The Character of Color Terms: A Materialist View

This paper investigates the character of predicates like: (A) λx(x is red), and (B) λxy(x appears red to y), where x stands for a visible object and y for a perceiving subject (the reference to a time may be neglected).1 I take here ”character ” in the sense of Kaplan (1977) as substantiated by Haas-Spohn (1995 and Chapter 14 in this book)). The point of using Kaplan’s framework is simple, but of utmost importance: It provides a scheme for clearly separating epistemological and metaphysical issues, for specifying how the two domains are related, and for connecting them to questions concerning meaning where confusions are often only duplicated. All this is achieved by it better than by any alternative I know of.2 Therefore using this framework seems especially relevant to color talk where meta-physical and epistemological issues are more difficult to tell apart or may even seem to coincide.3 And it should help in particular with my more specific goal, namely to clarify the epistemological and metaphysical status of such statements as: (1) x is red if and only if x would appear red to most English-speaking people unde