Related

Contents
86 found
Order:
1 — 50 / 86
  1. A Semantic Argument Against the Existence of Universal Properties and Its Implications for the Likelihood of Theism.Emanuel Rutten - manuscript
    By conducting a semantic analysis of the reference and meaning of concepts that correspond to properties, and assessing its metaphysical implications, I develop a new argument for theism. Theism is understood here as the thesis that a personal being is the ultimate origin and ground of reality. More specifically, I argue that there are no universally held positive contingent properties and that this absence significantly increases the likelihood of theism. By integrating semantic inquiry with metaphysical reasoning, this paper offers a (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  2. Against Instantiation.Christopher Frugé - forthcoming - Australasian Journal of Philosophy.
    According to traditional universalism, properties are instantiated by objects, where instantiation is a ‘tie’ that binds objects and properties into facts. I offer two arguments against this view. I then develop an alternative higher-order account which holds that properties are primitively predicated of objects yet, unlike traditional nominalism, are nevertheless genuinely real. When it’s a fact that Fo, it’s not because object o instantiates F-ness, but just that Fo – where F still exists. Against orthodox higher-order approaches, however, my arguments (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  3. Connexions et relations.Gilles Kassel - forthcoming - Revue Ouverte d'Intelligence Artificielle.
    In this article, we pursue the definition of an ontological framework and a species of ontologies called “epistemic ontologies” by focusing on the complex entities, physical and mental, that populate the world. These entities unify other entities on which they unilaterally existentially depend. These complex entities include states of affairs (in the physical sphere) and propositions and events (in the mental sphere). To account for their unity, we appeal to the ontological figure of ‘connection’, in reference to Gustav Bergmann's notion (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  4. 'Higher-Order Objects in the Semantics of Natural Language'.Friederike Moltmann - forthcoming - Disputatio.
    This is a comment on Cian Dorr 'Higher-Order Quantification and the Elimination of Abstract Objects'. The aim of this contribution is to clarify and further develop a view (with its empirical generalizations) on which higher-order objects play a highly restricted role in the ontology of natural language. A sharp distinction is drawn between ontologically dependent objects (events, tropes, qualities, attitudinal objects etc.) and higher-order objects (properties, relations, propositions, etc.). Natural language reflects an ontology of the former, rather than of the (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  5. Lexical Decomposition of Verbs and the Notion of an Abstract State.Friederike Moltmann - forthcoming - In Daniele Panizza, Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung 29.
    This paper will propose a novel semantic and syntactic analysis of stative verbs, more specifically abstract state verbs like 'need', 'believe', 'know', 'own', 'owe', and 'lack'. On that analysis, such verbs have an underlying structure on which they are complex predicates consisting of the light verb HAVE and a noun for a trope-like thing (a trope or attitudinal, modal or intensional object), a structure that is also input to semantic interpretation. Thus, 'need a coat' is underlyingly 'have need (of) a (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  6. Review of The Foundations of Modality: From Propositions to Possible Worlds by Peter Fritz. [REVIEW]Robert Trueman - forthcoming - Mind.
    This is a review of Peter Fritz's _Foundations of Modality: From Propositions to Possible Worlds_.
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  7. Can Basic Perceptual Features Be Learned?Gabriel Siegel - 2025 - Synthese 205 (2):1-24.
    Perceptual learning is characterized by long-term changes in perception as a result of practice or experience. In this paper, I argue that through perceptual learning we can become newly sensitive to basic perceptual features. First, I provide a novel account of basic perceptual features. Then, I argue that evidence from experience-based plasticity suggests that basic perceptual features can be learned. Lastly, I discuss the common scientific and philosophical view that perceptual learning comes in at least four varieties: differentiation, unitization, attentional (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  8. Classicism.Andrew Bacon & Cian Dorr - 2024 - In Peter Fritz & Nicholas K. Jones, Higher-Order Metaphysics. Oxford University Press. pp. 109-190.
