Cover not available

In:Essays on Linguistic Realism:
Edited by Christina Behme and Martin Neef
[Studies in Language Companion Series 196] 2018
► pp. 235–254

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload Book PDF
authorization required

Chapter 9
Cognitive propositions in realist linguistics

 | University of Southern California
Published online: 26 July 2018
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.196.09soa
Abstract
The paper presents a cognitive conception of propositions as semantic contents of (some) declarative sentences. The conception expands solution spaces for previously intractable empirical problems in natural-language semantics and pragmatics, while also explaining how an agent who is unable to cognize propositions can know or believe them, and how sophisticated agents acquire the concept and believe things about them by monitoring their own cognitions. Finally, an account is given of what it is for a sentence to mean that p in a language that doesn’t require having thoughts about p or L. Nevertheless, semantics isn’t psychology; agents with different psychologies can speak semantically identical languages, while those with the same purely internal states (embedded in similar immediate environments) can speak different languages. Cognitive semantics can be realist and naturalistic without being a branch of psychology.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Propositions
    • 2.1Propositions in intensional semantics
    • 2.2Propositions as cognitive act types
    • 2.3Predication
    • 2.4Complex propositions
  • 3.Foundational and empirical advantages of cognitive propositions
    • 3.1Cognitively distinct but representationally identical propositions
    • 3.2Linguistic cognition
    • 3.3The Millian modes of perceiving and recognizing
  • 4.Cognitive propositions in a realist conception of linguistics
    • 4.1Semantic contents excluding Millian modes
    • 4.2Semantic content vs. individual psychologies
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
References (26)
References
Bach, Kent. 1994. Conversational impliciture. Mind & Language 9: 124–162. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chalmers, David. 1996. The Conscious Mind. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Davidson, Donald. 1967. Truth and meaning. Synthese 17: 304–323; reprinted in Davidson (2001). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2001. Inquiries Into Truth and Interpretation. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fine, Kit. 2007. Semantic Relationism. Malden MA: Blackwell. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Grice, Paul. 1967. Logic and conversation (given in 1967 as the William James lectures at Harvard University). In Syntax and Semantics, Vol. 3: Speech Acts, Peter Cole & Jerry L. Morgan (eds), 41–58. New York NY: Academic Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kripke, Saul. 1979. A puzzle about belief. In Meaning and Use, Avishai Margalit (ed.), 239–283. Dordrecht: Reidel. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Putnam, Hilary. 1970. Is semantics possible? Metaphilosophy 1(3): 187–201; reprinted in Putnam (1975a). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1975a. Philosophical Papers, Vol. 2. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1975b. The meaning of ‘meaning’. In Language, Mind, and Knowledge [Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science 7], Keith Gunderson (ed.), 131–193. Minneapolis MN: University of Minnesota Press. Reprinted in Putnam (1975a).Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Salmon, Nathan. 2012. Recurrence. Philosophical Studies 159: 407–441. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Soames, Scott. 1987. Direct reference, propositional attitudes, and semantic content. Philosophical Topics 15: 44–87. Reprinted in Soames (2009c). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2002. Beyond Rigidity. Oxford: OUP. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2005. Reference and Description. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2006. Understanding assertion. In Content and Modality, Judith Thomson & Alex Byrne (eds), 222–250. Oxford: OUP. Reprinted in Soames 2009c.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008a. Drawing the line between meaning and implicature – and relating both to assertion. Nous 42: 529–554. Reprinted in Soames (2009b). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008b. Why propositions can’t be sets of truth-supporting circumstances. Journal of Philosophical Logic 37: 267–276. Reprinted in Soames (2009c). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2009a. The gap between meaning and assertion: Why what we literally say often differs from what our words literally mean. In Soames (2009b), 278–297.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2009b. Philosophical Essays, Vol. 1. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2009c. Philosophical Essays, Vol. 2. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2010a. What is Meaning? Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2010b. Philosophy of Language. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2012. Two versions of Millianism. In Reference and Referring, Topics in Philosophy, Vol. 10, Joseph Campbell, Michael O’Rourke & Harry Silverstein (eds), 83–118. Cambridge MA: The MIT Press. Reprinted in Soames (2014).Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2014. Analytic Philosophy in America. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2015. Rethinking Language, Mind, and Meaning. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Stalnaker, Robert. 1978. Assertion. In Syntax and Semantics, Vol. 9: Pragmatics, Peter Cole (ed.), 315–322. New York NY: Academic Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (2)

Cited by two other publications

Soames, Scott
2022. Anti-descriptivism 2.0. Philosophical Studies 179:3 ► pp. 977 ff. DOI logo
Hodgson, Thomas
2021. Act‐type theories of propositions. Philosophy Compass 16:11 DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 3 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue