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(2003) Wholes, sums and unities, Dordrecht, Springer.
A recurrent and striking feature of reflection on wholes and parts, both in ancient and modern times, is the attempt to draw a distinction between what might be described as higher-grade and lower-grade wholes. Perhaps the earliest example of such a distinction is that standing at the source of the present work, namely, Plato's distinction in Theaetetus between a complex which is different from all its elements and a complex which is identical to them. A more familiar ancient example is found in Aristotle's distinction between substances and heaps. In early modem times, Leibniz distinguishes similarly between monads and monadic aggregates.1 In the 19th and early 20th centuries, two notions in particular developed into central representatives of this perennial attempt to explicate a higher-grade type of whole: The notion of an organic whole, and the notion of a Gestalt.2 The latter two are fairly described as the main traditional modem notions of higher-grade wholes.
Publication details
DOI: 10.1007/978-94-017-0209-6_6
Full citation:
Meirav, A. (2003). Traditional higher-grade wholes as sums, in Wholes, sums and unities, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 141-165.
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