1 Introduction

In many cases, death seems to be harmful to (or bad for) the person who dies. The widely discussed timing problem consists in the difficulty of finding a plausible answer to the following question: When is death harmful to the person who dies? One of the most popular answers to this question is provided by subsequentism, according to which death harms its victim after she dies. In a recent Philosophia article, John Martin Fischer proposes a solution to what according to him “is typically thought to be the major difficulty with subsequentism” (2021: 2005). Fischer describes this difficulty, which he calls the Problem of Predication, as follows:

Epicurus and his followers point out that when the person exists, death does not, and when death exists, the person does not. If we say that a person P is harmed at a particular time T (where T can be an interval), we are saying that P has the property, being harmed, at (or during) T. … So how can death be a bad thing for the individual who dies? It appears to be a harm without a subject: a harm at (or during) T without a subject existing at (or during) T. … How can an individual who does not exist during the time at which he is dead have the property “being harmed” at that time? (2021: 2004)

In particular, Fischer suggests (2021: 2006), a person who does not exist at a time cannot have any temporally intrinsic property at that time—roughly, a property such that an object’s having it at a time constitutively depends only on what happens at that time, and thus not even in part on what happens at earlier or later times. And in order for an individual to be harmed at a time, doesn’t she have to have some temporally intrinsic property at that time?

In order to solve this problem, Fischer puts forward a grounding or truthmaking approach to the time of death’s badness.Footnote 1 In this reply, we raise three concerns for Fischer’s approach. The first is a minor one that can be dealt with by a slight modification of Fischer’s approach (Sect. 3). The second concern regards a deeply puzzling feature of Fischer’s approach—one that, however, might perhaps be avoided by a further modification (Sect. 4). The third concern is that Fischer’s approach, even with these modifications, does not properly address the problem it was designed to solve (Sect. 5).

2 Fischer’s Approach

Fischer’s solution to the Problem of Predication takes its point of departure in a deprivationist account of death’s badness.Footnote 2 According to this account, Fischer explains, a person’s death harms her, or is bad for her, if and only if the following claim is true:

The Comparative Proposition: If the person’s death had not occurred, she would have had an on balance better life.

According to Fischer, the question of when death harms its victim should be understood in terms of the Comparative Proposition. However, it should not be understood as a question about the time(s) at which the proposition is true.Footnote 3 Rather, he suggests, it should be understood as a question about the time(s) at which the proposition is made true—or more exactly, about the time(s) of the events that, perhaps together with entities of other kinds, compose its truthmaker. In light of the counterfactual comparative nature of the Comparative Proposition, Fischer suggests that the truthmaker of that proposition contains not only events that occur in the actual world, but also events that occur in what he calls the hypothetical world—the closest possible world in which the person’s death does not occur. To spell out his view in more detail, Fischer considers the death of “Agent”:

Let S be the set of events in Agent’s life (interpreted broadly) that actually take place during T—the time-interval after her death in the actual world and before her death in the hypothetical world. And let S* be the set of events in Agent’s life (interpreted broadly) during T in the hypothetical world. However one wishes to analyze the normative element and the structure of the truthmaker, it will at least involve both S and S*. … My claim (at least provisionally) is that the truthmaker, whatever else it contains, includes only these events. These events constitute all the events that ground the comparative proposition about death’s badness. (2021: 2011; footnote omitted; notation slightly altered)

Fischer stresses (2021: 2011, fn. 18) that on his broad understanding of “Agent’s life,” certain events that do not require Agent to be alive when they occur—such as the death of Agent’s mother, and Agent’s work being praised—can be parts of Agent’s life.

Fischer’s motivation for excluding all events that are earlier than T from the truthmaker of the Comparative Proposition is that it is only after Agent’s death that the actual and hypothetical worlds diverge. Their histories up to T are identical; for instance, if Agent’s death had not occurred, her receipt of pleasure and pain before T would still have been the same. However, Fischer stresses—and this is what makes his suggestion “provisional”—that excluding events that are earlier than T from the truthmaker is not essential to his approach. If we take the truthmaker to include such events as well, Fischer says, we should instead identify the time of death’s badness with “the time of the ‘path-differentiating’ events in the truthmaker” (2021: 2013)—those events in the truthmaker that are later than the time at which the two worlds diverge (which, again, is the time of Agent’s death). Hence, even on this alternative view of the truthmaker, Fischer says, Agent’s death harms her only during T. We shall disregard this alternative view, as our criticism of Fischer’s “provisional” suggestion applies to it as well.

