The vagueness argument against abstract artifacts

Abstract

Creationism is the thesis there are abstract artifacts, that is, objects that have no spatial location and that are deliberately brought into existence as a result of creative acts. One plausible example of an abstract artifact is a musical work. Musical works would seem to lack any spatial location and yet are evidently created by their composers. Other plausible examples include stories and fictional characters, languages and words, concepts, games, recipes, roles, software, electronic documents, and data sets. 1 There is certainly room for disagreement in each of these cases. But it is extremely plausible that at least some of these are abstract artifacts, neither eternal nor concrete.Universalism is the thesis that composition is unrestricted: for every plurality of material objects, there is a material object that is the sum of those objects. One might naturally assume that the question of whether composition is unrestricted is entirely independent from the question of whether stories and symphonies are abstract artifacts. But this would be a mistake. A minor variant of an influential and widely discussed argument for universalism-the vagueness argument-threatens to undermine creationism. I will show that these arguments stand or fall together. Those who accept universalism on the basis of the vagueness argument cannot accept creationism.

Music and Vague Existence

“…7 3 The Tension Involving Musical Creationism I will now explain the tension between musical creationism and the view that there is no vague existence. My explanation is similar to, but more direct than Korman's (2014) discussion.…”

“…7 Carmichael (2011) and Noonan (2010 informally prove that supervaluationists who think 'exists' is precise are committed to '∇∃xFx → ∃x∇Fx. 8 Korman (2014) argues that Sider's vagueness argument for unrestricted composition-an argument that rejects vague existence-and an analogous argument for anti-realism about abstract artifacts stand or fall together. My presentation of the tension eschews Sider's argument and focuses on the view that there is no vague existence.…”

“…It is compelling to think, as Daniel Z. Korman (2014) suggests, that realism about abstract artifacts (musical or otherwise) implies vague existence. The basic idea-to be explained in more detail below-is that if there are abstract artifacts, then it's indeterminate when people create them and thus indeterminate when they first exist.…”

Creating abstract objects

“…Perhaps, it would help to accept that abstract objects have a temporal origin, in the sense that they ontologically depend on timebound events, but are not themselves located in time. Relatedly, Korman (2014, p. 63) discusses, and Fiocco (2014) endorses, a view of “atemporal becoming” on which creative actions that occur in time cause objects to exist timelessly. Deutsch (1991) claims that authors create characters without bringing them into existence.…”

“…Korman (2014, 2015, pp. 160–182) and Friedell (2017), two defenders of abstract creationism, have worried about whether the view leads to vague existence.…”