Changing Truthmakers

I've posted a new paper, 'Changing Truthmakers'.  It's a reply to a paper by Jonathan Tallant and David Ingram, which is in turn a reply to my 'Truthmaking for Presentists'.

It's about how we can stop truthmakers for tensed truths changing, so as to ensure the validity of theorems of tense logic like 'If it's now the case that p, it always will be the case that it was the case that p'.  And I get to talk a bit about hypertime, which is always cool!

The Time-Travelling Trinitarian God

After having too much caffeine I started thinking about the metaphysics of the Trinity, for no immediately obvious reason.  The following is crazy, but maybe kinda fun too?  Well, here goes nothing . . .

It’s time t₀: the very first instant there is.  At this instant, there exists God the Father and God the Son.  One event occurs at this instant: God the Son is begotten of God the Father.

What is the relationship between God the Father and God the Son?  Well, we already have part of the story: the latter is begotten of the former.  Is there anything else we can say at this point?  One might be tempted to conclude that we know also that they are numerically distinct, since nothing is begotten of itself.

Certainly, this claim of distinctness seems to fit well with some of the things God the Son goes on to say.  He says, after all, that God the Father is greater than he is: and surely nothing is greater than itself!  Other things he says seem to at least conversationally imply that he is distinct from God the Father, even if they don’t logically entail it.  He says, for example, that no-one can come to the Father except through him (the Son): it would be less misleading to simply say ‘No-one can come to me except through me’ if that’s what this amounted to, as it surely would were the Father and the Son the same being.  All in all then, it seems like there is good reason to conclude that we have two things here: the Father and the Son.

Unfortunately, the Son also says some things that suggest that he is not distinct from the Father.  He says that he and the Father are one.  He doesn’t elaborate too much on what he means (he has a fondness for the cryptic!), but the smart money is on the claim that he’s saying they are of one essence.  And we have good metaphysical reasons for thinking that if A and B are of one essence, they are numerically identical.  For surely it is part of the essence of A that it is A and not some other thing.  And if B is not A then it is certainly not part of B’s essence that it is A.  So if A and B are distinct then they are not of one essence.  We also have theological reasons for thinking that the Father and the Son are identical, for we believe each of (i) The Father is divine, (ii) The Son is divine, (iii) For all x, if x is divine then x is a god, and (iv) There is exactly one god.  And (i)-(iv) together entail that the Father is the Son.

So we’re in a quandary: the story so far pulls in two directions, some things indicating that the Father and the Son are distinct, some things indicating that they are identical.  Let us now see how the story progresses.

God the Father is really powerful.  In fact, he can do anything metaphysically possible.  This is true at time t₀, and it remains true for ever.  He never loses any of his powers; and of course he never gains any, since he can already do anything possible (and that’s as powerful as it’s possible to be).  God the Son, on the other hand, starts off life at t₀ far less powerful.  (Hence his claim that the Father is greater than he is.)  But unlike the Father, the Son grows in power over time until, at the very last moment of time, t_z, he is himself capable of doing anything metaphysically possible.  One of the things he can do at t_z is travel in time, this being metaphysically possible.  And so he does: he travels back to t₀, at which point he calls himself God the Father and begets the earlier less powerful version of himself, calling him God the Son.

This is the story of a time-travelling deity.  At the beginning of time there is only God: but there are two ‘versions’ of him – there is the all powerful being he becomes at the end of time, who travelled back in time to the first moment, and there is the less powerful being that he started out as, who was begat by his more powerful future self after he travelled back in time.

I am not claiming that this is how the world is.  But I think it is possible, and that if it is true then the data we started with is accounted for.  Thus, I think we have here a metaphysical model that vindicates the orthodox Christian understanding of the relationship between God the Father and God the Son.

Consider the first puzzle: how can the Son be the Father if the former was begotten of the latter?  Well, if time travel is possible, cases of self-creation just aren’t that puzzling.  Let’s suppose that a man undergoing a sex change would be capable of giving birth.  So suppose I now, in 2012, travel back in time to 1979, wait a year and get a sex change and then travel back in time to 1979 again; at that point my male self that came back from 2012 can mate with my female self who came back in time from 1980, who will then give birth to infant me in 1980, who will grow up to back in time in 2012.  This scenario is perfectly consistent, and it involves me creating myself.  So there’s nothing impossible about God going back in time and begetting his earlier self.

