What is meant by necessary truth?
A necessary truth is one that could not have been false, one that would have been true no matter how things had turned out. As Leibniz put it, a necessary truth is one that is “true in all possible worlds.” Plausible examples include “17 is prime,” “If Moore is a bachelor, he is unmarried,” and so on.
What does contingently true mean?
A contingent truth is a true proposition that could have been false; a contingent falsehood is a false proposition that could have been true. This is sometimes expressed by saying that a contingent proposition is one that is true in some possible worlds and not in others.
What are necessary and contingent truths?
A necessary truth is one that could not have been otherwise. It would have been true under all circumstances. A contingent truth is one that is true, but could have been false.
What does necessary mean in philosophy?
necessity, in logic and metaphysics, a modal property of a true proposition whereby it is not possible for the proposition to be false and of a false proposition whereby it is not possible for the proposition to be true.
What makes something necessary?
A necessary condition is a condition that must be present for an event to occur. A sufficient condition is a condition or set of conditions that will produce the event. A necessary condition must be there, but it alone does not provide sufficient cause for the occurrence of the event.
What is a meaning of necessary?
Definition of necessary
1 : absolutely needed : required Food is necessary for life. 2a : of an inevitable nature : inescapable Death is a necessary feature of the human condition. b(1) : logically unavoidable a necessary conclusion. (2) : that cannot be denied without contradiction.
What does logical necessity mean?
When something is logically necessary, it is true by definition. These can also be called analytic truths. If we can prove that something is true because “it could not be otherwise,” then it is logically necessary. The statement is true with an absolute degree of certainty.
What is natural necessity in philosophy?
“Natural necessity” is a name I’m giving to a very general topic of metaphysics that concerns the nature of laws, causation, dispositions, counterfactuals, etc. I’m calling it “natural necessity” since it involves a kind of necessity that is supplied by “nature” rather than…
What is a physical necessity?
Definition & Citations:
the term that is given to the situation where a person is forced into taking a certain course of action.
What does metaphysically necessary mean?
Summary. If something could not have been otherwise, no matter how the world had turned out, that thing is metaphysically necessary.
Why do we need metaphysics?
Metaphysics adds a level of conceptual rigor and clarity that can only improve the steadfastness of our knowledge: it is not here to compete with or replace any other fields, it is here as a necessary supplement to them in our quest for truth about reality.
What does modal mean in philosophy?
A modal is an expression (like ‘necessarily’ or ‘possibly’) that is used to qualify the truth of a judgement. Modal logic is, strictly speaking, the study of the deductive behavior of the expressions ‘it is necessary that’ and ‘it is possible that’.
What is contingent in philosophy?
In philosophy and logic, contingency is the status of propositions that are neither true under every possible valuation (i.e. tautologies) nor false under every possible valuation (i.e. contradictions). A contingent proposition is neither necessarily true nor necessarily false.
What is the difference between necessity and contingency?
As nouns the difference between contingency and necessity
is that contingency is (uncountable) the quality of being contingent, of happening by chance; unpredictability while necessity is the quality or state of being necessary, unavoidable, or absolutely requisite.
Can something contingent be necessary?
Therefore, what sufficiently causes or fully adequately explains the existence of contingent beings must include a non-contingent (necessary) being. Therefore, a necessary being (a being such that if it exists, it cannot not-exist) exists. The universe, which is composed of only contingent beings, is contingent.