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 “Fiction and Indexinames”, Journal of Literary Theory 8 (2014), 292-321.
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Fiction and Indexinames
Alberto Voltolini (University of Turin, Italy)

Introduction

In this paper, I will first of all claim that once one takes proper names as indexicals of a particular sort, indexinames for short, one may account for some tensions that affect our desiderata regarding the use of such names in sentences directly or indirectly involving fiction. According to my proposal, a proper name “N.N.” is an indexical whose character is roughly expressed by the description “the individual called ‘N.N.’ (in context)”, where this description means “the individual one’s interlocutor’s attention is called to by means of ‘N.N.’ (in context)”. This character is a partial function that maps narrow contexts onto referents. Such contexts are enriched narrow contexts, for they also include an ‘acquisition’ parameter, i.e., a parameter filled by a naming practice constituted by a dubbing, which consists in calling via the name one’s interlocutor’s attention to something (if any), and usually also by a certain transmission chain. I will also claim that such a proposal works independently of one’s ontological stance on fictional entities, that is, independently of whether one believes either that there are or that there are no such entities. Moreover, I will claim that such a proposal is better than similar indexicalist proposals such as the one put forward by Tiedke (2011), Finally, I will try to show how this proposal can deal with some objections one may raise against an indexicalist treatment of proper names.

1.	Some seemingly contrasting desiderata concerning fiction

If we regard the practices we are engaged in when we have to do with fiction, they are affected by different desiderata. Some of these desiderata are more general, those concerning fiction qua linguistic activity. Some others are more particular, concerning proper names in sentential uses that involve fiction either directly, in the fictional use of language, or indirectly, in an apparently nonfictional use of language that however presupposes the previous one. Yet both the general and the particular desiderata respectively are in tension with each other. Here are the general desiderata:

(i)	The fictional use of language requires a context-shift;
(ii)	One understands a sentence whether fictionally used or not.

Let me explain why (i) and (ii) are in tension with each other. To begin with, consider the fictional use of language (also called conniving use), namely the use of sentences one makes from within pretense play viz. make-believe games, i.e., games in which one makes believe that so and so is the case. This use is different from the nonfictional, or nonconniving, use of the same sentences, in which such sentences are really asserted in order to convey how things stand according to a certain fiction. Instead, sentences fictionally used are clearly not really asserted; rather, they are fictionally asserted. Although there are different ways to account for what fictionally asserting means, I accept that the best account consists in holding, as Walton (1990) originally maintained, that such sentences are asserted within the context of a game of make-believe, in the sense that they acquire a truthconditionally relevant content only within such a context. Recanati (2000) has fruitfully interpreted this Waltonian idea as meaning that when fictionally used, such sentences receive a truthconditional interpretation, or say something, within such a context. So in principle, the truthconditions they acquire in such a context have nothing to do with the truthconditions they might take on outside such a context. In a nutshell, fictional use involves context-shift (on this, see also Voltolini 2006a). Such a context is a narrow fictional context of interpretation. It is narrow, for following Kaplan (1989a,b) it amounts to a set-theoretical construction involving a quadruple of parameters: agent, space, time, and world. It is moreover a context of interpretation, for it provides a sentence with certain truthconditions. Finally, it is a fictional context, for its ‘world’ parameter is filled by a fictional world, the world of the relevant fiction in which things unfold as in the fictional use they are said to unfold in. 
All in all, a fictionally used sentence has a truthconditional content (hence, a truthvalue) only in an unactual perspective: a fictional truthconditional content (as well as a fictional truthvalue). Hence, it is just fictionally understood. Yet such a sentence is already actually, not merely fictionally, understood. In other terms, it is not the case that in order to understand a fictionally used sentence one has to shift to a fictional context, as if the sentence would be mere gibberish if one did not so shift. Rather, one actually understands the sentence before knowing whether it is fictionally used or not.
	Now, this general tension shows up very easily when a fictionally used sentence contains proper names. If we take a sentence such as:

(1)	Holmes is a detective

in order for it to be fictionally used it must be paired with an unactual narrow context of interpretation whose ‘world’ parameter is filled by the world of Doyle tales in which there is a concrete human being named “Holmes” who brilliantly solves baffling crimes. Yet in order for (1) to be understood it requires no such context shift. For it is also understood by those who not only know nothing about Doyle tales but also erroneously take this sentence to say something about a concrete individual in the actual world. 
Over and above this general tension, there also is a particular tension affecting further desiderata that focus precisely on proper names, as they occur within sentential uses that not only directly but also indirectly involve fiction. Here they are:

(iii)	(Typically at least) one and the same proper name is mobilized both in a certain fiction, i.e., when the sentence containing it is used fictionally, and outside that fiction, i.e., when apparently at least, the sentence containing it is used nonfictionally yet in order to indirectly concern that very fiction; 
(iv)	 	Yet different naming practices are mobilized by such different uses (independently of whether the apparently nonfictional use is actually successful as far as the name’s reference is concerned).

On the one hand, the name identity that (iii) postulates suggests a unity of the relevant naming practices. Once such practices split, it seems hard to see how they may involve just one name. Yet on the other hand, (iv) stresses a plurality of such naming practices. 
To see such a tension at work, let me clarify these further desiderata by means of the following examples. As to (iii), when we use (1) fictionally, that is, in the context of the Doyle tales, by “Holmes” we mobilize the same proper name as in:

