Levels of Ontology and Natural Language: the Case of the Ontology of Parts and Wholes

In James Miller (ed.), The Language of Ontology. New York, NY: Oxford University Press (2021)
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Abstract

It is common in contemporary metaphysics to distinguish two levels of ontology: the ontology of ordinary objects and the ontology of fundamental reality. This papers argues that natural language reflects not only the ontology of ordinary objects, but also a language-driven ontology, which is involved in the mass-count distinction and part-structure-sensitive semantic selection, as well as perhaps the light ontology of pleonastic entities. The paper recasts my older theory of situated part structures without situations, making use of a primitive notion of unity.

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Author's Profile

Friederike Moltmann
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Citations of this work

Social Groups Are Concrete Material Particulars.Kevin Richardson - 2022 - Canadian Journal of Philosophy 52 (4):468-483.

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References found in this work

Knowledge of Language: Its Nature, Origin, and Use.Noam Chomsky - 1986 - Prager. Edited by Darragh Byrne & Max Kölbel.
Word and Object.Willard Van Orman Quine - 1960 - Les Etudes Philosophiques 17 (2):278-279.
New horizons in the study of language and mind.Noam Chomsky - 2000 - New York: Cambridge University Press.
The structure of objects.Kathrin Koslicki - 2008 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Individuals.P. F. Strawson - 1959 - Les Etudes Philosophiques 14 (2):246-246.

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