Peter Ludlow shows how word meanings are much more dynamic than we might have supposed, and explores how they are modulated even during everyday conversation. The resulting view is radical, and has far-reaching consequences for our political and legal discourse, and for enduring puzzles in the foundations of semantics, epistemology, and logic.

• 1: Introduction


• 2: Norms of word meaning litigation


• 3: The Nature of the Dynamic Lexicon


• 4: Meaning Underdetermination, Logic, and Vagueness


• 5: Consequences for Analytic Philosophy


• 6: Metaphor and Beyond


• Bibliography


• Index

Peter Ludlow is Professor of Philosophy at Northwestern University. He has written on topics ranging from metaphysics, epistemology, the philosophy of language, linguistics, and the foundations of cognitive science to conceptual issues involving digital culture, cyber rights, and the surveillance state. His most recent book was The Philosophy of Generative Linguistics (OUP, 2011).