The Metaphysicist's Question About Extended Symbols

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Is metaphysics coming in when we're deciding not just instrumental things that physicists like to talk about invoking, but the harder questions of which parts of these are real and actual? I mean, this is kind of interesting. Maybe you don't think of things in this way, but how does tell me if this resonates with you? So certainly not every metaphysician would think this. But a relatively common thought is something like, look, we get asked questions just about what are coherent pictures of what the world is like.

Is metaphysics like physics, but cooler? Or is it a relic of an outdated, pre-empirical way of thinking about the world? Closer to the former than the latter. Rather than building specific quantitative theories about the world, metaphysics aims to get a handle on the basic logical structures that help us think about it. I talk with philosopher Katie Elliott on how metaphysics helps us think about questions like counterfactuals, possible worlds, time travel, mathematical equivalence, and whether everything happens for a reason.

Blog post with transcript: https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2023/07/24/244-katie-elliott-on-metaphysics-chance-and-time/

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Katrina (Katie) Elliott received her Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. After being an assistant professor of philosophy at UCLA, she is now on the faculty at Brandeis. Her research covers topics in metaphysics and the philosophy of science, including explanation, chances, and the logic of time travel.

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