Recent years have seen a fl ourishing of what has been called ‘the metaphysics of science’. In part this is the result of certain challenges to metaphysics as currently practised, which have focused on its apparent lack of engagement with modern science. A quick scan of the relevant literature will reveal numerous works on monism, dispositions, metaphysical ‘simples’, gunk and other such exotica but which either deploy caricature-like examples from physics, say, or make no contact with current scientifi c developments whatsoever. When so challenged, metaphysicians will typically respond that they are more concerned with charting the vast seas of the possible than with accommodating the mundane features of the actual world, but that raises the obvious question: if their metaphysics of the actual fails to make contact with modern science, why should we pay attention to their claims about the possible?!