Reading: Finish the McTaggart

chapter for next time.

 ‘Water’ is a rigid designator
• ‘Water’ functions like a name for this kind
of stuff.
• It is not short for some description like,
‘the colorless, tasteless liquid that we
drink, etc.’
 The Necessity of “Water is
H2O”
• (1) This stuff is water
• (2) This stuff is H2O
• (3) Therefore, water is H2O

• Here, (1) is true in virtue of the way we

use the word ‘water,’ so necessary
• (2) is an empirical discovery, but
necessary because it reveals the nature
of the stuff in question.
 Could water have been XYZ?
• We can imagine a world in which there is
another substance that looks and tastes
like water, but that is not H2O.
• But that is not a world in which this very
stuff is not H2O.
• Compare: there is no possible way that
this very podium could have been
made of plastic.
“Water could have turned out not to
be H2O”
• This is true only in an epistemic sense:
at one time it could have been said:
“maybe water isn’t H2O.”
• But given that it is H2O, it is necessarily
H2O.
– Compare mathematical propositions the truth
of which we are unaware.
 Pegasus: Back to the Drawing
Board
• Problem of how there can be meaningful
proper names that do not denote anything
returns if Kripke is right.
 Time and Change
• Parmenides vs. Heraclitus:
• P: How could what is perish? How could
it have come to be? For if it came into
being, it is not; nor is it if ever it is going
to be. Thus coming into being is
extinguished, and destruction unknown.
• H: One cannot step into the same river
twice.
 McTaggart on Time
• Our concept of time involves both
Parmenidean and Heraclitean elements,
to the point of inconsistency.
• Time is “unreal” in the sense that our
concept does not fit anything in reality.
 The A and the B
• Two kinds of temporal concepts,
properties and relations:
• A-concepts: those involving the notions
of past, present, and future, and
references dependent on these ideas.
• B-concepts: those of earlier than and
later than, objective temporal references
such as May 15, 2007
 Egocentric/Allocentric
• Compare: conceiving of space in
egocentric terms: in front of me, behind
me, above me, to my left, to my right, etc.
vs.
• Allocentric terms: latitude and longitude,
obejctive spatial references such as “100
miles north of London.”
 The Overall Argument
• (1) Time requires change
• (2) Change can only be expressed or
described using A -concepts.
• (3) The A - concepts are contradictory.
• (4) Therefore, time is unreal.
 (1) Time requires change
• Time is the measure of change, or the
field in which change occurs.
(2) Change can only be expressed
in A-terms. 262-3
• No change is discernible in purely B-
terms.
• B- properties and relations are timeless
and eternal.
• “The Civil War IS earlier than the Great
Depression.”
– This is an eternal, unchanging fact.
A B-characterization of change?
• Russell’s suggestion 263-4:
• A particular x changes if and only if:
For some property F, and times t1 and
t2:
x IS F at t1, and x IS not F at t2.
With no restrictions on F, this leads to
some funny changes, but maybe that’s
OK.
Not Good Enough

• McT: this is not adequate for change.

• ‘x IS F at t1’ and ‘x is not F at t2’ are both
eternal facts. There is no change here at
all. 264
– No more than an object having one property
at a spatial point, and another property at
another spatial point.
– Reminiscent of Zeno’s paradoxes of motion.
 A- change

