The unbearable circularity of easy ontology
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The unbearable circularity of easy ontology Jonas Raab1 Received: 14 August 2019 / Accepted: 2 November 2020 © The Author(s) 2020
Abstract In this paper, I argue that Amie Thomasson’s Easy Ontology rests on a vicious circularity that is highly damaging. Easy Ontology invokes the idea of application conditions that give rise to analytic entailments. Such entailments can be used to answer ontological questions easily. I argue that the application conditions for basic terms are only circularly specifiable showing that Thomasson misses her self-set goal of preventing such a circularity. Using this circularity, I go on to show that Easy Ontology as a whole collapses. Keywords Easy ontology · Amie Thomasson · Circularity · Application conditions · Deflationary metaontology
1 Introduction In recent years, Amie Thomasson has been developing a deflationary metaontology called Easy Ontology. The ‘Easy’ in ‘Easy Ontology’ is supposed to make obvious that we can answer ontological questions easily—at least if certain conditions are satisfied. Ontological questions are questions asking whether certain entities exist. According to Easy Ontology, those questions are answered by considering whether the corresponding terms refer. The strategy to answer specific ontological questions is to check whether certain terms apply given some uncontroversial truths. This is accomplished by associating terms with what Thomasson calls application conditions. As relations between application conditions give rise to analytic entailments, we only need to check whether some of the uncontroversial truths analytically entail the fulfilment of the application conditions of the terms in question. This is why Easy Ontology is deflationary. This paper raises doubt whether Thomasson’s Easy Ontology is tenable. I argue that it is not—as it is viciously circular. To arrive at this conclusion, I only use what
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Jonas Raab [email protected] University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK
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Thomasson explicitly endorses as part of Easy Ontology. This is important insofar as there are many charges of begging the question in the debate. For example, Contessa (2016: §2) discusses a charge of begging the question that Thomasson directs towards the fictionalist; he claims that it is rather Thomasson who begs the question. In her reply, Thomasson (2017) claims again that it is the fictionalist who begs the question.1 Thus, to prevent the charge of question begging, it is important to use only what she gives us; this shows, then, that Thomasson’s Easy Ontology has an internal problem— regardless of whether or not it (or an internally consistent version of it, cf. footnote 3) is plausible for independent reasons. The structure of this paper is as follows. In Sect. 2, I present the relevant parts of Easy Ontology as developed by Thomasson. Section 2.1 is a brief account of how Easy Ontology works. Section 2.2 motivates Thomasson’s reasons to introduce application conditions and how they are characterized. Section 3 argues that the account of the
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