Towards a Theory of Properties:

Work in Progress on the Problem

of Universals
D. M. ARMSTRONG

I
Many philosophers have declared that everything which exists is a particu-
lar. There is a weak interpretation of this doctrine which I believe to be a
true proposition, and a strong one which I believe to be false.
On the weaker interpretation, everything which is logically capable of
independent existence is a particular. Hume defined 'a substance* as
'whatever is logically capable of independent existence', and if we accept
this definition of 'substance' the weaker interpretation becomes: every
substance is a particular. Given this interpretation, it is at least not ruled
out that particulars be at the same time instances of universals. On the
stronger interpretation, however, absolutely everything that there is, be it
a substance or not a substance, is a particular. There can be no universals.
Those philosophers who hold to the strong interpretation of the doctrine
are traditionally called 'Nominalists'. The term is not a very good one: a
more accurate label would be 'Particularists'. I will, however, use the
traditional term. Nominalists face a problem, which was put by Locke in
the following way:
. . . since all things that exist are only particulars, how come we by
general terms,. . . ?
(Essay, III, 3, 6)
The utterly natural solution to the problem of general terms is barred to
Locke. This is the answer that, just as the name 'Peter' is correlated with a
certain individual, so the word 'red' is correlated with a certain property.
Since this property can be possessed by indefinitely many individuals, nor
is it logically restricted to, nor logically linked with, particular times and
places, it is a universal. This natural solution need not involve the ridiculous
view that the word 'red' is a name in the same sense that the word 'Peter' is
a name. All that need be asserted by a believer in universals is that, amid
many differences, there is one important point of resemblance between the
semantic role of a name like 'Peter' and the semantic role of a general word
like 'red'. The point of resemblance is this: just as the word 'Peter' is
correlated in a certain way with a certain individual—Peter—so the word
Philosophy 50 1975 145
D. M. Armstrong

'red' is semantically correlated no doubt in quite another way with a certain

property: redness.
I shall be arguing shortly that this natural answer to Locke's question is
somewhat too simple. We cannot assume, because there is a general term
'red', that it applies to the particulars it does apply to in virtue of a single
property: redness. For the present, however, I want to emphasize what a
natural answer it is. But it is an answer that a Nominalist, such as Locke,
cannot give, and so for him the semantics of general terms are a problem.
It is a problem which I do not think any Nominalist can solve. There are
various strategies available. They may attempt to argue that the applic-
ability of predicates or general terms is a fundamental fact which cannot be
explained further. Or they can appeal to concepts ('abstract ideas'), or to
classes of particulars, or to the resemblances of particulars, what Locke
called 'the similitudes in things'. I believe that each of these strategies
faces a number of distinct insuperable problems. But since these problems
are individually fairly familiar I shall omit any further discussion of
Nominalism here.1
If Nominalism is false, Realism is true. For Realism, as I understand it,
is simply the denial that all things that exist are only particulars. But just
as there are different varieties of Nominalism, so there are different varieties
of Realism. In particular, Realism subdivides into 'Platonic' and
'Aristotelian' types of Realism. In Platonic Realism the universal is
separated from particulars and becomes, indeed, a strange sort of particular.
Ironically, therefore, many of the same difficulties which can be brought
against Nominalism can be brought against Platonic Realism. Once again,
I believe, these difficulties are insuperable.
Rejecting, as I do, all varieties of Nominalism, but also rejecting Platonic
Realism, I am led to embrace a moderate or Aristotelian Realism which
allows that things have properties and that two numerically different things
may have the very same property, but which rejects any transcendent
account of properties. (Such a Realism will also allow relations between
things, holding that two numerically different groups of things may be
related by the very same relation, but in this paper I confine myself for the
most part to properties.)
There are many problems involved in formulating a coherent version of
Aristotelian Realism. The main difficulty is to give an account of how
particulars stand to their properties. The difficulties of the orthodox
Lockean view, where an unknowable substratum supports knowable
properties, are so familiar that recapitulation is not called for here. But

