This is a working draft of a bibliography of works relating to modal epistemology. Maybe I'll have time to annotate the thing at some point. Corrections and suggestions are welcome.
The expanded and up-to-date version of this now stored on my university web page.
Armstrong, D.M. A Combinatorial Theory of Possibility. Cambridge UP, 1989.
________. A World of States of Affairs. Cambridge UP, 1997.
Bailey, Andrew. The Unsoundness of Arguments From Conceivability. Ms. Online. 2005.
Barnes, Gordon. "Modal Inquiry: an Epistemological Study." Diss. Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison, 2000.
________. "Necessity and A Priority ." Philosophical Studies (2006).
Bealer, George. "Origins of Modal Error ." Dialectica 58:1 (2004).
________. "Modal Epistemology and the Rationalist Renaissance." Conceivability and Possibility. Ed. Tamar Gendler and John Hawthorne. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002. 71-125.
________. "A Theory of the A Priori ." Philosophical Perspectives 13 (1999) 29-55.
________."A Priori Knowledge and the Scope of Philosophy ." Philosophical Studies 81 (1996) 121-142.
Brendel, Elke. "Intuition Pumps and the Proper Use of Thought Experiments." Dialectica 58:1 (2004): 88-108.
Brueckner, Anthony. "Chalmers’s Conceivability Argument for Dualism." Analysis 61 (2001): 187-193.
Bueno, Otavio, and Scott Shalkowski. "A Plea for a Modal Realist Epistemology." Acta Analytica 15 (2000): 175-193.
Casullo, Albert. A Priori Justification. Oxford UP, 2003.
________. "Conceivability and Possibility." Ratio 17 (1975): 118-121.
________. "Knowledge and Modality." Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Ed. Donald .M. Borchert. 2nd ed. New York: Macmillan, 2005.
________. "Modal Epistemology: Fortune or Virtue?" Southern Journal of Philosophy (Spindel Supplement) 38 (2000).
________. "Reid and Mill on Hume’s Maxim of Conceivability." Analysis 39 (1979): 212-219.
Chalmers, David. "Does Conceivability Entail Possibility?" Conceivability and Possibility. Ed. Tamar Gendler and John Hawthorne. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002. 145-200.
Cohnitz, Daniel. "Modal Skepticism: Philosophical Thought Experiments and Modal Epistemology." The Vienna Circle and Logical Empiricism -- Vienna Circle Institute Yearbook 2002. Kluwer, 2003. 281-296.
Della Rocca, Michael. "Essentialism Vs. Essentialism." Conceivability and Possibility. Ed. Tamar Gendler and John Hawthorne. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002. 223-252.
Depaul, M.R., and W. Ramset, eds. Rethinking Intuition: the Psychology of Intuition and Its Role in Philosophical Inquiry. Rowman & Littlefield, 1998.
Fine, Kit. "Essence and Modality." Philosophical Perspectives 8 (1994): 1-16.
Geirsson, Heimir. "Conceivability and Defeasible Modal Justification." Philosophical Studies 122 (2005): 279-304.
Hagen, Jason. "Modal Epistemology: Conceivability and Consistency." Diss. Purdue Univ., 2006.
Hale, Bob. "Knowledge of Possibility and of Necessity." Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 103 (2003): 1-20.
Hawthorne, John. "Implicit Belief and a Priori Knowledge." Southern Journal of Philosophy (Spindel Supplement) 38 (2000).
Henderson, David, and Terry Horgan. "What is a Priori, and What is It Good for?" Southern Journal of Philosophy (Spindel Supplement) 38 (2000).
Hill, Christopher. "Chalmers on the a Priority of Modal Knowledge." Analysis 58 (1998): 20-26.
________. "Imaginability, Conceivability, Possibility, and the Mind-Body Problem." Philosophical Studies 87 (1997): 61-85.
________. "Modality, Modal Epistemology, and the Metaphysics of Consciousness." The Architecture of the Imagination: New Essays on Pretense, Possibility, and Fiction. Ed. Shaun Nichols. Oxford: Oxford UP.
Jackson, Frank. From Metaphysics to Ethics: a Defense of Conceptual Analysis. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1998.
Kripke, Saul. Naming and Necessity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard UP, 1980.
Kung, Peter. Imaginability as a Guide to Possibility. Ms. Online. 2005.
________. "Imagination and Modal Epistemology." Diss. New York Univ., 2002.
________. Imagination and Modal Error. Ms. Online. 2003.
Lewis, David. On the Plurality of Worlds. Blackwell, 2000.
Loux, Michael. The Possible and the Actual: Readings in the Metaphysics of Modality. Cornell UP, 1979.
Manfredi, Pat. "The Compatibility of a Priori Knowledge and Empirical Defeasibility: a Defense of a Modest a Priori." Southern Journal of Philosophy (Spindel Supplement) 38 (2000).
Marcus, Ruth Barcan. Modalities: Philosophical Essays. New York: Oxford UP, 1993.
________. "Some Revisionary Proposals about Belief and Believing." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 50 (1990):133-153.
________. "Rationality and Believing the Impossible." Journal of Philosophy 80:6 (1983): 321-338.
________. "A Proposed Solution to a Puzzle About Belief." Midwest Studies in Philosophy 6 (1981): 501-10.
Markie, Peter. "Modest a Priori Knowledge and Justification." Southern Journal of Philosophy (Spindel Supplement) 38 (2000).
