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201According to a traditional conception, romantic love is both constant - if someone loves another, they continue to love them - and exclusive - if someone loves another, they love only the other. In this paper, we argue that the essentiality of constancy and exclusivity is incompatible with the possibilities of fission - roughly speaking, of one person becoming two - and fusion - roughly speaking, of two people becoming one. Moreover, if fission or fusion are possible, then constancy and exclusiv…Read more
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250Dialetheism and distributed soritesSynthese 202 (4): 1-18. 2023.Noniterative approaches to the sorites paradox accept single steps of soritical reasoning, but deny that these can be combined into valid chains of soritical reasoning. The distributed sorites is a puzzle designed to undermine noniterative approaches to the sorites paradox, by deriving an inconsistent conclusion using only single steps, but not chains, of soritical reasoning. This paper shows how a dialetheist version of the noniterative approach, the strict-tolerant approach, also solves the di…Read more
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267Dialetheism and the Problem of EvilIn Soraj Hongladarom, Jeremiah Joven Joaquin & Frank J. Hoffman (eds.), Philosophies of Appropriated Religions: Perspectives from Southeast Asia, Springer Nature Singapore. pp. 69-79. 2023.According to dialetheism, some contradictions are true. In a recent paper, Aaron Cotnoir has suggested that theists who are also dialetheists can resolve the paradox of the stone by accepting a contradiction, and arguing that God both can and can't make the stone. However, Zach Weber has replied that dialetheism is no help for avoiding one of the most serious problems for theism, namely the problem of evil. In this paper, I argue the situation is even worse than this for dialetheist theists, sin…Read more
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372Does everything resemble everything else to the same degree?Asian Journal of Philosophy 1 (1): 1-21. 2022.According to Satosi Watanabe's "theorem of the ugly duckling", the number of predicates satisfied by any two different particulars is a constant, which does not depend on the choice of the two particulars. If the number of predicates satisfied by two particulars is their number of properties in common, and the degree of resemblance between two particulars is a function of their number of properties in common, then it follows that the degree of resemblance between any two different particulars is…Read more
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194Dialetheism and Modus TollensThe Reasoner 15 (4): 30. 2021.Suppose that some contradictions are true – for example, that as I walk through the door, I’m inside and I’m not inside. Then we argue 'if I'm walking through the door, I'm inside; I'm not inside; therefore, I'm not walking through the door' is an invalid instance of modus tollens.
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416Extension and Self-ConnectionLogic and Logical Philosophy 30 (3): 435-59. 2021.If two self-connected individuals are connected, it follows in classical extensional mereotopology that the sum of those individuals is self-connected too. Since mainland Europe and mainland Asia, for example, are both self-connected and connected to each other, mainland Eurasia is also self-connected. In contrast, in non-extensional mereotopologies, two individuals may have more than one sum, in which case it does not follow from their being self-connected and connected that the sum of those in…Read more
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299MereologyArchive of Formal Proofs. 2021.The interactive theorem prover Isabelle/HOL is used to verify elementary theorems of classical extensional mereology.
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832Relevance and VerificationPhilosophical Quarterly 71 (3): 457-480. 2021.A. J. Ayer’s empiricist criterion of meaning was supposed to have sorted all statements into nonsense on the one hand, and tautologies or genuinely factual statements on the other. Unfortunately for Ayer, it follows from classical logic that his criterion is trivial—it classifies all statements as either tautologies or genuinely factual, but none as nonsense. However, in this paper, I argue that Ayer’s criterion of meaning can be defended from classical proofs of its triviality by the adoption o…Read more
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171The Number of Bricks in a ZigguratMathematics Magazine 93 (3): 226-227. 2020.The number of bricks in a ziggurat is a sum of consecutive squares.
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318Whitehead’s principleThought: A Journal of Philosophy 9 (2): 115-27. 2020.According to Whitehead’s rectified principle, two individuals are connected just in case there is something self-connected which overlaps both of them, and every part of which overlaps one of them. Roberto Casati and Achille Varzi have offered a counterexample to the principle, consisting of an individual which has no self-connected parts. But since atoms are self-connected, Casati and Varzi’s counterexample presupposes the possibility of gunk or, in other words, things which have no atoms as pa…Read more
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1064This is an introduction to the Isabelle proof assistant aimed at philosophers and their students.
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518Anselm's God in Isabelle/HOLArchive of Formal Proofs 9. 2017.Paul Oppenheimer and Edward Zalta's formalisation of Anselm's ontological argument for the existence of God is automated by embedding a free logic for definite descriptions within Isabelle/HOL.
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537Naturalness and Convex Class NominalismDialectica 73 (1-2): 65-81. 2019.In this paper I argue that the analysis of natural properties as convex subsets of a metric space in which the distances are degrees of dissimilarity is incompatible with both the definition of degree of dissimilarity as number of natural properties not in common and the definition of degree of dissimilarity as proportion of natural properties not in common, since in combination with either of these definitions it entails that every property is a natural property, which is absurd. I suggest it f…Read more
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753Story SizePhilosophical Papers 44 (2): 121-137. 2015.The shortest stories are zero words long. There is no maximum length.
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649Images, intentionality and inexistencePhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 79 (3): 522-538. 2009.The possibilities of depicting non-existents, depicting non-particulars and depictive misrepresentation are frequently cited as grounds for denying the platitude that depiction is mediated by resemblance. I first argue that these problems are really a manifestation of the more general problem of intentionality. I then show how there is a plausible solution to the general problem of intentionality which is consonant with the platitude.
