Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1996. Vol. 1. Eger Journal of English Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 24)

Albert Vermes: On the translation of proper names

amounts to saying that they do have 'senses'

2. Searle puts the problem the following way: 'Do proper names have senses?' What this question asks, as a start, is what, if any, similarity is there between the way a definite description picks out its referent and the way a proper name picks out its referent. Is a proper name really a shorthand description (Searle: 134)? As a first step to answer this question we must introduce the principle of identification, which may be formulated as follows: A necessary condition for the successful performance of a definite reference in the utterance of a description is that the description must be an identifying description or the speaker must be able to produce an identifying description on demand (Searle: 134). In accordance with this principle, Searle argues, when somebody uses a proper name, he must be able to substitute an identifying description of the referent of the proper name, otherwise he would violate the principle of identification and, consequently, would fail to perform a definite reference. These considerations lead Searle to say that "a proper name must have a sense, and that the identifying description constitutes that sense" (Searle: 138). His conclusion, then, is that although proper names are not descriptions themselves, they are in a "loose sort of way" connected with the characteristics of the referent (Searle: 139). Thus a proper name can be said to have a sense, but this sense is radically different to that of definite descriptions insofar as in the latter case the sense is definite and precjse, whereas in the case of proper names it is imprecise. Moreover, this imprecision of sense is a necessary 2 It has been pointed out to me that the difference between the denotation and the connotation of a proper name may be treated, perhaps in a more elucidating way for the purposes of translation, as a difference between the referential and attributive uses of that name, as demonstrated by Donellan (1975). This takes us from the (loosely understood) semantics of proper names to the pragmatics of proper names, the consequences of which move may well be worth another paper. 182