1
For one line of criticism of the various Nominalist positions (and also
Platonic Realism) see my 'Infinite Regress Arguments and the Problem of
Universals', Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 52, 1974 (December).
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having once rejected Nominalism, that is, the doctrine which tries to dis-
pense entirely with universals in favour of particulars, motives of intellec-
tual economy will naturally cause us to consider whether we cannot give
an account of particulars purely in terms of universals. We are thus led to
consider Russell's view that particulars are simply 'bundles of univer-

This view faces a well-known line of criticism. If particulars are essen-

tially bundles of universals, then, of necessity, there cannot be two particu-
lars with exactly the same properties. This consequence is a form of the
principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles, but there are good reasons
to think that, in this form, the principle is not a necessary truth. Here,
however, I will not develop any further this traditional line of criticism.
For I think that there may be a quite simple refutation of the view that a
particular is nothing but a bundle of universals.
If this is a true account of what a particular is, then some relation or other
tie must hold between those and only those universals which are 'properties
of the same thing'. Call this relation or tie 'co-instantiation' and symbolize it
by ' C . It, too, is a universal. Suppose, now, that there is an object, a,
which has properties P and Q and an object, b, which has P but lacks Q.
If this is so, then P and Q must be related or tied by C. Only so can a be
P and also be Q. But if the universals P and Q are so related, then how is
it possible that b should have P but lack Q ? Either P and Q are related by
C or they are not. If they are so related, how can they ever be disjoined?
So b cannot have P but lack Q, a conclusion which is obviously absurd.
It may be replied that C may be interpreted as the relation of co-
instantiation in some bundle. But this is simply a way of saying 'co-instantia-
tion in some particulars'. (There are no bundles independent of the co-
instantiation relation.) Then, however, the analysis has reintroduced the
notion of a particular, and has reintroduced it as a primitive. The moral
seems to be that if we start simply with the class of all universals, it is
impossible to find any way of organizing or bundling them by means of a
single relation, yet allow for the fact that some bundles must contain
members which are disjoined in other bundles.
This argument assumes that properties are universals, but this assump-
tion may be challenged. G. F. Stout, in particular, held that the properties
of particulars are as particular as the things themselves. On his view, every
billiard-ball has its own colour and its own shape, even although they may
have what ordinary language would call 'exactly the same shade' of colour
and 'exactly the same' shape.
What needs to be emphasized about Stout's view is that it is a form of
Nominalism. For although it admits properties, it admits them only as
particulars. Locke's problem about general terms is therefore as much a
problem for the particularist view of the properties as it is for orthodox
Nominalism. I think the problem is equally insoluble.
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So, I maintain, we cannot give an account of universality in terms of

particularity, as the various forms of Nominalism, including Stout's,
attempt to do so. Neither can we give an account of particulars in terms of
universals, as Russell advocated. The true view, I believe, is that while
universality and particularity cannot be reduced to each other, they are
interdependent, so that properties are always properties of a particular, and
whatever is a particular is a particular having certain properties.
At the same time, it cannot be allowed that particulars and properties
stand in a relation to each other. There are particulars and there are proper-
ties—but they are nothing apart from each other. What is capable of
independent existence, and so is the true substance of the world, are
particulars-having-certain-properties: this-suches, as Aristotle would have
said. It is obvious that there are very hard unsolved problems here.
Up to this point I have been concerned simply to sketch a general
position. The position is familiar enough, and the considerations which
can be adduced for and against it are well known. I believe that my criticism
of Russell's account of particulars as bundles of universals is new, and so
I have devoted a little space to it. For the rest, I have simply indicated my
view. But now I wish to develop the Realist theory of universals in a way
which does, I think, involve relative novelty.

