Argument

Property (philosophy)

Overview

In philosophy and logic (especially metaphysics), a property is a characteristic of an object; for example, a red object is said to have the property of redness. The property may be considered a form of object in its own right, able to possess other properties. A property, however, differs from individual objects in that it may be instantiated, and often in more than one object. It differs from the logical and mathematical concept of class by not having any concept of extensionality, and from the philosophical concept of class in that a property is considered to be distinct from the objects which possess it. Understanding how different individual entities (or particulars) can in some sense have some of the same properties is the basis of the problem of universals.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

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Passages from public-domain books where Property (philosophy) is discussed.

A child which has no toys of its own will pick up sticks or broken bricks or any odds and ends it may find, and will treasure them as its very own. The desire for property is so deep-seated that it cannot be thwarted without danger. Moreover property cultivates carefulness and curbs the impulse of destruction. Especially useful is property in anything that the child has made himself; if this is not permitted, his…
Bertrand Russell, Education and the good life
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A man's property is some object related to him. This relation is not natural, but moral, and founded on justice. 'Tis very preposterous, therefore, to imagine that we can have any idea of property, without fully comprehending the nature of justice, and showing its origin in the artifice and contrivance of men. The origin of justice explains that of property. The same artifice gives rise to both.
David Hume, Philosophical Works, v. 2
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It is obvious, however, that any hereditary property possessed by Adam must belong to all men; and similarly any hereditary property possessed by 0 must belong to all finite numbers. This is the principle of what is called "mathematical induction." It frequently happens, when we wish to prove that all finite numbers have some property, that we have first to prove that 0 has the property, and then that the property…
Bertrand Russell, Our Knowledge of the External World as a Field for Scientific Method in Philosophy
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Yet it is worth noting, I think, that there is another sense of "grounded" in which it may quite well be true that every relational property _is_ grounded in the nature of any term which possesses it. Namely that, in the case of every such property, the term in question has some quality _without_ which it could not have had the property. In other words that the relational property _entails_ some quality in the term…
G. E. Moore, Philosophical Studies
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But there is an important distinction. Wealth means enjoyment of goods and satisfaction of wants. Property means the title to the exclusive use or possession of goods. Hence the increase of property may involve increasing exclusion of part of the community from wealth, although the owners of the property may be increasing their own enjoyments.
John Dewey, Ethics
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Property (philosophy)

Overview

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