J. Ladyman and E. J. Lowe: Patterns, Essence, and Truthmaking

The paper aims to look for an adequate ontological explanation of the «second pattern» existence within Ladyman’s ITSR, the existence of which is a necessary condition that the analyzed pattern is a real pattern indeed. From Ladyman’s point of view, the ontological truthmaker for the epistemic fact is thus that it is a real pattern. As the core interpretation of truthmaking within Ladyman’s concept, we will take the interpretation of truthmaking as
essential dependence proposed by E.J. Lowe: an object is a truthmaker for the proposition when part of the essence of the proposition is that the proposition is true if the object exists. Taking into account a number of limitations of Lowe’s concept (essence precedes existence, essence is not an object, etc.), the existence of a “second pattern” within Ladyman’s conception should be understood via defining its essence, regardless of whether its very existence is ever confirmed.

Keywords: ontological explanation, essential dependence, second pattern existence, E.J. Lowe, J. Ladyman.