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Full Idea
Critics say there are no irreducible a posteriori truths. They can be factored into a part that is necessary, but knowable a priori through conceptual analysis, and a part knowable only a posteriori, but contingent. 2-D semantics makes this precise.
Gist of Idea
Critics say there are just an a priori necessary part, and an a posteriori contingent part
Source
Robert C. Stalnaker (Conceptual truth and metaphysical necessity [2003], 1)
Book Ref
Stalnaker,Robert C.: 'Ways a World Might Be' [OUP 2003], p.202
A Reaction
[Critics are Sidelle, Jackson and Chalmers] Interesting. If gold is necessarily atomic number 79, or it wouldn't be gold, that sounds like an analytic truth about gold. Discovering the 79 wasn't a discovery of a necessity. Stalnaker rejects this idea.
| 16423 | Conceptual possibilities are metaphysical possibilities we can conceive of [Stalnaker] |
| 16422 | The necessity of a proposition concerns reality, not our words or concepts [Stalnaker] |
| 16421 | Critics say there are just an a priori necessary part, and an a posteriori contingent part [Stalnaker] |
| 16429 | A 'centred' world is an ordered triple of world, individual and time [Stalnaker] |
| 16428 | Meanings aren't in the head, but that is because they are abstract [Stalnaker] |
| 16430 | Two-D says that a posteriori is primary and contingent, and the necessity is the secondary intension [Stalnaker] |
| 16431 | In one view, the secondary intension is metasemantic, about how the thinker relates to the content [Stalnaker] |
| 16432 | One view says the causal story is built into the description that is the name's content [Stalnaker] |