Multidimensional Possible-World Semantics for Conditionals
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 10696819 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Richard Bradley (0000-0003-3513-5661) |
| Year | 2012 |
| Volume | 121 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 539-571 |
| Publication date | 2012-10-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Philosophical Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0031-8108 • E-ISSN: 1558-1470 |
| Publisher | Duke University Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1215/00318108-1630921 |
| OpenAlex | W2149794818 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 13 |
| References cited | 22 |
Adams’s Thesis, the claim that the probabilities of indicative conditionals equal the conditional probabilities of their consequents given their antecedents, has proven impossible to accommodate within orthodox possible-world semantics. This essay proposes a modification to the orthodoxy that removes this impossibility. The starting point is a proposal by Jeffrey and Stalnaker that conditionals take semantic values in the unit interval, interpreting these (à la McGee) as their expected truth-values at a world. Their theories imply a false principle, namely, that the probability of a conditional is independent of any proposition inconsistent with its antecedent. But they also point to something important, namely, that our uncertainty about conditionals is not confined to uncertainty about the facts (what the actual world is like) but also expresses uncertainty about the counterfacts (what the world would be like if one or another supposition were true). To capture this observation, this essay proposes that the semantic contents of conditionals be treated as sets of vectors of possible worlds, not singleton worlds, with the coordinates of each specifying the world that is or would be true under the supposition that it represents. The probabilities of truth for conditionals will then depend on the joint probabilities of the facts and counterfacts, the latter in turn depending on the mode of supposition. The implication of this treatment is that the probabilities of conditionals are conditional probabilities whenever the mode of supposition is evidential
Antecedent (behavioral psychology) · Conditional probability · Discrete mathematics · Epistemology · Impossibility · Mathematical economics · Possible world · Proposition · Semantics (computer science) · Statistics · Unit interval · Computer Science · Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics · Mathematics · Philosophy · Philosophy and History of Science · Philosophy and Theoretical Science · Psychology
Credences for strict conditionals
Conditionals
A graph model for probabilities of nested conditionals
Counterfactuals, intention and dynamic choice
No fact of the middle
Possible worlds truth table task
Certain and Uncertain Inference with Indicative Conditionals
Similarity accounts of counterfactuals
Chance, ability, and control
Attitudes, deliberation and decisions
Desirability of conditionals
Contra counterfactism
Counterfactual Desirability
The Logic of Conditionals
The Foundations of Causal Decision Theory
A Theory of Conditionals
On Conditionals
Probability and Conditionals
Probabilistic Dependence Among Conditionals
Probabilities of Conditionals and Conditional Probabilities
On Assertion and Indicative Conditionals
On the Probabilities of Conditionals
On the Truth Conditions of Certain 'If'-Sentences
Conditional Probabilities and Compounds of Conditionals
Bruno de Finetti and the Logic of Conditional Events
Do Conditionals Have Truth Conditions
| Unique citing works | 13 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,3 |
| Citation span | 2016 - 2026 (11) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 12 |