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  1. What’s the Point of Ceteris Paribus? or, How to Understand Supply and Demand Curves.Jennifer S. Jhun - 2018 - Philosophy of Science 85 (2):271-292.
    Philosophers sometimes claim that economics, and the idealizing strategies it employs, is ultimately unable to provide genuine laws of nature. Therefore, unlike physics, it does not qualify as an actual science. Careful consideration of thermodynamics, a well-developed physical theory, reveals substantial parallels with economic methodology. The corrective account of scientific understanding I offer appreciates these parallels: understanding in terms of efficient performance.
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  • How Counterpart Theory Saves Nonreductive Physicalism.Justin Tiehen - 2019 - Mind 128 (509):139-174.
    Nonreductive physicalism faces serious problems regarding causal exclusion, causal heterogeneity, and the nature of realization. In this paper I advance solutions to each of those problems. The proposed solutions all depend crucially on embracing modal counterpart theory. Hence, the paper’s thesis: counterpart theory saves nonreductive physicalism. I take as my inspiration the view that mental tokens are constituted by physical tokens in the same way statues are constituted by lumps of clay. I break from other philosophers who have pursued this (...)
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  • An interventionist approach to psychological explanation.Michael Rescorla - 2018 - Synthese 195 (5):1909-1940.
    Interventionism is a theory of causal explanation developed by Woodward and Hitchcock. I defend an interventionist perspective on the causal explanations offered within scientific psychology. The basic idea is that psychology causally explains mental and behavioral outcomes by specifying how those outcomes would have been different had an intervention altered various factors, including relevant psychological states. I elaborate this viewpoint with examples drawn from cognitive science practice, especially Bayesian perceptual psychology. I favorably compare my interventionist approach with well-known nomological and (...)
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  • Ceteris Paribus Laws and Minutis Rectis Laws.Luke Fenton-Glynn - 2016 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 93 (2):274-305.
    Special science generalizations admit of exceptions. Among the class of non-exceptionless special science generalizations, I distinguish minutis rectis generalizations from the more familiar category of ceteris paribus generalizations. I argue that the challenges involved in showing that mr generalizations can play the law role are underappreciated, and quite different from those involved in showing that cp generalizations can do so. I outline a strategy for meeting the challenges posed by mr generalizations.
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  • The epistemology of hedged laws.Robert Kowalenko - 2011 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 42 (3):445-452.
    Standard objections to the notion of a hedged, or ceteris paribus, law of nature usually boil down to the claim that such laws would be either 1) irredeemably vague, 2) untestable, 3) vacuous, 4) false, or a combination thereof. Using epidemiological studies in nutrition science as an example, I show that this is not true of the hedged law-like generalizations derived from data models used to interpret large and varied sets of empirical observations. Although it may be ‘in principle impossible’ (...)
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  • The Ontic Account of Scientific Explanation.Carl F. Craver - 2014 - In Marie I. Kaiser, Oliver R. Scholz, Daniel Plenge & Andreas Hüttemann (eds.), Explanation in the special science: The case of biology and history. Dordrecht: Springer. pp. 27-52.
    According to one large family of views, scientific explanations explain a phenomenon (such as an event or a regularity) by subsuming it under a general representation, model, prototype, or schema (see Bechtel, W., & Abrahamsen, A. (2005). Explanation: A mechanist alternative. Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 36(2), 421–441; Churchland, P. M. (1989). A neurocomputational perspective: The nature of mind and the structure of science. Cambridge: MIT Press; Darden (2006); Hempel, C. G. (1965). Aspects of scientific (...)
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  • Evolutionary Contingency, Stability, and Biological Laws.Jani Raerinne - 2015 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 46 (1):45-62.