It’s also clear that if this is how things are, God the Son’s declaration that the Father is greater than he is is a perfectly sensible thing to say.  If I go back in time to 1980 then I can look at infant Ross and truly say ‘He is me’, but I can also sensibly say ‘I am taller than he is’.  In general, if something that changes across time travels back in time to a time when it was different, then we can sensibly contrast how its later self is with how its earlier self is, even though they are the same thing.  Thus the Father, God’s later self, can sensibly be said to be greater than the Son, his earlier self, despite them being the same being.

Similarly, if I go back in time to protect my infant self in the cradle, I can sensibly say ‘Nobody gets to him except through me’.  And it’s simply not more conversationally informative for me to say ‘Nobody gets to him except through him’, despite the fact that I am he.  Since I can sensibly contrast my later self with my earlier self – my later self is bigger and stronger – then I can sensibly say that it is my later self protecting my earlier self and not my earlier self protecting my earlier self, despite the fact that my later self is my earlier self.  Likewise, if it requires a being like us in some respects to bring us to a being who is so far beyond us in power, then the Son can sensibly say that it is only he that can bring you to God the Father; and it would not be better for him to say that it is only the Father that can bring you the Father, despite the fact that he is the Father.

Note that I’m not claiming that these contrastive claims are true, only that they are sensible claims to make in those circumstances.  Whether or not they are true depends on some tricky issues concerning persistence and change.  It’s a prima facie puzzle if A is F and travels back in time to a moment when it is not F, for then it seems that at that time A is F and not F – contradiction!  What should we say about this puzzle?  It’s obviously similar to the familiar problem of temporary intrinsics – how can David be hairy at one time and not hairy at some other time (once he’s lost his hair), given that it’s one person here, and nothing differs from itself?  But in our case, it’s not another time: it’s the same time, because the A that is F has gone back to meet the A that is not F.

Here are some common responses to the problem of temporary intrinsics.  The perdurantist thinks that the thing that is hairy is not David, but rather a temporal part of David, and the thing that is not hairy is a different temporal part of David.  Since these temporal parts are numerically distinct, there is no puzzle in their being different in properties.  When David says in his early life that he is hairy, he speaks truly, because the truth-conditions of his utterance are that the temporal part that makes the utterance is hairy.  If this is the correct response to the problem of temporary intrinsics, it carries over straightforwardly to the time travel case.  The later version of A that travels back to meet its earlier self is really a different thing: it is a later temporal part, and it is meeting its earlier temporal part, and so there is no puzzle in one being F and the other not being so.  On this view, I speak truly when I travel back and say that I’m taller than my infant self: the temporal part that makes that utterance is taller than the temporal part that’s in the cradle.  Similarly, the Son speaks truly when he says that the Father is greater than he is: the Father is God’s later temporal part, and does indeed have more powers than the Son, who is God’s earlier temporal part.

But suppose perdurantism is false.  The two most common endurantist solutions to the problem of temporary intrinsics need modification if they are to handle the time travel case.  On one view, things are incapable of changing with respect to their monadic properties, and what we normally think of as a thing changing with respect to a monadic property is in fact it standing in a certain kind of relation to some times but not others: so while it looks like David is hairy simpliciter at one time and not at another, in fact David is never hairy or not hairy simpliciter but rather bears the being hairy relation to some time but fails to bear it to a later time.  But if we’re to allow for the time travel case we will have to say that apparent monadic properties are not two place relations between an enduring object and a time, but rather three place relations between an enduring object, a time, and a place.  So when A travels back to meet earlier A, it is true simpliciter that A bears being F to time t and place L1 and true simpliciter that it fails to bear that relation to time t and place L2.  (L1 being the place the future version ends up at t, L2 being the place the earlier version is at that time.)

