The Meaning of Something : Rethinking the Logic and the Unity of the Ontology

This innovative volume investigates the meaning of ‘something’ in different recent philosophical traditions in order to rethink the logic and the unity of ontology, without forgetting to compare these views to earlier significative accounts in the history of philosophy. In fact, the revival of interest in “something” in the 19 th and 20 th centuries as well as in contemporary philosophy can easily be accounted for: it affords the possibility for asking the question: what is there? without engaging in predefined speculative assumptions The issue about “something” seems to avoid any naive approach to the question about what there is, so that it is treated in two main contemporary philosophical trends: “material ontology”, which aims at taking “inventory” of what there is, of everything that is ; and “formal ontology”, which analyses the structural features of all there is, whatever it is . The volume advances cutting-edge debates on what is the first et the most general item in ontology, that is to say “something”, because the relevant features of the conceptual core of something are: non-nothingness, otherness . Something means that one being is different from others. The relationality belongs to something.: Therefore, the volume advances cutting-edge debates in phenomenology, analytic philosophy, formal and material ontology, traditional metaphysics. Much Ado About Something 6 Something and Material Ontology 7 Inclusion/Exclusion 7 Something as an ``A Priori ́ ́ Mental Object 10 Back to the Stoic 12 Something and Formal Ontology 14 Something-as-Something 14 Something, Being, One 15 The Chapters of This Book: Some Introductory Remarks 18 Bibliography 21 Contents 25 Contributors 27 Chapter 1: Brentano on Presenting Something as an Intentional Object 28 1.1 Brentano on Physical Phenomena 32 1.2 The Identity Thesis and Mental Monism 35 1.3 The Identity Thesis and Metaphysical Phenomenalism 39 1.4 Conceptual Dependence of Mental States ́ Intentional Objects 42 1.5 The Theory of Primary and Secondary Objects and the Relationship Between Intentional Object and Presentation 45 1.6 Objections Against the Idea of Mediating Content 49 1.7 Concluding Remarks 52 Bibliography 55 Chapter 2: Husserl ́s Transcendentals? On Object, Essence, Thing, Being and Substance 58 2.1 The Starting Point: The Objet/Something or Gegenstand Überhaupt 60 2.2 Essence 61 2.3 Formal Essence 67 2.4 Region 74 2.5 The Thing or Ding as the Individuum of the Region ``Physical Nature ́ ́ 80 2.6 The Thing and the Phantom 81 2.7 Material Thing and Physicalistic Thing 83 2.8 The Material Thing as the Individuum of the Region ``Nature ́ ́ 85 2.9 Substance and Being 87 2.10 Concluding Remarks 91 Bibliography 92 Chapter 3: Something But Not Too Much: Ontological Considerations in Intuitionistic Mathematics 95 3.1 Brouwer 96 3.2 Arend Heyting 103 3.3 A Final Comparison 111 Bibliography 112 Chapter 4: Russell on the Widest Words in the Philosophical Vocabulary: A Platonic Path Through Terms, Units and Entities 115 4.1 The Widest Word and Then Some 117 4.2 A Path Through the Properties of Terms 119 4.2.1 Refutations and Alternatives 119 4.2.2 A Reasoned Alternative 122 4.2.3 `Term ́ Is the Widest Word 123 4.2.4 From `Terms ́ to `Units ́ 126 4.2.5 From `Units ́ to `Entities ́ 127 4.2.6 Looking Back on the Path 128 4.3 A Platonic Path 129 4.3.1 Putting the Passage Back in the Frame 129 4.3.2 A Well-Trodden Road 130 4.3.3 τι, ν and ν in the Sophist, 237c7-e6 131 4.3.4 Same Road, Different Destinations? 135 4.4 Concluding Remarks: An Analysis of Russell ́s Platonism 137 Bibliography 141 Chapter 5: The Nature of Ordinary Objects 143 5.1 The Basic Principles of Ingarden ́s Theory of Modes of Being 144 5.1.1 Existential Autonomous and Existential Heteronomous 145 5.1.2 Existential Originality and Existential Derivativeness 146 5.1.3 Existential Self-Sufficiency and Existential Non-Self-Sufficiency 146 5.1.4 Existential Dependence and Existential Independence 147 5.2 Ingarden ́s Theory of Cultural Objects 147 5.2.1 Distinction Between Cultural Objects and Physical Objects on which they Depend 148 5.2.2 The Existence and Persistence of Cultural Objects Are Intentional 149 5.2.3 The Double Dependence of Cultural Objects 150 5.3 The Extension of the Domain of Intentionality 152 5.3.1 Distinction Between Ordinary Objects and the Physical Objects of Which They Are Constituted 153 5.3.2 The Existence and Persistence of Ordinary Objects Are Intentional 153 5.3.3 The Double Dependence of the Ordinary Objects 156 5.4 Conclusion 157 Bibliography 157 Chapter 6: Object and Something in General in Contemporary Formal Ontology 159 6.1 The Substantial View: The Manchester School 160 6.2 The Husserlian Heritage of the Substantial View 161 6.3 Formal Ontological Laws 163 6.4 How to Characterise Formal Ontological Structures? 166 6.5 Formal Objects and Relations: Jonathan Lowe 169 6.6 The Naïve View: Cocchiarella 171 6.7 Conclusion 173 Bibliography 174 Chapter 7: Flat Ontology, a Negative Cosmology? The Aliquid and Its Other 176 7.1 Liberate Things! The Fundamental Principles of Flat Ontology 178 7.1.1 A General Structure from Meinong ́s Theory of Objects 178 7.1.2 The Triple Refusal of Flat Ontology 181 7.2 In Search of the Minimum Entity. The Aliquid as Brick of Flat Ontology 183 7.2.1 Thing, Object, Something 184 7.2.2 Determination of the Aliquid 185 7.3 Internal Difficulties and Ultimate Operations of Flat Ontologists 188 7.3.1 Conditions of Possibilities of the Aliquid ́s Definition: The World as Essential Piece of Ontology 188 7.3.2 A Host of Difficulties 190 7.3.3 The Ultimate Operations of Flat Ontology 195 7.4 Concluding Remarks: Flat Ontology: A Proposal That Is Neither Liberal, Nor Ontological, Nor Realist 198 Bibliography 201 Chapter 8: Nothing, Everything, Something! 202 8.1 A Trialogue 203 8.2 Comments 208 Bibliography 213 Name Index 216 Subject Index 220