Is “a=a” known a <i>posteriori</i>?

Abstract

Stavroula Glezakos has claimed that statements of the form a=a (i. e., instances of the so called law of identity) are on equal epistemic status as statements of the form a=b, and so known a posteriori. She justifies her claim on the basis of certain empirically possible uses of names. But, as we explain in this brief paper, the law of identity relevant for the cases of proper names considered by Glezakos is the pragmatic version of such a law and not the one considered in her paper. The intended target of Glezakos’ paper is the law of identity, in abstraction from pragmatic considerations. Once we take into account the relevant version of the law of identity, it will be clear that Glezakos’ cases and examples have no force at all and do not show that identities of the form a=a are known a posteriori.