title: Hysteria, race, and phlogiston. A model of ontological elimination in the human sciences.
abstract: Elimination controversies are ubiquitous in philosophy and the human sciences. For example, it has been suggested that human races, hysteria, intelligence, mental disorder, propositional attitudes such as beliefs and desires, the self, and the super-ego should be eliminated from the list of respectable entities in the human sciences. I argue that eliminativist proposals are often presented in the framework of an oversimplified "phlogiston model" and suggest an alternative account that describes ontological elimination on a gradual scale between criticism of empirical assumptions and conceptual choices.
authors.affiliation: Columbia University, Philosophy Department, 1150 Amsterdam Avenue, 708 Philosophy Hall, New York, NY 10027, United States. Electronic address: davidundludwig@gmail.com.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ludwig
mesh_terms: D001695:Biology; D006801:Humans; D007046:Hysteria; D010684:Philosophy; D044469:Racial Groups; D012586:Science
keywords: Elimination; Hysteria; Ontology; Phlogiston; Race; Reference