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    Carmelics

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    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that There are two distinct modes of predication: exemplification and encoding.

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    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.Quine's criterion of ontological commitment holds that to be is to be the value of a bound variable, leaving no coherent ontological role for 'encoding' distinct from exemplification.
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    • 2.Positing non-existent objects that encode properties generates a bloated ontology that violates parsimony without solving problems that robust actualism via possible worlds or Meinongianism cannot already address more cleanly.
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    Reason for 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Russell's analysis of definite descriptions dissolves apparent predication about non-existents into quantified claims about existing entities, eliminating the need for a separate encoding mode.
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    • 2.If 'Sherlock Holmes encodes being a detective' is reanalyzed as a claim about a fictional representation or abstract story-artifact, encoding collapses into ordinary exemplification by concrete cultural objects.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.Existent objects exemplify properties in the ordinary sense.
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    • 2.Non-existent objects may encode properties without exemplifying them.
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    • 3.The distinction between exemplification and encoding traces back to Mally and was developed by Zalta (1983).
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