Achille C. Varzi

An introduction to analytic ontology. Part 1 deals with the question, What is ontology?, focusing on (i) the interplay between ontological and broadly metaphysical concerns, and (ii) the difference between material ontology and formal ontology. Part 2 deals with the question, How is ontology done?, focusing on (i) the delicate interplay between ontology and truth-making (or: between meaning and existence), and (ii) the differences between revolutionary vs. hermeneutic, prescriptive vs. descriptive, and absolute vs. relative approaches to ontology. Part 3 surveys the state of the art in a number of areas, both in material ontology (e.g., the problem of universals, the status of objects and events, the ontology of mathematics, of the physical sciences, of the social sciences) and in formal ontology (identity, ontological dependence, part-whole relations).

In classical topology the only part of a doughnut that matters is the edible part. Here I review some good reasons for reversing the order and focusing on the hole instead. By studying the topology of the hole one can learn interesting things about the morphology of the doughnut (its shape), and by studying the morphology of the hole in turn one can learn a lot about the doughnut’s dynamic properties (its patterns of interaction with the environment). The price--of course--is that one must be serious about reifying voids.

In ‘Towards a Solution to the Sorites Paradox’, Graham Priest gives us a new account of the sorites based on fuzzy logic. The novelty lies in the suggestion that truth-value assignments should themselves be treated as fuzzy objects, i.e., objects about which we can make fuzzy identity statements. I argue that Priest’s solution does not have the explanatory force that Priest advocates. That is, it does not explain why we find the existence of a cut-off point counter-intuitive. I also argue that this sort of explanation calls for a general theory that goes beyond the special case of linguistic vagueness, for the phenomenon is at bottom not linguistic.

This paper focuses on the semantics of statements of the form ‘x is P at t’ vis-à-vis its metaphysical underpinnings. I begin by considering four main readings, corresponding to the four basic parsings of the temporal modifier ‘at t’: (1) at-t x is P, (2) x-at-t is P, (3) x is-at-t P, and (4) x is P-at-t. Each of these readings—which correspond to different metaphysical conceptions of the nature of temporal change—is found inadequate or otherwise problematic. In the second part of the paper I therefore consider a fifth account whose advantages over (1)–(4), I argue, exceed its revisionary costs. This fifth account is based on a conception of objects as entia successiva held together by a nexus of temporal counterparthood and reads ‘x is P at t’ as ‘the t-counterpart of x is P’.