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Oxford Studies in and Semantic Plasticity’ Grazer Philosophische Studien 76 (2008), 279–285. Dean ZIMMERMAN (ed.): Oxford Studies in and Semantic Plasticity’. IV. Metaphysics and Metaphysics, Vol. 2. Oxford: Oxford Uni- Th eism: Brian Leftow, ‘God and the Problem versity Press, 2006. x + 400 pp. ISBN 0- of Universals’; Michael Bergmann and Jeff rey 19-929059-8. £55.00, €105.50, $99.00 Brower, ‘A Th eistic Argument Against Pla- hardcover; £18.99, €25.34, $35.00 tonism (and in Support of Truthmakers and paper. Divine Simplicity)’; Hud Hudson, ‘Beauti- ful Evils’. Taken together, the essays consti- This book brings together an interest- tute a valuable sampling of current work in ing selection of contemporary writing on a metaphysics, and there are surprising, surely cross-section of important topics in analytic unintentional thematic connections between metaphysics. Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, papers from one section to another. What one under the general editorship of Dean Zim- learns from such a collection is not merely merman, publishes new work in many areas what topics are of interest to this medley of of ontology, philosophy of mind, time and writers and what philosophical conclusions causation, and philosophical theology. Th e they fi nd most defensible, but also the style papers provide a snapshot of the topics and in which metaphysics is now being practiced arguments currently of interest to profession- by these leading fi gures in the fi eld. al metaphysicians. Th e same general function Th e fi rst suite of three papers centers on could in principle be served by journal pub- a target essay by Block. Th e essays constitute lication, but there is currently no high pro- a ‘symposium’, but it is unclear if the sym- fi le philosophy journal dedicated specifi cally posium existed outside of the Oxford Studies to analytic metaphysics, and the advantage pages. Block mentions several venues in which of the Oxford Series is that it allows contribu- ancestors of the paper received comments, but tors the space they need to adequately address I could not discover whether the three partici- their topics virtually without restriction. In pants, Block, Perry, and White, ever had a viva the present volume the papers range in length voce exchange at which Block’s paper was dis- from 10 to 76 pages, with quite a few run- cussed. Block’s paper is in any case a remark- ning more than 50 pages. Th e Oxford Series, able study that takes its inspiration from Max additionally, unlike almost all journals, also Black’s objection to mind-body identity, but has a useful index. soon transitions into a detailed discussion of Th e essays, thirteen in all, are organized Frank Jackson’s so-called ‘knowledge’ argu- into the following four sections with papers ment for (some type of) mind-body dualism by the indicated authors: I. Symposium, (the least off ensive version of which is often Property Dualism: Ned Block, ‘Max Black’s held to be property dualism) associated with Objection to Mind-Body Identity’; John Per- Jackson’s thought experiment of Mary the col- ry, ‘Mary and Max and Jack and Ned’; Ste- or scientist. Interest in this much-discussed phen L. White, ‘A Posteriori Identities and the example is by no means exhausted, as the fi rst Requirements of Rationality’. II. Th e Open three papers in this collection clearly dem- Future: Trenton Merricks, ‘Goodbye Grow- onstrate. Block enters into exquisite detail, ing Block’; Eli Hirsch, ‘Rashi’s View of the pursuing the nodes of an extended decision Open Future: Indeterminateness and Biva- tree of fi ne-grained distinctions describing lence’; Peter Forrest, ‘General Facts, Physi- exactly how the color scientist’s experience is cal Necessity, and the Metaphysics of Time’. to be described, with an eye at every step to III. Issues in Ontology: Th omas Hofweber, its implications for the knowledge argument ‘Inexpressible Properties and Propositions’; in defense in particular of property dualism. Michael Loux, ‘Aristotle’s Constituent Ontol- Th ere is some diffi culty, in Block’s view, as to ogy’; Phillip Bricker, ‘Th e Relation Between just what the knowledge argument is, what it General and Particular: Entailment vs. Super- is trying to say, and how its implications for venience’; John Hawthorne, ‘Epistemicism the mind-body problems should be under- stood. I think I was less sure about what Jack- of being H20 steam, once again, even though son’s thought experiment is meant to describe (liquid) water = H20, and H20 steam = H20, after reading Block’s article than before, in every logically possible world, and despite which might be either a tribute to its value again assuming the transitivity of identity. or a criticism of its unnecessarily complicat- It is the states of the stuff , liquid, solid ice, ing an already thorny problem; nor am I even or vapor, after all, that matter in the truth con- sure after working through Block’s paper sev- ditions of these judgments, even if the stuff eral times which of these is the more appropri- itself, H20 qua natural kind, is always neces- ate evaluation. Th e conclusion toward which sarily the same. Th e states of a stuff , in turn, Block progresses inch by inch in the paper is as in the case at hand, the mental and pure- that Jackson’s thought experiment does not ly physical states of a neurophysiological sys- adequately support property dualism, which tem, are among its properties, that enter into clears the way for Block’s preferred interpre- psychological facts and that are relevant to tation and defense of a variant form of the interpretations of the knowledge argument in doctrine, which is mentioned but not devel- Jackson’s color scientist example as support- oped in the paper. ive of or indiff erent to the merits of property What I found most wanting in Block’s dualism. Such aspects of a neurophysiological exposition from my own philosophical stand- system are relevant in particular to whether point—which happens to strongly favor or not Mary upon emerging for the fi rst time an emergentist form of property dualism from her black and white laboratory acquires grounded on the irreducible intentionality new knowledge about the properties of and of mental acts, and is ideologically friend- facts about the outside world of color. Block, ly to anti-physicalist interpretations of Jack- much later in the paper, explores some of the son’s color scientist example—is the failure to ways of distinguishing facts and properties clarify the concept of property. Th us, when as having thick or thin, narrow or wide con- Block writes: ‘One can acquire new knowl- tent, in roughly the way these distinctions are edge about old properties by acquiring new usually drawn. What Block turns to instead concepts of them. I may know that there is for the greater part of the essay is a discus- water in the lake and learn that there is H20 sion of diff erent modes of presentation, cog- in the lake. In so doing, I do not learn of any nitive (CMoPs) and metaphysical (MMoPs), new property instantiated, and in that sense of what he thereafter takes to be the same I do not learn of any new fact’ (9), I do not properties and same facts of the color world know whether to think he is right or wrong; merely understood in diff erent ways by Mary it would rather depend on what a property before and after her confi nement to her origi- is and how properties are related to facts. In nal black and white environment, as the only light of Saul A. Kripke’s lectures on Naming ways of coming to terms with the signifi cance and Necessity, we have grown accustomed to of Jackson’s thought experiment. Block’s dis- regarding natural kind terms like ‘water’ as cussion in this regard arguably takes a decisive designating the same stuff in every logically wrong turn at a crucial early part of the dis- possible world in which they designate any- cussion, one that represents a missed oppor- thing at all. Th e situation is more complicat- tunity, and that is bound unnecessarily to ed when we try to move beyond the property prejudice discussion against the relevance of of being water (in any of its solid, liquid, or the color scientist example in maintaining vaporous forms) to the property of contain- some version of property dualism. Block’s ing water. Certainly, the property of having essay nevertheless is certain to provoke con- a mouthful of (liquid) water is not the same tinued controversy as philosophers struggle to as the property of having a mouthful of H20 assimilate its dense and complicated interrela- steam, even though (liquid) water = H20, and tions of distinctions and theses in recent phi- H20 steam = H20, in every logically possi- losophy of mind, and its publication in this ble world, despite the transitivity of identi- venue is an important event. ty. Moreover, the property of being (liquid) Th us, I found myself much in agreement water is not the same property as the property with Perry’s concise response to Block’s essay 280.
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