Contemporary Metaphysics Research Articles

Beyond Hermes: Metaphysics in a New Key

Abstract The following pages engage a hermeneutic approach to African philosophy, focusing on the work of Tsenay Serequeberhan. At the heart of the discussion is the question of where to locate such an approach in the existing philosophical literature. Does this way of working render African philosophy a European enterprise? Giving an affirmative response, the writings of Paulin Hountondji, which draw upon Husserlian phenomenology, are taken up as an alternative response to questions raised here about the meaning and methods of hermeneutics. Ultimately, however, this perspective is also set aside. Instead, suggestions are put forward for the markers around which a contemporary African metaphysics, which is both restorative and creative, might be pursued.

EACH THING IS FUNDAMENTAL

Abstract Each thing is fundamental. Not only is no thing any more or less real than any other, but no thing is prior to another in any robust ontological sense. Thus, no thing can explain the very existence of another, nor account for how another is what it is. This surprising conclusion is reached by undermining two important positions in contemporary metaphysics: hylomorphism and hierarchical views employing so-called building relations, such as grounding. The paper has three main parts. First, it is observed that hylomorphism is alleged by its proponents to solve various philosophical problems. However, it is demonstrated, in light of a compelling account of explanation, that these problems are actually demands to explain what cannot be but inexplicable. Second, it is shown how the argument against hylomorphism illuminates an account of the essence of a thing, thereby providing insight into what it is to exist. This indicates what a thing, in the most general sense, must be and a correlative account of the structure in reality. Third, it is argued that this account of structure is incompatible not only with hylomorphism, but also with any hierarchical view of reality. Although hylomorphism and the latter views are quite different, representing distinct philosophical traditions, it is maintained that they share untenable accounts of structure and fundamentality and so should be rejected on the same grounds.

The regress argument against realism about structure

ABSTRACTIs structure a fundamental and indispensable part of the world? Is the question of ontology a question about structure? Structure is a central notion in contemporary metaphysics [Sider 2011. Writing the Book of the World. Oxford: Clarendon Press]. Realism about structure claims that the question of ontology is about the fundamental and indispensable structure of the world. In this paper, I present a criticism of the metaphysics of realism about structure based on a version of Russell’s famous regress argument against nominalism [Russell 1911. “On the Relation of Universals and Particular.” In Logic & Knowledge. Reprint, London: George Allen & Unwin]. First, I argue that the three general tests for the fundamentality of structure proposed by realism about structure rely on a particular empirical test for structure, namely, the so-called ‘similarity test for structure.’ Second, I argue that the similarity test is not well-founded because it leads to a vicious regress. Third, I argue that the regress affects the whole metaphysics of realism about structure, and that no structural notion can be said to be fundamental in connection with any of the other tests. Lastly, I argue that the question of ontology as a question about structure is not substantive.

Deflationism and truthmaking

This paper is about the relationship between truthmaking—one of the pillars of contemporary metaphysics—and deflationism about truth—one of the main contenders in the debate about truth, and a key component of the broad anti-metaphysical philosophical approach known as (contemporary) pragmatism. Many philosophers have argued that deflationism and truthmaking are incompatible or in conflict in some interesting way. Some take this to count against deflationism, others to count against truthmaking. In this paper I argue that deflationism and truthmaking are compatible in most of the ways in which they are commonly thought to be incompatible. Deflationism does not render truthmaking unintelligible, avoidable, unmotivated, or trivial. While deflationism is incompatible with certain ideas within mainstream truthmaking, I argue that these ideas result from merely optional assumptions and principles commonly accepted by mainstream truthmaker theorists.

