-
17Of affairsIn Robin Le Poidevin, Simons Peter, McGonigal Andrew & Ross P. Cameron (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Metaphysics, Routledge. pp. 322. 2009.
-
62Indirect Speech, Parataxis and the Nature of Things SaidJournal of Philosophical Research 22 211-227. 1997.This paper makes the following recommendation when it comes to the IogicaI form of sentences in indirect speech. Davidson’s paratactic account shouId stand, but with one emendation: the demonstrative ‘that’ should be taken to refer to the Fregean Thought expressed by the utterance of the content-sentence, rather than to that utterance itseIf. The argument for this emendation is that it is the onIy way of repIying to the objections to Davidson’s account raised by Schiffer, McFetridge and McDowell…Read more
-
119Defending the Discovery Model in the Ontology of Art: A Reply to Amie Thomasson on the Qua ProblemBritish Journal of Aesthetics 52 (1): 75-95. 2012.According to the discovery model in the ontology of art, the facts concerning the ontological status of artworks are mind-independent and, hence, are facts about which the folk may be substantially ignorant or in error. In recent work Amie Thomasson has claimed that the most promising solution to the ‘ qua problem’—a problem concerning how the reference of a referring-expression is fixed—requires us to give up the discovery model. I argue that this claim is false. Thomasson's solution to the qua…Read more
-
223Works of music: an essay in ontologyOxford University Press. 2007.Introduction -- The type/token theory introduced -- Motivating the type/token theory : repeatability -- Nominalist approaches to the ontology of music -- Musical anti-realism -- The type/token theory elaborated -- Types I : abstract, unstructured, unchanging -- Types introduced and nominalism repelled -- Types as abstracta -- Types as unstructured entities -- Types as fixed and unchanging -- Types II : platonism -- Introduction : eternal existence and timelessness -- Types and properties -- The …Read more
-
128An identity theory of truthSt. Martin's Press. 2000.This book argues that correspondence theories of truth fail because the relation that holds between a true thought and a fact is that of identity, not correspondence. Facts are not complexes of worldly entities which make thoughts true they are merely true thoughts. According to Julian Dodd, the resulting modest identity theory, while not defining truth, correctly diagnoses the failure of correspondence theories, and thereby prepares the ground for a defensible deflation of the concept of truth
-
144Performing Works of Music AuthenticallyEuropean Journal of Philosophy 23 (3): 485-508. 2012.This paper argues that, within the Western ‘classical’ tradition of performing works of music, there exists a performance value of authenticity that is distinct from that of complying with the instructions encoded in the work's score. This kind of authenticity—interpretive authenticity—is a matter of a performance's displaying an understanding of the performed work. In the course of explaining the nature of this norm, two further claims are defended: that the respective values of interpretive au…Read more
-
21Facing facts by Stephen Neale oxford university press, 2001. Pp. XV + 254. £25Philosophy 78 (1): 123-145. 2003.
-
167Confessions of an unrepentant timbral sonicistBritish Journal of Aesthetics 50 (1): 33-52. 2010.Simplifying somewhat, sonicists believe that works of music are individuated purely in terms of how they sound. For them, exact sound-alikes are identical. Stephen Davies, in his ‘Musical Works and Orchestral Colour’ ( BJA 48 (2008), pp. 363–375) took me to task for defending a version of sonicism. In this paper I seek to explain why Davies's objections miss their mark. In the course of the discussion, I make some methodological remarks about the ontology of music
-
52John R. Searle claims that P.F. Strawson's well known objections to correspondence theories of truth can be side‐stepped, if we regard the correspondence theorist's facts as ‘conditions in the world’ rather than as complex objects. In response, I claim both that Searle's notion of a ‘condition in the world’ is obscure, and that such conditions cannot be the facts of a correspondence theorist on account of their being unsuited for truthmaking.The failure of Searle's attempt to come up with a corr…Read more
-
2IntroductionIn Helen Beebee & Julian Dodd (eds.), Truthmakers: The Contemporary Debate, Clarendon Press. 2005.
-
216Types, continuants, and the ontology of musicBritish Journal of Aesthetics 44 (4): 342-360. 2004.Are works of music types of performance or are they continuants? Types are unchanging entities that could not have been otherwise; continuants can undergo change through time and could have been different. Picking up on this distinction, Guy Rohrbaugh has recently argued that musical works are continuants rather than performance-types. This paper replies to his arguments and, in the course of so doing, elaborates and defends the conception of musical works as types of performance. I end the arti…Read more
-
126Is truth supervenient on being?Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 102 (1). 2002.This paper asks whether we should accept a weakened version of the truthmaker principle: namely, the claim that truth supervenes on being, in which 'being' is understood as whether things are. I consider a number of positive answers to this question, including the following: that the truthmaker principle is a requirement of any plausible explanation of truth; that the principle must be accepted, if we are to do justice to the Wittgensteinian insight that the world is the totality of facts, not o…Read more
-
2Events, facts, and states of affairsIn Robin Le Poidevin, Simons Peter, McGonigal Andrew & Ross P. Cameron (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Metaphysics, Routledge. 2009.
