  The case of metaphysics is similar but perhaps more extreme. Quine accepts that the philosopher is in a position to make very general claims about the world (that there are sets but not properties, for example). In his hands, such claims are answerable to the idea of a total system of our scientific knowledge, regimented so as to maximize clarity and systematicity. Many philosophers have welcomed the freedom to speculate about the nature of the world but have not accepted Quine’s constraints on the process. The result is a flourishing of metaphysics, often based on ordinary (unregimented) language or on the alleged deliverances of ‘intuition’; much of this work would be anathema to Quine. (See Rosen 2014.)