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Summary

Perhaps the answers to ontological questions turn on facts about our conventions—how we have collectively decide to think and talk about reality. Some even think of ontological questions as being answerable only relative to a given conceptual, linguistic, or theoretical framework. (Both views come in limited forms  as well, applied to specific ontological questions-- like whether there are fictional entities, possible worlds, or even macro-sized objects.) This category covers a range of metaontological views in the vicinity.

Key works Carnap 1950 Goodman 1978 Putnam 1981 Putnam 1987 Sidelle 1992 Sosa 1999 Hirsch 2005 Chalmers 2009 Thomasson 2007
Introductions Classic works in themselves, there is enough introductory material in the following papers that they may serve as useful beginning points: Sidelle 1992 Sosa 1999 Hirsch 2005 Chalmers 2009 Thomasson 2007. Views of this sort are also surveyed in the introduction to Wasserman et al 2009.
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105 found
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  1. What is the difference between conceptual and moral relativism? Rejecting the nature-value contrast, with help from Joseph Raz.Terence Rajivan Edward - manuscript
    I aim to undermine an account of the difference between conceptual and moral relativism according to which conceptual relativism focuses on the description of nature and moral relativism on values. I do so with some help from Joseph Raz.
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  2. Can We Be Skeptical About A Priori Knowledge?Sherif Salem -
    In this paper, we present a dialectical argument for a priori skepticism (i.e. the thesis that we can be skeptical about a priori knowledge). Then, we propose a framework that combines elements from inferential contextualism and logical conventionalism to offer a weak transcendental argument against a priori skepticism.
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  3. The Rise and Fall of the Mind-Body Problem.Katalin Balog - forthcoming - In Corine Besson, Anandi Hattiangadi & Romina Padro (eds.), Meaning, Modality and Mind: Essays Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of Naming and Necessity. Oxford University Press.
    In this paper, I examine the relationship between physicalism and property dualism in the light of the dialectic between anti-physicalist arguments and physicalist responses. Upon rehearsing the moves of each side, it is hard not to notice that there is a puzzling symmetry between dualist attacks on physicalism and physicalist replies. Each position can be developed in a way to defend itself from attacks from the other position, and it seems that there are neither a priori nor a posteriori grounds (...)
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  4. What is Logical Monism?Justin Clarke-Doane - forthcoming - In Christopher Peacocke & Paul Boghossian (eds.), Normative Realism. Oxford University Press.
    Logical monism is the view that there is ‘One True Logic’. This is the default position, against which pluralists react. If there were not ‘One True Logic’, it is hard to see how there could be one true theory of anything. A theory is closed under a logic! But what is logical monism? In this article, I consider semantic, logical, modal, scientific, and metaphysical proposals. I argue that, on no ‘factualist’ analysis (according to which ‘there is One True Logic’ expresses (...)
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  5. Relativism. [REVIEW]Ali Hossein Khani - forthcoming - The Philosophical Quarterly:1-3.
  6. The Relative Identity of All Objects: Tiantai Buddhism Meets Analytic Metaphysics.Li Kang - forthcoming - Ergo: An Open Access Journal of Philosophy.
    According to Zhiyi 智顗 (538–597), the founder of the Chinese Buddhist Tiantai school 天臺宗, “one object is all objects;” hence, all objects are profoundly interconnected. In this paper, I critically examine Zhiyi’s metaphysics of objects as presented in the historical Tiantai texts and subsequently develop a contemporary and accessible thesis of interconnectedness by integrating Zhiyi’s views with resources from contemporary analytic philosophy, particularly relative identity. By drawing on Zhiyi’s insights and incorporating contemporary philosophical ideas, I also illustrate how historical Chinese (...)
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  7. What is Real?Lajos L. Brons - 2023 - Organon F: Medzinárodný Časopis Pre Analytickú Filozofiu 30 (2):182–220.
    Two of the most fundamental distinctions in metaphysics are (1) that between reality (or things in themselves) and appearance, the R/A distinction, and (2) that between entities that are fundamental (or real, etcetera) and entities that are ontologically or existentially dependent, the F/D distinction. While these appear to be two very different distinctions, in Buddhist metaphysics they are combined, raising questions about how they are related. In this paper I argue that plausible versions of the R/A distinction are essentially a (...)
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  8. Solving the Mystery of Mathematics.Jared Warren - 2023 - Philosophy Now Magazine 157:16-19.
