A Chancy Theory of Metaphysical Indeterminacy

Metaphysical indeterminacy (MI) is indeterminacy originating in the nonrepresentational world. I develop a theory of MI in termsof objective chance with a number of attractive features: it provides a reductive analysis of MI; it applies at both macroscopicand microscopic scales; it demystifies the target phenomenon by employing no special-purpose metaphysical primitives; it doesnot prejudge the question whether the logic of a language capable of describing an indeterminate subject matter is classical,or whether its semantics is bivalent; it comes with built-in epistemic criteria informed by a naturalistic methodology. Thechancy account is compared to three salient alternatives: the Third-Way View, which postulates the existence of indeterminatepropositions; Metaphysical Supervaluationism, which takes indeterminacy to be a metaphysical primitive; and the Determinable-Based Account, which reduces the target phenomenon to patterns of determinables and determinates. It is argued that the chancyaccount fares better overall when tested against two paradigmatic case studies: future indeterminacy, and quantum indeterminacy.Applications to further domains are also sketched, and a number of open problems outlined.