Michael Jraven
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A Formal Mereology of Potential Parts
Not Another Brick in the Wall: an Extensional Mereology for Potential Parts Contents 0. Abstract .................................................................................................................................................................................................. 1 1. An Introduction to Potential Parts .......................................................................................................................................................... 1 2. The Physical Motivation for Potential Parts ............................................................................................................................................ 5 3. A Model for Potential Parts .................................................................................................................................................................... 9 3.1 Informal Semantics: Dressed Electron Propagator as Mereological Model ...................................................................................... 9 3.2 Formal Semantics: A Join Semi-Lattice ............................................................................................................................................ 10 3.3 Syntax: Mereological Axioms for Potential Parts ............................................................................................................................ 14 4. Conclusions About Potential Parts ....................................................................................................................................................... -
Matter and Mereology∗
Matter and mereology∗ Jeremy Goodman Draft of March 22, 2015 I am a material thing. But I am not the same thing as the matter out of which I am composed, since my matter, unlike me, could have existed as scattered interstellar dust. The distinction between matter and objects that are merely composed of matter is central to our ordinary conception of the material world. According to that conception, material objects have a hierarchical structure with matter at its foundation. This paper shows how matter and material constitution can be understood in terms of the part-whole relation.1 I present a novel mereology and apply it to debates about the persistence and plenitude of material objects, and compare my view to more familiar hylomorphic ones. A formal model of the theory is given in an appendix. 1 Anti-symmetry Consider the following principle: weak supplementation: If x is a proper part of y, then y has a part that does not overlap x. where x is a proper part of y =df x is a part of y and x 6= y. x overlaps y =df some part of x is part of y. Everyday cases of material coincidence are counterexamples to weak supple- mentation. A statue s composed of some clay c. c is distinct from s, since squashing c would destroy s but would not destroy c.2 c is part of s, since any ∗Thanks to Andrew Bacon, Cian Dorr, Maegan Fairchild, Kit Fine, Peter Fritz, John Hawthorne, Harvey Lederman, Gabriel Uzquiano, Tim Williamson and an anonymous referee for No^us for comments on previous versions of this paper, and to an audience at the University of Cambridge. -
Metaphysical Emergence: Weak and Strong∗
Metaphysical Emergence: Weak and Strong∗ Jessica Wilsony Draft: September 1, 2014 Introduction Why care about what emergence is, and whether there is any? To start, many complex entities of our acquaintance|tornados, plants, people and the like|appear to be com- posed of less complex entities, and to have features which depend, one way or another, on features of their composing entities. Yet such complex entities also appear to be to some extent autonomous, both ontologically and causally, from the entities upon which they depend. Moreover, and more specifically, many `higher-level' entities (particulars, systems, processes) treated by the special sciences appear to be broadly synchronically dependent on `lower-level' (and ultimately fundamental physical) entities.1 Yet, as is sug- gested by the associated special science laws, many higher-level entities appear also to be ontologically and causally autonomous, in having features in virtue of which they are dis- tinct from and distinctively efficacious relative to the lower-level entities upon which they depend, even taking into account that the latter stand in configurational or aggregative relations. An account of emergence making sense of these appearances would vindicate and illuminate both our experience and the existence and tree-like structure of the spe- cial sciences, as treating distinctively real and efficacious higher-level entities and their features. Reflecting these motivations, nearly all accounts of emergence take this to involve both ∗Thanks to Benj Hellie, an anonymous referee for this collection, students in my seminars on emergence at the University of Toronto, and members of audiences at the many talks on different aspects of emergence that I have given over the past decade, for helping to shape and improve my views on this topic. -
Fundamental Determinables, As Directions for Future Research
