This groundbreaking volume investigates the most fundamental question of all: Why is there something rather than nothing? The question is explored from diverse and radical perspectives: religious, naturalistic, platonistic and skeptical. Does science answer the question? Or does theology? Does everything need an explanation? Or can there be brute, inexplicable facts? Could there have been nothing whatsoever? Or is there any being that could not have failed to exist? Is the question meaningful after all? The volume advances cutting-edge debates in (...) metaphysics, philosophy of cosmology and philosophy of religion, and will intrigue and challenge readers interested in any of these subjects. (shrink)

Philosophers and theorists have long been puzzled by humans' ability to talk about things that do not exist, or to talk about things that they think exist but, in fact, do not. _Empty Names, Fiction, and the Puzzles of Non-Existence_ is a collection of 13 new works concerning the semantic and metaphysical issues arising from empty names, non-existence, and the nature of fiction. The contributors include some of the most important researchers working in these fields. Some of the papers (...) develop and defend new positions on these matters, while others offer important new perspectives and criticisms of the existing approaches. The volume contains a comprehensive introductory essay by the editors, which provides a survey of the philosophical issues concerning empty names, the various responses to these issues, and the literature on the subject to date. (shrink)

Conscious experience is at once the most familiar thing in the world and the most mysterious. There is nothing we know about more directly than consciousness, but it is extraordinarily hard to reconcile it with everything else we know. Why does it exist? What does it do? How could it possibly arise from neural processes in the brain? These questions are among the most intriguing in all of science.

How can you steal something that doesn’t exist? This question confronts those of us who take an irrealist view of virtual objects and agree with the Supreme Court of the Netherlands that robbery took place when two boys used non-virtual violence to coerce a third boy into relinquishing his virtual amulet and mask. Here we outline this Puzzle of Virtual Theft, along with the closely related Puzzle of Virtual Value. After demonstrating how these puzzles are deeply problematic for (...) the irrealist, we go on to sketch a solution that not only circumscribes the puzzles but also offers a framework by which legal scholars can make sense within existing legal codes of the new phenomenon of virtual theft. (shrink)

Why is it that most fictions present one and only one ending, rather than multiple ones? Fictions presenting multiple endings are possible, because a few exist; but they are very rare, and this calls for an explanation. We argue that such an explanation is likely to shed light on our engagement with fictions, for fictions having one and only one ending seem to be ubiquitous. After dismissing the most obvious explanations for this phenomenon, we compare the scarcity of multiple endings (...) in traditional kinds of fiction to their profusion in the case of interactive fictions. This contrast poses a challenge to accounts of our engagement with fictions in terms of games of make-believe. We conclude that solving this puzzle is likely to improve our philosophical understanding of fictions. (shrink)

Descartes and the Puzzle of Sensory Representation is an intensely polemical attack on many recent expositions of sensory representation in Descartes, and a defense of De Rosa’s own Descriptive-Causal Account of Sensory Representation. For Descartes, she says, there are two kinds of ideas, sensible and intelligible, both of which have presentational and referential content. The presentational content of sensible ideas consists of touches, tastes, sounds, odors, and colored visual images that are obscure and confused, in that there is nothing (...) like these sensible ideas in the material world. The presentational content of intelligible ideas, on the other hand, is clear and distinct, in that it consists of geometric representations of material bodies that do exist in the world outside the mind. Thus, whenever one has a clear and distinct intelligible perception of a material body that exists outside the mind, one also has at the same time an obscure and confused sensible image of that body as hard, sweet, squeaky, odiferous, and colored. Nothing like these sensible images actually exists in bodies. De Rosa says that the role of sensible imagery is to individuate and differentiate material bodies from one another, which would be difficult to do for. (shrink)

The ancient puzzle of Dion and Theon has given rise to a surprising array of apparently implausible views. For example, in order to solve the puzzle, several philosophers have been led to deny the existence of their own feet, others have denied that objects can gain and lose parts, and large numbers of philosophers have embraced the thesis that distinct objects can occupy the same space, having all their material parts in common. In this paper, I argue (...) for an alternative approach: I claim that human beings have ordinary parts—hands, heads, feet, and so on—but no extraordinary parts, such as ‘foot-complements’, the existence of which is essential to the puzzle. I rebut three objections to this approach: an objection that it is unacceptably metaphysically arbitrary, an objection that the view is incompatible with versions of the puzzle involving decapitation, and an objection concerning masses of matter. If we can believe that there are such things as hands and feet without involving ourselves in paradox, and without accepting large numbers of co-located material objects that share all their material parts, then that is what we should do. My view is the only known alternative which allows this. (shrink)

Hobbes’s theory of authorisation poses numerous puzzles to scholars. The weightiest of these conundrums is a supposed contradiction between chapter 17 of Leviathan, that calls for unconditional submission to the sovereign, and chapter 21, that defends the liberties of the subject. This article offers a fresh perspective on the theory’s consistency, function and addressees. While existing research doubts the theory’s consistency, focuses on its immunisation function and on the subjects as the theory’s main addresses, the paper argues that Hobbes’s theory (...) of authorisation is consistent with the doctrine of the liberty of subjects, and that it serves the dual purpose of immunising the sovereign against criticism and disciplining the sovereign via a counsel of memento mori: A hitherto underexplored element of authorisation theory is a reminder of the mortality of sovereignty directed at the sovereign to convince him to make restricted use of his absolute right to rule. Hobbes’s theory of authorisation can thus be read as part of a complex argumentative strategy for peace, rooted in a ‘liberal absolutism’ which is not as paradoxical as it sounds, and which is reflected in the frontispiece by the friendly smile of the sovereign. (shrink)

