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I develop a novel semantic theory for modals that has important consequences for contemporary work in epistemology, metaphysics and ethics. My theory replaces the dominant view about semantics—that our best theory of meaning should ascribe truth-conditions to modalized sentences—with a non-truth-conditional yet fully compositional semantics for modals. Its contributions to current debates in analytic philosophy include an explanation of the possibility of modal disagreement that avoids relativism, a solution to the paradoxes about conditional obligations (including the gentle murder paradox), and new impulses for a generalized solution to the Frege-Geach problem for noncognitivism.
| Advisor: | Asher, Nicholas M., Dever, Joshua |
| Commitee: | |
| School: | The University of Texas at Austin |
| School Location: | United States -- Texas |
| Source: | DAI-A 73/02, Dissertation Abstracts International |
| Source Type: | DISSERTATION |
| Subjects: | Philosophy |
| Keywords: | Conditionals, Deontic modals, Dynamic semantics, Epistemic modals |
| Publication Number: | 3484425 |
| ISBN: | 9781267002235 |
