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The problem of universals is an ancient question from
metaphysics Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...
that has inspired a range of philosophical topics and disputes: Should the
properties Property is the ownership of land, resources, improvements or other tangible objects, or intellectual property. Property may also refer to: Mathematics * Property (mathematics) Philosophy and science * Property (philosophy), in philosophy and ...
an object has in common with other objects, such as color and shape, be considered to
exist eXist-db (or eXist for short) is an open source software project for NoSQL databases built on XML technology. It is classified as both a NoSQL document-oriented database system and a native XML database (and it provides support for XML, JSON, ...
beyond those objects? And if a property exists separately from objects, what is the nature of that existence? The problem of universals relates to various inquiries closely related to metaphysics,
logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the science of deductively valid inferences or of logical truths. It is a formal science investigating how conclusions follow from premises ...
, and
epistemology Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics. Episte ...
, as far back as Plato and Aristotle, in efforts to define the mental connections a human makes when they understand a property such as shape or color to be the same in nonidentical objects. Universals are qualities or relations found in two or more entities. As an example, if all cup holders are ''circular'' in some way, ''circularity'' may be considered a
universal Universal is the adjective for universe. Universal may also refer to: Companies * NBCUniversal, a media and entertainment company ** Universal Animation Studios, an American Animation studio, and a subsidiary of NBCUniversal ** Universal TV, a ...
property of cup holders. Further, if two daughters can be considered ''female offspring of Frank'', the qualities of being ''female'', ''offspring'', and ''of Frank'', are universal properties of the two daughters. Many properties can be universal: being human, red, male or female, liquid or solid, big or small, etc. Philosophers agree that human beings can talk and think about universals, but disagree on whether universals exist in
reality Reality is the sum or aggregate of all that is real or existent within a system, as opposed to that which is only imaginary. The term is also used to refer to the ontological status of things, indicating their existence. In physical terms, r ...
beyond mere thought and speech.


Ancient philosophy

The problem of universals is considered a central issue in traditional metaphysics and can be traced back to
Plato Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
and
Aristotle Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of phil ...
's philosophy, particularly in their attempt to explain the nature and status of forms. These philosophers explored the problem through predication.


Plato

Plato believed that there was a sharp distinction between the world of perceivable objects and the world of universals or
forms Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens. Form also refers to: *Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data * ...
: one can only have mere opinions about the former, but one can have
knowledge Knowledge can be defined as awareness of facts or as practical skills, and may also refer to familiarity with objects or situations. Knowledge of facts, also called propositional knowledge, is often defined as true belief that is distinc ...
about the latter. For Plato it was not possible to have knowledge of anything that could change or was particular, since knowledge had to be forever unfailing and general. For that reason, the world of the forms is the real world, like
sunlight Sunlight is a portion of the electromagnetic radiation given off by the Sun, in particular infrared, visible, and ultraviolet light. On Earth, sunlight is scattered and filtered through Earth's atmosphere, and is obvious as daylight when t ...
, while the sensible world is only imperfectly or partially real, like
shadows A shadow is a dark area where light from a light source is blocked by an opaque object. It occupies all of the three-dimensional volume behind an object with light in front of it. The cross section of a shadow is a two-dimensional silhouette, ...
. This
Platonic realism Platonic realism is the philosophical position that universals or abstract objects exist objectively and outside of human minds. It is named after the Greek philosopher Plato who applied realism to such universals, which he considered ideal ...
, however, in denying that the eternal Forms are mental artifacts, differs sharply with modern forms of idealism. One of the first nominalist critiques of Plato's realism was that of
Diogenes of Sinope Diogenes ( ; grc, Διογένης, Diogénēs ), also known as Diogenes the Cynic (, ) or Diogenes of Sinope, was a Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Cynicism (philosophy). He was born in Sinope, an Ionian colony on the Black Sea ...
, who said "I've seen Plato's cups and table, but not his cupness and tableness."


