Natural Laws as Dispositions 9783110594843, 9783110595260

Citation preview

Florian Fischer Natural Laws as Dispositions

Philosophische Analyse/ Philosophical Analysis

Herausgegeben von/Edited by Katherine Dormandy, Rafael Hüntelmann, Christian Kanzian, Uwe Meixner, Richard Schantz, Erwin Tegtmeier

Band/Volume 76

Florian Fischer

Natural Laws as Dispositions

ISBN 978-3-11-059526-0 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-059484-3 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-059290-0 ISSN 2198-2066 Library of Congress Control Number: 2018941315 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2018 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Printing: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com

| Für Oma Margret

Contents Acknowledgements | 1 1 1.1 1.1.1 1.2 1.2.1 1.2.2

Laws of Nature | 3 Preamble | 3 Blue Print Ontology and Agnosticism | 4 Laws of Nature | 5 Characteristics of Laws of Nature | 6 Theories about Laws of Nature | 21

2 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.5.1 2.6 2.6.1 2.7 2.8 2.9 2.10 2.11

Analyses of dispositions | 31 Disposition Ascriptions and Dispositions | 31 Conditionals and Reductions | 33 The Simple Conditional Analysis | 37 Carnap’s Reduction Sentences | 41 The Simple Counterfactual Conditional Analysis | 45 Finks | 47 Lewis’ Reformed Conditional Analysis | 48 Masks and Antidotes | 51 Malzkorn’s Sophisticated Conditional Analysis | 55 Choi and Gundersen’s Context-Dependent Analysis | 61 Manley and Wasserman’s Gradable Dispostion Ascriptions | 62 Fara’s Habituals | 65 The Basic Problem of the Conditionalising Attempts | 67

3 3.1 3.1.1 3.2 3.3 3.3.1 3.3.2 3.4 3.4.1 3.4.2

Composition | 71 Mill on Component Causes | 71 The Status of Component Causes | 76 Millikan’s Oil Drop Experiment | 81 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour | 84 Symmetry Argument | 84 Trias | 91 Towards an Triadic Ontology | 97 The Functions f and f a as Systematic Links Between Wirkungen and Behaviour. | 99 Powers With Built-In Combination Rules | 102

4

Progressing to Processes | 106

VIII | Contents

4.1 4.1.1 4.1.2 4.2 4.2.1 4.2.2 4.2.3 5 5.1 5.1.1 5.1.2 5.1.3 5.1.4 5.1.5 5.2 5.2.1 5.2.2 5.2.3

Manifestation Dynamics | 106 Trigger Happy? | 108 Timing | 110 Processes | 112 Action and Process | 114 Processes and the Prevention Problem | 115 A Dynamic Disposition Ontology | 120 Dispositional Laws of Nature | 123 The Triadic Process Account and the Law Characteristics | 123 Truth | 124 Objectivity | 125 Universality | 125 Grounding Counterfactuals | 126 Role in Science | 127 Necessity | 128 Bird’s Necessary Laws | 132 Kit Fine’s Varieties of Necessity | 136 Modality within the Triadic Account | 139

Case File | 145 Theories of Dispositions | 149 The Story of Zucky | 151 Bibliography | 153 Author Index | 161 Index | 163

Acknowledgements This book is based on my PhD thesis which I defend in March 2017 at the University of Bonn. Special thanks belong to my supervisor Elke Brendel for all the support she gave me through the years while still giving me all the freedom I required to write this thesis. I also feel deeply thankful towards Andreas Hüttemann and the whole DFG-project Causation, Laws, Dispositions and Explanation (CLDE). I was very fortunate to have such a high-quality research network right at my doorstep. I would like to thank Andreas Bartels, who was with me from the beginning; Kit Fine, for being my pimp; Cord Friebe, for being Cord Friebe; Ludger Jansen, who read parts of this dissertation and commented in extenso on them; Marc Lange for the trip to Burma; Anna Marmodoro, for her positivity and for believing in me; Niels van Miltenburg, for showing me how much fun serious philosophical work can be; Thomas Müller, for his continuous menotring and the careful, productive comments; Antje Rumberg, for all the times we played billiard together; Rainer Stuhlmann-Laeisz, for introducing me to the wonderful world of modal logic and, although we do not agree on everything, I have learned so much from Nancy Cartwright. Furthermore, I want to thank all the people with whom I have discussed (parts of) my thesis over the years. They include: Holger Andreas, Rani Lill Anjum, Claus Beisbart, Alexander Bird, Florian Boge, Maren Bräutigam, Martin Carrier, Gregor Damschen, Michael De, Christoph Diehl, Mauro Dorato, Kristina Engelhard, Christian Feldbacher-Escamilla, Irini Fotini Viltanioti, Alexander Gebharter, Lars Gundersen, Ramona Flowers, Johannes Grössl, Stefan Heidl, John Heil, Gottfried Heinemann, Sascha Hilgert, Laurenz Hudetz, Siggi Jaag, Jon Jacobs, Marie Kaiser, Sonia Kamińska, Simon Kittle, Lukas Kraus, Meinard Kuhlmann, Dennis Lehmkuhl, Christian Loew, Sebastian Lutz, Holger Lyre, Thomas Meier, Anne Sophie Meincke, Cornelis Menke, Thomas Meyer, Jesse Mulder, Stephen Mumford, Tamer Nawar, Dawa Ometto, John Pemberton, Martin Pickup, Michael Poznik, Brian Prince, Stathis Psillos, Alexander Reutlinger, John Roberts, Matthias Rolffs, Magali Roques, Edmund Runggaldier, Alexander Samans, Oliver ‘Dr. Bunsen’ Schliemann, Stephan Schmid, Markus Schrenk, Carsten Seck, Tim Steegert, Erik Stei, Niko Strobach, Marius Thomann, Matt Tugby, Mucki Micha, Maike Vossen, Daniel von Wachter, Timo Weiß, Jan Wieben, Neil Williams, Christian Wüthrich, David Yates, Pamela Zinn, and my friend Toby Friend. If what Edward Craig said about Elizabeth Prior’s Dispositions [Prior, 1985] – ‘anyone who is irritated by proof-reading oversights will have to read this book under sedation’ [Craig, 1987, p. 111] – should apply to this book as well, it is not the

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-009

2 |

Acknowledgements

fault of Eva Merkel and Deborah Varenna, who went through the book cleansing away spelling mistakes and tiding up formulations, but solely mine. Material from this book was discussed and presented at various occasions: in 2018 at a Workshop with Stathis Psillos in Cologne; in 2017 at the KIT in Karlsruhe, the Philosophische Mittsommergespräche in Erfurt; in 2016 at the Research Seminar in Durham, the UCL in London, the SOPhiA conference in Salzburg, the Properties in London, the Visiting Speakers Seminar in Oxford; in 2015 at the Lunchtime Talks in Utrecht, the Dispositions & Manifestations conference in Cologne, the Interchair Kolloquium in Bonn, the Real Possibilities, Indeterminism and Free Will conference in Konstanz; in 2014 at a meeting of the Real Possibilites group in Konstanz, a meeting of the CLDE group in Düsseldorf, the DGPhil conference in Münster, the SOPhiA conference in Salzburg, the ECAP in Bukarest, a meeting of the causality reading group of the LSE in London, a Work in Progress seminar in Oxford, a meeting of the Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies group in Oxford; in 2013 at the DRZE in Bonn, the SOPhiA conference in Salzburg, the EPSA conference in Helsinki, the Interchair Colloquium in Bonn, a PhD workshop in Hannover, the SAPHIR workshop in Bochum, the DPG meeting in Jena; in 2012 at a colloquium of the institute of philosophy in Bern, the HANNES workshop in Bonn, the Grenzen conference in Bonn, the SOPhiA conference in Salzburg, the Philosophisches Colloquium in Cologne and at the Lunchtime Talks in Utrecht. I sincerely thank the audiences of all these events for the stimulating and fruitful discussions. Moreover, I want to thank my ‘family’ Stefan Flöck, Caro Haupt, Sascha Hilgert, Elli ‘Lara’ Hünninger, Eva Jeske, Julia Petz, Phillipp Ritzen, Sarah Schletter, Philine Schramek, Katharina von Stenglein and Tina Velten; my climbing family, the Crazy Carrots; and, of course, my real family, especially my parents Ruth Abel and Günther Fischer, my sister Esther Fischer and my grandmother Margret Roggenfelder. I am grateful beyond words for the love and support of my erumpent Anna von Schlotterstein. Without you, I could not have finished this!

1 Laws of Nature 1.1 Preamble This book combines two of my passions: laws of nature and dispositions. I have been interested in the laws of nature ever since having read David Deutsch’s The Fabric of Reality [Deutsch, 1997]. I will present systematic reasons for engaging in the philosophical debate about laws of nature soon (in section 1.2). But before that, let me explicate my reasons for engaging in the other topic, dispositions, by the means of a short anecdote. During a train ride, I once was privy to the conversation between a mother and her son. They were talking about some workers having a hard time to remove a graffiti, and the son asked why they couldn’t simply wash it off. His mother answered that most likely, ‘the colour is waterproof’. Upon hearing this, my first reaction was disapproval. Her answer seemed so obviously lacking in content that she need not have said anything at all. If you cannot wash off the colour, then it doubtlessly is waterproof. But, although obvious, the mother’s sentence is actually not trivial. She singled out one aspect of a complex situation. The fact that the graffiti could not be washed off was, according to her guess, due to a property of the colour. It could have also been due to a special surface of the wall or a especially lazy cleaning crew. Philosophically speaking the mother made a disposition ascription. She ascribed the property of being waterproof to the colour. This ascription is not trivial, as we have seen, and it does explanatory work as to why the graffiti cannot be washed off. Although dispositions play an important role in science and everyday language, they have been considered dubious and denounced as mystical for a long time. Luckily nowadays, at least since David Hugh Mellor’s In Defence of Dispositions [Mellor, 1974], they have undergone a renaissance. Once again, it is considered legit to engage in philosophical discussion about dispositions.¹ Not all battles can be fought at the same time and the debates about laws of nature and dispositions are immense. As it is important to lay a strong foundation

1 Besides the dispositional theories of laws of nature and necessity, which will be discussed in extenso below, there are dispositional approaches to such a wide array of topics as causation ([Mumford and Anjum, 2011]), counterfactuals ([Ellis, 2001] and [Handfield, 2001]), ethics ([Anjum et al., ]), free will ([Mumford and Anjum, 2014a]), meaning ([Anjum and Mumford, 2011]), medicine ([Kerry et al., 2013] and [Eriksen et al., 2013]), sports ([Mumford, 2014] and [Mumford and Anjum, 2014b]), virtues ([Brendel, 2009]) and even Spider Man ([Anjum and Mumford, 2013]).

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-011

4 | 1 Laws of Nature

before building to staggering heights², I will focus on the foundational problems of dispositions while drawing upon the different families of theories about laws of nature as background. I am certain that I will not convince any humean minded philosopher (or ADT’ler, although they seem to become rare these days) to convert to dispositionalism and, thus, the tour de force through the debate about laws of nature is to provide a motivation for engaging in dispositional theories of laws of nature. However, constructing a sturdy theory of dispositional laws of nature is a prerequisite to any quarrel between the families of law theories, as only fully developed philosophical accounts can be compared. John Heil says, ‘[p]arsimony figures in the endgame, not at the outset of theorizing’ [Heil, 2012, p. 97]. Hence, arguing against a position not yet fully formed is a misuse of Ockham’s Razor. But before we go medias in res, let me start with some methodological skirmishing I take to be important in order to understand the spirit of this whole endeavour.

1.1.1 Blue Print Ontology and Agnosticism Philosophical theorising is per se deeply interwoven. There are many discussions connected to the debates about laws of nature and dispositions. My general approach to these discussions is to be as agnostic as possible. I do not want to presuppose anything which is not necessary for my argument. The reason for this is twofold: First, I deem it utterly presumptuous to try to solve a philosophical debate on the go. Philosophical controversy about, for example, objects, indeterminism and persistence, is a longstanding enterprise, and my approach to dispositional laws of nature should not en passant take a stance on these topics. Second, I take agnosticism to be a theoretical value. The more premisses a position depends on the weaker it is. All the premisses constitute possible weak spots. An argument, however, is only as good as its weakest premises. That means that if A2 can show the same thing as A1 with less premisses, then A2 likely is the sturdier argument. Furthermore, argumentative integrity obliges one to state all premisses of an argument as explicitly as possible. One might successfully smuggle in premisses via a prestidigitator’s trick, but that is not candid. Thus, refraining from taking a stance on other debates strengthens an argument and makes it more integer, as it avoids implicit and useless assumptions.

2 This parallels Stuhlmann-Laeisz’s discrimination of philosophical and mathematical logic [Stuhlmann-Laeisz, 2002, p. 3]. While philosophical logic enlarges the ground floor, mathematical logic builds upwards.

1.2 Laws of Nature | 5

Especially, I want to stay agnostic as to whether dispositions need bearers or not. Maybe dispositions, like all properties, are dependent entities that need objects of which they are the properties, maybe power-bundles are all that is necessary for a pleasable ontology. Who knows? In any case, the considerations I present in the following are neutral regarding this question. Nevertheless, I will use ‘object-talk’ in some parts. This is due to convenience, as the debate is phrased in these terms. No ontological implications are intended. The situation is slightly different regarding indeterminism. Personally, I believe in indeterminism. But I do not want to presuppose it for my theory about laws of nature. Note that being agnostic about a distinction is not the same as claiming the compatibility with all options. Showing compatibility would be a much greater task. It may turn out that the theory I hold is not combinable with indeterminism at all. Still, I think that my approach is perfectly compatible with indeterminism³; the important thing, however, is that it does not presuppose indeterminism. Being agnostic about as many things as possible leaves a lot of metaphysical meat to be filled in. I take it to be a feature and not a bug that my approach delivers only the metaphysical skeleton. I call the resulting picture a blue print ontology. The blue print can be used to build an ontology but it is not by itself a full blown ontology (I will come back to this in section 3.4). For example, the debate about philosophy of time may have convinced you that objects need to exist in order to make sense of persistence. As my approach is agnostic about the bearers of dispositions, you can just plug in ‘objects’ and build an ontology of objects with dispositional properties. Lastly, the basic terminology has to be addressed: I will use terms like ‘power’, ‘capacity’ and ‘disposition’ interchangeably. This is no sign of ignorance of the subtle distinction some authors make between those terms, but due to my agnostic approach. As long as it does not lead to a contradiction, by all means take your favourite vocabulary.

1.2 Laws of Nature Laws of nature play a paramount role in philosophy, science and everyday life. Understanding laws of nature is philosophically interesting on its own right. Philosophical enquiry into the laws of nature has a long history although the term itself 3 The trailer is: The fabric of reality ‘is envisaged as excluding a certain sort of behaviour’ [Fine, 2005, p. 240] and when all but one behaviour is excluded we have determinisms, otherwise indeterminism (barring, of course, the absurd situation, that the fabric of reality abolishes itself, i. e. that no behavior is possible). The film is yet to be written.

6 | 1 Laws of Nature

is rather modern.⁴ We have to concern ourselves with laws of nature, ‘[i]f we are interested in the most basic question of metaphysics – “What is reality like?” ’ [Roberts, 2008, p. 4], according to John Roberts. Many important notions belonging to philosophy of science, like causation, prediction and explanation, are intimately related to the laws of nature. Comprehending laws of nature will thus have synergistic effects on a huge part of the debate in the philosophy of science. But other fields of philosophy refer to laws of nature as well. In the context of relevant logic, for example, Edwin Mares tells us that ‘one of the uses of laws of nature is to provide licence for inferences of certain sorts’ [Mares, 2004, p. 48].⁵ Outside philosophy, one cannot escape the laws of nature either. Many physicists depict themselves as investigating into the laws of nature. To name a few, one of Richard P. Feynman’s blockbuster books is called The character of Physical Law [Feynman, 1967] and Roger Penrose’s popular The Road to Reality has the subtitle A Complete Guide to the Laws of the Universe [Penrose, 2007]. Physics according to its self-conception is the search for the laws of nature and, thus, if ‘we are inclined to take modern science seriously, then we should be interested in the question of whether the law-governed world-picture is accurate’ [Roberts, 2008, p. 4]. Finally, even if you are neither a professional philosopher nor a professional physicist, you should care about the laws of nature as they are constitutive of our world view: ‘anyone with a philosophical temperament wants to know which kind of world we live in’ [Roberts, 2008, p. 4].

1.2.1 Characteristics of Laws of Nature This section concerns alleged characteristics of laws of nature. These characteristics constitute the starting point of the discussion. A theory of laws of nature should account for as many of them as possible, or explain why an intuitively plausible feature has to be abandoned under systematic scrutiny. Before presenting a list of assumed characteristics, I want to mention an ambiguity of the concept ‘law of nature’. Sometimes this concept is taken to refer to statements, and sometimes to the entities that are supposed to be described by the law statements. ‘A law is then the proposition or fact expressed by a true lawful sentence’ [Earman, 1978, p. 173]. Philosophers who think that there are

4 Discussion of the origin of the concept ‘laws of nature’ and its history can be found in [Hampe, 2007], [Ruby, 1986] and [Zilsel, 1942]. 5 A basic notion of Mares’ relevant logic are informational links and laws of nature provide one sort of informational links.

1.2 Laws of Nature | 7

no real laws of nature can nevertheless think that there are law statements, and philosophers who believe in laws of nature as real entities have to distinguish between law statements and laws, with the latter likely being the truth makers for the former. The difference between laws and law statements is of importance for keeping the ontological and the semantic level apart. Most of the time, the context will specify which reading is meant, and the following convention allows for a differentiation in the snagged cases: LoN S refers to the understanding of laws of nature as statements, while LoN E refers to the conception of laws as real entities. To get a grasp on our explanadum, we take a look at intuitively plausible features that laws of nature supposedly have. Theories of laws of nature have to explain why and how a law of nature possesses these properties. According to Andreas Hüttemann [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 139].⁶, laws of nature have the following characteristics. After giving you the whole catalogue, I will explicate Hüttemann’s criteria for a theory of laws of nature one by one. H1) truth H2) objectivity H3) contingency H4) necessity H5) universality H6) grounding counterfactuals H7) role in science: explanation, prediction, etc. 1.2.1.1 Truth It is plausible that laws of nature should be true. A clearly false statement, like ‘all charged particles turn into unicorns’ is not a good candidate for a law of nature. Nancy Cartwright speaks of the facticity of laws of nature:

6 Bas van Fraassen [Van Fraassen, 1989, pp. 25–29] and Gerhard Vollmer [Vollmer, 2000a, pp. 210–219] provide additional lists. According to Vollmer laws of nature are envisaged to be V1) general quantified statements, V2) implications, V3) relational, V4) acceptable as true, V5) logically general, V6) capable of inductive confirmation, V7) grounding unreal conditionals, and V8) necessary. Van Fraassen discusses the following criteria: F1) universality, F2) relations to necessity, F2a ) inference, F2b ) intensionality, F2c ) necessity bestowed, F2d ) necessity inherited, F3) explanation, F4) prediction and confirmation, F5) counterfactuals and objectivity, F5a ) context-independence, F5b ) objectivity, and F6) relation to science. These lists overlap, and I will mention both Vollmer’s and van Fraassen’s take on the matter during my discussion of Hüttemann’s characteristics. Till then, note that H1) corresponds to F2a ) and V4); H2) to F5b ); H4) to F2) and V8); H5) to F1) and roughly V1); H6) to F5) and V7); and H7) to F6).

8 | 1 Laws of Nature

If we think that the facts described by a law obtain, or at least that the facts which obtain are sufficiently like those described in the law, we count the law true, or true-for-the-nonce, until further facts are discovered. [Cartwright, 1980, p. 865]

As plausible as this characteristic sounds, it is not unproblematic as many examples of laws of nature discussed in the debate do not fulfil this criterion. Cartwright makes this point very explicit [Cartwright, 1983]; we will come back to this in section 3.1.1. Another problem with the requirement of ‘truth’ as a characteristic of laws of nature is that we can never know if a sentence is a law of nature, as Gerhard Vollmer [Vollmer, 2000b, p. 212] points out, because our knowledge is only preliminary. It does not help to demand that laws of nature have to be recognized as true [von Kutschera, 1972, pp. 341–343]. It would be but a matter of propaganda which statements are to be laws of nature. If I was able to convince enough people that ‘all charged particles turn into unicorns’ is true, this would be a law of nature.⁷ Further, the distinction between LoN S and LoN E becomes relevant in the context of truth. In order to be true, the laws of nature have to be apt truth-bearers. Whatever proper truth bearers are – propositions or sentences or something else – laws of nature as entities in the world (LoN E ) do not come into question. LoN E may be the truth makers for the LoN S sentences (or propositions or . . . ), but the LoN E cannot literally be true. For example, if you believe that LoN E are states of affairs that make the corresponding LoN S statements true, then the relevant LoN E states of affairs ‘hold’ or ‘obtain’, but they are not literally ‘true’. Figuratively, and only figuratively, we can say that LoN E are true. 1.2.1.2 Objectivity Laws of nature should be objective. They do not depend on our opinions or interests. The laws of nature are unimpressed by our mind shifts. We cannot simply invent laws of nature that suit our interests. We can only discover laws of nature, and it may be that there are some which we have not yet discovered or never will discover. Whether or not something is a law is entirely independent of our knowledge, belief, state of opinion, interests, or any other sort of epistemological or pragmatic factor. There have definitely been accounts of law that deny this. But they have great difficulty with such intuitively acceptable statements as that there may well be laws of nature which not only have not been discovered and perhaps never will be, but of which we have not even yet conceived. [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 36]

7 Vollmer takes this to be absurd. He himself pleads for ‘acceptability as true’ as a consequence. I do not really see how this circumvents the propaganda problem, but I will ignore this discussion in the following as I focus on the ontological side of the debate rather than the empirical.

1.2 Laws of Nature | 9

It is the laws themselves that are discovered and objective, and ‘objectivity’ thus concerns LoN E and not LoN S statements. 1.2.1.3 Contingency Laws of nature are supposed to be contingent. This criterion may refer to LoN E or LoN S statements, as a sentence can be contingently true and facts (or whatever LoN E turn out to be) can obtain contingently. It holds, however, that the negation of a law statement does not lead to a contradiction the way it does in the case of a logical or conceptual truth. It is possible, in a sense yet to be specified, that bodies do not attract each other according to Newton’s Law of Gravitation.⁸ In contrast, it is conceptually impossible that ‘there are married bachelors’. Further, in contrast to laws of nature, the negation of a logically necessary statement leads to a contradiction. Take the law of non-contradiction ¬(Φ ∧ ¬Φ), for example, whose negation clearly leads to a contradiction: ¬¬(Φ ∧¬Φ) ⊨ Φ ∧¬Φ. Rainer Stuhlmann-Laeisz [Stuhlmann-Laeisz, 2002, p. 7] states that the concept of necessity allows for differentiation. Situational statements like ‘If the wind blows the flowerpot from the windowsill, it will fall to the ground’ are in some sense necessary. Following Stuhlmann-Laeisz, the necessity involved is not logical necessity but physical necessity, because it is grounded in physical laws like Newton’s Law of Gravitation. According to Stuhlmann-Laeisz, philosophical logic can help us to refine the distinction between logical and physical necessity, especially by finding formal properties that distinguish both kinds of necessity. Take a statement ϕ which is necessary in a certain sense. We can then ask whether the statement ‘ϕ is necessary’ is itself necessary in the same sense as ϕ or not. Call the resulting principle (NN).⁹ (NN) □ζ ϕ → □ζ □ζ ϕ (NN) reads ‘If ϕ is necessary, then ϕ is necessarily necessary’. The subscript ζ indicates that we can formulate (NN) for different kinds of necessity, but we have to use the same kind throughout every instance of (NN). Stuhlmann-Laeisz holds that (NN) can be used to differentiate logical from physical necessity, as (NN) only holds for logical, but not for physical necessity. To see this, we need to consider the truth conditions for both kinds of necessity.

8 If you do not think that Newton’s Law of Gravitation is a good candidate, take any other alleged law statement you deem acceptable. 9 cf. [Carnap, 1947, p. 173].

10 | 1 Laws of Nature

Rudolf Carnap gives the following truth conditions for logical necessity □L in his Meaning and Necessity [Carnap, 1947] : (LN) A statement □L ϕ is true if ϕ is true and the truth of ϕ can be determined with definitions and logical rules alone.¹⁰ Stuhlmann-Laeisz argues that it is not necessary to specify the exact meaning of the vague phrase ‘logical rules’ in order to differentiate logical from physical necessity. It is sufficient to see that (LN) is itself a logical rule and, thus (LN) implies (NN-L): (NN-L) □L ϕ → □L □L ϕ If □L ϕ is true, then ϕ’s truth, according to (LN), can be determined with the help of definitions and logical rules alone. But adding (LN) to whatever set of definitions and logical rules was used in order to determine ϕ’s truth suffices for ensuring the truth of □L ϕ. As (LN) is a logical rule as well, the truth of □L ϕ can be determined with definitions and logical rules alone and, hence, □L □L ϕ holds. Physical necessity □P does not, in contrast to logical necessity □L , fulfil (NN). That is, (NN-P) does not hold: (NN-P) □P ϕ → □P □P ϕ In order to see that (NN-P) does not hold, we have to look at the truth conditions for □P . They can be given analogues to (LN) in the form of (PN): (PN) A statement □P ϕ is true if ϕ is true and the truth of ϕ can be derived solely from the laws of physics. Of course, the phrase ‘laws of physics’ is just as much in need of specification as the phrase ‘rules of logic’. But once again, this is not important for our considerations. The only thing we need to note is that (PN) itself is a logical rule and not a law of physics. In order to determine the truth of □P ϕ, we need the rule (PN). The truth of □P ϕ hence cannot be derived solely from the laws of physics. This in turn renders □P □P ϕ false. Physical necessity □P ϕ does not fulfil (NN) and is, thus, distinguished from logical necessity. I do not like the talk of ‘physical necessity’ much, as this connotes that there are no laws of nature other than those encompassed by the laws of physics. This may 10 (LN) is a combination of Carnap’s convention 2-1 [Carnap, 1947, p. 10] and convention 39-1 [Carnap, 1947, p. 174].

1.2 Laws of Nature | 11

be the case, but I do not want to presuppose this. Maybe the special sciences have their own laws of nature.¹¹ I thus prefer the talk of ‘natural’ or ‘nomic necessity’ instead of physical necessity. In order to capture the modality associated with the laws of the different sciences, I propose an intersection analysis. The class of the nomic possibilities is the intersection of the class of the physical possibilities with the classes of the possibilities from the respective special sciences. Figure 1.1 illustrates this with the example of physics, economics, chemistry, and biology¹². Here, the class of the nomic possibilities ✸N is the intersection of the physical possibilities ✸N p , economical possibilities ✸N e , chemical possibilities ✸N c , and biological possibilities ✸N b : ✸N = ✸N p ∩ ✸N e ∩ ✸N c ∩ ✸N b .

Fig. 1.1: Intersection of different nomic possibilities

The intersection analysis does not presuppose reductionism to physics. If reductionism is true, however, then other nomic possibilities will be a subclass of the physical possibilities. I don’t know whether there are economic possibilities, i. e. states of affairs compatible with the laws of economics, that are not physically

11 Rudolf Carnap, for example, introduces the infamous ‘All ravens are black’ as a law of zoology: ‘I do not know whether this statement is true, but, assuming its truth, we will call such a statement a law of zoology’ [Carnap and Gardner, 1966, p. 6]. 12 See [Schweitzer, 2000] for an introduction of the debate about laws of nature in biology.

12 | 1 Laws of Nature

possible. Maybe economics does not have any genuine laws¹³ or maybe in this case reductionism is true. Either way, this does not falsify the intersection analysis, it only renders it superfluous. The analysis only gets into technical difficulties when the intersection is empty. If the laws of the different sciences so wildly lack conformity that there is not even one possible world where all of them hold, then the intersection analysis cannot be applied. Luckily, our world seems to be a counterexample to the no-conformity claim. This is enough to safe the intersection analysis from vacuity. I believe that the intersection is much bigger than one world – nature is kind in this regard –, thus, I will use the terms ‘nomic necessity’ or ‘natural necessity’ rather then ‘physical necessity’ in the remainder of this book and by this terms refer to the intersection of the different nomic possibilities.¹⁴ With natural necessity □Na , we have to rephrase our observations in the context of (NN). We need the principle (NaN) instead of (PN): (NaN) A statement □Na ϕ is true if ϕ is true and the truth of ϕ can be derived solely from the laws of nature. The outcome, however, remains structurally the same. As (NaN) is no law of nature but needed in order to determine the truth of □Na ϕ, □Na □Na ϕ is false and hence (NN-Na) does not hold. (NN-Na) □Na ϕ → □Na □Na ϕ If Stuhlmann-Laeisz’s observations are true, we have found one upper bound for natural necessity □Na . As □Na does not fulfil (NN), natural necessities are not as necessary as logical necessities. ‘If a certain event is physically necessary – the falling of the flower pot that has been blown from the windowsill –, then the necessity of this event is itself not physically determined.’ [Stuhlmann-Laeisz, 2002, p. 9, translation FF]. In any case, we need to find a upper bound for nomic necessity in order to fulfil the requirement of ‘contingency’, if we do not want to deny altogether that laws of nature are necessary.¹⁵

13 Regarding the question whether there are laws of nature in economics, see, e. g. [Lütge, 2000]. 14 But nothing hinges on this. The rest of my analysis of laws of nature is independent of this point. 15 Wilhelm Essler considers excluding the logical truths, i. e. that something is a law of nature if the described state of affairs is necessary, while not being a logical truth. However, this exclusion is of no help, according to Essler, ‘if we do not know, when a state of affairs is to be considered necessary and when not.’ [Essler, 1979, p. 72, translation FF].

1.2 Laws of Nature | 13

1.2.1.4 Necessity Although contingent in one sense, the laws of nature are at the same time comprehended to be necessary. We have been speaking of the ‘nomic’ or ‘natural necessity’ □Na of the laws of nature, but what is this □Na supposed to mean? Formally capturing nomic necessity within modal logic seems quite straightforward. A statement is nomically necessary ‘if it is determined by the laws of nature, and physically possible if it is compatible with the laws of nature’ [Priest, 2008, p. 46].¹⁶ In possible world semantics we therefore just need to interpret the accessibility relation in the following way: a world w󸀠 is nomically accessible from w (wR Na w󸀠 ) if the laws of nature of w are all obeyed at w󸀠 . Let □Na be the nomic necessity operator. Thus the formula □Na Φ is true at w if, and only if, for every world w󸀠 that is nomically accessible from w, Φ is true at w󸀠 . The problem with this approach is its dependence on a pre-existing coherent notion of a law of nature. This, however, is what we are only just trying to set up in the first place. So we need a different approach to nomic necessity. Hüttemann [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 139] explains that the planetary laws following from Newton’s Law of Gravitation do not only describe how the planets de facto move, but how they must move. Kit Fine supplements¹⁷ the characterisation of natural necessity □Na in his Varieties of Necessity: Natural necessity is the form of necessity that pertains to natural phenomena. Suppose that one billiard-ball hits another. We are then inclined to think that it is no mere accident that the second billiard-ball moves. Given certain antecedent conditions and given the movement of the first ball, the second ball must move. And the ‘must’ here is the must of natural necessity. [Fine, 2005, p. 238]

The laws of nature bear some form of necessity. Fine’s quote shows that he refers to the LoN E reading regarding natural necessity. Also, Bas van Fraassen locates natural necessity within the realm of natural phenomena: Wood burns when heated, because wood must burn when heated. And it must burn because of the laws which govern the behaviour of the chemical elements of which wood and the surrounding air are composed. Bodies do not fall by chance; they must fall because of the law of gravity. In such examples as these we see a close connection between ‘law’ and ‘must’, which we should stop to analyse. [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 28]

16 Necessity is the dual of possibility in the sense that something is necessary if it is not possible that it is not the case. Alternatively possibility can be defined via necessity: ✸ζ Φ =df ¬□ζ ¬Φ. So, a statement Φ is possible ✸ζ in the sense ζ , if it is not necessary (in the same sense ζ ) that Φ is false (cf. [Garson, 2006, p. 20]). 17 Further work on the peculiar modal status of the laws of nature can be found in [Sidelle, 2002].

14 | 1 Laws of Nature

One of the main questions is the modal status induced to natural phenomena by the laws of nature, that is, which kind of ’must’ is involved.¹⁸ As shown above, Stuhlmann-Laeisz successfully argues that locigal necessity cannot be the correct answer. Still, it should be some kind of necessity nevertheless. Metaphysical necessity springs to mind and indeed ‘the laws of nature are, according to the dispositional essentialist view, metaphysically necessary’ [Bird, 2007, p. 46]. The urge for unification behind posting metaphysical necessity as the necessity of the laws of nature is understandble: one kind of necessity covers all. But the dispositional essentialists’ opinion is far from universally accepted. Markus Schrenk [Schrenk, 2010] presents a strong argument against the view that laws of nature are metaphysical necessary. But, contrary to Schrenk, I do not think that all forms of necessity are effected by his argument. Natural necessity has the power to resist Schrenk’s objection, or so I argue in section 5.2. Kit Fine holds that ‘there are three main forms of necessity – the metaphysical, the natural, and the normative – and that none of them is reducible to the others or to any other form of necessity’ [Fine, 2005, p. 235]. If Fine’s considerations are correct, then it is no wonder that metaphysical necessity is the wrong kind of necessity for a theory about laws of nature.

Fig. 1.2: Natural necessity

Besides distinguishing different kinds of necessity (logical, metaphysical, natural, . . . ), we have to consider what is supposed to be necessary: It is a different question whether the laws of nature hold with necessity, or whether the natural phenomena proceed with necessity. Van Fraassen introduces the terminology necessity bestowed and necessity inherited. Necessity bestowed is the necessity that the laws of nature bestow on the natural phenomena. Van Fraassen captures

18 This connection between ‘law’ and ‘must’ that van Fraassen speaks of will be discussed in chapter 5.2.

1.2 Laws of Nature | 15

this via the inference from ‘It is a law that Φ’ to ‘It is necessary that Φ’. Necessity bestowed is rather respected and the kind of necessity that Hüttemann and Fine have been talking about. Necessity inherited, the necessity with which the laws themselves hold, however, is more controversial: There is a minority opinion that what the laws are is itself necessary. This point definitely goes beyond the preceding, for logic does not require what is necessary to be necessarily necessary. More familiar is the idea that there are many different ways the world could have been, including differences in its laws governing nature. If gravity had obeyed an inverse cube law, we say, there would have been no stable solar system – and we don’t think we are contemplating an absolute impossibility. But we could be wrong in this. [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 30]

To sum up, laws of nature have a peculiar modal status. They are ‘necessary-ish’ [Roberts, 2010, p. 445] as they have to be distinguished from accidental truth as the lower bound and from logical or metaphysical necessities as the upper bound (see table 1.2).¹⁹ Furthermore we have to be careful to distinguish between the necessity that the laws are supposed to bestow on natural phenomena and the necessity with which they are supposed to hold. 1.2.1.5 Universality The universality of the laws of nature is widely recognised.²⁰ Following Hüttemann there are different interpretations of ‘universality’ at play in the context of laws of nature (see table 1.1). Tab. 1.1: Interpretations of universality UniversalityI : UniversalityII : UniversalityIII : UniversalityIV :

for all regions of space-time for all systems under all circumstances for all values of variables

Laws of nature obtain at every space-time region (universalityI ), not only at specific times or places. The concrete implementation of this demand may be

19 John Roberts himself is quite careful in formulating, as he only claims that ‘at least some laws of nature are metaphysically contingent’ [Roberts, 2010, p. 445]. 20 But there are also critical voices. John Earman, for example, holds that ‘universality is not a condition sine qua non for laws’ [Earman, 1978, p. 180].

16 | 1 Laws of Nature

problematic (is it not allowed to mention specific times and places in the wording of the law?) but the spirit behind it is clear. (UniversalityII ), the requirement that laws of nature hold for all objects or systems, seems strange at first. Think of biological or chemical laws, which are only about specific kinds of entities. Philosophy of science’s all time favourite ‘All ravens are black’ is a statement only about ravens, it seems, and thus does not hold for all objects. According to Vollmer [Vollmer, 2000a, pp. 210–219], the scheme for a law of nature is a general quantified implication: (LoN-Scheme) ∀x(Φ(x) → Ψ(x)) The scheme can easily be applied to the toy examples ‘All ravens are black’ (Φ has to be substituted with R: is a raven; and Ψ with B: is black), but with more realistic candidates for laws of nature it is harder to see how they fit into this scheme. Take Newton’s Law of Gravitation²¹: (Newton) F g = G m1r2m2 with F g being the gravitational force, G the gravitational constant²², m1 and m2 the masses of the two bodies, and r the distance between the two bodies. (Newton) supposedly has a different logical form than that which laws of nature should have according to the (LoN-Scheme). But F g = G m1r2m2 is not Newton’s Law of Gravitation (cf. [Scheibe, 1991]). The area of application has to be explicitly stated; it only holds for two bodies (with given masses and distance): (Newtont ) The force, which acts between two bodies is proportional to their respective masses (m1 and m2 ) and inversely proportional to their distance squared (r2 ): F g = G m1r2m2 Newton’s Law of Gravitation can also be stated in a formal way (Newtonf ) to expatiate its logical structure: (Newtonf ) ∀x∀y((MP(x) ∧ MP(y)) → (∀m1 ∀m2 ∀r(m2 = mass(x) ∧ m2 = mass(y) ∧ r = dis(x, y)) → (force(x) = newton(m1 , m2 , r) ∧ force(y) = newton(m1 , m2 , r)))

21 We will come back to this example in chapter 3, where we will discuss the status of the gravitational force, which is supposedly ascribed by the Law of Gravitation, in extenso. 22 G ≈ 6.674 ⋅ 10−11 Nm2 kg −2 .

1.2 Laws of Nature | 17

with the predicate MP(ϕ): ϕ is a mass point; and the functional symbols: mass(ϕ): the mass of ϕ, dis(ϕ, ψ): the distance of ϕ and ψ, force(ϕ): the gravit. ational influence on ϕ, and newton(ϕ, ψ, α): the result of G ϕψ α2 As you can see, (Newtonf ) is a general quantified implication and thus fits the (LoN-Scheme). It basically states that if there are two mass points, with the given masses m1 and m2 and distance r, then the gravitational influence F g between them is the result of m1r2m2 . Alternatively the general quantifiers can be gathered at the beginning: (Newtonalt ) ∀x∀y∀m1 ∀m2 ∀r((MP(x) ∧ MP(y) ∧ (m2 = mass(x) ∧ m2 = mass(y) ∧ r = dis(x, y)) → (force(x) = newton(m1 , m2 , r) ∧ force(y) = newton(m1 , m2 , r))) Now, let us come back to the example ‘All ravens are black’. Newton’s second law and Newton’s Law of Gravitation are envisaged to be universalI , because they concern all physical bodies. ‘All ravens are black’ in contrast concerns only ravens. However, as it is a general quantified sentence, ‘All ravens are black’ is still universalI . This universality depends on the formalisation whereas the universalityI of Newton’s Law of Gravitation is independent of the formalisation: ‘Some paradigmatic laws of physics are universal in the sense that they concern absolutely all objects, others however not’ [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 140]. UniversalityIII will be very important for our further discussion. Laws of nature are supposed to hold under all circumstances. The obvious problem with this requirement is that some laws are restricted to special circumstances, like Galileo’s free fall law, which explicitly only holds in the vacuum. But also seemingly universal laws, like Newton’s Law of Gravitation, are in tension with Universality III. The behaviour of two charged bodies is not completely described by the Law of Gravitation, as (at least) the electrical attraction/repulsion interferes. Laws which only hold under specific circumstances are called ceteris paribus laws (cf. [Reutlinger et al., 2015]).²³ According to Hüttmann, universalityIV is often overlooked because the debate focuses on toy examples like ‘All ravens are black’. Owing to their quantitative²⁴ nature, law statements should hold for all values of variables. Consider the following example. Before Max Planck formulated what is now known as Planck’s law, different attempts to capture the electromagnetic radiation 23 Very roughly, the general dilemma of ceteris paribus laws is that they are seemingly either trivial or false (cf. [Lange, 1993]). 24 See Carnap [Carnap and Gardner, 1966, ch. 5] for the merits of the quantitative method in science.

18 | 1 Laws of Nature

of a body in a law statement have been made. The Rayleigh-Jeans law describes the black body radiation at a given temperature against the background of classical physics. For wavelength λ, it is: 2ck B T (Rayleigh-Jeans law, 1.1) λ4 with c: as the speed of light, k B : the Boltzmann constant, and T: the temperatB λ (T) =

ure. The Rayleigh-Jeans law covers the experimental results for low frequencies f very well, but is wildly wrong for high frequencies – this is known as the ultraviolet catastrophe (cf. [Kutner, 2003, p. 15]). The failure to predict the radiation of hot objects was one of the big problems of physics at the turn of the 20th century (cf. [Crepeau, 2009, pp. 59–65]). The Rayleigh-Jeans law, thus, fails to be universalIV , as it only holds for low frequencies (i .e. long wavelengths). Max Planck introduced the quantum understanding of radiation and developed the Planck radiation formula, aka Planck’s law: 2hc2 1 (Planck’s law, 1.2) λ5 e λkhcB T − 1 with k B : the Boltzmann constant, h: the Planck constant, and c: the speed of light. Planck’s law is more universalIV as it covers the experimental data for more values of variables. For low frequencies Planck’s law and the Rayleigh-Jeans law are d’accord, but for long frequencies Planck’s tends to the Wien approximation. B λ (λ, T) =

2hc2 − λkhc T e B (Wien approximation, 1.3) λ5 with T: the temperature, h: the Planck constant, c: the speed of light, and k B : the Boltzmann constant. Just like the Rayleigh-Jeans law, the Wien approximation, is less universalIV than Planck’s law since it only works well for some values of λ (cf. [Badino, 2015, ch. 2]). I(λ, T) =

1.2.1.6 Grounding counterfactuals The laws of nature bear a special relationship to counterfactuals, as the truth or falsity of certain counterfactual statements depends on the laws of nature. Counterfactuals are conditionals where the antecedent might be false.²⁵ In counterfactuals, in contrast to indicative conditionals, the consequent is expressed 25 The term ‘counterfactual’ just means that the conditional is ‘contrary to fact’ (cf. [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 33]. Sometimes the term ‘subjunctive conditional’ is used for

1.2 Laws of Nature | 19

using the word ‘would’ (cf. [Priest, 2008, p. 13]), in order to indicate that the antecedent is not taken to be true. Counterfactuals state what would be the case if the antecedent was true, without presupposing that is true; and without presupposing that it is not true either. Consider the following two conditional sentences (OW1 ) and (OW2 ).²⁶ (OW1 ) ‘If Oswald didn’t shoot Kennedy someone else did.’ (OW2 ) ‘If Oswald hadn’t shot Kennedy someone else would have.’ The first conditional is considered true, while the second is considered false. Hence, counterfactual conditionals cannot be material, as there are false counterfactual conditionals with a false antecedence (cf. [Priest, 2008, p. 13]). A counterfactual can be formally expressed with €. Let Φ € Ψ stand for ‘If it were the case that Φ, it would be the case that Ψ’. David Lewis, building on the work of Robert Stalnaker²⁷, gave an analysis of counterfactuals. Roughly, without getting too technical, Lewis’ analysis of counterfactuals can be summed up in his own words: ‘If kangaroos had no tails, they would topple over’ seems to me to mean something like this: in any possible state of affairs in which kangaroos have no tails, and which resembles our actual state of affairs as much as kangaroos having no tails permits it to, the kangaroos topple over. [Lewis, 1973, p. 1]

In order to connect counterfactuals with the debate about laws of nature take the ideal gas law as an example: pV = Nk B T

(Ideal gas law, 1.4)

with p: the pressure of the gas, V: the volume of the gas, N: number of molecules, k B : the Boltzmann constant (i. e. the gas constant R divided by the Avogadro constant N A : NRA ), and T: the absolute temperature of the gas. conditionals where the antecedence might be true. The common feature is that these condtionals are not trivially true if the antecedent is fasle. Mostly nowadays the term ‘counterfactual conditional’ or simply ‘counterfactual’ does not anymore exclude cases where the antecedence is true. I will use the term in this wider meaning. Technically spaking, the nearest world where the antecedence is true might be the actual world. 26 The example goes back to Ernest Adams [Adams, 1970]. 27 Let a ‘Φ-world’, be a world in which Φ is true and a ‘Ψ-world’, be a world in which Ψ is true. According to Stalnaker [Stalnaker, 1968] Φ € Ψ is true, just in case the to the actual world most similar Φ-world is also a Ψ-world. For more on the history and semantics of counterfactuals see [Weatherson, 2016].

