Think Before You Speak: Utterances and the Logic of Indexicals

This essay discusses some aspects of the logical behaviour of sentences in languages containing indexical and demonstrative expressions. After some preliminary remarks in section one, sections two and three focus on instances of logically true sentences that may be uttered falsely, and on cases of logically equivalent sentences whose utterances may have distinct truth-values. The logical and semantic problems taken into consideration include the validity of a Principle of Translation, the so-called puzzle of addressing, and examples related to measurement and approximation. Section four discusses the complementary phenomenon of sentences that may presumably always be uttered truly, but that do not qualify as logically true. In particular, I argue against the widespread tendency to consider I am here now or I exist as truths of the logic of indexicals.     

Quasi Indexicals

I argue that not all context dependent expressions are alike. Pure (or ordinary) indexicals behave more or less as Kaplan thought. But quasi indexicals behave in some ways like indexicals and in other ways not like indexicals. A quasi indexical sentence ϕ allows for cases in which one party utters ϕ and the other its negation, and neither party's claim has to be false. In this sense, quasi indexicals are like pure indexicals (think: “I am a doctor”/“I am not a doctor” as uttered by different individuals). In such cases involving a pure indexical sentence, it is not appropriate for the two parties to reject each other's claims by saying, “No.” However, in such cases involving a quasi indexical sentence, it is appropriate for the parties to reject each other's claims. In this sense, quasi indexicals are not like pure indexicals. Drawing on experimental evidence, I argue that gradable adjectives like “rich” are quasi indexicals in this sense. The existence of quasi indexicals raises trouble for many existing theories of context dependence, including standard contextualist and relativist theories. I propose an alternative semantic and pragmatic theory of quasi indexicals, negotiated contextualism, that combines insights from Kaplan 1989 and Lewis 1979. On my theory, rejection is licensed with quasi indexicals (even when neither of the claims involved has to be false) because the two utterances involve conflicting proposals about how to update the conversational score. I also adduce evidence that conflicting truth value assessments of a single quasi indexical utterance exhibit the same behavior. I argue that negotiated contextualism can account for this puzzling property of quasi indexicals as well.     

Smith on Indexicals

In this paper, I advance a new view of the semantics of indexicals, using a paper by Quentin Smith as my starting point. I make use of Smith’s examples, refined and expanded upon by myself to argue, as Smith does, that the standard view, that indexicals refer to some prominent features of the context according to an invariant rule called the character, does not agree with a wide range of phenomena. I depart from Smith, however, in denying that we need more complex rules, which he does not give, called metacharacters to account for all the deviations, and instead argue for a view of indexicals as just being special cases of demonstratives. I show how demonstratives can be substituted for indexicals to support this view, and I adduce recent work in the semantics of demonstratives to explain how it can work.     

Indexicals and Character Shifting

Philosophia - According to Character Shifting Theory, the rules determining indexical reference vary according to the communication technology used. These rules are established by conventions...     

Indexicals and utterance production

We highlight various non-standard mechanisms of communication to both motivate our response to what is known as the ‘answering machine paradoxes’ and to shed light on recent variants of these cases. We claim that the most intuitive solution to these paradoxes requires one to distinguish between the agent (of a context), the tokening of a sentence and the agent’s chosen mechanism of communicating this tokening.     

Hybrid Indexicals and Ellipsis

In this essay, I explain how certain suggestions put forth by Frege, Wittgenstein, and Schlick regarding the interpretation of indexical expressions may be incorporated within a systematic semantic account. I argue that the ‘hybrid’ approach they propose is preferable to more conventional systems, in particular when it comes to the interpretation of cases of cross-contextual ellipsis. I also explain how the hybrid view entails certain important and independently motivated distinctions among contextually dependent expressions, for instance between ‘here’ and ‘local’.     

Indexicals: what they are essential for

Abstract

Cappelen and Dever have recently defended the view that indexicals are not essential: They do not signify anything philosophically deep and we do not need indexicals for any important philosophical work. This paper contests their view from the point of view of an account of intentional agency. It argues that we need indexicals essentially when accounting for what it is do something intentionally and, as a consequence, intentional action, and defends a view of intentional action as a possible conclusion of practical reasoning where the indexical is essential for the content of such a conclusion.     

Indexicals,context-sensitivity and the failure of implication

This paper investigates, formulates and proves an indexical barrier theorem, according to which sets of non-indexical sentences do not entail (except under specified special circumstances) indexical sentences. It surveys the usual difficulties for this kind of project, as well some that are specific to the case of indexicals, and adapts the strategy of Restall and Russell’s “Barriers to Implication” to overcome these. At the end of the paper a reverse barrier theorem is also proved, according to which an indexical sentence will not, except under specified circumstances, entail a non-indexical one.     

