In this book, Jiri Benovsky defends the view that he doesn't exist. In this book, he also defends the view that this book itself doesn't exist. But this did not prevent him to write the book, and although in Benovsky's view you don't exist either, this does not prevent you to read it. Benovsky defends a brand of non-exceptionalist eliminativism. Some eliminativists, typically focusing on ordinary material objects such as chairs and hammers, make exceptions, for instance for blue whales (that (...) is, living beings) or for persons (that is, conscious organisms). Benovsky takes one by one all types of allegedly existing objects like chairs, whales, and persons and shows that from the metaphysical point of view they are more trouble than they are worth – we are much better off without them. He thus defends an eliminativist view about ordinary objects as well as the 'no-Self' view, where he explores connections between metaphysics, phenomenology, and Buddhist thought. He then also considers the case of aesthetic objects, focusing on musical works and photographs, and shows that the claim of their non-existence solves the many problems that arise when one tries to find an appropriate ontological category for them, and that such an eliminativist view is more natural than what we might have thought. The arguments provided here are always topic-specific: each type of entity is given its own type of treatment, thus proving a varied and solid foundation for a generalized, non-exceptionalist, full-blown eliminativist worldview. (shrink)

Metaphysical theories are beautiful. At the end of this book, Jiri Benovsky defends the view that metaphysical theories possess aesthetic properties and that these play a crucial role when it comes to theory evaluation and theory choice.Before we get there, the philosophical path the author proposes to follow starts with three discussions of metaphysical equivalence. Benovsky argues that there are cases of metaphysical equivalence, cases of partial metaphysical equivalence, as well as interesting cases of theories that are not equivalent. Thus, (...) claims of metaphysical equivalence can only be raised locally. The slogan is: the best way to do meta-metaphysics is to do first-level metaphysics.To do this work, Benovsky focuses on the nature of primitives and on the role they play in each of the theories involved. He emphasizes the utmost importance of primitives in the construction of metaphysical theories and in the subsequent evaluation of them.He then raises the simple but complicated question: how to make a choice between competing metaphysical theories? If two theories are equivalent, then perhaps we do not need to make a choice. But what about all the other cases of non-equivalent "equally good" theories? Benovsky uses some of the theories discussed in the first part of the book as examples and examines some traditional meta-theoretical criteria for theory choice (various kinds of simplicity, compatibility with physics, compatibility with intuitions, explanatory power, internal consistency,...) only to show that they do not allow us to make a choice.But if the standard meta-theoretical criteria cannot help us in deciding between competing non-equivalent metaphysical theories, how then shall we make that choice? This is where Benovsky argues that metaphysical theories possess aesthetic properties – grounded in non-aesthetic properties – and that these play a crucial role in theory choice and evaluation. This view, as well as all the meta-metaphysical considerations discussed throughout the book, then naturally lead the author to a form of anti-realism, and at the end of the journey he offers reasons to think better of the kind of anti-realist view he proposes to embrace. www.jiribenovsky.org. (shrink)

Metaphysical theories are often counter‐intuitive. But they also often are strongly supported and motivated by intuitions. One way or another, the link between intuitions and metaphysics is a strong and important one, and there is hardly any metaphysical discussion where intuitions do not play a crucial role. In this article, I will be interested in a particular kind of such intuitions, namely those that come, at least partly, from experience. There seems to be a route from experience to metaphysics, and (...) this is the core of my interest here. In order to better understand such ‘arguments from experience’ and the kind of relationship there is between this type of intuitions and metaphysical theories, I shall examine four particular cases where a kind of experience‐based intuition seems to motivate or support a metaphysical theory. At the end of the day, I shall argue that this route is a treacherous one, and that in all of the four cases I shall concentrate on, phenomenological considerations are in fact orthogonal to the allegedly ‘corresponding’ metaphysical claims. An anti‐realist view of metaphysics will emerge. (shrink)

A bare individual was conceived by Tichý as an individual such as if the property the individual instantiates is non-trivial , it is possible for the individual to lack it ; and for any trivial property that it cannot lack this kind of property. The exact readings of Tichý’s original formulations of are subjected to a detailed analysis to reveal that any of them is refutable by means of Cmorejian objection that there exist contingent properties which are partly essential . (...) To avoid such objection, the present paper attempts to rebuild Tichý’s definitions into viable ones. (shrink)

Model-theoretic concepts of saturation and categoricity are studied in the context of accessible categories. Accessible categories which are categorical in a strong sense are related to categories of $M$-sets ($M$ is a monoid). Typical examples of such categories are categories of $\lambda$-saturated objects.