Aristotle

Plato's student Aristotle disagreed with his tutor. Aristotle transformed Plato's forms into " formal causes", the blueprints or
essence Essence ( la, essentia) is a polysemic term, used in philosophy and theology as a designation for the property or set of properties that make an entity or substance what it fundamentally is, and which it has by necessity, and without which it ...
s of individual things. Whereas Plato idealized
geometry Geometry (; ) is, with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. It is concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. A mathematician who works in the field of geometry is c ...
, Aristotle emphasized
nature Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physics, physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomenon, phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. ...
and related disciplines and therefore much of his thinking concerns living beings and their properties. The nature of universals in Aristotle's philosophy therefore hinges on his view of
natural kind "Natural kind" is an intellectual grouping, or categorizing of things, in a manner that is reflective of the actual world and not just human interests. Some treat it as a classification identifying some structure of truth and reality that exists wh ...
s. Instead of categorizing ''being'' according to the structure of thought, he proposed that the categorical analysis be directed upon the structure of the natural world. He used the principle of predication in ''
Categories Category, plural categories, may refer to: Philosophy and general uses *Categorization, categories in cognitive science, information science and generally *Category of being * ''Categories'' (Aristotle) *Category (Kant) * Categories (Peirce) * ...
'', where he established that universal terms are involved in a relation of predication if some facts expressed by ordinary sentences hold. In his work ''
On Interpretation ''De Interpretatione'' or ''On Interpretation'' ( Greek: Περὶ Ἑρμηνείας, ''Peri Hermeneias'') is the second text from Aristotle's '' Organon'' and is among the earliest surviving philosophical works in the Western tradition to dea ...
'', he maintained that the concept of "universal" is apt to be predicated of many and that singular is not. For instance, ''man'' is a universal while ''Callias'' is a singular. The philosopher distinguished highest genera like animal and species like man but he maintained that both are predicated of individual men. This was considered part of an approach to the principle of things, which adheres to the criterion that what is most universal is also most real. Consider for example a particular
oak An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...
tree. This is a member of a species and it has much in common with other oak trees, past, present and future. Its universal, its oakness, is a part of it. A biologist can study oak trees and learn about oakness and more generally the intelligible order within the sensible world. Accordingly, Aristotle was more confident than Plato about coming to know the sensible world; he was a prototypical
empiricist In philosophy, empiricism is an epistemological theory that holds that knowledge or justification comes only or primarily from sensory experience. It is one of several views within epistemology, along with rationalism and skepticism. Empir ...
and a founder of
induction Induction, Inducible or Inductive may refer to: Biology and medicine * Labor induction (birth/pregnancy) * Induction chemotherapy, in medicine * Induced stem cells, stem cells derived from somatic, reproductive, pluripotent or other cell t ...
. Aristotle was a new,
moderate Moderate is an ideological category which designates a rejection of radical or extreme views, especially in regard to politics and religion. A moderate is considered someone occupying any mainstream position avoiding extreme views. In American ...
sort of realist about universals.


Medieval philosophy


Boethius

The problem was introduced to the medieval world by
Boethius Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480 – 524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, ''magister officiorum'', historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the tr ...
, by his translation of Porphyry's
Isagoge The ''Isagoge'' ( el, Εἰσαγωγή, ''Eisagōgḗ''; ) or "Introduction" to Aristotle's "Categories", written by Porphyry in Greek and translated into Latin by Boethius, was the standard textbook on logic for at least a millennium after his ...
. It begins: "I shall omit to speak about genera and species, as to whether they subsist (in the nature of things) or in mere conceptions only; whether also if subsistent, they are bodies or incorporeal, and whether they are separate from, or in, sensibles, and subsist about these, for such a treatise is most profound, and requires another more extensive investigation". Boethius, in his commentaries on the aforementioned translation, says that a universal, if it were to exist has to apply to several particulars entirely. He also specifies that they apply simultaneously at once and not in a temporal succession. He reasons that they cannot be mind-independent, i.e. they do not have a real existence, because a quality cannot be both one thing and common to many particulars in such a way that it forms part of a particular's substance, as it would then be partaking of universality and particularity. However, he also says that universals can't also be of the mind since a mental construct of a quality is an abstraction and understanding of something outside of the mind. He concludes that either this representation is a true understanding of the quality, in which case we revert to the earlier problem faced by those who believe universals are real; or, if the mental abstractions were not a true understanding, then 'what is understood otherwise than the thing is false'. His solution to this problem was to state that the mind is able to separate in thought what is not necessarily separable in reality. He cites the human mind's ability to abstract from concrete particulars as an instance of this. This, according to Boethius, avoids the problem of Platonic universals being out there in the real world, but also the problem of them being purely constructs of the mind in that universals are simply the mind thinking of particulars in an abstract, universal way. His assumption focuses on the problems that language create. Boethius maintained that the structure of language corresponds to the structure of things and that language creates what he regarded as philosophical babble of confused and contradictory accounts of the nature of things. To illustrate his view, suppose that although the mind cannot think of 2 or 4 as an odd number, as this would be a false representation, it can think of an even number that is neither 2 nor 4.


