Kripke Lecture I [Alex Rowell]

Agree
"Frege should be criticized for using the term 'sense' in two senses. For he takes the sense of a designator to be its meaning; and he also takes it to be the way its reference is determined. Identifying the two, he supposes that both are given by definite descriptions. Ultimately, I will reject this second supposition too; but even were it right, I reject the first. A description may be used as synonymous with a designator, or it may be used to fix its reference. The two Fregean senses of 'sense' correspond to two senses of 'definition' in ordinary parlance. They should carefully be distinguished." [pg 59]

Frege uses 'sense' instead of 'definition' and therefore the reader is less likely to have the intuition that the two definitions of 'sense' are being used interchangeably. This allows for some blurring of the argument to make points that would not succeed if the word 'definition' was used instead. This should be more clearly laid out, and Kripke attempts to do so in this lecture.

I had some trouble with Frege's use of the word 'sense', though I didn't know why at the time. Philosophy works to make the implicit explicit, and Kripke's observations inform my understanding of Frege's work.

Disagree
"For example, though it may be informative to tell someone that horses are used in races, it is trifling to tell him that horses are called 'horses'. Therefore this could only be the case because the term 'horse', means in English 'the things called "horses" '. Similarly with any other expression which might be used in English. Since it's trifling to be told that sages are called 'sages', 'sages' just means 'the people called "sages" '. Now plainly this isn't really a very good argument, nor can it therefore be the only explanation of why it's trifling to be told that Socrates is called 'Socrates'. Let's not go into exactly why it's trifling." [pg 69]

Referencing a word as meaning the same word is not an informative statement, because it transmits no meaningful content. There are theoretical reasons for this, one of which is that words may simply be shorthand for '(x) is called (x)', but Kripke suggests there are deeper reasons than this.

I don't think I'm willing to dismiss this theory as trifling, mostly because Kripke did not seem to present it seriously. This passage felt like he was hand waving the theory, and I'm not sure why -- please DO explain why this is trifling.