How Properties Emerge

A framework for representing a specific kind of emergent property instance is given in terms of the fusion of property instances. A solution to a generalized version of the exclusion argument is then provided to show that this is not restricted to physical and mental events, and it is shown that upward and downward causation is unproblematical for that kind of emergence. One real example of this kind of emergence is briefly described and the suggestion made that emergence may be more common than current opinions allow. Throughout, reasons to be skeptical of an ontology containing sharply divided levels are given.

Numbers

This chapter develops a metaphysics-first view of natural numbers and real numbers. The account gives a philosophical priority to applications: to the application of natural numbers as numbering property-instances, and to the application of real numbers as ratios of extensive magnitudes. Each natural number is individuated by the condition for it to be the number of a property. The account is contrasted with the neo-Fregean approach to natural numbers advocated by Wright; but it does have a natural marriage with the postulationist approach of Fine. This metaphysics of numbers can then be deployed in combination with the principle that, for these ontologies, Individuation Precedes Representation. To be capable of representing numbers of these kinds is to have tacit knowledge of the principles that individuate them. The resulting account has both differences from and affinities with the views of Carnap.

Triangles, Tropes, and τὰ τοιαʋ ̃τα: A Platonic Trope Theory

A standard interpretation of Plato’s metaphysics holds that sensible particulars are images of Forms. Such particulars are fairly independent, like Aristotelian substances. I argue that this is incorrect: Platonic particulars are not Form images but aggregates of Form images, which are property-instances (tropes). Timaeus 49e-50a focuses on “this-suches” (toiauta) and even goes so far as to claim that they compose other things. I argue that Form images are this-suches, which are tropes. I also examine the geometrical account, showing that the geometrical constituents of the elements are also Form images. Thus everything in the sensible world is composed of tropes.

Perceptual Consciousness as a Mental Activity

Chapter 6 exploits the thesis that perception is constitutively a matter of employing perceptual capacities to address the problem of consciousness. Orthodox views analyze consciousness in terms of sensory awareness of some entities. The relevant entities have been understood to be (1) strange particulars, such as sense-data, qualia, or intentional objects, (2) abstract entities, such as properties, or (3) mind-independent particulars in our environment, such as objects, property-instances, and events. There are problems with all three versions of the orthodox view. Chapter 6 breaks with this orthodoxy. It argues that perceptual consciousness is constituted by a mental activity, namely the mental activity of employing perceptual capacities. I call this view mental activism. Insofar as employing perceptual capacities constitutes representational content, mental activism is a form of representationalism, one on which a substantive explanation is given why and how consciousness is grounded in representational content.

Abundant Properties

On an abundant conception of properties, properties serve as semantic values for most predicates and property names. Abundance is central to Dispositional Pluralism. Dispositional Pluralism is compatible with different theories of the metaphysics of properties. According to universalism (realism) properties are universals that are wholly present wherever they are instantiated. According to extensionalism (class nominalism) properties are sets of objects. According to trope theory, properties are sets of particular property instances, or tropes. In any case, properties correspond to sets of objects. Abundance is preferable to sparsity—the view that only an elite minority of sets of particulars correspond to properties. On most sparse views, the “real” properties are largely unknown. Consequently, sparse properties are unfit for the roles properties are posited to play: They rarely serve as the semantic values of predicates; they do not explain familiar causal powers; and it is not clear how they explain apparent similarities.

The Semantics of ‘Appear’ Words

In this initial chapter, the author establishes her framework for discussion of perceptual verbs like ‘look’, ‘see’, ‘seem’. Perceptual reports are particular speech acts made by utterances of sentences that contain a perceptual verb. More specifically, they are assertions made by utterances of these sentences. Perceptual reports assert how objects in the world and their perceptible property instances are perceived by subjects. A subset of these reports purport to assert how objects in the world and their visually perceptible property instances are visually perceived by subjects. This chapter is primarily concerned with the semantics of ‘seem’ and ‘look’, which—it is argued—subject-raising verbs. Subject-raising verbs function as intensional operators at the level of logical form, just like ‘it is possible’, ‘it was the case’, and ‘it might be the case’. The author’s main argument for the representational view rests on this fact about ‘seem’ and ‘look’.

