Modality And Anti Metaphysics

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Modality and Anti-Metaphysics

Author : Stephen K. McLeod
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 196 pages
File Size : 51,7 Mb
Release : 2018-01-18
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781351740203

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Modality and Anti-Metaphysics by Stephen K. McLeod Pdf

This title was first published in 2001. Modality and Anti-Metaphysics critically examines the most prominent approaches to modality among analytic philosophers in the twentieth century, including essentialism. Defending both the project of metaphysics and the essentialist position that metaphysical modality is conceptually and ontologically primitive, Stephen McLeod argues that the logical positivists did not succeed in banishing metaphysical modality from their own theoretical apparatus and he offers an original defence of metaphysics against their advocacy of its elimination. Seeking to assuage the sceptical worries which underlie modal anti-realism, McLeod provides an original contribution to essentialist epistemology, engaging with current debates about modality and suggesting that standard essentialist approaches to some issues in the philosophies of logic and language require revision. This book offers valuable insights to professional philosophers, postgraduates and advanced undergraduates interested in metaphysics, philosophy of logic or the history of twentieth-century analytic philosophy.

Modality

Author : Bob Hale,Aviv Hoffmann
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 384 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2010-03-25
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780191572296

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Modality by Bob Hale,Aviv Hoffmann Pdf

The philosophy of modality investigates necessity and possibility, and related notions—are they objective features of mind-independent reality? If so, are they irreducible, or can modal facts be explained in other terms? This volume presents new work on modality by established leaders in the field and by up-and-coming philosophers. Between them, the papers address fundamental questions concerning realism and anti-realism about modality, the nature and basis of facts about what is possible and what is necessary, the nature of modal knowledge, modal logic and its relations to necessary existence and to counterfactual reasoning. The general introduction locates the individual contributions in the wider context of the contemporary discussion of the metaphysics and epistemology of modality.

Modality

Author : Joseph Melia
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 192 pages
File Size : 52,9 Mb
Release : 2014-12-18
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781317489672

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Modality by Joseph Melia Pdf

This introduction to modality places the emphasis on the metaphysics of modality rather than on the formal semetics of quantified modal logic. The text begins by introducing students to the "de re/de dicto" distinction, conventionalist and conceptualist theories of modality and some of the key problems in modality, particularly Quine's criticisms. It then moves on to explain how possible worlds provide a solution to many of the problems in modality and how possible worlds themselves have been used to analyse notions outside modality such as properties and propositions. Possible worlds introduce problems of their own and the book argues that to make progress with these problems a theory of possible worlds is required. The pros and cons of various theories of possible worlds are then examined in turn, including those of Lewis, Kripke, Adams, Stalnaker and Plantinga.

Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality

Author : Alvin Plantinga
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 248 pages
File Size : 52,9 Mb
Release : 2003-03-27
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780198026389

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Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality by Alvin Plantinga Pdf

Perhaps no one has done more in the last 30 years to advance thinking in the metaphysics of modality than has Alvin Plantinga. Collected here are some of his most important essays on this influential subject. Dating back from the late 1960's to the present, they chronicle the development of Plantinga's thoughts about some of the most fundamental issues in metaphysics: what is the nature of abstract objects like possible worlds, properties, propositions, and such phenomena? Are there possible but non-actual objects? Can objects that do not exist exemplify properties? Plantinga gives thorough and penetrating answers to all of these questions and many others. This volume contains some of the best work in metaphysics from the past 30 years, and will remain a source of critical contention and keen interest among philosophers of metaphysics and philosophical logic for years to come.

A Critical Introduction to the Metaphysics of Modality

Author : Andrea Borghini
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 233 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2016-02-25
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781472521941

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A Critical Introduction to the Metaphysics of Modality by Andrea Borghini Pdf

A Critical Introduction to the Metaphysics of Modality examines the eight main contemporary theories of possibility behind a central metaphysical topic. Covering modal skepticism, modal expressivism, modalism, modal realism, ersatzism, modal fictionalism, modal agnosticism, and the new modal actualism, this comprehensive introduction to modality places contemporary debates in an historical context. Beginning with a historical overview, Andrea Borghini discusses Parmenides and Zeno; looks at how central Medieval authors such as Aquinas, and Buridan prepared the ground for the Early Modern radical views of Leibniz, Spinoza, and Hume and discusses advancements in semantics in the later-half of the twentieth century a resulted in the rise of modal metaphysics, the branch characterizing the past few decades of philosophical reflection. Framing the debate according to three main perspectives - logical, epistemic, metaphysical- Borghini provides the basic concepts and terms required to discuss modality. With suggestions of further reading and end-of-chapter study questions, A Critical Introduction to the Metaphysics of Modality is an up-to-date resource for students working in contemporary metaphysics seeking a better understanding of this crucial topic.

