Source
What was actually shown
The dilemma. Chakravartty reads non-eliminative OSR as a priority thesis: relata depend on their relations for the determination of their identity, and not the reverse (p. 193). Every theory of objects he surveys leaves intrinsic features to fix identity: substance, bundles, and bundles of dispositionally individuated properties. An object with no intrinsic features “is not an object at all” (p. 197). The no-priority variant, with relations and relata on a par, has the same two options (pp. 200–201). His conclusion (p. 200): one cannot deny both eliminativism and “a role for the intrinsic in the analysis of identity”. He says in so many words that nothing in the chapter tells against eliminative OSR.
Where the record’s texts fall. This is the record’s synthesis.
| Text | Intrinsic features of relata? | Position relative to the dilemma |
|---|---|---|
| Ladyman 2001, LIT-217 | Granted. Entangled particles keep “charge, mass and so on” (p. 72). | Intrinsic horn. The claim is only that entangled relations do not supervene on those features, so the priority thesis is never stated (NOTE-192). |
| Morganti, LIT-173 | Insisted on. State-independent kind properties are not structurally reducible. | Intrinsic horn, with symmetric partial dependence among objects (NOTE-095). |
| Floridi, LIT-152 | Denied. Structural objects without intrinsic natures, and a “package” of relata and relations. | Target. This is the no-priority variant with no intrinsic features, the case pp. 200–201 argue is eliminativism. Floridi cites Chakravartty as an ally (NOTE-099). |
| Ross 2008, LIT-218; Ladyman 2024, LIT-219 | Beside the point. Individuals are “book-keeping devices” at the fundamental level, real at their own scales. | Eliminative only about fundamental individuals, scale-relative elsewhere. Neither horn as framed (NOTE-189, NOTE-191). |
| Esfeld & Lam, LIT-895 | Denied for basic objects. Relata are “nothing but that what bears the relations” (p. 32); composites keep theirs. | Target, no-priority variant. Where relations do not discern, it accepts primitive numerical diversity, which it says is “not a primitive thisness” nor any sort of identity (p. 33). Whether that meets the dilemma is open (NOTE-695, THEORY-453). |
| Wallace, LIT-151 | Not asked. Objects are what the best precisification quantifies over. | Outside the framing. Math-first OSR makes no priority claim. On Wallace’s terms the dilemma belongs to language-first metaphysics (NOTE-142). |
So the dilemma is well aimed at two held positions. The founding non-eliminative text escapes it at a price: it concedes the premise, and what remains distinctively structural is a non-supervenience claim about relations.
What this does not say
- That the dilemma is sound. Its key step, that purely extrinsic characterisation regresses, is one the author admits may look question-begging (p. 201).
- That Floridi’s position is refuted. The package hypothesis is a reply to a regress. Whether it answers the dilemma is open (NOTE-099).
- That Every Thing Must Go is outside the dilemma’s reach. Chakravartty quotes it for objects “purged of their intrinsic natures”, and it is unread (LIT-301, Deferred). That is QUESTION-336.
- That the category-theoretic or graph-theoretic routes rescue the target position. Yoneda fixes identity only up to isomorphism among presupposed objects (THEORY-032). Leitgeb & Ladyman (LIT-154) defend primitive structural identity for mathematics only, and Chakravartty’s point about graph labels (pp. 197–200) addresses exactly that.
Connections
- THEORY-038: the eliminative horn, and why category theory does not support it.
- LIT-045: the Stanford Encyclopedia survey. Its collapse objection, that OSR reduces to standard realism, is what the intrinsic horn has to face next.
- THEORY-453: Esfeld and Lam’s moderate structural realism, the second position of the target kind. Its primitive numerical diversity is the reply this entry’s dilemma has to be tested against. Not a rival: the two accounts are of different things, a dilemma and a position it reaches.
Note of 2026-10-10: a second position of the kind
The title says only Floridi’s view, among the record’s readings, keeps relata
while denying them every intrinsic identity-fixing feature. Esfeld and Lam’s
moderate structural realism (LIT-895, read in NOTE-695) is a second.
It holds that relata have no fundamental intrinsic properties. Where nothing
discerns them, it accepts “a numerical distinction (diversity)” as primitive,
which it says is “not a primitive thisness” nor any other sort of identity
(p. 33). That meets the first condition of this entry’s promote_when.
Whether primitive diversity meets the dilemma is left open here. The title is
not changed by this note. (The title was corrected on 2026-10-16, at version 2.)