What real progress has metaphysics made since the time of Kant? Kant and the metaphysics of grounding

This paper argues that, despite appearances to the contrary, Kant and contemporary analytic metaphysicians are interested in the same kind of metaphysical dependence relation that finds application in a range of contexts and that is today commonly referred to as grounding. It also argues that comparing and contrasting Kant’s and contemporary metaphysicians’ accounts of this relation proves useful for both Kant scholarship and for contemporary metaphysics. The analyses provided by contemporary metaphysicians can be used to shed light on Kant’s understanding of what a real conditioning relation is, while Kant’s perspective on the practice and goals of metaphysics sheds light on several claims and issues at home in the contemporary debate.

Review of Declarations of Dependence: Money, Politics, and the Aesthetics of Care by Scott Ferguson (University of Nebraska Press)

Scott Ferguson explores the implications of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) for contemporary metaphysics and aesthetics. He asserts that only MMT can rescue society from neoliberal austerity by realizing the potential of money as a boundless public resource with an infinite capacity to serve human and environmental needs. In order to explain the resistance to MMT, Ferguson retraces the prevailing understanding of the money form to the political crises of the fourteenth-century republic of Florence. He presents the art of the Florentine renaissance as a response to these crises and the expression of the obsession with haecceity, or ‘thisness’, which has obscured money’s restorative potential for centuries. He also suggests that the sacramental theology of the thirteenth-century Dominican friar St. Thomas Aquinas offers a potential path out of the intellectual blind alley of haecceity, towards a just, tolerant, and ecologically sustainable future.

Holes in Spacetime: Some Neglected Essentials

The hole argument purports to show that all spacetime theories of a certain form are indeterministic, including General Relativity. The argument has sparked an industry of searching for a metaphysics of spacetime with the right modal implications to rescue determinism. In this paper, I first argue that certain prominent replies to the hole argument—namely, those that appeal to an essentialist doctrine about spacetime—fail to deliver the requisite modal implications. My argument involves showing that threats to determinism like the hole argument are more general than has heretofore been recognized. I then propose a novel essentialist doctrine about spacetime that successfully rescues determinism, what I call sufficiency metric essentialism. However, I ultimately argue that this doctrine is independently problematic, and teaches us that no essentialist doctrine about spacetime can succeed. I close by suggesting some lessons for future work on spacetime and the metaphysics of physics more broadly, and also drawing some morals for contemporary metaphysics, in particular about whether essence can be used to articulate a precise structuralist doctrine, and the relationship between essence and modality.

In the Vicinity of Incarnated Nothingness: Antonin Artaud and His Metaphysical Dominant

The article considers the authentic and extreme forms of metaphysics. Antonin Artaud’s personality is at the center of attention. The author endeavors to verbally explicate his metaphysics, which is not strictly verbal. The explication of Artaud’s modern metaphysics is carried out in comparison with the triad of the “ancient modernist” Gorgias. The role of nothingness and the ambivalent attitude of contemporary metaphysicians to Artaud are examined. In the author’s opinion, the position of A. Artaud can be expressed in the following theses: 1) nothingness is the speculative side of the border (between two somethings) that does not unite but separates the being; 2) the incarnation of nothingness is fraught with both an irrevocable fall into nihilism and an annihilation of nothingness; 3) during the incarnation-annihilation of nothingness, the disunity of being is ousted and its fullness is reached; 4) the sought-after fullness is different from amorphous totality and from law-abiding structuredness; 5) anarchic, in some sense, fullness of being demands a unique language which is free from repressive unification. Understanding the experience of Antonin Artaud allows to answer the questions: “What it means to be a metaphysician? Who is he, a metaphysician? What is he like?” He is the one who emphatically appeals to the flesh (both present and becoming, naturally transforming); who, moreover, is not limited to the physical as well as is not alienated from it for the sake of the technical; who does not deny the role of praxis but subordinates it to poiesis; who does not seclude himself in verbal being but appeals to being as such, to its boundaries and limits.

