“On What There Is”
E81089
“On What There Is” is a seminal philosophical essay by W.V.O. Quine that challenges traditional notions of ontology and argues for a criterion of ontological commitment based on the quantificational structure of our best scientific theories.
All labels observed (3)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| On What There Is | 2 |
| essay "On What There Is" | 1 |
| “On What There Is” canonical | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T648198 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: “On What There Is” Context triple: [Willard Van Orman Quine, notableWork, “On What There Is”]
-
A.
Enemies of the Permanent Things
Enemies of the Permanent Things is a collection of essays by conservative thinker Russell Kirk critiquing modern cultural, political, and moral trends in defense of enduring moral and social norms.
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B.
And There Was Light
"And There Was Light" is the English motto of Morehouse College, reflecting its mission to illuminate minds and foster leadership and service.
-
C.
"The Will to Meaning"
"The Will to Meaning" is a psychological and philosophical work by Viktor Frankl that further develops his logotherapy theory, emphasizing humanity’s search for purpose as the central motivational force in life.
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D.
The What D'Ye Call It
The What D'Ye Call It is a satirical one-act play by English poet and dramatist John Gay, known for parodying the conventions of contemporary tragedy and theatre.
-
E.
One Voice in the Cosmic Fugue
"One Voice in the Cosmic Fugue" is an episode of the science documentary series "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage" that explores the origin, evolution, and diversity of life in the universe.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: “On What There Is” Target entity description: “On What There Is” is a seminal philosophical essay by W.V.O. Quine that challenges traditional notions of ontology and argues for a criterion of ontological commitment based on the quantificational structure of our best scientific theories.
-
A.
Enemies of the Permanent Things
Enemies of the Permanent Things is a collection of essays by conservative thinker Russell Kirk critiquing modern cultural, political, and moral trends in defense of enduring moral and social norms.
-
B.
And There Was Light
"And There Was Light" is the English motto of Morehouse College, reflecting its mission to illuminate minds and foster leadership and service.
-
C.
"The Will to Meaning"
"The Will to Meaning" is a psychological and philosophical work by Viktor Frankl that further develops his logotherapy theory, emphasizing humanity’s search for purpose as the central motivational force in life.
-
D.
The What D'Ye Call It
The What D'Ye Call It is a satirical one-act play by English poet and dramatist John Gay, known for parodying the conventions of contemporary tragedy and theatre.
-
E.
One Voice in the Cosmic Fugue
"One Voice in the Cosmic Fugue" is an episode of the science documentary series "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage" that explores the origin, evolution, and diversity of life in the universe.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
academic article
ⓘ
philosophical essay ⓘ |
| arguesAgainst |
traditional metaphysical ontology
ⓘ
uncritical acceptance of abstract entities ⓘ |
| author |
Willard Van Orman Quine
ⓘ
surface form:
W. V. O. Quine
Willard Van Orman Quine ⓘ |
| centralThesis |
our ontological commitments are determined by what our best theories quantify over
ⓘ
questions of what there is are to be settled by examining the quantificational structure of our theories ⓘ |
| containsCharacter |
McX
ⓘ
Wyman ⓘ |
| countryOfPublication |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| critiques | Alexius Meinong's theory of objects ⓘ |
| field |
metaphysics
ⓘ
ontology ⓘ philosophy ⓘ philosophy of language ⓘ |
| hasNotableQuote | To be is to be the value of a bound variable. ⓘ |
| hasSection | critique of Meinongian ontology ⓘ |
| influenced |
analytic metaphysics
ⓘ
ontological debates in analytic philosophy ⓘ philosophy of language in the 20th century ⓘ theories of ontological commitment ⓘ |
| influencedBy |
Bertrand Russell
ⓘ
Rudolf Carnap ⓘ logical empiricism ⓘ logical positivism ⓘ |
| isConsidered |
classic text in analytic metaphysics
ⓘ
seminal essay on ontological commitment ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| mainTopic |
abstract objects
ⓘ
existence ⓘ logical analysis of language ⓘ nominalism ⓘ ontological commitment ⓘ ontology ⓘ paraphrase in philosophy ⓘ quantification ⓘ universals ⓘ |
| methodologicalApproach | logical analysis of formalized language ⓘ |
| philosophicalTradition | analytic philosophy ⓘ |
| proposes | criterion of ontological commitment based on bound variables of quantification ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1948 ⓘ |
| publishedIn | Review of Metaphysics ⓘ |
| relatedWorkByAuthor |
“Two Dogmas of Empiricism”
ⓘ
surface form:
Two Dogmas of Empiricism
Word and Object ⓘ |
| supportsView | ontological relativity to a background theory ⓘ |
| usesExample |
Pegasus
ⓘ
fictional entities ⓘ mythical creatures ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: “On What There Is” Description of subject: “On What There Is” is a seminal philosophical essay by W.V.O. Quine that challenges traditional notions of ontology and argues for a criterion of ontological commitment based on the quantificational structure of our best scientific theories.
Referenced by (4)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
On What There Is
this entity surface form:
essay "On What There Is"
this entity surface form:
On What There Is