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.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
Cartwright alludes here to the view that ‘about’ is ambiguous, a view held by Searle (1983) among others.
An example of a technical use of ‘about’ would be the kind of definition introduced by Smiley 1960.
I am indebted here to discussions with Bill Brewer.
Nature 293, 2 (1981). Thanks to Andrew Pomiankowski for bringing this to my attention.
For the purposes of this paper, I am assuming that fictional characters don’t exist. Some philosophers (e.g. van Inwagen 1977, Thomasson 2003) disagree. But even if they are right about fiction, they still need to explain non-fictional non-existence.
See Crane 2011a for a defence of the claim that we can think in a genuinely ‘singular’ way about non-existent objects.
I therefore use the word ‘myth’ in a way which is different from Salmon’s (1987), but I believe closer to its ordinary meaning.
Sir Ian Blair was the head of London’s Metropolitan Police Force from 2005 to 2008.
Quine’s remark would have to be modified to make room for plural terms and relational predications, but this does not affect the central point.
The literature on free logic is now vast. See Lambert 2003 for a useful collection of writings on the subject, and a clear introduction to the philosophical issues.
References
Azzouni, J. (2010). Talking about nothing. New York: Oxford University Press.
Bach, K. (1982). De re belief and methodological solipsism. In A. Woodfield (Ed.), Thought and object. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Brentano, F. (1874). Psychology from an empirical standpoint Originally published in 1874; English edition edited by L. McAlister, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul (1973); reprinted with an introduction by Peter Simons, London: Routledge (1995).
Broad, C. D. (1939). Religion, philosophy and psychical researc. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Burge, T. (1974). Truth and singular terms. Noûs, 8, 309–325.
Cartwright, R. (1960). Negative existentials. Journal of Philosophy, 57, 629–639.
Chalmers, D. J. (2004). The representational character of experience. In B. Leiter (Ed.), The future for philosophy (pp. 153–181). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Crane, T. (1998). Intentionality as the mark of the mental. In A. O’Hear (Ed.), Contemporary issues in the philosophy of mind (pp. 229–251). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Crane, T. (2001). Elements of mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Crane, T. (2003). The intentional structure of consciousness. In A. Jokic & Q. Smith (Eds.), Consciousness: New philosophical perspectives (pp. 33–56). Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Crane, T. (2011a). The singularity of singular thought. Proceedings of the aristotelian society supplementary volume 2011.
Crane, T. (2011b). Existence and quantification reconsidered. In T. Tahko (Ed.), Aristotelian metaphysics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Donnellan, K. S. (1974). Speaking of nothing. Philosophical Review, 83, 3–31.
Evans, G. (1982). The varieties of reference. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lambert, K. (2003). Free logic: Selected essays. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Meinong, A. (1904). On the theory of objects, translated by I. Levi, D. B. Terrell, and R. Chisholm. In R. Chisholm (Ed.) Realism and the background of phenomenology. Atascadero, CA: Ridgeview, 1981.
Moore, G. E. (1953). Some main problems of philosophy. London: Allen and Unwin.
Parsons, T. (1980). Nonexistent objects. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Priest, G. (2005). Towards non-being. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Prior, A. N. (1971). Objects of thoughts. Oxford: Clarendon.
Quine, Wv. O. (1948). On what there is. Review of Metaphysics, 2, 21–38.
Quine, Wv. O. (1960). Word and object. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Routley, R. (1980). Exploring Meinong’s jungle and beyond. Canberra: Research School of the Social Sciences.
Russell, B. (1903). The principles of mathematics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Russell, B. (1905). On denoting. Mind, 14, 479–493.
Russell, B. (1918). Knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 11(1910–1911), 108–128.
Russell, B. (1921). The analysis of mind. London: George Allen and Unwin.
Sainsbury, R. M. (2005). Reference without referents. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Salmon, N. (1987). Existence. Philosophical Perspectives, 1, 49–108.
Searle, J. (1983). Intentionality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Smart, J. J. C. (1989). Our place in the universe. Oxford: Blackwell.
Smiley, T. (1960). Sense without denotation. Analysis, 20, 125–135.
Smith, A. D. (2002). The problem of perception. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Tennant, N. (1990). Natural logic. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
van Inwagen, P. (1977). Creatures of fiction. American Philosophical Quarterly, 14, 299–308.
Van Inwagen, P. (2008). McGinn on existence. Philosophical Quarterly, 58, 36–58.
Walton, K. (1990). Mimesis as make-believe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to the audience at my Carnap Lectures in Bochum in March 2011 for helpful discussion, and to an anonymous referee for Philosophia for excellent critical comments.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Crane, T. What is the Problem of Non-Existence?. Philosophia 40, 417–434 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-011-9354-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-011-9354-1