What are the truth-conditions for ‘A is taller than B at time t’ if height properties are really three place relations between an object a time and a place?  There are various options: perhaps it’s true iff every height relation A bears to some place at t is greater than every height relation that B bears to some place at t; perhaps it’s true iff there’s a mapping that takes you from the height relations A bears to some place at t to the height relations B bears to some place at t (leaving no relations out) and which maps greater relations onto lesser ones; and there are other options.  But if either of those suggestions are correct, it would turn out to be false when I go back in time and say, looking at my infant self, that I am taller than he.  For if A=B then they will bear the same height relations to places at a given time, and so it’s hard to think of a sensible option on which it could come out true that A is taller than B at a time.

Another common endurantist option is to hold on to the thought that apparent monadic properties are just that, but to deny that such properties are ever had simpliciter: instantiation of such properties is always relative to a time.  So David has being hairy a certain way (i.e. relative to the earlier time) but he lacks that property some other way (relative to the later time).  The natural extension of such a view to allow for time-travel cases is to relativise instantiation to both time and place.  And it’s easy to see why, for similar reasons to those above, this is going to lead to a similar conclusion: that I won’t speak truly when I look at my infant self and say that I am taller than he.

So return to God the Son’s assertion that God the Father is greater than he is.  If God is a perduring object then there’s no problem in this being straight-forwardly true.  At t₀ there are two distinct things: the earlier temporal part of the spacetime worm that is God and the later temporal part of God – the former lacks omnipotence, the latter has it, and the utterance the former makes is thereby true.  If God is an enduring object, however, it looks like the Son’s utterance is false: for everything we can say about the Son’s powers at t₀ will also be things we can say about the Father’s powers at t₀.

I don’t want to take a stand on the perdurantism versus endurantism debate here.  What I want to argue is that each option adequately accounts for the data.  The perdurantist option does so by rendering the Son’s utterances concerning his relationship to the Father straightforwardly true.  The endurantist option renders some of them false; but I think this shouldn’t worry us, because the Son’s claims are still sensible things to say in these circumstances, and this is all we should need to secure.

If I’m an enduring object and travel back to meet my infant self, then I am in 1980 twice over: I am bi-located at that time.  Suppose I’m trying to locate my infant self, who is in a hospital in Glasgow, but I don’t know how to get there from where my adult self is (Leeds, let us suppose).  You’re trying to help me get there and you ask ‘Are you in Glasgow?’.  I can truly answer ‘yes’.  I am in Glasgow, for I am in two places, and one of them is in Glasgow.  But while true, it would be utterly unhelpful and disingenuous for me to answer in the affirmative: my speaking thus would not help you help me in my plans to bring my adult self to my infant self.  And while it would be false, it would nevertheless be completely helpful and appropriate to say ‘No, I’m not in Glasgow, I’m in Leeds’.  That’s false, because I’m both in Glasgow and in Leeds; but it’s a good thing to say because it communicates to you the information that you want: that the location I have in virtue of my adult self having travelled back to this time is in Leeds, even though I also have a location in Glasgow in virtue of my also having been an infant at this time.  Likewise, when I find my infant self and claim to be taller than he is, what I say is strictly speaking false: everything true of him is true of me, for we are identical, and so every height relation he bears to a place at this time (or every way he has a height) is also a height relation I bear to a place at this time (or is also a way I have a height).  Nonetheless, the false contrastive claim is a sensible thing to say and can impart useful information: it tells you that the height I have in virtue of having travelled back to this time as an adult is greater than the height I have in virtue of having been born at this time.

God the Son wasn’t speaking to metaphysicians, he was speaking to the folk.  The data that needs to be recovered is that he said something good: something that would impart good, true, information to his listeners.  Even given endurantism, his utterance does this on the time-travel story, despite being strictly speaking false.  Everything you can say about God the Son’s powers at t₀ you can say about God the Father’s powers at t₀, since they are the same thing.  Nonetheless, you learn something true and useful from the Son’s utterance that the Father is greater than he is: you learn that it is in virtue of this one being having come back in time after having changed that he is omnipotent at that time, and in virtue of him having begotten his earlier self at that time that he lacks omnipotence at that time.  The Son could have conveyed this information with a literally true utterance if he had spoken in a more metaphysically perspicuous manner; but since he was speaking to the folk and not to a select audience of metaphysicians, it’s perfectly understandable why he didn’t.

