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Single Idea 5440

[filed under theme 10. Modality / E. Possible worlds / 3. Transworld Objects / c. Counterparts ]

Full Idea

'Jack could have been taller' implies a different Jack in a different world, so Lewis defines a counterpart in a possible world as an individual sufficiently similar to Jack, and more similar to Jack than anything else in that world.

Gist of Idea

A counterpart in a possible world is sufficiently similar, and more similar than anything else

Source

report of David Lewis (On the Plurality of Worlds [1986]) by Thomas Mautner - Penguin Dictionary of Philosophy p.115

Book Ref

Mautner,Thomas: 'Dictionary of Philosophy' [Penguin 1997], p.115

A Reaction

If we say something like "I could have been twins" or "I could have been a genius" in another world, it would need an odd concept of my personal identity for it to remain identical in those counterfactual situations. Lewis has a point.

The 324 ideas from David Lewis

16456 For modality Lewis rejected boxes and diamonds, preferring worlds, and an index for the actual one [Lewis, by Stalnaker]
18415 The actual world is just the world you are in [Lewis, by Cappelen/Dever]
16392 A content is a property, and believing it is self-ascribing that property [Lewis, by Recanati]
16390 Lewis's popular centred worlds approach gives an attitude an index of world, subject and time [Lewis, by Recanati]
18416 Attitudes involve properties (not propositions), and belief is self-ascribing the properties [Lewis, by Solomon]
18418 A theory of perspectival de se content gives truth conditions relative to an agent [Lewis, by Cappelen/Dever]
4809 Lewis endorses the thesis that all explanation of singular events is causal explanation [Lewis, by Psillos]
15552 We only pick 'the' cause for the purposes of some particular enquiry. [Lewis]
15551 Ways of carving causes may be natural, but never 'right' [Lewis]
15553 Causal dependence is counterfactual dependence between events [Lewis]
14321 To explain an event is to provide some information about its causal history [Lewis]
15554 A disposition needs a causal basis, a property in a certain causal role. Could the disposition be the property? [Lewis]
15556 Science may well pursue generalised explanation, rather than laws [Lewis]
15555 Explaining match lighting in general is like explaining one lighting of a match [Lewis]
15558 A good explanation is supposed to show that the event had to happen [Lewis]
15559 Does a good explanation produce understanding? That claim is just empty [Lewis]
15557 Verisimilitude has proved hard to analyse, and seems to have several components [Lewis]
15560 We can explain a chance event, but can never show why some other outcome did not occur [Lewis]
8405 A theory of causation should explain why cause precedes effect, not take it for granted [Lewis, by Field,H]
10392 It is just individious discrimination to pick out one cause and label it as 'the' cause [Lewis]
9476 If dispositions are more fundamental than causes, then they won't conceptually reduce to them [Bird on Lewis]
17525 The counterfactual view says causes are necessary (rather than sufficient) for their effects [Lewis, by Bird]
17524 Lewis has basic causation, counterfactuals, and a general ancestral (thus handling pre-emption) [Lewis, by Bird]
8397 Counterfactual causation implies all laws are causal, which they aren't [Tooley on Lewis]
4795 Lewis's account of counterfactuals is fine if we know what a law of nature is, but it won't explain the latter [Cohen,LJ on Lewis]
8419 The modern regularity view says a cause is a member of a minimal set of sufficient conditions [Lewis]
8420 A proposition is a set of possible worlds where it is true [Lewis]
8421 Regularity analyses could make c an effect of e, or an epiphenomenon, or inefficacious, or pre-empted [Lewis]
8423 My counterfactual analysis applies to particular cases, not generalisations [Lewis]
8424 Determinism says there can't be two identical worlds up to a time, with identical laws, which then differ [Lewis]
8425 For true counterfactuals, both antecedent and consequent true is closest to actuality [Lewis]
8426 One event causes another iff there is a causal chain from first to second [Lewis]
8427 I reject making the direction of causation axiomatic, since that takes too much for granted [Lewis]
14399 Presentism says only the present exists, so there is nothing for tensed truths to supervene on [Lewis]
15546 Predications aren't true because of what exists, but of how it exists [Lewis]
15545 Armstrong's analysis seeks truthmakers rather than definitions [Lewis]
15548 Say 'truth is supervenient on being', but construe 'being' broadly [Lewis]
15543 How do things combine to make states of affairs? Constituents can repeat, and fail to combine [Lewis]
8433 There are few traces of an event before it happens, but many afterwards [Lewis, by Horwich]
14361 Lewis says indicative conditionals are truth-functional [Lewis, by Jackson]
8434 In good counterfactuals the consequent holds in world like ours except that the antecedent is true [Lewis, by Horwich]
9419 A law of nature is a general axiom of the deductive system that is best for simplicity and strength [Lewis]
16994 Counterpart theory is bizarre, as no one cares what happens to a mere counterpart [Kripke on Lewis]
11974 Counterparts are not the original thing, but resemble it more than other things do [Lewis]
11975 If the closest resembler to you is in fact quite unlike you, then you have no counterpart [Lewis]
11977 Essential attributes are those shared with all the counterparts [Lewis]
11976 Aristotelian essentialism says essences are not relative to specification [Lewis]
11979 It doesn't take the whole of a possible Humphrey to win the election [Lewis]
11978 Causal necessities hold in all worlds compatible with the laws of nature [Lewis]
15400 We must avoid circularity between what is intrinsic and what is natural [Lewis, by Cameron]
15458 A property is 'intrinsic' iff it can never differ between duplicates [Lewis]
15457 Interdefinition is useless by itself, but if we grasp one separately, we have them both [Lewis]
15459 Ellipsoidal stars seem to have an intrinsic property which depends on other objects [Lewis]
15527 Defining terms either enables elimination, or shows that they don't require elimination [Lewis]
15526 There is a method for defining new scientific terms just using the terms we already understand [Lewis]
15528 A Ramsey sentence just asserts that a theory can be realised, without saying by what [Lewis]
15529 It is better to have one realisation of a theory than many - but it may not always be possible [Lewis]
15530 A logically determinate name names the same thing in every possible world [Lewis]
15531 The Ramsey sentence of a theory says that it has at least one realisation [Lewis]
12895 Knowing is context-sensitive because the domain of quantification varies [Lewis, by Cohen,S]
19562 We have knowledge if alternatives are eliminated, but appropriate alternatives depend on context [Lewis, by Cohen,S]
12898 Justification is neither sufficient nor necessary for knowledge [Lewis]
12897 To say S knows P, but cannot eliminate not-P, sounds like a contradiction [Lewis]
12899 The timid student has knowledge without belief, lacking confidence in their correct answer [Lewis]
15562 Causation is a general relation derived from instances of causal dependence [Lewis]
15561 The events that suit semantics may not be the events that suit causation [Lewis]
15564 An event is a property of a unique space-time region [Lewis]
15563 Properties are very abundant (unlike universals), and are used for semantics and higher-order variables [Lewis]
15565 Events have inbuilt essences, as necessary conditions for their occurrence [Lewis]
15566 Events are classes, and so there is a mereology of their parts [Lewis]
15567 Some events involve no change; they must, because causal histories involve unchanges [Lewis]
14979 Being alone doesn't guarantee intrinsic properties; 'being alone' is itself extrinsic [Lewis, by Sider]
15454 Extrinsic properties come in degrees, with 'brother' less extrinsic than 'sibling' [Lewis]
15455 Total intrinsic properties give us what a thing is [Lewis]
15462 Backtracking counterfactuals go from supposed events to their required causal antecedents [Lewis]
15461 A 'finkish' disposition is real, but disappears when the stimulus occurs [Lewis]
15463 All dispositions must have causal bases [Lewis]
15464 The distinction between dispositional and 'categorical' properties leads to confusion [Lewis]
7441 Experiences are defined by their causal role, and causal roles belong to physical states [Lewis]
7442 'Pain' contingently names the state that occupies the causal role of pain [Lewis]
10847 Truthmakers are about existential grounding, not about truth [Lewis]
10845 To be true a sentence must express a proposition, and not be ambiguous or vague or just expressive [Lewis]
10846 Truthmaker is correspondence, but without the requirement to be one-to-one [Lewis]
21461 I tried to be unsystematic and piecemeal, but failed; my papers presuppose my other views [Lewis]
9426 The world is just a vast mosaic of little matters of local particular fact [Lewis]
