Abstract
Our goal in this paper is to extend counterfactual accounts of scientific explanation to mathematics. Our focus, in particular, is on intra-mathematical explanations: explanations of one mathematical fact in terms of another. We offer a basic counterfactual theory of intra-mathematical explanations, before modelling the explanatory structure of a test case using counterfactual machinery. We finish by considering the application of counterpossibles to mathematical explanation, and explore a second test case along these lines.
| Original language | English |
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| Pages (from-to) | 1-34 |
| Number of pages | 34 |
| Journal | Philosophia Mathematica |
| Volume | 28 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Feb 2020 |