    The contingency of biological regularities—and its implications for the existence of biological laws—has long puzzled biologists and philosophers. The best argument for the contingency of biological regularities is John Beatty’s evolutionary contingency thesis, which will be re-analyzed here. First, I argue that in Beatty’s thesis there are two versions of strong contingency used as arguments against biological laws that have gone unnoticed by his commentators. Second, Beatty’s two different versions of strong contingency are analyzed in terms of two different stabilities (...)
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  • Thinking about Non-Universal Laws: Introduction to the Special Issue Ceteris Paribus Laws Revisited.Alexander Reutlinger & Matthias Unterhuber - 2014 - Erkenntnis 79 (10):1703-1713.
    What are ceteris paribus laws? Which disciplines appeal to cp laws and which semantics, metaphysical underpinning, and epistemological dimensions do cp law statements have? Firstly, we give a short overview of the recent discussion on cp laws, which addresses these questions. Secondly, we suggest that given the rich and diverse literature on cp laws a broad conception of cp laws should be endorsed which takes into account the different ways in which laws can be non-universal . Finally, we provide an (...)
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  • Do Ceteris Paribus Laws Exist? A Regularity-Based Best System Analysis.Matthias Unterhuber - 2014 - Erkenntnis 79 (S10):1833-1847.
    This paper argues that ceteris paribus (cp) laws exist based on a Lewisian best system analysis of lawhood (BSA). Furthermore, it shows that a BSA faces a second trivialization problem besides the one identified by Lewis. The first point concerns an argument against cp laws by Earman and Roberts. The second point aims to help making some assumptions of the BSA explicit. To address the second trivialization problem, a restriction in terms of natural logical constants is proposed that allows one (...)
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  • Do Apes Read Minds?: Toward a New Folk Psychology.Kristin Andrews - 2012 - MIT Press.
    Andrews argues for a pluralistic folk psychology that employs different kinds of practices and different kinds of cognitive tools (including personality trait attribution, stereotype activation, inductive reasoning about past behavior, and ...
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  • Concepts of Law of Nature.Brendan Shea - 2011 - Dissertation, University of Illinois
    Over the past 50 years, there has been a great deal of philosophical interest in laws of nature, perhaps because of the essential role that laws play in the formulation of, and proposed solutions to, a number of perennial philosophical problems. For example, many have thought that a satisfactory account of laws could be used to resolve thorny issues concerning explanation, causation, free-will, probability, and counterfactual truth. Moreover, interest in laws of nature is not constrained to metaphysics or philosophy of (...)
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  • Ceteris Paribus Hedges: Causal Voodoo that Works.Michael Strevens - 2012 - Journal of Philosophy 109 (11):652-675.
    What do the words "ceteris paribus" add to a causal hypothesis, that is, to a generalization that is intended to articulate the consequences of a causal mechanism? One answer, which looks almost too good to be true, is that a ceteris paribus hedge restricts the scope of the hypothesis to those cases where nothing undermines, interferes with, or undoes the effect of the mechanism in question, even if the hypothesis's own formulator is otherwise unable to specify fully what might constitute (...)
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  • Collective De Se Thoughts and Centered Worlds.Shen-yi Liao - 2014 - Ratio 27 (1):17-31.
    Two lines of investigation into the nature of mental content have proceeded in parallel until now. The first looks at thoughts that are attributable to collectives, such as bands' beliefs and teams' desires. So far, philosophers who have written on collective belief, collective intentionality, etc. have primarily focused on third-personal attributions of thoughts to collectives. The second looks at de se, or self-locating, thoughts, such as beliefs and desires that are essentially about oneself. So far, philosophers who have written on (...)
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  • How the Ceteris Paribus Laws of Physics Lie.Geert Keil - 2005 - In Jan Faye, Paul Needham, Uwe Scheffler & Max Urchs (eds.), Nature's Principles. Springer. pp. 167-200.
