Metaphysics Primer for Synthetic Biology 2.1

8/7/2019 Metaphysics Primer for Synthetic Biology 2.1

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Material Constitution and Identity:

A Primer for MetaphysicsWhat are we doing hearing about metaphysics? Isn't this about synthetic biology?

Yes, but...

There are interesting metaphysical questions in synthetic biology:

How do we determine identity conditions for hybrid organisms that are built of bothnatural and synthetic components and may have components that do not exist in

the natural world, and do not function like anything in the natural world?

In other words, what the hell are we making in synthetic biology? When are thesesynthetic things members of some kind or the same kind? When do the things that a

being made have ethically relevant properties i.e., life, organismhood? Who ownsthe genetic recipe for a particular synthetic creation when the materials that constitute

it and the laws for their combination existed long before it was put together by so and s


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For example, take some arbitrary, artificial nano-device, AND, (for delivering someDNA).

AND is made of matter, atoms composing molecules, composing proteins,composing...

The matter composing AND is identical with AND, right? AND just is the matter itis constituted of. AND and the quantity of matterthat compose AND are identicalthe same way that a statue and the clay it is made from are identical. Thefollowing claims are true, at least intuitively:

A. When the statue is rained on, the clay is rained on.

B. When the clay is exposed to light, the statue is exposed to light.

Similarly:

C. When the atoms are outside, AND is outside.D. When AND is exposed to radiation, its atoms, its matter are exposed.

And so on for a long list of predicates or properties. But AND can be destroyedby some event e (say, dissolution by enzyme X). However, the exact atoms thatconstitute AND aren't destroyed by such dissolution, they just get spread over anarea larger than AND took up. The quantity of matter that made up AND stillexists and AND doesn't.


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How can it be that AND doesn't survive something that the quantity of matter makingup AND does survive, when AND and that quantity of matter are identical?

It is a feature of the concept of identity that if any two things are identical, what istrue of one is true of the other. That's just what identical means!

So, if AND and the quantity of matter (QOM) constituting it are identical, thenanything that is true of AND must be true of QOM and vice versa.

But the statement survives dissolution by enzyme X is false of AND and true ofQOM! So AND and QOM are not identical.

But that's crazy! That means that AND and QOM, two distinct, separate objects,were in the same space at the same time before AND was dissolved by enzyme X,and two things can't be in the same space at the same time! That's just a truism it's a fact about the world that we take to be obviously true.

This is an antinomy an apparently sound argument that results in a conclusion thatis obviously absurd.


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So, synthetic biology has built in metaphysical problems. And these could spin outinto more practical problems.

Just one example:Who owns AND and who owns QOM?

If I buy QOM, and someone comes up with a way to invent AND, who gets to keep it?If I own a house, and Shelly comes over and paints it or moves some parts of itaround, does Shelly own the house? Or is the changed house a distinct object that

Shelly owns while I own the original house? Who gets to live there?

If AND and QOM are not identical, can I own one and not the other?

If I own AND and QOM, do I still own QOM after AND has been dissolved? Do I havepartial ownership of anything that uses parts of QOM afterward?

The AND-QOM antinomy has the exact same structure as the classic Statue-Clayantinomy. In fact, there are many paradoxes of identity that share similar features.


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Statue-Clay:On Monday, a sculptor buys a lump of clay. On Tuesday, the sculptor shapes itinto a horse the clay is now a statue of a horse. On Wednesday, the sculptor(inexplicably) gets tired of horses and smushes the still-soft statue back into anondescript lump of clay. On Monday, the clay existed. On Tuesday, the statue

and the clay existed. On Wednesday, the clay still exists, but the statuedoesn't.

Let's introduce variables (briefly) to talk about it. If x and y are identical, theneverything true of x must be true of y. Now, let's substitute the statue for x andthe lump of clay for y. If the statue and the clay are identical, then everythingtrue of the statue must be true of the clay. It is true of the statue that smushing

destroys it, but it is not true that smushing destroys the clay. So the statue andthe clay are not identical!

Dion and Theon:There is a normal Greek man named Dion. Imagine Dion without his right foot.This sum of normal Greek man parts is just like Dion in every detail except

that he doesn't have a right foot call him Theon. Because any two thingsmust have all the same properties (all of the same predicative statements mustbe true of them), and Dion has a right foot while Theon doesn't, Dion and Theonare not identical.


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Debtors' Paradox:Imagine Dion borrows money from you on Monday. On Tuesday, youcome collecting, only to find out that he cut off his right foot. But now it isno longer true of Dion that he has a right foot. So Dion on Monday and

Dion on Tuesday are not identical. In fact Dion on Tuesday takes up theexact same space as Theon on Monday. Is Dion just Theon now? Anddoes Theon owe you anything? You can't collect a debt from someonethat didn't borrow anything from you, and Dion on Monday is not identicalwith Dion on Tuesday or with Theon on Monday, and neither of themborrowed from you.

Ship of Theseus:There is a famous ship (from some city, maybe it was Theseus). It ismade from planks of wood harvested from a particular forest, A.Eventually, it is housed in a museum to preserve it. Over time, theplanks rot and are replaced, one by one, with wood planks from adifferent forest, B. Eventually, the ship in the museum is made up ofentirely B-planks. Is this the same ship as the original? It is not true thatthe original ship was made of B-planks, but it is true of the ship in themuseum that it is made of B-planks. Vice versa for A-planks. The A-planks are in a different place than the original ship, so the original shipis not identical with the planks that made it up.


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These four situations all produce an antinomy because the conclusions that weare compelled to draw from them are inconsistent with the obvious truth that notwo, distinct objects can occupy the same space at the same time. Let's call

this...

The One Object to a Space Principle (OOSP):If two objects, x and y, are not identical, it is impossible for them to occupy thesame space at the same time.

In the Statue-Clay scenario, the statue, x, and and the lump of clay, y, are in the

same place at the same time.

In the Dion-Theon case, Dion and Theon are in the same place at the same time.

A further crazy-sounding consequence results in the Debtor's paradox: Dion isdestroyed by cutting off his right foot, and Theon survives. Dion and Theon havedifferent persistence conditions - they survive under different conditions. UntilDion cuts off his right foot, Dion and Theon exist in the same space at the sametime.

In the Ship case, the A-planks are in a different place than the original ship afterthe replacement. Before, they are in the same space as the original ship.


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We have good reasons to believe in the four non-identity theses. And OOSP isobviously true. Obviously. This is trouble. The non-identity theses can't betrue if OOSP is true and vice versa. So what can we do?

First, it helps to focus on one case. It reduces the amount of information wehave to juggle.

Let's focus on the Statue-Clay case, because it has the basic form that we arelooking for. The argument leading us to believe that the state and the clay arenot identical is this:

1. A lump of clay L exists on Monday, exists on Tuesday, and exists onWednesday.2. A statue S does not exist on Monday, exists on Tuesday, and does not existon Wednesday.3. For any two objects, x and y, if they are identical, then x and y share all of thesame properties (everything true of x is true of y and vice versa).C. S and L are not identical. (Modus Tollens)

And S and L exist in the same space on Tuesday.

*Absurd! The conjunction of the conclusion of the argument and the fact that Sand L are in the same place conflicts with OOSP.


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The first thing to notice is that there are assumptions underlying theprevious argument:

Creation: It is assumed that the statue really comes into existence

when the sculptor sculpts the clay and it really didn't exist before.

Survival: It is assumed that the clay continues to exist after it hasbeen sculpted into the statue.

Existence: It is assumed that both statues and lumps of clay reallyexist.

Absurdity: It is assumed the OOSP is true, so the conclusion of theargument is false.

Leibniz' Law (the law of indiscernability of identicals): x is identicalto y only if everything that is true of x is true of y and vice versa

(Or, more naturally but circularly: x and y are identical only if theyhave exactly the same properties.)


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Depending on what assumption we reject, we get a different solution to theantinomy.

Reject Absurdity Cohabitation Theory or Coincidence of ObjectsTheory

Reject Creation Just-Matter Theory

Reject Existence Eliminativism/Nihilism

Reject Survival Takeover Theory

Reject Liebniz' Law Relative Identity Theory


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Rejecting Absurdity Cohabitation Theory or Coincidence of ObjectsTheory

(Let's call it COT).

OOSP is false. It turns out that more than one object CAN occupy the samespace at the same time. The clay and the statue are two separate objectsthat occupy the same space at the same time. We can prove they're notidentical. The same goes for a book and the quantity of paper that make itup. And a table and the quantity of wood that make it up. Everywhere we

think we see a single object, we actually see at least two: the object and theamount of matter that constitute it. The other assumptions of the antinomyactually constitute an argument against OOSP.


