REAL POSSIBILITIES,
INDETERMINISM
AND
FREE WILL
Konstanz (Germany), 18-21 March 2015
Programme and Abstracts
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Programme
Wednesday, 18 March 2015
16:00
Registration (Level A7)
17:00-18:30
Keynote Lecture (Room A701)
Ruth Groff:
Powers, Agency and the Free Will Problematic
Chair: Thomas M¨
uller
18:30
Reception (Level A7)
Thursday, 19 March 2015 (Room A701)
09:00-10:30
Thomas M¨
uller and group:
Introduction
10:45-11:45
Peter Øhrstrøm:
A.N. Prior’s Philosophical and Tense-Logical Analysis of the Problem of Human Freedom
Chair: Daan Evers
12:00-13:00
Helen Steward:
What is Determinism?—Why we should Ditch the Entailment Definition
Chair: Daan Evers
13:00-14:30
Lunch (Mensa, K6 + K7)
14:30-15:30
Rani Lill Anjum & Stephen Mumford:
Causation is Not Your Enemy
Chair: Markus Schrenk
15:45-16:45
John Pemberton:
Possibilities from Powers
Chair: Markus Schrenk
17:00-18:00
Barbara Vetter:
Dispositions, Necessary Masks, and Counterpossibles
Chair: Markus Schrenk
19:00
Conference Dinner: Wessenberg, Wessenbergstraße 41
Friday, 20 March 2015
09:00-10:00
Plenary Talk (Room A 701)
Geert Keil:
What Is Wrong with the Luck Objection?
Chair: Katarzyna Paprzycka
Parallel Session 1 (Room A704)
Parallel Session 2 (Room A701)
G. Torrengo & S. Iaquinto:
The Invisible Thin Red Line
Verena Wagner:
Reconciling Projects
Chair: Niko Strobach
Chair: Katarzyna Paprzycka
Jesse Mulder:
Two Perspectives on Time
Anne-Sophie Spann:
Indeterministic Compatibilism: A Third Way
between Compatibilism and Incompatibilism?
Chair: Niko Strobach
Chair: Roland P¨ollinger
Tibor F¨
oldes:
Double-indexing, Propositional Identity and
Obtainment
Jacob Rosenthal:
Libertarianism and the Problem of Clear
Cases
Chair: Niko Strobach
Chair: Roland P¨ollinger
13:00-14:30
Lunch (Mensa, K6 + K7)
Lunch (Mensa, K6 + K7)
14:30-15:30
Jan Broersen:
A Spatial Stit-logic Approach to Real
Possibilities
Gottfried Seebaß:
Can Quantum Physics Ground
Indeterminism? Philosophical Remarks on a
Controversial Problem
Chair: Hans Rott
Chair: David Widerker
Simon Kittle:
Abilities, Circumstances and Possibilities
Federica Della Grotta:
What is the Future that Sets us Free?
Chair: Hans Rott
Chair: David Widerker
Florian Fischer:
Localized Dispositions and Global Laws
Anna Drozdzewska:
Free Will, Indeterminism and the Missing
Context
Chair: Hans Rott
Chair: David Widerker
10:15-11:00
11:15-12:00
12:15-13:00
15:45-16:30
16:45-17:30
21:00-21:00
Drinks: Barbarossa, “Stauferkeller”, Obermarkt 8-12
Saturday, 21 March 2015
09:00-10:00
10:15-11:00
11:00-11:45
12:00-13:30
Parallel Session 1 (Room A704)
Parallel Session 2 (Room A701)
Tomasz Placek:
In Praise of Forks
Erasmus Mayr:
The Relevance of Alternatives
Chair: Alberto Zanardo
Chair: Jacob Rosenthal
J. Wawer & L. Wro´
nski:
A New Theory of Historical Counterfactuals
Georg Gasser:
Human Agents as Rational Powerful
Particulars
Chair: Alberto Zanardo
Chair: Jacob Rosenthal
Frederik Van De Putte:
Possibilities, Abilities, and Obligations
Katarzyna Paprzycka:
Two-Way Two-Gear Powers
Chair: Alberto Zanardo
Chair: Jacob Rosenthal
Keynote Lecture (Room A701)
Tim O’Connor:
The Dead Hand of the Past
Chair: Hans Briegel
13:30
Closing of conference and departure: snacks will be provided
Abstracts
Rani Lill Anjum (Norwegian University of Life Sciences)
Stephen Mumford (University of Nottingham)
Causation is Not Your Enemy
Causation plays a vital role in the free will debate so it is among the top priorities that it
be understood right. There is a view that merely being subject to causal laws is already
enough to compromise our freedom. Watson (1982, p. 2), for example, speaks as if we
might be robbed of free will simply in virtue of our actions having prior causes. This trades
on an alleged link between causation and determinism. There might then be a temptation
to look for free will in an ability to step outside the regular causal nexus. That would be
a big mistake, effectively attributing supernatural powers to agency. Rather, we should
understand causation as something that is on our side: on the side of freedom. It is through
the exercise of causal powers that we are agents and through which we have gained free
will. The last thing we need is to be liberated from causation, then, for that would thereby
enslave us to pure chance. It is clear, however, that causation has been misunderstood in
terms of determining, necessitating and controlling. We argue for a different understanding
of causation as something that we use to get what we want. Causes acting upon us can
certainly influence us but we also make a causal contribution to what is brought about.
