Metaphysics

Mereological Composition and Material Objects

Investigates the principles governing how parts compose wholes and the metaphysical status of composite material entities.

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Temporal Parts and Four-Dimensionalism

Examines whether objects have temporal parts analogous to spatial parts and the implications for object persistence.

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Grounding and Metaphysical Dependence

Analyzes the fundamental relation of grounding that explains why some facts depend on others.

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Possible Worlds Semantics and Modality

Explores the nature of possibility and necessity through formal frameworks involving possible world structures.

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Substance Metaphysics and Substrate Theory

Investigates the nature of fundamental substances that underlie properties and relations.

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Abstract Objects and Platonism

Examines the ontological status and accessibility of abstract entities like numbers, propositions, and sets.

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Truthmaking and Truth-Conditions

Investigates what makes propositions true and the metaphysical requirements for truth-bearers.

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Universals and Particulars Distinction

Explores the fundamental ontological divide between repeatable properties and unique individual instances.

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Causation and Causal Powers

Analyzes the metaphysical nature of causal relations and the dispositional properties underlying causation.

Identity and Indiscernibility Principles

Examines Leibniz''s law and identity criteria across different ontological categories and domains.

Nominalism and Anti-Platonist Ontology

Develops metaphysical systems rejecting abstract objects in favor of purely concrete particulars.

Trope Theory and Particularized Properties

Investigates properties as non-repeatable abstract particulars that constitute the fundamental furniture of reality.

Bundle Theory and Property Composition

Explores systems where objects are fundamentally bundles or collections of compresent qualities.

Dispositional Properties and Powers

Analyzes properties defined by their capacity to produce effects under specified conditions.

Structural Realism and Mathematics

Examines whether metaphysics and physical science describe only structural patterns rather than intrinsic natures.

Persistence and Object Constitution

Investigates criteria for object identity across time and the role of material constitution in persistence.

Essential Properties and Essentialism

Examines which properties are essential to objects and develops rigorous criteria for essentialism.

Haecceities and Individual Essences

Investigates whether individuals possess primitive essences independent of their qualitative properties.

Counterpart Theory and Cross-World Identity

Analyzes how individuals in different possible worlds relate through counterpart relations rather than strict identity.

Truthmakers and Negative Truth

Explores metaphysical grounding for negative truths and the existence of negative facts.

Events, States, and Processes

Categorizes and analyzes the ontological status of events, states of affairs, and temporal processes.

Mereological Nihilism and Composition

Defends the thesis that composition never occurs except in degenerate cases of singleton sums.

Boundary Objects and Vagueness

Investigates how vagueness affects object identity and the metaphysical status of borderline cases.

Fundamentality and Levels of Reality

Examines what constitutes fundamental entities and the hierarchical structure of metaphysical levels.

Mereological Essentialism

Analyzes the thesis that an object''s parts are essential to its identity.

Properties as Modes and Modifications

Explores Spinozist and Leibnizian approaches treating properties as modifications of substances.

Necessitism and Platonic Realism

Investigates whether all possible objects necessarily exist as constituents of abstract reality.

Temporal Becoming and A-Theory

Defends the metaphysical reality of temporal passage and the present moment against eternalist views.

Block Universe and Eternalism

Analyzes the view that all times are equally real and temporally ordered in a static four-dimensional structure.

Growing Block Theory of Time

Develops the thesis that the past and present are real while the future remains indeterminate.

Presentism and Present-Centered Ontology

Defends the position that only present entities and events genuinely exist.

Tenseless Time and McTaggart''s Argument

Examines arguments that temporal properties are derivative and that reality is fundamentally atemporal.

Counterfactual Conditionals and Causation

Analyzes the metaphysical foundations of counterfactual truths and their relation to causal facts.

Panpsychism and Consciousness Distribution

Explores the thesis that consciousness or phenomenal properties are fundamental and ubiquitous in nature.

Emergentism and Downward Causation

Investigates whether higher-level properties can emerge with autonomous causal powers over lower levels.

Supervenience and Reduction Relations

Analyzes supervenience relations determining how higher-level facts depend on lower-level physical facts.

Mereology and Set Theory Foundations

Investigates formal systems of part-whole relations and their connections to mathematical ontology.

Hylomorphism and Matter-Form Doctrine

Revives Aristotelian approaches treating substances as compounds of matter and form.

Prime Matter and Substratum Theories

Examines concepts of pure potentiality and bare substrates underlying all determinate properties.