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Reasons to accept COT:The arguments for the non-identity of familiar objects and their matter can bestated in something like a general form like so:

P1. Liebniz' Law: for all x, if x=y, then Px implies Py.P2. For just about any object in any space at any time, we can show that thequantity of matter constituting it, which is in the same space at the sametime, has different properties or that not everything true of the object is true ofthe matter constituting it.C. For any object, in any space, at any time, we can show that the quantity ofmatter constituting it is not identical to the object proper.

Defending P1: This is a fundamental assumption of the logic of identity andjust what the word identical means.

Defending P2:- Persistence conditions

i.) x is destroyed by an event eii.) the quantity of matter making up x is not destroyed by an event e

- Historical propertiesiii.) x did not exist at t1, does exist at t2, and does not exist at t3iv.) the quantity of matter making up x existed at t1, existed at t2, and

existed at t3


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These pairs of statements can be substituted into for most arbitrary objects,so most objects are not identical to the matter making them up.

COT resolves the antinomy by just removing one of the two ideas that are inconflict.

Reasons not to accept COT:

1. The Explosion of Reality(!): We can come up with an infinite number ofproperties that could separate things that are intuitively not separate objects.Imagine a statue outdoors and a statue indoors. The statue, when it is

outdoors has the property being outdoors. The statue, while indoors, hasthe property being indoors. By using the argument form above, we can saythat the statue-while-outdoors (outstatue) is not identical to the statue-while-indoors (instatue). And so on for anything that can ever happen to a statue.The laptop in front of me is not just a laptop, but a quantity of laptop matter, asum of laptop parts, an in-laptop, a table-laptop, a Ralph-laptop, a lit-laptop, a If we want to rule out some of those objects as absurd, we need a reasonfor it. Why rule out in-laptops and lit-laptops?

Is there a reason to rule these other objects out other that isn'tanthropocentric?


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2. Impenetrability: Try walking through a wall or a table or a laptop. Youcan't occupy the same space! Toss a baseball at a tv. No occupying thesame space! OOSP is just true!

3. Extensionality: a response to impenetrability is that the wall and I aren'tmade of the same parts. If we were, there would be no problem.Sometimes two objects are made of the same matter. No problem. Butthat leads to the Extensionality problem: How can two things with exactlythe same parts be different objects or have different properties? Normally,what parts a thing is made of is what allows us to tell it apart from otherthings the difference between a beef hamburger and a veggie burger.

Or, think of a house painted red and a house made of the same parts in thesame place painted green. It's the same house, but a different color... isn'tit?

4. Grounding: normally, we think of some properties being dependent onother properties. The kinds of properties that are different between statuesand clay are non-categorical properties. The properties they share are

categorical properties. We think of non-categorical properties beingdependent on or grounded in categorical properties. How can thisgrounding relation allow for different non-categorical properties to begrounded in the same categorical properties? Is grounding a completelyindeterministic relation?


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So, there are good reasons not to accept COT and to keep accepting OOSP.What are our other options?

Reject Creation The Just-Matter Theory (JMT)

Turns out, just hunks. - Steve Brule

The JMT says that the statue is not created when the clay is sculpted. Wereally ought to identify the statue with the quantity or hunk of matter it ismade of from the very beginning and that matter existed long before the

sculpting. The statue is never actually created it just is the hunk of matterthat eventually makes it up and it has whatever properties the hunk of matterhas at any given time. It's also incredibly rare that matter is destroyed, too.Since the statue is identified with the hunk of matter, the statue actuallysurvives anything that the hunk of matter survives, including smashing,exploding, and being strewn across the galaxy. And the antinomy is avoidedbecause there is only the hunk of matter in statue form or in clay form or insome form in any space at a given time.


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Reject Existence Eliminativism/Nihilism (EN)

EN rejects the Creation assumption implicitly by rejecting the Existenceassumption. Statues and tables and people don't exist of course they're

never created. Rather than identifying objects with the hunk of matter theyare made of, we should just say that, strictly speaking, there are no objects atall, there are only objectlike configurations of basic things that do exist ofmatter.

Reduce objects to the fundamental particles that make them up. There is noadditional entity that exists in addition to the particles. The antinomy doesn't

come up because there aren't multiple objects in the same space, there arejust n fundamental particles distributed about a certain area.

