Natural and Artifactual Objects in Contemporary Metaphysics: Exercises in Analytic Ontology

ISBN-13: 9781350175433 / Angielski / Miękka / 2020 / 248 str.

Professor Richard Davies

Opis

What is an object? How do we look at them? Why do they matter? This collection presents a lively, timely discussion of natural and artifactual objects, considering the relationship between them from a range of philosophical perspectives, including the philosophy of biology, the metaphysics of space and the philosophy of perception. Beginning from the starting point that natural objects are bona fide, endowed with some natural border between themselves and everything else, while artifactual objects depend on the observation of tacit conventions and may include the ordinary objects of everyday life, this volume explores, contextualises and interrogates objects. Contributors discuss a variety of objects including physical, scientific and mental ones, as well as things that appear to question the limits of object-hood, including holes, Quinean 'posits' and language. The very first collection to address this growing topic within analytic philosophy, Natural and Artifactual Objects in Contemporary Metaphysics represents a highly original work, showcasing some of the most important and influential philosophers working in Europe today.

Spis treści

Introduction: Carving Nature at the Joints, Richard Davies (University of Bergamo, Italy) Part I: Does Nature Carve Itself? 1. Mental acts, externalism and fiat objects: an Ockhamist solution, Riccardo Fedriga (University of Bologna, Italy) 2. Is the World really a World of Objects? A Note on Quinean Ontology, Antonio Rainone (“L’Orientale” University of Naples, Italy) 3. Spatial Fictionalism. A Solution of the Grounding Problem, Nicola Piras (University of Sassari, Italy) 4. Talking about Properties: A Couple of Doubts about Hofweber’s Internalist View, Elisa Paganini (State University of Milan, Italy) Part II: Where Do Limits Lie? 5. The Eye of the Needle: Seeing Holes, Clotilde Calabi (State University of Milan, Italy) 6. Bona Fideness of Material Entities and their Boundaries, Lars Vogt (University of Bonn, Germany) 7. A Conceptualist View in the Metaphysics of Species, Ciro De Florio and Aldo Frigerio (both Catholic University of Milan, Italy) Part III: Where Do Tools Come From? 8. Artifacts and fiat objects: two families apart?, Massimiliano Carrara and Marzia Soavi (both University of Padua, Italy) 9. The Semantics of Artifactual Words, Marco Santambrogio (University of Parma, Italy) 10. Are linguistic objects fiat or bona fide? An ancient proposal, Maddalena Bonelli (University of Bergamo, Italy) Part IV: What Does Mind-Dependency Depend On? 11. Leibniz’s principle and psycho-neural identity, Andrea Bottani and Alfredo Paternoster (both University of Bergamo, Italy) 12. Do we exist? Mereological nihilism, collective thinking and dualism, Alfredo Tomasetta (University School for Advanced Studies IUSS, Pavia) Abstracts Index of Names Index of Principal Subjects