•  19
    Nonexistent Objects
    Journal of Symbolic Logic 49 (2): 652-655. 1980.
  •  158
    Property
    In Robert Audi (ed.), The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Cambridge University Press. pp. 657-658. 1995.
  •  1110
    After a brief history of Brentano's thesis of intentionality, it is argued that intentionality presents a serious problem for materialism. First, it is shown that, if no general materialist analysis (or reduction) of intentionality is possible, then intentional phenomena would have in common at least one nonphysical property, namely, their intentionality. A general analysis of intentionality is then suggested. Finally, it is argued that any satisfactory general analysis of intentionality must sh…Read more
  •  276
    The waning of materialism (edited book)
    Oxford University Press. 2010.
    This is a sustained critique of materialism. The contributors offer arguments from conscious experience, rational thought, the interaction of mind and body, and the unity and persisting identity of human persons, and develop a wide range of alternatives.
  •  1037
    Fine-Grained Type-Free Intensionality
    In Gennero Chierchia, Barbara H. Partee & Raymond Turner (eds.), Properties, Types, and Meaning, Volume 1, Kluwer Academic Publishers. pp. 177-230. 1989.
    Commonplace syntactic constructions in natural language seem to generate ontological commitments to a dazzling array of metaphysical categories - aggregations, sets, ordered n-tuples, possible worlds, intensional entities, ideal objects, species, intensive and extensive quantities, stuffs, situations, states, courses of events, nonexistent objects, intentional and discourse objects, general objects, plural objects, variable objects, arbitrary objects, vague kinds and concepts, fuzzy sets, and so…Read more
  •  1765
    The philosophical limits of scientific essentialism
    Philosophical Perspectives 1 289-365. 1987.
    Scientific essentialism is the view that some necessities can be known only with the aid of empirical science. The thesis of the paper is that scientific essentialism does not extend to the central questions of philosophy and that these questions can be answered a priori. The argument is that the evidence required for the defense of scientific essentialism is reliable only if the intuitions required by philosophy to answer its central questions is also reliable. Included is an outline of a modal…Read more
  •  549
    The purpose of this paper is to lay out the algebraic approach to propositions and then to show how it can be implemented in new solutions to Frege's puzzle and a variety of related puzzles about content.
  •  1516
    A solution to Frege's puzzle
    Philosophical Perspectives 7 17-60. 1993.
    This paper provides a new approach to a family of outstanding logical and semantical puzzles, the most famous being Frege's puzzle. The three main reductionist theories of propositions (the possible-worlds theory, the propositional-function theory, the propositional-complex theory) are shown to be vulnerable to Benacerraf-style problems, difficulties involving modality, and other problems. The nonreductionist algebraic theory avoids these problems and allows us to identify the elusive nondescrip…Read more
  •  790
    Property theory: The Type-Free Approach v. the Church Approach
    Journal of Philosophical Logic 23 (2). 1994.
    In a lengthy review article, C. Anthony Anderson criticizes the approach to property theory developed in Quality and Concept (1982). That approach is first-order, type-free, and broadly Russellian. Anderson favors Alonzo Church’s higher-order, type-theoretic, broadly Fregean approach. His worries concern the way in which the theory of intensional entities is developed. It is shown that the worries can be handled within the approach developed in the book but they remain serious obstacles for the …Read more
  •  827
    On the identification of properties and propositional functions
    Linguistics and Philosophy 12 (1). 1989.
    Arguments are given against the thesis that properties and propositional functions are identical. The first shows that the familiar extensional treatment of propositional functions -- that, for all x, if f(x) = g(x), then f = g -- must be abandoned. Second, given the usual assumptions of propositional-function semantics, various propositional functions (e.g., constant functions) are shown not to be properties. Third, novel examples are given to show that, if properties were identified with propo…Read more
  •  553
    Intuition and Modal Error
    In Quentin Smith (ed.), Epistemology: new essays, Oxford University Press. 2008.
