Abstract
In this paper, I argue against an influential view of Frege's writings on indexical and other context-sensitive expressions, and in favour of an alternative. The centrepiece of the influential view, due to (among others) Evans and McDowell, is that according to Frege, context-sensitiveword-meaning plus context combine to express senses which are essentially first person, essentially present tense and so on, depending on the context-sensitive expression in question. Frege's treatment of indexicals thus fits smoothly with his Intuitive Criterion of difference of sense. On my view, by contrast, Frege stuck by the view which he held in his unpublished 1897 ‘Logic’, namely that the senses expressed by the combination of context-sensitive word-meaning and context could just as well be expressed by means of non-context-sensitive expressions: being first person, present tense and so on are properties, in Frege's view, only of language, not of thought. Given the irreducibility of indexicals – a phenomenon noticed by Castañeda, Perry and others – Frege's treatment of indexicals thus turns out to be inconsistent with the Intuitive Criterion. I argue that Frege was not aware of the inconsistency because he was not aware of the irreducibility of indexicals. This oversight was possible because the source of Frege's interest in indexicals, as inother context-sensitive expressions, differed from that of contemporary theorists. Whereas contemporary theorists are most often interested in indexicals (and in Frege's treatment of them) because they are interested in the indexical versions of Frege's Puzzle and their relation to psychological explanation, Frege himself was interested in them because they pose a prima facie threat to his general conception of thoughts. The only indexical expression Frege's view of which the above account does not cover is ‘I’ insofar as it is associated with ‘special and primitive’ senses, but Frege did not introduce such senses with a view to explaining theirreducibility of ‘I’ his real reason for introducing them remains obscure.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
REFERENCES
Burge, T.: 1990,‘Frege on Sense and Linguistic Meaning’, in D. Bell and N. Cooper (eds.), The Analytic Tradition, Blackwell, Oxford.
Castañeda, H.-N.: 1966,‘“He”: A Study in the Logic of Self-Consciousness’, Ratio 8, 130–57.
Dummett, M.: 1981a, Frege: Philosophy of Language, 2nd edn., Duckworth, London.
Dummett, M.: 1981b, The Interpretation of Frege's Philosophy, Duckworth, London.
Dummett, M.: 1993,‘The Relative Priority of Thought and Language’, in M. Dummett (ed.), Frege and Other Philosophers, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Evans, G.: 1982, The Varieties of Reference, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Evans, G.: 1985,‘Understanding Demonstratives’, in G. Evans (ed.), Collected Papers, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Frege, G.: 1979a,‘A Brief Survey of My Logical Doctrines’, in Frege 1979g.
Frege, C.: 1979b,‘Introduction to Logic’, in Frege 1979g.
Frege, G.: 1979c,‘Logic [between 1879 and 1891]’, in Frege 1979g.
Frege, G.: 1979d,‘Logic [1897]’, in Frege 1979g.
Frege, G.: 1979e,‘Logic in Mathematics’, in Frege 1979g.
Frege, G.: 1979f,‘On Concept and Object’, in Frege 1979g.
Frege, G.: 1979g, in H. Hermes et al. (eds.), Posthumous Writings, Blackwell, Oxford.
Frege, G.: 1979h,‘Sources of Knowledge of Mathematics and the Mathematical Natural Sciences’, in Frege 1979g.
Frege, G.: 1984a,‘Collected Papers on Mathematics, Logic, and Philosophy’, in B. McGuinness (ed.), M. Black et al. (trans.), Blackwell, Oxford.
Frege, G.: 1984b,‘Compound Thoughts’, in Frege 1984a.
Frege, G.: 1984c,‘Function and Concept’, in Frege 1984a.
Frege, G.: 1984d,‘On Sense and Meaning’, in Frege 1984a.
Frege, G.: 1984e,‘Thoughts’, in Frege 1984a.
Frege, G.: 1993,‘Letter to Jourdain’, in A. Moore (ed.), Meaning and Reference, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Geach, P. T.: 1972,‘On Beliefs about Oneself’, in P. T. Geach (ed.), Logic Matters, Blackwell, Oxford.
Harcourt, E.: 1997,‘Frege on Indexicals: A Problem from the “Logic” of 1897’, in G. Meggle (ed.), Analyomen 2-Proceedings of the 2nd Conference: Perspectives in Analytic Philosophy, De Gruyter, Berlin & New York.
Künne, W.: 1982,‘Sinn, Indexikalität und propositionaler Gehalt’, Grazer Philosophische Studien 18, 41–74.
Künne, W.: 1992,‘Hybrid Proper Names’, Mind 101, 721–31.
McDowell, J.: 1984,‘De Re Senses’, Philosophical Quarterly 34, 283–94.
McGinn, C.: 1983, The Subjective View, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Meggle, G.: 1997, Analyomen 2-Proceedings of the 2nd Conference: Perspectives in Analytical Philosophy, De Gruyter, Berlin & New York.
Noonan, H.: 1984,‘Fregean Thoughts’, Philosophical Quarterly 34, 205–23.
Perry, J.: 1993a.‘Frege on Demonstratives’, in J. Perry (ed.), The Problem of the Essential Indexical and Other Essays, Oxford University Press, New York & Oxford.
Perry, J.: 1993b,‘The Problem of the Essential Indexical’, in J. Perry (ed.), The Problem of the Essential Indexical and Other Essays, Oxford University Press, New York & Oxford.
Wettstein, H.: 1991,‘Has Semantics Rested on a Mistake?’, in H. Wettstein (ed.), Has Semantics Rested on a Mistake and Other Essays, Stanford University Press, Stanford.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Harcourt, E. Frege On ‘I’, ‘Now’, ‘Today’ And Some Other Linguistic Devices. Synthese 121, 329–356 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005161620492
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005161620492