Philosophers’ volume 12, no. 4 Introduction Imprint february 2012 Contemporary philosophers commonly suppose that any fundamental entities there may be are maximally determinate. More generally, they commonly suppose that, whether or not there are fundamental entities, any determinable entities there may be are grounded in, hence less fundamental than, more determinate entities. So, for example, Armstrong takes the physical objects Fundamental constituting the presumed fundamental base to be “determinate in all respects” (1961, 59), and Lewis takes the properties characterizing things “completely and without redundancy” to be “highly specific” (1986, 60). Here I’ll look at the usually cited reasons for these Determinables suppositions as directed against the case of determinable properties, in particular, and argue that none is compelling (Sections 1 to 3). The discussion in Section 3 will moreover identify positive reason for taking some determinable properties to be part of a fundamental (or relatively fundamental) base. I’ll close (Section 4) by noting certain questions arising from the possibility of fundamental determinables, as directions for future research. 1. Preliminaries 1.1 Fundamentality vs. relative fundamentality Let a fundamental base at a world w be a minimal collection of entities that, either individually or in combination, provide a complete Jessica Wilson metaphysical ground for the entire inventory of w. Then an entity e at University of Toronto a world w is fundamental iff: (i) at w, there is a fundamental base; and (ii) e is in this fundamental base.1 Here and elsewhere ‘entity’ is used ontologically generally, as accom- modating, e. g., particulars, properties, tropes, events, states of affairs, © 2012 Jessica Wilson 1. -
The Question of Realism Ity
My aim in this paper is to help lay the conceptual and meth- odological foundations for the study of realism. I come to two main conclusions: first, that there is a primitive meta- physical concept of reality, one that cannot be understood in fundamentally different terms; and second, that questions of what is real are to be settled upon the basis of considerations of ground. The two conclusions are somewhat in tension with one another, for the lack of a definition of the concept of reality would appear to stand in the way of developing a sound methodology for determining its application; and one of my main concerns has been to show how the tension be- tween the two might be resolved. The paper is in two main parts. In the first, I point to the difficulties in making out a metaphysical conception of real- The Question of Realism ity. I begin by distinguishing this conception from the ordi- nary conception of reality (§1) and then show how the two leading contenders for the metaphysical conception—the factual and the irreducible—both appear to resist formula- tion in other terms. This leads to the quietist challenge, that Kit Fine questions of realism are either meaningless or pointless (§4); and the second part of the paper (§§5-10) is largely devoted to showing how this challenge might be met. I begin by in- troducing the notion of ground (§5) and then show how it can be used as a basis for resolving questions both of factual- ity (§§6-7) and of irreducibility (§§8-9). -
Grounding Is Not Causation (Forthcoming, Philosophical Perspectives; Please Cite Published Version)
Grounding is not Causation (forthcoming, Philosophical Perspectives; please cite published version) Sara Bernstein Grounding is not causation, and is not even substantively like causation, contra its contemporary characterizers. Apparent similarities between causation and grounding are mostly superficial, and utilizing causation as a way to illuminate ground glosses over their important dissimilarities while failing to untangle distinct, subtle problems that both grounding and causation face. Or so I will argue. By way of background: recent years in metaphysics have seen a surge in literature on grounding, roughly, the relation that connects more and less fundamental entities.1 Proponents of grounding (hereafter: groundhogs2) mean to explain a plentitude of interlevel relationships, including the various relationships between makers and makees, including “littler” things at the bottom levels of reality and the “bigger” things they make up, as well as the relationship between the physical and the mental, nonmoral facts and moral facts, generalizations and their instances, aesthetic properties and natural properties, and knowledge and true belief, to name a few. The ascent of the notion of grounding has given rise to several forms of pushback. One form (which Schaffer calls grounding nihilism) denies that grounding is a distinctive notion apart from other making-up relations like composition, constitution, supervenience, and the determinate/ determinable relation.3 Other challengers hold that grounding, taken as a metaphysical primitive, is too opaque to do the explanatory work on which its hopefuls bank: it is supposed to be the glue that holds reality together, but is irredeemably mysterious. One popular response to this latter form of grounding skepticism is to illuminate the notion of ground by appeal to the more familiar notion of causation. -
Vs. Aristotelian Essentialism
