Table of Contents

• Preface
• Introduction
• 1. Groundwork
  • 1.1 Reality
    • 1.1.1 Reality Precludes
    • 1.1.2 Reality Permits
    • 1.1.3 Reality Grounds
  • 1.2 Modal Status
    • 1.2.1 Possibility
    • 1.2.2 Impossibility
    • 1.2.3 Necessity
    • 1.2.4 Contingency
    • 1.2.5 Actuality
    • 1.2.6 Statuses Together
  • 1.3 Change
  • 1.4 Three Conditions
    • 1.4.1 Time
    • 1.4.2 Space
    • 1.4.3 Substance
    • 1.4.4 Triconditional Structure
  • 1.5 Existence
    • 1.5.1 Existence and Instantiation
    • 1.5.2 Constitution
    • 1.5.3 Inference
    • 1.5.4 Supervenience
    • 1.5.5 Ground and Dependence
    • 1.5.6 Causation
    • 1.5.7 Medium of Transmission
    • 1.5.8 Persistence
    • 1.5.9 What the Operators Require
• 2. The Argument
  • 2.1 The S5 Pipeline
    • 2.1.1 Modal Bivalence
    • 2.1.2 Bilateral Frame
    • 2.1.3 Modal Constitution
    • 2.1.4 Modal Stability
    • 2.1.5 The S5 Bottleneck
    • 2.1.6 The Transition Closure
    • 2.1.7 Two Readings
    • 2.1.8 Candidate-Ground Convergence
    • 2.1.9 What Necessity Transfer Needs
    • 2.1.10 Necessary Possibility
  • 2.2 Cartesian Certainty
    • 2.2.1 Change Is Actual
    • 2.2.2 Actuality’s Reach
    • 2.2.3 Witness’s Reach
  • 2.3 Necessary Possibility of Change
  • 2.4 Structural Requirement
    • 2.4.1 Constituting Modal Structure
    • 2.4.2 Structural Gap
    • 2.4.3 Demand Instantiation
    • 2.4.4 Something Must Be
    • 2.4.5 Forward Conditional
    • 2.4.6 Succession Requires Temporality
    • 2.4.7 Distinction Requires Spatiality
    • 2.4.8 Exchange Requires Physicality
    • 2.4.9 Forward Conditional Necessity
    • 2.4.10 Sufficiency of Structure
    • 2.4.11 The Frozen-World Test
    • 2.4.12 The Masking Test
  • 2.5 Triconditional Necessity
  • 2.6 Triconditionality of Nature
    • 2.6.1 Three Conditions, One Nature
    • 2.6.2 Succession’s Two Conditions
    • 2.6.3 Extension’s Two Conditions
    • 2.6.4 Persistence’s Two Conditions
    • 2.6.5 Mutual Containment
    • 2.6.6 Modal Identity
    • 2.6.7 Triconditional Cross-Entailment
    • 2.6.8 Ontological Identity
    • 2.6.9 Triunity of Nature
    • 2.6.10 Triconditional Identity
    • 2.6.11 No Fourth Condition
    • 2.6.12 Necessity’s Nature
  • 2.7 Nothing to Consider
    • 2.7.1 Null State (∅)
    • 2.7.2 Incoherence of ∅
    • 2.7.3 PSR Regress
    • 2.7.4 Preclusion Boundary
  • 2.8 The Whole Line
    • 2.8.1 Laws as Constitutive
    • 2.8.2 Nature Cannot Be Denied
    • 2.8.3 Not Physicalism
    • 2.8.4 Necessity Precedes Contingency
    • 2.8.5 Necessity of Nature
    • 2.8.6 Exclusivity of Nature
  • 2.9 Precedent Convergence
    • 2.9.1 Priority Monism
    • 2.9.2 Modal Limits
    • 2.9.3 Total-Theory Comparison
    • 2.9.4 Contemporary Necessitarianism
    • 2.9.5 Three Formal Logics
  • 2.10 Three Logical Strata
    • 2.10.1 Three Distinct Logics
    • 2.10.2 The Stratified Architecture
    • 2.10.3 The Metalogical Position
• 3. Convergence
  • 3.1 Necessary Possibility of Change
    • 3.1.1 The Changeless-Ground Dilemma
    • 3.1.2 The Unswitchable Capacity
    • 3.1.3 The Performative Witness
  • 3.2 Triconditional Necessity: Positive Account
    • 3.2.1 Something Is the Case
