P.F.Strawson  INDIVIDUALS 　

7. Language without particular　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　by Harai

[1] In a feature-placing language the subject-predicate distinction has no place.

Firstly, Strawson insists that by considering what means we have to employ in attempting to dispense with particular, we can understand the conceptual effect of introduction of particulars.

Secondly, he asks by what right we rule that feature-placing sentences are not subject-predicate sentences. For example, “It is snowing”, spoken in a suitable context, has some such force as “It is snowing here and now”. So he asks if we can think “now” and “here” as subject-expressions denoting a time and a place. So, in this case, the phrase such as “it is snowing” is a predicate-expression.

In this section, he deals with the second problem. Firstly he insists that because such expressions as “now” and “here” do not introduce times or places, they cannot be subject-expression. They serve to indicate the incidence of the general feature introduced by the rest of the sentence. Now, he asks if the expression which introduces the universal feature to be placed can be the subject-expression. For this expression introduces a term. He answers to this proposal by interpreting it less challengingly. Interpreted so, this proposal insists that the feature-universals in feature-placing sentences can appear as subjects in propositions which have already been admitted as subject-predicate proposition. So Strawson insists that this proposal prevents us from thinking that the subject-predicate distinction has no place in feature-placing sentences.

[2] Problems involved in dispensing with ordinary particulars.

In this section, Strawson turns to consider some problems which would confront us in an attempt to frame a language without particular. He insists that it is expedient, in attempting this task, to delimit extents of time and place, to introduce and to quantify over spatial and temporal term.

One problem that would face us is that of deciding upon the exact force of a statement to the effect that some feature is somewhere at some time. A first suggestion to this problem is that a feature is at a place at a time if no part of that place is not occupied by that feature at that time. This suggestion can be interpreted in many ways. Firstly, it may mean that it “φs p, t” holds for any point or area or volume, p, and for any instant or stretch of time, t, such that the spatial boundaries of p are co-extensive with a set of spatial boundaries traced out by the φ-feature during the whole of t. This interpretation can help us to construct the language without particular, he says, because it allow us to borrow criteria of distinctness for places from the feature concepts which we introduce.

But this formulation is not enough to frame to the language without particulars. For the concept of the φ-feature lacks altogether what the concept of sortal universal, that is to say, criteria of reidentification for particular φs. So, by this formulation, so long as we are concerned with distinguishing particulars at an instant or during a period over which their positions and boundaries remain unchanged, we can simplify our problem by borrowing criteria of distinctness for places from the feature-concepts, but no similar resource is available for identifying of particular through time.