According to the well–known argument, the traditional conception of existence and predication leads to the infamous paradox of non-existence. For instance, the sentence ‘Pegasus does not exist’ commits us to accept that there is something that does not exist. The easy way out is to analyze existence as a second–order concept expressing that there is at least one instance of some first–order concept. In this article, I argue that the traditional conception of existence and predication does (...) not lead to the paradox of non-existence. Negative existentials are not subject-predicate sentences that select existing beings only to deny them the property of existence. Aristotle’s insistence that being is not a genus, i.e. that being is not a predicate of some subject, is pivotal. Furthermore, Aristotle does not have a uniform conception of existence and predication. According to Aristotle, to be is to be an item in the categorical scheme, and consequently, every predication of some being should be analysable as one of the most general types of predication according to the categorical scheme. However, in the conceptual framework of Aristotle’s philosophy, a different problem of non-existence arises. For instance, ‘Pegasus is thought-about’ might commits us to the claim that Pegasus is a being of some kind. I reconstruct Aristotle’s solution as being satisfactory in the light of his understanding of predication and existence. Moreover, I suggest that a similar puzzle leads many contemporary philosophers to an abandonment of the Quinean concept of existence and predication in favour of a more traditional approach. (shrink)

Alethism is the view that successful remembering only requires an accurate representation of a past event. It opposes the truth-and-authenticity view, according to which successful remembering requires both an accurate representation of a past event and an accurate representation of a past experience of that event. Alethism is able to handle problematic cases faced by the truth-and-authenticity view, but it faces an important challenge of its own: If successful remembering only requires accurately representing past events, then how is it possible (...) that our memories are also experienced as originating in past experiences of those events? I call this the puzzle of alethic memory. I argue that alethism can be reconciled with the claim that memories are experienced as originating in past experiences of those events—what I call the experience of first-handedness—if we conceive of the phenomenology of remembering in metacognitive terms. According to the metacognitive approach that I favor, the phenomenology of remembering is partly explained by what memory represents and partly explained by the existence of a metacognitive feeling that accompanies memory representations. I argue that accounting for the feeling of first-handedness in terms of the metacognitive feeling that accompanies memory representations allows us to solve the puzzle of alethic memory. (shrink)

Research on employees’ responses to corporate social responsibility has recently accelerated and begun appearing in top-tier academic journals. However, existing findings are still largely fragmented, and this stream of research lacks theoretical consolidation. This article integrates the diffuse and multi-disciplinary literature on CSR micro-level influences in a theoretically driven conceptual framework that contributes to explain and predict when, why, and how employees might react to CSR activity in a way that influences organizations’ economic and social performance. Drawing on social identity (...) theory and social exchange theory, we delineate the different but interdependent psychological mechanisms that explain how CSR can strengthen the employee–organization relationship and subsequently foster employee-related, micro-level outcomes. Contributions of our framework to extant literature and potential extensions for future research are then discussed. (shrink)

Research on employees’ responses to corporate social responsibility has recently accelerated and begun appearing in top-tier academic journals. However, existing findings are still largely fragmented, and this stream of research lacks theoretical consolidation. This article integrates the diffuse and multi-disciplinary literature on CSR micro-level influences in a theoretically driven conceptual framework that contributes to explain and predict when, why, and how employees might react to CSR activity in a way that influences organizations’ economic and social performance. Drawing on social identity (...) theory and social exchange theory, we delineate the different but interdependent psychological mechanisms that explain how CSR can strengthen the employee–organization relationship and subsequently foster employee-related, micro-level outcomes. Contributions of our framework to extant literature and potential extensions for future research are then discussed. (shrink)

The notion of existence is a very puzzling one philosophically. Often philosophers have appealed to linguistic properties of sentences stating existence. However, the appeal to linguistic intuitions has generally not been systematic and without serious regard of relevant issues in linguistic semantics. This paper has two aims. On the one hand, it will look at statements of existence from a systematic linguistic point of view, in order to try to clarify what the actual semantics of such statements (...) in fact is. On the other hand, it will explore what sort of ontology such statements reflect. The first aim is one of linguistic semantics; the second aim is one of descriptive metaphysics. Philosophically, existence statements appear to reflect the distinction between endurance and perdurance as well as particular notions of abstract states and of kinds. Linguistically, statements of existence involve a particular way of drawing the distinction between eventive and stative verbs and between individual-level and stage-level predicates as well as a particular approach to the semantics of bare plurals and mass nouns. (shrink)

Public participation is well known for its practitioner insights and wealth of case reports. This knowledge is essential and has been well employed. Likewise, the theoretical literature on public participation is growing rapidly. The need for better conceptual and theoretical understandings of public participation has become clear. Public participation theories have not received great attention, and few have been proposed or tested. Yet theory offers much to practitioners of various interventions. The authors summarize work toward developing a public participation theory (...) and propose a way to conceptualize its skeletal components. The authors recognize that any theory must acknowledge that different people have different beliefs about what public participation should accomplish. Further, contextual variables affect a process’s character and outcomes. The authors begin with a discussion of theory’s importance to scholars, practitioners, and participants and provide an overview of existing approaches. The authors present findings from two empirical case studies used to further develop their theory of fair and competent public participation. They conclude with some observations about challenges and ways forward. (shrink)

