Joaquim Giannotti

There is widespread consensus that a view of nothing but powers or dispositional fundamental properties struggles to accommodate physical symmetries. An option is to expand the fundamental ontology admitting extra modal elements constraining the behaviour of physical systems. Another is to eliminate symmetries altogether deeming them as dispensable structures. Either option is problematic. The expansion strategy yields a problematic ontological inflation that undermines the explanatory ambitions of the powers view. The eliminativist approach, if unsupplemented, does not deliver a naturalistically respectable view of symmetries and their role in contemporary physics. To avoid these problems, Samuel Kimpton-Nye (2023) has recently defended a promising solution to ground symmetries in powers taken collectively by defending a non-Humean Best System Account of nomic items. This paper critically examines Kimpton-Nye’s view of symmetries. We argue that it raises metaphysical and scientific concerns regarding their powerful grounds of symmetries and their physical features. As a more promising alternative, we argue for combining an ontology of fundamental powers with a deflationist account of symmetries. In contrast to Kimpton-Nye’s proposal, symmetries are not grounded collectively in powers, but they are epistemic, rule-prescribing principles in the Best Systems. Embracing the resulting view, we hold, is a better way to be a power theorist about symmetries.

Ontologias de potência pura sustentam que todas ou muitas propriedades naturais fundamentais são completamente poderosas. Sua natureza se esgota nos vários papéis causais, disposicionais e nômicos que desempenham. Analiso um desafio subestimado à perspectiva da potência pura com base em considerações da física: como podemos harmonizar a tese da potência completa e o caráter manifesto qualitativamente estrutural, geométrico e matemático das propriedades físicas? Identifiquei e testei cinco abordagens que poderiam responder a esta questão: (i) eliminativismo, (ii) a perspectiva identitária, (iii) essencialismo, (iv) prioritarismo e (v) emergentismo. Qualquer resposta satisfatória ao desafio deve preservar a primazia do poder sobre a qualidade e evitar que a perspectiva do poder puro recaia sobre um de seus concorrentes. Eu argumento que cada um de (i) a (v) falha em atender a esses desideratos ou levanta novos problemas para a perspectiva de poderes puros.

Abstract. Pure powers ontologies hold that all or many fundamental natural properties are completely powerful. Their nature is exhausted by the various causal, dispositional, and nomic roles they play. I discuss an underappreciated challenge against the pure powers view based on considerations from physics: How can we harmonise the complete powerfulness thesis and the manifest qualitatively structural, geometrical, and mathematical character of physical properties? I identify and assay five approaches that could answer this question: (i) eliminativism, (ii), the identity view, (iii) emergentism, (iv) essentialism, and (v) prioritarianism. Any satisfactory answer to the challenge should preserve the primacy of the powerful over the qualitative, and it should avoid collapsing the pure powers view into one of its competitors. I argue that each of (i) – (v) either fails to meet such desiderata or raises new problems for the pure powers view. Resumen. Las ontologías de potencias puras sostienen que todas o muchas de las propiedades naturales fundamentales son completamente poderosas. Su naturaleza se agota en los diversos roles causales, disposicionales y nómicos que desempeñan. Analizo un desafío subestimado contra la perspectiva de las potencias puras basado en consideraciones de la física: ¿Cómo podemos armonizar la tesis de la potencia completa y el carácter manifiesto cualitativamente estructural, geométrico y matemático de las propiedades físicas? Identifico y ensaya cinco enfoques que podrían responder a esta pregunta: (i) eliminativismo, (ii) la perspectiva de la identidad, (iii) emergentismo, (iv) esencialismo y (v) prioritarismo. Cualquier respuesta satisfactoria al desafío debe preservar la primacía de lo poderoso sobre lo cualitativo y debe evitar colapsar la perspectiva de las potencias puras en una de sus competidoras. Argumento que cada uno de (i) a (v) no cumple con dichos desiderata o plantea nuevos problemas para la perspectiva de las potencias puras.

Michel Ghins's Scientific Realism and Laws of Nature: A Metaphysics of Causal Powers is a commendable exploration of the metaphysical foundations of scientific inquiry. The book, thoughtfully structured into six chapters, boldly advances a comprehensive and unified account of scientific theorizing, natural laws, and the ontology of properties. In an era where philosophical discourse often fragments into narrowly focused projects, Ghins's work offers a welcome counterpoint, providing a systematic and ambitious investigation into these distinctive questions of the metaphysics of science.