The correct account can thus give us both freedom and responsibility.
Jan Broersen (Utrecht University)
A Spatial Stit-logic Approach to Real Possibilities
We extend stit logic by adding a spatial dimension. This enables us to distinguish between
abilities and opportunities of agents. Abilities are independent of locations, but depend
on agents. Opportunities do depend on locations, but are independent of agents. The
possibility to see to the truth of a condition in space and time is defined as the combination of the ability and the opportunity to do so. We explain the relation with Belnap’s
branching space-time theory. We argue that in Belnap’s theory the agent has been lost in
the physics-oriented analysis. The focus on agent-relative abilities, as we define them in
our theory, brings the autonomous choice making agent back into the space-time picture.
We show how our semantics naturally distinguishes between different kinds of histories;
histories that reflect real (factual) possibilities and histories that reflect counterfactual
possibilities (of a particular hypothetical kind). Furthermore, we discuss how the spatial
picture sheds a clear light on the conceptual problems surrounding the central stit property of “independence of agency”. We provide a clarification of the concept and will argue
that the phrase is a misnomer; the better term would be exactly its opposite, that is,
“dependence of agency”.
Federica Della Grotta (University of Cambridge)
What is the Future that Sets us Free?
I argue that a metaphysical open future is not a necessary element to understand the
distinctive kind of agency human agents attribute to themselves. Instead, I argue that the
requirement is considerably lower: all that is needed is only an epistemic open future.
By further exploring the possibilities offered by epistemic openness, I aim to offer a convincing story about the attribution of autonomous human agency. As a starting point, I
distinguish between two claims typically made by incompatibilists. The first claim says
that the absence of an open future entails that no one can choose otherwise, thereby ruling
out free will. The second says that in the absence of an open future we are not the real
‘source’ of our actions. I endorse the first claim while I argue against the second. To this
end, I offer an original understanding of the role of deliberation as a first-person, normative space in which we attribute an active role to ourselves, and in which we recognize
ourselves as free agents.
Anna Drozdzewska (Universit´e Catholique de Louvain)
Free Will, Indeterminism and the Missing Context
With the recent advancement in neuroscience, the debate of free will gained new life. Most
of the neuroscientific experiments investigating free will, starting from Libet’s along with
his successors, are based on specific assumptions, which will be analyzed in detail, as a
starting point of this presentation. I will examine the potential issues with those premises,
influencing not only the conclusions of those experiments but also our understanding of
the problem, determining thus further experiments. I will present a new approach to free
will, which hypothesizes that, instead of a momentary occurrence, as its usually conceived,
it is exercised as a process.
In the second part of the talk, I will show how my proposal could be realized on a neuronal
level, based on the argument by P.U. Tse, and I will argue the informational patterns Tse
recognizes as paramount in his criterial causation are similar to what, for Habermas,
would be an objective brain: the world of shared symbols transferred through language.
I will conclude the presentation by discussing the additional advantages of the approach,
focusing on its solution to the problem of randomness in the indeterministic account of
free will.
