Download Fiction Paper

Fictional Migration and the Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis Before addressing what it is to say that a fictional character migrates from one work of
fiction to the next, it’s imperative to clarify the identity conditions for a fictional entity. How
one ultimately characterizes fictional entities often becomes a matter of deciding what
commitments one is willing or unwilling to give up. I am unwilling to give up a commitment to
poetic license with a vengeance. Coined by Harry Deutsch, a “principle of poetic license”
captures the intuition that absolutely anything can be a story. As a loosely-constructed
comprehension principle for story generation, a principle of poetic license shows the logical
basis for the claim that any proposition can constitute a story1. In endorsing poetic license in its
fullest, it follows that any theory of fictional entities that requires poetic license to be restricted
ought to be rejected.
A commitment to unrestricted poetic license precludes an object-theoretic analysis of
fictional entities. That is to say, fictional entities cannot be construed as objects without
restricting poetic license. An object theory of fiction has to provide an account of how a fictional
object has the properties it has. Fictional objects have both the properties ascribed to them in the
work in which they appear and also the properties they possess actually. A strong, unrestricted
comprehension principle of object generation holds that for any conditions on properties C, there
is an object that possesses all and only those properties satisfying C. Traditionally there has been
two ways in which object-theorists have dealt with the problem of accounting for the properties
the fictional object has relative to the story and relative to the actual world. One approach
involves positing two distinct kinds of properties and the other approach involves positing two
1
Deutsch 1 distinct modes of predication. The first approach involves the claim that there are different kinds
of properties, for example internal properties or external properties. The second approach holds
that there is only one kind of property, but an object can have its properties in different ways, for
example by either encoding or exemplification. In the end, it doesn’t make a difference whether
one adopts a kinds of properties distinction or a modes of predication distinction. Any fullfledged object-theoretic comprehension principle leads to paradox. This paradox is similar in
nature to the Russell paradox. The Russell paradox showed a problem with naïve set-theory, in
that the “set of all sets that do not contain themselves as members” would be a member of itself
if and only if it was not a member of itself. In order to avoid paradox, restrictions must be placed
on the comprehension principle so that not every object can be generated via the comprehension
principle. But this violates the principle of poetic licenses that holds that we can make up
absolutely anything we want to make up. And so, to maintain poetic license with a vengeance,
object-theoretic analyses of fictional entities are rejected.
Now, it is not crucial at this juncture to endorse a positive account of fictional entities.
One might remain ontologically neutral while maintaining that whatever fictional entities may
be, they are definitely not objects. In fact, it is probably most wise to remain ontologically
neutral, as a full account of fictional entities may require very difficult problems in the
philosophy of mind, intentionality in particular, to be solved. For now it will suffice to say that
fictional entities are intentional “objects” (for lack of a better word), whatever they might be
according to a complete theory of mind. I suspect that fictional entities are best defined as
concepts and that our intentional attitudes toward fictional entities are a matter of quantifying
over properties. But again, at this point, it will be enough to maintain a stance of ontological
2 neutrality toward fictional entities while maintaining that they are not objects, as object-theoretic
approaches to fictional entities require restricting poetic license to avoid paradoxical objects.
Returning to the phenomenon of fictional migration, as fictional entities are not objects,
the identity conditions for fictional entities across works cannot be a matter of sameness of
object. So when we ask what makes the fictional entity in fictional work A the same fictional
entity in fictional work B, we cannot answer by saying that they are the same object. We can,
while still maintaining neutrality, say that the same concept picks out both entities. And we can
also hold that fictional “worlds” are a type of fictional entity and thus the identity conditions for
fictional worlds are also a matter of falling under the same concept.
It’s important to be clear on what is meant by fictional “worlds” when accounting for
fictional migration. When claiming that a fictional character migrates from one fictional world
to another or that two works of fiction take place in the same fictional, it requires that we give an
account of what makes fictional worlds distinct or what makes them the same. But even if we
hold that fictional world identity is a matter of sameness of concept, questions still arise. We
need to address the question of whether distinct fictional worlds can combine, a phenomenon I’ll
call ‘fusion’. If fusion is possible, we need to stipulate the conditions under which two distinct
fictional worlds may or may not successfully fuse. Additionally, we need to address the question
of whether fictional migration is possible in the absence of fusion.
Given that we are loosely defining fictional entities (thus fictional characters and fictional
worlds) as concepts, it might strange to talk of two concepts fusing or one concept migrating
from another concept. If they are concepts, fictional entities are, or at least can be, highly
complex concepts. But when we consider simpler concepts, fusion and migration don’t seem all
3 that strange. For example, the concepts ‘unmarried’ and ‘male’ fuse in the concept ‘bachelor’.
Likewise, we can abstract the concept ‘unmarried’ from the concept ‘bachelor’ and in that sense
‘unmarried’ migrates out of ‘bachelor’. With an intuitive sense of fusion and migration, we can
now provide a more formal account that specifies the conditions for successful fusion and
successful migration.
