Philosophers and theorists have long been puzzled by humans' ability to talk about things that do not exist, or to talk about things that they think exist but, in fact, do not. Empty Names, Fiction, and the Puzzles of Non-Existence is a collection of 13 new works concerning the semantic and metaphysical issues arising from empty names, non-existence, and the nature of fiction. The contributors include some of the most important researchers working in these fields. Some of the papers develop and defend new positions on these matters, while others offer important new perspectives and criticisms of the existing approaches. The volume contains a comprehensive introductory essay by the editors, which provides a survey of the philosophical issues concerning empty names, the various responses to these issues, and the literature on the subject to date.
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Book Description
Contributions of some of the most important researchers working in empty names, fiction, and the puzzles of non-existence. The book contains a comprehensive introductory essay by the editors which provides a survey of the philosophical issues concerning empty names, the various responses to these issues, and the literature to date.
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This review is from: Empty Names, Fiction and the Puzzles of Non-Existence (Center for the Study of Language and Information - Lecture Notes) (Hardcover)
Perhaps the most interesting thing about this collection, is that it so clearly shows how far we are from a solution to the problem of empty names and the questions of non-existence (and the question of fictional names, which I believe - as clearly opposed to several of the contributors - must be treated as separate from questions pertaining to genuinely empty names).
The various articles certainly present a wide range of approaches, from appeals to pragmatic processes to explain how sentences literally expressing no complete propositions can still convey something true, through pretense theories to Meinongianism. Unfortunately, not all contributions seem to amount to much, and several seem to gloss over rather obvious weaknesses. The most interesting contributions are, I think, Schiffer's (pleonastic Fregeanism, but more comprehensively discussed elsewhere) and Zalta's (appeal to object theory). In the end, this book is thus of rather limited general interested. No doubt anyone who are working on issues related to these will have to read it, but there is not much to be gained for those who works on topics not directly related to these questions. I don't think anyone, after reading through the book, would claim that any of the responses come even close to actually solving the problems.
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