DOCSLIB.ORG

Plato and Aristotle: Categories and Conceptions of Being

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Plato and Aristotle: Categories and Conceptions of Being Plato and Aristotle: Categories and Conceptions of Being Syllabus* Spring 2012. Humanities 502. Mondays 3:25pm-6:20pm. Pamela Hood San Francisco State University Office: Humanities 359 Email: [email protected] Web: http://profhood.com Course Web: https://ilearn.sfsu.edu 1 Course Description This is a graduate seminar examining the categories and varieties of being in Plato’s and Aristo- tle’s philosophy and the metametaphysical positions each philosopher takes in constructing his metaphysics and ontology. By necessity, our discussions will range through many philosophical disciplines: logic, ontology, metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language and philosophy of mind. We will proceed on two simultaneous tracks. The task on one track will be to locate and explicate the various categories and conceptions of “being" and “beings" Plato and Aristo- tle describe. We will be raising such questions as: What is “being", what sorts of beings there are, the ways of being a “being", how do beings exist, and how do we conceptualize these var- ious entities and ways of being? We will pay close attention to understanding, comparing and contrasting Plato’s and Aristotle’s philosophical motivations for conceiving the various kinds of categories of being they recognize. The task on the other track will be to use contemporary work in metametaphysics as a means to delve even deeper into the issues we examine on the former track. As David Manley puts it: *This syllabus is subject to revision. The latest version of this syllabus will be posted on iLearn. Please inform me of any errors or discrepancies in this document: [email protected] 1 Spring 2012 PHIL 770: Plato and Aristotle Dr. Pamela Hood Metametaphysics is concerned with the foundations of metaphysics. It asks: Do the questions of metaphysics really have answers? If so, are these answers substantive or just a matter of how we use words? And what is the best procedure for arriving at themcommon sense? Conceptual analysis? Or assessing competing hypotheses with quasi-scientific criteria? The readings in metametaphysics will include contemporary (and not so contemporary) philoso- phers such as Rudolph Carnap, David Chalmers, David Lewis, G.E. Moore, W.V. Quine, Scott Soames, Peter van Inwagen, and Stephen Yablo. While I am sure there will be plenty of op- portunity to criticize Plato’s and Aristotle’s views, our intent is not to use contemporary work in metaphysics and metametaphysics to refute or to advocate any particular view or approach Plato or Aristotle takes. Rather, our ultimate goal in the seminar is to be better poised to assess (a) the scope of Plato’s and Aristotle’s categories and conceptions of being and (b) the metameta- physical (or theoretical) utility of their views. 2 Course Objectives and Learning Outcomes Students will gain advanced knowledge of Plato’s and Aristotle’s philosophy and how contempo- rary philosophers and scholars of Ancient philosophy are engaging with the topics under con- sideration in the seminar. By engaging both primary and secondary texts students will attain and demonstrate an advanced understanding of philosophical issues and the ways in which scholars address them today. By writing seven short papers and one long paper, students will develop the capacity to apply philosophical methods (including advanced analytic and interpre- tive skills) to the problems under discussion. This will allow students to demonstrate mastery in contemporary philosophical research methods, in conducting comparative critical analyses of philosophical figures, and in critical, creative, and reflective philosophical writing. By partic- ipating actively in class discussion and giving a formal presentation, students will also develop substantial verbal skills necessary for thriving in the profession. All of the above skills will sup- port students in their future graduate work at the PhD level or in conducting their own under- graduate classes. 