16210 Humean supervenience says the world is just a vast mosaic of qualities in space-time [Lewis]
7443 A theory must be mixed, to cover qualia without behaviour, and behaviour without qualia [Lewis, by PG]
7445 The application of 'pain' to physical states is non-rigid and contingent [Lewis]
7444 Type-type psychophysical identity is combined with a functional characterisation of pain [Lewis]
15539 Basic to pragmatics is taking a message in a way that makes sense of it [Lewis]
15537 If cats are vague, we deny that the many cats are one, or deny that the one cat is many [Lewis]
15536 We have one cloud, but many possible boundaries and aggregates for it [Lewis]
15538 Semantic indecision explains vagueness (if we have precisifications to be undecided about) [Lewis]
8209 Part of the folk concept of qualia is what makes recognition and comparison possible [Lewis]
10808 Mathematics is generalisations about singleton functions [Lewis]
10806 Megethology is the result of adding plural quantification to mereology [Lewis]
10807 Mathematics reduces to set theory, which reduces, with some mereology, to the singleton function [Lewis]
10809 We can accept the null set, but not a null class, a class lacking members [Lewis]
10810 I say that absolutely any things can have a mereological fusion [Lewis]
10812 The null set is not a little speck of sheer nothingness, a black hole in Reality [Lewis]
10811 The null set plays the role of last resort, for class abstracts and for existence [Lewis]
10813 What on earth is the relationship between a singleton and an element? [Lewis]
10814 Are all singletons exact intrinsic duplicates? [Lewis]
10815 We don't need 'abstract structures' to have structural truths about successor functions [Lewis]
10816 We can use mereology to simulate quantification over relations [Lewis]
15532 'Allists' embrace the existence of all controversial entities; 'noneists' reject all but the obvious ones [Lewis]
15533 We can quantify over fictions by quantifying for real over their names [Lewis]
15534 We could quantify over impossible objects - as bundles of properties [Lewis]
15535 We can't accept a use of 'existence' that says only some of the things there are actually exist [Lewis]
15452 We could not uphold a truthmaker for 'Fa' without structures [Lewis]
15453 The main rivals to universals are resemblance or natural-class nominalism, or sparse trope theory [Lewis]
3990 The whole truth supervenes on the physical truth [Lewis]
3989 I am a reductionist about mind because I am an a priori reductionist about everything [Lewis]
3991 Where pixels make up a picture, supervenience is reduction [Lewis]
3992 Folk psychology makes good predictions, by associating mental states with causal roles [Lewis]
3993 Arguments are nearly always open to challenge, but they help to explain a position rather than force people to believe [Lewis]
3994 Human pain might be one thing; Martian pain might be something else [Lewis]
3995 A mind is an organ of representation [Lewis]
3996 Folk psychology doesn't say that there is a language of thought [Lewis]
3998 If you don't share an external world with a brain-in-a-vat, then externalism says you don't share any beliefs [Lewis]
3997 Nothing shows that all content is 'wide', or that wide content has logical priority [Lewis]
3999 A spontaneous duplicate of you would have your brain states but no experience, so externalism would deny him any beliefs [Lewis]
4000 Wide content derives from narrow content and relationships with external things [Lewis]
7690 If sets exist, then defining worlds as proposition sets implies an odd distinction between existing and actual [Jacquette on Lewis]
16441 Lewis rejects actualism because he identifies properties with sets [Lewis, by Stalnaker]
12255 For Lewis there is no real possibility, since all possibilities are actual [Oderberg on Lewis]
9219 Lewis posits possible worlds just as Quine says that physics needs numbers and sets [Lewis, by Sider]
15022 If possible worlds really exist, then they are part of actuality [Sider on Lewis]
14404 The counterpart relation is sortal-relative, so objects need not be a certain way [Lewis, by Merricks]
5441 Why should statements about what my 'counterpart' could have done interest me? [Mautner on Lewis]
5440 A counterpart in a possible world is sufficiently similar, and more similar than anything else [Lewis, by Mautner]
10470 There are only two kinds: sets, and possibilia (actual and possible particulars) [Lewis, by Oliver]
15399 The property of being F is identical with the set of objects, in all possible worlds, which are F [Lewis, by Cameron]
