Lewis's Argument Research Articles

Could This Be Magic

A common view about possible worlds is that they are abstract entities that somehow represent the various ways the concrete universe might have been (including, of course, one that represents the way the concrete universe actually is). For example, many have taken possible worlds to be maximal consistent propositions. Views along these lines have been attacked by David Lewis, who calls abstract worlds ersatz and certain of their proponents ersatzers.2 The magical ersatzers are those who (according to Lewis) cannot give a satisfactory account of the allimportant representation relation. Without such an account, Lewis charges, our grasp of representation would seem possible only by magic. In a recent article Peter van Inwagen addresses himself to Lewis's main argument. While professing not to know just what is wrong with that argument, he nevertheless maintains that it must be wrong because it proves too much.3 According to van Inwagen, if the argument were sound, it would not only make it a feat of magic for us to grasp what it is for an abstract world to represent what is possible, it would also make it a feat of magic for us to grasp the fundamental notion of set theory: what it is for a thing to be a member of a set. (It is worth noting that not everyone would concede that this shows that the argument proves too much; some might welcome the outcome as supporting independent suspicions about sets.) Now I am not a proponent of magical or any other kind of ersatzism. In fact I don't even believe in possible worlds.4 But I do agree with van Inwagen that Lewis's argument is wrong. I

Lewis's puzzle about singular belief-attribution

In this paper, I have argued that Lewis fails to undermine thatP-theory by means of a variation of Kripke'sPuzzle. The flaw in Lewis's argument, given a wide interpretation ofworld-fitness, is that it simply begs the question against theP-theorist. I then argued that, given the narrow interpretation ofworld-fitness, Lewis's argument fails because Pierre doesn't have a belief that is narrowly characterizable by a sentence like, Pierre believes that the city that he identifies asLondon is pretty in either Kripke's story or even in Lewis's own variation of Kripke's story. It now remains to be seen whether theP-theory can be directly refuted by other arguments.

The Refutation of Determinism

In his Christian Theology and Natural Science, E. L. Mascall refers to a criticism by Elizabeth Anscombe of C. S. Lewis's well-known argument against determinism that appears in his Miracles. Both Lewis's argument and Anscombe's response appeared originally as papers delivered in the 40s to the Oxford Socratic Club. A certain historical interest attaches to that exchange in that Lewis seems to have been ‘deeply disturbed’ by it.2 I think he need not have been. But, more importantly, the sequence of Lewis's article followed by Anscombe's reply and then Mascall's comments on both, provides a suggestive presentation and examination of a certain kind of argument against determinism. Essentially it is a negative rebuttal of a retortive kind, such as Aristotle uses against the sceptic in the Metaphysics. But its treatment by these three writers indicates a metaphysical insight that could possibly furnish a positive refutation of any kind of radical determinism.