Theorists of grounding believe that this notion has an intimate connection with metaphysical explanation. However, they struggle to harmonize the objective mind-independent features of grounding and the context-sensitive aspects of metaphysical explanation. As a reconciliatory approach, I offer a framework of metaphysical explanation that draws from perspectival realist views in the philosophy of science. According to the proposed view, our understanding of grounding claims is inescapably situated in agent-dependent perspectives that aim to aptly latch onto a grounding structure out there. To defend its merits, I discuss how this grounding perspectivalism offers an insightful analysis of disagreements concerning the priority and asymmetry of what grounds what. Exploring some of the deeper implications of the proposed framework, I conclude by stirring controversy: contrary to a popular view, grounding perspectivalism implies that metaphysical explanation should not be regarded as a guide to grounding.

Dispositionalism holds that at least some fundamental physical properties are ungrounded dispositional ones. Unfortunately, the very scientific practice that dispositionalists invoke to support their view undermines the dispositional thesis: putative fundamental properties such as mass, charge, and spin appear to be grounded in symmetry structures. Can the dispositionalist hold that fundamental symmetry structures are dispositional? Livanios (2019) defends a negative answer: symmetry structures do not satisfy the truthmaking principle of dispositionality. By contrast, I offer a positive answer. Here I argue that if dispositionalists adopt an identity-based criterion of dispositionality, they can endorse what I shall call moderate dispositional structuralism: the view that the identity of fundamental symmetry structures is partially but not exhaustively fixed by their dispositional character. The purpose of this paper is to articulate moderate dispositional structuralism and its merits. To defend the plausibility of this view, I compare it with its radical counterpart: the view that the identity of symmetry structures is fully or wholly fixed by their dispositionality.

Strong emergentists about mental properties of conscious experience typically hold that these are ontologically “over and above” and distinct in kind as compared to physical properties. Powers-based account of strong emergence offer a promising framework for elucidating the ontological “over and above”-ness of strongly emergent properties. However, they do not automatically ensure the desired non-physicality. In this paper, I argue that a conception of properties as powerful qualities has in-built resources for capturing both the ontological “over and above”-ness and the kind distinctness in a unified way. I begin by illustrating powers-based accounts of strong emergence. Then I defend the superiority of a powerful qualities-based account of strong emergence over two standard approaches recovering the distinctness in kind of strongly emergent mental properties: the via negativa strategy, and the anti-materialist strategy. I conclude that a conception of powerful qualities is a surprising yet natural ally for the proponent of strongly emergent mental properties.

Some facts ground by generating: they ground by bringing about other facts or grounding connections among them. Intuitively, other facts play a similar role to background conditions in the causal case: they ground by enabling the obtaining of grounded facts or generative connections among them. As we may ask whether causal background conditions are irreducible to causes, we may wonder whether enablers are irreducible to generators. Some metaphysicians defend a genuine metaphysical distinction between generators and enablers. Yet considerations from ideological parsimony and unity should prompt us to defend a unified account of ground. Here, I identify and discuss some characteristics extracted from the literature that are said to be possessed by enablers only. Contrary to this claim, I argue that generators can possess the same features. I conclude that such features should not be regarded as a guide to the irreducibility of enabling to generation.

This chapter is a guide to the basics of metaphysical grounding. It offers an accessible overview of its features and uses, comparing this concept with other forms of dependency one can find in the literature. It emphasizes two major theoretical roles grounding is claimed to play in philosophical theorizing: (i) accounting for a distinctive form of non-causal determination and (ii) illuminating the hierarchical structure of reality. The chapter aims to persuade the reader of the usefulness of grounding by discussing how some objections targeting these roles can be mitigated. Este capítulo es una guía para conocer los elementos básicos de la fundamentación metafísica. Ofrece una revisión accesible de sus características y usos, comparando este concepto con otras formas de dependencia que se pueden encontrar en la literatura. Enfatiza dos roles teóricos centrales que la fundamentación supuestamente juega en la teorización filosófica: (i) dar cuenta de una forma distintiva de determinación no causal y (ii) entender mejor la estructura jerárquica de la realidad. El capítulo apunta a persuadir a las lectoras de lautilidad de la fundamentación discutiendo cómo pueden mitigarse algunas objeciones dirigidas a esos roles.

