Giacomo Andreoletti

Title

Branching time and the specter of fatalism

Abstract

Branching time is one of the most popular ways to resist classical fatalistic arguments. In branching time, the future is open insofar as it consists of alternative future possibilites that are all ontologically on a par. The peculiar ontology of branching time allows one to rebut fatalistic arguments to the conclusion that everything that will happen is already inevitable. However, in this paper I show that the specter of fatalism still haunts branching time, at least with respect to some aspects of the future. That is, I show how a form of fatalistic argument applies to branching time with respect to what is possible and what is not.

Date / Time / Place

June 21st / 10:45 / Aula 0A