Essence and Mere Necessity (original) (raw)

On Explaining Necessity by the Essence of Essence

Inquiry, 2023

There has been much debate recently on the question whether essence can explain modality. Here, I examine two routes to an essentialist account of modality. The first is Hale's argument for the necessity of essence, which I will argue is-notwithstanding recent attempted defences of it-invalid by its very structure. The second is the proposal that it is essential to essential truth that it is necessary. After o ering three possible versions of the view, I will argue that each fails to provide a metaphysical explanation of necessity in terms of essence.

More on the Reduction of Necessity to Essence

M. Dumitru (ed.), Metaphysics, Modality, and Meaning. Themes from Kit Fine, OUP, 2020

“Essence and Modality” has had a considerable impact on subsequent philosophical thinking about essence and modality. The paper argues that the traditional view that essence reduces to metaphysical modality is wrong. Many have found these arguments convincing and have accordingly abandoned the view. The paper also argues that the reduction goes the other way around, i.e. that it is metaphysical modality which reduces to essence. Twenty years after the publication of “Essence and Modality”, Kit Fine’s reductive view has become widely recognised as one of the main contenders for a reductive account of metaphysical modality. There are several ways in which such a reductive account can be spelled out. In Correia 2012, I raised objections against one natural way of doing so, and developed an alternative account – the “rule-based” account – which relies on a brief suggestion Fine makes in Fine 1995a. The aim of the present chapter is twofold: first, I wish to strengthen the case for the rule-based account by criticising alternative accounts, including some accounts based on other suggestions made by Fine, or inspired by material one can find in his work; and second, I wish to discuss certain objections to the rule-based account and suggest how they can be met.

On the Reduction of Necessity to Essence

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 2012

In his influential paper ‘‘Essence and Modality’’, Kit Fine argues that no account of essence framed in terms of metaphysical necessity is possible, and that it is rather metaphysical necessity which is to be understood in terms of essence. On his account, the concept of essence is primitive, and for a proposition to be metaphysically necessary is for it to be true in virtue of the nature of all things. Fine also proposes a reduction of conceptual and logical necessity in the same vein: a conceptual necessity is a proposition true in virtue of the nature of all concepts, and a logical necessity a proposition true in virtue of the nature of all logical concepts. I argue that the plausibility of Fine's view crucially requires that certain apparent explanatory links between essentialist facts be admitted and accounted for, and I make a suggestion about how this can be done. I then argue against the reductions of conceptual and logical necessity proposed by Fine and suggest alternative reductions, which remain nevertheless Finean in spirit.

Essence, Necessity, and Definition

Philosophical Studies, 2019

What is it for something to be essential to an item? For some time, it was standard to think that the concept of necessity alone can provide an answer: for something to be essential to an item is for it to be strictly implied by the existence of that item. We now tend to think that this view fails because its analysans is insufficient for its analysandum. In response, some argue that we can supplement the analysis in terms of necessity with a further condition. In this paper I argue that this view is untenable in its current form. I then provide a glimmer of hope to those who think that essence is at least partially analyzable in terms of necessity.

Essentialism and Forms of Necessity

CORRADINI, GALVAN (2018). In: T. TAMBASSI (ed.), Studies in the Ontology of E.J. Lowe, Editiones Scholasticae, Germany, 125-157, 2018

The aim of this essay is to deepen our understanding of E.J. Lowe’s essentialism, showing its importance for the characterisation of the modal notion of necessity. In the first section, we make an attempt to outline the basic characteristics of Lowe’s notion of essence. In order to recount Lowe’s theory in a sufficiently complete way, it would be necessary to present the features of his four-category ontology; however, in this first section we will focus in detail only on the concept of instantiation and on the distinction between essential and accidental properties of a substance. This is functional to the defence of an essentialist theory of necessity – a theory to which the second section of this paper is devoted – that is inspired by Lowe’s essentialism but does not fully coincide with it, rather developing it in an autonomous manner. The presentation of this theory serves as a basis for the discussion of some aspects of Lowe’s four-category ontology that are closely connected with his essentialism. That discussion is carried out in the third section, where the complex relations between instantiation, exemplification and characterisation will be addressed.

The Structure of Essentialist Explanations of Necessity

Thought: A Journal of Philosophy, 2019

Fine, Lowe and Hale accept the view that necessity is to be explained by essences: Necessarily p iff, and because, there is some x whose essence ensures that p. Hale, however, believes that this strategy is not universally applicable; he argues that the necessity of essentialist truths cannot itself be explained by once again appealing to essentialist truths. As a consequence, Hale holds that there are basic necessities that cannot be explained. Thus, Hale style essentialism falls short of what Wilsch calls the explanation-challenge (EC) for the metaphysics of necessity. Without endorsing the EC, I argue that Hale’s argument for basic, unexplained necessities fails due to a misunderstanding of the structure of essentialist explanations. Getting clear about the structure of essentialist explanations of necessity leads to a re-evaluation of crucial circularity- and regress-arguments that have been discussed in the debate about essentialism.

A ground-theoretical modal definition of essence

Analysis

I provide a case-by-case definition of essential truths based on the notions of metaphysical necessity and ontological dependence. Relying on suggestions in the literature, I adopt a definition of the latter notion in terms of the notion of ground. The resulting account is adequate in the sense that it is not subject to Kit Fine’s famous counterexamples to the purely modal account of essence. In addition, it provides us with a novel conception of truths pertaining to the essence of objects, which might help to dispel doubts on the legitimacy of the notion of essence itself.

Why Essentialism Requires Two Senses of Necessity

Ratio, 2006

I set up a dilemma, concerning metaphysical modality de re, for the essentialist opponent of a 'two senses' view of necessity. I focus specifically on Frank Jackson's two-dimensional account in his From Metaphysics to Ethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998). I set out the background to Jackson's conception of conceptual analysis and his rejection of a two senses view. I proceed to outline two purportedly objective (as opposed to epistemic) differences between metaphysical and logical necessity. I conclude that since one of these differences must hold and since each requires the adoption of a two senses view of necessity, essentialism is not consistent with the rejection of a two senses view. 1