How Many Angels Can Dance On The Point of A Needle?

How Many Angels Can Dance on the
Point of a Needle? Transcendental

Theology Meets Modal Metaphysics
John Hawthorne
Magdalen College, Oxford, OX1 4AU, United Kingdom
Downloaded from http://mind.oxfordjournals.org/ at Duke University on May 6, 2012

john.hawthorne@philosophy.ox.ac.uk
Gabriel Uzquiano
Pembroke College, Oxford, OX1 1DW, United Kingdom
We argue that certain modal questions raise serious problems for a modal meta-
physics on which we are permitted to quantify unrestrictedly over all possibilia.
In particular, we argue that, on reasonable assumptions, both David Lewis’s modal
realism and Timothy Williamson’s necessitism are saddled with the remarkable
conclusion that there is some cardinal number of the form @ such that there
could not be more than @-many angels in existence. In the last section, we
make use of similar ideas to draw a moral for a recent debate in meta-ontology.
In this paper we aim to shed light on an undeservedly disparaged

metaphysical question, one often used to parody medieval scholastics:
How many angels can dance on the point of a needle?1 It is not clear
that many scholastics were guilty of devoting time to this question.
There appears to be no discussion of this question in the work of
Thomas Aquinas, whose attempt to work out the nature of angels by
pure reason earned him the title of Angelic Doctor. In any case, there is
nothing for them to have felt guilty about. We think that there is much
to be learned from a proper assessment of this question. Modern com-
mentators have the advantage of the tools provided by contemporary
set theory, which was unavailable to scholastic commentators from
1
One source is D’Israeli (1875, p. 18), who writes:
The reader desirous of being merry with Aquinas’s angels may find them in Martinus
Scriblerus, in Ch VII who inquires if angels pass from one extreme to another without
going through the middle? And if angels know things more clearly in a morning? How
many angels can dance on the point of a very fine needle, without jostling one another?
Some earlier references to this question in the seventeenth century can be found in Sylla
2005.
Mind, Vol. 120 . 477 . January 2011 ß Hawthorne and Uzquiano 2011
doi:10.1093/mind/fzr004 Advance Access publication 13 April 2011
54 John Hawthorne and Gabriel Uzquiano
antiquity. Our results will not merely be of theological interest. It turns

out that coincident angels raise potentially damning problems for some
of the most prominent metaphysics of modality.
1. Preliminaries
First, some scene setting. To forestall any suspicion of heresy, we
embrace the possible existence (and indeed actual existence) of
angels. On location issues, there have been many opinions. We state
our own, though here is not the place to defend them at length.

To begin, we maintain that angels can literally occupy places — in
just the same sense that bodies can. Admittedly, this has been chal-
lenged by Boethius and many learned scholars who maintain that ‘in-
corporeal things do not exist in a place’.2 Yet we are partly encouraged
in our opinion by the Angelic Doctor, who rightly insists that ‘it is
befitting an angel to exist in a place’ (Aquinas, 1948, part I, q. 52, art. 1).
Is occupation of an place by an angel a primitive fact? Or else is it
parasitic on the application of angelic power to a place?3 Here we tend
towards the former view, this time in defiance of the Angelic Doctor,
who follows the Damascene in the latter opinion, and is led to think
that angels do not occupy places in the same sense as bodies can.
We agree with the Angelic Doctor that angels can lack positive
dimensive quantity. However, while he holds that while Angels fall
outside the genus of dimensive quantity, we hold that they can have
zero dimensive quantity, thus embracing a view he dismisses as mani-
fest deception, namely that the indivisibility of angels is like that of a
point. Given our conception of the dimensive quantities of angels, we
conclude that — perhaps excepting special cases of bilocation — angels
can occupy a single point at any given time. Finally, we assume that it
is possible for more than one angel to occupy a single point at the
same time. The Angelic Doctor has denied this on the grounds that an
angel is present in its place by its effects and that two things cannot be
immediate causes of one and the same thing. We answer that, first, we
doubt that an angel is in a place by the goings on in that place being its
immediate effects and, second, that since many events can occur at a
single place, the considerations given do not establish the conclusion.4
2
In De Hebdomadibus, as reported in Aquinas 1948, part I, q. 52, art. 1.
3
See Aquinas 1948, part I, q. 52, art. 1.
4
We note in passing that the dialectic of this paper would be largely unchanged if we held
the view that angels are extended but can be colocated.
How Many Angels? 55
We shall not primarily be concerned with what it means for an

angel to dance, rather than, say, run. Our focus is on the more central
question of how many angels can occupy a single point — say, one
that forms the boundary point of a perfectly sharp pin or needle — at a
single moment in time. Contrary to certain philosophers of antiquity,
we shall assume that it is perfectly possible for there to be infinitely
many beings in existence at the same time — ‘actual’ as well as
‘potential’ infinities are possible.5
We will also be making certain natural mereological assumptions
about angels. That they can be spatially point-sized does not show that

they can lack proper parts. (After all, a fusion of two cohabiting angels
is spatially point sized and yet has proper parts.) Indeed, we do not
wish to assume that angels lack — or can lack — proper parts — at
least one of us is tempted to the hypothesis that God is part of all
things.6 However, we do assume that no one object is simultaneously
a fusion of each of two different pluralities of angels. A fusion
of Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, for example, is not a fusion of
Michael and Gabriel, as some of its parts, namely, some — even if
not all — of Raphael’s parts, do not overlap either Michael or
Gabriel.7 Among other things, our assumption has the consequence
that no angel has another angel as a proper part — a consequence we
applaud. (To see this, suppose, say, that Raphael is part of Michael.
Then, any part of Raphael would thereby be a part of Michael and
therefore overlap him, with the consequence that a fusion of Michael
and Gabriel would also be a fusion of Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael.)
Those ‘naturalistic’ philosophers who have no truck with our theo-
logical pursuits will no doubt find ways to apply the ensuing discus-
sion to their own narrow concerns. For example, while they may
repudiate angels, they are typically more accommodating to particles
having integral spin — otherwise known as bosons — in modern par-
ticle physics. Such particles are generally thought to be point-sized.
Moreover, according to the spin statistics theorem, while fermions —
point-particles with half integer spin — cannot be colocated, bosons
5
Aquinas’s view is more nuanced: he claimed that God represents an actual infinity but
that no other actual infinities exist. See Aquinas 1948, part 1, q. 7, art. 1.
6
See Hudson 2006 for a discussion of a similar hypothesis.
7
We will say that an object x is a fusion of the Fs if and only if every F is part of x and for
any y, y is part of x if and only if y overlaps one of the Fs. Our definition of fusion is in line
with Tarski 1956 and Lewis 1991, but not with Simons 1987. See Hovda 2009 for the significance
of this difference.
are perfectly well able to cohabit a single spacetime point. An analo-

gous modal puzzle hence arises for bosons.8
2. Against offensive arbitrariness

The reflections so far have yielded a partial answer: ‘At least two’. But
let us, ambitiously, press on. The answer ‘Exactly seven’ is, prima facie,
offensive to reason. While it seems perfectly imaginable that there are
in fact at most seven angels on the point of any needle, it would be

