A perspectivalist better best system account of lawhood

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapter (peer-reviewed)peer-review

Abstract / Description of output

On David Lewis’s influential view, modal facts supervene on the mosaic of non-modal facts about sparse natural properties. I defend a Lewisian account of laws that abandons this supervenience claim in order to avoid the objections of subjectivity and lack of necessity that bedeviled Lewis’s original view. On my view, it is not the Humean mosaic of sparse natural properties that ultimately grounds laws of nature. Instead, it is the (always renegotiable) balance between our ever changing and perspectival standards of simplicity and strength that grounds laws of nature. My view reveals some unexpected resources available to a Humean account of lawhood, at the price of dispensing with Humean supervenience.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationLaws of Nature
EditorsWalter Ott, Lydia Patton
PublisherOxford University Press
Pages139-157
ISBN (Print)9780198746775
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 14 Jun 2018

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