Pluralists believe in the occurrence of numerically distinct spatiotemporal coincident objects. They argue that there are coincident objects that share all physical and spatiotemporal properties and relations; nevertheless, they differ in terms of modal and some other profiles. Appealing to the grounding problem according to which nothing can ground the modal differences between coincident objects, monists reject the occurrence of coincident objects. In the first part of this paper, I attempt to show (...) that the dispute between monists and pluralists cannot be settled based upon the grounding problem tout court. I argue that the grounding problem or a very similar problem is a challenge for all monists and pluralists alike if they are ontologically committed to the existence of composite objects as independent entities. In the final part, adopting the Aristotelian account of essence, I propose a solution that enables pluralists to plausibly ground modal differences between coincident objects. (shrink)

E. J. Lowe; Coinciding objects: in defence of the ‘standard account’, Analysis, Volume 55, Issue 3, 1 July 1995, Pages 171–178, https://doi.org/10.1093/analys/5.

According to strong pluralism, objects distinct by virtue of their modal properties can coincide. The most common objection towards such view invokes the so-called Grounding Problem according to which the strong pluralist needs to explain what the grounds are for supposed modal differences between the coincidents. As recognized in the literature, the failure to provide an answer to the Grounding Problem critically undermines the plausibility of strong pluralism. Moreover, there are strong reasons to believe that strong pluralists cannot provide (...) an explanation of the Grounding Problem. In this paper, we argue that strong pluralism can be motivated independently of the successful answer to the Grounding Problem. In order to achieve that aim, we provide a haecceitistic interpretation of strong pluralism according to which strong pluralism should be read as a position committed to the existence of primitive individuals, i.e., the individuals that have their criteria of individuation independently of their qualitative profiles. That said, we do not aim at defending haecceitism. Instead, our aim is rather modest: we want to provide a new way for the strong pluralist to supplement his view to make it more watertight. (shrink)

Following Wiggins’ seminal article, On Being in the Same Place at the Same Time, this article presents the first comprehensive account of the relation of material constitution, an asymmetrical, transitive relation which totally orders distinct ‘entities’ (individuals, pluralities or masses of stuff) which ‘spatially coincide.’ Their coincidence in space is explained by a recursive definition of ‘complete-composition’, weaker than strict mereological indiscernibility, which also explains the variety of logically independent similarities in such cases. This account is ‘analytical’, dealing with ‘putative’ (...) cases in general. The main strategy is to rationally reconstruct Aristotle’s notion of material cause. It is developed more fully with a theory of how to justify admitting generable and perishable things into the natural world, in The Kinds of Things: A Theory of Personal Identity Based on Transcendental Argument (Open Court, 1996). (shrink)

Existing puzzles about coinciding objects can be divided into two types, corresponding to the manner in which they bear upon the endurantism v. perdurantism debate. Puzzles of the first type, which involve temporary spatial co-location, can be solved simply by abandoning endurantism in favor of perdurantism, whereas those of the second type, which involve career-long spatial co-location, remain equally puzzling on both views. I show that the possibility of backward time travel would give rise to a new type of (...) puzzle. The new puzzles confront perdurantists and can be solved just by shifting to endurantism. (shrink)

Common sense believes in objects which, if real, routinely lose component parts or particles. Statues get chipped, people undergo haircuts and amputations, and ships have planks replaced. Sometimes philosophers argue that in addition to these objects, there are others which could not possibly lose any of their parts or particles, nor have new ones added to them--objects which could not possibly have been bigger or smaller, at any time, than how they actually were.1 (Sometimes the restriction on (...) size is argued independently of the restriction on switches of parts.2) If these other objects are real at all, they are alarmingly abundant. Exactly where the statue sits, there sits a parcel or piece of clay which would cease to be itself, and hence cease to exist, were even so small a part as the statue's nose removed.3 In exactly the place where the recently reconditioned ship is found, there is a mass of wood which never contained, and never could contain, any particles of wood--or bits of wood-stuff--other than those it now has.4 Moreover, since masses of matter (or "aggregates") can continue to exist even if divided into separate parts, while parcels cannot, the abundance is two-fold: where every parcel is found, there is also a mass.5 But how can there be room for all these additional objects if, at any time, two different objects cannot occupy exactly the same place? Or, worse, if even some of these additional objects are real, how can room remain for familiar objects? Recent treatments of this ancient puzzle have urged that we retain both "the principle of one object to a place" and the other ontological assumptions which make that principle seem to force a choice between affirming the reality of familiar objects, and that of the strangely brittle intruders.6 But all the recent treatments have left standing the reality of at least some of these brittle objects.7 By doing so they have passed up what is, perhaps, the simplest and safest response to the ancient puzzle.. (shrink)

The grounding problem is related to the puzzle of numerically distinct spatiotemporally coincident objects. Suppose Lumpl –a lump of clay– and Goliath – the statue – are created and later destroyed, simultaneously. They would share all of their physical and spatiotemporal properties and relations. But, Goliath and Lumpl have different modal and sortal properties, which would suggest they are distinct entities, while at the same time entirely co-located. This issue creates a puzzle and raises the question of how (...) two distinct objects can be entirely colocated. Thus, on the one hand, monists (opponents of coincident objects) argue that even though we have given that thing two different names, we should keep in mind that Lumpl and Goliath, for as long as they exist, are entirely similar in terms of their physical and spatiotemporal structures. On the other hand, however, the lump and the statue have different properties. So, pluralists claim that based on Leibniz‘s law, Lumpl and Goliath would be distinct coincident objects. Monists have challenged the possibility and plausibility of the occurrence of coincident objects by the grounding problem: they think that if we accept pluralism, we have to deal with the thorny problem of what grounds the alleged modal differences between Lumpl and Goliath, given that they are similar in all their physical and spatiotemporal aspects. Some monists suspect that pluralists will not be able to find plausible grounds by means of which to explain Lumpl and Goliath‘s modal (and other) differences, and therefore conclude that the grounding problem is a compelling reason to reject pluralism as an untenable approach towards the puzzle of coincident objects. In this thesis, I attempt to show that the grounding problem, contrary to the false advertisement of some monists, does not seriously threaten the possibility and plausibility of the pluralism concerning the existence of numerically distinct spatiotemporally coincident objects. Underlining the plausibility and possibility of the pluralists‘ position, I specify most parts of this thesis as an investigation into how the grounding problem can be solved in support of pluralism. Various solutions to this problem have been proposed by pluralists from different standpoints. In general, most of these significant solutions, based upon general strategies they follow, can be classified into these two categories: the solutions which appeal to the supervenience relations (supervenience-based solutions), and the solutions which take primitivist approaches (primitivist strategies). My research proposes to take up the validity of the aforementioned strategies, and I assess them in relation to the pluralists‘ ability to solve the grounding problem. I argue that both supervenience-based solutions and the some of primitivist strategies – including the modal plenitude, sortal, and identity-based primitivism – are not winning strategies to settle the grounding problem. Considering the point mentioned, I put forward a new account of the primitivist solution to the grounding problem based on the Aristotelian notion of essence which I call ‗essential primitivism‘. I argue that the primitive essences of coincident objects can properly ground the modal and sortal properties making coincident objects distinct. (shrink)

I argue that the coincidence of statue and matter is a special case of a common linguistic phenomenon: the use of partitive terms to individuate uses of non-count nouns (NCNs). By marking partitives and NCNs, we can easily account for the intuition that a statue and its matter are identical.

I consider some of the objections that have been raised against a conceptualist solution to the “grounding problem”, I address in particular two objections that I call Conceptual Validity and Instantiation, and I attempt to answer them on behalf of the conceptualist. My response, in a nutshell, is that the first of these objections fails because it ascribes to the conceptualist some commitments that do not really follow from the view’s basic insight, while the second objection also fails because it (...) denies the conceptualist resources that the alternative positions are allowed to use. (shrink)

This paper lays out the basic structure of any view involving coincident entities, in the light of the grounding problem. While the account is not novel, I highlight fundamental features, to which attention is not usually properly drawn. With this in place, I argue for a number of further claims: The basic differences between coincident objects are modal differences, and any other differences between them need to be explained in terms of these differences. More specifically, the basic (...) difference is not a difference in sort. A number of recent defenses of coincidence, which share the basic structure I outline, misidentify what, in their accounts, plays the basic role of addressing the grounding problem. More tentatively, I argue Coincident entities differ only in these modal properties, and properties they entail. In particular, they do not differ in properties like ‘being a tree,’ ‘being a statue,’ or aesthetic properties, and finally in light of how the account of coincidence offered addresses the grounding problem, the grounding problem provides no reason to prefer monism to pluralism. (shrink)

