Getting back to the empiricists, Hume is known to have denied idea of self, because he couldn't find the impression of self. He said, there is no corresponding impression or idea of self, and when tries to find the idea of self, he can only find a bundle of perception. Therefore the idea of self doesn't exist. Due to the point, he is branded as a sceptic as well as empiricist.
What does it tell you? Empirical thoughts can easily lead to extreme skepticism. Sometimes reason need to intervene to empirical way of thinking.

Yes, that could well be the case. Everyone has different interest on the different subjects in philosophy. Also you are an excellent logician.

:pray: :blush: No, Arcane. You are too modest. I am just a casual reader of philosophy. You are a professional metaphysician. We just see things from different perspectives sometimes.

Don't empiricists believe that knowledge comes from experience rather than reason alone? Hence even if there were no observable qualities of the objects movements were perceived, if it came from experience, then it would still be perception and knowledge. Hume didn't deny the movement of the billiard balls and existence force when expounding his cause and effect theory.

It doesn't mean empiricists are wrong. It means that some qualities of the objects are outside of human sense such as radio waves and magnetic force itself.

That's what I mean. — Wayfarer

:ok: :up:

So yeah, it's worth pondering - but don't expect to land on a "proven" paradigm. — Relativist

Arguments are as important as the conclusion in philosophy. Paradigm can change anytime when better proofs and arguments come along.

That doesn't seem to follow. Do you have an argument for why and how the fact that imagining is a function of mind precludes the possibility of imagining that the world is independent of mind? — Janus

Tell us first why it doesn't seem to follow.

It would - but by what measure? In the absence of awareness of past-present-future then what is time? — Wayfarer

How would it flow? If time is a general concept which covers all the temporality in general, how would time flow without human mind perceiving, measuring, asking, and telling?

It's the national poem of Argentina. It's part of my identity. — Arcane Sandwich

:ok: :cool:

These are examples..I don't know the exact nature of this intrinsic sense of "time", but only noting that there must be something.

I suggest that the best explanation for this vague sense of time, is that it is consistent with reality: there's something ontological; it's not just a figment of the imagination.

It's a secondary matter as to how we account for time, and how we analyze it. We first need to accept that there is SOMETHING ontological to it. — Relativist

I had this idea that Time could be a general concept for all the durations, intervals in hours, minutes and seconds, days, months, years, even the light years. It even includes past present future. When you are looking for the ontological status of time, what you get is just your past memories, present perceptions, and future ideas, which are fleeting in your mind.

I agree, and I think it's worthwhile to construct a framework that helps us analyze time. A framework that makes successful predictions is better than one that doesn't. Would you agree? — Relativist

I need to think about the point. Will get back to you if and when I get some ideas on it. But for now, what I think is this. It is a reiteration of above my point. It could be wrong, or reasonable. I need to keep thinking on it. If you let me know what you think, that would be great too.

Time is a general concept which contains all of the particular events of durations, intervals, moments, and personal perceptions from the memories of past, future ideas and present perception with consciousness.

Great poem on Time too. Gracias. :pray:

T. S. Eliot PoemsThe Four QuartetsBurnt Norton

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
Into the rose-garden. My words echo
Thus, in your mind.
But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves
I do not know

I thought you were interested in discussing the OP. It seems you are not. So the end of the discussion. — MoK

I was discussing about the logical problems in the argument of the OP, but you seem to think it is not related to the OP.

Philosophical discussion is all about clarification and verification with reasoning and logical inference on the given arguments. It is not about blindly accepting premises, assumption and definitions randomly made up.

What do you think of the argument in OP? Here is the final form of the argument:

P1) God exists and is the creator of the creation from nothing
P2) If so, then there is a situation in which only God exists
P3) If so, then God is in an undecided state about the act of creation when only God exists
P4) If so, then the act of creation is only possible if God goes from an undecided state to a decided state
P5) If so, then the act of creation requires a change in God
P6) If so, then God changes
C) So, God changes — MoK

The argument has many premises, but each premises need to be debated and verified for its coherence and soundness in order to proceed to the next premise and then to the conclusion. I am not sure if some folks just blindly accept any premises laid out as valid premise, and go crazy if the premise was denied, or assert that premises must be accepted without checking them out. But to me that is not logic.

Each premises must be checked out and verified for its validity and soundness. If you don't agree, then the argument cannot be reasoned between us. You need to discuss it with someone who insist all premises must be accepted as truth no matter what the premises say such as the Moon is made of cheese, or The King of France has 50 fingers.

This is a super large topic, because we must start with the first premise "God exists". This proposition has been in discussion for hundreds of years in history of philosophy.

This is off-topic too but I answer that. — MoK

But if the argument is full of nonsense, then should it not be pointed out? Claiming the clarification process as off-topic sounds irrational too.

This is off-topic. As I mentioned in the OP, I am not willing to discuss whether P1 is true or false. So I am not willing to discuss how the act of creation from nothing is possible either. I assume that P1 is true and see what this assumption leads to. — MoK

OK fair enough. But you know philosophical topics cannot be discussed meaningfully without reference to reality and the facts of the world we live in. Truth, logic and the laws of reasoning are based on the reality and the facts of the world, and they always come first in the proof process.