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302A Syncretistic Theory of Depiction (review)British Journal of Aesthetics 56 (4): 427-429. 2016.Review of A Syncretistic Theory of Depiction by Alberto Voltolini
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840Distance and DissimilarityPhilosophical Papers 48 (2): 211-239. 2018.This paper considers whether an analogy between distance and dissimilarlity supports the thesis that degree of dissimilarity is distance in a metric space. A straightforward way to justify the thesis would be to define degree of dissimilarity as a function of number of properties in common and not in common. But, infamously, this approach has problems with infinity. An alternative approach would be to prove representation and uniqueness theorems, according to which if comparative dissimilarity m…Read more
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628Pictures, perspective and possibilityPhilosophical Studies 149 (2). 2010.This paper argues for a possible worlds theory of the content of pictures, with three complications: depictive content is centred, two-dimensional and structured. The paper argues that this theory supports a strong analogy between depictive and other kinds of representation and the platitude that depiction is mediated by resemblance.
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64Depiction and IntentionIn Resemblance and Representation: An Essay in the Philosophy of Pictures, Open Book Publishers. pp. 51-66. 2014.This chapter defends intentionalism about pictorial representation
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1283Two Conceptions of SimilarityPhilosophical Quarterly 68 (270): 21-37. 2018.There are at least two traditional conceptions of numerical degree of similarity. According to the first, the degree of dissimilarity between two particulars is their distance apart in a metric space. According to the second, the degree of similarity between two particulars is a function of the number of (sparse) properties they have in common and not in common. This paper argues that these two conceptions are logically independent, but philosophically inconsonant.
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74Symbol SystemsIn Resemblance and Representation: An Essay in the Philosophy of Pictures, Open Book Publishers. pp. 85-98. 2014.
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422Maps and MeaningJournal of Philosophical Research 35 123-128. 2010.It's possible to understand an infinite number of novel maps. I argue that Roberto Casati and Achille Varzi's compositional semantics of maps cannot explain this possibility, because it requires an infinite number of semantic primitives. So the semantics of maps is puzzlingly different from the semantics of language.
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934Depiction and conventionDialectica 62 (3): 335-348. 2008.By defining both depictive and linguistic representation as kinds of symbol system, Nelson Goodman attempts to undermine the platitude that, whereas linguistic representation is mediated by convention, depiction is mediated by resemblance. I argue that Goodman is right to draw a strong analogy between the two kinds of representation, but wrong to draw the counterintuitive conclusion that depiction is not mediated by resemblance.
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885Fact, Fiction, and FantasyMidwest Studies in Philosophy 39 (1): 46-57. 2015.This paper argues: (1) All knowledge from fiction is from imagination (2) All knowledge from imagination is modal knowledge (3) So, all knowledge from fiction is modal knowledge Moreover, some knowledge is from fiction, so (1)-(3) are non-vacuously true.
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457Philosophical Perspectives on Depiction (review)Australasian Journal of Philosophy 90 (1). 2012.Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Volume 90, Issue 1, Page 187-189, March 2012
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683Defining depictionBritish Journal of Aesthetics 49 (2): 143-157. 2009.It is a platitude that whereas language is mediated by convention, depiction is mediated by resemblance. But this platitude may be attacked on the grounds that resemblance is either insufficient for or incidental to depictive representation. I defend common sense from this attack by using Grice's analysis of meaning to specify the non-incidental role of resemblance in depictive representation.
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1081A Note on the Definition of PhysicalismThought: A Journal of Philosophy 4 (1): 10-18. 2015.Physicalism is incompatible with what is known as the possibility of zombies, that is, the possibility of a world physically like ours, but in which there are no conscious experiences. But it is compatible with what is known as the possibility of ghosts, that is, the possibility of a world which is physically like ours, but in which there are additional nonphysical entities. In this paper we argue that a revision to the traditional definition of physicalism designed to accommodate the possibilit…Read more
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808Mental Maps1Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 85 (2): 413-434. 2011.It's often hypothesized that the structure of mental representation is map-like rather than language-like. The possibility arises as a counterexample to the argument from the best explanation of productivity and systematicity to the language of thought hypothesis—the hypothesis that mental structure is compositional and recursive. In this paper, I argue that the analogy with maps does not undermine the argument, because maps and language have the same kind of compositional and recursive structur…Read more
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421Interpreting ImagesIn Resemblance and Representation: An Essay in the Philosophy of Pictures, Open Book Publishers. pp. 118-138. 2014.Just as it’s possible to understand novel sentences without having heard them before, it’s possible to understand novel pictures without having seen them before. But these possibilities are often supposed to have totally different explanations: whereas the ability to understand novel sentences is supposed to be explained by tacit knowledge of a compositional theory of meaning for their language, the ability to understand novel pictures is supposed to be explained differently. In this paper I arg…Read more
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443Not every metaphor can be literally paraphrased by a corresponding simile – the metaphorical meaning of ‘Juliet is the sun’, for example, is not the literal meaning of ‘Juliet is like the sun’. But every metaphor can be literally paraphrased, since if ‘metaphorically’ is prefixed to a metaphor, the result says literally what the metaphor says figuratively – the metaphorical meaning of ‘Juliet is the sun’, for example, is the literal meaning of ‘metaphorically, Juliet is the sun’.
Singapore, Singapore
Areas of Specialization
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Language |
Philosophy of Mind |
Aesthetics |
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Logic and Philosophy of Logic |
PhilPapers Editorships
Depiction |