SEMANTIC WEEKLY ASSIGNMENT

Unit 8 & Unit 9

WORDS AND THINGS &
SENSE PROPERTIES AND STEREOTYPES

by

PUTHUT PANDU WIJAYA

0203519027

SEMARANG STATE UNIVERSITY

POST-GRADUATE PROGRAM
2020
UNIT 8 WORDS AND THINGS: EXTENSIONS AND PROTOTYPES

The EXTENSION of a one-place predicate is the set of all individuals to which

that predicate can truthfully be applied. It is the set of things which can POTENTIALLY
be referred to by using an expression whose main element is that predicate.

For example:

1. The extension of window is the set of all windows in the universe.

2. The extension of dog is the set of all dogs in the universe.
3. The extension of house is the set of all houses.
4. The extension of red is the set of all red things.

In the case of most frequent common nouns, at least, an extension is a set of physical
objects. Thus, extension contrasts with sense, since a sense is not a set of anything. And
extension contrasts with referent, since a referent is normally an individual thing, not a
set of things. Beside these contrasts, the notion of extension has similarities to that of
sense, on the one hand, and to that of reference, on the other. Extension is like sense, and
unlike reference, in that it is independent of any particular occasion of utterance.
Speakers refer to referents on particular occasions, but words which have sense and
extension have them ‘timelessly’. On the other hand, extension is like reference and
unlike sense, in that it connects a linguistic unit, such as a word or expression, to
something non-linguistic (i.e. outside language) be it a set of physical objects or an
individual physical object, or a set of abstract entities (e.g. songs, distances) or an
individual abstract object (e.g. a particular song, a specific distance).

A PROTOTYPE of a predicate is an object which is held to be very TYPICAL of the

kind of object which can be referred to by an expression containing the predicate. In other
words, the prototype of a predicate can be thought of as the most typical member of the
extension of a predicate.
For example:

A man of medium height and average build, between 30 and 50 years old, with
brownish hair, with no particularly distinctive characteristics or defects, could be a
prototype of the predicate man in certain areas of the world. A dwarf or a hugely
muscular body-builder could not be a prototype of the predicate man.

The REFERENT of a referring expression is the thing picked out by the use of that
expression on a particular occasion of utterance. The EXTENSION of a predicate is the
complete set of all things which could potentially (i.e. in any possible utterance) be the
referent of a referring expression whose head constituent is that predicate. A
PROTOTYPE of a predicate is a typical member of its extension.

We make a distinction between prototype and stereotype: we will define stereotype

in the next unit. In other texts, the two terms are often used interchangeably. A further
term, which we will have an occasional use for, is ‘denotation’. In many cases denotation
can be thought of as equivalent to extension. Thus, for example, the predicate cat can be
said to denote the set of all cats. But often the term is used in a wider, essentially vaguer,
sense, especially in connection with predicates whose extensions are problematical. Thus
one may find statements about meaning such as ‘redness denotes the property common to
all red things’, or ‘ambition denotes a human quality’, or ‘the preposition under denotes a
spatial relationship’.

UNIT 9 SENSE PROPERTIES AND STEREOTYPES

The SENSE of an expression is its indispensable hard core of meaning. This

definition deliberately excludes any influence of context or situation of utterance on the
senses of expressions. (Thus, it is problematic to talk of the senses of deictic words (Unit
7), but we will not go into that problem here.) The sense of an expression can be thought
of as the sum of its sense properties and sense relations with other expressions. For the
moment, we will concentrate on three important sense properties of sentences, the
properties of being analytic, of being synthetic, and of being contradictory.

An ANALYTIC sentence is one that is necessarily TRUE, as a result of the senses

of the words in it. An analytic sentence, therefore, reflects a tacit (unspoken) agreement
by speakers of the language about the senses of the words in it. A SYNTHETIC sentence
is one which is NOT analytic, but may be either true or false, depending on the way the
world is.

For example:

Analytic: All elephants are animals

The truth of the sentence follows from the senses of elephant and animal.

Synthetic: John is from Ireland

There is nothing in the senses of John or Ireland or from which makes this
necessarily true or false.

A CONTRADICTION is a sentence that is necessarily FALSE, as a result of the

senses of the words in it. Thus, a contradiction is in a way the opposite of an analytic
sentence.

For example:

1. This animal is a vegetable is a contradiction.

2. This must be false because of the senses of animal and vegetable.
3. Both of John’s parents are married to aunts of mine is a contradiction.
4. This must be false because of the senses of both parents, married, and aunt.

Analytic sentences can be formed from contradictions, and vice versa, by the
insertion or removal, as appropriate, of the negative particle word not. We pay no
attention here to the figurative use of both analytic sentences and contradictions. Taken
literally, the sentence That man is not a human being is a contradiction. This very fact is
what gives it its power to communicate a strong emotional judgement in a figurative use
(stronger than, say, the synthetic That man is very cruel).

For example:

1. That man is human has the sense property of analyticity (or of being analytic).
2. That man is tall has the sense property of syntheticity (or of being synthetic).
3. That man is a woman has the sense property of being a contradiction.

A NECESSARY CONDITION on the sense of a predicate is a condition (or criterion)

which a thing MUST meet in order to qualify as being correctly described by that
predicate.
A SUFFICIENT SET OF CONDITIONS on the sense of a predicate is a set of
conditions (or criteria) which, if they are met by a thing, are enough in themselves to
GUARANTEE that the predicate correctly describes that thing.

For example:

1. Take the predicate square, as usually understood in geometry. ‘Four-sided’ is a

necessary condition for this predicate, since for anything to be a square, it must
be four-sided.
2. ‘Plane figure, four-sided, equal-sided, and containing right angles’ is a
sufficient set of conditions for the predicate square, since if anything meets all
of these conditions, it is guaranteed to be a square.
3. ‘Four-sided and containing right angles’ is not a sufficient set of conditions for
square. Many non-square shapes, such as rectangles and trapezoids, meet these
conditions.
4. ‘Three-sided’ is not a necessary condition for square.
 The STEREOTYPE of a predicate is a list of the TYPICAL characteristics or
features of things to which the predicate may be applied.

For example: The stereotype of cat would be something like:

Quadruped, domesticated, either black, or white, or grey, or tortoise-shell, or marmalade

in colour, or some combination of these colours, adult specimens about 50 cm long from
nose to tip of tail, furry, with sharp retractable claws, etc., etc.

The sense of an expression can be thought of as the sum of its sense properties and
sense relations. Sense properties of sentences include those of being analytic, synthetic,
and a contradiction. With the exception of a few predicates such as bachelor, father,
square, sphere, etc. it is not possible to give complete definitions of the sense of most
predicates by sets of necessary and sufficient conditions. Stereotypes defined in terms of
typical characteristics account for the fact that people usually agree on the meanings of
the words they use.