Abstract
Abstract Construing ontology as an inventory of what genuinely and nonredundantly exists, this paper investigates two questions: (i) Do all – or any – social phenomena belong in ontology? and (ii) What difference does it make what is, and is not, in ontology? First, I consider John Searle’s account of social ontology, and make two startling discoveries: Searle’s theory of social reality conflicts with his ontological conditions of adequacy; and although ontology concerns existence, Searle’s theory of social reality is wholly epistemic. Then, I offer my own view of social reality, on which social phenomena are ontologically significant. Since ontology concerns what genuinely and nonredundantly exists, anyone interested in what there is ought to care about ontology.
Highlights
Social ontology is a budding branch of philosophy, but there has been little con sideration of what exactly social ontology is.1 Social phenomena include financial transactions, cocktail parties, two people walking together, athletic teams, and leg islatures, among countless other things – a “motley crew,” as Margaret Gilbert has called them (1989, p. 441)
The surprise is that the overall ontology to which Searle is committed excludes his theory of social reality
Searle’s question, as he has posed it, is, “What is the ontology of social reality?” (Searle 2007, p. 4) As we shall see, there is a real puzzle about Searle’s use of the word “ontology.”2 Searle’s view is complex: social and institutional reality depends on what he calls “status functions,” that is, functions that human beings confer on physical objects and people by a type of speech act; these func tions, in turn, carry deontic powers – rights, duties, obligations, etc. (Searle 2010, p. 7–9)
Summary
Social ontology is a budding branch of philosophy, but there has been little con sideration of what exactly social ontology is. Social phenomena include financial transactions, cocktail parties, two people walking together, athletic teams, and leg islatures, among countless other things – a “motley crew,” as Margaret Gilbert has called them (1989, p. 441). Social phenomena include financial transactions, cocktail parties, two people walking together, athletic teams, and leg islatures, among countless other things – a “motley crew,” as Margaret Gilbert has called them Construing ontology as an inventory of what genuinely and nonredundantly exists, do all – or any – social phenomena belong in ontology? Searle has at least three articles with the words “Social Ontology” in the titles, and he considers his project an attempt to “explain the fundamental nature and mode of existence – what philosophers call the essence and ontology – of human social institutional reality” The surprise is that the overall ontology to which Searle is committed excludes his theory of social reality
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