Ontology and Ideology Revisited

Journal of Philosophy, Inc.

Ontology and Ideology RevisitedAuthor(s): W. V. QuineSource: The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 80, No. 9 (Sep., 1983), pp. 499-502Published by: Journal of Philosophy, Inc.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2026110 .Accessed: 18/07/2014 13:56

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THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHlY VOLUME LXXX, NO. 9, SEPTEMBER 1983

ONTOLOGY AND IDEOLOGY REVISITED T O be, I have persistently held, is to be the value of a varia- ble. More precisely, what one takes there to be are what one admits as values of one's bound variables. The point has

been recognized as obvious and trivial, but it has also been deemed unacceptable, even by readers who share my general philosophical outlook. I shall begin by sorting out the pertinent considerations. Some of them hinge on confusion, but the more serious objections reflect a genuine awareness that a conspicuous dimension of existence ordinarily so called has been passed over. In conclusion I shall suggest how to meet those just demands.

The artificial notation ']x' of existential quantification is ex- plained merely as a symbolic rendering of the words 'there is some- thing x such that'. So, whatever more one may care to say about being or existence, what there are taken to be are assuredly just what are taken to qualify as values of 'x' in quantifications. The point is thus trivial and obvious.

It has been objected that what there is is a question of fact and not of language. True enough. Saying or implying what there is, however, is a matter of language; and this is the place of the bound variables.

It has been objected that the logical notation of quantification is an arbitrary and parochial standard to adopt for ontological com- mitment. The answer is that the standard is transferable to any al- ternative language, insofar as we are agreed on how to translate quantification into it. For predicate-functor logic, thus, the equiv- alent principle is that what one takes to be are what one takes one's monadic predicates (complements included) to be true of. For ordinary English it works out that what one takes there to be are what one takes one's relative pronouns to refer to.' Ordinary discourse is

'See my Theories and Things (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard, 1981), pp. 5/6.

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indeed seldom meticulous about ontology, and consequently an as- sessment based on the relative pronouns of ordinary discourse is apt to bespeak a pretty untidy world; but ontological clarity and economy can be promoted by paraphrase, if one so desires, in terms still of relative clauses and pronouns rather than quantifiers and bound variables. The notation of quantification is what is most usual and familiar, currently, where one is expressly concerned with ontological niceties; hence my choice of it as paradigm.

If in some language we are at a loss to arrive at a satisfactory contextual translation of 'there is', and hence of existential quantification, then we are at a loss to assess the ontology of the speakers of that language. Some languages are perhaps so unlike ours that any translation of 'there is' or ']x', however cunningly contextual, would be too far-fetched and Procrustean to rest with. To entertain the notion of an ontology at all, known or unknown, for the speakers of such a language would be an unwarranted projection on our own part of a parochial category appropriate only to our own linguistic circle.

Thus I do recognize that the question of ontological commit- ment is parochial, though within a much broader parish than that of the speakers and writers of symbolic logic. Some of my readers have objected even to this limitation, arguing that even a dumb animal reacts distinctively to particular things and kinds of things, thereby reifying them, recognizing their existence, incorporating them into his inarticulate ontology. Here at last is a valid point that I want to accommodate in my subsequent constructions.

Another such point has to do with what I call proxy functions. I have noted elsewhere2 that if we transform our ontology by any arbitrary one-to-one transformation, and then reinterpret our predicates in a compensatory way, our entire theory of the world will persist verbatim and all its evidential links with sensory stimulation will likewise continue undisturbed. I have pointed the moral that what matters is structure; the objects, concrete and abstract, familiar and recondite, matter only as neutral nodes in the structure. It is not to be wondered that this conclusion has been found disturbing, since it seems to belie, after all, the factuality of the question what there is. I hold that actually it does not, since the question what there is is a substantive scientific question within our system of the world, whereas the point about proxy functions is a point only about evidence, a point not of ontology but of the epistemology of ontology. Still I agree with my disturbed readers that ontology has

2Ibid., pp. 19-21.


ONTOLOGY AND IDEOLOGY REVISITED 501

undergone a humiliating demotion. This again is a point which my ensuing constructions may somewhat mitigate.

I long ago distinguished between ontology and what I called ideology,3 this latter being one's stock of simple and complex terms or predicates. I now propose to extend ideology beyond the subject's own verbal limits, to cover inarticulate abilities to recognize and discriminate. If the subject is disposed to react to the presence of any and every cat in some manner in which he is not disposed to react to anything but cats, then I shall reckon the term 'cat' to his ideology, though it is strictly my term, with which he may or may not be conversant. He need have no corresponding term; he may be dumb; his reaction to cats may even be allergic, and independent of the five senses. Again if he is disposed to react to Geach's Tabitha as to no other cat or noncat, I shall reckon 'Tabitha' to his ideology, though he be ignorant of the name.