Functionalism and Property Definition

Analyzes whether properties should be defined by their functional roles in causal networks.

Intrinsic Properties and Intrinsicness

Investigates which properties depend only on an object''s intrinsic nature versus relational properties.

Relations and Relationalism

Examines the ontological status of relations and whether fundamentally all properties are relational.

Spacetime Substantivalism and Conventionality

Debates whether spacetime is a fundamental substance or merely a conventional framework for describing relations.

Holes in Spacetime and Topology

Investigates the metaphysical implications of topological features and discontinuities in spacetime structure.

Category Theory and Ontological Structure

Applies categorical mathematics to analyze abstract ontological relationships and structural hierarchies.

Modal Realism and Lewis Framework

Develops the thesis that possible worlds are concrete entities causally isolated from actuality.

Fictionalism and Ontological Commitment

Explores strategies for accepting useful discourse about entities while denying their genuine existence.

Metametaphysics and Substantiveness

Investigates whether metaphysical debates concern genuine features of reality or linguistic conventions.

Conceptualism and Mind-Dependent Reality

Examines whether abstract objects or fundamental features of reality depend on conceptual schemes.

Quantum Ontology and Interpretation

Analyzes metaphysical implications of quantum mechanics regarding indeterminacy and superposition.

Mereological Loops and Circular Composition

Investigates whether wholes can be proper parts of their own parts and the logical coherence of circular mereological structures in metaphysical systems.

Temporal Paradoxes and Backward Causation

Examines the metaphysical feasibility of causal loops, time travel, and grandfather paradoxes within various temporal frameworks and their logical resolutions.

Metaphysical Indeterminacy and Vague Identity

Explores whether indeterminacy is merely epistemic or intrinsic to reality, focusing on vague identity conditions for objects and their persistence conditions.

Infinite Regress and Foundationalism

Analyzes different responses to metaphysical infinite regresses including foundationalism, infinitism, and coherentism in explaining grounding chains.

Composition as Identity Problem

Investigates whether the composition relation should be understood as a form of identity and implications for parthood and constitution.

Persistence through Radical Change

Examines how objects maintain identity through substantial changes in properties, matter, and spatiotemporal location across possible worlds.

Truthmaking for Negative Existentials

Addresses the metaphysical challenge of explaining what makes negative existential statements true without positing absence or negative facts.

Ontological Parsimony and Explanatory Power

Balances metaphysical economy of posited entities against adequacy and explanatory scope in developing comprehensive ontological systems.

Monism and Priority Monism Variants

Develops and evaluates different forms of monistic metaphysics where the whole is fundamentally prior to its parts.

Relative Identity and Cross-Categorical Comparisons

Explores whether identity is relative to sortals or categories, challenging absolute identity principles in metaphysical analysis.

Metaphysical Semantics and Aboutness

Investigates fundamental nature of representation, reference, and what makes propositions and thoughts about particular objects in reality.

Fictionalism about Mathematical Objects

Develops accounts treating mathematical discourse as useful fictions while preserving semantic and pragmatic features of mathematical practice.

Grounding Cycles and Coherence

Examines whether circular grounding relations are logically possible and how they affect metaphysical explanation and dependence structure.

Levels of Description and Multiple Realizability

Analyzes how metaphysical levels relate to physical implementation and whether higher-level properties have genuine causal efficacy.

Universals and the Problem of Imperfect Community

Addresses whether universals can account for resemblance among particulars that share some but not all properties in common.

Truthmaker Gaps and Theoretical Revision

Investigates truths that appear to lack truthmakers and whether this motivates metaphysical revision or limitations on truthmaker theory.

Nominalism about Properties and Qualities

Develops nominalist frameworks that avoid commitment to abstract properties while explaining quality variation and predication.

Persistence through Time and Stage Theory

Examines whether ordinary objects are stages in four-dimensional spacetime and how stage theory resolves persistence puzzles.

Spatiotemporal Location and Layered Ontology

Investigates how objects with different spatiotemporal profiles relate and whether there are distinct layers of spatiotemporal reality.

Causal Exclusion and Mental Causation

Addresses Jaegwon Kim''s exclusion problem regarding whether mental causes can be causally efficacious given physical completeness.

Essential Versus Accidental Properties Classification

Develops criteria for distinguishing essential properties that objects necessarily possess from accidental contingent properties.

Cross-Modal Identity and Transworld Individuals

Examines how we identify the same individual across possible worlds and whether counterpart relations adequately address this.