    After a brief survey of the literature on ceteris paribus clauses and ceteris paribus laws (1), the problem of exceptions, which creates the need for cp laws, is discussed (2). It emerges that the so-called skeptical view of laws of nature does not apply to laws of any kind whatever. Only some laws of physics are plagued with exceptions, not THE laws (3). Cp clauses promise a remedy, which has to be located among the further reactions to the skeptical view (...)
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  • Everything Else Being Equal: A Modal Logic for Ceteris Paribus Preferences.Johan Van Benthem, Patrick Girard & Olivier Roy - 2009 - Journal of Philosophical Logic 38 (1):83 - 125.
    This paper presents a new modal logic for ceteris paribus preferences understood in the sense of "all other things being equal". This reading goes back to the seminal work of Von Wright in the early 1960's and has returned in computer science in the 1990' s and in more abstract "dependency logics" today. We show how it differs from ceteris paribus as "all other things being normal", which is used in contexts with preference defeaters. We provide a semantic analysis and (...)
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  • Simple Generics.David Liebesman - 2011 - Noûs 45 (3):409-442.
    Consensus has it that generic sentences such as “Dogs bark” and “Birds fly” contain, at the level of logical form, an unpronounced generic operator: Gen. On this view, generics have a tripartite structure similar to overtly quantified sentences such as “Most dogs bark” and “Typically, birds fly”. I argue that Gen doesn’t exist and that generics have a simple bipartite structure on par with ordinary atomic sentences such as “Homer is drinking”. On my view, the subject terms of generics are (...)
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  • Scientific Explanation and Moral Explanation.Uri D. Leibowitz - 2011 - Noûs 45 (3):472-503.
    Moral philosophers are, among other things, in the business of constructing moral theories. And moral theories are, among other things, supposed to explain moral phenomena. Consequently, one’s views about the nature of moral explanation will influence the kinds of moral theories one is willing to countenance. Many moral philosophers are (explicitly or implicitly) committed to a deductive model of explanation. As I see it, this commitment lies at the heart of the current debate between moral particularists and moral generalists. In (...)
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  • Causal Equations without Ceteris Paribus Clauses.Peter Gildenhuys - 2010 - Philosophy of Science 77 (4):608-632.
    Some writers have urged that evolutionary theory produces generalizations that hold only ceteris paribus, that is, provided “everything else is equal.” Others have claimed that all laws in the special sciences, or even all laws in science generally, hold only ceteris paribus. However, if we lack a way to determine when everything else really is equal, hedging generalizations with the phrase ceteris paribus renders those generalizations vacuous. I propose a solution to this problem for the case of causal equations from (...)
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  • Pietroski and Rey on ceteris paribus laws.Gerhard Schurz - 2001 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 52 (2):359Ð370.
    , Pietroski and Rey ([1995]) suggested a reconstruction of ceteris paribus (CP)-laws, which — as they claim — saves CP-laws from vacuity. This discussion note is intended to show that, although Pietroski and Rey's reconstruction is an improvement in comparison to previous suggestions, it cannot avoid the result that CP-laws are almost vacuous. It is proved that if Cx is an arbitrary (nomological) event-type which has independently identifiable deterministic causes, then for every other (nomological) event-type Ax which is not strictly (...)
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  • "Ceteris Paribus", There Is No Problem of Provisos.John Earman & John T. Roberts - 1999 - Synthese 118 (3):439 - 478.
    Much of the literature on "ceteris paribus" laws is based on a misguided egalitarianism about the sciences. For example, it is commonly held that the special sciences are riddled with ceteris paribus laws; from this many commentators conclude that if the special sciences are not to be accorded a second class status, it must be ceteris paribus all the way down to fundamental physics. We argue that the (purported) laws of fundamental physics are not hedged by ceteris paribus clauses and (...)
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  • Horgan and Tienson on ceteris paribus laws.Marcello Guarini - 2000 - Philosophy of Science 67 (2):301-315.
