Questions of Ontology

Abstract

Aristotle begins Book Γ of the Metaphysics in this way: "There is a science [epistēmē] which investigates being [to on] as being and the attributes which belong to this in virtue of its own nature". 1 How exactly Aristotle conceives of the subject matter of this discipline, which we may call "ontology", is of course a difficult question. We are given some further instructions in Met. Γ.2, when Aristotle tells us that it belongs to the study of being qua being to investigate not only being, but also its privation, non-being, as well as unity and plurality (including sameness and difference), substance and its attributes, priority and posteriority, genus and species, whole and part, and other things of this sort. But the remainder of Met. Γ is all about first principles (i.e., axioms), especially the principle of non-contradiction and how to defend it against Protagorean relativism, as well as truth. How Aristotle conceives of the subject matter of metaphysics, in relation to ontology, is also a tricky matter, especially because the decision to collect together the fourteen books of what we now know as Aristotle's Metaphysics under the heading "ta meta ta physika" (literally "those after the Physics") reflects only a later editor's judgment about where this material belongs within the Aristotelian corpus relative to the Physics, Aristotle's treatise on nature (physis). Aristotle himself describes what he is pursuing in these fourteen books in various ways, in addition to "the study of being qua being", e.g., the discipline which aims at "wisdom" (sophia), "philosophy", "first philosophy", and "theology". There is a real question, debated by scholars, as to whether the fourteen books of Aristotle's Metaphysics in fact delineate a single unified discipline and, if so, what its subject matter is. But we can safely say that all of the topics and distinctions cited above figure among the issues debated there and among them very prominently the study of substance. Against this Aristotelian backdrop, it certainly comes as a surprise when we fast forward to the middle of the twentieth century and hear W.V. Quine confidently 1 Met. Γ.1, 1003a21-22, W. D. Ross' translation. The Greek term, ".. . " which Ross translates here with "as" is also sometimes rendered with the Latin, "qua".

Carnap’s epistemological critique of metaphysics

“…26 Schaffer (2010). Koslicki (2016) makes a similar point in relation to Carnap. See Huemer (2009) and Benovsky (2016) for a detailed discussion of various cases.…”

Back to the Question of Ontology (And Metaphysics)

“…To get a clearer idea of how this top-down structure may be based on ontology, consider the following example of a discussion by Koslicki (2016). According to Koslicki, one may agree on the question of whether there are tropes, but disagree on issues of fundamentality.…”

“…Of course, that emphasizes the role of quantifiers, and leads one to think of metaphysics as being concerned with existence questions. Also, that view leads to the recent revolt against the centrality of existence questions by part of the "grounding community" (see Schaffer 2009, Koslicki 2016). As we hope to have made clear in the previous section, prima facie there is room for everyone, provided that the proper distinctions are kept in mind.…”