Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Constitution and Strong Coincidence

I was rereading Ryan Wasserman's 'The Standard Objection to the Standard Account' for a seminar on material constitution that I'm teaching this term. In it, Wasserman considers a number of "mereological" solutions to the "standard objection" (i.e. since Lump and David share all of their microphysical parts, there is nothing to explain their difference in kind and de re modal and temporal properties). Wasserman considers three responses to that objection: the no coincidence response (Lump and David share no parts), the weak coincidence response (Lump and David weakly coincide, which essentially boils down to the fact that all parts of Lump are parts of David but some parts of David (e.g. its arm) are not part of Lump), and the strong coincidence response (Lump and David strongly coincide share all their (material) parts at every time they both exist). While I think Wasserman's case against the first two views is strong, I'm not persuaded by his case for the third view. (In fact, I'm not even sure I understand what his proposal exactly is.)

The strong coincidence response (SCR) seems to be committed to the following claims:
  1. For any time t, if Lump and David exist at t, they wholly exist at t.
  2. For any time t, if Lump and David exist at t, they strongly materially coincide at t (i.e. every (material?) part of Lump at t is a part of David at t and every part of David at t is a (material?) part of Lump at t.)
  3. For any time t, if Lump and David exist at t, they spatially coincide at t (i.e. every spatial part of Lump at t is a part of David at t and every spatial part of David at t is a part of Lump at t.)

So, one could wonder (at least I do) how can David and Lump differ in their parts given (1)-(3)? Since I'm not quite sure I understand Wasserman's answer, I'll let him do the talking now (I only divide the different claims and label them for the sake of the discussion):

[(a)][Both the defender of the standard account and the defender of the doctrine of temporal parts] will agree that David is a temporal part of Lump during the interval from t2 [when David came into existence] to t3 [when David and Lump ceased to exist]. For David exists only during that interval, David is a part of Lump during that interval and David overlaps during that interval everything that is a part of Lump during that interval.
[(b)] Moreover, both parties will agree that David is a proper temporal part of Lump during the interval in question since David is not identical to Lump.
[(c)]The two parties will not agree on everything, of course. Most importantly, the temporal parts theorist will assert, and the proponent of the standard account will deny, that Lump has temporal parts (during the interval from t1 [when Lump came into existence] to t2) that David lacks.
[(d)] Still, given that David is a proper temporal part of Lump, there must be some sense in which these two objects differ in parts.
[(e)] Indeed there is: Lump has spatial parts during the interval from t1 to t2 that David lacks.
I find it very hard to see how (a) and (even harder) (b) can be true. In fact, I can't see any good reason for the constitutionalist qua endurantist to hold that David is a temporal part of Lump between t2 and t3 let alone a proper temporal part of it. If one believes that Lump and David wholly exist at every time at which they exist, they would seem to have to believe that, at most, David and Lump can only have improper temporal parts at every time at which they exist (At t, if Lump exists, it is its only temporal part) but I can't see any plausible way to think that one can be a proper temporal part of the other (David can be a proper temporal part of Lump only if there are temporal parts of Lump that are not temporal parts of David, but since, given (1), it would seem that neither Lump nor David has (proper) temporal parts, I can't see how the latter can be a proper temporal part of the former).

I find it even harder to see how (b) can be true given (c). If the constitutionalist qua endurantist denies that Lump has temporal parts David lacks how can the latter be a proper temporal part of the former? According to Wasserman's (e), it would seem it can be so by virtue of Lump's having spatial parts between t1 and t2 that David does not have (after all, David doesn't exist during that period!).

Okay, so, suppose that you and Wasserman are standing in front of Lump and David and you ask 'But how can Lump and David have different kind, de re temporal and de re modal properties right now even if right now they are sharing all of their parts and their only parts are parts that exist right now?' I guess Wasserman's answer would be: 'Well, they do because they did not share all of their parts yesterday when David did not exist' But, at most this can explain why bakc then it was posssible for them to have different properties but not how it's possible now when the two share all of their parts (according to (2)).

I guess I'm missing something terribly obvious. Can anyone help me see what that something is?

(Let me mention a few other things Wasserman says that I find very puzzling:

Wasserman suggests that the standard objection applies not only to constitutionalism but also to fourdimensionalism and to the view that my hand is a spatial part of myself. But how can that be the case if the standard objection is predicated on the two objects sharing all of their parts? (of course the part of me that spatially coincides with my hand shares all of the parts with my hand (it is my hand after all!) but I don't)

And even if the standard objection applies to those views as well wouldn't that be a reason for those who hold those views to worry rather than a reason for the constitutionalist to feel relieved given that there are other views (most notably, nihilism) that are immune to that objection?

