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International Phenomenological Society

On What There is NotAuthor(s): Richard RoutleySource: Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 43, No. 2 (Dec., 1982), pp. 151-177Published by: International Phenomenological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2107527Accessed: 25/11/2010 03:52

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Philosophy and Phenomenological ResearchVol. XLIII, No. z, December i982

O n W h a t T h e r e Is N o t

RICHARD ROUTLEY

Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University

Quine's ultimate ontologicalreduction is radical. What exists?Simply the empty set, and setsconstructed by taking it as anelement. One thus enters a trulydesert landscape, and the reductionthus assumes the proportions of an

'ontological debacle' . . . 'Alesson to be drawn from thisdebacle is that ontology is not whatmainly matters' [i], p. i89; thequotations are from Quine).

Most things do not exist. For every thing that exists, for instance ThreeMile Island nuclear reactor (an odd product of the null set), there areseveral things that do not exist, abstractions beginning with the null setand the property of being that reactor. And there are a great manyabstractions other than those directly generated by the null set andthings that exist. These truths we hold to be elementary, and where notself-evident they can be argued for.' Quine, however, in a very boldstroke, has stolen much of the terminology we ordinarily use to state,

and argue, these elementary facts - and as far as most philosophers areconcerned, he has got away with it.

The theft is evident from the first lines of Quine's 'On What There Is',an influential period piece' from times when ontology did matter more,

I Many such arguments are assembled in [z], where a full account of the underlyingtheory, noneism, is given. Noneism is an elaboration of the theory of objects, perhapsbest known from Meinong's presentation. The present paper expands chapter 3 of [z].

' Especially as reprinted in [i], to which '[i]' will mostly refer. All page citations with-

ON WHAT THERE IS NOT I 5 I



with the discussion of which this paper is primarily concerned. Theontological problem is there said to be formulable as 'What is there?',and answered 'Everything'; an answer 'everyone will accept as true' (p.i). The ontological problem in question is, however, the problem as to

what exists or (perhaps differently) of what has being, which is not justa very different problem from the more easily answered question as towhat things there are, what count as things, but also a problem which isnot truly answered 'Everything', since many things do not exist. Thetheft is of the English expressions 'what', 'there is', 'is', 'thing', and'everything', which are commonly enough used without existentialimport to consider and talk about items that do not exist and have nobeing. Just consider 'What is . . . ?' questions concerning fictionalobjects or the objects of false theories, e.g. 'What is a hobbit?' 'What isa phlogiston?', or such questions as 'What is an impossible thing?','What is a merely possible thing as distinct from one that exists?' It isnot merely ironical then that Quine should subsequently (p. 3) magnan-

imously give away the word 'exist', claiming that he still has 'is'.'Once the stolen goods are restored it is no great feat to resolve many

long-standing, but gratuitous, philosophical puzzles, beginning with the

platonic riddle of non-being, that 'non-being must in some sense be,otherwise what is it that there is not?' (pp. i-z). Consider some thing, dsay, that does not exist, for example d is Meinong's round square. Thenwhat does not exist is in this case d; but it in no way follows from "d isnon-existent" that "d exists". Such nonentities as d need have no beingin any sense. It is basically because whatness and thinghood have beenillicitly restricted to what exists or has being, that a puzzle seems tohave arisen: for certainly we contradict ourselves if we say that whathas being does not have being. There is no contradiction however insaying that what is a thing or object, e.g. d, may have no being in anysense; and this dissolves what Quine nicknames Plato's beard, withoutusing or blunting, Occam's razor. For Occam's razor to remain sharprequires only that entities not be multiplied beyond necessity; but nomultiplication of entities has been made, no bloating of the universe (ofwhat exists) has occurred. Indeed the theory of objects enables a very

substantial reduction in what is said to exist, so that what is said to existcan coincide with what really does exist, namely only certain individualobjects now located in space. But, more to the point, Occam's razor

out further detail are to [I].

3 Nor is ontology exactly independent of lexicography, in the way Quine here suggests- a suggestion his own subsequent discourse-relativization of "ontology" undercuts.

4 It was Meinong's thesis that any existing object has a more or less definite location inspace and time. It is a corollary that abstract objects do not exist (see further [z], chap-

I52 RICHARD ROUTLEY



embodies various muddles of the very sort that it is important toremove. In particular, Occam's dictum that entities [or differently,objects] should not be multiplied beyond necessity supposes that it is inour power to increase or decrease the number of entities [or objects]:

but of course in that sense - as opposed to the destruction or creationof objects by one's activity - it is not. What we can increase or decreaseis not what exists but what we say exists, what we (choose to) talkabout, and what our theories commit us to in one way or another. Sothe dictum, and a use like Quine's of it, confuses what exists with whatwe (choose to) talk about or what we, or our theories, say exists - aconfusion that runs through into recent criteria for ontological com-mitment, themes of ontological relativity, and programs for ontologicalreduction.

Because d has no being there is no cause to try, like Quine's philoso-pher MCX, o assign some kind of being to d, e.g. ideational existence asan idea in men's minds. Pegasus and the Pegasus-idea remain, as theyare, distinct items: Pegasus is a horse, the Pegasus-idea is not, sinceideas are not (significantly) horses; Pegasus does not exist, but the Pega-sus-idea presumably does; and so on. In fact, detailed arguments that

ideas are different from the objects they present were given by Meinong.One of these, set out more formally (as in [v], p. xxv), runs as follows:

I. Ideas are, by their very nature, of something (some object).

z. Ideas, when they occur, exist. (This premise, which is rejectedin [z], is dispensable.)

3. If ideas were identical with their objects, all their objects

would exist whenever someone was having an idea of them.4. But there are objects which never exist (e.g. the perpetuum

mobile and Pegasus).

5. Therefore, ideas are not identical with their objects.

Elsewhere, ([zz], p. i99) Quine himself makes a similar distinction:

. . .to identify he Parthenon with the Parthenon-idea s simply o confuse one thing

with another; and to try to assure here being such a thing as Cerberus y identifying twith the Cerberus-idea s to make a similar confusion.

Yes, to confuse one thing with another. Quine's 'essential message' in[zz], h33 repeated over and over, is however that

ter 9).

ON WHAT THERE IS NOT I53



Some meaningful words which are proper names from a grammatical point of view, nota-bly 'Cerberus', do not name anything (p. zoz),

otherwise briefly referred to as 'the mistaken view that "Cerberus"must name something'. In fact, but not of necessity, 'Cerberus' does

name something, not the Cerberus-idea, but Cerberus. There is no mis-take: 'Cerberus' names Cerberus, whence, particularizing, 'Cerberus'names something. Quine's message is a plea to have us restrictquantifiers to existentially-loaded ones; for it is true that 'Cerberus'does not name anything existent. There are excellent reasons, however,for ignoring such pleas, for not so limiting quantificational apparatus.Nor does the removal of existential restrictions involve any of the mis-

takes Quine imagines he finds in taking nonentities in the domain ofquantifiers or as named: there need be no confusion of meaning withnaming (though meaning can be explicated through interpretationwhich is wider than naming - in worlds); there need be no confusionof meaning with things talked about (but naming is a sub-species ofbeing about); there need be no appeal to attempts (inspired by theOntological Assumption)5 to make nonentities exist somehow, forexample, as shadows of entities, or as names, or somewhere, for exam-

ple, in the mind, or in myth or in fiction and so on.Similarly, because there is no need to assign some kind of being to d,

the false dichotomies spawned by referential positions like empiricism,that Quine relies upon in putting the mythical MCX on the spot canequally be dispensed with, e.g. that whatever has being either exists spa-tio-temporally, or else exists as an idea in men's minds. Since d does notexist, it does not exist in this or that way. Like other alleged problems

about d the problem about how or in what way d exists vanishes giventhat d does not exist.The commonsense (noneist) position being advanced should not be

confused with that of Quine's other non-existent philosopher,Wyman.6 For it is not maintained that Pegasus, for instance, 'has hisbeing as an unactualized possible' (p. 3), or as anything else, since hesimply has no being. More generally, the transformation of 'c is d' (e.g.'what I am thinking of is Pegasus' or 'Pegasus is an unactualized possi-ble') to 'c has its being as d' (e.g. to 'what I am thinking of has its beingas Pegasus' or 'Pegasus has his being as an unactualized possible')

I This assumption, which is explained below, is criticized in detail in [z], I.3.

