Learning objectives
The course aims to provide an introduction to analytic metaphysics with a special emphasis on methodological continuities and discontinuities between that and the natural science. In particular, we will focus on some key problems and debates including the question of ontological commitment; the nature of events; identity criteria; persistence criteria; vagueness and its paradoxes; and the debate between realists and nominalists about properties. Articles by contemporary classics including W. V. O. Quine, S. Kripke, and T. Sider will be read during the course.
Prerequisites
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Course unit content
It is common to think that reality is given to us essentially in two ways: on the one hand as a manifest world, on the other hand as a scientific world. The former is the intuitive and inexact world of people, dogs and tables; the latter is a world of electrons and gravitational fields, described with rigor and exactitude by theories and mathematical models far removed from intuition.
This course aims to challenge the idea that an exact and rigorous description of reality is a prerogative of the natural sciences. We will focus on some of the problems that arise when questioning the nature of common-sense objects and events, and we will try to solve them by means of ideas and theories developed within analytic metaphysics. The resulting discussion will also act as a 'stress test' for classical logic, whose validity has been questioned when it comes to modeling reasoning involving objects and events of the manifest world.
Full programme
Theme I: ontological commitment.
Readings: Varzi 2001, ch. 1-2; Quine, 'On what there is,' in Varzi 2008, ch. 1.2.
Theme II: events.
Readings: Varzi 2001, ch. 3.
Theme III: criteria of identity.
Readings: Varzi 2001, ch. 4; Kripke, 'Identity, necessity, and rigid designation,' in Varzi 2008, ch. 4.2.
Theme IV: Persistence.
Readings: Varzi 2001, ch. 5; Sider, 'The world is a stage,' in Varzi 2008, ch. 3.5.
Theme V: vagueness.
Readings: Varzi 2001, ch. 6; Evans, 'Can there be vague objects?', in Varzi 2008, ch. 2.6.
Theme VI: ownership.
Readings: Varzi 2001, ch. 7; Russell, 'The World of Universals,' in Varzi 2008, ch. 5.1.
Bibliography
REQUIRED TEXTS
Varzi, A. (2001). Parole, oggetti, eventi e altri argomenti di metafisica. Carocci.
Varzi, A. (2008). Metafisica. Classici contemporanei. Laterza.
SUPPLEMENTARY TEXTS
De Angelis, M., Carrara, M., De Florio, C., Lando, G., Morato, V. (2021). Introduzione alla metafisica contemporanea. Il Mulino.
Esfeld, M. (2018). Filosofia della natura: fisica e ontologia. Rosenberg & Sellier.
Varzi, A. (2019). Ontologia. Laterza.
Teaching methods
The teaching method will abide by the standards of logically informed analytic philosophy, which involves the presentation of theories and models by means of clear and rigorous definitions, which are then discussed, challenged, and put to test against a range of data, as well as formal results.
Assessment methods and criteria
Oral examination.
Other information
Students who do not attend are strongly encouraged to complement the required readings with the supplementary texts.
