Combining Texts

Ideas for 'works', 'The Boundary Stones of Thought' and 'The Upanishads'

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2 ideas

10. Modality / B. Possibility / 1. Possibility
If two possibilities can't share a determiner, they are incompatible [Rumfitt]
     Full Idea: Two possibilities are incompatible when no possibility determines both.
     From: Ian Rumfitt (The Boundary Stones of Thought [2015], 7.1)
     A reaction: This strikes me as just the right sort of language for building up a decent metaphysical picture of the world, which needs to incorporate possibilities as well as actualities.
Since possibilities are properties of the world, calling 'red' the determination of a determinable seems right [Rumfitt]
     Full Idea: Some philosophers describe the colour scarlet as a determination of the determinable red; since the ways the world might be are naturally taken to be properties of the world, it helps to bear this analogy in mind.
     From: Ian Rumfitt (The Boundary Stones of Thought [2015], 6.4)
     A reaction: This fits nicely with the disposition accounts of modality which I favour. Hence being 'coloured' is a real property of objects, even in the absence of the name of its specific colour.