de re

1. Introduction

De re is a Latin expression meaning “about the thing.” In philosophy and logic it marks a way in which statements, modalities, or attitudes are directed toward objects themselves, as opposed to being directed merely toward words, descriptions, or propositions. Its standard foil is de dicto (“about the saying/proposition”), a label for talk whose primary target is a sentence, description, or content.

Across historical periods the contrast has been used to articulate different but related ideas:

• In medieval scholastic logic, it distinguishes attributions that apply to the res significata (the thing signified) from those that apply only to linguistic items or propositions.
• In metaphysics and modal logic, it frames debates about essences and necessary properties of individuals.
• In philosophy of language and mind, it structures analyses of reference and propositional attitudes, for example, beliefs that are anchored in an object versus beliefs that concern only a description.

Despite its seemingly straightforward literal meaning, the technical use of de re has shifted over time. Scholastics deployed it against a background of theories of suppositio, mental language, and the ordo rerum (order of things). Early modern philosophers connected it to questions about individual essences and possible worlds. Twentieth‑century analytic philosophers reintroduced it as a key term in discussions of opaque contexts, quantification, and modal semantics.

The sections that follow trace the linguistic origins of the phrase, the development of its technical roles in logic, metaphysics, and philosophy of mind, and the main interpretive controversies surrounding its application. Throughout, the focus remains on how “about the thing” has been understood, formalized, and contested, rather than on defending any particular theory of de re discourse.

2. Etymology and Linguistic Origins

The phrase de re consists of the Latin preposition dē and the ablative singular of rēs.

2.1 Morphology and Basic Sense

• dē: a preposition meaning “from,” “down from,” “about,” or “concerning,” with a wide range of spatial and abstract uses.
• rēs: a highly general noun meaning “thing, matter, affair, circumstance, fact.”

Grammatically, dē rē means simply “about the matter” or “concerning the thing.” In classical Latin this construction is entirely ordinary and not restricted to technical discourse. Over time, however, the phrase was stabilized as a quasi‑technical marker in philosophical Latin.

2.2 From Ordinary Phrase to Term of Art

Late antique commentators, especially Boethius, translated and systematized Greek logical vocabulary into Latin. In doing so, they introduced contrasts between:

• expressions that talk about words or propositions, and
• expressions that talk about the things signified.

The prepositional phrase de re proved convenient for the latter role. While initially it remained transparent—readers could interpret it compositionally—it gradually acquired a more specialized function, especially in logic and metaphysics.

2.3 Relation to Greek Background

There is no single Greek phrase that straightforwardly corresponds to de re, but scholars note affinities with:

Latin rēs overlaps with πρᾶγμα (“deed, fact, thing done”) but also with more general ontological talk of “beings.” The choice of rēs helped anchor logical distinctions in everyday language while enabling them to acquire technical depth.

2.4 Stabilization in Scholastic Latin

By the high medieval period, de re appears regularly in discussions of modalities and predication. It becomes paired with de dicto (literally “about the saying”), forming a terminological dyad that persists into early modern and contemporary philosophical vocabulary, often remaining untranslated in English‑language texts.

3. The Semantic Field of “rēs” in Latin

The noun rēs occupies a central and exceptionally broad semantic field in Latin, ranging from mundane “things” to abstract “facts” and “affairs.”

3.1 Core Senses

Standard lexical studies identify several overlapping uses:

This versatility made rēs a natural candidate for philosophical generalization, standing for “whatever there is that can be talked about.”

3.2 Contrasts within Latin Vocabulary

Philosophical and logical writers contrast rēs with more narrowly specified terms:

In scholastic contexts, rēs can function as an umbrella term under which substances, accidents, universals, and sometimes even mental items are considered “things” in a broad logical sense.

3.3 From Ordinary “Thing” to Logical Object

As logical theory develops, rēs is used to name:

• the res significata: what a term signifies;
• the res that makes a proposition true (or false);
• the items over which quantifiers range.

Thus, while in everyday Latin rēs might refer to a lawsuit or a political crisis, in scholastic logic it can refer indifferently to substances, qualities, relations, or even complex states of affairs, insofar as these can be targets of predication and modality.

This widening and abstracting of the semantic field underlies the later technical sense of de re as “with respect to the thing” in a logical or metaphysical sense, not merely in ordinary discourse about affairs.

4. Pre-Philosophical and Classical Usage

Before its technical philosophical employment, dē rē appears in classical Latin as a common prepositional phrase with non‑specialized meanings.

4.1 Common Collocations

Writers such as Cicero, Livy, and Caesar use dē rē (often followed by an attributive adjective) to mark the subject matter under discussion:

These constructions signal topical focus rather than any metaphysical thesis about “things.”