most surprising if some particular finite number provided a necessary
upper bound. We would after all, find it ridiculous to be told that
there are, of necessity, at most seven happy zebras in reality. The
proposed upper bounds seems no less ridiculous: in each case, the
necessity seems an unhappy marriage of the brute and arbitrary. If
the true bounds of necessity would appear totally arbitrary to the
human intellect, then our capacity to reason and theorize about mo-
dality is radically more impoverished than we imagine. We shall not
indulge in pessimistic scepticism here — that is not to be expected of
creatures made in God’s image. We could just about imagine that the
answer ‘exactly seven’ is not brute but has some further explanation.
Perhaps God sees that it is immoral for more than seven angels to
cohabit, and ensures that morally inappriopriate cohabitation — while
rife in the human realm — never occurs in the angelic realm. (If angels
were essentially good and sufficiently knowledgeable, they would see
to this themselves.) We shall assume in what follows that there are no
such surprising constraints flowing from the moral or the aesthetic,
but that they flow from the structures provided by logic, pure math-
ematics, and the abstract metaphysics of concrete being. In particular,
we shall assume that no such considerations rule out the possibility of
infinitely many concrete beings existing at the same time. And given
that there could be infinitely many concrete beings in existence and
there could be colocated angels, it seems clear that no considerations
from abstract metaphysics, logic, or mathematics would militate
against the possibility of infinitely many colocated angels.
8
Note that even if there is an upper bound on boson cohabitation dictated by the laws of
nature, that does not settle the modal question, at least on the standard assumption that the
laws of nature are contingent.
How Many Angels? 57
3. A Cantorian reminder
We have achieved a fuller answer: ‘infinitely many ’. However, once
the Cantorian hierarchy of transfinite cardinals is revealed to us
through the natural light of reason, we realize that this answer is
still only partial.9 The coarse answer ‘infinitely many ’ belies a range
of finer-grained distinctions. After all the familiar finite cardinals
comes @0, which is the first transfinite cardinal, that giving the car-
dinality of the set of natural numbers. And after @0 comes @1, which is
defined as the next transfinite cardinal. Unfortunately, we know very
little about how @1 compares with the cardinality of other familiar sets

such as, for example, the set of real numbers. We know that the set of
real numbers has size 2@0 but not whether the latter cardinal is strictly
greater than — as opposed to exactly — @1.10 But be that as it may, we
do know that after @1 comes the next transfinite cardinal @2, and we
know further that after each @n, comes @n+1, which is its immediate
successor. After all these, comes @!, which is the least cardinal greater
than every @n for n 2 !. And after @! comes @!+1. As you may expect
by now, after all cardinals of the form @!+n, for n 2 !, comes @!+!.
And so on. Quite generally, for every ordinal , there is a cardinal @.
The Cantorian scale of alephs provide us with a dizzying array of
candidate resolutions to our theological quandary.
But let us not forget another crucial tenet of the Cantorian frame-
work: every set in the realm of the finite and the transfinite has
an aleph as its cardinal number, but, conversely, every aleph is the
cardinal number of a set. More importantly, no aleph comes close to
matching the magnitude of the Absolute, ‘the veritable infinity ’ which:
… cannot in any way be added to or diminished, and it is therefore to be
looked upon quantitatively as an absolute maximum. In a certain sense it
transcends the human power of comprehension, and in particular is
beyond mathematical determination. (Cantor, 1932a, p. 405)
9
Here we side with Georg Cantor, who writes:
It is my conviction that the domain of definable quantities is not closed off with the finite
quantities and that the limits of our knowledge may be extended accordingly without this
necessarily doing violence to our nature. I therefore replace the Aristotelian-Scholastic
proposition: infinitum actu non datur with the following: Omnia seu finita seu infinita sunt
et excepto Deu ab intellectu determinari possunt. [All forms whether finite or infinite are
definite and with the exception of God are capable of being intellectually determined.]
(Cantor, 1932b, p. 176)
10
The assumption that 2@0 ¼ @1 is the Continuum Hypothesis, which is known to be
independent from first-order Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory with choice (ZFC).
Early on, Cantor went on to conceive of this absolute maximum as an

appropriate symbol of the power and transcendence of God:
What surpasses all that is finite and transfinite is no ‘Genus’; it is the single
and completely individual unity in which everything is included, which
includes the ‘Absolute’ incomprehensible to the human understanding.
This is the ‘Actus Durissimus’ which by many is called ‘God.’ (Cantor,
1979, p. 290)
But this further thought is of course far from obligatory in subsequent
articulations of the Cantorian framework.
What matters for present purposes is that unless we are prepared to

allow for the possibility of so many angels as to match the Absolute,
the scale of alephs exhausts the range of cardinalities we might hope
to assign to them.
4. Indefinite Extensibility
The answer ‘exactly @7 ’ is prima facie offensive to reason. The concern
about arbitrariness for the answer ‘exactly seven’ seem to carry over —
with roughly equal force — to the answer ‘exactly @7 ’:
Perhaps a better answer might be to say that while there cannot
possibly be absolutely infinitely many angels in existence, no aleph
manages to set an appropriate upper bound on the possible cardinal-
ities of angels dancing on the point of a needle:
Indefinite Extensibility : There could not be so many angels as to
exceed each and every aleph, but for each , there could be exactly
@-many angels in existence.
This answer does not suffer from the arbitrariness of previous answers,
though you may well wonder about the assumption that the Cantorian
sequence of alephs exhausts the range of live answers to our question.
What might prevent God from creating so many angels on the point
of a needle as to exceed each and every aleph? It is not obvious how, by
themselves, the methods of trascendental theology can rule out the
possibility of the existence of absolutely infinitely many angels on the
point of a needle. We would rather not speculate about the idea that,
since the transcendent Absolute is an appropriate symbol for the
power and transcendence of God, it is not to be matched by any
other actual infinity.11
11
It is striking that both Aquinas and Cantor reserve the greatest size for the deity.
How Many Angels? 59
5. Plenitude
We have arrived at another live answer to our question: ‘absolutely
infinitely many ’. Maybe there could be so many angels on the point of
a needle that no aleph in the Cantorian hierarchy could ever do justice
to their quantity. Unlike the offensive answers dismissed earlier, this
strikes us as a live alternative to Indefinite Extensibility.
But what exactly would it be for some angels to be absolutely in-
finite in number? Cantor (1967) used the series of ordinal numbers,
which he called
, in order to measure absoluteness. In particular, he
argued that a collection — or ‘multiplicity ’, to use his term — X is

absolutely infinite and hence not a set if and only if
can be injected
into X, that is, there is a one-one map from all the ordinals in the
sequence into some members of X.12 Since there is a one-one map
from
onto the aleph series, Cantor’s criterion gives us that X is
an absolutely infinite collection if and only if there is a one-to-one
map from the aleph series into X.
This observation can be used to sharpen the last live answer to our
question. To say that there could be absolutely infinitely many angels is
to say that there is a one-one map from the alephs into the angels, which
is to say that there could be at least as many angels as there are alephs.
Plenitude: There could be at least as many angels as there are
alephs.
Plenitude tells us that there could indeed be so many angels as to
exceed each and every aleph.
6. Some argumentative tools

How are we to choose between Indefinite Extensibility and Plenitude?
And what constraints will our answer place on a proper metaphysics
of modality? Before answering these questions, we need to call the
reader’s attention to three potentially important ideas. One of them
is a result that is largely beyond dispute. Two are quite natural hypoth-
eses about the structure of the universe of set theory. (After sketching
the consequences of these last two ideas we will entertain an approach
to the metaphysics of size that somewhat bypasses them, but which
preserves some of the lessons of the preceding discussion.)
12
Cantor relied on implicit assumptions that are far from innocent from a modern per-
spective. His conclusion, however, yields a very elegant criterion for absoluteness. See Hallett
1984, p. 172, for a detailed discussion of Cantor’s argument and his implications.
6.1 Idea one: a mereological result

