No Simples,No Gunk,No Nothing

Mereological realism holds that the world has a mereological structure – i.e. a distribution of mereological properties and relations. In this article, I defend Eleaticism about properties, according to which there are no causally inert non‐logical properties. I then present an Eleatic argument for mereological anti‐realism, which denies the existence of both mereological composites and mereological simples. After defending Eleaticism and mereological anti‐realism, I argue that mereological anti‐realism is preferable to mereological nihilism. I then conclude by examining the thesis that composition is identity and noting its consequences for the question of mereological structure.     

Hear No Evil,See No Evil,Think No Evil: Ethics and the Appeal to Experience

This essay distinguishes three types of appeals to experience in ethics, identifies problems with appealing to experience, and argues that appeals to experience must be open to critical assessment, if experientially-based arguments are to be useful. Unless competing and potentially irreconcilable experiences can be assessed and adjudicated, experientially-based arguments will be problematic. The paper recommends thinking of the appeal to experience as a kind of story telling to be evaluated as other stories are.     

No Outside,No Inside: Duality,Reality and Vasubandhu's Illusory Elephant

Some of the basic terminology of Yogācāra philosophy needs reevaluation. Whereas commentaries almost universally gloss the term dvaya (‘duality’) with some version of the phrase grāhya grāhaka ca (lit. ‘grasped and grasper’, but usually translated as ‘subject and object’), in fact this gloss is absent from the earliest strata. The term and its gloss are derived from separate streams of Yogācāra reasoning—one from discussions of linguistic conceptualization and the other from discussions of perception. Once we see that these two are distinct, it becomes clear that the commentarial literature asserts their identity in order to philosophically unify Yogācāra thought. One upshot of this is that even in this later assertion ‘duality’ refers not to the distinction between internal and external reality (as in ‘textbook’ Yogācāra), but to the falsely projected distinction between mental subjects and mental objects.     

Skepticism,Contextualism, and Discrimination*

The skeptic says that “knowledge” is an absolute term, whereas the contextualist says that ‘knowledge” is a relationally absolute term. Which is the better hypothesis about “knowledge”? And what implications do these hypotheses about “knowledge” have for knowledge? I argue that the skeptic has the better hypothesis about “knowledge”, but that both hypotheses about “knowledge” have deeply anti‐skeptical implications for knowledge, since both presuppose our capacity for epistemically salient discrimination.     

Metaphor,Idiom, and Pretense*

Imaginative and creative capacities seem to be at the heart of both games of make‐believe and figurative uses of language. But how exactly might cases of metaphor or idiom involve make‐believe? In this paper, I argue against the pretense‐based accounts of Walton (1990, 1993) , Hills (1997) , and Egan (this journal, 2008) that pretense plays no role in the interpretation of metaphor or idiom; instead, more general capacities for manipulating concepts (which are also called on within the use of pretense) do the real explanatory work. This result has consequences for both our understanding of metaphor and idiom as well as for the use of figurative language by fictionalists in ontology.     

Fiction,Indifference, and Ontology*

In this paper I outline an alternative to hermeneutic fictionalism, an alternative I call indifferentism, with the same advantages as hermeneutic fictionalism with respect to ontological issues but avoiding some of the problems that face fictionalism. the difference between indifferentism and fictionalism is this. the fictionalist about ordinary utterances of a sentence S holds, with more orthodox views, that the speaker in some sense commits herself to the truth of S. It is only that for the fictionalist this is truth in the relevant fiction. According to the indifferentist, by contrast, we are simply non‐committal—or indifferent—with respect to some aspects of what is literally said in our assertive utterances (specifically, with respect to the ontologically committing aspects).     

No creation, no revelation

There is a strong claim that the world’s createdness, if true, cannot be known but through revelation. In this paper we try to dismiss this claim by arguing that creation cannot be merely a revealed truth (revelabile tantum), since it is on the contrary the very preamble to any genuine revelation. Ontologically, no revelation can happen in a self-existent world. No creation, no revelation. Epistemically, no revelation is to be admitted but on the assumption that the world depends, for its existence and operation, on a supernatural agent. No admittance of creative power, no justified identification of any revelatory activity.     

No War, No Peace: Northern Ireland after the Agreement

In 1998 a historic agreement, commonly known as the Belfast or Good Friday Agreement, formed the basis of a negotiated settlement for the future of Northern Ireland. Since that time the level of violence in Northern Ireland has reduced but many problematic issues related to governance, sectarianism, and community relations remain on the political agenda and have destabilized the post-peace accord environment. Many of these issues can be viewed as either causes or consequences of the protracted conflict in Northern Ireland. This special issue examines some of these issues from a political psychology perspective. Economic, political, social, and psychological factors that have supported and hindered progress towards peace and stability are considered. While the paramilitary ceasefires have remained intact and certain aspects of life in Northern Ireland have been transformed, the road to peace has been hindered by both political and psychological intransigence. This paper offers an opportunity to reevaluate conceptualisations of conflict and its management in chronic situations, where divisions are deeply embedded within societal structures and relationships, and consider factors that may act as barriers to the development of a lasting peace.