scholarly journals Does Ontology Exist?

Philosophy ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 77 (2) ◽  
pp. 235-260 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans-Johann Glock
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Ontological Commitment ◽  
Scientific Theories ◽  
Ontological Commitments ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Ontological Turn ◽  
Analytic Ontology

Early analytic philosophers like Carnap, Wittgenstein and Ryle regarded ontology as a branch of metaphysics that is either trivial or meaningless. But at present it is generally assumed that philosophy can make substantial discoveries about what kinds of things exist and about the essence of these kinds. My paper challenges this ontological turn. The currently predominant conceptions of the subject, at any rate, do not license the idea that ontology can provide distinctively philosophical insights into the constituents of reality. I distinguish four main sources of analytic ontology—Strawson's descriptive metaphysics, Kripke's realist semantics, the Austro-Australian truth-maker principle, Quine's naturalistic conception of ontology—and indicate briefly why the first three do not rehabilitate ontology. In the remainder, I concentrate on the most influential and promising position. Quinean ontology seeks to bring out and reduce the ontological commitments of our best scientific theories through logical paraphrase. Against this programme, I argue that Quine's conception of ontological commitment is inadequate, and that his logical paraphrase cannot contribute to the exploration of reality, but at most to the clarification of our conceptual framework.

scholarly journals JUSTIFIED BELIEF IN A DIGITAL AGE: ON THE EPISTEMIC IMPLICATIONS OF SECRET INTERNET TECHNOLOGIES

Episteme ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Boaz Miller ◽  
Isaac Record
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Search Engines ◽  
Digital Age ◽  
Epistemic Responsibility ◽  
Modes Of Operation ◽  
Internet Technologies ◽  
Justified Belief ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Justificatory Status

AbstractPeople increasingly form beliefs based on information gained from automatically filtered internet sources such as search engines. However, the workings of such sources are often opaque, preventing subjects from knowing whether the information provided is biased or incomplete. Users' reliance on internet technologies whose modes of operation are concealed from them raises serious concerns about the justificatory status of the beliefs they end up forming. Yet it is unclear how to address these concerns within standard theories of knowledge and justification. To shed light on the problem, we introduce a novel conceptual framework that clarifies the relations between justified belief, epistemic responsibility, action and the technological resources available to a subject. We argue that justified belief is subject to certain epistemic responsibilities that accompany the subject's particular decision-taking circumstances, and that one typical responsibility is to ascertain, so far as one can, whether the information upon which the judgment will rest is biased or incomplete. What this responsibility comprises is partly determined by the inquiry-enabling technologies available to the subject. We argue that a subject's beliefs that are formed based on internet-filtered information are less justified than they would be if she either knew how filtering worked or relied on additional sources, and that the subject may have the epistemic responsibility to take measures to enhance the justificatory status of such beliefs.

Exploring the boundaries of rhetoric

2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 793-806 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduard Bonet
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
The Self ◽  
History Of Rhetoric ◽  
Content Type ◽  
History Of ◽  
Practical Development ◽  
The Subject

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine how the boundaries of rhetoric have excluded important theoretical and practical subjects and how these subjects are recuperated and extended since the twentieth century. Its purpose is to foster the awareness on emerging new trends of rhetoric. Design/methodology/approach – The methodology is based on an interpretation of the history of rhetoric and on the construction of a conceptual framework of the rhetoric of judgment, which is introduced in this paper. Findings – On the subject of the extension of rhetoric from public speeches to any kinds of persuasive situations, the paper emphasizes some stimulating relationships between the theory of communication and rhetoric. On the exclusion and recuperation of the subject of rhetorical arguments, it presents the changing relationships between rhetoric and dialectics and emphasizes the role of rhetoric in scientific research. On the introduction of rhetoric of judgment and meanings it creates a conceptual framework based on a re-examination of the concept of judgment and the phenomenological foundations of the interpretative methods of social sciences by Alfred Schutz, relating them to symbolic interactionism and theories of the self. Originality/value – The study on the changing boundaries of rhetoric and the introduction of the rhetoric of judgment offers a new view on the present theoretical and practical development of rhetoric, which opens new subjects of research and new fields of applications.

Agency, Structure and Causality in Political Science: A Comment on Sibeon

Politics ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul A. Lewis
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Structure ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Critical Realism ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Recent Contribution ◽  
Ontological Commitments ◽  
Political Analysis ◽  
The Social ◽  
Ontological Turn

Researchers in political science are devoting increasing attention to the ontological commitments of their theories – that is, to what those theories presuppose about the nature of the political world. This article focuses on a recent contribution to this ‘ontological turn’ in political science ( Sibeon, 1999 ). Tensions are identified in Sibeon's account of the causal interplay between agency and social structure. It is argued that these tensions can be resolved by reflecting explicitly on ontological issues, in particular the causal efficacy of social structure, using a particular approach to the philosophy of the social sciences known as critical realism. The value of such reflection for the explanatory power of political analysis is highlighted.

scholarly journals Multimodal Study of Adult-Infant Interaction: A Review of Its Origins and Its Current Status

2016 ◽  
Vol 26 (65) ◽  
pp. 377-385 ◽  
Author(s):  
Soledad Carretero Pérez ◽  
Silvia Ana Español
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Research Methods ◽  
Current Status ◽  
First Year ◽  
Central Topic ◽  
Interaction Studies ◽  
The Subject ◽  
First Year Of Life ◽  
Early Interaction

Abstract An interpretative review of research on adult-infant interactions involving the analysis of movement behaviors is presented, systematically linking previous studies to current research on the subject. Forty-two articles analyzing the dyad's interactive movement in the period 1970-2015 were found. Twelve papers were excluded, including only those that studied the phenomenon in the baby's first year of life. The results revealed that movement was a central topic in early interaction studies in the 70s. In the 1980's and 1990's, its study was marginal and it is currently resurging under the embodiment perspective. The conceptual framework and research methods used in the pioneering work are presented, and the thematic foci shared with current research are highlighted. Thus, essential keys are provided for the updated study of early interactions from a multimodal perspective.

Recognizing freedom

2018 ◽  
Vol 45 (8) ◽  
pp. 885-906
Author(s):  
Katharine M. McIntyre
Keyword(s):  
Ontological Commitment ◽  
Subject Formation ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Disciplinary Power ◽  
Ethical Concept ◽  
Recognition Theory ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Interpersonal Recognition ◽  
Ontological Concept

Domination as opposed to what? Michel Foucault’s works on power and subject formation uncover the subtle ways in which disciplinary power structures create opportunities for domination. Yet Foucault says little about the forms of freedom that we should prefer. I argue that the proper opposite of Foucauldian domination is a version of the concept of social freedom found in contemporary recognition theory. I establish that Foucault implicitly commits himself to an ontological concept of recognition in which the subject is constituted by acts that affirm particular qualities. On the basis of this ontological commitment, there is room for Foucault to endorse an ethical concept of recognition as well, in which the subject’s freedom is bound to a variety of forms of institutional and interpersonal recognition. Finally, Foucauldian insights regarding the potentially dominating tendencies of genuine acts of recognition lead to helpful modifications of the concept of social freedom.

Rethinking the Synthetic a priori de re

1998 ◽  
pp. 15-22
Author(s):  
Paul Burger
Keyword(s):  
Ontological Commitment ◽  
Necessary Conditions ◽  
A Priori ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Analytical Philosophy ◽  
Radical Empiricism ◽  
De Re ◽  
Direct Awareness ◽  
Synthetic A Priori ◽  
Ontological Turn

