Explanations by Constraint: Not Just in Physics

Several philosophers have argued that 'constraints' constrain (and thereby explain) by virtue of being modally stronger than ordinary laws of nature. In this way, a constraint applies to all possible systems, for a variety of possibility that is broader (that is, more inclusive) than the variety we employ when we say that the ordinary laws of nature apply to all physically possible systems. Explanations by constraint are thus more broadly unifying than ordinary causal explanations. Philosophical examples of good candidates for constraints have heretofore been drawn almost exclusively from fundamental physics. This paper argues for the existence of such constraints (even multiple levels of them) in at least one human science (linguistics), not just in physics.