    This is a magazine article discussing the philosophy of mathematics and arguing for mathematical conventionalism, written for a non-academic audience. (As often happens with popular articles, the editors made some changes that I'm not completely happy with, e.g., the titled section headings and sub-title).
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  9. Ontological Deflationisim and Metaphysical Realism.Ataollah Hashemi - 2022 - Perspectives About Truth: Truths About Truth.
  10. Présentation: L’ontologie métascientifique.François Maurice - 2022 - Mεtascience: Discours Général Scientifique 2:7-15.
    Les débats sur les liens qui uniraient la science à l’ontologie sont très actifs en philosophie contemporaine, et, en fait, ils ont toujours été présents. Malgré les diverses positions philosophiques sur le sujet, elles admettent toutes l’existence d’une réalité métaphysique. À l’opposé, la métascience soutient qu’une telle réalité n’existe pas. Ce second numéro de Mɛtascience présente sept articles sur douze qui ont comme fil conducteur soit l’ontologie métascientifique soit l’ontologie bungéenne.
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  11. On The Persistence of Absolute Metaphysics.Gustavo Picazo - 2022 - Logos and Episteme 13 (4):417-419.
    Greenwood (2019) casts doubts upon whether a certain view about social groups (the view that social groups persist throughout changes in their membership, by virtue of the maintenance of their structure or function) is a fundamental metaphysical truth about social groups, rather than a theoretical truth about some or many social groups. In this note, I introduce a distinction between absolute and relative metaphysics, and argue that there are no 'fundamental metaphysical truths‘ (as Greenwood conceives of them) at all. If (...)
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  12. Relativity in a Fundamentally Absolute World.Jack Spencer - 2022 - Philosophical Perspectives 36 (1):305-328.
    This paper develops a view on which: (a) all fundamental facts are absolute, (b) some facts do not supervene on the fundamental facts, and (c) only relative facts fail to supervene on the fundamental facts.
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  13. The Problem of Religious Relativism: An Interreligious Approach.Subhasis Chattopadhyay - 2021 - Indian Catholic Matters.
    This post is one in a series of posts about the ground-realities of interreligious dialogue. Interreligious dialogue is not the same as ecumenism. And this blog-post shows how Christian and Hindu celibates have veered to discussing categories which are inapplicable to one or the other religion. To quote part of the post: "So the first critique of interreligious dialogue that needs clarification is this problem of religious relativism. The Sanatana Dharma does not admit of relativism, moral or religious because there (...)
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  14. Is Conceptual Relativism a Prerequisite for Philosophy as Conceptual Engineering?Pavol Labuda - 2021 - Filozofia 76 (1):3-17.
    The aim of the paper is to examine whether conceptual relativism is a prerequi-site for conceptual engineering (and if so, then to what extent). In the first part of the paper, I explore and classify varieties of relativism to prepare a distinctive definition of conceptual relativism. In the second part I analyse conceptual relativism and I consequently propose two different readings of conceptual scheme: (i) conceptual scheme as a monolithic, timeless, and determinate systems of meanings, and (ii) conceptual scheme as (...)
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  15. Rejoinder to Kris McDaniel.Andrew Brenner - 2020 - Philosophy East and West 70 (2):565-569.
    I would like to thank Kris McDaniel for his reply. In my original response to McDaniel I say that, given his interpretation of the distinction between conventional and ultimate truth, we would no longer be able to employ certain powerful arguments in favor of the thesis that persons are merely conventionally existent, and it would turn out that the thesis that persons are merely conventionally existent doesn't have some of the important implications that proponents of that thesis generally take it (...)
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  16. Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz’s Views on Ontology.Artur Kosecki - 2020 - Kriterion - Journal of Philosophy 34 (3):99-116.
    This article will address the views of Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz - the leading representative of the Lvov-Warsaw School. I will present arguments proving that the Polish philosopher could have anticipated contemporary metaontological discussions. -/- In the first part, I will provide a profile of Ajdukiewicz as a representative of the Lvov-Warsaw School. I will outline the assumptions of his metaepistemological projects: radical conventionalism and semantic epistemology. In the second part, I will argue that the former project resulted in views on existence (...)
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  17. The threat of thinking things into existence.Kathrin Koslicki - 2020 - In Luis R. G. Oliveira & Kevin Corcoran (eds.), Common Sense Metaphysics: Essays in Honor of Lynne Rudder Baker. New York: Routledge. pp. 113-136.
