7024
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Properties are universals, which are always instantiated [Armstrong, by Heil]
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Full Idea:
Armstrong takes properties to be universals, and believes there are no 'uninstantiated' universals.
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From:
report of David M. Armstrong (A Theory of Universals [1978]) by John Heil - From an Ontological Point of View §9.3
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A reaction:
At first glance this, like many theories of universals, seems to invite Ockham's Razor. If they are always instantiated, perhaps we should perhaps just try to talk about the instantiations (i.e. tropes), and skip the universal?
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9478
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Even if all properties are categorical, they may be denoted by dispositional predicates [Armstrong, by Bird]
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Full Idea:
Armstrong says all properties are categorical, but a dispositional predicate may denote such a property; the dispositional predicate denotes the categorical property in virtue of the dispositional role it happens, contingently, to play in this world.
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From:
report of David M. Armstrong (A Theory of Universals [1978]) by Alexander Bird - Nature's Metaphysics 3.1
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A reaction:
I favour the fundamentality of the dispositional rather than the categorical. The world consists of powers, and we find ourselves amidst their categorical expressions. I could be persuaded otherwise, though!
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18431
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Internal relations combine some tropes into a nucleus, which bears the non-essential tropes [Simons, by Edwards]
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Full Idea:
Simons's 'nuclear' option blends features of the substratum and bundle theories. First we have tropes collected by virtue of their internal relations, forming the essential kernel or nucleus. This nucleus then bears the non-essential tropes.
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From:
report of Peter Simons (Particulars in Particular Clothing [1994], p.567) by Douglas Edwards - Properties 3.5
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A reaction:
[compression of Edwards's summary] This strikes me as being a remarkably good theory. I am not sure of the ontological status of properties, such that they can (unaided) combine to make part of an object. What binds the non-essentials?
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