However, it does not help here since the central features you posit for “Vladimir” do not distinguish the Vladimirs of the world from the Borises, Ivans, Dmitris, etc. The features you mention are all features we derived from the fact that we know that these are Russian male names.

Now, “Russian” and “male” are meaningful words and there are features associated with them, so we are not surprised that the features of the word “Russian” or the phrase “Russian male” conjures up mental images.

Yes, this is a stereotype, and like all stereotypes will often be wrong – but it is still knowledge of a ‘class’ and different to my knowledge of my friend Vladimir. After all, your knowledge of the ‘class’ of birds is not foolproof either, and you may plausibly misidentify a bird.

I will try to prove this by asking you a question: what is more birdlike, a sparrow or an ostrich? Both are birds; both fall into the class of ‘birds’. But I would argue that a sparrow is more ‘birdy’ than an ostrich. It has more of the features of a bird than an ostrich does (flight, for example). In much the same way, my stereotype of Vladimir has a number of features which individuals may or may not meet. In this respect at least, it is as much a ‘class’ as ‘bird’ and certainly far removed from my own personal knowledge of an individual Vladimir.

Ah, I’m just bored at work. Not sure if this is even a serious point I’m making…

If I knew someone named Vladimir, and saw another Vladimir, I would not be able to recognize the new Vladimir on the basis of what I know about the first one, as someone named ‘Vladimir’. I would only see a human being who could be called ‘Vladimir’, among a 1000 other possible names—if he speaks Russian.

Someone has to tell me that this person’s name is ‘Vladimir’. When I see a new bird, no one has to tell me that it is a bird. I know that automatically from my knowledge of the features of the class of birds that I have stored somewhere in my mind.

These mentally stored features of classes of things are what we call ‘meaning’. My memoriy of what Vladimir looks like and is called are is a recollection of what the noun ‘Vladimir’ refers to for me personally. It is a wholly different kind of memory unit.

But what if I ask you, “What does a Percival look like?” or “What does a Vladimir look like?” You might find it easier to answer these questions than, “What does fruit look like?” or, “What does furniture look like?”