    Modal intuitions are not only the primary source of modal knowledge but also the primary source of modal error. An explanation of how modal error arises — and, in particular, how erroneous modal intuitions arise — is an essential part of a comprehensive theory of knowledge and evidence. This chapter begins with a summary of certain preliminaries: the phenomenology of intuitions, their fallibility, the nature of concept-understanding and its relationship to the reliability of intuitions, and so f…Read more
  •  1018
    Universals
    Journal of Philosophy 90 (1): 5-32. 1993.
    Presented here is an argument for the existence of universals. Like Church's translation- test argument, the argument turns on considerations from intensional logic. But whereas Church's argument turns on the fine-grained informational content of intensional sentences, this argument turns on the distinctive logical features of 'that'-clauses embedded within modal contexts. And unlike Church's argument, this argument applies against truth-conditions nominalism and also against conceptualism and i…Read more
  •  623
    Completeness in the theory of properties, relations, and propositions
    Journal of Symbolic Logic 48 (2): 415-426. 1983.
    Higher-order theories of properties, relations, and propositions are known to be essentially incomplete relative to their standard notions of validity. It turns out that the first-order theory of PRPs that results when first-order logic is supplemented with a generalized intensional abstraction operation is complete. The construction involves the development of an intensional algebraic semantic method that does not appeal to possible worlds, but rather takes PRPs as primitive entities. This allo…Read more
  •  510
    The logical status of mind
    Midwest Studies in Philosophy 10 (1): 231-74. 1986.
    It is argued that the distinction between the mental and the nonmental is at bottom logical. The paper begins by sketching and defending a theory of intensional logic in which the notion of logically and metaphysically basic relations (called connections) can be defined. This notion is then employed in an analysis of intentionality: a connection is intentional iff it can contingently connect some individual to some proposition or concept independently of whether it connects the individual to som…Read more
  •  364
    Remarks on classical analysis
    Journal of Philosophy 80 (11): 711-712. 1983.
    Abstract of a paper to be presented in an APA symposium on Classical Analysis, December 30, 1983, commenting on a paper by Ernest Sosa.
  •  1914
    A priori knowledge and the scope of philosophy
    Philosophical Studies 81 (2-3): 121-142. 1996.
    This paper provides a defense of two traditional theses: the Autonomy of Philosophy and the Authority of Philosophy. The first step is a defense of the evidential status of intuitions (intellectual seemings). Rival views (such as radical empiricism), which reject the evidential status of intuitions, are shown to be epistemically self-defeating. It is then argued that the only way to explain the evidential status of intuitions is to invoke modal reliabilism. This theory requires that intuitions h…Read more
  •  461
    Predication and matter
    Synthese 31 (3-4). 1975.
    First, given criteria for identifying universals and particulars, it is shown that stuffs appear to qualify as neither. Second, the standard solutions to the logico-linguistic problem of mass terms are examined and evidence is presented in favor of the view that mass terms are straightforward singular terms and, relatedly, that stuffs indeed belong to a metaphysical category distinct from the categories of universal and particular. Finally, a new theory of the copula is offered: 'The cue is cold…Read more
  •  501
    Mental causation
    Philosophical Perspectives 21 (1). 2007.
    Suppose that, for every event, whether mental or physical, there is some physical event causally sufficient for it. Suppose, moreover, that physical reductionism in its various forms fails—that mental properties cannot be reduced to physical properties and mental events cannot be reduced to physical events. In this case, how could there be mental causation? More specifically, how could mental events cause other mental events, physical events, and intentional actions? The primary goal of this pap…Read more
  •  352
    Foundations without Sets
    American Philosophical Quarterly 18 (4). 1981.
    The dominant school of logic, semantics, and the foundation of mathematics construct its theories within the framework of set theory. There are three strategies by means of which a member of this school might attempt to justify his ontology of sets. One strategy is to show that sets are already included in the naturalistic part of our everyday ontology. If they are, then one may assume that whatever justifies the everyday ontology justifies the ontology of sets. Another strategy is to show that …Read more
  •  4
    In this paper, the arguments against the mind-body identity thesis from the author’s [1994] paper, “Mental Properties,” are presented but in significantly more detail. It is shown that, because of scientific essentialism, two currently popular arguments against the identity thesis -- the multiple-realizability argument and the Nagel-Jackson knowledge argument -- are unsatisfactory as they stand and that their problems are incurable. It is then shown that a refutation of the identity thesis in it…Read more
  •  30
    The A Priori
    In John Greco & Ernest Sosa (eds.), The Blackwell Guide to Epistemology, Blackwell. 2017.
