Objective BecomingWhat does the passage of time consist in? There are some suggestive metaphors. âEvents approach us, pass us, and recede from us, like sticks and leaves floating on the river of time.â âWe are moving from the past into the future, like ships sailing into an unknown ocean.â There is surely something right and deep about these metaphors. But how close are they to the literal truth? In this book Bradford Skow argues that they are far from theliteral truth. Skowâs argument takes the form of a defense of the block universe theory of time, a theory that, in many ways, treats time as a dimension of reality that closely resembles the three dimensions ofspace. Opposed to the block universe theory of time are theories that take the metaphors more seriously: presentism, the moving spotlight theory, the growing block theory, and the branching time theory. These are theories of ârobustâ passage of time, or âobjective becoming.â Skow argues that the best of these theories, the block universe theoryâs most worthy opponent, is the moving spotlight theory, the theory that says thatâpresentnessâ moves along the series of times from the past into the future. Skow defends the moving spotlight theory against the objection that it is inconsistent, and the objection that it cannot answer the question of how fast time passes. Healso defends it against the objection that it is incompatible with Einsteinâs theory of relativity. Skow proposes several ways in which the moving spotlight theory may be made compatible with the theory of relativity. Still, this book is ultimately a defense of the block universe theory, not of the moving spotlight theory. Skow holds that the best arguments against the block universe theory, and for the moving spotlight theory, start from the idea that, somehow, thepassage of time is given to us in experience. Skow discusses several different arguments that start from this idea, and argues that they all fail. |
Contents
Time Passes? | 1 |
2 The Block Universe | 4 |
3 What Might Robust Passage Be? | 22 |
4 The Moving Spotlight | 44 |
5 Growing Blocks and Branching Times | 70 |
6 The Moving Spotlight Theory is Consistent | 82 |
7 How Fast Does Time Pass? | 101 |
8 The Challenge from Relativity | 130 |
9 Relativity and the Passage of Time | 144 |
10 Can We Move through Time? | 178 |
11 Passage and Experience I | 188 |
12 Passage and Experience II | 207 |
Passage and Timebiased Preferences | 233 |
237 | |
245 | |
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Common terms and phrases
A-vocabulary argument B-theory Barack Obama block universe theory branching time theory claim definition diagram dimension function dimensionless discussion earlier exists experiences are available false Figure foliation future geometry growing block inconsistent instants later light cone look McTaggart’s mean Mellor’s metaphysically complete meters Minkowski spacetime moving spotlight theory MST-Supertense MST-Supertime MST-Time Newtonian spacetime notion objective becoming ordinary tensed passes past perdurance theory perspective phenomenal character philosophers picture point in supertime points of space predicate premise present relative presentists Prior’s quantity rate of time’s red experiences reductionism about tense reject relativistic robust change robust passage sense sentence token spacetime interval spacetime point spatial special relativity stage theory super-is present super-was super-will superseconds superspacetime supertense operators Suppose talk temporal distance temporal separation tense operators tensed language tensed sentence theorist theory is true theory says things time’s passage timelike line truth truth-value Tuesday experiences type-N theories verbs worldline