nothing much new to post, so . . .

I was pleased to see this paper by Kris McDaniel and Ben Caplan up on OPP. The mereological myths they’re rightly debunking are ones that really annoy me. It’s part of a more general annoyance at the all too common mistake of pulling de re essentialist conclusions from a de dicto hat.

I also enjoyed Jonathan Wolff’s column on owning up to be a philosopher, and the anecdote Leiter posts here. I remember Vann McGee saying he just tells people he’s a logician, and if they ask what that is he says, quite reasonably, that it’s like being a tax auditor for the mind. It can backfire though. I remember someone (I think it might have been Agustin Rayo) telling of the time they told someone they were a logician, and the person thought for a minute then said: ‘Ah yes, you have to know where your goods are going’!