Professor Fara is an Associate Professor at Princeton University.
Abstract: I argue that descriptions are predicates. The thesis applies to definite descriptions -- singular, plural, and mass; indefinite descriptions; and bare plurals. I appeal to Sharvy's (1980) maximality analysis of definite descriptions in order to give a unified account of singular, plural and mass definite descriptions. Meanwhile I show that the difference between treating the uniqueness implications of definite descriptions as presupposed (á la Frege) or as asserted (á la Russell) becomes a very simple choice point. The key evidence for my view stems from the interaction of descriptions with adverbs of quantification. In particular are argue that the predicate analysis of descriptions is required to account for the contrast between:
(1) Some Scandinavian rarely has brown eyes;
(2) A Scandinavian rarely has brown eyes.
The first can has only the weird meaning that there is some Scandinavian that rarely has brown eyes, which implicates that there is a Scandinavian whose eye color changes. Meanwhile the second can have the more normal meaning that few Scandinavians have brown eyes.
I argue that the predicative analysis affords the best account of the contrast. This involves a rejection of David Lewis's assumption in "Adverbs of Quantification" (1975) that adverbs of quantification must always quantify over the same sorts of things -- always over times, or always over individuals, or always over events. I say they sometimes quantify over individuals and sometimes over situations.
