How to Express Ontological Commitment in the Vernacular
Philosophia Mathematica 18 (3):293-310 (2010)
Abstract
According to the familiar Quinean understanding of ontological commitment, (1) one undertakes ontological commitments only via theoretical regimentations, and (2) ontological commitments are to be identified with the domain of a theory’s quantifiers. Jody Azzouni accepts (1), but rejects (2). Azzouni accepts (1) because he believes that no vernacular expression carries ontological commitments. He rejects (2) by locating a theory’s commitments with the extension of an existence predicate. I argue that Azzouni’s two theses undermine each other. If ontological commitments follow from predications of existence, then ontological commitments can be expressed in the vernacular via negative existential sentences.Author's Profile
DOI
10.1093/philmat/nkq005
My notes
Similar books and articles
Two kinds of ontological commitment.Howard Peacock - 2011 - Philosophical Quarterly 61 (242):79-104.
Deflating Existential Commitment: A Case for Nominalism.Jody Azzouni - 2004 - Oxford, England: Oup Usa.
Inscrutability and ontological commitment.Berit Brogaard - 2008 - Philosophical Studies 141 (1):21 - 42.
Quine, Wyman, and Buridan: Three approaches to ontological commitment.Gyula Klima - 2005 - Korean Journal of Logic 8 (1):1-22.
Ontological Commitments, Thick and Thin.Harold T. Hodes - 1990 - In George Boolos (ed.), Method, Reason and Language: Essays in Honor of Hilary Putnam. Cambridge University Press. pp. 235-260.
Ontology, Commitment, and Quine's Criterion.Yvonne Raley - 2007 - Philosophia Mathematica 15 (3):271-290.
Analytics
Added to PP
2010-02-05
Downloads
230 (#54,571)
6 months
1 (#450,425)
2010-02-05
Downloads
230 (#54,571)
6 months
1 (#450,425)
Historical graph of downloads
Author's Profile
Citations of this work
Putnam and the Indispensability of Mathematics.Otávio Bueno - 2013 - Principia: An International Journal of Epistemology 17 (2):217.
References found in this work
Science Without Numbers: A Defence of Nominalism.Hartry H. Field - 1980 - Princeton, NJ, USA: Princeton University Press.