Topics in philosophy of language: modeling representation

Lectures: 1 session / week, 3 hours / session

The seminar will be devoted to understanding what we're up to when we ascribe contents to a person's assertions and mental attitudes. We seek to make clear the rules of the game for the philosophy of language. We'll survey classic discussions of the issue by Field, Lewis and Stalnaker. But much of the emphasis of the class will be on getting clear about the limitations of our theoretical tools. I'd like to focus on places where our theorizing runs into trouble, or breaks down altogether.

High level graduate students with sufficient training to participate in sophisticated in-class discussion. A Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy should be adequate preparation to do the course readings.

Course grades will be based on the completion of a final paper. See assignments for more information.

Field, Hartry. Truth and the Absence of Fact. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2001. ISBN: 9780199242894.

Lewis, David. Philosophical Papers. Vol. 1. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1983. ISBN: 9780195032048.

———. Papers in Philosophical Logic. Vol. 1. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997. ISBN: 9780521587884.

Stalnaker, Robert. Inquiry. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1987. ISBN: 9780262691130.

———. Context and Content. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1999. ISBN: 9780198237075.

Abilities and incoherent belief

Guest lecture: Adam Elga, Princeton University

Don't show me this again

This is one of over 2,200 courses on OCW. Find materials for this course in the pages linked along the left.

MIT OpenCourseWare is a free & open publication of material from thousands of MIT courses, covering the entire MIT curriculum.

No enrollment or registration. Freely browse and use OCW materials at your own pace. There's no signup, and no start or end dates.

Knowledge is your reward. Use OCW to guide your own life-long learning, or to teach others. We don't offer credit or certification for using OCW.

Made for sharing. Download files for later. Send to friends and colleagues. Modify, remix, and reuse (just remember to cite OCW as the source.)

Learn more at Get Started with MIT OpenCourseWare