1. Lecture 4 Particulars: bundle theory
Dr. Donnchadh O’Conaill
2/2/2017
Metaphysics University of Helsinki

2. 1. Introduction
Concrete particulars: ordinary objects (tables, frogs, mountains) and many scientific posits (atoms, molecules)
What is their nature? One answer: wholes made of more fundamental constituents
Two versions of this claim:
Bundle theory
Substratum theory
Or: concrete particulars are themselves fundamental entities
Substance theory

3. 2. Bundle theory
Distinguish a property or attribute (e.g., redness, either a universal or a trope) from its bearer, the entity which has it (e.g., the entity which is red)
What is the bearer? i.e., what is it nature? One answer: a complex made up of constituents (Loux 2006, 86)
What are the constituents of each concrete particular? Bundle theory: its properties or attributes

4. How do the different attributes make up the single entity?
Compresence: “a special relation tying all the attributes in a bundle together […] the relation of occurring together, of being present together” (Loux 90-91)
e.g., this apple = [this redness + this shape + this size … + compresence of all these tropes]
Or: apple = bundle of (instances of) universals + compresence

5. 3. Why accept bundle theory?
Theoretical parsimony: one category of fundamental entities, i.e., the properties
Other entities (e.g., concrete particulars) exist but constructed out of these
“a thing (or a particular) is nothing but a bundle of properties” Casullo 1988, 125
Usually construed as a reductive theory: the category of concrete particulars is not fundamental, each particular can be analysed into its properties

6. Bundle theory and empiricisim
Empiricism: “the basic entities of a metaphysical theory must be limited to things that can be the objects of direct or immediate experience” (Loux, 90)
Bundle theory: “familiar objects are complexes […] whose constituents are exhausted by those attributes that can be the objects of perceptual or introspective awareness”, i.e. tropes or instances of universals (op. cit.)

7. 4. Problems with the bundle theory: change
Change can involve the one entity having different attributes at different times
If concrete particulars nothing more than bundles, “Different attributes entail different bundles, so where we have change we have numerically different bundles” Loux 93
Suppose this banana changes colour: this would not be a change in one entity, but a replacing of one bundle by another

8. The bundle-bundle theory
Distinguish (i) a bundle of properties at any one instant (ii) a series of such bundles standing in relation R
(i) is a momentary entity, existing only at that instant; (ii) is an enduring entity, existing across time (depending on R)
When banana changes colour, “the same enduring thing has changed its properties”, and “we have replacement of one momentary thing by a different momentary thing” Casullo 1988, 129

9. 5. Problems with bundle theory: predication
(1) The apple is red
Bundle theorist: the apple is a bundle of attributes – (1) is true if redness is among them
Problem: this makes (1) trivially true
(1) says that the red trope is part of a bundle which is defined by having (among other things) a red trope (or an instance of redness)
“No one could know which bundle a sentence […] is about without knowing that the sentence is true” (Loux, 94)

10. One response: in (1) ‘the apple’ picks out a smaller bundle, e. g
One response: in (1) ‘the apple’ picks out a smaller bundle, e.g., apple-minus-redness, to which the red trope is then added
Further problem: other predicative statements about the apple must also pick out smaller bundles – these smaller bundles not identical, but predications are each of the same apple – how is this possible`?
Alternative response: we can pick out an entity without being able to identify every feature of that entity
We can then discover features in the bundle, rather than knowing them trivially

11. 6. Problems with bundle theory: indiscernibles
Suppose bundle A is made up of instances of universals x, y and z, as is bundle B – how do they differ?
Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles (PII): if object A has exactly the same attributes as object B, and vice-versa, then A = B
If PII is true, for A and B to be distinct bundles, one must have an instance of a universal the other does not

12. Problem: couldn’t two entities have instances of the same universals? e.g., same colour, same shape, same size…
Bundle theory entails PII, but this principle is false – so bundle theory must be false
Response: how about the property being identical with A?
This property presupposes the identity of A, so cannot be more fundamental than A or used to construct it

13. 7. Problems with bundle theory: identity of tropes
PII only a problem for realist, i.e., bundles composed of instances of universals
Trope theorist: numerically different entities cannot share tropes – so PII trivially true and not a problem (Loux 99)
Problem for trope theorist: what determines numerical difference between exactly similar tropes? One answer: different bearers / bundles
But what determines identity of bearers? The tropes which constitute them?

14. “to hold both that tropes are identity-dependent upon trope-bundles and that trope-bundles are identity-dependent upon their constituent tropes is to fall into a fatal circularity” (Lowe 1998, 206)
Response: identity of tropes determined by their spatiotemporal location?
Problem: different tropes can be co-located
Identity of bundles determined by location?
Problem: different objects may be able to exist in same location, i.e., statue and the lump of bronze from which it is made

15. Next week: substratum theory…

16. Works cited
Casullo, A. (1988) ‘A Fourth Version of the Bundle Theory’ Philosophical Studies 54 (1):
Lowe, E. J. (1998) The Possibility of Metaphysics: Substance, Identity, and Time. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp