works" as clusters of epistemological principles-rules for the evaluation of evidence and assessment of propositions. The effect is that, on this view, ontologists of seemingly different viewpoints are understood not as talking past each other but as assessing the truth of propositions in different ways. This is an interesting and new idea, and very much worth a thorough investigation. References Carnap, Rudolf. (1950) 1956. "Empiricism, Semantics, and Ontology." In Meaning and Necessity, 205–21. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Hirsch, Eli. 2011. Quantifier Variance and Realism: Essays in Metaontology. New York: Oxford University Press. Moore, George Edward. 1939. "Proof of an External World." Proceedings of the British Academy 25, no. 5: 273–300. Pryor, James. 2000. "The Skeptic and the Dogmatist." Noûs 34, no. 4: 517–49. Thomasson, Amie. 2015. Ontology Made Easy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Vera Flocke Indiana University–Bloomington Philosophical Review, Vol. 129, No. 1, 2020 DOI 10.1215/00318108-7890533 Kris McDaniel, The Fragmentation of Being. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017. ixþ 320 pp. According to ontological pluralism, being isn't univocal-there is more than one kind of being or way to exist. And let ontological degreeism be the view that being is gradable-some entities enjoy more being or a greater degree of existence than others. Being fragments just in case either ontological pluralism or degreeism is true. While the idea that being fragments has played an import role in the history of philosophy, it's perhaps an understatement to say that it hasn't held much currency in contemporary analytic metaphysics. In his book The Fragmentation of Being, Kris McDaniel argues, however, that both ontological pluralism and degreeism are reasonable and fruitful views deserving of our consideration. The first six chapters of The Fragmentation of Being are devoted to ontological pluralism. In the first chapter McDaniel develops a version of this thesis that combines elements of views articulated by Heidegger and Theodore Sider. According to this Sideggerian view, while the unrestricted quantifier captures a generic notion of being, there are special restricted quantifiers that both capture more specific notions of being and are more natural (i.e., carve reality B O O K R E V I E W S 149 Downloaded from https://read.dukeupress.edu/the-philosophical-review/article-pdf/129/1/149/726468/149trogdon.pdf by VPI/SU user on 17 January 2020 closer to the joints) than the unrestricted quantifier. (Importantly, these special restricted quantifiers aren't mere restrictions of the unrestricted quantifier, for in this case the latter would be more natural than the former.) The view follows Heidegger in taking there to be both various specific modes of being in addition to a general, overarching form of being. And the view follows Sider in extending David Lewis's notion of naturalness from predicates and their semantic values to other linguistic items such as quantifier expressions and their semantic values. The second chapter focuses on the broadly Aristotelian idea that there is a metaphysical form of analogy. According to McDaniel, analogous properties are general properties that, while more natural than disjunctive properties, are less natural than their various "specifications" or "analogue instances" (52). (And analogousness, like naturalness, is also said to apply to ingredients of reality in addition to predicates and properties.) McDaniel sketches what he takes to be reasonable ontological views relative to which existence is plausibly regarded as being analogous in nature. He discusses views, for example, that distinguish between concrete and abstract existence as well as atemporal and temporally relativized existence. Chapters 3 through 6 are devoted to arguing that ontological pluralism is useful to our theorizing about time, ontological categories, "almost nothings," and persons, respectively (140). Each chapter appeals to a special case of the Sideggerian view: while the unrestricted quantifier isn't perfectly natural, there are various perfectly natural restricted quantifiers. As for time, McDaniel formulates an A-theory of time (a theory according to which the present is in some way metaphysically distinguished), which states that existence is analogous. For McDaniel, two specifications of existence are "past existence" and "present existence" (78). Among the perfectly natural restricted quantifiers, one ranges over past entities and another over present entities. Turning to ontological categories, McDaniel articulates a novel version of the view that ontological categories are ways of being. The perfectly natural restricted quantifiers represent ontological categories, so to belong to an ontological category is to fall within the range of one of these special quantifiers. With respect to almost nothings such as holes, cracks, and