Meanings

Stephen Schiffer

The first question in the theory of meaning is: Are there such things, such entities, as meanings? This question sets the agenda for the theory of meaning. If the answer is yes, then the next big question is: What’s the nature of those things that are meanings? After a brief account of the reasons for thinking there do exist such things as meanings—which things include the things we believe and assert—I attempt to say what their nature is. I end up defending the view that the things we believe and assert are Fregean propositions: structured propositions whose basic building blocks are concepts, or modes of presentation, of the objects and properties our beliefs are about. The novelty of my view, such as it is, resides in a certain deflationary conception of propositions and concepts, what I call the pleonastic conception of those things. One of the things that makes something a pleonastic entity in my sense is that the fact that it exists is (pace Kant and others) a conceptual truth, one that results simply from the concept of that type of thing. This allows us to understand how we can unproblematically have knowledge of, and talk about, abstract entities such as propositions, and, most importantly, allows us to appreciate how their individuation enables us answer those objections that have for a long time been thought decisive against the Fregean conception of propositions.