Tutorial Contents Tutorial Seven: Designators - Designators, the tableau rules and individual constants -
Using Russell's theory of descriptions - An oddity
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Using Russell's theory of descriptions

 

Of course some occurrences of designators which can't be translated as individual constants can be translated using Russell's method, paying careful attention to scope: (E8), for example ("There is no such thing as the first cow to jump over the moon"); and (E7) ("Buttercup is not Hugh Rice's cow"), in which "Hugh Rice's cow" can't in fact be translated as an individual constant (because there isn't in fact such a thing as Hugh Rice's cow) becomes, using an obvious interpretation,

 

             ¬[[CaÙHa]Ù"x[[CxÙHx]®x=a]]

 

One could even do something for (E4) (Elizabeth II became the Queen of England in 1952") by paraphrasing it as, "It came to be the case in 1952 that [Elizabeth II was the Queen of England]", and then translating the bit in brackets using Russell's theory of descriptions. But we could not achieve a complete translation.

 

 

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