Grounding, Circularity, and Regress

Abstract

Chapter 5 argues that there can be both infinite regress and circularity in chains of grounding. Drawing on the connection between grounding and truthmaking, it is argued that semantic paradoxes like the Liar paradox, the truth-teller, and the no-no paradox yield circles of grounding (including cases of self-grounding), and infinitely descending chains of grounding, but that each are acceptable once we pull apart grounding from metaphysical explanation. Dialetheism—the view that there are true contradictions—is defended as the solution for the Liar paradox, and the non-classical logic First Degree Entailment (FDE)—that allows sentences to be true, false, both, or neither—is defended. A distinctive account of how true contradictions arise and where they occur is defended: the world as is given to us may be consistent, but the socially constructed world is inconsistent.