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Semantic Relationism
Introducing a new and ambitious position in the field, Kit Fine’s Semantic Relationism is a major contribution to the philosophy of language.
160 pages, Hardcover
First published July 30, 2007
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April 13, 2012
How is it possible to express the same thought, either over time or as another, or both? This is the oft neglected question at the heart of Semantic Relationism. Throughout this work, Kit Fine puts forth an intuitive and satisfying account of semantics. His view, simply put, is that semantic expressions, variables, names, etc, play certain semantic roles, but the combination of these semantic entities does not simply amount to the addition of those elements. In other words, combinations of semantic expressions can lead to novel semantic expressions. What results is a fantastic work, which solves many puzzles in the philosophy of language (as well as the philosophy of mind) and is full of many useful distinctions which will have applications even outside of Fine's semantic framework.
One thing to note about this book is how unique Fine's technique is. He first modestly states what he takes to be the correct notion of the roles of semantic expressions, and in the subsequent chapters, uses the idea to solve various philosophical puzzles. His treatment is even-handed, and he does not underplay the significance of the puzzles which are dealt with. There are even times when Fine makes the puzzles even stronger in order to show just how difficult they really are, as in the case of Kripke’s Puzzle about Belief.
In what follows, I will give a brief overview of the contents. I will only go in minor detail about each in order to provide the reader with a glimpse at the sort of argumentation employed within the work.
Fine first deals with the antimony of the variable. It is commonly supposed that the variables, when ranging over the same domain, play the same semantic role.
So take the variables x and y which range over the domain of all real numbers. It can be said that x>0 and y>0 perform the same semantic role when used in two distinct expressions, both x and y can be used interchangeably in this context. But the use of these variables within the same expression, x>y, leads to a contradictory understanding of their semantic roles. Clearly when two variables which range over the same domain are part of the same expression, the semantic role differs.
From generalizing, we seem to have two contradictory inferences:
Semantic Sameness (SS): any two variables which reign over the same domain play the same semantic roles.
Semantic Difference (SD): any two variables which reign over the same domain play different semantic roles.
Or as Fine later puts it:
SS': There is no cross-contextual difference in semantic roles between variables x and y.
SD': There is a cross contextual difference in semantic role between the pair of variables x,y and the pair x,x.
It seems now that there is no explicit contradiction. But how else can the cross-contextual difference of the pair of variables x,y and x,x be accounted for than by a difference in the semantic roles of variables x and y?
A proper resolution will have to say that SS' and SD' are somehow compatible, or that either SS' or SD' may be reasonably rejected.
Fine wants to claim that there is no conflict between them.
To do this, he wants to draw a distinction, between intrinsic (non-relational) and extrinsic (relational) semantic features of an expression.
The intrinsic semantic feature of some variable is what it is without any relation to something outside of itself. So it is intrinsic to the semantic predicate "doctor" that it is true of doctors, but not an intrinsic semantic feature that it is synonymous with "physician".
If the semantic expression is a pair, say "doctor" and "physician". it is an intrinsic semantic feature that they are synonymous, but it is not an intrinsic semantic feature that they are synonymous with "licensed medical professional".
If a pair of variables, x,y and x,x, has an intrinsic difference, then there is an extrinsic difference between the individual variables x and y.
If the semantic expressions of x and y are the same and the pair of expressions x,y and x,x are different, we only need to account for this by some intrinsic difference.
The variables x and y in x>0 and y>0 are intrinsically the same, while the pair of variables x>y are intrinsically different. What makes them different is their intrinsic pairing, and must be analyzed as their pairing rather than any particular extrinsic difference between variables x and y.
The second of these puzzles is Frege's puzzle. Fine neatly sums it up as follows:
Take two coreferential names, "Cicero" and "Tully" and the identity statements "Cicero=Cicero" and "Cicero=Tully", from this we get
1. Semantic Difference: The two identity statements are semantically different.
2. Compositionality: If the sentences are semantically different, the names "Cicero" and "Tully" are semantically different.
3. Referential Link: If the names "Cicero" and "Tully" are semantically different, they are referentially different.
4. Referential Identity: The names "Cicero" and "Tully" are not referentially different.
It is well known that the Fregean rejects 3, while the Referentialist rejects 1. Fine, who defends a kind of Referentialism, rejects 2. It is here that one of the most important distinctions is drawn, that of closure by classical consequence and that of closure by manifest consequence. Briefly put, if we have the premises Fa and Ga, the conclusion ∃x(Fx&Gx) will not be manifestly valid. This is because we can differentiate between the premises as Fa' and Ga" so that the consequence ∃x(Fx&Gx) will not be classically valid. It is my worry that this notion is dealt with far too quickly in the book. Of course, it is crucial to the Relationist program as a form of Referentialism that it work, so a longer defense of it would have been ideal.
