The unity of linguistic meaning The problem of the unity of the proposition is almost as old as philosophy itself and was one of the central themes of early analytical philosophy greatly exercising the minds of Frege Russell Wittgenstein and Ramsey. The problem is how propositions or meanings can be simultaneously unities (single things) and complexes made up of parts that are autonomous of the positions they happen to fill in any given proposition. The problem has been associated with numerous paradoxes and has motivated general theories of thought and meaning but has eluded any consensual resolution; indeed the problem is sometimes thought to be wholly erroneous a result of atomistic assumptions we should reject. In short the problem has been thought to be of merely historical interest. Collins argues that the problem is very real and poses a challenge to any theory of linguistic meaning. He seeks to resolve the problem by laying down some minimal desiderata on a solution and presenting a uniquely satisfying account. The first part of the book surveys and rejects extant solutions and dismissals of the problem from (especially) Frege and Russell and a host of more contemporary thinkers