Resolving The Problem of Negative Existentials
One of the fundamental puzzles that Russell hopes to resolve with the theory of descriptions is the problem of non-referring expressions or, as they are now called, negative existentials. He finally explains how his theory resolves this problem after invoking a distinction between what he calls primary and secondary occurrences of denoting phrases.
Read more about this topic: On Denoting
Famous quotes containing the words resolving, problem and/or negative:
“Painting dissolves the forms at its command, or tends to; it melts them into color. Drawing, on the other hand, goes about resolving forms, giving edge and essence to things. To see shapes clearly, one outlines them—whether on paper or in the mind. Therefore, Michelangelo, a profoundly cultivated man, called drawing the basis of all knowledge whatsoever.”
—Alexander Eliot (b. 1919)
“And just as there are no words for the surface, that is,
No words to say what it really is, that it is not
Superficial but a visible core, then there is
No way out of the problem of pathos vs. experience.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“Isolation in creative work is an onerous thing. Better to have negative criticism than nothing at all.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)