The University of Texas at Austin

Graduate Student, Philosophy

Thesis Title: The Ontological Commitments of Natural Language Data (working title)

About

I am writing my dissertation under the supervision of Mark Sainsbury and Josh Dever at UT-Austin.  I am also working with Hans Kamp and Rob Koons.  An abstract of my dissertation is below.  In addition to interests in philosophy of language, semantics and ontology, I am interested in philosophy of mind and philosophy of science (particularly philosophy of linguistics). 

Abstract of The Ontological Commitments of Natural Language Data: Since the linguistic turn, many have taken semantics to guide metaphysics.  I develop a methodology to determine when natural language data carries ontological commitments.  I apply the methodology to two case studies of expressions in English––plurals and collective nouns.  I show that plural expressions have indeterminate ontological commitments and that collective nouns determinately carry a commitment to summed objects or groups.  These case studies reveal that an appeal to formal semantic theories will not always lead determinate answers to ontological questions.  So, semantics can only serve as a partial guide to ontology.  Further, semantics will not deliver answers to (many) questions regarding the nature of entities.  Last I develop a view of groups that fits with the requirement imposed by the semantics of collective nouns––that they exist––but which goes beyond semantics to examine their nature.