Project Prof. Dr. Hans-Jürgen Pirner

Vagueness in Philosophy – Unbestimmtheit in the Sciences

Since Eubulides the problem of vagueness exists in philosophy.  Vague predicates do not allow decisions in borderline cases whether the predicate is true or false. The Sorites paradox demonstrates such a case. Do ten rice corns form a heap or do they not form a heap? What happens if we have a corn less?  I propose to study mainly the question which kinds of vagueness exist and how people handle it. Explicitly, I would like to allow a larger realm of investigation.  Unbestimmtheit includes besides vagueness also impreciseness, uncertainty, inexactitude and indeterminedness.  However, I do not want to consider that part  which at least in the German word Unbestimmtheit includes psychological aspects of fear. I differentiate four kinds of Unbestimmtheit: factual, theoretical, semantic and ontological Unbestimmtheit. These will be studied separately. New information can be valuable to reduce existing impreciseness. It is a lack of information which leads to some kinds of Unbestimmtheit. Which role do interpreters play in increasing or decreasing Unbestimmtheit? Finally I propose to develop methods to arrive at decisions inspite of unclear or uncertain situations. Interdisciplinary work is necessary and promising  to arrive at meaningful insights.