Tropes and Related Entities

the redness of the apple the beauty of the picture the gentleness of John two kinds of intuitive descriptions: [1] concrete manifestations of properties in individuals, ‘concretized properties’, ‘particularized properties’ [2] ‘abstract particulars’: the thing you get when you abstract away from all the properties an individual has except for one, if you attend to only one of the properties an object has tropes in contemporary (as well as ancient and medieval) metaphysics: primitives, not defined in terms of properties and individuals t he term ‘trope’: Williams (1953) contemporary alternatives: ‘abstract particulars ’ (Campbell), ‘attribute instances ’ (Mertz), ‘modes ’ (Lowe), moments (Mulligan, Simons, Smith 1984), ‘cases ’ (Woltersdorff) historical alternatives: accidents (Aristotle), modes (medieval and upwards), s ome basic facts about tropes