Publications
1. “Being Is a Being,” Open Philosophy, 8 (1), 2025: https://doi.org/10.1515/opphil-2024-0058.
Heidegger claims that “the Being of beings ‘is’ not itself a being.” While he does not seem to argue for this claim (usually referred to as the “ontological difference”), there is now a very substantial literature that fills this gap. In this article, I subject this literature to philosophical scrutiny. My conclusion is that none of the extant arguments for the ontological difference is sound. Since, by contrast, we have at least two good reasons to think that Being is a being, this suggests that Being is a being, after all.
Published Version (Open Access)
2. “‘The Soul Is, in a Way, All Beings’: Heidegger’s Debts to Aristotle in Being and Time,” Inquiry, 67 (10), 2024: 3930–3968.
This paper develops a novel interpretation of Dasein, as we find it in Heidegger’s Being and Time. On this interpretation, Heidegger models this most famous of all his concepts after Aristotle’s account of the soul from De Anima as isomorphic with whatever it currently cognises. Indeed, Dasein proves central to the inquiry into Being he attempts in that book precisely because, like soul, it is capable of becoming like all beings.
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
3. “Why Being Fragments,” Synthese, 2023: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-023-04403-z (ahead of print.)
This paper develops a new argument for ontological pluralism – the thesis that being fragments. The argument goes, roughly, as follows. It is conceivable that some beings are ontologically dissimilar. So, it is possible that some beings are ontologically dissimilar. This is sufficient for ontological pluralism. So, being fragments.
Published Version / Pre-published Version
4. “Aristotelian Rhapsody: Did Aristotle Pick His Categories as They Came His Way?” Inquiry, 2023: https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2023.2211425 (ahead of print).
In the first Critique, Kant raises two objections against Aristotle’s categories. Kant’s concern, in the first instance, is whether Aristotle generated all categories that there are and if he did not generate any spurious categories. However, for Kant, this is only a symptom of the second – deeper – flaw in Aristotle’s thinking. According to Kant, Aristotle generated his categories ‘on no common principle.’ This paper develops the two Kantian objections, offers an overview of Brentano’s (1862) reconstruction of Aristotle’s categories (which claims to have addressed them), develops three objections to this reconstruction, and recommends Trendelenburg (1846) as a better – albeit still flawed – Aristotelian reply to Kant.
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
5. “Does Aristotle’s ‘Being Is Not a Genus Argument’ Entail Ontological Pluralism?” Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, 104 (4), 2022: 688-711.
This paper differentiates between two readings of Aristotle’s argument that unity and being are not “genē” (UBANG for short). On the first reading – proposed by commentators such as Ackrill, Shields, Loux, and McDaniel – UBANG entails the proposition that there are no features that characterise all beings insofar as they are, referred to by its contemporary proponents, including McDaniel, as ‘ontological pluralism’. On the second reading – proposed here – UBANG does not entail this proposition. The paper argues that only on the second reading does Aristotle’s argument secure its conclusion, that the second reading is, in fact, the correct reading of UBANG, and that anyone who thinks that UBANG succeeds and entails ontological pluralism probably equivocates between two different senses of ‘genos’.
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
6. “The Logic of Being in Heidegger’s Being and Time,” The New Yearbook for Phenomenology and Phenomenological Philosophy, 19, 2022: 220-254.
McDaniel argues that Heidegger’s accounts of the kinds of being in Being and Time (such as Dasein, the ready-to-hand, and the present-at-hand) might be understood as spelling out meanings of different restricted existential quantifiers whose domains do not overlap. This paper develops three objections to this proposal and, ultimately, a different view of the logical form of Heidegger’s kinds of being as disjuncts of the reality-predicate described by Fine applicable to any of the objects in the domain of the unrestricted existential quantifier some facts about which “ground” all facts about the remaining objects in this domain (the membership in which is denied the ontological significance invested in it by Quine and, following him, many other analytic philosophers including McDaniel).
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
1. “Being Is a Being,” Open Philosophy, 8 (1), 2025: https://doi.org/10.1515/opphil-2024-0058.
