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Single Idea 19009
[filed under theme 10. Modality / B. Possibility / 4. Potentiality
]
Full Idea
This book is a plea for recognising potentiality as an explanans in the metaphysics of modality, rather than as something in need of explanation or reduction.
Clarification
An 'explanans' is what does the explaining
Gist of Idea
Potentiality does the explaining in metaphysics; we don't explain it away or reduce it
Source
Barbara Vetter (Potentiality [2015], 1.1)
Book Ref
Vetter,Barbara: 'Potentiality: from Dispositions to Modality' [OUP 2015], p.2
A Reaction
Something has to do the explaining, and it is obviously much better to have some aspect of the real world do the job, rather than remote abstractions such as laws, possible worlds or Forms. Personally I like the potentiality of 'powers'.
The
34 ideas
from 'Potentiality'
23705
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A potentiality may not be a disposition, but dispositions are strong potentialities
[Vetter, by Friend/Kimpton-Nye]
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19009
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Potentiality does the explaining in metaphysics; we don't explain it away or reduce it
[Vetter]
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19010
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All possibility is anchored in the potentiality of individual objects
[Vetter]
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19008
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The modern revival of necessity and possibility treated them as special cases of quantification
[Vetter]
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19012
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The Humean supervenience base entirely excludes modality
[Vetter]
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19011
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If worlds are sets of propositions, how do we know which propositions are genuinely possible?
[Vetter]
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19013
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Possibility is a generalised abstraction from the potentiality of its bearer
[Vetter]
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19014
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How can spatiotemporal relations be understood in dispositional terms?
[Vetter]
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19015
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Grounding can be between objects ('relational'), or between sentences ('operational')
[Vetter]
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19016
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We should think of dispositions as 'to do' something, not as 'to do something, if ....'
[Vetter]
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19017
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Nomological dispositions (unlike ordinary ones) have to be continually realised
[Vetter]
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19018
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Explanations by disposition are more stable and reliable than those be external circumstances
[Vetter]
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19019
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Potentiality is the common genus of dispositions, abilities, and similar properties
[Vetter]
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19020
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Grounding is a kind of explanation, suited to metaphysics
[Vetter]
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19022
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Water has a potentiality to acquire a potentiality to break (by freezing)
[Vetter]
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19021
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I have an 'iterated ability' to learn the violin - that is, the ability to acquire that ability
[Vetter]
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19023
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Slippery slope arguments are challenges to show where a non-arbitrary boundary lies
[Vetter]
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19024
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A determinate property must be a unique instance of the determinable class
[Vetter]
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19025
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Potentialities may be too weak to count as 'dispositions'
[Vetter]
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19026
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If time is symmetrical between past and future, why do they look so different?
[Vetter]
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19027
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Potentiality logic is modal system T. Stronger systems collapse iterations, and necessitate potentials
[Vetter]
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19028
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Possibilities are potentialities of actual things, but abstracted from their location
[Vetter]
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19030
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Why does origin matter more than development; why are some features of origin more important?
[Vetter]
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19029
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It is necessary that p means that nothing has the potentiality for not-p
[Vetter]
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19031
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There are potentialities 'to ...', but possibilities are 'that ....'.
[Vetter]
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19032
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S5 is undesirable, as it prevents necessities from having contingent grounds
[Vetter]
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19033
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Deontic modalities are 'ought-to-be', for sentences, and 'ought-to-do' for predicates
[Vetter]
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19034
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The world is either a whole made of its parts, or a container which contains its parts
[Vetter]
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19036
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The Barcan formula endorses either merely possible things, or makes the unactualised impossible
[Vetter]
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19037
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Are there possible objects which nothing has ever had the potentiality to produce?
[Vetter]
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19039
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The view that laws are grounded in substance plus external necessity doesn't suit dispositionalism
[Vetter]
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19038
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Dispositional essentialism allows laws to be different, but only if the supporting properties differ
[Vetter]
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19041
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Presentists explain cross-temporal relations using surrogate descriptions
[Vetter]
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19040
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We take origin to be necessary because we see possibilities as branches from actuality
[Vetter]
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