I shall here only make a few suggestive remarks.So far as I can see, there are two sorts of noun phrases which arecom apt.Speakingintuitively, they are the nounphrases,includingdefinite descriptions,whichhave a strong ntuitive call to be considered as (singularorplural)singularterms,and those which happilyoccupy the position of 'NP' in There is/are NP.Moreprecisely,the classes are (1) the class of noun phraseswhich, in standarddevelopmentsof the theoryof generalizedquantifiers,are called definite,and (2)those noun phrases which are not definite, but areexistentiallypositive and areformedfromdeterminerswhich, in standardaccountsof generalizedquantifiers,are called weakdeterminers. A determinerD is said to be strong, roughlyspeak-


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270 / MarkRichardIf we acceptthis, it seems thatwe have even moreevidencefor the existenceof a specific reading.Consider(b) Hankblasphemedtwo gods.

(b) seems possibly true. It seems it would be true, if HankcursedZeus andAllah.There being, in any case, no such thing as Zeus, we cannot identify the truthexpressed with what is expressed by the raisedreading.And it doesn't seem thata non-specific reading is possibly true. (If Hank said 'damntwo gods' but "hadnone in mind", he blasphemed no gods, even if he did committblasphemy.)28I think thatthe evidence is misleading, and thatthere is no readingof (a) or(b) otherthan theraisedand the non-specific ones. My reason for thinkingthis isas follows. (i) There s strongreasonfor thinking hat, f there s a thirdreadingof(a) (or(b)), it is a readingon whichthequantifier s both aisedandunderstood nsome way different from the way it is understood in what I called the raisedreading above. (ii) There is strong reason for thinking that quantifiersare notambiguous in the way in which they would have to be, if the putative specificreadingwere to be explained as in (i). (iii) There is a straightforwardxplanationof how the intuition, thatthere are two possibily truesenses of (a), arises, eventhough thatintution is wrong.Withregard o (i): the argument or a third readingseems to arisewhen andonly when the embeddednoun phrase is capable of scope ambiguity.Consider,for example,

(c) Each Greek in the room blasphemedtwo gods.One can argue, with exactly as much force as for (a) and (b), that there is apossibly truereadingof (c) on which it says somethingtrue f Greek 1 said 'damnZeus and Hera',Greek2 said 'damnHeraandApollo', and so forth,and hat hereis possibily truereading of (c) on which its truthrequiresthator twogods,eachGreek in the roomblasphemedthem that is, that each GreekblasphemedZeusandHera, or each Greekblasphemed HeraandApollo, or.... Because the argu-ments for specific readings are thus tied to quantifierscope, it seems that a fairparsingof the second specific reading of (c) is given by

(c') Twox(x is a god, eachy(y is Greekin the room, y blasphemedx)).Now suppose that 'twox' is a simply a binaryquantifier which maps the pair ofsets (S, T) to the true iff T contains at least two members of S) with a normalrange.29 ince there are no gods, the extension of 'x is a god' is empty. So if (c')is possibly true,the quantifiermusthave a non-standardreatement herein.Thisestablishes (i).Now, some will respond that the gods exist, but they are fictional and/ormythological objects. By itself this is no help, since mythological gods are not


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Commitment / 271gods. However, we might suppose that 'god' (and any other noun which canappearn the scope of a verb like 'seek'or 'blaspheme')is ambiguous.Its narrowsense is one trueof non-fictional,non-mythologicalobjects which are gods; itswide sense is one trueof all these, as well trueof those objects which are suchthat,for some fiction ormythM, x is, according o M, a god. One mightclaimthatthe readingwe are interested n is achieved if 'god' is given such a wide sense in(c ). The problemwiththis is thatfiction is so easily generated.Let me tell you apost-moderniststory.

A Political Transfiguration.Once upon a time it was 1911 Zeus lookeddown andsaw thatTeddyRoosevelt andWoodrowWilsonwere worthymen.He deifiedeach of them. Hemade theformergod of themoose, and thelattergod of the tigers.And so they continueto be. The end.

