Referential theory

Referential theories are concerned with the relation between expressions and the external
world.
a. the meaning of a given word is considered the pointer to the selected object in
the real world. A word means what it refers to and, therefore, if one utters a word
such as mango, he is referring to an actual mango (or a set of mangoes) in
reality.

b. At least three functions of language exist that are important in explaining

meaning in language. These include language as the representation of reality.

c. The referential theory defines meaning as a label that is in human consciousness

to identify and point out objects in the outside world. As label, meaning usually
emerges due to observation and conclusion. Therefore, according to the theory,
the meaning of lexicons or vocabularies can be traced through their physical
reference

Meaning as the Relationship between Words and Objects

The relationship between words and the objects they refer to is known as referential
relation. According to this relation, the meaning of a word may be explained in terms of
the boundary between the word and the object that it describes. What makes words (or
other idioms or expressions) meaningful is the fact that they describe or represent
actual objects in the real world. In other words, what makes them consequential is the
relation they have to the objects they refer to.

Sense and Reference

Sense refers to the relationships inside the language.
Reference refers to the relationships between the words in the language and the things
in the outside world.
It deals with the relationship between the linguistic elements (words, phrases, sentence in
language) and the non-linguistic elements (the world-in the realm of experience).
In short, it is the relationship between the word in the language and the thing in the outside world.
By means of reference, a speaker indicates which thing in the world he is talking about. He is
referring to what then?
Animate and in-animate things.
He is the king. (he identifies a person)
Edmund is at the beach. identifies a place
The wardrobe is too expensive. Identifies an object
The lion is enormous. Identifies an animal

The word ____ is found in the language and refers to this thing in the outside world.
These words are parts of the language. We find them in the language. And the things they refer
to are part of the world.

 Reference which may take various forms such as a thought, an emotional state, an
energy projection, or a physical object, is the link between objects where one object
denotes, or serves, as a means of linking or connecting another object.
 In this theory of meaning, a word is interpreted as the object named by it.
 In this context, object refers to a concrete thing such as a table, an action such as reading
and writing, a state such as to know or understand, as well as abstract notions such as
courage and honesty. If an expression refers to a person, object, place, or an event, then
it has a reference.

REFERRING EXPRESSIONS
Are those expressions that are used to refer to things in the world.
Nouns:
Pronouns:
Longer descriptive noun phrases:
1 A referring expression is not a referent; the phrase a carrot can be a referring
expression but it is not a carrot. This may seem obvious, but throughout history people
have failed to distinguish between lexemes and what lexemes denote.

3 The existence of a referring expression does not guarantee the existence of a referent
in the physical-social world that we inhabit. We can easily use language to create
expressions with fictitious referents such as the skyscrapers of Antarctica, the present
Emperor of Texas, the pain-reliever recommended by 91 percent of all doctors. In fact,
we need such expressions in order to deny the existence of any physical referent.

4 Two or more referring expressions may have the same referent, but they do not
necessarily have the same meaning.

Robert Blair
the husband of Mildred Stone Blair
the father of Patrick and Robin Blair
the city editor of the Morgantown Daily Enquirer, etc.
All these and no doubt other referring expressions may identify the same individual, but
they do not mean the same.

REFERENT
Reference is a relationship in which a symbol or sign (a word, for example) signifies something;
the referent is the thing signified. The referent may be an actual person or object, or may be
something more abstract, such as a set of actions.
A referent is a person, entity, place, concept, experience and so on in the real (or an imagined)
world which is designated by a word or phrase
Definition:
A referent is the concrete object or concept that is designated by a word or expression. A
referent is an object, action, state, relationship, or attribute in the referential realm.
Examples:
Historically, there was only one person called George Washington, the first president of the
United States. He can be referred to in a text in many ways, such as

the president
Mr. Washington
he, or even
my friend.
Even though there are many ways to talk about him, there is only one referent in the referential
realm

A referring expression is a piece of language, a noun phrase, that is used in an utterance and is
linked to something outside language, some living or dead or imaginary entity or concept or
group of entities or concepts. That ‘something’ is the referent, not necessarily physical nor
necessarily ‘real.’ A referent is the concrete object or concept that is designated by a word or
expression.

The class of entities to which an expression can be applied is usually called its extension. The
term extension of an expression is the set of things which could possibly be the referent of that
expression. Consequently, the referent of a word is always a member of the class of entities
that constitutes its extension.
The referent of a referring expression is an individual entity referred to by that expression that
is dependent on a particular occasion of use. The extension of a referring expression is the set
of individual entities to which the referring expression could potentially refer.

Applied to proper names, his view was that

a name, say, “George W. Bush,” is associated by its users with a
certain descriptive condition, say, being the 43d president of the
United States , and that its referent is that object (if any) which
uniquely satisf es this condition.

The extension of a lexeme is the set of entities which it denotes. The extension of dog includes
all collies, dalmatians, dachshunds, mongrels, etc., etc. that have ever lived or will ever live and
every fictitious creature that is accepted as being a dog.
Constant and variable reference
two different types of reference

(Reference can be constant or variable. There are things which are always constant in
any place and at any time. The sun ___________________________________ are
expressions with constant reference. If you let people of different people identify the
word “sun” expect them to point at the same thing as the word “sun” is known by
everyone to refer to the same thing. Sun is something constant. Eiffel tower, red sea,
Earth, Philippines. These expressions have the same referent wherever they are used.
But others have their reference dependent on the context. Sometimes, the same
expression may refer to too many different things.
“My car” vs “My car”
We refer to different cars. In the language, expressions with variable reference are too
many while expressions with constant reference are less.