    This three-part chapter explores a higher-order logic we call ‘Classicism’, which extends a minimal classical higher-order logic with further axioms which guarantee that provable coextensiveness is sufficient for identity. The first part presents several different ways of axiomatizing this theory and makes the case for its naturalness. The second part discusses two kinds of extensions of Classicism: some which take the view in the direction of coarseness of grain (whose endpoint is the maximally coarse-grained view that coextensiveness is sufficient for (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   14 citations  
  9. Features and Bugs in Schnieder’s Theory of Properties.Arvid Båve - 2024 - Erkenntnis 89 (8):3379-3384.
    Although Benjamin Schnieder’s theory of the “ordinary conception” of properties successfully handles paradoxical properties—particularly, the property of non-self-instantiation—it fails to account for ordinary, non-pathological cases. The theory allows the inference of ‘a has the property of being F’ only given F(a) and the prior assertibility of ‘the property of being F can exist’. While this allows us to block an inference to a contradiction, it also blocks all of the non-pathological instances of the inference from ‘a is F’ to ‘a (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  10. Platonic Realism.Chad Carmichael - 2024 - In A. R. J. Fisher & Anna-Sofia Maurin, The Routledge Handbook of Properties. London: Routledge. pp. 127-137.
    In this chapter, I make the case for platonic realism, the thesis that there are properties that lack spatial locations. After criticizing the one-over-many argument for realism and Lewis's argument for realism, I endorse a modal argument that derives the existence of platonic properties from considerations involving necessary truth. I then defend this argument from various objections. Finally, I argue that epistemic considerations and considerations of parsimony favor a weak form of platonic realism on which there are platonic properties, but (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  11. Against the Property Theory of Musical Works.Nurbay Irmak - 2024 - Res Philosophica 101 (3):531-547.
    The property theory of musical works is the view that identifies works of music with properties as universals. The purpose of this article is to distinguish different versions of the property theory and argue that none of them can satisfy certain demands we expect from a successful theory of musical works. I conclude that although properties as universals are familiar and useful in other domains, we cannot rely on them to explain the ontological nature of musical works.
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  12. Ingarden vs. Meinong on Ficta’s Generation and Properties.Hicham Jakha - 2024 - Estetika: The European Journal of Aesthetics 61 (1):54–72.
    In this article, I explore the problems of ficta ‘generation’ and ‘properties’ in light of the philosophies of Alexius Meinong and Roman Ingarden. Comparing Ingarden and the historical Meinong is not a novel idea. By contrast, comparing Ingarden and a phenomenological Meinong has not, to my knowledge, yet been explored. Here, I rely on Alberto Voltolini’s ‘phenomenological conception of außerseiende entities’. I devise Ingarden’s phenomenological ontology to account for the problems of ascription and generation that cripple Meinong’s account. In short, (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  13. Serious Actualism and Nonexistence.Christopher James Masterman - 2024 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy (3):658-674.
    Serious actualism is the view that it is metaphysically impossible for an entity to have a property, or stand in a relation, and not exist. Fine (1985) and Pollock (1985) influentially argue that this view is false. In short, there are properties like the property of nonexistence, and it is metaphysically possible that some entity both exemplifies such a property and does not exist. I argue that such arguments are indeed successful against the standard formulation of serious actualism. However, I (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   5 citations  
  14. Against Second-Order Primitivism.Bryan Pickel - 2024 - In Peter Fritz & Nicholas K. Jones, Higher-Order Metaphysics. Oxford University Press.
    In the language of second-order logic, first- and second-order variables are distinguished syntactically and cannot be grammatically substituted. According to a prominent argument for the deployment of these languages, these substitution failures are necessary to block the derivation of paradoxes that result from attempts to generalize over predicate interpretations. I first examine previous approaches which interpret second-order sentences using expressions of natural language and argue that these approaches undermine these syntactic restrictions. I then examine Williamson’s primitivist approach according to which (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  15. Unlimited Nature: A Śaivist Model of Divine Greatness.Davide Andrea Zappulli - 2024 - Sophia 63 (3):553-569.
