The Non-existence of the Real World

The Non-existence
of the Real World

Jan Westerhoff

1
3
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To the lucky few
 過
猶
不
及¹

¹ ‘To go too far is not to reach it.’ Confucius: Analects XI: 16.
Acknowledgements

I am much indebted to my friends and colleagues who supplied me with

comments on earlier versions of this manuscript: Christian Coseru, Jonardon
Ganeri, Jacob Hohwy, James Ladyman, Thomas Metzinger, Graham Priest,
Mark Siderits, John Taber, and Paul Teller. The John Templeton Foundation
generously supported work on an earlier incarnation of the present work.
I would also like to thank audiences at Oxford University and Bristol Univer-
sity, where parts of this material was presented, for their comments, as well as
two anonymous readers for Oxford University Press for their detailed criti-
cism. Writing this book was a particularly long, drawn-out process (the
following pages are an ancestor of the sixth draft of the original manuscript)
and I am grateful to my wife Yuka Kobayashi and our daughter Sophie for their
support along the way.
Preface

Those readers familiar with my work will be aware that I spend a great amount
of my time trying to understand the arguments of an ancient Indian philo-
sophical school called Madhyamaka. I believe that the Mādhyamikas defend a
particularly far-reaching variety of non-foundationalism.² It occurred to me
some time ago that there are various theories within different parts of analytic
philosophy (as well as in its larger orbit), including metaphysics, epistemology,
the theory of personal identity, philosophy of science, philosophy of language,
and cognitive science that could be joined up to form a systematic development
and defence of key Madhyamaka claims. This book is my attempt to spell out
this idea.
Having clarified my motivation for writing this book I am not going to
mention Indian philosophy any more in the following pages.³ I will not defend
my interpretation of Madhyamaka here, nor will there be any other references
to Indian thinkers, works, schools, or concepts. My aim in this book is to put
together a set of arguments to support a specific set of conclusions, and I am
writing for a reader who is primarily interested to see how the conclusions I try
to establish can be supported by the arguments presented here.
I hope that the philosophical picture I present below is an interesting,
perhaps even an attractive one. Whether its outlines trace the contours of
Nāgārjuna I leave for my readers to decide.
Oxford, Buddha Pūrnima 2019
_
J.C.W.

² Westerhoff 2017. ³ With one exception: Chapter 3, n. 28.

Introduction

The argument in the following pages will look at a series of challenges to Four
increasingly more fundamental aspects of the notion of a real world. The challenges.
discussion begins by an investigation of reasons for the presumed certainty
of the existence of the external, mind-independent world around us, a world
containing material objects such as shoes, and ships, and sealing-wax, biological
organisms, such as cabbages, and persons, such as kings. In Chapter 1 I consider
a selection of arguments directed against the existence of such an external world.
The chapter focuses on the discussion of different theories of perception (naïve
realism, disjunctivism, representationalism) and the ontologies they involve.
I argue that ultimately a kind of brain-based representationalism works best as
a theory of perception but that this, somewhat surprisingly, also undermines the
justification of a mind-independent world of material objects.
A natural place of retreat once the reality of the mind-independent world
has been challenged is that of the certainty of our inner world, a world which,
we assume, is perfectly transparent to us and over which we have complete
control, which provides a sharp contrast with an external world of which we
have limited knowledge, and which frequently resists our attempts to influence
it. Many of the arguments against the existence of the external world presented
in this chapter are extremely well-known, and in many cases as old as the
discipline of philosophy itself. In Chapter 2 I consider a set of somewhat less
familiar arguments against the existence of the kind of internal world we have
just described. Amongst other things I look at various arguments critical of
introspective certainty and conclude that a foundation in the internal world
remains elusive: our introspective capacities do not give us any more of a secure
grasp of the world than the theories of perception discussed in the first chapter.
Supposing these arguments are successful, or at least challenge our belief in
the existence of a world inside, where would we retreat from here? If both the
external and the internal world turn out to be less solid than we initially
thought, one thing we can still hold on to is the certainty that something is
real, even if the external world is not, and even if we and our internal world are not.
This, of course, is the belief in the existence of an ultimate foundation that grounds
all existence. We will consider a series of challenges to this idea in Chapter 3,
evaluating possible arguments for the existence of such a foundation, and describ-
ing attempts to establish its opposite, a non-foundational view of reality.
If the anti-foundationalist turns out to have the better arguments on his side
it looks as if we can close the debate here, and conclude that at the end of the
day the word has a non-well-founded structure. We could do this, if it didn’t

The Non-existence of the Real World. Jan Westerhoff, Oxford University Press (2020). © Jan Westerhoff.
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turn out that there are substantial problems with the idea of a final, ultimately
true theory of the world. In the last, fourth chapter I look at a variety of
arguments (connected with the coherence theory of truth, semantic context-
ualism, and the denial of absolutely general quantification) that suggest that
the idea of a foundational theory of the world is as problematic as that of an
ontological foundation. From this it follows that if there cannot be an ultim-
ately true theory then it also cannot be ultimately true that the world has a non-
well-founded structure.
We are now left with an interesting problem, for it appears as if the theory of
the non-existence of the real world we defend here cannot be a final theory
either. The chapter closes with a discussion of this final problem, together with
some reflection on the implications of the denial of ultimately true theories for
the ontological or philosophical enterprise more generally.
Putnam on Another way of contextualizing the discussion in this book is by considering
realism. it as a reaction to various claims of metaphysical realism. Hilary Putnam
characterizes metaphysical realism as a conjunction of three claims:⁴
1. a mind-independence claim (‘the world consists of some fixed totality of
mind-independent objects’);
2. a unique true theory claim (‘there is exactly one true and complete
description of “the way the world is” ’);
3. a correspondence claim (‘truth involves some sort of correspondence relation
between words or thought-signs and external things and sets of things’).

This book considers arguments that challenge all three claims. Chapter 1
looks at reasons that try to undermine the ontological assumption of an
external world. Our purpose is not epistemological; we are not trying to find
out whether there might be reasons to doubt the existence of an external world,
reasons that undermine our claim that we can have any knowledge of such a
world. We are interested in examining reasons why there may not be such a world.
The question of the ultimately true theory of the world is raised in the final
chapter (Chapter 4). We consider a variety of reasons that appear to show that
the assumption of such a theory may be more problematic than we are usually
happy to assume.
The issue of correspondence is raised in Chapter 3. In fact we are looking at
a more general form of this claim. Instead of considering the issue whether
there needs to be any correspondence between words and things, we investigate
whether there is any necessity for representational theories to be grounded in
the non-representational. Such necessity is expressed by the claim that for

⁴ Putnam 1981: 49.

  xxxiii

linguistic items to be meaningful at all it is necessary that following down the

route of ‘means that’ will not continue to lead us from definitions to defin-
itions, but will at some level terminate in something that is part of the world,
not simply part of its description. This claim is obviously weaker than the
correspondence claim; the correspondence claim needs to establish that there
is a specific relation between words and things (a kind of structural similarity or
some such), while the weaker thesis of semantic foundation we are looking at
here just needs to make sure that there is some way in which the words link up
with the things. We first set out to argue that semantic non-foundationalism is
a consistent position (i.e. that there is no contradiction entailed in assuming
that representations only refer to other representations), and then consider
reasons for why one might consider this view in fact to be true.
The one dimension of metaphysical realism that Putnam’s three conjuncts
do not cover is realism about the inner world, the claim that looking inside our
own mind acquaints us with certain knowledge of an inner world and its
inhabitants, a collection consisting of our thoughts, beliefs, memories, as well
as the central point around which all of these revolve, our self. This is a natural
point of refuge in response to challenges of claims concerning the existence of
an external world. What is rarely realized in the debates between realism and
the various forms of idealism that some of its critics espouse is that the claims
about the existence of an internal world do not rest on a more secure basis than
those about the outer objects they are supposed to replace. Chapter 2 looks at
various arguments for the claim that any trust we may place in an inner realm
of certainty is in all likelihood without foundation.
 1
The Non-existence of the
External World

1.1 Arguing about the External World

§1 Denying the Existence of an External World
Philosophical debates about the external world usually arise in the context of The ontological
problem of the
epistemology. Such debates concern the question to which extent our beliefs external world.
about the external world are justified or by what routes we could achieve
knowledge of the external world. This chapter is not a contribution to this
debate. I am concerned with the ontological problem of the external world, i.e.
with the question of whether there is such a thing in the first place.¹
In particular, I want to look at some arguments against the existence of an Externality
external world. Let me hasten to add that by the denial of the external world equals mind-
independence.
I do not mean scenarios such as Berkeleyian idealism, where all seemingly
external objects are really mental entities existing in the mind of God. For
sure, external objects comprise items such as teacups, galaxies, or electrons. But
by ‘external’ I mean the more general property of an object’s existing without
depending on human interests or concerns. According to this understanding of
externality, platonistically understood mathematical structures and abstract
objects, as well as divine ideas count as external objects. By the denial of an
external world I therefore mean a denial of objects that exist independent of
human interests, concerns, and cognitive activities,² and according to this under-
standing Berkeleyian idealism counts as a theory that endorses external objects.³

¹ The epistemological and ontological questions are, though closely connected, to some extent
independent of one another. A positive answer to the ontological problem does not yet imply that we
have any knowledge of the external world (it might be cognitively inaccessible to us), while a negative
answer does not force us to believe that we could not in some sense still be epistemically justified in
our beliefs about such a world (though this kind of epistemic justification would not involve truth).
² What about other minds? Do they count as external objects? See Chapter 2, note 151.
³ Thus, by the externality of an entity I mean its objectivity. Whether the idea of objective
existence is inextricably intertwined with the notion of spatiality is a problem that has been
discussed since Kant. For a modern discussion of this matter see Strawson 1966, part 2; Bennett
1966, chapter 2; Evans 1985; van Cleve 2006.

The Non-existence of the Real World. Jan Westerhoff, Oxford University Press (2020). © Jan Westerhoff.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198847915.001.0001
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How could we We might wonder how we could possibly establish the non-existence of the
deny its exist- external world. For even if we suppose that we are able to explain everything we
ence in the first
place? want to explain in terms of objects that depend on human interests, external
and hence objectively existent entities could still exist. They could be, like the
Kantian noumenon, wholly inaccessible to human epistemic endeavours. Of
course such noumena could not be established in experiential terms: the world
would look exactly the same whether or not such entities existed. Yet it seems
that there is no argument we can come up with that would rule out the
existence of such cognition-transcending noumena.
The external While this objection has some force, it is important to note that we should be
world must do reluctant to allow entirely idle wheels into our account of what there is. If we
some
explanatory accept some entity such as a ‘world behind the appearances’ it should do some
work. theoretical or explanatory work, yet if the world is exactly the same in the
presence and in the absence of such an entity,⁴ it cannot do any such work.⁵
We need more of a reason for postulating something’s existence than the claim
that for all we know (even for all we could ever know) such a thing might exist.
§2 The Example of Mathematical Platonism
A parallel Consider the example of mathematical Platonism. Suppose for the sake of
(unsatisfactory) argument that we are able to show that all we want to explain about mathem-
argument for
Platonism. atics can be explained without referring to a world of necessarily existent
objects outside of time and space (by appealing to a variety of formalism,
say). Suppose further that we can argue that platonic objects could not possibly
play a part in how we know mathematical truths (for example because all our
epistemic functions involve causal processes, and entities outside of space and
time could not be causal relata). The defender of Platonism could still dig in his
heels, and accept that even though we do not know that 7 + 5 = 12 because we
intuit the identity relation between a set of abstract objects, a number and a
pair of numbers connected by the addition function, but because we have
accepted certain rules for manipulating marks on paper, while maintaining
that these abstract objects still exist. He could claim this while also accepting
that the presence or absence of these objects does not make any difference to
our ability to acquire mathematical knowledge, and if, per impossibile, they
were all going to vanish, we would still have the same mathematical knowledge.

⁴ Colyvan (2000: 89) points out that entities that do not stand in dependence relations with any
other entities (generalizing the notion of entities that do not stand in causal relations with any other
entities, on which see Colyvan 1998) are ‘metaphysically dubious’. See also Bliss 2019: 363.
⁵ Kant, of course, does not claim that there is any observational evidence for things in
themselves, but rather that because we can have knowledge of the world at all, we must accept a
necessary pre-condition of such knowledge, namely that there are noumena. This presupposes that
it is impossible to have just the phenomena without things in themselves that underlie them. We
will come back to this point in Section 1.3 C of this chapter.
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We can probably agree that this defence of Platonism is hopeless. The mere
postulation of an external world in the presence of arguments that such a world
would not be required to explain the perception of the world we do have would
not fare much better.

1.2 Three Arguments in Support

of an External World
In the following pages I want to examine some arguments that appear to
support postulating the existence of an external world, in order to show that
all of these arguments face significant problems. I first want to look at the claim
that the appearance of externality gives us reason to postulate the existence of
an external world that appears in this way, and secondly consider the argument
that the necessity to account for the difference between illusory and veridical
states forces us to adopt some form of belief in an external world.
Thirdly, I shall consider arguments based on the fact that the most popular
kinds of epistemic theories, direct realism and representationalism, both pos-
tulate the existence of an external world. I will try to argue that because neither
theory can really assume more than the bare existence of such a world (without
being able to say much about what this world would be like in itself) we might
have better reasons for adopting an epistemological picture that does not
presuppose the existence of an external world. If our assessment of the
problematic status of these arguments is correct it appears as if the main
motivations for postulating such a world fall away, and that that the notion
of an external world understood as a collection of entities existing independent
of human interests and concerns is one we would best do without.

A The Appearance of Externality

§3 There Appears to be an External World
What is the chief reason for our belief in an external world? The answer seems
to be obvious. The teacup I see standing on the table in front of me strikes me
as something external, as something that exists independently of my epistemic
contact with it (it is there whether or not I look at it), and independently of my
interests and concerns (whether or not I want the teacup to be on the table does
not make a difference for my seeing it). The simplest explanation for this,
I conclude, is that there is in fact an external teacup.
Yet the postulation of an external world does not seem to be necessary just to The appearance
explain this appearance: dreams and hallucinations can represent objects in the of externality is
not sufficient.
very same way. A dreamed teacup (lucid dreams aside) will also appear as
independent of my perceiving it in the dream, and as the impression of
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externality can thus demonstrably be caused by entities that are not external,
appeals to this phenomenology cannot be a sufficient ground for postulating
the existence of an external world.
The Moorean One might object, however, that the appearance of the existence of external
gambit.
objects is all that is really needed to settle the matter. This would be following
the lines of G.E. Moore’s argument,⁶ pointing out that our belief in the
existence of the external world is more secure than any empirical observations,
or any conclusion of philosophical arguments. Belief in the existence of an
external world is so entrenched in our web of belief that we would be willing to
revise any number of other beliefs in the web in order to keep this belief stable.
Peter Unger describes this response as the
Moorean gambit of clutching onto common sense at the expense of anything else, most
especially any philosophical reasoning. According to this way of thinking it is always
most appropriate to reply to philosophical challenges as follows. We are more certain
that there are tables than of anything in the contrary philosophic reasoning. Hence,
while we may never be able to tell what is wrong with the reasoning, at least one thing
must be wrong with it.⁷

Why the Unger points out that this reply is ‘extremely dogmatic’. It is also extremely
Moorean gambit
is unsatisfactory.
irrational. The holding on to certain beliefs no matter what contrary evidence
is presented to us is more characteristic of certain forms of mental illness than
of the exercise of reason. (This does not contradict the fact that, as passengers
in Neurath’s boat, we have to hold on to some beliefs as fixed—there is just no
justification for saying that we can tell in advance which beliefs these are, or
whether they always have to be the same.) In addition, there is no assurance
that our initial, commonsensical assumptions we use to jettison a given
philosophical argument are not of the same kind as, for example, the com-
monsensical assumptions that through any point only one parallel to a given
line can be drawn, or that two events that are simultaneous for me are also
simultaneous for everybody else.

B Distinguishing Veridical and Illusory States

§4 We Need to Explain the Difference between Veridical
and Illusory States
Fortunately the appearance of external objects is not the only consideration
the defender of the external world can bring to the table. Instead of
arguing that the external world is posited in order to account for a specific
phenomenological datum, he might propose that we want to postulate an

⁶ Moore 1939. ⁷ Unger 2006a: 10. See also 2006b: 41.

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external world because we need to account for the difference between

qualitatively identical illusory and veridical perceptions. We may not be able to
tell from the inside, while dreaming or while suffering from a hallucination that
our perception is illusory, but there is still a fact to the matter that it is illusory,
because illusory perceptions do not link up in the right (causal) way with the
external world, while perceptions in the non-hallucinatory waking state do.
Consider situations in which we are deceived about what is going on around
us. We dream we are fighting a ferocious tiger but are in fact sleeping
peacefully in bed; we hallucinate persons after taking certain kinds of drugs; Illusion as a
we grasp for a bunch of grapes in a trompe l’oeil painting, avoid a puddle on the contrastive
concept.
road that is merely a mirage on a hot summer’s day, feel cramps in a phantom
limb that has been amputated long ago. We can only conceptualize these
situations as illusory by contrasting them with situations in which we are not
deceived, when we are attacked by a real tiger, encounter a real person, and so
on.⁸ The difference involved is an ontological difference; in one case we are
confronted with an entity that forms part of the external world, in the other we
are simply interacting with a mind-made object. The fact that there are illusory
situations appears to give us a good reason for postulating the existence of an
ontological watershed that accounts for a situation being illusory or it being
real. This watershed is the distinction between what is part of the external
world, and what is not.
What kind of difference can we use to tell veridical and illusory perceptions 3 differences
apart, if they do not differ in terms of their qualitative appearance? Three kinds between illusory
and true
appear to be most important. perceptions.

§5 () 
First of all illusions are less coherent with the remainder of our perceptions
than veridical perceptions are. We fight a tiger in a dream and just when it Veridical
starts to attack us we wake up. The tiger has disappeared. Such a fortunate perceptions line
up with one
outcome rarely ensues when a real tiger is involved. We grasp for the grapes another.
and touch a canvas, even though usually what looks like a grape also feels like a
grape. We perceive pain in a phantom arm but can at the same time see that
there is no arm where we feel the pain. Veridical perceptions usually line up
neatly with one another, deceptive perceptions do not tend to do this.
A plausible reason for this difference in coherence is that out of the pair of
veridical and illusory perceptions only one is structurally similar to a collection
of objects and thereby succeeds in representing it. The objects themselves are
coherent (Australians aside we don’t usually assume there to be inconsistencies

⁸ As Gilbert Ryle (1964: 94) pointed out, we can only conceptualize counterfeit coinage on the
basis of real coinage.
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in things, but only in the representations of things) and so structural similarity

ensures the coherence of representations. The deceptive type of perception fails
to be coherent because it is devoid of such anchors within a coherent structure.
Being thus unconstrained it can present things in any way it likes, including
inconsistent ways.

§6 () 
Secondly, deceptions are directly available only to us. Nobody else sees the
Veridical dream-tiger or feels the phantom arm, while real tigers and real arms can be
perceptions can
be shared.
perceived by other people as well. Trompe l’oeil paintings (at least those
involving perspectives in a substantial way) are notorious for being fully
deceptive only from one vantage point. To the person standing right next to
us the painted nature of the scene is generally quite obvious. Real grapes, on the
other hand, look convincing from a multitude of perspectives.
Oliver Sacks regards this as the key difference between veridical and illusory
perceptions:
Perceptions are, to some extent, shareable – you and I can agree that there is a tree; but if
I say, ‘I see a tree there,’ and you see nothing of the sort, you will regard my ‘tree’ as a
hallucination, something concocted by my brain or mind [ . . . ].⁹

That certain appearances can appear to more than one subject, while others
are restricted to a single perceiver strongly suggests that we are dealing with
two very different kinds of things here, and thus supports the idea of an
ontological difference between what deceptive and what non-deceptive per-
ceptions present.

§7 () 
Veridical Finally, real things are efficacious. A real tiger can kill, the dream tiger cannot.
perceptions
Real water can quench our thirst or water our lawn, unlike water from a
work.
mirage. A phantom hand cannot grasp anything. It is hard not to attribute
this difference in efficacy to a fundamental ontological distinction between the
real and the deceptive, that is to the fact that the real objects possess some
power which their deceptive counterparts lack. The presence of such power
seems to be the best explanation for the ability of real water to quench our
thirst, while its deceptive counterpart fails to do so.
§8 The Three Differences as an Argument for the External World
It therefore seems to be that a good way of spelling out the difference between
illusory and veridical perceptions is in terms coherence, intersubjectivity,

⁹ 2012b: ix.
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and efficacy. The simplest explanation of why these three properties succeed in
differentiating two kinds of perceptions is that there are two different kinds of
things, separated by an ontological divide,¹⁰ that these perceptions are percep-
tions of. This ontological divide, which entails the existence of an external world,
thus appears to be necessary for being able to draw a distinction between what is
veridical and what is merely illusory, and it is for this reason, the defender of the
external world argues, not merely in order to account for the phenomenology of
externality that we need to postulate the existence of an external world.
Nevertheless, it is not entirely obvious what kind of support the three criteria
of coherence, intersubjectivity, and efficacy actually offer for the postulation of
an ontological divide. Even if the notions of coherence, intersubjectivity, and
efficacy are intricately connected with the veridical/illusory distinction it might
be possible to spell them out without postulating an ontological divide between
the internal and the external. In this case the necessity of drawing the distinc-
tion between what is an illusion and what is not would not be sufficient for
supporting the assumption of the existence of an external world. We will
consider this possibility more closely in the next section.
§9 Difficulties with Coherence
First of all, it is unclear what power considerations of coherence have to
establish the ontological distinction at issue. For the link to be established is
one between the coherence of our perceptions and their correspondence to an
external, mind-independent world, and it is not at all obvious that we can just
move from the former to the latter. There are, after all coherent fairy-tales,¹¹
that is, coherent accounts that fail to have anything corresponding to them.
A second problem with using the notion of coherence as part of a justification
for the introduction of the notion of an external world is that the coherence of
our perception may not be a reflection of any coherent, external world out
there, but might simply be an artefact produced by the perceptual machinery we Coherence as
employ. In this case the coherence of a significant part of our perceptual world is a cognitive
artefact.
not due to any special link with a coherent world, but is simply a result of the fact
that our cognitive mechanisms are aiming for a coherent representation.¹²

¹⁰ This divide may take different forms. It might be taken as a divide between different kinds of
phenomena, internal or external, that these perceptions are perceptions of, or it might be taken as a
divide between experiences which have objects, and experiences which do not.
¹¹ ‘But nowadays most men admit that beliefs must be tested by observation, not merely by the
fact that they harmonize with other beliefs. A consistent fairy-tale is a different thing from truth,
however elaborate it may be.’ (Russell 2009: 304).
¹² Indeed if human perceptual abilities have evolved by natural selection in order to deliver a
coherent representation of the world, it is hardly surprising that this representation is also shared
by all humans. In this case neither its coherence nor its intersubjective nature can serve as evidence
that it faithfully represents objective features of reality. See Hoffman et al. 2015a: 1497.
   -    

If inconsistencies are automatically ‘edited out’ it is hard to draw any ontological

conclusions from the fact that most of our perceptions are coherent.
Change There is a variety of experimental results that support the idea that our
blindness. cognitive mechanisms are coherence-seeking. One simple example of our
spectacular inabilities to perceive inconsistencies is constituted by the difficulty
of detecting blunders in films. Most movies contain significant failures of
consistency (actors changing their outfit mid-scene, Roman slaves wearing
wristwatches) of which the majority of people are completely ignorant.¹³ Not
only are we ‘change blind’ (to use the psychological term), we are also change
blind blind, that is we believe we would spot such inconsistencies but fail to do
so in practice.¹⁴
Choice Such change blindness can have even more puzzling results when it leads to
blindness. a condition known as choice blindness.¹⁵ Here experimental subjects are asked
to choose between two alternatives (such as two types of jams), and, after being
presented with their choice, asked to give reasons for choosing the way they
did. Unknown to them the selection was switched just after their choice, so that
they received the unwanted alternative.¹⁶ In experiments investigating choice
blindness about two-thirds of the subjects fail to notice this, moreover, subjects
of such experiments also subsequently produce introspectively fabricated
reasons for their ‘choice’.¹⁷ It appears as if the pressure towards coherence
does not just affect our perceptions of external objects, but also the relation
between outer actions and inner states (‘I publicly said that I like x, so I must
really like it’).
Reasons: Various factors are behind this cognitive bias towards coherence. One is the
extrapolation extrapolation of past experience that influences our perceptions through
from past
experience. expectations about what we are going to perceive. A case in point here is the
well-known playing-card experiment involving impossible cards.¹⁸ A subject is
briefly shown a variety of playing cards, some of which are doctored (such as a
black king of hearts) and is asked to identify them. In the majority of cases the
subjects did not note the anomalous features of the doctored cards, but rather
perceived them as regular cards. The black king of hearts would thus be

¹³ Chabris and Simons 2010: 52–7.

¹⁴ In one experiment 90 per cent of 297 subjects claimed they would notice an actor’s scarf
changing in a short film shown to them, even though none of the subjects of an earlier experiment
did in fact notice anything. See Levin and Momen 2000.
¹⁵ For an introduction, see Hall and Johansson 2009.
¹⁶ Hall, Johansson, et al. 2010. It is somewhat worrying that our inability to detect such changes
regarding our own preferences does not only seem to affect mundane matters like choices of jam,
but also more weighty issues such as moral choices. See Hall, Johansson, et al. 2012.
¹⁷ Johannson, Hall, et al. 2011.
¹⁸ The experiment is described in Bruner and Postman 1949. It became particularly well known
amongst philosophers after Thomas Kuhn discussed it in 1970: 62–4. See also Horner and Tung
2011.
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identified as a king of spades—not because the subject cannot differentiate

heart-shapes from spade-shapes, but because he sees what he is expecting to
see, namely a regular playing card. Our expectations about what we are going
to perceive can strongly influence what we do in fact perceive. In this way,
having perceived various coherent phenomena in the past, we will expect that
future perceived phenomena are similarly coherent, and this expectation may
make it more likely that we in fact experience them as coherent, whether they
are coherent or not.
Another factor contributing to the cognitive bias towards seeing our per- Reasons:
ceptions as coherent may be the desire to have our perceptions line up with the conformity
with other
perceptions of others around us who regard their perceptions as coherent. In a perceivers.
now classic experiment¹⁹ a group of subjects was shown two cards, one with a
single line on them, the other one with three lines. Their task was to determine
which of the three lines was of the same length as the line on the other card.
All but one subject were instructed in advance to give unanimously wrong
answers from a certain point onwards. The remaining subject thus had two
options: to believe the evidence of his senses and pick the correct line, or to go
with the faulty choice of his co-subjects. The prior probability of making
a mistake in judging the length of the lines was less than 1 per cent, yet in
36.8 per cent of the cases the subject would accept the mistaken majority
opinion. The contrast between the empirical evidence and what the subject
caused himself to belief for the sake of coherence could be quite extreme.
Asch reports that:
we varied the discrepancy between the standard line and the other lines systematically,
with the hope of reaching a point where the error of the majority would be so glaring
that every subject would repudiate it and choose independently. In this we regretfully
did not succeed. Even when the difference between the lines was seven inches, there
were still some who yielded to the error of the majority.²⁰

The perception of coherence may not simply be due to the fact that we (rightly
or wrongly) perceive the world as coherent, but might result from our desire
that our perceptions accord with the judgements of others who do in fact (with
or without justification) take the world to be coherent.
Yet if the coherence of our perceptions results from our epistemic mechan-
isms making them coherent, we could presumably have the same coherent
perceptions we have now even if the world was in fact inconsistent, for example
because it contained contradictions.

¹⁹ Asch 1951. Some later psychologist have argued that the ‘Asch effect’ was a reflection of
conformist tendencies of 1950s America and thus a ‘child of its time’ (Perrin and Spencer 1980).
For more recent attempts to replicate Asch’s experiment see Nicholson, Cole, et al. 1985; Neto 1995.
²⁰ Asch 1955: 34.
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The possibility Graham Priest²¹ gives the (fictional) example of an impossible object in the
of inconsistent form of a box that is simultaneously empty and has something in it. If our
worlds.
world contained such an object, this would constitute a local variation of the
law of non-contradiction, and as such our world would be inconsistent.
Priest’s point is not that his fictional example is actual, but that there is no
good a priori reason to assume that our world does not contain an object of
this kind, i.e. that it is not in fact inconsistent.²² It is not the case that the
presence of an inconsistency in the world entails that everything follows
from everything else, any more than the presence of a contradictory state-
ment in a paraconsistent system of logic entails that every other statement is
entailed by the contradictory statement. In particular, our world would not
be a fundamentally different world if it turned out to be inconsistent. For
Priest there is
absolutely no cogent (in particular, non-question-begging) reason to suppose that there
is an ontological difference between merely possible worlds and impossible worlds – any
more than there is for supposing there to be such a difference between merely possible
worlds which are physically possible and those which are physically impossible. To
differentiate between some nonactual worlds and others would seem entirely
arbitrary.²³

If Priest is right about this, then we cannot simply presuppose the coherence of
our world, nor can we use the coherence of our perceptions as a ground to
postulate the existence of such a coherent world beyond the perceptions. The
coherence of our perceptions, it appears, is unable to function as a support for
the assumption of an external world.
§10 Difficulties with Intersubjectivity
The intersubjectivity criterion relies on the assumption that the veridicality
and shareability of a perception are closely connected. The realm of veridical
perceptions coincides with those that are shareable: if perceptions are not
deceptive they are shareable, and the realm of the illusory coincides with the
subjective: if perceptions are deceptive, they are not shareable.
Yet neither of these two implications is unproblematic. Regarding the
Veridical former, it is not difficult to come up with examples of entirely non-illusory
perceptions perceptions that are nevertheless not shareable. Imagine a peepshow box that
that are not
shareable. displays two monitors inside: one shows a digital clock with the present hour,

²¹ Priest 1997: 575–6.

²² Priest (1997: 581) argues that there is ‘nothing in this definition [of a logically impossible
world as one where a logical truth is false] that precludes the actual world from being logically
impossible’.
²³ Priest 1997: 581.
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minute, second, and decisecond, the other is connected to a random number

generator that presents a new number every decisecond.²⁴ Since the set-up of
the peepshow only allows one person to look inside at one time, the display at
each individual decisecond is not shareable—you can tell others which number
you saw later, but they cannot check it for themselves. Yet there is nothing
deceptive about the scenario, the numbers and times are really displayed and
are clearly visible.
The second implication, that if perceptions are deceptive, they are not Shareable
shareable is equally problematic. It is evident that there are various deceptive perceptions that
are not veridical.
perceptions that are nevertheless intersubjectively accessible. Mirages, rain-
bows, bent sticks under water and mass delusions²⁵ (such as the alleged penis-
shrinkage associated with the koro disease)²⁶ are all deceptive, presenting
things as present that are not there, or as having properties that they do not
in fact have, yet they are all observed by a multiplicity of observers who agree in
considerable detail on what they perceive.
Even in the case of illusory phenomena like after-images that are not
shareable, the fact that they are only accessible to a single perceiver
simply seems to be the result of contingent empirical limitations, and not
of any deep connection between the properties of veridicality and public
accessibility. Without stretching our imagination too much we can think up
a science-fiction scenario in which the afterimage one person perceives
could be simultaneously made available to another person (by ‘reading’
the relevant processes in the first person’s brain, subsequently recreating
them in the second person’s brain). In a world in which such technology
was routinely available, afterimages would be shareable, though this would
not make them any more veridical: just because two persons perceive
it there isn’t a green, glowing patch hovering just in front of them. Veridi-
cality (or its absence) cannot simply be equated with public observability (or
its absence).
§11 Difficulties with Efficacy
The efficacy criterion is unsatisfactory because efficacy is neither a Veridicality and
necessary nor a sufficient condition for being non-deceptive. There are plenty efficacy do not
coincide.
of non-deceptive things that fail to be efficacious (matches that don’t ignite,
pens that don’t write, keys that fail to open locks) while there is also
a variety of deceptive things that are efficacious. A placebo is a fake medicine
that nevertheless manages to heal.²⁷ The nocebo effect occurs when

²⁴ This is a technologically updated version of Wittgenstein’s beetle-in-the-box scenario from

Philosophical Investigations 1.293.
²⁵ See Mackay 1852. ²⁶ Bartholomew 2001: 145–57. ²⁷ Benedetti 2014.
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equally inert preparations cause harm.²⁸ Illusory hands (produced with the
aid of mirrors) are surprisingly effective in curing pain associated with
phantom limbs.²⁹
Perspective- In addition, the supposed lack of efficacy with respect to deceptive phenom-
dependence of
efficacy.
ena is perspective-dependent. It is true that water from a dream cannot water
our waking-world lawn. But the reverse holds as well: when suffering from
recurrent nightmares of a tiger it is no use putting a rifle next to one’s bed,
since real-world rifles are inefficacious when it comes to killing dream-tigers.
But if the efficacy of some phenomenon depends on the context it occurs in
(if something is efficacious-in-a-dream but not efficacious-in-waking-life) it
cannot be taken as indicative of a fundamental ontological distinction as
usually understood. Such distinctions are characterized precisely by not
depending on descriptive context. Whether (say) numbers and electrons
belong to distinct ontological categories is not generally considered as
dependent on the perspective we have on them, but a consequence of their
intrinsic natures.³⁰ But if efficacy is context-dependent it is a fundamentally
relational property, not an intrinsic one, and thus not one indicative of a
substantial ontological division between the efficacious and the non-
efficacious. We cannot then bring it in with the aim of justifying a substantial
ontological division between the veridical and the illusory.
Efficacy and The efficacy of our actions is usually regarded as the strongest reason for
success. believing that our model of the world ‘in here’ lines up in fundamental ways
with the basic structure of the world ‘out there’. If that was not the case, it is
argued, the success of our actions would be a miracle. How would we be able to
successfully fly to the moon, build skyscrapers or cure diseases if we did not
manage to get important aspects of the world right?
Lack of unique One thing to be aware of in this context is what might be called the problem
solutions. of the lacking unique solution. The world might be such that both an
action based on assumption A, and one based on assumption B lead to success,
even though A and B are mutually incompatible. In this case successful
action cannot be considered as a guide to the correctness of the underlying
assumptions.
Cryptanalysis. Consider the example of cryptanalysis. There are numerous ways of
deciphering an encrypted message; any such decryption needs to provide us
at least with a comprehensible plain text and a set of rules that tell us how to get
from plain text to encryption and back. That one is able to produce a decryp-
tion meeting these minimal conditions does not constitute strong evidence that
the plain text produced is in fact the one that was originally encoded. (Consider
the fact that our set of rules could simply be a set of substitution rules, saying

²⁸ Pilcher 2009. ²⁹ Ramachandran and Blakeslee 1998, chapter 3.

³⁰ See, however, Westerhoff 2005: VI: 1–2.
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‘replace the first symbol of the encrypted message by this letter, the second by
this letter and so on’ for all the symbols in the encrypted message.) Of course in
real world cryptanalysis we use subsidiary considerations that manage to rule
out most or all of these alternatives, taking into account which method of
encryption was probably used, what kind of content we suspect the coded
message to contain and so on. Yet the fact remains that the encrypted message
itself does not tell us whether our decryption was successful.³¹
A simpler case is constituted by the ‘Quinean’ crossword puzzle introduced
into the philosophical discussion by Daniel Dennett.³² These are crossword Quinean
puzzles that admit of two different solutions, so that each clue points to at least crossword
puzzles.
two words (with the same number of letters) and the set of all the first words
and the set of all the second words fit together in the way indicated by the
structure of the crossword.³³
Applying different rules to an encrypted piece of text we end up with
different decrypted messages, and some of these we consider as successful
decryptions. Interpreting the clues differently, we arrive at two different ways
of solving a crossword puzzle and may regard one of them as the right solution.
In the same way our interaction with the world results in some effects (it would
be peculiar if it did not) and some of these we consider as successful, others as
failures. But there is nothing in the world and nothing in us that determines
which of the interactions is a successful one, just as there is nothing about two
alternative decryptions that determines conclusively which arrived at the
original plaintext, and nothing in a solution to a Quinean crossword that
settles whether it or its rival is the correct one. If there is a lack of unique
solutions (and there is no reason to suppose that such cases are very rare) then
our successful action floats free of our ability to ‘get the world right’. In fact it is
not even clear what ‘getting the world right’ would mean, or what ‘solving the

³¹ This worry could be generalized. If we conceive of understanding the meaning of a given text
as a form of decryption, the fact that we can attribute a coherent meaning to a text does not imply
that this was the meaning the author had in mind, or that there was any author at all (as opposed to
a sentence-generating algorithm based on a randomizer, for example). Of course the number of
instances where we can attribute two radically different meanings to a substantial body of text are
very small, but this ‘is not because, as a matter of metaphysical fact, there are real meanings in there
(Quine’s “museum myth”), but because the cryptographer’s constraint [“if you can find one
solution to a puzzle, you’ll have found the only solution to the puzzle”] just makes it a vanishingly
small worry. [ . . . ] Intentional interpretation almost always asymptotes in the limit at a single
interpretation, but in the imaginable catastrophic case in which dual interpretations survived all
tests, there would be no deeper fact to settle which was “right”.’ Dennett 2000: 346 (emphases in the
original).
³² Dennett 2013: 175–7.
³³ Needless to say it is very difficult to construct crosswords of this kind having any but the
smallest size (Dennett’s example has a 3-by-3 grid). Yet to make the point that interests us it is not
necessary that every clue in the crossword points at two words. On the day of the presidential
election 1996 the New York Times ran a crossword in which one of the clues asked for the name of
the next president; both CLINTON and BOBDOLE worked as solutions.
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crossword puzzle’ would, as there is more than one way of doing so, and as
there is more than one way of construing what went on in the puzzle-setter’s
mind.
The second problem with using success as a guide to ontology is that there is
Success is not no objective conception of what ‘success’ amounts to. If we measure success in
an objective terms of the technological achievements just mentioned, our actions are
notion.
successful, yet if we focus on other goals (e.g. the indefinite extension of the
human lifespan, creating machines that can think, eliminating violent conflict)
precisely this success is lacking. Generally speaking a worldview that regarded
human actions in the world as not very successful overall would also be less
inclined towards the kind of epistemic optimism the belief in the efficacy of our
actions seems to bring with it. If we don’t think we get it right most of the time,
why should we believe we see matters in the right way most of the time? Yet in
the absence of an argument to decide between the two alternatives that human
activity overall should be considered as successful or that it should not, an
appeal to the former in order to defend the assumption of an external world
appears to be less secure than one might have hoped.
Using the success of our actions as an indicator that our model of the world
largely corresponds to the way the world really is overlooks that our models
and our goals develop together. We construct certain models or devise certain
theories in order to achieve specific aims. Had we had other aims we would
have devised different theories, thereby ending up with a different model of the
world, yet often also with one that—according to its own definition of
success—achieves its aims. But if our notion of success is part of the model,
we cannot use it as a bridge across the model–world divide. In order to achieve
this we would have to assume that what success means is something that holds
in an objective, mind-independent fashion, and this is an assumption that is
very hard to justify. Success is a useful concept we employ to classify our
interactions with the world, and to adapt our interactions in the future. But it
would be baseless to assume that the interactions we grouped into the ‘suc-
cessful’ kind are based on representations that ‘get the world right’, while
others are not.
§12 The Three Criteria as a Reflective Equilibrium
It thus appears that none of the three criteria of coherence, intersubjectivity,
and efficacy succeed in drawing a clear boundary between the illusory and the
veridical. But that does not mean they are not useful in any way. An unclear
boundary is not the same as no boundary, as any of the world’s border disputes
can illustrate.
Reflective As the preceding discussion showed, we cannot equate the veridical with all
equilibrium for and only those perceptions that are mutually coherent, intersubjective, and
inferential
practices. efficacious, as we cannot equate the illusory with anything that fails to satisfy
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one of these criteria. But we are still able to reach a reflective equilibrium that
takes into account the three criteria and results in a mutually supportive and
mutually explanatory set of beliefs about which objects of perception are to be
counted as illusory and which as non-illusory. This can be understood along
the lines of the method for the justification of inferences proposed by Nelson
Goodman in his 1955 Fact, Fiction, and Forecast. The two factors to be brought
into an equilibrium in his case are the inferential practices we intuitively regard
as valid, and those inferences sanctioned by whatever system of logic we accept.
Rather than simply choosing one over the other in cases of conflict we should
conceive of the two as influencing each other: the intuitions support the formal
systems we develop; their development then produces more inferential pat-
terns which might change our initial intuitions; these revised intuitions might
then cause us to adapt the formal system, and so on. As the process continues,
the changes in our intuitions and the revisions of the formal system become
smaller and smaller, until a balanced state is reached where the discrepancies
between the two are minimized.
In the same way, we would want to argue, our intuitive views of what is Reflective
equilibrium for
deceptive and what is not can be explicated in terms of some set of criteria the illusion/
(such as the three just mentioned); applying these criteria may then influence reality
and refine our intuitions, which may then be reflected in revised criteria, and so distinction.
forth until a balance is achieved between those phenomena we intuitively
regard as illusory, and those our theory labels as illusory. In this way our
intuitions can be brought into balance with the verdict some theory delivers;
practice and principles can help to shape and inform each other.
While this explains why it is useful to think of the illusory/veridical distinc- This does not
tion as connected in an important way with the notions of coherence, inter- justify an
ontological
subjectivity, and predictive success, it is obviously no justification for an distinction.
ontological distinction between what is illusory and what is veridical. The
criteria can play a certain pragmatic role, but to see them as indicative of a
joint in the nature of reality is to overestimate their significance. Even if there
was no external world, referring to coherence, intersubjectivity, and predictive
success would allow us to achieve a conceptual distinction between the illusory
and the veridical, without there being any ontological chasm corresponding to
it. This point can be illustrated by briefly considering the deception hypothesis.
§13 The Deception Hypothesis
Anybody with even the slightest acquaintance with philosophy will have come The dream
across the dream hypothesis.³⁴ The dream hypothesis is, of course, the assump- hypothesis.
tion that we are presently not awake, but asleep and dreaming, so that

³⁴ Usually in the context of the Cartesian meditations. Modern cinematic audiences may be
more familiar with the dystopian variety developed in the Matrix trilogy.
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everything we think is happening in the waking world is in fact happening in a

dream. I want to focus on a somewhat broader understanding of this idea, one
that incorporates a number of hypotheses claiming that we live in a kind of
simulated reality—whether this simulation is a dream manufactured by our
sleeping brain, or by an evil scientist feeding electrical impulses into our
sedated body, whether it is the classical brain-in-a-vat scenario or some
other, yet unknown process of presenting us with a counterfeit world.
I will refer to this as the deception hypothesis. The deception hypothesis is a
disjunction of a number of mutually inconsistent hypotheses. What is common
to all of them is the claim that we are subject to a comprehensive error
regarding the world around us. The deception hypothesis subsumes the claims
that the objects of our current acquaintance are sights seen in a dream; that our
present experience is a single, complex hallucination; that what we think of as
the external world is a script fed into our brain directly by a mad scientist,³⁵
while our body lies unconscious in his laboratory; that we don’t have a body at
all but are simply an artificially stimulated brain in a vat;³⁶ that we are a
disembodied, immaterial soul deceived by a powerful demon to believe that
it has a material body placed in a material world, and so on.

³⁵ The setup described in the ‘simulation argument’ (Bostrom 2003) differs in important
respects and is not included in our understanding of the deception hypothesis. We will discuss
the simulation argument in Chapter 2, §71.
³⁶ The ‘brain-in-a-vat’ variety of the deception hypothesis is sometimes accused of inconsistency
by appeal to forms of externalist semantics motivated by Putnam’s twin-earth scenario, arguing
that because I think that water is wet, while no brain in a vat can think that water is wet, I cannot be
a brain in a vat (see e.g. Warfield 1995: 530). There is a considerable amount of discussion of this
argument in the contemporary philosophical literature (see e.g. Goldberg 2016 for a recent
anthology) and we could not possibly do it justice here. Let me just make three points.
First, the ‘brain-in-a-vat’ argument cannot cover all scenarios that fall under the deception
hypothesis (such as recently envatted brains, see Brueckner 1992, 2016: 24–5; Wright 1994: 234).
Second, assume we grant that if I believe that water is wet then I cannot be a brain in a vat
(accepting the premiss that envatted brains cannot enter into referential relations with entities that
do not exist in their world, such as water). I might still take myself to be mistaken about believing
that water is wet. If I lived in a world in which there was no water, but rather some complex
hallucination that people regarded as water I would be wrong in my assumption about what
I believed. If semantic externalism is right, we need to have some knowledge of the extracranial
world to determine what our beliefs are about (since both meanings and beliefs ‘just ain’t in the
head’), but it is precisely the existence of this knowledge that the deception hypothesis attempts to
undermine in the first place. At this point the debate is likely to reach an impasse, with Putnam
considering questioning the belief that water is wet as a slide into unanswerable ‘infinitely
regressive scepticism’ (1994b: 284), while the opponent considers the assumption of its veracity
(and with it the assumption that my usage of ‘water’ picks out real water) as question-begging.
Third, the defender of Putnam’s argument needs some way of ruling out that it could just be used
by a brain in a vat to convince itself that it is not a brain in a vat. If that was possible, we have gained
little, because we might now worry that that is a situation we are in. (Wright (1994: 233) argues that
a brain in a vat might work through the words of the argument, but cannot have the accompanying
thoughts, unfortunately without giving further support for this assumption. And even if this is
accepted, might it still appear to the brain in a vat as if it was having the accompanying thoughts?
And how would this differ from really having the thoughts?)
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The deception hypothesis can be employed for a variety of philosophical

ends. An obvious one is to challenge our belief in the mind-independent The deception
hypothesis and
external world of material objects around us. For if the deception hypothesis
the external
is true, all the supposedly material objects of our acquaintance, the desk, the world.
chair, the pen, and so on exist only as internal, mind-made entities, as dream
images or as empty representations manufactured by the creator of the simu-
lation. And if there is some probability that the deception hypothesis is true our
belief in a world of mind-independent objects ‘out there’ will be undermined in
proportion to this probability.
However, if the deception hypothesis raises the possibility of a perfect Perfect
simulation, a simulation that we cannot distinguish in any way from the simulations.

waking world, such a simulation would leave everything as it is. We can

distinguish what is veridical (seeing this desk) from what is deceptive (seeing
a straight stick as bent) in this world, so why would this distinction be suddenly
challenged if we found ourselves in a perfect replica?³⁷ If the replica is perfect,
everything present in the world to be replicated is also present in the replicated
world, and this includes the distinction between instances of perception that
are veridical and those that are illusory.
The reason why this particular distinction does not disappear is because the The illusion/
distinction between the veridical and the illusory does not rely on the existence reality distinc-
tion as a purely
of a world of external objects, as we have just argued. Our criteria for drawing internal
the distinction between the illusory and the veridical are purely based on how distinction.
some of our perceptions are related to other perceptions. We cannot go out
into the external world to check whether the desk as it appears in front of us is
really a veridical representation of the desk itself, but we can note that our
desk-perceptions cohere with our other perceptions, that we perceive other
people claiming to perceive the desk too, something that never happens in the
case of perceiving a headache or an after-image, and that we can successfully
interact with the desk.
The deception hypothesis will not undermine the distinction between the
deceptive and the non-deceptive, understood as above in terms of a reflective
equilibrium of coherence, intersubjectivity, and efficacy because all the distinc-
tions between different kinds of perception in terms of these criteria can be
drawn in precisely the same way from within the deception scenario. The mere
fact that the deception hypothesis obtains does not imply that we cannot
distinguish a spoon-appearance that coheres with our other perceptions from

³⁷ One author who raises this is J.J. Valberg, noting that: ‘Dream skepticism calls everything into
question. But in a way it leaves everything as it is: it does not touch my knowledge of the external
world’ (2007: 112). ‘If THIS were a dream, would the object I am examining, this object, be any less
of a hand? Would it be of the order of an image, an internal object of some kind? No, it would be
just what it is. It would be just as real, that is, just as independent of its presence in my experience,
as it is in reality’ (2007:112).
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one that pops up at random, one that we alone can see, and one that our
(simulated) fellow beings claim to be able to see as well, or one that we can use
at the table from one that vanishes in our hands once we touch it.
All of this shows that the distinction between the deceptive and the non-
deceptive developed so far is unable to establish any ontological distinction.
The two different spoon-perceptions in the deception scenario have the same
ontological status, yet the criteria we just examined place them on different
sides of the deceptive/non-deceptive divide.

C Establishing a Plausible Epistemology

§14 A Plausible Epistemology Requires Postulating an External World
Suppose we agree on the basis of the preceding argument that postulating the
existence of an external world is not necessary for explaining the difference
between veridical and illusory states. Still, there remains a substantial reason
for assuming the existence of an external world. It is the desire to come up with
a satisfactory epistemology, the desire to account for how we acquire know-
ledge of the world.³⁸ Practically all epistemological theories taken seriously by
philosophers involve reference to the external world at a crucial place. This is
not an accident. It seems that to explain how we can have any knowledge of the
things we think we know, we need to postulate the existence of external objects.
Both direct realist and representationalist theories of perception incorporate
references to an external world. For the direct realist we stand in a cognitively
The veil of unmediated relation with objects in this world; for the representationalist the
perception. external world is screened off by the veil of perception,³⁹ and the perceptual
relation only connects us in a cognitively unmediated manner with the repre-
sentation of objects, not with the objects themselves.
We can diagram this fundamental representationalist idea in the following
way:
perceiver ) percept || veil of perception || ( object

The left-hand side contains us, the perceiver; on the right-hand side is the
object we perceive. Somehow the object, through the veil of perception, gives
rise to the percept, also on our side of the veil. This percept is something we can

³⁸ The sceptical position, the view that we have no knowledge whatsoever, is of course not
motivated to postulate an external world in order to develop a plausible epistemology. However,
scepticism is not a position I want to defend here.
³⁹ Though the idea of a ‘veil of perception’ is usually associated with John Locke (see Bennett
1971: 69) it is by no means confined to Lockean empiricism. See Button 2013, ch. 6 for a recent take
on this metaphor.
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be in direct contact with, unlike the object, which is shielded from us by the veil
of perception.
Someone familiar with contemporary theory of knowledge might think that The veil of per-
the idea of a ‘veil’ between us and the world is a relic of a bygone age in ception and
extended
epistemology. If, as the defenders of extended cognition argue, external objects cognition.
such as notebooks and smartphones form part of processes that would really be
regarded as part of our cognitive system if they happened to be inside our
heads,⁴⁰ does this not entail that the distinction between ‘in here’ and ‘out
there’ is becoming sufficiently blurred to make the idea of a clearly defined veil
between the two obsolete? Or, as some proponents of the idea of embodied
cognition point out, if we can do without internal representations of the world,
letting the body and world act as its own model, does the idea of something
model-like at the left-hand-side of the veil not suddenly become questionable?⁴¹
Consigning the veil of perception to the graveyard of the history of ideas may be
premature, though. As will become evident from the discussion of three con-
temporary theories of knowledge and mind below, the concept of the veil of
perception continues to play an important theoretical role and has been
made considerably more precise within the mathematical frameworks that
some of these theories employ. It appears that, despite the increasing importance
of research into 4E (embodied, embedded, extended, enactive) cognition, the veil
of perception remains a useful part of the epistemologist’s toolkit.⁴²
Despite being hidden behind the veil of perception, the object and the
external world that contains it are an essential part of representationalist
theories since they are what brings about the representations in the first
place. For the direct realist, the object and the external world that contains it Existence and
are what we are in direct epistemic contact with.⁴³ Direct realism and repre- accuracy
requirement.
sentationalism are therefore both committed to the existence of the external
world (we will call this the existence requirement). Apart from the existence
requirement, direct realism and representationalism also agree in another
respect, which we will call the accuracy requirement. This is the demand that
there are certain aspects or properties of the external world that the perceptual

⁴⁰ Clark 2008: 76; see also Clark/Chalmers 1998.

⁴¹ On such interpretations of the idea of embodied cognition see e.g. Brooks 1991; Noë 2004,
2006; Hutto and Myin 2013.
⁴² For remarks on the compatibility of some ways of understanding the veil of perception and
research into embodied, enactive, and extended cognition see Clark 2017.
⁴³ ‘Thus if we ask a Naïve Realist what sort of thing it is whose existence he knows of in an act of
perceptual consciousness, he answers: It is that which visual and tactual sense-data are parts of the
surface of. And having a surface, it must be a three-dimensional entity located in space’. (Price
1964, 26). ‘In recent years, therefore, “direct realism” has been usually reserved for the view that
perceptual experience is constituted by the subject’s standing in certain relations to external objects,
where this relation is not mediated by or analyzable in terms of further, inner states of the agent.’
(Lyons 2017, section 2.3.3).
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relation accurately portrays. There is specific information about the things

perceived, the objectum quod percipitur, to use the scholastic phrase (whatever
this object may be) that the perceptual relation delivers to us in a veridical
manner.
The accuracy The accuracy requirement claims that there is some structural resemblance
requirement, between the entity perceived, and the external object that is the cause of
resemblance,
and causation. perception. Direct realism trivially satisfies the existence requirement, since
for the direct realist the entity perceived simply is the object out there that is
the cause of perception. And since every object resembles itself, the direct
realist’s account of perception trivially satisfies the accuracy requirement.
In the case of the representationalist, the accuracy requirement demands a
resemblance between the perceptual representation and the external cause of
the representation. Such a resemblance may take many different forms. It may
be located in relation to the ‘joints of nature’ that our representations carve.
In this case it is assumed that there are specific natural kinds out there, and
our conceptualization is set up in such a way (perhaps via its evolutionary
development) that it contains concepts corresponding to these kinds. Resem-
blance may be based on the idea that there very general mathematical prop-
erties of the represented that our representations share. Or, more specifically,
resemblance may be the sharing of particular ontological structures: our
representations of the world are phrased in terms of individuals, properties,
and relations, and the world is structured along similar lines.
Note that even a very minimalist understanding of the represented as
whatever it is that reliably causes the perceptions that we in fact have is
committed to a structural resemblance with the represented. Such an under-
standing has to assume a basic resemblance between representation and
represented as being located in the same spatio-temporal network. If we regard
something as a reliable cause of our perceptions we have to make a number of
assumptions about this something. It must exist in space and time, and its
temporal existence must link up with the temporal existence of our percep-
tions: the something could, for example, not only exist after we have the
relevant perceptions, but would have to exist previously or simultaneously.
Moreover, if causal powers are considered to reside in some way in the things
(and not just in our minds), the something would have to have this kind of
power inherent in it, together with some mechanism that manifests the powers
at specific times.
Does the In the following I want to argue that it is exceedingly hard for both direct
existence realist and representationalist theories of perception to satisfy the accuracy
requirement
make sense requirement. Yet if this is gone, and if all we are left with is the existence
without the requirement, we might ask ourselves what explanatory function it still serves.
accuracy
requirement? This may then also be the time to consider whether it might not be possible to
come up with a theory of perception that does without the existence requirement.
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Direct realism tries to establish the accuracy requirement via our direct Both types of
perceptual relation to a world of external objects. If my perceptual powers epistemology
endorse the
put me in direct contact with a teacup, how could I not discern at least some of accuracy
its features correctly? In the representationalist case our perceptual relation requirement.

only touches the veil of perception, so to speak, made of representations. But

here too most representationalist theories assume that some aspects of the
world behind the veil can be discerned at our side of the veil, like some of the
shape of a statue may be made out through a cloak hiding it. The external
world ‘pushes’ the representational veil in specific ways, and it is via the results
of these pushes that we can accurately perceive features of the external world in
a representationalist framework.⁴⁴
However, if we consider in detail how this is supposed to work, it becomes
very hard to see how the accuracy requirement is supposed to be satisfied. We
will consider both the direct realist and the representationalist account of
spelling out the accuracy requirement in turn.
§15 Direct Realism
Direct realism is the view that our perceptions put us into direct or immediate
contact with the world of objects. This world is generally conceived of as a
realm of external, material,⁴⁵ mind-independent objects that our minds link up
with in the production of knowledge.⁴⁶ Direct realism is an intuitively very
appealing position, at least as long as we consider our epistemic interaction
with the world as a form of causal interaction. When we set a billiard ball in
motion we cause something in the external world to move, and when we feel
the touch of the teacup against our hand, look at the tree, or conduct experi-
ments involving electrons we are at one end of an epistemological causal chain
that has the external object at the other end.⁴⁷ It is the existence of such
epistemic relations that is supposed to imply the existence of an external
world. However, in order to turn this somewhat vague idea of direct contact
with a world of objects into a satisfactory theory of knowledge we need to add
various qualifications.

⁴⁴ Note that if this idea is spelt out as saying that all we can know about the world behind the veil
is its structure, this gets us straight into the Newman problem. See Ainsworth 2009 for a detailed
discussion.
⁴⁵ There is no reason in principle, though, why one could not link up direct realism with an
idealist ontology.
⁴⁶ Compare, for example, the characterization of direct realism in Le Morvan (2004: 221) as
an ‘immediate or direct awareness of mind-independent physical objects or events in the
external world’.
⁴⁷ The direct realist can be a fallibilist about the nature of these external objects. They can simply
be considered to be whatever our best current physics tells us is causally responsible for the
regularities in our experiences. We might be radically wrong about this, but then direct realism’s
aim is a theory of perception, not the refutation of scepticism.
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§16 Immediacy
First, it is important to note that the ‘directness’ or ‘immediacy’ of direct
realism cannot be understood as causal immediacy. Consider a chain of falling
dominos. That domino directly adjacent to this one is the cause of this
domino’s falling, and it is also its immediate cause: there is no other event e
such that that domino’s falling causes e, and e causes this domino to fall. The
relation between objects and events in the external world and the perceptions
they bring about is clearly nothing like this.
Complexity of Empirical investigation into the processes of perception shows that the
the perceptual
process.
causal chains from sensory input to perception are extraordinarily complex
and involve a large (though finite) amount of intermediate causal steps.
A simple perceptual event like the visual perception of a teacup begins with
photons bouncing off the teacup’s surface, travelling through space and
through the optical mechanism that is our eye until they hit the retina, interact
in a complex chemical process with our retinal cells, sending electrical
impulses through the optic nerve that are then processed by our brain. Yet
while the number of immediate events between the teacup being illuminated
and us seeing the teacup is very large, and there is therefore no justification for
assuming any immediate causal connection between our perceptions and the
external world, we might wonder whether it makes sense to speak of immediate
causal relations even in simple cases like the chain of dominos. If causation,
Density of like time, is dense, then for any causal sequence ‘A causes B’ there will be an
causation. additional causal relatum X such that A causes X, and X causes B. Since causal
sequences can thus be interpolated indefinitely there will be no proximate
causation, nothing will be ‘directly’ causing anything else.⁴⁸
Causal and The direct realist will therefore typically interpret talk of the ‘directness’ or
cognitive ‘immediacy’ of perception as cognitive directness or immediacy. Despite the
immediacy.
fact that all of these different events happen between the illumination of the
cup and our perception of it, what we perceive is not any member in this chain
of intervening events, but only its last member, the cup.
This response is fine as far as it goes, and it is certainly not the case that
accepting the causal indirectness of perception would also commit us to an
intermediate representational layer between us and the external world, such as
a sense-datum, an image, or a sensation. The direct realist can circumvent the
criticism that the perceptual relation is not direct by accepting that it is not
causally direct, but that it is still cognitively or representationally direct. There
may be many causal steps between the perceiver and the percept, but that does
not mean that any of the steps form part of the perceptual process, and that
there is therefore an intermediate cognitive or representational layer between

⁴⁸ Chakravartty 2005. See also Fales 1990: ch 5; Mellor 1995. If the causal chain is dense there
will be infinitely many causal steps separating the perceiver from the object perceived.
  -     

us and the percept, as the representationalist assumes. Two houses in a street

may be direct neighbours, even though there is a considerable space between
them. This, however, does not undermine the directness of their relation as
long as there is no other house that comes between them. Or, to use a different
example: suppose Alice and Bob communicate by email. Even though their
exchange of messages is facilitated by a complex chain of computational
transmission that begins with the typed input at one end and ends with a
message on a display at the other end the two are still communicating directly
with one another (unlike, for example, a case where Alice’s secretary formed
part of the chain of transmission. In this case Alice would be communicating
with Bob only indirectly, via her secretary. But in this case there would be
another person forming a part of the chain that connects Alice and Bob.)
I believe that this response is able to show that causal indirectness need not
carry representational indirectness in its wake. Yet it faces the difficulty of
introducing a gulf between what we perceive and what appears to us that seems Introducing a
gulf between
to undermine many of the theoretical benefits of postulating a ‘direct’ perception and
relation between our perceptions and the world in the first place. If we appearance.
assume that we perceive whatever is at the far end of the perceptual chain
this means that the elliptical shape of a coin appears to us on the table in
front, albeit what we perceive is a perfectly circular coin, though we happen
to see it at an angle. Since an ellipse is different from a circle what appears to
us cannot be what we perceive, and despite the fact that the direct realist has
avoided the representationalist’s level of representation he now has to deal
with a level of ways of appearance. The direct realist obviously has something
to say in response, and we will discuss this in greater detail in §18. Before we
get to this, however, let us consider one further potential challenge to direct
realism.
§17 Simultaneity
A second observation that follows immediately from the empirical study of Time-lag
perception is that perception and object perceived are not only separated by a argument.
long and complex causal chain, but that they also cannot be simultaneous. The
sequence of causes that results in a given perception has to happen in time, and
for this reason the perception at time t will not be a perception of an object as it
is at t, but of the way it was at an earlier moment t-1. Depending on the kind of
object involved, the temporal distance between t and t-1 can be enormous.
Distant stars are an obvious example; the light we perceive now was emitted by
the star a long time ago in the past. The star might no longer exist, and we
would in this case be perceiving a (now) non-existent object.⁴⁹ Yet whether the

⁴⁹ The literature on the implications of the time-lag argument on direct realism is extensive, and
we do not have the space here to consider possible realist rejoinders. For a good survey of the
literature see Gram 1983: chapter 5.
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temporal distances are big or small, the fundamental problem remains.⁵⁰ Being
non-existent, the star cannot be numerically identical with the object the
astronomer perceives, and similarly, the temporal stage of the teacup that
caused our perception of it will already have passed out of existence once the
perception has been brought about.⁵¹ Again, the object of our perception then
cannot be numerically identical with its cause.
Presentism. The problem spreads if we combine this approach of perception with a
presentist metaphysics according to which only the present exists. For even if
the distance between t and t-1 is only a second, when I perceive the cup my
perception is of something that no longer has any ontological status, for objects
one second ago are no longer present. (There will usually be a continuant of the
cup of one second ago that exists now, but this is not the cup I perceive at t, but
at best the cup I will perceive at t+1.)⁵²
It now seems as if we have left the existence requirement behind, since our
perception would no longer connect us with an external world that has any
existential status. What would happen to the accuracy requirement in this case
depends on your metaphysics of non-existent objects. Only if the question
whether we can correctly represent something that fails to exist can be made
sense of could anything like the accuracy requirement still be meaningful.
Alternatives to The way direct realists usually respond to this problem is by rejecting
presentism. presentism, opting either for a block universe view (according to which past,
present, and future exist as part of one four-dimensional space-time ‘block’) or
for a pancake-stack model (according to which increasing layers of present
moments get added to the stack of past moments as they cease being present).
According to both accounts the teacup at t-1 does exist (though it is not
present), and as such perception can connect us with this existent past object.
This is a reasonable reply, assuming we are happy to accept the ontological
costs these two models of time entail. However, it also implies that, according
to the direct realist view, we do not actually perceive what we think we
perceive, as long as we believe that our perception presents us with a simul-
taneous picture of the world, a world as it is at present. In fact we are never
perceptually connected with the world as it is at present, and only with the

⁵⁰ Mandelbaum 1966: 182.

⁵¹ Presupposing that things like teacups are instantaneous stages in a four-dimensional universe
(that ‘the world is full of very short-lived objects existing in succession’ Hawley 2001: 42; see also
Sider 2001: 188–92), rather than aggregates of such stages (‘space-time worms’). For a phenom-
enological argument that we are stages see Parsons 2015.
⁵² The reason why our inability to perceive the present does not cause greater problems for our
perceptual abilities is that things in the world that are relevant for our day-to-day interactions do
not change very rapidly relative to the speed of our perceptual processing. We can still catch a
moving object, even though by the time we have perceived it at some location it is no longer there.
If most objects moved much faster, or if our processing speed was much slower, this would no
longer be possible.
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world of the past. This is a peculiar result, at least if we assume that the direct
realist view is supposed to systematize the ‘naïve’ what-you-see-is-what-you-
get view of perception. Representationalism and direct realism share the
predicament that we do not actually perceive what we think we perceive:
according to the representationalist we do not perceive the present teacup
because what we perceive is present, but no teacup (but a teacup representa-
tion), whereas direct realism does not give us the present teacup either (it does
give us a teacup, but not a present one). Once the direct realist responds that
perception gives us how things were a few milliseconds ago, which is quite a
reliable predictor of how things are at the present moment he has replaced
direct acquaintance with a probabilistic inference, namely with they idea that it
is likely that things are now the way they were a few milliseconds ago. The
problem is not that this inference is not usually justified, but that it once again
opens up a gap between what we perceive and what appears to us. What we
perceive is the object as it was some milliseconds ago, what appears to us is the
object as existing now. We can then appeal to an inferential relation in order to
bridge this gap, but once we have done so we have moved away considerably
from the direct realist idea that tries to dispense with any distinction between
the object perceived and the way that object appears to us.
§18 Illusions
Spelling out direct realism also requires us to give a satisfactory account of
illusory perceptions. Such perceptions are extremely common, and include
perceptions of round things that look elliptical, of white things perceived as
pink under red light,⁵³ reflections mistaken for the objects themselves, illusory
puddles observed on a hot road, straight sticks looking bent, sour things tasting
sweet after consuming synsepalum dulcificum, phantom smells, the Shepard
tone, the rubber hand illusion, and so on.⁵⁴ A direct realist account of percep-
tions appears to run into problems here, since there does not seem to be
anything elliptical, pink, sweet, and so on out there in the world that this
instance of perception immediately and directly acquaints us with. At this stage
direct realists generally introduce a third item in addition to the perceiver and How direct
the perceived object, a perspective, or point of view, or set of conditions or realism accounts
for illusions.
circumstances relative to which a specific object is observed.⁵⁵ The idea is that

⁵³ For the more general problem of metamers and its relation to the realism debate see Hoffman
et al. 2015a: 1483.
⁵⁴ We may add to these the more common illusions that form an intrinsic part of our normal
perception of the world. We know that the table in front of us is mostly empty space, that what is
‘now’ for me is not identical with the ‘now’ of someone moving relative to me, and so on. We know
all of these, but this is obviously not how we perceive the world: we perceive the table as solid, and
simultaneity as absolute.
⁵⁵ There are various ways in which this idea can be spelt out. See Campbell 2009; Brewer 2011;
Logue 2012 for some examples.
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in addition to the white disc (the external object) and the perceiving subject
there is also a collection of facts F, facts about lightning, the spatio-temporal
position of the observer relative to the disc, the structure of our visual systems
and the processing of colour perception in the brain. We can then claim that
whenever an observer perceives a white disc under a set of conditions F he will
perceive it as a pink ellipse. The facts in F are facts about how matters stand in
an objective way, they are not facts about how the object is represented. In this
way the direct realist will be able to account for illusory perceptions without
having to refer to the central notion of the representationalist account: repre-
sentations of externalobjects in our mind.
It is therefore possible for direct realists to hold that the external and mind-
independent objects of our acquaintance appear differently from the way they
Consequences are. Yet in order to hold on to the accuracy requirement the direct realist has to
for the accuracy
claim that this divergence between appearance and reality does not hold for all
requirement.
aspects of the perceived object: at least some of the properties of the object
perceived must be accurately represented. However, it is hard to see where our
conviction in the truth of this claim should come from.
The idea that perception puts us into direct or immediate contact with the
world of objects seems to have been eroded. Perception is no longer a two-
place relation between perceiver and perceived, as there is now a third entity
(the set of facts F) that effectively acts like a filter between the two, modulating
the information going from the perceived to the perceiver such that, for
example, we see a white disc as pink.
Although the set of facts F is as much part of the world as the white disc,
those facts that form part of our perceptual system (such as those pertaining to
the processing of colour perception in the brain) are wholly transparent. We
see straight through them, and they cannot themselves be perceived (otherwise
we would have access to some ‘filter-less’ perception in which to perceive
our perceptual processes that were modulated by the facts F). Nevertheless,
they determine how our perceptual information is filtered and in this way
they function like a veil that influences our perception of entities distinct from
the veil.
Moreover, there is no reason why the set of facts F may not in principle
modify any feature of the perceived object, and why the set of facts F, which has
nothing to do with the object, should not make an equally great or even greater
contribution to how the object appears than the object itself. In fact the claim
that such modulation only happens in a few cases where strange lighting,
mirrors, or similar devices are involved is quite implausible. Even if we just
restrict ourselves to the subset of facts F that form part of the human perceptual
system it is evident that empirical research into how perception works presents
us with abundant evidence for the modulation of perception by facts from this
subset. Yet if it is the case that such modulation is widespread and could apply to
  -     

any feature of an object perceived, while the existence requirement is still

satisfied we can no longer be assured that the accuracy requirement is satisfied
by direct realist theories of perception. It is perfectly compatible with this
version of the direct realist approach that all the features of some object that
appear to us are a consequence of circumstantial factors, apart from its mere
existence, which is the cause for its appearance in the first place.
To illustrate this point, consider the following thought experiment. Assume The problem of
you are an artificially stimulated brain that receives all its input from a virtual randomized
input.
reality software. You are having a set of interesting and entirely realistic
experiences involving a ride in a gondola across the Canale Grande. It later
turns out, however, that by a mistake your brain never got connected to the
output of a VR software, but was always fed from a randomizer. Everything
that went into your brain was a sequence of impulses that could have equally
been generated by a monkey tossing a coin. The direct realist will have to
assume that your perception in this case would have been ‘directly related’ to
the output of the randomizer. This would be the case even though the content
of the gondola experience was entirely the product of your internal filters and given
a different set of filters an entirely different experience would have been produced
from the same random input. There is no resemblance that we can determine
between the gondola experience and the randomized input, yet we would still have
to say that one is a direct perception of the other, to the extent that the randomized
input, together with the internal filters, is the cause of the experience.
The fact that any features of the perceived object may be modulated by Convention-
circumstantial factors also makes it impossible to claim, as the direct realist dependence of
‘veridical
would want to, that the difference between illusory and direct perception is perception’.
grounded in the fact that the veridical perceptions get something right that all
the illusory perceptions get wrong. Yet if different sets of facts F modulate the
perception of a coin, say, such that it looks round in the first case, elliptical in the
second, and flat in the third, unless we have some prior account of which of these
three corresponds to a feature the coin ‘really’ has (that is, in an intrinsic and
circumstantially unmodulated way), we cannot say which of these perceptions
are veridical, and which illusory. This distinction must ultimately be made by
appeal to conventions, but cannot be grounded in the nature of things.⁵⁶
§19 Hallucinations
This fact becomes particularly clear when we consider the direct realist’s
take on hallucinations. Here we are no longer talking about objects that are
misperceived (like the white disc that is seen as a pink ellipse), but about
perceiving objects that are not there, such as Macbeth’s dagger. Direct realism’s

⁵⁶ This point is also made in Kenneth Hobson’s review of Brewer 2011 (Hobson 2013).
   -    

commitment to spelling out perception as a direct or immediate contact with a

world of external, physical objects will find it hard to spell out what precisely
Macbeth is seeing when he sees the dagger.
The most common direct realist procedure for dealing with this issue is a
Disjunctivism. form of disjunctivism. This claims that there are two different states we can be
in when we think we see a dagger. One is a good epistemic state, where there
really is a dagger we are epistemically related to; the other is a bad epistemic
state, subjectively indistinguishable from a good state, and one that, given the
absence of any dagger it is related to, is not actually a perception at all, in the
same way in which a fake coin is not really a coin.
Disjunctivism is a position that is widely discussed within contemporary
Epistemological epistemology⁵⁷ and can take a variety of different forms. A mild version of
disjunctivism. disjunctivism, epistemological disjunctivism, appears largely unproblematic.
This is the thought that two indistinguishable mental events (say, the percep-
tion of a cup and the hallucination of a cup) have, despite our inability to find a
qualitative difference between them, a different status, due to the way that they
relate to other mental events. Paul Snowdown asks:
[W]hy cannot a single basic sort of (inner) experience have quite different
epistemological significance in different cases, depending, say, on the con-
text [ . . . ]?⁵⁸
The three criteria of coherence, intersubjectivity, and efficacy accomplish
precisely that. They refer to relations between different mental events (all of
which are undistinguishable for us in terms of their veridicality or lack thereof)
which allow us to group them into two camps, the deceptive and the non-
deceptive. This makes it possible to speak of perceptions and illusions/hallu-
cinations as belonging to different kinds. None of this has, of course, anything
to do with one type being ‘about the world’, while the other is not.
Metaphysical A stronger form of disjunctivism, metaphysical disjunctivism,⁵⁹ holds that in
disjunctivism. the case of the perceived cup and the hallucinated cup we are dealing with
experiences of a fundamentally different kind. They are different not because
of the way in which different kinds of perceptions (or perception-like events)
relate to each other but because they are different kinds of mental states and are
caused by different things. It is not just that they have a different epistemic
status resulting from how we group different experiences together, but because

⁵⁷ Haddock/Macpherson 2008; Byrne/Logue 2009; Pritchard 2012; Soteriou 2016.

⁵⁸ 2005: 140.
⁵⁹ Another form of disjunctivism, phenomenal disjunctivism (see Martin 2006) argues that a
cup-perception and a cup-hallucination do not even have a phenomenal character in common.
If the ‘phenomenal character’ of an experience refers to what it is like to have this experience
(assuming, ex hypothesi, that perception and hallucination are internally indistinguishable) I find it
hard to make sense of this idea.
  -     

at the bottom level they are different kinds of entities.⁶⁰ The perception of the
cup is caused by an external, medium-sized object made of porcelain, while the
hallucination of a cup is something else: it is a belief-like state, or a sensory
experience with representational content caused by something other than a
cup (perhaps by a neurological malfunction, or the consumption of hallucino-
genic drugs).
One of the motivations for disjunctivist endeavours is the supposed protec-
tion they afford against the sceptical threat. The Cartesian demon raises the
worrying possibility that we could have the very same experiences we have
now, but be radically deceived about the world behind these experiences,
because all of them have been fed to us by an evil demon. For the metaphysical
disjunctivist, this possibility does not arise. For if our experiences are demon-
made, they are not of the same fundamental kind as the experiences we have
now, because they are not veridical.
The disjunctivist response has the advantage of removing the problematic
cases of hallucinations from the domain of a direct realist theory of perception
(because they are no longer regarded as perceptions), but also has the flavour of Disjunctivism as
a dialectical sleight of hand. Consider the following example. A curator is epistemological
prestidigitation.
confronted with the fact that several paintings in the museum’s collection are
forgeries. He is given the task of cleaning up the collection by removing all the
forgeries. Instead of spending months on end concerned with stock-taking,
researching provenance, analysis of pigments, and so on, he solves the problem
without even getting up from his desk. He simply stipulates that nothing in the
collection that is a forgery is in fact a painting. There are, therefore, no more
forged paintings in the collection.
Imagine in addition that the curator would not be able to say anything
positive about what makes a forgery a forgery, apart from pointing out that a
forgery is not a painting, even though it is indistinguishable from one. Many
forms of disjunctivism provide only a negative characterization of mental
states like hallucinations: all that can be said about them is that they are not
perceptual states, though indistinguishable from them. Yet the absence of a
positive characterization confirms the worry that disjunctivism’s chief aim is to
rule out a group of rival theories of perception, rather than an independently
motivated approach that is likely to deliver a substantial theory of perception.
Disjunctivism has to accomplish more as a theory. It has to give us inde-
pendent reasons for believing that there are two kinds of perceptual states,
otherwise it looks as if its only way of addressing the problem of the epistemic

⁶⁰ Metaphysical disjunctivism thus conflicts with the identity of indiscernibles, since it claims
that two indiscernible entities (two separate perceptual states) have fundamentally different
natures.
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status of mental states like illusions or hallucinations is re-labelling some of the

entities involved.
Different states Yet once we set out to develop a positive account of hallucinations it
or different becomes more difficult to defend a theory according to which veridical and
kinds of mis-
representation? hallucinatory states are different kinds of states because of the way they are
linked up with external entities. It is uncontroversial that hallucinations, like
veridical perceptions, have causal ancestors. The dagger hallucination may be
caused by hallucinogenic drugs, by pathological brain-states, evil scientists
directly interfering with our visual cortex and so on. Veridical dagger percep-
tion’s causal ancestry will involve, according to the direct realist, a specific kind
of external object commonly referred to as ‘a dagger’. In each case there is some
external, objective phenomenon (a specific brain-state, and the unoccupied
space on which the dagger is projected in the hallucinatory case, a sharp metal
object in the veridical case) which is then modulated by our perceptual
processing in order to produce a specific instance of perception.
In either case we stand in an epistemic relation (one that is, according to the
direct realist, cognitively or representationally direct) with an entity that
appears one way, but exists in a different way. We have argued above that
the direct realist cannot avoid introducing a distinction between what we
perceive (the external cause of our dagger-representation, whether this is
metallic or pharmaceutic) and what appears to us (an object represented as
spatially extended, sharp, silver-coloured, etc.), but even if this is taken on
board it is very hard to make sense of why our dagger-representation would be
more similar to a sharp metal object than to the peculiar neurophysiological
events set in motion by hallucinogenic drugs. In fact it is hard to see how we
would compare these very different phenomena in the first place. It then seems
to be the case that in terms of similarity to their causes (to the extent that we
can make sense of this notion at all) there does not seem to be a dramatic
distinction between veridical and hallucinatory perceptions. Neither resembles
its cause very much.
Appeal to con- But if we cannot distinguish veridical from hallucinatory experiences by
textual criteria looking at the causes of these experiences, or at the way these causes resemble
means the
accuracy perceptual experiences the only route open to the direct realist who wants to
requirement is draw a line between the veridical and the hallucinatory seems to be some kind
no longer
satisfied. of contextualism, along the lines of the quote by Snowdown just given. This
would argue that some epistemic states (such as experiences of daggers caused
by daggers) link up with other epistemic states in one way, while others
(experiences of daggers caused by hallucinogenic drugs) do so in another
way, and that we can distinguish between them by taking this difference into
account. However, in this case the contextual criteria seem to do all the work.
The direct realist still has to assume that there is something other than the
experience that is causing the experience, and for this reason the existence
  -     

requirement is still satisfied. But otherwise there is nothing about the nature of
the cause and any purported ‘accurate portrayal’ in the veridical experience
that makes it differ from a hallucination, and therefore this version of direct
realism will no longer fulfil the accuracy requirement.
§20 Direct Realism and Representationalism
The preceding discussion shows that the distinction between direct realist and Common
representationalist theories of perception is not as stark as it may often appear. ground between
direct realism
In particular, the strong contrast between direct realist and representationalist and
theories of perception might be seen as a product of a view of epistemology that representa-
tionalism.
is primarily concerned with the nature of the object perceived: a ‘cup out there’
or a ‘cup-representation in here’. Yet we could also approach epistemology
differently by asking where the different components that make up a percep-
tual event come from. The resulting theory would then suggest that in a typical
cup-perception there are some components that are contributed by the cup
(via light-rays bouncing off its surface and hitting our retina, say), and some
that are contributed by our perceptual system (the cup’s colour, for example).
Both of these components are fused in our minds to produce the event of
perceiving a cup. Generally speaking every perception contains two compo-
nents, and both direct realist and representationalist theories attempt to
account for this, the direct realist in terms of the ‘collection of facts F’
mentioned above, that acts like a filter between the perceiver and the perceived
objects, and the representationalist in terms of the representations and in terms
of whatever entities in the world that cause them.
At first sight it may look as if for direct realism perceptions put us into direct Loss of the initial
or immediate contact with the world of objects, whereas the representationalist attraction of
direct realism.
is forced to hide the external objects behind a veil of representation. Yet as we
saw above, in order to account for rare and not-so-rare epistemological
phenomena (such as hallucinations and illusions) the direct realist has to
accept that a considerable modulation can be part of the perceptual process
connecting perceiver and object perceived. In particular, every property of a
perceived object could in principle be ‘modulated away’ in this manner, and
every property that we in fact perceive could have been ‘modulated into
existence’ by being an artefact of the perceptual process. As such the ‘direct
and immediate contact’ cannot be relied on to present the external object more
or less in the way it is (so that the accuracy requirement fails), even though the
realist can still be assured that there must be some external object that causes all
these perceptions (hence the existence requirement is satisfied).
Of course the direct realist may reply here that direct realism will always
fulfil the accuracy requirement, since the object perceived simply is the
cause of perception. As such the ‘structural resemblance’ between them is
guaranteed by their identity. But this would be holding on to the letter of the
   -    

accuracy requirement, while giving up on its spirit. The spirit of the accuracy
requirement demands that there are certain aspects or properties of the external
world that the epistemic relations brought about by our sensory contact with
the world (seeing, hearing, touching, etc.) accurately portray. Yet we saw above
that in the case of vision direct realism is required to draw a line between what
we see and what we perceive (when we see a pink disk but perceive a white disk in
peculiar lighting conditions). (The same distinction obviously applies to the
other sensory modalities.) In this way although direct realism can claim that we
always perceive what is out there (in the sense that we stand in a representa-
tionally unmediated connection with the causal powers that our best physics
tells us account for the regularities in our sensory experience) this does not
imply that we see, feel, touch, smell, or taste what is really out there. Because
there are many collections of facts out there that produce the same perceptual
experiences, the best we can say is that when we have perceptual experience e
any one from a (possibly infinite) combination of causal factors C1, C2, . . .
brought it about, without any guarantee that these causal factors jointly form a
natural kind in any way. So we are left with the assurance that some combin-
ation of causal factors caused our experience, and hence is what we perceive, but
what we see, smell, touch, etc. is no such combination of causal factors, but some
specific object. We see a pink disk, not some combination of facts about disks,
lighting conditions, and the mechanics of our visual system that can bring about
the experience of a pink disk. This gap between what is perceived and what is
seen, heard, touched, etc. is sufficient to undermine the spirit of the accuracy
requirement for the direct realist. Yet if the ‘directness’ of our perceptual contact
with the world and its support of the accuracy requirement provides the main
motivation for adopting direct realism we may worry that once we have made
the notion of ‘directness’ sufficiently precise and realize that the accuracy
requirement is slipping from our grasp we lose sight of what provided the initial
attraction of direct realism in the first place.
§21 Representationalism
Representation- In representationalist theories of perception matters present themselves in the
alism and the very same way; they too satisfy the existence requirement, but not the accuracy
accuracy
requirement. requirement. While in the direct realist case the ‘direct perceptual pipeline’ to
the object perceived turned out to be in fact very complex and convoluted, in
the case of representationalism the perceptual veil that separates us from the
objects represented does not allows us to make out the general features of the
objects hiding behind it, in the way we may be able to discern the body-shape
of a man hiding behind a curtain. As a matter of fact the veil of perception is
less of a veil, and more of an iron curtain.
3 examples of In order to illustrate this point we are going to consider some cases
representational- of representationalist theories. Representationalism has been discussed
ist theories.
  -     

extensively during the history of philosophy. Rather than looking at examples

of historical (and often well-known) representationalist theories I would like to
concentrate here on three contemporary accounts. The first example we shall
look at is the so-called interface theory of perception, developed by Donald
Hoffman.⁶¹
§22 Hoffman’s Interface Theory
The interface theory of perception attempts to give an account of perception as
an artefact of our evolutionary history.⁶² Its fundamental assumption is that
our perceptual abilities evolved because having such abilities provided advan-
tages in passing on our genes; they did not evolve to provide us with an
accurate representation of the world cognized. This discrepancy is not usually
regarded as problematic. We usually believe that the perceptual strategies that Coincidence
of aiming for
endow us with evolutionary fitness are the very same ones that lead to an
fitness and
accurate representation of the world.⁶³ Perceptual abilities of a certain kind aiming for truth?
raise our evolutionary fitness if they indicate to us when we can access potential
sources of food or potential mates. To make this possible they should indicate
that a source of food is present if and only if it is really present; neither false
positives nor false negatives are going to help a nutritionally deprived agent. As
such perceptual abilities that raise our evolutionary fitness and those that
deliver true knowledge of the world appear to fortuitously coincide.⁶⁴ However, Aiming for
the interface theory of perception argues that perceptual strategies tuned to fitness outper-
forms aiming
evolutionary fitness regularly outperform strategies tuned to truth. for truth.

⁶¹ Some readers might worry that my appeal to various scientific theories in this chapter is
incompatible with the denial of the existence of the external world that is the chapter’s overall
argumentative aim. If scientific theories presuppose the existence of an external world, are we not
simply contradicting ourselves in trying to marshall scientific support for the denial of this
supposition? There are two responses one might give here: first, that it is not necessarily problem-
atic if a philosophical theory is self-undermining, and second that assuming the existence of an
external world is not very central to science. The first response will be taken up again at the very
end of our discussion (on pages 297–8). As for the second, note that as the Berkeleyan idealist can
mirror what the materialist is saying, the account defended in this chapter can mirror much of what
a scientific realist might want to say. A significant part of science is concerned with explaining how
stuff works, or with finding out which things can be reduced to other things, but not necessarily
with the mind-independent existence of the external world. To give illuminating answers to how
life can arise out of inanimate matter, how minds can be produced from brains, or classical systems
from quantum systems, no commitment to the nature of the external world as a set of mind-
independent objects is necessary. The position argued for here does not prevent reference to cells,
brains, or photons, but rather says that such objects must be understood in a special way. As a
result, we are still able to take on board the explanatory relations science argues for, and for this
reason there is no conflict between the views defended here and pursuing science more or less as we
know it.
⁶² Hoffman et al. 2015a.
⁶³ This is the very link between accuracy of representation and success that we queried in §11.
⁶⁴ At least the former appear to be included in the latter. Perceptual abilities that have evolved to
increase evolutionary fitness may be used later for epistemic purposes that have no evolutionary
significance.
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Consider a simple example. Let the x-axis of a graph correspond to the

Example: resource quantity, and the y-axis to the payoff resulting from acquiring the
mapping
resource, as in Figure 1.1:⁶⁵
resource quan-
tity to payoff.
100
Payoff

0
0 50 100 Figure 1.1 One way of mapping
Resource Quantity resource quantity to payoff

The resulting function is a Gaussian normal distribution, indicating that the

highest payoff results not form the highest resource quantify, but from a
resource quantity somewhere in the middle between two extremes. Examples
for such non-linear payoff functions abound: too little water intake leads to
dehydration, too much to hyponatraemia, too little heat to hypothermia, too
much to hyperthermia, too little blood sugar to hypoglycaemia, too much to
hyperglycaemia—as we would expect for organisms that need to maintain
homeostasis relative to a large number of variables. Figure 1.1 depicts an
organism that has four perceptual states (coloured white, light grey, dark
grey, and black) that vary with resource quantity: white indicates a quantity
somewhere between 0 and 25, light grey between 26 and 50, dark grey between
51 and 75, and black between 76 and 100. Contrast this with another organism,
depicted in Figure 1.2, that also distinguishes four perceptual states, but maps
them to resource quantity in a different way:⁶⁶

100
Payoff

0 Figure 1.2 Another way of

0 50 100 mapping resource quantity to
Resource Quantity payoff

It maps black to the middle range of the resource quantity, dark grey to
quantities either more or less than those indicated by black, and so on. In
Figure 1.1, but not in Figure 1.2 the mapping from resource quantities to

⁶⁵ Based on Hoffman et al. 2015a: 1486, figure 2.

⁶⁶ Baed on Hoffman et al. 2015a: 1486, figure 3.
  -     

colours is order-preserving. In the former every resource quantity mapped to Mapping

white is smaller than any quantity mapped to light grey, which is in turn resource quan-
tity vs mapping
smaller than any mapped to dark grey and so on. In the latter, on the other payoff.
hand, some resource quantities mapped to white are smaller than those
mapped to light grey, and some are larger. However, in the second diagram
the mapping from payoff (rather than resource quantity) is order-preserving:
any payoff mapped to white will be smaller than any payoff mapped to
light grey, which in turn will be smaller than any payoff mapped to dark
grey, and so forth.
This is an interesting scenario, since it shows that perceptual setups picking
out (in the sense of mapping in an order-preserving way) facts about the world
‘as it is anyway’ (in this case, resource quantity) do not necessarily coincide
with setups picking out aspects of the world relevant for evolutionary fitness
(in this case, expected payoffs). These latter are aspects of the world that can
only be formulated by taking into account both the world ‘as it is anyway’ and
our relation to that world as an organism.
However, there is a result that is more interesting (and less obvious) than the
fact that perceptual strategies tuned to truth and tuned to fitness can diverge.
This is the fact that when the two types of strategy tuned in different ways are
pitched against each other in game-theoretic simulations, the strategies tuned
to fitness regularly drive those tuned to truth to extinction, at least as long
payoff does not vary monotonically with resource quantity.⁶⁷
These simulations support a suspicion we might have had all along: if our Evolution aims
perceptual capacities are the product of evolutionary dynamics, and if strat- at survival, not at
truth.
egies tuned to truth and fitness can diverge, why would we assume that our
perceptual capacities are the way they are because they have been evolution-
arily selected for tracking truth? If the purpose of our evolutionary capacities is
to facilitate passing on our genes, we would expect that the picture of the world
we end up with is not a mirror of the basic structures of the things in
themselves, but a custom-made stage-set aimed at making a specific kind of
behaviour possible.
The comparison with a computer’s interface is often introduced in order to Metaphor of the
underline this point. Like a computer’s graphical user interface the perceptual graphical user
interface.
representation allows us to interact with the world, but in the same way in
which the graphical user interface does not constitute a faithful representation
of the computer’s internal structure,⁶⁸ the perceptual image does not faithfully

⁶⁷ Hoffman et al. 2015a: 1486.

⁶⁸ That the graphical user interface contains a folder that collects together a set of files and
presents them in spatial proximity, for example, does not imply that these files are stored in any
such proximity in the computer’s memory. They can be stored in any gerrymandered way as long
as they can be retrieved in such a way that represents them as being stored together.
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represent the structure of the environment. In fact it is because the graphical

user interface hides and often distorts so many aspects of the computer’s
functioning that we can interact with it in the familiar manner. If we were
constantly presented with all the details of the way a file is stored we would
never get very far with the higher-level task of actually producing the contents
of a file. As such the distortion the interface produces only appears as a defect if
we mistakenly conceive of it as doing something other than what it is supposed
to do, that is, if we believe the interface is supposed to give us a detailed and
accurate insight into the computer’s inner architecture, rather than simply
helping us to accomplish certain tasks with the computer.
§23 Hohwy’s Prediction Error Minimization Theory
The second contemporary representationalist theory I would like to discuss
here is the prediction error minimization theory of brain function recently
developed by Friston, Hohwy, and Clark.⁶⁹ The idea of prediction error
Prediction error minimization itself is very straightforward: the brain receives input via differ-
minimization as ent perceptual channels and attempts, on the basis of the data received, to
an explanatory
tool. predict what kind of input it is going to receive in the future. Once the future
data come in, there is usually a difference between these and the input
predicted. This difference is the prediction error. It is advantageous for the
brain to keep this prediction error as small as possible: the smaller it is, the
more reliable will its predictions turn out to be. The prediction error mini-
mization theory sets itself the ambitious goal to explain ‘all aspects of mind and
cognition as the upshots of prediction error minimization’.⁷⁰ Whether it is able
to achieve this goal, and whether prediction error minimization can help us to
make sense of everything the brain does is an open question. Fortunately we do
not need to reach a consensus on this matter here; the reason why I introduce
the prediction error minimization theory is because of the interesting and
unusual way in which it spells out the notion of the veil of perception.
§24 The Evidentiary Circle and the Veil of Perception
Minimizing (on average and over time) the discrepancy between the internal
predictions the brain makes, and the actual sensory input it receives is essen-
tially an exercise in inference to the best explanation. The internal model (or
hypothesis, if we are speaking about part of the model) adopted is the one that
provides the best explanation for the information transmitted via the senses.
Model (M) and input (I) are then related to each other in an explanatory-
Explanatory- evidentiary circle.⁷¹ M explains I, and I provides evidence for the correctness of
evidentiary cir- M. Such circles are benign, and not uncommon. If you land on a deserted
cles: an example.

⁶⁹ Friston 2010, 2013; Hohwy 2013; Clark 2017. ⁷⁰ Hohwy 2017: 1.

⁷¹ Hohwy 2016: 263.
  -     

island and find a footprint on the beach (I) your hypothesis that the
island is, after all, inhabited (M) explains the footprint, and at the same
time the footprint presents you with evidence that there are in fact inhabit-
ants on that island. Yet there is a case where this circle could turn vicious,
namely when you try to evaluate alternative explanations of the cause of the
footprint without introducing further evidence. If someone presented
you with an alternative hypothesis M’ that the impression was caused by a
kind of foot-shaped shell that is not uncommon on the island you cannot
rule this out by reference to your belief in M, backed up by I. If there is no
further information available, you cannot come up with any probability
judgement of M’. M’ lies outside of the explanatory-evidentiary circle
and is inaccessible to you to the extent that you cannot provide an account
of its probability.
In the case of the brain, the members of the explanatory-evidentiary circle Explanatory-
are obviously more complex: M is your model of the world, and I is the total of evidentiary
circles and the
all sensory information available. M explains away I, making it unsurprising, brain.
and I provides evidence for M. But consider a sceptical claim M’ of the evil
demon or brain-in-a-vat kind. There is simply no way in which you could
epistemically assess M’, since I is by definition all the data you are ever going to
get, and if M’ is true there would be no variation in the kind of input you
receive. The explanatory-evidentiary circle creates an evidentiary boundary,
beyond which our epistemic powers do not penetrate. Like a veil it shields us
from facts beyond the reach of our knowledge.
§25 Markov Blankets
Prediction error minimization theories often spell out their conception of an
evidentiary circle in terms of the mathematical notion of a Markov blanket.
In order to see how they do this, we first need to introduce the notion of a
Markov chain.⁷²
A Markov chain is a specific kind of chance process. In such a process we are Markov chains:
presented with a set of states s1, s2, . . . and the process is simply the transition an example.
through these states. For each pair of states there is a transition probability
specifying the chance of the second state following, given that the first state
currently obtains. One toy example of such a chain could be a sequence of days,
or, more specifically, a sequence of weather conditions on such days. Suppose
there are only three types of weather, sunshine (s), rain (r), and fog (f ). If for
each s, r, f we specify the chance that s, r, f ensues on the next day (such as ‘if it
is s today, the chance of r tomorrow is .3’, ‘if it is r today, the chance of f

⁷² For an introductory discussion of Markov chains see Grinstead/Snell 2012, chapter 11.
   -    

x1 x2

x3 u1 u2

λ2 λ1 λ3

a1 a2
x6
x4 x5
Figure 1.3 Markov blanket

tomorrow is .2’, and so on), and if this chance depends on nothing but the
weather on the first day, we have an example of a Markov chain.
Markov blankets Instead of a chain of states and a set of transition probabilities from one state
to the next we can also imagine a network, such that from each node we can
pass on (with a specific probability) to another node in the network. The nodes
may be events, for example, and the transition probability from event 1 to
event 2 might refer to the probability of event 2 obtaining, given that event 1
obtains. Figure 1.3 is a simple example of such a network.⁷³
A Markov blanket is simply a specific subset of such a network’s nodes;
in the diagram above all the nodes in the grey circle form a Markov blanket
around the node λ1. More generally, for a given node x, the Markov
blanket around x is constituted by all of x’s parent nodes, by all child nodes,
and by all parents of its child nodes.⁷⁴ The Markov blanket shields the node it
covers from the rest of the network in the sense that in order to determine the
probability of the state represented by the covered node λ1, all you ever need to
know is the probability of the states associated with all the nodes in the Markov
blanket. What is going on with all of the other nodes is strictly irrelevant.
A medical To illustrate, consider the role that networks such as the one just given can
example. play in helping with medical diagnoses. The nodes would consist of various
symptoms and conditions, and the transition probabilities would specify how
likely a given symptom or condition is, given the presence of another one.
Assume the covered node λ1 stands for bronchitis. In order to determine the
probability that a given patient has bronchitis it is important to know the
probability of other states that make having bronchitis more likely (such as
having a viral infection, or being exposed to pollution). At the same time, it is
useful to know the probability of states made more likely by having bronchitis
(such as shortness of breath or coughing). But it is also necessary to know the
probability of other states that make these former states more probable.
Coughing is made more likely by bronchitis, but also by having an allergy.

⁷³ The diagram is based on Hohwy 2017: 3. ⁷⁴ Pearl 1988: 120–1.

  -     

If the probability of having an allergy goes up, that of bronchitis goes down:
bronchitis as a cause of coughing is explained away by having an allergy since the
two causes compete with one another. For this reason, in order to determine the
probability of a patient’s having bronchitis we refer to this condition’s parent
nodes, its child nodes, and all the parent’s nodes of its child nodes. Once we have
information about all these probabilities (i.e. about all the nodes that make up
the Markov blanket) we do not need to refer to any other nodes in the network
(such as states that make a viral infection more likely, or states made more likely
by coughing) to determine the probability of bronchitis.
The brain too is in a set of states made more likely by other states, and Markov blankets
making other states more likely in return. Its sensory input and active output and the brain.
can therefore be understood as constituting a Markov blanket, such that
observation of the states of these parts of the system, together with observation of the
prior expectations of the system in principle will allow prediction of the behavior of the
system as such. Causes beyond this blanket, such as bodily states or external states, are
rendered uninformative once the states of the blanket are known.⁷⁵

The Markov blanket can then be understood as the boundary of the mind,⁷⁶
such that everything covered by the Markov blanket can be identified with the
internal world, and everything beyond it with the external world.⁷⁷
What is particularly interesting about reference to Markov blankets in this The Markov
blanket as the
context is that it provides us with a more abstract way of thinking about the veil of
idea of a veil of perception.⁷⁸ We might ordinarily conceive of the veil in terms perception.
of some spatial surface, such as the surface of the body, or the outer layers of
the brain, or an organism’s sensory interface. But if we identify the veil with
a Markov blanket it becomes apparent that even though such a surface can
of course instantiate a Markov blanket, being instantiated in this way is not an
essential feature of it. The notion of a Markov blanket is formulated
neither in spatial nor in causal terms, but in terms of statistical relations
between the various nodes that constitute the network.⁷⁹ As such the notion

⁷⁵ Hohwy 2016: 283.