    Terence Horgan and John Tienson claim that folk psychological laws are different in kind from basic physical laws in at least two ways: first, physical laws do not possess the kind of ceteris paribus qualifications possessed by folk psychological laws, which means the two types of laws have different logical forms; and second, applied physical laws are best thought of as being about an idealized world and folk psychological laws about the actual world. I argue that Horgan and Tienson have (...)
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  • Is there life after the death of the computational theory of mind?Jeffrey Hershfield - 2005 - Minds and Machines 15 (2):183-194.
    In this paper, I explore the implications of Fodor’s attacks on the Computational Theory of Mind (CTM), which get their most recent airing in The Mind Doesn’t Work That Way. I argue that if Fodor is right that the CTM founders on the global nature of abductive inference, then several of the philosophical views about the mind that he has championed over the years founder as well. I focus on Fodor’s accounts of mental causation, psychological explanation, and intentionality.
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  • Being a physicalist: How and (more importantly) why.Andrew Melnyk - 1994 - Philosophical Studies 74 (2):221-241.
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  • Representation and the imperfect ideal.Charles Wallis - 1994 - Philosophy of Science 61 (3):407-28.
    This paper examines the nomic covariationist strategy of using idealization to define representation. While the literature has focused upon the possibility of defining ideal conditions for perception, I argue that nomic covariationist appeals to idealization are pseudoscientific and contrary to a foundational and empirically well-supported methodological presupposition in cognitive science. Moreover, one major figure in this camp fails to come to grips with its role and its problems in mainstream science. Thus he forwards a false dichotomy of the sciences and (...)
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  • From metaphysical to substantive naturalism: A case study.J. L. Dowell - 2004 - Synthese 138 (2):149-173.
    This paper addresses two related questions. First, what is involved in giving a distinctively realist and naturalist construal of an area of discourse, that is, in so much as stating a distinctively realist and naturalist position about, for example, content or value? I defend a condition that guarantees the realism and naturalism of any position satisfying it, at least in the case of positions on content, but perhaps in other cases as well. Second, what sorts of considerations render a distinctively (...)
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  • Individualism, causal powers, and explanation.Robert A. Wilson - 1992 - Philosophical Studies 68 (2):103-39.
    This paper examines a recent, influential argument for individualism in psychology defended by Jerry Fodor and others, what I call the argument from causal powers. I argue that this argument equivocates on the crucial notion of "causal powers", and that this equivocation constitutes a deep problem for arguments of this type. Relational and individualistic taxonomies are incompatible, and it does not seem in general to be possible to factor the former into the latter. The distinction between powers and properties plays (...)
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  • Frege Cases and Rationalizing Explanations.Mahrad Almotahari & Aidan Gray - forthcoming - Noûs.
    Russellians, Relationists, and Fregeans disagree about the nature of propositional-attitude content. We articulate a framework to characterize and evaluate this disagreement. The framework involves two claims: i) that we should individuate attitude content in whatever way fits best with the explanations that characteristically appeal to it, and ii) that we can understand those explanations by analogy with other ‘higher-level’ explanations. Using the framework, we argue for an under-appreciated form of Russellianism. Along the way we demonstrate that being more explicit about (...)
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  • Semantic dispositionalism and the rule‐following paradox.Elek Lane - 2022 - Metaphilosophy 53 (5):685-695.
    In virtue of what does a sign have meaning? This is the question raised by Wittgenstein's rule-following considerations. Semantic dispositionalism is a (type of) theory that purports to answer this question. The present paper argues that semantic dispositionalism faces a heretofore unnoticed problem, one that ultimately comes down to its reliance on unanalyzed notions of repeated types of signs. In the context of responding to the rule-following paradox—and offering a putative solution to it—this amounts to simply assuming a solution to (...)
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  • (1 other version)Multiple Realization and Evolutionary Dynamics: A Fitness-Based Account.Diego Ríos & Graciela Kuechle - 2022 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 100 (1):149-164.
