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154Optimus prime: paraphrasing prime number talkSynthese 190 (12): 2065-2083. 2013.Baker (Mind 114:223–238, 2005; Brit J Philos Sci 60:611–633, 2009) has recently defended what he calls the “enhanced” version of the indispensability argument for mathematical Platonism. In this paper I demonstrate that the nominalist can respond to Baker’s argument. First, I outline Baker’s argument in more detail before providing a nominalistically acceptable paraphrase of prime-number talk. Second, I argue that, for the nominalist, mathematical language is used to express physical facts about…Read more
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128Intuitions in physicsSynthese 190 (15): 2959-2980. 2013.This paper is an exploration of the role of intuition in physics. The ways in which intuition is appealed to in physics are not well understood. To the best of my knowledge, there is no analysis of the different contexts in which we might appeal to intuition in physics, nor is there any analysis of the different potential uses to which intuition might be put. In this paper I look to provide data that goes some way to giving a sense of the different contexts in which intuition is appealed to in p…Read more
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759Against mereological nihilismSynthese 191 (7): 1511-1527. 2014.I argue that mereological nihilism fails because it cannot answer the special arrangement question: when is it true that the xs are arranged F-wise? I suggest that the answers given in the literature fail and that the obvious responses that could be made look to undermine the motivations for adopting nihilism in the first place
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26There have been, are (now), and will be lots of times like the present in the hybrid view of timeAnalysis 67 (1): 83-86. 2007.
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119Quantitative Parsimony and the Metaphysics of Time: Motivating PresentismPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 87 (3): 688-705. 2012.In this paper I argue that presentism —the view that only present objects exist—can be motivated, at least to some degree, by virtue of the fact that it is more quantitatively parsimonious than rival views
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74Not a Total failurePhilosophia 38 (4): 795-810. 2010.In this paper I offer a partial defence of Armstrong’s totality relation as a solution to the problem of so-called “negative existentials”.
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182Defining Existence PresentismErkenntnis 79 (S3): 479-501. 2014.In this paper I argue in favour of a new definition of presentism that I call ‘existence presentism’ (EP). Typically, presentism is defined as the thesis that ‘only present objects exist’, or ‘nothing exists that is non-present’.1 I assume these statements to be equivalent. I call these statements of presentism ‘conventional presentism’ (CP). First, in §2, I rehearse arguments due to Ulrich Meyer that purport to show that presentism is not adequately defined as CP. In §§2.1–2.4 I show that consider…Read more
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285Monism: The Islands of PluralityPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 93 (3): 583-606. 2016.Priority monism (hereafter, ‘monism’) is the view that there exists one fundamental entity—the world—and that all other objects that exist (a set of objects typically taken to include tables, chairs, and the whole menagerie of everyday items) are merely derivative. Jonathan Schaffer has defended monism in its current guise, across a range of papers. Each paper looks to add something to the monistic picture of the world. In this paper we argue that monism—as Schaffer describes it—is false. To do …Read more
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78Time and realism: Metaphysical and antimetaphysical perspectives • by Yuval DolevAnalysis 69 (2): 372-374. 2009.Dolev's ambitious project is to show that the traditional debate in the philosophy of time between the so-called ‘tensed’ and ‘tenseless’ theorists is not a sustainable one. The key to the negative portion argument is that both the tensed and tenseless view of time can be understood only from within their respective ontological frameworks. Moreover, that there is only really an appearance of understanding within these frameworks, since neither framework furnishes us with the wherewithal to genui…Read more
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311Presentism and truth-makingErkenntnis 71 (3): 407-416. 2009.Here, I defend the view that there is no sensible way to pin a truth-maker objection on presentism. First, I suggest that if we adopt truth-maker maximalism then the presentist can requisition appropriate ontological resources with impunity. Second, if we deny maximalism, then the presentist can sensibly restrict the truth-maker principle in order to avoid the demand for truth-makers for talk about the non-present.
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60Memory, anticipation and the (un)reality of the past and futureIn Jo Alyson Parker, Paul Harris & Christian Steineck (eds.), Time: Limits and Constraints, Brill. pp. 13-89. 2010.
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260A Sketch of a Presentist Theory of PassageErkenntnis 73 (1): 133-140. 2010.In this paper I look to develop a defence of “presentist temporal passage” that renders presentism immune from recent arguments due to Eric Olson. During the course of the paper, I also offer comment on a recent reply to Olson’s argument due to Ian Phillips. I argue that it is not clear that Phillips’ arguments succeed.
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130The New A-theory of TimeInquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 58 (6): 537-562. 2015.The New A-theory of Time is the view, to be elaborated and defended in this article, that many times exist, and that time is real in virtue of every moment in time bearing each of the so-called A-properties: past, present and future. I argue that TNAT is at least as theoretically virtuous as mainstream views in the philosophy of time and may have some claim to being our best theory of time. I show that the properties ‘past’, ‘present’ and ‘future’ can be understood as compatible intrinsic proper…Read more
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234Ontological cheats might just prosperAnalysis 69 (3): 422-430. 2009.1. IntroductionA popular view in metaphysics is that which propositions are true depends upon how the world is . In more evocative language, truth requires ground. This thought then gets used to do some serious work. As Sider has it, ‘[t]he point of … the principle that truth supervenes on being is to rule out dubious ontologies’. Here, I argue that ‘dubious’ ontologies are theoretically virtuous
Areas of Interest
Metaphysics |
Trust |