2004

Robin Jeshion

  • Professor
  • Yale University

Project

Singular Thought: A New View of Thought About Individuals

Program

Frederick Burkhardt Residential Fellowships for Recently Tenured Scholars

Department

Philosophy

Location

For residence at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences

Abstract

I aim to complete a book manuscript on singular thoughts and singular attitudes and their connections with theories of reference. My book will advance a new theory of singular thought and demonstrate its importance to philosophy, linguistics, and psycho-semantics. My theorizing about singular thought is rooted in analytic philosophy of language and mind, but I also bolster my view by forging connections to semantic theories of discourse and psycholinguistic theories about learning the meanings of words and reference-determination. My book will apply the theory of singular thought to our thought about ourselves and our thought about natural numbers, and consequently will have wide-ranging impact within philosophy, extending into theories of agency and the epistemology of mathematics.