Skip to content
Carmelics
TopicsThinkersChangesContributorsLoading account…

    Carmelics

    A reasoning platform. Break down any belief into clear reasons, explore both sides, and weigh the evidence honestly.

    Navigate

    • Topics
    • Search
    • Recent Changes
    • Contribute
    • How It Works
    • Glossary
    • Thinkers
    • Contributors
    • About
    • Statistics
    • Terms
    • Privacy

    Database

    Statements
    —
    Perspectives
    —
    Topics
    —

    Press ? for keyboard shortcuts

    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
    See Original
    Inverse View

    It is not the case that The lack of informativeness is not a good objection to the optimalist account of negative truths

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Positive existential truths have clear ontological grounds (the cat itself), making non-informativeness a tolerable feature of a genuinely grounded account.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.Negative truths under optimalism lack any analogous ontological ground, so non-informativeness here signals the absence of a truthmaker rather than its presence.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 3.The disanalogy between positive and negative cases means the cat-example fails to discharge the explanatory burden optimalism faces with absences.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Reason for 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Armstrong and Lewis require truthmaker accounts to satisfy the Entailment Principle: truthmakers must necessitate the truths they ground.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.Optimalism appeals to the totality of what exists, but this appeal is itself uninformative precisely because it cannot specify which feature of reality necessitates any particular negative truth.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 3.An account that cannot specify the necessitating ground for each negative truth fails the Entailment Principle, not merely an aesthetic demand for informativeness.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.The positive existential statement that there is a cat is true because there is a cat
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.This is no explanation at all, yet it is none the worse for that
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 3.So non-informativeness by itself is not a defect in such accounts
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Next step

    Based on where you are in your exploration

    Strongest counterpoint
    Explore the most compelling reason on the other side.