Call a plurality disperse if and only if there are no two different sub-
pluralities of it such that a single object is a fusion of each of them.13
The plurality consisting of an apple, its left half, and its right half is not
disperse since the apple is a fusion of itself as well as a fusion of four
other subpluralities, namely, the apple and its left half, the apple and
its right half, the apple’s left and right half, and, finally, the apple and
both its left and right halves. In contrast, for example, any plurality of
mereological atoms will be disperse. It follows from our earlier as-
sumption that the archangels Michael and Gabriel are a disperse plur-

ality, for the simple reason that each of its three subpluralities results
in a different fusion: a fusion of Michael, a fusion of Gabriel, and a
fusion of Michael and Gabriel will be different from each other.
Let us say that a fusion is based on a plurality if and only if it is a
fusion of one of its subpluralities. We assume the principle of unre-
stricted composition — that any plurality has a fusion. The result that
we wish to draw attention to is the following:
Remark 1: If a plurality is disperse and more numerous than one,
then there will be more fusions based on that plurality than there are
members of it.
We draw on the following observation:
Remark 2: If a plurality is more numerous than one, then it has
more subpluralities than members.
Two pluralities have the same size if and only if there is a one-one map
from the first onto the second. A map is a relation which pairs every
object in the domain with at most one object in the range of the
relation. Finally, a relation is a one-one map from one plurality onto
another if (i) no two objects in the domain are paired with the same
object in the range and (ii) the first plurality is its domain and the
range is exactly the second plurality. (If the range is a proper subplur-
ality of the second plurality, we say that the relation is a one-one map
from the first plurality into the second.)
Quantification over relations can be simulated by plural quantifi-
cation over ordered pairs. However, we need the domain of individ-
uals to be closed under the formation of ordered pairs. The question is
13
As we use the terms ‘plurality ’ and ‘subplurality ’, to speak of a plurality of certain objects
is to speak of the objects themselves. Likewise, for a subplurality of a given plurality of objects,
by which we mean ‘some of them’.
How Many Angels? 61
how to understand talk of ordered pairs. One option is to take

them to be sets and rely on the closure of the domain under certain
set-theoretic operations. Another option is to mimic ordered pairs in
the framework of ‘megethology ’: plural logic augmented with mere-
ology.14 The appendix of Lewis 1991 shows how to simulate ordered
pairs in our framework on the assumption that there are infinitely
many mereological atoms. And Hazen (1997) has shown how to relax
this assumption further by carrying out the simulation in the context
of an infinite atomless mereology. Either way would suit our dialect-
ical purposes, though each option comes with its own costs. The

first option requires any two objects to form a set, which, though a
theorem of any Zermelo-Fraenkel-style set theory, makes our result
to depend on a purely set-theoretic assumption. The second option
requires one to assume fairly robust plural versions of choice as part of
the framework of plural logic.15
There is a more serious worry in the vicinity. One way to put the
second remark is as the claim that if a plurality is more numerous than
one, then there is no one-one map from its members onto its sub-
pluralities. But what sense is to be made of a relation between the
members of the plurality and its subpluralities? It is not, after all, as if
an ordered pair can pair an object with a plurality; we can only have
an object figure as a second component of an ordered pair. Here we
have to be devious and resort to coding.16 If x is in the domain of
a relation R, think of Rx as the plurality of objects which the relation
R pairs with x. Now think of x as a code in R for the plurality Rx.
We can now think of a relation R as representing a one-one map from
its domain into some pluralities, namely, those which are coded in R
by a member of the domain. So, given a plurality more numerous than
one, our observation becomes the claim that no relation can represent
a one-one map from its members onto its subpluralities.
Here is the (schematic) justification for the claim, which is inspired
by the usual diagonal proof of Cantor’s theorem:
Suppose, for reductio, that there is a relation R that represents a one-one
map from a plurality more numerous than one onto its subpluralities.
14
The term was coined by David Lewis in Lewis 1991.
15
Lewis (1991) identifies some of these principles and their role in the simulation. Any of
them fit well with one of the important ideas — limitation of size — we will introduce in a
moment. (This is because limitation of size will entail the existence of a well-ordering of the
universe.)
16
See Shapiro 1991 for discussion of the coding scheme and its limitations.
Then one such relation — call it a groovy relation — has one member
of the plurality code a subplurality of which it is not itself a member.17
(If a member of the domain, a, codes in R a plurality consisting of a
alone, then let a swap places with another, b, and the result will be a groovy
relation.)
Let R be a groovy relation. Now consider the codes in R of subpluralities of
which they are not members. Call them the Beatles. Since, by reductio,
R represents a one-one map that is onto, the Beatles must be coded in R by
some member of the domain, call him Ringo. Now let us ask the question:
‘Is Ringo one of the Beatles?’ Well, if Ringo is one of the Beatles, then we
will deduce that he is not. After all, the Beatles are all and only codes of

subpluralities that do not have them as members. If Ringo is one of the
Beatles, then he thereby fails to meet a necessary condition for membership
to the Beatles and we must conclude he is not one of them. But if we
suppose that Ringo is not one of the Beatles, we can prove that he is. For
if he is not, then he is the code of a subplurality that does not contain it
as a member and therefore meets a sufficient condition for bona fide
membership to the Beatles.
No groovy relation represents a one-one map from a plurality that is more
numerous than one onto its subpluralities. Therefore, no relation does. We
conclude that if a plurality is more numerous than one, then it has more
subpluralities than it has members.18
We are now one step away from our mereological result. A disperse
plurality that is more numerous than one has more subpluralities than
members. But given unrestricted composition, every subplurality will
have a fusion. By disperseness, different subpluralities will have dif-
ferent fusions, whence there are more fusions based on the initial
plurality than there are members of it.
To the extent to which our result did not depend on any contin-
gencies, it holds necessarily.19
17
This would not be true if the plurality had only one member, for there is only one
relation that represents a one-one map from its only member into its only subplurality, which
is not at all groovy.
18
Although we have given an informal argument, plural comprehension is the only prin-
ciple that is distinctive to the logic of plurals. In this respect, the argument is analogous to the
Cantorian argument for the second-order claim that no binary relation can represent a
one-one map from a concept, say, onto all its subconcepts (see Shapiro, 1991, p. 104).
19
Similar results hold for properties and propositions. Suppose we accept an abstraction
principle that tells us that for every plurality, there is a property of being one of them. Then an
analogous argument will show that for any plurality with more than one member, there are
more identity properties based on that plurality than there are members. Suppose we accept an
abstraction principle for propositions according to which for every plurality of worlds, there is
a proposition that is true if and only if one of those worlds obtains. Then, an analogous
How Many Angels? 63
6.2 Idea two: The Urelement Set Axiom

