The problem with the Frege–Geach problem

Abstract

I resolve the major challenge to an Expressivist theory of the meaning of normative discourse: the Frege-Geach Problem. Drawing on considerations from the semantics of directive language (e.g., imperatives), I argue that, although certain forms of Expressivism (like Gibbard's) do run into at least one version of the Problem, it is reasonably clear that there is a version of Expressivism that does not.

The expressive function of folk psychology

“…In any case, the importance of characterizing descriptivism is to provide an approximation to a particular understanding of the function that ascriptions and mental concepts play in our social interactions. In this sense, the interest of the definition is to distinguish functionally descriptive-states or sentences from action-guiding states or sentences which do not carry information about the world, i.e., states or sentences which provide evaluations by giving action-guiding information (Charlow, 2014(Charlow, , 2015Lewis, 1979) that specifies particular behavioral patterns.…”

Advice for Noncognitivists

“…Schroeder () helpfully distinguishes the problem of arriving at a satisfying explanation of the inconsistency between (1) and (2) from the one of arriving at a compositional expressivist semantics for natural language (see also Charlow, ). Compositionality requires a method for computing the semantic value of any well‐formed construction of L on the basis of the semantic values of its components.…”

“…And this is something that the classical expressivist frameworks from Blackburn and Gibbard simply do not deliveror so Dreier (2006, 2009), Schroeder (2008a, 2008b, 2008c, Schueler (1988), Sinnott-Armstrong (2000), and Unwin (1999Unwin ( , 2001 have all argued. Schroeder (2010) helpfully distinguishes the problem of arriving at a satisfying explanation of the inconsistency between (1) and (2) from the one of arriving at a compositional expressivist semantics for natural language (see also Charlow, 2014). Compositionality requires a method for computing the semantic value of any well-formed construction of L on the basis of the semantic values of its components.…”

“…4 At a minimum, this is the standard take on the semantic agenda of expressivism: see the discussions by, e.g., Dreier (2009), Horgan and Timmons (2006), Rosen (1998), Schroeder (2008a, 2008b, Wedgwood (2007), and Unwin (2001). Charlow (2014) and Silk (2013) develop non-standard outlooks on the semantics of expressivism, which I will discuss in more detail in the concluding section of this article. 5 As van Roojen (1996) observes, not just any clash of attitude will serve as a foundation for semantic inconsistency.…”

Should Expressivism Be a Theory at the Level of Metasemantics?

“…Charlow () and Chrisman (), in addition to Ridge (), all advocate a shift to the level of metasemantics in order to best develop the motivations characteristic of expressivism. They seem to concede that there are worrisome or fatal problems for expressivism as a mentalist semantic theory.…”