Philosophy Research Archives

Volume 12, 1986/1987

Rod Bertolet
Pages 251-260

Referring, Demonstrating, and Intending

Demonstratives have been thought to provide counterexamples to theories which analyze the notion of speaker reference in terms of the intentions of the speaker. This paper is a response to three attempts to undermine my efforts to defend such theories against these putative counterexamples. It is argued that the efforts of Howard Wettstein, M. J. More and John L. Biro to show that my own attempt to defuse the putative counterexamples offered by David Kaplan fails, are themselves unsuccessful. The competing view of demonstration which I endorse is clarified further by the discussion.