Abstract

Where lies the boundary between the natural and social worlds? For the local constructionist, who wants to say that whilst global constructionism is false, nonetheless there remains a domain of socially constructed phenomena, there is going to be a demarcation question. In this paper I explore two initially plausible accounts of the boundary, based on mind-dependence and constructive mechanisms, and show that each is bound to fail. After further rejecting an explanatory account drawn from the work of Ásta, I look at Hume’s account of the artificial to develop a distinctly Humean account of the boundary, improving it with a necessity condition to deal with potentially pernicious counter-examples, and suggesting that it provides our best answer to the local constructionist’s demarcation question.

摘要

自然世界和社会世界的界限在哪里？对于地方建构主义者来说，他们想说虽然全球建构主义是错误的，但仍然存在社会建构现象的领域，这将是一个划界问题。在这篇论文中，我探索了两个最初看似合理的边界解释，基于思维依赖和建设性机制，并表明每一个都注定会失败。在进一步拒绝了从 Ásta 的著作中提取的解释性说明之后，我研究了休谟对人工的说明，以发展一个明显的休谟式边界说明，并在必要条件下对其进行改进以处理潜在的有害反例，并建议它为当地建构主义者的划界问题提供了我们最好的答案。