    In the history of epistemology, discussions of the a priori have been bound up with discussions of necessity and analyticity, often in confusing ways. Disentangling these confusions is an essential step in the study of the a priori. This will be the aim of my introductory remarks. The goal of the remainder of the paper will then be to try to develop a unified account of the a priori, dealing with the notions of intuition and a priori evidence, the question of why intuitions qualify as evidence, …Read more
  •  2165
    A theory of concepts and concepts possession
    Philosophical Issues 9 261-301. 1998.
    The paper begins with an argument against eliminativism with respect to the propositional attitudes. There follows an argument that concepts are sui generis ante rem entities. A nonreductionist view of concepts and propositions is then sketched. This provides the background for a theory of concept possession, which forms the bulk of the paper. The central idea is that concept possession is to be analyzed in terms of a certain kind of pattern of reliability in one’s intuitions regarding the behav…Read more
  •  1579
    Quality and concept
    Oxford University Press. 1982.
    This study provides a unified theory of properties, relations, and propositions (PRPs). Two conceptions of PRPs have emerged in the history of philosophy. The author explores both of these traditional conceptions and shows how they can be captured by a single theory.
  •  707
    A definition of necessity
    Philosophical Perspectives 20 (1). 2006.
    In the history of philosophy, especially its recent history, a number of definitions of necessity have been ventured. Most people, however, find these definitions either circular or subject to counterexamples. I will show that, given a broadly Fregean conception of properties, necessity does indeed have a noncircular counterexample-free definition.
  •  1090
    On the possibility of philosophical knowledge
    Philosophical Perspectives 10 1-34. 1996.
    The paper elaborates upon various points and arguments in the author’s “A Priori Knowledge and the Scope of Philosophy” (Philosophical Studies, 1993), in which the author defends the autonomy of philosophy from the empirical sciences. It provides, for example, an extended defense of the modal reliabilist theory of basic evidence, including a new argument against evolutionary explanations of the reliability of intuitions. It also contains a fuller discussion of how to neutralize the threat of sci…Read more
  • Intensional Logic
    In Donald M. Borchert (ed.), The Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Supplement, Simon and Schuster Macmillan. pp. 262-264. 1996.
  •  698
    Universals and properties
    In S. Laurence C. MacDonald (ed.), Contemporary Readings in the Foundations of Metaphysics, Blackwell. pp. 131. 1998.
    This paper summarizes and extends the transmodal argument for the existence of universals (developed in full detail in "Universals"). This argument establishes not only the existence of universals, but also that they exist necessarily, thereby confirming the ante rem view against the post rem and in re views (and also anti-existentialism against existentialism). Once summarized, the argument is extended to refute the trope theory of properties and is also shown to succeed even if possibilism is …Read more
  •  514
    Concept possession
    Philosophical Issues 9 331-338. 1998.
    This paper answers critical responses to the author’s “A Theory of Concepts and Concept Possession.” The paper begins with a discussion of candidate counterexamples to the proposed analysis of concept possession -- including, e.g., a discussion of its relationship to Frank Jackson’s Mary example. Second, questions concerning the author’s general methodological approach are considered. For instance, it is shown that -- contrary to the critics’ suggestions -- an analysis of concept possession cann…Read more
  •  954
    The origins of modal error
    Dialectica 58 (1): 11-42. 2004.
    Modal intuitions are the primary source of modal knowledge but also of modal error. According to the theory of modal error in this paper, modal intuitions retain their evidential force in spite of their fallibility, and erroneous modal intuitions are in principle identifiable and eliminable by subjecting our intuitions to a priori dialectic. After an inventory of standard sources of modal error, two further sources are examined in detail. The first source - namely, the failure to distinguish bet…Read more