Could there be exactly two things?

Many philosophers think that, necessarily, any material objects have a fusion (let's call that doctrine "Universalism"). In this paper I point out a couple of strange consequences of Universalism and related doctrines, and suggest that they are strange enough to constitute a powerful argument against those views. By "thing" I mean material thing. We all believe that there actually are many more than two things, but could there have been exactly two? More generally, what are the ns such that there could have been exactly n things? Pre-theoretically, the following conjecture is quite attractive: Primitive Cardinality: For any n, there could have been exactly n things. For instance, we naturally judge that there could have been exactly two things, and exactly three, . . . Attractive as it is, many philosophers are committed to denying Primitive Cardinality. For instance, many philosophers believe in Universalism: Necessarily, any material objects have a fusion.1 I...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2008
• Where: SYNTHESE
• Authors: Juan Comesaña
• Keywords: Many Philosophers, Primitive Cardinality, SYNTHESE 2008, Universalism