4.2 Stylistic and Rhetorical Functions

In oratory and historiography, dē rē helps structure discourse:

• distinguishing talk about the matter itself from talk about persons, strategies, or words;
• marking transitions between topics (“as to this matter, …”);
• emphasizing objectivity or practicality, as when Cicero contrasts dē rē with purely formal or stylistic concerns.

Illustrative examples include:

"

Sed dē rē satis dictum est.
(But enough has been said about the matter.)

— Cicero, De Officiis

Here dē rē introduces no technical notion of “object,” but simply what has been under discussion.

4.3 Philosophical Echoes without Technicality

Classical philosophical Latin (e.g., Cicero’s translations of Plato and Aristotle, Lucretius’ Epicurean poetry) occasionally uses rēs in contexts that approach later metaphysical concerns—such as discussions of rerum natura (the nature of things). Yet the explicit opposition de re / de dicto is not a formal pair in this period.

There are, however, rudimentary contrasts between:

• examining the things themselves (ipsae rēs), and
• examining names, arguments, or speeches.

These classical tendencies provided linguistic resources that late antique and medieval thinkers could refine into logical distinctions involving de re attributions, but the phrase itself remained pre‑theoretical in the classical era.

5. Medieval Scholastic Crystallization

In medieval scholasticism, de re becomes a semi‑technical marker within systematic theories of signification, supposition, and modality.

5.1 Background: Words, Concepts, and Things

Scholastics often distinguished three “orders”:

De re is used when a logical feature—such as modality or quantity—is said to pertain to the thing signified rather than to a word or proposition.

5.2 De Re in Theories of Supposition

In accounts of suppositio, a term’s “standing for” can be analyzed as:

• de re: the term stands for the thing itself in the world;
• as opposed to uses where a term stands for a word, a universal, or a proposition.

For instance, in “homo est species” (man is a species), homo is not taken de re as an individual human but rather in a logical or universal sense.

5.3 De Re Modality in Scholastic Logic

Treatises De modalibus differentiate:

• modus de dicto: a modality (e.g., necessity) attached to the whole proposition;
• modus de re: a modality attached to the subject or predicate as such.

John Buridan and William of Ockham provide influential discussions. A simplified example:

• De dicto: “It is necessary that every human is an animal” – necessity of the entire enunciation.
• De re: “Every human is necessarily an animal” – necessity ascribed to the human as such.

Debates focused on how these readings correspond to underlying mental propositions and to the metaphysical status of the properties involved.

5.4 Systematic Pairing with De Dicto

By the high scholastic period, de re is regularly contrasted with de dicto in:

• modal logic,
• discussions of obligation and future contingents,
• treatments of belief, knowledge, and divine omniscience.

The pair becomes a standard analytical tool for distinguishing whether a logical operator targets a thing or a saying, thereby crystallizing the technical use that would later be inherited and reformulated in early modern and contemporary frameworks.

6. The De Re / De Dicto Distinction in Logic

In logic, the de re / de dicto distinction specifies different readings of sentences containing modalities, quantifiers, or propositional attitude verbs.

6.1 General Characterization

• A de dicto reading attributes a modal or attitudinal operator to a proposition or sentence.
• A de re reading attributes that operator to an object (or thing) with respect to one of its properties.

The same surface sentence can often be read in both ways, yielding different logical forms and sometimes different truth conditions.

6.2 Paradigm Examples

Consider:

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(1) Necessarily, every bachelor is unmarried.
(2) Every bachelor is necessarily unmarried.

Sentence (1) is usually treated de dicto: it says that the proposition “every bachelor is unmarried” is necessary (true in all possible worlds). Sentence (2) invites a de re reading: for each individual bachelor, being unmarried is a necessary property. The first seems trivially true by definition; the second is more contentious, since an individual bachelor might have married.

Formally, one influential way to distinguish them is:

Similarly, with attitudes:

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(3) Alice believes that the tallest spy is dangerous.
(4) There is someone Alice believes (of him) that he is dangerous.

(3) is standardly de dicto; (4) is de re, quantifying into the attitude context.

6.3 Logical Significance

The distinction matters for:

• validity of inferences under substitution of co‑referential terms (opaque contexts);
• the proper scope of quantifiers and modal operators;
• determining whether certain commitments (e.g., to essences or object‑dependent attitudes) have been made.

Different logical systems—medieval, early modern, and contemporary—formulate the distinction within their own notational frameworks, but the core idea remains the contrast between about the saying and about the thing within inferential practice.

7. De Re Modality and Essential Properties

De re modality concerns what an individual thing could or must be like, rather than merely the modal status of propositions. It is closely associated with the notion of essential properties.