    ABSTRACT Multiple realization occurs when a natural kind is variably realized at more basic levels and the common physical structure of the realizers is not essential for supporting nomological statements. It has been suggested that this phenomenon may be an outcome of natural selection acting over multiple realizers that perform an adaptive function. In this paper, we make the following contributions. First, we present a revision of this model, characterized by stricter equilibrium conditions and superior explanatory power. Second, we present (...)
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  • Levelling counterfactual scepticism.Katie Steele & Alexander Sandgren - 2020 - Synthese 199 (1-2):927-947.
    In this paper, we develop a novel response to counterfactual scepticism, the thesis that most ordinary counterfactual claims are false. In the process we aim to shed light on the relationship between debates in the philosophy of science and debates concerning the semantics and pragmatics of counterfactuals. We argue that science is concerned with many domains of inquiry, each with its own characteristic entities and regularities; moreover, statements of scientific law often include an implicit ceteris paribus clause that restricts the (...)
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  • Frege Cases and Bad Psychological Laws.Mahrad Almotahari & Aidan Gray - 2021 - Mind 130 (520):1253-1280.
    We draw attention to a series of implicit assumptions that have structured the debate about Frege’s Puzzle. Once these assumptions are made explicit, we rely on them to show that if one focuses exclusively on the issues raised by Frege cases, then one obtains a powerful consideration against a fine-grained conception of propositional-attitude content. In light of this consideration, a form of Russellianism about content becomes viable.
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  • Natural kinds, normative kinds and human behavior.Diana Ines Pérez & Lucia Gabriela Ciccia - 2019 - Filosofia Unisinos 20 (3).
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  • Economics, Equilibrium Methods, and Multi-Scale Modeling.Jennifer Jhun - 2019 - Erkenntnis 86 (2):457-472.
    In this paper, I draw a parallel between the stability of physical systems and that of economic ones, such as the US financial system. I argue that the use of equilibrium assumptions is central to the analysis of dynamic behavior for both kinds of systems, and that we ought to interpret such idealizing strategies as footholds for causal exploration and explanation. Our considerations suggest multi-scale modeling as a natural home for such reasoning strategies, which can provide a backdrop for the (...)
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  • Semantic dispositionalism without exceptions.Arvid Båve - 2020 - Philosophical Studies 177 (6):1751-1771.
    Semantic dispositionalism is roughly the view that meaning a certain thing by a word, or possessing a certain concept, consists in being disposed to do something, e.g., infer a certain way. Its main problem is that it seems to have so many and disparate exceptions. People can fail to infer as required due to lack of logical acumen, intoxication, confusion, deviant theories, neural malfunctioning, and so on. I present a theory stating possession conditions of concepts that are counterfactuals, rather than (...)
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  • Humeanism and Exceptions in the Fundamental Laws of Physics.Billy Wheeler - 2017 - Principia: An International Journal of Epistemology 21 (3):317-337.
    It has been argued that the fundamental laws of physics do not face a ‘problem of provisos’ equivalent to that found in other scientific disciplines (Earman, Roberts and Smith 2002) and there is only the appearance of exceptions to physical laws if they are confused with differential equations of evolution type (Smith 2002). In this paper I argue that even if this is true, fundamental laws in physics still pose a major challenge to standard Humean approaches to lawhood, as they (...)
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  • Artificial Intelligence and the Body: Dreyfus, Bickhard, and the Future of AI.Daniel Susser - 2013 - In Vincent Müller (ed.), Philosophy and Theory of Artificial Intelligence. Springer. pp. 277-287.
    For those who find Dreyfus’s critique of AI compelling, the prospects for producing true artificial human intelligence are bleak. An important question thus becomes, what are the prospects for producing artificial non-human intelligence? Applying Dreyfus’s work to this question is difficult, however, because his work is so thoroughly human-centered. Granting Dreyfus that the body is fundamental to intelligence, how are we to conceive of non-human bodies? In this paper, I argue that bringing Dreyfus’s work into conversation with the work of (...)