-
247Critical Study: Artworks and Generative PerformancesBritish Journal of Aesthetics 45 (1): 69-87. 2005.
-
156Adventures in the metaontology of art: local descriptivism, artefacts and dreamcatchersPhilosophical Studies 165 (3): 1047-1068. 2013.Descriptivism in the ontology of art is the thesis that the correct ontological proposal for a kind of artwork cannot show the nascent ontological conception of such things embedded in our critical and appreciative practices to be substantially mistaken. Descriptivists believe that the kinds of revisionary art ontological proposals propounded by Nelson Goodman, Gregory Currie, Mark Sagoff, and me are methodologically misconceived. In this paper I examine the case that has been made for a local f…Read more
-
62Resurrecting the Identity Theory of TruthBradley Studies 2 (1): 42-50. 1996.1. The conclusion of Stewart Candlish’s pithy survey of identity theories of truth is that he is not yet convinced that any instance is more than an “historical curiosity”. Candlish in effect presents the would-be identity theorist with a dilemma: identity theories are either substantial, yet intrinsically implausible ); or else they are trivial.
-
565Musical works: Ontology and meta-ontologyPhilosophy Compass 3 (6): 1113-1134. 2008.The ontological nature of works of music has been a particularly lively area of philosophical debate during the past few years. This paper serves to introduce the reader to some of the most fertile and interesting issues. Starting by distinguishing three questions – the categorial question, the individuation question, and the persistence question – the article goes on to focus on the first: the question of which ontological category musical works fall under. The paper ends by introducing, and br…Read more
-
132Farewell to states of affairsAustralasian Journal of Philosophy 77 (2). 1999.This Article does not have an abstract
-
76Upholding Standards: A Realist Ontology of Standard Form JazzJournal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 72 (3): 277-290. 2014.In “All Play and No Work,” Andrew Kania claims that standard form jazz involves no works, only performances. This article responds to Kania by defending one of the alternative ontological proposals that he rejects, namely, that jazz works are ontologically continuous with works of classical music. I call this alternative “the standard view,” and I argue that it is the default position in the ontology of standard form jazz. Kania has three objections to the standard view. The bulk of the article …Read more
-
37Reading Metaphysics: Selected Texts with Interactive Commentary (edited book)Wiley-Blackwell. 2007.This collection brings together key contemporary texts in metaphysics and features an interactive commentary which helps readers engage the texts critically and to use them to develop their own views. Each text is followed by a detailed commentary, setting it in context Includes questions designed to help readers think hard about what the author is saying and why, to think of objections, and to formulate his or her own views Aims to improve the reader’s ability to engage critically with philosop…Read more
-
411The Is/Ought Gap, the Fact/Value Distinction and the Naturalistic FallacyDialogue 34 (4): 727-. 1995.For the last 40 years or so the is/ought gap, the fact/value distinction and the naturalistic fallacy have figured prominently in ethical debates. This longevity, however, has had an adverse side effect. So familiar have they become that they—and their respective rationales—have tended to become blurred. It is the purpose of this paper to explain why they should be kept distinct.
-
17On a Davidsonian objection to minimalismAnalysis 57 (4): 267-272. 1997.Two features of Paul Horwich's minimalist conception of truth (1990) make it stand out from the deflationary crowd. First, Horwich takes propositions to be the primary vehicles of truth (1990: 17-18, Ch. 6). Second, he claims that an explicit definition of truth applicable to propositions cannot be given (1990: 26-31), and hence that the meaning of 'true' can only be determined by our disposition to assent to the infinitely many (non-paradoxical) instances of the following schema: (E) The propos…Read more
-
205McDowell and Identity Theories of TruthAnalysis 55 (3). 1995.The main thesis of this paper is that John McDowell (in his Mind and World) tries to occupy a position that is not coherently statable; namely, that facts have objects and properties as constituents and are yet identical with true (Fregean) Thoughts. This position is contrasted with two other identity theories of truth: the robust theory, in which true propositions are identified with facts (which are understood to have objects and properties as constituents); and the modest theory, in which fac…Read more