    • 3.2.2 No Bare Possibilities
    • 3.2.3 Structured Content
    • 3.2.4 All the Way Down
    • 3.2.5 Shape of Possibility
    • 3.2.6 The Null-State Reductio
  • 3.3 Triconditional Necessity: Negative Account
    • 3.3.1 Denial Runs on Nature
    • 3.3.2 The Negation Trap
    • 3.3.3 Against Fictionalism
    • 3.3.4 The Conceivability Trap
    • 3.3.5 Not Even the Impossible
    • 3.3.6 Uneven Overdetermination
  • 3.4 Reality and Nature Are One
    • 3.4.1 No Outside
    • 3.4.2 One Role, One Filler
    • 3.4.3 No Residue
    • 3.4.4 Nothing Additional
    • 3.4.5 Downstream of the Seal
  • 3.5 What the Convergence Shows
    • 3.5.1 Overdetermining the Spine
    • 3.5.2 Robustness
    • 3.5.3 Open Seam
    • 3.5.4 S5 Lives Upstream
    • 3.5.5 The S5 Bottleneck Reductio
  • Concluding Remarks
• 4. Metaphysical Rivals
  • 4.1 Modal and Semantic Foundations
    • 4.1.1 Rigid Designation
    • 4.1.2 Two-Dimensional Semantics
    • 4.1.3 Principle of Sufficient Reason
    • 4.1.4 Humean Contingency
    • 4.1.5 Information-Theoretic Foundationalism
    • 4.1.6 Quinean Modal Skepticism
    • 4.1.7 Modal Conventionalism
    • 4.1.8 Metaontological Deflationism
    • 4.1.9 Wittgensteinian Quietism
    • 4.1.10 The Source of Possibility
    • 4.1.11 Pizzi’s Impossibility of Nothingness
    • 4.1.12 Dispositionalism about Modality
    • 4.1.13 Modal Epistemology and the Remoteness Objection
    • 4.1.14 Impossible Worlds and Relative Modality
  • 4.2 Time, Change, and the Changeless
    • 4.2.1 The Changeless Ground
    • 4.2.2 Shoemaker’s Time Without Change
    • 4.2.3 Emergent Time
    • 4.2.4 Platonism
    • 4.2.5 The Unreality of Time
    • 4.2.6 Block Universe
    • 4.2.7 The Problem of Temporary Intrinsics
    • 4.2.8 Stage Theory
    • 4.2.9 Existential Inertia
  • 4.3 Physics and Mind
    • 4.3.1 The Hard Problem of Consciousness
    • 4.3.2 Eliminativism and Illusionism
    • 4.3.3 Russellian Monism
    • 4.3.4 Cosmopsychism
    • 4.3.5 Idealism
    • 4.3.6 The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics
    • 4.3.7 Mathematical Universe Hypothesis
    • 4.3.8 Non-Locality, Branching, and the Particle Concept
    • 4.3.9 Structural Realism
    • 4.3.10 Bundle and Trope Theory
    • 4.3.11 Mereological Nihilism
    • 4.3.12 Haecceitism
  • 4.4 Modal Variants and Extensions
    • 4.4.1 Modal Realism
    • 4.4.2 Linguistic Ersatzism
    • 4.4.3 Combinatorialism
    • 4.4.4 Modal Fictionalism
    • 4.4.5 Modal Expressivism
    • 4.4.6 Necessitism
    • 4.4.7 Sider’s Structuralism
    • 4.4.8 Whiteheadian Process Metaphysics
    • 4.4.9 Modal Collapse Objection
    • 4.4.10 Gasking’s Parody of the Ontological Argument
    • 4.4.11 Chisholm’s Paradox and the Chained-Origin Counterexamples
  • 4.5 What the Rivals Carried
• 5. Rival Ultimates
  • 5.1 Theistic Arguments for a Divine Ground
    • 5.1.1 Rasmussen’s Foundation Argument
    • 5.1.2 Cosmological Argument
    • 5.1.3 Simultaneous Causation
    • 5.1.4 Argument from Simplicity
    • 5.1.5 Fine-Tuning Argument
    • 5.1.6 Intelligent Design
    • 5.1.7 Modal Ontological Argument
    • 5.1.8 Modal-Grounding Argument
    • 5.1.9 Transcendental Argument