Accordingto this story,Roosevelt and Wilson areeach a god. So each is in thewide extension of 'god'. But surely thereis no sense of 'Rush blasphemedtwogods' on which it is true,if Rush said 'damnTeddyRoosevelt, and damnWood-row Wilson, too.'Various trategiessuggest themselveshere, butI don'tthinkanyreally works.It will not do to simply restrictthe domainof the quantifier'two gods' to crea-turesof mythand fiction i.e., to creatureswhichoccur in a mythor fiction. Onemight try redefining the notion of a predicate's wide extension, so that it in-cludes only objects which arein the narrowextension or objects which are, ac-cording to awell-knownmyth or story,gods. Butthis does not seem to capture hereadingof (c) we are interestedin. For suppose that there was in fact only oneGreekin the room, that she worshippedthe gods which populate(only) a veryobscuremythology,and that she cursedtwo such. As I understand he intuitionsfavoring a true,non-non-specificreading of (c), it shouldbe true in such a cir-cumstance.

I am thus inclined to conclude that if (c) has the readingin which we areinterested,not only must the quantifierbe understoodas raised, it must be inter-preted in some unusualfashion.Regarding(ii): the most obvious strategyis a substitutional nterpretation:We assign the determinera substitutionclass of expressions, andsay that(c') istrueprovidedthat, for at least two membersthereof

(c") x is a god, eachy(y is Greek in the room, y blasphemedx)is true,when those membersreplace'x' . Some mightobjectthatthisrequires hatsentences such as 'Zeus is a god' be true when they are not; let us waive suchobjections.A more pressing problemis that it is not clear that the substitutionclass could be specified so as to make this work. It will not do simply to let itconsistof English singular erms,since there arein thatclass distinct temswhich


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272 / MarkRichard"arenames of the same god"-for example 'Jesus'and 'Jesus Christ'.Presum-ably, if each Greek takesboth 'Jesus'and 'Jesus Christ' n vain, then the result ofreplacing 'x' in (c") with either is true. But (c), on the putative readingwe aretrying to capture s presumablynot true,simply because each Greektwice tookthe Lord's name in vain.We could, perhaps,partitionthe class of English singularterms into equiv-alence classes, so thateach memberof a class, speakingintuitively, names thesame thing. Such a partition will put 'Jesus', 'JesusChrist', and(assuming thatdefinitedescriptions aretreatedas singularterms)such things as 'the son of theVirginMary' n a singleequivalenceclass. Say thatsuch a class verifies aformulawith a single free variable providedthere is member n of the class such that theresult of replacingthe variable with n yields a trueformula.

Suppose, now, we take the interpretation f 'two' on a substitutional nter-pretation o be, not the class T of English singularterms,but a class which resultsfrom the sort of partion of T just described.We might then say that (c') on itssubstitutionalnterpretations trueprovidedthere are sets s andt in the interpre-tation of 'two' such that s verifies (c") and t verifies (c"). This arguablysolves theproblemraisedtwo paragraphsback.Arguably, the solution does not generalize very well. The problem is thatthere will be cases in which, say,(d) Each girl fears a unicorn.

is, on theputative(maximallyraised) specific reading,true,even though there isno term t such that(d') Each girl fears t

is true.Suppose the girls areEleanorand Jessica. Suppose that I have told a story

aboutamean unicorn n thegardenwith a green hornwith a ringin it. Yourecountthe story toEleanor,callingthe unicornSyd;you leave out thepart aboutthe ring.You recount the story to Jessica, calling the unicornStan, leaving out the partaboutthecolor.Eleanorand Jessicalattermeetanddiscuss whatthey have heard.Eleanor s frightenedby Jessica's story butnot herown; Jessica is frightenedbyEleanor' story,but not herown. As I understand heputativespecific reading of(d), it is true n thisstory,for "eachgirl is frightenedof theunicornof which I wasspeaking".But, it seems to me, it will be false that Eleanor is afraid of Syd, andfalse that Jessica is afraidof Stan;we mayfairly, I think, assumethatthereare nootherterms in the partitionwhich includes 'Syd'and 'Stan'.31There are other possible interpretationsof 'two' in (c). For example, onemighttake it asrangingover mentalentities of some sort oranother "concepts"),and tryto give an accountof such which would allow that, in the storyjust told,since Eleanor and Jessica share a unicornconcept, (d) is true. So far as I can see,


