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The account of indeterminacy is brought to bear on conditionals, both indicative conditionals and counterfactual conditionals. The existence of conditional propositions is easily secured on the theory of pleonastic propositions, and conditions are specified under which a conditional proposition is determinately true, determinately false, or indeterminate. These truth conditions generate a puzzle, in that the way we form partial beliefs in indeterminate conditional propositions is not what their truth conditions predict. The resolution makes an important concession to non-cognitivist accounts of indicative-conditional sentences.

Critical discussion of attempts by Davis, Stalnaker, Ellis, and Edgington to unify indicative and subjunctive conditionals within a single smooth theory. Edgington's work on this goes a long way, but one class of subjunctives refuses to submit to her treatment in which indicatives are supposed to call the tune.

This chapter defends the thesis that accepting an indicative conditional is a metacognitive process that is not metarepresentational. The argument that we give in favour of this thesis is based on (1) the suppositional theory of conditionals, (2) David Lewis’ triviality result on probabilities of conditionals, and (3) Joelle Proust’s account of metacognition. The chapter ends with a list of open questions that we aim to turn to in a more comprehensive study of metacognition and conditionals.

Expounds, mainly on the basis of Adams's work, the logic of indicative conditionals—with some help from his adaptation of Venn diagrams. Failure for indicatives of or‐to‐if, contraposition, transitivity, and antecedent strengthening. Controversy over whether modus ponens holds for indicatives. Independent indicatives identified and snubbed.

Discussion of reasons for approaching indicative conditionals in terms of subjective rather than objective probability. The reasons include stand‐offs of the sort Gibbard has presented: cases where two right‐thinking people with partial information accept conflicting conditionals. Discussion and rejection of the view that subjectivity comes in because in asserting an indicative conditional one says that one has such and such a probability for the consequent given the antecedent. What remains, and seems to be right, is the view that in asserting such a conditional one is expressing a conditional probability without asserting anything.

Discussion of the uses of indicative conditionals. Reasons for holding that when the antecedent is true, the conditional has the same truth value as the consequent. Conditionals as ‘inference‐tickets’. Non‐interference conditionals: ‘Even if A, still C’. So‐called ‘biscuit conditionals’.

This chapter looks in some detail at the important topic of counterfactual conditionals, examining both philosophical and psychological contributions. It argues that there may be a significant difference between indicative conditionals, or at least some of them, and counterfactuals. Some indicative conditionals at least, e.g. 7.2, 7.6, or 7.8, may express epistemic mental states, and counterfactuals may concern objective relations. Some philosophers have consequently argued for T3 for indicatives and T2 for counterfactuals. However, some indicative conditionals, e.g. 7.5, might be closely related to counterfactuals and about causal or other objective relations, and that could imply T2 for them at least.

Presents Bennett's theory about the different kinds of bases upon which indicative conditionals may be accepted; bases that enable one to explain the antecedent, or the consequent, or some other fact not expressed in the conditional. It is shown that bases of two of these kinds also support the corresponding subjunctive, while bases of the third kind do not; and that the classification of bases does not yield a classification of conditionals. This destroys the only persuasive reason for accepting the relocation thesis, according to which subjunctives should be grouped with indicatives of the type ‘If it rains tonight, the roads will be wet in the morning’.

This chapter examines the basic empirical findings on indicative conditionals when participants are asked to make inferences or judgements about them in the psychological laboratory, and compares these findings with the analyses of logicians. The chapter considers only studies using abstract or arbitrary problem materials to avoid the complications introduced by use of semantically rich problem content or context that very markedly affects reasoning performance. First it looks at studies that examine by several different methods people's understanding of the truth conditions of conditional statements; that is when conditionals will be true or false. Subsequently, it looks at studies that have examined the basic inferences that people are willing to endorse or draw from conditional statements. The psychological work includes studies of conditionals phrased both as ‘if p then q’ and as ‘p only if q’, and also conditionals with negated components. Finally, it looks at some studies of the development of conditional reasoning in children.

Aims to reconcile a unified semantic account of conditional statements with an apparent contrast between the logics of indicative and ”subjunctive” conditionals. The difference between the two kinds of conditionals is explained in terms of different constraints imposed on the contexts relative to which the different forms of conditionals are interpreted. A pragmatic concept of reasonable inference is defined and contrasted with semantic entailment. This concept is then used to explain why certain inferences involving indicative conditionals are compelling, and to diagnose a fallacy in a familiar argument for fatalism.

Gives an inconclusive discussion of how to define ‘conditional’. Conditionals fall into two groups (here reluctantly labelled ‘indicative’ and ‘subjunctive’), though there is dispute over just where the line falls (relocation thesis). ‘Independent’ conditionals, in which the relation between antecedent and consequent does not depend on any unstated matter of particular fact, are identified and set aside as uninteresting.

The Ramsey test implies that people will evaluate the probability of a conditional, P(if p then q), as the conditional probability, P(q¦p). This implication is referred to as the conditional probability hypothesis. As a normative position, this hypothesis has been much discussed in the literature on philosophical logic, as described in Chapter 2. A number of psychologists have also suggested, as an empirical hypothesis, that ordinary conditionals are related to conditional probability. However, only in very recent research have psychologists run experiments in which people are asked directly to assess the probability of conditional statements. This chapter introduces this experimental work, which is highly relevant to the three broad theoretical accounts of the indicative conditional — T1, T2, and T3 — that were presented in Chapter 2. The strict truth of the conditional probability hypothesis would imply T3, but it is not so easy to decide between T2 and T3.

A comparison of accounts of indicative conditional statements that treat them as a distinctive kind of conditional speech act—qualified assertion of the consequent qualified by the supposition of the antecedent—and accounts that treat them as unqualified assertions of propositions that are a function of antecedent and consequent. The aim is to reconcile the two accounts by making them precise in a common pragmatic framework, and showing that the former can be seen to be equivalent to a limiting case of the latter. It is argued that this way of representing the conditional assertion account helps to explain the relation between indicative and subjunctive conditionals.

The Ramsey test for indicative conditionals suggests that they are to be understood in terms of subjective probability. This concept is explained, and elements of probability logic expounded. Indicative conditionals are mostly zero intolerant, meaning that such a conditional is useless to someone who is really sure that its antecedent is false. The Equation is introduced: i.e. the thesis that your probability for ‘If A, C’ (indicative) is your conditional probability for C given A.

This chapter explores how biforcated attitude semantics might be exploited in order to develop nondescriptivist treatments in other philosophical domains. A strategy for applying biforcated attitude semantics to an arbitrary domain is developed, as well as a toy expressivist theory of indicative conditionals. A more sophisticated account of truth is developed, which predicts that ‘P’ and ‘it is true that P’ are equivalent but have different semantic contents, and on which ‘true’ is nondescriptive, corresponding to no property. It is shown, further, how such an account can be exploited to solve expressivist problems about disagreement and validity.

Extreme realism (Lewis), and abstract realism, about worlds. Introducing an approach to subjunctive conditionals through possible worlds; use of this to explain the failure of transitivity and antecedent strengthening. The notion of variably strict conditionals is explained, and the logical likeness of subjunctives to indicatives is explained. Discussion of subjunctive with disjunctive antecedents.

Discussion of Jackson's view that indicative conditionals are material conditionals, and his attempt to explain away apparent counter‐evidence by appeal to the notion of conventional implicature. His good explanation of the latter as a general phenomenon shows many respects in which it is not applicable to indicative conditionals.