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Towards a Nominalist Empiricism

Citation: Zalabardo, Jose (2001) Towards a Nominalist Empiricism.

The paper deals with our ability to classify objects as being of a certain kind on the basis of information provided by the senses (empirical classification) and to ascribe empirical predicates to objects on the basis of these classificatory verdicts (empirical predication). I consider, first, the project of construing the episodes in which this ability is exercised as involving universals. I argue that this construal faces epistemological problems concerning our access to the universals that it invokes. I present the empiricist strategy for dealing with these problems by appeal to sensory qualities, and argue that it rests on a mistake. Then I turn to sketching an account of our faculty of empirical classification and predication which doesn't invoke universals. The account takes as its starting point the nominalist construal of sense experience to be found in the work of C. I. Lewis and Nelson Goodman. I argue that this construal has the resources for explaining some of the central features of the practice of empirical predication.Article

Additional Information: Citation: Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society (2001) 101: 29–52.
Creators: Zalabardo, Jose and
Subjects: Philosophy
Keywords: Universals, Nominalism
Divisions: Institute of Philosophy
Collections: London Philosophy Papers
Dates:
  • 2001 (published)
Comments and Suggestions:
Description/Provenance: Submitted by Mark McBride (mark.mcbride@sas.ac.uk) on 2007-11-26T11:24:50Z No. of bitstreams: 1 J_Zalabardo_Nominalist.pdf: 144230 bytes, checksum: de0bd40240b093aa416b86f63ec691c8 (MD5); Description/Provenance: Made available in DSpace on 2007-11-26T11:24:50Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 J_Zalabardo_Nominalist.pdf: 144230 bytes, checksum: de0bd40240b093aa416b86f63ec691c8 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2001. Date accessioned: 2007-11-26T11:24:50Z; Date available: 2007-11-26T11:24:50Z; Date issued: 2001.

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