Metaphysics Final Study Guide

1. Heidegger's Ontology (Barrett's Irrational Man)

• Being vs. Beings: 'Being' (Sein) is not a thing; it is what makes beings intelligible.

• Dasein: Human existence as "Being-there" (in-the-world), not a detached subject.

• Das Man: Inauthentic existence; public, impersonal norm-following mode.

• Aletheia: Truth as "unconcealment" or revelation, not just correctness.

• Phenomenology: Letting beings reveal themselves as they are.

2. Bacigalupo on Existence

• Existence ≠ Property: Does not divide objects like true properties do.

• Fregean Criterion: Real properties divide the domain into haves and have-nots.

• a-Strategy: Everything exists; no contrast class.

• b-Strategy: Existence applies to concepts or predicates, not objects.

• Deflationary View: "Exists" is equivalent to quantification ("There is an x such that...").

3. Mumford on Nothingness

• Negative Entities: Allowed only if logically or empirically necessary.

• Negative Properties: Like "non-red" can't be meaningfully shared.

• Causal Absences: Lack of X causes Y? Interpreted via counterfactuals, not real absences.

• Negative Truths: Don't require negative truthmakers; rely on structure/logical form.

4. Rachels on the Mind-Body Problem

• Dualism (Descartes): Mind and body are distinct substances.

• Problems:

  • Interaction problem

  • Privileged access and infallibility of mental states

• Materialist Theories:

  • Behaviorism: Mind = observable behavior

  • Identity Theory: Mind = brain state

  • Functionalism: Mind = system's functional role

• Challenges to Materialism:

  • Qualia: Subjective experience (Mary thought experiment)

  • Intentionality: Aboutness of mental states

5. Russell on Existence and Logic

• Definite Descriptions:

  • "The King of France is bald" = quantified formula

  • No referent needed for meaningfulness

• Contextual Definitions: Phrases gain meaning only in sentences.

• Logical Constructions:

  • Higher entities reduced to lower ones (numbers → classes → attributes → particulars)

  • Terms like "average plumber" = logical fictions

• Proper Names:

  • Most are disguised descriptions (e.g., "Aristotle" = "teacher of Alexander")

  • Logically Proper Names: Only demonstratives like "this," "that"

• Existential Quantification:

  • "Lions exist" → ∃x (x is a lion)

  • Replaces "exists" as a predicate with quantifiers

6. Quine's Ontological Commitment

• To be is to be the value of a variable: ∃x Fx commits to x in domain.

• Domain of Quantification:

  • Should include only actual entities

  • Excludes mythical/fictional beings

• Distinction:

  • Actual vs. possible beings (modal logic)

  • Quine: Only actuals count in ontological commitment

7. Substitution vs. Range Interpretation of Quantifiers

• Substitution Interpretation:

  • ∃x Fx true if a substitution instance like "Tom is a man" is true

  • Objection: Not everything has a name

• Range Interpretation:

  • ∃x Fx true if something in the domain satisfies Fx

  • Objection: What defines the domain? Can't assume "existing things" without circularity

8. Final Metaphysical Framework of Existence

• Existence = membership in the space-time-causal network

• World Composition:

  • Matter: Fundamental objects

  • Form: Spatio-temporal-causal structure

  • Totality: All related entities

• Against Berkeleyan View: Not all existing things are perceivable (e.g., electrons, germs)

• Empiricist Legacy:

  • Accepts causal interaction as criterion for existence

  • Updated to include unobservable but theoretical entities

• Theological Note:

  • Divine existence may be analogical, not literal

• Operational Definition:

  • a exists ≡ a is part of the space-time-causal system

Key Terms

• Dasein: Human being-in-the-world

• Definite Description: Refers via quantification

• Logical Fiction: Entity referenced only through constructions

• Quantifier: Symbol expressing existence (e.g., ∃x)

• Proper Name: Refers directly; most are disguised descriptions

• Existence: Membership in causal, spatio-temporal reality

Reflection Questions and Answers

• Why isn’t existence a property?

