Material objects persist through time and survive change. How do they
manage to do so? What are the underlying facts of persistence? Do
objects persist by being "wholly present" at all moments of time at
which they exist? Or do they persist by having distinct "temporal
segments" confined to the corresponding times? Are objects
three-dimensional entities extended in space, but not in time? Or are
they four-dimensional spacetime "worms"? These are matters of intense
debate, which is now driven by concerns about two major issues in
fundamental ontology: parthood and location. It is in this context
that broadly empirical considerations are increasingly brought to bear
on the debate about persistence. Persistence and Spacetime pursues
this empirically based approach to the questions. Yuri Balashov begins
by setting out major rival views of persistence -- endurance,
perdurance, and exdurance -- in a spacetime framework and proceeds to
investigate the implications of Einstein's theory of relativity for
the debate about persistence. His overall conclusion -- that
relativistic considerations favour four-dimensionalism over
three-dimensionalism -- is hardly surprising. It is, however, anything
but trivial. Contrary to a common misconception, there is no
straightforward argument from relativity to four-dimensionalism. The
issues involved are complex, and the debate is closely entangled with
a number of other philosophical disputes, including those about the
nature and ontology of time, parts and wholes, material constitution,
causation and properties, and vagueness.
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Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9780191614743
Publisert
2020
Utgiver
Oxford University Press Academic UK
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter