Abstract artifacts such as musical works and fictional entities are human creations; they are intentional products of our actions and activities. One line of argument against abstract artifacts is that abstract objects are not the kind of objects that can be created. This is so, it is argued, because abstract objects are causally inert. Since creation requires being caused to exist, abstract objects cannot be created. One common way to refute this argument is to reject the causal inefficacy of abstracta. (...) I argue that creationists should rather reject the principle that creation requires causation. Creation, in my view, is a non-causal relation that can be explained using an appropriate notion of ontological dependence. The existence and the creation of abstract artifacts depend on certain individuals with appropriate intentions, along with events of a certain kind that include but are not limited to creations of certain concrete objects. (shrink)

Words are indispensable linguistic tools for beings like us. However, there is not much philosophical work done about what words really are. In this paper, I develop a new ontology for words. I argue that words are abstract artifacts that are created to fulfill various kinds of purposes, and words are abstract in the sense that they are not located in space but they have a beginning and may have an end in time given that certain conditions are met. What (...) follows from this two-fold argument is that words, from an ontological point of view, are more like musical works, fictional characters or computer programs, than numbers or sets. (shrink)

Realism about types is the view that types are abstract and repeatable objects. Although type realists seem to agree that types, unlike properties, are objects in their own right, they argue that there is a metaphysically intimate tie between the existence conditions of types and properties. In particular, most type realists believe that types are, in a certain sense, determined by the properties that underlie them. I argue that this is a mistake, especially for those type realists who believe that (...) social and cultural types such as works of music and fiction or words are artifacts. I offer an alternative version of type realism where social and cultural types are dependent objects that should be understood in analogy with concrete artifacts. (shrink)

Software is a ubiquitous artifact, yet not much has been done to understand its ontological nature. There are a few accounts offered so far about the nature of software. I argue that none of those accounts give a plausible picture of the nature of software. I draw attention to the striking similarities between software and musical works. These similarities motivate to look more closely on the discussions regarding the nature of the musical works. With the lessons drawn from the ontology (...) of musical works I offer a novel account of the nature of software. In this account, software is an abstract artifact. I elaborate the conditions under which software comes into existence; how it persists; how and on which entities its existence depends. (shrink)

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.

İÖ 99 ve 55 yılları arasında yaşamış olan Romalı şair Titus Lucretius Carus’un hayatı boyunca vermiş olduğu tek eser De Rerum Natura, Epikuros felsefesini son derece kapsamlı bir şekilde konu edinmesi ve öğretilerin her kesimden okuyucunun anlayabileceği türden basit bir dille aktarılması bakımından adeta Epikurosçuluğun kutsal kitabı niteliğindedir. Epikuros’un doğa felsefesini öğrenebildiğimiz Herodotos’a Mektup adlı çalışması, biyografi yazarı Diogenes Laertios’un aktarımı sayesinde günümüze ulaşmıştır, ancak mektup bir özet niteliğindedir.

A recent paper in this journal argues that some cases of schizophrenia should be seen as cases of demon possession and treated by faith healers. A reply, also published in this journal, responds by raising concerns about the intellectual credibility and potentially harmful practical implications of demon possession beliefs. My paper contributes to the discussion, arguing that a critique of demon possession beliefs in the context of schizophrenia is needed, but suggesting an alternative basis for it. It also reflects on (...) important differences between demonic and other forms of spirit possession, and considers the implications of this for mental health care providers. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The idea that two words can be instances of the same word is a central intuition in our conception of language. This fact underlies many of the claims that we make about how we communicate, and how we understand each other. Given this, irrespective of what we think words are, it is common to think that any putative ontology of words, must be able to explain this feature of language. That is, we need to provide criteria of identity for (...) word-types which allow us to individuate words such that it can be the case that two particular word-instances are instances of the same word-type. One solution, recently further developed by Irmak, holds that words are individuated by their history. In this paper, I argue that this view either fails to account for our intuitions about word identity, or is too vague to be a plausible answer to the problem of word individuation. (shrink)