9650 Supervenience concerns whether things could differ, so it is a modal notion [Lewis]
16132 On mountains or in worlds, reporting contradictions is contradictory, so no such truths can be reported [Lewis]
16133 Possible worlds can contain contradictions if such worlds are seen as fictions [Lewis]
9651 Verisimilitude might be explained as being close to the possible world where the truth is exact [Lewis]
9652 To just expect unexamined emeralds to be grue would be totally unreasonable [Lewis]
9658 An explanation tells us how an event was caused [Lewis]
9654 A proposition is a set of entire possible worlds which instantiate a particular property [Lewis]
15736 A proposition is the property of being a possible world where it holds true [Lewis]
15738 Propositions can't have syntactic structure if they are just sets of worlds [Lewis]
15739 There is the property of belonging to a set, so abundant properties are as numerous as the sets [Lewis]
10723 A property is the set of its actual and possible instances [Lewis, by Oliver]
9653 It would be easiest to take a property as the set of its instances [Lewis]
15733 Accidentally coextensive properties come apart when we include their possible instances [Lewis]
15732 Properties don't seem to be sets, because different properties can have the same set [Lewis]
15734 If a property is relative, such as being a father or son, then set membership seems relative too [Lewis]
9655 Trilateral and triangular seem to be coextensive sets in all possible worlds [Lewis]
9657 You must accept primitive similarity to like tropes, but tropes give a good account of it [Lewis]
15747 Universals aren't parts of things, because that relationship is transitive, and universals need not be [Lewis]
15745 Universals recur, are multiply located, wholly present, make things overlap, and are held in common [Lewis]
15746 If particles were just made of universals, similar particles would be the same particle [Lewis]
15748 Trope theory needs a primitive notion for what unites some tropes [Lewis]
15749 Trope theory (unlike universals) needs a primitive notion of being duplicates [Lewis]
15750 Tropes need a similarity primitive, so they cannot be used to explain similarity [Lewis]
15741 All of the natural properties are included among the intrinsic properties [Lewis]
15751 Surely 'slept in by Washington' is a property of some bed? [Lewis]
15742 A disjunctive property can be unnatural, but intrinsic if its disjuncts are intrinsic [Lewis]
15735 Properties don't have degree; they are determinate, and things have varying relations to them [Lewis]
9656 The 'abundant' properties are just any bizarre property you fancy [Lewis]
15737 To be a 'property' is to suit a theoretical role [Lewis]
14996 Natural properties give similarity, joint carving, intrinsicness, specificity, homogeneity... [Lewis]
15743 Defining natural properties by means of laws of nature is potentially circular [Lewis]
15744 We can't define natural properties by resemblance, if they are used to explain resemblance [Lewis]
15731 Quantification sometimes commits to 'sets', but sometimes just to pluralities (or 'classes') [Lewis]
15740 I don't take 'natural' properties to be fixed by the nature of one possible world [Lewis]
15752 We might try defining the natural properties by a short list of them [Lewis]
10469 A world is a maximal mereological sum of spatiotemporally interrelated things [Lewis]
9659 Causation is when at the closest world without the cause, there is no effect either [Lewis]
8901 Abstraction is usually explained either by example, or conflation, or abstraction, or negatively [Lewis]
8904 The Way of Abstraction says an incomplete description of a concrete entity is the complete abstraction [Lewis]
8938 The Way of Example compares donkeys and numbers, but what is the difference, and what are numbers? [Lewis]
8903 Abstracta can be causal: sets can be causes or effects; there can be universal effects; events may be sets [Lewis]
8902 If abstractions are non-spatial, then both sets and universals seem to have locations [Lewis]
8906 If we can abstract the extrinsic relations and features of objects, abstraction isn't universals or tropes [Lewis]
8905 If universals or tropes are parts of things, then abstraction picks out those parts [Lewis]
8908 For most sets, the concept of equivalence is too artificial to explain abstraction [Lewis]
8907 The abstract direction of a line is the equivalence class of it and all lines parallel to it [Lewis]
8909 Abstractions may well be verbal fictions, in which we ignore some features of an object [Lewis]
9660 The impossible can be imagined as long as it is a bit vague [Lewis]