Fine uses this notion, along with a few others, to claim that, though "Cicero" and "Tully" corefer, they do not strictly corefer. This, like the antimony of the variable, amounts to two names which corefer (or play the same semantic role), yet are uncoordinated in some way.
Just as language can represent as the same referent in two statements or propositions, so can thought. This is the third puzzle, the Cognitive Fregean Puzzle
One can think of Cicero, that he is Roman and that he is an orator, and thus have distinct thoughts which intentionally pick out the same referent, Cicero.
1. Doxastic Difference: the belief that Cicero is an orator is not the same as the belief that Tully is an orator.
2. Doxastic Link: if the beliefs are different, their content is different.
3. Compositionality: if the content of the beliefs differ, then so are the objectual components.
4. Objectual Link: if the objectual components differ, then so do the objects.
5. Objectual Identity: the objects do not differ.
Here, Fine provides us with a notion of cognitive base, where certain information can be, or fail to be, properly coordinated with that base. He asks us to reject Doxastic Link, showing that two beliefs can be different, while their intrinsic content is the same.
There are also coordination cases of semantics between speaker to speaker. The fourth, Kripke's puzzle, brings this out.
The basic puzzle is that Peter, when overhearing a conversation about Paderewski the pianist and statesman, comes to possess two beliefs concerning the man by thinking that Paderewski is really two men; Paderewski the pianist and Paderewski the statesman. Peter believes that all pianists are musical and that no statesmen are musical, he thus believes that Paderewski is musical and Paderewski is not musical. What makes this puzzling is not that Peter believes something inconsistent, but that we, who understand the referent Paderewski as a single man, have difficulty ascribing the belief to Peter. We can say individually that Peter believes Paderewski is musical and Peter believes Paderewski is not musical, but we are not in a position to say that Peter believes that Paderewski is both musical and non-musical, but it seems that we must.
Fine believes that this is a very real and difficult puzzle, and refines it in various ways to reveal that it is not simply about names. Fine offers a de re version, a weak and strong de dicto version, and a variable version.
To solve these, Fine establishes the idea that when one derives one’s use of some word P1 from someone else's use P2, the token utterances of those words P1 and P2 each aim at the common language use P. From here, He asks us to imagine Peter deriving P1 (his use of Paderewski) from our P2, and Charles deriving P3 from our use P2. We then want to say that P1 and P3 are strictly coreferential, but how can we have this in the Peter/Charles case and not the Peter/Peter case?
To tackle this, Fine wants to refine our account of the relation of the semantics of a name when it is derived from another's use.
He wants to say that when Peter derives P1 from our P2, he is aiming at the use P1 to be coreferential with P in the common language. Presumably our use P2 is coreferential with P as well.
In the second case with Charles who derives his use P3 from our P2, the coordination between P1 and P3 will not be a matter of Peter's semantics or Charles' semantics, but Peter and Charles' semantics jointly.
So under the semantics jointly, we need to consider how the individual knowledge relates to the group knowledge it composes.
The coordinated knowledge of a single proposition (such as the use of a name) is an internal link of the individuals semantics. This should remain the same when introduced into the group. Now, the relation between the individuals knowledge is an external link to those individuals, but should the eternal links between them then become internal links within the group?
Fine evaluates two ways to interpret this problem, the impersonal, or objective way and the personal, or subjective way.The first is too broad and makes P1 strictly coreferential to P3 in the Peter/Peter case and the latter is too narrow by failing to imply that P1 is strictly coreferential with P3 in the Peter/Charles case. What is needed is an intermediary inter-subjective solution.
This approach only allows external links to become internal when those internal links are properly coordinated.
Fine uses this conception to draw distinctions between the common language (what we all aim at speaking - objective), the individual language (what we individually speak and mean by what we say - subjective), and the communal language (the language we speak in common - inter-subjective).
He then neatly solves the quantified version:
1. ∃x[F(x) & Bel[P(x)] & ~(Bel[P(x)] & Bel[S(x)])]
2. ∃x[F(x) & Bel[S(x)] & ~(Bel[S(x)] & Bel[P(x)])]
3. ∃x∃y(x!=y & F(x) & F(y))
It seems that there is no way to distinguish between the correctness of the composite reports or the correctness of the component reports. So what should be given up, the reports or classical logic?
It appears that it is classical logic which should be violated. For each premise, there are four uses of x which are coordinated by refering to Paderewski independently of each other, premise 3 has occurrences of x which are not coordinated with each other.
