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48Humean laws and explanationPrincipia: An International Journal of Epistemology 23 (3): 373-385. 2019.My primary focus in this paper is on an objection to Humean account of laws and specifically to David Lewis’ “best systems analysis” (BSA). The objection is that the laws according to the BSA (which I call L-laws) fail to account for the ability of laws to explain. In contrast governing laws (which I will call G-laws) are alleged to account for the role of laws in scientific explanations by virtue of their governing role. If governing is required for laws to be explanatory then Humean accounts l…Read more
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137The package deal account of laws and propertiesSynthese 199 (1-2): 1065-1089. 2020.This paper develops an account of the metaphysics of fundamental laws I call “the Package Deal Account ” that is a descendent of Lewis’ BSA but differs from it in a number of significant ways. It also rejects some elements of the metaphysics in which Lewis develops his BSA. First, Lewis proposed a metaphysical thesis about fundamental properties he calls “Humean Supervenience” according to which all fundamental properties are instantiated by points or point sized individuals and the only fundame…Read more
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32Comments on Jaegwon Kim's Mind and the Physical WorldPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 65 (3): 655-662. 2002.
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Freedom from Physics: Quantum Mechanics and Free WillIn Tim Crane & Katalin Farkas (eds.), Metaphysics: a guide and anthology, Oxford University Press. 2004.
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78A companion to David Lewis (edited book)Wiley-Blackwell. 2015.In _A Companion to David Lewis_, Barry Loewer and Jonathan Schaffer bring together top philosophers to explain, discuss, and critically extend Lewis's seminal work in original ways. Students and scholars will discover the underlying themes and complex interconnections woven through the diverse range of his work in metaphysics, philosophy of language, logic, epistemology, philosophy of science, philosophy of mind, ethics, and aesthetics. The first and only comprehensive study of the work of David…Read more
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122Mind in a Physical World: An Essay on the Mind-Body Problem and Mental CausationJournal of Philosophy 98 (6): 315. 2001.
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96Knowledge and the Flow of Information. Fred I. DretskePhilosophy of Science 49 (2): 297-300. 1982.
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10Comments on Jaegwon Kim’s M ind and the Physical WorldPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 65 (3): 655-662. 2002.NRP is a family of views differing by how they understand “reduction” and “physicalism.” Following Kim I understand the non-reduction as holding that some events and properties are distinct from any physical events and properties. A necessary condition for physicalism is that mental properties, events, and laws supervene on physical ones. Kim allows various understandings of “supervenience” but I think that physicalism requires at least the claim that any minimal physical duplicate of the actual…Read more
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27David Lewis’s Humean Theory of Objective ChancePhilosophy of Science 71 (5): 1115--25. 2004.The most important theories in fundamental physics, quantum mechanics and statistical mechanics, posit objective probabilities or chances. As important as chance is there is little agreement about what it is. The usual “interpretations of probability” give very different accounts of chance and there is disagreement concerning which, if any, is capable of accounting for its role in physics. David Lewis has contributed enormously to improving this situation. In his classic paper “A Subjectivist's …Read more
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16Comments on Jaegwon Kim’s Mind and the Physical WorldPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 65 (3). 2002.NRP is a family of views differing by how they understand “reduction” and “physicalism.” Following Kim I understand the non-reduction as holding that some events and properties are distinct from any physical events and properties. A necessary condition for physicalism is that mental properties, events, and laws supervene on physical ones. Kim allows various understandings of “supervenience” but I think that physicalism requires at least the claim that any minimal physical duplicate of the actual…Read more
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3Copenhagen versus Bohmian Interpretations of Quantum Theory1 (review)British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 49 (2): 317-328. 1998.
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5Leibniz and the ontological argumentPhilosophical Studies 34 (1). 1978.According to leibniz, Descartes' ontological argument establishes that if God possibly exists then God exists. To complete the argument a proof that God possibly exists is required. Leibniz attempts a proof-Theoretic demonstration that 'god exists' is consistent and concludes from this that 'god possibly exists is true'. In this paper I formalize leibniz's argument in a system of modal logic. I show that a principle which leibniz implicitly uses, 'if a is consistent then a is possibly true' is e…Read more
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DeterminismIn Martin Curd & Stathis Psillos (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Science, Routledge. 2005.
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211A guide to naturalizing semanticsIn Bob Hale, Crispin Wright & Alexander Miller (eds.), A Companion to the Philosophy of Language, Wiley-blackwell. pp. 108-126. 1997.
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8The role of 'conceptual role semantics'Notre Dame Journal of Formal Logic 23 (July): 305-15. 1982.
Areas of Specialization
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Physical Science |
Philosophy of Probability |
General Philosophy of Science |