How Properties Hold Together in Substances

A main aim of chemical research is to understand how the characteristic properties of specific chemical substances relate to the composition and to the structure of those materials. Such investigations assume a broad consensus regarding basic aspects of chemistry. Philosophers generally regard widespread agreement on basic principles as a remote goal, not something already achieved. They do not agree on how properties stay together in ordinary objects. Some follow John Locke [1632–1704] and maintain that properties of entities inhere in substrates. The item that this approach considers to underlie characteristics is often called “a bare particular” (Sider 2006). However, others reject this understanding and hold that substances are bundles of properties—an approach advocated by David Hume [1711–1776]. Some supporters of Hume’s theory hold that entities are collections of “tropes” (property-instances) held together in a “compresence relationship” (Simons 1994). Recently several authors have pointed out the importance of “structures” for the coherence of substances, but serious questions have been raised about those proposals. Philosophers generally use a time-independent (synchronic) approach and do not consider how chemists understand properties of chemical substances and of dynamic networks of chemical reactions. This chapter aims to clarify how current chemical understanding relates to aspects of contemporary philosophy. The first section introduces philosophical debates, the second considers properties of chemical systems, the third part deals with theories of wholes and parts, the fourth segment argues that closure grounds properties of coherences, the fifth section introduces structural realism (SR), the sixth part considers contextual emergence and concludes that dynamic structures of processes may qualify as determinants (“causes”) of specific outcomes, and the final section suggests that ordinary items are based on closure of relationships among constituents additionally determined by selection for integration into more-extensive coherences. Ruth Garrett Millikan discussed the concept of substance in philosophy: . . . Substances . . . are whatever one can learn from given only one or a few encounters, various skills or information that will apply to other encounters. . . . Further, this possibility must be grounded in some kind of natural necessity. . . . The function of a substance concept is to make possible this sort of learning and use of knowledge for a specific substance. . . . (Millikan 2000, 33)

Truthmaking

The notions of “truthmaking” and “truthmakers” are central to many attempts in contemporary metaphysics to come to grips with the connection between truth and reality. The intuitive motivation for theories of truthmaking is the idea that truth depends on reality: that truth is not primitive or fundamental, but rather derivative and dependent. The idea, more precisely stated, is that true propositions (or whatever are the primary truth-bearers, e.g., statements, sentences, or beliefs) are not true in and of themselves but must be made true by reality. Truthmaker theorists think that for a proposition to be made true is for it to be true in virtue of the existence of some entity, which is called its “truthmaker.” While many find the thought that truths are “true in virtue of,” or “grounded in,” or “determined by” reality compelling, not everyone finds the truthmaker theorist’s way of articulating this idea adequate. This article focuses on recent truthmaker theories, their challenges, and alternative approaches to truthmaking. One major point of contention surveyed here is the scope of truthmaking: i.e., whether every truth has a truthmaker, or only some. Another important issue is the nature of truthmakers. Some contend that states of affairs are truthmakers, while others hold that particular property instances (“tropes”) are better qualified to ground truths. Truthmaker theorists also disagree about how to characterize the “truthmaking relation” that holds between truths and their truthmakers. The various principles of truthmaking (principles setting out necessary and sufficient conditions under which an entity is a truthmaker for some proposition) offered in the literature are also surveyed in this entry. Perhaps the most contentious matter in truthmaker theory is how to deal with “problem cases”: i.e., truths for which there are no obvious truthmakers, such as negative existential truths, necessary truths, and subjunctive conditional truths. Some deny that these truths have truthmakers, but others have come up with ingenious and therefore controversial accounts of the truthmakers for these truths. Works on the relation between theories of truth and theories of truthmaking are also surveyed. Because it brings together foundational issues in ontology and truth, the nature of truthmaking and truthmakers has and will continue to be a source of interest and excitement for philosophers.