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Almost Identical, Almost Innocent
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 July 2018
Abstract
In his 1991 book, Parts of Classes, David Lewis discusses the idea that composition is identity, alongside the idea that mereological overlap is a form of partial identity. But this notion of partial identity does nothing to help Lewis achieve his goals in that book. So why does he mention it? I explore and resolve this puzzle, by comparing Parts of Classes with Lewis's invocation of partial identity in his 1993 paper ‘Many But Almost One’, where he uses it to address Unger's problem of the many. I raise some concerns about this way of thinking of partial identity, but conclude that, for Lewis, it is an important defence against accusations of ontological profligacy.
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References
1 Lewis, David, Parts of Classes (Oxford, and Cambridge MA: Basil Blackwell Ltd., 1991), viiGoogle Scholar.
2 Lewis, David, ‘Mathematics is Megethology’, Philosophia Mathematica 1 (1993), 3–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 3. Burgess, John P., ‘Lewis on Mereology and Set Theory’, in A Companion to David Lewis, (ed.) Loewer, Barry and Schaffer, Jonathan (Malden MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2015)Google Scholar, is a user-friendly guide to Lewis's writing on these topics, and includes a fetching attempt to make ‘mereoplethynticology’ happen. Karen Bennett, ‘“Perfectly Understood, Unproblematic, and Certain” Lewis on Mereology’, in the same volume, explores many of the themes I touch on in the present article.
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34 I am grateful to Aaron Cotnoir for his helpful advice.