HYPERINTENSIONALITY OF DEONTIC MODALS: AN ARGUMENT FROM ANALOGY

A plenitude of motivations can and has been enlisted to speak for the hyper intensionality of epistemic modals. This fact is well-known and many logical frameworks have been introduced to capture the fine-grained nature of epistemic modals. Recently, hyper intensionality of deontic modals has been brought into the focus. Paradoxes of deontic logic and the failure of substitution of classical equivalents have been enlisted to motivate hyper intensionality in deontic logic. This paper formulates a new argument for hyper intensionality of deontic modals. The argument is based on an over-looked analogy between epistemic logic and deontic logic. This leads us to the question whether any hyper intensional framework apt for epistemic modals would be apt for deontic modals as well. The paper argues that many, but not all would be.