Two influential approaches to conceptualising the relationship between public and private law have suggested that the distinction between them should be abandoned. The first, as exemplified by Oliver, suggests that the distinction should be abandoned in favour of fusion based on the notion of commonality. The second, as exemplified by Teubner, rejects fusion, arguing for the replacement of the distinction with a concept capturing the multi-dimensional complexity of law in multiple social contexts: `polycontexturality'. This article focuses primarily on exploring conceptual (...) puzzles presented by Oliver's `commonality thesis', and argues for a reconceptualisation of the relationship between public and private law as multi-layered. Monolithic and rigidly binary concepts alike should be replaced by a complex set of relationships – a position broadly supportive of Teubner's. However, it is argued that the relationships between public and private law are to be seen as existing on a spectrum, or even on an overarching meta-spectrum, in which the existence of distinctive `archetypal conceptual paradigms' influence as `meta-spectrum extremities'. This presents a limited caveat to Teubner's thesis. I suggest that explicit theoretical attention to both the implications of polycontexturality and the existence of the archetypal conceptual paradigms as meta-spectrum extremities might avoid occluding important distinctions and nuances within a fusion that tends illegitimately to subsume private law within a public law paradigm. Such an analysis, I argue, could enhance the coherence of the law in complex, multi-dimensional cases at the troubled borderline between public and private law. (shrink)

This thesis mounts an attack against accounts of perceptual justification that attempt to analyze it in terms of evidential justifiers, and has defended the view that perceptual justification should rather be analyzed in terms of non-evidential justification. What matters most to perceptual justification is not a specific sort of evidence, be it experiential evidence or factive evidence, what matters is that the perceptual process from sensory input to belief output is reliable. I argue for this conclusion in the following way. (...) Chapter 1: The Arguments from HallucinationChapter 1 presents a skeptical argument from hallucination that starts from a premise about the alleged introspective indistinguishability of perception and hallucination, and concludes that perceptual knowledge is impossible. Underlying this argument are certain assumptions about the nature of perceptual justification, and different responses to the argument portray different views of perceptual justification. Evidentialism and dogmatism both reject the premise that appearances do not provide evidence sufficient for perceptual knowledge, although they disagree about the precise nature of the appearances. Epistemological disjunctivism rejects the premise that introspectively indistinguishable experiences provide the same evidence, while upholding the idea that some sort of evidence, namely factive evidence, is necessary for perceptual justification and knowledge. Process reliabilism rejects the premise that evidence is necessary for perceptual knowledge on the grounds that even perceptual justification can be obtained without evidence, as long as the cognitive process producing the belief is reliable.Chapter 2: EvidentialismChapter 2 starts by introducing some motivations for experientialist views of perceptual justification, such as evidentialism and dogmatism, which hold that conscious experiences evidentially justify perceptual beliefs. These motivations have to do with their ability to accommodate the New Evil Demon Intuition that demon-deceived subjects have justified perceptual beliefs and the Blindsight Intuition that blindsighters do not have justified perceptual beliefs. However, experientialist views are also faced with a Sellarsian dilemma: either experience is construed as non-propositional, but then the proposed evidential relation is unclear, or experience is construed as propositional, but then it is ad hoc to hold that they can evidentially justify without being justified themselves.Chapter 2 continues with a discussion of evidentialism, which grasps the first horn of this dilemma. I argue that evidentialism cannot adequately explain why a non-propositional experience constitutes evidence for this rather than that belief, and also does not provide any account of how to determine which belief fits an evidence-set which partly consists out of non-propositional experiences. Although a reliabilist version of evidentialism can provide a better account of these matters, it suffers from counter-intuitive predictions about justification and a conception of evidence that is so liberal that it could even include blindsighters and clairvoyants as having such evidence.Chapter 3: DogmatismChapter 3 focuses on variants of dogmatism, a theory of perceptual justification that grasps the second horn of the Sellarsian dilemma by holding that a perceptual experience with the content that p is sufficient for immediate prima facie justification of the belief that p. I first argue that dogmatism should identify perceptual experiences with high-level conscious states to accommodate the problem of novice vs. expert identification and the problem of the speckled hen. I then argue that this version of dogmatism still fails to meet a certain explanatory challenge which I dub the `Distinctiveness Problem'. Dogmatism should explain what is so distinctive about perceptual experience that enables it, in contrast with desire and imagination, to evidentially justify the belief that p without, in contrast with belief, being justified itself.Phenomenalist answers to this problem fail because they either do not provide a distinctive property of perceptual experience, or else provide a property that is reducible to or possibly caused by beliefs. In both cases, dogmatism would have the result that intuitively unjustifying experiences, such as imaginations, nevertheless become capable of justifying beliefs. Moreover, phenomenalists still need some explanation of why phenomenology is epistemically relevant at all.A new variant of the problem of the speckled hen is an intuitive illustration of this point against dogmatists. If a perceptual experience that p is not reliably connected to the fact that p or the belief that p, then beliefs based on this experience simply will not be intuitively justified. One possible response to this problem incorporates reliability into the content of experience in the sense that an experience cannot have the content that p if it is not reliably connected to both the fact that p and the belief that p. However, this will lose the