Modal Fictionalism
Updated 2026-09-10
INTRODUCTION
English translation pending.
CORE DEFINITION
Fictionalism treats statements in some domain as in a sense like fictional statements: not accepted literally, yet still regarded as serving a useful function. Modal fictionalism is usually not fictionalism about statements of necessity and possibility, but rather a fictionalist attitude toward statements about possible worlds, so that modal claims are paraphrased as claims about what a certain story says.
SCAFFOLDING EFFECT
Reduce cognitive load
- Keep the inferential tools: go on using possible worlds for modal reasoning without endorsing their reality. - Cut ontological cost: trade a storytelling stance for the same explanatory power while paying less in existential commitment. - Check paraphrase fidelity: verify that the fictionalist translation preserves the inferences it is meant to preserve.
Anchor fast decisions
A story about possible worlds is invoked: according to that story, a proposition is possible if and only if it is true in some possible world. We need not commit to possible worlds actually existing; we only need the fiction to preserve the original functions of modal reasoning, trading a smaller ontological bill for the same explanatory power.
MINIMUM ACTION
In progress 0/1Practice this model in one real situation:
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Source support: Explicit
- plato.stanford.eduhttps://plato.stanford.edu/entries/fictionalism-modal/verified
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