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Article

Counterfactuals and Abduction

Authors
  • Samuel Cumming orcid logo (University of California, Los Angeles)
  • Lauren Winans (University of California, Los Angeles)

Abstract

We argue that counterfactuals and indicative conditionals are not so different. Certain notorious differences previously observed between pairs of indicative and counterfactual sentences are actually due to the presence of an anti-abductive modal auxiliary (would) in the consequent of the counterfactual. But such auxiliaries, of which will is another example, span the counterfactual-indicative divide.

How to Cite:

Cumming, S. & Winans, L., (2021) “Counterfactuals and Abduction”, Ergo 8: 12. doi: https://doi.org/10.3998/ergo.1149

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Published on
13 Dec 2021
Peer Reviewed
License
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0