Russell's Theory of Meaning and Descriptions (1905-1920)

Russell's Theory of Meaning and Descriptions (1905-1920)* ALOYSIUS P. MARTINICH SINCE 1950, a literature has developed claiming that Russell's justification for his analysis of definite descriptions contains an equivocation. The three most distinguished advocates of this view are W. V. O. Quine,x P. F. Strawson,2 and A. R. White. Recently , R. K. Perkins, Jr. has challenged the claim by attacking in particular Alan R. White's contention that a certain argument in My Philosophical Development provides an "opportunity for giving a neat and precise proof of this conclusion.... "~ Perkins himself claims that Russell's argument "does not involve the alleged confusion of sense and reference, and that the belief that it does is a mistake resulting from the failure to grasp the purport of Russell's special notion of naming.''4 Perkins establishes this point by providing a univocal sense for the several occurrences of "mean" in Russell's argument and justifies doing so by appealing to the context in which his argument originally appears, that is, in Principia Mathematica (hereafter, Principia). Perkins explicitly disclaims judging the soundness of Russell's doctrine of meaning but holds that Russell's argument is valid, a conclusion he draws, I take it, from the fact that he has refuted the standard objection to it. Part I of this paper contains an analysis of the form of Russell's argument as it appears both in Principia and My Philosophical Development. Part II examines White's case that Russell's argument contains an equivocation on the meaning of "mean." Part III contains Perkins' criticism of White and his own interpretation of Russell's argument and theory of meaning. Part IV criticizes Perkins' interpretation of Russell's theory of meaning and presents an accurate account of the theory Russell held between 1905 and 1920. Part V explains how this nullifies not only Perkins' interpretation but White's also. Part VI exposes the confusions upon which Russell's argument founders. I. The argument White focuses on from My Philosophical Development is: The central point of the theory of descriptions was that a phrase may contribute to the meaning of a sentence without having any meaning at all in isolation. Of this, in the * I want to thank Edwin Allaire, Avrum Stroll, David Cole and LesLiePrice Martinich for their comments on earlier versions of this paper. The preparation of the paper was supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation to the University of California, San Diego. t "Russell's Ontological Development," in Bertrand Russell: Philosophero[ the Century, ed. R. Sehoenman (London: Allen &Unwin, 1967),p. 310. z "On Referring," in Essays in ConceptualAnalysis, ed. Antony Flew (London: Macmillan, 1956), p. 31. a Alan R. White, "The 'Meaning' of Russell's Theory of Descriptions," Analysis, XX (1959), 8. 4 R. K. Perkins, Jr,, "On Russell's Alleged Confusion of Sense and Reference," Analysis, XXX/I (1971), 45. [183] 184 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY case of descriptions, there is precise proof: (a) If "the author of Waverley" meant anything other than "Scott" "Scott is the author of Waverley" would be false, which it is not. (b) If "the author of Waverley" meant "Scott," "Scott is the author of Waverley" would be a tautology, which it is not. (c) Therefore, "the author of Waverley" means neither "Scott" nor anything else--i.e., "the author of Waverley" means nothing. Q.E.D.5 (Following White and Perkins, I have inserted "(a)" and "(b)" into the text for expository purposes and have added "(c)" for the same reason.) This argument is essentially a clearer statement of the one originally presented in Principia: Thus all phrases (other than propositions) containing the word the (in the singular) are incomplete symbols: they have a meaning in use, but not in isolation. For "the author of Waverley" cannot mean the same as "Scott," or "Scott is the author of Waverley" would mean the same as "Scott is Scott," which it plainly does not; nor can "the author of Waverley" mean anything other than "scott," or "Scott is the author of Waverley" would be false. Hence "the author of Waverley" means nothing.~ Although the version in My Philosophical Development clarifies the argument's...