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  • Manipulationism, Ceteris Paribus Laws, and the Bugbear of Background Knowledge.Robert Kowalenko - 2017 - International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 31 (3):261-283.
    According to manipulationist accounts of causal explanation, to explain an event is to show how it could be changed by intervening on its cause. The relevant change must be a ‘serious possibility’ claims Woodward 2003, distinct from mere logical or physical possibility—approximating something I call ‘scientific possibility’. This idea creates significant difficulties: background knowledge is necessary for judgments of possibility. Yet the primary vehicles of explanation in manipulationism are ‘invariant’ generalisations, and these are not well adapted to encoding such knowledge, (...)
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  • Daydreams and Anarchy: A Defense of Anomalous Mental Causation.Nick Zangwill - 2006 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 73 (2):253-289.
    Must mental properties figure in psychological causal laws if they are causally efficacious? And do those psychological causal laws give the essence of mental properties? Contrary to the prevailing consensus, I argue that, on the usual conception of laws that is in play in these debates, there are in fact lawless causally efficacious properties both in and out of the philosophy of mind. I argue that this makes a great difference to the philosophical relevance of empirical psychology. 1 begin by (...)
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  • The Role of Kinds in the Semantics of Ceteris Paribus Laws.Bernhard Nickel - 2014 - Erkenntnis 79 (10):1729-1744.
    This paper investigates the interaction between semantic theories for cp-laws (roughly, laws that hold “all things equal”) and metaphysical theories of kinds in the special sciences. Its central conclusion is that cp-laws concerning kinds behave differently from cp-laws concerning non-kinds: “ravens are black” which concerns the kind corvus corax, behaves differently from from “albino ravens are white” which concerns the non-kind grouping of albino ravens. I argue that this difference is in the first instance logical: the two sorts of cp-laws (...)
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  • Ceteris Paribus Laws: A Naturalistic Account.Robert Kowalenko - 2014 - International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 28 (2):133-155.
    An otherwise lawlike generalisation hedged by a ceteris paribus (CP) clause qualifies as a law of nature, if the CP clause can be substituted with a set of conditions derived from the multivariate regression model used to interpret the empirical data in support of the gen- eralisation. Three studies in human biology that use regression analysis are surveyed, showing that standard objections to cashing out CP clauses in this way—based on alleged vagueness, vacuity, or lack of testability—do not apply. CP (...)
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  • (1 other version)Ceteris Paribus Laws.Alexander Reutlinger, Gerhard Schurz, Andreas Hüttemann & Siegfried Jaag - 2011 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
    Laws of nature take center stage in philosophy of science. Laws are usually believed to stand in a tight conceptual relation to many important key concepts such as causation, explanation, confirmation, determinism, counterfactuals etc. Traditionally, philosophers of science have focused on physical laws, which were taken to be at least true, universal statements that support counterfactual claims. But, although this claim about laws might be true with respect to physics, laws in the special sciences (such as biology, psychology, economics etc.) (...)
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  • (1 other version)Contemporary debates in philosophy of science.Christopher Hitchcock (ed.) - 2004 - Malden, MA: Blackwell.
    Showcasing original arguments for well-defined positions, as well as clear and concise statements of sophisticated philosophical views, this volume is an ...
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  • Thinking without global generalisations: A cognitive defence of moral particularism.Nancy Salay - 2008 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 51 (4):390 – 411.
    In their article entitled “Ethical Particularism and Patterns”, Frank Jackson, Philip Pettit, and Michael Smith (JPS henceforth) argue that moral particularism is a cognitively implausible theory since it appears to entail the view that one might have a skill that is not grounded in an ability to recognise and represent natural patterns in the world. This charge echoes the complaints of computational theorists of cognition against their embodied cognition counterparts, namely that, theories of cognition that eschew talk of mental representation (...)