⁷⁶ ‘[T]he mind begins where sensory input is delivered through exteroceptive, proprioceptive,
and interoceptive receptors and it ends where proprioceptive predictions are delivered, mainly in
the spinal cord.’ Hohwy 2016: 276.
⁷⁷ Markov blankets can turn up in many places (Friston 2013), including the brain itself
(Markov blanket may contain other Markov blankets; Clark 2017: 2). In the present discussion
we are concerned with one Markov blanket in particular, that consisting of the sensory and the
active states in the human perceptual system.
⁷⁸ It is important to be aware that the understanding of the veil of perception as a Markov
blanket and the prediction error minimization theory of the brain do not necessarily have to be
endorsed together (see Clark 2017: 4).
⁷⁹ In addition to providing a model of the veil of perception, the notion of a Markov blanket
can also be used to define the spatial boundaries of an organism, such as a cell (see Friston 2013,
section 2).
   -    

of a Markov blanket gives us a better grip on the notions of ‘inside’ and

‘outside’ that are invariably used when discussing the external and the
internal world. When we speak about the external world we do not mean
extracranial reality, the world outside of our head. We mean the world that is
not part of our representation, located beyond the Markov blanket consisting
of our perceptual system’s sensory and active states, even if it happens to be
inside our heads.
Hohwy’s prediction error minimization is a particularly interesting example of
a representationalist theory, since it attempts to provide explicit, mathematically
detailed, and empirically testable accounts of the veil of perception (in terms of
Markov blankets) and of the processes employed by the brain to construct a
model of the world (via approximate Bayesian inference).⁸⁰ The only prob-
abilities the brain needs to refer to in updating its models of the world are the
probabilities of the nodes that form the Markov blanket, nodes which are
identified with the perceptual interface between the brain and its environment.
The Markov blanket thus shields the brain from anything happening beyond
the blanket. Nothing taking place there is in any way relevant for its model-
building activities.
Hoffman, With Hoffman’s interface theory and Hohwy’s prediction error minimiza-
Hohwy, and tion theory we have met two contemporary forms of representationalism that
virtual reality.
conceive of our perceptual system as creating a virtual reality, a virtual world
generated by our brain on the basis of perceptual information, a world that
constitutes a model of the real world in the form of a representation of the
world within the interface, or on the inside of the Markov blanket. A final,
third approach I want to discuss goes in the same direction but is also different
in many important respects. This is Thomas Metzinger’s representationalism
that forms part of his more general theory of the self.

§26 Metzinger’s Representationalism and Simulation Theories

According to Metzinger’s account we live in a brain-based simulation. He
describes the fundamentals of this theory as follows:
Nature’s virtual reality is conscious experience—a real-time world-model that can be
viewed as a permanently running online simulation, allowing organisms to act and
interact.⁸¹

⁸⁰ More precisely, rather than specifying an agent that uses a model to represent the world,
Hohwy’s account equates agent and model, suggesting that ‘models are the things that do the
acting, based on their representation of the world, and which (therefore) persist through time’.
(Hohwy 2017: 3, see also Clark 2017: 5).
⁸¹ Metzinger 2010a: 104.
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From internally represented information and utilizing continuous input supplied by

the sensory organs they [i.e. human brains] construct an internal model of external
reality. This global model is a real-time model; it is being updated at such a great speed
and with such reliability that in general we are not able to experience it as a model
anymore.⁸²
The idea is that the content of consciousness is the content of a simulated world in our
brains, and the sense of being there is itself a simulation. Our conscious experience of
the world is systematically externalized because the brain constantly creates the
experience that I am present in a world outside my brain. Everything we know
about the human brain today indicates that the experience of being outside the
brain, and not in a tunnel, is brought about by neural systems buried deep inside
the brain.⁸³
Whenever our brains successfully pursue the ingenious strategy of creating a unified
and dynamic inner portrait of reality, we become conscious. [ . . . ] [O]ur brains
generate a world-simulation, so perfect that we do not recognize it as an image in
our minds.⁸⁴

Metzinger is not the only defender of the view that our perceptual experience is
a form of simulation. Apart from the accounts of Hoffman and Hohwy, related
versions of the simulation view of perceptual experience have been developed
in philosophy, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, and phenomenology, as
well as in the popularization of biological science.
Another explicit (if philosophically less acute) proponent of this view is Dawkins and the
Richard Dawkins who dedicates a substantial amount of space in Unweaving simulation view.
the Rainbow to support the theory that our conscious life unfolds in a virtual
model of a world. He notes that:
We move through a virtual world of our own brains’ making. Our constructed models
of rocks and of trees are a part of the environment in which we animals live, no less than
the real rocks and trees that they represent.⁸⁵
There is an easy way to demonstrate that the brain works as a sophisticated virtual
reality computer. First, look about you by moving your eyes. As you swivel your eyes,
the images on your retinas move as if you were in an earthquake. But you don’t see an
earthquake. To you, the scene seems as steady as a rock. I am leading up, of course, to
saying that the virtual model in your brain is constructed to remain steady.⁸⁶

As a matter of fact the simulation view just described is relatively wide-

spread in the contemporary literature on the brain and the mind and
quotations like the ones just given could easily be multiplied. I will just
refer to one further author whose theory of perception follows a very

⁸² Metzinger 2003a: 555. ⁸³ Metzinger 2010a: 23. ⁸⁴ Metzinger 2010a: 6–7.

⁸⁵ Dawkins 1999: 284. ⁸⁶ Dawkins 1999: 278.
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similar direction, though with a noticeably more phenomenological slant.

Steven Lehar argues that:
Out beyond the farthest things you can perceive in all directions, that is, above the dome
of the sky, and below the solid earth under your feet, or beyond the walls, floor, and
ceiling of the room you see around you, is located the inner surface of your true physical
skull. And beyond that skull is an unimaginably immense external world of which the
world you see around you is merely a miniature internal replica. This can only mean
that the head you have come to know as your own is not your true physical head, but
merely a miniature perceptual copy of your head in a perceptual copy of the world, all of
which is contained within your real head in the external objective world. [ . . . ] [T]his
insight emphasizes the indisputable fact that every aspect of the solid spatial world that
we perceive to surround us is in fact primarily a manifestation of activity within an
internal representation, and only in secondary fashion is it also representative of more
distant objects and events in the external world.⁸⁷

The simulation It is interesting to note that early versions of theories of perception as a form
view and
of simulation were developed partly in order to provide a philosophically
dreaming.
sophisticated account of dreaming. In 1995 Antti Revonsuo suggested that
the accounts of dreaming previously developed,⁸⁸ which expressed scepticism
about the idea that dreams are conscious experiences at all are no longer
satisfactory in the face of subsequent empirical research about dreams and
dreaming. As an alternative paradigm he suggested treating both dreams
and waking experiences as a form of virtual reality.⁸⁹ Metzinger similarly
considers dreams as specific deviant cases of models of reality which differ
from the model that we know as the waking state by having different proper-
ties,⁹⁰ though they are not fundamentally different kinds of things.
The simulation Conceiving of our perception of the world as a kind of interface or simula-
view and reverse tion also appears to be relatively intuitive if we think of cognitive agents from a
engineering.
reverse engineering perspective. If we want to build a machine that functions
like a cognitive agent, receiving information from its surroundings and oper-
ating on its environment in turn it needs to be equipped with some sort of
internal model of the world it is placed in. An automated cleaning robot needs
to be provided with some form of floor plan of our flat so that it does not

⁸⁷ Lehar 2003: 8. See also Muhlhauser 1998: 129–30.

⁸⁸ Malcolm 1956, 1959, Dennett 1976.
⁸⁹ ‘In fact, I believe that we ought to use dreams as a model of full-blown consciousness. This, in
turn, helps us to see that consciousness in general may be treated as a ‘virtual reality’, a model of the
form ‘a-self-in-the-world’.’ (Revonsuo 1995: 55). See also Revonsuo 2009: 115–16.
⁹⁰ ‘Träume sind also nicht epistemisch vollkommen leere Artefakte ohne biologische Funktion,
sondern ein ganz bestimmter Typ von exklusiv internem Realitätsmodell, das nicht als solches
erkannt wird. [ . . . ] [Sie] zeichnen sich gegenüber dem Wachzustand durch eine Reihe kognitiver
Defizite aus. Das theoretisch interessanteste dieser Defizite ist ein metakognitives: Das entstehende
Realitätsmodell wird vom System selbst irrtümlicherweise in die Standard-Kategorie “Wachzu-
stand” eingeordnet’. (Metzinger 1993: 149).
  -     

constantly bump into things, and does not leave out any areas it needs to clean.
At the same time the internal model of our flat is the only interface the robot
has to put together information about the flat itself. If such a model is required
in the case of a simple cleaning robot and its limited interaction with the
environment it is not implausible that a similar, though more complex model
is required for cognitive agents that interact with their environment in a more
involved manner.⁹¹
In the case of the theories just described, which consider our perceptual
experiences as a form of simulation, the interface or simulated world consti-
tutes both the collection of percepts and the veil that shields us from direct
contact with the world of objects. All these theories agree that the existence
requirement must be satisfied: there is something on the right-hand-side of the
veil of perception. But what about the accuracy requirement?
§27 The World behind the Interface
If we think of our perceptual experience as a kind of interface or virtual 4 different views
reality we immediately face the question what lies behind the interface, of ‘real reality’.
what ‘real reality’ forms the basis on which the virtual reality can exist. We
can order the answers various theorists give in terms of the degree of
similarity they assume to hold between the virtual reality and the world it
represents.
Dawkins’ position can be located at one end of the spectrum. Not only is the 1. Dawkins.
intracranial simulation ‘constrained’ by data from the outside world, for
Dawkins at least this world is no realm of noumenal uncertainty, but some-
thing very much like the simulated world. For him the rocks and trees in the
virtual reality have non-virtual counterparts (‘the real rocks and trees’)⁹² that
exist beyond the simulation.⁹³ Time in the virtual reality mirrors that in the
real world,⁹⁴ and perceptual information flowing from the external world
constitutes a set of constraints allowing us to construct a model very much like
the world it represents.⁹⁵

⁹¹ The extent to which artificial intelligence requires internal models is of course a controversial
topic in the field. For some contrasting views see Brooks 1991; Marstaller et al 2013.
⁹² Dawkins 1999: 284.
⁹³ Lehar (2003:8) is similarly explicit in pointing out that there is ‘your real head in the external
objective world’ standing behind the ‘miniature perceptual copy of your head in a perceptual copy
of the world’.
⁹⁴ Dawkins 1999: 281–2: ‘We are so used to living in our simulated world and it is kept so
beautifully in synchrony with the real world that we don’t realize it is a simulated world.’
⁹⁵ Dawkins 1999: 276–7: ‘Whenever we look at anything, there is a sense in which what our
brain actually makes use of is a model of that thing in the brain. The model in the brain, like the
virtual Parthenon of my earlier example, is constructed. But, unlike the Parthenon (and perhaps the
visions we see in dreams), it is, like the surgeon’s computer model of the inside of her patient, not
entirely invented: it is constrained by information fed in from the outside world.’
   -    

2. Metzinger. Metzinger is somewhat less explicit about the contents of an external (or,
as he sometimes calls it, ‘extradermal’) reality, though it at least seems to
contain brains:
The idea is that the content of consciousness is the content of a simulated world in our
brains, and the sense of being there is itself a simulation. Our conscious experience of the
world is systematically externalized because the brain constantly creates the experience
that I am present in a world outside my brain. Everything we know about the
human brain today indicates that the experience of being outside the brain, and
not in a tunnel, is brought about by neural systems buried deep inside the brain.
Of course, an external world does exist, and knowledge and action do causally connect
us to it⁹⁶—but the conscious experience of knowing, acting, and being connected is an
exclusively internal affair.⁹⁷

3. Hohwy. Hohwy’s prediction error minimization theory allows us to account for an

external world and some of its very general features:
If prediction error is minimised through action, then there must be something out there
such that (modulo the overall level of prediction error minimisation and irreducible
noise) it stands in the modelled causal/statistical relations to each other and the agent.⁹⁸

While we cannot be assured that the external world contains objects and
properties that resemble those in the model, there still has to be something
that brings about the linkages between the different nodes in the Markov
blanket.
4. Hoffman. Hoffman’s interface theory is even more minimalist, implying that we
know ‘almost nothing’⁹⁹ about the world behind the interface, and that
we certainly cannot infer that it contains any kinds of familiar entities like

⁹⁶ Kant would have agreed: ‘Understanding accordingly limits sensibility, but does not thereby
extend its own sphere. In the process of warning the latter that it must not presume to claim
applicability to things-in-themselves but only to appearances, it does indeed think for itself an
object in itself, but only as a transcendental object, which is the cause of appearance, and therefore
not itself appearance [ . . . ]’ Critique of Pure Reason A 288 (Kant 2007: 293).
⁹⁷ Metzinger 2010: 23, italics in the original. ⁹⁸ Hohwy 2017: 12.
⁹⁹ Hoffman, Singh, Prakash 2015b: 1572: ‘It is certainly intuitively appealing to think that, because
our perceptual experiences contain specific regularities and invariances, the objective world W itself
must contain those regularities. But [ . . . ] almost nothing can be inferred about the structure and
regularities in W on the basis of the invariance properties of our perceptions and actions.’
A yet more austere point of view, suggested by the biologist Humberto Maturana, is that the only
adequate response to the question what is behind the representational interface is silence: ‘Aufgrund
der Art des kognitiven Prozesses und der Funktion der sprachlichen Interaktionen können wir nichts
über das aussagen, was unabhängig von uns ist, und womit wir nicht interagieren können. [ . . . ] Daraus
folgt, daß eine Realität als eine Welt unabhängiger Gegenstände, über die wir reden können, notwen-
digerweise eine Fiktion [ . . . ] ist [ . . . ]. [ . . . ] Es gibt keine Gegenstände der Erkenntnis. Wissen heißt
fähig sein, in einer individuellen oder sozialen Situation adäquat zu operieren. Wir können über das
Substrat, in dem unser kognitives Verhalten gegeben ist, nicht reden, und worüber wir nicht reden
können, darüber müssen wir schweigen, wie Wittgenstein betont hat [ . . . ]’ (Maturana 1982: 76).
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physical objects.¹⁰⁰ All that is assumed by the theory is that the world can be
treated like a set.¹⁰¹
There is thus an entire spectrum of ways in which representationalist
theories can fulfil the accuracy requirement, ranging from the view that there
are real rocks corresponding to our representations of rocks to the position that
more or less nothing (with the exception of the notion of the set) is shared
between the world and our representation of it.
§28 Arguments for the Nature of the World behind the Veil
Representationalists of the kind described above are usually not very explicit
about their arguments for backing up claims about what the nature of things ‘Phenomenal
on the right-hand-side is. The ‘conscious experience of knowing’ Metzinger signature of
epistemicity’.
refers to in the quote above is a phenomenal features of epistemicity, what it
feels like to know something (as opposed to merely entertaining, doubting,
wishing, etc.). But the mere phenomenology cannot, of course, bear any
epistemic weight. That the appearance of the external world comes with the
phenomenal signature of epistemicity¹⁰² no more entails that our perception
connects us with the external world than the fact that something looks as if it
was painted by Vermeer entails that it really was.
The following passage addresses the question in a more direct manner:
Trivially, if an internal representation of the system itself exists, according to the
fundamental assumptions of any naturalist theory of mind there also has to exist a

¹⁰⁰ Hoffman et al. 2015b, 1563: ‘In this sense, we say that there are no public physical objects.
There is no public sun, moon, Mount Everest, New York City, electron, or Pacific Ocean. [ . . . ] Our
belief in public physical objects - that you see exactly the same moon as I - is a cognitive illusion
based on a faulty inference.’
¹⁰¹ In fact they generally assume that the world is a measurable space (Hoffman et al. 2015a:
1482). A measurable space is a set S together with a collection of its subsets S closed under
complementation and countable unions, i.e. whenever some sets A, B are in S, so is the difference
of A and B, and whenever some countable number of sets A, B, etc is in S, so is the union of A, B,
etc. The set of all the subsets of some set is an example of a measurable space. This minimal
assumption is in place to ensure that we can assign probabilities to states of the world and correlate
them with the probabilities of perceptual events. This condition is the only structure imposed on
the world: ‘we do not stipulate other structures on W, such as a topology, a metric, a partial order,
or even a specific probability measure’ (Hoffman et al. 2015b: 1566). In fact even the condition that
the world is a measurable space can be dispensed with as long as we assume that our perceptual
experiences constitute a measurable space: ‘we need postulate no a priori structure of any kind on
W’ (Hoffman et al. 2015b: 1563).
An early example of a biologically motivated interface theory that denies the reality of a world
behind the interface was suggested by von Uexküll (‘Alle Versuche, die Wirklichkeit hinter der
Erscheinungswelt [ . . . ] aufzufinden, sind immer gescheitert, weil [ . . . ] es keine Welt jenseits der
Erscheinungswelt gibt. Alle Wirklichkeit ist subjektive Erscheinung—dies muß die große grundle-
gende Erkenntnis auch der Biologie bilden’, 1928: 2, emphasis in the original. See also Buchanan
2008: 13: ‘There is no objective reality in the form of objects, things, or the world; there is nothing
outside of the individually subjective experiences that create a world as meaningful.’)
¹⁰² On this see Metzinger and Windt 2014.
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physical system which has generated it. I call this the ‘naturalist variant of the Cartesian
cogito.’ Pathological or systematically empty self-representata may exist, but their
underlying existence assumption will never be false, because some kind of constructing
system has to exist. Even if I am a brain in a vat or the dream of a Martian, from a
teleofunctionalist perspective phenomenal self-representata are only given in the his-
torical context of a generating system.¹⁰³

‘Naturalism There are two arguments in play here. The first is that the existence of a
assumes a phys- physical world is a fundamental assumption of naturalist theories of mind,
ical world.’
the second the idea that if there is some construct (such as the collection of our
perceptual experiences) there also has to be something on the basis of which
the construct is constructed.
The difficulty with the first argument is that it is not much of an argument at
all. It is surely correct that a view of the world in which physical objects causally
affect our sense-organs, triggering a complex chain that ultimately results in
mental representations of these objects is a crucial part of the background
assumptions against which the theories of perception described here were
developed. But that does not change the fact that it is an assumption that is
part of the simulated world we have generated, and that the claim that it is true
of whatever exists beyond that world requires an additional argument.¹⁰⁴
A parallel theis- It is easy to come up with a theory very much like the ones mentioned above
tic argument.
that does not make any assumptions about a ‘physical system’ generating our
perceptual world. Such a theory might claim that all the impressions feeding
into the perceptual world are directly caused by God and could correctly
maintain it to be one of the theory’s fundamental assumptions that for any
internal representation of some system ‘there also has to exist a divine mind
which has generated it’. Yet we would hardly consider this to be a strong
argument for the existence of God.
‘Each construct The second argument is somewhat more interesting, but the conclusion it
needs a basis of establishes is weaker than what its proponent might want to achieve. For this
construction.’
reason the argument could be employed both by the naturalist as well as by the
divine projection theorist. It does not assert that the world behind the veil has
to be in a certain way (that it is physical or divine) but simply claims that there
has to be something other than the veil which brings about the stuff on the
inside of the veil. Yet this very claim is itself in need of support, since its truth is

¹⁰³ Metzinger 2003a: 278.

¹⁰⁴ Thus even if one grants Revonsuo’s point that ‘the most reasonable scientific hypothesis for
explaining the complex regularities and coherent organization at the phenomenal level during
perceptual states is to suppose that there is an organized external physical world out there’ (2009:
123) it would be a mistake to claim (as he seems to do) that this tells us that ‘the internal surrogate
of the external world corresponds to the external world as it is in itself’ (italics in the original), rather
than that our internal model of the surrogate of the external world is such that it represents the
surrogate as corresponding to the external world as it is in itself.
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not obvious.¹⁰⁵ Suppose someone argued that the world cannot just consist of
sets. Since everything has to be a set of something generating it (its members)
there has to be something inside every set. Even if we ignore the empty set this
argument is still deficient, since it is only successful if we assume the truth of
the axiom of foundation, but we know that there are perfectly functional
versions of set theory that do not assume this axiom.¹⁰⁶ What is required
here is an argument why the ‘depends on’ relation that has our perceptual
world as an antecedent has to be well-founded.
The prospects for showing this by means of a general argument to the effect that
existential dependence relations must always be well-founded do not seem bright. Metaphysical
As we will see in Chapter 3, where we investigate this problem in greater detail infinitism as a
live philosoph-
there is a substantial amount of recent literature investigating the consistency and ical option.
explanatory power of non-foundational ontologies that provides strong evidence
for the view that a kind of ‘metaphysical infinitism’ accommodating dependence
‘all the way down’ is a live theoretical option that deserves to be taken seriously.¹⁰⁷
§29 Two Ways of Developing Representationalism: Strong and Weak
On the basis of the preceding discussion it is evident that representationalist
theories can be developed in two directions. A strong form of representatio-
nalism takes the accuracy requirement seriously and tries to come up with an
argument why the represented world on our side of the veil should bear a
significant similarity to the world beyond the veil. A weak representationalist,
on the other hand, would reduce the accuracy requirement and argue that the
similarity is only slight. At the most extreme, this would amount to abandon-
ing of the accuracy requirement, holding on only to the existence requirement.
This is a representationalist theory that effectively says that while there is
something behind the veil,¹⁰⁸ we cannot know anything about it.¹⁰⁹

¹⁰⁵ Note that when Kant argued in the first Critique that we must be able to think of things in
themselves, as ‘otherwise we should be landed in the absurd conclusion that there can be
appearance without anything that appears’ (B xxvi, Kant 2007: 27), he refers to a cognitive
necessity, not an ontological one.
¹⁰⁶ One way in which this argument for the existence of non-sets could fail is if all chains of set-
membership looped back on themselves; another if every set contained a further, distinct set. See
Aczel 1998.
¹⁰⁷ See Morganti 2009, 2014 as well as Schaffer 2003; Ladyman and Ross 2007; Cameron 2008;
Orilia 2009; Bliss 2013.
¹⁰⁸ The Kantian ancestry of this view is readily apparent in these remarks from the first Critique:
‘Appearances are the sole objects which can be given to us immediately, [ . . . ]. But these appear-
ances are not things in themselves; they are only representations, which in turn have their object—
an object which cannot itself be intuited by us, and which may, therefore, be named the non-
empirical, that is, transcendental object = x.’ (A 109, Kant 2007: 137).
A similarly Kantian picture is defended by Lehar who claims that the divide between the
phenomenal and the noumenal is ‘one of the essential facts that make sense of our experience of
this world’ (2003: vii).
¹⁰⁹ While we would be able to say that the something is the source of the experiences we do have,
we cannot say anything about how the linkage between the something and the experiences is
supposed to take place. In particular, we cannot simply assume that this linkage is causal.
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Strong Strong representationalism is compatible with a variety of metaphysical

representatio- pictures. It sits well with a naturalist view that regards our relation to the
nalism and
naturalism. world as the very same kind of relation¹¹⁰ as that of an automatic cleaning
robot to the flat it is placed in. Such a robot is a material being like us, placed in
a material environment and functions by forming an internal model of its
surrounding world. This model is impoverished in comparison to the envir-
onment it models (it will lack, for example, the environment’s sounds and
smells) but it is identical with the model in reference to certain structural
properties (that is, there is a one–one mapping between certain individuals and
relations in the material world, and individuals and relations in the model).
Strong representationalism is also compatible with a view of the world in
Strong which no matter exists, and in which everything is mental. In this idealist
representatio- theory the merely mental beings that are us endeavour to represent an external,
nalism and
idealism. mental world (consisting of mental phenomena outside of our own mind,
perhaps the mental constituents of a divine mind). Such a world is not in any
way less objective than the material world of the automatic cleaning robot, and
we can succeed or fail in producing a structurally accurate representation of
this mental world.
Weak The weak account, by contrast, holds on to the key ideas of the representa-
representatio- tionalist view of perception, stating that perception does not equip us with a
nalism denies
that both sides of direct link to the world perceived, but that there is a layer of representation that
the veil can be simultaneously constitutes the world as we perceive it, and shields us from the
compared.
world of objects that it represents. However, it criticizes the supposition of a
structural correspondence between the perceptual interface and the world
behind the interface made by various versions of strong representationalism.
These strong accounts are taken to task for relying on the mistaken presup-
position that it is possible to squeeze both sides into a single conceptual
framework. Is the geometrical relation between Cambridge, Oxford, and London
we find in the world as we perceive it accurate? In order to answer this we
would first have to know what kind of space the right-hand side correlates of
the three cities ‘behind the veil’ are placed in. But of course we don’t have any
idea. We can settle such questions with respect to the automatic cleaning robot,
since we can occupy a perspective external both to the robot and to the space
in which it is placed. But we cannot take a position external to our perceptual
interface in order to make a similar comparison.¹¹¹ This point clearly

¹¹⁰ Identical in kind, not in complexity.

¹¹¹ It does not help much if we assume entire scientific communities, instead of individual
persons as epistemic subjects. To appeal to an intersubjective form of knowledge of this kind we
have to presuppose first that the community exists outside of the model. For if it is only part of the
model, why would it have any better claim to speak about whatever is outside than the individual
has?
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generalizes with respect to any structural comparison between what goes on at

our side of the interface, and what goes on beyond it.
An idealist theory claiming that ‘sensations are all there is’ faces similar This applies to
difficulties. Its claim can mean either that sensations are all there is, or that they naturalist and
idealist versions
are the most fundamental kinds of things. Certainly from the perspective of the of represen-
perceptual interface sensations are not all there is: there are also tables and tationalism.

chairs, and cabbages and kings. Perhaps the idea is that if we step out of the
interface we could see that there is nothing but sensations. But it is precisely
this idea of ‘stepping out’ of our perspective of the world which is problematic.
If the interface is our perspective on the world the result of stepping out of it is
not a more objective view, but no view at all.¹¹²
§30 Stepping Out of the Interface
The idea of ‘stepping’ out of our perspective of the world features prominently
in Thomas Nagel’s discussion of an ‘objective self ’.¹¹³ Nagel suggests the Nagel’s ‘centre-
less view’.
possibility of taking a ‘centreless view’ of the world, a view in which we see
ourselves as one of various human beings, not as the ‘hub of the universe’. We
use this view to form a picture of the world that only relies on the kind of
information we have about other people, that is, third-person information that
does not involve any direct knowledge of any first-person facts. Nagel himself
suggests a temporal parallel.¹¹⁴ We can look at history without placing our-
selves at the present (or at any specific point in time, in fact), looking forwards
and backwards from this point, but by giving every point in time equal status, The centreless
as if it were looking at the historical timeline from somewhere off the timeline. observer as the
objective self.
In the same way we can look at the universe without placing ourselves within
our own perspective (or within the perspective of any particular person, for
that matter), looking at the rest of the world from outside of this perspective,
but by giving each person’s perspective equal status, as if it were looking into
the universe from no point of view within it. Nagel’s key point is that once we
have this centreless view of the universe, we are of course still looking at the
universe, and so there still has to be some looker. This looker can’t be me, JCW,
since that is one of the persons in the world being looked at (in the same way as
the present moment, 12 October 2019, 10:27:59, is just one of the points in
time looked at from the centreless temporal perspective, and therefore cannot
be equated with the present), and so it has to be my ‘true self ’¹¹⁵ or my
‘objective self’.

¹¹² The view from outside of the interface would be a kind of God’s eye point of view. There are
reasonable doubts about the possibility of such a perspective (see e.g. Putnam 1981: 51, 74; 1987: 19,
70; 1994a: 258.).
¹¹³ Nagel 1986: 54–66. ¹¹⁴ Nagel 1986: 57, note 1. ¹¹⁵ Nagel 1986: 61.
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Now it looks as if with this conception of the centreless view Nagel has just
pulled off the feat that I said could not be done, namely ‘stepping out’ of the
Is this perspec- confines of a particular perspective to achieve an objective perspective. Or has
tive an ascent or he? What we have to determine is whether instead of ‘moving up’ beyond the
a descent?
realm of the virtual world of the individual perspective Nagel has instead
‘moved down’ into a virtual world within the virtual world which has the
appearance of an objective perspective. Has the dreamer woken up, or is he
dreaming a dream within a dream? This point is raised by Metzinger in his
discussion of Nagel;¹¹⁶ he argues that Nagel has actually ‘moved down’:
[ . . . ] you now simulate a noncentered reality within a centered model of reality. [ . . . ]
[But] [t]his inner experience, the current View from Nowhere as initiated and executed
by the psychological subject T[homas] N[agel] is not contained in the ‘centreless
conception of the world’. [ . . . ] However, it is very obviously contained in Nagel’s
autobiographical self model – else it would not be reportable.¹¹⁷

That both interpretations of the centreless view, the ‘objective’ and the ‘simu-
lated’ one are possible shows that we do not have an argument for being able to
‘step out’ of our perspective, but the description of a scenario based on the
assumption that such a step is conceivable—which is precisely the point at issue.
§31 Idealism and Dependence
Rather than suggesting that stepping out of the perceptual interface may let us
see that there is nothing but sensations the idealist might instead want to say that
sensations are the most fundamental kinds of things. There are tables and chairs,
bodies and brains etc. at the level of appearance, but the real world, ‘what is there
Circular anyway’ is just the collection of sensations. One way of spelling this out is by
dependence saying that all things depend for their existence on sensations, but the sensations
between inter-
face and themselves do not depend on anything. Yet if we analyse the level of appearance
sensations. this does not seem right either. As things appear to us, the entire content of the
perceptual interface is certainly dependent on sensations, since sensations shape
this interface via the process of the brain’s hypothesis-testing.¹¹⁸ On the other
hand, analysing how the brain appears to operate, sensations also depend on the
interface since they are determined in an important way by the brain’s predic-
tions, and these predictions and expectations of what the brain assumes it will
perceive constitute the content of the model of the world we generate.¹¹⁹

¹¹⁶ See also Metzinger 1993, 1995; Lycan 1987; Malcolm 1988.
¹¹⁷ Metzinger 2003a: 583. ¹¹⁸ Hohwy 2016.
¹¹⁹ ‘[b]eliefs, in the shape of prior expectations, are capable of determining perceptual content in
quite profound ways [ . . . ]. [ . . . ] [c]onscious experience arises as the upshot of the brain’s appetite
for making the best sense it can of the current sensory input [ . . . ]. This fits with the idea that
conscious experience is like a fantasy or virtual reality constructed to keep the sensory input at bay.’
Hohwy 2013: 137, see also 72–3.
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So it appears to be that if we can talk about dependence at all, we have to talk

about circular dependence, where the perceptual interface depends on sensations
and the sensations in turn depend on it. It might be objected that this circularity is
illusory since only the former dependence is objectively real, while the latter only
holds within the model, but not outside of it. But this objection and its privileging
of one dependence over another only goes through if sufficient sense can be made
of a view from ‘outside of the model’, which is not possible if all viewing is
existentially dependent on the model. If any empirical or intellectual perception
presupposes a model, as the representionalist theories discussed here asserts, there
is no position we could possibly occupy from which we can judge one kind of
dependence relation as real, and the other as only existing within the model.
The weak account does not reject the reality of entities behind the veil of The ‘real world’
perception, but denies that there is much we can say about them, apart from cannot be repre-
sented either
that they are there. It argues that because there is no way in which we can access accurately or
them directly, without relying on the veil or representational interface, any claims inaccurately.

about how successful the model is in ‘getting them right’ are ill-founded. This is
primarily due to the fact that the concept of ‘success’ is not in any way objective, as
we have pointed out above. Yet if we have no objective reasons for why we should
consider our model as successful, but simply label a specific set of its activities
(such as spreading our genes, or constructing complex devices) ‘successful inter-
action with the environment’ there is no reason why this kind of success should tell
us anything about the accuracy of the model in capturing the fundamental
features of the world. On the weak account the existence of a ‘real world’ is not
under dispute, but this world is not something to which our familiar epistemic
concepts of accurate and inaccurate representation could be applied.
§32 The Story So Far
I have argued that the accuracy requirement embraced by both direct realism
and representationalism is very problematic. It turned out to be a little less
problematic for representationalism, since it is possible to set up our repre-
sentationalist theory in such a way that the accuracy requirement becomes
exceedingly minimal, as we saw above in the case of Hoffman’s interface
theory. In this case all that we are really left with is the existence requirement,
and it is increasingly unclear how its underlying assumption is still to be
justified. All it guarantees is that there is something (some thing or some
things) behind the representation, a largely undefined entity about which we
cannot say anything apart from that it is something ‘one-knows-not-what
which solves our problems one-knows-not-how’.¹²⁰ Even taking it to be the Extending caus-
cause of the representation would be hard to justify, since it presupposes that ation beyond the
interface.
the causal relation is something that obtains not only within the interface, but

¹²⁰ Putnam 1983a: xii.

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also outside of it, for example by linking the veil of perception to whatever
exists on its right-hand-side. But if we can make the case for the
representation-independent existence of this relation, why can we not do the
same for other relations, properties, or individuals? The fact that we cannot do
so should provide us with strong evidence that applying the notion of caus-
ation beyond the purview of the representational interface is also impossible.
Epistemology The only remaining justification for the existence requirement would then
without the be to argue that we cannot have a satisfactory epistemology without such a
existence
assumption? theory, that we need a workable account of how we have knowledge of the
world, and that therefore the existence of a world behind the representational
interface has to be assumed as a postulate of a workable epistemology. I want to
spend the rest of this chapter questioning this premiss, introducing an epis-
temological account that does not require the existence assumption. If such an
account is possible, the justification of the external world via the epistemo-
logical route we have described above will also fall away.

1.3 Irrealism
A Preliminary Remarks about Irrealism
§33 Introducing Irrealism
An irrealist epistemology starts out from a form of representationalism that
treats our perceptions as part of a simulation or an interface along the lines
described above. According to this view, the perception of an external object,
an orange, say, takes place when something external stimulates our nerve-
endings by contact with different sensory organs, these then pass the stimuli on
to the brain where a perception of the orange including its various visual,
olfactory, tactile, and perhaps auditory aspects are put together. This percep-
tion is part of the virtual model of the world in which we live our lives.¹²¹
Phenomenal vs Of course this entire process is hidden from us. It is, as it is sometimes said,
epistemic ‘phenomenally transparent’¹²² because we see right through it, as we see
transparency.
through a pane of clear glass, to the end result, the virtual orange.¹²³ Phenom-
enally transparent states are parts of our internal representation of the world;

¹²¹ ‘How do the signals that come through those nerves give rise to our sense of “being in” the
outside world? The answer is that this is in a sense a complicated illusion. We never actually make
any direct contact with the outside world. Instead, we work with models of the world that we build
inside our brains’ (Minsky 1988: 110). Accordingly, the representational interface is both the
boundary between the ‘inner’ and the ‘outer’ as well as the model of the external (and internal)
world in which we live our lives.
¹²² Metzinger 2003b.
¹²³ A phenomenally opaque state, on the other hand, is a representational process that is
consciously experienced as a representation. A good example is a lucid dream, in such a dream
we are simultaneously dreaming and aware that we are doing so.
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their earlier processing stages are unavailable to introspective attention. We do

not have the possibility of observing our brain putting together the virtual
orange from the various stimuli either introspectively or from the outside, as
we can e.g. for a director producing a film, or a programmer producing a
computer simulation.
We should, however, not conflate phenomenal transparency with epistemic
transparency, i.e. the claim that we could not possibly be mistaken about what
is happening in our own consciousness.¹²⁴ Still, despite their distinctness
phenomenal transparency and epistemic transparency are related in an
important way. Because our self-representation is phenomenally transparent
to us it appears to us as if the various parts that make up this representation are
also epistemically transparent, that is, as if we could not possibly be mistaken
about them, simply because our self-representation is not anything we our-
selves can go beyond,¹²⁵ so the possibility of checking the accuracy of our self-
representation from some perspective beyond is simply not there. Needless to
say, the appearance of epistemic transparency is not the same as the existence
of epistemic transparency.
§34 The Key Difference
Irrealism goes beyond this form of representationalism by arguing that the External exist-
postulation of an external world is also part of the representational interface. ence confined to
representation.
Rather than being understood as a higher-level bridge principle that connects
the representational interface and the represented world, the claim that there
are objects beyond our representations is itself part of these representations.
Representing the world in the way we do involves representing it as existing
beyond our representational framework. Nevertheless, this representation does
not have any implication for existence beyond the representational framework.
One way of visualising the representationalist scenario is by imagining The sphere
example.
myself being contained in a sphere of one metre diameter, centred around
my navel.¹²⁶ The sphere, the inner surface of which is the veil of perception,
functions somewhat like a television screen. We see the external world pro-
jected onto this surface, but the world as accessed through our other senses is
projected onto this surface as well. If we prod the ground in front of us with

¹²⁴ We will address the notion of phenomenal transparency in greater detail in the following
chapter. Nevertheless, it might be worthwhile to stress already here that this pair of terms
involves two very different uses of ‘transparency’ that might easily lead to confusion. Epistemic
transparency is about seeing the mind as something into which one sees clearly (see e.g.
Carruthers 2011: 13). Phenomenal transparency is not about seeing something clearly, but
about not seeing something at all: it is about the mind as something one sees through; one
thereby does not see it (as when seeing through a window-pane one does not see the window-
pane, see e.g. Valaris 2013: 2).
¹²⁵ Metzinger 2003b: 363.
¹²⁶ For the use of this example in assessing sceptical arguments see Button 2013: 149–52.
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what appears to be a two-metre long pole, say, at the point of intersection of the
pole and the inner surface of the sphere the surface will create the tactile,
auditory, and visual perception of the stick hitting the ground two metres in
front of us.
There are now different ways of thinking about what takes place just beyond
the surface of the sphere. One is to assume that this is the place of the hidden
forces that shape our experiential world. As the world behind the vault of
heaven depicted in Flammarion’s engraving contains the wheels and pulleys
that move the stars, the world outside of the sphere contains the causes that
impact on the inner surface of the sphere, creating the particular manifestation
we experience as our perception of the world.
Another way of thinking about this scenario is to assume that all the activity
on the inner surface of the sphere is in fact caused by events happening inside
of the sphere. Nothing has to influence the sphere on the outside to produce
the perturbations on its inner surface, rather, everything that happens on that
surface has its explanation on our side of the surface.
The first way corresponds to representationalism that accepts the existence
requirement, the second to the irrealist variety of representationalism that sees
no need for postulating the existence of hidden forces behind the veil. It is
important to keep in mind that there is no need to spell out the notion of the veil
in spatial terms. The difference between being inside and being outside of the
veil is not characterized by being located at different locations in space, rather,
the whole of space is part of our model of the world as well and as such located
Non-spatial con- on our side of the veil of perception. If we conceptualize the veil in terms of a
ception of the Markov blanket it is to be understood in inferential, not in spatial terms. The
veil of
perception. veil of perception is constituted by the outermost set of states we need infor-
mation about in order to construct the model we have constructed.¹²⁷
§35 Searle’s Objection
The idea of regarding the external world as part of the representational
interface is questioned by Searle. He doubts that it constitutes a philosophically
substantial move, pointing out that
any representation of the relation between the set of representational states and the
representational system, on the one hand, and the reality represented, on the other, also
occurs within some representational system. But so what? It simply does not follow
from the fact that all cognition is within a cognitive system that no cognition is ever
directly of a reality that exists independently of all cognition.¹²⁸

¹²⁷ ‘Outermost’ is here to be understood in terms of transition probabilities between states

(represented by arrows in the diagram given above). In a sequence a ⟵ b ⟵ c, b is closer to a
than c is.
¹²⁸ 1995: 175.
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Searle is right in pointing out that where the cognition occurs does not settle
what the cognition is a cognition of. Even if all written sentences were found in
books this would not entail that all of them were about books.
However, the irrealist does not want to say that because any concept of the
representational interface–world link is itself part of the representational
interface there is no world ‘that exists independently of all cognition’, or that
we could never have any knowledge of such a world. Rather, the above
discussion has shown that even in the case of direct realism the ‘directness’
of perceptions does not automatically give us any structural correspondence
between perceptions and the perceived world. The irrealist is then asking
whether we could not simply move the postulation of a cognition-independent
word inside of the representative framework, rather than treating it as an
assumption about the framework, given that all our epistemology can really
deliver is the bare statement that there is such a cognition-independent world,
whatever that might look like (in other words, the existence requirement). We
will consider some reasons for doing so in a moment, but first let us say a bit
more about the conceptual location of the irrealist position by distinguishing it
from both scepticism and nihilism.
§36 Distinguishing Irrealism from Scepticism and Nihilism
The irrealist position is not a version of external world scepticism. The irrealist Irrealism and
does not make the epistemological claim that we cannot have certain knowledge scepticism.

that there is an external world. That mental representations represent is not under
dispute, what the irrealist on one side, and the representationalist and direct
realists on the other side disagree about is an ontological question, namely what
the nature of the represented entities is.¹²⁹ For the latter two they are objects of a
fundamentally different kind, belonging to whatever type of objects they want to
assume the world to consist of (fundamental particles, tropes, sets, ideas in the
divine mind, etc.). For the irrealist they are objects of the same kind. What the
representing parts of the model represent are other parts of the same model that
appear as if they belonged to a group of entities distinct from the model.
We should also point out that irrealism is not the same as the nihilist view Irrealism and
claiming that there is nothing on the right-hand side of the veil of perception.¹³⁰ nihilism.

¹²⁹ The irrealist would therefore make the same point about perceptions that Oliver Sacks (2012a)
made about hallucinations: ‘Yet while it is understandable that one might attribute value, ground
beliefs, or construct narratives from them, [they] cannot provide evidence for the existence of any
metaphysical beings or places. They provide evidence only of the brain’s power to create them.’
¹³⁰ As Metzinger’s eliminative phenomenalist does: “ ‘Eliminative phenomenalism is the thesis
that physics and the neuroscientific image of man constitute a radically false theory, a theory so
fundamentally defective that both the principles and the ontology of that theory will eventually be
displaced, rather than smoothly reduced, by a completed science of pure consciousness’. All reality,
accordingly, is phenomenal reality.” “No such things as brains or physical objects ever existed. The
contents of consciousness are all there is.” (2010a: 147).
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For saying there is nothing encounters exactly the same problem as saying there
is something: we have to occupy a position outside of the representational
interface in order to speak about reality as it exists beyond the interface, either
by asserting that it contains specific objects, or denying that it contains anything
at all.¹³¹ Rather, the irrealist would want to say that the right-hand side exists
only as part of the representational interface.¹³²
Irrealism and Note, also, that the irrealist can assent (together with the direct realist and
physical objects. the representationalist) to the truth of the statement ‘there exists an external

world beyond my representation’. Of course for the irrealist this statement can
only be true as part of the representational interface, but then he doubts that we
can make sense of truth independent of this interface in the first place. An
irrealist does not deny the reality of physical things: he simply proposes a
specific theory about the nature of physical things. An irrealist who equates
physical objects with parts of the representational interface does not deny the
reality of physical objects, any more than an economist who equates risks with
potentials for loss denies the reality of risks.¹³³
The irrealist is not forced to say that a cup in front of him is not really there,
nor that it only exists in his head, for this already implies that we can draw a
meaningful distinction (from some God’s eye point of view) between what is
really there, and what only appears, or between what only exists as part of our
representations, and what exists outside of it. But if ‘what is really there’ and
‘what exists outside of our representations’ is part of the representational
framework, this cannot be done.¹³⁴ As a consequence, the irrealist does not
have to claim that all we can perceive are our own conscious experiences.
Rather, the immediate objects of perception can be physical objects and events.
Conscious experiences are not something that we typically perceive: they are
something that we typically have, without perceiving them. We perceive phys-
ical things by having conscious experiences—experiences that fit into the
totality of experiences in a certain way. All of this is of course only speaking
from inside of the representational framework, and from this point of view it
does not appear to us as if all we perceive is only in our head. It is not some

¹³¹ Button 2013: 80: ‘[T]he nonrealist embraces the external realist’s radically external perspec-
tive. She adopts the God’s Eye point of view, and then declares that there is no God there, and no
objects.’
¹³² This implication of irrealism theory is very close to the notion of ‘Kantian angst’ Button
introduces in 2013: 57–8. The worry behind this anxiety is that our words and concepts may never
be able to refer to objects given that all reference-fixing mechanisms we have are yet more linguistic
or conceptual items. (To use our terminology, the worry is that we never manage to get out of the
representational interface to connect the elements of the model with objects outside of the model.)
The key difference is that Button asserts, and I deny, that Kantian angst is incoherent.
¹³³ The preceding two sentences are adapted from Pelczar 2015: 129.
¹³⁴ The following three sentences follow Pelczar 2015: 136–7.
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framework-independent insight into the structure of reality as it is in itself,

something the irrealist denies as constituting a possibility in the first place.
Finally, the irrealist can account for hallucinations and cup-illusions as well
as the defender of other epistemological theories. For all of these reasons, the
truth of the statement ‘there is an external world’ is not under dispute, rather,
the disagreement is about the status of this statement: is it a statement about
the world, or is it a statement about our representation of the world?

B Three Reasons for Irrealism

What reasons could there be to suggest that the irrealist position is in fact true?
Three considerations come to mind, parsimony, the conceptual saturation of
the world, and the interdependence of concepts.
§37 (a) Parsimony
The irrealist position is in direct conflict with the ‘naturalist variant of the
Cartesian cogito’ asserting that, given the existence of the representational
interface, some constructing system that brings about this interface has to
exist. The defender of irrealism is likely to point out that the foundationalist
viewpoint expressed in the strong and weak account of representationalism
described above are not the only possible epistemological positions. In par-
ticular, he will point out the difficulty the foundationalist positions have in Circularity of he
excluding the possibility that the ‘depends on’ relation that has the representa- ‘depends on’
relation.
tional interface as a first relatum is circular. If we accept the idea of the noumenal
as a mere ens rationis, having followed the dependence relation down up to
whatever ‘extracranial’ or ‘extradermal’ reality has generated it we find ourselves
once again in the confines of the representational interface, since this reality is
itself part of the interface. If this circular interpretation is indeed consistent, it
will have been shown that—in the absence of other considerations—the irreal-
ist’s position is one possibility besides the foundationalist accounts.
This point is prone to a mutual shifting of the burden of proof, with the
foundationalist holding that it has to be demonstrated that the circular conception
makes any sense at all, and the opponent replying that it is the foundationalist who
would have to derive an explicit contradiction from the circular account. Yet we
can at least agree that the irrealist account is not subject to the problem vitiating
many circular constructions, namely that of presupposing what it is trying to
prove. This account does not presuppose that the ‘extracranial’ world is part of the
representational interface but argues that faced with the choice between irrealism
and representationalism or direct realism, assuming the internality of such a
world is more parsimonious. It commits us to a smaller number of entities; the
irrealist is only committed to the representational framework, while his opponents
have to postulate in addition the existence of objects behind the framework.
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Parsimony Obviously parsimony or simplicity can refer to various different properties

understood in of a theory such as the number and types of theoretical entities assumed, the
terms of the
number of kind of laws postulated, or the explanations that it supports, and needless to
entities assumed. say these factors can be in conflict with one another; a theory that is parsimo-
nious relative to one criterion need not be so relative to another. In the context
of this discussion I am only looking at one of the possible ways of spelling out
parsimony: the number of kinds of unobservable entities a theory postulates.
A theory is therefore considered to be simpler than another if it assumes the
existence of a smaller number of kinds of unobservables.
How to justify But why should we be swayed by appeals to parsimony in the first place? It is
the principle of often claimed reference to parsimony is at best a ceteris paribus consideration, a
parsimony?
potential tie-breaker appealing to a vague aesthetics of simplicity and preference
for desert landscapes that lets us choose between two theories that perform equally
well, much in the same way in which we may choose between two lawnmowers
identical in price, design, and performance, by selecting the one with the simplest
silhouette. But if this is all there is to it, appealing to parsimony at a crucial stage of
a metaphysical argument, especially in a case where the defence of a highly
counterintuitive picture is proposed, can hardly be considered satisfactory.
Theological What is needed are some considerations that provide a bridge between the
justification. parsimony of a theory and its truth. One way in which this gap has been
bridged in the past is by appeals to theology. Why do the simpler theories have
a greater chance of being true? Because God made the world simple. And why
is that? Because God wanted his creatures to be able to understand His creation
using their limited intellectual capacities.¹³⁵ These considerations manage to
close the gap but are not going to convince non-theists, and might be treated
with caution by some theists as well.¹³⁶
Fortunately there are other ways of providing such a bridge. Some of these
Justification via present a probabilistic story, offering a reason why the more parsimonious theory
pessimism about is more likely than the less parsimonious one.¹³⁷ The possible bridge I want to
hypostatizations.
suggest here is based on a general pessimism regarding hypostatizations.¹³⁸

¹³⁵ See Sober 2015, chapter 1 for a discussion of different theological justifications of the
principle of parsimony. For attempts to replace God by evolutionary considerations in justifying
the principle of parsimony see Mitchell 1997: 66; Duda/Stork/Hart 2000: 465.
¹³⁶ Theists may believe that a maximally complex mind must create a maximally complex world
and therefore deny that the fundamental features of reality are accessible to human reason.
¹³⁷ See Sober 2015, chapter 2 for a discussion of some of these attempts.
¹³⁸ An argument in support of parsimony that goes somewhat in the same direction has been
proposed in Fischer 2017. Fischer argues that one likely reason for selecting a more complex theory
over a less complex one, even though both are explanatorily equivalent, is that the more complex
theory resulted from adjusting a theory already held previously in the face of contradictory data.
The preference for the more complex theory might come out of a desire to save one’s pet theory,
while the simpler theory might require re-constructing one’s theoretical approach from scratch.
‘ “Prefer the simple” checks the temptation to resist theoretical upheaval’ (Fischer 2017: 69). For a
formal argument that the principle of parsimony is always the most efficient way of arriving at the
truth, even though the truth may be arbitrarily complex see Kelly 2006, 2007.
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Hypostatizations are theoretical constructs that are taken ontologically seriously.

Instead of treating them simply as part of a theory used to explain a certain
subject-matter, these constructs are taken to correspond to parts of the world.
If we are pessimists about hypostatizations, the fewer hypostatizations a theory
contains, the better. And as fewer hypostatizations mean fewer unobservable
entities postulated by the theory, and as we spelt out parsimony in terms of the
number of such entities postulated, the fewer hypostatizations a theory contains,
the more parsimonious it is.
But why should we be pessimists about hypostatizations? Hypostatizations
are mind-made shadows that we project onto the world in order to make sense
of it. While some of these projected shadows might correspond to real fissures
in the things out there, we would not want to make the default assumption that
they do. Rather, the default assumption should be that they don’t, and that
hypostatizations are ancillary constructs we need to have recourse to in order
to understand the world, because we have the kind of mind we do—unless
some other reason convinces us otherwise.
Of course attempting to develop a theory of the world without hypostatiza-
tions would be a fool’s errand; we cannot conceptualize without using con-
cepts. For this reason the principle of parsimony does not say that Balance between
hypostatizations are a bad thing, but that we need to find the ‘sweet spot’ explanatory
power and
that provides the best balance between two forces that pull into different artificiality.
directions: on the one hand, the ability to explain a set of data using some
theory and, on the other hand, our confidence that the theory in question is in
fact tracing the joints of nature, rather than the artificial divisions of an
anatomy of reality that is the mind’s handiwork. As we maximize the hypos-
tatizations, the former goes up,¹³⁹ while the latter goes down, as we minimize
them, the latter goes up while the former goes down. The principle of parsi-
mony urges us to find the best balance between them: a theory that explains as
much as possible, while postulating a minimum of unobservables, thus maxi-
mizing our confidence that we are in fact dealing with a theory of the world,
and not with a theory of the world’s image in the mind.
For this reason the mereological nihilist appeals to parsimony to reject the Parsimony,
existence of wholes, since (he argues) their postulation does not confer any mereology, and
Platonism.
explanatory advantage. We cannot explain anything more about the world by
assuming that there is a whole bicycle over and above its parts arranged
bicycle-wise. Wholes are mind-cast shadows that have no cracks in the world
corresponding to them. On the other hand a mathematical Platonist could

¹³⁹ I am here ignoring the additional problem that the more hypostatizations are introduced by a
theory, the greater the need to devise explanations for problems caused by theoretical entities only
introduced to solve the initial problems the theory was meant to address may become—as a
stronger carriage can carry more weight, but will also need to be able to carry more of its own
weight.
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counter a nominalist attack based on the principle of parsimony by arguing that

nominalism is precisely not able to explain all aspects of mathematical practice
that Platonism is (such as the Gödelian observation that mathematical truth
outruns mathematical proof). As such nominalism does not achieve the best
balance between maximizing explanatory power and maximizing our confidence
in the theory’s ability to track features of the world.
The irrealist justifies his position by appeal to the principle of parsimony
pointing out that simply assuming the existence of the representational inter-
face is sufficient for explaining everything that needs explaining. To introduce
further levels of entities beyond the interface does not allow us to predict or
explain anything we could not predict or explain before. As such a theory that
postulates only the representational interface is closer to the ‘sweet spot’ than
one that postulates an interface-independent world as well.
Trading ontol- One criticism that may be raised at this point is that my understanding of
ogy for ideology? simplicity in terms of the number of kinds of unobservable entities a theory

postulates, considering a theory simpler than another if it assumes the exist-

ence of a smaller number of kinds of unobservables, overlooks to which extent
ontology can be traded in for ideology. The perturbations in the orbit of
Uranus could be explained without postulating the existence of another planet,
prior to the discovery of Neptune, and in this case our understanding of
simplicity would have advised against an additional unobservable entity. Yet
the explanations required in this case would have been considerably more
complicated, and if we are worried about the additional objects hypostatiza-
tions impose on the world, should we not equally worry about the additional
structure increasingly complicated explanations take the world to possess, even
if they do not attribute any additional objects to it?
While I appreciate the force of this criticism, the Uranus-Neptune scenario
is not really the situation we are facing here. The alternatives we compare are
not a common-sense account where shared objects are perceived by a com-
munity of observers (assuming various objects, but a relatively simple epis-
temology) and an idealist picture where shared perceptions have to be
somehow constructed from coordinated individual mental events, without a
single object standing behind them (parsimonious in its ontology, but com-
plicated in its epistemology).
Postulating a Rather, the preceding remarks have tried to show that the notion of a set of
world behind the objects behind the veil of perception is not doing much explanatory work in
veil does not
simplify the first place. We do not require it to be able to draw a distinction between
explanations. what is veridical and what is illusory, nor do we need to assume it in order to
hold on to the idea that our mental states connect us with an external world, at
least as long as we assume that all references to the world are confined to the
representational interface. As such the belief in a world behind the veil is little
more than accepting the existence assumption on its own, and this does not
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appear to produce any compensating gain in explanatory simplicity. Such a

gain would ensue if we could dispense with all the messy details of how our
brains construct the appearance of the world by simply assuming a world of
external objects, and letting our minds mirror these. But if the theories of
Hoffman, Hohwy, and Metzinger discussed above show us anything, then it is
that this robust approach of somehow forcing an entirely unconstructed world
inside the mind is unlikely to succeed.
Sober distinguishes two different ways of employing the principle of parsi- Two ways of
employing the
mony, which he calls the ‘razor of silence’ and the ‘razor of denial’.¹⁴⁰ The principle of
former suggests that we simply do not talk about entities ruled out by parsi- parsimony.
mony, the latter that we actively deny their existence. The understanding of
parsimony in terms of scepticism of hypostatizations described here seems to
favour the razor of denial. It is not that we have no view on whether some
hypostatization actually corresponds to something the world or not, but we
have strong reasons to abstain from hypostatizations unless their explanatory
power convinces us otherwise. For this reason the irrealist will not simply be
agnostic about anything beyond the representational interface, he will argue
that we have good reasons to deny postulating anything beyond the interface.
In themselves the various forms of brain-based representationalism that we The most parsi-
discussed above can be considered purely as theories that account for the monious inter-
pretation of
phenomenology of cognitive states, such as the impression that we have direct brain-based
and infallible access to our self at various times, and that there is a mind- represent-
ationalism.
independent world behind our representations. Doing so they aim to explain
this phenomenology by reference to processes that take place in the brain. Thus
conceived these theories are entirely neutral on ontological questions. The exist-
ence of an explanation for why it appears to us that F tells us nothing about
whether F is indeed the case: it may be the case that F is the case, and that this is the
reason why it appears to us that F, or F may be the case but fails to be responsible
for the appearance of F (while some other G is responsible), or F may appear to us
in the absence of F. Yet once we have shown that in a specific case F being the case
is not a necessary condition for the appearance of F the final possibility is the one
that avoids the greatest number of non-essential hypostatizations.
Of course it could be the case that an objectively obtaining F existed, and
that its appearance could be explained without making any reference to it. But
if being frugal with hypostatizations unless they are unavoidable is a meth-
odological virtue, we have good reasons for not making the existential assump-
tion. It could be the case that we can explain all of the appearance of the
‘extracranial’ world without referring once to anything outside of the model,
yet that such an outside still existed. But a theory assuming this would be
further removed from the ‘sweet spot’ than the irrealist alternative.

¹⁴⁰ Sober 2015: 12.

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§38 (b) The Concept-Dependence of the External World

The notion of a world, or of a set of referents of our representations is itself a
complex consisting of elements of the representational interface. To the extent
that these elements are constitutive of what it means to be a world, it is hard to
see how we could have any conception of a world independent of these parts of
the interface.
Example of the Consider chess openings. All there is to being a chess opening is being a
inexpressible
chess opening.
sequence of moves, expressed in the familiar notation of chess. Now consider
somebody claimed that he had discovered an opening that was so sophisticated
that it could not be expressed in the chess-theoretic notation. We literally
would not know what he meant: chess openings do not exist as entities that
different sequences of moves express more or less accurately (as different
sequences of words might express the arrangements of items on a table more
or less accurately), but the opening is the sequence of moves. Take the moves
away, and the opening vanishes with them.
Now as a given opening is put together from bits of chess-theoretical notation,
a given notion of a world is put together from bits of the representational
interface. Take the interface away, and the notion of the world vanishes
altogether. It does not leave behind an inexpressible noumenal world, no more
than taking away the chess notation leaves behind ineffable entities of chess.
The world of chess and the entities it comprises—the games and the
gambits, combinations, checks, and mates that constitute them—are made
up in every part from simple concepts expressed in chess-theoretic notation,
and thinking about chess independent of the conventionally constituted
entities that constitute a game of chess is a futile exercise. In the same way,
this example suggests, thinking about the world independent of the conceptu-
ally constructed entities that constitute the contents of the world within the
confines of the representational interface does not link us up with a world
untained by concepts, but with no world at all.
The map and the The irrealist’s opponent is likely to remark at this stage that a better analogy
territory. for the functioning of the representational interface than the rules of a game is a
map. There are certain features of the map that do not find any expression in the
terrain it represents (the map is flat, though the terrain is not; cities on the map
are red circles; real cities are neither red nor circular, etc.), yet others do (if one
place is between two other places on the map, what the first represents will also
be between what the other two represent). Similarly, there is our conceptual map
on the one hand, which allows us to successfully interact with the world, and on
the other hand there is the real terrain, whatever the conceptual map is a map of.
Maps and the Yet the map analogy is heavily invested in a version of the accuracy
accuracy requirement according to which many (or at least many fundamental) features
requirement.
of the world are accurately represented by the perceptual representation.
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Nevertheless, I have tried to argue above that the more interesting recent
versions of representationalism are located at the minimalist end of the
spectrum formed by different strengths of the accuracy requirement. But if,
as these versions of representationalism suggest, almost nothing is shared
between the world and our representation of it, it is hard to see how we can
still make use of the map analogy. If I give you a map with the assurance that
something corresponds to the map (so that the existence requirement is
satisfied), but that none of the entities on the map, none of their properties,
and none of the structural features constituted by how the entities and prop-
erties are linked is in any way shared by whatever the map corresponds to, you
may well ask how what I have given you is actually a map, rather than a piece of
paper with marks on it. If our representationalism does not rely on a substan-
tial form of the accuracy requirement it no longer makes much sense to think
of our representations as being along the lines of a map.¹⁴¹
For the irrealist, map and terrain will coincide:¹⁴² we use the concepts to move
through a represented world that is already conceptual through and through,
built around a conceptual scaffold of notions like causation, time, space, logical
implication, physical, mental, abstract, concrete, and so forth. Without the
scaffolding there would not be any internally coherent world-like entity at all.
For this reason we cannot assume that there is something beyond the map,
something which cannot be captured by our brain-generated model.¹⁴³

¹⁴¹ This is the difficulty Strawson (1992: 64) has in mind when he points out that a claim of a
correspondence between perception and the world perceived cannot be cashed out as ‘an invitation
to step outside the entire structure of the conceptual scheme which we actually have – and then to
justify it from some extraneous point of vantage. But there is nowhere to step; there is no such
extraneous point of vantage.’ Searle (1995: 174) holds the weaker position that the (hardly
contestable) claim that cognitions do not occur in isolation (‘Any cognitive state occurs as part
of a set of cognitive states and within a cognitive system’) entails the inaccessibility of such a
vantage point (‘It is impossible to get outside of all cognitive states and systems to survey the
relationship between them and the reality that they are used to cognize.’)
¹⁴² The representational interface therefore functions like the map of the empire the size of the
empire mentioned in Borges’ essay ‘On Exactitude in Science’. One difference is that the Borgesian
map is two-dimensional, so that it makes sense to speak of the real mapped terrain as lying below
the map. A wholly accurate map would of course be three-dimensional and would therefore
displace the terrain it is supposed to map.
¹⁴³ The reader may note a parallel between our rejection of the existence requirement (or rather
its demotion to wholly intra-theoretical status) and the kind of ontic structural realism most
recently defended by Steven French (for more discussion of ontic structural realism see
Chapter 3, §99). This entails a ‘tailoring of our metaphysics to epistemology’ that ‘rules out any
epistemically inaccessible objects hiding behind the structures which we can know.’ (French 2017:
96. French also identifies a similar view in Ernst Cassirer’s analysis of quantum mechanics.) The
iterative procedure by which ontic structural realism is to be developed (19) includes a ‘putative
distinction’ between objects and the properties and relations they instantiate, thereby according a
place to the (non-structural) objects at some level of the theory at least—corresponding to our view
of the existence requirement as at least forming part of the model.
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§39 (c) The Interdependence of Concepts

Restriction to a The preceding argument questioned the possibility of making sense of the
minimal set of external world independent of the conceptual resources in our representational
concepts?
interface. While such an impossibility might not be too surprising (a concept-
independent representation of the world does indeed seem to be oxymoron,
like a non-linguistic sentence, or an aniconic picture), another problem may
arise even if we simply restrict ourselves to a minimal set of concepts in order
to describe the world behind the representational interface.
Conceptual The concepts that constitute our representational interface do not exist as
contextualism.
isolated monads, but constitute a web: the nature of one concept is at least
partly determined by the relation it has to other concepts. We do not have to
strengthen this form of conceptual contextualism¹⁴⁴ into full-blown holism,
that is, we do not have to assume that no concept can be what it is without all
other concepts remaining in place exactly as they are. We can, for example,
imagine a world much like ours in which all smell and therefore all associated
olfactory concepts are absent. Such an absence would influence the nature of
some other concepts, but it would not transform beyond recognition the
conceptual scheme we use now. Yet our discussion of the difficulty of trying
to make sense of the accuracy requirement in any substantial way entails that
most of the concepts that constitute our representational interface would not
be applicable to the world behind the representation. We would therefore end
up with a radically restricted subset of concepts that is assumed to correspond
to reality in itself. But it is at least questionable whether these concepts,
stripped of most of their relations to other concepts in the conceptual web,
would still be able to stand up on their own in order to deliver a coherent
description of the world. This worry is exacerbated by the high probability that
some of the concepts argued to be inapplicable to the world behind the veil will
be relatively deeply ingrained in our conceptual scheme. Unlike the set of
olfactory concepts, say, which sits pretty much on top of our conceptual
scheme, and can be taken out without generating too much disturbance further
down, concepts we might have to let go of include the belief that all objects
have their properties independent of whether they are observed or unob-
served.¹⁴⁵ What remains when a fundamental concept such as this has been
taken out of a conceptual scheme (and with it all the other, higher-level
concepts that depended on it) may then not be sufficiently powerful to express
much about the represented reality at all. To take an imperfect, but hopefully
still illuminating, example: if we restrict the number of grammatical rules a
Restricted repre- given language is allowed to use we do not necessarily restrict its expressive
sentational
power. Gram-
matical example.
¹⁴⁴ For further discussion of contextualism see Chapter 4, §114.
¹⁴⁵ Hoffman et al. 2015a: 1501.
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capacities. Instead of expressing a given proposition by a sentence that relies on

a (now prohibited) grammatical rule we may work around this restriction by
expressing it via a proposition that does not rely on this rule for its formation.
But if the number of grammatical rules removed is sufficiently large, or if the
rules removed are sufficiently fundamental, we will end up with a language in
which we cannot say terribly much.

C Further Dimensions of the Irrealist Position

§40 Irrealism Is Fully Compatible with Naturalism
Irrealism differs from familiar conceptions of representationalism in two
important ways. The first difference is that irrealism, unlike many varieties of
representationalism, is fully compatible with naturalism. Representationalism
introduces a level of representational objects (such as sense-data, or adverbially Difficulty of
modified mental states) that are often hard to make sense of in naturalistic spelling out
sense-data in
terms.¹⁴⁶ Sense data in particular are considered to be peculiar kinds of entities naturalistic
for which the appearance/reality distinction collapses. While a white disk can terms.
appear pink under red light, a pink sense datum exists exactly in the way it
appears. Sense data are introduced to account for illusory perceptions on the
one hand (‘If the disk out there is white, not pink, what do I perceive when I see
something pink where the disk is?’) and to act as stand-ins for external objects
on the other, entities with which (unlike external objects) we can be immedi-
ately acquainted with. They are supposed to act as stand-ins by resembling
some of the qualities of the objects they represent. How to cash out these
curious entities in naturalistic terms, however, is entirely unclear.¹⁴⁷ When we
perceive a white disk as pink, amongst the many neurophysiological events
that take place in our brain none is in fact pink.
Moreover, both sense data and adverbially modified mental states are mind-
dependent objects. If there were no minds, these objects could not exist. This
makes it very difficult to integrate them into the naturalistic picture of the
mind, for according to this the order of origination flows from the physical to
the mental. If minds are what matter (specifically matter in the brain) does, as
the naturalist assumes, we cannot explain this fact by a theory that includes
primitive notions referring to mind-dependent objects.
Irrealism, on the other hand, does not make any prior assumptions con-
cerning the nature of the model created by our brain or its constituents. It does
not presuppose that it has unified parts that share some of the properties of the

¹⁴⁶ See Martin 2000: 222 on the incompatibility of sense-data and naturalism.
¹⁴⁷ Place 1956: 49: ‘If we assume, for example, that when a subject reports a green after-image he
is asserting the occurrence inside himself of an object which is literally green, it is clear that we have
on our hands an entity for which there is no place in the world of physics.’
   -    

represented (as sense data theory does) or that its parts correspond in any
obvious ways to the parts of the represented. As such it does not commit
ourselves to any entities that we find hard to explicate in the naturalistic
framework in which we can make sense of the brain.
§41 How Different Kinds of Naturalistic Representationalism
Lead to Irrealism
Moreover, it appears to be the case that the forms of representationalism
discussed above, due to Hoffman, Hohwy, and Metzinger will eventually result
in irrealist positions. By this I do not mean that any of the three authors
themselves defend forms of irrealism, but that the views they develop naturally
lead to an irrealist position.
Hoffman. Consider the metaphor of the graphical user interface often appealed to in
spelling out Hoffman’s interface theory. In the case of an actual graphical user
interface we use it to interact with something other than the interface, namely
the bits of electronic circuitry that make up the computer, entities that we
could (modulo certain practical limitations) also interact with without the
graphical user interface. However, in the case of the interface theory everything
perceived is part of the interface, including brains and all the physical mech-
anisms of perception, the fundamental physical constituents of the world, the
interface theory itself, and so forth. While the description of the interface
theory has started out as a form of representationalism, preserving the dichot-
omy of representation and represented we find in the analogy of the graphical
user interface, everything supposedly beyond the representation is eventually
subsumed under the representation itself.
Hohwy, Friston, Second, consider the theories of perception in terms of Markov blankets as
Clark. we find them in the works of Hohwy, Friston, and Clark. It is obvious that
according to these accounts medium-sized dry goods of our everyday
acquaintance are placed outside of the Markov blanket. Where, however, are
human brains supposed to be placed?
On the one hand the literature suggests that brains are to be found inside the
Markov blanket.¹⁴⁸ When discussing human perception, the Markov blanket is
often identified with the set of sensory detectors (where data from the envir-
onment come in) and effectors (where action starts). The inner nodes of the
Markov blanket covered by the detectors and effectors are then to be identified

¹⁴⁸ The set of nodes amongst which a Markov blanket may be found is an abstract object, not a
concrete entity. As such all talk about internality and externality relative to the Markov blanket is
entirely confined to relations between the nodes that constitute the abstract structure. Yet as
concrete objects can instantiate the nodes, we can speak of concrete objects as internal and external
to the Markov blanket to the extent that the abstract objects they exemplify are inside or outside of
the Markov blanket.
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with the states of the brain that process sensory input after it has arrived
through the detectors, and before it reaches the effectors.¹⁴⁹
On the other hand, we can also present strong reasons for the claim that
brains are located outside of the Markov blanket. Brains are as much part of the
external world as broccoli, and we learn about brains (even about our own
brain) in much the same way as we learn about broccoli, by piecing together
different bits of sensory information. In the case of brains this sensory infor-
mation might be interpreted as observing brains in vats, watching a neurosur-
geon at work, or even observing our own brain (e.g. as part of a neurosurgical
procedure during which we are conscious), rather than as watching plants on a
vegetable patch, but the kind of epistemic route taken is the same, whether we
are aiming at vegetables or internal organs. For this reason if one is part of the
external world, and hence outside of the Markov blanket, so is the other.
Consider some group of neurons N in the brain located somewhere between
the sensory epithelia and the actuators and effectors and assume that N can be
observed by some yet-to-be-determined neuroimaging technique. Supposing
we conceive of the human perceptual system in terms of Markov blankets, if we
perceive an object like a rock, N will instantiate a set of nodes inside of the
Markov blanket. But what if we use our perceptual system in order to perceive
N itself? In this case N will instantiate a set of nodes outside of the Markov
blanket. And as every part of the brain can in principle be observed, every part
can instantiate a set of nodes outside of the Markov blanket, even though it can
also, in other perceptual circumstances, instantiate nodes inside the Markov
blanket.
It is therefore evident that on the surface conceptualizing the human
perceptual system in terms of Markov blankets constitutes a form of represen-
tationalism that endorses the existence requirement, to the extent that they are
committed to the brain (or, more precisely, to the physical instantiation of the
Markov blanket) as that which brings about the representation in the first
place. Yet if we analyze the setup of the ‘Markov blanket system’ more closely it
becomes evident that it does not contain the resources to ascribe an ontological
status to the physical instantiation of the Markov blanket which differs from
that ascribed to the rest of the external world. The system has not only
incorporated the external world and turned it into a representation, it has
also swallowed up its own physical basis, thereby regarding it as a representa-
tion as well.

¹⁴⁹ See e.g. Friston (2017: 117): ‘This Markov blanket plays the role of sensory epithelia – that
mediate the influence of the world on the system – and active states, such as our actuators and
effectors – that mediate the influence of our internal states on the world.’ and Hohwy (2016:
275–6): ‘[T]he mind begins where sensory input is delivered through exteroceptive, proprioceptive,
and interoceptive receptors and it ends where proprioceptive predictions are delivered, mainly in
the spinal cord.’ Hohwy (2017: 7) explicitly equates the ‘Markov blanket system’ with the brain.
   -    

Metzinger. Finally, on Metzinger’s account the key representationalist assumption that

there is something beyond the representation that the representation repre-
sents is preserved via the ‘naturalist variant of the Cartesian cogito’,¹⁵⁰ that is,
the assumption that every representation needs a physical system that has
generated it. However, as we argued in §28 Metzinger’s account does not allow
us to make sense of this assumption as something that stands outside of the
representational framework. As such the best sense we can make of the relation
between the physical system and the representation it generates conceives of it
as wholly located within the representation, so that in the end both the self
(conceived of as a phenomenal self model) and the world (the physical system
that generates our representations) have to be understood as belonging to the
represented.
§42 Irrealism and Direct Realism
Does irrealism We might wonder whether the irrealist position, claiming that all external
reduce to direct
realism?
objects are simply part of the representation does not reduce to a form of direct
realism. For the irrealist everything that was behind the veil of perception is
now in front of it, and so directly, and no longer indirectly epistemically
accessible. As the veil plays no theoretical role once there is nothing behind
it any more we may as well dispose of it, and are then left with a veil-less theory
of perception in which everything is perceived directly.
In fact we may ask ourselves whether it makes any sense at all for the irrealist
to say that all is only representation, since there is nothing the representations
could be contrasted with. What a representation is was defined in contrast with
the represented, something that stood behind the representation. But once we
have given up on the represented, and moved it inside the veil, the represen-
tations are no longer representations. If one of two mutually defined concepts
goes, so does the other, just as there are no wives in a world from which all
husbands have disappeared.
This seems to leave us with a theory according to which we perceive some
kinds of objects (the erstwhile representations), and do so in a direct, veil-less
manner. Such an account looks suspiciously similar to direct realism. And if this
is right, then our argument has come full circle. Recall the dialectical progression
earlier in this chapter: we argued that once the modulation of the perceptual
process the direct realist needs in order to account for illusions and hallucinations
is taken into account, the resulting picture is closer to a representationalist theory
than we might have initially thought.¹⁵¹ However, once representationalism is
properly analysed, its commitment to the existence assumption turns out to
bear so little explanatory weight that we might consider dispensing with it

¹⁵⁰ Metzinger 2003a: 278. ¹⁵¹ §20.

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altogether.¹⁵² And once we have let go of the existence assumption and moved
everything into the realm of representation, the absence of any veil behind which
the source of the representations may be hiding appears to bring us straight back
to direct realism.
It is therefore necessary to get clear about the difference between irrealism and Key difference
direct realism. A key distinction between the two positions is that direct realism between irreal-
ism and direct
is generally understood as part and parcel of some form of metaphysical realism.
realism.¹⁵³ As such, the direct realist is committed to some form of independ-
ence principle regarding the perceived objects.¹⁵⁴ If I look at the moon, and then
suddenly stop existing, the moon would not be affected by this. But the irrealist
has subsumed the moon (as well as everything else) amongst what in the
representationalist framework was called the representations. Of course the
irrealist cannot, strictly speaking, call them representations any more, as there
is nothing represented behind them they could be contrasted with, but whatever
they are now called, it is clear that the presence of these entities would be affected
by the disappearance of the perceiver. Therefore the irrealist does not share the
direct realist’s commitment to the independence principle, and the metaphys-
ical realism that results from it. As a result the irrealist holds that what people
believe they are epistemically directly connected with (mind-, language-, and
theory-independent external objects) and what they are really epistemically
connected with (what was formerly referred to as representations) are different.
In direct realism we see a combination of veil-less theory of perception (the Direct realism as
‘direct’ part) together with some form of metaphysical realism (the ‘realism’ a combination of
directness and
part). As we move from direct realism to irrealism metaphysical realism drops realism.
out, though the two positions share a view of perception that is direct insofar as
it does not assume the existence of a set of represented objects behind the veil.
Yet they differ in their take on a fundamental philosophical position, the
question of metaphysical realism.¹⁵⁵

¹⁵² §32.
¹⁵³ Price (1964: 26); Lyons (2017: section 2.3.3); Gabriel (2013: 310): ‘Der direkte Realismus ist
in diesem Zusammenhang [i.e. McDowell’s discussion] die These, daß uns Gegenstände durch
Vermittlung von Wahrnehmungen begrifflich unverzerrt zugänglich sind. Der wahrgenommene
rote Apfel ist demnach kein erscheinender roter Apfel, dem irgendeine andere (etwa physikalische
oder gar weder räumliche noch zeitliche) Realität zugrunde liegt. Der wahrgenommene rote Apfel
ist wirklich rot, da man ihn wahrnimmt und sich ihn nicht bloß einbildet. Wahrnehmungen
beziehen sich direkt auf ihre Gegenstände und nicht etwa nur auf deren Einwirkungen auf einen
(immer potentiell) verzerrenden Filter.’
¹⁵⁴ Button 2013: 8: ‘The world is (largely) made up of objects that are mind-, language-, and
theory-independent.’
¹⁵⁵ In fact I believe that there is a more comprehensive solution to the problem of the potential
equation of direct realism and irrealism than the one presented here, and I will come back to this
problem at the very end of our discussion on p. 304. However, to make a convincing case for this
solution we first need to assess the arguments presented in the following three chapters.
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Our criticism of The criticism of the direct realist position discussed in §§15–20 is not
direct realism is targeted at direct realism’s ‘directness’ alone. Part of it is aimed at the com-
directed against
its metaphysical bination of the directness assumption with that of a largely mind-, language-,
realist and theory-independent world. Our best theories of the mechanics of the
component.
perceptual process tell us that it involves causal chains of considerable com-
plexity spread out in time, and, according to direct realism these are supposed
to connect us, the perceiver, with the perceived external world. But given the
nature of such connections, which are required by the need to link up with a
world conceived of as metaphysically real it becomes hard to see how the
‘directness’ component of direct realism can still be done justice.
The arguments from illusion and hallucination are directed primarily
against the realist component of direct realism. Direct realists are usually not
prepared to be realists about illusory or hallucinatory entities and therefore
have to find some other, non-realist way of accounting for them. As I have
argued above, these tend to lead to theories of perception that look remarkably
like forms of representationalism. The problem with realism, it appears, does
not lie in dispensing with a veil of representation between us and the world. It
lies in specific assumptions about what the veil-less perceptual relation con-
nects us with.

§43 A Kantian Parallel

The idea that the real world exists only as part of the virtual world has, in fact,
The thing-in- an interesting historical parallel. We find it, for example, in Vaihinger’s
itself as a fic-
tional entity.
interpretation of the Kantian thing-in-itself as an ens rationis, that is, as a
mere fiction.¹⁵⁶ Placing particular emphasis on material from Kant’s Opus
postumum Vaihinger argues that the distinction between the phenomenal
and the noumenal is not to be understood as a theory of appearances and

¹⁵⁶ Vaihinger 1935: 74–6, 151–3, 313–15. In this context I am not interested in the question
whether Vaihinger’s interpretation is the best, or even just whether it is a defensible reading of
Kant. My aim is rather to introduce it as one example of how the idea that the noumenal is part of
the representational interface and not a fundamentally real object can be spelt out.
We should note, however, that Vaihinger’s own development of his interpretation of Kant
appears to constitute a version of representationalism according to which we can make substan-
tial claims about the reality behind the veil of perception. For Vaihinger, once the things-in-
themselves disappear into the realm of the fictional, sensations (Empfindungen) remain as the
‘sole reality’. He writes ‘Kant introduces a device in the form of the Ding an sich, as an x to which
a y, the ego, as our organization, corresponds. By this means the whole world of reality can be
dealt with. Subsequently the “ego” and the Ding an sich are dropped, and only sensations remain
as real’ (Vaihinger 1935: 75–6); and ‘Kant allowed the tacit provisional assumption that there are
egos and Things-in-themselves, to remain as a scaffolding. Had he destroyed that scaffolding and
rejected them both he would have found that sensation [Empfindung] was the sole reality left’
(Vaihinger 1935: 151).
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underlying real objects, at least not at the ultimate level. From the standpoint of
philosophical inquiry it makes sense to draw such a distinction:
In order to explain the world of ideas which exists within us, Kant assumed that the
actual world consisted of things-in-themselves, mutually interacting, and on the basis of
this interaction he explained the genesis of sensations. We must, however, remember
that Kant only had the right to say, and in the first instance only wanted to say, that we
must (compelled thereto by reason of our discursive thought) regard real existence as if
things-in-themselves really existed, as if they influenced us and thus gave rise to our idea
of the world. In actual fact this is all he had the right to say according to his own system;
and in that case the Ding an sich was a necessary fiction, for only thus can we imagine
actual reality or think and speak of it at all.¹⁵⁷

However, there is no justification to infer any statement about how the

world is constituted independent of all cognition from what is at best a
cognitive necessity.¹⁵⁸ Noumenal reality is interpreted as a device of mere
pragmatic importance, comparable to the use of imaginary numbers which
make it possible to carry out a calculation, but which are not taken ontologically
seriously.¹⁵⁹ Vaihinger argues that in the same way as the ‘root of ’ operation is
meaningless for negative numbers, so the categories thing, attribute and caus-
ation are meaningless when applied to the things in themselves, since
[o]nly within the limits of discursive thought do these categories possess a meaning and
a justification, for here they serve to introduce logical operations. Only within the world
of our ideas are there things, things that are causes; in the real world these ideas are but
empty echoes.¹⁶⁰

§44 The Self-application Argument

Irrealism also encompasses the irrealist position itself. The irrealist holds that The irrealist’s
our best empirical accounts of human perception and cognition imply that all dilemma.
human cognition takes place in a brain-based representational interface.¹⁶¹
This then raises the question what precisely the status irrealism is by its own

¹⁵⁷ Vaihinger 1935: 76.

¹⁵⁸ See also Reflection 5554 where Kant states that the transcendental object of sense intuition is
not a ‘real thing’, but a concept: ‘Noumenon bedeutet [ . . . ] namlich das transcendentale Obiect der
sinnlichen Anschauung. Dieses ist aber kein reales obiect oder gegeben Ding, sondern ein Begrif
[ . . . ]’ (Kant 1926: 230).
¹⁵⁹ Vaihinger 1935: 74–5. See also Varzi 2014.
¹⁶⁰ Vaihinger 1935: 75. Though our aim here is not to assess the accuracy of Vaihinger’s
interpretation, we should at least note that there is a multitude of Kant’s characterizations of the
Ding an sich that are most straightforwardly interpreted in this way. See e.g. the references collected
in Eisler 1979: 97.
¹⁶¹ This point is sometimes made in criticisms of theories labelled as ‘neuroconstructvism’.
Gabriel (2015: 42–3) points out that based on the neuroconstructivist’s own theory the neurocon-
structivist would have to assume that we do not have a brain at all. (See also Gamez 2007: 86.)
Counterintuitive as this may appear, it is a bullet the neuroconstructivist can bite. It does not imply
(as Gabriel seems to think) that the claims of neuroconstructivism are therefore not truth-apt.
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Either: irrealism standards. For we seem to be facing the dilemma of either believing there to be
is not a human a world outside of the representational interface that does not take place in a
cognition.
brain-based representational interface and is therefore not a human cognition,
or that of believing that this belief itself only takes place in such an interface.
The claim that it is not a human cognition could be cashed out by arguing that
only a divine knower can know the truth that there is something behind the
interface, and that our only way of epistemic access to this truth is by faith in
the assertion of the divine knower. However, appeal to divine cognition is not
really compatible with the naturalist framework espoused by irrealism, so this
hardly seems to be the way we want our interpretation to go. In addition,
arguing that the belief in the existence of a world behind the representational
interface is not a cognition at all (human or divine) appears to be difficult to
accept as well; the statement ‘there is something beyond the representational
interface’ certainly looks like a knowledge claim referring to something beyond
the representational interface.
Or: irrealism is So we seem to be left with the second option, namely that the belief of a world
part of the rep- existing outside of the representational interface is part of that same interface.
resentational
interface. But all parts of the interface that can be evaluated for truth obtain their truth or
falsity relative to it. The statement that there is a red apple in front of me is true if
the virtual world I am located in¹⁶² contains a simulated red apple in a suitable
simulated spatial relation relative to the simulated me.¹⁶³ Yet if the claim ‘there
is a world outside of the representational interface’ is evaluated in this way, and
comes out as true, the only reason for this can be the irrealist one, namely that
the ‘world outside’ is part of the representational interface.
Irrealism and The irrealist interpretation has the added advantage of avoiding a problem
dialetheism. with the version of representationalism that relies only on the existence
requirement, without putting any emphasis on the accuracy requirement.
For if we refer to a world outside of the representational interface about
which nothing can be said (because none of our representations accurately
correspond to any of its properties) we have already said something about it.
Priest argues that attempts to combine the idea of a phenomenal interface with
a noumenal ‘extracranial world’ inevitably generate a contradiction due to the
tension between two principles appealed to: closure (that all our conceptual
resources coincide with the interface) and transcendence (that there is

¹⁶² It is likely that the irrealist would prefer to speak of the representational interface that has
generated the simulated me. See Chapter 2 for more discussion.
¹⁶³ We are thus not able to give a simple disquotational truth definition (‘The apple is red’ iff the
apple is red) but only an extended version that takes into account that our language is operating
within the interface (‘The apple is red’ is true iff the interface-apple is interface-red. See Khlentzos
2004: 201.)
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something beyond the interface).¹⁶⁴ Of course Priest does not regard such
contradictions as problematic, but those of us not yet converted to dialetheism
might regard it as an advantage of the irrealist approach that it avoids the
contradiction by omitting appeal to the principle of transcendence.
The irrealist scenario constitutes a picture of the world very much unlike the We cannot exist
ones we are used to. The idea that our brain creates the reality in which we live outside of the
representation.
is relatively widespread and intuitive. Yet if we adopt the theory that our
interaction with the world takes place via a representational interface, the
best account of the relation between mind and world we can give is an irrealist
one. This account is neither widespread nor intuitive. Quite a lot is at stake
when we consider whether or not to embrace irrealism, and we may find that it
induces a vague feeling of ontological claustrophobia. If irrealism is true, we are
suffering from a neurophysiological version of the locked-in syndrome. We
cannot escape the virtual world generated by our brain because there would be
no ‘we’ outside of the simulation. As in the case of a bubble in a liquid its
surrounding is constitutive of its existence; we can no more take us outside of
the representational interface we inhabit than we can take a bubble out of water.
§45 Ethics and Irrealism: The Experience Machine
Let us suppose we are persuaded that we live in an irrealistically construed
brain-based virtual reality of the kind described above. What would be the
consequences for the way we live our lives? To explore this matter further it is
instructive to compare the virtual world just discussed with the philosophical
fiction of the experience machine.
In 1974 Robert Nozick introduced the now classic philosophical thought
experiment of the experience machine, a virtual reality that promised maximal
hedonic satisfaction:
Superduper neuropsychologists could stimulate your brain so that you would think and
feel you were writing a great novel, or making a friend, or reading an interesting book.
All the time you would be floating in a tank, with electrodes attached to your brain.
[ . . . ] [B]usiness enterprises have researched thoroughly the lives of many others. You
can pick and choose from their large library or smorgasbord of such experiences,
selecting your life’s experiences for, say, the next two years. After two years have passed,
you will have ten minutes or ten hours out of the tank, to select the experiences of your
next two years.¹⁶⁵

The question Nozick was chiefly concerned with was whether you should Are we already
plug in for life, if such a machine was available. The question that becomes in the experience
machine?
particularly pressing in the context of irrealism is whether we have not already

¹⁶⁴ Priest 2002: 89. ¹⁶⁵ Nozick 1974: 43–4.

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been plugged into the experience machine. On the face of it this suggestion
seems preposterous, and the fact that most of our lives do not involve maximal
hedonic satisfaction most of the time seems to be a sufficient argument that we
Two key features are not presently in an experience machine. However, consider what the key
of the experience
machine.
two features of Nozick’s experience machine are. One is the separation between
1. No contact us and the world itself. For Nozick the person inside the experience machine is
with fundamen-
tal reality.
devoid of ‘actual contact with any deeper reality’, he is only interacting with a
simulacrum, a make-belief world.¹⁶⁶
2. Scripting The second feature is the scripting: we plan our experiences in such a way
that given our present preferences, having these experiences would give us
maximal pleasure. The two-year revision is presumably in place because there
is no more reason to assume that our preferences remain unchanged in the
experience machine, than there is to assume that they do so in real life. Hence
we occasionally need to make sure our planned experiences still deliver what
we want them to deliver.
If the arguments given above are in any way successful they will have shown
that the idea of actual contact with fundamental reality is a conceptual mirage.
The ‘natural’ virtual reality system we inhabit, a product of evolution, and an
artificial one, such as Nozick’s experience machine differ in a variety of ways,
but they do not differ in how close they bring us to reality. Whether you receive
information via ‘electrodes attached to your brain’ or via nerve-endings
attached to sensory organs makes no difference to the epistemic distance
between you and the perceived object. When we perceive an orange in the
ordinary manner, and when a Nozickian subject perceives one via the experi-
ence machine there is no reason to assume that one is in actual contact with
what underlies the orange at the deepest level, while the other only has access
to a pale ersatz citrus.
Being inside the Yet what about the second feature? First, consider the somewhat weaker
experience point that we would not necessarily be able to tell from the inside whether we
machine might
not involve are living in an experience machine or not. It is not sufficient to argue that we
maximal cannot be living in an experience machine because sometimes our plans fail,
hedonic
satisfaction.

¹⁶⁶ Nozick’s thought experiment was suggested as a way of criticizing moral hedonism and is
primarily discussed in this context. It is frequently suggested that the reason why people do not
want to ‘plug in for life’ is that they value actual contact with fundamental reality over having
specific kinds of experiences. But it is not clear whether there are not other explanations for this
fact. If we ask about the reverse scenario (‘Supposing you already were in an experience machine,
would you unplug?’) a smaller number than we would expect according to the ‘actual contact’
explanation chooses to leave the machine. One possible explanation may be a version of the
endowment effect well known to economists: people value their present total experiential states
more highly than possible alternatives, simply because these are the experiential states they are in.
For further discussion of this point see de Brigard 2010.
  -     

our desires are thwarted, and the results we hoped to obtain do not
materialize. For consider that if we were scripting our lives in the fashion
Nozick describes, we would have to do so against a set of constraints,
involving at least our own psychology and the structural features of the Lack of hedonic
perfection may
experience machine we are programming. We might not want the most be because of
desirable experiences all at once but staggered over time; they might have psychological
to come in a certain order since it would appear implausible to us to constraints, or
constraints on
have certain experiences that were not preceded by certain other experi- the machine.
ences; certain experiences are logically incompatible (we cannot simultan-
eously experience being a socialite and the pleasures of solitude), and so on.
Taking this into account it no longer seems so implausible that our life as it
feels from the inside could be the process of scripting to achieve a maximal
number of pleasant experiences against a set of constraints. We would in
any case have only experienced an initial finite segment of our scripted life;
arguing on the basis of this that it could not have been scripted with the
aim of pleasure-maximizing by us is as unconvincing as arguing that a film
cannot be a comedy because nothing funny happened during the first five
minutes.
Given these considerations we seem to be able to support a genuine
scepticism about whether or not we are currently placed in an experience
machine. We do not know. But that does not mean that we are. How could
we possibly believe this stronger thesis? Is there any evidence that we
regularly leave the natural virtual reality we inhabit in order to tweak the
future flow of experiences? Of course there isn’t, but then there wouldn’t be—
once you re-enter the experience machine you forget all about the ‘scripting
interval’.
However, the two-year requirement is not an essential feature of the experi-
ence machine in any case. There is no reason why the scripting could not be
done in shorter intervals, and, in particular, there is no reason why it could not
happen ‘on the fly’, while we are inside the machine. There is an obvious sense
in which we all script our lives in such as way as to ensure we have the
experiences we want to have, we just do not call this scripting. We carry out
certain actions within our natural virtual reality because we believe that relative
to the rules that govern it they will increase the probability of us having certain
experiences in the future. The scripting scenario only looks very different from
the predicament we are in because we have paid insufficient attention to details
of what such scripting actually involves. Its underlying appeal rests on the
assumption that the world frequently stands between us and the satisfaction of
our desire, and that if we could simply rewrite how the world works by
programming the experience machine we should be able to facilitate having
the experiences we want to have. But what this overlooks is that we cannot
have an experiencer without some structure, and we cannot have a world
   -    

without some structure either.¹⁶⁷ Our programming therefore has to work

around the constraints of our own psychological makeup and the constraints
of the experience machine. As such, concessions and trade-offs are inevitable
and the seemingly substantial difference between influencing the ‘natural’
virtual reality system we inhabit from the inside and scripting for the experi-
ence machine begins to disappear.
§46 Ethical Consequences
Given that ethical discussion was the original home of the example of the
experience machine it is worthwhile to discuss briefly what the ethical conse-
quences of the irrealist scenario are. There seems to be an intuitive pull in two
different directions.
Irrealism as On the one hand it appears to be a fairly widely shared philosophical
undermining
assumption that something like the irrealist scenario would at best be detri-
ethics.
mental for the existence of ethical behaviour, and would at worst completely
undermine it. Referring to a brain-in-a-vat scenario Button argues that envat-
ting brains
strips them of their ability to remain lovers of the good. Indeed, it will deprive them of
their desire to be a certain sort of person. [ . . . ] Before I was envatted, I loved my
partner; my well-being involves my continuing to love him, and his continuing to love
me. You destroy something of me (and him) when you interpret me as loving-in-the-
image him-in-the-image.¹⁶⁸

The idea seems to be that because in the context of irrealism and some of its
variants (such as certain forms of the brain-in-a-vat scenario) our ethical
attitudes never link up with real people, but only with representations in a

¹⁶⁷ There are some parallels between the point made here and some responses to the problem of
evil. The present argument tries to explain how the world, though scripted by us, is not hedonically
perfect, i.e. why there are still instances of unsatisfactoriness in such a world. The response to the
problem of evil attempts to show how there can be unjustified suffering in a world created by an
omnibenevolent and all-powerful god. One possible way of justifying this is by arguing that there
are certain constraints god is bound by in the creation of the world, and that these constraints bring
the existence of suffering about. For example, it might be logically necessary to allow some evils to
ensure the existence of greater goods (such as human free will), or it may be necessary that our
world is governed by unbreakable natural laws, which then in turn give rise to the cases of suffering
in question. (See e.g. Plantinga 1977; Reichenbach 1976.) The chief difficulty with these responses is
that the only necessity we can plausibly assume such a god to be bound by is logical necessity, and
that there is a logically necessary connection of goods and evils of this strength is difficult to
demonstrate.
Our point here does not suffer from this problem. All we need to agree on is that any system of
rules will entail consequences of these rules that may stand in contrast to what we wish these
consequences to be—and this is independent of the fact that we may have devised all the rules
ourselves. For example, we can set up a consistent system of axioms in any way we want, but
whatever we do there will be certain statements that cannot be derived in the system (assuming that
the system is consistent), even though we might wish them to be so derivable.
¹⁶⁸ Button 2013: 174.
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model, their ethical force somehow dissipates. I can only really feel love or
compassion (or aversion, or hatred) if I direct these attitudes towards a real
person, not towards some kind of virtual make-belief.
On the other hand we could also adopt a version of the Berkeleyan attitude Irrealism as
neutral towards
towards physics. If you are a Berkeleyan idealist you do not have to throw out ethics.
all of physics just because you believe there is no matter.¹⁶⁹ In fact you do not
have to throw out any of your physics, you just have to believe that every claim
about matter needs to be understood as being more fundamentally a claim
about mental stuff appearing as matter. Apart from that you can happily
continue conducting physical experiments, developing physical theories and
so forth. It is the same in the ethical case: just because all the people you are
interacting with are parts of the representational interface this does not mean
you cannot cultivate the kinds of mental attitudes towards them that you
regard as ethically commendable, try to avoid those you consider ethically
inferior, try to become the kind of person to whom carrying out certain kinds
of actions comes naturally and so on. As there is room for physics in the
Berkeleyan world, there is room for ethics in the representational interface.
How do we adjudicate between these positions? There is, I believe, room for Seeing ethics as a
a conception of ethics that is not primarily focused on our actions and their change in the
way the world
consequences for other people, or the performance of duty, or the cultivation appears to us.
of a specific character, but on bringing about a change of how the world
appears to us, a change of moral phenonemonology, so to speak, which will
then immediately influence the way we act on the basis of this appearance. The
idea is to replace a way of viewing the world in which it is primarily interpreted
as standing in the way of fulfilling our desires, as an obstacle-course to be
navigated in a race towards personal fulfillment with one in which our selfish
desires do not occupy the centre stage. The role of ethics is then seen as a way
of changing our comportment to the world, with a focus on care for skillful
interactions with others.
This conception of ethics needs spelling out in considerably more detail than Real ethics and
can be achieved here. It appears, however, that we can take the discussion a bit virtual ethics.

further, even if we accept, for the sake of argument, that it is an essential

characteristic of an ethical relation that is it a relation between two persons, not
between a person and a part of a virtual model. In this case there cannot be any
real ethical relations in irrealist scenario since there are no real other people
involved. Despite this absence of real ethics we would, it seems, still be able to
argue that there was something very much like ethics in the irrealist case, even
though it would not be the real thing (we might call this ‘virtual ethics’). Living
in a virtual world that is governed by rules, and which we cannot escape from

¹⁶⁹ For a similar point made from a phenomenalist, rather than idealist perspective, see Pelczar
2015.
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at will ensures that we accept constraints on our actions, that we endorse

certain ways in which we should act, and that we reject other possible courses
of action. Depending on the complexity of the virtual world, the number of
agents that form part of the model and the amount of time it has been running
this virtual ethics can also become quite complex. We can of course pound the
table and say that whatever ‘virtual ethics’ is, it is not ethics, since ethics (real
ethics, that is) involves multiple persons that exist outside of models, together
with their interrelations. But this entails the danger of turning the debate into
something merely terminological. We can say that the Berkeleyian physicist is
not really doing physics, since physics (real physics, that is) is the study of
mind-independent matter. But this leaves the entire field of interesting regu-
larities of mental-entities-appearing-as-matter that the Berkeleyian physicist
has discovered unaccounted for. If there is the choice between real physics we
cannot have (according to the Berkeleyian picture), and ‘idealist physics’ we
can know about in detail, should we not be interested in the latter, rather than
the former, no matter what we call it in the end?¹⁷⁰
Is metaphysics In the same way, if the arguments for irrealism are successful, ‘real ethics’ is
or ethics in the something we cannot have. Whether we would want to use this as the basis of
driving seat?
an ethical modus tollens against irrealism (‘because there are real ethical
relations, and because these must involve people that are not just people-
in-the-model we know that there are entities that exist outside of the model’)
depends on our view of the priority of different parts of philosophy. I see
metaphysics as occupying the driving seat and would thus be reluctant to base
an argument for a metaphysical conclusion on ethical premisses. That we
cannot have ‘real ethics’ may not be as problematic as we would initially
think, because it does not entail that we cannot have any ethics whatsoever,
in the same way in which it does not follow that the Berkeleyian cannot have
any physics whatsoever. It is just that we have to replace the ‘real’ version by a
suitably modified ‘virtual’ one.

