A bundle theory of words

Miller, J.T.M.

doi:10.1007/s11229-019-02430-3

A bundle theory of words

Miller, J.T.M.

Authors

Dr James Miller james.miller@durham.ac.uk
Assistant Professor

Abstract

It has been a common assumption that words are substances that instantiate or have properties. In this paper, I question the assumption that our ontology of words requires posting substances by outlining a bundle theory of words, wherein words are bundles of various sorts of properties (such as semantic, phonetic, orthographic, and grammatical properties). I argue that this view can better account for certain phenomena than substance theories, is ontologically more parsimonious, and coheres with claims in linguistics.

Citation

Miller, J. (2021). A bundle theory of words. Synthese, 198, 5731-5748. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02430-3

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Oct 4, 2019
Online Publication Date	Oct 17, 2019
Publication Date	2021
Deposit Date	Jul 29, 2020
Publicly Available Date	Jul 29, 2020
Journal	Synthese
Print ISSN	0039-7857
Electronic ISSN	1573-0964
Publisher	Springer
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	198
Pages	5731-5748
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02430-3

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