Conversation and Conditionals

I outline and motivate a way of implementing a closest world theory of indicatives, appealing to Stalnaker’s framework of open conversational possibilities. Stalnakerian conversational dynamics helps us resolve two outstanding puzzles for a such a theory of indicative conditionals. The first puzzle—concerning so-called ‘reverse Sobel sequences’—can be resolved by conversation dynamics in a theory-neutral way: the explanation works as much for Lewisian counterfactuals as for the account of indicatives developed here. Resolving the second puzzle, by contrast, relies on the interplay between the particular theory of indicative conditionals developed here and Stalnakerian dynamics. The upshot is an attractive resolution of the so-called “Gibbard phenomenon” for indicative conditionals. Stalnakerian conversational dynamics can help us resolve two outstanding puzzles for a “closest-world” modal theory of indicative conditionals. I begin the paper by outlining and motivating a new way of implementing a closest world theory of indicatives, appealing to Stalnaker’s framework of open conversational possibilities. Stalnaker’s framework itself shows its utility in application to conditionals by allowing us to explain a puzzling feature of conditionals—concerning so-called ‘reverse Sobel sequences’—in a theory-neutral way. The explanation has application to any “closest worlds” account of indicative or counterfactual conditionals, as well as to other truth-conditional accounts of conditionals. My favoured closest world theory of indicative conditionals, when combined with Stalnakerian dynamics, gives an attractive resolution of the so-called “Gibbard phenomenon” for indicative conditionals.