3.3 Proper names and definite descriptions

Proper Names and Definite Descriptions

When you refer to something in language, you can do it in two fundamentally different ways: you can use a name ("Aristotle") or you can use a description ("the author of the Nicomachean Ethics"). Both pick out individuals, but they work through very different mechanisms. Understanding this distinction is central to the semantics of reference.

Proper Names vs. Definite Descriptions

Proper names identify specific individuals, places, or things: John, London, Mount Everest. They function like labels attached to a particular entity.

Definite descriptions use the definite article "the" followed by a noun phrase to uniquely identify something: the tallest mountain in the world, the current President of the United States. Instead of labeling, they pick out a referent by specifying a property that (ideally) only one entity satisfies.

The key difference: a name tags an entity directly, while a description identifies an entity by fitting a unique characterization to it.

Semantics of Names and Descriptions

Proper names are rigid designators, meaning they refer to the same individual in every possible world. "Mount Everest" picks out that specific mountain whether we're talking about the actual world or a hypothetical scenario. Names lack descriptive content; they point to their referent without going through any intermediary meaning.

Definite descriptions, by contrast, are non-rigid designators. They can refer to different individuals depending on the circumstances. "The tallest mountain in the world" refers to Mount Everest in the actual world, but in a possible world where geological history unfolded differently, it could refer to some other peak. Descriptions refer by way of their descriptive content: whatever entity satisfies the description is the referent.

How Reference Works

Reference for proper names and definite descriptions is explained by different theories.

For proper names, two major accounts:

1. Direct reference theory holds that a name refers to its bearer without any mediating sense or meaning. "Aristotle" simply latches onto Aristotle, full stop.
2. Causal-historical theory (associated with Kripke) says the reference of a name is fixed by a causal chain of communication stretching back to an original "baptism" event. Someone names a baby "John," and from that point on, each speaker who picks up the name inherits the reference through a chain of usage.

For definite descriptions, two major accounts:

1. Russellian theory treats definite descriptions not as referring expressions but as quantified expressions. "The present king of France is bald" is analyzed as asserting three things: there exists a king of France, there is at most one king of France, and that individual is bald. If no unique entity satisfies the description, the statement is simply false.
2. Fregean theory says definite descriptions have both a sense (the descriptive content itself) and a reference (the individual that satisfies that content). The sense determines the reference.

Philosophical Debates on Name Meaning

This is where things get genuinely contested. The core question: do proper names have meaning beyond just pointing at someone?

• The Millian view says no. The entire meaning of "Aristotle" is exhausted by the individual Aristotle himself. Names are purely referential; they contribute nothing but their referent to the propositions in which they appear.
• The Fregean view says yes. Names carry a sense, a mode of presentation, in addition to their referent. The sense of "Aristotle" might be something like the student of Plato and teacher of Alexander. This explains why "Hesperus is Phosphorus" is informative even though both names refer to Venus: the two names have different senses.
• Kripke's challenge to Frege: Kripke argued that names are rigid designators, which creates a problem for the Fregean view. If the sense of "Aristotle" were the teacher of Alexander, then in a possible world where Aristotle never taught Alexander, "Aristotle" would fail to refer to Aristotle. But intuitively, "Aristotle" still picks out the same person regardless of what he did or didn't do. Kripke's causal-historical theory replaces descriptive senses with causal chains as the mechanism that fixes reference.