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Commitment / 273suchaccounts renomoreplausiblehan hetwojust sketched;paceprohibitsinvestigatinguchhere.32Withregardo (iii), thequestions how someonewhois self-consciouslycommittedo thenon-existence f godsandunicorns anbe quitecertain hattherearepossibly ruespecificreadings f (a),(b),and c).As I see it, thisintu-itionarises, n part,becausewe are inclined arguablyorrectly)o think hatsentences uchas

(e) ZeusandHeraaregods,andHankblasphemedhemarepossibily rue,and n partbecausewe are nclined understandably,ut in-correctly)o takeasobviouslyvalidtransitionsf the form

(T) a andb areFs,andc R'edthem.So, therearetwoFswhichc R'ed.Toholdthat(e) is (possibily) rue s notto be automaticallyommittedo theexistenceof gods.It isnotclear hat entencesike'Heras agod'and Hamletsa charactern a play'mustentail heirexistential eneralizations.nd it is notimplausibleo think hat,at leastonoccasion,ananaphoricthem' an functionsimplyas a proxyfor its antecedent.f thisis right,ourevident nclinationoaccept hings ike(e) maybecorrect.AndI take t thatour nclinationo accept(T) as unreservedlyalid is understandable,f only because(1) (T) supple-mentedwiththepremissa existsandso doesb is valid,and(2) sucha premissusuallygoes without aying.I conclude hat heevidence ora specificreading f sentences uchas (a)throughc) is illusory; hesesentenceshave no readings ther han heraisedreading nd heirnon-specific ne.V

(S), like (C), sees commitmentrising n existenceclaims.If so, andweinherithecommitmentsf thetheorieswe understandndaccept,we areonto-logically ommittedybeliefswhichareproperlyxpressed yexistential uan-tifications. or helastfew sections, havegonealongwith(S). Infact,I doubtthat t is correct, ince I doubt hatexistentialbeliefsneedgenerate xistentialcommitment.I shallexplain,butto doso, I mustdigress.Consider1. Someonehas hada redafter-image.2. Thereare wopilesof trashonthis stretch f thefreeway.3. Somevoicesaredeep;othersarenot.4. Therearefourprimenumbers etween10 and20.5. Thereareat leastthree hingsMarybelieves hatTomdoesn't.


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274 / MarkRichard(Non-philosopher) English speakers take these to have many true uses. Eachinvolves surface existential quantification nto a predicate 'is an after image','is a pile of trash', 'is a voice', 'is a prime number', and 'Marybelieves' whichspeakers generally presuppose can be sensibly and correctly applied to some ofwhat there is. Each of these predicates has associated (if rough and partial) cri-teria for counting and distinguishing among the things to which it applies.It is thus plausible that used literally (i) the sentences are often true (usebeing a fair indicatorof truth or non-theoretical entences), and (ii) the sentencesare existential quantifications. However, each sentence can be, and has been,doubted to be true if it is to be construed as involving quantification over therelevantentities. For more or less serious doubts have been raised concerningtheexistence of after images, piles of trash (which, if there are such, are vague ob-jects), voices, numbers, and objects of belief.A literal construal of a sentence need not be the construal which surfacesyntax and use most readily suggest. Considerthatparadigmof philosophy, Rus-sell's account of the definite article. Russell can be fairly understoodas holdingthat (a) surface syntax and the use of the definite article strongly suggest that aliteral use of

