Some Critical Issues in Social Ontology: Reply to John Searle

In my original paper I compared John Searle's conception of social ontology with my own. I concluded that in their basics the two accounts share a significant degree of overlap, albeit with these basics expressed in very different terms. However, I also suggested that Searle's conception does not go far enough. Specifically, although Searle seemingly often presupposes an account of emergent totalities and a founding role to human practices other than language use, these remain, at best, implicit and under-examined. In his typically robust and insightful reply, for which I am very grateful, Searle views things somewhat differently. Specifically, he appears to interpret various aspects of those parts of my account that I believe parallel his as deficient, and he is dismissive of most additional features of my conception, supposing them to rest on an untenable thesis that emergence is an explanatory notion. I do not have space to address all of Searle's critical comments here, so I concentrate on issues I believe lie at the heart of our differences.