Trope (philosophy)
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Trope denotes figurative and
metaphor A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another. It may provide (or obscure) clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas. Metaphors are often compared wi ...
ical language and one which has been used in various technical senses. The term ''trope'' derives from the
Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
τρόπος (''tropos''), "a turn, a change", related to the root of the verb τρέπειν (''trepein''), "to turn, to direct, to alter, to change"; this means that the term is used metaphorically to denote, among other things, metaphorical language. The term is also used in technical senses, which do not always correspond to its linguistic origin. Its meaning has to be judged from the
context Context may refer to: * Context (language use), the relevant constraints of the communicative situation that influence language use, language variation, and discourse summary Computing * Context (computing), the virtual environment required to su ...
, some of which are given below.


Basic meaning as metaphor

Here a trope is a figurative and metaphorical use of a word or a phrase. The verb ''to trope'' means then to make a trope.


In epistemology

A trope or "mode" refers to
skeptical Skepticism, also spelled scepticism, is a questioning attitude or doubt toward knowledge claims that are seen as mere belief or dogma. For example, if a person is skeptical about claims made by their government about an ongoing war then the p ...
stock arguments or "ways of refuting
dogmatism Dogma is a belief or set of beliefs that is accepted by the members of a group without being questioned or doubted. It may be in the form of an official system of principles or doctrines of a religion, such as Roman Catholicism, Judaism, Isla ...
." There are two sets of these tropes:
the ten modes of Aenesidemus Aenesidemus ( grc, Αἰνησίδημος or Αἰνεσίδημος) was a Greek Pyrrhonist philosopher, born in Knossos on the island of Crete. He lived in the 1st century BC, taught in Alexandria and flourished shortly after the life of C ...
and the five modes of Agrippa.


In metaphysics

Trope theory (or trope nominalism) in
metaphysics Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...
is a version of
nominalism In metaphysics, nominalism is the view that universals and abstract objects do not actually exist other than being merely names or labels. There are at least two main versions of nominalism. One version denies the existence of universalsthings ...
. Here, a trope is a particular instance of a property, like the redness of a particular rose, or the specific nuance of green of a specific individual leaf. Trope theories assume that universals are unnecessary. This use of the term goes back to D. C. Williams (1953). The basic problem has been discussed previously in philosophy without using the term "trope". The following is a brief background: The basic problem is the
problem of universals The problem of universals is an ancient question from metaphysics that has inspired a range of philosophical topics and disputes: Should the properties an object has in common with other objects, such as color and shape, be considered to exist be ...
. One part of the problem of universals is determining what it is for two tokens (or separate instances of something) to be of the same type. How different things can be the same. The arguments are complex, and involve
semantics Semantics (from grc, σημαντικός ''sēmantikós'', "significant") is the study of reference, meaning, or truth. The term can be used to refer to subfields of several distinct disciplines, including philosophy, linguistics and comp ...
,
metaphysics Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...
and
epistemology Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics. Epis ...
. One classical solution is that of realism as found in the middle period of
Plato Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
's philosophy, with the '' Republic'' as a crowning work. According to this solution there are ideas or
forms Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens. Form also refers to: *Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data * ...
for any property. These forms exist timelessly as singular, perfect individuals in a metaphysical (timeless, supra-sensible) world of their own. They correspond to what is later called " universals". Somehow the form of a specific color creates many secondary images of itself, as when a prototype is used to make copies or an object casts several shadows. Expressed more abstractly, the individual colour-instances (the green of a leaf, the similar green of a frog) all partake in the same idea of green. In Plato the
theory of forms The theory of Forms or theory of Ideas is a philosophical theory, fuzzy concept, or world-view, attributed to Plato, that the physical world is not as real or true as timeless, absolute, unchangeable ideas. According to this theory, ideas in th ...
is related to his theses about
innate knowledge Innatism is a philosophical and epistemological doctrine that the mind is born with ideas, knowledge, and beliefs. Therefore, the mind is not a ''tabula rasa'' (blank slate) at birth, which contrasts with the views of early empiricists such as J ...
. In ''
Phaedo ''Phædo'' or ''Phaedo'' (; el, Φαίδων, ''Phaidōn'' ), also known to ancient readers as ''On The Soul'', is one of the best-known dialogues of Plato's middle period, along with the '' Republic'' and the '' Symposium.'' The philosophica ...
'' the turn of the argument is that we cannot learn from experience what similarity is through abstraction, but must possess it in an innate form before we have any experience (''Phaedo'' 74a–75d). Nevertheless, Plato in the '' Parmenides'' dialogue himself formulated several problems for his view. One is: How the idea can, being single, nevertheless be present in a multitude of separate instances without being split apart. The other solution is that of
nominalism In metaphysics, nominalism is the view that universals and abstract objects do not actually exist other than being merely names or labels. There are at least two main versions of nominalism. One version denies the existence of universalsthings ...
. Here the thesis is that universals such as the ideas or forms of Plato are unnecessary in an explanation of language, thought and the world. Only single individuals are real, but they can be grouped together by a human observer through their similarities. Nominalists are usually
empiricists In philosophy, empiricism is an epistemological theory that holds that knowledge or justification comes only or primarily from sensory experience. It is one of several views within epistemology, along with rationalism and skepticism. Empir ...
. George Berkeley, for example, argued against universals or Abstract objects using nominalistic arguments. He used the term ''idea'' to denote specific perceptions of an atomistic nature. They could be grouped through similarities or one could take a specific instance, for example, the green hue of a frog one is looking at now, as a kind of paradigm case or prototype, and regard everything that was similar to it as belonging to the same type or category. One attraction of the nominalistic program is that if it can be carried out it solves Plato's problem in '' Parmenides'', since the need for a single idea or form or universal ''green'' then vanishes and it can be expunged through Occam's razor, i.e. the rule that, other things being equal, one should not multiply explanatory entities beyond necessity.
Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ...
(1912, chapter IX) argued against Berkeley and took the same basic position as Plato. His argument was basically one against any form of nominalism. It says, briefly, that if we introduce several instances of green as separate individuals, we nevertheless have to accept that the reason that we group them together is because they are similar. Therefore, we must presume at least one true universal, that of similarity. Two popular recent solutions to the problem of universals, as it relates to the possibility of entities existing in multiple locations at the same time, are as follows. David Armstrong, a prominent Australian philosopher, argues, that there are instantiated universals, like Russell and the middle Plato. An instantiated universal is a property (such as being green) that can exist in multiple locations at the same time. Going back to the problem of universals, for six different objects to all be green would be for each object to instantiate the universal green. The very same, identical universal green, would be wholly located at each green object. To be even more specific, if a frog and a leaf are the same shade of green, the green of the frog and the green of the leaf are one and the same entity (qua green-ness), which happens to be multiply located. D. C. Williams and Keith Campbell, among others, reject instantiated universals in favor of tropes. A trope is a property (such as being green) that can only exist in one location at one time. Trope theorists explain what it is for two tokens (individual instances) to be of the same type in terms of resemblance. As an example, for six different objects to all be green would be for each object to have its own distinct green trope. Each green trope would be a different entity from the other green tropes, but they would ''resemble'' each other and would all be taken to be green because of their resemblance. In the phenomenological tradition, a metaphysical doctrine embracing both tropes and the objects on which the tropes depend was elaborated by
Edmund Husserl , thesis1_title = Beiträge zur Variationsrechnung (Contributions to the Calculus of Variations) , thesis1_url = https://fedora.phaidra.univie.ac.at/fedora/get/o:58535/bdef:Book/view , thesis1_year = 1883 , thesis2_title ...
in his '' Logical Investigations'' (1900–01), as part of what Husserl called "
formal ontology In philosophy, the term formal ontology is used to refer to an ontology defined by axioms in a formal language with the goal to provide an unbiased (domain- and application-independent) view on reality, which can help the modeler of domain- or a ...
". Husserl's trope theory ("theory of moments" in his terminology; german: Momente) in this respect were used as the basis for the theory of truthmaking put forward by
analytic philosopher Analytic philosophy is a branch and tradition of philosophy using analysis, popular in the Western world and particularly the Anglosphere, which began around the turn of the 20th century in the contemporary era in the United Kingdom, United ...
s
Kevin Mulligan __NOTOC__ Kevin Mulligan (born 23 June 1951) is a British philosopher, working on ontology, the philosophy of mind, and Austrian philosophy. He is currently Honorary Professor at the University of Geneva, Full Professor at the University of It ...
, Peter Simons and Barry Smith in "Truth-Makers" (1984).Mulligan, K., Simons, P. M. and Smith B.,
Truth-Makers
, ''Philosophy and Phenomenological Research'', 44 (1984), 287–321.
According to this theory, it is tropes — including both individual qualities and events — that serve as the truthmakers for true atomic sentences such as "John is hot" or "Mary is loved by John" or "John kicked Bill".