Abstract Objects and Causality Relations

Investigates whether abstract objects like numbers and propositions can have causal effects or be causally affected.

Mereological Fusion and Unrestricted Composition

Defends or critiques positions allowing any objects to compose into a whole regardless of spatial or causal continuity.

Temporal Direction and Entropy Arrow

Explores metaphysical basis of temporal asymmetry and whether temporal direction reduces to thermodynamic entropy increase.

Presentist Semantics for Temporal Discourse

Develops truth conditions for statements about past and future events under presentism where only present exists.

Categorical Properties and Quidditism

Debates whether categorical properties have intrinsic natures independent of dispositional roles or are purely structural.

Constitution and Material Coincidence

Analyzes relationship between distinct objects occupying same matter, such as statues and clay, and their identity conditions.

Phenomenal Properties and Physical Structure

Investigates whether conscious experiences reduce to physical properties or if there are irreducible phenomenal features of reality.

Metaphysical Necessity and Analyticity Distinction

Examines whether metaphysical necessity diverges from conceptual or linguistic necessity and implications for modal metaphysics.

Object-Dependent Properties and Exemplification

Analyzes properties that essentially involve other objects and whether exemplification relations require special metaphysical accounts.

Sorites Paradox and Metaphysical Boundaries

Addresses whether sharp boundaries in reality support or undermine solutions to vagueness problems in metaphysical systems.

Bundle Theory and Quality Variation

Develops bundle-theoretic accounts where objects are bundles of properties and examines problems of property coexistence and identity.

Naturalism in Metaphysics and Scientific Authority

Investigates whether metaphysical theorizing should defer to scientific findings or retain autonomous rational analysis standards.

Temporal Logic and Tense Operators

Develops formal systems analyzing tense and temporal operators and their metaphysical implications for A-theory versus B-theory.

Spacetime and Relativity Theory Integration

Integrates metaphysical theorizing with special and general relativity, addressing implications for simultaneity and temporal flow.

Aristotelian Essentialism and Modern Metaphysics

Revives and develops Aristotelian approaches to essence and natural kinds within contemporary metaphysical frameworks.

Metaphysical Explanation and Causal Explanation

Distinguishes grounding and metaphysical explanation from causal explanation and clarifies their relationship in explanatory practice.

Objects in Social Reality and Institutional Facts

Investigates ontological status of social objects like money and institutions and their dependence on collective intentionality.

Quantum Superposition and Indeterminacy Metaphysics

Develops metaphysical interpretations of quantum indeterminacy and whether superposed properties have determinate or indeterminate status.

Fundamentality and Conceptual Dependence

Analyzes whether fundamentality grounds should be understood independently of conceptual or explanatory dependence relations.

Parts and Wholes in Quantum Systems

Applies mereological principles to quantum entanglement and nonseparability, questioning standard composition principles.

Rigid Designation and Metaphysical Reference

Examines whether natural kind terms rigidly designate across possible worlds and implications for metaphysical essentialism.

Truthmaking and Scientific Realism

Develops truthmaker accounts for scientific claims and whether scientific realism requires commitment to particular truthmakers.

Possibility Space and Modal Landscape

Investigates structure of possibility space, including modal gaps and whether all logically consistent scenarios are genuinely possible.

Time Travel and Personal Identity

Examines personal identity conditions for time travelers and whether time travel coherently combines with realist temporal metaphysics.

Fundamentality of Properties versus Relations

Debates whether properties or relations are more fundamental to reality and implications for understanding quality and structure.

Existence and Quantification Theory

Analyzes what existence consists in and whether first-order quantification adequately captures commitment to entity existence.

Mereological Fusion and Arbitrary Composition

Investigates the conditions under which arbitrary collections of objects can compose a unified whole and the metaphysical implications of unrestricted composition principles.

Temporal Location and Presentness

Examines how temporal properties like presentness and temporal location relate to the metaphysical structure of time and the nature of temporal reference.

Concrete Particulars and Substrate Independence

Explores whether concrete objects require material substrates or can exist independently of any particular physical manifestation.

Causation and Counterfactual Dependence

Analyzes the relationship between causal relations and counterfactual conditionals in explaining how effects depend on their causes.

Ontological Status of Mathematical Objects

Investigates whether mathematical entities like numbers and sets possess genuine metaphysical existence or are mind-dependent constructs.

Vagueness and Borderline Cases

Examines the metaphysical significance of vague predicates and explores whether indeterminacy reflects objective features of reality or epistemic limitations.