Both JMT and EN say that all of the properties of objects are explained by thefundamental things that objects are made of. The only disagreement is overwhether we should talk about those objects existing in a literal or a figurativesense. (The difference between JMT and EN is held by some to be merelyverbal a disagreement about whether the statement statues exist is truethat depends on language more than on the way the world is. The view thatthe entire debate about identity conditions is all just a verbal mess is calledDeflationism. It's complicated, I'm going to skip it.)


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Reasons for accepting JMT and EN:

The views are suggested by the success that physical science has hadreducing things to configurations of matter. We just supplement the idea

of everything being made of matter by identifying certain quantities ofmatter with objects that we are more familiar with or eliminating thosefamiliar objects from the category of things that reallyexist. Eitherseemingly resolves the antinomy.

A potential objection to both views might be that objects both exist andare created and destroyed. Isn't that obvious? To say that objects never

come into our out of being, either because they exist wherever theirmatter is or because they never actually exist is equally absurd asdenying OOSP. I can see and feel objects and watch them take shapeand lose it. JMT/EN proponents can respond by saying that that doesn'tmean that there are objects over and above the objectlikeconfigurations of particles or quantities of matter. Sensory evidencedoes not distinguish between n fundamental particles and n particles

plus the object itself. Just like sensory evidence doesn't tell betweenbeing on Earth or being a brain in a vat.


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Reasons for rejecting JMT:If objects just are the hunks of matter they are made of, then not only are theynot created by changing shape, they are not destroyed. This is problematic.The statue survives being smashed? What about a person? Does a person

survive a dramatic change in the hunk of matter that makes it up like explodingor otherwise dying? Socrates died thousands of years ago and his matter isdispersed. The Just-Matter theory implies that Socrates is still around.

The hunk of matter making up Socrates still exists, it is just in a differentconfiguration dispersed throughout the earth. So, if Socrates just is that hunkof matter, Socrates still exists, just dispersed around the earth.

Similarly, the quantity of matter making up me has existed for at leastthousands of years, it was just never in a configuration that resulted in a personwalking around and making powerpoints until recently. But it still existed. If Iam that hunk of matter, then I have existed for thousands of years, just in adifferent shape.

But, both of these conclusions are just about as absurd as the idea that twothings can occupy the same space at the same time, so a theory that entailsthem is no better alternative.


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Reasons to reject EN:

Even though sensory evidence can't directly show that EN is false, it is stillhard to swallow as hard as the idea of more than one object to a space and that counts against it.

There may not be fundamental particles. Physical science hasprogressively unveiled level upon level of increasingly tiny, increasinglyfundamental particles. Molecules gave way to atoms, which gave way tosubatomic particles, which gave way to quarks. Suppose that goes on

forever. EN is committed to denying everything but fundamental particles,if there are none, then EN denies everything which is much more absurdthan Cohabitation.


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Reasons to accept TT:


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Solves the antinomy.

Allows for creation and destruction in the statue-clay case, which areintuitively plausible.

Is somewhat consistent with physical science fundamental particles inconfigurations exist and the nature of these configurations determines whatproperties the resulting objects have.

Reasons to reject TT:

It's highly implausible that a lump of clay can be destroyed by an act likesculpting it into a statue.

Even with the rule about kinds determining persistence conditions, it'sunclear when a change or event destroys an object because it's unclearwhen one kind is dominant over another.

Weird cases: Imagine that we start treating a rock like a work of art displaying it in galleries, writing essays about it. If this makes the rock apiece of art, then it destroys the rock. But how can looking at and talkingabout a rock in a certain way destroy a rock?

Rejecting OOSP (again) Four Dimensionalism (4-D)


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Return to Cohabitation/Coincidence of Objects Theory.

The problems with COT were impenetrability, the explosion of reality,extensionality, and grounding objections.

We can answer some objections to COT with 4-D. Maybe that makesthe 4-D version of COT worth believing.

Time is like space objects can have parts in different locations in spaceand in time. My arm is in a different location than my nose. The legs ofthe table are in a different space than the table top. 4-D just holds that

one object can have different parts in time. We call different partsdifferent objects.

The statue is just the temporal part of the clay that is statue shaped.The clay has other parts too temporal parts where it is lump shaped.

Reasons to accept 4-D:

The argument for COT.

Accept the response to impenetrability, and then resist the extensionalityproblem.