    The notion of maximal greatness is arguably part of the very concept of God: something greater than God is not even possible. But how should we understand this notion? The aim of this paper is to provide a Śaivist answer to this question by analyzing the form of theism advocated in the Pratyabhijñā tradition. First, I extract a model of divine greatness, the Hierarchical Model, from Nagasawa’s work "Maximal God". According to the Hierarchical Model, God is that than which nothing (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  16. Philosopher of Samarqand: Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī’s Theory of Properties.Ramon Harvey - 2023 - In Amber L. Griffioen & Marius Backmann, Pluralizing Philosophy’s Past: New Reflections in the History of Philosophy. Springer Verlag. pp. 77-90.
    Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī (d. 944), from Samarqand in Transoxiana, is the eponym of one of the main Sunnī theological traditions. As a practitioner of kalām (dialectical theology), al-Māturīdī’s approach was often at odds with those engaged in falsafa, the main Arabic philosophical discourse in the Islamic world. However, a close examination of al-Māturīdī’s surviving theological text, Kitāb al-tawḥīd, not only reveals influence in some issues from al-Kindī (d. 873), one of the earliest of the falāsifa, but also interesting philosophical positions (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  17. Ontology Generator.Alik Pelman - 2023 - Metaphysica 24 (1):109-128.
    The paper proposes a simple method for constructing ontological theories—an ‘ontology generator’. It shows that such a generator manages to produce major existing ontological theories, e.g., Realism, Nominalism, Trope theory, Bundle theory, Perdurantism, Endurantism, Possibilism, Actualism and more. It thus turns out, surprisingly, that all these seemingly unrelated different ontological theories that were designed by thinkers hundreds of years apart, can all be generated using the same simple mechanism. Moreover, this same generator manages to produce entirely novel ontological theories, that (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  18. The Puzzle of Fictional Resemblance.Jeffrey Goodman - 2022 - Res Philosophica 99 (3):361-375.
    This paper discusses a puzzle, the heart of which is this question: How is it that real individuals can resemble fictional individuals? It seems that any answer given by one who has taken a stand on the ontology of fictional individuals will come with significant drawbacks. An Anti-Realist will have to explain, or explain away, the apparent truth of our positive assertions of resemblance, while a Realist will have to explain how we are to understand resemblance in light of either (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  19. Quasi-set theory: a formal approach to a quantum ontology of properties.Federico Holik, Juan Pablo Jorge, Décio Krause & Olimpia Lombardi - 2022 - Synthese 200 (5):1-26.
    In previous works, an ontology of properties for quantum mechanics has been proposed, according to which quantum systems are bundles of properties with no principle of individuality. The aim of the present article is to show that, since quasi-set theory is particularly suited for dealing with aggregates of items that do not belong to the traditional category of individual, it supplies an adequate meta-language to speak of the proposed ontology of properties and its structure.
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations  
  20. (1 other version)An Account of Suhrawardī’s Allegories in Light of the Illuminationist Philosophy.Mahdi Homazadeh - 2022 - International Journal of Platonic Tradition 16:1-20.
    In this paper, I seek to explain Suhrawardī’s method of writing his allegories – how he draws upon his philosophical principles to construct forms and plots of his stories. To do so, I begin by delineating two key doctrines of his Illuminationist (Ishrāqī) ontology: the world of Forms (‘ālam al-muthul) and the discontinuous imaginal world (‘ālam al-mithāl al-munfaṣil). I provide an account of the history of these two doctrines and the nature of these two worlds, and then consider some of (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  21. The beauty of sound: Timbre as grounds for aesthetic and artistic value in music.Ben Mc Hugh - 2022 - Dissertation, Uppsala University
    This thesis explores the concept of timbre through the lens of analytic philosophical aesthetics and philosophy of music. I argue that timbre should be thought of as providing the grounds for artistic and aesthetic values in music. To this end and firstly, I critique the physical sense of timbre in favour of two anti-realist senses of timbre. These two are the qualitative and the semantic senses which are developed from two of Siedenburg and McAdams’ four senses of timbre. I argue (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  22. Qualitative properties and relations.Jan Plate - 2022 - Philosophical Studies 179 (4):1297-1322.
