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Full Idea
If we have no good reason to believe that a disposition is instantiated, then the disposition should play no role in our theorizing about the world.
Gist of Idea
If a disposition is never instantiated, it shouldn't be part of our theory of nature
Source
Richard Corry (Dispositional Essentialism Grounds Laws of Nature? [2010], 3)
Book Ref
-: 'Australasian Journal of Philosophy' [-], p.6
A Reaction
It is part of our theory that a substantial lump of uranium will explode, but also that a galaxy-sized lump of uranium would explode. Surely we are committed to the latter, even though it never happens?
| 11938 | The Megarans say something is only capable of something when it is actually doing it [Aristotle] |
| 15766 | Megaran actualism is just scepticism about the qualities of things [Aristotle] |
| 15767 | Megaran actualists prevent anything from happening, by denying a capacity for it to happen! [Aristotle] |
| 21491 | Peirce's later realism about possibilities and generalities went beyond logical positivism [Peirce, by Atkin] |
| 16945 | We judge things to be soluble if they are the same kind as, or similar to, things that do dissolve [Quine] |
| 15490 | Explain unmanifested dispositions as structural similarities to objects which have manifested them [Quine, by Martin,CB] |
| 15315 | What is a field of potentials, if it only consists of possible events? [Harré/Madden] |
| 15180 | There doesn't seem to be anything in the actual world that can determine modal facts [Sidelle] |
| 9499 | Megarian actualists deny unmanifested dispositions [Bird] |
| 14350 | If a disposition is never instantiated, it shouldn't be part of our theory of nature [Corry] |
| 19017 | Nomological dispositions (unlike ordinary ones) have to be continually realised [Vetter] |