Higher-order Vagueness, Radical Unclarity, and Absolute Agnosticism
Philosophers' Imprint 10 (10):1-30 (2010)
| Abstract | The paper presents a new theory of higher-order vagueness. This theory is an improvement on current theories of vagueness in that it (i) describes the kind of borderline cases relevant to the Sorites paradox, (ii) retains the ‘robustness’ of vague predicates, (iii) introduces a notion of higher-order vagueness that is compositional, but (iv) avoids the paradoxes of higher-order vagueness. The theory’s central building-blocks: Borderlinehood is defined as radical unclarity. Unclarity is defined by means of competent, rational, informed speakers (‘CRISPs’) whose competence, etc., is indexed to the scope of the unclarity operator. The unclarity is radical since it eliminates clear cases of unclarity and, that is, clear borderline cases. This radical unclarity leads to a (bivalence-compatible, non-intuitionist) absolute agnosticism about the semantic status of all borderline cases. The corresponding modal system would be a non-normal variation on S4M. | |||||||||
| Keywords | vagueness higher-order vagueness agnosticism epistemology contextualism semantics | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,672 |
| External links |
  Try with proxy. Try with proxy. |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesSusanne Bobzien (2011). In Defense of True Higher-Order Vagueness. Synthese 180 (3):317-335.
Diana Raffman (2009). Demoting Higher-Order Vagueness. In Sebastiano Moruzzi & Richard Dietz (eds.), Cuts and Clouds. Vaguenesss, its Nature and its Logic. Oxford University Press.
Susanne Bobzien (2013). Higher‐Order Vagueness and Borderline Nestings: A Persistent Confusion. Analytic Philosophy 54 (1):1-43.
Elia Zardini (2013). Higher-Order Sorites Paradox. Journal of Philosophical Logic 42 (1):25-48.
Timothy Williamson (1999). On the Structure of Higher-Order Vagueness. Mind 108 (429):127-143.
Stewart Shapiro & Patrick Greenough (2005). Stewart Shapiro. Context, Conversation, and so-Called 'Higher-Order Vagueness'. Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 79 (1):147–165.
Susanne Bobzien (2012). If It's Clear, Then It's Clear That It's Clear, or is It? Higher-Order Vagueness and the S4 Axiom. In B. Morison K. Ierodiakonou (ed.), Episteme, etc. OUP UK.
Patrick Greenough (2005). Contextualism About Vagueness and Higher-Order Vagueness. Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 79 (1):167–190.
Crispin Wright (2009). The Illusion of Higher-Order Vagueness. In Richard Dietz & Sebastiano Moruzzi (eds.), Cuts and Clouds. Vaguenesss, its Nature and its Logic. Oxford University Press.
Patrick Greenough (2003). Vagueness: A Minimal Theory. Mind 112 (446):235-281.
Michael Tye (1994). Why the Vague Need Not Be Higher-Order Vague. Mind 103 (409):43-45.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2010-12-28Total downloads74 ( #11,126 of 549,065 )Recent downloads (6 months)11 ( #6,012 of 549,065 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