Medieval realism

Boethius mostly stayed close to Aristotle in his thinking about universals. Realism's biggest proponents in the Middle Ages, however, came to be
Thomas Aquinas Thomas Aquinas, OP (; it, Tommaso d'Aquino, lit=Thomas of Aquino; 1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest who was an influential philosopher, theologian and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism; he is known wi ...
and
Duns Scotus John Duns Scotus ( – 8 November 1308), commonly called Duns Scotus ( ; ; "Duns the Scot"), was a Scottish Catholic priest and Franciscan friar, university professor, philosopher, and theologian. He is one of the four most important ...
. Aquinas argued that both the essence of a thing and its existence were clearly distinct; in this regard he is also Aristotelian.
Duns Scotus John Duns Scotus ( – 8 November 1308), commonly called Duns Scotus ( ; ; "Duns the Scot"), was a Scottish Catholic priest and Franciscan friar, university professor, philosopher, and theologian. He is one of the four most important ...
argues that in a thing there is no real distinction between the essence and the existence, instead there is only a
formal distinction In scholastic metaphysics, a formal distinction is a distinction intermediate between what is merely conceptual, and what is fully real or mind-independent--a logical distinction. It was made by some realist philosophers of the Scholastic perio ...
. Scotus believed that universals exist only inside the things that they exemplify, and that they "contract" with the haecceity of the thing to create the individual. As a result of his realist position, he argued strongly against both nominalism and conceptualism, arguing instead for Scotist realism, a medieval response to the conceptualism of Abelard. That is to say, Scotus believed that such properties as 'redness' and 'roundness' exist in reality and are mind-independent entities. Furthermore, Duns Scotus wrote about this problem in his own commentary (''Quaestiones'') on Porphyry's ''Isagoge'', as Boethius had done. Scotus was interested in how the mind forms universals, and he believed this to be 'caused by the intellect'. This intellect acts on the basis that the nature of, say, 'humanity' that is found in other humans and also that the quality is attributable to other individual humans.


Medieval nominalism

The opposing view to realism is one called nominalism, which at its strongest maintains that universals are verbal constructs and that they do not inhere in objects or pre-exist them. Therefore, universals in this view are something which are peculiar to human cognition and language. The French philosopher and
theologian Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...
Roscellinus (1050–1125) was an early, prominent proponent of this view. His particular view was that universals are little more than vocal utterances (''voces'').
William of Ockham William of Ockham, OFM (; also Occam, from la, Gulielmus Occamus; 1287 – 10 April 1347) was an English Franciscan friar, scholastic philosopher, apologist, and Catholic theologian, who is believed to have been born in Ockham, a small vill ...
(1285-1347) wrote extensively on this topic. He argued strongly that universals are a product of abstract human thought. According to Ockham, universals are just words or concepts (at best) that only exist in the mind and have no real place in the external world. His opposition to universals was not based on his eponymous Razor, but rather he found that regarding them as real was contradictory in some sense. An early work has Ockham stating that 'no thing outside the soul is universal, either through itself or through anything real or rational added on, no matter how it is considered or understood'. Nevertheless, his position did shift away from an outright opposition to accommodating them in his later works such as the ''Summae Logicae'' (albeit in a modified way that would not classify him as a complete realist).


