Modality

Conventionalism about necessity was deemed hopeless for a long time. The philosophical landscape, however, is shifting now with recent work in modal metaphysics locating the source of necessity in some kind of convention, albeit non-linguistic. Modal neo-conventionalists claim that a proposition is necessary just when it is true and is classified as such as a matter of convention. But what is the function of adopting a convention about necessity? And what are these conventions that distinguish what is possible from what (...) is impossible, anyway? In this paper, I first offer an elucidation of the two accounts of neo-conventionalism, which I call ‘worlds-based neo-conventionalism’ and ‘axiom-based neo-conventionalism’. Then, I discuss a number of pressing questions that modal neo-conventionalism faces. The moral is that neo-conventionalists have some work to do in order for the account to be explanatorily satisfactory. (shrink)

This paper responds to Friend’s (2023) critique of the Powers-BSA, a view according to which laws of nature are efficient descriptions of how modally laden properties (powers) are possibly distributed in spacetime. In the course of this response, the paper discusses the nature of scientific and metaphysical explanation, the aim of science and the structure of modal space.

Pretense imagination is imagination understood as the ability to recreate rational belief revision. This kind of imagination is used in pretend-play, risk-assessment, etc. Some even claim that this kind of hypothetical belief revision can be grounds to justify new beliefs in conditionals, in particular conditionals that play a foundational role in the epistemology of modality. In this paper, I will argue that it cannot. I will first provide a very general theory of pretense imagination, which I formalise using tools from (...) dynamic epistemic logic. As a result, we can clearly see that pretense imagination episodes are build up out of two kinds of imaginative stages, so I will present an argument by cases. This argument shows that pretense imagination might indeed provide us with justification for believing certain conditionals. Despite this, I will argue that these are not the kind of conditionals that allow pretense imagination to play a foundational role in the epistemology of modality. (shrink)

Necessity, but not possibility, is typically thought to be rare and suspicion-worthy. This manifests in an asymmetry in the burden of proof incurred by modal claims. In general, claims to the effect that some proposition is impossible/necessary require significant argumentative support and, in general, claims to the effect that some proposition is possible/contingent are thought to be justified freely or by default. Call this the possibility bias. In this paper, I argue that the possibility bias is not epistemically justified. We (...) should regard possibility with at least as much suspicion, that is to say as incurring at least as much of an explanatory demand, as necessity. In fact, I suggest that we might even be justified in reversing the burden of proof asymmetry and adopting a necessity bias. This has quite radical implications for philosophical methodology and hence for many first-order philosophical concerns. (shrink)

Current orthodoxy in modal logic and metaphysics has it that actuality is non-contingent in the following sense: for all p, if actually, p, then necessarily, actually, p. Call this thesis (Actuality) Necessitism and its negation (Actuality) Contingentism. Thus, according to Contingentism, there is at least one proposition p which is actually true but which could have been actually false. In another paper, one of us (Glazier 2023) has recently defended Contingentism. The present paper explores the logic of actuality under Contingentism. (...) After informally introducing Contingentism and outlining what we take to be the main motivations for accepting it, we consider how contingent actuality should be taken to be. We argue that the nature, or essence, of actuality imposes certain limits on the extent to which actuality could have been different, and these then inform our view of the logic of actuality. Turning to the formal study of the logic of contingent actuality, we specify a formal language and a possible world semantics for that language and distinguish a number of natural notions of validity and consequence to which it gives rise. We present axiomatizations of the different resulting logics and examine the variety of iterated modalities in our systems. We establish soundness and completeness results. (shrink)

Thought experiments feature prominently in both scientific and philosophical methods. In this paper, I investigate two questions surrounding knowledge in the thought experiment process. First, on what implicit knowledge do thought experiments rely? Second, what provides epistemic justification for beliefs acquired through the process? I draw upon neo-Aristotelian metaphysics and Husserlian phenomenology to argue that essence is the object of implicit knowledge that anchors the imagined possibilities involved in thought experiments to the actual world, and that this essentialist knowledge enables (...) the possibility of prima facie justification being conferred by the phenomenological givenness of thought experiment scenarios. (shrink)

This essay defends two theses regarding the explanation, or ground, of modality in the early modern period. First, for philosophers in the period, essences ground a range of important modal facts. Second, as the period progresses, we witness increased skepticism about certain modal facts, due to a growing skepticism about the scope or existence of essences. These theses are supported by examination of three case studies: Descartes’ treatment of substance and mode (which forms the core of his ontology); Malebranche’s treatment (...) of causation (which bears on his defense of occasionalism); and Locke’s treatment of necessary connections among properties (which is related to his accounts of individuals and kinds). It is shown that in each case, claims about necessity and possibility take center stage, and that in each case, the status of these claims hinges on the status of claims about essences. (shrink)

