DOCSLIB.ORG

PHI 351 Nominalism

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
PHI 351 Nominalism Philosophy 351 September 9, 2008 Prof. Clare Batty Universals: Nominalism 1. Recap Metaphysical realism: the world contains both universals and particulars. Certain things (particulars) are alike in attribute (property, relation, kind) because they exemplify the same universal. Metaphysical realists claim that their two-category framework not only provides us with the machinery with which to explain attribute agreement/similarity/resemblance but also a pair of important phenomena: i. The truth of subject-predicate discourse ii. Our use of abstract reference. 2. Issues we have raised about metaphysical realism a. What universals is the metaphysical realist willing to allow into his/her ontology? • Does he/she allow the universal bachelor or just unmarried, adult, male (does he/she even allow unmarried?). What about he universal green or just green (or light green)? 52 b. Are there unexemplified universals? • Certainly there might have been different properties in the world. Are there universals corresponding to these non-existent, but possible, properties? c. Is the relation of exemplification itself a universal? If so, doesn’t this commit the metaphysical realist to an infinite regress? • Suppose a and b are both F. That is, they exemplify the universal F-ness. But now they have an additional thing in common: they are both exemplifications of F-ness. That is, they both exemplify the universal exemplification of F-ness. Can you see where this is going? d. Doesn’t the metaphysical realist overestimate the degree of agreement/likeness/resemblance in the world? • Grass, peas and wasabi paste are all similar; but they are not exactly alike. 3. Nominalism Nominalism denies the existence of universals. Nominalists remind us that metaphysical realists are in the business of theory construction. Given this, we can evaluate metaphysical realism along the following lines: i. Does the theory succeed in explaining the phenomena it aims to explain? ii. Does the theory attain theoretical simplicity? Ockham’s Razor: “Do not multiply entities beyond necessity”. Given two theories with the same explanatory power, the theory that posits fewer irreducibly distinct kinds of things is preferable. Concerns (a)-(c) above belie the suspicion that, where metaphysical realism is concerned, the answer to (ii) is ‘no’. Concern (d) above belies the suspicion the suspicion that, for metaphysical realism, the answer to (i) is ‘no’. 4. Price Price raises concerns of type (d) and, thus, raises concerns with question i. 1 The phenomena to be explained: attribute agreement, resemblance, likeness, similarity. According to the metaphysical realist, resemblance is always derivative: a resembles b because they are both instances of the same universal. a. Problem: Consider the following collection of things: a patch of freshly fallen snow, a piece of chalk, a piece of writing paper, a dusty handkerchief, and an old, worn, bow tie. All of these objects are white, we say. According to the metaphysical realist, these objects are all instances of the same universal, whiteness. But, these things are not exactly alike. They are more or less alike. But, if all of these objects are instances of the same universal, it ought to be that they are exactly alike in color. b. The nominalist diagnosis: Metaphysical realism aims to account for the resemblances between things but it treats resemblance as if it doesn’t come in degrees—either a fully resembles b or a doesn’t resemble b at all. But this doesn’t seem right. We all would admit that grass, green peas and wasabi paste resemble each other in some sense—although, admittedly, not fully or exactly. c. How do we account for this resemblance in some sense without positing the existence of universals? “The Philosophy of Resemblance” (Nominalism) Resemblance is not derivative. It does not depend on a relation to any further entity, like a universal. Consider the class of (what we call) white objects. Particular white objects do not exemplify objects of a further kind (namely, the universal whiteness); rather, they resemble each other. White objects form a set. In this set, there will be a sub-set of exemplars or paradigmatic white things. A white object is any object that resembles these exemplars as closely as they resemble each other. This is all we need to explain resemblance/likeness/similarity in the world. We do not need to posit any further entities, like universals. 2 .
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Idea of Mimesis: Semblance, Play, and Critique in the Works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W
    DePaul University Via Sapientiae College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences 8-2012 The idea of mimesis: Semblance, play, and critique in the works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno Joseph Weiss DePaul University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/etd Recommended Citation Weiss, Joseph, "The idea of mimesis: Semblance, play, and critique in the works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno" (2012). College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations. 125. https://via.library.depaul.edu/etd/125 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences at Via Sapientiae. It has been accepted for inclusion in College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Via Sapientiae. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Idea of Mimesis: Semblance, Play, and Critique in the Works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy October, 2011 By Joseph Weiss Department of Philosophy College of Liberal Arts and Sciences DePaul University Chicago, Illinois 2 ABSTRACT Joseph Weiss Title: The Idea of Mimesis: Semblance, Play and Critique in the Works of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno Critical Theory demands that its forms of critique express resistance to the socially necessary illusions of a given historical period. Yet theorists have seldom discussed just how much it is the case that, for Walter Benjamin and Theodor W.
