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12298
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Genuine motion, rather than variation of position, requires the 'entire presence' of the object [Fine,K]
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Full Idea:
In order to have genuine motion, rather than mere variation in position, it is necessary that the object should be 'entirely present' at each moment of the change. Thus without entire presence, or existence, genuine motion will not be possible.
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From:
Kit Fine (In Defence of Three-Dimensionalism [2006], p.6)
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A reaction:
See Idea 4786 for a rival view of motion. Of course, who says we have to have Kit Fine's 'genuine' motion, if some sort of ersatz motion still gets you to work in the morning?
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12296
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4-D says things are stretched in space and in time, and not entire at a time or at a location [Fine,K]
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Full Idea:
Four-dimensionalists have thought that a material thing is as equally 'stretched out' in time as it is in space, and that there is no special way in which it is entirely present at a moment rather than at a position.
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From:
Kit Fine (In Defence of Three-Dimensionalism [2006], p.1)
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A reaction:
Compare his definition of 3-D in Idea 12295. The 4-D is contrary to our normal way of thinking. Since I don't think the future exists, I presume that if I am a 4-D object then I have to say that I don't yet exist, and I disapprove of such talk.
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18882
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You can ask when the wedding was, but not (usually) when the bride was [Fine,K, by Simons]
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Full Idea:
Fine says it is acceptable to ask when a wedding was and where it was, and it is acceptable to ask or state where the bride was (at a certain time), but not when she was.
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From:
report of Kit Fine (In Defence of Three-Dimensionalism [2006], p.18) by Peter Simons - Modes of Extension: comment on Fine p.18
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A reaction:
This is aimed at three-dimensionalists who seem to think that a bride is a prolonged event, just as a wedding is. Fine is, interestingly, invoking ordinary language. When did the wedding start and end? When was the bride's birth and death?
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12297
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Three-dimensionalist can accept temporal parts, as things enduring only for an instant [Fine,K]
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Full Idea:
Even if one is a three-dimensionalist, one might affirm the existence of temporal parts, on the grounds that everything merely endures for an instant.
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From:
Kit Fine (In Defence of Three-Dimensionalism [2006], p.2)
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A reaction:
This seems an important point, as belief in temporal parts is normally equated with four-dimensionalism (see Idea 12296). The idea is that a thing might be 'entirely present' at each instant, only to be replaced by a simulacrum.
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19378
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Early modern possibility is what occurs sometime; for Leibniz, it is what is not contradictory [Arthur,R]
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Full Idea:
For Descartes, Hobbes and Spinoza, if a state of things is possible, it must occur at some time, whether past, present or future. For Leibniz possibility makes no reference to time; an individual is possible if its concept contains no contradiction.
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From:
Richard T.W. Arthur (Leibniz [2014], 4 'Contingent')
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A reaction:
It has always struck me as fallacious to say that anything that is possible must at some time occur. If '6' is possible on the die, what will constrain it to eventually come up when thrown? Mere non-contradiction doesn't imply possibility either.
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11214
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We learn 'not' along with affirmation, by learning to either affirm or deny a sentence [Rumfitt]
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Full Idea:
The standard view is that affirming not-A is more complex than affirming the atomic sentence A itself, with the latter determining its sense. But we could learn 'not' directly, by learning at once how to either affirm A or reject A.
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From:
Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], IV)
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A reaction:
[compressed] This seems fairly anti-Fregean in spirit, because it looks at the psychology of how we learn 'not' as a way of clarifying what we mean by it, rather than just looking at its logical behaviour (and thus giving it a secondary role).
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