(2)	Holmes is a fictional character

that we use outside the Doyle tales in order to indirectly concern those tales as well. Now, for realists about fictional entities, those who believe that there are such entities, the phrase “a use outside the Doyle tales” means: an utterly nonfictional use, that is, use in a narrow context that is as real as many other contexts in which names refer to actual individuals. On the contrary, for antirealists about fictional entities, those who believe that there are no such entities, this phrase means: a doubly fictional use, that is, a use in a metafictional narrow context, within a fiction in which one makes believe that there are fictional characters. Yet independently of one’s ontological beliefs, the above situation affecting respectively (1) and (2) suggests that the naming practices involving “Holmes” when so used in (1) and (2) respectively are different. This is what (iv) stresses. This duplication of practices is evident in the realist perspective about fictional entities. For while a realist may accept that in a fictional use like the one (1) exhibits a proper name is tied to no individual, she would definitely endorse that in a real use like the one (2) exhibits that name is tied to an actual individual. Thus, for such a realist the former practice is nonreferential while the latter practice is referential. Therefore, for her they are different practices. Yet even the antirealist would have to accept such duplication. For, as we have just seen, she says that while (1) mobilizes an ordinary fiction in which one makes believe that there is a concrete individual named “Holmes” who brilliantly solves baffling crimes, (2) mobilizes a metafiction in which one makes believe that there is a fictional character so named. Since to makebelievedly name a concrete individual is one thing, while to respectively to name a fictional individual is another thing – the former but not the latter practice may involve the pretense of a causal link between the namers and the make-believedly named entity – the two practices are again different.
	Now, in order to solve the tension generated by (i) and (ii) on the one hand and (iii) and (iv) on the other, one might think that proper names should be given different semantical treatments. For instance, one might think that (i) and (iii) match a referentialist, while (ii) and (iv) match a nonreferentialist (typically, descriptivist) treatment of proper names. According to this thinking, in simply using a proper name fictionally as in (1), one takes it as a device of direct reference, i.e., as a term that exhausts in its referent its truthconditional contribution to the sentences in which it figures, while in using such a name differently as in (2), the name is shorthand for a definite description treated in terms of Russell’s theory of descriptions (cf. Napoli 2000). Or one might think that things are the other way around: (1) exhibits a proper name taken as a definite description, while (2) exhibits a device of direct reference (cf. Currie 1990). Yet this variable semantic strategy goes against a further desideratum:

(v)	      Independently of their really having a referent, proper names are always devices of direct reference.

For first of all, (v) requires semantic uniformity: especially when at least morphosyntactically identical terms are involved, semantic treatments of proper names should not be multiplied beyond necessity. 
One might think that such semantic multiplication is forced by the fact that in one of the above uses, a name like “Holmes” is referentially empty, while in the other use it has a designation. (A sustainer of the first option sketched above will take the use of “Holmes” in (1) as having a (mock) designation, the use of “Holmes” in (2) as empty; the sustainer of the second of such options will take things as being the other way around.) Yet by following this reasoning one would obtain an unsatisfactory result, both from an epistemological and from an ontological point of view. The epistemological problem is the following. Since one often does not know whether a name is empty or full, if empty names and full names were different kinds of terms, either one would turn out to be semantically incompetent (one would not know which kind a name belongs to), or one’s semantic competence would turn out to be opaque (one would not know that one knows which kind a name belongs to). Here comes the ontological problem. If empty names and full names belonged to different kinds of names, this semantical difference would depend on a matter of fact, i.e., on whether a name actually has reference. One would have to accept conditionals of the kind: “if ‘Holmes’ had referred to something, it would have been a term of a different kind”. Yet (at least from Wittgenstein’s Tractatus onwards) we tend to accept that matters of meaning cannot depend on matters of fact.
	Moreover, (v) dictates that such semantic uniformity has to be accounted for in referentialist terms: proper names are always directly referential terms, as the new Kripkean mainstream claims.
All in all, therefore, how can all the above desiderata be jointly satisfied?

2.	Proper names as indexinames

Let me suppose that proper names are indexinames. By this I mean, first, that proper names are indexical expressions, i.e., context-sensitive expressions, expressions whose semantic value changes according to the context of their use. Moreover, I hold that among such expressions, proper names are closer to demonstratives like “that” rather than to pure indexicals like “I”, provided however that demonstratives are taken as indexicals that are to be paired with an enriched yet still narrow context of interpretation. Let me expand on these claims.
	To begin with, proper names are indexical expressions pretty much like ordinary indexicals. Like ordinary indexicals, they indeed have two layers of meaning, namely character and content. As Kaplan (1989a,b) has notoriously shown, all indexicals have such layers of meaning. For any such expression, character is a function from contexts of interpretation of that expression to its contents. Contexts of interpretations are our aforementioned narrow contexts: i.e., quadruples of parameters (agent, space, time and world). Character thus constitutes the fixed element of an indexical’s meaning, namely the part of its meaning that does not change across its contexts of interpretation. In this respect, character is the formal counterpart of an indexical’s linguistic meaning, the meaning the indexical retains in all its occasions of use. For instance, the character of “I” is roughly expressed by the description “the agent (in context)”. Content, on the contrary, is the variable part of an indexical’s meaning, for it varies throughout the occasions of use of the indexical. Indeed, each token of the indexical has its own content, as determined by the character of such an indexical given a certain context of interpretation. As such, the (narrow) contextual content of an indexical is its contribution to the truthconditions the sentence in which it figures has in such a context. In the case of indexicals that are genuine singular terms, such content is the (narrow) contextual referent of that term, the referent of a certain token of that term as determined by its character given a certain narrow context. If e.g. “I” is a directly referential term whose character is roughly expressed by the description “the agent (in context)”, given a specific narrow context that character singles out an individual as “I”’s contextual referent; i.e., the agent of that context (cf. Kaplan 1989a, 503).
	Yet according to Kaplan there is a difference between pure indexicals like “I” and demonstratives like “that”. Unlike pure indexicals, he says, the contextual reference of a demonstrative cannot be automatically fixed via its character. For in one and the same narrow context a demonstrative endowed with a certain character may still have different referents. To take an example of Kaplan’s, if I say:

