Denotation [noun]

To fix the connotation of a concrete name, or the denotation of the corresponding abstract, is to define the name.

The denotation of this eery evil tread of ruined lives grated terribly on Lem's highly tensioned nerves.

It is common to distinguish two aspects, meaning and denotation, such phrases as "the author of Waverley."

For if the denotation alone were relevant, any other phrase with the same denotation would give the same proposition.

A second reason is that propositions concerning "the so-and-so" are possible even when "the so-and-so" has no denotation.

If, then, we are asserting identity of denotation, we must not mean by denotation the mere relation of a name to the thing named.

If we call its meaning M', our proposition becomes "Scott is the denotation of M'."

In fact, it would be nearer to the truth to say that the meaning of "Scott" is the denotation of "the author of Waverley."

"The denotation of M," like "the author of Waverley," has both meaning and denotation, on the theory we are examining.

Hence it naturally comes to be supposed that the denotation is part of the proposition in which the description occurs.