Guidebook for destroying Kripke

[dangerzooey]

1. The main reason for believing proper names are directly referential is that there are beings in other possible worlds that are (for example) dangerzooey.

2. The main reason for believing dangerzooey exists in other possible worlds is that it was possible for things to happen to me other than those that do happen to me. (If it were not so possible, those things in

Comments

[easwaran]

Step 3 doesn't sound totally convincing to me. Just because the world is deterministic doesn't seem to me to indicate that it couldn't have been different from how it actually is. It's just that none of the worlds will share histories all the way back. As long as the worlds always had some amount of difference, and are possible (whatever that means) then everything is consistent with determinism.

Of course, if the worlds aren't identical at any point (as I guess they never can be, under determinism), then it's unclear how to identify the same person across worlds. Which I guess might be a problem. Kripke talks about the necessity of origins or something (whatever he calls "having the parents you actually do") but that's not going to get you anywhere unless there is some point in the history that is identical between the two worlds.

[dangerzooey]

Yeah, I think I have a biased notion of 'possibility', given my views on determinism.