    [Show full text]
  • Measuring Conceptual Similarity in Ontologies: How Bad Is a Cheap Measure?
    Measuring Conceptual Similarity in Ontologies: How Bad is a Cheap Measure? Tahani Alsubait, Bijan Parsia, and Uli Sattler School of Computer Science, The University of Manchester, United Kingdom falsubait,bparsia,[email protected] Abstract. Several attempts have been made to develop similarity mea- sures for ontologies. Motivated by finding problems in existing measures, we design a new family of measures to address these problems. We carry out an empirical study to explore how good the new measures are and to investigate how likely it is to encounter specific task-oriented problems when using a bad similarity measure. 1 Introduction The process of assigning a numerical value reflecting the degree of resemblance between two ontology concepts or the so called conceptual similarity measure- ment is a core step in many ontology-related applications (e.g., ontology align- ment [7], ontology learning [2]). Several attempts have been made to develop methods for measuring conceptual similarity in ontologies [22, 32, 23, 20, 4]. In addition, the problem of measuring similarity is well-founded in psychology and a number of similarity models have been already developed [6, 30, 26, 19, 29, 8, 12]. Rather than adopting a psychological model for similarity as a foundation, we noticed that some existing similarity measures for ontologies are ad-hoc and unprincipled. This can negatively affect the application in which they are used. However, in some cases, depending on how simple the ontology/task is, using a computationally expensive \good" similarity measure is no better than using a cheap \bad" measure. Thus, we need to understand the computational cost of the similarity measure and the cases in which it succeeds/fails.
    [Show full text]
  • A Model of Human Categorization and Similarity Based Upon Category Theory Michael Healy
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by University of New Mexico University of New Mexico UNM Digital Repository Electrical & Computer Engineering Technical Engineering Publications Reports 7-1-2008 A Model of Human Categorization and Similarity Based Upon Category Theory Michael Healy Thomas Caudell Timothy Goldsmith Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/ece_rpts Recommended Citation Healy, Michael; Thomas Caudell; and Timothy Goldsmith. "A Model of Human Categorization and Similarity Based Upon Category Theory." (2008). https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/ece_rpts/28 This Technical Report is brought to you for free and open access by the Engineering Publications at UNM Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electrical & Computer Engineering Technical Reports by an authorized administrator of UNM Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL AND COMPUTER ENGINEERING SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO A Model of Human Categorization and Similarity Based Upon Category Theory Michael John Healy Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering e-mail: [email protected] Thomas Preston Caudell Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Department of Computer Science e-mail: [email protected] Timothy E. Goldsmith Department of Psychology e-mail: [email protected] University of New Mexico Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, USA UNM Technical Report: EECE-TR-08-0010 Report Date: June 19, 2008 Abstract Categorization and the judgement of similarity are fundamental in cognition. We propose that these and other activities are based upon an underlying structure of knowledge, or concept representation, in the brain.
    [Show full text]
  • Wittgenstein and Religion
    Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Philosophy Theses Department of Philosophy 8-3-2006 Wittgenstein and Religion Daniel Patrick Corrigan Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/philosophy_theses Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Corrigan, Daniel Patrick, "Wittgenstein and Religion." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2006. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/philosophy_theses/13 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Philosophy at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Theses by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. WITTGENSTEIN AND RELIGION by DANIEL CORRIGAN Under the Direction of Robert L. Arrington ABSTRACT This thesis considers the implications of Wittgenstein’s early and later philosophy for the issue of religious belief, as well as the relation of religion to Wittgenstein’s thought. In the first chapter I provide an overview of the Tractatus and discuss the place of religion within the Tractarian framework. I then provide an overview of Philosophical Investigations . In the second chapter I consider interpretations by Norman Malcolm and Peter Winch of Wittgenstein’s comment that he could not help seeing every problem from a religious point of view, as well as Kai Nielsen’s famous critique of ‘Wittgensteinian Fideism.’ The third and final chapter takes up the issue of construing religious belief as a distinctive language-game. I consider arguments from D. Z. Phillips and criticisms of Phillips from Mark Addis and Gareth Moore. INDEX WORDS: Wittgenstein, Religion, Language-games WITTGENSTEIN AND RELIGION by DANIEL CORRIGAN A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in the College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University 2006 Copyright by Daniel Patrick Corrigan 2006 WITTGENSTEIN AND RELIGION by DANIEL CORRIGAN Major Professor: Robert L.