The successful early acquisition of reading literacy represents a crucial learning process determining the further course of academic development (Stanovich, 2009). During this process, interactions between children and their proximal social environment are of utmost importance. Therefore, we introduce a systemic framework for the development of learning potential (e.g., Mudrak et al., 2015, 2019, 2019b; Ziegler & Stoeger, 2017) and explore the interactions between the social and motivational processes associated with reading literacy development in school-age children. We base our analysis (...) on a representative Czech sample of fourth-grade pupils involved in the Progress in International Reading Literacy study (PIRLS, Martin et al., 2016). On the basis of the systemic framework, we hypothesized hierarchical relationships among family socioeconomic status, related developmental resources (including parental support, expectations, and reading resources), children’s reading motivation (including reading engagement and reading confidence), and manifested learning outcomes (including school grades and reading competence). We implemented three structural equation models to test the hypothesized relationships. The first model tested the direct effect of developmental resources on reading competence. The second model included the motivational variables as mediators between resources and competence. The third model included school grades as mediators between resources and motivational variables. Our analyses indicated the good fit of the proposed models. The final model explained 37.8 % of the variance in children’s school grades and 46.5 % of the variance in reading literacy test scores (compared to 34.8 % in the first model). Moreover, parental socioeconomic status was strongly associated with parental expectations, which were associated with reading confidence, partially through the effect of parental expectations on children’s school grades. Reading confidence was the main predictor of reading literacy within the model, followed by the direct effects of parental resources. The results illustrate complex processes through which the family environment affects the development of learning competencies such as reading literacy by providing children with the relevant social and material resources associated with their motivation and school outcomes. We discuss some of the reasons that these relationships may take place and consider their implications for educational practice. (shrink)

The eternalist endurantist and perdurantist theories of persistence through time come in various versions, namely the two versions of perdurantism: the worm view and the stage view , and the two versions of endurantism: indexicalism and adverbialism . Using as a starting point the instructive case of what is depicted by photographs, I will examine these four views, and compare them, with some interesting results. Notably, we will see that two traditional enemies—the perdurantist worm view and the endurantist theories—are more (...) like allies : they are much less different than what is usually thought, and some alleged points of central disagreement fall prey to closer scrutiny. The aim of this paper is to examine carefully all those points, and to call attention to the places where the real differences between these views lie. I will then turn to the perdurantist stage view, and claim that with respect to some central issues it is the view that is the most different from the other three, but that in some places the reason why it different is also the reason why it is less satisfactory. (shrink)

Tématem studie je hra jako antropologický, kulturní a estetický fenomén. Pojednává o Schillerově koncepci hry jako projevu lidské svobody a Huizingově pojetí herního jednání jako zdroji lidské kultury. Je též pokusem zhodnotit typologii her R. Cailloise a posoudit přínos Finkova a Gadamerova existenciálního a kosmologického pojetí hry. K analýze těchto teoretiků přidává typ herní aktivity, kterou představuje "zahrávání si" (s někým).

This open access book is about exploring interesting borderline cases of art. It discusses the cases of gustatory and olfactory artworks, proprioceptive artworks, intellectual artworks, as well as the vague limits between painting and photography. The book focuses on the author’s research about what counts as art and what does not, as well as on the nature of these limits. Overall, the author defends a very inclusive view, 'extending' the limits of art, and he argues for its virtues. Some of (...) the limits discussed concern our senses, some concern vagueness and fuzzy boundaries between different types of works of art, some concern the amount of human intention and intervention in the process of creation of an artwork, and some concern the border between art and science. In these various ways, by understanding better such borderline cases, Benovsky suggests that we get a better grip on an understanding of the nature of art. (shrink)

Un des problèmes persistants pour la philosophie pratique est de découvrir un procédé adéquat pour justifier des lois dont la finalité est de réguler le fonctionnement des démocraties constitutionnelles. Les libéraux partisans de la raison publique nient que cette justification puisse provenir de doctrines substantielles, étant donné que les lois doivent pouvoir être justifiées par tous les citoyens (raisonnables). La tradition de la loi naturelle offre un test utile quant à la plausibilité de cette thèse. L’article montre comment les deux (...) versions du libéralisme de la raison publique diffèrent quant à leur acceptation de raisons tirées du droit naturel, et pourquoi, étant donné l’influence de leurs points de départs disparates sur les critères normatifs par lesquels elles évaluent les lois, les partisans du droit naturel ont de bonnes raisons de les rejeter toutes les deux. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that (non-presentist) endurantism is incompatible with the view that properties are universals. I do so by putting forward a very simple objection that forces the endurantist to embrace tropes, rather than universals. I do not claim that this is bad news for the endurantist—trope theory seems to me by all means more appealing than universals—rather, I would like to see this result as a further motivation to embrace tropes. I then also put forward a (more (...) controversial) reason to believe that at least some versions of perdurantism also require tropes rather than universals. (shrink)

There are three main traditional accounts of vagueness : one takes it as a genuinely metaphysical phenomenon, one takes it as a phenomenon of ignorance, and one takes it as a linguistic or conceptual phenomenon. In this paper I first very briefly present these views, especially the epistemicist and supervaluationist strategies, and shortly point to some well-known problems that the views carry. I then examine a 'statistical epistemicist' account of vagueness that is designed to avoid precisely these problems – it (...) will be a view that provides an account of the phenomenon of vagueness as coming from our linguistic practices, while insisting that meaning supervenes on use, and that our use of vague terms does yield sharp and precise meanings, which we ignore, thus allowing bivalence to hold. (shrink)

Suppose that you travel back in time to talk to your younger self in order to tell her that she should have done some things in her life differently. Of course, you will not be able to make this plan work, we know that from the many versions of `the grandfather paradox' that populate the philosophical literature about time travel. What will be my centre of interest in this paper is the conversation between you and... you - i.e. the older (...) you that travelled back in time and the younger you, when you first meet. As we shall see, given this situation, endurantists will have to endorse a strange consequence of their view: you will turn out to be a universal while your properties will turn out to be particulars. (shrink)

How do ordinary objects persist through time and across possible worlds ? How do they manage to have their temporal and modal properties ? These are the questions adressed in this book which is a "guided tour of theories of persistence". The book is divided in two parts. In the first, the two traditional accounts of persistence through time (endurantism and perdurantism) are combined with presentism and eternalism to yield four different views, and their variants. The resulting views are then (...) examined in turn, in order to see which combinations are appealing and which are not. It is argued that the 'worm view' variant of eternalist perdurantism is superior to the other alternatives. In the second part of the book, the same strategy is applied to the combinations of views about persistence across possible worlds (trans-world identity, counterpart theory, modal perdurants) and views about the nature of worlds, mainly modal realism and abstractionism. Not only all the traditional and well-known views, but also some more original ones, are examined and their pros and cons are carefully weighted. Here again, it is argued that perdurance seems to be the best strategy available. (shrink)

The claim that the having of aesthetic properties supervenes on the having of non-aesthetic properties has been widely discussed and, in various ways, defended. In this paper, I will show that even if it is sometimes true that a supervenience relation holds between aesthetic properties and the 'subvenient' non-aesthetic ones, it is not the interesting relation in the neighbourhood. As we shall see, a richer, asymmetric and irreflexive relation is required, and I shall defend the claim that the more-and-more-popular relation (...) of grounding does a much better job than supervenience. (shrink)

The general recognition of the existence of atoms and molecules occurred only at the beginning of the twentieth century. Many researchers contributed to this, but the ultimate proof of the molecular nature of matter that convinced even the last sceptics was the confirmation of Albert Einstein’s statistical-fluctuation theory of Brownian motion, a part of his comprehension of interdisciplinary atomism, by Jean Perrin’s experiments on colloidal gamboge particles. Einstein noticed a difference between the values of Avogadro’s constant derived from Perrin’s experiments (...) and Planck’s calculation from black-body radiation. Einstein assumed the incorrectly evaluated size of the gamboge spherules to be a culprit of the difference and asked Perrin to check the assumption with additional experiments and using the viscosity formula introduced in his own dissertation. The result was a discrepancy that neither Einstein nor Perrin settled any further. In this communication, based on the survey of developments in colloid and polymer science and their comparison with relevant experiments, an explanation of the dilemma is given that now, after more than a century, proves Einstein correct. The comparison was de facto possible during his lifetime. (shrink)

