On Explaining Existence

No short book on the explanation of existence can afford the hubris of claiming to accomplish this task. And certainly no such claim can be or is being made here. What is at issue is not and cannot be an actual explanation. Rather, what is attempted here is at the very most a rough sketch of the conceptual architecture that an adequate explanation can be expected to exhibit. No more is achieved than a rough and general indication of the direction in which a satisfactory explanation can unfold. A vast amount of detail will have to be filled in to provide a tenable explanation. Only the rough shape that the explanation will have to take is something that one can map out in the basis of considerations of general principles, giving reasons why alternative directions are less promising and how objection to the indicated direction can be removed or mitigated. But the move from a general direction to a specific and detailed pathway calls for more than is or can be attempted here.

Nicholas Rescher, University of Pittsburgh, U.S.A.