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Single Idea 19038

[filed under theme 26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 8. Scientific Essentialism / b. Scientific necessity ]

Full Idea

Even on the dispositional essentialist view the world might have been governed by different laws, if those laws involved different properties. What is excluded is the possibility of different laws involving the same properties as our actual laws.

Gist of Idea

Dispositional essentialism allows laws to be different, but only if the supporting properties differ

Source

Barbara Vetter (Potentiality [2015], 7.8)

Book Ref

Vetter,Barbara: 'Potentiality: from Dispositions to Modality' [OUP 2015], p.282

A Reaction

Important. Critics of dispositional essentialism accuse it of promoting the idea that the laws of nature are necessary, a claim for which we obviously have no evidence. I prefer to say they are necessary given that 'stuff', rather than those properties.

The 34 ideas from 'Potentiality'

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