Nonconservative extensions by propositional quantifiers and modal incompleteness

Abstract Propositional modal logics can be extended by propositional quantifiers, i.e. quantifiers binding proposition letters understood as variables. This paper investigates whether such an extension is always conservative. It is shown that the answer depends on the way in which propositional quantifiers are added. On a minimal approach, according to which propositional quantifiers only have to satisfy the classical principles of quantification, every classical modal logic has a conservative extension by propositional quantifiers. However, in the context of normal modal logics it is natural to require propositionally quantified extensions also to be closed under the rule of necessitation. It is shown that in this setting, there are normal modal logics whose propositionally quantified extensions are nonconservative. Nonconservativity is shown to be a special case of a number of model-theoretic notions of incompleteness. More tentatively, it is suggested that nonconservativity indicates incompleteness in a more substantial sense, concerning the intended target of capturing the logics of modalities.