Abstract
This paper outlines the often striking parallels of various approaches to ontic vagueness, as well as their even more striking differences. Though circling around the same idea, some of these approaches were developed to solve quite diverse theoretical problems and encounter different challenges. In addition to these difficulties, the frequently disregarded epistemological problems of all theories of ontic vagueness turn out to be even more serious under critical scrutiny. The same holds for the difficulties of deciding, for every case of vagueness, whether the vagueness involved is semantic or ontic.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
Henceforth, I understand property in a broad sense, including relations.
Names and predicates are not the only constituents of sentences that can be vague; adverbs like ‘rapidly’ or indefinite pronouns like ‘many’ can be vague, too. As we use words like these to characterise properties or states of affairs, we can take them to denote higher-order properties. Thus, they fall under a theory of vague properties. (This idea was suggested to me by Alexander Dinges.)
This thesis has several names, among them ‘ontological vagueness’, ‘ontic vagueness’, ‘vagueness de re’, ‘vagueness in rebus’ and ‘vagueness in reality’.
Williamson (2003) emphatically argues that vagueness is basically a phenomenon of sentences or, if you take the world itself to be vague, of states of affairs (699−701).
The vague-identity view is commonly discussed under the heading ‘vague objects’, too. (For an example, see fn. 17.) As a result of this rather confusing fact, both views are frequently mixed up.
Theories of vague objects share this complication with Williamson’s epistemic approach (1994), which is, of course, a semantic theory of vagueness, not an ontic one. The fuzzy boundaries I discuss in this paper are non-epistemically fuzzy in the sense that their existence is due to the nature of the objects and not due to our limited means of perceiving them.
A similar piece of evidence for this point is a puzzle which concerns only temporal boundaries: There are objects which come into existence gradually, so that, for any of these objects, there are points in time at which it is indeterminate whether it exists, and there are no points in time earlier than these at which it determinately exists. So if some event destroys the object just while it is emerging, there are no points in time at which it determinately exists. How can that be? According to Baker (2007), ‘its being indeterminate whether x exists at t' requires that there is some other time, t, such that x definitely exists at t. Determinate objects (i.e. objects that determinately exist) may have indeterminate temporal boundaries. […] Indeterminate existence is thus parasitic on determinate existence’ (131). As a consequence, whether there is some object emerging can be known only afterwards.
If vague objects are not identical with quantities of particles, what then is the relation between quantities of particles and vague objects? There are several options, involving, for example, constitution, supervenience or emergence, each of which can be developed in various ways. This leads to numerous different variants of theories of vague objects.
This consequence may seem less obscure for semantic externalists, since someone who claims that our words can have meanings that we, their creators, only partially know, may find it easier to believe that our words can have denotations that we are unable to specify. (This was pointed out to me by Matthias Kiesselbach.)
This modal system is presumably not transitive, for otherwise all higher orders of vagueness would collapse into one (but see Soames 2003 for an argument that indeed they do).
To assume that there is a fixed number of categories greater than two is implausible not only for metaphysical reasons, but also for psychological ones. As Schiffer (2009) points out with respect to vague properties, we do not tend to ascribe any truth-status (i.e. being true or false, having a degree of truth, having no truth value) to the proposition that x is F if x is a borderline case of F.
Tye (1990) takes this claim to be part of the definition of vague objects: ‘I shall classify a concrete object o as vague […] if, and only if, (a) o has borderline spatio-temporal parts and (b) there is no determinate fact of the matter about whether there are objects that are neither parts, borderline parts, nor non-parts of o’ (535f).
According to Morreau (2002), this distinction is mirrored in our way of speaking: On the one hand, we would ask whether some quantity of matter at the foot of Carstensz Pyramid is part of it, but on the other hand we would ask whether Ngga Pulu is a part of it (340).
Again, Tye (1990) regards the latter point as definitional for vague properties: ‘In general I take a property to be vague only if (a) it could have borderline instances and (b) there is no determinate fact of the matter about whether there could be objects that are neither instances, borderline instances, nor non-instances’ (536; his italics).
As but one example of a theory which allows fuzzy temporal boundaries without allowing vague existence recall Baker’s position (fn. 7): An object definitely exists iff there is at least one point in time such that it definitely exists at that point; otherwise, it definitely does not exist. Hence, existence is not a vague property.