20 | 1 Laws of Nature

The ideal gas law does not only give us the actual pressure p of a gas given its actual volume v and temperature T, but also the pressure p the gas would have, if, say, its volume v was different. Although this seems rather intuitive, problem cases are not hard to come by. Consider: ‘if I had struck this match, then it would have lit. It does not follow that if I had struck this match, and it had been wet at the time, then it would have lit’ [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 36]. Such cases are well known and well discussed in the debate about dispositions – we will come back to them in section 2.6.1.²⁸ You can see the different criteria of laws of nature are not unrelated. ‘Many philosophers think of concepts like “explanation”, “law”, “cause”, and “support for counterfactuals” as parts of an inter-related family or circle of concepts that are “modal” in character’ [Woodward, 2014]. Solving the issue of the law’s natural necessity also helps to understand how the laws can be used to ground counterfactuals. 1.2.1.7 Role in science Laws of nature ground counterfactuals and this in turn allows them to play the role in science they do. We use laws to predict future outcomes and to explain what has happened. What good are such laws? What purpose do they serve in science and everyday life? The answer is twofold: they are used to explain facts already know, and they are used to predict facts not yet know. [Carnap and Gardner, 1966, p. 6]

Of course, the role laws of nature should play in explanation ‘depend[s] greatly on the philosophical opinions of what explanation is’ [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 31] and mutatis mutandum for predication. To sum up: the discussed criteria provide a touchstone for theories of laws of nature. Of course they are only pre-theoretic and relate to our intuitions. Thus, we should not take them to be necessary conditions for the laws of nature. ‘Nowhere should we require that all the criteria be met; but any account should respect this cluster as a whole’ [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 26]. Still, they suffice to get a first grasp on the concept ‘law of nature’ and, roughly, the more criteria a theory of laws can account for, the better. It is also not quite clear how the different criteria are to be weightened when assessing a theory of laws of nature. However, natural necessity seems to be the ‘holy grail’ of the debate about laws of nature (cf. [Hüttemann, 2007,

28 Section 2.6.1 presents the so-called prevention problem, while the whole chapters 3 and 4 are devoted to developing my solution.

1.2 Laws of Nature |

21

p. 153]). The next section is a tour de force through the different families of theories about laws of nature, with ‘natural necessity’ being the main benchmark.

1.2.2 Theories about Laws of Nature The modern debate about laws of nature is best understood against the background of David Hume. The sceptic Hume questioned that we are justified in positing causality. All we can observe is the successive occurring of events. For example, a white billiard ball is rolling towards a stationary green one, they collide and then the green one rolls away. We cannot observe that the green one starts rolling because of the white one. We cannot observe a causal relation between the two billiard balls, and, more generally, between events. Hume did not posit that there is no causality – as this would be a claim as ontologically strong as to posit that there is causality – but instead tried to build up his philosophical system without having to be committed to the existence of causality. The logical empiricists took the Humean limitations as their creed and demanded that all knowledge should be reducible to observable entities. This includes entities that are only in principle observable, but seemingly excludes modal connections, causality, dispositions and forces. The modern debate about laws of nature circles around the question whether the empiricist’s ontological toolbox suffices to give an adequate account of laws. There are basically three families of theories of laws of nature. Besides the (neo-)humean²⁹ and the Armstrong / Dretske / Toley approaches, dispositional theories of laws of nature have become more and more popular recently. In the following I will sketch the three families and assess whether they can account for the criteria listed above, and especially whether they can make sense of natural necessity. 1.2.2.1 Laws within (Ideal) Systems Following logical empiricism, laws of nature are nothing but statements which capture the regularities in nature. That laws of nature are to be understood as statements is due to the so-called linguistic turn.³⁰ The logical empiricists thought 29 I write ‘humean’, instead of ‘Humean’, because there is a significant difference: While David Hume found necessary connections and the like dubious and thus tried to do without them, the humeans claim that there are no necessary connections and the like. The humeans are, so to say, atheists in comparison to the agnostic Hume. 30 cf. [Carnap, 1996] and [Ayer, 1940]; [Ayer, 1966] provides an easily accessible but somewhat partial introduction to logical empiricism.

22 | 1 Laws of Nature

that philosophical problems, if genuine problems at all³¹, can be solved by logical analysis of language. Furthermore, laws of nature should not refer to modal facts, as the logical empiricists adversed to them. One of the show piece logical empiricists, Rudolf Carnap, characterises laws of nature in the following way: The observations we make in everyday life as well as the more systematic observations of science reveal certain repetitions or regularities in the world. Day always follows night; the seasons repeat themselves in the same order: fire always feels hot; objects fall when we drop them; and so on. The laws of science are nothing more than statements expressing these regularities as precisely as possible. [Carnap and Gardner, 1966, p. 3]

As you can see, Carnap believed that there are regularities in nature (night follows day, . . . ), but he did not believe in there being something that brings these regularities about. No modal fact which necessitates the following of the one kind of events after the other kind as a regularity maker is used by Carnap. Instead, law statements are just statements which meet the following semantic and syntactic requirements.³² Call the whole list the naïve regularity analysis of laws of nature (NRA). 1. 2. 3. 4.

Law statements have the logical form ∀x(Ψ(x) → Φ(x)) Law statements are always and everywhere true Law statements are contingent Law statements contain no predicates, which refer to specific persons, places or times

The logical empiricist thought of these criteria each to be necessary and jointly sufficient³³ to single out the laws of nature statements. The two well-known objections against this conception are laws without instances and accidental regularities. Laws without instances: One of the so-called ‘paradoxes of material implication’³⁴ is that whenever the antecedent of an implication is false, the whole implication becomes true no matter the truth value of the consequent. Thus, every statement of the form ∀x(Ψ(x) → Φ(x)) is a law of nature, according to the (NRA),

31 Rudolf Carnap [Carnap, 2005] famously claimed that a lot of the traditional problems of philosophy are nothing but pseudo problems. 32 cf. [Armstrong, 1983, p. 12] and [Earman, 1986, p. 83] for the formalisation of the logical empiricists’ law conception. 33 Vollmer [Vollmer, 2000a, pp. 210–219] captures all these features, so he also considers them necessary. But as he lists additional criteria, he does not deem the list to be jointly sufficient. 34 We will come back to this in the context of the simple conditional analysis of dispositions in section 2.3.

1.2 Laws of Nature |

23

provided requirements (2) – (3) are met, when there are no instances of Ψ. So, ‘all bodies on which no forces act, turn into unicorns’ has to be accepted as a law of nature, but also the contradictory ‘all bodies on which no forces act, continue to move with constant velocity or remain at rest’. Accidental regularities: The second objection goes back to Hans Reichenbach and Carl Gustav Hempel, who have claimed that the (NRA) cannot distinguish laws of nature from accidental regularities. Consider the following parallel pair of sentences (235 U) and (Au). (235 U) All solid spheres of enriched uranium (235 U) have a diameter of less than one mile. (Au) All solid spheres of gold (Au) have a diameter of less than one mile. There is an important difference between those two statements, which renders only 235 U a law statement: While constructing a gold sphere of this size is at least in principle possible, such an Uranium sphere would be above critical mass and thus could not be constructed even if enough material was available. As Bas van Fraassen says, ‘universality is not enough to make a truth or law of nature. No rivers past, present, or future, are rivers of Coca-Cola, or of milk. I think that this is true; and it is about the whole world and its history. But we have no inclination to call it a law’ [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 27]. It does not follow from the two aforementioned problems that an empiricist conception of laws of nature is impossible, but rather only that the NRA is insufficient. Accordingly, philosophers have tried to enrich the NRA by finding more criteria that are acceptable to empiricists which together are jointly sufficient to constitute an adequate analysis of laws of nature. David Lewis has paid attention to the fact that laws of nature are typically integrated into theories.³⁵ Lewis turned this observation into a requirement and claimed that something is only a law of nature if it is integrated into a theory, which immediately rules out our counterexamples of unicorns and uranium 235 U. The integration into just any theory is still insufficient. As theories change, different statements would be considered to be laws and the laws of nature would, thus, not be objective. But David Lewis did not stipulate that the laws are integrated into any theory, but into the ideal theory. Call the resulting account the systematic

35 The idea that the laws of nature acquire their lawhood from integration into theories goes back to John Stuart Mill [Mill, 1843]. More recent defenders include Frank Ramsey ([Ramsey, 1978]), David Lewis ([Lewis, 1973], [Lewis, 1983a], [Lewis, 1983b] and [Lewis, 1994]), John Earman ([Earman, 1984]) and Barry Loewer ([Loewer, 1996]).

24 | 1 Laws of Nature

regularity analysis of laws of nature (SRA). Lewis formulates the heart of the (SRA) in this way: [A] contingent generalization is a law of nature if and only if it appears as a theorem (or axiom) in each of the true deductive systems that achieves a best combination of simplicity and strength. [Lewis, 1973, p. 73]

Roughly, a theory is stronger than another theory if it captures more regularities in a more precise way, and simpler if it does so on the basis of less assumptions. This idea is prima facie attractive but its implementation into a concrete theory about laws of nature is not straightforward. Capturing simplicity in an objective way turns out to be problematic. With the right interpretation of predicates, every theory can be presented in just one (or few) axioms. Additionally, the (SRA) presupposes that all theories are not incommensurable as to their strength and simplicity. Furthermore, David Armstrong [Armstrong, 1983, p. 67] and Bas van Fraassen [Van Fraassen, 1989, p. 41] have emphasised that it is not clear how to balance simplicity and strength. Objective standards for this are far from established. Hüttemann [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 147] questions the basic idea of the (SRA) that laws of nature gain their lawhood by integration into theories. This critique is more fundamental than the ‘mere’ technical worries concerning the concrete implementation of the theory. The technical squabbles can be mediated, but an attack on the basic idea threatens the whole approach. The notion that laws of nature are typically integrated into theories, which is the starting point of the (SRA), can also be used in the opposite way. The goal of our theories is to capture the laws of nature. Then, lawhood would be independent of the affiliation to a theory and a theory would be good if it captured a pre-existing law of nature. ‘We accept laws of nature as such even if they are not integrated into theories. Even though it is desirable that an ideal theory integrates them. But the lawhood precedes the integration into theories.’ [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 148, translation FF] If Hüttemann is right and lawhood precedes integration, then (SRA) and similar theories face serious problems. (NRA) and (SRA) both understand laws of nature as describing regularities. The contrast class is what John Roberts calls ‘governing laws’. He sketches the (Law-governed world-picture) in his book The Law-Governed Universe: Scientific inquiry has revealed to us a universe that is governed by laws of nature. It has also found out what some of those laws are. Or at least, it has made some very good guesses: it has found principles that are, under certain circumstances, very good approximations to the laws of nature. And there is no principled limit to how much better its guesses and

1.2 Laws of Nature |

25

approximations might get; so in principle, science can discover particular laws of nature, whether it has already done so so or not. [Roberts, 2008, p. 1]

This is only a rough and ready characterisation of the law-governed world-picture, but for my purposes, it suffices to give general impression of what is meant by ‘governing’. To explicate further, Roberts provides four theses, which, according to him, are all necessary to support the law-governed world-picture [Roberts, 2008, p. 26]: The Lawhood Thesis: There is a distinct class of facts, or true propositions, fittingly called the laws of nature; alternatively, there is a property fittingly called lawhood that some but not all facts or true propositions (and no false propositions) have. The Discoverability Thesis: Science is in principle capable of discovering which propositions are the laws of nature – i. e., which true propositions have the property of lawhood . The Governing Thesis: The laws of nature govern the universe, in some robust, non-figurative sense of ‘govern’. It is not just everything behaves as if it were governed by laws; the evolution of the universe really is governed by laws. The Science-Says-So Thesis: We can be justified in believing that the laws of nature govern the universe (in whatever sense of ‘govern’ makes the Governing Thesis come out true) without appealing to any extra-scientific source of epistemic justification. Note that the ‘Science-Says-So Thesis’ excludes the need for ‘pure metaphysical’ or theological grounds for the laws of nature. Now, following Roberts, David Lewis (cf. [Lewis, 1994]) would not subscribe to the ‘The Governing Thesis’ and thus not to ‘The Science-Says-So Thesis’: [S]ome agree that there really are such things as laws of nature, and empirical science is in principle capable of discovering them, but say that it is a mistake to think of these laws as ‘governing’ the universe in any but a thin metaphorical sense. For these philosophers, the laws are nothing more than a special set of exceptionless regularities – patterns in the great cosmic mosaic – which are privileged by their comprehensiveness and their simplicity. [Roberts, 2008, p. 5]

Lewis is a prime example of the philosophers Roberts is talking about, as he claims that ‘a given regularity might hold either as a law or accidentally, depending on whether other regularities obtain that can fit together with it in a suitable system’ [Lewis, 1986, p. 367]. Hence, for Lewis, there are no governing laws, or at most

26 | 1 Laws of Nature

only such that govern the actual behaviour ‘only in a figurative sense’, and as Roberts nicely puts it: ‘nature does its elaborate dance as if it were obeying laws’ [Roberts, 2008, p. 1]. Still, following Hüttemann, the (SRA) is able to account for the necessity of the laws of nature. (Some) laws of nature can be derived from ‘higher’ laws of nature and a set of a initial conditions. This derivation makes for the necessity: Given the higher laws and the initial conditions, the law could not have been otherwise. But this is not what we had in mind when we introduced natural necessity as a characteristic of the laws of nature. The (SRA) explains away natural necessity, so the (SRA) accounts for it in some sense, but maybe we can do better. Let us take a look at the other two families of theories about laws of nature and see if they can explain natural necessity. 1.2.2.2 Laws as Universals Motivated by the troubles of the empiricist’s conceptions a second family of theories of laws of nature emerged. This approach views laws of nature as relations among universals. Its main representatives are David Armstrong, Fred Dretske and Michael Tooley – hence the collective synonym (ADT).³⁶ ADT is clearly non-humean. Laws of nature are not just descriptions of regularities, but there are modal connections in nature. These connections render law statements true and govern the processes in nature. Representatives of ADT hold that properties are universals³⁷ in the sense that there can be more than one instantiation of the same property at the same time. Individuals have one spatial location at each time while properties understood as universals can be multi-located. For example, there can be more than one instantiation of the red universal at the same time, when there is more than one red thing. According to David Armstrong [Armstrong, 1983, p. 91] there are secondorder universals, which are relations between the first-order universals. To take the classical toy example, there are the universals ‘ravenhood’ and ‘blackness’ and they happen to be connected by the second-order relation N: N(R, B). In contrast to the humean theories, the ADT’lers think that ravens do not just happen to be black, but that their blackness is necessitated and hence N is a ‘relation of

36 The classical texts are: [Armstrong, 1983], [Dretske, 1977] [Tooley, 1977] and [Tooley, 1987]. 37 The contrast class is nominalism. According to David Armstrong, universals are wholly present at each of their instances and as they can be instantiated by more then one particular they can be mulit-located. David Lewis, thus, calls them ‘repeatable entities’ [Lewis, 1983a, p. 343]. A nominalist denies the existence of such entities.

1.2 Laws of Nature |

27

necessitation’. The regularities in the world are brought about by the second-order universals; these are the regularity-makers. The difference between any accidental regularity with the logical form ∀x(Ψ(x) → Φ(x)) and a genuine law of nature is the existence of N. A statement is a law of nature if, and only if, N holds between the corresponding universals. Or more formally: (ADT-LoN) ‘∀x(Ψ(x) → Φ(x))’ is a law of nature, iff N(Ψ, Φ) (ADT-LoN) is a bridge principal linking law statements (on the left hand side) with laws of nature as entities (on the right hand side). If the contingent fact N(Ψ, Φ) holds, then it is a law that all Ψs are Φs. It is important that N(Ψ, Φ) holds contingently, if it holds. The resulting necessitation between the universals is not logical necessity. The variant of (NN) for N is thus false. (NN-N) N(Ψ, Φ) → □l N(Ψ, Φ) The necessity of the laws of nature which follows from (ADT) is natural necessity. This seems to be the right kind of necessity, which we have been looking for: it is logically contingent and yet a genuine form of necessity. So where is the catch? First of all, N is supposed to be a contingent relation of necessitation. The fact that, say, N(R, B) is logically contingent just means that it is not logically impossible that there are Rs which are not B, or: N(R, B) ∧ ✸∃x (R(x) ∧ ¬B(x)) – albino ravens are not logically impossible, but still, in the actual world all ravens are black and furthermore this is naturally necessary. But how is this possible? We are told that N(R, B) holds contingently and yet, when it holds R makes B necessary. This is not directly a contradiction but still, N is a strange hermaphrodite between contingency and necessity. Furthermore, David Lewis’ well known ‘mighty biceps’ argument emphasises yet another problem for N: How does the holding of N(R, B) bring it about that R necessitates B? The mystery is somewhat hidden by Armstrong’s terminology. He uses ‘necessitates’ as a name for the lawmaking universal N; and who would be surprised to hear that if F ‘necessitates’ G and a has F, then a must have G? But I say that N deserves the name of ‘necessitation’ only if, somehow, it really can enter into the requisite necessary connections. It can’t enter into them just by bearing a name, any more than one can have mighty biceps just by being called ‘Armstrong’. [Lewis, 1983a, p. 366]³⁸

38 See [Van Fraassen, 1989, ch. 3] for a similar complaint against ADT’s N.

28 | 1 Laws of Nature

Finally, Armstrong [Armstrong, 1983] considers a scenario very similar to the scenarios we discuss in the context of the prevention problem (section 2.6.1): It is possible that not all, say, Rs are B, even though N(R, B) holds. There can be a second second-order relation defeating the N(R, B), say N((R ∧ A), W), such that W and B are incompatible. For example, Bob (b), the albino (A) raven (R) is compatible with the fact the ravenhood necessitates blackness: N(R, B) ∧ (R(a) ∧ ¬B(a)) because of N((R ∧ A), W) ∧ (R(a) ∧ A(a) ∧ W(a)). The problem is not that the albino-case is unrealistic – quite the contrary: we will later argue that such ‘masking’ cases are ubiquitous – but, quite generally, that it is utterly mysterious how N(Ψ, Φ) is supposed to be compatible with some Ψ not being Φ. To summarise, 1) N is a strange hermaphrodite of contingency and necessity, 2) it is unaccounted for how N necessitates, and 3) from N(Ψ, Φ) it does not even follow that ∀x(Ψ(x) → Φ(x)).³⁹ However, I think that N is not per se a bad idea: If we had a good account of N, it would give us pretty much what we are looking for in a theory of laws of nature. There is no ontologically free lunch, however, and, thus, in order to be a respectable ontological entity N needs to be accounted for and not just posited. What N does is, in a way, nicely summarising the explanans, rather than providing the explanandum. We need a theory that elucidates natural necessity instead of abolishing it or taking it for granted, and this is where dispositions enter the scene. 1.2.2.3 Laws as Dispositions I will introduce the family of dispositional accounts of laws of nature only very roughly in this sub-chapter. This is due to the fact that I believe we need a feasible account of dispositions before we can give a dispositional account of anything. Hence, much of this book will be concerned with foundational work on dispositions. A better understanding of dispositions is our only hope for a better understanding of dispositional laws of nature. I am convinced that dispositions are worth the trouble as they bear capacity to capture natural necessity. Hüttemann outlines the dispositional account of laws of nature (DAL) this way: ‘law statements are to be understood as statements about dispositions of objects’ [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 151, translation FF]. (DAL) is advocated among others by Andreas Bartels⁴⁰ [Bartels, 2007], Alexander Bird [Bird, 2007], Nancy Cartwright

39 These are three different worries, whereat 1) pertains to the construction, while 2) and 3) concern the constructed. 40 Bartels also discusses the boundaries of the dispositional account of laws of nature in [Bartels, 2013] and [Bartels, 2015, ch. 3].

1.2 Laws of Nature |

29

[Cartwright, 1989], Andreas Hüttemann [Hüttemann, 2007], and Stephen Mumford [Mumford, 2004]. In a (very) first approximation, dispositions are properties that do not have to be manifest all the time.⁴¹ Glass, for example, does not need to be broken in order to be fragile. Dispositions show their manifestations only under specific stimulus conditions. So, the glass cup on my desk breaks if I hit it with a hammer. The idea is that laws of nature also ascribe behaviour to objects under very specific conditions, and, thus, law statements should be understood as/via disposition ascriptions. Also, the fact that laws of nature are typically ceteris paribus laws suggests that they ascribe dispositions, according to Hüttemann [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 152]. Dispositional theories transcend the humean boundaries as dispositions are understood as causal properties: It is the fragility of the glass that brings about the breaking in the right circumstances. Dispositions have one promising features which gives a dispositional account a great advantage over other accounts of laws of nature: they are local. To see what I mean by ‘locality’, take the example of breaking a glass with a hammer. First of all, let me establish that this process of breaking belongs to the realm of laws of nature. Phrased in terms of the Deductive-Nomological (DN) model of explanation⁴², an answer to the question ‘why did the glass break?’ is that ‘glasses break when struck with a hammer’ and ‘this glass was struck’. The sentence ‘glasses break when struck’ is a lawlike generalisation and the given explanation of the breaking of the glass is only scientifically apt if it corresponds to a law of nature. ‘According to the Deductive-Nomological Model, a scientific explanation [. . . ] must contain at least one “law of nature” and this must be an essential premise in the derivation in the sense that the derivation of the explanandum would not be valid if this premise were removed’ [Woodward, 2014]. Let us see how the three families of theories of laws of nature describe the law of nature involved in the example of the breaking glass. In my opinion, humeanism totally overshoots the mark. What is a law of nature depends on the complete mosaic that makes up the universe. A law has to be a regularity within this mosaic in order to have a chance to be captured by the best system in the first place. Thus, following humeanism, the whole universe plays a role in the explanation of the

41 Categorical properties can be understood as the contrast class to dispositional properties. The shape of the glass cup on my table may be a good example of a categorical property. Although intuitively compelling, it is hard to spell out the dispositional/categorical distinction. cf. [Mumford, 1998, ch. 4]. 42 The DN model of explanation is a special form of the Hempel Oppenheim scheme of explanation, which goes back to, well, Carl Hempel and Paul Oppenheim [Hempel and Oppenheim, 1948].

30 | 1 Laws of Nature

breaking of the glass on my table – taking a sledgehammer to crack a nut is modest in comparison. ADT is in the right ballpark, but not even close to the goal. According to the ADT theories, the explanation of the breaking of the glass depends on the existence of a second-order universal, the relation of necessitation N, we are told, but what are the first-order universals to be in this example? ‘Glass-hood’ and ‘breakingness, under struckness’? In any case, the explanation of the breaking of the glass on my table depends on a relation between universals. So once again, much more then the things on my table have to be taken into account in order to explain the process of the breaking of the glass. The dispositionalist, however, conceives entirely differently of the situation. As Brian Ellis puts it, for the dispositionalist ‘the laws of nature are immanent in things, rather than imposed on them from without’ [Ellis, 2014]. Neither ethereal nor omi-present ‘laws’ have to be consulted, and also we do not have to wait ‘till the end of time’. The dispositions of the glass here and now govern the breaking process. Local dispositions act local.⁴³ That is all. The promise of capturing natural necessity and the locality of dispositions is enough motivation for me to try to formulate a dispositional theory of laws of nature. As I have said, I believe that without a clear conception of dispositions, there cannot be a dispositional account of anything. Thus, the next chapters will be concerned with dispositions. I will return to the criteria of laws of nature in chapter 5. I am not trying to defend a dispositional theory of laws of nature against rival accounts, but rather want to help to develop a dispositional account in the first place, which then can be compared.

43 Note that the locality of dispositions makes them compatible with singular causation (cf. G. E. M. Anscombe’s Causality and Determination from her [Anscombe, 1981]). There need not ever again be another event like the glass breaking. In fact, the glass on my table could have literally been one of a kind, still the dispositionalist’s story goes through.

2 Analyses of dispositions In 1955 Nelson Goodman claimed that ‘the interrelated problems of dispositions, counterfactuals, and possibles are among the most urgent and most pervasive that confront us today in the theory of knowledge and the philosophy of science’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 33] and this is still true today. I will tackle this important topic complex in the context of dispositions via disposition ascriptions. Disposition ascriptions are the natural starting point, since even someone who does not believe in the existence of dispositions as real entities has to acknowledge the vast number of disposition ascriptions in language. Disposition ascriptions are one of the four areas of debate in the recent work on dispositions, according to Troy Cross [Cross, 2012, p. 115]: 1. 2. 3.

the semantics of disposition ascriptions the distinction between dispositional and categorical properties the metaphysical status of dispositions, i. e. their fundamentality, naturalness and intrinsicness 4. the various dispositional analyses of philosophical notions like causation, laws, modality, counterfactuals, chance, knowledge, freedom, belief, desire and colour. These areas are distinct, but related. It is disputed how exactly they are related and what the proper order of investigation among them is¹, but not that they have to be kept apart in order to enable a proper analysis of the theories about dispositions. Someone might only be concerned with the semantics of disposition ascriptions, for example, and then it would be wrong to criticise her for not delivering an ontology of dispositions. In turn, if someone wants to give an analysis of modality in terms of dispositions she need not deliver a semantics for disposition ascriptions. Nevertheless the choices in one area often de facto mirror the choices in the other areas.

2.1 Disposition Ascriptions and Dispositions Disposition ascriptions abound as ‘[o]rdinary language and scientific discourse are filled with linguistic expressions for dispositional properties such as “soluble”, “elastic”, “reliable” and “humorous”’ [Damschen et al., 2009, p. IX]. Every philo1 See, e. g. [Heil, 2003, p. 51].

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-039

32 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

sophical theory about dispositions has to account for this, but this accounting can be done in several ways. One could try, for example, to translate the sentences containing disposition ascriptions into sentences which are free of them. Another option would be to provide non-dispositional truth makers for disposition ascriptions. Of course, one can also take disposition ascriptions to be made true by dispositional properties (i. e. ontological entities), following ‘the idea that natural language is, in some carefully qualified sense, a guide to the nature of reality’ [Jokic and Smith, 2003, p. 4]. Dispositions as real entities in the world are good candidates for truth makers for disposition ascriptions and there are different ways how to flesh out this real-dispositions-option. The naïve way would be to take the sentences containing disposition ascriptions at face value and hold that there is a dispositional property for every dispositional predicate. ‘This glass is fragile’ would then be true just in case the object denoted by ‘this glass’ has the property ascribed with the help of the predicate ‘is fragile’, i. e. it has the dispositional property of fragility. This view is one extreme of a spectrum of possible views, as it posits an abundance of properties alongside the abundance of predicates. The other extreme end is a minimalist version, stating that in the end only a few dispositional properties are the truth makers for all the disposition talk. Theoretically these fundamental dispositions could be found on every level of reality, provided, of course, there are such things as levels of reality.² One might think, e. g. that the universe as a whole has some dispositional properties, on which all dispositional properties of its parts are based or which make all disposition ascriptions about its parts true. Typically, however, fundamental dispositional³ properties are to be found at the micro-level of reality. Then, e. g. the dispositional properties of some fundamental particles are the foundation for higher-order properties or the truth makers for higher-order predicates. As we have to distinguish sharply between the ontological level and the linguistic level, we have to keep predicates and properties apart. This is important for conceptual reasons, even if we want to claim that sentences containing disposition predicates are made true by dispositional properties, or, in short, dispositions. Actually one can only claim that disposition ascriptions are made true by dispositions once one has the conceptual resources to distinguish both. Now, as we have seen, ascriptions of dispositions are linguistic entities⁴ and thus one is not committed to ontological dispositions, if one accepts the mentioned abundance of dispos-

2 Cf. [Ladyman, 2007]. 3 Claus Beisbart has suggested the term ‘fispostions’ for fundamental disposition to me; accordingly their manifestations can be called ‘fanifestations’. 4 Just to disambiguate: I am not talking about the action of ascribing a disposition and thus it is safe to call disposition ascriptions linguistic entities.

2.2 Conditionals and Reductions | 33

ition talk. Prima facie disposition ascriptions are like ascriptions of categorical properties. Take an object denoted by a and the predicates B: is broken and F: is fragile. B(a): Object a is broken. F(a): Object a is fragile. From a logical point of view, a disposition ascription is at face value a general terminus [Tugendhat and Wolf, 1993, p. 127]. The deep structure of a sentence need not be like its surface form, however. A lot of analyses of disposition ascription have tried to identify dispositions with conditional sentences. These analysis and others will be introduced and discussed in the remainder of this chapter.

2.2 Conditionals and Reductions In the following I will present attempts of analyses of dispositions. I will start off easy with the simple conditional analysis (SCA), which could also been called naive conditional analysis. Then, I will turn to Carnap’s reduction sentences. Next is the simple counterfactual conditional analysis (SCCA), followed by David Lewis’ reformed conditional analysis from his Finkish Dispositions [Lewis, 1997]. A sophisticated counterfactual analysis, maybe the most sophisticated on the market, is provided by Wolfgang Malzkorn in [Malzkorn, 2000]. Lastly, I will look at recent analysis attempts of dispositions. The proposals of Sungho Choi [Choi, 2006] and Lars Gundersen [Gundersen, 2002], as well as David Manley and Ryan Wasserman [Manley and Wasserman, 2007], and Michael Fara [Fara, 2005] will be depicted. After discussing these analyses in detail, I will take a step back and look at the big picture. I’m convinced that all the discussed analyses share a common structure and that there is something fundamentally wrong with this way of attempting to analyse dispositions. Of course, this is a bold claim, so it needs a lot of argumentative backup. I will thus not only present said diagnosis of the fundamental problem of the disposition analyses, but also try to provide an alternative account which does – hopefully – not fall prey to the fundamental problem. As the elaboration of a concrete alternative is a quite large project, the entire chapter 3 is dedicated to this task. Before we start with the discussion of the different analyses, two general remarks are in order. The first one concerns the relation between dispositions and conditionals, the second the subject of reduction.

34 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

Dispositions and conditionals: Dispositions are related to conditionals, or as Elizabeth Prior puts it: ‘What is commonly accepted by all those who discuss dispositions is that there exists a conceptual connection between a statement attributing a disposition to an item and a particular conditional. The acceptance of the existence of this conceptual connection is a pre-theoretic common ground’ [Prior, 1985, p. 5]. Now, virtually nobody would challenge the connection between dispositional statements and the corresponding conditional statements, but does that imply that disposition ascriptions have to be analysed via conditionals? Dispositions are said to show their manifestations under given stimuli. So, sugar would dissolve (manifestation), when submerged into water (stimulus). But conventional disposition predicates do not mention the stimulus and the manifestation. Sugar is soluble and glass fragile. We usually do not ascribe ‘breaking-whenstruck’ to glass but ‘fragility’. You may want to explicate ‘solubility’ by ‘dissolvingwhen-submerged’, as many philosophers have tried, but prima facie they are distinct attributions, even when they are extensionally linked in such a way that the one is true iff the other is. It gets worse: I have been speaking as if there is always a corresponding pair of manifestation and stimulus readily available. ‘But what are the manifestations of fragility? Something like shattering or cracking, it seems. But what about splintering, or breaking cleanly in two, or, as with a fragile house of cards, collapsing? It seems hard to say. And what exactly are the stimulus conditions of fragility? Striking, it seems. But what about twisting or shaking? We are at a loss’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. Already for such a simple, everyday disposition as fragility it is not easy to name a corresponding unique manifestation and stimulus or a class of pairs of stimuli and manifestations. For David Lewis the first step in his two step program [Lewis, 1997] is an analysis of conventional dispositions into (a set of) canonical dispositions. Canonical dispositions are such that they explicitly mention the stimulus and the manifestation, such as dissolves when submerged. Thus every disposition corresponds to a stimulus-manifestation pair or a class of such pairs {, , . . . }, according to Lewis.⁵ Lewis acknowledges that it is an additional argumentative step from conventional to canonical dispositions: ‘the first problem we face in analysing any particular dispositional concept, before we can turn to the more general questions that our particular example was meant to illustrate, is the problem of specifying

5 This claim is not only held by Lewis, of course, but rather widespread. Wolfgang Malzkorn, for example, explicitly claims this in his paper Realism, Functionalism and the Conditional Analysis of Dispositions [Malzkorn, 2000, p. 468].

2.2 Conditionals and Reductions | 35

the stimulus and the response correctly’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 153]. Most of the early conditional analyses of dispositions have just implicitly assumed that the step from conventional to canonical dispositions is unproblematic or directly started with canonical dispositions as examples. However, restricting the analysis to canonical dispositions limits the possible applications severely, as most of our everyday language uses conventional dispositions. Admitting that it is an additional theoretical step from conventional to canonical dispositions is more honest, especially since this step is anything but trivial. The way of depicting dispositions in the stimulus-manifestation model already suggests some kind of link between conventional dispositions and canonical dispositions.⁶ There is a second step from canonical dispositions to conditionals. Having found the acceptable canonical dispositions is not sufficient, however, as it might not be the stimulus (manifestation) itself, but something containing the stimulus (manifestation), that has to be used as the antecedence (consequence). So, even if a stimulus is identified it still needs to be worked into an appropriate antecedence⁷. Even harder though, is the task to find an appropriate connective: The material conditional springs to mind, but with it all its problems. But does strict implication, or a counterfactual implication fare better? The remainder of this chapter is concerned with this question. For now we can sum up that there are three levels: conventional disposition ascriptions, canonical disposition ascriptions and the corresponding conditionals. These levels are related but far from identical.

6 The stimulus-manifestation model is criticised by John Heil and C. B. Martin, who prefer to talk of ‘mutual manifestation partners’ [Heil and Martin, 1998]. However, the focus of my overall project is the on metaphysics of dispositions and not on the semantics of disposition ascriptions, and thus the theoretical gap between conventional and canonical dispositions poses no threat. My venture point is not the ascription of solubility to sugar. Rather the dispositional properties of fundamental particles or fields and their interactions are the basis for a metaphysics of dispositions. I am not concerned with solubility at all, as this is a task for a scientist rather than a philosopher. Understanding solubility in all its chemical and physical details may be a complicated task and accordingly the corresponding canonical disposition may consist of a complicated stimulus and an equally complicated manifestation. This, however, is only a threat to a reductionistic analysis, which has to account for conventional dispositions in terms of canonical dispositions. I take a more modest route. As a philosopher, I leave it to the chemists and physicists to understand how solubility – and for that matter fragility and the rest – works. I merely try to provide a metaphysical framework which leaves room for disposition ascriptions. 7 This is far from trivial. It will be a re-occurring theme in this chapter. Wolfgang Malzkorn [Malzkorn, 2000, p. 456], for example, has proposed that an object in addition to being stimulated has be in normal conditions in order to show the corresponding manifestation, while Stephen Mumford instead opts for ideal conditions [Mumford, 1998, p. 87].

36 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

Reduction: Giving an analysis in terms of conditionals is not necessarily a reduction, even if both kinds of sentences – disposition ascriptions and the corresponding conditionals – are co-extensional or linked by necessary biconditionals. So, to concede that disposition ascriptions and the corresponding conditionals ‘are linked by necessary biconditionals is not yet to endorse a reduction in either direction’ [Cross, 2012, p. 116]. If disposition ascriptions are linked via necessary biconditionals to certain conditionals, then these conditionals are also linked via necessary biconditionals to the corresponding disposition ascriptions. This is – ensured by its logical structure – a symmetric arrangement, whereas a reduction is asymmetric: One thing is reduced to another, and not the other way around. Thus, to hold that disposition ascriptions can and should be reduced to the corresponding conditionals is a further claim. One could, by the same rights, also vote for the reduction of said conditionals to disposition ascriptions. It is de facto the case that the early analyses of dispositions in terms of conditionals were also reductive analyses. Only when the first counterexamples emerged⁸, the analyses of dispositions were questioned. Before that an analysis, and by that a reduction of dispositions, seemed easily available. With the problems of the analysis the status of it as a reduction became questionable and alternatives, such as dispositional essentialism⁹ where considered. To be sure, the problems of the reductive analyses where just the motivation for the alternative accounts of dispositions. The arguments against the analyses might not be conclusive, as till today some philosophers stand in for an conditional analysis of some kind or other¹⁰, and even if they where conclusive, from the denial of an reductive analysis of dispositions it does not follow that dispositions belong to the ontological foundation of our world. So, even a necessary link between dispositions and conditionals is compatible with the denial of a reduction of disposition ascriptions. Instead it could be, as John Heil suggests, that ‘[c]onditionals provide a defeasible, rough and ready way to pick out dispositions, not an analysis’ [Heil, 2005, p. 345]. What about the opposite direction? Does the lack of a necessary connection between disposition ascriptions and certain conditionals imply that the dispositions are not reducible? No! One could try to reduce disposition ascriptions to other sentences than conditionals or give non-dispositional truth makers for them. Cross concurs that ‘if there is no such linkage, it may still be that dispositions supervene on the distribution of categorical properties and laws’ [Cross, 2012, p. 116]. Cross talks about ‘dispositions’ here and I am not sure whether he uses it as shorthand for

8 cf. e. g. [Smith, 1977], [Johnston, 1992] and [Bird, 1998]. 9 cf. e. g. [Bird, 2007] and [Ellis, 2001]. 10 See [Choi, 2006], [Choi, 2008] and [Gundersen, 2002].

2.3 The Simple Conditional Analysis |

37

‘disposition ascriptions’, as so many do, or whether he really means ‘dispositions’, that is metaphysical entities. The quote directly follows the already mentioned: ‘to say that dispositions and conditionals are linked by necessary biconditionals is not yet to endorse a reduction in either direction’ [Cross, 2012, p. 116]. As only sentences (or propositions) are possible truth bearers, he might mean disposition ascriptions, or more precisely sentences containing disposition ascriptions, but, as entities or states of affairs are taken to supervene and not sentences, he might rather mean dispositions. Anyhow, the idea seems to be that disposition ascriptions can be made true by the distribution of categorical properties and laws, or that dispositional entities supervene on this. If we take disposition ascriptions to be translatable into conditionals, we have not automatically got rid of dispositions altogether. We have to ask further, what makes these conditionals true? ‘Presumably, if the conditional is an analysis, its truth maker will be whatever the truth maker is for the original dispositional assertion’ [Heil, 2005, p. 345]. So, if the truth maker is a dispositional property, we still have dispositions in our ontology. We could then shun the talk of dispositions in our language and just talk in, maybe complicated, conditionals and our talk would be made true, if true at all, by dispositional properties. This might sound strange, but once you keep the linguistic and the metaphysical level strictly apart, it is perfectly consistent. So much for the preliminary skirmishing, let us now take a look at the various attempts at reducing disposition ascriptions to conditionals of some sort, starting with the simple conditional analysis.

2.3 The Simple Conditional Analysis The rationale behind the attempt to reduce dispositions is that they, allegedly, are too ‘ethereal’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 40], and that they thus have to be given ‘an adequate explanation in terms of an acceptable basis’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 31]. Disposition ascriptions, it seems¹¹, do not ascribe actual properties, like ascriptions with categorical predicates do, but only possible behaviour. I can ascribe fragility to a certain glass a without it differing in actual behaviour from other glasses. Fragile glass a can stand unimpaired next to glass b, which is made from bulletproof glass.

11 It may of course turn out that it only seems to be that way. In fact, this is quite plausible. C. B. Martin, to name just one philosopher, holds that ‘dispositions are actual, though their manifestations may not be. It is an elementary confusion to think of unmanifesting dispositions as unactualized possibilia, though that may characterize unmanifested manifestation’ [Martin, 1994, p. 1].

38 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

The only thing that may warrant the ascription of the disposition fragility to only glass a is its possible behaviour, or so it could be argued. One could reply that it is actually the future behaviour which differentiates the glasses from each other, and not only their possible behaviour. Once I drop both of them, they will behave differently, as only a will break. Future behaviour is less ‘ethereal’ as it is this-wordly, the defender could go on. A reply of this kind has one decisive weak point: dispositions need not manifest. It may be that both glasses stand on the shelf forever without ever being dropped. We are back to possible behaviour as the difference maker. Thus, the fragility of an object, it seems, ‘has to do only with its possibly shattering in certain conditions. In general, it seems that nothing about the actual behavior of an object is ever necessary for it to have the dispositions it has. Many objects differ from one another with respect to their dispositions in virtue of their merely possible behaviors, and this is a mysterious way for objects to differ’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. Now, if you do not want to have dispositions in your ontology, because they are too ethereal, then you still need to account for disposition ascriptions, as they abound in science and everyday language. Or, if you agree with Nelson Goodman that ‘some of the things that seem [. . . ] unacceptable without explanation are powers or dispositions’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 33], you could try to explain ‘dispositions in other, more readily understandable terms’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. The first step in such an alleged analysis of disposition ascriptions is the locating of corresponding canonical dispositions. Once we have found an appropriate manifestation predicate and stimulus predicate, the most obvious thing to do would be to simply take them as the antecedence and consequence of a material implication. Call this the simple conditional analysis (SCA) of disposition ascriptions. Note that the abbreviation (SCA) is sometimes used for the simple counterfactual conditional analysis of dispositions. I deviate from this terminology to have the means to distinguish between the analyses using material implication from the analyses using counterfactual conditionals. I will call the simple counterfactual conditional analysis, which will be discussed in section section 2.5, (SCCA). The, in my terminology, simple conditional analysis states that every object has a disposition if and only if it shows the corresponding manifestation if the appropriate stimulus conditions obtain. (A1) ∀x(D(x) ↔ (C(x) → M(x))) Here D(x) represents a generic disposition ascription, so (A1) is not a sentence but a sentence schema. We can get to an analysis of a particular disposition ascription by filling in a concrete disposition, manifestation and stimulus:

2.3 The Simple Conditional Analysis |

39

(Z1) ∀x(S(x) ↔ (S(x) → D(x))) Every object is soluble, or has the disposition to dissolve upon submergence: S(x) iff it dissolves D if submerged S. A simple, yet powerful idea. The biconditional between D(x) and S(x) → D(x) expresses the idea that solubility is nothing over and above the fulfilling of S(x) → D(x). Or to put it extensionally: every object which is soluble fulfils S(x) → D(x) and there are no objects which fulfil S(x) → D(x), which are not soluble. To focus even more on the relevant parts of the (SCA), instead of the general sentence (Z1), take the ascription of a disposition to a concrete particular (Zucky 1).¹² (Zucky 1) S(z) ↔ (S(z) → D(z)) In this formula, z stands for Zucky, Ludger Jansen’s favourite chunk of sugar [Jansen, 2007, p. 166]. (Zucky 1) clearly illustrates the central problem of the (SCA). The biconditional makes sure that whenever the conditional on the right hand side is true, the disposition ascription on the left hand side is true as well. Now, to put it colloquially, material implications become true too easily. This is one of the well-known paradoxes of the material implication. As the material implication is a truth functional connective, its complete semantics can be given via a truth table: ϕ

ψ

ϕ→ψ

t t f f

t f t f

t f t t

In the truth table you can see that if the antecedence is true the whole implication becomes true, no matter which truth value the consequence has.¹³ This has severe consequences for the alleged analysis of dispositions, as it says that every object which is not submerged into water is soluble. Imagine Zucky being an anvil, or the least soluble thing you can think of. If anvil-Zucky is never submerged into water the implication S(z) → D(z) is trivially true, no matter if he dissolves or not,

12 This is d’accord with the findings of Ludger Jansen, who argues that ascriptions of dispositions to concrete particulars are ‘prior metaphysically, logically and epistemologically to disposition ascriptions to any of the other three ontological categories.’ [Jansen, 2007, p. 176]. 13 This is sometimes called ex falso quodlibet, in contrast to ex contradictionem quodlibet.

40 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

and thus S(z) is true. Hence, the never submerged anvil-Zucky is soluble according to the (SCA). This is absurd! But we can go even one step further and derive a contradiction. To do so we just have to consider when something, following the (SCA), fails to have a disposition. The idea here is that an object is insoluble, iff it does not dissolve upon submergence. (Z2) ∀x(¬S(x) ↔ (S(x) → ¬D(x))) Let us once again free ourselves of the general quantifier and continue with (Zucky 2): (Zucky 2) ¬S(z) ↔ (S(z) → ¬D(z)) Form (Zucky 1) and (Zucky 2) we can easily derive a contradiction with the additional premise that Zucky is not submerged: 1

¬S(z)

2

S(z) ↔ (S(z) → D(z))

(Zucky 1)

3

¬S(z) ↔ (S(z) → ¬D(z))

(Zucky 2)

4

S(z)

5

⊥

⊥ Intro 1,4

6

D(z)

⊥ Elim 5

7

S(z) → D(z)

→ Intro 4-6

8

S(z)

↔ Elim 2,7

S(z)

9 10

⊥

⊥ Intro 1,9

11

¬D(z)

⊥ Elim 10

12

S(z) → ¬D(z)

→ Intro 9-11

13

¬S(z)

↔ Elim 3,12

14

⊥

⊥ Intro 8,13

One might think that this actually fits our observation that objects which are not put in the relevant stimulus conditions do not differ in actual behaviour. The fragile glass a and the bullet proof glass b which stand motionless on the shelf

2.4 Carnap’s Reduction Sentences |

41

do not differ in this-wordly behaviour and thus they do not warrant difference in disposition ascriptions. The (SCA) would ascribe the same dispositions to a and b. The problem is that the (SCA) ascribes fragility and non-fragility to both glasses. Thus, both glasses are contradictory objects according to the (SCA). This is a too high of a price to pay, which cannot be counterbalanced by its simplicity.