• All change takes the form of an event in

the future becoming present and then
receding into the past.
• The argument if correct shows that such
flow is an essential aspect of time.
 (3) The A – concepts are
contradictory
• The notions of past, present, and future
are incompatible. (obvious)
• BUT
• Every event has all three properties ??
(very NOT obvious and needs to be
shown)
 Reality must have a single
complete description
• McT’s commitment to this Parmenidean
idea explains his unwillingness to allow
unreduced A-descriptions.
• Any description of temporal reality that
uses A-descriptions is only partial in the
sense that it leaves out certain facts.
– Those A-facts accessible only from other
positions in time
 What about Space?
• Is that unreal too?
– Recall that there is an egocentric/allocentric
distinction that can be drawn for space.
– And egocentric descriptions from different
points of view cannot be combined.
• No, because we can give a complete
description of a space by simply leaving
out the egocentric facts entirely.
– There is no analogue for space of the first
part of McT’s argument.
 Time’s Epitaph
• A complete description of temporal reality
must include facts stateable only in A-
terms
– To account for change, which is essential to
the reality of time.
• But a complete description of temporal
reality cannot include facts stateable only
in A-terms.
– Because such facts are inherently partial and
perspectival.
 Presentism
• McT’s argument assumes that we have to
defend the reality of the past and the
future as well as the present.
• Suppose we say that the past and the
future do not exist.
• Reality = the present.
 Prior’s Idea
• We don’t believe that reality includes the
existent (GWBush) and also the non-
existent (Pegasus).
• We don’t believe that reality includes the
existent and the “believed by little
Sally to exist” (Santa Claus).
• ?We don’t believe that reality includes the
actual (HRClinton) and the merely
possible (HRC’s first-born son). . . .
 No past, no future
• . . . so we shouldn’t believe that reality
includes in addition to the present things
(GWBush), the past things (A. Lincoln)
or the future things (the first person born
next year).
• Tense—presence--is fundamental to time.
• Reality is completely described by listing
all the truths from the present point of
view.
 What about facts about the past?
• It’s a fact that Abe Lincoln was president
of the US.
– This doesn’t seem to be a fact about the
present.
– The trick is to understand this fact as not
entailing the existence of AL.
• Compare: how do we express the facts
about Pegasus and Santa Claus?
 Intensional Contexts
• According to the myth (Pegasus was a
winged horse.)
• Little Sally believes that (Santa Claus
brings presents to all good children.)
• It is possible that (the Clintons’ son is
Chelsea’s older brother.)
 Existential Generalization fails in
some contexts
• Usually, from “a is F” it follows that “There
exists an x s.t. x is F.”
• But from: “Sally believes that Santa Claus
is coming tonight,” it does not follow that
“There exists an x s.t. Sally believes x is
coming tonight.”
Tense is another kind of intensional
context
• Prior’s idea is that statements about the
past and future should be treated like
myth and belief statements.
• “Abe Lincoln was president in 1863” =
• It was the case that (Abe Lincoln is
president in 1863.)
– This does not entail that anyone exists and
has the property of being president in 1863.
 Tense is fundamental
• There are no tenseless verbs.
– Temporal reality is essentially and irreducibly
tensed.
• B-relations are derivative from the notions
of past, present, and future:
• “The CW was earlier than WW1” =
• (something like) WAS[WAS(CW is
occurring) & WWI is occurring]
 Change in Presentism
• Events do not change, only things
change.
• There is no temporal becoming in McT’s
sense.
• Change in an object: “[It was the case
(that the poker is hot)] and [the poker is
cool].”
 Presentism and Physics
• Presentism requires that “the present” be
a well-defined notion from a metaphysical
point of view.
• This seems to contradict modern physical
theories, especially Special Relativity.
– In these theories time and space must be
treated as an integrated whole.
– One result: which events are simultaneous
depends on the frame of reference.
 Space-time
• A single 4-dimensional manifold.
– Strictly, you cannot factor it into 3 dimensions
of space and 1 dimension of time. But we will
oversimplify here.
• Finish Intro to Part VI, and read Lewis’s
“Counterparts or Double Lives,” from
bottom of 197 to break on 200.
 Smart’s 4-dimensionalism
• Smart offers a package consisting of:
– (1) “B-theory” of space-time:
• temporal ordering of events by “earlier than” is
basic; “A-” or tensed features not intrinsic to time.
– (2) A revised theory of objects:
• as “space-time worms” having both temporal and
spatial parts.
– Smart makes this looks like a package deal,
but in fact (1) does not entail (2): it is possible
to endorse (1) without accepting (2)
 Smart’s 4-D Theory
• B-relations of earlier than, later than,
simultaneous with, are fundamental.
• A-concepts are “anthropocentric,” don’t
belong in an intrinsic description of space-
time. 295
– We use only tenseless verbs in describing it.
 Change in 4-D
• “We replace the notions of change and
staying the same with the notions of
similarity and dissimilarity of time-slices of
four-dimensional solids” 296
• Alternatively, one might say that change
just consists in such similarity or
dissimilarity.
 From Russell to Smart/Lewis