For further generality let me switch from terms or predicates to occasion sentences. If the subject reacts distinctively in the rain, or at sunset, or when the chill factor drops below zero Fahrenheit, then the occasion sentence, 'It's raining', 'The sun is setting', or 'The chill factor is below zero Fahrenheit' will be reckoned to his ideology, irrespective of his powers of verbal expression. If he has the gift of language, his ability to call a spade a spade is just one among his dispositions to react in distinguishing ways.

Ideology so construed may be called perceptual ideology, to mark both its breadth and its limits. It is broad in transcending the subject's lexicon, if any, and narrow in treating only of his direct re- sponses to present stimulation. It accommodates dumb animals and remote aliens, thus supplying what was found wanting in mv appeal to values of variables. Also, since it shuns the subject's se- mantics, it is untouched by the consideration of proxy functions except as this bears on the theory of evidence of all science.

From perceptual ideology we could even derive, as a special case, a notion of perceptual ontology. Thus we might reckon all cats to a subject's perceptual ontology if 'It's a cat' belongs to his ideology. We might reckon Tabitha to his perceptual ontology so long as 'That's Tabitha' belongs to his ideology, even if 'It's a cat' does not. Should we reckon further elements to his perceptual ontology on the strength of such further elements of his ideology as 'It's raining' and 'The sun is setting' and the one about the chill factor? The choice is ours, and depends on our own ontology in my serious

"Ontology and Ideology," reprinted in Ways of Paradox (New York: Random House, 1966, and Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard, 1976).


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sense, the values of our bound variables. If we countenance such things as rain, sunsets, and chill factors as values of our variables, we may choose to reckon them to the subject's perceptual ontology in the light of his ideology.

Such a notion of perceptual ontology would be straightforward but idle, given that of perceptual ideology. The latter already covers the ground, and it dispenses with any arbitrary subsequent decision as to what to reckon as objects. For behavioral psychology and ethology we should look merely to perceptual ideology as the key idea, and for a properly philosophical theory of reference and ontology we should continue to look to the values of the variables. It is here that we can take account of the reification not only of per- ceptible things and situations but also of microphysical particles and abstract objects. It is here that we can make sense of ventures in ontological economy, and of the place of ontology in Tarski's recur- sive definition of satisfaction and truth. It is here, finally, that we come to appreciate the role of reification in the theory of scientific evidence: that it is a mere positing of neutral nodes in the structure of scientific theory, as shown by the proxy functions.

WN'. XI. QUTINE

Harvard University

COMMENTS AND CRITICISM

THE PHILOSOPHY OF NIATHEMATICS OF IMRE LAKATOS'

AKATOS' Proofs and Refutations was obviously intended to be more than mathematical history. It was also intended as a philosophical challenge to dominant views Lakatos regarded

2 as wrong and dangerous; yet Quine, one of Lakatos' villains, re- viewed it quite favorably.3 This essay attempts a balanced assess- ment of Lakatos' contribution to the philosophy of mnathematics.

Lakatos is concerned to establish that "informal, quasi-empirical mathematics does not grow through a monotonous increase of the

' This essay is based upon two works by Imre Lakatos: P7oofs and Refutations, edited by John Worrall and Elie Zahar (Cambridge: University Press, 1976)-henceforth referred to as Proofs; and Mlathematics, Science, and Epistemology: Philo- sophical Papers, Volume 2, edited by Worrall and Gregory Currie (Cambridge: Uni- versity Press, 1978)-henceforth referred to as Papers.

2Proofs, p. 4. 3In British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, xxviii, 1 (March 1977): 81.>82.

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Article Contentsp. 499p. 500p. 501p. 502

Issue Table of ContentsThe Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 80, No. 9 (Sep., 1983), pp. 499-554Front Matter [pp. ]Ontology and Ideology Revisited [pp. 499-502]Comments and CriticismThe Philosophy of Mathematics of Imre Lakatos [pp. 502-521]Conservativeness and Incompleteness [pp. 521-531]Levi against U-Maximization [pp. 531-534]The Wrong Box [pp. 534-542]

Book ReviewsReview: untitled [pp. 542-554]

Notes and News [pp. 554]Back Matter [pp. ]

Ontology and Ideology Revisited

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