According to Fischer, then, since all relevant truthmaking events take place during T, and the time(s) at which Agent’s death is bad for her is the time(s) of the relevant truthmaking events, Agent’s death is bad for her during T. Since T is located after the time at which Agent dies, and this sort of analysis can be generalized to other deaths, it follows that subsequentism is true. This way of arriving at subsequentism, Fischer suggests, solves the Problem of Predication. He writes:

This specifies the time of the badness of death without positing, at the fundamental metaphysical level, that some individual—any individual—actually has a temporally intrinsic property at a time at which she does not exist. During the relevant time T in the actual world, certain non-Agent-involving events (and no Agent-involving events) take place. During T in the hypothetical world, both Agent-involving and non-Agent-involving events take place. We can specify all of these events (in the actual and hypothetical worlds) in terms of individuals existing during T in each world having temporally intrinsic properties during T in these worlds.Footnote 4 (2021: 2012)

In short, Fischer’s truthmaking approach allows us to claim that Agent’s death harms her during T in the actual world without taking her to have any temporally intrinsic property during T in the actual world. This is because the events in S and S* are the only ones needed to make the Comparative Proposition true, and none of these events requires the possibility of an individual’s having a temporally intrinsic property at a time without existing at that time.

3 Posthumous Events

It is surprising that Fischer excludes events happening after T from affecting the truth value of the Comparative Proposition. In several other writings (Fischer, 1997, 2006, 2020: 49–59), he has famously argued that actions like spreading malicious rumors about a person can harm her, even assuming that she does not, and indeed cannot, have any negative experiences as a result of these actions. It seems clear that Fischer also thinks that such actions can harm the person even if they cannot even make any difference to the person’s receipt of positive experiences. As is often pointed out (see, e.g., Boonin, 2019), there seems to be no good reason to restrict this sort of anti-hedonistic view to cases in which the relevant actions take place while the person is still alive. In particular, since Fischer locates the time of death’s badness after death, he cannot advocate such a restriction on the grounds that if the posthumous rumor-mongering harms the person, it would have to be harmful to her at a time at which she no longer exists. He should thus accept, it seems, that posthumous events can harm us.

Suppose, then, that in the hypothetical world someone spreads malicious rumors about Agent after her death (that is, after T). On the anti-hedonistic view just described, this harms Agent in the hypothetical world. If so, this seems clearly relevant to the truth of the Comparative Proposition. The harm to Agent in the hypothetical world affects the value that her life has for her in that world. Hence, it may also affect whether or not her life in the hypothetical world is better for her than her life in the actual world.

If we instead assume the rumor-mongering to occur after T in the actual world, rather than in the hypothetical world, the upshot is the same. If Agent is harmed by the rumors, this affects the value that her life has for her in the actual world. It may therefore also affect whether or not her life in the actual world is better for her than her life in the hypothetical world. It is thus unclear how Fischer could cogently defend the assumption that events happening after T are irrelevant to the truth of the Comparative Proposition.

This might have been a mere ad hominem argument against Fischer if he and others had provided only a poor case for the anti-hedonistic view that events that cannot make any experiential difference for a person can harm her. As we see it, however, and unfortunately for Fischer in the present context, he and others have provided a reasonably good case for that idea. Hence, it seems to be a cost for Fischer’s solution to the Problem of Predication that it conflicts with this idea.

Nevertheless, our main aim in this section is not destructive but constructive. For it seems to be possible to modify Fischer’s approach in a way that avoids the problem. He could appeal to T* = the period that starts when Agent dies in the actual world and goes on until the last time at which, in either the actual world or the hypothetical world, an event occurs that affects the value that her life has on balance for her in that world. If the posthumous rumor-mongering harms Agent in the world(s) in which it occurs, it will be included in T*. By appealing to T*, then, Fischer would avoid having to regard posthumous events as irrelevant to the truth of the Comparative Proposition. This proposal is also highly congenial to Fischer’s broad conception of “Agent’s life” (see Sect. 2). Note, moreover, that even those who deny that posthumous events can affect the value of a person’s life should accept the appeal to T*. They would simply take T* to end no later than the time at which Agent dies in the hypothetical world. Indeed, depending on the details of the case, they might take T* to be the same time interval as T.

