A philosophical guide to conditionals / Jonathan Bennett.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bennett, Jonathan, 1930- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Conditionals (Logic).

Language and languages--Philosophy.

Language and languages.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xiii, 387 pages)

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Clarendon Press ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2003.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Conditionals are of two basic kinds, often called ‘indicative’ and ‘subjunctive’. This book expounds and evaluates the main literature about each kind. It eventually defends the view of Adams and Edgington that indicatives are devices for expressing subjective probabilities, and the view of Stalnaker and Lewis that subjunctives are statements about close possible worlds. But it also discusses other views, e.g. that indicatives are really material conditionals, and Goodman's approach to subjunctives.

The author, one of the world's leading authorities on the subject of conditional sentences, distils many years' work and teaching into 'A Philosophical Guide to Conditionals', an authoritative treatment of the subject.

Contents:

1. Introduction

2. The Material Condition: Grice

3. The Material Condition: Jackson

4. The Equation

5. The Equation Attacked

6. The Subjectivity of Indicative Conditionals

7. Indicative Conditionals Lack Truth Values

8. Uses of Indicative Conditionals

9. The Logic of Indicative Conditionals

10. Subjunctive Conditionals: First Steps

11. The Competition for 'Closest'

12. Unrolling from the Antecedent Time

13. Forks

14. Reflections on Legality

15. Truth at the Actual World

16. Subjunctive Conditionals and Probability

17. 'Even If ... '

18. Backward Subjunctive Conditionals

19. Subjunctive Conditionals and Time's Arrow

20. Support Theories

21. The Need for Worlds

22. Relating the Two Kinds of Conditional

23. Unifying the Two Kinds of Conditional.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [371]-379) and indexes.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

0-19-159704-X

9786612007224

1-282-00722-X

0-19-153174-X

OCLC:

560546326