6 Philosophical legend has it that Wyman is modelled on Meinong, but the serious dis-crepancies between Wyman's position and any but a hearsay Meinong position castsome doubt on the legend. Wyman is somewhat more like the Russell of The Principles

of Mathematics.

I54 RICHARD ROUTLEY



should be rejected; for it depends on the erroneous assumption that allobjects have being. Nor, for similar reasons, is it maintained, withWyman, that Pegasus is (p. 3). The expression 'Pegasus is' is, like'Pegasus likes', deviant in many English idiolects (including mine): its

incompleteness is suggested by questions like 'is what?' Insofar as 'is'functions intransitively, 'x is' means, as the OED (i.e. [6]) indicates, 'xexists'. In short, we can give Quine the intransitive use of 'is', and so (asin the title of this paper) of 'is not'. Since the noneist position certainlydoes not claim that Pegasus exists, or, as Wyman puts it, subsists (i.e.exists, though perhaps in a very low-level way), it does not claim, inWyman's way, that Pegasus iS.7 It follows, using the first account Quinegives of commitment to an ontology, according to which we commitourselves to an ontology containing d when we say d, that noneism isnot committed to an ontology containing items that do not exist, suchas possibilia and abstractions, since, for each such x, it is true that x isnot.8

As regards such impossible items as the round square cupola onBerkeley College, Wyman's position differs in kind from the theory ofobjects and Meinong's position (for which see e.g. [v], chapter iz). In

contrast with 'purple happy number', there is nothing meaninglessabout 'round square cupola', which is what Quine has Wyman say (p.5).9 Wyman, like traditional rationalists, unjustly restricts objects

Meinong's position diverges from the stream of noneism here followed: for accordingto Meinong possibilia such as Pegasus subsist. Insofar as this implies more than thatpossibilia are possible - in some or other of the commonly confused senses, e.g. thatthey could exist or that the supposition of their existence leads to no contradiction or

that their characterisation leads to no contradiction - it should be rejected as mislead-ing.

8 Observe that the results so obtained from the first criterion diverge from thoseobtained by applying Quine's other and better known criterion for ontological com-mitment, according to which ontological commitment is determined through prepar-edness to quantify (p. iz). In these terms noneism is ontologically committed to what itmaintains does not exist, e.g. possibilia, abstractions, and so on. A corollary is theinadequacy of the quantificational criterion that 'to be is to be the value of a boundvariable' (p. 15). The inadequacy of Quine's case for the criterion is discussed below.

The dilemma that Wyman is supposed to encounter is colourfully represented in [zz]p. zoz: "Having already cluttered the universe with an implausible lot of unactualisedpossibles, are we to go on and add a realm of unactualised impossibles? The tendencyat this point is to choose the other horn of the supposed dilemma, and rule that expres-sions involving impossibility are meaningless." That is almost certainly not the mainhistorical tendency; and it is a tendency to which there are serious objections (see [14).The supposed dilemma is no dilemma, not for the reasons Quine offers, that 'thereneed be no mystery about attributing non-existence where there is nothing [existent] toattribute it to' (and we have observed the inadequacies in reductions of talk about




which do not exist to the possible. The theory of objects in removingthis restriction does not thereby admit 'a realm of unactualized possi-bles': 'realm', like 'universe' and '(the) real', carries ontological over-tones. Although some items such as round squares are impossible, they

nonetheless have (distinctive) properties. Accordingly, various differentnon-null sets of impossibilia can be formed; but these sets do not exist,any more than their elements or other abstract sets.

Despite the differences between Wyman's position and those of agenuinely Meinongian turn, it is widely supposed that Quine's scholas-tic objections to Wyman's unactualized possibles do serious, perhapsirreparable, damage to all these positions. Thus, for example, Kenny([8], p. i69): 'these objections, I think, make untenable the notion ofMeinongian pure objects'. This is far from so, as we now try to explain.Quine's main charge (p. 4) is that possible objects are 'disorderly' and'well-nigh incorrigible'; and the basis of the charge is to be found in theassumption that 'the concept of identity is simply inapplicable to unac-tualized possibles'. The assumption is unwarranted, since identity anddifference judgements concerning such objects are commonly made,both ordinarily and in more technical discourse. Nor are such judge-

ments lacking in criterial underwriting. For the very same notions ofidentity - most importantly, extensional identity - and distinctnessthat apply to entities apply likewise to nonentities, objects that do notexist. The criterion for identity for nonentities is, as for entities, coinci-dence in extensional properties. Thus, for instance, Hercules and Hera-cles are identical, though some people did not and do not know this.The criterion for distinctness is that of positively differing on exten-sional properties. Thus, for example, Pegasus is distinct from Thunder-head because Pegasus has the (extensional) property of being wingedand Thunderhead does not. Hence, nonentities can 'meaningfully besaid to be identical with themselves and distinct from one another'(pace p. 4). Moreover, far from 'the concept of identity being simplyinapplicable to unactualized possibles', precisely the same criterion asthat given, and ordinarily used, is presupposed classically - on onecommon theory - in such misleading results as, for example, that

Pegasus and Chiron are one and the same because they have the sametraits (namely none). But, strictly, what is true of nonentities classicallydepends on the theory of names and descriptions adopted.'" On Rus-

nonentities to talk of entities), but because the first option can be restated neutrally.There are, and need be, no additions to the universe (of entities) of new realms: thepopulation, or number of elements, of the entity-universe is unchanged. Talk of'cluttering', 'implausible lot', etc., reflects inappropriate referential thinking.

I For instance, in Quine's Mathematical Logic, which includes a Fregean style theory of

descriptions much inferior (in all but technical ease) to Russell's theory, nonentities

I 56 RICHARD ROUTLEY



sell's theory of descriptions all nonentities are identical, indeed allstatements concerning unactualized possibilia b and c are indeterminatebecause it is false that b = c and false that b = c. At this point one latentinconsistency in Quine's stance becomes apparent. For it cannot both

be false - as it is on Russell's theory, which Quine endorses (pp. 5-6)- and meaningless, in the sense of concept inapplicability - as Quinesuggests it is - that nonentities are identical and not distinct.

The criteria for identity given, both nonclassical and classical, alsoserve to meet familiar overstatements like that of Kenny ( [8], p. i68):

The most serious - indeed the insurmountable - objection to Meinongian pure objectsis that it is impossible to provide any criterion of identity for them.

Since criteria compete, it is perfectly possible to provide them, and rivalcriteria can be critically assessed, for instance, in terms of their conse-quences. But, despite the ready availability of criteria, the objection,that nonentities have no (clear) identity conditions, is repeated over andover in the literature. Another recent example, where the objection isalso used as ground for setting aside Meinong's theory," may be foundin Linsky ([23], pp. 35-36, transposed):

Meinong comes nearest to capturing . . . our intuitions about reference in natural lan-guage and his theory does not seem to lead to contradiction as it is widely supposed to do.What disturbs us about his ontological population explosion, I believe, is that theseobjects have no clear identity conditions.