3 Overview of Course Content The course is divided into four (4) units of approximately four to five weeks each. A full schedule with all readings will be posted on iLearn. UNIT 1 Fundamentals: Category theory and metametaphysical concepts. This unit begins by examin- ing the philosophical terminology used in the study of metametaphysics, metaphysics, ontology and category theory. Topics include: distinction between different senses of “being"/“Being", 2 Spring 2012 PHIL 770: Plato and Aristotle Dr. Pamela Hood implications of existence, definition and uses of categories and concepts, notions of realism and anti-realism, deflation, quantification, nominalism, universals, particulars, trope/type dis- tinction, paradigms, classes, and states of affairs. Secondary Reading: Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology Chapters 1, 2, 3, and 4. Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Aristotle and the Metaphysics Chapters 1 and 2. UNIT 2 Plato and Aristotle: The metaphysical framework. The unit addresses (a) Plato’s “two world" (appearance/reality) view and grades of being. Readings are drawn principally from the Repub- lic, Parmenides, Phaedo, and Timaeus. We then turn to (b) Aristotle’s meta-ontological frame- works (substance/accident, form/matter, essence). Readings will be drawn from the Categories, Physics, and Metaphysics. Of particular interest will be an examination of Platonic Ideas and Aristotelian essence as they relate to the status of the conceptual being(s). Secondary Reading: Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology Chapters 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Aristotle and the Metaphysics Chapters 3, 4, and 5. UNIT 3 Plato and Aristotle: The epistemological considerations of the various categories of being. This unit deals with the epistemic status of different kinds of beings: Are they knowable? If so, to what degree? How are they known? What counts as knowledge of them? For Plato’s views we turn mainly to the Theatetus, Meno, and Republic. For Aristotle’s views we will read excerpts from the Posterior Analytics, De Anima and Metaphysics. Secondary Reading: Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology Chapters 10, 11, 12, and 13. Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Aristotle and the Metaphysics Chapters 6 and 7. UNIT 4 Plato and Aristotle: Categories and definitions as conceptual units of meaning. This unit fo- cuses on issues relating to the philosophy of language. We will address the utility of categories and definitions as bearers of meaning. We will explore Plato’s Cratylus, and Sophist for insights into his philosophy of language. For Aristotle’s views we will read excerpts from the Categories, De Interpretatione, and Topics. The seminar ends with an evaluative examination of Platonic and Aristotelian strategies for conceptualizing and categorizing Being/being(s). Secondary Reading: Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology Chapters 14, 15, 16, and 17. 3 Spring 2012 PHIL 770: Plato and Aristotle Dr. Pamela Hood Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Aristotle and the Metaphysics Chapters 8 and 9. 4 Instructional Methods and Materials While the instructor will also present lectures throughout the semester on topics in each unit, the course will be conducted as a seminar with opportunities for additional online discussion. Students are expected to participate actively in every session. Students are expected to have read, read well, and well before the class session, the primary texts and assigned secondary lit- erature in order. This level of preparation makes it possible to participate and contribute to the exchange of ideas and level of learning that is the hallmark of a graduate seminar course. 