2.4 Carnap’s Reduction Sentences The (SCA) has already been discussed and discarded by Rudolf Carnap in the nineteen thirties. Carnap clearly saw the problems we have just mentioned. In Testability and Meaning [Carnap, 1936] he examines whether the meaning of ‘x is soluble in water’ can be given as ‘whenever x is put into water, x dissolves’ and presents the alleged definition (D). (D) Q3 (x) ↔ ∀t(Q1 (x, t) → Q2 (x, t)) with the following interpretation: Q3 (x): the body x is soluble in water Q1 (x, t): the body x is placed into water at the time t Q2 (x, t): the body x dissolves at the time t Substituting S for Q3 , S for Q1 and D for Q2 brings us close to (Z1). The obvious difference is the quantification over time points in (D). Note that Carnap uses the same time point t for the stimulus and the manifestation. Following (D) Zucky should dissolve at the same point in time as he is placed into water. I will come back to the diachronic aspects of disposition manifestations later (section 4.1.2) and therefore I will just ignore the reference to the time till then. Take a certain match c, which was burned completely yesterday. Carnap asserts that c was not soluble in water, as it was made of wood. Hence Q3 (c), or in our terminology S(c), is false. As the match c has never been placed in water and will, according to the assumption, also never be, Q1 (c, t) is false (for any value of t). But then, ex falso quodlibet, ∀t(Q1 (c, t) → Q2 (c, t)) is true. Hence Q3 (c) / S(c) is true, which is a contradiction. Carnap concludes that Q3 (c) / S(c) ‘cannot be defined by D, nor by any other definition’ [Carnap, 1936, p. 440]. Carnap wants to account for disposition ascriptions by using so-called reduction sentences to introduce disposition predicates. The basic idea of reduction sentences is that ‘we can meaningfully tell whether or not a given item is soluble only if it is put into water’ [Choi and Fara, 2016] and thus reduction sentences cannot be used to completely eliminate disposition predicates like Q3 or S.

42 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

Suppose we want to introduce the disposition predicate Q3 (i. e. S) by means of Q2 and Q1 . Carnap holds that a definition of disposition predicates via corresponding stimulus and manifestation predicates and hence an analysis of disposition ascriptions in the spirit of the (SCA) is not possible (cf. [Carnap, 1936, p. 440]). So, instead of a definition, Carnap offers the reduction sentence (R): (R) ∀x ∀t(Q1 (x, t) → (Q3 (x) ↔ Q2 (x, t))) If we, once again, substitute S(z) for Q3 , S for Q1 and D for Q2 and omit the time parameter, we obtain (Z3): (Z3) ∀x(E(x) → (S(x) ↔ S(x))) Going to the concrete ascription of solubility to Zucky we get: (Zucky 3) E(z) → (S(x) ↔ S(z)) Comparing (Zucky 3) to (Zucky 1) emphasises the differences between the (SCA) and Carnap’s reduction sentences. (Zucky 1) S(z) ↔ (S(z) → D(z)) The problem with (Zucky 1) is that, when the stimulus condition S(z) is not fulfilled, S(z) gets trivially ascribed. Contrary to that, the corresponding reduction sentence (Zucky 3) takes S(z) / Q1 as the antecedence and thus ‘if “(x)(¬Q1 (x))” is valid, the sentence does not give any determination at all’ [Carnap, 1936, p. 442]. The whole sentence (Zucky 3) is, ex falso quodlibet, trivially true, when S(z) / Q1 is false, but this is not problematic as it does not lead to the erroneous ascription of a disposition. The never submerged anvil-Zucky does not get solubility ascribed, according to (Zucky 3). From (Zucky 3) together with ¬E(z) we cannot infer anything about S(z). Actually, (Zucky 3) is a special form of a reduction sentence, according to Carnap. For the introduction of a disposition predicate, such as Q3 , we should rather start with the establishment of a ‘reduction pair’ [Carnap, 1936, p. 441]. We can have different experiments for the obtaining and not-obtaining of Q3 . (R1 ) Q1 → (Q2 → Q3 ) (R2 ) Q4 → (Q5 → ¬Q3 ) (R1 ) means that, if the experimental condition Q1 is realised, then if we get the result Q2 the object has the property Q3 and accordingly (R2 ) means that, if

2.4 Carnap’s Reduction Sentences |

43

conditions Q4 obtain then the result Q5 gives us that Q3 does not obtain. The experimental conditions Q1 and Q4 can be very different, as well as the respective results Q2 and Q5 for one and the same disposition predicate Q3 . However, when Q1 coincides with Q4 and Q5 with ¬Q2 , we obtain (R2 ’) instead of (R2 ). (R1 ) Q1 → (Q2 → Q3 ) (R2 ’) Q1 → (¬Q2 → ¬Q3 ) And in this situation (R1 ) and (R2 ’) can be combined to a so-called bilateral reduction sentence: (Rb ) Q1 → (Q3 ↔ Q2 ) (Rb ) does not share the problems of the (SCA), as it does neither wrongly ascribe dispositions nor lead to a contradiction. It is, however, not suitable as an analysis of disposition ascriptions in general, as it is only a partial definition or, how Carnap calls this, a ‘conditioned definition’ [Carnap, 1936, p. 443]. (Rb ) says nothing about Zucky, or any other object, if the stimulus conditions are not met. Thus we cannot completely eliminate disposition ascriptions via reduction sentences and ‘[t]hough this is what Carnap explicitly embraced, many philosophers found it deeply problematic’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. Carnap would retaliate, according to Goodman, ‘that the effort to define ordinary physical disposition-terms is philosophically immoral. The scientist [. . . ] never defines such a term; he partially and progressively specifies its meaning as he learns more and more’ [Goodman, 1983, pp. 46–47]. As reduction sentences are silent about the cases where the stimulus conditions are not met, they do not constitute the meaning of the respective disposition terms. This leads to a ‘region of indeterminateness’ [Carnap, 1936, p. 445] for the other cases. It is indeterminate whether or not S(z) applies to the match c, from our previous example, which was completely burned without ever being submerged into water. Carnap offers a method to minimize the region of indeterminateness: we can use ‘laws’ that incorporate the disposition predicate in question. ‘In the case of the predicate ‘soluble in water’ we may perhaps add the law stating that two bodies of the same substance are either both soluble or both not soluble.’ [Carnap, 1936, p. 445]. We would not have to put every single piece of sugar in water with a law like this. Once it is established that Zucky was soluble we could infer that Zocky, his brother sugar cube, is soluble, because he is of the same substance, i. e. sugar. Laws of the kind ‘two bodies of the same substance either both have disposition D or both not.’ seem to be a good idea as they may easily decrease the region of indeterminateness. Nelson Goodman, however, has clearly spotted a problem for

44 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

those laws: ‘Nothing could be much simpler – or less illuminating. For just when are two things of the same kind?’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 44]. According to Goodman these laws cannot help us to eliminate dispositions, as they may very well use or presuppose dispositions. Goodman, thus, deems the proposal of using laws like Carnap’s solubility law threatened by circularity. It cannot be that objects need to share all predicates in order to belong to the same kind, or ‘be of the same substance’, because then no two objects fulfil this criterion. They differ at least in spatial location. Furthermore, even one and the same object would belong to different types if it persists and changes and so we have to restrict our attention to certain predicates, Goodman suggest, which are essential for belonging to a certain kind. Now, dispositions, and with them the threat of circularity, come into the picture as ‘we might find that only dispositional predicates are essential and all manifest predicates accidental’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 45]. The spatial location may be accidental to Zucky – the fact that this can change during his ‘lifetime’ is evidence thereof – but ‘if it is not soluble, it is not sugar’, one might argue. Reduction sentences describe how the scientist actually progresses in setting up tests and by these tests fixes the meaning of theoretical terms, they are not a satisfactory analysis of dispositions in general.¹⁴ The (SCA) as well as Carnap’s reduction sentences used material implication as the connective. After Carnap, there have been some attempts¹⁵ to analyse disposition ascriptions with material implications, but ‘[n]otwithstanding these attempts, however, it came to be widely accepted that disposition ascriptions cannot be analyzed in an extensional language’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. With the insufficiency of the material implication¹⁶ virtually universally accepted, philosophers tried using ‘stronger-than-materialconditionals’ [Martin, 1994, p. 2], in particular counterfactual conditionals.¹⁷.

14 Carnap’s reduction sentences could be the basis for alternative conception of dispositions for the humean minded philosopher, as (Rb ) is much easier as Lewis own reformed conditional analysis (see section 2.6). They could try to use the resources from the humean accounts of laws of nature or even full blown modal realism. Run on the the set of all possible worlds, reduction sentences seem to turn into full definitions, but I will not pursue this line of reasoning here. 15 cf. [Kaila, 1942] and [Storer, 1951]. 16 cf. e. g. [Burks, 1951], [Burks, 1955], [Pap, 1958] and [Sellars, 1957]. 17 Notably, if attempts are made to use a stronger-than-material implication, virtually always a counterfactual conditional is used. This is strange, since relevant logic seems perfect for this task from its self-conception. The only one I know using relevant logic is Dirk Hartmann. See [Hartmann, 2003, pp. 57–63] and [Hartmann, 2009, p. 153].

2.5 The Simple Counterfactual Conditional Analysis | 45

2.5 The Simple Counterfactual Conditional Analysis Instead of abandoning the quest for a full definition of disposition predicates, attempts have been made to use counterfactual conditionals for an analysis of disposition ascriptions. We have elucidated ‘soluble’ by ‘dissolves upon submergence’ already in section 2.2: this was the first step in Lewis two-step program which transfers conventional to canonical dispositions. It is reasonable to use the canonical stimulus and manifestation in some sort of conditional, because of the ‘conceptual connection between a statement attributing a disposition to an item and a particular conditional’ [Prior, 1985, p. 5] suggests. In lights of the problems of the (SCA) (cf. section 2.3) material implication was discarded as the connective between stimulus and manifestation. Instead, a simple counterfactual conditional analysis (SCCA) suggests itself. And indeed, the ‘replacement of a statement like “k was flexible at time t” by a statement like “If k had been under suitable pressure at time t, then k would have bent” has obvious promise as a step towards clarification’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 35]. The simple counterfactual conditional analysis (SCCA) has been held explicitly by Gilbert Ryle [Ryle, 2009], Nelson Goodman [Goodman, 1983], and Willard Van Orman Quine [Quine, 1960] ‘and implicitly by countless others’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. As Ryle and the like tried to analyse disposition ascriptions via counterfactual conditionals, they held that ‘the truth or falsity of [a dispostion] ascription does not consists in x having some categorical property that we may try to ascribe with a statement of the form ‘D(x)” [Mumford, 1998, p. 38]. Instead, the truth of the ascription of a disposition, such as D, consists of the truth of a counterfactual condtional¹⁸ with the stimulus C as the antecedence and the manifestation M as the consequence. (SCCA) ∀x(Dx) ↔ (C(x) € M(x))) According to the (SCCA) an object is soluble iff it would dissolve, if it were submerged (SCCA - Z) ∀x(S(x) ↔ (S(x) € D(x))) and so, Zucky is soluble if and only if he would dissolve if he were submerged:

18 See the classical text of David Lewis Counterfactuals. There Lewis defines that a counterfactual A € B is true in a world w iff some A-world where B holds is more similar to w than is any A-world where B does not hold. [Lewis, 1986, pp. 22–26].

46 | 2 Analyses of dispositions (Zucky 4) S(z) ↔ (S(z) € D(z)) Basically there is nothing wrong with the (SCCA)¹⁹, as it does not fall prey to the problems of the (SCA). Counterfactuals with a false antecedence are not trivially true and thus the corresponding dispositions are not ascribed trivially. The (SCCA) also distinguishes between objects that do not differ in actual behaviour. As it is an actual property of me, that I might have become a gardener, it is an actual difference between glass a and bulletproof glass b that only the former would have broken, if it were struck. Also, the truth maker of the conditional S(z) € D(z) might consist of actual properties of Zucky (maybe his molecular structure). Then, although the disposition ascription S(z) would be reduced to the counterfactual S(z) € D(z), as this was made true by actual properties of Zucky, we would not been forced to resort to only possible properties. Thus, just by adopting the (SCCA), one is not forced to adopt merely possible properties. Further, a contradiction, like with the (SCA), cannot be derived with the (SCCA), by adding (Zucky 5). (Zucky 5) ¬S(z) ↔ (S(z) € ¬D(z)) From the truth of ¬S(z) neither S(z) € ¬D(z) nor S(z) € D(z) follows. To the contrary, it is plausible to assume that only either S(z) € ¬D(z) or S(z) € D(z) is true. One might even generalize this to all material objects. Call this (Consistence): (Consistence) ∀x((S(x) € D(x)) 󴀈󴀂󴀠 (S(x) € ¬D(x))) It might be reasonable to hold that every object fulfils S(x) € D(x) or S(x) € ¬D(x) and none fulfils both, but as counterfactuals are a thorny business I will refrain form endorsing this claim. The semantics of counterfactuals in general is not the topic at hand, but whether it is possible to reduce disposition ascriptions to counterfactual conditionals in the way the (SCCA) suggest. The biconditional in the (SCCA) states that all objects, to which D applies, fulfil the counterfactual conditional C(x) € M(x) and that whatever fulfils C(x) € M(x) is D. This gives two basic strategies to attack the (SCCA): One could provide a situation where the ascription of a disposition D is intuitively plausible but where the corresponding counterfactual C(x) € M(x) is false or one could provide an

19 Some philosophers even think that not only basically there is nothing wrong with the (SCCA). Sungho Choi and Lars Gundersen still defend the (SCCA). In section 2.8 we will discuss their proposal.

2.5 The Simple Counterfactual Conditional Analysis |

47

example where C(x) € M(x) is true, but the object in question fails to warrant D.

2.5.1 Finks The issue that the truth value of a disposition ascription and the truth value of the corresponding counterfactual can fall apart was first formulated by Charles Martin in Dispositions and Conditional [Martin, 1994]. Dispositions can be gained or lost: ‘A piece of glass can be fragile for an hour and cease to be fragile for an hour. This change of disposition can be arranged by means of a change in temperature’ [Martin, 1994, p. 1]. So far nothing special. Martin however noticed that the conditions for gaining or losing a disposition can be the same as the stimulus condition of that disposition. An object would then have a disposition, but could not manifest it – it could for example swim, as long as it is not thrown into water – or an otherwise non-disposed object could acquire the disposition in the relevant moment and then show the behaviour that objects with this disposition normally display. Martin imagines an electro-fink, a device in which a wire can be inserted. The electro-fink reliably detects when a conductor is about to touch the wire and instantaneously renders the wire live for the duration of the contact. Now, consider a dead wire w that is put into an electro-fink. The elcetro-fink ensures that the ‘the wire is live when and only when a conductor touches it’ [Martin, 1994, p. 3]. Electro-fink cases are designed to illustrate the insufficiency of the (SCCA). The wire w’s disposition L(w) gets analysed, according to the (SCCA), by the corresponding counterfactual ‘The wire w would conduct electricity (C), if it were touched by an conductor (T)’. Or more formally (Wire). (Wire) L(w) ↔ (T(w) € C(w)) Martin uses the electro-fink example to show that the (SCCA)’s counterfactual conditional is neither sufficient nor necessary for the corresponding disposition ascription to hold. The wire w, untouched by a conductor, is dead, per hypothesis. But the electro-fink ensures that the counterfactual conditional is true: If w were to be touched, it would conduct electricity. Thus, the truth of T(w) € C(w) is not sufficient for the ascirption of the corresponding disposition L(w). The fink can also work in a reverse-cycle. In this mode it renders an otherwise live wire dead in the moment when it is touched by the conductor. A wire in such a device has the disposition of liveness, according to Martin, although it would not conduct electricity, if it would be touched by a conductor. Once again the truth of

48 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

the counterfactual and the disposition ascription fall apart. In the reverse-cycle mode L(w) is true, while T(w) € C(w) does not hold. The counterfactual is, consequently, not necessary for the corresponding disposition ascription. This is intuitively plausible. Whether or not a wire is live depends only on the wire and not on the circumstances it is in, one would think. The wire does not change by being inserted into an electro-fink. It is still the same wire and thus should not cease to be live (or dead). David Lewis captures this point, via intrinsic duplicates: ‘if two things (actual or merely possible) are exact intrinsic duplicates [. . . ] then they are disposed alike’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 148]. Imagine the match c had been put into a solubility-fink. Nothing relevant would have changed, as c was never submerged into water: The solubility-fink would have taken care of c’s dissolving, if it were submerged. But as c was not submerged, the fink did not do anything. So, it is plausible that c was never soluble. Still, the corresponding counterfactual is true in this set up; this is ensured by the solubility fink. Martin’s finks actually form a challenge for every reductionist account that tries to accommodate for dispositions in terms of counterfactual conditionals, such as ‘x has disposition D iff it would show manifestation M, if it were in stimulus condition S’. In the reverse-cycle fink case the antecedent of the conditional is true, while the consequent is false, resulting in a false implication. Carnap’s reduction sentences also fall prey to the issue: when submerged in circumstances involving a fink, sugar does not dissolve, but it is nevertheless true that sugar is soluble.

2.6 Lewis’ Reformed Conditional Analysis In response to the problems of finkish dispositions David Lewis came up with a reformed counterfactual conditional analysis (RCCA) in his paper Finkish Dispositions [Lewis, 1997]. First, Lewis questions Martin’s assumptions about timing. The electro-fink is imagined by Martin to work instantaneously, which indeed is a questionable idealisation. I postpone the extensive discussion of the diachronisity of disposition manifestation to section 4.1.2. To understand Lewis’ reformed conditional analysis, it is enough to note that Lewis drops Martin’s assumption that the electro-fink works instantaneously. Lewis himself has no qualms with the assumed instantaneousness, but concedes this to the (hypothetical) critic of Martin’s finking cases. Lewis also discusses the possible reply that dispositions are extrinsic, and that thus the wire actually changes its dispositions once it is inserted into the electrofink. The inserted wire would then not be live any more and the (SCCA) would rightly ascribe this to the wire. The truth of the conditional and the disposition

2.6 Lewis’ Reformed Conditional Analysis |

49

ascription would not fall apart with extrinsic dispositions. Lewis, once again, is not convinced by the reply, as he holds dispositions to be intrinsic. Nevertheless, he presents a variation of the finkish case, which he considers to be immune to this reply: A sorcerer takes a liking to a fragile glass, one that is a perfect intrinsic duplicate of all the other fragile glasses off the same production line. He does nothing at all to change the dispositional character of his glass. He only watches and waits, resolved that if ever his glass is struck, then, quick as a flash, he will cast a spell that changes the glass, renders it no longer fragile, and thereby aborts the process of breaking. So his finkishly fragile glass would not break if struck – but not thanks to any protective disposition of the glass itself. Thanks, instead, to a disposition of the sorcerer. [Lewis, 1997, p. 147]

I am not sure, however, that the sorcerer case actually fares any better than Martin’s original finkish case, regarding intrinsicness. Why could the person who accepts that a wire changes its dispositions when inserted into an electro-fink not accept that a glass changes its dispostions when watched over by a magician? The one change is neither more nor less absurd than the other. The magician case, however, is more absurd or unrealistic than Martin’s finking case, so I will stick to the original one.²⁰ Although Lewis takes finking to show the insufficiency of the (SCCA), he draws different conclusions from this than Martin. Martin thought that no conditional analysis can resist the finking cases, even that dispositions can and should not be reduced. Lewis finds this reaction too harsh and premature. He takes finks to refute just the (SCCA) and thus presents his reformed counterfactual conditional analysis (RCCA) which he deems superior to the (SCCA). Let’s have a look at Lewis’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 157] official formulation of the (RCCA), and then explicate it. (RCCA) Something x is disposed at time t to give response r to stimulus s iff, for some intrinsic property B that x has at t, for some time t󸀠 after t, if x were to undergo stimulus s at time t and retain property B until t󸀠 , s and x’s having B would jointly be an x-complete cause of x’s giving response r. First of all, Lewis thinks that objects have causal bases for the manifestations they display. The stimulus together with this basis property, or the having of this property, causes the manifestation. One and the same disposition can be realized by

20 Of course, the reply that if dispositions are extrinsic, then the (SCCA) works, is not refuted if Lewis’ case is not better than Martin’s. I will come back to extrinsic dispositions in section 2.8 and postpone a discussion till then.

50 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

different basic properties in different objects, but every object that has a disposition needs to have some causal basis for it. The property which makes a glass fragile can be different from the property which makes china fragile, but every fragile object must have a causal basis property for its fragility.²¹ Lewis’ (RCCA) further demands that the causal basis B is retained (at least) till the result r is obtained. This is supposed to block the finking cases we have discussed so far. The introduction of the basis property makes a new kind of fink case possible. An object could switch its causal base property. As fragility can be realized via different causal bases, say B1 , B2 and so on, a fragile glass may lose its base B1 and acquire a different base B2 just in the moment of stimulation. This case does not threaten the (SCCA), but still something seems to go wrong. Lewis at least is convinced that we have to exclude cases like this in our analysis of dispositions. One could object that this is rather artificial, as such a base swapping only becomes possible if one includes causal bases in the analysis of dispositions. Lewis’ problem is home made, so to say. We can ignore this possible objection however, as Lewis’ (RCCA) excludes bases swapping anyhow. Furthermore, Lewis insists that the property B needs to be an intrinsic property. Besides the already mentioned Sorcerer case, Lewis illustrates the claim for intrinsicness of dispositions with Willie, a pacifistic weakling, who is protected by his bigger, non-pacifistic, non-weakling brother. If extrinsic properties can be the causal bases of dispositions, then ‘Willie’s own disposition makes him a dangerous man to mess about with’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 155]. Lewis finds this implausible enough to reject extrinsic properties as possible causal base properties. An ‘x-complete cause’ is a complete cause for x – as opposed to only a partial cause – restricted to intrinsic properties. It thus excludes cases in which two or more intrinsic properties together are the complete cause of some manifestation. We can construct this as a finking case for the causal base. Having, say B3 and B4 , would cause breaking when their bearer is struck. Striking and only having B3 , however, is not enough for breaking. Now, consider a glass g which has only B3 , but is in some kind of finkish scenario where it would obtain B4 when struck. This glass would then break when struck, albeit lacking the corresponding disposition when not struck. To exclude such partial-causal-base-finks, Lewis demands that B is an x-complete cause. Lewis himself admits that the (RCCA) is an ‘unlovely mouthful’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 157], but this alone is not a problem. If it were to solve all the problem cases, 21 It is considered problematic for the (RCCA) if there are dispositions that do not have a causal basis. Such dispositions are called baseless dispositions [Molnar, 1999, p. 8] by George Molnar and bare dispositions [Johnston, 1992, p. 234] by Marc Johnston. Molnar explicitly argues that Lewis’ (RCCA) fails because of the existence of dispositions without bases.

2.6 Lewis’ Reformed Conditional Analysis | 51

the complexity of the (RCCA) would be bearable. There is, however, a further class of counterexamples which have turned out to be even more problematic than Martin’s finks. These are called masks or antidotes in the literature. So, even if the (RCCA) is able to solve all the fink related problems, it would not suffice as an analysis of disposition ascriptions without being able to take care of the mask and antidote cases. The consensus²² nowadays is that the (RCCA) falls prey to masks and antidotes, so let us have a look at these nasty cases in the next subsection.

2.6.1 Masks and Antidotes Masking/antidote cases are so central to the philosophical debate about dispositions that they deserves special attention. Although I am presenting them now in the context of reductionist analyses of disposition ascription, they also play an important role for realist conceptions. It is fair to say that all theories have to account for masking/antidotes in some way or other. I will present a masking case called (Breaking Bad) in detail below, which, I think, not only best illustrates the difference between finks and masks/antidotes, but is also constructed in a way to already block some responses. Later, in section 3.2, I will present my favourite masking case (Millikan), which is designed to show the weaknesses of some competing realist interpretations of dispositions and also to illustrate how widespread masking is. In the end, I will take masking cases to feature at the center of my account.²³ Masking cases exploit the fact that the end result of a disposition does not manifest under all circumstances. Goodman already knew in 1954 that ‘matches do not always light when scratched. They light only if attendant circumstances are propitious.’ [Goodman, 1983, p. 36]. So, if the circumstances are not propitious, the match does not light. With a lack of oxygen in the surrounding medium, for example, an inflammable match does not light up when scratched. We start our discussion of masking by looking at Johnston’s original²⁴ masking case.

22 See, for example, the excellent overview of the debate by Troy Cross in his Recent Work on Dispositions [Cross, 2012, p. 116]. 23 These cases will be explicated, as I will not take dispostional tending to be primitive, like, for example Stephen Mumford and Rani Lil Anjum do (cf. [Mumford and Anjum, 2011]). 24 The chronology of publication does not represent the chronology on which these examples have been invented. Johnston writes in 1992 that ‘Charlie Martin discussed, mimicked and masked dispositions thirty years ago in his classes at Sydney University’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 263]. John Heil told me in personal communication that David Lewis had Finkish Disposition ready in the top drawer of his desk, so to say, but waited for Martin to publish his ideas on finks first. So

52 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

(Masking) Consider a fragile glass cup with internal packing to stabilize it against hard knocks. Packing companies know that the breaking of fragile glass cups involves three stages: first a few bonds break, then the cup deforms and then many bonds break, thereby shattering the cup. They find a support which when placed inside the glass cup prevents deformation so that the glass would not break when struck. Even though the cup would not break if struck the cup is still fragile. The cup’s fragility is masked by the packing which is a) something extrinsic to the glass cup and b) causes the glass cup when struck to withstand deformation without breaking. Were it not for such an extrinsic masker the cup would break when struck. [Johnston, 1992, p. 233]

As in the (reverse-cycle) finking cases, the manifestation does not occur, but there is one crucial difference between (masking) and the finking cases. In the masking cases the disposition stays present, although the manifestation does not occur. The glass is still fragile, even at the time it is struck, but the manifestation of the fragility, i. e. the breaking, is blocked. How is this possible? Johnston himself thinks that the extrinsicness of the mask is important: ‘In the masking of x’s disposition to R in S under C, something extrinsic to x and the circumstances C is a cause of a manifestation inconsistent with the manifestation R’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 233 (my emph.)].²⁵ The internal structure of the glass cup does not change and thus, provided dispositions are intrinsic, the dispositions of the cup stay the same. This is plausible since, it is the same cup after all, no matter if it is on the shelf or carefully packaged. Even if the mask is extrinsic it can be triggered and, as in the finking case, the triggering conditions of the mask can be the same as the stimulus conditions of the disposition. Hawthorne and Manley differentiate between antidotes and masks on the basis of whether the trigger actually changes the external conditions, leading to the (non-finkish) prevention of the manifestation: ‘In the literature, an antidote appears to be a species of mask that involves an actual change in external conditions resulting from the trigger’ [Hawthorne and Manley, 2005, p. 193]. They refer to Alexander Bird, who introduced the term antidote. Bird answers: ‘While this was not my intention it may be a useful distinction to make’ [Bird, 2007, p. 25]. The antidote in Hawthorne and Manley’s terminology shares the feature with Martin’s

Martin came up with finking cases and David Lewis responded with his (RCCA). The (RCCA) is abandoned nowadays because of masking/and antidote cases. Just by a publication oddity did Johnston’s paper appear before Lewis’. This is not the whole story, however, as David Lewis mentions Johnston’s How to speak of colors in his Finkish Dispositions. But instead of focusing on exegetic work, I will rather discuss if the masking/antidote cases really refute the (RCCA) and other reductive analyses. 25 Johnston’s analysis of disposition ascriptions ‘T disposition to produce R in S under C.’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 229] includes different types of dispositions (T) and besides the stimulus (S) also the circumstances (C).

2.6 Lewis’ Reformed Conditional Analysis |

53

fink that the triggering of the disposition falls together with the triggering of the preventer. Unlike the fink case, however, the Hawthorne-and-Manley-antidote doesn’t remove the disposition. To me this seems to be the crucial conceptual difference between finks and masks/antidotes. I will not follow Hawthorne and Manley in terminology as it does not matter too much, in my opinion, whether the antidote (or mask) is brought about by the same trigger as the disposition manifestation or not. I take it to be much more useful to distinguish synchronic from diachronic masking (or antidoting) cases (see chapter 4). I will present my own taxonomy of counterexamples in section 4.2.2. Finks and reverse-cycle finks present equally strong cases against the reductive analyses of dispositions via counterfactual conditionals. But only reversecycle finks feature prominently as challenges for realistic accounts of dispositions. Reverse-cycle finks and masks/antidotes are omnipresent in the debate about dispositions. As in both kinds of cases the manifestation is somehow prevented, I will call the set of reverse-cycle finking and masking the problem of the prevented manifestation or simply the prevention problem. The prevention problem is the crux of the matter of the debate about dispositions and ‘[r]ecent literature on dispositions can be characterized helpfully, if imperfectly, as a continuing reaction to this family of counter-examples’ [Cross, 2012, p. 116]. Let us take a closer look at one of my preferred masking/antidote cases, namely a case involving a literal antidote. (Breaking Bad) Imagine you want to poison your fellow drug lords in order to expand your business. As they are drug lords, they are suspicious. You carefully inject poison into a bottle of Gran Patron Platinum and bring it with you. After a bogus deal is struck you encourage your fellow drug lords to celebrate with a glass of tequila. You all drink – you will have to start, of course, to lower suspicion – but only the others die, as you are the only one who has the corresponding antidote administered.

The (Breaking Bad) case features poison’s disposition to kill if ingested. In the case it is the same disposition, as all the protagonists drink the same tequila. Two similar glass vases may both be fragile, but as ‘liquid’ is a mass term one cannot even speak of two different dispositions in this case. Also the stimulus, i. e. ingestion, is the same for all the agents. The stimulus does not bring about the antidote, or has a common cause with the antidote. It is entirely separate. Note that in the (Breaking Bad) case the antidote was administered after the process of poisoning had started. Imagine that all the symptoms of a poisoning are present, like a faster heart beat, sweating, sickness, and only the lethal end result is prevented. For you, in this example, the stimulus and the disposition are present, but the manifestation is not. This is clearly an counter example to the (SCCA), which would analyse the disposition ‘lethal poisonousness’ along the lines of ‘kills when

54 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

it would be ingested (by humans)’. But as only your fellow drug lords die, the counterfactual is false while the disposition ascription is true. You cannot object that there are different contexts in play, as you and your fellow drug lords ingest the same poison under the same conditions – you are all human, the weather conditions are identical and so forth. To see this, imagine that your assisstant who is in charge of providing the antidote wants to get rid of you as well and administers you a placebo instead of the antidote. In this variant you die too, so during the ingestion of the poison the conditions are equal. We can record that one additional problem of the (SCCA) is that it assumes the occurrence of the stimulus, given that the disposition is present, is sufficient for the occurrence of the manifestation: ‘The conditional which is offered as the logical equivalent of the power ascription states that the activating conditions for the manifestation of a power are sufficient for the occurrence of the manifestation’ [Martin, 1994, p. 4]. The (Breaking Bad) example – and many others – shows that this is not the case. Diachronic cases in which the preventer acts later as the stimulus are especially hard cases, as one cannot fiddle with the stimulus conditions to take care of them. The variant in which you take the antidote before entering the meeting could be excluded by changing the antecedent of the conditional: ‘if ingested by humans who do not carry the antidote’. This move is blocked in the (Braking Bad) example, as it stands, as you do not carry the antidote in you at the time of the ingestion of the tequila. The (Breaking Bad) case is also a problem for the (RCCA), as the ingestion of the poison is not sufficient for ones death. Let us assume that the antidote works by blocking the receptors in the human body to which the poison would normally connect to. Thus the molecular structure of the poison is not altered by the presence of the antidote and hence the basic property B is retained. In the (Breaking Bad) case the ingestion is not an x-complete cause as the antidote prevents the death, so the conditional is false. Still, the disposition ascription is true: The substance you drank was lethally poisonous. Lewis, however, thinks that the (RCCA) can deal with antidote cases. He literally discusses poisons and antidotes in Finkish dispostions. Let me quote at length: One who is prepared to speak of masking might stay with the simple definition of a poison as a substance disposed to cause death if ingested, but might say as well that the disposition of poisons to kill is masked by antidotes. Perhaps we have no substantive issue here, but only a difference between styles of book-keeping. But if so, I think the masker’s style is less advantageous than it may seem. For even if we say that the poison has the disposition spelt out in the simple definition, and we say as well that this disposition is masked by antidotes, do we not still want to say that the poison has the further disposition spelt out in the complicated corrected definition? [Lewis, 1997, p. 154]

2.7 Malzkorn’s Sophisticated Conditional Analysis | 55

Antidote cases do indeed not work against Lewis’ (RCCA), according to Wolfgang Malzkorn (cf. [Malzkorn, 2001, p. 460]). Malzkorn thinks that Lewis (RCCA) works in principle, but he rejects it nevertheless for two reasons. Firstly, because the (RCCA) is confined to dispositions which have bases, and secondly because the (RCCA) is too complicated. In the way it is presented by Lewis the (RCCA) is not completely spelled out, as the notion of intrinsic property is in need of an analysis itself. This analysis may be offered of course, so the (RCCA) is not doomed, but it just becomes even more complicated with an explicit analysis of intrinsicness spelled out. Malzkorn holds that ‘if a simpler analysis will work, it should be adopted’ [Malzkorn, 2000, p. 460] and presents his idea of such and simpler analysis in his paper Realism, Functionalism and the Conditional Analysis of Dispositions.

2.7 Malzkorn’s Sophisticated Conditional Analysis Wolfgang Malzkorn delivers a sophisticated counterfactual conditional analysis (SoCCA) of dispositions, maybe the most sophisticated on the market. Malzkorn objected to Lewis that the (RCCA) presupposes that all dispositions have bases (see section 2.6.1) and thus his own (SoCCA) is intended to capture the most basic disposition concepts. Malzkorn offers a list of adequacy conditions, which an analysis of disposition ascriptions should fulfil in his opinion. Malzkorn’s adequacy conditions 1. The basic disposition concepts are time dependent: D(x, t). 2. The analysans of a disposition D(x, t) which corresponds to a testmanifestation pair must not imply that C or M is actually realized at the time of the ascription of D(x, t). 3. The analysans of an disposition D(x, t) must not imply that an object cannot have D(x, t) while displaying the corresponding manifestation M. 4. The analysans of a disposition D(x, t) must not imply that an object that has the disposition in question cannot display the corresponding manifestation M for a reason other than undergoing the corresponding test C. 5. Dispositions are causal properties; the analysans of a disposition D(x, t) must state some kind of causal relation between the corresponding test C and the corresponding manifestation M. 6. Dispositions are first-order rather than second-order properties. 1.) As dispositions can be gained or lost (see section 2.5.1), disposition ascriptions are time dependent. Objects can be magnetised, for example, and thus acquire a

56 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

new dispositional property. Malzkorn holds that the basic disposition ascriptions are time-dependent and that ‘[t]ime-independent dispositional concepts can be reduced to time-dependent ones’ [Malzkorn, 2000, p. 461]. If a disposition ascription holds all the time we can easily reduce it to time dependent disposition ascriptions, as we just have to state that the ascription is true for every value of the time variable t. Call this an omni-temporal disposition ascription. A possible objection is that atemporal dispositions cannot be reduced to time dependent disposition ascriptions. Atemporal disposition ascriptions are important for kinds: Copper, the kind, does not have the disposition of being an electrical conductor all the time. It is a category mistake to ask when copper is an electrical conductor. An individual piece of copper may, at least conceptually, be omni-temporally an electrical conductor, but the kind copper can only atemporally have this disposition. It is a difference whether a sentence is true/false for every value of an variable or whether it doesn’t make sense to relativize it to a time point.²⁶ 2.) Dispositions show their manifestations M, only when in the corresponding stimulus conditions C, so it is perfectly possible for an object to never show M, because it is never in C. Like the match c which was never tested for solubility, I could also burn Zucky without him ever being submerged. That he was never submerged and never dissolved does not change the truth value of the ascription of S(z, t). At least for concrete particulars it should not be presupposed by the basic analysis of disposition ascriptions that they need C and M to be actually realised. It may nevertheless turn out that a specific disposition cannot be had without it being manifested. Michael Esfeld e. g. claims that point particles always manifest their disposition to build up electrical fields (cf. [Esfeld, 2011b, p. 435]). Furthermore, even if you demand that every disposition has to manifest at least once, you can accept 2. as an adequacy condition. From the claim that something at some time has to dissolve in order for ‘solubility’ to be an acceptable disposition, it doesn’t follow that every soluble object has to dissolve. 3.) Some dispositions are one-shot, as for example fragility and solubility. A glass can only manifest its fragility once, after that it does not exist anymore and the same applies to a sugar cube and its solubility. But this is not generally the case for all dispositions. There are dispositions which can be displayed more than once. A magnet, for example, can attract various iron rods throughout its lifetime. Some

26 Think of the two sentences (1) ‘3 is a prime number’ and (2) ‘It is raining in London’. While (2) is omni-temporally true, (1) is atemporally true. The same distinction, arguably, applies to disposition ascriptions to concrete individuals and kinds, provided of course there are individuals which have dispositions omni-temporally. If not, it is still important to have the conceptual resources to express this.

2.7 Malzkorn’s Sophisticated Conditional Analysis | 57

of these non-one-shot dispositions²⁷ can be had while being displayed. A point particle continuously builds up an electrical field and so the particle manifests this disposition while at the same time having it. 4.) Malzkorn thinks that a fragile vase may break without displaying its fragility. A detonating explosive can break the vase, but would also have broken an unfragile chunk of wood. One could reject that the chunk of wood as well as the vase must be breakable in order to break in the first place. Every object must have the dispositions, which correspond to its actual behaviour. If it breaks, it is breakable. So, according to the objector, an object cannot show the manifestation M without having any disposition D. Malzkorn’s formulation is, however, so careful that it blocks this objection. Malzkorn demands that an object must be able to ‘display the corresponding manifestation for a reason other than undergoing the corresponding test’ [Malzkorn, 2000, p. 462] and could thus respond to the objector that the vase displays breaking because it is breakable and not because it is fragile. A similar, but more promising, objection comes from David Manley and Ryan Wasserman, who argue that dispositions come in degrees and that the chunk of wood is indeed not unfragile, but just less fragile than the vase. We will come back to this in section 2.9. 5.) Another adequacy condition for an analysis of dispositions is the fact that dispositions are causal properties, according to Malzkorn. One possible objection against this requirement are abstract dispositions (cf. [Mumford, 1998, pp. 9–11, 165–7]). Stephen Mumford deploys the example of ‘divisibility by 2’ as an abstract disposition. This is Mumford’s only example and Malzkorn brushes it off as a remnant of a ‘long since abandoned anthropomorphic conception of mathematical operations’. But the disposition of the kind copper to conduct electricity may be another example of an abstract disposition. In contrast to the disposition of a particular piece of copper, the disposition of the kind copper is arguably not causal. I will not pursue this line of critique any further, as it does not play an important role in Malzkorn’s (SoCCA). Note, however, that also the contrary objection could be made. For a philosopher like Michael Esfeld, who defines dispositions as ‘causal properties’ [Esfeld, 2011a, p. 9], 5. is not really a possible candidate for an adequacy condition, as he envisage it as a conceptual truth.

27 I refrain from calling them multi-shot dispositions, since they may be continuously manifesting. A point particle which is continuously building up an electrical field is hardly multi-shot, while clearly not being one-shot. Not too much depends on this, but maybe non-one-shot dispositions can be subdivided into multi-shot and continuously manifesting dispositions. Note that I use the term ‘continuously manifesting dispositions’ in a completely different way than Andreas Hüttemann does in Laws and Dispositions [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 130].

58 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

6.) That dispositions should be conceived as first-order rather than secondorder is d’accord with Malzkorn’s condition 5. that there should be a causal relation between the stimulus and the manifestation of a disposition, at least if one, like Malzkorn does, believes that second-order properties cannot do causal work. Furthermore, Malzkorn takes a stand in the debate about the relation between dispositions and their bases: ‘The ascribed disposition may have a basis, but my ascription is not meant to be an answer to the question whether it actually does or does not have a basis’ [Malzkorn, 2000, p. 462]. So Malzkorn, contrary to Lewis, claims that the ascription of a disposition is not the same thing as the object having some basis property B in the (RCCA) way, even if the ascribed disposition actually has B as basis. The goal of Malzkorn is to provide an analysis of disposition ascriptions which fulfils all the adequacy conditions. As a first step he considers the counterfactual (1): (1) If C(x, t) were the case, then M(x, t + δ) would be the case. If the object was under the stimulus condition C at time t, it would show the manifestation M at t + δ. Malzkorn writes M(x, t + δ) in order to not presuppose that the manifestation is instantaneous. If the manifestation is instantaneous, then δ would be 0. On top of that it is reasonable to assume that δ is some number greater than or equal to 0, in order to exclude backwards causation. Also an upper bound for δ could be considered. I will discuss the temporal aspects of disposition manifestation in chapter 4, till then just note that Malzkorn’s δ neither presupposes that the manifestation occurs later, nor rules out that it occurs at the same time as the stimulus. Malzkorn acknowledges that (1) is itself in need of an explanation and thus considers various possible truth conditions for (1). The most straightforward way is to simply take a counterfactual with C as the antecedent and M as the consequent. (TC 1) C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ) (TC 1) does not deliver adequate truth conditions for (1) as it is too weak. (TC 1) is compatible with cases of contingent coincidence, where the closest world just happens to be one in which the stimulus and the manifestation occurs. Malzkorn considers excluding contingent coincidence by adding the condition that if the object would not be under the stimulus conditions C, it would not show M. (TC 2) (C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ)) ∧ (¬C(x, t) € ¬M(x, t + δ))

2.7 Malzkorn’s Sophisticated Conditional Analysis | 59

(TC 2) may exclude contingent coincidence, but it is too strong. (TC 2) is in contradiction with Malzkorn’s adequacy condition 4. Malkzkorn holds that the analysis of disposition ascriptions should not presuppose that a fragile vase can’t break for other reasons, such as an explosion nearby, than the manifestation of its fragility. So the vase could break without the relevant stimulus for fragility occurring, according to Malzkorn. To weaken (TC 2) Malzkorn adds an antecedent to the conditional which is the second conjunction. So, if the stimulus and the manifestation occur, the object would not M if not in conditions C: (TC 3) (C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ)) ∧ ((C(x, t) ∧ M(x, t + δ)) → (¬C(x, t) € ¬M(x, t + δ))) But (TC 3) is still too strong, because M could be caused by a different sufficient cause. M(x, t + δ) could be caused by, say, C󸀠 (x, t󸀠 ) and thus (TC 3) is not adequate as it excludes this case. Malzkorn doubts that adding further antecedent conditions leads to an sufficient analysis. However, the too weak original (TC 1), can be strengthened in a different way. Instead of adding a counterfactual with the ¬C as antecedent, the contrapositive of (TC 1) can be added. (TC 4) (C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ)) ∧ (¬M(x, t + δ) € ¬C(x, t)) As counterfactuals do not imply their contrapositives, (TC 4) is actually stronger than (TC 1). Furthermore, (TC 4) does not share the problems of (TC 2) and (TC 3) which were just discussed. On top of that Malzkorn thinks that (TC 4) states some causal connection between C and M and thus fulfils adequacy condition 5. He is, however, not satisfied with (TC 4) as it still falls prey to the prevention problem. To exclude masks and the like, Malzkorn adds a reference to normal conditions. (TC 5) C N (x, t, t + δ) € ((C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ)) ∧ (¬M(x, t + δ

€ ¬C(x, t)))

The clause C ND (x, t, t + δ) states that x is in normal conditions (for the disposition in question), from t till t + δ. Malzkorn stipulates that the object has to be in normal conditions till the ink has dried, i. e. M has occurred. This is parallel to Lewis’ idea that the causal base must be retained in order to prevent diachronic prevention. (TC 5) gives us a definition schema for a disposition D and the corresponding stimulus-manifestation pair :

60 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

(SoCCA) D(x, t) iff C N (x, t, t + δ) € ((C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ)) ∧ (¬C(x, t + δ

€ ¬M(x, t)))

(SoCCA) is a highly sophisticated analysis for disposition ascriptions, still Malzkorn holds that ‘it is simpler than Lewis’ way of doing things’ [Malzkorn, 2000, p. 462]. Simpler or not, (SoCCA) is too strict, as it excludes the cases where a disposition manifests itself in non-normal conditions. Bird has an example of two identical vases, one named Ming the other Meissen (cf. [Bird, 2007, p. 31]). A sorcerer decides to protect only one of them, let us say Ming. Now consider that someone would strike the other vase, Meissen. Meissen would break because it is not protected by the sorcerer. The presence of a vase-loving sorcerer clearly does not count as a normal condition, still Meissen manifests its fragility by breaking. According to (SoCCA) we cannot attribute fragility to Meissen, although it was struck and broke because of this, just because it is in non-normal circumstances. Birds example has one additional twist which highlights the problem of C ND (x, t, t+ δ). At the moment of the striking the sorcerer is undecided yet which vase he wants to protect. Let us take things to the extreme: We could wait till shortly before t + δ and then let a glass-loving lottery sorcerer walk by who only protects the vase in question with a probability of 0.0001%. Of course this example is very absurd, but this is precisely the point. An analysis of disposition ascriptions should not have to rely on normal conditions, as there are so many non-normal cases where the disposition in question manifests nevertheless. Malzkorn’s analysis is quite sophisticated and avoids a lot of problems. Still, it was not convincing enough to settle the debate about disposition ascriptions.²⁸ Now, one could try to come up with an even more complicated counterfactual conditional analysis – although I honestly do not see how. But, instead of adding additional layers of complexity, we take a step back and re-consider. In the following, I present three alternative strategies to deal with the prevention problem. Sungho Choi and Lars Gundersen hold a back-to-the-basics approach. They are convinced that there is nothing per se wrong with the (SCCA), we just have to be careful which dispositions are ascribed. David Manley and Ryan Wasserman argue that dispositions come in degrees. This has not been considered so far and thus could provide a basis for an adequate analysis of disposition ascriptions. Manley and Wasserman at least are convinced that their approach solves the prevention problem en passant (cf. [Manley and Wasserman, 2007, p. 74]). Finally, Michael

28 I present a further objection which I call the basic problem in section 2.11. As the name suggest, I take it to be a quite strong objection. If it goes through it not only refutes the (SoCCA), but all conditionalising analyses.