II
There is a tradition in the history of philosophy which links together
Empiricism, and so perhaps the spirit of the natural sciences, with
Nominalism. Rationalism, on the other hand, and so perhaps the spirit of
mathematics and the a priori disciplines, is linked with a Realistic doctrine
of universals. The result has generally been that where Nominalism has
been rejected and Realism embraced it has been an a priori Realism. I con-
tend that Nominalists cannot solve the problem of general terms. They
cannot solve the problem of the application of a term like 'red' to an
indefinite number of particulars. Perceiving this, the Realist has then
jumped to the conclusion that corresponding to the term 'red' there must
be an objective property of redness. He proceeds to people the world with
at least as many distinct properties as there are distinct one-place general
predicates having application. A famous remark of Socrates in the Republic
will be remembered:
. . . shall we proceed as usual and begin by assuming the existence of a
single essential nature or Form for every set of things which we call by
the same name?
(595) translated by F. M. Cornford)
I wish to cut this link between Realism and Rationalism, between a
doctrine of universals and an attachment to an a priori style of reasoning in
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ontology. Against a priori Realism I wish to uphold scientific Realism. What

is a genuine property of particulars is to be decided by scientific investiga-
tion. The identification of properties should be an end-result of the efforts
of science, or the efforts of total enquiry. Properties are not given to us
from the beginning any more than the laws of nature are. It is a matter for
inquiry, both scientific and philosophical, very serious and painful inquiry,
whether there is or is not such a property or set of properties as redness, or
a set of properties which constitutes lionhood. If you ask me to give an
example of a genuine property I shall be deeply uncertain what example
to give, but inclined to suggest such a thing as having the mass of one
kilogram exactly.
In this way, I hope to reach a Realism which is acceptable to Empiricists.
I think, indeed, that it is a false dichotomy between the a posteriori spirit
of Nominalism and the a priori spirit of Realism which has kept so many
Empiricists so long in the Nominalist camp.
If we reject a priori Realism, then we must reject the view that there are
any uninstantiated properties. Suppose it to be the case, as it may be the
case, that nothing travels faster than light. This premiss would seem to give
the best of reasons for denying that there is any such property as travelling
faster than light. We can, of course, admit that it is possible that there
should be such a property, viz. if there were particulars which travelled
faster than light. But it is a contingent fact that there is no such property.
This denial of uninstantiated properties is an important respect in which
my theory of properties is Aristotelian and anti-Platonic.
At this point it becomes important to emphasize that different arguments
for objective properties are of different worth. There is a worthless argu-
ment from meaning. It runs: the predicate 'travels faster than light' is a
meaningful predicate, so there must be something for the predicate to
mean, so, despite the fact that no particular travels faster than light, there
is such a property as travelling faster than light. This the Empiricist
will reject. (Though he will regret that at present we seem to lack any
satisfactory theory of meaning.) But he will not reject the argument that
to say truly that numerically different particulars all have something in
common involves agreeing that these particulars have objective properties.
But, as has already been hinted, even this second line of thought must be
handled with care. Once freed of the idea that to every general predicate
(such as 'travels faster than light') a property corresponds, we may go on to
question whether, even if the predicate has application, there has to be a
single property in virtue of which the predicate applies. There has to be an
explanation of the way in which we can apply a predicate correctly to
individuals which are quite new to us and which played no part in our
learning the range of the predicate. This explanation will in the end have to
appeal to the nature, and so to the properties, of the things to which the
predicate correctly applies. But the explanation need not always take the
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form of saying that the predicate applies in virtue of the fact that each
particular has the very same property.
In identifying properties we are breaking through to the structure of the
world. Our ordinary terms are for the most part brought into existence to
serve our practical concerns. We should not expect such terms to pick out
properties for us any more than we would expect ordinary discourse to
indicate what are the laws of nature. We can, for instance, agree with
Wittgenstein that, very likely, the word 'game' does not apply to the
activities it applies to in virtue of a single complex property which all
these activities possess. But to say that what holds the class of games to-
gether is no more than a series of loose, overlapping, resemblances is only
a blow to an a priori Realism about universals. Resemblance is to be
analysed in terms of common properties (and, perhaps, properties with
common parts). And so, although there is no property of gamehood, the
various sorts of games are all called games in virtue of the (somewhat
different) properties which they all possess. A scientific Realism is in no
way affected.
So we cannot assume that, because a general term is correctly applied
to an indefinite class, it applies in virtue of a single property which the
members of that class all possess. Contrariwise, when two distinct, that is,
two non-synonymous, predicates both apply to all and only the same class
of things it does not follow that they apply in virtue of distinct properties.
Meanings do not create properties. Difference of meaning of predicates does
not ensure difference of property.
A particularly important case here is that where a property (or family of
properties) which is in fact complex is grasped by some rational being in a
simple, unanalysed, way. In Locke's terminology, the predicate would
then be an expression of a 'simple idea' in the mind of the person wielding
the predicate. But scientific and/or philosophical research may make it
plausible that this property or properties should be identified with some
complex property or properties of the objects in question. The predicate
which gives the formula for this property (properties) will clearly be
semantically distinct from the original predicate, yet may apply in virtue
of the very same property. I believe that this casts important light upon the
so-called 'contingent identification of properties'. (If you follow Kripke,
and suspect that at least some of these identifications, although a posteriori,
do not issue in contingent propositions, then substitute 'scientific identifica-
tion of properties'.) It shows, in particular, that the proposed physicalist
reductions of the secondary qualities to physically respectable properties
of objects are at least not misconceived in principle.2
2
For development of the argument of this paragraph, and other matters in
this paper, see my 'Materialism, Properties and Predicates', The Monist, 56,1972,
pp. 163-176.
 Towards a Theory of Properties

