Gabriel Uzquiano is a Professor at University of Southern California.
Abstract: Modal paradoxes by Russell, Kaplan, and others seem to suggest that there are difficult issues raised by the interplay between propositions and modality. Russell and Kaplan suggested ramification as a response to these problems. A ramified theory of propositions classifies propositions into orders. Very roughly, propositions of order 0 can only quantify over non-propositions; propositional quantifiers can only range over propositions of a given order; and the order of a proposition is higher than the order of the propositions over which it quantifies. Many philosophers seem to view the retreat to a ramified theory of propositions as overkill, and they hope to make do with less radical measures. In the talk, I will present a problem, which seems immune to ramification. Even if a ramified theory of propositions can preempt different versions of Russell and Kaplan's modal paradoxes, more radical measures will be needed in order to deal with the problem at hand.