    • 5.1.10 Moral Argument
    • 5.1.11 Pascal’s Wager
  • 5.2 Doctrines of the Divine Nature
    • 5.2.1 Divine Simplicity
    • 5.2.2 Via Negativa
  • 5.3 Non-Classical Ultimates
    • 5.3.1 Spinozist Pantheism
    • 5.3.2 Neoplatonism
    • 5.3.3 Process Theology
    • 5.3.4 Madhyamaka Emptiness
  • 5.4 What the Rival Ultimates Carried
• 6. Relocating Greatness
  • 6.1 Greatness
  • 6.2 Constitution
    • 6.2.1 Simplicity
    • 6.2.2 Unity
    • 6.2.3 Infinity
    • 6.2.4 Perfection
  • 6.3 Aseity and Modal Standing
    • 6.3.1 Necessity
    • 6.3.2 Eternity
    • 6.3.3 Immutability
    • 6.3.4 Impassibility
  • 6.4 Cognition
    • 6.4.1 Awareness
    • 6.4.2 Knowledge
  • 6.5 Intrinsic Value
    • 6.5.1 Holiness
    • 6.5.2 Beatitude
  • 6.6 Life
  • 6.7 Agency
    • 6.7.1 Power
    • 6.7.2 Causality
    • 6.7.3 Interaction
    • 6.7.4 Sovereignty
  • 6.8 Reach and Contact
    • 6.8.1 Presence
    • 6.8.2 Relatability
    • 6.8.3 Describability
    • 6.8.4 Revelation
  • 6.9 Moral Act
    • 6.9.1 Benevolence
    • 6.9.2 Righteousness
  • 6.10 No Exit
• 7. Nature Alone
  • 7.1 Convergence of Method
  • 7.2 Time
  • 7.3 Space
  • 7.4 Substance
  • 7.5 Binding of the Conditions
  • 7.6 Singularity
  • 7.7 Cosmic History
  • 7.8 Life
  • 7.9 Synthesis
• 8. Expanding the Field
  • 8.1 Drive
  • 8.2 Feeling
  • 8.3 Knowledge
  • 8.4 Reasoning
  • 8.5 Identity
  • 8.6 Sexuality
  • 8.7 Mortality
  • 8.8 Meaning
  • 8.9 Will
  • 8.10 Language
  • 8.11 Technology
  • 8.12 Morality
  • 8.13 Art
  • 8.14 Spirituality
  • 8.15 Synthesis
• 9. Maximum Possibility
  • 9.1 Rights
  • 9.2 Belonging
  • 9.3 Representation
  • 9.4 Information
  • 9.5 Environment
  • 9.6 Agriculture
  • 9.7 Economy
  • 9.8 Housing
  • 9.9 Education
  • 9.10 Healthcare
  • 9.11 Defense
  • 9.12 Enforcement
  • 9.13 Justice
  • 9.14 Convergence
  • 9.15 Installation
• Conclusion
• Excursus
  • E.1 Evil and Theodicy
    • E.1.1 Greatest Good
    • E.1.2 Skeptical Theism
    • E.1.3 Teleological Evil
    • E.1.4 Free-Will Defense
    • E.1.5 Soul-Making Theodicy
    • E.1.6 Defeat of Horrendous Evil
    • E.1.7 Authorship of Natural Evil
    • E.1.8 Evil-God Challenge
    • E.1.9 Divinely Legislated Evil
  • E.2 Sin and Salvation
    • E.2.1 The Fall
    • E.2.2 Original Sin
    • E.2.3 Inherited Guilt
    • E.2.4 Atonement
  • E.3 Divine Governance and Character
    • E.3.1 Divine Hiddenness
    • E.3.2 Divine Punishment
    • E.3.3 Divine Command Theory
    • E.3.4 Moral Gap
    • E.3.5 Providence, Foreknowledge, and Predestination
  • E.4 Practice and Epistemics
    • E.4.1 Petitionary Prayer
    • E.4.2 Scripture and Prophecy
    • E.4.3 Miracles
  • E.5 Christology and Eschatology
    • E.5.1 Eternal Life
    • E.5.2 The Incarnation
    • E.5.3 The Resurrection
    • E.5.4 Final Judgment
  • E.6 Collapse and Closing Arguments
    • E.6.1 No Greater Sacrifice
• Coda
  • What God Could the Evidence Allow?
• Appendices
  • Appendix A: Modal Logic Primer
  • Appendix B: Summary of the Formal Proof
  • Appendix C: Derivation Map
  • Appendix D: Empirical Predictions
• Author’s Notes
  • On Composition
  • On Publication
  • Acknowledgments
• Symbols
• Glossary
• Bibliography
• Index