  • It fails the Fregean criterion: it doesn't divide objects into those that have it and those that lack it.

  • Saying something exists is equivalent to asserting that a concept is instantiated.

• How does Russell eliminate non-referring names?

  • By treating them as definite descriptions and rewriting sentences as quantifier-based logical forms.

  • Example: "The King of France is bald" becomes a structured existential statement.

• How do functionalist and dualist theories differ on consciousness?

  • Dualism: Mind is a non-physical substance.

  • Functionalism: Mental states are defined by causal roles; not tied to physical substance.

• What does Quine mean by "to be is to be the value of a variable"?

  • Existence is defined by inclusion in the domain of quantification.

  • If a variable ranges over x, then asserting ∃x Fx commits us to x's existence.

• Why is the range interpretation of quantification problematic?

  • It requires a pre-specified domain of existing things, which assumes the very concept of existence it seeks to explain.

• How does this framework define when something exists?

  • An entity exists if it is part of the space-time-causal system of the actual world.

1. Heidegger’s Ontology (via Barrett’s Irrational Man)

Heidegger reconceives human existence not as an isolated substance but as Being-in-the-world. Barrett explains this with the Field Theory of Being: one’s Being is like a field spread over the world of one’s cares​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr. There is no inner “ego substance” at the center – instead, Dasein (literally “being-there”) is this field itself​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr. Dasein is Heidegger’s term for human existence; notably, he describes human life without ever using “man” or “consciousness”, dissolving the Cartesian subject–object split​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr.

• Dasein: The human way of being that is always already in a world. It literally means “being-there,” emphasizing that existence is not “inside the skin” but world-involved​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr.

• Das Man (“the One” or “the They”): The impersonal, everyday mode of Dasein. In ordinary life we are “one among many,” absorbed in public norms and roles rather than authentic individuality​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr. Heidegger calls this inauthentic public existence “the One”, later known by his German term das Man​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr.

• Aletheia (Truth): Heidegger revives the Greek word aletheia (“un-hiddenness”) to mean truth as revelation. As Barrett notes, Heidegger emphasizes Greek etymology: truth occurs when that which was hidden is brought into openness​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr. Thus truth is not merely propositional correspondence; for example, a work of art can “have truth” by unconcealing meanings beyond literal facts​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr.

• Phenomenology: Heidegger inherits Husserl’s project but reinterprets it as letting phenomena reveal themselves. He notes that the Greek phainomenon means “that which shows itself,” so phenomenology is simply attempting to let things appear as they are​file-bcp8efcfltwrm2vl6iesyr. This radical descriptive method seeks the structures of Dasein’s experience without imposing preconceived categories.

2. Bacigalupo on Existence

Bacigalupo surveys contemporary views on existence, echoing Frege and Kant that “to exist” is not a genuine property of things. For Kant, the copula ‘exists’ in “God exists” occupies predicate position but adds no real content to the concept​de.scribd.com. Frege likewise argued that saying “dinosaurs do not exist” just means “the concept DINOSAUR has no instances.” In Frege’s terms, a property is something that divides the domain into those that have it and those that don’t​de.scribd.com. If “exists” were a property, then (a) one strategy is to put everything in the “exists” column so nothing fails to exist; (b) another strategy is to deny existence applies to ordinary objects at all​de.scribd.com.

• Existence not a Property: Following Kant/Frege, existence is seen as a second-order concept (a property of concepts or predicates) rather than a predicate of individual objects​de.scribd.com​plato.stanford.edu. Saying “Unicorn exists” is read as “There is some x that is a unicorn,” i.e. the predicate ‘being a unicorn’ is instantiated​plato.stanford.edu.

• Fregean Criterion: A genuine property should split the domain into instantiators and non-instantiators. Bacigalupo cites Frege: “a property is something which enables us to divide the domain of objects into two classes”​de.scribd.com. Under this criterion, “exists” fails as a property of objects.