motivation from the New Evil Demon Scenario, and will make large concessions towards reliabilism.Chapter 4: Epistemological DisjunctivismGiven these problems for experientialist views of perceptual justification, chapter 4 focuses on a different evidential account of justification: epistemological disjunctivism. According to the Justified True Belief version of Epistemological Disjunctivism, the fact that I see that p is the factive and reflectively accessible evidence in virtue of which I know that p. I argue that JTBED faces formidable problems: first, it cannot adequately deal with the basis problem, second, it cannot accommodate the New Evil Demon Intuition, third,it faces the problem of hyper-intellectualization, and fourth, it has no good account of reflective access.Knowledge First Epistemological Disjunctivism, in contrast, holds that seeing that p just is a way of knowing that p. The fact that I see that p constitutes my justification for believing that p, even though it is not necessary for my knowledge that p. Although this view solves most of the above problems, I argue that KFED still faces a challenge of its own: its notion of justification is so strong that justification entails knowledge but is not itself entailed by it. This means that it too faces a hyper-intellectualization objection because it cannot accommodate animal justification, and that it too will struggle to accommodate the New Evil Demon Intuition.Nevertheless, there is something to the epistemological disjunctivist idea that higher-order capabilities are important to perceptual justification. Specifically, higher-order capabilities provide one with a way of accommodating the Blindsight Intuition without appealing to the notion of experiential evidence: blindsighters are epistemically worse off than normal human perceivers because they lack higher-order beliefs about how they are gaining their information. If one holds that these higher-order beliefs provide a special sort of justification for perceptual beliefs, then blindsighters lack this type of justification. Chapter 5: Process ReliabilismAfter displaying the problems of several evidential accounts of perceptual justification, chapter 5 introduces a non-evidential account: process reliabilism. The classic version of this view holds that the reliability of a belief-forming process is necessary and sufficient for the prima facie justification of a specific set of beliefs, namely, those that arise out of belief-independent processes. Two classic major problems for this view consist of counterexamples to both the necessity and sufficiency of reliability for justification. Although the Generality Problem raises some difficulties for reliabilism, they do not appear to be insurmountable.The second part of chapter 5 focuses on a variety of process reliabilism, inferentialist reliabilism, that is explicitly aimed at responding to clairvoyance cases. According to inferentialist reliabilism, one should distinguish between basic and non-basic beliefs, where basic beliefs are those that result out of the non-inferential operation of an inferentially opaque cognitive system that developed in a natural way. Reliability is only sufficient for the justification of basic beliefs, while non-basic beliefs also require conditional reliability and justification of the beliefs on which they are based.This distinction between basic and non-basic beliefs is meant to answer the challenge arising out of clairvoyance cases because these are all supposedly cases in which the resulting beliefs arenon-basic. However, I argue that the beliefs in these cases come out as non-basic primarily because of the etiological constraint on cognitive systems, a constraint that is unfortunately undermotivated. It seems that beliefs can be justified even if they are produced by a cognitive system that developed by accident, or by a system that was artificially designed to produce those beliefs. So even though the inferentialist reliabilist might have a point in distinguishing between basic and non-basic beliefs, it is still in need of a different response to clairvoyance cases. Chapter 6: Rejoinders for ReliabilismChapter 6 improves on the inferentialist reliabilist account of justification by presenting a different way of dealing with the clairvoyance cases and New Evil Demon Scenario. I start from the empirically plausible idea that we know that we are perceiving when we are perceiving, not because of the use of experiential evidence, but rather, because of an unconscious source-monitoring mechanism. I then argue that the existence of such a source-monitoring mechanism could be used to explain why clairvoyance cases actually have to do with defeat rather than absence of prima facie justification: beliefs that pop up in our head should be recognized as stemming from untrustworthy sources, and so we acquire defeating higher-order beliefs about the first-order beliefs. I also argue that this defeat should be able to occur even if the higher-order beliefs are themselves unjustified. This defeater-account of clairvoyance is preferable to several externalist alternatives. Making reliability relative to a specific world seems rather ad hoc, and further requirements on justification, such as evidence-based belief, cognitively integrated belief, or properly produced belief, all appear unnecessary and are susceptible to adapted versions of the clairvoyance case.I further argue for an alternative inferentialist reliablist response to the New Evil Demon Intuition which treats it as mistaken rather than correct. The New Evil Demon Intuition might arise because of a mistaken view of actual perceptual justification as having to do with experiential evidence. This mistaken view could be explained by the fact that experience is actually reliably connected to belief and is often cited in response to a knowledge-challenge. If this is a correct analysis of the New Evil Demon Intuition, then there is an element of question-begging involved when this scenario is still pressed against inferentialist reliabilists who do not adhere to the experientialist assumption it presupposes.With the inferentialist reliabilist account in hand,we are able to see that many of the premises of the epistemological argument from hallucination are problematic. Evidence does not appear to be required for perceptual knowledge, as perceptual justification does not even require such evidence. Moreover, if we accept a reliabilist model of introspection, then we are often able to know on the basis of introspection that we are perceiving rather than hallucinating. Once one gets clear about the alternatives, it becomes apparent that the argument thrives on internalist assumptions about justification and knowledge that one need not accept. (shrink)

