Knowledge of Necessity: Logical Positivism and Kripkean Essentialism

AbstractBy the lights of a central logical positivist thesis in modal epistemology, for every necessary truth that we know, we know it a priori and for every contingent truth that we know, we know it a posteriori. Kripke attacks on both flanks, arguing that we know necessary a posteriori truths and that we probably know contingent a priori truths. In a reflection of Kripke's confidence in his own arguments, the first of these Kripkean claims is far more widely accepted than the second. Contrary to received opinion, the paper argues, the considerations Kripke adduces concerning truths purported to be necessary a posteriori do not disprove the logical positivist thesis that necessary truth and a priori truth are co-extensive.</jats:p

Knowledge, Belief, and the A Priori

The notion of the a priori underwent several changes\ud since the time it came into existence in the Middle Ages.\ud Originally it had been used to mark a certain form of\ud argument, an argument that proceeds from what is prior to\ud what is later, from cause to effect: demonstratio procedens\ud ex causis ad effectum = demonstratio a priori. But this\ud changed with Kant, for whom it meant not a form of\ud argument but rather some special kind of knowledge (or\ud elements thereof), namely knowledge that (a) is independent\ud of particular experiences and (b) that makes experience\ud in general (Erfahrung überhaupt) possible. Tied up\ud with consciousness and the transcendental unity of\ud apperception, Kant"s understanding of the a priori was in\ud the spirit of his transcendental philosophy. But this\ud understanding changed again with the rise of analytic\ud philosophy, in which we still find the first characteristic but\ud not the second anymore. The idea of Erfahrung überhaupt\ud was given up, partly because one naturally wondered what\ud exactly this notion of experience in general, or experience\ud universally conceived, should be. Where should we get it\ud from, if not by way of abstraction and generalization from\ud individual cases of experience? And would this not make it\ud an empirical concept, so that the whole project of asking\ud for the conditions of its possibility would not lead us to the\ud kind of certainty, necessity and universality we expect from\ud a priori knowledge? There would be no guarantee that in\ud the future we would not make discoveries that would give\ud us new kinds of experiences or that would show us our\ud experiences in a new light. Thus, we would have to admit\ud that these experiences did not satisfy the conditions of\ud experience we had set up originally. The a priori conditions\ud would have to be revised

Non-Epicurean Desires

In this paper, it is argued that there can be necessary and non-natural desires. After a discussion about what seems wrong with such desires, Epicurus’ classification of desires is treated similarly to Kripke’s treatment of the Kantian table of judgments. A sample of three cases is suggested to make this point

The Epistemology of Modality

This article surveys recent developments in the epistemology of modality

What Is Possible?

This paper argues that there are true synthetic modal claims and that modal questions in philosophy are to be interpreted not in terms of logical necessity but in terms of synthetic necessity. I begin by sketching the debate about modality between logical empiricism and phenome-nology. Logical empiricism taught us to equate analyticity and neces-sity. The now common view is that analytic statements are necessary in the narrow sense but that there is also necessity in a wider sense. I argue against this that we should distinguish analyticity and necessity more strictly