Florian Fischer (University of Bonn, University of Cologne)
Localized Dispositions and Global Laws
One important problem for dispositional theories of laws of nature is the tension between
the locality of dispositions and the globality of laws. Already within the debate about
dispositions a similar question arises: the so-called generality problem. How do dispositions synchronise the behaviour they produce if each disposition is only a local property?
Dispositional theories of laws of nature claim to be the best candidates to explain natural
necessity. Their opponents allegedly either just posit necessity out of the blue (ADT theories) or abandon natural necessity altogether (Neo-Humean theories). But also the laws’
natural necessity seems endangered by the locality of the dispositions. I propose a theory
of dispositions as natural kinds which come with inbuilt combination principles for other
natural kinds. These ensure the global and modal behavioural stability and thus are good
candidates to ground universal and necessary laws.
Tibor F¨
oldes (ELTE Budapest)
Double-indexing, Propositional Identity and Obtainment
My paper focuses on the connections between our indeterminist intuitions about the future
and the various semantic treatments of the double indexing phenomenon in intensional
languages with indexicals. The two paradigmatic theories of the analysis will be John
MacFarlane’s relativist assessment-sensitive theory of future tense and Nathan Salmon’s
theory of complex semantic content with four different strata based on his classic eternalist understanding of propositions. I’ll argue that absolutism isn’t incompatible with
indeterminism at all, if we don’t leave the Stalnakerian concept of propositional functions
and their structures out of account. My paper discusses the different ontological intuitions about truth-making that can be found in the background of the different handling
of double-indexing. These divergent ontologies are mirrored in the different predictions
about the behavior of the meta-language truth predicates. While the truth predicate concerning the truth-bearers representing future facts is context-sensitive in a simple way from
a relativist stance, the eternalist indeterminism treats the truth-predicate itself doubleindexed. I’ll argue that these two intuitions about the future presuppose different relations
between time and obtainment of truth-makers.
Georg Gasser (University of Innsbruck)
Human Agents as Rational Powerful Particulars
This paper contributes to the current debate on agent-causal power by proceeding in four
steps: First, I briefly outline Tim O’Connor’s account which claims that there is genuine
agent-causal power, that is, the agent herself being a cause of her action. Second, I
present an objection against this account. It claims that the agent does not dispose of
any particular agent-causal power because the real powers are the powerful properties of
an agent. Third, in the bulk of my paper I propose a way how this line of reasoning can
be rejected. I argue that the distinction between powerful properties (of a substance) on
the one hand and the substance itself (bearing these properties) on the other hand rests
on a problematic metaphysical understanding of the relationship between substance and
(its) properties. I propose a more accurate understanding of this relationship. Finally,
in the light of these reflections I conclude with some remarks about how I think that
agent-causation should be spelled out.
Ruth Groff (Saint Louis University)
Powers, Agency and the Free Will Problematic
Realism about causal powers has begun to make its way into contemporary debates over
free will. Most powers theorists will say that agents, like other substances, have real
powers to engage in activity, in doing of various kinds. It is a natural thought to add that
agents, having the remarkable power of consciousness, are able to exercise or to decline to
exercise at least some of our other powers as we see fit, i.e., freely. A common rejoinder is
that agents would be no freer in a powers-based environment than in a non-powers-based
one, because (it is said) the exercise of agential powers is deterministically triggered by the
prior display of the powers of other things. Against this backdrop, I want to try to clarify
just how and why a non-Humean commitment to the existence of real causal powers might
make a difference for the theorizing of agency.
My working assumption is that there is significant confusion about what the commitment
in question actually involves, what it amounts to at the most basic level. Moreover, I
think that there are interesting philosophical reasons for the lack of clarity. I will begin,
therefore, by talking about why it might be hard for someone who doesn’t believe in the
phenomenon in question to understand what the term “power” is meant to pick out. Then,
in the central part of the talk, I will offer a sketch of how a properly conceived powers-based
ontology reconfigures (or, technically speaking, sublates) the existing free will problematic
in analytic philosophy—a problematic that, in its present form, presupposes a nomological
and/or regularity-based metaphysics. Finally, I will talk just a little bit about whether
or not every genuinely powers-based metaphysics shows the “powers-based determinism”
objection to be ill-conceived. It may be that one needs a position that is more like
Aristotle’s than not, in order to do the job.
Geert Keil (Humboldt University, Berlin)
What Is Wrong with the Luck Objection?