    According to the account of artifacts developed by Lynne Rudder Baker, artifacts have a certain “proper function” essentially. The proper function of an artifact is the purpose or use intended for the artifact by its “author(s)”, viz., the artifact’s designer(s) and/or producer(s). Baker’s account therefore traces the essences of artifacts back indirectly to the intentions of an artifact’s original author (e.g., its inventor, maker, producer or designer). Like other “author-intention-based” accounts (e.g., those defended by Amie Thomasson, Simon Evnine, and others), (...)
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  18. Shadows of Syntax: Revitalizing Logical and Mathematical Conventionalism.Jared Warren - 2020 - New York, USA: Oxford University Press.
    What is the source of logical and mathematical truth? This book revitalizes conventionalism as an answer to this question. Conventionalism takes logical and mathematical truth to have their source in linguistic conventions. This was an extremely popular view in the early 20th century, but it was never worked out in detail and is now almost universally rejected in mainstream philosophical circles. Shadows of Syntax is the first book-length treatment and defense of a combined conventionalist theory of logic and mathematics. It (...)
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  19. On Ajdukiewicz's and Quine's Views on Ontology.Artur Kosecki - 2019 - Kriterion - Journal of Philosophy 33 (2):49-66.
    The aim of the paper is to analyze the views of Willard van Orman Quine and compare them with the views of Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz, an eminent philosopher from the Lvov-Warsaw School. I will argue that Ajdukiewicz's approach to ontology is deationary and, in that respect, similar to Quine's. In my analysis of these two ontological stances, I would like to refer to Price's deationist interpretation of Quine's views in order to highlight the similarity between Ajdukiewicz's views and Quine's stance on (...)
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  20. Eliminativism: the Problem of Representation and Carnapian Metametaphysics.Krzysztof Poslajko - 2019 - Acta Analytica 34 (2):181-195.
    The aim of this paper is to propose a new reading of eliminative materialism concerning propositional attitudes, along the lines of broadly understood Carnapian metametaphysics. According to the proposed reading, eliminativism should be seen as a normative metalinguistic claim that we should dispose of terms like “beliefs” and associated linguistic rules. It will be argued that such reading allows a significant philosophical problem which besets eliminativism to be solved: the problem of representation. The general idea of the problem of representation, (...)
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  21. Metaphysics — Low in Price, High in Value: A Critique of Global Expressivism.Catherine Legg & Paul Giladi - 2018 - Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 54 (1):64.
    Pragmatism’s heartening recent revival (spearheaded by Richard Rorty’s bold intervention into analytic philosophy Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature) has coalesced into a distinctive philosophical movement frequently referred to as ‘neopragmatism’. This movement interprets the very meaning of pragmatism as rejection of metaphysical commitments: our words do not primarily serve to represent non-linguistic entities, but are tools to achieve a range of human purposes. A particularly thorough and consistent version of this position is Huw Price’s global expressivism. We here critically (...)
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  22. Ontology After Carnap Edited by Stephan Blatti and Sandra Lapointe Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 241, £45 ISBN: 9780199661985. [REVIEW]Karl Egerton - 2017 - Philosophy 92 (1):135-142.
  23. Review of C. Rovane, The Metaphysics and Ethics of Relativism (Harvard University Press, 2013). [REVIEW]Diego E. Machuca - 2017 - Journal of Moral Philosophy 14 (4):463-466.
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  24. Taking the concepts of others seriously.Terence Rajivan Edward - 2016 - Meta: Research in Hermeneutics, Phenomenology, and Practical Philosophy 8 (1):143-153.
    This paper assesses an argument against the representationalist tradition in anthropology: the tradition of reporting how a cultural group represents the world. According to the argument, anthropologists working within this tradition cannot take the concepts of those they study seriously. I defend the representationalist tradition against this argument.
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  25. Make ontology easy again: Amie Thomasson: Ontology Made Easy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015, xiii+345pp, $53.00 HB. [REVIEW]Greg Frost-Arnold - 2016 - Metascience 25 (3):497-500.
    A book review of Amie Thomasson's defense of Neo-Carnapianism in her "Ontology Made Easy" (2015, Oxford UP).
