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Full Idea
It is possible for an object to have a disposition even though the relevant conditional is false.
Gist of Idea
An object can have a disposition when the revelant conditional is false
Source
Trenton Merricks (Truth and Ontology [2007], 7.III)
Book Ref
Merricks,Trenton: 'Truth and Ontology' [OUP 2007], p.159
A Reaction
This is the now standard observation that finks (killing the disposition) and antidotes (blocking the effect of the disposition) can intervene, as in safety mechanisms in electrical gadgets. There may be replies available here.
| 15466 | 'The wire is live' can't be analysed as a conditional, because a wire can change its powers [Martin,CB] |
| 15467 | Powers depend on circumstances, so can't be given a conditional analysis [Martin,CB] |
| 15461 | A 'finkish' disposition is real, but disappears when the stimulus occurs [Lewis] |
| 12613 | Empiricists use dispositions reductively, as 'possibility of sensation' or 'possibility of experimental result' [Fodor] |
| 14312 | Orthodoxy says dispositions entail conditionals (rather than being equivalent to them) [Mumford] |
| 14416 | An object can have a disposition when the revelant conditional is false [Merricks] |
| 9474 | A disposition is finkish if a time delay might mean the manifestation fizzles out [Bird] |
| 9475 | A robust pot attached to a sensitive bomb is not fragile, but if struck it will easily break [Bird] |
| 14348 | An 'antidote' allows a manifestation to begin, but then blocks it [Corry] |
| 14347 | A 'finkish' disposition is one that is lost immediately after the appropriate stimulus [Corry] |
| 14584 | The simple conditional analysis of dispositions doesn't allow for possible prevention [Mumford/Anjum] |
| 19016 | We should think of dispositions as 'to do' something, not as 'to do something, if ....' [Vetter] |