David Smith

"This is a sea urchin", I declare while strolling the beach with a friend. What do I refer to by uttering the demonstrative pronoun "this"? The object immediately before me, of course. As it happens on this occasion, the object in the sand at my feet. I may point at it to aid my hearer - or I may not. BUt now , if the meaning of the term is distinguished from the referent, what is the meaning of this, or of my utterance of this? I think we can distinguish the meaning of this, or of its utterance, from its referent. And if we attend carefully to what meanings should be, we can see just what ,after all, is the meaning of this.

Phenomenology is the study of conscious experience from the first-person point of view. Husserl used principles of formal ontology even as he bracketed the natural-cultural world in describing our experience, and Heidegger pursued fundamental ontology in his variety of phenomenology describing our own modes of existence. I shall address the role of ontology in phenomenology, and vice versa. Our account of what exists depends on our account of what and how we experience. But, moreover, our understanding of the structure of consciousness depends on our understanding of structure, basic ontological structure, and hence of the place of consciousness in the structure of the world. What makes consciousness “hard” for contemporary philosophy of mind is understanding how intentionality and subjectivity fit into the structure of the world: how phenomenology fits with ontology

This collection explores the structure of consciousness and its place in the world, or inversely the structure of the world and the place of consciousness in it. Amongst the topics covered are: the phenomenological aspects of experience, dependencies between experience and the world and the basic ontological categories found in the world at large. Developing ideas drawn from historical figures such as Descartes, Husserl, Aristotle, and Whitehead, the essays together demonstrate the interdependence of ontology and phenomenology and its significance for the philosophy of mind.

This is a study of the epistemology of indexical reference, Or its foundation in the intentionality of the speaker's awareness of the referent. Where the referent is the object of the speaker's acquaintance on that occasion, The sense expressed is the generic content of that awareness. This, Indexical sense determines indexical reference, But indexical sense works by appeal to the context of the speaker's awareness of the referent. It is discussed how, By virtue of indexical sense, Indexical reference is rigid, I.E. Picks out the same referent in any possible world

Phenomenology is the study of conscious experience from the first-person point of view. Husserl used principles of formal ontology even as he bracketed the natural-cultural world in describing our experience, and Heidegger pursued fundamental ontology in his variety of phenomenology describing our own modes of existence. I shall address the role of ontology in phenomenology, and vice versa. Our account of what exists depends on our account of what and how we experience. But, moreover, our understanding of the structure of consciousness depends on our understanding of structure, basic ontological structure, and hence of the place of consciousness in the structure of the world. What makes consciousness “hard” for contemporary philosophy of mind is understanding how intentionality and subjectivity fit into the structure of the world: how phenomenology fits with ontology.