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    Abstract objects necessarily lack causal powers. — Carmelics
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    Home/Modality & Possibility
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    Abstract objects necessarily lack causal powers.

    Modality & Possibility
    ?Rate how convincing each reason is below to see the overall strength.
    1 reason for
    2 reasons against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
    ?
    • 1.Necessarily, anything with causal powers is concrete (□∀x(Cx → E!x)).
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    • 2.Abstract objects are, by definition, not concrete at any possible world.
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    Reasons Against

    2 perspectives
    Reason against 1 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Mathematical structures like the natural numbers causally constrain which physical computations are possible, as Penelope Maddy argues in 'Realism in Mathematics'.
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    • 2.If X's existence is necessary for Y to occur, X bears a counterfactual-supporting relation to Y that satisfies standard analyses of causal relevance.
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    • 3.Therefore, abstract objects can satisfy causal relevance conditions without being concrete, undermining the supposed necessary connection between concreteness and causal power.
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    Reason against 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.The abstract/concrete distinction in P2 is question-begging if 'concrete' is defined precisely as 'having causal powers', collapsing the argument into circularity.
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    • 2.Frege's Platonism treats the logical laws as abstract yet normatively governing thought in a way that Frege himself described as a form of efficacy over rational agents.
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    • 3.Normative governance of cognition by abstract objects constitutes a species of causal influence under interventionist accounts of causation like Woodward's, since ideal reasoners' beliefs co-vary with logical facts under intervention.
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    Abstract objects are, by definition, not concrete at any possible world.Frege's Platonism treats the logical laws as abstract yet normatively governing ...If X's existence is necessary for Y to occur, X bears a counterfactual-supportin...Mathematical structures like the natural numbers causally constrain which physic...
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    Necessarily, anything with causal powers is concrete (□∀x(Cx → E!x)).Normative governance of cognition by abstract objects constitutes a species of c...The abstract/concrete distinction in P2 is question-begging if 'concrete' is def...Therefore, abstract objects can satisfy causal relevance conditions without bein...

    Similar

    Abstract objects are causally inert86%Abstract objects cannot causally interact with material objects.84%Determination can hold between abstracta or other entities lacking cau...82%Non-existent objects can possess properties.79%

    Source

    AI-extracted1/3 agreementValid
    SEP: abstract-objects
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    Thus, the ordinary objects include all the concrete objects (since \(E!x\) implies \(\Diamond E!x\)), as well as possible objects that aren’t in fact concrete but might have been. On this theory, therefore, being abstract is not the negation of being concrete. Instead, the definition validates an intuition that numbers, sets, etc., aren’t the kind of thing that could be concrete. Though Zalta’s definition of abstract seems to comport with the way of primitivism—take concrete as primitive, and th
    Extraction notes

    Validity: Extracted via Max plan + API grounding/validity checks

    Details

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    claim
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