Realismo/Anti-Realismo

State of the art paper on the topic realism/anti-realism. The first part of the paper elucidates the notions of existence and independence of the metaphysical characterization of the realism/anti-realism dispute. The second part of the paper presents a critical taxonomy of the most important positions and doctrines in the contemporary literature on the domains of science and mathematics: scientific realism, scientific anti-realism, constructive empiricism, structural realism, mathematical Platonism, mathematical indispensability, mathematical empiricism, intuitionism, mathematical fictionalism and second philosophy

Making metaethics work for AI: realism and anti-realism

Engineering an artificial intelligence to play an advisory role in morally charged decision making will inevitably introduce meta-ethical positions into the design. Some of these positions, by informing the design and operation of the AI, will introduce risks. This paper offers an analysis of these potential risks along the realism/anti-realism dimension in metaethics and reveals that realism poses greater risks, but, on the other hand, anti-realism undermines the motivation for engineering a moral AI in the first place

Can the empirical sciences contribute to the moral realism/anti-realism debate?

An increasing number of moral realists and anti-realists have recently attempted to support their views by appeal to science. Arguments of this kind are typically criticized on the object-level. In addition, however, one occasionally also comes across a more sweeping metatheoretical skepticism. Scientific contributions to the question of the existence of objective moral truths, it is claimed, are impossible in principle; most prominently, because such arguments impermissibly derive normative from descriptive propositions, such arguments beg the question against non-naturalist moral realism, science cannot inform conceptual accounts of moral judgements, and the conceptual is logically prior to the empirical. My main aim in this paper is to clarify and critically assess these four objections. Moreover, based on this assessment, I will formulate four general requirements that science-based arguments in favor of moral realism and anti-realism should meet. It will turn out that these arguments are limited in several ways, and that some existing arguments have been unsound. Yet it is still possible in principle for the empirical sciences to contribute to the moral realism/anti-realism debate

Real Vagueness

The nature of vagueness is investigated via a preliminary definition and a discussion of the classical sorites paradox ; this is carried further by asking for the origins of vagueness and a critique of several attempts to remove it from language. It is shown that such attempts are ill motivated and doomed for failure since vagueness is not just a matter of ignorance but firmly grounded in epistemic and metaphysical facts. Finally, the philosophical interest of real vagueness is illustrated by the concept of “natural kind”, which is essential to realism/anti-realism debates

What Becomes of the Damned: Annihilationism Consistent with Nonexistent Objects

Annihilationism provides a fruitful point of contact between philosophers and theologians for further reflection on nonexistence. In this paper I articulate a key commitment of annihilationism; namely, that some persons cease to exist. Such a commitment, I argue, amounts to the claim that some persons exist at time t and then do not exist at t+1, become ‘annihilated objects.’ Claims about annihilated objects induct the annihilationist into a wider realism/anti-realism debate about nonexistent objects. I survey some major viewpoints in this debate. I then draw out some implications for each view for the annihilationist’s commitment to annihilated objects. I show that annihilationism is consistent with some forms of realism and anti-realism and inconsistent with others

The Semantic Realism/Anti-Realism Dispute and Knowledge of Meanings

Here the relationship between understanding and knowledge of meaning is discussed from two different perspectives: that of Dummettian semantic anti-realism and that of the semantic externalism of Putnam and others. The question addressed is whether or not the truth of semantic externalism would undermine a central premise in one of Dummett’s key arguments for anti-realism, insofar as Dummett’s premise involves an assumption about the transparency of meaning and semantic externalism is often taken to undermine such transparency. Several notions of transparency and conveyability of meaning are distinguished and it is argued that, though the Dummettian argument for anti-realism presupposes only a weak connection between knowledge of meaning and understanding, even this much is not trivially true in light of semantic externalism, and that semantic externalism, if true, would thus represent a reason for rejecting the crucial assumption on which the Dummettian argument depends.Peer reviewe

What Science Doesn\u27t Need to Know: Scientific Realism, Anti-Realism and the Continuum of Knowledge

In this paper, I characterize and criticize a recently articulated anti-realist defense, P. Kyle Stanford’s new induction over the history of science. I demonstrate that his position relies on a strong epistemological distinction between common sense knowledge and scientific knowledge. I argue that no such strong distinction exists and thus his anti-realism either collapses into realism or global skepticism. I also explore implications of this collapse for the belief/acceptance distinction and conclude that it is untenable only to accept our theories

Moral realism in Spinoza's Ethics

I argue that Spinoza is more of a moral realist than an anti-realist. More specifically, I argue that Spinoza is more of a realist than Kant, and that his view has deep similarities with Plato's metaethics. Along the way, I identify three approaches to the moral realism/anti-realism distinction. Classifying Spinoza as a moral realist brings out a number of important complexities that have been overlooked by many of Spinoza's readers and by many contemporary metaethicists

The Starry Heavens Above Me and the Starmaking Power Within Me

The worldmaking thesis stands as a contentious view of reality. Its primary tenet, that we play a role in cognitively making objects, properties, facts, and thereby the world, is dismissed by many philosophers as an incoherent and misguided position. In this paper I critically discuss the thesis and defend it against several criticisms: that (1) it is cosmologically incoherent, (2) raises a problem of causation, (3) implies subjectivism, (4) commits a use-mention fallacy, and (5) it commits the problem of disagreement. I show that these criticisms are not ultimately deleterious to the thesis. Furthermore, I explore ways in which worldmaking constitutes a more satisfactory account of objects, properties, and facts over and against competing views, viz., metaphysical realism

Aesthetic realism

Tese de doutoramento, Estudos de Literatura e da Cultura (Teoria da Literatura), 2009, Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de LetrasA dissertação defende o realismo em estética em particular, no que diz respeito às propriedades estéticas das obras de arte (incluindo obras literárias). O capítulo 1 caracteriza o debate geral sobre realismo acerca do mundo exterior, e de seguida o debate na estética e na filosofia da arte respeitante ao realismo estético. Os capítulos 2 e 3 consideram dois desafios proeminentes ao realismo estético. O capítulo 2 examina um ataque geral à objectividade dos valores. O capítulo 3 examina uma tese que alegadamente inviabiliza o realismo estético: a chamada tese da autonomia'. Ambas as formas de oposição ao realismo são rejeitadas. O capítulo 4 é sobre o ensaio de Hume Sobre o Padrão do Gosto'. Será sugerido que o sentimentalismo de Hume é compatível com, e talvez sustenta um realismo estético moderado. Os capítulos 5 e 6 fazem uma defesa positiva do realismo estético. O capítulo 5 invoca alguns argumentos principais a favor do realismoThe dissertation defends realism concerning the aesthetic in particular, concerning the aesthetic properties of works of art (including works of literature). Chapter 1 characterizes the general debate over realism about the external world, and then the specific debate in aesthetics and the philosophy of art concerning aesthetic realism. Chapters 2 and 3 consider two prominent challenges to aesthetic realism. Chapter 2 examines a general attack on the objectivity of values. Chapter 3 examines a thesis that purports to block aesthetic realism: the so-called autonomy thesis'. Both forms of opposition to realism are rejected. Chapter 4 focuses on Hume's essay Of the Standard of Taste'. It will be suggested that Hume's sentimentalism is compatible with, and perhaps gives support to, a moderate aesthetic realism. Chapters 5 and 6 provide a positive defence of aesthetic realism. Chapter 5 invokes some main arguments for aesthetic realism. Chapter 6 gives a realist account of aesthetic properties