A Chance for Possibility: An Investigation into the Grounds of Modality

Description

Winner of the 2012 GAP/ontos Award A Chance for Possibility defends the view that the objective modal realm is tripartite: truths about possible worlds supervene on modal truths, which in turn supervene on truths about objective chances. An understanding of supervenience in terms of grounding is developed which — unlike the standard modal characterization — allows the question of what modal truths supervene on to have a non-trivial answer. Relying on this understanding, a negative result is established: modal truths do not supervene on truths about possible worlds, whether possible worlds are conceived of as Lewisian concreta or as abstract objects of some kind. Instead, a conception of pleonastic possible worlds is developed that reverses the direction of supervenience. On the basis of linguistic considerations concerning our use of natural language ‘might’ and ‘might have’ sentences, Steinberg finally argues that truths about objective chances are able to provide a supervenience base for modal truths. A Chance for Possibility is an investigation in analytic metaphysics, drawing on related work in the philosophy of logic and language as well as linguistics. It provides a detailed case study for the fruitful use of a notion of grounding in the clarification and evaluation of longstanding philosophical issues. 1 Introduction 2 Supervenience 2.1 Supervenience 2.2 Covariance 2.3 Covariance and Ontological Priority 2.4 Covariance and Modal Supervenience 2.5 Modal Supervenience and Explanation 2.6 Explaining Explanations A Strong and Global Supervenience A.1 Kim’s Attempted Equivalence Proof A.2 Non-Equivalence Examples A.3 Restricted Entailment? A.4 Against Restricted Entailment 3 Concrete Possible Worlds 3.1 Possibility and Possible Worlds 3.2 The Analysis Claim 3.3 Lewis Worlds 3.4 The Irrelevance Objection 3.4.1 Against IO1 3.4.2 Against IO2 3.4.3 Against IO3 3.5 Counterparts 3.6 Actual Problems for Lewis 3.6.1 Possible Non-Existence 3.6.2 Surprises 3.6.3 Actuality 3.7 Lewisian Explanations 4 Abstract Possible Worlds 4.1 Something from Nothing 4.1.1 Pleonastic Properties 4.1.2 Something-from-Nothing Entailment Claims 4.1.3 Property Concepts 4.1.4 True SNECs 4.2 Pleonastic Possible Worlds 4.3 Objections and Clarifications 4.3.1 Existence 4.3.2 Explanation 4.3.3 Competitors 5 Possibility and Probability 5.1 Initial Motivation 5.2 Different Kinds of Probability 5.2.1 Epistemic Probabilities 5.2.2 Objective Probabilities 5.3 The Temporal Structure of ‘Might’s 5.3.1 Might 5.3.2 Might Have 5.3.3 Different Readings 5.4 DeRose on ‘Might’ Sentences 5.5 Supervenience 5.6 Objective and Metaphysical Possibility 6 Conclusion Appendix A Non-Nominal Quantification Name Index Bibliography