7.1 De Re vs. De Dicto Modality

A modal claim can be read:

• De dicto: necessity or possibility of a proposition.
  Example: “Necessarily, all triangles have three sides” – the sentence is true in every possible world.
• De re: necessity or possibility ascribed to a specific object with respect to a property.
  Example: “This triangle must have three sides” – the object itself is such that in any world where it exists, it has three sides.

The latter kind of claim is typically tied to the object’s essence.

7.2 Essential vs. Accidental Properties

Within de re modality, a property P of an object a is often classified as:

De re modal statements are then used to express essentialist theses, e.g.:

• “Socrates is necessarily human” (if humanity is essential to Socrates).
• “Socrates is contingently snub‑nosed” (if that feature could have been otherwise).

7.3 Historical and Systematic Variants

Different traditions articulate de re modality in distinct ways:

• Medieval scholastics invoke the nature or form of a thing.
• Early modern thinkers, such as Leibniz, ground de re necessity in complete concepts.
• Contemporary modal logicians often treat de re necessity in terms of accessibility relations over possible worlds and rigid designation.

7.4 Debates about De Re Essentialism

Proponents of robust de re modality argue that many everyday and scientific judgments implicitly presuppose essential properties: e.g., an element’s atomic number, a person’s origin, or an organism’s species. Critics contend that such de re attributions risk reintroducing controversial metaphysical doctrines or that they can be paraphrased into safer de dicto forms.

The logical distinction between modal scope readings thus intersects with substantive metaphysical disagreements about what, if anything, objects must be like in themselves.

8. De Re Belief and Propositional Attitudes

In the analysis of propositional attitudes—belief, desire, hope, fear, and so on—the de re / de dicto distinction differentiates ways in which a subject’s attitude may depend on objects versus descriptions.

8.1 De Dicto Attitudes

A de dicto belief is directed at a proposition under a particular description. For instance:

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(1) Sarah believes that the winner of the race cheated.

Here, Sarah’s belief is about the proposition “the winner of the race cheated,” regardless of who in fact won. If a different person had won, the content could have changed, even if Sarah’s belief state remained similar in some respects.

8.2 De Re Attitudes

A de re belief involves a relation to an object itself, possibly under misdescription. For example:

"

(2) There is a particular runner, Alex, such that Sarah believes of Alex that he cheated.

In formal terms, some analyses represent (2) by quantifying over individuals outside the belief operator and then applying the operator to an open formula, capturing belief about the thing rather than only about a description.

8.3 Formal and Semantic Treatments

Modern semantic accounts employ:

• objectual quantification into attitude contexts (as in Kaplan’s “Quantifying In”);
• relational structures where a believer bears a belief‑about relation to an individual and a property;
• possible‑worlds or informational models where de re attitudes track stable links between thinkers and objects across counterfactual scenarios.

These frameworks aim to explain intuitive data such as:

• substitution failures in opaque contexts (co‑referential names not being interchangeable);
• the difference between “Lois believes that Superman can fly” and “Lois believes of Clark Kent that he can fly.”

8.4 Philosophical Implications

Discussions center on whether de re attitudes require:

• a causal or perceptual connection between subject and object,
• a special kind of “object‑dependent” content,
• or can be reduced to complex de dicto structures together with background facts.

Competing views attempt to accommodate everyday ascriptions of belief “about” particular things while respecting logical constraints on quantification and substitution.

9. Leibniz and Early Modern Developments

In early modern philosophy, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz plays a prominent role in reshaping de re notions within a framework of essences and possible worlds.

9.1 Complete Concepts and Individual Essences

Leibniz holds that each individual substance has a complete concept containing all predicates that are ever true of it. A property is necessary de re for an individual when it flows from this complete concept. Thus:

"

“In the notion of each individual substance is contained once and for all everything that will ever happen to it.”

— Leibniz, Discourse on Metaphysics §13

On this view, de re necessity involves what belongs to an individual’s nature across all possible worlds in which that individual exists.

9.2 De Re vs. De Dicto in Leibnizian Modality

Leibniz distinguishes:

• truths of reason, often necessary in virtue of their form or conceptual content (closer to de dicto),
• from truths of fact, which concern contingent states of the world but may be necessary given God’s choice of the best possible world.

Yet, because the complete concept of an individual includes all its future states, Leibniz can describe certain features as necessary for that individual (de re), even when the corresponding propositions appear contingent before God’s creative decision.

9.3 Influence on Later Essentialism

Leibniz’s combination of:

• individual essences,
• a space of possible worlds, and
• a rigorous identity criterion (sometimes associated with what later became known as Leibniz’s Law),

provides a historical template for later de re essentialist thinking. Subsequent authors adopt, modify, or react against these ideas when discussing necessary properties of individuals and cross‑world identity.