Persistence Through Change and Continuity

Analyzes how objects maintain identity while undergoing qualitative and structural changes over time.

Property Instantiation and Truthmaking

Investigates how properties are instantiated in particulars and how instantiation relations serve as truthmakers for property ascriptions.

Modality and Counterfactual Truthmaking

Explores what makes counterfactual statements true and how modal truths are grounded in the structure of reality.

Mereological Overlap and Sharing

Examines whether distinct objects can share proper parts and the implications for identity and composition principles.

Fundamental and Derivative Properties

Investigates the distinction between fundamental properties that are basic to reality and derivative properties that supervene on fundamentals.

Temporal Order and Causation Direction

Analyzes whether temporal ordering determines causal direction or whether causal relations independently establish temporal asymmetry.

Concrete Abstractness and Hybrid Entities

Explores whether there exist entities that possess both concrete and abstract properties, challenging traditional categorical distinctions.

Parthood and Composition Asymmetry

Investigates why composition seems to be asymmetrical while parthood relations appear symmetric in mereological systems.

Scalar Properties and Continuous Variation

Examines how scalar properties like mass and temperature are instantiated in objects and how continuous variation relates to discrete properties.

Metaontology and Ontological Discourse

Analyzes what ontological claims are about and how to evaluate disagreements concerning what exists.

Location and Spatial Relations

Investigates how objects possess spatial locations and whether location is a fundamental relation or derivative property.

Constitution and Material Identity

Examines whether constituted objects are identical to their material constituents or distinct entities standing in constitution relations.

Causal Exclusion and Overdetermination

Addresses the problem of whether higher-level properties can be causally efficacious when physical properties already determine effects.

Ontological Commitment and Quantification

Explores how to identify what an ontology commits to through formal logic and whether quantification truly reveals existence.

Thick Particulars and Property Bundles

Investigates whether particulars are essentially bundles of coinstantiated properties or fundamentally distinct from their properties.

Grounding Circularity and Infinite Regress

Examines whether grounding relations can be circular or must terminate in fundamental facts, and implications for metaphysical explanation.

Relative Identity and Contextual Individuation

Analyzes whether identity is absolute and context-independent or whether objects can be identical in certain respects but not others.

Structural Dependence and Compositional Identity

Investigates how the identity of composite objects depends on structural organization and whether rearrangement preserves identity.

Nominalistic Reduction and Paraphrase

Examines strategies for interpreting statements about abstract objects in nominalistic frameworks that reject abstract entity ontology.

Degree of Properties and Gradations

Explores how properties can admit of degrees and variation, and how gradational properties relate to the metaphysical structure of reality.

Substrates and Underlying Reality

Investigates whether reality requires some underlying substrate or fundamental substance and whether substratum theories are metaphysically coherent.

Property Coinstantiation and Necessity

Examines which properties necessarily coinstantiate and whether some property combinations are metaphysically impossible.

Ontological Seriousness and Discourse

Investigates whether all forms of discourse make genuine ontological claims or whether some discourse is merely instrumentally useful.

Possible Objects and Possible Properties

Analyzes whether merely possible objects and properties have genuine ontological status or are creatures of our representational systems.

Temporal Parts and Perdurance

Examines whether objects are four-dimensional wholes extended through time via temporal parts or three-dimensional endurers.

Fundamentality and Hierarchical Ontology

Investigates whether reality has a hierarchical structure with fundamental and derivative levels and what principles govern such hierarchies.

Causal Chains and Causal Processes

Analyzes the structure of causal sequences and whether causation operates through continuous processes or discrete events.

Metaphysical Explanation and Grounding

Examines the nature of metaphysical explanation and how grounding relations provide non-causal accounts of dependence.

Intrinsic Properties and Independence

Investigates how to distinguish intrinsic properties that do not depend on external facts from extrinsic relational properties.

Fictionalist Metaphysics and Useful Falsehoods

Explores whether metaphysically problematic entities can be treated as useful fictions without genuine ontological commitment.

Multitude and Plural Composition

Investigates whether multiple objects can form a plurality without composing a single unified object.

Modal Semantics and Truth Conditions

Analyzes what makes modal statements true and whether modal truth requires commitment to possible worlds or alternative frameworks.

Composition as Identity Thesis

Examines the controversial claim that composition relations are identical to identity relations and implications for mereology.

Nominalist Reconstruction of Properties

Investigates nominalist strategies for explaining apparent reference to properties without positing abstract property entities.

Temporal Gaps and Discontinuity

Explores whether time could have gaps or whether temporal continuity is metaphysically necessary.

