- Title: Making Objects and Events - Author: [[Simon Evnine]] - Tags: #summary #llmgenerated #toread #book # Making Objects and Events: A Hylomorphic Theory of Artifacts, Actions, and Organisms ## Chapter 1: Hylomorphism and its Related Metaphysics ### 1.1 Some Varieties of Hylomorphism #### 1.1.1 A sufficient but minimal condition for hylomorphism - Hylomorphism is characterized by the following condition: - HYL) Some things stand in the relation of being the matter of to other things, and this relation (the matter relation) is irreflexive and asymmetric. - The matter relation implies: - A thing and its matter are always distinct entities - The domain of things has a hierarchical structure - Example of hylomorphic theory: statue and bronze - Statue and bronze are distinct entities - Bronze is the matter of the statue - They exist on different ontological levels > To give a concrete example, take the case, to be discussed many times in the course of this book, of a statue. HYL itself does not demand any particular view of this example, since it merely holds that some objects have matter to which they are not identical. But a statue is in fact a good example of the kind of objects that hylomorphic theories are concerned with. If a view is committed to HYL, and the example falls within the scope of that view, there are two distinct entities involved, a statue and a quantity, or lump, or piece of, say, bronze. The statue has the bronze as its matter but is not identical to it. They exist on different ontological levels, ordered by the matter relation. - Reasons for distinguishing statue and bronze: 1. Temporal differences: - Bronze may exist before the statue - Statue may cease to exist while bronze continues to exist 2. Modal differences: - Statue cannot survive being melted down, bronze can - Statue can change its matter [[over time]], bronze cannot 3. Essential differences: - Nature of being a statue vs. nature of being a quantity of bronze - Consequences of identifying statue and bronze: - Statue would exist before it is cast and after it is melted - Statue would not be necessarily statue-like - Distinction between phasal and substance sortals: - Phasal sortals (e.g., child): objects can exist as different phases - Substance sortals (e.g., human being): objects cannot exist as something else - Statue is a substance sortal, not a phasal sortal > First, if the statue and bronze must be taken to be distinct in cases where there are temporal differences, uniformity of treatment suggests they be taken to be distinct even in cases where there are no such temporal differences. Secondly, and more importantly, even if there are no such differences, there could be. The sculptor could have first mixed the copper and tin, making the bronze, and then subsequently used the bronze to make the statue; or she could have destroyed the statue by melting it down, rather than putting it in an acid bath, and thereby not have simultaneously destroyed the bronze. Or some of the bronze might have worn away or become detached. Thus, there are actual modal differences between the statue and the bronze, even when there are no actual temporal differences. The bronze can survive being melted down; the statue cannot. And hylomorphically complex objects like the statue are modally flexible in that they can change their matter [[over time]], losing some as they are worn away or damaged, gaining some as they are repaired and restored. - Constitution relation: - Often used to describe the relation between a statue and its matter - Irreflexive and asymmetric - Philosophers who accept [[this view]] are considered hylomorphists #### 1.1.2 Aristotelian hylomorphism - Aristotle's theory: - Objects are composites of matter and form - Form is embodied in or informs the matter - Form has distinct relations to matter and the composite - Four types of causes in Aristotle's framework: 1. Material cause 2. Formal cause 3. Efficient cause 4. Final cause - Coincidence of formal, efficient, and final causes: - Often coincide in Aristotle's view - What a thing is, what it is for, and what brings it into existence are the same > Aristotle argues for the existence of a kind of entity, form, such that [[the objects]] that fall within the domain of the theory are in some way composites of their matter and a form. The form and matter enter into some special kind of relation—the form is embodied in, or informs, the matter (though this simply names, and does nothing to explain, that special relation)—and [[the result]] is the hylomorphically complex entity. A form thus has two distinct relations of interest, one to the matter it informs (the bronze, for example), and a distinct relation to the composite of which it is the form (the statue). (A third relation will emerge shortly.) The elaboration of Aristotle's theory is multi-faceted, often highly obscure, and subject to almost endless commentary and controversy. I wish here only to focus on one aspect of it, the intersection of the theory of form and matter with the theory of the four types of causes. - Example of biological reproduction: - Individual human is a composite of matter and form (human) - Efficient cause: male parent - Formal cause: human form acting through the parent - Mechanism: semen carries form to female's matter (blood in uterus) - Final cause: form guides development to adult human - Two ways form occurs: 1. Exemplified by specimens of the species 2. Figures in the copying process from forebear to offspring - Importance of [[this distinction]]: - Explains teleological character of Aristotle's outlook - Final cause is explanatory because it is present in the past > A striking aspect of Aristotle's account is the certainty and clarity of its appreciation of the fact that the biological phenomena require there to be two different ways in which specific form occurs: one the way in which it is exemplified by specimens of the species, and a different way that figures in the copying process from forebear to offspring . . . [T]he recognition that the second way must indeed be different is perhaps Aristotle's most remarkable single insight, biological or otherwise. - Example of an artifact (bicycle): - Matter: steel, rubber, chrome, etc. - Formal cause: form of a bicycle - Efficient cause: maker or art of bicycle making - Final cause: function of the bicycle - Coincidence of efficient, formal, and final causes in the bicycle #### 1.1.3 Principle-based hylomorphism - Contemporary philosophers have adapted Aristotle's insights: - Variety of neo-Aristotelian hylomorphisms in current metaphysics - Two broad currents in contemporary hylomorphism: 1. Powers-based hylomorphism - Includes Jaworski, Koons, Marmodoro, Oderberg, and Rea - Uses powers or dispositions to explain form - Often invokes Aristotle's potentiality/actuality distinction - Some focus on the soul as form of an organism - Not all subscribe to HYL 2. Principle-based hylomorphism - Includes Fine, Johnston, and Koslicki - Committed to HYL - Do not engage in metaphysics of powers or potentiality/actuality - See hylomorphically complex objects as involving matter and a principle, property, relation, function, or structure - Principle-based hylomorphism: - Analyzes "the bronze shaped in a certain way" as a hylomorphic complex - Distinguishes between "comma" and "hyphen" readings - Comma reading: "the bronze, shaped in a certain way" (identical to bronze) - Hyphen reading: "the bronze-shaped-in-a-certain-way" (distinct from bronze) - Statue is a hylomorphic complex of bronze (matter) and the property of being shaped in a certain way (form) > According to principle-based hylomorphism, the statue is something appropriately described as the bronze-shaped-in-a-certain-way and its nature is a hylomorphic complex consisting of the bronze, as matter, and something like the property of being shaped in a certain way, as form. - Differences from Aristotelian hylomorphism: - Forms are much less metaphysically potent - Difficult to emulate Aristotle's rich conception of form - Challenging to maintain [[the unity]] of formal, efficient, and final causes ### 1.2 Amorphic Hylomorphism #### 1.2.1 A brief overview - Author's approach (amorphic hylomorphism): - Abandons [[the idea]] of form as a component - Embraces the interconnection of formal, efficient, and final causes - Characteristics of amorphic hylomorphism: - Hylomorphically complex entities are [[sui generis]] - Have matter to which they are not identical - No further component plays [[the role]] of form - Objects fall essentially under certain kinds - Must be understood in terms of kind-related processes of work on their (original) matter - Kinds are necessarily tied to particular ways of coming to be and particular functions/modes of behavior > On my approach, hylomorphically complex entities are [[sui generis]] entities that have matter to which they are not identical, but there is no further component of them that plays [[the role]] of form. Such objects fall essentially under certain kinds and must be understood in terms of the kind-related processes of work on their (original) matter by which they come to exist. When these processes are effectively directed at some matter, a further object of the kind related to those generative processes comes into existence with that matter as its matter, and this further object is associated, in virtue of the kind of thing it is, with certain functions or characteristic behaviors. Thus, the kinds to which the entities in the domain of the theory belong are necessarily tied to particular ways of coming to