• Alf IS round at t1 and Alf IS not round at t2
• Modify this as follows:
• The temporal part (“slice”) of Alf that
EXISTS at t1 IS round and
the temporal part of Alf that EXISTS at t2
IS not round.
 Tense is anthropocentric
• This is Smart’s gloss on the “indexicality”
of the notions of past, present, and future.
– They are descriptions that make implicit
reference to a perspective or point of view on
temporal reality.
– They do not describe time as it is in itself,
only how it appears to an observer located at
a point within it.
• As though s/he were the center of the temporal
world.
 Token-reflexivity
• “All the jobs that can be done by tenses
can be done by means of the tenseless
way of talking and the self-referential
utterance, ‘this utterance.’” 296
• “Smith ran a mile” = “Smith RUNS a mile
earlier than this utterance.”
• “Smith will cook dinner” = “Smith COOKS
dinner later than this utterance.”
 The main “job” of tenses
• Tensed talk and thought cannot be
dispensed with: they are crucial in
explaining human actions.
• The difference between
– “The meeting STARTS at noon on March 3,
2008”
– “The meeting is starting now.”
• His knowledge of the latter will explain why Smith
gets up and goes to the conference room.
 Science needs tense, too
• Tensed talk cannot be completely
dispensed with in a scientific account of
reality.
– It’s crucial to explaining human actions, and
humans and their actions are part of reality,
too.
 Determinism?
• All talk of the “flow” of time or temporal
“becoming” is mistaken, according to S.
• The future is “there” in some sense.
• Smart thinks this does not entail
determinism. 302
– It certainly does not entail causal determinism
– It does not entail that the future exists now.
 Persistence in Time
• Things persist in time: they exist at many
different times.
• Two different ways of persisting:
• (1) A thing may endure: it is wholly
present at each moment it exists.
• (2) A thing may perdure: it has temporal
parts, and only a part of it exists at each
time.
 Common sense vs. Lewis
• Common sense says that material objects
persist by enduring, events persist by
perduring.
• Lewis argues that the idea that objects
endure leads to contradiction.
– Specifically, the endurantist account of
change is contradictory.
Remember this picture?
Start reading Parfit’s
“Personal Identity”
 Lewis says “Yes.”
The Simple Arg from Leibniz’s Law
• The picture represents the following:
• O at t1 is F
• O at t2 is not-F
• O at t1 = O at t2.
• Taken together, these three statements
contradict Leibniz’s Law.
• Hence, the endurantist account of change
must be rejected.
 The Perdurantist Account of
Change:
• O at t1 (e.g., Bush in 2008) and O at t2
(e.g., Bush in 2010) are not identical.
– They are two distinct temporal parts of the
overall object O.
– “Change” is just dissimilarity of temporal
parts.
The Simple Arg from Leibniz’s Law:
Endurantist Response
• We should not accept that the basic kinds
of things are things like ‘O at t1.’
• Endurantists would say we should put it:
– O is F at t1
– O is not F at t2.
– Now Leibniz’s Law cannot be used to get a
contradiction.
 Lewis again:
• This must mean:
– O is (F at t1)
– O is not (F at t2)
• So all properties become relational
properties.
– This is in conflict with the intuition that some
properties are intrinsic.
• But how serious is this objection?
 Endurantist response to the Arg
from Loss of Parts
• We should give up (III) and allow that two
things can occupy the same space at a
time: An object and the matter that
constitutes that object.
• The Mistake is to say that Descartes after
the change = Descartes-Minus after the
change.
– Descartes is a person, Descartes-Minus is
not.
 You are not this matter.
• A living thing is constantly changing its
matter – this is an essential aspect of life.
• You will be sitting in this chair next week,
but this matter will not be sitting here next
week, so these things are not identical.
• Next week you will be constituted by a
slightly different chunk of matter.
 You can step into the same river
twice
• Heraclitus confused the river with the
water that constitutes the river at a
given moment.
• Reality comes in layers: different kinds of
particulars occupy different levels of
organization.
 Animal Persistence
• What makes it true that this giant oak in
the yard = the little sapling I planted as a
boy?
– Not that it is made of the same matter
– The identity is true in virtue of the continuity of
the life processes characteristic of this
species of plant.
– Same for animals
 Personal Persistence
• What makes it true that I am the same
person who gave an apple to Mrs.
Goodnow in the third grade?
– Continuity of life processes? Locke thought
not.
– That’s what makes me the same human
being, but Locke thought there is a difference
between the concept human being and the
concept person.
 Locke on Persons
• A person is a self-conscious being, it can
think of itself under the concept ‘I’, and is
conscious of its existence at various
times.
• It retains in autobiographical memory
knowledge of itself at earlier times. It
forms intentions to act at later times, and
carries out these intentions.
• “Person” is a forensic concept.
 Body-Switching
• It is possible for a king and a cobbler to
switch bodies – in that the person in the
king’s body “has the cobbler’s memories”
and vice versa.
– We would then have: Y at t2 is the same
person as X at t1 even though the biological
processes underlying this person are
discontinuous
– Cases of multiple personality disorder could
be used to make a similar point.
 The Lockean Account of Personal
Identity

