Abstract
David Lewis [1973b] offers a possible worlds approach to a theory of counterfactuals. He attempts to specify necessary and sufficient conditions according to which a given counterfactual is true or false. My profit surveys Lewis's theory of counterfactuals in detail. Although for the most part I defend Lewis's account from several objectors, in the final chapter I reason that his theory is susceptible to a severe skepticism, which threatens any philosophical theory that relies on Lewis's theory to distinguish between non-paradigmatically true and false counterfactuals. As for the more sympathetic portion of my project, while I show how Lewis's canonical account cannot handle some paradigmatically false counterfactuals-viz., those containing true components-I try to repair his analysis in the spirit of Alan Penczek (1997). I then discuss Lewis's extension or enhancement to his original theory, which he gives in order to foil an objection advanced by Kit Fine (1975) and Jonathan Bennett (1974). Finally, I outline and raise several worries inherent in Bennett's rival theory (1984). As for the less then sympathetic section of this paper, I exploit arguments put forward by G. Lee Bowie (1979) as well as by Daniel Krasner and Mark Heller (1994), which are designed to undermine any systematic procedure to circumscribe Lewis's crucial three-place comparative similarity relation between possible worlds.
Botham, Thad M (1999). A survey of David Lewis's theory of counterfactuals: resolved difficulties and resilient obstacles. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from
https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /ETD -TAMU -1999 -THESIS -B68.