16278 A particular functional role is what gives content to a thought [Lewis]
16279 General causal theories of knowledge are refuted by mathematics [Lewis]
9661 Induction is just reasonable methods of inferring the unobserved from the observed [Lewis]
16280 Often explanaton seeks fundamental laws, rather than causal histories [Lewis]
16274 If the well-ordering of a pack of cards was by shuffling, the explanation would make it more surprising [Lewis]
16281 Honesty requires philosophical theories we can commit to with our ordinary commonsense [Lewis]
11903 Extreme haecceitists could say I might have been a poached egg, but it is too remote to consider [Lewis, by Mackie,P]
13793 An essential property is one possessed by all counterparts [Lewis, by Elder]
16283 For me, all worlds are equal, with each being actual relative to itself [Lewis]
16282 Ersatzers say we have one world, and abstract representations of how it might have been [Lewis]
16284 Ersatz worlds represent either through language, or by models, or magically [Lewis]
16286 Linguistic possible worlds need a complete supply of unique names for each thing [Lewis]
16287 Maximal consistency for a world seems a modal distinction, concerning what could be true together [Lewis]
9662 Linguistic possible worlds have problems of inconsistencies, no indiscernibles, and vocabulary [Lewis]
16288 Analysis reduces primitives and makes understanding explicit (without adding new knowledge) [Lewis]
16289 We can't account for an abstraction as 'from' something if the something doesn't exist [Lewis]
16290 I believe in properties, which are sets of possible individuals [Lewis]
16291 In counterpart theory 'Humphrey' doesn't name one being, but a mereological sum of many beings [Lewis]
15968 Identity is simple - absolutely everything is self-identical, and nothing is identical to another thing [Lewis]
15969 Two things can never be identical, so there is no problem [Lewis]
9664 Endurance is the wrong account, because things change intrinsic properties like shape [Lewis]
9665 There are three responses to the problem that intrinsic shapes do not endure [Lewis]
9663 A thing 'perdures' if it has separate temporal parts, and 'endures' if it is wholly present at different times [Lewis]
9666 It is quite implausible that the future is unreal, as that would terminate everything [Lewis]
9667 Mereological composition is unrestricted: any class of things has a mereological sum [Lewis]
15129 Haecceitism implies de re differences but qualitative identity [Lewis]
9670 Extreme haecceitism says you might possibly be a poached egg [Lewis]
9669 There are no free-floating possibilia; they have mates in a world, giving them extrinsic properties [Lewis]
9057 Vagueness is semantic indecision: we haven't settled quite what our words are meant to express [Lewis]
9671 Whether or not France is hexagonal depends on your standards of precision [Lewis]
19280 I can ask questions which create a context in which origin ceases to be essential [Lewis]
14737 Properties cannot be relations to times, if there are temporary properties which are intrinsic [Lewis, by Sider]
13268 There are no restrictions on composition, because they would be vague, and composition can't be vague [Lewis, by Sider]
16262 Sparse properties rest either on universals, or on tropes, or on primitive naturalness [Lewis, by Maudlin]
15397 If a global intrinsic never varies between possible duplicates, all necessary properties are intrinsic [Cameron on Lewis]
15398 Global intrinsic may make necessarily coextensive properties both intrinsic or both extrinsic [Cameron on Lewis]
23019 The interesting time travel is when personal and external time come apart [Lewis, by Baron/Miller]
23021 Lewis said it might just be that travellers to the past can't kill their grandfathers [Lewis, by Baron/Miller]
10191 Set theory reduces to a mereological theory with singletons as the only atoms [Lewis, by MacBride]
18395 Sets are mereological sums of the singletons of their members [Lewis, by Armstrong]
10566 Lewis prefers giving up singletons to giving up sums [Lewis, by Fine,K]
14244 Lewis only uses fusions to create unities, but fusions notoriously flatten our distinctions [Oliver/Smiley on Lewis]
15497 We can replace the membership relation with the member-singleton relation (plus mereology) [Lewis]
15496 We can build set theory on singletons: classes are then fusions of subclasses, membership is the singleton [Lewis]
15500 Classes divide into subclasses in many ways, but into members in only one way [Lewis]