(3)	I love that

in a situation where I have several different things in front of me, I get a narrow context in which all these things may be the referents of my token of “that”. Yet according to many people the difference is only prima facie. For if one suitably enriches a narrow context for a demonstrative by adding a further parameter over and above the traditional four, then given the enriched narrow context, the character of a demonstrative may again automatically fix the demonstrative’s reference. Typically, the further parameter is conceived as a ‘demonstration’ parameter, namely a parameter that normally involves the outward manifestation of a certain directing intention the user of that demonstrative entertains. So, if the enriched narrow context (3) mobilizes contains the demonstration of a nearby dog, the character of “that” will automatically point to that demonstration so as to obtain that very dog as the referent of “that” in this context.
	Granted, even conceived this way there remains a further difference between a pure indexical and a demonstrative. Unlike a pure indexical, a demonstrative may have vacuous tokens, as when one uses “that” while failing to referring to anything. Thus, there are cases in which, given even an enriched narrow context, a demonstrative turns out to have no referent in that context. As a result, the character of a demonstrative is just a partial function from narrow contexts to contents.
	Once one takes names as indexinames, they are closer to demonstratives than to pure indexicals. Firstly, like demonstratives, there may be tokens of an indexiname that lack a referent. Suppose e.g. someone concocts a new use of “Aristotle” utterly independent both of the use in which it refers to the famous philosopher and of the use in which it refers to the shipowner, as well as any other such referentially successful use one may figure out; yet nothing whatsoever matches this use. This situation prompts the character “Aristotle” expresses (or the character of any indexiname for that matter) to be a partial function from narrow contexts to contents. Second, the narrow context affecting a proper name must again be an enriched narrow context containing a further parameter over and above the traditional ones. For again like demonstratives, many different things might be the referents of an indexiname if the narrow context affecting it were just the traditional quadruple. Take a sentence like:

(4)	Aristotle is Greek.

Given an agent, a space, a time and a world, it is still hard to fix whether in such a context “Aristotle” refers to the old philosopher, or to the shipowner, or even to any other individual so-called. Once again, one has to suitably enrich the narrow context of interpretation by adding a further parameter. The character of “Aristotle” (or of any other indexiname for that matter) will thus point to that parameter so as to contextually obtain that name’s referent (if any) automatically as it were.
In this respect, the similarity between indexinames and demonstratives (when taken as before) transpires even more clearly if one considers that both expressions may undergo a subsentential shift. Consider:

(5)	Aristotle speaks the same language as Aristotle

where the first token of “Aristotle” refers to the Greek philosopher, while the second token refers to the Greek shipowner. If the relevant narrow context for (5) were just an ordinary narrow context of interpretation whose parameters consisted in the traditional quadruple, it would be hard to explain how a reference shift occurs from the first to the second token of “Aristotle”. Yet if one takes that the first token is paired with a certain enriched narrow context while the second token is paired with another enriched narrow context, the reference shift turns out once again to be narrow-contextually determined. Now, demonstratives prompt precisely the same kind of account, insofar as with respect to them a subsentential shift may occur as well, as in:

(6)	That is bigger than that

with the two tokens of “that” referring to distinct individuals.
	Now that the theoretical framework is hopefully clear, we may see more in detail how indexinames work. Taking a certain indexiname “N.N.”, its character rather is roughly expressed by the description “the individual called ‘N.N.’ (in context)” that mobilizes the property of being called “N.N.” (in context), where “being called ‘N.N.’” means being called to one’s interlocutor’s attention by means of “N.N.”. This proposal has some advantages with respect to analogous proposals that by “being called ‘N.N.” mean being officially so-called (see e.g. Recanati 1993). First, by assigning a proper name the aforementioned character, in which “to call” has a psychological rather than an institutional meaning, we ensure that also nicknames or nonofficial names in general also have the same kind of character as official names. Second, it has to be taken for granted that such an assignment does not allow a sentence of the kind “N.N. is called ‘N.N.’” to be analytic, that is, to be true in every narrow context of interpretation, as Recanati (1993, 157) would like. For, since as we have just seen there are narrow contexts in which a proper name refers to nothing, the above sentence is not true in one such context in which “N.N.” refers to nothing. Yet if this predicament explains the sentence’s lack of analyticity, then the suitably reformulated sentence “if there is such an individual, N.N. is called ‘N.N.’” will have a reasonable chance of being analytic. Third, such an assignment avoids any circularity in accounting for a proper name’s reference. A certain token of a name does have a reference when the use of such a name is referentially successful because the transmission chain involving that token (see immediately below) traces back to the success of a mental act of attention towards something the initial name token of that chain triggers.
	Once such a character is assigned to an indexiname, one may better understand why, unlike a pure indexical, yet like a demonstrative, the relevant narrow context that (given such a character) provides a referent (if any) for an indexiname is an enriched context. For it is only when, given a certain agent, space, time, and world, attention is called to something by means of name that such a name acquires a referent. In addition, one may thus see why, unlike demonstratives, the further parameter such a context involves does not have to do with demonstrations, but rather with attentional callings and their progressions, which one may take as methods of acquisition of a name’s various referential uses. Let me focus in a greater detail on this second point.
	As far as indexinames are concerned, this further parameter is an ‘acquisition’ parameter. Indeed, it points to a referential use of the name characterized by a certain naming practice. This practice is constituted by an informal act of dubbing and usually also a transmission chain, provided that the dubbing is infectious so to speak. On the one hand, the act of dubbing consists in calling one’s interlocutor’s attention towards something, provided there is something one’s interlocutor’s attention is focused on. Thus, that dubbing generates a new referential use of the name that may be kept in force as long as a chain originates from it. Given its informal character, it is not always the case that the dubbing amounts to an official baptism of an individual. Sometimes, when there is no such individual, only the dubbing occurs, along with the chain it usually originates. In the case of a proper name, the dubbing (as well as the chain it usually originates) involves an empty referential use of the name. On the other hand, a transmission chain is the ordinary way for any expression, proper names included, to pass from an individual to another with its putative semantic value. In this case, it is the chain linking contemporary tokens of a proper name to the token of that name involved in the dubbing procedure. As such, the chain includes a causal as well as an intentional element (as Kripke 1980, 96 originally envisaged, a necessary condition to be a member of a transmission chain concerning an expression is to have the intention of using the expression in the same way as one’s mentors). A naming practice thus involves such a chain as soon as it becomes a robust practice for the name involved; namely, a practice that goes beyond its own originator.
To sum up, in different narrow contexts one and the same proper name may acquire different referents. For instance, in a narrow context whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled with a naming practice involving the Greek philosopher, the name “Aristotle” refers to the Greek philosopher; in a different narrow context whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled with a naming practice involving the Greek shipowner, that name refers to the Greek shipowner. Yet moreover, in some further narrow contexts the name acquires no referent at all, when the dubbing matches no individual. One may envisage narrow contexts with respect to which “Aristotle” remains empty, for no individual matches the dubbings that fill the ‘acquisition’ parameter in such contexts.

3.	How indexinames account for the desiderata

Granted, one may variously argue in favour of an indexicalist view of proper names. Yet here I want to argue that, armed with the conception I sketched in the previous Section, one may well account for all the above desiderata. Let me start with (v). This desideratum is clearly satisfied by the above conception. To be sure, the most popular conception that takes proper names as devices of direct reference, the so-called demanding view, also takes a name as an informal correlate in natural language of a logical individual constant. Yet this is not the only way for a proper name to be a device of direct reference. According to the typographical view, a name is individuated in terms of a certain morpho-syntactical type, a certain abstract linguistic entity. If one adds to that view the idea that a proper name is an indexiname, then such a name still is a device of direct reference. For an indexiname still exhausts its truthconditional contribution in its having a referent. Indeed, an ordinary indexical is such a device. If its use is full, the relevant narrow context that such an indexical involves maps that indexical to a content, i.e., to the direct referent of the indexical in that use. If that use is empty, as happens with demonstratives, the relevant narrow context maps that indexical to no content, i.e., to no referent. The same holds of an indexiname.
Let me now focus on (i). Since the fictional use of a sentence like (1) involves the indexiname “Holmes”, that use amounts to truthconditionally interpreting that sentence as to a narrow unactual context of interpretation in which not only is its ‘world’ parameter filled by the world of Doyle tales but also its ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by a naming practice that involves a concrete individual named “Holmes” in that world. In such a case, therefore, “Holmes” will exhaust its meaning in providing that individual to the fictional truthconditional content (1) has in such a context. If this is the case, the fictional use of the sentence involves no sui generis context shift, but just an ordinary context shift that any modification of a narrow context requires. Suppose now that such a sentence is interpreted by pairing it with the real narrow context in which the actual storyteller of the Doyle tale is speaking. In this real context, its ‘world’ parameter is filled by the actual world, yet its ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by a naming practice that is restricted to a dubbing matching no individual – the actual storytelling is actually calling one’s attention to nothing. In such a case, that very indexiname refers to nothing. Thus, it gives no truthconditional contribution to (1) in that context. Hence, that sentence has no truthconditions in such a context.
	Yet if the above is the case, one may immediately wonder, how (ii) can be satisfied? Well, it is satisfied precisely because proper names are indexinames. One understands a sentence like (1) independently of knowing whether it is fictionally used since one grasps the characters of the terms involved in it, in particular the character of “Holmes”. Suppose instead that names were not indexinames. In such a case, given (i) and (v) the context shift that the fictional use of a sentence requires would also involve a language shift, so that the relevant name – “Holmes”, in our case – would provide a fictional truthconditional contribution by having a certain referent in the world of the relevant context. Yet if this were the case, no independent understanding of a sentence like (1), that is, no understanding that is indifferent to whether the sentence is fictionally used, would occur. Thus, (ii) would not be satisfied at all.
	To show why if names were not indexinames they would involve such a predicament, consider first a rather unusual piece of fiction such as the one to be found in the incipit of Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky, a nonsense masterpiece:

(7)	‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves / did gyre and gimble in the wabe.

In the pretense play with (7), one primarily makes believe that (7) has a meaning. Thus, for its truthconditional interpretation the fictional use of (7) requires a context shift involving a modification not only of the ‘world’ parameter, as any ordinary fictional use of sentences requires – that parameter is indeed keyed to the world of Jabberwocky – but also of a ‘language’ parameter – the pretense mobilizes a modified English in which, unlike actual English, the words “brillig”, “slithy”, “tove”, “gyre”, “gimble”, and “wabe” have meaning. Yet if this is the case then there is no prior understanding of (7) independent of whether (7) is fictionally used. As a matter of fact, one does not understand most of the words in (7), one only makes believe that one understands them. One is just supposed to imagine that if one were in the Jabberwocky’s world where a modified kind of English is spoken, one would understand (7).
	Second, suppose that names were not indexinames but – in conformity with (v) – they were still devices of direct reference. As I said above, they might be such by being informal counterparts of logical individual constants, i.e., by being assigned a meaning just by having a referent. If this were the case, the fictional use of (1) would be very similar to that of (7). Such a use would indeed involve a context shift that would include a modification not only of the ‘world’ parameter, but also of a ‘language’ parameter. The pretense affecting (1) would indeed mobilize a modified English in which, unlike allegedly actual English, the word “Holmes” has a meaning just insofar as it refers to a concrete individual in the world of Doyle tales. Yet if this were the case then there would be no prior understanding of (1) independent of whether (1) is fictionally used. For as a matter of fact one would utterly fail to understand (1), one would merely make believe that one understood it. One would be merely supposed to imagine that if one were in the world of Doyle tales where a modified English is spoken, one would understand such a sentence. But this is actually not the case! For unlike (7) we do have an understanding of (1) regardless of whether we know that it is fictionally used.
	Clearly enough, if a fictionally used sentence contains an ordinary indexical, we do accept the kind of account I have previously provided for (1). Indeed, if we were faced not with (1), but with:

