4 - Powers and Dispositions
Summary
Introduction
Essentialism presents a view of reality that is very different from that of any kind of passivism. Essentialists believe that:
(a) inanimate matter is not passive, but essentially active;
(b) the actions of things depend on their causal powers and other dispositional properties;
(c) dispositional properties are genuine properties, and intrinsic to the things that have them;
(d) the essential properties of things always include dispositional properties;
(e) elementary causal relations involve necessary connections between events, namely between the displays of dispositional properties and the circumstances that give rise to them;
(f) the laws of nature describe the ways that members of natural kinds are logically required (or are necessarily disposed) to act, given their essential natures; and
(g) the laws of nature are metaphysically necessary, because anything that belongs to a natural kind is logically required (or is necessarily disposed) to behave as its essential properties dictate.
These are all highly controversial theses that are anathema to most philosophers. Those I call “Humeans” would argue that:
(a) inanimate matter is essentially passive, never intrinsically active;
(b) things behave as they are required to by the laws of nature;
(c) the dispositional properties of things (including their causal powers) are not real properties, and are never intrinsic to the things that have them;
(d) the essential properties of things never include any dispositional ones;
(e) causal relations are always between logically independent events;
(f) the laws of nature are universal regularities imposed on things whose identities are independent of the laws; and
(g) the laws of nature are contingent, not necessary.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Philosophy of NatureA Guide to the New Essentialism, pp. 59 - 80Publisher: Acumen PublishingPrint publication year: 2002