One obvious solution to the puzzles of apparently coincident objects is a sort of reductionism - the tree really just is the wood, the statue is just the clay, and nothing really ceases to exist in the purported non-identity showing cases. This paper starts with that approach and its underlying motivation, and argues that if one follows those motivations - specifically, the rejection of coincidence, and the belief that 'genuine' object-destroying changes must differ non-arbitrarily from accidental changes, that (...) one can plausibly be pushed to an extreme nihilism, that denies the existence of any objects at all. (shrink)

How should we understand de re modal features of objects, if there are such features? Any answer to the question is connected to how we should think about coincident objects, objects which occupy the same spatio-temporal region and share the same underlying matter. This thesis is mainly about the connections between de re modality and coincidence. My interest in the connections is twofold: First, how do theories of de re modality interact with theories about coincidence? Details (...) of interactions are discussed from chapter 2 to chapter 5. Second, do the considerations about de re modality offer reasons to favour a particular position about coincidence? And how does this answer contribute to current meta-ontological debate? These are raised in chapter 1 and are answered in conclusion. (shrink)

Pluralists argue for the distinctness of coinciding objects on the grounds that they have different properties. The grounding problem is the problem of explaining how the supposed difference in properties can arise in the first place. This paper considers this problem as an instance of a more general phenomenon, namely, the problem of dealing with underdetermination in asymmetrical systems admitting of non-trivial automorphisms. It argues in favour of primitivism by developing an account of stochastic grounding that makes room for (...) non-fundamental bruteness and substantially mitigates the costs of primitivism. (shrink)

Many philosophers deny that two different material objects can “coincide”, i.e. share their spatial location and microscopic parts. But, there seems to be a difficulty in identifying these coinciding objects, since we have many kinds of predicates that appear to show differences between them. One prominent strategy to avoid such a difficulty is to argue that such “problematic” predicates merely indicate our ways of describing objects, and thus that any difference between coinciding objects is only apparent. (...) I call this move "the semantic solution". The goal of this paper is to show that the semantic solution is unmotivated. The semantic solution, I argue, must distinguish problematic predicates from ones that indicate genuine properties. But the trouble is that in doing so it bringsmassive indeterminacy into our understanding of vast numbers predicates. Furthermore, indeterminacy would be hopelessly massive if every actual material object is made of “atomless gunk”, i.e. matter divisible into proper parts ad infinitum. (shrink)

Statues and lumps of clay are said by some to coincide - to be numerically distinct despite being made up of the same parts. They are said to be numerically distinct because they differ modally. Coincident objects would be non-modally indiscernible, and thus appear to violate the supervenience of modal properties on nonmodal properties. But coincidence and supervenience are in fact consistent if the most fundamental modal features are not properties, but are rather relations that are symmetric as (...) between coincident entities, relations such as "opposite-possibly surviving being squashed". (shrink)

Achille Varzi [2000] has suggested a nice response to the familiar argument purporting to establish the existence of perfectly coinciding objects – objects which, if they existed, would trouble mereological extensionality and the “Minimalist View” of ontology. The trick is to defend Minimalism without tarnishing its status as a meta-principle: that is, without making any firstorder ontological claims. Varzi’s response, though seeming to allow for a comfortable indifference about metaphysical matters peripheral to Minimalism, is not general enough to (...) stave off attacks on extensionality from more sophisticated corners. However, Varzi’s argument bears a kinship with a more general argument against coincident objects. I consider how such an argument sits with the meta-doctrinal status of Minimalism. (shrink)

Can different material objects have the same parts at all times at which they exist? This paper defends the possibility of such coincidence against the main argument to the contrary, the ‘Indiscernibility Argument’. According to this argument, the modal supervenes on the nonmodal, since, after all, the non-modal is what grounds the modal; hence, it would be utterly mysterious if two objects sharing all parts had different essential properties. The weakness of the argument becomes apparent once we understand (...) how the modal is grounded in the nonmodal. By extending the ideas of combinatorialism so that we recombine haecceities as well as fundamental properties, we see how modal properties can be grounded in non-modal properties in a way that allows coincidence and yet also explains why there are differences in the modal properties of coinciding objects. Despite this, some de re modal facts are not grounded in the non-modal but instead are brute. However, although we cannot explain why a particular object has the basic modal properties it has, we can explain a closely related, semantic fact and, comparing the facts we can’t explain to more familiar brute facts, we understand why there should be no better explanation. As a result, we can see how coincidence is, after all, possible. (shrink)

I discuss puzzles involving coinciding material objects (such as statues and their constitutive lumps of clay) and propose solutions.