    [Show full text]
  • How Language Expresses the World After Early Wittgenstein
    [VOLUME 5IISSUE 3 I JULY– SEPT 2018]E ISSN 2348 –1269, PRINT ISSN 2349-5138 How Language Expresses the World after Early Wittgenstein NOOR BANU KHATUN Research Scholar in Philosophy, University of Gour Banga, Mokdumpur, Malda, West Bengal. India Received: May 25, 2018 Accepted: July 15, 2018 ABSTRACT In twentieth century philosophy, Ludwig Wittgenstein holds a unique position as far as his development of linguistic philosophy is concerned. We know his philosophy as early (T.L.P) and later (P.I) Wittgenstein. His both philosophy is very important for us. Language is the universal medium of communication. Only language can reveal the world. Ludwig Wittgenstein is the most proponent of ideal language philosophy. He proposes the ideal language in his early philosophy in Tractatus logico-Philosophicus. He says that language is the picture of the world or reality. Wittgenstein also holds that language always is corresponding to the world and he also prefers in T.L.P the semantic relationship between picture and reality, where picture is a model of reality. Keywords:Language, world (reality), Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (T.L.P). Introduction During twentieth century philosophy, most of the analytic philosophers conceived that philosophical problems are linguistic, because philosophical problems arise due to the misinterpretation of language or misuse of language or ambiguity of the words or expressions or definitions of language. Since Ludwig Wittgenstein emphasizes on language. Language is the most important medium of our communication in our life. Only language can express the world. There are two types of language viz. ideal language and ordinary language. However, in twentieth century philosophy, most proponents of ideal language philosopher are …viz.
    [Show full text]
  • Philosophy 351 August 27, 2007 Prof. Clare Batty the Problem of Universals
    Philosophy 351 August 27, 2007 Prof. Clare Batty The Problem of Universals: Metaphysical Realism The question: How do we explain the similarities between objects? For example, wheels are circular. So are doughnuts and cd’s. How do we explain the similarity between these things? Both Plato and Bertrand Russell are metaphysical realists. Metaphysical realists think that we can explain attribute similarity by positing a further kind of object to which ‘ordinary things’ are related. Metaphysical realists are to be contrasted with nominalists—who we will discuss next week. Plato Revisited Plato’s answer: Individual wheels, doughnuts, cd’s and other circular things participate in the Form (sometimes “Idea”) of CIRCULARITY. Wheels, doughnuts, cd’s and so on are all circular because they bear the right relation (i.e. participation) to CIRCULARITY. Russell on Universals Russell accepts Plato’s basic ontological framework, although he changes the language with which he speaks about it. Instead of speaking of Forms, or Ideas, Russell speaks of universals. Universals are to be contrasted from particulars. He tells us: “We speak of whatever is given in sensation, or is of the same nature as the things given in sensation, as a particular; by opposition to this, a universal will be anything which may be shared by many particulars, and has those characteristics which, as we saw, distinguish justice and whiteness from just acts and white things” (15) Examples of particulars: Charles I, Charles I’s head, the act of cutting off his head Particulars occupy a single region of space at a given time. Examples of universals: justice, whiteness, being a head Universals are repeatable entities.