4 Non-Occurring Events

Even with the improvement just suggested, Fischer’s approach is deeply puzzling. Again, one of its central components is the claim that the truthmaker of the Comparative Proposition includes the merely counterfactual Agent-involving events that would have taken place during T (or T*) if her death had not occurred. Surely, however, an entity has to exist in order to be part of what makes a proposition true; non-existent things cannot help to ground anything at all. On a very common and attractive view, moreover, an event has to occur in order to exist. And, clearly, the merely counterfactual events in question do not occur. They would have occurred if Agent’s death had not occurred, but they do not occur. Hence, they do not exist, and therefore do not help to make the Comparative Proposition true.Footnote 5

In response, an advocate of Fischer’s approach might point out that on a widely endorsed view, a proposition can exist without being true, and a state of affairs can exist without obtaining. Similarly, it might be suggested, an event can exist without occurring. Arguably, this response requires rejection of the attractive claim that while propositions and states of affairs are abstract entities, every event is a concrete entity. (Surely no event can be both concrete and non-occurring.) Regardless of this, however, the present response is not much help for Fischer’s approach. After all, a proposition has to be true, and a state of affairs has to obtain, in order to be part of what makes something true—merely existing is not enough. In the same way, it seems clear that an event has to occur in order to be part of what makes a proposition true. And again, the merely counterfactual events in question do not occur.

But let us once again try to be constructive. In view of the problems just identified, Fischer could abandon his idea that merely counterfactual Agent-involving events help to make the Comparative Proposition true. Instead, he might appeal to the fact that those events would have occurred if Agent’s death had not occurred. This modal fact, Fischer might suggest, does help to make the Comparative Proposition true—that is, it does help to make it true that Agent would have had an on balance better life had her death not occurred.Footnote 6 While this modal fact does not seem to obtain at any particular time, or at least not specifically during T (or T*), Fischer might argue that the appeal to it nevertheless allows him to say that Agent’s death is bad for her during T (or T*). It is enough, he might suggest, that the events that this modal fact is about would have occurred during T (or T*).

5 Addressing the Problem of Predication

Even when modified along the lines proposed in Sects. 3 and 4, Fischer’s approach does not seem to adequately handle the Problem of Predication—again, the problem of explaining how a person can be harmed at a time at which she no longer exists and thus no longer has any temporally intrinsic properties. To begin to see this, it is instructive to briefly consider two prominent other subsequentist attempts of dealing with this problem—or rather, the closely related problem of explaining how a person can be harmed at a time at which she no longer exists and thus no longer has any intrinsic properties. (The difference between these problems can be disregarded for present purposes.)

The first approach is due to Bradley (2009: 105–108). According to Bradley, the problem has a false presupposition. It is in fact plausible, he argues, that a person exemplifies various intrinsic properties at times at which she no longer exists. In particular, a dead person exemplifies the negative intrinsic properties of not being pleased and not being in pain. Assuming hedonism, Bradley claims, having those two properties at a time is sufficient for having a well-being level of zero at that time. Hence, a dead person has a well-being level of zero.

The second approach is due to Feit (2016, 2023: 189–193). Unlike Bradley, Feit grants that an individual has intrinsic properties only at times at which she exists. He argues, however, that in order to have a well-being level of zero at a time, it is sufficient to lack certain properties at that time—such as, again assuming hedonism, the properties of being pleased and being in pain. Clearly, a dead person lacks those properties. Hence, a dead person has a well-being level of zero.

Of course, neither Bradley’s nor Feit’s approach is obviously correct.Footnote 7 But the important point in this context is that each of them, if correct, seems to adequately handle the Problem of Predication. This is because each of them implies that the person’s death, in a normal case, makes her worse off at various times after it occurs than she would have been at those times if it had not occurred. Plausibly, from this implication there is only a small and unproblematic step to the claim that death harms the person after she dies. Once we have explained how a person can have a well-being level after death, then, the Problem of Predication is in effect solved.

Nothing like this, however, can be said about Fischer’s approach. When modified as suggested in Sects. 3 and 4, its central components, as applied to the case of Agent, are the following:

  1. a.

    Various facts about what does happen, and various facts about would have happened, during T*—and no facts about what does happen, or would have happened, before or after T*—make the Comparative Proposition true;

  2. b.