Free Will and Mental Powers

In this paper, we investigate how contemporary metaphysics of powers can further an understanding of agent-causal theories of free will. The recent upsurge of such ontologies of powers and the understanding of causation it affords promises to demystify the notion of an agent-causal power. However, as we argue pace (Mumford and Anjum in Analysis 74:20–25, 2013; Am Philos Q 52:1–12, 2015a), the very ubiquity of powers also poses a challenge to understanding in what sense exercises of an agent’s power to act could still be free—neither determined by external circumstances, nor random, but self-determined. To overcome this challenge, we must understand what distinguishes the power to act from ordinary powers. We suggest this difference lies in its rational nature, and argue that existing agent-causal accounts (e.g., O’Connor in Libertarian views: dualist and agent-causal theories, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002; Lowe in Personal agency: the metaphysics of mind and action, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2013) fail to capture the sense in which the power to act is rational. A proper understanding, we argue, requires us to combine the recent idea that the power to act is a ‘two-way power’ (e.g., Steward in A metaphysics for freedom, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2012b; Lowe (in: Groff, Greco (eds) Powers and capacities in philosophy: the new aristotelianism, Routledge, New York, 2013) with the idea that it is intrinsically rational. We sketch the outlines of an original account that promises to do this. On this picture, what distinguishes the power to act is its special generality—the power to act, unlike ordinary powers, does not come with any one typical manifestation. We argue that this special generality can be understood to be a feature of the capacity to reason. Thus, we argue, an account of agent-causation that can further our understanding of free will requires us to recognize a specifically rational or mental variety of power.

Badiou and Frege: A Continental Critique of Logical Form

Abstract Various critiques of important (early) analytic thinkers made by Alain Badiou in the late 1960s have been largely overlooked by continental philosophers and entirely overlooked by analytic philosophers. This paper looks in detail at Badiou’s 1969 essay ‟Mark and Lack,” providing an exposition and clarification of his direct and sustained critique of Gottlob Frege’s supposed ideological (rather than scientific) philosophical commitments. Badiou’s intellectual context is analyzed in some detail, not only explaining his theoretical debt to his then-master Louis Althusser, but also clarifying his understandings of the notions of ‟the scientific” and ‟the ideological” in light of the projects of Gaston Bachelard and Georges Canguilhem. A philosophical exposition of Badiou’s point-by-point critique of Frege’s conception of logic follows. Finally, the paper concludes with an analysis of the more general relevance of Badiou’s half-century-old critiques in light of developments in contemporary analytic metaphysics, especially those indebted to W. V. O. Quine and Donald Davidson. In essence, Davidson’s Fregean reconfiguration of Tarski’s work on truth (more explicit than, but not unrelated to, Quine’s work) places contemporary analytic metaphysics within the scope of what Badiou directly criticizes. It is suggested that Badiou’s critique find a place in discussions of analytic metaphysics.

Why Intrinsicness Should Be Defined in a Non-reductive Way

Defining the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic properties has turned out to be one of the most difficult and controversial tasks in contemporary metaphysics. It is generally assumed that a definition of intrinsicness should aim to avoid as many counterexamples as possible and reduce the notion to less controversial philosophical notions. In this paper, the author argues for a new methodological approach to defining intrinsicness. Rather than trying to cover as many intuitive examples as possible, a definition of intrinsicness should reflect the crucial features of our intuitive understanding of the notion, and one of these features is that the intrinsic/extrinsic distinction has to be characterized in a non-reductive way.

The intelligibility of metaphysical structure

Theories that posit metaphysical structure are able to do much work in philosophy. Some, however, find the notion of ‘metaphysical structure’ unintelligible. In this paper, I argue that their charge of unintelligibility fails. There is nothing distinctively problematic about the notion. At best, their charge of unintelligibility is a mere reiteration of previous complaints made toward similar notions. In developing their charge, I clarify several important concepts, including primitiveness, intelligibility, and the Armstrong-inspired “ontologism” view of the world. I argue that, ultimately, their charge is best understood as an objection whose central premise is that the notion of ‘structure’ runs contrary to an important presupposition of contemporary metaphysics. But that central premise is, on closer inspection, implausible. I respond to the objection by identifying three popular metaphysical theories that violate the alleged presupposition but are still generally regarded as intelligible. The objection thus fails to show that a theory that posits metaphysical structure is unintelligible.

