Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: This paper aims at an integrated account of truth, probability and acceptance conditions of counterfactuals. The basic idea is that truth conditions are an abstract semantic device: they are not directly tested against semantic judgments, but determine the probability of a sentence, and via probabilistic acceptance conditions, they generate predictions of semantic judgments. The proposed account has two notable features: first, the probability of counterfactuals can be understood in a purely subjective sense, without reference to objective chance, and second, Lewis-style truth conditions for counterfactuals that quantify over multiple scenarios can be interpreted as describing their acceptance conditions.
Source: Synthese
Author: Jan Sprenger
Institution: University of Turin
Language: English
Subfield: Language and Linguistics
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $3,190
Funder: Università degli Studi di Torino
OpenAlex ID: W7154451262