Nominalism and its aftermath: the philosophy of Nelson Goodman

186 Pages·2009·0.769 MB·English

by  Goodman, Nelson, Shottenkirk, Dena

NOMINALISMANDITSAFTERMATH
SYNTHESE LIBRARY
STUDIESINEPISTEMOLOGY,
LOGIC,METHODOLOGY,ANDPHILOSOPHYOFSCIENCE
Editor-in-Chief:
VINCENTF.HENDRICKS,RoskildeUniversity,Roskilde,Denmark
JOHNSYMONS,UniversityofTexasatElPaso,U.S.A.
HonoraryEditor:
JAAKKOHINTIKKA,BostonUniversity,U.S.A.
Editors:
DIRKVANDALEN,UniversityofUtrecht,TheNetherlands
THEOA.F.KUIPERS,UniversityofGroningen,TheNetherlands
TEDDYSEIDENFELD,CarnegieMellonUniversity,U.S.A.
PATRICKSUPPES,StanfordUniversity,California,U.S.A.
JANWOLEN´SKI,JagiellonianUniversity,Krako´w,Poland
VOLUME343
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NOMINALISM AND ITS
AFTERMATH
THE PHILOSOPHY OF NELSON
GOODMAN
by
DenaShottenkirk
Brooklyn,NY,U.S.A.
123
Dr.DenaShottenkirk
360PresidentStreet
BrooklynNY11231
USA
d [email protected]
ISBN 978-1-4020-9930-4 e-ISBN 978-1-4020-9931-1
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4020-9931-1
SpringerDordrechtHeidelbergLondonNewYork
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EmilyMichael,Ingratitudeforherintellectual guidance
andmoralsupport

Preface
Nelson Goodman’s disparate writings are often discussed and written about only
within their own particular discipline, such that the epistemology is discussed in
contrast to others’ epistemology, the aesthetics is contrasted with more traditional
aesthetics,andtheontologyandlogicisviewedinoppositiontobothothercontem-
poraryphilosophersandtohishistoricalpredecessors.Thisbookarguesthatthatis
notanadequatewaytoviewGoodman.
Goodman’sfirstandseminalbook,TheStructureofAppearance(SA),whichwas
publishedin1951thoughitwasarevisedversionofhis1941Ph.D.dissertation,sets
forthnotonlyhislogicandnominalistontology,butistheframeworkuponwhich
he builds the rest of his work and thus the rest of his work cannot be adequately
understood without a grounding in his ontology. This applies to understanding his
epistemology but it is even truer in understanding his aesthetics. His epistemol-
ogy, developed thirteen years after The Structure of Appearance, which detailed
his ontology and logic, is heavily dependent on that ontology and logic. And his
aesthetics,primarilycapturedinLanguagesofArt,writtentwenty-sevenyearsafter
SA,isitselfdependentuponbothhisepistemologyandhisontologicalcommitment
tonominalism.Inshort,NelsonGoodman’saestheticscannotbeunderstoodwith-
out prior knowledge of both his epistemology and his ontology, in particular his
nominalism.Furthermore,thisbookalsoassertsthatitistheveryconsistencywith
whichheappliedhisnominalismthatresultedinthedifficultiesencounteredinboth
hisepistemologyandhisaesthetics.
Inordertodemonstratebothpoints–firstly,thedependencyofhisepistemology
and aesthetics on his early metaphysical and ontological writings, and secondly,
that it is the very application of those metaphysical and ontological positions to
the rest of his philosophical writings that is the source of much of which fails to
be completely satisfactory – the book has been divided into three sections: The
Metaphysics,TheEpistemology,TheAesthetics.Theyaresequentialsectionswith
eachprovidingthegroundrulesforthenextsectionand,furthermore,providingthe
reasonsforlimitationsonthetermsavailabletothesubsequentsection(s).Thusthe
Metaphysics is an explication of Goodman’s basic nominalist ontology and logic,
anditisuponthoseprinciplesthathebuildshisepistemology.Itisthesumofboth
themetaphysicsandtheepistemology,withthenominalistprincipleastheguiding
force, which constructs the aesthetics. At the end of each section, the consequent
vii
viii Preface
limitationsimposedonhistermsandconceptsavailabletohimareexplicated,such
that,bytheendofthebook,Iamabletodelineatetheconstraintsimposeduponthe
aestheticsbyboththemetaphysicsandtheepistemology.
Thisshortintroductionwillprovide,Ihope,thebasicthoughtsdrivingthebook
andgivethereaderthegeneralframeworkofthearguments.Thefundamentalpre-
ceptofthebookisthatGoodmanis,morethananythingelse,anominalist,granting
onlyentitiesofthelowestontologicalkind,necessitating,forexample,adefinition
of “property” as the typically repeated pattern of qualia exhibited by an object,
instead of an essentialist trait. Entities are defined not only as individuals but in
extensionalist terms to such an extent that, by his own account, Goodman was a
“super-extensionalist”.
His particular form of nominalism has fundamental consequences first in his
epistemology, which cannot itself be adequately understood apart from his ontol-
ogy for it is in his “calculus of individuals” that he defines qualia (presentation of
color,time,andspace)asthephenomenalbasicunits–entitiesthatsatisfythebasic
adequacycriterionforsystemsingeneral,anditisfromthesebasicprimitivesthat
the constructionalism can, with a limited set of terms and operations, be used to
buildanontologicalorepistemologicalsystem.
Goodman’s nominalism has the consequences of forbidding not only (Platon-
ist) properties, but also abstract objects, meaning accounts, classes, and fictive
reference as well. All of these constraints are directly translated in his epistemol-
ogy where his commitments involve denials of universal/objective truth, natural
kinds, the autonomous object, and univocal human responses. It is an epistemol-
ogy wherein empiricism is denied and coherentism embraced, objective reality
is denied and replaced by relativistic worldmaking, and induction and the pro-
jection of predicates is given the central role in the formation of all knowledge
systems.
CentralalsotoallofGoodman’sphilosophyisreference:weunderstandbycor-
rectly ascertaining the relation between a symbol and the thing symbolized. This
istrueforbothartandscienceinthatweunderstandbothbysortingthesymbols.
Hence, Goodman’s aesthetic symbols refer in ways that can only be understood
withinthegeneralframeworkoftherestofhisphilosophy.
Thusthecumulativesumofhismetaphysicsandhisepistemologyisseeninthe
final section of the book – the aesthetics. There it will be shown that Goodman’s
aesthetics,whichisasemanticaccountofreference,forbidsintensions,properties,
fictiveentities,non-semanticmeaning,naturalsymbols,acentralroleforemotion,
and any notion of a universal or empirical truth, and that those restrictions on the
termsandfunctionsavailabletohimarethedirectresultofhisepistemology,which,
torepeat,arguesforrelativism,pluralism,andworldmaking.
And to reiterate the recursive reasoning, these restrictions are the direct result
ofhismetaphysicsandontology.Inshort,theGoodmaniansystemisaremarkably
well-integrated and tightly knit whole with nominalism functioning as the foun-
dation and glue; but it is a glue that is, as the saying goes, both a blessing and a
curse.
Preface ix
At the close of this preface I don’t want to leave unmentioned my gratitude to
mychildren,Merida,Dodge,andArliss,whohavebeenendlesslytolerantandgen-
uinely supportive through this long process (do they ever remember a time when
NelsonGoodmanwasnotintheirlives?).IalsowanttothanktheGlasgowSchool
ofArtforgivingmethetimenecessarytocompletethisprojectandforcreatinga
workatmospherethatencouragedmetopushforward.
Brooklyn,NY DenaShottenkirk