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87Review of Heather Dyke, Metaphysics and the Representational Fallacy (review)Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2008 (11). 2008.
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544Metaphysical Vagueness and Metaphysical IndeterminacyMetaphysica 14 (2): 165-179. 2013.The topic of this paper is whether there is metaphysical vagueness. It is shown that it is important to distinguish between the general phenomenon of indeterminacy and the more narrow phenomenon of vagueness (the phenomenon that paradigmatically rears its head in sorites reasoning). Relatedly, it is important to distinguish between metaphysical indeterminacy and metaphysical vagueness. One can wish to allow metaphysical indeterminacy but rule out metaphysical vagueness. As is discussed in the pa…Read more
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796What are Thick Concepts?Canadian Journal of Philosophy 41 (1): 25-49. 2011.Many theorists hold that there is, among value concepts, a fundamental distinction between thin ones and thick ones. Among thin ones are concepts like good and right. Among concepts that have been regarded as thick are discretion, caution, enterprise, industry, assiduity, frugality, economy, good sense, prudence, discernment, treachery, promise, brutality, courage, coward, lie, gratitude, lewd, perverted, rude, glorious, graceful, exploited, and, of course, many others. Roughly speaking, thick c…Read more
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499Trends and Progress in PhilosophyMetaphilosophy 44 (3): 276-292. 2013.This article is in three parts. The first discusses trends in philosophy. The second defends reliance on intuitions in philosophy from some doubts that have recently been raised. The third discusses Philip Kitcher's contention that contemporary analytic philosophy does not have its priorities straight. While the three parts are independent, there is a common theme. Each part defends what is regarded as orthodoxy from attacks. Of course there are other reasonable challenges to philosophical metho…Read more
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4. Being Metaphysically UnsettledIn Dean W. Zimmerman (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, Oxford University Press. pp. 6--149. 2008.
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211Regress, unity, facts, and propositionsSynthese 196 (4): 1225-1247. 2019.The problem, or cluster of problems, of the unity of the proposition, along with the cluster of problems that tend to go under the name of Bradley’s regress, has recently again become a going concern for philosophers, after having for some time been regarded as primarily of historical interest. In this paper, I distinguish between the different problems that tend to be brought up under the heading of the unity of the proposition, and between different related regress arguments. I present my favo…Read more
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423Rejectionism about truthIn Cory D. Wright & Nikolaj Pedersen (eds.), New Waves in Truth, Palgrave-macmillan. 2010.
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614On some recent criticisms of the 'linguistic' approach to ontologyDialectica 63 (3): 313-323. 2009.No Abstract
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550MetaontologyPhilosophy Compass 1 (3): 317-334. 2006.Metaontology – the study of the nature of ontological issues – has flourished in recent years. The focus of this summary will be on some views and arguments that are central to today’s debate. One theme will be that of how seriously to take ontology: whether there is reason to take a skeptical or deflationary attitude toward ontological claims, as theorists like Rudolf Carnap, Hilary Putnam, and Eli Hirsch in different ways have urged. The other theme will be that of the viability of the Fregean…Read more
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80Is Hintikka's Logic First-Order?Synthese 131 (3): 371-388. 2002.Jaakko Hintikka has argued that ordinary first-order logic should be replaced byindependence-friendly first-order logic, where essentially branching quantificationcan be represented. One recurring criticism of Hintikka has been that Hintikka'ssupposedly new logic is equivalent to a system of second-order logic, and henceis neither novel nor first-order. A standard reply to this criticism by Hintikka andhis defenders has been to show that given game-theoretic semantics, Hintikka'sbranching quanti…Read more
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232The Ontological Significance of InscrutabilityPhilosophical Topics 35 (1-2): 115-134. 2007.I shall here discuss some matters related to the so-called radical indeterminacy or inscrutability arguments due to, e.g., Willard v. O. Quine, Hilary Putnam, John Wallace and Donald Davidson.1 These are arguments that, on the face of it, demonstrate that there is radical indeterminacy in what the expressions in a theory refer to and in what the ontology of the theory is. I will use “inscrutability argument” as a general label for these arguments. My main topic – after I have dealt with some iss…Read more
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