5 Required Texts 1. Barnes, The Collected Works of Aristotle (Princeton, 1984) 2. Chalmers, Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology (Oxford, 2009) 3. Cooper, The Complete Works of Plato (Hackett, 1997) 4. Politis, Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Aristotle and the Metaphysics (Routledge, 2004) Optional, but highly recommended Booth, et al, The Craft of Research (University Of Chicago Press, 2008) NB: You may substitute the Barnes Aristotle with McKeon’s much less expensive Basic Works of Aristotle. Ackrill’s New Aristotle Reader is another inexpensive option which also has a Kindle version available. I will make available to you texts that are not in the Ackrill or McKeon texts. 5.1 Required Secondary Reading Numerous articles and book chapters from sources other than the above will be required of all students. Most selections will be available on JSTOR, Project Muse, EBSCO or another Univer- sity database. You are responsible for bringing all assigned reading material to each seminar meeting in addition to the two required texts. 6 Course Requirements Prerequisites: Graduate standing in Philosophy or the consent of the instructor. Reading knowl- edge of Greek is a plus, but is not required. All four course requirements and observance of 4 Spring 2012 PHIL 770: Plato and Aristotle Dr. Pamela Hood course policies must be met in order to pass this course. For example, turning in a great term paper without sufficient class participation will result in a “not passing" grade, or D-. 1. Class Attendance and Participation 10% 2. Class oral presentation on term paper 10% 3. Eight short papers (3-4 pages) 40% 4. Final term paper (15 pages) 40% 6.1 Seminar Discussion & Discussion Leaders Discussion Leaders Each session, three students will be responsible for leading class discussion on the assigned readings: Plato (leader 1), Aristotle (leader 2), and one article or chapter from the assigned sec- ondary literature (leader 3). The signups for discussion leader will be on iLearn. Each leader is responsible for preparing and posting a 1-2 page handout for the class discussion on iLearn no later than Friday at 5pm. All students not leading a discussion, are required to read the three handouts and post comments or questions regarding the handouts. Seminar discussion leaders should aim for a 15-20 minute (maximum) seminar presentation. The point of the presentation is not simply to repeat what we all have read. You are to present a philosophical argument that is motivated by your assigned texts.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Philosophy of Language
    Philosophy OF Language Julian J. Schlöder, University OF AmsterDAM YEREVAN Academy FOR Linguistics AND Philosophy 2019 1 = 99 William Lycan, (Routledge, 3rD ed, 2019). ◦ Philosophy OF Language ◦ Stephen Yablo, LecturE NOTES ON Philosophy OF Language. > https: //ocw.mit.edu/courses/linguistics-and-philosophy/ 24-251-introduction-to-philosophy-of-language-fall-2011/ lecture-notes/ Jeff Speaks, (StanforD Encyclopedia OF ◦ Theories OF Meaning Philosophy). > https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/meaning 2 = 99 Language IS . ◦ REMARKABLE 3 = 99 ArE Pringles POTATO chips? 4 = 99 ◦ The British COURTS SPEND SOME TWO YEARS ON THAT question. > At STAKE WAS SOME £100 MILLION IN TAXes. Yes! A Pringle IS “MADE FROM POTATO ◦ The VAT AND Duties Tribunal: flOUR IN THE SENSE THAT ONE CANNOT SAY THAT IT IS NOT MADE FROM POTATO flour.” No! Pringles CONTAIN “A NUMBER OF ◦ The High Court OF Justice: SIGNIfiCANT INGREDIENTS” AND “CANNOT BE SAID TO BE ‘MADE OF’ ONE OF them.” TheY DO NOT EXHIBIT “POTATONESS”. (TheY ARE MORE LIKE BREAD THAN LIKE chips.) : Yes! The TEST FOR “POTATONESS” IS AN ◦ The Court OF Appeal “Aristotelian QUESTION” ABOUT “ESSENCE” AND THE COURT HAS “NO REAL IDEA” OF WHAT THAT means. Rather, THE QUESTION “WOULD PROBABLY BE ANSWERED IN A MORE RELEVANT AND SENSIBLE WAY BY A CHILD CONSUMER THAN BY A FOOD SCIENTIST OR A CULINARY pendant.” 5 = 99 THE QUESTIONS ◦ Fact: WORDS AND SENTENCES HAVE MEANINGSOR ARE MEANINGFUL. ◦ Fact: NOT ALL SEQUENCES OF sounds/letters ARE meaningful. ◦ But WHAT ARE meanings? Alternatively: WHAT IS meaningfulness? ◦ HoW DO LINGUISTIC ITEMS RELATE TO meanings? (And WHY DO SOME ITEMS FAIL TO RELATE TO meanings?) ◦ IN WHAT RELATIONS DO humans, LANGUAGES AND MEANINGS stand? 6 = 99 MEANING FACTS HerE ARE SOME THINGS THAT WE KNOW ABOUT meanings, WHATEVER THEY ARe.