Metaphysics of the principle of least action

Despite the importance of the variational principles of physics, there have been relatively few attempts to consider them for a realistic framework. In addition to the old teleological question, this paper continues the recent discussion regarding the modal involvement of the principle of least action and its relations with the Humean view of the laws of nature. The reality of possible paths in the principle of least action is examined from the perspectives of the contemporary metaphysics of modality and Leibniz's concept of essences or possibles striving for existence. I elaborate a modal interpretation of the principle of least action that replaces a classical representation of a system's motion along a single history in the actual modality by simultaneous motions along an infinite set of all possible histories in the possible modality. This model is based on an intuition that deep ontological connections exist between the possible paths in the principle of least action and possible quantum histories in the Feynman path integral. I interpret the action as a physical measure of the essence of every possible history. Therefore only one actual history has the highest degree of the essence and minimal action. To address the issue of necessity, I assume that the principle of least action has a general physical necessity and lies between the laws of motion with a limited physical necessity and certain laws with a metaphysical necessity.

Rosy with Sider? The Case of the Metaphysical Liar

An important trend in contemporary metaphysics denies that the structure of natural language is an important datum for investigating fundamental structure. Ted Sider proceeds on this basis to propose a metaphysical semantics for natural language. Within this framework he argues that natural language and a fundamental, ‘jointcarving’, language could be subject to distinct logics. Developing an argument of Hartry Field’s, I show that Sider’s preferred option of fundamental classicality combined with non-fundamental non-classicality trivialises within the framework of Siderian metaphysical semantics. The position can be saved only by revising key claims about truth and metaphysical semantics. This has serious implications for methdology in the metaphysics of logic.

Animal Dystopia in Marie Darrieussecq’s Novel Truismes

The article focuses on the contemporary French author Marie Darrieussecq’s dystopian novel, Truismes (1996), that contemplates the differential boundaries between human and non-human existence within the scope of contemporary Western metaphysics. The novel challenges the anthropocentric conception of dystopia on the grounds that it is not only a human dystopia; the story centres on a female protagonist whose body begins to turn into a sow. In the novel’s dystopian reality, non-human nature has only capitalistic value in relation to human needs, which has caused a large-scale ecological crisis. For the heroine, the dystopian cityscape is the antagonist that she struggles against; the story represents the sow-woman looking for a better place to live. By giving a narrative voice to an animal, Darrieussecq’s novel urges the reader to identify with the non-human world. The article aims to come to an understanding of the agency beyond the human species. Further, it argues that agency constitutes an entanglement of intra-acting agencies; it is not an attribute of (human) subject or (non-human) object as they do not pre-exist as such separately. Consequently, human and non-human agencies are related to one another; humans are not only affecting the non-human world, but they affect each other in a very profound way. In this, the article contributes to the ongoing interrogation of human relations with non-human agency that is being actively conducted in contemporary Western scientific discourse. The concept of agency also allows participation in discussion about the current ecological crisis.

Leibniz on the existence of atoms

In this paper I present and evaluate Leibniz’s two main arguments against the existence of atoms. In this context atoms are extended particles that are absolutely hard, homogeneous, indivisible, and indestructible by natural means. As we shall see, Leibniz’s arguments are flawed in a very instructive way. The first argument is in tension with the claim that God created the best possible world. The second argument overgeneralizes in an undesirable way. However, as I shall discuss in the last section of the paper, even if the arguments are somehow defective, at least the first one contributes valuable insights to contemporary metaphysics.

