A Novel Account of Grounding
摘要
Grounding is traditionally conceived in hierarchical or foundational terms, often tied to metaphysically necessary essences. This chapter develops an account of grounding that resists such hierarchies. Drawing on an evolutionary reinterpretation of the principle of sufficient reason, it reconceives grounding as an emergent ordering relation internal to processes themselves. Grounding thus becomes a mode of intelligibility immanent to being’s unfolding as opposed to an appeal to transcendent principles. This reconciles the demand for self-grounding intelligibility with the fractured, open-ended nature of reality. The chapter situates this approach against contemporary debates in analytic metaphysics of powers, showing how it can reframe grounding beyond neo-Humean regularism, neo-Aristotelian realism and analytic neo-Hegelian absolute idealism.