ontology metaontology wright platonism fregean existence epistemology.

The existence of natural laws, whether deterministic or indeterministic, and whether exceptionless or ceteris paribus, seems puzzling because it implies that mindless bits of matter behave in a consistent and co-ordinated way. I explain this puzzle by showing that a number of attempted solutions fail. The puzzle could be resolved if it were assumed that natural laws are a manifestation of God’s activity. This argument from natural law to God’s existence differs from its traditional counterparts in (...) that, whereas the latter seek to explain the fact of natural laws, the former seeks to explain their possibility. The customary objections to the traditional arguments cannot be successfully adapted to counter this new argument, with one exception which has only limited effect. I rebut four claims that the theistic solution to the puzzle about natural laws is paradoxical, though I concede that one of these claims has merit. I consider four objections to the new argument but find three of them more or less unsatisfactory. The fourth, if successful, would undermine our claims to know the truth about the world. (shrink)

A central theme of metaphysics has been the status of the object of experience. Vahlberg asks us to reconsider whether the object of sensory experience is an external or an internal object, that is, one whose existence is, respectively, independent of or dependent on experience.

Pursuing difficult long-term goals typically involves encountering substantial evidence of possible future failure. If decisions to pursue such goals are serious only if one believes that one will act as one has decided, then some of our lives’ most important decisions seem to require belief against the evidence. This is the puzzle of difficult action, to which I offer a solution. I argue that serious decisions to φ do not have to give rise to a belief that one will (...) φ, but can instead be accompanied by a hope to φ. Hope can motivate and rationalize the various actions that we associate with serious commitment. It can also account for the existence of special pressures to adopt an agential stance toward one’s future. Because hope can be cognitively rational when belief is not, there is no problematic tension between the ideal of epistemic rationality and the phenomenon of difficult action. (shrink)

In this paper I present an empirical solution to the puzzle of Macbeth's dagger. The puzzle of Macbeth's dagger is the question of whether, in having his fatal vision of a dagger, Macbeth sees a dagger. I answer this question by addressing a more general one: the question of whether perceptual verbs are intensional transitive verbs (ITVs). I present seven experiments, each of which tests a collection of perceptual verbs for one of the three features characteristic of ITVs. (...) One of these features is Nonexistence: the failure of sentences involving transitive verbs to entail the existence of their direct objects. The experiments reveal that with respect to all three of these features, "see" behaves much more like a paradigmatically extensional verb than an intensional one. But surprisingly, unlike "see", "perceive" behaves much more like a paradigmatically intensional verb. This shows that the category of perceptual verbs is not uniform with respect to the features of intensionality; while Macbeth does not see a dagger, he may still perceive one. (shrink)

In the 1930s, the Bengali philosopher K. C. Bhattacharyya proposed a new theory of rasa, or aesthetic emotion, according to which aesthetic emotions are feelings that have other feelings as their intentional objects. This paper articulates how Bhattacharyya’s theory offers a novel solution to the puzzle of how it is both possible and rational to enjoy the kind of negative emotions that are inspired by tragic and sorrowful tales. The new solution is distinct from the conversion and compensation views (...) that dominate the existing literature, and it derives its significance from how it ties aesthetic experience to self-awareness. (shrink)

This article criticises existing solutions to the 'puzzle of imaginative resistance', reconstrues it, and offers a solution of its own. About the Book : Imagination, Philosophy and the Arts is the first comprehensive collection of papers by philosophers examining the nature of imagination and its role in understanding and making art. Imagination is a central concept in aesthetics with close ties to issues in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of language, yet it has not received the kind (...) of sustained, critical attention it deserves. This collection of seventeen brand new essays critically examines just how and in what form the notion of imagination illuminates fundamental problems in the philosophy of art. (shrink)

This paper presents a new cognitivist account for the old puzzle of self-consciousness or knowing self-reference. Knowing self-reference does not rely on reflection on some putative pre-existent pre-reflexive self-consciousness, nor is it the result of a process of identification of oneself as the employer of the relevant token of “I” according to the token-reflexive rule of the first-person pronoun. Rather, it relies on the architecture of the cognitive system. By exploiting the acquaintance relation that every brain has to one’s (...) own body, a “mental file” is opened in a subliminal way to house information about oneself gained through the appropriate proprioceptors. Knowing self-reference based on self-files dispenses with self-identification because the opening of the file in the same brain/body is not a deed of the cognitive system but rather something that takes place sub-personally. (shrink)

Intra-molecular connectivity (that is, chemical structure) does not emerge from computations based on fundamental quantum-mechanical principles. In order to compute molecular electronic energies (of C 3 H 4 hydrocarbons, for instance) quantum chemists must insert intra-molecular connectivity “by hand.” Some take this as an indication that chemistry cannot be reduced to physics: others consider it as evidence that quantum chemistry needs new logical foundations. Such discussions are generally synchronic rather than diachronic —that is, they neglect ‘historical’ aspects. However, systems of (...) interest to chemists generally are metastable . In many cases chemical systems of a given elemental composition may exist in any one of several different metastable states depending on the history of the system. Molecular structure generally depends on contingent historical circumstances of synthesis and separation, rather than solely or mainly on relative energies of alternative stable states, those energies in turn determined by relationships among components. Chemical structure is usually ‘kinetically-determined’ rather than ‘thermodynamically-determined.’ For instance, cyclical hydrocarbon ring-systems (as in cyclopropene) are produced only in special circumstances. Adequate theoretical treatments must take account of the persistent effects of such contingent historical events whenever they are relevant—as they generally are in chemistry. (shrink)

The paper presents both new data and a new analysis of the semantic and pragmatic properties of the class of absolute scalar adjectives within an extension of a well-known logical framework for the analysis of gradable predicates: the delineation semantics framework . It has been long observed that the context-sensitivity, vagueness and gradability features of absolute scalar predicates give rise to certain puzzles for their analysis within most, if not all, modern formal semantic frameworks. While there exist proposals for solving (...) these puzzles within other major frameworks , it has been argued that some of their aspects are particularly challenging for the analysis of absolute scalar predicates within the delineation approach. By combining insights into the relationship between context-sensitivity and scalarity from the DelS framework with insights into the relationship between tolerance/similarity relations and the Sorites paradox from Cobreros et al.’s Tolerant, Classical, Strict framework, I propose a new logical system, called Delineation TCS , in which to set analyses of four classes of adjectival predicates. I argue that this new framework allows for an analysis of absolute scalar adjectives that answers these challenges for delineation-based frameworks, while still preserving the heart of the Klein-ian approach. (shrink)

