Reforging the Great Chain of Being: Studies of the History of Modal TheoriesSimo Knuuttila Springer Science & Business Media, 1980 M11 30 - 320 pages A sports reporter might say that in a competition all the participants realize their potentialities or possibilities. When an athlete performs far below his usual standard, it can be said that it was possible for him to do better. But the idea of fair play requires that this use of 'possible' refers to another com petition. It is presumed that the best athlete wins and that no real possibility of doing better is left unrealized in a competition. Here we have a use of language, a language game, in which modal notions are used so as to imply that if something is possible, it is realized. This idea does not belong to the general presuppositions of current ordinary usage. It is, nevertheless, not difficult to fmd other similar examples outside of the language of sports. It may be that such a use of modal notions is sometimes calculated to express that in the context in question there are no real alternative courses of events in contradistinction to other cases in which some possible alternatives remain unrealized. Even though modal notions are currently interpreted without the presup position that each genuine possibility should be realized at some moment of the actual history, there are contemporary philosophical models of modalities which incorporate this presupposition. In his book Untersuchungen tiber den Modalkalkiil (Anton Hain, Meisenheim am Glan 1952, pp. 16-36), Oscar Becker presents a statistical interpretation of modal calculi. |
Contents
AN EXERCISE IN THE METHODOLOGY OF THE HISTORY OF IDEAS | 1 |
EMPTY FORMS IN PLATO | 19 |
ARISTOTLE ON THE REALIZATION OF POSSIBILITIES IN TIME | 57 |
ARISTOTLE AND THE PRIORITY OF ACTUALITY | 73 |
ANSELMS MODAL CONCEPTIONS | 117 |
TIME AND MODALITY IN SCHOLASTICISM | 163 |
LEIBNIZ ON PLENITUDE RELATIONS AND THE REIGN OF LAW | 259 |
A COMPARATIVE STUDY | 287 |
309 | |
315 | |
Other editions - View all
Reforging the Great Chain of Being: Studies of the History of Modal Theories Simo Knuuttila No preview available - 2010 |
Reforging the Great Chain of Being: Studies of the History of Modal Theories Simo Knuuttila No preview available - 2013 |
Common terms and phrases
Abaelard according actual world aliquid Anselm argument Aristotelian Aristotle Aristotle's ascription assertion assumption Boethius causa cause claim compossibility contingent contingenter Descartes dicitur discussion distinction Divine doctrine Duns Scotus enim eternal existence facere fact follows Forms G. E. L. Owen God's Hintikka idea impossible improper individuals instantiated interpretation of modality JAAKKO HINTIKKA Kant Kant's kinds Knuuttila Leibniz logical Lovejoy Lovejoy's means medieval Metaphysics modal concepts modal logic modal notions modal theory natural necessarily necessary necessitate object Oxford particular passage Peter Damian Plato potentiality potest predicates premiss Principle of Plenitude prior priority proposition Proslogion quae quia quod realized reason says Schmitt secundum sedet semantic sense sensu sentence Socrates statistical interpretation Studies subsequent necessity substance sunt tamen temporally definite Theory of Forms theory of modality things Thomas Aquinas thought Timaeus tion true truth truth-value University Press Vlastos William of Sherwood