• X at t1 is the same person as Y at t2 iff:

Y remembers doing what X did, Y
remembers feeling what X felt, Y carries
out the intentions formed by X, and in
general, Y is (more or less)
psychologically continuous with X.
 The Demise of the Lockean
Account of Personal Identity
• Suppose the brain of X is removed, and
the right half implanted in one body and
the left half in another body.
• This results in two distinct persons, Y
and Z.
• Suppose that both of them claim to
remember doing what X did, feeling what
X felt, etc.
The Double Half-Brain Transplant
 Contradiction!
• By the Lockean Criterion, it would follow
that X = Y and X = Z. But this cannot be
right, because it would then follow that
Y = Z, which we know is not true.
• Thus this case shows that the Lockean
criterion is not true in general.
 Back to the Drawing Board?
• Parfit accepts that the Double Half-Brain
Transplant case refutes the Lockean
Criterion.
• Should we try to formulate a new criterion
of personal identity?
– Parfit thinks NOT: this case gives us
everything we could or should want in a
criterion of persistence or “survival.”
 Survival
• If you were X and your brain was
transplanted into a single other body, you
would consider yourself as having
survived. (assume for sake of arg).
• So we should say the same about the
double transplant case.
– How can a double success be a failure? 375
 What Matters in Survival
• . .. . is psychological continuity. Locke
was right that this is what we care about
when interested in forensic questions or
prudential questions about our future, etc.
380
• P: The only mistake Locke made was to
think that where there is psych. cont. there
is identity.
– This is usually true, but not always.
 Personal Survival
• This concept should replace the concept
of personal identity in our thinking.
• X at t1 survives as Y at t2 iff (1st try)
– Y remembers doing what X did, Y remembers
feeling what X felt, Y carries out the intentions
formed by X, and in general, Y is (more or
less) psychologically continuous with X.
Survival does not entail identity
• It is possible to survive as two or more
people. In such a case, one would not be
identical to either one.
– If I survive as someone, then I do not die.
– This is all I should care about, all that
should matter to me. I should not care if I
will not be identical to any person alive at
some future date.
 A Problem for Parfit
• Survival must be defined in a way that
does not presuppose identity.
– But the definition includes clauses like: “Y
remembers doing and feeling what X did and
felt.”
– This presupposes identity:
• Autobiographical memory is by definition,
memory of what you yourself did. 382
 Q(uasi)-Memory (382)
• Y q-remembers an experience iff
– (1) Y is in a state that seems to him like a
memory (2) someone did have such an
experience and (3) Y’s mental state is
causally dependent on that person’s
experience in the way characteristic of
memory.
– If the ‘someone’ in (2) is Y himself, then the q-
memory is also a memory.
Definition of Survival Re-stated
• X at t1 survives as Y at t2 iff
– Y q-remembers doing what X did, Y q-
remembers feeling what X felt, Y carries out
the q-intentions formed by X, and in
general, Y is (more or less) psychologically
continuous with X.
– This assumes X’s feelings, perceptions, and
intentions have no true first-person element.
 The Double Half-Brain Transplant
Again
• It was said that Y and Z have X’s
memories. But this is not true. Each of
them have a bunch of illusory or false
memories.
• Are you still sure that “survival” in Parfit’s
sense is all you care about?
 Memory and Q-memory
• Parfit holds that regular memories are just
Q-memories where the person in question
happens to be me.
• Supposedly, “it cannot be a part of what I
seem to remember about this experience
that I, the person who now seems to
remember it, am the person who had the
experience.” 382
 Parfit on ‘I’
• Parfit seems to assume a descriptive
account of the reference of ‘I’:
– ‘I’ means: “the person who is having this
thought (memory, experience, etc.)”
– When I remember taking Susie to the prom,
strictly speaking, all I remember is: the guy
in this memory took Susie to the prom.”
– I assume: the person having this memory =
the person represented in the memory.
 Lots of Problems Here!
• Kripkean objections: the modal behavior
of ‘I’ is different from any definite
description.
• Psychological objections: there is much
evidence that a genuine first-person
concept is precisely what is involved in
memory and other forms of thought.
 More problems
• How do I know that the person thinking
this thought is identical to the person
thinking this other thought?
• A very bad regress ensues.
 Back to Locke
• Recall that the concept of a person is the
concept of a self-conscious being: i.e., a
being that can think ‘I’ thoughts.
• And ‘I’ thoughts span time in a very
special way, via memory and intention.
• On Parfit’s view this isn’t really true: the ‘I’
is not represented as a persisting entity,
but a momentary or transitory one.
 A-theory vs. B-theory again
• The egocentric/allocentric distinction can
be drawn for each of space, time, and
personhood:
• I, here, and now form the axes of one’s
egocentric system of thought
• B-theories of space and time maintain that
the egocentric spatial and temporal
notions are not fundamental to space or
time.
 Parfit’s “B-theory” of personhood
• Parfit is proposing to leave out the ‘I’ when
giving a metaphysical account of
personhood.
– But this is just a mistake: How a person
appears to himself is a crucial part of what a
person is.
– A metaphysical account of the “self’ cannot
dismiss as “subjective” or unimportant the
self’s representations of itself.