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Universals & particulars
One redness, or many red things?
A red ball, a red cube and a red cone are three different objects. They are particulars: each is in one place at one time. Yet they have something in common. They are all red.
What is that common thing? Plato said there is one real Form of Redness, existing outside space and time, and each red thing “participates” in it. Aristotle agreed that redness is real, but said it only exists in the red things themselves, wholly present in each.
Try it · Switch between Plato, Aristotle and Nominalism. Watch where “redness” lives, or whether it is there at all.
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Nominalists disagree with both. They say there is no extra thing called redness. There are only the particular red objects, which resemble each other. “Red” is just a word we use for things that look alike in a certain way.
This is one of the oldest debates in philosophy, called the problem of universals. It matters for science too: when physicists talk about “mass” or “charge”, are they naming one real feature shared by many things?
Key ideas
Words worth remembering
- Particular
- A single, individual thing in one place at one time.
- Universal
- A feature that many particulars can share at once, like redness.
- Nominalism
- Only particulars exist; universals are just names for resemblances.
Think about it
If every red thing in the universe were destroyed, would redness still exist?