Abstract

This article offers an overview of inferential role semantics. We aimto provide a map of the terrain as well as challenging some of the inferentialist’sstandard commitments. We begin by introducing inferentialism andplacing it into the wider context of contemporary philosophy of language. §2focuses on what is standardly considered both the most important test casefor and the most natural application of inferential role semantics: the caseof the logical constants. We discuss some of the (alleged) benefits of logicalinferentialism, chiefly with regards to the epistemology of logic, and considera number of objections. §3 introduces and critically examines the most influentialand most fully developed form of global inferentialism: Robert Brandom’sinferentialism about linguistic and conceptual content in general. Finally, in§4 we consider a number of general objections to IRS and consider possibleresponses on the inferentialist’s behalf.