    (a) does not require Agent to have any temporally intrinsic property during T* in the actual world.

Both (a) and (b) are plausible. Unlike in the case of Bradley’s and Feit’s approaches, however, it is far from immediately clear how (a) and (b) are supposed to bear on the Problem of Predication—how Agent can be harmed during T* despite having no temporally intrinsic properties during T*. As far as we can see, they do have such bearing just in case (a) implies that Agent is harmed during T*. As illustrated by Bradley’s and Feit’s approaches, however, the most natural way of arriving at that implication is via the claim that Agent has a well-being level—in particular, a well-being level of zero—during T*.Footnote 8 And it seems clear that (a) does not imply the latter claim; (a) is fully compatible with the claim that Agent has no well-being level at all when she no longer exists.

Fischer might suggest that (a), despite this, simply provides a natural enough understanding of the claim that Agent’s death harms her during T*. Hence, he might say, our worries about how (a) is supposed to bear on that claim, are misguided. Clearly, for any claims c and c*, if c should be understood as c*, then c*’s bearing on c is thereby secured.

In order to test this suggestion, it will be useful to consider one of the main competitors to subsequentism. According to priorism, a person’s death harms her before it occurs. Priorists almost invariably base their view on the so-called time of desire view (see, e.g., Luper, 2009). According to the time of desire view, the satisfaction of a person’s desire, had at one time, for something to happen at some other time, intrinsically benefits her at the time of the desire. More precisely, it is when the person has the desire that she accrues the intrinsic benefit. In this way, proponents of the time of desire view argue, we respect the plausible idea that a person accrues an intrinsic benefit at a time only if something “resonates” with her then—something that the desired object evidently does while the person desires it.

Now suppose that Agent desires, before T*, to spend her vacations in Argentina during T*, and would have done so if her death had not occurred. Suppose also, for simplicity, that Agent’s death makes no other difference to the value of her life. When, if ever, does Agent’s death harm her? It seems clear that if the time of desire view is true, then this must be at the time of the desire—and hence before death, just as priorism says. After all, this is when Agent would have accrued the only intrinsic benefit of which her death deprives her. Of course, the claim that Agent’s death harms her before it occurs might be implausible. Any objection to it, however, should be directed at the time of desire view—and for all that we are saying, that view might also be implausible. The point is simply that the time of desire view, if true, unequivocally settles the issue of when Agent’s death harms her in favor of priorism. In particular, it would be completely unnatural to suggest that Agent’s death harms her after it occurs even though the only intrinsic benefit of which her death deprives her would have accrued to her before death.

Importantly, even given the time of desire view, (a) holds in this scenario. After all, the events in Agent’s life before T*, including the desire about Argentina, would have been the same had her death not occurred. While Agent’s death prevents her desire from being satisfied, it does not prevent her from having the desire. Even assuming the time of desire view, then, it is facts about what does happen, and facts about what would have happened, during T*—and not, for example, facts about what does happen, or would have happened, before T*—that make the Comparative Proposition true.Footnote 9 Hence, if (a) were a natural way of understanding the claim that Agent’s death harms her during T*, it would be natural for a proponent of the time of desire view to say that Agent’s death, in this scenario, harms her after it occurs. But again, it seems clear that it is not.

To put the point in another way, it should not be possible to block the inference from the time of desire view to the claim that Agent’s death harms her before she dies. If (a) were a natural way of understanding the claim that Agent’s death harms her during T*, however, it would be possible to block that inference. Contrary to the suggestion at hand, then, (a) is not a natural way of understanding the claim that Agent’s death harms her during T*.

Fischer might respond that (a) is a natural way for the subsequentist to understand the claim that Agent’s death harms her during T*, and that his solution to the Problem of Predication needs only this limited claim.Footnote 10 But the problem that we have already pointed out afflicts this response as well. It seems clear that if the claim that Agent’s death harms her during T* is to be understood as (a), then what subsequentism amounts to in the present case is simply the thesis that it is facts about what does happen, and facts about what would have happened, after Agent dies that make the Comparative Proposition true. Again, even advocates of the time of desire view should accept that latter thesis (and would thus count as “subsequentists” on the present proposal), and should still find it completely unnatural to say that Agent’s death, in this scenario, harms her after it occurs.Footnote 11