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It's more about an alternate, virtual, or
counterfactual history, dealing with "what if" speculations about past events,
like Stalin's missed chance.
Apropos, the alternaive history makes an
interesting mix of fictions, literary, science and historical, involving many
serious minds, as Churchill, with his "If Lee Had Not Won the
Battle of Gettysburg".
But the "what if" speculations/predictions
about future possible worlds/events, this is what the big science is supposed to
deliver.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, July 23, 2011 10:41
AM
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] intangibles
(was RE: Why most classifications are fuzzy)
Avril,
You have to make a distinction between 'possible world' and 'possible world
accessible from the actual world'.
In Kripke semantics, there is no limitation whatever on what a possible
world might be.
The criterion you cited is one of many, many suggestions for what it might
mean for some possible world to be accessible from the actual world.
For any particular application, philosophers want something much more
restricted. For example, somebody who is interested in politics might
ask "What would the world be like today if Jerry Ford had been elected
president in 1976 instead of Jimmy Carter."
In any case, note that you don't need the term 'possible world' in order to
discuss that question. You just refer to "the world".
That leads to my preferred way of talking: replace every occurrence
of the term 'possible world' with 'how the world would be if ...'.
John
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