Ruby Grant Report: Metaphysical Indeterminacy

We motivate and consider the ramifications of the thesis that there is worldly (or metaphysical) indeterminacy, not mere semantic indeterminacy (or vague-ness) about the boundaries and identities of objects. We give general consider-ations about what objects are that we think help to show that it is plausible that their lack of sharp boundaries is a feature of them, not just of the language used to describe them. Then we consider the difficulties raised by the fact that it is then natural to suppose further that there can be indeterminacy about the identities of objects. In particular, we focus on the argument of Gareth Evans that purports to show (as we interpret it) that indeterminacy of identity statements could not be due to worldly indeterminacy, on pain of logical incoherence. We criticize the response to this argument of Terence Parsons, a leading advocate of worldly inde-terminacy of identity. We offer our own approach, on which the threat of Evans’ argument can be effectively defused. Content