Conceptual necessity is a property of the certainty with which a state of affairs, as presented by a certain description, occurs: it occurs by conceptual necessity if and only if it occurs just by virtue of the meaning of the description. If someone is a bachelor, for instance, then he is bound to be unmarried by conceptual necessity, because the meaning of the word "bachelor" determines that he is.
Alternatively, there is metaphysical necessity, which is a certainty determined, not by the meaning of a description, but instead by facts in the world described.
Famous quotes containing the words conceptual and/or necessity:
“Entification begins at arm’s length; the points of condensation in the primordial conceptual scheme are things glimpsed, not glimpses.”
—Willard Van Orman Quine (b. 1908)
“The objects of a financier are, then, to secure an ample revenue; to impose it with judgment and equality; to employ it economically; and, when necessity obliges him to make use of credit, to secure its foundations in that instance, and for ever, by the clearness and candour of his proceedings, the exactness of his calculations, and the solidity of his funds.”
—Edmund Burke (1729–1797)