Logic and Philosophy of Science Research Group Talk (Peter Fritz, Oslo)

Peter Fritz is a professor of philosophy at the University of Oslo. Professor Fritz works mainly on logic and its philosophy, metaphysics, and the philosophy of language. He also has interests in the philosophy of mathematics and epistemology. Much of his work is on questions concerning modality and existence, and involves modal or higher-order logic.

Talk Title

Possible Worlds

Abstract

What, if anything, are possible worlds? And are there in fact possible worlds? I will argue that if there are possible worlds, then they may as well be certain propositions: if anything plays the theoretical role of possible worlds, then certain propositions do so, and we can translate any statement about possible worlds into an equivalent statement about these propositions. Further, I will argue that there are in fact certain propositions which play the theoretical role of worlds. These arguments depend on relatively strong modal background principles, including the non-contingency of possibility, the non-contingency of existence, and the identity of strictly equivalent propositions. To what extend similar arguments can be given without some of these assumptions is left open here. But for those who are happy to make these assumptions, it shows that reference to possible worlds in philosophical theorizing is unproblematic.

About the Logic and Philosophy of Science Research Interest Group

One of five departmental Research Interest Groups, the Logic and Philosophy of Science Group hosts talks on logic, general philosophy of science, and philosophy of the particular sciences, as well as talks in allied areas such as formal epistemology, decision theory, and the metaphysics of science.