O.K., Pat H, thanks for the explanation below of your terminology. You
propose to call the 3D view '3.1D view', but I think there would be fewer
misunderstandings if it was called the the '4.1D view'. As far as I can
see, it is four-dimensionalism with continuants. But, for heaven's sake,
let us not start a discussion about this. (01)
Ingvar (02)
>
> On Aug 12, 2009, at 4:37 AM, ingvar_johansson wrote:
>
>> Dear Pat H,
>>
>> You wrote to Chris P:
>>
>>> Of course I do not deny that. I was assuming a distinction between
>>> 3-D-
>>> ism and presentism, which you apparently conflate, but that is just a
>>> matter of terminology.
>>
>> Can you please tell how you define '3-D-ism' and 'presentism',
>> respectively.
>>
>
> Sorry. Presentism is the view that only the present is real, so that
> when we say 'exists' we mean, exists *now*. Tenses are used to refer
> to the past and future, which are therefore thought of as 'alternative
> worlds'. (To a strict presentist, in fact, these are in a sense
> imaginary worlds.) But worlds, in this view, are inherently 3- rather
> then 4-dimensional. When formalized, of course, this yields axioms
> which change as time passes, a phenomenon which the presentist regards
> as natural and even inevitable, on the grounds that time *is* change.
> Much of ordinary language seems to presume a presentist conceptual
> framework: we informally say things like 'Julius Caesar is no more' ,
> meaning he does not exist *in the present*, and of course we use
> tenses in the same way. The presentist of course sees the world as
> being 3-dimensional, and typically mentions time, if at all, only
> indirectly.
>
> What I was calling 3D in these discussions, but perhaps should have
> been calling 3.1D, is a view that accepts the idea of time as
> extended, and the need to refer to things in the past and the future,
> but resists the idea that 'solid' things like people and objects are
> truly 4-dimensional. It retains the 'presentist' view that a human
> being, for example, is truly a 3-dimensional entity (the relevant
> mantra is that all its parts are present whenever it is present, ie it
> has no temporal parts, such as a childhood in the case of a person)
> but asserts that this 3D thing 'continues' through time, hence the use
> of the word "continuant". Note, this does not mean that it is
> *extended* in time. There are things which extend in time, on this
> ontological view, but they are inherently different from continuants,
> more event-like, and are called occurrents. The occurrent/continuant
> dichotomy is fundamental to these ontologies and colors their entire
> approach: different ways of talking have to be used to refer to them,
> and their relationships are carefully delineated. In contrast, what
> are called 4D ontologies treat all physical things as occupying some
> piece of space/time and (in the case of extensionalist versions, as
> used by Chris and Matthew and indeed by me) individuated by their
> spatiotemporal locations. Proponents of the 3.1D style of description
> tend to characterize 4D ontologies by saying that they treat all
> things as occurrents, which is kind of true but ontologically
> misleading. It would be better to say that they deny the distinction
> in the first place.
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> Pat
>
>
>
>> Ingvar J
>>
>>
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