IS THE PROBLEM OF CONFLICTING INTENTIONS A GENUINE PROBLEM? SOME REMARKS ON GÓMEZ-TORRENTE´S “ROADS TO REFERENCE”

IS THE PROBLEM OF CONFLICTING INTENTIONS A GENUINE PROBLEM? SOME REMARKS ON GÓMEZ-TORRENTE´S “ROADS TO REFERENCE”1 _________ FILIPE MARTONE https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0723-6855 University of Campinas Department of Philosophy Campinas, S.P. Brazil Article info CDD: 401 Received: 22.09.2020; Accepted: 28.09.2020 https://doi.org/10.1590/0100-6045.2020.V43N4.FM Keywords Reference Demonstratives Indexicals philosophy of language Abstract: In this brief discussion piece I try to offer some considerations in favor of the so-called Simple Intention Theory of demonstratives, which is rejected by Gómez-Torrente. I try to show that the main argument offered against the Simple Intention Theory appears to be based on false data. 1 Research for this paper was funded by grant #2015/26344-3, São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP). Manuscrito – Rev. Int. Fil. Campinas, v. 43, n. 4, pp. 49-58, Oct.-Dec. 2020. Filipe Martone 50 The Kaplanian project of giving the character of demonstratives in terms of a description stating the necessary and sufficient conditions for their reference may be difficult to carry out, but philosophers usually believe it must be feasible2. One of the simplest theories of demonstratives in the Kaplanian spirit is the so-called Simple Intention Theory. This theory attempts to state the character of demonstratives as follows: (SIT) The use of a demonstrative refers to an object o if and only if o is the thing the speaker intends to refer with her use of the demonstrative. (SIT) is a very simple rule that states the necessary and sufficient conditions for demonstrative reference, one that can very easily be internalized by speakers. If the Simple Intention Theory is correct, then the Kaplanian project succeeds. But Gómez-Torrente (2019) and others3 think that this theory is clearly false. The main argument is that it cannot deal with cases involving conflicting intentions. In such cases, (i) the speaker has more than one referential intention in a given use of a demonstrative, (ii) these intentions, unbeknownst to the speaker, point to different objects, and (iii) the token demonstrative does not refer to all of the intended objects. It is argued that the Simple Intention Theory yields the wrong results in these cases: it either predicts reference failure when there is clearly reference to one of the intended objects, or it predicts reference failure when the matter is really indeterminate. More importantly, Gómez-Torrente thinks that the inadequacy of the Simple Intention Theory (and of theories that try to amend it) is very 2 C.f. Speaks (2017). 3 E.g. Speaks (2016) and (2017), King (2013). Manuscrito – Rev. Int. Fil. Campinas, v. 43, n. 4, pp. 49-58, Oct.-Dec. 2020. Is the Problem of Conflicting Intentions a Genuine Problem? 51 strong evidence that the whole Kaplanian project is hopeless. He argues that “the demonstrative descriptivism … is just as wrong as the corresponding descriptivism about proper names presumably is” (Gómez-Torrente 2019: 12). He concludes that the character of demonstratives can be stated only in terms of roughly sufficient conditions for reference. In this paper I offer some (indirect) considerations in favor of the Simple Intention Theory, and thus in favor of the Kaplanian project in general. It seems to me that the typical cases of conflicting intentions wielded against (SIT) describe impossible situations: such cases either involve situations in which the speaker has both a referential intention and an attributive intention in the sense of Donnellan (1966), or situations in which the speaker has conflicting referential intentions of different kinds. Both kinds of situation, I will argue, seem impossible. If I am right, the arguments against the Simple Intention Theory appear to rest on false data, and so one crucial step of Gómez-Torrente argument against the Kaplanian project would be unwarranted. For reasons of space, I will concentrate on the first case Gómez-Torrente offers against the Simple Intention Theory. Imagine that you and I are watching a soccer game on the university campus. In this game, there is an obviously talented player wearing a yellow shirt, and I happen to believe that he is also the best student in my philosophy class. I then say That’s a really good player, intending to refer to the player in the yellow shirt as represented by my perception of him, and also to the student as represented by the description ‘the brightest student in my philosophy class’. However, the player is not the student I am representing descriptively. According to Gómez-Torrente, (SIT) predicts that my use of ‘that’ will lack a referent in this case; yet it is clear that my use of ‘that’ successfully referred to the player I am perceptually representing. This would show that (SIT) is false, or at the Manuscrito – Rev. Int. Fil. Campinas, v. 43, n. 4, pp. 49-58, Oct.-Dec. 2020. Filipe Martone 52 very least that it needs to be supplemented with a theory of trumping that explains when one intention trumps the other4. But I think this scenario does not describe a possible situation: the speaker simply cannot have both intentions suitably connected to her use of the demonstrative. Let me explain. We can all agree that demonstratives are devices of direct reference. But what that means exactly is not immediately clear. I take it, following Almog (2014), that expressions are directly referential because of a certain sort of cognitive mechanics underpinning their use. Almog’s basic idea is this: my mind comes to be related to a certain object by a nonconventional process – perception being the paradigmatic case, but also memory and imagination –, and it is this nonconventional relation that fixes or determines the object of my thought. The important thing to note here is that the mind-object link in such cases is not established satisfactionally, that is, in virtue of the object satisfying some conditions I previously conjured up in my mind. In other words, I do not come up with a set of conditions and then “send them” looking for something in the world that fits them. The cognitive link with the object is established directly, meaning that it is not mediated by a relation of satisfaction. With the object of my thought fixed relationally in this way, I then use an expression to linguistically refer to the thing I am thinking about. As Almog puts it, linguistic reference in this sense is “back-reference, or reference back to an item one is already cognitively linked with” (p. 72). I agree with Almog that this is what Donnellan (1966) had in mind (pun intended) when he was describing the difference between referential uses of expressions and attributive uses of expressions. In this interpretation of Donnellan, referential uses are those uses in which the speaker is exploiting this precedent cognitive link, and so the 4 See Speaks (2016) and (2017). Manuscrito – Rev. Int. Fil. Campinas, v. 43, n. 4, pp. 49-58, Oct.-Dec. 2020. (...truncated)