Universalism (the thesis that distinct objects always compose a further object) has come under much scrutiny in recent years. What has been largely ignored is its role in the metaphysics of classes. Not only does universalism provide ways to deal with classes in a metaphysically pleasing fashion, its success on these grounds has been offered as a motivation for believing it. This paper argues that such treatments of classes can be achieved without universalism, examining theories from Goodman and Quine, Armstrong (...) and Lewis. In the case of each theory, universalism is drafted in to ensure that there are enough material objects to play a particular role. I argue that, for each theory, there's a better theory that ditches universalism and instead uses an alternative principle of composition demanding that the unrestricted composition of entities other than material objects (respectively: regions, states of affairs and singletons) play that role instead. I conclude that (1) non-universalists can consider accepting such theories of classes and (2) we should ignore any alleged motivation for universalism on the basis of dealing with classes. (shrink)

Trope theory is a leading metaphysical theory in analytic ontology. One of its classic statements is found in the work of Donald C. Williams who argued that tropes qua abstract particulars are the very alphabet of being. The concept of an abstract particular has been repeatedly attacked in the literature. Opponents and proponents of trope theory alike have levelled their criticisms at the abstractness of tropes and the associated act of abstraction. In this paper I defend the concept of a (...) trope qua abstract particular by rejecting arguments that purport to show that tropes should not be understood as abstract and by arguing that the abstractness of tropes plays an indispensable role in one of our more promising trope-theoretic analyses of universals and of concrete objects. (shrink)

Some philosophers have claimed that kinds can be construed as mereologically complex structural properties. This essay examines several strategies aimed at construing a certain class of natural kinds, namely isomeric chemical kinds, in accordance with this view. In particular, the essay examines views which posit structural proper parts in addition to micro-constitutive parts to individuate isomeric chemical kinds. It then goes on to argue that the phenomenon of chirality in stereochemistry gives the proponent of kinds-as-complex-properties evidence for positing the existence (...) of causal-cum-dispositional individuating proper parts, in addition to structural parts, for chemical enantiomeric kinds. (shrink)

Renewed worries about the unity of the proposition have been taken as a crucial stumbling block for any traditional conception of propositions. These worries are often framed in terms of how entities independent of mind and language can have truth conditions: why is the proposition that Desdemona loves Cassio true if and only if she loves him? I argue that the best understanding of these worries shows that they should be solved by our theory of truth and not our theory (...) of content. Specifically, I propose a version of the redundancy theory according to which ‘it is true that Desdemona loves Cassio’ expresses the same proposition as ‘Desdemona loves Cassio’. Surprisingly, this variant of the redundancy theory treats ‘is true’ as an ordinary predicate of the language, thereby defusing many standard criticisms of the redundancy theory. (shrink)

I present in this article a new theory of structural properties or, more precisely, of structural kinds, such as being methane. According to this theory, structural kinds are kinds that are both emergent and sustained in their existence. In the first section, I introduce structural properties and four problems that affect the most widely held conception of them, namely, the pictorial conception. In the second section, I introduce some theses about emergence, powers, emergent powers, relations and structures that I have (...) defended in other works and that constitute the basis on which my theory of structural kinds is built up. In the third section, I eventually develop my theory in full detail and show how it can solve the problems mentioned in the second section. Finally, in the fourth section, I face five objections and briefly compare my account with some other accounts of structural properties. (shrink)

David Lewis’s arguments against magical ersatzism are notoriously puzzling. Untangling different strands in those arguments is useful for bringing out what he thought was wrong with not just one style of theory about possible worlds, but with much of the contemporary metaphysics of abstract objects. After setting out what I take Lewis’s arguments to be and how best to resist them, I consider the application of those arguments to general theories of properties and relations. The constraints Lewis motivates turn out (...) to yield an argument for concretism about possible individuals that is quite different from the better-known Lewisian arguments for that position. The discussion also touches on the puzzling question of whether things are the way they are because of the properties they have, or are the properties and relations the way they are because of the things that have them. (shrink)