    [Show full text]
  • CURRICULUM VITAE KATALIN BALOG Department of Philosophy University-Newark 175 University Ave., Newark, NJ 07102 Rutgers Home
    CURRICULUM VITAE KATALIN BALOG Department of Philosophy University-Newark 175 University Ave., Newark, NJ 07102 Rutgers Home page: http://hypatiaonhudson.net/ Email: [email protected] Education and work history 2018- present – professor, Rutgers University – Newark. 2010- 2018 – associate professor, Rutgers University – Newark. 2006- 2010 – associate professor, Yale University. 2000-2006 – assistant professor, Yale University. 1998-1999 – Mellon postdoctoral fellow, Cornell University. 1998 – Ph.D. Philosophy, Rutgers University. Ph.D. Thesis Director: Brian Loar Conceivability and Consciousness* Degree obtained: October 1998 *My dissertation was selected by Robert Nozick for publication in the series Harvard Dissertations in Philosophy. Areas of specialization Philosophy of mind Philosophy of psychology/cognitive science Free will and personal identity Metaphysics Value theory Buddhist philosophy Publications Forthcoming: 1. Either/Or: Subjectivity, Objectivity and Value (pdf). In: Transformative Experience: New Philosophical Essays, eds. Enoch Lambert and John Schwenkler, Oxford University Press (UK), 2020. 2. Disillusioned (pdf). Journal of Consciousness Studies 27 (1-2), 2020. Published: 3. Hard, Harder, Hardest (pdf), in Sensations, Thoughts, Langugage: Essays in Honor of Brian Loar (pp. 265-289), Arthur Sullivan (ed.), Routledge Festschrifts in Philosophy, Routledge, 2020. 4. Consciousness and Meaning; Selected Essays by Brian Loar, Oxford University Press, 2017. (Editor, Introduction to Loar’s Philosophy of Mind, pp. 137-152) pdf. 5. Illusionism’s Discontent (pdf). Journal of Consciousness Studies, 23(11-12), 40-51, 2016. 6. Acquaintance and the Mind-Body Problem (pdf).In Christopher Hill and Simone Gozzano (Eds.), New Perspectives on Type Identity: The Mental and the Physical (pp. 16-43). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012. 7. In Defense of the Phenomenal Concept Strategy (pdf).
    [Show full text]
  • APA Eastern Division 2019 Annual Meeting Program
    The American Philosophical Association EASTERN DIVISION ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH ANNUAL MEETING PROGRAM SHERATON NEW YORK TIMES SQUARE NEW YORK, NEW YORK JANUARY 7 – 10, 2019 Visit our table at APA Eastern OFFERING A 20% (PB) / 40% (HC) DISCOUNT WITH FREE SHIPPING TO THE CONTIGUOUS U.S. FOR ORDERS PLACED AT THE CONFERENCE. THE POETRY OF APPROACHING HEGEL’S LOGIC, GEORGES BATAILLE OBLIQUELY Georges Bataille Melville, Molière, Beckett Translated and with an Introduction by Angelica Nuzzo Stuart Kendall THE POLITICS OF PARADIGMS ZHUANGZI AND THE Thomas S. Kuhn, James B. Conant, BECOMING OF NOTHINGNESS and the Cold War “Struggle for David Chai Men’s Minds” George A. Reisch ANOTHER AVAILABLE APRIL 2019 WHITE MAN’S BURDEN Josiah Royce’s Quest for a Philosophy THE REAL METAPHYSICAL CLUB of white Racial Empire The Philosophers, Their Debates, and Tommy J. Curry Selected Writings from 1870 to 1885 Frank X. Ryan, Brian E. Butler, and BOUNDARY LINES James A. Good, editors Philosophy and Postcolonialism Introduction by John R. Shook Emanuela Fornari AVAILABLE MARCH 2019 Translated by Iain Halliday Foreword by Étienne Balibar PRAGMATISM APPLIED William James and the Challenges THE CUDGEL AND THE CARESS of Contemporary Life Reflections on Cruelty and Tenderness Clifford S. Stagoll and David Farrell Krell Michael P. Levine, editors AVAILABLE MARCH 2019 AVAILABLE APRIL 2019 LOVE AND VIOLENCE BUDDHIST FEMINISMS The Vexatious Factors of Civilization AND FEMININITIES Lea Melandri Karma Lekshe Tsomo, editor Translated by Antonio Calcagno www.sunypress.edu II IMPORTANT NOTICES FOR MEETING ATTENDEES SESSION LOCATIONS Please note: this online version of the program does not include session locations.
