The semantics and metaphysics of rigid designators

Abstract

The aim of this research is to evaluate the relationship between Kripke's semantical doctrines about proper names and his metaphysical doctrines about essences. Throughout Naming and Necessity, Kripke claims that his semantical doctrines have substantive metaphysical consequences. The assessment of this relationship is important, since the metaphysical consequences of semantics and vice versa are often regarded with suspicion. Semantics concerns the relationship between language and the world, and metaphysics is about the world itself. The claim that the way we picture the world imposes some constraints on the world is odd enough to deserve suspicion. My aim in this work is try to show how the relationship between semantics and the metaphysics of essence can be explained by the concept of a rigid designator.