Philosophy 262 - Meaning and Truth: The Semantics of Natural Language

This course is an introduction to central topics in the philosophy of language. What is the relation between thought, language and reality? What kinds of things do we do with words? Is there anything significant about the definite article "the"? How does meaning accrue to proper names? Is speaker meaning the same as the public, conventional (semantic) meaning of words? Is there a distinction between metaphorical and literal language? We explore some of the answers that philosophers like Frege, Russell, Strawson, Donnellan, Austin, Quine, Kripke and Davidson have offered to these and other related questions. Prerequisite: PHI 101, PHI 102 or equivalent.