Philosophy East and West 49 (1):45-62 (1999)
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| Abstract |
Through a comparative case analysis regarding the Chinese language, it is discussed how the structure and functions of a natural language would bear upon the ways in which some philosophical problems are posed and some ontological insights shaped. Disagreeing with Chad Hansen's mass-noun hypothesis, a collective-noun hypothesis is argued for: (1) the denotational semantics and relevant grammatical features of Chinese nouns are like those of collective nouns; (2) their implicit ontology is a mereological ontology of collection-of-individuals with both part-whole and member-class structure; and (3) encouraged and shaped by the folk semantics of Chinese nouns, classical Chinese theorists of language take this kind of mereological nominalism for granted
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| DOI | 10.2307/1400116 |
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Mereological Nominalism.Nikk Effingham - 2020 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 100 (1):160-185.
Needing the Other: The Anatomy of the Mass Noun Thesis.Lajos L. Brons - 2014 - Argument: Biannual Philosophical Journal 4 (1):103-122.
Meaning and Reality: A Cross-Traditional Encounter.Lajos L. Brons - 2013 - In Bo Mou & R. Tieszen (eds.), Constructive Engagement of Analytic and Continental Approaches in Philosophy. Brill. pp. 199-220.
Do Differences in Grammatical Form Between Languages Explain Differences in Ontology Between Different Philosophical Traditions?: A Critique of the Mass-Noun Hypothesis.Xiaomei Yang - 2011 - Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy 10 (2):149-166.
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