This paper is about a puzzle concerning the metaphysics of material objects: a puzzle generated by cases where material objects appear to coincide, sharing all their matter. As is well known, it can be illustrated by the example of a statue. In front of me now, sitting on my desk, is a statue – a statue of a lion. The statue is made of clay. So in front of me now is a piece of clay. But what is (...) the relation between the statue and the piece of clay? Are they identical, or are they distinct? (shrink)

Eric T. Olson has argued that those who hold that two material objects can exactly coincide at a moment of time, with one of these objects constituting the other, face an insuperable difficulty in accounting for the alleged differences between the objects, such as their being of different kinds and possessing different persistence-conditions. The differences, he suggests, are inexplicable, given that the objects in question are composed of the same particles related in precisely the same way. (...) In response, I show that the differences are not at all inexplicable once it is recognized that the conditions for a persisting object to be composed by certain particles at a moment of time must involve facts concerning other moments of time, and that the relevant facts are different for persisting objects of different kinds. Philosophers who neglect this sort of constraint on composition principles may be said to be victims of the 'cinematographic fallacy'. (shrink)

This paper presents and defends an account of the coincidence of biological organisms with mereological sums of their material components. That is, an organism and the sum of its material components are distinct material objects existing in the same place at the same time. Instead of relying on historical or modal differences to show how such coincident entities are distinct, this paper argues that there is a class of physiological properties of biological organisms that their coincident mereological (...) sums do not have. The account answers some of the most pressing objections to coincidence, for example the so-called grounding problem , that material coincidence seems to require that coinciding objects have modal differences that do not supervene on any other properties. (shrink)

I compare a Lewisian defence of monism with Kit Fine's defence of pluralism. I argue that the Lewisian defence is, at present, the clearer in its explanatory intent and ontological commitments. I challenge Fine to explain more fully the nature of the entities that he postulates and the relationship between continuous material objects and the parts of those rigid embodiments in terms of which he proposes to explain crucial, modal and sortal, features of those objects.

In this paper I consider two objections raised by Nick Smith (1997) to an argument against the probability of time travel given by Paul Horwich (1995, 1987). Horwich argues that time travel leads to inexplicable and improbable coincidences. I argue that one of Smith's objections fails, but that another is correct. I also consider an instructive way to defend Horwich's argument against the second of Smith's objections, but show that it too fails. I conclude that unless there is something faulty (...) in the conception of explanation implicit in Horwich's argument, time travel presents us with nothing that is inexplicable. (shrink)

How can a statue and a piece of alloy be coincident at any time at which they exist and yet differ in their modal properties? I argue that this question demands an answer and that the only plausible answer is one that posits a difference in the form of the two objects.

Fairchild (2019) advertised the humility of material plenitude, arguing that despite the profligate ontology of coincident objects it entails, the best version of plenitude is one that takes no stand on a range of nearby questions about modality and coincidence. Roughly, the thought is that plenitude says only that there are coincident objects corresponding to every consistent pattern of essential and accidental properties. Plenitude says (or should say) nothing about which patterns those might be, and so (...) should be compatible with any reasonable hypothesis about which combinations of properties it is possible for something to have. I argued in the earlier paper that a particular formulation of the target view (Global Plenitude) has exactly that virtue. But, unfortunately, Global Plenitude turns out not to be very humble at all. Global Plenitude is incompatible with an exceptionally compelling hypothesis about coincidence: that there are some things which coincide, but might not have. Scandal ensues. (shrink)

