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CHAPTER TWELVE AN OXFORD DIALOGUE ON LANGUAGE AND METAPHYSICS! In the never-never land ofscience fiction and fantasy there are not only spacetransporters that can whisk one across the English channel from Paris or Cologne , but more wondrous still, time machines that can people the present with famous men of the past and, by reverse polarity, change the time-vector and send them back again at will. Recently Merton College acquired such a machine, and the man whose picture had graced its refectory wall for so many years, John Duns Scotus, was brought back in the flesh to dialogue with an ordinary language philosopher of its own, to the delight of the Oxford dons and fellows. In the short period preceding the first public discussion, Scotus stole a visit to Blackwell's and the Bodleian, and being a speed reader with a computer-like memory, he was able to digest much ofRussell and Wittgenstein as well as other "modern classics" from Austin and Ryle to Ayer and Strawson, and when the chairperson came to escort him to the lecture hall, she found the subtle Scot absorbed in the Collected Papers ofCharles Sanders Peirce, oblivious ofthe late hour. The two-day dialogue itselfwent something like this, ifwe can believe the stenographic report. First Day ANALYST: My first introduction to metaphysics was the course of eight lectures Bertrand Russell gave at Gordon Square, London, in the early months of 1918. "Theywere largely concerned with explaining certainideas learntfrom a friend and former pupil Ludwig Wittgenstein," he said. They were later published in the Monist, volumes 28-29, under the title of "Philosophy of Logical Atomism." SCOTUS: I read the Monist articles as well as Wittgenstein's own version of logical atomism in the TractatZls Logico-philosophicus. It seemed to be the culmination of a line of thinking initiated by Russell's earlier article, "On Denoting ." ANALYST: I believe you are referring to his Mind essay of 1905, the one Ramsey described as "that paradigm ofphilosophy, Russell's theory ofdescriptions ."2 In his early years, Russell had fallen under the influence ofMeinong's theory ofreference, which required some sort ofobjective status even for "gold mountains" that did not exist. SCOTUS: Well, that theory has a long history. In fact, it goes back, in what you now call the "Middle Ages," to a metaphysical dispute among biblical 229 230 EARLY FRANCISCAN SCHOOLMEN exegetes in Charlemagne's palace school as to whether nothing and darkness are something or not. Fridugis, the Deacon, believed he had solved the question definitively by language analysis. In his Letter on Nothing and Darkness he explained to Charles: Every definite name signifies something, as man, stone, wood. As soon as these names have been mentioned we understand immediately the things they signify ... Nothing, ifit is a noun at all as grammarians maintain, is a definite noun. But every definite noun signifies something. For it is impossible that something definite should not be something; it is impossible that nothing, which is definite, should not exist, and it is impossible that nothing, which is definite, should not be something. Likewise nothing is a word that has signification. But every signification has reference to that which it signifies ... Likewise every signification is signification of what is. Nothing, however, signifies something. Nothing, therefore is the signification ofwhat is, that is, something existing.3 Our "speculative grammarians" eventually found a way to deal with privations and negations, but I must admit I found Russell's analysis intriguing. To explain it to my colleagues when I return to Paris, however, I would have to reverse the roles Russell assigned to "the author ofWaverley" and "the present king of France." Unfortunately, we have one, and I'm afraid a number of my countrymen from across the English channel would be only too happy to be able to dispose of him as neatly as Russell did. Where I come from, we have little sympathy for those who think they are kings by divine right. You may recall my views on the origins of civil authority in Ordinatio 4, distinction 15, question 2. However, that is beside the point that I wished to make. ANALYST: And what was that? SCOTUS: In doing philosophy or theology, one does wish at times for an ideal language - if such could be achieved - one governed by logical grammar . In such a language, different modes of signification would not be expressed by the same word. For, as Wittgenstein rightly said, "in this way the most...

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