"On Denoting" is an essay by Bertrand Russell. One of the most significant and influential philosophical essays of the 20th century, it was published in the philosophy journal Mind in 1905; then reprinted, in both a special 2005 anniversary issue of the same journal and in Russell's Logic and Knowledge, 1956. In it, Russell introduces definite and indefinite descriptions, formulates descriptivism with regard to proper names, and characterizes proper names as "disguised" or "abbreviated" definite descriptions.
In the 1920s, Frank P. Ramsey referred to the essay as "that paradigm of philosophy." More recently, a contributor to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy singled it out as "the paradigm of philosophy", and called it a work of "tremendous insight" that has provoked discussion and debate among philosophers of language and linguists for over a century.
Read more about On Denoting: Meinong, Resolving The Problem of Negative Existentials, Criticisms