The Son’s utterance that no-one can come to the Father except through him is true.  As would have been the utterance that no-one can come to the Father except through the Father.  But while both true – and while in some sense they both say the same thing – the latter is not as good a thing to say as the former.  For the latter claim fails to impart the vital information conveyed by the former: that it is virtue of God having had his earlier properties that he is able to bring you to a being that is so far beyond you, namely the all-powerful being he becomes.  So it’s no surprise that the Son makes the former pronouncement and not the latter: far from being less informative, it is in fact more so.

And so I think we have a model of the relationship between the Father and the Son that adequately accounts for our initially recalcitrant data.  But what of the third member of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit?  Well, it would be easy to account for the third member in just the same way: have God travel in time twice.  Recall the story of me giving birth to myself: at the time I was born there were three versions of me about (the father, the mother after I had a sex change, and the child the first two versions of me gave birth to), because I travelled back to that time twice as well as being born there.  Thankfully, the Bible is pretty silent on the relationship between the Holy Spirit and the Son and the Father, so you can fit it in as you wish once you’ve got the general recipe.

Let me close by considering an objection.  One might object at the very idea of God starting out life as a limited being and only growing to be omnipotent over time.  That might be thought to violate the claim that it is essential to God’s very nature that he is omnipotent.  Care is needed here, however.  It’s perfectly compatible with the above account that God is essentially omnipotent in that it is of his essence that he grow to become omnipotent.  And God is around and omnipotent right from the beginning of time, remember.  He’s also around and limited at that time, but he’s omnipotent at that time as well, because his later self travelled back to then.  And this might also be of God’s essence: perhaps he has to so travel back (after all, if he didn’t travel back to beget himself, where would he come from?).  And so it’s compatible with the proposed account that God is essentially such as to become omnipotent, and that he is essentially such as to be omnipotent at all times.  What it’s not compatible with is the claim that he’s essentially such as to be never not omnipotent, since on this account he is sometimes both omnipotent and not omnipotent.  I doubt our intuitions regarding God’s essence are so fine-grained that this is determinately what we have in mind when he say that he is essentially omnipotent, so I’m unconcerned about biting this bullet.

Metaphysical Indeterminacy workshop: schedule

Update on the upcoming workshop for the Metaphysical Indeterminacy project.  The schedule will be:

Wed 13th June:
1.15-1.30pm: Registration in the philosophy foyer
1.30-3pm: Cian Dorr (Oxford): Semantic Plasticity
3-3.15pm: Break
3.15-4.45pm: Carrie Jenkins (UBC): Justification Magnets and Indeterminacy

Thur 14th June:
9.30-11am: Daniel Nolan (ANU): Indeterminacy and Essence
11-11.15am: Break
11.15am-12.45pm: Patrick Greenough (St Andrews): Evans' Argument

All the talks will be in BG36 in the philosophy department.

Aesthetics job

Leeds is advertising a one-year lecturer job in aesthetics.  Details, including how to apply, are here.  Leeds is one of the best places in the world for aesthetics: with Matthew Kieran, Aaron Meskin and Andrew McGonigal on faculty, we are rated in group 1 in the most recent Leiter report.

Indeterminacy workshop

The 4th (of 6) workshop for the Leeds based Metaphysical Indeterminacy project will take place on the afternoon of Wed 13th June and morning of Thurs 14th.  The speakers are:

Cian Dorr (Oxford): Semantic Plasticity

Patrick Greenough (St Andrews): Evans' Argument

Carrie Jenkins (UBC): Justification Magnets and Indeterminacy

Daniel Nolan (ANU): Indeterminacy and Essence


This is part of a 3 year project on Metaphysical Indeterminacy ran by myself, Elizabeth Barnes and Robbie Williams, and is funded by the AHRC.  Attendance is free, but please let me know if you would like to attend.  (E-mail me at r.p.cameron followed by that symbol then leeds.ac.uk.)

McTaggart paper

I've posted a new paper: 'McTaggart and Modal McTaggart: presentism and actualism to the rescue?'

