"Strong" and "Global" Supervenience Revisited

Abstract

THIS PAPER CORRECTS AN ERROR IN MY EARLIER PAPER,"CONCEPTS OF SUPERVENIENCE" ("PHILOSOPHY ANDPHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH", VOLUME 45, 1984), AND PRESENTSFURTHER MATERIAL ON SUPERVENIENCE. THE ERROR IS THE CLAIMTHAT "GLOBAL" SUPERVENIENCE ENTAILS "STRONG" SUPERVENIENCE.HOWEVER, IT IS ARGUED THAT THIS FAILURE OF ENTAILMENT ONLYGOES TO SHOW THE INADEQUACY OF GLOBAL SUPERVENIENCE AS ANEXPLICATION OF "DEPENDENCY" OR "DETERMINATION" RELATION,AND, IN PARTICULAR, THAT MATERIALISM FORMULATED IN TERMS OFGLOBAL SUPERVENIENCE APPEARS TOO WEAK. (IT IS POINTED OUT,AMONG OTHER THINGS, THAT GLOBAL SUPERVENIENCE DOES NOTENTAIL "WEAK" SUPERVENIENCE). A STRONGER FORM OF GLOBALSUPERVENIENCE, BASED ON "SIMILARITY" RATHER THAN"INDISCERNIBILITY" BETWEEN WORLDS, IS FORMULATED ANDBRIEFLY DISCUSSED.