Ground is all the rage in contemporary metaphysics. But what is its nature? Some metaphysicians defend what we could call, following Skiles and Trogdon (2021), the inheritance view: it is because constitutive forms of metaphysical explanation are such-and-such that we should believe that ground is so-and-so. However, many putative instances of inheritance are not primarily motivated by scientific considerations. This limitation is harmless if one thinks that ground and science are best kept apart. Contrary to this view, we believe that ground is a highly serviceable tool for investigating metaphysical areas of science. In this paper, we defend a naturalistic version of the inheritance view which takes constitutive scientific explanation as a better guide to ground. After illustrating the approach and its merits, we discuss some implications of the emerging scientific conception for the theory of ground at large.

In contemporary metaphysics, the doctrine that the fundamental facts are those which are wholly ungrounded is the received view or something near enough. Against this radical brutalism, several metaphysicians argued in favour of the existence of fundamental facts that are moderately brute or merely partially grounded. However, the arguments for moderately brute facts rely on controversial metaphysical scenarios. This paper aims to counteract the tendency in favour of radical brutalism on scientific grounds. It does so by showing that naturalistic metaphysicians can appeal to plausible considerations from physical theory to establish the existence of moderately brute facts. But should the naturalistic metaphysician embrace moderate brutalism, namely the view that the fundamental facts are those which are merely partially ungrounded? Here I argue for a negative answer, recommending a more inclusive pluralism about the kinds of brute facts we can expect to find in nature.

What grounds facts of ground? Some metaphysicians invoke fundamental grounding laws to answer this question. These are general principles that link grounded facts to their grounds. The main business of this paper is to advance the debate about the metaphysics of grounding laws by exploring the prospects of a plausible yet underexplored minimalist account, one which is structurally analogous to a familiar Humean conception of natural laws. In the positive part of this paper, I articulate such a novel view and argue for its merits. The minimalist account shuns essences and takes laws to be unmysterious elite regularities. Therefore, it is a promising alternative for theorists of ground who spurn the acceptance of essentialism about the grounding laws but think that these are needed in our theorizing. In the negative part, I argue that widely accepted principles of ground, coupled with the tenets of minimalism, jeopardize the fundamentality of the grounding laws. I discuss two immediately available and prima facie appealing strategies to evade this threat. However, I show that both have undesirable theoretical costs. I conclude by casting doubts on whether the benefits of a minimalist account of fundamental grounding laws outweigh such costs.

Metaphysical orthodoxy holds that a privileged minority of properties carve reality at its joints. These are the so-called fundamental properties. This thesis concerns the contemporary philosophical debate about the nature of fundamental properties. In particular, it aims to answer two questions: What is the most adequate conception of fundamental properties? What is the “big picture” world-view that emerges by adopting such a conception? I argue that a satisfactory answer to both questions requires us to embrace a novel conception of powerful qualities, according to which properties are at once dispositional and qualitative. By adopting the proposed conception of powerful qualities, an original theory of fundamental properties comes to light. I call it Dual-Aspect Account. In this thesis, I defend the Dual-Aspect Account and its superiority with respect to rival views of fundamental properties. I illustrate this claim by examining Dispositionalism, the view defended among others by Alexander Bird and Stephen Mumford, Categoricalism, which has been advocated notably by David Lewis and David Armstrong, and the Identity Theory of powerful qualities, primarily championed by C. B. Martin and John Heil. The latter is the standard conception of powerful qualities. However, in the literature, the Identity Theory faces the charge of contradiction. A preliminary task is therefore to show that a conception of powerful qualities is coherent. To accomplish this aim, I introduce the notion of an aspect of a property. On this interpretation, powerful qualities can be thought of as having dispositional and qualitative aspects. I show that such a conception allows us to disambiguate the claim that a property’s dispositionality is identical with its qualitativity, and evade the charge of contradiction. Aspects bring us other theoretical benefits. I illustrate this claim by showing how the Dual-Aspect Account offers us a promising theory of resemblance. I then compare its merits with David Armstrong’s theory of partial identity. The conclusion of this thesis is that the Dual-Aspect Account is better suited to capturing the world as we find it in everyday life and scientific investigation as compared to the theoretical positions examined.

