Abstract This paper argues that ontological category systems (OCS) should be assessed against explicit target criteria. To compare the highly diverse OCS, we focus on the epistemic issue of the category problem, not on the ontological one, and examine the system architecture at the bicategorical level. From existing systems we extract mutual exclusiveness , exhaustiveness , and generalness , and add a neglected criterion: recursiveness – the requirement that, at the most general level, the categories also categorize themselves, thereby conceptually closing the system. On this basis we motivate the most defensible number of categories and re-evaluate the traditional divide between universals and particulars in a slightly revised form. The resulting framework clarifies how OCS can remain maximally general while retaining classificatory power and shows why systems that exceed two top-level categories trade generalness for individuation without clear gain.

Abstract Fictionalism is a popular approach to handling possible worlds discourse. It gives one the power of possible world semantics without being committed to undesirable consequences. The standard approach of reparsing possible world statements by attaching a fictional operator suffers from a problem that we argue is structural for all kinds of narrow fictionalism. To show this, we develop a toy theory of temporal fictionalism, showing that it is vulnerable to the same problem. We develop a solution in the form of a broad account of modal fictionalism. Broad modal fictionalism is a contentious view and its usefulness needs to be clarified. Given this, towards the end of the paper we offer some motivations for why broad modal fictionalism is useful and gesture towards how modal talk arises in everyday discourse.

Abstract Speaking of fictional characters, the pretense theorist denies the existence of these entities, while the creationist maintains that they are abstract artefacts created by fiction writers. By interpreting fictional characters as trans-world individuals, we develop an alternative account in which fictional characters and real persons are treated uniformly. In particular, neither fictionalizing discourse nor internal discourse about fictional characters involves pretense, and neither external discourse nor non-existence claim about fictional characters concerns abstract artefacts. A fictional character is, after all, a person; to be fictional, he or she needs to be written about in a fictional work.

Abstract Contemporary debates on metaontology focus on discussions between two main positions: realism and deflationism. Ontological realism claims to deal with an independent objective reality, while deflationism downgrades the seriousness of ontology. From a position close to deflationism, E. Hirsch suggests that certain debates in ontology are not substantive but “merely verbal”. From a proper deflationist position, however, it seems doubtful that any ontological dispute can be merely linguistic without further consequences. The aim of this article is to argue that no ontological debate can remain purely verbal. For this purpose, a brief introduction to Hirsch’s ideas will be presented, followed by three different arguments against “merely verbal” disputes: semantic, epistemic and ontological.

Abstract This article aims to provide a reassessment of the relationship between God and abstract objects. This reassessment will provide a new conceptualisation of this important relationship and will be formulated, first, within the theoretical framework of ‘Theistic Aspectivalism’, which is grounded on the notion of an aspect, proposed by Donald L.M. Baxter, which provides a means to ward off the ‘Bootstrapping Problem’. Second, within the theoretical framework of ‘Theistic Essentialism’, which is based on the notion of essence and essential dependence, as proposed by Kit Fine, Jonathan Lowe, and Katherin Koslicki, which provides a metaphysical basis for the relationship between God and abstract objects to be further elucidated and for the position of ‘Platonic Theism’ to be free from the primary issues that are often raised against it.

Abstract Most recently, a number of philosophers have stressed the need for an intrinsic characterisation of the nature of powerful properties which nonetheless is compatible with the widely shared view that powers are intimately connected to the properties of their manifestations. This paper argues that the adoption of such an intrinsic criterion for the identity of pure powers has important consequences for Dispositionalism, the theory of modality according to which the truth of all alethic modal claims is grounded in the powers of actual entities. To this end, the paper examines the cases of two possibilities regarding pure powers and defends the view that these possible cases undermine the extensional adequacy of Dispositionalism.

Abstract This paper outlines a semantic analysis of fictional discourse alternative both to fictional realism and fictional fictionalism. The core idea is that competent speakers use fictional proper names in order to talk about certain pluralities of fictional depiction tokens rather than exotic entities such as Anna Karenina and Clarissa Dalloway. In order to corroborate this intuition, I propose an account of fictional proper names based on a Goodmanian notion of secondary extension and a model for the theory built upon negative free logic and plural quantification. Such a model aims to offer an anti-realist translation for three classes of problematic data: paratextual sentences, metatextual sentences, and negative existentials.

Abstract Panmicropsychism is the hypothesis that the physical ultimates of our universe (i.e., its fundamental physical ingredients) are also its phenomenal ultimates (i.e., its fundamental phenomenal ingredients). In this paper, I argue that, just as the mathematical description of the physical ultimates of our universe displays simplicity, symmetry, and beauty, panmicropsychists should similarly expect the mathematical description of the phenomenal ultimates to reflect these same qualities. I exemplify this claim using what is arguably the simplest of all types of phenomenal qualities – color. Specifically, I utilize phenomenological data on color to construct the maximally symmetric mathematical description of phenomenal color space. I then show that this mathematical description is isomorphic to the mathematical description of two-state quantum systems (qubits) in a mixed state. Based on this isomorphism, I suggest that color may be the phenomenal dual aspect of two-state quantum systems.

Abstract This paper shall explore the conjunction of eternalism and Everettian quantum mechanics. It shall be argued that there is a strong analogy between these two views. In case there is an indefinite number of worlds and observers that are all equally real, there should be an indefinite number of local times which are all also equally real. Whereas Everettianism, specifically the diverging version, treats actuality indexically, relativistic eternalism treats tense indexically. All times exist analogously to all isolated Everettian worlds. There is no unique ‘now’ that cuts throughout all that physically exists. Instead, as eternalism propounds, all times exist. The paper concludes that eternalism and the many-worlds interpretation are not only compatible but complement each other, providing a coherent framework for understanding the nature of temporal reality.

Abstract The nature of mind and the relationship of mind to the current form of AI is one of the great and fundamental topics of contemporary philosophy and science. Is the human mind computational or not? Can the brain perform processes that no Turing machine can perform? Can the mind be simulated? Does the incompleteness of the formal system, or the undecidability of all formulas, mean the impossibility of intelligent behaviour? Is it a necessary condition of intelligence to answer all possible questions and tasks, and if so, what answers will be sufficient in the assessment? Only correct answers, or on the contrary, does “only correct” mean too precise and therefore infallible, thus again exclusively “inhuman”? The main aim of this study is to analyse Gödel’s answer to the question about the nature of mind, his metaphysical assumptions and its implications for the current debate on AI.