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Ideas for 'Science and Method', 'Principles of Nature and Grace based on Reason' and 'Essential vs Accidental Properties'

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4 ideas

9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 2. Hylomorphism / a. Hylomorphism
10938 The extremes of essentialism are that all properties are essential, or only very trivial ones [Rami]
     Full Idea: It would be natural to label one extreme view 'maximal essentialism' - that all of an object's properties are essential - and the other extreme 'minimal' - that only trivial properties such as self-identity of being either F or not-F are essential.
     From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008])
     A reaction: Personally I don't accept the trivial ones as being in any way describable as 'properties'. The maximal view destroys any useful notion of essence. Leibniz is a minority holder of the maximal view. I would defend a middle way.
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 3. Individual Essences
10940 An 'individual essence' is possessed uniquely by a particular object [Rami]
     Full Idea: An 'individual essence' is a property that in addition to being essential is also unique to the object, in the sense that it is not possible that something distinct from that object possesses that property.
     From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §5)
     A reaction: She cites a 'haecceity' (or mere bare identity) as a trivial example of an individual essence.
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 5. Essence as Kind
10939 'Sortal essentialism' says being a particular kind is what is essential [Rami]
     Full Idea: According to 'sortal essentialism', an object could not have been of a radically different kind than it in fact is.
     From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §4)
     A reaction: This strikes me as thoroughly wrong. Things belong in kinds because of their properties. Could you remove all the contingent features of a tiger, leaving it as merely 'a tiger', despite being totally unrecognisable?
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 7. Essence and Necessity / b. Essence not necessities
10934 Unlosable properties are not the same as essential properties [Rami]
     Full Idea: It is easy to confuse the notion of an essential property that a thing could not lack, with a property it could not lose. My having spent Christmas 2007 in Tennessee is a non-essential property I could not lose.
     From: Adolph Rami (Essential vs Accidental Properties [2008], §1)
     A reaction: The idea that having spent Christmas in Tennessee is a property I find quite bewildering. Is my not having spent my Christmas in Tennessee one of my properties? I suspect that real unlosable properties are essential ones.