Russell has a good point about things that only exist if we think that they do and communicate that idea to others. There would be no unicorns, Hamlet, or other imaginary concepts to converse about if the idea of unicorns and the like were not spread through means of communication from thought to person to thought. For example, saying "I met a unicorn" and "I met the unicorn" does not hold the same logic in meaning as "I met a man" and "I met the man" even though it has the same grammatical implications because one concept "exists" and the other does not.
A problematic loophole to this idea is that even though some concepts are not present in the physical world is not to say that it does not exist in the minds of people. Even though there are clearly no true unicorns in reality, the concept of a unicorn is so widespread and known that it has become a subject that can be as implied and used as effectively as any other word in language whether it is real or not. "The unicorn" could mean a costume, media interpretation, or even a rhino (some people joke that rhinos are fat unicorns...) which all exist and are significant in the physical world. Where does one draw the line between statements that hold significant descriptions or not? It seems to depend on context in these scenarios.
I also wrote about unicorns existing in the minds of people. I like your "usefulness" approach. We use the term 'unicorn' to refer to this widespread concept that we share just like other terms in our language. I think treating unicorn as a proper subject is not as problematic as Russell thinks. I think if we are clear about what context a unicorn exists in, there is not a logical problem. When we speak of unicorns, we exploit the common knowledge that unicorns don't actually exist as physical animals, but they exist only in other domains. We aren't speaking contradictions when we talk about unicorns because we intuitively know the domains that unicorns are restricted to.
ReplyDelete