What is the Problem of Non-Existence?

Philosophia 40 (3):417-434 (2012)
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Abstract

It is widely held that there is a problem of talking about or otherwise representing things that not exist. But what exactly is this problem? This paper presents a formulation of the problem in terms of the conflict between the fact that there are truths about non-existent things and the fact that truths must be answerable to reality, how things are. Given this, the problem of singular negative existential statements is no longer the central or most difficult aspect of the problem of non-existence, despite what some philosophers say

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Tim Crane
Central European University

Citations of this work

Conversational Exculpature.Daniel Hoek - 2018 - Philosophical Review 127 (2):151-196.
Nonexistent objects.Maria Reicher - 2019 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Intentionality: Some Lessons from the History of the Problem from Brentano to the Present.Dermot Moran - 2013 - International Journal of Philosophical Studies 21 (3):317-358.
There Are Intentionalia of Which It Is True That Such Objects Do Not Exist.Alberto Voltolini - 2013 - International Journal of Philosophical Studies 21 (3):394-414.

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References found in this work

The Varieties of Reference.Gareth Evans - 1982 - Oxford: Oxford University Press. Edited by John Henry McDowell.
Word and Object.Willard Van Orman Quine - 1960 - Cambridge, MA, USA: MIT Press.
Intentionality: An Essay in the Philosophy of Mind.John R. Searle - 1983 - New York: Oxford University Press.
The representational character of experience.David J. Chalmers - 2004 - In Brian Leiter (ed.), The Future for Philosophy. Oxford University Press. pp. 153--181.
On Denoting.Bertrand Russell - 1905 - Mind 14 (56):479-493.

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