Hume and Kant destroyed the belief in the apriori de re, i.e. the rationalist’s doctrine of direct awareness of necessary facts about the nature of being. Later on, analytical philosophy told us that there are only two general classes of statements, synthetics a posteriori and analytics a priori. Quine eventually rejected the a priori in general and advanced a radical empiricism. However, both moderate and radical empiricism has recently been challenged by realistic minded philosophers. They have argued that ontological topics such as the nature of properties, laws or causation remain strongly undetermined by semantic ascent and Quinean ontological commitment, and announced an ontological turn. Are not ontological or metaphysical explanations a priori explanations? Despite his preferred talk in terms of a posteriori realism and inference of the best explanation, Armstrong’s defence of universals looks very much like an apriori one. Others, such as Barry Smith, explicitly defend that there are synthetic propositions a priori de re. I believe in both: Kant was right in claiming that an understanding of what metaphysics can teach us is dependent upon a clear concept of the synthetic a priori, but—against Kant— synthetics a priori de re are legitimate. In this paper I will defend synthetics a priori de re. However, I will reject the rationalist’s appeal to direct awareness of necessary facts as well as undeniableness or infallibility as necessary conditions for a prioris. Instead I will claim that all synthetics a priori express hypothetical truths.

Evolution and Scientific Theories of Changeability

2010 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-133
Author(s):  
Boguslawa Lewandowska ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Research Methods ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Synthetic Theory ◽  
Scientific Theories ◽  
Evolutionary Processes ◽  
Significant Group ◽  
Theory Of Evolution ◽  
Scientific Cognition ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Determinism And Indeterminism

Evolutionary processes are conditioned both by unique phenomena and probabilistic ones. Given probabilistic factors, one may speak of changeability of evolution. This essay attempts to model evolutionary processes by modeling changeability in the natural sciences. Yet a framework of determinism and indeterminism appears inadequate to apprehend evolutionary processes. Autodeterminism is a more promising framework for addressing the causal, functional, and probabilistic dimension of evolution. Such an approach ensures the possibility of perceiving and presenting the complexity of evolution. The essay proposes that the synthetic theory of evolution conjoins factors of evolution, determinism, and changeability. The question still remains whether one can say that real being, which exists in the stream of time, is the subject of philosophy. This puzzle may be resdved by showing that besides the scientific cognition of nature, there is another possible cognition--the philosophical cognition. This is reflected in a significant group of problems of philosophical cosmology which are not addressed by the natural sciences due to their research methods.

Partnering with Pots: The Work of Objects in the Imperial Inca Project

2017 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 243-257 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamara L. Bray
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Ceramic Assemblage ◽  
New Developments ◽  
Ontological Commitments ◽  
Empire Building ◽  
The Social ◽  
New Thinking ◽  
Ontological Turn

New developments in the natural sciences are contributing to new thinking on the nature of matter, materiality and being. Such re-visioning of the natural world is, in part, responsible for ‘the ontological turn’, a trend clearly visible in recent archaeological discourse. In combination with evolving relational and symmetrical approaches to investigating the constitution of ‘the social’, the door is open for exploring logics, taxonomies and understandings of reality different from our own in studies of the past. Applying these ideas to the investigation of early imperialism, this paper offers an analysis of a key element in the repertoire of Inca material culture that forwards the importance of human–thing relations in the context of early state politics. Working from the basis of the imperial Inca ceramic assemblage, the study examines how these objects were deployed in the task of empire-building and what insights they provide into Andean ontological commitments during the late pre-Columbian period. An argument is developed that imperial pots were construed as animate beings and agents of the State. The study brings to the fore the mutually constituted nature of the imperial Inca project and suggests new avenues for future research that highlight the matter of early empires.

The role of palaeoclimate studies: modelling

1993 ◽  
Vol 341 (1297) ◽  
pp. 341-342 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Multiple Equilibria ◽  
Rapid Change ◽  
Atmospheric Composition ◽  
Climate Modelling ◽  
The Past ◽  
External Conditions ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Almost All

Stepping back from the topic of the meeting, I should like to begin by addressing the role of palaeoclimate studies in the subject of climate and its prediction. I do not believe that it is only by looking at the past that one can see into the future. However, I do believe that studies of past climates have an important role to play. To perform climate modelling and to compare the data from models with observations, one must have a conceptual framework. Important elements in this framework are the roles of continents, mountains, solar input and atmospheric composition. It must include notions of rapid change. For example, the response to increasing atmospheric CO2 may be very slow until a certain critical point when it becomes very rapid: the ‘Joker in the pack’. The possibility of multiple equilibria, more than one possible climate for the same external conditions, must be recognized. The average situation is essentially irrelevant in a system that spends almost all of its time in either of two equilibra.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document