Summing up this portion of my argument, an Empiricist or a posteriori

Realism about universals envisages no uniform relation between predicates
and properties. To the one predicate, none, one or many properties may
correspond. And there may be none, one or many predicates answering
to the one property.

Ill

It is an a posteriori question what properties there are, and so in answering

it the philosopher had better be humble. At best he can do no more than
walk hand-in-hand with the scientist, often he must simply accept what
science tells him. But there are many questions, very difficult questions,
questions concerned with the general nature of properties, which it seems
that the philosopher can investigate in his characteristically a priori way.
Let us finally consider one or two of these questions. The theme that
predicates and properties stand in no uniform relation to each other will
be re-emphasized.
Should we admit disjunctive and negative properties? Suppose that the
predicates 'P' and 'Q' are both property-predicates, that is to say, that
they are predicates which apply in virtue of a single property, P, and the
single distinct property, Q, respectively. Consider then the predicates
'PvQ\'~P' and ' ~ Q\ Should we say that these are property-predicates?
I think that there are good reasons to deny that they are.
Consider the disjunctive predicate first. Suppose that there is a particular
which has the property P. Not only the predicate 'P' but the predicate
'P v Q' will apply to this particular whether or not it has the property Q.
It is clear, furthermore, that in place of the expression 'Q' we can substitute
any other property-predicate and still the resulting disjunctive predicate
will apply to the particular. Now if all these disjunctive predicates apply in
virtue of distinct disjunctive properties (which, if we are to have disjunctive
properties, seems the inevitable assumption), then we have an a priori
proof that this particular has at least as many disjunctive properties as
there are non-disjunctive properties in the world.
A conclusion like this should make an Empiricist reject the notion of
disjunctive properties. For it offends against the great principle that what
and how many properties there are in the world is to be discovered a
posteriori. Here is an Irish formulation of the principle. If it can be proved
a priori that particulars have certain properties, or a certain number of
properties, or that the numbers of properties possessed by different
particulars must bear each other the samefixedproportion (such as equality),
then these properties are not properties.
The same reasoning may be applied in the case of negative properties.
D. M. Armstrong

