Metaphysics, Free Will, and Realism vs. Nominalism

Vocabulary flashcards covering topics in metaphysics, including free will, determinism, incompatibilism, compatibilism, mental quausation, and realism versus nominalism.

Metaphysics

The philosophical study of fundamental reality (what exists and how entities relate) using a priori conceptual analysis rather than empirical measurement.

Principle of Alternate Possibilities (PAP)

The thesis that an agent is morally responsible for an action only if they could have done otherwise.

Determinism

The thesis that complete past history ($P_0$) plus the laws of nature ($L$) logically entail the total future state of the universe ($P$).

The Consequence Argument (CA)

The argument that since past history ($P_0$) and physical laws ($L$) are not up to us, and present actions ($P$) are logical consequences of both, our present actions are not up to us.

Inability to Break Laws

The principle that no human agent can perform an action that would render a law of physics false.

$\beta$-Principle (Transfer of Powerlessness)

The principle that if you cannot control cause $A$, and $A$ logically leads to $B$, then you cannot control effect $B$.

Van Inwagen's Goal

To prove incompatibilism (that free will and determinism cannot coexist), without deciding whether determinism or free will is true in reality.

Critique of PAP

Dennett's argument that incompatibilists misunderstand "could have done otherwise"—moral responsibility requires higher-level cognitive flexibility, not impossible micro-physical possibilities.

Frankfurt Cases

Thought experiments showing that an agent can be morally responsible even when they cannot do otherwise (e.g., a neurosurgeon ready to override a choice if you change your mind, but never needing to intervene).

Mark I Deterministic Deliberator (DD)

Dennett's Mars rover example showing that asking "could DD do otherwise?" means "would it act differently in relevantly similar situations?", not in identical micro-atomic conditions.

Open Future vs. Micro-Fatalism

The principle that moral responsibility requires an open future (effective, adaptable internal deliberation), not random quantum indeterminacy.

Dennett's Compatibilist Shift

A shift in the focus of free will away from micro-physical abilities to character assessment, cognitive adaptability, and practical responsibility.

Mental Quausation

Explaining how a mental event causes an effect specifically qua (in virtue of being) mental, given that underlying physical laws seem to do all the causal work.

Unifying Two Debates

The view that Free Will and Mental Causation are the same puzzle—both ask how higher-level mental features (free choices or conscious feelings) remain causally effective without being redundant over physical causes.

Hard Determinism vs. Eliminative Physicalism

Two positions that both deny higher-level mental features because underlying physical laws already determine outcomes.

Epistemological Weighting Objection

The argument that hard determinism is unjustified because our direct, daily empirical experience of choosing is far stronger evidence than speculative, unproven physics theories.

Proper Subset Strategy (SCCP & SCCA)

A strategy where nonreductive physicalists defend mental states via a subset of causal powers (SCCP), and soft determinists defend free choices via a subset of causal antecedents (SCCA)—isolating beliefs and desires from total past history.

Three SCCA Compatibilist Views

A. Underdetermination: Freedom relative to a perspective focused on psychological antecedents; B. Ownership (Frankfurt): Second-order desire identification must be underdetermined by external brainwashing; C. Responsibility (Strawson): Moral accountability assumes that relative to social/legal antecedents, you could do otherwise.

Causal Relevance

The way free choices work without new physical powers through difference-making (slight antecedent changes wouldn't alter the choice) and psychological causal grain.

Particulars vs. Universals

Particulars are single, unrepeatable items (such as a specific red shoe), whereas Universals are repeatable properties shared by multiple particulars at once (such as redness).

The "One Over Many" Problem

The realist argument that distinct objects sharing a feature ($a$ is red, $b$ is red) proves a real, mind-independent universal (redness) exists.

Devitt's "Ostrich" / "Mirage" Nominalism

Devitt's claim that "One Over Many" is a false problem (a mirage)—saying "$a$ is red and $b$ is red" fully explains the facts without needing abstract entities.

Paraphrase Strategy

A strategy used by nominalists to avoid abstract entities by paraphrasing sentences like "Red is a color" into claims about red physical objects.

Rejection of Devitt

Armstrong's argument that Devitt "buries his head in the sand" (ostrich nominalism) by refusing to explain what makes it true that two objects share a property.

Immanent Realism

The view that universals exist only inside physical particulars, not in an abstract Platonic realm.

States of Affairs

The fundamental units of reality in Armstrong's metaphysics ($a$'s being $F$: a particular instantiating a universal).

Non-Relational Instantiation

The account that particulars and universals are mutually "unsaturated" (gappy) items that link directly inside a state of affairs, avoiding Bradley's infinite regress where "instantiation" needs another relation to bind it ad infinitum.