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Single Idea 23705

[filed under theme 10. Modality / B. Possibility / 4. Potentiality ]

Full Idea

Although not all potentialities are dispositions, Vetter claims that all dispositions are potentialities which are had to a sufficiently high degree.

Gist of Idea

A potentiality may not be a disposition, but dispositions are strong potentialities

Source

report of Barbara Vetter (Potentiality [2015]) by Friend/Kimpton-Nye - Dispositions and Powers 2.4.2

Book Ref

Friend/Kimpton-Nye: 'Dispositions and Powers' [CUP 2023], p.28


A Reaction

This sounds plausible. A potentiality could be faint or negligible, but once it is a serious possibility it becomes a 'disposition'. ...I suppose. But if the meteor is probably going to hit my house, it doesn't mean it has a disposition to do so.


The 34 ideas from 'Potentiality'

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