9.4 Other Early Modern Figures

Other early modern thinkers also touch on de re themes, though they may not use the terminology:

• Descartes associates essences with what can be clearly and distinctly perceived as belonging to a substance.
• Spinoza talks about modes following from the essence of substance with a kind of necessity.
• Locke differentiates real from nominal essences, which has implications for de re vs. de dicto interpretations of modal judgments about kinds.

Leibniz’s explicit linkage of individual concepts with necessity, however, forms the clearest bridge between scholastic discussions of res and contemporary debates on de re modality.

10. Quine’s Critique of De Re Modality

In the twentieth century, W. V. O. Quine mounted a sustained critique of de re modality, raising doubts about its coherence and ontological commitments.

10.1 Opaque Contexts and Quantifying In

Quine highlights that modal operators create opaque contexts, where substitution of co‑referential terms may fail to preserve truth:

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(1) Necessarily, 9 > 7.
(2) The number of planets = 9.
(3) Therefore, necessarily, the number of planets > 7.

(3) appears invalid, since the number of planets could have been different. Quine argues that attempts to “quantify into” such contexts, producing statements like:

"

∃x (x = 9 ∧ □(x > 7)),

yield de re attributions of necessity to objects (here, the number 9) and invite essentialism: the doctrine that objects have necessary properties beyond purely logical or definitional ones.

10.2 Skepticism about Essentialism

Quine regards essentialist talk as dependent on a background choice of description or conceptual scheme. For him, attributing necessity to an object independently of the language used to describe it is philosophically suspect. He thus prefers to treat modality, if at all, in a strictly de dicto way within regimented, extensional languages.

10.3 Alternative Strategies

Quine suggests that many de re modal claims can be paraphrased or avoided by:

• eliminating modal operators in favor of set‑theoretic or extensional constructions,
• restricting quantification to extensional contexts,
• or treating modal idioms as belonging to a “deviant” logic not suitable for canonical scientific language.

He famously characterizes quantified modal logic as “a jungle” of unclear commitments, recommending caution in entering it.

10.4 Impact on Subsequent Debates

Quine’s critique framed de re modality as a test case for the acceptability of intensional logics and essentialist metaphysics. Later proponents of de re necessity, such as Kripke, formulate their views partly in response to Quinean worries, seeking to show that de re attributions can be made precise without collapsing into arbitrary or language‑relative essentialism.

11. Kripke, Rigid Designation, and De Re Necessity

Saul Kripke significantly reshaped discussions of de re modality through his notions of rigid designation and necessary a posteriori truths.

11.1 Rigid vs. Non‑Rigid Designators

Kripke defines:

• a rigid designator as an expression that designates the same object in every possible world in which that object exists;
• a non‑rigid (or flaccid) designator as one that may designate different objects in different worlds.

Proper names like “Aristotle” and certain natural‑kind terms like “water” are presented as paradigmatic rigid designators, whereas definite descriptions such as “the teacher of Alexander” typically are not.

11.2 De Re Necessity via Rigid Designation

Rigid designation enables de re modal claims by anchoring cross‑world talk to a specific object. For example:

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(1) Hesperus = Phosphorus

If “Hesperus” and “Phosphorus” are rigid designators for the same planet, then:

"

(2) Necessarily, Hesperus = Phosphorus

expresses a de re necessity about that object: in any possible world where that planet exists, it is identical with itself, regardless of how it is described.

Similarly, if “water” rigidly designates H₂O, then:

"

(3) Water is H₂O

is, on Kripke’s view, necessarily true de re, even though it was discovered empirically.

11.3 Necessary A Posteriori and Essential Properties

Kripke’s framework allows for statements that are:

Necessary a posteriori truths are typically interpreted as expressing essential properties de re (e.g., having a certain chemical composition, having particular parents, or originating from a given sperm and egg).

11.4 Response to Quinean Concerns

Kripke contends that once rigid designation is clearly distinguished from mere descriptive synonymy, de re modal claims need not depend on arbitrary descriptions or conceptual schemes. This is taken by many to answer Quinean worries about language‑relativity and to legitimize quantified modal logic with objectual, de re readings.

The resulting picture places de re necessity at the center of contemporary debates about identity, kind‑membership, and cross‑world individuation.

12. Formal Treatments in Modal Logic

Formal modal logic offers precise tools for representing de re and de dicto readings of sentences, especially those involving quantifiers and intensional operators.

