more on this theme | more from this thinker
Full Idea
A satisfying account of relations must be ontologically serious. This means refusing to rest content with abstract specifications of relations as sets of ordered n-tuples.
Gist of Idea
We want the ontology of relations, not just a formal way of specifying them
Source
John Heil (Relations [2009], Intro)
Book Ref
'Routledge Companion to Metaphysics', ed/tr. Le Poidevin/Simons etc [Routledge 2012], p.310
A Reaction
A set of ordered entities would give the extension of a relation, which wouldn't, among other things, explain co-extensive relations (if all the people to my left were also taller than me). Heil's is a general cry from the heart about formal philosophy.
| 21339 | We want the ontology of relations, not just a formal way of specifying them [Heil] |
| 21351 | Truthmaking is a clear example of an internal relation [Heil] |
| 21350 | If properties are powers, then causal relations are internal relations [Heil] |
| 21344 | If R internally relates a and b, and you have a and b, you thereby have R [Heil] |
| 21349 | Two people are indirectly related by height; the direct relation is internal, between properties [Heil] |
| 21348 | In the case of 5 and 6, their relational truthmaker is just the numbers [Heil] |
| 21340 | Maybe all the other features of the world can be reduced to relations [Heil] |