Grounding the Future (and the Future of Grounding)
Roberto Loss (University of Hamburg)

6 November 2020, 16:00 | The talk will be given in a mixed presence regime

Faculdade de Letras de Lisboa
Sala Mattos Romão (Departamento de Filosofia) & live-streamed

Abstract: According to what may be labelled ‘serious Ockhamism’, (i) the future is open, (ii) the openness of the future consists in the fact that what exists is insufficient to determine the truth-value of (at least some) future-directed statements, and yet (iii) future-directed statements all possess a determinate truth-value. Serious Ockhamism appears to be in tension with the idea that truth is grounded in reality. Some serious Ockhamists bite the bullet and accept some truths to be indeed ungrounded. Others prefer, instead, a more sophisticated approach and claim that even if future-contingent statements are not grounded in the way reality is, they are nevertheless not ungrounded, as they are ‘cross-temporally’ grounded in the way reality will be. In this talk I will construe the grounding challenge faced by serious Ockhamists as involving the notion of metaphysical grounding and I will argue that, although the kind of ‘cross-temporal grounding’ serious Ockhamists appeal to is in tension with a set of rather ‘orthodox’ grounding principles, serious Ockhamists appear to have independent reasons to embrace at least a certain kind of grounding ‘heresy’.

Free Attendance, but preregistration required: https://www.lancog.com/lancog/registration/