Is the present king of France identical with the present king of China? There seem to be noprinciples which can be used to provide an answer to such questions. One answer is asreasonable as the other and this makes the very notion of an object seem misapplied here.

Apart from the very first claim, this requires correcting claim by claim.Although Meinong's theory, if carefully (re-)formulated, does not leadto contradiction, the account Linsky gives ([23], p. 34) does lead to con-tradiction (given only a very minimal logic):

But Meinong insists, against Frege that what phrases of this form [r(Lx) (+x)7] denoteis always (lx) (+x). . . . The insistence that r(L) (+x)1 denote the right thing leadsimmediately to a special case of the independence of Sosein from Sein, for it entails that+(ix)(+x) is always true for any choice of +.

have the most amazing properties. For example, Pegasus is identical with the null set- so the concept of identity is certainly applicable - and has all the same properties,e.g. Pegasus exists, but has no members, Pegasus is a subset of every set whatsoever,and all the natural numbers are simple logical constructions of Pegasus. The data con-cerning nonentities may be a little soft - but it is not that soft.

I In general, acclaimed refutations of theories of objects and Meinong's theory are no

refutations at all: see [z], chapter 4, and the Appendix.




That for every X), r(Lx)(4)x)l denotes (Lx)(+)x) is distinct from the Inde-pendence Principle (as varieties of free logic will show) and does notentail +(Lx)(+)x) (as neutral logic countermodels will show). Theunqualified Characterisation Principle, +(Lx)(+)x), which Linsky (mis-

takenly) attributes to Meinong (p. 33, as well as p. 34), is an exceed-ingly damaging principle, and contrary to Linsky (p. 35) does lead topropositions of the form p & -p. For consider the object (Lx)(Rx &-Rx), a for short. Then, by the above principle, Ra & -Ra.

There is no "ontological population explosion" under Meinong'stheory: to suggest so is to misrepresent the theory. The identity condi-tions for objects are clear, even if, as in the case of existing objects, it isnot always clear, or determinate, whether certain objects are the sameor not. Since these ordinary identity principles provide an answer toquestions such as Linsky's about the kings, there certainly are principleswhich supply answers to such questions - and similarly theories ofdescriptions such as Russell's provide answers, even if wrong ones, e.g.the king of France = the king of China. In fact the king of France isLeibnitz-distinct from the king of China, since someone can think ofone but not the other; and a theory which gave a different result would

hardly be reasonable. And on Linsky's assumptions about Meinong'stheory, the two kings are presumably extensionally distinct since one isking of France and the other not (but of China): thus as they differ inextensional respects they are in fact distinct. Accordingly, there is nosolid evidence adduced, on the basis of identity-conditions, that thenotion of object is misapplied in Meinong's theory.

As with identity, so for likeness and similarity, essentially the sameaccounts that apply to entities apply to nonentities, two items beingalike if they have sufficiently many extensional properties in common. Itis on this basis that we say that a dryad and a naiad are alike, and muchmore alike than a unicorn and a centaur. Thus some possible things arealike, but as in the case of entities, alikeness is in general not sufficientfor identity. These simple points answer all Quine's alleged difficultiesfor objects that do not exist except those concerning the number of menin the doorway. Briefly, the concepts of identity and distinctness, like-

ness and difference, are applicable to nonentities, and the criteria fortheir application are the same as in the case of entities. Hence too set-theoretical notions are applicable to nonentities as well as entities, andnumerical concepts apply. As Locke and Leibnitz argued against thescholastics and Frege reiterated ([z6], p. 3 I), various classes of possibi-lia can be counted and numbered. A nonactual man in the doorwaybelongs to the three element class consisting of Pegasus, Heracles and a

I 5 8 RICHARD ROUTLEY



nonactual man in the doorway (not, as Frege's own theory, adopted inQuine's ML, would have it, to a one element class comprising the nullset). Similarly, it may make good sense to ask 'How many objects of agiven type have a given property?' even where some or none of the

objects exist. The main problem, not special to nonentities, lies indetermining which properties the objects in question have, not withmatters of sense.

Quine, however, is suggesting (e.g. p. 4, 'What sense can be madeof . . .') that such questions as 'How many possible fat men are therein that doorway?' make no sense, and accordingly, that correspondingassertions of the form 'There are n possible fat men in that doorway' aremeaningless. For the question is significant if the corresponding indica-tives are. But prima facie the indicatives are significant (and transforma-tions can be used and arguments constructed which reveal that the sen-tences are significant): they contain no category or type mistakes. Sothey cannot be convincingly written off as not well-formed: even if theyshould strike the uninitiated as odd they require logical accommoda-tion. Accordingly such questions, and indicatives, are just as much aproblem for classical logical positions as for the nonclassical position

they are directed against.Consider now a nearest open doorway and an arbitrary fat man who

never has existed, e.g. Mr. Pickwick. Ask whether Mr. Pickwick is inthat doorway. The answer is, as a matter of observation, No. In literalcontexts the answer is the same in the case of every other merely possi-ble fat man. Hence, the answer to the question 'How many (merely)possible fat men are in that doorway?' is: Zero. The same answer maybe expected on more theoretical grounds. By a familiar, and classicallyaccepted, thesis attributed to Brentano, a merely possible item cannotstand in entire physical relations, such as being in or standing in, toactual items. Hence, merely possible men of any variety, fat or thin,bald or not, cannot stand in actual doorways. Thus the answer toQuine's numerical (how many?) questions is: Zero. There are zero pos-sible men in that doorway, zero possible fat ones, and exactly the samenumber of merely possible thin ones.

The answers given to these last questions are, again, exactly those ofclassical orthodoxy, even if the reasons for the answers are of a some-what different cast. Since classical orthodoxy has, with its very limitedquantificational apparatus, serious difficulties in expressing its answers,let us articulate them for it. Since no nonentities exist, of whatever kind,there are exactly as many nonexistent fat men as thin men, namely,none, so none can be standing in any actual doorways.'" In short, clas-

On a favoured lternative ccount, hey are all identical ith he null set (or entity),

ON WHAT THERE S NOT I59



sical orthodoxy can already supply answers to what are reckoned thehardest of Quine's questions - giving the lie to such charges as thatidentity, difference and numerical properties cannot be meaningfullyattributed to nonentities, and so removing the ground for the further

charges of disorderliness and incorrigibility.It is not easy to avoid the impression that one of the many reasons

why Quine's questions have been thought to cause especially severedifficulties for theories of nonexistent objects is because 'A possible manis in that doorway' has been confused with 'A man is possibly in thatdoorway', because de re modalities have been confused with de dictomodalities (in one sense of that vexed distinction). As the latter claim,like the pure de dicto claim 'It is logically possible that a man should bein that doorway', is usually true for open unoccupied doorways (and letus suppose for the selected one such), if the conflation were correct theanswer to the question 'How many possible men are in that doorway?'- now the question 'How many men are possibly in that doorway?' -

would seem to be 'At least some' since Quine is possibly in that door-way, and the determination of the exact number would - on thedoubtful assumption that it is determinate at all - become a knotty,

though hardly "insoluble," problem. But the conflation is not correct:the sentences have different semantical analyses, the first stating a rela-tion of being in in the factual situation, whereas the second states such arelation in some possible world.

Part of the interest of Quine's question comes from the number ofdifferent answers it has been given by different philosophers, differentanswers induced partly by different questions, not only the de re ques-tion we have so far been concerned with, namely(i) How many merely possible (nonactual) men are in that actualdoorway?but also the questions:(z) How many men are possibly in that doorway?(3) How many men can possibly be in (be crowded into) that door-way?, or, more precisely, what is the largest number of men that canpossibly be in that doorway?

