<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>We identify two senses of ‘pragmatics’ and related terms that give rise to two different methods of propositional individuation. The first one is the contextualist approach that essentially acknowledges contextual information to take part in the determination of what is said by the utterance of a sentence. In this sense, Pragmatics relies on the Principle of Compositionality and interprets propositions as structured entities. It epitomises the Building-block Model of Propositional Individuation. The general approach that makes what the agents do the grounding level of philosophical and linguistic analysis characterizes the second sense, Pragmatism. It finds its clearest expression in Peirce’s Pragmatist Maxim, and it relies on (a particular interpretation of) the Fregean Principle of Context, and supports a view of propositions as unstructured entities. This is the Organic Model of Propositional Individuation. There is a test, the Analytic Equivalence Test, that tells apart the two models. According to it, the answer to the question whether a theory makes room for different but analytically equivalent propositions determines the model the theory belongs in. A positive answer classifies the theory as belonging to the building-block model; a negative answer allocates the theory within the organic model.</p></abstract>

We identify two senses of ‘pragmatics’ and related terms that give rise to two different methods of propositional individuation. The first one is the contextualist approach that essentially acknowledges contextual information to take part in the determination of what is said by the utterance of a sentence. In this sense, Pragmatics relies on the Principle of Compositionality and interprets propositions as structured entities. It epitomises the Building-block Model of Propositional Individuation. The general approach that makes what the agents do the grounding level of philosophical and linguistic analysis characterizes the second sense, Pragmatism. It finds its clearest expression in Peirce’s Pragmatist Maxim, and it relies on (a particular interpretation of) the Fregean Principle of Context, and supports a view of propositions as unstructured entities. This is the Organic Model of Propositional Individuation. There is a test, the Analytic Equivalence Test, that tells apart the two models. According to it, the answer to the question whether a theory makes room for different but analytically equivalent propositions determines the model the theory belongs in. A positive answer classifies the theory as belonging to the building-block model; a negative answer allocates the theory within the organic model.

Pragmatism. Propositional Priority and the Organic Model of Propositional Individuation

Disputatio

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

We identify two senses of ‘pragmatics’ and related terms that give rise to two different methods of propositional individuation. The first one is the...

Pragmatism. Propositional Priority and the Organic Model of Propositional Individuation

Published Online: Dec 31, 2018

Page range: 203 - 217

Received: Jul 19, 2016

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/disp-2016-0012

Keywords
Building-block model, compositionality, expressivism, Frege, relativism

© 2016 María J. Frápolli et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Pragmatism. Propositional Priority and the Organic Model of Propositional Individuation

Published Online: Dec 31, 2018

Page range: 203 - 217

Received: Jul 19, 2016

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/disp-2016-0012

KeywordsBuilding-block model, compositionality, expressivism, Frege, relativism

© 2016 María J. Frápolli et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
Building-block model, compositionality, expressivism, Frege, relativism