Skip to main content

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

A More Plausible Collapsing Principle

Andersson, Henrik LU and Herlitz, Anders (2018) In Theoria (Sweden) 84(4). p.325-336
Abstract

In 1997 John Broome presented the Collapsing Argument that was meant to establish that non-conventional comparative relations (e.g., “parity,” “imprecise equality,” “incommensurability”) cannot exist. Broome's argument has faced a lot of scrutiny and a certain type of counterexample has been used to undermine it. Most of the counterexamples focus on the Collapsing Principle which plays a central role in Broome's argument. In this article we will take a closer look at the most common type of counterexample and propose how to adjust the Collapsing Principle in order to avoid objections based on these counterexamples. We argue that a weaker version of the Collapsing Principle is not susceptible to the classical counterexamples.... (More)

In 1997 John Broome presented the Collapsing Argument that was meant to establish that non-conventional comparative relations (e.g., “parity,” “imprecise equality,” “incommensurability”) cannot exist. Broome's argument has faced a lot of scrutiny and a certain type of counterexample has been used to undermine it. Most of the counterexamples focus on the Collapsing Principle which plays a central role in Broome's argument. In this article we will take a closer look at the most common type of counterexample and propose how to adjust the Collapsing Principle in order to avoid objections based on these counterexamples. We argue that a weaker version of the Collapsing Principle is not susceptible to the classical counterexamples. Furthermore, after an explorative discussion about the intuitions behind the original principle, we show that this weaker formulation is at least as intuitive as the principle suggested by Broome.

(Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
collapsing principle, comparability, comparisons, incommensurability, incomparability, parity, value relations
in
Theoria (Sweden)
volume
84
issue
4
pages
325 - 336
publisher
Thales
external identifiers
  • scopus:85052915595
ISSN
0040-5825
DOI
10.1111/theo.12166
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
bfa2661a-cbed-4bd6-92ef-f65f3eea2388
date added to LUP
2018-10-26 08:43:50
date last changed
2022-04-25 18:30:54
@article{bfa2661a-cbed-4bd6-92ef-f65f3eea2388,
  abstract     = {{<p>In 1997 John Broome presented the Collapsing Argument that was meant to establish that non-conventional comparative relations (e.g., “parity,” “imprecise equality,” “incommensurability”) cannot exist. Broome's argument has faced a lot of scrutiny and a certain type of counterexample has been used to undermine it. Most of the counterexamples focus on the Collapsing Principle which plays a central role in Broome's argument. In this article we will take a closer look at the most common type of counterexample and propose how to adjust the Collapsing Principle in order to avoid objections based on these counterexamples. We argue that a weaker version of the Collapsing Principle is not susceptible to the classical counterexamples. Furthermore, after an explorative discussion about the intuitions behind the original principle, we show that this weaker formulation is at least as intuitive as the principle suggested by Broome.</p>}},
  author       = {{Andersson, Henrik and Herlitz, Anders}},
  issn         = {{0040-5825}},
  keywords     = {{collapsing principle; comparability; comparisons; incommensurability; incomparability; parity; value relations}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{09}},
  number       = {{4}},
  pages        = {{325--336}},
  publisher    = {{Thales}},
  series       = {{Theoria (Sweden)}},
  title        = {{A More Plausible Collapsing Principle}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/theo.12166}},
  doi          = {{10.1111/theo.12166}},
  volume       = {{84}},
  year         = {{2018}},
}