McLeod, Stephen. "Recent Work on Modal Epistemology." Philosophical Books 46 (2005): 235-245.
Miscevic, Nenad. "Intuition as a Second Window." Southern Journal of Philosophy (Spindel Supplement) 38 (2000).
Murphy, Peter. "Reliability Connections Between Conceivability and Inconceivability." Dialectica 60 (2006): 195-205
Peacocke, Christopher. Being Known. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999.
________. "Metaphysical Necessity: Understanding, Truth and Epistemology." Mind 106 (1997): 521-574.
________. "Principles for Possibilia." Nous 36 (2002): 486-508.
________. "The Past, Necessity, Externalism and Entitlement." Philosophical Books 42 (2001): 106-117.
________. "The Principle-Based Account of Modality: Elucidations and Resources." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 64 (2002): 663-679.
Plantinga, Alvin. Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality. Ed. Matthew Davidson. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003.
Prust, Joel. "On Explaining Knowledge of Necessity." Dialectica 58:1 (2004): 71-87.
Roca, Sonia. The (a)(B)(C) of Modal Epistemology: a Further Attempt to Meet the Epistemic Challenge. Ms. Online. 2006.
Shalkowski, Scott. "Modal Realism and Modal Epistemology: a Huge Gap." Modal Epistemology. Ed. Erik Weber and Tim De Mey. Brussels: Royal Flemmish Academy of Belgium.
Sidelle, Alan. Necessity, Essence, and Individuation. Cornell UP, 1989.
Sorensen, Roy. "Art of the Impossible." Conceivability and Possibility. Ed. John Hawthorne and Tamar Gendler. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002.
Sosa, Ernest. "Abilities, Concepts, and Externalism." Mental Causation. Ed. John Heil and Alfred Mele. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1993. 309-329.
________. "It's About Reality, Not Language." Rev. of From Metaphysics to Ethics: a Defense of Conceptual Analysis, by Frank Jackson. Times Literary Supplement 16 July 1999.
________. "Modal and Other a Priori Epistemology: How Can We Know What is Possible and What Impossible?" Southern Journal of Philosophy (Spindel Supplement) (2000).
________. "Reliability and the a Priori." Conceivability and Possibility. Ed. John Hawthorne and Tamar Gendler. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002. 369-385.
Stalnaker, Robert. Ways a World Might Be: Metaphysical and Anti-Metaphysical Essays. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003.
Tidman, Paul. "Conceivability as a Test for Possibility." American Philosophical Quarterly 31 (1994): 297-309.
________. "Conceivability." The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. Ed. Robert Audi. Cambridge UP., 1995.
________. "Logic and Modal Intuitions." The Monist 77 (1994): 389-398.
________. "The Epistemology of Evil Possibilities." Faith and Philosophy 10 (1993): 181-197.
________. "The Justification of a Priori Intuitions." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 56 (1996): 161-171.
Van Inwagen, Peter. "Modal Epistemology." Philosophical Studies 92 (1998): 67-84.
Williamson, Timothy. "Armchair Philosophy, Metaphysical Modality and Counterfactual Thinking." Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 105 (2005): 1-23.
________. "Conceptual Truth." The Aristotelian Society Supplement 80 (2006).
________. "Sosa on Abilities, Concepts and Externalism." Philosophers and Their Critics: Ernest Sosa. Ed. John Greco. Blackwell.
Yablo, Stephen. "Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda." Conceivability and Possibility. Ed. John Hawthorne and Tamar Gendler. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002.
________. "How in the World?" Philosophical Topics (1996).
________. "Is Conceivability a Good Guide to Possibility?" Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 53 (1993): 1-42.
Thanks for the biblio!
I just finished reading up on Plantinga's modal ontological argument.....very interesting stuff. He uses the S5 axiom to posit the necessary existence of God, based on the possibility of God's existence. While I personally don't think God's existence is very likely, if possible at all (its really up for debate I suppose), this argument is very intriguing in that it seems to provide a concrete argument for the rationality of religious belief.... Well, maybe deism at the least, the common Western theistic conception of God's attributes is too muddled, inconsistent and incoherent to really grant it as a real possibility.
Matt, this bibliography is extensive. I'm quite impressed.
I know that you included Van Inwagen's article, "Modal Epistemology," but there might be a few other resources published in his recent book _Ontology, Identity, and Modality_ that you might be interested in adding to your bibliography. For instance, there's a good article on Plantinga on Trans-world identity in it. I hope this helps.
Nice bibliography, Matt! Very comprehensive (although I would've expected the writings of Descartes in there, somehere!).
Absent from your bibliography:
"A Proposed Solution to a Puzzle About Belief" MIDWEST STUDIESIN PHILOSOPHY, ed, P.French et al, 1981
"Rationality and Believing the Impossible", JL OF PHILOSOPHY , LXXV, 6, 1983
"Some Revisionary Proposals About Belief and Believing", PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH, supplmentary volume 1990
"The Anti Naturalism of Some Languagre Centered
Accounts of Belief", dialectica, 1995
See my MODALITIES, 1993, OUP and MODALITY, MORALITY AND BELIEF, ed W.Sinnott Armstrong et al
1995 , for other relevant bibliography
Very useful bibliography, thank You!
Perhaps it were useful to include
John O'Leary-Hawthorne "The Epistemology of Possible Worlds: A Guided Tour", Philosophical Studies 84, 183-202, 1996.