The luck objection is commonly regarded as the most serious challenge to event-causal
libertarian accounts of free will. The objection says that (1) if there exist no deterministic causal links between mental processes and decisions, then it is a matter of sheer luck
whether the decision occurs. It further assumes that (2) luck precludes the kind of control
that is required both for moral responsibility and for any kind of free will worth wanting.
The phrase “being a matter of luck” has a number of readings. The only reading that
libertarians qua indeterminists are committed to is “not being deterministically caused”.
The paper argues that the dialectical situation in which the luck objection is put forward
is underexplored in the literature. It argues further that agnostic compatibilism is in
no better position to answer the challenge than libertarianism, while deterministic compatibilism cannot explain how the existence of deterministic links between pro-attitudes,
decisions and bodily actions should enhance the agent’s control.
Pereboom argues as follows: “On an event-causal libertarian picture, the relevant causal
conditions antecedent to the decision, i.e., the occurrence of certain agent-involving events,
do not settle whether the decision will occur”, since they do not render the decision 100%
probable. Therefore, the agent “will lack the control required for basic desert moral responsibility” (Pereboom 2014, 32). The second step of the argument from luck—i.e., the
assumption that in order to be morally responsible, an agent must be able to guarantee
that the decision takes place—seems misguided in the first place. Human agents have no
such abilities, not even in a deterministic world. Hence both compatibilist and incompatibilist accounts of free will are ill-advised to require such abilities.
Simon Kittle (University of Sheffield)
Abilities, Circumstances and Possibilities
In this paper I propose a way of individuating ability properties which requires the complete definition of an ability to include, in addition to the stimulus and manifestation, a set
of circumstances against which the manifestation is to be expected and a parameter which
concerns what Barbara Vetter has called “modal force”. Using this view it is possible to
make sense of a distinction in the free will literature that is often made, but not often
made clearly: that between general abilities on the one hand and specific, particular, or
local abilities on the other. I use the account of ability individuation presented to articulate two ways that an ability might be general. And with the two senses of generality
clearly separated, I then present a number of principles which aim to summarise which
abilities are most relevant to the agent’s control. This then promises an account of which
possibilities are genuine or real for an agent.
Erasmus Mayr (Oxford University, Humboldt University, Berlin)
The Relevance of Alternatives
Most arguments for incompatibilism are based on the idea that moral responsibility presupposes that the agent could have acted otherwise. With regard to responsibility for
blameworthy actions, this requirement is often motivated by the claim that it would be
unfair to blame or punish someone who could not avoid doing what he did. For praiseworthy actions, however, the issue is more complicated, and the requirement of alternative
possibilities has been rejected by several philosophers. I will examine both the plausibility
of fairness-based arguments for the requirement in the case of non-blameworthy actions
and will discuss the consequences of a powers- or disposition-based account of free will for
the question whether responsibility in these cases requires alternative possibilities.
Jesse Mulder (Utrecht University)
Two Perspectives on Time
Frege taught us how to understand one form of predication: an atemporal one. There is
also a different, temporal form of predication. Accordingly, there are two fundamentally
different approaches to time: a reductive one, aiming to account for time in terms of Frege’s
atemporal predication, and a non-reductive one, insisting that the temporal form of predication is irreducible. I argue that three of the main debates in contemporary philosophy of
time (endurantism–perdurantism, A-theory–B-theory, and presentism–eternalism) largely
boil down to mere quarrels amongst reductive approaches, and thus fail to hit the level
of fundamentality they aim for. The real issue, I suggest, is whether we should reduce or
not. Once we recognise this, we can start considering truly anti-reductionist versions of
endurantism, A-theory, and presentism.
Tim O’Connor (Indiana University)
The Dead Hand of the Past
The problem of free will is in large measure the problem of understanding how causally
conditioned agents can be loci of ultimate control: how can human actions originate, and
not merely conduct, causal influence upon the world? That our acts be causal undetermined is necessary for us to exert such ultimate control, but it is not enough. Also
necessary is that our activity be fundamental in the causal order, in the way we might
suppose is true of elementary particles. But how might this be? How might causally
conditioned and composed entities (as we are) be fundamental, non-derivative causes? I
will attempt to make progress towards an answer to this question.
