Proper Names as Rigid Designators in Natural Language

Abstract

In natural language, proper names are regarded as rigid designators. This means that proper names refer to or designates the same thing with respect to all possible worlds. The philosophical significance of this claim is that it challenges the position of the descriptivist theory on the reference of proper names, vis-a-vis that they cannot single out particular objects without the speaker's intention, which is specifiable by a set of descriptions. This paper argues to strengthen the descriptivist theory of reference. It argues, contrary to the prevalent view that proper names are rigid designators, that there is no direct, strict or rigid relationship between a proper name and the object it names. It supports the position that the correct relationship between proper names and the entities they refer to is mediated by contexts and descriptions.