A Speculative Solution to the Instantiation and Structure Problems for Universals

Abstract

Typical structural universals are not just the mereological sum of their constituents. Hence, there is the Structure Problem of explaining this non-mereological structure. The Instantiation Problem is that the predicate "U is instantiated by x, y, etc., in that order" is ill-suited to be a primitive, unanalyzed predicate. The proposed solution to these problems is based on the observation that if universal U is said to supervene upon universals V, W, etc., then it is the instantiation of U that supervenes on the instantiation of V, W, etc. Assuming there are few subvenient universals, which is admittedly a speculation, their instantiation may be explained in ways that would be uneconomic if there were too many.