(8)	He is a detective

we would first of all say that we understand it before knowing whether it is fictionally used insofar as we grasp the character of “he” – we would understand (8) as saying roughly that the demonstrated male in the context is a detective. Once we knew that (8) is fictionally used, moreover, we would say that (8) is interpreted in relation to an ordinary context shift that mobilizes a narrow unactual context whose ‘world’ parameter is filled by the world of Doyle tales and whose ‘demonstration’ parameter is filled by a demonstration that demonstrates a concrete individual inhabiting that world. In such an interpretation, (8) would thus have a fictional truthconditional content. Yet if we paired (8) with a corresponding real narrow context, whose ‘world’ parameter is filled by the actual world and in which the relevant demonstration demonstrates no individual at all, we would have that (8) has no truthconditional content. For “he” would then refer to no individual at all. Now, it should be evident that the situation (1) mobilizes is more similar to the one (8) mobilizes than to the one (7) mobilizes. So again, (ii) can be accounted for along with (i) once we take the proper name “Holmes” as an indexiname.
	Let me go on to evaluate (iii) and (iv). In the present literature, people tend to solve the tension between such desiderata by dropping one of them. On the one hand, realists about ficta are inclined to save (iv) to the detriment of (iii). For they may well claim that sentences like (1), when fictionally used, and (2), as according to them nonfictionally used, exhibit different naming practices insofar as they mobilize different though homonymous names, a nonreferring one in the fictionally used (1) and another one that refers to a certain fictional individual in the nonfictionally used (2). Yet first, such a claim seems to be motivated by their ontological choices only. Indeed, realists tend to think that, since “Holmes” refers to something in the nonfictionally used (2) while this is not the case as far as (1) when fictionally used is concerned, the two tokens of “Holmes” such sentences mobilize must belong to different names. Moreover, the motivation is clearly insufficient. To be sure, there is a systematic correlation between mobilizing “Holmes” in (1) when fictionally, hence noncommittally, used and mobilizing it in (2) even if nonfictionally, hence committally, used. Yet if one took that correlation seriously, it would justify not the idea that such a name is ambiguous, but at most the idea that such a name is polysemous. Granted, it is definitely not accidental that the very same expression “Holmes” appears both in (1) when fictionally used and in (2) as used nonfictionally. For we have the same correlation as far as any other proper name a fiction mobilizes is concerned. If for instance one fictionally uses:

(9)	 	Emma Bovary is a superficial woman

one is entitled to use the very same expression “Emma Bovary” in:

(10)	Emma Bovary is a fictional character.

Yet if one wanted to exploit such a systematic correlation between uses involving an expression, that correlation might at most justify the idea that such an expression is polysemous, not the idea that it is ambiguous. To take an example from a different field, the word “rabbit” is not ambiguous across:

(11)	A rabbit runs fast
(12)	I like rabbit

but rather polysemous insofar as in (11) it is used to mean the animal while in (12) is used to mean its meat. For so would the similar words “crocodile”, “kangaroo”, “ostrich” be, if they were similarly used.
	On the other hand, antirealists about ficta typically save (iii) to the detriment of (iv). Typically for them, “Holmes” is the same name both when used in (1) and when used in (2). For it refers to nothing both when fictionally, hence noncommittally, used in (1) and when it is used in (2), in which for them it is again fictionally, hence noncommittally, used. Yet for them this very name is mobilized there in the same make-believe naming practice (cf. e.g. Kroon 2010, 220). Firstly, it seems once again that such an idea is motivated by their ontological choices only. Secondly, such a motivation is again clearly insufficient. For, as I have said above, antirealists should instead accept that the naming practices that (1) and (2) respectively involve are different even if they are both considered noncommittal. For such practices belong to different sorts of pretense play – an ordinary fiction and a metafiction, as I already remarked. Even assuming that both (1) and (2) are fictionally used, such uses definitely do not belong to the same pretense. This would instead be the case if the make-believe game we played by means of them with “Holmes” were an inconsistent game in which we simultaneously ascribed to one and the same unactual individual the incompatible features of being a concrete individual, hence of being nonfictional, and of being a fictional individual.
	Now, if proper names are indexinames, both (iii) and (iv) can be simultaneously satisfied. Even though (1) and (2) respectively mobilize different naming practices, they involve one and the same name. Moreover, such desiderata can be satisfied independently of one’s ontological choices, for the naming practices in question remain different whether one is a realist or an antirealist about ficta.
To begin with, if one is a realist, then the apparently nonfictional use (2) mobilizes is effectively nonfictional hence it is committal. Yet it is just another use of the same indexiname that is also used fictionally in the underlying pretense affecting (1). The two uses mobilize different narrow contexts that differ both in terms of their ‘acquisition’ parameter and of their ‘world’ parameter (the fictional world of Doyle tales in the case of the fictional use of (1), the actual world in the case of the nonfictional use of (2)). Such contexts map one and the same name respectively to a concrete individual in the fictional world of Doyle tales, to a fictum in the actual world.
Moreover, if one is an antirealist, things do not change that much. The apparently nonfictional use (2) mobilizes is effectively fictional hence it is noncommittal. Yet again, it is just another use of the same name that is also used fictionally in the underlying pretense affecting (1). The two uses mobilize different narrow contexts that differ both in their ‘acquisition’ parameter and also in their ‘world’ parameter (the fictional world of Doyle tales in the case of the fictional use of (1), a metafictional world in the case of the merely apparently nonfictional use of (2)). Such contexts respectively map one and the same name to a concrete unactual individual existing in the fictional world of Doyle tales and to an unactual fictional individual existing in the metafictional world.
Finally, both in the realist’s and in the antirealist’s case, all those narrow contexts have to be distinguished from a further narrow yet real context that affects (1). In this context, the ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by an empty naming practice and whose ‘world’ parameter is filled by the actual world: it is a real context in which the actual storyteller of Doyle tales calls his interlocutor’s attention to nothing. In such a further narrow context, the name is mapped to no referent at all.
Once again, if instead of names we had ordinary indexicals, pretty much the same kind of account would hold. Let me pair (8) with:

(13) He is a fictional character.