This paper examines a variety of contexts in metaphysics which employ a strategy I consider to be suspect. In each of these contexts, ‘The Suspect Strategy’ (TSS) aims at excluding a series of troublesome contexts from a general principle whose truth the philosopher in question wishes to preserve. We see (TSS) implemented with respect to Leibniz’s Law (LL) in the context of Gibbard’s defense of contingent identity, Myro and Gallois’ defense of temporary identity, as well as Terence Parsons’ defense of (...) indeterminate identity. Our example of (TSS) as implemented with respect to the Existence Principle (EP) is Terence Parsons’ defense of non-existent objects. Finally, the coincidence-theorist’s analysis of the problem of constitution as given by Baker, Fine and Yablo, as well as Deutsch’s recent defense of the relative-identity theory provide examples of (TSS) as implemented with respect to restricted indiscernibility principles of the form in (RI). While we of course cannot conclude from our exposure to extant versions of (TSS) that no exclusion-procedure could ever overcome the troubling features we encountered, my remarks in this paper should, I think, at least give us reasons to be skeptical that any strategy which proceeds by means of purely formal (e.g., syntactic) individuation-criteria could achieve its intended purpose; for we have seen that such strategies are in general too coarse-grained to individuate contexts correctly into those that should and those that should not be excluded from the reaches of the general principle under discussion. I suspect, moreover, though I do not argue for this stronger claim, that any strategy which does not proceed by means of purely formal criteria would in some way succumb to the charge of circularity. As a result, I recommend that we should learn to become accustomed to a universe populated with a surprising multitude of numerically distinct yet almost indiscernible objects, such as statues and the lumps of clay that constitute them. Given the large amounts of overlap among these almost indiscernible objects, such a densely populated universe is actually quite easy to live with, but that’s a story for a separate occasion. (shrink)

If the laws of nature are as the Humean believes, it is an unexplained cosmic coincidence that the actual Humean mosaic is as extremely regular as it is. This is a strong and well-known objection to the Humean account of laws. Yet, as reasonable as this objection may seem, it is nowadays sometimes dismissed. The reason: its unjustified implicit assignment of equiprobability to each possible Humean mosaic; that is, its assumption of the principle of indifference, which has been attacked on (...) many grounds ever since it was first proposed. In place of equiprobability, recent formal models represent the doxastic state of total ignorance as suspension of judgment. In this paper I revisit the cosmic coincidence objection to Humean laws by assessing which doxastic state we should endorse. By focusing on specific features of our scenario I conclude that suspending judgment results in an unnecessarily weak doxastic state. First, I point out that recent literature in epistemology has provided independent justifications of the principle of indifference. Second, given that the argument is framed within a Humean metaphysics, it turns out that we are warranted to appeal to these justifications and assign a uniform and additive credence distribution among Humean mosaics. This leads us to conclude that, contrary to widespread opinion, we should not dismiss the cosmic coincidence objection to the Humean account of laws. (shrink)

This paper discusses some philosophical aspects related to the recent publication of the experimental results of the 2017 black hole experiment, namely the first image of the supermassive black hole at the center of galaxy M87. In this paper I present a philosophical analysis of the 2017 Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) black hole experiment. I first present Hacking’s philosophy of experimentation. Hacking gives his taxonomy of elements of laboratory science and distinguishes a list of elements. I show that the EHT (...) experiment conforms to major elements from Hacking’s list. I then describe with the help of Galison’s Philosophy of the Shadow how the EHT Collaboration created the famous black hole image. Galison outlines three stages for the reconstruction of the black hole image: Socio-Epistemology, Mechanical Objectivity, after which there is an additional SocioEpistemology stage. I subsequently present my own interpretation of the reconstruction of the black hole image and I discuss model fitting to data. I suggest that the main method used by the EHT Collaboration to assure trust in the results of the EHT experiment is what philosophers call the Argument from Coincidence. I show that using this method for the above purpose is problematic. I present two versions of the Argument from Coincidence: Hacking’s Coincidence and Cartwright’s Reproducibility by which I analyse the EHT experiment. The same estimation of the mass of the black hole is reproduced in four different procedures. The EHT Collaboration concludes: the value we have converged upon is robust. I analyse the mass measurements of the black hole with the help of Cartwright’s notion of robustness. I show that the EHT Collaboration construe Coincidence/Reproducibility as Technological Agnosticism and I contrast this interpretation with van Fraassen’s scientific agnosticism. (shrink)

