rigid designator

British

noun

logic an expression that identifies the same individual in every possible world: for example, "Shakespeare" is a rigid designator since it is possible that Shakespeare might not have been a playwright but not that he might not have been Shakespeare

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Water is a rigid designator, while “the substance that fills the lakes and oceans” is descriptive.

From New York Times

The term “rigid designator,” which has entered the Oxford English Dictionary, defines the type of linguistic expression that refers to the same thing in all possible worlds, as opposed to a descriptive designator, which may not.

From New York Times

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023