¹⁷⁰ We might draw a parallel here with the dispute between those who think we can account for
consciousness in purely functionalist terms, and those who believe that this would fail to account
for the qualitative aspects of experience. All the functionalist can ever account for, his critic may
contend, is the mental life of a zombie, where the lights are on, but nobody is at home. Such a
zombie may be functionally identical to us, but without having any of the feeling of what it is like to
have certain appearances. Daniel Dennett has argued that if we make the structure of the zombie
sufficiently complex and equip it with higher-order beliefs about his beliefs and other internal states
(a being Dennett calls a ‘zimbo’, 1998b: 172) it is very hard to justify that there are any properties,
functional or qualitative, that would distinguish it from a human being like us (Dennett 1991a,
1998b, 2001). We may argue in a similar manner that if we conceive of virtual ethics in a sufficiently
complex way, with sufficiently many virtual agents connected in the right ways, the theory of their
behavioural interactions and their influence on us would encompass everything we could ever
expect of an ethical theory.
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§47 Summing Up
Let us take stock of the dialectical progression so far. I have tried to argue above
that the main reasons we have for assuming the existence of an external world,
namely the appearance of externality, the need to draw a distinction between
veridical and illusory perceptions, and the desire for a plausible epistemology
are not as robust as they look at first sight. To repeat the point made at the
beginning of this chapter, nothing could stop a realist from postulating the
external world as an additional object, in the same way in which nothing could
stop a mathematical Platonist from simply postulating the mathematical The assumption
of an external
entities he believes to exist in an abstract realm. However, in the domain of world is
philosophy, postulation is not enough. We also expect that the entities we theoretically
postulate do some explanatory work. As we have seen in our discussion of dispensable.
representationalism, the epistemological assumption of an external world
turned out to be not much more than the claim that there is something out
there. Yet what work this claim was doing became increasingly unclear, and it
turned out instead that we could simply replace it by a claim of the existence of
an external world made within the representational interface itself, thereby
neutralizing its original ontological implication.
It should also be evident from the preceding pages that I am not simply
arguing for agnosticism about the external world, trying to show that the Agnosticism vs
reasons for assuming its existence (common sense included) are no stronger atheism about
the external
than the reasons against. Rather, my point is that if we can show that there are world.
no good reasons for assuming some entity then we are justified in denying that
entity’s existence. If the philosopher of mathematics can show that the assump-
tion of Platonic objects is theoretically dispensable this does not entail that we
should suspend judgment about the existence of Platonic objects, saying that
maybe there are such objects, or maybe there aren’t, but it entails that we are
justified in denying that there are any Platonic objects. The same holds if our
arguments do not concern Platonic objects but the external world. Hyposta-
tized entities that demonstrably fail to pull their explanatory weight do not
deserve the epistemological benefit of the doubt.
At the same time irrealism is also not a form of nihilism about the external Irrealism and
world, at least not in the way in which nihilism is usually understood. For the nihilism.

nihilist is taken to say that, independent of representational frameworks,

specific things do not exist. Yet the preceding remarks have questioned the
very intelligibility of making such framework-independent ontological state-
ments. Moreover, irrealism does not deny the existence of the external world
but accepts it, albeit restricted to the representational interface. As such the
characterization of irrealism as nihilism fails twice over: first, because irrealism
accepts the existence of an external world in a manner of speaking, and second
because the framework-independent denial of existence that the nihilist would
need is taken to be impossible by the irrealist.
   -    

Note that the view of the external world as a mere a postulate within the
Irrealism and perceptual interface does not in any way deny the possibility of scientific
scientific
progress. Science has been spelling out the claim ‘that there is something out
progress.
there’ over the centuries in increasingly detailed ways, replacing the entities
featuring in the most fundamental laws by even more fundamental ones. While
each of these steps amounts to progress in the sense of increasing our powers to
explain and manipulate phenomena, if the arguments sketched above are
accepted there is no reason to assume either that this process ever has to
come to an end when the most fundamental ‘somethings’ have been identified,
or that it would ever take us outside of the representational interface. More
detailed and more fundamental (in the sense of explanatorily and pragmatic-
ally more powerful) representations still remain representations.
If the assumption of an external world has no ontological implications the
desiderata we mentioned at the beginning of the chapter could be accom-
plished in an entirely ‘world-free’ manner: we can still draw a distinction
between what is veridical and what is illusory by reference to a reflective
equilibrium of coherence, intersubjectivity, and efficacy, and we can still assert
that our perceptions and intentional mental states connect us with an external
world as long as we understand references to the world as being made
exclusively ‘in the fiction’ of the perceptual interface. In this way the appear-
ance of externality is accounted for as well, even though it cannot claim to be
anything more than an appearance. But now the justificatory force of postu-
lating an external world seems to have evaporated. As it is good methodo-
logical practice to avoid postulations for which no sufficient justification exists,
our theory of reality should proceed without reference to an external world.
To return to the spherical metaphor we used earlier in this chapter: so far we
have argued for a picture of perception according to which we are trapped in a
sphere, constituted by the veil of perception, such that the exterior of the
sphere is explained away as a competing explanation of the world as it appears
to us. If we can account for everything that appears on the inner surface of the
sphere without having to postulate any causes that affect its outside we do not
have to assume the existence of a world beyond the sphere. But so far we have
not paid any close attention to the ontological status of whatever exists on the
inside of the sphere. This will be the subject-matter of Chapter 2.
 2
The Non-existence of the
Internal World

2.1 Realism about the Internal World?

§48 The External and the Internal World
In the previous chapter I considered the existence of the external world. The external
I explored problems for arguments purporting to establish that such a world world as
part of the
exists, either as a world that might be conceived as a collection of physical representational
objects surrounding our brain, which in turn is wired into its environment by a interface.

set of causal processes that flow from the world and affect our nerve-endings,
or simply as a something-out-there about nothing further can be said. As an
alternative I suggested a view according to which the external world can only
be made sense of as part of the representational interface; according to this
view the external world is an assumption that arises as a result of connecting
and grouping our mental events in certain ways.
I now want to continue our investigation by looking at the internal world.
The internal world is a popular point of retreat when the existence of the The internal
external world is threatened by philosophical arguments of the sceptical world as a
defence against
variety. Some philosophers believe the internal world contains some resources specticism.
to beat back the sceptical attacks, to establish a firm foundation on which the
external world can once more be firmly grounded (as in the case of the
Cartesian cogito). Others take it as a depository of raw material from which a
picture of the world that at least bears strong resemblance to the realist one can
be constructed (as in Carnap’s ‘logical construction of the world’), or they
might simply consider it as a realm of appearances that is, however, grounded
in some way in noumenal reality (as in various Kantian approaches).
In the approach described in the previous chapter the external world seems
to have been replaced by the internal world, or at least by a model which forms What is the
part of such an internal world. What, then, is the ontological status of that ontological
status of the
internal world? Can we say that, instead of what some people might think there internal world?
is (the external world modelled by the model), what really exists is something
else, namely just the inner world?

The Non-Existence of the Real World. Jan Westerhoff, Oxford University Press (2020). © Jan Westerhoff.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198847915.001.0001
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2.2 The Presumed Certainty of Introspection

§49 How Unproblematic is Introspection?
The ‘diamond Approaches that retreat from the external to the internal world generally
clockwork’. presuppose that the route to this inner world is entirely unproblematic. The
inner world appears to be a realm of direct cognitive access and indubitable
certainty.¹ When we introspect, we appear to see into a ‘diamond clockwork’,²
each toothed wheel, lever, and gear clearly visible in all of its complex inter-
actions. This picture has a certain intuitive appeal. After all, observation of
phenomena in the external world is often difficult, failing to deliver clear
results, and prone to illusion. Yet when we want to know whether we are
hungry, have a headache or see an apple appearing in front of us, the epistemic
task at hand seems to be as easy at its gets, yielding entirely decisive results, and
results secure from any kind of error.³
Knowledge of It appears to us that our knowledge of the inner world is not mediated, but
the inner world arises as the result of direct acquaintance. There is no middle-man in the form
is not mediated.
of perception or inference. We do not become acquainted with internal states
by putting together distinct perceptual data, as we might but together certain
round visual, smooth tactile, and citrus-like olfactory sensations to form the
perception of an orange, nor do we have to infer the existence of inner states in
the way in which we might have to infer the existence of a man from a visual
experience of a tall shape in the mist. Because of this absence of mediation
there also appears to be no room for mistakes. When I introspect and perceive
a certain inner state then I am in this inner state.
§50 Internal Illusions
Illusions also For all its obviousness, this picture is fundamentally wrong.⁴ The appearance/
affect
reality distinction not only arises with respect to the external world, as various
introspection.
examples of sensory illusions and hallucinations show, but also manifests in
relation to the internal world of mental phenomena.⁵ Here too things can

¹ For an account of how widespread this assumption is in philosophical traditions around the
globe see Carruthers 2011: 12–46.
² Schwitzgebel 2011: 120.
³ See, for example Reichenbach (1938: 90) for a clear example of this position: ‘We said that we
shall admit impression sentences as being absolutely certain; we see, however, that this absolute
certainty is restricted to events of a private world only. With the transition from my own subjective
experience to the objective external world, uncertainty enters into my statements. But not only
uncertainty as to special statements; there is superimposed a general uncertainty as to the world of
external things at all. How do we know that there is such an external world outside our private
world? It is the problem of the existence of external things which arises here.’
⁴ For an attempt to defend the infallibility of certain kinds of introspective knowledge in the light of
results from experiments in empirical psychology such as the ones discussed below see Parent 2017.
⁵ Dennett (2002a: 13) notes that ‘There is no proposition about one’s own or anybody else’s
conscious experience that is immune to error, unlikely as that error might be.’
  -     

appear in one way and exist in quite another way (like a bent stick appearing
straight) and things can appear to exist that do not, in fact, exist (like a tree-
stump that is mistaken for a man).
Some examples for this are provided by psychopathology. A particularly Anton’s
syndrome.
vivid case is provided by Anton’s syndrome,⁶ a condition in which patients
who have suddenly gone blind, usually through damage to the visual cortex,
still insist on being able to see and confabulate elaborate phenomenological
descriptions of what they see around them, even though they are functionally
unable to navigate their actual surroundings using the visual faculty. Anton’s
syndrome provides us with a clear case of truthful first-person reports about
the contents of their consciousness that are nevertheless mistaken.
Less dramatic but equally interesting examples can be found in the contem- Metacognitive
porary literature on metacognitive errors, that is errors in the estimation of our errors.

own cognitive capacities. A clear example of such a metacognitive error is the

phenomenon of choice-blindness mentioned in the previous chapter, which
demonstrates a considerable lack of insight into the ways in which we generate
justifications for our beliefs. An even more straightforward case concerns the
resolution of our visual field. It appears to us as if every part of the visual field
has the same resolution, that we do not see the scene before us as sharply
defined at one spot, and as grainy and indistinct elsewhere. In fact the area of
our retina with the highest resolution is at the foveal part at the very centre,
while the resolution of the remaining parts is considerably lower. The reason
why we do not notice this disparity is that our eyes move around very quickly,
perceiving different parts of our visual field with those parts of the eye that
offer the highest resolution. This can be easily demonstrated by a now classic
experiment suggested by Dennett.⁷ Take a playing card without looking at it,
and hold it at arm’s length, facing your ear, while looking straight ahead. Move
your arm from the periphery of your visual field to the centre without shifting
your gaze. It is surprising (and somewhat disconcerting) to realize how close to
the centre of our visual field the card has to be for us to be able to identify it.
As this example indicates, one way of identifying such metacognitive errors Detecting
metacognitive
is by a detailed study of the mechanics of our cognitive access to the world, by
errors.
reference to the physical basis of our minds, to facts about our perceptual
system and our brain. We might have the impression that our self is located in
our head, just behind the eyes, looking out into the world, but our knowledge
of neuroanatomy tells us that there is nothing specific in that location in the
brain that could qualify as the physical basis of our self. Similarly our know-
ledge of the structure of the retina tells us that the appearance of a continuous
visual field without any interruptions we have is illusory. If the eye works as we

⁶ Benson/Greenberg 1969, see also Metzinger 2003a: 234–5. ⁷ 1991: 53–4.

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think it works there is no way we can see anything in the location of the blind
spots, even though we do see something in their place.
Of course this is not the only way of detecting illusions concerning our
mental life. We remember that the results concerning change blindness dis-
cussed in the preceding chapter did not involve any references to the physical
basis of our minds but simply compared perceptions in a variety of carefully
controlled set-ups. We can convince ourselves of the falseness of certain
metacognitive beliefs (such as the belief that we are not change blind) by
considering a variety of situations in which we (or other people very much
like us) did not perceive what we previously thought we would perceive.
There is a considerable variety of metacognitive errors discussed in the
literature on cognitive science. In this chapter I will focus on two particularly
weighty examples. The first of these concerns the structure of our internal
world as it appears to us, the second has to do with its contents.

2.3 Illusory Certainties

§51 Two Key Features of the Internal World
Most people believe that their inner world is characterized by two key features:
1. Continuity of 1. The continuity of consciousness: Consciousness is an ongoing process
consciousness. that is always present as long as we exist (with the potential exception of
deep sleep and coma). Whether we are awake or dreaming, we are always
aware of something. Mental events follow each other in an unbroken
succession on the stage of consciousness.
2. Presence of a 2. The presence of a self: A central element of our internal world (in fact the
self. central element, the fixed point around which our mental life revolves) is
our self, a substantial, self-sustaining, unified, temporally extended ‘me’
closely connected (and perhaps identical) with our body, the locus of
agency and responsibility, and the prime object of our prudential concern.
Both certainties turn out to be illusory certainties. In this chapter we will
consider arguments why both the assumption of the continuity of conscious-
ness and that of the existence of a self are mistaken. The two issues are related:
if there is no continuity of consciousness it is difficult to see how there could be
a continuous self existing throughout that consciousness, at least if the experi-
ence of a self is considered to be part and parcel of what it is to be conscious.
Nevertheless, both questions are of sufficient independent interest to discuss
them separately.
In the discussion of the continuity assumption I will look at a series of
empirical results that suggest that consciousness is instead a discontinuous
process that stops and starts, not a constantly flowing river. Subsequently I am
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going to look at the prospects of building a theory of consciousness on the basis

of the view of consciousness as discontinuous.
Discussing the presence of the self I will consider some arguments that
challenge the existence of a self, person, or ‘me’ at the centre of our inner world.
Somewhat surprisingly, as opposed to the solipsistic view that only I exist,
which is not given much endorsement by philosophers, the view that I don’t
exist has found support amongst various contemporary thinkers, who have tried
to establish it by a number of quite diverse arguments. I will consider a set of
properties the self is commonly considered to possess in order to determine
whether it can in fact be taken to instantiate any one of them.
I discuss both of these illusory certainties in order to underline one central
thesis: that the internal world cannot be used as a point of retreat once
concerns about the existence of external objects (like those in Chapter 1)
have been raised. Once the external world has vanished out of sight behind
the veil of perception we cannot use the material on our side of the curtain to
build an indubitable and unshakeable substitute. If anything we should be more
suspicious of introspectively generated data than we are of perceptually gen-
erated ones.

A The Apparent Stream of Consciousness

§52 The River of Consciousness
A prominent feature of our internal world is the stream of consciousness. The
metaphor of the stream (first employed by William James) suggests that certain
exceptions (such as dreamless sleep and coma) aside, our inner life consists of
an unbroken sequence of conscious moments, one following another in quick
succession. As we can see various pieces of debris drifting by on a river so we
can observe sensations, feelings, thoughts, memories and so forth being carried
along through our mind by the stream of consciousness.
Susan Blackmore summarizes this picture well:
I feel as though I am somewhere inside my head looking out. I can see and hear and feel
and think. The impressions come along in an endless stream; pictures, sounds, feelings,
mental images and thoughts appear in my consciousness and then disappear again. This is
my ‘stream of consciousness’ and I am the continuous conscious self who experiences it.⁸

The naturalness and intuitive force of the metaphor of the stream of con- Intuitive force of
sciousness seems to be beyond dispute. Most of us feel as if our consciousness the metaphor.
had this unbroken, continuous nature. And we are all wrong about this, or so
I would like to argue. The idea of the stream of consciousness presents a

⁸ 2002: 19.
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particularly clear and important example of a case where introspection delivers

wrong beliefs about the inner world.⁹
First of all let us be clear what the ‘stream’ metaphor amounts to. Evidently
the idea of a continuous consciousness means that conscious experience has no
gaps: during a certain interval of consciousness (e.g. between two periods of
sleep), we are conscious (i.e. some experience appears) at every moment.
We would, of course, want to assess this by something other than mere
introspection. There is no point in assessing it in terms of experienced moments,
since then consciousness is gapless by definition—every experienced moment
is a conscious moment. If we assume that the smallest conscious moment
relevant for our purposes lasts for n seconds, our consciouness is gapless
during an m-second interval if there are mn conscious moments during that
interval.
§53 Discontinuity of Visual Consciousness—Saccadic Suppression
It is useful to restrict our present discussion to visual consciousness or the
appearance of visual perception. Like all conscious processes it appears con-
tinuous to us. Visual perception flows like a stream, each image seamlessly
blends into another, there are no gaps or sudden jumps. If we look at some
scene, say, a landscape with a river, we experience a continuous whole that is
synchronically unified (all the parts of the visual scene hang together) and
diachronically unified (each visual moment links up with the next).
But this is not the picture we get if we investigate how vision works.¹⁰ When
looking at some object or scene with a steady gaze our eyes do not rest like a
camera on a stand but continuously jump around in quick movements called
Duration and saccades. The duration of each saccade is short. The greater the distance
amount of
saccades.
covered by the eye movement the longer the saccade, but even long saccades
rarely last for more than 100 milliseconds (ms), with the majority being shorter
than 50 ms.¹¹ Yet saccades are very frequent. We make about three saccades
per second, that is more than 160,000 saccades a day.¹² If we assume for that
sake of simplicity that each saccade lasts for only 40 ms this adds up to a total
amount of nearly two hours a day.
Saccades alone do not imply any discontinuity. After all we can also have a
continuous shot with a camera that jerkily moves around a scene. But what

⁹ See also Blackmore 2001.

¹⁰ Some readers may wonder how we can even refer to theories of vision if the existence of an
external world is denied, as it was in the last chapter. The reason for this is (as was mentioned at the
end of §47) that considering the external world as a mere postulate within the perceptual interface
does not undermine the possibility of scientific activity, or the ability to claim that certain scientific
theories are better than others. References to scientific results in this book should be understood in
this manner, rather than as a tacit acknowledgement of realist presuppositions.
¹¹ Lee and Zee 2006: 111. ¹² Schiller et al. 2008: 661.
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does present problems for the idea of a continous visual consciousness is a

phenomenon known to experimental psychologists for at least a century:
saccadic suppression or saccadic masking. Saccadic suppression implies that
we cannot perceive visual stimuli during saccades. It can be most vividly
demonstrated by a simple experiment.
Look into a mirror and focus on your left eye, then on your right eye, then Example of
saccadic
on your left eye again, switching back and forth a couple of times. Your eyeballs masking.
are moving from one side to the other, but you never see them move, instead
you perceive your eyeballs as stationary. Try watching a friend doing this, or
video yourself during the experiment to see the considerable eyeball movement
involved.¹³
The reason visual information during saccades is not consciously available is
motion blur. While the eyes are moving, our eyes usually do not produce a
clear image;¹⁴ it is therefore useful for our visual system to exclude these
deficient data from the set of visual data cognitively available.
The existence of saccadic suppression provides strong empirical evidence Despite
that our visual consciousness is gappy and that its diachronic continuity is an saccades, visual
consciousness
illusion. We do not receive a continuous stream of images, but a cut-up appears
succession of visual data frequently interrupted by periods of non-perception continuous.
(or visual unconsciousness). The whole thing still appears continuous to us,
but this appearance is deceptive. If we add together all the small interruptions
in our visual consciousness we end up with a significant period of time each
day during which we do not have any visual perceptions.
Yet saccadic suppression is not the only phenomenon that suggests the
discontinuity of visual perceptions. Another example that points in the same
direction is the so-called wagon wheel illusion.
§54 Discontinuity of Visual Consciousness—the Wagon Wheel Illusion
When watching older films of moving carriages (such as a old Westerns, for Cinematic
example) it often seems as if the carriage is moving in one direction, while the version.
wheel is moving in a different one. This surprising effect is easily explained by
considering how the film was made. The camera would shoot a static picture of

¹³ See Tatler\Trościanko 2002 for another attempt to circumvent saccadic masking in order to
perceive the motion of our own eyes. We can regard saccadic masking as the temporal equivalent of
the blindspot’s spatial example. Even though each of our retinas contains an area roughly
equivalent to the size of an orange held at arm’s length where we are unable to see anything, the
manifest image of our visual world is a continuous whole, without any holes or discontinuities.
¹⁴ Unless, that is, our eyes are moving too. When we are sitting in a moving train and look out
on the neighbouring tracks they appear like a formless blur. But if we move our eyes along the track
in the direction the train is moving we sometimes manage to briefly produce a clear image. As soon
as the image stabilizes (a period as short as a millisecond appears to be sufficient for this) saccadic
inhibition is switched off and the image becomes cognitively available. In this specific situation the
only way we can achieve a stable image is during, not between eye-movements.
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Figure 2.1 How the wagon wheel moves

Figure 2.2 How the moving wagon wheel appears

the wheel as it turns, shooting one frame for each quarter-turn, let us assume
(Figure 2.1).
Given that all the spokes look the same, our brain always has two possibil-
ities for interpreting what is happening: seeing it as turning a quarter-turn to
the right, or turning a small distance to the left. Assuming that we always
interpret the wheel to have travelled the smallest distance possible, it will look
to us as if the wheel is actually travelling backwards (Figure 2.2).
Real life version. It is interesting to note that the wagon wheel illusion can also be observed in
real life. When watching a real carriage it can look as if carriage and wheels are
travelling in different directions. The discontinuity of visual perception can be
used to explain this effect. The underlying idea is that our visual system works
like a film camera in important respects, shooting static pictures of a moving
object that are then put together to create the appearance of continuous
motion. If we assume that at the time of putting together the frames we
make the same interpretative choice as in the case of the film this would
explain why the wagon wheel illusion is not confined to the cinema, as our
perception of motion is fundamentally cinematic.
There is certainly no universal agreement on whether the wagon wheel
illusion should be explained in this way¹⁵ or indeed on whether there is an
illusion at all.¹⁶ However, the phenomena of saccadic suppression and the
proposed explanation for the wagon wheel illusion just described add some
support to the view that visual perception is a fundamentally discontinuous,
gappy phenomenon.

¹⁵ Kline et al 2004; Andrews and Purves 2005; Andrews et al. 2005; Holcombe et al. 2005.
¹⁶ Pakarian and Yasamy 2003.
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If this is the case, however, how do the separate bits that make up visual
perception get bound up into a coherent whole? Research into cyclic phenom-
ena in the brain suggests that these might play a role putting together the
distinct perceptual phenomena into larger units.
§55 Motion Perception and Brain Rhythm
One of the earliest experiments of this kind was devised by Francesco Varela in Varela’s
1979, investigating the question of the continuity of consciousness based on experiment.

the brain’s alpha rhythm.¹⁷ If you flash two separate points of light onto a
screen in quick succession (less than 100 ms apart) they will appear simultan-
eous. If you increase the temporal interval slightly you will perceive one light
quickly moving back and forth, and if you increase it even further the lights will
appear one following the other. If our visual perception is discontinuous and
operates via a succession of separate moments one might suspect there to be a
difference in the perception of the flashes depending on when the flashes are
presented. If the timing is such that both flashes happen within the span of one
‘conscious moment’ we are more likely to see them as simultaneous, but if they
occur in two separate moments, we are more likely to see them as sequential.
Varela set up the experiment in such a way that the timing of two flashes
about 50 ms apart corresponded to different phases of the brain’s alpha
rhythm. He found there to be a correlation between how the flashes were
perceived, and how they were timed in relation to the alpha rhythm. When the
flashes were shown at the positive peak of the alpha rhythm they were nearly
always perceived as quickly moving; when they were shown at the negative
peak they were generally seen as simultaneous.¹⁸
Varela interpreted these results as indicative of a natural parsing of visual The ‘frames’ of
visual
perception into distinct frames, each lasting for about 100–200 ms. He argued perception.
that when the flashes are shown at the end of one such frame there is a much
greater probability that they are perceived as sequential, whereas showing them
at the beginning of a frame would make it more likely that they are seen as
simultaneous. Each frame then corresponds to something like a ‘visual pre-
sent’, and everything that occurred in such a present would be interpreted as
occurring at the same time.

¹⁷ For an interesting contextualization of Varela’s experiment see Thompson, chapter 2.

¹⁸ Varela et al. 1981. On the difficulties of replicating these results see Gho and Varela
1988–1989, which notes that ‘although cortical rhythms correlate with perceptual framing as
previously reported [ . . . ], the nature of this dependency is different than previously suggested: a
visual temporal frame seems to be a local event at the cortex, and not a global coordination
uniformly reflected in the alpha rhythm.’ (95); VanRullen and Koch 2003; VanRullen et al. 2011.
However, research into brain rhythm and the discontinuous nature of perception continues. For
interesting research on the connection between the alpha rhythm and stimulus detection see Busch
et al. 2009: 7869–76; Mathewson et al. 2009: 2725–32.
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§56 Flash Perception and Brain Rhythm

Brain rhythm There is not just a connection between brain rhythms and the way we perceive
and perceptual certain phenomena (e.g. as simultaneous or apparently moving flashes of light)
acuity.
but brain rhythms also seem to sometimes influence whether we perceive
anything at all.
In 2010 Busch and VanRullen published results suggesting that ‘detection
performance for attended stimuli actually fluctuated over time along with the
phase of spontaneous oscillations in the theta (= 7 hertz) frequency band just
before stimulus onset’.¹⁹ Busch and VanRullen showed the subjects flashes of
light just bright enough to be seen (i.e. such that each subject would only detect
them 50 per cent of the time). It turned out that their ability to detect the light
correlated with the ebb and flow of electrical oscillations in the brain that
happen about seven times per second. The threshold for detecting the lights
turned out not to be constant, but varied according to the ‘excitability’ of the
brain depending on which oscillatory phase it was currently in. Visual percep-
tion appears to be divided into distinct frames or moments of perception²⁰
such that during each moment there is a much higher chance of perceiving a
stimulus than between different moments. It is interesting that this variability
appears to exist only for stimuli that are actually attended to, suggesting that
sustained attention is, despite appearances, a periodic phenomenon, much
more like a strobe light flashing at various frequencies than like a torch with
a steady beam.²¹
§57 Elementary Integration Units
Brain rhythm Research into cyclical phenomena in the brain also provides evidence for the
and the
fact that these might play a role in unifying different perceptual moments
integration of
perceptual across sensory modalities. Results obtained by the neuroscientist Ernst Pöppel
modalities. suggests that periods of oscillation constituting ‘perceptual moments’²² might
be necessary to solve the problem of getting from a temporally disunified
input to a unified representation.²³ Visual and auditory information from a
single object taken up through different sensory channels arrives at the sensory
input points at different times due to the different speeds of sound and light

¹⁹ Busch and VanRullen 2010: 16048.

²⁰ See also VanRullen and Koch 2003: 213: ‘There is a certain minimal interstimulus interval for
which two successive events are consistently perceived as simultaneous: one can think of them as
occurring within a single discrete “epoch” of processing time. [ . . . ] When the stimulus (composed
of many distinct visual events, for example, 8 flashing lights) is repeated in cycles of less than
125 ms periodicity, all stimuli within one cycle are reported as occurring together, regardless of the
specific time differences between them.’
²¹ Busch and VanRullen 2010: 16050.
²² This term was first used by J.M. Stroud 1967 who estimated this quantum of psychological
time (the minimal amount required to integrate sensory information) to last about 100 ms.
²³ Pöppel 2009: 1889.
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and different modalities process them at different speeds. We are surrounded

by a ‘horizon of simultaneity’ about 10 metres around us. For objects placed on
the rim of this horizon, visual and auditory information emanating from them
arises at the same time, for anything beyond it visual information arrives
earlier, for anything within it, auditory information arrives earlier. The lack
of unification does not stop here: once processed by the brain information is
spatially spread out across a network of neural connections. Because of the
different transmission times within this network this spatial spread also entails
a temporal spread.²⁴ The existence of a perceptual moment timed by some
oscillatory mechanism (or set of such mechanisms) in the brain would allow it
to unify this spread-out arrangement into a series of coherent cognitive units.
There would then be no perceived temporal relationships within these units, as
the units themselves are shortest items from which our temporal experience is
built.
Pöppel also argues that on top of these ‘elementary integration units’ lasting The 3-second
for about 30–40 ms²⁵ there are longer units of integration lasting about three perceptual now.
seconds. He finds evidence for these in a variety of cognitive phenomena.
When we have to reproduce the duration of an auditory or visual event we tend
to overestimate durations shorter than 2–3 seconds, and underestimate longer
durations; successive stimuli (such as the clicks of a metronome) can no longer
be grouped into subjective units if the time between them is longer than three
seconds; an automatic shift tends to occur in the perception of ambiguous
figures (such as the Necker cube) after about three seconds.²⁶
Pöppel identifies this three-second interval with the ‘perceptual now’ or
specious present and argues that the existence of perceptual frames (rather
than continuous tracking) is essential for perceiving the world both in terms of
objects remaining the same, as well as in terms of change:
[T]he brain creates temporal windows of just a few seconds within which the identity of
a percept or a concept is maintained (stationarity), and allows after such an interval the
access of a new percept or concept (dynamics). Both stationarity and dynamics are
necessary for our mental machinery [ . . . ].
If consciousness were not divided up into different chunks there would be no chance for
the different spatio-temporally spread out neuronal processes to coalgulate into unified
entities, and if these chunks would not continuously replace each other our cognitive
lives would be static, not dynamic.²⁷

These different experimental results indicating a correlation between various

perceptual tasks and cycles of neuronal events suggest that the idea of

²⁴ ‘Within the neuronal machinery, events or objects are ill defined and show a high degree of
uncertainty both spatially and temporally.’ Pöppel 2009: 1889.
²⁵ See also Pöppel 1968: 449–50. ²⁶ Pöppel 2009: 1891. ²⁷ Pöppel 2009: 1893.
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quantized, rather than continuous perceptual consciousness should be taken

seriously.²⁸
§58 The Discontinuity of Consciousness More Generally
The experiments pointing towards the discontinuity of visual perception just
discussed provide us with a clear example of how our beliefs about the internal
Discontinuity as world can be false despite their introspective certainty. If we look inside it
a pervasive appears to be as certain as anything that our visual perceptions form a
feature.
continuous stream, yet if we investigate the mechanisms of visual perception
more closely it becomes apparent that this continuity (like the spatial continu-
ity of the visual field across the blindspot) is only an appearance. Gappiness
does not seem to be a phenomenon that is unique to visual perception. If we
consider perceptual mechanisms more generally, discontinuity appears to be
an obvious and pervasive feature. VanRullen et al. note that
Active periodic sampling in the outside environment is a ubiquitous property of sensory
systems: saccades in vision, sniffs in olfaction, whisker movements in rat somatosensa-
tion, and even echolocation in bats or electrolocation in electric fish are all examples of
explicit cyclic mechanisms for overt perceptual sampling.²⁹

Consciousness The fact that discontinuity is a widespread feature of different kinds of sensory
as a whole as perception might be considered as a step towards the more general claim that
discontinuous.
consciousness as a whole, not just consciousness relative to specific sensory
modalities, such as sight, olfaction, and so on, is discontinuous. This would
imply that the failure of our introspective certainty is even more extreme than
we might have thought. We would not simply be mistaken about the apparent
continuity of the streams of sensory information that enter our minds, but the
continuity of that very mind that is the seer, smeller, taster, the thinker of our
thoughts and the doer of our deeds appears to be called into question. Instead
of a continuous stream of conscious awareness that brings various pieces of
perceptual information to our attention, there would be a discontinuous, gappy
succession of moments of consciousness.
§59 Objections to the Discontinuity of Consciousness
This more general claim that consciousness itself is discontinuous faces two
immediate objections.
Objection 1: 1. Even if we grant that visual perception (or any other sensory modality) is
Input may be
gappy, but
gappy, this alone does not show us anything about consciousness, and it
consciousness
need not be.
²⁸ For some additional relevant material not discussed here see Crick and Koch 2003: 119–26;
Pockett et al. 2011. For a perspective very critical of the hypothesis of discrete frames in conscious
perception see White 2018.
²⁹ VanRullen et al. 2007: 19208.
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certainly does not show that consciousness itself is gappy. All the
existence of saccadic suppression, for example, demonstrates is that
consciousness gets gappy visual data. Consciouness might well be an
unbroken stream of awareness, even though the various sensory modal-
ities feeding it are discontinuous.
2. The second objection points out that we simply cannot fail to accord Objection 2:
Appearance of
some existential status to the appearance. If matters appear in a certain continuity
way there is an (appearing) way in which they are that way. Our first- implies
person experience cannot be mistaken in this case: if we experience our continuity.
conscious experience in a certain way then there is a sense in which it is
that way. If our visual world appears to be continuous then there is a way
in which it is continuous.³⁰
More generally, we believe that consciousness has the property of a
stream and therefore there must be something that has that property,
independent of what third-person experiments show us. Empirical
results may convince us that the world is not actually a certain way, but
how could they convince us that it does not appear to us in a certain way?

The first objection entails at least two immediate difficulties. First of all it @ 1: Can we
separate
entails the picture of a conscious perceiver in our mind or brain who can tune consciousness
in and out of the various data streams: visual, auditory, tactile, and so on. Yet from data?
the reason for this dualistic picture remains unclear. It is considerably easier to
suppose (and better supported by neuroscientific evidence) that consciousness
is nothing over and above the processing of various sensory inputs (amongst
which I include various reflexive self-monitoring processes).
Secondly, the idea that consciouness could have one property even though @ 2: A meth-
odological
observational data suggest that it lacks that property is in tension with the
problem.
methodology of the empirical study of consciousness. It may be the case that
whenever we detect some discontinuous process we actually do not deal with
consciousness, but with some other phenomenon that a continuous, more
fundamental process underlies. In the same way we could reply to any physicist
that any specific statement P he makes about the world must be false, since he
only deals with the realm of the phenomenal, whereas empirical data the
physicist refers to cannot access the level of the noumenal. If we take this
view we would not be able to hope that empirical research reveals any
interesting insights into the world or into the mind.

³⁰ This move from appearance to reality does not have any plausibility outside of the domain of
consciousness. Some false mathematical proposition may appear to have a proof, though the
purported proof is in fact a fallacy. Yet a merely apparent, fallacious proof is no proof at all. But
a merely appearing conscious state that appears to us, it is argued, is still a conscious state, since
what is a conscious state but an appearance of something to somebody?
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@ 2: What is the Regarding the second objection, it is hard to deny that this argument has a
‘objective certain intuitive pull, but it brings with it a conceptual difficulty of postulating
subjective’?
a category that Daniel Dennett has labelled as the ‘objectively subjective’.³¹ The
defender of this interpretation has to argue that there are all the different
cognitive processes on the one hand, and the way they appear to us on the
other hand. The cognitive processes involve appearances as well (they are, after
all, what makes the world appear), so we are dealing here with appearances of
appearances. According to this picture there would then be, for example, a gappy
series of visual perceptions (themselves appearances of visual objects) that again
appears to us in a different way (as a continuous series of perceptions).
I do not think that the concept of stacked appearances (as e.g. in the case of
intermittently appearing objects that underlie another appearance of a con-
tinuous visual stream) is problematic. We may, for example dream about an
illusionist’s performance, in which case his production of a rabbit out of an
empty hat would be a mere appearance, yet one that was itself included in a
another, lower-level mere appearance, namely that of the dream itself.
Problems The difficulty with this interpretation is rather the following. When we speak
spelling out the
‘objective
about a real appearance and an appearing appearance we also have to say who
subjective’. the appearances are appearances for. The real appearance cannot be an
appearance for us, since we have already assumed that the way consciousness
really is (namely discontinuous and not stream-like) is not the way it appears
to us. So there cannot be the same subject for the real appearance and for the
appearing appearance. This leaves the defender of the second interpretation
with two possibilities. The first is to postulate an internal perceiver, distinct
from us, to whom the real appearance appears. The second is to assume that
the real appearance does not appear to anyone, that it is without a perceiver.
Neither possibility is particularly attractive. The first alternative is even
stranger than the ‘homunculus in the brain’ idea sometimes postulated to
explain perception.³² For on that understanding the homunculus is us, sitting
in the Cartesian theatre of our mind and watching the performance of inte-
grated perceptual data on the internal stage. But here the perceiver of the real
appearance has to be distinct from us, since the real appearance does not
appear to us. Whether such a perceiver could fulfill any other explanatory
function apart from saving the two-level theory of appearance is at least

³¹ Dennett is very critical of this idea: ‘The Cartesian theatre may be a comforting image because
it preserves the reality/appearance distinction at the heart of human subjectivity, but as well as
being scientifically unmotivated, it is metaphysically dubious, because it creates the bizarre category
of the objectively subjective – the way things actually, objectively seem to you even if they don’t
seem to seem that way to you’ (1991: 132). ‘There is no such phenomenon as really seeming – over
and above the phenomenon of judging in one way or another that something is the case. (191: 364)’
³² Fallaciously, as it is generally assumed, since we would subsequently have to explain the
perceptions of this internal perceiver. For a homunculus scenario that may avoid that problem see
Dennett 2013: 91–5.
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unclear. The second alternative does not seem to fare much better, since
appearances seem to depend existentially on perceivers. We can make sense
of a cinema screening that nobody is watching, but when we say that an apple
appears red, though there is not anybody it appears red to it would be difficult
to explain the reason for its appearing red, rather than green.
These difficulties appear sufficiently problematic to suggest that the mere belief
(even if it is a universally held belief) that consciousness is continuous is not
sufficient to establish that there is something that is continuous. Even within the
realm of consciousness the move from appearance to existence has to be rejected.³³
§60 Theories of Discontinuous Consciousness
Apart from being able to explain specific empirical results about perception
and consciousness, the hypothesis of a discontinuous, gappy consciousness has
also led to a number of interesting results in developing more comprehensive
theories of the mind,³⁴ and it is illuminating to consider some of them briefly.
An early example is Marvin Minsky’s theory described in his ‘The Society of Minsky.
Mind’,³⁵ attempting to show that ‘you can build a mind from many little parts,
each mindless by itself ’.³⁶ Minsky develops a theory of ‘frame-arrays’, where a
frame is a kind of scheme with blanks (which Minsky calls ‘terminals’) to
which other pieces of information can be attached. A chair frame, e.g., might
have seat, back, and leg terminals.³⁷ A frame-array is a family of frames that
share the same terminals.³⁸ A collection of chair-frames could thus form an
array. Minsky argues that imagination and visualization proceed in a discon-
tinuous fashion where one frame-array succeeds the next. We would still
conceive of these processes as continuous because we represent them as
continuous, even though the underlying cognitive process is discontinuous.³⁹
Far from being a defect, Minsky argues, a discontinuous representation actually
has advantages over a continuous one when trying to gain information about

³³ See Dennett 1998a: 139: ‘It seemed obvious to many that consciousness is – must be – rather like
an inner light shining, or rather like television, or rather like a play or a movie presented in the Cartesian
theatre. If they are right, then consciousness would have to have certain features that I deny it to have.
But they are simply wrong. When I point this out I am not denying the reality of consciousness at all;
I am just denying that consciousness, real consciousness, is like what they think it is like.’
³⁴ While not making any direct claims about the continuity or discontinuity of consciousness,
embodied theories of cognition cohere well with the view of discontinuous consciousness. As these
theories stress, you do not have to have a representation of everything ‘in here’, since it can be
delivered just in time from ‘out there’ (Carter 1984: 184). There is no difficulty with assuming that
representations are both synchronically and diachronically discontinuous: it is sufficient to repre-
sent only parts of the environment at each particular moment; across time our representation can
act like a strobe-light, rather than a torch, generating representations only during specific intervals.
³⁵ Minsky 1988. ³⁶ Minsky 1988: 18.
³⁷ Minsky 1988: 245. ³⁸ Minsky 1988: 255.
³⁹ ‘Existence seems continuous to us not because we continually experience what is happening
in the present, but because we hold to our memories of how things were in the recent past.’ (Minsky
1985: 257).
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the world. Because our cognitive representations do not smoothly represent the
world in real time, but proceed from frame-array to frame-array we are able to
recognize how our present representation differs relative to a representation from
the recent past, thereby allowing us to see what has changed and what has remained
the same. For a continuous representation this would be much more difficult.
Dennett. The most well-known model of discontinuous consciousness is without
any doubt Dennett’s multiple drafts model. According to this theory the neural
Detectors. processing that forms the basis of consciousness consists of a set of feature
detectors activated by sensory input. These detectors can be very simple, detecting
a shape, or a size, or a degree of illumination. When a suitable sensory input is
received a feature detector that has been activated will return a certain verdict, say,
‘spherical’. These detectors can run in parallel, may compete with each other, and
can be stacked: the result of certain feature detectors is put together and passed on
to further feature detectors. A ‘person’ detector, for example, would depend on the
input of a variety of sub-detectors that deliver verdicts on shape, size, motions,
and so on. As more sensory data come in the activation level of some receptors
that run in parallel may be increased, that of some others diminished. As you
approach a figure in the fog, you are finally able to tell whether what you are
looking at is a person or a tree trunk, and the activation of each may go up or
down, depending on the nature of the incoming visual information. In this case
neither the ‘person’ detector nor the ‘tree’ detector deals with raw sensory data. All
that these detectors process is material that has already previously been inter-
preted by lower-level detectors that are concerned with more basic features.
It is important to note that the work of these detectors is largely uncon-
scious. For Dennett some interpretation and judgement can be carried out by
unconscious agents, and it is the very fact that the various detectors are not
conscious processes or conscious agents that keeps the multiple drafts model
from falling prey to the homunculus objection.
As we saw, the output from the detectors can feed into other, higher-order
detectors. In addition, detectors can also activate other neuronal circuits
connected with such abilities as memory, action, emotion, or language.
Drafts. Each output of the detectors can be considered as a draft. Like a draft for a
piece of writing it has descriptive content, and like such a draft it is provisional;
its content may be changed or discarded altogether at a later stage.⁴⁰ Various of
these possibly conflicting drafts co-exist at any one time. Consciousness
depends on their effects.
The collection of co-occurring drafts may be probed at various times, for
example if we are asked a question (‘What do you think you are seeing, a man or

⁴⁰ ‘Contents arise, get revised, contribute to the interpretation of other contents or to the
modulation of behaviour [ . . . ] at any point in time there are multiple drafts of narrative fragments
at various stages of editing in the various places in the brain.’ (Dennett 1991a: 136).
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a tree trunk?’) or some drafts may on their own generate enough neuronal
activity to have effects on memory, action or language. This is what accounts for
a certain draft rather than one of its rivals being conscious, not its occurring in
some way within rather than without the theatre of consciousness.
The theory therefore suggests an interesting inversion. It is not because we A draft’s effects
are conscious of a certain content that this content gets stored in memory, cause it to be
conscious.
leads to action, or is linguistically expressed. It is rather the fact that the
content’s ‘fame in the brain’ leads to some or all of these effects that constitute
its being conscious. In this respect the effects of drafts on linguistic activity are
particularly important. Dennett notes that:
Mental contents become conscious [ . . . ] by winning the competitions against other Drafts and
mental contents for domination in the control of behaviour, and hence for achieving linguistic
activity.
long-lasting effects [ . . . ]. And since we are talkers, and since talking to ourselves is one
of our most influential activities, one of the most effective ways – not the only one – for
mental content to become influential is for it to get into position to drive the language-
using parts of the controls.⁴¹

It is when considering linguistic activity that the inversion we just mentioned

becomes particularly important. In the same way as according to the multiple
drafts model to perceive an orange we do not have a central recognizer that puts
together various reports (‘it’s round’, ‘it’s the size of a fist’, ‘it’s sour’) and
subsequently generates the recognition of the orange, when speaking we also do
not have a central meaner that first (pre-verbally) determines what we want to say,
and then puts it into words. We should rather think of language production as a
process in which there are several unconscious proto-language generators that
compete with each other for influencing linguistic output activity (whether this is
actual or merely internalized speech). Those that succeed become conscious and
thereby generate the impression of what it was that we wanted to say.
It now becomes apparent how the gappiness of consciousness is an intrinsic Discontinuity of
feature of this model. We are not faced with a single, continuous stream of consciousness
and multiplicity
narrative, the voice of the central narrator of the real-time version of our of drafts.
autobiography, so to speak, but with a multitude of drafts flying around that
compete with each other for influence.⁴² Some draft may create sufficiently
many consequences to become conscious and then fade away, another may not.

⁴¹ Dennett 2003: 254.

⁴² It is hardly surprising that we are not conscious of the gappiness of our consciousness, simply
because we cannot be conscious of something we are not conscious of. To do so we would have to
postulate a higher-order consciousness watching the first consciousness, and we would have
to assume that this higher-order consciousness has no gaps (otherwise this would be like putting
a camera in the fridge—if the camera stops recording whenever we close the door we will get
documentary evidence that the light is always on). But if we have means of determining the
continuity of the higher-order consciousness, we could presumably also do this for the lower-order
consciousness straightaway.
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But the whole picture is fragmentary, various drafts becoming conscious at

different times, without a central coordinating principle that lines them all up
like an unbroken sequence of pearls on a string.⁴³
Strawson. The final theory of gappy consciousness I want to consider here is due to
Galen Strawson. Although primarily based on first-person observation rather
than the kind of empirical results we have just discussed, it has various
interesting features that make is worth discussing in the present context.
Strawson points out that there are strong reasons to assume the discontinu-
ity of consciousness even without referring to empirical results about discon-
tinuities involved in our cognitive processes. He considers the conception of a
stream of consciousness as ‘inept’⁴⁴ and argues that the discontinuity of
consciousness becomes particularly apparent when not following a sequence
of external events. When we are just ‘sitting and thinking’, without following
any external stimulus that captures our attention ‘trains of thought are con-
stantly broken by detours—byblows—fissures—white noise’.⁴⁵ The discontinu-
ity of consciousness is something that is merely masked when tracking some
external, continuous event, and we mistake its continuity for the continuity of
consciousness. Once this external stimulus is removed, the underlying discon-
tinuity becomes more pronounced. Strawson’s observations here merit quoting
at length:
Consciousness When I am alone and thinking I find that my fundamental experience of consciousness
as continuously is one of repeated returns into consciousness from a state of complete, if momentary,
restarting.
unconsciousness. The (invariably brief) periods of true experiential continuity are
usually radically disjunct from one another in this way even when they are not radically
disjunct in respect of content. (It is in fact often the same thought—or nearly the same
thought—that one returns to after a momentary absence.) The situation is best
described, it seems to me, by saying that consciousness is continually restarting.
There isn’t a basic substrate (as it were) of continuous consciousness interrupted by
various lapses and doglegs. Rather, conscious thought has the character of a (nearly
continuous) series of radically disjunct irruptions into consciousness from a basic
substrate of non-consciousness. It keeps banging out of nothingness; it is a series of
comings to.⁴⁶

Strawson here raises the interesting point that we should not conceive of gappy
consciousness as a somehow deficient (because interrupted) continuity. Con-
sciousness is not a continuity, but a series of successive momentary happenings
that are post facto conceptualized as forming part of a stream. When thinking
about the discontinuity of visual consciousness is it natural to conceptualize

⁴³ ‘ “Are you denying then that consciousness is a plenum?” Yes indeed. That’s part of what I’m
denying. Consciousness is gappy and sparse, and doesn’t contain half of what people think is there!’
(Dennett 1991a: 366).
⁴⁴ Strawson 1997: 421. ⁴⁵ Strawson 1997: 421. ⁴⁶ Strawson 1997: 422.
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this like the intermittent recording of a video camera. During the saccades no
visual information goes through—nothing is recorded on the video tape but
the result is still a single, albeit gappy recording. But if we take the discontinuity
seriously, a more apt metaphor for the discontinuity of consciousness would be
a series of flashes of light on a dark screen which, because of their spatial and
temporal proximity, are regarded by us as the motion of a single moving dot.
Unlike in the metaphor of the video recording there is not a single thing
imperfectly recorded, but a succession of different things that come into
existence and go out of existence, even though they are mistakenly conceptu-
alized as a single thing.
But are any of these theories of consciousness actually true? Could their Philosophical
consequences of
presumed status as plausible accounts of consciousness convince us to swallow
the discontinuity
the rather unintuitive consequence of the discontinuity of our inner life? In the of
field of consciousness studies there is limited universal consensus, and all of the consciousness.
theories we have described here are controversial. We certainly cannot hope to
provide anything like a final vindication of one of them in the context of the
present discussion. But what we can do is describe what consequences for the
status of the internal world would follow if some of these theories are at least on
the right track.
The discontinuity of consciousness is interesting insofar as it undermines
the assumption that we have indubitable correct beliefs about what goes on ‘in
here’, but it does not appear to be a particularly weighty issue in itself.
However, it acquires a lot more philosophical heft once we consider its
consequences for one of the major players in the internal world: the self.

B The Existence of the Self

§61 The Fictional Robert Nozick
In one of his ‘philosophical fictions’ Robert Nozick explores the possibility that Denying that we
he is a fictional character.⁴⁷ (He is undecided on whether his author is a ourselves have
fundamental
fictional character too, created by another author.) One of the interesting ontological
(and somewhat unsettling aspects) of this idea is that it uses the familiar status.

philosophical motif that some entity fails to have fundamental ontological

status (like colours for the physicalist, properties for the nominalist, or time
for the Gödelian) and applies it to ourselves. We usually assume that if
anything is fully real, we are, and for this reason ‘the idea of us having this
inferior ontological status takes some getting used to.’⁴⁸ This conviction is what
makes the solipsist’s reduction of the world to a single mind possible. We may
get rid of the entire furniture of the world and reduce it to mere representation

⁴⁷ Nozick 1997: 313–17. ⁴⁸ Nozick 1997: 315.

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in a specific mind; as long as we hold on to the reality of ourselves the world

can more or less look (from the inside, which is the only perspective there is for
the solipsist) like the world has always looked. While the solipsist scenario in
which we alone are fundamentally real is thus easy to imagine, it is much
harder to conceive of the scenario in which we are not real, though other things
may be. It does not help us much to say that in this case we would be like
fictional characters, because the fictional characters we know are precisely
characterized by having no ‘inside view’. We know some of Holmes’ inner
states by reading Conan Doyle, but there is, we presume, no such thing as
Holmes’ own view of what it is like to be Holmes.
It is perhaps not too surprising that a scenario denying the fundamental
ontological status of ourselves should be so hard to imagine. We are, after all,
denying one of the most famous certainties in the history of philosophy, the
Cartesian cogito. From the perspective of ourselves as fictional people Des-
cartes would have been wrong to infer from the fact that he is thinking or
doubting that he, the thinker or doubter, exists, in the same way in which we
would be mistaken to infer from the fact that Holmes lives at 221b Baker Street
that Holmes exists.⁴⁹
§62 Believing in the Cartesian Cogito
Belief in the Belief in the plausibility of the Cartesian cogito has been a continuous presence
plausibility of in Western philosophy since the early modern period.⁵⁰ Prima facie the
the cogito.
epistemic status of ourselves is much more secure than that of the sundry
objects that fill the external world around us. The deception hypothesis
presents us with various scenarios in which our perception of a teacup in
front of us could be mistaken. But how could we be tricked into believing we
exist when in fact we don’t? How could we be tricked into believing that we
have a self when in fact we have none? And who precisely would be tricked in
this case? Consider this more recent incarnation of the cogito argument:
Belief in our own My belief that I exist cannot possibly be false, and it is plausible to affirm that I cannot
existence as possibly fail to believe it. Consider my belief that I believe something. It is logically
incorrigible.

⁴⁹ See §68 below for further discussion. For a sceptical response to the Cartesian cogito based on
Zhuangzi’s butterfly dream see Han 2009: 1–9.
⁵⁰ The cogito has also made a recent reappearance in linguistic garb. In the contemporary
discussion we find the thought that the term ‘I’ is insured against (a) lack of reference (since there is
a user of the term) and (b) mistaken reference (since the way the first-person pronoun works is by
referring to the user of the statement). (See, for example, the papers by Strawson, Anscombe,
Castañeda, and Shoemaker in Cassam 1994.)
Note, however, that even if we accept these points, and in particular the claim that use of the
term ‘I’ guarantees that ‘the object an “I”-user means by it must exist so long as he is using “I”’
(Anscombe 1981: 30) the ontological status and the properties of such an I are still completely
open. Speaking about Sherlock Holmes may necessitate the reference to some object picked out by
the fictional name, but this does not settle anything about the status and nature of this object.
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impossible that I believe that I believe something and do not believe something.
The belief is clearly infallible. Moreover, it is plausible to maintain that I cannot fail
to believe that I believe something when, in fact, I do believe something and, thus, that
the belief is irresistible as well. Thus, the belief that I exist and the belief that I believe
something are infallible beliefs which are plausible candidates for the role of incorrigible
beliefs as so defined.⁵¹

What could be meant by the idea that ‘my belief that I exist cannot possibly Two versions of
be false’? We have to distinguish two different ways of reading this sentence. the
incorrigibility
First, we can understand it in a weak sense as saying that a self, a sense of claim.
I and its existence frequently appear to us. Alternatively, read in a strong sense
this claim could mean that there is a substantial, unified, and temporally
extended self.
If we consider the weaker version it is clear that the point made here is of the
same nature as saying that the claim that a cup appears to me now (if I happen
to have a cup-impression) could not possibly be false. Even if there was no cup,
there would still be the cup-appearance. Various beliefs we hold about the self
may be mistaken superimpositions on something that is actually fundamen-
tally different, as our beliefs about the cup might be superimpositions on mere
appearances that do not satisfy these beliefs at all. If we believe in a temporally
extended self, for example, but the self turns out to be in fact momentary then
my belief that ‘I exist’, which is the belief that ‘I exist as a temporally extended
self ’ will indeed be false. In this case we would have been misled by a mere
appearance of the self existing, in the same way as we might have been misled
by the mere appearance of a hallucinated cup.
Yet presumably the aim is to get from a claim about the appearance of the
self to the stronger claim about the substantial, unified, and temporally
extended existence of the self. How to do this is, unfortunately, not much
more transparent than how we can get from the cup-appearance to the
existence of a substantial cup.
In addition, the supposedly inescapable appearance of the existence of the self
might not be as solid as it looks as first sight. It is not entirely evident what the
strength of the impossibility of failing to believe one’s self to exist is supposed to
be. There are clearly cases where subjects plausibly claim not to believe in their
own existence, even though we would usually assign them to the realm of
psychopathology.⁵² In addition, our previous discussion of the failures of

⁵¹ Lehrer 1990: 48.

⁵² The most well-known manifestation of this is Cotard’s syndrome (Enoch and Ball 2001:
155–78; Thomson 2013); a detailed first-person (!) account of a somewhat different case is in Segal
1998. The belief in one’s own non-existence can also accompany various depersonalization
experiences (see Strawson 1997: 418, note 19).
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introspective certainty should also make us wary of relying on this very kind of
argument for the self.
Be this as it may, there are certainly a variety of contemporary philosophical
approaches that take Nozick’s idea of the self as a kind of fictional entity
seriously and attempt to develop arguments for it. In the remainder of this
section we will be looking at some of them.
§63 Properties of the Self
In order to do so, it is first of all necessary to consider briefly what kind of
properties we intuitively take our self to have. There are at least five main
properties deserving consideration.⁵³
1. Substantial 1. The self is a substantial and self-sustaining part of our mental world.
self.
Whereas other psychological entities cannot stand on their own (an
emotion must be had by someone, a thought must occur to some thinker)
the self is a psychological entity that is not had by anything else, it
underlies other such entities in much the same way in which a substance
underlies the instantiation of a property. Unlike properties, which require
for their existence something distinct from them that has them, the self
appears to be able to exist in a lonely state, it is independent to the extent
that it does not require mental states or events distinct from it to bring it
about.
2. Unified self. 2. The self is unified. It does not consist of spatially or functionally separate
bits but is a single, coherent entity. There are no parts of our self that are
far away from us, spatially separated by things that are not part of our
self, or cognitive functions not intricately bound up with the complex
that appears to us as our self.
3. Temporally 3. It is temporally extended. Our self exists, and remains the same, as long as
extended self. we exist. Our psychological properties, memories, abilities, and character
traits may change, but that does not affect the inner core that holds them
all together.
4. Self as an 4. The self is the locus of agency and moral responsibility. It is what acts
agent. when we act, and it is the entity that is causally and ethically responsible
for the actions that we have set in motion.
5. Self as subject 5. It is our prime object of prudential concern. When we make decisions
of prudential about the future, plan to avoid risks or attain gains we are doing so for the
concern.
sake of the self we are in epistemic contact with right now.
Status of this list. These properties are interconnected (moral responsibility appears to rely on
unification, prudential concern on temporal extension, and so on), but as my

⁵³ For a similar list of properties see Strawson 1997: 408.

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aim in this discussion is not to develop a comprehensive theory of our intuitive

conception of the self, the questions of what the precise nature of these
connections is, or whether the above list of five properties is exhaustive, are
not of primary importance here. The purpose of this set of five criteria is simply
to provide the reader with a conception of what kind of self is at issue when
considering arguments against the existence of a self.
In the following discussion we will consider arguments relating to each of Properties 1–4
the five features in turn. The overall aim of this section is to demonstrate that cannot be
ascribed to the
none but the last of the five properties can be uncontroversially ascribed to the self.
self. If this is the case it would support the claim that any self we perceive in our
internal world, and which exemplifies these properties, cannot be fundamen-
tally real, but must be something very much like a fictional entity.
Some of the arguments we will consider are primarily empirical, others Empirical and
philosophical
primarily philosophical. Obviously the boundary between these two is some-
arguments
what blurry. No set of empirical results delivers much of philosophical interest against the
without a significant degree of (philosophical) interpretation. On the other existence of a
self.
hand even the most armchair-based arguments about what goes on in the
mind tend to refer to some parts of the wider world, and a largely philosophical
argument may receive additional support, or may be further developed and
refined by reference to a set of empirical results. Nevertheless, it is worthwhile
to be aware of the difference between those of the following arguments that are
primarily motivated by research in cognitive science and neurobiology (such as
those by Dennett and Metzinger) and those based on more general philosoph-
ical results (the mereological argument being a clear case in point).

(a) The Substantial Self

§64 Dennett: The Self as Fiction
Dennett is highly critical of a conception of the self that understands it as a
unified, self-standing, persisting agent at the centre of our cognitive lives. Yet
given that this still appears to be the natural way of viewing ourselves in most
contexts, it is necessary to explain why it appears to us as if such a self existed.
Dennett therefore develops a substitute conception of the self, a way of
conceptualizing its place within the architecture of our mental life that does
not commit us to presupposing that it is the central unifier of incoming data, Substitute
conception of
and the central controller our outgoing actions, while still giving rise to the
the self.
kind of appearance we connect with the self. This is his notion of the self as the
centre of narrative gravity.
When we tell stories about ourselves to ourselves, we tell them in such a way The self as the
author of the
that there is a central character, the hero of the novel in our head to whom our self-narrative.
experiences happen, and who makes the decisions and carries out the actions
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that we ascribe to us. We could identify the self with this character, without
assuming that there is a Cartesian theatre involved: the self is a merely virtual
entity and no more the single spectator in the theatre of consciousness than the
pointer of our mouse is a real arrow moving across our computer’s monitor.
Yet when we conceive of the self in this way it immediately seems to presup-
pose the existence of a higher-order self behind this narrative one: the narrator
who generates the self-talk in the first place. This narrator, we should think, is
to be considered more fundamental than the narrative self, in the same way as
the author of a novel is more fundamental than any of its characters.
At this point Dennett makes an intriguing move, which he summarizes as
follows:⁵⁴
Authorless Our tales are spun, but for the most part we don’t spin them; they spin us. Our human
narration. consciousness, and our narrative selfhood, is their product, not their source.⁵⁵

What Dennett is suggesting here is the idea of an authorless narration. It is

somewhat hard to unpack this example, for the situation used as a comparator
is likely to strike us as inconsistent. Don’t narrations depend for their existence
on an author, and, if so, how can we have the effect (the story) without the
cause (the author)?
Psychoanalysis One example Dennett offers us to get some grip on the idea of an authorless
parlour-game. narration is that of a parlour-game called psychoanalysis. In this game, one
participant (the stooge) is sent out of the room while the others set up the
game. When he is recalled, the stooge is told that he should analyse a dream of
one of the participants, which was told to the others while he was out of the
room. Before that, though, he has to guess what the dream was about by asking
the other participants a series of questions they are only allowed to answer by
saying ‘yes’ or ‘no’. In reality, no dream has been described to them at all, the
participants simply answer the questions according to a simple rule: if the last
letter of the question is from the first half of the alphabet they answer ‘yes’, if it
is from the second half they answer ‘no’. The only exception is when some
answer would violate consistency, in this case the opposite answer is given.
(‘Was the dream about a girl?’ (yes—since ‘l’ is in the first half of the alphabet).
‘Did the dream include any humans?’ (no—according to the rule, since ‘s’ is in

⁵⁴ Dennett 1991a: 418.

⁵⁵ David Lodge aptly summarizes (and satirizes) this view in his novel Nice Work (1989: 40): ‘[T]
here is no such thing as the “self”, [ . . . ] that is to say, a finite, unique, soul or essence that
constitutes the person’s identity, there is only a subject position in an infinite web of discourses—
the discourses of power, sex, family, science, religion, poetry, etc. And by the same token there is no
such thing as an author, that is to say one who originates a work of fiction ab nihilo. Every text is a
product of intertextuality, a tissue of allusions to and citations of other texts [ . . . ]. There are no
origins, there is only production, and we produce our “selves” in language. Not “you are what you
eat”, but “you are what you speak”, or rather “you are what speaks you”.’
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the second half of the alphabet. But since this would contradict the previous
answer we have to reply ‘yes’).)
In this way the stooge can be seen to develop a most fantastic succession of
dream contents, before drawing conclusions about the dreamer’s psychological
situation. In this case the narrative, i.e. the dream does not have a single author.
It also differs from a story written by a collective, since for these usually each
author has some idea of the outline of the whole story, and all try to cooperate
in shaping it. But in this case the narrative is entirely new to all the participants
who either do not even know that they are in the process of creating a story
(the stooge), or they do know it, but their only contribution is to ensure that a
set of mechanical production rules (the correct distribution of positive and
negative answers) is observed.⁵⁶
It is now clear that criticizing Dennett for giving an example of a multi- Not a multi-
author scenario.
author scenario, instead of an authorless one, misses the point. We can easily
imagine a situation where none of the participants themselves are able to act as
narrators. The stooge would be replaced by a machine that generates gram-
matically correct English questions, and the remaining players by a mechanism
that consistently assigns ‘yes’ and ‘no’ to these. This would fix all the data for
the narrative, but without re-introducing a narrator through the back door.
The idea is now that once we have the narrative going, something will Centre of
emerge that constitutes its centre, such that all the events in the narrative narrative gravity.

happen to, or are essentially connected to it. As a physical compound will have
a centre of gravity, the narrative will have its own ‘centre of narrative gravity’,⁵⁷
a comparison that is apt since in the physical case the centre of gravity is not
identical with any particular part of the object. It refers to an abstraction, or, as
we might want to put it, to a theoretical fiction.⁵⁸
It is therefore easy to see how Dennett’s arguments make the role of a self as
the narrator which constitutes the causal source of our narrative of conscious-
ness superfluous.⁵⁹ Like God in the Laplacean system of cosmology the self
appears to be theoretically dispensable once we assume that our ‘self ’ narrative
can be generated along the lines of the dream in the party-game psychoanaly-
sis, by a multiplicity of agents, none of which is us.

⁵⁶ Another illustration Dennett sometimes uses is that of a novel-writing-machine-cum-robot

called Gilbert. See Dennett 1988.
⁵⁷ Dennett 1992.
⁵⁸ For some criticism of Dennett’s narrative account of the self and an attempt to build on its
core insights in the context of the prediction error minimization framework see Hohwy and
Michaels 2018.
⁵⁹ This is not to deny it is still useful to refer to the narrator for the purposes of self-monitoring,
self-control, and self-revision. But it does not mean that the narrator has to be given any ontological
role by identifying it with any particular entity, in much the same way as the centre of gravity of a
physical object is not identified with any subset of its parts.
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Insubstantial The conception of the self that emerges from this is evidently not substantial.
self. Substances stand on their own, but the narrative self is propped up by
something else. Arising from the inner narrative that clusters around one
character that I end up identifying as ‘me’ it is a derivative notion, not
something that forms part of the furniture of the world at the most funda-
mental level.
§65 Metzinger: The Simulated Self
Dennett’s approach combines rejecting the self in any substantial sense (as a
unifier of our mental life, the Cartesian spectator to whom all that exists in
consciousness is presented) with replacing it by a fictional version, a self that
bootstraps itself out of the continuous narrative taking place in our mind. An
Phenomenal approach that is similar to the extent that it only accepts the self as a form of
self-model.
simulation is Thomas Metzinger’s idea of the ‘phenomenal self model’.
1. Self model. His account consists of the combination of two ideas, that of a self model
and that of phenomenal transparency. A self model is a representation of some
system (it may be a living being, it may be a robot) that provides it with
information about its boundaries, its movements, and its internal states. The
self model makes this information available and allows it to be used as a basis
for cognitive processing, attention, and control of its interaction with the
environment. Such a self model may be entirely unconscious. Metzinger
discusses the example of a simple robot, looking somewhat like a starfish
with four legs. Being equipped with information about its ‘body’ via a self
model the robot can teach itself to walk, and it can modify its self model in such
a way that when one of its legs is removed, it can learn to walk with only three
legs.⁶⁰ Despite having a self model there is no substantial dispute over the
question whether this ‘starfish’ is conscious. Its internal architecture is far
simpler than that of any other system we are tempted to attribute conscious-
ness to.⁶¹
2. Phenomenal As it is able to exist in the absence consciousness, having a self model is
transparency. obviously not sufficient for having a self.⁶² Metzinger argues that a second
ingredient required is phenomenal transparency. Some internal process is
transparent to us if the earlier stages of its processing are not available for
attention. Examples of such transparent phenomena abound in our inner life.
An obvious example is that the visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, and tactile
Integration of properties of some object (or some subset of these) are experienced all at once,
sensory input as
transparent.

⁶⁰ Metzinger 2010a: 189–90.

⁶¹ Or, to put the matter in Dennettian terms, unlike humans or animals the ‘starfish’ is not an
entity we would regularly and consistently regard from the intentional stance.
⁶² Metzinger 2010a: 42: ‘A self model is by no means a self, but only a representation of the
system as a whole—it is no more than a global system-model.’
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even though the time it takes for the various signals to reach our brain, and the
neuronal processing speed of them once they have arrived, differs. Our internal
representation of the object smudges over these differences, and there seems to
be no way for us to train our attention to be able to experience that the auditory
experience of some moving object comes in a bit later than its visual experi-
ence. The integration of the various inputs from the different senses is trans-
parent because we look right through it, like the pane of glass in the shop
window. In both cases it appears to us as if we have unimpeded access to the
object in question, even though there is in fact something standing in between.
What are the reasons for the existence of such transparent processes? One Reasons for this.
reason might have to do with neuronal processing speed. Because the temporal
resolution of metarepresentational functions in the brain is relatively low, and
because the activation of other neural data structures is considerably faster,
they remain hidden when the brain forms a view of its own representations.⁶³
Second, it is unlikely that during the development of the human brain there
would have been any evolutionary pressure to make such transparent processes
non-transparent to us. No clear advantage would have been obtained if the
prior stages of the specific processes had been introspectively available.
The notion of transparency can be conceptualized most naturally by con- Transparency
sidering the difference between representational content and the carrier of that and literary
fiction.
representational content.⁶⁴ Take a piece of literary fiction. The representational
content is the story told, a carrier is the language that is used to tell the story.
The representational carrier can be more or less transparent to us, and the
more transparent it is the more we have the experience directly following the
story, and the less we are aware of the linguistic framing of the story itself.⁶⁵
You may even, immediately after reading something, be unsure whether you
read it in English or in French; at the time of reading the carrier was so
transparent that you did not even notice the language it employed.
It is important to note that phenomenal transparency is precisely that: it is Phenomenal vs
about how things appear to us, and not about what we know about things. epistemic
transparency.
Phenomenal transparency is not a synonym for epistemic transparency, for the
claim that certain facts (such as the contents of our own mind) are immediately
accessible to us and that this access generates knowledge that could not
possibly be mistaken.⁶⁶ Lack of knowledge of our own inner states and the
appearance of certainty can go hand in hand. Phenomenal transparency gives
rise to naïve realism about external objects of perception, since it comes with

⁶³ Metzinger 2010b: 43. ⁶⁴ Metzinger 2010b: 44.

⁶⁵ To pick a random example: the typical passage by David Foster Wallace appears less
transparent than the typical passage by Ian Fleming.
⁶⁶ We have argued above (§§49–50) that the epistemic transparency of our inner states is an
illusion. See also Metzinger 2003b.
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the impression that we are in immediate sensory contact with the objects.
In the context of this discussion naïve realism is not understood as a theory of
the world that could be either true or false,⁶⁷ but simply as a way the world
appears to us, given that our experience relies on the kind of neurocomputa-
tional system we do in fact have.
Self as Metzinger now argues that the appearance of a self emerges once there is a
phenomenally
transparent self-
self model that is phenomenally transparent, that is, a global representation of
model. the organism that facilitates its interaction with the environment, and that does
not appear as a representation, but rather as something else (namely as a
cognitive agent and substantial unifier of our mental lives). Such a ‘phenom-
enal self model’ functions very much like a cognitive organ that can be
switched on and off according to need. When we wake up in the morning
and integrate the different pieces of information coming in from our senses our
organism loads the computational tool that is the phenomenal self model, and
it remains active during our waking life, and while we are dreaming; when in
deep sleep, the model is switched off.⁶⁸ It is immediately obvious that such an
intermittent entity does not qualify as a substance:
Insubstantiality [T]he self is not a substance in the technical philosophical sense of ontological self-
of the self. subsistence, of something that could maintain its existence on its own, even if the body,
the brain, or everything else disappeared. It is not an individual entity or a mysterious
thing in the metaphysical sense. No such things as selves exist in the world: Selves and
subjects are not part of the irreducible constituents of reality. What does exist is an
intermittent process, the experience of being a self, as well as the diverse and constantly
changing contents of self-consciousness.⁶⁹

The self is not an individual but a gappy kind of event, event though it is an
event that has a view of itself, and misunderstands its own nature in an
important way, since it regards itself as a non-intermittent object.
Ego tunnel. A key metaphor Metzinger uses for conscious experience is that of an ‘ego
tunnel’.⁷⁰ One feature the metaphor illustrates is that our conscious experience
forms only a small part of the vast amount of information that is processed by
our nervous system at every moment. To this extent we can conceive of our
experience as ‘tunneling through’ the multitude of information that comes in
continuously. At the same time the input (both the input received through our
senses, as well as the input that is purely internally generated) ending up in
conscious experience constitutes the world in which we live, and the tunnel we

⁶⁷ Metzinger 2010b: 43: ‘Naϊve realism is not a belief or an intellectual attitude, but a feature of
phenomenal experience itself.’
⁶⁸ Metzinger therefore argues that the phenomenal self model most likely does not have a
conceptual or linguistic origin, but results from the need for a tool to organize motor behavior (see
Blackmore 2006: 153).
⁶⁹ Metzinger 2010a: 26. ⁷⁰ Metzinger 2010a: 6.
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move through is the horizon of our experience of the world. This tunnel is a
form of simulation, though it is phenomenally transparent. It does not appear
to us as a simulation, as a cognitive artefact, but we consider ourselves to be
looking straight through it onto entities in the external world. The key feature
of Metzinger’s theory is that we, the subjects moving through our respective
ego tunnels are as much of the nature of simulation as the tunnel itself. Instead
of a substantial self living in a cerebrally simulated world our phenomenal self Tunnel and its
model is a simulated entity that, due to its phenomenal transparency ‘looks and inhabitant are
both simulated.
feels’ like something unconstructed. It appears unconstructed in the same way
as the objects in the ego tunnel have the look and feel of unconstructed,
external objects. The simulated self inhabits a simulated world.
This account raises obvious questions about the consistency of the circular Consistency of
structure it embodies. For sure, the idea that the self is the product of a circular this account’s
circular
process is not unique to Metzinger’s approach. We find it in Daniel Dennett’s structure.
idea of narrative selfhood (‘our tales are spun, but for the most part we don’t
spin them; they spin us’), and in Douglas Hofstadter’s view of the self as a
strange loop:
It dawned on me—and it has ever since seemed to me—that what we call ‘conscious-
ness’ was a kind of mirage. It had to be a very peculiar kind of mirage, to be sure, since it
was a mirage that perceived itself, and of course it didn’t believe it was perceiving a
mirage, but no matter—it still was a mirage. It was almost as if this slippery phenom-
enon called ‘consciousness’ lifted itself up by its own bootstraps, almost as if it made
itself out of nothing, and then disintegrated back into nothing whenever one looked at it
more closely.⁷¹

But does this circularity actually make sense? First of all, if the self is an illusion, Problem 1: Who
who is it that has the illusion? The very idea of the ego tunnel suggests that the has the illusion?
self as a simulated entity does not have some kind of transcendent ego standing
behind it that could play the part of the deluded entity. But this then raises the
question how the self could be considered to be illusory in the first place.
Metzinger notes that ‘something that is not an epistemic subject in a strong
sense of conceptual/propositional knowledge is simply unable to confuse itself
with anything else.’⁷² He solves this problem by distinguishing between a
phenomenal conception of selfhood, which the idea of the phenomenal self
model accounts for, and an epistemic conception, one which involves ques-
tions of self-knowledge, which it does not. If all we are concerned with is
how the appearance of a self comes about, questions concerning the truth or
falsity of this conception, and hence of illusion and veridical perception, are
unable to arise.

⁷¹ Hofstadter 2007: xii. See also Nozick 1997: 313. ⁷² Metzinger 2010b: 45.
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Self- For Metzinger the illusoriness of the self does not presuppose a self that has
misrepresentingthe illusion.⁷³ All that there is at first is a self-monitoring process that misrep-
illusory process.
resents itself. The notion of transparency shows how this can happen. A gappy
process, for example, will not be able to perceive itself as gappy, simply because
the gaps belong to a stage of processing that is not introspectively accessible to
the process. The more mistaken assumptions it makes about itself the more
‘thing-like’ it will appear, thereby giving rising to a more and more substantial
appearance of a self.
Problem 2: Who Second, if the self and the world are constructed insofar as they are models,
constructs the who constructs them? There cannot be an unconstructed constructor, so is
self model?
there either no constructor, or is it constructors all the way down?⁷⁴ And what
would these alternatives actually mean?
Metzinger’s answer is that there is no constructor, if we conceive of the
constructor as an intentional agent. Such an agent is the result of the con-
struction, not its source. Of course the phenomenal self model still has a cause,
it does not come into existence as a mere random event. This cause is the brain.
In order to understand that this is not just a sleight of hand bringing in the

⁷³ As John Passmore (1952: 82–3) appears to believe: ‘For if all that happens is a series of very
similar (or causally linked) perceptions succeed one another, there is no possible way in which this
series of itself could generate the fiction of personal identity. Nor, the fiction once generated, could
this series ever reveal its fictional character. Both the original fiction and the discovery that it is a
fiction are possible only if there is something which is first misled by, and then, after reconsider-
ation, can discover that it was misled by, a series of similar perceptions.’
⁷⁴ An approach that avoids either alternative is suggested by Bruce Hood (2012). His idea of a
‘looking-glass self’ (xiii) sees the self as created analogous to an illusory shape in a Kanizsa figure.
As the surrounding shapes suggest the existence of an internal figure, so the external influences and
other people suggest the existence of a self where no such self exists: ‘You only exist as a pattern
made up of all the other things in your life that shape you. If you take each away, “you” would
eventually cease to exist. This does not mean that you do not exist at all but rather that you exist as
the combination of all the others who complete your sense of self’ (214). If we imagine each other
person as a sphere with a missing piece, our sense of self arises if ‘the brain considers the
arrangement and decides that the only sensible explanation for the way each sphere seems to be
missing a piece is because of the “you” circle in the middle. In other words, the brain hallucinates
the experience of “you” by stimulating its own neural circuits to create that impression’ (215).
Hood’s model is an interesting account considering the existence of the self as simply abstracted
from the existence of other beings. He avoids the puzzling bootstrapping involved in other ‘self-
construction’ approaches by bringing in the brain as an additional agent who ‘considers’, ‘decides’,
and ‘creates’. This is somewhat disingenuous, for now it looks as if there is a self after all, it just
happens to be our brain (as Hood seems to admit on p. 217). But even if we disregard this point
(perhaps suggesting that these expressions are to be understood merely metaphorically (though it is
not clear how these metaphors are supposed to be cashed out)) a more fundamental challenge
emerges. If ‘you’ only come about based on the existence of all the others, as ‘a reflection of the
others around you’ (217), and assuming that all people are ontologically on a par, each of the others
will equally require (amongst others) the existence of you. We can only make sense of this view of
the self if we can make sense of groundless ontological hierarchies. This model finds itself in the
same situation as the defender of the claim that each dispositional property can be cashed out in
terms of other dispositional properties, without requiring any categorical ones. For further discus-
sion of this point see §97.
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constructor through the back door it is essential to see that this idea is
formulated against the conception of the brain as a dynamic, self-organizing The brain as a
dynamic, self-
system. The idea of such an organization, ‘the appearance of ordered structures
organizing
without external interaction or a well-defined and highly specific initial state’, system.
is arguably a new theoretical tool for the understanding of the human mind
that was previously unavailable.⁷⁵ An obvious example of such a self-
organizing system is biological evolution, a process that generates a very
complex structure without a designer guiding the process, and without an
initial state in which this complexity was already prefigured. As evolution can
take place ‘mindlessly’, that is without an intentional agent interacting with the
process that brings about the complexity, the development of the phenomenal
self model by the brain does not require a transcendent subject, an ego
absconditus that stands behinds the scene and supervises the brain-based
construction of the self.⁷⁶
An interesting variation on Metzinger’s conception of the self model is The self as
modelling
discussed by Hohwy and Michael.⁷⁷ The central underlying assumption is internal causes.
that there is not only the necessity of modelling external causes affecting the
mind, resulting in a world-model, but also a need for modelling internal causes,
and that the resulting model is what we commonly refer to as a self. The self is
an ‘abstraction that is useful in recognizing deeply hidden, longer term patterns
among endogenous psychological properties, experiences and sensory inputs’.
This conception of the self is located in the prediction error minimization
framework suggested by Hohwy that we have already discussed. The general
idea is familiar: suppose I regard myself as not liking sweets, but observe that
whenever I find myself in a situation where I can acquire high-sugar food I do
so. There is now a discrepancy between what my model predicts, and what
consequences of internal causes are actually observed. Hohwy suggests that
there are two different ways in which I can set out to minimize the resulting
prediction error. I can either revise my self model so as to include the view of
myself liking sweets, or I can place myself in an environment where my sugar-
directed dispositions cannot be actualized (a sugar-free environment, say). In
each case there is no longer a discrepancy between what my model predicts,
and the behaviour observed. After various iterations of this process our model
(the self) will become more and more accurate in its predictions (about
patterns in our internal psychological states).

⁷⁵ Metzinger 2011: 282–3. See also Dennett 2013, chapter 6; 2017.

⁷⁶ Dominik Perler’s (2012) criticism of Antonio Damasio’s (2010) accounts of maps or neural
patterns in the generation of the self appears to be based on a failure to appreciate this point: ‘On
the one hand he argues that a mind, and therefore a self, only arises through the interconnection of
maps in the brain. On the other hand he presupposes that there is something from the very
beginning that has the ability to read maps and use them in a purposeful manner.’
⁷⁷ Hohwy and Michael 2018.
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Hohwy also suggests a second set of constrains on our model, apart from our
inner states. He argues that during their cognitive development children also
employ their self models in order to explain the actions of others.⁷⁸ In this case
it is clear that there is another way a model could go wrong: if the model we
have made of our own internal causes generates wrong predictions when used
to explain the behaviour of another agent caused by its internal causes we
should change our model. In this way the child not only becomes better at
predicting and explaining the actions of an adult it interacts with, as its
explanatory device is its self it will also become more similar to the adult.
Self model and This understanding of the self shares some features with narrative concep-
narrative tions such as Dennett’s. Most importantly, the self is understood as an abstrac-
conception of
the self. tion, either from a narrative stream or from a set of internal psychological
properties. It subsumes events under overarching regularities and, by doing so,
influences our interpretation of those events. However, one important advan-
tage of the present understanding over the narrative one is that it does not
presuppose a language in which the narrative selfhood is expressed. For this
reason pre-linguistic children or animals can be considered to have selves too.
Secondly, an understanding of the self based on prediction error minimization
gives a better account of the constraints the construction of a self is subject to.
Whereas the narrative model might tempt us to believe we can make up the self
in any way we like, the self is here shown to arise from a complex web of
interconnected causes, a web that includes external causes, states of the body,
perceptual states, internal states of different levels of introspective accessibility,
as well as actions initiated as a result of these.
Autopoiesis. A specific kind of self-organizing systems, so-called autopoietic systems are
of particular interest when considering the kinds of self model discussed
above. Much of the discussion of autopoiesis takes place in the context of
Characteristics addressing very fundamental questions in biology,⁷⁹ and indeed the paradigm
of autopoietic
systems.
example of an autpoietic system is the living cell. A relatively simply charac-
terization of autopoieitic systems in terms of three criteria was suggested by
Francisco Varela.⁸⁰ According to this, (a) such a system has a semipermeable
boundary; (b) it encloses within the boundary a network of reactions that
produce the boundary; and (c) the network of reactions also regenerates the
components of the system. The outer membrane of the cell sets it apart from its
environment, and within the membrane the network of metabolic processes
constructs the boundary of the cell and other components of the cell within the
boundary. The cell emerges like a figure against the chemical background, and

⁷⁸ For accounts of the mind-reading faculty in children that disagree with this idea see
Carruthers 2011: 240–8, Bogdan 2010, 137–8.
⁷⁹ Maturana and Varela 1980. ⁸⁰ Varela 2000.
  -     

once its metabolic processes cease it will be absorbed again into that very
background.
Considering the three criteria just mentioned it becomes clear that a bac-
terium is an autopoietic system, while a virus is not.⁸¹ A virus has an outer
boundary (a protein coat), but the components of the virus are not generated
within that boundary, but within the host cell. A virus has no metabolism, and
even though it can persist outside of a host cell, it does not constantly exchange
matter with its environment in a self-producing way characteristic of auto-
poietic systems.
We introduced the notion of self-organizing systems to explain the pecu- How do
liar circularity of the self seemingly bootstrapping itself into existence. While autopoietic
systems arise?
we have an idea how autopoietic systems maintain their existence via the
processes they contain within their boundaries, how do they come into
existence in the first place? Do they need another autopoietic system to
produce them? And does this mean that it is autopoietic systems all the
way down?
We can get a first idea of how this is supposed to work by considering a toy A toy model.
model considerably simpler than a cell.⁸² Consider a space (for the sake of
simplicity we can imagine it to be flat) that contains moving substrate (S)
particles, as well as a catalyst. When two substrate particles move sufficiently
close to the catalyst a linkage between the two can be formed. The two particles
then move together; the linkages persist for a certain amount of time before
they decay. A pair of linked S-particles can link up with another pair, produ-
cing a chain of the form S-S-S-S; these chains can grow in length and also
double up on themselves, thereby creating an enclosure. This enclosure, we
assume, lets through solitary S-particles in both directions, though linked
particles cannot pass it (perhaps because they are too bulky to pass through
it). Now consider what happens if a catalyst finds itself trapped in the enclos-
ure. Obviously the amount of linked particles inside will increase, as S-particles
can get in, but linked particles cannot get out. Therefore, if a link in the
enclosure breaks through a natural decay of the linkage there are plenty of
linked particles present inside that can plug the gap.⁸³ We can now understand
this enclosure (or something very much like it) as an autopoietic system. It is a
system with a semipermeable boundary that contains an inner process produ-
cing the boundary. (There are no real ‘other components of the system’ apart
from the linked particles that constitute the boundary, but this complexity

⁸¹ Thompson 2007: 103–4.

⁸² Our description is loosely based on the model described in McMullin and Varela 1997: 38–48.
⁸³ McMullin and Varela 1997 describe a cellular automaton simulating the persistence of the
enclosure via the replacement of linked particles from the inside. They do not, however, consider
how the enclosure arises in the first place, it is simply present as part of the automaton’s starting
formation. See Thompson 2007: 108–9, as well as Varela et al. 1974: 187–96.
   -    

could easily be added to the simulation.) The interesting point is now that we
can see how this autopoietic system could have arisen spontaneously, from an
initial array of particles arranged at random, without the need for an ancestor
system or a highly structured initial state. S-particles drift past the catalyst,
some form links, and if there is a sufficient number of either, some closed-up
chain of S-particles will form, sooner or later trapping a catalyst. Because of the
semi-permeability of the membrane the resulting ‘cell’ will be able to repair
itself for some time in case some of the linkages deteriorate, until it will
eventually break down and the autopoietic system is re-absorbed into the
chemical background of this toy world.
Autopoietic systems can be larger than a single cell; there can be ‘second-
order’ autopoietic systems that consist of first-order systems, that is, individual
cells. Determining what exactly falls under the concept of multi-cellular
Autpoietic autopoeitic systems requires some careful analysis (what, for example, about
systems need not colonies of ants?)⁸⁴ and probably makes it necessary to revise the initial
be physical.
definition. Moreover, there seems to be some justification in thinking that
the definition of autopoiesis need not mention physical objects such as semi-
permeable boundaries at all. Relaxing this condition we can see that the self can
be regarded as an autopoietic system. Having a self means the existence of a
boundary of what belongs to the self, and what does not. This boundary is
maintained by the inner processes of the system by distinguishing, for
example, which parts of our mental lives are externally generated (such as
perceptions) and which have an inner source (such as thoughts). Besides
establishing the boundary the self also produces other components of itself,
namely a significant amount of what goes on in our mind at every moment.
Conceiving of the self in this way links it up with other living phenomena in
the world around us, and gives us a first glimpse of the consistency of the idea
that the creation of the self would not require the existence of another, higher
self standing behind it.

§66 A Mereological Argument against the Self

Unlike the previously discussed arguments against a substantially existent self
by Metzinger and Dennett, which essentially rely on empirical results in
cognitive science, this argument is very much located in the philosopher’s
armchair, based, as it is, entirely on premisses about parts and wholes. The
argument consists of two premisses:
1. Mereological nihilism: There are no wholes, only simples.
2. Complexity: The self is a complex whole.

⁸⁴ See Thompson 2007: 105–6.

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Jointly they entail that there are no selves.⁸⁵ As frequently happens in philoso-
phy the point at issue is not the validity of the argument but its soundness.
Why should we believe its premisses? Let us look at them in turn.
If you imagine a box into which three simple objects have been put there are Premiss 1:
Mereological
various possible answers to the question ‘how many objects are there in the nihilism.
box?’ At the one extreme there is the answer ‘seven’, given by the mereological
universalist. For him all combinations of simples constitute wholes (and thus
objects), so in addition to the three simple objects we also have four complex
wholes, three consisting of a pair of simples each, and one consisting of all
three of them together. Next there are various possible answers that give a
number lower than seven, assuming that only certain combinations of simples
constitute wholes (such as those that are stuck together in some way, or appear
to be causally connected). Finally, the answer at the opposite extreme is
‘three’—the mereological nihilist denies that there are any wholes at all, there
are only the mereological simples.
The mereological nihilist’s position is of course very parsimonious. His
ontological commitment is reduced to a very small number of primitive
objects. In a world consisting of atoms he does not have to assume that in
addition to all the atoms there are also all the molecules, all the complexes of
molecules, all the medium-sized dry goods and so on, all the way up to galaxies
and even larger objects. Yet the theory needs to be defended against the charge
of intuitive implausibility that threatens to undermine its parsimony as a
theoretical virtue. It appears to us as if there are molecules, tables, and galaxies,
and the mereological nihilist does not seem to have the resources to account
for this.
Van Inwagen suggests that we can account for this appearance by drawing a Strict and loose
ways of
distinction between strict and loose ways of speaking.⁸⁶ According to him, talk speaking.
about wholes is comparable to talk about the rising and the setting of the sun.
When speaking with the vulgar such terms are acceptable, but when speaking
(and thinking) with the learned we want do deny that there are tables, though
we can still say that there are objects arranged table-wise. We are in a position
where common sense appears to pull us in one direction, while mereological
analysis pulls in another. Common sense is committed to tables and chairs in a
way that it is not committed to ‘table-wise arranged objects’. While this is
undoubtedly true, it is debatable how much weight should be put on this fact.
First, the man on the Clapham omnibus is unlikely to have considered the
existence of table-wise arranged objects in the first place. And had he done so,
it hard to see how he could have found anything in his perception that would
have led him to accept the table over the table-wise arranged object scenario.

⁸⁵ An argument very similar to the one discussed here is presented in Benovsky 2019, chapter 7.
⁸⁶ 1996, chapter 10.
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The two options are empirically indistinguishable. The reason why some
metaphysicians prefer one over the other is not because the world looks
different to them, or because their common sense is in some other way
uncommon, but because of the theoretical virtues one has compared to the
other in the larger context of metaphysical theorizing. Naïve common sense
can set us on the road to inquiry, but it cannot be given epistemic authority to
decide questions it has never explicitly considered.⁸⁷
Examples of Are there any mereological nihilists? Amongst contemporary authors, Van
ontological
nihilists?
Inwagen and Unger come closest.⁸⁸ Yet even though they agree to a somewhat
counterintuitive rejection of entities such as tables and chairs, neither is, in fact,
a mereological nihilist in the strictest sense of the term, because each accepts
the existences of some wholes. In the case of Van Inwagen these are humans,
squirrels, and other living beings; for Unger wholes that are ‘defined with
precision’⁸⁹ such as molecules and crystals, exist. The reasons for these very
different ideas on what wholes there are derive from their different conceptions
of what makes entities hang together sufficiently to form a composite entity. In
Van Inwagen: Van Inwagen’s case the parts of a whole need to stand in a causal relationship,
Organisms are
wholes.
and they need to constitute a life, that is, form part of a living organism. Other
potential forms of hanging together, such as the way atoms hang together to
Unger: form a table, do not manage to produce wholes.⁹⁰ For Unger, on the other
Molecules are hand, forming a life is not essential for being a whole, but being immune to
wholes.
sorites-style arguments is. He argues that a table is not a whole since this view
would commit us to accepting that a table with a few atoms or particles shaved
off is also a table. But if we accept this, we can continue removing small bits
from the table, always being assured that the result is also a table, until we end
up with a single particle, or nothing at all, and claiming that that is still a table
is obviously absurd. So something went wrong, and according to Unger it is the
initial idea that there are such things as tables.⁹¹

⁸⁷ Rosen and Dorr 2002: 158.

⁸⁸ For an argument similar to Unger’s see Wheeler 1979, as well as Wheeler 1975. Mereological
nihilism is also defended in Merricks 2003. The main papers by Unger discussed here (2006a, b,
and c) were all first published in 1979. For an account of how Unger’s thought on the topic has
developed in the meantime see chapter 6 of Unger 2014.
⁸⁹ 2006b: 43.
⁹⁰ The details of why such other forms of constituting complexes are rejected by Van Inwagen
are not central for the present discussion. See his 1995 for discussion of this point.
⁹¹ We can now see why an argument along these lines does not speak against the existence of
certain molecules or other sufficiently precisely defined entities. For suppose we have a molecule
consisting of two atoms. We clearly would not say that the result of taking a little bit off this still
results in a molecule, since the smallest ‘bit’ we could take off would be an atom, resulting in a
single atom, not in another molecule. Similar considerations apply in the cases of molecules
consisting of more than two atoms, but where extracting one atom undermines the stability of
the whole, so that the remainder does not constitute a molecule anymore.
  -     

In the context of our discussion Unger’s argument for mereological nihilism

can be introduced in support of the above argument for the non-existence of Mereological
nihilism and the
selves—in fact Unger himself uses it to this effect.⁹² Van Inwagen, on the other
existence of
hand, rejects mereological nihilism because it entails the non-existence of selves.
persons,⁹³ a consequence he considers unacceptable.
As we have just seen, Unger rejects wholes picked out by ‘vague discrim-
inative expressions’⁹⁴ such as ‘table’ or ‘person’ because they lead us—via the
subtraction or addition of tiny particles—to cases where we have to say that
there both is a table and that there is none. The only way to avoid this
unwelcome consequence that is not just the denial of there being tables in
the first place is, Unger argues, to believe in miracles: either a miracle of
metaphysical illusion,⁹⁵ or a miracle of conceptual comprehension.⁹⁶ The
idea behind the first miracle is that we would have to expect that at some Miracle of
metaphysical
stage during our gradual shaving off of particles from the table something
illusion.
happens that keeps us from sliding down the slippery slope towards a con-
glomerate of a few particles that we would still be obliged to call ‘table’. This
could be that at a certain stage we are physically unable to shave any more
particles off the table, or as soon as we do so they are replaced by other
particles, or after taking off one particle too many the whole table implodes
or turns into a blancmange. This view entails that things such as tables and
persons consist of an outer layer and an inner core. The outer layer can be
taken off without undermining the existence of the table, but once we have
reached the core, any further subtraction will not result in an object that is still
a table or a person. These core objects would be such that they required the
existence of every single one of their simple parts for their existence. But this is
obviously not what we observe: when gradually reducing the size of an object
we never encounter the ‘inner core’, i.e. a stage where any further reduction
leads to something drastic happening. It would, moreover, be very strange to
assume that when chipping away at a piece of stone there comes a stage when
we encounter a smaller stone such that it requires every single atom in it for its
existence.
The second miracle, that of conceptual comprehension refers to the idea Miracle of
that even though nothing drastic would happen to the table when gradually conceptual
comprehension.
reducing its size, still at some stage our concept ‘table’ would no longer be

⁹² 2006b. The picture Unger defends with these sorites arguments is basically a foundationalist
one. Fundamental material objects exist, as do sufficiently precisely defined complexes composed
from these objects. But apart from these most objects of our everyday acquaintance, including
tables, chairs, and persons do not exist. I discuss my disagreement with foundationalist accounts of
this nature in Chapter 3. For present purposes we can ignore this foundationalist background, as it
has no impact on the current discussion of the reality of selves.
⁹³ 1995: 73, and chapter 12. ⁹⁴ 2006c: 58.
⁹⁵ 2006a: 11, 2006b: 40, 47, 2006c: 85. ⁹⁶ 2006a: 11, 2006b: 47–8, 2006c: 85.
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applicable to it.⁹⁷ Thus a significant amount of time before we arrived at a stage

where there are only a few particles, or none at all, the resulting object could no
longer be classified as a table, and the move down the slippery slope would
therefore have been stopped. The difficulty with this suggestion is that it
considers the applicability of our concepts to be extraordinarily sensitive.
The difference of a few atoms is enough to move us from a situation in
which a concept applies to one in which it does not. Particularly difficult in
this respect is the fact that this difference of a few particles would not even be
perceptible by our unaided senses, yet the application of concepts seems to be
intrinsically linked up with what we can determine through these very senses.
If neither of these miracles can be sensibly expected to occur, and if a
situation in which something is simultaneously classified as a table and as a
non-table is not something we want to accept, the suggestion that there are no
objects that correspond to terms like ‘table’, ‘chair’, or ‘person’ deserves to be
taken more seriously.
Responses to the There is obviously a lot more that the opponents of the sorites argument can
sorites say at this stage, including thinking of tables and persons not as things but as
argument.
processes, accommodating the imprecise boundaries of such concepts by
incorporating vague objects into their ontology, or adopting a logic that allows
for truth values between 0 and 1, or for a combination of 0 and 1. Unger
discusses these, as well as other possible comebacks in his relevant papers, and
I leave it to interested readers to decide how successful they consider these
responses to be. For the time being let us assume that something like Unger’s
Premiss 2: The mereological nihilism can be successfully defended.⁹⁸ In order to argue against
complexity of
the self.
the existence of the self, we still need another premiss, namely that of the
mereological complexity of the self.
If the self is simple, an argument against the existence of wholes will
Identifying the obviously have no force against it. This idea of the self as a simple substance
self with a simple
particle.
goes back significantly further than Descartes, whom we nowadays regard as its
most famous exponent. In the Jewish and Islamic traditions we even find the

⁹⁷ This position is adopted by epistemicists about vagueness (such as Sorensen (1988) and
Williamson (1994)), who, though accepting that there is a clear line where the concept ‘table’ ceases
to be applicable, argue we are never able to know where it falls. See Schiffer 1999 for a survey and
criticism of the epistemic theory of vagueness.
⁹⁸ One peculiar consequence of Unger’s approach is that it also applies to language, and hence to
the possibility of formulating the argument for mereological nihilism (2006b: 50, 2006c: 102). He
points out that if there are no people, there is nobody ever to consider the argument, but, more
immediately, it is apparent that language is a partite entity itself (unless, that is, we assume it to be
nothing but a set of Fregean propositions, which do not have parts in any meaningful sense). But if
language is itself partite, entities such as words, sentences, and arguments appear to be vulnerable
to the same criticisms as tables and chairs. If this is the case then the argument seems to have sawn
off the branch it is sitting on (or, to phrase matters in more positive terms, to have thrown away the
ladder after climbing up on it). Resolving the question whether this self-dissolution of the argument
if a positive or a negative feature has to be left for another time.
  -     

idea of a substantial physical core, a bone sometimes called luz, the Aramaic
name for the os coccyx, the ‘nut’-shaped part at the bottom of the spinal
column, a bone that is considered physically indestructible, and from which
the body will be reconstructed at the time of resurrection. A variant of this
theory has recently been defended by Roderick Chisholm, who suggested the
identity of a person with some specific part of that person’s body:
The theory would be, then, that I am literally identical with some proper part of this
macroscopic body, some intact, nonsuccessive part that has been in this larger body all
along. [ . . . ] [I]t would be something of a microscopic nature, and presumably some-
thing that is located within the brain.⁹⁹

A challenge that all these theories face, whether they identify the self with some
simple physical object (say, a specific electron in the brain) or with a simple
non-physical object (for example a Cartesian res cogitans) is squaring it with How can this
account for
our view of our self as an object of prudential concern. Everything in our body prudential
or in our mind that we are aware of by perception or introspection appears to concern for the
have parts or to consist of constituents: all of our body including the different self?
regions of the brain, our streams of thoughts, sequences of feelings, chains of
memories, mental images, complex emotional states, and so on. And the self
we care about, plan ahead for, and generally regard as mattering to us is
something we feel to be in direct epistemic contact with. Why should we
take all the trouble that we do looking after ourselves for the sake of a bone
in our backside, an electron in our brain, or an immaterial entity that is forever
introspectively hidden from us? Moreover, we can easily imagine a scenario in
which these various physical or immaterial selves are secretly removed, while
everything else still looks the same.¹⁰⁰ If we still acted in the same manner in
these circumstances it would then be hard to justify the supposed importance
of the self in our cognitive lives.
But if we believe that some form of mereological nihilism is defensible, and if
we also reject the kind of error theory about the self that the defence of its
complexity appears to entail the denial of the self seems to follow.
However, we might still be worried that this argument cannot escape the Inconsistency of
the resulting
charge of inconsistency. To deny one’s existence, it appears, one has to be position.
around in the first place, and once we are around there is nothing left to do for
any potential argument against the self. As the argument inevitably leads to a
contradiction we have the strongest possible proof that one of its two premisses
must be rejected, even though we might be unsure about which one needs to go.
However, suppose, along familiar materialist lines, that all our thoughts are
nothing but neurocomputational processes, and can therefore be understood
as interactions among physically simple parts. If mereological nihilism is true

⁹⁹ Chisholm 1986: 75. ¹⁰⁰ For a development of this idea see Smullyan 1981: 383–8.
   -    

there is no whole they compose. But the entire network of causal interaction
between them still exists. Whatever needs doing still gets done, and so the
thinking of the question ‘Do I exist?’ gets done. In this situation the question
arises, though there is no one asking it. There is no whole, no person or self
doing this, and so the answer to the question is ‘no’.
Van Inwagen has helpfully suggested that talk about tables and so forth can
Selves and be considered to be ‘mere talk’. It is an imprecise reference to simples arranged
self-wise table-wise, and for most practical purposes it makes no difference if we conflate
arrangements.
the existence of tables and the table-wise arrangement of parts. Why, then,
should be not be able to consider our physical and mental parts to stand in a
self-wise arrangement, even though there is no self?¹⁰¹ We need to mitigate the
patent absurdity of the denial of tables and chairs (in cases where we are asked
to sit down on a chair, the response ‘there are no chairs’ would indeed be
peculiar) by explaining how we can nevertheless still engage in table-talk. In
the same way being able to engage in talk about self-wise arrangements is
essential for everyday interaction (and for resolving the contradiction we have
just mentioned), but engaging in it no more commits us to taking selves, and
even our self, ontologically seriously than talk about table-wise arrangements
commits us to the existence of tables.

