On what makes a fictional world a fictional world

There is a deep-rooted intuition that stories tell us about worlds, or universes, that are not actual or real. This intuition can be fleshed out when we consider fiction so that we have a general definition of a world. Once we have such a general definition of a world, we can then define what should count as a P-world. In the following, I propose three possible definitions of a world which, suitably applying to fictional practices, are good candidates for the required notion.

A short disclaimer first. That fictional practices can ground a definition of a world may recall Nelson Goodman’s notion of a “worldmaking activity”, presented in detail in his [Goodman 1978]. Goodman’s main argument in this book is that the origin of all worldmaking activities is to be found in the structural features of the symbol systemsused when performing these activities. If fictional practices are worldmaking in Goodman’s sense, then his argument should apply to fiction. I will not engage with Goodman’s argument though. For one thing, I do not need to speculate about the origin of the creative powers from which worlds spring, so to speak, in order to define

9Of course, one can argue that such systems will beinefficient. First, this remains to be proved.

Second, this is besides the point I am making about deontic modality being non-P-modal.

10And some other which are peculiar to deontics. See for instance McNamara, Paul, “Deontic Logic”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2019 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2019/entries/logic-deontic/.

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rigorously what a fictional world is. For another, I do not have much to say about symbol systems, nor do I think that the notion can be applied without difficulty to fictional practices. I guess the best way of putting the somewhat narrower question under discussion here is: What is it that makes afictional world a fictional world? Fictional worlds are spatio-temporal systems

Had we but world enough, and time, This coyness, Lady, were no crime We would sit down and think which way To walk and pass our long love’s day.

Opening of Andrew Marvell 1681 “To His Coy Mistress”

There is this idea that the notion of a world does not designate a thing, but the general background of all things and events. In this sense, the real world is the condition of possibility of all the real things and events.¹¹

Indeed there are natural phenomena or events, those we experience or those predicted by natural sciences for instance. So natural events are possible. But the condition of possibility of such events is that there is a world in which these events occur. In particular, because certain events are predictable by the natural sciences, there must be an underlying structure which makes scientific predictions possible.

So each time we recognise an event, it comes with a background which we call a

“world”.

In particular, this background is spatio-temporal. That is, events occur in space and time. This is tantamount to saying that there can be no event outside space and time. To simplify, I will identify a world with its corresponding spatio-temporal framework, setting aside the thorny issue of deciding what are the other non-spatial, non-temporal dimensions of worlds in this sense.¹²

This definition of a world as a spatio-temporal system can be generalised into talking of fictional worlds.¹³ Indeed, we easily recognise fictional events such as Hamlet deliberating for quite a long time on the possibility of ending his life instead

11Note the Kantian undertone of this idea. I do not claim that the notion I describe here is the same as Kant’s technical definition of aworld in the Transcendental deduction, though.

12Note that, in old English, the shade of meaning for “world” as synonymous with “space” was available, as shown by Marvell’s poem in epigraph of this subsection.

13This idea can be found also in the work of Enrico Terrone. I had several personal discussions with him on the subject. Terrone found this definition when reading the work of Strawson. It is possible that Strawson gets this idea from his reading of Kant. Again, I do not claim that Strawson’s reading of Kant is accurate.

of avenging his father. By definition, such fictional events do not occur in the real world. Hence, we form the idea of a different world in which the fictional events take place. Fictional worlds are nothing more than the imagined background which makes it possible one imagines the fictional events.

Once we have this definition of a world, one can define what a P-world is. Given a spatio-temporal frame, one can define a notion of spatio-temporal distance. A P-world is a world containing all the things and the events at a distance from each other.¹⁴ This definition of world also allows for non-P-world: isolated events ground the idea of an incomplete world. Impossible events require that we form the idea of an impossible world. Imagining the background of impossible events may not be phenomenologically easy but it is arguably conceptually possible. Indeed, it seems that we do so when, for instance, we read stories involving inconsistent time travel.

Fictional worlds are Stoic worlds

Fictional events seem to be inescapable. Indeed, Othello will kill Desdemona and there is no way around it.¹⁵ No spectator can prevent the murder, no character will.

