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Full Idea
The 'magical' conception of structural universals says 'simple' must be distinguished from 'atomic'. A structural universal is never simple; it involves other, simpler, universals, but it is mereologically atomic. The other universals are not its parts.
Gist of Idea
The 'magical' view of structural universals says they are atoms, even though they have parts
Source
David Lewis (Against Structural Universals [1986], 'The magical')
Book Ref
Lewis,David: 'Papers in Metaphysics and Epistemology' [CUP 1999], p.100
A Reaction
Hence the 'magic' is for it to be an indissoluble unity, while acknowledging that it has parts. Personally I don't see much problem with this view, since universals already perform the magical feat of being 'instantiated', whatever that means.
Related Idea
Idea 15449 If 'methane' is an atomic structural universal, it has nothing to connect it to its carbon universals [Lewis]
| 15465 | Structures don't explain dispositions, because they consist of dispositions [Martin,CB] |
| 15476 | Structural properties involve dispositionality, so cannot be used to explain it [Martin,CB] |
| 12685 | Categorical properties depend only on the structures they represent [Ellis] |
| 15800 | All events and objects are dispositional, and hence all structural properties are dispositional [Fetzer] |
| 15452 | We could not uphold a truthmaker for 'Fa' without structures [Lewis] |
| 15448 | The 'magical' view of structural universals says they are atoms, even though they have parts [Lewis] |
| 15449 | If 'methane' is an atomic structural universal, it has nothing to connect it to its carbon universals [Lewis] |
| 15439 | The 'pictorial' view of structural universals says they are wholes made of universals as parts [Lewis] |
| 15441 | The structural universal 'methane' needs the universal 'hydrogen' four times over [Lewis] |
| 15445 | Butane and Isobutane have the same atoms, but different structures [Lewis] |
| 15434 | Structural universals have a necessary connection to the universals forming its parts [Lewis] |
| 15437 | We can't get rid of structural universals if there are no simple universals [Lewis] |
| 11917 | Structural properties are derivate properties [Molnar] |
| 11955 | There are no 'structural properties', as properties with parts [Molnar] |
| 14535 | Pandispositionalists say structures are clusters of causal powers [Mumford/Anjum] |