6. The president of Williams College lives in Massachusettssays something singular,whose truth in any circumstanceof evaluation)turnsonwhere William's actual president lives. But (b) surface syntax and use notwith-standing,this is not what a literal use of (6) says.Whetherwe agreewith Russell about he particular ase of 'the', we may agreethata sentence's syntax andthe conditions associated with its use (its assertabilityconditions,putative dentitycriteriaassociatedwith its predicates,and so on) maybe highly misleading, as to what the sentence literally says. Thus, we may allowthe truthof (1) through(5), used literally, yet reject their truthwhen they are in-terpreted n accordancewith theirsurfacesyntax.For the sentences, when used lit-erally,may express truths hatdo not involve existentialquantification or at leastnot the quantification hey appear o involve.The picture of the possible divergence of literal use and surface structure swidely (and I think correctly) supposed cogent. The picture, applied to predi-cates, suggests that we may introduce a predicate, supposing that it applies to a(fairly) determinaterange of objects, while the theory in which the predicate'sintroduction s embedded is so wrong that there are no plausible candidates forthe predicate' extension. Still, according o the picture, f a wide enough rangeofsentencescontaining he predicatehave determinate ssertability onditionswhichregularlyobtain, and those sentences have a role in our thought about the worldwhich would induce us to continue using them even if we came to be awareof thesemantic bankruptcyof the predicate's introduction, the sentences (typically)have true uses.However,this picturedoes have a puzzling aspect. Consider(2); suppose, forillustrativepurposes, that we agree that there cannot really be piles of trash, as


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Commitment / 275suchwouldbe vague,andno thing anbe vague. Itis still notto be deniedthat(2),used whentrash s piled upin two places on thefreeway,wouldbe true.Here,usetrumpssyntax:the sentencehas come to say somethingtrue,even if its form ismisleadingas to whatis said.Now suppose someome recognizes all this. She thinksthatwhat (2) says is(somethingalongthe lines of theclaim) thattrash s piled up in two places on therelevant stretchof freeway. She thinks that though there are piles of trashonfreeway,that doesn't meanthat thereare ("really")piles of trash.What this per-son thinksseems to be expressedby

7. That there are two piles of trashon this stretchof the freeway doesn'tentail thatthereare piles of trash.How does (7) manage to say what it is supposedto say? For (7) to say what itneeds to say (which is, ex hypothesi,rue),the sentence

8. Therearepiles of trashneeds to functionin two ways. Onone use, which wasjust argued o be its literaluse, (8) is notan existentialquantificationover trashpiles. If (7) is true,however,then (8) as used after 'entails'in (7) expresses an existentialquantificationovertrashpiles.Well, perhapsthis is not so terriblypuzzling. If (8) can be used in a way inwhich it doesn't involve quantificationover piles, thatdoesn't meanthatit can'tbe used in anotherway as well. There s aperfectlygood sense, afterall, in which(8) is anexistentialquantificationover trashpiles, even if it normallydoesn't getused as such. In the envisioned situation,(8) and (2) are in a significant senseambiguous.Eachhastwoliteraluses or readings,a surface iteralone (dictatedbysyntax, the way in which vocabularywas introduced,and presuppositionssur-roundingthatvocabulary),anda normalliteralreading(inducedby use). In theenvisioned situation,the readingsaredistinct, thoughin happiersituationstheywill co-incide.If an expressione is treatedandusedby speakersas if it werea predicatewith(somewhat)determinatedentitycriteriaassociatedwith it, sentencesin which itappearscanbe expected to have a literalinterpretation n which it functionsas apredicateopento existentialquantification.Thosesentenceswill have literaluseson whichwhatthey say is a functionof e' s semanticvaluewhen it is construedasa predicatewith its (in- and) extension (partially)determinedby the associatedcriteria.This is consistentwith the sentenceshavingotherliteralinterpretations.In the sortof case we are considering,normaluses of 2 aretruewhentrash s piledupin two places on the freeway,even thoughthereare no trashpiles anywhere nthe universe.The "non-surfacereading"of 2 is its normalreading; ts normalityis whatjustifies us in calling thatreadingliteral.I have been discussing a case in which what is syntacticallyan existentialquantificationhas a literal use on which it says something determinatelytrue,


