But if Harry Potter does not exist, how are we able to talk about Harry Potter? — WISDOMfromPO-MO
If something categorically does not exist, how are we able to talk about it?
"If A does not exist, how are you able to talk about A?" — WISDOMfromPO-MO
If something categorically does not exist, how are we able to talk about it? — WISDOMfromPO-MO
infidel — Srap Tasmaner
Harry Potter does not exist, we are told. Harry Potter is a fiction; Harry Potter is our imagination, the thinking goes.
But if Harry Potter does not exist, how are we able to talk about Harry Potter?
Harry Potter does not exist outside of our imaginations? Okay. But that is different than saying that Harry Potter does not exist, period.
Everything exists, right? The question is what form it exists in (as a concrete being; only as an abstraction in our minds; etc.), right?
Or do things categorically not exist? If so, how? — WISDOMfromPO-MO
We categorically deny that you were ever a member of the Church of the Invisible Pink Unicorn. It's all lies! Lies and falsehoods! And innuendoes! Icky ones, with little thingies growing on them. — Srap Tasmaner
But if Harry Potter does not exist, how are we able to talk about Harry Potter? — WISDOMfromPO-MO
"If A does not exist, how are you able to talk about A?" — WISDOMfromPO-MO
Here is a hypothesis:
(1) If something does not exist, then we cannot talk about it.
It has a contrapositive:
(2) If you can talk about something, then it exists.
I believe (2) can easily be shown to be false, and I believe I have done so in this thread. Therefore (1) is false as well... — Srap Tasmaner
If something categorically does not exist, how are we able to talk about it? — WISDOMfromPO-MO
Here is a different hypothesis:
(3) if something is impossible, then we cannot talk about it.
Its contrapositive would be:
(4) If we can talk about something, then it is possible.
It may very well be that the current consensus among philosophers is that (4) is true, because possible world semantics. I'm not in love with PWS, and lean toward (4) being false. "There's no ball of ice at the center of the Sun," feels to me like a statement that cannot possibly be false. Does anything turn on whether that statement is about the non-existent ball of ice?
EDIT: This is silly. Obviously people who make regular use of PWS talk about impossibility too. It just annoys me for some reason. Unnecessary aspersions on the character of PWS hereby retracted. — Srap Tasmaner
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