shadows, McDaniel claims that they are "beings by courtesy," where being-by-courtesy is another specification of existence understood as an analogous property (146). An entity is a being by courtesy just in case it falls within the range of the unrestricted quantifier but not any perfectly natural quantifier. Turning to persons, McDaniel states that we're metaphysically distinguished-we're "fully real" in particular-just in case we fall within the range of one of the perfectly natural restricted quantifiers (170). For McDaniel, a sufficient condition for being fully real in this sense is to instantiate some perfectly natural property. McDaniel canvases various proposals according to which we instantiate such properties, though he ultimately doesn't endorse any particular proposal. B O O K R E V I E W S 150 Downloaded from https://read.dukeupress.edu/the-philosophical-review/article-pdf/129/1/149/726468/149trogdon.pdf by VPI/SU user on 17 January 2020 The remaining chapters are devoted to ontological degreeism. In the seventh chapter McDaniel clarifies the notion of degrees of existence by considering various accounts of its relation to the notion of degreed naturalness. One proposal flows from the Sideggerian take on ontological pluralism: for x to exist to degree n is for the most natural quantifier that ranges over x to be natural to degree n. Another proposal, one that McDaniel prefers, reverses the direction of definition: for x to be natural to degree n is for x to exist to degree n. The eighth and ninth chapters are devoted to arguing that ontological degreeism is useful to our theorizing about grounding and essence, respectively. Supposing that grounding is a relation between facts, and degreed existence is one measure of "ontological superiority" among many, McDaniel proposes that we define grounding roughly as follows: for one fact to ground another is for the former to be ontologically superior to the latter (e.g., the former exists to a higher degree than the latter) and for these facts to stand in a "connective relation" or a chain of such relations (237, 239, resp.). The connective relations are characterized by the fact that they induce relations of ontological superiority on their relata-a two-place relation R is a connective relation just in case it's necessary that x bears R to y just in case x is ontologically superior to y. The connective relations at issue in the definition of grounding are relations between facts in particular-McDaniel suggests that modal entailment between facts, fact determination, fact constitution, and disjunction formation between facts are candidate connective relations between facts. Turning to essence, McDaniel's discussion is wide-ranging. One of the many proposals he considers is this: the particular essence facts (e.g., part of what it is to be Ranger is that x is Ranger only if x is a dog) are grounded by general facts about the essences of different types of things, and these general essence facts in turn are grounded by facts concerning the ontological categories, which are represented by the special perfectly natural restricted quantifiers. As my selective summary of the book indicates, this is an ingenious work replete with interesting and often surprising proposals and distinctions. And, while I didn't stress this above, another virtue of the book is its sustained and fruitful engagement with a host of historical figures, some of which (happily) are outside of the Western tradition. As McDaniel states in the postscript, his project involves taking some "old ideas"-that there are modes and degrees of being- and putting them in "new clothing," so as to connect them to the concerns of contemporary analytic metaphysicians (290). In my view, McDaniel has succeeded in this task. I'll end with some brief critical remarks that focus on ontological degreeism. I worry about the proposed theoretical applications of this thesis, particularly the definition of grounding. And, as we will see below, McDaniel has his own concerns about the proposal, ones that I think he might underestimate. I have three general concerns. B O O K R E V I E W S 151 Downloaded from https://read.dukeupress.edu/the-philosophical-review/article-pdf/129/1/149/726468/149trogdon.pdf by VPI/SU user on 17 January 2020 First, it strikes me that the notion of a connective relation is underdeveloped. McDaniel claims that the inventory of connective relations between facts is to be established by doing (first-order) metaphysics-if we think, for example, that there are determinable and determinate properties, then we should also think that there is a connective relation-fact determination-holding between facts concerning the instantiation of these properties. Now, metaphysics is hard, so I don't expect McDaniel to propose what is in his estimation an exhaustive list of the connective relations between facts. Still, without having at least some idea (however provisional) of what