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  26. A Snowslide of Entities. Does Sosa's Existential Relativism Provide a Barrier Against Being Buried?Markus Seidel & Alexander Thinius - 2016 - In Bahr Amrei & Seidel Markus (eds.), Ernest Sosa. Targeting His Philosophy. Springer. pp. 101-118.
    This paper discusses Sosa’s via media between existential relativism and absolutism. We discuss three implications of Sosa’s account which require some further clarification. First, we distinguish three alternative readings of Sosa’s account – the indexicalist, the homonymist and the (proper) relativist reading – and argue that they differ with respect to two crucial points: (a) they lead to different analyses of the lack of disagreement in existential discourse, and (b) they differ with respect to the question of whether conceptual schemes (...)
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  27. Frameworks and Deflation in “Empiricism, Semantics and Ontology” and Recent Metametaphysics.Alan Sidelle - 2016 - In Stephan Blatti Sandra Lapointe (ed.), Ontology after Carnap. pp. 59-80.
    ABSTRACT: Rudolf Carnap’s “Empiricism, Semantics and Ontology” (ESO) has received a good deal of sympathetic interest over the years from philosophers who are not particularly sympathetic to verificationism, or suspicious of metaphysics in general. Recent work has favorably cited ESO in connection with doubts about the genuine content of debates in the metaphysics of material objects. But, when we look at how Carnap introduces his central notion of a ‘framework’, and the questions he wants to use it to deflate, there (...)
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  28. Metaontological Deflationism in the Aftermath of the Quine-Carnap Debate.Jonathan Egeland - 2015 - Kriterion - Journal of Philosophy 29 (2):33-52.
    With metaphysical philosophy gaining prominence in the aftermath of the Quine-Carnap debate, not only has it become assumed that the Quinean critique leaves ontological pluralism behind as an untenable approach, but also that the same is true of deflationism more generally. Building on Quine’s criticisms against the analytic-synthetic distinction and the notion of quantifier variance, contemporary metaphysicians like van Inwagen and Sider continue to argue for the untenability of deflationary approaches to metaontology. In this paper I will argue that Quine’s (...)
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  29. Pyrrhonian Relativism.Diego Machuca - 2015 - Elenchos: Rivista di Studi Sul Pensiero Antico 36 (1):89-114.
    This paper argues that Sextus Empiricus’s Pyrrhonism is a form of relativism markedly different from the positions typically referred to by this term. The scholars who have explored the relativistic elements found in Sextus’s texts have claimed that his outlook is not actually a form of relativism, or that those elements are inconsistent with his account of Pyrrhonism, or that he is confusing skepticism with relativism. The reason for these views is twofold: first, when employing the term ‘relativism’ one hardly (...)
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  30. Conventionalism, Consistency, and Consistency Sentences.Jared Warren - 2015 - Synthese 192 (5):1351-1371.
    Conventionalism about mathematics claims that mathematical truths are true by linguistic convention. This is often spelled out by appealing to facts concerning rules of inference and formal systems, but this leads to a problem: since the incompleteness theorems we’ve known that syntactic notions can be expressed using arithmetical sentences. There is serious prima facie tension here: how can mathematics be a matter of convention and syntax a matter of fact given the arithmetization of syntax? This challenge has been pressed in (...)
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  31. Quantifier Variance and the Collapse Argument.Jared Warren - 2015 - Philosophical Quarterly 65 (259):241-253.
    Recently a number of works in meta-ontology have used a variant of J.H. Harris's collapse argument in the philosophy of logic as an argument against Eli Hirsch's quantifier variance. There have been several responses to the argument in the literature, but none of them have identified the central failing of the argument, viz., the argument has two readings: one on which it is sound but doesn't refute quantifier variance and another on which it is unsound. The central lesson I draw (...)
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  32. Animal Interrupted, or Why Accepting Pascal's Wager Might Be the Last Thing You Ever Do.Sam Baron & Christina Dyke - 2014 - Southern Journal of Philosophy 52 (S1):109-133.
    According to conventionalist accounts of personal identity, persons are constituted in part by practices and attitudes of certain sorts of care. In this paper, we concentrate on the most well-developed and defended version of conventionalism currently on offer (namely, that proposed by David Braddon-Mitchell, Caroline West, and Kristie Miller) and discuss how the conventionalist appears forced either (1) to accept arbitrariness concerning from which perspective to judge one's survival or (2) to maintain egalitarianism at the cost of making “transfiguring” decisions (...)
