A Case for Necessitarianism

This book offers a detailed and focused defense of necessitarianism, arguing that it is true and that contingentarianism is false. It assesses various theories of contingency and provides a case for necessitarianism, discussing its relevance to ethics, philosophy of mind, and social philosophy.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 178 pages
Publication date: 29 January 2024
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

This book is a groundbreaking and comprehensive defense of necessitarianism, a philosophical position that asserts that the only way for the world to be the way it is is for everything to have a necessary cause. The author's original account of necessitarianism challenges commonly held metaphysical positions and raises important issues in other related areas of philosophy.

Necessitarianism is the view that absolutely nothing about the world could have been otherwise in any way, whatsoever. Most philosophers believe that necessitarianism is simply false and presume that some things could have been otherwise than what they are. In this book, the author argues that necessitarianism is true and the view that some things in the world are contingent, what the author terms contingentarianism, is false.

The author assesses various theories of contingency, including the possible worlds theory, combinatorialism, and dispositionalism, and argues that no theory can successfully explain why an entity is such as it is rather than not. She then lays out a case for necessitarianism and provides responses to various objections. The book concludes with an explanation of the ways in which necessitarianism is relevant to issues in ethics, philosophy of mind, and social philosophy.

A Case for Necessitarianism will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in metaphysics, logic, and philosophy of science.

Weight: 453g
Dimension: 229 x 152 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781032033174