    This paper is concerned with two concepts of qualitativeness that apply to intensional entities. I propose an account of pure qualitativeness that largely follows the traditional understanding established by Carnap, and try to shed light on its ontological presuppositions. On this account, an intensional entity is purely qualitative iff it does not ‘involve’ any particular. An alternative notion of qualitativeness—which I propose to refer to as a concept of strict qualitativeness—has recently been introduced by Chad Carmichael. However, Carmichael’s definition presupposes (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   6 citations  
  23. How to minimize ontological commitments: a grounding-reductive approach.Reuben Sass - 2022 - Synthese 200 (4):1-22.
    Some revisionary ontologies are highly parsimonious: they posit far fewer entities than what we quantify over in ordinary discourse. The most radical examples are minimal ontologies, on which physical simples are the only things that exist. Highly parsimonious ontologies, and especially minimal ones, face the challenge of either accounting for the truth of our ordinary quantificational discourse, or paraphrasing such discourse away. Common strategies for addressing this challenge include classical reduction, paraphrase nihilism, and a distinction between ontological and existence commitments. (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  24. The iterative solution to paradoxes for propositions.Bruno Whittle - 2022 - Philosophical Studies 180 (5-6):1623-1650.
    This paper argues that we should solve paradoxes for propositions (such as the Russell–Myhill paradox) in essentially the same way that we solve Russellian paradoxes for sets. That is, the standard, iterative approach to sets is extended to include properties, and then the resulting hierarchy of sets and properties is used to construct propositions. Propositions on this account are structured in the sense of mirroring the sentences that express them, and they would seem to serve the needs of philosophers of (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  25. Gaps: When Not Even Nothing Is There.Charles Blattberg - 2021 - Comparative Philosophy 12 (1):31-55.
    A paradox, it is claimed, is a radical form of contradiction, one that produces gaps in meaning. In order to approach this idea, two senses of “separation” are distinguished: separation by something and separation by nothing. The latter does not refer to nothing in an ordinary sense, however, since in that sense what’s intended is actually less than nothing. Numerous ordinary nothings in philosophy as well as in other fields are surveyed so as to clarify the contrast. Then follows the (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  26. (1 other version)The Question of Algorithmic Personhood and Being (Or: On the Tenuous Nature of Human Status and Humanity Tests in Virtual Spaces—Why All Souls are ‘Necessarily’ Equal When Considered as Energy).Tyler Jaynes - 2021 - MDPI: J 3 (4):452-475.
    What separates the unique nature of human consciousness and that of an entity that can only perceive the world via strict logic-based structures? Rather than assume that there is some potential way in which logic-only existence is non-feasible, our species would be better served by assuming that such sentient existence is feasible. Under this assumption, artificial intelligence systems (AIS), which are creations that run solely upon logic to process data, even with self-learning architectures, should therefore not face the opposition they (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  27. Positive Universally Held Properties are Necessarily Universally Held.Emanuel Rutten - 2021 - Acta Philosophica 30 (1):139-158.
    The well-known Principle of Plenitude has it that everything that exists in some possible world exists in the actual world. I argue for an amended version of this principle: If there’s a possible world in which something lacks some positive property, then there’s an object in the actual world that lacks that property. That is, all positive universally held properties in the actual world are necessarily universally held. This rules out that for some positive property, everything in the actual world (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  28. Heat in Renaissance Philosophy.Filip Buyse - 2020 - Encyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy.
