Abstract: I clarify the notion of necessity that I will be examining in the book. In the first section , I claim that the relevant notion of necessity is ‘broad logical necessity’, which I distinguish from causal necessity, unrevisability and a proposition being self-evident or a priori. In the second section, I distinguish between modality de dicto and modality de re. An assertion of modality de dicto predicates a modal property of another dictum or proposition, while a claim of modality de re asserts of an object that it possess a property either essentially or contingently. I conclude by examining the use of the de dicto/de re distinction in the works of Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas, G.E. Moore, and Norman Malcolm.

Keywords: a priori, Aquinas, Aristotle, de dicto, de re, essential, Norman Malcolm, modality, G.E. Moore, necessity, property, proposition,