Essay Concerning the Psychological Importance of Proper Names

Kyle Willmore (100819789)

In this essay concerning the psychological importance of proper names, our goal will be
to look at certain aspects of Eros Corazzas work, specifically pertaining to chapter five, and to
challenge or add too what has already been said. In addition, I will then change gears and
develop my own thoughts concerning the psychological importance of names. First I want to
challenge the idea that proper names are not count nouns, second I want to examine the idea that
it is easier to retrieve information under common nouns than it is proper names, third I will
challenge the idea that we cannot possess empty files in our minds, fourth I will discuss what is
said about proper names being considered empathic inducers and how they classify us as
psychologically salient individuals, and finally I will present my own thought concerning the
psychological importance of proper names. In the end, after dissecting chapter five of the
monograph and presenting my own thoughts on the subject, What I hope to have presented are
some good points that will only go to help further the completion of professor Corazzas
monograph.
Firstly I want to begin by discussing the idea that proper names are not count nouns. Now
I am aware that this does not wholly have much to do with he psychological importance of
proper names, but it is a point that is nonetheless brought up in this chapter and it is something
that puzzles me. By definition, a count noun is a word that can be taken in its plural and singular
forms and still make logical sense. Proper names such as John, Kate, etc, however are said not to

be count nouns, but why is that? Let us say for example that we take every John located in
Ontario and placed them in the same place with a sign saying, Johns. Does it not make sense
for someone not named John to look at the group and say perhaps, wow, that is a lot of Johns. It
is understandable that giving a proper name plurality is generally deemed incorrect, but it is not
so strange to think of examples in which that is possible. For a second example, let us assume
that there are three students all named Bob in the same classroom. To me, in such a case it seems
appropriate that one might say, this class has multiple Bobs. With that being said, I do not want
to dwell on this topic too long so I will leave it at this, but I believe that there is something to be
said about the possibility of plurality in proper names.
Next I want to discuss the idea that it is easier to retrieve information under common
nouns than it is proper names. The reason for this is because it is said that proper names are
cognitively more costly than that of other nouns. Here I want pose a question that hopefully
raises a couple concerns. I will no doubt agree that it does appear proper names are more costly
than common nouns, but I feel it is for another reason other than being confirmed by
biological tests, such as Semenzas baker-Baker puzzle. To quickly summarize this particular
puzzle, essentially you tell the subject the name and information pertaining to the picture of a
person and more times than not, the subject has a far easier time recalling the information about
the baker over remembering what that bakers name was. As I just said prior to this example, it is
understandable that proper names cognitively cost more to store, however perhaps they cost
more because of how unorganized proper names are in accordance to common nouns. What I
mean by this is that proper names can represent such a wide variety of things in this world, with
these names being undoubtedly equal in importance to each other. No one proper name has more
significance over another as they are just tags for ideas, nothing more. It appears to me that there
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is a link between proper names and human development, so allow me to explain. Let us say that
we go back a five hundred years and imagine ourselves living in a small community of roughly a
hundred people, something that was certainly existent in this time and obviously even to this day.
Another important point to note is that if we go back to this time five hundred years ago there
was no internet, just simple face to face interaction. Now, under such conditions I think it is
imperative that we realize the cognitive cost of proper names would be far less than it is today.
Remember that there were no such thing as cars and planes so travelling was less convenient and
people in general tended to stay closer to home throughout their lifetime because of that fact. The
freedom we have today allows us to meet and converse with new people every day and it is only
a matter of time before you start getting multiple versions of the same proper name. If we were
to go back five hundred years, the amount of interaction you do with new people will surely fall
and so there are less proper names for you to remember. Living in the here and now we know so
many people, regardless of whether they know us, and this certainly plays a detrimental role in
clarifying proper names as cognitively more costly. Back in a time five hundred years ago, you
knew significantly less people so I feel our ability to store proper names would definitely
increase. Bringing up an important point I mentioned earlier, about how proper names are
disorganized in comparison to common nouns, we need to understand why this is so. Let us say
we take the example of bread, bread everywhere is considered one thing, bread. I can be here in
Ottawa examining some bread and if I decide to go all the way to Los Angeles to look at other
bread, it is still bread. If we flip this situation and instead replace bread with people named Phil,
then there will be some confusion. Every Phil can be completely different from the last and while
bread can certainly take many forms, we can almost always recognize any form of bread as being
bread. With all this being said, I will reiterate that I in no way am trying to show why this

classification of proper names is wrong, but rather that we should take these ideas into
consideration.
The next topic I wish to discuss in this paper concerns the idea that we cannot possess
empty files in our minds. It is said in the previous chapter of Corazzas work, concerning the dual
function of names, that the information in a mental file can be incorrect, such as in the example
of Einstein where if we find out that he did not discover relativity then file is still about him, but
this will not make the file stand for anyone else. With this being said, we can understand that a
counter example to this train of thought will not be something that once was and then ceased to
be, such as in the case of Pluto being once considered a planet and now considered a dwarf
planet. The fact that Pluto is no longer a planet does not erase the content of the file. Now that
we understand this, I will propose an example of which I believe to be a file with no information
in it. Seeing as how we us the metaphor of our mind being a filing cabinet, and a file in real life
can no doubt sometimes contain nothing within it, we too will try to show this can happen
mentally as well. To keep things simple let us assume that I did not know the names of the
planets and a friend jokingly told me that we live on the planet Shmigmere. Now Shmigmere is
not a recognized word so what we have is all this information about the planet earth stored in a
file labeled by a made up word. With this being said now lets say that another friend, and
countless others, tell me that we live on the planet Earth and the planet Shmigmere is not a real
thing. Now all of the information stored under Shmigmere is moved to the file labeled Earth. At
this point what can we say about the file name Shmigmere? The file is obviously not deleted
from our memory because once it was made it is destine to remain their, but I find it hard to
imagine there would be anything remaining in the file. Perhaps I am overlooking the info that
Shmigmere is a word my friend made up to play a practical joke on me. Would this perhaps be