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  33. Review of: Reading Putnam, by Maria Baghramian (ed.). [REVIEW]Tim Button - 2014 - Mind 123 (490):569-575.
    Reading Putnam consists largely of papers from the fantastic ‘Putnam @80’ conference (organised by Maria Baghramian in 2007) together with replies from Hilary Putnam. Given the diversity of Putnam’s work, the papers in this collection cover many different topics. This makes the collection difficulty to read but, ultimately, extremely rewarding. In this review, I focus on the contributions from Michael Devitt, Charles Parsons, Richard Boyd, Ned Block, Charles Travis and John McDowell, together with Putnam’s responses. My aim is to highlight (...)
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  34. Review of The Construction of Logical Space by Agustín Rayo. [REVIEW]Cian Dorr - 2014 - Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 201406.
  35. The Flying Termite.Laszlo Katona (ed.) - 2014 - Vernon Press.
    ABSTRACT of The Flying Termite by L.L. Katona -/- In this book I would like to show the term “intelligence“ has a universal, non-anthropomorphic meaning. We can perceive intelligence in dogs, dolphins or gorillas without understanding of it, but intelligence can be also seen in many other things from insects and the Solar System to elementary particles or the rules of a triangle. But that doesn’t mean intelligence comes from Intelligent Design, yet alone a Designer, they seems to be the (...)
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  36. Antirealist Essentialism.Jonathan Livingstone-Banks - 2014 - Dissertation, University of Leeds
    This project is an investigation into the prospects for an antirealist theory of essence. Essentialism is the claim that at least some things have some of their properties essentially. Essentialist discourse includes claims such as “Socrates is essentially human”, and “Socrates is accidentally bearded”. Historically, there are two ways of interpreting essentialist discourse. I call these positions ‘modal essentialism’ and ‘neo-Aristotelian essentialism’. According to modal essentialism, for Socrates to be essentially human is for it to be necessary that he be (...)
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  37. Hysteria, race, and phlogiston. A model of ontological elimination in the human sciences.David Ludwig - 2014 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 45 (1):68-77.
    Elimination controversies are ubiquitous in philosophy and the human sciences. For example, it has been suggested that human races, hysteria, intelligence, mental disorder, propositional attitudes such as beliefs and desires, the self, and the super-ego should be eliminated from the list of respectable entities in the human sciences. I argue that eliminativist proposals are often presented in the framework of an oversimplified “phlogiston model” and suggest an alternative account that describes ontological elimination on a gradual scale between criticism of empirical (...)
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  38. The Deontic Cycling Problem.William Simkulet - 2014 - Philosophical Analysis 31:49-64.
    In his recent article “Deontic Cycling and the Structure of Commonsense Morality,” Tim Willenken argues that commonsense ethics allows for rational agents having both ranked reasons (A > B, B > C, and A > C) and cyclical reasons (A < B, B < C, and A > C). His goal is to show that not all plausible views are variations of consequentialism, as consequentialism requires ranked reasons. Here I argue apparent instances of deontic cycling in commonsense morality are the (...)
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  39. Relativity and Degrees of Relationality.Jack Spencer - 2014 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 92 (2):432-459.
    Some well-known metaphysical arguments against relativism rest on the claim that relativity somehow must be accompanied by relationality. I argue otherwise, and trace the consequences for some prominent disputes between relativists and absolutists.
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  40. Ontology Made Easy.Amie Lynn Thomasson - 2014 - New York: Oup Usa.
    Existence questions have been topics for heated debates in metaphysics, but this book argues that they can often be answered easily, by trivial inferences from uncontroversial premises. This 'easy' approach to ontology leads to realism about disputed entities, and to the view that metaphysical disputes about existence questions are misguided.
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  41. Realism in the Desert.Achille C. Varzi - 2014 - In Massimo Dell’Utri, Fabio Bacchini & Stefano Caputo (eds.), Realism and Ontology without Myths. Cambridge Scholars Press. pp. 16–31.
    Quine’s desert is generally contrasted with Meinong’s jungle, as a sober ontological alternative to the exuberant luxuriance that comes with the latter. Here I focus instead on the desert as a sober metaphysical alternative to the Aristotelian garden, with its tidily organized varieties of flora and fauna neatly governed by fundamental laws that reflect the essence of things and the way they can be, or the way they must be. In the desert there are no “natural joints”; all the boundaries (...)
