Strawson on Definite Descriptions

Strawson's Theory of Referring

General Points about Language 

• Two sentences can have same truth conditions, but be used very differently.
• eg. Problems like capturing exclusive disjunction, the temporal implications of 'and' etc
• Strawson wants to show there can be no exact logic of ordinary language 
• We should not have to build further sensitivity into language

Strawson's Analysis of Russell

• Strawson wants to show that subject-predicate sentences can be meaningful even when they fail to refer.
• Whereas Russell wants to show 'the present king of france is bald' is meaningful without recourse to:

1. Having to posit the king of france's existence, because for a subject-predicate sentencte to be meaningful it must be about the King of France

2. If the claim is meaningful, it's true or false. Whether the king of France is bald, or is not bald,both are true only if the King of France Exists.

• Russell's solution: sentences which fail to refer are not of SP form at all; instead, grammatical form masks true logical form. Only logically proper names can be the subjects of SP sentences.

• Strawson, conversely, argues that people, not sentences refer.
• So, we should think of reference in terms of uniquely referring use.
• There can be different tokens of…