scholarly journals Wondering about the future

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephan Torre
Keyword(s):  
Future Contingents ◽  
The Future ◽  
True Alternative

AbstractWill it rain tomorrow? Will there be a sea battle tomorrow? Will my death be painful? Wondering about the future plays a central role in our cognitive lives. It is integral to our inquiries, our planning, our hopes, and our fears. The aim of this paper is to consider various accounts of future contingents and the implications that they have for wondering about the future. I argue that reflecting on the nature of wondering about the future supports an Ockhamist account of future contingents according to which many of them are true. Alternative accounts which maintain that no future contingents are true, either by claiming that they are all false or by claiming that they are neither true nor false, face difficulties concerning why it is appropriate to wonder about them. Reflecting on wondering in general, and wondering about the future in particular, suggests that in wondering how the future will go, we implicitly assume that there is a determinate fact of the matter. After presenting an attractive account of interrogative attitudes that has been recently proposed by Jane Friedman and outlining some norms governing wondering, I argue that all accounts of future contingents except Ockhamism face difficulties concerning why it is appropriate to wonder about them.

Three Models of the Undetermined Future

2021 ◽  
pp. 21-49
Author(s):  
Patrick Todd
Keyword(s):  
Universal Quantifier ◽  
Future Contingents ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future

This chapter articulates three models of the undetermined future. Assuming that there are multiple future histories consistent with the past and the laws, we can maintain that (I) there is a unique actual future history, and it is determinate which history that is; (II) there is a unique actual future history, but it is indeterminate which history that is; (III) there is no such thing as the “unique actual future history”. Models (I) and (II) are united in terms of there being a unique actual course of history; models (II) and (III) are united in terms of there being no privileged history in the model. The author defends model (III). He further argues that will is a universal quantifier over all the causally possible histories consistent with the future directed facts. The author shows how this view combined with model (III) generates the view that future contingents are all false.

Assertion and the Future

2019 ◽  
pp. 479-504
Author(s):  
Corine Besson ◽  
Anandi Hattiangadi
Keyword(s):  
Future Contingents ◽  
Norms Of Assertion ◽  
Knowledge Norm ◽  
The Future ◽  
Truth Norm

It is disputed what norm, if any, governs assertion. We address this question by looking at assertions of future contingents: statements about the future that are neither metaphysically necessary nor metaphysically impossible. Many philosophers think that future contingents are not truth apt, which together with a Truth Norm or a Knowledge Norm of assertion implies that assertions of these future contingents are systematically infelicitous.In this article, we argue that our practice of asserting future contingents is incompatible with the view that they are not truth apt. We consider a range of norms of assertion and argue that the best explanation of the data is provided by the view that assertion is governed by the Knowledge Norm.

The Open Future

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Todd
Keyword(s):  
Classical Logic ◽  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Future Contingents ◽  
Open Future ◽  
Radical Interpretation ◽  
Norms Of Assertion ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Open Future ◽  
Patrick Todd

In The Open Future: Why Future Contingents are All False, Patrick Todd launches a sustained defense of a radical interpretation of the doctrine of the open future, one according to which all claims about undetermined aspects of the future are simply false. Todd argues that this theory is metaphysically more parsimonious than its rivals, and that objections to its logical and practical coherence are much overblown. Todd shows how proponents of this view can maintain classical logic, and argues that the view has substantial advantages over Ockhamist, supervaluationist, and relativist alternatives. Todd draws inspiration from theories of “neg-raising” in linguistics, from debates about omniscience within the philosophy of religion, and defends a crucial comparison between his account of future contingents and certain more familiar theories of counterfactuals. Further, Todd defends his theory of the open future from the charges that it cannot make sense of our practices of betting, makes our credences regarding future contingents unintelligible, and is at odds with proper norms of assertion. In the end, in Todd’s classical open future, we have a compelling new solution to the longstanding “problem of future contingents”.

scholarly journals Credible Futures

Synthese ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Iacona ◽  
Samuele Iaquinto
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Future Contingents ◽  
Semantic Framework ◽  
Branching Structures ◽  
The Future ◽  
Epistemic Property

AbstractThis paper articulates in formal terms a crucial distinction concerning future contingents, the distinction between what is true about the future and what is reasonable to believe about the future. Its key idea is that the branching structures that have been used so far to model truth can be employed to define an epistemic property, credibility, which we take to be closely related to knowledge and assertibility, and which is ultimately reducible to probability. As a result, two kinds of claims about future contingents—one concerning truth, the other concerning credibility—can be smoothly handled within a single semantic framework.

scholarly journals Aquinas on the Existence of the Future: A Response to Gili

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 225
Author(s):  
Damiano Costa
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Future Contingents ◽  
The Future

I defend my paper “Aquinas, Geach, and Existence”[1]against objections from Luca Gili, who argued that, according to Aquinas, future contingents do not enjoy genuine existence but exist in God’s mind only.[1] Damiano Costa, “Aquinas, Geach, and existence”, European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 11, no. 3 (2019).

scholarly journals Against the Russellian Open Future

Mind ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 126 (504) ◽  
pp. 1217-1237 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anders J Schoubye ◽  
Brian Rabern
Keyword(s):  
Classical Logic ◽  
Definite Descriptions ◽  
Future Contingents ◽  
Open Future ◽  
The Future ◽  
Law Of Excluded Middle ◽  
The Law ◽  
Excluded Middle

Abstract Todd (2016) proposes an analysis of future-directed sentences, in particular sentences of the form ‘will()’, that is based on the classic Russellian analysis of definite descriptions. Todd’s analysis is supposed to vindicate the claim that the future is metaphysically open while retaining a simple Ockhamist semantics of future contingents and the principles of classical logic, i.e. bivalence and the law of excluded middle. Consequently, an open futurist can straightforwardly retain classical logic without appeal to supervaluations, determinacy operators, or any further controversial semantical or metaphysical complication. In this paper, we will show that this quasi-Russellian analysis of ‘will’ both lacks linguistic motivation and faces a variety of significant problems. In particular, we show that the standard arguments for Russell's treatment of definite descriptions fail to apply to statements of the form ‘will()’.

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