Abstract
In this paper, I defend modal dimensionalism against the objection that it is ontologically and ideologically heavy. First, I briefly outline the theory and the objection against it. The objection relies on the widely accepted view that ontological and ideological parsimony are operational criteria when comparing metaphysical theories. Second, I outline the conventional distinction between ontology and ideology in the metaphysical tradition. Third, I challenge a particular kind of parsimony: reduction by identification. Fourth, even if reduction by identification is accepted, I show that theories that pursue this often minimize differences, and that such minimization paves the way to epistemic underdetermination. Finally, I demonstrate that some theories in modal metaphysics also suffer from difference minimization and should thus not be measured on the ontology/ideology scale (contra the objection from heaviness).
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17 January 2020
The original version of this article unfortunately contains incorrect argument in section 5 and the corrected section headings.
Notes
Stalnaker dubs MR as ‘extreme’ realism about possible worlds since, for him, it is not true that ‘possible worlds are things of the same sort as the actual world-‘I and all my surrounding”. (Stalnaker 1976, 67).
I shall put to the side what I mean by ‘real’ here. For more on this, see Yagisawa (2010).
Although it is temporal tense that is mostly discussed, spatial tense is not any different. Consider a sentence ‘China is tropical’. As Yagisawa, replying to Hayaki, claims there are a number of different readings of the sentence. Yagisawa prefers a truth relative reading according to which the assertion is true when certain regions of China are considered but untrue when other regions are considered. In terms of spatial tense terminology, the objective reality is such that China isGuangdongttropical and in notHeilongjiangtropical. See Yagisawa (2011) and Hayaki (2011) for more details and Yagisawa (2010, 81) and Kim (2011, 295) for the importance of metaphysical tensing.
Cf. Yagisawa (2002, 31).
See also Ballarin (2011) for a similar, although not identical, objection to MD. She calls the position ‘double souled’ since it attempts ‘to reconcile the best sides of two apparently incompatible positions’. According to Ballarin, ‘metaphysical indices are meant to provide a non-reductive, primitive, yet clear and formally well-structured account of modality’. See Ballarin (2011, 277).
See also Cowling (2013).
Even in cases where the revisionary approach is of no help, defenders of Spudism can turn to the conciliatory strategy. The conciliatory strategy comes in two versions according to Effingham: the context shift solution and the analogical predication solution. See Effingham (2015, 289–293).
Note also Lewis’s claim that: ‘[t]he question worth asking is: which entities, if any, among those we should believe in, can occupy which versions of the property role?’ (Lewis 1986a, 55).
Here, I use Bennett’s own ‘downplay’ and ‘upplay’ terminology.
Interestingly, (P) provides us with the analysis of modality in some sense. Namely, it says what possibility is: to be possible is to hold in some possible world. What it does not say, however, is what possibility there is, namely what the extent of possibility is. Divers formulate the so-called separatist approach according to which two questions are distinguished: the nature-question of what possibility is, and the extent-question of what possibilities there are (Divers 2013, 189). We can then say that given the separatist approach, MgE is not a complete explanation of modality. If, on the other side, we take the accurate analysis to concern the nature-question only, MgE plays just as well as MR. Many thanks to the anonymous reviewer for pointing that out.
The same phenomenon appeared in the constitution talk between mereological nihilism and mereological anti-nihilism. They also share the same subject matter, the common sense data, although their theoretical explanations differ. I am using the neutral notion ‘data’ instead of the philosophically controversial notion ‘intuition’, and what I mean by it is strongly entrenched opinions that ought not to be denied by any metaphysical approach. See, for example, Lewis’s (1973) claim that ‘[i]t is not the business of philosophy either to undermine or to justify these pre-existing opinions (Lewis 1973, 99).
I borrow this structure from Divers (2013).
Lewis himself admits that MR does disagree, to an extreme extent, with firm common sense opinion and is therefore met with many incredulous stares.
See also Kim (2011, 295-296) for the discussion and comparison of MD and MR’s analysis of the case at issue.
Here, I ignore the issues concerning the similarity relations between various doorways in different possible worlds. The thing is that if Quine considers the actual doorway, the only relevant worlds are those worlds that have a counterpart of the actual doorway as their parts. See, for example, Lewis (1968) and Lewis (1986a).
For more about the application of impossibility tense, see (Author).
An anonymous reviewer pointed out to me that MgE is not the only ME’s candidate. I agree. For instance, Sententialism, Propositionalism, Property Ersatzism or Combinatorialism aim at such an analysis of modality which avoids rich ontological commitments by paying the cost for ideology. However, what I was interested in is a debate of a special kind, namely trading off ontology and ideology between competitive metaphysical theories. I am quite sure that it could be identified between MD and other sorts of ME as well since, as I have for it, the example represents one token of one type of metaphysical practice.
Cf. Van Inwagen (1986).
Cf. Denby (2006).
Nolan (forthcoming) provides a more detailed identification of Lewis’s argument and its three dimensions: intelligibility, epistemology and metaphysics. He then offers responses to each version of the argument.
Again, the ersatzist can point to Lewis’s own use of this sort of predicate: ‘…is a part of…’ or ‘…is a member of…’. See, for instance, Nolan (forthcoming).
Note, that although it is primarily MD that I tried to rehabilitate from recent objection from ontological and ideological extravagance, MD, as a kind of MR, is one of many theories accused from lacking these theoretical virtues. But if I am right, methodology of metaphysics is far from being settled and should be rebuilt on different grounds.
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Acknowledgement
I would like to thank an anonymous reviewer for very helpful comments which substantially improved the final version. My thanks go also members of the Logic, Epistemology and Metaphysics of Fiction band. Namely, thank to Daniela Glavaničová, Miloš Kosterec, Marián Zouhar and Matteo Pascucci. This paper was supported by grant VEGA No. 2/0117/19: Logic, Epistemology and Metaphysics of Fiction and Štefan Schwarz's Slovak Academy od Sciences scholarship.
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Vacek, M. Trading Ontology for Ideology (and Vice Versa). Acta Anal 35, 405–420 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12136-019-00411-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12136-019-00411-2