SUMMARY: R.IVI. Sainsbury’s account of reference has many compeIIing and attractive features. But it has the undesirabie consequence that sentences 0f the form °°x is thinking about y” can never be true when y is repIaced by a non-referring term. Of the two obvious ways to deaI with this probIem within Sainsbury’s framework, I reject one (the anaIysis of thinking about as a propositionaI attitude) and endorse the other (treating °°thinks about” as akin to an intensionaI transitive verb). This endorsement is aIso within the spirit of Sainsbury’s account of reference.