In the fictional narrow context mobilized by (8) when fictionally used, the demonstrative “he” refers to a concrete unactual individual existing in the fictional world of Doyle tales. Moreover, in the real vs. metafictional narrow context respectively mobilized by (13) (according to one’s ontological convictions), “he” refers to a fictional individual existing in the actual world / to an unactual individual existing qua fictional being in the metafictional world. Finally, in the different real narrow context mobilized by the actual storytelling of (8), “he” refers to nothing at all.
	Let me now take a further step. Both realists and antirealists on ficta acknowledge that, as I said at the very beginning, sentences like (1) also have another use that is somehow nonfictional. In such a use, they are interpreted as having a somehow nonfictional truthconditional content (and a somehow nonfictional truthvalue). Now, if proper names are indexinames, I can quite easily account for this use as well. An indexicalist on proper names may well say that, independently of whether one is a realist or an antirealist, the narrow context (1) involves in this further case is the same as the one that (2) involves. Thus, not only is its ‘world’ parameter obviously filled by the same world, but also, as far as “Holmes” is concerned, its ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the same naming practice. Yet if one is a realist, then straightforwardly such a context is a real context, involving the actual world and a naming practice in which “Holmes” refers to an actual individual that is a fictional character (cf. Thomasson 1999). For antirealists instead, such a context may again be a metafictional context that involves a metafictional world and a naming practice that singles out an unactual fictional individual in that world.
	
4.	A different indexicalist proposal

The idea that fiction shows that names are context-sensitive expressions is not new. In (2011), Heidi Tiedke argued for this idea in a different way. Yet although Tiedke’s proposal obviously bears many similarities with the ‘indexiname’ account, it is not only certainly different from it but also, as far as I can judge, less recommendable.
	For Tiedke (2011, 714-8), names are context-sensitive expressions mapping contexts of use onto dubbings. In turn, dubbings are pairs made by either i) an actual ordinary individual plus a referential mode of dubbing (which, following Recanati (1993) Tiedke labels REF) or ii) a set of properties and a fictional mode of dubbing (which Tiedke labels FIC). In a real context of use, the function associated with a proper name maps it onto a semantic value, i.e., a dubbing, of type i); in a fictional context of use, the function associated with that name maps it onto a semantic value of type ii).
	To begin with, the proposal sounds ad hoc. For one thing, I am unclear as to why the indexicality of proper names has to be treated in a way that differs so far from the indexicality of ordinary indexicals. In the ‘indexiname’ account, names are like ordinary indexicals but for the fact that the narrow context they are paired with includes an ‘acquisition’ parameter. Now, as we have seen before, the idea of including a different parameter in narrow context is the standard way to deal with the prima facie difference, as far as ordinary indexicals are concerned, between pure indexicals and demonstratives. According to that idea, demonstratives are closely related to pure indexicals, provided that one takes them to be paired to an enriched narrow context. As I have hinted above, unlike pure indexicals, the narrow context that according to this idea a demonstrative is to be paired with also contains demonstrations among its parameters. Thus, by applying such an idea just one step further, the ‘indexiname’ account is closer to the standard treatment of ordinary indexicals than Tiedke’s account.
	To be sure, since Tiedke actually remains silent with respect to ordinary indexicals, perhaps she is inclined to give a treatment of such expressions that is close to the one she provides for proper names. Yet what exactly are the REF and FIC modes of dubbing and why are they to be postulated? Even if one accepts that fictional individuals are sets of properties, as Tiedke seems to be disposed to hold, why should reference to those sets work differently than reference to ordinary individuals? This seems to be an unnecessary complication of the theory. In the ‘indexiname’ account, in a fictional context a name is used pretty much in the same way as in a real context: it refers in the same way to an individual yet existing in the world of that context.
	Yet Tiedke’s theory raises even more serious problems. First, it provides no necessary conditions for a proper name’s referential use. As we have seen, there are also cases of contexts in which proper names have no entity at all qua their referents, hence no semantic value in Tiedke’s terms. For although in such cases REF would be mobilized, lack of reference would not contribute a member to the pair in which for her a semantic value, i.e., a dubbing, consists. The mobilizations of names like “Holmes” that actual storytellers provide are instances of such cases, but they are not the only cases. How would Tiedke cope with such cases?
	Second, consider that, as Tiedke (2011, 718-20) herself underlines, when a name has the second kind of semantic value (i.e., a dubbing made by a set of properties and FIC), predication in the sentence containing such a name is set-membership, not exemplification. So for her, when we fictionally use (1), of a certain set of properties linked via FIC to the name “Holmes”, we are predicating that the property of being a detective belongs to that very set. However, this proposal hardly accounts for co-predication when a sentence involves both a name linked via FIC to a certain set of properties and a name linked via REF to an ordinary individual. Cf. e.g.: 

(14)	Both Hamlet and Charles Mountbatten are princes.

Yet the co-predication in (14) seems to imply that the predicate involved is predicated in the same way both of a fictional individual – the one corresponding to the Hamletian set of properties – and of a concrete individual, Queen Elizabeth’s heir. Some further story has to be told in order to avoid this result. Moreover, and more importantly, this proposal hardly provides sufficient conditions for a proper name’s referential use. To begin with, suppose “Holmes” is also used not as the name of the protagonist of Doyle tales, but as the name of the very set of properties including the property of being a detective, when this set is taken utterly outside any fiction at all. How can Tiedke’s proposal rule out that in uttering (1), instead of contributing to telling a Doyle tale we merely predicate membership of that very property to that very set? To be sure, Tiedke may reply that in the latter case “Holmes” is used in the REF mode to refer to a set of properties. Yet she (2011, 718-9) also says that the REF mode prompts the predication in a sentence to be meant as exemplification rather than as set-membership. So, perhaps “Holmes” could be used in the REF mode to refer to the set in question, for example in order to predicate of such a set its being a set, a property that set only exemplifies. Yet, if “Holmes” were so used, (1) could be not used utterly outside fiction to say that such a set includes the property of being a detective.
	All in all, I see no cogent reason to abandon the treatment of proper names the ‘indexiname’ account puts forward in favour of Tiedke’s alternative indexicalist account. To say the least, such an account must be developed further.

