{"id":1986,"date":"2025-03-18T00:44:35","date_gmt":"2025-03-18T00:44:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cful.letras.ulisboa.pt\/lancog\/?p=1986"},"modified":"2026-02-05T12:38:44","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T12:38:44","slug":"seminar-series-in-analytic-philosophy-2024-25-session-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/seminar-series-in-analytic-philosophy-2024-25-session-18\/","title":{"rendered":"Seminar Series in Analytic Philosophy 2024-25: Session 18"},"content":{"rendered":"

Necessary in the Highest Degree \u2014 Whatever That Means<\/strong><\/p>\n

Cian Dorr (New York University)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

21 March 2025, 16:00 (Lisbon Time \u2013 WET)<\/p>\n

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa<\/p>\n

Sala Mattos Rom\u00e3o [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Abstract:<\/strong>\u00a0There are many reasons to think that the \u2018necessity\u2019 in the title and topic of\u00a0Naming and Necessity\u00a0<\/em>is intended to be understood as\u00a0minimally inclusive<\/em>, in the sense that whenever it is necessary (tout court<\/em>) that something is the case, it is also necessary in every other way that it is the case. It is also clear that Kripke believes he has identified a powerful and general technique for arguing for claims of necessity, by appealing to the necessity of identity\u2014a technique that can be applied not just to identities involving proper names, but to \u201ctheoretical identifications\u201d, thereby establishing necessity\u00a0tout court<\/em>\u00a0for many facts that Kripke’s immediate predecessors would have classified as merely nomically necessary. But many authors find the modal claims supported by this technique so implausible when \u2018necessary\u2019 is read as minimally inclusive that they reject the straightforward interpretation of Kripke as intending such a reading.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In this talk, I will defend both the straightforward interpretation and the claim that his argumentative technique really does have the power and generality that Kripke attributes to it, for \u201ctheoretical identifications\u201d as well as identities involving proper names. My initial focus will be on\u00a0property identities<\/em>\u00a0like \u2018The property of being made of gold is the property of being composed of atoms with 79 protons\u2019, as well as related\u00a0infinitival identities<\/em>, like \u2018To be made of gold is to be composed of atoms with 79 protons\u2019. I will argue that such sentences are plausibly true and support attributions of necessity, even on a minimally inclusive reading of \u2018necessary\u2019. This requires rebutting views that either reject such identities, or reject the validity of substituting them into the necessity of identity, on the grounds that this implies false claims involving propositional attitudes such as \u2018Everyone who knows that something is made of gold knows that it is composed of atoms with 79 protons\u2019. In response to the proponents of such views, I will sketch a view of speech and attitude verbs as semantically ill-behaved (in a way somewhat reminiscent of quotation). Finally, I will argue that although Kripke’s paradigm \u201ctheoretical identifications\u201d\u2014sentences like \u2018Water is H\u2082O\u2019 and \u2018Heat is molecular motion\u2019\u2014have readings on which they are not identities of any sort, they also admit readings as equivalent to corresponding infinitival identities (e.g., \u2018To be water is to be\u00a0H\u2082O\u2019), and are thus equally capable of playing the relevant argumentative role.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This work\/event is funded by Portuguese national funds through FCT – Funda\u00e7\u00e3o para a Ci\u00eancia e a Tecnologia, I.P., within the project UID\/00310\/2025, Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa
\n(https:\/\/doi.org\/10.54499\/UID\/00310\/2025)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Necessary in the Highest Degree \u2014 Whatever That Means Cian Dorr (New York University)   21 March 2025, 16:00 (Lisbon Time \u2013 WET) Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa Sala Mattos Rom\u00e3o [C201.J] (Departamento de Filosofia)   Abstract:\u00a0There are many reasons to think that the \u2018necessity\u2019 in the title and topic of\u00a0Naming and Necessity\u00a0is intended to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federate","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1986"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1986\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2136,"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1986\/revisions\/2136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cful.demiurgos.eu\/lancog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}