    [Show full text]
  • Essence and Appearance in Folk Biology
    Journal of Ethnobiology 17(1):17-43 Summer 1997 GENERIC SPECIES AND BASIC LEVELS: ESSENCE AND APPEARANCE IN FOLK BIOLOGY SCOTTATRAN Institutefor Social Research UniversityofMichigan Ann Arbor, MI48106-1248 PAUL ESTIN Cognition and Perception Psychology UniversityofMichigan Ann Arbor, MI48106-1248 JOHN COLEY DOUGLAS MEDIN Department of Psychology Northwestern University Evanston, IL 60208-2710 ABSTRACT.-Results indicate that the same taxonomic rank is cognitively privi­ leged for biological induction in two diverse populations: people raised in Michi­ gan, and Itzaj Maya of the Peten rainforest. This is the generic species - the level of oak and robin - which is coextensive with Berlin's folkgeneric rank but with a distinct theoretical sense. The findings are unaccounted for by similarity-based models of category formation and induction because such models cannot simul­ taneously yield different measures of privilege. For example, Rosch and her col­ leagues suggest that life forms - the level of tree and bird - rather than folkgenerics comprise the "basic level" for many Americans. Rosch, like Berlin, advances such domain-general models of similarity to account for privileged cat­ egories as maximally informative clusters of perceptual attributes that best repre­ sent"objective discontinuities" in nature. However, this favors cross-cultural dif­ ferences in the rank privileged in induction as a function of differences in famil­ iarity with the natural environment. Although our data indicate some relative downgrading of knowledge to a higher rank among industrialized Americans and upgrading to a lower rank among silvicultural Maya, these differences are clearly a second-order effect. To account for the absolute privilege of generic spe­ cies in diverse cultures, a domain-specific view of folkbiology is offered.
    [Show full text]
  • Determinable Nominalism*
    1 DETERMINABLE NOMINALISM* 1. PROPERTIES AND THEIR ROLES In our ordinary unreflective talk we refer to properties by name and we quantify over them. This ontological commitment does not seem to be gratuitous. David Lewis has distinguished between what he calls a sparse and an abundant sense of ‘property’ corresponding approximately to two important and perhaps indispensable theoretical roles that properties are called on to play.1 Properties in the abundant sense (abundant properties) are required as the semantic values of predicates. There must be an abundant property for every possible predicate in every possible language, however gruesomely gerrymandered that predicate may be, and however impossible that language may be for us to master. Lewis: There is one of them for any condition we could write down, even if we could write at infinite length and even if we could name all those things that must remain nameless because they fall outside our acquaintance. In fact the [abundant] properties are as abundant as the sets themselves, because for any set whatever, there is the property of belonging to that set.2 Properties in the sparse sense of ‘property’ (sparse properties) are required as that which makes for genuine, objective, “qualitative” similarity among their instances.3 Sparse properties are said to “carve up reality at the joints” and it is their inter-relations that natural science aims to codify.4 * Earlier versions of this paper were read at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, Dartmouth College and Tufts University. I would like to thank the audiences for their helpful suggestions on those occasions.
    [Show full text]
  • Wittgenstein and Buddhism? on Alleged Affinities with Zen and Madhyamaka
    Comparative Philosophy Volume 6, No. 1 (2015): 24-37 Open Access / ISSN 2151-6014 www.comparativephilosophy.org WITTGENSTEIN AND BUDDHISM? ON ALLEGED AFFINITIES WITH ZEN AND MADHYAMAKA FLORIAN DEMONT-BIAGGI ABSTRACT: Buddhism is popular nowadays and so it becomes in analytic philosophy, as an increasing number of publications on possible intersections between analytic philosophy and Buddhism suggests. The paper focuses on two possible intersections between the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Buddhism. Drawing mainly on an article by Rupert Read, it is first assessed whether there are affinities between Wittgenstein and Zen. After that follows a discussion of alleged affinities between Wittgenstein and Indian Madhyamaka. The upshot of this paper will be that, while alleged affinities between Wittgenstein and at least one important variety of Zen lead to a dead end, constructively engaging Wittgenstein and Indian Madhyamaka is surprisingly fruitful if we make two specific exegetical choices. The first exegetical choice is to focus on Wittgenstein’s Big Typescript (and related documents). The second exegetical choice is to read Nāgārjuna according to Chandrakīrti and Lama Tsong Khapa (and all three as expounded by Jay Garfield). Under the assumption that these choices are good, further investigations to charter this new terrain appear justified. Keywords: Wittgenstein, Nāgārjuna, Zen, Dōgen, meta-metaphysics, conventional reality Contemporary philosophy is much concerned with meta-metaphysical questions, reintroducing central issues about the relation between reality and human concepts. Both, Wittgenstein and Buddhist thinkers after Nāgārjuna have worked hard on these issues. It has been argued by Rupert Read, Jay Garfield and others that there are interesting parallels between Wittgenstein’s and Nāgārjuna’s (and his followers’) views on reality.