be and particular functions and modes of behavior. - Terminology: - "Amorphic hylomorphism": author's view (no forms as components) - "Morphic hylomorphists": those who take hylomorphically complex entities as composites of form and matter - Justification for using the term "hylomorphism": a) Aristotelian in attempting to tie together accounts of origin, essence, and function b) Accepts HYL (objects have matter to which they are not identical) c) Places great weight on having a metabolism (ability to change matter [[over time]]) d) Descended from and close to principle-based hylomorphism #### 1.2.2 The methodological priority of matter to complex object - [[Peter van Inwagen]]'s Special Composition Question (SCQ): SCQ) When is it true that there is something the xs compose? - Possible answers to SCQ: - Universalism: under any circumstances - Nihilism: never - Intermediate answers (e.g., when in contact, when bonded) - Van Inwagen's answer: - Only when the activities of the xs constitute a life - Only organisms are mereologically complex entities - Methodological priority of parts to wholes: - Given some things, explanation is needed for claiming a whole exists - May not always be applicable (e.g., parts identifiable only as parts of a whole) - Similar methodological priority of matter to hylomorphically complex object - Given a quantity of bronze, why suppose a distinct object (statue) exists? - Revisionary vs. descriptive metaphysics (Strawson): - Descriptive: articulate existing conception of reality - Revisionary: improve on existing conception - Adopting methodological priority leads to revisionary metaphysics - Objects become hostage to philosophical fortune - Not safely presupposed - Hylomorphic views often present as friends of common sense ontology - Accept existence of ordinary things (mountains, chairs, organisms) - Take natures of objects as close to common sense - Problem of ontological inflation: - Principle-based hylomorphists may admit existence of many unsuspected entities - Oversuppliers can claim common sense is silent about such entities - Undersuppliers can allow indulgence in fiction of entities' existence - Author's approach: - Aims for reasonable balance between acceptance and rejection of entities - Modest undersupplier - Limited use of fictionalist strategy > I hope my own approach will strike a reasonable balance between acceptance and rejection of various kinds of entities to approximate our common sense ontology, though the match with common sense will not be perfect. I will be a modest undersupplier and make limited use of just the fictionalist strategy I indicated undersuppliers in general can resort to (see 6.3). #### 1.2.3 The metabolic priority of a complex object to its matter - Metabolic priority: - Runs opposite to methodological priority - Metaphysical rather than methodological issue - Hylomorphically complex objects: - Can have different matter at different times (temporally flexible) - Can have different matter at different possible worlds (modally flexible) - Extensionalist views: - Take identity and nature of complex object as determined "from the bottom up" - Determined by things that are its matter at different times or possible worlds - Respond to desire to identify complex objects with their matter - Typically associated with Classical Extensional Mereology (CEM) and four-dimensionalism - Author's view: - Extensionalist approaches are misguided - Hylomorphically complex objects should be thought of in terms of metabolism - Object "selects" its matter rather than being determined by it - Metabolic priority of complex object to matter > To illustrate this metabolic priority, let me briefly discuss a view advanced by Richard Grandy (1975). His view is interesting because it shows that theories that seem, on the face of it, to be quite far in spirit from the usual metaphysical stomping grounds of extensionalism (classical mereology and four-dimensionalism, to be discussed in 1.3 and 1.4 respectively) can be extensionalist nonetheless. According to Grandy, at least some of the objects that I have called hylomorphically complex (his example is a gold ring) are identified with mathematical functions from times to quantities of matter. - Grandy's view: - Gold ring identified with function from times to quantities of matter - Function understood as set of ordered pairs - Temporally flexible but modally inflexible - Problems with Grandy's view: - Ring's nature and identity derive from its matter at different times and worlds - No metabolic priority of complex object to matter - Alternative understanding of functions: - Functions as rules rather than sets - Rule specifies which quantity of matter to associate with ring at different times and worlds - Gives ring a metaphoric "metabolism" - Importance