Ontological Dumpster Diving A search for a four-dimensionalist account of a person

Abstract

Throughout the literature on personal identity, the term ‘fourdimensionalism’ is poorly understood. Indeed, Mark Johnston deploys the concept of ontological trash to show that there is no feasible four-dimensionalist account of a person as an object entirely within spacetime, but he does not consider how any particular theory of spacetime or four-dimensionalism comes to bear on personhood. In this paper I will explain this line of reasoning, clarify fourdimensionalism, and show that there is a feasible account of personhood available on four-dimensionalism. In the introduction, I explain the concept of ontological trash and its threat to personhood. In the first section, I explain the concept of time dilation and use it, in conjunction with ontological trash, to prove that a person’s life does not have an unqualiοed temporal duration. In the second section, I summarise Cody Gilmore’s analysis of four-dimensionalism and explain how it comes to bear on persistence. In the third section, I sketch a new way to escape ontological trash in light of four-dimensionalism. In the fourth section, I apply this response to personhood, arguing that persons exist fully within spacetime and can withstand almost any psychological change. In the conclusion, I reflect on avenues for future research.