The space of possibilities of dispositional essentialism

Philosophical Studies 175 (11):2813-2839 (2018)
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Abstract

How we define the space of possibilities of dispositional essentialism —that is, the set of possible worlds that are genuinely possible from the point of view of DE—has important consequences for central modal debates such as how to understand the concept of essence or the relation between DE and the necessity of laws of nature. In order to define DE’s space of possibilities we need to explore DE’s consequences regarding both necessity and possibility. Unfortunately, the notion of possibility has not received much attention within the DE literature. In this paper, I attempt to fill this gap. I argue that the standard way of understanding possibility found in the literature—a proposition is possible iff it expresses the manifestation of some actual disposition—needlessly restricts the space of possibilities by not accepting global and absolute possibilities, including some alien properties, as genuinely possible. I propose instead to accept a more permissive understanding of possibility: a proposition is possible iff it does not contradict any of the necessities that follow from the core commitments of DE. This allows dispositionalists to expand their modal space and to account for modal intuitions that may otherwise undermine the tenability of DE.

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Xavi Lanao
Universidad Nacional de Quilmes

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References found in this work

On the Plurality of Worlds.David K. Lewis - 1986 - Malden, Mass.: Wiley-Blackwell.
The meaning of 'meaning'.Hilary Putnam - 1975 - Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science 7:131-193.
Naming and Necessity.Saul Kripke - 1980 - Critica 17 (49):69-71.
Scientific Essentialism.Brian Ellis - 2001 - New York: Cambridge University Press.
Essence and modality.Kit Fine - 1994 - Philosophical Perspectives 8 (Logic and Language):1-16.

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