There is a clear sense in which the fate of fictional characters is settled for good. If Othello were not to kill Desdemona, it would not be the same fiction.

On the other hand, it seems implausible that all fictional events are all equally inescapable. For instance, suppose in one version Othello blinks before killing Des-demona, and in another version he does not. Clearly, this does not support the intuition that there are two different fictions. So Othello’s blinking before killing Desdemona does not seem to be part of his inescapable fate.

Therefore, the inescapability of fiction should rather be thought of at the level of the plot of the story. Changing the plotis changing the story. In this sense, the plot is the inescapable fate of the fictional characters.

The stoics had this idea that fate was the world’s pneuma, the deep-down struc-ture of the cosmos. Similarly, the character’s fate can ground the idea of a world as a definite, inescapable, determinate sequence of events. The plot of a story is the backbone of the fictional world thus conceived. Interestingly, if one takes this general definition of a world, one can easily explain why it is so interesting and fruitful to investigate the systematic relations between narrative structures of a story and the causal structures of the associated fictional worlds.

Stoic worlds defined as determinate sequences of event can yield P-worlds. From the idea of fate, one should define a notion of causality. For instance, take that of the

14This is, in spirit, Lewis’s famous definition of a world in the opening of [Lewis1986].

15This example and the inescapability of fiction is discussed in [Walton1978].

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physical sciences. In this case, events are causally linked into a particular sequence, the sequence thus defined being inescapable. A P-world is the closure of the sequence of events under the relevant causal relation. It thus includes all the causes and all the effects of the sequence of events in question. Stoic worlds can also be non-P-worlds, since there is no constraint on the connection of the events into a sequence in the above definition. It will naturally be incomplete, and sometimes inconsistent given the plot.

Fictional worlds are clusters of fictional truths

Here is a definition of fictional worlds taken from [Walton 1978]:

“Fictional worlds” can be understood as collections of fictional truths.

The fact that “Robinson Crusoe exists in a given fictional world” amounts simply to the fact that this is fictional that Crusoe exists, and that this fictional truth belongs to a collection of fictional truths. The fictional world is not construed as a realm in which it istrue that Crusoe exists.¹⁶ So given a definition of fictional “truth”, one can define what a fictional world is by clustering them together. One can appreciate how Walton’s proposal is a complete reversal of the modal account. First we get a “cluster of fictional truths”, and then we call that a world. It is because we have a bunch of fictional propositions about Robinson Crusoe, that we say he lives in a fictional world. Providing such a theory of fictional “truth” is the task of the functionalist.¹⁷

One way to flesh out Walton’s idea is the following. We have propositions, ex-tracted from the fictional text. Fictional reading consists in “realizing” or “satisfying”

these well-formed formulae by constructing a set-theoretical model. What we usually call “fictional imagination” is precisely this way of “realizing” or “satisfying” a set of propositions. Walton calls fictionalworld this set of interpreted propositions in the imagination.

A fictional world, understood in a full-fledged phenomenological sense, is usually imagined to quench our irresistible desire to reify propositions. But it is not necessary, really. In principle, we could compute fictional propositions without imagining a fictional world in any substantial phenomenological sense.¹⁸ It is just the way we

16pp. 15-6.

17The technical detail are presented inchapter 6and7.

18Arguably, some abstract fictions force us to compute fictional propositions while preventing us from imagining a “world” in any phenomenological sense. See for instance the work of Norman McLaren, like Blinkity Blank, Rythmetic, or Canon. Perhaps non-narrative poems are akin to abstract fictions in this sense. Thanks to Marion Renauld for helping me thinking along these lines.

usually understand proposition which takes over.

Given the definition of a world as a cluster of fictional “truths”, one can define what a P-world is. A P-world is a set of propositions which is closed under a classical entailment relation. This can be regimented, for instance, by forcing the set of fictional “truths” to be expressed in predicate logic endowed with a relevant semantics for the notion of entailment. Set-theoretic semantics is one way to go. But a cluster of fictional “truths” need not be closed under classical entailment. So that they can be just a set of propositions, thus defining a non-P-world.

This completes the second missing part in the first direct argument given above.

A fiction-first perspective is now available and, if my argument above goes through, desirable.