My belief that Socrates was wise, and your belief that Socrates was mortal can be said to have a common focus, insofar as both these thoughts are about Socrates. In Peter Geach’s terminology, the objects of our beliefs bear the feature of intentional identity, because our beliefs share the same putative target. But what if it turned out that Socrates never existed? Can a pair of thoughts share a common focus if the object both thoughts are about, does not actually, (...) really exist? Object-centric accounts of intentionality which explain the aboutness or directedness of thought in terms of the intentional object the thought in question is about, contend that thoughts which share a common focus do so in virtue of both thoughts simply being about the same intentional object. However, Alexander Sandgren contends that such theories face difficulties in explaining a puzzle of intentional identity put forward by Walter Edelberg, in which a pair of sentences seem to differ in truth value but are purportedly logically equivalent on the object-centric theory. If this is right, then it seems that any account which explains intentionality with reference to an intentional object is threatened by this result, whether this object be abstract, merely possible, Meinongian, or otherwise. In this paper, I argue that Edelberg’s Puzzle is analogous to Frege’s Puzzle and the same tools conventionally used to solve Frege’s Puzzle can be used to solve Edelberg’s Puzzle. I then propose a new object-centric solution to Edelberg’s Puzzle which takes into account modes of presentation and which is able to accommodate all the relevant linguistic data. (shrink)

To turn then to our own question, I should say, in order to supply the fundamental puzzle at once, that a work of art has an intermittent existence.

In 1662 Christiaan Huygens carried out the famous Torricelli experiment to test the existence of atmospheric pressure by inserting the apparatus in the glass receiver of a vacuum pump, and evacuating the air inside it. He reported that when the air was exhausted, a column of water remained suspended in a 4-foot tube. This unexpected result was in stark contrast with earlier experiments of Boyle and Hooke that apparently had confirmed Torricelli’s explanation that such a water column was supported (...) by outside air pressure, and would fall when the air was removed. Huygen’s “anomalous suspension” led to the continuation of controversies in the seventeenth century about the nature of the vacuum that these experiments were expected to resolve. Surprisingly, the origin of Huygens’ unexpected result has remained a puzzle up to the present time. In this paper, I discuss the dynamics of such a column of water under the experimental conditions reported by Boyle and by Huygens, that turned out to be different, and present the results of a replication of their experiments with a modern vacuum pump. Contrary to the conventional explanations of these experiments, I demonstrate that in the Boyle–Hooke version of this experiment, the water column descends initially because it is forced down by the gas pressure due to air dissolved in the water which is released inside the Torricelli tube after the external pressure is sufficiently decreased. Huygens, however, first removed this trapped air before he carried out his experiment. In the absence of this internal gas pressure, the early rudimentary vacuum pumps were inadequate to decrease the air pressure sufficiently inside the receiver to demonstrate the descent of a Torricelli column of airless water 4-foot in height or less. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume on the Abstract Idea of Existence: Comments on Cummins' "Hume on the Idea of Existence"1 Fred Wilson Hume'sviews on theconceptofexistence: thisisone ofthemore obscure parts of Hume's philosophy. Professor Cummins has done a valuable service simply by trying to unravel some ofthe puzzles; it is still more valuable for shedding as much light as it does on the issues. There are nonetheless problems with the interpretation that (...) he develops, and I would like to bring out some ofthese. I will address three questions: (a)What, more precisely, is the (abstract) idea ofexistence? (b)What is the notion of"necessity" as Hume would use it in connection with the notion that something exists "necessarily," or, contrarily, "contingently"? (c)Does it follow from the fact that whatever thing we conceive we conceive as existent that every thing necessarily exists? In order toanswerthese questions somethingwillhave tobe said about Hume's doctrine ofabstractideas. Butonall theseissues, Humeis often not so much inadequate as incomplete; and I shall suggest that a numberofpoints canbeilluminatedbylookingatthe historical context that Hume himselfcould take for granted. The upshot will not be that Hume's views are unproblematic, but only that they are perhaps less problematic than Professor Cummins makes out. I. Abstract Ideas In many respects, Hume's doctrine of ideas is fairly traditional. We think in terms ofideas. In particular, our capacity to think generally, and to use general terms, is a matter ofhaving abstract ideas. In this, Hume follows the views ofhis predecessors such as Locke, Descartes and the Port Royal logicians. Hume also adopts the principle that what is conceivable is possible. Again, he follows the same tradition ofLocke, Volume XVII Number 2 167 FRED WILSON Descartes and the Port Royal logicians. Where Hume differs from his predecessors is in his account of what precisely an abstract is. For Hume's predecessors, one forms an abstract idea by separation. Thus, for Locke, forming ideas by abstraction consists in "separating them from all other Ideas that accompany them in their real existence."2 This sortofseparation is the mechanism bywhich "the Mind makes the particular Ideas, received from particular Objects, to become general" (Essay, 2.11.9). The Port Royal logicians make the same point: abstraction occurs with respect to "choses... composées" when one "les considérant par parties, et comme par les diverses faces qu'elles peuvent recevoir." In abstraction what is thus known is considered separately from the whole; either one considers "les parties séparément" in the case of"parties intégrantes," or one "peut séparer les choses en divers modes," or, finally, "quand une même chose ayant divers attributs, on pense à l'un sans penser à l'autre."3 The former occurs when, for example, we separate in thought the parts ofthe body. Thisis the simplestform ofabstraction. Berkeleyhas noproblems with this notion: "Iwill notdenyI can abstract, ifthatmay properlybe called abstraction, which extends only to the conceiving separately such objects, as is possible may really exist or be actually perceived asunder."4 Neither does Hume have problems with this notion; it is the basis of his—and Berkeley's—view that ideas are either simple or complex and that some of the complex ideas are a result of our combining simple parts in ways that are not found in reality, as, for example, in our idea ofthe New Jerusalem.5 It is the other two sorts ofabstraction that are more problematic. Consider the first of these two forms of abstraction. We begin with simple ideas ofsensation, for example, white (Essay, 2.3.1). One forms the abstract idea of white by separating the property white from the other qualities with which it is conjoined in the white particulars, for example, snow or milk (Essay, 2.21.73), that are given in sense experience. The resultingideais distinct from other ideas, for example, blue or heat (Essay, 2.12.1). The example given by Nicole and Arnauld is thatofthe geometers who explore the idea ofthree-dimensional space by considering first length alone, then area, and finally volumes or solids (which is the same, for these Cartesians as "corps," body) (Logique, 1.5). This is one form ofseparation. By this means one forms abstract... (shrink)