Contemporary “Essentialism” vs. Aristotelian Essentialism 1. The principal theses of contemporary “essentialism” vs. Aristotelian essentialism Contemporary “essentialism”, if we want to provide a succinct, yet sufficiently rigorous characterization, may be summarized in the thesis that some common terms are rigid designators.1 By the quotation marks I intend to indicate that I regard this as a somewhat improper (though, of course, permitted) usage of the term (after all, nomina significant ad placitum2). In contrast to this, essentialism, properly so-called, is the Aristotelian doctrine summarizable in the thesis—as we shall see, no less rigorous in its own theoretical context—that things have essences. The two theses, although related, are by no means identical. In this paper I wish to show exactly how these theses differ in virtue of the radically different conceptual frameworks in which they acquire their proper meaning, yet without these conceptual differences rendering them logically “incommensurable”. By this comparative analysis I hope to provide reasons to reconsider our contemporary philosophical problems in a historical perspective, realizing how their intrinsic difficulties stem from a contingently evolved conceptual heritage. In these considerations, being primarily concerned with the distinction between them, I am going to treat both contemporary “essentialism” and Aristotelian essentialism very broadly and rather indistinctly in themselves, in the sense that I am not going to delve into otherwise importantly different versions of either of the two. For reasons of clarity and influence I have selected Kripke and Aquinas as paradigmatic representatives of their respective conceptual frameworks. Nevertheless, I will try to treat these frameworks in such general terms as to be able to cover the thought of a great number of similarly important thinkers. -
Narrative As Philosophy: Methodological Issues in Abstracting from Hebrew Scripture
Narrative as Philosophy: Methodological Issues in Abstracting from Hebrew Scripture Jessica Wilson Trinity Evangelical Divinity School In the second half or so of the twentieth century, the dominance of modes of communication characterized primarily by “abstract propositions arrived at through rational argument”1 in what were considered to be paradigmatic works of Christian systematic theology came under fire on several fronts. Attempts to assert (or reassert) the value of narrative for Christian theology gained support across a broad swath of theological orientations, and in some cases – like that of the Narrative Theology movement associated in various forms with Niebuhr, Frei, Lindbeck, and Crites2 - proponents of the rediscovery of narrative for theological methodology went so far as to argue that its employment is strictly indispensable for theology. Nevertheless, clearly, theology conducted primarily in terms of “propositional discourse” remains the norm. In contemporary analytic philosophy, too, the idea of philosophy’s incorporating (let alone consisting of) narrative at a deeper or more fundamental level than that of illustration or example – say, the occasional adventure story about a runaway trolley or sci-fi thriller about brains-in-vats and philosophical zombies – remains relatively exotic. But here, as in theology, the possibilities for a more substantial relationship between philosophy and narrative have not gone entirely unexplored. Among very recent works, for instance, Eleonore Stump’s Wandering in Darkness3 - along with earlier publications in which she explored related ideas4 - makes a particularly exemplary foray into this territory in connection with narrative in Hebrew Scripture, with implications for both philosophy and theology. And, now, Yoram Hazony’s Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture adds a new and important layer to the literature on the subject. -
Better Semantics for the Pure Logic of Ground
Better Semantics for the Pure Logic of Ground Louis deRosset [Forthcoming in Analytic Philosophy] September 23, 2015 Abstract Philosophers have spilled a lot of ink over the past few years exploring the nature and significance of grounding. Kit Fine has made several sem- inal contributions to this discussion, including an exact treatment of the formal features of grounding [Fine, 2012a]. He has specified a language in which grounding claims may be expressed, proposed a system of ax- ioms which capture the relevant formal features, and offered a semantics which interprets the language. Unfortunately, the semantics Fine offers faces a number of problems. In this paper, I review the problems and offer an alternative that avoids them. I offer a semantics for the pure logic of ground that is motivated by ideas already present in the ground- ing literature, and for which a natural axiomatization capturing central formal features of grounding is sound and complete. I also show how the semantics I offer avoids the problems faced by Fine's semantics. Philosophers have spilled a lot of ink over the past few years exploring the nature and significance of grounding. Grounding is supposed to be a certain relation of dependence and determination among facts. This relation is linked with a certain kind of explanation. It is targeted by the sort of explanations we give sometimes when we say that some facts obtain in virtue of other facts and when we ask what makes something the case. When, for instance, ethi- cists ask what makes murder wrong, epistemologists ask what makes my belief that I have hands justified, chemists ask what makes alcohol miscible in wa- ter, and physicists ask what makes gravity so weak, they are asking after the worldly conditions on which the facts in question depend, and by which they are determined. -
