Is the Wholly Past Now Impossible?

Boston's Scollay Square is an example of a wholly past item. It existed, but it does not now exist. Boston's Copley Square, by contrast, existed and still exists: it has a past but it is not wholly past.

In an earlier exercise I gave an anti-presentist argument one of the premises of which is:

d) It is not the case that Scollay Square is [now] either merely possible or impossible: what passes away does not become merely possible or impossible.

The Ostrich objected:

I didn’t follow the assumption (d) above. Scollay Square  is impossible, having perished. 

The question is this:  When a thing that actually existed passes away and becomes wholly past, does it cease to be actual and become impossible?  Can the passage of time affect an object's  modal status?

I say No; the Ostrich says Yes.  My No, however, will be nuanced by a distinction I shall introduce shortly.

A Concession

Scollay Square novelI concede to the Ostrich that there is a sense in which Scollay Square, that very item, is now impossible: it cannot be restored to existence. (If you made a copy of it, the copy would not be it.) After the demolition was complete, there was nothing anyone could do to bring back that very item.  In this respect the demolition of the famous square is like a person's loss of virginity. If you lose your virginity at time t, then there is nothing anyone can do after t to undo the loss. (Repairing a girl's hymen would not do the trick. Hymenoplasty is possible but it is not the same as restoration of virginity.) 

Now there is no need to drag the Deity into this debate, but I will do it anyway just to throw the issue into relief. Not even God can restore a virgin or bring back Scollay Square (where many a sailor lost his virginity).  This is because it is the very natures of time and existence that prevent the restoration.  (Now please forget that I even mentioned God, and do not ask me any questions about divine omnipotence.)

Let's consider another example. Our patron Socrates was executed by the Athenian state. That event might not have occurred. That is, his execution was not metaphysically necessary. In the patois of 'possible worlds,'  there are possible worlds in which Socrates is executed and possible worlds in which he is not.  Therefore, his execution was metaphysically contingent and remains sub specie aeternitatis metaphysically contingent despite the fact that the execution cannot be undone.  But if the execution cannot be undone and was impossibly undone from the moment of the event onward, then how can the execution be contingent?  Is it not necessary?  Obviously, we need to make a distinction.

Metaphysical versus Time-Bound Modalities

We have to make a distinction between metaphysical modalities and time-bound modalities.  We can say that Socrates' execution, while metaphysically contingent, nevertheless enjoys necessitas per accidens and its undoing impossibilitas per accidens.  Nothing hinges on this particular terminology, but there is a distinction to be made here.

Someone could say, and the Ostrich perhaps will say, that before Socrates came to be, he was merely possible, that when he came to be he became actual, and that after he passed away he became impossible. If this makes sense, then our man's modal status is time-dependent.

I think the following are logically consistent:

1. It is impossible that an actual being that no longer exists be restored to existence.

2. A metaphysically contingent being that exists in the sense that it existed, exists, or will exist retains its modal status when it passes away. Socrates exists in this disjunctive sense. When Socrates ceased to exist (assuming no immortal soul) he retained his modal status: actual but not necessary.

(1) is a concession to the Ostrich. But (2) is also true. I am inclined to accept  a Growing Block theory of time: as time passes the 'block of reality' gets bigger and bigger. Everything that IS is actual, and everything that WAS is also actual.  The past is not nothing: it is real.  

Socrates is (in the disjunctive sense) an actual being.  This may be the same as saying that he is tenselessly actual. His passing away does not affect his metaphysical modal status. He is no longer temporally present but he is nonetheless metaphysically actual. 

Furthermore, he remains a contingent being after his passing.  He does not become an impossible being.

So I think we can achieve a sort of irenic if not quite Hegelian  synthesis. The Ostrich is speaking from the perspective of the present. (I suspect he is a presentist and I should like him come clean on this.) From the point of view of the present, the wholly past is now impossible in the sense that nothing ANYONE can do can restore the past or bring it back.  I believe I have accommodated, with all due charity, the insight of the Ostrich.