Question (z) splits into different questions according as the collectivequantifier precedes or follows the modal operator, namely

which does not stand n any actual doorways. he result s as before. But otheraccounts rom out of the classical tables differ, e.g. Hilbert's heory upplies oanswer, nd even Russell's heory trictly pplied ivesno answer o those questionswhich nclude he adjective possible'. et t not be taken s an objection o nonclassi-cal approaches, hen, hat different heories rovide ifferent nswers o the questions.

i6o RICHARD ROUTLEY



(za) Of what numbers n of men is it true that for those n men it is pos-sible that they are in that doorway (together)?(zb) Of what number of men is it true that it is possible that those menare in that doorway?

The answer to question (3) sets a bound on the answer to question (z).No doubt the answer to (3) is at least, Many, but a more exact answerdepends on how small humans can be and on what shape and how largethe doorway is (and also on the type of modality). The answer to (zb) isthen: any number between zero and the bound. For let k be any suchnumber: then the statement "it is possible that k men are in the door-way" is true. Accordingly, the best answer to (z) is: it is indetermi-nateI3 though the indeterminacy is bounded.

No doubt some conflation of modalities is encouraged by ordinarydiscourse. Consider, for example, 'Some clouds and a possible thunder-storm are forecast for Victoria this afternoon', where the apparent de remodality has an intended de dicto expansion. A confusion of modalitiesmay seem to damage Parsons' answer to Quine ([IO], p. 57z):

. . .when Quine sksabout "the merely] ossible at man n the doorway", e uses adefinite escription hich, n this account because heuniqueness lause s not satisfied],fails o refer for there are many possible at men n the doorway.

It is logically possible that many fat men are in the doorway, but itwould be quite invalid to infer that many possible fat men are in thedoorway - nor does Parsons' analysis support such a move. For prop-erties such as those of possibility and actuality figuring in the interpreta-tion of 'possible fat men' and 'actual doorway' are (in the intendedsense) extra-nuclear and so are not characterizing. But what has been

said is not what Parsons means. There is an ambiguity in 'possible fatman', depending upon whether 'possible' goes into the description, assupposed above, or not, i.e. is regarded as consequential. On the latterconstrual, there are on Parsons' theory infinitely many possible fat menin that doorway (indeed the cardinality is presumably nondenumera-ble), one for each consistent set of nuclear (i.e. roughly, characterizing)properties which includes at least the properties of being a man, beingfat, and being in the doorway.I4 Infinitely many, irrespective of the size

'3 This is the answer to Quine's question arrived at in the original version of [z]. It nowappears to be an answer to a different, if easily confused, question, namely (ib).

I4 This may be freely admitted for Parsons doorways, Parsons doorways being the door-ways of Parsons' theory and having properties supplied by that theory. That is, a Par-sons doorway is like Holmes' London - only the source book for such an object isParsons' theory, not the requisite group of Sherlock Holmes stories. There are manyinteresting questions one can ask, and answer, about Parsons doorways, e.g. Do any

ON WHAT THERE IS NOT i6i



of the fat men and perhaps that some of them will be giants who fill thedoorway or more. Such results are implausible but can easily beavoided, by requiring joint possibility (in the consequential sense) ofoccupation of the doorway.

It is bound to be objected that any theory of (nonexistent) objects willgenerate many, very many, possibilia standing in that doorway. Con-sider the n possible fat men standing in that doorway, for an arbitrarilyselected number n. Then surely, by assumptions of such theories (e.g.object characterisation postulates), some n possible fat men are stand-ing in that doorway? Emphatically, No. Such postulates have only care-fully restrained roles on any theory that can claim coherence: they donot warrant ontological arguments or the establishing of new exten-sional relations between what exists and what is merely possible (as [z]explains in detail). Nothing, of course, stops the design of (generally,less acceptable) theories with more sweeping characterization postu-lates. Some of these theories would, like Parsons' ingenious theory, givedifferent answers to some of Quine's questions. This is unsurprising,rather as it is unsurprising that different classical-style theories identifyPegasus with different objects, or admit different universes of sets.

A similar reply can be made to the related objection that we can tell avariety of conflicting stories which describe fat men in the doorway. Atells one story with 3 fictional fat men fitted into the doorway. B out-does A and tells a tale in which io fat men are squeezed into the door-way. C tells an even taller tale. . . . How many fat men are n thedoorway? On A's story 3, B's io, and on C's tale 98 say. But in reality,as before, o. For the world of A's story is not the real world. No charac-terisation postulate applies: we cannot directly determine such charac-teristics of the real world as what stands in actual places by story tell-ing.'5 For these reasons too Rescher's answer (in [I4]) to Quine's how

exist? The answer is No; for if one did a merely possible object could stand in entirephysical relations to an entity, contravening the Brentano thesis. Could an existingobject, e.g. Parsons, stand in a Parsons doorway? On Parsons' theory the answer isYes, given that Parsons is fat enough (in fact a Parsons doorway will, on the theory,contain as many existing fat men as are standing in the given doorway). But, in fact(i.e. on the theory here elaborated), the answer is, again, No; for Parsons would standin the doorway along with, and next to, various merely possible objects, again contra-vening Brentano. However, Parsons' Parsons, i.e. the set with exactly Parsons' nuclearproperties, could be in a Parsons doorway (e.g. in the world of Parsons' theory); butnow the Brentano thesis is not violated, for, in particular, the set correlated with Par-sons does not exist.

's This is part only of a larger story concerning the truth of fiction and storytelling. Ofcourse it is true that Mr. Pickwick wore gaiters, that Sherlock Holmes lived in London,and that phlogiston is the heat substance; and it is true that James Bond stood in, or at

least passed through, various doorways; and this need not conflict with the fact that no

i6Z RICHARD ROUTLEY



many questions, namely, 'As many as are described', is inadequate(Rescher's answer is a much better answer to question (z) above, whichmay be the question Rescher intended to answer). Each of A, B and Cdescribe different numbers and not all can be right, since 3 men differ

from 98. That is, different, and inconsistent, descriptions may be given,and different, and inconsistent, riders may be added at a later time.Moreover, descriptions are not the only way of specifying possibilia;they may, for instance, be inferred from a theory. That the story-tellerline cannot be right perhaps emerges more clearly if the story tellers useactual fat men in their accounts, e.g. A's story is about Herman Kahnand two other modern Falstaffs. A story about actual figures does notmake that story true, except in appropriately indicated fictional con-texts. As it is with entities, so also is it with nonentities.

The fact is that differences between entities and nonentities have beenmuch exaggerated, especially by the enemies of the nonexistent, empiri-cists and idealists alike.'6 For nonentities are not as chaotic, as inde-terminate, or as lacking in independence as they have been representedas being; while at the same time entities are not as totally independent,as free of indeterminacy and vagueness as has been made out. The fol-

lowing cloud parody, which can be reworked for a great many othernatural entities, should help to bring out these points:

. . . The slum of entities s a breeding round or disorderly lements. Take, forinstance, hecloud n the skyabove; nd, again, headjacent loud n the sky. Are hey hesame loud r two clouds? How are we to decide? ow many louds re here n the sky?Are heremore umulus han nimbus? ow many f them realike?Or would heir beingalike make hem one? . . . is the concept f identity imply napplicable o clouds? utwhat sense can be found n talking f entities which cannot meaningfully e said o be

identical with themselves nd distinct rom one another? hese elements re well-nighincorrigible . . I feelwe'd do better o clear he slum of entities nd be done with t.

And so to parody Kenny also: these objections make untenable thenotion of an entity. What should be removed, however, is not the slumof entities and nonentities, but the classical logical economy which hasreduced these solid dwellings to slums.

such objects exist or ever existed. The reconciliation is (as [z], chapter 7 tries toexplain) in the first place, by way of contextual differences - fictional statements arecontextually intensional - in the second and associated place, by way of duplicatesubjects, e.g. Bond stood in the doorway depicted in the film (which is true iff, in theworld of the film, he stood in the given doorway) and, in the third and most importantplace, through what are called reduced relations.

i6 Of course, when it comes to attempts to discredit nonentities, the reverse also happens:features of entities, such as reliability of characterization, are inappropriately trans-

ferred intact to nonentities.

