Against Facts (The MIT Press)

Synopsis

In This Book Arianna Betti Argues That We Have No Good Reason To Accept Facts In Our Catalog Of The World, At Least As They Are Described By The Two Major Metaphysical Theories Of Facts. She Claims That Neither Of These Theories Is Tenable - Neither The Theory According To Which Facts Are Special Structured Building Blocks Of Reality Nor The Theory According To Which Facts Are Whatever Is Named By Certain Expressions Of The Form The Fact That Such And Such. There Is Reality, And There Are Entities In Reality That We Are Able To Name, But, Betti Contends, Among These Entities There Are No Facts. Drawing On Metaphysics, The Philosophy Of Language, And Linguistics, Betti Examines The Main Arguments In Favor Of And Against Facts Of The Two Major Sorts, Which She Distinguishes As Compositional And Propositional, Giving Special Attention To Methodological Presuppositions. She Criticizes Compositional Facts (facts As Special Structured Building Blocks Of Reality) And The Central Argument For Them, Armstrong's Truthmaker Argument. She Then Criticizes Propositional Facts (facts As Whatever Is Named In The Fact That Statements) And What She Calls The Argument From Nominal Reference, Which Draws On Quine's Criterion Of Ontological Commitment. Betti Argues That Metaphysicians Should Stop Worrying About Facts, And Philosophers In General Should Stop Arguing For Or Against Entities On The Basis Of How We Use Language. -- From Dust Jacket. I: Compositional Facts -- 1. Compositional Facts -- Compositional Facts: What -- Compositional Facts: Why -- The Nature Of Compositional Facts -- Facts Versus Propositions, Facts Versus States Of Affairs -- Conclusion -- 2. The Unity Problem -- Compositional Facts And The Unity Problem -- Step 1: Facts Are Ad Hoc Entities -- The Unity Problem In An Ontology Of States Of Affairs -- Conclusion -- 3. Solving The Unity Problem -- Step 2: A Fact-free Dissolution Of The Unity Problem -- What Problem? Relational Unity, The Unity Problem, And Truthmaking -- Conclusion -- Ii: Propositional Facts -- 4. Reductio -- Against Suffsufffirstconjunct 1: That-clauses Are Not Singular Terms -- Against Suffsufffirstconjunct 2: 'the Fact That P' Is Not A Singular Term, In Particular Neither A Definite Nor An Appositive Description -- Against Necfirstconjunct: 'is A Fact' Is Not A Predicate -- Conclusion -- 5. A Fallback Position (1) -- Fact Reference Refined And Strengthened: Fact Reference [power!] -- Propositional Facts -- Fact Reference [power!] Commits Us To Propositional Facts -- The Collapse Of Propositional Facts Into True Propositions -- 6. A Fallback Position (2) -- Sixth And Final Attempt: Linguistic Evidence Cannot Motivate The Acceptance Of Propositional Facts Alongside True Propositions -- No Reference To Propositional Facts As Distinct From True Propositions -- Exit Fact Reference [power!] Together With Singular Terms -- Conclusion -- Conclusion: Farewell To Facts. Arianna Betti. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.