(b) The Unified Self

§67 The Location of the Self
One thing we can mean when considering the self as unified is that it is wholly
Locating the self and exclusively present in a circumscribed spatial location. It appears to be
in the immediately obvious that the self is spatially located in this way. It is present
boundaries of
the body. where our body is,¹⁰² even though we do not usually claim that the two occupy
the very same locations: there are some places that are within my body but not
within my self, so to speak (my little finger, say). How this boundary is drawn is
a matter of cultural context. Contemporary Western people tend to locate
themselves inside their heads, at a place roughly behind and between the eyes,
other cultures have located the self in the heart, the lungs, or the abdomen.¹⁰³
This belief in the location of the self does not imply that we have to identify it
with a particular piece of matter in our body, or that we have to assume that it
has clear spatial boundaries. We can, for example, claim that the self is a
process happening in the brain, a specific configuration of neurons firing, say,

¹⁰¹ See also Wheeler 1979: 172–3, note 19.

¹⁰² There appear to be good reasons to identify a being’s outer boundaries with its skin as ‘[i]ts
metabolism, its immune system, and its capacity for growth and repair extend to the skin and no
further’ (Olson 2011: 489).
¹⁰³ Bertossa et al. 2008; Santoro et al. 2009.
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that can take place in different parts of the cortex¹⁰⁴ and is therefore neither
identical with a specific sets of neurons, nor present in a single location, but is
located within certain boundaries that are part of our body (the dura mater,
say). According to this view the self is wholly present in a location circum-
scribed by the outer boundary of our brain. In addition, there is not any other
self that is wholly or partly present within the same boundaries.
The view of the self as unified within the boundary of a location faces strong Extended minds,
criticism from contemporary work on extended cognition.¹⁰⁵ Proponents of extended selves.
extended cognition point out that
thinking and cognizing may (at times) depend directly and noninstrumentally upon the
ongoing work of the body and / or the extraorganismic environment. [ . . . ] The local
mechanisms of the mind, if this is correct, are not all in the head. Cognition leaks out
into the body and world.¹⁰⁶

Clark and Chalmers¹⁰⁷ introduce the example of Otto, a character with mem-
ory problems, who keeps seminal information in a notebook he carries always
with him. When he needs to access a certain piece of information (an address,
say), he looks it up in his notebook. Another person without memory
problems will just ‘look up’ the same information directly in their memory.
Clark and Chalmers argue that the address in the notebook and the neurally
encoded address in the brain play exactly the same role in cognition. External External parts of
cognitive
objects (such as notebooks, smartphones, and a variety of other devices) form processes.
part of processes that would be uncontroversially regarded as part of our
cognitive system if they happened to be inside our heads.¹⁰⁸ If this is the
case, cognition happens both within and outside of the confines of the dura
mater, and the mere fact that some object or event plays a role in a cognitive
process does not tell us anything about whether or not that object is internal
or external.¹⁰⁹
As the self is essentially bound up with cognition the spatial dispersal of Spatial dispersal
cognitive processes¹¹⁰ brings with it a spatial dispersal of the self; at least it of the self.

would be hard to justify why, if cognition could happen outside of our bodies,

¹⁰⁴ For example like the ‘minimalism’ considered by Olson (2011: 493) according to which ‘I am
a highly exiguous net of tissue scattered across the parts of my brain that light up during CAT scans
when I am mentally active.’
¹⁰⁵ See, for example Clark and Chalmers 1998; Clark 2008.
¹⁰⁶ Clark 2008: xxviii. ¹⁰⁷ 1998.
¹⁰⁸ Interesting comparisons may be drawn between the notion of the extended mind and that of
the extended phenotype developed by Richard Dawkins (1982), who explores the idea that a
beaver’s dam or a bird’s nest is as much part of the animal’s phenotype as its body.
¹⁰⁹ See Clark 2008: 163–4.
¹¹⁰ Those uneasy with the idea that cognitive processes or mental states have any spatial location
at all can simply regard such talk as referring to the physical bases that underlie the realization of
such processes. For the defender of extended minds these bases extend beyond the confines of our
bodies.
   -    

our self could not be located where the cognition is. It appears to be that the
physical bases of the mental states of a being should not be located where that
being is not.¹¹¹ Clark and Chalmers point out that
[m]ost of us already accept that the self outstrips the boundaries of consciousness; my
dispositional beliefs, for example, constitute in some deep sense part of who I am. If so,
then these boundaries may also fall beyond the skin. The information in Otto’s
notebook, for example, is a central part of his identity as a cognitive agent. What this
comes to is that Otto himself is best regarded as an extended system, a coupling of
biological organism and external resources. To consistently resist this conclusion, we
would have to shrink the self into a mere bundle of occurrent states, severely threatening
its deep psychological continuity. Far better to take the broader view, and see agents
themselves as spread into the world.¹¹²

Such a ‘spreading out into the world’ as defended by this theory of extended
selves¹¹³ makes it impossible to assign spatial boundaries to any particular self.
The question where we are has become unclear. Some parts of our self may be
connected with none of its other parts; the notebook may be part of me, but the
table between me and the notebook is not. The self becomes a mereologically
dispersed or scattered object¹¹⁴ at least if we presuppose that no object can be
present in a place where none of its parts are present. Granted, this principle is
not entirely uncontroversial. We know that a material objects consists mainly
of empty space (recall the famous simile of the ‘fly in the cathedral’), and we
might want to include the empty space inside the atoms that make up the rock
as part of the rock. Yet if we do so, and thus simply draw an outer boundary
around all of theses seemingly disparate parts there seems to be hardly any
limit for how much space our self can occupy.¹¹⁵ To make matters worse, our
Overlapping self would no longer be exclusively present within the perimeter of this spatial
selves? boundary, as there are now obvious possibilities for selves to overlap (as in the
case of two people sharing the same notebook, for example). If anything like
the notion of the extended self is plausible, our belief in a unified self wholly
and exclusively enclosed within a given spatial boundary has to be given up.¹¹⁶
Localization of What, however, about the persistent appearance of us being located in a
the self as a
cognitive
specific location? Recent research in cognitive neuroscience has produced a
projection. variety of results that make it possible to account for this appearance. The
clearest way of interpreting these results is to take them as saying that the
localized appearance of the self is a cognitive projection, a projection we are

¹¹¹ Olson 2011: 484. ¹¹² 1998: 18.

¹¹³ For criticism of the idea of ‘extended selves’ see Wilson 2004; Baker 2009; Olson 2011.
¹¹⁴ Olson 2011: 484.
¹¹⁵ Suppose my (electronic) notebook stores its data on a server somewhere on a distant planet.
In this case everything between me and the planet would have to be part of me.
¹¹⁶ There are interesting connections between the theory of the extended self and a bundle-
theoretic view of selves. For further discussion see Olson 2007: chapter 6; 2011: 493–5.
  -     

unconscious of, because it is a phenomenally transparent superimposition of

our selves into a specific spatial location.
The idea of the self as a cognitive projection has been explored in a colourful ‘Where am I?’
way in Daniel Dennett’s essay ‘Where am I?’.¹¹⁷ He imagines a scenario in
which the main character’s brain is removed from his skull and kept artificially
alive in a vat. The connection with its body takes place with the help of radio
transmitters placed in his (now empty) skull. The conceptual climax of the
story occurs when the body goes to visit its brain in the vat. The tricky question
of who is looking at whom arises: is it the person looking at his brain in the vat,
or is the person in the vat, being looked at by his own eyes from outside the vat?
There appears to be no objectively right way of answering the question, the
primary difference between the two options is that the former sounds psycho-
logically more plausible. If you suddenly discovered that the neurological
support of what is going on in your mind was only partly caused by your
brain, and that it is also dependent on input received from subsidiary brains,
one located on Mars and one on Venus, which could somehow communicate
with your body, it would be more natural for you to interpret this as a situation
in which you have three spatially distributed brains, rather than as one in
which ‘the natural sense of your mental singleness’¹¹⁸ is given up and you
conceive of yourself as a kind of triply and discontinuously located entity on
Earth, Mars, and Venus.
Interestingly enough the process of projecting ourselves into a specific Manipulating
the spatial
location and into a specific body can be manipulated. Most people are familiar
projection of the
with the rubber hand illusion, a setup where we can be tricked into feeling self.
sensations in a rubber hand which we consequently regard as our own hand.¹¹⁹
What is less well known, though, is that the rubber hand illusion can be
extended to cover the entire body.¹²⁰ In this setup the experimental subject
wears a head-mounted display (a pair of ‘virtual reality glasses’) and looks at
the output of a camera filming them from behind, so that it appears to them as
if they were looking at the back of their own bodies. If the candidates are now
touched on the back they experience the sensation of being touched while
observing the body appearing in front of them being touched. At this stage
many experimental subjects report feeling that the virtual body in front of
them is their own body. They identify with it and try to ‘jump into it’.
Interestingly the illusion can be replicated if what is being filmed is not the
candidate’s body at all, but a similar-looking mannequin. The rubber hand
seems to have grown to encompass the entire body; what we misidentify is not
part of our body, but all of it.

¹¹⁷ 1981. ¹¹⁸ Strawson 1997: 414.

¹¹⁹ See Botvinick and Cohen 1998 for a description of the original experiment.
¹²⁰ Metzinger 2010a: 98–101.
   -    

This ability of ourselves to project our location into objects different

from our body can also be used for therapeutic ends, as demonstrated in
V.S. Ramachandran’s work with patients suffering from phantom limbs.¹²¹
Phantom limbs can feel to the patient as cramped up in a painful position.
With a simple arrangement of mirrors Ramachandran put the patients in a
situation where they could observe a mirror image of their extant limb in the
place where the phantom limb should have been. Moving the real limb allows
the patients to see their phantom limb move, generating the perception that it
moves out of its painfully contorted position.
What results such as these indicate is that our experience of the presence of a
unified self in a specific location does not imply that there is anything unified
present at these locations. The localization of the self is not based on anatom-
ical or neurophysiological facts (‘I feel I am in my head because my brain is,
and my brain underlies the actions of my mind’) but a projection the self brings
about. This projection is not conscious (it is phenomenally transparent) and
for this reason we cannot influence it at will. But this does not mean that it
cannot be influenced and changed at all (as the above arguments show), and
that the localization of ourselves in our body or our head is significantly more
than a cognitive accident.
The location of The view of a unified self understood as something present in a single
the self as only location is therefore mistaken if we take this to be anything more than an
an appearance.
appearance. It seems to us as if the self existed in this way, but the basis of this
appearance is not any collection of facts of what is located where, but simply a
transparent projection of ourselves as located in a specific place.
The self as a We might object at this stage, pointing out that the unity of the self should
functional unit. not simply be considered in spatial, but in functional terms. Consider, for
example, two computers in two separate rooms. In the first case the two
computers are linked by a wireless connection and perform a single calcula-
tion, exchanging data between each other as they do so. In the second case the
two computers perform separate calculations. It seems clear that in the first
case there is one functional unit, the action of which is spread out across two
different locations, while in the second case there are two functional units. But
if this is the case the unity of the self is not undermined by the scenario in
which we have three brains. We could simply say that despite its spatially
spread-out nature the brain is still functionally unified, since the three brains
operate in unison, forming a single causal nexus for processing information
that underlies our self.
The picture of the self as functionally unified is a fairly intuitive account of
the self as a functional, not a spatial locus where information about the external

¹²¹ 1998.
  -     

world is perceived, where thoughts are formed, decisions are made and actions
are initiated. Unification means that all these faculties are faculties of a single
subject. There are not four different agents—a perceiver, a thinker, a decider,
and an actor—that share information, but just a single self that can do all of
these. All the different kinds of information necessary for different conscious
processes are available to this single self.
There are two sets of empirical results very problematic for the self as a locus Problems for
of functional unity. Both of them have been discussed at length by Daniel functional unity.

Dennett. The first concerns the absence of a locus of integration in the brain.
The second is connected with the fact that very complex feats of information-
processing can be achieved by processes that are, taken one by one, very simple.
The first set of results is relevant for the idea that the existence of a unified 1. No Cartesian
self requires some instantiation of spatio-temporal integration that could act as theatre.

the physical support for such a self. Yet the more we learn about how the brain
processes information, the more we understand how radically distributed this
processing is. Parts of information that ‘belong together’ are processed in
different parts of the brain (there is no locus of physical integration), they
are not all processed simultaneously (there is no locus of temporal integration),
nor do they all have to pass through one common process (there is no locus of
functional integration). It then becomes exceedingly difficult to say where
amongst all these various events that take place in the brain when we are
conscious we should locate a functionally unified self.¹²² Whatever kind of
thing the self is, it should in some sense be one thing that interacts with or
participates in everything performed in the theatre of consciousness. And for
this basso continuo of ‘mineness’ there should be some form of neural correlate,
as there is some story we can tell about what is happening physically in the two
computers that explains why they form a functional unit in one case, but not in
the other. However, if we consider the empirical results that Dennett discusses
in his criticism of the metaphor of the Cartesian theatre it is very difficult to see
what such a correlate could be.
The second set of results adds support to the idea that a complex mind can 2. The cascade of
homunculi.
exist without a self-like complex unifier, without a CEO in a cerebral control
room that has the oversight of all that is going on in our cognitive life. If a
complex process can be reconstructed as an arrangement of basic routines at

¹²² Metaphorical representations of the brain intended for the general public like those created
by Fritz Kahn (von Debschitz and von Debschitz 2009) are interesting in this respect: some depict a
‘main office’ (‘Where all orders start’) with a little man inside in the centre of the skull (175), some
show a Cartesian projection room into which an image of a car is projected when a car is seen,
though this projection room is empty: nobody watches the performance. Yet others depict the
mind as composed of a multiplicity of agents: the diagram ‘man as industrial palace’ (54–5) features
a set of smaller offices labeled ‘reason’, ‘understanding’, and ‘will’, each with a number of little men
inside.
   -    

different levels, with each level sitting on top of the next, and if each of these
routines is sufficiently simple that it can plausibly be conceived of as not
needing its own unifier, we can see how the need for one single grand unifier
has been bypassed. This is essentially a way of understanding the homunculus
picture of cognition without the regress. Ordinarily, explaining any function of
the mind in terms of a little man in the head carrying out that function is not
going to lead anywhere, since explaining the little man’s ability is as difficult as
explaining the original one. This is not the case, however, if the explanation
proceeds in terms of multiple homunculi, and if each of these is considerably
simpler than the original cognitive agent whose ability we want to explain. In
this case the explanation can be genuinely informative.
Of course the fact that complex cognitive processes are composed of very
simple individual processes does not entail that there is no central unifier of all
these processes. However, it constitutes an altogether simpler explanation, and
one which also suggests how a complex mind could have arisen from a gradual
hierarchical agglomeration of processes each of which is very simple.
If we conceive of the mind as a cascade of simple homunculi built one on top
of another, then ‘we’ do not really exist. For we are not one of the homunculi
The self as an (since the cognitive capacities of each one are smaller than ours), we are not
emergent entity. many of them put together (since they are multiple, but the self is unitary), nor

are we anything separate from them (since they are all there is to the mind).
What is surprising about this picture is that a conglomeration of primitive
automata so simple that they cannot possibly have an inside view can give rise
to something with an inside view. However, ‘surprising’ here does not mean
impossible. We are familiar with emergent complexity from other contexts.
Large termite castles are built by the termites’ collaborative effort, yet no
termite has the ability to build a small castle on its own. As such their
architectural ability cannot be understood as a sum of qualitatively similar,
though quantitatively smaller abilities (as in the case of a rope, where each
thread can support a small weight, and all together can support a larger
weight), but has to be considered as the emergence of something genuinely
new.
It thus appears that it is not only hard to find a physical basis for the self ’s
supposed functional unity, but that there seems to be little necessity
for postulating anything that achieves this functional unification in the first
place. Our mind is able to do what it does even in the absence of such a
unifier, and its assumption does not fill an explanatory gap that could not
otherwise be closed.
So far, our attempts to spell out the apparent unity of the self in spatial and
functional terms has met with little success. There seem to be strong arguments
against the idea of a unitary self, and if these arguments go through, as far as we
imagine our self to be such a unitary entity it simply does not exist.
  -     

(c) The Temporally Extended Self

§68 Continuity and Discontinuity of the Self
We conceive of ourselves as stretched out in time, not simply because we are
tied to a temporally extended body, but also because our mental abilities, our
memories, and character traits (changeable as they may be) appear to revolve
around something that is not changing with them, something that can act as a
fixed anchoring point for a variety of psychological states. This does not
necessarily imply belief in the immortality of the self, but simply the assump-
tion that the self is around for a sufficiently long amount of time to bring
together all the different events that we consider to constitute our life.
Discontinuous accounts of consciousness such as those we discussed above Difficulty with
present problems for the conception of a conscious and persistent self that do the discontinuity
of
not arise for continuous accounts. From the perspective of a continuous view consciousness.
of consciousness it is not difficult to explain how the self could participate in
cognitive activities that are stretched out in time, as one continuous stream of
consciousness and one continuous self involved in this stream would carry
them out. If consciousness is continuous we can argue that there is one
strand (or perhaps the backbone) of this stream which stretches across the
different parts of our cognitive life (although it might be modified and chan-
ging across time).
But for the discontinuous view of consciousness it is hard to explain the
continuity of the self. For if consciousness really is gappy, we seem to have to
accept a succession of many different things (the various moments of con-
sciousness) none of which can be identified with a self, as long as we assume
that the self has any significant temporal extension. We appear therefore
unable to locate the self anywhere in consciousness.
One way of getting around this difficulty in order to account for the A solution:
extended existence of the self in the presence of gappy consciousness is to Selves without
consciousness?
argue that consciousness is not necessary for the existence of the self. The self
exists unperturbed throughout the gaps of conscious activity, and we can
continue to exist, though we are not aware of it. The difficulty with this
approach is, once again, that it moves existence of the self outside of the
context of our current experience, into a transcendent realm we usually do
not, and perhaps cannot, access. The self, something we ordinarily regard
ourselves as intimately acquainted with, has suddenly become ineffable. And,
being ineffable, it is hard to see how we could develop the familiar attitude of
prudential concern for the self. If we literally have no idea what something is,
because it is beyond our conceptual and linguistic grasp, how can we reason-
ably have any attitude like care or concern for its well-being towards it? We
might then feel as if we have been the victim of a philosophical bait-and-switch:
   -    

instead of getting what we originally wanted, we get something else that is

nowhere remotely like it. If I take away all your money and replace it by twice
the amount in another ‘currency’, one that cannot in fact be used to purchase
anything you would be justified in feeling cheated.
Momentary On the other hand, the idea of a momentary self does not appear as too
selves. attractive either. A minimum of temporal persistence seems to be required to
ascribe any kind of agenthood to the self. If the self is momentary, by the time
we finish thinking any thought the self that started it will already have
disappeared, and will have been replaced by a different, very similar one. If
we formulate any inference the self that draws the conclusion will not be the
same that put up the premisses. Part of what it means to be an agent of some
process is to see that process through from start to finish, rather than being
replaced mid-way by somebody else. If a burglar breaks into a safe and then
walks off, leaving it to somebody else to take the contents, he will not be
considered as the perpetrator of the entire crime. If we then cannot even
ascribe such simple activities as thinking and inferring to a momentary self,
in what sense could it be considered as an agent?
Strawson’s The most important recent defender of a theory of momentary selfhood is
theory and Galen Strawson. In setting up his account he introduces a principle he calls
Frege’s thesis.
‘Frege’s thesis’,¹²³ claiming that ‘an experience is impossible without an experi-
encer’.¹²⁴ According to this thesis the notion of a subject-less experience makes
no sense, necessarily every experience must bring with it the subject that has
the experience. Strawson considers this to be an analytic truth,¹²⁵ and his
argument for it rests primarily on the unintuitive consequences of its denial.
Otherwise, if there was a subjectless experience of pain there would be no
reason (neither egoistic nor altruistic) to prevent it, since it would not be the
pain of anybody in particular.
Given its supposed status as an analytic truth it is surprising to find acute
thinkers that disagreed with Frege’s thesis. Hume was famously unable to
discern the experiential subject that is supposed to go with every experi-
ence,¹²⁶ and Lichtenberg believed that statements about thinking no more
necessitated the existence of a thinker than statements about rain necessitated
that of a rainer.¹²⁷

¹²³ 1994: 129–34. ¹²⁴ 129.

¹²⁵ ‘It follows immediately from the notion of experience [ . . . ]’ (130).
¹²⁶ ‘I never can catch myself at any time without a perception [ . . . ]’ Hume 1896: 252.
¹²⁷ ‘Wir kennen nur allein die Existenz unserer Empfindungen, Vorstellungen und Gedanken.
“Es denkt”, sollte man sagen, so wie man sagt: “es blitzt”. Zu sagen cogito, ist schon zu viel, so bald
man es durch “Ich denke” übersetzt. Das “Ich” anzunehmen, zu postuliren, ist practisches Bedürf-
niß’ (Lichtenberg and Kries 1801, vol. 2, 95–6). For criticisms of Lichtenberg’s point as directed
against the Cartesian cogito, one in defence of Descartes, one equally critical of Descartes and
Lichtenberg see Katz 1986: 118–30; Williams 1978: 95–101.
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The suspicion that Frege’s thesis not only fails to be analytic, but also fails to The falsity of
be true is supported by the fact that it seems to be possible to account both for Frege’s thesis.
the intuitive plausibility of the belief that experiences are always had by specific
subjects, and the justification for reducing the number of experiences of pain in
the world, without assuming that each experiential state inevitably necessitates
a bearer of that state. The way to do so is to accept the existence of some
subject-free experiences, and to argue that whenever sufficiently many of such
experiences congregate in contiguity they give rise to an experience that
misinterprets itself as the bearer of all the experiences within this conglomer-
ation. This explains why we never encounter subject-free experiences: since all
the experiences we have are experienced by us, and since we consist of a
conglomeration of experiences that self-projects a subject into them we find
all experiences as connected with this subject. Moreover, all the experiences of
pain we will come across will be connected with subjects in a similar manner,
and for this reason whatever egoistic or altruistic motivation we would usually
accept as justifying the removal of these painful experiences would apply.
Metzinger interprets this picture as having important ethical consequences
for the development of artificial intelligence and artificial life. For if this theory
is correct once we build an artificial agent with a sufficiently complex structure
to develop a phenomenal self model, we will have created at the same time the
potential for this agent to experience suffering. Metzinger argues that for this
reason we should be extremely cautious about attempts to build artificial
agents equipped with a phenomenal self model.¹²⁸
Let us, however, for the sake of argument, accept the idea that every The pearl view.
experience necessarily brings an experiencer with it. Strawson believes that
this experiencer does not have to be assumed to be ‘something grand’, it exists
‘even in the case of mice or spiders’.¹²⁹ In particular, the existence of an
experiencer does not commit us to the acceptance of a ‘thing-like’ entity,
something to which something distinct from it is happening.¹³⁰ Strawson
considers Frege’s thesis to be fully compatible with a universe where all that
exists are ‘pure processes’, a pure process being ‘something which is just the
happening itself’, without an underlying individual.¹³¹ What Frege’s thesis
postulates is just that every pure process of an experience must go together
with a pure process that is an experiencer. Finally, there is no reason to suppose
that this is always the same experiencer, so if I have a visual experience at one
moment, and an auditory experience at the next moment there is one experi-
encer followed by a distinct one immediately afterwards. Distinct successive

¹²⁸ ‘If there is such a thing as a forbidden fruit in modern consciousness research, it is the
careless multiplication of suffering through the creation of artificial Ego Tunnels without a clear
grasp of the consequences’ (2010a: 197).
¹²⁹ 1994: 133. ¹³⁰ 1997: 427. ¹³¹ 1994: 132, 1997: 427.
   -    

experiences in our mental life bring with them distinct successive experiencers.
Strawson calls this account the ‘pearl view’,¹³² since it holds that momentary
selves are lined up like pearls on a string, each following the other. This
account differs from bundle theoretic accounts to the extent that the latter
postulates the existence of a collection of experiences that make up the self at
any one time, and across time. Strawsonian selves are not diachronically spread
out; they exist at a certain moment, then pass out of existence and are replaced
by distinct selves, that is, by the next pearl on the string.
The pearl view as We might wonder whether the pearl view is in fact a theory of the self, or a
no-self theory. theory that denies the existence of a self.¹³³ Strawson himself sometimes seems
to move in this direction as well:
In so far as I have any sense of Me* [the “fundamental way in which I think of myself”]
(rather than the living human being that I am) as something with a history and future, it
seems that this sense is a wispy, short-range product of, and in no way a ground of, my
innate predisposition to physiological impulses that develop into experience of anxiety
or regret. It dislimns when scrutinized, and it is more accurate to say that it does not
exist.¹³⁴

On the other hand Strawson considers one attraction of the pearl view to be
that it allows us to consider the self as ‘something that really exists’, rather than
as a mere ‘Humean or Dennettian fiction’.¹³⁵ Yet as in the case of the ineffable
self it remains questionable whether ‘real existence’ is something anybody
really wants. If the best we can do in attempting to rescue the self from the
realm of the merely fictional is coming up with an entity that lasts for a
maximum of a few seconds¹³⁶ it might be more honest to admit that the self,
understood as something with the properties we ordinarily ascribe to it (and
which are really the only properties that matter) does not exist.
Tension between The discussion of the pearl view underlines why philosophers have found it
the different
properties
so difficult to come up with a satisfactory view of the self. This is largely
ascribed to the because the different features we intuitively consider the self to have pull
self. in different directions. We want our self to be substantial (property 1), to

¹³² 1997: 424.

¹³³ Such as Thomas Nagel in his review of ‘Selves’ (Nagel 2009: 34): ‘Yet his conclusions depart
so far from the idea most people have of themselves that it seems natural to describe him as offering
not a theory of the self, but rather the view that there is no such thing as the self, distinct from the
human being.’
¹³⁴ 1997: 420. See also 2009: 9.
¹³⁵ 1997: 425. Van Inwagen (1995: 209–10) discusses the example of a staccato entity called
Alice who is annihilated every few milliseconds and then recreated as a near-identical copy. For
him, of course, this entails that Alice is not a continuous being, or indeed conscious, since the
different temporal parts do not constitute a whole. Nor does Alice constitute a conscious being at
any of the moments of her existence.
¹³⁶ For Strawson a self only exists ‘at any given moment of consciousness or during any
uninterrupted or hiatus-free period of consciousness’ (1997: 425).
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participate in our lived experience of rapidly changing psychological states,

states that unfold over time (property 3), and to be something we care about
(property 5).
Substantiality comes into tension with being temporally spread out, since we
cannot make out a unique object that exists in all these different states: in
different emotional states, with different sets of memories at different parts of
our lives, in altered states of consciousness caused by dreaming or psychoactive
substances. We can rescue substantiality by making the self momentary along
Strawsonian lines (if we accept something like Frege’s thesis) but at the
seeming cost of diminishing the relevance of the entity the substantiality of
which we are about to establish. If the reason why the self is of concern to us is
because we want it to have a certain kind of future, and to have had a certain
kind of past, and if the aim of our present actions is to make this happen, the
idea of a momentary self seems to rob us of most of the foundation of that
concern. If the self that existed yesterday and the self that exists tomorrow are
completely distinct from the present self (to the extent that we are talking
about three different substances), why should the nature of these distinct past
and future selves, though they are causally connected with our present self in a
specific way be particularly important to us?¹³⁷
It thus appears that the notion of the self is problematic not simply to the
extent that we often cannot find a sufficiently self-like instantiator of each of
the five central properties of the self that we listed earlier, but that it is also
difficult to put different ones of these properties together, as an entity that
satisfies some of these conditions is unlikely to also satisfy some of the others. It
appears that our concept of a self is not just like a notion that happens to be
uninstantiated (such as a flying horse), but one that could not be instantiated,
since some of its properties rule each other out (as in the notion of an ice-cube
every part of which is above freezing point).

(d) The Self as an Agent

§69 Selves Bring about Change
Conceiving of ourselves as an agent means seeing ourselves as sources of causal Selves as sources
changes in the world. The self receives information from the outside world and of causal change.
in response carries out actions that change the way the world is: in the most
basic sense by moving, pushing, or pulling its surroundings. We take most of
these actions to be no direct consequences of the input we receive through our

¹³⁷ Strawson (1997: 421, note 22; 419) argues that the belief in a momentary self does not
undermine justification of ethical behaviour, and also considers it to correspond closely to the way
his own self appears to him. We can agree with all of this while still holding that it makes the self an
entity far less important than it is usually assumed to be.
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senses (as in the case of reflexes, for example), but as something that is carried
out on the basis of the volitional activity of the self, a locus of control that has
decided to act in a certain way in certain circumstances.
Yet our agentive involvement with the world is not simply restricted to the
causal. The self is also involved in relations with the world that are not (or at
The self and least not obviously) causal. A good example of this is the semantic relation of
semantic
relations.
something standing for something else. That a certain thing, such as a mark on
paper, a series of soundwaves, or a set of electric impulses means something is
based on our ability (individually or collectively) to connect these things by
means of semantic relations. The resulting change may be very different from
setting a billiard ball in motion by the movement of our hand, but it is
nevertheless a product of our self acting as an agent in the world.
Libet’s This conception of the self as an agent has recently come under attack from a
experiments.
variety of directions. A well-known set of arguments revolves around the
interpretation of experiments carried out by Benjamin Libet in the 1980s.¹³⁸
Libet studied a specific pattern of neuronal activity called the ‘readiness poten-
tial’, a pattern that precedes actions such as voluntary muscle movements. Libet
was able to show in specific cases that the readiness potential can be present even
though the intention to act is not (yet) introspectively felt by the subject that is
about to act. It is therefore unlikely that the intention has caused the readiness
potential. The readiness potential may have caused the intention, and yet it
appears to us as if the intention has preceded the neuronal pattern.
The literature on the implications of these results for our conception of the
self as an agent is considerable, and we will not retrace its steps here.¹³⁹ Instead,
we will focus on two less prominent, but equally interesting discussions that
challenge the idea of the agenthood of the self. We will first look at arguments
for the more restricted claim that the self does not play the role of an agent in
semantic relations, that it is not the entity that confers meaning to things
that stand for something else. We are then going to look at some more
general memetic arguments that aim to establish the lack of autonomy of the
self as an agent.
§70 Original Intentionality
The notion of original intentionality raises problems for the idea of a self as an
agent. It is intuitively plausible to assume that the intentionality or ‘aboutness’
we find around us (in books and newspapers, speeches and conversations,
paintings and photographs, to name but a few) is derivative in comparison to
the intentionality within us. The sign ‘hot tea’ outside of a teashop means what

¹³⁸ Libet et al. 1983, 106: 3, 623–42.

¹³⁹ For a useful discussion of the conscious will as an illusory yet useful phenomenon see
Wegner 2008.
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it means only because following back the sequence of causes that brought it
into existence eventually leads to a self with specific beliefs about hot tea that Intentionality as
grounded in the
lent their aboutness to the sign. If the words ‘hot tea’ just occurred by chance
self.
(say, on a malfunctioning electronic display board) they would not be about
anything. Another way of making the same point is to say that intentionality
has to be grounded. Meanings have to be derived from someone that means,
and this someone can mean directly, without deriving its power to mean from
someone else. The author of the ‘hot tea’ sign means directly, the sign only in a
derivative manner. At the end of the chain of meanings there must be, to use
Dennett’s phrase, an ‘unmeant meaner’. It makes sense to identify this meaner
with human persons or selves. Our mental states have the ability to be about
the world directly, and by doing so, these examples of original intentionality
give rise to an entire cascade of unoriginal intentionality, of items that have
their intentionality only in a derived fashion.
This intuitively plausible position has two immediate problems. The first Problems for
grounding
stems from its foundationalist premiss. Perhaps there is a way of having intentionality:
meanings all the way down, or all the way round, without ever encountering 1. No unmeant
an unmeant meaner. Alternatively, perhaps meaning is an emergent property, meaner.
such that if sufficiently many non-meaningful things are put together in the
right way, meaningful things emerge. An obvious parallel can be drawn here
with the origin of life. We can explain the nature of living things without
assuming that there are some intrinsically living things all other living things
are assembled from, or that all things without exception are alive.
The second difficulty concerns the identification of the unmeant meaner 2. A distinct
unmeant
with us. Even though we might agree that the chain of derivative meanings meaner.
must bottom out somewhere, it need not do so with us. The intentionality of
our thought about hot tea may be as derived as that of the sign at the teashop,
even though there are some things that have their aboutness intrinsically. This
second way of critizing the assumption of an unmeant meaner is considerably
weaker than the first, since it allows for the possibility of such a meaner at least
somewhere, but its consequences for our view of ourselves are severe. We
usually think that the fact that meanings start with us is an essential part of our
freedom to act: we have the intrinsic ability to make a certain sign refer to a
certain object, and if we are successful in convincing sufficiently many other
people to do so as well, we have created a linguistic convention. Even after we
are long dead and gone the convention may continue, and the sign continues to
mean that object. But if the critic of original intentionality is right, we do not
have this property intrinsically, but borrow it from somewhere else. Where,
then, might it be coming from?
Defenders of original intentionality agree that artefacts such as slot
machines or computers only borrow whatever meaning their actions have
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from the mind of their designers. If we consider the causal antecendents of such
artefacts their ability to mean anything seeps away into their underlying causes;
like water draining from soil it cannot be retained at the higher level but only
accumulates at a lower level from which it cannot escape any more (this is the
level at which original intentionality is located). However, most contemporary
thinkers would agree that we are artefacts too, to the extent that our bodies and
minds are produced by the process of evolution. But if the slot machine has to
Passing on hand back its powers to mean something to its designers, why would we not have
intentionality to
evolution.
to hand back our intentionality to the driving force of the evolutionary process
that made us what we are, namely, to our genes (and, if we accept the existence of
such things, to our memes)? This suggestion sounds simultaneously intringuing
and fantastic. It sounds intringuing since if opens up the prospect of explaining
intentionality without reference to a special quality human meaners have that
others objects (even very complicated ones, such as the products of AI labs) lack by
Explaining life their very nature. When explaining the nature of life, being able to do so without
without the
élan vital.
such a special quality, a scientifically inaccessible élan vital, proved the power of
the scientific theories involved. Living beings, from the humble amoeba to the
mighty whale are not made of fundamentally different things than what sticks and
stones are made of, but of the same kinds of things put together in amazingly
complicated ways. If we can provide an explanation of intentionality that uses the
same resources we use to explain the development of the human brain and body it
would certainly be preferable on grounds of parsimony.
Can the literal The suggestion that original intentionality does not rest with us sounds fantastic
depend on the because it looks as if it gets things the wrong way round. Surely the genes are mere
metaphorical?
theoretical postulates that can have an ability to mean anything only through an
abbreviated comparison that has been stretched to the extreme? As Daniel Dennett
points out, we are here dealing with an account that ‘derives our own intentionality
from entities—genes—whose intentionality is a paradigm case of mere as if
intentionality. How could the literal depend on the metaphorical?’¹⁴⁰
Moreover, if this account is correct we find ourselves in a scenario where we
are being pushed around by extraneous forces in directions we know nothing
about. We do not usually worry that our material frames are pushed around by
laws of nature beyond our control, but if see the same happening with the
contents of our minds things appear to get too close for comfort.
Intentional One problem is that it looks as if what our intentional states mean could
states changing
without our
change without our inner nature changing. It might seem to us as if the
inner nature contents of our mind are attached to the contents of the world by a set of
changing. invisible semantic wires we have thrown out. But as various twin-earth and
brain-in-a-vat scenarios seem to show us, if we were placed in different

¹⁴⁰ Dennett 2013: 171.

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circumstances all these wires could be re-attached to different objects without

our doing anything or changing any of our intentional states.
Secondly, we would be faced with a further depopulation of our internal Depopulation of
world. We may have initially thought that what our thoughts, beliefs, and the internal
world.
desires are about is something we have guaranteed privileged access to. But this
turns out to be no longer the case. If we do not know that someone has not
surreptitiously placed us in a world of near-indistinguishable fakes we also do
not know whether our thoughts refer to the fakes, or to the originals. And this
is not because the facts about what means what are hidden from us behind a
veil of perception, but because there are no such facts.
The two problems just mentioned are of course nothing but the expression
of a kind of metaphysical queasiness to which we should not ascribe much
argumentative force. Sure, if this argument is right then we are wrong about
much that we thought was going on in the internal world. But in the absence of
any proof that we must be mostly right about what is going on inside,¹⁴¹ this
does not in itself tell us much.
But what about the worry that the dependence of the literal on the meta- Mutual
dependence of
phorical sounds as incomprehensible as the ability to pull ourselves up by our the literal and
own bootstraps? The most cogent response seems to say that from the per- the
spective of humans, genes have intentionality since they are relevantly similar metaphorical.
to other intentional objects humans interact with, and from the perspective of
genes humans have intentionality because it is derived from the genes. But, we
now want to ask, which is prior, and therefore the donor of the original or
literal usage to the derived or metaphorical? Neither, for the idea of priority
presupposes that some objects are intrinsically intentional, and others are not.
The difficulty with this presupposition is that the semantic properties that
characterize intentional objects typically apply to partite entities (DNA
sequences, sentences, diagrams, photographs, and so on), and such entities
borrow their properties both from their parts, and from their relations to the
other parts of the complex systems in which they occur. However, such
borrowing precludes the properties in question from being intrinsic.
Independent of whether we want to assume that intentionality has no
foundation at all, or that it has a foundation that is not identical with us, in
neither case can we assume our self as a locus of semantic agency. However
meaning arrives in the world, it is not via the actions of a self or of a group of
selves. When properly analyzed the notion of intentionality seems to entail a
substantial loss in the degree of agency we usually ascribe to the self.

¹⁴¹ Davidson might be considered to have given such a proof (see e.g. Lepore and Ludwig 2007:
372) though I believe that in the end the resulting picture is largely compatible with the one
presented here.
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§71 Memetic Arguments against the Self

Genes and The theory of memes produces a more general set of difficulties for the belief in
memes. the self as an autonomous agent. A fundamental idea behind memetics is that
the process of evolution by natural selection is substrate independent. It will
occur whenever there are entities that are copied (replicators), when there is
variation in the copying (mutation) and when there is a difference between the
copies with regard to success (competition). The notion of a ‘meme’ arose in
the context of this generalized understanding of evolution, combining the
study of biological evolution, the study of the human mind, and the develop-
ment of cultures in a way that has interesting implications for the status of the
self. Memes are non-material idea-like replicators analogous to genes,¹⁴² with
the difference that memes are not informational entities about how to build
new organisms, transmitted in the reproduction of the parent organisms, but
informational entities that these organisms use to shape their environments.
The construction of beaks in birds, for example, is encoded in sets of genes,
while the use of instruments for eating (such as forks, or spoons, or chopsticks)
is transmitted in a non-genetic way and forms the content of memes.
Both are Like genes, memes are functionally defined. They are essential for specific
substrate-
independent.
tasks (in the case of the gene, for generating the organism’s phenotype) and are
based on a physical substrate (for human genes, the DNA). However, what
exactly their substrate consists in is inessential for their existence.¹⁴³ As such,
genes and memes are defined by what they do, their function, and not by the
nature of the bases that carry them. There may be other life-forms that do not
pass on genetic information on the basis of DNA, though they could still be
described in terms of genes. The genes and memes themselves, like computer
programs or recipes, are substrate-independent. Both are carried by a host, an
organism or a mind that supports the existence of a multiplicity of genes or
memes grouping together. Memetic’s consequences for the nature of the self
are based on two key ideas.
1. The selfish The first is the extension of the idea of the ‘selfish gene’ to memes. The
gene. selfishness of genes amounts to the fact that what counts as success for a given
gene is its reproduction, not anything that is necessarily advantageous for the
organism carrying in the gene. In fact there are various examples of genes such
that their reproduction is distinctly disadvantageous for their host organism.

¹⁴² Memetics is not the only application of evolutionary concepts beyond the biological realm.
Such concepts have been applied to entities as diverse as molecules (Eigen and Winkler 1983),
languages (the applicability of the concept of natural selection to the development of languages has
already been noticed by Darwin (Dennett 2002b)), and computer viruses.
¹⁴³ What the physical substrate of a meme might be is still an open question. It is likely that it is
some process taking place in the brain, though precisely what process is impossible to tell given the
primitiveness of our present understanding of how brains generate minds. For some discussion of
this question see Aunger 2002.
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This may appear to be somewhat counterintuitive, since in many cases what is

good for the gene is also good for the host. A gene that provides immunity
against a common disease is beneficial for the host to carry (his chances of
living longer improve), but the gene benefits too: a longer-lived and healthier
individual is more likely to pass on its genetic inheritance, including this very
gene). But there are other cases in which the benefits are clearly on the side of Genes that
spread to the
the gene only. There is a specific kind of gene, the segregation-distorter genes, detriment of
that is operative at the level of cell division when chromosomes are halved and their hosts.
sperm and egg cells are produced. These genes increase their representation in
the sperm and egg cell to make sure that they are amongst the ones replicated.
One example of such genes, the t-gene in mice, leads to the mouse’s offspring dying
young or being sterile, if it is inherited from both parents. As such a gene spreads by
cheating its way into being included in the reproductive cells to the detriment of
other genes, the likelihood that a new-born mouse inherits the t-gene from both
parents increases, and eventually the entire population becomes extinct. The gene
spreads to the detriment of its host (and in the long run also undermines its own
interest, since eventually none of its carriers will be alive to spread it any more).
From this point of view genes are not tools that the organism uses to
promote its survival in future generations, but are entities that only try to get
themselves copied as often as possible. In many cases this coincides with
promoting the survival of the host organism, but this connection is accidental,
not necessary.
The second key idea is to extend the notion of a genetic complex to that of a 2. Complexes of
memetic complex. It is obvious that a single gene would find it very hard to get genes.

itself copied. For this reason genes congregate into complexes of genes that we
refer to as organisms. In the context of an organism some genes can direct the
production of biological components other genes require, thereby enlarging
the chances of each gene to get copied. As in the case of the selfish meme, the
notion of a genetic complex requires a certain shift in perspective. Just before
we saw that the notion of genes acting as tools of the organism in its attempt at
genetic reproduction was inverted, leaving us with genes that are not subor-
dinates to any higher goal, having no other purpose than getting themselves
reproduced. Now the idea of the organism as host to the genes is turned on its
head and is replaced by a picture of the organism as nothing but the result of a
conglomeration of genes. This shift in perspective entails a shift in agency: now
it is the genes, not the organism that is in charge. It is no longer an organism
that carries its genes, it is the genes that make up the organism in order to
facilitate their own reproduction.
When we apply these two ideas about genes to memes we end up with a Applying these
conception of informational entities, the memes, that strive for their own repro- two ideas to
memes.
duction by means of a mental host. Whether or not such informational entities,
such beliefs or ideas are good for the host to hold is again of secondary importance,
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as the goal of the meme is self-reproduction.¹⁴⁴ Memes, like genes, spread more
easily when forming parts of complexes. The meme of how to make gunpowder
might spread on its own to some extent, but it will do so much more rapidly and
widely if it is combined with memes for rockets, cannons, bombs, and guns, memes
that will themselves spread better in conjunction with the gunpowder meme.¹⁴⁵
Given that memetic reproduction is greatly aided by the existence of complexes
of memes we might then consider the mind as a conglomeration of memes
operating together. Once more, the intuitive order of ideas is inverted. Instead of
us having ideas, the ideas are having us. As genes congregate to make a physical
organism, memes get together to form a mental organism. In this context the self can
The self as a be considered as a particularly successful meme,¹⁴⁶ one that facilitates the copying
successful
of other memes, and which is itself aided by them in its own reproduction.¹⁴⁷ We
meme.
are more likely to work for the propagation of a belief that we ourselves hold,
rather than for the spreading of any old belief. As such it is advantageous for the
memes to enter into a complex with a self, since it increases their chance of getting
copied. At the same time the self-meme benefits from having other memes
congregate around it, since they support its continued existence (I consider
myself to be myself to a large extent because of the beliefs and ideas I have). Of
course none of this looks like it from the inside—it does not appear to us as if we
are simply a complex of co-present memes. But this is not entirely surprising if we
take the notion of phenomenal transparency discussed in §65 above into account.
The process of the construction of the self from memes could be one that is
introspectively entirely inaccessible.

¹⁴⁴ It should be clear that the truth of specific beliefs that arise as consequences of the presence of
particular memes is also not a satisfactory indicator of the success of these memes. Not only does
the fact that a meme is good for the host (say, by making us more intelligent or more compas-
sionate) fail to be reliably connected with its success in propagating through minds, the fact that a
belief arising as the consequence of the presence of a particular meme corresponds to the way the
world is also does not allow us to infer that the meme is going to be more successful than one that
fails to correspond. Plenty of demonstrably false ideas and beliefs spread better than demonstrably
true ones. Dennett observes, however, that there is a correlation between a meme being a good
replicator, and it being good for ‘whatever it is we hold dear’ (1995: 364). The important point is,
though, that this notion is not the same as biological fitness, and that it is itself the product of
memetic evolution. See 1995: 361–9 for further discussion.
¹⁴⁵ See also Blackmore 1999: 19–20.
¹⁴⁶ This view of the self as a culturally evolved entity need not be in tension with views that see it
as originally biologically evolved (e.g. by regarding it as facilitating the integration of sensory
perception and motor behaviour (Blackmore 2006: 153)), as long as we see the memetically evolved
self as sitting on top of and enhancing the functionality of the genetically evolved one.
¹⁴⁷ Blackmore 1999: 231–4. For a discussion of memes that disagrees with Blackmore’s under-
standing of the self as meme see Distin 2005. Note, however, that the latter author’s conclusions
about consciousness and agenthood seem to be quite independent of any implications memetics
might have. She holds that ‘memetic evolution is quite consistent with a world of intentional,
conscious, and responsible free agents. And if it weren’t, then common sense dictates that I should
exercise my free will and reject meme theory in preference to dispensing with mind, conscience and
autonomy’ (5). This response is essentially a form of the Moorean gambit we have discussed above
in §3.
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The two ideas of the selfish meme and of the self as a complex of memes Two ways of
obviously have important implications for the view of ourselves as agents, and understanding
the memetic
of our self as the source of causal and ethical responsibility for the acts it has challenge.
brought about. How can we consider ourselves as an autonomous agent if the
memes are in charge, and if they are only interested in self-propagation?
There are two different ways in which this memetic challenge to the self ’s 1. The self as
colonized by
agency could be understood. The first, less satisfactory way, sees the self as memes.
colonized by hostile genes, as a plaything of informational parasites that are
following their own agenda, and impose their will on their helpless host. This
understanding would be subject to the same misunderstanding that might lead
one to understand Metzinger’s idea of the ego tunnel as a variety of Cartesian
scepticism. It is easy to read it as an approach claiming that the self is trapped
in the representational tunnel and has no way of escaping from it. But
according to Metzinger’s account the tunnel is essential for creating the self
in the first place. Instead of a non-simulated entity trapped in a simulation, the 2. The self as
existentially
self is a simulated entity within a simulation, and we can no more take it out of dependent on
the ego tunnel than we can take a hole out of the substance it is a hole in.¹⁴⁸ In memes.
the same way we cannot think of the self in abstraction from all the memes it
hosts. Dennett notes that
[w]e cannot sustain the polarity of vision we considered earlier, it cannot be ‘memes
versus us’, because earlier infestations of memes have already played a major role in
determining who or what we are. The ‘independent’ mind struggling to protect itself
from alien and dangerous memes is a myth.¹⁴⁹

Another way of making this point is by considering the difference between the The deception
deception hypothesis discussed in the previous chapter and the simulation hypothesis and
the simulation
argument. The simulation argument¹⁵⁰ tries to establish the probability, given argument.
empirical facts about the speed of current computing technology and its likely
future development, that we are currently living in a computer simulation
programmed by our technologically more advanced descendants. Whether the
argument is successful in this respect need not concern us here, we are only
interested in the idea of us as beings in computer simulation, an idea that is
fundamentally different from the idea of us as beings in a simulated world
common to all versions of the deception hypothesis.
The key difference is that on the basis of the deception hypothesis we can
coherently formulate what it would mean to leave the scenario and exist
outside it. In the evil demon scenario, even though the world around us and

¹⁴⁸ Neither can we take a Markov blanket and whatever it encloses out of the statistical/causal
nexus that constitutes it. Independent of this nexus the agent will no longer be able to minimize
prediction error, and the Markov blanket ‘will begin to disintegrate, and the agent begin to disperse’
(Hohwy 2017: 13).
¹⁴⁹ Dennett 1995: 365. ¹⁵⁰ Bostrom 2003.
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our body might disappear (the evil demon having tricked us into believing that
all of these exist) the certainty of the cogito and everything else necessarily
associated with the Cartesian res cogitans would remain untouched. In the
dream scenario the person who wakes up is the same person who dreams, the
brain-in-a-vat will remain a brain whether or not it is artificially stimulated by
evil scientists, while the inhabitant of the Matrix continues as a prisoner of a
body-farm run by aliens. This is not the case in the simulation scenario. If the
simulation is stopped, all of its contents disappear, including the simulated
beings that form part of it. There is no way a simulated being can exist outside
of the simulation that brought it into being, taking up some external perspec-
tive towards it, as a being escaped from the Matrix can view the entire
delusional setup from the outside.¹⁵¹ In the scenario described by the deception
hypothesis, having escaped from the deception I can still recognize myself as
myself. For a simulated being, this would no longer be the case.
Rather than seeing the self as somehow colonized or taken over by a hostile
coalition of memes, a second, better interpretation sees the self as constituted
by and existentially dependent on the congregation of memes. As such it is
obviously not an autonomous agent, but not because its already-present
autonomy is in some way hidden or constrained, but because it is a dependent
entity in the first place. Blackmore points out that
[a]ll human actions, whether conscious or not, come from complex interactions
between memes, genes, and all their products, in complicated environments. The self
is not the initiator of actions, it does not ‘have’ consciousness, and it does not ‘do’ the
deliberating. There is no truth in the idea of an inner self inside my body that controls
the body and is conscious.¹⁵²

¹⁵¹ It should now also be evident why the account developed so far does not amount to a form of
solipsism. Solipsism is a monistic form of foundationalism assuming that there is only one thing
that really exists: me. All the remainder of the world is simply something spun out from the one real
thing, although I may mistakenly believe that it exists independently of that thing. The present
account agrees with one part of the solipsist’s picture, namely the rejection of the external world
conceived of as a set of independently existent entities, but contradicts it at a basic level by denying
the fundamental reality of the self.
The proximity of the Cartesian scenario to solipsism is evident, and has been noted frequently in
the literature. Even though Descartes himself does not move from the indubitable certainty of the
cogito to the sole existence of the res cogitans such a move is certainly possible in the argumentative
context that characterizes the beginning of the Meditations. The simulation argument, and the
account developed in this chapter do not provide a route to solipsism. Because neither my own
mind nor that of any other beings in the simulated reality is an independent, fundamentally real
entity there is no way in which it could encompass all of what there is.
¹⁵² Blackmore 1999: 237. Despite the fact that their memetic arguments against the self are quite
similar there are two major differences between Dennett’s and Blackmore’s views: First, Dennett
regards the notion of the self as a ‘benign illusion’, while Blackmore thinks that it is pernicious.
Second, on Dennett’s picture the memetic complex and the existence of consciousness are
inextricably bound up with each other. Blackmore assumes the existence of some form of
consciousness that could exist independently of memes (238), though it would obviously have to
be a form of consciousness without the memetically induced notion of a self.
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From its own point of view the self will, of course, regard itself as autonomous, Lack of
but this has no more epistemic weight than the fact that our consciousness or autonomy as
introspectively
our visual field appears continuous to us has for establishing that they are in invisible.
fact continuous. The lack of autonomy is introspectively invisible, due to the
phenomenal transparency of the cognitive processes that keep our conception
of the self in existence.

(e) The Self as the Subject of Prudential Concern

§72 Could the Self Be a Transcendent Entity?
The preceding discussion has shown difficulties with conceiving of the self as a
substantial entity, a spatial or functional unity, an object spread out in time, or
as an autonomous agent. If any of these properties is essential to being a self,
and if the above arguments were successful in showing that what we take to be
a self does not have the property in question then what we take to be the self
cannot be the self.
Can the defender of the existence of the self then reply by arguing that we Selves not
qualified by the
are simply confused about the qualities we intuitively ascribe to our selves?
properties
There are selves, he might say, but they fail to be characterized by the four mentioned
properties mentioned above. This argumentative move, which pushes the above?
object of philosophical scrutiny into the realm of the transcendent is familiar
from metaphysical discussions. Someone who worries that a significant
portion of what we ordinarily consider as part of the mind-independent
world turns out to be a cognitive artefact (colours and other secondary
properties, macroscopic partite objects, enduring entities, causation and so
on), a product of our specific setup as a cognizer and thereby precisely not
mind-independent might argue that even though the mind-independent world
is not coloured, partite and so on, it is still there. We are simply mistaken about
what kinds of properties we ascribe to it. (In the most extreme form the world
‘in itself ’ is entirely moved to the realm of the noumenal, and is then not
describable by any concepts.)
I believe that this move to the transcendent should be resisted in the Difficulties with
moving the self
metaphysical case, but the problems it faces in the case of the self are even to the
more severe. For such a solution will solve our problems merely nominally. transcendent.
Someone worried by the fact that there is no self is unlikely to be comforted by
an account according to which there is a self, though it fails to have any of the
properties we ordinarily ascribe to it. What we want from a self, it seems fair to say,
is something that has those very properties. A self that is not where we expect it to
be in spatial and temporal terms, a self that does not occur at the place in the causal
chain where we believe it to be is simply not a self we are going to care about
greatly. Yet it is an essential feature of the self (if it has any essential features) that
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we are concerned about its continued existence, and the mental and physical
properties that are presently attached to it and that will be attached to it in the
future. Our self ’s present and future well-being and happiness are at the centre
of our concern, they are the axis around which our mental and physical
activity revolves. If the supposed self cannot play this role it is more coherent
to say that there is no self, rather than that the self is not what it appears to be.
When a waiter brings us a blancmange instead of a peach melba we are
probably not satisfied by the explanation that this really is a peach melba,
though it has none of the visual, gustatory, or olfactory properties we ordinarily
believe peach melba to have. Nor should we be satisfied with the kind of ersatz
self the proponent of the transcendent move is trying to settle us with. The
resulting scenario is in fact unsatisfactory on two counts: on the one hand we
have a self that does not really do what we expect a self to do, on the other hand
we are settled with an additional entity quite unlike all other ones we presently
have to account for. A self that does not constitute the focus of prudential concern
is no self, and it is hard to see how something that is not a substantial entity, a
spatial or functional unity, an object spread out in time, or an autonomous agent
could constitute such a focus. The self, we have to conclude, does not exist.
Motivation for What we might offer, however, is an explanation of the intuitive pull
moving the self towards moving the self into the realm of the transcendent. The self, it appears,
to the
transcendent. belongs to a set of illusions that are ‘inherently persistent’.¹⁵³ Other examples of
such illusions include some well-known optical illusions such as Shepard’s
tables.¹⁵⁴ What unifies them is the fact that an explanation of how the illusion
works does not make the appearance of the illusion go away. If the self is an
illusion, as we tried to argue above, and if it is also a persistent one, there is no
amount of philosophical arguments we can study that will make the appear-
ance of a self with the five properties discussed above go away. But if something
continues to appear despite the fact that, upon analysis, we cannot find
anything like the kind of entity there seems to be, a natural move is to claim
that there must be something there, though we cannot put our finger on it with
the help of the epistemic instruments presently at our disposal. For this reason
this something has to be a kind of transcendent entity. Natural as this intuition
is, though, it should be resisted. The Shepard tables keep appearing as if they had
different sizes, though their size is identical. We do not believe that there is
another notion of size, in addition to the one we can measure, and that according
to this notion the tables have different sizes. In the same way there are no good
reasons to postulate a transcendent self in addition to the self that turns out to be
non-existent once we analyze the properties commonly associated with it.

¹⁵³ Wegner 2008: 236. ¹⁵⁴ Shepard 1990: 48.

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2.4 The Non-existence of the Internal World

§73 No Retreat to an Inner Realm
In the preceding sections we have looked in detail at two important examples
of metacognitive errors, the illusion of the continuity of consciousness, and the
illusion of the self. These two cases should provide significant evidence for the
claim that we cannot look inside ourselves like we would into a diamond
clockwork, but that investigating the internal world is at least as likely¹⁵⁵ to
produce illusory certainties as the inspection of the external world.
This insight is very important for the progression of our argument, for if we Realism about
believed that, with respect to the internal world, ‘what you see is what you get’ a the internal
world leading to
set of arguments against the existence of the external world such as that idealism.
discussed in the previous chapter can easily be seen to lead to a form of
idealism. If the external world is lost, the internal world seems to be the cogent
place to retreat to, since the worries of what, if anything, is hidden behind the veil of
perception will suddenly vanish: our inner world is not hidden by a veil. Yet, as the
arguments in this chapter have shown, the existence of an objectively existent,
epistemically perspicuous internal world is as questionable as that of its external
counterpart. For this reason an idealism claiming that while the outer world is an
illusion, everything is really internal or really mental cannot be an attractive option.
§74 Representationalism and the Internal World
In fact the three contemporary versions of representationalism discussed in the
previous chapter are in significant tension with the idea of an internal world that
is at least in part immediately and directly accessible, a world that is immune to
the epistemic problems that haunt our conception of the external world. This is
immediately apparent in the case of the prediction-error minimization theory.
Applying the prediction-error minimization framework to the internal world Prediction-error
is a cogent extension of applying it to the external world. The external world can minimization
and the internal
violate our experiential expectations (there is no milk in the fridge though we world.
expect to find it), but so can the internal world. Cases of this are familiar and
numerous, including, for example expectations regarding pain (we expect the
dentist’s drill to cause more pain than it does), memory (we expect to be able to
recall most of a list of words we have memorized for a test, but in fact can only
remember a small percentage), skills (not having ridden a bike for twenty years we
expect that it is difficult to do so, but once sitting on the bike we find this easy)

¹⁵⁵ Schwitzgebel (2011: 136–7) even argues that our knowledge of the internal world is less
secure than that of the external world, and that for this reason the Cartesian approach should be
turned on its head: instead of proceeding from the supposedly iron-clad certainty of particular
introspective perceptions we should ‘begin with judgements about plain, easily knowable facts of
the outside world, then infer to what is stranger and more elusive: our conscious experience of that
world’ (137).
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or levels of satisfaction (we drink a cup of coffee but enjoy it less than we
thought we would). But if there is a violation of experiential expectations, there
is some kind of representation of our inner states involved in the mismatch of
expectational representation and inner state represented, and hence the pos-
sibility of applying the prediction-error minimization account. In the same
way in which we can conceive of the mind building a model of the external
world driven by the objective to reduce prediction error to a minimum, it can
also be seen to be building a model of our internal states in order to minimize
error in predicting what goes on inside, rather than outside.
As we saw above, prediction-error minimization theory spells out the notion
of the veil of perception in terms of a Markov blanket. The states of the Markov
blanket are influenced by the hidden distant causes that are inaccessible to us.
Yet if we adopt this picture both the internal and the external world appear
to be on the outside of the Markov blanket: the hidden causes that bring
about our perception of mental events are as hidden as the causes that bring
about perceptions of external objects.
Spelling out the It is therefore apparent that the internal/external distinction spelled out in
internal/external
distinction in
terms of the Markov blanket is not the same internal/external distinction
terms of Markov familiar from most forms of representationalism. According to the familiar
blankets. picture the internal is privileged at least by some sort of direct access to it that
the external lacks, hence the necessity for representations that drag the external
into the internal. Yet when the internal/external divide is understood in terms
of a Markov blanket, ‘perceptual and cognitive processing all happen within
the internal model, or equivalently, within the Markov blanket’.¹⁵⁶ While
perceptions are mostly conscious, perceptual processing is not, and so every-
thing within the Markov blanket is, to use Metzinger’s term, phenomenally
transparent. It is the work of our mind that happens ‘under the hood’ and is
not available to introspective awareness. In this case the things within our
internal world, emotions and plans and deliberations and imaginations, are as
much outside of a Markov blanket as cabbages and kings. They too are part of a
model our mind constructs to account for causal or statistical regularities in a
set of hidden causes, though our mind models these causes as very different
kinds of entities, physical objects in one case, mental objects in the other. The
distinction between them is drawn simply in terms of the functional role they
play within the mind-made model. Once we spell out the internal/external
distinction in terms of Markov blankets there is no reason to assume that there
is a privileged access to the internal.
This might strike us as a very counterintuitive picture, at least if introspec-
tion is supposed to deliver information with indubitable certainty, and if our

¹⁵⁶ Hohwy 2017: 7. See also 9: ‘All the perceptual and inferential work is done within the Markov
blanket.’
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inner states are considered to be fully laid bare to our inner gaze. However, as
our above discussion of research into metacognitive errors has shown, much of
our introspectively gained knowledge is not indubitably certain; in fact we are
often wrong about what we believe to be going on in our own minds.¹⁵⁷ This
fact might then cause us to reconsider the idea that when we look inside, we see
everything clearly and distinctly laid out, a position that appears in any case to
be at odds with a careful inspection of the world inside:
The teetering stacks of paper around me I’m quite sure about. My visual experience as
I look at those stacks, my emotional experience as I contemplate the mess, and my
cognitive phenomenology as I drift in thought, staring at them—of such things I’m
much less certain. My experiences flee and scatter as I reflect. I feel unpracticed, poorly
equipped with the tools, categories, and skills that might help me dissect them. They are
gelatinous, disjointed, swift, shy, changeable.¹⁵⁸

We seem to be able to explain much of this picture by considering our inner Considering our
inner world as a
world to be as much the product of a model produced in response to hidden
model.
causes as the external world.¹⁵⁹ Rather than directly apprehending our inner
states, introspection would be explained as the production of a model that best
explains the occurrence of the hidden causes.
An absence of privileged access to the internal also applies to the interface
theory and to Metzinger’s brand of representationalism. Even though the Interface theory
and the internal
interface theory does not include an account of introspection¹⁶⁰ it seems world.
evident that it can be developed along the same lines by identifying the
world a given conscious agent accesses through the interface with the con-
scious agent himself.¹⁶¹ In this case all the causes of experience, external and
internal, have been moved beyond the interface, and what remains at the other
end is simply the cognitive processing that generates the interface in the first
place. None of this processing is introspectively accessible, and hence there is
no privileged access to the internal.
Finally, for Metzinger’s form of representationalism, the internal world, just Metzinger’s
represen-
like the external world, ends up being a sort of virtual reality. This includes the tationalism and
character at the centre of the virtual world, the perceiver. This perceiver, or the internal
rather this model of a perceiver (which is the only perceiver there is) is no less world.
of a construct than the virtual world he perceives. There is no more direct
epistemic contact with our inner states or with the self than there is with any

¹⁵⁷ For discussion of the possibility of error though misidentification regarding the self as an
agent see Jeannerod and Pacherie 2004.
¹⁵⁸ Schwitzgebel 2011: 136.
¹⁵⁹ Hohwy discusses the interesting phenomenon of introspective dissonance: while much of
our introspection appears ‘elusive, fleeting, and uncertain’, other introspective episodes are ‘easily
accessible’ and seem ‘certain and sometimes beyond doubt’. For a way in which prediction-error
minimization theory might explain this see his 2013: 247–9.
¹⁶⁰ Bennett et al. 1989: 267. ¹⁶¹ Hoffman and Prakash 2014: 13.
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object on the outside. While the view of reality as a simulation is reminiscent of

a pilot in a flight simulator, we are here confronted with the notion of a total
flight simulator:
Total flight The brain is like a total flight simulator, a self-modeling airplane that, rather than being
simulator. flown by a pilot, generates a complex internal image of itself within its own internal
flight simulator. The image is transparent and thus cannot be recognized as an image by
the system. Operating under the condition of a naive-realistic self-misunderstanding, the
system interprets the control element in this image as a nonphysical object: The ‘pilot’ is
born into a virtual reality with no opportunity to discover this fact. The pilot is the Ego.¹⁶²

This construction is intriguing, not least because of its obvious circularity.¹⁶³

The ‘system’ here appears as an intentional agent (it ‘interprets’) producing the
model of an intentional agent (the Ego). The construction of the modelled self
in this example proceeds by appeal to an intentional agent, but this in turn
seems to depend on something very much like the self that can be the executor
of this intentional agency.
§75 The Unintuitive Idea of the Simulated Self
It still remains the case that the idea of the self as a merely simulated entity is
highly unintuitive, much more unintuitive, in fact, than the suggestion that
some or all of the external world is the result of a simulation.
Does the idea of One reason for this is that examples of simulated individual objects are not
a simulated self hard to find: mirages, dream images, computer games, or virtual reality set-ups
lead to a
contradiction? provide plenty of examples. But I cannot easily come up with similar examples
where parts of me, parts of the process that is my inner life, are simulated. We
might even doubt whether it actually makes sense to speak of a simulated self.
Ayer¹⁶⁴ points out that ‘no one who uses these words [“I exist”] intelligently
and correctly can use them to make a statement which he knows to be false. If
he succeeds in making the statement, it must be true.’
But if we managed to construct an intelligent machine that said of itself
‘I exist’, we would then have to assume that the machine speaks truly, and that
it has a self it refers to. And if this is the case, there does not seem to be any
reason in principle why this machine could not be wholly constructed inside
Distinguishing some simulation, in the same way in which we can e.g. construct a Turing
two senses of machine inside a cellular automaton, such as Conway’s Game of Life.¹⁶⁵ But
truth.
this appears to lead to a contradiction: on the one hand this self is only
simulated, on the other hand it must also be true that this self exists. One
way of dissolving this contradiction is to distinguish two senses of truth, where

¹⁶² Metzinger 2010a: 108. ¹⁶³ See the discussion on p. 109 above.
¹⁶⁴ Ayer 1956: 50. ¹⁶⁵ Poundstone 1987.
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the fundamental, metaphysical sense is still called ‘truth’, while the second,
in-a-manner-of-speaking sense, a sense that is useful for daily interaction but is
not to be taken seriously so as to entail any existence statements, may be called
‘correctness’.¹⁶⁶ We can then say that it is correct that the intelligent machine
has a self, though it is not true. Moreover, it will not be the case that there is any
experiential difference for the intelligent machine that allows it to draw a
distinction between correct existence and true existence of itself: the way it
appears to itself to exist, that is, the way it seems to have a self from the inside is
all the experience it is ever going to have. Every machine that was able to state
‘I exist’, and would be able to engage in coherent communication about itself
(which is presumably what Ayer means by using the phrase ‘intelligently and
correctly’) would then be correct about having a self, but this would not entail
the truth of the statement, and would not entail the existence of any entity the
term ‘self ’ referred to.
§76 A Hidden Internal World?
The variety of experimental results that suggest that our introspective abilities
are highly error-prone appear to support the case for a kind of internal world
scepticism.¹⁶⁷ We might now wonder what the relevance of such a result for
our present discussion is, since we have made clear in the last chapter that the
aim of our discussion is first and foremost ontological, not epistemological. We
are concerned with the question of what does and does not exist, not with the
question of what we can and cannot know.
Epistemological and the ontological questions that can be decoupled to a Interlinking of
epistemological
certain extent in the case of the external world are closely interlinked in the and ontological
internal case. When challenged by the sceptic the believer in the external world questions in the
can always reply that there are certain aspects of this world (perhaps its internal case.
structural features) we can know with certainty, though others may remain
forever hidden from us. As we might be able to discern the shape of an object
hidden under a cloth but not its colour, certain properties of the world may
penetrate the veil of perception, while others do not. Alternatively, we can
simply assume the existence of something behind the veil, the existence of a
noumenon about which we cannot know anything.
I have argued in Chapter 1 that neither strategy is successful in supporting a
realist conception of the external world. But even if we assume that one of these
strategies is successful, the prospects of adapting it to argue for a similar

¹⁶⁶ See Sider 2013 for one way of spelling out this distinction. French (2017: 173) distinguishes
‘contextually operative standards governing common usage’ that make ‘there are tables’ come out
true, and ‘much rarer semantic standards that apply to “direct correspondence”, where this involves
the standard Tarskian account of truth’ that let it come out false.
¹⁶⁷ Schwitzgebel 2011: 117.
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conception of the internal world are dim. Suppose there was an inner world
clearly and precisely laid out, made up of some entities with properties, and
relations between these properties. Taking into account the above remarks on
the unreliability of introspection, we would be able to make out some of the
elements of this inner world, though we would be left in the dark about a great
many others. Yet they would still be there, as the features of the external world
that we cannot access would still be there. However, the idea of an internal
world that no one can access is a curious one. Others cannot access it, as such a
world is private, and we ourselves can never get a clear view of it either, given
the limits of our introspective abilities. Does it make sense to replace the crystal
clockwork by one mostly shrouded in darkness that no ray of light ever
penetrates? We could, instead, make the more restrictive claim that the inner
The idea of an world still exists, but only in the most restrictive form of an indescribable thing
inaccessible
in itself. In this case there would not even be a partly visible clockwork,
internal world.
something with an inner structure that is at least accessible to us in some of
its aspects, but simply a noumenal something. Yet what would be the purpose
of postulating such an inner world that is not just partly inaccessible, but about
which nobody could ever say anything whatsoever?
There does not appear to be much theoretical work that the assumption of
something behind the inner veil of perception could accomplish. It is not the
case that there are a variety of important features of our psychology that can
only be explained by making this assumption, and in no other way. Other
Motivations for things being equal, explanatory success does generally warrant the postulation
postulating the of unobservable (or in fact necessarily unobservable) entities. There is reason
‘objective
subjective’. to suspect, however, that the assumption of an introspection-independent
inner world, a realm of the ‘objective subjective’, derives its motivation not
from its explanatory success, but from quite different sources.
One may simply be the internalization of naïve realism about the external
world. If it makes sense to conceive of the existence of this teacup independent
of our cognitive access to it, does it not equally make sense to conceive of this
feeling of anger, this memory of the smell of lavender, this presently occurring
thought about a friend in the same way, independent of the way our mind
attends to it? But there is obviously no reason why the model of the ontological
distinctness and independence of observed and observer, even if it is applicable
to our relation to the external world, should be applicable to the internal world.
Are we not simply recycling a cognitive schema by applying it to a case where it
may have no relevance?
A different source for the assumption of an objective inner world may be the
apparent irrefutability of our answers to introspective questions. If someone
asks you a question about your experience (such as ‘do these two lines appear
the same length to you?’), no matter what answer you give, nobody will ever be
able to prove you wrong. This may lead us to thinking that because nobody can
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prove us wrong about x, we must always be right about x, and if we are always
right about something, the something we are always right about must be there.
So there must be an objective subjective fact about how long these two lines
appear, and, by extension, there must be objective facts corresponding to all
introspective reports.
§77 Error and Realism
We might wonder whether the above claims for the unreliability of introspect-
ive reports, and for the illusoriness of given parts of the inner world, do not in
turn give rise to a form of realism? If empirical results show us that our
introspective reports are often wrong, does this not automatically entail that
the opposites of our reports are true, and that these statements express
objective truths about the world? Most people may believe that their visual
field has the same resolution everywhere, and once we demonstrate that this is
not the case, will this not show that it is mind-independently true of the
internal world that our visual field has variable resolution?
Also, does talk of an illusory self not require a self that is not illusory, in the Does the illusory
same way as something can only be counterfeit if there is something genuine to presuppose
veridical?
the

contrast it with? Tim Bayne¹⁶⁸ introduces the notion of ‘virtual phenomenal-

ism’ which considers selves as ‘merely intentional entities’.¹⁶⁹ Bayne argues that
such an account of selves deals with the problem of phenomenal gaps in the
same way we would account for narrative gaps in the existence of fictional
entities, for example between two novels featuring the same character. In both
cases two narrative strands are connected by a network of conventions.¹⁷⁰ Yet,
Bayne points out:
It should not be thought that the self is fictional in the way that Hercule Poirot and other
creatures of fiction are. [ . . . ] Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective and his mode
of existence is to be contrasted with that of real (non-fictional, actual, existent) Belgian
detectives. But there is no kind of real self with which our kinds of selves could be
contrasted, for it is in the very nature of selves to be virtual.¹⁷¹

However, as something being counterfeit only requires that we have the The concept of
concept of something being genuine (rather than that something is in fact veridicality
presupposed by
genuine), real selves are not required to consider our actual selves to be virtual illusoriness.
or illusory. For even if our self is not fictional in the way Hercule Poirot is, it
may still be fictional in the way Humpty Dumpty is, a being that is undoubt-
edly fictional even though his mode of existence is not contrasted with that of
real (non-fictional, actual, existent) talking eggs. For it to make sense to call x
fictional there does not have to be an x that is real; we just need the concept of a
non-fictional self in order to make the existence of a fictional self possible.

¹⁶⁸ 2010. ¹⁶⁹ 2010: 292. ¹⁷⁰ 2010: 290–1. ¹⁷¹ 2010: 293.
   -    

We can call something fictional if it has a set of properties only in a narrative,

but has no counterpart in reality.
Moreover, taking into account the remarks from the preceding chapter it is
Limitations of doubtful whether being wrong about specific introspective reports commits us
introspection
and the virtual
to a realist position with respect to the negation of these reports. For consider
world model. some attempt to determine that our visual field has variable resolution, by
reference to anatomical facts about our retinas, experimental results, and so
forth. All of these will form part of the virtual world model mentioned above.
So what we are doing is making an attempt to change one part of our model
(realistic beliefs about the internal world) on the basis of other parts (beliefs
about the retina, experiments, etc.), using general methodological principles of
logic, inductive inference, scientific methodology, and so forth, all of which are
equally part of the model. This is unproblematic as a process, and it is perfectly
defensible to assume that some such changes are more suitable than others,
given the standards internal to the model. It is, however, difficult to draw any
inference about the realist interpretation of any part of the model, given that
the falsity of even large parts of the model (again, relative to the model’s own
standards) is compatible with a general irrealist interpretation of the model
itself. For this reason the fact that we are wrong about a significant amount of
beliefs about the internal world does not entail that it has to be conceived of in
realist terms.
So where does this leave us with respect to the existence of the internal
world? We argued in the preceding chapter that there is no external world as
The non- commonly conceived, that is, a world outside our model of the world, a world
existence of the
internal world
determined either in terms of its structural outlines or of its mere noumenal
outside of the existence behind the veil of perception. The same, I want to argue, is true of the
model. internal world. According to the model of the world in which we operate there is
a distinction between an external world of mind-independent phenomena, and
an internal world of mind-dependent ones. However, neither of these, includ-
ing our self, which appears to us to be the centre of the internal world, can
make any claims to existence outside of the model.
Through experience of the world presented to us inside the model we can
arrive at an understanding that the way the model exists differs from the way it
The persistence appears, though this does not of course affect the fact that it still appears to us
of appearances. in this way. Even if we are convinced by all of the arguments presented so far,

accepting that our experience takes place within the model, that our self is
merely a phenomenally transparent illusion, and that any claim to existence
outside of the model must similarly be model-based, the appearance of this
teacup as external and mind-independent, the appearance of the continuity of
consciousness or of the substantiality of the self do not suddenly vanish. Nor
would we want to deny the appearance of conscious mental states, although we
cannot call these ‘inner’ states, given the absence of external states to contrast
  -     

them with, although we are regularly mistaken about their contents, and
although these states are not the states of anyone. It would be hard to reject
the claim that there appears something we are wrong about when we misap-
prehend mental states in the ways described above, and this was in fact not the
objective of this chapter. What I wanted to show was that the assumption of an
inner world to which we have epistemically privileged access, centred around a
substantial self, an assumption that is erroneously superimposed on the
appearance of conscious mental states, is deeply problematic. This inner
world does not exist.
In the previous two chapters I have argued against the existence of the
external and the internal world as ordinarily conceived. If we cannot ascribe
fundamental ontological status to these is there anything at all that could have
such a status? This is the question I will investigate in Chapter 3.
 3
The Non-existence of
Ontological Foundations

3.1 Some Preliminary Remarks about

Foundationalism
§78 Foundationalism and Grounding
Ontological The kind of foundations in which we are interested in this chapter are
foundations.
ontological foundations, objects that stand at the end of a chain of existential
dependence relations.¹ If the table depends existentially on a plank of wood
and its legs (meaning that if these did not exist, there would be no table), if
those depend on their parts, all the way down to the molecules, if they depend
on atoms, which depend on sub-atomic particles and so on: do we ever reach
something that does not depend on anything else in turn? Foundationalists say
yes, non-foundationalists say no. When the foundationalists say yes, they may
hold very different theories about what these foundations are: fundamental
particles, property particulars, mental objects, mathematical objects, and so on.
We are not interested here in the question of what foundations there are if
there are any, but only in the more general question of whether there are
foundations at all.
Grounding. The question of foundationalism is often approached by introducing the
metaphysical notion of grounding, rephrasing the question as one about
whether all grounding structures are well-founded. This approach has the
advantage of adding some clarity to an otherwise often murky area. However,
Characterizing given that there is no consensus on how the notion of grounding is to be best
grounding. understood in the contemporary literature we need to begin by some stipula-
tions. First, we hold grounding to be a relation between facts.² Thus the fact
that a specific set of atoms is located in a given space-time region would ground
the fact that there is a table in front of me. Second, we consider grounding to be

¹ Even though the understanding of fundamentality in terms of independence is the most

widespread one, it is not necessarily the only possible one. Barnes 2012 has argued that emergent
entities are best understood as a kind of fundamental items that are also dependent. This notion of
fundamentality is not what I have in mind in the present discussion.
² Raven 2015.

The Non-Existence of the Real World. Jan Westerhoff, Oxford University Press (2020). © Jan Westerhoff.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198847915.001.0001
 -    

a relation of ontological priority (or the converse of a relation of ontological

dependence),³ not one of metaphysical explanation.⁴ Of course this does not
imply that facts about atoms cannot explain facts about tables, but it implies
that such explanation is merely derived from the fact that the atoms are
ontologically prior relative to the table. Metaphysical explanation is not all
that the relation of grounding amounts to.
Once we have an intuitive grasp of what we mean by grounding we can ask Grounding:
ourselves what kind of structural properties the grounding relation has. Can structural
properties.
things ground themselves?⁵ If one thing grounds another, can the second
also ground the first?⁶ Can grounding form chains, so that when one grounds
another, the other a third, the first also grounds the third?⁷ A considerable
amount has been written on these questions,⁸ and I do not want to add to this
discussion here. The reason why I do not want to make any substantial
assumptions about the structural features of grounding here is primarily the
worry⁹ that we should beware of attributing structural properties to the
grounding relation which may then rule out significant classes of ontological
theories as impossible, simply because we made an initial decision about what a
specific ontological relation should look like.¹⁰ In particular I want to leave Grounding:
open the question of whether the grounding relation always bottoms out at well-
foundedness and
a fundamental level, and the question whether there can be symmetric asymmetry.

³ Even though we will here treat ontological or existential dependence as basic (see Schaffer
2010 and Rosen 2010 for other accounts doing this), there are various proposals for spelling out this
notion. A modal analysis (‘necessarily, if there is the dependent object there is the basis of
dependence’) is often seen as insufficient to account for grounding because of difficulties involving
cases of necessarily existent objects (Fine 1995a). Other proposals spell out ontological dependence
in terms of essence (Fine 1995b, 2015), explanation (Schnieder 2006), or a specific ‘building’
relation (Bennett 2017).
⁴ This position is taken by Schaffer (2012: 214), who considers grounding to relate to meta-
physical explanation in the same way in which a realist about causation would see causation as
related to causal explanation: providing its basis without being reducible to it. For more discussion
of the connection between grounding and metaphysical explanation, and an attempt to provide an
epistemology of grounding relations see Miller and Norton 2017a, 2017b.
⁵ Jenkins 2011; Correia 2014; Raven 2013; Kovacs 2018.
⁶ Bliss 2014; Barnes 2018; Nolan 2018.
⁷ Schaffer 2012; Tahko 2013; Litland 2013; Raven 2013; Javier-Castellanos 2014.
⁸ Surveys that cover a substantial amount of the present literature include Clark and Liggins
2012; Raven 2015; Bliss and Trogdon 2014; and the papers by Koslicki, Corkum, Trogdon,
Steinberg, and Haukioja in Hoeltje et al. 2013.
⁹ Shared by Barnes 2018.
¹⁰ See the discussion of this point in Nolan 2018: ‘Substantial metaphysical progress is not
to be made by analytic stipulation, so we should select our conceptual tools with an eye to
what can be used to illuminate our target of inquiry, rather than to try to bake in some of our
favoured conclusions about that target in advance.’ (97). Nolan also raises the possibility that
grounding may have different structural features when we distinguish local from global
contexts (as a non-Euclidean geometry might appear Euclidean when short distances are
considered) (104).
   -    

grounding relations.¹¹ The first of these is connected with the question whether
grounding structures that go all the way down are possible, the second with the
question of whether grounding structures can go all the way round. The first
creates a kind of bottomless ontology, the second a form of ontological holism.
Both are forms of non-foundationalism. Since I believe (as will become apparent
in the following discussion) that both are types of structure that are of consid-
erable philosophical interest I would not want to rule them out by deciding from
the outset that the grounding relation must be well-founded or asymmetric.
§79 Foundationalist Ontologies and the Existence of
a Fundamental Level
What does it mean for grounding structure to possess a fundamental level?
Multiple Intuitively the idea is that every chain of objects connected by the grounding
realizations of relation, where each succeeding object is the ground of the preceding one,
structures with a
fundamental eventually terminates in an object not grounded in something else. There is,
level. however, more than one way of making this intuitive picture precise.¹² The
Foundations at a most straightforward scenario is a finitely grounded structure, where following
finite distance. downwards each chain of grounding eventually leads to an ungrounded object
after a finite number of steps. An example of this would be a world in which all
facts are ultimately grounded in the fact that God exists, and every finite search
for ultimate grounds will finally arrive at this fact, which is not in turn
grounded by any other fact.
Infinitely far A somewhat less obvious case are structures where it might take an infinite
foundations.
number of steps to arrive at the ungrounded grounds.¹³ As an example take a
disk in a world where space is infinitely divisible. Consider a sequence of
divisions of the disk into halves, quarters, eighths, and so forth. Each member
will ground its predecessor (the halved disk grounds the whole disk, the
quartered disk the halved disk, and so on), and for every disk we can find
another disk that grounds it (if it is divided into n segments, a disk divided into

¹¹ Of course if we accept instances of symmetric grounding we could not also believe grounding
to be both irreflexive and transitive (Jenkins 2011 argues against the former, Schaffer 2012 against
the latter).
It is worth noting at this point that the conception of reality as structured into layers is not tied to
a specific conception of the grounding relation that is assumed to be well-founded, anti-symmetric,
irreflexive and transitive. Even if we take grounding to violate some of these properties we can still
make sense of the grounding structure linking up with a layered conception of reality. To consider
the structural properties most pertinent to the present discussion, well-foundedness and anti-
symmetry, the grounding conception can structure the world into layers whether or not there is a
most fundamental layer. Moreover, there is no tension between a layered conception of reality and
some entities mutually grounding each other—these entities would simply be assigned to the same
level of reality. For further discussion see Rabin 2018.
¹² For a discussion of the different ways in which foundationalism about grounding can be spelt
out see Dixon 2016; Rabin and Rabern 2016.
¹³ See Bliss 2013: 416.
 -    

2n segments will ground it). Yet there is an ultimate ground or foundation for
all of these disks, namely the set P of all points on the disk, though it cannot be
‘reached’ by any finite division of the disk into segments. P is a lower bound of
the sequence of finer and finer divided disks:¹⁴ every one of the disks is
grounded by P, though P is itself not one of the disks. Though our intuitive
understanding of ontological fundamentality might suggest that chains of
grounding relation that bottom out are finite, it is clear that as long as we
accept the possibility of finite entities (such as a disk with a 1 cm diameter, or
the interval between 0 and 1) containing infinitely many other entities within
them (such as all the points on the disk, or all the real numbers between 0 and 1)
it is possible that there are cases where the chain of ontological reduction that
follows the chain of grounds downwards is infinitely long.
The existence of such infinite chains with lower bounds also underlines the
fact that we should be wary of naïvely equating the idea of ontological
foundation with the notion of well-foundedness familiar to us from set the-
ory.¹⁵ Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory comes with an axiom of foundation that
excludes self-membership of sets, as well as infinitely descending chains of
membership, but when considering the concept of grounding an equivalent of
the axiom of foundation is clearly too restrictive: in the case of the sequential
division of disks just described it is intuitively plausible that the set of points on
the disk acts as the foundation of all the divisions, despite the fact that this
involves the existence of infinite chains.
It turns out that finitely grounded structures and structures with grounds
that are lower bounds are not the only structures that can be reasonably
claimed to be well-founded. There is at least one example of a well-founded A foundation
structure with a foundation that can neither be reached in a finite number of that is not a
lower bound.
steps, nor is a lower bound of a descending chain of grounds. Given its
somewhat technical nature,¹⁶ however, it has so far not attracted much atten-
tion in the discussion of the well-foundedness of grounding structures.
For the purpose of this discussion we will understand a grounding struc-
ture to be foundational if every non-fundamental fact in it is grounded
by some fundamental fact.¹⁷ This way of understanding foundationalism

¹⁴ Rabin and Rabern 2016: definition 10. ¹⁵ Rabin and Rabern 2016: section 4.5.
¹⁶ Dixon 2016: 447–52; Rabin and Rabern 2015: section 4.4. This structure essentially involves
reference to disjunctive facts that can have separate, full grounds (in the fact that A or B, B is fully,
grounded by A and fully grounded by B). Independent of the question of whether one accepts the
existence of such facts it is also clear that this kind of structure is not what most philosophers have
in mind when postulating ontological foundations.
¹⁷ By grounding I here mean full grounding, i.e. the way in which the fact that A or B is
grounded by A (or B), and not the way in which the fact that A and B is grounded by A (or B). Each
of these two grounds the fact that A and B, but only in a partial, not in a full way. Dixon 2016: 446
argues for understanding foundationalism about grounding in terms of full grounding.
   -    

has the combined advantage of including the three kinds of grounding

structures just mentioned, and of expressing some of the key intuitions
behind foundationalism, namely that the derivative or secondary must
have its basis in, or acquire its existence from, the non-derivative and
primary,¹⁸ and that all existential dependence must derive from an ultimate
source.¹⁹
§80 Non-foundationalist Ontologies
Two kinds of In contrast with foundationalist theories, non-foundationalist theories deny
non- the existence of a fundamental level. This denial can mean different things.
foundationalism.
It can mean dependence all the way down, so that no fundamental fact is
encountered by going down chains of grounding, either at the end of such a
chain, as its lower bound, or by considering the ground of each member of the
chain.
Symmetric Alternatively, it can mean dependence all the way round, if the chains of
grounding.
grounding close back up on themselves.²⁰ In this case each fact in such a chain
grounds each other fact in the chain, though no fact is ungrounded.²¹ This
implies the existence of cases of symmetric grounding relations, since if a and b
are part of a grounding chain that closes up on itself it will be possible to move
from a to b going round the circle in one way, but also to move from b to a by
going round the other way. Structures with symmetric grounding relations can
differ with respect to how widespread these relations are. Only some sets of
objects may form part of a grounding-cycle, or all of them might be part of
some grounding cycle (thus forming a structure in which everything depends
on something else). Even more extreme, we might be able to move from any
entity to any other entity in the structure via a sequence of grounding relations
(thereby forming a structure in which everything depends on everything
else).²² There is also no reason why grounding cycles should be finite, A can
depend on B, . . . which depends on B, which depends on A, with infinitely
many entities in between.

¹⁸ Dixon 2016: 447, 465. ¹⁹ Dixon 2016: 454.

²⁰ For a defence of the view that such grounding cycles are not a rare phenomenon in
metaphysics see Barnes 2018.
²¹ There is also space for a combined approach, where some chains of dependence never bottom
out, and some loop back on themselves.
²² An example of this (at least if we spell out ‘depends’ as ‘contains as a part’) is the kind of
universe described by Rucker 1982: 33–4 (the full-size novelistic development of this idea is in
his 1981) where we have a chain of parthood from the universe, down to galaxies, medium-
sized objects, and elementary particles; the particles then (closing the loop) contain the
universe amongst its parts. In this scenario nothing is intrinsically smaller than anything
else. Another example is Borges’s Aleph, on which see Parsons 2013; Sanford 1993: 222; Van
Inwagen 1993.
 -    

§81 Grounding and Meta-grounding

So far our discussion of foundationalism in terms of grounding has been
interested in questions such as what grounds mereological complexes like
tables, or collections of objects like all the grains of sand in the universe. We
have so far not considered questions such as ‘What grounds the fact that the Pure grounding
questions
table’s atoms ground the table?’ or ‘What grounds the truth of the table’s being
discussed in this
grounded by the atoms it contains?’ Let us call these questions meta-grounding chapter.
questions, and the former, by contrast, pure grounding questions. Meta-
grounding questions concern facts that contain the grounding relation itself,²³
while pure grounding questions do not. In the present chapter we are only
concerned with pure grounding questions, and in particular with the question of
whether chains of such ‘pure’ facts are well founded. In Chapter 4 we will address
the grounding status of grounding relations themselves.
I will divide my discussion into two parts. First, I will consider what possible
arguments one can give for the well-foundedness of ontological dependence. Examining
That ontological dependence is well-founded (and that there is therefore a arguments for
well-
collection of fundamental facts) appears to be somewhat of a default assumption foundedness.
in the contemporary ontological literature. Curiously, it is not entirely obvious
what the argument for the correctness of this default assumption is supposed to
be. We will therefore consider what appear to be the best possible arguments for
establishing the existence of an ontological foundation. I will argue that none of
them actually succeed in doing so. (Readers who share this belief might want to
fast forward to the beginning of Section 3.3 in this chapter.)
At the end of Section 3.2 we should therefore arrive at an agnostic position
regarding the well-foundedness of ontological dependence. We could not come
up with strong arguments for our intuitive belief that ontological dependence
had to be well-founded, either by identifying a contradiction in the non-well-
founded position or by establishing the existence of a foundation directly. For
all we know, ontological dependence might be well-founded (if this could be
established by an argument we have not so far examined), or it might not be.
Section 3.3 will then consider arguments in favour of non-well-founded Arguments
for non-well-
conceptions of ontological dependence. I will divide these arguments into three foundedness.
classes: first, those that are based on the idea of mutually inconsistent theories or
‘versions’ of the world, second arguments that share a criticism of the notion of an
intrinsic property, and finally arguments from specific sciences, arguments that
claim that there are particular observable features of the world that should push us
into the direction of a non-well-founded view of ontological dependence.

²³ Of course the notion of ‘containment’ needs to be made more precise. The fact that Peter
thinks about the grounding relation contains the grounding relation in some sense of the word, but
not in the way in which we intend it here (see Rabin and Rabern 2016, note 7). I assume that when a
fact is about grounding in the required sense is sufficiently clear for the purpose of our discussion.
   -    

3.2 Arguments for Foundationalism

Two common Two objections are commonly made against non-foundationalist theories. The
objections.
first is that such theories lead to a vicious regress. When arguing for depend-
ence all the way down we have actually not asserted anything, but just keep
pushing away a legitimate explanatory demand to another level, the ontological
equivalent of moving the bulge under the carpet out of sight, but not out of the
carpet.²⁴
The second objection is that we cannot actually be non-foundationalists,
because reference to some kind of foundation creeps in somewhere in the
formulation of our theory. Non-foundationalism undermines itself. If we
regard vicious regresses as generating explicit contradictions, then both objec-
tions are simply two different ways of arguing that non-foundationalist
accounts are inconsistent. These two objections will feature prominently in
the attempts to establish the truth of foundationalism we will consider now.

A The Regress Argument

§82 The Strangeness of Non-foundationalism
One way of arguing for the existence of ontological foundationalism is by suggest-
ing that no good sense can be made of the alternatives. Jonathan Lowe,²⁵ for
example, notes that ‘an “axiom of foundation” [for ontology] is quite probably
beyond conclusive proof and yet I find the vertiginous implications of its denial
barely comprehensible’.
Non- The idea is that non-foundationalist ontologies are intrinsically odd, and
foundationalism
that therefore well-founded ontologies are to be preferred. It is certainly true
as bizarre.
that well-founded ontologies are a lot more straightforward.²⁶ Ontology, we

²⁴ This objection is obviously primarily directed against the ‘dependence all the way down’
version of non-foundationalism. Whether a circular dependence-structure with an infinitely large
loop could be accused of generating a vicious regress is unclear.
²⁵ 1998: 158.
²⁶ In the context of this discussion we present our account of foundationalism as following a
negative answer to the question whether the internal world (including the self ) can be regarded as
fundamentally real. In this chaper, having denied the fundamentality of the external and the
internal world in the previous two chapters, we want to find out whether we can at least commit
to something being real. Thomas Metzinger connects the two questions in an interesting way by
pointing out that our conception of a substantial self acts as a source for the postulation of
substantial entities (individuals, or other kinds of foundations) elsewhere: ‘If anything grounds
our naïve-realistic world-view that reality is composed out of individual substances possessing
intrinsic, context-invariant properties and standing in certain relations to each other, it is exactly
the phenomenology of selfhood. Cognitively, the conscious experience of selfhood leads directly to
the metaphysical prototype of “objecthood” and to the idea of an individual substance. This
observation implies the interesting conclusion that many of our irresistible theoretical intuitions
about substancehood are ultimately anchored in the conscious experience of selfhood.’ (Metzinger
2011: 283–4).
 -    

imagine, is a bit like lego for grown-ups. We have our basic pieces (individuals,
properties, relations, tropes, facts, space-time locations, set-formation, . . . —
take your pick) and then we build increasingly complex structures from them
that not only look like the real things, but are the real things.
A similar situation can be encountered in mathematical theory-building. We
have some axioms and some rules of inference, and then we build beautiful
theorems by putting them together in interesting ways. In both cases the
perspicuity of the system derives from the fact that any complex can be
resolved into the ultimate constituents.
In the non-foundationalist case, on the other hand, one possibility is that the
chains of existential dependence continue infinitely downwards, so that each
object depends on another object, that in turn depends on another, and this
goes on forever, in which case we have an infinite regress. Alternatively,
dependence goes round in a loop. Dependence loops contradict the (at least
intuitively) plausible idea that existential dependence is asymmetric: if
A depends on B, then B does not depend on A. If we reject infinite regresses
and symmetric dependence relations as neccesarily problematic then anti-
founded ontologies are not something we should take on board.
Of course if we describe matters like this, anti-founded ontologies are Ontological
comprehensible enough; it is not that we do not understand what the anti- queasiness is not
enough.
foundationalist wants to say, but we have the strong suspicion that there might
be fatal problems lurking underneath. Yet mere ontological queasiness is not
enough to establish the existence of ontological foundations. Those who object
to an infinite ontological descent as metaphysically strange would have to show
that the regress it engenders is in fact vicious, that is that the chain of existential
dependence relation stretching infinitely backwards implies a contradiction
somewhere, infringes parsimony, or gives us only a non-reductive theory
where we would want a reductive one.²⁷
§83 Infinite Regresses and Inheritance
One way spelling out what seems to be wrong with the infinite descent of Existence must
existential dependence is the following. What seems to be happening in the be inherited
from a source.
case of existential dependence is that the dependee inherits its existence from its
basis. It is only due to the existence of the individual parts of the bicycle that the
whole of the bicycle, the dependent entity, acquires its existence. But if this goes
on infinitely, we have a chain of inheritance without a source, and this seems
impossible. If Peter inherits his wealth from his father, and his father from his
grandfather, and so on, there must be someone down the line who has not
inherited his wealth, but acquired it by other means. Otherwise, where would it

²⁷ See Nolan 2001, and specifically Bliss 2013 for an argument that infinitely regressive chains of
dependence are not vicious.
   -    

have come from? And if I copy a book from the library, which is a copy of a
manuscript, which is a copy of another manuscript and so on, there must be
some token of the work down the line that has not been copied from some-
where else, but composed by an author. Otherwise, where would the contents
of the manuscript have come from? Readers may differ with respect to the
intuitive pull they feel from these considerations,²⁸ but let us accept them for
the sake of argument. It seems to me that they will still not be able to give us
strong reason to dismiss infinite regresses of existential dependence without
further argument.
First, it does not seem to be the case that existential dependence going
Infinite infinitely backwards per se is a problem. A chain can go backwards infinitely
existential
and still have a beginning (the sequence of predecessors of 1 in the real number
regress as such is
not problematic. interval [0,1] regresses infinitely—the interval contains infinitely many real
numbers smaller than 1—yet it also contains a smallest member, 0).²⁹ Presum-
ably this kind of infinite regression would also be acceptable in the case of
existential dependence, as there is still a source from which the existence of
each member is inherited.
Infinite Second, even an infinite regress without a source is likely to appear unprob-
existential lematic if there is no inheritable feature involved. The regress of every negative
regress without a
source is not number having a predecessor is not regarded as problematic, even though
problematic. there is no first member, as there is in the case of the real number interval [0,1].
This is because we do not think that –1’s ‘having a predecessor’ is a property –1
inherits from –2, which in turn got it form –3, and so on ad infinitum. Rather, the
axioms of Peano arithmetic establish the underlying structure all at once, with no
need for a property being passed along an infinitely regressing chain.
It may then be the case that those who see an infinite regress of existential
dependence as unproblematic might not believe that inheritance is the best
conceptual framework for thinking about existential dependence. Existence
might not be passed on like a baton in a relay race.
Difficulties for Trogdon has recently questioned the feasibility of ‘inheritance of existence’
inheritance of by arguing that it is either underspecified or inconsistent.³⁰ If we assume that
existence.
the ‘inheritance of existence’ is a primitive concept then we cannot rely on the
fact that because other cases of inheritance (the inheritance of wealth, the
inheritance of bodily characteristics, etc.) imply the presence of a source where
the inherited entity comes from, the same is true of ‘inheritance of existence’.