Reality and Formal Systems

Investigates whether formal mathematical systems map onto objective features of reality or merely represent conventional structures.

Composition and Natural Boundaries

Examines whether composition follows natural boundaries in reality or whether arbitrary collections can compose objects.

Grounding and Fundamentality Levels

Analyzes how grounding relations establish levels of metaphysical fundamentality and whether there must be fundamental facts.

Event Causation and Agent Causation

Investigates whether causation is fundamentally a relation between events or whether agents can be irreducible causal relata.

Intrinsic Features and Duplicate Objects

Examines whether objects that share all intrinsic properties must be duplicates and whether duplicates are metaphysically possible.

Truthmaking and Negative Facts

Investigates what makes negative statements true and whether negative facts or facts about absences exist in reality.

Possibility and Metaphysical Consistency

Analyzes what makes states of affairs metaphysically possible and whether logical consistency is sufficient for metaphysical possibility.

Temporal Perdurantism and Three-Dimensionalism

Examines the debate between perduring temporal parts and enduring whole objects, exploring implications for persistence and change through time.

Fundamental Properties and Sparse Properties

Analyzes the distinction between fundamental intrinsic properties that form the basis of reality and abundant derivative properties constructed from fundamentals.

Ontological Dependence and Grounding Relations

Explores the formal structure of dependence relations between entities and how grounding provides a framework for understanding why certain facts obtain.

Impossible Worlds and Non-Classical Logics

Investigates metaphysical frameworks that accommodate impossible worlds to handle necessities, counterfactuals, and non-classical logical systems.

Primitive Thisness and Qualitative Identity

Examines whether objects possess primitive identifying properties beyond their qualitative features and the implications for identity and indistinguishability.

Configuration Space Ontology and Physics

Develops ontological frameworks based on configuration spaces in physics, addressing whether spacetime or abstract mathematical structures are fundamental.

Property Dualism and Mental Causation

Investigates how mental properties can causally interact with physical properties while maintaining the causal closure of the physical domain.

Truthmaker Maximalism and Metaphysical Completeness

Examines whether every true proposition requires a truthmaker and explores the implications for negative truths, mathematical truths, and modal claims.

Bare Particulars and Substratum Theory

Investigates whether objects possess property-independent substrata and the coherence of bare particular theory versus bundle theoretic alternatives.

Type Identity and Mental Properties

Explores whether mental properties are strictly identical to physical properties and addresses the multiple realizability objection to type-physicalism.

Powerful Qualities and Categorical Bases

Investigates whether properties can be both dispositional and categorical, unifying the traditional distinction between powers and qualities.

Truthmaker Necessitation and Grounding Strength

Examines the logical and metaphysical relationship between truthmakers and the truths they make, and how grounding strength varies across domains.

Object Boundaries and Mereological Vagueness

Addresses whether vagueness in object boundaries reflects linguistic indeterminacy, metaphysical indeterminacy, or objective facts about composition thresholds.

Abstracta and Mathematical Platonism

Investigates the existence and nature of abstract objects in mathematics and logic, examining the epistemological challenges of abstracta.

Causation and Agency in Metaphysics

Explores the relationship between agent causation, event causation, and causation by absences, with implications for free will and responsibility.

Spacetime Substantialism and Relationalism Debate

Examines whether spacetime is a fundamental substance independent of material objects or merely a relational structure supervening on physical bodies.

Quantum Superposition and Ontological Indeterminacy

Investigates whether quantum superposition indicates genuine metaphysical indeterminacy regarding properties or represents incomplete knowledge.

Kind Essentialism and Natural Kinds

Examines whether natural kinds possess essential properties that determine membership and whether essences are intrinsic or relational.

Identity Across Possible Worlds

Explores criteria for identity of objects and properties across different possible worlds and the relationship to essential properties.

Abstract State Space Realism

Defends the view that abstract state spaces are fundamental to physical ontology, challenging standard spacetime-based metaphysics.

Part-Whole Relations and Composition

Analyzes the formal structure of part-whole relations, examining principles governing how wholes relate to their constituent parts.

Constitutive Dependence and Realization

Investigates how higher-level entities are constituted by lower-level entities and whether this relationship differs from mereological composition.

Proposition Theory and Content Bearers

Explores the nature of propositions as abstract truth-bearers and examines whether they exist necessarily or depend on minds and languages.

Property Nominalism and Predicate Nominalism

Defends nominalist ontologies that deny abstract properties, examining alternatives like class nominalism and resemblance nominalism.

