Realism and Antirealism About Socially Constructed Properties
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5652051 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Vincent Tanzil |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 20 |
| Issue | 10 |
| Publication date | 2025-10-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Philosophy Compass (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1747-9991 • E-ISSN: 1747-9991 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1111/phc3.70060 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 57 |
Social metaphysics raises intriguing questions about realism and antirealism. I focus on properties because other social entities arguably involve the instantiation of socially constructed properties, properties are relevant to discussions of causation, and their reality may have implications for the reality of other social entities. I delineate a possible distinction between socially constructed, social, and nonsocial properties. I outline and then resist recent attempts to revise the criteria for realism and antirealism about such properties, specifically about the mind-independence criterion for existence, relative frame manipulability, and kind projectibility. Instead, I propose that realism and antirealism about socially constructed properties should be understood in terms of the existence of socially constructed universals or tropes. If we accept this alignment, we can draw on the traditional arguments for and against the existence of specific kinds of properties within a given domain, without having to revise the conditions for realism that we have traditionally relied on
Resemblance Nominalism
The Ant Trap
Homeostasis, Species, and Higher Taxa
On What Grounds What
Metametaphysics
Social Categories in Context
Social Objects, Response-Dependence, and Realism
Inductive Reasoning Involving Social Kinds
The Stage Theory of Groups
The Construction of Human Kinds
The Causal Power of Social Structures
Social Construction, HPC Kinds, and the Projectability of Human Categories
Social Structures and the Ontology of Social Groups
Three Kinds of Social Kinds
Anchoring versus Grounding
Social Construction and Grounding
The Metaphysics of gender is (Relatively) substantial
Searching for social properties
Anchoring as Grounding
Foundations for a Social Ontology
Resisting Reality
The Metaphysics of Social Groups
Metaphysics and social justice
Feminist Metaphysics and Philosophical Methodology
Methodological Individualism and Holism in Political Science
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |