this idea and the indeterminacy of meaning. Both theses caused a revolution in the philosophic world in the sixties, generating a cascade of articles and doctoral theses. Agitation seems to have cooled down, but the point is still debated and it may be experiencing a renewed resurgence. Both theses make their appearance in Word and Object, Quine’s work from 1960, and they will be a constant in his ulterior writings, going under several reformulations and clarifications. Each one of these ideas, underdetermination of theories and indeterminacy of meaning, deserves a deep analysis by itself, but we will centre here specifically on the relation between them, since it has proved to be an excellent way of clarifying both ideas. T. Bonk’s work discusses the relations between both theses in chapter 6, named «Underdetermination and Indeterminacy». The sections of this chapter are: «Underdetermination and Translation», «Indeterminacy versus Underdetermination», «Empirical Investigations of Cognitive Meaning», «Indeterminacy and the Absence of Fact» and «Quine’s Pragmatic Interpretation of Underdetermination». I will present here my own reconstruction of the issue, which should serve me to show the points I find obscure in Bonk’s study. 1. Underdetermination

/pdf/underdetermination-versus-indeterminacy-2g1glxu98m.pdf

Underdetermination versus indeterminacy

This paper deals with the treatment of infinity and finiteness in mereology. After an overview of some first-order mereological theories, finiteness axioms are introduced along with a mereological definition of “x is finite” in terms of which the axioms themselves are derivable in each of those theories. The finiteness axioms also provide the background for definitions of “(mereological theory) T makes an assumption of infinity”. In addition, extensions of mereological theories by the axioms are investigated for their own sake. In the final part, a definition of “x is finite” stated in a second-order language is also presented, followed by some concluding remarks on the motivation for the study of the (first-order) extensions of mereological theories dealt with in the paper.

https://apcz.umk.pl/czasopisma/index.php/LLP/article/download/LLP.2016.023/9508

Mereology and Infinity

Abstract This chapter considers the geometric structure of theories with regular nomic structure within the framework of Hamiltonian mechanics. In this context, broad symmetries facilitate the identification of dynamically isolated substructures of a theory. In particular, the space of conserved charges and the Poisson sub-algebras of this space give representations of the interesting dynamically stable structures of a theory. However, there are good reasons to avoid a naïve reductionism in which the isolated structures of a theory are removed. Rather, once the broad symmetries are parameterized so that the isolated structures and conserved charges are identified, one can then proceed to identify the narrow symmetries in a second step based upon physical reasoning. The preliminary stance, that narrow symmetries are all broad symmetries which are variational symmetries of the full system under study are narrow symmetries, is the basic starting point in this approach. 

Conservation and Geometry

Abstract How, if at all, can scientific progress improve our view of the modal facts? According to rationalist approaches to modal epistemology, science has no substantive role: a priori reflection reveals the structure of modal space, and a posteriori science merely locates us within that modal space, by identifying the actual properties and structures instantiated at our world. According to modal naturalist approaches, science provides evidence about the structure of the underlying modal space. In this paper I distinguish four versions of modal naturalism, with science playing an increasingly robust evidential role, and discuss their plausibility. 

VI—Four Grades of Modal Naturalism

Existence: An Unholy Trinity. An account of Indeterminate Existence

On empirically equivalent systems of the world

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On empirically equivalent systems of the world

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Underdetermination versus indeterminacy

Mereology and Infinity

Conservation and Geometry

VI—Four Grades of Modal Naturalism

Existence: An Unholy Trinity. An account of Indeterminate Existence

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