²⁸ Note in this context that the classical Indian philosophical school of Mīmāmsā rejects this
_
very intuition when it comes to the foundational texts of Brahmanism, the Vedas. They regard the
Vedas as authoritative precisely because they have no author, as they have been transmitted
through an infinite sequence of teachers and students, without an original source.
²⁹ Another illustration is the example of the disk discussed in §79.
³⁰ Trogdon 2018: 10–13.
 -    

Even though ‘inheritance of existence’ and ‘inheritance of wealth’, for example,

are both referred to by the term ‘inheritance’ they might not have much to do
with one another, and might not share all structural properties. In particular,
‘inheritance of existence’ might not imply the presence of a source of existence.
As such the notion is underspecified, since we appear to be only able to
stipulate, but not to justify the existence of such a source.
On the other hand, if ‘inheritance of existence’ is a composite concept, it will
be a composite of whatever structural properties we extract from ‘inheritance
of wealth’, ‘inheritance of bodily characteristics’, and so on, applied to the case
of existence. But then the question arises whether the resulting mix is actually
consistent. For in the case of inheriting wealth we have two entities, two
persons, and a property that is transferred from one to the other. But in the
case of ‘inheritance of existence’ we do not have two entities, an existent and a
non-existent one, such that existence is transferred from one to the other.³¹
There are no non-existent entities, and as such we end up with the problem of a
two-place relation with only a single relatum.
Given the difficulties with the idea of ‘inheritance of existence’, one alternative
would be to see existence not as inherited or transmitted, but as emerging from a
chain of dependence relations, parallel to the way some epistemologists see justifi-
cation as not inherited or transmitted, but as emerging from a regressing chain
of reasons.³² And once this notion of emergent existence has been taken on board, it
is no longer clear why the emergence of existence from an infinitely regressive
chain of existential dependence relations should be particularly problematic.
Similarly, those wary of loops would have to come up with an argument
demonstrating that existential dependence is asymmetric. This is particularly What is the
pressing because there seem to be no problems spelling out symmetric scen- argument for
asymmetry of
arios for specific kinds of existential dependence, such as the dependence of a existential
whole on all its parts.³³ In the absence of any contradiction the opponent is able dependence?

to derive from such symmetric grounding scenarios, given that we may be able
to explain the appearance of existential dependence as asymmetric (after all we
never observe breaking an object apart and finding the original thing contained
in one of its fragments) in terms of a difference between small-scale and large-
scale properties³⁴ (as a segment of a very large circle may appear as a straight
line), and taking into account that symmetric existential dependence relations
play an important role in some philosophical projects³⁵ it becomes clear that

³¹ Trogdon forthcoming 13: ‘[I]f we judge that an inheritor exists due to inheritance then we’re
using the notion of inheritance incorrectly.’
³² See §85 for further discussion of this point.
³³ See note 22 in this chapter.
³⁴ Nolan 2018: 99–104.
³⁵ Yates 2017 argues that symmetric grounding is essential for making sense of an ontology of
pure powers.
   -    

the purported asymmetry of existential dependence needs to be established by

argument, and cannot simply be postulated as an axiom.
§84 Fundamental Levels Outside of Ontology
One way of making considerations based on the presumed obscurity of the
non-foundationalist picture more precise is to consider reasons why we find
foundational ontologies so much more appealing. After all, many of our
inquiries into important aspects of the world suggest the existence of some
kind of foundation, so that it would be reasonable to assume that a general
theory of the most abstract features of the world such as ontology also assumes
the existence of a foundation.
Foundations in Even though we no longer believe atoms to be indivisible physics still
physics, postulates some basic entities (particles, fields, strings or some other kinds of
mathematics,
semantics. things) as the foundation of the material world. Set-theory, which is used as
the foundation of much of mathematical practice, usually comes with an axiom
of foundation, and a fundamental level of urelements or the empty set as a
basic element. When studying semantics we do not spell out the meaning of
a term by a definition, and then the meaning of this definition by a set
of further definitions and so on: at some point our linguistic practices reach
a foundation in the real world. We do not learn Chinese from a Chinese–
Chinese dictionary alone. We have to find out what non-linguistic things
some of the characters represent (or at least which linguistic symbols in
another language (for which we already know the word–world connection)
correspond to them).³⁶
It therefore appears to be the case that important instances of our investi-
gation into the material, the abstract, or the representational presuppose the
existence of a fundamental level. Why should ontology not be in accordance
with these?
In order to assess these arguments we have to answer two questions:
1. Do these different disciplines really postulate a fundamental level?
2. If so, does this support the existence of a fundamental level in ontology,
that is, the existence of an ontological foundation?
Fundamental The a posteriori argument for a physically fundamental level (‘our best
level in physics. physics is going to tell us what the fundamental parts of matter are’) has
been convincingly defused by Jonathan Schaffer. He notes that
we now have no evidence that there will be a final theory, no evidence that such a theory
will postulate anything that could serve as a mereological atom, and no evidence that

³⁶ This is sometimes referred to as the symbol grounding problem. See Harnad 1990, Taddeo and
Floridi 2005.
 -    

such a theoretical postulate will correspond to an ontological atom as opposed to a

boringly decomposable composite.³⁷

Moreover, the fact that much of our thinking about the physical world as
located in space and time appears to presuppose a foundation of spatial and
temporal points across which the world can be spread out does not entail that
this appearance is correct. If relationism about space and time holds³⁸ the belief
in space-time points as foundational is a mere illusion, for in this case the
points would only be brought about by abstraction from the objects in the first
place. Thinking of space-time points as prior and fundamental is a convenient
shorthand, and might come natural to us, but neither of these considerations
give any support to regarding them as such in ontological terms.³⁹
Considering the mathematical case, even if we don’t take into account such Fundamental
level in
systems as anti-founded set theory,⁴⁰ the success of such alternative founda- mathematics.
tions as category theory makes it increasingly less certain that our most basic
and general mathematical theories must incorporate a fundamental level in the
form of set theory. This is especially true when taking into account that
category theory can itself be analyzed in term of category theory.⁴¹ The notion
of a foundational level of mathematical entities also does not cohere well with
the structuralist understanding of mathematics, one of the most successful
explanatory frameworks in the recent contemporary development of the phil-
osophy of mathematics. If mathematical objects drop out as places in a
structure, and if these structures, as systems of relations, can only be conceived
of as relating objects, it is hard to see how either the objects or their relations
could be considered as foundational.⁴²
So the claim that physics and mathematics, which together constitute a key
way of investigating the world, have to postulate the existence of a fundamental
level must at least be subjected to serious scrutiny.
Upon closer investigation the semantic case also turns out to be less Fundamental
level in
straightforward than it may appear. Structuralist linguists such as Saussure
semantics.
certainly tried to come up with a theory of meaning in which finding the basis

³⁷ Schaffer 2003: 505. Another empirical argument for the existence of a fundamental level has
been suggested in an unpublished manuscript by Tuomas Tahko (‘In search of a fundamental
level’). The basic idea is that an infinitely descent of ontological dependence necessitates infinitely
many different laws governing all the levels. All these laws would have to fall in a narrow range, and
thus the existence of macrophysical objects would be very unlikely. One challenge for this
argument would be the supposition that in the same way in which there might be a ‘boring’
descent through infinitely many levels (where every level mirrors the structure of the one above),
the laws at any level n may be identical with or systematically similar to the laws at the level n+1
directly above it.
³⁸ See Earman 1989; Newman 1989. ³⁹ See Dipert 1997: 339.
⁴⁰ See Correia 2005: chapter 3; Aczel 1998. ⁴¹ Landry 2011.
⁴² Of course the entire structure can be considered as a foundation, but this is not the kind of
foundationalism discussed here, which looks for a variety of fundamental objects that can bring
about the remainder by recombination. See also the discussion in Chapter 4.
   -    

of meaning in those parts of the world that linguistic items pick out took very
much the back seat when compared to an understanding of meaning based on
the relation of linguistic entities to one another. Colour terms, for example, can
be accounted for much more easily by considering the relations of these terms
to each other, rather than the relation of each term to a specific wave-length of
light.⁴³ And if we take the Quinean notion of the indeterminacy of translation
at all seriously, the prospects of anchoring the meanings of expressions in
certain states of the world look increasingly dim.⁴⁴
Do foundations Yet even if the theories inquiring into the very general features of the
elsewhere have physical, mathematical, or semantic world came back with clear arguments
ontological
implications? for the existence of a physical, mathematical, or semantic basic level,⁴⁵ this
would still not go very far in establishing the existence of an ontologically basic
level. For it is perfectly consistent to assume that there are some most basic
physical fundamental entities (let us call them x-ons), but that x-ons do not
feature on the list of basic ontological categories. This may be the case because
each x-on depends on another entity that is itself not physical (for example an
irreducibly mental entity, or an abstract entity), and that each of these depends
on another entity of the same kind, and so on all the way down. In this case the
fundamental physical entities would be the most basic physical things to
postulate, but not the most fundamental things tout court.
Similarly it is perfectly possible that semantic foundationalism is true, that is
that there are expressions that derive their meaning not from further expres-
sions, but directly from a link with non-representational objects, while these
semantically fundamental objects do not feature in our ontological theory at all
(perhaps because no intensional entities are ontologically fundamental).
Appeal to physical, mathematical, or semantic foundations would only
carry weight if it showed that the most fundamental entities postulated are
all we need for a complete furnishing of the world. The consideration that
some theory has to assume the existence of particular entities as fundamental
for itself carries absolutely no weight for the issue at hand unless we have
an additional argument that the entities talked about are also ontologically

⁴³ Averill 1992. ⁴⁴ Quine/Ullian 1970.

⁴⁵ An area I have not discussed here is epistemology. Appeals to how we acquire knowledge
about the world may be made to support foundationalist claims in at least two ways. First, by
arguing that our knowledge of the world is founded on a set of extra-epistemic objects in the world
that our knowledge represents, and secondly by pointing out that given the implication relations
between our beliefs, some must be fundamental, some merely derivative. Yet neither the appeal to
epistemically fundamental objects nor the appeal to fundamental beliefs seems to be able to carry
much weight. We know that much of our epistemic contact with the world does not happen by
connecting with one object at a time, but by perceiving objects in relation (colour perception is a
particularly clear example). Further worries about the possibility of moving from epistemic to non-
epistemic objects have been discussed in Chapter 1. Moreover, Quinean considerations of the web-
like structure our beliefs form seem to throw serious doubt on the idea of any of them being
fundamental.
 -    

fundamental, i.e. that all there is could be shown to depend on them. Given our
present knowledge of the world it is very hard to think of any entity, funda-
mental or not, that would be likely to do the job.
What this argument from analogy with physics, mathematics, and semantics Explaining the
(or at least with common, though not necessarily correct foundationalist intuitive pull of
foundationalism.
conceptions of physics, mathematics, or semantics) shows is where the strong
intuitive pull to develop our ontology in a foundationalist manner comes from.
It explains to a certain extent the greater plausibility and naturalness of
foundationalist theories, though such psychological considerations are of
course no guide to truth. As will become more clear below, the foundationalist
intuitition is a faulty intuition that ought to be resisted.
§85 Epistemic and Ontological Infinitism
It is interesting to observe in this context that there appears to be no similar Metaphysical
intuitive pull towards foundationalism in the epistemological case. This point foundationalism
as unjustified
is put well by Ricki Bliss: orthodoxy.

there is no question that an orthodoxy—metaphysical foundationalism—has fast settled

upon the research program: reality is hierarchically structured and contains a funda-
mental level populated by contingent existents. [ . . . ] [I]t is somewhat striking to
observe just how poor so many of the arguments presented in defense of this view
actually are. Over in foundational epistemology, on the other hand, a field whose most
basic terrain bears a striking resemblance to just this kind of foundational metaphysics,
one notes that epistemic foundationalism is by no means the only position to be
reckoned with. Both epistemic infinitism and epistemic coherentism are live and
respectable views.⁴⁶

In the epistemological cases all three alternatives of Agrippa’s trilemma (that

justification leads to foundational axioms, goes infinitely far back, or forms a
circle) are considered live theoretical options, while in the ontological case all
but the first are regarded with suspicion. Yet given that it is not clear why we
should be intuitively more drawn towards foundationalism when we are con-
cerned with existence, rather than with knowledge we might be more suspicious
of the validity of the intuitive pull it appears to exert in the former case.
In fact, as it has been argued that particular accounts of making sense Infinitely
of infinitely receding chains of explanation may also be adapted to conceptu- receding chains
of explanation.
alize infinitely receding chains of existential dependence, and thus ontological
non-foundationalism. Consider the fact that p is a reason for r if raising the
probability of p raises that of r, and lowering the probability of p lowers r’s
probability (we assume all the probabilities involved are between 0 and 1). Now
assume we introduce a series of intermediate reasons p’, p’’, . . . between p and r,

⁴⁶ Bliss 2015: 414.

   -    

so that instead of p ! r (where ! means ‘is a reason for’) we have p . . . ! p’’!

p’ ! r. It is then possible to define the value of r ‘in the limit’ after it has been
preceded by infinitely many ps. Moreover, we only ever need to consider a
finite number of ps in order to achieve a value very close to that achieved by
considering all the ps. Finally, as we move further back along the sequence of
ps, the influence of each p on the value of r becomes smaller and smaller, until
it disappears completely as their number goes to infinity.⁴⁷
These facts appear to remove most of the worries we have with chains of
justification that stretch infinitely backwards. The status of the proposition
justified by the infinite chain of reasons appeared to be epistemically inaccess-
ible, for we could never complete the calculation including all the probabilities
of the reasons in order to determine the probability of the proposition justified.
Second, if the reasons transmit their justification to the proposition justified, it
seems as if this process is indefinitely deferred: we can never reach the end of
the chain of reasons, and hence never arrive at its first member that has to
transmit the justification to the chain.
As for the first, it can be shown how the apparent difficulties in calculating
the probability of a proposition preceded by an infinite chain of reasons can be
solved. The second is addressed by a change in perspective: rather than
considering justification as something to be transmitted from reason to prop-
osition justified, it is seen as something that gradually emerges as we trace back
the chain of reasons.⁴⁸
Emergence of It might then be suggested that in the same way in which justification may
justification, emerge from a chain of reasons that stretches infinitely backwards,⁴⁹ existence
emergence of
being. may emerge from an infinitely regressive chain of existential dependencies.⁵⁰
This does not have to commit one to the assumption that existence comes in
degrees.⁵¹ One might claim that as a partial backwards traversing of the chain
of reasons results in partial justification, tracing back a segment of existential
dependencies from some object confers only partial existence on that object.
And given that we usually regard existence as an all-or-nothing matter this
might be deemed problematic. However, one could reply here that such a
partial traversing of the chain of existential dependencies is only relevant at the
level of our representation of existential dependence relations, leading to a

⁴⁷ Peijnenburg and Atkinson 2012: 271–3.

⁴⁸ Peijnenburg and Atkinson 2013: 555–6; Klein 2007: 16. For further discussion of epistemo-
logical infinitism see Aikin 2011; Klein and Turri 2014.
⁴⁹ Once this idea of emergence has been taken on board it may then be the case that the ‘natural
supposition’ referred to by Fine 2010: 15 (‘For given a truth that stands in need of explanation, one
naturally supposes that it should have a “completely satisfactory” explanation, one that does not
involve cycles and terminates in truths that do not stand in need of explanation’) no longer appears
so natural after all.
⁵⁰ Morganti 2015: 562. For criticism of Morganti’s approach see Lubrano 2018.
⁵¹ A view defended, for example, by Smith 2002; McDaniel 2010.
 -    

partial metaphysical explanation, but does not entail that the existence
emerging from the infinitely regressive chain of represented existential depend-
ence relations is anything less an an all-or-nothing matter. We do not have
to assume that the structure of our metaphysical explanations is isomorphic to
the structure of existential dependence relations.⁵² After all, the structure
of metaphysical explanation is linked with the nature of the minds these
explanations are explanations for, while the structure of reality may not be.

B The Transcendental Argument

§86 Constructions Require the Unconstructed
One way of making the regress objection against non-foundationalism more Primary and
secondary
precise is by pointing out that ontological theories can be understood as objects.
theories of primary and secondary objects. Objects are secondary if their
existence is only derived, as the existence of some material object depends on
its parts, or as the instantiation of some properties depends on a bare particu-
lar, or on the bundling together of some tropes. If our ontological analysis is
sufficiently thorough the bases of reduction mentioned in such analyses are
primary. One might then want to argue that this means that there is something
fundamentally wrong with the assumption that we could have just the second-
ary, the derived or dependent, without the primary, the underived, independent,
and fundamental.⁵³ It seems that it is a conceptually necessary condition of the
possibility of secondary existence that there is something primary. And these
primary things, one might think, are just what the ontological foundations are.
These considerations find a close parallel in Searle’s ‘transcendental’⁵⁴ argu- Searle’s
ment against social constructivism: ‘transcendental’
argument.
a socially constructed reality presupposes a reality independent of all social construc-
tions, because there has to be something for the construction to be constructed out of.
To construct money, property, and language, for example, there have to be raw
materials of bits of metal, paper, land, sounds, and marks, for example. And the raw
materials cannot in turn be socially constructed without presupposing some even rawer
materials out of which they are constructed, until eventually we reach a bedrock of brute
physical phenomena independent of all representations. The ontological subjectivity of
the socially constructed reality requires an ontologically objective reality out of which it
is constructed. [ . . . ] Because the logical form of the creation of socially constructed

⁵² This position is defended in greater detail in Morganti 2015: 563–5.

⁵³ To give a linguistic analogy, the primary objects may be identified with literal meanings, and
the secondary ones with metaphorical expressions. The latter depend on the former, so how could
we make sense of language in which every expression was metaphorical?
⁵⁴ ‘Transcendental’ because it is based on the observation that there are social constructions, and
asks what the world would have to be like to make this possible.
   -    

reality consists in iterations of the structure X counts as Y in C, the iterations must

bottom out in an element X that is not itself an institutional construction. Otherwise
you would get an infinite regress or circularity. It is a logical consequence of the main
argument of the book that you cannot have institutional facts without brute facts.⁵⁵

Of course Searle is making a more specific point than what we have in mind
here (arguing that there cannot be a hierarchy of objects depending for their
existence on some process of social construction without there also being a
non-constructed bedrock) but the similarity to the more general ontological
claim (that you cannot have a hierarchy of dependent objects without there
also being a non-dependent bedrock) is evident.
Searle’s point is It is important to note that there is not just a semantic point at issue. The
not just claim is not that you cannot have a language containing the term ‘secondary
semantic.
existent’ without it also containing the term ‘primary existent’. The anti-
foundationalist can readily grant this while maintaining that there just happens
to be nothing falling under the term ‘primary existent’. The claim is that there is a
logical consequence enforcing the existence of something independent as long
as you have something dependent. But this just means that the assumption of its
negation, which, as Searle correctly notes, involves the postulation of ‘an infinite
regress or circularity’ leads to a contradiction. The burden of proof lies clearly
Why is the with the defender of the transcendental argument. As we noted before, not every
infinite regress infinite regress is vicious, and not every circular account theoretically problem-
vicious?
atic. Until we have a clear indication where the problem is supposed to lie, the
opponent can simply bite the bullet and accept the regress or the circularity.
Schaffer: infinite Searle’s worry is echoed by Schaffer’s observations that ‘all being must originate
deferral of being.
in basic being [ . . . ]. There must be a ground of being. If one thing exists only in
virtue of another, then there must be something from which the reality of the
derivative entities ultimately derives’ and that ‘endless dependence conflicts with
the foundationalist requirement that there be basic objects. [ . . . ] There would be
no ultimate ground. Being would be infinitely deferred, never achieved.’⁵⁶ The
issue here seems to be that in the case of dependence all the way down, existence
can never get started. Yet it is hard to pinpoint what exactly this worry amounts to.
It does not seem possible to see this as a worry that could apply to grounding
in general. For grounding is not a dynamic, but a static relation.⁵⁷ The relation
between an object and its ground is akin to that between a number and its
prime factors, not to that between a cake and the actions of the baker in
bringing it about. Yet the worry about infinite deferral relies essentially on
understanding the grounding relation in a temporal way.
Infinite deferral One way of understanding Schaffer’s observation might be by reading it as a
of our point about our knowledge of grounding. Following this epistemological
knowledge of
being.

⁵⁵ Searle 1995: 190–1. ⁵⁶ Schaffer 2010: 62. ⁵⁷ Bohn 2018: 170.

 -    

reading, no matter how long we analyze the world around us, no matter how
deeply we penetrate downwards along the chain of ontological dependence
relations, we will never encounter the ontologically real things.⁵⁸ The know-
ledge of fundamental being would be ‘infinitely deferred, never achieved’.
However, this may be just a fact of life, and we would no more want to
postulate the existence of a fundamental level for this reason than we would
want to let epistemological assumptions determine our cosmology, postulating
that the universe must be identical with the observable universe at any given
point in time during the history of humankind, so that it would at least be
theoretically possible for some humans to know it in its entirety.
Another possibility might be to regard this argument as being concerned Mereological
composition
specifically with mereological composition, a relation that can be plausibly
could never have
understood in temporal terms. One could then assume that every step of begun.
mereological decomposition must have been preceded by a corresponding
step of mereological composition in the past. And in a world in which
decomposition never comes to an end, composition could not have had a
beginning, since the first step of putting two simples together would corres-
pond to a final analytical step of taking a compound of two simples apart, and
ex hypothesi there is no such final analytical step. As such, this world could not
have had a beginning in time, since there is no time when the ‘putting together’
of the simples could have started to get going, and therefore ‘being’, the world
around us, which presumably consists of a composition of many simples would
have been ‘infinitely deferred, never achieved’.⁵⁹
Yet this observation might not cause too much of a difficulty. First, our
world might not have had a beginning in time, and if it did, we would hardly
expect this conclusion to drop out of some simple observations about depend-
ence relations. Secondly, even if the history of the world up to now is finite, as
long as time is infinitely divisible the compositional process might contain
infinitely many steps, but they could all have been squeezed into a finite past
time interval, as in the completion of a supertask.⁶⁰

⁵⁸ If there was ‘no mereological bottom level, we would never reach the highest degree of reality’
(Tahko 2014: 258).
⁵⁹ It is worth noting here that Schaffer’s worries here do not only apply to cases where there is no
foundation, but also to those where the foundation is infinitely far removed (as in the example of
the disk mentioned in §79, since in this case the simples would also be ‘infinitely deferred’. As such
Schaffer’s claim would not just be that all structures need to be grounded, but that all need to be
finitely grounded and that structures with foundations that are lower bounds are as problematic as
those with no foundations at all.
⁶⁰ There is considerable debate about the conceptual and physical possibility of supertasks, and
no decisive argument for their impossibility in either sense. See Laraudogoitia 2013 for a good
survey.
   -    

Boghossian: Another attempt to spell out where the problem with an infinite regress lies,
infinitary at least for a very specific form of non-foundationalism is provided by
propositions.
Boghossian. He discusses the Rortyan idea that all truth claims need to be
relativized to a theory in which they occur, a suggestion that obviously
opens up the way to an infinite descent through further and further theories.
Boghossian notes that
The upshot is that the fact-relativist is committed to the view that the only facts there
are, are infinitary facts of the form:
According to a theory that we accept, there is a theory that we accept and according to
this latter theory, there is a theory that we accept and . . . there have been dinosaurs.
But it is absurd to propose that, in order for our utterances to have any prospect of being
true, what we must mean by them are infinitary propositions that we could neither
express nor understand.⁶¹

The idea seems to be that the place where the contradiction arises for the non-
foundationalist is when he has to squeeze an infinitely complex object into a
system with finite representational and cognitive resources. The non-
foundationalist demands that we form ideas we literally cannot have.
Unfortunately Boghossian does not spell out his objection any further, as a
Humans can result it is not entirely clear what precisely the problem with ‘infinitary
coherently think propositions that we could neither express nor understand’ is supposed to
about infinite
objects. be. Despite the obvious finitude of the human mind we do not find it impos-
sible to represent and coherently think about all kinds of infinite objects, as
the study of the transfinite since Cantor demonstrates. The cardinality of the
‘according to the theory that’ hierarchy is presumably the same as that of the
set of natural numbers, an infinite object that appears perfectly expressible and
understandable. Once again the spectre of the contradiction seems to have
vanished as we realize that the greater complexity of non-foundationalist
theories has been mistaken for inconsistency.

C The Self-refutation Argument

§87 Anti-foundationalism as Self-undermining
Nevertheless, the foundationalist might point out, the reason that it is hard to
substantiate the suspicion that the regress generated by non-foundational
accounts is vicious may be that the problems lie elsewhere. The problem for
non-foundationalist accounts is not the regress, but the fact that we cannot
make much sense of these theories without re-introducing the notion of a
foundation through the back door. We will look at three different ways of

⁶¹ Boghossian 2006: 56.

 -    

developing this suspicion here, based on the idea of maximal chains of

dependence, on semantic considerations, and on the nature of metaphysical
explanation.
§88 Maximizing: What about the Chain of Interdependence?
This argument can best be understood as an attempt at showing that, despite
their best intentions, the non-foundationalist accounts are always finally forced Maximal chains
to accept some kind of ontological foundation. Essential to this is the idea of a of dependence.
maximal chain of dependence. A chain of dependence starting with some
object is maximal if it not only incorporates that object, as well as any object
it depends on, but also any object this second object depends on, and so on
further down the dependence chain.⁶²
Now consider an arbitrary example of such chains of dependence. We can
ask what the existence of that chain depends on. An intuitively plausible
response for the anti-foundationalist is to claim that it is dependence all the
way down. Here is how Cameron formulates this point:
Here the thought is that if there could be an infinite chain of entities e₁, e₂, e₃, . . . such
that e₁ is ontologically dependent on e₂, and e₂ on e₃, etc., then while every entity in the
chain is grounded, nothing grounds the chain itself. Even if there need not be a first
member of the chain, an independent entity that provides the ultimate ontological
grounding for every member of the chain, there must be an ontologically independent
entity to ground the existence of the chain itself.
But this is unconvincing. Grant for the sake of argument not only that every being
on the chain must have an ontological grounding, but that the chain itself must have
an ontological grounding. This does not entail that anything is an independent
entity. Perhaps the chain of entities e₁, e₂, e₃, . . . depends on a further entity ea₁,
which depends on ea₂, which depends on ea₃, etc.? If someone asks ‘But what about
the chain ea₁, ea₂, ea₃ . . . ?’, we can appeal to a new entity eb₁ which is the ontological
ground of this new chain, and which depends on eb₂, which depends on eb₃, etc.; and
so on. In each case, the infinite chain of entities is dependent on an entity which is
itself the first member of another infinite chain. Provided we are prepared to
postulate more and more entities, one for every cardinal number, then nothing
will go ungrounded.⁶³

The point of the present argument is to show that this ‘dependence all the way
down’ response is inconsistent and that therefore the question ‘And what
grounds the chain?’ must be answered by giving some non-dependent entity

⁶² Of course, if there is no ontological foundation and existential dependence relations do not

loop any maximal chain of dependence will be infinitely long. It would also be infinitely long if the
ontological foundation was infinitely far removed. See §79.
⁶³ Cameron 2008: 11.
   -    

the chain depends on, thereby establishing the existence of some ontologically
fundamental object.
Let us for the moment disregard objects for which it is at least debatable
whether they stand in dependence relations at all (such as mathematical and
necessarily existent objects). Now assume we take some object x and form a
collection consisting of x and the objects x directly depends on (a directly
depends on b if there is no a’ such that a depends on a’ and a’ in turn depends
on b). As a second step we include all objects these new objects directly depend
on. Continue in this way until the collection is maximal: nothing anything in
the collection directly depends on is excluded. Now consider the question what
this maximal collection M depends on.
What do The anti-foundationalist might be tempted to reply that there is some
maximal hitherto unconsidered object or collection of objects y such that M depends
collections
depend on? on this y. But a moment’s reflection shows that this view is problematic.
x depends on x’ which in turn depends on x’’ etc.—this entire sequence
makes up M. So x depends on M, but if M depends on some hitherto uncon-
sidered object y then by transitivity x depends on y, and y should have been
included in M in the first place. So assume y is included in M. Now M, as a
collection, depends on all its members, so it also depends on y. But then y
depends on M and M depends on y, which contradicts the usual assumption that
dependence is asymmetric or at least antisymmetric. So the infinite downward
chain of dependence relations has to be rejected. But if there is no infinite
downward chain, and no loops, then there must be something the chain
terminates in, so foundationalism is true.
Dialetheism. There are a variety of ways in which the anti-foundationalist can reply to
this. First of all, if he is a dialetheist, he could claim that the contradiction is just
one of many arising at the limits of thought, and that there is no necessity to
reject the idea of a chain of dependence stretching back infinitely just to
remove this contradiction.
Challenging the Secondly, he could reject the existence of collection M. Such a rejection
Domain could be based on mereological nihilism, denying the fundamental existence of
Principle.
M, so that there would be no real thing that needs something to depend on.
M could just be a convenient way of talking about various particular things,
each of which already has something to depend on. Alternatively, rejecting
M may be motivated by challenging the Domain Principle, the principle that
‘whenever there are things of a certain kind, there are all of those things’,⁶⁴ a
move familiar in the resolution of various paradoxes.⁶⁵

⁶⁴ Priest 2002: 280. Cartwright 1994: 7 refers to this as the ‘All-in-One principle’ and considers it
to be false. Cartwright’s criticism is criticized in Priest 2002: 280–2.
⁶⁵ For a detailed investigation and critique of the Domain Principle see Grim 1991, as well as
Section 4.3 C in Chapter 4.
 -    

Especially in the context of ontological theorizing the Domain Principle

might look less than robust. For if our ontology is a theory of all there is it will
require us to speak about everything. To do so we need a language, and for
this we need a semantics, and if this is constructed in the familiar set-theoretic
way we need a domain, some set or collection that subsumes all we are talking
about. But if this set or collection is something on top of the members, our
theory does not speak about everything, since this set is not included in the
domain. So we might be tempted to reject the Domain Principle in this context
and argue that our ontological theories always have to be incomplete.⁶⁶ While
they can be theories of fundamental kinds of things, they cannot be theories of
everything.⁶⁷
Thirdly, the anti-foundationalist could reject the asymmetry or antisymme- Accepting
try of dependence and claim that dependence loops form no problem. Such dependence
loops.
loops appear intuitively implausible because they resemble the attempt to pull
oneself up by one’s own bootstraps. If the existence of some thing a is
supported by some thing b, b cannot also be supported by a, since otherwise
nothing would ever get supported in the first place. But mere intuitive implaus-
ibility is not enough to settle the question of the asymmetry of existential
dependence.⁶⁸
§89 Does Semantics Necessitate a Foundation?
Even if we do not believe that the idea of a maximal chain of dependence or
related constructions provide an inevitable necessity for foundationalism
to introduce some kind of grounding for the structures they postulate,
one may still believe that foundationalists are forced to accept certain kinds
of foundations simply because they hold that we can form representations of
the world at all.
One way of making this point is by considering Wittgenstein’s characteris- Wittgenstein’s
argument for
tically cryptic argument for the existence of substance in the Tractatus: substance.
2.0211 If the world had no substance then whether a proposition had sense
would depend on whether another proposition was true.
2.0212 It would then be impossible to form a picture of the world (true
or false).
Wittgenstein’s idea seems to be that we would never know what the sense of a
given proposition was without first understanding an infinity of other

⁶⁶ Of course, rejecting the Domain Principle is not the only option. We could also reject set-
theoretic semantics, claim that a set does not exist as a separate entity over and above its members,
or allow a set to contain itself.
⁶⁷ This point will be developed in more detail in Chapter 4.
⁶⁸ We will discuss the question of the symmetry of existential dependence in more detail in §91.
   -    

propositions (since the sense of the first proposition depends on the truth of a
second proposition affirming the existence of a complex mentioned in the first,
and the sense of the second would depend on the truth of a third and so on,
ad infinitum). This interpretation is supported by Max Black’s commentary
which notes that ‘unless some signs are in direct connection with the world (as
names are when they stand for objects) no signs can be in indirect connection
either. Thus the sense which we find attached to the propositions we encounter
in ordinary life forces us to believe in elementary propositions and so to believe
in objects.’⁶⁹
Semantic We might think that this simply is an argument for a semantic foundation,
foundations and not for an ontological foundation.⁷⁰ Semantic foundationalism claims that we
ontological
foundations. cannot forever go on spelling out the meaning of some piece of language by yet
more language. When following down the ‘means that’ chain we must even-
tually arrive at some set of items that are not linguistic or representational
themselves. When analyzing the meaning of signs we must finally encounter
the world.⁷¹ But none of this yet says anything about the existence of things
that do not depend on other things.
Yet assume that after analyzing some sentence S into its ultimate constitu-
ents (the logically simple names, as Wittgenstein would have it) we end up,
amongst other things, with the name a, which stands for an object A. A, we
further assume, is not independent, but depends for its existence on the object
B. Now the sentence S only has a truth-value if it is meaningful, and it is only
meaningful if there is something a stands for. This is only the case if A exists,
and as this depends on B, that S has a truth-value at all depends on the truth of
the sentence T = ‘b exists’. But for this to be meaningful (and thus also for it to
be true) there must be something b stands for. And if the existence of
B depends on the existence of some object C, ‘b exists’ will only be meaningful
if yet another sentence, ‘c exists’, is true. This can go on indefinitely.

⁶⁹ Black 1964: 60.

⁷⁰ See note 36 in this chapter.
⁷¹ Maudlin 2004: 30–1; Priest 2002: 125 gives a mathematical example of this point. He quotes
Hallett 1984: 25: ‘In order for there to be a variable quantity in some mathematical study, the
“domain” of its variability must strictly speaking be known beforehand through definition.
However, this domain cannot itself be something variable, since otherwise each fixed support for
the study would collapse. Thus this “domain” is a definite, actually infinite series of values.’ and
continues by commenting on this: ‘Now consider some statement about a potentially infinite
variable; by the observation, if this has determinate sense, its domain of variability must be
determinate. Can this domain not itself be a potential infinity (variable)? Perhaps it can; but
then the sense of the original claim is not determinate unless the domain of this variable is itself
determinate. Could that, itself, be a variable? Perhaps. We are obviously off to an infinite regress.
Moreover, this regress is vicious. If it went on forever, the sense of the original statement would
never become determinate. Given that the statement does have determinate sense, the regress must
bottom-out somewhere. And thus the original variable must find its ultimate ground in an actual
infinite domain.’
 -    

So it seems that in order to understand the meaning and determine the truth
of the original sentence S we would have to complete a supertask (namely
determining the meaning and truth of infinitely many other sentences). Since it
is not clear whether we can complete a supertask, while it is clear that we can
determine the meaning and truth of sentences, the chain of semantic depend-
ence must stop somewhere. In order to stop somewhere the objects logically
simple names like a refer to cannot in turn depend for their existence on
something else. They must be logically simple objects.
This argument is interesting insofar as it attempts to establish an ontological What kind of
conclusion (what kinds of objects there are) via a semantic route (the fact that argument is this?

we can form representations of the world). We might want to interpret it as

an argument that shows that there is a hidden contradiction in the assump-
tion that the chain of ontological dependence can go infinitely backwards,
since this would entail that we cannot form representations of the world,
while we also know that we can form such representations. Alternatively,
one might also regard it as a kind of transcendental argument, claiming
that the anti-foundationalist must presuppose that we can represent the
world in some way (otherwise, what would the anti-foundationalist theory
be a theory of?), while an infinite regress of existential dependence shows that
we cannot do so.
It is essential for the argument to work that the meaningfulness of the
sentence S does not just depend on the existence of the object A, but also on
the truth of another sentence, namely T = ‘b exists’. But it is not so clear after all
why this should be the case. Even if we agree that the meaningfulness of
S depends on the existence of A, and the existence of A depends on the
existence of B, why should the meaningfulness of S also have to depend on
the sentence T = ‘b exists’, rather than just on the existence of B? Surely, both
the meaningfulness of S and the truth of T = ‘b exists’ depend on the existence
of B, but why does this show that the meaningfulness of S also depends on the
truth of T = ‘b exists’?
If this dependence does not obtain, however, the semantic and the onto- The semantic
and the
logical aspects which appear unified in the argument from representation come
ontological
apart. For now it seems to be possible to agree with the semantic foundation- aspects of the
alist and to maintain with Black that ‘some signs are in direct connection with argument can
come apart.
the world (as names are when they stand for objects)’, but that these bits of the
world can still stand in continuing (and potentially infinitely descending)
chains of existential dependence.⁷²

⁷² Returning to Graham Priest’s point mentioned in the previous footnote we note that even if
there has to be the actual infinite domain, or, more generally, the set of non-linguistic referents
where word and world meet this by no means implies that the domain or set or their respective
members would have to be ontologically fundamental.
   -    

This difficulty also becomes apparent in Ian Proops’s discussion of this

argument. He argues that
we would suppose that a proposition containing a semantically simple term, ‘a’, fails to
have sense evaluated with respect to worlds at which a does not exist. (Whether ‘Fa’, say,
has sense would thus depend on the truth of some proposition whose truth is equivalent
to a’s existence).⁷³

While it may indeed be the case that the truth of ‘b exists’ is equivalent to the
fact that b exists (the fact being a non-linguistic item), meaning that whenever
we have the one, we have the other, they are nevertheless not one thing: one is a
piece of representation, and the other is a piece of the world that itself does not
represent something else. But if we distinguish these two we can very well
end up with an infinite downward chain of existential dependence, without
an infinitely descending chain of semantic dependence, where, to ascertain
the truth of any sentence, we first have to ascertain the truth of infinitely
many others.⁷⁴
But even if semantic foundationalism would not bring along ontological
Do final analyses foundationalism in its wake, are there at least good grounds for being semantic
stop the regress? foundationalists? One reason would be to argue that if there was an infinitely

descending chain of semantic dependence (which, as I have argued above, is

not actually implied by the argument from representation) this would in fact be
vicious. This is how Black interprets Wittgenstein’s argument:
If a proposition had no final analysis, there would be an infinite (and vicious) regress. In
order for p to have sense we should first have to determine by experience that some
other proposition q was true (2.0211). But before doing so, we should have to know that
q made sense, i.e. we should have first to verify some other proposition r, etc.⁷⁵

⁷³ Proops 2004: 116.

⁷⁴ Another way of reading Wittgenstein’s argument for substance is to understand it as being
about what a system of representation that can represent the space of possibilities in a bivalent way
must be like. Our system of representation should be able to characterize possible worlds such that
for every possible world we can state how (relative to that system of representation) this possible
world is. But if there was no substance every representation would be such that for some worlds,
this representation is neither true nor false with respect to these worlds (if we assume that for truth
or falsity all the referential elements have to refer). If the reference of a term is contingent on the
world being a certain way, no sentence containing that term will be bivalent relative to all worlds.
However, it is clear that even if we accept the soundness of this argument it will not help us to
establish the existence of a fundamental level of substances. This is because the argument is about
properties of an ideal language (supposedly characterized by bivalence across possible worlds) and
the semantics this requires (logically simple names standing for logically simple objects). But what
is missing is an argument that such an ideal language is indeed possible (if there are no foundations,
it will not be) or the stronger argument that our actual language has this property. But there is no
obvious antecedent reason to believe that our actual language is bivalent across the set of all
possible worlds, and there is no reason to believe that it should be unless we are convinced by
independent reasons that substances exist. It does therefore not provide us with any good reason to
believe in the existence of a fundamental level if we do not already do so.
⁷⁵ Black 1964: 62.
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This is obviously not to be taken to imply that usually people carry out such a
process when determining whether a proposition has sense, a process that
traces a proposition back through several other propositions until it is found to
have a specific stopping-point. In order to determine that the proposition p
‘the cat is on the mat’ has sense we do not in fact first check whether some
proposition q analyzing the term ‘cat’ is true, and then to determine whether q
has sense determine the truth of some proposition r and so on, until this
process stops at some finite stage, when we can finally conclude (by moving
all the way back to the beginning of the chain) that ‘the cat is on the mat’
indeed has sense. If this was the case we would have to know the final analyses
of propositions, since otherwise we could not know at which point we can
move back to the beginning of the chain, since the sequence of analyses has
come to an end.
So the idea must be that the final analyses must somehow just be there, Final analyses as
without actually being known by anyone. (And after all not even Wittgenstein unknown.

himself was able to tell us what exactly the logically simple names that drop out
as the product of the final analysis of a proposition are supposed to be.) But
then it is hard to see what difference their absence would actually make, as it
would not suddenly make a finite analysis infinitely regressive. Consider the
example of someone who claims that there have to be fundamental truths
(never mind whether anybody in fact knows any such truths), since otherwise
our explanations would be infinitely regressive. For every explanation prof-
fered we could ask ‘and why is that?’ and never get to an end. But of course the
why-regress always stops after a few iterations (because our explanatory needs
have been met, or because fatigue sets in), and this stopping is not due to any
fundamental truths being referred to. It would be very peculiar to assume that,
were we somehow able to remove all fundamental truths, the why-regress
would suddenly stop terminating, since these truths never seemed to be
involved in its termination in the first place.
So we might wonder whether the fact that the final analyses are in fact
never used to stop the supposed regress, and the fact that I do not need
to traverse a long series of propositions to determine whether ‘the cat is on
the mat’ has sense, would not placate any regress-driven demands for semantic
foundationalism.
A further point to consider when discussing semantic foundationalism is Circular
semantics: a toy
that signs can fail to be ‘in direct connection with the world’ and thus fail to example.
force us ‘to believe in elementary propositions and so to believe in objects’⁷⁶ not
only if our semantics involves an infinite descent, but also if it involves a circle.

⁷⁶ Black 1964: 60.

  -    

For a toy example of what I have in mind, consider a language P, a fragment of

propositional calculus, consisting just of two sentences:
a: P ∨ P
b: Q ∨ Q
Let L’ be a formalized meta-language we use to describe P. L’ contains a
two-place relation Rxi, meaning ‘sentence x (of the object-language described)
contains i expression(s)’
P can be exhaustively described in L’ by the following set of true sentences:
a’: Ra3
b’: Rb3
We can now have a meta-meta-language L’’ with a similar predicate R’ that
describes L’ by the following sentences:
a’’: R’a’3
b’’: R’b’3
Now let us assume we replace our fragment of propositional calculus, P, by a
language L speaking about L’’. We then end up with the following cycle (where
‘)’ means ‘is the metalanguage of ’):
L’’ ) L’ ) L ) L’’
Of course there are certain constraints on what L must look like for
this to work. First of all the sentences of L must truly and completely
describe L’’. Secondly, they must be truly and completely described by the
sentences of L’. So L could be:
a: R’’a’’3
b: R’’b’’3
We here have a case in which the sentences of each language can be evaluated
for their truth relative to their object-language, but there are no non-linguistic
objects that need to be taken into account for these evaluations. Each sentence
in each language can be assigned a truth-value in a consistent manner, but
there is nothing non-linguistic that grounds all the truths.
The underlying idea is that we can have some language L that talks about
some model M, some world of individuals that have certain properties and
stand in certain relations. Then L’ is a meta-language speaking about the
sentences of L, and L’’ a meta-meta-language speaking the sentences of L’.
And the structure of L’’ is isomorphic to M, i.e. if we understand L’s sentences
about individuals and their properties as talking about sentences of L’’ and
their properties, all and only the truths of L are preserved. If we regard
isomorphic models as identical we can just identify M with L’’, thereby ending
 -    

up in a situation where L’’ speaks about L’, which speaks about L, which in turn
speaks about L’’.
In this case we would never escape the language–metalanguage hierarchy to
connect with any objects, yet sentences at each level are perfectly meaningful
and in fact true. The notion of an ‘object’ here is purely level-dependent: it is
whatever a language talks about. Whether or not this in turn talks about
something else (and is therefore linguistic in nature) is of no concern.
This section has argued that even if semantic foundationalism were
true, the route from it to ontological foundationalism is by no means
obvious. Moreover, we may even have our doubts whether semantic foun-
dationalism makes sense in the first place. The toy example just discussed
suggests that it may be possible to construct coherent semantics in cases
where the foundationalist assumption fails. In Chapter 4 we will look at
further reasons against semantic foundationalism based on arguments for
semantic contextualism.
§90 Does the Demand for Explanations Necessitate a Foundation?
A third argument to consider is based on the idea that non-foundationalism is Explanation and
self-undermining as it conflicts with a plausible theory of explanation that we existential
grounding.
accept as part of the metaphysical enterprise. This approach is defended by
Ross Cameron:
If you believe in metaphysical explanation, you should believe it bottoms out some-
where. [ . . . ] it is better to give the same explanation of each phenomenon than to give
separate explanations of each phenomenon. [ . . . ] if there is an infinitely descending
chain of ontological dependence, then while everything that needs a metaphysical
explanation (a grounding for its existence) has one, there is no explanation of every-
thing that needs explaining. [ . . . ][A common metaphysical explanation for every
dependent entity can be given] only if every dependent entity has its ultimate onto-
logical basis in some collection of independent entities.⁷⁷

⁷⁷ Cameron 2008: 12. It could of course be the case that metaphysical explanation bottoms out
somewhere and that there are infinitely descending chains of metaphysical explanation, in accord-
ance with the structure of the example of the disk mentioned above in §79. For another example
consider the case of ordinal numbers. According to the von Neumann definition each ordinal is
identified with a set of all the ordinals smaller than it, the first ordinal being the empty set. If each
set depends on its members (and nothing else) each ordinal depends solely on its predecessor and
the first ordinal depends on nothing at all, because the empty set has no members. Now an infinite
ordinal o is both well-founded, since there is an object at the end of the chain of dependencies that
does not depend on any other object for its existence and the chain of dependencies starting
backwards from o is infinite, since o itself is infinite. So the explanation for the existence of each
ordinal bottoms out somewhere (in the empty set), and yet there are some ordinals such that their
explanations involve infinitely many steps. It is therefore not infinitely descending chains of
ontological dependence as such that Cameron objects to, but only those infinite chains that are
not well-founded.
   -    

Note that the notion of explanation at issue here is the explanation of why
things exist, not the explanation of the various metaphysical properties of the
things that exist. Trying to spell out the argument in a bit more detail we can
set it out in the following way:

1. An explanation of why things exist that is based on the assumption of a

fundamental level (let us call this a ‘grounded explanation’)⁷⁸ provides a
unified explanation.
2. An explanation of why things exist that is not grounded is not unified.
3. A unified explanation is better than a non-unified one.
4. The assumptions made by the best explanation are true.

Therefore

5. The assumption of a fundamental level is true.

Premiss 1 has recently been criticized in the literature,⁷⁹ we will therefore not
Grounding and discuss it any further.
unified Regarding premiss 2, while giving a precise definition of what a ‘unified
explanation.
explanation’ amounts to is a complex question it is sufficient for our present
purposes to assume that such an explanation will only have to appeal to a finite
set of propositions in order to explain what it has to explain. This certainly
does not capture everything we mean by the term ‘unified explanation’,
perhaps not even its most important aspects, but it does rule out non-grounded
explanations that explain the existence of each phenomenon by the existence of
a new, distinct phenomenon. On this understanding it is not true that an
explanation of why things exist that is not grounded is not unified. For
consider a set of objects instantiating a circular dependence relation (such
that, for example, a depends on b which depends on c which depends on a). An
explanation of the existence of each object in terms of what it depends on is
obviously not grounded, but it is also unified: the only propositions we have to
appeal to relate to the existence of a, b, and c.⁸⁰
It is also worthwhile to note that it is difficult to support the claim that an
explanation of why things exist that is grounded will also be explanatorily
unified. There might not be more theoretical unity with fundamental facts than
there is without.⁸¹ The fundamental facts that are supposed to provide the
unified explanation might come in separate clusters that have little to do with
each other. In this case even though fundamental facts are accepted, little

⁷⁸ See also Orilia 2006: 232–2. ⁷⁹ Orilia 2009.

⁸⁰ Of course according to the usual understanding of existential dependence as asymmetric or
anti-symmetric such a set could not exist. But see our discussion below in §§91 and 97.
⁸¹ Bohn 2018: 180.
 -    

explanatory unity would result. If we imagine grounding like a tree structure,

the bottom of the tree might converge in a small number of branches (or even a
single branch), representing the fundamental acts that ground everything else.
Or the majority of the many grounding chains may terminate in its own
stopping point, without much downwards convergence. In this case each
non-fundamental fact is grounded in a fundamental one, so foundationalism
holds, but our explanations will not be particularly unified. In order to explain
100 top-level phenomena we might have to mention 97 fundamental facts,
instead of just two or three. Foundationalism, it appears, is no guarantee of
metaphysically unified explanations.
That a unified explanation is better than a non-unified one, as asserted by Are unified
explanations
premiss 3, is due to the fact that we prefer being able to describe and predict the
better than non-
behaviour of a variety of phenomena by a single set of laws, rather than having unified ones?
to use a separate set of laws for each kind of thing.⁸² But note that we are here
talking about the explanations of properties of things. Is the same also true of
explanations of why things exist? The unification of laws has an immediate
practical benefit; e.g. we can use a common set of principles when explaining
and predicting the behaviour of gases and when explaining and predicting the
behaviour of liquids. The unification of explanations of why things exist, on the
other hand, has primarily hypothetical benefits. At present the explanation of
the existence of any physical thing, for example, consists of a description of the
entities at the next lower level. But there is not anything we can explain now by
assuming there is a level lower than all levels. This assumption is a mere
promissory note concerning the advantages of a theory of everything, not
anything that greatly simplifies our present attempts at explaining phenomena.
To this extent the methodological advantages of a unified set of laws are
considerably greater than those of a unified explanation of why things exist.⁸³
Premiss 4 is a version of the inference to the best explanation. Yet it is either Are the best
explanations
too weak or simply question-begging. When we say that ‘the assumptions true?
made by the best explanation are true’, ‘best’ can be understood epistemically,
meaning that it appears to be most convincing to us, or it can be understood
metaphysically, meaning that there is the closest fit with the way the world is.
The first reading is just an expression of epistemic prejudice, telling us some-
thing about our psychological states, but not about the way the world is. Of
course it is often difficult to judge when one explanation is better than another
one, and to judge metaphysical theories in this way is particularly problematic.

⁸² It might be worthwhile to point out that there is a certain tension between the postulation of
an ontologically fundamental level and the demand for ontological explanations to be unified.
Given that dependent and independent things are fundamentally different things, shouldn’t we
expect fundamentally different explanations for each?
⁸³ For more discussion of this premiss see Orilia 2009: 337–9.
   -    

But even if we are successful in doing this we will have learned something
about our cognitive responses to certain kinds of statements, but not much
about the world. The second, metaphysical reading, on the other hand, is
question-begging, for if we already knew that explanations providing an
ontological foundations are better because that is the way the world is we
would not need an argument for establishing the existence of these foundations
in the first place.⁸⁴
In sum, none of the four premisses purporting to support the existence of a
fundamental level seem to be as secure as they might have initially appeared. It
is therefore doubtful whether the notion of metaphysical explanation can be
used to argue for the existence of an ontological foundation.
Another point to mention in this context is that the appeal to grounded
explanations appears to be much more problematic in metaphysics than it is in
other areas. Assume there is some grounded and unified metaphysical explan-
ation out there (let us call this U). Once this has been presented to us, can we
then ask ‘Why is U?’. Yet if we can ask this, there is a need for another
unified metaphysical explanation U’, this time to explain U. And once we
have allowed U’ in, there is no reason to stop at this, or at U’’, U’’’ and so on.
Infinite regress But now the foundationalist seems to be in the same predicament as the anti-
for the foundationalist earlier. The anti-foundationalist claimed that if the world was
foundationalist.
ontologically boring he could explain the properties of every level just in the
same way in which this level explained the properties of the level above it. In
this way he could still give a unified explanation of all there is, even though the
world did not come equipped with a bottom level. The foundationalist replied
that it is the explanation of existence he is after, not the explanation of
properties. And to explain the existence of each level the anti-foundationalist
still had to bring in a numerically distinct explanation, namely the existence of
the level directly below it. But now if we allow that U has any explanation at all,
then the foundationalist seems to be committed to the existence of an infinitely
descending series of numerically distinct explanations supporting U. It appears
that even for the foundationalist ‘there would be no end to explanation when
we try to explain why what there is exists’.⁸⁵ It is then not so clear what the
advantage of the foundationalist’s infinite sequence of levels of explanation has
over the anti-foundationalist’s infinite sequence of levels of existence.

⁸⁴ These remarks are not intended to reject all inferences to the best explanation. There are cases
when we need to rely on this kind of inference (for example when attempting to infer properties of
entities we cannot observe), but problems start to arise when we make the inferred statements carry
too much ontological weight. To say that some explanation is the ‘best’ relative to our epistemic
standards and practices provides us with a justification to accept its pronouncements and to rely on
it in our future epistemic endeavours. But to claim that such bestness settles what the unobservable
entities out there are really like presupposes a concordance between our epistemic standards and
practices and the world beyond these standards and practices that is exceedingly difficult to defend.
⁸⁵ Cameron 2008: 7.
 -    

But perhaps this argument is somewhat uncharitable towards the founda-

tionalists. After all, if you explain that you can’t come skiing with me by the fact
that you broke your leg I can certainly ask for an explanation of that explan-
ation, but this does not mean that ‘because I broke my leg’ is not a perfectly
good explanation, or that I need to know an infinite sequence of propositions
in order to get an explanation why you can’t come skiing with me. The reason
why the why-regress does not worry us in our day-to-day affairs is because we Stopping the
ask for explanations relative to a context. Because of that it is reasonable to stop why-regress by
appeal to
giving explanations when doing so would take us out of the context in which context.
the need for explanation arose in the first place, such as an explanation of what
went on in the brain that caused its owner to drop the banana peel you slipped
on, thereby breaking your leg. Facts about neuronal activity just have no place
in the context of demanding an explanation for why you can’t come skiing with
me, and to satisfy my need for an explanation I don’t first have to go out and
understand how activity in the brain causes behaviour in general, in order to
then be able to understand the banana-dropping behaviour in particular. But
the demand for an explanation of the unified metaphysical explanation U is by
its very nature not amenable to such a contextualization treatment. If we want
to explain why there is what there is, and are given U, the request for an
explanation of U cannot just be countered by the remark that it would take us
out of the context of the explanation of why there is what there is, because U is
something that there is too.
What precisely constitutes a context of explanation and when an explan-
ation takes us outside of it is of course a difficult question to answer, and
perhaps even one for which a general precise answer cannot be provided. But
when considering explanations we give and accept in our daily interactions it
becomes clear that after some finite length the chain of explanations E – E’ – E’’
– E’’’ . . . we construct to account for any fact F ends up talking about something
apparently wholly irrelevant to answering the question ‘Why F?’. But if our F is
the fact that there is what there is, and our first member of that chain is U, there
will never be a point where the next member in the explanatory chain can be
regarded as sufficiently irrelevant to be ignored.
But if the foundationalist cannot stop the why-regress by appeal to context,
he can attempt to stop it in other ways. One way is to say that U is self-evident,
and provides its own explanation, another that U is one (perhaps the only one)
explanation where we cannot ask for an explanation of it; that is that the
question ‘Why U?’ is meaningless. In this case the explanatory argument Explanatory
argument for
for ontological foundations pushes us towards epistemic foundationalism. foundations
Epistemic foundationalism claims that some beliefs (the basic ones) are justi- leads to
fied in the absence of reasons. In order to accept U as an explanation, epistemic
foundationalism.
the defender of the explanatory argument would want to say, we do not have
to wheel in additional reasons for U, but U is justified just as it is. In fact we
   -    

are committed to something stronger than this, something BonJour calls

‘strong foundationalism’, which is the view that the basic beliefs are ‘not
just adequately justified, but also infallible, certain, indubitable, or incorri-
gible’.⁸⁶ The unified metaphysical explanation U is not just a belief that is on
its own sufficient to fulfill the adequate-justification condition for knowledge,
or a belief that is initially plausible. Rather, if it is the fundamental explan-
ation of why there is what there is it is not something that could be wrong.
Epistemic foundationalism (and certainly the strong foundationalism
required here) is not particularly popular with contemporary epistemolo-
gists.⁸⁷ If our best defence of ontological foundationalism implies that we
have to be epistemic foundationalists as well we might be tempted to call for
an application of modus tollens, suggesting that a more widespread prefer-
ence for coherentism in epistemology be matched by a similar anti-
foundationalist stance in ontology.⁸⁸
Motivation for To use our preference for grounded explanations as an argument for
the link between
explanatory and
ontological groundedness appears plausible since the explanations we usually
ontological give in empirical disciplines are grounded. If we consider the case of epidemi-
grounding. ology it is easy to see that its explanations are grounded insofar as some
propositions (e.g. ‘There are living organisms’) are not considered to be in
need of any explanation themselves. This is not because we could not explain
them in turn, but because in doing so we would no longer be engaging in
epidemiology. This points to a general fact about explanations. In order to
explain some proposition P we regard some other propositions as basic and
explain P in terms of them. In addition, explanations are always explanations
for somebody. A set X of propositions is not an explanation of a proposition
P all on its own, but only for someone who has no qualms about accepting X.
To this person we have to show that once you believe in X, P is explained by X.
For this reason some proposition can be an explanans against one explanatory
background, and an explanandum against another, simply because in one
situation it is a member of X, and we show that P is explained by X, while it
another situation it is P itself.⁸⁹

⁸⁶ BonJour 1985: 26–7.

⁸⁷ For a defence of a weaker version of foundationalism see Van Cleve 2005.
⁸⁸ If we adopt a coherentist epistemology the explanatory argument against circular existential
dependence described above will also no longer be available.
⁸⁹ Note that this thought also opens up an avenue for the Rortyan to avoid an infinite
downwards chain of explanations. He can agree that to justify the truth of the statement that
dinosaurs existed in the past we need some theory T (which is going to be our best theory of the
past). To justify T we need some other theory T’ (e.g. a theory explaining why there are facts about
the past). This sequence of theories could be finite even if there was no foundational theory, if we
allow that the sequence loops back into itself at some point. Somewhere in the sequence of
explanations we just get back to some previously explained theory and use this (circularly) as an
explanation.
 -    

This view of explanation that essentially relies on the idea of an explanatory Explanatory
background becomes problematic once we apply it to the metaphysical case, context and
unified
because we now want to have an explanation (if at all possible a unified metaphysical
explanation) of everything. But if we have to hold some propositions fixed in explanations.

order to explain anything we have not managed to provide an explanation of

everything there is to explain. To provide a unified metaphysical explanation, it
seems, we would have to construct an explanation that works in a fundamen-
tally different way from all the explanations we are used to. It could not be an
explanation that holds a set of statements fixed to constitute the explanatory
background, at least not as long as these statements have any existential
implications. For in this case we would not have provided an explanation of
why these things exist, so that our metaphysical explanation would not be
comprehensive. And even if we managed to construct our U purely a priori it
would still be legitimate to ask ‘And why are there these laws of logic?’ The
attempt to establish an ontological foundation by appeal to explanatory and
epistemic foundations appears to face serious problems.

D The Argument against the Symmetry

of Grounding
§91 Problems with Circular Grounding Structures
Even though structures where grounding chains loop back on themselves,
rather than descend infinitely, without an ungrounded grounder in sight are
one way in which an ontology can fail to be foundational, the majority of
arguments against the plausibility of non-foundational ontologies focus on the
infinitely descending and not on the circular kind of grounding structures.
When circular grounding structures are challenged this is usually by focus- Against
ing on the connection between grounding and explanation. A good example of symmetry 1:
argument from
such an argument against the possibility of symmetric grounding is given by explanation.
Jonathan Lowe.⁹⁰
Lowe argues that existential dependence relationships express explanatory
relationships: to say that I existentially depend on my parents tells us that my
parents can function as an explanation for my existence. But we are rightly Circular
dependence,
suspicious of explanations that move in a circle; explaining that an action is just
circular
because it is approved by the wise, and answering our further question of why explanation.
it is approved by the wise by saying that this is so because it is just does not
expand our insight. Since circular dependence relations produce circular
explanations they have thus to be rejected. ⁹¹ Like the hierarchy of explanation

⁹⁰ Lowe 1998: 144–5.

⁹¹ See for example Lowe 1994, 2010a; Schaffer 2010; Schnieder 2006. For further discussion of
circular arguments see Walton 1991.
   -    

the hierarchy of existence has to be well-founded. If we accept that grounding

and metaphysical explanation are similar enough that they have to share basic
structural features,⁹² the argument seems to be plausible enough: circular
arguments beg the question and do not establish whatever they are trying to
establish. So if arguments mustn’t be symmetric, grounding mustn’t either.
Yet if we consider the reason for our rejection of circular arguments, matters
Holistic are not so clear any more.⁹³ This is not just because of the fact that circular
explanations. arguments are obviously valid, but also because explanatory circularity begins
to look considerably less absurd if the circles become reasonably large. While
circular explanations account for A in terms of B, and then use A again to
explain B, or move in similarly small explanatory circles, holistic explanations
are characterized by larger circles with various intermediaries between
A and B.⁹⁴ Complex social phenomena, such as wars, famines, or revolutions,
may be explainable (via a long chain of intermediary phenomena) wholly in
terms of the individual psychological states of the numerous agents involved,
while these very states might in turn be explicable (via a different long chain of
intermediary phenomena) by the fact that these agents are part of a war, a
famine, or a revolution.⁹⁵ Similarly, a holist about belief content will explain
the content of a given belief p in terms of the other beliefs held by the person,
while their content is in turn explained by beliefs that include p. Again, certain
mental states may be explained by the underlying neurobiological facts, but
given the multiple realizability of such states the explanation why a certain
organism is in a certain neurobiological state might in turn require reference to
the mental state the organism is in.
In each of these cases the circularity is indicative of the complexity of the
situation to be explained, rather than of a deficient explanatory setup where,
say, opium’s sedative properties are explained by its soporific power, and its
soporific power by its sedative properties.

⁹² Thompson (2016: 44) raises the important point that though metaphysical explanation might
track grounding in the way causal explanation tracks causation, this does not preclude there being
cases of symmetric grounding that metaphysical explanation might not track, simply because (it
would be assumed) explanatory structures need to be anti-symmetric to be explanatory.
⁹³ See Barnes 2018.
⁹⁴ If we are thoroughgoing coherentists, all explanations will turn out to be circular (because
there are no fundamental beliefs) even though the circles are somewhat larger. Because we usually
stop demanding explanations a few steps into the why-regress we are not aware that should we do
so, we would come full circle, in the same way as traversing the rim of a very large circle might give
us the impression of moving in a straight line. We will come back to the discussion of coherentism
in Section 4.3 A of Chapter 4.
⁹⁵ Tolman 1938 makes the related point that psychological explanations of human behaviour
often only make sense against the ‘culture-pattern’ (234) of the society in which the behaviour
occurs. So even though sociological phenomena may be explained via the psychology of individual
agents, individual psychological explanations may then still need to refer to the ‘higher level’ theory
of sociology to show why a given set of psychological regularities is supposed to be at work in the
mind of a person showing a specific behaviour.
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Another common objection to circular arguments is that they deliver no Circular

new knowledge. If I explain the tensile strength of wood by reference to its arguments
deliver no new
molecular structure, and then explain that structure by reference to the prop- knowledge.
erties of the atoms that make up the molecules, at each explanatory stage I have
introduced new information that was not available before. Yet a circular
argument, going from A to B, and then to A again would simply recycle
what we already know.
This is true, though it is questionable whether metaphysical explanations are Metaphysical
explanation does
explanations of this kind. When producing metaphysical explanations our aim not try to
is not to uncover further and further facts about the world,⁹⁶ but to connect up discover new
different claims about very fundamental features of the world in a systematic facts.
manner such that the individual claims address whatever philosophical prob-
lems we want them to address, and that all of them together form a system that
in its overall structure, simplicity, and explanatory power fares better than its
competitors. As such metaphysics is a highly holistic enterprise.⁹⁷ We can
encounter cases where some fundamental claim about the structure of the
world p is explained as following from two other philosophical claims q and r,
and where the justification for the introduction of q and r is at least partly the
fact that we can derive p from them. What we expect from a metaphysical
system is to explain to us how different fundamental claims are connected with
each other, and this aim does not conflict with the existence of symmetric
metaphysical explanations.
A second kind of argument against symmetric dependence relations (also Against
due to Lowe) focuses not on the relation between dependence and explanation, symmetry 2:
argument from
but on circular individuation dependence. Individuation dependence is the individuation.
dependence of one object on another for being the object it is (as e.g. my
funeral is the event it is because of me; its relation to me fixes its identity and
makes it my, rather than somebody else’s funeral). Could two objects indi-
viduate each other? Lowe believes they could not:
[I]t just doesn’t seem intelligible to suppose that different entities of the same kind can
be each other’s sole individuators. Imagine, for instance, that someone were to try to
counter my earlier suggestion that the two electrons orbiting a helium nucleus are not
‘individuals’ (in my sense) by contending that each of them is in fact the other’s
individuator. The obvious and, in my view, correct reply would be that this suggestion
is futile, because viciously circular. Two different entities of the same kind cannot both
individuate each other. Nor indeed, more generally, can any plurality of entities of the
same kind all be individuated solely by other members of the same plurality. Consider
first the two-entity case. Two distinct Ks cannot each determine which K the other one

⁹⁶ This appears to be essentially the same point Barnes 2018 makes when claiming that
metaphysical explanation is non-epistemic.
⁹⁷ See Meixner 2004: 13–4.
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is, because unless it is already determined which K one of them is, this K cannot fix the
identity of the other. And the two-entity case surely generalizes.⁹⁸

Unclarity aboutI am tempted to be somewhat cautious with this argument since we do not at
the status of
circular
present have a precise enough understanding of the ontological characteristics
structures. of circular structures, or a good grasp when such structures are vicious or
benign. Circular individuation dependence appears to be no problem in
mathematics,⁹⁹ so why does it fail in the extramathematical world? Moreover,
our intuitions about what is and what is not possible with circular structures
might not take us very far even just regarding the concrete. It is intuitively clear
that two people cannot sit on each other’s lap, but perhaps a bit less intuitive
that, if we have a group of, say, eleven people forming a circle each can sit on
the lap of exactly one other person, and nobody has to sit on the ground.¹⁰⁰ We
cannot just assume without further argument that because two objects cannot
stand in relation R to each other, there cannot be a larger group in which each
object is related by R to some other object in that group.
Three examples Whether we can in fact come up with an argument that circles of ontological
of symmetric dependence need to be excluded for reasons to do with the structure of
grounding.
ontological dependence is unclear. In particular, it is hard to see how such
an argument could be more than simply an ad hoc specification postulating
that ontological dependence is asymmetric, given that there are prima facie
plausible examples involving symmetric forms of grounding.¹⁰¹
Consider three straightforward cases.¹⁰²
1. A clay statue depends for its existence on its boundaries, since without
Statues and these the clay would be dispersed through space. But the boundaries also
persons. could not exist without the clay statue, because otherwise there would be
no two entities (such as the clay statue and the surrounding air) between
which the boundary existed. Socrates depends on his life, since without
this series of events there would be nothing to call ‘Socrates’, but the life
also depends on him, since without him the life would not just fail to be
his life, it would not be any life at all.
Universals. 2. The second case concerns the status of universals in some neo-
Aristotelian ontologies. If such theories hold that universals existentially
depend on their instances (so that there are no uninstantiated universals),

⁹⁸ Lowe 2012: 228–9.

⁹⁹ As Lowe 2012: 232 admits: ‘while a “structuralist” ontology may well be apposite in the case
of certain abstract mathematical structures such as graphs, there is no good reason at all to suppose
that the same can be said with regard to concrete entities of any kind, such as events, powers, and
material objects.’
¹⁰⁰ For photographic evidence see Hofstadter 2007: 100. The circles can get bigger, see Hughes
2011: 89–90 for further discussion.
¹⁰¹ See Wilson 2014: 570; Barnes 2018; Thompson 2016; Rodriguez-Pereyra 2015: 528–32.
¹⁰² See also Barnes 2018 for further discussion.
 -    

and that in some cases instantiating a given universal is an essential

property of a particular (so that it simply could not exist without having
this property) there can be cases where the particular grounds the
universal (as the latter could not exist without the former) and, at the
same time, the universal grounds the particular (as the particular could
not be what it is without having this property).
3. Finally, consider cases where a larger event (say, the Japanese invasion of Events.
Manchuria) has a smaller event (the Mukden incident) as a constituent part.
The larger event as we know it could not exist without having the dynamit-
ing of a railway line in 1931 as a part, nor would the Mukden incident have
ever occurred without the larger framework of Imperial Japan’s involvement
in China.¹⁰³ In the mereology of states of affairs, it appears parts will not only
ground wholes, but wholes will also ground parts.
Further potential examples of cases of symmetric grounding are not difficult
to come by.¹⁰⁴ What matters most here is not whether all of them are in fact
best explained as involving cases of symmetric grounding, but that it would be
unwise to preclude even the discussion of these cases by making the ab initio
assumption that grounding must be antisymmetric. If we want to develop a
comprehensive theory of the world the door to instances of symmetric ground-
ing must be left open.¹⁰⁵

3.3 Arguments for Non-foundationalism

So far we have examined arguments for the necessity of introducing an onto-
logical foundation and have found them wanting. As a result it is clear that there
is no threat of inconsistency that forces us to opt for foundationalism. In
addition to criticizing arguments for the inconsistency of anti-foundationalism
there is also a more direct argument in favour of its metaphysical possibility.
§92 Arguing for the Consistency of Non-foundationalism:
The Possibility of Gunk
This argument¹⁰⁶ focuses on mereological dependence. The mereological Possibility of
gunk entails
dependence of wholes on the parts that compose them is one form of existen- grounding may
tial dependence or grounding; what we mean by saying that the whole is not be well-
founded.

¹⁰³ Even if in some alternative version of history Japan had never invaded China, and the
explosion in question had still occurred at the same time and place, it would have been a different
event, simply because of its lack of connection with the causes that brought it about and the effects
it had.
¹⁰⁴ See Thompson 2016.
¹⁰⁵ We will come back to the notion of symmetric grounding in our discussion of Dipert’s
graph-theoretic ontology in §97.
¹⁰⁶ Bohn 2018: 175.
   -    

grounded by the parts is that the whole existentially depends on the parts.
But the question whether mereological dependence is well-founded is open.
It might be the case that every part contains further parts (to use the technical
term, that the world is gunky)¹⁰⁷ or it might be that the divisional chain stops
somewhere with objects that themselves have no parts. But if it is possible that
some particular kind of grounding is not well-founded, then it has to be
possible that grounding in general, too, is not well-founded.
Response 1: The defender of the claim that anti-foundationalism about grounding is
denying that
parthood
inconsistent, and hence impossible, then needs to argue that either mereo-
amounts to logical dependence does not track the structure of grounding, or that mereo-
grounding. logical dependence must bottom out, and that gunk is impossible. The first
seems hardly attractive. If the relation of the parts to the whole they compose is
not included in what we mean by grounding, then it is unclear what grasp we
have on the notion of grounding at all.¹⁰⁸
Response 2: The second is more promising, but remains simply a promissory note: at
denying gunk.
present there is certainly no consensus among metaphysicians that gunk is
impossible.¹⁰⁹ Moreover, it is highly questionable whether the decision
between gunk and some form of atomism, i.e. a decision which of two
competing hypotheses about the physical world is true is something to be
settled by metaphysicians on an a priori basis. It is likely that experimental data
need to be taken into account in order to reach a consensus in this matter—
which then also implies that whatever conclusion we reach regarding the well-
foundedness of grounding will similarly depend on these experimental data.¹¹⁰
Despite the fact that the well-foundedness of grounding is something of a
default assumption in much of the contemporary literature that deals with

¹⁰⁷ For more on gunk see Sider 2003; Arntzenius 2008.

¹⁰⁸ We might argue that the fundamental is located somewhere else but at the top or bottom of
the mereological hierarchy (e.g. by saying that medium-sized objects provide the ground both for
the very small and the very big, which only exist as abstractions from the mesoscopic. See
Thompson 2016: 49. Morganti (2014: 567–8) points out that an infinite regress (such as a regress
of parthood) might run in the opposite direction of the chain of ontological priority.). But it would
be hard to spell this out independent of human epistemic capacities (since what is medium-sized
depends on what range of objects our perceptual system can perceive), and relativizing the
existence of ontological foundations to these capacities is something few defenders of ontological
foundationalism would like to endorse. For an alternative way of de-coupling mereological
dependence and grounding see Raven 2016.
¹⁰⁹ Koons and Pickavance. 2015, 138–144, 2017: 494–7.
¹¹⁰ This point is independent of whether we think that there already are empirical data against
the well-foundedness of mereological grounding provided by the fact that whenever physicists
believed they had found the fundamental components of matter something more fundamental was
subsequently identified. For different assessments of the relevance of this fact for the present debate
see Ladyman/Ross 2007: 178; Sider 2013: 271; McKenzie 2011: 245–6; Bohn 2018: 175.
It does, however, raise a difficulty for the defender of the well-foundedness of grounding who
also believes that mereological dependence is a form of grounding. For it now seems as if the
problem of the structure of grounding has acquired a dependence on experimental data, data that
we would usually not expect to be relevant for answering fundamental metaphysical questions.
 -    

grounding and existential dependence, it is actually a very strong thesis that is

hard to defend. In order to demonstrate the well-foundedness of grounding the
well-foundedness of all instances of the grounding relation (such as mereo-
logical dependence) needs to be established. Suffice it to say that none of the
arguments for the well-foundedness of grounding suggested so far seem to be
able to rise to the challenge.
§93 Direct Arguments for Non-foundationalism
I hope that the preceding discussion increased the reader’s confidence in the
belief that there is no hidden contradiction lurking in the anti-foundationalist Coherence of
picture. There are no logical reasons that would rule out the anti- anti-
foundationalism.
foundationalist position.¹¹¹ However, all this amounts to is to support the
consistency (and hence metaphysical possibility) of the anti-foundationalist
picture. This in itself might not appear to be a very significant point, but given
the strong intuitive pull the foundationalist assumption appears to have in the
contemporary metaphysical discussion, and the frequent suggestions that its
negation is not just philosophically objectionable, but in some way self-
contradictory, it is important to underline the consistency of the anti-
foundationalist option. Nevertheless, knowing that a position is consistent
does not yet give us any reason to adopt it, as there are plenty of consistent
positions that have no other attractive features. What we are looking for are
therefore positive arguments that support the anti-foundationalist position,
bring out the advantages of taking this position, and provide evidence that it is
not simply consistent but also true.
For the sake of our discussion we will distinguish three broad classes of 3 classes of
arguments for non-foundationalism. The first class is based on the idea that arguments for
anti-
there are various mutually inconsistent theories or versions of the world. If we foundationalism.
cannot reduce all to a single one that acts as a foundation, and is itself founded
on how the world is, then we either end up with an infinitely descending
sequence of theories, or with a circle. Moreover, theories based on this view do
not simply try to account for the different ways in which we conceptualize the
world, but make the additional claim that there is no further world beyond the
hierarchy of theories.
The second class of arguments focuses on criticism of the notion of an
intrinsic property. Intrinsic properties are properties that a thing can have all
by itself, in a lonely state, without depending on anything else. Substances are
often conceived in this way, and if we could somehow show that nothing can
have intrinsic properties, then everything would depend on some other things

¹¹¹ On the consistency of anti-foundationalism see also Rosen 2010: 116; Bliss 2013, 2014.
   -    

for being the kind of thing it is, and a foundational level that determines why
everything is the way it is would appear superfluous.
The third class incorporates arguments from specific sciences. Some
scientists have argued that results in specific fields (such as quantum mech-
anics, or the neurobiology of cognition) suggest that a foundationalist picture
should be replaced by one that is either regressive or circular. Such claims
usually contain a significant amount of philosophical argumentation, though
the original motivation for their non-foundationalist claims is clearly
empirical.

A The Argument from Inconsistent Versions

§94 Mutually Inconsistent Theories or Versions of the World
An example of a theory with clear anti-foundationalist implications is the kind
Goodman: of constructivism we find defended by Nelson Goodman. Most versions of
constructions all
constructivism are conceived of in a clearly foundationalist manner (assuming
the way down.
that there is a basis of unconstructed objects from which the constructs can be
made), but Goodman’s theory is an exception. Unlike localized versions of
constructivism that claim that certain kinds of objects (ethical imperatives, say,
or social institutions) are constructions, Goodman is a constructivist about
everything.¹¹²
The process of Goodman argues that our linguistic and conceptual activity in the world
construction. creates new worlds on the basis of constructs that surround us. This kind of
conceptual construction is essentially responsible for the types of things that
the world contains. Regarding constellations such as the Big Dipper Goodman
notes that
I suggest that to say that all configurations are constellations is in effect to say that none
are: that a constellation becomes such only through being chosen from among all
configurations, much as a class becomes a kind only through being distinguished,
according to some principle, from other classes.¹¹³

By picking out specific entities and grouping them together to form other, new
entities, such as the Big Dipper, new constituents of the world we live in are

¹¹² ‘As nothing is at rest or is in motion apart from a frame of reference, so nothing is primitive
or derivationally prior to anything apart from a constructional system’ (Goodman 1978: 12). ‘And
this, as I have mentioned earlier, goes all the way down. Not all differences between true versions
can be thought of as differences in grouping or marking off within something common to all. For
there are no absolute elements, no space-time or other stuff common to all, no entity that is under
all guises or under none.’ (Goodman 1983: 107, note 6). ‘We cannot find any world-feature
independent of all versions. [ . . . ] No firm line can be drawn between world-features that are
discourse-dependent and those that are not’ (Goodman 1980: 212). ‘The line between convention
and content is arbitrary and variable’ (Goodman 1980: 214).
¹¹³ Goodman 1983: 104.
 -    

produced. Goodman’s claim is that this is true for all things that surround
us: they all only exist as parts of the world we have conceptually constructed
in this way.¹¹⁴
It is easy to misunderstand what Goodman is up to when using the
example of the Big Dipper.¹¹⁵ Would we not simply want to say that
while the Big Dipper may be a conceptual construct, the stars it is con-
structed from were there prior to us constructing it? Of course this point
generalizes. Even if everything is a conceptual construct, don’t we need
something it is all constructed from? So what Goodman must really be
suggesting is some kind of cookie-cutter theory where our concepts cut
shapes out of the cookie-dough (and arguably these shapes did not exist
before we started cutting), but this does not mean that there is not some
objective, pre-existent cookie-dough out there that forms the object of our
baking endeavours.
Goodman, however, it quite clear that this is not the position he wants to There is no
defend. All making of ‘versions’ of world, to use his terminology, starts from primordial basis
of construction.
other versions, there is no primordial base version where it all began:
The many stuffs – matter, energy, waves, phenomena – that worlds are made of are
made along with the worlds. But made from what? Not from nothing, after all, but from
other worlds. Worldmaking as we know it always starts from worlds already on hand;
the making is remaking. Anthropology and developmental psychology may study social
and individual histories of such world building, but the search for a universal or
necessary beginning is best left to theology.¹¹⁶

It is therefore easy to see that the cookie-dough objection to Goodman’s

constructivism only goes through if we misunderstand his anti-foundationalist
project as containing tacit foundationalist assumptions. As we have seen above,
such assumptions are not necessitated by logic, so we cannot say that if we
want to make sense of Goodman’s position in any way at all we have to
understand it as in some way foundationalist. Once we have dropped this
assumption it becomes clear that Goodman’s theory presents us with an

¹¹⁴ ‘The worldmaking mainly in question here is making not with hands, but with minds, or
rather with languages or other symbol-systems’. (Goodman 1980: 213).
¹¹⁵ An example of a failure to account for the complexity of Goodman’s position is chapter 3 of
Boghossian 2006.
¹¹⁶ Goodman 1978: 6–7. ‘We might take construction of a history of successive development
of worlds to involve application of something like a Kantian regulative principle, and the search
for a first world thus to be as misguided as the search for a first moment of time’. (Goodman
1978: 7, note 8). ‘We start, on any occasion, with some old version or world that we have on
hand and that we are stuck with until we have the determination and skill to remake it into a
new one. [. . .] Worldmaking begins with one version and ends with another’. (Goodman 1978:
97). ‘All we have available is scrap material recycled from old and stubborn worlds’. (Goodman
1980: 213).
   -    

ontology with no ground of being. There is nothing prior to all conceptual

activity that could be regarded as ontological rock-bottom.¹¹⁷
Scepticism about The main reason for Goodman’s position is scepticism about the possibility
reducing of reducing theories to each other. Most physicalists will be happy with talk
theories to each
other. about ‘multiple actual worlds’, about ‘versions’ of worlds corresponding to
different theoretical frameworks we employ for navigating reality around us, as
long as we are clear that all such theories can be reduced to a single theory,¹¹⁸
preferably a complete version of current physics. Instead of speaking about
such versions we could instead introduce a very complicated theory wholly
phrased in terms of concepts available in this kind of super-physics, and
describe the same things about the actual world that the original account
described in a less long-winded manner. The problem is of course that such
reducibility is at present at best a theoretical ideal, and at worst a figment of the
imagination. It is not just the case that the reductions concerned would be so
vastly complex that we cannot in fact carry them out in practice, but that at
present we do not even have the outline of an approach that would allow us to
account for a multiplicity of phenomena in wholly physicalist terms. How
could we account in purely physicalist terms for the incompleteness of arith-
metic, the structure of the set-theoretic hierarchy, the emergence of Italian out
of Latin, or for the difference between impressionist and expressionist painting
styles, or, more generally, for the way a multiplicity of minds could bring about
a conceptualization of the world by means of a specific theory?
Postulating a We are then left with two remaining options: we either postulate
‘neutral the existence of ‘an ambivalent or neutral something’¹¹⁹ that provides the
something’?
subject-matter of all the different theories we use in order to make sense of
the world, or we accept the multiplicity of versions and relate them to one
another in terms of reducibility, subsumption, coherence, and so on, without
presupposing that there is a single one amongst them such that all the others
can be reduced to it. Goodman rejects the first alternative, and there are indeed
reasons to be suspicious of this approach. First, as long as such reductions
cannot be carried out the mere postulation that they can does not carry much
argumentative weight. Second, if we could somehow show that there must be

¹¹⁷ It is worth noting that one consequence of Goodman’s theory is that the existence of mind
must stretch infinitely far back. For if constructions take place in time and are carried out by minds,
and if for every construct there is a construct it is constructed from, itself constructed by a mind at
an earlier time there can be no point in the past at which minds did not exist. As our usual
understanding of mind disagrees with this (assuming that minds arose once a specific stage in the
evolution of physical bodies had been reached) this would also entail that Goodman’s account is
incompatible with a widespread naturalist understanding of the world. See Westerhoff 2009.
¹¹⁸ Note that Goodman’s conception of such frameworks is very catholic, including not only
theories in the familiar scientific sense, but also the ‘world-views’ expressed in the works of artists
such as James Joyce, Canaletto, or Van Gogh (Goodman 1978: 3, 5).
¹¹⁹ Goodman 1978: 5.
 -    

such a neutral entity, and that all theories can be reduced to it this leaves it What purpose
unclear what the purpose of assuming it is in the first place. If we claim that would it serve?
there is a neutral theory such that all other theories are based on it, even though
we could never know this theory, all our attempts to relate theories to one
another could only proceed by comparing the different theories directly, not by
determining how they differ in conceptualizing the neutral foundational the-
ory. To this extent our actual thinking about versions would not change much,
except if we mistakenly assume that some of the theories we know are identical
with or very similar to the neutral theory. But of course this is something we
could never be in a position to know.
If we follow the Goodmanian line in accepting a multiplicity of versions we
will also have to let go of the idea that any entities could provide us with an
ontological foundation. Everything that looks fundamental turns out to be only
fundamental relative to a version, but the version itself, built as it is from other
versions, cannot be fundamental itself.

B The Argument against Intrinsic Properties

§95 Intrinsic Properties
A second class of arguments for non-foundationalism we want to consider
draws on the criticism of intrinsic properties. The idea is that the objects that
exist at the foundational level would have to be objects that bear their prop-
erties intrinsically, but if we can somehow show that there cannot be anything
that bears its properties in this way this would imply that there cannot be any
objects at the foundational level.
Simply put, an object has a property intrinsically if it does not borrow it Defining
from something else. Many properties are clearly borrowed, and intrinsic ‘intrinsic
property’
properties are the creditors of these debtors. The intrinsic properties are
properties that objects do not get from other objects, but properties they
have all by themselves, and which can therefore stand at the beginning of
this line of ontological credit.
The clearest example of extrinsic properties are relational properties. Sup- Borrowing
pose that I am an uncle because my sister had a child. I do not have this properties from
other objects.
property by my own powers (indeed I could not have it in this way) but I only
have it because other things have specific properties. But many non-relational
properties are extrinsic too. The sound of the Great Bell in Elizabeth Tower is
not something the bell has all by itself, but is a product of the presence of
various factors quite distinct from the bell itself (such as the surrounding air).
We can have different ways of understanding what the ‘something else’ Borrowing
properties are borrowed from may include. In the above examples both my properties from
its parts.
sister and the surrounding air are clearly a ‘something else’ that is outside
   -    

of the spatial boundaries of the object in question. But what about an

object’s parts?
A figure made from parts of a tangram puzzle has the shape it has because of
the parts used to construct it, and because of the way these parts are arranged.
But if the parts are considered as entities distinct from the figure, the figure
derives its shape from something else, and so this property cannot be an
intrinsic property. Similarly for temporal parts. If the sphere at time t is only
spherical because the preceding slice in its spatio-temporal worm was spher-
ical, being spherical at t cannot be an intrinsic property of the sphere.
Restriction to If we make it part of the definition of intrinsic property that it cannot be
atomic entities? borrowed from an object’s spatio-temporal parts we restrict the only possible

location of intrinsic properties to spatio-temporally atomic entities. Since any

defence of intrinsic properties would then depend on first proving that there
are spatio-temporally atomic entities, and since this question is far from
settled, we would seem to load the deck against intrinsic properties. It would
also mean that we could not actually be acquainted with any examples of
intrinsic properties through our five senses, since everything we appear to be
thus acquainted with are properties of non-atomic, spatio-temporally extended
entities. In order to give the theory of intrinsic qualities a run for its money,
and in order to leave open the possibility that we may in fact come up with
some examples of intrinsic properties we will conceive of intrinsic properties as
properties that are not borrowed from anything outside of the spatial and
temporal boundaries of the object that has them.
An analogous way of defining intrinsic properties is in terms of those
properties an individual could have in a completely lonely state. If we took
away everything else in the world in which a specific individual is located, those
properties it would still be left with are those that it cannot be getting from
anything else, since there is not anything else.
Are there any There are two ways to settle the question whether there are any intrinsic
intrinsic properties, either by providing examples, or by coming up with an existence
properties?
proof. The first route is simpler and more satisfactory: we just provide cases of
objects that have some properties where we can make a good case that these
properties do not apply to them merely derivatively, via something else, but
that they are had by the objects in question on their own accord. Yet even if we
do not succeed in coming up with any good examples (which may simply be
due to a failure of our imagination) this does not imply that there are no
intrinsic properties. We might be able to come up with an existence proof
showing that for some reason there must be intrinsic properties (for example
by showing that the assumption that all properties are extrinsic is contradict-
ory), even though we cannot give any actual example. This would be sufficient
for an argument in support of ontological foundationalism, since these prop-
erties (whatever they may be) would be a good candidate for ontologically
 -    

fundamental objects. We might, however, have our doubts about the feasibility
of such a proof. Given the difficulty of coming up with an argument that
demonstrated the incoherence of anti-foundationalism, and the demonstrable
consistency of this position it may be hard to see what precisely such a proof
would consist of.
§96 Examples of Intrinsic Properties
What could be possible examples of intrinsic properties? If we look at material
objects, two come to mind immediately: shape and mass. Let us consider each
of these in turn.
Shape, it seems, is a property objects have in a purely non-relational manner. Shape.
An equilateral triangle has the shape it has because of the relation of the points
on its boundary to each other. Its triangularity is not borrowed from anything
not within the boundary of the triangle and is hence intrinsic. Similarly, if we
look at a metal cube, we know that it has the shape it has because of the specific
arrangement of the molecules that make up the cube. As such its being cubical
only depends on its parts, and not on any objects in its surroundings.
Yet these cases are not as straightforward as they seem. In order to asses the
first example we must first be clear about whether we have in mind an abstract
triangle, a mathematical object, or a material object made of paper, wood, Intrinsic
plastic, and so on. In the first case it is highly questionable whether we want to properties
compatible with
admit that any mathematical objects have intrinsic properties, at least if we are mathematical
inclined towards a structuralist conception of mathematics. If the latter, the structuralism?
case of the triangle is the same as that of the cube. Consider what would Intrinsic
properties and
happen if we moved these objects from their present location on your desk to a gravitational
different place in the universe where an immense gravitational force was acting fields.
on them. Their shape would be transformed, and this entails that their present
shape at their present location cannot be intrinsic either, since it depends on
the fact that they are in the location in the gravitational field they are in fact
placed in, rather than in another one. So even though it seems as if the shape of
objects would be something that did not reach out beyond the boundaries of
the object itself, this is in fact not the case. The shape of objects existentially
depends on other things located outside of them.
It might be objected at this point that while we may agree that no specific
shape of an object can be regarded as intrinsic, since it depends on a variety of
external factors, its having a shape (rather than, say, being cubical) must be Is ‘having a
intrinsic, because a body may be deformed in any odd way by external forces, shape’ intrinsic?

but no such forces could turn it from something that has a shape to something
that does not. ‘Having a shape’ is of course a property very different from
properties like ‘being cubical’. It is an infinite, or at least very long, disjunction
of such shape properties, each of which is extrinsic. What precisely the status of
such disjunctive properties is remains open to debate, but it would turn out to
   -    

be quite a peculiar result if these were the only intrinsic properties we could
come up with. After all, the chief motivation for determining what intrinsic
properties there are is to find properties things have just by themselves, without
external intervention, and this of course includes intervention from a concep-
tualizing mind. But a property that is a long disjunction seems to bear all the
hallmarks of a mind-made creation. As such this is probably not anything we
would want to rest our theory of intrinsic properties on.
In addition, note that as the disjunction is going to list all the possible shapes
an object could have, it will be extensionally equivalent to the property of being
spatially extended. Every spatially extended thing will have a shape described
Essential by some of the disjuncts, and every one of the disjuncts will be spatially
properties need
extended. Being spatially extended is an essential property of material objects,
not be intrinsic.
that is, a property something could not lose without ceasing to be that very
object. But essential properties need not be intrinsic.¹²⁰ Consider a block of ice.
It is essentially cooler than 10 degrees Celsius, because if it was not, it would no
longer be a block of ice but a puddle of water. Its essential quality of coldness is
borrowed from the ambient temperature that surrounds it.¹²¹ In the case of a
metal cube, if the universe suddenly changed in such a way that all matter went
out of existence at once (though other entities, such as abstract objects, might
continue to exist) there would be no cube left. The essential quality ‘being
spatially extended’ that qualifies the cube, as well as all other non-atomic
material things is therefore dependent on such change not happening, or, to
rephrase the matter in positive terms, it is dependent on whatever causes keep
matter in existence continuing to obtain. For this reason ‘having a shape’ does
not appear to be any better as a possible example of an extrinsic quality than
being round, or cubical, or having any other specific shape.
Rest mass. Another popular candidate for being an intrinsic property is an object’s rest
mass, i.e. the resistance the object generates when one tries to change its state of
motion using some force. Since mass (unlike shape) does not change in
dependence on where the object is located it appears to be a property that
would not in any way be borrowed from something else.
Is it a A potential difficulty with this is that mass may be considered as a disposi-
dispositional tional property.¹²² What it means for an object to have a certain mass is to
property?
generate certain dynamical effects, i.e. to behave in specific ways when another
object tries to push it. In the same way as other dispositional properties like
fragility this disposition is only manifested when the object interacts with other
objects. But this means that the property cannot exist in a lonely state.

¹²⁰ Compare Yablo 1999.

¹²¹ Similarly, belonging to the genus mus is essential to being a mouse, but it is not intrinsic. The
hierarchy of the genus and species depends on what other organisms there are around.
¹²² Blackburn 1990.
 -    

In response we might object that the extrinsicality of a disposition such as Reduction of the
mass is only an appearance. A disposition would not count as extrinsic if an dispositional to
the categorical.
object’s having that disposition is just a manifestation of the way the object’s
non-dispositional, categorical properties are arranged. The glass is fragile
because of having a specific molecular structure, and all facts about this
structure are inside the glass; we do not need to bring in any external objects
to account for this disposition. Of course the glass could never manifest this
disposition in a lonely state, there would have to be some other thing that
could bump into it. But this appears to be an epistemological, not an
ontological point: we could never know whether the glass was really fragile
unless there is a context in which this disposition is manifested, but this is
quite different from the fact that the glass has that disposition on the basis of
its categorical properties.
The reason why we might not be completely happy with this reply is that the
concept of fragility (as well as the concept of mass) essentially depends on the
assumption that things can move. Mass is resistance to displacement; break- Could there be
ing is shattering after impact. What is the basis of our assumption that if we mass in purely
static worlds?
consider completely static worlds in which nothing moves there could be a
counterpart of the glass and of the metal cube? We can picture putting these
objects into these worlds, but this gives us no better justification than
picturing a block of ice in a world always above freezing point gives us to
grounds to believe that there could be blocks of ice outside of sub-zero
environments.
We have to rule out the possibility that the difference between worlds with
motion and static worlds is due to any categorical properties of the objects in
these worlds, because in this case the glass or cube in the static worlds could
no longer be regarded as counterparts for the purposes of our argument.
It seems impossible to assess this criticism of the view that the dispositional
cannot be intrinsic without settling the question of which of the underlying
modal intuitions is correct, and there does not appear to be an obvious way in
which we can reach such a settlement.
Another possible argument against the intrinsicality of mass focuses on the Mass and
fact that when we speak about mass, we assign it a numerical value, a value that measurement.

expresses its magnitude either in relation to an abstract object, a number, or in

relation to some other mass we consider as the unit of quantification.¹²³ (The
same happens of course with other physical quantities such as length, which is
quantified in relation to the standard metre.) Some have argued that this entails
that no quantifiable property of mass could be intrinsic, because all measure-
ments are extrinsic. Harris points out that

¹²³ Black 2000: 102–3.

