Category: Modal Matters
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Background to the (Ontological) Problem of the Merely Possible
One commenter seems not to understand the problem as I set it forth here. So let's take a few steps back. In this entry I explain terminology, make distinctions, and record assumptions. 1) Everything actual is possible, but the converse does not follow and ought not be assumed. Possible items that are possible, but not…
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Per Impossibile Counterfactual Conditionals
God is a necessary being. That means: given that God exists, it is metaphysically impossible that he not exist. My opening sentence does not imply that God exists. It merely reports on God's modal status. Let us assume both that God exists and that all truth depends on God. How might this relation of dependence…
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Notes on Nicholas Rescher, “Nonexistents Then and Now”
0. This entry is relevant to my ongoing dialog with Dr. Novak about reference to the nonexistent. I hope he has the time and the stamina to continue the discussion. I have no doubt that he has the 'chops.' I thank him for the stimulation. We philosophize best with friends, as Aristotle says somewhere. But…
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Does Everything Contingent Have a Ground of its Existence?
What is it to be contingent? There are at least two nonequivalent definitions of 'contingency' at work in philosophical discussions. I will call them the modal definition and the dependency definition. Modal Contingency. X is modally contingent =df x exists in some but not all metaphysically (broadly logically) possible worlds. Since possible worlds jargon…
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A Most Remarkable Prophecy
The Question Suppose there had been a prophet among the ancient Athenians who prophesied the birth among them of a most remarkable man, a man having the properties we associate with Socrates, including the property of being named 'Socrates.' Suppose this prophet, now exceedingly old, is asked after having followed Socrates' career and having witnessed…
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Existence, Unity, Possibility, and Actuality: Are There Merely Possible Individuals?
Steven Nemes by e-mail: Here’s a question for you about existence, perhaps one you could discuss on the blog. In your book, you argue that existence is ontological unity. I think that’s right. But a merely possible this-such is a unity as much as an actual this-such. What then distinguishes merely possible existence from actual…
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Does Divine Immutability Entail Modal Collapse?
That divine simplicity entails modal collapse is a controversial thesis, but one for which there are strong arguments. Does the same hold for divine immutability? I don't think so. That immutability should entail modal collapse strikes me as based on a simple confusion of the temporal with the modal. Modal Collapse In the state of…
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Summa Theologica, Q. 19, Art. 3: Whether Whatever God Wills He Wills Necessarily
This is the question we have been discussing. Let us now see if the answer Thomas gives is satisfactory. The question is not whether, necessarily, whatever God wills, he wills. The answer to that is obvious and in the affirmative. The question is whether whatever God wills, he wills necessarily. If so, then God's willing…
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Necessary God, Contingent Creatures: Another Round with Novak
In an earlier thread, Lukas Novak writes, . . . God simply does not need any causal acts to mediate his causal power. He is causally efficient through his very essence, directly, and contingently, imparting being to the created essences immediately. It is only with respect to this causal power which is an aspect of…
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The Euthyphro Dilemma, Divine Simplicity, and Modal Collapse
The Question God commands all and only the morally obligatory. But does he command it because it is obligatory, or is it obligatory because he commands it? The question naturally arises, but issues in a dilemma. A dilemma is a very specific sort of problem in which there are exactly two alternatives, neither of which…
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Divine Simplicity, Modal Collapse, and the Difference Principle
The question before us is whether the doctrine of divine simplicity (DDS) can be upheld without the collapse of modal distinctions. In "Simply Impossible: A Case Against Divine Simplicity" (Journal of Reformed Theology 7, 2013, 181-203), R. T. Mullins asks (footnote omitted): Could God have refrained from creating the universe? If God is free then it seems…
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Intrinsic Intentionality and Merely Possible Thoughts
I claimed earlier that there are no intrinsically intentional items that lack consciousness. The claim was made in the context of an attempted refutation of the notion that abstract entities, Fregean senses being one subspecies thereof, could be intrinsically intentional or object-directed. One argument I gave was that (i) No abstract entity is conscious; (ii)…
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Contingency and Composition
Joe, who describes himself as "a high school student with a passion for philosophy of religion and metaphysics," asked me a long series of difficult questions. Here is one of them: After reading [Edward] Feser's Five Proofs, I have had difficulties with the concept of sustaining causes. First, Feser argues that composites require a sustaining…
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Possible Worlds Again: Thomist versus ‘Analyst’
Fr. Matthew Kirby by e-mail: By the way, in thinking about my comments on the [your] SEP entry I realised that I had used the term "possible worlds" in an idiosyncratic way, one non-standard within the analytical school, applying a Thomist twist to it. Unlike standard usage, I do not include a hypothetical transcendent First…
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Evidence and Actuality: A Modal Punch at W. K. Clifford
Here, at Maverick Philosopher: Strictly Philosophical. W. K. Clifford is often quoted for his asseveration that "it is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence." Now one of my firmest beliefs is that I am an actual individual, not a merely possible individual. [. . .]