Yanni Nicolaides Metaphysics 3000C Prof. George Seli 10/24/2021 Persistence and Qualitative Change “Augustus said that he had found the city of Rome of brick, and had left it of marble. … What then is this Rome, which was at one time brick, and at another time marble?” Time is a powerful subject and has always fascinated the best thinkers. We naturally think things can persist through time despite undergoing qualitative change, or a change in their properties. (Lecture 11, Slide 1). Time is the path of endless events of the past, present and future. Presenteeism is the theory that only the present exists. The time includes a series of events. There is an interesting theory about the ontology of time, and whether the past or future exists even now. Objects survive over time and undergo qualitative changes that change their properties. Persistence is defined as an act or fact of permanence. An example of changing the properties of an object is the change that everyone experiences, known as puberty. Humans begin to grow their hair, and testosterone and estrogen levels rise as they experience these abnormal physical changes. For example, after puberty, I experienced the above changes like everyone else. I'm still the same person as before puberty. I have the same name, spirit, soul, and intellect, but my body has changed. I worked hard all the while experiencing physical changes. I was the same person before puberty (time 1) and after puberty (time 2). The theoretical view of persistence and qualitative change that the object exists and sticks to the premise that I want to defend is called the standard view of persistence. This theory that an individual or an object labelled x can and may persist through times such as t1 and t2 when x at t1 is numerically similar or can be said to be the same as x at t2. It may be easy to agree with the standard view of persistence, but it involves a powerful logical problem that is too big to worry about. Assuming that an object survives qualitative changes, a logical dilemma arises. Antoine Arnault and Pierre Nicole have created the idea that objects cannot exist while they can withstand qualitative changes. Qualitative change entails that there can be no persisting things. With each change in properties, there is literally a new thing (Lecture 11, Slide 2). Qualitative changes can be extreme, as in adolescents, or small, such as when a dog gets wet. A major motivation for Arnauld and Nicole’s theory is a certain logical problem that supposedly arises if we assume that things persist through qualitative changes (Lecture 11, Slide 3). There are two principles related to logical issues. First, the law that the same distinction cannot be made. This rule shows that if one object looks like another, both objects share all the properties. All properties of X are properties of Y. The second is the principle of noncontradiction. That is, an object cannot have a property of P and cannot be P at the same time. The object cannot be inconsistent with itself. In my opinion, an object can be perverted and still be the same object. For example, I recently started to grow facial hair. I have experienced physical changes that give facial hair quality and do not lose previous properties. Growth does not have to be a physical change. As you continue to study, the growth of your mind is a constant change, which is constantly connected to the same person, being, and intellectually. As long as a person can maintain self-esteem and intellect, they can generally be considered the same before qualitative changes occur. All three theories of persistence and qualitative change do not address the potential for flaws in the standard view of persistence. There are strong logic issues and many assertions that support this issue. However, it does not outweigh the shortcomings of the other two theories, so we must accept the relevant shortcomings. The remaining two theories of persistence and qualitative change are non-persistence theory and temporal partial theory. Non-persistence theory argues that objects do not persist over time. Philosophers who agree with this idea believe that when an object undergoes a qualitative change, it becomes a new object. However, to keep this theory true, you need to enter a "time index". A time index is an assertion that time is an element built into a property. Accordingly, we time-index the contradictory properties to remove the contradiction. Time-indexed properties have time elements is built into them (Lecture 11, slide 6), The theory of the temporal part introduced by Willard Van Orman Quin and David Lewis states that things do not exist more than once as a whole . Instead, things are in temporary parts that spread over time, and at the same time are slices of a particular level or time. One of the problems of temporal partial theory is the strange conflict between the definition and persistence of an individual's object. It also maintains the idea that objects do not change at all, so it does not accurately or accurately explain qualitative changes. Rather than agreeing on the multiple complex shortcomings of the theory of non-persistence and the theory of the temporal part, I would like to agree on the simple shortcomings of the standard view of persistence. References Loux, M. J., Zimmerman, D. W., & Loux, M. J. (2003). Persistence through Time. In The Oxford Handbook of Metaphysics (pp. 134–135). essay, Oxford University Press.