But we also have the power to view things 'from above,' We are time-bound to be sure, but we are also "spectators of all time and existence" as Plato once taught us.  Looking down upon this scene of flux and folly we can 'see' with the eye of the mind the tenseless modal relationships that obtain here below. These are not affected by the passage of time.

For example, no contingent being  is impossible.  Socrates is a contingent being.  Ergo, Socrates is not impossible.  He was not impossible before he became present; he was not impossible when he was present; and he is not impossible now when he is past. He is tenselessly contingent.

The stable view sub specie aeternitatis is just as valid as the view from one's shifting temporal location.

Taking Stock

The question is this: When a thing that actually existed, or an event that actually occurred, passes away and becomes wholly past, does it cease to be actual and become impossible? 

The Ostrich answers in the affirmative.  I think this answer is sustainable only if presentism is true.  Presentism, however, is hard even to formulate (nontrivially), let alone evaluate.  

I must now demand of the Ostrich that he come clean and tell us whether he is indeed a presentist.  If I am not mistaken most if not all of the medieval philosophers he studies are presentists; if so, he may be unaware that there are alternatives to ptesentism.  It may just seem obvious to him when it ought not seem obvious to him. 

Kurt Schlichter

You don't want to end up on the wrong end of his invective.  Schlichter may be the contemporary master of this mode of discourse. There is a place for invective in this fallen world although I sincerely wish invective were not needed.

"Resist not the evil doer" and "Turn the other cheek" make sense only within a loving community of the like-minded. In the wide world, however, practice of these precepts will soon lead to the demise of your loving community of the like-minded.

The American Catholic Bishops and others whose hustle is Religion, Inc. are blind to these truths. 

I have a good post that deals with some of the issues in the vicinity: Machiavelli, Arendt, and Virtues Private and Public.

It begins as follows:

An important but troubling thought is conveyed in a recent New York Times op-ed (emphasis added):

Machiavelli teaches that in a world where so many are not good, you must learn to be able to not be good. The virtues taught in our secular and religious schools are incompatible with the virtues one must practice to safeguard those same institutions. The power of the lion and the cleverness of the fox: These are the qualities a leader must harness to preserve the republic.

The problem as I see it is that (i) the pacific virtues the practice of which makes life worth living within families, between friends, and in such institutions of civil society as churches and fraternal organizations  are essentially private and cannot be extended outward as if we are all brothers and sisters belonging to a global community.  Talk of  global community is blather.  The institutions of civil society can survive and flourish only if protected by warriors and statesmen whose virtues are of the manly and martial, not of the womanish and pacific,  sort. And yet (ii) if no  extension of the pacific virtues is possible then humanity would seem to be doomed  in an age of terrorism and WMDs.  Besides, it is unsatisfactory that there be two moralities, one private, the other public.

Read it all.

Meditation as Inner Listening

Our friend Vlastimil V. worries that his meditation practice might lead him in a Buddhist direction, in particular toward an acceptance of the three marks of phenomenal existence: anicca, anatta, dukkha.  He shouldn't worry. Those doctrines in their full-strength Pali  form are dubious if not demonstrably untenable. 

For example, the doctrine of anicca, impermanence, is not a mere recording of the Moorean fact that there is change; it is a radical theory of change along Heraclitean lines.  As a theory it is dialectically driven and not a summary of phenomenology. One could read it into the phenomenology of meditational experience, but one cannot derive it from the phenomenology. The claim I just made is highly contentious; I will leave it to Vlastimil to see if he can verify it to his own satisfaction.

Since he is a Christian I recommend to Vlastimil an approach to meditation more in consonance with Christianity, an approach  as inner listening.  In one sentence: Quiet the mind, then listen and wait.  Open yourself to intimations and vouchsafings from the Unseen Order.  But be aware that the requisite receptivity exposes one to attack from demonic agents whose power exceeds our own. So discernment is needed.

The East no more owns meditation than the Left owns dissent.  Here is a quick little bloggity-blog schema.

