According to S. Kripke, an expression is rigid provided it refers to the same object in all possible worlds in which the object exists. On the other hand, H. Putnam claims that an expression is rigid provided it refers to the same object in all possible worlds in which it refers to anything at all. The paper shows that the two notions of rigidity are not equivalent because Putnam's rigidity is much broader than Kripke's; unlike Putnam's rigidity, Kripke's is interwoven (...) with essentialism; and identity statements between rigid designators in Putnam's sense need not be necessarily true. (shrink)

Zatímco v případě otázek rigidity singulárních termínů panuje obecná shoda, v případě rigidity predikátů tomu tak překvapivě není. Záměrem této statě je opřít distinkci rigidní / nerigidní o jasné pojmy, jmenovitě o pojem reference v určité sémantické teorii. V důsledku toho lze podat rigorózní definici pojmu rigidního designátoru individua. Tato definice je pak přímočaře adaptovatelná pro případ pojmu rigidního designátoru třídy individuí (apod.). Tímto je dosaženo nejen obecnosti, ale i vnitřní jednoty teorie rigidity.

A bare individual was conceived by Tichý as an individual such as if the property the individual instantiates is non-trivial , it is possible for the individual to lack it ; and for any trivial property that it cannot lack this kind of property. The exact readings of Tichý’s original formulations of are subjected to a detailed analysis to reveal that any of them is refutable by means of Cmorejian objection that there exist contingent properties which are partly essential . (...) To avoid such objection, the present paper attempts to rebuild Tichý’s definitions into viable ones. (shrink)

The author of the article seeks to find an answer to the question whether it is possible to determine a priori the truth value of the statement „M = N“ where „M“ and „N“ are proper names of the same particular. He analyses the argumentation of the conception defending the positive answer to the question and tries to present arguments in favour of the opposite view. Let us suppose that the individual I is named by „M“ at time t1 and (...) by „N“ at time t2. If the individual changes considerably during the interval or presents us from quite different sides at t1 and t2, respectively , we will be unable to find out a priori, without certain empirical knowledge, whether M = N, although there were any doubts about the identity of the baptized individual neither at t1 nor at t2. (shrink)

The paper presents the logical milieu of the Paradox of ravens, identified by Hempel in his Studies in the Logic of Confirmation. It deals with Hempel’s interpretations of Nicod’s criterion of confirmation as well as with its inadmissible consequences. I, subsequently, suggest an epistemological and semantic specification of empirical properties, i.e., of their identity; then I formulate a criterion of the test of properties expressed by empirical hypothesis. Finally, I propose a procedural conception of confirmation by means of the testing (...) procedure schema. The confirmation is, therefore, conceived as an attribute which can be ascribed to a hypothesis through the process of its testing. The methods of testing are central to the hypothesis’s qualifica-tion as confirmed. (shrink)

The paper focuses on the relation of the so-called Transparent Intensional Logic and Aristotelian Essentialism. TIL is presented here as an antiessentialist system. I analyse the reasons of TIL´s anti-essentialism, and I see the main reasons in the very conception of possible worlds, which is preferred by TIL, as well as in the ontological status of properties and secondarily in the relation between individuals and properties, as TIL conceives it. I assert that even within the frame of TIL it is (...) possible to formulate a certain version of the Aristotelian Essentialism and I point out the intuitions that are connected with the concept of essence and preserved by the formulated conception, contrary to TIL and other systems of modern logic. (shrink)