Wright, Briggs Marvin;
(2004)
Do things persist?
Masters thesis (M.Phil), UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
Mereological essentialism - the doctrine that an object cannot survive the loss or gain of a part - is a much-maligned and largely disregarded view about the persistence of material objects. I aim to shore up plausibility for mereological essentialism. This is a three-fold task. I first explore the composition relation - the relation that holds between a composite material objects and its parts. I conclude that the standard account of material objects - which holds that there can be more than one material object to a place at a time - is false. I then explore how implausibility affects the various theories of persistence. Implausibility is the primary criticism of mereological essentialism, and I show that all theories of persistence are affected to some extent by implausibility. However, this fact need not grant mereological essentialism any plausibility. Some will argue that mereological essentialism is so outrageous it cannot be considered as a live candidate amongst theories of persistence. To these critics I introduce the paradox of increase. The paradox of increase presents a clear case in favor of mereological essentialism. The only way to escape the paradox is either to accept that mereological essentialism is true or to make some rather (perhaps more) spectacular claims about objects and the nature of change. While mereological essentialism may benefit from the paradox of increase, there is still much to do in the way of accommodating mereological essentialism with the nature of thinking about objects and ourselves. I conclude by laying the foundation for that work. In the end, this thesis not only shows that mereological essentialism is not absurd, but also that it is a genuine, tenable option amongst theories of persistence.
| Type: | Thesis (Masters) |
|---|---|
| Qualification: | M.Phil |
| Title: | Do things persist? |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Thesis digitised by ProQuest. |
| Keywords: | Philosophy, religion and theology |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10105777 |
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