ON WHAT THERE IS NOT i63



The parody leads to certain further points. To begin with, many ofthe problems which are taken to be insuperable in the case of nonenti-ties arise equally in the case of entities, especially natural objects such asclouds and storms and waves, mountains and waterfalls and forests.

But the problems are not usually seen as - and should not be seen as -discrediting entities. Thus a double standard is being applied. Questionswhich it is realized do not present insuperable problems for entities, aretaken to do so in the case of nonentities, which are required to bedeterminate, distinct, and so on in a way that entities are frequently not(see further [z], chapter 9). For recall the decision questions for entitiesthat Wittgenstein and Wisdom introduced us to, and add some more,e.g. How wide is Mt. Egmont? Where do its slopes end? How long is aleech? How long is Plato's beard? Is this a new wave? How manymountain peaks are in a range? Questions as to precise boundaries, inparticular, are very common with natural entities: these are sometimessettled by decision or convention, and sometimes not. Sometimes theyare said to call only for cheerful indecision.

An upshot is that common philosophical paradigms of entities andthe resulting pictures of the universe (of entities) need considerable

adjustment, or better, replacement. The paradigms of entities have toooften been artefacts such as furniture and office equipment which,because human artefacts, do have sharp boundaries and determinatenumerical properties, in contrast to natural objects, which frequently,in advance of specific decisions, do not. The paradigms have encour-aged dicta, such as Quine's 'No entities without identity', designed(unsuccessfully) to rule out such things as attributes, which, too seri-ously applied, exclude many natural objects as entities. It is then thedicta, not the entities, that have to go. Likewise to be rejected as mis-leading is the familiar philosophical picture of entities as the 'furnitureof the universe' (for a recent elaboration of this picture, see Findlay[I3], pp. 3z8-z9, on 'the universe's undeniable furniture', and Bunge[24] on 'the furniture of the world').

Why has the Identity Problem been thought to be so severe fornonentities, far more problematic than for entities? There are a number

of different sources of identity anxiety, and in order to see where thesources of anxiety lie and help to remove them, it is important to sepa-rate out these different sources for the alleged Problem. For differentaspects of the theory of objects are appropriately brought in to dealwith different sources. Thus some anxieties are mitigated by appeal toindeterminacy, some are resolved through the theory of extensionalityand of identity in intensional frames, and some by making use of fea-

I64 RICHARD ROUTLEY



tures which derive from (object) characterization postulates. There areat least these cases:i. Anxiety arises from indeterminacy of identity. Some identity claimsconcerning nonentities are indeterminate, e.g. (in advance of a theory

which decides the issue) which of the various Faustus's of the literatureare the same. From this point of view identity is simply on a par withother features of nonentities. It is felt, however, that this reveals an arbi-trariness and perhaps chaoticness about nonentities because the prop-erty in question, namely, identity, is a logical one. It is felt that the factthat some identities concerning nonentities are indeterminate makesnonentities unsuitable objects for logical treatment. This is not so, anymore than it is so in the case of entities. It is simply that a satisfactorylogical treatment will have to allow appropriately for indeterminacy.Further, this particular sort of worry should be resolved once indeter-minacy and the way it is treated are grasped; and in fact it should beseen as a superior feature of a theory that it can take up and explain thedata on which the anxiety is based, rather than simply using it as a rea-son for rejecting nonentities as outside the scope of a logical theory.z. Several worries derive from the issue of criteria of identity for

nonentities. The first worry arises because no distinction is madebetween contingent and necessary identity; it is assumed that identityrelations between nonentities must be necessary identities (e.g. identityof concepts), giving rise to the mistaken charge that nonentities arenothing but concepts, and thereby making them unsuitable for inten-sional analysis and sacrificing much of the very substantial point of hav-ing nonentities for intensional analysis (on this see [z], especially chap-ter 8). That the assumption is mistaken should be evident fromelementary contingent identities, such as 'Pegasus is what I am thinkingabout'. Necessary identity is rightly perceived as generating seriousproblems, but the options are not perceived. The difficulties areresolved by a theory of extensional identity (as in [i6]), which applies tononentities, just as to entities. Then, 'no therapy of concepts' is requiredfor the 'rehabilitation of objects which do not exist' (p. 4); nor is itdesirable.

A worry remains. It is thought that one cannot have contingent iden-tities between nonentities because this is identity of reference and in thecase of nonentities there is no reference to be identical. This problem isremoved (in the theory-of identity) by distinguishing identity of refer-ence and extensional identity, that is identity under extensional proper-ties. Referential identity, which can only apply truly to existing items, isdefined in terms of coincidence of entities in extensional respects: it is




extensional identity of entities. Thus if a and b are referentially identical'a' and 'b' have interchangeable referential occurrences.'7 Since expres-sions about nonentities have no referential occurrences in true state-ments, nonentities cannot have identity of reference. But they can still

be extensionally (or contingently) identical, since they have extensionalproperties, and extensional identity of nonentities is coincidence ofextensional properties.3. Perplexity derives from failure to see that nonentities can haveextensional properties, with the result that it is thought that any two ofthem must be the same. The worry is resolved in the theory of objectsthrough characterisation postulates which assign extensional featuresto nonentities on the basis of their characterizations.4. Anxiety arises from the failure of nonentities to have distinctiveidentity criteria, different from those for entities. For example, Lambert(in [9], p. 252) seems to think that each sort of item should have its owndistinctive identity criteria. This need not be so." Different sorts ofitems may have the same identity criteria, e.g. possibilia and impossibi-lia, or properties and intensional sets, and yet be distinguished by otherfeatures, e.g. the assumption of existence leads to inconsistency in the

case of impossibilia but not of possibilia, and sets differ categoriallyfrom properties in such matters as being able to have members.

Quine suspects 'that the main motive for' including nonentities in thedomain of discourse is to escape the 'riddle of non-being' (p. 4); butsince that riddle can be satisfactorily disposed of, so he thinks, by wayof Russell's theory of descriptions without appeal to nonentities (p. 8),there is no need or ground for such expansion of the discourse domain.According to noneism, he is wrong on both counts. Firstly, the noneistsolution to the riddle is, like Meinong's, an incidental, but pleasing,by-product of a theory designed primarily for, and from, the analysis ofintensional discourse about what does not exist (see [z], especiallychapter i). Secondly, Russell's theory of description is inadequate forsuch a task; for it sometimes delivers the intuitively wrong truth-valueassignments. For example, it is true that Meinong thought that theround square is square, but whatever scope it is given on Russell's

theory of description it nevertheless gets wrongly assigned value false.

'7 For a referential occurrence of a subject both existential commitment and referentialtransparency are required. And then truth can be assessed entirely in terms of the refer-ence. According to the Reference Theory, all genuine subjects occur referentially.Much of [z] is devoted to the refutation, dismantling, and replacement of the Refer-ence Theory.

I8 Of course, differences can be contrived, e.g. referential identity is (trivially) distinctive

of entities.

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Once one such counterexample has been glimpsed, others are easilydesigned. Somewhat different counterexamples are supplied by truthssuch as the following yields: If the winged horse Pegasus does not exist Ican nevertheless think of him and be aware that he is winged.