    [Show full text]
  • On Physical Multiple Realization
    ON PHYSICAL MULTIPLE REALIZATION BY RONALD P. ENDICOTT Perhaps no argument has done more to set the direction of contemporary philosophy of mind than the “multiple realizability argument.” First championed by Hilary Putnam and later reformulated by Jerry Fodor, the argument begins with the observation that a given psychological property can be realized by any number of diverse physical systems, and then ends with the conclusion that psychological properties are irreducible vis-à-vis the physical sciences.^ Its target, in other words, is type physicalism and the unity of science, as traditionally conceived. According to one popular criticism, however, the multiple realizability argument has been discredited by the fact that physical properties are also multiply realized} But this, I believe, is a mistake. While the criticism does serve to bring a number of important issues into better focus, it can be shown that the facts about physical multiple realization are perfectly consistent with the Putnam-Fodor style argument, and that, when such facts are rightly understood, they do not vitiate the original point about the irreducibility of psychological properties. /. Multiple Realization In spite of much talk about multiple realization, philosophers have generally been content to leave this central concept unanalyzed. I shall try to remedy this situation by indicating the two most salient features of the concept. First, there is the idea that a property is realized by a number of diverse states, which I take to mean that different state types can provide lawfully sufficient conditions for the instantiation of the multiply realized property. And second, there is the idea that among this range of diverse Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 70 (1989) 212-224 0279-0750/89/0300-0212 $01.30 Copyright © 1989 University of Southern California ON PHYSICAL MULTIPLE REALIZATION 213 states, there are no lawfully necessary and sufficient conditions for the instantiation of that property.
    [Show full text]
  • 1 Stephen Yablo's New Book Seeks to Rehabilitate the Notion of Subject
    FINDING THE QUESTION Zoltán Gendler Szabó Yale University “Well, I have the key in my hands: all I have to find is the lock” From Ernst Lubitsch’s 1942 film To be or not to be Stephen Yablo’s new book seeks to rehabilitate the notion of subject matter, which has been largely discarded within the theory of meaning. The project is immensely significant: it promises to reorient semantic theory and throws a fresh light on a number of recalcitrant problems, including confirmation, verisimilitude, knowledge attributions, enthymatic reasoning, pretense, and presupposition. In this commentary, I try to do two things: present Yablo’s view on subject matter as a way of fixing a problem within the classic Fregean theory of meaning, and then argue that the proposal needs one additional repair. 1. Going with Frege (but not all the way) It is a natural thought that to represent is to represent something in some way. Right now I am imagining a black cat – the thing I represent is a cat and the way I represent it is as stretching out on a mat. The object of my imagination is different from its content. And yet, at least when it comes to believing or asserting, the majority of contemporary philosophers tend to identify the two. The object and content of my belief or assertion that the cat is on the mat is typically taken to be the very same thing: the proposition that that the cat is on the mat. The central thesis of Yablo’s book is that this is a mistake – we should distinguish object and content in beliefs and assertions, or for that matter, in the sentences we use to report what people believe and assert.
    [Show full text]
  • Certified By
    Siding with Euthyphro Response-Dependence, Essentiality, and the Individuation of Ordinary Objects by Asta Kristjana Sveinsd6ttir B.A., Mathematics MASSACHUSETS INS! TE and Philosophy OF TECHNOLOGY Brandeis University, 1992 NOV 2 3 2004 A.M., Philosophy Harvard University, 1997 LIBRARIES i1 Submitted to the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy at the ARCHIVES|, Massachusetts Institute of Technology September 2004 © 2004 Asta Kristjana Sveinsd6ttir The author hereby grants to MIT permission to reproduce and to distribute publicly paper and electronic copies of this thesis document in whole or in part Signature of Author Department of Linguistics and Plilosophy Tune 14th, 2004 Certifiedby Sally Haslang/er Professor of Philosophy Thesis Supervisor Accepted by Vann McGee Professor of Philosophy Chair, Committee on Graduate Students Siding with Euthyphro: Response-Dependence, Essentiality and the Individuation of Ordinary Objects by Asta Kristjana Sveinsd6ttir Submitted to the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy onJune 14, 2004 in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy ABSTRACT The motivation for the dissertation is the desire to take a certain Kantian intuition seriously. This is the intuition that aspects of the world may be dependent in some way on, or constructed by, human thought and practices. The aim of the thesis is to offer one clear and coherent articulation of this intuition. What I offer is an account of what makes a property essential to an object that traces the source of that essentiality to our conceptual practices. This is a key component of an anti-realist essentialism.
    [Show full text]
  • I Believe I Can '⇤
    I Believe I Can '⇤ Matthew Aaron Mandelkern, Ginger Schultheis and David Boylan Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.A. [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] Abstract We propose a new analysis of ability modals. After briefly criticizing extant approaches, we turn our attention to the venerable but vexed conditional analysis of ability ascriptions. We give an account that builds on the conditional analysis, but avoids its weaknesses by incorporating a layer of quantification over a contextually supplied set of actions. 1 Introduction Our topic is ability modals, modals of the kind found in the following sentences: (1) John can go swimming this evening. (2) Mary cannot eat another bite of this rotten meal. (3) Louise is able to pick Roger up from work today. As a simple heuristic, we can identify ability modals as modals that appear in sentences that can be paraphrased pS is able to 'q (on its most prominent reading) or pS has the ability/power 1 to 'q (or with their negations). Our topic in particular is ability modals which have a specific action—an action tagged with a specific time—as the modal’s prejacent, as in (1), (2), and (3). Other ability modals, as in (4) Susie can swim. (5) Jim is able to touch his nose with the tip of his tongue. have as their prejacent a generic action, one not tied to a specific time. We assume that ability ascriptions with generic actions are just specific ability ascriptions embedded under a generic operator, and thus that a semantics for generic ability ascriptions will fall out of our proposal together with a suitable semantics for the generic operator.
    [Show full text]
  • 1- Concepts & Consciousness Stephen Yablo I. The
    Concepts & Consciousness Stephen Yablo I. The Conscious Mind is a hugely likeable book. Perceptive, candid, and instructive page by page, the work as a whole sets out a large and uplifting vision with cheeringly un- Dover-Beach-ish implications for "our place in the universe." A book that you can't helping wanting to believe as much as you can't help wanting to believe this one doesn't come along every day. It is with real regret that I proceed to the story of why belief would not come. Almost everything in The Conscious Mind turns on a single claim. The claim is that there can be zombie worlds: worlds physically like our own but devoid of consciousness. Zombie worlds provide a counterexample to psychophysical supervenience; which refutes physicalism; which sets the stage for Chalmers's "naturalistic dualism" with its contingent correlational laws; which comes scarily close to casting consciousness as an epiphenomenal by-product of its physical basis; which startles us into a measure of open- mindededness about Chalmers's "way out," in which the by-product role is abandoned for a powerful new position as the physical's intrinsic realizer; which sets up the panpsychic speculations of the final chapters. Zombie worlds are possible because they seem possible; one can conceive a scenario in which, with no physical provocation whatever, the phenomenal lights blink out. Any argument in this style has got, of course, to come to terms with Kripke's treatment of conceivability in Naming and Necessity. But Kripke can seem to be teaching a "good news/bad news" lesson about modal intuition with favorable implications for Chalmers's case.