left in the file? At this point I am not entirely positive, but I feel like in the circumstance
presented above what we do get is an empty file, or the closest thing to it.
Now I want to take the time to look at proper names and the emotional impact they have
had on us since its conception. One point I want to discuss is the idea that we can get emotionally
attached to the bearer of a name even if we never knew, or met the individual. I agree that we can
become emotionally connected to someone without having met them face to face, but to say we
can become emotionally connected with someone whom we know nothing about other than there
name seems to go too far for me. I think it is imperative we understand that, unless you are
psychologically unstable like a serial killer, we have a deep rooted love for all people and when
we find out they have died, we are conditioned to feel sad. I do not feel this emotional
connection rests on the shoulders of people bearing a proper name. For example, when the
attacks on the Twin Towers took place on September 11th, I along with countless others, felt sad
for all the innocent people who died that day, but I did not know any of their names. Now fast
forward too 2013 and let us take the example of Paul Walker (star of the Fast and the Furious
movie franchise) who died in a car accident on his way to a charity event. I too felt that same
form of emotional connection, another innocent person who had their life taken far too early, the
only difference here is that I knew the name Paul Walker, but I knew nothing else about Paul
other than the fact he starred in movies. So at this point we have two situations, one in which I
know the proper name, one in which I do not, and yet I find it hard to see a difference in the level
of emotional connectivity between the two scenarios. In both cases innocent lives were lost. With
that being said I feel that there is a difference in emotional connectivity between two people once
we know more about the person. If we take the example of Paul Walker again, I can confidently
say that if another actor such as Robert Downey Jr were to pass away, I would certainly be more

sad because I am a huge fan of his movies and follow his work closely. There is an added
connection between us that was not present with Paul Walker, even though I do not know Robert
personally. From this I like to think that our knowledge of a person directly correlates to the
emotional connection we have with that said person. The more we know about an individual, the
sadder well be if they pass away, and vice versa, if they are a hated war criminal like Hitler, the
easier it will be for us to accept they are gone. In the case of our parents and children, this bears
the largest emotional connection because our knowledge of them is, in a good situation, much
greater. For me, the proof that this does not stem from proper names is realized if we take a look
at wild animals and their children. We can see numerous examples of wild animals showing an
overwhelming amount of compassion for their young and yet they do not possess proper names.
In summary, I feel proper names do not carry with them as much emotional connectivity as is
proposed. It seems to me that the level of emotionality we have bearing towards a particular
individual rests more greatly on our knowledge of that person rather than the fact that they have
a name. It appears, in my mind, that the general connection we have with people is not because
they are named, but because they are human.
Now that I have discussed Corazzas monograph, specifically chapter five concerning the
psychological importance of proper names, I want to present my own thought on this particular
subject. I want to say that I feel it is extremely important, psychologically speaking, that we are
endowed with proper names because of the sense of belongingness it provides. This is something
which is touched upon towards the end of chapter four of the monograph, but why wouldnt we
speak of this in chapter five? It seems to me that proper names give us a grounds to base our
lives. If we were born with no name, our sense of understanding pertaining to who were are as
we grew up would be skewed and uncertain. Different aspects of a name, the first and last to be
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specific, have great importance. The first name we are given provides us with a sense of self, it
gives us the ability to feel like we are our own person. On the other hand our last name provides
us with a sense of belonging, it allows us to be apart of a group. These two things together should
not be taken for granted as I feel they are very important in allowing a person to develop as a
human being. Without these two forms of proper names there would be something missing in the
person and this no doubt would have an effect on them psychologically. I for one, being apart of
the Willmore family, even though I know what family I belong too, have a deep rooted feeling of
wanting to know as much about my family history as possible. Personally, I do not know that
much, but I can only imagine how much greater this sense would be present in someone who is
given no name at all.
With everything that has been said I feel as though I have presented some good
arguments with respect to the psychological importance of proper names. After challenging the
idea that proper names are not count nouns, examining the idea that it is easier to retrieve
information under common nouns than it is proper names, challenging the idea that we cannot
possess empty files in our minds, discussing what is said about proper names being considered
empathic inducers and how they classify us as psychologically salient individuals, and finally
presenting my own thought concerning the psychological importance of proper names, I believe I
have a paper that raises fundamental questions pertaining to the topic. Being someone who has
no background in literature, perhaps my arguments are not as strong as I make them out to be,
but nevertheless I am confident that they will garner some attention.

Bibliography

Corazza, Eros. Proper Names.