Combining Texts

Ideas for 'Individuals without Sortals', 'The Principles of Mathematics' and 'Meaning and the Moral Sciences'

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4 ideas

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 1. Unifying an Object / a. Intrinsic unification

17517	Could the same matter have more than one form or principle of unity? [Ayers]
	Full Idea: The abstract question arises of whether the same matter could be subject to more than one principle of unity simultaneously, or unified by more than one 'form'.
	From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Realist' vii)
	A reaction: He suggests that the unity of the sweater is destroyed by unravelling, and the unity of the thread by cutting.

14164	The only unities are simples, or wholes composed of parts [Russell]
	Full Idea: The only kind of unity to which I can attach any precise sense - apart from the unity of the absolutely simple - is that of a whole composed of parts.
	From: Bertrand Russell (The Principles of Mathematics [1903], §439)
	A reaction: This comes from a keen student of Leibniz, who was obsessed with unity. Russell leaves unaddressed the question of what turns some parts into a whole.

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 1. Unifying an Object / b. Unifying aggregates

14112	A set has some sort of unity, but not enough to be a 'whole' [Russell]
	Full Idea: In a class as many, the component terms, though they have some kind of unity, have less than is required for a whole.
	From: Bertrand Russell (The Principles of Mathematics [1903], §070)
	A reaction: This is interesting because (among many other things), sets are used to stand for numbers, but numbers are usually reqarded as wholes.

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 3. Unity Problems / c. Statue and clay

17513	If there are two objects, then 'that marble, man-shaped object' is ambiguous [Ayers]
	Full Idea: The statue is marble and man-shaped, but so is the piece of marble. So not only are the two objects in the same place, but two marble and man-shaped objects in the same place, so 'that marble, man-shaped object' must be ambiguous or indefinite.
	From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Prob')
	A reaction: It strikes me as basic that it can't be a piece of marble if you subtract its shape, and it can't be a statue if you subtract its matter. To treat a statue as an object, separately from its matter, is absurd.