Retroactive Continuity and Fictional Facts

British Journal of Aesthetics 64 (4):669-686 (2024)
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Abstract

This paper deals with the phenomenon of retroactive continuity, or retcon for short, in which the truth-value of a proposition in an established fictional work is changed later. The primary aim of this paper is to provide the most compelling explanation for retroactive continuity. I first defend the metaphysical view about fiction, according to which when retconning occurs, a fictional work changes its property of containing a proposition while preserving its identity. I then argue that this view is theoretically preferable to all other competing approaches.

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Jeonggyu Lee
Sungkyunkwan University

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References found in this work

Naming and Necessity.Saul Kripke - 1980 - Philosophy 56 (217):431-433.
Naming and Necessity.Saul Kripke - 1980 - Critica 17 (49):69-71.
Truth in fiction.David K. Lewis - 1978 - American Philosophical Quarterly 15 (1):37–46.
Nonexistence.Nathan Salmon - 1998 - Noûs 32 (3):277-319.
The Puzzle of Imaginative Resistance.Tamar Gendler - 2000 - Journal of Philosophy 97 (2):55.

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