12.1 Basic Possible-Worlds Framework

Standard Kripke semantics for modal logic introduces:

• a set of possible worlds,
• an accessibility relation between worlds,
• an interpretation assigning extensions to predicates at each world.

Modal operators □ (“necessarily”) and ◊ (“possibly”) are interpreted as quantifying over accessible worlds.

12.2 De Dicto in Formal Semantics

A typical de dicto reading of:

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Necessarily, every F is G

is represented as:

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□ ∀x (F(x) → G(x)),

which requires the formula ∀x(F → G) to be true at every accessible world.

12.3 De Re via Objectual Quantification

A de re reading often inverts the scope of quantifier and modality:

"

∀x (F(x) → □ G(x)),

which says that for each object satisfying F at the actual world, that same object has property G in every accessible world where it exists. This treatment presupposes rigid domains or identity across worlds for individuals.

12.4 Varying Domains and Barcan Formulas

When domains of quantification vary across worlds, additional issues arise. Formulas such as the Barcan Formula and its converse govern the interaction of □ with ∀x and affect the interpretation of de re quantification. Some logicians accept these principles; others reject them to avoid strong ontological commitments.

12.5 Propositional Attitudes and Intensional Operators

For attitudes like belief, modal logicians and semanticists introduce specialized operators (e.g., B_a for “a believes that”). De re readings may be captured by:

• quantifying into the scope of attitude operators,
• or employing two‑place or relational attitude predicates (e.g., BelievesAbout(a, b, φ(b))).

Alternative frameworks—such as Montague semantics, intensional type theory, or hyperintensional logics—provide increasingly fine‑grained distinctions, aiming to represent how a single sentence can support multiple de re and de dicto readings.

12.6 Alternative Formal Approaches

Other formalisms address de re phenomena without standard possible worlds, including:

• algebraic and neighborhood semantics,
• property theory and world‑indexed predicates,
• dependence/independence logics that track informational constraints on quantification.

Each framework offers different resources for modeling the object‑directedness that characterizes de re attributions while preserving logical rigor.

13. De Re and De Dicto in Philosophy of Mind

In philosophy of mind, the de re / de dicto distinction is used to analyze the aboutness (intentionality) of mental states.

13.1 Intentional Content and Object-Dependence

A mental state, such as a belief or perception, may be said to have:

• de dicto content: a proposition the subject entertains under a specific mode of presentation;
• de re content: a relation to an object itself, where the state’s individuation may depend on that object.

For example, a person may think “the author of Hamlet was a genius” (de dicto) while also having a belief about Shakespeare (de re), even if they do not know that Shakespeare is the author of Hamlet.

13.2 Causal and Informational Theories

Many theories of mental content link de re attitudes to:

• causal connections (e.g., perception, memory, communication);
• informational channels that reliably track objects in the environment.

On such views, a belief is de re when there is an appropriate external relation between thinker and object, beyond internal descriptive representations.

13.3 Externalism and Object-Dependent Thoughts

Some philosophers argue that certain thoughts are object‑dependent: they could not exist unless the relevant object existed. For instance, a demonstrative thought “that man is dangerous” is sometimes treated as de re in a strong sense: its content is partly constituted by the particular man perceived.

Others resist strong externalism, holding that mental content can be fully described in purely internal, perhaps de dicto, terms; de re descriptions of attitudes are then derivative or pragmatic.

13.4 Indexicals, Demonstratives, and the Essential Indexical

Indexical expressions (“I,” “here,” “now,” “that”) play a central role in de re attitudes. Analyses inspired by work such as John Perry’s on the essential indexical emphasize that certain action‑guiding states cannot be captured purely by de dicto propositions; they involve a first‑person or demonstrative perspective tightly connected to specific objects or positions.

13.5 Phenomenology of Aboutness

Some discussions extend beyond formal semantics to phenomenological questions: whether experiencing something as “this particular object” involves a distinctive type of intentional directedness that de re / de dicto terminology helps illuminate. Different theories propose competing accounts of how such object‑involving phenomenology relates to underlying representational structures.

14. Translation Challenges and Terminological Debates

Translating de re into modern languages raises both linguistic and philosophical difficulties.

14.1 Literal vs. Technical Translation

Literally, de re means “about the thing” or “concerning the thing.” However, these renderings do not always capture its technical use in logic and metaphysics. Translators and commentators face choices such as:

As a result, many authors leave both expressions in Latin, especially in analytic philosophy and medieval studies.

14.2 Historical Shifts and Anachronism

The meaning of de re in scholastic texts is shaped by concepts like suppositio, intentiones, and the res significata. Applying contemporary glosses such as “objectual quantification” or “rigid designation” risks anachronism. Scholars debate how far later uses can be projected back:

• Some argue that the core contrast between talk about words and talk about things is stable.
• Others caution that medieval res does not straightforwardly match modern notions of “object” or “entity.”

