## 1. Biographical



Chisholm was born in North Attleboro, Massachusetts in 1916. As an
undergraduate, he studied philosophy at Brown University where he
worked with a number of distinguished philosophers including C. J.
Ducasse and R. M. Blake. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University
in 1942. At Harvard, Chisholm worked mainly with C. I. Lewis and
Donald C. Williams. Bertrand Russell and G. E. Moore visited Harvard
during Chisholm's time there and each of them evidently played
an important role in Chisholm's development as a
philosopher.



After serving in the Army (primarily as a psychological tester) and
getting married, Chisholm was employed briefly as a lecturer at the
Barnes Foundation in Pennsylvania. An amusing account of
Chisholm's experience at the Barnes Foundation can be found in
Chisholm's intellectual autobiography in [LLP]. He then returned
to Brown as an assistant professor. He remained at Brown for the rest
of his long career (aside from periods as visiting professor at
Harvard, Graz, Princeton, Chicago, Massachusetts, Salzburg, and
several other places). He was Editor of *Philosophy and
Phenomenological Research* from 1980 until 1986. He was then
Associate Editor until the time of his death.



As a result of his dealings with Russell and Moore, Chisholm became
aware of the work of Brentano and Meinong. His interest in these
philosophers eventually led to correspondence with Austrian
philosophers and visits to Graz. Several of Chisholm's
publications, perhaps especially "Sentences about
Believing" and [B&IV], helped to make some of
Brentano's leading ideas familiar to American philosophers. In
1972 Chisholm was awarded an honorary doctorate at Graz. He was
intrigued to discover that it would now be correct to address him as
"Professor Doktor Doktor h. c. Roderick M. Chisholm."



Chisholm was a tremendously successful teacher of philosophy. His
courses, both at the undergraduate level and at the graduate, were
always packed with enthusiastic students and colleagues. In spite of
his great distinction, he was modest and amusing in the classroom. He
enjoyed engaging in animated critical discussion with students, and
encouraged his students to present their questions and objections. In
many cases these questions led to revisions of the doctrines Chisholm
had presented. He was always pleased to receive good criticism, and
showed enormous creativity in producing revisions in his attempts to
overcome the problems. In his autobiography, Chisholm mentions how
delighted he was to have had such eager "refuters" in his
classes at Brown as well as at other places where he visited. For a
touching discussion of Chisholm's teaching style, see Taylor
(1975) .



Chisholm directed about 59 doctoral dissertations, thus making him
perhaps the third most prolific producer of philosophy PhDs in
American history. Many of his students went on to have distinguished
careers of their own. If we consider the class containing
Chisholm's students and the students of those students, it
becomes obvious that through his teaching, Chisholm influenced a
remarkable number of philosophers. In addition, many of
Chisholm's colleagues and friends turned their attention to
Chisholm's work.



Chisholm published an extraordinary number of journal articles and
reviews. A short discussion of some of the most important of these is
included below in Section 13. He also edited, co-edited, and
translated several works of others. Among the most important of the
books written by Chisholm are: *Perceiving: A Philosophical
Study* [PPS], *Theory of Knowledge* ([TK1], [TK2], and
[TK3] for first, second, and third editions), *Person and Object: A
Metaphysical Study* [P&O], *The First Person: An Essay on
Reference and Intentionality* [FP], *The Foundations of
Knowing* [FK], *Brentano and Intrinsic Value* [B&IV],
*On Metaphysics* [OM], and *A Realistic Theory of
Categories: An Essay on Ontology* [RTC].



Chisholm received a remarkable array of academic honors and awards. He
was a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, President
of the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association,
President of the Metaphysical Society of America, and a member of many
other distinguished councils and boards. He presented important
lectures at Oxford, London, Stanford, and elsewhere. A volume of the
Library of Living Philosophers is devoted to his work.



Among the books devoted to Chisholm are *Analysis and
Metaphysics* (Lehrer 1975) [A&M], *Roderick M.
Chisholm* (Bogdan 1986) [RMCp], *Essays on the Philosophy of
Roderick M. Chisholm* (Sosa 1979) [EPRMC], and *The Philosophy
of Roderick M. Chisholm* (Hahn 1997) [LLP]. A special issue of the
journal *Metaphilosophy* devoted entirely to Chisholm's
work was published in October of 2003.



Chisholm died in Providence, Rhode Island, in January of 1999.
Memorial Minutes on Chisholm written by Ernest Sosa appeared in the
*Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical
Association* in May of 1999. Chisholm's intellectual
autobiography can be found in "My Philosophical
Development" in [LLP]. An earlier version of his intellectual
autobiography appears as the "Self-Profile" in [RMCp].
Some readers may be amused by Fred Feldman's Banquet Address
from the Chisholm Memorial Conference held at Brown in November, 2000
and available online (see Other Internet Resources).


## 2. Philosophical Method



Chisholm wrote and taught in a distinctive style that inspired his
readers and students. His characteristic methodology was to begin his
discussion of a philosophical issue by identifying a few key questions
and citing pre-analytic data that an adequate theory should
accommodate. In many cases his work began in the Aristotelian fashion
with a set of "aporia" or puzzles. He sought to develop a
theory that would be adequate to the puzzles. He formulated his
theories by first introducing a small number of primitive or
unanalyzed terms and then constructing an often elaborate system of
definitions and principles all built on these primitives. The final
principles and definitions were intended to provide the basis for
solutions to the puzzles with which he began. The clarity and elegance
of the systems were remarkable, though in some cases critics worried
that the primitive concepts were for one reason or another suspect.
Chisholm encouraged readers and students to criticize his systems by
proposing counterexamples and objections. They were eager to do so,
and Chisholm took great joy in revising and improving upon his views
in the light of their comments.



Chisholm was well known for his penchant for formulating definitions
and subsequently revising them in the light of counterexamples. The
authors of the *Philosophical Lexicon* (see Other Internet
Resources) took note of this and accordingly introduced a new
technical term of their own:



> 
> **chisholm**, v. To make repeated small alterations in a
> definition or example. "He started with definition (d.8) and
> kept chisholming away at it until he ended up with
> (d.8'''''''')."
> 


## 3. Epistemology I -- Epistemic Terms, Principles, Foundationalism



Chisholm is perhaps best known for his work in epistemology. Though
the details of formulation steadily changed, Chisholm's
fundamental position in epistemology remained constant. Chisholm took
it as a starting point for his epistemological theorizing that we do
have knowledge of the external world. In addition, Chisholm accepted
further anti-skeptical doctrines concerning knowledge by memory of the
past, and a priori knowledge of some necessary truths. He did not
assume that he could *refute* skepticism. Rather, he understood
the central project of epistemology to be the project of showing in
detail how it is possible for us to have quite a lot of the knowledge
that, in our reflective moments, we take ourselves to have. In
adopting this stance, he seems to have been influenced by Moore as
well as some of his teachers at Brown and Harvard.



Perhaps the most distinctive element of Chisholm's theory of
knowledge is a set of tightly linked epistemic principles. These serve
to display the relation between directly evident foundational
knowledge and indirectly evident beliefs about the external world, the
past, and other matters about which we can have knowledge. In his
doctoral dissertation, Chisholm made his earliest attempt to formulate
a set of such principles. [PPS] contains a more sophisticated system
of principles. In the three editions of [TK] Chisholm presented even
more carefully worked out sets of proposed epistemic principles.



When he stated these principles, Chisholm made use of several terms of
epistemic appraisal. He appreciated the importance of explaining
precisely what each of these terms means. He also appreciated the
importance of explaining precisely how they are related. In an effort
to explain all this, Chisholm started with a single primitive
epistemic concept -- this is the concept of *greater
reasonability*, which relates the holding of one propositional
attitude toward some proposition with the holding some other
propositional attitude toward some proposition. In his discussion of
this concept, he pointed out that holding an attitude (belief, denial,
withholding) in one proposition could be more reasonable for a certain
subject than holding some attitude (belief, denial, withholding) in
another proposition. And then, making use of this fundamental
epistemic concept (as well as the concepts of *belief,
refraining* and *negation*), Chisholm defined the concepts
of *certainty*, being *evident*, being *beyond
reasonable doubt*, being *acceptable*, and so on.



In [TK1] (22), Chisholm proposed these definitions of some central
terms of epistemic appraisal:



> 
> 
> *p* is *reasonable* for *S* at *t*
> =*df* believing *p* is more reasonable for
> *S* at *t* than withholding *p*.
> 
> 
> 
> *p* is *acceptable* for *S* at *t*
> =*df* withholding *p* is not more reasonable
> for *S* at *t* than believing *p*.
> 
> 
> 
> *p* is *evident* for *S* at *t*
> =*df* (i) *p* is reasonable for *S* at
> *t*, and (ii) there is no proposition *q* such that it
> is more reasonable for *S* to believe *q* at *t*
> than it is for *S* to believe *p*.
> 
> 
> 



Chisholm maintained that there are logical relations among these
concepts. Thus, for example, he said that if something is evident,
then it is (at least) reasonable. A key necessary condition for
knowing a proposition, according to Chisholm, was that the proposition
be evident. In some of his early works, Chisholm analyzed knowledge as
evident true belief. In subsequent works he modified this in response
to the Gettier problem.



Chapter 3 of [TK1] provides a good illustration of Chisholm's
way of using these terms of epistemic appraisal in the statement of
his epistemic principles. In that chapter, he presents a set of nine
epistemic principles. The first of these concerns
"self-presenting states". These are states such as belief,
hope, fear and other propositional attitudes, as well as phenomenal
states of being appeared to in various ways, as well as states of
intending or undertaking to do something. The principle is:



> 
> (A) If there is a "self-presenting state" such that
> *S* is in that state, then it is *evident* to *S*
> that he is in that state.
> 



Principle (A) would play a central role in a proposed explanation of
the possibility of a certain form of introspective knowledge. For
example, it would figure in an explanation of how it is possible for a
person to know that it now seems to him that he is seeing a doorknob.
By itself, (A) has no implications for knowledge of the external
world.



Subsequent principles purport to explain further sorts of knowledge.
Principle (B) says:



> 
> (B) If *S* believes he perceives something to have a property
> *F*, then the proposition that he does perceive something to
> have *F*, as well as the proposition that something has
> *F* is *reasonable* for *S*. ([TK1], 45)
> 



(B) applies only in cases in which *S* thinks he is seeing, or
smelling, or in some other way perceiving something to have
*F*; it does not imply that in such conditions there actually
is something that has *F*, or that it is evident to *S*
that there is something that has *F*. It implies merely that it
is *reasonable* for *S* to believe this. Since
reasonability is not a sufficiently strong epistemic condition for
knowledge, this would not explain how knowledge of the external world
is possible. But the next principle may seem to explain this.



