Zalabardo, Jose; (2024) The Meaning of Meaning Ascriptions: Assertibility Conditions and Meaning Facts. In: Verheggen, Claudine, (ed.) Kripke's Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language at 40. (pp. 238-258). Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, UK.

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Abstract

Kripke finds in Wittgenstein an argument for the conclusion that there are no meaning facts and considers the consequences of this outcome for the meaning of meaning-ascribing sentences. One immediate consequence is that their meaning cannot be given by their truth conditions. Kripke proposes instead that meaning ascriptions obtain their meaning from (i) their assertibility conditions and (ii) the non-representational function that the practice of asserting these sentences in these conditions plays in our lives, accepting that these sentences can’t play the role of representing the world. I present a strategy for avoiding this outcome. Meaning ascriptions obtain their meanings from their assertibility conditions, but they successfully perform the function of representing the world. The states of affairs they represent can be singled out with definitions by abstraction, using the synonymy conditions generated by their assertibility conditions. When meaning facts are construed in this way, the argument that Kripke finds in Wittgenstein does not establish that they don’t exist.

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