more from this thinker
|
more from this text
Single Idea 5819
[filed under theme 10. Modality / D. Knowledge of Modality / 4. Conceivable as Possible / a. Conceivable as possible
]
Full Idea
Conceivability is no proof of possibility.
Gist of Idea
Conceivability is no proof of possibility
Source
Hilary Putnam (Meaning and Reference [1973], p.159)
Book Ref
'Meaning and Reference', ed/tr. Moore,A.W. [OUP 1993], p.159
A Reaction
This strikes me as a really basic truth which all novice philosophers should digest. It led many philosophers, especially rationalists, into all sorts of ill-founded claims about what is possible or necessary. Zombies, for instance…
The
26 ideas
with the same theme
[ if conceivable then it is possible]:
22149
|
Scholastics assess possibility by what has actually happened in reality
[Suárez, by Boulter]
|
4818
|
People who are ignorant of true causes imagine anything can change into anything else
[Spinoza]
|
20310
|
Error does not result from imagining, but from lacking the evidence of impossibility
[Spinoza]
|
23487
|
What is thinkable is possible
[Wittgenstein]
|
5819
|
Conceivability is no proof of possibility
[Putnam]
|
5478
|
Imagination tests what is possible for all we know, not true possibility
[Ellis]
|
15098
|
Empirical evidence shows that imagining a phenomenon can show it is possible
[Shoemaker]
|
15100
|
Imagination reveals conceptual possibility, where descriptions avoid contradiction or incoherence
[Shoemaker]
|
15764
|
'Conceivable' is either not-provably-false, or compatible with what we know?
[Shoemaker]
|
13967
|
Kripke's essentialist necessary a posteriori opened the gap between conceivable and really possible
[Soames on Kripke]
|
13970
|
Kripke gets to the necessary a posteriori by only allowing conceivability when combined with actuality
[Kripke, by Soames]
|
14659
|
We can imagine being beetles or alligators, so it is possible we might have such bodies
[Plantinga]
|
16522
|
It is hard or impossible to think of Caesar as not human
[Wiggins]
|
16473
|
Modal Rationalism: conceivability gives a priori access to modal truths
[Chalmers, by Stalnaker]
|
19258
|
Evaluate primary possibility from some world, and secondary possibility from this world
[Chalmers, by Vaidya]
|
13963
|
Maybe logical possibility does imply conceivability - by an ideal mind
[Chalmers]
|
16536
|
Williamson can't base metaphysical necessity on the psychology of causal counterfactuals
[Lowe on Williamson]
|
9596
|
We scorn imagination as a test of possibility, forgetting its role in counterfactuals
[Williamson]
|
18853
|
A proposition is 'correctly' conceivable if an ominiscient being could conceive it
[Rosen]
|
15167
|
Empiricism explores necessities and concept-limits by imagining negations of truths
[Sidelle]
|
15177
|
Contradictoriness limits what is possible and what is imaginable
[Sidelle]
|
9505
|
Empiricist saw imaginability and possibility as close, but now they seem remote
[Bird]
|
14606
|
Only ideal conceivability could indicate what is possible
[Schaffer,J]
|
16978
|
If conceivability is a priori coherence, that implies possibility
[Tahko]
|
19440
|
How do you know you have conceived a thing deeply enough to assess its possibility?
[Vaidya]
|
19267
|
Define conceivable; how reliable is it; does inconceivability help; and what type of possibility results?
[Vaidya]
|