This chapter introduces two of the most fundamental questions in the philosophy of language. These are the question of the nature of things that we assert, the problem of propositions; and the question of the relation between language and the world. Frege has advanced a classical account of propositions, the idea that a proposition is the sense of a sentence. It is argued that Frege’s views are mistaken, and that Russell’s views point the way forward.
Keywords: philosophy of language, problem of propositions, Frege,