    The term ‘heat’ originates from the Old English word hǣtu, a word of Germanic origin; related to the Dutch ‘hitte’ and German ‘Hitze’. Today, we distinguish three different meanings of the word ‘heat’. First, ‘heat’ is understood in colloquial English as ‘hotness’. There are, in addition, two scientific meanings of ‘heat’. ‘Heat’ can have the meaning of the portion of energy that changes with a change of temperature. And finally, ‘heat’ can have the meaning of the transfer of thermal energy (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  29. The limits of classical mereology: Mixed fusions and the failures of mereological hybridism.Joshua Kelleher - 2020 - Dissertation, The University of Queensland
    In this thesis I argue against unrestricted mereological hybridism, the view that there are absolutely no constraints on wholes having parts from many different logical or ontological categories, an exemplar of which I take to be ‘mixed fusions’. These are composite entities which have parts from at least two different categories – the membered (as in classes) and the non-membered (as in individuals). As a result, mixed fusions can also be understood to represent a variety of cross-category summation such as (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  30. Against Disjunctive Properties: Four Armstrongian Arguments.Bo R. Meinertsen - 2020 - Philosophia 49 (1):95-106.
    This paper defends the case against (sparse) disjunctive properties by means of four Armstrongian arguments. The first of these is a logical atomist argument from truthmaking, which is, broadly speaking, ‘Armstrongian’ (Armstrong 1997). This argument is strong – although it stands or falls with the relevant notion of truthmaking, as it were. However, three arguments, which are prima facie independent of truthmaking, can be found explicitly early in Armstrong’s middle period. Two of these early arguments face a serious objection put (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   5 citations  
  31. A Defence of Lucretian Presentism.Jonathan Tallant & David Ingram - 2020 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 98 (4):675-690.
    In this paper, we defend Lucretian Presentism. Although the view faces many objections and has proven unpopular with presentists, we rehabilitate Lucretianism and argue that none of the objections stick.
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   5 citations  
  32. Disposições e propriedades categóricas.Gustavo Bravo Carvalho - 2019 - Dissertation, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  33. El Teorema de Kochen-Specker y las Semánticas no deterministas.Juan Pablo Jorge - 2019 - Buenos Aires: Departamento de Física, Universidad de Buenos Aires.
    Desde los trabajos de von Neumann y Birkhoff hasta la actualidad, el estudio de distintas estructuras algebraicas asociadas al formalismo cuántico ha dado lugar a interesantes desarrollos. A modo de ejemplo, el teorema de Kochen-Specker ha tenido una fuerte repercusión en los fundamentos e interpretación de la teoría cuántica. En este trabajo, prestaremos especial atención al abordaje lógico-algebraico iniciado por von Neumann y Birkhoff (aunque también discutiremos otros formalismos, tales como la lógica de la superposición de Tzouvaras). Se presenta el (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  34. There is no haecceitic Euthyphro problem.Alexander Skiles - 2019 - Analysis 79 (3):477-484.
    Jason Bowers and Meg Wallace have recently argued that those who hold that every individual instantiates a ‘haecceity’ are caught up in a Euthyphro-style dilemma when confronted with familiar cases of fission and fusion. Key to Bowers and Wallace’s dilemma are certain assumptions about the nature of metaphysical explanation and the explanatory commitments of belief in haecceities. However, I argue that the dilemma only arises due to a failure to distinguish between providing a metaphysical explanation of why a fact holds (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   5 citations  
  35. The Problem of Universals and the Asymmetry of Instantiation.Donald L. M. Baxter - 2018 - American Philosophical Quarterly 55 (2):189-202.
    Oliver's and Rodriguez-Pereyra's important interpretation of the problem of universals as one concerning truthmakers neglects something crucial: that there is a numerical identity between numerically distinct particulars. The problem of universals is rather how to resolve the apparent contradiction that the same things are both numerically distinct and numerically identical. Baxter's account of instantiation as partial identity resolves the apparent contradiction. A seeming objection to this account is that it appears to make instantiation symmetric, since partial identity is symmetric. Armstrong's (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  36. Distance and Dissimilarity.Ben Blumson - 2018 - Philosophical Papers 48 (2):211-239.