   -    

[i]f numbers are distinct (albeit abstract) objects and can be relata engendering
d-relations,¹²⁴ then all measurements will be d-relations, and so cannot be intrinsic. [ . . . ]
[N]o measurement would be intrinsic if a relation to an abstract particular were to
qualify as a d-relation.¹²⁵

And if all properties of mass are quantifiable, this would entail that none of its
properties can be intrinsic. Yet even if we conceive of measurement not in
terms of relation to abstract objects, but in terms of relations specific objects
have to each other, if the quantification of mass demands the presence of other
objects in this way, should we isolate a specific object that has a specific mass,
and remove all other objects with mass from that world, we will no longer be
able to assign any mass to it. This is not just an epistemological point. We are
not just unable to know what mass the object has in this world, but there is no
numerical value that could be assigned to it. The object’s mass seems to have
been turned into a determinable without a determinate. Whether such things
exist is a question we cannot answer here,¹²⁶ it is clear, however, that what we
are left with in having moved the object under discussion into the lonely
position is not mass as we know it, but some other kind of property. If
somebody told us that some physical thing has a length, but no expression in
terms of metres can measure it, we would infer that the length referred to here
cannot be the length we are familiar with. Mass as an indeterminate determin-
able is therefore not mass in the usual sense. Yet if this is the case then having a
mass in the usual sense depends on other objects being around, in which case it
cannot be an intrinsic property.
Other While size and shape are obvious examples of intrinsic properties for the
candidates.
defender of a materialist ontology, we also want to look briefly at the prospects
Tropes. of the notion of intrinsicality in other kinds of ontological theories. In a pure
trope ontology, the individual tropes would seem to be natural examples of
intrinsic properties; the existence of the specific shade of red of that postbox
fails to depend on any other trope, and therefore on anything outside of it
for its existence. So even though it seems as if the adoption of a pure trope
ontology guaranteed the existence of intrinsic properties matters are actually
Individuating somewhat more complex. The problem arises from the question how tropes
tropes. are to be differentiated. An obvious suggestion that seems to differentiate one
red-trope from another are its spatio-temporal coordinates; one red is here
now, the other is over there at another time. But this fails to account for what
spatial and temporal properties are. They certainly appear to be properties just
like being red and being cubical, and for this reason they should just be tropes

¹²⁴ Roughly speaking, a relation some object bears to an object that is distinct from it. See
Francescotti 1999: 601–8 for the details.
¹²⁵ 2010: 471. See Francescotti 2014: 192–3 for further discussion.
¹²⁶ Wolff 2015 argues that quantum superpositions may be understood in this way.
 -    

like all other tropes. If we do not turn them into background notions of the
ontological theory that do not form part of the content of the theory,¹²⁷ the
individuation problem cannot be solved by appeal to the spatio-temporal
location of tropes, since we would try to individuate one thing (e.g. red-tropes)
in terms of things that themselves need individuation (such as spatial-location-
tropes). A plausible alternative approach to the problem is to individuate
tropes in terms of their co-location in bundles of tropes. What makes this
red-trope different from that one is that it occurs together with these tropes to
make up this post-box, whereas that one occurs together with those to make up
that post-box. The difficulty with this approach, elegant as it is, is that the
individuation of each trope now depends on other tropes it co-occurs with,
thereby undermining the claim that tropes are intrinsic properties.
We can try to defend the intrinsicality of tropes by taking them to be Primitive self-
primitively self-individuating, and indeed this seems to be the majority pos- individuation?
ition amongst trope theorists.¹²⁸ The difficulty with this approach is that it
introduces a set of additional brute facts (namely the distinctness between pairs
of tropes) that have to pay for themselves in terms of explanatory utility. The
motivation for introducing tropes in the first place is to come up with an
account that is both realist about properties (rejecting the nominalist idea that
there are only individuals) and can do without the peculiarities of universals
that seemingly transcend the restrictions of space and time in a spatio-
temporal world (since, unlike other things, universals can be simultaneously
present at multiple locations).¹²⁹ Tropes fit the bill nicely, since I can refer to
the redness of the rose in my garden, and the redness of the rose in my
neighbour’s garden last summer as distinct entities, and can still talk about
redness itself in terms of resemblance between them. According to this story it
is also evident that I could not create a red-trope identical with either, since
even if I constructed the perfect artificial rose, I could not put it in precisely the
same spatio-temporal location as either of them. This, however, is not what the
primitivist says. For him there is a brute fact about the nature of each redness
trope that makes them distinct, and that also keeps me from creating an
identical redness trope.
If we want to bring in brute facts we need to be clear what additional benefits
these new primitives yield in terms of explanatory power. And when consid-
ering the debate between those who favour spatio-temporal individuation of
tropes, and those who favour individuation as primitive,¹³⁰ it appears doubtful
that there is much the primitivist can account for that his opponent cannot.

¹²⁷ Schaffer 2001: 251; Allen 2016: 53.

¹²⁸ See e.g. Campbell 1990: 69; Ehring 2011: 76 and the further references in Schaffer 2011: 248;
the position defended in Schaffer 2001 is a noteworthy exception.
¹²⁹ Schaffer 2001: 247–8. ¹³⁰ See Schaffer 2001; Allen 2016: 51–60.
   -    

Yet if we accept the spatio-temporal identification of tropes they are very hard
to defend as examples of intrinsic properties.
Mental entities. Other kinds of ontological theories seem even less compatible with intrinsic
properties. If we consider a kind of idealist theory taking mental entities as its
fundamental objects it is hard to see how any of these could have intrinsic
properties. Obviously an understanding of intrinsicality in terms of spatial
boundaries does not apply in this case, but we could use the loneliness criterion
mentioned above. A property would then count as intrinsic if it could be had
by a mental entity in a lonely state. But how much sense could we make of a
mental entity in a lonely state, of a world in which there was nothing but a
single idea? Not only do mental entities tend to bring along their bearer, they
also seem to be clear candidates of objects that can only occur in groups.¹³¹ But
if we cannot have an idea on its own, but only in the context of other ideas,
the question of which of their properties could exist in a lonely state does not
even arise.
Mathematical Similar difficulties arise if we wanted to claim that the world consists
objects. fundamentally of mathematical objects. Given the success of the structuralist
conception of mathematics, it is very hard to argue that mathematical objects
could exist in a lonely state. If each mathematical object is a place in a structure,
taking the object out of the structure is about as sensible as taking a bubble out
of water—we end up with nothing at all. Even if we subscribe to the Platonist
conception and regard each number as a necessarily existent individual no
object can fulfil the loneliness criterion, simply because their necessary exist-
ence means that they all exist in any context. Ontologically isolating one of
them is not even a logical possibility.
It therefore seems to be the case that although neither shape nor rest mass
turned out to be reliable candidates for being an intrinsic property, the
materialist conception still appears to be the best framework for defending
the existence of intrinsic properties. Accommodating them in alternative
scenarios seems to be less easy.
The above remarks have obviously not been able to present a comprehensive
case against intrinsic properties—doing so is quite beyond a section of a book,
and possibly even beyond a sequence of books. Still, the fact that neither shape
nor mass appear to be as clear examples of intrinsic properties as we might
have hoped, and the fact that no general existence proof for intrinsic properties
seems to be on the horizon might well have undermined our faith in the
view that an account of intrinsic properties is going to save ontological

¹³¹ An idealist who dropped both of these assumptions, assuming that there could be bearerless
mental events, and that mental events did not require other such events to exist at the same time
could probably make sense of a mental event existing in a lonely state at a given time, and thereby
argue for the intrinsicality of mental events.
 -    

foundationalism. We might still, however, have the nagging suspicion that we

cannot do without them. How can we even make sense of a world in which Ontologies that
do without
every property is extrinsic? I want to conclude this section on intrinsic prop-
intrinsic
erties by looking at two such accounts, accounts that argue for non- properties.
foundationalism on the basis of rejecting intrinsic properties and assume
that at the bottom level the world is a mathematical object. One is due to
Randall Dipert, who argues that at the ultimate level the world is a graph, the
other one comes from Graham Priest, who considers a theory according to
which the world is a very large non-well-founded set.
§97 Non-foundationalism and the Rejection of Intrinsic Properties
Randall Dipert’s graph-theoretic ontology¹³² is an attempt to make several Dipert’s graph-
structural features of a non-foundational ontology more precise. It tries to spell theoretic
ontology.
out a version of a relation-based metaphysics by reference to some simple yet
intriguing mathematical results.¹³³ Unsatisfied with the resources of set-
theoretic semantics of predicate logic for describing ontological structure he
instead opts for graph theory, aiming to show that we can conceive of the
underlying structure of the world as a graph. A graph consists only of vertices
and edges, which appear structurally alike to individuals and symmetric two-
place relations. This similarity is also the source of a potential problem, since it
seems clear that we cannot have a world just consisting of individuals and
symmetric two-place relations between them. For how could be distinguish a
relation that connects a and b from one that connects c and e, if we not already
had a set of properties that distinguished the individuals amongst each other?
Our ontology therefore appears to require at least individuals, relations, and
one-place properties.
Dipert argues that this problem is in fact illusory, for it will not be applicable Asymmetric
to asymmetric graphs. Informally speaking, an asymmetric graph is a graph graphs.

where each vertex can be distinguished from any other vertex simply by
considering the edges that connect it and other vertices. If we consider a simple
graph with three vertices connected in a ‘v’-shape it is clear that the vertices
that form the endpoints of the two legs are indistinguishable in this way: each is
connected to precisely one other vertex. But if the number of vertices and edges
goes up, we frequently find cases where each vertex has its own ‘connection-
signature’.¹³⁴ But this means that the individuation of the vertices does not
have to be done by one-place properties (such as labels for the vertices), but can

¹³² Dipert 1997.

¹³³ His aim is to argue for a form of ‘exclusive relationism’ according to which ‘two- or higher-
place relations are basic and thus required for a structural account of the world’, while no one-place
properties need to be assumed (Dipert 1997: 337).
¹³⁴ We can prove that for each graph with more than five vertices there is at least one such
asymmetric graph.
   -    

arise from the very graph itself. This then opens the way for an ontology in
which one-place properties are regarded as merely derivative, while two-place
relations are primary. This is not because the one-place properties are con-
structed from the relations, but because the relations, put together in the right
way, give rise to a set of distinct individuals, individuals the distinctness of
which can then be cashed out in terms of one-place properties.
Parsimony of The main argument for this unusual construction Dipert presents is based
this approach. on considerations of parsimony. If we have an ontology that regards space-
time points as ontologically basic we need to assume that there is a distinct
one-place property that makes every one of these points distinct from every
other point. We therefore need to postulate infinitely many such properties.
The graph-theoretic approach presented here, on the other hand, only needs to
assume the existence of a single symmetric two-place relation between the
vertices. All further entities can then be understood as shorthand for patterns
of connections between the vertices formed by this relation.
Moreover, Dipert’s system not only promises qualitative, but also quantita-
tive parsimony. He argues that the ‘entities closest to a common-sense notion
of an entity will be connected subgraphs’ of the world graph,¹³⁵ i.e. graphs such
that there is a path from every vertex to every other vertex in the graph via an
edge. The number of subgraphs even for very small graphs is large; a graph
with forty vertices will contain 2⁴⁰ subgraphs. Thus even a graph with a low
three-digit number of vertices will contain a number of constituents commen-
surate with the number of particles in the universe. It looks as if the graph-
theoretic model can account for much of the complexity of the world on an
extremely sparse basis.
Looking at the matter in another way confirms this point. If we distinguish
individuals by one-place properties, as the number of individuals to be distin-
guished goes up, so does that of the properties required for their distinction.
To distinguish two individuals, we just need one property (one has them, the
other does not); to distinguish 16 we need at least four (the first has all four,
the last lacks all four, with all the other possibilities in between). In general,
to distinguish n objects, we will need at least log₂n one-place properties.¹³⁶ On
the graph-theoretic account, on the other hand, the amount of primitives
required does not go up as more entities need to be distinguished. As we can
show that there is at least one asymmetric graph for any order greater than five,

¹³⁵ Dipert 1997: 352.

¹³⁶ In many materialist ontologies the greatest number of these one-place properties will be
those of being particular space-time points (assuming the account is not relationalist about space-
time). Once all of these properties are in place we can then use them to uniquely characterize (and
hence distinguish) every particle in the universe.
 -    

any arbitrary number of entities can be characterized in terms of asymmetric

graphs based on a single relation.¹³⁷
Dipert argues that the reason for the prominence of talk of individuals and Epistemological
their one-place properties is epistemological, not ontological. We talk and justification of
individual/
think in such ways not because they correspond to the way the world is property
structured at a deep level, but because these ways prove to be computationally ontology.

more tractable than the relational version.¹³⁸ Conceiving of the world as built
up of individuals and properties makes it easier to think about it, but it gives us
no licence for drawing ontological conclusions.
We might wonder, however, despite Dipert’s aim to account for the ‘ “con- Is this a non-
nectedness” of all things’,¹³⁹ whether his account is not in fact a foundationalist foundationalist
proposal?
one. At the bottom level there is the big asymmetric graph that constitutes the
world, and everything else is an abstraction from it. Dipert’s fundamental stuff
is not individuals differentiated by one-place properties, but that does not
imply that his account fails to feature an ontological bottom level.
However, matters are not so straightforward. We cannot simply say that on
Dipert’s model the vertices and edges (whatever they are)¹⁴⁰ are fundamental,
and everything else is derivative. For the vertices only emerge as distinct
entities from the structure of an asymmetric graph of sufficient complexity,
and we can only talk about relation-instances once we are clear about the
distinctness or not of the vertices connected by the edges. The graph relies on
the vertices (since without vertices there is no graph), but the vertices also rely
on the graph (without the individuation by the graph we would not be able to
speak about them as distinct individuals). We cannot even regard the sym-
metric two-place relation as ontologically fundamental, since it can only exist
when it has determinate objects to relate, and the existence of the relations in
an asymmetric graph are what is supposed to bring determinate objects (i.e. the
vertices) into existence in the first place.
At the heart of Dipert’s system lies no ontological rock-bottom, but a
circular dependency structure. This structure fixes the identity of things
which themselves make up the structure. For this reason it makes no sense
to ask how the vertices and edges could ever have been put together in the first
place, as neither could have been present without the other.
Dipert’s proposal is most frequently discussed not as an alternative frame- Dipert and
work for ontology, but in the context of accounts of providing an analysis of dispositions.

dispositional properties. We have already mentioned above that dispositional

¹³⁷ Dipert 1997: 350. ¹³⁸ Dipert 1997: 342. ¹³⁹ Dipert 1997: 329.
¹⁴⁰ At the end of his essay (1997: 358) Dipert makes the somewhat hand-waving remark that the
vertices of the world-graph may be considered to be ‘pure feelings (Peircean “firstnesses”)’.
Without further discussion it is hard to assess this idea. What is clear, however, is that Oderberg’s
interpretation of these vertices as fundamental physical objects (Oderberg 2011: 5) are not what
Dipert has in mind (as he points out explicitly).
   -    

properties like being fragile, or being magnetic do not qualify as intrinsic, since
they rely on other objects to bring about their manifestation. The glass needs to
be hit with something to shatter, the magnet requires some magnetic object in
order to display its attractive power. But the dependent nature of dispositions
also manifests in a different form. We usually spell out the existence of
dispositional properties in terms of non-dispositional, categorical properties.
The fragility of the glass is a manifestation of its specific molecular structure,
and this is spelt out in terms of non-dispositional properties. As such we have a
chain of properties that depend on each other, with the whole chain being
grounded in categorical properties (either because there are fundamental
categorical properties, or because there is an infinite descent of properties
that depend on each other, but they are all categorical). In fact it is more useful
Powers. in this context to speak of powers, instead of dispositions. Powers relate to
dispositions as a person’s characters to their character-traits: powers bestow
dispositions, and one power can be the source of different dispositions. Nega-
tive charge, for example, bestows the disposition to exert Coulomb forces and
the disposition to emit electromagnetic radiation when accelerated.¹⁴¹ The
alternative to the postulation of a bottom-level of categorical properties is a
pure powers ontology, the position that all fundamental entities are powers,¹⁴²
making it unnecessary to rely on a fundamental level of categorical
properties.¹⁴³
Pure powers and An objection frequently raised against a pure powers theory is that since
determination of
powers have their identity determined by their manifestations, if the manifest-
identity.
ation is yet another power its needs its identity determined before it can
determine that of the first power, but this is not going to happen, since either
this determination is infinitely deferred (if it is powers all the way down) or
something needs to determine its own identity (if it is powers all the way
round). This objection can be addressed by adapting Dipert’s proposal, repre-
senting the powers by the vertices of the graph, and the manifestation relation
by its edges. As the structure of the asymmetric graph is able to determine
the identity of the vertices, the defender of a pure powers ontology can argue

¹⁴¹ For further discussion of the difference between powers and dispositions see Yates 2013,
2018: 4528.
¹⁴² Note that there can be a version of a pure powers theory that does not admit fundamental
properties, for example by saying that while there may be categorical properties at the level of
everyday acquaintance, once we analyse reality in greater detail it is powers all the way down.
¹⁴³ See Bird 2007: 513–34 for an attempt to defend a pure powers ontology with reference to
Dipert’s idea. The feasibility of this is questioned in Lowe 2010b; 2012. For a response to Lowe see
Yates 2018 (though it is unlikely that Lowe would have accepted the symmetric grounding relation
proposed by Yates).
A context in which similar questions arise is in the discussion of causal essentialism, the claim
that the nature of objects is exhausted by the causal relations in which they stand. See Shoemaker
1980; Mumford 2004.
 -    

that identity of the individual powers is determined by the network of

manifestation relations as a whole, not by the relation of any particular
power and its manifestation.
Given that much of the discussion of Dipert’s approach considers the
usefulness of asymmetric graphs as a tool in the defence of a pure powers
ontology, a great part of the debate about the feasibility of his non-
foundationalist ontology is intertwined with assessing the metaphysical status
of powers and dispositions, issues that are not central for the questions we are
concerned with here. While we cannot provide an assessment of the criticism
of the graph-theoretic approach in the context of the metaphysics of powers,
there is at least one more general objection to his proposal that is worthwhile
considering.
This objection concerns the coherence of the notion of circular dependence. Circular
That such dependence can be spelt out in a consistent manner has been dependence.
questioned by various philosophers.¹⁴⁴ Regarding the dependence of some
entity on another for fixing its identity Jonathan Lowe notes that
[t]he problem [ . . . ] is that no property can get its identity fixed, because each property
owes its identity to yet another – and so on and on, in a way that, very plausibly,
generates either a vicious infinite regress or a vicious circle.¹⁴⁵

David Oderberg agrees, making a point specifically about the nature of powers
being determined by their actualizations:
If a power’s determinate nature is to be fixed by its relation to its actualization, then if
that actualization were itself a power whose nature required further actualization, and if
such a chain of powers and actualizations terminated in the original power under
consideration which was putatively to function as the actualization of a prior power
in the chain, then the nature of the original power would be determined, at least in part,
by its own nature. Yet the determinacy of its own nature is what is originally in question,
hence the viciousness of the circle.¹⁴⁶

Both authors are right in pointing out that there seems to be something A concrete
intrinsically odd about first demanding that something needs its identity example.
fixed, and then saying that it is fixed (at least partly) by the thing itself.
A stick that cannot stand by itself cannot be made to do so by leaning against
itself, but needs to lean against a wall. Still, if we lean three (or more) sticks
against each other, they all stand up. In this case stick a leans against stick b, b
leans against c, and, since the relation is transitive, a leans against itself. Here
the ‘is propped up by’ relation seems to function very similarly to the ‘has its
nature determined by’ relation in Oderberg’s example.

¹⁴⁴ We discussed some of the problems connected with circular dependence in §91.
¹⁴⁵ 2006: 138. ¹⁴⁶ 2012: 209–10.
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Such examples are not confined to the concrete. We can construct examples
An abstract of sets of sentences where each sentence only talks about other sentences in the
example.
set, yet we are still able to assign truth values to the sentences, despite the fact
that nothing outside of the set is referred to. Simple examples of these are the
‘knights and knaves’ puzzled popularized by Raymond Smullyan.¹⁴⁷ Knights
always say the truth, knaves always lie, and the goal is to determine who is who
on the basis of their assertions. Consider the following example, which consists
of four statements, each made by one of four characters named A, B, C, and D:

A says: B is a knave and C is a knight.

B says: If D is a knight, then C is a knave.
C says: A is a knight, if and only if E is a knight.
D says: A is a knave and B is a knight.

We can work out that the only consistent assignment of truth-values is that A’s
statement is false, B’s is true, C’s is false, and D’s is true. These statements
acquire their truth-values only through their places in a network, and this
network is circular (e.g. A’s statement refers to the truth-value of all of C’s
utterances, who in turn refers to the truth-value of all of A’s utterances).¹⁴⁸
What examples such as these show is that the mere fact of circularity is not
sufficient for demonstrating viciousness. We need an indication why a circle of
mutually determining powers is more problematic than a circle of mutually
supporting sticks, or mutually determining truth-values in order to explain
why we should not accept circular dependency structures in the case of Dipert’s
graph-theoretic model.
Priest’s theory of A second interesting example of a non-foundationalist ontology is the
loci.
theory of loci developed by Graham Priest.¹⁴⁹ The motivation for this theory
is closely connected with the critique of intrinsic properties. Priest argues for a
Relational ‘relational quidditism’, that is, for the view that everything is what it is due to
quidditism. its relation to other things (hence nothing could be what it is intrinsically). His
argument for this view (at least in the case of spatio-temporal entities) is that
objects change, and that in order to make sense of them as persisting through
time we need to conceive of them as gaining and losing properties or parts.¹⁵⁰
The ship of Theseus is the obvious example for illustrating his point. We need
to conceive of the ship in terms of the planks its loses and gains through the
history of its repairs. Of course the difficulty is that there is no entity that stays
constant throughout this exchange process as the recipient of the gains and
losses. For this reason it is advantageous to consider the ship itself as a mere
empty placeholder to which various relations attach. Seen in this way, there is

¹⁴⁷ See Aszalós 2000, 533–40.

¹⁴⁸ See also the Dean/Nixon example in Kripke 1975: 695–6.
¹⁴⁹ Priest 2009. ¹⁵⁰ Priest 2014: 171–2.
 -    

nothing that it is to be the ship of Theseus separate from its relation to

other objects.
In order to spell out this relational quidditism, Priest needs to develop a
thoroughly relationalist ontology. What this means can be most easily Relationalist
ontology.
explained by considering the controversy between Newton and Leibniz about
the nature of space. For Newton, spatial points are substantial entities that exist
on their own accord, for Leibniz they are mere abstractions derived from
spatial relations. Being at a specific place is not being related to a specific
spatial point, but standing in certain spatial relations with other objects. In the
Leibnizian picture, the spatial points evaporate into a network of relations.
Now the aim of a thoroughly relationist ontology is to similarly evaporate all
individuals, conceiving of all of them as simply abstracted from relations. On
the face of it this may seems like a fool’s errand: for if we replace some
individuals with some network of relations, these relations have to relate
some other individuals, and if we replace these again by yet other relations
these will need individuals to instantiate them and so forth. Individuals will re-
occur at each level of the analysis, and so the relationist’s elimination of
individuals can only ever be local, but never global.
To assess whether this criticism is justified it is necessary to spell out the
global relationist’s enterprise in more detail. Priest formulates his approach in
terms of a labelled graph, a simple and perspicuous framework for thinking Relationalism
about individuals and relations between them. We think of the vertices of the and labelled
graphs.
graph as the individuals and consider the directed edges or arrows as the
relations between them. If an arrow R goes from a to b, the individual a stands
in the relation R to the individual b. Of course more than one arrow can start at
a given vertex. If a is taller than b and heavier than c, two distinct arrows, one
for the ‘taller than’ and one for the ‘heavier than’ relation would be shown as
departing from vertex a. We can now group together all the vertices that have a
common origin. This means forming a relation (an equivalence relation, in
fact) between co-originating arrows (or relations that share the first relatum).
At this point we need one more preliminary step, namely closing the set of
relations on the objects under complementation. What this means is simply
that whenever some relation R connects some objects, we postulate that there is
a different relation, R, such that R relates all the objects that R does not relate.
The result of this move is that now every object is related to every other object
in the set, either by one of the original relations, or by one of the subsequently
introduced ‘negative’ relations. In graph-theoretic terms there is now an arrow
going from every vertex to every other vertex.
At this point we can go back to our concept of co-originating arrows and
define a locus as a set of such arrows. Since all objects are accessible by arrows
now that we have closed under complementation we can then replace the
individuals simply by loci.
   -    

A toy example. It may be helpful to illustrate Priest’s construction by means of a small toy
example. Assume our initial set of individuals consists of just three objects: a
cube a, a cube b, and the number 0. Assume further that we have two relations,
H and B, ‘heavier than’ and ‘bigger than’, and that a is heavier than b, and
that b is bigger than a. In its graph-theoretic representation we would have an
H-arrow going from a to b, and a B-arrow going from b to a.
If we close the set of relations {Hab, Bba} under complementation we end up
with the following larger set: {Hab, Bba, Hba, Haa, Hbb, H0a, Ha0, H0b, Hb0,
H00, Bab, Baa, Bbb, B0a, Ba0, B0b, Bb0, B00}. In the graph-theoretic repre-
sentation of this, all of the three individuals are connected by arrows of both
directions with each other individual. Forming the set of loci of each individual
is easy; la, the locus of a, is just the set of all relation-instances having a as their
first member, {Hab, Haa, Ha0, Bab, Baa, Ba0}, lb the set of all relation-
instances having b as their first member, {Bba, Hba, Hbb, Hb0, Bbb, Bb0}
and l0 the set of all relation-instances having 0 as their first member, {H0a,
H0b, H00, B0a, B0b, B00}.
Eliminativism in It is now clear that whatever we can accomplish talking about the original
favour of loci.
individuals we can accomplish by talking about these sets of relations. At this
stage the argument needs to appeal to a form of eliminativism, for the point is
not simply that the loci give us another, if somewhat more roundabout way of
talking about the individuals, but that the existence of the loci makes the
individuals ontologically superfluous. Once the loci are in place, we can
eliminate the objects in favour of relations; at the ontological level no commit-
ment to objects is necessary any more. The justification of this form of
eliminativism is presumably an appeal to parsimony: if we can explain all we
want to explain by reference to one kind of thing (relations), why assume there
is also a second kind of thing (individuals)?
Loci as the In itself this process is not too interesting, since we have merely replaced one
fundamental
level.
domain with another one: instead of being committed to a bunch of objects we
are now committed to a bunch of relations. Why this would yield any particu-
lar theoretical advantage is not immediately apparent. There is a sense in which
we have fulfilled the pure relationist’s agenda, for all individuals have been
removed, and all we are left with are first- and second-order relations. Yet in
another sense we have just moved the previous individual-property model one
level higher up, with relations playing the role of individuals, and second-order
relations playing the role of the original first-order relations.
Repeating the For this reason Priest’s construction does not stop here. It is because the world
elimination
infinitely often.
we end up with structurally resembles the world of individuals and properties so
much that we can repeat the entire process at the next level. We can define a
higher-order relation that allows us to form the loci of loci, and once this is done
we can throw out the original loci as we earlier threw out the individuals. We
then repeat this process infinitely many times up the hierarchy.
 -    

Coming back to our example, we can introduce a new relation R which

holds between two loci if and only if the total number of as in the relation-
instances of the first is strictly greater than the total number of as in the
relation-instances of the second. Closing under complementation we end up
with the following set of relations instances: {Rlalb, Rlal0, Rlala, . . . }. On the
basis of this we can now form the locus of each locus, that is lla, the locus of
la, llb, the locus of lb, and ll0, the locus of l0. Again, lla is just the set of all
relation-instances having la as their first member, i.e. {Rlalb, Rlal0, Rlala, . . . },
and so on.
As we keep repeating this process the resulting set-theoretic construction Forming the
becomes richer and richer, each one incorporating structures of the previous limit of this
process.
level. If we form the limit of this procedure we end up with an infinitely rich
structure. It is not identical with the empty set, even though we might have
initially thought that repeating this process infinitely many times gets rid of all
domains, since each domain is thrown out at some particular, finite stage. The
interesting thing about this structure is that in it nothing is fundamental. For
suppose there was: it would have to be the domain of the relation at some finite
stage (as the loci were the domain of the second-order relation in the first
example of the construction), but each such domain is thrown out at the next,
also finite stage. So there is no domain that survives into the limit of this
construction, and so nothing that could be considered as fundamental.
But what about the limit? Can we now not simply say that this construction
is what is fundamentally real according to this approach, and therefore con-
stitutes the ontological foundation, thereby undermining the account’s non-
foundationalist agenda? In response the non-foundationalist can point out that
the limit is simply a very complex set theoretic structure, that is some objects
with some relations between them. But this means we can simply re-run our
initial construction on these new objects, replacing individuals by loci and so
forth. There is then no stage where we are left with anything fundamental.
Priest argues that this move is in fact superfluous, for we could either assume
that the original set we analysed is either the universal set which contains
everything or, (if we have worries about the existence of such a thing)¹⁵¹ we
could assume that the original set included the limit as a subset, in which case it
would have already gone through the process of analysis.¹⁵²
This last move turns the construction from a straight infinite descent Non-
foundationalism
into something more exotic. It shows that the system described here is not a based on circular
non-foundationalism of infinite descent, but a non-foundationalism based dependence.
on circular dependence. We do not fail to hit rock bottom when we go
down the chain of ontological dependence because we encounter ever new

¹⁵¹ See Section 4.3 C of Chapter 4 for a discussion of some of these.

¹⁵² Priest 2014: 178–9.
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levels underneath, but because we meet the same objects we have already
encountered further up once more, now apparently down below.
An alternative Priest does in fact describe a variant of his system which incorporates
construction. circularity more centrally in its construction. In this variant, once the loci of
individuals have been formed, instead of considering relations between sets of
relations, we can alternatively continue the construction in terms of sets of
higher-order relations.¹⁵³
Come back again to our toy example and to the loci la, lb, and l0. There are
higher-order relations of relations between individuals. For example, Hab
being the converse of Hba is an instance of the second-order relation ‘being
the converse of’ (written R’HabHba). This fact allows us to regard the elements
of a locus as the set of higher-order relations of which that element forms the
first member. We can therefore replace the first element of la, Hab by its locus,
the set lHab = {R’HabHba, R’HabHab, . . . } containing all those relation-
instances from the closure of the set of second-order relation instances on
relations between individuals which contain Hab as their first element. Then
the first member of lHab, R’HabHba, can be replaced by a set of suitable
relation-instances of some third-order relation R’’. The limit of continuing this
Xω and Xο. process is a different infinitely complex set. The chief difference between these
two sets (which Priest calls Xω and Xο) is that the first is well-founded, while the
second is not. The reason for this is easy to see. In the case of Xω the set was getting
more and more complex by adding more structure around it, incorporating the
previous constructions as parts. In the case of Xο more and more structure is
added inside it. Xω resembles a bucket with an increasing diameter at higher levels,
Xο is like an inverted bucket. Following the set-theoretic hierarchy downwards the
first bucket turns out to have a bottom, while the second does not.
Priest is very explicit in pointing out that his construction does not lead to
Is this a form of nihilism, though I am not sure matters are quite as clear as he makes them
nihilism?
appear. First, he identifies nihilism with the position that there is only the
content of the empty set, and argues that the limit-structure he introduces is
distinct from the empty set. I doubt that the empty set is the best conceptual
tool for characterizing ontological nihilism. When there is the empty set, there
are sets, and whatever they are, they are something. Moreover, you cannot just
have the empty set. As long as you have any set, you have set formation, and
from this we can rebuild the entire set-theoretic hierarchy, and, if we follow
Quine, a substantial theory of the material world.¹⁵⁴ If the resulting theory
qualifies as nihilism, it is hard to see how anything would not.
Second, consider that Priest appears to argue that the individuals in his
original structure fail to exist in the end. After the construction of the loci these

¹⁵³ Priest 2009: 475. ¹⁵⁴ Quine 1981.

 -    

are ‘dispensed with’,¹⁵⁵ they ‘disappear under analysis’,¹⁵⁶ in the course of the
construction every ‘ontology is thrown away’.¹⁵⁷ So the loci are not just fancy
ways of referring to the same old world; their presence indicates that what they
analyse does not exist. This, however, will entail that since everything is
analysed away in the end, everything fails to exist, and this seems to be as
clear a statement of nihilism as one is ever likely to get.
Dipert’s and Priest’s account differ in a variety of ways. Priest presents us Dipert and
with a procedure for transforming a foundationalist ontology of individuals Priest.
and relations into a non-foundationalist one. First the individuals are replaced
by loci of relations, then these are replaced by other loci, and so on, up to the
limit. The resulting structure is then fed back into itself, so that the highest
level (the limit of the infinite construction) coincides with the lowest level
(the individuals and relations that stood at the beginning of the process of
replacement).
Dipert, on the other hand, sets out to build his ontology on a circular basis
from the beginning. The world graph consists of vertices and edges, the vertices
depending on the edges (since these are what they are vertices between), and
the edges depending on the vertices (since their connections in an asymmetric
graph establish their distinctness in the first place). On top of this circular
structure all other phenomena can be built.
What both accounts have in common is that they understand individuals as
projections of relations. In Priest’s case the loci that stand in for individuals are
generated by relations in a way analogous to the generation of the Kanizsa
triangle by its surrounding shapes. For Dipert what appears to us as a specific
individual turns out to be, when properly analysed, simply a particular “pure
graph structure”.¹⁵⁸

C Arguments from Specific Sciences

The final set of arguments for non-foundationalism we want to consider
draws its motivation from observations by specific sciences. If we regard results
from mathematical and empirical inquiry, and in particular the systematic
investigation of fields such as physics as a reliable guide to ontology, these
accounts argue, our ontological theories should be non-foundationalist.¹⁵⁹

¹⁵⁵ Priest 2014: 190. ¹⁵⁶ Priest 2014: 191.

¹⁵⁷ Priest 2009: 474. Note that Priest now regards this way of putting the matter as misleading
(personal communication). What the construction makes disappear, according to his understand-
ing, is the intrinsic nature of anything, i.e. the existence of anything that is not itself dependent.
Each of the loci has to be regarded as existent, though it only exists in a wholly dependent manner.
¹⁵⁸ See Oderberg 2012: 221.
¹⁵⁹ Several lines of arguments appear to ‘converge towards the conclusion that the world of
physical phenomena is groundless throughout’ (Bitbol 2007: 303), including reflections on the very
small (Cao and Schweber 1993) and the very large (Minkel 2002).
   -    

§98 The Mathematical World

Mathematical One set of arguments relevant in this context tries to to establish the claim that
entities as our world consists fundamentally of mathematical entities. Unintuitive as this
fundamental.
view may seem (how could we really believe that teacups and numbers are the
Quine. same kinds of things?), it has still found several proponents in the contempor-
ary literature. For the most straightforward way of making sense of this latter-
day Pythagoreanism it is worthwhile to go back to Quine’s essay on ‘Things
and Their Place in Theories’.¹⁶⁰ If we attempt a reductive explanation of the
things around us we would first reduce the world of medium-sized dry goods
to statements about very basic material objects, such as molecules, and from
there down to atoms, and subatomic particles. At this stage we do not have to
decide what the fundamental physical objects are, not even if there are any such
objects, since we can always understand matter at the most basic level in terms
of which space-time points are occupied.¹⁶¹ Instead of having a theory state
which fundamental particle is located where we can speak about which spatial
points are occupied at which period of time. In fact our theory can be made even
more minimalist. If we pick a fixed point in space, we can determine all other
points in terms of spatial coordinates relative to this point, and we can do the same
for time. In this way we can have a way of expressing space-time points as sets of
four positive or negative numbers, x, y, z, and t, where x, y, and z represent the
three spatial dimensions and t the temporal dimension. Numbers can then be
reduced to sets, and sets to constructions from the empty set. At this stage it looks
as if we can say everything we want to say about the material world in terms of an
immensely complicated story of constructions on the basis of the empty set.
Tegmark. There are other, more recent attempts to establish mathematical entities as
the most fundamental level of existence. One of the most detailed ones has
been developed by Max Tegmark. Tegmark’s version of the claim that reality is
fundamentally mathematical forms part of a complex theory of four multi-
verses stacked into each other (the first including distant parts of space, the
third the branching worlds according to the many-worlds interpretation of
quantum mechanics, and the fourth the collection of all mathematical struc-
tures). The details of the theory need not detain us here, but the core claim
relevant for our discussion is that ‘our physical world not only is described by
mathematics, but [ . . . ] is mathematical (a mathematical structure)’.¹⁶²

¹⁶⁰ Quine 1981.

¹⁶¹ In this context I shall ignore complications that arise for this picture at the quantum level due
to Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle.
¹⁶² Tegmark 2014. It is worthwhile noting, though, that the theory does not imply that
everything we can think of exists (existence at the most fundamental level still needs to be
established by mathematical existence proofs), nor that every theory can be deemed to be explicable
in mathematical terms, so that the entities it describes exist (as not every theory can be mathem-
atized). See 2007: 16–17.
 -    

Assuming we accept the claim that mathematical entities are the only
fundamentally real objects (whether in the Quinean form just described, or
on the basis of multiverse theory) we need to consider exactly what kind of
entities we are committing ourselves to. In the development of the philosophy
of mathematics over the last few decades structuralism has proven to be a Structuralism in
particularly successful account of mathematical objects. One of its advantages the philosophy
of mathematics.
is that it provided an answer to the vexed problem of the epistemology of
mathematical objects. Since it is hard to explain how we could have knowledge
of abstract objects that are in themselves neither spatial nor temporal, struc-
turalism allows for some mathematical structures to be abstracted from spatio-
temporal entities, and others (the unexempliefied ones) to be constructed from
the first kind of structures. This approach entails that mathematical objects are
considered as places in mathematical structures, and thereby eventually as
individuals that drop out of a network of relations. Since mathematical objects
are not identified with individuals in any particular instantiation of one
structure we are also able to find a way around the question of what happens
when two distinct sets of object instantiate the same structure (as in the case of
the Ernie and Johnny problem).¹⁶³ The mathematical object is neither, but
occupies the space carved out by the relations between the different objects in
the two structures.
One immediate consequence of the structuralist picture in the philosophy of
mathematics is that it is not meaningful to speak of mathematical objects in
isolation. While on certain conceptions of the natural numbers it would be
meaningful of talk about a situation in which the existence of number 100 is
quite independent to that of number 101,¹⁶⁴ this is not possible in the struc-
turalist case. The existence of each natural number depends on each other
number and on the set of numerical relations in the natural number structure.
Tegmark offers three main arguments for why we should believe that the Arguments for
Tegmark’s
world is mathematical at the most fundamental level. The first argument points position.
out that if we successfully describe some part of nature with a mathematical
theory, we claim that this description is based on an isomorphism between 1. Isomorphism.
description and described: the mathematical structure we have in mind is
instantiated in the world. But if two structures are isomorphic, they are
identical.¹⁶⁵ For this reason the structure of the world has to literally be the
mathematical structure, and not simply be describable by that structure. This
argument is unlikely to convince the yet unconverted. While it is of course true

¹⁶³ Benacerraf 1965.

¹⁶⁴ For example if one held that the existence of numbers depends on the presence of sufficiently
many objects to count. In a world with only a hundred objects, there would be no number 101.
¹⁶⁵ Tegmark 2008: 107.
   -    

that isomorphic structures are identical, what we consider in the physical case
is the identity of a given structure S described by a mathematical theory and the
structure of some piece of the world W. And while it is uncontroversial that S is
identical with the structure of W, this does not yet give us that S is identical
with W. The structure of W may be regarded as one of its properties, or as an
abstract object related to W, but the fact that a property or an entity related to
W are the same as a mathematical structure does not entail its identity with W.
2. Intrinsic The second argument is that everything in the physical description of the
properties of
fundamental
world that has some claim to fundamentality (space, elementary particles, the
entities. wavefunction) has as its only intrinsic properties mathematical properties, and
must therefore itself be a mathematical object.¹⁶⁶ In the case of elementary
particles, for example, each particle can be described by its own unique set of
quantum numbers, and these quantum numbers are also all the properties the
particles have in themselves.¹⁶⁷ In this case everything that can be asserted
about a particle’s nature can be derived from these numbers, and to this extent
we can simply identify the particle with a set of numbers, hence equating it
with a mathematical object.
3. Topic-neutral Tegmark’s third argument tries to generalize this idea and attempts to derive
description. the mathematical nature of the world directly from the assumption that there is
an external, mind-independent world.¹⁶⁸ If there is such a world, it should be
describable with concepts that are as far as possible topic-neutral, in a way that
does not rely on the various contingent factors that form the basis of how
humans conceptualize the world. Mathematics is the epitome of such a topic-
neutral description, and if the only way we can make sense of reality in a mind-
independent fashion is by describing it in mathematical terms, this is what the
reality described must be in its very nature.
Applicability of The mathematical conception of ultimate reality also has the advantage that
mathematics. it immediately solves the problem of why mathematical structures can be
successfully applied to the world—namely because the reality these structures
describe is nothing else but these very structures.¹⁶⁹ This, Tegmark argues, also
implies that the conception of the fundamentally mathematical nature of
reality is open to empirical testing.¹⁷⁰ Such a test is based on the observation
that in the past mathematics developed descriptions of mathematical struc-
tures that later proved to have physical applications. If it happened that this
process stopped at some time, i.e. that further structures discussed by math-
ematicians failed to have physical applications, if ‘there would be no further
mathematical regularities left to discover’ in nature, even though we still lacked
a comprehensive understanding of the universe—then this would count
against the idea that the world was mathematical at its most fundamental

¹⁶⁶ Tegmark 2014: 253–4. ¹⁶⁷ Tegmark 2014: 164. ¹⁶⁸ Tegmark 2014: 271, 281.
¹⁶⁹ Tegmark 2007: 4. ¹⁷⁰ Tegmark 2007: 4, 25–6, 2014: 355–6.
 -    

level. There would be parts we could no longer get to grips with using
mathematical tools.¹⁷¹
Tegmark occasionally refers to his theory as a form of ‘radical Platonism’,¹⁷²
though we have to be careful about how exactly to understand this. Platonism
can refer to the position that mathematical entities exists in an objective, mind-
independent way, in addition it sometimes means that there are necessarily
existent mathematical individuals, and that each of them is not only independ-
ent from us and our conceptualizations, but also from each other mathematical
entity. While Tegmark clearly embraces the first form, he equally clearly
distances himself from the second. In fact he considers this theory to specif-
ically address an explanatory regress problem connected with the postulation
of individuals: if the properties of every individual have to be explained in
terms of the properties of its constituents parts, and if there are no smallest Explanatory
parts, our explanations will have to go on forever. Tegmark suggests that his regress and
structuralism.
theory
offers a radical solution to this problem: at the bottom level, reality is a mathematical
structure, so its parts have no intrinsic properties at all! [ . . . ] [W]e live in a relational
reality, in the sense that the properties of the world around us stem not from
properties of its ultimate building blocks, but from the relations between these
building blocks.¹⁷³

This account has the consequence of identifying the final questions concerning
the ontology of our world with those of the ontology of structuralism. What
there is fundamentally is a network of mathematical relations, not a set of
necessarily existent individuals.¹⁷⁴
It therefore appears to be the case that if (a) we want to commit ourselves to Structuralism
the claim that reality is at the most fundamental level mathematical and (b) if and non-
foundationalism
we endorse a structuralist understanding of mathematical entities we must also
endorse non-foundationalism. For according to the structuralist understand-
ing mathematics is not built up in a hierarchical fashion with some primitive
objects at the ground level, and various more or less elaborate constructions
built on top of them, but forms a web of mutually dependent entities, where the

¹⁷¹ Tegmark also mentions the possibility (2014: 356) that the existence of fundamental
randomness in nature would also count as an argument against the mathematical nature of reality.
A mathematical structure is fixed (in Tegmark’s block-universe there is no change, but only the
appearance of change) and has no place for randomly changing processes.
¹⁷² Tegmark 2014: 321.
¹⁷³ Tegmark 2014: 267. He identifies his account as ‘the “ontic” version of structural realism’
(2007: 4).
¹⁷⁴ Of course this does not imply that intrinsic properties have disappeared altogether, since on
this kind of Platonist account there continues to be one big object, the collection of all mathem-
atical entities, and this object has various intrinsic properties.
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existence and identity of each object is determined by the relations in which it

stands with other objects.
Mathematical It is a curious fact that Tegmark’s mathematical basis of existence seems to
reality share the same fate as the naturalist’s nature or material reality: it recedes into
disappears in the
transcendent. the transcendent, changing from a straightforwardly accessible epistemic
object to something that is no longer quite so close to hand. When the
materialist claims that all is matter, or the physicalist claims that the most
fundamental kinds of things are what physics talks about he will usually not
assume this to mean ‘matter as we currently understand it’ or ‘what present
physics talks about’, since there are so many phenomena we cannot at present
explain on these bases. He will rather have some more idealized understanding
of matter or the domain of physics in mind, which makes it more plausible to
conceive of the associated theories as explanatorily comprehensive, but also
makes it considerably harder to understand just what kind of theory materialism
or physicalism does advocate. When Tegmark argues that all is mathematics, the
question ‘which mathematics?’ naturally arises. From the beginning of the
philosophy of mathematics there have been discussions about which parts of
mathematics are to be considered to be part of mathematical reality, and which
are not. The spectrum of views ranged from Kronecker’s idea that to exist as a
mathematical object means to be constructible from the natural numbers in a
finite number of steps (‘Die ganzen Zahlen hat der liebe Gott gemacht, alles
andere ist Menschenwerk.’)¹⁷⁵ to Hilbert’s position that every consistent set of
axioms picks out a set of mathematical objects. Tegmark himself is sceptical of
the existence of the continuum—for him ‘infinity is merely a way of speaking’.¹⁷⁶
The chief motivation for his view is that if we do not allow the continuum in, we
can restrict the thesis that the basis of existence is the collection of all mathem-
atical structures to the claim that it is the collection of all computable mathem-
atical structures. This comes with the benefit of defending the hypothesis of the
mathematical nature of all existence from various charges of inconsistency and
incompleteness arising from modern logic.¹⁷⁷ Such scepticism about infinity
leads Tegmark to a certain epistemic pessimism that implies that our current
beliefs about mathematical objects do not possess the epistemic certainty we
would usually want to ascribe to them. Mathematical reality is ‘out there’ and
is a structure that ‘is both the totality of what has mathematical existence and
the totality of what has physical existence’ but it is a ‘transcendent structure
whose nature we still do not fully understand’.¹⁷⁸ Even if we knew that the
fundamental layer of the world is mathematics, we would still know consid-
erably less than we might think we do.

¹⁷⁵ See Goodstein 1951. ¹⁷⁶ Tegmark 2014: 316.

¹⁷⁷ See Tegmark 2007: 20–4 for further discussion of this point.
¹⁷⁸ Tegmark 2007: 19, 2014: 337.
 -    

§99 Ontic Structural Realism

Not all scientific arguments for non-foundationalism rely on the controversial Structuralism
assumption that everything is mathematical, however.¹⁷⁹ An example of a non- based on current
scientific
foundationalist theory that considers itself as based on current scientific practice practice.
(rather than on pre-scientific, ‘common sense’ intuitions) is the theory of Ontic
Structural Realism defended, inter alia, by James Ladyman, Don Ross, Steven
French, and Simon Saunders.¹⁸⁰ They argue that inductive considerations provide
evidence against the foundationalist assumption. Most generally speaking, every
time science has postulated entities as fundamental they have turned out not to be
fundamental. If this process can be expected to continue, there cannot be a
fundamental level of existence.¹⁸¹ More specifically, they point out that much
pressure is put on the foundationalist conception by results from modern phys-
ics.¹⁸² This is not only the case because according to the relativistic picture space-
time points do not appear to have their identity and diversity settled by intrinsic
properties, but through the network of relations in which they stand. In addition, in
the quantum mechanical case quantum entanglement seems to make it impossible
to understand the relations between the entangled particles in terms of the intrinsic
properties of each of them.¹⁸³ The intuitive picture of a foundational ground level of
entities that have all the properties they have in splendid isolation, and give rise to
the complexity of the world by recombination does not cohere well with the
conception of physical reality emerging from modern physics.¹⁸⁴

¹⁷⁹ For an interesting non-foundationalist perspective on cosmology see Minkel 2002, arguing
that large-scale features of the universe determine the features at the microlevel as much as the
other way round.
¹⁸⁰ Ladyman and Ross 2007; French and Ladyman 2010; Saunders 2003, French 2014, ch. 7. For
a specific discussion of S-dualities that have ‘tentatively been taken to signal the triumph of ontic
structural realism’ see McKenzie 2015.
¹⁸¹ Ladyman and Ross 2007: 178. See also note 110 above.
¹⁸² See also Morganti 2015: 569: ‘When one looks at the issue in more detail, however, it seems to me
that science does not in fact have a lot to say in favour of metaphysical foundationalism, and that what we
are dealing with is mere intuition, reinforced by some contingent facts from the history of physics in their
more or less usual interpretation’ (emphases in the original). Morganti focuses in particular on Hans
Dehmelt’s model of elementary particles based on infinite regression (Dehmelt 1989).
¹⁸³ Ladyman and Ross 2007: 151; French and Ladyman 2010: 26.
¹⁸⁴ Maudlin 1998: 59. It is of course possible to interpret the claim that all our knowledge of the
world comes in structural terms not as a guide to the way reality is, but as an expression of the
limitations of our knowledge. That we can only get hold of the structural features is then taken to
suggest that the other, non-structural features (essences, intrinsic natures, haecceities) are properties
of the things in themselves, and forever beyond our ken. To use Kantian terminology here, the
phenomena might have to be construed in structuralist terms, but this does not yet show us that there
could not be non-structural features had by the noumena. This is, I think a temptation to be resisted,
for two reasons. First, as Ladyman and Ross point out (2007: 154) it is hard not to see such
transcendent elements as ‘idle wheels’; they do not seem to explain much about how the world
appears to us, a fact which is hardly surprising given that there does not appear to be any way in which
we could interact with them, or they with us. Second, appealing to things in themselves seems to be a
too facile a method for supplying philosophical notions with a home that we find it otherwise hard to
argue for. If we find it difficult to establish the existence of property P as there seems to be little
evidence for it, attaching it to things in themselves and arguing that it is their very remoteness that is
responsible for the limited amount of evidence is usually not going to be a very convincing strategy.
   -    

Real patterns. Ladyman and Ross summarize their position as follows:

The tentative metaphysical hypothesis of this book, which is open to empirical falsifi-
cation, is that there is no fundamental level, that the real patterns criterion of reality is
the last word in ontology, and there is nothing more to the existence of a structure than
what it takes for it to be a real pattern.¹⁸⁵

Compression The term ‘real pattern’ was first introduced by Daniel Dennett.¹⁸⁶ What do
and Ladyman and Ross mean by ‘real pattern’? Simplifying their account somewhat
projectability.
we can say that real patterns are characterized by two properties, compression
and projectability. The former means that a pattern in some data can be
expressed in a shorter way than the entire data, it compresses the data into a
shorter form. To say that we can make out the figure of an elephant in a dot-
matrix picture means precisely that we can respond to the question ‘What does
it show?’ in a shorter way than reproducing the entire picture dot by dot.¹⁸⁷
Projectability of a pattern picks out precisely those patterns in past data that we
expect to recur in future data. If we look at a large enough set of economic data,
for example, we can detect a huge amount of patterns (correlations between
data) if we look long enough, but most of them will be entirely uninteresting.¹⁸⁸
We are interested only in those patterns that we suspect to continue holding in
the future.¹⁸⁹
What is interesting about this account for our present purposes is that we
would normally expect an ontology of patterns to come with a distinct category
Patterns without of whatever it is that is patterned. Moreover, the patterned would then provide
something
patterned.
the ultimate foundation for the existence of the pattern.¹⁹⁰
Yet this account rejects the idea of a patterned foundation (or of an
underlying cookie-dough from which variously patterned entities, the cookies,
are cut). The way it does this is by answering the question ‘What is the pattern

¹⁸⁵ Ladyman and Ross 2007: 178. ¹⁸⁶ Dennett 1991b.

¹⁸⁷ The way Ladyman and Ross formulate this criterion has various other implications, such that
a random combination of two patterns does not count as a pattern itself (2007: 231). These further
details need not concern us in the present discussion.
¹⁸⁸ Sober 2001 discusses the case of the correlation between the rise in bread prices in England
and the rise of Venetian sea levels over the last centuries. This is a pattern we would not expect to
project into the future.
¹⁸⁹ Patterns that are not real are ‘mere patterns’, defined as ‘a locatable address associated with
no projectible or non-redundant object’ (Ladyman and Ross 2007: 231, note 51).
¹⁹⁰ Somewhat disingenuously Ladyman and Ross refer to Reichenbach’s distinction between
illata and abstracta to illustrate this, claiming that ‘the former are the things that exist at the
fundamental level’ (2007: 178). Reichenbachs illata are unobservable, inferred entities like atoms,
electricity, or radio waves, which he contrasts with abstracta, things like the height of Mt Everest, or
the average life expectancy in the US, entities superimposed on the illata for pragmatic purposes.
The illata are not coextensive with the class of fundamental entities, however. Further examples
Reichenbach gives for illata are visual and acoustic sensations, and the inner, unobservable parts of
the body (Reichenbach 1938: 237).
 -    

a pattern in?’ by replying ‘Another pattern’. As a consequence, ‘to put matters

as simply and crudely as possible: it’s real patterns all the way down’.¹⁹¹
Saunders concurs, noting that
I believe that objects are structures; I see no reason to suppose that there are ultimate
constituents of the world which are not themselves to be understood in structural terms.
So far as I am concerned, it is turtles all the way down.¹⁹²

It is interesting to note in this context one instance where a move from

relationism to relationism about the relations themselves appears to become
necessary in the context of empirical investigations. The case I have in mind
here concerns structural realist interpretations of quantum mechanics. These
account for quantum entanglement by treating the correlations between the
particles, though not the particles themselves as real. David Mermin sum-
marises this succinctly in the slogan that ‘correlations have physical reality,
that which they correlate does not’, a statement that is mirrored by claiming
about electrodynamics that ‘fields in empty space have physical reality; the
medium that supports them does not’.¹⁹³
Yet there appears to be experimental evidence that undermines attempts to Cabello.
understand this relationism as a fundamental truth. Research by Adán Cabello
suggests that taking the correlations between entangled particles to be real is as
problematic as taking the particles themselves to be real.¹⁹⁴ Michel Bitbol
points out that Cabello’s research rules out the possibility of treating a system
of relations without relata as a foundation for quantum mechanics:
Irrespective of the credence one might grant an ontology of pure relations [ . . . ],
quantum physics does not make it more likely than a classical ontology of individuals
endowed with monadic properties. Not only are the relations specific to quantum
physics devoid of any relata capable of ‘grounding’ them, but nothing authorizes us to
take them as an alternative foundation. Relational realism, which nowadays appears as a
lifeline for scientific realism threatened in physics, has no greater intrinsic credibility
than a realism of substances and qualities.¹⁹⁵

Of course none of the above demonstrates that it is ‘relations all the way down’. Realism about
But the fact that mere relationism does not appear sufficient in explaining relata cannot
account for
quantum
entanglement.

¹⁹¹ Ladyman and Ross 2007: 228. They deny ‘that real patterns resolve “at bottom” into self-
subsistent individuals. [ . . . ] [T]o take the conventional philosophical model of an individual as
being equivalent to the model of an existent mistakes practical convenience for metaphysical
generalization’ (229). Ladyman and Ross clearly state (2007: 158) that the resulting structure is
physical and not mathematical, though they do not provide an argument for why this is the case:
‘What makes the structure physical and not mathematical? That is a question that we refuse to
answer. In our view, there is nothing more to be said about this that doesn’t amount to empty
words and venture beyond what the PNC [principle of naturalistic closure] allows.’
¹⁹² Saunders 2003: 129. ¹⁹³ Mermin 1998: 753.
¹⁹⁴ Cabello 1999a, b. ¹⁹⁵ Bitbol 2010: 343.
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quantum entanglement, but requires relationism about the very relations

introduced to replace the objects suggests that models incorporating an infinite
descent of relationisms should at least be taken seriously as providing a
potentially useful model for understanding reality.
Reasons for That there is something problematic about assuming the existence of rela-
denying tions without also accepting the entities so relates is a criticism frequently
‘relations
without relata’. raised against structuralism. The standard ontological view holds that any
network of relations needs to be grounded in a set of non-relations, a set of
individuals between which these relations hold. Yet the kind of structuralism
considered here denies the existence of such non-relations. There are various
things that can be meant by this criticism of structuralism characterized by the
claim that ‘there cannot be relations without relata’.
1. Set theory. First, the claim might be that we cannot formulate a theory of pure relations,
since the fundamental theory in which this should be expressed is set theory,
and set theory defines relations in terms of sets of individuals that are not
relations themselves (at the most fundamental level as sets of urelements or
constructions from the empty set).¹⁹⁶
2. Saturation. Alternatively, the thought might go back to the Fregean idea that properties
are unsaturated entities and in order to have a stable ontological system they
need to be saturated by entities that are themselves saturated, namely
individuals.¹⁹⁷
3. Priority. Third, ‘no relations without relata’ might mean that a ‘relations only’
approach violates orders of priority, since for items to relate any objects
there must first (in some relevant sense of ‘first’) be objects to be so related.
Pure relationism would try to take the second step before the first.¹⁹⁸
4. Abstract/ Finally, one could object that while it may be possible to imagine a purely
concrete
distinction.
abstract realm, a form of Platonic heaven, where relations, and only relations
exist, such a model could not be instantiated in the world of concrete objects,
where particulars are needed for making the instantiation of relations possible.
If one argues that in the final analysis there are only relations, we would not be
able to distinguish the ultimate level of reality of the concrete world (which is
presumably concrete too) from an abstract object.¹⁹⁹
Responses. There is something the ‘patterns all the way down’ theorist can reply to each
of these objections. Regarding the first objection, it is of course correct that
standard set theory is a useful and widely applied framework for expressing
1. Alternatives to ontological theories. But to argue from the assumptions of set theory to
set theory. ontological conclusions seems to be not much more sophisticated than arguing
that there must be individuals and properties in the world because English

¹⁹⁶ Bain 2003: 1622–3. ¹⁹⁷ Westerhoff 2005: 175–6. ¹⁹⁸ Esfeld and Lam 2008: 32.
¹⁹⁹ See Cao 2003; Chakravartty 2003: 872–3; Busch 2003; Psillos 2006: section 2; Esfeld and Lam
2008: 31.
 -    

contains nouns and adjectives. This argument would only carry any force if
standard set theory was the only or the best tool for formulating ontological
theories. This is manifestly not the case. We have met an example of an
ontological theory formulated in non-well-founded set theory earlier on.
Moreover, category theory allows us to provide a description of ontological
structures at a level more general than set theory, and does not necessitate the
postulation of individuals for the construction of relations as set theory does.²⁰⁰
That there cannot be set-theoretic descriptions of relations without descriptions
of relata does not appear to be the strongest criticism the opponent of the
‘dependence all the way down’ view can put forward.
Appeal to the unsaturated nature of relations does not seem to help us much 2. Mutual
saturation.
here either. If we look at where Frege got his notion of unsaturatedness from
(from the chemistry of his time),²⁰¹ it is certainly the case that there could be
cases of unsaturated entities saturating each other.²⁰² This is what happens in
Ladyman’s and Ross’s case, which accounts for the patterned grounding the
patterns, by having what looks like an infinitely receding ground (and is
therefore no ground at all), letting the relata themselves be relations. In this
way it is relations all the way down, and our ontology needs to include
only relations, and no individuals.²⁰³ If we conceptualize this saturation of
properties by other properties in a type-theoretic framework it turns out to
be a scenario in which every property is of infinite order, since it is a Properties of
property of a property of a property . . . all the way down. Some may regard infinite orders.

this as problematic, and it may be the case that something like this is behind
Boghossian’s worry about infinitary facts.²⁰⁴ This would not be a problem
for the likes of Ladyman and Ross, however, since they reject the idea of
an ontological hierarchy that corresponds to the type-theoretic hierarchy.
But even for those who do not, there is no supposition that the infinite
order of a property would imply that in order to know it we need to conclude
an infinite epistemic process of some sort. Even if it is patterns all the way
down, we do not need to know the patterns below in order to know the
pattern above.
A variation on this problem is not so much concerned with the fact that each
relation presupposes relata and cannot exist in an ‘unsaturated’ state without
them, but worries that the notion of structure itself presupposes the existence
of non-structural objects.

²⁰⁰ Bain 2013. ²⁰¹ Majer 1996; Martin 1983: 251. ²⁰² Westerhoff 2005: 180.
²⁰³ Ladyman and Ross (2007: 152, note 43) argue that ‘contemporary physics gives us good
reason to expect that [this view] is correct’. They also point out that ‘the best sense that can be made
of the idea of a relation without relata’ leads to asserting that ‘the world of appearances is illusory’
(152), though that it not a conclusion they themselves want to draw.
²⁰⁴ Boghossian 2006: 56. See §86.
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Van Fraassen summarizes this problem for structuralism as follows; the

structuralist van Fraassen has in mind is one who holds that all there is is
structure. But in that case
[W]hat has looked like the structure of something with unknown qualitative features is
actually all there is to nature. But with this, the contrast between structure and what is
Structures need not structure has disappeared. Thus, from the point of view of one who adopts this
non-structures. position, any difference between it and ‘ordinary’ scientific realism also disappears. It
should, once adopted, not be called structuralism at all! For if there is no non-structure,
there is no structure either.²⁰⁵

The point here is that we define structure in opposition to things that are not
structures themselves. The stations of the London Underground are individ-
uals, and on the basis of these we can define the structure of connecting lines
that is the underground system. But if the individuals are taken away, because
all that exists is structural, how could we still have this definition?
The structuralist identifies some structure of individuals instantiating prop-
erties and relations, and then throws out the individuals, claiming that only the
structure is real. But to differentiate structure from non-structure, we need
some non-structural things. It seems as if the structuralist has just robbed
himself of the resources for making the key distinction he needs to make.
An analogous point is sometimes made by pointing out that you cannot
transform an appearance-reality account into one where it is appearances all
the way down, or a phenomenal-noumenal account into one in which there is
only the phenomenal, since in these cases all that is distinctive of these
accounts, that is a specific kind of dichotomy, is lost, and we are faced with a
monistic account that begins to look very much like a version of standard-issue
realism.
However, as Steven French has noted,²⁰⁶ the ‘throwing out’ of the individ-
uals from the ontology does not imply that they cannot be appealed to in
Only the concept order to make conceptual distinctions, just as the non-existence of Sherlock
of individuals is
required.
Holmes does not imply that we cannot distinguish him from Arthur Conan
Doyle. According to the iterative framework French recommends to the
structuralist,²⁰⁷ the identification of the structure is the first step, the onto-
logical pruning²⁰⁸ the second. Yet with cutting away the individuals, we do not
also remove the concepts of individuals, and this is all we seem to need to
articulate the structuralist position.

²⁰⁵ van Fraassen 2006: 292–3. I do not share Ladyman and Ross’s interpretation (2007: 157–8)
that this point is about the impossibility of giving a structuralist account of the difference between
mathematical and physical structure.
²⁰⁶ French 2014: 200–1. ²⁰⁷ French 2014: 19, 215.
²⁰⁸ Of course this description is entirely metaphorical. It is not the case that the individuals were
there in the first place, and then structuralism somehow made them vanish.
 -    

Critizing the structuralist for the non-existence of non-structure would be Dependence for
like criticizing a materialist by saying ‘if there is no non-matter, there is no existence vs
dependence for
matter either, so materialism cannot even be coherently expressed’. The struc- description.
turalist can agree that structures depend for their description on non-
structures, but need not accept that they so depend for their existence—in
fact the entire argument about the possibility of relations without relata
revolves around this latter possibility. As the materialist can express his
position by saying that certain combinations of properties are uninstantiated
(such as those that characterize a disembodied soul, for example), the struc-
turalist can give a perfectly coherent account of non-structures while at the
same time maintaining that there aren’t any.
This view does not stand in conflict with the ubiquity of talk about individ-
uals in everyday life, in ontology, and in formal disciplines such as logic and set
theory which are often considered to provide the formal basis of our meta-
physical thinking. The critic may wonder whether this ubiquity does not
indicate that we simply cannot do without individuals in our thinking? Even
if we accept this, it does not in itself commit us to anything more than an
epistemological position. The fact that our thinking is limited in a certain way Epistemic
does not imply without further assumptions that these limitations also have necessity does
not have
ontological repercussions.²⁰⁹ Even if it is a psychological fact that we cannot ontological
clearly conceive of a space with more than three dimensions this does not have consequences.
any immediate implications for the dimensionality of space. In the same way
the (presumed) fact that we cannot think about the world without thinking
about individuals does not imply that there are individuals in the world.
It seems that the third worry, that relations without relata violate priority 3. There will
constraints can be addressed in a manner similar to the second. Suppose we always be
sufficiently
accept that there cannot be a relation without some relata having been there many relata.
first (‘first’ here understood in a sense of metaphysical, not temporal priority).
On the ‘patterns all the way down’ approach every relation relates some relata,
it just always happens that the relata are relations themselves. The problem will
therefore recur at the next level, but since we have an infinite supply of
relations to draw on there will never be the case of a relation existing without
what it presupposes (the relata) existing as well.
The fourth and final objection is based on the idea that the defender of 4. Abstract/
relations without relata cannot draw a clear line between structures of abstract concrete should
obey the same
objects and structures of concrete objects. This objection seems to presuppose saturation
that properties and relations between abstract and concrete objects obey constraints.

different ontological rules. Cao notes that

²⁰⁹ Ladyman and Ross 2007: 155, see also French and Ladyman 2010: 33.
   -    

while the meaning of a mathematical structure can be completely exhausted in a purely

relational way without assuming the existence of relata, a physical structure (which itself
can be viewed as an entity) has an open texture and thus is inexhaustible, and the
existence of its constituents is ontologically presumed.²¹⁰

But it is unclear why such a difference can be assumed. If it is an ontological

law that relations always need to be saturated by some individual or by some
relations of finite order, this will be the same regardless of whether it is a
relation between two numbers or between two pieces of rock. In this case it
would make no sense to argue that we could have ‘relations without relata’ in
the abstract case, but not in the concrete case.
In addition, it is necessary to ask whether the blurring of the line between the
concrete and the abstract²¹¹ is a consequence that needs to be avoided, and
Blurring the whether this is not a consequence that is not confined to the ‘pattern all the way
abstract/
down approach’. If we draw the line between the concrete and the abstract in
concrete
distinction the familiar way by considering all objects that can stand in spatial and/or
might be a good temporal relations to be concrete, and those that cannot to be abstract, it is
thing.
evident that problems will arise once we inquire into the foundations of space
and time. Supposing time is a substance, is it concrete? Hardly, since it cannot
stand in temporal relations to itself (time, considered in this way like a
temporal container, does not contain itself). Is it abstract? If so, it is abstract
in a way very different from other abstract objects, since it contains concrete
objects within it. Similar considerations arise for relationists about space and
time. Perhaps we should simply agree that the abstract/concrete distinction is
of use at a certain level of description of reality (namely one where space and
time are already taken for granted), but cannot be expected to make sense at
every level of description.
Some authors have suggested that there is something inherently problematic
about describing the kind of structuralism discussed here as a form of non-
Structuralism: in foundationalism.²¹² For consider the two most common varieties of structur-
re or ante rem? alism familiar from mathematics, in re and ante rem structuralism. The former

takes a structure to exist insofar as it is instantiated by, and can be abstracted

from a particular system of concrete objects. When we abstract the particular
structure of the London underground from the transport system’s real archi-
tecture we are speaking about an example of a structure that exists in re, ‘in the
things’. In this case the structure is obviously founded on the instantiating
system it is abstracted from. Alternatively the view that structure exist ‘before
the things’ assumes that there is a collection of abstract objects (such as the
Fibonacci sequence) which corresponds to the way in which certain concrete

²¹⁰ Cao 2003: 60. ²¹¹ Which French and Ladyman accept, see French and Ladyman 2003: 75.
²¹² Psillos 2006.
 -    

objects are arranged (such as the parts of a pine cone). In this case we are not
just committed to relations, but also to specific abstract individuals inhabiting
some Platonic heaven that stand in these relations. It therefore appears that no
matter how we understand the structure appealed to by this account, in either
case is there a fundamental level of objects, concrete or abstract, but no infinite
downward descent.
Yet we might wonder to which extent it is fair to force the ‘patterns all the An alternative
way down’ structuralist to choose between in re and ante rem accounts of what form of
structuralism?
structure is, overlooking the fact that it might describe a genuinely alternative
understanding of structure that is neither based on abstraction from the
concrete, nor on correspondence with some non-material realm inhabited by
abstract objects. The underlying idea is that the world of the manifest image
differs in important ways from the underlying structure. Even though individ-
uals are part of the manifest image, they do not exist at the level of structure—
they are rather an epistemic shorthand for specific series of patterns. We can
draw a comparison here between a computer’s graphical user interface and the
code used to program it. One is a manifestation of the other, yet their
ontologies diverge. At the level of the graphical user interface we have folders,
documents, windows, and so forth, at the level of the code the syntactic
categories of the programming language, without any one-to-one correspond-
ence between the two.
The critic might point out here that this is simply another form of ante rem
structuralism, with the Platonic entities now being the code, which is itself an
abstract object. And this Platonist interpretation of structuralism, it is argued,
has its own problems—most prominently the questions how causal relations
are supposed to be accounted for, if what underlies the world is some kind of
abstract, and hence acausal entity.²¹³ Two things need to be pointed out in
reply. First, this revised version of Platonism addresses the original criticism
that the structuralist would be committed to individuals in any case, since he
had to assume the existence of abstract individuals. Yet the existence of
abstracta does not entail the existence of abstract individuals. Second, there
are ways of replying to the causal problem, primarily by arguing that causality
is not a fundamental feature of the world, but only applies at the level of the
manifest image. However, whether or not this account could be developed at a
level of detail that would have a chance of convincing the opponent, it is clear
that understanding it as a form of ante rem structuralism is not very useful
when trying to understand ontic structural realism. For ante rem structure is
usually regarded as an ontological foundation and such a foundation is pre-
cisely what ontic structural realism denies. There is no abstract pattern

²¹³ Busch 2003; Psillos 2006.

   -    

underlying the world of appearances, but an endless sequence of such patterns,

each being instantiated by yet another one.²¹⁴
Circular Motivations quite similar to those behind the ‘relations all the way down
structuralist approach’ by Ladyman and Ross have given rise to other accounts that
approaches.
resemble it in certain ways, but differ from it with respect to the structure
they ascribe to the world. Simply put, they propose to replace the infinite
regress inherent in Ladyman and Ross’s account by a loop. On the regress
conception, the relata of every relation are other relations, which in turn relate
other relations, and so forth. Analysing relational states of affairs would never
provide us with relata that are not relations in turn. On the circular account,
however, relations and relata depend for their existence on each other. One
defender of this approach, Luciano Floridi²¹⁵ describes this view as follows:
Floridi. [U]ltimately, basic entities and structures, relata and relations, simply co-exist as a
package: they make each other possible and one cannot choose which one to have: it is
all or nothing.²¹⁶

Floridi’s main argument for this seems to rest on denying the claim that relata
are logically prior to relations. This is because the relata need to be distinct
from each other, so it looks as if there needs to be a relation of difference or
non-identity logically prior to them. We could then of course repeat the
argument and insist that this relation needs relata too and so on. Floridi argues
that we should resolve this argumentative back-and-forth by reaching ‘a kind
of truce’ in pointing out that
[l]ike the two playing cards that can stand up only by supporting each other or not at all,
ultimately the relation of difference and the relata it constitutes appear logically
inseparable. Difference and the differentiated are like the two sides of the same sheet
of paper: they come together or not at all.²¹⁷

§100 Quantum Physics

Esfeld. Examples of non-foundationalist, circular systems can also be found in inter-
pretations of quantum physics. Michael Esfeld defends a version of the same
circular structuralist account we have just encountered, claiming that (pace
Ladyman and Ross) relations require relata. Nevertheless these relata need not
have any intrinsic properties.²¹⁸ Esfeld develops this idea especially in relation

²¹⁴ Could we be Platonists about this endless sequence? I have my doubts, based mainly on the
arguments discussed in Chapter 4, Section 4.3 C.
²¹⁵ Floridi 2011. According to his approach reality consists ultimately of informational objects
that we have no reason to suppose are material, even though they are still in some sense supposed
to be concrete objects (368). According to Floridi these informational entities are to be conceived of
in structuralist terms.
²¹⁶ Floridi 2011: 354. ²¹⁷ Floridi 2011: 354.
²¹⁸ Esfeld 2004: 601–17. See also French 2014, section 7.6.
 -    

to developing a satisfactory metaphysical account of quantum entanglement,

though the fitness for this purpose is not our main concern in this context.²¹⁹
What makes it interesting for the purpose of our discussion is that it consti-
tutes another empirically motivated attempt for developing a non-
foundational ontological theory. As opposed to the monocategorical account
in the ‘relations all the way down’ approach this theory distinguishes two
categories, relations and (non-relational) relata, even though the characteriza-
tion of the latter is exceedingly thin. They have no intrinsic properties, lack a
‘primitive thisness’, and it is not the case that ‘there is more to the related
things than standing in the relations’. On the basis of this last characterization
we might wonder whether we could not just conceive of the ‘things’ as
superimposed on the network of relations, and thus as only having derivative
ontological status. Yet this is clearly not the direction in which this theory is
going. Rather, things and relations are supposed to be conceptually and
existentially dependent on each other:
[A]s far as the physical world is concerned, there is a mutual ontological as well as
conceptual dependence between objects and structure (relations): objects can neither
exist nor be conceived without relations in which they stand, and relations can
neither exist in the physical world nor be conceived as the structure of the physical
world without objects that stand in the relations.²²⁰

Instead of leading to an infinite regress, following the chain of dependence

relations downwards ends in a circle. Trying to find out what certain funda-
mental relational states of affairs existentially depend on we end up with
relations and things they relate. Asking what they in turn depend on we switch
between one and the other: there are no relations without things, and no things
without relations. Even though there is nothing self-subsistent, nothing that
does not existentially depend on any other thing, there is still no infinite
descent of ontological dependence.
That there is nothing intrinsically problematic about such a circular picture Quine.
is supported by the appearance of clear cases that instantiate it. The Quinean
‘web of belief ’ is a case in point. Most philosophers agree that beliefs come in
clusters. Nobody has just one or two beliefs, but having any belief presupposes
having a multitude of them that form a network of relations of entailment and
support. In this case it is clear that the beliefs cannot have been there first and
were then subsequently connected by relations, like houses built on a plot that
are then subsequently connected by roads. Inferential relations are not acci-
dental features of a belief, but something that is constitutive of the content of
the belief. For this reason the individuals in the web of belief (the individual

²¹⁹ See e.g. Ladyman and Ross 2007: 152, note 44.
²²⁰ Esfeld and Lam 2008: 32.
   -    

beliefs) as well as the relations between them must have arisen together, as each
depends on the other. But if there is nothing incoherent with this picture in the
case of semantics, it cannot be incoherent if we transfer it from the realm of
belief dynamics to the realm of ontology.²²¹ Of course there may be other
reasons why a model that is successful in semantics or epistemology is not
successful in the ontological case, but the reasons for this must be other ones
than intrinsic deficiencies in the model.
Substances One might object that the empirical reasons for the structuralist (and hence
behind the
structures?
non-foundationalist) picture presented above should simply be understood in
epistemic terms, as what we can know about the world, and not as having any
kind of ontological import. The view would then be that all of our knowledge
of the world (certainly all knowledge regarding fundamental physical facts) is
structural, but that this does not contradict the existence of substances, intrin-
sic natures, self-subsistent entities, and other foundational entities beyond the
grasp of our epistemic reach. These items underlie the structures we observe,
even though we can never have any kind of epistemic contact with them.²²²
Defenders of the theory that structuralism should be understood ontologically,
rather than epistemically sometimes argue that this would constitute an
unacceptable gap between our knowledge of the world and the nature of the
world, where all the resources sanctioned by our epistemology tell us that the
world is one way, while its ontology is in fact another way.²²³ This appears to
be a peculiarly weak argument, since even if we somehow knew that the
epistemic instruments sanctioned by our epistemology are in some sense the
best we could ever get, what would guarantee that there is no such gap between
the world and our knowledge of it? The belief that there is a preestablished
harmony between the world and our ability to know it appears to be an
unwarranted item of philosophical faith.
A better reply to the suggestion of a level of unperceivable substance beyond
the perceivable structure would be to say with Laplace ‘je n’ai pas eu besoin de
cette hypothèse’. Esfeld points out that if the case of quantum entanglement, an
example frequently considered in empirical arguments for structuralism, is
spelt out in terms of non-separability there is no theoretical need to appeal to
an underlying structure of intrinsic qualities to explain the results.
Quantum theory, interpreted in terms of non-separability, speaks in favour of a
metaphysics of relations that do not require any intrinsic properties of the related

²²¹ See Esfeld and Lam 2008: 33: ‘Moderate structural realism can be received as proposing to
transfer this idea [of a web of belief] from semantics to metaphysics, the objects being now physical
entities instead of beliefs. If this idea is intelligible in semantics, then so it is in metaphysics.’
²²² This is of course a broadly Kantian position, accepting that there are unknowable features of
the things in themselves that are not affected by the fact that the world appears to us as a structure.
See also Langton 2004.
²²³ See for example Esfeld 2002; Esfeld and Lam 2008: 30; Ladyman and Ross 2007: 154.
 -    

quantum systems. As far as the properties that are subject to entanglement are
concerned, there is no reason to suppose that there are intrinsic properties of the related
systems in question: the relations among the systems are determined from above so to
speak, namely by the pure state of the whole.²²⁴

The point made here is thus not an appeal to a kind of verificationism, claiming Their clash with
that it makes no sense to speak of entities we could not even possibly observe, parsimony.

but an appeal to parsimony. If we can explain what we want to explain without

recourse to substances, intrinsic natures, or other entities that found the system
of relations, a theory that does without them is overall theoretically preferable.
We are necessarily committed to relations since we cannot replace reference to
relations by talk about one-place properties without losing the expressive
capacities of our language.²²⁵ Given that we have the relations in the first
place, demonstrating that we can go all the way with them constitutes a gain in
explanatory economy. The postulation of substances ‘behind the veil’ now
begins to look like an idle wheel, not because such substances could never be
perceived, but because they also do not seem to play an irreplaceable role as
theoretical postulates.²²⁶ Once we allow ourselves to postulate transcendent
entities that accomplish no explanatory roles there appear to be no limitations
on what kind of entities, no matter how extravagant, we could possibly
introduce.
Another example of a case where non-foundationalist, circular structures Quantum
arise is in the discussion of quantum physics is the Copenhagen interpretation. physics and
circular
It assumes that the collapse of the wave function occurs when the system to be structures.
measured interacts with the measuring device, for example when an electron
hits a phosphor screen that acts as a detector. It is assumed that the phosphor
screen behaves classically, and does not itself exhibit the peculiar quantum
behaviour shown by the electron.
The Copenhagen interpretation assumes that things and processes describ-
able in terms of familiar classical concepts are the foundation of any physical
interpretation. And this is where the circularity comes in. We analyse the The loop in the
Copenhagen
everyday world of medium-sized dry goods, a world that includes phosphor interpretation.
screens, cameras, computers, our eyes, and so on in terms of smaller and
smaller constituents; molecules, atoms, and subatomic particles, until we deal
with parts that are so small that quantum effects become relevant for describ-
ing them. But when it comes to spelling out what our theories of quantum
effects really mean we do not ground them in some yet more minute microlevel
structures. As Bohr himself pointed out, ‘there is no quantum world. There is
only a quantum physical description.’²²⁷ What this means is that instead of

²²⁴ Esfeld 2004: 10. See also Esfeld and Lam 2008: 34.
²²⁵ Esfeld and Lam 2008: 30. ²²⁶ Ladyman and Ross 2007: 154.
²²⁷ Petersen 1963, see also Jammer 1974: 203–11.
   -    

going further down we instead jump right back up to the level of concrete
phenomena of sensory perception, namely macrophysical measuring devices,
such as phosphor screens and cameras, claiming that our theory is about the
reading these instruments make. But this means we can neither say that the
microphysical world of quantum objects is fundamental (since talk about these
is just a conceptual tool by which we connect certain statements about what
happens to ordinary-sized measuring devices) nor can we say that the macro-
physical world of measuring devices is fundamental (since these devices are
themselves nothing but large conglomerations of quantum objects). We are
therefore left with a circular dependence structure.
This is what Michel Bitbol means when he points out that ‘the concepts of
macrophysics are exactly as indispensable to characterize microphenomena as
Circular causal the concepts of microphysics are indispensable to explain certain macrophe-
structures.
nomena’.²²⁸ For him, this circularity is also accompanied by a circular causal
structure. Cause–effects relations cannot only go from the basic level to the
emergent level, for example from the physical to the biological, from the
biological to the mental, or from the mental to the social, but also the other
way round. This does not mean, however, that causal powers inhere in both
levels. Bitbol spells out causation in terms of probability-raising,²²⁹ and this
makes it relatively easy to understand the basic level and the emergent level as
symmetric in causal terms: some physical event occurring can be seen to raise
the probability of a mental event occurring just as much as that of a mental
event can raise that of a physical event.
The chain of Circularity also arises in various understandings of quantum mechanics that
measurement.
attribute a crucial role to a conscious observer in the collapse of the wave
function, at least as long as consciousness is considered to be a phenomenon
that requires a physical basis. In the example of an electron being detected by a
phosphor screen it seems clear that the event of measurement, and the collapse
of the wave function, takes place when the electron hits the screen. But suppose
that we cannot actually be there to witness the experiment, so we point a
camera at the phosphor screen and have the result sent via a satellite link to the
computer on our desktop. In this case the light emitted from the screen has to
travel to the camera recording it, and the same episode is repeated: like the
electrons light also travels as a wave and arrives as a particle (a photon, in this
case). So what reason is there to believe that the collapse of the wave-function,
the switch from probability wave to particle actually occurred on the phosphor
screen, and not in the camera? Given that any physical object transmitting the
measurement we can add on to this sequence (the camera, the satellite, our
computer, our eyes, our brain) is made up of particles displaying the exactly

²²⁸ Bitbol 2007. ²²⁹ Bitbol 2007: 305–6.

 -    

same properties as the electron we are concerned with, how can we determine
any particular step at which to place the cut between what is measured and
what is doing the measuring?
A suggestion where the cut in this ever-expanding ‘von Neumann chain’ of Conscious
observers
measured phenomena and measuring devices could be made was put forward collapsing the
by Eugene Wigner. As we follow the von Neumann chain upwards the first entity wave function.
we encounter that may be argued not to consist of pieces of matter is the
consciouness of the observer who makes the measurement. We might therefore
want to say that when consciousness enters the picture the wave function collapses
and the probability wave turns into a particle. This account of course implies that
if we place the entire experimental setup of electron gun, partition with a hole, and
phosphor screen in a tightly closed box the wave function will not collapse, since
there is no conscious observer involved that perceives the flash of light coming
from the phosphor screen. Systems with conscious observers in them can collapse
the wave function, the mere presence of non-conscious measuring devices cannot.
In support of this consciousness-based theory of wave-function collapse it is Spreading of
sometimes pointed out that if the consciousness of the observer did not collapse superposition.

the wave function, curious consequences would follow. More and more objects
would get sucked into the vortex of von Neumann’s chain by changing from
being a measuring instrument to being part of what is measured, and in this way
the ‘spread out’ structure of the probability wave becomes a property of these
objects too. The superposed nature of the electron that seems to be at various
places at once now also affects the former measuring instruments.²³⁰
If we now abstract from the observer’s consciousness he becomes nothing The case of
Wigner’s friend.
but a fairly intricate measuring device, a macrolevel object made of matter like
the phosphor screen, the camera, and so forth. Assume we put a physicist into
a hermetically sealed container, big enough to be a laboratory but completely
shielded from outside influences. The physicist’s task is to observe whether an
electron shot at the phosphor screen precisely at noon on a Monday hits the
screen at the centre of the emerging pattern or at the periphery. He takes note
of the result and continues with other experiments. On the following Monday
we open the door to the container and the physicist tells us that the electron hit
the screen at the centre. Assuming that the physicist’s consiousness did not
collapse the wave function he will just have been incorporated into the von
Neumann chain as yet another part of the measured system (which is now no
longer just the electron but everything that goes on in the box). But this system

²³⁰ It has been verified experimentally that objects large enough to be seen under a microscope
(such as a 60 micrometre long metal strip) and not just the unobservably small can exhibit such
superposition behaviour (O’Connell 2010). Of course we cannot look through a microscope and
actually see the metal strip being at two places at once, as this would immediately collapse the wave
function. Yet the presence of superposition behaviour in objects at the outer end of observability
seems to suggest that indeterminacy we found at the microlevel could spread to the macrolevel.
   -    

has only been measured once we open the door and ask where the electron hit
the screen. This seems to presuppose that for a week the physicist was in a
similarly superposed state, in a state of ‘suspended animation’ simultaneously
believing that the electron hit at the centre, and that it did not. Only by our
intervention the probability wave collapses, and one of the two states becomes the
real one. This is a very unintuitive conclusion, since we have to assume that the
physicist didn’t exist like other men during the past week, and that he certainly was
not able to hold beliefs like people usually do. It is extremely difficult to imagine
what would be going on in such a case, as we appear to have no idea what it would
be like for us to be in two contradictory belief-states at the same time.
But things get worse. If the physicist was not able to collapse the wave
function how can we, as humans very much like him in every respect, achieve
this? Does the opening of the laboratory door not mean that we are now part of
the measuring device as well? Could we be in two states at once and not know
it, just like the physicist in his container? Or if we are in a definite state, whose
observation is responsible for this?
The apparently paradoxical features of this scenario (usually described as
‘the case of Wigner’s friend’) are meant to support the idea of the wave
function’s collapsing as soon as the first consciousness enters the measurement
situation. It is straightforward to understand this as a foundationalist construal
Idealism or with a fundamental level that is purely mental, that is, as a form of idealism. If
circularity? we decide to break off the chain at this point it follows that matter cannot be
ultimately real. If consciousness is required to turn ghostly probability waves
into things that are more or less like the objects we meet in everyday life,
consciousness, not matter, will be what constitutes the fundamental level of
being. If, on the other hand, we do not want to embrace this form of idealism
the circularity of the theory becomes obvious. Consciousness is required to
collapse the wave function, though given that consciousness itself has a phys-
ical basis it presupposes the existence of other quantum objects that had to
have their wave function collapsed and so on.²³¹ There are no entities, whether
physical or mental, that are prior to other objects in the sense that all objects
existentially depend on them. To this extent foundationalism fails.
Wheeler’s A final example of an interpretation of quantum mechanics that is essen-
‘participatory
tially circular²³² is John Wheeler’s theory of the ‘participatory universe.²³³
universe’.

²³¹ Instead of a circle this situation can also be understood as a regress. For each consciousness
there have to be quantum objects that provide its basis and that were collapsed by a distinct, prior
consciousness and so on, ad infinitum.
²³² It is important to point out, though, that some remarks of Wheeler’s sound clearly foundation-
alist: ‘[E]very item of the physical world has at bottom—a very deep bottom, in most instances—an
immaterial source and explanation; that which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing
of yes–no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things
physical are information-theoretic in origin and that this is a participatory universe’ (Wheeler 1990: 5).
²³³ Wheeler 1980: 341–75.
 -    

This theory involves various ingredients, amongst them the fundamentally

informational nature of all natural phenomena (summarized by the slogan ‘it
from bit’),²³⁴ as well as the view of the universe as a ‘self-excited circuit’ that,
through the act of observation, gives reality to its own past, and that for this
reason ‘observers are necessary to bring the universe into being’.²³⁵ This
circular structure is also represented in the well-known U-shaped diagram
Wheeler uses to illustrate his theory.²³⁶ The observer, represented by an eye, is
located at the left top of the U, looking over to the right top which represents
the beginning of the universe:
Starting small (thin U at upper right), it grows (loop of U) and in time gives rise (upper
left) to observer-participancy—which in turn imparts ‘tangible reality’ (cf. the delayed-
choice experiment) to even the earliest days of the universe.

The temporal circularity referred to here gives rise to a circularity of onto-

logical dependence.²³⁷ If an act of observation at the present moment ‘imparts
“tangible reality” ’ to an earlier moment, and if this moment contained (as we
have to assume) all the causes that brought the observer into existence, who
carries out the present act of observation, we have a circle of dependence: the
cause depends existentially on the observer, and the observer depends similarly
on the cause.
§101 Cognitive Science
The final set of theories we want to consider in our discussion of empirical
support for non-foundationalism comes from cognitive science. We want to
look particularly at the theory of cognition developed by biologists Humberto
Maturana and Francisco Varela.
Maturana and Varela intend their theory to constitute a halfway house Between
between a representationalist theory which assumes a structural correspond- representa-
tionalism and
ence between the content of the cognizer’s consciousness and the external subjectivism.
world on the one hand, and a subjectivist theory in which all there is to the
world is the cognizer’s subjective construction on the other. Varela sums up the
fundamental idea by pointing out that

²³⁴ ‘every particle, every field of force, even the space-time continuum itself—derives its func-
tion, its meaning, its very existence entirely—even if in some contexts indirectly—from the
apparatus-elicited answers to yes-or-no questions, binary choices, bits’ Wheeler 1990: 5.
²³⁵ Barrow and Tipler 1986: 22. Wheeler (1980: 362) points out that ‘[b]eginning with the big
bang, the universe expands and cools. After eons of dynamic development it gives rise to observer-
ship. Acts of observer-participancy—via the mechanism of the delayed-choice experiment—in turn
give tangible ‘reality’ to the universe not only now but back to the beginning.’ See also Heller 2009:
101–2.
²³⁶ Wheeler 1980: 362, figure 22.13.
²³⁷ See Penrose 1989: 381. For a different cosmological theory incorporating a loop in a
comparable manner see Hawking 2007: 91–8; Gefter 2006.
   -    

Varela: there is no subject, as the constructivists suggest, on one side, constructing its reality in
interdependence the desired way. And there exists no object, as the realists believe, on the other side,
of subject and
object. which determines what happens in the organism.
My view is that subject and object determine and condition each other, that knower and
known arise in mutual dependence, that we neither represent an external world inside
nor blindly and arbitrarily construct such a world and project it outside. My plea is for a
middle way that avoids both the extremes of subjectivism and idealism, and the
presumptions of realism and objectivism. [ . . . ] My point is that neither the subject
nor the object is primary. Both exist only in mutual dependence and in mutual
determination.²³⁸

This ‘mutual dependence’ (or, as he sometimes calls it ‘dependent coorigina-

tion’)²³⁹ is considered as one aspect of a more comprehensive circularity
evident, for example, in the biological evolution of organisms. As we cannot
conceive of the epistemic process as comprising two mutually independent
entities, knower and known, such that the former strives to form an accurate
representation of the latter, so the evolutionary process cannot be understood
as consisting of two mutually independent entities, organism and environ-
ment, such that the former tries to overcome the challenges imposed by the
latter on its propagation. What this view overlooks is the way in which
organism and environment shape each other.
Circularity in One example of this circularity can be found in the evolution of colour
evolution.
perception. Bees are specifically sensitive to ultraviolet light, and flowers have
contrasting reflecting patterns under such light. A straightforward way of
explaining this is that the visual capacities of the bees have evolved in order
to successfully detect the flowers. The perceptual abilities of bees have been
formed by evolutionary pressure to maximize their chances of finding food.
There is, however, good evidence that the two features have co-evolved.²⁴⁰ This
fact is not very surprising, after all the plants producing the flowers need the
bees as much as the bees need them, so it is reasonable to assume that evolution
moved both into a direction where each can derive the maximal benefit from
the other. The organism of one perspective is the background of the other, and
both are interlinked in a relation of mutual dependence.²⁴¹ This circularity is
not just restricted to cases where the ‘background’ consists of other living
things. Plants change the chemical composition of the soil they grow in,²⁴² and
the evolutionary development of organisms changes the environment in which
they live as much as it changes them in challenging them to adapt.

²³⁸ Varela 2004: 90. ²³⁹ Varela and Thompson et al. 1991: 150.
²⁴⁰ Lythgoe 1979: 188–93.
²⁴¹ For further discussion of colour perception as indicative of such mutual dependence see
Varela/Thompson et al 1991: 157–71.
²⁴² Lewontin 1983.
 -    

Varela argues that we can neither regard the observer-independent world,

nor the subjective world of cognized entities as a foundation for our account of
cognition. The former, labelled as the ‘chicken position’²⁴³ fails to take into
account the extent to which perception is an active process requiring inter-
action with the world, rather than simply the abstraction of features, like a
perceiver chained to a Platonic cave.²⁴⁴ The latter, ‘egg’ position²⁴⁵ neglects the
fact that we cannot have perceptual content without bodily and social inter-
action. The view of object-independent minds is as hard to maintain as that of
mind-independent objects.²⁴⁶
As in the original chicken-or-egg question we need both. Neither focusing
on the existence of chickens to the exclusion of eggs, nor the other way round
are likely to be successful, as each determines the other.
The circular structure of the underlying dependence relation is also stressed Maturana.
by Maturana who points out that
the discovery that matter, metaphorically speaking, is the creation of the spirit (the
mode of existence of the observer in a domain of discourse), and that the spirit is the
creation of the matter it creates.²⁴⁷

This idea has its foundation in Maturana’s theory of cognition which tries to do
without the notion of representation. The basic idea is that an organism is
embedded in a medium which causes certain changes in the former. The exact
nature of these changes is, however, not determined by what the medium does
but depends crucially on the internal structure of the organism which deter-
mines how it reacts to certain changes. The organism’s internal states are co-
determined by the causal influences (‘perturbations’, to use Maturana’s term)
through which the medium affects the organism, as well as by the organism’s
internal structure.
Maturana argues that the nervous system is closed, meaning that it does not The nervous
correlate internal states with external ones (the causes of the sensory input) but system as closed.
only with other internal states. This idea was apparently suggested to him by
some of his early experiments on the colour-perception of pigeons. Maturana
found that there is a correlation between the actvity of the avian retinal ganglia-
cells and colour-terms, but not between these activities and the specific spectral
composition of the light affecting the cells. This picture of the ‘closed’ nervous

²⁴³ “The world out there has pregiven properties. These exist prior to the image that is cast on
the cognitive system, whose task is to recover them appropriately. (Varela/Thompson et al 1991:
172).
²⁴⁴ An interesting experiment where the role of the cave-dweller is played by kittens raised in the
dark is described in Held and Hein 1958.
²⁴⁵ ‘The cognitive system projects its own world, and the apparent reality of this world is merely
a reflection of internal laws of the system.’ (Varela and Thompson et al. 1991: 172).
²⁴⁶ Varela and Thompson et al. 1991: 233. ²⁴⁷ Maturana and Varela 1980: xviii.
   -    

systems has strong solipsistic overtones which are further enforced by the
illustrative examples Maturana provides. These include an aviator landing a
plane purely by relying on the dials and indicators in the cockpit without being
able to look out of the window,²⁴⁸ as well as that of a navigator steering a
submarine solely by consulting the various data about its surroundings avail-
able inside the submarine. What the operators of these vehicles do is correlate
one internal state (the reading of a particular dial) with another one (turning a
handle or pressing a button). There is a clear sense in which the operators do
not interact with the outside world in which they move, but only interact with
the inside of their crafts.
Collective The system is not solipsistic, however. This, Maturana argues, follows from
solipsism.
the fact that we speak a language which is a system of convention-based
interactions. Systems of conventions, however, necessitate the existence of at
least two participants between which the rules governing the interactions can
be implicitly or explicitly established. We should rather understand the view of
the world described here as a form of collective solipsism, where various actors
are locked up inside their respective cockpits and create the outside world and
the objects in it by the use of language.
The theory described so far constitutes a strong form of anti-realism which
postulates the existence of several separate realities which are all on a par. Each
of them is constituted by the distinctions an observer draws amongst the
perturbations which affect him as an organism. Existence claims have to be
relativized to particular realities. In the context of the example of the aviator
Maturana notes that ‘take-off ’ and ‘landing’ exist only for the observers outside
of the plane, not within the cockpit. This means that objects, and the successful
interaction with objects exists only for the realities brought about by observers
of the organism, but not for the organism itself. For the organism there is only
the correlation between different internal states.
Mutual What is interesting about this approach is that it is not simply a subjectivist
dependence of version of constructivism which claims that the observer is the primary
observer and
observed. existent, and all the remaining reality (or rather: remaining realities) are
constructed by him. The observer does not exist in all realities, in particular
he does not exist in physical reality.²⁴⁹ Physical reality, however, is where living
systems exist. They are intricate complexes of molecules. Physical objects, and
molecules are one particular kind of such objects, do not exist without obser-
vers. It is therefore evident that in this system the level of the observer and the
level of physical reality are mutually existentially dependent. Without physical
reality there are no living beings, and thus no observers. Without observers
there is no physical reality. For the purposes of explanation it is of course

²⁴⁸ Maturana 2000: 114–15. ²⁴⁹ Riegas and Vetter 1991: 59.
 -    

possible to break this loop and transform it into a hierarchy: explaining

(depending on our interest) the biological basis of observers, or the observer
based existence of reality. But neither of these explanatory hierarchies is prior
to the other and neither implies the existence of an ontological hierarchy.