Bergson, Descartes e a Vida Interior

A despeito de seu vocabulário técnico e argumentos sinuosos, a questão da subjetividade indica uma maneira peculiar pela qual a Filosofia moderna pensa sobre “quem nós somos”. Trata-se aqui de recuperar o aspecto intuitivo deste problema. Para tanto, proponho um contraponto entre as filosofias de Descartes e de Henri Bergson. O que as torna mais próximas daquela intuição filosófica quanto à nossa vivência interior é que ambas compartilham a concepção de Filosofia como um modo de vida do qual o discurso teórico é uma parte importante, mas somente uma parte. Por isso, os argumentos e o plano de exposição dessas filosofias serão interpretados à luz da conjuntura existencial na qual foram ensinados. Ao realçar a concepção existencial que subsiste à questão estritamente teórica do sujeito, pretendo indicar como esta pode renovar, no âmbito da Metafísica Contemporânea, o problema filosófico do sentido da vida.

Grounding and anchoring: on the structure of Epstein’s social ontology

ABSTRACTBrian Epstein’s The Ant Trap is a praiseworthy addition to literature on social ontology and the philosophy of social sciences. Its central aim is to challenge received views about the social world – views with which social scientists and philosophers have aimed to answer questions about the nature of social science and about those things that social sciences aim to model and explain, like social facts, objects and phenomena. The received views that Epstein critiques deal with these issues in an overly people-centered manner. After all, even though social facts and phenomena clearly involve individual people arranged in certain ways, we must still spell out how people are involved in social facts and phenomena. There are many metaphysical questions about social properties, relations, dependence, constitution, causation, and facts that cannot be answered (for instance) just be looking at individual people alone. In order to answer questions about (e.g.) how one social entity depends for its existence on another, we need different metaphysical tools. Epstein thus holds that social ontological explanations would greatly benefit from making use of the theoretical toolkit that contemporary analytical metaphysics has to offer. He focuses specifically on two metaphysical instruments: grounding and anchoring. This paper examines Epstein’s understanding and use of these tools. I contend that Epstein is exactly right to say that contemporary metaphysics contains many theoretical instruments that can be fruitfully applied to social ontological analyses. However, I am unconvinced that Epstein’s tools achieve what they set out to do. In particular, I will address two issues: (1) How is grounding for Epstein meant to work? (2) Is anchoring distinct from grounding, and a relation that we need in social ontology?

Against Lewisian Modal Realism from a Metaontological Point of View

Modal realism is an ontological position made familiar by David Lewis, according to which there exist possible worlds other than the actual world that we inhabit. It is hard to uphold modal realism, and indeed modal realism has only a few advocates. However, as most contemporary metaphysicians agree, this does not mean that it is easy to refute modal realism. In this paper, I argue against modal realism from a metaontological point of view. First, I provide a precise formulation of modal realism based on Lewis’ discussion of modal realism. Second, I argue that modal realism is undermined unless it incorporates a view of metaontology known as ontological realism. Third, I point out that if modal realism incorporates ontological realism, it comes into conflict with its own formulation.

The Return of Aristotelian Essentialism in Contemporary Metaphysics

아리스토텔레스적 본질주의는 근대 과학의 도래 이래 담당하고 있었던 많은 이론적 역할을 상실하게 되지만, 정체성의 형이상학에서의 역할은 여전히 유효한 것으로 남아 있다. 그럼에도 불구하고 분석적 전통의 현대 철학에서 아리스토텔레스적 본질주의는 20세기 중반 이후에서야 학적 논의의 장으로 들어오게 된다. 이 논문은 아리스토텔레스적 본질주의의 진입을 어렵게 한 요소는 무엇이고 그것이 어떻게 극복되었는지 살펴보고, 아리스토텔레스적 본질주의에 대한 이해를 심화시킨 본질 개념에 대한 최근의 논의를 검토함으로써, 아리스토텔레스적 본질주의가 현대 형이상학에 귀환하게 된 과정을 이론적 동기를 중심으로 추적한다. 논문의 마지막에는 현대 형이상학에서 논의되고 있는 본질주의가 사실 아리스토텔레스적이지 않다는 이영환의 논의를 비판적으로 검토한다.