Noneists have no taste for grossly impoverished discourse - which iswhat Quine's taste for desert landscapes (p. 4) comes to and has led to

yet find no convincing case for populating the domain of reality witha profusion of abstractions such as sets in their transfinite multiplicity

after the fashion of Quine. (Indeed, one has the feeling from Quine'swork that in the beginning there is no case for admitting that suchobjects as sets exist, except that the immensely important enterprise ofscientifically essential mathematics could not get along without theirexistence. But, somewhat rewritten, it can: see [z], chapter ii. So theresidual case collapses.)

Quine's discussion of the ontological problem of universals in [i] ismuch less detailed in argument and less conclusive than his discussionof the problem for particulars. The noneist critique of Quine which fol-lows will correspondingly be more doctrinaire and less detailed inarguments for the claims advanced. The noneist thesis is, in direct con-

trast to MCX, that there are no such entities as attributes, relations,classes, numbers, functions, propositions, and the like: none of theseexist, in any sense. Even so, some items are attributes, others are num-bers, and so on; and these non-existent items play an important, andsometimes essential, role in discourse and can have a major explanatoryrole. Such a position, anathema to most empiricists, Quine tries, ineffect, to rule out as not even an option. In this he is less than successful,as is now argued.

Quine's main move is to try to foist upon us a criterion of ontologicalcommitment in terms of use of bound variables, namely, that 'to beassumed as an entity . . . is to be reckoned as the value of a variable'(p. I 3), and more explicitly,

. . . we are convicted of a particular ontological presupposition f, and only if, thealleged presupposition has to be reckoned among the entities over which our variablesrange n order to render one of our affirmations rue (p. 13, emphasis added).

'9 Note that the criterion is formulated in terms of ontological commitments or presup-positions of people (notably philosophers), not as in Quine's subsequent work, interms of theories or discourse. Even within a referential framework, which its use isheavily biased towards, (since intensional discourse ruins its operation), the criterionencounters serious difficulties. For example, the italicized modal clause cannot bedeleted without the criterion (and nontrivial extensional variants upon it) yielding




The argument offered for the criterion'9 is hardly compelling. While itis true that we can easily involve ourselves in ontological commitments,i.e. commitments to the existence of certain things, by maintaining (say-ing is not enough) that there exist such and such things, this is not the

only way in which ontological commitments can arise, nor need non-ex-istential quantification commit us ontologically. Quine contends, how-ever, in an inference which looks remarkably like an A-conversion, that'use of bound variables' . . . 'is, essentially, the only way we caninvolve ourselves in ontological commitments' (p. iz). On the face of itthis contention is just false: someone who maintains that such and suchthing exists commits himself just as much as someone who maintainsthat there exist such and such things. Quine's further argument (pp.Iz-I3) is that the eliminability of names and descriptions shows thatnames, and descriptions, are 'altogether immaterial to the ontologicalissue'." The argument is invalid: the support is irrelevant. For 'exists'is a referentially transparent predicate, and the paraphrasing of'Pegasus', for example, as 'the thing which pegasizes' does nothing toeliminate the commitment but simply rephrases it. That Pegasus exists(or does not) remains true because it is true that the x which pegasizes

exists (or not). In symbols, p = ixp(x) D. E(ixp(x) D E(p)). It is similarwith the elimination of descriptions. Because E(x) (3y) (x = y) andE!(x) (3 !y) (x = y) we can quite evidently involve ourselves in ontolog-ical commitments by way of names and descriptions if we can soinvolve ourselves through the use of bound existential variables. And allthe fact that languages shunning names can be designed shows is that insuch languages we should lack primitive expressive means of statingontological commitments through names. In itself this shows nothingabout the statements of such commitments in languages which are notso lacking in expressive power. The conclusion is accordingly thatQuine's claim as to bound variables being the only way we can involveourselves in ontological commitment is false.

Nor does the use of quantifiers and bound variables always involveus in ontological commitments: the use of intentionally coveredquantifiers may not, and the use of non-existential or existentially neu-

unintended and unsatisfactory results, yet the needed modal qualification - like theset of conditions upon translation of discourse into an approved canonical language totest for ontological commitment - exceeds acceptable referential resources (see [iz]

and [I5]).

A related argument for the commitment criterion is suggested in [I7], pp. I52-53. Butall the argument shows is that a test cannot be given simply in terms of singular terms,not that singular terms have no role or that with singular terms removed the questionof commitment contracts just to 'the ranges of values of variables of quantification', of

one sort or another. This is so only for a very limited segment of discourse.

i68 RICHARD ROUTLEY



tral quantifiers does not (as [3] and [4] explain). For example, use ofthe neutral quantifier 'something' (which expands symbolically to 'forsome object x, x . . .'), as in the claim 'something does not exist', in noway commits the claimant to the existence of anything ('anything' can

also be used neutrally here). The appealing equation 'to be assumed asan entity, purely and simply, is to be reckoned as the value of a variable'(p. I3) is as false as it is simple.

Quine now acknowledges the limitations of the criterion: 'admissionof additional linguistic elements can upset this ontological standard'([zi], p. i6i). What is true is that 'when language is thus [severely] reg-imented [to the framework of referentially restricted quantification andtruth functions], its ontology comprises just the objects that the vari-ables of quantification admit as values' (p. i6i). What is not true, how-ever, is that 'the basic structure of the language of science' is of thisseverely regimented form." And it is palpably false that 'It is only our[rather, this] somewhat regimented and sophisticated language of sci-ence [in contrast with the common man's idiom, for example] that hasevolved in such a way as really to raise ontological questions' (p. i6o).More than two millenia of nonregimented philosophical discussion of

ontological questions tell against this claim, and should force its refor-mulation. But what Quine adds only makes things worse. 'The ontolog-ical question . . . for ordinary language generally makes sense onlyrelative to agreed translations into ontologically regimented notation'(p. i6i, emphasis added; also p. i68), which there may well not be. Theonly argument Quine indicates for this astonishing proposition (p. i6z)is based on adopting his already-flawed criterion of ontological com-mitment: the argument, along with surrounding considerations, is per-haps better construed as a reductio ad absurdum of the adoption of thetranslation-to-regimented-notation as sole test for ontological com-mitment.

Unfortunately, the original false criterion pervades much of whatQuine has to say about ontology and ontological problems, and rendersit unacceptable. This applies in particular to what he has to say (espe-cially in [i]) about the ontological commitments of conceptual schemes

and about the problem of universals. The result in the case of the uni-versals problem is that the noneist position,2 according to which wecan talk quantificationally about universals though none such exist, isentirely excluded. And the separation of neutral quantification fromexistence, as in noneism, removes what basis such assertions as the fol-

XI For reasons advanced in [z], chapters Io and ii.

Such a position, which has substantial historical roots, is developed in [z].




lowing may have had:

One's ontology is basic to the conceptual scheme by which he interprets all experiences,even the most commonplace ones. Judged within some particular conceptualscheme . . . an ontological statement goes without saying, standing in need of no sepa-

rate justification at all (p. io).

A noneist conceptual scheme, or theory, may include notions such asthose of time and number which items are definitely not assigned exis-tence, and others where the question of existence is unknown or leftopen (and even on Quine's view the latter can happen as long asquantification is eschewed). Ontology is not so basic after all.3 Forsimilar reasons fixing upon an over-all conceptual scheme does not

(contrary to Quine's claim on pp. i6-I7) determine an ontology.Quine attempts to use the relativity of conceptual schemes, and of

what he takes to be the automatically associated ontology, to dispose ofpositions on universals like McX's (p. io). But the rival scheme Quinesketches is hardly very compelling, and the serious weakness of some ofhis points becomes apparent if the working example is changed fromredness to, for instance, brittleness or solubility. Brittle things havenothing in common 'except as a popular and misleading manner ofspeaking'? The grounds for assessments of brittleness extends no fur-ther than actual things that are brittle? Properties such as brittlenesshave no 'real explanatory power'? Even more surprisingly, predicatessuch as 'is red' and 'is brittle', though meaningful, have no meaning! In'refusing to admit meanings' Quine has thereby deprived himself evenof the usual semantics for applied quantificational logic which inter-prets predicates through universals, either attribute- or set-theoretically.

