Invention is the Mother of Necessity: modal logic, modal semantics and modal metaphysics

October 2007

“Invention is the Mother of Necessity: modal logic, modal semantics and modal metaphysics,” article in progress.

Modal logic is a well-established field, and the possible worlds semantics of modal logics has proved invaluable to our understanding of the logical features of the modal concepts such as possibility and necessity. However, the significance of possible worlds models for a genuine theory of meaning–let alone for metaphysics–is less clear. In this paper I shall explain how and why the use of the concepts of necessity and possibility could arise (and why they have the logical behaviour charted out by standard modal logics) without either taking the notions of necessity or possibility as primitive, and without starting with possible worlds. Once we give an account of modal logic we can then go on to give an account of possible worlds, and explain why possible worlds semantics is a natural fit for modal logic without being the source of modal concepts.

This paper is an early draft, and comments are most welcome.


 download pdf

You are welcome to download and read this document. I especially welcome feedback on it. As it is not yet published in final form, if you want to cite the paper, please check with me first. Thanks.


about

I’m Greg Restall, and this is my personal website. I am the Shelby Cullom Davis Professor of Philosophy at the University of St Andrews, and the Director of the Arché Philosophical Research Centre for Logic, Language, Metaphysics and Epistemology I like thinking about – and helping other people think about – logic and philosophy and the many different ways they can inform each other.

subscribe

To receive updates from this site, subscribe to the RSS feed in your feed reader. Alternatively, follow me at  @consequently@hcommons.social, where most updates are posted.

contact

This site is powered by Netlify, GitHub, Hugo, Bootstrap, and coffee.   ¶   © 1992– Greg Restall.