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  42. The Endurance/Perdurance Controversy is No Storm in a Teacup.Tobias Hansson Wahlberg - 2014 - Axiomathes 24 (4):463-482.
    Several philosophers have maintained in recent years that the endurance/perdurance debate is merely verbal: these prima facie distinct theories of objects’ persistence are in fact metaphysically equivalent, they claim. The present paper challenges this view. Three proposed translation schemes are examined; all are shown to be faulty. In the process, constructive reasons for regarding the debate as a substantive one are provided. It is also suggested that the theories may have differing practical implications.
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  43. Dharmakirti, Davidson, and knowing reality.Lajos Brons - 2013 - Comparative Philosophy 3 (1):30-57.
    If we distinguish phenomenal effects from their noumenal causes, the former being our conceptual(ized) experiences, the latter their grounds or causes in reality ‘as it is’ independent of our experience, then two contradictory positions with regards to the relationship between these two can be distinguished: either phenomena are identical with their noumenal causes, or they are not. Davidson is among the most influential modern defenders of the former position, metaphysical non-dualism. Dharmakīrti’s strict distinction between ultimate and conventional reality, on the (...)
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  44. The Limits of Realism.Tim Button - 2013 - Oxford: Oxford University Press UK.
    Tim Button explores the relationship between words and world; between semantics and scepticism. -/- A certain kind of philosopher – the external realist – worries that appearances might be radically deceptive. For example, she allows that we might all be brains in vats, stimulated by an infernal machine. But anyone who entertains the possibility of radical deception must also entertain a further worry: that all of our thoughts are totally contentless. That worry is just incoherent. -/- We cannot, then, be (...)
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  45. Quantifier Variance and Realism: Essays in Metaontology. [REVIEW]David Liebesman - 2013 - Philosophical Review 122 (2):310-314.
  46. Boundaries in Reality.Tuomas E. Tahko - 2013 - In David S. Oderberg (ed.), Classifying Reality. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 41–60.
    This paper defends the idea that there must be some joints in reality, some correct way to classify or categorize it. This may seem obvious, but we will see that there are at least three conventionalist arguments against this idea, as well as philosophers who have found them convincing. The thrust of these arguments is that the manner in which we structure, divide or carve up the world is not grounded in any natural, genuine boundaries in the world. Ultimately they (...)
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  47. Fictionalism in Ontology.Achille C. Varzi - 2013 - In Carola Barbero, Maurizio Ferraris & Alberto Voltolini (eds.), From Fictionalism to Realism. Cambridge Scholars Press. pp. 133–151.
    Fictionalism in ontology is a mixed bag. Here I focus on three main variants—which I label after the names of Pascal, Berkeley, and Hume—and consider their relative strengths and weaknesses. The first variant is just a version of the epistemic Wager, applied across the board. The second variant builds instead on the fact that ordinary language is not ontologically transparent; we speak with the vulgar, but deep down we think with the learned. Finally, on the Humean variant it’s the structure (...)
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  48. Bare and indexical existence: integrating logic and sensibility in ontology.Lajos L. Brons - 2012 - In S. Watanabe (ed.), Logic and Sensibility. Keio University Press.
    This is the published version of a talk on meta-ontology in a conference of a multidisciplinary research project on "logic and sensibility". It argues against univocalism about "existence" and for a variety of perspectivism.
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  49. Questions about 'Internal and External Questions about God'.Natalja Deng - 2012 - Religious Studies 48 (2):257-268.
    This article is an evaluation of Le Poidevin’s use of Carnap ’s stance on ontology within the philosophy of religion. Le Poidevin claims that 1) theists need to take God to be a putative entity within space-time in order for their claim that God exists to be meaningful, and that 2) instrumentalism about theology is viable. I argue that although Le Poidevin’s response to Carnap ’s argument is no less problematic than that argument itself, his position is in fact thoroughly (...)
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  50. Metaontological Minimalism.Øystein Linnebo - 2012 - Philosophy Compass 7 (2):139-151.
    Can there be objects that are ‘thin’ in the sense that very little is required for their existence? A number of philosophers have thought so. For instance, many Fregeans believe it suffices for the existence of directions that there be lines standing in the relation of parallelism; other philosophers believe it suffices for a mathematical theory to have a model that the theory be coherent. This article explains the appeal of thin objects, discusses the three most important strategies for articulating (...)
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