In metahistory

The use of tropes has been extended from a linguistic usage to the field of metahistory by, among other theorists, Hayden White in his ''Metahistory'' (1973). Metahistorical tropes are generally understood to be styles of discourse — rather than figures of style — underlying the historian's writing of history. They are historically determined in as much as the
historiography Historiography is the study of the methods of historians in developing history as an academic discipline, and by extension is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiography of a specific topic covers how historians ha ...
of every period is defined by a specific type of trope. For Hayden White, tropes historically unfolded in this sequence:
metaphor A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another. It may provide (or obscure) clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas. Metaphors are often compared wi ...
, metonymy, synecdoche, and finally, irony.


See also

* Trope (disambiguation)


References


Sources

* Costa, Claudio (2018). "Trope Theory and the Unsustainable Lightness of Being", in ''Philosophical Semantics: Reintegrating Theoretical Philosophy'', Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. * Quine, W. V. O. (1961). "On What There is", in ''From a Logical Point of View'', 2nd ed. N.Y., Harper and Row. * Russell, Bertrand (1912). ''The Problems of Philosophy'', Oxford University Press. * White, Hayden (1973). ''Metahistory'', Johns Hopkins University Press. * Williams, D. C. (1953). "On the Elements of Being: I.", ''Review of Metaphysics'', 7(1), pp. 3–18. * Williams, D. C. (1953). "On the Elements of Being: II.", ''Review of Metaphysics'', 7(2), pp. 171–92.


External links

* *{{cite SEP , url-id=nominalism-metaphysics , title=Nominalism in Metaphysics , last=Rodriguez-Pereyra , first=Gonzalo
Universals
entry by Mary C. MacLeod and Eric M. Rubenstein in th
''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy''
Tropes Concepts in epistemology Concepts in metaphysics