3.4 A Potential Difficulty for Circular

Non-foundationalism
The preceding discussion of empirical (or at least extra-metaphysical) argu-
ments in support of non-foundationalism shows that if we think metaphysics
should develop in continuity with other, non-metaphysical investigations of
the world, non-foundationalist systems need to be taken seriously as possible
metaphysical theories. Before we move on—in chapter 4—to discuss possible
limitations of the non-foundationalist conceptions, I want to conclude our
discussion by having a closer look at one potentially very damaging objection
to the circular version of non-foundationalism.
§102 Do All Truths Depend on Beliefs?
An objection we might make to the theory of universal interdependence is the Universal
following. If we make the statement ‘Mount Everest is taller than Mount interdependence
and true
Olympus’, its truth will not only depend on the comparative height of the statements.
two mountains but also, since everything depends on everything else, on our
belief that Mount Everest is taller than Mount Olympus. But it is part of our
assertoric practices that the truth of such statements precisely does not depend Does truth
on our doxastic status. I could have believed whatever I wanted about the two depend on
belief?
mountains, without this having any effect on which is taller than which. So it
seems as if an element of ‘believing it to be so makes it so’ enters our account of
truth if we adopt universal interdependence, and this is something we might be
wary to accept. We may think that if we are no longer able to conceive of truth
as a mind-independent word–world relation, that if our subjective states
begin to influence objective facts, we have lost the ability to make any true
statements at all.
The defender of universal interdependence may here raise the point that The dependence
even if there is some contribution that my belief that x makes to the truth of x is negligible:
economic
this contribution is so slight as to be almost negligible. Consider the following example.
example from economics. Not only does my belief about the price of some
share depend on the price of the share (since this is what the belief is about) but
the price of the share also depends inter alia on my belief about the price (since
its price is simply what all potential buyers are willing to pay for it, which is in
turn a reflection of what they believe the share to be worth). Of course the price
of the share does not depend exclusively on my belief (unless I am the only
   -    

buyer), but nor do the relative heights of Mount Everest and Mount Olympus
(according to the defender of universal interdependence) depend exclusively
on my thought. In the economic case, my belief is one constituent of the price.
The fact that my belief and its referent are locked in a double-bind in this way
does not mean that there is a general and fundamental problem with making
true statements about prices.
It is sometimes said that beliefs have a mind-to-world fit; that is that these
Not all beliefs mental entities take on such a form as to reflect that of the mental and non-
have a mind-to-
world fit.
mental entities in the world. But in fact the matter is slightly more complicated.
When we describe beliefs about medium-sized dry goods mind-to-world fit
indeed seems to be what is going on. To be a correct belief my belief that the
apple is on the table must faithfully reflect the arrangement of fruit relative to
furniture. But when we speak of entities that are exclusively our mind’s
handiwork, this direction is reversed: if I write a mystery novel my belief that
the detective wears a deerstalker makes it so, and if I invent a chess-variant
with two kinds of knights, my stipulation that these are its rules makes it the
case that these are its rules. So in this case we have a world-to-mind fit, the
world takes shape in accordance with our thoughts about it. In addition, there
are various cases in between, where even though it is not the case that our
thinking it’s so makes it so, our thinking it’s so is part of what makes it so. We
do not decide the prices of shares on our own, but our beliefs are part of what
makes the price be the price it is; we do not single-handedly decide what words
mean, but our using them in a certain way is constitutive of word meaning.
While talk about truth and falsity when speaking of words we just made up is
largely vacuous (at least if we refer only to the stipulations, rather than to the
implications of such stipulations, which can be complex and often genuinely
surprising), this is not the case when we consider truths that depend on the
doxastic status of various believers, ourselves included. As such it is not a
problem for the defender of universal interdependence that he believes all
truths to be like this, having aspects of mind-to-world and world-to-mind fit.
The economic The critic of universal interdependence may object at this point that the
example cannot
economic example is unable to show that universal interdependence is unprob-
show that
universal lematic, since the economic case does not in fact involve any circularity. If we
interdependence are physicalists, my belief that a certain share has a certain value is going to
is
unproblematic. be spelt out in terms of a complicated story involving my brain-states, and the
same is true for all other beliefs regarding its value. Now the price of the share
is just the output of a complicated function that takes all these brain-states as
input. Of course it is true that it is impossible in practice to determine this
output with complete accuracy. We cannot ask everybody about their belief in
the price of this share, and even if we could, the very act of asking might change
their belief. But none of this detracts from the fact that the price of the share
 -    

has a precise value at a given time, and that this is simply a function of all the
individual beliefs about the price.
Nevertheless, at this point the defender of universal interdependence can But then
turn round, replying that this account of removing the threat of circularity universal
interdependence
from the economic example is also available to him. For what else is our belief can be rendered
that Mount Everest is higher than Mount Olympus but an arrangement of harmless in the
same way.
atoms in our brain?²⁵⁰ And the fact that Mount Everest is taller than
Mount Olympus includes a different, somewhat larger set of atoms, which
contains all the atoms in the two mountains as a subset. So all the defender of
universal dependence is really committed to is to say that there are two sets of
conglomerates of atoms, such that the first depends on the second, and the
second depends on the first. And given that he has already assumed that
everything depends on everything else it is unclear why this particular example
should provide a problematic exception.
There are two different ways in which the critic of universal dependence can
respond here. First, it is evident that from a third-person point of view the
truth of beliefs about prices of shares is not more problematic or more likely to
involve circularity than the truth of beliefs about mountains. In both cases
there are certain classes of objects (beliefs or bits of rock) that act as truth-
makers for the beliefs. Yet a difference seems to remain. In the case of the belief
that Mount Everest is higher than Mount Olympus I have to ascertain certain
ones of the individual constituent facts that make up this larger fact (in this
case that each of the mountains has its respective size). This is the same in the
idealized economic scenario: in order to ascertain the price of the share, I have
to ascertain what the individual price-beliefs are. There is no fundamental
difficulty with this, apart from one particular case. I also need to ascertain what
the facts about my own price-belief are (they are a constituent fact of the larger
fact in the same way in which the height of Mount Everest is). But here the idea How can I be
wrong about my
of ascertaining it seems to lose its grip: my own price belief is whatever I want it own belief?
to be. There is no meaning to getting it right or wrong.
Second, we may wonder whether the defender of universal interdependence No levels
allowed for
is really entitled to his reductionist move. He says that we do not have to worry
universal
about the dependence of facts on beliefs, since the beliefs can just be reduced to inter-
facts about atoms in motion, and then all we have is the unproblematic case of dependence?
facts depending on other facts. But this depends on him being able to say that
the belief about mountains is not real, while facts about atoms are. But what
would be the reason for this? After all, the defender of universal interdepend-
ence will not just say (with the reductionist) that beliefs depend on atoms-in-
motion, but also that atoms-in-motion depend on beliefs, since everything

²⁵⁰ If you are uncomfortable with atomism, take your favourite theory of the ultimate constitu-
ents of the universe instead. The details do not matter at this stage.
   -    

depends on everything else. But if the atoms depend on the beliefs we are then
in the curious position that what is real depends on what is unreal. Yet this
bizarre consequence only follows because we have mistakenly assumed that the
defender of universal interdependence could adopt a levels-of-existence
account in which only the bottom levels come out as real. But this does not
at all cohere with the idea behind universal interdependence.
Ascertaining my In response to the first point the proponent of universal interdependence
own beliefs? should point out that the idea of being wrong about one’s own beliefs is not as
counterintuitive as it sounds. We might think that we ascribe a certain prob-
ability to something, but in fact when asked what we would consider a fair bet
on it happening give an answer that corresponds to a different probability.
Upon reflection, we have realized that our real belief about the probability is
different from what initial introspection suggested. In the same way, we might
argue that we need to find out about our own price-beliefs as much as we have
to find out about the price-beliefs of others (even though we would use
different means in each case), and that there is a possibility of getting it
wrong in each case. But even if we do not want to accept this, the influence
of my own price-belief on the price, which is the aggregate of all the price-
beliefs is usually so slight that we could just settle for determining the price by
considering only the price-beliefs of everyone else.
Interdependence In response to the second point the defender of universal interdependence
only at the might try to argue that universal interdependence applies only to the most
fundamental
level. fundamental things, but that this entails no restriction of the account, since the
most fundamental things are all there is. This view postulates the existence of a
set of fundamental objects (let us call them fundamentrons—what precisely
they are supposed to be does not matter much at this point),²⁵¹ and adopts an
eliminativist position about everything else. Shoes and ships and sealing-wax
do not exist, they are not things (the only things there are are the fundamen-
trons); such medium-sized dry goods are just talk that is mistaken for things.
If this position can be made to work then the defender of universal inter-
dependence would have a way of arguing that the belief-fact interdependence is
not problematic, since in reality there are no beliefs, just different arrange-
ments of fundamentrons (some of which constitute Mount Everest, others
Mount Olympus, and still others my belief that ones is taller than the other)
that depend on one another.
Eliminativism Note that eliminativism is essential here. It would not do to take a reduc-
tionist line, saying that beliefs, though not fully real, exist in some weaker
sense. In this case we would still be saying that the fact about mountains

²⁵¹ Benovsky 2019: 61 argues that eliminativism does not commit us to any particular ontology
of fundamental objects; it ‘is best understood as being a flexible method, rather than as a complete
ontology.’
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depends on my belief about mountains, and this conflicts with the view that
truth is a property that obtains independent of our doxastic attitudes. The
disadvantage with this eliminativist position is that it involves a radical revision
of our everyday ontology. We should not underestimate how radical this is;
according to this account literally none of the things you see around you exists.
The only existent things are the fundamentrons, invisible objects that are in all
likelihood only epistemically accessible to us as the postulates of a successful
theory of how the world works. Universal interdependence, i.e. interdepend-
ence that is not just restricted to the fundamentrons on the other hand, has the
advantage that no such radical revision is called for. All the things that you
think exist still exist, it is only that they are all interdependent.
A fundamental assumption behind this dispute about whether universal Principles
interdependence fails to account for our ability to make true statement appears regarding truth.
to be something like this metaphysical principle:
We cannot make a true assertion Fx unless the fact that x is F is existentially
independent of that assertion.
Or, in a weaker form, that is concerned not so much with truth but with what
we mean when we talk about truth it may be based on this semantic principle:
We cannot take ourselves to be making a true assertion Fx unless we may justifiably take
the fact that x is F to not depend for its obtaining on the occurrence of that assertion.

Principles of this kind could be supposed by the critic of universal interdepend- 1. Denying the
ence. The defender of universal interdependence seems to have two ways of principles.
response open to him. First, he could question whether these principles are in
fact true. Regarding the metaphysical principle, note that x being F depending
existentially on my belief that Fx does not cause any difficulties for determining
whether the belief is in fact true. In order to test whether Mount Everest is in
fact higher than Mount Olympus we just have to develop a device that
measures the height of each mountain, and then compare the results. Of course
there are various other facts on which the fact that Mount Everest is taller than
Mount Olympus depends (facts about geology, chemistry, physics, and so on).
In the case of universal interdependence the belief that Mount Everest is taller
than Mount Olympus will turn up somewhere amongst these facts, but it is
unclear why this would cause problems when determining whether our belief
was true. As we do not have to determine the truth of all the relevant
statements expressing the geological, chemical, and physical facts the fact
that Mount Everest is taller than Mount Olympus depends on, we do not
have to determine the truth-value of our belief that Mount Everest is taller than
Mount Olympus before we can make any pronouncement on which mountain
is higher than which.
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Regarding the semantic principle the defender of universal interdependence

might go back to the idea that we can, after all, take ourselves to be having a
true belief Fx while also believing that the fact that x is F depends to some extent
for its obtaining on the occurrence of that belief. Again, the economic example
seems to be a case in point.
2. Biting the The second response would consist in biting the bullet. The defender of
bullet.
universal interdependence would reply that yes, because truth requires inde-
pendence from facts there are, strictly speaking, no true assertions. But that
does not mean that loosely speaking there aren’t any either, for we will of
course still consider ourselves to make a truth-apt statements when we say that
Mount Everest is taller than Mount Olympus. Similar situations are very
familiar from other contexts. Even though there is no common ‘now’ for two
people moving relative to each other, in cases of small distances and low
velocities it is still useful to (loosely) talk about a present moment we all
share. Similarly, even though there are no truths that fully conform to the
principles mentioned above it is still useful to (loosely) talk about statements as
if they expressed such truths.
In fact the two responses contrasted here might not be as far apart as we
think. According to the first response, all truths are like truths about price-
judgments in so far as the fact judged depends to a small amount on our belief
about what the fact we judge is. But since we usually do not think about truth in
this way (whether we are dealing with economic contexts or with other ones)
the independence principles mentioned above appears plausible to us.
According to the second response it is really true (either as a fact of
metaphysics, as a fact of semantics, or both) that there cannot be doxastic
states about a fact without the independence of the fact from the doxastic state.
But because the world we live in is the way it is, i.e. because universal
interdependence holds, we never encounter instances of such independence
(as we never encounter perfectly frictionless planes). We therefore use a more
relaxed way of speaking that allows us to subsume various cases in which
independence falls under a less rigid concept of truth.
The choice between the two responses then comes down to whether we
prefer to say that there are truths, but that these differ from the way we
ordinarily conceptualize truth (since they allow for interdependence), or that
there are no truths strictly speaking, but that we can still use a substitute notion
that allows us to say most of the things we want to say about truth. The
important point is that regardless of the option we choose we do not have to
assume that the defender of universal interdependence is unable to account for
assertions of truth and falsity.
Where does this This chapter has discussed non-foundationalist ontologies, and has argued
leave us? that theories that postulate an infinite regress or a circle of existential
 -    

dependence relations need to be taken seriously. If we are convinced by the

considerations given above, doing without ontologically fundamental objects
appears like a possible, and even attractive theoretical option. But we had very
little to say so far on the status of fundamental truths. We might be able to do
without fundamental objects, but can we also do without fundamental truths?
This is the question we will discuss in the next chapter.
 4
The Non-existence of
Foundational Truths

4.1 Some Preliminary Remarks about

Higher-Order Grounding
§103 Fundamental Things, Fundamental Truths
In the preceding chapter we discussed various arguments against the existence
Fundamental of an ontologically fundamental level, and arguments for a non-well-founded
truths despite ontology. Such ontologies would either incorporate an infinite downward
the absence of
fundamental descent of ontological dependence, or they would close up on themselves,
things? forming a cycle of dependence. When foundationalism is abandoned, the
options are either dependence all the way down, or dependence all the way
round. We have looked at various examples of such non-well-founded ontol-
ogies proposed by different philosophers in the preceding chapter.
Despite arguing in support of such non-well-founded ontologies, thinking
about the problems of foundationalism may leave us suspicious of these
attempts. In our previous discussion we have examined a variety of arguments
against fundamental things, entities that provide ‘something stolid under-
neath’, to use Nelson Goodman’s phrase, to ground everything there is. We
then formulate this insight in the form of a specific non-well-founded ontology
that functions without reference to fundamental things. At this stage, however,
we are expected to accept a set of fundamental truths, a set of truths that form
part of a theory of what the world is like at the ultimate level, namely the non-
well-founded ontology. The claim that it is dependence all the way down is, if
true, a truth that, unlike truths about shoes and ships and sealing wax forms
part of the final story about reality. We are always able to spell out the non-final
truths in terms of more basic truths; truths about molecules, or atoms, or
subatomic particles arranged in specific ways. Yet it seems hard to see how
truth about ontological dependence can be reduced in this way. What are the
more basic notions that could spell out claims like ‘every thing depends on
some other thing’?

The Non-Existence of the Real World. Jan Westerhoff, Oxford University Press (2020). © Jan Westerhoff.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198847915.001.0001
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§104 Higher-Order Grounding

To rephrase the problem in terms of the notion of grounding introduced
above: we have so far considered the question of the well-foundedness of Foundational
facts that did not themselves involve the grounding relation (which we referred meta-grounding
facts?
to as ‘pure grounding facts’), and argued against the view that any of these facts
(such as the fact that such-and-such space-time points are occupied, or that
such-and-such mental states obtain) are foundational. But there are other facts
besides these, in particular there are facts about what grounds what (‘meta-
grounding facts’, such as the fact, if it is a fact, that there is no fact or set of
facts that grounds all other facts). If the pure grounding facts provide no
habitat for the foundational, might the higher-order meta-grounding facts
do? Might it be a fundamental fact that there are no facts that ground
everything? There appears to be an obvious necessity to continue our inquiry
in this direction, since our quest for fundamentality is supposed to be
comprehensive, rather than restricted to specific kinds of things that may
or may not be fundamental.
§105 Is There a Problem of Higher-Order Foundationalism?
At this point we might wonder whether questions about higher-order founda-
tionalism are sensible at all. Suppose, for the sake of simplicity, that each object
in the universe is part of a single, infinite chain of grounding or existential
dependence. By locating each member of an object’s chain we can find its
ground, and thereby provide a metaphysical explanation of the existence of
this object. But is there then anything more left to account for, namely the
chain itself?
The answer to this question turns on what is sometimes called the Hume– The Hume-
Edwards Principle, which says that in explaining every conjunct of a propo- Edwards
Principle
sition, one has explained the whole proposition.¹ If this holds, then the
question of what grounds (and hence metaphysically explains) an infinite
chain of grounding becomes meaningless. All we need to account for is what
grounds each individual link in the chain. But the Hume-Edwards Principle
seems to be too strong. If you notice that all the waiters in the restaurant where
you are dining have tattoos, there might not be any further explanations than
the biographies of each individual waiter, and whatever it was that got each one
of them to be tattooed. On the other hand, there might be. One of the waiters
might have inspired all the others, or the restaurant’s owner might have a
policy of only hiring tattooed staff, or all the waiters are recruited from the
yakuza. The principle needs to be softened a bit, saying that for any propo-
sition such that one has explained every conjunct of that proposition, one

¹ Pruss 2009: 80. See also Bliss 2019: 365.

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might have thereby explained the whole.² Adopting this weaker version leaves
the question of higher-order grounding open once more. One might have
explained the fact that there are all these infinitely descending grounding
chains by having explained the ground of each link, but then one might have
not, in which case higher-order grounding facts may be appealed to. We can
therefore reasonably ask whether there are higher-order grounding facts.³
Yet there remains a sense in which an affirmation of lower-order anti-
Rejecting well- foundationalism renders the question of whether higher-order foundational-
foundedness
tout court
ism holds baseless. If you reject well-foundedness in the manner suggested in
excludes higher- the previous chapter, talk about the big fact incorporating all grounding facts
order grounds makes no sense (because it incorporates all grounding facts it cannot be
grounded in anything else (else there would be a grounding fact not in it),
but rejecting well-foundedness precisely means that everything is grounded in
something else).
Problematic Take all the bottomless chains of being, and consider that together they form
status of the set
of all grounding
a single fact G about the world. What grounds G? Given that, as argued above,
chains grounding is not well-founded, something must ground G, and if grounding is
irreflexive, it must be something distinct from G. But then G does not incorpo-
rate all the grounding chains. So every fact has a ground, but all of them taken
together do not have a ground. It turns out that reference to ‘all the chains of
grounding’ and the idea of higher-order foundationalism based on this is
inherently problematic.
Any attempt to come up with some fact grounding the big fact G that the
world contains all these specific infinitely descending grounding chains will
end up with a contradiction. It is a fact that cannot have a ground itself, and
must for this reason be a fundamental fact. Yet rejecting well-foundedness
altogether means there cannot be a fundamental fact.
Restricting anti- Rejecting well-foundedness for grounding tout court you cannot accept that
foundationalism
to pure
there are ungrounded grounding facts, because rejecting well-foundedness for
grounding facts grounding just means that everything (including facts about grounding) are
grounded in something else. However, the first-order anti-foundationalist who
wants to defend higher-order foundationalism can formulate his position with
a bit more nuance. One thing he can do is to assert anti-foundationalism about
grounding only for pure grounding facts, i.e. facts such that none of their relata
contain the grounding relation in turn. It is this position about higher-order
grounding that we are going to consider here.

² Sometimes referred to as the Hume–Edwards–Campbell principle. See Pruss 2009: 81.

³ Note that Pruss 2009: 81–4 argues against the weaker Hume-Edwards-Campbell principle as
well. A full discussion of his argument would take us too far afield, but for one response to his
counter example see Bohn 2018: 173–174.
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§106 Four Possibilities

As we could be foundationalist or anti-foundationalist when it came to facts
that did not incorporate the grounding relation (first-order foundationalists or
anti-foundationalists), we can also be foundationalist or anti-foundationalist
at the meta-level (second-order foundationalists or anti-foundationalists), when it
comes to grounding facts. There are thus four different positions we could adopt:

1. First-order foundationalism, second-order foundationalism: Dependence- 1st/2nd order

foundationalism
chains for things bottom out in fundamental things, and dependence-chains and anti-
for grounding facts bottom out in fundamental facts. (This is the standard foundationalism
foundationalist position.)
2. First-order anti-foundationalism, second-order foundationalism:
Dependence-chains for things do not bottom out in fundamental things,
and dependence-chains for grounding facts bottom out in fundamental
facts. (This is the position defended by the majority of anti-foundationalist
proposals discussed in the previous chapter.)⁴
3. First-order foundationalism, second-order anti-foundationalism: Dependence-
chains for things bottom out in fundamental things, but dependence-chains
for grounding facts do not bottom out in fundamental facts.
This position would defend the existence of fundamental things (the
‘fundamentrons’), but would also claim that the fact that there are
fundamentrons is itself dependent on other facts.
4. First-order anti-foundationalism, second-order anti-foundationalism:
Dependence-chains for things do not bottom out in fundamental things,
and dependence-chains for grounding facts do not bottom out in funda-
mental facts. (The position defended in this chapter.)
Of course we can distinguish even more positions if we consider the sequence
of first, second, . . . , nth order dependence relations and have some assignment of nth order
foundationalism
‘foundationalism’ and ‘anti-foundationalism’ for each order. However, the
and anti-
philosophical motivation for most of these positions is unclear. For the purposes foundationalism
of our discussion we are mainly interested in the contrast between position 2 and
position 4, that is in the question whether, given anti-foundationalism about
things, we should be anti-foundationalists about grounding facts as well.
Foundationalist proposals about grounding facts can be divided into two
broad classes:
1. The first class claims that nothing grounds grounding facts. One reason for Foundationa-
lism 1: nothing
this can be the view that grounding facts are just not the kinds of things that grounds
could have grounds in turn. This kind of approach is taken by Dasgupta.⁵ grounding facts

⁴ See French 2014: 181: ‘At the fundamental level there are no objects, only structures.’
⁵ Dasgupta 2015.
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He distinguishes between two kinds of facts, substantive facts (such as the

grounding of the chemical in the physical) and autonomous facts (such as
the grounding of the mental in the physical). Only substantial, but not autono-
mous facts are apt for being grounded, for such a fact ‘the question of what
grounds it does not legitimately arise’.⁶ Not only do autonomous facts fail to
have grounds, unlike other facts that might have no grounds but could have,
these facts could not even have grounds. (Dasgupta draws a helpful parallel
here between facts that lack a causal ancestor as a matter of fact (the Big Bang
comes to mind: it is the kind of event that could have a cause, though it
happens to have none), while others (such as 7 + 5 = 12) don’t because they
simply are not the right kinds of things for having causes.)
Terminal The view that grounding facts have terminal foundations is, in fact, another
foundations way of saying that nothing grounds grounding facts. For according to this view
grounding facts have foundations in turn, and the foundational chain stops at
these foundations. For example, the fact that b grounds a may be grounded in
the essences of a and b, though there are then no further facts that ground the
fact that a and b have the kinds to essences they have.⁷ Even though this
position asserts the existence of foundations for grounding facts, in the final
analysis we are always left with a specific kind of grounding facts, the final
grounding facts, that have no grounds themselves.
Zero-grounded The position that grounding facts are zero-grounded should also be included
facts in this category. Litland⁸ introduces a theological example to explain the notion
of zero-grounded facts. Consider as ungrounded those facts God has to make
in the process of an ex nihilo cretation of the world. Grounded facts then are
those facts that ‘come for free’, they are generated by the ungrounded facts.
Zero-grounded facts, on the other hand are those that are generated by an
empty set of facts.
Fine⁹ compares zero-grounded entities to the empty set, and ungrounded
entities to urelements. Both are ungrounded insofar as there are no objects the
set-building operation generates them from. But the empty set is generated
from a zero number of elements, while urelements are not generated by the set-
building operation at all.¹⁰

⁶ Dasgupta 2015: 576.

⁷ Dasgupta 2016: 388 argues that essentialist facts cannot have grounds in much the same way
in which definitions do not have proofs. That water is H2O or that gold is the element with atomic
number 79 is picks out water and gold. It is not that these have any existence independent of their
essential properties so that we can subsequently wonder what makes them link up. Rather ‘the
essentialist facts specify what the domain is in the first place’ (389).
⁸ Litland 2012: 161–2. ⁹ Fine 2012: 47.
¹⁰ How useful the notion of zero-grounding is going to be in the end is not entirely clear. It is
certainly the case that if we want to assume (like Fine) that all essential facts are zero-grounded we
end up with the somewhat counterintuitive result that all essential facts have the same ground (see
Dasgupta 2015: 590).
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2. The second class claims grounding facts ground themselves. The fact F that Foundationa-
p grounds q is grounded by F, as is the fact F’ that F grounds F, the fact F’’ that lism 2: ground-
ing facts ground
F’ grounds F, and so on. A variation on this idea is the view¹¹ that the themselves
grounding facts do not ground themselves, but that a constituent of the
grounding fact grounds them. Thus the fact F that p grounds q is grounded
by p, the fact F’ that p grounds F is grounded by p, the fact F’’ that p grounds F’
is grounded by p and so on.
Anti-foundationalist proposals about grounding facts, on the other hand,
can be divided into the same two kinds as anti-foundationalist accounts of
entities that do not involve grounding, as discussed in the previous chapter.
1. There is an infinite chain of grounds grounding grounding facts. The fact Anti-
F that b grounds a is grounded in fact G, and both G and the fact that G foundationalism
1: infinite
grounds F are grounded in fact H, and so on all the way down.¹² descent
2. Grounding facts depend in a symmetric manner on other grounding facts. Anti-
There is no descending chain, but a set of interconnected circles ground- foundationalism
2: loops
ing grounding facts.¹³

§107 Higher-Order Foundationalism and the Extrinsicality of

Fundamentality
An immediate problem for the higher-order foundationalist, who sees facts A thing’s
fundamentality
about what grounds what as themselves fundamental arises once we question
depends on what
whether the fundamental status specific objects might be said to have is itself other objects
intrinsic or extrinsic. Is the fundamentality of some entity x something that is there are
only to do with x, something x could have in a lonely state, or does it in turn
depend on something else? The fundamentality of an entity x seems to be
extrinsic, since independent of whether your theory claims that some objects
are fundamental or that none are fundamental, these facts are always
dependent, since they depend on what other objects there are: in the presence

¹¹ Defended by Bennett 2011. See also deRosset 2013; Rosen 2010.

¹² Note that infinite chains can also feature in foundationalist approaches like Dasgupta’s.
Regarding the series of iterations implied by his account Dasgupta (2015: 588) notes the resulting
infinite series is not problematic since ‘[f]or one thing, it is not an infinite descending chain of
ground. It would be an infinite descending chain if (C) were grounded in the Xs, and the Xs were
grounded in the Ys, and so on.’ What we have instead is an infinite series of facts depending on one
another: that P grounds C, that X grounds the fact that P grounds C, that Y grounds the fact that
X grounds the fact that P grounds C, and so on. So we have an ‘infinite descending chain of
grounds’, it is just that the members of the grounding chains are not first-order individuals, such as
atoms and minds, but facts. Why we should be more worried about an infinitely descending series
of thing-dependencies than about an infinitely descending series of fact-dependencies is not
entirely clear. Dasgupta’s response appears to be that the resulting descent of fact-dependencies
is simply what Tahko 2014 calls a ‘boring’ descent, where the same entities re-appear again and
again as we traverse the series of levels downwards: ‘it is not that each grounding fact appeals to yet
new explanantia’ (589).
¹³ This is the view taken in Thompson 2016.
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of some, x is fundamental, in the presence of others, it is not. So a truth about

what is fundamental could never be a fundamental (that is, an independently
obtaining) fact.
A toy example Consider a toy example: a set S contains the strings ab, cd, abcd, cdab.
A string is fundamental if it cannot be concatenated from other members of
the set, so ab and cd are fundamental. However, if we add the strings a and b to
the set, ab is no longer fundamental. So the fact that ab is fundamental depends
on the fact that
1. ab is in S
2. cd is in S
3. abcd is in S
4. cdab is in S
5. these are all the strings there are in S.
Or, more concisely
For every string, if that string is in S, then that string is identical to one of the
following: ab, cd, abcd, cdab.
Now this last fact is a fact that holds for all strings, saying that if they have
one property (being in S) they have another property (being one of those four
strings). So the fact that the string ab is fundamental depends on a fact about
all strings. The fact that ab is (constructionally) independent is itself
dependent.
McKenzie summarizes this point by noting that
whether an entity is fundamental or not can be relative to what else there is. Since to
call a property intrinsic is (roughly speaking) to say that it may be possessed indepen-
dently of what the rest of the world is like, it apparently follows from all this that
fundamentality is, at least in many cases, both a contingent and an extrinsic feature of
the fundamental.¹⁴

If the fundamentality of a given string is extrinsic, the fact that something in

this particular toy example is fundamental is dependent. It only obtains
because specific other facts about what is and what is not included in the set
of strings obtain.
Non- Another way of putting this is to say that the property of being fundamental
monotonicity of is non-monotonic. Objects that have this property may lose it when other
fundamentality
objects are introduced. A closely related example of a non-monotonic property
is ‘being an axiom’. A formula in a set may be non-derivable from the other
members, but become derivable once further formulae are added. Like ‘being
Parametrizing to fundamental’, ‘being an axiom’ is not an intrinsic property. Of course ‘being
what exists fundamental’ (and ‘being an axiom’) can be made monotonic by parametrizing

¹⁴ McKenzie 2017: 93.

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them, saying that relative to a specific set of entities or formulae a given entity
or formula is independent or not derivable, but this does not give us the kind of
intrinsicality that is at issue here.
In this way, those wanting to defend the fundamentality of grounding
facts might reply that when we are talking ontology, the parametrization of
‘being fundamental’ has already happened. Fundamentality is always implicitly
understood as relative to a specific set. When we want to know whether some
thing is fundamental we want to know whether it is fundamental in this world,
fundamental given what else there is in this world, not fundamental with
respect to some other possible world that contains we-know-not-what.
The difficulty with this suggestion is that it renders fundamentality epistem- Facts about
fundamentality
ically inaccessible, or only accessible as the limit of an idealized, endless
would then be
inquiry. It is hard to express great epistemic confidence in the completeness inaccessible or
and correctness of our knowledge of what there is in the world. But if our dependent on a
complete theory
knowledge is incomplete, and if the way it is incomplete matters for ontology¹⁵
we would be unable to achieve certainty about what is fundamental. As our
knowledge of what there is may be revised, so may be our belief in what is
fundamental. For this reason, our knowledge of fundamentality would be as
revisable as our best current empirical account of what there is in the world.
Some who accept the fundamentality of grounding facts may welcome this
conclusion, as it seems to secure a place for talk about fundamentality within
the naturalistic worldview.¹⁶ Attractive as this conclusion might appear, it is,
unfortunately less straightforward than we might initially think. For the
parametrization relative to ‘what there is’ that makes ‘being fundamental’
monotonic depends essentially on a complete account of all entities there are
in the world. As we will see below, the belief that there can be such an account
faces a number of difficult challenges.

4.2 Ultimately True Theories

§108 Anti-foundationalism about Grounding Facts and
Ultimately True Theories
These challenges become apparent when considering the notion of an ulti- Ultimately true
mately true theory. There is an important connection between the question theories

¹⁵ Our knowledge of the world is not simply incomplete because there are some objects we
might not have come across yet (a new species of beetle, for example), but, as the development of
quantum physics demonstrates, there might be fundamental features of objects very much unlike
ones we have encountered previously.
¹⁶ McKenzie 2017: 93: ‘[I]t seems to me that there is nothing in the fact that being fundamental
is not in general intrinsic that invites anti-realism about fundamentality. Indeed, its sensitivity to
physical context seems only to make it more similar to a first-order physical property, and as such
less naturalistically contentious.’
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whether grounding facts are themselves grounded, and the existence of such an
ultimately true theory of the world. By ultimately true theory I mean a theory
such that its statements do not hold in virtue of anything else. It is basic insofar
as the truths it contains do not require other truths to make them true. All the
facts an ultimately true theory describes are brute.
Potential What would an example of such a theory be? Consider, for example,
example:
Euclidean
Euclidean geometry. If the truth of its theorems rests in the nature of geomet-
geometry rical entities like points, lines, and so on, and if these are not grounded in
anything else, Euclidean geometry is an ultimately true theory of a restricted
subject-matter, namely a collection of specific mathematical objects. If, on the
other hand, the nature of points and lines is in turn dependent, on human
thought, say, or on a divine creation of Platonic objects, it would not constitute
an ultimately true theory.
Ultimately true The ultimately true theories we are interested in the present context are
theory as not local theories dealing with a restricted subject matter such as geometry,
terminus of
metaphysical they are, as the theories metaphysicians and ontologists are interested in,
inquiry theories of the most general features of everything there is. Consider cases
where the first two of the four alternatives distinguished at the beginning of
§106 hold: there is a foundation for all things, and there is a foundation for
the facts about how things are grounded, or there is no foundation for all
things, but there is still a foundation for this fact. In either case the facts
about these grounding facts, whether they are grounded in nothing, or
ground themselves, are where our ontological quest for the rock-bottom of
reality, for its most basic and general features, stops. Having identified these
facts, we have before us at least part of the ultimately true theory of the
world. In the first case we live in a Tractatus-like scenario where the world is
built up from ontologically basic entities; in the second case it is dependence
all the way down, or all the way round, but that the things in the world
depend in this way is a fact that is itself a termination point for our
ontological analysis.
Higher-order Contrast this with the final two alternatives distinguished above. In both
anti-
the anti-foundationalist picture also affects the grounding facts. Its anti-
foundationalism
undermines foundationalism will undercut the existence of an ultimately true theory, for
ultimately true if there are no ungrounded facts to be found anywhere, there are also no such
theories
facts an ultimately true theory could refer to.
Each time you try to specify what the world is like at the ultimate level,
you come up with an unsatisfactory description. Suppose you say that all
things depend on other things, all the way down, and all facts about grounding
depend on other facts, all the way down. But if the anti-foundationalism is
really thoroughgoing, there will be something that grounds this fact that
you have not yet mentioned, and therefore you have not yet specified the
ultimately true theory of the world. But as soon as you include these further
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facts, the problem reoccurs with the new fact, and so on.¹⁷ So it appears that if
anti-foundationalism holds all the way down, there cannot be an ultimately
true theory of the world.
What about the converse? Suppose we have some argument that there is no Absence of an
ultimately true
ultimately true account of the world. Does this undermine higher-order foun- theory
dationalism? This seems to be the case, for if there is no ultimately true theory undermines
of the world, there cannot be any facts that fail to hold in virtue of anything. higher-order
foundationalism
Foundationalism and anti-foundationalism are still possible options when it
comes to facts that do not involve the grounding relation, but when it comes to
the structure of these facts, foundationalism fails.
Each ultimately true theory of the world implies that there are some facts or
truths that are brute. For the foundationalist these are the facts that whatever
entities populate the most fundamental level exist, for the anti-foundationalist
it is the fact that no level is fundamental. Ultimately true theories fail to exist if
no facts or truths are brute,¹⁸ and of course this means that they must hold
because of something else, and existentially depend on this something. This is
the reason for the second-order anti-foundationalist’s claim that even the fact
that specific dependence structures hold must be dependent on something else.
In this chapter we are particularly interested in this converse implication,
that the non-existence of an ultimately true theory entails the failure of higher- Arguing for
order foundationalism. I will be looking at three types of arguments against the higher-order
anti-
existence of ultimately true theories. Each of the three types sets out to foundationalism
undermine a different aspect of such theories. If these arguments are deemed
to be convincing we should at the very least be very suspicious of the feasibility
of higher-order foundationalism.
Before looking at these arguments, however, it is worthwhile to remind
ourselves of the discussion we presented in the preceding chapter in support Extending argu-
of first-order foundationalism. Are these considerations by their very nature ments against
first-order foun-
restricted to the first-order level, or could they be extended to argue against dationa-lism?
higher-order foundationalism as well? We discussed three different types
of arguments: those going back to Nelson Goodman, arguments critizing the
notion of an intrinsic property, and arguments based on individual empirical
considerations.

¹⁷ The same problem reoccurs, mutatis mutandis, if you believe that the grounding facts depend
on each other in a symmetric fashion (as in Thompson 2016).
¹⁸ Note that I am not simply speaking about the impossibility to know an ultimately true theory,
even though such a theory might still exist. Foundationalism may still hold even if we could never
acquire complete knowledge of the ultimately true theory of the world, as merely epistemic
limitations to ever knowing an ultimately true theory are compatible with foundationalism. The
failure of higher-order foundationalism only follows if the reason why we cannot have an ultimate
account of the world must be in some way because of the world, not because of restrictions on
having knowledge of that world.
   -    

Of these the last kind lends itself least to criticism of higher-order

Arguments from foundationalism. The general form of these argument is to claim that entities
specific sciences
of type x feature in the fundamental description of the world, and that the best
account of x is formulated in non-foundationalist terms. But there is then no
motivation to go beyond the assertion that this non-foundationalist account of
x is the final true theory of the world. If the world fundamentally consists
of mathematical entities, and if our best account of these entities is some kind
of structuralism, nothing in these observations suggests that we should take
the resulting structuralism as anything but the last word about how the world
is constituted. Similarly, if the ontic structural realist argues that it is ‘patterns
all the way down’, the theory does not suggest that ontic structural realism
itself is to be regarded as a pattern itself dependent on yet other patterns.
Arguments from Considerations of intrinsicality do not seem to fare much better. The
intrinsicality
arguments we examined were directed against intrinsic properties of
objects. But once we start thinking about higher-order foundationalism we
are no longer concerned with objects that, endowed with intrinsic properties,
might constitute an ontologically fundamental level. Instead, we are dealing
with a (purportedly fundamental) level of facts or truths or statements about
dependence relations. While we cannot extend the arguments from intrinsi-
cality directly, we can do so in an indirect manner, however. We can extend the
notion of the intrinsicality of properties (an object has a property intrinsically
if it does not borrow it from something else) to include true statements as well,
considering a statement to be intrinsically true if it does not borrow its truth or
meaning from any other statement, or does not depend for its truth on the
truth or meaningfulness of any other statement. In fact such an extension will
be what motivates some of our arguments against higher-order foundational-
ism discussed below.
Arguments from The clearest case of an argument against first-order foundationalism that can
Goodman’s
theory of
be extended to higher levels is Goodman’s theory of versions. For if it is the case
versions that ‘[w]e cannot find any world-feature independent of all versions’, that ‘ [n]o
firm line can be drawn between world-features that are discourse-dependent and
those that are not’¹⁹ it would hardly be satisfactory to regard first-order anti-
foundationalism as a feature of the world independent of all versions. Goodman
himself does not say much explicitly on the higher-order implications of his
account, and we too will put it to one side for now. Instead of trying to extend the
arguments against first-order foundationalism from the last chapter to higher-
order foundationalist claims we will look at three arguments against ultimately
true theories, arguments that, if successful, should at least raise concerns about
being a foundationalist about (first-order) anti-foundationalist ontology.

¹⁹ Goodman 1980: 212.

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4.3 Arguments against Ultimately True Theories

The first argument against ultimately true theories I am going to consider
holds that in the light of the discussion in the previous three chapters we
should adopt a coherence theoretic account of truth, and that such an account
is incompatible with an ultimately true theory. The second is concerned with
semantic contextualism, a theory in the philosophy of language that aims to
establish the claim that the meaning of any given sentence depends on the
meaning of other sentences. Arguments for a coherence theoretic account of
truth and for semantic contextualism can be understood as putting pressure on
the notion of an ultimately true theory from two different directions: the
former undermines the idea of context-independent truth, the latter that of
context-independent meaning. Ultimately true theories require the presence of
both. The final and third argument focuses on the notion of universal quan-
tification, arguing that if there is no such thing as an absolutely general
quantification (a quantification over absolutely everything) there can be no
ultimately true theory.

A The Argument from Coherence

§109 The Coherence Theory of Truth
There appears to be an immediate tension between a coherentist account of Coherentism
truth and the idea of an ultimately true theory. An ultimately true theory will and ontology
contain the most basic truths, that is, truths that do not depend on other truths
in turn. Consider a statement like ‘the apple is on the table’. Its truth presup-
poses various other truths in turn, such as truths of biology (what kind of thing
qualifies as an apple), and truths about artefacts (what humans ordinarily
consider as tables). By comparison, take the translation of ‘the apple is on
the table’ into the ultimately true theory of what there is, i.e. fundamental
ontology. This may be a description of the location of fundamental particles in
space, or a protocol-sentence about basic experiences (‘green spot over there’),
or a set of Wittgensteinian elementary sentences, or a statement about co-
instantiated tropes, or a proposition about ideas in the mind of God, or whatever
else your favourite theory comprises. Yet in each case these statements link up
with the world in a direct manner. Their truth is a result of their immediate
contact with the world: names for elementary particles name elementary par-
ticles, polyadic property-descriptions name their relations, and so on.
To use a graph-theoretic analogy suggested by Maudlin, if we imagine the
sentences of a language as a set of points, and draw an arrow from each
semantic constituent of a sentence to that sentence the graph will have a
boundary such that
   -    

[T]he truth values of sentences on the boundary are not assigned in virtue of, or as a
consequence of, the truth values of any other sentences. [ . . . ] The truth values of the
boundary points of the graph are determined not by the truth values of other bits of
language but by the world.²⁰

Coherentist Yet for the coherentist no truths are made true by direct contact with the
truth needs no world. What coherence amounts to is a set of relations to other statements,
contact with the
world which in turn acquire their truth by coherence with yet others, and so on,
round and round. The truth of the translation of ‘the apple is on the table’ into
ontologese will not depend on whether the ultimate constituents of the world
are really arranged in the way the statement specifies, but depends on its
coherence with other sentences in the language.
No ultimately But if this is the case a fundamental feature of the ultimately true theory falls
true theory for away. The coherence theorist may still be able to account for the perceived
coherentism
difference of ‘the apple is on the table’ and its ontologese translation in terms of
the inferential relations in which they stand, but this does not entail that the
latter are intrinsically more fundamental. For the coherence theorist all truths
are essentially on the same level; they cannot be ranked according to their more
or less direct contact with the non-linguistic world.
Some historical Coherentism is not a theory of truth that finds many supporters today,
remarks
nevertheless it was surprisingly popular amongst early analytic philosophers.
Hempel²¹ describes the way in which the theories of Neurath and Carnap
Protocol developed away from the correspondence-theoretic account associated with
sentences Wittgenstein’s Tractatus. At first Wittgensteinian atomic sentences, sentences
that were supposed to link up directly with atomic facts, thereby providing an
ultimate foundation for all talk about the world, were replaced by protocol
sentences. These were supposed to be unrevisable expressions of unified experi-
ences of a specific subject at a specific time (‘red circle here now’), they could not
refer to simple sensory experiences (such as the experience of redness) which were
only supposed to be abstracted from the more complex experiences reported in
the protocol sentences, nor could they be about concrete objects such as tables and
chairs. These protocol sentences, which were taken to be immediate reports of
experiential facts could then be used as the basis for reconstructing our ordinary
talk about the world, including medium-sized dry goods, persons, mathematical
objects, and everything else we might want to include in our ontology.
Contradictory Yet it soon became apparent that protocol sentences could not function as
protocol
the firm foundation on which the pyramid of science was to be built subse-
sentences
quently. What, Neurath asks, would we do if some subject simultaneously
wrote two protocol sentences, one with each hand, and these two contradicted
each other (such as, say, ‘centre of visual field red now’ and ‘centre of visual

²⁰ Maudlin 2004: 30–1. ²¹ Hempel 1935.

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field blue now’). As no theory can be built on contradictory foundations, at least

one of the protocol sentences would have to be discarded. However, as such
sentences are supposed to be in direct contact with the experiential facts, what
justification would we have to discard one or both of them? Neurath’s example
might appear slightly fanciful, but it does point out that protocol sentences seem
to have inherited one feature from Wittgensteinian atomic sentences, namely
their logical independence, which implies their inability to contradict each
other. Yet this logical independence is nothing that can simply be assumed,
and it is hard to see what kind of argument could be brought forward to defend it.
This does not mean that we have to give up on the notion of protocol
sentences altogether, even though they are unable to provide the direct foun-
dation in the world of facts that the correspondence theory demands. We can
circumvent the problem by regarding sentences as true not if they are derivable
from some set of protocol sentences, but if they are consistent with them. In
this way one of the two contradictory protocol sentences would play no role in
our talk about truth, but at the same time we would also have replaced
correspondence by coherence theory.
The implications of a coherence-theoretic understanding of truth for the Carnap: formal
status of ultimately true sentences can also be seen in Carnap’s distinction and material
mode of speech
between the formal and the material mode of speech, and in his preference for
the former. In the material mode we speak about things, in the formal mode we
speak about language. In his ‘Logical Syntax of Language’ Carnap presents
us with examples of translations of philosophical statements in the material
mode into the formal mode. The material sentence ‘an object is a complex of
atoms’, for example, becomes ‘every sentence that contains a name for an
object is equivalent to a sentence containing space-time coordinates and
specific descriptive functors (from the realm of physics)’; the famous first
sentence of the Tractatus (‘the world is the totality of facts, not of things’)
now says ‘science is a system of sentences, not a system of names’. The
foundational sentences of ontological or physical theories (presumably strong
candidates for ultimately true sentences) turn out to be no longer sentences
about the world at all, but sentences about other sentences.²² In a way that is

²² Hempel is very clear in asserting that ‘Carnap and Neurath do by no means intend to say:
“There are no facts, there are only propositions”; on the contrary, the occurrence of certain
statements in the protocol of an observer or a scientific book is regarded as an empirical fact, and
the propositions occurring as empirical objects’ (1935: 54). ‘There are no facts, there are only
propositions’ is of course a statement in the material mode. Transposing into the formal mode we
get something like ‘our theories only ever speak about sentences’. This is certainly not true when
considering the inside view of most theories of the world; they take themselves to be speaking about
non-linguistic objects, or facts in which such objects feature. But it is difficult not to wonder whether
these early analytic theories do not gravitate towards precisely this position. If the fundamental
theories of ontology and physics have to be construed in the formal, and not in the material mode, if
sentences about ordinary objects such as tables and chairs have to be construed in terms of protocol
sentences, and if these protocol sentences do not obtain their truth value via a direct link with the
world, whatever facts there might be in addition to propositions seem to recede more and more.
   -    

exactly what we would expect. If these foundational sentences can no longer be

considered to be directly about the world, we have to find a different way of
accounting for their truth, and that is in terms of their relation with other
sentences.
§110 Problems for Coherence Theory 1: The Coherence of the
Coherence Theory
Coherent fairy The incompatibility between coherence theory and the existence of fundamen-
tales tal propositions is also brought out by criticism that tries to argue that it is an
incoherent theory in the first place. The chief objection to a coherence theory
of truth, already raised by Moritz Schlick²³ is that coherence is easy to achieve,
but that we would be reluctant to call all such instances of coherence truths.
The statements we find in the tale of Hansel and Gretel are coherent with each
other, and we could define a notion of truth that is identical with coherence
with the sentences in this fairy tale. But we would not want to call this truth in
the familiar or everyday sense.
Therefore the coherence theorist needs to restrict the range of possible bases
Coherence with of coherence. For a belief to count as true it is not sufficient that it coheres with
actual beliefs
some consistent set of propositions, it must cohere with the beliefs people
actually hold. Few people believe in witches that inhabit gingerbread houses,
and for this reason coherence with such beliefs has very limited relevance for
determining which propositions are true. But this restriction of the coherentist
position seems to bring its own problems with it.
How do we characterize the system of belief people actually hold? Hempel
suggests that
[t]he system [ . . . ] which we call true, and to which we refer in everyday life and science,
may only be characterized by the historical fact, that it is the system which is actually
adopted by mankind, and especially by the scientists of our culture circle; and the ‘true’
statements in general may be characterized as those which are sufficiently supported by
that system [ . . . ].²⁴

Turning But now we seem to have introduced a system of objectively true statements
coherence
theory into
about what people believe made true by historical facts, and this sounds as if
correspondence we have adopted a correspondence theoretic account of such facts. We should
theory rather think that the coherence theorist will want to spell out the idea of a
specified set of beliefs, the beliefs that people actually hold, in purely coher-
entist terms. Since the coherentist will interpret ‘p is true’ as saying that
‘p coheres with the set of beliefs people hold’, he would have to understand
the claim that ‘it is true that people believe that q’ (i.e. q is a member of the

²³ Hempel 1935: 55. ²⁴ 1935: 57.

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specified set) as ‘that people believe that q coheres with the set of beliefs
people hold’.
We might worry about the kind of regress generated here, where each truth Regress for
claim is spelt out in terms of further statements about coherence. We seem to coherentism?
be never able to get out of the circle of some beliefs cohering with other beliefs,
and seem unable to characterize the specified set in an objective manner.
Kirkham points out that
[t]he only escape for the coherence theorist is to stop the regress by picking out some
proposition in the chain and saying of it, “The truth of this proposition is grounded in
the mind-independent fact that it coheres with the designated set.” The coherence
theorist, in other words, must concede that coherence is not the nature of truth for
every kind of proposition.²⁵

Yet it is hard to see what precisely is vicious about this regress. The fact that
when we ascend the meta-linguistic hierarchy, stacking one ‘it is true that’ after
the next, each item we arrive at is to be spelt out in terms of coherence is hardly
surprising, given that coherence theory aims at providing a comprehensive
account of all instances of truth. Moreover, the correspondence theorist may
be faced with a regress of a very similar nature. If we spell out the truth of ‘x is
P’ in terms of correspondence between the statement and some fact F, what
about the truth of ‘ “x is P” corresponds to F’? We can account for this by
appealing to the correspondence between the statement and a further fact
G. The defender of correspondence theory is then as obliged to pile corres-
pondence on correspondence as the coherence theorist has to pile coherence
on coherence.
The worry that coherence theory could only be made consistent if the
designated set, relative to which coherence is assessed, supports truth claims A dilemma for
in a correspondence theoretic manner therefore appears to be groundless. It coherentism
springs from the belief that the intimate connection between truths and facts
we observe in correspondence theory ought to be preserved in other theories of
truth. ‘If the coherence theorist postulates a specified set’, the correspondence
theorist argues, ‘there is the fact that individual beliefs belong to this set. What
is the status of these facts? If they underwrite some truths, we end up with a
hybrid theory, consisting of a correspondence theory at the bottom level with
a coherence theory placed on top, and if they do not we end up with the curious
idea of “mute facts”, facts that obtain, though they do not make anything true.
But how could we have a fact that obtains but does not make the statement
expressing that fact true?’

²⁵ Kirkham 2001: 115, emphases in the original. The same point is also made by Walker: 1989,
99–100, 143–4, 210.
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But at this point the coherence theorist can reply: ‘Assume I accept the facts
you suggest, including the facts about which beliefs belong to the specified set.
When considering the underlying ontology of facts we are then committed to,
we still have to answer the question of what makes claims about these facts
true. For the coherence theorist the answer is clear: it is their coherence with
other beliefs we hold.’
The dialectical situation is now clear. The correspondence theorist wants all
his truths grounded in some bit of ontology, and claims that we simply cannot
make sense of what the correspondence theorist says without grounding at
least some of their statements in this way. The coherence theorist, on the other
hand, does not share the assumption that we need a fundamental ontological
theory operating one level below our theory of truth in order to ground our
truth-claims. For him, the fundamental ontological theory is a theory like any
other to the extent that it sits above, not below the theory of truth. Its claims to
truth are interpreted in a coherence theoretic manner, it does not itself
ontologically underwrite the coherence theory.
Coherence This accords with our earlier claim that a coherence theory of truth does not
theory and
ontology
accommodate an ultimately true theory of the world that does the same for it
that the fundamental ontology does for the correspondence theorist. Of course
this does not imply that we could not or should not do ontology, or that
ontological theories could not or should not exist. But if whatever ontology
we come up with is located above the coherence theory, just like, say, chemistry
or epidemiology. It cannot occupy the same position ontology has in the
correspondence-theoretic world.
It should be obvious that the considerations in this section do not provide an
argument for coherence theory, but they nevertheless demonstrate that the
regress objection to coherence theory only goes through if we illegitimately
export correspondence theoretic assumptions about the relation between the-
ories of truth and ontology into a framework in which they have no place.
§111 Problems for Coherence Theory 2: Coherence, Resistance,
and Inertia
Is the notion of We might also be concerned that the coherence theoretic understanding truth
coherence too will lose some of the key properties usually associated with it. Most importantly,
malleable?
given that for the coherence theorist truth can be cashed out entirely in terms of
coherence with the set of beliefs we in fact hold we can switch the truth-value
of any statement from true to false or vice versa simply by adjusting our system
of beliefs in such a way that the negation of the original statement, rather than
the statement itself coheres with it. Moreover, we can make any consistent set of
sentences true simply by adopting a system of beliefs they cohere with.
But something seems to have gone wrong here. It appears to be a central
characteristic of the notion of truth that we cannot just make things true or
  -    

false at will. The correspondence theorist will express this by saying that the
world puts up resistance to our wishes and desires. A belief will be true because
the world is in a certain way, not because we want it to be in a certain way. If it
turns out that the coherence theorist’s concept of truth is as malleable as it
seems to be, then might it not be the case that coherence is not, after all, the
right kind of concept to spell out what we intuitively mean by truth?
While the coherence theorist will not talk about facts putting up resistance Inertia of our set
to our desire, and beliefs being formed in a way that reflects their structure, he of beliefs

also does not have to claim that truth or falsity is whatever we want it to be.
First, making adjustments to one’s system of belief is not as straightforward as
we might initially think. Beliefs do not just stand on their own, but form part
of a web where the different members imply or inductively support each
other. Changes will therefore have repercussions beyond the individual belief
changed; in particular care must be taken that the revised system is not
inconsistent, and that beliefs that one would like to see supported continue
to be supported. Second, we cannot just discard our current beliefs wholesale
and adopt different ones, thereby making a different set of propositions
cohere and thus true. In this case we would be left without any beliefs, and
would not be in the position to make a rational decision about which beliefs to
adopt instead. To use Neurath’s well-worn metaphor, we can replace individ-
ual planks, but we cannot take away all the planks and throw them overboard,
because in the end there will be no plank left to stand on, and we will be afloat
in the open sea.
We can therefore argue that the ‘resistance’ the world puts up against our
desires can be accounted for in terms of practical restrictions on updating our
set of beliefs and the resulting inertia of the system when we try to change
parts of it.²⁶ Consider a concrete example. I push my hand towards the wall
and its progress is blocked by the wall, it does not go straight through it. In this
case my belief ‘my hand passes through the wall’ does not cohere with a variety
of my other beliefs (such as the belief that I have specific visual experiences of
the wall blocking my hand) and is therefore classified as false. Now I could
bring it about that the belief is rendered true by adapting my set of beliefs, for
example by replacing the belief that I see the wall blocking my hand by the
belief that I am merely hallucinating that this is taking place. This would of Modifications of
course lead to further modifications of other beliefs that imply or support it our set of beliefs
are complex
(e.g. that I am not usually prone to hallucinations) and also of beliefs about
the testimony of others. You may see that my hand does not go through
the wall, and might tell me so, in which case I have to assume that you
are, too, hallucinating, or that I misunderstood what you said, or that you are

²⁶ Compare our discussion in §45.

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intentionally lying to me and so on. Modifications necessary to render my

initial belief true are complex, and may threaten to undermine the function-
ality of my entire system of belief.²⁷ It is therefore not the world that forces us
to accept certain beliefs because specific facts obtain (if there is one thing we
have learned from the Quinean theory of the web of belief it is that no belief is
sacrosanct, and that every belief is revisable), but the fact that revising our web
of beliefs is a complex process that cannot be attempted without due consid-
eration for the state of the web as a whole. It is our desire to preserve the
functionality of our web of belief that accounts for our inability to change our
beliefs at random, and to render every belief true that we might want to see
rendered true.²⁸
§112 Problems for Coherence Theory 3: Coherence, Relativism,
and the Principle of Charity
Does coherence A final worry is that coherence theory leads to an unacceptable relativity of
imply truth, a view that makes the truth of a proposition essentially depend on who
relativism?
holds it. For consider two people with their respective sets of beliefs, A and B. If
they are not identical it is likely that some of the propositions that cohere with
one do not cohere with the other. Thus there are some propositions that are
true for A but not for B, and vice versa. Now we cannot appeal to any objective
facts about which of the two sets of beliefs is the ‘real’ specified set. Nor can we
settle the matter by appeal to coherence, for the belief ‘A’s set of belief, and not
B’s, is the specified set’ coheres with A’s set of beliefs, while ‘B’s set of belief,
and not A’s, is the specified set’ coheres with B’s set of beliefs. And this seems to
be where we have to leave matters. There is no way for the coherentist to settle
the disagreement about the truth of beliefs that cohere with one set of beliefs,
but not with the other. They are simply true for A, but false for B.
In order to assess how problematic this situation is we need to have some
idea of how often it occurs. That there are some cases where we are in principle
Faultless unable to settle who is right might not be too worrying. Matters of taste come
disagreement to mind here; there is no great harm in agreeing that ‘green tea is delicious’ is
true for me and false for you. But if such cases of ‘faultless disagreement’²⁹
happened all the time, if we could hardly ever say that if A and B disagreed, one

²⁷ A real-life example of such a process can be observed in the case of psychological illnesses that
lead the patients to construct complex explanations to account for specific delusional beliefs. While
the original belief may be saved in the face of conflicting evidence, the resulting system of belief is
often severely limited in fulfilling its normal functions.
²⁸ Of course this raises the question what accounts for the functionality of our beliefs, or our
success in interacting with the world. If this was in turn to be accounted for in terms of
correspondence with the world it would in the final instance be the world that puts up the
resistance. For reasons why we do not have to conceive of success in this way see section §11.
²⁹ See Kölbel 2004.
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is making a mistake, there would be little use for the concept of truth at all, for
all we would be left with are individual opinions.
Fortunately, this is unlikely to be the case. In order for there to be much
interaction between people with different belief systems there needs to be a Why the
considerable overlap in the beliefs they accept. If we agree with Davidson’s idea relativistic
scenario is rare
of employing the principle of charity when interpreting another speaker’s
utterances, thereby assuming that the majority of beliefs we ascribe to him
are true, we have to bring our set of beliefs and his (putative) set of beliefs in
line (the same is of course true of the other speaker). This means that agents
who are in communicative or other kinds of interactive situations with each
other will end up with fairly similar sets of belief to make this interaction
possible in the first place. This then entails that the extreme relativist scenario,
where there is no sense of speaking about truth, but only about ‘truth for me’
and ‘truth for you’ does not obtain. Of course this does not mean that such a
scenario could not obtain, and that if we put together speakers with strongly
divergent sets of beliefs ‘truth’ might not fragment into a multitude of speaker-
relative notions, thereby effectively undermining the concept as a whole. But
such a world would be very different from the world in which we live, where,
given the relative similarity of the various instances of ‘truth for me’ and ‘truth
for you’ it makes sense to refer to truth simpliciter as a manner of speaking. It
may not be necessary to demand that concepts that are perfectly functional in
the environment in which they have originally arisen would continue to
function even against a fairly substantial change of background assumptions.
That we can rule out the strong relativist consequences mentioned in the
situation in which we actually are should be sufficient.
§113 The Case for Coherentism
In the previous three sections we have looked at various prima facie problems
for the coherence theory of truth, and noted that its defender is able to provide
robust responses to them. Such responses are no arguments for coherence
theory, what they show, if they work, is that the theory does not imply the
unpalatable philosophical consequences that its critics have sometimes sug-
gested. But even if coherence theory turns out to be a perfectly consistent
theory, why should we want to adopt it?
Our case for coherence theory here will rest primarily the considerations Coherence
discussed in the first chapter. As a theory of truth it corresponds naturally to theory and
irrealism
the irrealist account outlined there. The irrealist argues that any assumption of
a distinction between cognitive events in our mind that are directly caused by the
world, and others that are mere internal by-products of the system cannot be
maintained. The only thing we cognitively interact with is the model of the world
that we (or our brains) have produced. In a similar way coherence theory does
not allow for the existence of special sentences that are in direct contact with the
   -    

world and are verified or falsified by the world without further intermediaries.
All that particular parts of language can be evaluated against truth-wise is other
parts of language, for their coherence with these other parts is what we under-
stand by their truth. One way of reading irrealism is to regard it as saying that we
cannot ‘get out’ of the model in order to evaluate our perceptions against the
world;³⁰ in the same way coherence theory will not let us get outside of language
in order to evaluate the truth of sentences against non-linguistic reality.³¹
This does not contradict accepting something like a correspondence-
Correspondence theoretic account at the level of appearances. Because the brain’s model of
as a theory of the world is phenomenally transparent the world appears to us to contain
truth on the level
of appearance. external and mind-independently existent objects. Operating within this
model we can assume that a sentence like ‘the apple is on the table’ is true
because it (or its ontologese translation) corresponds to a fact that forms part
of the appearing world. But if irrealism holds, all we can ever have is a relation
between certain parts of the model (such as our belief that the apple is on
the table) and other parts (such as the appearance that there is an apple on the
table). We might still call this correspondence, but all that we are really left
with in this case is the mere name, since we have given up one of the central
correspondence-theoretic assumptions, namely that the correspondence rela-
tion forms a bridge between two distinct ontological realms, the representa-
tional and the non-representational. We could therefore account for the strong
intuitive pull towards a correspondence-theoretic account of truth, without
having to assume that this provides any specific evidence for the obtaining of
correspondence beyond the realm of appearance.
How coherence If coherence is the criterion by which the truth of all statements is to be
theory rules out assessed, it follows that we cannot have an ultimately true theory in the sense of
the existence of
an ultimately one consisting of statements that do not hold in virtue of anything else. For the
true theory coherence theorist coherence is not just an epistemic property, an indicator we
can appeal to in order to find out what is true. Rather, coherence is constitutive
of being true; it is not that there is some other property that makes sentences
true, though the one we refer to in order to find out about their truth is
coherence. But then what it means for a given statement to be true is simply
to stand in specific relations to other sentences, and the truth of these other
sentences is cashed out by their relation to other sentences, and so on, round
and round the logically connected set of beliefs we hold about the world. In this
case no sentences could constitute an ultimate foundation, a semantic rock
bottom on which, ultimately, all other truths are founded.

³⁰ This claustrophobic interpretation needs to be tempered by pointing out that ‘getting out’ is
strictly meaningless within the irrealist framework: there is nowhere ‘out’ to get, and no one to get
out in the first place. Does it make sense to feel constrained inside if there is no outside?
³¹ See Young 2001: 91–2 for an argument to this effect.
  -    

B The Argument from Semantic Contextualism

§114 Semantic Contextualism and Ontology
This argument takes its motivation from a particular understanding of the Contextualism
meaning and truth-conditions of expressions. We can distinguish two broadly and literalism

different ways to conceive of such meaning. On the one hand there is the
position which we might call literalism,³² this claims that we can assign truth-
conditions to individual sentences, while its opposite, contextualism, holds that
we can only do so by considering the sentence together with its context.
An obvious case where we cannot determine what would make a sentence Indexicals
true without further consideration of its context are sentences containing
indexicals. If we just see the sentence ‘I am hot now’ on a piece of paper we
are not able to determine its truth or falsity; it is only after we have determined
who is ‘I’, and when ‘now’ is that we can do this. Sentences containing
indexicals are cases where the need for supplementation by context is already
written into their syntax.
Literalists may therefore account for them by simply saying we can assign Absolutizing
truth conditions to sentences one by one, unless the structure of the sentence indexicals

itself tells us that there is something missing we have to fill in before such an
assignment can be made. The logical form of an indexical sentence contains an
empty place, and once this is filled its truth or falsity can be ascertained without
having to take other sentences into account. Another way of making this point
is by saying that certain sentences have their truth-value in an absolute fashion,
and others, such as the indexical ones, only do so in a non-absolute fashion
since their truth-value changes when the contextually determined reference of
some of their constituents changes. But each of these non-absolute sentences
can be transformed into an absolute (or ‘eternal’) sentence, simply by filling in
the empty places left by the indexicals with the relevant information. Instead of
‘I am hot now’ we simply say ‘JCW is hot on 18th October 2019 at 08:56:01’.
Despite its intuitive plausibility³³ the idea that each indexical sentence really Indexicals that
is its absolute version in disguise is problematic, however. Consider the cannot be
absolutized.
following example. You fall asleep on a train and, when woken up, are asked
what the weather is like. You say ‘it is raining’ and can convincingly claim that

³² Recanati 2005.
³³ As Azzouni (2013: 215–16) points out, this intuitive plausibility is a direct consequence of
underestimating the role of contextual factors in the generation of meaning: ‘Indeed, it takes the
grueling work of examining numerous expressions in natural languages to show nonprofessional
speaker-hearers in detail how their purported eternal sentences fail to be such. [ . . . ] This datum
about the phenomenology of language transactions—that the natural assumption is that eternal
sentences are easily available to express truth contents in natural languages—is fallout from the
invisibility to the nonprofessional speaker-hearer of the role of contextual/intentional factors in the
meaningfulness of natural-language expressions.’
   -    

you are saying something true, even though you may have no idea what the
absolute version of the sentence you just uttered is. This absolute version is
something like ‘it is raining in [place specification] at [time specification]’, but
it is unlikely that you know where the train is right now, nor would you need
to know what time it is. Simply looking out of the window is sufficient for you
to be able to truly assert that it is raining. In this case the connection between
the indexical sentence and its absolute version seems to be tenuous at best.
As this example shows, it is not always the case that the indexical sentence is
simply the abbreviated version of something we could have said had we had
space enough and time, but in fact this absolute version is something we
could never have said, since we are lacking the necessary information to
do so. But this entails that the indexical and the absolute version are not always
interchangeable modulo considerations of brevity, non-repetitiveness and so
on.³⁴ Various other difficulties with replacing indexical sentences with their
absolute versions have resulted in the view that ‘were it not for the necessities
of practical life, we might utter only eternal sentences’³⁵ being more or less put
to one side.³⁶
Indefinite Instead of assuming then that every indexical sentence has an absolute
minimal sentence lurking if not right behind it, then at least in the close vicinity, the
meaning?
literalist may say that indexical sentences have, on the one hand, an indefinite
meaning which they have on their own (‘someone is hot at some time’), and on
the other hand an actual meaning conveyed when the missing information is
supplied by the context of utterance. (‘someone’ refers to me, ‘some time’ refers
to a specific time).³⁷
The difference between these two approaches is that the first assumes that
the sentence itself does not yet have a meaning on its own. The sentence tells us
what is lacking (via the free variables in its logical form) to become something
that has meaning, and we then bring in this information from the sentence’s
context in order to form an absolute sentence which has meaning on its own.
The second approach assumes that the indexical sentence itself already has a
(though indefinite) meaning; in the actual meaning conveyed this indefinite
meaning is then enriched by supplying contextual information, though not in a
way that is determined by the sentence itself. Unlike in the first case, the
sentence itself does not tell us what is missing in order to arrive at something
that is fully evaluable for truth.
Minimal In the second case we assume that each sentence has a kind of minimal
meaning, meaning. One reason for assuming this is because we may think that the
grammar, and
pragmatics

³⁴ The train example is modified from Sayward 1968: 539. ³⁵ Recanati 2005: 173.
³⁶ See also Moser 1984: 361–75 and Thomson 1969, 737–47 for further objections to what is
sometimes referred to as the ‘externalization principle’.
³⁷ Recanati 2005: 176.
  -    

minimal meaning is the product of the interaction of the grammatical rules

operative in the sentence, and this product is then further adapted by prag-
matic rules to convey the meaning the speaker actually wants to get across. But
matters do not appear to be as simple as that. If someone says ‘There is a
dragon on the roof’, in most cases he does not mean literally that, but wants to
say that there is a representation of a dragon on the roof. Via pragmatic rules
the predicate ‘dragon’, denoting mythological creatures, is transferred to archi-
tectural elements sometimes found on roofs. Now consider the sentence ‘There
is a golden dragon on the roof.’ What this means is not that there is a
representation of a golden dragon on the roof, but a golden representation of
a dragon. This shows that the pragmatic rule is not applied after ‘golden’ has
modified ‘dragon’ at the grammatical level, but that the pragmatic rules get
applied even before the output of the grammatical rules is complete. In this
case it is not entirely clear how we can make sense of the minimal meaning
existing without any reference to pragmatic rules, since the pragmatic pro-
cesses do not appear to sit on top of the grammatical processes, as the Gricean
picture would have it, but interlink with them.³⁸ To this extent the notion of
literal, though indefinite minimalist meaning does not appear to do any
explanatory work.
Moreover, it seems to be the case that the picture of a level of grammatical The example of
and logical form that exists prior to pragmatic conventions and is established ancient Chinese.
before these conventions are applied is not universally applicable to all lan-
guages. Christoph Harbsmeier remarks about ancient Chinese that it is char-
acterized by a principle that makes informationally redundant elements
grammatically optional.³⁹ What is informationally redundant is determined
by a sentence’s context, that is, by other sentences in the same text, and by
assumptions the text’s author could have reasonably made about the reader’s
prior knowledge. But if this is the case then the grammatical form of a sentence
in Ancient Chinese, and the logical form that underlies it, cannot be something
implicit in the sentence considered in isolation, but rather seems to be some-
thing we project back into the sentence once we have gained a clear under-
standing of its meaning in the context in which it was made. The application of
grammatical and pragmatic rules overlap when we attempt to determine the
meaning and truth conditions of a sentence. For this reason the idea of a
context-independent grammatical and logical form of a sentence is of limited
use when trying to understand languages like ancient Chinese.

³⁸ Recanati 2005: 178–9.

³⁹ Harbsmeier 1979: 110. Similar observations are sometimes made about Classical Tibetan.
Beyer 1992: 195 refers to the ‘Telegram principle’, postulating that ‘redundant elements of the
message may be—and frequently are—omitted. The principle may override syntactic rules of the
language.’
   -    

In fact we might take our criticism of the minimal meaning one step further.
Instead of just saying that the minimal meaning is an idle wheel that does not
fulfil any explanatory function on its own, we might argue that the whole
notion does not make sense in the first place. Without sufficient ‘modulation’
(such as semantic enrichment or predicate transfer)⁴⁰ no proposition could be
expressed in the first place. According to this view, sometimes labelled the
Pragmatic pragmatic composition view⁴¹ modulation does not affect words, but once the
composition words are put together we need pragmatic principles in order to determine
view
what the composition of the words means.
Yet it seems that this insistence on modulation and the pragmatic consid-
erations it brings with it entails that no sentence has literal satisfaction condi-
tions independent of the background against which it is uttered. Referring to
Searle’s ‘The Background of Meaning’⁴² Recanati notes that
Context- We cannot specify a determinate proposition which the sentence can be said literally to
independent express, without building unarticulated assumptions into that proposition. The best we
truth
conditions? can do is to construct a disjunction of the propositions which could be determinately
expressed by that sentence against alternative background assumptions.⁴³

If we consider a proposition consisting entirely of expressions not usually

considered as ambiguous, but presented without further context, such as the
sequence of words ‘cut the sun’, we realize that
[t]he abstract condition we can associate with that sentence (involving some form of
linear separation affecting the integrity of the sun) is, precisely, too abstract to enable us
to tell the worlds in which the condition is satisfied from the worlds in which it is not.⁴⁴

Can something This problem is not confined to somewhat deviant-looking concatenations of

be red
independent of
words like ‘cut the sun’, but also occurs in cases which ought to be much more
context? straightforward. If we consider the sentence ‘x is red’ it seems that to know its
truth conditions all we need to know is that x is an individual, and ‘is red’ is a
one-place property applying to it. But this is not the case. For starters, where
the object is red depends on whether it counts as red. A red apple is red on the
outside, but not on the inside, a red watermelon is red on the inside but green
on the outside, a piece of red clay is red both inside and outside. Nor can we
leave temporal considerations aside, something can be red, though fail to be

⁴⁰ Semantic enrichment happens when we add contextual information in order to amplify some
piece of language. For example, the sentence ‘I would like coffee’ is generally understood as
meaning ‘a cup (not a drop or a bucket) of liquid, drinkable coffee (not ground coffee or coffee
beans)’, because the literal interpretation of the sentence has been ‘enriched’, made more specific by
this contextual information. In the case of predicate transfer we move from a literally expressed
property to another one that is systematically related to it, as when the phrase ‘the red sweater
ordered a martini’ is understood as ‘the person wearing the red sweater ordered the martini’.
⁴¹ Recanati 2005: 180. ⁴² Searle 1980.
⁴³ Recanati 2005: 182. ⁴⁴ Recanati 2005: 182.
  -    

red now (a red glaze, for example, turning red only after it is fired). Sometimes
considerations of naturalness come into play: for a coral to be red the redness
should be its natural colour, rather than something achieved with spray paint.
We can multiply these examples⁴⁵ but the underlying message is clear: different
things can be red in different ways, and we need background assumptions
telling us what it means for some specific kind of thing to be red.
The fundamental idea is therefore that all these expressions express some- A merely
thing, but this something is so abstract and general that we need to refer to epistemological
point?
pragmatic modulation in order to get from this to a truth-condition.⁴⁶ Yet one
might object at this point that the difficulty is in fact just epistemological, not
ontological. The expressions in question can still have truth-conditions, inde-
pendent of any pragmatic, contextual considerations, even though we do not
know what makes the expressions true. Thus there is some abstract structure
inherent in a sequence of words like ‘cut the sun’ such that, if ‘cut the sun’ is
true, it exhibits some correspondence with the world, but we do not know what
this correspondence is. We know that Fx is true iff x is F, but we do not know
how to verify that the second half of the equivalence obtains. But this is not a
problem: something can be the case without us knowing how to determine that
it is the case. (Or, to put it in another way, we can make meaningful statements
without providing verification conditions for them.)
The difficulty with this response is that in this case the right-hand-side of the We would then
biconditional ‘Fx is true iff x is F’ is only mentioned, not used. And if such know the
meaning of
mentioning is sufficient for knowing the meaning of a sentence, it absurdly every sentence
follows that we know the meaning of every sentence. Take your favourite
incomprehensible sentence P. In fact it is not incomprehensible after all,
since you know what would make it true: ‘P’ is true iff P. But this is of course
too good to be true. There are many sentences of English where we do not have
the first idea what they mean, and formulating a version of the T-schema in
this way is not suddenly going to make them perspicuous.⁴⁷ In fact this is a
manifestation of a more general point, namely that the epistemological claim
that we cannot know anything about x has ontological implications. For it
means that the x is not involved in our regular cognitive interactions with the
world, and that any such alleged interactions, which are based on the assump-
tion that we know something about x, are in fact interactions with something
else. For this reason postulating unknowable abstract structures that ensure
correspondence with the world, or unknowable selves,⁴⁸ or any similar entity
‘one-knows-not-what which solves our problems one-knows-not-how’,⁴⁹ is not
going to be a very satisfactory defence of such objects when being faced with

⁴⁵ Lahav 1989: 264. ⁴⁶ Recanati 2005: 182–3. ⁴⁷ Recanati 2005: 185.

⁴⁸ See §72. ⁴⁹ Putnam 1983a: 12.
   -    

criticisms of the versions of the world, or of the self we actually believe to have
knowledge of.
An alternative possible response to save the existence of context independ-
ent truth-conditions would be to drop the idea of a literal, though indefinite
minimalist meaning and say instead that the structures of expressions actually
constitute a complex frame, a frame in which various empty slots must be filled
to arrive at the expression’s meaning. As in the case of indexicals, the expres-
sion itself is without determinate meaning, but once all the gaps have been
plugged in, it has a determinate meaning. So instead of saying that we need to
have recourse to pragmatic rules in order to assign a meaning to the expression
we just have to assume that verbs like ‘to cut’ are context-sensitive (like
indexicals) and therefore in need of supplementation. Once supplemented,
their meaning is perfectly definite and context-independent.
Yet the main difference between the two cases is that in the case of indexical
expressions we need to have the relevant argument-roles assigned so that the
expressions may possess a definite meaning. This is not usually the case for
Are verbs verbs. These can have a definite meaning, even though not all of their roles are
context-
sensitive?
filled; some may just be existentially quantified. For example, the frame of a
verb such as ‘to open’ would contain a slot for the instrument that we use for
opening a door (a key, or a crowbar, or a lock-picking device, or a battering
ram, etc.). But in most cases it is not necessary to assign a value to this role,
other than saying that something fills it. The expression ‘he opened the door’
can have a perfectly definite sense even though it is neither explicitly nor
implicitly made evident what the instrument is.⁵⁰
None of the contextualist views we have considered so far actually assume
Contextualism that contextualist considerations are relevant at the level of words. It is once we
about words.
join up the words that we need to refer to pragmatic considerations. Yet we can
go one step further in the move from literalism to contextualism and argue that
pragmatic modulation is not just necessary when dealing with semantically
composite entities like concatenations of words, but even at the level of words.
The idea is that even individual words could not have their meaning all on their
own, and could not contribute directly to the process of the construction of
complex meaning via semantic composition. Rather, linguistic meaning would
have to be abstracted from them first, and then this construct could go into the
construction process.
Doing without At this stage we might wonder whether we cannot do without linguistic
linguistic meaning of individual words altogether. Can we ‘cut out the middle-man’ and
meaning?
go from the meaning abstracted from a use of a word in a specific situation to
the use of the word in a different situation? According to this picture, words do

⁵⁰ Recanati 2005: 186–8.

  -    

not have abstract application conditions, but their application depends on the
similarity of a source-situation (in which the application of a term is sanc-
tioned) to a target-situation (in which the term is about to be used). However,
this similarity is not an objective feature, but depends on the interests of the
speakers. This has the curious consequence that what makes an utterance true
in a specific case depends on which background features one holds to be most
salient. Therefore ‘one can, by simply shifting the background interests
ascribed to the conversational participants, change the truth-conditions of a
given utterance, even though the facts (including the target-situation) don’t
change, and the semantic values of indexicals remain fixed’.⁵¹ If somebody
points at a wooden duck, saying ‘That is a duck’, the statement is false if made
in the context of differentiating real ducks from wooden ones. But made when
differentiating wooden ducks from wooden geese, or life-like wooden duck-
representations from those that don’t look like ducks at all, the statement may
well be true.⁵² The facts about the world and the reference of ‘that’ do not
change, but which of the multitude of similarities and differences in the world
the speakers hold to be most salient changes: the difference between live and
wooden ducks, that between duck and goose representations, or that between
kinds of duck representations.
Now if we take contextualism seriously, statements do not have their truth-
values (and possibly not even their meanings) on a one-by-one basis. In order
to understand a sentence precisely enough to be able to see what the world
would have to be like for the sentence to be true we need to resort to a host of
background assumptions, to statements that support the kind of pragmatic
modulation (such as semantic enrichment or predicate transfer) mentioned
above. We have also seen that it is not sufficient to conceive of this context-
ualism in purely epistemological terms, as if we just need the context for
knowing the meaning or truth-values, though the existence of meanings or Contextualism
and ontology
truth-values is not at all affected by this. The context that is necessary consists
of statements saying such things as that coffee is usually served by the cup, that
reference to dragons in architectural contexts is most frequently a reference
to representations of dragons, that an apple’s colour is determined by the
colour of its outside and so on. In order to say something about the world by
recourse to modulation we have to hold some other things fixed as contextual
background, regarding them as things that have their meaning and truth-
conditions in an unmodulated way. In order to account for meaning or truth
we therefore need to move from context to context. In order to understand Moving from
context to
what it means for one statement to be true we refer to background assumptions context
that allow us to modulate, but these obviously cannot wear their meaning on

⁵¹ Recanati 2005: 191–2. ⁵² See Travis 1975: 51.

   -    

their sleeves either, so we need to move to a different context of background

assumptions to understand these, and so on.
The relevance of all of this to ontology in general, and to ultimately true
theories more specifically is that ultimately true theories will be theories that
purport to hold independent of any context. But such theories would be
incompatible with the contextualist accounts of meaning and truth-value just
described. If these accounts are sufficiently convincing to be adopted we cannot
Context- also subscribe to the existence of an ultimately true theory.⁵³ Why do onto-
independence of
ontological
logical theories (or ultimately true theories in general) purport to hold inde-
theories pendent of any context? Ontological theories that incorporate statements such
as ‘the world is the collection of all facts’, ‘the two fundamental categories are
individuals and properties’, ‘everything is mental’ and so on speak about all
there is at the most general level. Now consider that for contextualists these
statements could not be understood or evaluated for truth until we read
them against some context, against some other statements that we hold fixed.
Then the original statements could not be about all there is, since they fail
to incorporate some items, namely the context against which they are to be
interpreted.
Contextualism If we assume that contextualism holds, we therefore encounter a dilemma
and ontology: a when discussing ontological theories. For the contextualist assumes that
dilemma
whether some statement p from such an ontological theory O has a certain
property (truth or meaningfulness) depends on whether various other state-
ments (specifying the nature of the context) a, b, c also have that property.
There are now two possibilities (or two horns of the dilemma): either a, b, c are
part of O or they are not.
Consider the second horn first. One thing we could mean by ‘they are not a
part of O’ is that they constitute a completely separate body of knowledge, in
the way in which statements about chess, say, are not part of biology. But this
idea would not cohere well with the idea that ontology is a maximally general
theory of the world, for now the truth of some of its statements actually turns
out to be dependent on other theories of the world; that some ontological claim
holds presupposes that various other non-ontological ones do as well.
Suppose then that they are part of O. Then to find out whether p is true we
have to have a look at other statements in O, namely a, b, c to find out whether
they are true. But these will presuppose yet other contexts, expressed by other
statements, and since these other statements (for the reasons we have just

⁵³ It is also worth noting that for the purposes of the present argument the scope of the
contextualist thesis is important. We might imagine a variety of contextualism that only applied
to a subset of all sentences. In this case there is not necessarily a conflict between contextualism and
ultimately true theories, since the sentences that make up the ultimately true theory may be outside
of the scope of the contextualist thesis.
  -    

given) cannot be outside O we will keep circling around inside O to determine

the truth of p. But this does not cohere well with the idea that ontology is a
maximally general theory of the world, that is, that it should be the world we are
looking at in order to determine the truth of its theories.
It seems that the key issue that causes problems for ultimately true theories Truth-value is
from a contextualist perspective is the fact the truth-value of the sentence is pushed out into
the context
pushed out from the sentence into a larger context. What this context is taken
to consist of can differ: it can be other sentences, or sets of pragmatic conven-
tions, or mixtures of the two. If we are considering sentences that are spoken in
actual conversation it is likely that the conventions the different speakers
adhere to play an important role in fixing the truth-values of the sentences.
Procedures such as semantic enrichment or predicate transfer require precisely
these kinds of conventions, agreements on what form of coffee people buy in
coffee-shops, how big a cup is, what other things are usually added to the coffee
and so forth.⁵⁴
If we consider sentences in a written language, the context is more likely to Circling through
consist of other sentences. The basic problem is the same in either case. In the theory

trying to evaluate the sentence in question we never seem to get to the world,
but keep circling through the theory from sentence to sentence. This is hardly
what we would expect from an ultimately true theory. In practice we avoid this
problem by considering some set of sentences as truthbearing independent of
other sentences. Of course it is not true that they are, but we just consider them
to be so for practical purposes, whether these sentences express pragmatic rules
of interpretation, or are simply background assumptions against which other
sentences are understood. We adopt the fiction that these sentences are made
true directly by the world, and thereby stop circling around inside the theory,
without ever seeming to reach the world.
We can draw an analogy here with explanations. In order to deal with the
‘why regress’ that lets us ask, for any explanation, why the explanans obtains The parallel with
we have to make contextual assumptions about specific explanation-stops. explanation.

Why does that object float on water? It is made of ice, and ice is lighter than
water. If we find that explanation sufficient it is because we rely on the
background assumption that ice is just the kind of thing that is lighter than
water, that this is part of its nature. Of course we may then ask why ice is lighter
than water. To explain this we would refer to the hydrogen bonds between the
water molecules. Because they form a lattice in the case of ice, the resulting

⁵⁴ Of course all of these conventions can be expressed by sentences in turn. But the conven-
tionalist can escape a problem that we might see looming here (‘how can these sentences help us to
determine the truth-conditions of a sentence if they need to have their own truth-conditions settled
first?’) by denying that the ‘has its truth-conditions settled by’ relation needs to be well-founded, or
by denying that every convention can be replaced by a sentence expressing it.
   -    

structure takes up more space than the same set of water molecules in a liquid
state, making it less dense than water. The lower density is a property ice has
borrowed from the specific relation that holds between its parts. This explan-
ation in turn assumes that water molecules are just the kind of thing that forms
a lattice at temperatures below freezing point. As a next step we could then ask
why this is the case, and so on. The underlying pattern should be clear: at each
stage we are assuming the existence of some entities with intrinsic natures to act
as an explanatory background. Because these entities are thought to have their
properties intrinsically we do not need to provide an explanation for why they
have these features. We thus hold certain assumptions fixed as unexplained
explainers (such as that it is just the nature of things to behave in a certain way)
in order to arrive at an explanation. These explainers are obviously not unex-
plained in any absolute way; if we want to come up with an explanation of these
in turn we just have to build that explanation from another set of unexplained
explainers, having regarded the first set as now explainable.
Wittgenstein The presumption that sentences need to be made true directly by the world
connects the contextualist point with Wittgenstein’s argument for the exist-
ence of substance in the Tractatus we have discussed above.⁵⁵ Wittgenstein
argues that if one proposition being meaningful depended on another one’s
truth we would not be able to form a representation of the world since our
doing so would be indefinitely deferred. In order to determine the meaning of p
we would have to know whether p’ was true, for that we would need to know
whether it was meaningful in the first place, to find that out we would have to
see whether p’’ was true and so forth. Wittgenstein then uses the claim that we
can form such a representation in order to argue for the existence of sub-
stances, that is, for the existence of entities that language could latch on to at
the most basic level, making propositions meaningful and thereby stopping the
regress. He thereby presents an argument for an ontological conclusion (that
substance exists) via semantic route (from the fact that we can form represen-
tations of the world). This argument must presuppose that endlessly circling
within the language without ever reaching the world is a conclusion we should
reject. But if we consider the suggestion that the ‘why regress’ can be accounted
for by the assumption of local unexplained explainers, it may be that the reason
why this argument seems appealing is because we confuse the necessity of a
local foundational level, a level that is determined by the context of utterance,
that is, by the interests and cognitive limitations shared by utterer and audience
with the necessity of a global or absolute foundational level that is independent
of the context of utterance. In this case we might consider whether we could
not equally run the argument the other way round, arguing that because there

⁵⁵ §90.
  -    

are no substances of the kind Wittgenstein imagines there could be no

representation if it is understood Tractatus-style, that is, in a way in which
the structure of propositions mirrors the structure of facts. Because we pre-
sumably still agree that there can be language and linguistic representation of
the world this means that it has to take place in some other way; one possibility
here would be that representation works along contextualist lines where
propositions cannot be lined up with the world in a one-to-one manner.
Contextualism is not just the view that some sentences (such as those Contextualism
implies the
containing indexicals) only have meaning or truth-value against a certain absence of literal
context, or that each sentence can only be evaluated as modulated via back- meaning
ground assumptions. Rather, it is the position that the very idea of meaning
without background assumptions that can then be used for modulation is
deficient. There is no such thing as the ‘literal meaning’—at best there is a
disjunction of several such meanings. And if there is no literal meaning, there is
also no literally true ultimate theory of the world, since its literal truth would
entail that it has this truth independent of context, and, as contextualism
claims, nothing has its truth independent of context. The truths contained in
any theory can only be truths about the world as long as there are other true
statements not included in the theory, thereby undermining the very compre-
hensiveness that ultimate theories are aiming for.

C The Argument from the Failure of Absolutely

General Quantification
§115 The Impossibility of Quantifying over Everything
Philosophers (and ontologists in particular) frequently make reference to Ontologists
everything when elaborating their theories of the world. Eliminative material- speaking about
everything
ists argue that all that exists is material, dualists claim that there are precisely
two kinds of substances, the material and the mental, and that everything
belongs to either kind, absolute idealists say that only mental things exist,
solipsists claim that only one mental thing, one’s own self, exists.
Yet such references to everything are more problematic than they appear. The problem of
When we talk about all men we interpret this in terms of a domain, which is the domain

some sort of collection of all men, but when we speak about the collection of all
things (or about the world, or the universe) we cannot similarly understand
this as acquiring its meaning by talking about a domain of all things, at least as
long as this domain constitutes an additional item not included in the original
collection. If we want to make our talk about everything exhaustive we have to
enlarge the domain to include this collection, but then we need a larger domain
to explicate this more comprehensive meaning of ‘all things’, and this process will
go on indefinitely. We never seem to be able to talk about absolutely everything.
   -    

The question whether absolutely general quantification is possible has

attracted a considerable amount of attention in the contemporary philosoph-
ical literature.⁵⁶ Arguments against the absolutist position that we can quantify
over everything whatsoever in its entirety tend to be centred around four
different concepts or theorems:
1. Cantor’s theorem
2. Conceptual frameworks
3. Löwenheim-Skolem’s theorem
4. Indefinite extensibility
In the following we will consider each one in turn. Philosophical opinion on
whether all (or any) of these four provide sufficient evidence for rejecting
quantification about absolutely everything is divided. About half of the con-
tributors to a recent volume dedicated exclusively to this question argue in its
favour, and half against it.⁵⁷
1. The argument Some of the most obvious ways of deriving a contradiction from the idea
from Cantor’s that we can generalize over absolutely everything are based on Cantor’s
theorem
theorem. This allows us to produce a fairly simple argument against absolutely
general quantification, at least as long as we assume that the kind of ‘collection’
the world constitutes is sufficiently set-like. As soon as you have put together
all the things in the world in order to form the universal collection you realize
that there is one more thing: the collection of all the sub-collections one can
form by grouping together the different things in the universal collection in
different ways. This ‘power-collection’ will be strictly larger than the original
one and therefore cannot already be a part of the universal collection.⁵⁸ We
can, of course, enlarge the universal collection by adding the ‘power-collection’
to it, but then there will be another ‘power-collection’ for this extended one,
and so on. You are never able to bring everything together in one big collection.

⁵⁶ A good reflection of various approaches to the question is Rayo and Uzquiano 2006.
⁵⁷ Rayo and Uzquiano 2006. A recent work sceptical of the possibility of absolutely general
quantification is Studd 2019. We should note that there is a third possible position, that of the
dialetheist, which argues that we should neither rule out absolute generality, nor strive to find a way
to make it paradox-free, but to accept that the resulting inconsistencies represent true contradictions.
⁵⁸ This distinguishes the case of the universal collection from that of the universal list. If you try to
construct a long laundry-list of everything there is in the universe you will at the end discover that there is
one more thing to be included, namely the list itself. But including this will increase the universe, so that
we now need a larger list, to cover the new universe + list. But unlike the Cantorian case, this does not
have to go on forever. There is no inconsistency in assuming that one of the things that exist in the
universe is the following list: ‘the earth, Mt Everest, New York, . . . . , this list’, where ‘ . . . ’ has to be filled in
by giving all the remaining objects in the universe. There is no inconsistency because unlike a set, a list
can contain itself.
A more difficult situation arises if we want to include a smaller map or model of all there is within the
world. If this is a maximally accurate model, that is if everything in the world has an equivalence in the
model, the model would have to be infinitely complex. For at the place in the model corresponding to
where the model is located in our world it would have to contain a model of itself (and thus of the entire
world) which would have to contain another copy of itself and so on ad infinitum.
  -    

There are various obvious ways of avoiding this conclusion, such as denying
that the universal collection is sufficiently set-like for the Cantorian result to
hold, or arguing that the members of the ‘power-collection’ are mere entia
rationis, thought-constructions that are not to be regarded as fully real (per-
haps because they are reducible to other, non-mental objects). Instead of
discussing possible comebacks that someone concerned about the conse-
quences of the Cantorian results for absolutely general quantification might
hold I want to move on to the second reason to be sceptical about absolutism.
This argument boils down to the point that in order to talk about all things 2. The argument
in an intelligible manner we need to have some clear conception of what a from conceptual
frameworks
‘thing’ is in the first place.⁵⁹ Unless you already know how to tell the things
from the non-things you cannot even start collecting them all together into one What is a thing?
big collection. Unfortunately the conception of a thing is not anything given to
us by the universe, but arises from our conceptual engagement with the world.
A nominalist ontology might hold that all there is in the world are individuals,
and be reductionist about universals, while a universalist might say that there
are only universals, and that all reference to individuals is only taking place in a
manner of speaking. For the nominalist, universals are no things, though
individuals are, for the universalist it is just the other way round.
Yet this implies that conceptions of thinghood can differ as our conceptu-
alizations (or ‘versions’ of the world, to use Nelson Goodman’s term) differ,
giving rise to differing accounts of what the ‘collection of all things’ amounts
to. But if this is true we have lost the notion of absolute generality, of
quantifying over absolutely everything, since we can now only speak about
everything relative to such-and-such an understanding of what a thing is.
We might object at this point that once a particular conception of what a That is an
internal question
thing is has been established, absolutely general quantification over everything
is, after all, possible. While this it true, two things need to be taken into
account. First, we might have thought that universal quantification is some-
thing that forms part of our ontological theorizing, and that part of what
constructing an ontological theory amounts to is to subsume everything
under this collection, and then to describe the fundamental distinctions
between the entities so collected. In fact this is not the case, we have to have
a substantial part of our ontological theory, including the conception of what a
thing is, first, before we can even coherently formulate absolutely general
quantification. To make the point using Carnapian terminology:⁶⁰ we can

⁵⁹ For further discussion of this objection see Lavine 2006: 102–3; Hellman 2006: 83–8.
⁶⁰ ‘[Q]uestions of the existence of certain entities of the new kind within the framework; we call
them internal questions; and second, questions concerning the existence or reality of the system of
entities as a whole, called external questions’ Carnap 1950, section 2, reprinted in Carnap 1956,
205–21: 206.
   -    

only employ absolutely general quantification as part of an internal question,

having already defined certain central parts of the framework in which internal
questions make sense. As there is for Carnap no fact about the world implying
that one framework is better than another one, we would also not be able to
claim that there is a substantial difference between conflicting absolutely
general quantifications generated by different frameworks. To conceive of
such quantifications in terms of external questions (and it is in this way that
they are most commonly understood) that somehow directly engage with facts
about the world is meaningless. Yet it appears that such an understanding of
quantification is a considerable part of what makes the absolutist’s position
philosophically attractive.⁶¹
Second, even once we have settled for a specific conception of a thing relative
to which we want to quantify over objects the difficulties for absolutely general
quantification do not go away. The next two difficulties we discuss cause
problems even for quantification relative to a given conceptual framework.
3. The argument One difficulty arises from a well-known result in model theory, the
from the Löwenheim–Skolem theorem.⁶² One of its implications is that every theory
Löwenheim–
Skolem theorem that has an infinite model will have a model that is countably infinite. On the
face of it this is a very puzzling result, for the theory might assert the existence
of an uncountable infinite collection (the real numbers, say), while having a
model that makes all the statements of the theory true but only contains a
countable infinity of elements (say, the natural numbers). Lavine⁶³ refers to this
as the ‘Hollywood technique’, since as a film-maker can simulate the appear-
ance of vast architectural structures by only building a sub-structure consisting
of those parts that the camera is going to see (only the façade, or perhaps only
the roof) we can simulate an uncountable model by relying only on a countable
substructure: ‘one just keeps what the language “sees”, or asserts to exist: one
takes out of the original structure one witness to every true existential sentence,
however many witnesses there may have been in the original, and proceeds in
like manner from that point in the construction’.⁶⁴
Applying the The Löwenheim–Skolem theorem has been put to more general philosoph-
Löwenheim–
ical use by Hilary Putnam.⁶⁵ The idea is that we apply the theorem not to the
Skolem theorem
to ordinary language of set theory, but to the ordinary language we use for speaking about
language. the world. If we quantify over everything we will speak about an uncountably
large collection containing all numbers, all sets, and so on. But we can now

⁶¹ Without this understanding the motivation for upholding absolutism might not be quite so
apparent any more: ‘having “absolutely everything” refer to what exists relative to our own standards
[ . . . ] surely contravenes the spirit, and presumably the letter, of absolutism’ (Hellman 2006: 88).
⁶² For the formal details see Ebbinghaus et al. 1994, section VI; Button and Walshe 2018:
167–169.
⁶³ Lavine 2006: 105. ⁶⁴ Lavine 2006: 105–6.
⁶⁵ Putnam 1983b: 423. For a recent discussion of Putnam’s argument see Button 2013.
  -    

construct another model that makes exactly the same sentences true, though its
domain is a countable subcollection of everything. The problem is not simply
that we have two diverging models that seem to be equally good, and that we
somehow have to fix that we are talking about the larger one. Rather, such
reference-fixing would presuppose that we have a clear way of picking out the
two models in the first place in order to formulate our reference-fixing strategy.
But since each such fixing presupposes a language, and the Löwenheim–
Skolem theorem can be applied to that language as well we cannot even
coherently express the intention of doing so. Furthermore, if all our thinking
about these matters essentially relies on language, we cannot even coherently
form the thought of wanting to pick out the larger model.
Of course the Löwenheim–Skolem theorem as described here only Switching to
applies to countable, first-order languages. Yet switching to an uncountable second-order
logic
language is hardly going to help if we want our response to apply to natural
languages. Whether employing a second-order language instead will block the
theorem depends on the semantics we give to the underlying second-order logic.
The Löwenheim–Skolem theorem will not follow on a full semantics, though it
will continue to hold under a Henkin semantics. The difference between these
two semantics is essentially that the former lets the second-order quantifiers
range over the entire power-set of the first-order domain, while the latter
restricts their range to a subset. So it seems that in order to prevent the
Löwenheim–Skolem result we have to pay the price of assuming that unrestricted
second-order quantification is possible.⁶⁶ Yet when the possibility of unrestricted
first-order quantification is at issue this is not something we simply want to take
for granted. McGee suggests that the limitations the Löwenheim–Skolem the-
orem entails for absolutely general quantification are not simply a manifestation
of an unsatisfactory restriction to first-order language:
The worry is that, when we move to logically more expressive languages, the difficulties
[resulting from the Löwenheim–Skolem theorem] will reassert themselves in a slightly
different form. [ . . . ] [O]ne lacks confidence that the Löwenheim–Skolem theorem
won’t follow us, in one form or another, even as we move to languages that are logically
highly complex.⁶⁷

Even though the Löwenheim–Skolem theorem only applies in the specific

context of first-order model theory its ramifications for the possibility of
absolutely general quantification might extend considerably further.⁶⁸
The final argument against absolutely general quantification I want to 4. The argument
consider here is closely connected with Russell’s paradox. Its form is most from indefinite
extensibility
easily illustrated by considering the case of sets.

⁶⁶ Lavine 2006: 108. ⁶⁷ McGee 2006: 185–6.

⁶⁸ For more discussion of this point see Button 2013.
   -    

Picture the set of all sets as a box, and draw a line to divide it into two
Circular and sections. In the left-hand-side of the box we put all the circular sets, that is sets
straight sets
that contain themselves (such as the set of things, which it itself a thing, the set
of abstract objects, which is itself an abstract objects, etc.), and in the right-
hand-side of the box we put all the straight sets that do not contain themselves
(the set of shoes (itself not a shoe), of ships (not a ship), and so on). Now
consider the set of straight sets (we will call this S). Does this go in the left-
hand-side or in the right-hand-side of the box? Remember that is has to go
somewhere, since the box is the set of all sets. If it goes in the left-hand-side it
will contain itself, which means that if we look inside S, we will find S again.
But S is supposed to be the set of all sets that do not contain themselves. So it
cannot go in the left-hand side of the box. If we put it in the right-hand side,
then, it will not contain itself. But if S is the set of all sets that do not contain
themselves, S should contain S. In this case it should go in the left-hand
side of the box . . . and so the reasoning continues. S cannot be put either
amongst the circular nor amongst the straight sets. But they together are
supposed to encompass all sets. This cannot be right any more. It appears
that with S we have introduced a new kind of set (we have extended the
concept of a set), and so it follows that the original box cannot be regarded as
containing all sets.
Modest We can construct another version of this argument by considering not sets,
interpretations but interpretations of a language.⁶⁹ An interpretation of a language is a set of
meta-level statements that assigns individuals to the names in the language,
and sets to its predicates. Interpretations can of course have properties them-
selves. For example, all interpretations have the property of being an abstract
object, of being a set-theoretic entity, and of being essential for assigning truths
to sentences in a language. This allows us to introduce the property of modesty
for interpretations. An interpretation i (we are here restricting ourselves to
interpretations of predicates) is modest if it does not interpret a predicate P in
such a way that P applies to i itself. Thus if i is modest it is not the case that it
interprets some P as being an abstract object, being a set-theoretic entity, and
so forth. If we want to talk about the property of modesty in a language we can
introduce a predicate M such that Mi if and only if there is no predicate letter
P such P-interpreted-by-i applies to i. Doing this is of course just providing
an interpretation of M (let us call this j). Now the question is: Is j modest?
Assume Mj. This means that there is no predicate letter P such P-interpreted-
by-j applies to j. But there is, namely M, which j interprets as being the
property of modesty. So -Mj. But if it is not modest then there must be some
predicate letter P such that it, interpreted by j, applies to j. But as M is the only
predicate letter interpreted by j, M must be this letter, so that Mj.

