Names, reference, and correctness in Plato's Cratylus
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Names, reference, and correctness in Plato's Cratylus
（American university studies, Series V . Philosophy ; v. 55）
P. Lang, c1989
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Note
Bibliography: p. [173]-204
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
The Cratylus unfolds as a confrontation between competing theses on the question of the correctness of names. Since Plato levels criticism against both theses, we are led to wonder whether Plato himself takes a position on the main issue. Dr. Palmer argues that we can discern in the Cratylus a positive statement of Plato's own views. Plato, unlike many contemporary theorists who follow Frege, does not presuppose that intensional entities such as concepts or meanings mediate the relation between a name and its nominatum. Plato believes that reality divides into discrete, natural units and that names are established, in part, to mark these non-conventional units. Plato holds (or at least assumes) that a name is correct if it successfully (and directly) picks out a real unit or entity, and if it aptly describes its nominatum.
Table of Contents
Contents: This book offers an interpretation of Plato's own views in the Cratylus on how names pick out or refer to objects. Most scholars who have written on the Cratylus believe Plato assumes that names refer to objects through the mediation of concepts or other intensional entities. DR. Palmer argues that Plato's views are most consistent with a theory of direct reference. Another distinctive feature of the present study is that it contains the most up to date and comprehensive bibliography on the Cratylus available anywhere.
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