Deducing strict parts

Consider an object oriented ontology. Let A and B be objects and let A be a strict part of B. Now, there must be a truthmaker for the truth of the proposition "A is a strict part of B". This propostion is logically equivalent with "A is a part of B and B is not a part of A". It's truthmaker is not confined to A and B. For A and B together only make it true that A is a part of B, whereas also proposition "B is not a part of A" needs to be made true. So which object or objects make "B is not a part of A" true? If B is not a part of A, then there must be an object that is part of B and that is not part of A. So a truthmaker of "B is not a part of A" is any object that is part of B and not part of A. It follows that B has at least two strict parts, namely A and the aforementioned truthmaker of "B is not a part of A".

Sums of Things

Let's talk about sums of things. Or more specifically, let's talk about their ontology. There are three options with respect to the ontological status of sums. First, one may say that sums do not exist. There are no sums. There is no such thing as the sum of A, B and C. What exists is just A, B and C separately. Nothing more and nothing less. Alternatively one may hold that the sum of A, B and C does exist but is nothing more than A, B and C taken together. The sum of A, B and C is nothing over and beyond A, B and C considered as a whole. The sum is identical to these three objects counted as one. Finally, one may hold that the sum is more than just A, B and C taken together. But what does this surplus, this "more", consist in? It's the togetherness hypostatized. It's the act of taking them together that has ontological import.

The chair-cabinet

Consider a room that contains a chair, an empty table and an empty cabinet. Suppose that this list of things offers a complete description of what there is to be seen in the room. Imagine that you enter it. You look around and you see nothing more but those three things. Would it be possible for you to create a new material object in this room merely by looking around and using language? Such a verbal creatio ex nihilo obviously seems metaphysically impossible. Nevertheless, look intensively at the chair and the cabinet at the same time. Focus your attention on them as being together. While doing so introduce the word 'chair-cabinet' and fix it's reference by declaring that it refers to the chair and cabinet together. After this act of naming the context has changed. For it seems not unreasonable anymore to hold that the room now also contains a chair-cabinet that has the chair and the cabinet as its material parts. Here we have an example of an act that perhaps resembles to at least some extent an act of verbally creating something out of nothing.