Vol. 20 No. 3 · 5 February 1998
pages 22-25 | 4852 words
Why anything? Why this?
Derek Parfit concludes his essay on the Universe
In the first half of this essay, I suggested how reality’s deepest features might be partly explained. Of the countless cosmic possibilities, or ways that reality might be, a few have very special features. If such a possibility obtained, that might be no coincidence. Reality might be this way because this way had this feature. Thus, if nothing had ever existed, that might have been true because it was the simplest way for reality to be. And if reality is maximal, because all possible local worlds exist, this may be true because it is the fullest way for reality to be. The highest law may be that being possible, and part of the fullest way reality might be, is sufficient for being actual.
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[*] Of several discussions of these questions, I owe most to John Leslie’s Value and Existence (1979), and to Robert Nozick’s Philosophical Explanations (1981); then to Richard Swinburne’s The Existence of God (1979), John Mackie’s The Miracle of Theism (1982), Peter Unger’s article in Mid-West Studies in Philosophy, Volume 9 (1989), and some unpublished work by Stephen Grover.
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Letters
Vol. 20 No. 8 · 16 April 1998
From Haim Gaifman
Derek Parfit’s tour de force (LRB, 22 January and 5 February) raises basic philosophical problems about the role that explanations can legitimately play. Parfit assumes that the notion of an explanation is sufficiently clear and uniform, that philosophical analysis will show when an explanation is needed and how to evaluate different candidates, and that the criteria apply across the board: from everyday facts to scientific conjectures of varying generality. This however is doubtful. ‘Explanation’ is an umbrella term covering an assortment of loosely related notions (explanations in physics, mathematical explanations, elucidations, clarifications, what have you). There is a danger of philosophical illusion in treating them as species of one generic concept.
Let me substantiate this by a particular objection to Parfit’s arguments. Parfit distinguishes those extremely unlikely events that do not require explanation from those that do. His example: a thousand people, I among them, face death. Only one person can be rescued and that person will be chosen by lottery. If I win (with odds 1 in 1000) and my life is saved, the fact requires no explanation. ‘Someone had to win, and why not me?’ In the second scenario I am sentenced to death, but the sentence will be remitted if the gaoler draws the longest straw out of a thousand. The longest straw is drawn and my life is saved. This, Parfit argues, is something special that requires an explanation. Appealing to coincidence won’t do. We will be right to conclude that it is much more likely that the draw was rigged. Sounds convincing. But is it? And how far can this line of thought be pushed?
Imagine a third scenario. As in the first, there are a thousand doomed people, one of whom, chosen by lottery, will survive. If I happen to win, no explanation is required. But let the lottery be implemented as follows. Going over the alphabetical list of the thousand people, an official draws, against each name, a straw from an initial bundle of a thousand straws. The winner is the person against whose name the long straw (1 in 1000) is drawn. Once this happens, the draws are discontinued. I am the first on the list and the first try succeeds. Exactly as in the second scenario, I am saved by a single draw of the longest straw out of a thousand, with no other draws taking place. The intention, to be sure, was to carry on in the event of failure. Why should this intention matter? Say I had lost, and the lottery continued. Again, why should this counterfactual reasoning make a difference? Counterfactuals are usually invoked in causal explanations: ‘Had John not slammed on the brakes, the car would not have swerved,’ showing that the slamming was the cause of the swerving. But in our case causality works in the other direction: from my winning to the termination of the lottery. It does not explain my winning. And it is not clear why it should obviate the need for explanation. And if there is no need here, why should there be one in Parfit’s second scenario?
Haim Gaifman
Columbia University, New York