Buddhist Nihilism: the ultimate goal is nibbana, cessation, and the final defeat of the 'self' illusion.

Hindu Monism: the ultimate goal is for the little self (jivatman) to merge with the Big Self, Atman = Brahman.

Christian Dualism: the ultimate goal is neither extinction nor merger but a participation in the divine life in which the participant, transfigured and transformed as he undoubtedly would have to be, nevertheless maintains his identity as a unique self.  Dualism is retained in a sublimated form.

I warned you that my schema would be quick. But I think it is worth ruminating on and filling in.  The true philosopher tacks between close analysis and overview, analytic squinting and syn-opsis and pan-opsis.

You say you want details?

Related

A 'No' to 'No Self' 

Can the Chariot Take Us to the Land of No Self? 

Buber on Buddhism and Other Forms of Mysticism

 

The Unbearable Hilarity of Hillary

Her gravitas having given way to levitas, I am half expecting her to begin levitating into Wolkenskukuheim, a word I found in Schopenhauer translatable as Cloud Cuckoo Land.   In plain English, Hillary Clinton is losing her mind in a bid to establish once and for all the psychological reality of TDS, Trump Derangement Syndrome.

Her latest sample of brain leakage is her suggestion that President Trump's wise SCOTUS pick, the distinguished and widely-lauded Brett Kavanaugh, is fixing to turn back the clock to 1850 and bring back slavery.

Hillary in 2020!

Millianism and Presentism: An Aporetic Pentad

A Millian about proper names holds that the meaning of a proper name is exhausted by its referent. Thus the meaning of 'Socrates' is Socrates.  The meaning just is the denotatum. Fregean sense and reasonable facsimiles thereof  play no role in reference. If so, vacuous names, names without denotata, are meaningless.

Presentism, roughly, is the claim that present items alone exist. This implies that no past or future items exist in the sense of 'exists' that the presentist shares with the eternalist who maintains that past, present, and future individuals all exist.  What exactly this sense is is a nut we will leave for later cracking. 

Now Socrates is a wholly past individual: he existed, but he does presently exist. It follows on presentism that Socrates does not exist at all. The point is not the tautology that Socrates, who is wholly past, does not exist at present. The point is that our man does not exist, period: he is now nothing at all.  

We now have the makings of an aporetic pentad:

1) 'Socrates' has meaning. (Moorean fact)

2) The meaning of a proper name is its referent.  (Millian thesis)

3) If a name refers to x, then x exists.  (Plausible assumption)

4) 'Socrates' refers to a wholly past individual. (Moorean fact)

5) There are no past individuals. (Presentism)

It is easy to see that the pentad is logically inconsistent: the limbs cannot all be true. Which should we reject?

Only three of the propositions are candidates for rejection: (2), (3), (5).   Of these three, (3) is the least rejectable, (5) is the second least rejectable, and (2) the most rejectable.

So I solve the pentad by rejecting the Millian thesis about proper names.

You might budge me from my position if you can give me a powerful argument for the Millian thesis.

Here, then, we have an 'aporetic' polyad that is not a genuine aporia. It is soluble and I just solved it.

The Recalcitrant Ostrich will probably disagree.

The Kavanaugh Nomination: Leftist Crazy Talk at Yale

Heather Mac Donald:

This press release rendered the letter signatories, who include several law school and Yale College professors, “ashamed” of their alma mater. “Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination presents an emergency—for democratic life, for our safety and freedom, for the future of our country,” the letter stated. The use of “safety” rhetoric signals that we are in prime identity-politics territory. Students across the country regularly claim that they are unsafe at college campuses—threatened by reading Milton, threatened by politically unorthodox views. “Without a doubt,” the letter continues, “Judge Kavanaugh is a threat to the most vulnerable. He is a threat to many of us, despite the privilege bestowed by our education, simply because of who we are.” This fear, the authors clarify, is not hyperbole. “People will die if he is confirmed,” the letter alleges.

