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This paper grew out of a talk entitled ‘Parallel Worlds and the Principle of Plenitude’ given at various times at University of Wisconsin; University of Chicago; Calgary University; U.C.L.A. and U.C. Berkeley, in which I presented, and then criticized a position much like that of David Lewis. That paper, more than this, exhibited my ambivalence to a many-worlds view of reality which I find aesthetically attractive but, in the final analysis, philosophically indefensible. Thanks for helpful comments are due to the audiences at each of these talks and also to Jim de Jong; Terry Parsons; Bas van Fraassen; David Kaplan; David Lewis; Arthur Fine; Neal Grossman; Abner Shimony; Paul Teller; Ernest Adams; Phil Quinn; Gail Stein; Nancy Cartwright and Leslie Tharp (none of whom are to be taken as ensorsing the following). This paper is not an attack on modal logic. This paper is not an attack on the Everett-Wheeler interpretation of quantum mechanics.
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Skyrms, B. Possible worlds, physics and metaphysics. Philosophical Studies 30, 323–332 (1976). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00357930
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00357930