Abstract

It is both a matter of everyday experience and a tenet of sociological theory that people often occupy a range of social roles and identities, some of which are associated with mutually incompatible properties. But since nothing could have incompatible properties, it is not clear how this is possible. It has been suggested, notably by Kit Fine (1982, 1999, 2006), that the puzzling relation between a person and their various social roles and identities can be explained by admitting an ontology of social qua objects—objects constituted by, yet distinct from, the persons on which they are based. This article argues that admitting even a rich ontology of such qua objects does not suffice to explain the puzzle cases of interest. Instead, alternative resources are required which, once available, diminish the motivation for adopting an ontology of social qua objects in the first place. The paper concludes by considering whether there remains work for social qua objects in explaining differences in persistence conditions between a person and the social individuals to which they may give rise, but reaches a negative verdict. Social qua objects, if they exist, have little work to do in our theorizing about the relation between a person and their various social roles and identities.

中文翻译：

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Qua 对象及其限制

摘要

人们经常占据一系列社会角色和身份，其中一些与互不相容的属性相关联，这既是日常经验的问题，也是社会学理论的原则。但是由于没有任何东西可能具有不兼容的属性，因此尚不清楚这是如何实现的。尤其是 Kit Fine (1982, 1999, 2006) 已经提出，一个人与其各种社会角色和身份之间令人费解的关系可以通过承认社会作为对象的本体论来解释——由其所基于的人构成但又与其所基于的人不同的对象。本文认为，即使承认此类作为对象的丰富本体也不足以解释令人感兴趣的谜题案例。相反，需要替代资源，一旦可用，首先会减少采用社会对象本体的动机。该论文最后考虑了社会作为客体在解释一个人和他们可能产生的社会个体之间的持久条件差异方面是否还有工作，但得出了否定的结论。社会作为对象，如果它们存在的话，在我们对一个人与其各种社会角色和身份之间的关系进行理论化方面几乎没有什么可做的。