ABSTRACT
The two-truths theory of Buddhist Reductionism leads to what can be called a dualist semantics: two distinct languages, with one containing terms for partite entities, the other containing only terms for their impartite constituents. Suppose that both the chariot and its parts are real in the same sense, that it may be said of both with the same ontological seriousness that they exist. Then like any other existents, they must be either identical or distinct. Either the chariot is identical with the parts when suitably arranged, or else the assembly of the parts into this arrangement results in a new entity that simultaneously exists as long as they are so arranged. What the neither-identical-nor-distinct argument suggests is that people take there to be such ordinary objects as chariots and baseballs only because people have forgotten that terms like 'chariot' and 'baseball' were introduced as collective terms serving as shorthand ways of referring to commonly occurring assemblages.