15499 A subclass of a subclass is itself a subclass; a member of a member is not in general a member [Lewis]
15498 We can accept the null set, but there is no null class of anything [Lewis]
15501 We have no idea of a third sort of thing, that isn't an individual, a class, or their mixture [Lewis]
15502 There are four main reasons for asserting that there is an empty set [Lewis]
15503 We needn't accept this speck of nothingness, this black hole in the fabric of Reality! [Lewis]
15504 Atomless gunk is an individual whose parts all have further proper parts [Lewis]
15508 If singletons are where their members are, then so are all sets [Lewis]
15507 Set theory has some unofficial axioms, generalisations about how to understand it [Lewis]
15506 If we don't understand the singleton, then we don't understand classes [Lewis]
15509 Some say qualities are parts of things - as repeatable universals, or as particulars [Lewis]
15511 If singleton membership is external, why is an object a member of one rather than another? [Lewis]
15512 In mereology no two things consist of the same atoms [Lewis]
15513 Maybe singletons have a structure, of a thing and a lasso? [Lewis]
15514 A huge part of Reality is only accepted as existing if you have accepted set theory [Lewis]
15515 To be a structuralist, you quantify over relations [Lewis]
15516 A property is any class of possibilia [Lewis]
15517 Giving up classes means giving up successful mathematics because of dubious philosophy [Lewis]
15518 I like plural quantification, but am not convinced of its connection with second-order logic [Lewis]
15520 Existence doesn't come in degrees; once asserted, it can't then be qualified [Lewis]
15519 Trout-turkeys exist, despite lacking cohesion, natural joints and united causal power [Lewis]
15521 Given cats, a fusion of cats adds nothing further to reality [Lewis]
15522 The one has different truths from the many; it is one rather than many, one rather than six [Lewis]
14748 The many are many and the one is one, so they can't be identical [Lewis]
15523 Set theory isn't innocent; it generates infinities from a single thing; but mathematics needs it [Lewis]
15524 Zermelo's model of arithmetic is distinctive because it rests on a primitive of set theory [Lewis]
15525 Plural quantification lacks a complete axiom system [Lewis]
10660 A commitment to cat-fusions is not a further commitment; it is them and they are it [Lewis]
6129 Lewis affirms 'composition as identity' - that an object is no more than its parts [Lewis, by Merricks]
15790 Lewis can't know possible worlds without first knowing what is possible or impossible [Lycan on Lewis]
15791 What are the ontological grounds for grouping possibilia into worlds? [Lycan on Lewis]
15789 Lewis's distinction of 'existing' from 'being actual' is Meinong's between 'existing' and 'subsisting' [Lycan on Lewis]
14283 A conditional probability does not measure the probability of the truth of any proposition [Lewis, by Edgington]
4038 Properties are sets of their possible instances (which separates 'renate' from 'cordate') [Lewis, by Mellor/Oliver]
9423 If simplicity and strength are criteria for laws of nature, that introduces a subjective element [Mumford on Lewis]
9424 A number of systematizations might tie as the best and most coherent system [Mumford on Lewis]
9409 Laws are the best axiomatization of the total history of world events or facts [Lewis, by Mumford]
14209 Descriptive theories remain part of the theory of reference (with seven mild modifications) [Lewis]
14215 Causal theories of reference make errors in reference easy [Lewis]
14210 A gerrymandered mereological sum can be a mess, but still have natural joints [Lewis]
14213 Anti-realists see the world as imaginary, or lacking joints, or beyond reference, or beyond truth [Lewis]
14212 A consistent theory just needs one model; isomorphic versions will do too, and large domains provide those [Lewis]
15540 You can't deny temporary intrinsic properties by saying the properties are relations (to times) [Lewis]
15433 Tropes are particular properties, which cannot recur, but can be exact duplicates [Lewis]
15448 The 'magical' view of structural universals says they are atoms, even though they have parts [Lewis]
15449 If 'methane' is an atomic structural universal, it has nothing to connect it to its carbon universals [Lewis]
15439 The 'pictorial' view of structural universals says they are wholes made of universals as parts [Lewis]
15441 The structural universal 'methane' needs the universal 'hydrogen' four times over [Lewis]
15440 A whole is distinct from its parts, but is not a further addition in ontology [Lewis]
