Extension and Meaning

Pointing to an object usually involves extending a finger, hand, and/or an arm in the direction of it.  Thus, the 'extension' of a term could, with linguistic justification, be its referent.  However, such an act is a specific event, so the generalization of 'extension', common in Contemporary Semantic Theory, to every exemplification of a term, abstracts from a distinctive facet of Referring, and, hence, from that justification.  Accordingly, even less grounded is the use of 'extension' by Nominalists, for whom the Word-Object relation is, quite to the contrary, a contraction from the latter to the former.  Now, Russell's misuse is more complicated, the apparent product of an effort to reconcile Nominalism with Logicism, e. g. his concept of Number abstracts from its exemplifications, and, yet, entails relations that he posits as independent of empirical experience.  So, for him, a non-oriented, inert version of 'extension' mediates that reconciliation--it correlates Word/Number and Object, with neither pole as prior.  Thus, like Descartes' version, it reflects a systematic exigency, rather than nay Philosophical insight into the process of Extending.