Manuscrito
Tropes and Resemblance
Fecha
2015Institución
Resumen
it has been traditionally contended by defenders of trope ontologies that resemblance classes
of tropes are not affected by the difficulties of the imperfect community and the companionship, that do
affect resemblance classes of objects. This is supposedly an important advantage of trope ontologies
over resemblance nominalism. It is argued here, however, that there is no such advantage.
Resemblance classes of tropes are as affected by those problems as nominalists are. Three cases are
considered and in each one of them the same conclusion is reached. Tropes can be conceived as
modifier or module. A ‘modifier trope’ is a trope that grounds a character in an object but does not have
it. A ‘module trope’ is a trope that grounds a character in an object precisely by having it. If the
qualitative nature of a trope is grounded on the resemblance relations of that trope with others, then
resemblance classes of tropes, be they modifier or module, are vulnerable to the imperfect community
and the companionship difficulties. This situation is not improved if it is assumed that tropes have an
‘intrinsic nature’ that grounds internal relations of resemblance between tropes. It is difficult to sustain
in this case that tropes are simple are ‘thinly charactered’.