5.	Objections and replies

At this point, however, a question remains. Even if an indexicalist approach to proper names seems so promising, how is it that it remains a minority approach to such terms? Are there any devastating objections that rightly prevent one from adopting it?
	There are two main objections that have to be considered on this concern. The first is the objection from validity, the second is the objection from contexts. Yet neither is decisive against the ‘indexiname’ variant of the indexicalist approach. Or so I claim.
	The objection from validity runs as follows. A trivial argument of the kind: 

N is F;
therefore, N is F.

where N is a proper name, is intuitively valid. Yet if proper names are indexicals and issues of argumentative validity concern sentences as such, the inference is no longer valid. Indeed, according to David Kaplan (1989a, 546-7), an argument is valid iff, for any (narrow) context, if the argument’s premises are true in such a context, the argument’s conclusion is also true in that context. Yet if proper names are indexicals, then there is a narrow context in which the premise of an argument of the above kind is true, for the proper name involved in that premise refers to a certain individual, yet the conclusion of such an argument is false, for in that conclusion that very name refers to another individual. Thus, the argument is invalid. Take e.g. the intuitively valid:

(A)	 Aristotle is a philosopher;
therefore, Aristotle is a philosopher.

Consider now a narrow context in which “Aristotle” refers to our old Aristotle in (A)’s premise while it refers to the shipowner in (A)’s conclusion. In such a context, the premise is true yet the conclusion is false, for unlike our old Aristotle, Onassis has no philosophical tendency. Appearances notwithstanding, therefore, (A) is invalid. Thus, proper names are not indexicals, a fortiori not indexinames.
	Now, this objection presupposes that qua indexical, a proper name shifts its reference within one and the same narrow context. Yet if a name is an indexiname, this cannot be the case. For if an indexiname shifts its reference, then a different naming practice is mobilized, hence a different (enriched) narrow context arises whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is differently filled. Given such a conception of what a narrow context for a proper name is, the intuitive validity of (A) above is indeed preserved. Let us first take narrow context c, whose ‘world’ parameter is filled by  and whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the naming practice a involving our old Aristotle. In such a context, both the premise and the conclusion of (A) are true. Second, take narrow context c1, whose ‘world’ parameter is still filled by the actual world  and whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the naming practice a1 involving Onassis. In such a context, both (A)’s premise and (A)’s conclusion are false – again, Onassis has no philosophical tendency. Thus, c1 is not a counterexample to (A)’s validity. In order to find one such counterexample, one should find a narrow context in which (A)’s premise is true yet (A)’s conclusion is false. Now, in order for this to be the case, the context should be such that “Aristotle” in (A)’s premise refers to a certain individual while in (A)’s conclusion it refers to another individual. Yet since for the indexicalist a narrow context for an indexiname in its ‘acquisition’ parameter mobilizes only the naming practice that involves one and the same referent, there cannot be such a context. Thus, if names are indexinames, (A) is valid, as well as all arguments of the same form. 
	However, at this point another ‘validity’ problem may arise. If the narrow context for an indexiname is an enriched narrow context, then, as we have seen before, a subsentential context shift may occur, as in (5). Yet how can one account for the validity of an inference like:

(B)	 Aristotle speaks the same language as Aristotle
Therefore, Aristotle speaks the same language as Aristotle

which requires that both its premise and its conclusion are paired to just one context, i.e., the very same narrow context? Yet this problem may be solved in the very same way as the analogous problem that may affect sentences involving demonstratives such as (6) would be solved. Even an inference like:

(C)	 That is bigger than that
Therefore, that is bigger than that

is valid. How can one account for its validity if both its premise and its conclusion allow for subsentential context shifts? Well, because saying that one such shift occurs in (6) is the same as saying that (6) is evaluated as a whole in a larger enriched context that contains a doubly filled ‘demonstration’ parameter, in which the first demonstration is indexed in the same way as the first token of “that” is, while the second demonstration is indexed in the same way as the second token of “that” is. Mutatis mutandis, that is, once the (doubly filled) ‘demonstration’ parameter is replaced by a (doubly filled) ‘acquisition’ parameter, the same holds for (5).
	Let me now consider another objection, the objection from contexts we owe to Predelli (2001). This objection begins as follows. If a proper name is an indexical, then a sentence (in a certain narrow context) containing it is absolutely true (or true-in-that-context) iff it is true with respect to the world (and the time; from now onwards, I take this specification for granted) of that context, as Kaplan (1989a, 562) generally holds. Take now a possible world w in which “Aristotle” is used to refer to Alexander the Great (more precisely, in the context c* whose world is w and whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the naming practice a*, the name refers to Alexander). The sentence (in context c*):

