1. Ways of Being
1.1 Introduction
This chapter willfirst be devoted to developing a meta-ontological theory based on
the work of Martin Heidegger circa 1927. I focus on Heidegger’s work partly because
of the historical importance of Heidegger’s philosophy, and partly because Heidegger
provides a particularly clear statement of the doctrine that there are many ways to be.
Heidegger’s views are also philosophically interesting in their own right, and by
reflecting on them we can draw some general lessons about the myriad ways in which
one can believe in ways of being.
So I’ll begin by carefully discussing and then formulating the relevant aspects of
Heidegger’s meta-ontological theory. This takes place in section 1.2. After this is
done, I will move beyond the particulars of Heidegger’s philosophy and develop a
more general framework for thinking about modes of being.
I understand the discipline of meta-ontology (and meta-metaphysics more gener-
ally) as standing in the same sort of relation to ontology proper as the discipline of
meta-ethics stands to ethics proper.^1 We can ask a variety offirst-order ethical
questions, such as: what are the necessary and sufficient conditions for right action;
which character traits are worthy of admiration and which are worthy of contempt;
and what kinds of things have intrinsic value? But reflection on the practice of
raising, contemplating, arguing over, and answering these questions itself generates
further questions. Some of them are epistemological, such as: what are our sources of
evidence for claims about which actions are right? Some of them are semantical, such
as: what do the expressions“worthy of admiration”and“worthy of contempt”mean?
And some of them are metaphysical, such as: what must the world be like in order
for anything to have intrinsic value? In addition, there are also logical, methodo-
logical, and even ethical and political questions raised by the practice of doing
first-order ethics.
The same is true of ontology. But though Heidegger has interesting things to say
about the methodology and epistemology of ontology, and deplorable things to say
about the ethics and politics of ontology, an in-depth discussion of these topics would
take us too far afield. Our discussion of Heidegger’s meta-ontological views will focus
(^1) We can thank van Inwagen (2001b) for stressing the importance of this discipline.