Essence and Modality: Continued Debate

Year, pages: 2024, 309 - 336

Here I offer a critical evaluation of modalism about essential properties. To that effect, I begin by rehearsing Fine’s now infamous counterexamples to pure modalism. I then consider two recent defenses of it, offered by Livingstone-Banks and Cowling, respectively. I argue that both defenses fail. Next I consider the most plausible variety of impure modalism – sparse modalism – which has recently been defended by Wildman and de Melo. Skiles has argued that sparse modalism fails too. I argue that Skiles’s counterexamples misfire; nonetheless, his conclusion that, like pure modalism, sparse modalism is too broad, is on the right track. And so, I offer an original objection–the sparse modal propria counterexample – to show that this is so. I conclude by considering ways the modalist might once again modify her account to circumvent this new objection and improve the account’s extensional adequacy.

Bassford, A. 2024. Essence and Modality: Continued Debate. In Organon F, vol. 31, no.3, pp. 309-336. 1335-0668. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31577/orgf.2024.31305

Bassford, A. (2024). Essence and Modality: Continued Debate. Organon F, 31(3), 309-336. 1335-0668. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31577/orgf.2024.31305

Publisher: Filozofický ústav SAV, Filosofický ústav AVČR

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