    [Show full text]
  • Stephen Yablo Department of Linguistics & Philosophy, MIT Cambridge, MA 02139 Email: [email protected] Phone: 617-258-0740
    Stephen Yablo Department of Linguistics & Philosophy, MIT Cambridge, MA 02139 email: [email protected] phone: 617-258-0740 EDUCATION Ph. D 1986 UC, Berkeley (Philosophy) ½ MA 1980 University of Pune, India (Philosophy) B.Sc. 1979 University of Toronto (Math & Philosophy) PROFESSIONAL BACKGROUND 2012-XX David W. Skinner Professor of Philosophy, MIT 2008-2012 Professor, Linguistics and Philosophy, MIT 2005-2008 Professor and Chair, Linguistics and Philosophy, MIT 2004-2005 Professor and Head of Philosophy Section, MIT 2001-2004 Professor, Linguistics and Philosophy, MIT 1998-2001 Assoc. Professor, Linguistics and Philosophy, MIT 1992-1998 Assoc. Professsor, Philosophy, U of Michigan 1991-1992 Visiting Asst Professor, Philosophy, U of Toronto 1986-1992 Asst Professor, Philosophy, U of Michigan AREAS OF INTEREST Metaphysics, Philosophy of Mind, Philosophical Logic, Epistemology, Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Mathematics BOOKS AND COLLECTIONS Thoughts: Papers on Mind, Meaning, and Modality (OUP, 2009) Things: Papers on Objects, Events, and Properties (OUP, 2010) Aboutness (Princeton, 2014) HONORS, AWARDS, LECTURES Whitehead Lectures, Harvard University (2016) NY Institute of Philosophy Lectures (2014) Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Science (2012) ACLS Fellowship (2012) Guggenheim Fellowship (2012) John Locke Lecturer (Oxford, 2012) Kant Lecturer (Stanford, 2011) Hempel Lecturer (Princeton, 2008) Dewey Lecturer (Vermont, 2007) Nelson Visitor (University of Michigan 2007) Gareth Evans Memorial Lecture (Oxford 2005) Jacobsen Lecture (University of London 2005) National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship (2003) Michigan Humanities Fellowship (1995) National Humanities Center (1995) Teaching Award, University of Michigan (1992, 1993) "Mental Causation" picked for Philosopher's Annual (1992) Center for Advanced Study in Behavioral Sciences Fellowship (1991) Canada Research Fellowship (1990) National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship (1989) "Identity, Essence, & Indiscernibility" picked for Philosopher's Annual (1988) ARTICLES IN PRINT 1.
    [Show full text]
  • Bibliography on Metaontology (Including Ontological Commitment, and Some Philosophy of Mathematics)
    Bibliography on Metaontology (including ontological commitment, and some philosophy of mathematics) Ted Sider, Spring 2006 Thanks to Savitt, and Amie Thomasson for sharing syllabi with me, and to Karen Bennett, Matti Eklund and Steve Yablo for posting syllabi online: Karen Bennett: http://www.princeton.edu/~kbennett/metasyllabus05.htm Matti Eklund: http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/me72/ontologysyll.pdf Steve Yablo: http://www.mit.edu/~yablo/501.html Abstracts from The Philosopher’s Index, except when indicated parenthetically, or when in SMALLCAPS (the latter are by me). Alston, William P. “Ontological Commitments.”, Philosophical Studies. 1958; 9,8-16 This article considers the task of translating linguistic expressions, such as sentences of the form ‘there are p’s’, to sentences of some other form. The author is especially concerned with the view that such translations enable us to avoid “ontological commitments.” he takes an example from morton white which allegedly provides a case of a translation which avoids ontological commitments and argues that if the translation is adequate then it is used to make the same assertion as the original and so makes the same commitments. He concludes that those who take avoidance of ontological commitment as the point of linguistic translations are obstructing our view of the real point of such translations. Anderson, Alan Ross. 1959. Church on Ontological Commitment. Journal of Philosophy 56: 448-451. Austin, J. L. 1962. Sense and Sensibilia (Oxford University Press). Azzouni, Jody. 2004. Deflating Existential Consequence: A Case for Nominalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Belnap, Nuel. 1961-62. “Tonk, Plonk and Plink”, Analysis 22: 130-134.
