Lewis's ontological commitment to possible worlds via the argument from Counterfactuals is insufficiently justified

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1.Lewis claims that quantifying over possible worlds in a paraphrase of our theories is permissible
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2.Lewis provides vanishingly little defence of why that paraphrase is permissible
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3.An ontological commitment requires justification that the paraphrase permitting it is well-founded
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SEP: david-lewis

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The short argument from Counterfactuals that I quoted seems deeply unQuinean. Rather than saying that possible worlds exist because they are quantified over in the best paraphrase of our theories, Lewis says they exist because they are quantified over in just one paraphrase of our theories. To be sure, he says this is a permissible paraphrase. On the other hand, there is vanishingly little defence of its permissibility.

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

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Type: claim
Perspectives: 1 (0 for, 1 against)
Edits: 1 edit