Impure set theory is set theory with urelements, that is, non-sets.
In contrast to pure set theory, in which one restricts attention to
pure sets, in the context of impure set theory, many have found it
natural to assume that necessarily, the urelements form a set. Call the
proposition that the urelements form a set the Urelement Set Axiom.20
Although independent from the usual axioms of impure set theory
(e.g., Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory with urelements plus choice
(ZFCU)), it is not uncommon to cite the iterative conception of set
by way of motivation. On the iterative conception, sets are built in

stages of a certain cumulative hierarchy. At stage zero we have the
non-sets. At stage one we form arbitrary sets of urelements — any
urelements form a set in stage one. At stage two, we form arbitrary
sets built of urelements and or level-one products. At stage omegath,
we form arbitrary sets of urelements and products from finite stages.
And, more generally, at stage , we build sets from materials that
figure in prior stages. On this picture, the set of urelements will
appear at stage one.21
Yet another consideration in support of the hypothesis has to do
with the alleged universal applicability of mathematics, which is sup-
posed to investigate structures presented by the other sciences. To the
extent to which set theory is understood to provide a foundation for
mathematics, we would expect the universe of sets to be rich enough
to enable us to provide a set-theoretic surrogate for any structure
whatever presented by the other sciences. Without the Urelement
Set Axiom, we may not be able to represent certain structures
argument will show that for every plurality of worlds greater than one, there are more prop-
ositions based on those worlds than there are worlds. (An identity property is based on a
plurality of things if and only if, for some subplurality, it is the property of being of the
elements of the subplurality; a proposition is based on a plurality of worlds if and only if, for
some subplurality, that proposition is true if and only if one or other of the worlds in the
subplurality obtains.)
20
Call an urelement that has no sets as parts an untainted urelement. A fusion of the empty
set with a trout is undoubtedly an urelement, but not an untainted one as it still has a set as a
proper part. A candidate restriction of the axiom is this: any untainted urelements form a set.
This restricted version of the urelement set axiom would serve our dialectical purposes just as
well.
21
See Lewis 1986, p. 107, and Sider 2009 for support. When we begin with a set of indi-
viduals, the result is a transfinite sequence of stages, which provides us with a map of the
set-theoretic universe. If U is the set of individuals:
U0 = U
Uþ1 ¼ U [ PðU Þ
S
Ul = <l U , for l a limit
constituted by non-sets, and this would threaten the universality of

mathematics.22
There is a more arcane motivation for the Urelement Set Axiom:
McGee (1997) shows how the axioms of the resulting theory are able to
fix the structure of the domain of pure sets in combination with
the size of the universe of all objects.23 However, weaker assumptions
will do when one is willing to avail oneself of plural quantification
over ordered pairs. The idea we introduce in the next subsection —
limitation of size — would fit the bill perfectly.
Moreover, the axiom is exactly what you need if you want to avoid

recourse to full second-order logic. However, since we take ourselves
to have enough resources to simulate full second-order quantification,
we are not particularly moved by this consideration.
While we accord our second idea — the urelement set axiom — a
measure of respect, we would not like to rest too much weight on it.
As Nolan (1996, p. 254) emphasizes, nothing of strictly mathematical
value would be lost if we were forced to abandon it — in fact, set
theorists seem to vary from ignoring urelements as a bothersome
distraction to explicitly assuming, for convenience, that there are no
urelements at all. Moreover, Zermelo (1930) sketched a conception of
the universe of set theory with urelements as layered in stages of a
cumulative hierarchy in which the urelements need not form a set.
There is some evidence, then, that the heuristic picture of the universe
of set theory as built in stages need not require the assumption that
the urelements must form a set.
6.3 Idea three: Limitation of size

One heuristic thought often used to motivate some of the axioms of
set theory is the limitation of size view on which a plurality forms a set
if and only if they are not in one-one correspondence with the entire
universe of all objects. This principle, which is due to von Neumann
(1925), helps motivate some of the standard axioms of Zermelo-
Fraenkel set theory (with or without urelements). For example, lim-
itation of size yields the axioms of separation and replacement as
22
This consideration has been independently advanced, for example, by Allen Hazen (2004)
and Vann McGee (1997).
23
The result reads as follows: any two models of (schematic) second-order ZFCU +
Urelement Set Axiom of the same cardinality have isomorphic pure sets. For a proof and
an account of the difference between schematic and full second-order logic, see the appendix
to McGee 1997. In the context of full second-order logic, our third idea below could be used to
achieve the same purpose.
How Many Angels? 65
immediate consequences. Separation says that any plurality of mem-

bers of a set forms itself a set. Replacement, for its part, says that if a
plurality is in one-one correspondence with the members of a set, then
it does itself form a set. More surprisingly, perhaps, limitation of size
yields justifications for the axioms of union and choice.24 As for
choice, von Neumann’s principle delivers the existence of a global
well-ordering of the universe. We know, by the reasoning of the
Burali-Forti paradox, that the ordinals fail to form a set. Therefore,
by limitation of size, we have that the ordinals must be in one-one
correspondence with the entire universe. However, given that the

ordinals are themselves well-ordered, a one-one map of the universe
into the ordinals gives us a global well-ordering of the universe, which,
in turn, entails weaker formulations of the axiom of choice.25
Against the background of the Cantorian framework, one attractive
consequence of the von Neumann principle is that it tells us that the
size of the Cantorian aleph series is the only extant size beyond all the
alephs. You may think this is in line with the early Cantorian idea that
the Absolute cannot be increased any further and thus sets a quanti-
tative maximum (and furthermore, the limitation of size hypothesis
makes the Cantorian series of alephs an adequate foundation for a
perfectly general theory of cardinality — we know from Cantor that if
a plurality is too large to be numbered by an aleph, then the entire
aleph series can be injected into it), but the von Neumann principle
tells us that this can only happen if there is a one-one correspondence
between the members of the plurality and the members of the aleph
series. So, we can count on the aleph series as an appropriate measure
of its size.
The scale of alephs can thus be thought to form a proper founda-
tion for the metaphysics of size by forming a kind of universal ruler, in
the sense that the size of a plurality is determined by its relation to the
ruler. If a plurality corresponds to a notch on the ruler, the aleph at
that notch says what size it is. And if a plurality does not so
24
The claim that limitation of size gives us union is due to Lévy (1968).
25
Not only was von Neumann himself aware of the strength of his axiom, he conceded that
‘one might say that somewhat overshoots the mark’. However, he went on to write ‘I believe I
was not too crassly arbitrary in introducing it, especially since it enlarges rather than restricts
the domain of set theory and nevertheless can hardly become a source of antinomies’ (von
Neumann, 1925, p. 402). We note in passing that one way of motivating the limitation of size
axiom is by the Urelement Set Axiom. A second-order version of the axiom is, in the context
of second-order ZFC, a consequence of the axiom of global choice. The observation can be
extended to the case of second-order ZFCU given the Urelement Set Axiom
correspond one can deduce what size it is: it matches the plurality of
alephs and thus size of the universe. This is in fact the main conse-
quence of the von Neumann principle we will be using in what
follows.
The von Neumann principle is not offered as a mere contingency.
So let it be part of the third idea that it holds necessarily.
7. Plenitude under fire