(4)	Aristotle is Greek 

is absolutely true (or true-c*) iff it is true with respect to the world w of c*, i.e., iff Alexander is Greek in w. But, the objection continues, this is implausible. For in order to evaluate that sentence (in context c*) as absolutely true (true-c*) we would have expected that it be evaluated as true with respect to w iff in w Aristotle is Greek (cf. Predelli 2001, 149-54).
	Yet for the ‘indexiname’ account this alleged implausibility instead shows things as they should be. To begin with, suppose that people on Twin Earth use “Aristotle” to name Twin-Aristotle. As regards context c** whose world is , the actual world, yet whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the naming practice a**, constituted by the tracing back of a certain transmission chain to a token of “Aristotle” uttered in Twin-Greece IV century B.C. in order to baptize Twin-Aristotle, (in context c**) (4) is absolutely true (true-c**) iff in  Twin-Aristotle is Greek. Now, why should things change if we imagined Twin-Earth not as located in a far galaxy of our world, but as replacing Earth in a possible world different from the actual one? Let me even take a case in which the relevant narrow context cF  has its ‘world’ parameter filled by the world wF  that differs from the actual world since it is a fictional rather than a possible world, while the ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the different naming practice aF in which the name “Aristotle” refers to a certain guy existing in that fictional world, an imaginary unactual guy from our perspective. Then, (4) (in cF) is absolutely true (true-cF) iff it is evaluated as true with respect to wF, namely iff the referent of “Aristotle” with respect to aF, i.e., the imaginary guy, is Greek in wF. If this holds of a fictional world, why should things be different when the above possible world w is concerned?
	In point of fact, the expectation that Aristotle has to be what (4) in context c* (whose world is w) is about comes from the fact that one implicitly interprets that sentence with respect not to c*, but to another narrow context, namely the context c’ whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the ordinary naming practice a, where “Aristotle” refers to our old Aristotle. Yet either one takes c’ to be identical with c, i.e., the narrow context that not only contains a, but whose ‘world’ parameter is also filled by , the actual world. As a result, w is no longer the world of the context. Thus, one may only say that (4) (in context c’=c) is true with respect to w, but not absolutely true (true-c’=c), iff Aristotle is Greek in w. Or one takes c’ to be a narrow context of interpretation altogether different from c; namely, a peculiar context that still has w as its world but that, by setting w’s naming practices aside, also has the naming practice a concerning Aristotle as filling its ‘acquisition’ parameter. This allows one to say that (4) (in context c’c) is still absolutely true (true-c’c) iff Aristotle is Greek in w.
	Now, Predelli (2001, 157-8) says that the latter is the move the indexicalist about proper names should adopt when faced with the situation concerning (4) and world w. This seems to me incorrect. For, as I said before, I hold that the friend of indexinames should say instead that in such a situation (4) must be paired with context c*, the context that has a as its ‘acquisition’ parameter and w as its ‘world’ parameter. As a result, (in such a context) (4) is absolutely true (true-c*) iff Alexander is Greek in w. 
Yet I agree with Predelli that there are other situations in which such a move is recommendable for an indexicalist about proper names. Consider the case of a languageless possible world w’ in which our old Aristotle is still Greek. If we want to evaluate (4) with respect to that world, we cannot pair it with a narrow context whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by a naming practice occurring in w’. For since there is no language in w’, there is no naming practice either, hence no narrow context of interpretation. In want of such a context, we obviously could not say that (4) is absolutely true (it would have no content at all). Faced with this situation, one may again consider two possible moves. Either one pairs (4) with c, our old narrow context whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is filled by the naming practice a concerning Aristotle and whose world is . In such a case, (4) (in c) is true with respect to w’ iff Aristotle is Greek in w’, yet it remains not absolutely true (true-c), for w’ is not the world of c. Or one pairs (4) with c***, another peculiar narrow context whose ‘acquisition’ parameter is still filled by a yet whose world is w’. In such a case, (4) in (c***) is absolutely true (true-c***) iff Aristotle is Greek in w’, the world of that context.
	According to Predelli (2001, 154-5), the latter is the move the indexicalist about proper names must adopt. As I hinted above, I agree with him here. For such a move tallies with the analogous treatment an indexicalist provides as far as similarly problematic cases concerning ordinary indexicals are concerned. To stick to Predelli’s own example, take:

(15)	I am hungry now

and a possible world w” in which nobody utters sentences containing more than three words. So in w” (15) is not uttered. Yet can it not be absolutely true in the sense of being true with respect to the world of a certain narrow context? Of course. If (15) is paired with a peculiar narrow context c” whose agent is an individual not uttering (15) in w” and whose world is w”, (15) (in c”) is absolutely true (true-c”) iff that individual is hungry at the time of c” in w”. As Predelli himself (2001, 149-50) remarks.
	Yet, proceeds Predelli, this is a poisoned apple for the indexicalist about proper names. For if the indexicalist agrees on such a move, she is forced to say that:

(16)	Aristotle is called “Aristotle”

is no longer analytic. As you will remember, a sentence is analytic iff it is true in every narrow context of interpretation. Yet, says Predelli (2001, 157-8), there is at least one narrow context in which (16) is not true, namely context c*** above. For as we have just seen, in such a context “Aristotle” refers to our old Aristotle yet since w’, the world of such a context, is languageless, Aristotle is not so-called there.
Yet pace Predelli the naming practice the verb “call” involves in (16) as far as the possible world w’ is concerned is not a naming practice in w’ – which is obviously missing, since w’ is languageless – but our naming practice, the Aristotle-involving naming practice a in . For “called” in (16) is elliptical for “contextually called”. Since moreover for the indexicalist the token of “Aristotle” in the subject position of (16) in c*** refers to Aristotle, as Predelli acknowledges, the implicitly present adverb “contextually” must there single out the very narrow context involving a, i.e., c*** itself. Therefore, however, (16) is also absolutely true (true-c***). For in w’, the world of c***, Aristotle is called “Aristotle” in the naming practice a of c***, i.e., our naming practice, even though nobody so calls him in w’. Mutatis mutandis, things here work pretty much as with:

(17)	I am the agent.

In (17), “agent” is elliptical for “agent in context”. Once we pair (17) with the aforementioned narrow context we already paired (15) with, i.e., c”, “I” refers to a less-than-four-words-speaking agent. This forces the implicit expression “context” in (17) in c” to single out that very context involving that agent. As a further result, (17) is absolutely true (true-c”). For in w”, the world of c”, a certain individual, i.e., the less-than-four-words speaker, is the agent of c”, even though nobody utters (17) in w” (cf. Predelli himself 2001, 155).
True enough, as I said before, (16) is not analytic, i.e., true in every narrow context of interpretation. For according to the friend of indexinames there are contexts in which “Aristotle” refers to nothing, hence (16) is not true. Yet a suitable reformulation of (16) has a reasonable chance of being analytic, namely:

(16b) If there is such an individual, Aristotle is called “Aristotle”.

To sum up, not only the objection from validity, but also the objection from contexts seems ineffective against the ‘indexiname’ account. Unless other objections arise, this account definitely suggests itself as the right semantical account of proper names. As its ability in dealing with fiction-involving uses of such terms strongly suggests.

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