Would Ockham Have Shaved Wyman's Beard?

WOULD OCKHAM HAVE SHAVED WYMAN'S BEARD?1 WiUiam of Ockham used his razor very efficiently within the realm of the actual. Scores of generally assumed entities were eradicated from his universe. But in possibilia, i.e. things which though they can exist, do not, he took no offense; on the contrary, such entities appear as indispensable elements of an Ockhamist ontology. To prove this point is the purpose of the present writing. To some the thesis may appear so obviously true as to be hardly worth the argument. "Of course," it will be argued, by an Ockhamscholar we shall call 'Mac Ay1' "an author who acknowledges that reference may be made to non-actuals and for whom there may be knowledge of non-actual entities is committed to possibilia/" To others the thesis may seem intolerable. "Do you not know," it will be impatiently objected, by Beaman say, "that Ockham rejected the theories of his contemporaries who admitted possible being2 in their ontologies? And have you overlooked the fact that Ockham intends 'thing' and 'actually existent' to have exactly the same meaning?3 For Ockham, the concept of a non-actual being is no better off than that of a chimera!" The vexing fact is of course that Mac Ay and Beaman seem to 1 Wyman is a fictional character who is made to argue in favor of possible objects. He is taken from V. O. Quine's classic: "On what there is" (in From a Logical Point of View, Harvard University Press, 2nd edition, 1961). 'Wyman's beard' is of course intended to refer to Wyman's ontology, by an adaptation of Quine's somewhat disrespectful use, in the same piece, of Plato's name. The names 'Mac Ay' and 'Beaman' are mere conveniences for later reference to the two conflicting interpretations of Ockham's doctrine and are also reminiscent of a device of Quine's from the same article. 2 The Latin we have in mind here for 'possible being' is both 'possibile esse' (cf. Ordinatio, d. 36, q. 1 in Opera Theologica IV, St. Bonaventure, N.Y., 1979. P- 559) and 'ens in potentia' (cf. Summa Logicae I c. 38 in Opera Philosophica I, St. Bonaventure, N.Y., 1974, p. 108). 3 'Meaning' is here intended in the sense given by Ockham to 'significatio.' Would Ockham Have Shaved Wyman's Beard?245 score equaUy. Mac Ay has collected unadulterated textual evidence in his favor: he need only point to the pages where Ockham deals with the "suppositio" of terms in modal sentences of possibility4 or to the discussions of intuitive and abstractive knowledge.6 But Beaman can call to his support textual evidence which seems no less conclusive. Mac Ay would have the advantage in way of quantity of written text, but Beaman would undoubtedly insist that he possesses Ockham's "true" doctrine since the texts in his favor are those where Ockham directly confronts the concepts of possible being and of non-actual things.* What this suggests—at least to Beaman—is that Ockham makes use, when convenient, of a somewhat incautious language, with apparent commitment to non-actual entities; however, as discussions which center on the very concept of a possible thing reveal, he never intended such entities "to be taken seriously." Of course, if this suggestion proved to be correct, the task would then be ours of finding a non-committal reformulation of much of Ockham's doctrine. Such an undertaking is fortunately unnecessary. As I hope to prove conclusively, Ockham, in the texts Beaman has in view, is altogether misunderstood if interpreted as rejecting possibilism. Our task can be delineated: we must examine the texts which served as basis for Mac Ay's evaluation of Ockham's position. The first part of this essay will accordingly consist of an analysis of a text, contained in the Summa Logicae, which deals with the concept of possible being (ens in potentia). This analysis will however need to be supplemented by such clarification of related issues as is required for a full appreciation of Ockham's position: therein consists the second part of the present essay. The remainder of the textual evidence apparently in Beaman...