Our First Submission! (Untitled)

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Abstract:
David Lewis' best-system account of lawhood does not get off the ground unless some 'elite minority' of attributes (i.e., properties or relations) is singled out for special treatment. Lewis thought that this elite class of attributes is formed by the perfectly natural ones, but this idea faces two related challenges: first, the concept of a perfectly natural attribute can easily seem rather mysterious – at least no less so than the concepts of universal and trope on the basis of which it may (according to Lewis) be explicated if it is not taken as primitive. Second, in part because of its mysterious character, it is not clear why the concept of perfectly natural attribute should play any special role in an account of lawhood. In this paper, I offer an account of what it means for an attribute to be simple, and argue that the concept of a simple attribute is better suited for the role that, in Lewis' best-system account of lawhood, is played by the concept of a perfectly natural attribute.

Keywords: 
Perfectly natural properties; Laws of nature; David Lewis

Approx. Word Count:
8,400

Excerpt:
Here

Notes:
Currently under review at Erkenntnis