14.3 Cross-Linguistic Issues

In non‑English scholarship, alternative expressions appear:

• French: de re often retained, but sometimes paraphrased as à propos de la chose or objectuel.
• German: de re retained, or glossed as sachbezogen or gegenstandsbezogen.
• Italian and Spanish: similar patterns, with the Latin kept as a term of art.

These variations can subtly influence interpretation, especially where native terms carry additional connotations.

14.4 Terminological Extensions

The de re / de dicto distinction has been extended beyond modality and attitudes to areas like:

• knowledge (de re vs. de dicto knowledge),
• obligation and permission,
• semantics of generics and kind terms.

Some philosophers question whether these extensions preserve the original contrast or merely repurpose the labels for loosely analogous phenomena.

14.5 Debates about Retention vs. Replacement

There is ongoing discussion about whether to:

• preserve the Latin terms to signal historical continuity and theoretical neutrality, or
• replace them with more transparent vernacular expressions (e.g., “object‑involving” vs. “description‑involving” readings).

Each option has trade‑offs regarding accessibility, precision, and the risk of importing contemporary frameworks into historical texts.

15. Comparative Perspectives: Medieval vs. Analytic Uses

Although medieval scholastics and contemporary analytic philosophers both employ the de re / de dicto contrast, they do so within quite different theoretical environments.

15.1 Different Background Ontologies and Logics

Consequently, res in medieval texts can include a wider range of metaphysical items than the “objects” of many analytic systems.

15.2 Placement of the De Re / De Dicto Contrast

• Medieval: primarily within discussions of modes of predication, supposition, and mental propositions; modalities are often analyzed in terms of how they modify subject or predicate in a proposition.
• Analytic: prominently within the semantics of quantified modal logic and propositional attitudes, using possible‑worlds models and formal syntax to differentiate scope relations.

15.3 Roles in Argumentation

In scholastic debates, the distinction helps:

• diagnose fallacies involving the shift of modality or quantity,
• evaluate theological claims about divine knowledge, future contingents, and necessity.

In analytic debates, it is used to:

• analyze essentialist claims, identity across possible worlds, and reference,
• clarify substitution failures and opacity phenomena.

15.4 Continuities and Discontinuities

Some scholars see a substantive continuity: both traditions distinguish whether a logical operator targets words/propositions or things. Others emphasize discontinuity, arguing that:

• the medieval res significata is more tightly integrated with theories of intentionality and mental language;
• analytic objects are often abstracted from such psychologistic considerations, embedded instead in model‑theoretic structures.

15.5 Methodological Reflections

Comparative work raises methodological questions:

• To what extent can medieval uses be reconstructed in modern formal idioms without distortion?
• Are analytic de re/de dicto distinctions implicitly reliant on metaphysical assumptions (e.g., robust essences) more akin to medieval frameworks than is often acknowledged?

Different historians and systematic philosophers provide divergent answers, shaping how they relate medieval and analytic uses of de re within a larger narrative of logical and metaphysical development.

16. Related Concepts and Contrasting Terms

The term de re sits within a network of related concepts and oppositions in logic, metaphysics, and philosophy of language.

16.1 De Dicto

The primary contrasting term is de dicto (“about the saying/proposition”), designating attributions where:

• modalities, attitudes, or other operators apply to a content (sentence, proposition, description),
• rather than to an object with respect to its properties.

The de re / de dicto pair is thus a structural tool for analyzing scope and target of operators.

16.2 Rigid Designation and Objectual Quantification

In contemporary settings, rigid designators and objectual quantification are often invoked to explicate de re readings:

• Rigid designators fix reference to the same object across worlds.
• Objectual quantifiers range over objects rather than syntactic entities.

Both notions are conceptually close to, but not identical with, de re. Some authors caution against conflating them, arguing that de re talk can be articulated in other frameworks as well.

16.3 Essential vs. Accidental Properties

The essential/accidental distinction is frequently expressed in de re modal terms: an essential property is something an object has necessarily, an accidental property something it has contingently. While not definitional of de re, these notions are commonly intertwined with de re modality.

16.4 Intensionality and Opaque Contexts

Intensionality refers to contexts where substitution of co‑referential terms may change truth value. Such opaque contexts—generated by modal, epistemic, and attitudinal operators—are where de re / de dicto distinctions become salient. Related terms include:

16.5 Object-Dependent and Object-Independent Thoughts

In philosophy of mind and language, object‑dependent thoughts (requiring the existence of a particular object) are frequently aligned with de re attitudes, while object‑independent or purely descriptive thoughts align with de dicto attitudes. This mapping is debated, but the terminology is often used in tandem.

