Counterfactual (conditional)

Counterfactual conditionals

By Doring, Frank

‘If bats were deaf, they would hunt during the day.’ What you have just read is called a ‘counterfactual’ conditional; it is an ‘If…then…’ statement the components of ...

Lewis, David Kellogg (1941–2001)

By van Inwagen, Peter

David Lewis has made extremely important and influential contributions to many topics in metaphysics, philosophical logic, the philosophy of science, the philosophy of mind, the philosophy of language, ...

Conditional, counterfactual

Reichenbach, Hans (1891–1953)

By Salmon, Wesley C.

Philosophy of science flourished in the twentieth century, partly as a result of extraordinary progress in the sciences themselves, but mainly because of the efforts of philosophers who ...

Deductive closure principle

By Brueckner, Anthony

It seems that one can expand one’s body of knowledge by making deductive inferences from propositions one knows. The ‘deductive closure principle’ captures this idea: if S knows ...

Alexander, Samuel (1859–1938)

By Emmet, Dorothy

Alexander propounded a metaphysical system based on a view of Space-Time differentiated into ‘motions’ from which new qualities emerged at certain levels of organization; matter, life and mind ...

Non-monotonic logic

By Fuhrmann, Andre

A relation of inference is ‘monotonic’ if the addition of premises does not undermine previously reached conclusions; otherwise the relation is non-monotonic. Deductive inference, at least according to ...

Indicative conditionals

By Jackson, Frank

Examples of indicative conditionals are ‘If it rained, then the match was cancelled’ and ‘If Alex plays, Carlton will win’. The contrast is with subjunctive or counterfactual conditionals, ...

Nozick, Robert (1938–2002)

By Wolff, Jonathan

Although Robert Nozick published on an enormous range of topics, he is best known as a political philosopher, and especially for his powerful and entertaining statement of libertarianism. ...

Nozick, Robert (1938–2002)

By Wolff, Jonathan; Blackburn, Simon

Although Robert Nozick published on an enormous range of topics, he is best known as a political philosopher, and especially for his powerful and entertaining statement of libertarianism. ...

Semantics

By Crimmins, Mark

Semantics is the systematic study of meaning. Current work in this field builds on the work of logicians and linguists as well as of philosophers. Philosophers are interested ...

Dispositions

‘Disposition’ is a term used in metaphysics usually to indicate a type of property, state or condition. Such a property is one that provides for the possibility of ...

Ockhamism

By Finch, Alicia

Ockhamism, so named because it was developed and defended by the fourteenth-century philosopher William of Ockham, is a long-enduring response to fatalist arguments. Fatalism, the thesis that ...

Semantics, possible worlds

By Perry, John R.

Possible worlds semantics (PWS) is a family of ideas and methods that have been used to analyse concepts of philosophical interest. PWS was originally focused on the important ...

Negative facts in classical Indian philosophy

By Gillon, Brendan S.

Like their European counterparts, the philosophers of classical India were interested in the problem of negative facts. A negative fact may be thought of, at the outset at ...

Phenomenalism

By Fumerton, Richard

On its most common interpretation, phenomenalism maintains that statements asserting the existence of physical objects are equivalent in meaning to statements describing sensations. More specifically, the phenomenalist claims ...

Power

By Green, Leslie

The general notion of power involves the capacity to produce or prevent change. In social and political philosophy, narrower conceptions of power specify the nature of these changes. ...

Ramsey, Frank Plumpton (1903–30)

By Mellor, D.H.

Before Ramsey died at the age of 26 he did an extraordinary amount of pioneering work, in economics and mathematics as well as in logic and philosophy. His ...

Language, philosophy of

By Crimmins, Mark

Philosophical interest in language, while ancient and enduring (see Language, ancient philosophy of; Language, medieval theories of; Language, Renaissance philosophy of; Language, early modern philosophy of), has blossomed ...

Communicative rationality

By Dews, Peter

The concept of ‘communicative rationality’ is primarily associated with the work of the philosopher and social theorist Jürgen Habermas. According to Habermas, communication through language necessarily involves the ...

Laws, natural

By Hooker, C.A.

It is widely supposed that science aims to identify ’natural laws’. But what are laws of nature? How, if at all, do statements of laws differ from ’mere’ ...

Causation

By Cartwright, Nancy

Two opposed viewpoints raise complementary problems about causation. The first is from Hume: watch the child kick the ball. You see the foot touch the ball and the ...

Causation, further themes

By Menzies, Peter

The traditional focus of philosophical interest in causation has been token causation: the kind of causation that relates particular dated events. There has been controversy in recent times ...

Computer simulations in science

Since the advent of digital computers around 1950, the method of computer simulation (simulation, for short) has enriched the repertoire of scientific methods. A computer simulation traces the ...