I like these posts, but let me add a couple of comments. In philosophical circles the “type distinction”, as you call it, is known as the use/mention distinction, i.e. the distinction between using a phrase like “evening star” (to talk about the thing itself) and merely talking about the phrase (usually signaled by quotation marks).
But that’s not the first problem you mentioned, which is known in philosophical circles as the failure of substitution in intensional (i.e., roughly, mental) contexts. I’m not so sure the use/mention distinction is useful in explaining this failure. For example, the sentence “Lois is looking for Superman” cannot be substituted for “Lois is looking for Clark Kent”, because she may not know that that Superman and Clark Kent are identical. Obviously we never make that mistake, but if someone were to make it, the reason is surely to do with failing to realise that Lois may have false beliefs. But that’s not a category mistake.
What is Lois actually looking for? When we say she’s looking for Superman, we mean she’s got a search target in her mind, a conceptual representation of Superman, and she’s looking for something that matches that target closely enough to satisfy her. (Or, well, we ought to mean that. What we actually mean, I’m less sure of.)
If I introduce the typographical convention to designate a conceptual representation of an object X and the convention m(x) to designate an object that matches a concept x, then Lois is looking for m().
Superman is Clark Kent, but is decidedly not . To expect that because Superman is Clark Kent that Lois is looking for m() sure sounds like a category mistake to me.
One nice thing about this is that if you know the secret, then in your mind starts to resemble very closely… they aren’t identical, but any m() is almost undoubtedly also a m() and vice versa. Which is exactly what we would expect—the more I believe Clark Kent and Superman are one and the same, the more likely it is that if I’m looking for one I’ll terminate the search upon finding the other.
One nice thing about this is that if you know the secret, then in your mind starts to resemble very closely...
… especially in the most recent movie. I remember very little of the storyline (mostly because I have an aversion to trying to remember) but have a distinct recollection of disgust at home much of a pansy superman was portrayed as.
I like these posts, but let me add a couple of comments. In philosophical circles the “type distinction”, as you call it, is known as the use/mention distinction, i.e. the distinction between using a phrase like “evening star” (to talk about the thing itself) and merely talking about the phrase (usually signaled by quotation marks).
But that’s not the first problem you mentioned, which is known in philosophical circles as the failure of substitution in intensional (i.e., roughly, mental) contexts. I’m not so sure the use/mention distinction is useful in explaining this failure. For example, the sentence “Lois is looking for Superman” cannot be substituted for “Lois is looking for Clark Kent”, because she may not know that that Superman and Clark Kent are identical. Obviously we never make that mistake, but if someone were to make it, the reason is surely to do with failing to realise that Lois may have false beliefs. But that’s not a category mistake.
Really?
What is Lois actually looking for? When we say she’s looking for Superman, we mean she’s got a search target in her mind, a conceptual representation of Superman, and she’s looking for something that matches that target closely enough to satisfy her. (Or, well, we ought to mean that. What we actually mean, I’m less sure of.)
If I introduce the typographical convention to designate a conceptual representation of an object X and the convention m(x) to designate an object that matches a concept x, then Lois is looking for m().
Superman is Clark Kent, but is decidedly not . To expect that because Superman is Clark Kent that Lois is looking for m() sure sounds like a category mistake to me.
One nice thing about this is that if you know the secret, then in your mind starts to resemble very closely… they aren’t identical, but any m() is almost undoubtedly also a m() and vice versa. Which is exactly what we would expect—the more I believe Clark Kent and Superman are one and the same, the more likely it is that if I’m looking for one I’ll terminate the search upon finding the other.
… especially in the most recent movie. I remember very little of the storyline (mostly because I have an aversion to trying to remember) but have a distinct recollection of disgust at home much of a pansy superman was portrayed as.