display all the ideas for this combination of texts
11 ideas
| 11900 | We can accept criteria of distinctness and persistence, without making the counterfactual claims [Mackie,P on Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: We might agree with Wiggins's theory of individuation, but reject his thesis that a thing's principle of individuation (of distinctness and persistence) must be preserved in all counterfactual situations. | |
| From: comment on David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001]) by Penelope Mackie - How Things Might Have Been 8.7 | |
| A reaction: I'm not even convinced that initial individuation consists of falling under a sortal, and I prefer to discuss the powers of the thing, rather than counterfactual facts about behaviour. |
| 11870 | Activity individuates natural things, functions do artefacts, and intentions do artworks [Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: What a principle of activity does completely for a natural thing, and the function does imperfectly for an ordinary artefact, the artist's conception of his own making of the work must do for the painting. | |
| From: David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001], 4.12) | |
| A reaction: This nicely sums up Wiggins on individuation, and he seems to effectively elide individuation with essence. I certainly feel uneasy that a work of art needs a quite separate account from other artefacts. Surely it is just that we are fussier about them? |
| 11866 | The idea of 'thisness' is better expressed with designation/predication and particular/universal [Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: It is hard to think of anything true and significant that could not be said using the idea of thisness not better said while respectiving the distinctions designation/predication and particular/universal. | |
| From: David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001], 4.7) | |
| A reaction: Politis calls 'thisness' the 'ultimate subject of predication', so it is covered in logic by the name for an object. But we need to understand objects, and not just refer to them, and I'm not sure that 'universals' advance our understanding. |
| 11896 | A sortal essence is a thing's principle of individuation [Wiggins, by Mackie,P] |
| Full Idea: Wiggins bases sortal essentialism on the notion that a thing's principle of individuation is essential to it. | |
| From: report of David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001]) by Penelope Mackie - How Things Might Have Been 7.1 | |
| A reaction: This idea has failed to make much impression on me. I seem to be the only person who doesn't understand the concept of 'individuation'. Please let me know exactly what it means. Type individuation is not individual individuation, I presume. |
| 15835 | Wiggins's sortal essentialism rests on a thing's principle of individuation [Wiggins, by Mackie,P] |
| Full Idea: Wiggins bases sortal essentialism on the notion that a thing's principle of individuation is essential to it. | |
| From: report of David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001]) by Penelope Mackie - How Things Might Have Been 7.1 | |
| A reaction: My problem with this is that individuation is a human activity, not an intrinsic feature of the entities in the external world. Entities presumably have a 'unity', but I'm not sure about a 'principle' that does that job, though Aristotle is sympathetic. |
| 11841 | The evening star is the same planet but not the same star as the morning star, since it is not a star [Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: The evening star is the same planet but not the same star as the morning star. For Venus is not a star. | |
| From: David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: This is a nice objection to the idea that identity is entirely a matter of falling under the same sortal category. |
| 10679 | 'Sortalism' says parts only compose a whole if it falls under a sort or kind [Wiggins, by Hossack] |
| Full Idea: 'Sortalism' endorses the view that some things have parts, but denies that every collection of things composes something. Whenever there is a particular, there must be a sort or kind to which it belongs. | |
| From: report of David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001]) by Keith Hossack - Plurals and Complexes 7 | |
| A reaction: What is the status of 'the first of its kind'? This seems to say that a token only has identity if it has type-identity. This sounds wildly wrong to me. I've made a 'thing' for you, but I haven't decided what it is yet. |
| 14363 | Identity a=b is only possible with some concept to give persistence and existence conditions [Wiggins, by Strawson,P] |
| Full Idea: Wiggins says an identity a=b stands no chance of being true unless there is some concept f under which a falls and under which b falls, which 'determines identity, persistence and existence conditions for members of its extension'. | |
| From: report of David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001]) by Peter F. Strawson - Review of 'Sameness and Substance' p.604 | |
| A reaction: This is the first clear statement I have met of Wiggins's central idea, upon which his sortal essentialism is built. Strawson's exposition adds that each thing necessarily falls under the 'highest' appropriate sortal ('dog', rather than 'terrier'). |
| 14364 | A thing is necessarily its highest sortal kind, which entails an essential constitution [Wiggins, by Strawson,P] |
| Full Idea: In Wiggins's theory, necessity carries over from the kind to constitution. If Toby is necessarily a dog and 'dog' is a natural kind term, then Toby necessarily has the constitution of a dog, the features of which make up the real essence of being a dog. | |
| From: report of David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001]) by Peter F. Strawson - Review of 'Sameness and Substance' p.605 | |
| A reaction: The essence will then presumably consist of all and only the characteristics which are shared by all dogs whatsoever. So how do you decide the borderline between wolf and dog? Why isn't a wolf a dog? |
| 11851 | Many predicates are purely generic, or pure determiners, rather than sortals [Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: There are countless predicates in English that have the appearance of sortal predicates but are purely generic (animal, machine, artefact), or are pure determinables for sortal determination (space-occupier, entity, substance). | |
| From: David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001], 2.6) | |
| A reaction: This is preparing the ground for a specification of a sortal which defines something essential as being the hallmark of identity. It is never quite clear to me whether Wiggins's case rests on a nominal or a real essence. |
| 11865 | The possibility of a property needs an essential sortal concept to conceive it [Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: A thing could have a property only if its having the property could be conceived, and that requires some sortal concept which adequately answers the Aristotelian question what the thing is. | |
| From: David Wiggins (Sameness and Substance Renewed [2001], 4.5) | |
| A reaction: [Algebra omitted!] The core idea of Wiggins's theory. It seems at first glance to be a revival of Aristotelian essentialism, but his view of that seems to merely involve falling into a category. He treats sortal concepts as Aristotle's 'primary being'. |