Focus paper on the epistemology and metaphysics of F

The difference between something being an F and how we know it is an F rests in the difference between something possessing a certain property and our ability to know about a property. Our ability to know about a property depends on two avenues of inquiry: through empirical evidence and through analytical reasoning. Suppose our F is actually the letter “f.” We might know the letter is “f” because the symbol is linked to a sound. We also know where “f” falls in the alphabet (this is included in the definition of f-ness, along with its sound), so that we know something is f given its sound (except in cases like “philosophy”) and by its position in the alphabet. We understand some rudimentary rules of English, and then all questions about the identity of “f” become fairly obvious. For example, given this question: “what is the letter between “e” and “g”?” the answer is obvious because part of the definition of “f” is that it falls between these two letters. This is a case of analytically based epistemology; another case would be knowing that a letter is “f” by getting this description: “the sixth letter of the alphabet.” Gaining analytical knowledge of “f” inherently involves understanding the alphabet system. I am uncertain as to whether it actually is possible to gain a priori knowledge of something like an alphabet system. It seems like this system is a conceptual framework of sorts, but it also seems that the only way one can come to any kind of knowledge about the alphabet would be through experiencing it. Is being told about the alphabet or seeing it written out enough to be considered experiencing it? It doesn’t seem as though we can experience it in any other way, or that we could come to any understanding of it aside from what has already been mentioned.

Let us return to the example of knowing “f” by its sound. Before we had cases of analytic understanding of how a letter is “f”; I think that coming to an understanding about “f” through an experience (a posteriori) with its particular sound is gaining empirical knowledge about “f.” It seems that this happens for us as children; we hear the sound and then later we are taught that the sound corresponds with a certain symbol. We are gaining empirical knowledge about a language, something artificially created by humans. A case would be as a child, I don’t know how to say a certain word starting with “f”. I go to my mother and ask her to say it for me. I hear the sound and then understand through my experience of having my mother read it aloud that the letter-sound corresponds to the symbol “f”. This is a case of empirically based epistemology. After empirical knowledge is gained about the alphabet, then it seems that analytical rules can be understood.

Something is an F when it possesses some essential property; it’s F-ness. I take this to go beyond the meaning that something is an F when it is necessarily identical with itself. In other words, something could not be an F unless it has property x in every counterfactual. For example, “f” would not be “f” unless it was a letter. If we try to imagine a counterfactual where “f” is a number (I don’t mean a variable), then I think we should be inclined to say that the thing we are talking about is no longer “f”. It seems that we could imagine a number system that replaces every symbol we take as a letter for a number value, and in this sense “f” could be a number. This would be placing “f” in a new system. But I am still inclined to believe that a symbol that looks identical to “f” outside of our current conceptual framework of language would not actually be “f.” Something is an F because of certain essential properties: for “f” some of them would be a. being a letter, b. corresponding to a certain sound, c. being a certain kind of letter (a consonant), etc.