>[!abstract] >Various ancient philosophers, including Aristotle, pointed out that statues seem to differ in important respects from the portions of matter from which they are made. Suppose that, on Monday, a sculptor purchases an unformed lump of clay, which he names ‘Lump’. Suppose further that, on Tuesday, the artist sculpts the clay into the form of the biblical king David and names his statue ‘David’. It is tempting to say that, in this case, there is only one object in the sculptor’s hands—David just is Lump. But, on reflection, this identification is problematic, since Lump and David seem to differ in many respects. For example, Lump existed on Monday, whereas David did not. Moreover, Lump could survive being squashed tomorrow, whereas David could not. However, this would imply that Lump and David and numerically distinct entities, since Leibniz’s Law tells us that numerical identity requires qualitative sameness. The upshot is that it is possible for two material objects to exist in the same place at the same time. ("Material constitution", 2025). ## References - Material constitution. (2025, January 31). In *Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy*. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/material-constitution/ ## Related to - [[Material constitution]]