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Plumbing metaphysical explanatory depth.
Plumbing metaphysical explanatory depth.
- Source :
-
Philosophical Studies . Sep2024, Vol. 181 Issue 9, p2091-2112. 22p. - Publication Year :
- 2024
-
Abstract
- Recent years have seen increasing interest in interventionist analyses of metaphysical explanation. One area where interventionism traditionally shines, is in providing an account of explanatory depth; the sense in which explanation comes in degrees. However, the literature on metaphysical explanation has left the notion depth almost entirely unexplored. In this paper I shall attempt to rectify this oversight by motivating an interventionist analysis of metaphysical explanatory depth (MED), in terms of the range of interventions under which a metaphysically explanatory generalization remains invariant. After elucidating the notion through a toy-example, I demonstrate the important work which MED can perform in characterizing debate within contemporary metaphysics. Focusing upon rival approaches to explaining the identity and distinctness of concrete objects, I argue that the progress achieved in this debate can be characterized in terms of increasing explanatory depth. Having made an initial case for the utility of MED, I then turn this analysis to the metaphysics of explanation itself. By adopting an interventionist framework with respect to MED, I will show that we can assess the depth of competing theories of explanation. This application has two interesting results: first, it suggests that an interventionist analysis of explanation provides deeper explanations of the connection between explanans and explanandum than rival accounts; and second, it suggests that explanations provided by interventionism become deeper still, if one accepts that this methodology ranges over metaphysical, as well as causal, instances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 00318116
- Volume :
- 181
- Issue :
- 9
- Database :
- Academic Search Index
- Journal :
- Philosophical Studies
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 179536168
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-022-01886-3