REFERENTIAL CONSISTENCY AS A CRITERION OF MEANING by Steven

his paper describes a logically compelling criterion of meaning—that is, a necessary condition of meaning, one which is non-arbitrary and compelling. One cannot not accept the proposed criterion without selfreferential inconsistency. This “metalogical” variety of selfreferential inconsistency is new, opening a third category beyond semantical and pragmatical forms of self-referential inconsistency. It is argued that such a criterion of meaning can serve as an instrument of internal criticism for any theoretical framework that permits reference to a class of objects. The paper combines the concern of the logical empiricists to formulate a rigorous meaning criterion, with the analytical interest in identifying and eliminating self-defeating statements through an analysis of the referential structure of theories. The paper is followed by a list of other publications by the author that further develop and extend the ideas presented here. T