Theoria, Volume 88, Issue 2, Page 348-364, April 2022.

John Searle has recently developed a theory of reasons for acting that intends to rescue the freedom of the will, endangered by causal determinism, whether physical or psychological. To achieve this purpose, Searle postulates a series of “gaps” that are supposed toendowthe self with free will. Reviewing key steps in Searle's argument, this article shows that such an undertaking cannot be successfully completed because of its solipsist premises. The author argues that reasons for acting do not have a subjective, I-ontology (...) but a first-person plural, Weontology that better accounts for agency and responsibility. (shrink)

There is a puzzle about the use of paraphrase in philosophy, presented most famously in Alston's [1958] ‘Ontological Commitments’, but found throughout the literature. The puzzle arises from the fact that a symmetry required for a paraphrase to be successful seems to necessitate a symmetry sufficient for a paraphrase to fail, since any two expressions that stand in the means the same as relation must also stand in the has the same commitments as relation. I show that, while this problem (...) does undermine some conceptions of paraphrase, on a proper understanding of paraphrase the puzzle gets no purchase. Since paraphrase is an important component of Quinean approaches to meta-ontology, this paper constitutes a partial defence of Quinean meta-ontology. Since paraphrase is an important component of traditional methods of philosophical inquiry, this paper constitutes a partial defence of traditional modes of philosophizing as well. (shrink)

John Searle has recently developed a theory of reasons for acting that intends to rescue the freedom of the will, endangered by causal determinism, whether physical or psychological. To achieve this purpose, Searle postulates a series of "gaps" that are supposed toendowthe self with free will. Reviewing key steps in Searle's argument, this article shows that such an undertaking cannot be successfully completed because of its solipsist premises. The author argues that reasons for acting do not have a subjective, I-ontology (...) but a first-person plural, Weontology that better accounts for agency and responsibility. Key Words: free will • agency • reasons for acting • ontology. (shrink)

John Searle’s argument that social-scientific laws are impossible depends on a special open-ended feature of social kinds. We demonstrate that under a noncontentious understanding of bridging principles the so-called "counts-as" relation, found in the expression "X counts as Y in (context) C," provides a bridging principle for social kinds. If we are correct, not only are social-scientific laws possible, but the "counts as" relation might provide a more perspicuous formulation for candidate bridge principles.