Existentialism entails anti-haecceitism

Philosophical Studies 168 (2):297-326 (2014)
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Abstract

Existentialism concerning singular propositions is the thesis that singular propositions ontologically depend on the individuals they are directly about in such a way that necessarily, those propositions exist only if the individuals they are directly about exist. Haecceitism is the thesis that what non-qualitative facts there are fails to supervene on what purely qualitative facts there are. I argue that existentialism concerning singular propositions entails the denial of haecceitism and that this entailment has interesting implications for debates concerning the philosophy of language, the nature of propositions, and the metaphysics of modality.

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Kenneth Boyce
University of Missouri, Columbia

References found in this work

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Frege’s Puzzle (2nd edition).Nathan U. Salmon - 1986 - Atascadero, CA: Ridgeview Publishing Company.

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