Anyone who admits the existence of composite objects allows a certain kind of coincidence, coincidence of a thing with its parts. I argue here that a similar sort of coincidence, coincidence of a thing with the stuff that constitutes it, should be equally acceptable. Acknowledgement of this is enough to solve the traditional problem of the coincidence of a statue and the clay or bronze it is made of. In support of this, I offer some principles for the persistence (...) of stuff that are general, not relying on the particular features of a kind of stuff in the way that principles for the persistence for a thing would. This provides a non-arbitrary grounding for stuff that is independent of the conditions on the nature and persistence of things the stuff composes. The principles also provide a general basis for responding to other questions about coincident stuff. (shrink)

It is uncontroversial that artifacts like statues and tables are mind-dependent. What is controversial is whether and how this mind-dependence has implications for the ontology of artifacts. I argue the mind-dependence of artifacts entails that there are no artifacts or artifact joints in the extra-mental world. In support of this claim, I argue that artifacts and artifact joints lack any extra-mental grounding, and so ought not to have a spot in a realist ontology. I conclude that the most plausible story (...) about artifacts is that they are in minds of suitably intelligent creatures, and not the extra-mental world. Artifacts and their joints are merely mental projections onto a world of ‘indifferent materials’. With this established, I show how many cases of object coincidence, the view that more than one material object can be located in the same exact region of space-time, cannot occur. (shrink)

RESUMEN El presente estudio está dirigido a establecer coincidencias entre el pensamiento de José Martí y de Carlos Marx en el terreno filosófico. Ambos representan los más altos exponentes del saber filosófico y humanista de la cultura europea y latinoamericana del siglo XIX, respectivamente, con un alcance genuinamente universal. No fue objetivo en modo alguno convertir a Martí en marxista, del mismo modo que sería absurdo afiliar a Marx a las ideas y las concepciones martianas. Sin embargo, no es posible (...) dejar de subrayar la profundidad del ideario martiano en el terreno filosófico, político, social y económico y sus aproximaciones a las concepciones marxistas o al socialismo científico. ABSTRACT The present study is directed to establish coincidences between the thought of José Martí and Carlos Marx in the philosophical area. Both are represented by the highest exponents of the philosophical and humanist knowledge of the European and Latin-American culture of the 19th century, respectively, with an authentically universal scope. It was not objective in any way to turn Martí into Marxist, in the same way that it would be absurd to affiliate Marx to the ideas and the Martí´s conceptions. Nevertheless, it is not possible to stop underlining the depth of the Martí´s ideology in the philosophical, political, social and economic area and his approaches to the Marxist conceptions or to the scientific socialism. (shrink)

In this paper we present a new metaphysical theory of material objects. On our theory, objects are bundles of property instances, where those properties give the nature or essence of that object. We call the theory essential bundle theory. Property possession is not analysed as bundle-membership, as in traditional bundle theories, since accidental properties are not included in the object’s bundle. We have a different story to tell about accidental property possession. This move reaps many benefits. Essential bundle (...) theory delivers a simple theory of the essential properties of material objects; an explanation of how object coincidence can arise; an actual-world ground for modal differences between coincident objects; a simple story about intrinsic properties; and a plausible account of certain ubiquitous cases of causal overdetermination. (shrink)

This chapter accepts for the sake of argument Ronald Dworkin’s point that the only viable form of normative skepticism is internal, and develops an internal skeptical argument directed specifically at normative realism. There is a striking and puzzling coincidence between normative judgments that are true, and normative judgments that causal forces led us to believe—a practical/theoretical puzzle to which the constructivist view has a solution. Normative realists have no solution, but are driven to conclude that we are probably hopeless at (...) recognizing the independent normative truths they posit. Since this is an unacceptable conclusion, we must conclude that normative realism is false. Drawing on evolutionary considerations, it is explained why this internal skeptical argument does not carry over to our knowledge of objects in our manifest surroundings, and why the challenge does not depend on any assumption that the epistemology of the normative domain must be a causal one. (shrink)

I defend Intuitive Non-Naturalism in ethics from an objection by Matt Bedke.