When I say that I am a lot of things, I mean it literally and metaphysically speaking. The Self, or so I shall argue, is a plurality (notwithstanding the fact that ordinary language takes "the Self" to be a singular term – but, after all, language is only language). It is not a substance or a substratum, and it is not a collection or a bundle. The view I wish to advocate for is a kind of reductionism, in line with (...) some – but not all – broadly Humean ideas. In short, I will defend the view there are the experiences and mental states we have, and that's it: no additional substances, and no bundles. This does not mean, however, that there is no Self – the Self simply is the experiences. I will try to articulate and defend this view by showing that it can accommodate what I take to be the three main desiderata for any theory of the Self to satisfy: first, that the Self is the subject of experience (a subject of mental states, in general); second, that there is a unity to the Self in the sense that our (conscious, phenomenal) experience is at least partly continuous or 'stream-like'; and third, that we do not die when we go to sleep or when we otherwise don't have any (conscious, phenomenal) experiences. (shrink)

During the Czechoslovak normalization era (roughly from the 1970s to the 1980s), the Czech lawyer Vladimír Čermák, who later became a Justice of the newly established Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic after the breakdown of the Communist regime, authored a monumental piece called The Question of Democracy. Although this ambitious work has no equal in the Czech context, no attention has been paid to it in the English-speaking world. The present article aims to fill this gap by analyzing the (...) most original aspects of Čermák’s political thought. First, I present Greek tragedy, Plato, and Augustine as the main influences on his thought, which was further shaped by Čermák’s experience with the First Czechoslovak Republic and the Communist era. Second, I show that the most important category permeating all of his intellectual project is the principle of polarity, combined with the concept of polémos as derived from Greek tragedy. Third, I focus on the consensually anchored value order of society, which is created through an interplay between positive and negative forces. Čermák’s idea that all law must be measured against the value order has deeply influenced the value-based jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court. Finally, I position Čermák’s thought in the context of contemporary political theory, arguing that the contrast with the work of the radical political theorist Chantal Mouffe is particularly illuminating. Even though Čermák and Mouffe share a similar attitude to democracy—in that the primacy of strife renders universal rational consensus impossible—I maintain that Čermák’s theory, due to its emphasis on the categories of good and evil, can be more usefully described as “secular Augustinianism”. (shrink)

Abstrakt/Abstract Článek pojednává o buddhistické logice a jejím vztahu k logice aristotelské, zejména k principu sporu a principu vyloučeného třetího. Dotkne se také dialetheismu a parakonzistentních logik, které se v souvislosti s interpretacemi buddhismu objevují. The article deals with the Buddhist logic and its relation to Aristotle’s logic, in particular, to the principle of non-contradiction and the principle of exluded middle. It also tackles the topic of dialetheism and paraconsistent logics, which are sometimes mentioned in connection with the interpretations of (...) Buddhism. (shrink)

Dans ce livre sur les photographies, l'auteur defend l'idee que les photographies n'existent pas. En effet, pour le philosophe, la nature des photographies est assez evasive. Quel type d'entites sont-elles? Des objets materiels concrets comme des tirages papier? Des types abstraits qui peuvent etre instanties dans de nombreuses formes tres diverses (tirages, fichiers, images a l'ecran,...)? Nous allons voir qu'aucune categorie metaphysique traditionnelle ne parvient a rendre compte de la nature des photographies, et je soutiendrai alors la these que les (...) photographies n'existent pas. Mais qu'elles existent ou pas, les photographies soulevent un certain nombre de questions philosophiques importantes. En particulier, on peut se demander de quelle maniere une photographie represente le monde et en quoi la representation consiste. Nous allons voir que les photographies ont (ou peuvent avoir) un contenu narratif qui joue un role central dans la maniere dont elles representent. Nous allons egalement aborder le cas particulier de representation de la duree temporelle: une image statique, telle qu'une photographie, comment peut-elle representer un intervalle temporel non-instantane. (shrink)

Ordinary objects are vague, because either (i) composition is restricted, or (ii) there really are no such objects (but we still want to talk about them), or (iii) because such objects are not metaphysically (independently of us) distinguishable from other 'extra-ordinary' objects. In any sense in which there are ordinary objects, they are vague.