    [Show full text]
  • Psychological Review J Copyright © 1977 C ? by the American Psychological Association, Inc
    Psychological Review J Copyright © 1977 C_? by the American Psychological Association, Inc. VOLUME 84 NUMBER 4 JULY 1977 Features of Similarity Amos Tversky Hebrew University Jerusalem, Israel The metric and dimensional assumptions that underlie the geometric represen- tation of similarity are questioned on both theoretical and empirical grounds. A new set-theoretical approach to similarity is developed in which objects are represented as collections of features, and similarity is described as a feature- matching process. Specifically, a set of qualitative assumptions is shown to imply the contrast model, which expresses the similarity between objects as a linear combination of the measures of their common and distinctive features. Several predictions of the contrast model are tested in studies of similarity with both semantic and perceptual stimuli. The model is used to uncover, analyze, and explain a variety of empirical phenomena such as the role of common and distinctive features, the relations between judgments of similarity and differ- ence, the presence of asymmetric similarities, and the effects of context on judgments of similarity. The contrast model generalizes standard representa- tions of similarity data in terms of clusters and trees. It is also used to analyze the relations of prototypicality and family resemblance. Similarity plays a fundamental role in errors of substitution, and correlation between theories of knowledge and behavior. It serves occurrences. Analyses of these data attempt to as an organizing principle by which individuals explain the observed similarity relations and classify objects, form concepts, and make gen- to capture the underlying structure of the ob- eralizations. Indeed, the concept of similarity jects under study.
    [Show full text]
  • Aspects of the Problem of Universals
    Aspects Of The Problem of Universals Donald Brownstein ¥ JNIVERSITY OF KANSAS HUMANISTIC STUDIES, 44 UNIVERSITY KANSAS PUBLICATIONS Humanistic Studies, 44 AUG 211978 ASPECTS OF THE PROBLEM OF UNIVERSALS Donald Brownstein LAWRENCE: UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS, 1973 COPYRIGHT 1973 BY THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS PRINTED IN LAWRENCE, KANSAS, U.S.A. BY THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS PRINTING SERVICE Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 73-620116 Contents I: Introduction 1 II: Qualities, Classes, and Aspects 5 III: Similarity, Perfect Particulars, and Universals 17 IV: Platonisrn and the Rejection of Universals 49 V: Moore's Platonisrn 63 Preface This book is a study in metaphysics. For quite some time that would have required an apology in Anglo-American philosophical circles. In recent years metaphysics has once more become respectable—it even shows dim signs of being a fashion. During the period when it was furthest from fashion there were some philosophers who insisted upon the centrality of metaphysics in philosophy. Among these were my teachers and my teachers' teachers. Herbert Hochberg, May Brodbeck, and Douglas Lewis—all my teachers—first made me see that there was work that could be done in meta• physics. And I have also learned much from their teacher, Gustav Bergmann. Those familiar with the work of these philosophers will, no doubt, recognize some of their themes in this book. Of all those who have taught me Herbert Hochberg is the one most closely connected with that which you may be about to read. So he deserves the lion's share of my thanks. I must also thank my colleagues and former colleagues at the University of Kansas who encouraged me in the face of what I now know to be the usual miseries of publishing a book.
    [Show full text]
  • Ontology-Based Domain-Specific Semantic Similarity Analysis and Applications
    Clemson University TigerPrints All Dissertations Dissertations 5-2018 Ontology-based Domain-specific eS mantic Similarity Analysis and Applications Xuebo Song Clemson University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_dissertations Recommended Citation Song, Xuebo, "Ontology-based Domain-specific eS mantic Similarity Analysis and Applications" (2018). All Dissertations. 2105. https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_dissertations/2105 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Dissertations at TigerPrints. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TigerPrints. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Ontology-based Domain-Specific Semantic Similarity Analysis and Applications A Dissertation Presented to the Graduate School of Clemson University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy Computer Science by Xuebo Song May 2018 Accepted by: Dr. James Z. Wang, Committee Chair Dr. Pradip K Srimani Dr. Jim Martin Dr. Feng Luo Abstract Millions of text data are penetrating into our daily life. These unstructured text data serve as a huge source of information. Efficient organization and analysis of the overwhelming text can filter out irrelevant and redundant information, uncover invaluable knowledge, thus significantly reduce human effort, facilitate knowledge discovery and enhance cognitive abilities. Semantic similarity analysis among text objects is one of the fundamental problems in text mining including document classifi- cation/clustering, recommendation, query expansion, information retrieval, relevance feedback, word sense disambiguation, etc. While a combination of common sense and domain knowledge could let a person quickly determine if two objects are similar, the computers understand very little of human thinking.
    [Show full text]