Indeed, it was applied by McTaggart, although he did not draw the

Empiricist conclusion.3 For all properties, either a thing has that property
or it lacks it. If the lack of a property be also a property, then we know
a priori that every particular will have exactly the same number of proper-
ties. McTaggart was pleased to reach this conclusion, but in my view we
should be appalled and should instead conclude that there are no negative
properties.
Although few Realists have gone so far as to admit disjunctive properties
many have accepted negative properties. And, indeed, there has always
been a problem how to avoid postulating negative properties. Given that
a lacks the property P, how does the predicate ' ~P' apply to a? Some have
tried to argue that it is in virtue of some other positive property which the
particular has (it is not-red because it is green) but it has proved difficult
to carry this line of argument through. So in order to give the predicate
' ~ P' something in a to hook on to, as it were, negative properties have been
reluctantly accepted.
It is useful here to consider the disjunctive case. How does the predicate
'P v Q' hook on to a? We readily see that, while a property-predicate 'P'
may hook on to a in virtue of a's being P, in the case of disjunctive predicates
the mode of correspondence of the predicate to the thing is a different mode.
The predicate lP v Q' corresponds if, and only if, at least one of disjuncts
'P' and 'Q' has the more ordinary, straightforward, type of correspondence
to the world.
Now consider an object a which is not P (but which has properties
Q, R . . . etc.), and so to which the predicate '~P' applies. The predicate
'P', which is part of the predicate '~P', might be said to have a corre-
spondence of a sort to a's property Q. It might be called 'counter-
correspondence' (a phrase suggested by Keith Campbell) because the rule
is that the predicate 'P' corresponds to property Q provided that this
property is not identical with property P. It is a perfectly good corre-
spondence rule which gives 'P' something to hang on to at the other end.
Furthermore, 'P' counter-corresponds to each property of a. And now
why should we not say that the predicate ' ~ P ' applies to a if, and only if,
the predicate 'P' counter-corresponds to each property of a—properties
which are all positive? The need to postulate negative properties seems
removed.
This correspondence-rule for genuinely negative predicates (predicates
which deny the presence of a genuine property) itself involves the notion
of negation, in particular the notion of something not being identical with
something else. But I do not think this is any objection to the corre-
spondence-rule. We are not trying to give a reductive analysis of statements
3
J. McT. E. McTaggart, The Nature of Existence (Cambridge University
Press), Vol. I, p. 63.
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 Towards a Theory of Properties

of the form 'a is not P\ which would be impossible, but are simply trying
to show that their truth-conditions need not include negative properties.
(In the same way, the correspondence-rule for disjunctive predicates
involves the notion of disjunction.) What in fact are the genuinely non-
negative and non-disjunctive predicates is, of course, for empirical enquiry
to determine. Notice further that none of this shows that there are no
disjunctive and/or negative properties. What I hope it shows is that there
is no need to postulate such properties. I would then rely on Occam's
Razor.
So we need not admit disjunctive or negative properties. What of con-
junctive predicates? Given that 'P' and 'Q' are both property-predicates,
is 'P & Q' a. property-predicate? One restricting condition must be
imposed at once. Since all properties are instantiated properties, there
must be a particular, x, which is both P and is Q. But suppose that con-
dition is met. Is the conjunctive predicate a property-predicate?
I think it is. One important consideration here is that it seems possible
that every property is a conjunctive property. It seems logically possible
that for each property, P, there exist two properties, Q & R, wholly
distinct from each other, such that P=Q & R. Compare this with the
possibility that for each spatial area, S, there exist two areas, T &U, wholly
distinct from each other, such that S=T & V. Just as space is, or may be,
infinitely divisible, so properties may be infinitely complex. There may be
no simple properties. Where a property is a structural one, involving
certain sorts of element in certain sorts of relation it may be the case that
the elements (and perhaps the relations too) are themselves structural in
nature, and so ad injinitum. There seems to be no contradiction here.
If all properties reduce in the end to complexes of simple properties,
then, of course, there is a case for saying that simple properties are the
properties. But I do not see how philosophy (or perhaps any other disci-
pline) is to settle the question whether there are simple properties one way
or the other. And so, since we need to keep open the possibility that there
are properties which do not reduce to complexes of simple properties, we
need to admit conjunctive properties (and structural properties generally).
This is not to say, however, that the three properties, P, Q, and P & Q
are three wholly distinct properties. The property P and the property Q
are both of them parts of the conjunctive property P & Q. The class of
things which are both P and Q may well be a (proper) part of the class of
things which are P and also a proper part of the class of things which are Q.
But the property P and the property Q are proper parts of the conjunctive
property P & Q. (This is linked with so-called 'inverse variation of in-
tension and extension'.)
A word here about wholes and parts. It is a vulgar error to think that the
notions of whole and part have any special connection with spatial wholes
and parts. Spatial wholes and parts are simply the whole-part cases which
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most easily strike our imagination. Temporal phases of a thing ('time-