    This paper considers whether an analogy between distance and dissimilarlity supports the thesis that degree of dissimilarity is distance in a metric space. A straightforward way to justify the thesis would be to define degree of dissimilarity as a function of number of properties in common and not in common. But, infamously, this approach has problems with infinity. An alternative approach would be to prove representation and uniqueness theorems, according to which if comparative dissimilarity meets certain qualitative conditions, then it (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  37. Two Conceptions of Similarity.Ben Blumson - 2018 - Philosophical Quarterly 68 (270):21-37.
    There are at least two traditional conceptions of numerical degree of similarity. According to the first, the degree of dissimilarity between two particulars is their distance apart in a metric space. According to the second, the degree of similarity between two particulars is a function of the number of (sparse) properties they have in common and not in common. This paper argues that these two conceptions are logically independent, but philosophically inconsonant.
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   12 citations  
  38. The Metaphysics of Relations, edited by Anna Marmodoro and David Yates. [REVIEW]Rognvaldur Ingthorsson - 2017 - Disputatio 9 (44):123–130.
    The Metaphysics of Relations is an anthology of thirteen original papers plus an introduction, addressing the philosophical issue of relations from a contemporary and historical perspective. The result is a remarkably coherent whole, where the different papers shed light on each other even though very few of them explicitly address interconnections. As a consequence, the book works really well as an introduction to the philosophical issue on relations, while the individual papers represent cutting edge research on the particular issues that (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  39. (1 other version)Aquinas on the Problem of Universals.Jeffrey E. Brower - 2016 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 92 (2):715-735.
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   10 citations  
  40. Speaks’s Reduction of Propositions to Properties: A Benacerraf Problem.T. Scott Dixon & Cody Gilmore - 2016 - Thought: A Journal of Philosophy 5 (3):275-284.
    Speaks defends the view that propositions are properties: for example, the proposition that grass is green is the property being such that grass is green. We argue that there is no reason to prefer Speaks's theory to analogous but competing theories that identify propositions with, say, 2-adic relations. This style of argument has recently been deployed by many, including Moore and King, against the view that propositions are n-tuples, and by Caplan and Tillman against King's view that propositions are facts (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  41. (1 other version)To Be F Is To Be G.Cian Dorr - 2016 - Philosophical Perspectives 30 (1):39-134.
    This paper is an investigation of the general logic of "identifications", claims such as 'To be a vixen is to be a female fox', 'To be human is to be a rational animal', and 'To be just is to help one's friends and harm one's enemies', many of which are of great importance to philosophers. I advocate understanding such claims as expressing higher-order identity, and discuss a variety of different general laws which they might be thought to obey. [New version: (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   205 citations  
  42. Theories of Properties and Ontological Theory-Choice: An Essay in Metaontology.Christopher Gibilisco - 2016 - Dissertation, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
    This dissertation argues that we have no good reason to accept any one theory of properties as correct. To show this, I present three possible bases for theory-choice in the properties debate: coherence, explanatory adequacy, and explanatory value. Then I argue that none of these bases resolve the underdetermination of our choice between theories of properties. First, I argue considerations about coherence cannot resolve the underdetermination, because no traditional theory of properties is obviously incoherent. Second, I argue considerations of explanatory (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  43. A Neo-Armstrongian Defense of States of Affairs: A Reply to Vallicella.Katarina Perovic - 2016 - Metaphysica 17 (2):143-161.
    Vallicella’s influential work makes a case that, when formulated broadly, as a problem about unity, Bradley’s challenge to Armstrongian states of affairs is practically insurmountable. He argues that traditional relational and non-relational responses to Bradley are inadequate, and many in the current metaphysical debate on this issue have come to agree. In this paper, I argue that such a conclusion is too hasty. Firstly, the problem of unity as applied to Armstrongian states of affairs is not clearly defined; in fact, (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  44. Relationalism about perceptible properties and the principle of charity.Pendaran Roberts & Kelly Ann Schmidtke - 2016 - Synthese 193 (9).
