A Forgotten Strand Of Reception History: Understanding Pure Semantics

Keywords

History of analytic philosophy; Logical empiricism; Pure semantics; Rudolf Carnap; Wilfrid Sellars

Abstract

I explore a strand of reception history that follows Rudolf Carnap’s shift from a purely syntactical analysis of constructed languages to his conception of pure semantics. My exploration focuses on Gustav Bergmann’s and Everett Hall’s interpretation of pure semantics (as centered around Carnap’s notion of ’rules of designation’), their understanding of what constitutes a ’formal’ investigation of language, and their arguments concerning the relationship between expressions and their extra-linguistic referents. I argue that Bergmann and Hall strongly misread Carnap’s semantic project and, subsequently, their misunderstanding is passed down through colleagues and students (found most notably in Wilfrid Sellars’ early philosophy).

Publication Date

1-1-2017

Publication Title

Synthese

Volume

194

Issue

1

Number of Pages

121-141

Document Type

Article

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-015-0678-4

Socpus ID

84922570632 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/84922570632

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