    [Show full text]
  • Truth As a Pretense 134 James A
    Fictionalism in Metaphysics Edited by Mark Eli Kalderon CLARENDON PRESS OXFORD Á Contents Notes on Contributors ix Introduction 1 Mark Eli Kalderon 1 Problems in the History of Fictionalism 14 Gideon Rosen 2 Metaphor and Prop Oriented Make-Believe 65 Kendall L. Walton 3 The Myth of the Seven 88 Stephen Yablo 4 Modal Fictionalism and Analysis 116 Seahwa Kim 5 Truth as a Pretense 134 James A. Woodbridge 6 Belief about Nothing in Particular 178 Frederick Kroon 7 Fictionalist Attitudes about Fictional Matters 204 Daniel Nolan 8 What we Disagree about when we Disagree about Ontology 234 Cian Dorr 9 Moral Fictionalism 287 Richard Joyce viii Contents 10 Quasi-Realism is Fictionalism 314 David Lewis 11 Quasi-Realism no Fictionalism 322 Simon Blackburn References 339 Index 351 5 Truth as a Pretense James A. Woodbridge Truth is a pretense. This bald statement might inspire ‘‘incredulous stares’’, but my aim here is to deXect this initial incredulity. To begin, then, my claim that truth is a pretense is really part of an analysis of truth-talk—the fragment of our talk (and thought) that employs the notion of truth.1 Just this clariWcation probably deXects little skepticism, since it merely marks my view as some sort of Wctionalism with respect to truth-talk. On a common understanding of Wctionalist analyses, certain statements from a ‘‘way of talking’’2 understood Wctionally may be ‘‘true in the Wction’’, but really all statements from this fragment of discourse are false.3 Some of the abiding skepticism toward my initial claim likely comes from the recognition that this error-theoretic conception of Wctionalism undermines itself when applied to truth-talk.
    [Show full text]
  • Kooky Objects Revisited: Aristotle's Ontology
    r 2008 The Author Journal compilation r 2008 Metaphilosophy LLC and Blackwell Publishing Ltd Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK, and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA METAPHILOSOPHY Vol. 39, No. 1, January 2008 0026-1068 KOOKY OBJECTS REVISITED: ARISTOTLE’S ONTOLOGY S. MARC COHEN Abstract: This is an investigation of Aristotle’s conception of accidental com- pounds (or ‘‘kooky objects,’’ as Gareth Matthews has called them)Fentities such as the pale man and the musical man. I begin with Matthews’s pioneering work into kooky objects, and argue that they are not so far removed from our ordinary thinking as is commonly supposed. I go on to assess their utility in solving some familiar puzzles involving substitutivity in epistemic contexts, and compare the kooky object approach to more modern approaches involving the notion of referential opacity. I conclude by proposing that Aristotle provides an implicit role for kooky objects in such metaphysical contexts as the Categories and Metaphysics. Keywords: accident, Aristotle, ontology, sameness, substitution. In the course of my forty-year friendship and collaboration with Gary Matthews, he has taught me many things, more than I have space to enumerate here. So I won’t try to enumerate them. Instead, I am going to focus on just one of those thingsFthe idea that it is worth taking seriously a certain aspect of Aristotle’s ontology that seems at least quaint, if not weird, to our contemporary ears. Its quaintness, or weirdness, consists in the fact that it is a finer-grained ontology than we are accustomed toFit distinguishes between entities that we tend not to distinguish, and hence gives ontological status to entities that philoso- phers nowadays are not entirely comfortable with.
    [Show full text]