Truth in Virtue of Meaning - A Defence of the Analytic/Synthetic Distinction (Electronic book text)

The distinction between analytic and synthetic sentences - the idea that some sentences are true or false just in virtue of what they mean - is a famous focus of philosophical controversy. Gillian Russell reinvigorates the debate with a challenging new defence of the distinction, showing that it is compatible with semantic externalism. -;The analytic/synthetic distinction looks simple. It is a distinction between two different kinds of sentence. Synthetic sentences are true in part because of the way the world is, and in part because of what they mean. Analytic sentences - like all bachelors are unmarried and triangles have three sides - are different. They are true in virtue of meaning, so no matter what the world is like, as long as the sentence means what it does, it will be true.