Instead of a vague definite description, we may have a singular term which could be analysed as a vague definite description. If we assume, for example, that ‘Denmark’ does not denote a vague object distinct from Denmark plus Greenland and Denmark minus Greenland and does not denote exactly one of these two objects (though we cannot find out which), then there is no object at all for ‘Denmark’ to denote. Following Russell, we may deal with this by analysing ‘Denmark’ as a definite description, for example ‘the country whose capital is Copenhagen’. This description is vague, because it remains unclear whether Denmark is Denmark plus Greenland. The whole point here is merely to stress that we cannot deduce that we talk about a precisely denoted object from the fact that we use a singular term.
Sometimes, only the objects mentioned in this definition are called ‘vague objects’. Garrett (1988), for example, defines vague objects in roughly the same way in which I define vague identity: ‘The thesis that there can be vague objects is the thesis that there can be identity statements which are indeterminate in truth-value (i.e. neither true nor false) as a result of vagueness (as opposed e.g. to reference-failure), the singular terms of which do not have their references fixed by vague descriptive means’ (130; his italics).
Or else we could argue that ‘the mountain which I climb’ denotes something for which it is indeterminate whether it is identical to Ngga Pulu, CP+ or Carstensz Pyramid. Whether we use a singular term or a description does not necessarily tell us anything about whether what we talk about is definitely identical or indeterminately identical or definitely distinct to some differently denoted object.
Noonan, incidentally, would not be very impressed by this solution, for his aim is to show that there cannot be vague objects without vague identity (2004; see also 2008, n. 3). Another argument that the existence of vague objects implies the vagueness of identity is presented in Noonan 2008, but I regard this argument as less convincing because it assumes a particular description of Shoemaker’s Brown/Brownson case. Consequently, Paganini (2011) replies to it by rejecting one part of that description, but her solution obviously faces the too many minds problem I formulate below. A better way out, for a proponent of vague objects who is not a vague-identity theorist, would be to reject another part of the description, namely that it can be indeterminate whether a certain person is in a certain room. However, in doing so, she would admit that she cannot handle this case any better than someone who takes persons to be precise entities.
The argument does not depend on the fuzziness of temporal boundaries. A structurally analogous case in terms of fuzzy spatial boundaries is Shoemaker’s example of Alpha Hall and Beta Hall (1984).
For a defense of the vague-identity view against these concerns about denotation, see Parsons (2000, ch. 9).
I have developed the argument more fully in Weber (unpublished draft).
Note that supervaluationist solutions to that problem are semantic solutions and cannot be applied here.
References
Baker L R (1999) What am I? Philosophy and phenomenological research 59: 151−159
Baker L R (2007) The metaphysics of everyday life. An essay in practical realism. Cambridge Univ Pr, Cambridge
Evans G (1978) Can there be vague objects? Analysis 38: 208
Garrett B (1988) Vagueness and identity. Analysis 48: 130−134
Morreau M (2002) What vague objects are like. The Journal of Philosophy 99: 333−361
Noonan H (2004) Are there vague objects? Analysis 64: 131−134
Noonan H (2008) Does ontic indeterminacy in boundaries entail ontic indeterminacy in identity? Analysis 68: 174−176
Noonan H (2010) The thinking animal problem and personal pronoun revisionism. Analysis 70: 93−98
Olson E (2003) An argument for animalism. In: Martin R, Barresi J (eds) Personal identity. Blackwell, Oxford
Paganini E (2011) Vague objects without ontically indeterminate identity. Erkenntnis 74: 351−362
Parsons T (2000) Indeterminate identity. Metaphysics and semantics. Clarendon, Oxford
Schiffer S (2009) Vague properties. In: Dietz R, Moruzzi S (eds), Cuts and clouds: vagueness, its nature, and its logic. Oxford Univ Pr, Oxford
Shoemaker S (1984). A materialist’s account. In: Shoemaker S, Swinburne R: Personal identity. Blackwell, Oxford
Shoemaker S (2008) Persons, animals, and identity. Synthese 162: 313−324
Soames S (2003) Higher-order vagueness for partially defined predicates. In: Beall J C (ed) Liars and heaps. New essays on paradox. Clarendon, Oxford
Tye M (1990) Vague objects. Mind 99: 535−557
Weber M A (unpublished draft) The too many minds argument against vague identity.
Williamson T (1994) Vagueness. Routledge, New York
Williamson T (2003) Vagueness in reality. In: Loux M, Zimmerman D (eds) The Oxford handbook of metaphysics. Oxford Univ Pr, Oxford
Zemach E M (1991) Vague objects. Noûs 25: 323−340
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
About this article
Cite this article
Weber, M.A. Interrelations and Dissimilarities Between Distinct Approaches to Ontic Vagueness. Int Ontology Metaphysics 14, 181–195 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12133-013-0120-7
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12133-013-0120-7