Rozwiązanie paradoksów Rossa i Priora okazało się trudnym zadaniem. Jego pierwsze dwa etapy, obejmujące identyfikację prawdziwych natur implikacji i wartości logicznych, zostały opisane w artykułach "Rozwiązanie paradoksu implikacji materialnej – 2024" i "Rozwiązanie dylematu Jörgensena – 2024". Ten artykuł opisuje trzeci etap, obejmujący odkrycie brakujących funktorów modalnych i Klasycznego Rachunku Modalności. Na zakończenie zostają podane procedury rozwiązania obu paradoksów.

Priority monism is the doctrine that there is only one basic object: the entire cosmos. Priority monists often take this to be a metaphysically necessary thesis. I explore the consequences of modalizing the priority monist thesis. I argue that, modulo some assumptions, the modalized thesis entails the necessary existence of the actual cosmos. I further argue that, if the modalized thesis is true, and the actual cosmos necessarily exists, then the only possible concrete objects are the actually existing ones.

According to First-Person Realism, one's own first-person perspective on the world is metaphysically privileged in some way. After clarifying First-Person Realism by reference to parallel debates in the metaphysics of modality and time, I survey eight different arguments in favor of First-Person Realism.

The Consequence Argument for incompatibilism is beset by two rival interpretations: the counterfactual sufficiency interpretation and the counterfactual might interpretation. Waldrop recently argued that the counterfactual sufficiency interpretation conflicts with certain principles governing the logic of counterfactuals. In this paper, I show that Waldrop’s argument can be adapted to prove that the counterfactual might interpretation also conflicts with the same principles. So the problem Waldrop pointed out is not peculiar to the counterfactual sufficiency interpretation.

Dispositionalism is the theory of modality according to which all (metaphysical and natural) modal truths are made true by some actual irreducibly dispositional property. The relationship between Dispositionalism and time is yet to be satisfactorily explored. In this paper we contribute to this task by examining how Dispositionalism deals with ‘dated truths’: propositions involving a specific time, e.g. “It might rain at 12.30”. We examine two possible accounts: the first, 'Dated Manifestations Strategy', is the idea that powers are very fine-grained, (...) and tend towards temporally very specific manifestations. We argue that such strategy should not be adopted, for it leads to unnecessary violations of ontological parsimony; it is unable to accommodate an ontology of platonic universals; and it is incapable of offering a principled explanation of the forward-looking nature of powers. We offer an alternative account, the "Duration Strategy", which relies on an independently determined arrow of time and the existence of some “duration facts” that specify how long a power takes to bring about its manifestation. We argue that the Duration Strategy is to be preferred. We then flesh out the account by exploring the connection between powers, duration facts, and processes. (shrink)

We ordinarily think that we human beings have agency: we have control over our choices and make a difference to our environments. Yet it is not obvious how agency can fit into a physical world that is governed by exceptionless laws of nature. In particular, it is unclear how agency is possible if those laws are deterministic and the universe functions like a mechanical clockwork. In this short paper, I first explain the apparent conflict between agency and physical determinism (referring (...) to recent work by Helen Steward on "agency incompatibilism"), then review some salient responses one might give to this conflict, and finally sketch a response that rests on a distinction between “physical” and “agential possibilities.” Agency, I suggest, is a higher-level phenomenon, which comes with its own level-specific notion of possibility, and it cannot be adequately analyzed in physical terms alone or just through the lens of physical possibility. (The paper was written as an informal position paper for a symposium on "Possibilities".). (shrink)

A model of metaphysics associated with EJ Lowe and Tuomas Tahko sees metaphysics as involving a priori knowledge of possible essences, or at least modal facts, and delimiting the actual ‘ontological categories,’ the ultimate and essential divisions of what exists, based on the results of a posteriori scientific investigation. Their approach to metaphysics has been criticized by those who argue that such metaphysics is unsuitably a priori, disconnected with empirical research in natural science, and ends up failing to provide meaningful (...) constraints on metaphysical theorization. I present different epistemological and semantic worries about these accounts to motivate an alternative perspective on which metaphysics centers on form, rather than possibility. This scholastic perspective is shown to incorporate the skeptical insights as constitutive of its approach to existence, by way of the position that ‘being’ is not a genus. Rather, ‘being’ is a determinable. The scholastic approach can thus provide responses to the skeptics, since it denies that ontological categories – in the Lowe/Tahko sense – are what metaphysicians investigate and proposes a different view of ontological categories as classes of forms. (shrink)

