Single Idea 20826

[catalogued under 9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 8. Parts of Objects / c. Wholes from parts]

Full Idea

How could one avoid the inconsistency of saying that adjacent objects that can easily be separated are all the same united with each other, being coherent and never able o be separated from each other without division?

Gist of Idea

How is separateness possible, if separated things are always said to be united?

Source

comment on Stoic school (fragments/reports [c.200 BCE]) by Alexander - On Mixture 2.2

Book Reference

'The Stoics Reader', ed/tr. Inwood,B/Gerson,L.P. [Hackett 2008], p.96


A Reaction

In general my sympathies are with Alexander on this. If you abandon all principles of unity apart from unrestricted mereological composition, you save yourself a lot of bother, but you abandon the most useful concepts in ontology.