Kant's Modal Metaphysics

Author : Nicholas F. Stang
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 352 pages
File Size : 40,6 Mb
Release : 2016-03-18
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780191021091

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Kant's Modal Metaphysics by Nicholas F. Stang Pdf

What is possible and why? What is the difference between the merely possible and the actual? In Kants Modal Metaphysics Nicholas Stang examines Kants lifelong engagement with these questions and their role in his philosophical development. This is the first book to trace Kants theory of possibility all theway from the so-called pre-Critical writings of the 1750s and 1760s to the Critical system of philosophy inaugurated by the Critique of Pure Reason in 1781. Stang argues that the key to understanding both the change and the continuity between Kants pre-Critical and Critical theory of possibility is his transformation of the ontological question about possibility-what is it for a being to be possible?-into a question in transcendental philosophy-what is it to represent an object as possible? The first half of Kants Modal Metaphysics explores Kants pre-Critical theory of possibility, including his answer to the ontological question about the nature of possibility, his rejection of the traditional ontological argument for the existence of God, and his own argument that God must exist to ground all possibility. The second half examines why Kant reoriented his theory of possibility around the transcendental question, what this question means, and how Kant answered it in the Critical philosophy. Stang shows that, despite this reorientation, Kants basic scheme for thinking about possibility remains constant from the pre-Critical period through the Critical system. What had been an ontological theory of possible being is reinterpreted, in the Critical system, as a theory of how we must represent possible objects, given the nature of our intellect.

The Metaphysics of Modality

Author : Graeme Forbes
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
Page : 280 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 1985
Category : Metaphysics
ISBN : UOM:39015008988795

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The Metaphysics of Modality by Graeme Forbes Pdf

Analytic philosophy has recently demonstrated a revived interest in metaphysical problems about possibility and necessity. Graeme Forbes here provides a careful description of the logical background of recent work in this area for those who may be unfamiliar with it, moving on to d discuss the distinction between modality de re and modality de dicto and the ontological commitments of possible worlds semantics. In addition, Forbes offers a unified theory of the essential properties of sets, organisms, artefacts, substances, and events, based on the doctrine that identity facts must be intrinsically grounded, and analyzes and rejects apparent counterexamples to this doctrine.

The Routledge Handbook of Modality

Author : Otávio Bueno,Scott A. Shalkowski
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 510 pages
File Size : 49,6 Mb
Release : 2020-12-30
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781317585275

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The Routledge Handbook of Modality by Otávio Bueno,Scott A. Shalkowski Pdf

Modality - the question of what is possible and what is necessary - is a fundamental area of philosophy and philosophical research. The Routledge Handbook of Modality is an outstanding reference source to the key topics, problems and debates in this exciting subject and is the first collection of its kind. Comprising thirty-five chapters by a team of international contributors the Handbook is divided into seven clear parts: worlds and modality essentialism, ontological dependence, and modality modal anti-realism epistemology of modality modality in science modality in logic and mathematics modality in the history of philosophy. Within these sections the central issues, debates and problems are examined, including possible worlds, essentialism, counterfactuals, ontological dependence, modal fictionalism, deflationism, the integration challenge, conceivability, a priori knowledge, laws of nature, natural kinds, and logical necessity. The Routledge Handbook of Modality is essential reading for students and researchers in epistemology, metaphysics and philosophy of language. It will also be very useful for those in related fields in philosophy such as philosophy of mathematics, logic and philosophy of science.

Williamson on Modality

Author : Juhani Yli-Vakkuri,Mark McCullagh
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 406 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2018-10-18
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781351730051

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Williamson on Modality by Juhani Yli-Vakkuri,Mark McCullagh Pdf

Timothy Williamson is one of the most influential living philosophers working in the areas of logic and metaphysics. His work in these areas has been particularly influential in shaping debates about metaphysical modality, which is the topic of his recent provocative and closely-argued book Modal Logic as Metaphysics (2013). This book comprises ten essays by metaphysicians and logicians responding to Williamson’s work on metaphysical modality, as well as replies by Williamson to each essay. In addition, it contains an original essay by Williamson, ‘Modal science,’ concerning the role of modal claims in natural science. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Canadian Journal of Philosophy.