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276 / MarkRichardthoughthat truth s not whatthe sentencesays when used (literally)to maketheclaim naturallyassociated with it by its syntacticform,what I have been callingits (literal)surfacereading.I have argued hat t ispossible thata sentencedisplayanambiguitywhen it is anexistentialquantificationof apredicatewhich, thoughassociatedwith(more orless determinate, f partial) dentitycriteria, ails foroneor anotherreason to have a non-nullextension.I do notclaim, of course, that t is invariably he case thatsuch a sentencewillhave a trueuse: 'unicorn' s apredicatewhich fits the bill I havebeen describing;'there areunicorns'has no true use. The difference, I think, lies in the conditionsunderwhich the sentences are assertible. 'There is a trash pile in the road' andallied sentences have assertabilityconditionswhich arenot only quiteoften sat-isfied, butwhich arequitegenerallyknownto be satisfied;not so with 'thereareunicorns'andallied sentences.Trashpile sentencesareroutinelyconfirmedandroutinely confirm and provide good evidence for sentences which are non-problematically rue.("There' a pile of trash n the road.So Henrywill swerve/complain to the mayor/get the broom.")Not so with existential claims aboutunicorns. I do not claim that it follows, from a class of sentences being thusentwined in the web of belief, thatthey have uses on which they make determi-nate, trueclaims. I do claim thatwhen sentencesareso entwined, andthereis astraighforward,ystematic way of assigningclaims to thesentenceswhich makesthemsay things which are, by andlarge,true(just) when they areassertible,thesentences,ceterisparibus, anbe literallyused to makethe claims in question.33Whatdoes all this have to do with the viability of (S) as an account of onto-logical commitment?Well, the case we have been discussing is one in which it isperfectly rationalfor someone to believe that there are trash piles on a certainroad,but notbelieve thatthere s aproperty,beinga trash ile,possessedby someof whatthereis.34Such is a case in which the belief, thattherearetrashpiles onthe road, does not come with an ontological corrlmitmento trashpiles. Quitegenerally, if a personcan rationallybelieve a claim p while also believing thatthere is no suchthingas thepropertyof being an F, thensimplyhaving the beliefp does not entail an ontological commitmentto things which are F.Now, consider a case which is a mirror mage to thatwe have been discuss-ing. We have a predicate,F, which hasbeen introducedwith (more or less deter-minate) identity criteria.And, in fact, the introductionwas successful, and thepredicate applies (more or less determinately) o some class of objects.Fordef-initeness in whatfollows, let us supposethat 'voice' is such a predicate.In this case, existentialquantificationsof the predicatewill not exhibit theambiguitydiscussedabove.WhatI havecalled thenormal iteralreadingof 'therearevoices' will co-incide withits surface iteralreading.But there s no reason tosupposethata speakerwho understands entences in which 'voice' occursmustknow oreven believe that 'there arevoices', whentrue, is generally,orever,trueon its surfaceliteralreading.After all, a speakerwho understandsand accepts'thereare trash piles' need not believe that it is ever surfaceliterally true.Butwhatrelevantdifference is therebetween 'trashpile' and 'voice' ?


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Arguably,all the competentspeakerneeds is a commandof syntax and as-sertabilityconditions. Such a speakermay be agnostic, as to whetherthere are"really"voices, or even doubt thatthereare "really"such, yet acceptthat 'therearevoices' is literally true.Most speakersare presumablywithoutan opinion,astowhether,when 'therearevoices' is true, t is trueas construed n accordwith itssurfacesyntax;many, if they were to reflect on it, might become agnostic ordoubtful,thatthere was a property,being an voice, whose possession by some-thingis necessaryfor the truthof 'Markhas a deep voice'.If so, these speakerscan rationallybelieve thatthereare voices withoutbe-lieving thatthere is such a thing as the propertyof being an voice. And they are,epistemically,more or less indistinguishable romthoseagnosticor doubting hattherereally are piles of trash,all the while understanding nd accepting 'thereisa pile of trashon yonderroad'.These arespeakerswho are thusrational,believetheexistentialclaim that therearevoices, but don't thinkthat thereis a property,of being a voice. That such believers arepossible, as noted above, implies thatbelieving the existentialclaim thatthereare voices does not by itself carryonto-logical commitmentto voices. And thus it simply does not follow, from the factthatsomeonebelieves anexistentialclaim that thereare Fs thatshe has an exis-tentialcommitmentto Fs.If it be accepted thatwe inheritthe ontologicalcommitmentsof ourtheories,we must thus reject accounts of ontological commitmentsuch as (S). We couldpreserve(S), of course,by denyingthe necessity of such inheritance.To do this,it seems to me, robsthe notionof a theory's ontological commitmentof most ofits interest.35Notes

