Worlds, Books, and Essential Properties

In The Nature of Necessity. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press (1974)
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Abstract

I begin by introducing the ideas of possible worlds, books on worlds, and essential properties. A possible world is a broadly logically possible state of affairs that is maximal. Furthermore, for any possible world W and proposition p, let the book on W be the set S of propositions such that p is a member of S if W entails p. Finally, an object x has property P essentially if and only if x has P and has it in every world in which x exists. I use the above three concepts to give a sound argument for the conclusion that human persons are essentially immaterial.

Other Versions

reprint Plantinga, Alvin (1978) "IV Worlds, Books, and Essential Properties". In Plantinga, Alvin, The Nature of Necessity, pp. 44-69: Clarendon Press (1978)

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Alvin Plantinga
University of Notre Dame

Citations of this work

Limits on god, freedom for humans.Nathan Huffine - 2025 - International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 98 (1):187-207.
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