Ways a World Might Be

Author : Robert C. Stalnaker
Publisher : Clarendon Press
Page : 300 pages
File Size : 54,7 Mb
Release : 2003-08-07
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780191530746

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Ways a World Might Be by Robert C. Stalnaker Pdf

Ways a World Might Be collects, and adds to, Robert Stalnaker's published papers on metaphysical issues. The central theme that runs throughout the book is the role of possible worlds in articulating our various metaphysical commitments. The essays contain both reflections on the general idea of a space of possibilities and attempts to use the framework of possible worlds to formulate and clarify semantic and metaphysical questions about properties and individuals, supervenience and essentialism, reference, thought and experience. The essays also reflect on the nature of metaphysics, and on the relation between metaphysical and semantic questions - questions about what there is and questions about how we talk and think about what there is. The book begins by asking what possible worlds are, and how we are able to represent and know about them. Stalnaker argues that we can take possibilities seriously without embracing the kind of modal realism that David Lewis defended, and can take them as fundamental without purporting to offer a reductive account of modality. He then turns to questions about the nature of properties and relations and their role in carving up a space of possibilities, and to questions about the nature of individuals, and the way they are identified across time and possible worlds. The essays in the last two sections of the book are concerned with the interaction of metaphysical and semantic issues, and with the place of subjective experience in our conception of an objective world as it is in itself. Two of the fourteen essays, plus an extensive introduction that sets the papers in context and makes explicit some of the essays' common threads, are published here for the first time.

Ways a World Might Be

Author : Robert C. Stalnaker,Department of Linguistics and Philosophy Robert C Stalnaker
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 300 pages
File Size : 40,6 Mb
Release : 2003-08-07
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9780199251483

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Ways a World Might Be by Robert C. Stalnaker,Department of Linguistics and Philosophy Robert C Stalnaker Pdf

Robert Stalnaker draws together in this volume the extent of his work in metaphysics. The central theme is the role of possible worlds in articulating our various metaphysical commitments. The essays presented reflect on the nature of metaphysics, with two of the essays featured being published for the first time.

Modal Logic as Metaphysics

Author : Timothy Williamson
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 481 pages
File Size : 54,7 Mb
Release : 2013-03-28
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780199552078

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Modal Logic as Metaphysics by Timothy Williamson Pdf

Timothy Williamson gives an original and provocative treatment of deep metaphysical questions about existence, contingency, and change, using the latest resources of quantified modal logic. Contrary to the widespread assumption that logic and metaphysics are disjoint, he argues that modal logic provides a structural core for metaphysics.

Necessity and Possibility

Author : Michael Tooley
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 428 pages
File Size : 50,7 Mb
Release : 1999
Category : Causation
ISBN : 081533382X

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Necessity and Possibility by Michael Tooley Pdf

First published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Modality and Meaning

Author : W.G. Lycan
Publisher : Springer Science & Business Media
Page : 351 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 2012-12-06
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9789401109369

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Modality and Meaning by W.G. Lycan Pdf

Part I of this book presents a theory of modal metaphysics in the possible-worlds tradition. `Worlds' themselves are understood as structured sets of properties; this `Ersatzist' view is defended against its most vigorous competitors, Meinongianism and David Lewis' theory of existent concrete worlds. Related issues of essentialism and linguistic reference are explored. Part II takes up the question of lexical meaning in the context of possible-world semantics. There are skeptical analyses of analyticity and the notion of a logical constant; and an `infinite polysemy' thesis is defended. The book will be of particular interest to metaphysicians, possible-world semanticists, philosophers of language, and linguists concerned with lexical semantics.

The Possible and the Actual

Author : Michael J. Loux
Publisher : Cornell University Press
Page : 340 pages
File Size : 51,7 Mb
Release : 1979
Category : First philosophy
ISBN : 0801491789

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The Possible and the Actual by Michael J. Loux Pdf

This well-chosen collection of fifteen important essays in the fields of philosophical logic and metaphysics addresses questions relating to the nature and status of possible worlds.