Formal Philosophy Seminar

Since the publication of (Frege 1892), (Russell 1905) and (Strawson 1950), the semantics of definite descriptions has been one of the most extensively debated topics within the philosophy of language. And even though the majority of current theorists are Russellians of one flavour or another, Frege’s and Strawson’s approach to definite descriptions has undergone a veritable renaissance in the recent literature. In this paper I argue that important insights of both camps can be combined in a unified account of the semantics of definite descriptions.

This paper examines the conditions under which we can hold the members of some committee responsible for the outcome resulting from the committee's decision making process. First, we establish the conditions under which we can be sure that there is at least one member who can thus be held responsible. Formulated differently, we examine the conditions that ensure the absence of `responsibility voids'.

In A Theory of Conditionals, Robert Stalnaker distinguishes the ``logical problem'' of counterfactuals from the ``pragmatic problem'' of counterfactuals. Whereas the former problem has received much attention, the latter has received relatively little. This paper is concerned with a central aspect of the latter problem, namely the problem of change in the evaluation of counterfactuals (which corresponds to change in the selection function, under Stalnaker's theory).