Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
uk 16/03/17
Plan
- Describe Jonathan Schaffer’s ‘tripartite structure’ for metaphysical explanation.
- Offer a route to simplifying the tripartite worldview.
The Principle View appears well-motivated. Why is it that the existence of Socrates grounds the
existence of Singleton Socrates? Intuitively: partly because of a principle of set theory. Why is that
the correct answer to our question? Intuitively: partly because of whatever higher-order principle
connects principles of set theory and the existence of set elements on the one hand with the
existence of sets on the other.
What is this higher-order principle? The simplest possible suggestion seems to be:
Conjecture A: The grounding principle of all grounding facts from the second order on upwards is
[grounding principles materially imply the holding of the connections they mediate].
Conjecture B: Nothing grounds [grounding principles materially imply the holding of the
connections they mediate]: it is fundamental.
The intuitive picture here is that the general principle that [grounding principles materially imply the
holding of the connections they mediate] is partly responsible for the holding of all connections
between grounding principle and grounds on the one hand and the resulting grounding facts on the
other – including second-order and above connections where it itself plays the role of grounding principle. (Note that
this is not to say that it grounds itself.)
A potential challenge to the Principle View: the ground and the grounding principle play distinctively different
roles in explaining why the ground grounds the grounded. This is true. But we have the resources to draw this
distinction. The grounding principle will take the form of a conditional connecting the other grounds
to the grounded fact. The grounds will be characterized by the antecedent of this conditional.
Why does Schaffer think the Principle View, with its one ontological category, cannot account for
metaphysical explanation? Perhaps he is moved by an analogy with the logical case. In the case of
logical explanations, as indicated by Lewis Carroll’s parable of Achilles and the Tortoise, we need a
distinction in kind between premises (even conditional premises) and inference rules. Without rules,
all we have is a big bag of premises, but as yet no conclusion. But I think that the analogy breaks
down. (The analogy between grounding and causation remains good, but it gives rise to no problem
of this sort.) Logical explanations do not state objective dependencies at all, but merely reflect
conceptual or representational dependencies: they are unworldly. This is controversial, of course. But if
it is correct, then we have the beginnings of an account of why a distinction between premises and
rules is needed in logic, but no analogous distinction is needed in metaphysics. Logical inference,
unlike metaphysical grounding, is something we do.
Why does Schaffer accept the Collapse View?
“First, it offers an elegant and systematic answer to the question of what grounds the grounding facts. Second, it
discharges any fears about infinities. The infinite sequence is an expansion out from the grounds, that is just as
unproblematic as the infinite sequences of disjunctive expansions (and double-negations etc.) that all come out of a single
starting proposition: p, p⋁q, p⋁q⋁r, p⋁q⋁r⋁s… In particular there is no threat of a limitless regression of ever deeper
grounds. It all just comes down to the very facts that one had designated as fundamental already. Thirdly—and to my
mind most saliently—the collapse view befits a fundamentalist image, on which “all God would need to do” is to put
the fundamentals in place, and these (given the grounding principles) would be enough to generate the rest…” –
Schaffer (MS) p.15 (n.b. this is an early draft of Schaffer’s; please do not quote or cite further.)
All these reasons, so far as I can see, carry over to the Principle View. And the Principle View has the
further advantage of not requiring a categorical distinction between facts and grounding principles.
References
Dasgupta, S. (2014). “The Possibility of Physicalism”, Journal of Philosophy 111: 557–92.
Schaffer, J. (Forthcoming). “The Ground Between the Gaps”, Philosophers’ Imprint.
Schaffer, J. (MS). “The World for Explanation”. In preparation.