Abstract

For most of the recorded history of philosophy, it has been assumed that an adequate account of language and thought would require postulating abstracta of one sort or another. In this chapter, wielding the bright light of Lewisian metaphysics, the author draws into the open some less well‐known moments from the history of philosophy. Puzzlement over persistence goes back to the beginnings of philosophy, and gave rise to protracted debates between those who were skeptical about whether anything persists through change. It would be natural to suppose that, up until the time of Hume, philosophers generally and uncritically accepted the notion of causality in something like our modern sense. Though historical generalizations are always hazardous, it seems safe to say that no one before David Lewis attempted to account for modality in terms of real, concrete possible worlds.