Robert Frederick

The dissertation is a study of the relations between individual things, parts of individual things, and boundaries. In first chapter I present an expanded system of axioms and definitions for the primitive mereological relation "x is a part of y." I discuss alternatives to some of the axioms, particularly the axiom of mereological essentialism, i.e. the view that things have their parts essentially. I also give axioms and definitions that characterize the relations between three dimensional objects and their boundaries. I argue that boundaries are ontologically dependent particulars in that they cannot exist apart from or independently of three dimensional objects. ;In the second chapter I discuss conjunctivism, i.e. the thesis that for any two discrete objects there is something made up of those two objects. I develop several different forms of conjunctivism, including what I describe as the conjunctivism of heaps. I consider several arguments for and against conjunctivism and conclude that none of them offer convincing grounds for either accepting or rejecting it. ;In the third chapter I suggest that one way to decide between different mereological principles is via an examination of the problem of identity through time. I argue that a widely held theory of identity, the sortal theory, multiplies entities beyond what is needed to give an adequate account of identity. I then propose a strictly mereological view of identity. This view has the consequence that all individuals, other than boundaries and monads, are mereological sums, and that the only non-universal properties individuals have necessarily are those implied by mereological principles.