If all three ideas are embraced, two distinct arguments against

Plenitude soon become available:
(1) The Argument from the Urelement Set Axiom:
Consider, for reductio, a world where there are exactly as many
angels as there are actual alephs. And suppose that the domain
of pure sets does not vary from world to world. Since, presum-
ably, no angel is a set and they are therefore urelements, it
follows, by the Urelement Set Axiom, that there is not only a
set of urelements but, by separation, a set of angels. It follows,
by Plenitude, that the entire sequence of alephs is in one-one
correspondence with the members of a set. But, by replace-
ment, the alephs themselves would have to form a set,
which would in turn have an aleph as its cardinality. But the
set-theoretic antinomies prohibit such a conclusion. Hence
Plenitude must fail.
A version of this argument has been used by Sider (2009) in connec-
tion to Williamson’s necessitism.
(2) The Limitation of Size Argument:
We assume that a fusion of urelements is itself an urelement.
And, since angels are themselves urelements, a fusion of
angels must itself be an urelement. Given the mereological
result, there must be strictly more urelements than there are
angels. After all, our result tells us that there are strictly more
fusions of angels than there are angels. Limitation of size tells
us that the size of the urelements is at most the size of the
alephs. Let us further make the benign assumption that
the size of the aleph series does not vary from world to
world. Given Plenitude, we are forced to conclude that the
size of the angels matches the size of the actual alephs. But
now, by our mereological result, we must conclude that there
How Many Angels? 67
are strictly more urelements than there are alephs, which

contradicts limitation of size. We conclude that Plenitude
fails again.
8. Modal variation
We have been labouring under the assumption that that the aleph
sequence, and likewise the domain of pure sets, remains constant
from world to world. What if we relax that assumption? There are

two ways to do this. One is to allow for modal variation in the domain
of pure sets and yet to insist on a modal maximum for such a size:
there is some world, wM, where the alephs (and the pure sets) have
maximal size and hence there is no possible world where we can find
strictly more of them. Another denies a modal maximum for the size
of the alephs or that of the pure sets: for any world w1 there is a world
w2 where there are strictly more alephs and pure sets than there
are at w1.
If we choose the first option, then there is a natural analogue of
Plenitude: there is a maximum size for the plurality of angels, which is
given by the maximum size for alephs and pure sets. But the analogue
view will be undermined by either the Urelement Set Axiom or the
Limitation of Size argument. If, instead, we choose the second option,
then we no longer have a natural analogue for Plenitude available.
Selecting any particular pure set size — the size that the alephs actually
have, for example — as the modal maximum for the size of angels
commits us to unwanted arbitrariness. It would be more natural to
opt for an analogue of Indefinite Extensibility instead. Just as the size
of the alephs is indefinitely extensible, so is the size of the angels.
However, von Neumann’s limitation of size principle is not parti-
cularly appealing in the context of Indefinite Extensibility. For sup-
pose we grant that there could have been strictly more alephs than
there are in our world. And let us grant, in addition, that there could
have been strictly more angels than there are alephs in our world, call
their size . Whence now the modal guarantee that in any world
in which there are exactly -many angels, there must be strictly
more than -many alephs? Such a claim appears to institute a neces-
sary connection between the sizes of distinct existences — alephs and
pure sets and angels — that is not at all easy to justify. Having noticed
that there could be exactly -many angels, on the one hand, and that
there could be exactly -many alephs and pure sets, on the other,
it becomes mysterious why those states of affairs should not be com-

possible. But once this compossibility is allowed, von Neumann’s
limitation of size principle fails, since there will be strictly more
fusions of angels at such a world than there are alephs at that world.
We shall not be speaking further to the view that the size of the
alephs is modally inconstant. Such a view is certainly a minority view.
And in any case it does little to disturb the intellectual thrust of the
discussion so far, which favours the indefinite extensibility vision.
9. Interlude

The materials presented thus far strongly point towards Indefinite
Extensibility. Does this provide us with a stable resolution of our
scholastic inquiry, a secure result within transcendental theology?
Matters are not quite so simple. In the remaining discussion we
shall pursue two separate themes. First, we shall attempt to show
that a number of prominent views in the metaphysics of modality
cannot be squared with the Indefinite Extensibility picture. If we
hold that picture as a theological fixed point, we are given new and
surprising resources to select certain metaphysics of modality over
others. Second, note that the space of alternatives explored thus far
has been set by the Cantorian theory of cardinality, minimally supple-
mented by the assumption that we can make sense of the size of the
entire sequence of alephs. However, it is not at all clear that this is the
appropriate foundational framework. We sketch an alternative frame-
work for thinking about sizes in which certain structural assumptions
endemic to the set theoretic framework are exposed as non-obligatory
and with which another important candidate resolution to our theo-
logical quandary presents itself.
10. Trouble for modal realism

Suppose with Lewis (1986) that possible worlds are existing concrete
universes. Suppose further that we embrace Indefinite Extensibility:
there could not be so many angels to exceed each and every aleph, but
for each , there is a world in which there are exactly @-many angels.
The trouble comes when we open up our quantifiers and describe the
structure of the pluriverse, the posited reality of multiple concrete
universes.
When we take in the universe in one sweep, some mereological
decisions have to be made. Are we to allow fusions that are composed
How Many Angels? 69
from objects from multiple worlds? For example, is there a object

that has David Lewis as one part and a possible talking donkey as
another? Lewis explicitly allows such fusions and, indeed, gives them
substantive work to do in his metaphysics. (For example, in Lewis
1986 he recommends the identification of properties of individuals
with sets of individuals, where such sets are typically transworld.
However, in Lewis 1991 he identifies sets with fusions of singletons.
Therefore, properties of individuals become fusions of singletons,
where such fusions are generally transworld.) It would be exceedingly
strange, moreover, to disallow such composition. If the mereological

gods are sufficiently liberal as to allow the fusion of David Lewis with
objects that are spatially and/or temporally distant, why should spatio-
temporal disconnectedness provide an insuperable barrier? (Note that
such barriers would be particularly surprising if, as he avers in Lewis
1991, mereology is analogous to logic. From that perspective, a prohi-
bition on transword composition would be analogous to a bar on
conjunction introduction for propositions about different worlds.)
Once transworld composition is allowed, the very sorts of problems
that afflicted Plenitude re-emerge, even for the proponent of
Indefinite Extensibility. If for any , there are exactly @-many
angels at one world or another, then there will be at least as many
angels across the pluriverse as there are alephs altogether. (Note that
this result does not even require the thesis — which Lewis in any case
embraces — that angels are world-bound, that is, the thesis that angels
at different worlds are numerically distinct.) The cardinality of the
angels across the pluriverse will have to be greater than any aleph,
since by hypothesis, any aleph is surpassed by the angels at some
corner of the pluriverse. The confinement of angels to aleph-sizes
within worlds still leaves us with a pluriversal size that matches the
size of the alephs and the pure sets across the pluriverse. With this
result in place, both arguments against Plenitude can now be brought
to bear against any such description of the pluriverse. The Urelement
Set Axiom would force the angels across the pluriverse to form a set,
which cannot be allowed for the reasons given above.26 And the com-
bination of the von Neumann principle and the mereological result
would entail that the angels across the pluriverse both do and do not
match their fusions in size.
26
A similar argument given in Nolan 1996, pp. 246–7, and adapted to the constant domain
metaphysics discussed below by Sider (2009).
It thus seems that if one is a modal realist, one can embrace neither
Plenitude nor Indefinite Extensibility: one has to claim that for some
, @ does in fact provide a modal upper bound on the size of the
angels can have in a world. One could say that at some world this size
is attained by the angels. Or one could instead says that while it is
never attained, any lower cardinal is attainable. Either way, the posited
upper bound reeks of the very sort of arbitrariness we have been at
pains to avoid.
To ward off the Forrest-Armstrong argument against his favourite
principle of recombination, Lewis has elsewhere noted that his brand

of modal realism accepts certain size and shape limits on recombina-
tion.27 But notice that a restriction on the possible size and shapes
of concrete universes do not help us much in a context where angels
can be packed into a single point. While modal restrictions on
size and shape of universes may not seem too outrageous, the restric-
tion envisaged here — to a particular aleph upper bound on the size
of angels — cannot be swallowed so easily. In so far as we know
Indefinite Extensibility to hold, we also know that modal realism is
false.
In a slightly different but related context, Nolan (1996) has recom-
mended that Lewis drop the Urelement Set Axiom. Note that in
the present context such an adjustment is not sufficient to solve the
problem. After all, the proponent of Indefinite Extensibility who
is also a modal realist has two arguments to deal with, not one.
Even with the Urelement set axiom dropped, a von Neumann limita-
tion of size principle plus our mereological result will undo Indefinite
Extensibility.
11. Trouble for necessitism