> 
> (C) If there is a sensible characteristic *F* such that
> *S* believes that he perceives something to have *F*,
> then it is *evident* to *S* that he is perceiving
> something to have *F*, and that there is something that has
> *F*. ([TK1], 47)
> 



Principle (C) applies only in cases where *F* is a sensible
characteristic. This would be a feature that is appropriate to one of
the senses, or a common sensible. But even when so restricted, (C)
seems to be a very strong principle, for it seems to imply that some
of our beliefs about objects in the external world are evident --
and this would be sufficient for knowledge according to the analysis
of knowledge that Chisholm accepted at the time.



However, on the next page Chisholm expresses some serious reservations
about (C). He mentions an analogy to statements of prima facie
obligation. Such obligations can be overridden. These later remarks
suggest that Chisholm had intended (C) to be understood as a principle
of merely *prima facie* evidence. Apparently, then, the real
principle is:



> 
> (C') If there is a sensible characteristic *F* such that
> *S* believes that he perceives something to have *F*,
> *and this belief does not occur as part of some overriding wider
> situation*, then it is *evident* to *S* that he is
> perceiving something to have *F*, and that there is something
> that has *F*.
> 



Principle (C') is considerably less bold than principle (C).
This can be seen if we reflect on what would count as a counterexample
to (C). Consider a case in which a person knows perfectly well that he
has just taken some hallucinogenic drugs. Suppose he knows the typical
effects of these drugs. Suppose he has good reason to believe that
there are no unicorns, but now he believes that he is perceiving
something to be a unicorn.



Principle (C) seems to imply that it is evident to him that there is a
unicorn. Principle (C') does not have this implication. The fact
that the appearance occurs within this wider context defeats its prima
facie epistemic status. Although (C') is less bold than (C), it
does help to explain how we can have knowledge of the sensible
characteristics of external objects.



Then come three principles about memory:



> 
> 
> (D) If *S* believes he remembers having perceived something to
> have *F*, then the proposition that he does remember having
> perceived something to have *F*, as well as the proposition
> that he did perceive that something had *F*, and the
> proposition that something was *F*, is *acceptable* for
> *S*.
> 
> 
> 
> (E) If *F* is a sensible characteristic, and *S*
> believes he remembers having perceived something to have *F*,
> then the proposition that he does remember having perceived something
> to have *F*, as well as the proposition that he did perceive
> that something had *F*, and the proposition that something was
> *F*, is *reasonable* for *S*.
> 
> 
> 
> (F) If there is a self presenting state *P* such that
> *S* believes he remembers having been in *P*, then the
> proposition that he remembers that he was in *P*, as well as
> the proposition that he was in *P*, is one that is
> *reasonable* for *S*.
> 
> 
> 



None of these principles would explain how we can have knowledge of
the past, for none of these principles implies that beliefs about the
past can rise to the status of being *evident* -- and
according to Chisholm a person can know a fact only if it is evident
for him.



Chisholm wanted to say that we can have knowledge of things beyond
those we "see with our own eyes". These would include
things that are confirmed by the evidence of our senses. As a step
toward achieving this, he has a principle about such things. The
principle makes use of the concept of the *empirically
acceptable*. To find what's empirically acceptable for
*S*, just consider all those propositions that get a rating of
acceptable (or higher) by the aforementioned principles. Those are
empirically acceptable for *S* at *t*. Chisholm does not
define confirmation, but assumes we understand it.



> 
> (G) If *h* is confirmed by the set of all things empirically
> acceptable for *S* at *t*, then *h* is
> *acceptable* for *S* at *t*. ([TK1], 53)
> 



But note that this raises such things up to the level of acceptability
only. This is still not enough for knowledge.



Consider a set of propositions that are logically consistent and
independent. No member is entailed by any combination of the others;
no member is such that its negation is entailed by any combination of
the others. Suppose each member is confirmed by the combination of all
the others. Then that set is "concurrent".



> 
> (H) If *h* is a member of a concurrent set of acceptable
> propositions for *S* at *t*, then *h* is
> *reasonable* for *S* at *t*.
> 



Principle (H) serves to raise the epistemic status of acceptable
propositions. When they are members of concurrent sets, such
propositions become reasonable. This is a coherentist element in
Chisholm's foundationalism in [TK1]. But it is still not quite
sufficient for knowledge of the external world. For that, Chisholm
finally introduces:



> 
> (I) If *S* believes at t that he perceives something to be
> *F*, and *h* is the proposition that *there is
> something having the property F*, and *h* is a member of a
> set of concurrent propositions each of which is acceptable for
> *S*, then *h* is *evident* to *S* at
> *t*.
> 



So now we can see how, according to Chisholm at the time of [TK1],
knowledge of the external world is possible. Let's take the
proposition that there is a doorknob here. How can I know that?
Suppose I am looking at, smelling, feeling, and remembering the
doorknob. Then via (B) lots of such propositions are reasonable for
me. Suppose these all confirm the proposition, *d*, that there
is a doorknob here. Then via (G), *d* is acceptable. Suppose
all of these together with *d* form a concurrent set. Then via
(H), d is reasonable. Suppose I think I am seeing the doorknob, and
the proposition that there is a doorknob is a member of a concurrent
set of acceptable propositions. Then it is evident to me that there is
a doorknob here. If it's true, then I know it. If all these
conditions are satisfied, I have knowledge of the external world.



Critics may complain that this set of principles is incomplete and
sketchy. (Indeed, in spite of the principles about memory, nothing in
this system even purports to explain how someone could have knowledge
of the past.) Chisholm has given us no more than a sketch of a
possible answer to the question of how empirical knowledge is
possible. But it reveals the foundational, coherentist, Chisholmian
epistemic principle-ist structure of his thought. All later variants
retain these features. What is most distinctive about these principles
is that they are not instances of more general logical principles and
Chisholm does not claim that they are true in virtue of any facts
about causal connections or reliability. They are presented as
fundamental epistemological facts.


## 4. Epistemology II -- Other Epistemological Doctrines.



According to Chisholm, epistemology consists of Socratic inquiry into
the questions "What can we know?" and "What are the
criteria of knowledge?" He thought that a puzzle faces anyone
who attempts to answer these questions. It appears that to answer the
first question, one needs a criterion to distinguish between things
that are known and things that are not known. That is, one needs an
answer to the second question. But to have an answer to the second
question, he thought, one needs a list of the things one knows so that
one can identify the features that distinguish knowledge from its
opposite. That is, one needs an answer to the first question. Lacking
such an answer, Chisholm feared, one would not be in a position to be
confident that any proposed criterion of knowledge was correct.
Chisholm calls those who think that they have an answer to the second
question that they can use to answer the first
"methodists" and those who think that they have an answer
to the first question that they can use to answer the second
"particularists." Chisholm himself was a particularist,
yet he claimed that he had no argument to offer against methodism or
against the view that neither question could be answered without a
prior answer to the other. In a number of places he said that the
problem of the criterion could be answered only by begging the
question.



A final epistemological doctrine for which Chisholm is particularly
well-known is internalism. Chisholm characterized internalism in the
following way: 'The internalist assumes that, merely by
reflecting upon his own conscious state, he can formulate a set of
epistemic principles that will enable him to find out, with respect to
any possible belief he has, whether he is justified in having that
belief. The epistemic principles that he formulates are principles
that one may come upon and apply merely by sitting in one's
armchair, so to speak, and without calling for any outside assistance.
In a word, one need only consider one's own state of mind'
[TK3: 76]. A crucial implication of this doctrine is that people whose
conscious states are alike must be justified in believing the same
propositions. Also present in the quoted passage is a related theme
concerning the autonomy of epistemology. Chisholm held that
epistemologists did not need the assistance of the empirical sciences
in answering their purely epistemological questions. In advancing
these doctrines, Chisholm took issue with the externalist and
naturalistic theories, such as the causal theory and reliabilism, that
gained favor with many epistemologists toward the end of
Chisholm's career.


## 5. Metaphysics I -- The Nature of Persons



Throughout his career, Chisholm thought and wrote about the
metaphysics of persons. His book, *Person and Object*, contains
an extended discussion of the topic and the claims he makes there
provide a good illustration of his views about persons. Chisholm
maintained that a fully satisfactory metaphysics of persons would have
to accommodate certain bits of preanalytic data, or else explain how
they can be false. He took these bits of data to be "innocent
until proven guilty". Among these is the notion that persons are
genuine objects, and not merely logical fictions. Talk about persons
must be taken seriously, and not as a mere figure of speech. Chisholm
mentioned further data (which he presented in the first person): (1) I
have various beliefs, feelings, desires, attitudes; (2) I have a body;
(3) I am intentionally bringing about various things that I could have
refrained from bringing about. He went on to affirm past-tense
versions of (1)-(3): at various times in the past I had certain
other beliefs, etc. Chisholm emphasized a kind of "unity of
consciousness" thesis according to which the contemporaneous
psychological facts pertain to one and the same thing. Additionally,
he thought he was entitled (at least until strong evidence to the
contrary is provided) to assume that there is one thing that has
beliefs, and also has a body, and also engages in intentional
action.



Chisholm argued that many of the alternative conceptions of persons
did not conform to the preanalytic data. One prominent alternative is
the so-called "Bundle Theory", which illustrates a
strikingly different conception of persons. On this view, there is no
thinker of my thoughts, no "owner" of my body, and no doer
of my deeds. Instead, there is just a "bundle of
perceptions". The *locus classicus* of this view is a
well-known passage in Hume's *Treatise* where he
says:



> 
> For my part, when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I
> always stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat or
> cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never can
> catch myself at any time without a perception, and never can observe
> any thing but the perception. When my perceptions are removed for any
> time, as by sound sleep; so long am I insensible of myself, and may
> truly be said not to exist. (*Treatise of Human Nature*
> I.iv.vi)
> 



Chisholm points out that this view is in sharp conflict with the
preanalytic data since, if taken seriously, it implies that there is
nothing that is having the perceptions, or feeling the pains and
pleasures. He goes on to claim that Hume's argument for the
Bundle Theory is based on a bit of evidence that presupposes (contrary
to the theory) that there is an object that is doing the perceiving,
and thinking the thoughts. Chisholm points out that Hume mentions
occasions on which *he* enters into what he calls himself; Hume
says that on these occasions *he* stumbles on some particular
perception; he says that *he* never notices anything other than
the perceptions. Who or what is this thing that is doing all this
entering and stumbling and failing to notice? Is it some single thing?
Does it persist through the time of entering and stumbling and failing
to notice? If it does, then it is the very thing whose existence Hume
seems to be concerned to reject.



Certain forms of materialism have been endorsed by many philosophers.
According to some of these theories, each person is to be identified
with his or her body. The body is the bearer of both physical and
mental properties. The person persists so long as his or her body
persists. Chisholm, however, was always uneasy about such theories.
One of his most distinctive lines of objection involves the use of
some metaphysical distinctions. Consider a ship that persists through
successive replacements of parts. First one plank is replaced, then
another, until after some time many of the ship's original parts
are no longer present. Chisholm describes the situation by saying that
at each time that the ship exists, it exists in virtue of the fact
that a certain collection of parts exists then. The collection of
parts that exists at a moment is an "*ens per se*"
-- it exists in its own right; but the ship is an "*ens
per alio*" -- it exists in virtue of the fact that some
other things exist. Different collections of parts do duty for, or
stand in for, the ship at different times. In some cases, a thing has
a property at a time in virtue of facts about happenings at other
times. Thus, for example, a person might be a widow at a certain time,
but that's because of marriages and deaths that happened
earlier. Other properties are not in this way "rooted" in
facts about other times. With respect to properties that are not
rooted outside the times they are had, Chisholm makes an interesting
claim about a difference between things that exist in their own right
and things that exist in virtue of others. The ship (an *ens per
alio*) has properties at times in virtue of the fact that its
stand ins (*entia per se*) have those properties at those
times.



A famous old argument reveals something important about the identity
of the ship through time. Suppose a ship (call it "Theseus
1") was constituted by a certain collection of parts at a
certain time long ago. Suppose the parts in that collection were
gradually replaced by newer parts. Eventually we find ourselves with a
ship ("Theseus 2") that is the result of all this gradual
replacement. It is the apparent "descendant" of Theseus 1.
Suppose, however, that the cast-off parts were all saved and
eventually were reassembled so as to constitute a ship (call it
"Theseus 3"). Suppose Theseus 3 contains all and only the
parts that constituted the original ship Theseus 1 at the outset.
Since Theseus 3 is part-for-part indiscernible from Theseus 1, there
is an inclination to identify Theseus 3 with Theseus 1. But since
Theseus 2 emerged from Theseus 1 by a series of individually minor
replacements, there is also an inclination to identify Theseus 2 with
Theseus 1. We cannot consistently give in to both of these
inclinations since it is obvious that Theseus 2 is distinct from
Theseus 3. Chisholm suggests that the facts in the world leave this
somewhat indeterminate. If a case like this were to arise in the real
world, we would leave it to the courts to make a determination of
which ship is the legitimate successor to the original. If the courts
decide that Theseus 2 is the "real" descendant of Theseus
1, then we will have to accept this conclusion for all practical
purposes.



When a thing -- like the persisting Ship of Theseus -- is a
logical construction out of more fundamental entities, questions of
identity through time become somewhat conventional. Thus Theseus 2 can
be identical with Theseus 1 only in a "loose and popular"
sense of 'identical'. In the "strict and
philosophical" sense a collection of parts, C1, can be identical
with a collection of parts, C2, only if C1 and C2 contain exactly the
same parts. In this strict sense, Theseus 2 is not identical with
Theseus 1.



At least some of what has been said about the Ship of Theseus holds
also for human bodies. Old parts are steadily being replaced by new
ones. After a period of time the body may contain little of the stuff
that originally constituted it. As a result, the body of an old person
may be said to be identical to the childish body with which he started
only in the loose and popular sense. This has implications for
materialism.



If some typical form of materialism is true, then each person is his
or her body. The implication is that an old person may be said to be
identical to himself as a child only in a loose and popular sense. If
we take this sort of materialism seriously, we will have to say that
no person strictly persists through any change of parts. Chisholm
finds this incredible. He recalls an argument attributed to C. S.
Peirce: suppose you are about to undergo surgery. Suppose you are told
that you can save a lot of money by taking the surgery without
anesthesia. Instead, you will be given amnesia-inducing drugs that
will make you forget the pain afterwards. Still you might be uneasy,
since you might fear that the man undergoing the painful surgery will
be you. Chisholm then continues:



> 
> Suppose that others come to you -- friends, relatives, judges,
> clergymen -- and they offer the following advice and assurance.
> "Have no fear," they will say. "Take the cheaper
> operation and we will take care of everything. We will lay down the
> convention that the man on the table is not you, Jones, but is
> Smith." What *ought* to be obvious to you, it seems to
> me, is that the laying down of this convention should have no effect
> at all upon your decision. For you may still ask, "But
> won't that person be I?" and, it seems to me, the question
> has an answer. ([P&O]: 111)
> 



Chisholm's Peircean argument has considerable intuitive force.
It surely seems to many of us that our persistence through time is not
simply a matter of convention. No matter what the courts decide,
either the person undergoing the painful surgery will be you, or he
won't be you. If this intuition is right, then materialism of
the imagined kind is false. For materialism implies that you are an
*ens per alio*, a logical construction. Yet each of us takes
himself or herself to be an *ens per se*.



In several places (e.g., 1991, 168), Chisholm hinted at a modal
argument against materialism. He noted that he himself could survive
the loss of his hand. Thus, he has this modal property: being such
that it is possible for him to exist without the hand that he actually
has. But Chisholm contended that his body was identical with the
particular collection of human bodily parts that then constituted his
body. That collection of parts could not survive the loss of
Chisholm's hand. If Chisholm's hand were annihilated, that
collection would cease to exist. Thus the collection of parts does not
have the property of being such that it is possible for it to exist
without the hand that Chisholm actually had. One application of
Leibniz's Law implies that Chisholm is not the collection of
parts that then constituted his body. The argument clearly presupposes
the doctrine of mereological essentialism, according to which if a
compound thing *W* has a certain part *P*, then
*W* cannot exist without having *P* as a part.



In yet other places ([P&O], 104), Chisholm pursues another line of
thought. Note for example that if a certain ship (an *ens per
alio*) has a property such as the property of weighing so-and-so
many pounds at a certain time, it has this property in virtue of the
fact that the *ens per se* that constitutes it at that time
actually has that property. The "stand-in" really has the
property; the logical construction "borrows" the property
from the stand-in. But Chisholm considers himself at a time when he
has the property of hoping for rain. He asks whether he himself
actually has that property, or whether instead he just borrows it from
some stand-in. He dismisses this suggestion, saying that it 'is
not to be taken seriously'. If there are two things present (the
persistent Chisholm and the temporary stand in), and each of them is
hoping for rain, then surely it is Chisholm himself who more
fundamentally has the property and his stand-in who has it
derivatively. In this case, Chisholm himself must be an *ens per
se*.



Perhaps persons are somehow simple entities. It might appear that they
could be simple bodily substances -- perhaps like extra-small
versions of the Luz Bone mentioned by Leibniz (in Book II, Chapter
xxvii of the *New Essays*). But Chisholm had defined
'bodily substance' as 'substance with parts'.
Thus on his view, there cannot be a simple bodily substances. So if
the person is a simple substance, it must be simple and immaterial
-- a "monad" as Chisholm
 says.[1]



In "On the Simplicity of the Soul" (1991), Chisholm
pursues this Leibnizian line. He identifies a sort of property that he
characterizes as "qualitative". Any such property would
characterize substances (rather than other properties, or states, or
abstract objects); it would be a property that could characterize a
simple thing; it would be an internal (or, as some might prefer to
say, "intrinsic") property of anything it characterized
- thus a thing existing in isolation could have such a
qualitative property. Chisholm says that the familiar mental
properties that we know ourselves to have (e.g., the property of
hoping for rain) are in this way qualitative. So we know that we have
qualitative properties. But, as he says, we never know, with respect
to any compound thing, that it has any such qualitative property.
Thus, there is reason to doubt that we are compound things. We know
ourselves to have properties of a kind such that we do not know, of
any compound thing, that it has properties of that kind. It's
not entirely clear that this argument establishes that people are not
compound things. Perhaps it shows only that *for all we know*
we might be simple entities.


## 6. Metaphysics II -- Agency and the Free Will Problem



We like to think that we are sometimes morally responsible for some of
the things we have done. It seems natural to suppose that if a person
is morally responsible for something he has done, then he could have
done otherwise. But there is a puzzle here. Precisely what do we mean
when we say of a person who acted in a certain way that "he
could have done otherwise"? Chisholm takes this as a fundamental
question in the metaphysics of action. It seems to be his way of
conceiving of the so-called "free will problem". He
discussed this topic in "Freedom and Action" (1966),
"He Could Have Done Otherwise" (1967a) and then again in
[P&O] as well as in quite a few other papers. It would be very
difficult to describe in detail all the twists and turns of
Chisholm's constantly evolving views on this topic. Instead, we
will focus on some of the more persistent and characteristically
Chisholmian points.



Suppose a certain person in fact did not go to Boston this morning,
but suppose it seems that he could have done so. We want to say that
though he stayed in Providence, he could have done otherwise --
he could have gone to Boston. Surely the statement that he could have
done otherwise does not mean merely that it is logically possible that
he did otherwise, for superhuman and miraculous bits of behavior are
logically possible. But we don't want to say, of a person who
failed to perform a miracle, that he could have done otherwise. Nor
does our statement mean that it is epistemically possible that the
person did otherwise. Suppose that this man was confined in
Providence, and utterly incapable of getting to Boston on a certain
morning. Suppose we know nothing about this confinement. We just know
that he remained in Providence. Under these circumstances, while it is
epistemically possible for us that he went to Boston, it would not be
correct to say that he could have done so. His doing otherwise than
staying in Providence was epistemically possible for us, but not
possible for him in the way that bears on moral responsibility.



Some have said that 'can's are constitutionally iffy. On a
simple version of this view, to say that someone could have done
otherwise is just to say that if he had chosen to do otherwise, then
he would have done otherwise. Chisholm points out ([P&O],
56-7) two reasons why this is wrong. First, suppose the person
was capable of traveling in any direction and easily could have gone
to Boston; but suppose in addition that he did not know the way to
Boston. If he had chosen to go to Boston, he would have ended up in
New London. Then it is correct to say that he could have gone to
Boston, but incorrect to say that if he had chosen to go to Boston, he
would have done so. Secondly, suppose the person is incapable of
choosing to go to Boston. Maybe he is overwhelmed with fear of Boston.
But if nothing else prevents the trip, it will be correct to say that
if he had chosen to go to Boston, he would have gone, but it is
incorrect to say that he could have gone to Boston.



Another account of 'could have done otherwise' makes use
of the concept of *sufficient antecedent causal condition*. We
might think that when we say that someone could have gone to Boston
instead of staying in Providence, what we mean is merely that at some
earlier time this morning, his trip to Boston was causally
indeterminate -- there was no sufficient causal condition either
for his going to Boston or for his not going to Boston. Chisholm
argues against this idea, too. Suppose another person was lying in
wait in Chelmsford. Suppose this other person would have freely
interfered with our man's travel plans if he had tried to get to
Boston. Then it would not be correct to say that the man could have
gone to Boston, but it would have been correct to say that there was
no sufficient causal condition then in place that would have prevented
the trip. The relevant sufficient causal condition would not have
arisen until the person lying in wait in Chelmsford had freely
interfered.



Thus we have a problem. What do we mean when we say that a person
could have done otherwise? Chisholm begins by introducing some
concepts that will serve as conceptual primitives in his account. The
first of these is a concept that Chisholm calls "causal
contribution". If one event helps to bring about another, then
we have one familiar sort of causal contribution. But in other cases
it is not an event, but a person, who causally contributes to some
event (1966, 284). A case (if there are any) in which a person
causally contributes to some event would be described as an instance
of "agent causation". Chisholm claims that in an earlier
era philosophers would have thought that agent causation is the
familiar notion; they would have assumed that event causation is to be
explained in terms of it. He recognized that at the time of his
writing the priority relation between the concepts had probably
reversed.



The second concept that Chisholm employs is the concept of
*undertaking* or *endeavoring*. This is an irreducibly
teleological concept. It introduces the notion of purpose, or aim.
Chisholm makes use of this undefined expression: '*S*
makes *B* happen in the endeavor to make *A*
happen'. Suppose, for example, that a man dials a certain
telephone number intending thereby to make a certain phone ring in Los
Angeles. (Recall that Chisholm started working on this material back
in the 1960s. Telephones had dials in those days.) Let Smith be the
man; let *B* be the state of affairs that consists in
Smith's dialing the phone; let *A* be the state of
affairs that consists in the phone's ringing in Los Angeles.
Then it would be correct to say, using Chisholm's undefined
technical term, that Smith made *B* happen in the endeavor to
make *A* happen.



From the fact that Smith thus endeavored to make the phone ring, it
does not follow that phone actually rang. Maybe it was off the hook.
Thus endeavor has a certain intentional aspect. Furthermore, assume
that the telephone in Los Angeles is in fact the only purple phone in
the Area Code. Even if Smith dialed in the endeavor to make that phone
ring, it does not follow that he dialed in the endeavor to make the
only purple phone in the Area Code ring. Maybe Smith didn't know
the color of the phone; maybe he didn't care about making purple
phones ring. So the concept of endeavor has a further intentional
feature.



Chisholm then introduces an element of indeterminism: suppose that at
a certain time there is no sufficient causal condition for a person to
endeavor to bring about *p*; suppose in addition that there is
then is no sufficient causal condition for him to fail to endeavor to
bring about *p*. Then Chisholm wants to say that he is free to
endeavor to make *p* happen.



In some such cases a person might be free to endeavor to bring about a
certain state of affairs, and furthermore if he were to endeavor to
bring it about, he would succeed. Such things are directly in a
person's power. Chisholm notes that he is thus making the
concept of power "constitutionally iffy".



In other cases a person might not have a certain state of affairs
directly in his power, but there might be a sequence of things,
<*p*, *q*, *r*, *s*> such that he
has *p* directly in his power, and if he were to bring about
*p*, he would then have *q* directly in his power, and
if ... he would have *s* directly in his power. In such a
case, the person has *s* indirectly in his power.



With these concepts in place, Chisholm is prepared to answer the
question with which he started. Suppose again that a certain person
did not travel to Boston this morning. To say that he could have done
otherwise -- that he could have traveled to Boston this morning
-- is just to say that as of this morning, going to Boston was
either directly or indirectly in his power. Chisholm claims --
with some plausibility -- that this account of the meaning of
'he could have done otherwise' explicates what those who
believe in freedom have in mind when they say that someone could have
done otherwise. Furthermore, in virtue of various technicalities of
the definitions, it apparently turns out that Chisholm's account
of the meaning of 'he could have done otherwise' is
adequate to all the cases that prove difficult for theories such as
the ones surveyed above.



One essential element of Chisholm's view is the idea that there
is a distinction between event causation and agent causation. In cases
exclusively involving event causation, everything that causally
contributes to an event is another event. In cases involving agent
causation, among the things that causally contribute to an event is a
person. In virtue of this feature, Chisholm's view is generally
categorized as a form of libertarianism. Another essential element of
his view is the idea that when a person acts freely, he does something
for which there is no event or state or combination of events or
states that is a sufficient causal condition for his doing it. (There
is also no event or state that is a sufficient causal condition for
his failing to do it, obviously.) In virtue of this feature of his
view, it may be seen as incorporating an element of indeterminism.


## 7. Metaphysics III -- The Ontology of Events, States of Affairs, and Facts



Consider the following list of kinds of things:


1. Concrete, individual objects, or "substances"
2. Properties, attributes, qualities, relations
3. Times
4. Places
5. Propositions
6. Concrete, individual events, or "happenings"
7. Facts
8. Sets



We can imagine a metaphysician making a grand claim about this list.
He could say that there really are things in each of those eight
categories. Furthermore, he could say, there is no redundancy in the
list: there is nothing that belongs in more than one of the
categories. Finally, this metaphysician could claim that the list is
complete: everything that exists falls into one or another of the
categories in the list. In this way our metaphysician would have
endorsed a fairly robust ontological
 scheme.[2]



Throughout quite a long period of time, Chisholm would have maintained
that the imagined ontological scheme violates Occam's Razor,
since it affirms the existence of more fundamental kinds of things
than we really need. More specifically, he would have thought that he
could accomplish considerable pruning by replacing three of these
proposed categories with a single new category -- "states
of affairs". He thought he could explain all talk of
propositions (category 5) by appeal to states of affairs of a certain
sort. Similarly, he thought he could explain all talk of concrete
events (category 6) by appeal to states of affairs of a different
sort. Facts (category 7) would turn out to be nothing more than true
propositions.



Underlying Chisholm's efforts here was a methodological view
about ontological commitment. Suppose there is a certain statement
that we take to be true; suppose that statement seems to require the
existence of entities of a certain type. We then must admit entities
of that type into our ontology unless we can find a way of
paraphrasing the statement in such a way as to preserve our original
meaning, but to avoid any implication of the existence of the entities
in question. As Chisholm puts it:



> 
> ... from the fact that a true sentence *seems* to commit
> us to a certain type of thing it does not follow that there is in fact
> that type of thing. For perhaps what the sentence tells us can be
> re-expressed in such a way that it no longer even seems to commit us
> to the type of thing in question. ([P&O], 116)
> 



Thus, Chisholm undertook to provide paraphrases for sentences about
concrete events, propositions, and facts. In each case, he provided a
paraphrase that involved states of affairs (and some other items, such
as times). But since the project turns crucially on various claims
about states of affairs, Chisholm took special pains to explain
precisely what he took a state of affairs to be.



As examples of states of affairs, Chisholm mentions such things as
*the author of Marmion being knighted* and *the author of
Waverly being knighted*. Chisholm takes these to be two different
states of affairs; each of them existing necessarily; neither of them
depending for its existence on the existence of any contingent thing.
Thus, each of these states of affairs would exist even at a possible
world in which there is no author of Marmion or Waverly. Furthermore,
according to Chisholm, states of affairs may *occur*,
*obtain*, or *take place*. They serve as the objects of
such attitudes as belief, hope, and mere consideration. Some of them
serve as causes and effects. In affirming the existence of states of
affairs, Chisholm took himself to be aligned with Frege (who,
according to Chisholm, used the term '*Gedanke*'
for entities of this sort).



Chisholm did not want to define states of affairs as things that can
possibly occur, since he thought that some of them could not possibly
occur. So he proposed instead to say that *p* is a state of
affairs if and only if it is possible that there is someone who
accepts *p*. Even if it's impossible for *p* to
occur, it is still possible for there to be someone who accepts it. As
Jaegwon Kim pointed out (Kim 1979), there is something a bit odd about
the fact that Chisholm attempted to define 'state of
affairs' at all, since this is supposed to be a fundamental item
in his ontology. Furthermore, as Kim also pointed out, the definition
is of questionable value, since there is considerable disagreement
about the nature of the items that we "accept". Some take
them to be sentences; others may take them to be mental items of some
 sort.[3]
 Chisholmian states of affairs are presumably intended to be neither
linguistic nor psychological.



For Chisholm, *entailment* is not a merely logical notion. If
*p* entails *q*, then not only does *p* logically
imply *q*, it must also be the case, necessarily, that whoever
accepts *p* also accepts *q*. Chisholm makes use of this
distinctive "intentional" concept of entailment to explain
the identity conditions of states of affairs. Where *p* and
*q* are states of affairs, *p* is the same state of
affairs as *q* if and only if *p* entails *q* and
*q* entails *p*. This explains why Chisholm said that
the state of affairs of *the author of Marmion being knighted*
is distinct from the state of affairs of *the author of Waverly
being knighted*, even if the author of Waverly happens to be the
author of Marmion. So, for Chisholm, states of affairs are very
fine-grained entities.



Consider the state of affairs that is expressed by the sentence
'Someone is walking'. Chisholm wanted to say that this
state of affairs occurs whenever someone walks, and fails to occur at
times when no one is walking. Other states of affairs are not like
this. For them, it is impossible to sometimes occur and sometimes fail
to occur. Chisholm claims that this provides the opportunity for an
ontological reduction. We can define a *proposition* as a state
of affairs of this latter sort -- it is impossible for there to
be times when it occurs and other times when it does not occur. A
*true* proposition is thus one that occurs; and a
*false* proposition is one that does not occur. Chisholm thinks
that we may understand the principles of logic to be about these
propositions. By saying that a *fact* is a true proposition,
Chisholm gains yet another ontological reduction ([P&O], 123).



Chisholm thought that in some cases it makes sense to speak of the
location at which a state of affairs occurs. Suppose John walks in
Chicago at a certain time. Then Chisholm would be willing to say that
the state of affairs of *John's walking* occurs in
Chicago and at that time. Furthermore, some states of affairs entail
certain properties. The state of affairs of *John's
walking* entails the property of *walking* because (i) if
the state of affairs occurs, then something has the property of
*walking*, and furthermore, whoever accepts the state of
affairs believes that something has the property. This gives Chisholm
the ammunition he needs to explain what an *event* is and
thereby to effect another ontological reduction.



Among states of affairs, there are some that (i) occur, and (ii) are
not propositions. Furthermore, among these states of affairs, some
(iii) entail contingent intrinsic properties that may be exemplified
only by individual
 things.[4]
 Chisholm says that an *event* is a state of affairs that
satisfies all of these conditions. These are intended to play the role
in Chisholm's ontology that concrete individual events play in
the ontologies of philosophers who accept concrete events as
fundamental entities.



This way of conceiving events yields certain (possibly surprising)
results. For one, every event occurs. For another, events happen at
times and places. Furthermore, as Chisholm sees it, when an event
occurs, there must be some individual thing or things somehow
participating in the occurrence of the event. These are the things
that have the properties entailed by the event. The event is said to
be "concretized" by those things. Finally, events may
*recur*. *John's walking* occurs when and where
John walks; it occurs only if John has the property of
*walking*. It can occur on many different occasions and in many
different places. It may be an effect of some causes, and it may be a
cause of some effects. Chisholm goes on to discuss the role of events
in perception, causation, and explanation.



He presents an ingenious system for counting events ("John was
injured while taking his third walk of the day") that makes use
of the concepts of time, place, and concretization. Chisholm's
efforts in this project were described by one of his philosophical
opponents as "breathtaking" (Davidson 1970, 31).



We can see, then, that around the time of [P&O], Chisholm probably
would have accepted an ontological scheme more like this:


1. Concrete, individual objects, or "substances"
2. Properties, attributes, qualities, relations
3. Times
4. Places
5. States of affairs (some of which are event-like; some of which are
proposition-like; and some of which are fact-like)
6. Sets



As time went by, Chisholm became dissatisfied with this picture. One
main source of difficulty, as he saw it, was the commitment to
*times*. Furthermore, in spite of their utterly central place
in this ontology, he began to feel uneasy about states of affairs.
Some of his concern evidently arose as a result of conversations with
his colleague Jaegwon Kim, who had developed a different theory of
events. On Kim's theory, if we have a suitable object
*a*, property *F*, and time *t*, and *a*
has *F* at *t*, then there is an event,
*a*'s *having F at t*. An event is the having of a
property by a thing at a time.



In his paper "Events without Times: An Essay in Ontology"
(1990), Chisholm presented a new and even more sparse ontological
scheme. As the title indicates, times were banished. Furthermore,
states of affairs disappeared, replaced by the new category of
*states*. A Chisholmian state is in some ways like a Kimian
event. If we have a suitable contingently existing object, *a*,
and we have a suitable property, *F*, then, if *a*
actually has *F*, then there is the state *a*'s
*being F*. A state such as this is an event. If *a*
doesn't have *F*, then there is no such state. There are
no non-occurring states.



There are several things to note about these events:



First, Chisholm uses the terms 'substrate' and
'content' to indicate the object and property involved in
an event. The substrate must be a contingently existing thing. The
content must be a property that the substrate has contingently. Each
event is said to have its substrate and content essentially. So if
there was such an event as Plato's writing of the
*Republic*, then that event essentially involved Plato and the
property of writing the *Republic*. The event itself could not
have occurred with a different substrate or content. Nor could it have
failed to have its "categorial" property of *being an
event*.



Second, since Chisholm has banished times from his ontology, there are
no times in a Chisholmian state. In this respect, Chisholm's
view differs from Kim's. This might seem to leave open the
possibility that a Chisholmian state could occur for a while, then
stop occurring, and then start occurring again. If a state could do
such a thing, then states would be relevantly like the now-banished
states of affairs. But Chisholm denies this possibility. He says that
if he was reading earlier, then stopped reading, and then started
reading again, we have *two* distinct states with Chisholm as
substrate and *reading* as content. Since there are no
"times" Chisholm is careful to avoid saying that what
distinguishes these two states is their time of occurrence. When we
say, informally, that an event recurs, all we mean is that its
substrate has had its content before.



Third, by the time of "Events without Times", Chisholm had
become a presentist. He also was taking tense very seriously. To say
that there is such a thing as *x* is equivalent to saying that
there is such a thing as *x* *now*. On this view it
would be wrong to say that there is such a thing as Socrates; equally,
it would be wrong to say that Socrates is such that he formerly
existed but no longer does. Nevertheless, Chisholm constructed
ingenious (sometimes convoluted and unintuitive) paraphrases that
enable us to say everything we need to say about Socrates and others
no longer among us.



So the new ontological scheme looks more like this:


1. Concrete, individual objects, or "substances"
2. Properties, attributes, qualities, relations
3. States; some of which are event-like
4. Sets



[OM] contains a final summing up of Chisholm's metaphysical
system. In [OM] Chisholm pares away still further. Among other things,
he proposes to get rid of sets in favor of attributes.


## 8. Metaphysics IV -- Brentano's Thesis



Consider the statement that John is thinking about a unicorn. This
could be true even if no unicorn actually exists. But surely John is
thinking about *something*. His mind is not simply a blank.
Some philosophers have wanted to say in such a case that there is an
object -- in fact, a unicorn - about which John is
thinking, but that this object is one that has "intentional
inexistence". It exists merely as an object of thought. In
*Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint*, Brentano said that
every psychical phenomenon is characterized by "intentional
inexistence". He went on to say that this intentional
inexistence is "exclusively peculiar to psychical phenomena. No
physical phenomenon shows anything similar".



Brentano's Thesis not entirely clear, but its importance should
be obvious. Suppose that every psychological fact somehow involves
something with intentional inexistence (however precisely this is to
be construed). Suppose that no physical fact involves a thing with
intentional inexistence. Then it would follow that no psychological
fact can be identified with a physical fact; one version of the
psycho-physical identity theory would be false; physicalism of some
popular varieties would be untenable.



Chisholm was fascinated by Brentano's Thesis. He published a
series of papers on the topic, starting in 1952 and carrying on until
at least 1981. In his papers Chisholm formulated precise versions of
Brentano's thesis. Each paper provoked critical reaction from
other philosophers. Since in some cases the criticisms were cogent,
Chisholm was motivated to develop new and more ingenious versions of
the Thesis.



Tracing all the different ways in which Chisholm attempted to
formulate Brentano's Thesis would require a book-length
discussion. Instead, we here focus on one illustrative example. In
Chapter 11 of [PPS], Chisholm developed a version of Brentano's
Thesis that turned on the notion of an *intentional sentence*.
He identified three marks of intentionality. Any noncompound sentence
that manifested one of these marks would be identified as an
intentional sentence. The first mark of intentionality recalls
Brentano's idea of intentional inexistence. Consider the
sentence 'John is thinking about the Loch Ness Monster'.
Neither this sentence nor its negation entails either that the Monster
exists or that it does not exist. Any such simple declarative sentence
is intentional.



The second mark of intentionality is closely related, but involves
whole propositional clauses rather than mere singular terms. Consider
the sentence 'John wonders whether there is a monster in Loch
Ness.' Neither this sentence nor its negation entails either
that there is a monster in Loch Ness or that there is not such a
monster. Any simple sentence that displays this feature is also
intentional.



The third mark of intentionality involves the failure of
substitutivity for coextensive singular terms. In fact Eisenhower was
the man who would succeed Truman as President of the United States.
However, from the fact that we knew that Eisenhower was in command of
the Army, it does not follow that we knew that the man who would
succeed Truman was in command of the Army.



These three marks of intentionality apply only to noncompound
sentences. A compound sentence counts as intentional if and only if
one of its components is intentional. Thus, 'if Parsifal sought
the Holy Grail, then he was a Christian' is intentional because
its antecedent is intentional. The antecedent carries the first mark
of intentionality because neither it nor its negation entails either
that the Holy Grail exists or that it does not exist.



Chisholm then says -- somewhat cautiously -- that a thesis
"resembling that of Brentano" may be stated in this way:
we can express all of our beliefs about physical phenomena without the
use of intentional sentences; but when we describe psychological
attitudes, then we must either use intentional sentences or else make
use of other terms that are not needed for the description of physical
phenomena. In his discussion, it appears that when Chisholm speaks of
'terms that are not needed for the description of physical
phenomena' he has in mind terms that are ultimately definable
only by the use of intentional sentences.



Chisholm recognizes that we sometimes use intentional sentences to
describe nonpsychological facts. For example, consider the sentence
'This weapon, suitably placed, is capable of making it be the
case that Boston is destroyed.' Neither that sentence nor its
negation entails either that Boston is destroyed or that Boston is not
destroyed. So it carries the second mark of intentionality. But it
seems not to be psychological. Chisholm claims that we can rephrase
the sentence nonintentionally: 'If this weapon were suitably
placed, then Boston would be destroyed.' This is a compound
sentence. Reflection will reveal that neither component carries any of
the marks of intentionality. (The critic may wonder whether this reply
is entirely satisfactory, since it may seem that the paraphrase does
not mean precisely what the original meant.)



Another difficult class of sentences involves statements of
probability. Consider this example cited by David Sanford: 'It
is not probable that Providence will be hit by a comet in the
21st Century'. Neither this sentence nor its negation
entails either that Providence will be hit or that it won't be
hit; thus the sentence carries the second mark of intentionality. Yet
it seems to be nonpsychological.



At the time of [PPS] Chisholm already recognized that this formulation
of Brentano's Thesis was problematic. He mentioned
'sentences describing relations of comparison' as a
difficulty. Consider the sentence 'This lizard looks something
like the Loch Ness Monster'. Neither that sentence nor its
negation entails either that the Loch Ness Monster exists or that it
does not exist. Yet there seems to be nothing psychological about the
statement that the lizard looks something like the Monster.



Over a period of more than thirty years, Chisholm formulated and
reformulated Brentano's Thesis. Perhaps the most insightful
discussion of his views and their connections can be found in David
Sanford's 'Chisholm on Brentano's Thesis'. In
reply to that essay, Chisholm said, 'Anyone who wants to
understand what I have been up to in trying to formulate criteria of
intentionality, should read Sanford's paper' ([LLP],
215).


## 9. Metaphysics V -- "Chisholm's Paradox"



Chisholm's paper "Identity through Possible Worlds: Some
Questions" (1967b) was the lead article in the first issue the
new journal *Nous* in 1967. In that article, Chisholm
presented an argument that provoked a remarkable amount of discussion
and debate. A variant of the argument was subsequently presented in
Chisholm's "Parts as Essential to Their Wholes",
which was Chisholm's Presidential Address at the Metaphysical
Society of America in 1973. This essay corresponds closely to Appendix
B of [P&O]. The puzzles presented in those papers have come to be
known as versions of "Chisholm's Paradox" (though it
must be pointed out that the term 'Chisholm's
Paradox' is also widely taken to refer to the problem about
contrary to duty imperatives that is discussed below in Section
11).



Chisholm's target in the 1967b paper was a popular collection of
views about the metaphysics of modality. Many philosophers --
going back perhaps to Leibniz -- seem to presuppose these views
in their discussions of necessity and possibility. The central
doctrine is that there are many possible worlds. The actual world is
just one among them, distinguished by the fact that what happens here
is what actually happens. To say that a statement is *true* is
just to say that it is true *at the actual world*. To say that
a statement is *possible* is just to say that it is true *at
some possible world*. To say that a statement is necessary is just
to say that it is true *at every possible world*. Thus we have
an account of de dicto modality.



On one typical construal, it is assumed that an individual who exists
here at the actual world also exists at many other possible worlds.
When we say that a certain individual *actually* has a certain
property, we mean that he has that property at the actual world. To
say that he *possibly* has that property is just to say that he
has that property at *some possible world*. To say that he
*necessarily* has that property is just to say that he has that
property *at every possible world where he exists at all*. This
gives us an account of de re modality. But it also generates
questions.



Chisholm imagines that Adam and Noah exist here in the actual world,
*w*1, and that each of them has his own collection
of properties. He assumes (following *Genesis 5*) that Adam
actually lives to the age of 930 years, whereas Noah lives to the age
of 950 years. Chisholm asks us to imagine a nearby possible world in
which Adam lives one more year, dying at age 931 instead of 930, and
in which Noah lives one year less, dying at age 949 instead of 950. By
imagining further similar one year alterations in life-span, we
finally reach a possible world in which Adam lives to the age of 950
and Noah lives to the age of 930. Thus, in that world Adam and Noah
have "swapped ages". In that world Adam has the age that
Noah has in *w*1, and Noah has the age that Adam has
in *w*1.



Chisholm then continues by imagining a series of worlds in which Adam
and Noah gradually swap letters in their names. This series ends with
a world in which they have "swapped names" altogether. In
that world, Adam is called 'Noah', and Noah is called
 'Adam'.[5]
 Going still further, Chisholm imagines a world,
*w**n*, in which Adam and Noah have swapped
all their qualitative properties, so that in
*w**n* Adam has all the properties that Noah
has in *w*1, and Noah has all the properties that
Adam has in *w*1. Then Chisholm asks a series of
tough questions:



Should we say of the Adam of *w**n* that he
is identical with the Noah of *w*1 and should we say
of the Noah of *w**n* that he is identical
with the Adam of *w*1? In other words, is there an
*x* such that *x* is Adam in *w*1 and
*x* is Noah in *w**n*, and is there a
*y* such that *y* is Noah in *w*1 and
*y* is Adam in *w**n*? And how are we
to decide? ... aren't the two Adams, the two Noahs, and the
two worlds indiscernible? Could God possibly have had a sufficient
reason for creating *w*1 instead of
*w**n*? (3-4)



Chisholm extends the example. He points out that what has happened to
Adam and Noah could happen to anyone. Let us say that a person's
"role" in a world is defined by the set of qualitative
properties he has there. We can say that a possible world,
*w**s*, is a "role swapping
world" of the actual world, *w*1, just in case
the roles being played in *w**s* are
precisely the same as the roles being played in
*w*1, but at least some of those roles are being
played in *w**s* by someone other than the
person who plays the role in *w*1. Role swapping
worlds will therefore be indiscernible from each other and from the
actual world except for the bare identities of the individuals playing
the roles. Chisholm says:



> 
> ... there may be good ground for the existentialist's
> *angst*; since, it would seem, God could have had no sufficient
> reason for choosing the world in which you play your present role
> instead of one in which you play mine. (4)
> 



Chisholm's remarks strongly suggest that he takes these
questions to indicate that there is something deeply problematic about
the notion that the same individual can exist in different worlds with
different qualitative properties. Once we accept this notion, we seem
to be on a path that will eventually lead us to the conclusion that
there are indefinitely many worlds each of which is qualitatively
indiscernible from the real world, but differing from it only in the
identities of the individuals playing the various roles. Such a
plurality of worlds seems undetectable and pointless.



In "Parts as Essential to Their Wholes" (1973), Chisholm
presents a structurally similar argument for a similar point. In this
case, however, Chisholm's target is a doctrine that he calls
'complete, unbridled mereological inessentialism'. This is
the view that nothing has its parts essentially -- anything
that's made of parts could have been made of different
parts.



Chisholm starts his argument by sketching some outlandish examples,
but then he turns to a familiar case. He asks us to consider a pair of
tables, *x* and *y*. Each table is made of smaller
parts. Just as he did in the case of Adam and Noah, Chisholm imagines
a series of small changes. Instead of gradual changes of properties,
he here imagines gradual changes of parts. First, he describes a
possible in world in which *x* and *y* have exchanged
one small part. Then he describes further possible worlds in which
more small parts are exchanged. At last we reach a possible world in
which *x* and *y* have exchanged all their parts:
everything that is actually a part of *x* has now become a part
of *y*; and everything that is actually a part of *y*
has now become a part of *x*.



It's not hard to see why Chisholm finds this example perplexing.
For we have arrived at a world at which the table that is identified
as *x* is composed of all and only the parts that in fact
compose *y*; and the table that is identified as *y* is
composed of all and only the parts that in fact compose *x*. Is
this world in fact distinct from the actual world? What possible basis
is there for saying that the table composed of the *x* parts is
*y*? Why isn't that table *x*? It is partwise
indiscernible from the actual *x*.



Chisholm concludes this discussion by saying that "these
reflections, on the consequences of extreme mereological
inessentialism, may suggest to us that *some* version of
mereological essentialism must be true..." (586). In the
remaining pages of the paper Chisholm presents a view according to
which extreme mereological essentialism is true -- but only for
what he calls "primary objects". Ordinary or
"vulgar" objects such as tables and ships are not primary
objects. Each such vulgar object may be understood to be a gradually
evolving sequence of primary objects. The vulgar object is constituted
by different primary objects at different times. Vulgar objects can
gain and lose parts across times and possible worlds. Mereological
essentialism is not true for them.



Chisholm strongly suggests that he thinks that vulgar objects occupy a
decidedly lower rung on the ontological ladder. In a discussion of an
example involving a statue and a hunk of metal that temporarily
constitutes it, he suggests that we might be content to say that the
hunk of metal is a primary object and that this hunk of metal
temporarily has the property of *being statuesque*. In the
strict and philosophical sense, it would be acceptable to say that
there really is no such thing as "the statue". Yet another
possible view would maintain that the statue is merely a mode of the
hunk of metal. This too would diminish the ontological status of the
statue, though it would not banish the statue entirely. This latter
"modal" view is explicitly defended in Chisholm's
1986 "Self-Profile" in [RMCp].



Chisholm discussed these problems in a number of papers and chapters.
He did not always defend precisely the same combination of views, but
certain elements seemed to persist. He steadily maintained a
commitment to mereological essentialism for ontologically fundamental
physical objects; he tried in various ways to account for facts about
persistence, enumeration, and reidentification of ordinary objects by
appeal to what he took to be ontologically more fundamental facts
about real "substances". Chisholm's work on these
topics was remarkably provocative. Some have suggested that David
Lewis's development of counterpart theory was intended (among
other things) to provide a metaphysical account of the structure of
possible worlds that would avoid the strange implications that
Chisholm described.


## 10. Ethics I -- Intrinsic Value, Defeat, Theodicy



A reader starting out with [B&IV] for the first time might not
anticipate how it is going to end. Indeed, even as the reader
patiently works his way through definitions, principles, remarks about
what Brentano might have said, etc., the eventual point remains in the
background. Nevertheless, as becomes clear in the final pages, the
book as a whole may be seen as one long argument for a distinctive
solution to the problem of evil.



Chisholm starts by explicating some of Brentano's idiosyncratic
metaphysical views. Soon, however, Chisholm turns to some central
ethical doctrines. Perhaps the first among these involves the
introduction of the concept of *correctness*. In the first
instance, we think of certain judgments as being correct. Thus, for
example, suppose it now seems to me that I am seeing something red. If
I judge that I am now seeing something red, it will be clear to me
that my judgment is correct. If another person judges that I am not
seeing something red, it will be clear to me that his judgment is
incorrect. A similar thing could happen in the case of a judgment to
the effect that all squares are rectangles. If I make that judgment
with full understanding of the concepts of squareness and
rectangularity, it will be clear to me that my judgment is correct.
Brentano evidently made use of this concept of correct judgment in an
attempt to explain the notion of truth.



Chisholm claims that Brentano extended the application of the concept
of correctness so that it would apply to *emotions* as well. On
Chisholm's view, emotions are analogous to judgments in certain
ways. Corresponding to the notion of affirmation or "positive
judgment" we have the notion of love, or positive emotion.
Corresponding to the notion of denial we have the notion of hatred, or
negative emotion. In addition, there is the concept of preference. If
I love one thing and hate another, then I prefer the one to the other.
Similarly if I love one thing and am neutral about (neither loving nor
hating) the other, then I prefer the one to the other. And if I am
neutral about one thing and hate the other, then I prefer the one to
the other. So we have the concept of preference as well.



Suppose I feel some pleasure. Suppose I love the fact that I am
feeling that pleasure. Suppose my love of this pleasure is intrinsic
-- I love the pleasure "in and for itself". If I
reflect on this situation, I may recognize that my love is correct.
This seems to mean, roughly, that I can see that it is appropriate, or
fitting, for me to feel this strong pro-attitude toward this
experience. The feeling of pleasure deserves, or merits, this sort of
positive emotional reaction. If another person were to hate that
pleasure, or were to feel an equally strong anti-attitude toward it
"in and for itself", his hatred would be incorrect. We can
just see that a feeling of pleasure does not deserve this sort of
negative emotional reaction.



Chisholm prefers to formulate these claims about the fittingness of
certain emotional reactions to certain objects by appeal to a
fundamental concept in his ethics. This is the concept of
*requirement*. Instead of saying that it is correct, or
fitting, to have a certain emotional reaction to a certain object, we
can say that contemplation of that object *requires* that
emotional reaction. With these concepts at our disposal, Chisholm
suggests, we can define all the central concepts of ethics
([B&IV], 53).



To say that one thing *A* is *intrinsically better* than
another thing *B*, according to Chisholm, is just to say that,
for any person, *x*, contemplation of just *A* and
*B* by *x* requires that *x* prefer *A* to
*B*. Consider the fact that there are stones. While of course
we might be glad that there are stones in virtue of their usefulness,
it would not be correct to love this state of affairs for its own
sake. Mere contemplation of this state of affairs does not require
either love or hate. It seems to be intrinsically neutral. An
intrinsically good thing is one that is intrinsically better than a
neutral thing; an intrinsically bad thing is one such that an
intrinsically neutral thing is intrinsically better than it. Thus
according to Chisholm we may define intrinsic goodness, badness, and
neutrality entirely in terms of preference and requirement.



In some cases a complex state of affairs contains some good parts and
some bad parts. We can assign positive numbers to the good parts and
negative numbers to the bad parts in order to represent their
respective amounts of intrinsic value. The intrinsic value of the
whole state of affairs may just be the sum of the values of those
parts. In such cases Chisholm would say that the positive value of the
good parts is "balanced off" by the negative value of the
bad parts.



In other cases the interaction among the parts is not in this way just
a matter of summation. Chisholm asks us to compare two cases. In Case
1, I take pleasure in what I take to be Smith's pleasure. In
Case 2, I take an equal amount of pleasure in what I take to be
Jones's pain. So here we are comparing two instances of
pleasure. Imagine that they are alike in what we may call the
"raw amount" of pleasure involved. They differ in that one
is pleasure in something good whereas the other is pleasure in
something bad. Chisholm stipulates that the objects of these pleasures
(Smith's pleasure and Jones's pain) are "intentional
objects" -- I take them to be happening, but I may be
mistaken. Maybe they are just figments of my imagination.



Following Brentano (and Moore as well) Chisholm assumes that pleasure
in the good is extra good, while pleasure in the bad is not so good.
In these cases the value of the whole is either greater than, or less
than, the sum of the values of the parts. (Since Jones's pain is
an intentional object of my pleasure in Case 2, its actual occurrence
is not entailed by the fact that I take pleasure in it; hence,
according to Chisholm, it is not a "part" of the that
larger state of affairs.) As a result, Case 1 is better than Case 2 in
spite of the fact that Case 1 and Case 2 contain the same parts, with
the same values. The difference in value arises because of the
appropriateness of the object of pleasure in Case 1, and the
corresponding inappropriateness of the object of the pleasure in Case
2.



Case 2 illustrates what Chisholm calls "the defeat of
good". Case 2 contains a good part and no bad part; but the
value of the whole is less than the value of the good part. Somehow,
the value of the good part has been defeated without being balanced
off.



The defeat of evil would occur in a case in which some state of
affairs contains a bad part that is worse than the whole, even though
the whole does not contain any good part that balances off the evil of
the bad part. Consider Case 3 in which I take pain in what I take to
be my bad behavior. The badness of my pain may be mitigated by the
fact that the object of this pain is something that requires that pain
be taken in it -- my own bad behavior. But it is possible that I
am mistaken about my bad behavior; maybe it never really happened.
Thus, Case 3 does not contain that bad behavior as an actual part. The
state of affairs may have no good part to balance off the badness of
my pain, and yet it may be, as a whole, not as bad as its worst part.
(It may be neutral; or even good.)



In the final five pages of [B&IV], Chisholm turns to theodicy. He
raises the question whether an omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent
deity could create a world that contains some things that are
intrinsically evil. Standard theistic answers are quickly rejected.
(1) We cannot claim that evil is just an illusion, for in the case of
pain (for example) it is evident to the one who suffers it that it is
genuinely evil. Nor can we say (2) that some evils are required as
means to good. For if God is omnipotent, he could find a way to
produce the good without making use of the evil means. (3) Some might
say that God produces only "positive" states, such as
experiences of pleasure. The evil in the world occurs in
"negative" states, and these are not due to God's
creative efforts. But Chisholm points out that the negation of a good
state is neutral, not bad. Furthermore, the actual existence of pain
is not a mere negation. It is as "positive" as the
existence of pleasure. (4) Some have claimed that God gave us freedom,
which we then misused. Thus, it's not God's fault that
there is evil in this world. But this "free will defense"
is quickly rejected. The problem is that if God is omnipotent, he
could have created a different world in which we always freely choose
to act in the better way. Surely there must be such a world; surely it
must be better than the actual world in which we freely misbehave. Why
didn't God actualize a world like that?



Chisholm then sketches his own solution to the problem of evil. He
says 'Some of the evil in the world is necessary for the
enhancement of goodness. And the rest of the evil is defeated'
([B&IV], 100). In a characteristically careful way, Chisholm does
not assert that all the evil in this world is actually to be explained
in this way. He restricts himself to suggesting that Brentano would
have said such a thing, and that the conceptual machinery he has
developed shows us how it is possible that the world could contain
some evil even though the world was created by an omnipotent,
omniscient, and benevolent god. Whether the evil in this world is in
fact defeated is another question. Chisholm concludes by saying
'The wise theodicist, I should think, would say that he
doesn't know' ([B&IV], 102).


## 11. Ethics II -- Contrary to Duty Imperatives



One of Chisholm's most influential critical papers in ethics is
"Contrary-to-Duty Imperatives and Deontic Logic". A number
of philosophers had noted the analogy between statements of necessity
(e.g., 'it's necessary that red things are
colored.') and statements of obligation (e.g., 'it's
obligatory that promises are kept.') They also noted the
structural similarities between the alethic modalities of necessity,
possibility, and impossibility and the deontic modalities of
obligation, permission, and prohibition. It's natural to think
that alethic necessity can be understood as truth at all possible
worlds. So, by analogy, some suggested systems of deontic logic in
which obligation would be understood as truth at all morally perfect
worlds. Statements of permission (and prohibition), would be taken to
mean respectively truth at some (or no) morally perfect worlds. This
generates a straightforward deontic logic.



Chisholm recognized, however, that any system based on those
assumptions (and making use of the standard connectives) would be
unable to express certain familiar and important facts. Among these is
the fact that in many cases our moral obligations depend essentially
upon our moral failings. For example, a person might have a moral
obligation to apologize for some misbehavior -- yet obviously he
would not be apologizing in a morally perfect world, since in such a
world he would not have misbehaved in the first place. Presumably,
there are no apologies in a morally perfect world. If we let
'*O*(Smith apologizes)' express the idea that there
is a moral obligation for Smith to apologize, then the imagined
semantics would apparently be unable to account for the possibility
that the statement could be true. Smith does not apologize for
anything at any morally perfect world.



Chisholm sketched a situation in which a person, (we can call him
'Smith'), had (a) an obligation to go to the aid of his
neighbor, (we can call him 'Jones'). Assuming that it
would be best to notify Jones beforehand, Chisholm imagined that (b)
Smith also had a conditional obligation to notify Jones in advance if
he was going to come to his aid. On the other hand, (c) if he was
going to fail to come to Jones's aid, then Smith's
obligation would be to avoid telling him that he was coming to his
aid. Finally, Chisholm assumed that (d) Smith was going to fail to
come to Jones's aid.



There is nothing incoherent or even surprising about the situation
Chisholm described, yet there seemed to be no adequate way to express
these statements in any extant system of deontic logic. No matter how
the obligation operators, material and formal conditionals, temporal
restrictions, etc. were juggled, the formal-language sentences simply
did not preserve the logical features of the familiar ordinary
language sentences. Consider, for example, the following
sentences:



> 
> 
> (a1) *O*(Smith goes to the aid of Jones)
> 
> 
> 
> (b1) *O*(Smith goes to the aid of Jones - Smith tells
> Jones he is coming)
> 
> 
> 
> (c1) ~(Smith goes to the aid of Jones) - *O*(~Smith tells
> Jones he is coming)
> 
> 
> 
> (d1) ~(Smith goes to the aid of Jones).
> 
> 
> 



Chisholm pointed out that in many extant systems of deontic logic,
there is a general principle ("deontic detachment") that
would validate the inference from (a1) and (b1) to:



> 
> (e1) *O*(Smith tells Jones he is coming)
> 



While (c1) and (d1) entail:



> 
> (f1) *O*(~Smith tells Jones he is coming)
> 



The conjunction of (e1) and (f1) is a near contradiction, telling
Smith that he both has an obligation to warn Jones, and also that he
has an obligation not to warn Jones. If we assume that if you have an
obligation to do something, then you don't have an obligation to
avoid doing it, we can derive an outright contradiction. Other
possible representations of the situation fail to preserve other
logical features of the original sentences.



Perhaps Chisholm was thinking that this puzzle could be solved by
appeal to a system of deontic logic based on the notion of
requirement. Maybe he thought that a good way to represent the
sentences in question would be to say (a) that Smith had a
non-overridden requirement to go to the aid of Jones; but that (b)
that if Smith were going to go to the aid of Jones, then this fact
would require that Smith notify Jones in advance; and furthermore (c)
that if Smith were not going to go to the aid of Jones, then this fact
would require that Smith not notify Jones in advance. Finally, there
is the stipulation (d) that Smith is not going to go to the aid of
Jones. This solution to Chisholm's puzzle would be of greatest
interest if it could be shown not only to provide a suitable
semantical interpretation for the four cited sentences, but also to
pave the way to a complete system of deontic logic adequate for the
expression of statements of conditional obligation.



Chisholm's paper had a profound impact. It provoked renewed
interest in the logic of obligation. Several philosophers began
working on new systems of deontic logic. Many of these new systems
incorporated a new idea -- conditional obligation. This was
intended to provide a formal representation for the thought behind
such statements as 'if you don't do what you ought to do,
then you ought to apologize'.


## 12. Ethics III -- The Ethics of Requirement



As we noted above in Section 10, Chisholm offered an account of the
concept of intrinsic goodness by appeal to the concept of requirement.
In some places, Chisholm defended the idea that a thing is
intrinsically good (bad) when contemplation of just that thing
requires that the contemplator loves (hates) it. But Chisholm wanted
to go much further. In his discussion of these matters in [B&IV]
Chisholm remarks:



> 
> This way of defining intrinsic value, then, makes use of the concept
> of *requirement*. And there is reason to think that the concept
> of requirement is the central concept of ethics. It yields adequate
> definitions of the basic intrinsic value concepts. And it has the
> following advantage as well: It provides a way of reducing the
> concepts of the theory of value ("axiology") to those of
> ethics ("deontology"). ([B&IV], 53)
> 



In a couple of papers, Chisholm tried to show how the central concepts
of axiology and deontology can be defined by appeal to this one
fundamental concept of requirement. These papers provide beautiful
illustrations of one of Chisholm's most characteristic
philosophical procedures -- the clear definition of a tangle of
related concepts by appeal to a small set of undefined primitives. In
this instance, he tries to explain confusing and problematic concepts
in the realm of ethics. He makes use of just a few undefined concepts.
One of them -- *requirement* -- seems to carry all of
the distinctively normative burden. (It would be interesting to
compare Chisholm's efforts on behalf of *requirement* in
ethics with his efforts on behalf of *more reasonable than* in
epistemology. The projects seem to illustrate the same methodological
propensity.)



In "The Ethics of Requirement", Chisholm uses
'*pRq*' to abbreviate '*p* would
require *q*'. The relevant concept of requirement is
operative in the statement 'If I were to promise to meet you for
lunch that would require my meeting you for lunch.' An actual
requirement for *q* comes into being when *q* is
required by something, *p*, *and p actually occurs*.
Thus, if I actually did promise to meet you for lunch, then there is a
requirement that I show up. But even if actual, the requirement is
defeasible. It may be overridden. When an action is actually required
in this way, it counts at least as a prima facie obligation. If I meet
an injured stranger on the way to lunch, and I alone am qualified to
tend to his injuries, then this further state of affairs overrides my
prima facie obligation to meet you for lunch. In light of this,
Chisholm defines all-in, or all things considered, obligation as
non-overridden requirement. In other words:



> 
> *q* is all things considered obligatory =*df*   
> 
>     [?]*p*(*pRq* & *p* occurs &
> ~[?]*s*(*s* occurs &
> ~((*p*&*s*)*Rq*)))
> 



This concept of obligation is not restricted to actions. It is a
concept of the "ought to be". In order to explain the
"ought to do", Chisholm introduces another operator,
'*A*'. '*Ap*' expresses the idea
that a person *S* *succeeds in bringing about* the state
of affairs *p*. Making use this further expression, Chisholm
defines the ought to do by saying that the statement that *S*
ought to bring about some state of affairs *p* just means
*OAp*.



Once we have a definition of all things considered obligation, it is
easy enough to define permission, forbiddenness, and gratuitousness.
Chisholm does this in the expected ways.



A person has a prima facie obligation to do something when his doing
it is required by something that happens. An all-in obligation arises
when there is a non-overridden requirement for him to do it. Chisholm
claims that this helps to solve the puzzle about conflicts of
obligation. Obviously, there can be conflicts of prima facie
obligation. But there cannot be conflicts of all-in obligation.



In addition, Chisholm attempts to apply his conceptual scheme to some
other long-standing puzzles in ethics. Among these is a puzzle about
supererogatory action. A supererogatory action is supposedly one that
is "beyond the call of duty" -- something that would
be outstandingly good to do, but permissible to fail to do.
Consequentialists have a hard time explaining how there could be any
such things, since they typically say that duty requires us to do the
best we can. How can there be anything "beyond" that? And
how could it be permissible to fail to do such a thing, if it is
"extra good"?



Chisholm proposes to explain this by saying that a certain action is
supererogatory when its "object" absolutely ought to be,
but its agent is neither obligated to bring it about nor to refrain
from bringing it about. He uses '*PAq*' to
abbreviate '*S* is permitted to bring about
*q*', where permission is understood to be the absence of
obligation to refrain:



> 
> *S*'s doing *q* is supererogatory
> =*df* *Oq* & *P*~*Aq* &
> *PAq*
> 



In subsequent papers, Chisholm made further claims about the
usefulness of his concept of requirement.


## 13. Evolution and Criticism of Chisholm's Views



Chisholm continued to work on a multitude of philosophical projects
over a period of many years. Though his central convictions remained
relatively stable, he steadily revised the details of his formulations
in light of criticism from others and as a result of his own
reconsideration. Thus it is difficult to identify any chapter or paper
as containing the final, official version of his view.



Nevertheless, there are several more or less fundamental Chisholmian
doctrines. We have sketched some of these doctrines. Here, we list
some things that Chisholm wrote in which he discussed the doctrines.
We go on to mention some books and papers by others in which they
offer exposition or criticism of Chisholm's views.



In epistemology, Chisholm took as his fundamental primitive concept
the idea we express when we say that *believing p is more
reasonable for S than believing q would be*. He tried to define
other terms of epistemic evaluation by appeal to this one.
Furthermore, he assumed that we in fact do know many of the things we
take ourselves to know. He thought that a person can be justified in
believing many foundational propositions about his own current mental
state. He took one of the central projects of epistemology to be the
formulation of epistemic principles that would show how we become
justified in believing things about the external world, the past, and
other problematic things on the basis of this present, internal,
self-oriented foundation.



An early formulation of Chisholm's view can be found in [PPS].
Subsequent formulations were presented in the three editions of [TK]
as well as in [FK]. [FK] is a collection of essays in epistemology.
Some were newly written for [FK], but most were slightly revised
versions of articles that Chisholm had already published. [FK] is thus
a comprehensive presentation of Chisholm's distinctive views in
epistemology.



Three excellent critical discussions are Heidelberger (1969), Foley
(1997), and Sosa (1997). For comprehensive examinations of
Chisholm's epistemology, see Legum (2021 [Other Internet
Resources]) and the papers in [PLRMC].



One issue in Chisholm's epistemological work that has been
widely discussed is the problem of the criterion. Chisholm thought
that the problem arises because the fundamental problems of
epistemology were "What do we know?" and "What are
the criteria for knowledge?" and he argued that an answer to
either one required a prior answer to the other. He contended that the
problem could be addressed only by begging the question. He defended
the common-sense view that we do know most of what common-sense says
we know. For discussion, see Amico (1993), Lemos (2004), and McCain
(2014 [Other Internet Resources]).



In metaphysics, Chisholm maintained that certain things are genuinely
persisting "substances". Such things literally last
through time and survive changes in their properties. Each person is
such a being, retaining his or her strict identity over time. On the
other hand, ordinary physical objects can be said to persist only in
an extended sense. Since it has undergone changes of parts,
today's chair is only "loosely identical" with
yesterday's chair. Chisholm thought that a complex thing could
strictly persist only if it retained all of its parts. Thus, he
endorsed mereological essentialism. He thought that persons would have
to be ontologically simple in order for it to be possible for them to
maintain strict identity over time and through change. Thus, we are
not to be identified with our bodies.



An excellent presentation of Chisholm's views on these matters
can be found in [P&O], as well as in his papers "Is There a
Mind-Body Problem?" (1978) and "On the Simplicity of the
Soul" (1991). Chapters 4, 6, 7, and 13 of [OM] are especially
helpful. For a brief final discussion of the metaphysics of persons,
see "Persons and Their Bodies: Some Unanswered Questions"
(1996).



Plantinga (1975) contains a clear and helpful discussion of
Chisholm's views about mereological essentialism. For a
drammatically non-Chisholmian view concerning the relation between a
person and that person's body, see Baker (2002). Although he did
not explictly say that he was presenting an objection to
Chisholm's view, Derek Parfit also defended a radically
different approach to the nature of persons and the conditions for
"personal identity" in Parfit (1971).



For a penetrating critical discussion of Chisholm's metaphysics
of persons, see Quinn (1997).



Another metaphysical view that evidently fascinated Chisholm is
libertarianism. According to this view, there is a special sort of
causation in which an event is caused at least in part by an agent.
When an agent thus "imminently" helps to bring about some
effect, his doing so is not determined by antecedent causal
conditions. Thus, he freely makes something happen. This makes genuine
moral responsibility possible.



An early defense of this libertarianism can be found in "Freedom
and Action" (1966). Another classic statement of the view can be
found in Chisholm's "He Could Have Done Otherwise"
(1967a). Chisholm discussed these ideas in greater detail in Chapter
II of [P&O] and then again in Chapters 1 and 2 of [OM]. For
further helpful work, including Chisholm's "Human Freedom
and the Self," see Ekstrom (2000). See also Zimmerman (2010) and
von Wachter (2003).



Chisholm's views in ontology underwent steady pruning. In an
earlier period he believed in necessarily existent states of affairs
some of which might occur and recur. He also believed in times, though
not in "concrete events". Later he abandoned times and
recurrable states of affairs in favor of a sparser ontology including
"one shot" states, but lacking times. The earlier view can
be found in "Events and Propositions" (1970), and
"States of Affairs Again" (1971), and Chapter IV of
[P&O]. The later view appears in "Events without Times: An
Essay in Ontology" (1990). See also Chapter 16 of [OM] and
Chapter 10 of [RTC].



Kim 1979 contains a very helpful critical exposition of
Chisholm's early view. Both views are discussed in Brandl 1997.
See also Zimmerman (1997), Rosenkrantz (1998), and Steen (2008).



Chisholm was dubious about such things as sense data, appearances, the
"looks" of things. He defended a different view about the
ontology of perception. An amusing early paper on this topic is
"The Problem of the Speckled Hen" (1942). A more extended
discussion, including a presentation of Chisholm's preferred
theory of appearing, can be found in Chapter 8 ("Sensing")
of [PPS]. More than forty years later, near the end of his career,
Chisholm made some final remarks about appearances in Chapter 13 of
[RTC].



Chisholm steadily thought there is something fundamentally right about
Brentano's Thesis -- the idea that the psychological
somehow involves intentionality, and that in this respect it is unlike
the purely physical. Chisholm discussed this idea in his early paper
"Sentences about Believing" (1955-6). He discussed
it again in Chapter 11 ("Intentional Inexistence") of
[PPS]. A summary statement of the view can also be found in
Chisholm's article "Intentionality" (1967c).
Chisholm returned to this topic in Part IV (Chapters 10-14) of
[OM].



Two excellent critical discussions of Brentano's Thesis are
Sanford 1997 and Kim 2003.



The term 'Chisholm's Paradox' has been credited to
Graeme Forbes in his "Two Solutions to Chisholm's
Paradox" (1984) The topic has been discussed extensively; see,
for example, Salmon 1996. In his discussion of the mereological
version of the puzzle, Chisholm mentions Chandler 1966. Lewis 1986 is
essential reading here. A good discussion of the whole problem of
transworld identity can be found in Mackie 2008.



One central Chisholmian view in ethics is the idea that all the main
concepts of ethics can be defined by appeal to the concept of
*requirement*. He defends this idea in his early paper
"The Ethics of Requirement" (1964) and then again ten
years later in "Practical Reason and the Logic of
Requirement" (1974). The idea is briefly mentioned, but not
developed, in [B&IV] 53. See also Chisholm (2005).



For quite a long time Chisholm thought that the fundamental bearers of
intrinsic value are states of affairs. He also thought that in some
cases, the value of a state of affairs could be defeated by that
state's occurrence within some larger context. In this he seemed
to be working out some ideas of Brentano and Moore. One of
Chisholm's most moving presentations of this view can be found
in his Presidential Address before the Eastern Division of the
American Philosphical Association titled "The Defeat of Good and
Evil" (1968). Many of his ideas about defeat, enhancement,
mitigation, and organic unities are further developed in Chapters 6,
7, and 8 of [B&IV]. For further discussion, see Lemos (2005),
Gustafsson (2014), and Tucker (2016).



No list of Chisholm's contributions to ethics could be complete
without mentioning "Contrary-to-Duty Imperatives and Deontic
Logic" (1963).