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Single Idea 6143
[filed under theme 7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / a. Nature of events
]
Full Idea
That events endure is difficult to reconcile with the claim that, say, the American Civil War existed; for such an event seems never to have been 'wholly present' at any single time.
Gist of Idea
Prolonged events don't seem to endure or exist at any particular time
Source
Trenton Merricks (Objects and Persons [2003], §3 n14)
Book Ref
Merricks,Trenton: 'Objects and Persons' [OUP 2003], p.82
A Reaction
A nice problem example for those who, like Kim, want their ontology to include events. Personally I am happy to allow some vagueness here. The Civil War only became an 'event' on the day it finished. An event's time need not be an instant.
The
17 ideas
with the same theme
[what we should take events to consist of]:
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15832
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Events are states of affairs that occur at certain places and times
[Chisholm]
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8439
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Maybe each event has only one possible causal history
[Bennett]
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8440
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Maybe an event's time of occurrence is essential to it
[Bennett]
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7771
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We need 'events' to explain adverbs, which are adjectival predicates of events
[Davidson, by Lycan]
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8860
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Language-learning is not good enough evidence for the existence of events
[Yablo on Davidson]
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17520
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Events do not have natural boundaries, and we have to set them
[Ayers]
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15561
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The events that suit semantics may not be the events that suit causation
[Lewis]
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15565
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Events have inbuilt essences, as necessary conditions for their occurrence
[Lewis]
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15566
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Events are classes, and so there is a mereology of their parts
[Lewis]
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15567
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Some events involve no change; they must, because causal histories involve unchanges
[Lewis]
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3310
|
If slowness is a property of walking rather than the walker, we must allow that events exist
[Benardete,JA]
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8270
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Events are changes or non-changes in properties and relations of persisting objects
[Lowe]
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4219
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Numerically distinct events of the same kind (like two battles) can coincide in space and time
[Lowe]
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8973
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Einstein's relativity brought events into ontology, as the terms of a simultaneity relationships
[Simons]
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6143
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Prolonged events don't seem to endure or exist at any particular time
[Merricks]
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12840
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I do not think there is a general identity condition for events
[Simons]
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14541
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Events are essentially changes; property exemplifications are just states of affairs
[Mumford/Anjum]
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