Finally, Wasserman seems to assume that a difference in temporal or spatial parts can explain a difference in kind, but I don't see any good reason to think so. There seems to be plenty of objects that differ in spatial and temporal parts without differing in kind and the reason why I am a human being and my hand is not is presumably not that I don't spatially coincide with my hands (althugh presumably it is a necessary condition for my being human).)

4 comments:

  1. Hi Gabriele,

    Regarding (a), (b), and (c):

    On the Strong Coincidence View, David is a part of Lump. So, given the Sider definition of 'x is a temporal part of y at t', David is a temporal part of Lump. Given that 'x is a proper part of y' is equivalent to 'x is a part of y and ~(x = y)', it will also be true that David is a proper part of Lump. And, given that 'x is a proper temporal part of y' is equivalent to 'x is a temporal part of y and ~(x = y)', it will also be true that David is a proper temporal part of lump.

    You're right that this results in some mereological weirdness. Saying all of this requires us to reject a couple of mereological principles that seem pretty plausible:

    (A) For any x and any y, if x is a proper part of y at t, then it is not the case that y is a proper part of x at t.

    (A) comes out false on the Strong Coincidence View because David is a proper part of Lump at t2, but David is also a proper part of Lump at t2.

    (B) For any x and any y, if x is a proper part of y at t, then there is a z such that z is a proper part of y at t and ~(z is a part of x at t).

    (B) turns out false because - as you note - though David is a proper part of Lump at t2, there is no z which is a part of Lump at t2 but not a part of David at t2.

    So, given the Strong Coincidence View, it looks like we either side with the standard definition of 'x is a proper part of y' or with (A) and (B). Wasserman seems to want to do the former.

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  2. Hi Andrew,

    Thanks for your comments, but I'm afraid that they don't really address the source of my puzzlement. What I find puzzling about SCR cannot be explained by the fact that that Wasserman adopts the definition of proper temporal part he adopts. What I find puzzling is that:

    First, as you note, in adopting that notion of proper temporal part, he rejects the standard notion of proper temporal part and that the resulting non-standard notion of proper temporal part would seem to be unfit for the job he wants it to perform. In particular, Wasserman needs the resulting notion of proper temporal part to support Supplementation for his argument to go through (see (e) above). But as you note this is one of the principles (your (B)) that come out false on his notion of temporal part.

    Second, even admitting the argument goes through isn't it a reductio of SCR? Given (1) and (2), doesn't it follow that, whenever both Lump and David exist, there is no part of Lump that is not a part of David?
    Suppose that both Lump and David exist at t. From (2) it follows that all parts of Lump at t are parts of David at t and from (1) it follows that, at t, Lump has no parts (whether spatial or not) that do not exist at t. So, how can Lump have any parts that are not parts of David if David exist? And how is it that that is not a straightforward contradiction of the conclusion of the argument I quoted?

    Again, probably I'm missing something very obvious.

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  3. Hi Gabriele,

    I'm not really clear on this:

    "..in adopting that notion of proper temporal part, he rejects the standard notion of proper temporal part.."

    What is the standard notion of a proper temporal part if not a temporal part that is distinct from the thing of which it is a part?

    "In particular, Wasserman needs the resulting notion of proper temporal part to support Supplementation for his argument to go through (see (e) above). But as you note this is one of the principles (your (B)) that come out false on his notion of temporal part."

    Yeah, this seems right. I don't think that the stuff about temporal parts ends up having much to do with the response.

    The response, in the end, is just to reject the claim that, roughly, modal and temporal properties supervene on the spatial parts that an object has at a time. Wasserman notes that both the perdurantist will reject this claim, and the endurantist can do so too. Right?

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  4. Hi Andrew,

    What is the standard notion of a proper temporal part if not a temporal part that is distinct from the thing of which it is a part?

    I thought we agreed on that! It's one that, among other things, is compatible with Asymmetry (i.e.: PTPxy → ~PTPyx) and Supplementation (i.e.: PTPxy → ∃z(TPzy & ~Ozx)).

    The response, in the end, is just to reject the claim that, roughly, modal and temporal properties supervene on the spatial parts that an object has at a time. Wasserman notes that both the perdurantist will reject this claim, and the endurantist can do so too. Right?

    First, even if this was the correct interpretation of Wasserman's proposed solution, it is far from obvious that, if the perdustantist can reject the claim that de re temporal and modal properties supervene on the parts that an object has at a time, the endurantist can do so as well. The perdurantist's rejection seems to rely on the denial of the endurantist's claim that an object wholly exists at any time it exists. (It is by having temporal parts at other times that objects have de re temporal properties according to the worm theorist).

    Second, as far as I can see, Wasserman is clearly proposing something stronger (and even more puzzling) than what you suggest. For example, in the abstract, he says 'the statue and the lump differ with respect to their parts and this explains their difference with respect to de re temporal properties, de re modal properties and the like'. One of my main question is 'How can the parts that neither Lump nor Statue have (at t) explain their alleged differences (at t)'?

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