Here's the abstract:

McTaggart aims to cause trouble for views on which there is a privileged present but it changes what time it is. The modal analogue of his argument aims to cause trouble for views on which there is privileged actuality but it’s contingent which world is actual. Prima facie, the arguments work against views which are realist about other times and worlds, but not against presentist or actualism. But this has been challenged in both directions. Nick JJ Smith argues that the temporal problem still afflicts the presentist: if he’s right, the modal analogue afflicts the actualist as well. Phillip Bricker argues that the modal problem doesn’t afflict the modal realist with privileged actuality: if he’s right, the temporal analogue doesn’t afflict the A-theoretic eternalist. I argue they are both wrong: there is a serious problem for eternalism with A-theory and for modal realism with absolute actuality, but there is no problem for the presentist or actualist.

Comments welcome!

New Leeds hires: update

Just an update on the post below: unfortunately Paulina Sliwa is no longer such as to have accepted our job, so we will only be welcoming Paolo Santorio and Matt Smith to the department.

3 new Leeds philosophers!

I'm delighted to announce three new hires at Leeds: Paolo Santorio, Paulina Sliwa, and Matthew Smith.

Paolo received his PhD from MIT in 2011 and is currently a postdoc at the ANU. He works on the philosophy of language, mind and epistemology, with some interests in metaethics, and his paper 'Reference and Monstrosity' is forthcoming in The Philosophical Review.

Paulina is currently finishing up her PhD at MIT. She works on ethics and epistemology, and on their intersection. Her paper 'In Defense of Moral Testimony' is forthcoming in Philosophical Studies.

Matthew Smith received his PhD from UNC Chapel Hill in 2004 and currently works at Yale. He works on moral and political philosophy, and has a bunch of papers in places like Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Philosophers' Imprint, Philosophical Studies, etc.

These are three outstanding philosophers, and will make a great contribution to our Centre for Metaphysics and Mind and our Centre for Ethics and Metaethics.

Metaphysical Mayhem!

I've been asked to post the following:

Metaphysical Mayhem is back! Rutgers University will be hosting a 5-day summer school for graduate students May 14-18, 2012. John Hawthorne, Katherine Hawley, Ted Sider, Jonathan Schaffer, and Dean Zimmerman will lead the seminars on a variety of topics in metaphysics, including: natural properties, composition as identity, grounding, metaphysical explanation, and stuff like that...

For more information, see:

http://fas-philosophy.rutgers.edu/mbenton/mayhem.html

Chair in Philosophy and Relgion at Leeds!

Leeds is advertising for a chair in philosophy and religion - see the advert pasted below.

Chair in Philosophy and Religion

Faculty of Arts
School of Humanities
Reference: 0995/5
Closing Date: Friday 23rd March 2012

This Chair is a part of a major strategic investment by the University to achieve an ambitious improvement in academic performance and enhanced student experience.

From August of this year, the present School of Humanities will become the new unitary School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science, bringing together the subject areas of Philosophy, Theology and Religious Studies and the History of Science. Building on established research excellence, and committed to providing a world-class standard of student education, the School is investing in a significant number of new posts aligned to its strategic commitment to ensuring its place amongst the top-ranked Schools internationally. The creation of this Chair reflects that ambition, alongside recognition of the potential to enhance existing research and teaching strengths through cross-disciplinary collaborative leadership and activity.

Philosophy at Leeds is one of the highest ranked research units in the UK, with an internationally-recognised world-leading status in key areas, while Theology and Religious Studies is an international leader in the study of religion and public life, and the History of Science is one of the foremost units of its kind in the UK, with an impressive international profile. In this context, this post offers an exciting opportunity for an individual to exercise a leading role in enhancing collaborative activity and achievement, while developing their own expertise and career in a School committed to world-leading research and student education. The School is open to applications from candidates with expertise in philosophy of religion, religion and science, and other areas that can build on existing and developing cross-disciplinary strengths in the School, such as religion and ethics, religion and aesthetics and religion and metaphysics. The person appointed will report to the Head of School and deliver research-led education that contributes to an exceptional student experience, top quality research outputs that contribute to impact and innovation, and expect to take on a significant leadership role in the organisation in education and/or research.

Preliminary enquiries about the post should be directed to our retained consultancy firm, Perrett Laver on +44 (0)207 340 6200.

To download further particulars about the role please visit www.perrettlaver.com, quoting reference number 0995/5.

Salary

The salary, which is negotiable, will be within the Professorial range - minimum £59,302 p.a.