1. I assume that 'K'is a schematic letter. I discuss Cartwright'suse of 'follows from'below.

2. Strictly,accordingto (C), we need to be able to derivethatfor any x, x satisfies 'x isan Albaniandentist'only if x is a memberof the kind (set? class?) of Albanianden-tists, or somethingof the sort. I am going to ignore this nicety here.

3. "Logicchases truthup the tree of grammar."PL, 35)4. So defined,f-following is eithera relationbetween a theoryand a proposition,or, for

each S, Itf-followsromx thatS is a monadic property,not to be furtheranalyzed.Analagously for m-following. It does not make a difference for the argument.Wemight also define a relationbetweenpropositions,one which q bearsto p just in caseT expressesp andhas a theoremwhich saysq. Thisrelation, oo, will be heirto the sortof problemsraisedbelow.

5. What follows supposes that this view of necessity is correct. But the points madecould be madewith otherexamples,shouldsomeonedissentfrom theview thatchem-ical substanceshave theirchemical makeupnecessarily.

6. Couldwe patchthings up by changing(C) so thatit mustfollow fromthe semanticaltheorythatfor anyx, x satisfiesthepredicate fandonly if it is of kindK?No. A correctsemantictheoryfor (5) will have a theoremwhich says somethingwhich (of neces-


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278 / MarkRichardsity) is true if andonly if for any x, x satisfies (5)'s predicate ff x is a sample of saltcomposed of sodium, hydrogen,and chlorine and x was abductedby aliens. So wewould still have to say thatsomeone who makes a chemicalmistake is committed tosalt samples which, among otherthings, were abductedby aliens.And anyone com-mitted to thatis committed to alien abductees.7. I assumethetruthof principlessuch as:If S says that(Fa iff (GaandHa)), then S saysthat(Fa only if Ga).8. [NN], p.24-5, can be read as suggesting an argument ike the following.9. This is so, if we deny that1 and 2 say anythingatall. It is also true f we allowthattheysay something,butidentifywhat is saidwith a "gappy"or"partial" roposition,some-thingwhich is missing a constituentcorresponding o thepredicates 'is aunciorn'and'is a centaur'.10. GarethEvan's view held thata way of presentingx can exist only if it presents x, andthus only if x exists; see [VR], Chapter1. GraemeForbeshas suggested thatsensespresent(types of ) states of affair;see [LP],PartII.11. If someone says otherwise, they presumablythink thatmodalizing what would nor-mally be takento be the sense of 'centaur' s not necessaryto capture ts sense.Might we ascribe something like the sense of 'the beasts to whom the Greekswere actuallyreferringwith the termfromwhich 'centaur'descends' to 'centaur'?Itis still notclear that,generalizing,we will satisfy(b). Thesuggestionpresupposes hatouruse of a kindterm t mustreferto whatwas referred o by usersof ancestorsof theterm. Such a condition seems to fail in the case of propernames, as witnessed byEvans' 'Madagascar' xample.Whyshouldn't t inprinciplefail forgeneralterms ike'centaur' oo?12. One might say thatthereis a fictional species, the unicorn,and a genuine relationalproperty,x is an instance f thespeciesy, whose "composition" s expressed by thepredicate is aunicorn'.Itwould still need to be shownthatevery"fictionalattribute"canbe reducedto somethingconstructable rom("genuine")propertiesandrelationsandfictional objects.13. In [NE]. (Page references areto its manuscript.) confine attention,as does Salmon,to propernames introduced n fiction and myth;what I have to say aboutthis caseapplies,mutatismutandis,o predicatesarising in such.Twoobservations.Salmon is notconcernedwithontologicalcommitmentper se,but with existence and negative existentials.And Salmon's approachwill not reallysolve the problemunderdiscussion. Salmon acknowledges that therecan be emptynames, thoughhe thinksthatthey areratherunusual. If so, therepresumablycan beempty kind names, as well, and thus it is possible for a theory to be committed tomembersof one (non-fictional)kind butnot another.14. A fiction can have real objects as characters.Let us ignore this.15. Babinetoriginallyintroduced'Vulcan';Le Verrierappropriatedt.16. In correspondance,Salmonpointedout that(3) has some claim to literaltruth:

