Are non-accidental regularities a cosmic coincidence? Revisiting a central threat to Humean laws

Kód výsledku v IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F67985955%3A_____%2F21%3A00545130" target="_blank" >RIV/67985955:_____/21:00545130 - isvavai.cz</a>

Výsledek na webu

<a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02397-1" target="_blank" >https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02397-1</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02397-1" target="_blank" >10.1007/s11229-019-02397-1</a>

Jazyk výsledku

angličtina

Název v původním jazyce

Are non-accidental regularities a cosmic coincidence? Revisiting a central threat to Humean laws

Popis výsledku v původním jazyce

If the laws of nature are as the Humean believes, it is an unexplained cosmic coincidence that the actual Humean mosaic is as extremely regular as it is. This is a strong and well-known objection to the Humean account of laws. Yet, as reasonable as this objection may seem, it is nowadays sometimes dismissed. The reason: its unjustified implicit assignment of equiprobability to each possible Humean mosaic, that is, its assumption of the principle of indifference, which has been attacked on many grounds ever since it was first proposed. In place of equiprobability, recent formal models represent the doxastic state of total ignorance as suspension of judgment. In this paper I revisit the cosmic coincidence objection to Humean laws by assessing which doxastic state we should endorse. By focusing on specific features of our scenario I conclude that suspending judgment results in an unnecessarily weak doxastic state. First, I point out that recent literature in epistemology has provided independent justifications of the principle of indifference. Second, given that the argument is framed within a Humean metaphysics, it turns out that we are warranted to appeal to these justifications and assign a uniform and additive credence distribution among Humean mosaics. This leads us to conclude that, contrary to widespread opinion, we should not dismiss the cosmic coincidence objection to the Humean account of laws.

Název v anglickém jazyce

Are non-accidental regularities a cosmic coincidence? Revisiting a central threat to Humean laws

Popis výsledku anglicky

If the laws of nature are as the Humean believes, it is an unexplained cosmic coincidence that the actual Humean mosaic is as extremely regular as it is. This is a strong and well-known objection to the Humean account of laws. Yet, as reasonable as this objection may seem, it is nowadays sometimes dismissed. The reason: its unjustified implicit assignment of equiprobability to each possible Humean mosaic, that is, its assumption of the principle of indifference, which has been attacked on many grounds ever since it was first proposed. In place of equiprobability, recent formal models represent the doxastic state of total ignorance as suspension of judgment. In this paper I revisit the cosmic coincidence objection to Humean laws by assessing which doxastic state we should endorse. By focusing on specific features of our scenario I conclude that suspending judgment results in an unnecessarily weak doxastic state. First, I point out that recent literature in epistemology has provided independent justifications of the principle of indifference. Second, given that the argument is framed within a Humean metaphysics, it turns out that we are warranted to appeal to these justifications and assign a uniform and additive credence distribution among Humean mosaics. This leads us to conclude that, contrary to widespread opinion, we should not dismiss the cosmic coincidence objection to the Humean account of laws.

Druh

J_imp - Článek v periodiku v databázi Web of Science

CEP obor

—

OECD FORD obor

60301 - Philosophy, History and Philosophy of science and technology

Projekt

—

Návaznosti

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Rok uplatnění

2021

Kód důvěrnosti údajů

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Název periodika

Synthese

ISSN

0039-7857

e-ISSN

1573-0964

Svazek periodika

198

Číslo periodika v rámci svazku

6

Stát vydavatele periodika

NL - Nizozemsko

Počet stran výsledku

23

Strana od-do

5205-5227

Kód UT WoS článku

000657791400013

EID výsledku v databázi Scopus

2-s2.0-85074016980