Modern and contemporary philosophy


Mill

The 19th-century British philosopher
John Stuart Mill John Stuart Mill (20 May 1806 – 7 May 1873) was an English philosopher, political economist, Member of Parliament (MP) and civil servant. One of the most influential thinkers in the history of classical liberalism, he contributed widely to ...
discussed the problem of universals in the course of a book that eviscerated the philosophy of Sir William Hamilton. Mill wrote, "The formation of a concept does not consist in separating the attributes which are said to compose it from all other attributes of the same object and enabling us to conceive those attributes, disjoined from any others. We neither conceive them, nor think them, nor cognize them in any way, as a thing apart, but solely as forming, in combination with numerous other attributes, the idea of an individual object". However, he then proceeds to state that Berkeley's position is factually wrong by stating the following: In other words, we may be "temporarily unconscious" of whether an image is white, black, yellow or purple and concentrate our attention on the fact that it is a man and on just those attributes necessary to identify it as a man (but not as any particular one). It may then have the significance of a universal of manhood.


Peirce

The 19th-century American logician
Charles Sanders Peirce Charles Sanders Peirce ( ; September 10, 1839 – April 19, 1914) was an American philosopher, logician, mathematician and scientist who is sometimes known as "the father of pragmatism". Educated as a chemist and employed as a scientist for t ...
, known as the father of
pragmatism Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition that considers words and thought as tools and instruments for prediction, problem solving, and action, and rejects the idea that the function of thought is to describe, represent, or mirror reality. ...
, developed his own views on the problem of universals in the course of a review of an edition of the writings of George Berkeley. Peirce begins with the observation that "Berkeley's
metaphysical Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...
theories have at first sight an air of paradox and levity very unbecoming to a bishop". He includes among these paradoxical doctrines Berkeley's denial of "the possibility of forming the simplest general conception". He wrote that if there is some mental fact that works ''in practice'' the way that a universal would, that fact is a universal. "If I have learned a formula in gibberish which in any way jogs my memory so as to enable me in each single case to act as though I had a general idea, what possible utility is there in distinguishing between such a gibberish... and an idea?" Peirce also held as a matter of
ontology In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality. Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities exis ...
that what he called "thirdness", the more general facts about the world, are extra-mental realities.


James

William James William James (January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910) was an American philosopher, historian, and psychologist, and the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States. James is considered to be a leading thinker of the lat ...
learned pragmatism, this way of understanding an idea by its practical effects, from his friend Peirce, but he gave it new significance – which was not to Peirce's taste: he came to complain that James had "kidnapped" the term and eventually to call himself a "pragmaticist" instead. Although James certainly agreed with Peirce and against Berkeley that general ideas exist as a psychological fact, he was a nominalist in his ontology: There are at least three ways in which a realist might try to answer James' challenge of explaining the reason why universal conceptions are more lofty than those of particulars: the moral–political answer, the mathematical–scientific answer, and the anti-paradoxical answer. Each has contemporary or near-contemporary advocates.


Weaver

The moral or political response is given by the conservative philosopher
Richard M. Weaver Richard Malcolm Weaver, Jr (March 3, 1910 – April 1, 1963) was an American scholar who taught English at the University of Chicago. He is primarily known as an intellectual historian, political philosopher, and a mid-20th century conservative ...
in '' Ideas Have Consequences'' (1948), where he describes how the acceptance of "the fateful doctrine of nominalism" was "the crucial event in the history of Western culture; from this flowed those acts which issue now in modern decadence".