This volume draws connections between Wittgenstein's philosophy and the work of Saul Kripke, especially his Naming and Necessity. Saul Kripke is regarded as one of the foremost representatives of contemporary analytic philosophy. His most important contributions include the strict distinction between metaphysical and epistemological questions, the introduction of the notions of contingent a priori truth and necessary a posteriori truth and original accounts of names, descriptions, identity, necessity and realism. The chapters in this book elucidate the relevant connections between Kripke's (...) work and Wittgenstein, specifically concerning the standard meter, contingent apriori and rule-following. The contributions shed light on how Kripke's philosophical outlook was influenced by Wittgenstein, and how mainstream analytic philosophy and Wittgensteinian philosophy can fruitfully engage with one another. Kripke and Wittgenstein will be of interest to philosophers working on Wittgenstein, Kripke, and the history of analytic philosophy. (shrink)

Stephen Mumford and Alexander Bird disagree about which properties are powers and, correspondingly, about the extent of the philosophical work to which powers may be put. Unfortunately, there is an important respect in which these authors are talking past each other and so the reason for their disagreement remains obscured. I highlight what has gone wrong in their recent exchange, attempt to clear up the confusion and pinpoint the true source of their disagreement. My hope is to redirect the efforts (...) of these authors and their followers onto more pressing foundational issues in the metaphysics of powers. (shrink)

Two approaches to elevating certain laws of nature over others have come to prominence recently. On the one hand, according to the meta-laws approach, there are meta-laws, laws which relate to laws as those laws relate to particular facts. On the other hand, according to the modal, or non-absolutist, approach, some laws are necessary in a stricter sense than others. Both approaches play an important role in current research, questioning the ‘orthodoxy’ represented by the leading philosophical theories of natural laws—Humeanism, (...) the DTA view, dispositional essentialism and primitivism. This paper clarifies the relations between these two emerging approaches, as well as their applicability to physical laws and the status of the challenges they pose for standard theories of laws of nature. We first argue that, despite some significant similarities between the two approaches (especially in the context of Lange’s counterfactual account of laws), they are in general distinct and largely independent of each other. Then, we argue that the support for meta-laws from physical theory and practice is more questionable than usually presented. (shrink)

This paper discusses the account of alethic modality as presented by Wilfrid Sellars in his earlier work from 1947 to 1958. Its aim is twofold. First, I discuss Sellars' analysis by exploring its historical relationship to Carnap's account of modality. I argue that Carnap's early syntactic treatment of modality profoundly influenced Sellars' own so-called ‘regulist' account of modality in terms of rules of inference. Furthermore, it is suggested that Sellars' lesser-known possible worlds analysis was influenced by Carnap's later semantic account (...) of modality. The second aim of the paper is a critical one. I raise a number of objections to Sellars’ account of modality and argue that his account confronts some serious limitations. I also argue that Sellars does not provide a satisfying explanation of the relationship between his regulist account and his possible worlds analysis. I offer such an explanation by arguing that his regulist account should be understood as a pragmatic account of what is conveyed by the use of modal sentences, whereas his possible worlds analysis is a semantic account of the asserted content of modal statements. That is, the regulist account and the possible worlds analysis have different explanatory targets. (shrink)

1. T. Antike Philosophie -- 2. T. Christliche Philosophie.

Grounding necessitarianism (GN) is the view that full grounds necessitate what they ground. Although GN has been rather popular among philosophers, it faces important counterexamples: For instance, A=[Socrates died] fully grounds C=[Xanthippe became a widow]. However, A fails to necessitate C: A could have obtained together with B=[Socrates and Xanthippe were never married], without C obtaining. In many cases, the debate essentially reduces to whether A indeed fully grounds C – as the contingentist claims – or if instead C is (...) fully grounded in A+, namely A plus some supplementary fact S (e.g. [Xanthippe was married to Socrates]) – as the necessitarian claims. Both sides typically agree that A+ necessitates C, while A does not; they disagree on whether A or A+ fully grounds C. This paper offers a novel defence of the claim that, in these typical cases, unlike A+, A fails to fully ground C – thereby bringing further support to GN. First and foremost, unlike A+, A fails to fully ground C because it fails to contain just what is relevant to do so, in two distinct senses – explanatory and generative relevance. Second, going for A, rather than A+, as a full ground undermines not just grounding necessitarianism, but modally weaker views which even contingentists may want to preserve. (shrink)

I argue that it is metaphysically necessary that: (i) every fundamental entity is conscious, and (ii) every fundamental property is a phenomenal property.

