Abstract
My goal in this paper is to address what I call the ‘Incoherence’ objection to the growing universe theory of time. At the root of the objection is the thought that one cannot wed objective temporal becoming with the existence of a tenseless past—which is apparently what the growing universe theorist tries to do. To do so, however, is to attribute both dynamic and static aspects to time, and, given the mutual exclusivity of these two aspects—so the thought goes—incoherence results. My solution to the problem is to offer an alternative account of past existence that is compatible with a dynamic conception of time. I take as my starting point Adams’ suggestion that the past exists in virtue of the existence of thisnesses of past individuals. I first seek to defend this suggestion, before amending it in order to provide a satisfactory response to the Incoherence objection. The result is a new growing universe theory which avoids the Incoherence objection but which has some surprising features of its own. Chief among these is the rejection of present events. I argue, however, that such a rejection is a necessary consequence of endorsing the growing universe theory, and that it is not as counter-intuitive as it initially sounds.
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Notes
See Diekemper (2005).
I prefer this label to the more standard ‘growing block’ label, since the latter implies a four dimensionalist theory of time and persistence, and I wish to avoid this implication.
Given that I am interested in defending a version of the A-Theory of time against a rival A-Theory, I will not be considering B-Theoretic objections. For my purposes here, I take the A-Theory of time to denote a dynamic conception of time according to which temporal becoming (however conceived) and tense are objective features of reality. I take the B-Theory to denote a static conception of time according to which there is no objective temporal becoming, and according to which past, present, and future events all exist tenselessly. In stipulating these definitions, I am drawing the distinction between the A- and B-Theories rather coarsely, but my argument does not require a more fine grained distinction.
As a matter of fact, as we will see in Sect. 3.1, Adams’ rejection of both Neutrality and Absolutism yields incoherence.
So although the Incoherence objection may be related to McTaggart’s paradox, more work is required in solving it than just giving up one of Fine’s four inconsistent theses.
I am, however, largely sympathetic with the arguments against material objects having thisness (see Diekemper (2009)).
See Diekemper (2009).
Armstrong (1999, p. 198), who has an Aristotelian theory of universals, endorses what he characterizes as a ‘relatively liberal form’ of the ‘Principle of Instantiation,’ according to which the principle ranges over all times. According to this form of the principle, every universal must be instantiated at some time, but not necessarily at the present time.
I take it that ECC would require either that past individuals exist in the present, or that the thisnesses of past individuals do not exist in the present; and, as we have seen, Adams rejects both of these claims.
Again, there is a difficulty here in reconciling Adams’ quantifier with the presentist’s. I will make this explicit below; but I should emphasize that presently I am simply trying to give my interpretation of Adams’ TTT a run for its money. I will be developing my own view (distinct from Adams’, but indebted to it) in Sect. 3.
Another possibility here—one that conforms to Armstrong’s version of the principle of instantiation (see n. 8, above)—would be to posit a universal which exists at all times, but which depends for its existence on being instantiated during some finite temporal period.
Tooley is one growing universe theorist who is explicit that past existence is tenseless; even though he, like Adams, maintains that existence at a time is a primitive notion. See Tooley (1997, Chaps. 5, 6).
Thus we see, speaking in Fine’s terms (see Sect. 2.1), that rejecting both Neutrality and Absolutism (i.e. existence simpliciter) does not dispel the incoherence.
Josh Parsons first suggested to me that I should character past existence as existence simpliciter.
I should note that I am happy to acknowledge instantaneous events as theoretical entities, and simply claim that there are no natural events that could be instantaneous. In support of this position, Simons (2003, p. 377) points out that modern physics appears to show that no event can be registered below the minimum time span of \(\mathrm{10^{-43}}\) s (the so-called Planck time).
See Zimmerman (2008) for a recent articulation of this view and the problem that it is supposed to create for the growing universe theory.
I am grateful to Noah Lemos for this suggestion.
See Lowe (2006, Chap. 4).
One might think that this revisionist account of events is inconsistent with my claim in Sect. 2 that events are fundamental entities. Given, however, that thisnesses are individuating principles, and not qualitative properties, I do not take my account of events in terms of the instantiation of event thisnesses to be a reductive one. See Diekemper (2013).
Do my amendments to Adams’ theory require me to embrace ECC (see Sect. 2.3.2, above)? Trivially, yes, though it is important to see that Adams had to deny ECC only because he claimed that e exists at t (where t is a past time). Since I am claiming that e exists simpliciter, I do not have to deny ECC in order to affirm the existence simpliciter of \(e^{*}\) (the existence of \(e^{*}\) just is the existence of e).
References
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Acknowledgments
This paper has a long history, and I am grateful to the many people who have influenced it. In particular, I am grateful to Sarah Broadie, who commented in depth on the paper at its very early stages, and audiences at the University of St. Andrews, the Irish Philosophical Club, the University of Geneva, and the College of William and Mary.