In Williamson 1998 and Williamson 2002, Timothy Williamson has
argued for a view according to which the very same objects exist at all
worlds. So, for example, David Lewis necessarily exists. The appear-
ance of contingency is explained away via the hypothesis that Lewis is
concrete at some worlds though failing to be concrete at others,
together with the speculation that ‘exists’ in natural language some-
times means ‘concrete existence’ and not the existence simpliciter that
concerns logic and metaphysics.
27
See Lewis’s discussion of recombination in Lewis 1986, pp. 102–4.
How Many Angels? 71
On this view, then, every possible angel exists. Of course, a possible

angel need not be an angel — perhaps one has to be concrete in order
to be angelic. (We leave aside the issue of what the concrete/non-
concrete distinction might come to if, as the Angelic Doctor seemed
to hold, an angel is form without matter.) Yet, even if we take care to
distinguish bona fide angels from bona fide entities that are merely
possible angels, the seemingly happy solution provided by Indefinite
Extensibility becomes destabilized. After all, if for any , there could
be exactly @-many angels, then there actually are at least as many
possible angels as there are alephs.

Now while many possible angels may not be angels, it seems clear
that a possible angel is not a set. (For one reason, it seems that a set is
necessarily a set and that nothing could be both a set and an angel.)
Then, as Ted Sider has pointed out (in Sider 2009), the Urelement Set
Axiom will make trouble for Williamson’s position. Moreover, even if
that axiom is dispensed with — in accord with Nolan’s advice — our
second argument will proceed along familiar lines. Assuming unrest-
ricted composition, there will be strictly more fusions of possible
angels than there are possible angels. But once von Neumann’s prin-
ciple is assumed, this cannot be reconciled with the claim that there
are exactly as many possible angels as there are alephs.28
The problems facing Lewis and Williamson are highly analogous
and bear emphasis. In both cases, we are given philosophical systems
that allow for quantification over all possible objects. In Williamson’s
case this is because all possible objects are actual. In Lewis’ case this is
because we are allowed to open up our quantifiers so that they range
beyond what is actual. In both cases, this kind of quantification, when
combined with Indefinite Extensibility, brings proper-class-many pos-
sible angels within the domain of our broadest quantifiers. And this
spells trouble when combined with various of our three ideas.
12. Confining composition

In this and the next two sections, we address possible ways that one or
other or our metaphysical targets — Lewis and Williamson, that is —
28
A similar problem arises for someone who wants to combine Indefinite Extensibility with
the assumption that possible worlds are themselves objects — as opposed to properties, pro-
positions, or any other items not in the range of the first-order quantifiers. If for each , there
is a world in which there are @ angels, then there are as many possible worlds as there are
alephs, namely, proper-class-many. But this fact cannot be reconciled with the combination of
limitation of size and our mereological result.
may try to deal with the argument from Limitation of Size. It goes
without saying that those who are thoroughly convinced by the argu-
ment from the Urelement Set Axiom will not, in any case, be assuaged.
When confronted with the Limitation of Size argument, one natural
escape route for Williamson is to restrict the scope of our favourite
mereological principles to concrete existence: while there may well be
a fusion of angels, there need not be a fusion of possible angels. One
natural restriction — if it even serves to be so called — on mereology is
to first-order objects, objects that are fit assignments for first-order
variables.29 But that does not help here, since angels are obviously

first-order objects. Similarly, it does not help anyone who takes pos-
sible worlds to be first-order objects. A more relevant consideration in
favour of such a restriction is that it may, in any case, be recom-
mended by considering the case of the pure sets themselves. After
all, the combination of limitation of size and our mereological
result cannot be reconciled with our allowing unrestricted composi-
tion to extend even to the realm of pure sets, at least on one natural
assumption on their mereological structure. Assume (with Lewis, for
example) that the plurality of singletons of pure sets is disperse. Then,
by the mereological result, there are strictly more fusions of singletons
of pure sets than there are singletons of pure sets. But this contravenes
the von Neumann limitation of size principle as the singletons of all
pure sets do not themselves form a set and must thereby be in one-one
correspondence with all things. A natural reaction to this is to delimit
the scope of composition. But once we recognize that composition
does not apply to sets, it may also be natural to remove other non-
concrete objects from its scope of application. Note that this move is
not available to the modal realist. On Lewis’s view possible angels are
just as concrete as actual ones.
29
Note that this provides an attractive way of blocking certain arguments that put prima
facie pressure on limitation of size. Consider for example an argument that proceeds via
noting that there are more identity properties based on the alephs than there are the alephs
(see n. 18). Does this show that the limitation of size principle is false after all? The defender of
limitation of size need not resort to a despairing nominalism at this point. A natural — and we
think more promising — response is, with Frege, to insist on a deep rift between the values of
first- and second-order variables, and on the back of this argue that it is mistaken to try to
cram the values of second-order variables into the domain of first-order variables. Assuming a
similar rift between first-order and propositional variables, arguments against the limitation of
size that proceed via the plenitude of propositions can be similarly blocked.
How Many Angels? 73
13. The one and the many

The attempt to make trouble for unrestricted composition by applying
the combination of the limitation of size principle and our mereolo-
gical result to the realm of pure sets can be resisted by adopting a non-
standard view of their mereological structure. Suppose that one holds
that a sufficient (though not necessary) condition for an object — set
or urelement — to be part of a set is that the former be a member of
the latter. Then the disperseness assumption required for the mereo-
logical result would not hold. In the case of possible angels, a non-
standard merelogy can also escape the argument. When one learns of

the Williamsonian framework, it is perhaps natural to think of possi-
bly (but not actually) concrete objects as being scattered like merelo-
gical dust across Platonic Heaven. Yet that conception is far from
obligatory. Among the mereological alternatives we suggest one that
is particularly appealing, and which is indeed perhaps more theologi-
cally proper. Suppose we adopt a mereology that — as against classical
extensional mereology — abandons the presumption that parthood is
antisymmetric: if x and y are parts of each other, x is identical to y.
(Such an abandonment is quite familiar among those who are careful
to distinguish a ship from the quanity of steel or wood that constitutes
it, even in cases where they eternally coincide). It now becomes pos-
sible to think of the possibly (but not actually) concrete objects, not as
forming a disperse plurality, but as parts of each other, forming an
entangled unity.
When an object becomes concrete it breaks off from — that is,
becomes mereologically discrete from those entangled entities, and
when it ceases to be concrete, it returns to — that is, becomes mer-
eologically reconciled to — those entities. While this is not perhaps a
full vindication of Plotinus’ doctrine of a return to the One — carried
into scholastic philosophy by the early Church Fathers — it is perhaps
as close to a vindication as sober analytic metaphysics can provide.
14. Restricting limitation of size

Lewis (1991) opts not quite for von Neumann’s limitation of size
principle, as we have stated it, but instead for a more qualified version
of it, restricted to singletons: a plurality of singletons forms a set, that
is, their fusion has a singleton, if and only if they are not in one-one
correspondence with all the singletons. So, there is exactly one size a
plurality of singletons can be and not form a set. But this leaves
open whether or not there are more objects altogether than there are
singletons. And indeed, there are, in Lewis’s framework, many more
arbitrary fusions of singletons than there are singletons. On this
system, then, the Cantorian sequence of alephs matches the size of
the singletons, but it is far from matching the size of all things.
Does this qualification enable him to escape from the Limitation
of Size argument that we have advanced against the modal realist?
It does not. Lewis is quite explicit that any urelement has a singleton.
Assume that there are again exactly as many angels as there are alephs.
Then there are strictly more fusions of angels than there are alephs.