(3) A mythicalplanet, Vulcan, was supposed by Le Verrier o lie between theSun andMercury'sorbit.There was never any mythicalplanetwhose orbitwas supposedto lie between EarthandMars'orbit.

(I have alteredSalmon's example a bit.) If (3) is literallytrue,then Le Verrierhaddereintentionswith respectto a mythicalplanet.I amdubious.Whatis arguably iterallytrueis


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Commitment / 279

(4) It was supposedby Le Verrier hatVulcanwas a planetthatlay between theSun and Mercury.But the theory that there was such a planet was false/amyth.

It is easy to confuse the truthof this with the truthof the filst conjunctof (3), simplybecausethe inference

(5) It was supposedby X thatN was an F thatwas G.So, N is an F thatX supposedto be G.

won't fail if N as used by X names something.Arguably, Vulcan'as we use it does namesomething:If we acceptthe view thatsomeone self-consciously telling a fiction raises a character o salience and thus isable to referto it using the name which, accordingto the fiction, it has, we shouldprobablyalso allow thatwhen we takea theoryto be false, characterswill be raisedtosalienceto whichwe canrefer,using the nameswhich occurin the false theory.But itdoesn't follow that 'Vulcan'as used by Le Verrier eferred o the mythicalobject, forwe have no reasonto thinkthatit was particularlysalientto him.This leaves it unexplainedhow (4) canbe true f Le Verrierdidnot referto Vulcanwith 'Vulcan'.I hope thatthe remarksof the next section areat least suggestive of ananswerto this.

17. I have argued n [PA]thatsuch a notion of translation s involved in the semanticsofpropositionalattitudeverbslike 'believes'. A summarystatementof the view is in mycontribution o [CL].

18. In whatfollows, I use 'semanticvalue' in the way a neo-Russellianmightuse 'prop-ositionalcontribution'. nparticular, taketheunembedded emanticvalueof anameto be its bearer,and the unembeddedsemanticvalue of an n-arypredicateto be ann-aryrelation.

19. Of course this should be relativized to a context of use and an assignment to thevariables,andprobablymore besides. To reducecomplexity, I supress such relativ-ization throughout.

20. One should carefullydistinguish 'few ducks' from 'a few ducks'.21. 'presupposes' n the definition is understoodas in [SP]. Semantic values of names,

demonstrativesand indexicals,andpronounsunderassignmentareassumednotthoseof quantifiers, .e., of the result of combining determinerswith nouns; thus names,demonstrativesandindexicals, andpronounsunderassignmentareautomaticallyex-istentiallypositive.

22. I often dropmentionof the requirement, hatthe verb's objectbe existentially posi-tive, in whatfollows.

23. This proposalis kinderedto Michael Devitt's, thatwhat is semanticallyrelevanttoobliqueoccurrencesof names whatplays the role of theirsense therein is (a con-struction rom)thecausalchainwhichdetermines heirreference.See [CS]Chapter4,passim. I have criticizedthe generalproposal n [WM].But in the case of expressionswhich lack a semanticvalue or referent,the proposalseems to me right.24. This is sloppy,since it slursthe differencebetweell a predicateandthe pairingof thepredicatewith its semanticvalue. It is correctedbelow.