For further details and for information on how to apply, please read the complete job description for this role

Oxford Studies in Metaphysics Younger Scholar Prize

I've been asked to post the following notice about the

Oxford Studies in Metaphysics Younger Scholar Prize

THE

Sponsored by the Ammonius Foundation (http://www.ammonius.org/) and administered by the editorial board of Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, the 2012 Younger Scholar Prize annual essay competition is open to scholars who are within ten years of receiving a Ph.D. or students who are currently enrolled in a graduate program. (Independent scholars should enquire of the editor to determine eligibility.) The award is $8,000. Winning essays will appear in Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, so submissions must not be under review elsewhere.

Essays should generally be no longer than 10,000 words; longer essays may be considered, but authors must seek prior approval. To be eligible for the 2012 prize, submissions must be electronically submitted by 30 January 2012 (paper submissions are no longer accepted). Refereeing will be blind; authors should omit remarks and references that might disclose their identities. Receipt of submissions will be acknowledged by e-mail. The winner is determined by a committee of members of the editorial board of Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, and will be announced in early March. At the author’s request, the board will simultaneously consider entries in the prize competition as submissions for Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, independently of the prize.

Previous winners of the Younger Scholar Prize are:

Thomas Hofweber, “Inexpressible Properties and Propositions”, Vol. 2;

Matthew McGrath, “Four-Dimensionalism and the Puzzles of Coincidence”, Vol. 3;

Cody Gilmore, “Time Travel, Coinciding Objects, and Persistence”, Vol. 3;

Stephan Leuenberger, “Ceteris Absentibus Physicalism”, Vol. 4;

Jeffrey Sanford Russell, “The Structure of Gunk: Adventures in the Ontology of Space”, Vol. 4;

Bradford Skow, “Extrinsic Temporal Metrics”, Vol. 5;

Jason Turner, “Ontological Nihilism”, Vol. 6;

Rachael Briggs and Graeme A. Forbes, “The Real Truth About the Unreal Future”, Vol. 7;

Shamik Dasgupta, “Absolutism vs Comparativism about Quantities”, forthcoming, Vol. 8.

Enquiries should be addressed to Dean Zimmerman:

dwzimmer@rci.rutgers.edu

Parthood, CAI and grounding

I've posted a new paper: 'Parts generate the whole, but they are not identical to it'. The paper argues that the view that wholes are grounded (at least in part) by their parts is better than the view that wholes are their parts (composition as identity), because it does as well or better at solving certain puzzles concerning parthood, and has the advantage of not having counter-intuitive essentialist consequences. Any comments welcome!

Three jobs at Leeds

We are advertising three continuing lecturer jobs at Leeds, in philosophy of language, epistemology, and value.

(These jobs are roughly equivalent to tenured assistants professorships, in US terms. And feel free to apply for more than one: if you do language and epistemology, e.g., then put in two separate applications, one for each job.)

Further details:

1. Lecturer in Value Philosophy Job reference: ARTHM0010

The School seeks to hire a Lecturer in of Philosophy of Value, broadly construed to include (e.g.) normative ethics, metaethics, and political philosophy.

The position will incorporate undergraduate and postgraduate teaching, some thesis supervision, and some non-teaching administrative duties. With a research record and teaching experience commensurate with career stage, the successful candidate should have completed or submitted a PhD by the beginning of the appointment.

The successful candidate will have the ability to make an outstanding contribution to the research activities of the Centre for Ethics and Metaethics, to the research life of the department in general, and to Philosophy’s REF 2014 submission.

Post must commence no later than 1 September 2012 (or sooner if required to do so in discussion with the School).

Candidates are encouraged to apply for more than one Philosophy position where appropriate.

We particularly welcome applications from candidates belonging to groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in philosophy, including but not limited to women and ethnic minorities.

For more information on Philosophy at the University of Leeds see http://www.leeds.ac.uk/arts/info/20048/philosophy

University Grade 7 (£32,751 – £35,788) or University Grade 8 (£36,862 - £44,016)

Informal enquiries may be made to Professor Graeme Gooday Tel +44 (0)113 343 3274, messages Tel +44 (0)113 343 3260,

Email: g.j.n.gooday@leeds.ac.uk

Closing date 18 November 2011

Interviews are expected to be held in February 2012

2. Lecturer in Epistemology Job Reference: ARTHM0009

The School seeks to hire a Lecturer in Epistemology, broadly construed to include (e.g.) specialists in the history of the subject and candidates whose research engages with issues in philosophy of science.

