Auctor dissertationis theses de nominum propriorum significatione et praedicatione, quas Lucas Novák in tractatione cui titulus De nominum propriorum significatione et „doctrina identificationis“ (SN 1 (2004)/1–2) evulgavit, analysi criticae subicit. Prima in parte sententiam de nominum propriorum significatione descriptiva breviter adumbrat et rationes, quibus S. Kripke ductus eam reiecit, in mentem legentium revocat. Deinde Lucae Novakii theses nonnulas circa vocum significationem mentisque humanae naturam valde dubias supponere ostendit, quae S. Kripkii doctrinam, nisi novis quibusdam argumentis confirmentur, refutare haud valent. Ceterum auctor significationem istam minimam, quam Lucas Novák nominibus propriis concedat, nimis parvam esse arbitratur, quin genuinam sententiae descriptivae ideam salvare quaeat. In altera dissertationis parte auctor thesim de praedicatione ut identificatione quadam concepta, quam Lucas Novák defendit, non super identitatem illam fundari, quae axiomatibus theoriae identitatis vulgo describitur, demonstrat.

This paper is a polemic response to the essay “The Semantics of Proper Names and Identity Theory of Predication” by L. Novák (SN 1–2/2004). In the first part of the article, the so-called descriptive theories of proper names and Kripke’s challenge to these views are briefly presented. It is pointed out that Novák’s exposition rests upon certain presuppositions in the theories of meaning and mind, which are controversial and which – without further argument – can hardly cast doubt on the so-called New Theory of Reference. Furthermore, it is argued that Novák’s “minimal sense” of a proper name is too minimalistic and cannot be of service to the original idea of descripitivism. In the second part of the paper, an attempt is made to show that Novák’s extensional-intensional identity theory of predication is not based on identity, insofar as it is characterised by the axioms of the theory of identity.