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  • Psychological laws and nonmonotonic logic.Arnold Silverberg - 1996 - Erkenntnis 44 (2):199-224.
    In this essay I enter into a recently published debate between Stephen Schiffer and Jerry Fodor concerning whether adequate sense can be made of the ceteris paribus conditions in special science laws, much of their focus being on the case of putative psychological laws. Schiffer argues that adequate sense cannot be made of ceteris paribus clauses, while Fodor attempts to overcome Schiffer's arguments, in defense of special science laws. More recently, Peter Mott has attempted to show that Fodor's response to (...)
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  • (1 other version)Why Reasons May Not Be Causes.Julia Tanney - 1995 - Mind and Language 10 (1‐2):105-128.
    This paper considers Davidson's (1963) arguments for construing reasons as causes and attempts to show that he has failed to provide positive reasons for introducing causation into his analysis of rationalizing explanation. I consider various ways of spelling out his intuition that something is missing from explanation if we consider only the justificatory relation between reasons and action, and I argue that to the extent that there is anything missing, it should not be provided by construing reasons as causes. What (...)
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  • (1 other version)Multiple Realization and Evolutionary Dynamics: A Fitness-Based Account.Graciela Kuechle & Diego Ríos - 2022 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 100 (1):149-164.
    Multiple realization occurs when a natural kind is variably realized at more basic levels and the common physical structure of the realizers is not essential for supporting nomological statements. It has been suggested that this phenomenon may be an outcome of natural selection acting over multiple realizers that perform an adaptive function. In this paper, we make the following contributions. First, we present a revision of this model, characterized by stricter equilibrium conditions and superior explanatory power. Second, we present a (...)
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  • The Multiplicity of Explanation in Cognitive Science.Raoul Gervais - 2020 - Foundations of Science 26 (4):1089–1104.
    In this paper, I argue that explaining cognitive behavior can be achieved through what I call hybrid explanatory inferences: inferences that posit mechanisms, but also draw on observed regularities. Moreover, these inferences can be used to achieve unification, in the sense developed by Allen Newel in his work on cognitive architectures. Thus, it seems that explanatory pluralism and unification do not rule out each other in cognitive science, but rather that the former represents a way to achieve the latter.
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  • Everything Else Being Equal: A Modal Logic for Ceteris Paribus Preferences.Benthem Johan, Girard Patrick & Roy Olivier - 2009 - Journal of Philosophical Logic 38 (1):83-125.
    This paper presents a new modal logic for ceteris paribus preferences understood in the sense of “all other things being equal”. This reading goes back to the seminal work of Von Wright in the early 1960’s and has returned in computer science in the 1990’s and in more abstract “dependency logics” today. We show how it differs from ceteris paribus as “all other things being normal”, which is used in contexts with preference defeaters. We provide a semantic analysis and several (...)
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  • Violated Laws, Ceteris Paribus Clauses, and Capacities.Sheldon Smith - 2002 - Synthese 130 (2):235-264.
    It is often claimed that the bulk of the laws of physics –including such venerable laws as Universal Gravitation– are violated in many (or even all) circumstances because they havecounter-instances that result when a system is not isolated fromother systems. Various accounts of how one should interpretthese (apparently) violated laws have been provided. In thispaper, I examine two accounts of (apparently) violated laws, thatthey are merely ceteris paribus laws and that they aremanifestations of capacities. Through an examination of theprimary example (...)
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  • Laws are conditionals.Toby Friend - 2016 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 6 (1):123-144.
    The ubiquitous schema ‘All Fs are Gs’ dominates much philosophical discussion on laws but rarely is it shown how actual laws mentioned and used in science are supposed to fit it. After consideration of a variety of laws, including those obviously conditional and those superficially not conditional, I argue that we have good reason to support the traditional interpretation of laws as conditionals of some quantified form with a single object variable. I show how this conclusion impacts on the status (...)
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