Hence an If statement with non-factual premises will be rejected. Some folks will say it is denial of antecedent. I say, it is a nonsense. Reality and the facts of the world is the basis of logical arguments. When someone gives with an IF statement with nonsense premise, then it has to be rejected.

If the Moon is made of cheese, then God is a substance.

The premise is a nonsense. The Moon is not made of cheese. Hence the statement is not worthy of consideration. It is not denying premise.

It is informative in my opinion. A car is a substance, by this I mean it is made of matter, and it has a set of properties, such as form, color, weight, etc. — MoK

Substance is a form of physical matter i.e. tangible, visible, locatable ...etc. God is not a physical matter, is it? Could you prove God is a physical matter? Definition is not a proof. Some definitions need proof to be meaningful.

A new substance that is caused by God as is illustrated above when I discuss the act of creation from nothing. — MoK

When you say A caused B, you must be able to give out the detail of the cause. Simply saying A caused B, is not meaningful or informative.

If a stone caused window to break. It has further implied explanation that someone threw a stone at the window, which caused breaking.

By second, I mean there is no substance but an agent. This agent can cause a new substance though. — MoK

How though? Who is an agent?

I already defined a substance as something that exists and has a set of properties. — MoK

Sure, but it is not informative to be meaningful in saying that God is a substance.

It sounds like you’re getting your notion of time from that human invention and then applying it back onto the concept of time, in the process concealing the basis of time in past-present-future. — Joshs

Time as human invention is what we use in daily life. But I don't believe it is time itself, even if it is also significant part of time. There seem to be far more to it than just daily life version of time. We know time from our perception of the motions, movements and changes in the external world. We also have ideas of past present future in our mind via lived experience.

Should we not look into time as our mental acts of perceiving the temporality from the shared faculty of mind such as reason and sympathy, which are also objectified as means to apply to the real world for the practical purposes?

For me we do have time in itself, but time has different ways of appearing. one of them is measurable and discontinuous time. What we see in a watch are differences of times or differences of movements, — JuanZu

Time is known to be eternal and non stoppable. It keeps flowing even all your watches and clocks stopped. Even when someone died, time keeps flowing. Maybe not for the dead. If there were no life on earth, would time still keep flowing?

No, I am saying that God is a substance and the creator of the creation from nothing. — MoK

Saying X is a substance sounds not informative. It needs further elaboration with detail and evidence.
The creator of the creation from nothing? What does it mean? Is it from the Bible? What is "the creation" here?

No, God by definition is the creator of the creation from nothing. — MoK

If God is substance, then God is the creator of the creation from nothing. Is it what you are saying?

You asked about Buddhism before. The 'co-arising of self and world' is not foreign to Buddhism. In many of the early Buddhist texts (known as the 'Pali Canon') you will encounter the expression 'self-and-world' which designates the nature of lived experience. This is because the normal human state is always characterised by the sense of self and world. Being conscious is being conscious of. — Wayfarer

:fire: Great post. I will read it over taking time to digest fully before coming back to your points. cheers.

By substance, I mean something that exists, such as matter, and has a set of properties. — MoK

But there are billions of things which exist and have a set of properties in the world. Are they all God?

Do you deny there's some innate sense of past, present, and future? If you agree that there is, WHY do you suppose we have this? — Relativist

When you say something is innate, what does that mean? I would say innate means we have them without experience of the external world, or we have it from birth.

Is past present future innate? We need our sense perception to rely on what we are perceiving to tell what part of time we are experiencing. Time doesn't tell you what time it is. It is you who knows what time it is. How would you be able to do that without the sense perception of what is happening outside of yourself?

A strange fact about Now is that it seems to be subjective but at the same time objective. Because my Now must be your Now, and the whole folks living on earth must be facing the same Now. However, my past, your past, the other folks pasts are all unique. Same goes with future. So past future must be different from Now, although they all seem to in the same category of the concept called Time.

Let's think about your future and past. How would you be able to tell about your future or past with no lived life or experience? Your future will be something that is deriving from your present and past. Your past is the life you have lived with your own experience. They are all empirical, a posteriori mental states. They are not innate.

Of course not: time isn't a thing. But the present has just come into being — Relativist

Could "present" be being? Being is a concept which needs some explanation too, my friend. Would you agree?

I am currently thinking about nature of psychological time so I cannot by certainty say if it is a substance or not. — MoK

Let us know about it when you come to the Eureka moment.

As I've said, my belief is that time has an unavoidably subjective aspect, so I agree that it is not solely objective. But then, nothing is is 'solely objective'. I agree with the idealists and phenomenologists who say that the world and the subject are 'co-arising'. — Wayfarer

If dichotomy is the nature of time, which one is the real time? What necessitates the "co-arising"? How could subjectivity co-arises with the objectivity? When they co-arisen, are they then one? Or still two?

You clearly have an intuitive understanding of past present and future - because you refer to.them . Those are "imaginings", but they're primary - innate. No one has to train you to distingish events in this way. You just learn words to apply to your innate sense.

