Combining Texts

Ideas for 'Meaning and the Moral Sciences', 'To be is to be the value of a variable..' and 'Every Thing Must Go'

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3 ideas

7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 2. Realism

6280	Realism is a theory, which explains the convergence of science and the success of language [Putnam]
	Full Idea: Realism is an empirical theory; it explains the convergence of scientific theories, where earlier theories are often limiting cases of later theories (which is why theoretical terms preserve their reference); and it explains the success of language.
	From: Hilary Putnam (Meaning and the Moral Sciences [1978], Pt Four)
	A reaction: I agree. Personally, I think of Plato's Theory of Forms and all religions as empirical theories. The response from anti-realists is generally to undermine confidence in the evidence which these 'empirical theories' are said to explain.

7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 6. Physicalism

14909	Physicalism is 'part-whole' (all parts are physical), or 'supervenience/levels' (dependence on physical) [Ladyman/Ross]
	Full Idea: There is part-whole physicalism, that everything is exhausted by basic constituents that are themselves physical, or supervenience or levels physicalism, that the putatively non-physical is dependent on the physical.
	From: J Ladyman / D Ross (Every Thing Must Go [2007], 1.3)
	A reaction: The cite Hüttemann and Papineau 2005. I am not convinced by this distinction. Ladyman and Ross oppose the first one. I'm thinking the second one either collapses into the first one, or it isn't physicalism. Higher levels are abstractions.

7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 11. Ontological Commitment / b. Commitment of quantifiers

10700	First- and second-order quantifiers are two ways of referring to the same things [Boolos]
	Full Idea: Ontological commitment is carried by first-order quantifiers; a second-order quantifier needn't be taken to be a first-order quantifier in disguise, having special items, collections, as its range. They are two ways of referring to the same things.
	From: George Boolos (To be is to be the value of a variable.. [1984], p.72)
	A reaction: If second-order quantifiers are just a way of referring, then we can see first-order quantifiers that way too, so we could deny 'objects'.