Chapter 1 provides the background in the philosophy of science. The goal is twofold. First, I aim to provide the reader with a firm grasp of the general idea of scientific underdetermination. For this purpose, I start with some examples to illustrate the phenomenon, ranging from everyday situations to physics to other domains of science. Then, I introduce the two main progenitors of the idea, Pierre Duhem and W. V. O. Quine. Second, I provide a more systematic overview of two issues that inform the later discussion in ethics. On the one hand, I introduce the main argumentative strategies that have been employed to argue for underdetermination in science, i.e., the inductive, the holistic, and the algorithmic strategies. On the other hand, I make a number of distinctions between different versions of underdetermination to provide a picture of the various forms that underdetermination can take. These distinctions are: existence vs. non-uniqueness vs. egalitarian, local vs. global, permanent vs. transient vs. recurrent, and deductive vs. ampliative.

Carnap’s naturalism evidently differs from Quine’s, but the precise nature of this difference has proven elusive. This chapter focuses on what Quine defends as his “provincial” naturalism against a Carnapian “cosmopolitan” alternative. The problem with this contrast, however, is that Quine does not represent a pure form of what he calls a “provincial” view. This is illustrated by his tergiversations about analyticity; after initially denying that there was even an explicandum worth bothering about, he later offered his own ordinary-language-based account of analyticity, without feeling any need to supply a more exact explication; there would appear to be no way to resolve the resulting stand-off with the cosmopolitan standpoint. This paper suggests a more robust explicandum for analyticity (and cosmopolitanism more generally). We come back, in the end, to the confrontation between Carnap and Quine in Chicago in 1950, where Carnap convinced Quine that their differences did not concern any question about which there could be right or wrong, correct or incorrect; it is regretted that Quine soon lost this lesson from sight.

Carnap’s naturalism evidently differs from Quine’s, but the precise nature of this difference has proven elusive to generations of commentators. This chapter focuses on what Quine defends as his “provincial” naturalism against a Carnapian “cosmopolitan” alternative. The problem with this contrast, however, is that Quine does not represent a pure form of what he calls a “provincial” view – he vacillates between provincial and cosmopolitan temptations. To illustrate a purely provincial view the position of Peter Strawson is held up as an opposite, provincial extreme to Carnapian cosmopolitanism, and while Quine is clearly tempted by both these extremes, the attempt to locate him on a continuum between them is complicated by his evident indecisiveness. This is further illustrated by his tergiversations about analyticity; after initially denying that there was even an explicandum worth bothering about, he later offered his own ordinary-language-based account of analyticity, without feeling any need to supply a more exact explication; there would appear to be no way to resolve the resulting stand-off with the cosmopolitan standpoint. This chapter suggests a more robust explicandum for analyticity (and cosmopolitanism more generally). We come back, in the end, to the confrontation between Carnap and Quine in Chicago in 1950, where Carnap convinced Quine that their differences did not concern any question about which there could be right or wrong, correct or incorrect; it is regretted that Quine soon lost this lesson from sight.

Chapter 13 opens by asking readers to look at a bubble chart showing numbers of native speakers of various languages, then to describe the figure in words, and finally to compare these visual and verbal ways of conveying information about speakers. The chapter encourages demonstrations that start with memorable and fun examples, emphasizing that the free-choice setting means people can walk away if they are not immediately intrigued. Again, research articles can be mined for classic phenomena. The chapter also exemplifies several ways of giving people something to talk about: Using one’s own body can launch demonstrations of speech articulation. Special hardware or software can launch demonstrations of speech acoustics. Video such as fMRI of arias and beatboxing can catch people’s attention and start the desired conversations. Pictures and objects that can be handled, as well as games and puzzles such as tongue twisters, are a rich ground for juicy questions. The Worked Example shows different ways to build a demonstration with the Stroop task, interactive with low-tech or high-tech support. Giveaway materials are also emphasized as making a demonstration memorable and fun.

In this chapter, I articulate and defend several views that play important roles throughout the remainder of the book. First, I articulate the task of a metaphysical theory of action as that of providing an account of the distinction between actions and mere behaviours. I then distinguish two things we might mean to talk about when we talk about someone’s actions: the things they do; and their particular doings of those things. I argue that we are ontologically committed to entities of both types, and defend my preferred ontology, according to which particular doings are events, while the things we do are a kind of property we possess.