• a- and b-Strategies: Bacigalupo distinguishes two moves to eliminate existence as a distinguishing property​de.scribd.com:

  1. A-strategy – claim everything exists (so the “non-existent” column is empty). Then existence adds nothing.

  2. B-strategy – claim existence isn’t a predicate of objects at all (it belongs to something else, e.g. predicates). In this view, existence isn’t the kind of thing things have or lack.

• Deflationary View: In a deflationary or “no-content” approach, existence is conceptually redundant​philpapers.org. Bacigalupo suggests thinking of “exists” as “a redundant notion”​philpapers.org. The advantage is that it poses no contradiction in saying something “does not exist.” Existence then is simply the use of ∃ over a clarified domain, not a deep metaphysical attribute of things.

3. Mumford on Nothingness

Mumford examines non-being and argues for a “soft Parmenidean” ontology: reject negative entities unless absolutely needed. He notes how absences and negations show up in thought: “Absences can be causes, there are negative properties… negative facts… we can refer to and speak about nothing”​sites.google.com. Classical Parmenides denies all this. Mumford’s strategy is to exclude negative entities by default, only admitting them if irreducible in our best theories​sites.google.com.

• Negative Properties/Facts: Philosophers have posited things like “non-redness” or “the absence of a tooth.” Mumford notes Armstrong’s failed attempt to eliminate negative properties: two objects can share being non-red in very different ways (e.g. one red, one blue)​sites.google.com​sites.google.com. No decisive argument refutes negatives, but they’re allowed only if indispensable.

• Causation by Absence: It seems “lack of water” causes a plant’s death. But Mumford points out a paradox: if absences caused events, then by the Eleatic principle they’d have to exist – which seems absurd​sites.google.com. Instead, one should treat absences as non-causal explanations: for example, “the absence of F explains G” in the sense that had F occurred, G would not​sites.google.com. This way, we avoid postulating an ontological “absence” as a causal agent.

• Negative Truths & Truthmakers: Truthmaker theory says every truth is made true by something existing. But what makes “Ronald McDonald does not exist” true? As Mumford notes, this puzzle (highlighted by Molnar) can be solved by treating negation as logical rather than metaphysical: the negation takes wide scope​plato.stanford.edu. In practice, Mumford argues we need no “negative truthmakers”. We can have beliefs about non-being without positing non-existent entities. Thus, “no truthmakers are required for negative truths; we can have negative beliefs concerning what-is-not without what-is-not being part of what is”​sites.google.com.

4. Rachels on the Mind–Body Problem

James Rachels surveys classical and modern responses to the mind-body split. At one end is Dualism (e.g. Cartesian), which holds mind and body are distinct substances. Descartes claimed the nonphysical mind has “privileged access” (we know our own thoughts directly) and is infallible about its contents​slideserve.com. The chief problem for Cartesian dualism is explaining mind-body interaction.

Materialist replies attempt to locate the mind in the physical world:

• Behaviorism: Mental talk is shorthand for behavioral dispositions. Rachels (following Ryle/Carnap) notes behaviorism treats “pain” as the tendency to shriek, wince, etc​slideserve.com. This handles only overt actions, failing to capture unexpressed mental events (e.g. silent thinking).

• Identity Theory (Mind–Brain Identity): Each mental state is a physical brain state. (Rachels will treat “identity theory” as opposed to the multiple token-token theory.)

• Functionalism: Mental states are defined by their causal roles or functions. A mental state is what it does (its relations to inputs, outputs, and other states). Rachels notes functionalism accounts for multiple realizability (pains in humans, octopuses, or silicon machines) and handles the causal role of states.

Rachels emphasizes two challenges to materialism: subjectivity and intentionality​slideserve.com. Subjectivity (qualia) refers to the “what-it’s-like” of experience. For example, Mary the color scientist learns all the physical facts about red but (according to Jackson’s argument) only acquires what red looks like upon seeing it. Materialism struggles with this: why isn’t complete physical information already all knowledge of the mind? Likewise, intentionality (aboutness) – the mind’s capacity to be about things – is hard to explain if the brain only has causal, non-semantic relations. Rachels notes that materialist accounts seem unable to fully explain why thoughts can be about objects and properties in the world​slideserve.com.

