Abstract
There are infinitely many states of affairs. In fact, the cardinal number even of obtaining states of affairs is at least א 1. This is shown by the following argument: Consider two material objects m1 and m2 moving continuously towards each other on a straight line in space until they collide. This process consists in the obtaining of non-denumerably many states of affairs: that the distance between m1 and m2 is r meters at t(r) is an obtaining state of affairs for every r in the appropriate continuous interval of real numbers IR, t(r) being that moment out of the appropriate time-interval IT in which the distance between m1 and m2 is r.
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© 1997 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
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Meixner, U. (1997). The Cardinality of the Universe of States of Affairs. In: Axiomatic Formal Ontology. Synthese Library, vol 264. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-8867-6_21
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-8867-6_21
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
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