The position will incorporate undergraduate and postgraduate teaching, some thesis supervision, and some non-teaching administrative duties. With a research record and teaching experience commensurate with career stage, the successful candidate should have completed or submitted a PhD by the beginning of the appointment.

The successful candidate will have the ability to make an outstanding contribution to the research life of the department, and to Philosophy’s REF 2014 submission.

Post must commence no later than 1 September 2012 (or sooner if required to do so in discussion with the School).

Candidates are encouraged to apply for more than one Philosophy position where appropriate.

We particularly welcome applications from candidates belonging to groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in philosophy, including but not limited to women and ethnic minorities.

For more information on Philosophy at the University of Leeds see http://www.leeds.ac.uk/arts/info/20048/philosophy

University Grade 7 (£32,751 – £35,788) or University Grade 8 (£36,862 - £44,016)

Informal enquiries may be made to Professor Graeme Gooday Tel +44 (0)113 343 3274, messages Tel +44 (0)113 343 3260,

Email: g.j.n.gooday@leeds.ac.uk

Closing date 18 November 2011

Interviews are expected to be held in February 2012

3. Lecturer in Philosophy of Language Job Reference: ARTHM0011

The School seeks to hire a Lecturer in the Philosophy of Language, broadly construed to include (e.g.) specialists in the history of the subject.

The position will incorporate undergraduate and postgraduate teaching, some thesis supervision, and some non-teaching administrative duties. With a research record and teaching experience commensurate with career stage, the successful candidate should have completed or submitted a PhD by the beginning of the appointment.

The successful candidate will have the ability to make an outstanding contribution to the research life of the department, and to Philosophy’s REF 2014 submission.

Post must commence no later than 1 September 2012 (or sooner if required to do so in discussion with the School).

Candidates are encouraged to apply for more than one Philosophy position where appropriate.

We particularly welcome applications from candidates belonging to groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in philosophy, including but not limited to women and ethnic minorities.

For more information on Philosophy at the University of Leeds see http://www.leeds.ac.uk/arts/info/20048/philosophy

University Grade 7 (£32,751 – £35,788) or University Grade 8 (£36,862 - £44,016)

Informal enquiries may be made to Professor Graeme Gooday Tel +44 (0)113 343 3274, messages Tel +44 (0)113 343 3260

Email: g.j.n.gooday@leeds.ac.uk

Closing date 18 November 2011

Interviews are expected to be held in February 2012

Indeterminacy workshop

The 2nd workshop for the Leeds Metaphysical Indeterminacy Project will be held on September 8-9 2011 at the University of Leeds.

Speakers and titles include:

* Katherine Hawley (St Andrews) 'A Problem of the Many for Universals' (joint work with Alexander Bird)
* Benj Hellie (Toronto) 'Treating the future as open'
* Nick JJ Smith (Sydney) 'Many kinds of indeterminacy; one kind of credence'
* Jessica Wilson (Toronto) 'Indeterminacy in the World'

The workshop will start around midday on Thursday, and finish mid-afternoon Friday. Thanks to funding from the AHRC, there is no registration fee; but if you'd like to attend, please contact Robert Williams (j.r.g.williams@leeds.ac.uk) so we can ensure we have enough space.

The workshop is the second of six sponsored by the AHRC as part of the 3-year Metaphysical Indeterminacy project at Leeds. Further details can be found at the project homepage.

Open future (again)

Elizabeth and I have posted a draft of a new paper on the open future: available here. Comments welcome!

Fictional Realism, Nominalism, and Indeterminate Identity

I’ve posted a new paper: How to be a nominalist and a fictional realist. Here are the Cliff notes.

