Renewing Meaning: A Speech-Act Theoretic Approach by Stephen J Barker

Author:Stephen J Barker [Barker, Stephen J]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 0199263663

end p.149

Another piece of evidence comes from comparing (29) and (30) below: (29)

Jane saw a hippo yesterday. The hippo Jane saw yesterday was black.

(30)

Jane saw at least one hippo yesterday. *The hippo Jane saw yesterday was black.

(29) is fine but (30) is defective. Assuming uniqueness implications for singular definite descriptions, but no uniqueness implications for indefinites, the (x)-analysis cannot explain why (29) should be fine and (30) defective, because, according to it, both are semantically identical. This suggests that UI is correct.

To conclude, NUI is in trouble, and so is the pure (x)-analysis of indefinites. The (x)-analysis needs to supplemented by a theory according to which an F carries a conventional implicature by virtue of which UI holds. This, of course, is not an entirely happy situation for the (x)-analysis, since the Frege model, its natural home, espousing as it does SCT, cannot make any sense of conventional implicature—see §1.2.14

5.3.1 Truth-Value Gaps

For STA's theory of indefinites, UI is not merely a matter of implicature. It is a thesis about truth-conditional content. In (24) above, an ocean beach fails to denote. Given that it is highly implausible to suppose that (24) is false—assuming the facts about Australia and ocean beaches—STA must conjecture that (24) lacks truth-value. But what is the nature of this truth-value gap? Standard assertions of sentences like (24) are reports: acts in which U advertises an intention to represent a complex of a certain kind, where U defends that intention. In the case of (24) the representational intention U defends is: (31)

Intention to represent a complex of the form <x, has y>, where Australia denotes x and y uniquely satisfies {Ocean Beach possessed by Australia}.

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