Since every fusion of angels is itself an urelement, both angels and
their fusions have singletons. But now we are forced to admit —
contra the qualified principle — that there are at least two different
sizes a plurality of singletons can have and not form a set. There are, in
other words, two different sizes that are larger than any aleph.30
15. A guide for the set-theoretically perplexed

Not all metaphysicians will be content to use pure sets as the basis for
an exhaustive account of size. Some will think that pure sets are
merely a useful fiction. Others will indulge in pure set ontology but
believe that such an ontology is inadequate to a complete account of
size. The latter may break from the traditional set-theoretic strictures
by positing a scale of sizes that extends beyond the aleph sequence
by countenancing sizes greater than the size of any set. If the von
Neumann principle holds, this would only add an additional endpoint
to the series of alephs. But some may postulate, in defiance of the von
Neumann principle, a multitude of sizes beyond the sizes captured
by the alephs.
Let us now approach the metaphysics of size in a way that is neutral
on set theory. We take a page from Frege, who famously offered a
quite a different foundation for arithmetic. He started from what has
come to be known as Hume’s principle:
The number of Fs is identical to the number of Gs if and only if there are
exactly as many Fs as there are Gs.
30
To be sure, if we take ‘urelement’ to mean ‘non-set’ — as we have done — then Lewis
would not accept the principle that there is only one size a plurality of urelements can have
and not form a set. (Compare, for example, the plurality of all proper classes, i.e., fusions of
singletons without a singleton, with a subplurality of that plurality of the size of the pure sets.)
How Many Angels? 75
One immediate consequence of Hume’s principle is that no matter

what Fs we consider, we are in a position to ascribe a cardinal number
to them — whether or not they are set-sized. Thus even if there is no
set of all self-identical objects, we can, according to Frege, assign
a cardinal number to them, that is, anti-zero.31
In what follows, we will reify sizes as certain objects, but, unlike
the traditional set-theoretic framewok, we will assume them to be
governed by a modal version of Hume’s principle as formulated in
a suitable language:
Necessarily, the size of Fs is identical to the size of Gs if and only if there

are exactly as many Fs as there are Gs.
Let us concede upfront that the adoption of this principle relies on the
presupposition that any two pluralities are comparable in size: either
there are exactly as many Fs as there are Gs, that is, they are in one-one
correspondence, or there are strictly fewer Fs than there are Gs, that is,
the Fs are in one-one correspondence with some (but not all) Gs, or
there are strictly more Fs than there are Gs.32 This assumption takes us
far beyond orthodox set theory, which remains silent when it comes to
the question of whether various proper classes are comparable in size.
Some further assumptions are natural enough, though not extrac-
table from the principle alone. Some of them are analogues to certain
unofficial assumptions on the nature of sets. In particular, it is natural
to assume that sizes, even if not sets, are, like sets, necessary beings.
We assume, too, that it is not necessary that everything is a size.
Cardinal comparability gives us that the sizes posited by our prin-
ciple are linearly ordered. A further natural assumption — though
certainly one not extractable from the previous ones — is that sizes
are well ordered, i.e., given any sizes, there is a least one of them. (This
rules out, for example, the hypothesis that not only is the Continuum
Hypothesis false, but also there is a countable number of densely
ordered sizes between the size of the reals and the size of the naturals.)
In a setting like this, where an ontology of sizes is posited that need
not be identified with sets, there is little to speak in favour of the
Urelement Set Axiom. If there are no sets, it will not be true. And
even if sets are posited alongside sizes, the Urelement Set Axiom
cannot be tolerated since it will be manifestly unacceptable to allow
31
The term ‘anti-zero’ comes from Boolos (1997).
32
Otherwise, if too many pluralities turned out not to be comparable in size, then there
might not be enough objects to satisfy the principle in the first place.
that the sizes form a set. (Otherwise, the set of all sizes would have an
aleph as its cardinal number. But this means that our scale would leave
out sizes for any succeeding aleph, let alone the entire series of
alephs.)33 And in a setting like this, there is little force to the von
Neumann principle. When the aleph series no longer forms the
basis for the metaphysics of size one cannot, without special additional
argument, plausibly assume that the alephs arbitrate the limitations
on size.
What are the alternatives to Indefinite Extensibility and Plenitude in
this new setting? And how should we choose among them?

We have been silent on one feature of the linear ordering of sizes,
namely, whether it has an absolute upper bound, a modal anti-zero.
To be sure, our modal variation of Hume’s principle requires the
existence of an anti-zero relative to each world in which it holds.
But if the universe is modally inconstant, that observation does not
settle whether there is a modal anti-zero. We may, after all, wish the
scale of sizes to mark all the alternative sizes some objects might have,
whether or not they have do them. But then, what counts as anti-zero
with respect to the actual world may not correspond to the endpoint
of the entire scale of possible sizes.
Now if sizes are themselves objects and, as we have assumed, them-
selves necessary beings, then the size of the objects in each world is at
least the size of all the sizes. Given that there is at least one non-size,
there are infinitely many sizes. But little further can be deduced from
the preceding assumptions, and, in particular, we cannot deduce
whether or not the well-ordering of sizes has an upper bound.
Let us now return to our original question both from within a
framework that assumes no end-point for the series of sizes and one
that does.
A structure with no endpoint is notably different from the com-
bination of the Cantorian framework and the von Neumann principle.
There is manifestly a topmost size — at least if we assume modal
constancy for the alephs and hence the pure sets. But in the present
setting there is no such size. If sizes have no endpoint, no natural
analogue for Plenitiude is available. Of course one could still insist
that, even though there are plenty of sizes greater than any aleph,
the maximal size for angels is that of the entire aleph sequence.
But what could justify this when there are plenty of sizes beyond
33
We understand ‘urelement’ to mean ‘non-set’ and leave open whether the urelement set
axiom could be tolerated on a different reading of the term.
How Many Angels? 77
that of the aleph sequence? Here, then, the natural view is an analogue
of Indefinite Extensibility: no matter what size you pick, there could
have been strictly more angels than that on the point of a needle.
But notice now that there are crushing objections to Lewis and
Williamson’s modal metaphysics, and indeed, to any metaphysics
that quantifies over all possibilia. For if, for any size, there could be
that many angels at the end of a needle, then no size whatever can be
coherently associated with the merely possible angels (in Williamson’s
case) or with the transworld panoply of angels (in Lewis’s case). The
lesson is that if one is to indulge in quantification over all possibilia

then one had better opt for a scale of sizes with a topmost element.
Suppose instead one opts for a scale of possible sizes with a topmost
element. Let us call the topmost size, a modal anti-zero. The necessi-
tarian is independently committed to there being such a size, which is
modally constant. Then one can adapt two of the earlier positions to
the present setting. One position is that the number of angels on the
point of a needle could be anti-zero — the analogue of Plenitude.
The other is that while the number of angels on the point of a
needle could not be the modal anti-zero, there is no upper bound
on the size angels could be — and, indeed, for any size less than anti-
zero, the angels could be strictly larger in size than . This is the
analogue of Indefinite Extensibility. But given that there are strictly
more fusions of angels than there are angels, the analogue of Plenitude
will be unstable. And, as before, the analogue of Extensibility will be
rendered unstable by various modal metaphysics that permit quanti-
fication over all possibilia.
However, in the current framework there is a genuinely new option.
In the Cantorian framework combined with the von Neumann limita-
tion of size principle, the maximal cardinality — namely, that of the
entire aleph sequence — has no immediate predecessor. However, we
are not, in the current framework, entitled to the assumption that the
modal anti-zero has no immediate predecessor. Of course we may
boldly speculate that the modal anti-zero does not have one. But it
is at least open to us to speculate that the modal anti-zero does have
an immediate predecessor, call it a modal anti-one. In this setting we
may have a principled reason for claiming that there is a particular
maximum less than the modal anti-zero that angels can have, namely,
the modal anti-one. Our mereological result will rule out the modal
anti-zero, but not the modal anti-one. (Note that the mereological
result cannot be reapplied to the fusions of the angels to get an even
larger size since the discreteness assumption will not hold for the
fusions.)34
16. A meta-ontological sermon

Some lost souls, rebelling against the natural light, have promulgated
the heretical view that metaphysics is but wordplay. What went by the
name of substantive metaphysics among our distinguished semantic
predecessor was, according to these naysayers, a case of capturing the

same facts using different notations. What was taken to be substantive
is alleged to be superficial. And what goes for our predecessors goes for
contemporary metaphysicians who carry the torch of metaphysical
learning. These lost souls are careful not to avow the heresies of
verificationism, at least not in public. Instead, they avow what pur-
ports to be a new semantic picture, one according to which there is
no distinguished or privileged meaning of ‘exists’, ‘there is’, ‘some
object’, or of any of the other foundational expressions in which
ontological disputes are canvassed. Instead, ontological proposals, if
they are not to be construed as crazy disavowals of what is self-
evidently true in English, are at best charitably construed as tacit
proposals for using ontological language in new ways to capture old
facts. We cannot engage directly with the detailed semantic theories
that these naysayers offer us. For they have not provided such theories.
Instead, they present us with a ramshackle mixture of Moorean
posturing and sample translation schemes that allegedly render meta-
physical questions empty.
The paradigm example — indeed, often the only example that is
offered — of an empty metaphysical dispute is that between the nihi-
list who believes that only simples exist and the proponent of classical
mereology who adds a full stock of fusions to whatever simples exist.
At least part of the rhetoric of our heretical opponents is that every
possibility — construed as a set of possible worlds — that is embraced
by the proponent of one position is embraced by the other. Let us say
that position A modally advances on position B iff there is some set of
worlds such that there is a sentence in A’s language that is true at all
and only those worlds and which is reckoned to be possibly true by the
34
If with Lewis we admit singletons, there may be a principled reason for a third answer, a
modal anti-two. Moreover, if the power-plurality operation jumps n steps up the size tree, we
may envisaged reason for other answers as well namely, a modal anti-three, a modal anti-four,
etc.
How Many Angels? 79
defender of A, but there is no sentence in B’s language true at all

and only those worlds and that is reckoned to be possibly true by
the defender of B. With this in place, one might think it altogether
obvious that, assuming the Nihilists language is sufficiently rich, and
interpretation is sufficiently charitable, the Mereologist and Nihilist
will be so situated that neither makes a modal advance upon the other.
Insofar as one agrees that there is a non-empty set of worlds picked
out by ‘there are three things’ in the mouth of the Mereologist, it
will be a set captured by ‘there are two simples’ in the mouth of
the Nihilist (and will also be captured by ‘there are two things’ in

the mouth of the Nihilist on the charitable assumption that the
Mereologist ought to treat him as using a quantifier that is restricted
relative to the Mereologist’s quantifier).
Now there is plenty to say about this sort of semantic picture
thinking which goes beyond the scope of this tract. But one lesson
should be immediately obviously from the considerations adduced
above, namely that it is far from clear that mereology makes no
difference to which possibilities are possible for the concrete simples
themselves. In particular, suppose that the mereologist adopts a con-
ception of size grounded in the Cantorian framework. He will likely,
for the reasons given, balk at the possibility of a plurality of concrete
simples that are as plenitudinous as the alephs. By contrast, the
Nihilist will be under no similar pressure to deny that possibility.
Hence, from the perspective of the Nihilist there will be a genuine
possibility for the concrete simples that the Mereologist is blind to —
on any reasonably charitable and natural construal of the
Mereologist’s language. Thus, the Nihilist will take himself to have
modally advanced on the Mereologist. Of course things will look
different to the Mereologist. If he charitably construes the Nihilist’s
quantifiers as restricted, he will not think that the Nihilist is guilty of
error in the claim there are only simples. But he will, even from this
(excessively?) charitable perspective construe the Nihilist as incorrect
in claiming ‘Possibly, the concrete simples are so numerous as to
match the alephs in size’. From the perspective of the Mereologist,
there is no modal advance made by the Nihilist. So, does one theory
modally advance on the other? One can only decide this by figuring
out which theory is true! When the deconstructionist smoke has
cleared, we can only settle whether one theory modally advances
on the other by theorizing as best we can. The lesson is obvious
enough: semantic ascent to a discussion of language games, notations
and linguistic rules was never an adequate substitute for doing

metaphysics.35
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35
We would like to thank Øystein Linnebo, Daniel Nolan, Robbie Williams, Timothy
Williamson, and audiences at Abeerden, Chicago, Leeds, Manchester, MIT, Nottingham,
Oxford, Paris, and Vancouver.
How Many Angels? 81
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How Many Angels Can Dance On The Point of A Needle?

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How Many Angels Can Dance on the

Point of a Needle? Transcendental

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In this paper we aim to shed light on an undeservedly disparaged

antiquity. Our results will not merely be of theological interest. It turns

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We shall not primarily be concerned with what it means for an

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are perfectly well able to cohabit a single spacetime point. An analo-

2. Against offensive arbitrariness

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Early on, Cantor went on to conceive of this absolute maximum as an

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6. Some argumentative tools

6.1 Idea one: a mereological result

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how to understand talk of ordered pairs. One option is to take

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6.2 Idea two: The Urelement Set Axiom

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constituted by non-sets, and this would threaten the universality of

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6.3 Idea three: Limitation of size

immediate consequences. Separation says that any plurality of mem-

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7. Plenitude under fire

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are strictly more urelements than there are alephs, which

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it becomes mysterious why those states of affairs should not be com-

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10. Trouble for modal realism

from objects from multiple worlds? For example, is there a object

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11. Trouble for necessitism

On this view, then, every possible angel exists. Of course, a possible

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12. Confining composition

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13. The one and the many

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14. Restricting limitation of size

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15. A guide for the set-theoretically perplexed

One immediate consequence of Hume’s principle is that no matter

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16. A meta-ontological sermon

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defender of A, but there is no sentence in B’s language true at all

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and linguistic rules was never an adequate substitute for doing

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Koetsier, T. and L. Bergmans (eds) 2005: Mathematics and the

Downloaded from http://mind.oxfordjournals.org/ at Duke University on May 6, 2012

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