In my musical works paper, I argued that there are true claims proclaiming the existence of, and properties of, musical works, but that there weren’t really any musical works, because such claims were made true by an ontology that didn’t admit such things. In this paper, I attempt to tell a similar story for fictional characters. It’s literally true that the fictional character Bilbo Baggins exists, and it’s literally that he is a Hobbit according to the fiction The Lords of the Rings. But these claims can be made true without admitting fictional characters, or fictions, into our ontology. What makes them true, I suggest, are our acts of interpreting the fiction. Thus we can account for these truths with a nominalistically acceptable ontology (assuming, as I do, that there is in general a nominalistically acceptable account of the mental).

I also argue that the resulting view solves various puzzle cases concerning fictional characters. The most salient being Anthony Everett’s argument that fictional realism leads to untenable indeterminacy in identity. Everett argues that there are fictions in which it is indeterminate whether A is identical to B. The fictional realist believes in the fictional characters A and B. Whether the fictional characters are in reality identical is determined by whether they are identical according to the fiction to which they belong. So since it’s indeterminate whether they are identical in the fiction, it’s indeterminate in reality whether the fictional characters are identical. Reductio of fictional realist, given Evans’ argument against indeterminate identity.

I attempt to solve this puzzle by locating the source of the indeterminacy to indeterminacy in what fictional character is referred to, thus avoiding conflict with Evans’ conclusion (which is, as Lewis noted, directed only at indeterminate identity de re, not at indeterminacy in identity statements). Roughly, the idea is that when the fiction attempts to make an indeterminate identity, we are forced to interpret the fiction both ways. Given the above account, this results in there being two fictions, and two sets of fictional characters associated with each fiction, and it will as a result be indeterminate which fiction and which characters we refer to. In which case, the statement of identity will be indeterminate, but there will be no indeterminacy of identity de re.

Further details in the paper, of course; comments welcome.

'In virtue of' and propositions

Like many metaphysicians, I think the world is structured. Some truths hold true in virtue of others; some things exist in virtue of other things; some truths are made true by things. I think that there’s only one relation here, and it is the in virtue of relation, that holds between true propositions. For A to exist in virtue of B (i.e. for A to be ontologically dependent on B) is for the proposition [A exists] to be true in virtue of the proposition [B exists]; for the proposition P to be made true by A is for P to be true in virtue of the proposition [A exists].

Sometimes I hear the objection that this assumes that propositions are themselves fundamental constituents of reality. This objection is misplaced, for the view does not assume that. I can’t really see why one would think it did, but I’ve heard it enough times that I think it’s worth spelling out why I don’t think it does. If I’m just confused, I’d like to hear why!

Suppose you have an in virtue of chain that terminates in the proposition P. All that is entailed by this is that what P says to be the case is fundamentally the case; but that P exists may well be true in virtue of something else, and so P may itself be a derivative entity, despite its content being a fundamental truth.

Here is a toy example, just to illustrate the consistency. Suppose for every proposition, p, that p exists is true in virtue of the fact that it is possible for someone to entertain the content of p. So P might be true in virtue of Q, which is itself fundamental. But the proposition [Q exists] needn’t be fundamental. On the toy proposal, [Q exists] is true in virtue of [Possibly, someone entertains the content of Q]. Of course, now I’ve invoked another proposition, call it R; so if it is to be a derivative entity I need to invoke a new instance of the in virtue of relation. [R exists] in virtue of [Possibly, someone entertains the content of R]. And now we have another new proposition, so need a new instance of the relation; and so on, and so on. We generate an infinite sequence of in virtue of relations. But this is not, I think, a vicious regress. The success of an instance of the in virtue of relation never depends on the success of the instance of the relation it ‘generates’. P obtains in virtue of Q, and that generates a new instance: [Q exists] in virtue of R. But the success of ‘P obtains in virtue of Q’ doesn’t depend on the success of ‘[Q exists] in virtue of R’, for it doesn’t matter to P’s being grounded in Q whether or not Q is fundamental. That Q is not a fundamental existent is nice, but it’s irrelevant to Q’s ability to be the relata of the in virtue of relation. So the fact that there is an infinite sequence of in virtue of instances is, I think, unworrying.

Now, I don’t particularly recommend that account of what grounds the facts concerning the existence of propositions, but it’s clearly just a placeholder for a better account. So I think taking propositions to be the relata of the in virtue of relation simply has no consequences for whether or not propositions are fundamental constituents of the world.