4-D resolves the extensionality problem by saying that objects are


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4-D resolves the extensionality problem by saying that objects aredistinguished by their parts including their temporal parts. The clay and thestatue don't have the exact same parts the statue is the temporal part partof the clay that is statue shaped and the clay is made of the statue-shapedtemporal parts and the lump-shaped temporal parts.

4-D could solve the grounding problem by saying that the difference in non-categorical properties of the statue and the lump are grounded in the fact thatthey are different temporal parts. I'm not sure what this means.

Reasons to reject 4-D:

4-D doesn't resolve the Explosion problem, it accepts it. In fact, 4-D takesExplosion farther. Each change takes place over time and each instant oftime is a new temporal part. In fact, we can think of arbitrary temporal parts.We can carve up any object into 14 second long temporal parts. This is stillan absurd conclusion, and there is no nonanthropocentric and intuitive way ofruling out new temporal parts, each of which is a new object. If this isimplausible, it counts against 4-D.

Also, there is the chance that the image of time being like space might fail infavor of another image. Maybe it's just not right to think of time like space.

Lumpl and Goliath. Two objects with all of the same temporal parts.


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Rejecting Liebniz' Law Relative Identity Theory (RIT)

There is no absolute identity relation, identity is only a relative relation relativeto kinds. A statue is the same statue as the lump of clay and the same clay asthe lump of clay. There is no reason to think they ought to have all of the sameproperties as each other they each need to only have the properties of thekind they are both associated with.

More generally: x is the same F as y and y is the same F as x, but x and y aredifferent Gs, and it doesn't make sense to just say that x is the same as y.

Think of the Debtors' paradox: Dion is the same kind, person, as Theon eventhough they are distinct in other ways they have different masses, they havedifferent lists of parts.

Reasons to accept RIT:

It solves some problems quickly and to intuitive satisfaction; the statue-clay, thedebtors, Dion-Theon... and all problems with their exact structure.


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Take home points:

There is an antinomy apparently sound argument that leads to an obviouslyfalse conclusion or that is inconsistent with something that seems obviouslytrue.

The crucial idea: The keys to resolving the antinomy are i.) knowing that thereare assumptions underlying the antinomy and ii.) systematically and carefullythinking about what is being assumed and how those assumptions inferentiallyrelate to the conclusions. Exposing the assumptions requires figuring out howthey support the inconsistent statements.

But... rejecting some of the assumptions will have consequences, and this iswhat distinguishes the various theories of identity. We have to figure out whichconsequences we are willing to live with and which ones we aren't.

These ideas hold for just about everything that can be debated. It's good tocarefully think about the assumptions and inferential connections for any

problem.

Bibliography:


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Bibliography:

Ted Sider. (2005) Riddles of Existence

Ryan Wasserman. (2009) Material Constitution Stanford Encyclopedia ofPhilosophy

Harold Noonan. (2009) Identity SEP

Harry Dutsch. (2007) Relative Identity SEP

Achille Varzi. (2009) Mereology SEP

John Pollock. (1990) Technical Methods in Philosophy

W.V. Quine. (1950) Methods of Logic

Ernie Lepore (2000) Meaning and Argument

First-hand reading:4 Dimensionalism:


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4-Dimensionalism:Ted Sider. (2001) Four DimensionalismDavid Lewis (1976) Survival and Identity Ed. A. Rorty. The Identities of Persons.

Takeover Theory (Dominant Kinds):Micheal Burke (1997) Preserving the Idea of One Object to a Place... Ed.

Micheal Rea. Material Constitution.Explosion of Reality:Eli Hersch. (1982) The Concept of Identity.Ernest Sosa (1987) Subjects Among Other Things Ed. J.E. Tomberlin.

Philosophical Perspectives.Eliminativism/Nihilism:

Trenton Merrick (2001) Objects and Persons.

Peter Unger (1979) There are No Ordinary Things Synthese.Peter van Inwagen (1990) Material Beings.

Just-Matter Theory:Roderick Chisolm (1976) Person and Object.

Cohabitation/Coincident Objects:David Wiggins (1968) Identity and Spatio-Temporal Continuity.David Lewis (1976) Survival and Identity Ed. A. Rorty. Identities of Persons.

Relative Identity:Peter Geach (1967) Identity Review of Metaphysics.

Deflationism:Rudolf Carnap (1950) Empiricism, Semantics, Ontology International Review of

Philoso h .

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Metaphysics Primer for Synthetic Biology 2.1