 An initial problem with meaning holism is that it seems to conflict with the presumed compositionality of language (Fodor &amp; Lepore 2002). Semantics is supposed to explain, among other things, how the meanings of sentences and complex terms are a function of the meanings of their parts, and meaning holism appears to stand in the way of such an approach. If meaning were, say, inferential role, then the inferential role of, for instance, “pet fish” would follow from the inferential roles of “pet” and “fish”, but while one can typically infer “weighs less than three ounces” from “is a pet fish”, this inference follows neither from “is a pet” or “is a fish” nor from a combination of those two sets of inferences. In short, they argue: