AMBIGUITY IN NATURALIZED METAPHYSICS: a case study in the philosophy of time and theory of relativity

Abstract

In this paper, after a brief discussion of traditional metaphysics and its guiding principles, we take a look at naturalized metaphysics. There is an agreement in the practice of naturalized metaphysics that it is continuous with science. However, it turns out that this commitment is not enough to define the discipline. Having defined what naturalized metaphysics is, a concrete example drawn from the literature on the philosophy of time is examined thoroughly. The example is taken from Putnam's famous paper on the relation of science to the problem of time. In that paper, he argued that special relativity favors the static model of time, which has a counterpart in philosophy. Based on our chosen example, four kinds of approaches to naturalized metaphysics emerge. Additionally, the naturalistic aspects of these approaches are introduced. Finally, we conclude by saying that naturalized metaphysics is not radically different from the traditional one with respect to its methods. Therefore, there is a fundamental vagueness in terms of methods in multiple instances of alleged naturalized metaphysics.