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Single Idea 16213

[filed under theme 9. Objects / E. Objects over Time / 5. Temporal Parts ]

Full Idea

I claim that there are relations between the distinct stages of a persisting object which are not determined by the intrinsic properties of those stages. …The later stages depend, counterfactually and causally, upon the earlier stages.

Gist of Idea

Stages of one thing are related by extrinsic counterfactual and causal relations

Source

Katherine Hawley (How Things Persist [2001], 3.5)

Book Ref

Hawley,Katherine: 'How Things Persist' [OUP 2004], p.85


A Reaction

This is the heart of her theory. How can there be a causal link between two stages which is not the result of intrinsic properties of the stages? This begins to sound like Malebranche's Occasionalism.


The 21 ideas with the same theme [things have parts in time, as they do in space]:

Temporal parts is a crazy doctrine, because it entails constantly creating stuff ex nihilo [Thomson, by Koslicki]
How can point-duration slices of people have beliefs or desires? [Thomson]
You can't have the concept of a 'stage' if you lack the concept of an object [Ayers]
Temporal 'parts' cannot be separated or rearranged [Ayers]
Stage theorists accept four-dimensionalism, but call each stage a whole object [Noonan]
Three-dimensionalist can accept temporal parts, as things enduring only for an instant [Fine,K]
Even a three-dimensionalist might identify temporal parts, in their thinking [Fine,K]
Temporal parts exist, but are not prior building blocks for objects [Sider]
Temporal parts are instantaneous [Sider]
How can an instantaneous stage believe anything, if beliefs take time? [Sider]
Four-dimensionalism says temporal parts are caused (through laws of motion) by previous temporal parts [Sider]
Stage Theory seems to miss out the link between stages of the same object [Hawley]
Stage Theory says every stage is a distinct object, which gives too many objects [Hawley]
The stages of Stage Theory seem too thin to populate the world, or to be referred to [Hawley]
Stages must be as fine-grained in length as change itself, so any change is a new stage [Hawley]
An isolated stage can't be a banana (which involves suitable relations to other stages) [Hawley]
Stages of one thing are related by extrinsic counterfactual and causal relations [Hawley]
We must explain change amongst 'momentary entities', or else the world is inexplicable [Haslanger]
If the things which exist prior to now are totally distinct, they need not have existed [Haslanger]
You believe you existed last year, but your segment doesn't, so they have different beliefs [Merricks]
Perdurantism imposes no order on temporal parts, so sequences of events are contingent [Mumford/Anjum]