ABSTRACT
The term ‘naturalism’ is a badge of honour; for others, it is a term of abuse. On these grounds alone, it is predictable that the term admits a wide range of conflicting interpretations. Ontological naturalists maintain, roughly, that natural reality exhausts causal reality: there are none but natural causal entities with none but natural causal powers. Naturalists disagree about whether there are non-causal entities: for example, some, but not all, naturalists allow that there are non-causal abstract objects. Naturalists disagree about whether there is ‘first philosophy’. Some naturalists are entirely dismissive of any alleged investigation of the first causes of things, that which does not change, and ‘being as such’. Naturalists disagree about the stance to take on disputes between rationalists and empiricists. ‘Naturalism’ has many critics. There are many volumes devoted to arguments against ‘naturalism’.