MCX, presumably, was not impressed by Quine's attempt to cool downthe hot spot he put himself in with his vaunted rejection of meanings,and nor are we. Meaning does not reduce, as Quine hopes we'll allow,to sameness of meaning unless, what is at issue, attribute abstraction isalso allowed; but given abstraction, through which meaning can berecovered from sameness of meaning, redness can be retrieved fromthings being red, and so on. Quine, no doubt, hopes that we'll allow toothat 'what is called giving the meaning of an utterance is simply theuttering of a synonym'; but this (pre-Wittgensteinian suggestion) is atravesty of the range of things that would count as giving the meaningof an expression.

23 Quine has now reached a similar conclusion ([zz], p. i69), but on entirely differentgrounds. In terms of what this does to his earlier logical point of view, the term

'debacle' is not entirely inappropriate.

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When it comes to the universals of mathematics and physical science,as distinct from those of commonsense, Quine's attitude suddenlychanges. The 'higher myth' of numbers and classes 'is a good and usefulone' (p. 18). Truth has vanished: in trying on one or other conceptual

schemes or associated myths, we are only selecting, it is alleged, what issimple, economical, useful, and serves our various interests or purposes.Important issues among the problems of universals have been lost sightof, such as, what is true in classical mathematics, and which, if any, ofthe claims made as to the existence of universals are correct, how muchof classical mathematics is myth (and how precisely is this analogycashed out) and how much can be redeemed. Don't anticipate clearanswers on such issues in [i].

Quine supposes that the intermediate and upper ramifications (thecantilevered superstructure, on a later image) of his conceptual schemewill enable him to communicate successfully with MCX, on such topicsas politics, the weather, and language (p. i6). Given Quine's assump-tions as to what can be significantly said and the severe limitations onhis conceptual scheme, this should strike one as extremely doubtful,and certainly as nowhere substantiated. Weather forecasts, for exam-

ple, are frequently decidedly intensional and exhibit remote grades ofmodality: the intensional assessment of such forecasts, as discussion ofthe weather may involve, strikes the less credulous among us as evenfurther beyond the pale of legitimate Quinean discourse and admissiblemyth.

There is much else, of less immediate relevance to noneism, to disa-gree with in Quine's essay 'On What There Is', especially in the lastpages. There is, for example, good reason to dispute the unsupportedclaim (p. i9) that the phenomenalistic conceptual scheme 'claims epis-temological priority'. (The reasons include those Austin has advancedin [25], and those introduced in the analysis of phenomenalism in [z],chapter 8). It is certainly highly disputable that 'we adopt, at least inso-far as we are reasonable, the simplest conceptual scheme into which thedisordered fragments of raw experience can be fitted and arranged' (p.i6). That is a slick, and on reflection obnoxious, empirico-pragmatic

reslanting of what is accounted reasonable. Raw experience is by nomeans all that has to be accounted for, correctly. Much depends too onwhether or not "fitting" is forcing and whether or not a classical logicalstraightjacket is imposed.

But Quine's position has not remained stationary, and several partsof the essay (the claim to priority of a phenomenalistic scheme is aminor example) have been abandoned in, and sabotaged by, later work.

ON WHAT THERE IS NOT I7I



Early on Quine was tempted by nominalism (and phenomenalism),which shaped priorities and sharply delimited what existed (or whatwas said to exist) whatever science might require; subsequently, how-ever, as reflected in [i], the accommodation of science became the dom-

inating factor in determining what things exist,24 and a physicalistontology of physical objects and sets formed therefrom for scientificallyessential mathematics, resulted; but recently ontology has come to mat-ter less and less, and a new ontology, carrying ontological reductiontowards a set-theoretic limit, has emerged. The tendency to superannu-ate the ontological problem as to what exists, for instance as trivial, oras a matter for scientists, or to dispose of it in a relativistic fashion, astheory relative, was long discernible in Quine's work, but it has becomemore prominent with the emphasis of relativistic and reductionisticthemes.

According to the theme of ontological relativity, we can enquireabout the ontology of a theory only relative to 'the background theorywith its own privately adopted and ultimately inscrutable ontology'([I3], p. 5i). Total relativity Quine tries to escape by appeal to analleged qualitative difference between ontology, which is relative, and

truth, which is not. 'Sentences in their truth or falsity are what run deep,ontology is by the way ... questions of inference and ontology becomeincidental' ([zi], p. i65). But, to all appearances, truth is relative forQuine, certainly when remote from experience, a matter to be pragmat-ically settled, like choice of a conceptual scheme (cf. [i], p. I8, discussedabove). There is, moreover, a serious tension between the relativity the-sis and Quine's theme that ontology is on the same footing as science;for instance:

What reality s like is the business f scientists, n the broadest ense,painstakingly osurmise, nd what here s, what s real, s a part of that question [io], p. zz).

4 For Quine, the three principles which govern the domain of entities are, according to

Gochet ([I5], . i 8 i), a criterion of individuation ("no entity without identity"), a nom-inalist principle of economy rooted in a principle of relative empiricism ("Don't ven-ture further from the sensory evidence than you need to"), and a principle that science,i.e. scientific laws, should be preserved; 'it is necessary to economize, but withoutimpoverishing science'. But we don't choose what exists, nor freely what we honestlysay exists; and though someone might try to impose requirements like the above onwhat a well-constructed theory takes to exist, the procedure would be misguidedbecause, for example, a worthwhile theory might, like many scientific theories, includeamong its objects many that do not exist, and in a way scarcely governed by considera-

tions such as economy and relative empiricism ([z], chapters io and ii).

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Several things have gone astray: (i) science is not so relative, given thattruth is not, nor therefore, given the above connection, is reality andwhat exists, contradicting the theory relativity of ontology. In any case,the relativity theme is prima facie implausible, and arguments for it can

be faulted in the same sort of way as arguments for the theory-depen-dence of all (observational) truth-claims (Cf. [iz], chapter ii, wherethe claim that 'all entities are theoretical' is rejected). This is unremark-able, for, on referential assumptions, (ii) truth and existence are farfrom independent.z" In particular, by the Ontological Assumption, if itis true that c has some property, then c exists. Thus theory relativity ofexistence would be reflected back in theory relativity of truth. However,(iii) what exists is by no means entirely the business or preserve of scien-tists. For they too may operate with mistaken referential or other (e.g.reductionistic) assumptions, and so for instance conclude from ontolog-ical reduction that only pure sets exist or from the fact that there aretrue statements about c's, or that c's have properties, that c's exist.There is also the crucial matter of criteria for existence, which - likethe quite distinct matter of criteria for ontic commitment - are asmuch the business of philosophers as anyone else.

Though much is sometimes made of the difference between what atheory says and what it is committed to, the separate issues of whatexists and what ontic commitments to allow ourselves are characteristi-cally (but not invariably) conflated.

There emains he question what there s, or perhaps etter, what ontological ommit-ments o allow ourselves n our discourse. . this question, ikeany question oncern-ing the broadest eatures f our scientific chematism, as to be settled pragmatically([r1], p. 159).

The matter of what exists is not open to pragmatic settlement (any morethan to choice), and is, though, to a declining extent, largely beyondhuman technological control. The different question of what theory toadhere to is, however, sometimes a matter open to limited choice, but itis not, in important cases (such as fundamental theories or conceptualschemes), settled simply pragmatically. For theory choice is constrainedby factual data before pragmatic factors come into play.76 It is partly

5 And often (erroneously) equated, especially in the case of propositions.6 See [i8], where it is argued that pragmatic factors are rather lightweight ones. Ayer

puts part of what needs to be said nicely: 'when Quine and Goodman renouncedabstract entities, were they thinking only that it would be more convenient . . . wasthere not a suggestion that their reason for renouncing them was that they did notbelieve n their existence?' [I7], p. 148).