2.8 Choi and Gundersen’s Context-Dependent Analysis |

61

Fara conceptualises disposition ascriptions as habituals, i. e. universal generalizations which allow for exceptions. Let us see how well this alternative strategies come off.

2.8 Choi and Gundersen’s Context-Dependent Analysis Sungho Choi and Lars Gundersen defend the (SCCA) in various publications, e. g. [Choi, 2003], [Choi, 2008] and [Gundersen, 2002]. Their idea is that the (SCCA) is apt for disposition ascriptions, if we are careful which dispositions are ascribed. According to them a glass loses its fragility if it is wrapped in bubble wrap and instead acquires the complex disposition to break when struck in the absence of packing material. Sungho Choi, for example, states that ‘if an object is situated in a stimulating circumstance c but does not exhibit a manifestation m because of the masking operation of a dispositional antidote, we will deny that it has the disposition to exhibit m in response to being situated in c; instead we will ascribe to it the disposition to exhibit m in response to being situated in c in the absence of the antidote’ [Choi, 2008, p. 798]. Choi extends this line of thought to conventional disposition ascriptions by holding that ‘the fragility-specific stimulating circumstance and manifestation are not identical to the events of being struck and breaking, respectively’ [Choi, 2008, p. 798]. Thus he already denies the step from ‘fragility’ to , i. e. fragile objects need not have the disposition to break when struck, following Choi. Arguably, this is a deviation from the creed of the (SCCA). As we have seen in section 2.2, until Lewis explicitly spelled out that there is a theoretical step from conventional to canonical dispositions, it was just assumed that ‘solubility’ meant something like ‘dissolving when submerged’. The simple counterfactual conditional analysis is called ‘simple’, not just because the counterfactual S(x) € D(x) is not complex, but also because every disposition is thought to correspond to a specific class of stimulus-manifestation pairs. Choi and Gundersen’s contextdependent counterfactual conditional analysis (CCCA) in contrast to the (SCCA) states that striking is not uniquely linked to breaking, but rather that it depends on the circumstances, i. e. whether a preventer is around, to which manifestation striking is linked. The context-dependence of the (CCCA) should not be confused with the fact that a fragile glass vase can be broken in different ways, for example by striking it with a hammer or by throwing it on a hard surface. It is a different matter if one disposition corresponds to more than one stimulus-manifestation pair {, , . . . } or if one stimulus corresponds to more than one manifestation {, , . . . }. If the different manifestation behaviours are incompatible, which ‘breaking’ and ‘not-breaking’ are, then the latter leads to a contradiction if the stimulus occurs. To avoid this criticism, Choi and Gundersen must argue that dispositions are extrinsic, as they need to claim that ‘striking in absence of masking packing material’ and ‘striking in presence masking packing material’ are two different stimuli. So they must hold that Ming and Meissen have to be ascribed different dispositions, that is, which dispositions two intrinsically identical glass vases have depends on the extrinsic circumstances they are in. Although there may be extrinsic dispositions, many philosophers think that fragility is not one of them.²⁹ The belayed decision variant of the Ming and Meissen example, where the sorcerer waits till after the striking to decide which vase to safe, causes additional havoc. According to the (CCCA) it is not decided at t which dispositions Ming and Meissen have at t. We have to wait till the sorcerer decides (let us say at t1 ; with t2 > t1 ) before we can ascribe a disposition to one of the vases. It is not settled which of the both vases, Ming or Meissen, will be in a masking scenario, so, according to the (CCCA), in order to ascribe a disposition at t to one of them, we have to wait till t1 . I find this consequence absurd. The (CCCA) posits that every disposition is extrinsic and furthermore it faces the problem of the belayed disposition ascription, as I like to call it. Choi and Gundersen may come up with good replies against these accusations. Personally I’m convinced that these problems are severe enough to not accept their account, but I do not have to resort to this line of critique. I will present an argument in section 2.11 which, if successful, shows the unacceptability of Choi and Gundersen’s analysis, even if they could handle the ‘extrinsicness-’ and ‘belayed’-charges.

2.9 Manley and Wasserman’s Gradable Dispostion Ascriptions The main motivation for David Manley and Ryan Wasserman’s analysis of disposition ascriptions are comparative disposition ascriptions. Take for example a glass vase standing on a table. Other accounts have understood ‘fragility’ as an all-or-nothing concept and have taken for granted that a glass vase is just fragile (full stop) and a table is not fragile (full stop). But the table is not unbreakable, it

29 Another line of reasoning against Choi and Gundersen’s theory is the so called problem of ‘Achilles’ heel’. [Manley and Wasserman, 2008], which I will not mention here.

2.9 Manley and Wasserman’s Gradable Dispostion Ascriptions |

63

is just harder to break than the vase. According to Manley and Wasserman both are fragile. The table is just less fragile than the vase. Manley and Wasserman have engineered an analysis that can account for comparative disposition ascriptions like this. Their analysis takes the circumstances in which a disposition is manifested into account. Whether an object is fragile or not does not only depend on the actual circumstances, but also on the way it behaves in other situations, according to Manley and Wasserman. These situations are specified by complete causal scenarios³⁰ and their account basically boils down to counting them: object a is more fragile than object b, if the number of complete causal scenarios in which a breaks is bigger than the proportion in which b breaks. (More) x is more disposed than y to give response r to stimulus s iff there are more s-cases in which x would give r than s-cases in which y would give r. The notion of an s-case is central to Manley and Wasserman’s account. A scase is a ‘fully specific scenario that settles everything causally relevant to the manifestation of the disposition.’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. S-cases can be considered causally complete, as they includes everything causally relevant. Especially masks play an important role for the individuation of the s-cases, as for every possible mask there is an s-case. Counting causal scenarios can also help with non-comparative disposition ascriptions. A glass is fragile (full stop) if it breaks in a large enough fraction of circumstances. Which fraction is large enough is determined by the context of the ascription, according to Manley and Wasserman: ‘on this account, the positive predicate ‘is fragile’ is understood in terms of the comparative ‘is more fragile than’, so it is only by invoking something like (More) that we can make sense of what it is to be fragile relative to a comparison class’ [Manley and Wasserman, 2007, p. 74]. Manley and Wasserman’s gradable counterfactual conditional analysis (GCCA), thus comes down to the following for positive, non-comparative, disposition ascriptions: (GCCA) D(x, t) iff some suitable proportion of C-cases are such that x would M in them I have three worries concerning the (GCCA), which I call actuality, gerrymandering and causal independence. I will present them in turn. Actuality is the concern that the truth of an ascription of a disposition depends on other causal scenarios. If I break a glass, I principally do not know that it was

30 Complete causal scenarios fix everything causally relevant to the resulting behaviour. They thus can be smaller than whole possible worlds.

64 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

fragile, according to Manley and Wasserman. I have to consider a class of other causal scenarios. So which disposition an object actually has depends on much more then the actual situation, in which it should be ascribed. On top of that the theory precludes singular dispositions without any argument. It may be that empirically it turns out that there are no singular dispositions, but it is problematic to exclude them conceptually. Gerrymandering: As we have said the class of causal scenarios is at the heart of Manley and Wasserman’s account. Now, there need to be differences in order to for there to be different causal scenarios. These differences cannot be something as simple as the colour of the table, to be sure, as their causal scenarios only state causally relevant factors. This treatment of causal factors allows for gerrymandering. We can attribute every disposition in every actual situation by packing it together with enough causal scenarios where the wanted manifestation comes about. Let us look at an example. Take a class of causal scenarios Γ = {γ1 , γ2 , γ3 , . . . } and let γ1 be the a situation where a rubber is struck with an hammer and does not break. Now, if we take γ2 , γ3 and so forth to be freak cases where the rubber actually breaks, say by an explosion or by deep freezing it before the impact, we can ascribe fragility to the rubber. The last problem for the Manley and Wasserman approach I want to mention here is causal independence. It focuses on the fact that complete causal scenarios contain all, but only causally relevant, factors. Consider again the case of the fragile glass vase. Manley and Wasserman want to solve the problem that the glass is fragile, even if it does not break under all circumstances in which it is struck. They counterbalance the one case where the bubble wrap frustrates the otherwise expected behaviour of the glass with all the other cases where it breaks. But this strategy depends on the assumption that there is a large number of cases where the glass breaks, compared to a relatively low number of masking cases. This is in tension with their specification of causal scenarios. If only causally relevant factors come into the scenario, then such things as the colour of the table is excluded to discriminate causal scenarios. But then it is hard to see how the number of the cases in which the glass breaks can be bigger than the frustrated manifestation cases, as there are so many ways to mask a certain disposition. A glass breaks when it falls from the table, but only if there is no soft pillow on the ground, the table is high enough, it doesn’t stand on the moon and so on: ‘the ways in which a disposition may be masked are indefinitely variable’ [Fara, 2005, p. 51]. Furthermore, it conceptually excludes (necessarily) unmanifested dispositions. To summarise, Manley and Wasserman’s theory tries to solve the prevention problem by abstracting away from the actual case at hand and due to that faces some serious problems. Once again, however, I do not want to rely on this criticism

2.10 Fara’s Habituals |

65

– although I find it convincing – but instead refer, once again, to the argument in section 2.11, which, if successful, also threatens Manley and Wasserman’s (GCCA).

2.10 Fara’s Habituals Michael Fara argues in Dispositions and Habituals [Fara, 2005] that disposition ascriptions are universal generalisations which allow for exceptions. According to Fara, it should be a universal generalisation that struck glass breaks, even when this behaviour is blocked on the occasion. Fara thinks that dispositions are like habits in this regard. I can have the habit to walk to the university in the morning even if sometimes I take the bike or the bus, say, if I am late or it is raining. In light of the prevention problem, Fara thinks that a ‘promising approach would be to forget about conditionals, and try to state the truth conditions of disposition ascriptions in some other way’ [Fara, 2005, p. 61]. The other way Fara has in mind is the introduction of a dispositional operator disp: (Disp) D(x, t) iff disp (x Ms when C) Fara considers two problem cases for disp. Take the ascription of the disposition to tremble when in anger to Jack. Firstly, we do not want to ascribe this disposition if, by a crazy coincidence, whenever Jack is angry a nearby earthquake causes him to tremble. Acceptable analyses of dispositions, Fara holds, have to exclude cases of crazy coincidence. Furthermore, a second class of cases has to be ruled out. Suppose that Jack is hunted by a fiend with a jack-hammer who always makes Jack tremble whenever Jack is in anger. Even if not an coincidence, it is still not Jack’s doing and thus he is not responsible, Fara argues. Cases of the two sorts have to be excluded by an adequate disposition analysis, according to Fara. The problem with situations like the ones described, he holds, is that disposition ascriptions have to state ‘something about the object’ [Fara, 2005, p. 70]. In both cases some external factor interferes and thus it would be wrong to ascribe the disposition to tremble when in anger to Jack. Fara, therefore, includes the criterion that it has to be an intrinsic property in his analysis: (Habitual) D(x, t) iff x has an intrinsic property in virtue of which it Ms when C. As you can see, there are two main ingredients in Fara’s analysis. (Habitual) accounts for disposition ascriptions via intrinsicness and habitual sentences: A disposition ascription is true if the corresponding habitual sentence is true and

66 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

features an intrinsic property of the object to which the disposition is ascribed to. A habitual sentence is a sentence of the form ‘x Ms when C’ [Fara, 2005, p. 64]. Fara envisages habituals to be tolerant of exceptions. To see how let us have look at the original maskingcase by Johnston (cf. section 2.6.1), where a fragile glass cup is protected from breaking by a support structure. Fara thinks that the sentence (Cup) ‘The cup breaks when struck’ remains true even if the supporting structure is inserted into the cup. According to him (Cup) ‘tolerates some exceptional instances, and the fact that the cup fails to break when it is occasionally struck while protected is not sufficient to make [(Cup)] false’ [Fara, 2005, pp. 72–73]. Habituals do not tolerate every exception, however. The exception has to be of the right kind. Fara captures this in, what he calls, the ‘exception-tolerating semantics’ [Fara, 2005, p. 66] for habitual sentences: (The exception-tolerating semantics) A habitual “x Ms when C” is true iff every exception to the habitual is a permissible exception. One wired consequence of Fara’s account is that disposition ascriptions become elusive. This has to do with Fara’s claim that ‘disposition ascriptions, like the habitual sentences they embed, are context-dependent to a certain extent’ [Fara, 2005, p. 76]. The same wire can either be disposed to conduct electricity or not, depending on how intimate the connection to the electro fink is, or, as Fara himself expressed this, if ‘being attached to the fink is a “way of life” for the wire’ [Fara, 2005, p. 77]. I do not want to press this point, however, but instead turn to a different, more serious problem. The big problem with Fara’s exception-tolerating semantics is that it is not clear when an exception is ‘permissible’. Juhani Yli-Vakkuri [Yli-Vakkuri, 2010] even claims that Fara’s account de facto just introduces a ceteris paribus clause.³¹ ‘The job of the clause would be to exclude all the entities, be they finks or maskers, whose presence interferes with the emergence of the manifestation of a disposition in its activating conditions’ [Hauska, 2008, p. 220]. Yli-Vakkuri introduces the ceteris paribus operator ‘C’ which supposedly amends the conditional analysis of disposition ascriptions, by excluding the problem cases. Yli-Vakkuri calls this the ceteris paribus conditional analysis, or short (CPCA). (CPCA) D(x, t) ↔ C (C(x) € M(x))

31 Wolfgang Spohn holds that ceteris paribus should be understood as ‘other things being normal’ (cf. [Spohn, 1997] and [Spohn, 2002]). Accordingly Gerhard Schurz thinks of CP laws in the non-physical sciences as normic laws of the form ‘As are normally Bs’ (cf. [Schurz, 2001] and [Schurz, 2002]).

2.11 The Basic Problem of the Conditionalising Attempts |

67

Yli-Vakkuri claims that Fara’s account is equivalent to the (CPCA): ‘Fara would not see matters this way, as he denies being in the conditional analysis business, but the equivalence can be shown’ [Yli-Vakkuri, 2010, p. 666]. If this claim is true, then Fara’s account has a hard time to differentiate between sentences like (CP) and the trivial truth (TT). (CP) If the glass was struck, it would break, ceteris paribus. (TT) If the glass was struck, it would break, unless it does not break. (TT) does not have any explanatory value and is not a suitable basis for an account of anything. The discussion about ceteris paribus clauses, however, is a thorny business, so thorny actually that I want to avoid it. I think, instead, we should take a step back at this point.

2.11 The Basic Problem of the Conditionalising Attempts All the presented theories face their own difficulties in solving the prevention problem. Of course the discussion does not stop and the respective authors respond to the charges. But instead of getting lost in the the details of this emerging cottage industry of more and more complex theories and counterexamples, we can ask ourselves if the alleged solutions discussed are on the right track. I fear not. I think that each of the theories discussed would not be feasible even if all the problems mentioned in the respective sections would be solved. I think the basic direction in which they want to deal with the prevention problem is wrong. Reconsider the prevention problem. Dispositions do not always manifest when in triggering conditions, sometimes a (reverse-cycle) fink takes away the disposition, sometimes a mask blocks the manifestation. ‘The problem could be described in the following, suggestive terms. The flaw in SCA³² is just that it has exceptions. So, in fact, SCA is correct except for those exceptions! SCA is true in all but exceptional cases’ [Yli-Vakkuri, 2010, p. 665]. Yli-Vakkuri describes the psychological motivation behind all the mentioned theories of dispositions: Basically the (SCCA) is right, we just have to exclude the problem cases. The discussed theories try to solve the prevention problem by restricting the area of application of the disposition ascriptions. Ultimately all of the theories come down to the same basic strategy: excluding the problem cases. The disposition is supposed to show its manifestation either only under normal conditions or ideal 32 Note thaht Yli-Vakkuri uses the term ‘SCA’ for what I have called the (SCCA).

68 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

conditions or ceteris paribus or in enough cases or if no mask / antidote / fink is around or only habitually. Disposition ascriptions allow for exception cases, it is argued. There are different approaches to these exceptions. Malzkorn restricts³³ the analysis to normal condition, Mumford votes for ideal cases. So, both think that there is a special subclass of cases which have to be excluded. Manley and Wasserman do not distinguish a special class, but just think that certain amount of cases are exceptional. I do not think that this makes a considerable difference, as both kinds of approaches agree that enough successful cases counterbalance the allegedly few exceptions. This is wrong on two accounts: firstly the prevention cases are not a minority group and secondly exclusion is the wrong strategy, or so I argue. Firstly, there are many prevention cases, not just a few exceptions. Dispositions hardly ever manifest without disturbances. This is a claim which hardly can be disputed: ‘Notice that finking, masking and mimicking situations are ubiquitous’ [Choi and Fara, 2016]. I think it is therefore misleading to talk about exceptions. There are not some exceptions, while most dispositions manifest unhindered. Secondly, I think it is wrong to exclude the problem cases (even if they would be a minority). I do not think that you can just brush off the prevention cases. These cases are exactly the cases that interest me. I want to know what happens when the ‘oddities are in play’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 261]. I think this is the basic problem of all the conditionalising accounts, as I want to call them: they have nothing substantial to say about prevention cases. This leads to explanation gaps, as the respective dispositions cannot be used to explain the happenings in the prevention cases.³⁴ Choi and Gundersen for example claim that the bubble-wrapped glass has the disposition to break when struck in the absence of a mask. But this disposition cannot be used to explain what happens if the glass is struck in the presence of the mask. Or, the disposition to break when struck under normal conditions does not explain abnormal situations. The same goes for all other varieties of conditions: Whenever some cases are excluded, be it by a special subclass or by numbers, the respective dispositions cannot be used to explain these cases.

33 With restriction, I do not mean that the sentences are false in the other cases. ‘All eagles are black’ is not false for hedgehogs but trivially true. Content-wise the sentence makes no statement about hedgehogs, although of course, logically it is a general quantified sentence. Semantically the sentence says that for all objects it is the case that if they are an eagle, they are black. Because of the material conditional – ex falso quodlibet – the sentence is trivially true for hedgehogs. With ‘restriction’ I mean that problem cases are excluded content-wise. 34 Contrary to Nancy Cartwright I hold that there is no ‘trade-off between factual content and explanatory power’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 72]. I will discuss Cartwright’s position in detail in section 3.1.1.

2.11 The Basic Problem of the Conditionalising Attempts |

69

There is a related, but worse problem: outlaw areas. We are not just discussing dispositions for their own right³⁵ but want to use them for an dispositional theory about laws of nature. If, now, all the interaction cases are excluded – and I argue that all interaction cases are masking cases in section 3.2 – then there are huge areas where the laws of nature do not apply. The laws may not be broken nominally, but they do not play any ontological role. So, wither now? I think we have to reconsider the relation between dispositions and disposition ascriptions. In this chapter I have presented theories which tried to get a grip on dispositions via disposition ascriptions. This did not work well and I think it is time to try something new. Starting with sentences, you ask when they are true and thus it is natural to come up with conditionalising attempts: If your main objective is to account for the truth of sentences, it is understandable that you want to exclude the cases where the sentence is not true. The result then is the fragmented picture of explanation gaps and outlaw areas which I have just sketched. Beginning with analyses of disposition ascriptions, you run into all the trouble with counterexamples, we just have seen. John Heil is convinced that additionally even if you could find a conditional analysis that is extensionally adequate, you are not done as you still have to provide the truth maker for the conditional. Even if you could concoct a conditional analysis of dispositionality impervious to counterexamples, it is not clear what you would have accomplished. You would still be faced with the question, What are the truth makers for dispositional claims? Suppose you decide that ‘object o is fragile’ implies and is implied by ‘o would shatter if struck in circumstances C’. You are not excused from the task of saying what the truth maker might be for this conditional. Presumably, if the conditional is an analysis, its truth maker will be whatever the truth maker is for the original dispositional assertion. This is progress? [Heil, 2005, p. 345]

Heil emphasises that an analysis of disposition ascriptions via counterfactuals doesn’t by itself free you from dispositions as entities. This fact plus all the trouble of the conditionalising attempts is enough motivation for me to try something else. Rather than focusing on conditionals and trying to exclude the problem cases, I vote for taking the contrary approach. I think we should embrace masking

35 Some of the authors discussed are not in the game of using dispositions for laws of nature. They could, thus, protest that it would be unfair to accuse them because of ‘outlaw areas’. I have two replies. Firstly, excluding all masking cases will hardly result in a useful semantics. No disposition could ever be ascribed, since masking abounds. Secondly, I think that it is a virtue of theories to be applicable to a wide range of entities. If there are two theories of disposition ascriptions where the underlying theory of dispositions of only one can be used to account for laws of nature, then this theory is clearly superior.

70 | 2 Analyses of dispositions

and include it into our basic framework. Masking is not an outcast that has to be shunned. In the course of the next chapters, I will develop my own account of dispositions, the triadic process account (TPD), which has masking cases at its heart. I will first tackle the synchronic masking cases (in chapter 3), before turning to the diachronic cases (in chapter 4). In general masking cases arise through the interaction of different factors (poison and antidotes; cups and bubble wrap; glass and sorcerers, . . . ), so we will start by having a closer look at the phenomenon of composition, or component causes.

3 Composition Composition is a central idea for disposition manifestation. The omnipresence of masking cases is a good indicator of the fact that dispositions seldom, if ever, manifest without interfering factors. The first objective of this chapter, thus, is to get grip on the notion of composition. An early analysis of this can be found in John Stuart Mill’s work on the principle of causation, as he calls it. Component causes as understood by Mill have been strongly challenged by Nancy Cartwright, however. Although I agree with Cartwright that Mill-style component forces are indeed faulty, I disagree with the general claim that there is something wrong with the idea of component causes. I will try to develop a theory of component causes that resists Cartwright’s critique. Said theory will be generalised in chapter 4 in order to capture interactions not limited to synchronic component causes.

3.1 Mill on Component Causes John Stuart Mill was, amongst other things, an english philosopher and economist. In the midst of his vast philosophical work are some considerations that may be useful for our discussion of dispositions. His famous A System of Logic is a well of ideas and counts as a canonic text for several philosophical disciplines: ‘Mill made his philosophical reputation with his System of Logic, which he published in 1843; this work re-vitalized the study of logic, and for the remainder of the century provided the definitive account of the philosophy of science and social science’ [Craig, 1996, p. 361]. Mill’s account of component causes can be found in Book III. Chapter VI. of his System of Logic. Mill starts his discussion of component causes with the observation that joint effects exist and that they can be sufficiently different from the effects the involved parties would have caused on their own. Suppose, then, that two different agents, operating jointly, are followed, under a certain set of collateral conditions, by a given effect. If either of these agents, instead of being joined with the other, had operated alone, under the same set of conditions in all other respects, some effect would probably have followed, which would have been different from the joint effect of the two. [Mill, 91, p. 370]

The interesting case is the one where the joint effect differs from the effect of the individual agents, had they acted on their own. This does not preclude that the joint effect can be the same, of course. In Mill’s terminology it would only ‘probably’ differ and therefore it is not the case that it has to differ. Having mentioned this once,

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-079

72 | 3 Composition

in the following I will simply talk of ‘the different joint effect’ without specifying that it only can differ. Although Mill states that the joint effect (probably) differs, he does not claim that it is independent of its cause. And indeed, it does not follow that if the effect is not completely determined by one cause that it is independent of it. [I]f we happen to know what would be the effect of each cause when acting separately from the other, we are often able to arrive deductively, or a priori, at a correct prediction of what will arise from their conjunct agency. [Mill, 91, p. 370]

Mill is concerned with epistemic endeavours like prediction, while I am more interested in the ontology behind the joint effect, i. e. that which validates the deduction or which warrants the prediction. Nevertheless, the principle of Composition of Causes (CoC) plays an important role on both readings, the epistemic and the ontic one. It is of such importance because there are ‘very few effects to the production of which no more than one agent contributes [Mill, 91, p. 370]. So, in most cases different causes are acting jointly. Thus, we need a principle to govern the interactions. The (CoC) is just such a principle. Let us have a look at Mill’s own formulation of the principle [Mill, 91, pp. 370–371]:

Fig. 3.1: Illustration of the Principle of Composition of Causes

(CoC) If a body is propelled in two directions by two forces, one tending to drive it to the north and the other to the east, it is caused to move in a given time exactly as far in both directions as the two forces would separately have carried it; and is

3.1 Mill on Component Causes | 73

left precisely where it would have arrived if it had been acted upon first by one of the two forces, and afterwards by the other. The idea behind the (CoC) is the well-known composition of forces due to vector addition.¹ In figure 3.1 you can see how the two component forces F1 and F2 are added up via a parallelogram of forces to yield the resultant force F r . In the same manner the contributions of the individual causes can be added to predict the outcome in a joint-action-case. Suppose that object o is propelled in two directions like in Mill’s formulation of the (CoC), i. e. one force is tending to drive o to the north and the other is tending to drive o to the east.² Furthermore consider that this has been going on for n seconds and o has actually moved the distance a north-east. This situation is depicted in figure 3.2. In the given time of n seconds, o has ‘moved as far in both directions as the two forces would separately have carried it’ [Mill, 91, pp. 370–371]: The object moved the distance a1 to the north, just as it would have if only F1 had acted on it and it moved a2 to the east, the same distance it would have moved to the east if only F2 had acted on it.

Fig. 3.2: Distances object x has moved

1 Mill himself writes that he named the Principle of Composition of Causes in honour of the principle of composition of forces [Mill, 91, p. 371]. 2 George Molnar discusses the structurally equivalent example of two horses pulling a barge down a canal (cf. [Molnar, 2003, p. 195]).

74 | 3 Composition

Now assume that the object o has moved after n seconds from its starting point A to the point B. Figure 3.3 illustrates that x would arrive at the same point, B, if it first moved AC to C and then CB to B. Thus, the prediction according to the (CoC) that the object ‘is left precisely where it would have arrived if it had been acted upon first by one of the two forces, and afterward by the other.’ is accurate. The (CoC) can be used to determine the positions of objects which are jointly acted upon from the contributions of the actions in the ideal case. For the (CoC) to hold true ‘it is only necessary that the same law which expresses the effect of each cause acting by itself shall also correctly express the part due to that cause of the effect which follows from the two together’ [Mill, 91, p. 370], according to Mill. In our example, thus, the part of the effect due to F1 is the same both in the case where also F2 is acting and in the case where only F1 is acting.

Fig. 3.3: Prediction according to the Principle of Composition of Causes

Mill is well aware that the (CoC) cannot be applied to all cases of causation. Vector addition is an especially ‘nice’ case as the composition of forces in Newtonian mechanics is linear: ‘This mathematical property models the fact that forces are independent of each other – the strength and direction of a force is not affected by the existence of other forces, which is to say that forces are invariant’ [Corry, 2009, p. 186]. Due to this invariance we can transfer the results from the ideal case to the joined case. This is just what Mill means when stating that the part of the effect of the cause is the same in all cases. Mill calls those sciences which, like mechanics, follow such nice rules deductive or demonstrative sciences. But Mill deems not

3.1 Mill on Component Causes | 75

all sciences to be deductive. Chemistry and especially biology are no deductive sciences. Consider, for example, the tongue and its capacity to taste: The tongue, for instance, is, like all other parts of the animal frame, composed of gelatine, fibrine, and other products of the chemistry of digestion; but from no knowledge of the properties of those substances could we ever predict that it could taste, unless gelatine or fibrine could themselves taste; for no elementary fact can be in the conclusion which was not in the premises. [Mill, 91, p. 372]

Mill’s term ’deductive science’ hence describes the feature that ‘no elementary fact can be in the conclusion which was not in the premises’. Mill interprets this to the effect that the compound can only have the properties of its components in a deductive science. Emergent properties, like the capacity to taste, which only the tongue has but none of its components, cannot occur in a deductive science. Or, formulated the other way around, if some properties are emergent then the corresponding science is not deductive. A deductive science is thus one where ‘we can compute the effects of combinations of causes, whether real or hypothetical, from the laws which we know to govern those causes when acting separately’ [Mill, 91, p. 371]. The distinction between deductive and non-deductive sciences is mirrored in the ways laws of nature can interfere with each other, according to Mill. For him, there are two modes of conjunct action of causes. In the one mode the causes involved would in isolation produce contrary effects. Take for example the famous Millikan experiment where the gravitational force pulls a charged oil drop to the ground, while the electrical force pulls it upwards.³. The oil drop tends to move upwards due to the electrical force and tends to move downwards due to the gravitational force, in Mill’s terminology. This is actually a special case of vector addition. The two acting forces are parallel to each other but point in different directions. It thus seems as if the effect of the one cause is frustrated by the other effect/cause. Following Mill, however, this is no adequate description. The concept of a ‘sum’ includes the ‘difference’ as a special case (cf. [Mill, 91, p. 372]) and thus ‘[e]ach agent produces the same amount of effect as if it had acted separately’ [Mill, 91, p. 372]. The other mode of conjunct action is very different. In this second mode ‘the agencies which are brought together cease entirely, and a totally different set of phenomena arise’ [Mill, 91, p. 372]. Mill’s example consists of two liquids which, when brought together, instantly become a solid mass rather than a larger amount 3 I will come back to the Millikan experiment shortly. The entire section 3.2 is devoted to the detailed exposition of the experiment, while section 3.3 lays down the philosophical conclusions I will draw from it.

76 | 3 Composition

of liquid. But according to Mill, these cases are only exceptions. (CoC) is the general principle: ‘There are no objects which do not, as to some of their phenomena, obey the principle of the Composition of Causes: none that have not some laws which are rigidly fulfilled in every combination into which the objects enter’ [Mill, 91, p. 376].

3.1.1 The Status of Component Causes The notion of a component cause plays a central role for Mill’s (CoC), as was shown above, but what status do the component causes have? Are they just a mathematical device for calculation, are they an epistemic tool or do they have a place in ontology? Richard Corry is sure that Mill took component forces to be real [Corry, 2009, p. 182]. According to Corry, Mill held that a particle on which two forces act actually moves in the direction of both forces. So, the composite movement consists of two simultaneous movements. This might be plausible in the case of the north-east movement discussed earlier: object x moves to the north-east because it simultaneously moves to the north and to the east. In the case of the parallel but oppositely orientated forces, however, this becomes bizarre. The oil drop would move upwards and downwards at the same time and thus not move at all. It sounds almost contradictory to state that an object is motionless because it simultaneously moves in two incompatible directions. Cartwright illustrates this point with two spheres, who are charged to the effect that their electric repulsion compensates their gravitational attraction: The gravitational capacity should produce a motion of the two towards each other; the Coulomb, motion away from each other. In fact the two are motionless. Are we prepared to say that the separate motions exist in the motionlessness [Hartmann et al., 2008, p. 155]

Cartwright’s answer to this rhetorical question is ‘no’, of course. She does not believe in the reality of component causes and thus criticises Mill’s (CoC) for taking component forces too seriously. She explicitly holds vector addition, Mill’s prime example of the (CoC), to be just a metaphor with no ontological impact. The vector addition story is, I admit, a nice one. But it is just a metaphor. We add forces (or the numbers that represent forces) when we do calculations. Nature does not ‘add’ forces. For the ‘component’ forces are not there, in any but a metaphorical sense, to be added; and the laws which say they are must also be given a metaphorical reading. [Cartwright, 1980, p. 78]

3.1 Mill on Component Causes | 77

Cartwright’s dismissal of component causes is part of her attack on laws of nature, or more specificly, on a certain conception of laws of nature. Remember the facticity view of laws of nature, following which ‘laws of nature describe facts about reality’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 54]. Cartwright argues that the facticity view is false, ‘[f]or the fundamental laws of physics do not describe true facts about reality. Rendered as descriptions of facts, they are false; amended to be true, they lose their fundamental, explanatory force’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 54]. Cartwright brings forth a strong argument as to why the laws of nature are not true. Contrary to what one might suspect, it is the fundamental laws of physics and not the laws of, say, biology that fail to be true, according to Cartwright. Or, to be more precise, it is the fundamental explanatory laws that are false. Let us have a look at Cartwright’s argument. Take the Law of Gravitation (LoG) in Richard Feynman’s formulation [Feynman, 1967, p. 14]: (LoG) The Law of Gravitation is that two bodies exert a force between each other which varies inversely as the square of the distance between them, and varies directly as the product of their masses. Now, consider two objects which, besides having mass, are charged.⁴ According to the (LoG), the two bodies should exert a force F g of size G m1r2m2 , with m1 and m2 being the two masses and r their distance. But as the two objects are also charged, the two bodies should also exert a force F e of size k e q1r2q2 according to Coulomb’s Law (CL), with q1 and q2 being their charges. The force between the two bodies is the vector product of both component forces; call this resultant force F r . So, for charged, massive bodies the (LoG) and (CL) ‘interact to determine the final force’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 57]. The problem with this is that the force between the two bodies is neither F g nor F e and thus both (LoG) and (CL) are false in this interaction situation. The (LoG) says that two bodies exert a force between each other of size G m1r2m2 , but the force between the two bodies is not of that size: it is F r and not F g . The same holds for (CL). And thus ‘[n]o charged object will behave just as the laws of universal gravitation says; and any massive objects will constitute a counterexample to Coulomb’s law’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 57]. There is a supposedly easy fix right at hand: We can just add a ceteris paribus clause. Or, if one does not like the idea of ‘adding’, we can understand Feynman’s formulation as to include an implicit ceteris paribus clause, which is just made explicit. This leaves us with (LoG2 ). 4 The oil drops in Millikan’s famous experiment are good examples. We will discuss this soon in section 3.2.

78 | 3 Composition

(LoG2 ) If there are no forces other than gravitational forces at work, then two bodies exert a force between each other which varies inversely as the square of the distance between them, and varies directly as the product of their masses. Now, (LoG2 ) is true, according to Cartwright, but it is useless, as there are virtually no situations in which only gravitational forces are at play, not to mention cases where there are more than two bodies present. As it is, (LoG2 ) can only explain in ideal conditions, namely when only two bodies which only have masses are present. But ‘[o]ne of the chief jobs of the law gravity is to help explain the forces which objects experience in various complex circumstances’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 58] and thus (LoG2 ) is useless. The ‘easy fix’ of adding a ceteris paribus clause may make (LoG2 ) true, but the price is too high. A true but useless law is not better than a false law. At this point one might wonder whether (CoC) might help and exactly here, Cartwright’s critique of component causes kicks in. In order for (CoC) to hold, Cartwright argues, the participating laws must be the same, both in the ideal and the combined case. But, as explained above, the effect in the combined case (force F r ) is not the same as in the ideal case (forces F g and F e respectively). This leads to the trade-off between truth and explanatory power: The effect which occurs is not an effect dictated by any one of the laws separately. In order to be true in the composite case, the law must describe one effect (the effect which actually happens); but to be explanatory, it must describe another. [Cartwright, 1983, p. 59]

With (CoC) one could think that the Law of Gravitation actually states the component force between the bodies due to gravitation. This would lead to a possible re-formulation of the Law of Gravitation (LoG3 ). (LoG3 ) Two bodies produce a force between each other (the force due to gravity) which varies inversely as the square of the distance between them, and varies directly as the product of their masses. and accordingly we can put Coulomb’s law (CL3 ): (CL3 ) Two charged bodies produce a force between each other (the force due to electricity) which also varies inversely as the square of the distance between them, and varies directly as the product of their charges. (LoG3 ) spells out the component force due to gravity F g and (CL3 ) the component force due to Coulomb’s law F e . Understood this way, both laws seem to satisfy the facticity constraint. In fact, the two bodies produce a force due to their mass

3.1 Mill on Component Causes | 79

which is F g and in fact they produce F e due to their charge, one could argue. But, Cartwright counters, in the interaction case only one real force occurs, namely F r and ‘the force of size Gmm󸀠 /r2 and the force of size qq󸀠 /r2 are not real, occurent forces.’ This is what is wrong about (LoG3 ) and (CL3 ), following Cartwright. Both state that in the interaction case their respective component force is real. Taking the component causes to be real, is, thus, the mistake that Mill makes, following Cartwright. The way she understands Mill, he takes the component causes to exist as parts of the cause: ‘Mill [. . . ] thinks that in cases of composition of causes, each separate effect does exist – if it exists as part of the resultant effect, just as the left half of a table exists as part of the whole table’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 60]. But is this really accurate? Did Mill really believe the component causes to be real? We have said it is at least prime facie plausible that the north-east motion of object o consists in its north and east motion, whereas it seems nonsensical that the motionlessness of the oil drop in the equilibrium case of Millikan’s oil drop experiment consists in its simultaneous up- and down-movement. Reconsider figure 3.2. There it is illustrated that the oil drop covers as much distance north in the joint-action-case at it would have in the solo-north-case. This was exactly what Mill stated in the (CoC). In the joint-case the object ‘is caused to move in a given time exactly as far in both directions as the two forces would separately have carried it’ [Mill, 91, pp. 370–371, my emph.]. But does that really mean that the object moves simultaneously north and east? If it moved to the east and to the north, the distance it would have moved must be the sum of the length of AC and CB. This sum is, obviously, greater than the distance the object has actually moved, namely AB. If we carefully observe how Mill stated the (CoC), however it becomes evident that he did not hold that the object moves AC and then CB. Mill just claimed that the object ‘is left precisely where it would have arrived if it had been acted upon first by one of the two forces, and afterwards by the other’ [Mill, 91, pp. 370–371, my emph.]. This is correct: the position of the object after n seconds in the north-east movement is the same position the object would occupy, had it first moved n seconds north and then n seconds east (see figure 3.3), or vice versa. This, actually, is true for every n, so that we could calculate the trajectory of the object in the joint-action case from its hypothetical movement in the ideal cases. This does not mean, however, that the object actually moved first north and then east. This is blatantly wrong, since then the object would have been on its journey for 2n seconds and not only n seconds. Nevertheless, as a predictive tool the (CoC) is useful. If we want to predict where the object is after n seconds north-east movement, we can calculate where it is after moving first in the one direction and then in the other. Thus, already in the north-east movement case it is implausible

80 | 3 Composition

to assume that the (CoC) describes what actually happens, since it would get time as well as the distance wrong. Mill himself states that ‘the joint effect of several causes is identical with the sum of their separate effects.’ [Mill, 91, p. 371]. If Mill means ‘end result’ with ‘joint effect’ then this is surely right (Remember figure 3.3). But Mill is not too consistent in his formulations. For example ‘whatever would have happened in consequence of each cause taken by itself, happens when they are together, and we have only to “cast up” results’ [Mill, 91, p. 371], really sounds as if Mill believes that both behaviours are there at the same the same time. This might not be deemed so bad in the case of the north-east movement by some, but in an equilibrium case it becomes blatantly wrong. Then again, the principle is called ‘composition of causes’ and not ‘composition of effects’ which speaks against the interpretation that Mill really thought that there are two movements at the same time. But instead of getting lost in an exegetic quarrel, I want to focus on the systematic matter at hand. There are good reasons not to take the component causes/forces as behaviour, independent of whether Mill held this view or not. Cartwright herself opts for an alternative interpretation of (CoC). As we have seen, she criticises the factictiy view of laws of nature according to which laws are about facts of reality. According to her, this view leads to false or useless laws. Her alternative conception is that ‘laws describe the causal powers that bodies have.’ [Cartwright, 1980, p. 82]. In her later work she fleshes this view further out: We say that Coulomb’s law gives the force that is due to their charge [as opposed to their mass]. But this is no concept for an empiricist. What we mark when we say that there is a Coulomb force at work is not the presence of an occurrent force whose size is that given in Coulomb’s law, but rather the fact that the charged bodies have exercised their capacity to repel or attract. Coulomb’s is never the force that actually occurs. [Cartwright, 1999, p. 82]

We will come back to Cartwright’s own triadic picture soon (in section 3.3), but let us stick, for now, with the question of the status of component causes. Independent of whether Mill held this view or not, it is implausible to assume that a north-east movement, or worse motionlessness, consists in two simultaneous movements. This however is not a refutation of the idea of component causes in toto, but only of a certain interpretation of them. I have no quibble with Cartwright’s response to Mill. I too baulk at the claim that the motionlessness of a particle could consist in a motion to the left simultaneous with a motion to the right. But showing that Mill’s reasons for countenancing component forces are no good does not show that we should not countenance component forces. In particular, it does not show that there is something wrong with component forces considered as causal influences [Corry, 2009, pp. 182–183]

3.2 Millikan’s Oil Drop Experiment | 81

So, in the following we will look into the idea of component forces and whether there is a sensible way of understanding them. Before doing that, however, we need to properly introduce the Millikan experiment. As this will play an important role in the remainder, I will introduce it in some detail.

3.2 Millikan’s Oil Drop Experiment Robert Andrew Millikan calculated the charge of an electron by measuring the effect an electric field has on it. Millikan received the Nobel Prize for physics in 1923 partly for his work on the elementary charge of an electron. Nowadays his oil drop experiment is a physics text book example.⁵ Millikan’s experiment is based on the discovery of the electron by James J. Thomson. Thomson himself conducted an experiment to measure the charge of an electron, using a Wilson cloud chamber and a magnetic field. Millikan’s experiment uses the electrostatic charge instead, allowing him to obtain ‘a higher accuracy than had before been possible’ [Millikan, 1913, p. 109]. Certain fluids, including oils, become electrically charged when sprayed. Millikan atomized oil drops by spraying them through a small opening between the two plates of a plate condenser. The condenser produced a variable electric potential. When the current was off the oil drop fell due to gravity. With the current on, the condenser produced an electrical field which deflected the oil drops. Millikan then could calculate the charge of the oil drops using their mass and the intensity of the electric field. The plates of the condenser are alined parallely to the surface of the earth. The vectors of gravity and the electrical field are thus parallel or anti-parallel, depending on the polarity. The movement of the oil drop can be observed through a microscope and thus its speed can be measured. First the radius R and the mass m D of the oil drop D (see Figure 3.4) have to be determined. Therefore the movement of the oil drop with the current off is traced. Besides the weight G = mg (with g being the gravitational constant) the buoyant force F b Fb =

4πR3 σ Dr gk 3

(Buoyant force, 3.1)

and the friction force F f F f = 6πη L Rv oF k

(Friction force, 3.2)

5 cf. e. g. [Hänsel and Neumann, 1993, p. 93], [Krebs, 2001, p. 231], [Meschede, 2003, p. 307] and [Hänsel and Neumann, 1995, p. 65].

82 | 3 Composition

Fig. 3.4: Schematic representation of Millikan’s oil drop experiment

act upon the oil drop. In order to determine the charge of the oil drop, the electrical field is turned on. In principle the oil drop can float on the spot if the upward forces just compensate the downward gravitational pull. Practically however, the realization of this equilibrium case is tricky. It is much easier to measure the sinking speed of a specific oil drop while given an electrical current, then change the current in the condenser till the drop rises. The difference of the sinking speed v1 and the rising speed v2 can be used to calculate the charge of the oil drop. It is easiest to just reverse the polarity of the condenser, because then the contribution of the electrical field has the same value. The falling velocity v f of the oil drop is calculated with Stoke’s Law because the air is an viscous medium for the small drops. vf =

2 ga2 (σ Dr − σ A ) 9 η

(Stoke’s Law, 3.3)

The radius of the droplet is a, σ Dr is the density of the oil and σ A is the density of the air. The radii of the drops are very small (≈ 1 micron). They are not much greater than the mean free path of the air molecules und thus the equation needs to be adjusted. The additional factor is called the Cunningham correction. vf =

2 ga2 l (σ1 − σ2 ) (1 + A ) 9 η a

(3.4)

3.2 Millikan’s Oil Drop Experiment |

83

The friction force is propositional to the velocity of the oil drop. At some time t0 friction force plus buoyant force counterbalance the gravitational force. After t0 the oil drop will fall with constant speed v c . Fg = Ff + Fb

(3.5)

4πR3 4πR3 σ Dr gk = 6πη L Rv1 k + σ Dr gk 3 3 This gives us the radius of the drop R: R=

η A v oF 3 √ √2 g(σ Dr − σ A )

(3.6)

(3.7)

Now the elemental electrical charge can be determined. The electrical force acting on the oil drop is F e = zeE

(Electrical force, 3.8)

The switched on electrical field E = v2 and gives us an analogous to (3.6)

U d

changes the falling speed of the oil to

4πR3 4πR3 σ Dr gk = 6πη L Rv1 k + σ Dr gk + zeE (3.9) 3 3 Here z is a positive integer and the smallest measured value for ze corresponds to the elemental electrical charge. One can calculate zeE with (3.6) and (3.9) zeE = 6πη A R(v1 − v2 )

(3.10)

Together with (3.7) this gives us ze 1

ze =

3

9√2πv12 (v1 − v2 )η l2 E(σ Dr − σ A ) 2 g 2 1

1

(3.11)

For the following discussion, we abstract away from the air and thus ignore the buoyant force and the friction force according to Stoke’s Law, as well as the Cunningham correction. Also, we will talk about the equilibrium case in which the oil drop floats on the spot, regardless of the technical problems of actually implementing it. In this simplified version the oil drop does not move because the gravitational force F g is exactly counterbalanced by the electrical force F e (see Figure 3.4). The speed of the oil drop v0 will be 0 in that case. − Fg = Fe

(3.12)

84 | 3 Composition

With (Gravitation, 3.13) for the gravitation force F g Fg = −

4πR3 σ Dr gk 3

(Gravitation, 3.13)

this gives: 4πR3 σ Dr gk = zeE (Equilibrium, 3.14) 3 These simplifications allow us to focus on the ontological issues at hand. Nevertheless the results we draw will generalize to the more complex case described above. Instead of only the two forces F g and F e acting, there all for forces (including F b and F f ) would have to be considered. In any case, the results I try to show hold for n forces present and thus also in the four forces case. −

3.3 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour This section is dedicated to the development of my theory about synchronic interactions. As the ontology that I will end up supporting is a ‘rain forest’ rather than a desert, it will not be welcomed with too much love by some. Therefore, I will argue for each part of the ontology and motivate why it is important for an adequate analysis of dispositions. I will begin by bringing together our discussion of component causes (section 3.1.1) and masks / antidotes (section 2.6.1) through the example of Millikan’s oil drop experiment (section 3.2). I will first argue that manifestations and masks / antidotes are ontologically on a par (section 3.3.1). Then, I will argue that we need a triadic ontology, as masks / antidotes / manifestations are neither behaviour nor dispositions / powers / capacities (section 3.3.2). This in turn leaves us with the important, but in my opinion under-discussed, question of the ontological status of the combination rules, which I will discuss in section 3.4.2.

3.3.1 Symmetry Argument In this subsection I argue that manifestations and masks / antidotes are ontologically on a par and that both are distinct from the resulting behaviour. In a first step I will review Hüttemann’s continuously manifestable dispositions. This conception is a step in the right direction, as it recognizes that there is something constant in the masking and ideal cases. However, in the end Hüttmann’s account is not feasible as he identifies component causes with behaviour, which we have seen

3.3 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour |

85

results in the weird consequence that Millikan’s oil drop does not move because it moves simultaneously in two opposite directions. So, in a second step I argue that in order to avoid this oddity while still saving the advantages of Hüttemanns’s view (it can make sense of the wide-spread method of ‘abstraction’; see below) we have to accept that there is a separate level of manifestations and masks. Remember the prevention problem that the manifestation of a disposition can be frustrated somehow or other (section 2.6.1). The difference between finks and masks is that while finks take away the disposition in question, masks leave the disposition intact.⁶ Hence, the masking cases are considered so devious. The manifestation is blocked, although the disposition and the stimulus are present. So far we have taken it for granted that the manifestation of the disposition was completely prevented in the masking case. This is not really adequate, however. Andreas Hüttemann differentiates between continuously manifestable dispositions (CMDs) and discontinuously manifestable dispositions (DMDs). With DMDs the manifestation is an all-or-nothing affair and the ‘state of the object changes discontinuously in the very moment the manifestation conditions are realized.’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 130]. A good example of this may be fragility, as a fragile glass is intact till its fragility is manifested and then it is not intact anymore. With a CMD, in contrast, ‘[t]he transition to the realization of the manifestation condition is smooth’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 130]. Here, solubility is Hüttemann’s example. Salt is soluble in water, but this solubility can be realized in degrees. If you pour more and more water over a heap of salt, more and more salt gets dissolved. Following Hüttemann, in the case of a CMD the manifestation of a disposition can be partially masked. The reason that Hüttemann introduces the distinction between DMDs and CMDs is that ‘one might measure CMDs even while they are not completely manifest.’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 131] and this, in turn, is part of Hüttemann’s argument that the method of abstraction can only be made sense of if one holds that physical systems have dispositions. Let me elaborate. The method of abstraction (MoA) is a wide-spread and important part of science, according to Hüttemann, and thus any account of laws of nature has to make sense of it in order to be adequate. Roughly, it can be understood as the contrapositive to the (CoC): a complex system is (conceptually) split up into subsystems.

6 Mill’s distinction between the two modes of conjunct action, the one where the causes involved would in isolation produce contrary effects and the other mode where ‘the agencies which are brought together cease entirely, and a totally different set of phenomena arise’ [Mill, 91, p. 372] seems to fit the distinction between masks and finks pretty well. A masking case, then, is a case where two (or more) contrary effects occur, if we identify ‘effect’ with ‘manifestation’. And if we take ‘agency’ to be the ‘disposition’ then the second case is a finking case.

86 | 3 Composition

Hüttemann characterises the (MoA) in the following way [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 125]: (MoA) In a first step, the complex physical system is split up conceptually into subsystems. In a second step, these subsystems are treated as if they were isolated; their behavior in isolation is determined. Finally, the contributions of the subsystems are added up so as to determine the behavior of the complex system. Now, in order to make sense of the (MoA), Hüttemann distinguishes between the ‘description’ and ‘application’ of laws of nature and then explicates application via CMDs. Remember our discussion of Cartwright’s example of the two charged spheres. According to Hüttemann the Law of Gravitation describes the behaviour of massive bodies in isolation, but it can also be applied in a non-isolated case. The same holds true for Coulomb’s law. Much is at stake here. If Hüttemann was able to make sense of the differentiation between application and description, he could resist Cartwright’s charge that the laws are either useless or false. Hüttemann’s conception would render the laws of nature useful, as they could be applied to all the non-ideal cases, which, as we have seen, are basically all cases. According to Hüttemann, laws ascribe dispositions to physical systems. In contrast to the humean philosophers, he does not see any problems with dispositions per se, but he holds that we have to provide a story of their epistemologically accessibility in order to make them empirically acceptable, i. e. we must ‘explain how it is in principle possible to get empirical evidence for dispositions even though they are not manifest’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 130]. In doing so, it is vital to cover the overwhelmingly huge class of non-isolated cases and in just these cases CMDs come into play. Hüttemann’s example is the specific heat of a crystal, lithium fluoride. Even if a pure crystal never existed, we can get empirical evidence for such a crystal by extrapolation. The pure crystal is considered a limiting case of less and less impure crystals. If we order the accessible samples of lithium fluoride according to their pureness⁷ we can take the impure crystals as evidence for the (hypothetical)

7 One might object here that this presupposes some kind of ordering and it is questionable whether such an ordering really exists for many dispositions. If Hüttmann’s argument depends on a carefully designed example, the (MoA) is far less applicable than one might want it to be. Furthermore, it might not be enough if there is some kind of ordering. Is a topology sufficient or do we need a full-blown metric? It seems reasonable that a metric is necessary if we want to arrive at a specific value for the ideal case. But, is a metric also sufficient? Maybe we also need a bridge principle to commute between the values of the ordering of purity and specific heat.

3.3 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour |

87

pure crystal: ‘the less impurities there are, the more manifest the disposition of the lithium fluoride crystal becomes’ [Hüttemann, 1998, pp. 131–132]. The lithium fluoride crystals provide a case of CMDs as, following Hütteman, ‘the behavior of the combined system is a continuous function of the degree to which the manifestation condition has been realized.’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 132]. As I understand him, Hüttemann takes the pureness of the crystals as the manifestation condition and the specific heat as the disposition in play. This would mean that the less impure the crystals are, the more the manifestation condition is realized and thus the more manifest the disposition is. To sum up, Hüttemann holds that laws of nature describe the behaviour of physical systems in isolation, but they can also be applied in non-isolation cases. We can have evidence for the dispositions that the laws ascribe even when they are not completely manifested via extrapolation. Hüttemann takes the dispositions to be the same in the ideal and non ideal cases⁸ and this enables the usage of the method of abstraction. The behaviour of the subsystems in isolation can be transferred to the complex case, because the same disposition is manifested in both cases. In the isolation case the disposition is just more manifest than in the complex case. This difference in degree of manifestation is possible because the disposition in question is a CMD. If Hüttemann’s account worked, it would show that manifestations can come in degrees and that there can be partial masks. It could also provide an explication of the method of abstraction and the (CoC). Although I think that CMDs are a step in the right direction, there are several problems with Hüttemann’s way of spelling them out. Firstly, it is questionable whether his proposal can be generalized. Hüttemann’s example has very specific features, which are by far not shared by all cases. The disposition at play must be a CMD and the samples at hand must be organizable in a (metric) order. But even if we ignore all this, Hüttemann’s account remains dubious because he understands the (MoA) as summing up the behaviour of the subsystems. Hüttemann is explicit about this: ‘the behavior of the rotator is described in abstraction. The energy contribution of the oscillator – i. e., its behavior – is calculated in abstraction as well’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 125, my emph.] and ‘their [the subsystem’s] behavior in isolation is determined.’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 125, my emph.].

8 I will argue in section 3.3.2 that Hüttemann falls prey to a false dilemma fallacy and that it is not the dispositions but the ‘middle level’ between dispositions and resultant behaviour that stays constant.

88 | 3 Composition

This may not be so problematic for Hüttemann’s own example of an oscillating rotator⁹, which is conceptually split up into an oscillator and a rotator. In this case it is not prima facie implausible to hold that the oscillating rotator oscillates and rotates, i. e. that both of the isolated behaviours are added up into one combined motion. Although not prima facie implausible, one could still argue that this conception is inadequate for the oscillating rotator example. But even if one accepts this view, it cannot be generalized. It fails in the case of Mill’s example of the body which moves north-east as a result of a force tending to drive it north and a second force tending to drive it east. As Cartwright puts it, ‘no pure north motion can be part of a motion which always heads northeast’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 79]. Also, in the case of Millikan’s oil drop, Hüttemann’s conception is not applicable. The motionlessness of the oil drop in equilibrium simply does not consist of two motions in opposite directions, be they in conceptual space or not. Cartwright argues that vector addition is but a metaphor. Still, even metaphorically, what is added are forces and not behaviours. It is a category mistake to mix up forces and behaviour. Even in the isolated case, when there is only one force acting, this force is not the behavior of the object. The behaviour may be influenced by the gravitational force F g (non-isolated case) or completely determined by it (isolated case), yet it is never identical to it. The equilibrium Millikan case is particularly nasty, as it also reveals another problem of Hüttemann’s account. In this case the disposition is not even partly manifest, to use Hüttemann’s vocabulary. In the equilibrium case the electrical force completely masks the gravitational force (or vice versa) and thus, from Hüttemann’s point of view, this case cannot provide any evidence for the gravitational disposition at work. But this is wrong: There is no metaphysical reason whatsoever to treat an equilibrium case differently and it also contradicts scientific practice. If we know the other forces at work, we can calculate the remaining forces, whether the resultant force F r is a null vector or not. So, the equilibrium case should be capable of delivering as much evidence as any other case where the corresponding disposition is acting. The Millikan case is a simple textbook example and can thus not be disregarded as a freak case. So instead of trying to exclude it, I will use it as a prime example. There is a different lesson to be learnt from it. I hold that the Millikan equilibrium case shows that manifestations and antidotes are ontologically on a par. The Millikan case is not a case of finking, as the presence of the electrical field does nothing to eliminate the gravitational capacities at play. When a body gets

9 Hüttemann discusses a carbon monoxide molecule can be considered as a combination of a rotator and a two-dimensional oscillator (cf. [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 125]).

3.3 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour |

89

electrically charged it does not loose (part of) its mass. The Millikan case, and all other cases of interaction, are masking cases. Consider the oil drop which is falling towards the ground as a result of the gravitational force F g acting on it. This behaviour, the falling, is masked by the electrical force F e . But we can also tell the story the other way around: The behaviour due to the electrical force F e is masked by the gravitational force F g . Ontologically the situation is completely symmetric. It does not matter whether the resultant behaviour is falling or motionlessness or rising, as soon as there is more than one force at work it must be considered a masking case. ‘Of course, this contributory manifestation does not determine the effect on its own. The effect depends on the exact ‘mix’ of contributions by all the contributing powers’ [Molnar, 2003, p. 195] Taken seriously this implies that masks and disposition manifestations are ontologically on a par. We only call the one a mask and the other the manifestation. It is literally only a story to consider the electrical (or gravitational) force as a mask. Ontologically speaking the resultant behaviour is just brought about by the interactions of the different manifestations present. As John Heil puts it, ‘[h]appenings in the world are usually the outcomes of several capacities acting in conjunction in complex ways’ [Heil, 2003, p. 95] Now, I do not want to argue that the term ‘mask’ is useless. From a pragmatic standpoint it is very well acceptable to distinguish one of the manifestations at play by calling it a mask. We are used to the gravitational impact on objects and thus we may only find the lack of falling explanation-worthy. But this has to do with our epistemic situation and our expectations. Ontologically speaking there is nothing special about any of the interaction partners. If, now, manifestations and masks are ontologically on a par, then both must be different from the resulting behaviour. On the level of manifestations there is no annihilation. The resultant behaviour can vary but not the manifestations. In the case of the oil drop, the behaviour is highly various as it can sink, float or rise, but the manifestation of the gravitational disposition is constant. Already Mill has argued for something like this: ‘In this important class of cases of causation, one cause never, properly speaking, defeats or frustrates another; both have their full effect’ [Mill, 91, p. 371]. Dispositions manifest to the same components in every circumstance, but this results in different behavior, depending on the other components present. A component always adds the same contribution to the resulting behavior. The acceptance of components which are no behaviour allows us to block Cartwright’s argument that there are no true laws of nature.¹⁰

10 cf. [Corry, 2009, p. 188]

90 | 3 Composition

From this conception it follows that the ideal cases are only epistemologically special. The contribution the component makes to the resulting behavior just happens to be the only contribution in the ideal case. Nevertheless the contribution also in the ideal case is not the behaviour of the object, as this would be a category mistake. The isolation case is in so far special as the ‘adding up’ is particularly easy, it is not special as to the ontological gap between the level of the manifestations and the level of the resultant behaviour. There is some terminological dispute going on about how to call this additional level and the entities which inhabit it. Richard Corry calls the entities ‘causal influences’ [Corry, 2009, p. 176] while Nancy Cartwright and John Pemberton [Cartwright and Pemberton, 2013] use a variety of notions to refer to this level – manifestation, exercise, canonical effect, force, component, contribution, tries to X, attraction. I don’t want to let this succumb to a fight about words, so I will introduce a new term for this level: the German word ‘Wirkungen’ which roughly translates as actings or effects. Some people use the term manifestation for what I have called resultant behaviour¹¹, other use the word for Wirkungen. To capture this different usage, I will add a subscript to ‘manifestation’: if the level of Wirkungen is meant, I use ‘manifestation1 ’ and if the resultant behaviour is meant, I use ‘manifestation2 ’. Thus, for example, in the Millikan experiment manifestation1 is stable, while manifestation2 is highly various, depending on the strength of the electric field. Masks are nothing but manifestations1 which we distinguish for pragmatical or epistemic reasons. Manifestations1 cannot be identified with behaviour, as this would lead to the unacceptable view that motionlessness consists in multiple simultaneous motions and thus manifestations1 are differentiated from manifestations2 . This conception can easily account for the Millikan equilibrium case and also the (MoA) and (CoC) can be made sense of: it is the manifestations1 which are constant. Not only constancy is afforded by the level of Wirkungen, but also it can explain causal interactions.¹² Remember the (breaking bad) case from section 2.6.1, where the antidote’s causal powers counteracted the poison’s and prevented death. With the level picture we can now describe this case in a higher resolution.¹³ The poison is manifesting1 its disposition but also the antidote is manifesting1 . Although

11 The rationale behind this usage is that Wirkungen are not really manifest and thus should not be called manifestations. 12 Cartwright argues that ‘causal interactions are interactions of causal capacities, and they cannot be picked out unless capacities themselves are recognised’ [Cartwright, 1989, p. 164]. In her later work, she adopts a three-level picture. I will come back to this in the next section. 13 It is still not the full story, as we suppress the temporal development. We will come back to this in chapter 4.

3.3 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour | 91

neither leads to the behaviour it would produce in the isolated case – arsenic would lead to death and the antidote would cause whatever dimercaprol does to the body when no arsenic is around – the actual occurring resultant behaviour depends on nothing but the interacting Wirkungen. In order to make sense of interactions, we need something that can interact, i. e. we need Wirkungen.¹⁴ The differentiation of Wirkungen from resultant behaviour allows us to conceptualize constancy and variability together, as ‘the manifestation [. . . ] is fixed even if the behaviour described in occurent-property language [. . . ] is highly various’ [Cartwright, 2008, p. 195].¹⁵ More has to be said about the connection of the two levels and I will do so in section 3.4, but before that I will say something about the third level and argue why we need a triadic ontology of dispositions.

3.3.2 Trias In this sub-section, I will argue for a triadic account of dispositions.¹⁶ Now, to establish a triadic account, the ‘middle level’ must be differentiated from both other levels. So far we have argued that the level of Wirkungen is separate from the level of resultant behaviour. We thus also need to discriminate the ‘middle level’ of Wirkungen from the level of dispositions. The resulting ontology is very non-humean: ‘What matters for capacities is the threefold distinction Hume denied between the obtaining of the capacity [. . . ], the manifestation or exercise of the capacity [. . . ], and the ‘occurent-property’ behaviour’ [Cartwright, 2008, p. 195]. Besides the dispositions as real ontological entities, the triadic picture takes their manifestations1 ontologically serious. Both cannot be reduced to the third level of resultant behaviour, but the three levels are interconnected.

14 Stathis Psillos depicts this case differently: ‘The venom in my bloodstream has the capacity to kill me, but I don’t die because the antidote has the capacity to neutralise the venom. That’s a case of causal interaction, where one capacity blocks another’ [Psillos, 2008, p. 185]. According to this reading it would be a case of finking. This is not adeqaute, however, as it is not the capacities that interact but their manifestations1 . To be fair to Psillos, this is not his own conception; he is just reporting how he understands Cartwright. 15 Cartwright uses the term ‘manifestation’ for what I have called ‘manifestation1 ’ or ‘Wirkung’. 16 I was inclined to call the resulting picture the Cartwright’ian trias, in honour of Nancy Cartwright. I have refrained from doing so because, while Cartwright was a major influence for me to posit a triadic account, all the eccentricness of the account I present is my own fault. She may feel responsible for what she likes about the account and I will stand accountable for the rest.

92 | 3 Composition

The level of dispositions – or capacities, or powers; depending on your vocabulary¹⁷ – is different from the level of Wirkungen and surely different from the level of behaviour. So I agree with the ‘traditional’ dispositionalist that we have to exceed the humean ontology to make sense of laws of nature and scientific practise ((MoA), (CoC) and the ‘analytic method’), but I disagree that dispositions are enough. Still, the dispositions of an object are distinct from the behaviour they give rise to. It would be a category mistake to mix up the dispositions of an object with its behaviour. After all, dispositions need not manifest and hence need not influence the resulting behaviour: Think of a charged body with no other charge around, or a poisonous tequila, never drunk. Using my terminology we get the following three levels for our ontology: 1. 2. 3.

dispositions Wirkungen resultant behaviour

If we keep the three levels apart, another problem for Hüttemann’s account becomes evident. Basically Hüttemann conflates the first and second level and thus falls prey to a false dilemma fallacy. It is not that Hüttemann does not think of all three levels, but he explicitly holds that the first and second level are not differentiated. Let me quote at length: The notion of a contribution that has been made use of in the above objection does not seem to me to be particularly helpful. The contribution of the crystal to the overall specific heat seems to be that part of it that the crystal would display if it were isolated. The notion of a contribution thus coincides with that of a disposition. Contributions somehow seem to be more manifest than ordinary dispositions because the term is used mainly with respect to such dispositions whose super-position with disturbing factors is particularly simple, viz. superposition through simple addition. In such cases, one is tempted to call the disposition or contribution manifest (even though it is not) because the abstraction of the contribution or disposition of the disturbing factors is so easy to handle. [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 132]

With ‘contribution’ Hüttemann refers to what we have called Wirkungen in an interaction case. Hüttemann argues that the notion of ‘contribution’ coincides with that of a disposition, because both contributions are not more manifest than dispositions. Well, I disagree. First of all, the terms ‘disposition’ and ‘contribution’

17 The distinction is not purely a matter of terminology, though. As I maintain that agnosticism is a theoretical value for ontologies, i. e. you should be as little committal as possible in building your ontology, I do not want to be committed to a specific view about dispositions (capacities, powers, . . . ). Every understanding which is compatible with my claims is warmly welcomed.

3.3 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour |

93

cannot have the same extension. This is evident from Hüttemann’s own writings, as in the isolated case there is a disposition, but no contribution. Another reason to keep the level of dispositions and Wirkungen apart is that an object may have contradicting dispositions. This is not problematic as long as they do not manifest1 at the same time, or at least do not lead to incompatible behaviour. The oil drop in Millikan’s oil drop experiment can rise and fall, it just cannot do both at the same time. It can also be subjected to a downwards facing electrical force F e or an upwards facing one F 󸀠e (see section 3.2). Both of these Wirkungen (and many more) are enabled by its charge, although they are not compatible. Anyhow, an account of dispositions should not presuppose that dispositions have to be manifest at all times and as soon as there is one case where an object has a disposition which is not manifesting1 the two fall apart extensionally. So at most, ‘contributions’ could be a subclass of dispositions. However, this is not feasible either. Let us take a closer look at Hüttmann’s argument why the first and second level are supposed to coincide. Hüttemann argues that contributions are nothing but dispositions and that we just have been fooled into thinking that they are something else. One could – wrongly, according to Hüttemann – be tempted to think that contributions are something other than dispositions because they seem more manifest. Following Hüttemann, the term ‘contribution’ is reserved for ‘such dispositions whose super-position with disturbing factors is particularly simple, viz. superposition through simple addition’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 132]. But consider a case of two non-manifested dispositions coming together. Think of a lamp, g, which has a green light bulb in it and a lamp, b, with a blue one. Imagine both lamps standing close to each other on a white table. If I turn on only g, it will emit green light, if I turn on only b, there will be blue light and if I turn on both, the light will be turquoise. As one can clearly see in this case, it is the manifestations that are interacting and not the dispositions. Just putting g next to b changes nothing about the dispositions of b or g. An object can have a disposition and not manifest it. This leaves us with three different kinds of situations which all can be differentiated by the triadic ontology – but not by a diadic ontology, be it Hüttemann’s or the traditional dispositionalist’s. An object can have a disposition or not, i. e. the lamps can be broken or intact; then an object can manifest1 its disposition or not, i. e. the lamps can be turned on or not and then interactions can be such that the resulting behaviour is the same as if no manifestation1 was present, as in the equilibrium case from Millikan’s oil drop example. I argue that Hüttemann falls prey to the fallacy of a false dilemma and thus holds that it must be the disposition that stays the same in the (MoA), because it cannot be the behaviour. But although the disposition actually stays the same, this

94 | 3 Composition

reasoning is faulty. There is a third alternative, namely Wirkungen, which can be constant. Thus it just does not follow that, if it cannot be the behaviour, it must be the dispositions that stay the same. One might object that if there is to be an extrapolation, the contribution of the subsystem we are interested in must be assumed to be fixed and unchanging rather than continuously manifestable. Something must indeed be kept fixed and unchanging if the behavior of the crystal is meant to be determined. It is certainly not the manifest behavior of the crystal, for then we would need no more than one measurement. What is fixed in these measurements is the disposition of the lithium fluoride crystal. However, this disposition is not manifest in any of the impure samples. This is why we need extrapolation. [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 130]

The problem with Hüttemann’s conception is that the same disposition is present in much more cases than only in those where it is manifest. Hüttemann’s proposal is extensionally¹⁸ wrong, not because it does not cover all the cases, but because it includes too many cases. To see that it is not acceptable to overshoot the mark, so to say, consider something which trivially holds in all cases, like a tautology. This would be constant throughout all the cases in which one wants to apply the (MoA), say all the crystals with the different levels of impurity, but it would not justify the usage of the (MoA). The holding of the tautology is irrelevant for the crystal case. In order to account for the (MoA) you need something which holds in all and only the relevant cases. Now Hüttemann is not the only one who conflates the first and second level. Rani Lil Anjum and Stephen Mumford also do not take the level of Wirkungen seriously enough, when they argue in the context of an equilibrium case that ‘nothing happens, precisely because the dispositions involved balance each other out’ [Mumford and Anjum, 2011, p. 30]. I think that this is not an adequate description of the Millikan equilibrium case. The turning on of the plate condenser does not fiddle with the gravitational disposition of the oil drop. The electrical field does not make the oil drop loose mass, it makes it fall slower. And this is not something special about the Millikan case. In all masking cases the disposition remains unchanged. Now, maybe there are ‘equilibrium’ finking cases where the dispositions actually ‘balance each other out’ – whatever that means – but it is a substantial, and to my mind unacceptable claim, that all equilibrium cases are like this. I think we need the conceptual resources to distinguish between medicine against radi-

18 Even if the two terms would have the same extension, they must be kept apart for conceptual reasons. If dispositions, fundamental or not, always wirken this dose not make their Wirkung identical to them.

3.3 Manifestations Between Dispostions and Behaviour |

95

ation poising which takes away the disposition, and dimercaprol which fiddles with the manifestation of the poison.¹⁹ Imagine two people, Alice and Bob, engaging in a rope-pulling contest. As it happens, Alice and Bob pull equally strong and as a result the mark (a little red flag, say) in the middle of the rope does not move. The resultant behaviour of the flag is ‘not moving’. Now imagine Alice and Bob are just holding the rope without pulling. This leads to the same resultant behaviour: the flag does not move. Still the two cases, pulling equally strong and not pulling at all, have to be differentiated. These cases are actually physically different, because if Alice and Bob pull long and strong enough the rope will rip apart at some point.²⁰ The account I want to defend is, as I have said, very non-humean as it involves dispositions and Wirkungen as ontologically respectable entities. I have been arguing that these three levels are ontologically different, but just arguing that there are three levels is of course not yet a triadic account of dispositions by itself. So even if I succeeded so far in establishing that there are three different levels, I still have to say how they are connected. Just three different unrelated levels do not help explicate dispositions much. I will talk about the relations between the three levels in section 3.4. Before that I will concern myself with an argument raised by Psillos against Cartwright. As my conception is similar to Cartwright’s, Psillo’s argument also applies to it. Psillos voices a worry that may be shared by others and although I think, in the end, Psillos miss-represents Cartwright’s view, discharging his attack will help capturing the triadic account more clearly. Cartwright, in explaining how she understands capacities, discusses aspirin. Aspirins have the capacity to relieve headaches. But, of course, this does not mean that ‘aspirins always relieve headaches, or always do so if the rest of the world is arranged in a particularly felicitous way, or that they relieve headaches most of the time, or more often than not’ [Cartwright, 1989, p. 3]. Psillos takes up on this and considers a kind of masking scenario for aspirin’s capacity to relief headaches: ‘Suppose that I take an aspirin while I am still hearing the continuous and desperate screaming of my daughter, who suffers from colic. The aspirin has the capacity to relieve my headache, but the headache does not go away’ [Psillos, 2008, p. 185].

19 I will come back to this in figure 4.1. I am concerned with setting up the conceptual space for the counterexamples, rather than the actual classification of the counterexamples. It would thus not affect my overall point if I classified dimercaprol wrongly. 20 There are more examples. Heil’s two cards [Heil, 2012, p. 119] and Kleist’s archway [Kleist, 2001, Vs. 1349f.]. Both keep stable by the interaction of the gravitational forces applied to the parts. Also, stability on the macro level is often achieved by various interactions on the micro level. Think of all that which has to be going on in our body just to keep us alive.

96 | 3 Composition

From this set-up Psillos questions the structural integrity of capacities. Let me quote his concern at length: How shall I explain this? Shall I say that this is because the screaming of my daughter has the capacity to cause aspirin-resistant headaches? This would be overly ad hoc. Shall I say that this is because the screaming of my daughter has the capacity to neutralise the capacity of aspirin to relieve headache? This would be very mysterious. Something has indeed happened: There has been an interaction of some sort which made aspirin not work. But why should I attribute this to a capacity of the screaming? If I did that, I would have to attribute to the screaming a number of capacities: the capacity to-let-aspirin-work-if-it-is-mild, the capacity to let-aspirin-work-if-it-is-not-mild-but-I-go-away-and-let-my-wife-deal-with-my-daughter, the capacity to block-aspirins’-work-if-it-is-extreme, etc. [Psillos, 2008, p. 185]

Because of this, Psillos thinks that capacities are useless. As there is no fact of the matter about what a system can do just by virtue of having a given capacity’ [Cartwright, 1999, p. 73], the capacity cannot be used to ‘to (a) predict what a system can or cannot do and (b) explain why it behaves the way it does’ [Psillos, 2008, p. 189]. Explanation and prediction are two central issues in science and it would indeed be very bad if the triadic account cold not account for them. Psillos thinks that if the having of a capacity is not enough to specify the resultant behaviour, ‘any kind of behaviour would be compatible with the system’s having a certain capacity. No specific behaviour could be predicted, and any kind of behaviour could be explained’ [Psillos, 2008, p. 189]. There are basically two problems with Psillos’ depiction of the aspirin case. The first problem rests on the terminological confusion we have been talking about: ‘Some of Psillos’s worries about identifying capacities by their manifestation rest on a conflation of the manifestation, or exercise, of the capacity with the occurrence of the canonical behaviour we associate with the capacity’ [Cartwright, 2008, p. 195]. So Psillos confuses manifestation1 with manifestation2 . Also, which is worse, his argument is a non sequitur. Cartwright, being very well aware of masks and such, claims that capacities do not specify exactly one behaviour, but it does not follow from this that the resulting behaviour is independent of the capacities of the objects in question. Cartwright admits that there is more (the screaming of the daughter, etc.) than a single capacity (the capacity of aspirin to relief headaches) to the resulting behaviour (the relief of the headache) but that does not deprive capacities of their explanatory and predictive power. In the Millikan case we can predict the outcome quite easily: it is no wonder that the oil drop does not move in the equilibrium case. Also, understood in the right way, the manifestations1 at play, F g and F e , explain the resulting behaviour. Just because there is no one-to-one correspondence between capacities and resultant behaviour, the behaviour is per se neither unrelated nor inexplicable nor unpredictable.

3.4 Towards an Triadic Ontology | 97

Now, just Pillos’ argument being a non sequitur does not mean that his conclusion is not valid. And, actually, I think there is a genuine worry lingering in the background: If there was no systematic way how capacities relate to the resulting behaviour, then they would indeed be useless for explaining and predicting. As Psillos worry is not enough to discredit capacities, it is not enough to accept there is more to the resultant behaviour than aspirin’s capacity to relief headache. Arguing that the argument that we cannot predict/explain the behaviour is invalid is not quite the same as arguing that we can predict/explain the behaviour. In the next section I will, thus, lay down how I think that the three levels are related.²¹

3.4 Towards an Triadic Ontology In this section I want spell out the triadic account in greater detail. I do not want to end up with a completely specified ontology, though. Rather, I want to provide a blue print ontology (see section 1.1.1), as I call it. This means that I want my ontology to be as little committal as possible in order to be as compatible as possible. The basic idea behind this is that you should be able to plug in your favourite account of x and then use the blue print to build a full-blown ontology. For example, I do not want to presuppose that dispositions need bearers. So my blue print may be used to build an ontology either with objects as disposition bearers or with bundles of dispositions. Provided that these options are possible and not necessary, that is, if it is not possible to make sense of the idea of bundles of dispositions, then this of course cannot be plugged into the blue print, and if other philosophical puzzles necessitate a certain view then this has to be plugged in. If, say, persistence requires objects, then this is combined with the triadic blue print in order to build an ontology of persisting objects changing by manifesting their dispositions. The three level picture has two ‘gaps’: one, Gap1 , between the level of dispositions and Wirkungen, the other, Gap2 between Wirkungen and resultant behaviour: Dispositions

Gap1

Wirkungen

Gap2

Behaviour

21 The triadic account is independent of the question about multi track: ‘The same power must always make the same contribution, however, no matter how different the effect. This is not to be confused by the confused issue of single versus multi-track powers’ [Molnar, 2003, p. 195]. Multitrack powers give different manifestations1 given different stimuli. But – excluding indeterministic and stochastic dispositions or propensities – the same stimulus gives the same manifestation1 .

98 | 3 Composition

As we have already seen there is no one-to-one correspondence between a disposition and the resulting behaviour. There can be other Wirkungen around which also influence the end result. The movement in the Millikan case depends on the electrical force acting on the oil drop, and the influence of the gravitational disposition is not enough to determine the resulting behaviour. The behaviour of the oil drop is highly various: it can fall at various speeds, hover and it even rise. A given disposition, here the gravitational disposition at play, is compatible with all kinds of behaviour. There is something stable, however. The contribution made by gravitation is the same throughout the different cases. The manifestation1 is stable, whereas the manifestation2 is various. Cartwright and Pemberton hold that ‘powers are Aristotelian’ and by that they mean ‘that what a power does when exercised is in the nature of that power’ [Cartwright and Pemberton, 2013, p. 93]. These ‘doings’ of the dispositions are the Wirkungen. It is in the nature of a magnet to attract a suitably positioned piece of iron. And it would indeed be strange to hold that the resultant behaviour is in the nature of the power after all we have heard so far about masks and interactions. As there is (virtually) no pure case, a power would (almost) never be able to realize its nature. Then, I think, the term ‘nature’ would not be adequate any more. It is in the nature of a magnet to attract iron rods and on the occasion an iron rod may indeed be moving towards a magnet because of this attraction. Still it would be wrong to hold that this movement is in the nature of a magnet, as on so many occasions an iron rod may not move towards the magnet. Accepting²² that the Wirkungen of dispositions are in the nature of those dispositions fills Gap1 . We can thus update our schema of the triadic account. Still, Gap2 has to be bridged. Dispositions

nature

Wirkungen stable

Gap2

Behaviour variable

George Molnar also holds that there is a one-to-one correspondence between dispositions and Wirkungen, or as he says, powers and manifestations: ‘Manifestations are strictly isomorphic with, and necessarily linked to, the properties

22 Cartwright and Pemberton argue that the alternative to their Aristotelian powers, a so-called causal profile account, is indefensible. ‘A causal profile can be represented as a set of ordered pairs, where the first member of each pair is a set of mutual manifestation partners, and the second member is the manifestation that can occur when the associated manifestation partners obtain’ [Cartwright and Pemberton, 2013, p. 109]. I will not discuss their arguments here, as I am more interested in the link between Wirkungen and behaviour, which is, in my opinion, under-represented in the debate.

3.4 Towards an Triadic Ontology | 99

that they are manifestations of. Not so effects.’ [Molnar, 2003, p. 195]. Molnar also points at the further work we have do to: we have to provide a link between Wirkungen and the ‘effects’, as these are not strictly isomorphic to the dispositions and Wirkungen. This link is the topic of the next section.

3.4.1 The Functions f and f a as Systematic Links Between Wirkungen and Behaviour. In his discussion of the carbon monoxide molecule ([Hüttemann, 1998, p. 126]), Hüttemann mentions three laws. As the carbon monoxide is a rotating oscillator there is first the law about rotators, second the law about oscillators and third a law about rotating oscillators: 1.

2.

3.

All rotators can be described by the Schrödinger equation with the following Hamiltonian: Hrot = L2 /2I where L is the angular momentum operator and I the moment of inertia. All oscillators can be described by the Schrödinger equation with the following Hamiltonian: Hosc = P2 /2μ + μω2 Q2 /2 where P is the momentum operator, Q the position operator, ω the frequency of the oscillating entity and μ the reduced mass. All oscillating rotators can be described by the Schrödinger equation with the following Hamiltonian: H = H rot ⨂ I + I ⨂ H osc where I is the identity operator.

Hüttemann argues that neither the third law alone, nor the first two alone are sufficient to understand the (MoA). He holds in particular that ‘the third law does state something with respect to the combined system that is not contained in the first two laws, namely the way the contributions add up to produce the overall behavior’ [Hüttemann, 1998, p. 127]. The Wirkungen, in our terminology, interact and thus determine the resultant behaviour. If we do not want to talk about ‘merely tending’ we need a systematic explication of how they are linked to the behaviour. I will first present an abstract discussion of this link and then say something about its interpretation. Let ∆ be the set of all possible resultant behaviours. ∆ := {δ1 , δ2 , δ3 , . . . }

(3.15)

We have said that the resulting behaviour depends on which Wirkungen are present. This can be captured by a function, f , mapping the Wirkungen present to

100 | 3 Composition

the resulting behaviour. This function has all possible sets of Wirkungen Ω as its domain. Ω := {⌀, {ω1 }, {ω2 }, . . . {ω1 , ω2 }, {ω2 , ω3 }, . . . }

(Wirkungen, 3.16)

Note that we do not need n-tuples here, since the behaviour only depends on the Wirkungen present, not on the order they are listed. This fact corresponds to the symmetry argument (see section 3.3.1) that Wirkungen and so called masks are ontologically on a par. Remember that in the Millikan equilibrium case it does not matter for the resulting behaviour whether we take the gravitational pull on the oil drop to be ‘masked’ by the electrical pull or vice versa. f : Ω 󳨃→ ∆

(Manifestations, 3.17)

The function f is, of course, injective (or into) but it need not be bijective. This means that not all possible behaviour must be a result of some combination of Wirkungen. f is the first candidate for the systematic link between the second and third level. Take, for example, the initial segment for f from figure 3.1. Tab. 3.1: Function f mapping Wirkungen to behaviour.

1 2 3 4 .. .

Wirkungen present

Behaviour

⌀ ω1 ω2 ω1 &ω2 .. .

δ1 δ2 δ3 δ1 .. .

f allows for different sets of Wirkungen to be mapped to the same resultant behaviour. We have already encountered a situation like this in the discussion of the Millikan experiment. An oil drop in the empty void does not move, because there are no forces acting on it; i. e. there are no Wirkungen present. Call the notmoving of the oil drop δ1 . The equilibrium case, where the gravitational force F g is counterbalanced by the electrical force F e , also leads to behaviour δ1 . Thus ⌀ and, let us say, {ω1 , ω2 } are both mapped to the same element of ∆.

3.4 Towards an Triadic Ontology |

101

Spatial location²³ and orientation are not dispositions themselves, but are nevertheless causally relevant. Or, as George Molnar puts it, they are not causally operative themselves, but still ‘affect the outcomes of the workings of the powers’ [Molnar, 2003, p. 10]. The spatial arrangement can be included in the picture via the Cartesian product. Call the resulting function f a . The Cartesian product of two sets A and B gives us the set of all ordered pairs (a, b) such that A × B = {(a, b) | a ∈ A and b ∈ B}

(Cartesian product, 3.18)

f a maps pairs of sets of Wirkungen and arrangements to behaviour. More precisely, its domain is the Cartesian product of the sets of manifestations Ω and spatial arrangements Ψ with Ψ := {ψ1 , ψ2 , ψ3 . . . . ψ n }

(Spatial arrangement, 3.19)

this gives us f a : (Ω × Ψ) 󳨃→ ∆

(3.20)

Tab. 3.2: Function f a mapping spatially arranged Wirkungen to behaviour

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .. .

Wirkungen present

Arrangement

Behaviour

⌀ ω1 ω1 &ω2 ω1 &ω2 ω1 &ω3 ω1 &ω2 &ω3 ω1 &ω2 &ω3 .. .

ψ1 ψ2 ψ3 ψ4 ψ3 ψ5 ψ6 .. .

δ1 δ2 δ3 δ4 δ5 δ2 δ6 .. .

The function f a is the missing link between Wirkungen and behaviour and thus fills Gap2 . The function f a is stable, but still accounts for the required variability via the different values of the codomain.

23 Actually it is the spatio-temporal arrangement that matters. In the next chapter we will discuss the diachronic part of disposition manifestation. Till then, I will talk about ‘spatial arrangement’, but keep in mind that not only the spatial arrangement matters. Otherwise somebody could try to argue with the special theory of relativity against my account.

102 | 3 Composition

Dispositions

nature

Wirkungen stable

fa

Behaviour variable

The functions f and f a are not the only ways of linking Wirkungen and behaviour. They just show that it is possible to combine stability and variability. I do not want to claim that f and f a depict how the ontology actually looks like. During our discussion of dispositions a theoretical problem arose, namely how the evident variability in behaviour is compatible with the postulation of stable Wirkungen. Psillos thought that this was in principal problematic. Now, the functions f and f a show that there is a systematic way to connect the stable Wirkungen to the variable resulting behaviour. This is sufficient to block Psillos’ charge: With (partial) knowledge about the function and the manifestations around, we can predict and explain the resulting behaviour. Listing all possible combinations is a cumbersome way to account for all cases²⁴ but if nature is kind, or let us say orderly, there could be rules for combination like vector addition.²⁵ These rules would then fulfill the function of bridging the gap between the second and third level.

3.4.2 Powers With Built-In Combination Rules In this subsection, I will discuss which ontological role the link between level two and three plays. First of all, note that even in the ideal case, where only one Wirkung is present, there is an ontological gap between the Wirkung and the resulting behavior. As we have argued with regards to the Millikan experiment, a force is not a movement, i. e. they belong to different ontological categories. We have just introduced combination rules – the cumbersome functions f and f a and the more elegant principles like vector addition – as the stable link between Wirkungen and behaviour, but we have said nothing so far about the ontological status of this combination rules. Cartwright and Pemberton briefly touch upon the issue: As we acknowledged above, this account of powers leaves the need for some account of composition. Perhaps component powers come with rules for what will be produced overall when they act in combination in specific arrangements with other successfully exercised powers. But this seems unnecessarily complicated. Consider by analogy: Each of us having a rule for calculating what we would do should we get together seems far more efficient than each of us

24 Note that the epistemic problem, that for us it is not possible to list all the cases, does not apply here, as the functions represent ontology. 25 Or to be more precise the ontological equivalent of vector addition. I will come back to the difference of a physical combination and a mathematical sum soon.

3.4 Towards an Triadic Ontology |

103

having built in a dense set of predetermined outcomes for ‘all’ of the indeterminate situations we might possibly encounter. We leave this as future work. [Cartwright and Pemberton, 2013, p. 111]

Cartwright and Pemberton vote against powers with built-in combination rules, as this would be too complicated: All the powers come with built-in combination rules for each situation. They do not spell out an alternative account, however, but just vaguely suggest that ‘rules of composition of various sorts apply’ [Cartwright and Pemberton, 2013, p. 110]. Which ontological status do this combination rules have? Cartwright and Pemberton do not elaborate on this but I think that we have to and that we have good reasons to posit built-in combination rules. One of the benefits of a dispositional account is its locality (remember section 1.2.2.3). It is not some ethereal or omni-present governing law that dictates what happens when a glass is hit by a hammer, but it is the powers of the glass and the hammer here and now that are responsible for the breaking of the glass, according to the dispositional understanding. Now if the combination rules are not built-in into the powers, ethereal or omi-present laws sneak in through the back door. The advantage of bypassing the manifestation problem²⁶ would be set at nought, if we had to introduce combination rules outside the powers again. Actually, it does not follow directly from the negation of ‘outside’ laws that the combination rules are in the dispositions. They might is well be in the Wirkungen. But how should they be in the Wirkungen, if they are not in the dispositions? As there is a one-to-one correspondence between the dispositions and the Wirkungen, it would be strange if the combination powers arose ad hoc with the Wirkungen. Nothing can be in the Wirkungen that is not already in the dispositions²⁷, one could sensibly claim. Of course, that does not mean that the Wirkungen and the dispositions are ontologically on a par, but still it precludes the unfounded emergence of combination rules on the level of Wirkungen. Thus, either the combination rules come from outside, or they are already built-in into the dispositions. From this, together with the premise that the combination rules cannot be outside, it follows that they must be built into the dispositions. In order to understand better what powers with built-in combination rules are supposed to be, I will compare them to a well-known and similarly structured account: David Hugh Mellor’s account of tensed sentences from the philosophy of

26 Roughly the problem how universal a-spatio-temporal or omni-spatio-temporal laws relate to their instances which are local. See [Jaag, 2015]. 27 G. W. F. Hegel claimed something equivalent to this for causation: ‘an effect contains nothing whatever that the cause does not contain.’ [Hegel, 2010, p. 494].

