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Full Idea
If modal Platonism was true, how could we ever know the truth of a modal proposition?
Clarification
'Modal Platonism' treats possible worlds as real
Gist of Idea
How can modal Platonists know the truth of a modal proposition?
Source
Stephen Read (Thinking About Logic [1995], Ch.2)
Book Ref
Read,Stephen: 'Thinking About Logic' [OUP 1995], p.51
A Reaction
I take this to be very important. Our knowledge of modal truths must depend on our knowledge of the actual world. The best answer seems to involve reference to the 'powers' of the actual world. A reply is in Idea 10983.
Related Idea
Idea 10983 Knowledge of possible worlds is not causal, but is an ontology entailed by semantics [Read]
| 15472 | It is pointless to say possible worlds are truthmakers, and then deny that possible worlds exist [Martin,CB] |
| 5482 | Possible worlds realism is only needed to give truth conditions for modals and conditionals [Ellis] |
| 16959 | If possible worlds have no structure (S5) they are equal, and it is hard to deny them reality [Dummett] |
| 12255 | For Lewis there is no real possibility, since all possibilities are actual [Oderberg on Lewis] |
| 9219 | Lewis posits possible worlds just as Quine says that physics needs numbers and sets [Lewis, by Sider] |
| 15022 | If possible worlds really exist, then they are part of actuality [Sider on Lewis] |
| 10469 | A world is a maximal mereological sum of spatiotemporally interrelated things [Lewis] |
| 16283 | For me, all worlds are equal, with each being actual relative to itself [Lewis] |
| 12008 | Unlike places and times, we cannot separate possible worlds from what is true at them [Forbes,G] |
| 12009 | The problem with possible worlds realism is epistemological; we can't know properties of possible objects [Forbes,G] |
| 4586 | You can't embrace the formal apparatus of possible worlds, but reject the ontology [Heil] |
| 10982 | How can modal Platonists know the truth of a modal proposition? [Read] |
| 12465 | Concrete worlds, unlike fictions, at least offer evidence of how the actual world could be [Jacobs] |