Quine insinuates that there are no decisive rational argumentative or dialectical

methods for choice of conceptual scheme, so we are 'thrown back on pragmatic con-




because the criteria for what is said to exist are open to haggling, andare to some extent theory-dependent, that it is thought that what existsis also open to human negotiation, and is theory relative. What is theoryrelative is what theories assert to exist and, differently, are committed

to the existence of, not what exists. (The confusion is like that, alreadynoted, underlying applications of Occam's razor.) Of course, whatexists, and what a theory maintains exists are connected, again throughtruth. If a theory is true and asserts that c's exist (or is committed to theexistence of c's), then c's exist. 7 But truth cannot be here whittleddown in the manner of pragmatism, to acceptability or the like, withoutcorrespondingly weakening the conclusion. Yet this is precisely whatQuine, and many others, have tried to do.

Quine divided he question What hings r sorts of things xist?' nto two questions: i)

What, according o a given theory, exists? (In Quinean erms: What are the ontologicalcommitments f a given theory); (2z)Which theories have we a good reason to accept astrue? Chihara zo]; according o Gochet i], p. 142, 'this aithfully eports heviewsofQuine').

The division is illegitimate. When (z) is so varied from the requirementof truth, what (i) and (z) yield is not what is given, but instead: What

things have we good reason to accept do exist?Pragmatism illicitly transfers a certain softness we can find in what

we have good reason to accept as existing (and, similarly, as true) to asoftness in what exists (and what is true). Ontological reduction proper,as opposed to theory reformulation, presupposes such softness. Muchas the question of what exists has been conflated with the question ofontological commitments of discourse and theories, so reduction upon

what exists (which can hardly happen purely theoretically) has been(con-)fused with a theoretical "ontological" reduction. To affect onto-logical reduction in this sense is 'to delete superfluous objects in a theo-ry's ontology without affecting the truth-values of the sentences thatconstitute it' ([5], p. i69). What such ontological reduction effects isprecisely a reduction in the primitive subject terms of a theory, which isreflected back in the domain of objects and entities required by thetheory, not any diminution of what exists. For this reason there would

be no ontological debacle, no debacle as regards what exists, even if

siderations, or other considerations as yet unproposed' ([17], p. 159), the latter beingimmediately dismissed. The argument obviously lacks tightness at several points.There are rational methods of theory choice which by no means reduce to pragmaticconsiderations.

7 A converse connection holds for complete theories.

I74 RICHARD ROUTLEY



Quine's ultimate ontological reduction to pure set theory could bepulled off. Ontological reduction is not existential elimination8Ontology does not cease to matter.

AppendixWhile the referential paradigm prevails, "fatal" objections to theoriesof objects and to Meinong's theory will continue to roll off the presses.Another recent example is afforded by Cargile who contends thatMeinongianism, at least as applied to sentences of a logical subject-predicate form, is 'an absurd doctrine' ([iv], pp. 175-76). He gives asreasons i) 'the fact that "impossible objects" such as "the round square

plane figure atop Berkeley College" are logically intolerable' and ii) thatthere are "permanently unanswerable questions" about such objects asthe king of France and the great and wise king of France, such aswhether they are the same. As with Linsky and Kenny, the reasonsoffered, descending from Russell through Quine, do not strictly guaran-tee the contention, and, more important, neither withstands investiga-tion. As to i), objects like that mentioned are not logically intolerable:they can be included in the domain of neutral quantification logic with-out any serious difficulty. As to ii), incompleteness of objects is not adamaging feature, but what should be expected. However, incomplete-ness neither sharply separates nonentities from entities, nor is as ramp-ant as Cargile supposes. The two kings of France, for example, differ byvirtue of different properties. In fact, though he vigorously rejectsMeinongianism, Cargile has no decisive arguments against it. Mostlywhat he presents are his own referential views as opposed to viable log-

ical alternatives (e.g. p. i85), and travesties of Meinong (e.g. p. I78,'even Meinong would not have called "the round square is round"true') and Meinongian alternatives.

References

[I] W. V. Quine, From a Logical Point of View, Second Edition,Revised, Harvard University Press, i96i.

[z] R. Routley, Exploring Meinong's Jungle and Beyond,Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National Uni-versity, I979.

[3] R. Routley, 'Some Things Do Not Exist', Notre Dame Jour-nal of Formal Logic, 7 (i966), z5I-76.

28 Cf. the discussion of ontic commitment above.




[4] L. Goddard and R. Routley, The Logic of Significance andContext, Scottish Academic Press, Edinburgh, I973.

[5] P. Gochet, The Ascent to Truth: An Exposition and Defenseof Quine's Philosophy, ypescript, Liege, i98i.

[6] Concise Oxford English Dictionary, Fourth Edition, Claren-don Press, Oxford, I95I.

[7] A. Meinong, On Emotional Presentation, ranslated by M. L.Schubert Kalsi, Northwestern University Press, Evanston,I972.

[8] A. Kenny, Descartes: A Study of His Philosophy, RandomHouse, New York, i968.

[g] K. Lambert, 'On "The Durability of Impossible Objects"',Inquiry 9 (I976),5 51-54.

[io] W. V. Quine, Word and Object, MIT Press, Cambridge,Mass., i960.

[II] T. Parsons, 'A Prolegomenon to Meinongian Semantics',

Journal of Philosophy, 7I (I974), 56i-80.

[IZ] R. L. Cartwright, 'Ontology and the Theory of Meaning',Philosophy of Science, zi (I954) 3i6-z5.

[Ii] W. V. Quine, Ontological Relativity and Other Essays,Columbia, New York, i969.

[I4] N. Rescher, Topics in Philosophical Logic, Reidel, Dor-

drecht, i968.

[I5] I. Scheffler and N. Chomsky, 'What Is Said to Be', Proceed-ings of the Aristotelian Society, n.s. 59 (I958), 7i-8z.

[i6] R. Routley, 'Existence and Identity in Quantified Modal Log-ics', Notre Dame Journal of Formal Logic iO (i969), II3-49.

[I7] P. T. Geach, A. J. Ayer, W. V. Quine, 'Symposium: On What

There Is', Aristotelian Society Supplementary Vol. 25 (I95I),

Iz5-60.

[I8] R. Routley, 'The Choice of Logical Foundations', StudiaLogica 39 (I979), 76-96.

[i9] J. Cargile, Paradoxes: A Study in Form and Predication,Cambridge University Press, I979.

I76 RICHARD ROUTLEY



[Zo] C. S. Chihara, Ontology and the Vicious Circle Principle,Cornell University Press, Ithaca, I973.

[zi] W. V. Quine, 'Facts of the Matter', in Essays on the Philoso-phy of W. V. Quine, (ed. R. W. Shahan and C. Swoyer), Uni-versity of Oklahoma Press, Norman, I979, I55-69.

[zz] W. V. Quine, Methods of Logic, Revised edition, Holt, Rine-hart and Winston, New York, I959.

[z3] L. Linsky, Names and Descriptions, University of ChicagoPress, I977.

[24] M. Bunge, Ontology I: The Furniture of the World, Reidel,Dordrecht, I977.

[z5] J. L. Austin, Sense and Sensibilia, Clarendon Press, Oxford,i96z.

[z6] G. Frege, The Foundations of Arithmetic, ranslated by J. L.Austin, Blackwell, Oxford, I950.

r. routley-1982-on what there is not

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