Prayer Utterances as Aligning Actions

Social actors use prayer utterances (e.g., statements such as “prayed over,”“prayed about,” or “spent time in prayer”) as aligning actions that justify problematic or questionable courses of action and prevent possible negative characterizations. The prayer utterance functions as an aligning action in American society because of Americans’ beliefs and actions concerning the efficacy of prayer in solving problems and because prayer is viewed as a sign of personal morality and trustworthiness. Three examples of individuals who use the prayer utterance as an aligning action serve as illustrations of this argument (Oprah Winfrey, Alabama State Supreme Court Justice Sue Bell Cobb, and President Barack Obama). Scholars should investigate the uses and functions of prayer utterances in social life and should also investigate the possible uses of other religious talk as aligning actions.     

Sexual Utterances and Common Life

The essay discusses sexual activity as forms of communication that are constitutive of social practices. In this context, marriage is understood as a representative practice of the church, nothing more and nothing less. The essay draws on Thomas Nagel's essay, 'Sexual Perversion', and Robert Solomon'ls 'Sexual Paradigms' for its account of sexual communication. For its critical perspective, it frames questions about sex with Herbert McCabe's account of bodily utterances as 'ways of entering into social life'     

Kapitan on Indexicals and Indexical Thought: A Retrospective

My aim in this essay is to look back on and critically examine Tomis Kapitan’s (1949–2016) views of indexical language and indexical thought. Despite the novelty and insightfulness of Kapitan’s writings on these topics, his work has largely gone ignored. I believe this to be a tragic oversight, especially given the renewed interest in whether any of our thoughts might be essentially indexical. To be sure, there may be a reason for this oversight. In particular, Kapitan’s views are complex and his writing often dense. So my hope is to do justice to his work on indexicality not only by making it more accessible but also by examining it in such a way as to demonstrate its strength and plausibility.     

Indexicals and Reference‐Shifting: Towards a Pragmatic Approach

I propose a pragmatic approach to the kind of reference‐shifting occurring in indexicals as used in e.g. written notes and answering machine messages. I proceed in two steps. First, I prepare the ground by showing that the arguments against such a pragmatic approach raised in the recent literature fail. Second, I take a first few steps towards implementing this approach, by sketching a pragmatic theory of reference‐shifting, and showing how it can handle cases of the relevant kind. While the immediate scope of the paper is restricted to indexicals and reference‐shifting, and the discussion is confined to a specific range of theories and cases, the approach proposed is compatible with a fairly broad range of more or less semantically conservative theories, and many of the conclusions drawn are significant for the evaluation of pragmatic explanations in philosophy more generally. The overall goal is to offer a new perspective on the issues under discussion, and to prompt philosophers to reconsider some of the established methods by which pragmatic explanations are evaluated.     

Kinds of Context: A Wittgensteinian Approach to Proper Names and Indexicals

In focusing on indexicals and proper names and on the different ways in which their references are fixed, I illustrate how our linguistic practice rests on context, broadly construed. The following theses are discussed and defended:

• ? There are two main kinds of information: (i) anchored information, i.e. the information one gathers in using and entertaining indexical expressions and (ii) unanchored information, i.e. the information one may gain in hearing a proper name.
• ? Indexical expressions differ from proper names; this difference relies on the differing ways in which extra‐linguistic context enters the scene.
• ? The Kaplanian framework in particular, and the framework of direct reference in general, are best understood and appreciated against the background of a Wittgensteinian conception of language.

     

Back through the Looking Glass: On the Relationship between Intentions and Indexicals

Donnellan and Predelli have both responded to accusations that in virtue of involving intentions in their accounts of reference they are committed to ‘Humpty Dumpty’ theories of reference. I examine their responses and argue that they do not succeed in escaping this accusation. Corazza et al. (2002) propose an alternative to Predelli’s account involving linguistic conventions instead of intentions. I argue that Predelli’s responses to Corazza et al. are unsatisfactory and that the intentional theorist is obliged either to accept the Humpty Dumpty conclusion or to adopt the conventional picture, thus relegating intentions to a less significant role in their reference theory.     

Effect of Rate,Intonation, and Sentence Length on Nigerian Children's Imitation of Adults' Utterances

This Nigerian study replicated the work of Bonvillian et al. (1979) on the effects of rate, intonation, and sentence length on children's sentence imitation. Nursery school children (N = 12; M age = 5 years, 0.5 months) were asked to imitate sentences that varied in rate of presentation, intonation, and length. Results revealed better imitation of shorter sentences than longer ones, of sentences read at a rate nearer the children's normal speech rate than those read at a faster or slower rate, and of sentences read with normal intonation than those read with flat intonation. These findings replicated those of Bonvillian et al., while indicating an even stronger effect of intonation in the Nigerian sample, because its effect was not limited to long sentences but affected all sentences. Adults' utterances to children are often slow, with exaggerated intonation. The present findings suggest that such modifications in adults' speech facilitate children's language comprehension.