Category: Time and Change
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All is Impermanent? Impermanence and Self-Reference
I have long been fascinated by forms of philosophical refutation that exploit the overt or covert self-reference of a thesis. To warm up, consider 1. All generalizations are false. Since (1) is a generalization, (1) refers to itself. So if (1) is true, then (1) is false. On the other hand, if (1) is…
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Presentism
Franklin Mason tells me he is a presentist. I would like to see if he and I understand the same thing by the term. The rough idea, of course, is that the temporally present — the present time and its contents — alone exists. The only items (events, individuals, properties, etc.) that exist are the…
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Future Individuals and Haecceities
According to a wisecrack of Schopenhauer, the medievals employed only three examples: Socrates, Plato, and an ass. In keeping with this hoary if not 'asinine' tradition, I too in my capacity as humble footnoter to Plato shall employ Socrates as my example. To point out the obvious: he stands in for any concrete individual whatsoever, animate…
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Moral Objectivism, Mackie’s Argument from Queerness, and Alterational Change
Our old friend Vlastimil Vohanka from the Czech Republic asked me if moral objectivism is a respectable metaethical position. It depends on what exactly moral objectivism is. Let's first of all see if we can locate it on the metaethical map. Then I take a quick look at Mackie's 'argument from queerness.' Let's think about…
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A Common Misunderstanding of So-Called Cambridge Changes
There are philosophers who think that 'Cambridge' changes and real changes are mutually exclusive. Thus they think that if a change is Cambridge, then it is not real. This is a mistake. Real changes are a proper subset of Cambridge changes. Consider an example. Hillary gets wind of some tomcat behavior on the part of…
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Boethius Contra Nietzsche on Time and Transition
Like Nietzsche, "I am grieved by the transitoriness of things." (Letter to Franz Overbeck, 24 March 1887, quoted in R. Hayman, Nietzsche: A Critical Life, Penguin, 1982, p. 304) Unlike Nietzsche, Iappreciate that the Eternal Recurrence of the Same is no solution. The problem with time is not that it will end, but that its…
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A Routley/Sylvan Argument for the Utter Nonexistence of Past Individuals
Many of us are inclined to say that purely past individuals (James Dean, Scollay Square, my cat Zeno, anything that existed but does not exist now), though past, yet exist. Of course, they don't presently exist. But why should only what presently exists, exist? Why should that which loses the temporal property of presentness fall…
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A Defense of Presentism
An article by Ned Markosian.
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Presentism Between Scylla and Charybdis
What better topic of meditation for New Year's Eve than the 'passage' of time. May the Reaper grant us all another year! ………….. If presentism is to be a defensible thesis, a 'presentable' one if you will, then it must avoid both the Scylla of tautology and the Charybdis of absurdity. Having survived these hazards,…
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What Is Presentism?
What is time? Don't ask me, and I know. Ask me, and I don't know. (Augustine). The same goes, in my case at least, for presentism, as Peter Lupu made clear to me Christmas night. Don't ask me what it is, and I know. Ask me, and I don't know. The rough idea, of course, is that…
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Under the Aspect of Temporality
What doesn't matter under the aspect of eternity may well matter under the aspect of temporality. Which aspect trumps which, if either trumps either, is a problem, one more to add to the list of riddles that charm and seduce the philosopher.
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Can a Bundle Theory Accommodate Change?
0. Peter L. has been peppering me with objections to bundle theories. This post considers the objection from change. 1. Distinguish existential change (coming into being and passing out of being) from alterational change, or alteration. Let us think about ordinary meso-particulars such as avocados and coffee cups. If an avocado is unripe on Monday but…
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Kerouac October Quotation #5
"Time is the purest and cheapest form of doom." (Visions of Cody, McGraw-Hill, 1972, p. 374)
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Time and Tense: A Note on the B-Theory
What is time? Don't ask me, and I know. Ask me, and I don't know. (Augustine) This post sketches, without defending, one theory of time. On the B-Theory of time, real or objective time is exhausted by what J. M. E. McTaggart called the B-series, the series of times, events, and individuals ordered by the…
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Wittgenstein on Time and Flux
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Remarks, ed. Rush Rhees, trs. Hargreaves and White, Chicago 1975, p. 83: 52. It's strange that in ordinary life we are not troubled by the feeling that the phenomenon is slipping away from us, the constant flux of appearance, but only when we philosophize. This indicates that what is in question here…