A defence of the conceptualist solution to the “grounding problem” for coincident objects
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22370/rhv2020iss16pp41-60Keywords:
composition, material object, concept, instantiation, modality, kindAbstract
I consider some of the objections that have been raised against a conceptualist solution to the “grounding problem” (the problem of grounding the sortalish properties of material objects in their non-sortalish ones), I address in particular two objections that I call Conceptual Validity and Instantiation, and I attempt to answer them on behalf of the conceptualist. My response, in a nutshell, is that the first of these objections fails because it ascribes to the conceptualist some commitments that do not really follow from the view’s basic insight, while the second objection also fails because (among other things) it (inadvertently) denies the conceptualist resources that the alternative positions are allowed to use.
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