What is happening is the doxastic operator Bel cannot be regarded as a standard sentential operator because it picks out a coordinated body of opinion rather than a range of individual opinions.
We can now use this insight to express the distinction between an uncoordinated belief about a single referent and a coordinated belief of a single referent. So we can formally express the difference of beliefs in the Paderewski cases where the name Paderewski is represented as p.
1. ∃x(x=p & Bel[P(p)]) & ∃x(x=p & Bel[S(p)]) (there is some individual identical to Paderewski that the person believes is a pianist and there is some person identical to Paderewski that the person believes is a statesman);
2. ∃x(x=p & Bel[P(p)] & Bel[S(p)]) (there is some individual identical to Paderewski that the person believes to be a pianist and believes o be a statesman).
Fine ends the book noting some further work to be done with regards to relationism.
Overall, this is a solid work. It is not an easy read, but it is certainly rewarding. This is also deeply satisfying for me personally. I have always been plagued with a similar puzzle regarding the use and derivation of indexicals, in particular the first-person singular pronoun "I". Semantic Relationism offers a nice solution to this as well. This is, on its surface, a work in the philosophy of language, but it is my belief that much of the material discussed will be fruitful in many debates outside of this field. That being said, this is highly recommended for any of those interested in the philosophy of language, as well as anyone interested in those areas of philosophy which rest heavily on linguistic assumptions (metaphysics, meta-metaphysics, metaethics, etc.).
One thing to note about this book is how unique Fine's technique is. He first modestly states what he takes to be the correct notion of the roles of semantic expressions, and in the subsequent chapters, uses the idea to solve various philosophical puzzles. His treatment is even-handed, and he does not underplay the significance of the puzzles which are dealt with. There are even times when Fine makes the puzzles even stronger in order to show just how difficult they really are, as in the case of Kripke’s Puzzle about Belief.
In what follows, I will give a brief overview of the contents. I will only go in minor detail about each in order to provide the reader with a glimpse at the sort of argumentation employed within the work.
Fine first deals with the antimony of the variable. It is commonly supposed that the variables, when ranging over the same domain, play the same semantic role.
So take the variables x and y which range over the domain of all real numbers. It can be said that x>0 and y>0 perform the same semantic role when used in two distinct expressions, both x and y can be used interchangeably in this context. But the use of these variables within the same expression, x>y, leads to a contradictory understanding of their semantic roles. Clearly when two variables which range over the same domain are part of the same expression, the semantic role differs.
From generalizing, we seem to have two contradictory inferences:
Semantic Sameness (SS): any two variables which reign over the same domain play the same semantic roles.
Semantic Difference (SD): any two variables which reign over the same domain play different semantic roles.
Or as Fine later puts it:
SS': There is no cross-contextual difference in semantic roles between variables x and y.
SD': There is a cross contextual difference in semantic role between the pair of variables x,y and the pair x,x.
It seems now that there is no explicit contradiction. But how else can the cross-contextual difference of the pair of variables x,y and x,x be accounted for than by a difference in the semantic roles of variables x and y?
A proper resolution will have to say that SS' and SD' are somehow compatible, or that either SS' or SD' may be reasonably rejected.
Fine wants to claim that there is no conflict between them.
To do this, he wants to draw a distinction, between intrinsic (non-relational) and extrinsic (relational) semantic features of an expression.
The intrinsic semantic feature of some variable is what it is without any relation to something outside of itself. So it is intrinsic to the semantic predicate "doctor" that it is true of doctors, but not an intrinsic semantic feature that it is synonymous with "physician".
If the semantic expression is a pair, say "doctor" and "physician". it is an intrinsic semantic feature that they are synonymous, but it is not an intrinsic semantic feature that they are synonymous with "licensed medical professional".
If a pair of variables, x,y and x,x, has an intrinsic difference, then there is an extrinsic difference between the individual variables x and y.
If the semantic expressions of x and y are the same and the pair of expressions x,y and x,x are different, we only need to account for this by some intrinsic difference.
The variables x and y in x>0 and y>0 are intrinsically the same, while the pair of variables x>y are intrinsically different. What makes them different is their intrinsic pairing, and must be analyzed as their pairing rather than any particular extrinsic difference between variables x and y.
The second of these puzzles is Frege's puzzle. Fine neatly sums it up as follows:
Take two coreferential names, "Cicero" and "Tully" and the identity statements "Cicero=Cicero" and "Cicero=Tully", from this we get
1. Semantic Difference: The two identity statements are semantically different.
2. Compositionality: If the sentences are semantically different, the names "Cicero" and "Tully" are semantically different.
3. Referential Link: If the names "Cicero" and "Tully" are semantically different, they are referentially different.
4. Referential Identity: The names "Cicero" and "Tully" are not referentially different.
It is well known that the Fregean rejects 3, while the Referentialist rejects 1. Fine, who defends a kind of Referentialism, rejects 2. It is here that one of the most important distinctions is drawn, that of closure by classical consequence and that of closure by manifest consequence. Briefly put, if we have the premises Fa and Ga, the conclusion ∃x(Fx&Gx) will not be manifestly valid. This is because we can differentiate between the premises as Fa' and Ga" so that the consequence ∃x(Fx&Gx) will not be classically valid. It is my worry that this notion is dealt with far too quickly in the book. Of course, it is crucial to the Relationist program as a form of Referentialism that it work, so a longer defense of it would have been ideal.
Fine uses this notion, along with a few others, to claim that, though "Cicero" and "Tully" corefer, they do not strictly corefer. This, like the antimony of the variable, amounts to two names which corefer (or play the same semantic role), yet are uncoordinated in some way.
Just as language can represent as the same referent in two statements or propositions, so can thought. This is the third puzzle, the Cognitive Fregean Puzzle
One can think of Cicero, that he is Roman and that he is an orator, and thus have distinct thoughts which intentionally pick out the same referent, Cicero.
1. Doxastic Difference: the belief that Cicero is an orator is not the same as the belief that Tully is an orator.
2. Doxastic Link: if the beliefs are different, their content is different.
3. Compositionality: if the content of the beliefs differ, then so are the objectual components.
4. Objectual Link: if the objectual components differ, then so do the objects.
5. Objectual Identity: the objects do not differ.
Here, Fine provides us with a notion of cognitive base, where certain information can be, or fail to be, properly coordinated with that base. He asks us to reject Doxastic Link, showing that two beliefs can be different, while their intrinsic content is the same.
There are also coordination cases of semantics between speaker to speaker. The fourth, Kripke's puzzle, brings this out.
The basic puzzle is that Peter, when overhearing a conversation about Paderewski the pianist and statesman, comes to possess two beliefs concerning the man by thinking that Paderewski is really two men; Paderewski the pianist and Paderewski the statesman. Peter believes that all pianists are musical and that no statesmen are musical, he thus believes that Paderewski is musical and Paderewski is not musical. What makes this puzzling is not that Peter believes something inconsistent, but that we, who understand the referent Paderewski as a single man, have difficulty ascribing the belief to Peter. We can say individually that Peter believes Paderewski is musical and Peter believes Paderewski is not musical, but we are not in a position to say that Peter believes that Paderewski is both musical and non-musical, but it seems that we must.
Fine believes that this is a very real and difficult puzzle, and refines it in various ways to reveal that it is not simply about names. Fine offers a de re version, a weak and strong de dicto version, and a variable version.
To solve these, Fine establishes the idea that when one derives one’s use of some word P1 from someone else's use P2, the token utterances of those words P1 and P2 each aim at the common language use P. From here, He asks us to imagine Peter deriving P1 (his use of Paderewski) from our P2, and Charles deriving P3 from our use P2. We then want to say that P1 and P3 are strictly coreferential, but how can we have this in the Peter/Charles case and not the Peter/Peter case?
To tackle this, Fine wants to refine our account of the relation of the semantics of a name when it is derived from another's use.
He wants to say that when Peter derives P1 from our P2, he is aiming at the use P1 to be coreferential with P in the common language. Presumably our use P2 is coreferential with P as well.
In the second case with Charles who derives his use P3 from our P2, the coordination between P1 and P3 will not be a matter of Peter's semantics or Charles' semantics, but Peter and Charles' semantics jointly.
So under the semantics jointly, we need to consider how the individual knowledge relates to the group knowledge it composes.
The coordinated knowledge of a single proposition (such as the use of a name) is an internal link of the individuals semantics. This should remain the same when introduced into the group. Now, the relation between the individuals knowledge is an external link to those individuals, but should the eternal links between them then become internal links within the group?
Fine evaluates two ways to interpret this problem, the impersonal, or objective way and the personal, or subjective way.The first is too broad and makes P1 strictly coreferential to P3 in the Peter/Peter case and the latter is too narrow by failing to imply that P1 is strictly coreferential with P3 in the Peter/Charles case. What is needed is an intermediary inter-subjective solution.
This approach only allows external links to become internal when those internal links are properly coordinated.
Fine uses this conception to draw distinctions between the common language (what we all aim at speaking - objective), the individual language (what we individually speak and mean by what we say - subjective), and the communal language (the language we speak in common - inter-subjective).