104 | 3 Composition

time.²⁸ Tensed sentences like ‘It is raining now’ (R) pose a special challenge for a B-theoretic account of time, as they are not translatable without loss of meaning into their tenseless counterparts.²⁹ A tensed sentence has a stable meaning, independent of when it is uttered, i. e. I do not need to know which time and date it is to understand a sentence like (R). Still, (R) has different truth conditions and by that possibly³⁰ varying truth values at each point in time. Mellor, in his Real Time II [Mellor, 1998] holds that a tensed sentence means a function from points in time to truth conditions. The sentence means this same function at every utterance, so the meaning of the sentence is stable. Yet, the truth conditions vary from time point to time point. Mellor’s treatment of tensed sentences thus combines stability with variability in just the way I have proposed. Other aspects are quite different from my account, however, as Mellor’s account is about semantics (and not ontology) and it is reductionistic. Still, I think, the comparison helps to better grasp my view on built-in combination rules. You may wonder at this point how an account including a combination rule like vector addition can be realist. After all, Cartwright has explained to us that ‘[w]e add forces (or the numbers that represent forces) when we do calculations. Nature does not ‘add’ forces. For the ‘component’ forces are not there, in any but a metaphorical sense, to be added; and the laws which say they are must also be given a metaphorical reading’ [Cartwright, 1980, p. 78]. I think, however, that this threat to the realist interpretation of the combination rules can be met. Rudolf Carnap, following Carl Gustav Hempel, distinguishes between mathematical addition and physical combination.³¹ The context where Carnap draws this distinction does not matter for us, it is only important that Carnap insists on the difference between the two:

28 See [Fischer, 2016] for an overview of the debate in philosophy of time and the placement of Mellor’s account within this debate. 29 This has been argued by Arthur Prior [Prior, 1959] and John Perry [Perry, 1979] and is nowadays accepted almost universally (cf. [Oaklander and Smith, 1994, p. 58]). 30 The truth values are only possibly varying, as it may be that it always rains. But even if always true, the sentence (R) is still tensed. It is quite a different thing whether a sentence is omnitemporally true or a-temporal. ‘It is raining in London’ may be a good example of the first, while ‘2 is a prime number’ may be good example of the second. 31 My [Fischer, 2016] explores the implication this difference has for the philosophy of time. As ‘[w]e cannot manipulate time intervals in the way we can manipulate space intervals’ [Carnap and Gardner, 1966, p. 78], physical combination of durations is quite different from physical combination of length.

3.4 Towards an Triadic Ontology |

105

[S]ome authors said that if two line segments, a and b, were added, the length of the new segment was obtained by adding the length of a and the length of b. This is an extremely poor way to formulate the rule, because in the same sentence the word ‘add’ is used in two physical objects by putting them together in a specific way, and then it is used in the sense of the arithmetical operation of addition. [Carnap and Gardner, 1966, p. 72]

The combination rules are, thus, as real as the components themselves are. The combination rules are the equivalent to physical combination, as vector addition is the equivalent of the mathematical addition. This differentiation may also help to remove the scruples some will have with the middle level of the triadic ontology. The whole middle level of wirkungen is acceptable for an empiricist. To see this, let us have a look at Carnap’s treatment of theoretical concepts. For him theoretical concepts are respectable, if they ultimately terminate in observables. Initially Carnap thought that all scientific concepts can be introduced via definitions. The inadequacy of this was quickly realized by Carnap and the other logical empiricists. Carnap then allowed three different ways to introduce concepts into a language (of science): explicit definition, reduction sentences and postulates [Andreas, 2007, p.13]. Now, reduction sentences allow the introduction of concepts which are not directly observable. For example, the movement of a magnetic needle can be the test condition for the electrical current in a wire, while the term ‘magnetic needle’ is itself a not basic. Carnap allows for the ascriptions of such higher order terms via ‘introductive chains’ [Andreas, 2007, p. 61]. In the same way, the middle level is empiricist, even if it is non-humean. Wirkungen may not be observable themselves, but they terminate in observable behaviour via the combination rules.³² To sum up, I hold that we have a triadic ontology consisting of dispositions, Wirkungen, and resulting behaviour. ‘The component features have capacities, the capacities are exercised, and the result of their joint operation is what happens.’ [Cartwright, 2008, p. 196]. It is in the nature of dispositions to produce just the Wirkung they do produce, while at the same time the possible interactions are also in their natures. Dispositions are thus directed at the interactions they cause (‘bewirken’) via their Wirkungen. The Wirkungen in turn interact and bring about the behaviour.

32 I take this to be an answer to Jennifer McKitrick’s worry (cf. [McKitrick, 2010]). I have described the ontological role the middle level plays and have argued that it is acceptable for the empiricist. I even gave it a name: ‘Wirkungen’. What more could you request?

4 Progressing to Processes In this chapter I will discuss diachronic masking cases and the dynamics of disposition manifestation. So far we have mostly neglected temporal aspects in our analysis of dispositions, but now is the time catch up on this. Section 4.1.1 evaluates whether it is possible to solve the prevention problem¹ by capturing the trigger of the disposition in question more precisely. As you can imagine, I do not think that this strategy works. There is a special subclass of masking cases that, for systematic reasons, cannot be handled by tinkering with the trigger, namely the diachronic masking cases. I argue in section 4.2 that we can deal with these cases by accepting ongoing processes in our ontology. Section 4.2.1 depicts the action-theoretic account of Michael Thompson, which can be utilised for our analysis of dispositions, as it possesses relevant similarities. Section 4.2.2 applies the insights gained from this excursion to the debate about dispositions. Processes can abort before reaching their goal. This characteristic enables them to thwart the diachronic prevention cases. With a process ontology of the right kind, all counterexamples to disposition manifestation can be taken care of, or so I will argue. Finally, section 4.2.3 brings together the diachronic part of my blue print ontology with the synchronic part from chapter 3. Wirkungen are processes which interact over time.

4.1 Manifestation Dynamics Let us reconsider the prevention problem from section 2.6.1: the manifestation² of a disposition can be prevented somehow or other. There are cases – finking cases – where the disposition in question is taken away in an inconvenient moment and thus, the manifestation is prevented. In other cases, the manifestation does not occur although the disposition and its trigger are present. These cases – masking or antidote cases – are especially troublesome. In a way, it is no wonder that

* The chapter is based on joint work with Niels van Miltenburg. 1 I will therefore return to the term ‘manifestations’ without a subscript for the most part of this chapter. In the end, in section 4.2.3, I will include the results from chapter 3 and take up the differentiation between manifestations1 and manifestations2 again. 2 I will fall back to talking of manifestations without subscript. The systematic reason for this is that I will offer a diagnosis of why the prevention problem is so notorious and most people in the debate do not distinguish between manifestations1 and manifestations2 .

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-114

4.1 Manifestation Dynamics |

107

the manifestation does not occur when the disposition is not present.³ Nobody will be surprised if the manifestation is absent when the trigger is missing. Why should it be any different if the disposition is missing? In contrast, a at least prima facie problematic situation arises if the manifestation fails to occur although both disposition and trigger are present. I have argued in chapter 2 that ultimately all conditionalising attempts fail, but still the pre-theoretic ‘conceptual connection between a statement attributing a disposition to an item and a particular conditional’ [Prior, 1985, p. 5] exists. A theory of dispositions has to acknowledge this connection in order to be adequate. This does, of course, not imply that we need to provide a conditional analysis of dispositions, but the analysis has to be ‘conditional-friendly’, as Troy Cross calls it. He argues that the debate about dispositions ‘will be put to rest only if some conditional-friendly theory is widely acknowledged to be free from counterexamples.’ [Cross, 2012, p. 121]. By tackling the diachronic masking cases in this chapter, I will try to provide just this: a counterexample-free but at the same time conditional-friendly analysis of dispositions. To capture the pre-theoretic connection, let us start with the following rough and ready characterisation of dispositions: (D) When object o has the disposition D, it displays M under circumstances C. (D) is not supposed to be an analysis of dispositions, but an analysis of dispositions should be able to make sense of (D). As intuitive as (D) seems, its problem is that there are so many cases where a disposition does not show its manifestation M – the notorious prevention problem. An plausible reaction is to claim that the object o was not actually in the right circumstances. For example, sugar put into saturated water will not dissolve. It seems obvious to conclude that the stimulus condition for the disposition of ‘solubility’ is not simply ‘submergence into water’ but ‘submergence into unsaturated water’. In the next section, I will examine whether a robust defence against the prevention problem can be established on this ground.

3 Finking cases, in contrast to masking cases, are only problematic for someone who wants to reduce dispositions to conditionals, but not for a dispositional realist, i. e. it is not per se a problem that a non-fragile glass cup does not break when struck, but only when you try to reduce ‘fragility’ to something like ‘will break if struck’.

108 | 4 Progressing to Processes

4.1.1 Trigger Happy? In this section I will argue that fiddling with the trigger only works up to a certain point: While I concede that some of the counterexamples can be avoided by specifying the trigger of the disposition in question, I do not think that the strategy of ‘finding a trigger with whom everybody is happy’ works in general. To not let this succumb to a clash of intuitions, I will present systematic reasons why an important class of counterexamples cannot be handled by the ‘trigger-happy’ strategy. First consider a fragile glass cup c. If I strike c with a hammer, it breaks. The stimulus-manifestation-pair belongs to the conventional disposition profile associated with fragility. (D) tells us that c should break B when struck S due to its fragility F: (Dglass ) If glass cup c has the disposition F, it displays breaking B when being struck S. Johnston’s original masking case features ‘a support which when placed inside the glass cup prevents deformation so that the glass would not break when struck’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 233]. This case seems to contradict (Dglass ): the masked glass cup is supposed to be fragile but does not display breaking when struck. However, according to defenders of the ‘trigger-happy’ strategy, (Dglass ) can be saved if we capture the trigger of fragility more precisely. ‘Striking’ is a much too generic term to be the appropriate stimulus for ‘fragility’, the defender could go on. And indeed a science-oriented philosopher might argue that a certain threshold of the total impressed net-force is more adequate as a trigger for ‘fragility’.⁴ The big advantage of this formulation is that it is irrelevant how this threshold is reached. Firstly, it unifies the different ways a fragile glass cup can be brought to breaking. I can strike it with a hammer or I can throw it on the ground. And there are countless other ways, but they all have one thing in common, namely that enough net-force is impressed upon the glass cup. Secondly, this formulation unifies the unsuccessful cases as well. It does not matter whether the glass is thrown to the ground on the moon or the hammer is not heavy enough or I do not strike with enough speed or the hammer is wrapped in bubble wrap – as long as the total impressed net-force stays below the threshold. Even the case where the protection is inside the glass cup is captured by this way of specifying the trigger.⁵ Maybe

4 Mathias Frisch has suggested this in personal communication. 5 It does not matter if you are not convinced that the net-force is actually a good way to capture the trigger of fragility or not. I argue that the ‘trigger-happy’ strategy fails ultimately, so if you

4.1 Manifestation Dynamics |

109

even all realistic⁶ counterexamples against fragility can be handled by taking a certain threshold of impressed net-force as the trigger, or something along this lines. So, capturing the trigger more precisely is initially a promising strategy, and it can handle other cases besides fragility as well. Consider the case were the antidote is ingested before⁷ poisoning. The ‘trigger-happy’ strategy may also work here. We might offhand define a poison as a substance that is disposed to cause death if ingested. But that is rough: the specifications both of the response and of the stimulus stand in need of various corrections. To take just one of the latter corrections: we should really say ‘if ingested without its antidote’. [Lewis, 1997, p. 153]

And indeed, if we formulate the trigger of poison as ‘ingested without its antidote’, then the just mentioned counterexample can be excluded. But Lewis already hints at the problems for the ‘trigger happy strategy’: it is not only the trigger that stands in need of various corrections, but also the response, as he calls it. The appropriate antidote can be administered after the poison, as in the masking case (Breaking Bad) from section 2.6.1. Call this case (antidotea ) for ‘after’ and the case where the antidote was administered before or at the same time as the poison (antidoteb ). The refined trigger ‘ingested without its antidote’ does not help in the (antidotea ) case, because in this case the poison was ingested without its antidote, and still the manifestation fails to appear. Thus, (antidotea ) constitutes a counterexample to the conditional analysis of ‘poisonous’ with the refined trigger ‘ingestion without the corresponding antidote’. There is no easy fix at hand. Tinker with the formulation of the trigger as much as you want, as long as there is a time gap between the occurrence of the stimulus and the response, some mask may interfere. Although it looks promising on first sight, the ‘trigger-happy’ strategy ultimately is bound to fail as it cannot handle diachronic masking cases. Markus Schrenk puts it this way:

believe it fails already at this point, then this would just amount to a shortcut to the conclusion I argue for anyway. 6 I write ‘realistic’ because otherwise successful counterexamples can be constructed. Bird introduces the case where the sorcerer, being a brilliant physicist, is able to administer ‘shock waves to the struck glass which precisely cancel out the shock of the original striking, hence saving the glass from destruction.’ [Bird, 1998, p. 228]. Even if we understand the trigger via the net-force, this variant constitutes a counterexample. While, I think that this is not problematic for a dispositional realist – the existence of such a sorcerer is just to outlandish to be taken serious – this case may be able to cause havoc for the reductionist. 7 Think of the difference between ‘rad-x’ and ‘radaway’: the first prevents radiation poisoning, while the second is administered after exposure to radiation.

110 | 4 Progressing to Processes

[W]henever a process, starting with event C and ending with event E, is temporally extended, that is, whenever E is supposed to succeed C after a period of time ∆t, there is the in-principle possibility of an interference with C such that E could be prevented. [Schrenk, 2010, p. 729].

The only difference between the two variants of the antidote case, (antidotea ) and (antidoteb ), is the timing of the antidote administering. If the antidote is administered at latest with the poison, the case can be handled quite easily by specifying the trigger, while, if the antidote is administered after the poison, this is in principle not possible. This shows that timing is crucial for an analysis of dispositions. In the next section I will thus take a closer look at timing issues in disposition manifestations.

4.1.2 Timing Remember Carnap’s reduction sentences from section 2.4. (R) ∀x ∀t(C(x, t) → (D(x) ↔ M(x, t))) Here, the same time point t occurs in the stimulus conditions C(x, t) and the manifestation M(x, t). But, as Lewis points out: ‘Sometimes it takes some time for a disposition to do its work’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 146]. Carnap’s formulation of reduction sentences precludes such cases. (R) contains a general quantifier ranging over all times t, but in every instance it is the same value for t in C(x, t) and M(x, t). Thus, the manifestation of a disposition always takes place at the same time as the stimulus. We have to be a bit careful, since the logical structure of Carnap’s reduction sentences differs from those of the (SCA) and other conditional analyses. The object in question shows the manifestation M at the same time as the stimulus occurs, if it is in the stimulus condition C and has the disposition D. Still, an analysis of dispositions should not presuppose that the manifestation occurs at the same time as the stimulus; earlier would be odd, but later should be possible. Wolfgang Malzkorn’s (SoCCA) is more careful in this regard: (SoCCA) D(x, t) iff C N (x, t, t + δ) € ((C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ)) ∧ (¬C(x, t + δ

€ ¬M(x, t)))

Malzkorn’s (SoCCA) neither presupposes that the manifestation is at the same point in time as the stimulus, nor that it is at some later time. If δ is zero, then t + δ just is t: stimulus and manifestation occur at the same time. This is a case of ‘instantaneous causation’, as Malzkorn calls it. But δ can also take positive values

4.1 Manifestation Dynamics | 111

in order to account for diachronic cases. In this case t + δ denotes a time later than t and thus the manifestation occurs later than the trigger. Lewis is opposed to locating stimulus and manifestation at the same time, because for him instantaneous causation ‘is contrary to the normal ways of the world’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 146]. Of course, this does not speak against Malzkorn’s analysis. As it stands the (SoCCA) is just formulated carefully. It does not take a stance on the issue of instantaneous causation. If we want to follow Lewis in ruling out instantaneous causation, however, the (SoCCA) can easily be amended to incorporate this. We just have to add the requirement that δ > 0. Lewis’ discussion of instantaneous causation arises in the context of finking. Lewis considers whether the original finking case (cf. [Martin, 1994]) is unrealistic as it involves the instantaneous loss of the disposition in question in exactly the moment the trigger occurs. Lewis concedes that someone who wants to resist this finking case ‘may protest with some justice that the case is fantastic, that we are not entitled to firm linguistic intuitions about such far-fetched cases, and accordingly that the case is not a convincing refutation’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 146]. For Lewis Martins’ original finking case has not much argumentative strength as it relies on instantaneous causation. There are, however, two ways of setting up the fink example in real life without involving an instantaneously acting fink. Either (Fink a )⁸ the fink could be a fastacting circuit breaker⁹ or (Fink b ) there could be some device monitoring the wire. In the (Fink a ) case, the stimulus occurs and then there is a, maybe small but existing, time gap ∆t before the circuit breaker takes the disposition away and thus undermines the manifestation. In the (Fink b ) case, the wire is monitored by some device, a camera say, which registers when the wire is about to be touched by a conductor (cf. [Choi, 2012, p. 369]) and accordingly takes away the disposition. This way, the stimulus would not really occur as the disposition was taken away beforehand. Lewis describes the (Fink b ) case in the following way: ‘the finkishly disposed thing would somehow see s coming. Some precursor of s would cause both s and the loss of the disposition’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 146]. I take it that the case where the disposition is taken away before being triggered is significantly different from the case where it is taken away after the trigger. For me, the cases in which the trigger does not occur and the disposition is taken away before the stimulus are on a par: In both cases the lack of an occurring manifestation is not explanation-worthy. It does not matter whether an objects

8 As with the two variants of the antidote case, you can think of the ‘a’ standing for ‘after’ and the ‘b’ for ‘before’ as a memory aid. 9 cf. [Lewis, 1997, p. 147].

112 | 4 Progressing to Processes

lacks a disposition or the trigger – or even both. Nobody is surprised if a sugar cube that is not submerged into water does not dissolve. Also nobody is surprised if a stone which is submerged does not dissolve. Finally, even less surprisement arises when a stone which is not submerged does not dissolve. The interesting cases are those where something interferes after the disposition was triggered. And only these cases are problematic for (D). In the next section, section 4.2, I will argue that understanding manifestation as processes can help us with these diachronic masks.

4.2 Processes In this section, I argue that we should integrate processes into our theory of dispositions. I will first recap the recent history of the debate about dispositions, to present my diagnosis of why the prevention problem is so notorious. The bottom line is that Humeanism is far more wide-spread then one might expect. Then, I will take an excursus and sketch how in action theory the humean paradigm was challenged by process theorists (section 4.2.1). Finally, in section 4.2.2, I will explicate how understanding the manifestations of dispositions as processes solves the prevention problem. In chapter 2 we have come to the conclusion that the conditionalising analyses of dispositions ultimately fail because they give rise to explanation gaps and outlaw areas. Giving an analysis in terms of conditionals is not necessarily a reduction. However, the early conditional analyses have de facto been reductive analyses. It would be wrong to claim that the failure of the reductive analyses led to the rise of realist interpretations of dispositions, as the debate is not yet settled, but the problems they encountered at least motivated the search for alternative conceptions. So, in reaction to the trouble caused by the prevention problem, realist accounts of dispositions have been proposed. The reductionist pigeonholed themselves in the (neo-)humean tradition, as they wanted to do away with necessary connections in the world. In contrast, realists think of dispositions as real entities in the world. The emerging realist theories went explicitly beyond the humean constraints. Alexander Bird, for example, claimed that ‘[n]ecessarily if the potency is instantiated and receives its stimulus, then the manifestation will occur’ [Bird, 2007]. Or consider Stephen Mumford who writes: ‘properties are intimately connected with powers and have de re connections with other properties in virtue of those powers [. . . ] and the connection is, contrary to claims by the enemies of the dispositional, more than mere analytic necessity’ [Mumford, 1998, p. 166].

4.2 Processes |

113

According to these realist conceptions, necessary links between distinct entities exist, which is clearly a refusal of the humean ontology. However, just by means of enhancing the ontological tool box the prevention problem does not disappear. Bird’s own antidotes backfired on the realists, Markus Schrenk argues, and thus ‘metaphysical necessity can hardly be the driving force behind dispositional powers’ [Schrenk, 2010, p. 729]. The simple, yet powerful idea behind Schrenk’s critique is that the triggering of a disposition cannot with necessity lead to its manifestation because something can come in between.¹⁰ There is a reason why the prevention problem prevailed so long, plaguing realists as well as reductionists. Virtually everybody ¹¹ in the debate thinks about stimulus and manifestation as events, be that implicitly or explicitly, and following Hume, ‘all events seem entirely loose and separate.’ [Hume, 2011, p. 111]. Now, if the stimulus and the manifestation are separate events, there is in principle a possibility of interference. And as something can come in between the stimulus and the manifestation, the manifestation can be prevented. The dispositional realists explicitly go beyond the humean conception by accepting necessary connections between events. The Hume quote from above contains two distinct ideas, namely that events are ‘loose’ and that events are ‘separate’. By positing metaphysical necessity as the binding force between events, philosophers like Bird attacked the ‘loose’ part. The ‘separate’ part, however, remained untouched. Metaphysical necessity was thought to be the binding force between separate events. By accepting separate events, implicitly or explicitly, even the realist theories have still been under the spell of Humeanism.¹² Separation is the point of attack for interferences and so the prevention problem prevailed because separation prevailed.

10 I cannot go into the details of the realist accounts of dispositions here. Note, however, that the prevention problem has to be accounted for by every theory of dispositions and the diachronic masking cases are especially troublesome. Some realist theoreticians may not think that the prevention problem really is a ‘problem’ (Mumford and Anjum, for example), but still the ‘[r]ecent literature on dispositions can be characterized helpfully, if imperfectly, as a continuing reaction to this family of counter-examples’ [Cross, 2012, p. 116]. 11 According to Matthew Tugby, the manifestation and the stimulus can temporally overlap. But he still thinks that triggering ‘states of affairs must be distinct from manifestation states of affairs.’ [Tugby, 2010, p. 337] and this allows for the possibility of prevention. 12 Jonathan Jacobs thinks that Humeanism has plagued the dispositions debate for too long. He also presents an alternative. ‘We philosophers have suffered under the burden of Hume for too long. It is time for us to return to our philosophical home in a metaphysics of substances and powers – the metaphysics of Aristotle, whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light’ [Jacobs, 2010, p. 246]. While, I think it is the yoke of the humeans, not of Hume, I agree that we have to break it

114 | 4 Progressing to Processes

The natural follow up question is whether it is possible to find an alternative to the humean ontology of events. In action theory, the idea came up that we should stop thinking about actions as events, but rather adopt a process ontology. I will review the process theory in the field of action theory in section 4.2.1 and then apply the findings to the debate about the prevention problem of dispositions in section 4.2.2.

4.2.1 Action and Process Event ontology was prevailing in action theory as nearly everybody followed Donald Davidson¹³ in that actions are events. According to Davidson, events are spatiotemporally individuated, i. e. two events are identical if they occupy the same space-time region (cf. [Lepore and McLaughlin, 1985, pp. 162–157]). From this point of view, the important question of ‘what distinguishes an action from a mere happening or occurrence’ [Wilson and Shpall, 2016] is captured by the causal history of the events. We can ignore the details, but roughly the events which are caused by an agent-involving mental state are the intentional actions. The view that actions are events was challenged by Michael Thompson. Thompson argued that intentional actions can be incomplete and that thus, the Davidsonian picture is inadequate. Consider the following simple example: (Lightning): Person s is on her way to the university. As s passes the bookshop, about half-way through, she is struck by lightning. On account of the fatality of her encounter with electricity, s never reaches the university. In this example there is no event of walking-to-the-university, because s has never reached the university, i. e. there is no space-time region containing s in the relevant circumstances. And as there is no event of walking-to-the-university, Davidson’s analysis of intentional action cannot be applied. He may be able to distinguish between different kinds of events, but without an event, the analysis is useless. The best we can come up with is an event of s walking to the bookshop, but this is insufficient to account for the phrase ‘s was walking to the university’. In linguistics, this phenomenon is well discussed in the context of the so-called imperfective paradox (cf. e. g. [Dowty, 1977]). From ‘s was walking’ we can conclude that ‘s has walked’, but in contrast, from ‘s was walking to the university’ we cannot conclude that ‘s has walked to the university’. No matter how short the time that s was actually walking, this is enough to make it true that s has walked, whereas 13 See, for example, [Davidson, 1963] and [Davidson, 1980].

4.2 Processes |

115

no matter how far s already came, as long as she has not reached her destination, there is in principle the possibility of interference (cf. [Thompson, 2008, p. 126]). We can never conclude that s has actually walked to the university while her action is still ongoing (the imperfective ‘is walking’); we could conclude that only if she already reached the university, but then she is not walking there any more. Exactly this progressive aspect of intentional agency cannot be captured by the Davidsonians, according to Thompson: There is thus something that Davidson’s doctrine of events or of things that happened is missing, namely, not to put too fine a point on it, the things that didn’t happen. That is, he forgets about the things that didn’t happen, but were happening. [Thompson, 2011, p. 205]

Thompson argues in favour of ongoing processes instead of static, completed events, as understanding intentional actions via processes helps to overcome the shortcomings of the Davidsonian account. I will sketch some features that intentional actions have, in order to get a better grasp on processes, before we apply this conception to the dispositions debate. The walking of s can become slower or faster, it can be interrupted, for example when she stops to buy a coffee, and several other things can happen, all of which do not threaten the identity of the walking-to-the-university process. That is to say, processes can change. Also, processes can overlap. There can be a process of baking a cake and a process of, say, singing at the same time and both actions can even be performed by the same person. This is all possible because processes, in contrast to events, are not individuated by the space-time region they occupy. And it is also due to this feature that processes can be stopped. Take, for example, the baking of a cake. The baker can interrupt the baking process when she receives an important call, the baking process can become slower when she phones while baking and it can be brought to an end if she gets an electric shock from the telephone. Even without the tasty end product, it its true that the electrocuted baker was baking a cake, i. e. that there was a process of cake-baking. Whether the process view really helps in the debate about action theory is of no concern here. I am only interested in the question whether processes can tame the diachronic prevention problem and, hence, in the next section, I will apply the idea of overpowering the humean limitations by adopting a process ontology in the dispositions debate.

4.2.2 Processes and the Prevention Problem The prevention problem is seemingly in tension with (D). In chapter 2 I have argued that the problematic cases cannot just be excluded and in section 4.1.1 I have shown

116 | 4 Progressing to Processes

that a reformulation of the trigger cannot, for systematic reasons, deal with all the problem cases; the prevention problem, thus, drives us towards a re-interpretation of the manifestation. Inspired by action theory, I propose understanding manifestations as ongoing processes. In order to see how this helps with the diachronic prevention cases, reconsider (D): (D) If object s has the disposition D, it displays M under circumstances C. The disposition of arsenic cannot just be death upon ingestion, as with the administering of dimercaprol, death can be prevented. The prevention problem, thus, seems to show that (D) cannot be upheld. But the phrase ‘displays M’ is imprecise: it can either refer to the end product (here: death) or the process leading to this end product (here: the process of poisoning).¹⁴ If we disambiguate between the two readings, (D) can be saved. The process reading of ‘displays M’ tames the diachronic prevention problem. Made explicit, (D) accordingly turns to (D∗), with M-ing as the progressive form of M indicating the process reading: (D∗ ) If object o has the disposition D, it is M-ing under circumstances C. The process reading helps with the prevention problem. The M-ing cannot be prevented, only the end result can. The imperfective paradox revealed that, as soon as a process started, there was a time where the corresponding object was M-ing. Take Bird’s example of an uranium pile: (Nuclear pile) A nuclear pile which is above critical mass has a disposition to chain-react catastrophically. However, the pile has attached to it a fail-safe mechanism. Heat and radiation sensors detect large increases in radioactivity and allow boron moderating rods to penetrate the pile and by absorbing the radiation to prevent the catastrophic chain-reaction. [Bird, 1998, p. 229]

In the (Nuclear pile) case the antidote is triggered by the increasing radiation. It is, thus, not only the case that the manifestation process was happening, i. e. the pile was M-ing, but also does the M-ing itself cause the antidote. The manifestation process is stopped by the boron rods before it reaches its catastrophic end result, but it was nevertheless ongoing. If we stick to the process reading, (D) can be saved. With the triggering, the manifestation process begins – it may be stopped soon afterwards, but it begins with the triggering.

14 This has a foothold in our linguistic praxis, as we sometimes name a disposition after the process. Fragility, for example, is the disposition to break, not to be broken.

4.2 Processes |

117

There may be a process that leads to the triggering, but the trigger itself is not extended in time. The spatio-temporal locations of the trigger and the manifestation process overlap in such a way that a) there is no part of the manifestation process located earlier than the trigger and b) there is no part of the trigger located earlier than the manifestation. The trigger must fulfil the following two conditions: ∀x(xPt → ¬∃y (yPm ∧ l(y) ≺ l(x)))

(Trigger-𝔻1 , 4.1)

∀x∀y(xPt ∧ yPm → l(x) ⪯ l(y))

(Trigger-𝔻2 , 4.2)

and

with the relations¹⁵ ϕPψ meaning that ϕ is a part of ψ and ψ ≺ ϕ meaning that ψ is earlier than ϕ or ψ ⪯ ϕ meaning that ψ is earlier than or at the same time as ϕ, as well as the function symbol l(ϕ) referring to the location of ϕ. (Trigger-𝔻1 ) ensures that there is no part of the manifestation process earlier than the trigger, while (Trigger-𝔻2 ) makes sure that the trigger is indeed only the initial segment¹⁶ of the manifestation process. Further, we might want to demand that the trigger is connected: ∀x∀y((xPt ∧ yPt) → ¬∃z (B(z, l(x), l(y)) ∧ ¬∃w (wPt ∧ l(w) = z))) (Trigger-𝔻c , 4.3) The three-place relation B(ϕ, ψ, χ) meaning that ϕ is located in between ψ and χ, that is on the geodaete connecting ψ and χ; while the variable w ranges over locations. (Trigger-𝔻c ) says that there are no locations between (the locations of) two parts of the trigger, which themselves are not locations of the trigger. It is important not to claim that there is nothing located between (the locations of) two parts of the trigger, which is not itself part of the trigger, as processes are not identified by their spatio-temporal location. Processes can overlap and in this case there can be something located between two (distinct) parts of the trigger that is not part of the trigger, namely the manifestation process. I hold that the triggering is the beginning of the manifestation process and, hence, there is no separation.¹⁷ The possibility of interference does not even exist

15 Written in ‘infix notation’ for a more convenient reading experience. See, e. g. [Barwise and Etchemendy, 2002, p. 23]. 16 There may be a process, i. e. a temporally extended entity, leading to the trigger, but the trigger itself is instantaneous. 17 I believe the trigger to be identical with the beginning of the manifestation process. The diachronic necessity is then reduced to synchronic identity. This is not important for the argument,

118 | 4 Progressing to Processes

in principle, and thus, the prevention problem is disarmed.¹⁸ If the triggering is the start of the manifestation process, then it is conceptually impossible that there should be a trigger without the manifestation. Those diachronic counterexamples¹⁹ which threaten (D) all follow the same pattern: A disposition is present, gets triggered, but the end result is prevented somehow or other. The process understanding reveals that, actually, there cannot be any counterexample to (D∗ ). All alleged counterexamples must fall into one of two categories (see figure 4.1). Either there is no manifestation (A) or there is an intervention with the manifestation (B). The prevention cases of (A) are harmless. It is no wonder that there is no manifestation when there is no disposition (A1) or no trigger (A2) – and of course it is also no problem if both are absent. Neither (A1) nor (A2) can be used to construct a counterexample. And the ‘problematic’ diachronic cases are harmless as well, if we carefully stick to understanding manifestations as processes. The manifestation process can be stopped (B1) or interacted with (B2), but in any case there is a manifestation process as soon as the disposition has been triggered. An example of (A1) is fink b , the finking case where the device renders the wire dead when it is about to be touched by a conductor. The device takes away the disposition and thus the manifestation is prevented. (A2) is exemplified by the bubbled-wrapped glass cup case. Bubble-wrapping the glass cup does not take away the cup’s fragility, but inhibits its triggering. The (Breaking Bad) case belongs to category (B1), as the antidote cuts off the poison’s unfolding manifestation process. Finally, Millikan’s oil drop experiment is a (B2) case. The electric field neither takes away the gravitational disposition nor ends the gravitational attracting process. Both attraction processes interact and thus bring about the resultant behaviour. These are only showcase examples, but the taxonomy tree is complete. Some cases might be hard to categorise but it is a conceptual truth that either the manifestation process does not start at all, or it starts. Finding the mechanisms how

however. It is sufficient that the time point of triggering is identical to the first moment of the manifestation process. 18 Markus Schrenk pointed out in personal communication that Martin [Martin, 2007, p. 51] believes that the coming together of two reciprocal manifestation partners (i. e. what he believes triggering consists in) is identical to their mutual manifestation. However, as Tugby [Tugby, 2010, p. 337] argues, triggering and manifestation cannot be identical in this way precisely because masking cases show that manifestations can be prevented even though manifestation partners have come together. In contrast, I hold that the triggering is only identical to the start of the manifestation process. 19 As has been said, the analysis is limited to the cases of counterexamples which also pose a problem for the dispositional realist.

4.2 Processes |

119

prevention cases

(A)

(B)

no manifestation

intervention on manifestation

(A1)

(A2)

(B1)

(B2)

no disposition

no trigger

process stops

process interaction

Fig. 4.1: Taxonomy of prevention cases

a concrete case works is a job for science, not philosophy. The taxonomy tree constitutes the pigeon holes, the scientist finds out which pigeon we are dealing with. The taxonomy tree is not mutually exclusive, as there are cases where neither the trigger nor the disposition is present, and which thus fall under (A1) and (A2). On top of that, (B1) and (B2) correspond to two kinds of partial manifestations: temporal and degree. The manifestation is temporally partial if the process is stopped before it reaches its end result, and a manifestation is partial in degree if the manifestation process is interacted with in such a way that the resultant behaviour is of a lesser degree than in the ideal case (think of Hüttmann’s CMD’s). A manifestation process which is first hampered and then stopped, i. e. when the manifestation is partial temporally and in degree, shows that the categories (B1) and (B2) are also not mutually exclusive. All purported counterexamples have their place in the taxonomy, even if it might be hard to decide with some individual cases. Understanding disposition manifestations as processes is not only the key to dismantling all current counterexamples, but ensures that, no matter how sophisticated future examples will be, they will never again be able to harm (D∗ ). According to Troy Cross ([Cross, 2012, p. 121]) the ultimate goal of the dispositions debate is to find an analysis of dispositions that is counterexample free and at the same time conditional-friendly. I have tried to show how the process

120 | 4 Progressing to Processes

understanding of manifestations avoids the prevention problem and if this was successful, the process account is indeed counterexample-free. My account explicitly is realist, accepting dispositions and processes as ontological entities of integrity, so it is not a reductive analysis. But it is still conditional-friendly, since by disambiguating that manifestations are processes, we can stick to (D∗ ) that to have a disposition is to show the corresponding manifestation when triggered. The pre-theoretic ‘conceptual connection between a statement attributing a disposition to an item and a particular conditional’ [Prior, 1985, p. 5] can be accounted for by the process understanding – the consequent of the conditional representing (or including) the manifestation process. In a way, the problem of the conditional accounts was not the relation but the relata.

4.2.3 A Dynamic Disposition Ontology This section sketches a way to bring together the dynamical aspects of disposition manifestation, which we have just discussed, and the triadic ontology, introduced in chapter 3. There are three levels – dispositions, Wirkungen and resultant behaviour – according to the triadic picture. The dispositions bring about their Wirkungen when triggered, and these bring about the resultant behaviour by interacting via combination rules, which are built-in into the dispositions. To avoid terminological misgivings, I have distinguished between manifestations1 and manifestations2 corresponding respectively to Wirkungen and resultant behaviour. Manifestations1 are stable, while manifestations2 are highly various, depending on the interactions with the other manifestations1 around. The first thing to do in order to bring together the triadic picture with the process account, is to talk about ‘resultant behaviour’ instead of ‘end result’ in the process cases. This is per se important, as there are a lot of processes which do not have an end result. All stability processes belong to this category, but there are other examples as well. Imagine two particles who are thus charged that the repulsion due to their charge is greater than the attraction due to their mass. They will be repelling each other without an obvious end result, but still there is a resulting behaviour, i. e. they are moving apart. Some processes have an end result, some do not. The diachronic masking cases have shown that end results can be prevented. However, this does not lead to any counterexamples on the process picture. As soon as there is a trigger, there is the manifestation process. Although a specific behaviour can be prevented, it cannot be prevented that something happens. Reconsider Millikan’s oil drop experiment. One might think that the gravitational field has the disposition to make the oil drop move downwards and that the interference of the electrical field constitutes

4.2 Processes |

121

a counterexample, as the oil drop is not moving downwards. In contrast to this, we now can see that Millikan’s oil drop experiment is a perfectly normal case. The oil drop does not move, just because both the gravitational disposition and the electromagnetic disposition are manifesting. The two ongoing attraction processes explain why the oil drop remains stationary. Processes can lead to stability just as much as to change. The resultant behaviour can be ‘no movement’ like in the Millikan equilibrium case, still, there is a manifestation2 . The ongoing stasis is a result of the interaction of the two ongoing processes. Compare this to John Heil’s famous example of the two playing cards: You take two playing cards and prop them up against one another so they stand upright on the table. [. . . ] The cards’ remaining upright is a continuous mutual manifestation of reciprocal powers possessed by the cards and the table. [. . . ] Stability requires massive cooperation, the mutual manifestation of countless reciprocal powers to hold things together, to preserve the status quo. Their holding together is an outcome, but one that temporally coincides with their manifesting themselves as they do. [Heil, 2012, p. 119].

John Heil also comes to the conclusion that manifestations are not prevented. Quite contrary, a lot has to happen to keep the status quo upright. The triadic process account can easily caputre these cases. As processes are not individuated by the space-time region they occupy, they can easily overlap; furthermore as processes interact, they can in concordance bring about the resultant behaviour. Once the metaphysical origin is elucidated, the resultant stability case is on a par with the resultant change case (and both are distinguished from the no-influence and hence no-change case). It is an advantage of the process view that it can naturally account for stability cases.²⁰ Re-introducing the differentiation between manifestations1 and manifestations2 , we have to ask which level the processes are at: the level of Wirkungen or the level of resultant behaviour. I think that we need processes on both levels. Ongoing interactions of manifestation1 processes lead to resultant manifestations2 processes.²¹ Consider the Millikan case. Here, the gravitational force does not pull the oil drop for only one moment, but rather there is an ongoing attraction process. This gravitational attraction process interacts with the electrical attraction process. Both processes are ongoing over time and the resultant behaviour is either a movement process or a stasis process, depending on the value of F e .

20 Some authors (e. g. [Ducasse, 1926] [Lombard, 1979]) claim that events essentially involve change. A conception like this has a hard time to account for the cases where stability is brought about by ‘massive cooperation’. 21 If this specific way to combine the triadic part with the process part of my ontology fails, this does not concern me much. The parts, so to say, do not fall with whole.

122 | 4 Progressing to Processes

Of course, a lot more has to be said on how processes interact, but the general idea should have become clear. If triggered²², dispositions unfold their manifestation1 processes, whose interaction rules are already built-in into the dispositions and who in concordance bring about the resultant behaviour manifestation2 processes.

22 Although I use ‘trigger’ talk, nothing hinges on this. Talking about the ‘coming together of mutual manifestation partners’ is equally fine in the process view.

5 Dispositional Laws of Nature Let us now return to the debate about laws of nature. The last two chapters have been devoted to the developement of the triadic process account of dispositions (TPD). In chapter 3 I have argued that in order to tame the synchronic prevention problem, we need a triadic ontology consisting of 1) dispositions, 2) Wirkungen, and 3) resultant behaviour. As to the diachronic cases, we need to include ongoing processes in our ontology (chapter 4). In accordance with my general methodology of being as agnostic as possible, I will re-examine the criteria of laws of nature from chapter 1 and see if and how the (TPD) can account for them, instead of trying to build a detailed ontology of dispositional laws of nature.

5.1 The Triadic Process Account and the Law Characteristics We started our discussion of laws of nature with a list of alleged characteristics of laws of nature as given by Andreas Hüttemann [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 139]. A good theory of laws of nature should be able to account for those, or at least to explain why they seem plausible. The criteria that have been introduced in chapter 1 are: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

6. 7.

truth objectivity contingency necessity universality (a) universalityI : for all regions of space-time (b) universalityII : for all systems (c) universalityIII : under all circumstances (d) universalityIV : for all values of variables grounding counterfactuals role in science: explanation, prediction, etc.

For most of the characteristics, I will quickly sketch how the (TPD) relates to them. However, the main part of the chapter is dedicated to natural necessity, as section 1.2.1 concluded with the claim that natural necessity is the ‘holy grail’ of the debate about laws of nature (cf. [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 153]). Accordingly, I will discuss natural necessity in extenso. But first, let us start with the application of the (TPD) to the other characteristics.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-131

124 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature

5.1.1 Truth We have stated that clearly false sentences like ‘all charged particles turn into unicorns’ are no good candidates for laws of nature, and hence, law statements LoN S should be true. Now, the (TPD) is concerned with laws of nature as real entities LoN E and thus ‘truth’ cannot directly be a criterion for the (TPD). We have discussed the related criterion of the facticity of the laws of nature: If we think that the facts described by a law obtain, or at least that the facts which obtain are sufficiently like those described in the law, we count the law true, or true-for-the-nonce, until further facts are discovered. [Cartwright, 1980, p. 865]

This explains in which way truth relates to the (TPD)-understanding of laws of nature. Roughly, the LoN E are the facts which are described by the LoN S and thus, some LoN S is true if it corresponds¹ to the LoN E facts. Nancy Cartwright has put forth a powerful objection to the facticity view of the laws of nature. Cartwright argues that laws of nature ‘cannot literally be true, for the consequences which would occur if it acted alone are not the consequences which actually occur when it acts in combination’ [Cartwright, 1983, p. 72]. This charge applies to all approaches which want to accommodate the ‘truth’ requirement in their theory of laws of nature. The (TPD) can handle Cartwright’s objection by differentiating between Wirkungen and resultant behaviour. The Wirkungen occuring in the ideal case are the same as in the combination case. So, if we take LoN S to ascribe (TPD)dispositions, they can literally be true. Following the (TPD), for example Newton’s Law of Gravitation ascribes the disposition to bring about Wirkungen according to F g = G m1r2m2 to bodies. These F g = G m1r2m2 -Wirkungen are the same both in the single and in the combination case. As we have argued in chapter 3, the resultant behaviour is not the force acting, not even in the single case. So, the actings of the laws as LoN E are never directly the resulting behaviour. The LoN S can hence not be true if they are understood to be about the behaviour (only²), but they can be true if they are taken to ascribe (TPD)-dispositions. Cartwright admits that a law can be made true by adding a ceteris paribus clause, but then ‘it is not a very useful law’ [Cartwright, 1980, p. 868]. The (TPD)

1 I cannot go into the thorny debate about ‘truth’ here, so I stay agnostic about whether the correspondence theory of truth is correct. 2 I write ‘only’, because the (TPD) also accounts for the behaviour of objects and systems. But, it is not limited to the behaviour.

5.1 The Triadic Process Account and the Law Characteristics |

125

laws of nature are not of this kind: they are not true because of their uselessness, but have explanatory power (see chapter 3).

5.1.2 Objectivity The criterion of ‘objectivity’ is easily meet by the (TPD), as the dispositions an object has are independent of our beliefs and opinions. Science exists in order to find out about the (LoNE ), not in order to make them up. According to the (TPD), the dispositions of objects are discovered and not invented. One advantage of the (TPD) is that it can make sense of the fact that equilibrium cases are as good for discovering LoN E as any other cases (see chapter 3). For practical purposes it may be good to have an equilibrium case, or to avoid such a case – ontologically, they are on a par.