5. Bertrand Russell on Existence

Russell developed a rigorous logical account of existence in the early 20th century. Key points include:

• Definite Descriptions: Russell’s famous theory (from “On Denoting”) analyses phrases like “the F” into quantifiers. For example, “The King of France is bald” means “There is exactly one x such that x is King of France, and x is bald.” In this way, “The present King of France does not exist” can be rendered as a false proposition without invoking a non-existent referent. Russell also suggested many ordinary proper names are actually disguised descriptions (“Aristotle” ≈ “the student of Plato who taught Alexander…”​plato.stanford.edu). In Russell’s logic, a description is not a simple name but a quantificational phrase with unique-existence conditions.

• Logical Constructions and Fictions: Russell sought to construct all mathematical and logical entities from logical primitives. He used contextual definitions: some symbols have meaning only in context, defined by how sentences containing them are paraphrased​plato.stanford.edu. For instance, numbers are defined via classes of classes of individuals (the class of all one-membered classes as “1,” etc.). Since numbers and even classes are not “given” entities but constructions from logic, he calls them “logical fictions”​plato.stanford.edu. In this view, “2” is not an independently existing object but a shorthand for a second-order concept (equivalence class of pairs).

• Reductive Ontology: Russell’s project builds “higher” entities from “lower” ones. Individuals (particulars) are taken as primitive. Attributes or properties are classes of individuals satisfying some predicate. Classes of classes yield sets, and numbers arise from specific classes of classes. Thus there is a hierarchy: individuals → attributes (unary classes) → classes of attributes (sets or relations) → numbers. Everything is to be defined in terms of individuals and logical constructions​plato.stanford.edu.

• Proper Names: Russell distinguished logically proper names (like “I” or demonstratives), which “merely and solely name” an object, from ordinary names. Most ordinary names are, for Russell, disguised descriptions (hence quantificational)​plato.stanford.edu. A name like “Bill Gates” was treated as shorthand for something like “the richest man in the world.” Because descriptions have logical form, the name isn’t a simple tag but encodes existence and uniqueness conditions.

• Existential Statements (Quantifiers): Russell (like Frege) sees “∃x Fx” as a claim that the predicate F has at least one instance. Thus “Foxes exist” means “∃x (x is a fox)”: the property ‘being a fox’ is instantiated by something​plato.stanford.edu. Crucially, he insists that apparent singular existentials (“X exists”) are actually hidden quantifications: “Bill Gates exists” really says “There is an x such that x is identical with Bill Gates.” The name “Bill Gates” is analyzed away via the description account​plato.stanford.edu​plato.stanford.edu.

• Quantifier Interpretation: In formal logic, the existential quantifier ranges over a domain of discourse. Russell and Frege agreed that commitment to existents comes only through quantification. For Russell, the form “∃x Fx” is not shorthand for a single object predicate but a true existential claim. He pointed out that saying nothing exists (a negative existential) should not ascribe a property to a non-being. The negation takes wide scope: e.g. “Ronald McDonald does not exist” does not mean “Ronald McDonald is (nonexistent)”, but rather “There is no x that is Ronald McDonald”​plato.stanford.edu.

• Criticisms and Limits: Russell’s approach avoids paradoxes of referring to “nothing” by rewriting sentences logically. However, it relies on sophisticated machinery of quantifiers and types. Critics note that contextual definitions (incomplete symbols) require care, and that eliminating names via descriptions can make some sentences cumbersome. Moreover, distinguishing “logically proper names” from others is subtle; many argue that most everyday names function more like rigid designators than descriptions. Still, Russell’s analysis clarifies how “existence” in language can be accounted for without postulating mysterious existence-properties​plato.stanford.edu​plato.stanford.edu.