In this paper we are dealing with Kant's view on the phenomenon of incongruous counterparts, in particular with the argument from his article 'On the First Ground of the Distinction of Regions in Space', where the phenomenon of incongruous counterparts is used as an argument for the existence of the absolute and objective space, and with the argument from Kant's Inaugural Dissertation in which he uses the phenomenon of incongruous counterparts again, but this time for a different purpose - (...) as an argument in favor of the idea of space as a pure intuition. Our aim is to show that Kant's argument from 'On the First Ground of the Distinction of Regions in Space', although it shows the inadequacy of Leibniz's definition of congruence, does not in fact represent the reductio ad absurdum of the relationist view, for his argument in favor of the existence of the absolute space represents merely the inference to the best explanation. We also propound an alternative account of the phenomenon of incongruous counterparts, which is in line with the relationist theory. Furthermore, we call in question Kant's argument from the Inaugural Dissertation, according to which incongruence could not be explained discursively, and we put forward a conceptual determination of incongruence in terms of the notions of similarity, equality and congruence, taken as the possibility of objects to be included within the same spatial boundaries. U ovom radu bavimo se Kantovim shvatanjem fenomena inkongruentnih pandana pre svega njegovim argumentom iz spisa 'O osnovnim principima razlikovanja smerova u prostoru', gde Kant fenomen inkongruentnih pandana koristi kao argument u prilog tvrdnje o postojanju apsolutnog i objektivnog prostora, kao i argumentom iz Kantove Inauguralne disertacije, u kojoj se on ponovo poziva na fenomen inkongruentnih pandana, ali ovoga puta sa drugacijim ciljem - kao argument u prilog shvatanja prostora kao cistog opazaja. Cilj nam je da pokazemo kako Kantov argument iz spisa 'O osnovnim principima razlikovanja smerova u prostoru', iako pokazuje neadekvatnost Lajbnicove definicije kongruencije, ipak ne predstavlja reductio ad absurdum relacionisticke pozicije, buduci da njegov argument u prilog postojanja apsolutnog prostora predstavlja samo zakljucak na najbolje moguce objasnjenje, kao i da ponudimo alternativno objasnjenje fenomena inkongruentnih pandana, koje je u skladu sa relacionistickom teorijom. Takodje, dovodimo u pitanje Kantov argument iz Inauguralne disertacije, prema kojem se inkongruencija ne moze izraziti diskurzivno, nudeci pri tome pojmovno odredjenje inkongruencije preko pojmova slicnosti, jednakosti i kongruencije, shvacene kao sposobnost objekata da zauzmu istovetne prostorne granice. (shrink)

Kit Fine has proposed a new solution to what he calls ‘a familiar puzzle’ concerning modality and existence. The puzzle concerns the argument from the alleged truths ‘It is necessary that Socrates is a man’ and ‘It is possible that Socrates does not exist’ to the apparent falsehood ‘It is possible that Socrates is a man and does not exist’. We discuss in detail Fine’s setting up of the ‘puzzle’ and his rejection, with which we concur, (...) of two mooted solutions to it. (One of these uses standard, Kripkean, notions, and the other rests on work done by Arthur Prior.) We set out, and reject, the philosophy of modality underlying Fine’s new solution, and we defend an alternative response to the alleged puzzle. Our solution follows the work of David Wiggins in distinguishing between the sentential operator ‘It is necessary that’ and the predicate modifier ‘necessarily’. We briefly provide this distinction with a possible- world semantics on which it is neither a necessary truth, in some sense, that Socrates exists nor true, in some sense, that Socrates necessarily exists. (shrink)

Attempts at solving what has been labeled as Eugene Wigner’s puzzle of applicability of mathematics are still far from arriving at an acceptable solution. The accounts developed to explain the “miracle” of applied mathematics vary in nature, foundation, and solution, from denying the existence of a genuine problem to designing structural theories based on mathematical formalism. Despite this variation, all investigations treated the problem in a unitary way with respect to the target, pointing to one or two ‘why’ (...) or ‘how’ questions to be answered. In this paper, I argue that two analyses, a semantic analysis ab initio and a metatheoretical analysis starting from the types of unreasonableness involved in this problem, will establish the interdisciplinary character of the problem and reveal many more targets, which may be addressed with different methodologies. In order to address objectively the philosophical problem of applicability of mathematics, a foundational revision of the problem is needed. (shrink)

Much ink has been spilled to explain why Darwin avoided publishing his views for many years. Although a general consensus was never achieved on any one reason, not much doubt has been raised as to the existence of such a delay. In this article I argue that there was no delay. Darwin published his views as soon as he developed a defensible theory. I argue that the appearance of a delay emerged as a consequence of reading Darwin out of (...) context. Once we distinguish what would constitute a satisfactory account of transmutation for Darwin from what it would be for us, there will be no plausible case to argue that Darwin delayed publication. (shrink)

Rasmussen develops a new answer to the question, "Why does anything exist?" He begins by describing a puzzle about how anything can exist. The puzzle motivates the quest to explain things as far as one can. To solve the puzzle, Rasmussen describes a sequence of scenes in a story about existence. The story brings to light a three-pronged explanation of existence: (i) things exist because it is impossible for nothing to have existed, (ii) it is (...) impossible for nothing to have existed because there is a foundational reality that cannot not exist, and (iii) such a foundation would have a certain nature—to be specified--that allows it to be foundational. Rasmussen considers how this theory of fundamental reality can incorporate other large scale theories, including Platonism, axiarchism, and naturalism. (shrink)

