ESSINDEX · Essential Indexicality
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2019-09-01 → 2021-08-31
- EU contribution
- €173,076
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF-EF-ST
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Essential Indexicality
The problem addressed in ESSINDEX is the “problem of the essential indexical” in the contemporary philosophy of language and mind. Indexicals are words like ‘I’, ‘here’, ‘now’, ‘that’, etc. whose referent (what they designate) varies according to the context of their use. Pioneers of modern semantics regarded indexicality as a dispensable feature of the words whereby we express thoughts – and even as a defect of natural languages, which, like other forms of context-dependency (such as ambiguity or vagueness), ought to be eliminated from the ideal, logical languages better suited to the purposes of knowledge and science. However, around 1970, philosophers noticed that some thoughts cannot be expressed without the help of indexicals. This is the so-called “problem of the essential indexical,” which suggests that indexicality, far from being a dispensable feature of the words whereby we express our thoughts (linguistic indexicality), is much more fundamentally an essential feature of certain thoughts, which represent the world from an irreducibly first-person, egocentric perspective (mental indexicality). Because of their subjective, 'perspectival' nature, such indexical thoughts pose deep challenges to what are common and otherwise plausible objectivist, 'propositionalist' doctrines about the semantics of mental states like beliefs. Like for other fundamental philosophical themes, developing an understanding of mental indexicality is of general importance for society. The phenomenon questions mysterious features of what is most distinctive about human life and experience: the human mind. Mental indexicality is now widely regarded as a nexus between classical issues in philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, semantics, pragmatics, epistemology, and philosophy of science, having to do with subjectivity and the first person in the realms of language, thought, knowledge, perception, and consciousness. But while the phenomenon of essential indexicality is connected to old themes in philosophy, intense debates are currently raging about its extent, its varieties, and its semantics. The project ESSINDEX contributes to these ongoing debates by developing an original account of what is distinctive about indexical thoughts. In particular, it explores a new general hypothesis, according to which the reason why the problem of the essential indexical has sounded so intractable thus far is that two different problems were conflated from the start. Once the two problems are properly distinguished, surprising and groundbreaking solutions become accessible for each problem. The main conclusions of ESSINDEX are (1) that the general hypothesis of an overlooked distinction between two different problems stands up to scrutiny, and (2) that one of the possible accounts of the two problems envisaged in the project is particularly successful and has general consequences for philosophy and linguistics.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
My aim in the project ESSINDEX is to understand the phenomenon of essential indexicality. Indexicals are linguistic terms such as ‘I’, ‘here’, ‘now’, ‘he’, etc. whose referent varies according to the context of use. For example, an utterance of ‘now’ refers to the time of its utterance. Like other context-dependence phenomena, indexicality had long been regarded as a defect of natural language. But in 1970, it was noticed that some thoughts cannot be expressed or communicated without the help of indexicals. Such thoughts appear to represent the world from a situated perspective in it. This creates a deep problem for traditional doctrines about thought and communication: the “problem of the essential indexical” (PEI). The PEI has generated a vast literature in the last 40 years. It has foundational implications in philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, semantics, and pragmatics. This is the perfect time for a renewed assessment of the PEI: recent sceptics began to complain that the PEI was ill-posed and that essential indexicality was a myth. The novel view I propose to explore in this project integrates insights from both the advocates and the detractors of essential indexicality. It could mark a turning point in debates on the PEI, and thereby have broad implications for the relevant fields. I want to run ESSINDEX under the supervision of François Recanati at the Institut Jean Nicod (IJN), which is partnered with the École Normale Supérieure (ENS) in Paris. Given the unrivalled expertise of F. Recanati on most topics of ESSINDEX, and that of other researchers at IJN on specific issues to be explored in various research fields (philosophy of language/mind/cognitive science, semantics/pragmatics, epistemology), the interdisciplinary team of IJN provides the best possible environment in which to run that project, which directly engages with the current work of several of its researchers.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- ECOLE NORMALE SUPERIEURE · ParisCoordinatorFrance
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union