A widely debated issue in contemporary metaphysics is whether the modal profile of ordinary objects has to be explained in non-modal terms (that is, Thesis 1). However, how to solve such an issue with respect to occurrences – namely, processes and events – is a question that has been largely neglected in the current metaphysical debate. The general goal of this article is to start filling this gap. As a first result of the article, we make it plausible that, if (...) Thesis 1 holds for objects, then it also holds for processes and events. Then, we develop a metaphysical account of processes derived from Fine’s (1999, 2022) suggestions, according to which a process is a variable embodiment that is manifested by different events at the different times it goes on – namely, Thesis 2. We raised the challenge from the completion of a process that asks the Finean account of processes to explain relevant modal features of processes in non-modal terms. As a second result, we argue that four initially plausible strategies for solving such a challenge fall short of solving it. As a third result, we show that the theory of variable embodiments Fine formulates for objects must differ from the theory of variable embodiments that aims to model processes. We conclude by investigating some revisions to a theory of variable embodiments that aims to model processes. (shrink)

As Price (2009) famously mused, if a philosopher were to be magically transported, perhaps through means of time travel, from the 1950s to the modern day, they would indeed be shocked by the resurgence of metaphysics in the analytic tradition. Most of all, perhaps, they would be shocked by the popularity of power metaphysics. What a strange item to have in a philosopher’s curriculum, they might think: after all, didn’t David Hume claim that “[t]here are no ideas which can occur (...) in metaphysics more obscure and uncertain than those of power, force, energy, or necessary connection”? Indeed, much has changed since then. At the pain of using overly vague terminology, we can call “power metaphysics” the subdiscipline of metaphysics interested in the development and evaluation of a family of positions which we will refer to under the umbrella term of “dispositionalism”. According to dispositionalists, the world we inhabit is also populated by genuine and irreducible powers, dispositions, and capacities of objects. (shrink)

The actions of able agents are often reliably successful. I argue that their success may be modally robust along two dimensions. The first dimension helps distinguish the exercise of abilities, which requires local control, from lucky success. The second concerns the global availability of acts: agents with the ability to φ can φ across a variety of circumstances. I introduce a framework that captures the two dimensions and their interaction, and show how it bears on a disagreement about the modal (...) force the robustness of ability requires: while local control involves a kind of local necessity, global availability does not. (shrink)

I maintain that substantive metaphysics makes an ineliminable contribution to our mind’s cognitive relation to objects. To account for the precise nature of this metaphysical contribution, I investigate domains of thought in which our cognitive relation to objects appears problematic. In perception, an experience’s metaphysical dependence upon objects and their essences ground its content and, in part, epistemic worth. Regarding metaphysical modality, viewing modality and actuality as equally fundamental is pivotal to understanding our modal knowledge and thought. Relating to the (...) ontological argument, and necessary existents generally, understanding ontological statuses as differences in the way an object’s properties are grounded contributes to explaining our thoughts’ relation to objects. Systematic and historical research are integrated in developing these philosophical views, drawing on Descartes, Baumgarten, and Kant in particular. (shrink)

Was bisexuality a widespread feature of ancient Greek society? This question is an instance of cross-cultural projection -- of taking the means through which people are categorized in one culture and applying it to members of another. It’s widely held by those who think that sexual orientation is socially constructed that its projection poses a problem. In this paper, I offer a more careful analysis of this alleged problem. To analyze projection, I adapt Iris Einheuser’s substratum-carving model of conventionalism to (...) fit the specific needs of social construction. Using this model, I show that projection is conceptually coherent, and so does not for that reason pose any problem. Along the way, I identify some of the epistemic difficulties facing projection. While these difficulties are formidable, they are not substantially affected by the constructivist claim. I therefore conclude that there is no unique problem facing the projection of a socially constructed sexual orientation. (shrink)

Spinoza scholars have had good reason to be in Shirley's debt in the past on account of his excellent translations of the Ethics and the Tractatus Theologico-Politicus. Now again, they will be no less in his debt with his translation of Spinoza's correspondence. The text translated is "based largely on Gebhardt, but takes into account the more recently discovered letters and additional critical work published through 1995". Shirley's is the first complete English translation of the correspondence since Wolf's pioneering effort (...) in 1928. Curley's translation has, to date, presented only letters 1-29. (shrink)

This is a collection of fifteen of Ruth Barcan Marcus's most important and influential essays, drawn from a wide variety of sources. The earliest of these essays, the classic "Modalities and Intensional Languages," was originally published in 1961, although the present collection adds, as an appendix, an excerpt from a 1948 review of Smullyan. The most recent essay in the collection, "Some Revisionary Proposals about Belief and Believing," was first published in 1990.

In diesem Aufsatz argumentiere ich für eine teleologische Fähigkeitstheorie, derzufolge Fähigkeiten Dispositionen zu zweckmäßigem Handeln sind.