Quine

The noted American philosopher,
W. V. O. Quine W. may refer to: * SoHo (Australian TV channel) (previously W.), an Australian pay television channel * ''W.'' (film), a 2008 American biographical drama film based on the life of George W. Bush * "W.", the fifth track from Codeine's 1992 EP ''Bar ...
addressed the problem of universals throughout his career. In his paper, 'On Universals', from
1947 It was the first year of the Cold War, which would last until 1991, ending with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Events January * January–February – Winter of 1946–47 in the United Kingdom: The worst snowfall in the country in ...
, he states the problem of universals is chiefly understood as being concerned with entities and not the linguistic aspect of naming a universal. He says that Platonists believe that our ability to form general conceptions of things is incomprehensible unless universals exist outside of the mind, whereas nominalists believe that such ideas are 'empty verbalism'. Quine himself does not propose to resolve this particular debate. What he does say however is that certain types of 'discourse' presuppose universals: nominalists therefore must give these up. Quine's approach is therefore more an epistemological one, i.e. what can be known, rather than a metaphysical one, i.e. what is real.


Cocchiarella

Nino Cocchiarella put forward the idea that realism is the best response to certain logical paradoxes to which nominalism leads ("Nominalism and Conceptualism as Predicative Second Order Theories of Predication", ''
Notre Dame Journal of Formal Logic The ''Notre Dame Journal of Formal Logic'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed scientific journal covering the foundations of mathematics and related fields of mathematical logic, as well as philosophy of mathematics. It was established in 1960 and is p ...
'', vol. 21 (1980)). It is noted that in a sense Cocchiarella has adopted Platonism for anti-Platonic reasons. Plato, as seen in the dialogue ''
Parmenides Parmenides of Elea (; grc-gre, Παρμενίδης ὁ Ἐλεάτης; ) was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher from Elea in Magna Graecia. Parmenides was born in the Greek colony of Elea, from a wealthy and illustrious family. His dates a ...
'', was willing to accept a certain amount of paradox with his forms. Cocchiarella adopts the forms to avoid paradox.


Armstrong

The Australian philosopher
David Malet Armstrong David Malet Armstrong (8 July 1926 – 13 May 2014), often D. M. Armstrong, was an Australian philosopher. He is well known for his work on metaphysics and the philosophy of mind, and for his defence of a factualist ontology, a functiona ...
has been one of the leading realists in the twentieth century, and has used a concept of universals to build a naturalistic and scientifically realist ontology. In both ''Universals and Scientific Realism'' (1978) and ''Universals: An Opinionated Introduction'' (1989), Armstrong describes the relative merits of a number of nominalist theories which appeal either to "natural classes" (a view he ascribes to
Anthony Quinton Anthony Meredith Quinton, Baron Quinton, FBA (25 March 192519 June 2010) was a British political and moral philosopher, metaphysician, and materialist philosopher of mind. He served as President of Trinity College, Oxford from 1978 to 1987; a ...
), concepts, resemblance relations or predicates, and also discusses non-realist "trope" accounts (which he describes in the ''Universals and Scientific Realism'' volumes as "particularism"). He gives a number of reasons to reject all of these, but also dismisses a number of realist accounts.


Penrose

Roger Penrose Sir Roger Penrose (born 8 August 1931) is an English mathematician, mathematical physicist, philosopher of science and Nobel Laureate in Physics. He is Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics in the University of Oxford, an emeritus fello ...
contends that the
foundations of mathematics Foundations of mathematics is the study of the philosophy, philosophical and logical and/or algorithmic basis of mathematics, or, in a broader sense, the mathematical investigation of what underlies the philosophical theories concerning the natu ...
can't be understood without the Platonic view that "mathematical truth is absolute, external and eternal, and not based on man-made criteria ... mathematical objects have a timeless existence of their own..."


