The Semantics and Pragmatics of the Term ‘God’

This thesis explores the semantics and pragmatics of the term ‘God’. The purpose is to build a linguistic framework in which to place existing philosophical work in The Philosophy of Religion. The thesis argues that the dominant methodological approaches for defining ‘God’ before argumentation fail to capture the nature of religious beliefs. A range of proposals are considered, including Perfect Being Semantics, Causal Theories of Reference, Hybrid Theories, and Descriptivism. It is argued that ‘God’ should be modelled as a title term. The consequences of such a view are considered for topics in Philosophy of Religion such as religious diversity, religious disagreement, and religious debate.