Analogy is taken into consideration by its didactive and heuristic functions. Analogic changes are analyzed in the form of syntactic-semantic graphs. Their recognizable structural similarity corresponds to the syntax or semantics in the analogy. The concept of analogy has subjective and objective aspects. The explanation in analogies is a dynamic transition from one concept structure to another. The possibility of analogy in the world is a statement about the disposition of the world. The possibility of analogy asserts something about the (...) behaviour of the environment. Analogy is considered as a means of explanation and a dynamic method of cognition. (shrink)

1. Směry, osobnosti, problémy -- 2. Biograficko-bibliografický slovník.

The article presents an overview concerning Heidegger's work and life, especially with respect to the contemporary state of publishing of his texts. The article aims at showing a continuity in Heidegger's Thinking of Being on one hand, but, on the other hand, stresses also necessity of a new assessment of his thought, if we take into consideration some recently published manuscripts (especially vol. 65 and 66). The necessity of a new assessment concerns also his personal standpoints during the time of (...) his rectorate in 1933-34. The new documents are presented in volume 16 (published in 2000). The author is convinced that Heidegger is a philosopher of our future. We are still waiting for a truly philosophical assessment and exploiting of his work. (shrink)

The article focuses on the problem of constitutional symbolism in functionally differentiated societies and its relevance to legal, political, and moral systems. The first part analyses differences between the three systems and their constitutional context. The second part concentrates on the moral symbolic function of modern constitutions and its temporal dimension. It shows that the “good/bad” moral code of constitutions draws on expressive symbolism and transforms it into evaluative symbolism and dogma of morality. The final part analyses the prospective character (...) of modern constitution‐making and its symbolic selectivity regarding the past. The paper concludes by emphasising the systemic pluralisation effect of constitution‐making and the impossibility of constituting systems of “pure” law, morality, and politics. (shrink)

This article reinterprets the Kelsen-Schmitt debate in the context of social systems theory and rethinks its major concepts as part of legal and political self-reference and systemic differentiation. In Kelsen?s case, it is the exclusion of sovereignty from juridical logic that opens a way to the self-reference of positive law. Similarly, Schmitt constructed his concept of the political as a self-referential system of political operations protected from the social environment by the medium of power. The author argues that the process (...) of legal and political globalisation rules out the possibility of formulating substantive theories of the state associating this particular social organisation with metaphysical values and a self-validating collective identity. Kelsen and Schmitt continue to inspire current theories of non-metaphysical globalised law and politics. However, the constitutional state and sovereignty need to be reformulated as a meeting point of functionally differentiated and globalised legal and political communications and not as their ultimate end. (shrink)

The problem of hyperintensional contexts, and the problem of logical omniscience, shows the severe limitation of possible-worlds semantics which is employed also in standard epistemic logic. As a solution, we deploy here hyperintensional semantics according to which the meaning of an expression is an abstract structured algorithm, namely Tichý's construction. Constructions determine the denotata of expressions. Propositional attitudes are modelled as attitudes towards constructions of truth values. Such a model of belief is, of course, inferentially restrictive. We therefore also propose (...) a model of implicit knowledge, which is the collection of a possible agent's explicit beliefs which are related through a derivation system mastered by the agent. A derivation system consists of beliefs and derivation rules by means of which the agent may derive beliefs different from the beliefs she is actually related to. Conditions imposed on the set of base beliefs and the set of rules capture the limitations of the agent's deriving capabilities. (shrink)

Zatímco v případě otázek rigidity singulárních termínů panuje obecná shoda, v případě rigidity predikátů tomu tak překvapivě není. Záměrem této statě je opřít distinkci rigidní / nerigidní o jasné pojmy, jmenovitě o pojem reference v určité sémantické teorii. V důsledku toho lze podat rigorózní definici pojmu rigidního designátoru individua. Tato definice je pak přímočaře adaptovatelná pro případ pojmu rigidního designátoru třídy individuí (apod.). Tímto je dosaženo nejen obecnosti, ale i vnitřní jednoty teorie rigidity.

Book review on Jakub Jinek, Platón a problém filosofické vlády. Politické myšlení v dialogu Zákony. Praha (Oikúmené) 2021, 302 str.