Positions

There are many philosophical positions regarding universals. #
Platonic realism Platonic realism is the philosophical position that universals or abstract objects exist objectively and outside of human minds. It is named after the Greek philosopher Plato who applied realism to such universals, which he considered ideal ...
(also called extreme realism"MacLeod & Rubenstein (2006), §3.Herbert Hochberg, "Nominalism and Idealism," ''Axiomathes'', June 2013, 23(2), pp. 213–234. or exaggerated realism) Nominalism, Realism, Conceptualism – ''Catholic Encyclopedia'' (1913) is the view that universals or
forms Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens. Form also refers to: *Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data * ...
in this sense, are the causal explanation behind the notion of what things exactly are; (the view that universals are real entities existing independent of particulars). # Aristotelian realism (also called strong realism or
moderate realism Moderate realism (also called immanent realism) is a position in the debate on the metaphysics of universals associated with the hylomorphic substance theory of Aristotle. There is no separate realm in which universals exist (in opposition to P ...
) is the rejection of extreme realism. This position establishes the view of a universal as being that of the quality within a thing and every other thing individual to it; (the view that universals are real entities, but their existence is dependent on the particulars that exemplify them). #
Anti-realism In analytic philosophy, anti-realism is a position which encompasses many varieties such as metaphysical, mathematical, semantic, scientific, moral and epistemic. The term was first articulated by British philosopher Michael Dummett in an argument ...
is the objection to both positions. Anti-realism is divided into two subcategories; (1)
Nominalism In metaphysics, nominalism is the view that universals and abstract objects do not actually exist other than being merely names or labels. There are at least two main versions of nominalism. One version denies the existence of universalsthings t ...
and (2)
Conceptualism In metaphysics, conceptualism is a theory that explains universality of particulars as conceptualized frameworks situated within the thinking mind. Intermediate between nominalism and realism, the conceptualist view approaches the metaphysical co ...
. Taking "beauty" as example, each of these positions will state the following: * Beauty is a property that exists in an ideal form independently of any mind or description. * Beauty is a property that exists only when beautiful things exist. * Beauty is a property constructed in the mind, so exists only in descriptions of things.


Realism

The school of realism makes the claim that universals are real and that they exist distinctly, apart from the particulars that instantiate them. Two major forms of metaphysical realism are
Platonic realism Platonic realism is the philosophical position that universals or abstract objects exist objectively and outside of human minds. It is named after the Greek philosopher Plato who applied realism to such universals, which he considered ideal ...
(''universalia ante res''), meaning "'universals before things'" and Aristotelian realism (''universalia in rebus''), meaning "'universals in things'". ''Platonic realism'' is the view that universals are real entities existing independent of particulars. ''Aristotelian realism'', on the other hand, is the view that universals are real entities, but their existence is dependent on the particulars that exemplify them. Realists tend to argue that universals must be posited as distinct entities in order to account for various phenomena. A common realist argument said to be found in Plato's writings, is that universals are required for certain general words to have meaning and for the sentences in which they occur to be true or false. Take the sentence " Djivan Gasparyan is a musician" for instance. The realist may claim that this sentence is only meaningful and expresses a truth because there is an individual, Djivan Gasparyan, who possesses a certain quality: musicianship. Therefore, it is assumed that the property is a universal which is distinct from the particular individual who has the property.


Nominalism

Nominalists assert that only individuals or particulars exist and deny that universals are real (i.e. that they exist as entities or beings; ''universalia post res''). The term "nominalism" comes from the Latin ''nomen'' ("name"). Four major forms of nominalism are
predicate nominalism In metaphysics, nominalism is the view that universals and abstract objects do not actually exist other than being merely names or labels. There are at least two main versions of nominalism. One version denies the existence of universalsthings th ...
, resemblance nominalism,
trope nominalism Trope denotes figurative and metaphorical language and one which has been used in various technical senses. The term ''trope'' derives from the Greek τρόπος (''tropos''), "a turn, a change", related to the root of the verb τρέπειν (' ...
, and
conceptualism In metaphysics, conceptualism is a theory that explains universality of particulars as conceptualized frameworks situated within the thinking mind. Intermediate between nominalism and realism, the conceptualist view approaches the metaphysical co ...
. One with a nominalist view claims that we predicate the same property of/to multiple entities, but argues that the entities only share a name and do not have a real quality in common. Nominalists often argue this view by claiming that nominalism can account for all the relevant phenomena, and therefore—by
Occam's razor Occam's razor, Ockham's razor, or Ocham's razor ( la, novacula Occami), also known as the principle of parsimony or the law of parsimony ( la, lex parsimoniae), is the problem-solving principle that "entities should not be multiplied beyond neces ...
, and its principle of simplicity—nominalism is preferable, since it posits fewer entities. Different variants and versions of nominalism have been endorsed or defended by many, including Chrysippus, Ibn Taymiyyah,
William of Ockham William of Ockham, OFM (; also Occam, from la, Gulielmus Occamus; 1287 – 10 April 1347) was an English Franciscan friar, scholastic philosopher, apologist, and Catholic theologian, who is believed to have been born in Ockham, a small vill ...
,
Ibn Khaldun Ibn Khaldun (; ar, أبو زيد عبد الرحمن بن محمد بن خلدون الحضرمي, ; 27 May 1332 – 17 March 1406, 732-808 AH) was an Arab The Historical Muhammad', Irving M. Zeitlin, (Polity Press, 2007), p. 21; "It is, of ...
, Rudolf Carnap,
Nelson Goodman Henry Nelson Goodman (7 August 1906 – 25 November 1998) was an American philosopher, known for his work on counterfactuals, mereology, the problem of induction, irrealism, and aesthetics. Life and career Goodman was born in Somerville, Mas ...
, David Lewis, H. H. Price, and D. C. Williams.


