nominalists

Nominalism is a family of philosophical positions about universals and abstract objects, principally arguing that there are no mind‑independent universals. According to nominalists, only particular things exist; universal terms such as “redness” or “dog” are not real entities but names for sets of similar things, or for mental constructs used in language and thought. In this view, predication and general statements do not pick out objective, standalone essences.

Historically, nominalism emerged as a critique of realist accounts that treated universals as real, existing independently of the objects they characterize. In medieval Europe, figures associated with nominalism argued that only individuals exist and that universals are mere words or concepts. William of Ockham is one of the most influential medieval proponents, advocating a parsimonious ontology in which universals have no independent existence beyond language or mental content. In modern philosophy, nominalist themes persist in debates about the nature of mathematics, science, and language, and various modern versions have been developed.

There are several strands within nominalism. Name nominalism holds that universals are nothing more than names for groups of objects. Trope nominalism contends that reality consists of particularized properties (tropes) rather than universal properties. Conceptualism, by comparison, holds that universals exist only as mental concepts, not as external objects; some readers distinguish conceptualism from strict nominalism by noting universals’ dependence on mind rather than on linguistic usage alone.

Nominalism faces challenges related to explaining the stability of predication and the apparent objectivity of general terms. Proponents respond with alternative theories such as trope theory or refined linguistic accounts, while critics argue that nominalism struggles to account for common knowledge about shared properties across many objects.