16.6 Other Analogous Distinctions

Various adjacent distinctions sometimes play similar roles:

• token‑reflexive vs. non‑token‑reflexive contents,
• relational vs. non‑relational semantics for attitudes,
• wide vs. narrow content.

These frameworks offer alternative vocabularies for describing phenomena that the de re / de dicto pair also aims to capture, and discussions often compare their explanatory power.

17. Applications in Contemporary Metaphysics

Contemporary metaphysics employs de re notions across several central debates.

17.1 Essentialism and Identity Across Worlds

De re modality underpins many accounts of:

• essential properties of individuals (e.g., having a certain origin, belonging to a certain natural kind),
• identity across possible worlds, where an object’s cross‑world counterpart is said to share its essential properties.

Metaphysicians use de re language to formulate claims such as:

• “This table could not have been made of ice” (essential material),
• “I could not have been a different human being” (essential origin or haecceity).

Competing theories—e.g., origin essentialism, counterpart theory, haecceitism—present different understandings of these de re judgments.

17.2 Natural Kinds and Laws of Nature

Debates about natural kinds often invoke de re necessity:

• If being H₂O is essential to water, then necessarily, water is H₂O;
• If being gold is essentially having atomic number 79, then no object lacking that number could be gold.

Similarly, some accounts of laws of nature treat them as de re constraints on how particular kinds of entities must behave, rather than merely de dicto regularities among propositions.

17.3 Metaphysical Grounding and Dependence

Recent work on grounding and metaphysical dependence sometimes distinguishes:

• de re grounding claims: one thing’s existence or nature grounds another’s,
• from de dicto claims about what follows from certain descriptions.

For instance, a statement like “facts about mental states are grounded in physical facts” may be interpreted as asserting a de re dependence of mental properties on physical ones.

17.4 Modal Realism and Anti-Realism

Positions on modal realism (the reality of possible worlds) influence how de re modality is understood:

• Robust realists treat de re necessities as facts about objects’ behavior in other concrete or abstract worlds.
• Actualists and ersatzers may instead construe de re talk as constrained by descriptions of possibilities or by sentential surrogates.

Debates concern whether de re modality requires a strong ontological commitment to non‑actual possibilities or can be fully analyzed in more deflationary terms.

17.5 Personal Identity and Survival

In theories of personal identity, de re claims about what a person could or could not survive (e.g., brain transplant, fission, radical psychological change) are central. Different criteria of identity—bodily, psychological, or mixed—yield divergent de re judgments about which scenarios involve “the same person,” and these are often expressed using de re modal locutions.

Across these and other areas, de re vocabulary offers a way of formulating fine‑grained metaphysical theses about how particular things must or could be.

18. Applications in Semantics and Pragmatics

In contemporary semantics and pragmatics, de re distinctions are used to model context‑sensitive meaning, reference, and speaker intentions.

18.1 Scope Ambiguities and Semantic Representation

Many natural‑language sentences exhibit scope ambiguities that correspond to de re / de dicto readings. Formal semantic theories (Montague grammar, type‑theoretic semantics, dynamic semantics) represent these by:

• alternative scope assignments for quantifiers and intensional operators,
• variable binding strategies enabling quantification into intensional contexts.

For example, a sentence like:

"

Every student believes they will pass

can support readings where each student’s belief is de dicto (about “I will pass”) or de re (about the actual person who is that student).

18.2 Attitude Reports and Embedded Clauses

Semantic analyses of attitude reports (belief, desire, hope, fear) treat de re readings as involving:

• res‑indexed variables or world‑indexed individual concepts,
• or dedicated mechanisms like res‑movement in syntactic‑semantic interfaces.

These tools aim to explain why:

• co‑referential expressions are not always interchangeable under attitude verbs,
• but certain inferences involving anaphora, pronouns, and donkey sentences still go through.

18.3 Indexicals, Demonstratives, and Direct Reference

Semantics of indexicals (“I,” “here,” “now”) and demonstratives (“this,” “that”) often attribute de re aspects to their reference. Kaplan’s framework distinguishes character (context‑sensitive rule) and content, with direct reference to objects playing a key role in de re truth conditions.

Pragmatic considerations—such as pointing, shared perceptual attention, and common ground—shape when a hearer interprets an utterance as attributing a de re or de dicto attitude.

18.4 Pragmatic Enrichment and Speaker Intentions

Pragmatics investigates how speakers choose between de re and de dicto formulations to achieve communicative goals, including:

• emphasizing particular individuals or objects,
• hedging commitments about identity or description,
• exploiting ambiguity for politeness or plausible deniability.

