Edward N. Zalta | |
|---|---|
 Zalta speaking at theWikimania 2015 | |
| Born | Edward Nouri Zalta (1952-03-16)March 16, 1952 (age 73) |
| Education | |
| Education | |
| Thesis | An Introduction to a Theory of Abstract Objects (1981) |
| Doctoral advisor | Terence Parsons |
| Philosophical work | |
| Era | Contemporary philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
| School | |
| Institutions | |
| Main interests | Metaphysics |
| Notable ideas | Abstract object theory,exemplifying and encoding aproperty as two modes ofpredication,Platonized naturalism,[4]computational metaphysics |
Edward Nouri Zalta[5] (/ˈzɔːltə/; born March 16, 1952) is an American philosopher who is a senior research scholar at theCenter for the Study of Language and Information atStanford University. He received hisBA fromRice University in 1975 and hisPhD from theUniversity of Massachusetts Amherst in 1981, both inphilosophy.[5] Zalta has taught courses atStanford University,Rice University, theUniversity of Salzburg, and theUniversity of Auckland. Zalta is also the Principal Editor of theStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.[6]
Zalta's most notable philosophical position is descended from the positions ofAlexius Meinong andErnst Mally,[7] who suggested that there are manynon-existent objects. On Zalta's account, some objects (the ordinary concrete ones around us, like tables and chairs)exemplify properties, while others (abstract objects like numbers, and what others would call "non-existent objects", like theround square, and the mountain made entirely of gold) merelyencode them.[8] While the objects that exemplify properties are discovered through traditional empirical means, a simple set of axioms allows us to know about objects that encode properties.[9] For every set of properties, there is exactly one object that encodes exactly that set of properties and no others.[10] This allows for aformalizedontology.
Principal Editor: Edward N. Zalta, Senior Research Scholar, Center for the Study of Language and Information, Stanford University.
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