Abstract
It is commonly assumed that there is a kind of necessity, natural or physical necessity, that is in some sense “weaker” than logical necessity and is somehow related to natural laws, or, more specifically, to causal laws — whence this supposed kind of necessity is often also called ‘nomic’ or ‘causal’ necessity. Of course, many empiricist philosophers have followed David Hume in being sceptical either about the existence or, less radically, at least about our epistemic access to any such species of necessity.1 But in recent years the foregoing concept of natural necessity has come under attack from another quarter, namely, from certain philosophers — some of whom describe themselves as ‘scientific essentialists’ — who hold that natural laws are in fact necessary in the strongest possible sense: that is, who hold that the necessity of such laws is no weaker than, and just as “absolute” as, the necessity of logical truths.2
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Notes
There is controversy amongst commentators as to whether Hume was an antirealist or a sceptical realist concerning causal necessity: see Strawson [1989]. I adopt no particular position in this paper on this historical issue.
See, especially, Shoemaker [1998], Fales [1993], and Ellis [1999]. See also Shoemaker [1980] and Martin [1993].
The locus classicus is Kripke [1980].
The term ‘broadly logical necessity’ is Alvin Plantinga’s: see Plantinga [1974] p.2. See further Lowe [1998] p.13ff.
Here I follow the lead of D. M. Armstrong: see Armstrong [1983], p.8.
For a partial defence of the view that laws have this form, see Foster [1982].
See Armstrong [1983], p.85
See Armstrong
See Armstrong, [1989b], pp.75ff.
See Armstrong’s replies to Smart and to Menzies in Bacon et al. (eds.), [1993], p.172 and p.229, and also Armstrong, [1997], p.223ff (he endorses the ‘making happen’ idiom at pp.210-11).
See further Lowe [1989], Chapter 8.
For Armstrong’s dismissive view of kinds, see Armstrong [1997], p.65ff.
Armstrong maintains that non-causal laws are supervenient: see Armstrong, [1997], p.231ff.
See further Lowe [1989], Chapter 8, and Lowe [1987].
Compare Drewery [2000].
For a fuller account of my views about counterfactual conditionals, see Lowe [1995].
For Armstrong’s deployment of a similar argument on behalf of his own view of laws, see his reply to Fales in Bacon et al. (eds.), [1993], p.144ff.
But see further Lowe [1987], for reasons to modify this proposal in certain ways which, however, do not undermine the argument of the present paper. For more on the distinction between “relative” and “absolute” necessity, see Lowe [1998], p.18ff.
Of course, Armstrong himself is not a realist concerning possible worlds: see Armstrong [1989] and Armstrong [1997], p.172ff. For my own view of the ontological status of possible worlds, see Lowe [1998], p.256ff Nothing I say in the present paper in the language of possible worlds is intended to imply a commitment to their reality.
See the papers cited in note 2 above.
See further Ellis [1999], p.30.
See Davidson [1980]. He abandons the proposal in Davidson [1985].
For more on the circularity objection to Davidson’s criterion, see Lowe [1998], p.43.
One essentialist who does at least discuss the matter — though not, to my mind, entirely satisfactorily — is Sydney Shoemaker: see Shoemaker [1998].
In fact, E.A. Milne’s cosmological theory of kinematic relativity, which was perfectly respectable from a scientific point of view, proposed a secular increase in the value of the “constant” of gravitation: see Bondi [1961], Chapter 11.
See Kripke [1980], and Putnam [1975].
In point of fact, I have doubts about the Barcan-Kripke proof: see Lowe [1982].
I do not mean to suggest that I endorse this intraworld criterion of identity for properties myself: in fact, I reject it on the grounds that it is circular. For my own account of the identity-conditions of properties (universals), see Lowe [1999].
See Putnam [1975].
I am very grateful for comments received when this paper was presented at the Bergamo Conference on ‘Individuals, Essence, and Identity: Themes of Analytic Metaphysics’, and especially grateful to Dr. Käthe Trettin, who replied to the paper. I am also grateful to an anonymous referee for some criticisms which prompted me to clarify certain aspects of the paper.
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Lowe, E.J. (2002). Kinds, Essence, and Natural Necessity. In: Bottani, A., Carrara, M., Giaretta, P. (eds) Individuals, Essence and Identity. Topoi Library, vol 4. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1866-0_8
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