In the sentence ‘Tom sits’, the name distinguishes Tom from anyone else, whereas the predicate assimilates Tom, Theaetetus and anyone else to whom the predicate applies. The name marks out its bearer and the predicate marks together what it applies to. On that ground, his name is used to trace back Tom, and the predicate is used to describe and classify him. Here, I’ll minimally sketch a picture of predication, which deems this notion a primitive semantic one along with reference, and the first differing from the second by one trait. Predication is proper to predicates playing their role, i.e. predicating predicates, rather than to nominalized ones (such as ‘talking’, in ‘Talking is something I like to listen to’).
Predication
LEONARDI, PAOLO
2014
Abstract
In the sentence ‘Tom sits’, the name distinguishes Tom from anyone else, whereas the predicate assimilates Tom, Theaetetus and anyone else to whom the predicate applies. The name marks out its bearer and the predicate marks together what it applies to. On that ground, his name is used to trace back Tom, and the predicate is used to describe and classify him. Here, I’ll minimally sketch a picture of predication, which deems this notion a primitive semantic one along with reference, and the first differing from the second by one trait. Predication is proper to predicates playing their role, i.e. predicating predicates, rather than to nominalized ones (such as ‘talking’, in ‘Talking is something I like to listen to’).I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
