Ontological Pluralism and Time: Will Kris Mcdaniel’s “Presentist Existential Pluralism” (PEP) be a stance about the nature of Time that I can stand with? I hope so. I’m never satisfied with the options I’m presented with.
3.2 Formulating Presentist Existential Pluralism (PEP)
“PEP is a version of ontological pluralism, the doctrine that there are modes of being or different ways to exist. The particular version of PEP that I will focus on agrees with the neo-Quinean orthodoxy that there is a deep connection between quantification and
existence: since there are fundamentally different ways to exist, there are corresponding to them metaphysically important quantifiers. The different modes of existence correspond to different highly natural quantifier expressions.
Interestingly, many participants in the current debate between the growing block theory, presentism, and eternalism appeal to logical joints in order to ensure that their debate is substantial. Metaphysicians purport to substantially dispute with each other over the nature of reality, but perhaps the disputes in the philosophy of time are merely apparent disputes. The presentist grants that, although there are no dinosaurs, there were dinosaurs, and although there are no manned moon bases, there will be. The eternalist claims that, tenselessly speaking, there are all of these things “