Conceptualism

Conceptualism In metaphysics, conceptualism is a theory that explains universality of particulars as conceptualized frameworks situated within the thinking mind. Intermediate between nominalism and realism, the conceptualist view approaches the metaphysical co ...
is a position that is meshed between realism and nominalism. Conceptualists believe that universals can indeed be real, but only existing as concepts within the mind."Conceptualism." The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy. Simon Blackburn. Oxford University Press, 1996. Oxford Reference Online. Oxford University Press. 8 April 2008. Conceptualists argue that the "concept" of universals are not mere "inventions but are reflections of similarities among particular things themselves." For example, the concept of 'man' ultimately reflects a similarity amongst Socrates and Kant.


See also

*
Abstract object In metaphysics, the distinction between abstract and concrete refers to a divide between two types of entities. Many philosophers hold that this difference has fundamental metaphysical significance. Examples of concrete objects include plants, hum ...
*
Bundle theory Bundle theory, originated by the 18th century Scottish philosopher David Hume, is the ontological theory about objecthood in which an object consists only of a collection (''bundle'') of properties, relations or tropes. According to bundle the ...
* Constructor theory *
Crystal system In crystallography, a crystal system is a set of point groups (a group of geometric symmetries with at least one fixed point). A lattice system is a set of Bravais lattices. Space groups are classified into crystal systems according to their po ...
*
Object (philosophy) An object is a philosophical term often used in contrast to the term '' subject''. A subject is an observer and an object is a thing observed. For modern philosophers like Descartes, consciousness is a state of cognition that includes the subjec ...
*
Observation Observation is the active acquisition of information from a primary source. In living beings, observation employs the senses. In science, observation can also involve the perception and recording of data via the use of scientific instruments. The ...
*
Philosophy of mathematics The philosophy of mathematics is the branch of philosophy that studies the assumptions, foundations, and implications of mathematics. It aims to understand the nature and methods of mathematics, and find out the place of mathematics in people's ...
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Platonic form Platonic realism is the philosophical position that universals or abstract objects exist objectively and outside of human minds. It is named after the Greek philosopher Plato who applied realism to such universals, which he considered ideal fo ...
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Present The present (or here'' and ''now) is the time that is associated with the events perception, perceived directly and in the first time, not as a recollection (perceived more than once) or a speculation (predicted, hypothesis, uncertain). It is ...
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Qualia In philosophy of mind, qualia ( or ; singular form: quale) are defined as individual instances of subjective, conscious experience. The term ''qualia'' derives from the Latin neuter plural form (''qualia'') of the Latin adjective '' quālis'' () ...
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Realism (philosophy) Philosophical realism is usually not treated as a position of its own but as a stance towards other subject matters. Realism about a certain kind of thing (like numbers or morality) is the thesis that this kind of thing has ''mind-independent ex ...
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Self The self is an individual as the object of that individual’s own reflective consciousness. Since the ''self'' is a reference by a subject to the same subject, this reference is necessarily subjective. The sense of having a self—or ''selfhood ...
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Similarity (philosophy) In philosophy, similarity or resemblance is a relation between objects that constitutes how much these objects are alike. Similarity comes in degrees: e.g. oranges are more similar to apples than to the moon. It is traditionally seen as an Relation ...
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Transcendental nominalism Ian MacDougall Hacking (born February 18, 1936) is a Canadian philosopher specializing in the philosophy of science. Throughout his career, he has won numerous awards, such as the Killam Prize for the Humanities and the Balzan Prize, and been a ...
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Universality (philosophy) In philosophy, universality or absolutism is the idea that universal facts exist and can be progressively discovered, as opposed to relativism, which asserts that all facts are merely relative to one's perspective. Absolutism and relativism have ...
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Tianxia ''Tianxia'' (), literally meaning "(all) under Heaven", is a Chinese term for a historical Chinese cultural concept that denoted either the entire geographical world or the metaphysical realm of mortals, and later became associated with poli ...
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Ubuntu Ubuntu ( ) is a Linux distribution based on Debian and composed mostly of free and open-source software. Ubuntu is officially released in three editions: '' Desktop'', ''Server'', and ''Core'' for Internet of things devices and robots. All ...


