Quine: Underdetermination and naturalistic metaphysics

Kemp, G. (2015) Quine: Underdetermination and naturalistic metaphysics. Philosophical Topics, 43(1/2), pp. 179-188.

Abstract

Quine’s naturalism has no room for a point of view outside science from which one might criticize science, or a transcendental point of view from which one could ask questions about the adequacy of science with respect to reality (‘as it is in itself’). Adrian Moore sniffs out some genuine tensions in this, arguing in effect that Quine is forced by his own views to admit those sorts of questions as legitimate. I venture that Quine, even if he would grant that the posing of such questions is an inevitable feature of reason in some sense, would take such curiosity to be strictly speaking a mistake, something like that of thinking there must be a single truth-predicate for all levels of Tarski’s hierarchy.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Kemp, Dr Gary
• Authors: Kemp, G.
• College/School: College of Arts > School of Humanities > Philosophy
• Journal Name: Philosophical Topics
• Publisher: Philosophy Documentation Centre
• ISSN: 0276-2080
• ISSN (Online): 2154-154X
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2017 American Catholic Philosophical Assoc.
• First Published: First published in Philosophical Topics 43(1/2):179-188
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher