A mediated reference theory (also indirect reference theory)Leszek Berezowski, ''Articles and Proper Names'', University of Wrocław, 2001, p. 67. is any

semantic Semantics is the study of linguistic Meaning (philosophy), meaning. It examines what meaning is, how words get their meaning, and how the meaning of a complex expression depends on its parts. Part of this process involves the distinction betwee ...

theory that posits that words refer to something in the external world, but insists that there is more to the meaning of a name than simply the object to which it refers. It thus stands opposed to direct reference theory.

Gottlob Frege Friedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege (; ; 8 November 1848 – 26 July 1925) was a German philosopher, logician, and mathematician. He was a mathematics professor at the University of Jena, and is understood by many to be the father of analytic philos ...

is a well-known advocate of mediated reference theories. Similar theories were widely held in the middle of the twentieth century by philosophers such as

Peter Strawson Sir Peter Frederick Strawson (; 23 November 1919 – 13 February 2006) was an English philosopher who spent most of his career at the University of Oxford. He was the Waynflete Professor of Metaphysical Philosophy at Magdalen College, O ...

and

John Searle John Rogers Searle (; born July 31, 1932) is an American philosopher widely noted for contributions to the philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and social philosophy. He began teaching at UC Berkeley in 1959 and was Willis S. and Mario ...

Saul Kripke Saul Aaron Kripke (; November 13, 1940 – September 15, 2022) was an American analytic philosophy, analytic philosopher and logician. He was Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and emer ...

, a proponent of direct reference theory, in his ''

Naming and Necessity ''Naming and Necessity'' is a 1980 book with the transcript of three lectures, given by the philosopher Saul Kripke, at Princeton University in 1970, in which he dealt with the debates of proper names in the philosophy of language. The transcript ...

'' dubbed mediated reference theory the Frege–Russell view and criticized it. Subsequent scholarship refuted the claim that

Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, and public intellectual. He had influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, and various areas of analytic ...

's views on reference theory were the same as Frege's, since Russell was also a proponent of direct reference theory.Howard Wettstein, "Frege-Russell Semantics?", ''Dialectica'' 44(1/2), 1990, pp. 113–135, esp. 115: "Russell maintains that when one is acquainted with something, say, a present sense datum or oneself, one can refer to it without the mediation of anything like a Fregean sense. One can refer to it, as we might say, ''directly''."

References

External links

Theories of Meaning (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mediated Reference Theory Theories of language Meaning (philosophy of language)

See also

References

External links