5.1.3 Universality Universality may appear to be the most problematic requirement for the (TPD) view. The locality of the dispositional accounts of laws of nature, including (TPD), prima facie seems contrary to the spirit of ‘universality’.³ However, the (TPD) can account for all four kinds of universality distinguished by Hüttemann (cf. [Hüttemann, 2007, pp. 139–141]). UniversalityI : for all regions of space-time According to the (TPD), the LoN E are universalI as there are no outlaw areas. The main problem of conditionalising attempts was that they tried to amend their account of dispositions by excluding problematic cases like masks and finks (cf. 2.11). In contrast, the triadic picture does not exclude problematic cases, but rather embraces them. Thus, there are no regions of space-time which are not covered by the (TPD). UniversalityII : for all systems According to the (TPD), the law of nature statements LoN S ascribe dispositions to objects or systems. Understood in the triadic way, it does not matter whether these systems act in isolation or not. Hence, the laws hold for all systems.

3 Stephen Mumford refers to the idea that LoN E are general, which is at odds with the locality of dispositions, in the context of the generality problem, as he calls it (cf. [Mumford, 1998, pp. 232–236]). This problem goes back to Nicholas Everitt [Everitt, 1991]. Due to spatial constraints, I cannot discuss it here, albeit I am convinced that (TPD) offers a solution to the generality problem.

126 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature

UniversalityIII : under all circumstances The criterion of universalityIII is the showcase application of the (TPD). The gravitational disposition applies a Wirkung F g = G m1r2m2 to Millikan’s oil drop, no matter the contribution of the electrical disposition following k e q1r2q2 . There are no problematic circumstances to be excluded by a ceteris paribus clause: Whether the electrical field is turned off or on, and which value it has if turned on – none of these cases challenges the (TPD). The laws of nature LoN E cover all circumstances. UniversalityIV : for all values of variables The (TPD) is concerned with LoN E , not LoN S , so this requirement does not really apply. Still, since the functions f and f a (or the respective principles like vector addition) are envisaged to be complete, they cover every possible combination. Likewise, a law of nature statement LoN S has to cover all variables. The Wien approximation and the Rayleigh-Jeans law (cf. section 1.2.1.5) may be useful in a small area of applications, but they do not really correspond to the dispositions involved in bringing black body radiation about. UniversalityIV may, thus, be a good guide to the LoN E .

5.1.4 Grounding Counterfactuals Dispositional theories want to spell out the special relationship between laws of nature and counterfactuals. They aim to do so by giving a dispositional semantics for counterfactuals.⁴ Brian Ellis [Ellis, 1979] states the truth conditions⁵ for counterfactuals of the form ‘if A were the case, then B would be the case’ via circumstances. B has to hold in circumstances that are as near as possible to those that actually obtain.⁶ His essentialist semantics for counterfactual conditionals (ESCC) can be captured like this: (ESCC) Φ € Ψ is true if in any world of the same natural kinds as ours in which Φ is true, in circumstances as near as possible to those that actually obtain, Ψ must also be true.

4 See for example [Ellis, 2001, p. 282] and [Handfield, 2004]. Criticism can be found in [Eagle, 2009]. 5 This is not entirely accurate, but we cannot go into the details here as they depend too much on Ellis’ other work. Roughly, he argues for assertability conditions rather than truth conditions and thus provides the semantics for counterfactuals as assertability conditions. 6 Ellis adds the further proviso that the world needs to have the same natural kinds as ours.

5.1 The Triadic Process Account and the Law Characteristics |

127

John Bigelow criticises Ellis’ dispositionalist semantics in his brilliantly named Scientific Ellisianism [Bigelow, 1999]. He argues that a lot of conditionals that actually should be informative, instead will be vacuously true on Ellis’ account. One special class of such seemingly substantive counterfactuals which are depicted as being vacuous by the (ESCC) are counterlegal conditionals. Toby Handfield argues in his Counterlegals and Necessary Laws [Handfield, 2004, p. 402] that all, as he calls them, ‘necessitarian accounts of the laws of nature’, get into trouble when faced with counterfactuals like ‘If bodies behaved according to the inverse square law F g = G m1r2m2 , then they would turn into unicorns’. He suggests an amendment in the form of (CouLe): (CouLe) ‘If it turns out that the laws of nature are contingent, then if the laws had been otherwise, then such and such would have been the case.’ The (TPD) is a necessitarian account of the laws of nature. But, contrary to Ellis, the laws are naturally necessary (section 5.2) while being metaphysically contingent. A strategy like (CouLe) can thus be easily be integrated into (TPD). I will also present a dispositional account of possibility (section 5.2) as an alternative to Lewis’ possible world semantics. A (TPD) semantics for counterfactuals would have to be based on this understanding. Of course, I cannot provide a detailed account here, but the general idea is close to the truth maker view developed by John Heil and C. B. Martin [Martin and Heil, 1999]. They hold that the dispositional properties are the truth makers for the counterfactuals, which describe what objects can do ‘in the various circumstances they might find themselves in’ [Jacobs, 2010, p. 241].

5.1.5 Role in Science According to Carnap, laws are used to explain facts already known, and predict facts not yet known (cf. [Carnap and Gardner, 1966, p. 6]). This is the main role they play in science. As we have seen in section 3.3.2, (TPD)-dispositions are capable of explaining and predicting. Reconsider the Millikan case: Actually prediction was never a problem. Everybody expected the oil drop to fall slower with the plate condenser turned on. And, with careful measurements, the actual falling speed (or rising speed, or the equilibrium case) can be predicted accurately. The question was how to account for the case. In section 3.3, I have laid down meticulously how the Millikan case has to be understood according to the triadic picture.

128 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature

The same holds true for explanation. Following the (TPD), dispositions cover the ideal as well as as the interaction cases and, hence, no explanation gaps (see section 2.11) arise. Of course, all of these are only sketches of approaches to the respective features of the laws of nature. But the (TPD) is more than just a vague gesture at dispositions made in the hope that a dispositional theory yet to be built may deliver the means of accounting for the alleged characteristics of the laws of nature. With the (TPD), we have an ontology of dispositions that not only does not fall prey to the notorious prevention cases, but can even deal with the especially vicious diachronic masks. Thus, it constitutes a robust foundation for accounts of the mentioned characteristics of laws of nature, i. e. truth, objectivity, universality, grounding counterfactuals and their role in science.

5.2 Necessity This section concerns the most notorious feature of laws of nature, their modal status. The notion of nomic or natural necessity is so problematic because it combines two seemingly opposing criteria: laws of nature are supposed to be both contingent and necessary at the same time. Andreas Hüttemann [Hüttemann, 2007, p. 153] correctly considered the need to account for natural necessity to be the main problem of the debate about laws of nature. As we have seen in chapter 1, the different theories about laws of nature have a hard time making sense of this characteristic. It is neither convincing to reduce natural necessity to the integration into theories, as lawhood precedes integration, nor to simply postulate natural necessity without making the postulate plausible. Nevertheless, the natural necessity of the laws of nature has to be accounted for as it is essential to philosophy of science. Thomas Müller⁷ puts it this way⁸: For philosophy of science, however, a notion of physical possibility seems to play an even more important role. Physical possibility is often taken to be what laws of nature express, and

7 Müller himself argues for yet another kind of necessity. ‘My conviction is that physical possibility is not fundamental, and that a fruitful explanation of the use of possibility in philosophy of science needs to refer to a different notion of possibility: real possibility, also known as historical possibility because of its link with temporality’ [Müller, 2010, p. 210]. Due to spatial constraints, I cannot go into the notion of real possibility here, although I think it can be linked with my account of dispositions. 8 I prefer to talk about nomic or natural necessity, rather than physical necessity. See section 1.2.1.3.

5.2 Necessity |

129

insofar as science is a quest for the laws of nature, science is really about physical possibility. [Müller, 2010, p. 210]

Roughly, dispositional realists want to analyse natural modality via reference to dispositions. As dispositions themselves are modal properties⁹, this analysis cannot be understood as a full reduction of natural modality. Nevertheless, it can be seen as a partial reduction since, if the dispositional realists’ project is successful, natural necessity is reduced to a more basic subclass of modality (cf. [Pruss, 2002, p. 330]). Analyses of modality in terms of dispositions can be found in the work of Alexander Bird, Andrea Borghini, Jonathan Jacobs, Jennifer McKitrick, Alexander Pruss, Barbara Vetter, and Neil Williams.¹⁰ These ontological projects are aptly called ‘dispositions-first ontology’ [Cross, 2012, p. 116] by Troy Cross. This is because they include dispositions in their basic ontology, and then try to reduce other philosophical notions like causation, necessity, possibility or counterfactuals, to dispositions. Generally, the take of the dispositions-first ontologists on possibility is that something is possible if it corresponds to actual dispositions.¹¹ Pruss, for example, describes possibility in the following way: ‘A non-actual state of affairs is possible if there actually was a substance capable of initiating a causal chain, perhaps non-deterministic, that could lead to the state of affairs that we claim is possible’ [Pruss, 2002, p. 329]. So, following Pruss, there needs to be a substance¹² with the corresponding dispositions – or as he says, capacities – to initiate the relevant causal chain in order for the result of this chain to be possible. Jacobs presents a similar analysis. His example is the possibility of being a truck driver: ‘[b]ecause of the properties I have, and my powers, capacities, or dispositions, I could have initiated a chain of events leading to my actually driving a truck’ [Jacobs, 2010, p. 233]. For Jacobs, possibility is thus reduced to actual dispositions,

9 See section 1.2.2.3. Dispositions transcend the humean limitations on ontology inter alia by bringing modal connections to the world. 10 See [Bird, 2005], [Borghini and Williams, 2008], [Jacobs, 2010], [McKitrick, 2010], [Pruss, 2002] and [Vetter, 2015]. Critique on the overall project of reducing modality to dispositions – or better, a challenge to anyone engaging in this project – is voiced by Siegfried Jaag in [Jaag, 2014]. 11 The dispositional accounts of modality can thus be called actualistic. ‘Modal actualism’ means that all modality is part of the fabric of reality, i. e. the actual world. (cf. [Jacobs, 2010, p. 233]). 12 His talk of substances gives away that he is an (neo-)Aristotelian. If you are for some reason appalled by Aristotleianism, you can substitute something like ‘object’ or ‘bundle of dispositions’ for ‘substance’.

130 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature

as well.¹³ Williams and Borghini nicely condense the dispositions-first ontologists account of possibility (DOP): ‘If the world contains some disposition such that its manifestation is the state of affairs S, then S is possible’ [Borghini and Williams, 2008, p.26]. Take S to denote a state of affairs, and the function symbol M(α) to refer to the manifestation of α; finally D is a disposition. (DOP) ✸S iff ∃D (M(D) = S)¹⁴ (DOP) can also be formulated about objects, if you believe that dispositions are had by objects, which I take to be the majority view. Once, again I do not want to presuppose that dispositions need bearers, that is why I have offered (DOP), but I also do not want to presuppose that dispositions can not have bearers, and this is I why I offer (DOPo ): (DOPo ) ✸S iff ∃x (D(x) ∧ (M(D) = S)) (DOPo ) states that some state of affairs S is possible if there is an object, which has the disposition, whose manifestations is the quested state of affairs S. Of course, (DOPo ) is still just a template, which can be customized to fit the details of different philosophical accounts. For example, if one believes that the manifestations are not themselves states of affairs but rather that a certain state of affairs is the result of the manifestation of a disposition or, even more accurate, that the obtaining of that state is the result of the manifestation, then this can also be incorporated. Take the function symbol O(α) to denote the obtaining of α and the two-place relation R(α, β) which says, that β is the result of α. (DOPn ) ✸S iff ∃D R(M(D), O(S))

13 Note that in both analyses some kind of chain plays an important role. Pruss speaks of a ‘causal chain’ and Jacobs of a ‘chain of events’. I will not go into this here, but I think this separated picture does not work, having to do with the reasons given in chapter 4. Initiating a causal chain is not enough to render the result possible. As we have seen, the end result can be prevented. Now, consider if this prevention itself is necessary – a necessary mask, if you will. In this case, the result of the chain is not possible although there actually is a disposition to initiate this chain. 14 Is the existence of the corresponding stimulus Σ necessary in order for Φ to be possible, or is it enough if there is a disposition which has Φ as its manifestation? Consider a disposition that requires more energy than is available in the whole universe. Would you deem the manifestation of this disposition possible? See [Vetter, 2015, p. 250] for a discussion of unmanifastbale dispositions.

5.2 Necessity |

131

According to (DOPn ) a state of affairs S is possible if and only if there is a disposition such that the result of its manifestation is the obtaining of S. (DOPo ) can also be amended accordingly to give (DOPo,n ): (DOPo,n ) ✸S iff ∃x (D(x) ∧ R(M(D), O(S))) Necessity is typically conceived as the dual of possibility.¹⁵ Hence, something is necessary if and only if it is not possible that it is not the case: □Φ iff ¬✸¬Φ. Correspondingly, something Φ is necessary if there actually are no dispositions to initiate a causal chain leading to ¬Φ. Parallel to (DOP) we can formulate the dispositions-first ontologists account of necessity (DON): (DON) ✷Φ iff ¬∃D (M(D) = ¬S) According to (DON), a state of affairs S is necessary if there is no disposition, whose manifestation is not-S. This conception of necessity is initially plausible: If there is nothing with the power to cause ¬Φ, then Φ is necessary. Necessity is understood as inevitability. (DON), just like (DOP), is a template to be suited to fit different philosophical accounts. For example will it depend largely on the specific account of state of affairs how ¬S has to be fleshed out. The manifestation of a specific disposition has to be incompatible in some sense with the obtaining of S. Hence, with the two-place relation I(α, β) which states that α and β are incompatible we can upgrade (DON) to (DONi ): (DONi ) ✷Φ iff ¬∃D (I(M(D) = O(S))) And of course also (DONi ) can be formulated about the objects, which are the bearers of the dispositions: (DONi,o ) ✷Φ iff ¬∃x (D(x) ∧ I(M(D) = O(S))) Now, we have to apply this general idea to our subject at hand, the laws of nature. Following the conception of disposition-first ontologists, the laws are necessary because no entity has the power to break them. Nothing has a disposition to initiate a counterlegal causal chain and thus, the laws of nature are necessary.¹⁶

15 Cf. for example, [Garson, 2006, p. 20]. 16 In section 1.2.1.4 we have distinguished between necessity bestowed and necessity inherited. It is a different questions whether the laws of nature themselves are necessary, or whether what follows from these laws that is necessary. So, for example, one may hold that the lawhood of ‘all ravens are black’ is contingent, but that – given ‘all ravens are black’ is a law – ravenhood

132 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature

Everything which is possible, and, by that, everything which actually happens, is in accordance with the laws of nature. As initially plausible as this idea sounds, we have to be careful how to flesh it out. First of all, the defenders of the dispositions-first ontology do not account for combination rules. It is not the case that they do not see that combination is important. Quite the contrary. Jacobs, for example, admits that ‘[t]ypically, it will be a property complex or collection of properties’ [Jacobs, 2010, p. 236] which bring about the germane state of affairs. And in his characterisation of possibility he even explicitly speaks of jointly exercising: ‘If they are capable of jointly exercising their powers in such a way that would bring about A, then A is possible’ [Jacobs, 2010, p. 236]. At this point, the question of what ‘jointly’ is supposed to mean suggests itself. However, Jacobs does not give an account of how objects jointly exercise their powers. To be sure, I do not think that it is wrong what Jacobs claims, it is just not sufficient. We need to explicate the interactions of dispositions and I will argue in section 5.2.3 that the triadic account of dispositions is up for the task. There is a second more troublesome worry for dispositional accounts of modality. This worry concerns the kind of the resulting necessity, especially in the context of laws of nature. Roughly, the dispositional realists¹⁷ have used a too strong kind of necessity in their account of laws of nature and because of that, the dispositional essentialists’ own counterexamples can be used against them. Dispositionalists take the laws to be metaphysical necessary [Cross, 2012, p. 117] and this is the wrong kind of necessity, I will argue. To do so, I will first present Bird’s account of the necessity of laws of nature (section 5.2.1) and Schrenk’s powerful objection against it. Although I agree with Schrenk that metaphysical necessity is not feasible, I object to the general claim that all necessity is ‘powerless’. Following Kit Fine’s considerations (section 5.2.2), metaphysical necessity was the wrong kind of necessity to begin with. Taking this into consideration, I will then develop an account (section 5.2.3) of necessity which is based on the (TPD). The resulting necessity will be natural necessity and not metaphysical necessity.

5.2.1 Bird’s Necessary Laws In this section, Bird’s take on the necessity of laws of nature will be depicted. Bird not only thinks that his position, dispositional essentialism, is compatible with laws of nature, but that the laws can be derived from the central claims of

necessitates blackness. Thus, in fleshing out an account of the ‘necessity of the laws of nature’, one has to be careful to keep these notions apart. 17 For example Alexander Bird [Bird, 2005] and Jennifer McKitrick [McKitrick, 2010].

5.2 Necessity |

133

the essentialist.¹⁸ We cannot go into the details of Bird’s account here, but his Nature’s Metaphysics: Laws and Properties [Bird, 2007] is an accessible, yet concise introduction to dispositional essentialism. The important thing to note is that he concludes that the laws of nature are metaphysically necessary. Bird’s derivation of the laws starts from two premisses – 1) a version of the simple counterfactual analyses and 2) a central claim of dispositional essentialism. So, first remember the simple counterfactual conditional analysis (SCCA) introduced in section 2.5. The (SCCA) states that an object x has the disposition D(x) just in the case it would respond with manifestation M if it was under stimulus condition C.¹⁹ (SCCA) D(x) ↔ (C(x) € M(x)) Bird thinks that (SCCA) holds with necessity²⁰, and accordingly takes (SCCA□ ) as the first premiss of his derivation. (SCCA□ ) □(D(x) ↔ (C(x) € M(x))) Bird’s second premiss stems from his essentialism. According to him, properties are essentially dispositional and thus ‘have the same dispositional character in all possible worlds’ [Bird, 2007, p. 45]. So, if an object has an essentially dispositional property P, which Bird calls a potency (cf. [Bird, 2007, p. 45]), then it necessarily has the corresponding disposition D: (DEP ) □(P(x) → D(x)) The implication also holds in the other direction, according to Bird, because the ‘individuation of potencies is to be given by their dispositional powers’ [Bird, 2007, p. 46]. Hence, (DEP ) can be strengthened to (DEP *).

18 It is interesting that Stephen Mumford and Bird start of with a similar dispositional ontology, but then hold extremly opposite views regarding laws of nature. Mumford advocates a view called realist lawlessness, i. e. ‘realism about necessary connections but not about laws’ [Mumford, 2004, p. xv], in his Laws in Nature. He thinks that an ontology of dispositions does not leave room for laws of nature while Bird holds that the laws can be derived thereof. 19 Bird [Bird, 2007, p. 43] calls this the conditional analysis (CA), probably in regard to the plain insufficiency of the (SCA). 20 One reason why this would be the case is that dispositional statements are analytically true and if (SCCA) ‘is true, it is plausible that it is analytically true’ [Bird, 2007, p. 44]. Bird leaves the possibility open that there are other reasons for its necessity, so that, even if one is not concerned with disposition statements but rather with dispositions, one could take the (SCCA) to be necessary.

134 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature (DEP *) □(P(x) ↔ D(x)) From (DEP ) and (SCCA□ ) you get (I).²¹ (I) □(P(x) → (C(x) € M(x))) Take any world w and case which contains some x which possesses the potency P and is in the stimulus conditions C: (II) P(x) ∧ C(x) From (I) and (II) together we get (III). (III) M(x) Now we can introduce a conditional → by discharging the condition (II): (IV) (P(x) ∧ C(x)) → M(x) From the fact that x was chosen arbitrarily, we generalize (IV) to (V). (V) ∀x(P(x) ∧ C(x)) → M(x) Bird holds that (V) is a law of nature²², and reasons that the necessity of (CA□ ) is transferred to the derived laws. Thus, ‘the laws of nature are, according to the dispositional essentialist view, metaphysically necessary’ [Bird, 2007, p. 46]. However, Markus Schrenk [Schrenk, 2010] has spotted a problem for Bird’s view. This objection applies to all forms of, as he calls it, necessitarian dispositionalism, not only Bird’s²³, though ironically, it is Bird’s own counterexample that causes trouble for the necessitarian dispositionalists if Schrenk’s argumentation is correct. Consider Bird’s description of a literal antidote: ‘one can ingest a lethal dose of poison, yet not die if a suitable antidote is administered soon enough’ [Bird, 1998, p. 228]. Bird uses the antidote case as a counterexample against reductive analysis of

21 Note that you do not need (DEP *) for Bird’s derivation. (DEP ) is sufficient. 22 Following Bird, as all we have used for the derivation of (V) was (DEP ) and (CA□ ), ‘we have explained the truth of a generalization on the basis of the dispositional essence of a property’ [Bird, 2007, p. 46]. Furthermore, he holds that (V) is a nomic generalisation, i. e. it represents a law of nature. 23 Bird is among the main representatives, if not the most prominent champion of necessitarian dispositionalism.

5.2 Necessity |

135

dispositions. As seen in chapter 2, counterfactual analyses of dispositions indeed have a hard time accounting for antidote cases. Take the (SCCA) applied to the poison case: (SCCA)Po ∀x(P(x) ↔ (I(x) € D(x))) with D for ‘death’ and I for ‘ingestion’²⁴. Bird argues that the poison’s disposition P(x) cannot be reduced to I(x) € D(x), since in the antidote case, I would happen without D. Schrenk now takes this observation to use it against the necessitarian dispositionalists. He claims that ‘if this counterexample works then it shows en passant that metaphysical necessity can hardly be the driving force behind dispositional powers’ [Schrenk, 2010, p. 729]. Necessitarian dispositionalists argue against counterfactual analysis like the (SCCA), and, as we have seen, their critique is justified. Yet, and this is the center of Schrenk’s critique, they posit the stronger (NEC): (NEC) □M (C(x) → M(x)) Following Schrenk, one cannot criticise counterfactual analyses à la (SCCA) and simultaneously endorse (NEC), because ‘metaphysical necessity is, as much as logical necessity, modally too strong. It does not have the variable strictness counterfactual conditionals allow for’ [Schrenk, 2010, p. 732]. Counterfactuals show variability²⁵, so it is perfectly consistent that the addition of another antecedence condition changes the truth value of the consequent: Co1 C(x) € M(x) Co2 (C(x) ∧ D(x)) € ¬M(x) Co3 (C(x) ∧ D(x) ∧ F(x)) € M(x) .. . Take A for ‘the administering of the antidote’. Transferred to the antidote example, we get that ‘If the poison was ingested, it would lead to death’ I(x) € D(x) , while ‘If the poison was ingested and the corresponding antidote administered, it would

24 Or some suitable description of the stimulus and response of the poison’s disposition (cf. section 4.1.1). 25 The variability of counterfactuals is already noted in David Lewis’ classical Counterfactuals [Lewis, 1973, pp. 10–19].

136 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature not lead to death’ (I(x) ∧ A(x)) € ¬D(x). And ‘[w]ith a little ingenuity, it seems possible to prolong such a sequence indefinitely’ [Lewis, 1973, p. 10].²⁶ In contrast to counterfactuals, necessity is monotonic. So adding antecedent conditions can never change the truth value of the consequent. As it is, if C(x) is sufficient for M(x), then adding D(x) (and further antecedent conditions like F(x) . . . ) can never render M(x) false. The following sequence is not consistent: Ne1 □M (C(x) → M(x)) Ne2 □M ((C(x) ∧ D(x)) → ¬M(x)) Ne3 □M ((C(x) ∧ D(x) ∧ F(x)) → M(x)) .. . In accordance with the title of his paper, Schrenk infers the Powerlessness of Necessity: ‘As strong as necessity might be once it applies, it has no power as long as C is not a pure, uninterfered-with-C’ [Schrenk, 2010, p. 733]. Bird’s own counterexample shows that the necessitarian dispositionalism, which he himself endorses, is not feasible. Thus, following Schrenk, □M is not acceptable as the link between a triggered disposition and its manifestation. But, if Kit Fine’s considerations from The Varieties of Necessity [Fine, 2005] are correct, the failure of metaphysical necessity does not come as a surprise. Metaphysical necessity was ab initio the wrong kind of necessity. The necessitarian dispositionalists were seduced by ‘Kripke ’s liberating views in the early 1970s’ [Psillos, 2002, p. 161] to posit □M for too many cases.²⁷

5.2.2 Kit Fine’s Varieties of Necessity Kit Fine argues that there are three kinds of necessity (metaphysical, natural and normative necessity), which are not reducible to each other. Basically, there are two ways in which one kind of modality could be reduced to another kind of modality: 1) starting with a narrow notion of necessity, one could try to define

26 I think this is the wrong characterisation of the situation. In the antidote case, death was prevented, which is different from just ’no death occurs’. If you only take the end result into account, you loose sight of this difference (see chapter 3). 27 Saul Kripke’s Naming and Necessity [Kripke, 1980] made a posteriori necessities philosophically acceptable. Yet, this can only be seen as the motivation (cf. [Psillos, 2002, p. 161]) for the necessitarian dispositionalism, as Naming and Necessity concerns only synchronic or a-temporal cases while necessitarian dispositionalism wants to apply □M to diachronic disposition manifestation.

5.2 Necessity |

137

Fig. 5.1: Natural and metaphysical necessity

the broader notions of necessity via relativisation and 2) starting with a broad notion, the narrower notions could be defined via restriction (cf. [Fine, 2005, p. 237]). Natural necessity □Na is supposedly a broader notion than metaphysical necessity □M – see figure 5.1. The modal monist, who believes that there is only metaphysical necessity, has to either challenge this claim or show that □Na can be defined as a relative form of □M . Fine argues that neither strategy works in the case of metaphysical and natural necessity. In order to show that □Na is indeed broader than □M , it suffices to find one proposition X that is metaphysically possible but nomically impossible. It seems easy to find such an X, for example (E1 ) that bodies attract one another according to an inverse cube law.²⁸ (E1 ) bodies attract one another according to F ∗g = G m1r3m2 ²⁹

28 One could object with Cartwright [Cartwright, 1980] that in our messy world bodies rarely if ever behave according to the inverse square law, and that the same applies to the inverse cube law. The triadic process account of dispositions, however, is able to nullify this objection by differentiating between Wirkungen according (Sch-)Newton’s Law of Gravitation and the resultant behaviour. 29 With F: the force between the masses; G: the gravitational constant, m1 and m2 the two masses, and r is the distance.

138 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature

But for the philosopher who has read his Kripke (cf. [Kripke, 1980]), directly an objection springs to mind. If the bodies behave according to F g = G m1r3m2 , then they cannot have mass. Mass lets bodies behave according to F g = G m1r2m2 , and, hence, they must have some other property, call it ‘schmass’. Thus, the objector could go on, (E1 ) is not really a counterexample. The objector could deploy a similar strategy to other counterexamples mutatis mutandis, and maintain that every natural necessity is metaphysically necessary. At this point, Fine’s argumentation becomes a little complex. If the objection is corrected, this directly gives us another counterexample (E2 ). ‘For the proposition that there is no schmass exists in the hypothetical situation in which there is schmass, and this very proposition is a natural necessity in the actual world, though not a metaphysical necessity.’ [Fine, 2005, p. 241] (E2 ) there is no schmass Fine does not claim that the objection is correct, only that being right would be of no use to the objector, because then another counterexample pops up immediately. Hence, either E1 stands and thus shows that □Na is broader than □M , or E2 shows that □Na is broader than □M : ‘In either case, the “fabric of the universe” is envisaged as excluding a certain sort of behaviour – whether this be the deviant behaviour of mass or the normal behaviour of schmass’ [Fine, 2005, p. 240]. It is not the case that something is wrong with Kripke’s arguments, according to Fine. They just force us to be more careful when making modal statements, not necessarily to assign different truth-values. Indeed, there is no reason in general why the sophisticated post-Kripkean should not agree with the naive pre-Kripkean as to which of the metaphysically possible worlds are naturally impossible. For whereas the pre-Kripkean will take such a world to be a natural impossibility because of the straightforward failure of a law, the post-Kripkean will take it to be a natural impossibility because of the instantiation of an alien property or kind. [Fine, 2005, p. 240]

Both considerations, the pre- and post-Kripkean, agree that there are naturally impossible but metaphysically possible scenarios and hence, □Na is really broader than □M . Or, to put it another way: there is an X (see figure 5.1). The modal monist wanting to reduce natural necessity to metaphysical necessity thus is only left with the option to try to define □Na as a relative form of □M . However, Fine also argues against this attempted relativisation. He holds that there is no adequate definition of natural necessity as a restricted or relative form of metaphysical necessity. If one wants to define a kind of necessity □ζ1 as a relative form of another kind of necessity □ζ2 , then one will have to define a class of certain propositions Γ on which □ζ2 is relativised. For natural necessity, Γ□Na will consist

5.2 Necessity |

139

of the laws of nature. According to this proposal, a proposition Φ is naturally necessary if it is entailed by the laws of nature Γ□Na : (REL) □Na Φ iff Γ□Na ⊨ Φ But what about the laws themselves? Fine claims that (REL) does not deliver an adequate account of the natural necessity of the laws of nature. What would it amount to for any γ χ ∈ Γ□Na to be naturally necessary □Na γ χ , according to this proposal? Firstly, γ χ would have to be entailed by Γ□Na because of (REL), and secondly, γ χ would have to be a law of nature because of our assumption. The first condition is a matter of mere self-entailment since γ χ ∈ Γ□Na , and thus cannot contribute to the natural necessity of γ χ . But the second condition is of no help either, following Fine, as it hard to see ‘how the defining feature of a “law” might constitute an adequate account of the necessity of the given proposition’ [Fine, 2005, p. 247]. On the one hand, just including a proposition into Γ□Na and calling it a ‘law’ does not make it □Na . On the other hand, if a proposition has to be □Na in order to be a member of Γ□Na in the first place, then (REL) does not contribute anything. In any case, Fine argues, (REL) fails to account for the natural necessity of the laws. Hence, the second option is not feasible either, according to Fine: natural necessity cannot be defined as a relative form of metaphysical necessity. □Na and □M are thus distinct kinds of necessity. If Fine’s considerations are right – and I take them to be right – then metaphysical necessity is not the necessity of the laws of nature. While I agree with Schrenk that in the case of dispositions manifesting ‘metaphysical necessity is, as much as logical necessity, modally too strong’ [Schrenk, 2010, p. 732], I think that natural necessity may turn out to be powerful after all. Schrenk’s argument does not apply to necessity per se, but only to metaphysical necessity. In the next section, I will consider which conception of the law’s necessity flows from the (TPD).

5.2.3 Modality within the Triadic Account Let us quickly recap the triadic account picture of dispositions (TPD). There are three levels: dispositions, Wirkungen and the resultant behaviour. It lies in the nature of dispositions to bring about a certain Wirkung, given a corresponding stimulus. These Wirkungen interact according to combination rules, which are built-in into the dispositions themselves, to bring about the resultant behaviour. This behaviour (and the Wirkungen) have to be understood as processes in order to account for the notorious diachronic masking cases. Given a specific set of

140 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature

Wirkungen Ω and their arrangement Ψ, the resultant behaviour is determined (f a is a function), while one and the same behaviour may be brought about by different Wirkungen-arrangement-ensembles. f a : (Ω × Ψ) 󳨃→ ∆

(5.1)

According to the (TPD), basically some behaviour³⁰ is possible if there are the appropriate Wirkungen. As I have argued in 3.4, the spatio-temporal arrangement of these Wirkungen may not be causally operative itself, but still influences the resultant behaviour (cf. [Molnar, 2003, p. 10]). Hence, for something to be possible there need not only be the relevant Wirkungen, they also have to be in the right arrangement.³¹ (Pω ) ✸δ n iff ∃Ω n ∃Ψ n f a (Ω n , ψ n ) = δ n (Pω ) states that a behaviour δ n is possible if and only if some set of Wirkungen Ω n in some arrangement Ψ n can bring it about, i. e. if f a contains at least one entry that maps to δ n . Of course, it is no problem if more than one combination of Ω n and ψ n maps to δ n . If we take necessity as the dual of possibility (□Φ iff ¬✸¬Φ) we can define (Nω ). (Nω ) ✷δ n iff ¬(∃Ω n ∃Ψ n f a (Ω n , ψ n ) = ¬δ n ) Parallel to (DON), (Nω ) represents the idea that δ n is necessary if there are no dispositions that bring about ¬δ n .³²

30 The (TPD)-account is not a semantics for possibility in general. Remember the example that Jon Jacobs could have been a truck driver. As far as I can see, this is not covered by the (TPD). (TPD) can prima facie capture only capture behaviour, like ‘It is possible that Jon Jacobs drives a truck.’ A behavioural account of ‘is a truck driver’ would have to be supplemented as a bridge principle. 31 If you think that Ω × Ψ is incomprehensibly huge, remember that the alternative, possible worlds semantics, is not less lavish. 32 Of course, this idea needs yet to be put in a more concrete form, especially as to what the meaning of ¬δ n should be.

5.2 Necessity |

141

Tab. 5.1: Function f a mapping spatially arranged Wirkungen to behaviour

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 .. .

Wirkungen present

Arrangement

Behaviour

⌀ ω1 ω1 &ω2 ω1 &ω2 ω1 &ω3 ω1 &ω2 &ω3 ω1 &ω2 &ω3 .. .

ψ1 ψ2 ψ3 ψ4 ψ3 ψ5 ψ6 .. .

δ1 δ2 δ3 δ4 δ5 δ2 δ6 .. .

Which Wirkungen there are depends on the stimulated dispositions present, according to the (TPD). Hence, not the Wirkungen, but the dispositions which bring them about are the ultimate source of modality. We can refine our account of possibility accordingly: Some behaviour δ n is possible if there are the suitable dispositions to bring about the Wirkungen ω1 , . . . , ω n , that under the arrangement ψ n bring about δ n . Ω is the set of the Wirkungen present. Let wir(α) denote the Wirkung of some disposition α. Thus, every wir(α) corresponds to an ω n . Any specific ‘value’³³ of Ω will be a specific set of Wirkungen Ω n , such that: (WIR) Ω n = {wir(D1 ), wir(D2 ), . . . , wir(Dn )}³⁴ If n is 1, then only one Wirkung is around and hence, talk of ‘arrangement’ may seem exaggerated. But as a limit case, this is perfectly fine. If n is 0, then ω degenerates to ⌀ (see figure 5.1). As we cannot exclude the case in which the resultant behaviour is ‘no movement’ (see 3.4), we should not exclude the case in which no Wirkungen are around. Combine (Pω ) and (WIR), we get the (TPD) account of possibility (PTPD ).

33 The talk of a ‘value of Ω’ has to be understood metaphorically, since actually, the domain of f a consists of Ω × Ψ. Nevertheless, given all ω n and the arrangement ψ n , f a specifies exactly one behaviour delta n . 34 Once again, I think that nothing hinges on the stimulus-manifestation picture. My whole account could also be phrased as ‘mutual manifestations with reciprocal partner’ [Heil and Martin, 1998, p. 295] or ‘transition to a different status of the power itself’ [Marmodoro, 2014, p. 13]. wir(α) is a function symbol which denotes the Wirkung of the disposition α independently of whether α is named after its manifestations1 or manifestations2 , and thus M n is independent of this differences.

142 | 5 Dispositional Laws of Nature (PTPD ) ✸δ n iff ∃D1 ,D2 ,...,Dn ∃Ψ n f a ({wir(D1 ), wir(D2 ), . . . , wir(Dn )}, ψ n ) = δ n According to (PTPD D), some behaviour δ n is possible if, and only if, there is an arrangement ψ n and there are dispositions D1 , D2 , . . . , Dn which under the arrangement ψ n bring about δ n . The (TPD) does not presuppose that dispositions have bearers and, thus (PTPD ) is formulated without mentioning objects. But as the (TPD) also does not presuppose that dispositions do not have bearers, the (TPD) account of possibility can also be formulated with objects: (PTPD,o ) ✸δ n iff ∃x1 , ... , x n ∃Ψ n (D1 (x1 ) ∧ D2 (x2 ) ∧ ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ∧ Dn (x n ) ∧ f a ({wir(D1 ), wir(D2 ), . . . , wir(Dn )}, ψ n ) = δ n ) According to (PTPD,o ), some behaviour δ n is possible if, and only if, there is an arrangement ψ n and there are objects x1 , . . . , x n with the suitable dispositions to bring about the Wirkungen ω1 , . . . , ω n , which under the arrangement ψ n bring about δ n . Correspondingly, as necessity is the dual of possibility, □Φ iff ¬✸¬Φ, we can formulate the (TPD) account of necessity: (NTPD ) ✷δ n iff ¬(∃D1 ,D2 ,...,Dn ∃Ψ n f a ({wir(D1 ), wir(D2 ), . . . , wir(Dn )}, ψ n ) = ¬δ n ) According to (NTPD ), some behaviour δ n is necessary if and only if there is no combination of dispositions and arrangements such that the dispositions bring about the suitable Wirkungen ω1 , . . . , ω n , that under the arrangement ψ n bring about ¬δ n . Just like (PTPD,o ) (NTPD ) can also be formulated about objects: (NTPD,o ) ✷δ n iff ¬(∃x1 , ... , x n ∃Ψ n (D1 (x1 ) ∧ D2 (x2 ) ∧ ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ∧ Dn (x n ) ∧ f a ({wir(D1 ), wir(D2 ), . . . , wir(Dn )}, ψ n ) = ¬δ n ) Following (NTPD,o ), some behaviour δ n is necessary if and only if there is no combination of objects and arrangements such that the objects x1 , . . . , x n have the suitable dispositions to bring about the Wirkungen ω1 , . . . , ω n , that under the arrangement ψ n bring about ¬δ n . The (TPD) account of modality, is non-reductive since dispositions are intrinsically modal, and it is actualistic as modality is part of the fabric of reality. According to the (TPD), the ‘world is not ungoverned, as the neo-Humean world is; it is selfgoverned. It unfolds as it does and includes the possibilities and necessities that it does because of the way it is intrinsically’ [Jacobs, 2010, p. 233]. With (NTPD ) and (PTPD ), or respectively (NTPD,o ) and (PTPD,o ), in place, the question which kind of necessity flows from the (TPD) can finally be tackled. The

5.2 Necessity |

143

combination rules are built-in into the dispositions (see section 3.4.2) and thus, the necessity of (NTPD ) is entirely based in the actual world. I argue that because of the absence of alien properties³⁵ in the basis of (NTPD ) and (NTPD,o ), the resulting necessity is natural necessity. I agree with Fine that natural necessity is not reducible to metaphysical necessity. I thus hold that the necessity of the laws of nature is natural necessity. Now, remember (E2 ): ‘There is no schmass’. Fine holds that (E2 ) is metaphysically contingent because it ‘exists in the hypothetical situation in which there is schmass’ [Fine, 2005, p. 241]. So, (E2 ) ‘is a natural necessity in the actual world, though not a metaphysical necessity.’ [Fine, 2005, p. 241]. Schmass is uninstantiated in our world and hence an alien property. There are no objects that have the dispositions to bring about schmassy behaviour in our world, i. e. there are no schmodies. The (TPD) is actualitstic and hence cannot include alien properties. As possibility is captured via the actual dispositions, no behaviour according to the (PTPD ), or (PTPD,o ), is possible which would involve an alien property. Such behaviour would be ‘a natural impossibility because of the instantiation of an alien property or kind.’ [Fine, 2005, p. 240]. Schmassy behaviour is naturally impossible, but metaphysically possible. Thus, the necessity of the (TPD) is not metaphysical necessity □M , but natural necessity □Na .

35 Roughly, alien properties are ‘perfectly natural properties not instantiated in the actual world).’ [Hall, 2016]. See Lewis’ classical [Lewis, 1986, p. 66] for more on alien properties.

Case File In the following you will find a list of cases, discussed in the literature on dispositions. Note that this list is only a rough overview and I do not claim that it is comprehensive. Angel ‘The glass cup is fragile but an angel has decided to make the cup shatterproof if it begins to fall to the ground or if it is about to be hit by a hammer, or enter any other condition of being struck. Even though the conditional corresponding to fragility does not hold, i.e. the cup would not break if struck, the cup was fragile before the angel did its work. Were it not for the extrinsic activities of the angel prior to the cup being struck then the cup would have broken when struck.’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 233] Antidotes ‘An object x is disposed to display response r under stimulus s. At time t it receives stimulus s and so in the normal course of things, at some later time t’, x gives response r. [. . . ] An antidote to the above disposition would be something which, when applied before t’, has the effect of breaking the causal chain leading to r, so that r does not in fact occur. Thus one can ingest a lethal dose of poison, yet not die if a suitable antidote is administered soon enough. (For instance, the antidote to arsenic poisoning is dimercaprol, which incidentally, is also known as British Anti-Lewisite.)’ [Bird, 1998, p. 228] Canary yellow ‘For consider Zinka the canary and a lifelike color photograph of her. The canary yellow appearance produced when one looks at Zinka is due to a physical property very different from the physical property responsible for the canary yellow appearance of the relevant part of the photograph. Call the relevant physical properties P1 and P2 respectively. The fact that Zinka’s feathers have P1 explains the canary yellow appearance that occurs when one looks at Zinka. But P1 is not canary yellowness according to the Primary Quality Account. On that account, canary yellowness is what canary yellow things have in common and so is a disjunctive property which includes as disjuncts P1, P2 and so on.’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 235]

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-153

146 | Case File

Gold chalice ‘A gold chalice is not fragile but an angel has taken a dislike to it because its garishness borders on sacrilege and so has decided to shatter it when it is dropped. Even though the gold chalice would shatter when dropped, this does not make it fragile because while this dispositional conditional is not bare, i.e. the breaking when struck has a causal explanation, something extrinsic to the chalice is the cause of the breaking.’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 232] Green objects ‘There might have been a ray emitted from the center of green objects, a ray which acted directly on our visual cortices so that green objects always would look red to us in any viewing situations. But this would not be enough to make them green.’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 231] Hater of styrofoam ‘When a styrofoam dish is struck, it makes a distinctive sound. When the Hater of Styrofoam hears this sound, he comes and tears the dish apart by brute force. So, when the Hater is within earshot, styrofoam dishes are disposed to end up broken if struck.’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 153] HIV ‘A certain virus is disposed to cause those who become infected with it to end up dead before their time, but not to undergo the direct and standard process whereby lethal viruses mostly kill their victims. For this virus does not itself interfere with any of the processes that constitute life. Rather, it interferes with the victim’s defences against other pathogens - whereupon those other pathogens, like the Hater of Styrofoam, do the dirty work. Do we call this a lethal virus? Of course we do. After all, my story of the virus is not just another philosophical fantasy! It is the true story of HIV, slightly simplified.’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 154] Killer Yellow ‘Saul Kripke has imagined a special shade of yellow, ‘killer yellow’, which, thanks to some quirk of our neural wiring, would instantly kill anyone who set eyes on it. If what I have just said is right, then, whatever else may fairly be said against a dispositional theory of colours, the case of killer yellow does not suffice as a refutation.’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 145]

Case File |

147

Masking ‘Consider a fragile glass cup with internal packing to stabilize it against hard knocks. Packing companies know that the breaking of fragile glass cups involves three stages: first a few bonds break, then the cup deforms and then many bonds break, thereby shattering the cup. They find a support which when placed inside the glass cup prevents deformation so that the glass would not break when struck. Even though the cup would not break if struck the cup is still fragile. The cup’s fragility is masked by the packing which is a) something extrinsic to the glass cup and b) causes the glass cup when struck to withstand deformation without breaking. Were it not for such an extrinsic masker the cup would break when struck.’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 233] Ming and Meissen ‘Consider two identical vases, named Ming and Meissen. Our question is whether they are fragile at time t. Before t the sorcerer has decided to protect one of them, but he has not yet chosen which. At t both Ming and Meissen are struck. With remarkable speed the sorcerer decides to protect Meissen and issues his protection (fink or antidote) soon enough for Meissen not to break. Meanwhile Ming does break. For Meissen not to be a counterexample to (CA), we have to say that at time t Ming is fragile and Meissen is not. But at t the environments of Ming and Meissen are the same. Thus Meissen’s lack of fragility at t is dependent not so much on its environment at t but rather on what will occur later (the sorcerer’s decision). That an object’s fragility at some time should depend on events occurring at a later time is absurd, and so one may conclude that the finkish protection of vases it not a way of removing their fragility and hence that they do present a counterexample to (CA).’ [Bird, 2007, p. 31] Nuclear pile ‘A nuclear pile which is above critical mass has a disposition to chain-react catastrophically. However, the pile has attached to it a fail-safe mechanism. Heat and radiation sensors detect large increases in radioactivity and allow boron moderating rods to penetrate the pile and by absorbing the radiation to prevent the catastrophic chain-reaction.’ [Bird, 1998, p. 229] Shy chameleon ‘There might have been a shy but powerfully intuitive chameleon which in the dark was green but also would intuit when it was about to be put in a viewing condition and would instantaneously blush bright red as a result. So although in the dark

148 | Case File

the chameleon is green it is not true of it in the dark that were it to be viewed it would look green. It would look bright red.’ [Johnston, 1992, p. 231] Sorcerer - Fink ‘A sorcerer takes a liking to a fragile glass, one that is a perfect intrinsic duplicate of all the other fragile glasses off the same production line. He does nothing at all to change the dispositional character of his glass. He only watches and waits, resolved that if ever his glass is struck, then, quick as a flash, he will cast a spell that changes the glass, renders it no longer fragile, and thereby aborts the process of breaking. So his finkishly fragile glass would not break if struck – but not thanks to any protective disposition of the glass itself. Thanks, instead, to a disposition of the sorcerer.’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 147] Sorcerer - Antidote ‘Another way of protecting the glass once it is struck is to find an antidote to striking. The sorcerer, being a brilliant physicist, may be able to administer shock waves to the struck glass which precisely cancel out the shock of the original striking, hence saving the glass from destruction.’ [Bird, 1998, p. 228] Willie ‘Willie is a dangerous man to mess with. Why so? Willie is a weakling and a pacifist. But Willie has a big brother – a very big brother – who is neither a weakling nor a pacifist. Willie has the extrinsic property of being protected by such a brother; and it is Willie’s having this extrinsic property that would cause anyone who messed about with Willie to come to grief.’ [Lewis, 1997, p. 155]

Theories of Dispositions In the following you will find a list of the conditional analyses of dispositions, discussed in this book. The Simple Conditional Analysis (SCA) ∀x(D(x) ↔ (C(x) → M(x))) – Not held by anybody. Already discussed and discarded by Rudolf Carnap ([Carnap, 1936]). Reduction Sentences (R) ∀x(C(x) → (D(x) ↔ M(x))) – Held by Rudolf Carnap ([Carnap, 1936]). The Simple Counterfactual Conditional Analysis (SCCA) ∀x(D(x) ↔ (C(x) € M(x))) – Held for example by Gilbert Ryle [Ryle, 2009], Nelson Goodman [Goodman, 1983], and Willard Van Orman Quine [Quine, 1960]. The Reformed Counterfactual Conditional Analysis (RCCA) Something x is disposed at time t to give response r to stimulus s iff, for some intrinsic property B that x has at t, for some time t󸀠 after t, if x were to undergo stimulus s at time t and retain property B until t󸀠 , s and x’s having B would jointly be an x-complete cause of x’s giving response r. – Held by David Lewis ([Lewis, 1997]). The Sophisticated Counterfactual Conditional Analysis (SoCCA) D(x, t) iff C N (x, t, t + δ) € ((C(x, t) € M(x, t + δ)) ∧ (¬C(x, t + δ – Held by Wolfgang Malzkorn ([Malzkorn, 2000]).

