This is reading list for a 4-session seminar on mereology. We will be covering philosophical rather than formal issues, but I will assume acquaintance with first order predicate logic.
List of topics and readings
Starred readings (*) are particularly central or essential.
1. Classical mereology; gunk; unrestricted composition
- (*) Simons, P. (1987). Parts: A Study in Ontology. Oxford University Press, USA http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199241460.001.0001/acprof-9780199241460, ch 1 and 3
- (*) Varzi, A. (2012). Mereology. In E. N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2012/entries/mereology/
- (*) Lewis, D. (2001). On the plurality of worlds. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 211-213
- (*) Sider, T. (2001). Four-Dimensionalism. Oxford University Press http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/019924443X.001.0001/acprof-9780199244430, pp. 120-132
- Hovda, P. (2009). What is Classical Mereology? Journal of Philosophical Logic, 38(1), 55–82 http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10992-008-9092-4
(The Hovda article is very technical: give it a go but don’t worry too much if you find it too hard).
Issues: What are the mereological concepts “part”, “proper part”, “overlap”, “disjoint”, “fusion”, “product”? Relationship between formal mereology and metaphysical theorising. What is gunk? Could we have reasons to believe in it? What is the Lewis/Sider defence of unrestricted composition? Does it work?
2. Spatial and temporal parts; “unrestricted” partition; extended simples
- (*) Haslanger, S. (2003). Persistence through time. In M. J. Loux & D. W. Zimmerman (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of metaphysics. Oxford: Oxford University Press http://tinyurl.com/c2eubkc
- (*) van Inwagen, P. (2001). The doctrine of arbitrary undetached parts. In Ontology, Identity, and Modality: Essays in Metaphysics (pp. 75–94). Cambridge University Press
- (*) Sider, T. (2001). Four-Dimensionalism. Oxford University Press http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/019924443X.001.0001/acprof-9780199244430, ch 3
- (*) Parsons, J. (2007). Theories of location. Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, 3, 201–232 http://otago.academia.edu/JoshParsons/Papers/1015465/Theories_of_Location
- Parsons, J. (2004). Dion, Theon, and Daup. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 85(1), 85–91 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-0114.2004.00188.x/abstract
- Parsons, J. (2005). I am not now, nor have I ever been, a turnip. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 83(1), 1–14 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00048400500043894
- van Inwagen, P. (1990). Four-Dimensional Objects. Noûs, 24(2), 245–255 http://www.jstor.org/stable/2215526
- Hud Hudson (2005). The Metaphysics of Hyperspace. Clarendon Press, ch 4
Issues: Is classical mereology consistent with the fact that things can change their parts? Does it makes sense to suppose that something could be extended in time or in space without having any proper parts?
3. Non-extensional mereology; supplementation and anti-symmetry
- (*) Thomson, J. J. (1983). Parthood and Identity Across Time. The Journal of Philosophy, 80(4), 201–220 http://www.jstor.org/stable/2026004
- (*) Varzi, A. C. (2008). The extensionality of parthood and composition. The Philosophical Quarterly, 58(230), 108–133 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9213.2007.542.x
- (*) Cotnoir, A. J. (2010). Anti-symmetry and non-extensional mereology. The Philosophical Quarterly, 60(239), 396–405 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9213.2009.649.x
- (*) Parsons, J. (2013). An extensionalists’s guide to non-extensional mereology. /draft/nem3/
- Cotnoir, A. J., & Bacon, A. (2012). Non-wellfounded Mereology. The Review of Symbolic Logic, 5(2), 187–204 http://www.journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S1755020311000293
Issues: Are there good metaphysical reasons (e.g. Statue / Lump cases) to doubt the truth of “extensionality” principles? Supposing there are, what would a non-extensional formal mereology look like?
4. Fuzzy mereology
Updated: 08 Nov 2013 03:03