15443 Mathematicians abstract by equivalence classes, but that doesn't turn a many into one [Lewis]
15450 Maybe abstraction is just mereological subtraction [Lewis]
15451 I assume there could be natural properties that are not instantiated in our world [Lewis]
15444 Different things (a toy house and toy car) can be made of the same parts at different times [Lewis]
15446 Composition is not just making new things from old; there are too many counterexamples [Lewis]
15445 Butane and Isobutane have the same atoms, but different structures [Lewis]
15434 Structural universals have a necessary connection to the universals forming its parts [Lewis]
15437 We can't get rid of structural universals if there are no simple universals [Lewis]
15435 If you think universals are immanent, you must believe them to be sparse, and not every related predicate [Lewis]
15436 Universals are meant to give an account of resemblance [Lewis]
15438 We can add a primitive natural/unnatural distinction to class nominalism [Lewis]
9425 Lewis later proposed the axioms at the intersection of the best theories (which may be few) [Mumford on Lewis]
16079 De re modal predicates are ambiguous [Lewis, by Rudder Baker]
14401 Every proposition is entirely about being [Lewis]
15549 If it were true that nothing at all existed, would that have a truthmaker? [Lewis]
21961 Physics aims to discover which universals actually exist [Lewis, by Moore,AW]
15120 Lewisian properties have powers because of their relationships to other properties [Lewis, by Hawthorne]
14499 Properties are classes of possible and actual concrete particulars [Lewis, by Koslicki]
7031 Lewis says properties are sets of actual and possible objects [Lewis, by Heil]
10717 Natural properties figure in the analysis of similarity in intrinsic respects [Lewis, by Oliver]
16217 Lewisian natural properties fix reference of predicates, through a principle of charity [Lewis, by Hawley]
8576 The One over Many problem (in predication terms) deserves to be neglected (by ostriches) [Lewis]
8605 In addition to analysis of a concept, one can deny it, or accept it as primitive [Lewis]
8585 Reference partly concerns thought and language, partly eligibility of referent by natural properties [Lewis]
8613 Objects are demarcated by density and chemistry, and natural properties belong in what is well demarcated [Lewis]
8586 Natural properties tend to belong to well-demarcated things, typically loci of causal chains [Lewis]
8589 For us, a property being natural is just an aspect of its featuring in the contents of our attitudes [Lewis]
8615 We need natural properties in order to motivate the principle of charity [Lewis]
8614 A sophisticated principle of charity sometimes imputes error as well as truth [Lewis]
8606 A supervenience thesis is a denial of independent variation [Lewis]
8607 Supervenience is reduction without existence denials, ontological priorities, or translatability [Lewis]
15727 Physics aims for a list of natural properties [Lewis]
8608 Counterfactuals 'backtrack' if a different present implies a different past [Lewis]
8569 I suspend judgements about universals, but their work must be done [Lewis]
8584 Causal counterfactuals must avoid backtracking, to avoid epiphenomena and preemption [Lewis]
8611 A law of nature is any regularity that earns inclusion in the ideal system [Lewis]
8581 Physics discovers laws and causal explanations, and also the natural properties required [Lewis]
8580 Materialism is (roughly) that two worlds cannot differ without differing physically [Lewis]
8579 Psychophysical identity implies the possibility of idealism or panpsychism [Lewis]
15460 All perfectly natural properties are intrinsic [Lewis, by Lewis]
15726 Natural properties fix resemblance and powers, and are picked out by universals [Lewis]
8572 Any class of things is a property, no matter how whimsical or irrelevant [Lewis]
8571 Universals are wholly present in their instances, whereas properties are spread around [Lewis]
18433 There are far more properties than any brain could ever encodify [Lewis]
8604 We need properties as semantic values for linguistic expressions [Lewis]
8570 To have a property is to be a member of a class, usually a class of things [Lewis]
8573 Most properties are causally irrelevant, and we can't spot the relevant ones. [Lewis]
8574 Class Nominalism and Resemblance Nominalism are pretty much the same [Lewis]
16458 Semantic vagueness involves alternative and equal precisifications of the language [Lewis]
4398 An event causes another just if the second event would not have happened without the first [Lewis, by Psillos]