This book collects original essays on the epistemology of modality and related issues in modal metaphysics and philosophical methodology.
The contributors utilize both the newer ""metaphysics-first"" and the more traditional ""epistemology-first"" approaches to these issues. The chapters on modal epistemology mostly focus on the problem of how we can gain knowledge of possibilities, which have never been actualized, or necessities which are not provable either by logico-mathematical reasoning or by linguistic competence alone. These issues are closely related to some of the central issues in philosophical methodology, notably: to what extent is the armchair methodology of philosophy a reliable guide for the formation of beliefs about what is possible and necessary. This question also relates to the nature of thought experiments that are extensively used in science and philosophy.
Epistemology of Modality and Philosophical Methodology will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working on the epistemology and metaphysics of modality, as well as those whose work is concerned with philosophical methodology more generally.
Introduction Anand Jayprakash Vaidya Summary of Articles Duško Prelević 1. Modality, Worlds, Essence, and Modal Knowledge Boris Kment 2. An Agency-Based Epistemology of Modality Barbara Vetter 3. The Price of Sensitivity Rebecca Hanrahan 4. Modal Epistemology for Modalists Otávio Bueno and Scott A. Shalkowski 5. How (Meta-)Semantics Defuses Modal Pessimism Christian Nimtz 6. How Things Have to Be Nathan Salmon 7. In Search of a Structurally Complete Epistemology of Essence Michael Wallner 8. Morals and Modals: Puzzling about the Dual Use of Modal Verbs Arindam Chakrabarti and Ian Nicolay 9. The Explanatory Power of Modal Rationalism Duško Prelević 10. Conceivability: Still Not Enough: A Response to Prelević Sonia Roca-Royes 11. Reviving the Modal Account of Essence Rebecca Chan 12. A Neo-Aristotelian Reply to a Modalist Sanna Mattila 13. Semantic Rules, Modal Knowledge, and Analyticity Antonella Mallozzi 14. Modal Knowledge and Modal Methodology Theodore Locke and Amie Thomasson 15. Gettier’s Thought Experiments Joachim Horvath 16. Horvath on Gettier’s Thought Experiments Timothy Williamson 17. Challenges for an Experimentalist’s Skepticism about Cases Margot Strohminger and Juhani Yli-Vakkuri 18. In Defense of Modest Modal Skepticism Edouard Machery
Anand Jayprakash Vaidya is Professor of Philosophy at San Jose State University, USA. His research focuses on epistemology and philosophy of mind. For 25 years he has worked on the epistemology of modality and how it relates to problems in the philosophy of mind, such as the nature of consciousness. Duško Prelević is Associate Professor at Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, Serbia. His research focuses on the epistemology of modality, philosophy of mind, and metaphysics. For 13 years he has critically examined various aspects of physicalist research programme and modal rationalist account of our modal knowledge.
