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Property (philosophy)
In logic and philosophy (especially metaphysics), a property is a characteristic of an object; a red object
is said to have the property of redness. The property may be considered a form of object in its own right,
able to possess other properties. A property, however, differs from individual objects in that it may be
instantiated, and often in more than one thing. It differs from the logical/mathematical concept of class
by not having any concept of extensionality, and from the philosophical concept of class in that a
property is considered to be distinct from the objects which possess it. Understanding how different
individual entities (or particulars) can in some sense have some of the same properties is the basis of the
problem of universals.
Contents
Metaphysical debates
Realism vs. anti-realism
Categoricalism vs. dispositionalism
Physicalism, idealism, and property dualism
Essential and accidental properties
Determinate and determinable properties
Lovely and suspect qualities
Properties and predicates
Intrinsic and extrinsic properties
Relations
See also
References
External links
Metaphysical debates
In modern analytic philosophy there are several debates about the fundamental nature of properties.
These center around questions such as: Are properties real? Are they categorical or dispositional? Are
properties physical or mental?
A realist about properties asserts that properties have genuine existence.[1] One way to spell this out is in
terms of exact, repeatable, instantiations known as universals. The other realist position asserts that
properties are particulars (tropes), which are unique instantiations in individual objects that merely
resemble one another to various degrees.
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The anti-realist position, often referred to as nominalism claims that properties are names we attach to
particulars. The properties themselves have no existence.
According to the categoricalist, dispositions reduce to causal bases.[2] The fragility of a wine glass, for
example, is not a property that exists in the glass. Rather it can be explained by the categorical property
of the glass's micro-structural composition.
Dispositionalism, in turn, asserts that a property is nothing more than a set of causal powers.[3] Fragility,
according to this view, identifies a real property of the glass (e.g. to shatter when dropped on a
sufficiently hard surface).
Several intermediary positions exist.[4] The Identity view that states that properties are both
categorical(qualitative) and dispositional, they are just two ways of viewing the same property. One
hybrid view claims that some properties are categorical and some are dispositional. A second hybrid view
claims that properties have both a categorical(qualitative) and dispositional part, but that these are
distinct ontological parts.
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A property may be classified as either determinate or determinable. A determinable property is one that
can get more specific. For example, color is a determinable property because it can be restricted to
redness, blueness, etc.[7] A determinant property is one that cannot become more specific. This
distinction may be useful in dealing with issues of identity.[8]
Relations
The distinction between properties and relations can hardly be given in terms that do not ultimately
presuppose it.[11]
Relations are true of several particulars, or shared amongst them. Thus the relation "... is taller than ..."
holds "between" two individuals, who would occupy the two ellipses ('...'). Relations can be expressed by
N-place predicates, where N is greater than 1.
There are at least some apparent relational properties which are merely derived from non-relational (or
1-place) properties. For instance "A is heavier than B" is a relational predicate, but it is derived from the
two non relational properties: the mass of A and the mass of B. Such relations are called external
relations, as opposed to the more genuine internal relations.[12] Some philosophers believe that all
relations are external, leading to a scepticism about relations in general, on the basis that external
relations have no fundamental existence.
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See also
Abstraction
Doctrine of internal relations
Identity of indiscernibles (or "Leibniz's law")
Intension
References
1. "Properties" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/properties/#DisTer). The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. 2017.
2. "Properties" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/properties/#CatProVsCauPow). The Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. 2017.
3. "Dispositions" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dispositions/#CatDisLawNat). The Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. 2018.
4. "Dispositions" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dispositions/#CatDisLawNat). The Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. 2018.
5. "Physicalism" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/physicalism/). The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. 2017.
6. "Idealism" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/idealism/#Int). The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. 2018.
7. Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy Determinate and Determinable Properties (http://plato.stanfor
d.edu/entries/determinate-determinables/)
8. Georges Dicker (1998). Hume's Epistemology & Metaphysics. Routledge. p. 31.
9. "Lovely and Suspect Qualities" (http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/dennett/papers/lovely&s.htm). Retrieved
3 August 2016.
10. Nelson, Michael (1 January 2012). Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
(http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2012/entries/existence/). Retrieved 3 August 2016 – via
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
11. MacBride, Fraser. "Relations" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/relations/). In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.).
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
12. G. E. Moore (December 15, 1919), "External and Internal Relations" (http://hume.ucdavis.edu/matte
y/phi156/moore.pdf)
External links
Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). "Properties" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/properties/). Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
MacBride, Fraser. "Relations" (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/relations/). In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.).
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
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