Empty-Base Explanation

Yannic Kappes

Open Access Published by De Gruyter 2023

Empty-Base Explanation

Yannic Kappes

Volume 86 in the series Philosophical Analysis

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111069500

Overview
Contents

About this book

Open Access

This book develops and applies a novel kind of explanation: Empty-Base Explanation. While ordinary explanations have a tripartite structure involving an explanandum, a base of reasons why the explanandum obtains, and a link that connects the reasons to the explanandum, this book argues that there are explanations whose corresponding set of reasons is empty. This novel idea is located in the theoretical background of several fundamental philosophical issues. For example, it provides a convincing kind of ultimate or final explanation that completely and conclusively explains a phenomenon without involving other phenomena for which further explanations could be demanded.

The possibility and fruitfulness of empty-base explanation is defended by general considerations from the theory of explanation, as well as concrete applications to

the practice of explanation by status,

the explanation of logical theorems, causal connections, and laws of nature,

self-explanation,

the use of IBE in metaphysics,

the notion of zero-ground (which it provides with a solid theoretical footing), and

ultimate explanation and its application to philosophical cosmology, the debate about the PSR, and the question of why there is anything at all.

For this book, Yannic Kappes has received the 2022 De Gruyter Prize for Ontology and Metaphysics from the German Society for Analytic Philosophy (GAP).

Author / Editor information

Yannic Kappes, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	I
Acknowledgements Publicly Available Download PDF	V
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	VII
Introduction Open Access Download PDF	1
1 Preliminaries Open Access Download PDF	10
2 Introducing Empty-Base Explanation Open Access Download PDF	36
3 Explanation by Status Open Access Download PDF	70
4 Explanation of Logical Theorems Open Access Download PDF	97
5 Causation Ex Nihilo: Could There Be Empty-Base Causal Explanations? Open Access Download PDF	125
6 Self-Explanation Open Access Download PDF	143
7 The Epistemology of Empty-Base Explanation Open Access Download PDF	161
Conclusion Open Access Download PDF	184
Bibliography Open Access Download PDF	187
Index Open Access Download PDF	193

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter
Audience: Researchers and advanced students interested in metaphysics, theory of explanation, and related areas
Pages
- Front matter: 10
- Main content: 195
Illustrations
- Tables: 5
Keywords: Explanation; Grounding; Fundamentality; Epistemology of metaphysics

eBook

Published: August 7, 2023
ISBN: 9783111069500

Hardcover

Published: August 7, 2023
ISBN: 9783111069241