Heidegger claims that “the Being of beings ‘is’ not itself a being.” While he does not seem to argue for this claim (usually referred to as the “ontological difference”), there is now a very substantial literature that fills this gap. In this article, I subject this literature to philosophical scrutiny. My conclusion is that none of the extant arguments for the ontological difference is sound. Since, by contrast, we have at least two good reasons to think that Being is a being, this suggests that Being is a being, after all.
Published Version (Open Access)
2. “‘The Soul Is, in a Way, All Beings’: Heidegger’s Debts to Aristotle in Being and Time,” Inquiry, 67 (10), 2024: 3930–3968.
This paper develops a novel interpretation of Dasein, as we find it in Heidegger’s Being and Time. On this interpretation, Heidegger models this most famous of all his concepts after Aristotle’s account of the soul from De Anima as isomorphic with whatever it currently cognises. Indeed, Dasein proves central to the inquiry into Being he attempts in that book precisely because, like soul, it is capable of becoming like all beings.
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
3. “Why Being Fragments,” Synthese, 2023: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-023-04403-z (ahead of print.)
This paper develops a new argument for ontological pluralism – the thesis that being fragments. The argument goes, roughly, as follows. It is conceivable that some beings are ontologically dissimilar. So, it is possible that some beings are ontologically dissimilar. This is sufficient for ontological pluralism. So, being fragments.
Published Version / Pre-published Version
4. “Aristotelian Rhapsody: Did Aristotle Pick His Categories as They Came His Way?” Inquiry, 2023: https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2023.2211425 (ahead of print).
In the first Critique, Kant raises two objections against Aristotle’s categories. Kant’s concern, in the first instance, is whether Aristotle generated all categories that there are and if he did not generate any spurious categories. However, for Kant, this is only a symptom of the second – deeper – flaw in Aristotle’s thinking. According to Kant, Aristotle generated his categories ‘on no common principle.’ This paper develops the two Kantian objections, offers an overview of Brentano’s (1862) reconstruction of Aristotle’s categories (which claims to have addressed them), develops three objections to this reconstruction, and recommends Trendelenburg (1846) as a better – albeit still flawed – Aristotelian reply to Kant.
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
5. “Does Aristotle’s ‘Being Is Not a Genus Argument’ Entail Ontological Pluralism?” Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, 104 (4), 2022: 688-711.
This paper differentiates between two readings of Aristotle’s argument that unity and being are not “genē” (UBANG for short). On the first reading – proposed by commentators such as Ackrill, Shields, Loux, and McDaniel – UBANG entails the proposition that there are no features that characterise all beings insofar as they are, referred to by its contemporary proponents, including McDaniel, as ‘ontological pluralism’. On the second reading – proposed here – UBANG does not entail this proposition. The paper argues that only on the second reading does Aristotle’s argument secure its conclusion, that the second reading is, in fact, the correct reading of UBANG, and that anyone who thinks that UBANG succeeds and entails ontological pluralism probably equivocates between two different senses of ‘genos’.
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
6. “The Logic of Being in Heidegger’s Being and Time,” The New Yearbook for Phenomenology and Phenomenological Philosophy, 19, 2022: 220-254.
McDaniel argues that Heidegger’s accounts of the kinds of being in Being and Time (such as Dasein, the ready-to-hand, and the present-at-hand) might be understood as spelling out meanings of different restricted existential quantifiers whose domains do not overlap. This paper develops three objections to this proposal and, ultimately, a different view of the logical form of Heidegger’s kinds of being as disjuncts of the reality-predicate described by Fine applicable to any of the objects in the domain of the unrestricted existential quantifier some facts about which “ground” all facts about the remaining objects in this domain (the membership in which is denied the ontological significance invested in it by Quine and, following him, many other analytic philosophers including McDaniel).
Published Version / Pre-Published Version
Under Review
- A paper about Aristotle and pros hen homonymy (R&R)
- Two papers about the ontological difference
(drafts available upon request)
- A paper about Aristotle and pros hen homonymy (R&R)
- Two papers about the ontological difference
(drafts available upon request)