No fact of the middle
A middle fact is a true proposition about what would have happened had A been true (where A is in fact false), whose truth isn't entailed by any non-counterfactual facts. I argue that there are no middle facts; if there were, we wouldn't know them, and our ignorance of them would result in...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Wiley
2022
|
| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/140431 |
| _version_ | 1826201595988148224 |
|---|---|
| author | Khoo, Justin |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Linguistics and Philosophy |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Linguistics and Philosophy Khoo, Justin |
| author_sort | Khoo, Justin |
| collection | MIT |
| description | A middle fact is a true proposition about what would have happened had A been true (where A is in fact false), whose truth isn't entailed by any non-counterfactual facts. I argue that there are no middle facts; if there were, we wouldn't know them, and our ignorance of them would result in ignorance about whether regret is fitting in cases where we clearly know it is. But there's a problem. Consider an unflipped fair coin which is such that no non-counterfactual fact determines that it would have landed heads had it been flipped (or tails had it been flipped). If there are no middle facts, it's not true that it would have landed heads had it been flipped nor that it would have landed tails had it been flipped. Yet each counterfactual is still possibly true for all we know. I argue that we can resolve this tension in the anti-middle fact position, further strengthening the case against middle facts. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T11:53:52Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/140431 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T11:53:52Z |
| publishDate | 2022 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1404312024-06-06T19:59:08Z No fact of the middle Khoo, Justin Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Linguistics and Philosophy A middle fact is a true proposition about what would have happened had A been true (where A is in fact false), whose truth isn't entailed by any non-counterfactual facts. I argue that there are no middle facts; if there were, we wouldn't know them, and our ignorance of them would result in ignorance about whether regret is fitting in cases where we clearly know it is. But there's a problem. Consider an unflipped fair coin which is such that no non-counterfactual fact determines that it would have landed heads had it been flipped (or tails had it been flipped). If there are no middle facts, it's not true that it would have landed heads had it been flipped nor that it would have landed tails had it been flipped. Yet each counterfactual is still possibly true for all we know. I argue that we can resolve this tension in the anti-middle fact position, further strengthening the case against middle facts. 2022-02-16T18:23:06Z 2022-02-16T18:23:06Z 2021-09-12 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 0029-4624 1468-0068 https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/140431 Khoo, J. No fact of the middle. Noûs. 2021; 1– 23. en http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/nous.12389 Noûs Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ application/pdf Wiley Wiley |
| spellingShingle | Khoo, Justin No fact of the middle |
| title | No fact of the middle |
| title_full | No fact of the middle |
| title_fullStr | No fact of the middle |
| title_full_unstemmed | No fact of the middle |
| title_short | No fact of the middle |
| title_sort | no fact of the middle |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/140431 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT khoojustin nofactofthemiddle |