Inconstancy and Content

According to David Lewis, many de re modal predications – that is, sentences such as ‘John McCain could have won the 2008 U.S. Presidential election’ and ‘Dwight could receive a promotion’ – are inconstant insofar as their truth values can vary alongside changes in our interests. In this paper, I argue that previous accounts of this inconstancy, such as those offered by Lewis and Harold Noonan, are inadequate. Linguistic data, I claim – specifically, agreement and disagreement data – tell against these views and in favor of a new, more radical approach. My goal in this paper is to present such data in an effort to offer some initial motivation for this new approach.