Assistant Professor of Philosophy Russell Marcus presented his paper "The Explanatory Indispensability Argument" at the Eastern Division meeting of the American Philosophical Association in Boston on Dec. 30.
The paper argues that the new explanatory argument, because of its equivocation between two senses of ‘explanation,' either is unsound, or fails to extend the standard indispensability argument. The paper was on the main program and Professor Sarah Scott, of John Jay College, CUNY, was selected to respond. Professor Alan Baker of Swarthmore College, whose work is a central focus of Marcus' paper, was in attendance, and contributed to the fruitful discussion.
