The problem of the ontological commitments of semantics

The article raises the question of the ontological commitments of a semantic theory. It is demonstrated that Tarski's semantics is independent of any theory of truth. We justify the semantics' independence of ontological commitments related to the quantification of the variables of a particular object theory. The main difficulty in using the category of ontological commitments author sees is that the semantics refers to the metalanguages level, while the methodology of the analysis of ontological commitment is designed primarily for the field of the object’s interpretation of quantifiers. The second important point is that the study of the ontological commitments should be conducted in relation to the theory, but not in relation to the language. In this paper, we justify the ontological neutrality of the meta-language as a language of semantics. The article presents the idea that the Tarski's semantics is indifferent to the choice of the theory of truth. Semantics defines the general conditions of material adequacy for different theories of truth, and the famous Tarski's scheme can act as a universal criterion (canon) to determine the inadequacy of a theory. Tarski present confusion in his semantics of the two points of view to solve the problem of the ontological (metaphysical) nature of the semantic theory. Tarski simultaneously emphasizes a metaphysical neutrality of semantic theory, and at the same time its relationship with the correspondence theory of truth. It is very difficult to interpret in the spirit of ontological neutrality of the semantics. The article presents the rationale for distinguishing the semantics from a theory of truth. If the language is neutral to the existence or non-existence of certain objects, the ontological commitments passed on theory. The W. Quine’s concept of ontological commitments has no consistent differentiation of the language and of the theory; may be, it is related to the features of artificial languages that are always constructed on the basis of some theory. The problem of ontological commitments moves from semantics as language to the area of semantic as theory. However, the semantic theory presents as a meta-theory, and for that reason to talk about the object quantification of the variables in the statements of metalanguage is problematic enough, because for this purpose it is required to enter abstract objects.

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