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Single Idea 16284

[filed under theme 10. Modality / E. Possible worlds / 2. Nature of Possible Worlds / a. Nature of possible worlds ]

Full Idea

I distinguish three principal ways ersatz worlds represent: linguistic, in which they are like stories or theories; pictorial, like pictures or isomorphic scale models; or magical, in which it is just their nature to represent.

Gist of Idea

Ersatz worlds represent either through language, or by models, or magically

Source

David Lewis (On the Plurality of Worlds [1986], 3.1)

Book Ref

Lewis,David: 'On the Plurality of Worlds' [Blackwell 2001], p.141

A Reaction

I think I incline to the 'model' view. The linguistic version means animals can't assess possibilities. I take modelling to be basic to what a mind is, and what a mind is for.

Related Idea

Idea 16282 Ersatzers say we have one world, and abstract representations of how it might have been [Lewis]

The 32 ideas with the same theme [overview of what we take possible worlds to be]:

23507 Unlike the modern view of a set of worlds, Wittgenstein thinks of a structured manifold of them [Wittgenstein, by White,RM]
23469 An imagined world must have something in common with the real world [Wittgenstein]
15786 Commitment to possible worlds is part of our ideology, not part of our ontology [Hintikka]
16992 Possible worlds aren't puzzling places to learn about, but places we ourselves describe [Kripke]
16983 Probability with dice uses possible worlds, abstractions which fictionally simplify things [Kripke]
11980 A possible world is a maximal possible state of affairs [Plantinga]
6975 Possible worlds could be concrete, abstract, universals, sentences, or properties [Jackson]
4898 Possible worlds are indices for a language, or concrete realities, or abstract possibilities [Perry]
14507 Are possible worlds just qualities, or do they include primitive identities as well? [Adams,RM]
16437 Possible worlds are properties [Stalnaker]
16444 Possible worlds don't reduce modality, they regiment it to reveal its structure [Stalnaker]
16445 I think of worlds as cells (rather than points) in logical space [Stalnaker]
15793 We can take 'ways things might have been' as irreducible elements in our ontology [Stalnaker, by Lycan]
16396 Kripke's possible worlds are methodological, not metaphysical [Stalnaker]
14285 A possible world is the ontological analogue of hypothetical beliefs [Stalnaker]
16284 Ersatz worlds represent either through language, or by models, or magically [Lewis]
13968 Kripkean possible worlds are abstract maximal states in which the real world could have been [Soames]
14675 Possible worlds just have to be 'maximal', but they don't have to be consistent [Salmon,N]
14672 Possible worlds are maximal abstract ways that things might have been [Salmon,N]
15795 Treating possible worlds as mental needs more actual mental events [Lycan]
15796 Possible worlds must be made of intensional objects like propositions or properties [Lycan]
12007 Possible worlds are points of logical space, rather like other times than our own [Forbes,G]
7688 The actual world is a maximally consistent combination of actual states of affairs [Jacquette]
15069 Possible worlds may be more limited, to how things might actually turn out [Fine,K]
15068 The actual world is a totality of facts, so we also think of possible worlds as totalities [Fine,K]
9213 The actual world is a possible world, so we can't define possible worlds as 'what might have been' [Fine,K]
8963 Four theories of possible worlds: conceptualist, combinatorial, abstract, or concrete [Hoffman/Rosenkrantz]
10466 Maybe possible worlds are just sets of possible tropes [Bacon,John]
14189 'Modal realists' believe in many concrete worlds, 'actualists' in just this world, 'ersatzists' in abstract other worlds [Paul,LA]
14002 Possible worlds must be abstract, because two qualitatively identical worlds are just one world [Markosian]
18872 We should reject distinct but indiscernible worlds [Cameron]
15432 Structural universals might serve as possible worlds [Forrest, by Lewis]