of metabolic priority: - Hylomorphically complex objects not determined by their matter - They have matter they do because of what they are - Artifacts misrepresented if principles of variable embodiments taken as sets of ordered pairs - Advantages of understanding principles as rules: 1. Preserves metabolic priority of complex object to matter 2. Allows for possibility of object coming into existence without predetermined future 3. Enables de re thought about particular variable embodiment without knowing entire future and possible history > The advantages, then, seem all on the side of taking the principles of variable embodiments as rules rather than sets of ordered pairs. So we should ask, what does Fine himself think about this question? And if we do take principles as rules, what will the resulting picture be like? As to what Fine's own position is, the evidence is exiguous. The only thing of which I am aware that he says that bears on the matter is this: > In contrast to the case of a rigid embodiment a,b,c, . . . /R, the matter of a variable embodiment is not given independently of the form or principle, but is itself specified by means of that principle. (1999, 69) #### 1.2.4 Artifacts - Importance of artifacts in the author's approach: - Artifacts are central cases and paradigms of hylomorphically complex objects - We make artifacts, which provides clarity on their existence - The significance of origins is clear for artifacts > To get the biological phenomena from the principles of the nature of matter, something else would have to be operative, working up the matter, mixing it in the right proportions, and guiding its development. This something Aristotle called form. A comprehensive account of the natural phenomena, Aristotle argued, would have to be couched in terms of "principles" of the nature of both matter (hyle) and form (morphe). Thus was born the first, and still the prototypical and most impressive, variety of hylomorphism, the metaphysics of form and matter. - Van Inwagen's objection to the reality of artifacts: - Pushing around stuff doesn't produce anything new - It's merely rearranging existing furniture - Author's response to van Inwagen: - Creating artifacts is genuinely creative - Example: child building a sand castle - Child intends to build a sand castle - Moving sand around in specific ways is what it means to make a sand castle - A new object (sand castle) comes into existence - Sand castle is not identical to the sand (its matter) - Sand castle can endure through changes in its matter > Van Inwagen's reasons for rejecting the view that, in cases that resemble our sand castle scenario, a new entity is brought into existence are exhibited in the following: > Pick up a lump of clay and knead it into some complicated and arbitrary shape. Call anything essentially of that shape a gollyswoggle. Did you bring a gollyswoggle into existence? I should think that if our sculptor brought a statue into existence [mutatis mutandis for our sand castle builder], then you brought a gollyswoggle into existence . . . But if you can make a gollyswoggle by accident by kneading the clay, then you must, as you idly work the clay in your fingers, be causing the generation and corruption of the members of a compact series of objects of infinitesimal duration. That is what seems to me incredible. (1990, 126) - Author's critique of van Inwagen's argument: 1. Gollyswoggle example assumes shape is the only essential property 2. Ignores the role of intentional making in artifact creation 3. Disregards the fact that artifacts are essentially products of intentional activity - Artifacts as "ideal" objects: - Real, but dependent on minds - Dependence is not just causal - Form a distinct sui generis category - What it is to be an object of that kind is to be the impress of a mind on matter - Created through the process of working on matter with certain intentions > Artifacts are what I call "ideal" objects. They are ideal not in the sense that they do not really exist. Sandwiches and statues are quite real, but they are ideal in that they depend essentially on minds. Their dependence is not just causal, requiring minds if they are to come into existence. In this sense, quantities of transuranic elements are dependent on minds. Artifacts are ideal, or mind-dependent, in a much deeper sense. They form a distinct sui generis category of objects for which what it is to be an object of that kind is to be the impress of a mind on matter. And minds impress themselves on matter not by combining something abstract with that matter, as principle-based hylomorphism would have it, but through the process of working on the matter with certain intentions. #### 1.2.5 Historical ontology - Importance of history in ontology: - What something