    Color relationalism holds that the colors are constituted by relations to subjects. The introspective rejoinder against this view claims that it is opposed to our phenomenally-informed, pre-theoretic intuitions. The rejoinder seems to be correct about how colors appear when looking at how participants respond to an item about the metaphysical nature of color but not when looking at an item about the ascription of colors. The present article expands the properties investigated to sound and taste and inspects the mentioned asymmetry, (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations  
  45. The Bradleyan Regress, Non-Relational Realism, and the Quinean Semantic Strategy.Jonathan Reid Surovell - 2016 - Grazer Philosophische Studien 93 (1):63-79.
    Non-Relational Realism is a popular solution to the Bradleyan regress of facts or truths. It denies that there is a relational universal of exemplification; for an object a to exemplify a universal F-ness, on this view, is not for a relation to subsist between a and F-ness. An influential objection to Non-Relational Realism is that it is unacceptably obscure. The author argues that Non-Relational Realism can be understood as a selective application of satisfaction semantics to predicates like ‘exemplify’, and that (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  46. The many (yet few) faces of deflationism.Jeremy Wyatt - 2016 - Philosophical Quarterly (263):362-382.
    It's often said that according to deflationary theories of truth, truth is not a ‘substantial’ property. While this is a fine slogan, it is far from transparent what deflationists mean (or ought to mean) in saying that truth is ‘insubstantial’. Focusing so intently upon the concept of truth and the word ‘true’, I argue, deflationists and their critics have been insufficiently attentive to a host of metaphysical complexities that arise for deflationists in connection with the property of truth. My aim (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   27 citations  
  47. Coextension and Identity.Ghislain Guigon - 2015 - In Ghislain Guigon & Gonzalo Rodriguez-Pereyra, Nominalism About Properties: New Essays. New York, NY: Routledge. pp. 135-155.
    This chapter is concerned with the coextension difficulty for nominalist theories of properties that reject tropes alongside universals. After carefully explaining the coextension difficulty and describing the theories it targets, the chapter describes different solutions to the difficulty. These solutions differ with respect to how much involved they are into a dualist approach to coextension. A dualist approach to a case of coextension consists in agreeing with the realist that the relevant ascriptions of properties are numerically distinct. A monist approach (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   3 citations  
  48. Construção Social.Teresa Marques - 2015 - Compêndio Em Linha de Problemas de Filosofia Analítica.
    A ideia de que certas categorias, propriedades, eventos, ou factos, são construídos socialmente tem sido defendida nas ciências sociais e humanidades desde meados do século xx. Nas últimas décadas, vários filósofos da tradição analítica começaram a dedicar mais atenção à possibilidade de que haja tipos de coisas construídas socialmente. A ideia complementa outra ideia relativamente consensual hoje em dia: a de que existem tipos naturais, mas que nem tudo o que existe constitui um tipo natural. São particularmente interessantes os tipos (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  49. Logic, Essence, and Modality — Review of Bob Hale's Necessary Beings. [REVIEW]Christopher Menzel - 2015 - Philosophia Mathematica 23 (3):407-428.
    Bob Hale’s distinguished record of research places him among the most important and influential contemporary analytic metaphysicians. In his deep, wide ranging, yet highly readable book Necessary Beings, Hale draws upon, but substantially integrates and extends, a good deal his past research to produce a sustained and richly textured essay on — as promised in the subtitle — ontology, modality, and the relations between them. I’ve set myself two tasks in this review: first, to provide a reasonably thorough (if not (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  50. Pictures and Properties.Ben Blumson - 2014 - In Resemblance and Representation: An Essay in the Philosophy of Pictures. Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers. pp. 179-198.
    It’s a platitude that a picture is realistic to the degree to which it resembles what it represents (in relevant respects). But if properties are abundant and degrees of resemblance are proportions of properties in common, then the degree of resemblance between different particulars is constant (or undefined), which is inconsonant with the platitude. This paper argues this problem should be resolved by revising the analysis of degrees of resemblance in terms of proportion of properties in common, and not by (...)
    Remove from this list   Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
1 — 50 / 86