Once again, we need to consider whether our analysis of fictional fusion or fictional
migration requires us to sacrifice any commitments we might be unwilling to sacrifice. As
fusion of fictional worlds involves combining the propositions that are true in those worlds, the
issue of truth in fiction becomes central to the discussion. While providing a thorough account
of truth in fiction is outside the scope of this paper, the question of how to handle contradiction is
highly relevant when considering the conditions under which we can successfully combine
fictional worlds. On most accounts of truth in fiction, more is true in a given fiction than is
explicitly stated. Not only are the propositions stipulated as true in the fiction true, but so are the
propositions entailed by those propositions. Now when fictional world are combined, it might be
the case that a contradiction arises in either the explicitly stipulated propositions or in the
propositions that are true by entailment. So, we might ask what happens when fictional worlds
combine and a contradiction arises.
We might first ask why it matters if combining fictional worlds generates a contradiction.
We might ask why we should care about contradictions. We should care about contradictions
because in logic, everything follows from a contradiction. This is called explosion. If we don’t
block explosion, we have to allow that in contradictory fiction, everything is true. Some
philosophers, David Lewis for instance, take the position that it is the case that in contradictory
fiction (a type of impossible fiction), everything is true. This seems unappealing. Lewis does
4 make accommodations for venially impossible fiction, in which the impossibility that arises from
the contradiction is a matter of oversight on the part of the author. His accommodation involves
appealing to revised, contradictory-free versions of the fiction2. This latter approach
compromises poetic licenses. It also raises the question of whether we need to allow for
impossible fiction to avoid constraining poetic license. The answer is yes. If we simply stipulate
that fiction must be possible, we constrain poetic license. We should be free to make up any
story we want, possible or impossible.
But what should we do with contradictions? As embracing contradictions would involve
sacrificing rules of logic I refuse to sacrifice, I suggest that the best option for dealing with
contradictions is to adopt a relevance logic in regard to fiction. Relevance logic will allow us to
bracket contradictions to avoid explosion but falls short of embracing contradiction at the
expense of classical logic. In respect to fusion, we can hold that the degree to which fusion is
possible is relative to the amount of bracketing that would be required to fuse the fictions. We’ll
now look at some possible instances of fusion, in the context of the Tommy Westphall Universe
Hypothesis.
Tommy Westphall is an autistic child character on televisions St. Elsewhere. The last
episode of St. Elsewhere suggests that the entirety of the show took place in the imagination of
Tommy Westphall. St. Elsewhere shared characters with other shows, for instance Homicide:
Life on the Street, which shared characters with other shows, which shared characters with other
shows… If we hold that in virtue of shared characters, the fictions in question take place in the
same fictional world, we can reach the ridiculous conclusion that all these television shows
2
Lewis 5 actually take place in the mind of Tommy Westphall. Philosopher Brian Weatherst3on came up
with six objections to the Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis. I’m not going to address all
six, but his sixth objection is relevant to the discussion of fictional fusion and migration.
Weatherson’s sixth objection simply states that just because a fictional character appears in two
different shows, it doesn’t follow that the shows take place in the same fictional world. This
seems to imply that fusion is not necessary for migration, and migration is not sufficient for
fusion. If we deny that migration is sufficient for fusion, the Tommy Westphall Universe
Hypothesis falls apart.
Though the Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis falls apart, it does provide a good
source of examples of fictional migration. Let’s consider the fictional character John Munch.
Munch first appeared in Homicide: Life on the Stree and later transitioned to Law and Order:
SVU. As the worlds of Homicide: Life on the Street and Law and Order: SVU are similar and
combining the two doesn’t generate any glaring contradictions I’m aware of (as we can allow for
insignificant contradictions to be bracketed), we can say that this is an instance of fictional
migration and successful fusion. Munch also appeared in an episode of The X-Files. Since The
X-Files involves a lot of weird, paranormal stuff, we could say that to try to combine the world
of The X-Files with the worlds of Homicide: Life on the Street and Law and Order: SVU would
require extensive bracketing. So here we would have an instance of fictional migration but not
of successful fictional-world fusion.
To conclude, fictional migration is not sufficient to entail fictional fusion. Just because
two fictions share the same fictional character, it doesn’t follow that they share the same fictional
world. They might share the same fictional world, but fusion of fictional worlds requires that
3
http://tar.weatherson.org/2004/10/04/six-­‐objections-­‐to-­‐the-­‐westphall-­‐hypothesis/ 6 bracketing be kept to a minimum. As fictional entities are not objects, an account of fictional
migration that characterizes successful migration in terms of object-identity across fictions is
problematic. And if one wants to block explosion so as not to have it be the case that everything
is true in an inconsistent fiction, adopting a relevance logic is the best option. So, a successful
account of fictional migration needs to reject an object theory of fiction and ought to adopt a
relevance logic with respect to the realm of fiction. These considerations are not merely
interesting in the context of the philosophy of fiction. ‘Fictionalism’ is adopted as a
methodological approach to ontological issues in the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy
of science, ethics and other areas. As treating entities as “useful fictions” gains popularity, the
more important it becomes to construct a complete theory of fiction not just for philosophy, but
for a wide range of disciplines.
7 References: Deutsch, Harry “Making up Stories” Empty Names, Fiction, and the Puzzles of Non-­‐Existence Anthony Everett and Thomas Hofweber (eds) 2000, CSLI Publications Lewis, David “Truth in Fiction.” American Philosophical Quarterly 15, (1978), 37-­‐46 http://tar.weatherson.org/2004/10/04/six-­‐objections-­‐to-­‐the-­‐westphall-­‐hypothesis/ 8