such a list might look like, it's hard to evaluate the plausibility of McDaniel's proposed definition of grounding, specifically whether there are cases of bare grounding (cases in which one fact grounds another yet these facts don't stand in connective relations or chains of such relations).1 The second concern is related to the first-as McDaniel himself notes, there are straightforward grounding claims that, if true, apparently involve bare grounding. McDaniel mentions the following case: the fact that x is intrinsically desired by God grounds the fact that x is intrinsically good. By way of response, McDaniel suggests that you might think that fact constitution is the connective relation in play here. But, while I understand what material constitution is, I confess that I don't have a good grip on what fact constitution comes to, if this relation is understood to be distinct from grounding itself. McDaniel recommends that we "seriously consider the assumption [that there is no bare grounding] but neither decisively accept nor reject it independently of doing other first-order metaphysical explorations" (244). My impression is that here McDaniel underestimates the problem of bare grounding for his proposal, as there are many rationally permissible if not plausible views formulated in terms of grounding that seem to commit us to claims that involve bare grounding. Here are two examples: given essentialism about modality, the fact that Ranger is essentially a dog grounds the fact that it's necessary that Ranger is a dog; and, given mathematical structuralism, the fact that thus-andso abstract structure has thus-and-so features grounds the existence and nature of the number 4. It's unclear what connective relations might be operative in such cases. Now, we could always cook up some candidate connective relation to cover these cases, but this would run counter to McDaniel's methodological 1. And it may be that some of McDaniel's potential connective relations between facts aren't genuine candidates for him given his other commitments. Regarding fact determination, McDaniel claims that determinate properties aren't ontologically superior to their determinable properties. This suggests that facts concerning the instantiation of the former aren't ontologically superior to facts concerning the instantiation of the latter either, which in turn suggests that fact determination isn't a connective relation after all (see p. 240n42 for discussion of this matter). B O O K R E V I E W S 152 Downloaded from https://read.dukeupress.edu/the-philosophical-review/article-pdf/129/1/149/726468/149trogdon.pdf by VPI/SU user on 17 January 2020 recommendation to let (first-order) metaphysics decide which relations are the connective relations. The third issue concerns McDaniel's characterization of the connective relations in terms of ontological superiority. It's fairly standard to understand the implementing mechanisms for causation partly in terms of causation itself. Part of what it is to be a causal mechanism is to be a structured entity that induces particular patterns of causation. I'm inclined to think that we should say something similar about McDaniel's connective relations, which he claims are relations that implement grounding. Don't say that to be a connective relation is to be a relation that induces certain patterns of ontological superiority; say instead that these relations by their nature induce particular patterns of grounding.2 Kelly Trogdon Virginia Tech Philosophical Review, Vol. 129, No. 1, 2020 DOI 10.1215/00318108-7890546 Andrew Bacon, Vagueness and Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. xviþ 340 pp. Many investigations of vagueness treat it as primarily a linguistic phenomenon. Their objective is to give a model of the meanings of vague words and use it to analyze the sorites paradox, borderline cases, and other phenomena distinctive of vagueness. Nobody would deny that, in addition to saying vague things, we think vague thoughts. But on the standard approach, the investigation of vague language is primary, and what we say about vague thought is derivative from this. Thought is an afterthought. The main aim of Bacon's impressive book is to argue that this approach is backward. According to Bacon, we should start by investigating vagueness in thought and explain linguistic vagueness in terms of it. In embracing this order of explanation, he sets himself apart not just from supervaluationists, who typically think of vagueness as a matter of "semantic indecision," but also from epistemicists (like Williamson [1994]), who explain our ignorance in borderline cases in terms of our ignorance about the way the meanings of vague terms depend on use. 2. Thanks to Sam Cowling and Kris McDaniel for helpful discussion. B O O K R E V I E W S 153 Downloaded from https://read.dukeupress.edu/the-philosophical-review/article-pdf/129/1/149/726468/149trogdon.pdf by VPI/SU user on 17 January