Language

Is philosophy of language and empirical study, since it discusses how humans actually communicate, as opposed to all the ways we hypothetically could communicate?

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Thanks for your message. The philosophy of language is not exclusively interested in how humans actually communicate; it is also interested in the various ways in which we could communicate, where 'we' is not limited to members of our species. Nonetheless, the field is not entirely divorced from empirical considerations. For instance, theories concerned with what it is to *mean* something are sensitive to the cognitive requirements that have to be met for one to do so, and some such theories are at risk because they make empirically implausible predictions about what, for instance, a child would have to know in order to mean anything.

By contrast, some areas of the philosophy of language, such as those that share a border with metaphysics (for instance, theories of propositions) are relatively un-empirical. Most theorizing in such areas can be done "in the armchair." The result is that some areas of the philosophy of language are relatively empirical, while others are not.

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