What is ontic vagueness?

Abstract

There is ample divergence among students of vagueness as to what exactly should be understood by a vague object, or by ontic, or metaphysical vagueness in general. In fact, the very intelligibility of the notion of a vague object has been called into question by important philosophers in the past, indicating that the task of finding a coherent, philosophically fertile characterization of the notion is not a simple one. This article aims to contribute to this undertaking, by identifying, examining and comparing some of the main proposals in the literature. It is suggested that we should try to characterize vague properties and relations independently of any particular view about vague objects, and then to formulate a criterion for vague objects in terms of indefinite instantiation of sharp properties. It is shown that this approach makes it easier to evaluate certain semantic-epistemic dismissive strategies concerning the possibility of there being vague objects. It is briefly indicated that if the objects are analysed with the theoretical and conceptual resources of quantum physics (and not of classical physics, as is ordinarily done), such dismissive strategies are seriously undermined.