25. 'most' is standardly lassified as a strongdeterminer,andmustbe so, if the typologyis to work.It turnsout to be so classified because (i) the standarddefinition of strongdeterminerhas it that a determinerD is strongprovidedthat, for any set A, in any


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280 / MarkRichardmodel n whichapplyinghemeaning f D toA is defined,he condition in the text issatisfied; (ii) mostN is taken as undefinedwhen the extension of N is null.Somethinganalagous s required ordefinitedescriptions o come out as definiteon standardaccounts.(Expositing the notionof a definite nounphrase(really, a nounphraseformedfrom a definite determiner)would take us too farafield; the interestedreader can persue this in, for example, Barwise andCooper,Section 4.) This meansthat,for example, sentences containingdefinite descriptionsmustbe treatedas truthvalueless when the description does not denote.I hopeelsewhere to the recastthe accountsketchedhere so that t doesn'trequirethis sort of account of 'most' and 'the'.26. I assume an account of 'says' along the lines of [PA]. On such an account,s sayspcomes out,roughly,ass canbe translated s p, and so Tis committedoNPcomes outas the claim that T has a theoremwhich can be aptlytranslatedwith a claim which isan exquant of 'xNP.The view of translationsuggested above, on which '(Pegasusexists) may translatea Greekremarkaboutunicornsbutnot one aboutcentaursmustbe assumed to have been extendedto this account.27. Reference to the Sing function necessary to get the truthconditions for T is com-mitted o ducks has been supressed in the last few paragraphs.28. The point can be made with other verbs. Consider 'Miss Two Cats worships twogods'.29. Thereason for using a binaryquantifier s to simplify the discussion of substitutionalquantificationbelow.30. If thisresponseweretenable, we could say thatsentenceslike (a) above haveonly tworeadings, the raised andthe non-specific.31. What about 'the unicornof which Richardwas speaking'? On the approachwe arecurrentlypursuing,the truthof

A unicornis such that Jessica is afraid of itis, finally, underwrittenby the truthof something of the form

Jessica is afraid of twheret takes small scope with respect to 'is afraid of'. Since the story aboutJessicaand Eleanordoes not require that either have ever heard of me, it would seem thatthereis no reason to thinkthat

Jessica is afraid of the unicornof which Richardwas speakingis true, when the descriptiontakes small scope.32. Partof what I find so implausiblein such stories is the arbitrarynatureof the inter-personalidentifications of concepts it requires.33. Of course, theremay be more thanone way to make such assignments of claims tosentences, in which case it may be indeterminatewhich, of a number of claims atvariance with surfacesyntax, the sentencesmake.34. If you prefer to go metalinguistic:The personneed not believe that there is anythingof which 'is a trash pile' is true.35. Thanks o NathanSalmonfor comments on section II, to JodyAzzouni for commentsandfor discussions aboutsection V's topic, and to JimTomberlin or his patience.


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Commitment / 281References[GQ]JohnBarwiseand RobinCooper,"GeneralizedQuantifiersand NaturalLanguage",Linguistics

and Philosophy4 (1981), 159-219.[OTM]RichardCartwright,"Ontologyand the Theoryof Meaning" n Philosophical Essays, (MITPress, 1987).

[CS] Michael Devitt, Coming to Our Senses (CambridgeUniversityPress, 1995).[VR] GarethEvans, The Varietiesof Reference(OxfordUniversity Press, 1984).[LP]GraemeForbes,Languagesof Possibility (Blackwell, 1989).[CL]Bob Hale andCrispinWright, eds., A Companionto the Philosophyof Language (Blackwell,

1997).[NN] Saul Kripke,Namingand Necessity (HarvardUniversityPress, 1984).[OW]W.V. Quine, "On WhatThere is" in Froma Logical Point of View,second edition, (Harvard

UniversityPress, 1980).[TT]W.V.Quine,"Things andTheir Place in Theories", n Theoriesand Things (HarvardUniversityPress, 1981).[PL]W.V. Quine,Philosophyof Logic, second edition, (HarvardUniversity Press, 1986).[PA]MarkRichard,PropositionalAttitudes(CambrdidgeUnivesity Press, 1990).[WM]MarkRichard,"Whatdoes CommonsensePsychology Tell Us aboutMeaning?",Nous XXXI

(1997), 87-114.[NE] Nathan Salmon, "Nonexistence", orthcomingin Nous.[SP] Scott Soames, "How Presuppositionsare Inherited",LinguisticInquiry13 (1982), 483-545.

mark richard, commitment

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