Thomas Norton-Smith

Common themes in American Indian philosophy -- First introductions -- Common themes : a first look -- Constructing an actual American Indian world -- NelsonGoodman's constructivism -- Setting the stage -- Fact, fiction, and feeders -- Ontological pluralism -- True versions and well-made worlds -- Nonlinguistic versions and the advancement of understanding -- True versions and cultural bias -- Constructive realism : variations on a theme by Goodman -- True versions and cultural bias -- An American Indian well-made actual world -- Relatedness, native knowledge, and ultimate acceptability -- Native knowledge and relatedness as a world ordering principle -- Native knowledge and truth -- Native knowledge and verification -- Native knowledge and ultimate acceptability -- An expansive conception of persons -- A western conception of persons -- Native conceptions of animate beings and persons -- An American Indian expansive conception of persons -- The semantic potency of performance -- Opening reflections and reminders about performances -- Symbols and their performance -- The Shawnee naming ceremony -- Gifting as a world constructing performance -- Closing remarks about the semantic potency of performances -- Circularity as a world ordering principle -- Goodman briefly revisited -- Time, events, and history or space, place, and nature? -- Circularity as a world ordering principle -- Circularity and sacred places -- Closing remarks about circularity as a world ordering principle -- The dance of person and place -- American Indian philosophy as a dance of person and place -- Consequences, speculations, and closing reflections.

Nelson Goodman maintains that there is a plurality of internally consistent, equally privileged, well-made actual worlds constructed through the use of very special symbol systems—right or ultimately acceptable world versions. Using evidence from American Indian traditions, I will argue that Goodman’s criteria for ultimately acceptability are culturally biased against any non-Western world version—especially a Native version. I will then offer a culturally sensitive interpretation of Goodman’s criteria for ultimate acceptability that an American Indian world version satisfies, and so is numbered among the internally consistent, equally privileged, well-made actual worlds

The view that philosophy is a uniquely and essentially European endeavor rooted in ancient Greece became dominant in Europe only in the late eighteenth century, eclipsing several centuries during which Europeans had denied this proposition. Advocates of intercultural philosophy aim to integrate Western and non-Western philosophical histories and traditions in hopes of better addressing the crucial questions facing global humankind. A Native American standpoint charges this project with being exploitative, and disrespectful.

In The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge Philip Kitcher develops an exciting and insightful picture of arithmetical reality by considering mathematical activities--not objects--as ontologically primitive. Yet, his account goes astray because of his nominalistic interpretation of the properties of human activity, resulting in an implausible modal view of the truth of arithmetical statements. ;After critiquing Kitcher's conceptions of arithmetical truth and knowledge--and finding them deficient--I develop an interpretation of standard first-order number theory which finds the referents of numerical expressions to be platonistically construed properties of human collecting activity. I proceed by specifying three "meta-arithmetical" criteria which, when conjoined with Kitcher's assumption of the ontological primacy of human operations, serve to delimit the range of possible candidates for a plausible interpretation of number theory. ;I require the referents of arithmetical expressions to be abstract objects, epistemically accessible in an appropriately causal way, and fixed in part by the way that numerical expressions are used. Clearly, reconciling the first two criteria is tantamount to answering Benacerraf's challenge to platonism: provide a naturalistically acceptable account of mathematical knowledge. Further, I argue that a causal account of reference which parallels the Kripke/Putnam view for natural kinds arises naturally from my account, buttressing its plausibility. ;That we have arithmetical knowledge is obvious. The more interesting question is whether or not it is posssible that any of our mathematical knowledge can be a priori. Providing an affirmative answer to this query closes this defense of arithmetical platonism