Aristotle’s solution to Zeno’s arrow paradox differs markedly from the so called at-at solution championed by Russell, which has become the orthodox view in contemporary philosophy. The latter supposes that motion consists in simply being at different places at different times. It can boast parsimony because it eliminates velocity from the ontology. Aristotle, by contrast, solves the paradox by denying that the flight of the arrow is composed of instants; rather, on my reading, he holds that the flight is a (...) unity which is ontologically prior to the temporal parts that may be abstracted from it. I label this position temporal holism; and an entity that is ontological prior to its temporal parts lasting. Lasting, I argue, is the key to Aristotle’s solution to the arrow paradox, but it has received insufficient attention in the relevant literature. I therefore set out here to investigate lasting and highlight its major role in Aristotle’s metaphysics more broadly, and in his solution to other problems of change. I show, too, how lasting within a contemporary context underwrites a parsimonious and intuitive solution to the arrow paradox that retains instantaneous velocity, and hence solves a problem for those who think velocity is required within the ontology to underwrite certain causal roles. (shrink)

Although Aristotle does not explicitly address persistence, his account of persisting may be derived from a careful consideration of his account of change. On my interpretation, he supposes that motions are mereological unities of their potential temporal parts – I dub such mereological unities ‘lasting’. Aristotle’s persisting things, too, are lasting, I argue. Lasting things are unlike enduring things in that they have temporal parts; and unlike perduring things in that their temporal parts are not actual, but rather are potential. (...) Lasting, that is Aristotle’s persisting, is thus a distinctive alternative to enduring and perduring. I assess this alternative showing it to be attractive. (shrink)

How can a persisting object change whilst remaining the same object? Lewis, who frames this as the problem of temporary intrinsics, presents us with the perdurance solution: objects persist by having temporal parts which may have differing properties. And in doing so he characterises the opposing view as persisting but not by having temporal parts – a view he calls endurance. But this dichotomous picture of Lewis, although now widely embraced, misses out the orthodox historic view – a view I (...) call temporal holism: objects persist by having temporal parts to which they are ontologically prior. (In the perduring solution, by contrast, the temporal parts are ontologically prior.) This paper sets out this temporal holist solution and makes clear its differences from perdurantist and endurantist solutions. Although temporal holism has a long and illustrious history, this history has not been explicitly recognised. I begin the task of recognising this history in this paper, in order to make clear the nature of temporal holism, and to show that it is a long-established, well supported and distinctive position. The paper sets out, too, how temporal holism solves other ontological problems so that, despite its current neglect, temporary holism has the potential to greatly enrich contemporary philosophical debates. (shrink)

Ancient Philosophy Today, Volume 4, Issue 1, Page 1-3, April, 2022.