The Superiority of Universals Over Resemblance Nominalism

Three alternatives to universals are discussed in this work: resemblance nominalism, trope theories and theological nominalism. This chapter discusses resemblance nominalism, especially in its strongest formulation by Gonzalo Rodriguez-Pereyra. It is argued that there are important difficulties for resemblance nominalism because it requires to postulate primitive and complicated facts of resemblance, it requires an inversion of the direction of ontological priority, it cannot explain structures of determination of properties, it cannot explain adequately causal powers, natural laws, or the reliability of our inductive practices, and it requires a possibilist modal metaphysics. Besides, resemblance nominalism under the specific formulation of Rodriguez-Pereyra suffers from a vicious regress.