This paper provides a defence of the account of partial resemblances between properties according to which such resemblances are due to partial identities of constituent properties. It is argued, first of all, that the account is not only required by realists about universals à la Armstrong, but also useful (of course, in an appropriately re-formulated form) for those who prefer a nominalistic ontology for material objects. For this reason, the paper only briefly considers the problem of how to conceive of (...) the structural universals first posited by Armstrong in order to explain partial resemblances, and focuses instead on criticisms that have been levelled against the theory (by Pautz, Eddon, Denkel and Gibb) and that apply regardless of one’s preferred ontological framework. The partial identity account is defended from these objections and, in doing so, a hitherto quite neglected connection—between the debate about partial similarity as partial identity and that concerning ontological finitism versus infinitism—is looked at in some detail. (shrink)

A well-known difficulty that affects all accounts of laws of nature according to which the latter are higher-order facts involving relations between universals (the so-called DTA accounts, from Dretske in Philosophy of Science 44:248–268, 1977; Tooley in Canadian Journal of Philosophy 7:667–698, 1977 and Armstrong (What is a Law of Nature?, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1983)) is the Inference Problem: how can laws construed in that way determine the first-order regularities that we find in the actual world? Bird (Analysis 65:147–55, (...) 2005) has argued that there is no solution to the Inference Problem which is consistent with both categorical monism (that is, the view that all natural properties are categorical) and basic tenets of Armstrong’s account of the laws of nature. This paper shows that, given Armstrong’s view about laws as first-order structural universals whose instantiation ‘produce’ nomic regularities and under specific plausible metaphysical assumptions concerning nomic relations which are consistent with a broadly construed DTA approach to laws, there is no extra difficulty regarding the Inference Problem in a categorical monistic context besides the ones that beset structural universals in general. (shrink)

Structural universals are a kind of complex universal. They have been put to work in a variety of philosophical theories but are plagued with problems concerning their compositional nature. In this article, we will discuss the following questions. What are structural universals? Why believe in them? Can we give a consistent account of their compositional nature? What are the costs of doing so?

David Lewis objected to theories that posit necessary connections between distinct entities and to theories that involve a magical grasping of their primitives. In On the Plurality of Worlds, Lewis objected to nondescript ersatzism on these grounds. The literature contains several reconstructions of Lewis’ critique of nondescript ersatzism but none of these interpretations adequately address his main argument because they fail to see that Lewis’ critique is based on broader methodological considerations. I argue that a closer look at his methodology (...) reveals the broader objection he presented against nondescript ersatzism. This objection, I further argue, remains a challenge for the ersatzer who posits structure-less entities as possible worlds. (shrink)

The different occurrences of a word in a sentence cannot be identified with the one word type, nor with its many tokens. What then are occurrences of a word? How can one type occur more than once in another type? Is the conception of ‘structural universals’ that leads to these questions incoherent, as Lewis maintained? I argue against the answer Wetzel suggested, which identifies sentences with functions from numbers to expressions, and propose instead that occurrences of one type in another (...) are subtypes with different relative positions in the whole. Types have subtypes as well as tokens. Occurrences in non-symmetrical types like sequences are individuated by their relative positions in the type. Occurrences in a symmetrical whole have different positions but stand in the same relations to the other components. They are numerically different subtypes that do not differ from each other qualitatively. (shrink)

Haecceitism and Hume’s Dictum are each controversial theses about necessity and possibility. According to haecceitism, there are qualitatively indiscernible possible worlds that differ only with respect to which individuals occupy which qualitative roles. According to Hume’s Dictum, there are no necessary connections between distinct entities or, as Humeans sometimes put it, reality admits of “free recombination” so any entities can co-exist or fail to co-exist. This paper introduces a puzzle that results from the combination of haecceitism and Hume’s Dictum. This (...) puzzle revolves around the free recombination of non-qualitative properties like being Socrates. After considering several responses to this puzzle, I defend an ideology-driven solution, which dispenses with non-qualitative properties like being Socrates in favour of primitive theoretical ideology while, at the same time, preserving a commitment to both haecceitism and Hume’s Dictum. (shrink)

