Yes, but given that we’re not logically omniscient, it seems like it would be awfully useful to also have a weaker concept of coherence for discussing practical affairs. Otherwise I fear we wouldn’t be allowed to talk about counterfactuals at all, for who among us is wise enough to prove that a purported possible world doesn’t contain any hidden contradictions?
‘Descriptions’ that claim to describe possible worlds can contain contradictions. But such descriptions don’t describe anything, they’re just words.
Maybe they don’t describe anything, but that doesn’t make them “just words.” To be concrete, QED is, to the best of my ability to wrest information from physicists, inconsistent; yet it remains “the most accurate physical theory.”
You don’t have to go as exotic as QED to derive inconsistencies from the assumption of the continuum. When physicists encounter these inconsistencies, I suspect the continuum (or another source of infinity) is behind them. Singularities, for example, can be handled using discrete cut-offs.
Yes, but given that we’re not logically omniscient, it seems like it would be awfully useful to also have a weaker concept of coherence for discussing practical affairs. Otherwise I fear we wouldn’t be allowed to talk about counterfactuals at all, for who among us is wise enough to prove that a purported possible world doesn’t contain any hidden contradictions?
‘Descriptions’ that claim to describe possible worlds can contain contradictions. But such descriptions don’t describe anything, they’re just words.
Maybe they don’t describe anything, but that doesn’t make them “just words.” To be concrete, QED is, to the best of my ability to wrest information from physicists, inconsistent; yet it remains “the most accurate physical theory.”
I don’t know enough to deal with the counter example. How does QED contradict itself?
In defense of the consistency of the universe...
You don’t have to go as exotic as QED to derive inconsistencies from the assumption of the continuum. When physicists encounter these inconsistencies, I suspect the continuum (or another source of infinity) is behind them. Singularities, for example, can be handled using discrete cut-offs.
(Later edit: Why down-voted?)