He then neatly solves the quantified version:
1. ∃x[F(x) & Bel[P(x)] & ~(Bel[P(x)] & Bel[S(x)])]
2. ∃x[F(x) & Bel[S(x)] & ~(Bel[S(x)] & Bel[P(x)])]
3. ∃x∃y(x!=y & F(x) & F(y))
It seems that there is no way to distinguish between the correctness of the composite reports or the correctness of the component reports. So what should be given up, the reports or classical logic?
It appears that it is classical logic which should be violated. For each premise, there are four uses of x which are coordinated by refering to Paderewski independently of each other, premise 3 has occurrences of x which are not coordinated with each other.
What is happening is the doxastic operator Bel cannot be regarded as a standard sentential operator because it picks out a coordinated body of opinion rather than a range of individual opinions.
We can now use this insight to express the distinction between an uncoordinated belief about a single referent and a coordinated belief of a single referent. So we can formally express the difference of beliefs in the Paderewski cases where the name Paderewski is represented as p.
1. ∃x(x=p & Bel[P(p)]) & ∃x(x=p & Bel[S(p)]) (there is some individual identical to Paderewski that the person believes is a pianist and there is some person identical to Paderewski that the person believes is a statesman);
2. ∃x(x=p & Bel[P(p)] & Bel[S(p)]) (there is some individual identical to Paderewski that the person believes to be a pianist and believes o be a statesman).
Fine ends the book noting some further work to be done with regards to relationism.
Overall, this is a solid work. It is not an easy read, but it is certainly rewarding. This is also deeply satisfying for me personally. I have always been plagued with a similar puzzle regarding the use and derivation of indexicals, in particular the first-person singular pronoun "I". Semantic Relationism offers a nice solution to this as well. This is, on its surface, a work in the philosophy of language, but it is my belief that much of the material discussed will be fruitful in many debates outside of this field. That being said, this is highly recommended for any of those interested in the philosophy of language, as well as anyone interested in those areas of philosophy which rest heavily on linguistic assumptions (metaphysics, meta-metaphysics, metaethics, etc.).
November 4, 2024
The clarity of Fine's writing is virtually unparalleled, but I did read this fairly quickly, so what I'm going to write is to be taken with a pinch of salt. Having said that,
Fine opposes ‘semantical intrinsicalism’, namely the view that the difference of meaning between the pair < x, y > and < x, x > must be attributable to intrinsic differences between x and y. He defends the contrary view that the relationship, or the merely relational difference, is primitive (ch. 1).
If you believe p and believe q but don’t believe p & q, the coordinated content of the beliefs is not a function of the content of the individual beliefs. Compositionality is itself a function of coordination (77). But it’s not entirely clear how coordination can be triggered without reliance on MOPs. Fine, after Wittgenstein, wants to distinguish between representing as the same (using one symbol), and representing (two symbols) as *being* the same (which then involves an additional symbol ‘for’ sameness), and it is true that you can represent a as F, b as G, and a and b as being the same, without further representing a or b (arbitrarily) as F & G (and the point generalizes to the question of whether the truth/correctness of individual belief reports composes, i.e. determines the truth/correctness of complex belief reports). But this launches a regress, and to assume that we just ‘coordinate’ our uses of ‘a’ and ‘b’ explains nothing.
Fine opposes ‘semantical intrinsicalism’, namely the view that the difference of meaning between the pair < x, y > and < x, x > must be attributable to intrinsic differences between x and y. He defends the contrary view that the relationship, or the merely relational difference, is primitive (ch. 1).
If you believe p and believe q but don’t believe p & q, the coordinated content of the beliefs is not a function of the content of the individual beliefs. Compositionality is itself a function of coordination (77). But it’s not entirely clear how coordination can be triggered without reliance on MOPs. Fine, after Wittgenstein, wants to distinguish between representing as the same (using one symbol), and representing (two symbols) as *being* the same (which then involves an additional symbol ‘for’ sameness), and it is true that you can represent a as F, b as G, and a and b as being the same, without further representing a or b (arbitrarily) as F & G (and the point generalizes to the question of whether the truth/correctness of individual belief reports composes, i.e. determines the truth/correctness of complex belief reports). But this launches a regress, and to assume that we just ‘coordinate’ our uses of ‘a’ and ‘b’ explains nothing.
July 28, 2013
If you've got a strong background in Frege and other linquistic philosophers and a strong understanding of mathematical logic, this is an interesting take on a broader concept of semantics that may overcome the plethora of issues with denotational semantics. It takes some real intellectual effort to pull out the meat, though.
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