Social Ontology: Some Basic Principles1         John R. Searle I. The Problem of Social Ontology The aim of this article is to explore the problem of social ontology.  The form that the exploration will take is a development of the argument that I presented in The Construction of Social Realty2.  I will summarize some of the results of that book and then develop the ideas further. First of all, why is there a problem about social ontology at all?  We are talking about the mode of existence of social objects such as the United States of America, the San Francisco Forty Niners football team, the University of California and the Squaw Valley Property Owners Association, as well as such large-scale institutions as money or private property.  We are also talking about social facts, such as the fact that I am a citizen of the United States, that the piece of paper that I hold in my hand is a twenty dollar bill, and that France is a member of the European Union.  We are also talking ab

For hundreds of years now, the lion’s share of all moral philosophy has been laughably mistaken. To defend this with scholarly arguments would be a waste of time. Here, as before, we come face-to-face with the divergent aims of philosophy and scholarship.