What can we do about the destructive, self-induced stupidity of 'liberals'?  I have noticed that even a crazy-headed 'liberal' can achieve a modicum of clear thinking when money is at issue. So one thing you can do is withhold funds.  If you are a Yale alumnus or alumna, and not a self-enstupidated bonehead, then, when Yale asks for money, tell them "No money for you until you regain your sanity."

But be kind to the poor peon who is calling you during the dinner hour. Be kind, but be firm.

A Lying Deep State Crapweasel to the Very End

And cocky to boot. George Neumayr on Peter Strzok:

The cockiness of Strzok at Thursday’s hearing is a reflection of the immunity that ruling-class mandarins enjoy in liberal Washington. He was testifying from the safety of the deep state and thus knew that he could lie his head off without consequence. How else to explain his unrepentant opening statement, with its blatant anti-Trump special pleading? The statement sounded like it had been written by Rachel Maddow, resting on the lamest and hackiest of MSNBC-style talking points, that “today’s hearing is just another victory notch in Putin’s belt and another milestone in our enemies’ campaign to tear American apart.”

Hats off to Trey Gowdy & Co. for their services to the Republic.

Should a Pro-Lifer Advocate the Killing of Abortionists?

Mike Valle on his Facebook page raises the title question in these terms: "If you believe that abortion is truly murder, then wouldn't it be incumbent on you to kill an abortion doctor? After all, wouldn't you kill a serial killer in the act? " One way to construe the question is as follows. Is it logically consistent for a pro-lifer to hold both of the following:

a) Abortion is morally wrong.

b) Killing abortionists is morally wrong. 

To focus the issue, let's consider only cases of third-trimester abortion in which both fetus and mother are healthy and normal, the pregnancy did not result from rape or incest, and the mother's carrying the child to term will not endanger the mother's life.  To sharpen the issue even more, suppose the fetus is likely to be born within a week.  

To my mind, abortion in a case like this is a grave moral evil for reasons I supply elsewhere, for example here. If you agree with me on this, is it "incumbent on you," i.e., morally necessary for you, to at least try to kill any late-term abortionists you are in a position to kill?  Or is it morally justifiable to hold both (a) and (b)?

Answer A. Yes, one can hold both (a) and (b) because all intentional killing of humans is wrong, regardless of who the humans are, what they have done and what they have left undone.  This pacifist answer is no good because it rules out killing in self-defense, just war, capital punishment, and suicide, and surely at least one of these is morally justifiable.  Surely some intentional killing of human beings is morally justifiable.

Answer B. Yes, because abortion is legal and we have a moral obligation to uphold the rule of law by obeying particular laws and by not taking the law into our own hands. This is a much better answer.  The rule of law is a precious thing because civil order is a precious thing. Laws enacted and enforced by proper procedures have a prima facie claim on our respect. To tolerate mass lawbreaking is to invite social chaos. We should work within the system to have the abortion laws changed.

Answer B is better than Answer A although it is not quite satisfactory. I myself am not about to kill abortion providers, nor do I advocate that anyone else do so.  In explanation I would invoke something like Answer B.

But if I am not willing to kill abortion providers, do I really believe that abortion is a grave moral evil?  Yes, I really believe it. My belief is demonstrated by such actions as voting and arguing against abortion over many, many entries that have cost me a lot of time and effort without making me a cent.   Note that if a person lacks the full courage of his convictions, in the sense that he is not willing to sacrifice his life or liberty for them, it does not follow that he lacks convictions.  Most of us are moral mediocrities and I am no exception. The fact that my efforts to save the unborn are paltry and insignificant does not show that I do not really believe that abortion is wrong. 

The Higher Hypocrisy

A man is only a man. If he tries to live like an angel, he may end up a hypocrite attempting the impossible.  A man ought to live up to his highest possibilities. But what they are and where they lie is unknown until he seeks them out, risking hypocrisy as he does so. There is the hypocrisy of those who make no attempt to practice what they preach. And there is the hypocrisy of those who have the will to practice what they preach but cannot practice it because their ideals are too lofty for them.