Meta-ontology (in van Inwagen's sense) concerns the methodology of ontology, and a controversial meta-ontological issue is to what extent ontology can rely on linguistic analysis while establishing the furniture of the world. This paper discusses an argument advanced by some ontologists (I call them unifiers) against supporters of or coincident entities (I call them multipliers) and its meta-ontological import. Multipliers resort to Leibniz's Law to establish that spatiotemporally coincident entities a and b are distinct, by pointing at a (...) predicate F () made true by a and false by b . Unifiers try to put multipliers in front of a dilemma: in attempting to introduce metaphysical differences on the basis of semantic distinctions, multipliers either (a) rest on a fallacy of verbalism, entailed by a trade-off between a de dicto and a de re reading of modal claims, or (b) beg the question against unifiers by having to assume the distinction between a and b beforehand. I shall rise a tu quoque, showing that unifiers couldn't even distinguish material objects (or events) from the spatiotemporal regions they occupy unless they also resorted to linguistic distinctions. Their methodological aim to emancipate themselves from linguistic analysis in ontological businesses is therefore problematic. (shrink)

Simon J. Evnine explores the view that some objects have matter from which they are distinct but that this distinctness is not due to the existence of anything like a form. He draws on Aristotle's insight that such objects must be understood in terms of an account that links what they are essentially with how they come to exist and what their functions are. Artifacts are the most prominent kind of objects where these three features coincide, and (...) Evnine develops a detailed account of the existence and identity conditions of artifacts, and the origins of their functions, in terms of how they come into existence. He then extends this account to organisms, where evolution accomplishes what is effected by intentional making in the case of artifacts, and to actions, which are seen as artifactual events. (shrink)

For those who think the statue and the piece of copper that compose it are distinct objects that coincide, there is a burden of explanation. After all, common sense says that different ordinary objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time. A common argument in favour of four-dimensionalism (or ?perdurantism? or ?temporal parts theory?) is that it provides the resources for a superior explanation of this coincidence. This, however, is mistaken. Any explanatory work done by the (...) four-dimensionalist notion of absolute parthood rests ultimately on notions equally available to the three-dimensionalist. Thus, a neutral explanation of coincidence is at least as good while avoiding commitment to temporal parts. ?Many thanks to David Christensen, Louis deRosset, Matti Eklund, and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. (shrink)

Ned Markosian argues (Australasian Journal of Philosophy 76:213-228, 1998a; Australasian Journal of Philosophy 82:332-340, 2004a, The Monist 87:405-428, 2004b) that simples are ‘maximally continuous’ entities. This leads him to conclude that there could be non-particular ‘stuff’ in addition to things. I first show how an ensuing debate on this issue McDaniel (Australasian Journal of Philosophy 81(2):265-275, 2003); Markosian (Australasian Journal of Philosophy 82:332-340, 2004a) ended in deadlock. I attempt to break the deadlock. Markosian’s view entails stuff-thing coincidence, which I show (...) is just as problematic as the more oft-discussed thing-thing coincidence. Also, the view entails that every particular is only contingently so. If there is a world W like our own, but with ether, then there would be only one object in W. But, since merely adding ether to a world does not destroy the entities in it, then W contains counterparts of all the entities in the actual world—they just are not things. Hence, if simples are maximally continuous, then every actual particular is only contingently so. This in turn entails the following disjunction: (i) identity is contingent or intransitive, or (ii) there are no things at all in the actual world, or (iii) the distinction between stuff and things is one without a difference. I recommend that we reject this stuff-thing dualism. (shrink)

A lot of people believe that distinct objects can occupy precisely the same place for the entire time during which they exist. Such people have to provide an answer to the 'grounding problem' – they have to explain how such things, alike in so many ways, nonetheless manage to fall under different sortals, or have different modal properties. I argue in detail that they cannot say that there is anything in virtue of which spatio-temporally coincident things have those (...) properties. However, I also argue that this may not be as bad as it looks, and that there is a way to make sense of the claim that such properties are primitive. (shrink)

It is often said that the same particles can simultaneously make up two or more material objects that differ in kind and in their mental, biological, and other qualitative properties. Others wonder how objects made of the same parts in the same arrangement and surroundings could differ in these ways. I clarify this worry and show that attempts to dismiss or solve it miss its point. At most one can argue that it is a problem we can live (...) with. (shrink)

