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    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that Armstrong's partial identity requires that universals have genuine mereological parts, but universals are traditionally simple, non-composite entities.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
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    • 1.Universals can be multiply located without having spatiotemporal parts; location is a non-mereological relation between abstract entities and particulars.
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    • 2.Positing mereological parts in universals creates regress problems: do those parts themselves have parts, and do universals remain genuinely universal?
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    • 3.Simplicity has been central to universals theory precisely because it explains their transcendence of particular instances without material composition.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
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    • 1.Armstrong's partial identity theory requires universals to have spatiotemporal parts corresponding to their instantiations in different particulars.
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    • 2.If universals lack mereological structure, partial identity becomes unintelligible—we cannot explain how the same universal exists in multiple locations.
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    • 3.The traditional simplicity thesis conflicts with empirical adequacy; structured universals better explain how properties relate to their instances.
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