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Single Idea 7923

[from 'Varieties of Things' by Cynthia Macdonald, in 1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 5. Linguistic Analysis ]

Full Idea

In 'She did it for the sake of her country' no one thinks that the expression 'the sake' refers to an individual thing, a sake. But given that, how can we work out what the ontological commitments of a theory actually are?

Gist of Idea

'Did it for the sake of x' doesn't involve a sake, so how can ontological commitments be inferred?

Source

Cynthia Macdonald (Varieties of Things [2005], Ch.1)

Book Reference

Macdonald,Cynthia: 'Varieties of Things' [Blackwell 2005], p.25


A Reaction

For these sorts of reasons it rapidly became obvious that ordinary language analysis wasn't going to reveal much, but it is also a problem for a project like Quine's, which infers an ontology from the terms of a scientific theory.