Prospects for a theory of decycling (Q2656214)

The solutions presented in the author's [``Grounding, explanation, and the limit of internality'', Philos. Review 124, No. 4, 481--532 (2015; \url{doi:10.1215/00318108-3147011})] and \textit{K. Fine} [Notre Dame J. Formal Logic 51, 97--118 (2010; Zbl 1256.03034)] to a range of puzzles about what grounds what belong to the family of what the author refers to as ``decycling'' solutions. Puzzles of a self-referential nature, one of which is called (S1) in this paper and is used as a test case, ``present more serious challenges to such decycling solutions than has previously been realized. The goal of this paper is to examine to what extent these challenges can be met.'' First, a number of general constraints that any reasonable decycling solution has to meet are identified. Any solution that meets all the constraints agrees on the treatment of (S1). However, the existing decycling solutions in [loc. cit.] fail to meet some of those constraints. On the other hand, the author constructs a solution that meets all those constraints and shows that that particular solution is not only not unique, but that there are uncountably many distinct solutions that meet the constraints. This ``can be interpreted to mean that the notion of ground is indeterminate.''