My thesis is devoted to an attempt to offer, on behalf of mathematical Platonism, a reply to what may seem to be a powerful objection to it. The objection is this: If there is, as the Platonist supposes, mathematical knowledge of abstract objects, then there is a correlation between our beliefs and the mathematical facts. However, how is such a correlation to be explained given that mathematical objects are a-causal? The worry is that no explanation is possible and (...) that this is a considerable mark against mathematical Platonism. The source of the difficulty here is obvious: standard models for explaining such correlations proceed via the idea that facts cause beliefs, or that beliefs cause facts, or that there was a common cause. But these possibilities are not available to the Platonist given the a-causality of mathematical objects. ;I claim that such a correlation is explicable in a way which neither, contra expectation, renders abstract objects causal nor assigns to us capacities the exercise of which allows to us to explain the correlation on some implausible extension of a perceptual model. The thought is this: that explaining the correlation requires explaining conjunctions of facts and beliefs. But the conjunctions in question are, at least for the Platonism here considered, conjunctions of a brute fact and an explicable fact . However I argue, and this is the core of the thesis, that such conjunctions can always be explained by reiterating the brute fact and citing whatever explains the explicable fact. If this thesis about explanation is accepted, then such correlations are readily explicable. ;The rest of the thesis is devoted to examining various objections to this reply and to the thesis concerning explanation. I argue that they are not fatal. (shrink)

Agent-causal libertarians maintain we are irreducible agents who, by acting, settle matters that aren’t already settled. This implies that the neural matters underlying the exercise of our agency don’t conform to deterministic laws, but it does not appear to exclude the possibility that they conform to statistical laws. However, Pereboom (Noûs 29:21–45, 1995; Living without free will, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001; in: Nadelhoffer (ed) The future of punishment, Oxford University Press, New York, 2013) has argued that, if these neural (...) matters conform to either statistical or deterministic physical laws, the complete conformity of an irreducible agent’s settling of matters with what should be expected given the applicable laws would involve coincidences too wild to be credible. Here, I show that Pereboom’s argument depends on the assumption that, at times, the antecedent probability certain behavior will occur applies in each of a number of occasions, and is incapable of changing as a result of what one does from one occasion to the next. There is, however, no evidence this assumption is true. The upshot is the wild coincidence objection is an empirical objection lacking empirical support. Thus, it isn’t a compelling argument against agent-causal libertarianism. (shrink)

Four-dimensionalists claim that their take on the temporal versions of the puzzles of coincidence favors their view over three-dimensionalism. In this paper I argue otherwise. In particular, I argue that the four-dimensionalist’s treatment of such puzzles doesn’t give her an edge over so-called `standard theorists’, i.e. three-dimensionalists according to whom there are distinct material objects that coincide at some time. I look at two ways in which the dispute between four-dimensionalists and standard theorists might be construed. First, as an (...) issue about commitment to distinct coincident material objects: the purported advantage of the four-dimensionalist’s approach is supposed to lie in its being compatible with there being no such things. Second, as an issue about explanation of such objects: the alleged superiority of the four-dimensionalist’s view is supposed to lie in its being able to provide a better account of how distinct material things manage to share their parts and exact location at some time. I argue that four-dimensionalism falls short of expectations in either case: the existence of distinct overlapping worms requires the existence of distinct coincident material objects, and temporal parts do not afford any better an explanation of such things than is available to the standard theorist. (shrink)

The objective of this paper is to study stable coalition structures in symmetric majority games. We assume that players deviate from a coalition structure to another to maximize their power given by the Owen power index. We introduce three myopic core concepts and one farsighted stability concept, the farsighted vNM stable set. Our main result is that the pessimistic core, the largest myopic core, coincides with some farsighted vNM stable set for any number of players. Moreover, we show that a (...) coalition structure belongs to the pessimistic core and the farsighted vNM stable set if and only if it contains an exact majority coalition. (shrink)

From five plausible premises about ordinary objects it follows that ordinary objects are either functions, fictions or processes. Assuming that the function and fiction accounts of ordinary objects are not plausible, in this paper I develop and defend a (non-Whiteheadian) process account of ordinary objects. I first offer an extended deduction that argues for mereological essentialism for masses or quantities, and then offer an inductive argument in favor of interpreting ordinary objects as processes. The ontology (...) has two main types of entities, masses of matter and processes. A cat, for instance, is shown to be a ‘catting’ process that migrates through distinct portions of matter, much like how a wave passes through distinct portions of water. I also show how the account solves the paradox of coincidence, the Ship of Theseus, fusion cases (e.g. Tib/Tibbles), and answers the Special Composition Question. (shrink)