That distinguishes it from your other imaginings about past present and future. — Relativist

Time itself doesn't have past present future. It is us who divide time into those categories depending on what point, and what part of time we want to focus on.

It does not follow that they are one. The "becoming" needs to be accounted for, and can be - in a way consistent with your intuitive basis. — Relativist

Again, time itself doesn't become anything. We see them different way. There are no labels on time.

God is a substance. By change, I mean a change in the substance. — MoK

What is substance? Would it be some sort of mass or matter? Mass or matter would be perceivable i.e. sensible i.e. tangible, visible and locatable. Is this what you mean by substance?

Now that I've joined this thread, I will say something about this statement, namely, that I think it's fallacious. — Wayfarer

I have missed this post. Apologies. Belated welcome to the thread.

But this emphatically doesn't mean that 'time doesn't exist', simpliciter. Try holding your breath for a minute while you say that. — Wayfarer

I think I said it in some other replies the same answer. "time doesn't exist" doesn't mean it is denying the reality of time or our daily uses and reliance of time. But it is asking rather if time is the objective entity or property of the world, or it is rather internal perception of human mind.

If it is the former, it might exist in some form of physical entity. If it is the latter then it is psychological state of mind. In that case would it be correct to say time exists? We are not talking about the use or reliance of time in our daily life here, but we are (as the traditional philosophers have done) trying to find the arche of time.

If it didn't exist, it doesn't mean it is nothing. Because nonexistence is also a type of existence. It could be defined as a pure form of existence. If you are an idealist, then it is a perfectly acceptable definition.

FC) Therefore, God changes — MoK

What does "God changes" mean here? Is it physical change or metaphysical change? Changes can happen in different levels i.e. physical, logical, metaphysical, biological, syntactic or semantical ... etc.
Of course physical changes require space and time for its precondition. Biological changes can be the same changes as physical or chemical changes.

You came to the conclusion, but the conclusion need to clarify himself what he means by "changes". I would guess that it would be tricky to clarify the nature of change without first knowing what God means.

The OP seems to assert he doesn't want to talk about God. But the conclusion you arrived seems to be forcing for revelation under the logical necessity here between "changes" and "God". Without the clarification, the conclusion would sound empty and blind.

I think we first must distinguish between subjective time and objective time. We perceive subjective time rather than objective one. The subjective time is created in the brain, and it is subject to change, depending on the mood, emotion, substance usage, diseases, etc. This article discusses the subjective time. Objective time is a part of the spacetime manifold and it is the subject of physics though. — MoK

If you posit time into two different types, then which one is the real time? Are the two different times synchronisable in any way? Would it not create confusion trying to find out which time you must accept as the real time?

If one is the real, then is the other illusion? Or are they both real, or both illusion?

That's why I said it. We can't speak too much in Spanish, in this Forum, even though this Thread is called Ontology of Time.

Think of it like this: Heidegger said "remanens capax mutationem". That's Latin. And Spanish, unlike English, evolved from Latin. — Arcane Sandwich

remanens capax mutationem ? - I need to go and think about it for a while to see what it actually means.

Being seems to be another vast topic in Philosophy, similar to Time, hence why I tried to read Heidegger, because he wrote about Being and Time extensively. But his language in the original texts is highly abstruse, and uses the Greek words extensively in his sentences, which I found difficult to penetrate.
I put them down, and decided to return when I learned some Greek, which hasn't happened yet.

I didn't know Latin and Spanish had the same root. But Latin is another language which would be very useful in reading philosophy I would imagine. I had tried to learn Spanish long time ago, when I had a friend from Chile. But I realised it is impossible to learn so many different languages within the limited time we each have in life.

Talking about languages, I believe that a large part of Time is also embedded in our languages.
Always, eventually, gradually, at the end, in the beginning, at the same time, instantly, .... all seem to describe Time. But then is it the case they describe Time? Or would it be the case that they describe motions, movements and changes rather?

Indeed, comrade. Indeed. — Arcane Sandwich

Comrade sounds more spiritualistic.

I’ve never researched the question from the perspective of Buddhism. — Wayfarer

From my understanding, Buddhists claim there is no eternity and no self. Time is known to be eternal. Could it mean Buddhists deny time too? Would be interesting to find out.

Mine is an intuitive understanding but I believe it can be justified philosophically. — Wayfarer

What do you mean by "it can be justified philosophically"? I agree time is a wide topic, but at the end of the day, the OP is asking if time exists. When it asks if it exists, it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It means in what form it exists. Actually t may be found that time may not exist. But isn't nonexistence a pure form of existence?

It would be silly to ask if water or air exists. But it is a valid question to ask in what form time exists.

What's Buddhism's account of time? Is your view of time from Buddhism?

So reflecting on past and future doesn't have bearing on their having actually been a past, nor in there eventually being a future. Right? — Relativist

Yes, you are correct here.

The ordered relation: past-present-future refers to the actual, not to the order we choose to contemplate them. — Relativist

In theory, the ordered relation is true, but in reality they are one. If you think about it, future continuously becomes present, and present becomes past. In this case, is the division actually valid?