Peter Øhrstrøm (Aalborg University)
A.N. Prior’s Philosophical and Tense-logical Analysis of the Problem of
Human Freedom
Arthur Norman Prior was born in 1914 in Masterton, New Zealand. In 1932 he went to
Otago University at Dunedin. He set out to study medicine, but after a short time he
instead went into philosophy. During his first year as a Philosophy student, he joined
the Presbyterian denomination. He became a very active member of the Presbyterian
community. As such he felt that a Christian had to be a determinist, since he would
have to believe in a perfect divine foreknowledge. On the other hand, even a determinist
will have to be able to give an account of the human feeling of free choice. Prior became
a specialist in the debates regarding the logical tension between the doctrine of divine
foreknowledge and the doctrine of human freedom. He found inspiration in the works of
Aristotle, Diodorus, St. Thomas, Ockham, Peirce, Lukasiewicz and several others. Based
on the study of these famous contributions he formulated his tense-logic and demonstrated
how the problem can be analyzed in terms of this formalism. In fact, he argued that in
the discussion concerning divine foreknowledge and human freedom there are only a few
possible positions.
Gradually, it became more and more difficult for Prior to accept determinism and to reject
human freedom of choice. Finally, he left the Presbyterian denomination, and he claimed
that human freedom should in fact be maintained as an important philosophical tenet. In
terms of his tense-logic this means that there are future contingents.
When Prior died in 1969 he left a number of unpublished papers and notes. This material
is now being edited and published. Based on recent studies in Prior’s Nachlass we can
in fact obtain a much better understanding of Prior’s analysis of the future contingency
problem as well as his own personal way from a defence of determinism to a strong belief
in human freedom.
Katarzyna Paprzycka (University of Warsaw)
Two-Way Two-Gear Powers
It is natural to think that the following biconditional holds for any agent with two-way
powers: (A) It is in α’s power to φ iff it is in α’s power not to φ. I distinguish between
two grades of an ability to φ: the first grade ability (roughly, reliability in φing) and the
second grade ability (merely occasional success in φing). I define three two-way power
concepts: control, doability and power∗ . φing is in α’s control [is doable for α] iff α has
the first [second] grade ability to φ and the first [second] grade ability not to φ. It is within
α’s power∗ to φ iff α has the first grade ability to φ and at least the second grade ability
not to φ. (A) does hold for control and doability but not for power∗ (cases of an addict
and a person with Parkinson’s disease serve as illustrations). I argue that power∗ seems to
do much work frequently thought to be required of the notion of ability in philosophical
discussions. I focus on: the Butler problem, the normative theory of omission (which
requires the ability to do otherwise), the ought-implies-can principle.
John Pemberton (London School of Economics)
Possibilities from Powers
Powers are producers of change, we should suppose—and hence powers give rise to possibilities. This view contrasts with others which take possibilities as central: e.g. the
various possible world accounts and now-popular counterfactual approaches, such as the
interventionist approach of Woodward, where offering an account of how possibilities come
about is not in focus.
Powers exercise, in general, when they are in suitable contact with other correlate powers.
Thus configurations of powers and the features in which they inhere can give rise to the
exercising of powers, and hence the changing of that configuration—over time such changing is then what may be called a process of change. The processes of change to which a
configuration (or type of configuration) can give rise are possibilities associated with that
configuration, as are the configurations which result from such changes.
By reference to Aristotle’s ontology of powers and change, I outline this this-world account of possibilities. Powers are often empirically available entities within the world
associated with features which we can recognise and perhaps control—they thus license
use of analytic and experimental methods, and hence make sense of many of the practices
of contemporary science. Many of our most well-established empirical methods thus make
use of possibilities which may be taken to arise from powers.
Tomasz Placek (Jagiellonian University, Krak´ow)
In Praise of Forks
Although general relativistic spacetimes with non-isometric extensions satisfy the standard
definition of indeterminism (due to J. Butterfield), they are rarely taken as evidence for
indeterminism of general relativity. A peculiar feature of these extensions is that their
union does not contain forks (bifurcating timelike curves). It looks as if the spacetime had
more than one extension, but no object faced alternative possible evolutions. Clearly, this
sounds like a statement of determinism. I thus suggest that forks be made a criterion of
indeterminism. Forks are almost everywhere in our thinking about indeterminism: in our
intuitive approach to alternative possibilities, in Prior’s (1967) branching time analysis,
in Belnap’s (1992) branching space-times analysis, and even in my (2014) GR-friendly
branching, devised to handle closed timelike curves. Moreover, a fork can be extracted
from a Lewis-style divergent pair of worlds that witnesses indeterminism in Lewisian sense.
And, forks would occur in a union of non-isometric multiple maximally global extensions
of an appropriate initial data set, provided such non-isometric multiple extensions existed
(they are prohibited by the Bruchat-Geroch theorem). In contrast, forks are absent in a
controversial case of non-isometric multiple extensions of a maximally global spacetime.
Oddly, a union of such extensions is non-Hausdorff (signaling alternative spacetimes), but
forks are absent. I would illustrate this phenomenon on extensions of Misner’s spacetime,
and contrast it with fork-like patterns introduced before.
Jacob Rosenthal (University of Konstanz)
Libertarianism and the Problem of Clear Cases
Recent years have seen the development of new arguments in favour of and new varieties
of libertarianism. It has gained many adherents and can no longer be called a minority
view. I would like to highlight what seems to be a lacuna in all libertarian accounts, which
concerns the specific role indeterminism is supposed to play in our practical deliberations,
decisions and actions. The embarrassment is brought out most clearly by the various
cases of decisions in which there are strong and quite obvious reasons for one of the
options and only relatively weak ones in favour of the disjunction of the alternatives.
What is the proper role of indeterminism in such cases? The problem with all answers
given so far is that they either abandon libertarianism to a conspicuously high degree,
leaving indeterminism no essential role to play, or that they link indeterminism to some
serious defect in the person’s rationality, making implausible assumptions about what is
genuinely possible and conferring a purely negative role upon indeterminism. I spell this
out dealing with the accounts of Helen Steward and Geert Keil, respectively. Furthermore,
I argue that some versions of compatibilism face a similar dilemma.
Gottfried Seebaß (University of Konstanz)
Can Quantum Physics Ground Indeterminism? Philosophical Remarks on a
Controversial Problem
From the diagnosis that the denial of determinism represents a necessary (though not
sufficient) condition for human freedom, this talk enquires into the question of whether
quantum physics as a fundamental theory of matter is in a position to justify the claim
that the physical world is (significantly, if only partially) undetermined. Indeed, many
physicists and philosophers of science make just this assertion. However, upon closer examination the claim is highly dubitable. In neither a theoretical nor even an ontological
respect can quantum physics count as unrestrictedly “indeterministic”. When such inferences are drawn, this is (in addition to extra-physical reasons) the result of a substantial
overestimation of the significance that the features relevantly distinguishing quantum from
classical physics (quantization, probabilism, indeterminacy of measurement, doubtful applicability of basic ontological terms, etc.) have for indeterminism. Thus, as I will show,
we cannot speak of a proof for the time being, but must content ourselves with a sustained
assault on the na¨ıve faith in determinism and its unlimited applicability that developed
in the wake of the classical mechanics of the Modern period.
Anne Sophie Spann (University of Exeter)
Indeterministic Compatibilism:
Incompatibilism?
A Third way between Compatibilism and
John Dupr´e has recently proposed a third way between compatibilism and incompatibilism:
indeterministic compatibilism. Indeterministic compatibilism rests on the metaphysical
assumption that agency is a genuinely biological phenomenon, involving a special kind of
indeterminism. On this basis, then, it is argued that agency can be made comprehensible
as being free in a sense that does neither reduce freedom to the absence of external pressure
and obstacles nor turns it into a matter of mere chance. In my talk, I want to present and
critically discuss this position. I will also reflect on the general prospects of a biological
approach to the problem of free will.
Helen Steward (University of Leeds)
What is Determinism?—Why we should Ditch the Entailment Definition
J.L. Austin once famously claimed that determinism was “a name of nothing clear” (‘Ifs
and Cans’, Philosophical Papers, p.231). But today many philosophers working on the free
will problem operate happily with a definition of determinism that is pretty well accepted
on all hands. I call it the ‘entailment definition’ and it states, roughly, that determinism is
the thesis that for any given time, a complete statement of the nonrelational facts about
that time, together with a complete statement of the laws of nature, entails every truth as
to what happens after that time. In this paper, I argue that acceptance of the entailment
definition has been a mistake—and make some suggestions about what ought to be put in
its place.
