Mereological Update
When the whole McCain house thing came to light my initial reaction was to observe that most journalists don’t really have the technical background necessary to determine the metaphysical status of John McCain’s main residence, a Phoenix condo that’s actually two condos combined into one. I thought we might need the assistance of Laurie Paul, Arizona’s leading mereologist (that’s the branch of philosophy that studies “the relations of part to whole and the relations of part to part within a whole”) and wife of Crooked Timber blogger Kieran Healy. No word yet from Professor Paul, but Healy blogs in from on vacation in Ireland:
My understanding is that mereological relations are somewhat flexible, and it’s quite acceptable for the same material object to be two condos and one home. Nevertheless, I am a mereologist by marriage only, so my views should not be taken as representing the opinions of a trained and licensed professional.
That does make sense and tends to highlight the fact that political philosophy is in some respects less independent of metaphysical considerations than John Rawls would have you believe.
18 Responses to “Mereological Update”
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August 23rd, 2008 at 11:04 am
Paul moved to UNC.
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:16 am
kieran should have asked his better half.
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:16 am
I thought mereology was discredited. You can’t tell much by feeling the shape of one’s mere.
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:22 am
That’s a whole heap of philosophizing! Or is it two heaps?
McCain doesn’t have 13 houses, he has 0 houses and 18,765 undetached house parts.
Gavagai! Gavagai!
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:24 am
in any case, it’s not so much this: “political philosophy is in some respects less independent of metaphysical considerations”,
as that, even within metaphysical considerations, mereological relations are sortal-relative. “do we have one or more?” can only be answered by saying “one or more whats?”
which is what kh was getting at by the home vs. condo distinction. (of course, this was mother’s milk to him, since the church long ago gave different answers for god vs. person).
i think the answer is: it adds one more home to the list, and two more pieces of real estate. he bought them separately, and the deeds are probably still registered separately, and could be sold separately.
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:38 am
Lord, I hope the OP was done so ironically. Or do people actually study this stuff?
http://xkcd.com/451/
August 23rd, 2008 at 11:38 am
Matt, nothing to say about the choice of Biden?
August 23rd, 2008 at 12:35 pm
The McCain campaign told the New York Times that we need to stop talking about the houses. They belong to Cindy, you see. John McCain doesn’t actually own any houses. But here’s the thing. If they showed Cindy’s finances to the New York Times, can the rest of us have a look? Because McCain’s running interference for Charles Keating’s looting of the S&Ls was complicated by the fact that Cindy and her dad had investments with Charles Keating predicated on said looting.
August 23rd, 2008 at 2:28 pm
Matt B, any grad-student metaphysician could cut you to flinders if you tried to fake your way through mereology. Heck, they could cut me to flinders if I tried to fake my way through it, and I’m a philosopher.
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