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-157

€ ¬M(x, t)))

150 | Theories of Dispositions

The Context-Dependent Counterfactual Conditional Analysis The (CCCA) states that striking is not uniquely linked to breaking, but rather that it depends on the circumstances, i. e. whether a preventer is around, to which manifestation striking is linked. – Held by Sungho Choi and Lars Gundersen ([Choi, 2003], [Choi, 2008] and [Gundersen, 2002]). The Gradable Counterfactual Conditional Analysis (GCCA) D(x, t) iff some suitable proportion of C-cases are such that x would M in them – Held by David Manley and Ryan Wasserman ([Manley and Wasserman, 2007]). Habituals (Habitual) D(x, t) iff x has an intrinsic property in virtue of which it Ms when C. – Held by Michael Fara ([Fara, 2005]) The Ceteris Paribus Conditional Analysis (CPCA) D(x, t) ↔ C (C(x) € M(x)) – Not held by anybody. Used by Juhani Yli-Vakkuri [Yli-Vakkuri, 2010] in the discussion of Fara’s (Habituals).

The Story of Zucky

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-159

Bibliography [Adams, 1970] Adams, E. (1970). Subjunctive and indicative conditionals. Foundations of Language, 6(1):89–94. [Andreas, 2007] Andreas, H. (2007). Carnaps Wissenschaftslogik. Mentis. [Anjum et al., ] Anjum, R. L., Lie, S. A. N., and Mumford, S. Dispositions and ethics. manuscript. [Anjum and Mumford, 2011] Anjum, R. L. and Mumford, S. (2011). What we tend to mean. Norsk Filosofisk Tidsskrift, 1(46). [Anjum and Mumford, 2013] Anjum, R. L. and Mumford, S. (2013). With great power comes great responsibility: On causation and responsibility in Spider-Man, and possibly Moore. In Stepanians, M. and Kahmen, B., editors, Critical Essays on Causation and Responsibility. De Gruyter. [Anscombe, 1981] Anscombe, G. E. M. (1981). Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Mind: The Collected Philosophical Papers of G. E. M. Anscombe Volume Two. Blackwell. [Armstrong, 1983] Armstrong, D. M. (1983). What is a Law of Nature? Cambridge University Press. [Ayer, 1940] Ayer, A. J. (1940). The Foundations of Empirical Knowledge. Macmillan. [Ayer, 1966] Ayer, A. J. (1966). Logical Positivism. Free Press. [Badino, 2015] Badino, M. (2015). The Bumpy Road. Max Planck from Radiation Theory to the Quantum (1896-1906). Springer. [Bartels, 2007] Bartels, A. (2007). Wissenschaftstheorie: Ein Studienbuch. Mentis. [Bartels, 2013] Bartels, A. (2013). Why metrical properties are not powers. Synthese, 190(12):2001–2013. [Bartels, 2015] Bartels, A. (2015). Naturgesetze in einer kausalen Welt. Mentis. [Barwise and Etchemendy, 2002] Barwise, J. and Etchemendy, J. (2002). Language, Proof and Logic. CSLI Publications. [Bigelow, 1999] Bigelow, J. (1999). Scientific ellisianism. In Sankey, H., editor, Causation and Laws of Nature, pages 45–59. Kluwer Academic Publishers. [Bird, 1998] Bird, A. (1998). Dispositions and antidotes. Philosophical Quarterly, 48(191):227– 234. [Bird, 2005] Bird, A. (2005). The dispositionalist conception of laws. Foundations of Science, 10(4):353–70. [Bird, 2007] Bird, A. (2007). Nature’s Metaphysics: Laws and Properties. Oxford University Press. [Borghini and Williams, 2008] Borghini, A. and Williams, N. E. (2008). A dispositional theory of possibility. Dia-lectica, 62(1):21–41. [Brendel, 2009] Brendel, E. (2009). The epistemic function of virtuous dispositions. In Damschen, G., Schnepf, R., and Stüber, K., editors, Debating Dispositions: Issues in Metaphysics, Epistemology and Philosophy of Mind. De Gruyter. [Burks, 1951] Burks, A. W. (1951). The logic of causal propositions. Mind, 60(239):363–382. [Burks, 1955] Burks, A. W. (1955). Dispositional statements. Philosophy of Science, 22(3):175–193. [Carnap, 2005] Carnap, R. (1928/2005). Scheinprobleme in der Philosophie und andere metaphysikkritische Schriften. Meiner. [Carnap, 1936] Carnap, R. (1936). Testability and meaning. Philosophy of Science, 3(4):419–471. [Carnap, 1947] Carnap, R. (1947). Meaning and Necessity. University of Chicago Press. [Carnap, 1996] Carnap, R. (1996). The elimination of metaphysics through logical analysis of language. In Sarkar, S., editor, Logical Empiricism at Its Peak: Schlick, Carnap, and Neurath, volume 2. Garland Publishing.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-161

154 | Bibliography

[Carnap and Gardner, 1966] Carnap, R. and Gardner, M. (1966). Philosophical Foundations of Physics. Basic Books. [Cartwright, 1980] Cartwright, N. (1980). Do the laws of physics state the facts? Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, (61):75–84. [Cartwright, 1983] Cartwright, N. (1983). How the Laws of Physics Lie. Clarendon Press. [Cartwright, 1989] Cartwright, N. (1989). Nature’s Capacities and Their Measurement. Clarendon Press. [Cartwright, 1999] Cartwright, N. (1999). The Dappled World: A Study of the Boundaries of Science. Cambridge University Press. [Cartwright, 2008] Cartwright, N. (2008). Reply to Stathis Psillos. In Hartmann, S., Hoefer, C., and Bovens, L., editors, Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science. Routledge. [Cartwright and Pemberton, 2013] Cartwright, N. and Pemberton, J. (2013). Aristotelian powers: Without them, what would modern science do? In Greco, J. and Groff, R., editors, Powers and Capacities in Philosophy: The New Aristotelianism. Routledge. [Choi, 2003] Choi, S. (2003). Improving Bird’s Antidotes. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 81(4):573–580. [Choi, 2006] Choi, S. (2006). The simple vs. reformed conditional analysis of dispositions. Synthese, 148(2):369–379. [Choi, 2008] Choi, S. (2008). Dispositional properties and counterfactual conditionals. Mind, 117(468):795–841. [Choi, 2012] Choi, S. (2012). Intrinsic finks and dispositional/categorical distinction. Noûs, 46(2):289–325. [Choi and Fara, 2016] Choi, S. and Fara, M. (2016). Dispositions. In Zalta, E. N., editor, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, spring 2016 edition. [Corry, 2009] Corry, R. (2009). How is scientific analysis possible? In Handfield, T., editor, Dispositions and Causes. Oxford University Press, Clarendon Press. [Craig, 1987] Craig, E. (1987). Review of e. prior, “dispositions”. Philosophical Quarterly, 37(46):109. [Craig, 1996] Craig, E. (1996). Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Routledge. [Crepeau, 2009] Crepeau, J. (2009). A bief history of the T4 radiation law. In Proceedings of the 2009 ASME Summer Heat Transfer Conference. [Cross, 2012] Cross, T. (2012). Recent work on dispositions. Analysis, 72(1):115–124. [Damschen et al., 2009] Damschen, G., Schnepf, R., and Stüber, K., editors (2009). Debating Dispositions: Issues in Metaphysics, Epistemology and Philosophy of Mind. De Gruyter. [Davidson, 1963] Davidson, D. (1963). Actions, reasons, and causes. Journal of Philosophy, 60(23):685–700. [Davidson, 1980] Davidson, D. (1980). Essays on Actions and Events. Oxford University Press. [Deutsch, 1997] Deutsch, D. (1997). The Fabric of Reality. Allan Lane. [Dowty, 1977] Dowty, D. R. (1977). Toward a semantic analysis of verb aspect and the english ‘imperfective’ progressive. Linguistics and Philosophy, 1(1):45–77. [Dretske, 1977] Dretske, F. I. (1977). Laws of nature. Philosophy of Science, 44(2):248–268. [Ducasse, 1926] Ducasse, C. J. (1926). On the nature and the observability of the causal relation. Journal of Philosophy, 23(3):57–68. [Eagle, 2009] Eagle, A. (2009). Causal structuralism, dispositional actualism, and counterfactual conditionals. In Handfield, T., editor, Dispositions and Causes, pages 65–99. Oxford University Press.

Bibliography |

155

[Earman, 1978] Earman, J. (1978). The universality of laws. Philosophy of Science, 45(2):173–181. [Earman, 1984] Earman, J. (1984). Laws of nature: The empiricist challenge. In Bogdan, R. J., editor, D.M. Armstrong. Springer. [Earman, 1986] Earman, J. (1986). A Primer on Determinism. Springer. [Ellis, 1979] Ellis, B. D. (1979). Rational Belief Systems. Blackwell. [Ellis, 2001] Ellis, B. D. (2001). Scientific Essentialism. Cambridge University Press. [Ellis, 2014] Ellis, B. D. (2014). The Philosophy of Nature: A Guide to the New Essentialism. Routledge. [Eriksen et al., 2013] Eriksen, T., Kerry, R., Mumford, S., Lie, S. A. N., and Anjum, R. L. (2013). At the borders of medical reasoning: Aetiological and ontological challenges of medically unexplained symptoms. Philosophy, Ethics, and Humanities in Medicine, 8(1):11. [Esfeld, 2011a] Esfeld, M. (2011a). Causal properties and conservative reduction. Philosophia Naturalis, 47(1):9–31. [Esfeld, 2011b] Esfeld, M. (2011b). Wozu Dispositionen? In Gethmann, C. F., editor, Lebenswelt und Wissenschaft. Deutsches Jahrbuch Philosophie 2. Meiner. [Essler, 1979] Essler, W. K. (1979). Wissenschaftstheorie IV. Karl Alber. [Everitt, 1991] Everitt, N. (1991). Strawson on laws and regularities. Analysis, 51(4):206–208. [Fara, 2005] Fara, M. (2005). Dispositions and habituals. Noûs, 39(1):43–82. [Feynman, 1967] Feynman, R. (1967). The Character of Physical Law. MIT Press. [Fine, 2005] Fine, K. (2005). The varieties of necessity. In Modality and Tense. Clarendon Press. [Fischer, 2016] Fischer, F. (2016). Carnap’s logic of science and reference to the present moment. In Fischer, F., editor, New Developments in Philosophy of Time. Kriterion – Journal of Philosophy. [Gale, 2002] Gale, R. M. (2002). The Blackwell Guide to Metaphysics. Wiley-Blackwell. [Garson, 2006] Garson, J. (2006). Modal Logic for Philosophers. Cambridge University Press. [Gendler and Hawthorne, 2002] Gendler, T. S. and Hawthorne, J. (2002). Conceivability and Possibility. Oxford University Press. [Goodman, 1983] Goodman, N. (1983). Fact, Fiction, and Forecast. Harvard University Press. [Greco and Groff, 2013] Greco, J. and Groff, R. (2013). Powers and Capacities in Philosophy: The New Aristotelianism. Routledge. [Gundersen, 2002] Gundersen, L. (2002). In defence of the conditional account of dispositions. Synthese, 130(3):389–411. [Hall, 2016] Hall, N. (2016). David Lewis’s metaphysics. In Zalta, E. N., editor, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, winter 2016 edition. [Hampe, 2007] Hampe, M. (2007). Eine kleine Geschichte des Naturgesetzbegriffs. Suhrkamp. [Handfield, 2001] Handfield, T. (2001). Dispositional essentialism and the possibility of a lawabiding miracle. Philosophical Quarterly, 51(205):484–494. [Handfield, 2004] Handfield, T. (2004). Counterlegals and necessary laws. Philosophical Quarterly, 54(216):402–419. [Hänsel and Neumann, 1993] Hänsel, H. and Neumann, W. (1993). Physik, volume 1. Elektrizität, Optik, Raum und Zeit. Spektrum Akademischer Verlag. [Hänsel and Neumann, 1995] Hänsel, H. and Neumann, W. (1995). Physik, volume 3. Atome, Atomkerne, Elementarteilchen. Spektrum Akademischer Verlag. [Hartmann, 2003] Hartmann, D. (2003). On Inferring. An Enquiry Into Relevance and Validity. Mentis. [Hartmann, 2009] Hartmann, D. (2009). Eine gebrauchstheoretische Semantik formal relevanten Schlussfolgerns. In Kamp, G. and Thiele, F., editors, Erkennen und Handeln. Festschrift für Carl Friedrich Gethmann zum 65. Geburtstag. Fink.

156 | Bibliography

[Hartmann et al., 2008] Hartmann, S., Hoefer, C., and Bovens, L., editors (2008). Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science. Routledge. [Hauska, 2008] Hauska, J. (2008). Dispositions and normal conditions. Philosophical Studies, 139(2):219–232. [Hawthorne and Manley, 2005] Hawthorne, J. and Manley, D. (2005). Review of Stephen Mumford’s Dispositions. Noûs, 39:179–95. [Hegel, 2010] Hegel, G. W. F. (2010). The Science of Logic. Cambridge University Press. [Heil, 2003] Heil, J. (2003). From an Ontological Point of View. Oxford University Press. [Heil, 2005] Heil, J. (2005). Dispositions. Synthese, 144(3):343–356. [Heil, 2012] Heil, J. (2012). The Universe as We Find It. Oxford University Press. [Heil and Martin, 1998] Heil, J. and Martin, C. B. (1998). Rules and powers. Philosophical Perspectives, 12(S12):283–312. [Hempel and Oppenheim, 1948] Hempel, C. G. and Oppenheim, P. (1948). Studies in the logic of explanation. Philosophy of Science, 15(2):135–175. [Hume, 2011] Hume, D. (1748/2011). An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. Broadview Press. [Hüttemann, 1998] Hüttemann, A. (1998). Laws and dispositions. Philosophy of Science, 65(1):121–135. [Hüttemann, 2007] Hüttemann, A. (2007). Causation, laws and dispositions. In Kistler, M. and Gnassounou, B., editors, Dispositions and Causal Powers. Ashgate. [Hüttemann, 2007] Hüttemann, A. (2007). Naturgesetze. In Bartels, A. and Stöckler, M., editors, Wissenschaftstheorie: Ein Studienbuch. Mentis. [Jaag, 2014] Jaag, S. (2014). Dispositional essentialism and the grounding of natural modality. Philosophers’ Imprint, 14(34). [Jaag, 2015] Jaag, S. (2015). Explaining laws of nature: A metaphysical investigation into the natural principles governing the universe. PhD thesis, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg. [Jacobs, 2010] Jacobs, J. (2010). A powers theory of modality: Or, how i learned to stop worrying and reject possible worlds. Philosophical Studies, 151(2):227–248. [Jansen, 2007] Jansen, L. (2007). On ascribing dispositions. In Kistler, M. and Gnassounou, B., editors, Dispositions and Causal Powers. Ashgate. [Johnston, 1992] Johnston, M. (1992). How to speak of the colors. Philosophical Studies, 68(3):221–263. [Jokic and Smith, 2003] Jokic, A. and Smith, Q., editors (2003). Time, Tense, and Reference. A Bradford Book. [Kaila, 1942] Kaila, E. (1942). Über den physikalischen Realitätsbegriff. Zweiter Beitrag zum Logischen Empirismus. Helsinki: Akateeminen Kirjakauppa. [Kerry et al., 2013] Kerry, R., Madouasse, A., Arthur, A., and Mumford, S. D. (2013). Analysis of scientific truth status in controlled rehabilitation trials. Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice, 19(4):617–625. [Kistler and Gnassounou, 2007] Kistler, M. and Gnassounou, B. (2007). Dispositions and Causal Powers. Ashgate. [Kleist, 2001] Kleist, H. v. (2001). Sämtliche Werke und Briefe: Zweibändige Ausgabe in einem Band. dtv Verlagsgesellschaft. [Krebs, 2001] Krebs, R. E. (2001). Scientific Laws, Principles and Theories. Greenwood Press. [Kripke, 1980] Kripke, S. A. (1980). Naming and Necessity. Harvard University Press. [Kutner, 2003] Kutner, M. L. (2003). Astronomy. A Physical Perspective. Cambridge University Press.

Bibliography |

157

[Ladyman, 2007] Ladyman, J. (2007). Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalized. Oxford University Press. [Lange, 1993] Lange, M. (1993). Natural laws and the problem of provisos. Erkenntnis, 38(2):233– 248. [Lepore and McLaughlin, 1985] Lepore, E. and McLaughlin, B. (1985). Actions and Events: Perspectives on the Philosophy of Donald Davidson. B. Blackwell. [Lewis, 1973] Lewis, D. K. (1973). Counterfactuals. Blackwell Publishers. [Lewis, 1983a] Lewis, D. K. (1983a). New work for a theory of universals. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 61(2):343–377. [Lewis, 1983b] Lewis, D. K. (1983b). Philosophical Papers. Oxford University Press. [Lewis, 1986] Lewis, D. K. (1986). On the Plurality of Worlds. Blackwell Publishers. [Lewis, 1994] Lewis, D. K. (1994). Humean supervenience debugged. Mind, 103(412):473–490. [Lewis, 1997] Lewis, D. K. (1997). Finkish dispositions. Philosophical Quarterly, 47(187):143–158. [Loewer, 1996] Loewer, B. (1996). Humean supervenience. Philosophical Topics, 24(1):101–127. [Lombard, 1979] Lombard, L. B. (1979). Events. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 9(3):425–460. [Lütge, 2000] Lütge, C. (2000). Naturgesetze in der Ökonomik? Philosophia Naturalis, 37(2):385– 393. [Malzkorn, 2000] Malzkorn, W. (2000). Realism, functionalism and the conditional analysis of dispositions. Philosophical Quarterly, 50(201):452–469. [Malzkorn, 2001] Malzkorn, W. (2001). On the conditional analysis of dispositions. In Meixner, U., editor, Metaphysics in the Post-Metaphysical Age, pages 140–148. [Manley and Wasserman, 2007] Manley, D. and Wasserman, R. (2007). A gradable approach to dispositions. The Philosophical Quarterly, 57(226):68–75. [Manley and Wasserman, 2008] Manley, D. and Wasserman, R. (2008). On linking dispositions and conditionals. Mind, 117(465):59–84. [Mares, 2004] Mares, E. (2004). Relevant Logic: A Philosophical Interpretation. Cambridge University Press. [Marmodoro, 2010] Marmodoro, A. (2010). The Metaphysics of Powers: Their Grounding and Their Manifestations. Routledge. [Marmodoro, 2014] Marmodoro, A. (2014). Aristotle on Perceiving Objects. Oxford University Press. [Martin, 1994] Martin, C. B. (1994). Dispositions and conditionals. Philosophical Quarterly, 44(174):1–8. [Martin, 2007] Martin, C. B. (2007). The Mind in Nature. Oxford University Press. [Martin and Heil, 1999] Martin, C. B. and Heil, J. (1999). The ontological turn. Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 23(1):34–60. [McKitrick, 2010] McKitrick, J. (2010). Manifestations as effects. In Marmodoro, A., editor, The Metaphysics of Powers: Their Grounding and Their Manifestations. Routledge. [Mellor, 1974] Mellor, D. H. (1974). In defense of dispositions. Philosophical Review, 83(2):157– 181. [Mellor, 1998] Mellor, D. H. (1998). Real Time II. Routledge. [Meschede, 2003] Meschede, D. (2003). Gerthsen Physik. Luxemburg: Springer, 22 edition. [Mill, 1843] Mill, J. S. (1843). A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive. University of Toronto Press. [Mill, 91] Mill, J. S. (1963–91). The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, volume 33. University of Toronto Press, Routledge and Kegan Paul.

158 | Bibliography

[Millikan, 1913] Millikan, R. A. (1913). On the elementary electrical charge and the avogadro constant. The Physical Review, 2(2):109 – 143. [Molnar, 1999] Molnar, G. (1999). Are dispositions reducible? Philosophical Quarterly, 50(194):1– 17. [Molnar, 2003] Molnar, G. (2003). Powers: A Study in Metaphysics. Oxford University Press. [Müller, 2010] Müller, T. (2010). Formal methods in the philosophy of natural science. In Stadler, F., Dieks, D., Gonzales, W., Hartmann, S., Uebel, T., and Weber, M., editors, The Present Situation in the Philosophy of Science, pages 111–123. Springer. [Mumford, 1998] Mumford, S. (1998). Dispositions. Oxford University Press. [Mumford, 2004] Mumford, S. (2004). Laws in Nature. Routledge. [Mumford, 2014] Mumford, S. (2014). In praise of teamwork. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 42(1):51–56. [Mumford and Anjum, 2011] Mumford, S. and Anjum, R. L. (2011). Getting Causes From Powers. Oxford University Press. [Mumford and Anjum, 2014a] Mumford, S. and Anjum, R. L. (2014a). A new argument against compatibilism. Analysis, 74(1):20–25. [Mumford and Anjum, 2014b] Mumford, S. and Anjum, R. L. (2014b). The Tendential Theory of Sporting Prowess. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 41(3):399–412. [Mumford and Tugby, 2013] Mumford, S. and Tugby, M. (2013). Metaphysics and Science. Oxford University Press. [Oaklander and Smith, 1994] Oaklander, N. L. and Smith, Q., editors (1994). The New Theory of Time. Yale University Press. [Pap, 1958] Pap, A. (1958). Disposition concepts and extensional logic. In Feigl, H., Scriven, M., and Maxwell, G., editors, Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, volume 2, pages 196–224. University of Minnesota Press. [Penrose, 2007] Penrose, R. (2007). The Road to Reality. A Complete Guide to the Laws of the Universe. Vintage Books. [Perry, 1979] Perry, J. (1979). The problem of the essential indexical. Noûs, 13(1):3–21. [Priest, 2008] Priest, G. (2008). An Introduction to Non-Classical Logic: From If to Is. Cambridge University Press. [Prior, 1959] Prior, A. N. (1959). Thank goodness that’s over. Philosophy, 20:17. [Prior, 1985] Prior, E. (1985). Dispositions. Aberdeen University Press. [Pruss, 2002] Pruss, A. R. (2002). The actual and the possible. In Gale, R. M., editor, The Blackwell Guide to Metaphysics, pages 317–33. Blackwell. [Psillos, 2002] Psillos, S. (2002). Causation and Explanation. Routledge. [Psillos, 2008] Psillos, S. (2008). Cartwright’s realist toil: From entities to capacities. In Hartmann, S., Hoefer, C., and Bovens, L., editors, Nancy Cartwright’s Philosophy of Science, pages 167–194. Routledge. [Quine, 1960] Quine, W. V. O. (1960). Word & Object. MIT Press. [Ramsey, 1978] Ramsey, F. P. (1978). Foundations. Routledge and Kegan Paul. [Reutlinger et al., 2015] Reutlinger, A., Schurz, G., and Hüttemann, A. (2015). Ceteris paribus laws. In Zalta, E. N., editor, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, fall 2015 edition. [Roberts, 2008] Roberts, J. (2008). The Law-Governed Universe. Oxford University Press. [Roberts, 2010] Roberts, J. (2010). Some laws of nature are metaphysically contingent. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 88(3):445–457.

Bibliography |

159

[Ruby, 1986] Ruby, J. (1986). The origins of scientific "law". Journal of the History of Ideas, 47(3):341. [Ryle, 2009] Ryle, G. (2009). The Concept of Mind: 60th Anniversary Edition. Routledge. [Sankey, 1999] Sankey, H. (1999). Causation and Laws of Nature. Kluwer Academic Publishers. [Scheibe, 1991] Scheibe, E. (1991). General laws of nature and the uniqueness of the universe. In Agazzi, E. and Cordero, A., editors, Philosophy and the Origin and Evolution of the Universe, pages 341–360. Kluwer Academic Publishers. [Schrenk, 2010] Schrenk, M. (2010). The powerlessness of necessity. Noûs, 44(4):725–739. [Schurz, 2001] Schurz, G. (2001). What is ‘normal’? an evolution-theoretic foundation for normic laws and their relation to statistical normality. Philosophy of Science, 68(4):476–497. [Schurz, 2002] Schurz, G. (2002). Ceteris paribus laws: Classification and deconstruction. Erkenntnis, 57(3):351–372. [Schweitzer, 2000] Schweitzer, B. (2000). Naturgesetze in der Biologie? Philosophia Naturalis, 37(2):367–374. [Sellars, 1957] Sellars, W. (1957). Counterfactuals, dispositions, and the causal modalities. In Scriven, H. F. M. and Maxwell, G., editors, Minnesota Studies in The Philosophy of Science, volume 2. University of Minnesota Press. [Sidelle, 2002] Sidelle, A. (2002). On the metaphysical contingency of laws of nature. In Hawthorne, J. and Gendler, T., editors, Conceivability and Possibility, pages 309–336. Oxford University Press. [Smith, 1977] Smith, D. (1977). Dispositional properties. Mind, 86(343):439–445. [Spohn, 1997] Spohn, W. (1997). The character of color predicates: A materialist view. In Anduschus, M., Newen, A., and Künne, W., editors, Direct Reference, Indexicality, and Propositional Attitudes. CSLI Press. [Spohn, 2002] Spohn, W. (2002). Laws, ceteris paribus conditions, and the dynamics of belief. Erkenntnis, 57(3):373–394. [Stalnaker, 1968] Stalnaker, R. (1968). A theory of conditionals. In Rescher, N., editor, Studies in Logical Theory, pages 98–112. Blackwell. [Storer, 1951] Storer, T. (1951). On defining ‘soluble’. Analysis, 11(6):134–37. [Stuhlmann-Laeisz, 2002] Stuhlmann-Laeisz, R. (2002). Philosophische Logik. Mentis. [Thompson, 2008] Thompson, M. (2008). Life and Action: Elementary Structures of Practice and Practical Thought. Harvard University Press. [Thompson, 2011] Thompson, M. (2011). Anscombe’s intention and practical knowledge. In Ford, A., Hornsby, J., and Stoutland, F., editors, Essays on Anscombe’s Intention. Harvard University Press. [Tooley, 1977] Tooley, M. (1977). The nature of laws. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 7(4):667–98. [Tooley, 1987] Tooley, M. (1987). Causation: A Realist Approach. Oxford University Press. [Tugby, 2010] Tugby, M. (2010). Simultaneity in dispositional interaction? Ratio, 23(3):322–338. [Tugendhat and Wolf, 1993] Tugendhat, E. and Wolf, U. (1993). Logisch-semantische Propädeutik. Reclam. [Van Fraassen, 1989] Van Fraassen, B. C. (1989). Laws and Symmetry. Oxford University Press. [Vetter, 2015] Vetter, B. (2015). Potentiality: From Dispositions to Modality. Oxford University Press. [Vollmer, 2000a] Vollmer, G. (2000a). Kandidaten für Naturgesetze. Philosophia Naturalis, 37(2):193–204. [Vollmer, 2000b] Vollmer, G. (2000b). Was sind und warum gelten Naturgesetze? Philosophia Naturalis, 37(2):205–239.

160 | Bibliography

[von Kutschera, 1972] von Kutschera, F. (1972). Wissenschaftstheorie II. Wilhelm Fink Verlag. [Weatherson, 2016] Weatherson, B. (2016). David Lewis. In Zalta, E. N., editor, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, winter 2016 edition. [Wilson and Shpall, 2016] Wilson, G. and Shpall, S. (2016). Action. In Zalta, E. N., editor, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, winter 2016 edition. [Woodward, 2014] Woodward, J. (2014). Scientific explanation. In Zalta, E. N., editor, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, winter 2014 edition. [Yli-Vakkuri, 2010] Yli-Vakkuri, J. (2010). Conditional and habitual analyses of disposition ascriptions. Philosophical Quarterly, 60(240):624–630. [Zilsel, 1942] Zilsel, E. (1942). The genesis of the concept of physical law. Philosophical Review, 51(3):245–279.

Author Index Adams, Ernest 19 Andreas, Holger 105 Anjum, Rani Lill 3, 51, 94 Anscombe, Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret 30 Armstrong, David Malet 22, 24, 26, 28 Arthur, Antony 3 Ayer, Alfred Jules 21 Badino, Massimiliano 18 Bartels, Andreas 28 Barwise, Jon 117 Bigelow, John 127 Bird, Alexander 14, 28, 36, 52, 60, 109, 112, 116, 129, 132–134, 145, 147, 148 Borghini, Andrea 129, 130 Brendel, Elke 3 Burks, Arthur W. 44 Carnap, Rudolf 9–11, 17, 20–22, 41–43, 104, 105, 127, 149 Cartwright, Nancy 8, 29, 68, 76–80, 88, 90, 91, 95, 96, 98, 103–105, 124, 137 Choi, Sungho 33, 34, 36, 38, 41, 43–45, 61, 63, 68, 111, 150 Corry, Richard 74, 76, 80, 89, 90 Craig, Edward 1, 71 Crepeau, John 18 Cross, Troy 31, 36, 37, 51, 53, 107, 113, 119, 129, 132

Fara, Michael 33, 34, 38, 41, 43–45, 63–66, 68, 150 Feynman, Richard 6, 77 Fine, Kit 5, 13, 14, 136–139, 143 Fischer, Florian 104 Gardner, Martin 11, 17, 20, 22, 104, 105, 127 Garson, James 13, 131 Goodman, Nelson 31, 37, 38, 43–45, 51, 149 Gundersen, Lars 33, 36, 61, 150 Hall, Ned 143 Hampe, Michael 6 Handfield, Toby 3, 126, 127 Hänsel, Horst 81 Hartmann, Dirk 44 Hauska, Jan 66 Hawthorne, John 52 Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 103 Heil, John 4, 31, 35–37, 69, 89, 95, 121, 127, 141 Hempel, Carl Gustav 29 Hume, David 113 Hüttemann, Andreas 29, 57, 85–88, 92–94, 99 Jaag, Siegfried 103, 129 Jacobs, Jonathan 113, 127, 129, 132, 142 Jansen, Ludger 39 Johnston, Mark 36, 50–52, 68, 108, 145–148

Davidson, Donald 114 Deutsch, David 3 Dowty, David Roach 114 Dretske, Fred Irwin 26 Ducasse, Curt John 121

Kaila, Eino 44 Kerry, Roger 3 Kleist, Heinrich von 95 Krebs, Robert E. 81 Kripke, Saul A. 136, 138 Kutner, Marc L. 18

Eagle, Antony 126 Earman, John 6, 15, 22, 23 Ellis, Brian David 3, 30, 36, 126 Eriksen, Thor 3 Esfeld, Michael 56, 57 Essler, Wilhelm Karl 12 Etchemendy, John 117 Everitt, Nicholas 125

Ladyman, James 32 Lange, Marc 17 Lepore, Ernest 114 Lewis, David Kellogg 19, 23–27, 33–35, 45, 48–50, 54, 109–111, 135, 136, 143, 146, 148, 149 Lie, Svein Anders Noer 3 Loewer, Barry 23

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-169

162 | Author Index

Lombard, Lawrence Brian 121 Lütge, Christoph 12 Madouasse, Aurélien 3 Malzkorn, Wolfgang 33–35, 55–58, 60, 149 Manley, David 33, 52, 60, 62, 63, 150 Mares, Edwin 6 Marmodoro, Anna 141 Martin, C. B. 35, 37, 44, 47, 54, 111, 118, 127, 141 McKitrick, Jennifer 105, 129, 132 McLaughlin, Brian 114 Mellor, David Hugh 3, 104 Meschede, Dieter 81 Mill, John Stuart 23, 71–76, 79, 80, 85, 89 Millikan, Robert Andrew 81 Molnar, George 50, 73, 89, 97, 99, 101, 140 Müller, Thomas 128, 129 Mumford, Stephen 3, 29, 35, 45, 51, 57, 94, 112, 125, 133 Mumford, Stephen D. 3

Reutlinger, Alexander 17 Roberts, John 6, 15, 25, 26 Ruby, Jane 6 Ryle, Gilbert 45, 149 Scheibe, Erhard 16 Schrenk, Markus 14, 110, 113, 134–136, 139 Schurz, Gerhard 17, 66 Schweitzer, Bertold 11 Sellars, Wilfrid 44 Shpall, Samuel 114 Sidelle, Alan 13 Smith, David 36 Spohn, Wolfgang 66 Stalnaker, Robert 19 Storer, Thomas 44 Stuhlmann-Laeisz, Rainer 4, 9, 12 Thompson, Michael 115 Tooley, Michael 26 Tugby, Matthew 113, 118 Tugendhat, Ernst 33

Neumann, Werner 81 Oppenheim, Paul 29 Pap, Arthur 44 Pemberton, John 90, 98, 103 Penrose, Roger 6 Perry, John 104 Priest, Graham 13, 19 Prior, Arthur Norman 104 Prior, Elizabeth 1, 34, 45, 107, 120 Pruss, Alexander Robert 129 Psillos, Stathis 91, 95, 96, 136

Van Fraassen, Bas Cornelis 7, 8, 13, 15, 18, 20, 23, 24, 27 Vetter, Barbara 129, 130 Vollmer, Gerhard 7, 8, 16, 22 von Kutschera, Franz 8 Wasserman, Ryan 33, 60, 62, 63, 150 Weatherson, Brian 19 Williams, Neil E. 129, 130 Wilson, George 114 Wolf, Ursula 33 Woodward, James 20, 29

Quine, Willard Van Orman 45, 149

Yli-Vakkuri, Juhani 66, 67, 150

Ramsey, Frank Plumpton 23

Zilsel, Edgar 6

Index alien kind, 138, 143 alien property, 138, 143 antidote, 51–55, 61, 68, 84, 88, 90, 91, 106, 109, 113, 116, 118, 134–136 atemporal, 56, 104, 136 behaviour, 5, 13, 17, 25, 26, 29, 37, 38, 40, 41, 46, 47, 57, 62–65, 77, 80, 84, 86–102, 105, 118–124, 127, 137–143 categorical predicate, 37 categorical property, 29, 31, 33, 36, 37, 45 causality, 21, 29, 30, 49, 50, 55, 57–59, 63, 64, 80, 90, 91, 98, 101, 114, 129–131, 140 causation, 3, 6, 20, 30, 31, 49, 50, 52–54, 58, 59, 62, 65, 71–80, 84, 85, 89, 91, 96, 103, 105, 109–112, 114, 116, 129, 131, 149 CCCA, 61, 62 composition, 71–74, 76, 78–80, 102, 103 concrete particular, 39, 56 conditional, 7, 18, 19, 22, 33–39, 44–49, 53–55, 59–61, 63, 65–69, 107, 112, 119, 120, 125, 126, see counterlegal, 127, 133–135 – counterfactual, see counterfactual counterfactual, 3, 7, 18–20, 31, 33, 35, 38, 44–49, 53–55, 58, 59, 61, 63, 123, 126–129, 133, 135, 136 counterlegal, 127, 131 CPCA, 66, 67, 150 disposition, 3–5, 14, 20–22, 28–41, 43–45, 47–69, 71, 84–95, 97–99, 101–103, 105–108, 110–116, 118–123, 125–131, 133–137, 139–143 – canonical, 34, 35, 38, 45, 61 – conventional, 34, 35, 45, 61 – multi-shot, 57 – operator, 65 – abstract, 57 – ascription, 3, 16, 29, 31–39, 41–49, 51, 52, 54–56, 58–69, 86, 87, 107, 124, 125, 133 – atemporal, 56 – comparative, 62, 63

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110594843-171

– non-comparative, 63 – omni-temporal, 56 – semantics, 31, 35, 69 – time dependent, 56 – canonical, 90, 96 – continuously manifesting, 57, 84–87 – degree, 57, 60 – discontinuously manifesting, 85 – multi track, 97 – singular, 64 empiricism, 21, 23, 26, 80, 105 – logical, 21, 22, 105 epistemic, 8, 25, 39, 72, 76, 86, 89, 90, 102 essence, 29, 44, 121, 128, 133, 134 essentialism, 14, 36, 126, 132–134 event, 12, 21, 22, 30, 61, 110, 113–115, 121, 129, 130 explanation, 3, 6, 7, 13, 20, 26, 28–30, 37, 38, 58, 67–69, 77, 78, 86, 89, 90, 95–97, 102, 111, 121, 123, 125, 127, 128, 134 – DN model of, 29 – gaps, 68, 69, 112, 128 extrinsic, 48–50, 52, 62 fink, 52–54, 66–68, 85, 88, 91, 94, 106, 107, 111, 118, 125 – reverse-cycle, 47, 48, 52, 53, 67 fisposition, 32 force, 16, 17, 21, 23, 71–84, 88–90, 93, 95, 98, 100, 102, 104, 108, 109, 113, 121, 124, 135, 137, 138 fragility, 29, 32–35, 37, 38, 40, 41, 47, 49, 50, 52, 53, 56, 57, 59–64, 66, 69, 85, 107–109, 116, 118 fundamental, 24, 31–33, 35, 77, 94, 128 general terminus, 33 governing, 6, 13, 15, 24–26, 30, 72, 75, 103, 142 grounding, 7, 9, 18, 20, 25, 62, 123, 126, 128 habitual, 61, 65, 66, 68 Humeanism, 4, 21, 26, 29, 44, 86, 91, 92, 95, 105, 112–115, 129, 142

164 | Index

imperfective paradox, 114–116 individuation, 63, 114, 115, 121, 133 interaction, 35, 69, 71, 72, 77, 79, 84, 89–93, 95, 96, 98, 99, 105, 106, 118–122, 128, 139 intrinsic, 31, 48–50, 52, 55, 62, 65, 66, 142, 149, 150 knowledge, 8, 21, 31, 75, 102 lawhood, 23–25, 128, 131 lawlike generalisation, 29 laws of nature, 3–31, 36, 37, 43, 44, 69, 74–78, 80, 85–87, 89, 92, 99, 103, 104, 123–129, 131–134, 138, 139, 143 – ceteris paribus, 17, 29, 66–68, 77, 78, 124, 126 – statements, 6–9, 17, 21–23, 27–29, 124–126 – characteristic of, 6–8, 26, 123, 128 – economics, 12 – facticity of, 7, 77, 78, 124 – zoology, 11 level of reality, 32 linguistic turn, 21 local, 29, 30, 103, 125 manifestation, 29, 32, 34, 35, 37, 38, 41, 42, 44, 45, 47–64, 66–68, 84–103, 106–113, 116–122, 130, 131, 133, 136, 139, 141, 150 mask, 28, 51–54, 59, 61–64, 66–69, 84, 85, 87–90, 94–96, 98, 100, 106–109, 112, 113, 118, 120, 125, 128, 130, 139 – diachronic, 53, 54, 59, 106, 107, 109, 112, 113, 115, 116, 120, 128, 139 material implication, 38, 39, 44, 45 – paradoxes of, 22, 39 Millikan’s oil drop experiment, 75–77, 79, 81–85, 88, 89, 93, 94, 96, 98, 100, 118, 120, 121, 126, 127 mimicking, 51, 68 modality, 11, 13–15, 20–22, 26, 31, 44, 128, 129, 135–139, 141, 142 – natural, 129 natural kind, 126

necessity, 3–5, 7, 9, 10, 12–15, 21, 22, 26–28, 30, 36–38, 97, 98, 112, 113, 123, 127–134, 136–140, 142, 143 – a posteriori, 136 – bestowed, 7, 14, 15, 131 – conceptual, 112 – diachronic, 117 – inherited, 7, 14, 15, 131 – logical, 9, 10, 12, 14, 27, 112, 135, 139 – metaphysical, 14, 15, 113, 132–139, 143 – natural, 9, 11–14, 20, 21, 26–28, 30, 123, 127–129, 132, 136–139, 143 – normative, 14, 136 – physical, 9–12, 128 Newton’s law of gravitation, 9, 13, 16, 17, 124, 137 ontology, 4, 5, 7, 8, 21, 28, 31, 32, 36–39, 69, 72, 76, 84, 88–93, 95, 97, 100, 102–106, 113–115, 120, 121, 123, 125, 128–131, 133 – blue print, 4, 5, 97, 106, 123 outlaw areas, 69, 112, 125 poison, 53, 54, 90, 92, 95, 109, 116, 118, 134, 135 possibility, 9, 11, 13, 15, 19, 23, 28, 31, 37, 38, 46, 48, 99, 100, 102, 105, 110, 113, 115, 117, 127–133, 136, 140–143 – biological, 11 – chemical, 11 – conceptual, 9, 118 – economical, 11 – logical, 27 – metaphysical, 137, 138, 143 – natural, 11, 12, 137, 138, 143 – physical, 11–13, 128, 129 – real, 128 prediction, 6, 7, 18, 20, 72–75, 79, 96, 97, 102, 123, 127 prevention problem, 20, 28, 53, 85, 106, 107, 112–116, 118, 120, 123 process, 26, 29, 30, 49, 53, 106, 110, 112, 114–123, 139 RCCA, 48–52, 54, 55, 58, 149 reduction sentence, 33, 41–44, 48, 105, 110

Index |

regularity, 21, 22, 24–27 – accidental, 22, 23

165

theory, 3–7, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 28–32, 34, 51, 62, 64, 67, 69, 71, 84, 101, 104, 106, 107, 112–116, 120, 123, 124, 126, 128 time, 15, 16, 22, 26, 29, 41, 42, 45, 49, 52, 54–58, 72, 73, 76, 79, 80, 83, 90, 93, 95, 101, 103–107, 109–111, 113–119, 121, 123, 125, 128, 135, 140, 149 trias, 80, 84, 91, 93, 95–98, 105, 120, 121, 123, 125, 127, 132, 137, 139 trigger, see stimulus truth maker, 7, 8, 32, 36, 37, 46, 69, 127

SCA, 33, 38–46, 67, 110, 133 SCCA, 33, 38, 45–50, 53, 54, 60, 61, 67, 133–135, 149 semantics, 7, 22, 39, 66, 68, 104, 127, 140 – exception-tolerating, 66 – possible world, 13, 127, 140 SoCCA, 55, 57, 60, 110, 149 solubility, 31, 34, 35, 39–45, 48, 56, 61, 85, 107 stimulus, 29, 34, 35, 38, 40–43, 45, 47–49, 52–54, 56, 58, 59, 61–63, 67, 85, 97, 106–113, 116–120, 122, 130, 133–136, 139, 141, 149 stimulus condition, see stimulus substance, 43, 44, 54, 75, 113, 129 supervenience, 36, 37

Wirkung, 90–95, 97–103, 105, 106, 120, 121, 123, 124, 126, 137, 139–142

temporal, 56, 104

Zucky, 39–46, 56

universal, 26, 27, 30 universality, 7, 15, 17, 18, 23, 26, 103, 123, 125, 126, 128