Videos footage from RuCCS Colloquium Talks can be found on the RuCCS YouTube Channel. For all other events, please check the sponsor's website for more detail.

To filter by event category, click on the event category link in the table below or use the menu on the right.

List of Past Events

Reference and Sortals

Dr. Friederike Moltmann

Thursday, October 11, 2007, 12:00pm - 07:00pm

Director of Research, CNRS, Paris, FRANCE

Copy to My Calendar (iCal) Download as iCal file

The received view in contemporary philosophy of language is that� sortals are not needed for reference: the reference of a term,� especially that of a directly referential term can be fixed without� the help of a sortal. In this talk I will present a range of new� linguistic generalizations that indicates that reference to abstract� objects (such as facts, propositions and numbers) and certain derived� objects (such as collections) does indeed require a sortal and cannot� be achieved by a 'nonreferential' expression alone, such as a� that-clause, a plural like 'the children', or a numeral like 'eight'.
I will argue that predicates when taking such a nonreferential� expression as complement must be understood in a new way, not as� expressing a property applying to an object, but as specifying� 'multiple relations' (for that-clauses), as being multigrade (for� plurals), or as syncategorematically interacting with what is� expressed by a numeral, as on the 'adjectival strategy' for treating� number terms, discussed in the philosophy of mathematics.

Dr. Friederike Moltmann