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61. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 5 > Issue: 2
Jörgen Sjögren Indispensability, the Testing of Mathematical Theories, and Provisional Realism
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Mathematical concepts are explications, in Carnap’s sense, of vague or otherwise unclear concepts; mathematical theories have an empirical and a deductivecomponent. From this perspective, I argue that the empirical component of a mathematical theory may be tested together with the fruitfulness of its explications.Using these ideas, I furthermore give an argument for mathematical realism, based on the indispensability argument combined with a weakened version of confirmational holism
62. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Maciej Sendłak Modal Meinongianism, Russell’s Paradox, and the Language/Metalanguage Distinction
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The subject of my article is the principle of characterization–the most controversial principle of Meinong’s Theory of Objects. The aim of this text is twofold. First of all, I would like to show that Russell’s well-known objection to Meinong’s Theory of Objects can be reformulated against a new modal interpretation of Meinongianism that is presented mostly by Graham Priest. Secondly, I would like to propose a strategy which gives uncontroversial restriction to the principle of characterization and which makes it possible to avoid Russell’s argument. The strategy is based on the distinction between object language and metalanguage, and it applies to modal Meinongianism as well as to other so-called Meinongian theories.
63. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Graham Priest Three Heresies in Logic and Metaphysics
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This paper concerns three heterodox views in logic and metaphysics: dialetheism (the view that some contradictions are true), noneism (the view that some objects do not exist), and the non-transitivity of numerical identity. It explains each of the views, some of their features and applications, and some of the relationships between them.
64. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Anna Pietryga Graham Priest and his P-Scheme
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The works by Graham Priest that I'm most familiar with are those of the 1980’s. I understand they belong to the logical part of his writing, as presented by the organizers of the “Towards Graham Priest” meeting at Szczecin University on 20 June, 2012. Myself, I read Priest’s works to be imprecise, to say the least. Thelack of precision is to be traced particularly in his interpretations of Alfred Tarski’s heritage. This applies to Tarski’s main points, namely: semantically closedlanguages, the T-scheme, and the appreciation of natural language. The strange thing about it is that Priest does not mind other people expressing views opposite to his own, but admits he cannot determine which contradictions are true and gives only vague indications about how to judge the criticisms.
65. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Adriana Schetz “Is This a Dagger which I See before Me?” On Objects and Contents of Contradictory Perceptions
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The paper is an attempt to answer the question: what kind of philosophical theory of perception may warrant the claim that one can perceive contradictions, that is, undergo visual or other experiences with contradictory contents? Apparently, the conception of perceptual experience endorsed by Graham Priest makes it intelligible that one can truly experience contradictions. Moreover, as we try to argue, Priest’s insistence that one can perceive contradictions is to some extent defensible on the ground of a version of direct realism which identifies content of perception with its object, and underlines holistic character of perceptual experience.
66. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Graham Priest Replies
67. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Joanna Odrowąż-Sypniewska Paraconsistent vs. Contextual Solutions to Sorites
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In my paper I argue that a successful theory of vagueness should be able to account for faultless (aka permissible) disagreement concerning borderline cases.Firstly, I claim that out of the traditional (semantic, noncontextual) conceptions of vagueness the best equipped to account for faultless disagreement areparaconsistent solutions (such as Hyde’s subvaluationism and Priest’s dialetheism). One worry concerning dialetheism is that it seems to allow not only for faultless disagreements between different speakers, but also for such ‘disagreements’ between the given speaker and himself. Another worry, at least for some people, is that subvaluationism and dialetheism account for faultless disagreements by allowing contradictions. Next, I go on to argue that contextual conceptions, which are free from this latter worry, are equally well able to account for such disagreements. To this aim I offer a new account of the usage of personal taste predicates and suggest that we model the usage of all vague predicates on them. The idea is that in clear cases “a is F” means “a is F simpliciter”, whereas in borderline cases it means “a is F-to-me”. Since the boundary between borderline and nonborderline cases depends on context, my solution weds content-contextualism with truth-contextualism.
68. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Adam R Thompson Debt relief: On Haji's Reason's Debt to Freedom
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Ishtiyaque Haji develops and supports the view that alternative possibilities are a requirement on many morally-relevant facets of our lives. I argue that the main argument he offers for his view fails due primarily to two things. First, Haji employs a Jackson-type case to support a claim that such cases fail to support. Second, Haji offers no reason to think that we must understand the 'can' in certain of his important principles as alethic. These troubles vex the insightful support Haji offers for his many, wide-ranging conclusions.
69. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Piotr Warzoszczak Remarks on Graham Priest’s Views on Transworld Identity
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In Towards Non-Being Graham Priest proposes an informative criterion of identity across possible worlds. Roughly, the criterion says that whenever two objects satisfy the very same qualitative characteristics in every possible world they are identical. But Priest also maintains that there are qualitatively indiscernible possible worlds. It is argued in the paper that for this reason he should allow the existence of two numerically different but qualitatively identical objects, and that is in tension with the criterion of transworld identity he has proposed. Thus Priest should reject either his criterion of transworld identity, or the thesis of possibleexistence of qualitatively indiscernible worlds.
70. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 7 > Issue: 2
Ishtiyaque Haji No Debt Relief in Sight: Reply to Thompson
71. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 9 > Issue: 1
Stephen K. McLeod Two Philosophies of Need
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Instrumentalists about need believe that all needs are instrumental, i.e., ontologically dependent upon ends, goals, or purposes. Absolutists view some needs as non-instrumental. The aims of this article are: clearly to characterize the instrumentalism/absolutism debate that is of concern (mainly §1); to establish that both positions have recent and current adherents (mainly §1); to bring what is, in comparison with prior literature, a relatively high level of precision to the debate, employing some hitherto neglected, but important, insights (passim); to show, on grounds not previously to the fore in the literature, that insofar as instrumentalism’s advocates have provided arguments for the position, these are unsound (§2); to argue against instrumentalism using a new dilemma concerning whether ‘end’, ‘goal’, and ‘purpose’ are interpreted in a mentalistic manner (§3); to elucidate the implications of the needs/need-satisfiers and preconditions/means distinctions for the debate (§4).
72. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 9 > Issue: 1
Arkadiusz Gut Overcoming Logical Psychologism (Frege’s Influence on Husserl)
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The central and probably most controversial point concerning the psychologism — anti-psychologism debate is the problem of Frege’s alleged influence on the change in Husserl’s views. Contemporary thinkers investigating the early period of Husserl’s philosophy (between 1891—1895) have attempted to show that the opinion that Frege’s doctrine had a traumatic influence on Husserl’s views is not justified. This paper, which tries to maintain a balance between strictly philosophical argumentation and narrowly understood historical argumentation, suggests an alternative solution. By appealing to Frege’s works (known by Husserl) published before 1894, the locus of psychologism will be determined. Afterwards, I will present Husserl’s and Frege’s views on the elucidation procedure and the distinction between calculus and ‘lingua characteristica’. By discussing Husserl’s works from 1894-1897, I will show that his standpoint changed dramatically as he entered into the anti-psychological program, involving a new theory of concepts, judgment, and the so-called ‘pure Fregean flavour’ — a new account of logical content.
73. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 9 > Issue: 1
Gianfranco Soldati Methodological Problems in the Phenomenology of Time
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It is difficult to develop a coherent conception of time on the basis of our experience of time. The philosophical analysis of our experience of time is a central topic in phenomenology. So one might expect phenomenology to deliver a contribution to the solution of the most challenging puzzles of the philosophy of time. This paper deals with some methodological issues related to such an expectation. It opposes two main conceptions of the role of phenomenology in the philosophy of time. On the first conception phenomenology draws conclusions about the nature of time from the description of the qualitative features of our experience of time. On the second conception, phenomenology determines what we are rationally entitled to believe about the nature of time on the basis of the way we experience time. It is argued that if one aims at integrating different approaches in one’s philosophical conception of time, then it is the second conception one ought to choose.
74. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 9 > Issue: 1
Mats Volberg Implications of Paternalism and Buck-passing: A Reply to Quong
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In his latest book, Liberalism without Perfection (2011), Jonathan Quong argues against liberal perfectionism and defends Rawlsian political liberalism. In the course of his argumentation he presents us with a judgmental account of paternalism and the buck-passing account of truth in political philosophy. The aim of this paper is to critique both of those elements in Quong’s argumentation. I will first present the judgmental account of paternalism and then demonstrate that it will place impossible demands on us, insofar as paternalism is a prima facie wrong and we have a duty to reduce wrongness in the world. I will then turn to the buck-passing account of truth; after introducing it, I show that it will generate uncertain results for political philosophy, making it an unsatisfactory solution for the political liberal making truth claims in political philosophy.
75. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 9 > Issue: 1
John Shand Free Will and Subject
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Traditionally formulated, the problem of free will cannot be solved. We may nevertheless be justifiably confident that we have free will. The traditional formulation makes a solution impossible by juxtaposing contradictory objective and subjective accounts of whether there is free will, between which accounts there is no third way to choose. However, the objective stance inherently denies the conditions under which free will is possible, namely that there are subjects, and is thus question-begging. It gives us no good reason for our not having free will without our also accepting that there are no subjects. As subjects we may not deny that there are subjects, and that as subjects we have good reason, through our experience of free will, to hold that we have free will. The problem of free will is a footnote to how there may be subjects. In order to understand what free will is we need to look at how it is experienced, that is, at the phenomenology of free will.
76. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 3 > Issue: 1
John Barker Disquotation, Conditionals, and the Liar
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In this paper I respond to Jacquette’s criticisms, in (Jacquette, 2008), of my (Barker, 2008). In so doing, I argue that the Liar paradox is in fact a problem about the disquotational schema, and that nothing in Jacquette’s paper undermines this diagnosis.
77. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 3 > Issue: 1
Jan Woleński Notes on Books
78. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 3 > Issue: 1
Mark McLeod-Harrison God and (Nearly) Universal Pluralistic Antirealism
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This essay takes on two challenges to universal pluralistic antirealism (UPA). One of those challenges is successful, so the universality of UPA is not entirely plausible. However, I propose that the best way to remain as close to the spirit of UPA is to be a theist. God is the only thing that needs to be outside the universal claim of UPA. However, even God is what God is partially within human noetic schemes. Since God is “in the mix” with humans in terms of being a concept-user, God’s presence can solve the other challenge to UPA. UPA is thus replaced by nearly universal pluralistic antirealism (NUPA). The difference between UPA and NUPA, in the end, is not very great.
79. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 3 > Issue: 1
Włodek Rabinowicz Values Compared
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Gert (2004) has suggested that several different types of value relations, including parity, can be clearly distinguished from each other if one interprets value comparisons as normative assessments of preference, while allowing for two levels of normativity - requirement and permission. While this basic idea is attractive, the particular modeling Gert makes use of is flawed. This paper presents an alternative modeling, developed in Rabinowicz (2008), and a general taxonomy of binary value relations. Another version of value analysis is then brought in, which appeals to appropriate emotions rather than preferences. It is also shown what the modeling of value relations would look like from such an emotion-centered perspective. The preference-based and the emotion-based approaches differ importantly from each other, but they give rise to isomorphic taxonomies.
80. Polish Journal of Philosophy: Volume > 3 > Issue: 1
Christopher Norris Badiou on Set Theory, Ontology and Truth: mathematics as a guide to metaphysics (Part One)
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Alain Badiou is a highly original, indeed decidedly iconoclastic thinker whose work has ranged widely over areas of equal concern to philosophers in the ‘continental’ and mainstream analytic traditions. These areas include ontology, epistemology, ethics, politics, and – above all – philosophy of mathematics. It is unfortunate, and symptomatic of prevailing attitudes, that his work has so far receivedminimal attention from commentators in the analytic line of descent. Here I try to help the process of reception along by describing Badiou’s remarkably ambitious approach to issues of mathematical (more specifically: of set-theoretical) ontology, and by explaining just where his project stands in relation to some major issues within current analytic debate. Chief among them are: the issue between realists and anti-realists – along with various avowed middle-ground or compromise solutions – and those oddly tenacious problems-from-Wittgenstein (e.g., concerning what it means to follow a rule) that have so preoccupied philosophers over the past decade. In particular I stress the unusual, indeed unique combination in his thought of high formal rigour and conceptual clarity allied to a speculative scope and inventiveness which tend to make those other discussions appear somewhat self-absorbed and parochial. Most importantly, Badiou engages these issues at a level of creative as well as of technical or analytic grasp, which puts his thinking closely in touch with the way that set theory has itself evolved through a constant process of – in Badiou’s phrase – ‘turning paradoxes into concepts.’ I also discuss his strong and principled rejection of the ‘linguistic turn’ in its manifold (analytic and continental) variants, and his idea of the ‘event’ as that which inherently eludes or surpasses the conceptual resources of any received ontology, whether in mathematics and the natural sciences or in the history of genuinely epochal changes in politics and ethics. All in all, I put the case for Badiou as a thinker of the first importance not only for the impressive range, depth and originality of his work, but also because it points to an escape-route from some of the more cramped or windowless quarters of present-day philosophic thought.