Part VI: Metaphysics

Chapter 19 Study questions for Is our World Structured?

Explain, in your own words, what the difference is between simply making a list of what exists, and explaining how the world is structured.
Why do mountaineers think that appealing to supervenience is not a good way to understand the structure of our world?
Give an example where the As supervene on the Bs in an asymmetric way.
Can you find an example that is like the Euthyphro problem, in which two sets of properties supervene in a symmetric way across all possible worlds?
Do you think that mountaineers are right and we need to posit a grounding relation? Explain why.
Explain why some mountaineers think that chains of dependence must terminate.

Lowe, E. J. (2010). ‘Ontological Dependence’. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring), ed. Edward N. Zalta, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2010/entries/dependence-ontological/.

McLaughlin, B and Bennett, K. (2014). ‘Supervenience’. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring), ed. Edward N. Zalta, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2014/entries/supervenience/.

Rickles, D. (2006). ‘Supervenience and Determination’. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://www.iep.utm.edu/superven/.

Correia, F. (2008). ‘Ontological Dependence’. Philosophy Compass 3(5): 1013–32.

Leuenberge, S. (2008). ‘Supervenience in Metaphysics’. Philosophy Compass 3(4): 749–62.

Schnieder and A. Steinberg. Basic Philosophical Concepts, Philosophia Verlag.

Trogdon, K. (Forthcoming). ‘An Introduction to Grounding’. In Dependence, eds M. Hoeltje, B.

Schaffer, J. (2009). ‘On What Grounds What’. In Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology, eds D. Chalmers and R. Wasserman. Oxford University Press, pp. 347–83.