Dispositional essentialism is the view that all or many fundamental properties are essentially dispositional, orpowers. The literature on the dispositional essence of powers is abundant. In contrast, the question of how to understand the fundamentality of fundamental powers has received scarce interest. Therefore, the fundamentality of powers stands in need of clarification. There are four main conceptions of the fundamental, namely as that which is (i)metaphysically independent; or (ii)belonging to a minimally complete basis; or (iii)perfectly natural; or (iv)metaphysically primitive. Here, I present and discuss each of these approaches from the viewpoint of dispositional essentialism. I show that (i) is incompatible with the metaphysics of powers and (ii)–(iv) have more drawbacks than merits. Therefore, my conclusion is that the dispositional essentialist should seek an alternative. Although I offer no positive account, I pave the way to more fruitful views by identifying the shortcoming of these unpromising options.

There is no consensus on the most adequate conception of the fundamental properties of our world. The pure powers view and the identity theory of powerful qualities claim to be promising alternatives to categoricalism, the view that all fundamental properties essentially contribute to the qualitative make-up of things that have them. The pure powers view holds that fundamental properties essentially empower things that have them with a distinctive causal profile. On the identity theory, fundamental properties are dispositional as well as qualitative, or powerful qualities. Despite the manifest difference, Taylor (2018) argues that pure powers and powerful qualities collapse into the same ontology. If this collapse objection were sound, the debate between the pure powers view and the identity theory of powerful qualities would be illusory: these views could claim the same advantages and would suffer the same problems. Here I defend an ontologically robust distinction between pure powers and powerful qualities. To accomplish this aim, I show that the collapse between pure powers and powerful qualities can be resisted. I conclude by drawing some positive implications of this result.

A respectable assessment of priority-based ontic structuralism demands an elucidation of its metaphysical backbone. Here we focus on two theses that stand in need of clarification: the Fundamentality Thesis states that structures are fundamental, and the Priority Thesis states that these structures are prior to putative fundamental objects, if these exist. Candidate notions to illuminate and such as supervenience and ontological dependence failed at this task. Our purpose is to show that grounding is the best competitor to articulate and, and regiment such theses in a desirable unified way. Our strategy is two-fold. First, we make the case that grounding does better than ontological dependence and supervenience. Second, we show that the distinction between partial and full grounds permits us to respond to an objection raised by Kerry McKenzie against the proposal of interpreting priority-based Ontic Structuralism in the idiom of metaphysical determination. Our conclusion is that priority ontic structuralists have compelling reasons for adopting a grounding-based approach.

Grounding is claimed to offer a promising characterization of the fundamental as thatwhich is ungrounded. Detractors of this view argue that there can be fundamental and yet mutuallygrounded entities. Such a possibility undermines the denition of the fundamental as theungrounded. I aim to show, however, that the possibility of fundamental mutually grounded entitiesdoes not force us to renounce the prospects of characterizing fundamentality in terms of ground-ing. To accomplish this aim, I defend a grounding-based view that accommodates fundamentalmutually grounded entities straightforwardly. My denition of fundamentality is similar to, butimportantly different from, one that Karen Bennett discusses. I conclude by resisting two objec-tions raised by Jessica Wilson against the Bennettian framework that also target theproposed view.

Dispositionality and qualitativity are key notions to describe the world that we inhabit. Dispositionality is a matter of what a thing is disposed to do in certain circumstances. Qualitativity is a matter of how a thing is like. According to the Identity Theory of powers, every fundamental property is at once dispositional and qualitative, or a powerful quality. Canonically, the Identity Theory holds a contentious identity claim between a property’s dispositionality and its qualitativity. In the literature, this view faces a contradiction objection that undermines its merits. We should therefore consider an alternative version that does not embrace the identity claim. My aim is to show that we can enjoy the benefits of the Identity Theory without embracing the identity between the dispositional and the qualitative. I shall argue that a distinction between two senses of dispositionality and qualitativity serves the purpose. I will then discuss three readings of the identity claim that can be formulated in light of such a distinction. I will conclude that even if the identity were to fail in any of the suggested readings, it would be possible to hold an account of fundamental powerful qualities.

The notion of fundamentality is supposed to play an important role in philosophical inquiry and scientific theorising. Yet there is no consensus on how to formulate it in precise terms. According to a promising view, fundamentality is a form of ontological independence. This view has the merit of capturing a natural connection between fundamentality and ontological dependence. However, it has been recently argued that it is possible that there are fundamental and yet ontologically dependent entities; therefore, we should not characterise the fundamental in terms of ontological independence. My aim is to show that such a possibility does not threaten a conception of fundamentality as a form of ontological independence. I illustrate this claim by providing a definition of equifundamentality and showing that fundamental and yet ontologically dependent entities can be treated as equifundamental.