⁶⁹ This kind of argument is discussed in Grim 1991, Williamson 2003.

  -    

We are thus faced with a contradiction. It is obvious that the property of

modesty (applied to models) is a close cousin of that of heterologicality Modesty and
heterologicality
(applied to words). A word is heterological just in case it does not apply to
itself (such as ‘monosyllabic’), autological otherwise (such as ‘polysyllabic’). If
‘heterological’ was heterological it would not apply to itself and therefore
would not be heterological. Yet if it is not heterological it is autological, and
thereby expressing a property that also applies to itself, in which case it is
heterological after all. There appears to be something fundamentally wrong
with the notion of heterologicality, as there appears to be with the notion of a
modest interpretation. This difficulty results from the attempt to quantify
over all interpretations of a language. Doing so appears to be indispensable
for making certain fundamental philosophical points (such that the inference
‘P → P implies P’ is a logical truth because on all interpretations of the
sentence-letter the resulting sentence comes out as true). Yet as soon as we
can do that there is nothing that keeps us from defining predicates like modesty
for interpretations, leading directly to a paradox. What gave rise to the paradox
is the fact that we did not take into account that as we talk about objects, then
about interpretations of terms, then about properties of interpretations, the
scope of what we mean by ‘all’ widens. By moving from an object-level
statement about tables and chairs to a meta-level statement about the inter-
pretation of the terms ‘table’ and ‘chair’ we talk about more things: first we
talked about a universe with tables and chairs in it, now we talk about a bigger
one that also features interpretations. As we can always repeat the move to a
meta-language there is always more to talk about than we initially thought we
were talking about. Full generality is therefore forever beyond our grasp.
For this reason concepts such as ‘set’, ‘interpretation’, or ‘ordinal’ have been Indefinitely
extensible
described by Michael Dummett as ‘indefinitely extensible’. By using a form of concepts
the Russell construction described above, we can always construct a version
of such a concept that cannot have been included in our original starting
collection of all entities that fell under the concept we began with.⁷⁰ Yet it is
important to note that the consequences of indefinite extensibility are not just
local issues concerned with the theoretical accounts we give of sets, with
interpretations in mathematics or semantics, or with ordinals. The problems
collecting all entities of type x together continue to haunt us if we later want to
collect all the type y entities together, and if the ys subsume the xs. For in order
to collect all the ys we need to collect all the xs that form a sub-collection first,
and if we cannot do so for the xs, for reason of indefinite extensibility, we
cannot do so for the ys either.⁷¹ As such the indefinite extensibility of some

⁷⁰ Glanzberg 2006: 50.

⁷¹ Dummett (1994: 249) points out that a concept subsuming an indefinitely extensible concept
is for that reason itself indefinitely extensible: “the (formal) concept object (or identical with itself)
embraces all others; since some of the others are indefinitely extensible, it must be also”.
   -    

concepts entails difficulties for referring to the totality of what is included

under such concepts as ‘thing’, ‘object’, or ‘entity’, and as such for the possi-
bility of absolutely general quantification.
We will consider some possible responses from the defender of absolutely
general quantification in a moment. Before doing so, however, let us draw out
some of the implications of the impossibility of quantifying over everything for
our present discussion.
If the above arguments against absolutism are successful, the view that we can
quantify over absolutely everything leads to sufficiently severe conceptual problems
that we might be better off doing without it. As a consequence, we can no longer
refer to a complete list or theory of all there is, or to a complete universe comprising
all things or all facts. This has significant consequences for the possibility of
ultimately true theories in general, and for ontological theories in particular.⁷²
Hyper- The denial of absolutely general quantification may be understood as sup-
antirealism and porting a view which we shall call hyper-antirealism, a position relative to
the
consequences of which familiar kinds of realism and anti-realism have to be considered as
denying equally ‘realistic’ since they both affirm that there is a final account of the world
absolutism for
ontology correctly captured by these respective theories.
The most obvious consequences of hyper-antirealism concern ontology. If
ontology is understood in the traditional Quinean sense as providing an
account of ‘what there is’, and if this does not just mean accounting for some
of what there is, but for all of it, it appears that ontology is impossible. For if no
The scope of sense can be made of the notion of a collection of all things on any plausible
ontology understanding of ‘collection’, if there is no final account of what things there are in
the world, how is it possible to come up with an ontological theory that provides
precisely this? There are some who claim (rightly, it seems to me) that the Quinean
definition of ontology sacrifices accuracy for conciseness. For ontology is not
concerned with either a partial or a comprehensive laundry-list of all there is,⁷³ but
with an account of very general structural features of what exists. But even this

⁷² At least if we do not assume that ontology is in any way provisional or fallible. The arguments
against absolutism do not rule out forms of theorizing according to which the ontological
enterprise is never completeted. See §118, problem 1 (The ‘no philosophy’ objection).
⁷³ ‘Metaphysics is about what there is and what it is like. But it is not concerned with any old
shopping list of what there is and what it is like. Metaphysicians seek a comprehensive account of
some subject-matter—the mind, the semantic, or, most ambitiously, everything—in terms of a
limited number of more or less basic notions’ (Jackson 1998: 4). ‘Because the ingredients are limited,
some putative features of the world are not going to appear explicitly in some more basic account. The
question then is whether they nevertheless figure implicitly in the more basic account, or whether we
should say that to accept that the account is complete, or is complete with respect to some subject-
matter or other, commits us to holding that the putative features are merely putative. In sum, serious
metaphysics is discriminatory at the same time as claiming to be complete, or complete with respect
to some subject matter, and the combination of these two features of serious metaphysics means that
there are inevitably a host of putative features of our world which we must either eliminate or locate’
(Jackson 1998: 5). ‘Es geht in der Ontologie um die Grundstrukturen des Seienden. [ . . . ] [This
includes the possible and the impossible.] Ansonsten würde man dem Anspruch der Ontologie nicht
gerecht, eine allgemeinste Wissenschaft von allem überhaupt zu sein’ (Meixner 2004: 9).
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more sophisticated understanding of ontology is difficult to reconcile with the idea

that it is impossible to quantify over absolutely everything.
A prominent part of ontology is concerned with ontological categories and Ontological
deals with a set of structural features that are supposed to tell us about the categories

dependence relations between general kinds of things in the world. Ontological

theories construct accounts of dependence relations by taking certain categor-
ies as primitive or primary, showing how other categories can be understood as
derived or secondary.⁷⁴
For such a constructive view of derived categories to be informative it has to Lists of
be supplemented by the assumption that the list of basic categories is closed, categories as
closed
that no other categories in the world are basic. For the interest in pursuing such
axiomatic approaches lies in developing them from a restricted basis. If it was
the case that the world contained all kinds of entities unfamiliar to us,
including some additional basic categories, any particular construction of a
derived category would be less interesting (for perhaps there are shorter
constructions of these categories based on these additional, basic ones, or
perhaps the supposed derived categories do in fact belong to the additional
basic categories) and any claim that a certain category could be constructed
would not be likely to remain stable under this enlargement.
In addition, the list of basic categories should be derivationally complete: all Lists of
kinds of things in the world that are not basic should be derivable or con- categories as
complete
structable from the basic kinds. But of course such a claim cannot be made
plausible on the view that we cannot quantify over absolutely everything, for if
we could not even have a final account of all the kinds of things there are, how
could we claim that they are all derivable from a fixed list of basic categories?⁷⁵
Does this mean that the denial of absolutely general quantification precludes Ontological
claims that are
us from making any ontological claims? This might be too rash a generaliza- universal
tion; it is clear, however, that the difficulties apply to ontological claims that are statements.
also universal statements, such as the claim that apart from these categories all
are non-basic, or that all kinds of things in the world are derivable from a
specific set of categories.

⁷⁴ As such ontological theory-building can be understood along the lines of constructing

axiomatizations of theories, the axioms corresponding to the fundamental categories and the
theorems to the derived categories.
⁷⁵ Of course this presupposes that the incompleteness of the world is an incompleteness in
kinds, a qualitative, rather than quantitative incompleteness. The assumption that the world could
be qualitatively complete, yet quantitatively incomplete, so that there would be a complete
collection of kinds of things, while there would no collection of kinds subsumed amongst them
does not seem to be very promising. Certainly if our argument for incompleteness relies on the view
that our knowledge of the world is based on some conceptual scheme, and that any attempt at
forming a collection of all the elements of the scheme would take us outside of that scheme this
would still apply in the case of kinds. The collection of all kinds is a kind not included amongst the
original kinds, which means that these kinds could not have exhausted all there is.
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However, as the majority of ontological claims either takes the form of

universal statements, or relies on such statements (as in the case of claims of
ontological reducibility, which rely on universal statements about the set of
basic categories) it appears as if at least a great part of ontology is thrown into
doubt if we accept that absolutely general quantification is impossible.⁷⁶
We could still save much of what we usually regard as ontological truths by
rephrasing them as hypothetical truths, as truths that would hold if the
contents of the universe could in fact be completely enumerated, if there was
a final theory and a collection of all that is the case. (Though there would be the
difficulty that this antecedent is then a necessarily false proposition, and we
would therefore have to adopt a non-classical logic in order to prevent every-
thing being true under the hypothesis.)
Universal Another consequence of hyper-antirealism is that we encounter difficulties
explanations
when developing a theory of all truths as a whole, and of their relation to the
world as a whole. Since the denial of absolutely general quantification denies
the existence of either of these such an enterprise will be doomed from the
start.
Problems arise, for example, if we tried to develop some answer to the
question why the world exists at all,⁷⁷ or why it is the way it is. This is not
asking for the explanation of individual truths, such as why tomatoes are red,
or why bananas are curved, but for an explanation of all truths taken as a
whole. Unless we accept the Hume–Edwards principle,⁷⁸ to answer this ques-
tion it is not sufficient that we can provide an explanation for each individual
truth, but we want an explanation of why everything is as it is, that is an
explanation of all truths taken together. And nothing but the set of all basic
sentences or fundamental truths is able to provide such an explanation. But if
there is no such thing, there will also not be a collective explanation for
everything.
This also entails that what is probably the best argument for ontological
foundation dissipates. Some philosophers argue that the reason why there
cannot be an infinitely descending sequence of dependence relations is that

⁷⁶ Compare Williamson 2003: 435. I do not share his belief that this is not much of a problem, as
‘most of our life, even most of our intellectual life, does not appear to depend on the prospects for
traditional metaphysics’. This appears to underestimate the foundational role generally ascribed to
ontology within the architecture of philosophical disciplines.
⁷⁷ See Van Inwagen 1996; Parfit 1998; Rundle 2004. Bliss 2019 connects the problem of
ontological foundationalism with the question of why there is something rather than nothing by
examining the argument that (1) there must be an explanation of why there are any dependent
entities at all and (2) one cannot appeal to any dependent entities to supply this conclusion, so that
this explanation must be supplied by something independent, which will provide an ontological
foundation. We cannot assess this argument in detail here, but will simply note that even if we
accept the version of the principle of sufficient reason that stands behind (1), it is very hard to
justify (2) in a non-question-begging way.
⁷⁸ On which see §105.
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we could never arrive at a comprehensive explanation of why the world is the

way it is.⁷⁹ We can always find an explanation for each particular fact, just by
referring to a more fundamental fact it depends on, but it would be impossible
to come up with an explanation of the whole. Yet if we cannot even quantify
over all entities there could never be such an explanation, so that arguing
that an infinite descent of dependence relations forbids such an explanation
loses its force.
§116 Possible Responses to the Denial of Absolutely General
Quantification
How can the defender of ultimately true theories, or of ontological theories
more specifically, respond to the challenge from the denial of absolutely
general quantification? There are two general strategies. The first is to reject
the denial of absolutism and its consequences altogether. The second is to
accept that we cannot quantify over absolutely everything, but to argue that the
consequences for our theorizing are not as severe as we made them appear. We
will look at each in turn.
The defender of absolutely general quantification may worry that to assert 1. Rejecting the
denial of
its impossibility appears to come dangerously close to self-refutation. In fact absolutely
some would argue that it is self refuting. One thing the critic of absolutely general
general quantification wants to assert is that there is no set or class or collection quantification
containing everything. But this is just the same as saying of all things that they
cannot be put in a set, class, or collection. However, if we agree with the idea
that the notion of the complete universe, of ‘all things’ is incoherent⁸⁰ then the Inexpressibility
previous sentence contained a meaningless term, and is therefore itself mean- of
incompleteness
ingless. So embracing incompleteness at the same time robs us of the ability to
express it. The proponent of incompleteness is literally unable to express his
position.⁸¹
This worry is succinctly expressed by Vann McGee:
[T]he thesis that, for any discussion, there are things that lie outside the universe of
discourse of that discussion is a position that cannot be coherently maintained.

⁷⁹ Cameron 2008: 12. See §90.

⁸⁰ Grim 1991: 122.
⁸¹ See also Williamson 2003: 433–4. An immediate, but ultimately unsuccessful reply would be
to point out that we could run the same argument against someone who says that there are no
square circles, pointing out that by his own lights ‘square circle’ is a contradictory concept, so that
his statement ‘There are no square circles’ is meaningless for that very reason. The opponent of
square circles could reply that his statement is just to be understood as the claim that the properties
of squareness and circularity cannot be co-instantiated in any one object, so no reference to
contradictory entities is required. Could we equally say that the properties ‘being complete’ and
‘being the world’ can never be co-instantiated? A straightforward way of spelling this out says that
the two properties cannot be instantiated by the collection of all objects, and we are thus back to
square one.
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Consider the discussion we are having right now. We cannot coherently claim that there
are things that lie outside the universe of our discussion, for any witness to the truth of
that claim would have to lie outside the claim’s universe of discourse.⁸²

This is because in any language we can only ever refer to objects in the
language’s domain, for this is what the language is about. If some part of our
language was somehow considered to link up with objects outside of the
domain of interpretation, these terms would be meaningless, for all referents
of the language are drawn from the domain. Of course we can enlarge the
domain, but this merely pushes the bump under the carpet somewhere else,
since the problem re-occurs for the larger domain.
Assuming, for the sake of argument that the denial of absolutely general
quantification is indeed inexpressible, how should its defender respond? First,
note, as McGee himself points out, inexpressibility does not entail falsity. The
Showing what claim ‘nothing exists’, for example, would, if true, be inexpressible, because
cannot be said.
there would be nothing around to express it. Second, even if there is no
sentence that could express the theory the critic of absolutely general quanti-
fication wants to express, this does not entail that he silently has to wave his
hands towards an ineffable inexpressible. As Wittgenstein pointed out, there
are things that cannot be said, but can nevertheless be shown. In this context
two strategies for showing what cannot be conveyed by a sentence in our
language suggest themselves.
a. Schemas The first strategy involves the use of schemas. We could argue that even
though a single sentence might not be able express the failure of absolutely
general quantification, infinitely many could. In order to express the impossi-
bility of absolutely general quantification for every domain, we can assert it for
any specific domain d. This does not imply that we somehow have to say infinitely
many things in order to express what we want to say. It is sufficient to express the
schematic proposition ‘there are objects not included in the domain d’, and then
allow the substitution of arbitrary domain names for the schematic letter.
Believing in But it seems as if this has not really resolved the problem that the critic of
infinitely many absolutely general quantification has to believe infinitely many things. For he
things?
would still have to believe that for each domain-name you can plug in for the
schematic letter d, the resulting sentence is going to come out true—and there
are infinitely many of these domain-names. We might then wonder to which
extent he manages to believe in any theory at all, at least as long as we make the
plausible assumption that to hold a theory is to believe in a finite set of
propositions.
Yet can we not hold theories that fail to be finitely axiomatizable? Zermelo-
Fraenkel set theory with Choice and urelements, expressed in a first-order language

⁸² McGee 2000: 55.

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with the identity predicate, the element-of predicate, and the set-predicate is not
finitely axiomatizable. Yet we seem to be able to form perfectly coherent beliefs
about set theory, so the lack of finite axiomatizability cannot be a fundamental
problem when formulating a theory. However, referring to the example of set
theory might not help the critic of absolutely general quantification much in this
context. If we add plural resources to Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory with Choice and
urelements the result is finitely axiomatizable, and we might argue that it is only
because of this fact that our beliefs about the non-axiomatizable weaker version can
be considered to be beliefs at all. Yet if that is true, then we can only believe in the
impossibility of absolutely general quantification if there is a finite number of
theses that has this impossibility as a consequence. If we put these all together into
one big conjunction, this conjunction will assert the impossibility of absolutely
general quantification for all domains, including the domain of the language in
which this impossibility is expressed, and this is exactly the scenario that McGee’s
quotation given earlier considers as inconsistent.
The reason why this reply is not as strong as it initially appears is that there
seems to be no way of completely avoiding reference to schemas, whether or Reference to
schemas seems
not we believe in absolutely general quantification. Consider how a simple to be
logical law, such as the law of the excluded middle, is usually understood. If we unavoidable.
phrase it in schematic terms, we get something like
LEM: For all S, either S or not S.
Dialetheists aside, we consider this to express a truth. We cannot do so, of
course, after having considered each of the infinitely many sentences we could
plug in for S, having ascertained that the generalization holds for each single
one. Rather than entailing the psychologically implausible actual belief in
infinitely many sentences, belief in LEM should be understood as the dispos-
ition to accept the resulting sentence once a grammatically correct sentence has
been put in place of the schematic letter. Apart from avoiding the conclusion
that we must somehow get infinitely many token beliefs into a finite mind, it
also respects the fact the language from which the substitution-instances are
drawn (in this case, English) is open-ended. During the course of our lives we
are likely to say or speak sentences that no other speaker of English has ever
uttered. Our belief in LEM is not based on the fact that we already believe now,
for each sentence P amongst these unuttered ones that ‘either P or not P’.
Rather, our belief in LEM is to be cashed out as the disposition to accept ‘either
P or not P’ as soon as we have actually formulated P.
The second strategy involves restricted quantification over reductio argu- b. Restricted
ments. Assume that R is the (possibly infinite) set of theories entailing the quantification
over reductio
possibility of absolutely general quantification. Then consider the claim that arguments.
for every Ri there is a set of sentences Si in it such that Si entails a contradiction.
This statement seems to express what the defender of the impossibility of
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absolutely general quantification wants to say, namely that all attempts of

formulating absolutely general quantification are inconsistent, and that its
impossibility must therefore be assumed. Yet in order to make this claim we
did not have to quantify over absolutely everything, but only over the restricted
domain of all the Ri.
According to this second strategy the denial of absolutely general quantifi-
cation would not have to be understood as a claim about absolutely everything
but as an open-ended claim about one’s own abilities of developing philosoph-
ical demonstrations: whenever someone comes up with a theory that postulates
the ability to quantify over absolutely everything (in terms of a universal
collection, an omniscient knower, an assembly of all facts) we are able to
derive a contradiction from this theory.⁸³ The rejection of absolutely general
quantification is therefore to be understood as an existential statement assert-
ing the existence of a reductio argument against any purported claim of
completeness.⁸⁴
Phrasing this point in terms of the dialectical situation between two oppon-
ents, the critic of absolutely general quantification is not aiming to come up
with an argument that once and for all establishes that such quantification is
impossible. But when his opponent suggests a theory that makes this assump-
tion he is able to derive a contradiction from it. At a later stage another claim
may be made that also presupposes the ability to quantify over absolutely
everything. Again, a contradiction is derived and at some point, one would
expect, the proponent of absolutely general quantification gets the point and
will stop trying to quantify over absolutely everything. At this point, though the
impossibility of absolutely general quantification has not been asserted (the
proponent only ever makes ‘local’ statements about specific claims), it has been
shown.
Methodological What is the reason for this peculiar philosophical methodology? Why can’t
justification
the defenders of completeness and incompleteness pitch their positions against
each other in honest philosophical combat, instead of the latter acting as an
argumentative sniper who aims at instances of absolutely general quantifica-
tion whenever they rear their heads? The explanation lies in the fact that both
disagree about a fundamental philosophical assumption.
The problem of The defender of absolutely general quantification assumes that there is a
the final account final account of the world. ‘Final’ here is to be understood in two senses. Firstly,
of the world
this account leaves nothing out, it does not have to be supplemented by other,
additional theories. This does not mean that every true statement must be
a part of it, but that such statements could always be derived from the
statements which are part of it. Secondly, the statements included in the final

⁸³ See Fine 2006: 28–29; Waghorn 2014: 63–4 for further discussion of this strategy.
⁸⁴ This interpretation is suggested by Grim 1991: 123–4. See also Rayo/Uzquiano 2006: 3.
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account are all primary statements. Primary statements do not depend for their
truth on other statements, they encompass ‘what is true anyway’, what is ‘true
no matter what’. Secondary statements, on the other hand, are true only
because certain other statements are true.⁸⁵
It is evident that the denial of absolutely general quantification creates
difficulties for both senses of finality. The deductive closure of the final account
is supposed to encompass all truths, yet the critic of absolutely general quan-
tification denies that there is such a thing as ‘all truths’. Secondly, there is a
conflict between the impossibility of absolutely general quantification and the
notion of primary statements. Suppose we have some primary statement X that
describes part of how the world is fundamentally (say ‘electrons exist’). It is
only primary if there aren’t other statements Y, Z such that X depends for its
truth on them. So what it means for X to be a primary truth is that it is true that
there are no truths distinct from X such that X is only true because they are.
That statement is a generalization over all truths. This reveals an interesting
connection between primary statements and absolute generalizations. It
appears that we can only speak of primary truths if we accept some absolutely
universal statements as truths as well.⁸⁶
It is important to understand the denial of absolutely general quantification
not in a way in which we might e.g. say that an encyclopaedia is not absolutely
general, as if there were certain important topics it leaves out. Rather, we
should understand it as saying that the very notion of a world over which we
can quantify with full generality is incoherent. The claim of absolutely general
quantification is entailed by saying that there is an ultimately true theory. The
denial of such quantification is not the claim that there is something extra,
something that every quantification leaves out, but says that we cannot give an
account of ‘the world as it is anyway’, for such an account can only be made
sense of if we understand what ‘being true independent of everything’ means,
and to do this we have to understand absolutely general statements. Virtually
all metaphysical theories agree with the meta-metaphysical assumption that
there is an ultimately true theory accounting for the whole of reality. This is
hardly surprising, given the way we usually understand theorizing with onto-
logical categories. If there were sections of reality we could not account for by

⁸⁵ What if the defender of completeness rejects the idea that some truths depend on other
truths? In this case all truths are primary, and there is nothing to differentiate between the two
senses of finality.
⁸⁶ This is the reason why ‘it is impossible to quantify over everything’ cannot be a primary truth.
For if it is then (a) there is no collection of all truths and (b) ‘it is impossible to quantify over
everything’ does not depend on other truths for its truth. But (b) means that for all truths it is the
case that no subset of them is such that ‘it is impossible to quantify over everything’ is only true
because that subset is. But this contradicts (a).
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appeal to these sets of categories we would regard the theory based on them at
best as a partial ontological account of the world.
The appearance The critic of absolutely general quantification disagrees with the presuppos-
of self-refutation ition that there is some big fact to the matter regarding what there is in the
results from
assuming the world, some final theory that encompasses all truths. It is now evident that the
existence of a appearance of self-refutation only arises for the critic of absolutely general
final theory
quantification because we still rely on the opponent’s presupposition. We
might reply to someone who believes that there is no final theory by saying:
‘Well, is this your final theory? And if it isn’t, why should I be convinced by it,
as it is eventually going to be replaced by another one (since that’s what it
means to say that it is not final)?’ But this reply only carries any force if we
assume that not being final speaks against a theory, because other theories are
final. Yet this is exactly the point at issue.
Incompleteness The key claim of the denial of absolutely general quantification is that there
and cannot be a final theory of the world, since such a theory would encompass the
realism/anti-
realism totality of what there is, and since the primary status of its claims can only be
distinction spelt out in terms of a collection of all truths. But since there is no such totality,
there cannot be such a theory.⁸⁷ The distinction we are looking at here is
significantly more fundamental than the one involved in the debate about
realism. For even the most extreme global anti-realist, one believing that
everything (including Mt Everest, electrons, and the moon) are social con-
structs would agree that there is a fact to the matter regarding what there is in
the world (social constructs all the way), that there is some final theory that
gives a record of all there is (i.e. his particular brand of social constructivism).
2. Rejecting A second possible response to the critic of absolutely general quantification
absolutely is to embrace the denial of absolutely general quantification, trying at the same
general
quantification time to determine whether there are ways to avoid the hyper-antirealist
while consequences mentioned above.
minimizing the
ontological An obvious but unsatisfactory suggestion would be to understand the
consequences rejection of absolutely general quantification along the lines of Zermelo’s
Incompleteness picture of the realm of set theory, consisting of ‘an open-ended but well-
as open-
ordered sequence of universes, where each universe is strictly more inclusive
endedness
than its predecessor’.⁸⁸ Yet on this theory there is precisely one final and
comprehensive account of what the world is like, and that is that it has this
open-ended structure.
Incompleteness Nor would it make sense to regard the impossibility to quantify over
restricted to absolutely everything as only applicable to the representation, and not to
representation

⁸⁷ Of course if there cannot be a final theory of the world the account described in these pages
cannot be a final theory either. I will return to this point on page 303 below.
⁸⁸ Rayo and Uzquiano 2006: 6. See Zermelo 1930.
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the representatum. There is an important difference between the failure of

comprehensiveness of representational items (lists, models, languages, formal
systems, knowledge, truth) and non-representational items (facts, states of
affairs). For representational items their failure to be comprehensive amounts
to the representata outrunning the representanda (not every part of what is out
there can be modelled, described in language, thought of), or the true outrun-
ning the provable. But for non-representational items their failure to be
comprehensive cannot be such a ‘mismatch’. Facts or states of affairs do not
stand for anything, so their collection cannot fail to be comprehensive in the
sense that there are not enough to go round. Grim⁸⁹ notes that ‘what the
arguments above ultimately indicate is not merely that all truths, somehow
unproblematically referred to, fail to form a set. What they show, on the
contrary, is that the very notion of all truths—or of all propositions or of all
that an omniscient being would have to know—is itself incoherent.’⁹⁰
Failure to be comprehensive concerning representations has consequences
that are just the opposite of such a failure concerning the world. The former
supports realism by claiming the existence of something that goes beyond all
our representational resources.⁹¹ The latter does not, saying that there is
something fundamentally problematic with the idea of all entities in the
world put together.
A final reply that attempts to minimize the consequences of the denial of Incompleteness
absolutely general quantification consists in understanding the claim that we only concerns
our concept of
cannot quantify over absolutely everything not as a statement about the world, the world
but as a statement at the meta-level speaking about our concept of the world.
This statement would then be saying that the world being the way it is, and our
conception of collections etc. being the way it is, the world fails to be compre-
hensive. In this case our concept of the world would not include absolutely
everything there is, but only everything at the object level. Should we now
produce a concept ‘world+’ really incorporating all there is (which would thus

⁸⁹ Grim 1991: 122.

⁹⁰ Note that ‘there need be no suggestion, by the way, that truths be thought of as linguistic
entities in even the most attenuated or metaphorical sense. Nothing in the arguments demands, for
example, that the truths at issue be in any way linguistically expressible. The result would thus be
the same for “true propositions”, for “actual states of affairs”, or for “facts” in place of “truths”:
there can be no set of all true propositions, no set of all facts, and no set of all actual states of affairs’
(Grim 1991: 93–4).
⁹¹ Though we seem to have a choice here between realism about the representata and realism
about the representanda. Compare Yourgrau (1999: xiv), who points out that Gödel made two
different choices here in two different argumentative contexts: ‘I formulate a question that no one
else has yet addressed, to wit: Why did Gödel conclude, in the case of T, intuitive arithmetic truth,
that the limitation lies with formalized mathematics, whereas in the case of t (intuitive time) he
concluded, not that relativity theory has intrinsic limitations, but rather that intuitive time itself is
an appearance or illusion?’ On p. 107 he notes that ‘I don’t think we really know enough, at present,
to resolve this question satisfactorily.’
   -    

function as the domain of the language in which our meta-level assertions are
phrased) we would of course just replicate the problem we encountered when
thinking that the world incorporated all there is. We therefore need a statement
at the meta-meta-level to tell us what the meta-level statement means. But
Infinite semantic since this process continues we have the case of an infinite ascent through
ascent higher and higher meta-languages, none of which is ever furnished with a
domain. To which extent this is problematic is not immediately clear. We
certainly have, for each level, a statement that tells us what the statements at
that level mean. (This is comparable to the case of an infinite descent of levels
of explanations where, even though there is no fundamental explanation, there
is an explanation for every level.)
Impossibility of With such an infinitely ascending chain of languages we would never
a universal acquire a universal semantics in the sense of a theory that supplied the
semantics.
meaning for all the languages in the chain. And indeed there are some who
claim that such a thing is impossible in the first place.⁹² The basic thought
behind this claim is that a formal semantic theory will face the difficulty of
having to postulate some kind of universal domain in terms of which all of the
language is interpreted, and such a domain cannot exist if absolutely general
quantification is impossible. On the other hand if we choose an informal
semantic theory as a final reference point to determine meaning⁹³ there
would be no reason why there could not be a language powerful enough to
quantify over whatever resources the informal theory employs (whether these
are plural noun phrases or some other devices) in which case we could easily
generate a version of Russell’s paradox, as this language would have to be
interpreted in the same language in which the informal semantic theory is
formulated.⁹⁴ Yet if the idea of a comprehensive semantic theory applicable to
all languages is an inconsistent fiction we could hardly find fault with the
infinite hierarchy of languages just described for failing to provide us with such
a semantics.
The method of semantic ascent appears to be the most promising of the
three ways out presented, yet it is doubtful whether it will be of much use in
defending the ontological enterprise as traditionally conceived. For it concedes
that when we are seemingly talking about the world we are de facto talking
about something else, namely about our concept of the world. Of course if
concepts were all there is, talk about concepts would qualify as genuinely
ontological talk, but if that is the consequence we have to accept in order to
ward off hyper-antirealism many might regard the cure as worse than the disease.

⁹² ‘[T]here may in the end be no universally adequate formal (or for that matter informal)
semantics. [ . . . ] Thus it may be that there is and can be no X such that an X-theoretic semantics
would prove adequate in all cases’ (Grim 1991: 153).
⁹³ Along the lines of Boolos 1984. ⁹⁴ Grim 1991: 153.
  -    

We are thus left with a dilemma: either the arguments against absolutely Two ways of
general quantification are insufficient (though it is hard to come up with a proceeding from
here
refutation that is successful against all four kinds) or ontology as traditionally
conceived, and, more generally, the attempt to construct an ultimately true
theory of the world is a fundamentally deficient enterprise (which is a conclu-
sion we might be reluctant to accept). We therefore have a choice between
either coming up with a robust argument demonstrating that despite appear-
ances to the contrary, absolutely general quantification is unproblematic, or
developing a revised conception of ontology compatible with a world where
absolutely general quantification is impossible. Our present discussion sup-
ports the second option, and we will have more to say below on what such a
conception of ontology would look like.

4.4 Final Remarks

§117 Ultimately True Theories and Foundationalism
In the last three sections we looked at three different approaches that seem to Recap: 3
arguments
undermine the existence of an ultimately true theory of the world. Coherent-
against
ism questions the idea that we can have specific truths that do not depend for ultimately true
their truth on any other ones, but have a direct link to the world, so to speak. In theories
the case of these, language, thought, or whatever other representational system
we have in mind would touch the world directly. Ultimately true theories will
of course depend on the existence of such truths, for the fundamental truths
they postulate are taken to be true simply because the world is in a certain way.
Semantic contextualism makes a related point when it comes to the meaning
of expressions. It is critical of the assumption that there can be propositions, or
even terms, that have their meaning independent of other terms or proposi-
tions that provide a background for how they should be understood.⁹⁵ Again, if
this is true, postulating ultimately true theories runs into problems. For if the
meaning of these theories cannot stand on its own, but has to bring in other
propositions or terms, the ultimately true theory cannot be as ultimate as it
looked initially—it depends for its very meaning on extraneous material.
Finally, the denial of absolutely general quantification undermines the idea
that there could be a collection of all truths or all facts. Yet a crucial factor of the
ultimately true theories metaphysicians and ontologists are interested in is that
they capture the fundamental features of the entire world. But if there cannot be
such a thing as the entire world, in the sense that there is no collection of all

⁹⁵ As such logic, which treats propositions as independent in this way may be regarded as
concerned with idealizations, in much the same way in which physics deals with idealizations such
as perfectly rigid bodies. In neither case is the utility of the theory undermined by the non-existence
of such entities.
   -    

truths or facts, then there can be no theory of it (or at best an empty theory). It
appears as if the theory of the world the metaphysician chases is a mirage.
Implications of If these three lines of criticisms are successful in challenging the idea of an
the denial of ultimately true theory, this has immediate consequences for higher-order
ultimately true
theories for foundationalism. Higher-order foundationalism is a response to the question
higher-order what grounds the facts about first-order grounding, or to the question what
foundationalism
grounds the truth of the assertion that such grounding relations obtain. One
response is that whatever ground grounds these facts, it must be ultimate. For
the grounding facts are either grounded in nothing at all, or grounded only in
themselves. In both cases they enjoy ultimate status, as we cannot go existentially
or explanatorily beyond them. They are the place where the stratified structure of
the world, as well as our attempts to make sense of it come to an end. But if there
are no ultimately true theories of the world it is unclear how we could possibly
account for the grounds of grounding relations. What grounds the grounds
must, it appears, either go all the way down, or all the way round.
§118 The Resulting Picture and Four Problems
The preceding four chapters of this book have attempted to dissolve a sequence
of four intuitively plausible assumptions about the world: first, that our
epistemic processes connect us with objects in the external world that they
represent more or less faithfully, second, that we have direct and incorrigible
access to our inner world of mental states, third, that even if the status of external
and internal objects as a firm foundation was undermined, there would still be
some fundamental level of reality, and finally, that even if this foundationalism
should fail, the truth of the statement that it fails would constitute part of the
ultimate theory of what the world is like at the most fundamental level.
The rejection of the fourth assumption, and the claim that there are no
ultimately true theories of the world is at the same time far-reaching and not
widely held. Assuming we are prepared to follow this argument all the way
through, what is the philosophical position we are left with?
Four problems To give a full-scale exposition of the ramifications of the resulting philo-
sophical picture is beyond the scope of the present book and needs to be left for
another occasion. However, it might be useful to respond to some of the more
obvious challenges this position could be seen to face. Four such problems
immediately come to mind.

.  ‘ ’ 

If there is no ultimately true theory, have we not given up on the philosophical
enterprise altogether? Is this project an example of philosophical analysis
undermining itself by its own method, sawing off the very branch on which
it sits? And having once fallen off that tree of knowledge, is the only response to
philosophical problems left a quietist one?
  -    

.   

If there are no foundational truths, does this not land us in a dismal kind of
relativism, where each position is as good as any other? If there is no gold standard
of ultimate truth, how can we differentiate between different accounts of the world?

.  ‘  ’ 

Do we not need some foundational truths (and therefore an ultimately true
theory) to make sense of the claim that the ‘intuitively plausible assumptions
about the world’ we discussed in the previous chapters turn out to be false? If
there is no way the world ultimately is, what is our basis for considering these
assumptions to be false?

.  ‘   ’ 

Have we not simply come full circle? Our criticism of naïve realism in
Chapter 1 suggested a distinction between appearance, the way the world
seems to be, and reality, the way the world is. If we abandon the idea of
ultimately true theories, this position can no longer be maintained.
Our position does not want to say (as various approaches that incorporate the
existence of some kind of noumenal ‘thing in itself ’) that the way the world truly
is is very strange, and not in any way as it looks to the philosophically unsophis-
ticated observer. It is rather saying that there is no way the world truly is, that
there is appearance only, without some underlying final turtle that shoulders all
the ontological burden. The non-existence of the world referred to here is no
‘existence as something else’, but precisely the denial of the world’s ontological
status. But does this not imply that our previous analysis is simply trivialized? If
we take the noumenal out of the equation, are we not simply left with the
appearance, and thus with the naïve realist picture that the way the world
appears is the way the world is?
I’ll consider each challenge in turn.
If we take it to be an essential feature of a philosophical account of the world to 1. The ‘no
philosophy’
present us with an ultimately true theory, the above arguments indeed appear objection
to be self-undermining. For they purport to give a philosophical argument for
why the philosophical enterprise, understood here as the search for an ultim-
ately true theory cannot succeed. This results in the inconsistent claim that it is
ultimately true that nothing is ultimately true, and since inconsistent claims
cannot be upheld, there must be something wrong either with the premisses or
with the argument.
One way of evading this problem is to bring in the Wittgensteinian distinc- Showing and
tion between showing and telling once more. It is clear that on pain of telling

contradiction no philosophical theory (conceived as ultimately true) could

   -    

say or tell that there are no ultimate truths. It could nevertheless show this to be
the case, for example by demonstrating that any purported example of an
ultimately true theory contains a contradiction somewhere. In this case even
though assertions of ultimate truths are not what the theory delivers, the
resulting scenario is very far from a quietist one. There is much the defender
of such a theory can still say, even though his approach is entirely reactive,
formulated in response to theories defenders of ultimate truths suggest, rather
than developing a theory on its own.
Philosophy as a As a matter of fact, the conception of philosophy as a kind of über-science,
kind of medicine delivering an ultimately true account of the world is not the only self-

characterization of philosophy we find in its history. As such the worry that

if philosophy cannot be carried out in this manner, it cannot be carried out as
all is misplaced. An alternative conception (found, inter alia, in Pyrrhonian
scepticism, as well as in the later Wittgenstein) is that of philosophy as a kind
of medicine, providing a cure for intellectual problems that cause us trouble. As
in medicine, the accordance of our theory with the fundamental structure of
the world is not of primary importance. What makes a medical theory, or a
particular medicine successful is its ability to cure diseases. If the account we
have described here is successful, and if there is something inherently prob-
lematic about ultimately true theories this does not imply that there is no room
any more for the enterprise of philosophical inquiry, and that a quietist silence
is the only option left for us. For even if the philosopher’s aim is not to make
ultimately true assertions, but to rule out assertions that purport to be ultim-
ately true, there is still much philosophical analysis to be undertaken in order
to show why they should be ruled out.
2. The relativist The way to avoid being forced into a position where every view is as good as
objection
any other, once we have relinquished the idea of an ultimately true theory, a
theory that is made true by direct contact with the world, is to accept that
Better without certain views can be ranked as better than others, without any one being
best ranked as the best overall. This phenomenon is familiar to us from the
discussion of first-order anti-foundationalism. Even if there is no fundamental
level (and assuming for the sake of argument that the more fundamental the
entities a theory refers to are, the better the theory is) one theory (a theory of
atoms, say) can still be regarded as better than another one (a theory of
molecules), even though there is no overall best theory, because there are no
most fundamental entities.
The absence of an ultimately true theory does not keep us from comparing
the quality of two non-ultimately true theories, not in terms of their distance
Pragmatic from the ultimately true theory, for sure, but in terms of explanatory power,
success simplicity, elegance, coherence with other theories, pragmatic success, and so
forth. Consider pragmatic success. One theory can be described as pragmatic-
ally superior to another one because it allows us to perform practical tasks
  -    

(building an aeroplane, computing prime numbers, making chocolate mousse)

better than another. Such bestness ranking can also be extended to theories
that do not have any practical applications themselves, but that may help us in
developing and explaining other theories that do. Of course it is not the case
that ‘pragmatic success’ is an objective feature of the world, nor would it need
to be. What is pragmatically successful crucially depends on what our interests
and needs are and is therefore highly dependent on us. Pragmatic success, like
everything else for the appearance-only theorist, is merely an appearance, and
the differentiation between theories is nothing but relating one kind of appear-
ance (pragmatic success) to another one (the theories). In this way we can build
up entire hierarchies of theories, with each one being better than its predeces-
sor, without assuming that any of these is ‘best’, i.e. without assuming that it
could not be supplanted by a more successful one, or that it is indicative of
fundamental structural features of the world, objectively speaking. Leaving
behind ultimate truth therefore does not require that we regard every truth
to be as good as any other, in the same way as denying that anything has
ultimate economic value (just by being the kind of thing it is) implies that
everything costs the same as anything else.
Some readers might perceive a tension between some of the claims made in 3. The ‘no
the preceding discussion. On the one hand the philosophical picture presented semantic value’
objection
here is one that incorporates not just the possibility but the actuality of massive
error. If we follow these arguments then we are mistaken about many of our
intuitively held beliefs, such as beliefs about the existence of an external world,
the introspective certainty of an inner world, the existence of a substantial self,
or a foundational level of reality. In this final chapter I criticize the idea of an Does the
ultimately true theory and argue that the anti-foundationalist arguments possibility of
error not
discussed earlier should also be employed to dispel the misconception that presuppose
there is a final and ultimately true theory of the world. Yet the possibility of realism?

massive error is usually connected with a realist understanding of the world.⁹⁶

We can be massively deluded about how the world exists if it is—objectively—
one way, and we perceive it as being some other way entirely. But if there is not
one ultimately true way, one objective way, that is the way things are, how can
we be massively mistaken about this way?
We can formulate this worry is by contrasting two different theories of Conventionalist
reference, conventionalist theories and causal theories.⁹⁷ Conventionalist the- and causal
theories of
ories claim that the reference of a term is derived from a set of implicit or reference

⁹⁶ See Button 2013: 10–11 for a characterization of realism that relies on the possibility of the
radical falsehood of our theory of the world.
⁹⁷ The difference between these two theories is discussed in a way pertinent to our argument in
two papers by Samuel Wheeler (1975, 1979). Somewhat disingenuously Wheeler refers to conven-
tionalist theories as ‘resemblance theories’.
   -    

explicit agreements that some community of speakers observes. The precise

way in which this is supposed to work varies from theory to theory. Conven-
tions can be conceived of as solutions to coordination problems in the manner
suggested by David Lewis,⁹⁸ reference can be determined by the convention
that speaker’s utterances should be interpreted in a way that makes them
mostly true⁹⁹ or in some other way. The presence of a group of speakers is
obviously essential for conventionalist theories. Individual agents do not have
coordination problems, nor do they have to interpret their own utterances.
Insofar as such notions are essential for the existence of reference there cannot
be private languages consisting just of one speaker (not because everything
could mean anything, depending on the speaker’s decision, but because noth-
ing would mean anything, since the conceptual preconditions for anything
meaning something are not in place).
Causal theories of reference, on the other hand, assume that the linkage of a
piece of language and its reference arises out of a causal connection between
the two. Simplifying matters somewhat the idea is that each use of a term for a
certain thing can be traced back via an unbroken causal chain to an initial
dubbing where some original Adam ‘baptised’ an instantiation of that thing by
a term.¹⁰⁰ This event is the first cause of all subsequent usages of the term for
the thing. The notion of causality in play here is typically conceived of in non-
Humean terms, that is, not as a particular way of conceptualizing events, but as
part of the structure of the events themselves.
The causal, but It is now that clear that for the conventionalist the possibility of large-scale,
not the ongoing error about the use of a term is hard to make sense of. For the meaning
conventionalist
theory makes and reference of a term is settled by a system of conventions, and if these
large-scale error conventions are not obeyed, we would not have any meaning or reference at all,
possible
rather than having a mistaken one. As an example, consider the reasons
adduced by philosophers such as Unger, Wheeler, and Van Inwagen that
there are no ordinary objects like tables. Suppose for the sake of argument
that they are successful. The conventionalist could simply not make sense of
the idea that everybody is always misusing the world ‘table’, since misuse is
only defined as a minority’s violating a convention that is followed by the
majority. But on the basis of a causal theory of reference it is possible that the
initial baptism of an object as a table went wrong, because when the original
Adam pointed at an object consisting of a board and four legs, saying ‘I call this
a table’ he could have been mistaken. There were no tables (and nor are there
any now), but Adam mistakenly thought there were.

⁹⁸ Lewis 2002. ⁹⁹ Davidson 1967, 1973–1974.

¹⁰⁰ This idea can be extended from proper names to natural kind terms. In these cases reference
is fixed by dubbing of a specific sample, the natural kind term then subsequently refers to whatever
has the same internal structure as the sample.
  -    

It is an interesting fact that if we consider how terms like ‘refers to’ and Our use of the
‘means’ are actually used by speakers of English such as us, the idea of large- term ‘refers’
implies the
scale, ongoing errors does not appear to be that peculiar after all. Imagine the possibility of
following hypothetical case: One night in the British Museum, some aliens large-scale error

pulverize the Rosetta Stone. As a cover-up the museum replaces it by a replica

that even the most acute visitor cannot distinguish from the original. It seems
intuitively plausible that references to the Rosetta Stone after the switch are
mostly mistaken, or at least that seems to be what our way of using terms like
‘refers to’ implies. If somebody says ‘I went to Room 4 of the British Museum
today to see the Rosetta Stone’ he will be mistaken, since the term ‘Rosetta
Stone’ refers to the artefact from the Ptolemaic period, not to the modern
replica. Yet this artefact no longer exists.
This intuition is easily explicable by the causal theory of reference. The
ancient Egyptian artefact was dubbed the ‘Rosetta Stone’ after its discovery on
15 July 1799 near the town of Rosetta, and subsequent reference of the term
stems from this initial dubbing. And whether or not the Rosetta Stone in the
British Museum is replaced by a replica, the term ‘Rosetta Stone’ continues to
refer to the participant in the initial dubbing.
However, according to a conventionalist understanding of reference the
large-scale error accompanying the subsequent use of the term ‘Rosetta
Stone’ cannot be so explained so easily. After all, if its reference is derived
from a set of implicit or explicit agreements that some community of speakers
observes (such as ‘it is a piece of a grey and black stone stela with 14 lines of
hieroglyphic inscription’, ‘it is located in the British Museum’, ‘it is commonly
believed to be of ancient Egyptian origin’ and so forth), all of these agreements
are still in place after the switch. And if all these agreements together pick out
an object that is the reference of the term ‘Rosetta Stone’, what they will pick
out is the piece of a grey and black stone stela with 14 lines of hieroglyphic
inscription in the British Museum and so on, that is, the replica. And in this
case anybody saying ‘I went to Room 4 of the British Museum today to see the
Rosetta Stone’ will not be mistaken, since he really saw what the term ‘Rosetta
Stone’ refers to, namely the replica.
Now the fact that linguistic intuitions that express our knowledge of how we reductio of the
conventionalist
use a term like ‘refers’ seem to support the possibility of large-scale error
theory
appears to constitute a reductio of the conventionalist theory of reference.¹⁰¹
When we consider how a specific set of terms in our language that is concerned
with reference and meaning is in fact used, it turns out that this usage does not
imply the conventionalist theory of reference, for if it did, we would not believe
that after the switch speakers using the term ‘Rosetta Stone’ are systematically

¹⁰¹ Compare Wheeler 1975: 379.

   -    

deluded about its reference, but accept that whatever a sufficiently large group
of speakers assumes a term refers to it does indeed refer to. As such the
conventionalist theory appears to be false, if true, and therefore must be false.¹⁰²
Conventions However, this is not the only way of understanding the situation before us.
that regard
themselves as
We can also consider language, along the lines of the conventionalist theory of
more than reference, as a system of conventions that says about itself that its nature is not
conventions. merely conventional. (Assume, for the sake of simplicity, that a causal theory of
reference was embedded into our actual usage of terms like ‘refers to’.) This
would not be the only system of its kind. We encountered earlier on the world
model of irrealism which, according to its own view, is real, not virtual, and
Metzinger’s phenomenal self model that equally does not regard itself as a
model. In the two latter cases we would not regard these as reductios of the
respective theory, in fact it is part and parcel of the success of these models that
they do not regard themselves as models. The same may be true about
language. It might be essential for the success of our system of linguistic
conventions that it does not regard itself as a convention.¹⁰³
Relevance for If this is the case, the denial that there is an ultimate true theory of the world
the denial of an
ultimately true
need not be incompatible with the claim that most people are mistaken most of
theory the time about the world they live in. A sufficiently complex framework of
conventions will not only have something to say about whatever objects the
conventions are about, but also about its own status. When it considers itself as
not conventional, the view from the inside of the framework of conventions
will be mistaken. But does saying so presuppose the framework-independent
truth that the framework is just conventional? Not necessarily. The framework
could be part of a larger one, like an infinite, ever expanding set of Russian
dolls, thereby failing to imply that there is an ultimately true theory.¹⁰⁴

¹⁰² Wheeler 1975, 1979 uses this argument to argue against the conventionalist and for the
causal theory of reference.
¹⁰³ Button 65–7: 2013 makes a case for an internal reading of the claim that some objects are
mind-independent, that is, understanding it as a claim internal to one’s best theory. This is another
example of a clash between the inside and the outside view of a theory. From the inside, the claim
that x exists mind-independently comes out true, since claims for the mind-independence of x-type
objects are part of the theory. But from the outside the claim is either false or meaningless, since
one’s best theory is itself mind-dependent, and there is no theory other than this theory that
somehow speaks about the objects from beyond the confines our best theory, and declares them to
exist in a theory-independent (and hence mind-independent) manner.
¹⁰⁴ This opens up a way in which a conventionalist theory of reference might be able to account
for widespread referential error, understanding this not as a deficient connection between language
and reality (where words point at the wrong things) but as an internal difficulty for the system of
conventions. If our conventions establish tables as convention-independently real, and if further
analysis into their status leads to difficulties in conceptualizing their existence in a coherent way
(due to the mereological nihilist’s arguments, say), the conventionalist about reference might
describe this difficulty as a widespread error in our reference to tables, where our system of
conventions points at them as existing in one way, while further analysis of these conventions
also shows that they cannot exist in this way.
  -    

One way of formulating a large-scale error theory with respect to some

theory is by being able to take a perspective from outside of the theory. By
looking at the brain-in-a-vat scenario or the evil-demon scenario from a
perspective that incorporates the mad scientist or the evil demon as its parts The standpoint
outside of the
we can describe how the subject located in this framework is inevitably deluded system does not
about its real nature. However, the ability to take a standpoint outside of the have to be the
system does not imply that this standpoint is the final one, or in fact that any final one
standpoint is. The error scenario might repeat itself with respect to the ‘outside
perspective’, as could be determined by another perspective outside of it. You
might observe some helpless brain being fed a world-simulation by evil
scientists, all the while being yourself tricked by an evil demon to believe in
the existence of the scientists and their lab. Being in error does not presuppose
absolute truth, but merely truth relative to another perspective external to it. It
is not the case that for a theory (or large parts of a theory) T to be false it has to
get the facts of some underlying domain D of objects right. Even if there is no
D, and T just speaks about T, we can still make sense of T being false by looking
at it from the perspective of the metalanguage T’. If T says that P, and T’ says
that non-P, assuming that we take T’ to be more authoritative than T, T’s
assertion is false, even though it is not about anything external to T.
What if the ascent into the metalanguage is not available to us? It is evident Irrealism and the
that the case of the irrealist scenario described in Chapter 1 is slightly more possibility of
large-scale error
complicated, since in its discussion we questioned the feasibility of the very
idea of a perspective outside of the virtual world. So how would it still make
sense to speak of an error theory with regard to the virtual world? A second
route for judging the falseness of parts of a theory in the absence of a theory-
independent domain the theory can be considered to be talking about is via an
argument internal to the theory. In the irrealist case, all the standards for
judging truth and falsity must be considered as being part of the virtual world
as well (otherwise, where would they be located?). These standards are nothing
else but the standards we commonly accept when settling arguments, and a
naïve realist or a representationalist living in a virtual world would be able to
convince himself, by the arguments described earlier, based on accounts of
how perception work, considerations of parsimony and so on that his view
of the world was mistaken. If he then instead becomes an irrealist, has he
reached the final true theory of the world? No, because of the considerations
raised earlier in this chapter, arguing against the possibility that this irrealist
theory could be regarded as a comprehensive, ultimately true ontological
theory. It is thus apparent that there are numerous ways of being wrong for
an inhabitant of the virtual world, even though there is no outside perspective
relative to which the inhabitant’s perspective is mistaken. There is no incon-
sistency between anti-foundationalism about truth and the assumption of
widespread error.
   -    

4. The ‘back to At the end of the movie The Truman Show the hero gets on a boat and
square one’ travels to the end of the world. This end is a wall bounding the ocean that is
objection
painted like the sky. Truman gets off the boat and, like the man in the famous
Flammarion engraving manages to break through the wall to see what is
behind it. In the case of the Truman show this world is relatively similar to
What is behind the one from which Truman has just emerged, but there are variations on the
the veil of
perception?
same scenario where this is not the case. Flammarion’s clockwork universe of
moving spheres is a case in point, as is the nightmarish body-farm of the
Matrix. These are illustrations of two very different ways of interpreting the
way the world is presented to us. We can either consider it to be more or less
faithfully represented, conforming to the accuracy requirement discussed in
Chapter 1 (as a TV camera records its surroundings more or less correctly), or
we can consider it to be seriously distorted (like a TV camera that inverts
colours, lets straight lines look wavy and so on). These distortions can be very
severe, for example, when we look at something that looks like a chair but is in
fact a random combination of pieces of wood that only looks like a chair from
one specific point. In addition to our appearances being similar to or very
dissimilar from the world behind the world we need to consider the possibility
that there is no such world behind the appearances at all.
4 ways Jean Baudrillard distinguishes four ways in which appearance and reality
appearance and can be related.¹⁰⁵ The first, which he terms ‘good appearance’, is one in which
reality can be
related reality is faithfully represented, the second, ‘evil appearance’, ‘of the order of
maleficence’ is one where appearances represent reality in a distorted way, the
third, ‘of the order of sorcery’, contains appearances that merely give the
Appearance- impression of representing reality, though there is no reality to represent,
only and finally, the fourth, pure simulation, which ‘is no longer of the order of
appearance at all’, here there is not even the presumption that a reality is
represented. Baudrillard considers these four ways to form a kind of chrono-
logical sequence, placing the ‘good appearance’ in the pre-modern period and
the pure simulation in the present. Moreover, this sequence is a story of
decline; for Baudrillard living in a world of pure simulation is clearly a bad
thing. These additional complications need not concern us here. What inter-
ests us in the present context is the common feature of the last two of the four
ways. They restrict the reality/appearance distinction to its second member:
there are only the appearances.¹⁰⁶
Can we have the After the preceding discussion it does not seem to be controversial that such
phenomenal a position is consistent; appearances can be grounded in further appearances,
without the
noumenal?

¹⁰⁵ Baudrillard 1994.

¹⁰⁶ The difference between the two does not appear to be ontological, but indicative of our
perspective on the appearance. In the case of the third way we expect there to be a reality behind the
appearance, in the case of the fourth we do not.
  -    

without some non-appearance somewhere to ground it all; but we might

well wonder whether it does not just collapse into a fairly familiar theory. Is
it not the case that if we take the noumenal out of a world split up into the
phenomenal and the noumenal, the phenomenal becomes the only reality
there is?¹⁰⁷ In other words, does this not just mean that there is no appear-
ance/reality split, and that the world is just as it seems to be?¹⁰⁸ There seems to
be some justification for this idea if we take into account that appearance and
reality are contrastive concepts. We can only have one if we also have the other,
as in the case of up and down, or left and right, or hot and cold.
On the other hand we might be reluctant to accept this argument since our The aporia of
original reservations about a what-you-see-is-what-you-get world have not naïve realism

gone away. Naïve realism seems to be as unsatisfactory a position now as it

ever was. We seem to have arrived at an aporia. Some very basic reflection on
our epistemic capacities show that what we see is not quite what we get. Some
distinction between the world as it appears and the world as it is seems to be
required. But the preceding arguments tried to show that the idea of a world ‘as
it is’, a real world behind the world of appearances, is deeply problematic. But if
rejecting this leads us back to the naïve realist position that we have already
found wanting there appears to be nowhere left to turn.
However, as we pointed out in §99, to have a dichotomy it is not necessary Irrealism only
that both sides of the dichotomy are instantiated. If we accept that we can needs the
concept of the
coherently think about a contradictory pair such as appearance and reality, or real world.
structure and non-structure, while agreeing that one half of the pair may have
nothing corresponding to it in the world, it becomes clear that rejecting the ‘world
behind the world’ does not lead us back to square one. What distinguishes the
naïve realist from the appearance-only theorist is that the former underwrites the
existence of an ultimately true theory, while the other does not. For the former
reality has a variety of different features, which are just the features that make
themselves manifest to us in our perception. But for the latter the idea of a final
account of what the world is like turns out to be problematic.
For the irrealist one half of the contradictory pair is empty, and this half is
also where the truth-makers for ultimate truths are commonly located. For him
there is nothing real, nothing that is not itself an appearance and therefore to
be spelt out in terms of something else, and hence nothing that could constitute
the content of an ultimately true theory. Yet at the same time we can still
formulate the distinction between appearance and reality, in the same way the

¹⁰⁷ Ferraro 2013: 214.

¹⁰⁸ In this case it appears to make no difference whether we refer to the only reality there is as
phenomenal or noumenal: ‘Yes, it might be true that “All the world’s a stage, And all the men and
women merely players”, but this does not make any informational difference, as long as we accept
that there is only this stage anyway. There is nothing to be epistemically worried about calling the real
virtual, or the virtual real, if the two are identical. It is only a matter of poetic taste’ (Floridi 2010: 85).
   -    

structuralist can distinguish structure from non-structure, even though all that
exists is structure.
An example Consider the following example. Assume you are sitting in a baroque theatre
before the performance of a play. A formal garden is visible on stage, with
clipped hedges, statues, topiaries, and shape of a maison de plaisir in the
background. While admiring all this your friend tells you that you are not
actually looking at the stage at all. What you are looking at is a skillfully painted
trompe d’euil screen between curtain and stage. You may now wonder whether
this screen is a faithful or unfaithful representation of what is happening on the
stage behind it. Once the screen goes up you may realize that there is a formal
garden exactly like the painted one behind it. Or there may be something
entirely different behind it. But now consider that you also find out that you are
sitting in a fake theatre as well. For some reason the nobleman who built it ran
out of funds and decided just to build the auditorium. While the seats, curtains,
boxes, and so on are all there, there is no stage. Behind the painted screen is just
a brick wall, and behind that is the backyard of the ducal kitchen. You now
realize that your initial pondering of whether the representation on the screen
truly represented the setup on the stage behind it is without an object, for there
is no stage behind it. But learning that there is no stage does not put you back
into the state you were in when you first sat down in the theatre—then you
thought that there was a three-dimensional array set up on the stage. Your
views of what you now have in front of you are very different. Even though
your former and your present self both reject the idea of a setup behind a
screen (the former because you did not think there was a screen, the latter
because you think there is nothing but the screen), you have very different
ideas of what the theatre is like. In the same way the naïve realist and the
irrealist have different views of what the world is like. The former believes there
to be a comprehensive theory of the world as it is in its most basic features, the
latter can offer only local theories that describe specific aspects of the world
(and needs to assert that the claim ‘there are no comprehensive theories’ is not
itself part of a comprehensive theory).
The role of It might seem that the upshot of the discussion we have just presented is that
ontology ontology, and metaphysics more generally, are hopeless enterprises. Ontology
not only aims at determining ‘what there is’, but aims at doing so in ultimately
general and exhaustive terms. But if the arguments presented above have any
force, such a theory is an unobtainable mirage, unobtainable because there are
no absolutely general quantifications such a theory would need, and because
there is no context-independent notion of truth such a theory would want to
express. Nevertheless, even though the universal and global theories remain
unobtainable, this does not mean that we cannot obtain what is relative and
dependent. That our ontological theories cannot encompass everything does
not mean we cannot have restricted theories of something (such as causation,
  -    

probability, properties, and so on). And that the truth of its statements can
only be understood relative to a body of background assumptions outside of
the theory does not mean that the statements are pointless. The things we have
to hold fixed in a given case may well be uncontroversial and universally
accepted, or at least deemed to be such. In this case it is not detrimental to
our theory that it does not provide an account of these background assump-
tions as well. Intersubjective truths that hold relative to a sufficiently large body
of subjects seem to be a reasonable substitute for objective truths.
A point that is sometimes made in support of Berkeleyan idealism is that it Berkeleyan
makes no difference for our scientific endeavours whether or not we are physics and
irrealist
Berkeleyans. The idealist will simply understand a physical theory as a theory metaphysics
about the relation between different kinds of mental entities, while the materi-
alist will consider the objects involved to be material. Up to a point the same
applies when we replace idealism by irrealism, and physics by metaphysics. In
order to develop a workable theory of, say, causal pre-emption it is largely
irrelevant whether you think causation is only an appearance, or whether there
really are objective causal facts. If our intuitions about grounding do not spring
from contact with particular metaphysical grounding facts, but are simply
appearances resulting from certain (hard-wired, evolved, sub-personal) psy-
chological mechanisms¹⁰⁹ this does not render the question what grounding
structures are best suited for systematizing these intuitions obsolete. And if we
try to decide between trope theory and universalism we look at the same data
whether we are an irrealist or not: we attempt to come up with a reliable
systematic account of how the instantiation relation seems to work.
There are of course cases where this does not hold. If we develop a philo-
sophical account of mathematics a Platonist understanding would not cohere
well with irrealism. We could of course say that the best way in which we can
make sense of our mathematical practices is by assuming that there are non-
spatio-temporal, necessarily existent objects that constitute the subject-matter
of mathematics. Yet the Platonist will want to say something more, namely that Philosophy at
therefore there are mathematical objects, and that this is a statement that forms the level of
appearance.
part of the ultimate theory of what there is. But if there is no such theory no
such statement can be made. All we can do is assert the somewhat weakened
form of Platonism just mentioned. But this also shows that the above account
is far from describing all philosophical theorizing as defective. Philosophical
theories, like scientific theories, are still useful to have at the level of appear-
ance. What we cannot do is ascribe to any of them the status of a complete
theory of the ultimate structure of the world. But perhaps this is a price that is
not too high to pay.

¹⁰⁹ As argued by Miller and Norton 2017b.

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Index
absolutely general quantification
argument against ultimately true
theories 277–296
minimizing ontological consequences of
its denial 292–295
abstract objects 1, 2, 227
abstract/concrete distinction 226
accuracy requirement 19–20, 51, 147
and direct realism 21, 30–31, 32
and illusory perceptions 26
and maps 62–63
and structural resemblance 19
and representationalism 21, 32
afterimages 11
agent, self as 102, 131–141
Agrippa’s trilemma 165
alpha rhythm 89
analysis, final 174–177
anti-foundationalism, see
non-foundationalism
Anton’s syndrome 83
appearance 23, 47 n.105
appearance-only 304
as implying existence 93, 94–95
correspondence theory of truth at the
level of appearance 266
four possible relations between
appearance and reality 304
persistence of 150
philosophy at the level of appearance 307
stacked 94
world of appearances as illusory 223 n.203
applicability of mathematics 216–217
Asch effect 9
Australians, see dialetheism
authorless narration 104
autopoiesis 112–114
toy model of 113–114
non-physical instantiations of 114
axiom of foundation 47, 155, 158
Ayer, Alfred 146, 147
‘back to square one’ objection 297, 304–307
Baudrillard, Jean 304
Bayesian inference 40
Bayne, Tim 149
belief revision and inertia 263
beliefs, truth depending on 239–245
Berkeleyan idealism 1, 33 n.61, 77, 78, 307
best explanation, inference to the 181–182
better with no best 298
Bitbol, Michel 213 n.159, 221, 232
bivalence 176 n.74
Black, Max 174, 176–177
Blackmore, Susan 85, 138 n.140, 145–147
blindspot 87 n.13, 92
Boghossian, Paul 170, 193 n.115, 223
Borges, Jorge Luis 63 n.142, 156 n.22
boundaries, and circular dependence 188
brain
as dynamic, self-organizing system 111
and Markov blankets 39
brain-based representationalism 61
co-located with the self 120–121
cortical rhythms 89–90
inside or outside of Markov
blankets 66–67
testing hypotheses 50
self as material part of the brain 119
world as brain-based simulation 40–41
brain-in-a-vat scenario 16 n.36, 16, 37, 76,
134, 140, 303
brute facts 255
and ethics 76
and Dennett 123
butterfly dream 49, 100
Cabello, Adán 221
Cameron, Ross 171, 179–185
Cantor, Georg 170
Cantor’s theorem 278–279
Cao, T.Y. 225–226
Carnap, Rudolf 81, 258, 259–260, 279–280
Cassirer, Ernst 63 n.143
categorical properties 199, 206
categories, ontological 285
list as closed and complete 285
category theory 163
causation
and direct realism 21
and perceptual process 22, 44
and representation 19, 63
causal activity of the self 131
causal connection of parts in a whole
116, 120
causal essentialism 206 n.143
causal explanation 153 n.4, 186 n.92
causal theories of reference 299–302
circular causal structures 232
density of 22
 
causation (cont.)
extending beyond the interface 51–52
not a fundamental feature of the
world 227
universal causal connectedness 2 n.4
cells 112–113
cellular automata 113 n.83, 146
centre of narrative gravity 105
centreless view 49
chain of measurement 233
change blindness 8, 84
chess opening, inexpressible 62
chicken and egg 237
children, cognitive development of 112
Chinese language 269
Chisholm, Roderick 119
choice blindness 8
circular dependence, see also
interdependence
and cosmology 219 n.179
for Priest 211–212
of interface and sensations 50–51, 57
of subject and object
236, 238
of vertices and edges 205
circularity
and explanation 36–37
and grounding 153, 156, 159, 168, 173,
255 n.17
and set-membership 47 n.106
and structuralism 228
and the self 104, 109–110
argument against the circular
grounding 185–189
circular causal structures 232
circular explanation 184 n.89, 185–186
circular identify fixing 207
circularity and evolution 236–237
circularity and quantum
entanglement 229
circularity and Wigner’s friend 234
circular semantics 177–179, 275
Copenhagen interpretation 231–232
examples of circular grounding 188–189
self-application of irrealism 70–73
temporal circularity 235
unclear status of circular structures
188, 207
cognitive projection of the self into
space 122–123, 124
manipulation of 123
cognitive science and non-
foundationalism 235–239
coherence
as a cognitive artefact 7
and circular explanations 186 n.94
and irrealism 265–266
and relativism 264–265
coherence argument against ultimately
true theories 257–266, 295
coherence with what kinds of
beliefs? 260
developed through evolution 7 n.12
difficulties with this as a criterion for
veridicality 7–10
no contact with the world required 258
of veridical perceptions 5–6
rules out ultimately true theories 258
coherence theory of truth 256–266
problems for the coherence theory of
truth 260–265
resulting notion of truth too
malleable? 262
rules out ultimately true theories 266
turned into correspondence
theory 260–261
coherentism
and ontology 257, 262
dilemma for 261–262
historical role of 258–260
regress for 261
support for 265–266
complexity of the self 114, 118–119
compression, as indicating real
patterns 220
computable mathematical structures 218
conceptual comprehension, miracle
of 117–118
conceptual frameworks, argument against
ultimately true theory 279–280
concepts
interdependence of 64–65, 149
concepts, rather than objects required for
dependence 224–225
conceptual contextualism 65
conformity with other perceivers 9
conscious observers collapsing the wave
function 233
consciousness
appears continuous 87
continuity of 84–85
continuously restarting 98
difficulty with discontinuity for the
self 127
discontinuity of visual
consciousness 86–89
discontinuity more generally 92–93,
95 n.34, 97
gaps in 86–87, 88, 92–93, 98–99, 108
methodology of its empirical study 93
separate from data 93
stream of 85–86
unconscious selves 127–128
visual 86–92

construction
all the way down 109
basis of 46–47
cookie-cutter theory of 193, 220
constructivism
Goodman’s 192–195
Maturana 238–239
neuroconstructivism 71 n.161
social constructivism 167–168
Varela 236
context, stopping the why-regress 183
context-independence 270–272
of ontological theories 274
of unified metaphysical explanation 185
contextualism 272–277
and literalism 267, 277
and ontology 273–275
as argument against ultimately true
theories 267–277, 295
continuity of consciousness 84–85
continuum, scepticism about 218
contradictions 9–10
between protocol sentences 258–259
contradictory objects 287 n.81
conventionalist theories of
reference 299–302
and widespread referential error
302 n.104
reductio of 301–302
conventions 300
regarding themselves as more than
conventions 302
cookie-cutter theory of conceptual
construction 193, 220
Copenhagen interpretation 231–232
correctness, as distinguished from truth 147
correspondence theory of truth
xxxii–xxxiii, 264 n.28
at the level of appearance 266
coherence theory of truth turned
into 260–261
Cotard’s syndrome 101 n.52
cryptanalysis 12–13
Dasgupta, Shamik 249–250, 251 n.12
data of consciousness 93, 108
Davidson, Donald 135 n.141, 265
Dawkins, Richard 41–42, 43, 121 n.108
deception hypothesis 15–18
and simulation argument 139–140
Dennett, Daniel 78 n.170, 82 n.5, 83, 94–95,
96–98, 102–106, 106 n.61, 109, 111, 123,
125, 129, 134, 138 n.144, 139, 140 n.152
detectors 96
dependence, see also interdependence
and the self 102
circular dependence 50–51, 205
 
dependence on objects vs dependence on
concepts 224–225
for description 225
for existence 225
individuation dependence 187–88
maximal chains of 171–173
of truth on beliefs 239–245
ontological, see existential dependence
dependent coorigination 236
Descartes, René 15 n.34, 29, 46, 94, 95, 100,
104, 119, 125, 139
Cartesian cogito 46, 57, 68, 81, 100–102,
128 n.127, 140, 143 n.155
dreams 3, 5, 17 n.37, 85, 94
dream hypothesis 15–16
as a form of simulation 42
lucid dreams 52 n.123
dialetheism 5–6, 72–73, 172, 278 n.57
Dipert, Randall 203–208, 213
direct realist epistemology 19 n.43,
21–32, 55
and accuracy requirement 21, 30–31, 32
and external world 18
and illusory perceptions 25–27
and irrealism 68–70
common ground with
representationalism 31
failure to fulfil the accuracy
requirement 30–31
loss of initial attraction 31–32
disjunctivism 28–30
as epistemological prestidigitation 29–30
epistemological 28
metaphysical 28–29
phenomenological 28 n.59
dispositional property
Dipert 205–206
mass 198–199
domain
domain of variability 174 n.71,
175 n.72
domain principle 172–173
problem of the domain 277–278
Dummett, Michael 283–284
economic example for dependence of truth
on beliefs 239–240
efficacy
context-dependence of 12
difficulties with this as a criterion for
veridicality 11–14
of veridical perceptions 6
ego absconditus 111
ego tunnel 108–109, 129, 139
élan vital 134
elementary integration units 90–92
eliminative phenomenalism 55 n.130
 
eliminativism
about beliefs 242–243
about loci 210
embodied cognition 19, 95 n.34,
121–122
emergence 152 n.1
of existence 161, 166–167
of justification 166–167
empirical arguments
for non-foundationalism 213–239
for higher-order non-
foundationalism 256
endowment effect 74 n.166
environment and organisms shape each
other 236
Esfeld, Michael 228–228, 230–231
essential properties 198
eternal sentences, see indexicals
ethics
and consciousness research 129
and irrealism 73–78
and the momentary self 131 n.137
real and virtual ethics 77–78
epistemic inaccessibility of fundamental
reality 253
epistemic infinitism 165–167
epistemic necessity, does not have
ontological consequences 225
epistemology
and foundationalism 164 n.45, 165,
183–184
epistemology and ontology of
meaning 271
gap between epistemology and
ontology 230
without the existence assumption 52
error
and conventionalist theories of
reference 302 n.104
and irrealism 303
and the denial of an ultimately true
theory of the world 302
and realism 149–151, 299
possibility of large-scale error 300–301
Euclidean geometry, as ultimately true
theory 254
events, and circular dependence 189
evidentiary boundary 37
evil, problem of 76 n.167
evolution
as self-organizing system 111
circularity in 236–237
producing intentionality 134
evolutionary fitness 33
experience machine 73–78
are we already in it? 73–76
constraints on 75–76
explanation 2
and context 275–276
causal 153 n.4, 186 n.92
circular 184 n.89, 185–187
metaphysical 152–153, 179–185, 187
unified 180–184
universal 286–287
explanatory and ontological
grounding 184–185
explanatory argument for
foundationalism 179–185
explanatory power and parsimony 59, 79
explanatory regress and structuralism 217
explanatory-evidentiary circles 36–37
existence
and inheritance 159–161
existence requirement 19–20, 51, 54, 55,
72, 147
without the accuracy requirement 20
existential dependence 152–153
asymmetric 161–162
extended cognition, see embodied cognition
external world
and deception hypothesis 17
and naturalist theory of mind 45
agnosticism and atheism about 79
appearance of 3
as projected by the cognitive system
237 n.245
assumption of, as theoretically
dispensable 79
belief in, as product of phenomenal
transparency 107–108, 158 n.26
concept-dependence of 62–63
confined to representations 53
defined in terms of Markov blankets 40
epistemological problem of 1 n.1
measurable space 45 n.101
ontological problem of 1, 147
scientific support for the denial of
33 n.61
simulated 44
external perspective, and final theory 303
externalism, semantic 134–135
extrinsic
extrinsicality of fundamentality
251–253
extrinsic properties 195
facts
disjunctive 155 n.16
infinitary 140, 223
mute 261
fairy-tales 7, 260
fallibilism 21 n.47
fame in the brain 97
faultless disagreement 264–265

fictional entities 70–71, 80, 96–97, 99–100,
103–106, 107, 149
final account of the world
and external perspective 303
problem with 290–292
final analysis 174–177
Fine, Kit 153 n.3, 250, 290 n.83
finitely grounded structures 154, 169 n.59
fitness vs truth 33
Flammarion engraving 54, 304
Floridi, Luciano 228
foundationalism 57, 117 n.92, 155–156
and epistemology 164 n.45
and grounding 152–154
and the question why there is something
rather than nothing 286 n.77
and ultimately true theories 295–296
as unjustified orthodoxy in
ontology 165
at the meta-level 249
explanatory and ontological
grounding 184–185
explanatory argument for
foundationalism 179–185
higher-order 247–248, 251–256, 296
intuitive pull towards 165
ontological foundations 152
regress argument for
foundationalism 158–167
self-refutation argument for 170–185
semantic argument for
foundationalism 173–179
terminal foundations 250
transcendental argument for
foundationalism 167–170
formal and material mode of
speech 259–260
frames
frame-array 95
in film 87–88
in visual perception 89
Frege, Gottlob 118 n.98, 222–223
Frege’s thesis 128–130
French, Steven 63 n.143, 224
fridge, light in the 97 n.42
functional unity of the self 124–126
fundamental level 246
as mesoscopic 190 n.108
empirical evidence against 190 n.110
extrinsicality of 251–253
informational objects 228 n.215,
234 n.231
in mathematics 162, 163
interdependence at 242
in physics 162, 163
in semantics 162, 163–164
non-monotonic 252–253
 
outside of ontology 162–165
parametrizing to what exists 252–253
fundamental reality
contact with it is a conceptual
mirage 74
epistemically inaccessible 253
revisable 253
self not being part of this 99–100
fundamental truths
and fundamental things 246
fundamental ontological theory sitting
above a theory of truth 262
gap
between epistemology and ontology 230
gaps in consciousness 86
genes
and memes 136
complexes of 137
detrimental to their hosts 137
selfish 136–137
substrate-independence 136
God 46, 105, 154, 250
justifying parsimony 58
God’s eye point of view 48–50, 53, 56,
63 n.141, 73
Gödel, Kurt 60, 99, 293 n.91
Goodman, Nelson 15, 192–195, 246, 256
grammar 64–65, 268–269
graphs
and sentences 257–258
asymmetric 203–204
graph-theoretic ontology 203–208
labelled graphs 209
parsimony of graph-theoretic
approach 204–205
graphical user interface
and structuralism 227
as metaphor for perceptual
representation 35–36
grounding 152–154
and ultimately true theories 253–256
and unified explanations 180–184
characteristics of 152–154
de-coupling mereological dependence
and grounding 190 n.108
finite 154
foundations that are not a lower
bound 155
grounding facts ground themselves 251
higher-order grounding 247
infinitely far foundations 154–155
local vs global contexts 153 n.10
meta-grounding 157, 247
not a temporal relation 168
nothing grounds grounding
facts 249–250
 
grounding (cont.)
partial grounding 155 n.17
pure grounding facts 248
pure grounding questions 157
set of all grounding chains 248
symmetry, see circularity and grounding
Grim, Patrick 293
gunk 189–191
hallucinations 3, 5, 6, 16, 27–31,
55 n.129, 57, 70, 263
Harbsmeier, Christoph 269
Hempel, Carl Gustav 258,
259 n.22, 260
Henkin semantics 281
heterological 283
Hohwy, Jacob 36–40, 44, 66, 111–112,
144 n.156, 145 n.159
Hoffman, Donald 33–36, 44–45, 66
Hofstadter, Douglas 109
holism
ontological 154
explanatory 186
homunculus in the brain 94, 125–126
Hood, Bruce 110 n.74
horizon of simultaneity 91, 106–107
Hume, David 128, 129
Hume-Edwards principle 247–248, 286
hyper-antirealism 284, 294
hypostatizations, pessimism about
58–61, 79
idealism xxxiii, 48
and circularity 234
and direct realism 21 n.45
and intrinsic properties 202
derived from realism about the internal
world 143
identity fixing, circular 207
identity of indiscernibles 29 n.60
idle wheels 2, 219 n.184, 231
illata/abstracta distinction 220 n.190
illusion 25–27, 70
as a contrastive concept 6
as part of our normal perception of the
world 25 n.54
inherently persistent illusions 142
introspective illusions, see introspection,
illusions of
illusion-reality distinction 4–18
as an internal disctinction 17
contextualist criteria for 30–31
illusory perceptions 25
illusory states
and ontological divide 6–7
difference from veridical states 4–6
implying veridical states 149, 299
immediacy 22–23, 26
causal 22
cognitive 22–23
impossible worlds 9–10
incompleteness
and realism/antirealism distinction 292
as inexpressible 287–288
as open-endedness 292
of our knowledge 253 n.15, 255 n.18
of the world 285 n.75, 293 n.90
only concerning our concept of the
world 293
restricted to representation 292–293
inconsistent versions, argument
from 192–195, 256
inconsistency in the world 9–10
incorrigible beliefs 100–102, 107
indefinite extensibility 281–284
independence
and foundations 152
independence principle 69
indexicals 267–268
absolutizing indexicals 267–268
individual-property ontology, as
computationally more tractable
205, 225
individuating tropes 200–202
individuation dependence 187–188
mutual 207
inertia and belief revision 263
inexpressibility of completeness 287–288
inference to the best explanation 181–182
infinitary facts 170, 223
infinite deferral of being 168–169
infinite descent of dependence 153–154,
155, 156, 159, 168, 171 n.62, 176,
251 n.12
as not vicious 159 n.27, 160
infinite semantic ascent 293–294
infinitely far foundations 154–155
infinitely receding chains of
explanation 165–166
informationally redundant as grammatically
optional 269
informational objects 228 n.215,
234 n.231
inheritance, and existence 159–161
inside/outside distinction 51, 54, 55
mutual dependence of 266 n.30
spelt out in terms of Markov
blankets 144
instantaneous objects 24 n.51
intentionality
grounded in self 133
grounding of 133–135
original 132–135
intentional stance 106 n.61

interdependence
at the fundamental level 242
of concepts 64–65
of subject and object 236, 238
universal 2 n.4, 239–245
interface theory 33–36
and internal world 145
and irrealism 66
and virtual reality 40
world behind the interface 43–45
intergalactic selves 123, 124
internal interpretation of mind-
independence 302 n.103
internal question 279–280
internal world xxxiii, 81
as a model 145, 149
defence against scepticism 81
moving it to the transcendent 147–148
ontological status of 81
part of the representational interface 81
interpretation, modest 282–283
intersubjectivity 6
difficulties with this as a criterion for
veridicality 10–11
intrinsic properties
and higher-order
foundationalism 251–253
and quantum entanglement 231
argument against 195–203
definition 195
essential properties 198
examples and existence proofs 196–203
mathematical properties as only
examples of 216
ontologies without 202–213
spatio-temporal parts 196
introspection
and discontinuity of consciousness 99
illusions of 82–84, 135, 142 n.155, 145
regarded as unproblematic 82, 107
unmediated form of epistemic access 82,
148–149, 241–242
introspective dissonance 145 n.159
irrealism 52–80
and Berkeleyan physics 307
and coherence theory 265–266
and direct realism 68–70
and ethics 73–78
and maps 63
and nihilism 55–56, 79
and scepticism 55
does not deny the existence of physical
objects 56–57, 65–66, 80, 86 n.10
only requires the concept of the real
world 305–306
possibility of wide-spread error 303
self-application of 71–73, 302
 
isomorphism between description and
described 215–216
it from bit 235
James, William 85
joints of nature 15, 20, 59, 237 n.243
Kahn, Fritz 125 n.122
Kanizsa figure 110 n.74, 213
Kant, Immanuel 1 n.3, 2 n.5, 44 n.96,
47 nn.105, 108, 70–71, 81, 193 n.116,
219 n.184, 230 n.222
Kantian angst 56 n.132
Kirkham, Richard 261
knights and knaves 208
knowledge, incompleteness of 253 n.15,
255 n.18
Kuhn, Thomas 8 n.18
Ladyman, James 219–228
language
and mereological nihilism 118 n.98
lap-circle 188
Laplace, Pierre-Simon 105, 230
law of the excluded middle 289
laws of nature 181
Lehar, Steven 42, 47 n.108
levels
and universal interdependence 241–242
mesoscopic level as fundamental
190 n.108
of language 178–179
of explanation 179–185
of reality 154 n.11, 163 n.37, 169 n.58,
182, 223
Lewis, David 300
Libet, Benjamin 132
Lichtenberg, Georg Christoph 128
limit of loci elimination 211
limits of conceivability 225
linguistic activity and consciousness 97
list, universal 278 n.58
literal depending on the
metaphorical 134–135, 167 n.53
literalism 267
Litland, Jon 250
living organism 116, 134
loci
as fundamental level 210
theory of 208–213
Locke, John 18 n.39
Lodge, David 104 n.55
logically simple objects 174–175, 258
lonely state, existence in 102
Löwenheim-Skolem theorem 280–281
Lowe, Jonathan 158, 185, 187–188,
206 n.143, 207
 
lower bound of grounding structures 155,
169 n.59
luz bone 119
Maturana, Humberto 44 n.99, 235,
237–239
Macbeth’s dagger 27–28
map and territory 62–63
Markov blankets 38–40, 44, 54, 66–67,
139 n.148, 144
Markov chains 37–38
mass 198–200
and measurement 199–200
in purely static worlds 199
mass delusions 11
mathematics
and non-foundationalism 214–218
applicability of 216–217
mathematical reality moved to the
transcendent 218
mathematical entities
and intrinsic properties 202
as distinguished from physical
entities 221 n.191, 222, 224 n.205,
225–226
Matrix trilogy 15 n.34, 140, 304
Maudlin, Tim 257–258
maximal chains of dependence
171–173
McKenzie, Kerry 252
McGee, Vann 281, 287–288, 289
meaning
absence of literal meaning 277
doing without 272–273
minimal 268–270
omniscience about 271–272
meanings ain’t in the head 134–135
measurement, chain of 232–233
medicine, philosophy as 298
memetics 136–141
complexes of memes 137–138
genes and memes 136
memes colonizing the self 139
physical substrate of memes
136 n.143
self as a meme 138
self dependent on memes 139
mental entities, and intrinsic
properties 202
mere talk, selves as 120
mereology 114–115
de-coupling mereological dependence
and grounding 190 n.108
infinite deferral of mereological
composition 169
mereological argument for
non-foundationalism 189–191
mereological circles 156 n.22
mereological nihilism 59, 114–115,
117–119, 300
and language 118 n.98
and the self 117–118
Mermin, David 221
mesoscopic level as fundamental 190 n.108
metacognitive errors 82–83
meta-language 178–179
metamers 25 n.53
metaphorical grounding the
literal 134–135, 167 n.53
metaphysical explanation 152–153,
179–185, 187
and empirical data 190 n.110
as non-epistemic 187 n.96
context-independence of unified
metaphysical explanation 185
does not try to discover new facts 187
metaphysical illusion, miracle of 117
metaphysical infinitism 47
metaphysical inquiry terminating in
ultimately true theory 254
metaphysical nihilism 286 n.77
metaphysical realism xxxii, 69
Metzinger, Thomas 40–43, 44, 68,
106–114, 129, 139, 145–146,
158 n.26, 302
Mīmāmsā 160 n.28
minds,_ existence of stretching infinitely
backwards 194 n.117
mind-independence xxxii, 1, 302 n.103
and topic-neutral descriptions 216
mind-to-world fit 240
minimal meaning 268–270
Minsky, Marvin 95–96
miracle
of conceptual comprehension 117–118
of metaphysical illusion 117
model
maximally accurate model 278 n.58
of the world 40, 42–43, 52 n.121, 302
modest interpretation 282–283
modulation 270
momentary selves 128–131
Moore, G.E. 4
Moorean gambit 4, 138 n.147
movement between perspectives 49
multiple-drafts model 96–98
museum myth 13 n.31
Nagel, Thomas 49–50, 130 n.133
naturalism 48
and fundamentality 253
and irrealism 65–66
and sense-data 65
naturalist theory of mind 44–45
principle of naturalistic closure
221 n.191
  

Necker cube 91 speaking about everything 277

nervous system as closed 237–238 universal statements 285–286
neutral basis of construction 194–195 organisms and environment shape each
Neurath, Otto 258, 259 n.22 other 236
Neurath’s boat 4, 263 Otto 121–122
neuroconstructivism 71 n.161
Newman’s problem 21 n.44 parametrizing the fundamental level to what
nihilism exists 252–253
and Priest 212 parsimony 57–61
and irrealism 55–56, 79 and brain-based representationalism 61
mereological, 59, 114–115, 117–119, 300 graph-theoretic ontology 204–205
metaphysical 286 n.77 in terms of number of entities
nocebo 11–12 assumed 58
‘no philosophy’ objection 296, 297–298 justification via pessimism about
‘no semantic value’ objection 297, 299–303 hypostatizations 58–61
no-self view 130 mereological nihilism 115
non-foundationalism ontology and ideology 60
about grounding 153–154 theological justification of 58
and structuralism 217–218 participatory universe 234–235
arguments for 189–239 patterns
as bizarre 158–159 all the way down 221, 227–228
at the meta-level 249 real 220
coherence of 191 without something patterned 220–221
Dipert’s account 205 payoff vs resource quantity 34–35
non-foundationalist ontologies 156 pearl view of momentary selves 129–130
Priest 211–212 perception/appearance divide 23, 24–25, 26, 30
restricted to pure grounding facts 248 perceptual moments 90
semantic xxxiii perceptual now 91
non-monotonicity of perceptual process 22
fundamentality 252–253 as a form of simulation 41
noumenon 2, 47 nn.105, 108, integration of perceptual input 106–107
219 n.184, 230 n.222 processing speed 24 n.52
as a fictional entity 70–71 phantom limbs 12, 124
impossibility of representing it accurately phenomenal self-model 106–107, 302
or inaccurately 51 phenomenal signature of epistemicity 45
phenomenal without the phenomenal without the noumenal 304–305
noumenal 304–305 philosophy
Nozick, Robert 73–75, 99, 109 n.71 as medicine 298
at the level of appearance 307
object placebo 11–12
interdependence with subject 236, 238 Platonism 222, 307
objective subjective 94, 148–149 and structuralism 227, 228 n.214
objective world as an illusion 44 n.99, and parsimony 59–60
45 n.100 radical 217
objectivity 1 n.3 unsatisfactory argument for 2–3, 79
Oderberg, David 207 Platonic cave 237
omniscience about meaning 271–272 playing-card experiments 8–9, 83
ontic structural realism 63 n.143, 219–228 Pöppel, Ernst 90–92
ontology powers, ontology of 161 n.35, 205–207
and contextualism 273–275 pure powers 206
denial of absolutely general pragmatic composition view 270
quantification 284–285 pragmatics 268–269
its role in philosophy 306–307 pragmatic success 298–299
not a laundry-list of all there is 284 n.73 predicate transfer 270
ontological categories, see categories, prediction error minimization
ontological theory 36–40, 139 n.148
ontological theories as context- and Dennett 105 n.58
independent 274 and Metzinger 111–112
 

prediction error minimization theory (cont.) reductio arguments, restricted quantification

and virtual reality 40 over 289–291
applied to the internal world 143–145 reference, theories of
presentism 24 conventionalist and causal 299–302
primary and secondary reflective equilibrium
objects 167, 168 and logic 15
statements 290–291 and illusion/reality distinction 14–15,
principles about truth and 17, 80
interdependence 243–244 regress
priority for coherentism 261
and pure relationism 222, 225 regress argument for
ontological 152–153 foundationalism 158–167
Priest, Graham 10, 72–73, 174 n.71, Reichenbach, Hans 82 n.3, 220 n.190
175 n.72, 208–213 relational quidditism 208
private experiences 10–11 relationism
probabilistic inference 25, 44 about time and space 163, 209
probability, and infinitely receding chains of about reality 217
explanation 165–166 exclusive 203 n.133
projectability, as indicating real relations
patterns 220 and relata depend on one another
Proops, Ian 176 228, 229
protocol sentences 258 without relata 222
contradictions between 258–259 relativism
prudential concern for the self 102, 119, and coherence theory of truth 264–265
141–142 rarity of relativist scenario 265
psychoanalysis, parlour-game 104–105 relativist objection 297, 298–299
psychopathology 30, 83, 101, 264 n.27 representation
Putnam, Hilary xxxii, 16 n.36, 51, 280 and causation 19, 47 n.106
existence outside of 73
quantification, see absolutely general realism about representata or
quantification representanda 293 n.91
quantum mechanics 221–222, 228–235 representationalist epistemology 32–52
questions, internal and external 279–280 and accuracy requirement 32
quidditism, relational 208 and external world 18
Quine, Willard Van Orman 212, 214, 284 and prediction error minimization
indeterminacy of translation 164 theory 40
web of belief 229–230, 263–264 and subjectivism 235–236
Quinean crossword puzzle 13–14 common ground with direct realism 31
strong and weak
Ramachandran, V.S. 124 representationalism 47–49
randomness, fundamental 217 n.171 three examples of 32–33
ranking of theories 298 resemblance
razor of perception and its cause 30
of silence 61 of representation and represented 19
of denial 61 resistance of the world to our
randomized input, problem of 27 desires 263–264
readiness potential 132 resolution of the visual field 83–84
real patterns 220 resource quantity vs payoff 34–35
realism, see also direct realist epistemology rest mass, see mass
about representata or representanda reverse engineering 42
293 n.91 revisable, fundamental as 253
aporia of naïve realism 305 robots 42–43, 48, 105 n.56, 106, 133–134
real world Rorty, Richard 170, 184 n.89
four challenges to the notion of a rubber hand illusion 123
xxxi–xxxii Russell, Bertrand 7 n.11
Recanati, François 270 Russell’s paradox 281–284, 294
reducing theories to each other 194 Ryle, Gilbert 5 n.8

saccades 86–87, 99
Sacks, Oliver 55 n.129
saturation, and pure relationism 222–223
Saunders, Simon 221
Schaffer, Jonathan 162–163, 168–169
Schlick, Moritz 260
schemas 288–289
Searle, John 54–55, 63 n.141,
167–168, 270
secondary and primary objects 167, 168
second-order logic 281
self 84–85, 99–147
and intentionality 132–135
as an agent 102, 131–141
as a meme 138
as colonized by memes 139
as dependent on memes 139
as fiction 103–106, 149
as a physical substance 119
as reflection of others around you
110 n.74
as simulated 106–114
autopoietic conception of 114
belief in its existence as
incorrigible 100–102
bundle-theoretic accounts of 130
complexity of 114, 118–119
emergent entity 126
empirical and philosophical arguments
against its existence 103
experiencer of the illusion of the
self 109–110, 111 n.76
functional unity of 124–126
lacking fundamental ontological
status 99–100, 108
location of 120–124
memetic arguments against 136–141
mereological argument against 114–120
misunderstanding its own nature 108,
109–110, 129, 141
momentary 128–131
moving it to the transcendent 141–142
narrative conception of 103–106, 112
objective 49
overlapping 122
phenomenal and epistemic conception of
selfhood 109
phenomenally transparent model 108
projected into space 122–123
prudential concern 102, 119, 141–142
simulated self as contradictory 146–147
spatial location of 120–124
spatial dispersal of 121–122
substantial 102, 103–120
temporally extended 102, 127–131
tension between its different
properties 130–131
 
unconscious selves 127–128
unified 102, 120–126
selfish gene 136–137
self-model 106
tool for organizing motor behavior
108 n.68
self-organizing system 111
self-refutation argument for
foundationalism 170–185
self-refuting arguments 118 n.98, 119, 146,
175, 292
self-wise arrangements 120
semantic
and ontological foundations 174
argument for foundationalism 173–179
ascent, infinite 293–294
circles 275
contextualism, see contextualism
enrichment 270
relations and the self 132
wires 134–135
semantics
circular 177–179
semantic and metaphysical web
230 n.221
universal 294
sensations 50
sense-data 65
set theory 47, 155, 288–289
and pure relationism 222–223
circular and straight sets 282
shape 197–198
Shepard’s tables 142
showing what cannot be said 288, 297–298
simple particle, self as 118–119
simulation
and dreams 42
of self and world 109
perception as a form of 41
perfect simulations 17
simulated self as contradictory 146–147
simulation argument 139–140
simultaneity 23–25, 91
Smullyan, Raymond 119 n.100, 208
scepticism 18 n.38, 29, 53 n.126
about hypostatizations 61
about infinity 218
about reducing theories to each other 194
and butterfly dream 100 n.49
and internal world 81, 147
and irrealism 55
infinitely regressive 16 n.36
Pyrrhonian 298
Sacks, Oliver 6
shareable perceptions 10–11
ship of Theseus 208–209
social constructivism 167–168
 

solipsism 85, 99, 100, 140 n.151, 238 time

collective 238 circularity 235
sorites 116, 118 experience 95 n.39
space 1 n.3, 63 time-lag argument 23–24
space-time points 204 n.136, 214, 219 Tolman, Edward Chace 186 n.95
spatial location of the self 120–124 topic-neutral description 215
spatial dispersal of the self 121–122 total flight simulator 146
sphere example 53–54, 80 transcendent
stepping out of the interface, see God’s eye entities without explanatory role 231
point of view moving the internal world to
staccato entity 130 n.135 the 147–148
star-making 192–193 moving mathematical reality to the
Strawson, Galen 98–99, 128–131 218
Strawson, P.F. 63 n.141 moving non-structural features to
stream of consciousness 85–86 the 219 n.184
structuralism 188 n.99, 215 moving the self to the 141–142
and explanatory regress 217 transcendental argument for
and intrinsic properties 197, 202 foundationalism 167–170, 175
and non-foundationalism 217–218 transfinite 170
computable mathematical transparency
structures 218 epistemic 53, 107
in re/ante rem 226–228 phenomenal 52, 97 n.42, 106–108, 110,
structures depending on 138, 141, 144
non-structures 224 tropes 200–202
substances behind structures 230 truth, see also coherence theory of truth,
subject-object interdependence 236, 238 correspondence theory of truth
substance and context 275
behind the structures 230 and correctness 147
Wittgenstein’s argument for 173, and interdependence, prinicples
276–277 about 243–244
semantic and ontological aspects of bivalence 176 n.74
this 175–176 depending on beliefs 239–245
substantial existence of self and world, fragmenting of 265
connection between the two fundamental ontological theory sitting
ideas 107–108, 158 n.26 above a theory of truth 262
substantial self 102, 103–120 fundamental truths 246
success 12, 264 n.28 intersubjective and objective 307
not an objective notion 14 not the aim of evolution 35
pragmatic 298–299 strictly speaking there are no true
supporting the existence of an external assertions 244
world 46 n.104 truth for me 265
superposition 233 two senses of 146–147
supertask 169, 175 T-schema 271
symbol grounding problem 162 n.36 twin earth 16 n.36
symmetry two-component view of perception 31
of dependence 161–162 type-theoretic hierarchy 223
of grounding, argument against
185–189 ultimately true theories 253–295
and anti-foundationalism about
Tegmark, Max 214–218 grounding facts 253–256
temporally extended self 102, 127–131 and foundationalism 295–296
terminal foundations 250 and higher-order
termite castles 126 foundationalism 254–255
thing arguments against 257–295
non-absolute notion of 279 definition of 254
in itself, see noumenon four problems for the denial of
Tibetan language 269 n.39 296–304

ruled out by coherence theory of
truth 266
terminus of metaphysical inquiry 254
Unger, Peter 116–118
unified self 102, 120–126
unique solutions, lack of 12
unique true theory of the world xxxii
universal interdependence 2 n.4, 239–245
and truth 239
universal semantics 294
universals, and circular
dependence 188–189
unmeant meaner 133–134
Vaihinger, Hans 70–71
Valberg, J.J. 17 n.37
Van Fraassen, Bas 224
Van Inwagen, Peter 115–116,
130 n.135
vagueness 117, 118 n.97
Varela, Francesco 89, 112–114, 235–237
veil of perception 18, 21, 37, 47, 48,
54, 55, 60–61, 68–70, 135,
143, 231
and embodied cognition 19
and Markov blankets 39–40
inner veil of perception 148
what is behind it? 304
veridical perception
convention-dependence of 27
veridical states
 
and ontological divide 6–7
difference from illusory states 4–6
presupposed by illusory states
149–151, 299
versions of the world 192–195, 256
virtual reality 40
generated by the brain 40–41, 50 n.119
von Neumann chain 233
von Uexküll, Jakob 45 n.101
wagon wheel illusion 87–89
wave function 233
web of belief 229–230, 263–264
Wheeler, John 234–235
wholes, strict and loose ways of speaking
about 115–116, 120
Wigner, Eugene 233
Wigner’s friend 233–234
Wittgenstein, Ludwig 11 n.24, 44 n.99,
173–177, 258, 276–277, 297–298
world
impossible world 9–10
problem with final account of 290–292
resisting our desires 263–264
world-to-mind fit 240
why-regress 183, 186 n.94, 275–276
zero-grounded facts 250
zombies and zimbos 78 n.170
Zhuangzi 100 n.49