Non-wellfounded mereology

In philosophy, specifically metaphysics, mereology is the study of parthood relationships. In mathematics and formal logic, wellfoundedness prohibits $\cdots<x<\cdots<x<\cdots$ for any x.

Thus non-wellfounded mereology treats topologically circular, cyclical, repetitive, or other eventual self-containment.

More formally, non-wellfounded partial orders may exhibit $\cdots<x<\cdots<x<\cdots$ for some x whereas well-founded orders prohibit that.

See also

• Non-wellfounded set theory
• Aczel's anti-foundation axiom
• Peter Aczel
• Larry Moss
• John Barwise
• Aaron J Cotnoir
• Jesse Hughes
• Steve Awodey
• Dana Scott

External links

• http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nonwellfounded-set-theory/