Studie je pokusem o zhodnocení klasického filosofického pojetí smíchu. Bergson a jeho předchůdci (Hobbes, Stendhal, Baudelaire) jej zvažovali jako výraz a způsob zakoušení nadřazenosti: smích jako výsměch. Ve srovnání s nimi Karel Kosík odkazuje k dalším antropologickým významům. V této studii se poukazuje k rozmanitosti varietních podob tohoto fenoménu a specifickým možnostem estetické distance v těchto případech.

If S, T are stationary subsets of a regular uncountable cardinal κ, we say that S reflects fully in $T, S , if for almost all α ∈ T (except a nonstationary set) S ∩ α is stationary in α. This relation is known to be a well-founded partial ordering. We say that a given poset P is realized by the reflection ordering if there is a maximal antichain $\langle X_p; p \in P\rangle$ of stationary subsets of $\operatorname{Reg}(\kappa)$ so that (...) $\forall p, q \in P \forall S \subseteq X_p, T \subseteq X_q \text{stationary}: (S We prove that if $V = L\lbrack\overset{\rightarrow\mathscr{U}}\rbrack, o^\mathscr{U} (\kappa) = \kappa^{++}$ , and P is an arbitrary well-founded poset of cardinality ≤ κ + then there is a generic extension where P is realized by the reflection ordering on κ. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore the nature of photographs by comparing them to hand-made paintings, as well as by comparing traditional film photography with digital photography, and I concentrate on the question of realism. Several different notions can be distinguished here. Are photographs such that they depict the world in a 'realist' or a 'factive' way ? Do they show us the world as it is with accuracy and reliability other types of pictures don't posses ? Do they allow us, (...) as some have suggested, to literally see the world through them ? Below, I will distinguish three kinds of realism about photographs, reject two, and partly endorse one. Indeed, the label "realism", when concerning photographs, can stand for a variety of very different claims. The first (and quite obvious) distinction to start with concerns what the realist thesis is about : the claim that somehow photographs are more accurate or more reliable or that they somehow depict the world better than hand-made pictures can be a claim about the photographic image itself or alternatively a claim about the way in which photographs are produced. In the former case, realism is a thesis about how photographs look and what sort of information they contain, while in the latter case realism is a claim about the process of production of photographs. It is the latter claim that is the most discussed in the philosophical literature about photography. I will concentrate on this type of realism, of which I shall examine two varieties. (shrink)

Is the self a substance, as Descartes thought, or is it 'only' a bundle of perceptions, as Hume thought ? In this paper I will examine these two views, especially with respect to two central features that have played a central role in the discussion, both of which can be quickly and usefully explained if one puts them as an objection to the bundle view. First, friends of the substance view have insisted that only if one conceives of the self (...) as a substance is it possible to account for genuine particularity of selves and genuine persistence through time of them. I will discuss in detail this claim as well as a special case of persistence - the case of a fission of a self - and I will ask, as Shoemaker (1997) did, how such a case can be handled by the two competing theories. The second central point of traditional disagreement concerns independence : it is often said that only a substance, but not a mere bundle, is independent enough of its properties to play properly the role of a self, and I will have something to say about this. Concerning all these points, my thesis will be a meta-theoretical one : contrary to appearances, both views can accommodate all of them (particularity at a time, persistence, fission, independence) in the same way, and I will examine two possible conclusions to be drawn from this : either that the differences between the two views are no more than terminological and that they turn out to be equivalent views, or that the differences are metaphysical but that it is epistemically under-determined which one of the views we should choose. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore several versions of the bundle theory and the substratum theory and compare them, with the surprising result that it seems to be true that they are equivalent (in a sense of 'equivalent' to be specified). In order to see whether this is correct or not, I go through several steps : first, I examine different versions of the bundle theory with tropes and compare them to the substratum theory with tropes by going through various standard (...) objections and arguing for a tu quoque in all cases. Emphasizing the theoretical role of the substratum and of the relation of compresence, I defend the claim that these views are equivalent for all theoretical purposes. I then examine two different versions of the bundle theory with universals, and show that one of them is, here again, equivalent to the substratum theory with universals, by examining how both views face the famous objection from Identity of Indiscernibles in a completely parallel way. It is only the second, quite extreme and puzzling, version of the bundle theory with universals that is not be equivalent to any other view; and the diagnosis of why this is so will show just how unpalatable the view is. Similarly, only a not-so-palatable version of the substratum theory is genuinely different from the other views; and here again it's precisely what makes it different that makes it less appealing. (shrink)