{"id":9617,"date":"2012-06-21T13:18:44","date_gmt":"2012-06-21T13:18:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2012\/06\/21\/george-f-will-and-the-beach-boys-meet-alexius-meinong\/"},"modified":"2012-06-21T13:18:44","modified_gmt":"2012-06-21T13:18:44","slug":"george-f-will-and-the-beach-boys-meet-alexius-meinong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2012\/06\/21\/george-f-will-and-the-beach-boys-meet-alexius-meinong\/","title":{"rendered":"George F. Will and the Beach Boys Meet Alexius Meinong"},"content":{"rendered":"

"The Beach Boys Still Get Around." Excellent sociocultural analysis<\/a> by George Will.  Opening paragraph:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

T<\/em>hree hours before showtime, Brian Wilson<\/a> says: \u201cThere is no Rhonda.\u201d Sitting backstage at Merriweather Post Pavilion, gathering strength for the evening\u2019s 48-song, 150-minute concert<\/a>, Wilson was not asked about her, he just volunteered this fact. The other members of the Beach Boys seem mildly surprised to learn that the 1965 song \u201cHelp Me, Rhonda\u201d was about no one in particular.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The philosopher of language in London Ed <\/a>should find the above intriguing.  The song<\/a> was about no one in particular in that Brian Wilson had no actual person in mind as Rhonda.  But surely the song was about three people, one named 'Rhonda,' another girl referred to only by an antecedent-less 'she,' and the singer.  "Since she put me down, I was out doin' in my head."  There is a sense in which these are three particular, numerically distinct, persons.  <\/span><\/p>\n

If you deny that, aren't you saying that the song is not about anybody?  And wouldn't that be wrong?<\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, the persons in  question are incomplete objects.  They violate the property version of the Law of Excluded Middle.  We know some of Rhonda's properties but not all of them.  We know that she looked "so fine" to the singer.  And we know that she caught the singer's eye.  But we don't know her height, the color of her eyes or her blood pressure.  With respect to those properties she is indeterminate.  Same with the other girl.  We know she was going to be the singer's wife, and he was going to be her man, but not much else.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now nothing incomplete can exist.  So the three persons are three particular nonexistent objects, and the song is about three persons in particular.<\/span><\/p>\n

I wrote this just to get London Ed's goat.  The record will show that I myself eschew Meinongianism.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

"The Beach Boys Still Get Around." Excellent sociocultural analysis by George Will.  Opening paragraph: Three hours before showtime, Brian Wilson says: \u201cThere is no Rhonda.\u201d Sitting backstage at Merriweather Post Pavilion, gathering strength for the evening\u2019s 48-song, 150-minute concert, Wilson was not asked about her, he just volunteered this fact. The other members of the … Continue reading “George F. Will and the Beach Boys Meet Alexius Meinong”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[408,482,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-language-philosophy-of","category-meinong-matters","category-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9617"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9617\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}