Trope Bundle Theory

The aim of this paper is that of analysing trope bundle theory, its promises and some of its problems. First of all, it will begin by showing what trope bundle theory is, its development and its undoubted appeal. Then, it will focus on two problems that affect this theory, both concerned with the relation of compresence invoked in order to explain what a material object is by the bundle theory. Finally, it will take one possible view to avoid one of the aforementioned problems into consideration and it will claim that this view does not seem to be convincing enough to adopt trope bundle theory. Trope theorists hold that properties and relations are particulars rather than universals. In the history of Western philosophy the thought of properties and relations as particulars was minor. Traces of it can be found in Aristotle, in medieval nominalism, in the authors of English empiricism and in Leibniz. During the past century this thought became popular once again through the works of the pioneer Donald Williams and Keith Campbell. The word trope was used by Williams for the first time to denote the ‘occurrence of an essence’. According to Williams, tropes are primitive and fundamental entities, they are the ‘alphabet of being’. Campbell defines tropes as ‘abstract particulars’ in his homonym book: this definition appears to be revolutionary in that it breaks the traditional nexus between an abstract-universal and a concrete-particular. In order to understand what a trope is better, let us have a look at terminology. To say that an entity is universal means that it can be instantiated in different particulars at the same time and that it is wholly present in each of its instances. To say that an entity is particular means that it can be exemplified only by an instance since it has a specific space-time location. Thus, [8], [3]. Williams takes this word from Santayana reversing its meaning. In fact, Santayana considers a trope as the ‘essence of an occurrence’.