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22Introduction to the Special Issue ‘Word Meaning – What it is and What it is not’Dialectica 71 (3): 335-336. 2017.
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48Analogical Cognition: an Insight into Word MeaningReview of Philosophy and Psychology 10 (3): 587-607. 2019.Analogical cognition, extensively researched by Dedre Gentner and her colleagues over the past thirty five years, has been described as the core of human cognition, and it characterizes our use of many words. This research provides significant insight into the nature of word meaning, but it has been ignored by linguists and philosophers of language. I discuss some of the implications of the research for our account of word meaning. In particular, I argue that the research points to, and helps ac…Read more
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28Is There Something in Common? Forms and the Theory of Word MeaningEuropean Journal of Philosophy 25 (4): 1675-1694. 2017.Plato's reflections on Forms have generally been overlooked, in contemporary Philosophy of Language, as a serious resource for illuminating the notion of word meaning. In part, this is due to the influence of Wittgenstein's critical reflections on looking for ‘something in common’ as explanatory for use of a general term. I argue that, far from being undermined, appeal to Forms can both help explain, and provide corrective critical insight into, Wittgenstein's observations. Plato's reflections p…Read more
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308Miracles and violations: Timothy PritchardReligious Studies 47 (1): 41-58. 2011.The claim that a miracle is a violation of a law of nature has sometimes been used as part of an a priori argument against the possibility of miracle, on the grounds that a violation is conceptually impossible. I criticize these accounts but also suggest that alternative accounts, when phrased in terms of laws of nature, fail to provide adequate conceptual space for miracles. It is not clear what a ???violation??? of a law of nature might be, but this is not relevant to the question of miracles.…Read more
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131Meaning, signification, and suggestion: Berkeley on general wordsHistory of Philosophy Quarterly 29 (3): 301-317. 2012.Discussion of Berkeley ’s theory of language has largely ignored what he says about the ‘meaning’ of a general word. Berkeley distinguishes the meaning of a general word both from the extension of the word and from what the word might suggest in the mind of the language user. D. Flage has argued that Berkeley has an ‘extensional’ theory of meaning, but this is based on passages where Berkeley does not speak of word meaning. When Berkeley explicitly discusses the meaning of particular words he do…Read more
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31Knowing the Meaning of a Word: Shared Psychological States and the Determination of ExtensionsMind and Language 32 (1): 101-121. 2017.What is it to know the meaning of a word? The traditional view is that it involves the possession of a concept that determines the extension of a word, with the concept corresponding to a single psychological state. Millikan criticizes this view, denying not only that concepts determine extensions but also that sharing a concept means sharing a psychological state. The purpose of this article is to defend a modified version of the traditional view. I argue that Millikan's claims do not translate…Read more
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97Locke and the primary signification of words: an approach to word meaningBritish Journal for the History of Philosophy 21 (3): 486-506. 2013.Locke’s claim that the primary signification of (most) words is an idea, or complex of ideas, has received different interpretations. I support the majority view that Locke’s notion of primary signification can be construed in terms of linguistic meaning. But this reading has been seen as making Locke’s account vulnerable to various criticisms, of which I consider two. First, it appears to make the account vulnerable to the charge that an idea cannot play the role that a word meaning should play…Read more
London, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Language |
Areas of Interest
Philosophy of Language |
Philosophy of Mind |
17th/18th Century Philosophy |