is depends on its history - Particularly important for artifacts - Kripke's necessity of origin thesis: - Origins of certain things are essential to them - For artifacts, Kripke focuses on the necessity of original matter - Author's view on necessity of origin for artifacts: - Agrees with the importance of origins - Disagrees with Kripke's focus on original matter - Argues for necessity of origin-as-act rather than origin-as-matter - The act of creation is essential to an artifact's identity > I shall, in 3.4.1, argue for a necessity of origin thesis for artifacts according to which the origin in question is not the original matter (which in fact is neither necessary nor sufficient for the identity of a given object) but the act of its creation. If I make a statue from some bronze, but I might, by that very same act, have made a statue from a different quantity of bronze, or even from some clay, then this statue, this bronze statue, might have been made from different bronze or even from clay. - Implications of the author's view: - Questions about artifact identities depend on questions about act identities - Acts of creation might have occurred at different times - Times of performance are not essential to actions - Hylomorphism for actions: - Actions themselves are hylomorphically complex entities - Actions are artifacts (artifactual events) #### 1.2.6 Vagueness - Vagueness in the context of artifacts: - Emphasis on intentional aspects makes vagueness more likely - Vagueness may be a feature of the world itself, not just language and concepts - Artifacts depend on intentions of makers > Vagueness, or indeterminacy, is a topic that has much concerned philosophers in the last few decades. The majority opinion is that vagueness always resides in the language and concepts we use to represent reality, but a minority view has it that vagueness is actually a feature of the world itself. Any view that emphasizes those aspects in which the world depends on our intentions (as makers of artifacts, for example) will be especially prone to the postulation of worldly vagueness. - Author's approach to vagueness: - Accepts possibility of worldly vagueness - Vagueness in artifact concepts transmitted to objects - Objects derive identity and existence from intentions - Vague identities: - Author finds Parsons and Woodruff's (1995) treatment congenial - Vagueness in terms of states of affairs - Indeterminate identity due to world's indeterminacy about identity states of affairs - Examples: Ship of Theseus, gradual matter replacement > Parsons and Woodruff diagnose what they see as the problem in Gareth Evans's (1978) famous argument that "it is indeterminate that a = b" implies "it is determinate that a ≠ b" (and hence that indeterminacies of identity cannot be true); and they provide a non-vague model of vague identities to help make sense of this kind of vagueness. - Vague existence: - Possibility of vague existence for mereologically or hylomorphically complex objects - Example: artisan working on matter to make a chair - Indeterminacy in success of artifact creation > It seems to me that what is going on here is that there are (at least) two routes to the genuine creation of artifacts, each representing a different combination of, on the one hand, the maker's intentions, and on the other, some objective constraint. If one intends to make a K and thereby produces something that can perform the kind-associated function of Ks, that is sufficient for making a K. ### 1.3 Mereology - Definition of mereology: - Study of parthood and composition - Also refers to a particular theory: Classical Extensional Mereology (CEM) - Classical Extensional Mereology (CEM): - Primitive concept: "is a part of" - Three axioms: 1. CEM-1: Parthood is transitive 2. CEM-2: For any things, there exists their fusion (sum or aggregate) 3. CEM-3: If x and y have the same parts, then x is identical to y > CEM-1) Parthood is transitive. > CEM-2) For any things, x, y, . . . z, there exists something (called variously their fusion, sum, or aggregate) of which they are parts, and that has no parts not contributed by those things. > CEM-3) If x and y have the same parts, then x is identical to y. - Implications of CEM: - Existence of counterintuitive fusions (e.g., fusion of a dog's ear, Eurasia, and the number three) - Flat, unstructured view of the world - Relevance of mereology to hylomorphism: 1. Hylomorphism is unlikely to be compatible with classical mereology - CEM-3 conflicts with distinctness of matter and form - CEM recognizes only one type of parthood, incompatible with hylomorphic structure 2. Some philosophers analyze the matter relation in terms of parthood - Different approaches to this analysis (e.g., Fine, Baker) > It will be evident with a little reflection