GREGORY LAVERS CARNAP, SEMANTICS AND ONTOLOGY ABSTRACT. This paper will deal with three questions regarding Carnap’s transition from the position he held at the time of writing Syntax to the doctrines he held during his se- mantic phase: (1) What was Carnap’s attitude towards truth at the time of writing Syntax? (2) What was Carnap’s position regarding questions of reference and ontology at the time of writing Syntax? (3) Was Carnap’s acceptance of Tarski’s analysis of truth and reference detrimental to his philosophical project? Section 1 of this paper will deal with the first of these questions. Special attention will be paid to identifying what it was that prevented Carnap from defining a truth predicate for descriptive languages in Syntax. Section 2 of this paper will deal with the question of Carnap’s attitude towards reference and ontology in Syntax. It will be shown that the attempt in Syntax to address ontological questions is seriously defective. Section 3 of this paper addresses the last of the questions posed above. It is argued that in the light of what is established in Sections 1 and 2, Carnap could not have retained the position of Syntax with respect to truth and reference. INTRODUCTION Carnap thought that one of the main tasks of philosophy was the clarifica- tion of improperly understood notions. At the time of writing The Logical Syntax of Language (Syntax hereafter) Carnap saw the task of clarifying the notion of truth to be, for practical reasons, an impossibility. He also thought that the notion of reference was obscure beyond clarification. Tarski showed him that a precise, simple and fruitful explication of these notions could be given. Alberto Coffa (1991) and Richard Creath (1990) argue that contrary to popular belief, Carnap’s views did not go through a dramatic shift between the time of writing Syntax and his later semantic period. In fact, as they point out, Syntax contains an explication of many semantic notions. However, according to both Warren Goldfarb (1997) and Thomas Ricketts (1996), despite the fact that the move to semantics did not represent a major shift in Carnap’s views, it was still an error. They both contend that had Carnap retained his views on truth and reference he could have more successfully defended his philosophical worldview. This paper will deal with three questions regarding Carnap’s transition from the position he held at the time of writing Syntax to the doctrines he held during his semantic phase: (1) What was Carnap’s attitude towards Erkenntnis 60: 295–316, 2004. © 2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.