The Empty World as the Null Conjunction of States of Affairs.
If possible worlds are conjunctions of states of affairs, as in David Armstrong's combinatorial theory, then is the empty world to be thought of as the null conjunction of states of affairs? The proposal seems plausible, and has received support from David Efird, Tom Stoneham, and Armstrong himself....
| Publicado en: | Erkenntnis Vol. 90; no. 3; pp. 989 - 999 |
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| Autor principal: | |
| Formato: | Artículo |
| Publicado: |
Springer Nature
Mar2025
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| Sumario: | If possible worlds are conjunctions of states of affairs, as in David Armstrong's combinatorial theory, then is the empty world to be thought of as the null conjunction of states of affairs? The proposal seems plausible, and has received support from David Efird, Tom Stoneham, and Armstrong himself. However, in this paper, it is argued that the proposal faces a trilemma: either it leads to the absurd conclusion that the actual world is empty; or it reduces to a familiar representation of the empty world in which the concept of a null conjunction plays no role; or it needs to make room for the null individual of certain non-classical mereologies. |
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