that a hylomorphist is unlikely to be a friend of classical mereology. Hence, CEM is opposed to hylomorphism. Take once again the statue and bronze. The statue seems to have as parts some bronze molecules and the quantity of bronze that is the matter of the statue seems likewise to have as parts exactly the same bronze molecules. CEM gives us only one way of thinking of a whole in relation to its parts, namely, as the fusion of those parts. But CEM-3 says that if things have the same parts, they are identical. So if the bronze is a fusion of those molecules and the statue is a fusion of them too, CEM implies that the bronze and the statue must be identical, contrary to HYL. - Author's approach to mereology and hylomorphism: - Matter relation should not be analyzed in terms of parthood - Matter relation is not incompatible with parthood - Matter of something may sometimes be its parts and sometimes not - Mereological complexity vs. hylomorphic complexity: - Possibility of things with parts but no matter (e.g., quantities of matter) - Hylomorphic structure is not the only structure in objects - Types of matter relations: 1. Singular: x is the matter of y 2. Mass: some M is the matter of y 3. Plural: the xs are the matter of y - Issues with mass and plural matter relations: - Temptation to singularize mass and plural relations - Use of set theory or mereology to create singular entities - Author's approach: use Cartwright's quantities for mass terms, allow plural matter relations ### 1.4 Three- and Four-Dimensionalism - Definition of three-dimensionalism (endurantism) and four-dimensionalism (perdurantism): - Debate over the relation between objects and time - How to understand change in objects - Four-dimensionalism: - Objects have time built into them - Analogous to spatial extension - Objects have temporal parts - Change explained by different temporal parts having different properties > Four-dimensionalism is the view that objects, things like cats, cars, and quantities of bronze, have time built into them. It treats an object's relation to time analogously to its relation to space. Objects exist not only by being extended through three spatial dimensions, but also through a fourth, temporal dimension. They occupy a region of, or take up, time just as they occupy a region of, or take up, space. This means that just as they have spatial parts, they have temporal parts too. Not only is there the front end of a cat and its back end; there is its first half and its second half. Just as an object is at a place by having a part of itself that is at that place, so it is at a time by having a part of itself at that time. - Three-dimensionalism: - Objects' relation to time different from relation to space - Whole object present at any time it exists - Objects endure through time - Change explained by modifying object's relations to properties > The whole of the object is present at any time at which the object is present. An object is not present now by having a "now" part; the whole of it is present now and equally, the whole of it is present later. The object as a whole does not occupy a region of time by being extended through it; rather it "endures" through time, whole and complete. - Ways three-dimensionalists explain change: 1. Time-indexed properties (e.g., being solid-at-t) 2. Time-modified property instantiation (e.g., is-at-t solid) - Significance for hylomorphism: - Four-dimensionalism challenges distinctness of statue and bronze - Four-dimensionalism often associated with Classical Extensional Mereology (CEM) - Four-dimensionalism presents an extensionalist view of objects > First, we need to highlight another connection, between four-dimensionalism and CEM. Though logically independent, in practice the two tend almost always to go together. It is not hard to see why. A classical mereologist has only the notion of a fusion to describe mereological complexity. But this can give rise to various counterintuitive consequences when combined with the facts of change since the fusions of CEM cannot change their parts over time. So a classical mereologist will welcome four-dimensionalism as a way of rendering CEM more plausible in the face of apparent change. - Four-dimensionalist account of constitution: - Constitution defined as sharing all parts at a time - Symmetric and reflexive relation - Incompatible with hylomorphic view of constitution - Two metaphysical packages: 1. Four-dimensionalism and CEM: - Unhierarchical universe - Structured only by univocal parthood relation - Flat ontology 2. Three-dimensionalism and hylomorphism: - Rejects CEM - Sees universe as ontologically hierarchical - Structured in richer way than given by CEM's part relation - Author's position: - Favors three-dimensionalism and hylomorphism package -