Existence as the Possibility of Reference

Abstract

The mere fact that ontological debates are possible requires us to address the question, what is it to claim that a certain entity or kind of entity exists--in other words, what do we do when we make an existence-claim? I develop and defend one candidate answer to this question, namely that to make an existence-claim with regard to Fs is to claim that we can refer to Fs. I show how this theory can fulfil the most important explanatory desiderata for a theory of existence; I also defend it against the charges of illegitimate 'semantic ascent' and of making existence counterfactually dependent on human linguistic ability.