You seem to be saying that motion is separate from temporal passage, but isn't the present moment when motion occurs and events happen? — Luke
If I threw a ball in the air yesterday, and that event eternally exists according to eternalism, then is that ball still in motion (now) according to eternalism? — Luke
We directly perceive motion with our senses in our subjective present (obviously), but we conceptualize motion as change over time, which can happen in the past or in the future, here or there, perceived or unnoticed. This concept of motion is available to both presentists and eternalists, but presentists will additionally qualify it with an objective temporal modality. — SophistiCat
Yeah, this is where I definitely part company with both parties. Not that I think that either of them is wrong - I just think that this talk of existence is both confusing and pointless. I'll leave it to advocates to untangle this mess. — SophistiCat
But if you prefer an objective reality and take scientific knowledge seriously, you are confronted by situations like the following:
If you pass someone in the street, your present, among other things, includes that person. You consider that person to be real, and equally subject to the laws of physics. If this person is real, and independent of you and your present, relativity tells you that she also has her own present, which is as real to her as your present is to you. Your presents are not the same. — Inis
Luke, Please note that I don't intend to argue that eternalism is true, only that the reductio ad absurdum style argument you make does not succeed. Indeed, it may even be the case that eternalism is false, but not for the argument from experience that you make. — Walter Pound
The argument you are making seems to follow this rationale:
Premise 1. I experience a changing state of affairs.
Premise 2. If I experience a changing state of affairs, then becoming is a real feature of the reality.
Premise 3: If becoming is a real feature of reality, then eternalism is false.
Conclusion: Therefore eternalism is false. — Walter Pound
The eternalist will counter this experience based argument for the A theory of time with an analogy with space. You are only ever aware of one location in space and that is the one you experience, which we tend to call "right here." You experience your location in space, but you do not experience any other location in space or all locations of space. However, simply because you experience your location of space that does not mean that that location of space is the only location of space that exists. Indeed, I may never go to China or to Pluto or outside the milky way galaxy, but I don't assume that those locations are simply mental fictions. If someone asked, "if other locations in space exist, then why don't I experience them" it would be best to respond with "why would one assume that X exists only if one experiences X?" — Walter Pound
Yes. The way I would state it is that our knowledge (of reality) is reference-frame dependent. In my reference frame, I make a distinction between the past, present and future. Per that distinction, other people and many other things exist, but dinosaurs do not exist. Similarly, while each person has their own reference frame (and thus present), dinosaurs do not exist for them either.
So I think on that view, presentism, relativity and realism are compatible. — Andrew M
For the "eternalists" and "block universe" advocates on the thread.
I want to know the status of "dinosaurs"? Are they truly extinct and vanished from the universe (except for their bones and descendants)?
Or are they still moving and inhabiting the earth in their region of the 4D space time block and the only reason we can't get back there is because our timeline won't curve enough to take us back? — prothero
Except you have just argued for observer dependence. — Inis
I have no idea why you think our knowledge is reference-frame dependent. We all know relativity, and it has nothing to do with which particular reference frame we happen to be in. — Inis
Thats already inherent in the notion of "observation" isn't it? Or are you arguing that gaining any information is impossible? — Echarmion
Well you can't. Everything in your present is space-like separated from you. — Inis
Under presentism, there is no hypersurface or light cone, both 4 dimensional concepts. So if you seek information about any of the simultaneous events that make up your present, you have to wait for the information to come to you, at which time the information is no longer about the present.Your present hypersurface is inaccessible to you. If you seek information about any of the simultaneous events that make up your present, you have to wait for the information to become part of your past light-cone. — Inis
The observing is done in your present, but what is observed is only right here, nowhere else. I cannot see the present moon, but I see light in the image of moon right now. That light is right here, and from that image, I deduce a moon in the past and infer the moon still being there in the present, totally unmeasured. This process is automatic and not usually noticed. Andrew M points this out.But I still observe the objects in my present. — Echarmion
What you refer to is probably a proposed objective present. In that scenario, present reality is observer independent, and the present defines you, not the other way around. That present is not reference frame dependent, and thus reality is the same for everybody (as it should be for any observer-independent stance).Either we are referring to an objective present, in which case all information I currently observe refers to an objective past, or we are referring to my subjective present, in which case I can observe objects in my present.
I cannot see the present moon, but I see light in the image of moon right now. — noAxioms
Quite true, but it is still at least 'right here', or at least as much as 'here' can be defined for an entity which doesn't exist all in one place.I wouldn't say that this is "right now", because the image is created, and that takes time. The light hitting your eyes is processed, and the image is created. So even the light from the moon hitting your eyes is in the past by the time you see the image. — Metaphysician Undercover
Quite true, but it is still at least 'right here', or at least as much as 'here' can be defined for an entity which doesn't exist all in one place. — noAxioms
All (reasonably local, like not outside the Hubble Sphere) parts exist in all frames.What do you think it means for an entity not to exist all at one place? Could one part of that entity be in one frame of reference, and another part be in another? — Metaphysician Undercover
Being not all in one place means I am not in a defined state except to an event which has measured that entire state, which can only be in the future of the state being defined. — noAxioms
Measurement doesn't require processing. The light hits me somewhere (eyes, toenail, whatever) and I've measured the moon. It exists to me now. The processing is only necessary for me to know it exists, but knowing doesn't define existence except under idealism where the photon never hit me at all.The light hitting your eyes is processed, and the image is created. — Metaphysician Undercover
It takes time to gather all information about the spread-out state into one point (said future event) which can be anywhere, not necessarily an event that is part of me.Why would this event, which measures all the defined states as one state, need to be in the future of those states? Can't the different defined states just be compared as occurring in different frames of reference? — Metaphysician Undercover
Measurement doesn't require processing. — noAxioms
The processing is only necessary for me to know it exists, but knowing doesn't define existence except under idealism where the photon never hit me at all. — noAxioms
Choosing different frames of reference just defines a different set of events to be 'my state'. Under presentism, there is only the preferred frame, and other frames don't represent my actual state. — noAxioms
We have different definitions of measurement. I'm speaking of measurement in the QM wave-function collapse sort of way. That interaction is 'actually measuring it'.Of course measurement requires processing, it is a process. You cannot measure something without actually measuring it. — Metaphysician Undercover
Yes, I figured that was the definition under which you were working. I'm not talking about knowing.Measuring creates a knowing. If there is no knowing, then there has been no measuring.
I don't see how any of that doesn't occur in all frames of reference. Maybe I don't understand how you're using the term. I'm interpreting it as 'inertial frame of reference' but maybe you mean POV or something, except no POV is specified then.Wouldn't you agree that the movements of my arms and legs ought to be understood as occurring in a different frame of reference from the movements occurring within the neurology of my brain, and my nervous system?
We have different definitions of measurement. I'm speaking of measurement in the QM wave-function collapse sort of way. That interaction is 'actually measuring it'. — noAxioms
I had mentioned the rock above. Yes, it very much is a measurement. Thing X (source of photon) has now caused an effect on said rock, and X now exists to the rock. That's how QM measurements work. It causes the state of X and the state of the rock to become entangled. The special equipment in labs is only special because it records the measurement precisely for the purpose of the knowledge of the lab guys, but measurement itself is trivial.This would be like saying that light hitting a rock is an act of measurement. — Metaphysician Undercover
Under presentism, there is no hypersurface or light cone, both 4 dimensional concepts. So if you seek information about any of the simultaneous events that make up your present, you have to wait for the information to come to you, at which time the information is no longer about the present. — noAxioms
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