For example, saying “Someone in this room is a spy” (and intending a specific person) can invite a de re interpretation, even if the literal content is compatible with a purely existential, de dicto reading.

18.5 Cross-Linguistic Phenomena

Cross‑linguistic semantics examines how other languages mark de re / de dicto contrasts, using:

• dedicated particles or evidential markers,
• variation in quantifier scope possibilities,
• differences in the behavior of pronouns and indexicals.

Findings suggest both universal pressures (tied to general intensionality) and language‑specific strategies, providing a broader empirical basis for theorizing about de re interpretation in natural language.

19. Ongoing Controversies and Open Questions

Despite extensive work, several issues concerning de re notions remain contested.

19.1 The Metaphysical Status of De Re Necessity

Debate continues over whether de re necessities reflect:

• objective features of reality (robust essentialism),
• constraints imposed by our conceptual schemes or linguistic practices,
• or merely convenient ways of summarizing more basic de dicto facts.

Disagreement persists on how to adjudicate between these interpretations and what empirical or theoretical criteria are relevant.

19.2 Reduction to De Dicto vs. Irreducibility

Some philosophers attempt to reduce de re claims to complex de dicto structures plus background facts about reference and description. Others argue that de re attributions are irreducible and that any such reduction fails to preserve intuitive distinctions, particularly in attitude reports and cross‑world identity judgments.

19.3 Object-Dependence and Empty Names

Questions arise about how to treat:

• attitudes apparently directed at non‑existent or fictional objects,
• de re claims involving empty names or failed reference.

Do these cases show that de re talk presupposes problematic entities, or can they be handled via fictionalist or descriptive strategies?

19.4 Hyperintensionality and Fine-Grained Content

Standard possible‑worlds semantics identifies propositions with sets of worlds, which may be too coarse‑grained for many purposes. Hyperintensional logics and structured propositions offer alternatives, but it remains disputed how de re / de dicto distinctions should be formulated in such frameworks and whether they are altered or sharpened by finer content individuation.

19.5 Cross-Linguistic and Cognitive Constraints

Empirical research in linguistics and cognitive science raises questions about:

• whether all languages encode de re / de dicto contrasts in comparable ways,
• how children acquire sensitivity to such distinctions,
• and whether there are universal cognitive mechanisms underpinning object‑involving thought.

Findings in these areas may support or challenge philosophical claims about the centrality or even the coherence of de re attitudes.

19.6 Methodological and Historical Questions

Scholars also debate:

• how to interpret historical uses of de re without projecting modern frameworks backward,
• whether medieval and contemporary uses are genuinely continuous,
• and how much weight technical de re/de dicto distinctions should bear in broader metaphysical and semantic theorizing.

These and related questions continue to motivate work at the intersection of logic, language, mind, and metaphysics.

20. Legacy and Historical Significance

The notion of de re has had a lasting impact across multiple domains of philosophy and logic.

20.1 From Latin Phrase to Technical Term

What began as a common Latin prepositional phrase evolved into a term of art in medieval scholasticism, where it structured sophisticated analyses of suppositio, modality, and the relation between words, thoughts, and things. This scholastic legacy shaped early modern thought, particularly through figures like Leibniz, and helped transmit a conceptual toolkit for distinguishing different targets of predication and modality.

20.2 Role in the Development of Modal Logic

In the twentieth century, debates over quantified modal logic, essentialism, and the legitimacy of intensional operators frequently turned on how to understand de re claims. Quine’s critique and subsequent responses motivated refinements of formal semantics and sharpened awareness of the logical complexities of object‑directed modalities.

20.3 Influence on Philosophy of Language and Mind

The de re / de dicto distinction has become standard vocabulary in the analysis of propositional attitudes, reference, and indexicality. It informs discussions of:

• the semantics of attitude reports,
• the nature of direct reference and rigid designation,
• the structure of object‑dependent thoughts and perceptual states.

This has led to more nuanced theories of linguistic meaning and mental content.

20.4 Integration into Metaphysical Debates

In contemporary metaphysics, de re notions are central to:

• essentialism about individuals and kinds,
• theories of personal identity,
• accounts of laws of nature and grounding.

Disputes about the legitimacy and interpretation of de re modality continue to shape broader views about what there is and how it could be.

20.5 Continuing Relevance

Today, de re remains a key cross‑disciplinary concept linking historical scholarship, formal logic, and systematic philosophy. Its enduring significance lies in providing a concise way to pose a fundamental question: when we speak, think, or theorize, are we talking about our descriptions, or about the things themselves? Different answers to this question have structured major developments in logic, metaphysics, and the philosophy of language from antiquity to the present.