Notes


References and further reading

; Historical studies * Klima, Gyula (2008). "The Medieval Problem of Universals", ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward N. Zalta (ed.).
link
* Pinzani, Roberto (2018). ''The Problem of Universals from Boethius to John of Salisbury'', Leiden: Brill. * Spade, Paul Vincent. (1994, ed., transl.), "Five Texts on the Mediaeval Problem of Universals: Porphyry, Boethius, Abelard, Duns Scotus, Ockham", Hackett Pub Co Inc. ; Contemporary studies * Armstrong, David (1989). ''Universals'', Westview Press. * Bacon, John (2008). "Tropes", ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward N. Zalta (ed.).
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* Cocchiarella, Nino (1975). "Logical Atomism, Nominalism, and Modal Logic", ''Synthese''. * Feldman, Fred (2005). "The Open Question Argument: What It Isn't; and What It Is", ''Philosophical Issues'' vol. 15

* Lewis, David (1983). "New Work for a Theory of Universals", ''Australasian Journal of Philosophy''. * Loux, Michael J. (1998). ''Metaphysics: A Contemporary Introduction'', N.Y.: Routledge. * Loux, Michael J. (2001). "The Problem of Universals" in ''Metaphysics: Contemporary Readings'', Michael J. Loux (ed.), N.Y.: Routledge, pp. 3–13. * MacLeod, M. & Rubenstein, E. (2006). "Universals", ''The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', J. Fieser & B. Dowden (eds.).
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* Moreland, JP. (2001). "Universals." Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press. * Price, H. H. (1953). "Universals and Resemblance", Ch. 1 of ''Thinking and Experience'', Hutchinson's University Library. * Quine, W. V. O. (1961). "On What There is," in ''From a Logical Point of View'', 2nd/ed. N.Y: Harper and Row. * Rodriguez-Pereyra, Gonzalo (2008). "Nominalism in Metaphysics", ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward N. Zalta (ed.).
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* Russell, Bertrand (1912). "The World of Universals," in ''The Problems of Philosophy'', Oxford University Press. * Swoyer, Chris (2000). "Properties", ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward N. Zalta (ed.).
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* Williams, D. C. (1953). "On the Elements of Being", ''Review of Metaphysics'', vol. 17.


External links

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with an annotated bibliography

* ttp://www.friesian.com/universl.htm The Friesian School on Universals {{DEFAULTSORT:Problem Of Universals Epistemology Ontology Cognition
Universals In metaphysics, a universal is what particular things have in common, namely characteristics or qualities. In other words, universals are repeatable or recurrent entities that can be instantiated or exemplified by many particular things. For exa ...