 A similar example is the term president of the United States of America. If you
say this at the time of this writing (2019) the term would refer to Donald Trump.
The term the president of the United States of America would refer to Barack
Obama if the phrase was uttered in 2010. This is variable reference.

 The word, Florida, however, has constant reference. The word Florida will always
refer to the state of Florida.

Both of the underlined noun phrases are referring expressions. They might have the
same referent, but a lake can refer to various bodies of water whereas Lake Ontario
always refers to the same body of water. A referring expression has fixed reference
when the referent is a unique entity or unique set of entities, like Lake Ontario, Japan,
Boris Yeltsin, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Philippine Islands.
 A referring expression has variable reference if its referent may be different every time
it is used: that dog, my uncle, several people, a lake, the results.

Can you identify if the following referring expressions have constant or variable
reference?

 The lion is enormous. (Lion refers to a constant thing in the world.)

 Edmund (proper noun) is at the beach (Edmund may refer to any person that bear the
name Edmund.)

NOTES
Note: Two or more referring expression may refer to SAME THING.
The morning star, the evening star= refers to the same thing=VENUS.
Note: two or more referring expressions in different languages can have the same
referent (or refer to the same thing.)
“Mona lisa”
“La mesa”

The individual that is referred to is.

These referring expressions____, refers to an individual, to a one referent in the world.
These different words in different language refer to the same thing and have the same
meaning.
NOTE: Every expression that has meaning has sense, but not every expression has
reference. There are words that have meaning and refer to things and there are words
that have meaning but do not refer to things. Not all words in the language refer to
things in the physical world.
Words like ____________________ have meanings and they point out to things in the
world.
Words like _____________________ have meanings but they do not refer to things in
the world.
Every word that has meaning has sense but not every word that has meaning has
reference. Some words do not have something to point to in the real world; they don’t
have a referent. For example, the word unicorn doesn’t have a referent as the word
cannot point to something that doesn’t exist.

LIMITATIONS
It is imperative to note that words do not relate directly to objects in the real world, but
connect indirectly through the mind. Therefore, words express the attitudes of the
speaker towards what they observe, as well as the manner in which they interpret it.
Nonetheless, the referential theory, which emphasizes the relationship between words
and the objects, or the ‘things’ they describe, has several limitations.

 First, it is unclear how the theory treats abstract concepts. For instance, it
becomes difficult to point to “truth” or “justice,” or even point to the meaning of a
word such as “whomsoever” (Harley, 2001, p. 278).

 Second, the theory does not account for objects with mystic and fictitious
existence, such as phoenix or dragons. There exists dissociation between certain
words and the objects or things they can refer. Moreover, different phrases may
refer to the same object at different occasions. For instance, different persons
may designate the same woman as a wife, a daughter, or a mother depending on
the situation.

Meaning as a Triangular Relationship

A designator represents a concept, which denotes an object such that the designator
indirectly refers to the object. The object, which is often referred to as ‘the referent,’
need not necessarily be a physically existing object or thing. Charles Ogden and Ivor
Richards posited that understanding came from within individuals instead of the words
they interpret, which led to their “Triangle of Meaning” that was intended to enhance the
understanding of how language works.

The Triangle is fundamentally a theory of signs and is meant to show the relationship
between words, thoughts, and things. Stated differently, the Semantic Triangle
demonstrates the direct connection between Words and Thoughts, and between
Thoughts and Thing. Any word or sign has its own meaning, although a certain
reference is required to understand it, and this is referred to as “The Meaning of
Meaning.”

In other words, a referential theory assumes that meaning is reference to objects or

facts that exist in the real world. The referential theory has two fundamental flaws. First,
people do not just understand what expressions refer to by understanding their
meanings. Another difficulty is the assumption that all words denote some object or
thing. Certain classes of words, such as conjunctions and prepositions, do not refer to
any object.

The term denotation (that is also frequently used in the sense of an extensional
reference) refers to the constant, abstract, and basic meaning of a linguistic expression.
Secondary meanings or associations the expression evokes are called connotations
SAUSSURE

 Meaning occurs as a result of the relationship between the words and the world.

-they allow us to identify parts of the world and make statements about them.

 Expressions stand for things/objects in reality.

-the meaning of the word is the object it refers in the external world.
for every word there is an associated concept.
May it be concrete entities, the actual person or event.

Example::

 When we utter, we pick out certain individual entities.

“John lifted the pitcher.” “John just flown back from Paris.”
These expressions “John” “pitcher” “Paris” could be identified because
these things exists.

“The planet Jupiter.”

The actual thing is the referent of the word Jupiter.
“”-“”-“”
Different referring expressions, in this case, there’s one thing in the world that they refer
to.
__________is the individual, not the picture on the screen but the person out there.

Referring VS Referent

REFERRING

 referring is what speakers do

 REFERENT

 the referent of an expression is often a thing or a person in the world.The object

denoted by a word is called its referent.
• Frege: The referent is an object nominated by the term.

• Russell: The referent is the object to which the referring term is connected
directly, without a descriptive intermediary.

• Strawson. To succeed in referring to an item. there must be an item (i.e.,

a referent) with certain characteristics that stands in a particular relation to speaker and
context.
The tallest man in the world lives in Los Angeles. The reference of the subject
NP in this sentence is determined by whoever satisfies or fits the descriptive content
expressed by the nominal the tallest man in the world. The tallest man in the world is a
definite description.

Symbol- the word that refers to the referent like it could be a table or a mesa depending
on language

Referent (What the symbol is representing)- the same in each language like a table is
always a tableSymbol is created to represent a referent and symbolizes a thought
which refers to a referento

Denotative meaning- Dictionary definition of the word

Connotative meaning- Our interpretation of the meaning of a word