Uncritical semantics is the myth of a mu... by Willard Van Orman Quine

Change Words Language Logic epistemology

Uncritical semantics is the myth of a museum in which the exhibits are meanings and the words are labels. To switch languages is to change the labels.

- Willard Van Orman Quine

Other quotes by Willard Van Orman Quine

Meaning

Meaning is what essence becomes when it is divorced from the object of reference and wedded to the word.

- Willard Van Orman Quine

Nature World

Physics investigates the essential nature of the world, and biology describes a local bump. Psychology, human psychology, describes a bump on the bump.

- Willard Van Orman Quine

Value

To be is to be the value of a variable.

- Willard Van Orman Quine

English

'Ouch' is not independent of social training. One has only to prick a foreigner to appreciate that it is an English word.

- Willard Van Orman Quine

Philosophy

It is one of the consolations of philosophy that the benefit of showing how to dispense with a concept does not hinge on dispensing with it.

- Willard Van Orman Quine

May

The familiar material objects may not be all that is real, but they are admirable examples.

- Willard Van Orman Quine

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