Chris Scambler
Chris Scambler New York University Phone: +1 (929) 422-9674 Department of Philosophy Email: [email protected] 5 Washington Place Web: https://chrisjscambler.com New York, NY 10003 United States Areas of specialization Logic, Foundations of Mathematics Areas of competence Metaphysics, Philosophy of Physics, Philosophy of Mind Publications Forth. \Transfinite Meta-inferences": Journal of Philosophical Logic Forth. \A Justification for the Quantificational Hume Principle": Erkenntnis Forth. “Ineffability and Revenge": Review of Symbolic Logic 2020 \Classical Logic and the Strict Tolerant Hierarchy", 49, 351-370: Journal of Philosophical Logic 2020 \An Indeterminate Universe of Sets" 197, 545-573: Synthese Education 2015 - present Ph.D. in Philosophy, New York University. Dissertation title: Was the Cantorian Turn Rationally Required? Committee: Hartry Field (chair), Kit Fine, Graham Priest, Crispin Wright August 2019 Visiting Scholar, University of Oslo (ConceptLab, funded fellowship) July 2016 Visiting Scholar, University of Vienna (Kurt G¨odelResearch Center, funded fellowship) 2014 - 2015 M.Res in Philosophy, Birmingham University. Dissertation title: An indeterminate universe of sets. 2012 - 2014 Conversion MA in Philosophy, Birkbeck College, University of London. 1 Presentations Aug 2020 Comments on Button and Walsh's `Philosophy of Model Theory', European Congress of Analytic Philosophy (invited) Feb 2020 \Categoricity and Determinacy", workshop on Structuralist Foundations, University of Vienna (invited) July 2019 \Can All Things Be -
Relevance and Relationalism
Int Ontology Metaphysics (2011) 12:19–30 DOI 10.1007/s12133-011-0074-6 ORIGINAL PAPER Relevance and Relationalism Mark Young Published online: 25 February 2011 # The Author(s) 2011. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract This paper will provide support for relationalism; the claim that the identity of objects is constituted by the totality of their relations to other things in the world. I will consider how Kit Fine’s criticisms of essentialism within modal logic not only highlight the inability of modal logic to account for essential properties but also arouse suspicion surrounding the possibility of nonrelational properties. I will claim that Fine’s criticisms, together with concerns surrounding Hempel’s paradox, show that it is not possible to provide a satisfactory account of certain properties in abstraction from their place within a wider context. Next, we will shift attention to natural kinds and consider the notion that relevance plays in metaphysical accounts of identity, by examining Peter Geach’s notion of relative identity. I will argue that the intensional relation between subject and object must be included in a satisfactory account of metaphysical identity. Keywords Relevance . Relationalism . Holism . Anti-essentialism The aim of this paper will be to provide support for a form of ontological holism that fills the vacuum in analytic philosophy, namely the “relationality thesis.” Versions of this thesis can be found in the early work of Heidegger,1 and throughout the work of Richard Rorty. For the purposes of this essay, we will take the relationality thesis to be the claim that the identity of objects is constituted by the totality of their relations to other things in the world. -
Review of Kit Fine, Vagueness: a Global Approach
1 (Penultimate draft of review in Mind, https://academic.oup.com/mind/advance-article- abstract/doi/10.1093/mind/fzaa084/6048194) Vagueness: A Global Approach, by Kit Fine. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. Pp. xx + 100. This pocket-sized volume derives from Kit Fine’s three 2016 Rutgers Lectures in Philosophy, which inaugurated the annual series. He has already published some of the material in two articles, but it is useful to have a unified exposition. As one would expect from Fine, the discussion is highly original, despite the well-trodden ground, technically ingenious and well- developed, and inspired by a big picture. Whether his approach will catch on remains to be seen. The first part of the book is introductory and largely familiar, sketching three mainstream views, Degree-ism, Supervaluationism, and Epistemicism, and Fine’s objections to them Although he authored the classic case for Supervaluationism (Fine 1975, still his most-cited work), he has long been dissatisfied with the view; we now have his attempt to do better. The key idea is that vagueness is a kind of indeterminacy which is global rather than local. ‘Local indeterminacy is indeterminacy in the application of the predicate to a single object. … Global indeterminacy, by contrast, is indeterminacy in the application of the predicate to a range of cases’ (p. 18). So, with vagueness, there is no such thing as an isolated borderline case. Technically, the contrast is manifested by a logic in which one cannot deny a single instance of the law of excluded middle (¬(p ∨ ¬p) is inconsistent), but one can deny some conjunctions of two or more instances of the law (¬((p ∨ ¬p) ∧ (q ∨ ¬q)) is consistent).