Giuliano Torrengo (University of Milan)
Samuele Iaquinto (University of Milan)
The Invisible Thin Red Line
Our aim is to argue that the adoption of an unrestricted principle of bivalence is compatible with a metaphysics that (i) denies that the future is real, (ii) adopts nomological
indeterminism, and (iii) exploits a branching structure to provide a semantics for future contingent claims. To this end, within a non-standard tense realist framework, we
elaborate—after Kit Fine’s terminology—a fragmentalist presentism, according to which
reality is divided up into maximally coherent collections of tensed facts. In this way, we
show how to reconcile a genuinely A-theoretic branching-time model with the idea that
there is a branch corresponding to the thin red line, that is, the branch that will turn out
to be the actual future history of the world.
Barbara Vetter (Humboldt University, Berlin)
Dispositions, Necessary Masks, and Counterpossibles
A disposition is masked when, for some reason, its manifestation would be prevented even
if the right kind of conditions for it were to obtain. A glass’s fragility, for instance, may be
masked by the glass being safely packed in styrofoam. In standard cases, masks are such
that they could in principle be removed. But might there be necessary masks? In other
words, might objects have dispositions that they are necessarily prevented from manifesting?
This paper will explore the question whether there might be necessary masks before the
background of dispositionalism about modality, the view that metaphysical modality is
a matter of which dispositions are possessed by actually existing individual objects. The
question about necessary masks will be shown to pose a prima facie dilemma for dispositionalists: if there are necessary masks, then the existence of a disposition is not sufficient
for metaphysical possibility; but if there are no necessary masks, then dispositionalists
have trouble accounting for counterpossibles, i.e., counterfactuals with metaphysically
impossible antecedents. I will sketch ways of dealing with the dilemma and saving the
dispositional account of metaphysical modality from the threat of necessary masks.
Frederik Van De Putte (Ghent University)
Possibilities, Abilities, and Obligations
My talk will consist of two parts. In the first, I will show that a currently dominant
approach to agency and ability in the logical literature (i.e., STIT logic and its many variants) cannot adequately cope with normative claims that concern the abilities of agents.
More precisely, “ought to be able” and “is able” are simply equivalent, if we use the most
common deontic extension of STIT logic.
In the second part of the talk, I will propose and investigate three variants of STIT logic
which fill this lacuna, comparing their inferential strength and philosophical underpinnings. If time permits, I will also consider an older proposal by Richmond Thomason from
the viewpoint of abilities.
Verena Wagner (University of Konstanz)
Reconciling Projects
Compatibilism is the thesis that free agency is possible in a deterministic world. In order
to spell out a theory of free agency, the compatibilist, so it seems, only has to take
into account the possible truth of determinism. The question as to whether and how
indeterminism may be reconciled with free agency seems to be none of the compatibilist’s
business. But this view is mistaken. Being a convinced compatibilist myself, I aim at
showing that compatibilists have to care more about reconciling indeterminism with free
agency if they do not want to commit themselves to the determinist position, but rather
stay neutral with regard to this question. In this talk, I will show that proponents of the
most prevalent compatibilist line of thought, the so-called “neutral compatibilists”, are
committed to affirming the compatibility of freedom and indeterminism when they claim
that there are actually free agents in our world. I will point out that neutral compatibilists
not only have to allow for some random occurrences that are irrelevant for our agency, but
have to side with the libertarian in her aim to refute the luck objection. I will explain how
the neutral compatibilist can defend both compatibility claims (free agency is compatible
with determinism and indeterminism) by the same arguments.
Jacek Wawer (Jagiellonian University, Krak´ow)
Leszek Wro´
nski (Jagiellonian University, Krak´ow)
A New Theory of Historical Counterfactuals
In the paper we investigate the semantics of historical counterfactuals in indeterministic
contexts. We claim that “plain” and “necessitated” counterfactuals differ in meaning. To
substantiate this claim, we propose a new semantic treatment of historical counterfactuals
in Branching Time. We supplement our semantics with supervaluationist postsemantics,
thanks to which we can explain away the intuitions which seem to talk in favor of the
identification of “would” with “would necessarily”.