In ‘The Semantics of Singular Terms’ (1976) Brian Loar proposed a famous case where a hearer seems to misunderstand an utterance even though he has correctly identified its referent. Loar’s case has been used to defend a model of communication where speaker and hearer must think of the referent in similar ways in order for communication to succeed. This ‘Similar Ways of Thinking’ (SW) theory is extremely popular, both in the literature on Loar cases and in other philosophical discussions. My (...) goal is to offer a novel argument against this influential model of communication and propose an alternative picture. First, I show how a certain version of SW fails to solve Loar’s puzzle. Then I point at a more general problem with SW, arguing that no version of this model can account for Loar-style cases without making the conditions for communication too strict. I then propose an alternative account of Loar cases, analyzing them as cases of luck where the hearer does not know that she has identified the referent correctly. I conclude by contrasting my view with other existing accounts of Loar cases. (shrink)

Attempts at solving what has been labeled as Eugene Wigner’s puzzle of applicability of mathematics are still far from arriving at an acceptable solution. The accounts developed to explain the “miracle” of applied mathematics vary in nature, foundation, and solution, from denying the existence of a genuine problem to designing structural theories based on mathematical formalism. Despite this variation, all investigations treated the problem in a unitary way with respect to the target, pointing to one or two ‘why’ (...) or ‘how’ questions to be answered. In this paper, I argue that two analyses, a semantic analysis ab initio and a metatheoretical analysis starting from the types of unreasonableness involved in this problem, will establish the interdisciplinary character of the problem and reveal many more targets, which may be addressed with different methodologies. In order to address objectively the philosophical problem of applicability of mathematics, a foundational revision of the problem is needed. (shrink)

Attempts at solving what has been labeled as Eugene Wigner’s puzzle of applicability of mathematics are still far from arriving at an acceptable solution. The accounts developed to explain the “miracle” of applied mathematics vary in nature, foundation, and solution, from denying the existence of a genuine problem to designing structural theories based on mathematical formalism. Despite this variation, all investigations treated the problem in a unitary way with respect to the target, pointing to one or two ‘why’ (...) or ‘how’ questions to be answered. In this paper, I argue that two analyses, a semantic analysis ab initio and a metatheoretical analysis starting from the types of unreasonableness involved in this problem, will establish the interdisciplinary character of the problem and reveal many more targets, which may be addressed with different methodologies. In order to address objectively the philosophical problem of applicability of mathematics, a foundational revision of the problem is needed. (shrink)

In the Posterior Analytics (I 6, 75a18–27) Aristotle discusses a puzzle which endangers the possibility of inferring a non-necessary conclusion. His solution relies on the distinction between the necessity of the conclusion's being the case and the necessity of admitting the conclusion once one has admitted the premisses. The former is a factual necessity, whereas the latter is meant to be a normative or deontic necessity that is independent of the facts stated by the premisses and the conclusion. This (...) paper maintains that Aristotle resorts to this distinction because he thinks that, as long as it is conceived as a factual relation, logical consequence cannot exist independently of the facts expressed by the premisses and the conclusion. As a corollary, the necessity of such a consequence relation always requires the necessity of these facts. Aristotle holds this factual conception of logical consequence responsible for the puzzle, since it cannot account for valid syllogisms with contingent or false premisses. The alternative conception of necessity is then introduced by him in order to make good this deficiency. The distinction between the necessity of being and the necessity of saying was revived by the Oxford logician E. W. B. Joseph, and taken over by Frank Ramsey in his seminal Truth and Probability, but has not received attention from recent interpreters of Aristotle's logic. This paper, however, argues that, in spite of its intrinsic interest, the distinction bore no significant fruit in Aristotle's logical doctrine. (shrink)

In this course we will examine several philosophical puzzles concerning time. We all seem to experience time in a very fundamental and direct way. Yet once we begin to reflect on what time really is, it is easy to feel as puzzled as St Augustine was, who wrote: “If no one asks me, I know what [time] is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks me, I do not know.” The first set of issues we will discuss (...) concern the question whether time is ‘real.’ Time appears to consist of past, present and future. But do the past and the future exist in the same way as the present or is only the present real? Does time ‘flow’? In what ways is time different from space? What would it be to ‘spatialize’ time? Next we will ask whether certain views of time imply that there can be no freedom of the will. One might worry that if facts about the future (including facts about what I will do tomorrow) already existed in the same way as facts about the present exist, then I could not be free to choose what I will do. After all, how can I be free to decide to skip class tomorrow, if it is ‘already’ a fact today that I will attend class? What, if anything, is the connection between various views of time and ‘fatalism’? The third topic we will discuss is time travel. First we will ask whether time travel is a conceptual possibility. As we will see, there are certain conceptual puzzles associated with the possibility of time travel. For example, one might think that if time travel is possible, then I should be able to travel back in time and kill my father before the date of my conception. But this scenario seems to lead to a contradiction. Some have taken considerations such as these to argue that the very idea of time travel is incoherent. Is this right? If not, why not? Then we will look at what the theory of relativity says about the nature of time in general and about the physical possibility of time travel more specifically. Finally we will examine several issues concerning the asymmetry of time.. (shrink)

Some metaphysicians believe that existence debates are easily resolved by trivial inferences from Moorean premises. This paper considers how the introduction of negative Moorean facts—negative existentials that command Moorean certainty—complicates this picture. In particular, it shows how such facts, when combined with certain plausible metaontological principles, generate a puzzle that commits the proponents of this method to a contradiction.