Welcome to the web-page of the Workshop Deflationism in Metaphysics,
which will be held at the University of Vienna on December 15-16, 2017.
While metaphysics and ontology are traditionally concerned with the existence and nature of what there is in the world, metametaphysics and metaontology focus on methodological issues such as: What kind of questions belong to the field of metaphysics or ontology? What are the best methods to address them? Are metaphysics and ontology even respectable disciplines? Are their questions really substantive, or do they rather merely deal in matters of language?
Deflationism is the view according to which metaphysical and ontological questions are somehow defective and lacking substance. Anti-Deflationism, by contrast, aims at vindicating metaphysical and ontological questions as substantive and as respectable as any other scientific question.
This workshop aims to bring together philosophers who have advocated deflationist positions, but also who have engaged critically with them; who have defended deflationism from critcisms, refined and bolstered the main tenets of the position; but also who have pointed at its weaknesses and at some not-so-deflationary implications of it.
which will be held at the University of Vienna on December 15-16, 2017.
While metaphysics and ontology are traditionally concerned with the existence and nature of what there is in the world, metametaphysics and metaontology focus on methodological issues such as: What kind of questions belong to the field of metaphysics or ontology? What are the best methods to address them? Are metaphysics and ontology even respectable disciplines? Are their questions really substantive, or do they rather merely deal in matters of language?
Deflationism is the view according to which metaphysical and ontological questions are somehow defective and lacking substance. Anti-Deflationism, by contrast, aims at vindicating metaphysical and ontological questions as substantive and as respectable as any other scientific question.
This workshop aims to bring together philosophers who have advocated deflationist positions, but also who have engaged critically with them; who have defended deflationism from critcisms, refined and bolstered the main tenets of the position; but also who have pointed at its weaknesses and at some not-so-deflationary implications of it.