Mereological Determinism and Fixity

Investigates whether an object''s mereological structure is metaphysically fixed and whether parthood relations could change over time.

Ontic Structural Realism and Fundamentality

Examines whether abstract structures rather than objects or properties are fundamental to reality, with implications for physics and mathematics.

Metaontology and Quantifier Variance

Investigates whether different quantification schemes provide equally valid ontological frameworks and whether ontological disputes are substantive or verbal.

Intrinsic Properties and Duplication

Analyzes the relationship between intrinsic properties and possibilities of qualitative duplication across different possible worlds.

Fundamental Quantifiers and Restricted Quantification

Examines whether restricted quantifiers or unrestricted quantifiers provide the metaphysically fundamental framework for ontological commitment.

Essence and Necessity in Metaphysics

Explores the relationship between essential properties and necessary truths, examining whether essence grounds necessity or vice versa.

Causal Graph Theory and Causal Structure

Investigates how causal structures can be represented formally using directed graphs and their implications for causation metaphysics.

Bundle Theory and Loose Objects

Develops and defends bundle theory accounts where objects are fundamentally collections of compresent properties without underlying substrata.

Temporal Genuineness and Open Future

Examines whether the future is metaphysically open and indeterminate, contrasting with presentist, eternalist, and growing block conceptions.

Relations as Fundamental to Ontology

Investigates whether relations are fundamental entities rather than derivative, exploring monadic versus polyadic fundamental structures.

Mereological Possibility and Constraints

Examines which mereological configurations are metaphysically possible and what constraints govern feasible part-whole combinations.

Nominalistic Reconstruction of Set Theory

Develops nominalist frameworks for mathematics that eliminate abstract sets while preserving mathematical structure and applicability.

Higher-Order Properties and Hyperintensionality

Investigates properties of properties and their role in explaining hyperintensional contexts that resist standard extensional analysis.

Determinism and Metaphysical Branching

Explores whether deterministic worlds admit branching possible futures and how this relates to presentism and libertarian free will.

Massless Particles and Ontological Minimalism

Examines the ontological status of massless particles in quantum field theory and challenges particle-based foundations of metaphysics.

Category Mistakes and Metaphysical Types

Investigates whether category errors involve metaphysical violations or merely semantic confusion, with implications for ontological structure.

Asymmetry of Causation and Time

Explores the relationship between causal asymmetry and temporal asymmetry, examining whether causation grounds the direction of time.

Bundle Theory and Quality Resemblance

Develops bundle theory accounts that rely on resemblance relations among qualities rather than substrate-based individuation.

Counterpart Overlap and Transworld Identity

Examines whether objects in different possible worlds can partially overlap or wholly duplicate, with implications for identity theory.

Primitive Modality and Modal Primitivism

Defends the view that modality is primitive and cannot be reduced to alternative frameworks like possible worlds or counterfactuals.

Temporal Stages and Cross-Temporal Identity

Examines how objects maintain identity across time through stage theory and competing accounts of temporal continuity and succession.

Mereological Boundaries and Conventionalism

Investigates whether mereological boundaries are conventional human impositions or reflect objective metaphysical structure in nature.

Graded Modality and Degrees of Possibility

Explores non-binary modal systems where possibilities and necessities admit of degrees rather than classical two-valued modal logic.

Truthmaker Conditions for Disjunctions

Examines what truthmakers are required for disjunctive propositions and whether disjunctive truthmakers are singular or plural entities.

Fundamentality and Explanatory Priority

Analyzes whether fundamentality in metaphysics is determined by explanatory priority, causal closure, or independence from other entities.

Ontological Dependence and Explanation Chains

Analyzes how metaphysical explanation relates to dependency structures and whether infinite explanatory chains are metaphysically coherent.

Hyperintensionality and Fine-Grained Distinction

Develops formal frameworks for distinguishing propositions that intensional logic conflates, addressing opacity in metaphysical attitude reports.

Relative Identity and Sortal Relativity

Investigates whether identity can be relative to sortals or concepts rather than absolute, challenging classical logic foundations.

Constitution and Compositional Variation

Examines how distinct objects can share identical material components while differing in constitution and the metaphysics of artifact kinds.

Constitutive Grounding and Fundamentalist Metaphysics

Research investigating the non-causal, non-mereological relationships between fundamental entities and derivative phenomena, examining how basic facts ground complex metaphysical structures through constitutive dependence rather than compositional or causal mechanisms.