On that which is not

Wheeler, Samuel C.

doi:10.1007/bf00869569

Cited by 66 publications

(10 citation statements)

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“…Composition never takes place, and the only existing things are “simples,” that is, atomic objects that have no proper parts. This position is known as nihilism (Unger ; Wheeler ). For the nihilist, there are, or there exist, no tables, chairs, or mountains.…”

Section: Representing a Debate As Merely Verbal: The Case Of Metaomentioning

confidence: 99%

Two Species of Merely Verbal Disputes

Belleri

2018

Metaphilosophy

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It is common to criticize a debate by alleging that it is a “merely verbal dispute.” But how conclusive would an argument based on such allegations be? This article takes the material‐composition debate as a case study and argues that the merely verbal dispute objection is less decisive than one might expect. While assessing the dialectical effectiveness of the mere‐verbality move, the article also tries to mark some progress in the philosophical understanding and appreciation of the phenomenon itself of merely verbal disputes. Its contribution consists in shedding light on a distinction between the “faultlessness” and “faultiness” of a merely verbal dispute.

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Section: Representing a Debate As Merely Verbal: The Case Of Metaomentioning

confidence: 99%

Two Species of Merely Verbal Disputes

Belleri

2018

Metaphilosophy

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“…It is possible to interpret R and 'not R' in such a way that there exists no precisification: choose their interpretations so that the definite regions are recursively inseparable. 9 In such cases it is truly in principle impossible for a finite agent to precisify the concept. Vagueness of this depth I call depth-3-vagueness.…”

Section: Modeling Deeper Vaguenessmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although some have sought to save us from paradox by denying the base case. Unger[8] and Wheeler[9] deny that there are non-heaps by denying that there is a concept heapness at all.2 A program semidecides a set if it halts and says YES on all and only those inputs in the set; but when input with something not in the set, the program might not halt at all.2nd Irish Workshop in Formal Methods, 1998…”

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confidence: 99%

Motivation for a New Semantics for Vagueness

Changizi

1998

Electronic Workshops in Computing

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Vagueness is the phenomenon that natural language predicates have borderline regions of applicability and that the boundaries of the borderline region are not determinable. A theory is presented which argues that vagueness is due to the fact that we are computationally bound by Church's Thesis. Syntactic and semantic models motivated by the theory are introduced. Each disallows the use of classical negation, capturing the fact that it is generally only possible to semidecide but not decide our interpretations of natural language predicates. The role of negation is filled, for each predicate R, by the existence of a dual predicate nonR that acts as if it is the negation, although its interpretation is generally, at best, only an approximation to the complement of R. Multiple "levels" of vagueness are modeled using concepts from recursion theory.R and things not R, and more than this, it is that any line drawn would seem ad hoc, arbitrary and wrong. Sometimes the borderline region is defined more epistemically as that region for which knowledge concerning membership in R is unattainable. The phenomenon is probably best communicated by example: wolves are borderline dog, violet is borderline blue, and so on.

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“…So, not only a r e there no bald men b u t also there could be no bald men! The claim that vague predicates are logically inconsistent is one which Peter Unger (1979b) and Samuel Wheeler (1979) have endorsed.8 According to Unger, vague predicates have d imensions of difference and direction associated with them, which can be shown to generate contradictions. Consider some vague general term l!…”

Section: Paradoxes and Problemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Vagueness: Welcome to the Quicksand

Tye

1995

The Southern J of Philosophy

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On that which is not

Cited by 66 publications

References 0 publications

Two Species of Merely Verbal Disputes

Two Species of Merely Verbal Disputes

Motivation for a New Semantics for Vagueness

Vagueness: Welcome to the Quicksand

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