Dispositions and Ontology

One might have assumed that the increase, in recent years, in the number of writers willing to defend the ontological status of dispositions is evidence that the reductionist positions have lost favor.’ Instead, we see reductionism regarding the dispositional holding its own. The debate rages on, and not without good reason.2 Reductionists often seem to occupy the dialectical high ground, especially when one considers how typically unwieldy or uninformative are the nonreductionist alternatives. Nor is the debate a minor internecine skirmish, of significance only to a few practitioners of a small branch of metaphysics. Dispositional notions are commonplace in much of the current work in philosophy. One finds mention of capacities, abilities, potentialities, and dispositions in ethics, epistemology, and the philosophy of mind, as well as the philosophy of science. Indeed, these notions have come to play a more, not less, important role. Making sense of the dispositional is a continuing challenge. What I have to say will do little to assuage our worries about