Mentaculus Laws and Metaphysics
Open accessAbstract
The laws of nature are central to our understanding of the world. And while there is often broad agreement about the technical formulations of the laws, there can be sharp disagreement about the metaphysical nature of the laws. For instance, the Newtonian laws of nature can be stated and analyzed by appealing to a set of possible worlds. Yet, some philosophers argue the worlds are mere notational devices, while others take them to be robust, concrete entities in their own right. In this paper, I use a recent view of laws called the Mentaculus as a case study to illustrate the wide variety of metaphysical pictures that can accompany such a view. I conclude that the technical features of the laws -- typically (though not always) given to us by practicing scientists -- are compatible with many different metaphysical foundations.
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PH is not a natural fit for Aristotelian Reductionism.
“And it is not a natural fit for Aristotelian Reductionism (but see Demarest (2019) for a recent proposal for how they might fit).”
From Governing Without A Fundamental Direction of Time: Minimal Primitivism about Laws of Nature (2022) · cites this paper as Demarest (2019)
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Governing Without A Fundamental Direction of Time: Minimal Primitivism about Laws of Nature
Chen, E. K., & Goldstein, S. (2022) · Jerusalem Studies in Philosophy and History of Science · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-96775-8_2 · Cited by 69 · see citing works
“And it is not a natural fit for Aristotelian Reductionism (but see Demarest (2019) for a recent proposal for how they might fit).”
BackgroundThe Past Hypothesis and the Nature of Physical Laws
Chen, E. K. (2020) · arXiv · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2008.00611 · Cited by 14 · see citing works
“16This version of the guidance equation is first proposed by Bell (1980), then discussed for a fundamental density matrix in Dürr et al. (2005). 17To my knowledge, the W-GRW equations first appear in (Allori et al.”
Method
- Authors
- Demarest, H.
- Affiliations
- University of Colorado Boulder (US)
- Corresponding author
- Demarest, Heather
- ORCID
- Demarest, Heather
- Venue
- Principia: an international journal of epistemology
- Published
- 2019-12-31
- Volume
- 23
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 387-399
- ISSN
- 1414-4247 (ISSN-L)
- 1808-1711
- OpenAlex
- W3012159874
- Cited by
- 8
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2025: 2 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 3 · 2020: 1
- FWCI
- 4.68
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- diamond
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Principia an international journal of epistemology (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- LA Referencia (Red Federada de Repositorios Institucionales de Publicaciones Científicas) (publishedVersion)
- Americanae (AECID Library) (submittedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- Dialnet (Universidad de la Rioja) (submittedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › History and Philosophy of Science › Philosophy and History of Science
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Philosophy and Theoretical Science
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Philosophy › Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics
- Keywords
- laws of nature, metaphysics of law, possible worlds, classical mechanics, scientific laws
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