This closely relates to the internalist/description theory of meaning in philosophy. The theory said, if we refer to something, we do so via a mental representation (“meanings are in the head”), which is something we can verbalize as a description. A few decades ago, some philosophers objected that we are often able to refer to things we cannot define, seemingly refuting the internalist theory in favor of an externalist theory (“meanings are not in the head”). For example, we can refer to gold even if we we aren’t able to define it via its atomic number.
However, the internalist/description theory only requires that there is some description that identifies gold for us, which doesn’t necessarily mean we can directly define what gold is. For example, “the yellow metal that was highly valued throughout history and which chemists call ‘gold’ in English” would be sufficient to identify gold with a description. Another example: You don’t know at all what’s in the box in front of you, but you can refer to its contents with “The contents of the box I see in front of me”. Referring to things only requires we can describe them at least indirectly.
This closely relates to the internalist/description theory of meaning in philosophy. The theory said, if we refer to something, we do so via a mental representation (“meanings are in the head”), which is something we can verbalize as a description. A few decades ago, some philosophers objected that we are often able to refer to things we cannot define, seemingly refuting the internalist theory in favor of an externalist theory (“meanings are not in the head”). For example, we can refer to gold even if we we aren’t able to define it via its atomic number.
However, the internalist/description theory only requires that there is some description that identifies gold for us, which doesn’t necessarily mean we can directly define what gold is. For example, “the yellow metal that was highly valued throughout history and which chemists call ‘gold’ in English” would be sufficient to identify gold with a description. Another example: You don’t know at all what’s in the box in front of you, but you can refer to its contents with “The contents of the box I see in front of me”. Referring to things only requires we can describe them at least indirectly.