I support John Locke's rather than Mill's method of explaining the truth of meaning and reference. I think Mill's perspective, that words directly express X itself, is limited as it removes the agent from the situation. Each of our individual experiences in the world are first synthesized into ideas in our brains and then spoken, by that individual, through words, which leads me to believe that meaning and reference are based in the agent's mind and subject to one's interpretive bent, level of intention, etc.
John Locke's agency-centric approach raises the question, are our individual experiences and goings-on about the world merely coincidentally similar such that we can have a proper language? I would argue yes, as two individual who are fluent in English can completely misunderstand each other due to personal context and their own ideas. Locke's view is heavily agent dependent, but I am wondering if agency is innate to meaning and reference; does (X + individual mind = meaning and reference) always need the individual mind?
Mill's approach would say otherwise. Mill's approach has parallels to someone who walks around with a label maker, labeling the types of true or innate names of things proper. Mill's view is comfortingly static, taking as a given that these names hold across individuals and time. I have reservations about Mill's approach ignoring the underlying humanity behind these words and assigning every word by divisions of types of names. Would this not be subject to hole-poking given a single case where it becomes widely agreed upon to use a word deviating from it assigned place by Mill?
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