6. Quine’s Ontological Extension

W.V.O. Quine took Russell’s formalism and turned it into a general criterion of ontological commitment. His famous slogan is “To be is to be the value of a variable.” In practice, this means:

• Variables and Domains: In a first-order theory, one fixes a domain (set) of discourse for quantifiers. Whatever entities (or types of entities) must lie in that domain for the theory to be true are the entities the theory is committed to existing. In other words, saying “∃x Fx” commits us to something in the domain that satisfies F​plato.stanford.edu. Quine insisted we paraphrase any statement so that only bound variables remain as ontologically committing. For example, “Socrates exists” can be regimented as “∃x (Is-Socrates(x))”, where Is-Socrates(x) is true of exactly Socrates. The quantifier now does the existential work​plato.stanford.edu. This way, names aren’t mystical referents; commitment comes only from what our variables range over.

• Actual vs. Possible Entities: Quine was famously actualist: the domain of quantification contains actual (concrete) entities only. He was skeptical of talking about non-actual “possible” objects. If we allow modal talk, we risk expanding our ontology to include unrealized possibilities. Quine preferred to treat modal statements as part of an extended language or to paraphrase them away. In sum, “to exist” in a Quinean sense means being among the values a variable may take in our best (first-order) scientific theory – typically those in spacetime and causally efficacious​plato.stanford.edu.

• Domain Constraints: Quine’s method is also practical: one evaluates theories under different candidate domains. If a statement “∃x Fx” is true, then something in that domain must fall under F. A change in domain can change existential claims. But critically, Quine would allow whatever domain makes our theories true; committing to anything else is unwarranted. His paraphrasing rule aims to keep ontological commitments as sparse as possible (no commitment to abstract numbers, universals, etc., unless required by quantification).

7. Toward a Metaphysical Framework of Existence

Integrating the above, we may frame existence as membership in the spatio-temporal-causal structure of reality. In other words, something exists if it has a place (or potential place) in space-time and can participate in causal processes. This echoes a naturalistic stance: existence is empirically grounded.

• Kantian/Empiricist: Kant taught that existence is not a real predicate but indicates whether a concept’s instance is given in experience. Modern empiricists similarly demand evidence: if physics and observation allow an entity (like electrons), we say it exists; if something has no empirical support (like leprechauns), we say it does not. Thus existence-talk is tied to our epistemic access to a phenomenon.

• Scientific View: Science typically assumes only that which can in principle affect experience or measurement “exists.” Entities posited by a successful scientific theory (fields, particles) are taken as existing. On this view, existence claims are hypotheses about causal roles: e.g. “electrons exist” means something must play the electron’s causal role. This is compatible with a Russell/Quine quantifier criterion over the domain of observable or theoretically postulated entities.

• Theological Analogies: Traditional theology often speaks of God’s existence as analogical rather than univocal with creaturely existence. Heidegger noted God is “absent” in his ontology, and theists might say God is Being itself (se ipsum esse)[^*]. In a metaphysical framework, one might treat divine existence as a special mode: not localized in space-time but as the ultimate source of Being. Aquinas’s analogia entis suggests God “exists” analogically, evading the Fregean/Kantian critique by positing a different category of being. Thus, a creature can meaningfully say “God exists” by analogy even if it’s unlike saying “rock exists.” Such an approach can be made consistent with the above by reserving ordinary “exists” for spatio-temporal beings and allowing a qualifier (e.g. “exists infinitely” or “necessarily exists”) for the divine.

• Formalization (a-Quantifier): Once the domain of discourse is clarified (e.g. “the set of all objects in spacetime” or “the set of all physical systems”), we can use a standard existential quantifier (sometimes called an “actuality” or a-quantifier) to assert existence. For example, “∃x (P(x))” then unambiguously means “there is something in the specified domain with property P.” This avoids confusion by tying existence claims to an explicitly fixed domain of discourse and allowed substitutions.