Fantasy <> possibility. you'r literally trying to ontologize fantasy. — StreetlightX
There's no actual individuation that goes on at all: the whole idea is that possible worlds are a given set out of which the actual world is simply one; as you said, "the actual world is part of the set of possible worlds" — StreetlightX
"We can do the thing" (given the current conditions). But then some idiots decided that it'd be a good idea to reify individual possibilities as quasi-substantial entities in-themselves. — StreetlightX
Identification <> Individuation. — StreetlightX
I'm not sure how comfortably the idea can be transferred from biology to philosophy, maybe it's too specific to biology? — gurugeorge
Everything in the OP seems unobjectionable, but I don't see why it's at odds with modal logic. — Pax Minoica
To identify something is to recognize it as distinct from everything else, which is to assign to it a specific character, and this is to individuate it. "Identification", and "individuation", are two different ways of describing the very same act. — Metaphysician Undercover
Who carries out the acts of precipitation, adaptation, conflagration, (non-human) propagation, prolongation...and so on? — Janus
Objects are individuated by constitutional difference as I said before. If there were no individual differences between things we would not be able to differentiate them in the first place, would we? — Janus
These examples are irrelevant. — Metaphysician Undercover
I think the suffix "ation" indicates an act. If this act is not carried out by a subject who individuates something from that thing's environment, then what does carry out this act? — Metaphysician Undercover
The differences must be judged, distinctions must be made, in order that there is individuation. — Metaphysician Undercover
They all possess said suffix. They are counterexamples to your baseless claim. — Janus
Any distinction we make could be nothing but arbitrary unless it is due to real differences. It is difference, singularity, which constitutes individuation. — Janus
A difference between here and there does not mean that here and there are separate individuals. — Metaphysician Undercover
presumably an act carried out by a subject); — Janus
This seems like blatant sophistry, you are morphing the terms of the discussion. — Janus
So the difference involved in spatial location is clearly a necessary element of individuation. — Janus
Different individuals can be at the same place, at different times. — Metaphysician Undercover
Individuation is a process. — StreetlightX
They cannot be at precisely the same place even at different times. In any case it should have been obvious that I was referring to being at the same place at the same time.
Nothing else there to respond to, so.... — Janus
So, you think the world is utterly homogeneous, undifferentiated until the human mind comes along and carves it up? No constraint on the way the mind carves things up from nature at all? — Janus
I said that two individuals cannot inhabit precisely the same region of space simultaneously, and you reply with the lame objection that, for example two individuals could be in the place at the same time "depending on how one individuates". What, you mean like two people could be in the same room? As I said this is mere sophistry; but at least its kinda funny... — Janus
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