slices') are equally parts of the thing. Nor do the spatial and temporal parts
of particulars exhaust the notion of whole and part. For instance, where
one class of numbers includes within itself another class of numbers, this
is a case of whole and part. After contemplating these very different sorts of
case, it should not be hard to recognize that properties may also stand to
each other as whole to part.
The relation of whole and part is thus seen to be extraordinarily ubiqui-
tous. I believe that there is a simple explanation of this. It is as ubiquitous
as the so-called 'relations' of identity and difference because whole and part
is simply a special case of partial identity or, if you like, partial difference.
Australia is strictly identical with the smallest continent. It is com-
pletely distinct from (strictly different from) Europe. But strict identity or
strict difference does not always obtain. Two adjoining terrace houses or
two Siamese twins are not identical, but they are not completely distinct
from each other either. They are partially identical, and this partial identity
takes the form of having a common part. Australia and New South Wales
are not identical, but they are not completely distinct from each other
either. They are partially identical and this partial identity takes the form
of the whole-part 'relation'. The examples are drawn from spatial cases,
but it is clear that they can be reproduced in all other contexts.
If this is correct, then the property P and the property P & Q are
partially identical. Similarly, given a 'structural' property which involves
something having property Q having relation R to something having
property S, Q, R and S will be parts of, and so will be partially identical
with, the structural property.
I have gone on at some length about the partial identity of properties
because I think it may cast light upon the horribly difficult but immensely
important topic of determinables and determinates. If we take determinate
notions such as coloured, or red, or having length, then, for reasons which
I will not spell out here, I am inclined to think that to such predicates no
property corresponds. I am inclined to deny, that is, that there are such
properties as having length, being coloured or even being red. To reach
properties we must go to such things as absolutely determinate lengths or
absolutely determinate shades of colour. To say that an object a is red, for
instance, is to say that there exists a property P such that a has P and P
is a member of a certain class of properties: the class of the determinate
shades of red.
But, of course, this analysis only leaves us with a problem. What is the
principle of unity of such classes of properties as the class of the lengths
or the class of the reds? They are obviously not mere arbitrary assemblages.
It is here that I look to the notion of partial identity for help. Perhaps the
class of lengths or the class of reds (the universals, not the particulars)
stand in the whole-part relation or overlap with each other in the same way
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that the conjunctive property P & Q contains P or the conjunctive property

P & Q overlaps with the property Q S? R, or a structural property contains
a certain element, or two structural properties may have a common
element. To coin a phrase, perhaps such things as the lengths, or the
colours, or the reds form a family. This family is a family of universals
and the binding principle of the family is a series of partial identities.
In the case of the lengths, we can perhaps see how one universal can
contain another. A yard (the universal, not particulars which are a yard in
length) may plausibly be said to contain those lengths which are less than
a yard: it can be treated as a simple sort of structural property (a 'simple
mode' Locke would have called it) whose parts are lengths. In the case of
the colours, the partial identity is not apparent to us, but must be postu-
lated as that which explains the complex logical links which the colour-
properties bear to each other. The much-remarked 'simplicity' of the
colours is, I think, epistemological only. In fact the colour-properties
have a complexity of structure, and can thus overlap in the required way,
but mere perception, at any rate, is unable to penetrate to that structure.
This matter is, of course, linked with the question of the scientific reduc-
tion of the secondary qualities. If colours, for instance, are strictly identical
with wavelengths, as I believe them to be, then they turn out to be complex
properties which could have the required relations of partial identity.

There are many, many, other issues connected with the theory of proper-
ties which emerge when one tries to work out a systematic view. For
instance, there is the question whether properties themselves can have
properties and also the question whether they can be related to each other
in any other way than the 'relation' of partial identity. If properties can
be related to each other in other ways, this may cast light on the nature of
nomic or law-like connection in nature and also on causal connection.
Again, there is the question whether or not we should admit relational
properties as properties, and the whole very difficult question of relations
themselves. Presumably they should be admitted as a second species of
universal alongside properties.
But I hope I have said enough to show that the working out of an
Empiricist theory of properties, more generally, an Empiricist theory of
universals, is an enterprise not without philosophical promise. In the not
too distant future I hope to put something very much more complete
before the philosophical world in order that they may judge it.

University of Sydney