The Fragmentation of Being

Here is one place where considerations of how things persist, and specifically how
personspersist, come into play. Let me say at the outset that it is compatible with the
doctrine of temporal parts that persons are fully real. But the doctrine of temporal
parts does undercut one way of establishing that persons are fully real. On the
strongest version of the doctrine of temporal parts, a persisting thing has a temporal
part corresponding to every sub-interval of the interval of time across which that
entity persists. On the weakest version of the doctrine of temporal parts, the
possession of temporal parts coincides with the possession of changing intrinsic
properties: in effect, an entity has distinct temporal parts only to the extent that its
possession of them suffices to avoid the problem of temporary intrinsics. Consider a
world that consists of a persisting spherical ball that changes from blue to red.
Suppose the ball is blue for one hour before the change begins, and suppose that
the change is instantaneous and that the ball is red for one hour afterwards. On this
weaker version of the doctrine of temporal parts, the persisting ball is composed of
two temporally smaller entities: a persisting temporal part that is blue and a persist-
ing temporal part that is red. The persisting ball has no temporally smaller temporal
parts than these two. And there are many intermediate versions of the doctrine of
temporal parts that are worth considering.
But, on any version, the doctrine of temporal parts raises trouble for the argument
from the naturalness of qualia to the fundamentality of persons. Qualia are supposed
to be intrinsic properties, and moreover, they are temporary properties: that quali-
tative chocolatey taste disappears so quickly, which is why I must eat chocolate chip
cookie after chocolate chip cookie. On even the weakest version of the doctrine of
temporal parts, I have distinct temporal parts corresponding to each distinct episode
of chocolatey enjoyment. Moreover, it is these temporal parts that are the bearers of
the qualia: a persisting thing can be said to have the qualiaat a timejust in case it has
a temporal part that is located at that time and has that qualia period. Now it is true
that temporal parts theorists do not accept in full generality the claim that an object is
F at timetjust in case it has a temporal part that is located attwhich is F. But the
exceptions to this principle are, in general, extrinsic properties. With respect to
temporary intrinsic properties like shapes or qualia, the principle holds.
So, if four-dimensionalism is true, at best considerations from qualia support that
persons have some fundamental person-like temporal parts, but not that persons are
fully real. I suppose that, if one such person-like temporal part were to exist without
being part of a larger person, thenitwould count as a person. However, such an
occurrence is at most merely possible. But perhaps the qualia argument can promise
the possibility of fully real people, albeit very short-lived ones.
Perhaps there are qualia that last long enough that they can be attributed to whole
persisting persons directly rather to any of that person’s temporal stages. Recall that
Hume’s (1958: 251–3) skepticism about our possessing an idea of a self was driven by
his inability to locate any permanent impressions that could correspond to such an
idea. One early responder to Hume was Henry Home (2000: 123–4), who argued that

 PERSONS AND VALUE