The dominant theory of parts and wholes – classical extensional mereology – has faced a number of challenges in the recent literature. This article gives a sampling of some of the alleged counterexamples to some of the more controversial principles involving the connections between parthood and identity. Along the way, some of the main revisionary approaches are reviewed. First, counterexamples to extensionality are reviewed. The ‘supplementation’ axioms that generate extensionality are examined more carefully, and a suggested revision is considered. Second, (...) the paper considers an alternative approach that focuses the blame on antisymmetry but allows us to keep natural supplementation axioms. Third, we look at counterexamples to the idempotency of composition and the associated ‘parts just once’ principle. We explore options for developing weaker mereologies that avoid such commitments. (shrink)

Classical mereology seems unable to characterise the identity conditions of word types. For example, the same letter types ordered differently result in different word types; but mereological fusions of the same letters are identical, regardless of the order of the letters. We show, however, that by combining classical mereology with plural logic one can give a definition of word types that satisfies the identity criteria of word types. This means that it is not necessary to abandon classical mereology in order (...) to give an analysis of the mereological structure of word types. (shrink)

Contemporary theories of universals have two things in common: first, they are unable to account for necessary connections between universals that form a structure. Second, they leave teleology out of their accounts of instantiation. These facts are not unrelated; the reason why contemporary theories have such trouble is they neglect the ancient idea that universals are ends at which nature aims. If we want a working theory of universals, however, we must return to this idea. Despite its unpopularity among realists, (...) teleology is not a disposable eccentricity, and its dismissal is not an improvement on ancient views. (shrink)

This paper maps the landscape for a range of views concerning the metaphysics of natural kinds. I consider a range of increasingly ontologically committed views concerning natural kinds and the possible arguments for them. I then ask how these relate to natural kind essentialism, arguing that essentialism requires commitment to kinds as entities. I conclude by examining the homeostatic property cluster view of kinds in the light of the general understanding of kinds developed.

Why is it that whenever a structural property is instantiated, its constituent properties are instantiated as well, by proper parts of the original object? By developing a suggestion from Lewis :25–46, 1986), Hawley :117–133, 2010) rises to this explanatory challenge by taking structural properties to be mereologically composed by their constituents, and by taking composition to be analogous to identity. However, setting up a plausible framework for composition and CAI claims about properties, I will argue that structural properties are not (...) identical to their constituents, at least not in any sense robust enough to warrant an Hawley-style argument—and perhaps not identical to them in any sense whatsoever. More generally, core principles of extensional mereology are in danger when applied to structural properties, which may force an extensionalist to either reconsider the application altogether, or reconsider mereological monism, thus granting the mereology of structural properties a peculiarly non-extensional status. Finally, although this debate has been traditionally framed as a debate about universals, an appeal to structural tropes can reconcile, at least to some extent, the mereology of structural properties with Lewisian extensional mereology— CAI included. (shrink)

David Lewis is typically interpreted as a class nominalist. One consequence of class nominalism, which he embraced, is that the reduction of ordered pairs, triples, etc to unordered sets of sets is conventional. The reaction by his Australian counterparts D.M. Armstrong and Peter Forrest was that Lewis was not being ontologically serious. This chapter evaluates this debate over serious ontology. It is argued that in one sense Lewis is ontologically serious, but that his additional commitment to structuralism about classes should (...) push him to adopt a trope-theoretic account of naturalness, which opens up another way to respond to the charge of not doing serious ontology. This conclusion is supported by certain remarks he makes in his correspondence, thus revealing how his thinking about properties appears to have evolved from property-egalitarianism to a sparse theory of tropes. (shrink)

2020 update of the entry "Properties".

An overview of contemporary part-whole theories, with reference to both their axiomatic developments and their philosophical underpinnings.

The debate about the ontological innocence of mereology has generally been framed as a debate about the plausibility of Universal Fusion. Ontologically loaded fusions must be more than the sum of their parts, and this seems to violate parsimony if fusion is universal. Less attention has been paid to the question of what sort of emergence mereological fusions must exhibit if they are irreducible to their parts. The philosophy of science literature provides several models of such strong emergence. Examining those (...) models suggests that the difficulty with emergent fusions has at least as much to do with extensionality as it does with Universal Fusion. Some accounts of emergence fail to ensure irreducibility when combined with extensional mereologies. The most promising model for the strong emergence of ontologically loaded fusions fails to validate Anti-Symmetry, which naturally leads to failures of extensionality. These results suggest that the focus on Universal Fusion may have been misplaced. (shrink)