Abstract

This dissertation is a defense of Kripke's contention that the reference of a name can be established via a reference-fixing description as well as via ostension. ;Descriptive names and similar devices give rise to contingent truths that can apparently be known a priori; the idea of a truth that is both contingent and a priori appears to be somewhat paradoxical. For example: It seems that simply stipulating that 'one meter' is to name the length of stick S enables one to know a priori a mind- and language-independent fact---the fact that the length of stick S is one meter---that one previously could only have known a posteriori. How can a trivial stipulation give one a priori access to extralinguistic reality? If one knows a proposition a priori, then one knows it without experience of the world. It should hence be true however the world happens to be, that is, true in any possible world, and so a necessary truth. ;I offer solutions to these paradoxes. My solution to claims that the stipulator and others knew that the length of stick S is one meter before the stipulation is made. This knowledge, however, is implicit. I argue that implicit knowledge is far more widespread than has been previously supposed. ;My solution to is offered in the second part of the dissertation, which consists of the development of a novel theory of concepts, the parasitic theory. I critically examine rival theories, suggesting that the phenomenon of descriptive reference raises hitherto unappreciated problems for these rival theories. The most important conclusions of my discussion are as follows: The parasitic theory challenges the assumption that a token intentional state realizes a unique thought that has a unique decomposition into its conceptual constituents. The parasitic theory allows that a token intentional state can be, and generally is, an instance of many thought types with differing conceptual constituents. The parasitic theory provides an account of conceptual truth. Concepts turn out to be world-bound on the parasitic theory; certain concepts can only be possessed in a restricted range of possible worlds